To Die For

Chapter Twenty-one

We were early getting to Mom and Dad’s, even though we stopped for the doughnuts and condensed milk I needed for the bread pudding. Wyatt had everything else at his house, including the size pans I needed. Yes, pans. Plural. We bought four-dozen glazed doughnuts. The smell of them made my mouth water, but I was strong and didn’t even open the box.

Dad opened the door, paused while he studied my face, then said, “What happened?” in a very quiet tone.

“I totaled my car,” I said, going to him for a hug; then I went on into the kitchen to face Mom. Behind me, I heard Dad and Wyatt carrying on a low-voiced conversation and I figured Wyatt was giving Dad the skinny.

In the end, I hadn’t tried to conceal the bruises. Well, I did have on a pair of long pants, a light-weave cotton with pink and white stripes, and a white T-shirt tied in a knot at my waist, because if I’d worn shorts that showed the bruises on my legs, someone would have thought Wyatt was beating me and I didn’t feel up to defending his honor. But I hadn’t put any concealer on the bruises under my eyes, because I figured any makeup would make a mess when Mom did whatever she was bound to do to my face.

She was standing with the freezer door open, staring inside. “I meant to do a roast,” she said without looking up when she heard me come in. I’m not certain she knew it was me and not Dad, but it didn’t matter. “But I’ve been fighting with that damn computer for so long I don’t have time now. What do you think about grilling-” She looked up and saw me, and her eyes went round. “Blair Mallory,” she said in an accusing tone, as if I’d done this to myself.

“Car accident,” I said, sitting down on one of the tall barstools at the eating bar. “My poor little car is totaled. Someone cut my brake line and I went through the stop sign into the traffic at that busy intersection just down from my house.”

“This has to stop,” she said, her voice tight and angry as she closed the freezer door and opened the refrigerator portion instead. “I thought the police caught the man who killed Nicole.”

“They did. He didn’t do it. He didn’t shoot at me, either; after he shot Nicole, he didn’t leave his house except to go to work. His wife alibied him, and since she’s found out he was cheating on her, she’s filed for divorce, so it isn’t as if she’s protecting him.”

Mom closed the refrigerator door without taking anything out, and opened the freezer door again. Mom is scarily efficient, so this dithering told me how upset she was. This time, she pulled out a package of frozen peas and wrapped them in a clean kitchen towel. “Hold this over the bruises,” she said, handing the peas to me. “What other damage do you have?”

“Just bruises. And I’m sore in every muscle. A car T-boned my car on the passenger side, so I took a huge jolt. The air bag hit me in the face and gave me a bloody nose.”

“Be glad you don’t wear glasses. Sally”-Sally Arledge is one of Mom’s closest friends-“drove her car into the side of the house, and when the air bag hit her, it broke her glasses and her nose.”

I couldn’t remember Sally driving into the side of her house, and I’m sure Mom would have told me. My sisters and I had all called her “Aunt Sally” when we were little, and they palled around together-Mom and the three of us, Sally and her five. That was quite a group when we all went somewhere. Sally had four boys, then a daughter. She’d named the four boys after the Gospels, but didn’t find any biblical girl’s name that she liked, so they were Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, and Tammy. Tammy always felt left out because she didn’t have a biblical name, so we’d called her Rizpah for a while, but she didn’t like that either. Personally, I thought Rizpah Arledge had a ring to it, but Tammy decided to go back to being Tammy and didn’t even have to have counseling.

“When did Sally drive into the house? You didn’t tell me about this.”

“Put the peas on your face,” she said, and I obediently tilted my head back and draped the bag of frozen peas over my face. It was big enough to cover my eyes, cheekbones, and nose, and, damn, it was cold. “As for why I didn’t tell you, it just happened on Saturday, while you were at the beach, and there hasn’t been an opportunity since then.”

Ah, the beach. I remembered it with longing. It was just a few short days ago, but then my only problem had been Wyatt. No one had been trying to kill me while I was at the beach. Maybe I should go back. Tiffany would like that. So would I, if no one would shoot me or tamper with my car while I was there.

“Did she hit the gas instead of the brake pedal?” I asked.

“No, she did it on purpose. She was mad at Jazz.” Sally’s husband’s name is Jasper, which is likewise a biblical name, only no one calls him that; he’s always been Jazz.

“So she rammed her house? That doesn’t sound cost-effective.”

“She was aiming for Jazz, but he dodged.”

I took the bag of peas off my face and stared at Mom in astonishment. “Sally tried to kill Jazz?”

“No, she just wanted to maim him a little.”

“Then she should use, like, a riding lawn mower or something, not a car.”

“I’m pretty sure he could outrun a lawn mower,” Mom said thoughtfully. “Though he has put on a little weight. No, I’m certain he could, because he was fast enough to get out of the way when she drove the car at him. So a lawn mower wouldn’t work.”

“What did he do?” I had visions of Sally catching him in the act with some other woman, like maybe her worst enemy, which would make the betrayal doubly bad.

“You know those shows on television where a husband or a wife invites these interior decorators to come into the house and redecorate a room as a surprise for the other one? While Sally was visiting her mother in Mobile last week, he did that.”

“Oh. My. God.” Mom and I looked at each other in horror. The thought of someone else coming into our houses and undoing what we had done, plus redecorating without having a clue what we like or dislike, was awful. I shuddered. “He got a television show decorator?”

“Not even that. He hired Monica Stevens from Sticks and Stones.”

There was nothing to say to that. I was mute in the face of such a calamity. Monica Stevens had a predilection for glass and steel, which I guess was fine if you lived in an laboratory, and she liked black. A lot of black. Unfortunately, Sally’s taste runs more toward cozy cottage.

I knew how Jazz had picked Monica, though: she had the biggest ad in the phone book, so poor Jazz would have figured she was very successful and popular if she could afford the biggest ad. That’s just how Jazz thinks. He was also hampered by having no clue about a woman’s boundaries, despite having been married for thirty-five years. If he’d just thought beforehand to ask Dad if redecorating was a good idea, this whole problem could have been avoided, because Dad has more than a clue, he has it down to an exact science. My daddy’s a smart man.

“Which room did Monica do?” I asked faintly.

“Put the peas back on your face.” I obeyed, and Mom said, “The bedroom.”

I moaned. Sally had worked hard finding just the right pieces for her bedroom, haunting estate sales and auctions to find the perfect antiques. Some of them had been heirloom quality. “What did Jazz do with Sally’s furniture?” Technically I guess it was his furniture, too, but Sally was the one who was emotionally invested in it.

“That was the kicker. Monica talked him into putting it in her consignment shop, where of course it sold right away.”

“What?” I dropped the peas to stare openmouthed at Mom. I couldn’t believe what I’d just heard. Poor Sally couldn’t even re-create her bedroom. “Forget the car, I’d have rented a bulldozer and gone after him! Why didn’t she back up and take another go?”

“Well, she was hurt. I told you it broke her nose. And her glasses, so she couldn’t see, either. I don’t know what’s going to happen to them. I don’t see how she can ever forgive him- Hello, Wyatt. I didn’t see you standing there. Blair, I didn’t have time to put on the roast, so we’re going to grill hamburgers.”

I looked around at where the two men were standing in the doorway, listening. The expression