The next morning Rex had the limo ready for us by ten o’clock. We’d gone back to the Bissonnette House for our final night. Without Darla there, the place was a shell of what it had been. Tinkie had managed to place the newlywed couple in another inn and we had the place to ourselves.
I was still wrapping my head around the relationship between Darla and Kathleen, the close bond that had formed between the women at the orphanage where Darla had lived for most of her childhood. She’d found out about the murder of her biological mother only in the last few years. Before Darla could find the courage to meet her mother, Aurora had been murdered. With all chance of knowing her birth parents taken from her, Darla had set about to seek revenge.
“Ready to go home?” Coleman asked as he hefted our bags into the trunk.
“I am. More than ready.” I looked back at the inn, wondering what would become of it. “It’s been a fabulous vacation. With a few drawbacks.”
“Our time together was fabulous.”
“It was.” I stood on tiptoe to give him a gentle kiss.
He and the men loaded our bags as I made one final phone call to check on Clarissa at the hospital. She’d made it through surgery and was expected to recover. Tulla had gone home with her arm in a sling. No one died, at least not in Columbus.
Coleman put his arm around my shoulders. “Sorry it ended this way. I really liked Darla and Kathleen.”
“As did I.” It had given me a lot to think about, how old wounds festered and infected the entire body. “I don’t blame Darla for wanting revenge. I don’t. If Clarissa truly killed Darla’s mother and her father, I can’t fault Darla for wanting to kill her.”
“Deputy Ford says he’s reopening Johnny Bresland’s shooting death. He believes Clarissa paid another hunter to do it.”
“Do you think he can find the evidence?”
“I do.” Coleman rumpled my hair.
“And what about Aurora?”
“The deputy over in Lafayette County said they were reopening that case. It will mean disinterment, but if there was poison, they should be able to find it.”
“I can’t help but wonder why Darla didn’t speak up sooner,” I said.
“The cases in both deaths were closed quickly. I’m not faulting the investigators. There was no reason to believe it was other than suicide and accident,” he said. “An older woman whose husband is cheating on her in one case. Suicide isn’t that far-fetched. Then with Johnny Bresland, a hunting accident. It happens more than people know. It adds up.”
“Except for the inheritance. It was right there when we finally went looking. Clarissa was smart to kill the Breslands in two different jurisdictions.”
“You’re right about that.”
“Will Clarissa be charged?”
“Goode has assured me that if the evidence points to her guilt, she’ll be turned over to the proper authorities and prosecuted.”
“And Kathleen?” The last time I’d seen her, she was being led away in handcuffs.
“Same for her. And Tulla Tarbutton also. She was involved in duping an innocent man into committing a felony.”
The others came out of the house. Tinkie locked the front door of the Bissonnette House and put the key under the mat for one of Goode’s fellow officers to retrieve. She picked up the kitty carrier. Oscar hadn’t stood a chance trying to halt her adoption of Gumbo. Soon the Richmond household would be brimming with pets and a child.
“Our work here is done,” Tinkie said, putting the kitty carrier in the limo. “Next year, no matter where we travel or what’s going on, we are not taking a case.”
“Amen to that,” Coleman and Oscar said together. They were acting way too much like Tinkie and me.
Millie picked up her bag before Coleman could load it. “Len is going to take me home,” she said. She looked at the deputy and her smile held only happiness.
“We’ll want details when we get back to Zinnia,” Cece said in a whisper loud enough for everyone to hear and for the Tippah County deputy, who took the bag from Millie’s hand, to blush to the roots of his hair.
“Then we’re off. We still have to get home in time to cook Christmas dinner,” Harold said. “The party is at my house.”
“But first a little Christmas Eve fun,” Coleman said as he patted my butt. “I can’t wait.”
35
Coleman was sound asleep when I got up Christmas morning. I lit a fire in the parlor and turned the stove on to heat. I wouldn’t attempt scratch biscuits, but I’d bought some heat-and-serve biscuits from a little bakery in Columbus.
As I prepared a special Christmas morning breakfast for my lover, my thoughts were on the treacheries of revenge. I’d won my bet with Coleman, and last night he’d gone a long way toward paying off his debt. In a way, though, the whole mess that Darla had set in motion was also about money. She felt cheated out of her due. Part of that rested with Aurora, though, not just Clarissa. And whatever sympathy I’d had for Darla, I lost when I thought of Kathleen. She was a decent person who’d become a criminal because of her love for Darla. It was all just so depressing.
I’d left my cell phone plugged in to the charger on the kitchen counter, and just as I reached for it, “Unfaithful” began to play. My phone was possessed by Rihanna. This was the Christmas that just kept on giving.
I backed away from the phone and it stopped. “Great.” I picked it up and examined it. Nothing unusual there. Not until the Eagles took it over. “Lyin’ Eyes” started up.
“Nope, nada, stop!” I turned it off. It came back on, still
