“Brinley. What an unusual name,” Marie exclaimed as she took Brinley by the hand and led her into the dining room. “You’re the first I’ve met. Is it a family name, dear?”
Brinley looked nervously over her shoulder at Jason as she was being led away like a lamb to slaughter. Before Marie Anderson was done she’d know every little detail about Brinley, including her grandmother’s maiden name. His mother had missed her calling. She should have worked for the NSA.
Jason felt a little guilty but he knew better than to interfere with his mother when she had a goal in mind. If he and Brinley had any sort of future, and he didn’t even know if that’s what he wanted, she’d need to learn how to handle his mother.
“No, just one my parents liked. Something smells wonderful. Is it pot roast?”
“It is. Do you like to cook?” Marie didn’t wait for an answer, continuing to lead Brinley away from Jason. “Why don’t you come into the kitchen and we can talk recipes?”
Jason, West, and his father watched the two women disappear behind the swinging door to the kitchen in silence.
“Do you think we’ll ever see Brinley again?” West said in a mock serious tone. “Poor girl. She has no idea that she’s being pumped for information and vetted as the future Mrs. Jason Anderson. If she did, she’d run out the door and never look back.”
Peter Anderson slapped Jason on the back and smiled. “I’m sure your girl will be fine. How long have you two been together?”
“She’d not exactly my girl. We’re…friends. Good friends.”
A friend that Jason had kissed. And fantasized about seeing naked.
His father gave him a knowing look. “Of course. Friends. Well, she seems like a nice girl. Very pretty. You said she’s your neighbor?”
“She lives in Gail Denton’s old place. Which leads me to a question, Dad. What do you know about the Barnes family and the murder that took place there twenty years ago?”
“Does Dad need a lawyer?”
Jason hadn’t heard his oldest brother enter the house but that query had come from Travis Anderson who ran the business side of the family holdings. Tall and dark-haired just like the rest of the Anderson clan, he leaned heavily on a cane due to hip surgery after a motorcycle accident a year ago. Pain was etched on Travis’s face, making him look older than his forty-two years but he was still smiling, albeit with difficulty.
“No attorney required. I was just wondering what he remembered,” Jason replied as he hugged his brother. “It’s good to see you. I thought you were still in New York.”
Travis was spending time in the Big Apple working with a rehab specialist.
“I’ve been home for several days. You and West have been busy with your new case.”
“You heard about it then?” West asked as they sat down in the living room. “Do you remember anything about the Barnes family?”
Travis rubbed his chin and set his cane down on the floor, sliding it behind his feet. “I remember Wendell Barnes coming here to the house a few times but that’s it. I don’t think I ever met his wife.”
Peter Anderson stood and strode over to the bar in the corner of the room. Silver-haired but still vital and energetic in his mid-sixties, he’d been the driving force behind Anderson Industries since its inception forty years ago. What had started as progressive ranching had grown into mining, oil, and banking making their father one of the richest men in Montana, if not the entire western half of the country.
“If we’re going to talk about that murder twenty years ago I’m going to have to have a drink. Anyone want to join me?”
Peter poured four glasses of whiskey and West helped him pass out the drinks before they all sat back down.
“So you do remember the murder.” Jason tossed back the liquor, enjoying the burn all the way down to his belly. “I guess we were all at college.”
“All three of you boys were gone at the time. It was a terrible thing, really. Everyone in town knew that Linda and Dell had marital problems. Linda loved to spend money and she was frustrated with Dell’s ideas about living a frugal life. She hated that house. Thought it was way too small. She wanted something she could throw lavish parties in and decorate expensively. Never made a secret about it either. Her complaints were loud and frequent to anyone who would listen.”
“So everyone thought Wendell did it?” West prompted. “Did you?”
“No, but I don’t know if I would call Dell a nice man either. He could be ruthless in business and he definitely didn’t lack self-esteem. But a murderer? I doubt it. From what I remember he hated guns. He only had them in the house for protection. They’d been robbed a few times.”
Robbed more than once in a town like Tremont? That alone was strange.
West cleared his throat noisily. “So you say Wendell didn’t like guns, Dad? And that they’d been robbed? That wasn’t in the police report.”
“Dell hated guns. He begrudgingly bought one when they were robbed about six months before Linda was shot.” Tom frowned and took another sip of his whiskey. “I don’t remember what the burglars took though.”
“The cops found him at the lake. He said he was fishing in the middle of the night. Was he a fisherman?”
Tom sighed and shook his head. “Not that I ever heard of. But that doesn’t mean he didn’t. We weren’t close friends, only acquaintances. Maybe Damian was into fishing.”
“What happened to him?” Jason’s fingers tightened around the highball glass. So far he hadn’t learned anything earthshattering. “The file doesn’t say a thing and I don’t remember him at all.”
“He was younger, of course.” Peter rubbed his chin in thought. “A nice boy. Very smart. When Linda died Dell sent him off to boarding school in upstate New York. I don’t think he ever came to visit his Aunt Gail, which is a shame. She’s a sweet woman and deserved better treatment than she got by Wendell.”
It looked like there was plenty of animosity to go around in the Barnes family. But if Jason could finally solve Linda Barnes’s murder, he would bet that he would solve Roger Gaines’s at the same time.
“I’ll be talking to Gail,” Jason revealed. “And I’m going to need to talk to Wendell and Damian as well. Plus anyone else who might have had a motive.”
“It’s a two for one. We find one killer it will lead us to the other.” West finished his whiskey and slapped it down on the coffee table. His father went back to the bar and poured himself another.
Travis picked up his cane and struggled to his feet.
“Neither Wendell nor Linda were very well liked in this community. Some people might not want to walk down that memory lane with you so be careful.”
“Like who?” West asked, getting to his feet. “I’m not giving the rich and powerful a pass on this investigation.”
“I have a distinct memory of Wendell in the study with Dad and another man. Wendell and that man were at each other’s throats and Dad was trying to keep the peace.”
“So who was it?” Jason stood as well, too restless to sit still.
Travis grinned, the look of pain and fatigue temporarily falling away. “Mayor Leon Cavendish. Of course he wasn’t the mayor then. Have fun questioning him.”
West groaned and slapped his forehead. “Shit. Just…shit.”
Jason and West were about to dig up a few buried secrets in this town, and it was not going to go over well.
*