MARIUS
Ishouldn’t have let the funeral get me so bent out of shape. I’d sworn I’d dance on Brooks’s grave when he finally kicked the bucket. I just didn’t know it would be so soon.
I’d listened, eating the plate of refreshments and making noncommittal noises while Zoe and Emmie excitedly told me their half-baked theories about Oakley or Beatrice being the killer.
It was possible. But if I was going to defend Emmie in court, I needed more than plausible deniability. We needed proof. Evidence, timeline, motive. The reading of the will would ideally provide that. But I hoped that it wouldn’t just provide proof that Emmie had killed her husband.
She’d been shocked and Zoe, furious, when I’d played devil’s advocate and suggested that maybeEmmiehad been the one to find out about Beatrice and had killed Brooks. Emmie had refused to ride back to the senior center with me, instead cramming into the bus and ignoring me all evening.
The next afternoon, I stepped into the dark alley. Emmie hadn’t told me she’d seen any more evidence of the shadowy figure, so that was a probable dead end. It was likely a voyeur,though if I had to choose, I’d bet it was the crazy cat people who were camped out in front of the store. While Alice and Gertrude were still hell-bent on shutting the café down, Rosie seemed a little too interested in me, which was why I’d been entering the back way.
I reached for the door, preparing to knock.
Then I heard voices.
“Girl, you’re going to get everything!” Zoe said, clapping her hands.
“Shh! We don’t know that.” That was Emmie hissing. “I bet Brooks fucked me over.”
“I bet he was stringing Oakley along, especially if he and Beatrice had something going on.” Zoe was excited.
“I mean, it would be nice to have the house back. And my car. And the life insurance cash,” Emmie added, a smirk in her voice.
“Girl, you’ve been holding out…”
I backtracked, bracing for the cat protestors on Main Street so I could think.
Emmie did know about a life insurance policy, and it was likely a lot of cash. I’d have to make sure she didn’t talk to anyone else about it.
Rosie blew me kisses as I walked past.
“Emmie,” I said, approaching the counter.
She looked a little flustered.
“We have to go to the reading of the will now.”
“Oh!” she exclaimed, feigning confusion. “Is it happening already? I can’t imagine why I need to be there. Brooks will give everything to Oakley.”
As I helped Emmie with her coat, Zoe flashed her a thumbs-up.
Emmie gave an imperceptible shake of her head.
“This is just like a movie,” Emmie said as I hurried her along Main Street.
“Yeah. No one does will readings anymore unless you were rich or apparently lived in a kooky small town.”
I held the door of my father’s former office open for Emmie. The same shoe-repair store was on the bottom, the same carpet on the stairs as we climbed up to the wood-paneled state-of-the-art-in-the-1960s office. The only thing that had changed was Theo’s name on the desk.
Somehow, the fact that nothing had been altered was more unnerving than if Theo had redone everything.
I hung up our coats on the worn coatrack and pulled out Emmie’s chair for her in the conference room.
“I’ll go fetch you a coffee, Oakley,” Beatrice was saying as they entered behind us.
“I thought pregnant women couldn’t have coffee,” I said, staring at them.
“I meant decaf.”
