Page 48 of The Anniversary Party

“Not necessarily,” Bodhi spoke quietly but with an air of authority.

Everyone’s head swiveled toward him.

“What do you mean by that?” Brian asked, drawing his eyebrows together.

“The type of head injury Rex sustained sometimes causes a condition called ‘talk and die syndrome.’ Because the swelling and compression of the brain stem can take some time, there have been cases where the victim of an epidural hematoma has presented as fine for minutes to hours after the fatal blow. So, you could have spoken to him after the murderer struck him in the head.”

Leo scanned the faces in the room while they processed Bodhi’s explanation. Grady began to fill the glasses and used a dropper to carefully add a precise row of aromatic bitters to each drink.

Paul was the first to react to Bodhi’s statement.

“That’s ridiculous,” he snapped. “Annette’s dress was covered in blood after she found Rex. Don’t you think Grady would have noticed if Rex’s head was bleeding? Or that Rex might have mentioned if he’d been cracked over the skull?”

Annette paled and closed her eyes.

“That’s enough, Paul,” Brian warned grimly.

She opened her eyes and gulped for air. “I didn’t even realize he was bleeding at first,” she said in a voice barely above a whisper. “He was lying on the floor, and I thought he was unconscious. When I couldn’t wake him up, I screamed and then put his head in my lap and stroked his hair until Joy ran in. That’s when I noticed the blood.”

Brian pushed back his chair and wrapped his wife in a tight embrace.

Leeza glared at Paul and took over passing out the cake slices for Annette.

Grady garnished each glass with a candied orange peel. Then he cleared his throat. “Rex called me into the room because he said he needed to tell me something important.”

“Something like who hit him?” Carl wondered.

“No. It was … personal.”

Joy inhaled sharply. Leo watched as Sasha cut her eyes toward Tessa, who gave no indication that she knew about the hostile takeover threat. From her spot at the table, Bethany rose to her feet and clinked her fork against her plate.

“Come on. This is supposed to be a celebration of Rex’s life, remember? Let’s have a toast. Chance, help me pass out the drinks.”

Chance dutifully did as his wife instructed. The couple worked quickly to place a glass at each seat.

“Everybody got one?” Chance asked.

“Everyone but Grady,” Chris noted.

Grady was frozen, staring off into the middle distance with a stricken expression.

Bethany plucked the empty coupe glass from Grady’s seat at the table, edged him out of the way behind the bar, and picked up the shaker.

“I’ll fix that,” she said. She poured a drink into Grady’s glass and grabbed the jar of candied orange peels. “Oh, they’re all gone.”

“There’s a smaller container of candied lemon twists,” Paul offered. “I saw it when I grabbed all this stuff earlier.”

“Lemon? He always used orange juice and peels only,” Chance mused. “Rex must’ve been ready to change up his signature cocktail.”

Bethany found the jar and used the ice tongs to pluck out a curl of candied lemon and drape it over the rim of Grady’s glass. “There. All set.”

She guided Grady to his seat and eased him into the chair. He took the drink wordlessly.

Leo sneaked a forkful of the cake and instantly regretted his decision as his mouth dried up. “Wow, talk about almond-forward,” he whispered to Sasha.

She whispered back, “It’s good. But strong.”

Strong was an understatement. The thought of washing the cake down with an amaretto sour made Leo feel every one of the twenty-some years he had on the members of Rex’s party.

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