Page 35 of Murder Will Out
Nick. Of course it had to be Nick.
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
When Diana got back from her deliveries the next morning, Willow and Catherine were already waiting at the café with Mac. Rina had not yet arrived. This worried Diana; her friend should have been there by now.
Rina was not okay. Diana had known her for too long not to be able to see it, though her old friend tried to hide her pain beneath a patina of normalcy. Truth be told, Diana was not okay either; none of them were. The loss of Sue was too fresh and raw, and Rina’s grief so huge, that none of them had yet found time to deal with their own.
When Diana Reyes had arrived on Little North twelve years ago, she had not planned to settle there permanently—she only knew she needed to get away from Boston, find somewhere quiet and steady where she could raise her child and heal her heart. But she had fallen in love at first sight with the ramshackle old house with its leaky roof and sagging front porch; Susan Davis, island handywoman and fellow smash-the-patriarchy feminist, had helped her renovate the building and make it beautiful. Morethan that, Sue was her first friend on Little North, eventually becoming the closest thing to family she and Mac had ever known.
Diana looked around at the quiet group. Catherine sat cross-legged on a cheerful calico cushion on the wide bay window seat, head down, clicking away at the small computer balanced on her lap. Mac sprawled sideways in one of the soft chairs beside the window, one leg dangling over the chair’s arm.For God’s sake, Diana thought indulgently,she’s an adult. Can’t she wear shoes inside the shop?
She took note of Willow as well, curled up in the other chair. Diana hadn’t been the best jury selector in her firm for nothing—after years of practice, Diana could read body language as easily as law briefs. The other night at the cabin, Willow had begun to relax and open up; today, the invisible walls were up again, thick and impenetrable and vibrating with energy. Something was up.
Diana’s glance skated over to the bakery case and back to the crumb-covered plate in front of Mac. She said in the mixture of exasperation and alarm familiar to all parents, “Please tell me you didn’t eatallthe scones before the lunch rush?”
“Relax, Mom,” Mac said lazily, popping the last bite of a cranberry-orange scone into her mouth. “We put a new batch in the oven; there will be plenty.” From the kitchen, a timer dinged. “There they are. I’ll pull them out to cool.”
Before she could move, the bell over the door jingled again, and Rina entered the café, looking agitated. Willow uncurled from the chair and stood up quickly. “It’s okay, Mac, I’ll get the scones,” she said, hurrying into the kitchen without meeting anyone’s eyes.
Interesting, Diana thought.Something’sdefinitelyup.
As Willow slipped out, Mac called, “Bring back a plate with a few fresh ones for us—” She caught Diana’s glare. “I mean, for Mom and Rina, okay?”
“Got it,” Willow called back, already out of sight.
Rina hadn’t noticed Willow’s precipitous departure. “Did you all hear what happened last night? Have any of you been to the village yet?” she asked.
Diana, on the verge of following Willow into the kitchen to try to talk to her, turned back to Rina. Mac and Catherine looked up blankly.
“No one’s told you?” Rina continued. “About Patricia Ramsey?”
They looked at one another blankly.
“Did she finally murder her husband?” Catherine asked.
Diana chimed in from behind the counter, where she filled large mugs of coffee and handed one to Rina, “Or decide at last to pay someone to give her highlights?” It was an open secret on the Island; Patricia was so vain that she wouldn’t even let the ladies over at Stacia’s salon see her graying roots, so she dyed her hair herself at home, to results only marginally better than her organ playing.
“Drive her car into a tree again?” Mac asked.
“A hundred points to the girl with the tattoos and rainbow hair,” Rina said dryly, leaving Mac looking shocked and a little guilty. “She’s saying someone cut the brake lines on her car and sent her down Boulder Hill after her gig at the Raven.”
Diana and Catherine looked at her dubiously. “Patricia Ramsey?” Catherine said, shaking her head. “Saying someonecuther brake lines?”
Diana added, “As in, someone tried to kill her? Where did you hear this?”
“Ask Willow,” Rina said, gesturing to Willow as she reentered the room, a plate of miniature scones in one hand and a fresh coffee cup in the other. “Apparently, she was there.”
Four sets of eyes swung around to fix on Willow, who awkwardly cleared her throat and brought the plate over to the little table. Resuming her perch on the corner of the couch, she said uncomfortably, “Um… yeah.” She took a gulp of coffee. “Naomi texted me last night and wanted to talk, so I met her upat the big pub up the hill on Great North. Patricia and her band were playing; I left right after she did and saw her car at the bottom of the hill as I came around the curve. She was…” Willow remembered the blood pouring down Patricia’s face, the terrified hand gripping hers, the unsteady wobble as Willow helped the shaken woman away from the crash. “She’d bumped her head and was kind of beat up, but she seemed to be mostly okay. Then it was all cops and paramedics and… of course… Nick.” She scowled. “The way he acted, it was like he thoughtI’ddone it.”
“Isn’t it more likely she had one too many glasses of bad rosé and lost control?” Diana asked pragmatically. “I thought cars were designed now to make sure the brakes can’t fail precipitously like that.”
“Not if she was driving one of Ramsey’s old vintage numbers,” Catherine said. “Automobiles made after 1967 have dual master cylinders to prevent that kind of complete failure, but older cars don’t.”
They all stared at her.
“What?” she asked. “I dated someone once who was into vintage cars.”
“Becausethat’sso totally in character for you,” Mac said dryly. She glanced at Willow. “You were at the Raven to meet Naomi?” she asked curiously. “What was that like?”
