Southern Harm

by Caroline Fardig

  “Then you can understand. If it was dark or rainy when it was time for her to leave, I’d give her a ride home instead of making her walk around the block. I was trying to be nice, not creepy. We all had shared privacy fences with no gates, so it’s not as if she could cut through our yards to get home. Anyway, her mother noticed us sitting in my car in front of their house once, about a week before…you know. It was totally innocent—I went for my wallet to pay her for watching my kids and realized I had no cash. I was in the middle of apologizing to Esther and explaining that I’d run home and be right back when her mother came flying out of the house, screaming at me to quit holding her daughter against her will.” He seemed to deflate right before our eyes. “Ada was so loud. That woman’s voice could wake the dead. Just my luck, that night everyone was home and heard all the yelling, so of course everyone came out to watch. I’ve never been so embarrassed in all my life. After that, you’d have thought I was a sex offender. No one seemed particularly afraid of me, but the ridiculing got so bad, my family eventually had to move.”

  Aunt Lela’s busybody neighbor, Mrs. McAlfrin, had mentioned that Esther turned the heads of every man in the neighborhood. She hadn’t named any names, but she’d definitely implied Beau wasn’t the only one with eyes for young Esther.

  I said, “I’m sorry you had to go through that.”

  Delilah picked up on his resentment and said, “Esther’s mom is a real piece of work, especially when it came to trying to protect her daughter’s virtue. In your opinion, if she’d found out Esther had been knocked up, what do you think she would have done to control the situation?”

  He huffed out a breath. “Probably killed the father.”

  “And what about her daughter? What do you think she would have done to her?”

  Donnie’s eyes practically sprang out of his head. “Oh, no. I think I know where you’re going with this, and I don’t want any part of it. I know what it’s like to feel wrongly accused—”

  Delilah interjected, “By the woman in question.”

  “Doesn’t matter. I’m not going to point the finger of blame. Ada Sinclair may have done it to me, but I’m not the kind of person to stoop to that. I don’t want to see Lela in jail for something she didn’t do, but I’m sure as heck not going to speculate about something like this. I can’t imagine a parent killing her own child.”

  Tucker hadn’t said much lately, and had backed off Donnie once he started spilling his guts. But now he brought up a good point. “What about her husband, Bert? We know very little about him. He never seems to be in the middle of the drama in any of the stories we’ve heard.”

  Donnie wrinkled his nose. “Bert was…an unusual man. Never said much. Granted, he had plenty to say when Lela set Esther’s car on fire. That was another neighborhood drama that lived in infamy. I felt for Lela. Even though her incident wasn’t a misunderstanding like mine, she still became a pariah because of it. I’m surprised she stuck around all these years.”

  Delilah wouldn’t let it go. “One more question—did you ever see Esther’s parents abuse her physically? Did she ever confide in you or your wife?”

  He flicked his eyes away. “Well, I hate to…” After a pause, he dragged his gaze up to meet ours. “Yes. They used corporal punishment, and they weren’t shy about it. But…back in the seventies and eighties, parents could spank their kids and not worry about them calling child services or worry about other people’s judgment. I admit I spanked my kids when they were young—not a lot, and of course not in a violent way, but enough that they behaved. However…I will also admit that I did witness the Sinclairs physically punishing both Esther and Ezra well into their teens. They were much too old for it, in my opinion, but I didn’t feel it was my place to judge their parenting style. They weren’t violent; they were…strict.”

  Delilah nudged me with her elbow. “So you’re saying the Sinclairs didn’t hesitate to mete out harsh punishment for their children’s sins?”

  He gave her an admonishing look. “I’ve already answered that question.”

  Shrugging, she said, “Worth a try.”

  Chapter 40

  Delilah had somehow managed to wrangle an early dinner meeting for us with both Violet Huggins and her cousin Shawna Daniels, Coralee’s housekeeper. After we checked in our new guests and tidied up the B&B, we headed to a small café to meet them.

  Violet made her signature and of course unnecessary grand entrance, this time squealing when she saw me and rushing over with her cousin Shawna in tow, bumping chairs, tables, and people as she went. She threw her arms around me and hugged me tightly, as if we were old friends. She oohed and aahed over getting to meet Delilah and gave her a bear hug as well. But when her eyes landed on Tucker, she turned into a stone-cold cougar.

  “Well, well. And who might you be?” she asked, fluttering her eyelashes.

  Tucker smiled, although it was his amused smile rather than the obligatory “how do you do.” He said, “I’m Tucker Heyward, ma’am. Quinn’s boyfriend.”

  “Oh,” Violet said with a pout.

  She’d worn another garish Christmas sweater, but this one was devoid of any blinking lights. However, it unfortunately had several dozen tiny sleigh bells sewn to it. She jingled every time she moved. She quickly introduced her cousin Shawna Daniels, who resembled her in appearance only, and minus the odd clothing choice. Shawna was quite personable.

  Undeterred by the fact that Tucker made it blatantly obvious he was taken, Violet plopped down next to him and leaned against him as she perused her menu. Delilah, of course, thought it was hilarious. I wasn’t jealous by any means, but I felt bad for how uncomfortable she was making poor Tucker. Once we put in our orders and started our conversation, though, she gave him some space. When Violet Huggins got her gossip on, she forgot about the rest of the world.

  “So you girls want to know all the dirt about Coralee, huh?” she asked, wiggling her eyebrows. She cuffed her cousin on the arm. “Tell them, Shawna.”

  Shawna smiled apologetically. “I don’t want to speak ill of my employer. The Marshalls have been so good—”

  Violet interrupted her. “Tell them about the pills and the booze and the separate beds.”

  Shawna’s cheeks reddened. “I really shouldn’t have said anything to anyone about that. It’s just that…” She sent Violet a pleading look. “I know Mrs. Marshall was awful to you in school. And at first, I resented her for that. But now that I know what she’s been through, I hate to gossip about her. Especially now.”

  I said kindly, “We know about her slipped disk and subsequent substance addiction. We’re not here to air her dirty laundry. We’re here to get to the bottom of why she felt the need to name our parents—and me—in her suicide note. It seems odd that she would use her last communication to accuse someone of murder. I would think she would have wanted that note to be more about what she was feeling prior to ending her life. Not protecting someone or settling an old score.”

  Shawna nodded sadly. “I found Mrs. Marshall in her bed. The note was next to her. I agree; I found it strange that there was not a lot of sentiment to the note. She mentioned her charity work, but not her husband. She also mentioned her two grown children, but again, only a short line saying she’d miss them. No apologies, and overall not terribly heartfelt.”

  Violet huffed, “It’s hard to be heartfelt when you don’t have a heart.”

  Delilah asked Shawna, “Did Coralee ever mention our parents to you? Or did you ever overhear her mentioning them to someone else?”

  Shawna thought for a moment, then nodded slowly. “Last week, actually. She was speaking to her friend Mrs. Sheridan. I recognized your mama’s name from the time I went with Violet for her aura cleanse. The minute they saw me enter the room, they hushed up, so I didn’t catch what they were saying.”

  I said, “Wait. Portia Sheridan was at Corale
e’s house last week?”

  “Yes. In fact, Mrs. Sheridan has come calling several times lately.”

  “Like in the past couple of weeks?”

  “Yes. She hadn’t been by for quite a while, but she more than made up for it in the past two weeks.”

  I looked at Delilah. “That’d be ever since Esther’s body surfaced.”

  D frowned at me. “Yeah, I got that.”

  “Which means she lied to us.”

  “Yeah, I got that, too.”

  I didn’t have the heart to ask my sister why she thought her new friend might have neglected to tell us the truth. I supposed there could have been many reasons, but protecting her husband would be the likely one. If there was even a whisper of suspicion that Brock had anything to do with Esther’s murder, he’d be finished in this town, and possibly the whole state of Georgia. For a man looking to become a career politician, that was a doomsday scenario. As for Portia, her lifestyle and her future would be at risk. Even if Brock had absolutely nothing to do with the whole situation, the Sheridans probably still felt the need to do damage control before it was too late.

  Delilah asked Shawna, “Can you remember anything else you might have heard relating to Esther Sinclair’s death? Anything at all?”

  Shawna sent a warning glance at Violet. “Violet Huggins, you will not repeat this. You hear me?”

  Violet leaned back and placed a hand over her heart. “You act like all I do is gossip.”

  Shawna raised her eyebrows at her cousin in response.

  Violet huffed, “Okay, fine. My lips are sealed.”

  I highly doubted that, but at least she seemed to be making an effort.

  Shawna lowered her voice. “Mrs. Marshall watched the news coverage of Esther Sinclair’s death for hours on end. She seemed…obsessed. Sometimes I’d find her pacing the floor as she watched, muttering to herself. Something about it had her spooked.”

  I nudged Delilah. “Sounds to me like she definitely knew who did it.”

  Delilah griped, “A lot of good that does us, because she’s the one person we can’t ask. Maybe her husband knows. We could try to talk to him tomorrow.”

  Tucker frowned. “At his wife’s wake?”

  “Soon-to-be-ex-wife,” Violet interjected helpfully. “He probably isn’t too torn up about her demise, right, Shawna?”

  Again, Shawna seemed wildly uncomfortable. “Mr. Marshall is a nice man. The reason they split is that the two of them simply no longer wanted to be married. There was no animosity between them, at least none that I saw. He cares that she’s gone.”

  Delilah sat back and folded her arms. “I guess we’ve heard all we need to hear. Quinn, are you good?”

  “I suppose…” I still felt like we hadn’t yet pulled the last thread that would tie everything together. We were still missing something, although I didn’t know what that something was.

  * * *

  —

  After Delilah, Tucker, and I finished our dinner and thanked Violet and Shawna, we got in his truck and went to the bar where Dennis Griffin worked. We didn’t see him, so we asked the bartender if Dennis was scheduled to come in tonight. The woman said he’d called in sick. Troubled by that, we set out for his home, which was a seventies-style ranch in a well-kept neighborhood.

  Tucker knocked on the door of the home. We waited a minute or two, and then he knocked again.

  “So much for being ‘sick,’ ” Delilah muttered. “Although I will say I think this makes him look like an excellent suspect.”

  I frowned. “Why hide now? Coralee made sure to send the police on a wild-goose chase.”

  “Which gave him ample time to pack and find a new place to stay.”

  I wasn’t buying it. There was no evidence outside that the home’s occupant wasn’t here to stay—there was a live pine Christmas wreath on the front door and nets of twinkling lights covering several of the larger shrubs in the nicely tended flowerbeds. Curtains still hung inside on the windows. Evidently Delilah wasn’t buying it, either. She left the two of us and headed around toward the back of the house.

  Tucker and I caught up with her halfway there. He demanded, “Where are you going? Tell me you’re not going to peep in his windows.”

  “There’s no crime in that.”

  His eyes bulged out. “There are multiple crimes in that.”

  She waved a hand. “If he’s not here, it won’t matter.”

  “Delilah, no,” he said, reaching out to place a hand on her arm.

  Before he was able to make contact, she took off for the backyard, calling, “Less talkie. More stalkie,” over her shoulder.

  I tried to usher Tucker toward the backyard, but he stood his ground.

  “This is a bad idea.”

  I replied, “Well, it’s a bad idea to loiter where people can see us while we have this discussion. At least let’s get to the backyard, where there’s less chance someone will notice us.”

  Tucker relented, and we headed into Dennis Griffin’s backyard. Outdoor furniture sat neatly on his patio, another sign to me that he wasn’t planning to abscond anytime soon. I spotted a couple of windows where the curtains were open. Delilah was already at one of them, peering inside. I came up next to her and took a look for myself.

  We saw a bedroom with a door leading to an attached bathroom. I assumed that meant it was the home’s master bedroom and in that case it likely belonged to Dennis. The bed was made neatly, and there were no suitcases or bags of any kind sitting out. Nothing was in any sort of disarray.

  Tucker grumbled from behind us, “Are you two done with your crime spree? I’d like to get out of here before one of the neighbors calls the cops and we get arrested.”

  Delilah gave him a good-natured punch on the arm. “Oh, lighten up, Tucker. We’re not going to get caught.”

  No sooner were the words out of her mouth than we heard a car pulling into the driveway.

  Tucker hissed, “Get down!”

  The three of us crouched to the ground and scuttled to a hiding spot along the back corner of the garage, behind a large holly tree. We heard a car door slam and the garage door closing, but we didn’t dare move. A light flipped on at the back of the house. We could see its glow coming from a smaller window, the one closest to us. I assumed that window sat over the kitchen sink.

  Delilah was fidgety next to me, and after several moments, she couldn’t stand it anymore. She broke away from our hiding spot and scampered over toward the window in question.

  Tucker whispered, “Are you nuts? Get back here!”

  Delilah shushed him and kept going.

  Tucker growled softly next to me.

  I looked up at him. “Let her do this. She’s playing sleuth. I haven’t seen her this excited in a while.”

  His jaw clenched, but he said nothing more.

  We watched with bated breath as Delilah gingerly peered into the window, only to duck down after a few seconds. She stayed put for a few moments, then inched over to the next window for some more peeping. I could feel the frustration radiating off Tucker, but I wasn’t going to make D give up her mission. After a few more minutes of ninja-like moves to get glimpses inside Dennis’s home, she finally gave it up and tiptoed back over to our hiding spot.

  She huffed, “Looks like he wasn’t doing anything more dastardly than going to the pharmacy for a prescription. I saw the telltale white bag on his kitchen table, and now he’s making himself some soup. He actually is sick.”

  Tucker said, “That’s our cue to get the heck out of here.”

  Chapter 41

  Back at the B&B, Delilah and I took turns between baking our mountain of scones for Coralee’s wake tomorrow and reading and re-reading her case notes until we gave ourselves headaches.

  I took off my glasses and rubbed my eyes. “I don’t k
now what to think, D. I don’t want to believe Brock Sheridan killed Esther. I don’t want to believe Dennis Griffin killed her, either.”

  “Or her own parents. Don’t forget about her parents.”

  I screwed up my face in concentration. “I guess we should probably answer the question of who Coralee would most feel the need to protect. Would she go the extra mile to protect Esther’s folks? I’m thinking not. And furthermore, why would she protect anyone who killed one of her best friends?”

  Delilah tapped a pen against her pursed lips. “Unless…they weren’t friends anymore?”

  “Why do you think that?”

  “Ezra said Esther pulled back from her friends during that last week she was alive…What if it was because of a falling out rather than the fact that she was choosing to spend time with Griffin over them?”

  I shook my head. “That doesn’t track because the Magnolias went as a unit to the grad parties.”

  “Oh, yeah.” Still not willing to let that go, she added, “What if it was for show?”

  “Why would they stick together ‘for show’ after graduation? Their reign as the queens of Reynolds High was over. If their friendship had indeed deteriorated…why would it matter at that point? They were all set to go their separate ways, so why bother with a charade?”

  “Hmm…” was her response. She had something in her craw, but I didn’t think even she knew what it was.

  “Maybe we should sleep on it. Maybe tomorrow everything will make sense.”

  “I think I’ll see if Uncle Frank is around.”

  I pasted on a smile and kept my opinion that she’d be wasting her time to myself. “Go ahead. I’ll finish up here.”

  * * *

  —

  The next morning, we used some of the several dozen scones we’d baked last night for breakfast, plus we quickly whipped up some other dishes to go with them. I hoped this would be one of our last days of having to cheat at breakfast for the sake of the case. I was more than ready to have my normal life back.