Mariah Stewart - Coming Home

Vanessa nodded. “I heard that, too. I was wondering if we could get together sometime to talk about her.”

Grace frowned. “She isn’t… bothering you, is she?”

“Ah… no.”

“Because she’s really harmless, you know.”

Vanessa stared at her. “You mean, when she was alive?”

“Oh…” Grace laughed. “Of course. I meant, she was harmless.”

“I see,” Vanessa said, although she wasn’t sure she did.

“What did you want to talk about, then?”

“I’d just like to know a little about her, that’s all. All I know is that she kept to herself a lot, and that she grew a lot of herbs.”

“Well, she wasn’t completely antisocial. She did have friends,” Grace made a point of telling her, “but she didn’t care to go out. Everyone visited her at her home.”

“Did you visit with her?”

“Oh, of course. We were friends, even though I was a lot younger. I’ve often wondered if anything still grew in her garden.”

“A lot of herbs, but I’m not sure what they all are. There’s a bunch of what appears to be herbs hanging over the back door.”

“Really? What do they smell like?”

“I don’t think they smell like anything, Miss Grace. They’re very dry.”

“Oh, of course they would be.” Grace smiled. “I’m sure it’s just something she put there for good luck.”

“Good luck,” Vanessa repeated flatly. Yes, her luck had certainly been swell lately.

Grace glanced at her watch. “I’m going to have to dash. I need to get these articles to the printer or we’ll have no paper this week.”

“Thanks for the coffee.” Vanessa walked her visitor to the door. “And maybe sometime we could chat about Miss Ridgeway…”

“Yes, I’d like that.” Grace was halfway out the door when she turned and asked, “You haven’t happened to find any of her books. Her journals or… anything like that?”

Vanessa shook her head. “No. I’ve looked through the books on the shelves in the living room, and there are several books about herbs, but I haven’t found any journals or… anything like that.”

Grace started to close the door behind her. “Have you been in the attic yet?”

“Yes, several times. Although I haven’t had time to look through the boxes that are up there. I’ve been so busy with the shop and then in the off-season, painting the downstairs and the bedrooms and trying to get the kitchen in order. You’ll have to stop over sometime and see what I’ve done in the house.”

“I’d like that very much.” Grace turned and smiled again. “Yes, I would like that.”

“Anytime. And thanks again for the coffee…”

Grace waved before she hustled down the sidewalk in the direction of her newspaper’s office. Vanessa was shaking her head as she closed the door behind the tiny woman. Well, she took my mind off feeling bad about this place. And it was nice of her to bring me coffee…

Vanessa’s cell began to ring, and she searched her pockets until she found it.

“Hello?”

“I wasn’t kidding when I said I’d take him when you didn’t want him anymore.”

Vanessa laughed.

“You think I’m jesting but I am so serious. I just passed him on Kelly’s Point Drive. He’s seriously fine, so whenever you’re finished with him, just toss him my way.” Steffie paused. “I hope this doesn’t interfere with our friendship.”

“It won’t, because he’ll be leaving for Montana any day now,” Vanessa said.

Steffie sighed. “So I suppose I will need to schedule some consolation time. We’ll be busy at Scoop but I can work it in.”

“What are you talking about? I won’t need consolation.”

“Please. It’s Steffie you’re talking to here. You know you’re going to miss him, Ness.”

“Well, sure. The sex has been great.”

“Is that all you can say?”

“It has been.” Vanessa bit a cuticle and frowned.

“Get off it. You’re not that shallow.”

“What shallow? It’s the truth. And sex matters.”

“What about the rest of it?”

“Yeah, well, the rest of it matters, too,” Vanessa admitted. “But it’s all moot. So it doesn’t matter-it can’t matter-beyond the next few days or however long he’s going to be here.”

“A girl can still dream, Ness,” Stef protested.

“I don’t dare dream, Stef. Any dream involving Grady is bound to have an unhappy ending. I’ve had enough of those.” She caught herself before she could say more. “And speak of the devil; he’s just crossing the street and walking in my direction.”

“Well, I’ll let you go, then, so you can chat with that guy who doesn’t really matter all that much…”

“I didn’t say that, damn it,” she whispered as Grady pushed open the door and came in. She slipped the phone into her pocket, knowing as well as Stef did that she’d been lying through her teeth.

“I thought you were keeping this door locked.” He frowned.

“It was locked. I just opened it to let Miss Grace in. She just left.”

“I had a little talk with her over at Cuppachino when I left here this morning.”

“Well, I hope your conversation with her made more sense than mine did. I asked her about Alice Ridgeway, the woman who used to live in my house. She asked me if Alice was bothering me. As if she expected the woman to still be there. And then she asked me if I’d found any of Alice’s journals. Like she was interested in those.” Vanessa’s hands were on her hips. “I suspect that Miss Grace might have known Alice Ridgeway a lot better than I’d previously thought.”

She paused. “What’s that in your hand?”

“Photocopies of the people we suspect broke into Bling and your house.” He pulled the sheets of paper out of the envelope Hal had given him and laid the photo of Jackie Weston on the counter. “Look familiar?”

“That’s Candice,” she said as she leaned forward. “Her hair wasn’t blond like this-it was brown-but that’s definitely her.”

“And this?” He placed the picture of Edmund Dent next to Weston’s.

“Oh my God, that’s Gene’s cousin.” Her eyes grew wide. “Edmund Dent. That slimy, sleazy little son of a bitch burned my house down. Not that there was anything in there worth saving-I didn’t have very much-but the fact that he thought I was inside-”

“What?”

“Oh, yeah. He thought I was inside the house. That’s why he and Gene’s brother torched the place.”

“How do you know this?”

“Because the doors and windows were all nailed shut. The arson expert testified that there was no reason to do that unless they were trying to trap someone inside.”

“And yet they were still acquitted?”

“The jury couldn’t decide which of the cousins and which of the brothers were involved, even though the circumstantial evidence pointed to Edmund and Gene’s brother, Calvin. I never doubted that it was them. They were both really angry with me for calling the cops on Gene.”

“Well, apparently, Edmund is still pretty pissed at you.”

“I imagine they all blame me for Gene dying in prison.” She leaned on the counter, one hand holding her stomach. “I guess he’s not going to stop until I’m dead, too.”

Grady put his arms around her from behind.

“That is not going to happen,” he told her. “I will see him dead before he lays a hand on you.”

“You can’t watch over me twenty-four hours a day, Grady.” She turned and put her hands on his chest, her fingers toying absently with the collar of his shirt. “Besides, sooner or later, you have a life to go back to. Don’t you have some hikes or something lined up?”

He nodded.

She started to say something else, when she froze momentarily, then looked down.