Last Chance Christmas (Last Chance #5)(25)
Author: Hope Ramsay

“So?” Lizzy pressed. “What’s this about Daddy and a photograph?”

Lark took a deep breath and explained what had happened in as calm a voice as she could muster.

“Oh, how horrible,” Louise said, “to take a photo of something so beautiful and have it also contain something like that. You didn’t see it when you took the picture?”

“No.” Lark didn’t explain about the hunter, the gunfire, or her flashback. And she sure didn’t say anything about the shadows lurking at the edges of the frame until after the photo was shot. She usually didn’t notice the shadows. But they were always there, like Jimmy Marshall’s body.

Instead, she gave Haley a little hug and breathed in her little-girl scent. She smelled like cinnamon. “Mmmm, you smell like something good to eat,” Lark said.

“Oh, we made clove and orange pomanders in—” She slapped her hands across her face, and her eyes grew round. “Oops.”

“It’s okay, sugar, I didn’t hear what you said,” Ruby commented without missing a beat.

Haley rolled her eyes and leaned in. “I was making it for Granny for Christmas,” she whispered.

“So,” Lizzy interrupted, “do you think it was murder?”

“Lizzy!” Ruby scolded from across the room.

“I don’t know,” Lark replied. “Stone said Mr. Marshall had a gunshot wound to the head.”

“Yeah, but if it was suicide wouldn’t they have found the gun?” Lizzy asked.

Lark blinked at Liz. “I hadn’t thought about that. I guess so, but it was swampy. The gun could have fallen into the water.”

“So they didn’t find a gun?” Louise asked.

“I don’t think so.”

“All right, y’all, that’s enough,” Ruby said. “I expect Stone will get to the bottom of things.”

“Ha! You know good and well that Billy will be doing the investigating,” Louise said. “And I don’t think that boy could investigate his way out of a paper sack. When are you going to convince that son of yours to run for sheriff?”

“I’m not going to,” Ruby replied. “Stone has to decide that’s what he wants. And he’s still making up his mind.” Ruby looked up into the mirror and stared right at Lark. “He’s been stuck in his life for a long time.”

“Well, I can understand that,” Louise said, “what with him losing his soulmate and all. But life goes on. My Henry’s been gone fifteen years, and I’ve gone on without him.”

“Granny,” Haley said from her perch on Lark’s lap, “if Daddy found his soulmate and she went to be with Jesus up in Heaven, can he ever get another one?”

“That’s a good question,” Ruby said.

“I wish he could find another one,” Haley said, resting her head on Lark’s shoulder. “I think Daddy is lonesome.”

Lark’s girl parts chose that moment to recall Stone’s recent kiss. Maybe he wasn’t as lonesome as people thought, because that kiss had been hot. She was pretty sure that Stone wouldn’t be averse to taking things to a more intimate place. Thinking about sex and Stone in the same thought set Lark’s heart to racing.

“Well,” Ruby said as she finished blow-drying Louise’s short hairdo. “I want to believe that a person can love twice in a lifetime. But Miz Miriam gave your father advice a long time ago, and he followed it. I can’t say I ever heard of Miriam giving anyone advice twice.”

“Hey,” Lizzy said, “what kind of advice did Miz Miriam give Daddy anyway? I don’t think anyone has ever told me that.”

Louise frowned for a moment. “Oh, I think it was something about how he needed to go out and tame a crusader.”

“What?” Lizzy looked confused.

“Well,” Ruby said, “I think Miriam told your daddy that the woman he should be looking for was a person who wanted to change the world. And that his job was to make sure she remembered that the world starts at home.”

“And Momma was always getting involved in projects, wasn’t she?”

“She was the most dedicated churchwoman I ever met,” Louise said. “I know that she would be disappointed in Stone, the way he’s turned away from church these last few years.”

Lizzy rolled her eyes and gave Lark one of those teenager looks. She leaned in and whispered, “That’s what they all say about Momma.” Then, in a louder voice, Lizzy proclaimed, “I wish I remembered Momma better because it’s tough being the spawn of a saint.”

“Elizabeth Ames Rhodes, that’s a terrible thing to say,” Louise said. Ruby scowled at her granddaughter in the mirror.

Haley cocked her head and gave her sister a long look. After an awkward silence, Haley said, “I feel the same way.”

Lizzy turned toward her sister. “No, you don’t. You don’t even understand what I said.”

Haley shrugged. “Maybe not, but whatever it means, you made the angel happy. She just stopped crying and smiled. So if it made her happy, then I want it, too.”

All activity in the shop came to a stop. Everyone stared at Haley.

Lark felt a little sorry for the kid. She understood what it was like to talk about a person who wasn’t really there.

It was Jane who broke the tension with a little laugh that didn’t sound strained or put on. “Well, isn’t that nice. It sounds like the Sorrowful Angel has a sense of humor.”

Ruby gave Jane a skeptical look and handed Louise a hand mirror so she could see the back of her head.

A moment later Jane spoke again, firmly and deftly changing the subject. “You know, Lark, you’d look so much better with a few highlights, and maybe not so many layers.”

“I was thinking the very same thing,” Ruby said.

Lark held her breath. Here it came. Just like Stone had predicted.

The last thing she wanted were highlights that would grow out in Africa, leaving her roots exposed. And she had always worn her thick hair like this, because the layers made it easy to dry and kept it from frizzing when she was sent off to the tropics.

But how could she make them understand? They were kind. They were good people. They didn’t know her life.

And then it occurred to her that she didn’t want to go back to Africa. And once she let that thought blossom in her head, she started to realize that maybe, just maybe, she needed more than a new haircut and some highlights.

She needed to make over her life.

“I’ll speak to him if I damn well please.” Lee Marshall’s voice sounded through the door to Stone’s office. An instant later the old man came barreling through the door looking as mean as nine miles of rusty barbed wire.

“My son did not kill himself,” Lee proclaimed. The old man stood there, his frame drawn up as straight as it would go. He carried a cane, but he wasn’t leaning on it. His eyes looked red-rimmed, his jowls grizzled with unshaved beard.

“I never said Jimmy killed himself,” Stone replied as he gestured toward the hard metal chair beside his desk. Lee eyed the chair for a moment, and a little of the starch went out of him.

“Billy told Hettie it was a clear case of suicide,” Lee said. “Stone, that just makes no sense. Jimmy didn’t have the balls to kill himself. Besides, he was under the thumb of that holy-roller wife of his, and she would have disapproved of something like that.”

“Sit down, Lee. You and I both know Billy’s an idiot. We won’t know what happened until we get the coroner’s report. And that won’t happen for a while, what with the holidays coming up and all.”

“How long is a while?”

“Not until after Christmas.”

“You’ve got to be kidding. They’re going to keep my boy’s body for that long?”

“I gather Doc Humphrey has gone to Aspen for the skiing and won’t be back until late next week.”

Lee collapsed into the chair. His hands were just the tiniest bit shaky as he clutched his cane. “I should give Billy Bennett a piece of my mind.”

“Yes, you should. He might listen to you. He sure as shooting doesn’t listen to me. By the time Doc Humphrey figures out the cause of death and Billy actually starts investigating, the crime scene will be useless. Of course, the rain didn’t help anything.”

“Damn it, Stone, Jimmy did not kill himself.”

“I’m sorry for your loss, Lee.” Stone invested his voice with as much compassion as he could muster for the old coot. It had to be hard burying your only child. And Hettie and Jimmy didn’t have any kids, so Lee would never have grandchildren. The Marshall line was coming to an end. It was sort of ironic, considering how many Rhodeses there were in Allenberg. A hundred and fifty years after Diamond Jim Marshall beat Chancellor Rhodes in a poker game, Chance Rhodes’s descendants appeared to have won.

Lee cast his gaze over the blown-up printouts of Lark’s photographs that Stone had been examining when Lee had interrupted him.

“What are these?”

“Photos of the crime scene taken a couple of days ago.”

“A couple of days ago, but—”

“Lark Chaikin was out taking photos of wildlife. She photographed more than she intended to. That’s how I found Jimmy’s body. You should be thankful I didn’t run her out of town. If we’d left it up to Billy, we might never have found your son.”

Lee leaned forward and grabbed the photos off Stone’s desk. He pulled out a pair of reading glasses and studied them, flipping through them, one by one. Stone didn’t say a thing. Jimmy’s body was clearly identified in the one blowup of the heron in flight.

“These were taken on that old road that leads to the Jonquil House, weren’t they?” Lee asked.

“Yes, sir.”

“That’s mighty strange.”

“How so?”

“Jimmy never went out that way—not alone, anyways—not into that swampy woods. He was terrified of snakes.”

As Lee spoke, his hands started to tremble, and his jowly cheeks went red. It was a strange reaction, more anger than anything else.

“Thank you, Stone,” the man said as he pushed himself out of the chair. “Clearly I need to talk to the sheriff.”

No sooner had Lee departed than Kamaria LaFlore, the mayor-elect of Last Chance, arrived. She didn’t knock either.

“The town is in an uproar. Is Jimmy Marshall really dead?” she asked as she sat herself down in his chair. Kamaria must have come from her day job at Voorhees College, where she taught African studies. She wore a suit and a take-charge attitude.

Stone folded his hands on his desk. “Yes, ma’am.”

“How did he die?”

“The cause of death has not been officially determined.”

“I heard he was shot in the head.” Kamaria’s gaze narrowed.

“Well, that’s true, but how the bullet hole got there, what caliber the gun was, and the rest of the important details remain unclear.”