Page 135 of Hello, Summer
She waited to see if he would explain, but he was still watching the crowd on the church lawn. “How can they tell he was already dead?”
“There wasn’t much bleeding from his head injuries. If he’d been alive and his heart had still been pumping, you’d have seen way more blood.”
“So what did kill him?” she asked.
The sheriff’s smile was enigmatic. “Are we still off the record?”
“Yes, damn it. Quit stalling. Are you going to tell me or not?”
“The medical examiner tells me he had elevated levels of fentanyl in his blood. And a blood alcohol level of .06. Pretty toxic combination.”
“I talked to a friend who’s an oncology nurse. She said cancer patients using a fentanyl patch can tolerate much higher levels of opioids because they metabolize it at a different rate. Are you saying it was an accidental overdose?”
“I’m not saying anything at all,” Goggins said. “Because we didn’t have this conversation. Have a nice day, okay?”
50
The Baptist church gym was at or near capacity. Conley edged between clumps of people balancing coffee cups and plates loaded with food, making her way to a row of bleachers on the far side of the room. She climbed halfway up and stood, looking out from her vantage point over the wood-floored room. A buffet had been set up beneath the large electric scoreboard, and a long, white-clothed table held polished silver candelabras and an endless array of silver trays holding dainty tea sandwiches, cookies, and cakes, the tray lineup punctuated by massive arrangements of ferns, palm fronds, white lilies, and white carnations.
Not far from one of the side doors, she spotted Toddie, Rebecca, and Hank sipping coffee and looking ill at ease.
Only a few yards away, Vanessa was stationed in front of a round table holding a silver coffee urn and a cut glass punch bowl, chatting with two white-haired women in dark dresses. If Vanessa saw Toddie and her clan, she made a good show of pretending she hadn’t.
While she watched, Charlie walked up to Toddie and her children and began chatting with his half siblings. Kennedy McFall stood a safe distance away in neutral territory, with the dozing Graceanne slung over her shoulder.
As much as she dreaded another confrontation with the Little Prince,Conley needed an off-the-cuff, unscripted quote from him for her story. She clambered down from the bleachers as quickly as she could, but before she could reach the reunited Robinette siblings, she saw George McFall sidle up and whisper something in Charlie’s ear while Toddie and her children drifted away into the crowd, which seemed to swallow them up whole.
As she worked her way through the crowd, keeping an eye on the two men, she saw Charlie shake his head vehemently, brushing off the funeral director with some sort of sharp exchange. McFall turned his back on Charlie, stopped to speak briefly to his daughter, then returned to Vanessa’s side.
Conley saw an opening and went for it. “Charlie? Can I have a moment?”
“What the hell do you want?” he snapped.
“That was quite a moment back there in church,” she said. “Did your mother know you were going to mention Toddie and the others in your eulogy?”
“She’s not currently taking my calls.” He started to walk away, but she hurried after him.
“If it’s any consolation, she’s not taking mine either,” Conley said.
He turned around, and the expression on his face said that he wasn’t amused. “I read that piece-of-crap story you wrote in theBeacon.It’s clear you’re still nursing some old beef and mounting a personal vendetta against me, so I don’t have anything else to say to you.”
“No vendetta,” Conley said. “This is professional, not personal. I’m a journalist, reporting the news. Like it or not, your father was a public figure. You’re running for Congress in this district, and so is your mother, which makes you public figures too. So any comment on what the medical examiner says was your dad’s cause of death?”
He blinked. “That hasn’t been released yet.”
“Not officially, no.”
“The sheriff says his car hit a deer,” Charlie said. “That’s really all we know. Look, I gotta get back to the reception.” He turned again to join his waiting fiancée.
“He was already dead when he hit that deer,” Conley said.
Charlie whipped around. “You don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“I was there that night. I’ve been back to the crash site twice. There were no skid marks. Think about that.”
“So what’s your point? My dad was seventy-seven years old. He was dying. And in case you haven’t noticed, Sarah, we’re burying him today, so I’d appreciate it if you’d just back the hell away from me and my family.”
She was pondering her next move. The gym’s air-conditioning wasn’t adequate for a crowd this size. It was hot, and the air was thick with the cloying scent of lilies and aftershave. She was trying to spot Toddie in the crowd when George McFall suddenly materialized at her side. “Mrs. Robinette would appreciate it if you would leave now,” he murmured, grasping her elbow.
