A Willing Murder (Medlar Mystery 1)
Page 96
She stood up. “Good.” She went into the house.
Minutes later, Arthur was lying naked on the massage table that Henry Lowell had made for Verna. Her hands were glistening with oil as she gouged and dug into his flaccid leg muscles.
“So why’d you come back to Lachlan?” he asked.
“Why do you want to know?”
“Just being friendly, that’s all.”
“You’ve never so much as asked me how my day was, much less about my life.”
“So maybe I’m curious. Is that so unusual?”
“From you, it is.”
Arthur took his time before asking again. “So I’m bored. Tell me your life story. Take my mind off my own problems.”
“I thought you believed only you had problems.”
Arthur gave a sigh. “How about that car for Cheryl? In exchange for a story?”
“The green one?”
“Sure. So tell me a story worth a car.”
“Why not? It’s not like I have a thousand friends in this town. It’s simple, really. In high school all I could think about was getting away from this backwater town. I wanted to go someplace where the muggers didn’t have four feet and teeth.”
“What you got against gators?”
“Are you going to listen or not? So anyway, the day after I graduated from high school, I went to Baltimore. I loved it! Everything was fast and they had snow. I worked as a waitress during the day and went to school at night. I became a legal secretary.”
“Good money?”
“Yes.” She paused. “But then my father died and I returned to Lachlan for the funeral and to get my
mother settled in a nursing home. That was the end of my life as I knew it.”
“You look healthy to me.”
“But then, you never believe that there are things worse than your own problems. Turn over.” She waited until he was on his back. “I met a man.”
“Ah,” Arthur said.
“Right. Exactly. I knew him in high school. He was a jock and I’d never paid any attention to him, but—” She shrugged. “But when I came back, I fell for him. Fell really, really hard.” She seemed ready to stop there.
“So why aren’t you with him now?”
“He was already married.”
“Never heard of divorce?”
“He wouldn’t do it. Gave lots of reasons. So I went back to Baltimore, cried a lot and thought that was the end of it. But four months later, I realized I was pregnant.”
“What did he say when you told him?”
“I didn’t. I planned to wait until after the baby was born, then send him photos. I was sure that would make him come running. But when I held Cheryl in my arms...”
“That was it,” Arthur said.