Killing Her Softly (30 page)

"He can stay gone for all I care."

Annabelle followed her aunt down the hall and into the back parlor, which had been, in times past, the ladies' parlor. Decorated in light shades of blue and green and filled with priceless antiques, this was Annabelle's favorite room in the mansion. She remembered playing dominoes and checkers in this room with her Grandmother
Vanderley
, a notorious cheat who wanted to win at all costs. Once this house had been filled with laughter and love. Now only sadness dwelled within these ancient walls.

"You should go home, to your own house,"
Perdita
said as she poured their coffee from the silver pot atop the silver tray on the tea table. "Why don't we pack first thing in the morning and—"

"I'm going back to Memphis in the morning," Annabelle said as she accepted a cup from her aunt.

Perdita
eyed her inquiringly. "I thought you didn't intend to return to Memphis for the time being, not until you'd worked through whatever feelings you have for the Cortez man."

Annabelle sat in one of the two chairs flanking the tea table. After pouring herself another cup of coffee,
Perdita
took the opposite chair.

"There's something I didn't tell Uncle Louis and I made Wythe promise not to tell him," Annabelle said. "You see, Lulu was pregnant. Approximately six weeks."

Perdita's
mouth opened on a silent ah-ha. "Was Quinn Cortez the father?"

"He says not, but. . . she did have other lovers who could have fathered the child. Three men gave DNA samples to be compared to the fetus's DNA. Chad received a call right before he left telling him the results of the DNA testing would be in tomorrow morning."

"You don't have to go back to Memphis just for that." When
Perdita
lifted her cup to her lips, she looked right at Annabelle and then said "Ah . . ." She took a sip of the coffee. "It's such a pity you didn't meet Mr. Cortez under different circumstances."

Annabelle gazed down into the cup and sighed. "Go ahead and call me a fool. I am, you know. I want to be there with him when we find out if he was the baby's father."

"Oh, my poor Annabelle. Life plays cruel tricks on us sometimes, doesn't it?"

Kevin paused in the doorway between the living room and hall. "Ah, Mom, why can't I stay up just a little while longer. It's not like Dad's here every night."

"I said no." Mary Lee pointed her finger toward the corridor leading to the bathroom. "Go brush your teeth and get ready for bed. It's ten-thirty. I let you stay up thirty minutes later than usual."

When Kevin gave her a pleading look, she frowned. "Your dad will come in and say good night before he leaves."

"Go on, pal. Do what your mother says." Jim could fault Mary Lee on many issues and she might not be the ideal mother, but she tried her best. When she set rules for Kevin, Jim did what he could to support her.

When Kevin reluctantly disappeared down the hall, Mary Lee turned to Jim. "Want another beer?"

"No, thanks."

Just as he'd predicted Mary Lee had ordered pizza and served them cold beer and their son iced cola. They'd eaten store-bought chocolate chip cookies for dessert and then Jim had helped Kevin with his homework while Mary Lee cleaned up. It wasn't fair to compare his ex-wife to his mom, who'd baked homemade cookies on a regular basis. And who had been a loving, supportive and faithful wife until her dying day.

You 're not the man your dad was either,
he reminded himself.
If you'd been a better husband, maybe Mary Lee would have been a better wife.

"How are those murder cases going?" Mary Lee asked. "You haven't arrested that big shot lawyer from Texas, have you? Quinn Cortez. God even the guy's name sounds sexy."

Mary Lee would think a name could sound sexy. Bet she'd jump Cortez's bones in a New York minute if given half the chance.

"No, we haven't made an arrest yet."

"Want to sit down?" she asked.

He shook his head. "I'll just go say good night to Kevin and then leave."

Mary Lee came up to him. "Look, let's lay our cards on the table, okay?"

Here it comes. Whatever reason she invited me to dinner and let me have this extra time with Kevin.
"Sure thing."

"I know that you know I've been having a thing with Chad."

Was that it? Was that what the invitation to dinner had been about? Did she honestly think he'd give a damn? Had she been concerned about how he would react when he found out? "Yeah. So?"

"Don't you care?" She inched closer, so close that her breasts almost touched his chest.

There had been a time that whenever Mary Lee just walked into a room, he got hard. "Why should I care?"

With her body leaning into his, she lifted her arms and placed them around his neck. "Aren't you just the least bit jealous? Don't you wish you were getting some from me instead of him? The sex was always good for us, wasn't it, Jimmy?"

His dick twitched as old memories flickered through his mind. "Yeah, babe, the sex was always good." He clasped his fingers around her arms and removed them from his neck, then took a step backward putting some breathing room between them.

She glanced down at his crotch and smiled when she noted his partially aroused state. "Why don't you stick around and after Kevin goes to sleep—"

"I can't," he said. Damn, he was tempted to stay. A part of him still wanted her. Yeah, the part that didn't have a lick of sense. "I've got a late night date." He wasn't lying. Not exactly. Sandra had suggested he drop by tonight and she'd all but told him he'd be welcome to spend the night.

Mary Lee's nostrils flared as she took in several quick, sharp breaths. He knew that look. She was pissed.

"This was a one-time-only offer," she told him. "Take it or leave it, but know this—I won't ask you again."

Yeah, she would. In the years since their divorce, she'd made the offer at least once every six months and every time he rejected her she swore it would be the last time.

"Hey, Dad I'm ready for bed" Kevin called from down the hall.

"I'll go say good night to Kevin." Jim glanced at his ex-wife briefly, then left her standing there fuming.

"Be right there," Jim told Kevin as he walked out of the living room, halfway expecting Mary Lee to start screaming at him.

But she didn't. And when he came out of Kevin's room ten minutes later, she was sitting in front of the TV and didn't even acknowledge his presence when he said good night.

Annabelle had soaked in the tub for nearly an hour after coming upstairs to her room at
Vanderley
Hall, hoping it would relax her enough so that she could sleep. But as she lay in bed her eyes wide open and staring up at the twelve-foot ceiling, she realized that she probably should have asked Aunt
Perdita
for one of her sleeping pills.

Her aunt was a walking drugstore, keeping a large variety of prescription and nonprescription medication with her at all times.

"You never know when you or a friend will need something for pain or to sleep or to pep you up,"
Perdita
had once told Annabelle.

Maybe she should go down the hall and knock on her aunt's door. What would it hurt to take a sleeping pill tonight since she so rarely used anything stronger than an aspirin? Just as Annabelle flung the covers back and slid to the edge of the bed her cell phone rang. Knowing before she lifted the phone from the nightstand who the caller was, she snatched the phone up, flipped it open and said "Hello."

"Are you all right?" Quinn asked.

"I am now," she replied honestly.

"Rough day, huh?"

"A really bad one."

"I guess you know the Memphis PD will have the DNA test results tomorrow morning."

"Yes, I know," she said.

"Did Jim Norton call you?"

"He called Sergeant George, who in turn told me." Silence. "Quinn?"

"Chad George was at Lulu's funeral? He was there with you this evening?"

 
"Yes."

"He's got a thing for you, doesn't he?"

"Yes, I believe he does."

"How do you feel about him?" Quinn asked.

"I should tell you that it's none of your business how I feel about him, but. . . He's what my parents would have referred to as a very suitable young man."

"Meaning he's a white Anglo-Saxon Protestant from a respectable middle-class background and is an up-and-coming member of a time-honored profession."

"Yes."

"He's much better for you than I am. You'd be a fool to reject him in favor of me, considering I have none of his attributes to recommend me."

Tell him. Admit the truth. You can't keep lying to yourself, so why lie to Quinn?

"You're assuming it's an either/or situation," she said.

Quinn laughed quietly, a low rumbling chuckle. "Yeah,
I
guess I did narrow down the field and limit your choices, didn't I?"

"Quinn, I'm coming back to Memphis in the morning," she told him. "I want to be there when you find out the DNA results."

"I should tell you not to come, to stay as far away from me as possible, but I can't do that. You see, honey, I'm a selfish bastard. I want you to want to be with me."

"I'll see you in the morning and afterward . . . after we leave the police station, we should go somewhere and talk. I'll stay at the Peabody again, so—"

"There's something you should know."

"What?" Her heart skipped a beat.

"Griffin has found out that another woman I used to know—Carla
Millican
—was murdered in Dallas four months ago, on the same day I was there. But I swear to you, Annabelle, I didn't kill her any more than I killed Lulu or Kendall or Joy Ellis."

A fourth victim! Four of Quinn's lovers had been murdered. There was no way their murders could have been coincidental. "Was she . . . was Carla killed the same way the others were?"

"She was smothered and her right index finger removed after she was dead."

"Someone is trying to frame you," Annabelle said. "That's it, isn't it?"

"Possibly. Griffin and Judd believe we have a psychopath on our hands. A serial killer. And with the evidence Griffin has acquired so far, it appears the first murder was a year ago."

"You'll have to share this information with the police. Surely then they'll realize you're completely innocent."

"Maybe. But there's a chance that since I was in the same city at the time of each murder and have no alibi any of the four times, the police could figure that I killed all four women."

"But you didn't. I know you didn't." How did she know? How could she be so sure? It wasn't as if she had any past experience with Quinn on which to base her conviction. Just because she was infatuated with Quinn—possibly in love with him—didn't mean he was innocent.

"I couldn't blame you if you had some doubts. Hell, if I didn't know better, I might think I was guilty."

"Maybe my head has some lingering doubts," she admitted. "But my heart doesn't."

"Ah, Annabelle. Honey." Genuine anguish saturated his speech. "Please, please don't let me hurt you."

At eleven-fifteen, Jim Norton stood outside Sandra Holmes's apartment. He rapped on the door only a few times and as quietly as possible, not wanting to disturb her neighbors. He waited. Knocked again. Then waited. And just when he'd given up on her responding and turned to leave, the door opened.

"Jim?"

He did an about-face. Sandra wore a pair of cotton shorts and an oversized T-shirt, her pointed nipples pressing against the material. "Hi," he said. "Is it too late to—?"

She reached out, grabbed the lapels of his jacket and tugged him toward her. "It's not too late for you, Jimmy Norton. It would never be too late."

When she slid her arms around his waist and dropped her hands to cup his buttocks, Jim's body reacted immediately. She stood on tiptoe, lifted her face and kissed him. Responding to her advances, he grabbed the back of her neck and deepened the kiss. She thrust her tongue into his mouth and moaned when their tongues did a wicked tango.