by Beth Byers
While Vi was recovering, Lila said, “She spooked Jack.”
“She hired Jack and Ham,” Rita added, writing that first.
“She spooked Smith too,” Vi said, waving her hand in front of her too-hot mouth. “He told Jack and Ham that there was something off about the case when he handed it over to them.”
“Jack wrote that it seemed she’d alienated most of her family.” Rita looked the question to Vi, who nodded in fervent agreement.
They paused and Vi read the board over.
BERTHA MEYERS — hired Jack & Ham to find her grandson. Spooked Jack. Smith turned down the case but told the boys that something wasn’t right. Alone but for this one grandchild.
“You know,” Vi said as she looked at the board. “I think that she chose to be alienated. That daughter of hers would have been respectful and attentive if the mother hadn’t been quite so venomous.” She slowly rose and crossed to the board, staring while her mind ran over the last few days.
“Unlike you,” Lila shot out.
“Or you,” Vi added. She grinned, sniffed, and then added, “I don’t really blame Mrs. Watkins for distancing herself. The things Mrs. Meyers said to us about her grandchildren, without compunction or hesitation, were painful. Even Lady Eleanor who half-despises me would never tell a random investigator and his wife the things that Mrs. Meyers said.” Vi considered for too long. “Of all the people I met who seemed to have a reason to kill Jason Meyers, Mrs. Meyers is my favorite.”
“Favorite?” Lila snorted and then crossed over, stealing half of Vi’s doctored scone. “The problem is that your Jason Meyers wasn’t just a family member. He was attempting all sorts of crimes, wasn’t he?”
Vi nodded. “We could easily not know anything about the murderer if it were some criminal that his family wouldn’t know about.”
Rita muttered darkly. “Look, I don’t really care who murdered him, and I certainly don’t care enough to go out and seek out the criminals, but I do know this…”
Everyone waited for Rita to finish and she looked them over and laughed. “You are so transparently worried, it’s suffocating.”
“Hence the gin,” Vi agreed. “Maybe a few drinks and we won’t smother you with our love.”
“Or we actually will smother you,” Kate suggested and then added for the effect, “literally.”
As a group they groaned and Rita threw a pillow at Kate. “We are not playing the literally-figuratively game. It makes my back teeth hurt.”
“Fine,” Kate shot back, “since you’re the one who’s the queen of today.”
Rita stared, realized she got what she wanted, which was less-tender handling, and then she laughed. “Brat.”
“Wench,” Kate snapped back.
“Blue-stocking,” Rita said after almost too long of a pause.
“Proudly,” Kate countered without delay. The exchange was exhilarating, and they were laughing too hard from it. It wasn’t the barely amusing counter-play, it was the relief that the tension was starting to drain.
Rita’s humor fled and her expression crumpled. Lila patted her on the head. “It’ll hit you over and over again and then it just starts to fade some. It’s not that you don’t wish for things to be different, you just—learn to move forward.”
“I can’t imagine what it would be like to lose a child you had met,” Rita said, and another tear slipped down her cheek. “I just can’t imagine it. I loved him so much. It seemed like I could feel him in my arms, and I ached for him. It was like missing someone that I loved and suddenly, with his impending presence, I had a sense of recovery. As though that long-missed loved one was on his way. Only now—he’s not coming.”
The tears were falling fast and quick for all of them, and Vi could too easily imagine what Rita was talking about. Vi didn’t feel the need for a baby yet, but she knew that someday she’d be a mother, and there was a part of her heart reserved for the children who would come. Filling that piece of her heart only to have it emptied would be painful.
Vi didn’t know what to say, however, so she just reached out and held Rita’s hand while Lila rose and made another drink. It wasn’t, perhaps, the most healthful of ways to deal with mourning, but being there for each other was what truly mattered.
And, because they had Kate, Rita got a plate of sandwiches along with her drink and Kate’s fierce gaze pushed Rita into eating a few of the small squares.
“I declare Mrs. Meyers the favorite suspect,” Lila said after handing Rita her drink. With that, Lila put a crown over Bertha Meyers’s name on the board and said, “What was next? The heiress?”
Lila didn’t wait for the name but drew a bag of money with surprising skill and then followed it with, ‘HEIRESS’. The next thing wasn’t the usual dash followed by observations but a sketch of a mask.
Lila then wrote:
HEIRESS — We’d prefer for her not to be the killer as some of our company were heiresses themselves and chased for money. As a non-heiress, however, I suspect the spoiled machinations of a girl who expected to be wanted for her money and still no one was interested in breaching her walls.
“Lila!” Vi started and then laughed.
“You’re bad,” Kate told Lila, who grinned and bowed.
“We don’t know no one wanted her,” Rita said. “We just know that no one won her.”
Vi paused and then nodded. “Her father was determined that she not marry Jason Meyers, but any loving father would have felt the same if he knew even a smidge of what Jason was after.”
“Did she, however?” Kate asked. “It’s intoxicating to have someone want you, especially if she really hadn’t been wanted before. Didn’t Jane Austen write something to the effect that love given brought about love from the recipient?”
“It didn’t for me,” Rita muttered.
“That’s because they didn’t love you,” Vi said. “Those money-grubbers didn’t count. You succumbed pretty hard to Ham, who loved you from afar.”
“Oh,” Lila laughed, “it was so painful to see. The older man, not in the same class, desperately in love with the pretty, mischievous heiress. He was so sure you’d never love him in return.”
Rita paused and then a slow, soft smile crossed her face. “He did sort of hover protectively. It was completely intoxicating until he turned me away.” Remembered pain crossed her face and then she smiled. It seemed that being loved by Ham had healed those old wounds. “I did love how his eyes followed me.”
“So maybe the heiress, like Rita and Vi, was pursued, but recognized her pursuers for money-grubbers,” Kate suggested.
Lila shook her head. “The father was worried.”
Vi hadn’t considered that. “He must have had reason to be worried. Maybe no one had ever paid Miss Sinclair attention before, and he feared the attention would make her, I don’t know, less obedient. Or…”
“Or, she really did like him,” Lila finished. “Regardless of what her father thought.”
Vi’s eyes narrowed. “She didn’t act like a woman in love.”
“That doesn’t mean she wasn’t offended,” Rita said and then surprised them all by rising to make herself a scone. “I was offended every time a man thought that he could shoot me a smarmy grin and take me and my money for his own.”
Vi laughed. “Hear, hear.”
“Amen,” Kate muttered. She shivered and her gaze landed on Vi. They had, the both of them, been tracked and wanted by those who had simply decided to be obsessed. It had been terrifying at times. All of the sudden, Vi thought, it had been offensive as well. As though protestations and notes and someone following you were reason enough to hand yourself over to them.
“Men,” Vi muttered disgustedly.
“They’re not all bad,” Lila said. “Though I do find they all smell far more often than they should.”
Rita laughed and then sat down, putting up her feet and diving into her scone. “It’s true.”
They ate quietly for a few minutes and Vi dared to
try her chocolate cocoa despite the burn in her mouth. She slowly sipped and finished her own scone as she stared at the two names. They didn’t have nearly enough information to find anything out, but this wasn’t a true investigation so much as it was an attempt to keep Rita from descending into the grey days that Vi so often fought.
“We should lay a wager,” Vi said suddenly. “Between us, we can list out all the suspects we have, who we think did it, and we’ll put them in an envelope and when a confession is made or a conviction is achieved, we’ll open them and see who won.”
“What is the prize?” Lila demanded.
Vi shrugged, looking at the others for inspiration.
“A first edition book?” Kate suggested.
“Jewelry,” Lila said, shaking her head immediately.
“No,” Rita said, “the choosing of the location of the next trip we take.”
“Can we play?” Smith asked and Vi gasped, jumping and spilling her cocoa all over her dress.
“No,” Vi snapped. She grinned at Beatrice and then looked down, helplessly, at her dress. There was no dabbing that spill off.
“But I’ve brought you suspects to distract you.” Smith’s angel smile, for the first time, actually seemed angelic. Those dark, unfeeling eyes of his were full of emotion. He was almost gentle as he pressed his hand to Rita’s shoulder and added, “And Beatrice. I find she makes my days brighter.”
“Ahhh,” Kate cooed. “I love it. He loves you, Beatrice.”
The rest of them ignored Kate’s melting.
“Suspects?” Rita asked, looking excited even. Vi knew she liked Smith. She hadn’t realized quite how much she liked him herself until that moment.
“Some of the tepid cousins,” Smith said. He looked proud of himself, as he should have been. Vi didn’t even object when he stole her refill of the G&T and made himself a plate of nibbles.
Chapter 15
“How did you do it?” Vi hissed to Beatrice.
“He dragged me out of the house and got me to go with him to a few places before we visited the cousins. I don’t know. Smith has a way of manipulating people,” Beatrice replied. “Seeing their secrets and worries and knowing just how to tug on their threads to get them to do what he wants.”
Vi nodded, looking at Rita who seemed eager to meet the tepid grandchildren. They followed Hargreaves to the library and Rita opened the door first. The trio of grandchildren were not quite as handsome as the picture of Jason Meyers.
Tobias, the son, really did look tepid. Vi fought back her reaction at the insidious description. It colored how she was viewing him, and Vi was all too aware how utterly unfair that was to the young man. He was in his early twenties with a soft chin and a bit of extra flesh. With light blonde hair, light brown eyes, and skin nearly as pale as Vi’s and Rita’s, he looked nearly colorless in his tan suit.
His sisters were smaller, feminine versions of him. Unlike him, however, they were both fine-boned and tiny, like little pale birds.
Smith introduced them and then leaned back and waited. There was a long, awkward silence where the five women faced the three strangers, who had to know they were suspects in their cousin’s murder.
“Ah, tea,” Vi said.
“Or cocktails,” Lila added wickedly. “We’re being quite indulgent today.”
“Tea, at the least,” Kate inserted, “is on the way.”
“I wouldn’t say no to a cocktail,” one of the ladies said.
Vi’s gaze jerked to the one who had spoken. She was, perhaps, slightly more vibrant. Not in her physical coloring, but her sister was wearing a white dress and she was wearing a pale pink dress. The pale pink was well-chosen for her coloring and somehow made her eyes seem a little darker, her cheeks a little healthier, her lips a little deeper in contrast. This sister also lightly colored her lashes and brows, so she wasn’t quite so ghostly.
The lady smiled, nodded, and then added to her request for the cocktail. “I’m Jane, of course. Equally tepid is our Ann. Tobias, at least, got multiple syllables in his name.”
“Vi,” Violet replied, deliberately leaving off her own extra syllables. “So nice to meet you. Your mother told you what your grandmother said?”
“Mother doesn’t believe in sheltering us from Grandmother,” Tobias replied, sounding exhausted. “Mother says that we need to know what we’re dealing with when it comes to Grandmother and learn how to defend our hearts.”
Vi fiddled with her wedding ring and then crossed to make the cocktails. She made enough for everyone and then passed a tray around. Almost as one, Violet and Kate set theirs to the side while Lila and Rita drank deeply.
“Your mother must have been frustrated to have your cousin the favored son when he was such a rogue,” Violet said as Jane sipped her drink.
Jane’s expression didn’t try to protect her mother or grandmother. It was a mix of dislike, sarcasm, frustration, and a multitude of other feelings. “I don’t understand why Mother even cares—” She paused and then adjusted, “cared.”
“Jane—” Tobias’s plea went unheard.
“Grandmother Meyers is her mother. Our mother can’t just forget that, can she?” Ann added, and it sounded like an old argument. An old one and not a tepid one. Suddenly the colorlessness of the Watkins’s youth was ridiculous. They weren’t colorless or tepid. They were simply not Jason Meyers.
“I don’t see why not,” Jane replied.
“Because,” Ann started, scoffed, and lifted the cocktail as though it were a lifeline.
Violet leaned back and watched, hoping they’d carry on, but it seemed the movement of watching them like they were her own personal three-act play was sufficient to silence the trio.
“Smith said you think Mother may have killed Jason,” Tobias started. “That idea is ludicrous.”
“Is it?” Smith asked silkily. He was in the corner of the room, watching silently and taking notes as the rest of them interacted. “People murder each other for far less than a lifetime of never being good enough. Let alone dislike and persistent snipping about one’s children.”
Tobias met Smith’s gaze and then sighed deeply. “Do we know when Jason was murdered?”
Smith nodded. “He was killed the evening of the storm around 8:00 p.m. He was last seen by his friends, the Tappers, for dinner.”
Tobias rose, frowned deeply and then asked, “Tessa was there?”
Ann and Jane scoffed in unison in such a way that only a sister would understand.
“Do you have feelings for Miss Tapper?” Vi asked Tobias.
Tobias flushed so brilliantly red that his sisters groaned for him.
“Toby,” Ann muttered low. She shook her head and glanced at the others as if to ask, “Can you believe this?”
“So,” Rita said, “it’s love.”
“It’s not love,” Jane snapped. “Love isn’t wanting a girl who is stupid enough to be in love with Jason Meyers. It’s the admiration of her looks and her fine eyes.”
Vi grinned at Jane, catching the reference and then glanced at Kate, whose smile was as wide as her own.
“I do like you,” Kate told Jane.
It was as though they had found a like-minded soul in the other. Violet turned her attention from Jane to Tobias, whose cheeks were slowly returning to their normally pale hue.
“I didn’t meet Tessa when I visited the Tapper home,” Violet told Tobias. She made sure there was no judgement or mockery in her voice. “But I’ve been the one who loved someone and wasn’t sure of their feelings. This is what I can tell you for sure—”
He turned to her, his gaze masked.
“Mrs. Tapper despises Jason Meyers. He’s gone now. But do not just show up and expect Tessa to turn her feelings, whatever they were, to you. Her feelings are complex, I’m sure. They were lifelong friends, weren’t they?”
Tobias nodded.
“Then she’s mourning. Even if he isn’t worth mourning, she’s mourning him.”
Tobias’s hand cl
enched into a fist and Vi wanted to reach out and smack him.
“If you mock those feelings or try to talk her out of having them, well—”
“Don’t,” Lila said firmly.
Tobias nodded, but Vi wouldn’t bet her fortune on his capacity to listen.
“She’s lost her fiancé because of Jason. She’s now lost him too. Her parents aren’t going to want to support her forever,” Tobias said. The calculation in his gaze made Violet’s desires shift. She wanted to ball up her fist and knock him right in the nose.
“Oh Toby,” Jane muttered.
“She could do far worse than Toby,” Ann defended.
“You can’t just tell a girl to love you because she was dumb enough to love another and now she’s getting a bit older.” Jane finished her cocktail while also rolling her eyes at her brother. “She can’t just turn on love. It takes time, being worthy of it, and sheer compatibility. You love her?”
“You know I do,” he said with a tortured groan.
Jane didn’t seem impressed with his earnestness, but Ann reached over and patted him. “She’d be lucky to receive your love.”
“Oh,” Lila groaned. “I can’t…he did it.”
Rita laughed. “Lila!”
“Me?” Tobias asked.
“She’s been drinking,” Kate soothed, shooting Lila a scolding look.
“We were together,” Ann snapped. “When Jason died, we were together.”
Every gaze turned to Ann and she blushed.
“Do you have any witnesses?” Smith asked.
“We need them?” Ann demanded. “We have each other.”
“But you clearly all care about each other. I would lie for any of these people, except maybe Smith,” Lila said. She turned to Smith. “No offense, Smith.”
“None taken. If I need someone to lie for me, I haven’t done things as I should have.” His angelic voice made Ann blush, and her gaze lingered on his too pretty face.
“Oh my,” Lila muttered, but there was something utterly satisfying in watching Smith not react to Ann’s lascivious expression and then turn his attention to Beatrice, who rolled her eyes. “I bet that happens all the time,” Lila said dryly. “Smith, you need to scar up your face a bit.”
