Pleating for Mercy

“There you are,” a man said loudly just as a hand clasped my elbow. “I thought you weren’t coming.”

I tried to shrug free, but the grip tightened. Shielding my eyes from the sun, I looked up into Will Flores’s face. “What are you talking—”

“Shhh!” he interrupted, never breaking his stiff smile. He lowered his voice. “Are you crazy, following Ted Mitchell like that?”

“How did you—”

“Darlin’, you’re about as inconspicuous as a copperhead at the beach.”

My confidence deflated. Being a descendant of Butch Cassidy didn’t mean my reconnaissance skills rivaled his during his primo train- and bank-robbing years. “What’s going—”

He pulled me to him until not a puff of air could have slipped between our bodies. “Pretend like you’re happy to see me,” he whispered.

The short, staccato squeeze of his arms zapped the air from my lungs and cut me off. His warm breath through my hair tickled my ear. “I’m saving your ass, that’s what’s going on,” he murmured. “You don’t want to mess with Ted Mitchell. He works for the Kincaid family, and if he thinks you’re snooping into their business . . . Let’s just say it wouldn’t be good.”

He released me and I pushed away from him. From the corner of my eye, I saw the flash of Ted Mitchell’s eyes looking at Will and me as he crossed the street. “What’s over there?” I asked after he disappeared behind a closed door.

I started to point at the space next to a vacant space on the square, but he gently pushed my hand back down to my side. “Not pointing at his office would be a good idea. I’ll lay money down that he’ll be watching us from his window.”

I started to turn my head to look, but he caught my chin with his fingers, tilting it up until I looked in his eyes instead.

“Don’t quit your day job,” he said.

I’d been married to my sewing machine and the fashion world for so long that there wasn’t a chance in hell I’d quit designing. But it also meant I hadn’t remembered what it felt like to be this close to a man, and it was throwing me for a loop. My fluttering heartbeat turned my thinking upside down. In a movie, this would be the moment when the hero lowered his head until his lips lightly brushed the heroine’s in a long-awaited kiss.

This wasn’t a movie. There was no kiss.

Will dropped his fingers from my chin, put his hand at my lower back, and started guiding me back to Seed- n-Bead. When we were out of Ted Mitchell’s potential line of vision, he stopped walking suddenly. Facing me, his black suede cowboy hat blocking the sun from my eyes, he demanded, “Cassidy, just what the hell do you think you’re doing?”

Chapter 42

“It’s possible it was a married man,” Mama whispered. “She was awfully secretive about it.”

“You mean an engaged man.”

“Someone who was already taken,” she amended.

I’d avoided Will’s question and he’d escorted me back to the reception, leaving me at the door. He headed to the hardware store to buy some wood glue so he could finish repairing Meemaw’s antique shelf while I went in search of my mother. Now we huddled in the corner of Seed-n-Bead, talking under our breath.

I showed her the ring and told her my theory that Nate might well be Nell’s killer. One by one, I ticked the facts off on the fingers of my left hand. “First, he was in Buttons and Bows that day, so he could have taken something to use as the murder weapon. Second, Nell’s mirror. I found it in my yard, all scratched up. She must have had it with her the night she died. Maybe she was hiding that, too.”

“Or wanted to break it and give whoever she met that night seven years of bad luck,” Mama said.

I went on. “Third, Nell told me she hoped Nate wouldn’t break Josie’s heart, but she said it like she’d experienced that particular heartbreak firsthand. Fourth, she was pregnant and told her friends she was going to announce something big at the rehearsal dinner. What better place to ruin the man who’d wronged her? Fifth, there’s Miriam. She’s worried Holly will get hurt, so she won’t come forward about whoever she thinks the killer is, which means it has to be someone close to her . . . like her brother. Sixth, Nell tried to hide the ring in my shop. She must have thought the diamond was her insurance policy. Nate wouldn’t dare hurt her unless or until he had that ring back. Seventh . . .” Was there a seventh? “Oh! The lawyer. He met with Nell to write her will. How creepy is that? And it doesn’t quite compute, since he doesn’t do wills and trusts. Karen told me so herself. I think he might have been trying to intimidate her into giving the ring back. Maybe even threatening her.”

They were seven suspicious facts, but they were all circumstantial. I’d watched enough television crime shows to know it took more than circumstantial evidence to bring a murderer to justice. I dropped my hands, no more facts to tick off on my fingers. Perfect timing, since Josie immediately walked up to us. “What are you two whispering about?”

“Sweetheart, we were just wondering if you’re really sure about holding the wedding so soon,” Mama said. “Are you up to it?”

I snuck a surprised look at Mama. She’d never been good at fibbing, even with all the practice she’d had trying to hide her magical green thumb. All that sneaking around with Hoss McClaine had made her smooth as Texas honey.

“I wasn’t, not at first,” Josie said, “but now I am. Nell wouldn’t have wanted me to cancel.”

Yes, well, I was afraid Josie didn’t know Nell nearly as well as she thought she did.

The funeral guests had all gone. Just Josie, Ruthann, Karen, Mrs. Sandoval, and I were left. A pearl white SUV pulled up to the curb in front of the shop. Nate got out and popped the back hatch. We loaded the car with the leftover food. “What are you going to do with it all?” I asked Josie.

“Nate’s taking it to the women’s shelter in Granbury.”

I carried the last rectangular foil tray out to the car. Nate slid it into the back and pressed a button on his key ring. The hatch clicked, automatically closing. “Thanks,” he said.

“Sure.” I looked at him, wondering how a person could look so innocent, yet be so diabolical. What if he figured out where Nell had hidden the ring? Was I safe in my house? I looked at him, suddenly horribly afraid he’d be able to read every one of my thoughts.

“I meant what I said at the sheriff’s,” he said quietly.

I thought back. He’d said Josie wouldn’t know how to hurt anyone, let alone kill Nell. And that he loved her. All the more reason for him to protect Josie from Nell’s big announcement and his own betrayal of the woman he loved.

“I can see it in your eyes. After everything, you think I killed her, don’t you?” He moved closer.

Criminy. My whole body trembled. Yes. “N-no.”

“I didn’t. Nell and I went out on a few dates. It was a long time ago. She was Josie’s friend, that’s it. I had no reason to kill her.”

I clutched the strap of my purse. Except the forty-thousand-dollar engagement ring she stole. Oh, yeah, and the pregnancy. “Where were you that night? Why weren’t you with Josie?” All he had to do was give his alibi and he’d be in the clear.

His expression hardened, the cleft in his chin growing more pronounced. “I was helping someone.”

I threw my hands up, exasperated. “Do you know how much Josie loves you? How much she wants to believe you? She asked me to help prove you’re innocent, Nate. You can’t just say you were helping someone. Where were you?”

I didn’t really think he would just cough up his alibi, but he never had a chance. Josie, Karen, and Ruthann came outside, and a second later Mr. and Mrs. Kincaid turned the corner and walked briskly toward us. Miriam was next to her mother, and next to her was . . . Derek?

Taking a step back, I tripped on an uneven piece of cement. My foot twisted under me. I fell, dropping my purse, my knee scraping against the edge of the curb. A sharp stab of pain shot from my knee to my gut, but I swallowed the angry sting the second I saw the contents of my purse scattered all around me.

All at once, everyone rushed forward.