Jeff Abbott - Distant Blood

“Did you talk to her often?” I remembered her note to call Aubrey on her pad.

“Sometimes. She'd call Mom and I'd take the message. I've been living with Mom for the past few months.” He seemed embarrassed, as though I might criticize him. Since I'd moved home myself, I wasn't about to tease him for his living arrangements.

I pressed on: “These mental problems you mentioned- did it go along with her fixation on her dog?”

My new cousin smiled slyly. “There's two schools of thought. Some of us believed Lolly had real problems. Others-like Philip and Mutt-think it was all a little charade.”

“Charade?”

“Sometimes we wondered if Aunt Lolly was having a big joke on us all-pretending to be just an amusing amount of crazy.”

For a moment my dumb act was the real thing. “You're saying she faked believing that Sweetie was Uncle Charles back from the dead? And any other eccentricities she had?”

Aubrey nodded. “Well, it's one theory.”

“Why? What would be Lolly's motivation?”

“Attention. Power. Aunt Lolly was a control addict from time immemorial. She liked everyone's lives just the way she had arranged them.”

“I still don't understand.”

“If everyone in your family believes you're a little crazy, they go out of their way to accommodate you. They don't disagree with you often, if at all. Everyone views you as a sad case to be coddled.” Aubrey smiled at the shock on my face. “I understand your mother has Alzheimer's. I'm terribly sorry. But wouldn't you say it's true that your mom's condition-her craziness, for lack of a better term, and don't take offense-dictates a lot of how you live your life?”

I didn't answer him immediately. “So Philip thought she was pretend crazy. Who thought she was truly ill?”

Aubrey shrugged. “Me. My mother. Probably Uncle Jake, they had a rocky relationship. And even though Lolly raised her, Deborah has never had a good relationship with Lolly. She's convinced Lolly was sick.”

“But Lolly was taking care of Uncle Jake. If anyone thought she was mentally ill, she had no business being his caretaker,” I said. “Him being at her mercy…”

For the first time Aubrey laughed and I had a sneaking suspicion there might be a likable fellow lurking underneath the sugary platitudes. “Uncle Jake's not half the invalid he appears to be. Sure, he's got the heart condition, but he's very sharp and active still.”

I recalled Jake wielding his cane with youthful vigor. Aubrey might have a point. “So, by acting the family loon, Lolly might've gotten whatever she wanted?”

“But I'm not sure her stakes were very high. Uncle Mutt, of course, indulged her to a fault. She's always had the twins at her beck and call. And although I'm sure you find it hard to imagine, my mother was once devoted to her.” I saw anger flash in his eyes for a moment and I wasn't sure if the emotion was directed at Sass-or at Lolly's memory.

“I'm sorry your mom and I started off crossways,” I said. But I remained unconvinced of this alleged devotion- when Lolly was dying, Sass had stood by the window in frosty observance.

He saw the doubt in my face. “My mother's buried more people that she loved than most ever will. Death's not a stranger to her. That doesn't mean she deals with it well.”

“Death is hard. Always,” I ventured. “Your mother-she kind of blew the whistle on the plans for your book, didn't she?”

Aubrey fidgeted. “Yeah, well, Mom sometimes drinks too much. And shoots off her mouth.” He fumbled for words and didn't quite look me in the face. He tapped idly at his laptop's keys. “My success as an author's been a bit hard on her.”

“Let me ask you a hard question, then. That empty bottle of Jake's medicine-do you think Lolly could have poisoned herself?” I tensed for a retreat, but Aubrey didn't falter. He shook his head.

“Suicide in front of your family would be the ultimate form of control. Will any of us ever forget her now, forget her last moments on earth? I won't, and neither will you. Her death wasn't an anonymous one in a hospital bed while she wasted away from some pernicious disease. She branded herself on our brains, she put our memories in a death grip.” He paused so his fancy words would sink in. “But-there's no reason for someone like Lolly to take her own life. She was too much in love with it, with herself, with the little role she'd carved out in the family. Jordan, if poison was involved, I'm sure she was murdered.” He held his breath, as if deciding whether or not to say more. Finally he shut his mouth and stared at me, his words hanging in the air like a family's ghost.

Temptation put the words she sent me poisonous letters on my tongue, but I didn't speak. I wasn't quite ready to confide in anyone other than Uncle Mutt. Aubrey might actually be okay, but he was as an smooth as an eel's skin and I didn't trust him fully.

“Murdered,” I murmured. “By one of us. It wouldn't be the first time a murder's occurred in this family, would it? Your-our-uncle, didn't Lolly say he killed his wife-”

A rap at the door startled us both. Before I could bid the visitor to enter, Aunt Sass pushed the door open, eyeing me with frank distaste and her son with some surprise.

“There you are, Aubrey. I've searched half the house looking for you. We need to talk.” My presence in my own room was not acknowledged.

“Sure, Mom,” Aubrey said, his voice soft. “I was just having a nice chat with Jordan.” He gave me a sidelong glance, hushing me from continuing my question.

“Well, yes, of course,” Aunt Sass hemmed. She glanced at his laptop and folder of notes. Some of the fire seemed doused in her and I wondered if she'd gotten a lecture from Bob Don as well. Finally she let her gaze drift toward the general vicinity of my face. I didn't smile or look apologetic. “We'll see you at lunch, Jordan. Come along, Aubrey.”

My cousin got up and followed his mother out of my room without a backward glance, clutching his computer and his papers to his chest like a tardy schoolboy. I shut the door after them and sat down on the corner of my bed.

My head hurt. I'd planned on duping Aubrey, but wasn't sure I hadn't been duped myself. He believed Lolly had been murdered. Did he express that belief solely to see people's reactions to the horrifying thought of willful poisoning? He certainly wanted to dissect me for one of his chapters. (I imagined I'd be the case study for “Patient Reacts to His Own Illegitimacy.”) I wondered if for a moment I'd seen the bright and capable man that lived behind the psychobull. Aubrey might be direct on center. Which meant we had a cold-blooded murderer in our midst. But he'd offered no single suspect, and no concrete motive.

He'd clammed up quick enough when his mother entered the room. If he suspected her-he'd never have admitted his own doubts about Lolly's suicide. So did he have another suspect in mind, one he didn't wish to discuss before his mother?

I returned to the window. Candace and Deborah still stood out on the deck, Deborah tossing bread crumbs to the circling, cawing gulls. Candace flung another handful of torn crusts to the flock and they swooped down to scoop up the treats.

Animals always put Candace in a good mood. (I hoped obnoxious scavenging birds fell into the cuddly category, at least for today.) Maybe she'd talk to me and I could apologize-and perhaps make my point of view clearer. I don't like fighting with my love.

I hurried down the stairs and saw no one except Philip lounging in the library. I politely knocked and stuck my head in the door; he glanced up at me with utter disinterest.

“You're not out enjoying this beautiful day?” I asked.

“My aunt just died. I believe I'm allowed to mope.” He looked away from me, rubbing a thumb across his knuckle.