Everett really does know how to get my engine going.
“I heard that,” Noah says. “That’s Lottie’s love language.”
It’s safe to say Noah knows me, too. “Who’s up, Lot?”
“Stassi Maxwell. I can’t believe she might be lying to us.”
Everett sighs. “She did seem pretty adamant about the fact she wasn’t the mistress.”
Noah shakes his head. “And Ariella did say it was Stassi who was walking out to the parking lot with Jasmine to have a talk.”
“That’s right,” I say. “That would make Stassi the last person to see Jasmine alive.” My stomach begins to tighten and I stiffen in response.
“Lemon?” Everett leans in to get a better look at me, and I force a smile.
“Next up is Jen Olsen,” I grit the words through my teeth. “Oh my stars above Honey Hollow, what I wouldn’t do for a bucket of Hennifer’s chicken right now.”
“I’m on it,” Noah says, running his thumb over his phone. “They’ve hooked up with a delivery service I use. They already have my credit card on file, and all I have to do is text them my order. And—I’m done.” He holds up his phone in triumph.
Everett gives my shoulders a warm squeeze. “Now that our cabana boy has your latest craving on the way, Lemon—what are your thoughts on Jen?”
“She had a lot to lose,” I point out. “Her business, for one. She certainly didn’t pretend to be broken up over Jasmine’s death.”
Noah nods. “And Jasmine had dirt on her regarding how Jen got the money to open up her business.”
Carlotta gives a wistful tick of the head. “You got to give it to girls like Jasmine. They really know how to rule the universe. If I had that kind of dirt on people, I’d be on top of the world. I could blackmail my way right into—”
“The path of a bullet,” I say. “The more we look at this case, the more it’s becoming clear that Jasmine was the intended target.”
Everett blows out a breath. “Unless, of course, it was done by someone with a vendetta against the judge. Owen was a polarizing person. You either loved him or hated him. There wasn’t much room in between. And the second category was overflowing.”
“That leads us to Ariella Kellerman.” I blink up at Everett. “She said she saw Jasmine take Stassi outside.”
Noah shrugs. “But according to Slater, she lied about not taking over Door-to-Door Gourmet.”
“I’ll look it up, Lot,” Carlotta says while fiddling with her phone. “Says right here, out of business.”
“Then there’s that.” I take a breath as another one of those horrid Braxton Hicks contractions hits me.
Why does my body insist on torturing me before it’s time to be tortured? I must be malfunctioning. But I don’t say a word, just simply covertly breathe my way through it. I have an appointment with Dr. Barnette bright and early next Monday and I’ll bring it up then.
Noah turns to look at me. “Are you all right? You went quiet.”
“I’m thinking, Noah,” I grunt. “Can’t a girl think?”
His dimples invert, no smile. “Anything else on Ariella?”
“Yeah, something big,” I add. “The poor thing is grieving her husband. I can’t imagine what she’s going through.”
“Agree.” Noah spreads the documents in his hand out over the table. “And Slater? I guess you could argue he’s grieving, too, but on a much smaller scale.”
“He didn’t care for her,” I say. “He admitted to having an affair with Stassi, and he basically said he wasn’t sorry for it.”
Everett nods. “He hinted he was sorry he didn’t pick Ariella because he wouldn’t have been caught.”
Noah glances my way. “Spoken like a man who was sorry he was caught. So Slater is a jerk. Not much has changed. He and Jasmine were on their way to absolving their marriage. I don’t see why he’d gun down Owen along with Jasmine. Especially using Owen’s weapon to do it. The pieces don’t fit.”
“They must not be the right ones.” I motion for Carlotta to give me another slice of the anchovy pizza, my special request that apparently the rest of them won’t touch, and she kindly obliges once again. “I guess we’ll have an opportunity to mine a few more clues tomorrow night at the class reunion part two.”
“We will,” Noah says, waving the folder in his hands before pulling out three glossy eight-by-ten photos of the crime scene and we all swoop in to view them.
The first is the picture of the tracks in the snow that look as if they’ve been heavily exaggerated.
The second is a picture of Jasmine and Owen slumped to the ground, each with a piece of my lemon Bundt cake within reach. Jasmine’s legs look twisted as if she had tried to run, and Owen looks as if he simply fell asleep in his dark suit with its green glint on the side of his jacket.
And the third is the weapon abandoned a good six feet from the bodies.
Jasmine pops up on the television set once again, wearing her string bikini and a strand of pearls as she douses herself with oil while lounging in the sun. She looks to the camera and sheds an easy smile.
“Sometimes I wonder what I did to deserve this,” she giggles as she says it.
“You and me both, Jasmine,” I say just as the doorbell rings.
Noah jumps up, and before we know it, we’re indulging in a bucket of Hennifer’s fried chicken, contemplating death, contemplating this new life brewing inside of me.
There is so much to wonder about.
But not one of us brings up that mystery woman.
And yet I wonder about her, too.
Lottie
Another one.
The muscles in my stomach feel as if they’re spasming more than ever, but nothing close together the way Dr. Barnette warned me about. Unfortunately, these still fall under the category of the most annoying Braxton Hicks contractions ever. So much for enjoying the last drops of my pregnancy. It feels as if I’ve been in labor for weeks—with even worse intensity just these
