I stood. “You’ve been so helpful, Mrs. Grayson. I won’t keep you any longer.”
“You’ve gone white as flour, miss. You sure you’re all right?”
“Well, I’m not sure I understand why he ended up working for my sister and me, that’s all.”
“Could be a simple explanation, Miss Abby. Ben’s been a workingman all his life. Could hardly think straight if he wasn’t using his hands. Can’t see him holin’ up in some hotel while he was in the city. That woulda never suited him. Carpentry was his first love, but he liked working with the earth, too. My guess is he took the job to keep busy while he looked for the killer.”
“Maybe,” I said, not sure I bought this explanation.
Ruth Grayson and I exchanged phone numbers, and I promised again that I’d move Ben’s body back to Shade for burial as soon as the police gave me the okay.
After we said our good-byes, I walked out into the late-afternoon heat, slid behind the wheel of my Camry, and pulled onto the dirt drive that led to the main road.
A cloud of dust signaled the approach of another vehicle, and with the road barely wide enough for my car, I wasn’t sure I could squeeze over without side-swiping the rail fence. I started to back up, but then recognized the car and braked.
Willis’s Mercedes lurched to a halt beside me, and he rolled down his window.
I did the same and tried to sound pleasant despite my irritation. “Hi, there, Willis.”
“What in hell do you think you’re doing?” he asked.
“Long way from home, aren’t you?” I forced a smile. I was not in the market for a surrogate father, even if he’d driven sixty miles to apply for the job.
“I asked you why you’re here.” His nose wrinkled and the sunglasses on the bridge of his nose edged closer to his eyes.
“Paying my respects to Ben’s widow.”
“Kate tells me you found things out about Ben. Unpleasant things.” He blotted his wet forehead with a handkerchief.
“Depends on whose version you listen to. And exactly why are you here?” Heat poured in through the open window, and I could feel sweat erupting on my hairline.
“Charlie expected me to look out for his girls after he died, so when Kate told me what you were up to, I thought I should help. The sheriff sent me this way.”
“You may be surprised to learn that I go to bed after Letterman, so I qualify as an adult. I can handle my own affairs.”
I pressed the window control and stomped on the gas, leaving him behind in a whirl of red dust.
5
Willis followed me home from Shade, coming in on my heels through the back door when we arrived. To my dismay, Kate immediately invited him to dinner.
She had prepared an organic vegetable ragout, and we ate in the kitchen, probably because any concoction containing rutabagas was never meant to be eaten in a dining room the size of a football field. No, I consider rutabagas, turnips, and collard greens to be kitchen food, the kind of stuff you feed the dog when no one’s looking.
Willis seemed completely unruffled by our previous testy encounter, so after we finished eating, I reminded him about his offer of assistance when he’d come over yesterday. “I think that’s why you drove all the way to Shade today, right? To help me out?”
“That’s right.” Willis wiped a zucchini seed off his chin with his napkin.
“Then help me arrange for Ben to be moved north to Shade for burial as soon as the medical examiner releases his body.”
“What?” he said.
“I promised Ruth Grayson her husband could be buried back home, and I’m not sure how to start the ball rolling. Since you seem so all-fired anxious to be involved, maybe this assignment will satisfy your need.”
Willis turned to Kate. “Can’t you talk some sense into your sister?”
“I avoid telling Abby what to do,” Kate replied. “Makes it much easier to live with her that way.”
“You think it’s easy living with someone who thinks tofu is actually edible?” I shot back.
She just smiled.
“Anyway,” I went on, getting back to Wills. “I promised Ben’s widow, so please make the arrangements. Bill me at double your hourly rate, if that makes you feel better.”
“Hourly rate will suffice,” he replied tersely.
Kate broke the uncomfortable silence that followed. “One problem solved. Now for the other issue. Selling this house. Helping us with the legalities might be more up your alley, Willis.”
He flushed so deeply I feared his blood pressure might shoot off the charts. “The dirt hasn’t settled on Charlie’s grave and you’re selling his house?” He pushed away from the kitchen table, a jagged vein in his temple pulsing. He stomped over to the sink with his plate.
“This isn’t about Daddy, Willis,” I said. “Kate’s moving in with Terry, and the idea of living alone in an airplane hangar disguised as a house does not appeal to me. I need a smaller place.”
Willis turned and stared at me for a second, then closed his eyes and took a deep breath. Sounding calmer, he said, “What does Caroline think about this idea?”
“She doesn’t know yet,” I said.
“Really?” Willis said. “I suggest you inform her before the For Sale sign goes up. And now I’d better leave before you two spring something else on me.”
I walked him down the hall and across the foyer, surprised to see we had another visitor when I opened the door. Steven Bradley, my ex-husband, stood on the front porch, his finger ready to press the bell.
“Hi there,” he said.
New contact lenses, I noted. This time he’d chosen an intriguing sea green. I had to admit a little ocean in his eyes looked pretty darn good.
“I’ll be running along,” Willis said uneasily, glancing back and forth between us as he slipped past to the walkway.
Steven stepped inside. “I see my favorite girl has gotten her name into the newspaper—nice picture, by the way. So tell me, what’s been going on here, babe?”
“I am neither your babe nor your girl, a difference of opinion that probably explains why we’re divorced.”
He grinned wider. “I knew that. Sorry. How’s about you tell me the straight story? Because I’m not sure I can believe what I read in the Chronicle.”
“If you promise not to address me with any word synonymous with child,” I said.
He held up a hand. “Promise.”
We walked into the game room, his favorite spot when we lived here together—maybe because he’d purchased the big-screen TV, the DVD, stereo, and home-theater equipment himself. Steven sat down on the butter-colored leather sectional and stretched out his legs.
I sat next to him and started at the beginning, when I first discovered Ben in the greenhouse. By the time I finished, Steven was shaking his head in disbelief.
“And you’re doing a funeral for this Ruth person? Then what, Mother Teresa?”
“Save the sarcasm, Steven.”
“If I know you, Abby—and I do believe I’m familiar with every square inch of skin and strand of hair—you’re more than a little interested in why Ben got himself killed. Does your curiosity have anything to do with this charity project?”
“I would have helped Ruth Grayson no matter what. After finding Ben like that, I feel so... so... responsible.”
“Responsible? Some nutcase kills a guy and you feel responsible? I don’t get it.”
“I never took the time to get to know Ben, to really talk to him—and I should have.”
Steven reached over and took my hand. “You’ve had a rough few months since losing Charlie. Cut yourself some slack.”
“But why do I feel so guilty?”
“You got me.” He slid over and fingered a wisp of hair near my temple. “I like your hair short, by the way. Like the color, too. Red suits you.”
I could smell his soap, the hint of an unfamiliar cologne, and I was tempted. But I refused to give in, even though lust was powerful enough to transcend insight and obliterate a long list of unpleasant memories, at least temporarily.