by Laurie Cass
“I should have known better.” Brad grimaced. “Dad was never the kind of guy to take a hint. He probably knew what I wanted to do, he just wanted to make me say it straight out.” He half smiled. “Eventually I did. At the top of my lungs. On a Saturday. In the summer. While we were doing an emergency repair job for the Round Table.”
I blinked. “That’s a little . . .”
“Public?” he suggested. “Yeah, that’s what Leese and Mia said. I think part of me wanted it that way, though, so I couldn’t go back.”
I’d always heard you should never burn bridges when you left a job, but for Brad it sounded as if a scorched earth policy had been a necessity. “You’re still at the same brewery?”
His face lit up. “Absolutely. There’s this new recipe I’m trying. Flavorings of maple syrup and chocolate. What could be better, right?”
It sounded horrible, but then I wasn’t a big beer drinker. But I also didn’t see how a five-year-old argument that had ended with Brad in a career he clearly loved could also have caused him to kill his father.
I smiled and wished him well with his new beer. “Were there other guys who worked for your dad that might have . . . well, you know.”
He shook his head. “I’ve been thinking about it, but I don’t see it. What I can see is one of the guys blowing a gasket, killing dad in the heat of anger kind of thing, but not like this. Anyway, I can’t think of anyone who would go to the trouble of implicating Leese. I mean, how many people even knew she was back in the area?”
Hundreds, actually. She’d joined the chamber of commerce and was attending Rotary meetings, not to mention that article in the newspaper.
“None of your dad’s former employees were the kind of guys to carry a grudge?” I asked.
“Hard to say for sure.” He shrugged. “I just don’t see it.”
I wished I shared his conviction, but it was my feeling that hate-filled grudges could last a long time.
“Well,” he said, glancing at his watch. “I have to get to the brewery. I just wanted to stop by and say I was sorry that my mom socked you with all that work last night.”
“Don’t worry about it.”
I watched him walk out and got the feeling that both he and Mia had probably done a lot of apologizing for their parents.
• • •
Ash’s mom, Lindsey, smiled across the table at us. “It feels as if it’s been ages since I’ve seen you two. Anything new?”
We were at the Three Seasons, sitting in what had been a parlor, back when the hundred-year-old building had been a luxurious summer residence for a wealthy family. Kristen herself had advised us on what to have for dinner, which in my case was more telling than advising. As long as whatever arrived didn’t have mushrooms, I was good.
“New?” Ash repeated. “I’ve been working the night shift. Do you really want to know what kind of thing goes on at two in the morning?”
His mother was a gorgeously elegant woman who made an extremely good living as a financial consultant. I had to keep reminding myself that there was no reason to be intimidated, and mostly the reminders worked.
Lindsay tipped her head to one side, considering her son’s question. “Probably not. Unless you have some amusing anecdotes you can share.”
“Nothing funny lately,” he said, glancing at me.
Lindsey noticed the look. “Are you going to tell me what’s going on right now?” she asked. “Or shall it wait until the salad course? Because I will find out, in spite of the fact that I was out of the country researching new investments for the last week and a half.”
“Just tell her,” I suggested.
“Nah.” Ash grinned. “Make her wait. It’ll be good for her and entertaining for me.”
“You are a horrible son,” Lindsey said. “What did I ever do to deserve you?”
The horrible son’s dimpled smile bore a striking resemblance to his mother’s. “Nothing. It was sheer good luck.”
She paused, considering, then nodded. “Acknowledged, but the question remains. What’s going on?”
Before Ash could continue baiting his mother, I said, “There was another murder.”
“Oh, no.” Her face fell into sad lines. “How awful. Someone from around here? A tourist?”
I looked at Ash, because I had no idea whether or not Lindsey had known Dale. Was this going to be a shock that we should prepare her for? And how does one do that anyway?
“Dale Lacombe,” Ash said.
A variety of emotions passed over Lindsey’s face. Most of them I couldn’t catch, but I was confident of two. Surprise had been the first one, and finally resignation. Somewhere in there I thought I’d pegged satisfaction, but surely I was wrong about that.
“Well.” Her expressions settled back down. “Isn’t that interesting?”
I frowned. Her voice had been curiously flat. “It is?” I asked.
She flashed a short smile. “Hal Inwood and Ash are going to run themselves ragged trying to figure this one out.”
Ash sighed. “Mom, let it go.”
I looked from mother to son and back. “Let what go?”
Our waiter approached and there was a pause as water glasses were filled and drink orders taken, which was basically us agreeing to the bottle of wine that Kristen had recommended. When he’d left, Lindsey said quietly, “Marrying that man was the dumbest thing Bev Diesso ever did. Her parents told her not to. Her grandparents told her not to. I told her not to. But she was in love”—Lindsey sighed— “and she wouldn’t listen to any of us.”
Lindsey knew Leese’s mom? One of these days I would have to stop being surprised at the interlocking relationships I kept stumbling over. “What was so bad?” I asked.
She laughed shortly. “I can tell you never met him.”
“Mom—”
Lindsey put up a hand against Ash’s mild protest. “To put it mildly, Dale was a misogynistic ass, and I was glad to offer Bev and Leese refuge when she left him. Yes, dear, I know Dale was your father’s friend but he was never mine. Never.”
It occurred to me that not only had I never met Ash’s dad, but I didn’t know anything about him. I tucked the thought away. Now wasn’t the time. “You and Leese’s mom are friends?” I asked.
“In a way,” Lindsey said. “I’m good friends with Mary, Bev’s older sister. Bev is a few years younger than us.”
Small towns. “I know Leese, but I’ve never met her mom. Did she stay in the area?”
Lindsey nodded. “She went back to school and became a registered nurse. She’s assistant director up at Lakeview Medical Care Facility.”
“Never remarried?” I asked, hopping my chair to make sure I was out of the way of a gray-haired man using a walker who was being escorted to a nearby table.
“Not for lack of trying by a certain gentleman,” Lindsey said, smiling. “Bev is a fantastic skier and goes out to Colorado regularly. Twenty years ago she met a man who proposed after she avoided a child who fell in front of her. She did this by going airborne.”
I was a skier myself, but I couldn’t imagine having either the presence of mind or the technical ability to do something like that. “Sounds like a reasonable basis for marriage.”
“Better than many.” Lindsey laughed. “Bev wasn’t interested, though, and still isn’t. But they’ve worked out a long-distance relationship that works for them.” She made a very unladylike noise. “She would have been better off if she’d had that kind of relationship with Dale Lacombe.”
The world was truly a strange place. And if Bev was happy in her post-Dale life, there was no reason for her to strike out at him decades later. Not that I’d suspected Leese’s mom of killing her ex-husband, but it was nice to keep her off my mental suspect list.
Behind us, I heard the man with the walker murmur to the hostess that he’d prefer a tabl
e closer to the window, which was where we were sitting. I hitched my chair forward another couple of inches, just to make sure I was out of the way.
“What about the current wife?” Ash asked. “Carmen.”
His mother studied him. “Am I being questioned by an officer of the law or by my son?”
“To which one would you give the most information?”
Lindsey, however, did not return the smile. She didn’t say anything for a long moment. Then, when I was about to break the increasing tension with a comment about the weather, she said, “My darling boy. You’re working to be a detective, a career choice I admire, but please think carefully about the questions you’ll be posing to your family and friends and the complicated situations that might result.”
She was absolutely right, and I hadn’t once thought about the awkward positions Ash might put people into. He could potentially be asking the people he knew best to betray confidences. To spill secrets. To blab.
I slid him a sideways glance and wondered at what point I’d stop telling him things. Of course, we didn’t exactly have many soul-baring conversations, which was another sign that the love I’d hoped would blossom was never going to burst into flower.
Ash nodded at his mother. “I know. Hal and I have talked about this. It’s something I’m working on.”
“Good,” Lindsey said. “Since that’s settled, I’ll tell you about Carmen.”
“And Leese and Brad and Mia?” Ash asked.
She considered the question. “The only thing I’ll share about the kids is about Brad. He had a horrible temper when he was a child and I’ll lay the blame for that at his father’s cold feet. From what I’ve heard, since he broke away from his father, he has turned into a fine young man.”
“Carmen,” Ash said.
Lindsey glanced at our new neighbor, but continued. “Not from around here,” she told us.
My chin went up the slightest bit. “Neither am I.”
“But you fit with the way things work Up North,” Lindsey said. “Carmen hasn’t stopped complaining about the way things are done around here since the day she showed up.” She shook her head. “She and Dale make an excellent pair.”
“Not much of a pair any longer,” Ash said.
“No.” His mother sighed. “I couldn’t stand the man, but I didn’t wish him dead.”
Though that seemed to be a common sentiment, he was undeniably deceased. Lindsey’s information about Bev was reassuring, but I certainly hadn’t wanted to know that Brad Lacombe’s history included a horrible temper.
And that Lindsey hadn’t wanted to say anything about Mia.
Or Leese.
At that point, Ash’s phone started buzzing frantically. He pulled it out of his pocket and glanced down. “Sorry,” he said, rising, “it’s Hal. I have to take this.” Thumbing the phone’s screen, he walked out of the room and toward the front door.
I was trying to figure out why Ash’s sudden and frequent departures didn’t bother me nearly as much as the similar departures of my former doctor boyfriend had when Lindsey said, “Minnie, I need to use the restroom. Do you mind if I leave you alone for a moment?”
After shooing her off, I considered the options for the next few minutes of my life. Was there enough time to pull out the book I always carried with me? There wasn’t much point in looking at the menu, but hope did spring eternal that I might someday be able to order something different from what Kristen wanted me to eat.
“Excuse me,” said a male voice.
I jumped the slightest bit. It was the man sitting at the table behind us. I turned and smiled politely. “Hi.”
“Were you talking about the Lacombes?”
One of his eyes was looking at me, but the other was staring into a slightly different direction. The poor man probably had horrible headaches “Yes,” I said cautiously. In the years I’d lived in Chilson, I’d learned to accept the fact that personal conversations with strangers were commonplace, but I wasn’t always comfortable having them. “Do you know them?”
“In a manner of speaking.”
He smiled, and the skin over his right cheekbone drew up oddly. I was so distracted as I tried to think what could have caused the effect—Skin cancer? Plastic surgery gone awry? A bad burn? A congenital problem?—that I almost missed his next question.
“Leese has to be, what, in her mid-thirties by now?” he was asking.
“That’s right.” I wondered if I was about to be the bearer of bad tidings, and said, “Did you know that Dale Lacombe was killed just over a week ago?”
The man nodded briefly. “I hear Leese is an attorney these days.”
“That’s right. She’s specializing in elder law.”
“Interesting,” he said, but I got the feeling I hadn’t told him anything he hadn’t already known. “Well, have a good dinner.” He smiled again.
Choosing his left eye to focus upon, I smiled back. “You, too.”
As I turned around in my seat, Lindsey returned. “Is now the time we talk about Ash?” she asked, sitting.
“Sure,” I said. “Although I don’t have any problem talking about him when he’s here, either.”
She laughed. “You two make a great team. Your senses of humor are so similar it’s frightening. Are you sure you’re not my own child?”
“If I’d come out of your gene pool, I’d probably be six inches taller,” I said. “Then all my pants would be too short.”
“Who are you calling short?” Ash asked, sliding into his chair.
“No one,” Lindsey and I said together, and then laughed at the same time.
Ash shook his head in mock sorrow and murmured something about not being able to leave us two alone.
The rest of the meal passed in a similar lighthearted fashion, but underneath, I kept wondering the same thing: Exactly how uncontrollable was Brad Lacombe’s temper?
Chapter 10
The next day, Saturday, was a bookmobile day, but instead of being my normal bright self, I started off the morning yawning and wishing for a couple more hours of sleep.
“Up late last night?” Julia asked. “Did you and Ash go barhopping?”
Barhopping in Chilson wouldn’t have taken very long since there was only one establishment in town dedicated to the serving of alcohol. Half a dozen restaurants had bar areas, but I wasn’t sure if those would count. “We had dinner with his mom and ended up back at her house playing trivia games.”
Julia looked down at Eddie. “What do you think, my furry friend? Could there possibly be a more romantic way to spend an evening?”
“I like Lindsey. She’s funny. And smart.”
“Are you dating her or her son?”
I couldn’t think of any response that didn’t involve sarcasm, and since I’d recently promised my mother that I would try to avoid being sarcastic for at least a week, just to see how it felt, I flicked on the turn signal and said, “Is that Mr. Zonne’s car?”
Julia looked at the church parking lot. “It is indeed. What kind of story do you think he’ll have for us today?”
It was bound to be a good one. After the death of his wife, Lawrence Zonne, a sprightly white-haired octogenarian, had returned home to Tonedagana County from a retirement community in Florida. Mr. Zonne had vision sharper than an eagle’s and a memory that retrieved information faster than Wikipedia and with far more accuracy.
I parked, Julia opened the door to Eddie’s carrier, and we went about getting the bookmobile ready for business, which amounted to flipping open the laptop computers, unstrapping the chair at the back desk, and unlocking the back door.
Mr. Zonne bounded up the stairs. “My dears, I was so sorry to hear about your macabre discovery. What a dreadful thing!” He spread his thin arms wide and gave Julia a massive hug, which then got transferred to me. “More dreadful for Dale L
acombe,” he said into my hair, “but then Dale was a dreadful man.”
“You knew him?” I asked as I was released.
“In a way.” Mr. Zonne paused and squinted at the ceiling. “The rat bast . . . sorry, that miserable son of . . . no, sorry . . .” He pursed his lips. Finally, he said, “Dale Lacombe was the low bid for an addition to our house some thirty years ago. And there was a reason he was low bidder.”
“What’s that?” Julia asked.
Mr. Zonne declined to answer, but after being peripherally involved with Rafe’s home renovation for three years, I could guess. Dale had purchased cheap materials. Or he’d been late starting the project and even later finishing. Or he modified the floor plans without talking to Mr. and Mrs. Zonne. Or his subcontractors were rude. Or he didn’t come back to finish the punch list. Or he didn’t clean up the site. Or it had been all of that and he still demanded full payment.
“Have they arrested anyone for the murder?” Mr. Zonne asked. “No, never mind. I can see from your exchange of glances that they haven’t. And with that particular victim”—he shook his head—“I imagine it’s going to take a long time to winnow down the suspect list to a manageable size.”
That seemed to be the common sentiment from everyone except the widow. Who, now that I thought about it, hadn’t seemed to be suffering from an overabundance of grief.
Then again, everyone grieved in their own way. Maybe Carmen didn’t like to display her sorrow to strangers, which I essentially was. Not that she seemed to have a problem communicating any number of other emotions, notably impatience and irritation, but maybe those were masking the grief.
“Mrr!!”
All three of us turned. Eddie was on the dashboard, standing on his back feet and pawing at the front window.
“What, pray tell, is your cat doing now?” Julia asked.
If he was Lassie, he would be trying to tell us that someone was in danger and we’d spend the rest of the time before the commercial break trying to figure what, where, when, why, and how. But since he was Eddie, other possibilities were far more likely. “He probably thinks that spot on the windshield is a cat toy.”