“You think I murdered her?”
Will’s wounded eyes and hurt tone wrecked Reid’s inner peace. They sat on their shady porch with the heat and humidity shimmering off the grass. Augusta had her notepad out and her first question was to ask about Will’s tackle box.
Jane leaned over in her wicker chair and touched his arm. “Of course not, Will. I’m just telling you what we know so far. Augusta has to ask these questions. It’s just part of the investigation.”
Will didn’t lean back in his chair, and his knee jiggled constantly. Reid willed him to stay calm. Agitation wasn’t a good sign to the detective. The dog seemed to know too because Parker whined and pressed his head against the boy’s leg.
“I didn’t hurt her. I told you how it happened.”
“Uh-huh,” Augusta said. “Why didn’t you get her out of the water then?”
“I told you I tried! She smacked at my hand and told me to leave her alone. I didn’t know what else to do. She’s an adult. Was I supposed to forcibly haul her up to the dock? She was too mad for me to handle.”
The detective nodded. “I totally get it, Will. You’ve been taught well by your father, and you’re a respectful kid. I like that about you. I’m just trying to fully understand what happened. Did you hate her for what she was doing to your mom and dad? No one could blame you.”
Reid’s leg wanted to jiggle too. Augusta was good, and if Will let down his guard, he might reveal something that would implicate him.
His phone vibrated, and he glanced down at a text message from Scott.
Don’t let the police interrogate Will until I get there. Half an hour.
A little late. He cleared his throat. “Our attorney is on his way here now, Detective Richards. He has advised us to stop any questioning until he arrives.”
Augusta’s congenial smile faded. “If Will has nothing to hide, then there’s no reason to cut it off. I’m merely trying to understand what happened.”
“And we want to be open and honest. But Will is still shaken by what happened. I’m going to get him a sandwich while we wait on our attorney. Would you like something?”
“No, thank you. I’ll wait in the car.” She motioned to Jackson, and the two of them went to the patrol car parked in the drive.
Jane exhaled. “This is getting ridiculous. Will didn’t do anything.”
He rose and beckoned for Will to follow them inside to the kitchen. Reid found ham and cheese in the kitchen and fixed the three of them a sandwich while Jane made coffee before feeding her dog. All his assurances to Jane when things turned sideways came back to haunt him. It had felt easier to hold tight to his faith then, but now that they were faced with intense suspicion, his insides felt like a quivering mass of gelatin.
What would he do if Augusta arrested Will? And would she really arrest her boss’s fifteen-year-old son? It seemed incomprehensible.
He slid a ham sandwich piled high with mayo over to Jane. His and Will’s sandwiches were made with just a thin smear of mustard, and he watched a drip of mayo slide down the corner of Jane’s mouth when she took a bite.
He reached over and wiped it away. “I may have gone a little overboard with your beloved mayo.”
“Mom says you can never have too much mayo.” Will devoured his sandwich in four bites. “Am I going to be arrested?”
“I don’t think so, Will.” Jane bit her lip. “Um, do you know where you put your tackle box?”
“I left it on the dock when I ran off to the house. I didn’t even think about it until Augusta started asking me about it. Was Lauren really killed with it?”
“We won’t know until we get the autopsy results back. Did you see anyone around last night except Lauren? Was anyone with her in the car?”
“I didn’t see anyone else. I didn’t even notice her car come up the drive since I was down the hill at the river. The first I knew she was there was when she started yelling. She asked where you were, Dad, and she got even madder when she found out you were out of state with Mom. She seemed jealous.”
Jane looked stricken and put down her sandwich. “I feel responsible for what happened. If I wasn’t in the picture, she might not have become so unhinged about this.”
Reid put his sandwich plate down with a clatter. “It wouldn’t have mattered. I still would’ve refused to pay her, and I still would have had to file for divorce. She was the one who started her little extortion game, Jane.”
“If you say so.” She took a sip of coffee. “I need to quit letting emotion cloud my thinking about this. If someone killed her, we know it wasn’t Will. So who wanted her dead? And why?”
“And if that person used Will’s tackle box to do the job, he might have wanted to implicate Will. Why?”
“To throw off suspicion?” Will suggested.
“Or something more sinister,” Jane said. “Whoever it was followed her to your house. He may have intended all along to kill her and throw suspicion on one of you.”
“If I hadn’t been out of state, I’d be a suspect,” Reid said.
She gave him a hard look. “You might still be. I can guarantee Augusta will look into whether you might have hired it done.”
“I wouldn’t implicate my own son!”
“You’d be surprised what people do to their own family members.”
Reid gulped and went toward the chiming doorbell. Scott might be able to get them out of this mess.
* * *
The longest day on record was nearly over. Jane’s head pounded in a sickening surge with every beat of her heart. Her adrenaline had spiked, and she was on a downward spin.
She dropped onto Reid’s sofa and leaned her head back. “I thought Augusta was going to haul him off before it was all over. I wasn’t sure we’d get Will to go to bed. He kept pacing and wouldn’t even sit on the edge of the bed for a while.” Pressing a finger against her temple helped her head only slightly.
“You have a headache?”
“The worst.”
He tossed a soft throw onto the wood floor. “Sit down there and let me see what I can do with it.”
She settled on the throw and nearly groaned when his fingers pressed a spot that relieved the pain for a few moments. “That’s it right there.”
He massaged her head for several minutes, and she lost herself in the firm assurance of his touch on her scalp. The radiating pain began to leave the spot behind her left eye, and she relaxed against him.
“Come up here and let me have your hand.”
She scrambled up to the sofa with him, and he took her hand and clamped the webbing between her thumb and forefinger in a tight hold. The rest of the pain ceased in moments.
“That’s magic. Where’d you learn to do that?”
“John’s wife, Geena, used to get migraines, and I watched him get rid of them for her with this acupressure move.”
“The truck driver who picked up you and Will when you escaped the cult?”
“Uh-huh.” He released her hand. “Better?”
“All gone.”
She didn’t resist the pull he made to draw her back against him to settle in the crook of his arm. He smelled delicious after his shower. His hair still glistened from the water, and she ran her palm down the curve of his arm around her waist. All the resistance against him she’d been able to muster for the past few months seemed to have evaporated. All she wanted to do was turn her face up and kiss him until she didn’t remember anything about today. A slow burn started in her belly.
She needed to get out of here before she made a fool of herself.
“I need a shower myself. I should go home.” But she didn’t want to leave his warm embrace.
“You could take one here. You have clean clothes in the suitcase out in my SUV.”
“But I’d have to move, and I’m not sure I can.” Her head turned of its own accord toward him, and she lifted her face to stare at him. “Has anyone ever told you that you’re a beautiful human being?” She reached up to caress his freshly shaven face. “Your hair is really growing out.” She ran her hand over the top of his head.
His eyes widened. “Did you find the wine the owners left behind in the cabinet or something?”
She smiled and shook her head. “Nary a drop. I think the trauma of the last few days has done something to me. I can’t seem to summon any resistance to you tonight.”
“You have to resist me?”
His mouth came closer, and she wound an arm around his neck. “Constantly. Even in my sleep.”
A low chuckle rumbled in that big chest she’d admired before his head came down and his lips met hers. The jolt of pure desire shook her, but she met the passion of his kiss with her own. His warm, firm lips were more than she’d remembered, more than she’d dreamed.
He pulled her onto his lap and kissed her until she lost all sense of time and place. All that mattered right now was the scent and taste of him. She wanted to forget she’d helped bury his mother. She never wanted to remember the way her officers had looked at her boy. She never wanted to see another dead body or feel the weight of responsibility for justice on her shoulders.
All that mattered was this moment, this man.
She gradually realized his breathing had grown ragged and he’d pulled away a bit. Just enough to bring her back to the present. And to the problems that still hounded her.
She tore her lips from his. They felt somehow fuller and more tender than she’d ever remembered. “Sorry.”
“For what? For being the only woman I’ve ever loved? For giving me the most perfect son a man could have?” He cupped her face in his hands and stared into her eyes. “I love you, Jane Hardy. I’m not going anywhere. Not ever. You’re going to marry me and Will, and we’ll live here for the rest of our lives, God willing. But you’re hard to resist, and I was beginning to forget you don’t have a ring on your finger yet.”
Tears flooded her eyes. “I don’t deserve you, Reid. I’d better get home before I lose all reason. Otherwise I might forget about that ring too.”
His crooked smile made her heart melt. She pulled herself out of the warm security of his embrace and wobbled to her feet. She had maybe an ounce of resistance left, and she knew she’d better make use of it and get home.
Parker gave her a reproachful stare as he followed her to the door. This living in two separate houses would need to end soon.