A Willing Murder Read online

  Kate smiled. “Probably so. Personally, I could use a meal, a hot shower and a couple of episodes of Madam Secretary.”

  Sara laughed. “Me, too. Let’s go home.”

  Kate liked the sound of that word.

  FIVE

  When Kate arrived at the real estate office the next morning, there were a dozen reporters waiting for her, all of them firing questions.

  “How many bodies were there?”

  “Was it a massacre?”

  “Murder or suicide?”

  “How long have you known Jack Wyatt? Was he involved in the crime?”

  Kate did her best to push through the crowd and get inside.

  Melissa was waiting for her at the door with excited eyes. “They were here at six a.m. Did you really find a dozen bodies? Were you with Jack? Were you frightened? Did he, uh, comfort you?”

  What the woman was saying was so far from reality that Kate couldn’t reply. Tayla’s office was straight ahead, and Kate wanted to see her friend. She gave a single knock, went in, closed the door and leaned on it.

  Tayla had her back to her and was looking at a computer screen of current listings. “Bad, isn’t it?”

  “Horrible,” Kate said.

  Tayla turned and smiled. “Nothing like catastrophe to bond people, is there?” She was tall, slim, and had beautiful gray hair. She was a handsome woman, quite regal-looking, and Kate could see why the sheriff bragged that he was “a Kirkwood.” They obviously had good genes.

  She motioned to the chair in front of her desk. Kate took it, and they looked at each other.

  “You look like your father,” Tayla said.

  “Do I?” Kate’s eyes lit up. “I know nothing about him.”

  “A charmer, a sweet talker. Could get anyone to do anything he wanted. If he hadn’t been younger than me, I would have gone after him.” She paused. “Now, tell me what caused all this?” She waved her hand to indicate what was happening outside the office.

  “There were two skeletons in the roots of a tree that came down on one of Jack’s properties.”

  “That’s it?”

  “Yes,” Kate said. She wasn’t about to hint that they thought they knew who the victims were.

  “So how was Sheriff Flynn?”

  Kate remembered that the man was related to Tayla. She needed to be tactful. “He... He, uh...”

  Tayla leaned forward. “He’s a terrible bigot, isn’t he?”

  “He’s number four. Not even close to my three uncles,” Kate said, completely deadpan.

  The women laughed together.

  “Relatives, right?” Tayla said. “You can’t choose them. Was he awful to Jack?”

  “Dreadful. Sara wanted to punch him, but Jack stopped her.”

  “Oh, yes. Her boxing. Jack should have let her. Daryl would have been too embarrassed to tell anyone who hit him.” Tayla grew serious. “What are we going to do about these?” She picked up a dozen yellow message slips off her desk. “These are requests for you—no one else will do—to show them houses. But I’m betting most of them are reporters trying to get some one-on-one time to question you. All the media think you and Sara and Jack know a lot more than you’re telling.”

  Kate made her face blank. She’d learned early on to conceal what she was thinking.

  Tayla leaned back in her chair. “That’s your private life and it’s none of my business. I had a couple of houses for you to show today, but under the circumstances I think you shouldn’t leave the office. Why don’t you spend today going over the local listings? Familiarize yourself with them.”

  In the last week Kate had been over them so often that she knew the square footage of every house for sale in Lachlan. But she didn’t say that. She knew when she was being dismissed. “Good idea.” She left Tayla’s office and went to her own.

  The reporters stayed outside, and when Kate went to the kitchenette, they spotted her and came alive like bees when their hive was disturbed. It was going to be a difficult day.

  “And Cheryl wanted to be part of that,” Kate muttered as she made herself a cup of tea.

  At ten, she finally checked her phone. She’d been too cowardly to do it before but now scrolled through the list of missed calls: reporter, reporter, her mother, Alastair. Four more reporters, her mother, Alastair, three reporters. She wasn’t about to return the calls of the reporters and she didn’t want Alastair to hear the agitation in her voice.

  That left her mother, and Kate knew she couldn’t postpone that. She braced herself for hysterics, but there were none. All Ava wanted to know was how Sara was treating her.

  Images of tears and laughter ran through Kate’s mind. What a lot they’d been through in the last twenty-four hours! We, she thought and smiled. She reassured her mother that Sara had been quite courteous. “Mom, did you hear about Lachlan on the news?”

  “Oh, yes. Skeletons in a tree, right? Small towns are full of creepy crimes like that. Always secretive. Not like in a city, where they just shoot you out in the open and leave your body on the street where people can find it.”

  “That’s one way to look at it,” Kate said, eyebrows raised. “I better go. I’m at work.”

  “Oh, sure. Make a good impression. ’Bye.”

  Kate stared at her phone for a moment. What a truly surprising response her mother had given. But then, her mother had been surprising her a lot lately. And when she thought about it, there hadn’t been one of her multiday depressions in months.

  Next, she called Alastair, but she got voice mail. “I’m sorry I didn’t get back to you, but you may have heard that I’ve been busy. Today I’m fighting off reporters. I’ll try to call you this evening. Oh. This is Kate Medlar.”

  At three, Tayla said that a security company had called and Kate was needed at home. By then everyone had given up trying to work. Kate slipped out the back way and ran to her car. She made two wrong turns, but she finally found Stewart Lane—and wasn’t surprised to see two armed guards at the entrance to the road. When the reporters sitting there saw her, they jumped up, but the guards waved her through.

  The front door was unlocked and she saw Sara sitting outside in the shade of her screened-in area. Kate joined her. “How are you holding up?”

  Sara put down her pen and notebook. “Not bad, considering. Help yourself.” She nodded to a pitcher of what looked to be iced green tea.

  Kate poured herself a tall glass and sat down on one end of the couch. “Where’s Jack?”

  “Getting dressed. He didn’t get back until six this morning, took a bath, then went straight to bed. I had to wake him up to tell him that the sheriff’s coming at four.”

  Kate groaned. “Mind if I borrow your boxing gloves?”

  Sara smiled. “He won’t be alone. Some big shot from the Broward County sheriff’s office is coming with him. It seems that they not only have information, they believe they have answers.”

  “You’re kidding.”

  “Wish I were.”

  Kate sipped her tea and looked at the pool. It had a big spa at one end.

  “Do you swim?” Sara asked.

  “Not well,” Kate said. “What about you?”

  “Not a stroke. When Jack isn’t on crutches, he does laps. Sometimes Gil and his son use the pool.”

  “Gil?”

  “Jack’s foreman. You’ll meet him soon. Everyone will want to meet you. What’s that look for?”

  “I was thinking how normal all this sounds. Relatives, friends. Steps and halves.”

  “Not what your life has been like?”

  “Far from it,” Kate said but then smiled. “Except in college. I loved college.”

  “Me, too!” Sara said. “I—” She broke off when Jack opened the door and came outside.

  His hair was wet, his clothes clean, and he was frowning.