For an instant, Kim’s face was devoid of response. Then she raised a sculpted eyebrow. “A new will? I’m afraid there’s some confusion.” She was polite but firm. “Mrs. Flynn’s will has been in existence for several years.”
A resonant bong tolled the half hour. An elegant early twentieth-century grandfather clock with an ornate bronze face read four-thirty.
She glanced at the clock. “I’ll check with Mr. Farrell, but I believe he is on his way out. Possibly I can make an appointment for you for tomorrow afternoon.”
I was imperious. “Susan drafted a new will Saturday night. I must speak with him now.”
She gave me a bright smile. “I’ll see what I can do. You are?”
“Jerrie Emiliani.” I hoped St. Jerome Emiliani, that great benefactor of orphans, didn’t mind my continued use of his name. I was trying to do my best for one particular orphan.
She pushed the intercom. “Mr. Farrell, a Ms. Jerrie—” She hesitated.
“Emiliani,” I said distinctly.
“—would like to speak with you about Mrs. Flynn’s estate.”
There was no response.
“Mr. Farrell?”
Silence.
She flicked off the intercom. “Mr. Farrell has left the office.” She turned to her computer. “Tomorrow morning is blocked out for Mrs. Flynn’s funeral. I can offer you an appointment at two o’clock tomorrow afternoon.”
I paused to listen in the entrance hall of Wade Farrell’s house. The tile floor matched the vivid blue rim of a terra-cotta vase decorated with a charging buffalo. An eight-sided Art Deco beveled-glass mirror reflected red and white pom-pom chrysanthemums in a cut-glass vase on a pine side table. To my left a living room with comfortable sofas and chairs, not too big and not too small, looked welcoming. There was an air of come-sit-down-and-let’s-share-good-times warmth. To my right in the dining room, a table looked festive with holiday decorations, a snowman centerpiece and red candles, and fine china and crystal. The stairway at the end of the hall was decorated with candy canes.
A woman’s voice was cheerful but firm. “You’ll ruin your dinner.”
Wade’s words were indistinct. “I need a pick-me-up. Mmmm. Lots of butter.”
I wafted to the kitchen. Spacious and homey with savory scents rising from several pans on the range, the kitchen was obviously geared for a dinner party.
A willowy brunette in a frilly gingham apron inscribed Cindy’s Kitchen folded dough into Parker House rolls. Her fond expression slipped into a frown. “I heard Susan may have taken an overdose of something.”
Wade put down a golden brown cranberry bar. His frown was dark and angry. “Who’s saying that?”
Cindy looked uncertain. “You know how rumors are. Someone heard it from somebody else and pretty soon the buzz is all over town. Liz Latham said she’d heard from her hairdresser who had it straight from somebody in the mayor’s office.”
“That woman’s a menace.”
“Liz?”
“Neva Lumpkin. How’d she ever get elected? You’d think a tarantula could beat her.” He broke off another piece of the cranberry bar.
“Most tarantulas don’t have husbands with enough leases in the Barnett Shale to bring in forty thousand dollars a month. Who’s got the money to run against her? Anyway, you didn’t come home out of sorts because of Neva Lumpkin. What’s wrong, Wade?” She pushed the baking sheet with the rolls to the back of the counter. At the sink, she turned on the water, began to rinse utensils.
He pulled off his suit coat, hung it from the back of a kitchen chair, loosed his tie. “You know that trip you’ve been wanting to make to Tahiti? I looked at my calendar. I can get away the last two weeks of February.”
She turned off the water. Her eyebrows rose. “You said we couldn’t afford it.”
I scarcely breathed.
His lips curved in a lopsided grin. “If I look at the books like an accountant, we can’t. Right now, I don’t give a hoot. Book the tickets. If there’s something we want to do, something that matters to us, we need to do it now. Susan Flynn thought she had one more day. I spent Saturday at the office. I missed Billy’s birthday party, but I got her new will drafted. One more day, that’s all Susan needed. The will would have been signed and her grandson would have inherited her estate. Instead, she died Saturday night. I can tell you for sure she never committed suicide. Die and leave that little boy penniless? Not on your life. But maybe that’s what cost Susan her life.”
“Could she have accidentally taken too much medicine?” Cindy placed spoons in a draining rack.
“She would have had to be drunk or blind to have dumped that much digitalis in her hot chocolate. Sam Cobb asked me what I thought. Off the record.” Wade’s eyes narrowed. “I told him I think one of the heirs murdered her before she could sign the new will. Not Peg Flynn. Peg Flynn’s all right. I hope our kids would be as honorable. She wants the grandson to have her share. None of the others volunteered a penny. After Peg made her announcement and walked out, the rest of them hemmed and hawed and hung around, each one waiting for the others to leave. Finally, I asked if each one would like to speak with me privately. Will it surprise you”—his tone was sarcastic—“to learn each one wanted money? Jake Flynn wants to modernize the kitchen, said Susan kept putting it off, but Jake knew that fixing everything up would be exactly what Susan would have wanted. Tucker wants to buy the Nickerson spread. That will squeeze the McKinley ranch between the Nickerson ranch and Burnt Creek. Susan was good friends with the McKinleys and knew they would be worried about access roads if Tucker bought out the Nickersons. Tucker Satterlee eats, sleeps, and breathes Burnt Creek. He wants the biggest spread in the county. Gina Satterlee’s maxed out on five credit cards and she lost her job about three weeks ago and one creditor got a judgment against her. Harrison Hammond looked like a man reprieved from the gallows. He’s in big trouble with the housing crisis. He hasn’t been able to sell most of the homes in his new development and he’s up to his ears in debt to the suppliers. Now they’re all on easy street. Except Peg.” His tone was admiring. “If Susan had lived one more day, they would each have had to settle for two hundred thousand.”
Cindy stacked the rinsed cooking ware and utensils in a plastic dish rack. “Won’t the judge make some provision for Susan’s grandson?”
“She didn’t sign the will.” Wade looked morose.
I crossed Wade Farrell off my list. His sorrowful expression told me where I needed to go.
“So”—he came around the table and drew his wife into his arms—“make those reservations. Maybe all we’ve got is today, but if we make it to February, you and I are going to enjoy sea, sand, and sun. Merry Christmas, Cindy.”
“Oh, Wade, that will be wonderful.” Her laughter was a sweet cascade. “If you look at the books again and change your mind, that’s all right, too. I’m glad you want to go, whether we can or not.” She smiled and lifted her lips to his.
Christmas lights blinked on a small frosted tree. The apartment was clean and tidy, but the cheap furniture looked as if it had been there for years. Travel posters on the bland beige walls of the small living room offered brightness and a sense of dreams not bound by the confines of a rented furnished apartment. The Parthenon in its weathered glory, the Cathedral at Chartres, and Castle Hill in Nice spoke of a hunger for faraway places.
Kim Weaver sat in a maple chair with dingy green cushions. Her feathered haircut had been teased into a tousled look, as if she stood on a ship deck and the wind rushed against her. Her face was interesting, high forehead, high-bridged nose, high cheekbones. Her cold brown eyes were too calculating for beauty. The firmness of her jaw suggested a woman with a strong will.