Page 81 of The Secret to a Southern Wedding

He didn’t flinch or look away. “No. When I told you they caught the guy who killed her I was telling the entire truth.”

“Then why does your aunt, her sister, think he had something to do with it?”

“Because no one believed my dad’s story at first. I told you they were both in the house the night she disappeared. They found blood by the back door. Her body was found later. She’d been dumped in a ditch less than five miles from our house. Immediately the police suspected my dad. And when they suspected him, her family suspected him, too. I was out of town with friends and couldn’t confirm that my dad had gone upstairs and fallen asleep while Mom was still downstairs watching television. Everyone believed he would have heard if something had happened to her or if she had left the house. It didn’t help that they’d argued the day before.”

“Was their marriage in trouble?” She frowned with her question, but she didn’t look at him as if she thought he were lying. Instead, she looked at him as if she were trying to understand the entire story. That was more than some people he’d known all his life had given.

He shook his head. “My parents loved each other. I saw that every day. Look at the way my dad is with your mom, then imagine it amplified.” He smiled at the memory of the good times. “They were always touching, kissing and being sweet with each other. Were they perfect, though? No. They argued and disagreed about stuff, but no more than any other couple. After the police suspected my dad, Aunt Gayle only remembered the things my mom complained about with my dad. She brought up that they’d argued about money recently. The police heard that and immediately jumped to their new insurance plan as a motive. They didn’t care when I said my mom initiated the update after their previous term life policy expired. That I listened to them talk about the various options and they lectured me on why I needed life insurance when I grew up and had my own family. No one cared that they’d called me that same night she disappeared, and they were laughing and loving on each other on the phone. No one cared that my dad’s voice was filled with panic and pain when he called me to say Mom was missing or how he broke down in tears and threw up after the police told him they’d found her body.”

He squeezed his eyes shut and tried to block out the memory. When Imani spoke, her voice was a little closer.

“Who is the person they got?”

He opened his eyes. His hands tightened into fists on the blanket. “It was one of her co-workers. A guy who’d been obsessed with her and then got angry when she overshadowed him on a project. An offhand comment by another co-worker about him being weird at my mom’s funeral got one investigator to check him out. Turns out he not only killed my mom, but three other women he felt slighted him in some way. He came by the house late that night. Knocked instead of ringing the doorbell. He attacked her right after she opened the door, dragged her out of the house. He didn’t call first, so there were no records of him reaching out to her. My parents didn’t have a doorbell camera to catch him. Our car never left the yard. He would have gotten away with it if it weren’t for the random comment and the police discovering another woman close to him who’d gone missing. He confessed to them all.”

“If they caught him then why does her family still blame your dad?”

“Because he winked at my dad in the courtroom. As if it were all a sick joke. Aunt Gayle saw it and thought that my dad must have heard something or knew the guy had done it. She blames him for her death. How could he not know that someone had kidnapped his wife when he was home with her? Rumors spread when he was originally arrested, and even though his name was cleared, we couldn’t stay there anymore. We left and tried to start over.”

She was silent for several moments. They both stared out at the lake. He waited for her to say something. He wouldn’t push her to respond. He’d admitted to a lot.

“Why didn’t you tell me or my mom this?” she asked.

“My dad worries everyone who hears the story will feel the way my aunt Gayle feels. If her family thought he would kill her then others would, too. That, and he blames himself enough for going upstairs to bed before her and hearing nothing. He carries a lot of guilt for that. He doesn’t want anyone else to look at him or turn their back on him the way his in-laws did. My dad has no other family. My mom’s family was his family.”

“I wish you would have said something.”

“I gave my dad until the wedding to tell the entire story. I told him that if he didn’t say anything I would. But when you told me about your dad...and then we slept together. I knew I had to say something. I didn’t want you to doubt me or how I felt.” He slid closer. This time he could feel the warmth of her body and smell the sweet scent of her perfume in the breeze. “Imani, I need you to know that I care about you.”

He moved his hand over until their fingers brushed. Held his breath in fear that she’d pull away. She didn’t.

“I care about you, too,” she said in a soft, pained voice. “Before I was ready to trust in someone. I was considering moving back to Peachtree Cove to be around my family, but also to make things work with you.”

He slowly slid his fingers from her hand, up her arm. Each second his heart pounded harder as he waited for her to jerk back, but with each tentative caress she didn’t move. “You can still move here.” He didn’t bother to hide the need in his voice. He wanted her here. He wasn’t ready to let her go.

When his fingers reached the side of her face, she turned to face him, but she shook her head. “You don’t understand, nothing can happen between us. My mom has called off the wedding. No matter how I may feel about you...we can never be together.”

The pained expression on Cyril’s face made Imani want to reach out and touch him. Instead, she tightened her hand into a fist. She couldn’t reach out and touch him. Her heart wasn’t supposed to ache saying the words that needed to be said. The words were true. They couldn’t be together. It was hard enough before, but now... Now it was impossible. His hand dropped from her face. The cool breeze swept away the heat of his touch.

“Do you really believe my dad had something to do with my mom’s murder?”

She shook her head. “No. Not anymore.”

After leaving her mom’s shop, she’d sat and considered everything that happened. Her mom had known about the murder, just not that Mr. Dash had been the original suspect. Being a suspect and then having someone else arrested didn’t make him guilty. She wanted to hear the entire story, which is why she hadn’t left when Cyril approached her. Now that she’d heard it, she was angry again. They could have made things work, but now her mom’s heart was broken, the trust between them shattered. How could they come back from this?

“I know you tried to tell me what happened yesterday. I believe you called me to the Dairy Bar to finish the story. You just took too long to tell me.”

“I know. Nothing I can say will make up for that. I was only trying to go with my dad’s wishes. I know how much it hurt him to see friends and family turn against him. I know he didn’t want the same thing to happen to him here. From the moment he told me about the engagement I let him know that he had to say something before the wedding.”

“I’m glad you were willing to go against him to tell me, Cyril...but that doesn’t change the fact that he still held it back. I believe he had nothing to do with it. I saw the lack of remorse in my dad’s eyes after what happened with my mom. He blamed everything on the mistress and took absolutely no responsibility for her actions. Then I noticed all of the cold, calculated ways he expressed love in the form of manipulation. Your dad doesn’t do any of that, but he still wasn’t truthful. My mom is hurt. So hurt she called everything off. We can’t be together after that.”

“Maybe they’ll make up.”

She smiled at the hope in his voice, but she saw the look in his eyes. They both knew a reconciliation would be difficult.

“They won’t,” she said. “My mom is talking about closing the shop and moving back to Florida with me. She doesn’t want to be the center of a scandal again.”

His brows drew together. “Moving back with you. Imani... I thought you wanted to stay.”

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