A Seamless Murder (23 page)

He shook his head. “She got a copy somehow. I never gave it to her.”

I filled in the rest as best I could. She’d been caught red-handed by Pastor Kyle searching through the church files. Looking for Todd’s resume, which she’d found. Maybe she’d given it to Lou Childs as a potential candidate for his law office so he could find out the truth. At this point we would likely never know exactly what she’d been thinking.

But before Childs could do his due diligence, thanks to the investigator Delta had hired, she already knew the resume was a fake. And that everything about Todd was, in fact, fake.

“So you arranged to meet her at the church,” I prompted, circling back to the morning of Delta’s death, hoping he’d tell us the rest.

His chin quivered, his eyes spilling tears. He raked his fingers through his hair then buried his face in his hands. “After she handed me the investigator’s file, I didn’t know what to do. She was going to work at the tag sale the next morning, so I asked if we could talk first. Alone. I didn’t mean to do it,” he wailed. “We argued, and she wouldn’t listen.”

He turned to Megan, reaching for her, but she backed away. “I didn’t mean to hurt you.”

She stared at him, her mouth agape. “You killed her?”

Todd staggered back until he was pressed against the wall. He sank down, crouching on his wobbly haunches. “I didn’t mean to! When I told Rebecca, she freaked. She wanted me to go with her, but Megs, I couldn’t leave you. You have to believe me, Megs . . . Megs . . .” His sobs grew frenzied. “Delta wouldn’t listen to me. She kept saying that she’d figure out how to make me pay, and that she’d protect you from me. I . . . I . . . I snapped.”

I looked at Coco. Her upper lip was raised in disgust, but her eyes had glazed with tears. “How could you do that?”

“I didn’t mean to,” he said again. “We were arguing, and she was belligerent, and then she was just going to walk away. Before I knew what was happening, I’d picked up a rock and hit her with it.”

He broke down again, his sobs matching Coco’s and Megan’s and now Jessie Pearl’s, who had hobbled to the dining room on her crutches. Mama stood on the other side of the archway, and next to her, towering over her by a good five inches, was her husband. The sheriff.

Thank God.

“Not to Delta,” Coco said, her voice cracking. “To Megan. How could you do that to the woman you say you love?”

A panicked, horrified expression came over him as he looked first at Coco then at Megan. “I’m sorry, Megs,” he said through his tears. “I’m so sorry.”

And then he collapsed on the floor, his body wracked with despair.

Meemaw’s old Mission-style rocking chair was in the corner of my bedroom. This was where I felt her presence more often than anywhere else in the house. The chair had a walnut finish and leather seat and sat next to the oval freestanding mirror, also Meemaw’s. I’d spent thirty minutes rocking in the chair, thinking about everything that had happened next door. During my time in New York, I’d had plenty of time to observe models and designers and just people in general. What I’d found is that people acted one way when they thought others weren’t watching, putting on a different face altogether when they knew people were. Delta, on the other hand, pretty much showed you what you were going to get. She had her core group of friends, the Red Hat ladies, and she had her family.

It was true that we all had more in us than we showed the world. It had been true for Delta, although she was more honest about who she was than most. It was true for Jeremy Lisle, Pastor Kyle, and even Mayor Radcliffe. And it was definitely true for Todd Bettincourt.

After I’d rehashed everything, I moved to the attic to dig through some of the Cassidy women’s old clothes. I had an idea for a keepsake quilt. Something just for myself that
honored the women who’d come before me, and would be a memory for those who came after. Meemaw had a stack of runners much like the pile Jessie Pearl had given to me. One or two of them could be included in the quilt.

I’d decided to offer a class on the keepsake quilt, letting local teens focus theirs on T-shirts. I needed a prototype first, and more than anything, I wanted to include some of Meemaw’s creations. The relationship between Coco, Delta, and Sherri had made me appreciate being a Cassidy all the more. We were honest, we didn’t hide who we were, and above all, we loved each other.

A part of me hoped Megan would want to come to the class. She needed a way to deal with the grief of losing her mother by her husband’s hand, and then losing her husband to his lies and to the justice system. Coco and Sherri did, too. If I could, I’d help them make it a family affair, one that could heal and bond rather than tear apart.

I yanked on the drawer of an old sideboard, but it stuck. Something important was in the drawer, though. I was sure of it. What I wasn’t sure of was whether Meemaw was playing games and keeping me out of it, or if it really was just stuck, the wood having swelled and contracted so many times over the years that the whole piece had given up trying to be functional.

“Cassidy, you in here?” Will’s voice reached me about two seconds before I saw him round the corner. He’d maneuvered plenty of things in and out of the attic for me in the last year, so he knew his way around. “Thought I might find you here,” he said.

“Why is that?” I asked. I had my grip on the drawer
handle again, braced my feet, and pulled. The entire banquet lurched forward, but the drawer stayed shut.

“Just a hunch. If you’re not in your workroom, or in the kitchen, it’s a pretty good bet you’re in the attic.”

He reached over and grabbed hold of the handle. He looked around the attic and said, “Loretta Mae?”

And then he pulled. The drawer slid open easily, and from somewhere in the attic, the pipes creaked and it sounded like laughter. “Meemaw! You are incorrigible,” I scolded. I crouched to look at the treasures the drawer held, and my breath caught.

“What is it?” Will asked, but a glass crashed to the ground behind him, pulling his attention. He hurried to the attic’s entrance to see what had happened.

Alone for a moment, I pulled out the garment sitting on top of the folded clothes in the drawer. The soft flannel and the scent of the fabric mixed with the wood it had been sitting in for who knew how many years filled every bit of my being.

Will came back, a smile on his face. “What’s that?” he asked.

I held up a pair of children’s pajamas made from a vibrant, whimsical flannel printed with pink and gray elephants clutching umbrellas. The pajamas Meemaw had made me when I was six years old and we’d gone to the fabric store together for the very first time. My mind flooded with a wave of emotions. Meemaw, sewing, the comfort of wearing the
garments she’d made for me. It hit me all at once, filling me with utter happiness, but also with a sense of loss. I wanted to go back to that moment when she’d shown me what she’d made for me, and when I’d known that I wanted to give people the very same joy she’d just given me.

We talked about Meemaw for a few minutes, and I shared my plan for the class and the quilt. “It’ll be great,” he said.

“Will Gracie come?” I asked.

“I don’t think flying horses could keep her away.”

“Darlin’,” Will said to me a moment later.

“Mmm?” I folded the pajamas and placed them on the pile of clothes I’d already gathered for the keepsake quilt, then looked up at him.

Earl Grey scurried over to us, pausing at our feet and looking up at us, his little snout lifting as if he were smiling. Will crouched to pat his head, then stood again and looked squarely at me. Anxiety flitted through me. He had an expression I’d never seen before. It was equal parts determination, trepidation, and excitement.

“What’s wrong?” I asked.

He moved closer, putting his hands on the banquet on either side of me. “We belong together, Harlow.”

I gasped, perfect clarity coming over me. I understood what was happening. Meemaw seemed to get it, too, because the door to the attic slammed shut, and a few seconds later we heard scraping noises from downstairs. She was giving us privacy.

“We do,” I said, my voice breathy with anticipation. We belonged together like Nana and my granddaddy Dalton did. Like Mama and Hoss did. Like leather and lace. I almost
laughed as I thought of more ways to say that we were meant to be.

“I thought about planning a dinner or a little getaway to tell you how I feel, but I can’t wait that long.”

“No, let’s not wait,” I said, excitement bubbling up inside me. I’d known we’d end up together, but having it happen at this very moment was like nothing I’d ever experienced. Knowing that Will wanted it, too, and that he was too anxious to wait for our future made my stomach flutter.

“I want to marry you,” he said. “I want to be your husband. I want you to be my wife. I want us to be a family. You. Me. Gracie.”

“And Meemaw?” I asked, a smile forming on my lips that I couldn’t tamp down. Will and I would be a force to be reckoned with as a married couple.

“Especially Meemaw.” He put one hand in his jeans pocket. “She’s been trying to tell me something for a while now.”

“I’ve noticed.”

“That broken jar a minute ago?”

I nodded. The shelves at the entrance of the attic were filled with Mason jars, and in those jars were buttons and trims and trinkets. I hadn’t even begun to go through them, but it was on my list of things to do.

“She finally found what she’s been looking for. What she wanted me to have.”

I waited, not understanding.

“Really, it’s what she wants
you
to have.”

“What do you mean?”

“I’ve been looking at rings but haven’t found anything quite right.”

My heartbeat ratcheted up a notch, and suddenly I knew what he was going to say. What he was going to show me. He pulled his hand from his pocket and held out a ring, and I lost my breath. It was an Art Deco platinum ring with sapphires, a bejeweled, vaulted frame, and a bezel-set round diamond. The diamond floated on an etched frame and was surrounded by eight small diamonds, alternated with the channel-set French-cut sapphires. The whole thing reminded me of a flower, dainty and magical yet symmetrical and strong.

I knew without a doubt that this was the trinket so often referred to in our family lore. Butch Cassidy had given it to Texana, but it had disappeared, and no one was even sure that it had really existed. It had been more like folklore. We thought it existed, but no one knew for sure whether it did. Or even what it was. A trinket to show his love—that’s all we’d ever known.

But Meemaw had known. She’d been searching for it so Will could give it to me. He held my left hand and slipped it on my finger. It fit perfectly, just like he and I fit, and in that instant I knew that it wasn’t my charm or Meemaw’s dreams that had brought Will into my life or that had brought us to this moment.

Like Butch’s love for Texana, we were meant to be.

1. When making an apron, take care to choose a style that fits your personality! There are bib aprons, half aprons, cobble aprons (that cover both the front and the back of the body), and smocks (no strings).

2. When choosing fabric for your apron, consider how much wear and tear your apron is likely to receive. If it will be heavily used, choose machine washable and dryable, sturdy fabric that can withstand frequent cleaning. Natural fibers will probably require ironing!

3. If you’re experimenting, roam through the fabric store and let the fabrics speak to you. Check out the home décor and remnant fabrics, too!

4. Embellishing an apron is a ton of fun! Use ruffles, rickrack, and ribbon, as well as lace, buttons, yo-yos, beads, and stenciling. The sky’s the limit!

5. Adding black to a clothing design is like adding mascara to your lashes. It punctuates the other colors in the palette, so consider black as an
accent.

Go big or go home.
That had to be the philosophy of the people who spearheaded the Texas homecoming mum tradition. Big flowers made of ribbon, with trinkets and more ribbon, and even the occasional cowbell, to be worn by girls across Texas during homecoming week, were a sign of status in most Lone Star State schools. The grander, the better. There was no other logical explanation, and at this particular moment, I wanted those homecoming boosters strung up by their toes.

“Everything’s bigger in Texas,” I said aloud to the three people in my shop. Earl Grey, my little teacup pig, snorted before going back to rooting his way into a mound of fabric scraps I’d yet to bag up.

Mrs. Zinnia James stood framed beneath the French doors that separated the front room of Buttons & Bows, my custom dressmaking shop, from my workroom. Danica Edwards stood on the fitting platform I’d pulled out next to the cutting table, a length of black tulle draped over one shoulder. She was fairly new to Bliss, and she’d signed up to be part of the Helping Hands community
outreach program, so along with a mum, I was also making her homecoming dress.

And so far, the visions I normally saw of people in outfits that would help them realize their wishes and dreams weren’t materializing. A black dress, even though it was a flirty, intricately silver-beaded embroidery number with a waist belt and a sheer illusion neckline and tulle underlay, felt far too serious for a seventeen-year-old. I’d have to go back to the drawing board for her.

My grandmother, Coleta Cassidy, stood next to the open window in the workroom, cooing at Thelma Louise, the granddam of her goat herd. Her Cassidy charm as a goat whisperer served her well. Every woman in my family had a magical gift, thanks to the wish my great-great-great-grandfather Butch Cassidy had made in an Argentinian fountain. Nana communicated with her goats. My mother had a powerful green thumb. And my gift had to do with dressmaking.

“All this . . .” Mrs. James waved one arm around at the mum paraphernalia, the right side of her top lip curling up. “It’s just absurd.”

She’d sprayed and teased her silver hair to within an inch of its life in a very Texas do. As she shook her head, not a strand of her hair even budged. I had to grin. She’d always had a heavy hand with her makeup and an affinity for Botox and fillers, but still, her papery skin revealed a map of blue veins.

She was the wife of Senator Jebediah James, which made her the quintessential Texas blue blood, and she’d fight her age until her dying breath. With both barrels blazing, I’d heard her say on more than one occasion.

Still, even with all her effort, the evidence of her years was there. Her skin pulled tautly over the hardscape of her cheeks and jawbones, but the indentation of fine lines curved around both sides of her mouth and her eyes.

She looked like a slightly odd, cloned version of herself, and I sometimes thought that if I squinted, I’d get a glimpse of the real Zinnia James. But then I’d blink and she’d have that frozen-in-time look she wore like a mask. It had been more than a year
since I’d been back in Bliss, but I still hadn’t grown completely used to the mannequin look of my biggest fan, Mrs. James.

“It wasn’t always like this,” she remarked.

“No?” I peered at the mounds of ribbon heaped on the cutting table in the center of the room. I’d amassed yard upon yard upon yard of red, black, and white grosgrain, satin, organza, wire-edged, double ruffled, and ultrathin curly ribbon, all in the name of the homecoming mum. Some of the ribbon was emblazoned with the words
BLISS BRONCOS
,
CHEERLEADING
,
ROD
EO
,
FOOTBALL
, and other extracurricular activities our high school offered to their student body.

“Good heavens, no, not in our day,” Mrs. James said. “Isn’t that right, Coleta?”

My grandmother tugged her cap down as she shook her head, the two dancing goats that formed the logo of her Sundance Kids dairy farm doing a jig as she forced it back into place over her wavy hair. “Got that right.” She pointed at me as if it were my fault and she was setting me straight. “Your granddaddy gave me a
real
chrysanthemum.”

I flung the back of my hand to my forehead, letting my mouth gape and my eyes widen. “What? No ribbons? No bows? No trinkets?” I said in my best Scarlett O’Hara drawl as I pointed to the pile of plastic adornments Bliss’s teens wanted hanging from their mums.

Thelma Louise wrenched her lower jaw to one side, baring her teeth at me. Apparently she didn’t like my sarcasm.

Nana lowered her chin. Neither did she. “That’s right, ladybug.” She waved her arm around. “None of this nonsense.”

“A few ribbons,” Mrs. James said.

“A few,” Nana agreed. “You can’t hardly count the three strands of ribbons we had back then to the million and one these girls wear today. Good Lord, I’ve heard people say they pay up to five hundred dollars for a mum. Five hundred dollars! That would buy a whole lot of grits and grain for my goats.”

“And they were pinned to the bodice like a corsage,” Mrs. James added, shaking her head. “Not like the mammoth mums today that need harnesses.”

Danica stood on the fitting platform, riveted by the
discussion. Nana leaned against the windowsill, crossing one white-socked foot over the other. “There aren’t even any silk chrysanthemums on them anymore. Why they bother calling it a mum is a mystery.”

Mrs. James and my grandmother had grown up together in Bliss, and had spent forty-some-odd years in a feud that had only recently ended. Now they were thick as thieves, their distaste over the state of the homecoming mum apparently fueling their camaraderie. “Why in heaven’s name are you making them, anyway, Harlow?”

It was a good question, and one I’d wrestled with. The bottom line was, I wasn’t going to
stop
the madness, so I’d decided that I might as well join it. “The girls want them. They’re going to buy them. If I don’t make them, they’ll get them from the mega craft store or the local florist. So why not me? With all the bad press the
Bliss Tribune
has laid at my doorstep after the
D Magazine
fiasco, I figured this might help turn things around.”

“Murder does have a way of putting a damper on business, I imagine,” Mrs. James said.

I spread my arms wide. “Which is why I’ve been doing a million and one Buttons and Bows do-it-yourself mum parties. It’s like Pampered Chef home parties, only with crafts.”

They all three stared at me. “So let me get this straight,” Nana said, her eyes sweeping the array of mum materials in the workroom. “You’ve been hauling all this stuff to people’s homes and helping them make their own mums?”

I pushed my glasses back into place, nodding. “That’s exactly right. I made some of the foundations ahead of time with the backings and the ribbon flowers over these polyurethane bases I have—they’ll support twenty or thirty pounds—”

Danica gasped, clasping her chest with both hands. The tulle dropped from her shoulder to the floor. “Is that how much they weigh?”

“Some are even more, and if you want the crown jewel—a double mum that sandwiches the body, front and back—I bought these dog harnesses to support the weight.”

She hopped down to retrieve her lost tulle, tossing it over her shoulder. “That’s crazy,” she said, gliding back into place. “My
mom never—” She stopped short, swallowing the grief that instantly seemed to bubble up. She hadn’t talked much about her mom, and whenever she mentioned her in passing, the hole inside her seemed to open wider.

“It is crazy,” I said. I hadn’t even attended the homecoming dance, let alone had a mum, so to hear the words “double mum” and “harness” coming from my mouth felt foreign and absurd. But business was business, Texas was Texas, and the craziness of the tradition notwithstanding, the crafting part of the project was fun.

Mrs. James patted me on the shoulder. “My dear, you never cease to amaze. You get tossed a bushel of lemons; you turn around and make lemon bars. Buttons and Bows will be just fine—you’ll see.”

Danica shifted around nervously. “But you . . . you’re making this for free,” she finally said, gesturing toward the morose black tulle.

Mrs. James moved her attention from me to Danica. “My darling,” she said, “Helping Hands is my special project. We have volunteers and the foundation pays for some services. Harlow’s just fine.

“So while I don’t adore the enormity of the mum, I do think every young woman should have a beautiful dress to wear to the homecoming dance. And if a girl wants a mum, she should have one.”

“I don’t have to have the mum—”

“Of course you’re having a mum,” I said. “We’re going to make it together as a group. Don’t you worry about a thing. Just think of yourself as Cinderella, and we’re your fairy godmothers.”

Mrs. James handed Danica an oversized notecard. “I need you to fill this out with your address, any dietary preferences, and such.”

Danica arched a brow in question.

“It’s for the Helping Hands brunch the day of the dance.”

Danica obliged, carefully writing the information and handing the card back to Mrs. James, and then stepping back onto the fitting platform.

Mrs. James tucked the card into her purse. “Thank you, darlin’. And thank you for letting me put a little more light in your life.”

Danica smiled shyly, gazing down at the platform and brushing back her black hair to reveal earbuds tucked in her ears. So, she was like every other teenager, listening to her music twenty-four seven. I wondered what her natural hair color was. A lighter brown, judging from how pale her skin was, but she died it raven black, emphasizing her fair complexion. “I don’t know how to thank you.”

Mrs. James gave her hand a squeeze. “You just have fun at the dance and look gorgeous. That’s all the thanks I need.”

“And don’t turn into a pumpkin,” Nana added with a chortle.

Mrs. James and Nana ambled into the kitchen, leaving Danica and me alone with our dress design. I looked long and hard at her, from her straight black hair to her wide shoulders and hips, to the trim indentation of her waist. Rather than stick thin, she was curvy in a way that reminded me of Jessica Rabbit, but so far, whenever I’d seen her, both here and at Villa Farina, the bakery where she worked part-time, her body was hidden under baggy tops and jackets.

“The black’s not going to work,” I said, tapping my finger against my lips. I was also making a dress for another Helping Hands girl, Leslie Downs. Hers, I already had clear in my mind. It had been easy: I’d looked at her and seen the exact dress, just like that.

It was a sapphire blue floor-sweeping semisheer tiered overlay with an explosion of confetti-colored sequin fabric as the main skirt and bodice. The strapless bandeau neckline, an A-line silhouette, a high-low hem, coming to the fingertips in front and sweeping the floor in back, would all set off her ebony skin beautifully. An updo for her hair, high-heeled black sandals, and she’d be a standout at the dance.

But Danica . . . She was a different story, and with her design, I was less confident. I’d had a vision of the short, flirty black dress I’d been planning, but it wasn’t quite right. Everything around me faded away as I looked at her. Her blue eyes and pale skin reminded me of Emma Stone, but her black hair,
heavy black boots, and patterned black stockings paired with a lacy black skirt gave her a hard look. Mostly, though, there was an underlying sadness to her. Completely understandable, given the fact that she’d been in foster care and now, at nearly eighteen, was finishing high school and would be living on her own soon. Not the way most teenagers envisioned their lives turning out.

I pulled the tulle away from her and wound it up in a haphazard ball. “Danica, I want to play a little game with you.”

She took out her earbuds, turned off her music, and tucked it all away in her pocket, lifting her gaze and looking at me through her long, spidery eyelashes. “Okay?” she said, more like a question than acquiescence. “What kind of game?”

“Word association.”

She pulled her lips in thoughtfully until they disappeared. “Okay,” she said again. “Why?”

“I can’t quite get a picture in my head of the right dress.” Apparently my charm was failing me, but I couldn’t tell her that. “This will help me get to know you better. I’ll sketch tonight, and show you some ideas tomorrow. I want your input on this.”

She batted her eyelashes, whisking away the thin layer of moisture glazing her eyes. I wished I knew her background. Had her relationship with her parents been okay, or strained? What about her foster family? Had they wanted her? Shown her love?

More than ever, I wanted to give Danica a Cinderella night at the dance.

“Let’s give it a try,” I said.

She nodded as I fired off my first word. “Homecoming.”

“Parade,” she said. No hesitation. So she liked the festivities.

“Monday.”

“Day off.”

“Saturday.”

“Car shows.”

“Sunday.”

“Church.”

So far, so good. Her answers didn’t give me any insight to her psyche, but she was talking, so I was hopeful.

“Car.”

“My dad,” she said quietly. She wasn’t with her dad anymore, but that’s all I really knew. Now didn’t feel like the right time to push for more information, so I moved on.

“High school.”

“Torture.”

I left that one alone. “Mums.”

“Status.”

Danica’s perspective on school reflected her situation, namely that she was alone in the world. The next set of words that came to my mind were family, home, and vacation. Having her respond to them could give me more insight, but on the other hand, thinking about what she didn’t have could drive her deeper into herself. I waffled back and forth, but finally made up my mind. If I had cancer or my husband—if I had a husband—had cheated, I wouldn’t want my friends or the people I ran into to cower and pretend like my reality didn’t exist. My grandmother, Loretta Mae—and all the Cassidy women, for that matter—had taught me to face adversity head-on. No pussyfooting around.