Grave Risk Page 25

  Blaze’s chair squeaked. Fawn heard quiet footsteps in the office as Blaze walked to the reception window. “I’m listening.”

  Fawn cringed. Here she was eavesdropping again, and Blaze knew it. She couldn’t leave without calling attention to herself and interrupting something that sounded pretty important.

  And she really didn’t want to miss it.

  “I guess you heard I went out to the ranch to talk to Dane and Cheyenne last week,” Austin said. “I did Dane wrong for a lot of years. I almost wish I could say that I was taking it out on him because I couldn’t face the fact that my own son was doing the things I blamed on the ranch kids. But I can’t say that. I never even picked up on the fact that Ramsay was responsible for the vandalism, the death of Edith’s cat and even the barn fire that nearly killed you.”

  “I never picked up on it, either, until it was almost too late,” Blaze said. “I thought Ramsay and I were friends.”

  “I wish you truly had been friends. Maybe you’d have been a good influence on my son.”

  “And then again, maybe not.”

  Fawn could hear the gentle, teasing note in Blaze’s voice, and something inside her relaxed. With Blaze, she could already tell, all was forgiven.

  “Or, it could be,” Blaze continued, obviously carried by a thought, “that I’d be a good influence on Ramsay’s father, if the stubborn ol’ cuss would let me.”

  There was a tense silence, then, “Jill been talking to you?”

  “Didn’t have to. I was here when Taylor brought you in, remember? You need help. Cheyenne can see to it you get that help. Just listen to her.”

  “It isn’t that easy.”

  “It is, you know,” Blaze said. “You grew up in Hideaway and you still don’t know that your problem is everyone’s problem? But folks can’t help a guy if he’s too proud to share his load with them.”

  Another silence.

  “They’ve already shared too much of that load. If I’d not forbidden Ramsay to see you, if I’d encouraged your friendship instead of hurling accusations at you, maybe my son wouldn’t have done the things he did, and maybe this town wouldn’t have suffered like it has.”

  A long, heavy silence fell. All Fawn heard was the buzz of the wall clock and the hum of the fluorescent lights.

  “But you know,” Blaze said finally, his voice so soft she had to strain to hear him, “I think you’re wrong. I’m no shrink, but sometimes I can read people almost as well as I can read animals. What happened to Ramsay happened when his mama died. I don’t think anything you could’ve done afterward would’ve changed that.”

  There was another silence, then Fawn heard a loud sniff.

  Austin was crying.

  Blaze continued to talk to him in soothing tones, the way he might talk to a sick animal, but Fawn heard very little. She did hear Austin clearly agree to submit to tests.

  Blaze Farmer was a miracle worker.

  Jill managed to button-punch her way into the house without setting off any alarms. She stepped into her sitting room with a feeling of accomplishment. She couldn’t erase the grin from her face.

  Rex had put it there. Rex and his kisses.

  She covered her face with her hands as the grin widened. She could feel her face flushing even as she thought about it again.

  She stepped into the bathroom and looked at herself in the mirror, half expecting to see a major change. But she didn’t. She was still Jill Cooper, with her morning makeup no longer in evidence. She still had noticeable strands of white in her dark hair—though the cut did, indeed, seem to lift her features.

  Younger and perkier. Hmm.

  With a chuckle, she reached for the jar of face cream she had lusted after since last night. Sheena had told her to apply a thick layer of it over her skin whenever she felt stressed.

  Well, she should’ve been using it for the past week and a half, but now would work. She was supposed to lie down while the mask was in place, but she had too much to do.

  In the first place, she hadn’t heard from Miss Sheave, and she wanted to follow up on that call. She also wanted to go through those boxes of school records Doris had brought. There had been no time on Sunday to check them out, and last night, after work, she’d paged through them but was dissatisfied with the result—which was zilch.

  Now would be a good time to revisit some of those records and see what might turn up.

  The bluebird button still had her puzzled. She opened the medicine cabinet and took it out to look at it again. How was it connected to Chet’s death? Could Edith or Cecil have found this button near the body? Obviously, Edith was convinced of a connection or she wouldn’t have placed it in the envelope with the files of the boys. She stuck the button in her pocket.

  The telephone rang just as she was smoothing the cream from her face to her neck and feeling the nice tingle. Chuckling at her green reflection in the mirror, she went to answer. It was Rex.

  “I was wondering if I could convince you to come down and join Tyler and me in the dining room of the bed and breakfast. I think Tyler would like to meet you.”

  “Sounds to me like you’re trying to avoid a one-on-one discussion with him,” she said. “I’m not interfering in that.”

  “We’ve already had that. He’s curious about you.”

  “I’m sorry, Rex, but now isn’t a good time. I just finished applying this cream on my face.”

  “Well, then, later tonight?”

  She smiled, loving it. “Sounds interesting.”

  “Okay, look, if you see the sheriff’s car cruising past your house a few extra times tonight, don’t worry. I called and asked Tom to keep a closer watch on you for a while.”

  The smile died. “You did what?”

  “I told you, I don’t like the thought of you alone in that house right now.”

  Great. “Greg and Tom already think I’m a neurotic female, and now they’re going to think I put you up to this.”

  “Does it really matter what they think? I would just feel more comfortable if there’s extra security for the next few days, until we find out who’s been so interested in your house. Or in you.”

  “Easy for you to say. You don’t have to live in this town.”

  He didn’t say anything.

  “Okay, look. I’m getting a little bit of a headache, and here I am trying to relax. Why don’t we talk about this later?” she suggested. “Meanwhile, try to spend some quality time with Tyler.”

  “Yes, boss. Will do.”

  “And Rex?”

  “Yes?”

  “Thanks.”

  “For what?”

  “For caring enough to humiliate me.”

  “You’re welcome.”

  When he hung up, she disconnected, then looked once more at the bluebird button. Where had she seen this before?

  Rex closed his cell phone and stuck it back into his belt holster. Well, that had gone wonderfully.

  “Is she joining us, Dad?” Tyler asked, standing at the door, looking like a starved waif.

  “She will later. Right now we get to spend some quality time together.”

  “Oh, wonderful. That means I get to sit and listen to you lecture me about how to treat my mother like she’s some queen or something, and take all the trash she tries to dish me and—”

  “I won’t lecture. Promise. We’ve both been under a lot of stress lately. Maybe we should just take a break from it and relax for a couple of hours.”

  “You mean it?”

  “Yes.” He meant it. Except he couldn’t seem to shake a feeling of…heaviness. It would be an overstatement to call this feeling one of impending doom. Still, he couldn’t let it go.

  Jill pulled out her old high-school album, junior year. Despite the soft classical music she had just put on the player, and the soothing feel and smell of the mask, her headache threatened to get worse. She’d waited too long to take steps to stop the tension headache. She was surprised she hadn’t had one before now.

/>   Opening to the page where Austin had scribbled his macho version of “I love you” around the perimeter of her picture, she felt a wave of sadness. Poor Austin. With his dysfunctional family history, did he ever really have a chance at a normal life?

  Come to think of it, did she? Neither of their lives had been normal. Certainly not happy. But in spite of her struggles, she was, for the most part, glad about the choices she’d made. She knew Austin was still struggling. She needed to tell him that he could make up his mind to make the right choices from now on. The first thing he needed to do was take steps to fight his illness so he could be there for his son. Giving up was not the answer.

  Austin’s condition could very well go into remission, even if he did have histiocytosis X.

  She turned the page and saw photos of her friends, so many familiar faces. Mary Larson, in their junior year, wore a bright smile for perhaps the last time in her life.

  And then Jill saw something that startled her. The button. It was attached to the blue sweater that Mary had made for an FHA project at school. She had worn it all the time in their junior year, and through most of their senior year.

  Jill remembered her friends complaining because Mary liked to wear that sweater so often.

  The button…it matched. Jill pulled the bluebird button from her pocket. It matched perfectly.

  So what did this tell her?

  Why would Edith have placed this button in the envelope, unless she saw a connection?

  Time to make that second call to Alabama.

  Chapter Thirty-Seven

  Rex made a second trip to the food buffet. He was thoroughly enjoying Tyler’s company, and dreading what he knew he had to do. Tyler had to return home before Margret called out the National Guard.

  But there were other things on Rex’s mind that superseded even Margret for the moment. He couldn’t get his mind off Jill. He had such a powerful need to be where she was right now…as if something wasn’t quite right. And yet his subconscious wasn’t communicating with his conscious thought process at the moment.

  What was bothering him?

  Jill’s head pounded as she waited for the phone to connect. Finally Miss Sheave answered, and Jill identified herself.

  “I know this sounds crazy, Miss Sheave, but—”

  “Honey, we’re both adults now. Why don’t you call me Marilyn?”

  “Yes. Of course, Marilyn.”

  “I’ve been thinking about what you told me the other day. I’m bound by a code of confidentiality, and even though it’s been nearly three decades, I don’t feel right about—”

  “What if I just tell you what I know?” Jill asked.

  “And what would that be?”

  Now she had to guess. “Something traumatic happened to Mary Larson during her junior year.”

  There was a hesitation. “Go on.”

  “It did something to her. She was never the same since. I told you about the death we had at the school my senior year.”

  “You didn’t tell me much about it,” Marilyn said, still hesitant.

  “We had some boys in our class who liked to play practical jokes. They thought they were setting up a stink bomb in the chemistry lab supply closet for the lab assistant, but it turned deadly. Sulfur was replaced with selenium, which asphyxiated the assistant when he opened the door one morning.”

  Marilyn made no comment.

  “Mary was a very good chemistry student, and she had hoped for the position of assistant. Cecil Martin chose Chet Palmer, instead.”

  There was an audible gasp over the line.

  “I’m becoming more and more convinced, because of recent incidents, that Chet’s death was a murder,” Jill said. “I’m not saying for sure Mary had anything to do with it. It could be someone else committed the deed to avenge whatever happened to Mary. Her boyfriend—who is now her husband—was one of the pranksters.”

  There was a deep sigh at the other end. “You wouldn’t be…your question wouldn’t be in regard to the rape, would it?”

  It took some effort for Jill to conceal the shock in her voice. “The rape.”

  “You guessed Mary was raped the night of the junior-senior prom, and you need me to verify it.”

  “That isn’t exactly a logical conclusion for someone to draw,” Jill said softly.

  “Rumor. Word of mouth. I know how kids talk. Of course, it seldom reaches the teachers, but it’s nearly impossible to keep something like that quiet among the student body, especially one as small and tightly knit as Hideaway’s. Girls tell their girlfriends, and such as that.”

  “Mary Larson practically stopped talking to everyone after that dance.”

  “Yes.”

  “Rape would, of course, do that to someone.”

  “That’s right,” Marilyn said.

  “So Chet Palmer was a rapist.” Jill didn’t put it in the form of a question.

  There was a soft sigh. “You’re probably wondering why I didn’t tell the authorities about it.”

  “I’m not sure it would have made much difference, judging by the way the sheriff handled Chet’s death a year later.”

  “Jill, at the time I wasn’t even sure it was Chet, and in fact, at first, I didn’t even know she had been raped. Edith Potts first sent Mary to talk to me because the girl was showing signs of severe depression.”

  “And then Mary told you?”

  “Two sessions later, she admitted she had been raped.”

  “Did she say by whom?”

  “She never did. All I knew about Chet was what I saw the night of that prom, when I was chaperone. Mary came rushing into the gymnasium from outside, where she wasn’t even supposed to be. She had smudges of mud on her dress, her hair was a mess and she was crying. At the time, I thought she’d fallen or something. I don’t even know why I remembered, later, that I had seen Chet follow her outside probably thirty minutes before that.”

  “You never reported the rape.”

  “Mary begged me not to. She said her father would blame her.”

  “He probably would have.”

  “Face it, Jill, twenty-eight years ago, public opinion was usually against the woman in cases like that. Were you a friend of hers?”

  “Not really.” And why wasn’t I? Why didn’t I notice that something was bothering Mary that whole year? “Marilyn, can you tell me if you think she might have been angry enough with Chet that she could have killed him the next year?”

  There was a long pause, and while Jill waited, she winced with each pounding of her head. This thing wasn’t getting better.

  “Mary internalized everything. In time, it’s possible something might have given way in her mind. Looking back now, I’d have handled the situation much differently, but then I was young and eager to please the student body. I thought I knew what was best for ‘my’ kids.”

  “You’re saying it’s possible she did it.”

  A soft sigh. The answer was slow in coming. “It’s possible.”

  “Thank you, Marilyn. That’s what I needed to know.”

  After ending the call, with her head aching so badly it was making her sick, Jill dialed Rex’s cell phone. The picture that had begun to form in her mind was an ugly one, indeed, but she was convinced now that neither Austin, Junior nor Jed had intended Chet’s death.

  Mary Larson, on the other hand, might very well have snapped when her rapist received the position as lab assistant.

  Maybe she had simply overheard the boys planning the prank and had impulsively given in to a darker motivation. She’d always been close to Jed, of course, and privy to anything he would be planning.

  If Mary had used those three poor dupes to do her dirty work, had Jed ever discovered how he’d been manipulated? Had he even suspected? Jed Marshall had always been like a besotted puppy when it came to Mary.

  But why would Mary have killed Edith and Cecil? Especially if Marilyn Sheave had told no one about the rape. There would be no connection without that knowledge.
>
  Once again, Jill considered the button. Handmade by Mary, herself, and distinctively different from any other button, it could very well have been found in a suspicious place. The most likely people to have found that button would have been Cecil or Edith.

  Before Jill could continue her line of thought, Rex answered his cell phone. Jill could hear the sound of clattering dishes and chattering people in the background.

  “Did you change your mind?” he asked.

  “No. Look, Rex, can you find out where Mary Marshall was on Saturday night? I’ve just uncovered some information that’s vital enough that Greg may need to know about it.”

  “Mary was in town last weekend. I just overheard someone asking Jed if they’d liked the new dinner menu in the dining room Saturday evening. What have you uncovered?”

  She leaned her head back against the firm cushion of her recliner. “I think it’s possible Mary killed Chet Palmer.”

  There was a quick intake of breath, but Rex recovered quickly. “Why Mary?”

  “Rape. I’m just guessing here, but I gathered from some things Austin said that Edith was highly suspicious. I’m also guessing that Mary lost a button at the scene of the crime, and Edith has kept it all these years.”

  “Why haven’t you called Greg yet?”

  “He’s not going to settle for this flimsy bit of evidence in a case as old as this. There’s got to be more.”

  “Are you thinking Mary might have had something to do with Edith’s and Cecil’s deaths?” His voice was softer, and the clatter grew distant, as if he’d left his table to talk in a more private place.

  “Mary had just left the spa before Edith died. If Edith had figured out the truth with this button and the other information in the manila envelope I found in her things, then she might have said something to Mary. Or to someone else.”

  “Someone like who?”

  “Cecil, maybe? Or Jed? If Mary told Jed about the rape, he might have intentionally switched the ingredients for that bomb. But that doesn’t explain the button. I still think it was Mary, or that she was in on it. Cecil was at the spa talking to Edith that morning. Maybe Mary overheard.”