“The police station.”
Rafe glanced over at me. With only the glow of the instrument panel lighting his face, I couldn’t gauge his reaction. “Charla said the police stopped Mama’s car,” I said. “Britt took Mama and impounded her Olds. My children and my dog, who were with her, are stranded at the police station.”
His silence unnerved me. Charlie would’ve been yelling by now. But Rafe wasn’t Charlie. He wasn’t criticizing Mama or outwardly judging us. He was helping by getting me to my family. Relief whooshed out of my lungs, loosened my tongue. “I’ve been dreading something like this for days. But I never thought the girls would get tangled up in Mama’s mess.”
“I see.”
Did he? We rocketed down the dark road, in a tiny car, and all I saw was the road before us. I wished we were there already. But what was I going to do to help? Think, Cleo. Your family is depending on you. Make a plan. Analyze the data. I could do that. The police had Mama. She needed more than a hug and a ride home. She needed a lawyer. With trembling fingers, I dialed her lawyer, Bud Flook. No answer.
Where was he?
Hogan’s Glen was small enough that I knew Bud Flook played poker every Friday night. Some of his poker buddies were my clients and listed in my cell phone contacts. Two calls later, I found him.
I cut right to the chase. “Bud. This is Cleopatra Jones. Mama needs you at the police station.”
“Now?” he grumbled.
Bud’s gruff tone hit a raw nerve. Did he object to being told what to do? Tough. I couldn’t pander to male egos right now. “Yes. Now.” I ended the call.
“Is Bud a good lawyer?” Rafe navigated a tight curve with the skill of an Indy 500 driver.
I tunneled my fingers through my hair. “Criminal matters aren’t his forte, but I’ve known Bud for years. He’s solid. He’ll get Mama out of jail.”
“Was Delilah arrested?” he asked.
“I don’t know.” I tried to inject an optimistic tone in my voice. “Earlier this week Britt mentioned he needed to talk to her.”
In the back of my mind a little voice warned that Rafe didn’t sign up for family high drama. His interest in me was physical. Chances were good none of his previous dates had ended up at jail. Given that, chances were very good this was our last date. My spirits sank even lower.
“From your earlier comment, it sounded like you expected this to happen,” he said.
I stared at the blur of dark trees and faintly illuminated houses rushing past my window. The swiftly changing landscape held no easy answers. Rafe wasn’t family. He wasn’t involved. Except for driving me to the police station.
Our relationship had boundaries. Dirty laundry fell outside the arena of great sex and fine dining. I wanted to confide in him because shutting him out seemed wrong. Except I was vulnerable. My whole family was vulnerable. What a house of cards I’d built.
But the new Cleo didn’t sit back and let life happen to her. The new Cleo took calculated risks. The new Cleo wanted a future with Rafe. I sighed out a long, shaky breath and crossed my fingers. “It has to do with Erica Hodges.” His sidelong glance had me balling my fingers into tight fists.
“I thought Erica was a hit by a car,” he said.
“She was.”
“Your mother’s car?”
“Probably,” I whispered. Hot tears stung my eyes, and my expensive dinner clotted into a solid lump in my queasy stomach. I squeezed my eyes shut to keep the tears from falling. Mama wouldn’t crumble in the face of adversity and neither would I. But taking risks was harder than I thought.
“You knew about her car?”
My stomach slid around in my throat as Rafe wheeled through another series of sharp turns. “I knew her car had been in an accident.”
“I see.”
I sighed. Poor deluded man. He couldn’t know what it was like to live with a stubborn, opinionated woman like Mama. Daddy had looked after Mama for years, and he’d passed the baton of caretaking to me. I couldn’t let Daddy down.
Even though Rafe had every right to walk away from this situation, I hoped otherwise. “I need another favor. Would you take the girls home and stay with them until I spring Mama from jail?”
“I’m being sent home with the children?”
His incredulous tone snapped the thin rein on my patience. “You’re being entrusted with the two most precious things in my life. If you screw this up, I will hunt you down like a dog and tear you limb from limb.”
“Got it.”
I massaged my pounding temples.
I didn’t want to fight with Rafe. I wanted him on my side. “If it’s not convenient, I can call Jonette at the Tavern. She’ll come get them.”
“I’ll do it. But I want a full explanation of what’s going on.”
“You and me both.”
* * * * *
Fluorescent lights starkly illuminated the no-nonsense white walls of the county police station. The heels of my taupe pumps clicked on the tile floor as I strode inside. A central wooden information kiosk blocked direct access to the reception desk.
I adjusted my course to navigate around it. This place wasn’t old, but it felt like the end of the road. Panic nipped at my nerves. My kids were in here somewhere, and I had to get them out.
Immediately.
The uniformed desk sergeant behind the thick glass barrier glared at me in stony-faced grimness, but I quickly forgot about him at the excited shouts of my girls.
“Mom!” Charla and Lexy darted out of a seating area on the side of the room. They flew into my arms and held on tight. Madonna barked her relief at being rescued. Thick threads of doggie drool splattered against the center island, on the tile floor, and on my taupe pants. Lord, what a mess.
I held my daughters close and took strength from the fact that they were unharmed. Charla burst into tears. Lexy let go of me to calm the dog. Madonna usurped Lexy’s place at my side and licked my slacks.
After sending up a prayer of thankfulness, I took a deep breath and made eye contact with my girls. “What happened? I thought you were having a quiet evening at home.”
“We were,” Lexy said. “Then we wanted Italian ice to wash down our Christmas pizza. Only we never made it to the place by the park. A policeman stopped us on the way because of Grammy’s headlight being out. The cop made us stand on the side of the road until Detective Radcliffe got there. When he looked at Grammy’s car, his face got hard and mean.”
Charla swiped at the tears on her cheeks and choked back her heartrending sobs. “Detective Radcliffe hustled Grammy into a police car. Then he didn’t know what to do with us. Another cop car came, and we ended up here. The officer tried to give us stuffed animals like we were little kids. I’ve never been so humiliated in my entire life.”
She didn’t look humiliated. Her eyes glittered with excitement. I’m sure she would recover from this trauma. I knew exactly where to place the blame for this disaster, and I would deal with Mama next.
Mama had no business driving that car. The keys for my Volvo were on the hutch. None of this would have happened if she’d stayed home tonight or used my car. I intended to give her a piece of my mind.
I stroked Lexy and Charla’s youthful faces. “You girls had quite a shock tonight.”
“And Madonna. She had quite a shock, too,” Lexy said, sounding ten years older than her thirteen.
I petted my dog, and her tail thumped against the center island of the room. Tufts of white dog hair swirled on the floor. “We all had a shock tonight.”
Lexy tugged on my blouse. “Mama, what about Grammy? Why can’t we see her? Is she coming home tonight?”
I ruffled Lexy’s dark hair. “I’ll find out. I want you girls and Madonna to go home with Rafe. He’ll stay with you until I come home.”
“I don’t want to go, Mama,” Charla said. “I’m not a child.”
My back teeth ground together. Regardless of what she thought, Charla was a child, and I wanted her safe at home. A l
ittle reverse psychology was needed to finesse her compliance. “No problem. You can wait with me. The thing is, it may take hours until we know something. I thought you might be more comfortable waiting at home.”
“I’ll be more comfortable at home,” Lexy said. “Madonna and I want to go home. This place stinks.”
Emotions flashed across Charla’s face in rapid-fire succession. I could see that she wanted to go home with her sister and she wanted to stay with me. “It does stink here. I have to shampoo the nasty smell out of my hair before I can go to sleep.”
“I don’t know how long I’ll be,” I said.
Charla wrinkled her nose. “I’d rather wait at home then.”
“It’s your choice,” I said, as if her decision didn’t matter to me. My eyes met Rafe’s above the top of Charla’s curly red hair. He’d listened to the exchange with rapt attention. Did he think I was shamelessly manipulative?
“Call us if you hear anything,” Charla said.
“Are we ready?” Rafe asked.
“Shotgun,” Lexy called, jostling past her sister toward the door.
“No way.” Charla stood her ground. “You had shotgun last time. Mom! It’s not fair. She can’t call it all the time. I’m the oldest. I get shotgun. Tell her, Mom.”
I threw my hands up in the air. “It’s not my car, not my rules. Rafe will decide who sits in the passenger seat.”
Rafe brushed his lips across mine. “Thanks a lot, Red.”
“No reason why I have to make all the hard decisions.” Chills ran down my spine at his touch.
The grumpy desk clerk and Charla watched us in stern disapproval. Madonna and Lexy stood poised in front of the glass doors, Madonna looking mournfully sad as if she didn’t want to leave me here.
“Stay out of trouble,” Rafe directed before he left.
I approached the window and leaned down to speak into the intercom. “I’m here to see my mother, Delilah Sampson.”
The desk clerk glared at me. “Who was the arresting officer?”
I swallowed harshly. Arresting officer sounded so negative. But here in the police station, one had to speak their language. “Detective Britt Radcliffe.”
“And your name is?”
“Cleopatra Jones.”
He gestured to the plastic orange chairs lining the side of the room. “Have a seat. I’ll let Detective Radcliffe know you’re here.”
I didn’t budge. “Can I see my mother?”
“That will be up to Detective Radcliffe. Take a seat.”
As if I could sit calmly when Mama was being grilled or fingerprinted. I paced the room until Mama’s lawyer showed up. Bud Flook wasn’t tall for a man. He was exactly my height, five-foot-six. He wore his salt-and-pepper hair closely cropped. Light glinted off his rounded frameless glasses. The sleeves of his blue Oxford shirt were rolled up, and his tan trousers were wrinkled from sitting. The haze of cigar smoke enveloped him.
“What’s the deal, Bud?” I blushed, realizing how ungrateful I sounded. “I mean, thank you for coming.”
“No problem.” Bud set his battered briefcase down on the center island kiosk. “What are the charges against Delilah?”
I swiped my hair back from the side of my face. “I have no new information. I can’t get past the guard at the door.”
His voice broke. “I can.”
I blinked at the unusual sound. Bud had always been in control of his emotions. He was lethal on the golf course because you never suspected someone who was so quiet to be such a good scorer. I studied his face and realized his color was off. Tension radiated from him in unrelenting waves. “You okay, Bud?”
“I’m fine,” he grumbled, picking up his briefcase. “I’ll let you know what I find out.”
“Can I come with you?” I asked, following him to the front desk.
“No,” the desk clerk said, motioning me back to the seating area. “You wait here.”
Bud Flook vanished into the building. I sat. I paced. I waited. And I waited some more. The wet spot on my blouse from Charla’s tearful outburst dried. I went to the bathroom. And still nothing.
I walked up to the front desk again. “Are you sure I can’t go back there?”
“I’m sure, lady.” He gestured toward the orange chairs. “Take a seat.”
I didn’t want to sit. I wanted action. I wanted the sinking feeling in the pit of my stomach to go away. I wanted my skin to stop crawling.
Pairs of officers passed through the room and entered the sacred inner sanctum. Their cop eyes studied me and dismissed me. The contrary part of me wanted to stand up and say, “I can be a threat. I’m trouble.” But I stopped short of making a spectacle of myself.
One spectacle in the family was enough.
I crossed and recrossed my legs. I brushed the dog hair off my slacks. I counted the tiles on the floor, then the ones in the ceiling. I thought about calling Jonette to come keep me company when her shift at the Tavern ended.
Then the door opened. My least favorite cop in the whole world stepped forward. He motioned me over. I leapt to my feet and followed. My heart raced as I was ushered down a side corridor and into a sterile-looking room. My thoughts about the décor came in crisp bullets. Pale blue walls. Classier furniture than the lobby. Beige-colored padded chairs with chrome frames and plastic-covered armrests.
I took the seat he indicated on the far side of the room. Questions burst out of me with machine-gun rapidity as I perched on the edge of my chair. “Where’s Mama? Why did you arrest her? Can I take her home tonight? Can I see her?”
Britt sat down across from me, pen and notebook in hand. Oh, Lord. Was I under suspicion too? My palms dampened. Fear clawed at me, but I held tough. I was innocent. “Well?”
“There is a broken headlight on Delilah’s car.”
Britt’s dark eyes drilled into me. The chords in his thick fireplug neck bulged. I gave it right back to him. “Headlights get broken all the time.”
A muscle in his tanned cheek twitched. “You should have stepped forward.”
Why would I volunteer incriminating evidence? He had the power here, and that didn’t sit well with me. Britt claimed he was my friend. He wasn’t treating me like a friend. “You should have told me Mama was being investigated.”
“You should have realized Delilah was a suspect based on her relationship with the deceased.”
His unyielding tone worried me. Had he already tried and convicted Mama in his head? Was he forgetting that the deceased wasn’t little Miss Sunshine? “Erica had run-ins with other people. Mama wasn’t the only person she didn’t get along with.”
He studied me intently. “Delilah is the only person she didn’t get along with who has a damaged car.”
I swear I didn’t squirm in my seat, but I mentally flinched. Poor Mama. One misstep on my part and she would wear a prison jumpsuit the rest of her days. She hated the color orange.
“Mama says she didn’t kill anyone,” I said.
He tugged at his shirt collar. “I have a team of forensic experts going over her car. We will know soon if that car was the murder weapon.”
I paled. “You think Mama intentionally killed Erica Hodges?”
“Delilah had the motive and the means. Whether she had the opportunity remains to be seen.”
I’d thought the same thing, but I didn’t like hearing it from a police detective. I could buy that there had been a car accident. Not murder. “Mama didn’t murder anyone.”
Britt glared at me.
“What did she tell you?” I asked.
“Nothing helpful. She called me every name in the book. The only thing that shut her up was the arrival of her lawyer. Bud got her calmed down, but now she won’t tell me anything.”
I shook my head in disbelief. Mama’s behavior made no sense. “I don’t understand.”
Britt ignored my comment and flipped his notebook open. “I need to ask you a few questions, Cleo. What can you tell me about that night?”
My heart sank. Britt would know the times didn’t match up, and that would be all he needed to lock Mama up for good. God help us all. I swallowed thickly. “The night Erica died?”
“Yes. Where was Delilah?”
“She was home all afternoon.” I thought about the events of that night for a few seconds. I would state things in the most favorable light. If Britt drew the wrong conclusion, that wasn’t my fault. “After supper she drove Francine and Muriel to the Hospitality Committee meeting. Mama went straight to bed when she got home.”
“What time did she go out?”
“A little before seven. You asked me these questions this morning at church.”
Britt scribbled something else. “What time did she return?”
I stared at my hands on the table. “I was busy with the girls when she came in. We were getting their new bookbags ready for school the next day. The thing that stuck in my mind was that Mama went to bed earlier than the girls. Sorry. I didn’t note the exact time.”
With any luck that would be good enough.
Britt pressed on. “What time did the girls go to bed?”
He wouldn’t let this go. I exhaled half a breath of air. “Sometime between nine and ten.”
“If you estimated the time of Delilah’s return, it would be?”
“I wasn’t paying attention. I don’t recall.” Britt jotted more notes. I would have given anything to see what he was writing.
“What level of physical activity can she reasonably perform with her heart condition?”
Fear for Mama washed over me. “Is Mama all right? Does she need her heart medicine?”
“Delilah is fine. I brought her in myself.”
My stomach clenched. “You took her off the side of the road. In front of my children.”
“I had no choice. Not once I saw the car.” He flipped back through his book until he found what he was looking for. “What would you say her state of mind was prior to going out Tuesday evening?”
I chewed on the inside of my mouth. I didn’t want to answer this question.
Britt leaned forward. “Her state of mind, Cleo. What was her state of mind that night?”
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