Page 113 of Without a Clue

“Are you harboring rage you aren’t telling me about?”

“Aren’t we all?”

“Well, yes, but that’s not the point. Are you?”

“I’ve already . . . discussed . . . the croissant situation.”

Okay.

It’s time to move on.

I suck in my breath, staring at his hand and the fact that blood is now running down his finger, apparently unbeknownst to him.

Can he not feel that?

Is he not interested in doing anything about that?

“Why do you think someone would want to kill Hugh? Were you surprised when you heard the news?”

“I’m never surprised . . . by earthly death. It’s the fate . . . of us all. I am . . . however . . . continuously surprised . . . that people are surprised . . . by it. Pip.”

He beckons me closer.

I hesitate, not daring for a moment to move, but the opportunity of the moment gets me.

I move forward until we are a foot apart. “Yes?”

“Do you think . . . there will be . . . those grits at dinner again?”

My brow knots. “Your friend died and you’re asking me about dinner choices?”

“Your friend also died . . . and you fell in love with the cowboy. Life stops . . . for no one.”

“Well . . . I haven’t said I love him.”

“What’s stopping you now?”

I look over to Nash, trying painfully not to blush right now. Is he hearing this? If he is, he’s graciously pretending not to.

“They were . . . remarkable grits,” Ricky says. “It is . . . curious timing, though.”

I point to his finger. “Are you going to do something about that?”

“Nash falling so obviously smitten with you . . . now. Now that death is at our door and the buck must lie . . . with someone. Are you . . . truly going to consider . . . Nash’s suspicious nature? Or, like my finger, will we both ignore . . . what is right . . . before us?”

Did he . . . did he cut himself on purpose to make a chilling point?

To try to say Nash is a murderer?

“I’ve interviewed him already,” I say quickly.

Ricky lowers his voice to a mere whisper. “And yet . . . I fear . . . he hasn’t mentioned . . . his criminal background . . . has he?”

I can’t help myself.

My face has fallen.

I inch closer.