The Inheritance Part II

by Olivia Mayfield

  She had to. For her sister’s sake.

  They would get through this investigation, find the truth, and then Maggie could get the closure with Andrew she’d wanted years ago. Hopefully she wasn’t making a mistake here.

  No, she had to trust her gut. And her gut was telling her this was the right thing for her to do.

  Andrew finished his last bite, then glanced at his watch. “Sorry to cut this short, but I gotta run. I have a meeting with a potential client soon.” He fished into his wallet and took out more than enough to cover both of their meals, plus a generous tip.

  “Oh, you don’t need to—”

  “I know I don’t need to,” he said with his typical crooked smile. He leaned across the table so they were just a foot or so apart; she could smell his rich cologne and fought the urge to breathe in deeply. “But I want to.” He paused, staring at her lips for a moment, then fixed on her eyes. “I’ll talk to you later, Maggie.”

  With that, he slid out of the booth and out the door.

  Chapter 9

  Maggie spent the rest of the morning and early afternoon running various errands, taking her new computer with her to a local Panera so she could get some work done. She dropped by the police station again to see if David would let her back into the evidence room, given the break-in and theft of her notes, but he was out on patrol and wouldn’t be back until later. Well, she’d just call him in a few hours when he was off work and ask. Plus she owed him a cup of coffee in thanks for all his help so far.

  Truth be told, she wasn’t quite ready to be at the house by herself yet. The alarm company had recommended a carpenter to fix the damaged doorjamb, and he was nice enough to visit the house last night. It was solid, secured. Back to normal.

  But she still felt unsafe.

  The thought of someone pawing through her personal belongings made her far more unsettled than she was ready to face. Sleep had been nearly impossible again last night—she’d lain in bed for hours, body tied up in knots, anxiety making her mind churn. She’d been unable to shake off her fear of someone trying to break in again in the future as the stakes escalated in this inheritance competition.

  Safety was a precious commodity, one she hadn’t fully appreciated until it had been threatened.

  After she left the police station, she strolled around a nearby mall, getting Japanese for lunch from the food court, buying a few staple clothing items to supplement her thin wardrobe. Just mindless wandering and shopping, a welcome relief from the stresses of the last few days.

  A little after four, her phone vibrated from her jeans pocket and she tugged it out. It was David. “You’re just the man I wanted to talk to,” she said with a smile.

  “Well, that sounds promising,” he teased back. His voice was jovial and welcoming. “I heard you dropped by the station for me. Sorry I missed you. Everything okay?”

  “Totally fine. The house is safeguarded again.” She shifted the phone to her other hand and dug her keys out of her purse, making her way out of the mall toward her car. As soon as she stepped through the glass doors, a brisk breeze hit her. “I was hoping we could set our coffee date. I need to pick your brain a little, if you don’t mind. And perhaps . . .” She cleared her throat, wondering how to broach the subject of the evidence room without seeming like she was using him. “Uh, would you . . .”

  “I’d be happy to let you have another go at your sister’s evidence,” he answered smoothly. “But I’m upgrading our coffee date to dinner if you’re gonna ask me any cop questions. We’ll need more time to talk than just a half hour.”

  She laughed. Was David coming on to her? She felt foolish trying to analyze his dialogue, assuming something that might not be there, but he sounded very flirty right now. “Well, I have a lot of questions to ask you about police procedure and such. You know, how it relates to my sister. I suppose I could squeeze them all in over dinner.”

  “How very kind of you,” he said with a chuckle. “What about Monday evening? I’m off work, then.”

  She unlocked the car, dumped her bags in the back seat, then slipped in, cranking on the heat. Her fingers were chilled just from the brief walk. “That sounds perfect. Seriously, I appreciate this so much. There’s a lot I don’t understand, and if I’m going to find out what happened to her, I need all the information I can get.”

  “It’s no problem, really. Be a nice chance for us to catch up, anyway.” Pause. “But you don’t have a boyfriend back home who will be mad at us going out for a meal, do you? Or a husband?”

  Yup. Definitely flirting. She wasn’t sure how she felt about that yet. David was very attractive, of course, but she hadn’t considered him in that way before. “No boyfriend or husband,” she answered honestly. She thought of Andrew. How would he feel about her going to dinner?

  Well, it didn’t matter. They were business partners, essentially, not dating. And she was going to get info they could both use.

  She heard the crackle of walkie-talkie static in the background.

  “Oh, I’m getting a call. I’ll talk to you later,” David said. “Bye, Maggie. Text me what time we should get together.”

  She told him she would, then hung up, tucking her phone in her purse and heading out of the mall parking lot. The drive home was longer than she’d like, given that rush hour was starting, and her mind wouldn’t stop rolling over everything that had happened since arriving in town a few days ago: David’s attention, Andrew’s proposition, her broken computer, her mother’s tears.

  With a sigh she exited the highway, opting for local roads to trim some time off her commute, and made her way back to Bay Village. When she got to her parents’ driveway, she saw her mom’s car, plus a shining, brand-new black Benz. Who was there?

  She parked, grabbed her bags and headed inside, juggling the bags. “Mom?” she called out.

  “In the front room, honey,” her mother replied.

  Maggie dropped her bags on the kitchen table and went into the living room. No one else’s car was there, and her mother stood facing the large picture window, hands clasped behind her back. “Whose car is that?” Maggie asked, glancing around to see if she’d missed seeing someone in the room.

  Her mom turned around, her face flat. “Bethany’s here to talk to you. She popped upstairs to use the restroom. Can’t imagine what she wants, but she made it hard for me to refuse her politely. Half shoved herself through the door as soon as I opened it, in fact.”

  A strange swirl hit Maggie’s stomach. Something felt strange about this. “I’m gonna take my shopping bags to my room,” she said evenly. “I’ll be right back.”

  She darted through the kitchen, leaving the bags on the table so she could be quiet, and slipped on tiptoes up the soft, carpeted stairs. There was a rustling sound coming from behind her sister’s closed bedroom door.

  Unbelievable. That bitch. She’d lied to her mom and had used the opportunity to do some snooping of her own.

  Maggie flung the door open, anger washing over her fast and hard. “What the hell do you think you’re doing, going through my sister’s stuff?” she barked at Bethany, who froze in her crouched position by Cassandra’s bed, eyes going wide.

  The room was trashed, clothes pouring out everywhere, books and papers scattered. The woman had obviously been digging around for anything she could find quickly. Probably was going to steal anything she deemed evidence and stick the goods in the large white Coach bag on top of the dresser.

  Bethany stood, dusting off the knees of her True Religion jeans and smoothing down the front of her tight blue sweater. She tossed her long brown hair over her shoulder and propped her hands on her hips. “I’m investigating your sister’s disappearance, of course,” she answered, as if she hadn’t done anything wrong. “I have every right to look through here.”

  “Excuse me? No, you actually don’t,” Maggie said with a scoff, opening the door wider. “You need to leave, now.”

  Bethany jutted out her jaw as she stared Maggie down
. “I will not. Your grandfather—”

  “Shut up right now. Don’t you dare talk about him with me!” Maggie yelled, unable to hold her anger back for another second. Bottled-up rage at this conniving scammer made her hands shake. She fisted them at her side, nails digging into her palms. “I don’t want to hear one word about my grandfather out of your lying mouth, you hear me?”

  “I loved him!” Bethany yelled back. She crossed her arms under her chest. “And he loved me, and if you can’t accept that, too bad! Because it’s the truth. He wanted to marry me. He was going to propose before he got sick.”

  Maggie’s stomach cramped. If the thought of Bethany as her new grandmother hadn’t been so insane, she would have laughed right in Bethany’s face. “That’s revolting. You really have no qualms about getting money any way you can—except through a legitimate job, of course. Then again, it’s a lot easier to ‘work’ when you don’t have to do anything but lie on your back and spread your legs.” So spiteful, but she couldn’t bite back the words. All those things she’d secretly wanted to say to this woman were flowing out now, like an unplugged geyser.

  Bethany flinched then took a step closer, her heavily lined eyes stabbing into Maggie’s. “You think you’re so amazing and perfect, don’t you,” she spat out, shooting daggers at Maggie. “But you don’t know shit about me, or my life, or what I shared with Jeffrey, despite all your assumptions. And you have no idea how your grandfather really felt about you. Or your brother, for that matter. You two abandoned him when he needed you—”

  “Bullshit!” Maggie said, furious tears burning her eyes. Her whole body was shaking with rage. What the hell did Bethany think she knew, anyway? Nothing. And Maggie was going to vomit if she had to stand here and hear one more word come out of Bethany’s mouth. She struggled to put her emotions in check, biting her lip for a second to keep from spewing more nasty words. “Just . . . shut up. I’m not talking about him with you. I’m not talking about anything with you, in fact. Get out.”

  “I will not—I am one of the investigators, and your grandfather would want me here,” Bethany replied, slitting her eyes. “This is about him and Cassandra, not me or you or our feelings about each other.”

  “You will leave my house right now,” her mom suddenly said, popping up behind Maggie and speaking in a chillingly icy voice, “or I will call the police and have you physically removed.”

  Bethany’s large chest heaved as she dragged in deep breaths, staring at Maggie and her mom. “This is totally unfair, and you both know it. You are denying me access to vital case information. I will make sure Mr. Webber hears of this.” Dark anger flashed in her eyes. “This is against the spirit of what Jeffrey had wanted.”

  “I don’t care. This is my home, and you’re trespassing. Get out,” her mom ground out, jaw clenched so tight that Maggie could hear her teeth grinding.

  Bethany stared for another long moment, grabbed her large purse and left, slamming her shoulder into Maggie’s as she passed. Maggie refused to reach up and rub the sore spot, not wanting to give any satisfaction to the gold-digging bitch.

  The side door slammed hard as Bethany left, and a moment later the Benz squealed out of the driveway.

  Maggie and her mom stood there in silence for a couple of long minutes, eyeing the damage left in the wake of Hurricane Bethany. Maggie’s pulse roared in her ears, her heart still slamming beneath her breast, and she forced herself to take slow, deep breaths to calm her anger. She unclenched her fists and stretched her fingers, rolled her neck.

  It didn’t help.

  What a horrible, asinine person. How could she and Bethany have ever been friends? With a frustrated sigh, Maggie bent over and began picking up the mess of clothes, putting them on the bed and sorting them into piles. Her mother moved beside her in silence, doing the same. They folded them all into small stacks.

  Her mom went to lift a stack and put them back in the drawer, but Maggie impulsively placed a hand on her shoulder. Maybe it wasn’t the right time to address the issue, but it needed to be said. “Mom, we should talk about this,” she said quietly, indicating her sister’s clothes. “It’s not . . . it’s not good for you to hold on to all of this stuff.”

  Her mom remained frozen, the only sign of life in the slight rise and fall of her chest. She didn’t look at Maggie, her eyes fixed ahead of her. “I can’t let it go right now,” she finally said. “Don’t ask me to explain why. I just can’t.”

  Maggie’s heart pinched in sympathy, and the remnants of her anger left in a whoosh. Her mother’s face was etched with deep lines, her brow furrowed from years of suppressed pain. “I know,” she said softly. “But maybe once all of this is done, we can talk more about it.”

  Her mom gave a stiff nod. Maggie wasn’t sure she believed her, but that didn’t matter at the moment. Right now they both needed to focus on the task at hand.

  They tucked the clothes away and straightened the room up again. Maggie tightened the pristine white bedspread, brushing her fingers across the surface to smooth out the bumps. She still vibrated with anger at Bethany.

  “I hope all of this won’t throw you off of your focus. She can complain to Dad’s lawyer all she wants, but my home is my home,” her mom said.

  “I’m not worried about it—she just likes to whine when things don’t go her way. And I won’t let this distract me.” Maggie focused her attention on the menial tasks to help her shake off her frustration.

  Her mom put the last of the clothes in the drawer, then moved over to the closet. Bethany hadn’t had a chance to do much damage in there, thankfully. For once, Maggie was glad her sister’s diary and evidence was in the police station, locked away safely where no one could access it. Should she bring this up to David to make sure Bethany didn’t have access to the evidence box? Did she even need to? After all, Bethany wasn’t a legal family member and had no right to access the evidence beyond what was public information in the police report.

  “I can’t wait until this is all over,” Maggie’s mom muttered. She shook her head and pasted on her infamous fake smile. “Anyway, it’s fixed now. Your brother called me earlier and said that he’ll be over for dinner tonight. Maybe you two can talk about your progress so far.”

  Maggie made a noncommittal sound. Yeah, she’d start sharing info when her brother did. Actually, she’d been hoping to talk to her parents tonight about their recollections of the night Cassandra disappeared. But between the break-in, Bethany’s intrusion and Robert coming for dinner, it wasn’t the right time. She made a mental note to postpone the talk until maybe a few days from now, when everything settled a bit.

  “I’ll help you with dinner,” she offered, hoping to change the subject.

  Her mom’s eyes widened in surprise but she recovered fast, giving a genuine smile. “I’d like that. Thank you.”

  The two of them exited the room, her mother closing the door behind her. They made their way downstairs and into the kitchen, working side by side to get the steaks ready. Though it was chilly, her dad was apparently going to fire up his grill. A last hurrah before tucking it away for the winter.

  Cassandra had loved the way their dad cooked steak. Maggie smiled as she applied a rub to the outside of the thick slice. Her sister had loved meat in general, actually. One time she’d downed an entire rack of barbequed ribs, plus ate Robert’s leftovers that he’d been too stuffed to finish. Where she’d held all that food in her small body, no one knew.

  Her heart tightened and her throat closed up. She struggled to keep her sudden sorrow in check, blinking back the bite of tears. Her mother didn’t need more to worry about right now.

  It would never get easier, she knew in that moment, without a shadow of a doubt. This pain would never go away, despite how she’d told herself for years that it would. The best she could hope for were days where she found some measure of peace.

  And that one day, probably many years from now, the pain would fade to be nothing more than a small twinge in her
stomach, a bittersweet longing for the girl who never got a fair chance to live her life.

  Chapter 10

  “Pass the Italian dressing, please,” her dad asked Robert.

  Her brother gave a dramatic sigh, like it took him a lot of effort to reach over, and slid the bottle across the table. The bottom caught on the edge of the table leaf and it thudded over.

  “Manners, please,” her mother chastised him as she picked the bottle up and passed it on, shaking her head in disappointment.

  Robert rolled his eyes and looked over at Maggie, who smothered a small laugh behind her hand. Despite her son being twenty-six and well out of childhood, their mom didn’t have any qualms about putting him in his place. Couldn’t blame her if this was how he acted at dinner.

  Maggie took a bite of her steak, cooked to medium-rare perfection. Her dad was still a master at the grill.

  “So I heard you were at the diner this morning with Andrew,” Robert said to Maggie casually, one eyebrow cocked. He took a bite of his grilled asparagus. “What were you guys chatting about?”

  “Andrew, your ex-boyfriend?” her dad asked, a frown line appearing between his brows. He put his fork down on his plate and studied her. “He’s one of the people you two are working against, right?”

  Her breath hitched in her lungs as she bit back a sigh of frustration. How the hell did her brother know about the meeting? For God’s sake, was someone watching her every damned movement now? This was getting ridiculous.

  She opened her mouth to lob a gripe at Robert about minding his own business, when he held up a hand.

  “Whoa, before you get pissy and rant at me, I’m only asking because Stephanie, one of the waitresses at the diner, has a crush on me and she said she’d seen the two of you there this morning, having breakfast. Do you remember her? She went to our school and was in a couple of my classes.” He held out his hands in front of his chest. “She has these huge—”