Scoop to Kill (25 page)

“She knew you loved her,” I said.

“Yes, but love doesn’t save your life. Medicine does.” He shook his head tightly. “And then the bills started rolling in. I thought we had good insurance, but . . .” His voice trailed off.

“I couldn’t let us lose everything, Ms. Jones. My Rosemary had suffered enough. She’d supported me through graduate school, picked up and moved across the country when I got my first academic job, endured the loneliness of my pre-tenure years when I was consumed by work. When I traveled for my research, she stayed here, alone, in this backwater town and never once complained. The thought of her spending her golden years in poverty again, all because she’d married a man who loved ideas more than money . . . I couldn’t let that happen.”

“Of course not,” I murmured soothingly.

“So I took some money. Just enough to cover the bills. I wasn’t greedy. I just shuffled it from one bloated research account to another. Rosemary’s happiness was worth more than a new computer that could solve a complex equation in thirty seconds instead of a minute.”

I nodded again, but my attention had shifted to the door behind Gunderson. There was a tiny square window in that door, and I thought I saw a shadow move across it. If someone were out in the hallway, if I could just make a little noise . . . something to draw that unknown somebody’s attention without startling George.

“I took the money, and then I had to find a way to give it back. Eventually, those accounts would be audited. The researchers would wonder where their money went. That was when I got the idea to pad the budgets up front. I only planned to fiddle with the percentages until I’d paid back the money I borrowed. But once I started, it was just so easy to keep doing it. And it meant I could take better care of Rosemary. We could afford help around the house, and I could take her on trips.”

And to eat regularly at the Hickory Tavern. I kept my lips shut. My mama didn’t raise any fools, and I wasn’t going to poke back at the man with the gun.

“I know it was wrong, Ms. Jones. If it were only my life on the line, I would have turned myself in when Bryan Campbell discovered what I’d been doing. I never would have paid him any blackmail money, and I certainly wouldn’t have killed him when he threatened to expose me anyway.”

Out of the corner of my eye, I caught a flash of movement. Someone at the door?

“But it isn’t just my life,” George continued. “It’s Rosemary’s. She’s strong, stronger than I, and she could withstand the scandal. But I would have to pay back the money. They would take everything to get their pound of flesh: our house, Rosemary’s jewelry, our savings, everything. She’d be left with nothing. What if the cancer came back? How would she fight it, alone, without any money?”

I heard a faint scraping sound. Someone was definitely right outside the door. I didn’t dare look to see who it was, though.

Another sound, a squeak of rubber on linoleum, faint but clear. George twitched, and started to turn, as though he, too, had heard the noise.

Quickly, I tried to distract him.

“I see how it happened, Professor Gunderson. One small lapse in judgment, and then years covering it up.” In my peripheral vision, I saw the door behind Gunderson inch open. “The problem growing bigger and bigger,” I rushed on. “You didn’t mean to, but once you started, there was no stopping it.”

Something flared in his eyes—joy, relief, excitement? “Exactly,” he exclaimed. “One small lapse in judgment . . .” He laughed softly. “The poet was correct. ‘Oh, what a tangled web we weave when first we practice to deceive!’ ” His gaze sharpened on me. “Do you know who said that?”

Really? This hardly seemed the time for a quiz. I went with the old standby. “Shakespeare?”

“Sir Walter Scott.”

Gunderson and I both jumped nearly out of our skins and spun around to find Bree standing at the back of the room. She stood perfectly still, her hands open and spread away from her body to show that she wasn’t armed.

Her eyes met mine briefly, and she must have seen the shock in my face. She arched a brow and drawled, “What? I can read, you know?”

I don’t know whether it was Bree’s sudden appearance or her startling command of British literature that knocked George off guard, but I took full advantage of his momentary confusion. I grabbed the first thing I encountered—Emily Clowper’s flea market foam rooster—and threw it at Gunderson with all my might.

The rooster bounced off him, doing no real damage, but he threw up his arms in a defensive reflex.

Bree, too, snatched the nearest object, a much more weapon-worthy book from on top of Emily’s filing cabinet. She threw it overhand, and it struck Gunderson squarely in the forehead.

He stumbled and the gun went flying.

Alice scrambled over the desk, lunging for the gun, while Bree and I both tackled Gunderson.

We had him pinned to the ground, groaning, and Alice was standing on top of Emily’s desk with the gun trained on Gunderson’s head, when Cal and Finn came rushing into the office.

Cal, his weapon drawn and a look of panic on his face, surveyed the scene.

“Lord-a-mighty, I’ve had nightmares like this.”

Beside him, Finn laughed. “Me too. But in mine, a couple people were naked and the rooster was very much alive.”

I
didn’t see Cal or Finn during the week between Gunderson’s arrest and Crystal and Jason’s wedding. Finn’s articles about ivory-tower corruption—Jonas Landry’s fabricated interviews and George Gunderson’s massive embezzlement—made national news, and Cal fielded media requests from across the state. I just wanted to lay low and wait for the dust to settle.

But in a town the size of Dalliance, you can’t avoid anyone for very long, and we were all at the wedding at the Silver Jack.

A whip-thin young man in a tux, a black cowboy hat, and silver-chased boots ushered Deena down the flower-lined aisle. She had the poor boy’s arm in a death grip, and he had to pry her fingers from his sleeve to hand her off to Tom Silver. A gentle murmur of laughter rippled through the guests, and then they grew silent when Crystal Tompkins stepped through the French doors and onto the patio.

She stood in the midst of her pink-ribboned brides-maids, swathed from head to toe in silk chiffon, a circlet of palest pink tea roses anchoring a gossamer veil to her sleek cinnamon bob. One by one, her friends paired off with dapper cowboys to mosey down the aisle, until Crystal stood alone, her chin high, her bouquet of lilies and roses clutched to her breast.

As she crossed the lawn and swayed down the aisle, the honeyed light of late afternoon caught the flecks of gold in her amber eyes. She looked like a voluptuous fairy engulfed in a cloud of dandelion floss. She took my breath away.

I tore my eyes away to watch her groom’s face. He had the dazed look of a man crawling out of a lifeboat onto dry land. At one point, he rocked forward on his toes and I thought he might bolt down the aisle to greet her. But he held his ground until she stood at his side, gazing up at him with the sure knowledge of her power over him.

Beside me, I heard Bree snuffle. She always cried at weddings. Especially her own.

Beyond her, I heard a muffled groan from Alice, who had her mother’s tender heart but lacked her sentimentality.

Mother and daughter had been clingy for a few days after our tussle with George Gunderson. Alice’s quick thinking, using her e-mail account to send her mother a text message for help, and Bree’s Amazonian book-throwing skills had created a sense of mutual admiration. But, of course, that had melted away after a week, and we’d returned to a familiar state of mother-daughter detente.

I turned my attention back to the bride and groom. They were pledging their undying love to one another, in sickness and in health, for richer or for poorer.

I couldn’t help but think of George and Rosemary Gunderson. He’d stood by her in sickness, and now she was standing by him in poverty, their assets frozen as authorities sought to determine the extent of his theft.

So much pain, all in the name of love.

It was almost enough to make me swear off romance forever.

Almost.

 

After the service, the bridal party disappeared for a round of photographs, while the rest of the guests convened in the barnyard for cocktails and the signature Pink Pepperberry “groom’s shakes” we were serving.

I drifted through the sea of guests, passing out champagne flutes filled with luscious deep pink milk shakes. Finn, documenting the day on film, nearly backed over me twice. Both times, he offered me overly polite apologies. The second time, I felt tears well in my eyes.

I finished my circuit, handing my next-to-last flute to one of Crystal’s sorority friends, and then wandered over to greet Cal McCormack. He stood off to the side of the yard, at the fringes of the party, and he nodded in greeting as I approached.

“Truce?”

Cal squinted hard and studied me from tip to tail before dusting his hand on his pants and holding it out for me to shake. “Truce.”

I let his big fingers close around my smaller ones, felt the sinew and strength of his grip. He made me feel fragile and girly. Not a bad feeling, mind you, but one I had no business feeling at that precise moment. I forced my lips to turn up in a teasing smile. “Aren’t we supposed to spit on our palms or something?”

He leaned in close, bringing the scent of leather and line-dried laundry with him. “Nah. I can think of better ways to swap spit if that’s what you’ve got in mind.”

My breath caught and a furious burn licked up my cheeks. “Cal McCormack!”

He chuckled, a low and liquid sound like water at the bottom of a well. “Settle down, Tally. I’m just teasing.” He winked. “Probably.”

I handed him the last flute of milk shake, and he accepted it with a gentlemanly nod of the head. He took a tentative sip.

“Delicious,” he said, a bemused smile on his face. “What’s in it?”

I smiled back. “Raspberries, for one. And a secret ingredient known only to the bride and groom.”

No one other than me, Jason, and Crystal knew that the milk shakes contained a Dr Pepper reduction, which added a rich complexity to the bright note of the berries. I’d even managed to keep Bree in the dark. Not only was I worried about how Dr Pepper-flavored ice cream would be received, but I figured Jason and Crystal would enjoy sharing a secret on their wedding day.

“I can taste the berries, but there’s something else there. Familiar, but I can’t place it.” He shrugged. “Whatever it is, it’s tasty. Reminds me of you. Sweet, but not simple.”

I felt my face heating up at his compliment, and guessed I was probably every bit as pink as the milk shakes.

I suddenly realized we were still holding hands right in the middle of the Silver Jack barnyard. I began to pull away, but just then the band inside the barn struck up “When the Saints Go Marching In,” and folks started pairing up for the grand march.

Cal tugged me around so I stood at his side and dragged me to a spot in line right behind the groom’s parents. I craned my neck looking for Bree, hoping I could get her to take my place, but I watched in dismay as she shoved Alice and Kyle together and then pulled Finn into the line right behind us.

Ahead of me, the line started moving, everyone stomping their feet and shaking their hips in time to the music. When Cal started forward, I followed dutifully, but I felt the force of Finn’s gaze on the back of my neck.

We shuffled through the barn doors and into the reception site. Fairy lights and flowered garlands hung from the rafters and the oak plank floor glowed a mellow gold in the gentle light. Long trestle tables topped with crisp white linens, colorful mismatched china, and dozens of ivory pillar candles lined either side of the big open space. A dozen or so of the older folks were already perched on the benches, nodding their heads and tapping their toes to the beat. The flower girl, one of Jason’s nieces, snuggled on the lap of one plump matron, her white patent leather Mary Janes peeping from the frothy pink spill of her skirts. The woman clasped the child’s hands in her own and clapped them gently together.

Two by two, the bridal party and guests danced down the length of the barn. At the front of the room, the couples peeled off, alternately moving to the right or the left, forming two lines that boogied around the perimeter of the room and back to the door. There, the two lines merged again as each couple met another and formed a group of four.

Cal didn’t have the best sense of rhythm, but he bopped along good-naturedly, swinging our joined hands back and forth between us.

Ahead of me, I watched as Tom and Deena Silver met the Arbaughs, coming from the other side, in front of the barn door. Deena took Mr. Arbaugh’s hand in her own, and the foursome began the trek down the dance floor again.

Cal and I rounded the corner and came face-to-face with Bree and Finn. Cal stiffened just slightly, and I hesitated a beat before taking the last few steps and reaching out for Finn’s hand. To their credit, neither man came to a full stop. Casual observers might not have even noticed the tension between them.

But I noticed, and I was caught squarely in the middle.

Finn, the passion of my past. Cal, with his promise of respectability and stability. Just exactly what I’d always wanted.

If I’d figured out anything over the last year, it was this: you have to live in the now.

As I stood between those two men, one like fire, the other like rock, I realized I needed to focus on who they were at that exact moment. Who I was at that exact moment. How they made me feel.

And I knew which man held my heart at that very point in time.

My heart pounding in my chest, I squeezed his hand.

This is the signature milk shake Tally whipped up for Jason and Crystal’s wedding. The milk shake is a lovely deep-rose color, and the Dr Pepper adds a surprising complexity to the flavor.