A Fortune Wedding Page 6

  “What if you’re right?”

  “I can’t be,” she said passionately.

  “Frannie.” His gaze was unwavering. “For both of our sakes, I need to know what you know.”

  She shook her head mutely. Her eyes swam in despair.

  “Tell me,” he said softly.

  “Josh.” She swallowed. “I’m afraid it’s Josh.”

  But you don’t know what’s happened, you don’t know the spot I’m in—

  “You think Josh had something to do with Lloyd’s murder?”

  “No,” she said too quickly. “It’s impossible. There’s no way he could kill his own father. It’s just that…”

  “What?” He kept his voice gentle.

  “He and Lloyd have been—were—at each other’s throats the last couple of months. They fought at the Spring Fling.”

  “That doesn’t necessarily mean anything.”

  “It was right before Lloyd was killed. Roberto, he could have been the last person to see him alive.”

  “Do the police know this?”

  She turned to look back at him, eyes shimmering with tears. “How could I tell them? He’s my son.”

  “Just because they fought doesn’t mean anything happened. Did anybody else hear it?”

  “A potter at the Spring Fling named Reynaldo Velasquez. And Lily. My brother Ross talked to her about it. He’s a private investigator.” Frannie dashed away the tears impatiently. “I was working the raffle tent for the Fortune Foundation. I went to the back to get more tickets and I heard them.”

  “What were they fighting about?” Roberto asked, getting to his feet.

  “They were a ways away, but they sounded absolutely furious. Josh told Lloyd he’d be sorry, that he’d make him sorry, and there was something in his voice, something I’ve never heard before…hard, almost violent.” She shivered.

  He crossed to her. “What happened?”

  She shook her head. “There was so much noise from the dance and the carnival and people walking by. And I got called away to help some customers. By the time I got done, I couldn’t hear the fight anymore. When I went around to the back to look for them, I found—” Her mouth moved, but no words came out.

  Roberto reached out and gathered her to him, stroking her hair.

  “I dream about it almost every night,” she whispered, her breath hitching. “I’m leaning over him and there’s moonlight and I can see his blood. There’s so much of it. I can’t get away from it, I can’t get it off. It’s everywhere, all over my face, and my clothes…my hands…everywhere.” And she wept then, giving in to the horror.

  Roberto swung her up into his arms and carried her over to the couch, holding her, aching for her, hating the fact that he couldn’t protect her from what she’d been through, that he couldn’t wipe it all away. But he was here now and he’d do his damnedest to take care of her from now on.

  The moments slid by and finally the cataclysm passed, leaving her wrung out and quiet against him. Finally, she stirred. “I’m sorry.”

  He stroked her hair lightly. “There’s no reason to be.”

  “It’s all just been such a nightmare. I’ve been numb. Until now.” Frannie sighed. “I don’t know what to do. How can I talk to the police about Josh?”

  “The only thing that makes you suspicious is the fight?”

  This time the sigh was longer. “That’s not the worst of it. The night of the murder, the police found a pottery vase that had blood on it. They found it pushed under the flap of a tent.” She swallowed. “I bought that vase. It was part of what made them suspect me. But I wasn’t the last one who had it.”

  “Josh?”

  She nodded. “He was supposed to take it to my car. Somehow, he never did. Instead, it wound up under the edge of the Fortune Foundation tent, at the back.”

  “But it’s not the weapon.”

  She blinked. “It’s not?”

  “I don’t think so. If it was, they wouldn’t have been so curious about the bar that I found.”

  “The bar? What bar?”

  “I saw someone leave the area where Lloyd was found, in a hurry, right around the time all the noise started. They tossed something away. Turned out to be a kind of a blue-gray crowbar thing, with stuff on it that looked a hell of a lot like…evidence.”

  She paled. “Oh my God.”

  “What?”

  “That came from the Fortune Foundation tent. The table supports got jammed and we used it to pry them loose. The guys who were helping with setup dropped it at the back of the tent before they draped the tarps over.” She stared at him, eyes filled with anguish. “Roberto, what if he really did it? What if he was trying to tell me today and he just couldn’t say the words?”

  “Do you honestly think Josh could kill anyone? Especially his father?”

  “I don’t know,” she burst out. “I can’t imagine it, but he was there at the right time. He could have swapped the vase for the bar. He made threats. And he’s been acting so strange. He looks like he hasn’t slept right in weeks and he’s so on edge. He’s never blown up at me like he did today, never.”

  “It just doesn’t add up,” Roberto said. “I can’t see how the kid who was standing there protecting you killed Lloyd. Someone else did it, we just need to find out who.”

  “How are you going to do that?” she demanded. “My brother Ross still hasn’t figured it out after almost three weeks on the case. What makes you think you can?”

  “I have what you call a vested interest. Take me to see Ross and we can compare notes, set up a game plan.”

  “Roberto, you can’t just take over here.”

  “And you can’t be so dead-set on turning down help from anyone, especially me, that you put us all at risk,” he shot back.

  She opened her mouth then closed it. “All right, fine. I’ll call Ross and see what he says.”

  “Good,” Roberto said. “Keep me posted. Now where did we leave that coffee?”

  They skirted the boxes and Roberto looked around the room. Lloyd Fredericks was dead and no one knew why. The killer was still at large, and maybe it was Josh, but maybe it wasn’t. In which case, it wouldn’t be a bad idea to stick close to Frannie, just to be sure she was safe.

  “All right, that’s one of your problems taken care of,” he said aloud, following her back to the kitchen table. “Next is getting your house sold. It shouldn’t stay on the market long. It’s a nice-enough place.”

  “It’s not a nice house, it’s a horrible house,” she countered, her spirit back, he was relieved to see. “Lloyd picked it out. It’s so big it echoes, and the rooms are all at weird angles to each other, and it’s in a Stepford neighborhood. It’s true,” she defended when one corner of his mouth curved up. “You look when you drive out. They’re all alike. It’s a good thing he didn’t drive me to drink or else I’d have come home some night and pulled up at the wrong house and crawled into someone else’s bed.”

  And before he could stop it, the image flashed in Roberto’s mind of Frannie, silky and fragrant and wrapped around him. He suppressed it ruthlessly.

  But not before he saw her eyes darken.

  Roberto cleared his throat. “Well, you’ve got a guard. Some people like that.”

  “I wouldn’t want to bet on our security team to take down anyone much more dangerous than a kindergartner.” She picked up the mugs.

  “At least you’re safe from preschool gangs. Thanks,” he added, taking his cup from her. “What kind of house would you have picked if you’d had the chance?”

  “Something older, quirkier. Cozier,” she added as she leaned a hip against the counter. “Wood and wallpaper, not marble and chrome. I’m going to look for something small. With Josh going off…to college, I won’t need much space.” There was a beat of silence. “But I’ve got to sell this one first before I can go looking. There’s no way the bank would give me another mortgage at this point—I don’t have quite Lloyd’s gift for the con.”

>   “You want me to take a look at those commercial properties you were talking about and give you my opinion?”

  “Roberto,” she said in exasperation. “How many times do we have to have this discussion? I can take care of my own business. I’m not going to turn around and let somebody else run the show again, including you. Especially you,” she added.

  The walls were back up, he realized with a pulse of frustration. All the years they’d lost, the life she’d had without him. If she’d at least been happy, it would have been easier to accept, but she hadn’t and he hadn’t been there to help. And now she was pushing him away, again.

  But this time, he wasn’t going anywhere.

  “I told you, I do property development for a living. It wouldn’t be free. I’d take a commission. I could assess what you’ve got, give you my advice on which ones to unload, which ones to keep, which ones to invest money in.”

  “No, okay? You can’t come in here and fix everything. I’ll get to it.”

  “Will you get to it in time?”

  She raised her chin. “We’ll find out, won’t we? Right now, I’ve got to focus on two things—getting some kind of paid work, and selling this place. Assuming it’ll move.”

  “It’ll move.” From ingrained habit, he’d been evaluating the house since he’d walked through the door, studying the ceilings and walls for clues to the bones underneath. Expensive, it might have been, but it wasn’t well built by anyone’s standards. With a little repair work, though, it would probably attract a buyer. “How long have you been here?”

  “Five years. We moved in when they were first built.”

  He traced a crack in the plaster next to what he presumed was the pantry door. “You’ve had some settling. It happens a lot when developments are built on construction fill, especially if they don’t compact it right.”

  Frannie followed him out to the foyer. “They must not have because we’ve got cracks all over. And half the doors won’t stay closed—the latches don’t catch.”

  “That’s easy enough to fix.” He nudged a loose floor tile. “You’ll need to reset this. And once you get the cracks fixed, the whole place could probably do with a coat of paint.”

  She sighed. “I should start making a list. I’m going to need to get someone in to do an estimate.”

  “You know, I could do this work for you.”

  “Roberto—” she began.

  Frustration rippled in his voice. “I rebuilt my parents’ restaurant after the fire, but since then I’ve either been helping tend bar at Red or sitting on my hands, neither of which I’m good at. If you gave me this job—and I do mean job—I’d estimate it and give you a payment schedule. A payment schedule,” he repeated firmly, when she would have interrupted. “There are a lot of clients I do that for. You’d be able to concentrate on getting your business going, and in return, you’d be doing me a favor. What do you say?”

  She crossed her arms and looked at him.

  “Look, I’m not trying to compromise your all-fired independence. This would be purely a business arrangement, customer and vendor.”

  There was a moment of silence.

  “It’ll sell faster.” He gave her his best guileless look and was rewarded by a twitch at the corners of her mouth.

  “Do you by any chance sell as part of your real-estate work?” she asked.

  He raised his brows. “Sometimes. Why?”

  “I bet you’re good at it.” And she put out her hand. “It’s a deal.”

  “I still can’t believe the police had the nerve to lock up Roberto just to grill him,” Isabella complained. “I’d like to give those Red Rock detectives a swift kick somewhere painful.”

  “Tell that to Roberto,” Jorge invited. “I’m sure he’d appreciate it.”

  They sat at a table in Red with Isabella’s fiancé, J. R. Fortune, and Jorge’s fiancée, Jane.

  “I’ve barely ever spoken to Roberto,” Isabella said. “What are we, third cousins twice removed?”

  “Well, if you haven’t much talked to him, that puts you in good company. He’s not too chatty except with people he knows well,” Jorge said.

  “Unlike you.” Jane reached for a chip.

  “Is that your way of telling me I’m a silver-tongued devil?” He gave her a leer.

  “Hey, enough of the tongue talk, you two.” J.R. took a swallow of his beer.

  “So, if Frannie didn’t do it and Roberto didn’t, then who did?” Jane asked.

  “I don’t think the police know,” Jorge said. “They’re still looking for information.”

  “I wonder…” Isabella stopped.

  The others looked at her. “Yes?” Jane said.

  “Well, I don’t know.” Isabella nibbled on her thumbnail.

  “Oh, come on, you can’t stop there,” J.R. complained.

  “It probably means nothing, but remember when we had that fight?”

  “You mean a couple days before you promised to fight exclusively with me for the rest your life?” he asked, his eyes glimmering.

  She blushed. “That night. It was about a week and a half before Lloyd Fredericks got killed. I went out for a drink, like I told you, and there was a guy in there.” The other three at the table all raised their brows.

  “Now she tells me,” J.R. said.

  “Oh, it wasn’t like that.” She frowned impatiently. “I barely talked to him, although he was definitely looking to hook up. But the thing was, he had a fight with someone on his cell phone while I was there, and it sounded like…well, like he was being threatened.” She hesitated. “I’m pretty sure the guy in the bar was Lloyd Fredericks.”

  It got their attention. “Did you tell the cops?” Jorge demanded.

  “Not yet. I didn’t know ’til now. I don’t read the papers a lot or watch the news,” she confessed. “I didn’t see his picture until this whole thing came up about Roberto. The bar was pretty dark, and the guy didn’t look just like the shots they showed of Lloyd Fredericks, but the more I think about it, the more I’m sure it was him.”

  “We need to get Roberto over here. He needs to know about this,” Jorge said.

  “I suppose. It’s been almost a month, though. I’m not sure what I can tell him. The weird thing was, after he hung up, he looked all flushed and angry, but he said something about it being a telemarketer. That was what made it stick in my memory. You don’t know the names of telemarketers, and he called this guy by name.”

  “What was it?”

  She ran her hands through her hair. “I’ve been racking my brain trying to remember. It was kind of unusual, started with a J. Jonas, Jo Jo…”

  “J.R.?” Jorge put in helpfully.

  Jane swatted at him. “This is serious.”

  “See this, J.R.? Less than two months to the wedding and she’s already beating me,” Jorge said. “Don’t say you weren’t warned.”

  “You’re so abused,” Jane said, giving him a quick kiss. “So, let’s see, unusual J names. Um, Jasper? Julius? Jonah? Jocelyn?”

  “Josh,” Isabella said triumphantly. “That was it. He was talking to someone named Josh.”

  Chapter Six

  The gray rock felt smooth and warm against Josh’s fingers. With a hard snap of his arm, he sent it flying over the water to skip once, twice, thrice before it disappeared. A stone on water, out of its element and sinking.

  The same way he felt.

  “Hey, Josh, stop messing around and come sit with me.”

  He looked back over his shoulder to see Lyndsey sitting on the sand in her beach chair, his hat clapped on her head. He bent to search out another rock, adding a little more juice to get four flat, hard bounces before it went under. Out of its element, in an impossible situation.

  There were lessons to be learned. Keep moving, first and foremost. If you kept moving, you wouldn’t go under—if you kept moving and didn’t let yourself touch anything for too long.

  He wished he’d been smarter.

  “Josh.”


  He sighed and turned back up the beach.

  “Stealing my hat?” he asked.

  She adjusted the brim. “I needed some shade. And black’s my color. Anyway, who cares? You’re more interested in rocks than me,” she pouted. “Maybe I should be worried.”

  “Nah.” He gave her a quick kiss and sat next to her on the sand. “I was just thinking.”

  “About what?”

  He shrugged. “Stuff.”

  “Don’t be such a worrywart. Things are going to be fine.”

  He studied her, her uncreased brow, her guileless blue eyes staring back at him—happy and untroubled. “How can you be so sure? What if my mom finds out that I—”

  “That you’re what? Going to be a dad?” She reached out for his hand and laid it over the still-slight curve of her belly. “She ought to be excited and proud of you. Everybody should. Anyone who’s not, well, they can take a flying leap. We’re not going to let anybody stop us, right? No way, no how.”

  A baby. As if everything else wasn’t enough, there was this. “It might not be as easy as that, Lyns.”

  “Worry, worry, worry. You know what they say, if you worry you die, if you don’t worry you die, so why worry?”

  Josh gave her a tight smile. “Can we not talk about people dying, please?”

  There was a flash of temper in her eyes. “Okay, let’s talk about names. How do you feel about Cheyenne if it’s a boy, and Piper if it’s a girl?”

  Josh leaned back on his hands and stared out over the lake. He remembered going to Six Flags on a class trip back when he was in fourth grade. All week, he and his friends had been daring each other to ride the great white knuckler. But it was so big when they had gotten there, so high, and maybe his mother had seen something in his face because she’d told him he couldn’t go, he was too young. That had been all it took. Anger had made him heedless and he’d found himself fighting back until finally she’d relented.

  And then he’d been in the train ratcheting its way up the hill and all of a sudden he’d realized what he’d done—acting without thinking, hotheaded—to wind up in the middle of something he’d never really wanted. But by then they had been at the top of the hill and it had been too late to do anything but ride it out. Sometimes that was all you could do. You made your choices, whether you meant to or not, and then you figured out a way to live with them.