A Willing Murder (Medlar Mystery 1)

“Oh, yeah.”

Smiling, the two women went to the big couch in the family room. Sara picked up the remote.

Jack put down his crutches, made his way to sit between them and took the remote. “What are we watching?”

“Severide,” they said in unison.

Groaning, Jack turned on the TV and brought up Hulu. The women directed him to choose Chicago Fire.

“Yet another man,” Jack mumbled.

He started to eat his ice cream, but when he looked at the women curled up at the ends of the couch, their legs drawn up, he lifted his bowl.

They stretched out, their feet in Jack’s lap. He pulled a soft lap robe off the back of the couch, covered their bare feet and put the ice-cream bowl on top. They settled in to watch back-to-back episodes of the TV series they all enjoyed.

Sort of watched it. In their minds was the story they’d heard that day. Cheryl had done a very good deed for a girl she hardly knew. She had changed Elaine’s and Jim’s lives. And in a way, she’d changed the world. The Elaine Cross line of clothing wasn’t necessary to the earth’s health, but it provided jobs and gave pleasure. More couldn’t be asked.

Yet Cheryl hadn’t been allowed to live to see what she’d done. The question of “where do we go from here?” hung in the air.

During the credits of the first episode, Sara said, “We have to find Gena.”

“Yes,” Jack said.

“When we go, do we take arsenic or hemlock?” Kate said and the others smiled.

It was exactly how they all felt.

The next morning at breakfast, they agreed that the best thing would be to get back to normal.

“As if we’ve had any normal.” Sara turned to Kate. “I still want to show you around South Florida.”

“I’d like that.”

Jack was moving eggs about on his plate and saying nothing.

Once Kate got to her office, everyone stared at her, but no one asked any questions.

Tayla gave her the listings and the code to the locks on the doors. “I want my agents to see a house before they try to sell it, so go look at them. If you see anything distinctive, put it in the specs.”

Kate was glad to get out on her own. Her mind was so full of what had been going on that it was hard to think of small talk. “So how was your weekend?” wouldn’t end in “Oh, fine. How was yours?”

She finally had a map of Lachlan and used it to find her way around town.

Tayla’s specs included comments about each house. There were selling points, like walk-in closets, divine kitchen, new air-conditioning.

But there were also coded comments. “Make it your own” meant the house needed to be gutted. “Cozy” meant too small for more than three pieces of furniture.

But Kate’s thoughts were so filled with the Morris women that it was hard to concentrate on what she was seeing.

When she left the bedroom of the eighth house and Jack was standing by the front door, leaning on his crutches, she wasn’t surprised.

“The Matthews family owned this house,” he said. “It needs a new roof and the plumbing is bad. There are three dogs buried in the backyard.”

“Okay, Mr. Sunshine, what’s happened?”

“We found Gena. She’s in Miami.”

Kate took out her cell. “I’ll call Tayla and tell her—”