We’re a lot alike, you and me.”
I held Mary’s gaze but said nothing.
“It’s hard to be all alone with our kind of pain.” She looked back at the headstone. “Others try to understand, but they can’t. Not unless they’ve been through it.” She walked over to touch the top of her husband’s grave. “I know I keep saying it, but he was a wonderful man. A good man. I can tell your Adam was too.”
I swallowed hard. I couldn’t let my emotions get the better of me.
“That’s what other people can’t understand. When you have a love like that, it never lets you go. There is no moving on. Others want you to be whole again, but it’s not that simple.” She shook her head. “Constance never knew that kind of love. If she had, she never would have done what she did.”
I stepped toward the Graves family plot and looked down at the area closest to Grant Coleman’s grave. “This was where you wanted to be buried, wasn’t it?”
“Grant and I thought we were so lucky when we were able to buy this plot. How perfect. I could be both with him and my family. I never imagined she would take that away from me.”
I didn’t answer.
“Constance was the only mother I had ever known. Let me ask you, how do you raise a child and then treat them the way she treated me?”
I shook my head.
She looked away. “It was that damned will. My father hurt us all so much in life and then that.” She wrapped her arms across her chest. “That’s where it all started. I was under so much pressure back then.”
“Pressure from your first husband?”
“He was a monster. When he found out I wasn’t getting our piece of the family pie, I was afraid for my life. My daughter’s life.” She stepped even closer to her second husband’s grave. “I just couldn’t understand why Constance would do that to me. My father was one thing, but she had all the power after he died. She could have split the estate. Everything could have been different.”
I thought back to the letter Rip Sr. had written. This was all such a mess. “Did she ever try to explain?”
“We didn’t give her much chance. Beatty Barnes made sure we all had copies of the will as soon as our father had died. I remember thinking he was behaving strangely when he came to the door. He looked sick with guilt. It didn’t take long to figure out why. He knew what was in that will. All he said was that he was sorry for our loss and that I should speak to Constance right away. So that’s what the three of us did. We were furious when we headed over to confront her. Even John. Although that didn’t last long.”
“Rip attacked Constance, didn’t he?”
“He was vicious. He accused her of having planned it for years. For taking care of our father just so she could whisper poison in his ear. He said she was the one who had pushed him to change his will. And then he—”
“And then he what?” I knew what she would say, given what Ben had told me, but I wanted to hear it from her.
“He accused Constance of hurrying our father’s death along.”
“You mean he accused her of murder.”
She patted the top of the gravestone. “He never said those words. I think even he had some shame deep down. But that was the implication.” She curled her fingers into a fist. “I’ll never forget the look on her face.”
Despite everything Constance had done since, I couldn’t help but feel for her. It must have been a terrible moment.
“When Rip was through, she asked John and me if we felt the same way.”
“What did you say?”
“John didn’t say anything. He walked out. He was never good at expressing himself, especially when he was upset. But me, all I could think about was what Carl was going to do to me when I got home.” She looked up at the trees. “So, I said I agreed with Rip.”
I forced myself to take a breath. My hands trembled with the effort of staying in control, but I had to hang on until she told me everything.
“I don’t know what we were thinking. Maybe that we’d shame her into splitting up the estate? All it did, though, was harden her heart in a way I never thought possible.” She met my eye again. “I know you think I’m a monster, but I never gave up on trying to make things right with her.” Her face twitched. “Ask me how many apology letters I’ve written.”
I didn’t say anything.
“Hundreds,” she spat. “Year after year, I wrote her letters. They always came back unopened. And every time I got one of those letters back in the mail, it was like Constance was there, telling me, over and over again, You’re still a bad person, Mary. Bad. Bad. Bad.”
Suddenly I knew I was seeing the creature who had been capable of ending her sister’s life.
“And I’ve had to live with that voice for years. It was better with Grant, but when he died, that voice got so much louder.” Her body shuddered, forcing her to grab the headstone for support. “And then I found out about the family plot. Connie’s last revenge.” She stared at me with an uncomfortable intensity. “I think you know what happened after that.”
I held her gaze though every part of me wanted to look away. “The night Constance died you went to the bookstore. Theo said you were upset. You had tried to cancel, but she convinced you to come by. Liz came too, but she didn’t stay long.”
Mary nodded. “She was worried about me. I had just found out about the addendum. Liz had known about the plot since Grant died. She had handled the arrangements. She didn’t want to upset me with it, but I found a copy of the paperwork at her house. She thought maybe there was some legal recourse, but I knew my sister. She’d have everything in order. I was so upset. I thought going to Theo’s might calm me down, but it didn’t.”
“So you left the bookstore. Theo said you left around ten, giving you an alibi, but her timing had been off by at least an hour. The grandfather clock in the store had stopped. You then headed for the graveyard to clean up the site the way you normally did.”
Mary looked at me questioningly.
“There was a yellow rose petal in Constance’s room at the B&B. We don’t grow them.”
She nodded.
“Then you left to go home, but on the way, you spotted Constance in the window of the B&B. It’s a small town, you would have likely known she was staying with us while Graves House was undergoing renovations, and the view of the Rosewater Room is clear from the street.”
“I saw her in the window on the second floor and all I could think was when is enough, enough? I know I hurt my sister. I know I did. But hadn’t she already made me pay?” Her gaze drifted away from me to the memory I couldn’t see. “I knew then it was never going to stop. As long as she was alive, she’d find a way for me to keep on paying. But to deny me Grant?” Her eyes flashed back to mine. “Tell me, what would you do? What would you do if someone told you that you couldn’t lie beside your husband when the time came?”
The truth was, I didn’t know, but I couldn’t let her derail me. Not now. I had to hang on. “After that you came around the back of the house. Nora had left her mallet out. You picked it up and snuck inside. You knew to use the hidden staircase. Graves House has one too.”
“It was all so easy. It was like I was in a dream. I headed up those stairs and—”
“What are you doing?”
Mary and I both jolted as a voice tore through the night.
“Get away from my mother!”