Page 7 of Luck of the Devil
I considered asking him how he knew all of this, but figured now wasn’t the time. It was no surprise he had access to information even I wasn’t privy to. At the moment, I didn’t see how it mattered who’d fed it to him.
“Would your father know?”
“Uh…” My head was spinning. I asked myself, again, where she’d been going. She’d had that suitcase with her…
“Maybe,” I said, distracted. “Maybe not. I take it they weren’t very close.”
“You take it? You don’t know?”
“My mother pretty much kicked me out of the house the day I left for college. I wasn’t home much, so no, I don’t know. I came back for the summer after my freshman year, and got the message loud and clear that she didn’t want me around. So, I only came back for holidays after that, and over the past decade, I didn’t even do that much. All I know is that he left her a month ago.”
“Did she have a medicine cabinet?”
“No. She kept some medication in a kitchen cabinet, but only Tylenol, antibiotic ointment, and things like that. Besides, she had a suitcase with her, like she was going out of town. She would have taken any prescription medication with her.”
“Did they return her belongings to you?” he asked.
“Yeah.” I was trying to wrap my head around the possibility that she’d been murdered . “It was all wet and soggy. I didn’t go through it.”
“Where is it now?”
“In a plastic bag in the garage. My dad didn’t want it and it didn’t seem right to just throw it away, even though everything had to be completely ruined.” I narrowed my eyes. “Surely you’re not basing your theory on the fact she had a Zoloft in her bloodstream.”
“Remember the bruising? She had a contusion on the back of her head.”
“Maybe she hit it on the head rest,” I countered. “Or maybe she turned her head when the car was falling and hit it on the window.”
“The indentation in her skull fits blunt force trauma better than it does cracking her head on a window or head rest.”
I gave him a hard stare. “Where’s the report with this information? It seems unlikely that the sheriff’s department would overlook blunt force trauma. Everyone knows they’re leaps and bounds better than the Jackson Creek police.”
“The preliminary report doesn’t state she had blunt force trauma. I had my own expert talk to the pathologist.”
My blood iced in my veins. “Why?”
He reached over and picked up the mug. “Why what?” He took a sip, as though we were discussing the weather and not my mother’s potential murder.
“Why would you have someone look at the report?” A new thought hit me. “I’m not paying you for that, and I sure don’t owe you a favor.”
He took another sip and shook his head. Tsking, he said, “So cynical.”
I snorted. “Coming from you, that’s laughable.”
He lowered the cup but held onto it. “The timing of her death seemed suspicious.”
“Because I was looking into Hugo Burton’s murder? The last time I talked to her was around noon last Tuesday when I was on my way out to meet with Hugo’s widow. I didn’t see her lights on in the house when I headed out to Scooters around seven that night, and they were still off when I came back well after ten. I suspect she left that afternoon. The timing makes it unlikely her accident had anything to do with my investigation into Hugo.”
He shook his head. “I’m not necessarily talkin’ about Hugo. I’m talking about you bein’ back in town, diggin’ shit up. Your father was involved with J.R. Simmons, who had some very mean and deadly people in his back pocket. Your parents were in the process of going through a divorce. What if she dug something up and it made someone nervous?”
I shook my head. “Sure, she dug up dirt on people, but they were rumors, whispered into the right ears. Nothing serious enough to get her killed.”
He cocked an eyebrow. “It wouldn’t be the first time someone was murdered for destroying someone’s reputation. Had your mother been nervous lately? Acting out of character?”
I didn’t have to consider it to reluctantly admit, “She seemed super needy. She wanted me around all the time in the evening. I ate dinner with her most nights, and she wanted me to stay late. I figured she was just lonely after my dad left.”
“I thought your parents weren’t close,” he said. “So why would she be lonely?”
“I suspected she was probably doing it to manipulate me.”
