Tuesday, 10:15 a.m.
At Sweetwater Cove Country Club, Blanche sipped on a Bloody Mary, glanced at her diamond-encrusted gold watch. So what if it was only a little past ten on Tuesday morning. She didn’t give a hoot. Tomato juice and V-8 juice were breakfast drinks, right? The vodka just added a little kick, a kick she seemed to need more often these days. She was antsy, different, but she didn’t know why. Could it possibly be because Tom was gone? Surely she couldn’t miss him so much. For all these years she’d thought of Tom as a meal ticket, someone to pamper her, shower her with trinkets, smother her with the finer things in life. And, in her opinion, she deserved the attention Tom gave her. She was spoiled; she always had been. Her parents had seen to that. She enjoyed being spoiled, liked having underlings kowtow to her every whim. But without Tom, something was missing. Could she actually care about him? Miss him just a teeny bit? Or maybe a lot?
The club bartender appeared at her shoulder, refilled her glass, stuck a fresh celery stick in it. “Any word on Mr. Southerland?” he asked.
“No, Jip. But my fingers are crossed.” She smiled at him.
The buzzer signaling other arrivals sounded and in walked Lillian, Mary Ann, and Estelle. “It’s chilly in here, don’t you think?” asked Estelle. She rubbed her hands together.
Both Mary Ann and Lillian agreed.
“Not to me,” quipped Blanche.
“You’re never cold, Blanche,” said Mary Ann. Except in your heart, she thought, as she laid the cards on the table and the four of them drew for deal.
“Looks like I deal,” said Lillian, as she turned over the five of diamonds. She wondered if the three of hearts, the four of hearts, and the two of clubs the other three had drawn meant the cards would be lousy today. Or would it be a bad day period? She shivered.
The bartender interrupted their conversation. “Mrs. Southerland, you have a call.” He handed her a portable phone. “It’s your housekeeper.”
Blanche frowned. Maria had orders to never call her at the club. “This had better be important,” she said.
“Yes, ma’am, it is. The sheriff called here. He’s been trying to find you. He asked if I knew where you were. I know you don’t like nobody calling you at the club, so I figured I’d pass the message on and you can call him back if you want to.” She paused, dreading the string of expletives that would fly out of the receiver. “It’s about Mr. Southerland.”
“About Tom?” The color drained from Blanche’s face. “Did the sheriff say what?”
“No, ma’am. But he gave me a number for you to call.”
Blanche grabbed the score pad and pencil, jotted down the number, and hung up. She picked up her Bloody Mary and the portable, walked away from the bridge table. She identified herself to the woman who answered the phone and was connected to the sheriff immediately.
“Mrs. Southerland, we found your husband,” he said. He heard her gasp. “He’s alive.”
“That’s wonderful.” Blanche sank into an overstuffed chair, fought to control her emotions. She didn’t want the bridge girls to see her crying.
“He’s in a coma. But for right now, he’s alive.”
“Where is Tom? And where did you find him?” Suspicions of Tom being found in some kind of love nest ran through her brain. Could she ever forgive him for that? And what would her friends think?
“I’m not sure we should go into detail right now. Is anybody there with you?”
“My three bridge buddies are here. I’ll call them.” Blanche gestured frantically to Mary Ann, Lillian and Estelle to come. They hurried to her side, and Blanche quickly told them about the phone call.
“Sheriff, what’s wrong with my husband?” Her hand shook as she raised the Bloody Mary to her lips. The celery stick bumped her nose.
“Mrs. Southerland, your husband is at a hospital in Charlottesville.”
“How in heaven’s name did he get there?”
“He was airlifted off Smith Mountain. The EMTs on the scene thought it best that he go there immediately.”
“What was he doing on Smith Mountain?” Blanche asked.
“We don’t know why he was on Smith Mountain. He can’t tell us anything; he’s in a coma, remember?” He didn’t mention that Tom had been found in a freezer, that part of a toe had been chewed off, and that he wasn’t expected to survive. She’d learn that soon enough. “His condition is critical.”
“Oh, my,” said Blanche. She stared at her friends, took a sip from her glass. “I’m going to Charlottesville.”
“Are you up to driving yourself?” the sheriff asked.
“Estelle will take me.” She looked at Estelle. “Right?”
“Well….”
Estelle didn’t want to drive Blanche to Charlottesville. Each way would take over two hours, not counting the time she’d have to spend waiting in the hospital. And she’d be with Blanche, a person she could barely stand, the entire time. The one thing that would make the trip to Charlottesville tolerable would be if Tom died and she’d no longer need to pretend when around Blanche. She had nothing against Tom. He was a nice, honest man. But he was incompetent. He never deserved the contractor job. And if Tom died, her husband Dave would be the contractor—a position that should have been awarded to him three years ago.
“Right, Estelle?”
“I’ll need to make a few phone calls first,” Estelle said.