Deadly Patterns

by Melissa Bourbon

  Will was suddenly right beside me, his hand on my lower back. “Cassidy,” he said softly, “you sure you want to go up there after what happened yesterday?”

  “I’m not going onto the widow’s walk. I’ll never trust another railing,” I said lightly, trying to make it sound like a joke. But it came off tinged with fear, and I wondered how much truth was behind the words.

  As I blinked, I suddenly saw myself on the widow’s walk again, and then I was falling, falling, falling. I stopped for a second in alarm and put my hand on Will’s arm, looking up into his smoky blue eyes. “Would you check the railing on my porch? Make sure it’s not going to split in two like the one here?” There were steps leading up to it and it wasn’t high off the ground, but I was spooked.

  He laid his hand on mine and squeezed. “No problem.”

  At the landing, I led Gracie and Will to the bathroom with the claw-foot tub. Behind the door I pointed out the silk dressing gown. Gracie brushed her fingers over the skirt, closing her eyes. I’d done the same thing, wanting to isolate just my sense of touch as I felt the quality of the fabric. She angled her head slightly, a strand of her dark hair tumbling down her forehead. I watched her, amazed at how attuned she was to the fabric. Her eyelids fluttered as if she could absorb the history of the garment just by touching it. “I can almost see who wore this,” she said softly.

  Will nosed around the bathroom, finally gesturing to me that he was going to wait in the hallway.

  “Did it belong to the woman who owned the house?” Gracie asked as he started to leave. Her question made him stop.

  “Which owner? There have been a few.”

  “There have? I thought Justin Kincaid won the deed to the house in a poker game,” I said.

  Will leaned against the doorjamb, hands in his jeans pockets. “Right. So there was Vanetta and Justin Kincaid, but before that was Pearl and Charles Denison. They were the first owners. Far as I remember, the Kincaids let Jeb James’s grandmother live here for a spell. The senator lived with her as a boy. Or so the story goes.”

  I stared at Will. I’d been in this house a handful of times, most often with Zinnia James, and she’d never mentioned that her husband had lived here as a child. More secrets. It seemed I uncovered one everywhere I turned. Bliss was bursting with them.

  Gracie’s fingers tightened on the silk skirt. “This dressing gown belonged to Pearl,” she said. “I’m sure of it. She was the first owner, right? So it has to be hers. I can almost picture her in it,” she added, her eyes fluttering closed, a slight smile curving her lips.

  Sweet Gracie. She was a sixteen-year-old romantic at heart. We went on to look in each room, marveling at the attention to detail. “Barnett Restoration did a great job,” I said. From the ceiling molding to the windowsills to the hand-scraped wood floors, the house had been brought back to the glory it had known when it was first built.

  I paused at the staircase, drawing in a deep breath and bracing myself for the pain of descending. “Before we go, I want to check out the runway in the tent,” I said.

  Gracie pointed to the door at the end of the hallway. “Is that the widow’s walk?”

  As I nodded, Will bypassed the staircase and went for the door, Gracie on his heels. “Since we’re here, I wanna see this railing,” he said in what I imagined was his official architect voice.

  I followed him. “No, let’s go see the runway,” I said, but he was already turning the glass doorknob. Pulling the door open. Stepping out.

  I reached my arms out to stop him. “Will—”

  A woman screamed.

  Gracie screamed.

  I clapped my hand to my chest. And screamed.

  A dark-haired woman gaped at us from the center of the widow’s walk.

  She screamed again, her arms airplaned, and she was suddenly off balance.

  “No!” I yelled, reaching for her from where I stood, still inside the doorway. Will lunged, blocking me, and the next second, he was hauling her inside by her limp arms.

  She crumpled to the floor in a heap, her brown skirt settling around her legs. I crouched by her side, my heart still in my throat, as much from nearly reliving my fall from yesterday as because of this woman’s near miss. “Are you okay?”

  She gasped for air, her hand against her chest. “I—I’m—I think so.” Her gaze skittered from me to Will to Gracie and back to me. “You s-scared the livin’ daylights out of me,” she said, her heavy accent making each vowel sound extend into two syllables instead of just one.

  “You scared us!” Gracie said, her voice jittery. “Who are you? What were you doing out there?”

  I wanted to know the very same things, but I’d planned to be more tactful about asking. Leave it to a teenage girl to cut to the chase.

  “I—I was just . . . that is, I . . .” She paused, her eyes wide, looking like a deer in the headlights. She hemmed and hawed before her shoulders finally sagged and she said, “I needed to see . . . to see . . . where he died.”

  We all stared at her, and suddenly I recognized her. She had the same rosy cheeks as Hattie, and their hair was nearly the same Miranda Lambert–blond. The biggest differences were this woman’s Marilyn Monroe shape and her dowdy clothes. This had to be Raylene Lewis, Hattie’s sister and the ex-wife of Dan Lee.

  Will crouched next to her, holding her hand. “Are you . . .”

  She placed a trembling hand against her plump chest and I had a sudden vision of her in a cheongsam, an embroidered brocade fabric making the traditional Chinese gown interesting, and a body-skimming fit reminiscent of a sheath dress. I’d never made anything like a cheongsam, but I couldn’t shake that it was the dress for this woman. Maybe it was her curves. “Raylene Lewis,” she said. “Dan . . . he was . . . was my . . . my—”

  “Ex-husband,” I finished for her.

  She gulped down her tears, nodding her head. As she brushed her hair away from her face, I registered her red-rimmed eyes and her sunken cheeks. My heart went out to her. Even if a divorce was ugly, death was worse. The man she’d created a child with and had once loved was gone.

  She looked at me, a hint of recognition flickering over her. “H-Harlow? Harlow Jane Cassidy?”

  “It’s good to see you, Raylene,” I said. Bliss was a small town and I’d been back for a good many months now, but there were plenty of people from my childhood I hadn’t yet reconnected with.

  “I heard you were back.” Her eyes glazed over as she spoke, and I could feel her pain.

  “I’m so sorry about your . . . your . . . about Dan Lee,” I said, knowing that none of my words would ease her pain.

  She spread her arms wide, gesturing to the house at large. “H-he was obsessed with this place. He wore Arnie down until he finally let him work on the renovations.” She chattered on, her words carried on her grief-filled, nervous energy. “We used to t-talk about buying this house and turning it into a bed-and-breakfast. He researched some of the best bed-and-breakfasts in Texas, and I knew I could do better than those. I’ve always wanted to have a little gift shop with homemade j-jams, pickled okra, and canned peaches.” She stopped, her gaze jumping around. “I can just see this place decorated up for holiday teas. Petit fours, cucumber sandwiches, and cranberry white chocolate scones. But now? He went crazy. Do you know that?” Her voice took on an angry edge and sounded laced with venom. “Off the turnip truck, and I don’t know what to do.”

  Her rambling faded and she sniffled, running the back of her fisted hand under her nose. She buried her face in her hands, sobbing. “I may n-never . . . never . . .”

  She broke down sobbing again.

  “I’m awfully sorry, Raylene.” I took her hand and helped her up, leading her away from the door. My shoulder blades unclenched as we moved farther away from the widow’s walk. We stopped at the top of the stairs just as the front door slammed and someone sprinted up the steps. “I heard a scream all the way outside!”

  Hattie. She skidded to a stop as she saw us and p
ut her hand on Raylene’s shoulder. “Baby, are you okay?”

  Will met my gaze for a second, to make sure I could handle Raylene and her grief, I think. I gave him a quick nod and he moved back onto the widow’s walk. Raylene watched him, her red-rimmed eyes wide, before turning to her sister. “No. I’m n-not even close to bein’ okay.”

  Hattie gave her a sympathetic hug. “I know. I’m so sorry, Ray.” She gave her sister another squeeze, pulling her even closer. “I told you yesterday, Harlow. Dan Lee put Ray through hell, and now that lyin’, cheatin’—”

  “Hattie!” Raylene jerked free of Hattie’s hug.

  “It’s true!”

  “Okay, but we don’t gotta air all our dirty laundry,” she said tersely.

  “But everythin’ has changed,” Hattie said. “He—”

  “Stop,” Raylene said, and this time she grabbed Hattie’s arm.

  “But—”

  Raylene squeezed, and Hattie jerked her arm free. Raylene started for the stairs, but Hattie’s frown deepened. “That banister was the last thing on Arnie’s list of repairs. If only he’d gotten to it before Dan Lee went out there.”

  “But he didn’t,” Raylene said.

  “It was an accident,” Hattie said, but her cheeks had gone pale.

  Not according to the sheriff and deputy, I thought grimly, my aching body reminding me that I might well be the innocent victim of a sinister crime. “The sheriff isn’t so sure,” I said. I didn’t want to say too much, but I figured it wasn’t a huge secret at this point.

  “Arnie tightened all those screws three times. Three times,” Hattie said with emphasis. “He was going to change ’em out, but he said it would hold fine till he got to it.” She paused, as if she were imagining the scene in her mind. “Oh Lord, Arnie’s fingerprints are all over this place. What if the sheriff thinks . . . ?”

  She heaved, falling forward and resting her hands on her knees as she caught her breath. A second later, she looked up, pushing strands of her ash blond hair away from where they’d fallen in her eyes. “What if they think it’s his fault?” she asked, her voice barely more than a whisper.

  “They won’t, Hattie,” I said, but they felt like empty words because I knew they were thinking Raylene had something to gain if Dan Lee wasn’t around anymore. People I knew from high school days couldn’t be murderers. The very idea sent my stomach reeling. I didn’t trust Gavin’s detective skills for a second. He wanted an open-and-shut case, no matter who he pinned to the wall.

  Hattie’s eyes welled with tears. “Can you imagine? If our kids hear people think their dad killed Santa Claus—not that he didn’t deserve it, the son of a bitch, but still—”

  Raylene grabbed her wrist and gave it a shake. “Hattie, get a grip! Arnie didn’t kill Santa Claus. It was an accident.”

  “But what if it wadn’t?” she said in her heavy drawl, dropping the “s,” as so many Southerners do. “Think about it. Things come in threes. Bliss has had two murders this year. First there was that bridesmaid that done got herself killed. Then the golf pro. And now this. You know what small towns are like.” She looked at me. “You were there at each one—” Her eyes narrowed and she backed away.

  My head had started to pound again. I could practically see what Hattie was thinking. It would be the same thing half of Bliss would ponder when they found out I was at the scene of another death. Either I was cursed . . . or I was involved.

  Maybe both.

  There was nothing to do but pretend I didn’t see the doubt and suspicion on her face. “Hattie,” I said, “are you sure Arnie tightened the bolts?” Maybe it was an accident after all.

  She nodded. “Positive.” Her forehead puckered. “We came to do a few last-minute chores the other night. I—I came up to the widow’s walk to look at the Christmas lights. It’s got a great view of the square. The railing was a little loose, so I called him up there. He tightened them right in front of me, said they’d hold till he could switch ’em out, and that was it!”

  After a few seconds, Raylene raised her gaze to me. “I’m awfully sorry for your loss,” I said, squeezing her hand. I’d lost Meemaw not that long ago, and the fact that her spirit hung around the old farmhouse didn’t wipe away the empty feeling of knowing I would never see her again.

  Will came back inside, slowly closing the door behind him, cutting short any more offerings of comfort. His face was grim as he met my gaze and flicked his eyes to the side. I got the message. He wanted to talk to me—privately.

  “If I can do anything to help, you just let me know,” I said, my heart going out to Raylene. “I’ll be right back, y’all.” Gracie, Hattie, and Raylene headed downstairs, a stark contrast to one another. Gracie held her head up high, her graceful neck and easy posture making me think of a model on a runway. Hattie had pushed away her worries about her husband being targeted for the loose screws and stood straight, shoulders back and chin up. She seemed to know that Raylene needed her, and she held her sister by the arm, walking by her side with each and every step. And then there was Raylene, bless her heart. Her shoulders slumped and her legs looked like they’d buckle any second.

  “Harlow.”

  The sharpness in Will’s tone, not to mention the fact that he’d used my given name instead of my last name, made me turn away from the stairs and hurry over to him. “What’s wrong?” I said, but from the hard line of his lips and the darkness in his eyes, I almost didn’t want to know the answer. I backed away, waving my hands in front of me, fingers spread. “Oh no . . .”

  “I’m pretty sure Hoss and Gavin are right. That railing didn’t just give,” he said, his voice low.

  “What are you saying, Will Flores?” I heard my mother’s voice coming out of my mouth, with her Southern indignation and her use of a person’s first and last names. I gathered up my gumption, not daring to believe he could be saying what I feared he was saying, but I jammed my hands on my hips and looked him straight in the eyes. “It had to have been an accident!”

  His look told me he felt sure it wasn’t.

  I gave it one last-ditch effort. “Will, it’s an old house.”

  “I want to show you something,” he said, and he took me by the arm, steering me back to the widow’s walk.

  I shook my arm loose, but followed him out onto the porch, stepping slowly and gingerly, and steering clear of the edge. He pointed to the bracket that had attached the railing to the house. It barely hung on by two loose screws.

  “What about it?” I said, hoping against hope that the screws had pulled out of the wall from the force of Dan Lee’s fall against the railing.

  As Will crouched down, pointing, my nerves tingled from being in the exact same spot I’d been in the day before when I’d fallen. My bravado evaporated into the wintery afternoon, and I clamped my hand down on his shoulder as I moved behind him.

  He tilted his head back to look up at me. “You okay, Cassidy?”

  “Yup,” I said, realizing that my hand had tightened, the cloth of his shirt clenched between my fingers. I released it, smoothing the wrinkles out of the fabric. “What are we looking at?”

  “The heads of the screws.” He pointed. “Look.”

  They looked like ordinary screws to me, and I told him so.

  “Uh-uh. The head of that one,” he said, pointing to the one on the right, “is ground down.”

  To see any better, I’d have to come around to Will’s side, closer to the gaping hole where a railing used to be. Which wasn’t going to happen. Instead, I stayed behind him, putting both my hands on his shoulders. As I leaned down over him, the same warmth I felt whenever Meemaw was near seeped into me. “What are you saying, Will?”

  I felt his body tense, as much from the question as from me being so close to him. The warmth evaporated, replaced by a cold chill. I stepped back, away from the edge of the porch, away from him, away from the loose bracket. I knew what he was going to say.

  “I mean,” he said, standing up, “that this was no
accident, and from the way the railing was ripped out with such force, I’d say you’re right. Someone pushed Dan Lee Chrisson to his death.”

  Chapter 7

  My friend Josie was perched on the stool in the workroom of Buttons & Bows, her golden olive skin glowing, her walnut hair shimmery. A pint of Ben & Jerry’s ice cream sat on the cutting table next to her. She stared at me, wide-eyed. “Murdered?”

  I dusted the windowsill, waving my duster at the goats lined up at the fence line between my property and my grandparents’ goat farm. Not that they could see this far, but somehow I got the impression that they knew I could see them. “Hoss and Gavin seem to think so,” I answered, “and Will is convinced that the railing was tampered with.”

  “Well,” she said, “if Will’s convinced.”

  We were long past junior high, so I ignored the teasing and continued. “Hoss said there were no fingerprints on the doorknob to the widow’s walk, which is strange. Not even Dan Lee’s were there, and they should have been.”

  She licked a spoonful of ice cream, waiting. “So?” she finally asked.

  “So,” I said, putting the duster in the corner and picking up a piece of fabric and a thick metal washer, “there should have been fingerprints. Dan Lee’s, definitely. Hattie said she’d been out there to look at Christmas lights a few nights back, so hers should have been there. It was wiped clean.”

  “Poor Raylene,” she said, resting her hand on her belly. “I can’t imagine what she’s going through. I might be big as a house, but Nate would never up and leave me and his child.”

  I scolded her with a wave of my hand. “You’re not big as a house,” I said.

  “Um, yes I am, and I’m not going to be in the fashion show.”

  I dropped the heavy washer I’d been turning into a fabric-covered pattern weight and stared at her. “Josie Sandoval Kincaid, what did you just say?”

  “Look at me, Harlow!” She turned, propping her elbows on the cutting table, dropping her head into her hands. “A fashion show? Nothing will look even halfway decent on me.”