by Nova Nelson
I needed to let her see that I wouldn’t be adjusting my whole plan to accommodate her.
“Ah, yes. Busy, busy,” she said, settling into her seat opposite me and adjusting the fur on her shoulder. “I’ve heard it’s quite a rat race out there for the working class nowadays.”
Man, oh man, I did not like Veronica Lovelace. She was turning out to be as bad as Lucent had made her out to be.
“Yes. But I much prefer it to just sitting around,” I said. “Now, Heather, I’ll cut to the chase here. There are some who don’t believe that your daughter Heather committed—”
“Oh!” wailed Veronica. “Oh, dear me! My poor, sweet Heather!” She grabbed the framed photo I’d noticed earlier, which was conveniently placed on the table next to where she’d sat, and clutched it to her bosom. “The agony of losing a child. I hope you never have to go through it, Eleanore!”
“Nora,” I corrected, fully expecting her to ignore it. “Mrs. Lovelace—”
“Oh, please call me Veronica.”
I cleared my throat, trying not to let her constant interruptions get under my skin. “Of course. Veronica, I have reason to believe Heather’s death was not a suicide.”
“Of course not!” she said quickly. “I knew that the second I heard. Oh … my poor baby. She was such a good girl and simply fell in with the wrong crowd. It’s probably my fault. I must have failed her somewhere along the way.”
I knew she was fishing for reassurance, but she couldn’t possibly expect that, right? We weren’t friends, and what I knew of her was that she was beyond manipulative. Maybe her haphazard flinging of emotions from one direction to the next would work on a man, but I could recognize disingenuous nonsense when I saw it. “Who do you mean when you say she ran with the wrong crowd?”
She sat up straight, replacing the photo on the side table so that Heather’s shining face stared at me along with Veronica’s penetrating gaze. “Lucent, obviously. All of the Scandricks and their mangy cousins. They go around moping about how the witches stole their land and homes and displaced them to the Outskirts. Ha! They were useless nobodies and scummy addicts long before the Coven took over. The sense of entitlement. It’s just too much!” She fanned her face with her hand before ringing a small bell.
Bartholomew arrived in the doorway looking flushed and satisfied. Maybe Veronica’s excuse for being late wasn’t completely fabricated.
“Yes, Mrs. Lovelace?”
“Bring some cold water, please, Barty. I’m afraid I’ve worked myself into another frenzy. Our guests look like they could use some hydration as well.”
He nodded and disappeared, and when Veronica faced us again, her composure had returned as if she’d never brought up the Scandricks.
“Have they arrested him yet?” she asked calmly.
“Who?”
“Lucent.
“Oh. No. The sheriff and deputy still believe it’s a suicide.”
She rolled her eyes theatrically. “Typical. I’ll never understand why the Coven continues to pay their salary. In the end, it’s always the mediums who have to get the job done.” She motioned to me, and yet another suspicion was confirmed: Veronica had done her homework.
“And you’re sure it was Lucent?” I asked.
“Absolutely. You’ve spoken to him, I assume. That’s probably what led you here. He’s trying to throw you off his scent, so to speak.”
“I wish I could get his scent out of my nose, to be honest,” Grim said.
“Yes, I spoke with him,” I replied, ignoring my familiar.
“You never saw the two of them together, did you?” she asked.
I shook my head.
“Then I’ll fill you in— Thank you, Barty. That’s all.”
Bartholomew poured Veronica and me a glass from his pitcher before setting a full bowl on the ground in front of Grim. Then he left the room.
“Heather looked at Lucent like he was all that mattered, but I caught things she missed, so blinded by her naive sentiment as she was. There were moments, almost imperceptible, when Heather would mention money or expensive things she planned to buy for them, and Lucent’s eyes would light up. I’ve seen that expression a million times. I know what greed looks like. The louse was only after our money.” She casually sipped her water before placing the glass back down on a handcrafted doily on the table. “She made him continue working, of course, but recently he’d started to make his move. He was only working part-time when she died. I suspect he was trying to quit completely, but she wouldn’t let him. So he decided to throw caution to the wind and go for broke … figuratively speaking. In reality, he was going for rich, not broke. I’m absolutely sure she left all of her material possessions to him.”
“I hope this doesn’t come off as too forward, but who do your things go to when you pass on? Bartholomew?”
She brayed with laughter, throwing her head back and fanning her face as the burst of emotion subsided. “Oh no, no, no. Bartholomew is just my servant in the end. I’m bequeathing my worldly possessions to my heir.”
“And that is?”
She cleared her throat into a balled fist and her somber composure returned. “Until recently, it was Heather, since she is my eldest daughter.”
I suspected that whatever wealth Heather had paled in comparison to that of her mother. If someone was after money, Veronica would be the better target. “And who does it go to now?”
“My son, Heath. Heather’s twin brother. Technically, he was older than her by a few minutes, but it didn’t matter, since we’re matriarchal, like any dignified pack. Since I have no other daughters, Heath is now the sole beneficiary.”
“Is that him, there?” I pointed to one of the photographs just beyond her arm’s reach. From it, four faces stared back at me, their arms thrown around those next to them, forming a chain. Lucent was on the far right, looking much more jovial than when I’d spoken to him but not quite happy, and next to him was Heather. It seemed a recent picture. While I didn’t recognize the man next to Heather, it wasn’t a difficult guess. They looked so similar. It must be Heath.
Veronica leaned over, squinting, and then stood to fetch the picture.
But as she did so, she wobbled and nearly fell, catching herself on the armrest just in time.
Grim’s head perked up at the sudden movement.
“Are you alright?” I asked.
The worry on her face looked genuine. I didn’t think this was part of the act.
“Yes, I’m fine. Just a slight dizzy spell. Can you blame me, though? I did just lose my daughter.”
She grabbed the picture and brought it close to her face to inspect it. “Yes. I almost forgot about this one.”
“That’s Heath?”
She nodded. “And his wife Francesca Jericho. Sweet girl. Not a werewolf, but comes from old Avalon money.”
Translation: not a gold digger like Lucent. I didn’t care that much about Francesca, though. It was Heath whose face my eyes remained glued to. “Heath lives in Eastwind?”
“Yes,” she said quietly. “But he’s been gone on business for almost a week. I just … I can’t even bring myself to tell him what happened to his sister, and I made his wife promise not to mention it until he was home. She agreed immediately. He and Heather were close. He hated Lucent, of course, but he managed to overlook it if it meant spending time with his sister.”
There went my brother-killed-for-inheritance theory. Heath wasn’t even in the same city.
As strong as my distaste for Veronica was, I felt inclined to address the peculiarity I’d witnessed a few moments before. “Your dizziness. When did it start?”
She pinched her lips together and stared thoughtfully at the ceiling. “Hmm … Wednesday evening.”
“Wednesday. Are you sure?”
She nodded a single decisive time. “Absolutely. I play bridge with some of the other matriarchs every Wednesday evening. I was getting ready for bed and telling Barty about how Caroline and Juanita only won
because they were cheating—much like they did on their husbands until those old fools passed—when the first wave overcame me.”
“And you believe your dizziness can be attributed to Heather’s death?”
Again, she nodded, sipping her cold water.
“But you didn’t find out about Heather’s death until Thursday morning.”
She paused, the rim of her glass touching her lips, and blinked rapidly. “Oh,” she said, setting down the glass carefully on the side table. “That’s right.”
“Who prepares your food, Veronica?”
“What?” Her practiced facade had cracked, and through her confusion, I glimpsed the real Veronica. She wasn’t a powerful matriarch that could kill me with her bare paws. She wasn’t born with more worth or importance than me. As the confusion swirled behind her eyes and her brain grappled with the discordance of the narrative she’d told herself—that her dizziness was an emotional response to her daughter’s death—I saw that Veronica was just a little girl who grew up and learned to fit the mold of matriarch, but that child was still there.
I felt sorry for her. “Who prepares your food each day?” I repeated.
“Sammy. Or if it’s just a nibble, Barty prepares it.”
“Heather was experiencing dizzy spells before her death.” I wasn’t sure yet what it indicated, but I had my suspicions. “May I make a suggestion?”
“Of course,” she breathed, staring at me through dilated pupils.
“Order delivery for a while. Make sure you are the one who answers the door and takes the food from the hands of the delivery person. If you see the same delivery person two times in a row, don’t eat the food. And be sure you order from a restaurant you trust, preferably one with no ties to Hightower Gardens.”
She clutched her heart. “You think that’s necessary?”
“Yes,” I said firmly. “I do. You have the resources to afford it. What’s money for if not safety and security?”
I knew that last bit would resonate with her. She nodded adamantly. “I agree. Thank you, Nora.”
I stood and had to give Grim a little kick underneath the butt before he got the message and lumbered to his feet. “Thanks again for taking the time to meet us, Veronica. I’ll let you know if we figure out anything. And when it’s safe to stop ordering take-out.”
Chapter Seven
“I have to agree with Heather here,” I said, addressing Ruby. “I don’t think Lucent did it.”
We sat around the parlor table, Ruby and I drinking tea after dinner and Heather floating nearby. Unlike Bruce, she didn’t feel the need to sit. Perhaps she was just more coordinated at floating than he was. Who knew, really?
Grim and Clifford sat by the blue fire, cooling their paws—Grim after a long day of walking in the heat, and Clifford after a long day of nothing at all.
“See?” Heather said. “I knew once you met him you’d be convinced he would never do it.”
“Don’t get too excited,” I replied. “I’m not saying that because I think he deserves the title of Eastwind’s Best Husband. In fact, I think the only reason he’s not in jail for one thing or another is because Deputy Manchester and Sheriff Bloom are swamped with other things.”
Heather shot me a dirty look, but I continued.
“I’m saying I don’t think he did it because he didn’t have access to your food that night and because there wasn’t a way for him to sprinkle silver on your food in the morning. If he’d done it before you came down, he risked poisoning himself, too, since you split the steak and eggs.”
She nodded. “And as was usual, he let me pick which half of the steak I wanted. Seems a little risky to only poison one half and hope I pick it.”
“Exactly.”
“And Veronica?” Ruby asked.
I’d already briefed her on the conversation earlier that evening.
“I think the dizziness rules her out. She genuinely seemed to believe it was related to Heather’s death. It’s easy to get dates and events confused when a family member dies.” I knew that from experience, but I didn’t feel inclined to bring it up. “When I pointed out that the timelines didn’t match up, she looked worried.”
“You think whoever killed me is also targeting my mother?” Heather asked.
“It’s possible, assuming the dizziness is brought on by silver poisoning. And it would point to one motive in particular.”
Ruby grinned but sipped her tea and said nothing. Heather, though, said, “Which is?”
“The money. Now that you’re dead, Heath is the beneficiary of the Lovelace estate. If your mother dies, he’s in the money.”
Heather shook her head. “No, no, no. Heath never cared much about the estate. He preferred to make money for himself. Besides, he’s been out of town.”
“Could he have paid Reatta and Sammy to do it?” I asked.
“No,” she said firmly. “Heath wouldn’t do that. Reatta wouldn’t do that.”
I sighed. We’d reached another dead end, not only because Heather was becoming too agitated to be of any use, but because she was right. My theories were stretching it.
“I’m beat,” I said. “The only thing I can think to do now is retrace your steps tomorrow once I get off work. Maybe I’ll find some new shred of information.”
“More steps? You don’t need me for that, right?” said Grim.
“What if I promise there’s a juicy steak in it for you?”
“No deal. I fell for that once, but not again. Besides, I can get a juicy steak just by prancing into Medium Rare and giving Tanner the big eyes. You’re gonna have to do better than that if I’m supposed to walk all over Eastwind in June heat again.”
I considered it. What did Grim want more than anything?
“You can take a vacation to the Deadwoods. Once this is wrapped up.”
His ears perked, and his tail wagged, slapping the wood floorboards and giving away his excitement despite his unenthusiastic, “Yeah, I guess that’ll do.”
“Re-evaluating your inventory and shipments will take a long weekend to complete, but it’ll save you headaches over time,” I said, pointing to it on my list of action items. My eyes crossed slightly as I looked over my handwriting. Tanner had finally called for our meeting, but unfortunately, the best time for him was a half-hour before our early shift began. I’d always been a morning person, but being anywhere ready to go at 4:30 am was asking too much, especially on a Sunday.
When I glanced up, Tanner was staring at me with his mouth slightly open, his eyes wide. The two of us sat in the manager’s office at Medium Rare, doing a darn good job of pretending this wasn’t where we found the dead body of Bruce Saxon four months earlier.
He looked down at the list again. “I realize you just explained all this, but I only understood half of it.” He dragged his hands down his face. “I miss just being a waiter.”
He was definitely better suited for that job. I’d seen the toll that not spending as much time conversing with the regulars was taking on his morale and overall well-being.
“It’ll take a little bit of work, but once we get this under control, you’ll have way more time to relax and visit with the customers. Plus, you’ll be making more money than if you were just waiting tables.”
“I hope you’re right,” he said, his head drooping.
“I am. Like I said, I’ve been where you are. Granted, I had a little more preparation and a mentor to help me through.”
“I have a mentor, too,” he said, that annoyingly sexy half-grin peeking through his tired expression.
“Yeah, I guess you do.”
His eyes narrowed for a second, and he chewed his lip as he stared at me. I couldn’t get a read on what that meant.
“Here’s an idea,” he said. “What if you co-own Medium Rare with me?”
I opened my mouth to speak (I wasn’t entirely sure what I was going to say), but he held up a hand to stop me.
“Hear me out, Nora. It doesn’t seem fair that yo
u would help me learn how to do this without any compensation. But I don’t have that much money right now to pay you a fair wage. What I do have is the money-making potential of Medium Rare. We sign a deal saying we each own fifty percent for the next year, then we decide what we want to do from there. What do you say?”
While Tanner probably thought it was a simple solution, I knew better. This made things all kinds of complicated. Not just in a business sense, but in a personal sense as well.
Being his mentor was one thing, but if I agreed to co-own Medium Rare with Tanner, any potential romance suddenly became high-stakes. I knew what Jane would say, that I should go for it anyway, that all good things come to an end. While it had started to make sense under the influence of Donovan’s cocktails, while I was stone-cold sober, the risk of mixing business and pleasure seemed much less alluring. Romance was often the quickest way to enmity, and that just wouldn’t do if we ran a restaurant together.
I had to pick a single route here. Go for it with the romance or help him run the diner. It couldn’t be both. That just wasn’t realistic over the long term. Not with the track record I had with men, at least.
In the end, his face decided it for me. The same face that made me want to grab it and make out with it until I couldn’t feel my lips anymore also made me incapable of refusing help when he most needed it.
Besides, there was the chance that nothing would ever happen between Tanner and me. Sometimes that happened between two people with palpable sexual tension—it just fizzled out and never amounted to anything. Would I forsake a friend just because there was this dumb hope in my heart that something more might transpire between us?
No. Tanner was my friend. Probably my closest friend, if I was being honest. And I knew that if our roles were reversed and I asked for his help, he wouldn’t even hesitate. He would give me a big, emphatic yes.