Chapter Eight
DAISY WOBBLED AND GRIPPED CORDELIA’S ARM. “NO. THAT CAN’T BE right. I—”
“We’re so sorry for your loss.” Cordelia ushered Daisy into the passenger seat before she could either confess or faint, giving them both away. “If you’ll excuse us, I do believe Miss Daisy has a touch of the heatstroke.”
“Sure thing.” Archer stepped to the side, his gaze steady and unyielding as he watched Cordelia walk around to the driver’s side. “I know you only just got here, but it wouldn’t hurt to remind you it would be a bad idea to leave town right now.”
Cordelia tripped over the heel of her shiny black flats as she stepped off the curb.
A betrayal of nerves that damaged her pride more than anything else.
Ever since she’d come in second place in the President’s Fitness balance beam exam in the fifth grade—no small feat for a girl who was all limbs and no grace—she’d put clumsiness firmly in the same category as messiness and meanness.
“I have no intention of running.” At least for another week. Cordelia yanked her car door open. “No matter how bad you’re itching for the chase.”
He gave her a full grin, that infuriating toothpick still dangling from his mouth. “It hasn’t been the same around here since you’ve been gone, Delia. I’ll be seeing you.”
She wasn’t sure if that was a promise or a threat.
Neither option stopped the goose bumps from raising on her arms. Daisy sat in the front seat mumbling affirmations of encouragement to herself, but Cordelia didn’t want to stay in town trying to sort her out.
She’d wait until they got back to the Chickadee before asking her questions about poison.
Once they passed the gas station and hit the dirt road, Daisy seemed to snap out of the catatonic state. She turned her big brown eyes on Cordelia, pleading for her very life in their depths. “I swear, I didn’t poison the pastor.”
“Of course you didn’t.” Cordelia waved her off. She didn’t know Daisy well, but she knew her well enough to know she wouldn’t hurt a fly if it bit her riding horse. “You’re the one who told me not to pay any mind to Edna Abernathy.”
“Yeah, but Archer . . .” Daisy nibbled on her lower lip as she stared out the window, staining her teeth with her bright-red lipstick. “He knew his daddy was coming to the Chickadee that night. That’s why he stopped over. He’s not going to let this go.”
“He can’t prove anything.” They’d been careful. Cordelia was certain the only person who had seen them had been Corbin, or else the news would’ve been all over town by now. “He can be as suspicious as he wants, but it’s not like he can launch an investigation.”
“Actually, he can.” Daisy tapped her fingernails on the center console in a staccato rhythm. “He’s a detective for the South Texas branch of the FBI.”
“He’s what now?” Cordelia slammed on her brakes hard enough for the seat belt to dig into her chest. Her heart beat wildly against her ribs. “Since when?”
“Since always? He was an early recruit, fresh out of college. His daddy was so proud.” Daisy sniffled as tears began to well in her eyes. “He said if his son wasn’t going to serve God, at least he was going to serve the law, which to him was the next best thing.”
“That’s a problem.” Cordelia didn’t mean to sound so insensitive when Daisy was in the throes of an emotional moment, but this wasn’t the appropriate time for reminiscing. “Do you have any idea how the pastor might’ve been poisoned?”
Daisy shook her head.
“Do you think maybe his wife knew he was coming to the Chickadee and put something in his dinner before he left the house that night?”
Daisy gasped. “Stella would never. She might not have loved her husband the way a wife typically does, but she didn’t hate him. And she really didn’t mind him spending his time at the Chickadee. It freed her up to have crochet nights with her gal pal Gladys.”
“I’m just examining the angles, not accusing anyone of anything.” Cordelia backed away from the pastor’s family. She trusted Daisy’s judgment of character, if only because she seemed to dislike the same people as Cordelia. “Did he have any enemies that you know of? Anyone he might’ve mentioned?”
“Oh, no.” Daisy’s eyes widened in horror. “Everyone in Sarsaparilla Falls loved Pastor Reed-Smythe. He was sweet as stolen honey, salt of the earth and all that.”
Cordelia’s momma hadn’t much cared for the pastor, but seeing as she was no longer in Sarsaparilla Falls, she figured Sherilynn didn’t count.
“We ought to make a list.” Cordelia worked best when she had a list to organize her day, and she figured a murder investigation wouldn’t be any different.
“No offense, Miss Cordelia, but why is it on us to do anything?”
“Because it’s only a matter of time before Edna starts crowing all over town once word gets out that the pastor was murdered, and Archer Reed-Smythe is already giving you the eye. As much as I’d like to believe otherwise, he doesn’t strike me as a fool.”
Daisy sat back in her seat with her arms crossed. “I didn’t do anything wrong, except protect his family’s peace by moving him to someplace more respectable.”
Cordelia softened and patted her shoulder. “I know that, but if we don’t want suspicion pointing your way, we need to come up with an alternative suspect.”
“I see what you’re saying.” Daisy sniffed. “I just don’t like to go around accusing innocent people of wrongdoing.”
“We’re not accusing anyone yet. Just making a list.”
Once Cordelia and Daisy returned to the Chickadee and filled Arline and Belinda Sue in on everything that had happened in town, the four of them decided to put their heads together to come up with some reasonable suspects.
Belinda Sue mixed up a batch of appletinis, which was really just a jug of water, a frozen can of apple juice concentrate, and a handful of single-serve vodkas she’d gotten for ninety-nine cents at the H-E-B checkout line.
As the chicks sipped on the tart concoction, they began naming everyone in town who came to mind.
Thankfully, Belinda Sue had been on board with Cordelia’s way of thinking, so Daisy relented on building a list.
Everything Cordelia learned about investigating a murder had come from reruns of Father Dowling Mysteries and Murder, She Wrote and whatever else her momma would watch between the jewelry and skin-care hours on QVC, which put them at a significant disadvantage considering Archer’s position.
But the one thing they had on their side was knowing Daisy didn’t do it.
While he was busy wasting his time looking into her, they could get a few steps ahead of him by looking into everyone else.
By the time they’d finished their first drinks, they had only three suspects. At the top were Corbin and Edna Abernathy, who had the most to gain from setting up Daisy, and Honey Stevens, who got put on the list by Daisy for her Fatal Attraction tendencies.
And Cordelia secretly added Stella Reed-Smythe to the list, on account of the spouse being the most common killer according to Dateline, even though the chicks insisted Archer was the only hell she ever raised.
Thus far, she had no motive. Daisy had assured her she knew all about the pastor’s visits to the Chickadee and didn’t mind one bit.
And she had a fair point. Plus, now that he was gone, the church deacons were voting on whether she’d even get to keep her house, so being without him didn’t do her any favors.
Daisy puckered her lips and reapplied her lipstick. “How are we supposed to go about investigating the Abernathys when they’d call the sheriff the moment we set foot on their land, especially after Cordelia told off Edna today?”
Belinda Sue’s green eyes sparked with mirth. “Wish I’d gone into town with y’all after all, just to see that go down.”
“It was glorious.” Daisy released a happy sigh.
“I could bring her a pie and an apology,” Cordelia said.
“Hush now.” Daisy sat up so fast, apple juice slid over the rim of her glass and splashed on the concrete. “You’ll do no such thing.”
Cordelia stared down at the glass in her hand. She had yet to take a sip of the appletini and wished she hadn’t asked Belinda Sue to make her one. “I’m not normally like that.”
While Cordelia couldn’t deny Edna had deserved her tongue-lashing and then some, she still regretted the way she’d spoken.
She was starting to understand what her momma had gone through when she’d wake up after a nasty bender and go on an apology tour with half the town.
Maybe feeling bad about things was just in her DNA.
“Don’t worry about the pie. It’s gonna take a lot more than that to get you in.” Belinda Sue tilted her glass toward Cordelia. “Edna wouldn’t scratch her own momma’s fleas, and Corbin’s apple fell off the same branch as his daddy. That whole family is rotten.”
Cordelia bit her lip, more than a little troubled that good manners couldn’t see her out of a bad situation. “What do you propose we do, then? Wait for Archer to show up and start handing out arrest warrants?”
“I knew my ears were ringing on the way out here.” At the sound of that voice, equal parts rough and smooth, Cordelia about jumped out of her skin. “Now what makes you think I just go around handing out arrest warrants without provocation?”
Archer had rolled the sleeves up on his shirt, and Cordelia was certain he’d done that on purpose. A man with forearms that nice didn’t go whipping them out without just cause. And he had the nerve to toss around the word “provocation.”
Daisy had gone pale, still not over her last encounter with Archer, but Belinda Sue popped right up.
Her cold efficiency was a welcome balm under the heat of Archer’s gaze.
“We figured you’d be by sometime to ask your questions, but I’m afraid we won’t be much help as we hadn’t seen the pastor in over a week. ”
Archer tipped down his sunglasses so he could look Belinda Sue square in the eyes. “That’s not what Edna Abernathy is saying.”