Миранда Джеймс - Digging Up The Dirt

An’gel knew by the way he’d tensed up the moment she mentioned Coriander’s name that he was lying to her now. He knew exactly what Coriander had to do with everything.

“You’re still trying to lie to us even now,” An’gel said. “I swear to you, if you don’t start acting like the man your daddy and mama raised you to be and start telling us the truth, I’m going to, well, I don’t know exactly what, but it’s going to hurt like hell, I know that much.”

An’gel felt Dickce’s hand on her arm, and she realized she was getting too worked up. She had lost control of her temper, she realized, because she’d been on the point of getting up and slapping Hadley for all she was worth. She made herself take several deep breaths, but she kept her eyes locked on his.

Hadley must have read the determination in her gaze and in her words. He held up his hands even as his shoulders slumped in obvious resignation.

“All right, An’gel, you win,” he said. “I’ll tell you anything you want to know.”

An’gel wanted to say, It’s about damn time , but refrained. Instead she said, “Let’s start with Callie.”

“I loved her with all my heart.” Hadley sighed. “She was my dearest friend, my sister. I wasn’t in love with her. I didn’t want to steal her away from Hamish. But she fell in love with me. Hamish wasn’t tender, he wasn’t romantic, he wasn’t understanding. You know what he was like. But he loved Callie, too, in his way. He was devastated when he realized how she felt about me.” He paused for a moment. “I loved my brother, and I hated to see him in pain. That’s why I left and didn’t come back until after he died. I hoped my being gone would help Callie and Hamish somehow rebuild their marriage.”

“It evidently didn’t work,” An’gel said. “If that truly was Callie we found out there under the tree, something went badly wrong after you left.”

“I have no idea what happened after I left,” Hadley said, his expression devoid of emotion. “I thought by cutting myself off completely, I’d done the best thing I could for us all. I never spoke to my brother again.”

“Do you think Hamish killed Callie?” Dickce asked.

“Who else would have done it?” Hamish replied. “He must have struck her in a rage, it happened accidentally. You know what a temper he had. Then, instead of calling the authorities, he decided to bury her and pretend to everyone that she had run away to be with me. I never knew it until I came back.”

That sounded truthful, An’gel thought. “I agree that Hamish is the most likely suspect in Callie’s death. But we have Sarinda’s death and Arliss’s accident to account for. Hamish wasn’t responsible for those.”

“No,” Hadley said. “I don’t understand what is going on with that.”

“I have a theory,” An’gel said. “I’ll explain it in a minute. First, though, tell me, did you ever have affairs with any of the garden club board members?”

Hadley looked pained. “I hardly like to talk about what happened so long ago, especially when the other parties aren’t around to give their consent.”

“We understand that,” Dickce said, “but you can’t afford such niceties of behavior now. Lives are at stake.”

“I suppose you’re right,” Hadley said. “Okay, then. Yes, I did have brief flings with a couple of them. Barbie Gross and Lottie MacLeod.”

An’gel exchanged a swift glance with Dickce. Barbie had lied to them after all, despite being so convincing earlier.

An’gel turned back to Hadley. “What about the others? Reba, Sarinda, and Arliss?”

“Sarinda was very sweet,” Hadley said. “I was pretty sure she was infatuated with me, but I simply wasn’t interested in her. Arliss, who’d divorced her husband not long before I left, was doing her best to get me into bed, but as attractive as she is, I wasn’t interested in her either. She was fun to flirt with, but that was as far as it went.”

An’gel felt a moment of sadness for Sarinda, who had never married. Had that been because of Hadley? she wondered.

“What about Reba?” Dickce asked.

Hadley grimaced. “She was married and had a child, and frankly I never found her that attractive. She was after me, though I did my best to discourage her. She even trapped me once—I believe it was at Riverhill, actually—in a bedroom and tried to force me into, well, you know.”

“We do know, actually,” An’gel said. “Barbie Gross saw you, and she told us about it this morning.”

Hadley looked startled. “I remember thinking at the time that somebody opened the door, but Reba was so determined that I didn’t have time to see who it was. I had to concentrate on getting her to understand I wasn’t interested.”

“Tell us more about Lottie and Barbie,” An’gel said.

“They were definite mistakes,” Hadley said. “You’re right, I was raised better, and I knew better than to get involved with married women. The problem was, I was trying to avoid commitment, and they seemed like ways to accomplish that. The thing with Barbie consisted of maybe three encounters, shall we say? We parted quickly by mutual agreement.”

“And Lottie?” Dickce prompted.

“That was a bit more than three encounters,” Hadley said. For a moment, An’gel thought he was actually blushing. “Let’s just say that Lottie was on the aggressive side, okay? And she wasn’t easily discouraged. It didn’t take me long to realize I’d made a huge mistake getting involved with her, and breaking it off wasn’t easy. She wanted to divorce her husband and marry me. She wasn’t happy when I told her there was no way that was going to happen.” He shuddered. “I don’t know who was worse, her or Reba. They were both nightmares, in a way. Reba kept pestering me, even after that incident at Riverhill.”

An’gel felt sure now that her theory was right. One of those three women—Barbie, Lottie, or Reba—was behind the murders and the attempts on Arliss and herself.

“There’s one more woman unaccounted for,” Dickce said. “Coriander Simpson.”

Hadley didn’t appear so surprised by that name this time, An’gel thought. Before he could respond to Dickce, however, a voice from the doorway captured their attention.

“I believe I can explain that.”

CHAPTER 32

An’gel turned to see a tall, striking woman in her sixties advancing into the room. White hair, cut short and styled attractively, framed a face with flawless café-au-lait skin. She was dressed comfortably in black slacks and a white blouse.

Hadley rose quickly and went to her side. “Why didn’t you stay upstairs, honey?” He appeared distressed.

The woman kissed his cheek. She ignored his question. She looked straight at An’gel and Dickce. “I’m Coriander Simpson.”

“My wife,” Hadley said.

Coriander took Hadley’s chair, and he stood, looking ill at ease, beside it. She looked up at him fondly. “Relax, love, it’s all going to be just fine.”

He touched her shoulder briefly, and An’gel could see that he adored her.

“We’re delighted to know that you’re alive,” An’gel said. “And the heartiest congratulations to you and Hadley.”

“Thank you,” Coriander said. “I know this must come as quite a shock to you. Not only my being alive, but also being married to Hadley.”

“In a way,” Dickce said. “An’gel had already figured out that it was you Hadley was probably in love with forty years ago.”

Coriander nodded. “He was, though he didn’t want to admit it for a while. He wasn’t so good at committing to one woman back in those days.” She laughed and looked up at him. “Fortunately for me, he got over it.”

“I visited with your mother,” Dickce said, her tone cool. “Either she’s a prize-winning actress, or she really believes you died forty years ago.”