Framed!

by Robin Caroll

  “Max!”

  He pulled on jeans and a sweater from a stack on the floor before trudging down the stairs in his bare feet. “I’m coming, Mom.”

  “Breakfast is ready.”

  As if he couldn’t tell by the hickory scent of the bacon and strong aroma of the coffee. He slouched into the kitchen and dropped into a chair. The kitchen was back in order. His mother’s doing, of course. She might not have any taste in decor, but Lenore Pershing couldn’t stand disorder.

  She sat a plate in front of him, precisely between the cup of coffee and glass of concentrated orange juice. One hundred percent predictable. “I still can’t believe Bradford would think you had anything to do with the murder of that hapless playboy.” She passed him the salt and pepper.

  Digging right in before his first sip of coffee—he hated to be right on target all the time. Of course, where his mother was concerned, it wasn’t exactly rocket science. “I guess he’s just doing his job.”

  “His job?” She huffed.

  “The FBI is probably directing him.” For a moment, Max felt sorry for the sheriff. He and Lenore went way back—back to when Lenore’s husband, Max’s father, ran off and divorced her decades ago—and the sheriff always seemed to be sweet on her. Sometimes to the point where Max wondered if they’d had a special relationship when he was younger and not so observant.

  “Well, he should be man enough to stand up to them. He lives here. He’s known you since you were a child. There’s no way he can believe you’d be involved.”

  The bacon was too done. Crisp wasn’t the way Max liked it. He swallowed hard, the hickory-flavored edges scraping against his throat. “I don’t know, Mom. All I know is I’m innocent and I think I’m being framed.”

  “Framed?” She set her coffee cup on the table with a thump. The brown liquid sloshed over the rim. “How on earth are you being framed?”

  “Someone put that medallion in Dylan’s pocket. Why else would they do that except to implicate me?”

  “Why?”

  He shook his head. “I haven’t a clue, except to make me look like a murderer. Maybe because it’s a well-known fact that the Pershings and Renaults don’t get along.”

  His mother’s face paled. “Who would do such a thing?”

  “I don’t know, but I aim to find out.” He swigged the orange juice, washing out the taste of the charred toast. Poor Lenore, she’d never been much of a cook.

  Her face brightened. “It had to be Ava.”

  He choked on the juice and coughed. Max swallowed, coughed again then took a sip of the coffee. “Ava? Are you serious?”

  “Why not? She’s the one who went running to the police about the medallion being yours in the first place. Why wouldn’t she set you up?” She wiped imaginary crumbs from the place mat in front of her. “Think about it…maybe she had this all planned for some time. Didn’t you say she’s now taking over the Renault Corporation?”

  He needed a map to keep up with her train of thought. “What’s that have to do with anything?”

  “What if she wanted control of the corporation and couldn’t get it with Dylan around?” Lenore creased her nose. “Maybe she killed Dylan, realized what she’d done, panicked, and needed someone to set up for the crime.”

  “But me?” And Ava would no more kill her brother than, well, he would.

  “Of course, you. Y’all had recently begun working together on the pageant committee and were talking again. She was getting back in your good graces. Had it all planned so you wouldn’t suspect her.” Lenore stood and carried her cup to the sink. “It makes perfect sense. I told you she was trying to get her hooks back into you. Here’s why.”

  As strange and deranged as it sounded, he could almost follow her logic. Maybe Ava had orchestrated everything—their being on the committee together, getting their relationship on a more friendly footing…yeah, he could see that. But to have killed her brother? No way, no how.

  “I think you’re way off base, Mom. Ava wouldn’t kill her brother.”

  “You’d be surprised what people will do, Maximilion.”

  “For what possible reason?”

  “Greed. Money. Power.” Lenore grabbed her purse from the counter. “She is, after all, Charla’s daughter. Who knows what poison that woman’s infected her children with.”

  Max set his dishes in the sink and faced his mother. “Ava’s not like that.”

  Lenore smiled but looked sad. “You’re still remembering the young woman you fell in love with back in high school, son. Back before Charla taught her the wicked ways of the world.” She shook her head. “Don’t fall for it. You’d be a fool not to remember how she just wrote you off without even so much as an explanation.”

  Ava had avoided him up until last month.

  The week before Dylan had been murdered.

  His mother stood on tiptoe and planted a kiss on his jaw. “I have some errands to do in town, but I’ll have a cleaning service here by this afternoon to put your place back in order.”

  “Thank you.”

  She moved toward the door, then paused. “Are you going to church with me in the morning?”

  He let out a dry laugh. “Mom, I haven’t gone to church with you in years. Why do you keep asking?”

  “Because I refuse to give up on your eternal salvation.”

  “You don’t get anything out of the service. You only go to catch up on gossip and see who’s wearing what.”

  “What a tacky thing to say.” But she smiled as she let herself out.

  Max ran water over the dishes and placed them in the dishwasher. His thoughts raced in twenty different directions.

  Ava.

  Could she have set him up? It was still too much for him to swallow that she killed her own brother, but maybe once the deed had been done, she saw her opportunity. No, that wasn’t Ava.

  Yet she’d rushed in and taken over the corporation, even though she hadn’t a clue about the investment business or how to run the family empire. And she’d sure jumped on his offer to help her. Could his mother be right? Could Ava be so like her mother?

  No, she was kind and gentle. A delicate rose amid a family of thorns. The meaning of the medallion she’d given him. They were two roses in the midst of their thorny families. Or was he the only rose and Ava had become the thorn in his side? The thorn that wanted to see him put away for a murder he didn’t commit.

  TEN

  Good, both his car and truck were here. That meant Max was home.

  Ava took a long breath, curtailing her anxiety, fear and anger all rolled into a tight ball in the center of her stomach. She needed to curb her emotions and be rational.

  As if she’d ever been able to string coherent thoughts together around Max. He had a knee-weakening effect on her, just by being in close proximity. Which was one of the reasons she’d avoided him when he returned to Loomis from LSU. After her mother and Dylan told her about some business deals in which the Pershings got clients to invest in real estate instead of with the Renault Corporation, Ava promised her parents she’d steer clear of Max.

  And then there was the secret of her past.

  But now…she had no other choice but to confront him.

  Lord, I could really use some divine wisdom and guidance right about now.

  She tucked the newspaper under her arm and rang the doorbell. Her heart rose into her throat.

  The door swung open, and Max filled the doorway. Filled the doorway with his over-six-foot frame. His wide shoulders. His dark, wavy hair still damp from the shower. His jeans and sweater. Okay, he filled the doorway, and her senses, with a grabbing reality. No man should look so good first thing on a Saturday morning.

  “Ava.” He ground out her name, as if it hurt to pronounce it.

  The speech she’d mentally prepared on the drive over flew right out of her head. She slapped the newspaper against his chest. “I want an explanation.”

  Pain flickered in his eyes, followed immediately by anger, a
n emotion she wasn’t used to seeing from him. “I’d like one as well. Actually, I think I’m entitled to one.”

  “You? An explanation for what, pray tell?”

  He motioned her inside, glancing over her shoulder. “I’d rather not have this discussion on my front doorstep, if you don’t mind.”

  She stomped into his condo and immediately wished she hadn’t. Never had she been in Max’s private space before. The entire area seemed to swallow her in Max’s pure essence. The smell of his cologne. The art an extension of his good taste, which was in direct contrast to the gaudiness of the building’s exterior. The plush carpet that seemed to wrap around her feet. She wanted to kick off her flats and bury her toes in the lushness.

  Moving from the foyer, she spied the living room. A warm, brown leather couch and recliner faced a fireplace with a mounted television over the mantel. But the mess—things thrown everywhere as if he’d been searching for something in a great hurry.

  “Excuse the mess. The Loomis parish sheriff’s office helped me with some redecorating last night.” Max’s tone was pure sarcasm. What was he talking about?

  “Come on into the kitchen. Coffee’s still hot.” He moved around her, leading the way.

  She studied his back as he walked, his muscles rippling under his thin sweater. Suddenly, even the thought of coffee made her stomach recoil.

  He poured coffee, then turned to her. “Still add a little coffee to your sugar and milk?”

  She nodded, touched that he remembered after all these years, and took a seat at the dinette table tucked into the bay window alcove. Max had a nice home. Her heart thudded. At one time, she’d planned to have a home with Max.

  He set a steaming cup in front of her before taking a seat across the table, then opened the newspaper. His eyes darted back and forth for a few seconds. He set the paper down with a sigh. “I’m sure you know exactly what evidence they’ve recovered.”

  “The necklace.” Her throat threatened to close.

  “Yes. The one you told them was mine.”

  “It is yours, Max. I gave it to you the night…”

  “The night you left. The night you swore to wait on me.”

  Regret filled her chest, and she broke eye contact to stare into her cup. She took in a steadying breath before looking back at him. “Yes. That’s the night I gave it to you. What I’d like to know is how it got in my brother’s pocket the day he was murdered.”

  “I’d like to know the same thing.”

  She stared into his eyes, searching for confirmation of the truth, detection of falsehood, anything. Nothing jumped out at her. How could she have known every nuance of his face so well fifteen years ago and not be able to tell if he was lying now? “If you don’t know how it got there, try telling me why you kept it.”

  “Because you gave it to me. It was proof that you loved me.” His gaze slid to the floor as his voice cracked.

  Guilt held her voice hostage. She could only stare back at him with pain thrumming through her veins.

  “Let me ask you this, Ava—why did you take it to the sheriff before talking to me about it?”

  Her voice cracked, but at least she could speak. “I saw it when the deputy brought by Dylan’s personal belongings. I was shocked, to say the least, to see it again. Touch it. Naturally, the deputy picked up on my reaction and questioned me.” He thought she’d found it on her own and run to the sheriff? Could he really think her so low?

  “So, you didn’t mean to point the finger at me?”

  “Of course not.” Then again, this was a murder investigation they were talking about. Her brother’s murder. “I would’ve told them anyway, but I probably would’ve asked you about it first.” At least she thought she would have.

  Relief flitted across his face. “Can I ask you something else?”

  “Yes.” Unless it was about the past.

  “Why did you want to take over the Renault Corporation?”

  “I refuse to let the company that was my grandfather’s, that Dylan put so much time and energy into building, just die. I owe it to their memories to keep it going.” And if Dylan had an heir, to protect the company for her. “Why did you offer to help me?”

  He paused and took a long sip of his coffee. She waited, wondering if he was delaying to think up an excuse.

  “Honestly?”

  “Yes. I want the truth.”

  “Because I could be close to you.”

  Ouch. That one hit her smack in the face. “Oh.” What more could she say to that?

  In an instant, his hands were over hers. “Ava, there are some things in our past we need to discuss, but you need to know this—I didn’t kill your brother. I wasn’t involved with his murder in any way, shape or form.” He squeezed her hands before withdrawing his own. “And it really hurts that you could even think, for one second, that I could’ve done this.”

  She felt lower than the scum sitting on the swamp. Her heart had told her he couldn’t be involved, yet the evidence…“What about you not having an alibi for the time of the murder?”

  “I went out to look at some property, meeting an appraiser. He didn’t show. I didn’t want it to be a total waste of my time so I had a look around.”

  “What about that meeting with Dylan the week before his murder? Come on, Max. You have to admit it doesn’t even sound right.” Please, please have a logical answer. One she could believe and cling to.

  He nodded. “I don’t know why he asked for my opinion. Maybe because he knew I wouldn’t tell anyone. I don’t know. I wish I’d never met with him. But I did, and I’m telling the truth about what we discussed. That’s all I know.”

  “So how do you explain the medallion being in his pants pocket?”

  “I think I’m being framed.”

  “Framed?” Ava’s eyes widened more than his mother’s had. The difference being, Max was held spellbound by the honest beauty in Ava’s face. “Why would you think that?”

  “It’s the only logical explanation for how the medallion got in Dylan’s pocket.” And he truly hoped Ava wasn’t involved in setting him up. Now that he knew about the deputy being there when she saw and identified the medallion, her motive for taking over at the Renault Corporation…well, he could see her total innocence.

  “But how? Who?”

  “I don’t know who, and I don’t exactly know how. But someone took that medallion and planted it in Dylan’s pocket. That person had to be the murderer.”

  “You don’t think someone gave it to Dylan before he even showed up there? He could’ve gotten it early that morning and slipped it into his pants pocket.”

  She had a point. He pushed aside his cup. “I never considered that. But still, if I’m being framed, someone had to know Dylan was going to be murdered to give him the medallion.”

  “But that could mean you aren’t being framed. That it’s just bad timing.” Sincerity cloaked her features. Those amazing Renault eyes.

  “Then how can you explain away someone even having my medallion?”

  “Where was the last place you know you had it?”

  “At Clancy’s Gym, about a month ago. I’d been playing racquetball and the chain broke. After my shower, I took it and put it in my car console so I could get to the jeweler’s and get another chain if that one couldn’t be repaired.”

  “And did you take it to the jeweler’s?”

  He shook his head, trying to remember. “By the time I got out of the gym, it was late. The jeweler was closed. I left it in my car’s console.”

  “Did you take it maybe the next day?”

  “No. I’ve been driving my truck.” He flashed her a sheepish grin. “I don’t like taking the car out in cold and nasty weather.”

  She grinned. “I can imagine.” The smile slid from her face. “Is it possible that maybe the necklace didn’t make it into your car at all? Maybe you dropped it as you were getting in?”

  “I saw it. I remember the end of the chain almost caught on the gear
shift.”

  “But did you see the medallion, not the chain, once you put it in the car? Maybe the charm fell off and someone picked it up.”

  He closed his eyes, fighting to recall that particular evening. “I’d lost the game, I remember that. The chain somehow broke and it slid to the floor.” He concentrated harder. “I picked it up and the medallion was still on the chain. I went into the locker room and put it on the shelf by my wallet.”

  “Who were you playing with?”

  Max stared at her. “I’ve tried to remember, but can’t. I plan on calling my regular guys on Monday to see if any of them remember.”

  “Okay. So you put it in your locker.”

  “Right.” He focused again. “I got dressed and grabbed my wallet and the chain and my keys.”

  “Was the medallion on the chain then?”

  He paused, trying to picture the moment. He recalled putting his wallet into the pocket of his jeans. Could feel the cold of the keys against his palm. Could feel the weight of the chain in his hand. But was the medallion there?

  “I can’t remember.”

  “Okay, let’s just say it was. What did you do next?”

  “I headed out to my car.” But stopped. “Wait. I stopped at the front desk to check the reservation of the court for later in that week.”

  “Did you set the necklace down?”

  Had he? He knew he’d used a finger to glance at the appointment book, but was the chain in his hand? “I don’t know.”

  “Let’s say you didn’t for the sake of argument. What’d you do then?” Ava leaned her elbows on the table.

  “I went out to my car and put the necklace in the console. The end of the chain almost got caught on the gearshift, I remember that, so I had to make sure it was in the console.”

  “And you don’t remember if the medallion was on there?”

  Why could he see the chain so clearly in his mind, but not the medallion?

  “I don’t.”

  “And did you see the necklace again after that?”