Nan laughed. “She is, but only when it comes to everyone else. Never about herself.”
“I guess that makes sense. But Vaughn never mentioned it either.”
“He probably didn’t want you to get the wrong idea or think he was interested in her.”
“I suppose.” That explanation suited her best, and she decided to believe it. It was a hot day at the pool, and she leaned back in her chair, contemplating a quick swim. A handful of teen-age girls were in the pool now, and some moms chasing small children at the shallow end. “You grew up here, Nan. Do you think I’ll ever really fit in?”
“I think people fit in wherever they decide they want to.”
“Just as easy as that, is it?”
Nan pushed down her sunglasses, giving Bexley a stern look. “Actually, it is. Now enough with your insecure bullshit, okay? Look at you. You’re beautiful. Your hair is just the right shade of brown, not mousy-looking, but rich, like chocolate, with those beautiful highlights when the sun hits it and that little curl at the ends that keeps it looking like you just stepped out of the salon.” She finished her appraisal, looking Bexley over like a mother about to send her daughter off on a date. “And those eyes of yours. Man. I don’t think I’ve ever seen such a deep shade of blue. You have no idea how much I’d like to trade your blue eyes for my brown ones. And you’ve got the lashes too. Hell, you don’t even have to wear mascara.”
“Okay, Nan. That’s enough confidence-building for one day. I get it. I should be thankful for what I have and stop comparing myself to everyone else.”
Nan grinned. “Just like our days at college, isn’t it?”
Bexley laughed, remembering all those days at Baylor with the parties and the boyfriends and the late nights talking, wondering how they’d ever stay awake through class when they were dozing off just as the sun came up. Nan always the one to take charge, steering Bexley in the right direction, and away from any boy she deemed unworthy. They sat there quietly for a minute, sipping on ice water and listening to the squeals of children in the pool, the far-off hum of a lawn mower on the golf course, and the idle chatter of the three-peas-in-a-pod. “It’s a real shame,” Bexley finally said. “About Annie Dodson. I hope they find who killed her.”
Chapter Five
Hannah Ransom walked alone on Kercheval, making the turn onto Country Club Drive. It was 1:56 a.m., and she was stoned, listening to Fetty Wap through her earbuds, singing along as best she could. Josh Rycroft had gotten some killer weed, and he and his buddies had suggested an orgy. She and Charlotte McKibbens, her BFF, had laughed, giggling about how the young men would be beating their chests about banging the hottest women in town for the rest of their lives. “We’re going down in history,” she’d said. “These guys will be eighty years old and still talking about this night as part of their glory days.”
Charlotte was still there, giving Darren Crane a blow job. Plus, Sophie Durning and Emma Elkins had shown up with Gabe Ashcroft and Stephen Yee, and a bottle of apple schnapps. The schnapps was half gone when they got there, and they started up a game of strip poker while they passed the bottle around the basement of the old Hubbard mansion.
Abandoned since the nineties and scheduled to be torn down and divided into lots for a new condo development, the Hubbard mansion had been giving Grosse Pointers something to tell ghost stories about for decades. Rumor had it the Hubbard place was home to the ghosts of long-dead family members. A mom and four kids had been murdered there back in 1899. Hacked to death with an ax by the father one night while stinking drunk, after he’d gotten it into his head that his wife was in love with another man.
Only the eldest child had been spared. Eight years old at the time, she’d hidden behind the stairs and had been the sole witness at her father’s trial. Family tragedy had followed ever since, until finally, the last surviving descendant of the Hubbard family had died…alone and broke, and the Hubbard mansion became part of Grosse Pointe history. The haunted aspect of the old house added an extra layer of excitement to their trespassing.
Walking home alone in the dark, Hannah imagined there was a lot of fun still to be had, and she was missing out on it. But she still lived at home and thirty-two-years-old or not, her mom locked the door at 2 a.m. sharp. So she stumbled down the road to the country club, cutting through the golf course toward the homes on Provencal in a blur, with the semen of some college boy running down her legs.
The crunch of branches, sounding like a dim snap in the background of her music, barely registered. And if it registered at all, she paid it no mind. It wasn’t until the hand clamped over her mouth that she realized the threat to her safety, and by then it was too late.
Chapter Six
“Fancy meeting you here.” Vaughn caught Bexley’s attention as she wheeled an empty cart across the Kroger parking lot, headed in the direction of the store.
“Vaughn, hey.”
She smiled when she saw him, that genuine smile of hers, the one that made her eyes light up like stars twinkling over the water at night, and she turned her cart toward his Mercedes. He stood with his trunk open and a cart full of groceries waiting to be stored inside.
“Look at you, doing your own grocery shopping and everything,” she said. “Who’d have guessed?”
She looked beautiful, with her curves protruding out of her white tank top and denim shorts. He stood tongue-tied for a moment, fantasizing about what she looked like beneath her clothes. But then he caught hold of himself. “I know. Imagine that. Next thing you know, I’ll be planting crops and milking cows.”
Fortunately, she got the joke and laughed, standing there on the hot asphalt while he stuffed groceries into the trunk of his car.
“Shh…” She put her finger up to her rose-colored lips. “Don’t say that too loudly, or the entire town will think you’re about to move.”
She was funny, and he really liked that about her. It was such a refreshing change of pace. The only jokes Eleanor ever told were about other people. “Lord, isn’t that the truth? You can barely sneeze without someone coming up to you two days later and asking how your cold is.”
“Did you see Nan’s article in the Detroit News?” she asked.
He nodded, the smile fading from his face. She’d dubbed Annie’s killer, “The Country Club Ripper,” a name that was sure to stick, and not one the members at GPCC were going to be too crazy about. “I did. It was well-researched and thorough.”
“Nan’s a great reporter. It amazes me the way she gets people to open up and talk.”
Well, what could he say? Nan was Bexley’s friend. “She amazes me as well. I’d love to know how she got so much information out of Annie’s friends about all the drug use she’d been involved with in the past several years. Or the insinuations they’d made about why she’d suddenly stopped.”
Bexley shrugged it off. “Nan always makes it seem like you’re just having a conversation. I watched her interview a professor at school once…a woman accused of flunking a student because she didn’t like the kid’s political views. Everyone had rallied around the professor, but Nan went to school with the boy, Peter Jordan was his name, and she thought he was super bright and gifted. Nan was interviewing Professor Pickering, and somewhere along the line, she stopped asking questions and started commenting on what the professor said. Before long the woman forgot all about Nan’s interview, and was chatting away like they were long-lost friends. She wound up confessing how much she despised Peter’s politics and how determined she was to make sure “people like him” didn’t end up in charge of anything. God, what a bombshell that had been.” Bexley handed Vaughn a bag containing Tide pods and a quart of milk to put into his car. “So who do you think killed Annie Dodson?”
Annie. That seemed to be the only question on people’s minds nowadays. Bexley seemed genuinely curious though, not just interested in scandal like everyone else he’d talked to. Her expression was a mixture of concern and sympathy. It got to him, the way she seemed to ca
re about the death of someone she’d never met. And good grief, but she looked so beautiful standing there, the wind whipping her long locks of hair in front of her face, sweeping it over her chest…making him think about sex all over again. He looked away for a second, willing his organ not to give away how much she affected him. He loaded the last of his groceries and slammed down his tailgate, staring off into space. “I don’t know. I told Detective LeBec last week I was as stumped as he was.”
“You were questioned by the police?” Bexley asked.
He could have kicked himself. The one detail about Annie’s murder he’d wanted to keep from her, and he’d gone and given it to her himself. “It’s no big deal,” he said, playing it down. “Detective LeBec just had a few questions to ask.” Quickly adding, “He’s talking to everyone who knew Annie right now. Just in case someone knows something that might prove useful.”
“Right. Of course.” She nodded, her expression switching from curious to thoughtful. “I guess that would make sense.”
“Anyway,” Vaughn said, desperate now to change the subject. “I know everyone thinks Cameron did it, and I suppose he’s as good a suspect as any.”
“You don’t sound convinced.”
“Cameron was awfully drunk at that party,” he said quickly. Good grief, he really did lose control of himself around her. He was blabbing like a damn idiot. “And Carolyn may keep it well-hidden, but she has one hell of a temper.”
“Enough to kill her own sister?”
Vaughn suppressed a chuckle. “I don’t think there’s a sentimental bone in Carolyn’s body. Just loads of ambition and self-interest.”
“For someone who’s not sentimental, she sure didn’t mind giving me the evil eye over her husband’s attempts to make a pass at me. Like it was my fault or something.”
Vaughn relaxed. Finally, on to something besides Annie. “It isn’t so much he made a pass at you, as he did it at the club, where someone might see.” He reached out at last to touch her hair and brush it away from her lovely face. “Carolyn’s keenly aware of appearances.”
“And what about the disappearance of that other girl, Hannah Ransom? Do you think it has anything to do with Annie’s murder?”
Hannah had disappeared the night before last…left a party at the Hubbard Mansion, and never made it home. That little nugget of information had appeared in Nan’s story as well, with the implication that her disappearance was linked somehow to Annie’s murder. “Hard to say. Hannah and Annie were friends. Ran in the same circle. But it’s just as likely she met up with some guy and took off for a few days.”
“Without telling anyone?”
He shrugged. “Hannah Ransom isn’t really known for making good decisions. No one in that crowd is. They partied their way through high school. Partied their way through college. And now they seem determined to just party their way through life. I wouldn’t put anything past her. But I guess we’ll know for sure if she surfaces in a day or two. In the meantime, I feel sorry for her mother. She’s been putting that poor woman through hell since she was thirteen.”
“That’s a shame,” Bexley said. She glanced at the key fob in his hand, and the trunk where his groceries were melting under the July sun. “I suppose you should get those frozen dinners home. Nice bumping into you.”
“Definitely my good fortune.” He started around the side of his car, then paused. “You handled that whole situation at the Summer Soiree really well, you know. I was impressed.”
“Thanks.” She gave him another smile, one that was wide and lovely.
He climbed inside his black sedan, leaving the driver’s door open. “Let’s have lunch tomorrow. I can take you out somewhere, or I can cook. You pick.”
“Why don’t you come by my place, and I’ll cook. I can impress you with my talents.”
He winked. “Are we talking about your culinary skills, or something more along the lines of dessert?”
Letting her smile speak for her, she lifted a shoulder. “I guess you’ll have to wait and see.”
He watched her leave, pushing her metal cart back towards the store. As soon as she disappeared inside, he closed his car door and started the engine. If he didn’t make love to her soon, she was going to tear away every bit of self-control he possessed, and possibly his very carefully built reputation along with it.
Chapter Seven
Humidity hugged the ninety-degree day like a clinging child. It was hot, muggy, and sitting outside feel like being in a sauna. Bexley watched a line of towering clouds rolling in from the west. They’d obscured most of the sky already, yet despite the threat of storm they carried had yet to shed a drop of rain. She yawned, stretched out in the lounge chair under the center of a large, green umbrella. “If Mother Nature plans on drenching us, I wish she’d hurry up and get it over with.”
Nan rolled her eyes, setting her tumbler of chardonnay down on the pool deck. “And spoil our day of fun in the sun?”
Bexley eyed the chlorinated water in front of her. “I swear; it’s hotter than blazes out here. I feel like I’m baking.”
“We should get in the pool for a while.”
“Agreed.”
The water in the pool felt like heaven, and they stood at the shallow end by the ladder, with their drinks set down on the deck and their sunglasses still on. “Tell me about your lunch date with Vaughn yesterday,” Nan said.
It was typical Nan to phrase it that way. She never asked one-word-answer questions. Always, they were open-ended and meant to encourage the person being asked to include as many details as they felt like adding. Bexley smiled, remembering yesterday. “I made cucumber sandwiches with Grandmama’s dill and cream cheese spread, and Mama’s fruit salad ambrosia, made with less sour cream and whipped cream and more coconut and honeyed pecans. And I served sweet tea with lemon garnish.”
“Oh good grief, Bexley.” Nan sounded put out. “You know darn well I’m not asking you about the menu.”
Bexley smiled. Of course she knew, but it was fun to make Nan work for it. “We did sit on the sofa and talk for a spell.”
“And?” Nan strung the word out when she spoke, sounding impatient.
“And we kissed.” Bexley sighed. “Vaughn’s a wonderful kisser.”
“I’ll bet.” Nan paused, taking a sip of chardonnay, then saying, “Well, go on.”
“We did get a little cozy on the sofa.” He’d felt like fire beside her, his body all hard and full of need. She’d felt the urgency too. The desire to dispense with formalities and take off her clothes and have his hands feeling her breasts without her lingerie to cover them. It had gotten so hot and heavy with all the kissing and mating tongues and heavy breathing, she’d felt her loins getting wet, and she’d known if she didn’t stop it soon, there would be no postponing things. “But eventually, I had to suggest we go for a walk.”
Nan laughed out loud. “I’ll bet you did!” Then allowing her laughter to subside into chuckles. “Still sticking to your five-date rule, I see.”
“Of course I am.” Bexley laughed now, because Nan sounded so indignant. “Grandmama made Granddaddy wait. Mama made Daddy wait. And I have every intention of making my future husband wait.”
“Poor Vaughn. He has no idea what he’s signing himself up for.”
Bexley wanted to believe it. She could see a future with Vaughn. But she’d felt that way before, and been made a fool. “We’ll see. He hasn’t indicated any plans to sign anything just yet.”
“Oh, he’ll sign alright. All you have to do is show him the dotted line.”
“C’mon,” Bexley said. “Let’s go back to our chairs and dry off.”
She was just stepping off the ladder behind Nan when a college-aged waitress hurried from the restaurant at the Summer Village to a group of young ladies seated under the umbrella to their right. The waitress whispered something to a girl about her age, mid-to-late-twenties.
The girl gasped. “Oh my God!”
Everyone turned to stare, but
Nan homed in on the pair with a focused stare Bexley recognized as Nan’s reporter instincts kicking in, her ear trained in their direction. The waitress, a chubby blonde in khaki shorts and white polo shirt, and the young member springing up from the lounge chair, a tall, slender girl wearing a bright pink bikini and with her dark hair twisted into a bun, whispered furiously back and forth.
“What happened?” someone asked.
Looking behind her, Bexley saw it was Sally Hamilton. She was with Peggy LeRoux, both of them sipping cocktails while their progeny played basketball in the pool. Carolyn Pringle was notably absent, cutting the three-peas down to two.
The dark-haired girl from the club worked a solemn expression onto her face, replacing the blasé one she’d been wearing, before veering into a look of incredulity mixed with scandalous pleasure. “There’s been another murder,” she said, sounding just a little too solemn to make it believable. “Hannah Ransom. They just found her body.”
“No!”
“Oh my God!”
Betsy and Sally gasped in unison. They began mumbling about how awful this news would be for Hannah’s family. And wondering if this murder had something to do with Annie’s.
“Come on.” Nan nudged Bexley’s arm, already moving back to their chairs, grabbing her wine, and sliding her cover-up over her head. Seeming to do it all at once.
Bexley followed suit, pulling on her cover-up and stepping into her flip-flops. “You’d make a terrible poker player, you know that?”
“Huh?”
Bexley pointed at her jittery hands. “Your entire body screams curiosity and anxiousness.”
Nan laughed. “I suppose it does at that.” Turning to the girl in the pink bikini, Nan said, “Weren’t you with Hannah the night she disappeared, Charlotte?”
Charlotte shook her head, looking past Nan to Sally Hamilton, whose narrowed eyes and pursed lips gave away a displeasure Bexley didn’t really understand.
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