A Willing Murder (Medlar Mystery 1)

“Of course you can. There’s a logical explanation for all of it.” He sounded sarcastic.

“Don’t say it like that. I keep thinking of Dan’s family.”

“Mom called me. She and some of the ladies from church have been there. His wife is a mess.”

“Her husband commits suicide and confesses to a double murder. How does she wrap her brain around that?”

“From what Mom said, Dan Bruebaker was an excellent husband and father.”

“But—” She broke off when Sara came out of the bedroom.

“Are you two talking about anything interesting?”

“Nothing at all,” Jack said.

Kate would have backed up his lie but her cell phone started singing. She took it to her bedroom and listened to her mother’s heartfelt concern about what her daughter had been through when she found a man hanging. If Kate hadn’t heard what her aunt Sara had said, she would have thought her mother had been told she had three days to live and was trying to create good memories.

There were no questions about Aunt Sara’s bad temper, no prying into every minute of Kate’s life. There was just loving concern about the ordeal her daughter had been through.

When Kate hung up and went back to the kitchen, she was in such a dazed state that her eyes seemed to be pinwheels. It was difficult not to throw her arms around Aunt Sara’s neck and thank her.

As it was, she got behind Sara, looked at Jack and made faces and gestures of jubilance and being thankful. He looked down and didn’t betray his amusement.

* * *

Kate awoke to the doorbell ringing like it was a fire alarm. Not again, she thought. What did Krystal want this time? The clock said it was 2:14 a.m. She waited for a moment, hoping someone else would answer Krystal’s call, but the ringing kept on.

She pulled on a pair of jeans under the big T-shirt she was wearing and ran to the foyer, reaching it at the same time as Sara and Jack.

“I’m going to kill her,” Jack muttered. “If she—” When he looked out the glass panel beside the door, he halted. “It’s Dan’s mother.” He opened the door. “Mrs. Bruebaker, how—?”

She pushed past them, went straight to the living room and sat down. Her face was ravaged with tears and grief.

There was a wet bar around the corner and Jack went to it to pour a

tall rum-and-Coke, then handed it to Mrs. Bruebaker. She drank half of it in one gulp.

Jack, Kate and Sara sat down on the couch across from her and waited in silence for the woman to speak.

“I was in Australia. Dream vacation,” she said. “All my life I’ve wanted to hug a koala.”

She took a sip of her drink. “I flew back as fast as I could. I was sure my daughter-in-law had made a mistake. Couldn’t be Dan. Not my son.”

There was no response they could make to that.

“I went to Sheriff Flynn and woke him up. He said his hands were tied, that the case was closed. I had to ask him what the hell he was talking about. What ‘case’? He told me about finding skeletons and that my son said he’d killed those two women.”

She got up and looked out the big windows at the garden in the outdoor lights. When she turned around, she was calmer. “Daryl Flynn and I used to date. I liked him, but then I met my son’s father and...” She shrugged and sat back down.

“Daryl told me the case was officially closed and was never going to be reopened. And that under no circumstances was I to go to you guys and get you fired up again. But if I did see you, I was to tell you that he was really angry at having to go to the funerals of innocent people, and that he wants the killings to stop. And people should know the truth about those girls.” She paused. “Daryl said every bit of that three times. Three! It was like he thought I’d lost my hearing. I kept telling him that my Dan would never commit suicide and certainly not murder! But all Daryl could talk about was how Sara Medlar and her troop of would-be detectives were finally off the case since he’d gone ballistic and threatened you.”

She looked at Sara. “I’ve read your books. Everyone in Lachlan has, but I moved to Sunrise a few years ago. I didn’t know you’d bought the Stewart house. I didn’t know—”

Mrs. Bruebaker put her face in her hands and began to cry.

Kate went to her, put her arms around the woman and looked at Jack and Sara sitting rigidly on the other couch. Her eyes held a question. Did they get involved with this woman or tell her they were out of it?

Sara nodded first, then Jack. He seemed reluctant and Kate knew it was because he worried about their safety.