“Thanks,” I said, taking the tickets. “It’s Sunday, right?”
She touched her hair, the green slightly less bright today. “I’m so nervous about it. I’m showing my designs for the new labels and I’m always apprehensive about people’s reactions. This is the first time Aunt Etta’s let me design the labels, so I want to do a good job. I’m going to actually be working on one there—a watercolor of Churn Dash running, with Great-Grandma’s quilt in the background.”
“I’m sure they’ll be great. How are things at home?” JJ was much easier to ask than Bliss, and for a split second I couldn’t help but wish it was JJ Sam was in love with, not Bliss. On the surface, it seemed as if they would be better matched. Then again, I knew better than anyone else that love never paid attention to who matched and who didn’t.
“Everyone’s in a tizzy, of course. That weird detective left a message for me on my answering machine. Said he wants to talk to me again. Is that normal? I told him everything I knew the night it happened.” She rubbed her lips together, slightly smearing her burgundy lipstick.
I stuck my hand deep into the pockets of my coat. “It’s not just you. He dropped by the museum this morning to talk to me, too. I couldn’t tell him anything else either. I think he’s just fishing.”
“Giles’s family is having a fit about it, as you can imagine. His father is a very powerful man. He flew down in a private jet as soon as he was told. I wasn’t at the ranch when he arrived, but I called Jose, and he said there was quite a shouting match between him and Cappy. He claimed we were harboring a murderer.”
She was understandably upset by the accusation, obviously not wanting to face the fact that he was probably right. I couldn’t help asking, “Who do you think might have wanted Giles dead?”
JJ’s face twisted in thought. “I have no idea. He was a jerk, but exactly the type of guy I’d expect Arcadia to marry. Bliss would probably know more than me. She’s lived here since she was eighteen. I’ve only been here a few months.”
“I just saw her and Miguel at McClintock’s buying lunch. We didn’t talk about Giles, but then, Miguel was there and so was my cousin Emory. Emory writes for the newspaper, so that would tend to keep her from saying anything.”
“I’m worried about her.”
“We all are, but she’ll be okay. Pregnancy isn’t a disease. She and Sam will work things out.”
She reached up and fiddled with the four silver dangly earrings trailing down her left ear. “It’s not just the baby. She’s been upset about something else, and she won’t tell me what. That’s not like her. She usually tells me everything.”
“Have you asked her about it?”
Her dark lips turned up in a wry smile. “Get Miss Closed-Mouth Cop to talk when she doesn’t want to? I figured it had something to do with work. I knew about her and Sam, so it wasn’t that. And she told me when she first suspected she was pregnant, even before she told Sam. Like I said, we usually tell each other everything.”
I gave a deep, dramatic sigh. “If it has to do with her work, welcome to the wonderful world of law enforcement relatives. We should start a group. Cop-Anon.”
She giggled. “I forgot, you know all about that.”
“Trying to get them to talk to you when they don’t want to is, as my gramma Dove would say, like trying to milk a two-thousand-pound bull. Ain’t possible. Also, don’t forget, she’s got Sam now, so that might be where some of her confidences are going.”
“He’s her first boyfriend, you know. I always knew when she fell it would be hard.”
“If it makes you feel any better, even though he’s young, he’s a really decent human being. And I’m not just saying that ’cause he’s my stepson and I happen to be crazy in love with his dad.”
She touched my forearm lightly. “I know, Benni. It just seems like so much has changed so fast.”
“I hate to break the news to you, but as you get older, it only gets worse.”
She shook her head, her earrings making a soft, tinkling sound. “What a depressing thought.”
I WALKED THE three blocks to the Historical Museum where I interrupted a meeting of the San Celina Senior Citizen Kitchen-Raising Committee, the honorable Dove Ramsey presiding.
“Sit down, honeybun,” she said, pointing her gavel at an empty chair in front. “We’re almost done.”
After an excruciating half hour of listening to the seven people on the committee carp and pick at each other’s suggestions, Dove brought the gavel down with an angry slam. “People, the bottom line is we need twenty thousand, we’ve got three, and the insurance will pay ten. We need seven thousand dollars and we need it fast.”
“What’s the hurry?” I asked.
“The kitchen has to be rebuilt soon,” Sissy Brownmiller said. “There’s lots of seniors who depend on the hot meal they get there. It’s sometimes their only good meal of the day. It’s already been shut down a month. We’ve borrowed the kitchen at First Baptist, but they’re getting kinda restless about us going back to our own place.”
“I’m telling you,” Dove said, “we need something that no one’s ever done here before. I’m sick of bake sales and quilt raffles. We need something that’ll stand out. Something people really want. Something they’re willing to shell out lots of their hard-earned money for.”
“Like what?” Sissy countered. “Bake sales and quilt raffles are all we know how to do.”
Dove smacked the gavel down again. “Ten-minute break! Get something to eat and drink, and we’ll study on this some more.”
At the dessert table, filled with apple turnovers, oatmeal cookies, cream puffs, and Sissy’s blue-ribbon-winning black walnut-chocolate chip coffee cake, I grabbed a cream puff, a slice of coffee cake, and a cup of Folger’s coffee. Though this group was high class in their home-baked goodies, they’d never bought into the baby boomers’ addiction to gourmet coffee. Theirs was hot, black, and strong. I put an extra dollop of milk in it to cut the stoutness.
Dove pulled me aside. “Have you heard how things are doing at Seven Sisters?”
“I just talked to JJ. She’s pretty agitated, with good reason. She doesn’t want to admit it, but everyone knows the killer had to be someone in the family. I don’t think she’s ready to face that yet.”
“It’s hard thinking one of your kinfolk would have that kind of meanness in them, but it wouldn’t be the first time. That little Texas boy working on the case is a sharp one. I fathom he’ll ferret out the bad apple in the bunch right quick. His mama raised a good boy. He donated a hundred dollars to our new kitchen.”
“With a little arm twisting from you, I heard.”
She opened her eyes wide in mock innocence. “Why, honeybun, a person can’t make another person do something they don’t want to do. It was purely voluntary.”
“Right, kind of like the military draft. Anyway, if you’ll tell me where the information Mrs. Shandon left for me is, I’m outta here.”
“There’s an envelope with your name on it near the cash register.”
“Thanks.”
BY FRIDAY, GILES’S murder had been relegated to second-page news since there was nothing new to report. It was still on people’s minds and lips, though, according to Elvia. Her mystery reading group at the bookstore had spent more time talking about San Celina’s real-life mystery than their fictional English one. Gabe and I didn’t even discuss it since his department wasn’t handling it. We did, however, talk at length about Sam and Bliss, their impending marriage and parenthood.
“At least she’ll be covered by insurance,” Gabe said. “Lydia and I are relieved about that.” We’d sat down for a rare breakfast together. Usually he jogged with Scout and ate before I got out of bed since I rarely had to be at the folk art museum before nine o’clock, but the telephone had jarred me awake at six-thirty this morning while he was still out jogging. My grouchy hello had been answered by Lydia’s sensuous contralto voice.
“Benni? Did I wake you up?”
“Uh, no, I was . . . just... taking a sip of coffee.” I sat up in bed and ran a hand through my tangled curls, smoothing them down, as if she could see their wildness. “Gabe’s not here.”
Her laughter grated in my ear. “Out jogging for five miles before his two cups of coffee, bagel with grape jelly, glass of juice, and a quick glance at the front page and sports section.”
It irritated me slightly that she knew his morning routine that well. “I guess some things never change.”
“Actually, the jogging is new in the last few years, but everything else is the same. If nothing else, our Gabe is predictable in his unpredictable way.”
Our Gabe. Yikes. Someone lock the knife drawer. “Want me to have him call you?” I said as sweetly as I could manage without any caffeine in my system. “It’s Lydia, right?”
“Right. Lydia Ortiz. Tell him I’ll be at home for the next hour, then at the office. He has both numbers.”
“Ortiz?” I said without thinking. “I thought you got remarried.”
The sexy laugh again. “His surname was Dembrowski. I figured Ortiz suited me better. Besides, it’s been my professional name since I was twenty-two. Gabe and I parted on amicable terms. I don’t have any animosity about his name.”
“Oh,” I said, the irony not lost on me. My husband’s ex-wife had his last name, not her second husband’s, and I, his current wife, still had the name of my late husband. “I’ll tell him you called.”
“Thanks, Benni. I’ll let you get back to sleep now. Sorry to wake you. Good-bye.”
“You didn’t wake . . .” But she’d hung up before I could finish my protest.
Gabe found me fifteen minutes later, standing in the kitchen wearing one of his old blue LAPD T-shirts and watching coffee drip into the pot.
He came over, lifted my hair, and nuzzled the back of my neck. “No woman has ever looked better in my T-shirts than you.” His warm tongue licked a cool, wet circle on my neck.
I turned and snapped, “And just how many women have you seen in your T-shirts?”
He jerked back, surprise widening his eyes. “Whoa, let’s start over. You are the most beautiful woman I’ve ever seen not”—he held up his hands—“that I ever look at other women to compare, because I don’t, but if I did, you would be the most beautiful, I’m absolutely sure.”
Glaring at him, I poured a cup of coffee. His dark face was glossy with sweat, his damp cotton shorts clinging in a way that was not unattractive. The sincerity in his blue-gray eyes was real, and his white, slightly crooked smile seduced me, as it first had in Liddie’s parking lot that cold November night a few years ago. I held out the mug of coffee to him. “You’re lucky I’m in love with you, Friday.”
He took the coffee, then kissed me on the cheek. “PMS, sweetheart?” he whispered. “Shall I fetch the Godiva chocolate?”
“Oh, man, you’re asking for it now,” I said, swatting at his stomach. “Bad cop, no doughnut.”
He laughed, and Scout, who had been watching our exchange with his one German shepherd ear straight up in worry, barked. I took a dog biscuit out of the jar on the counter and tossed it to him. “Good Scout. I wasn’t talking to you. You are the one male in this house who knows how to keep his mouth shut.”
“And why are we so cranky this morning?”
“We are not cranky. Do you want some toast?”
“No, I’ll have a bagel.” He opened the refrigerator door. “Are we out of grape jelly?”
I growled inwardly, then said in an even voice, “By the way, Lydia called while you were jogging. She said she’d like you to call her back. She’ll be at home for the next hour, then at the office.” I poured myself some coffee and pushed my way around him to get the milk, taking it over to the kitchen table.
“So that’s what’s wrong,” he said, his voice amused. He faced me, the jelly jar in his hand, his expression searching. “Was she rude to you?”
I sat down, propping my elbows on the table. The wooden chair was cold against my bare thighs. “No, Gabe, she was perfectly gracious. I just need a cup of coffee. Call her.”
When he came back from calling her, he sat down at the table across from me. I was well into my second cup of coffee and feeling a bit more genial toward the world, even one that held perfect first wives. “So, what did she want?” I asked.
“She’s coming back up here to spend the weekend. Says she wants to get to know Bliss better, that last weekend was not a good way to start an in-law relationship. She wants us all to go to dinner tonight.”
“I agree that it was a rough start to a relationship. Do you think Sam and Bliss will go?”
“I called Sam already, and he’s not working at the bookstore. I know it’s Bliss’s day off. He says he’s sure she’ll want to come. Lydia’ll be staying at the San Celina Inn, so we’re just going to eat there.”
“Their pot roast is great. It’s usually crowded on a Friday night though. You might want to make reservations.”
“So, are you free?”
“Me?”
He nodded. “Lydia specifically told me to tell you that you were included.”
“How thoughtful of her,” I said, thinking, Bland face, Benni, bland face. “But this doesn’t really have anything to do with me, so I’ll pass.”
“What do you mean it doesn’t have anything to do with you? You’re my wife. You’re Sam’s stepmother. Of course it has to do with you.” A tinge of irritation crept into his voice.
I went over and pushed my way onto his lap. “Let me attempt to be a mature human being about this. You go to dinner with your son and his fiancée and your gorgeous ex-wife and let me just trust you, okay? I’ll grab a sandwich and harass Elvia at the bookstore if she’s not on a date with Emory.”
He buried his face in my neck. “I’d rather have you come with us, but it’s up to you. Lydia may be gorgeous, but don’t forget she dumped me a long time ago.”
I laid my cheek on his damp, black hair, my heart troubled, thinking, that’s my problem, Friday. I’d feel a heap better if you’d dumped her.
LATER AT THE museum, in the early afternoon when I’d finally caught up on all my paperwork, I decided to take Bliss up on her offer to watch her work the horses. Since I knew it was her day off, I called the ranch, hoping she was there.
“Come on down,” she said. “You’re welcome anytime. I’ll be exercising Churn Dash in about an hour,” she said. “We’ll be down at the training track.”
I went by the house, picked up Scout, and arrived at Seven Sisters stables a little before two-thirty. Scout, his nose quivering with new, tantalizing smells, reluctantly obeyed my command to heel as we walked behind the stables and down the short path to the training track. Bliss was jogging Churn Dash around the freshly graded black dirt. I waved to her, and when she waved back, he took the opportunity to crow-hop and dance around, generally behaving squirrelly. She scolded him verbally and gently brought him back under control with firm, experienced hands.
I climbed up on the metal rail and watched her start around the track at a lope. With the cool, early-afternoon ocean breeze sweeping over me, I felt myself relax and really enjoy the pure, incredible beauty of a young horse’s muscles at work. He fought her, aching to break into a run. You could see the pleasure in his neck and ears as she rode him around the half-mile track. I knew enough about horses to see this one had something special—that unpredictable, unknowable thing you couldn’t breed into an animal, the thing that made them go the extra mile, make the extra effort, the thing that made you suspect they’d keep going until they collapsed. That thing some people called heart.
After two times around the track she walked him for a while, cooling him down. Then she rode him over to my perch on the railing. She pulled off her jockey helmet and shook out her blond hair.
“Glad you could make it,” she said, reaching down and patting his neck. “What do you think?”
“He’s something special, no doubt about it.”
She climbed down and led him toward the gate, which I’d already opened. I followed her to the tie stall where she untacked him and slipped on a baby blue halter. She stopped briefly, touching her hand to her stomach, her face tightening for a moment.
I hesitated before saying, “Are you okay?”
“Fine,” she said. “Just a little sick spell.”
Knowing it was none of my business, I didn’t say anything about the safety of riding a racehorse so early in her pregnancy, but I couldn’t help wondering if it was a wise choice.
“Can I clean him up?” I asked, thinking she could at least rest while I did that. “I kinda miss doing that on a regular basis now that I’m a city girl.”
Her eyes were disbelieving, but she said, “Sure, if you want.”
We led Dash over to the wash racks, and she leaned up against an oak tree as I hosed him off.
“Why aren’t you coming to dinner tonight?” she asked, scratching behind Scout’s ears.
I ran the slow-flowing water over Churn Dash’s brown back. “I thought it might be easier for you to get to know Lydia without me there.”
She wrinkled her nose as if she smelled something bad. “Designer suits and those perfect nails. And she’s a defense lawyer. I can’t believe she and the chief produced Sam. Frankly, she scares me spitless.”
I laughed in recognition and camaraderie. “I know the feeling. I still feel that way about Gabe’s mother. But we get along okay. Of course, there are two thousand miles between us.”
“I’d feel a lot better if you were going.”
“Sorry, but I have a dinner date with Scout tonight.”
“I’m jealous.”
She watched me silently for a moment, then said, “Can I ask you something? Just between us?”
Thinking it was another mother-in-law question, I said, “Sure.”
“What do you think is more important, your family or your job?”
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