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“What was the ‘job’ Ellie brought up?” he asked Crassley.
“Don’t know what you mean.”
“Nia said it was a ‘job’,” he quoted.
“Bitch doesn’t know what she’s talking about,” he muttered, and then subsided into silence.
* * *
Delta saw Amanda’s interview with Ellie on the noon news. It felt weird to be the subject of their conversation. She’d called Amanda but hadn’t heard from her, which was the way of it, she was learning. Amanda was fairly demanding when she needed something from you, hard to reach when she didn’t.
And then she switched to Channel Four, thinking of the young, balding reporter who’d dogged her so much. And there he was . . . talking about her!
“. . . in recent days Blood Dreams sales have skyrocketed. It’s topping the e-book charts. I asked Delta Stahd about her book, but she declined to answer. The story is remarkably similar to the fate that her newly deceased husband, Doctor Tanner Stahd, suffered. The wife of a notoriously cheating doctor concocts a plan to stab her husband to death and inherit his estate. In the book, she gets away with murder, but in real life, Tanner Stahd’s father, Doctor Lester Stahd, is making a claim that Delta should not profit from killing his son, which is what he believes she did. Does the sudden ‘rise to fortune’ of Blood Dreams constitute monies Delta should not profit from as well? Tanner and Delta Stahd also have a young son, Owen Stahd, and Lester Stahd is suing for custody of him. It’s a family tragedy that grows more complicated daily. If—”
Delta switched off the set. Her mother was standing at the edge of the family room. She’d heard too. “Mom, I didn’t do it,” she said.
“I know.” Her mother came over and put her arms around her. Delta leaned her head on her shoulder. She closed her eyes, thinking about her meeting with Amanda, who’d asked as they were wrapping up, “Is there anything else? Anything you can think of that might be something we have to spin?”
She’d shaken her head. She hadn’t thought about the uptick in sales of Blood Dreams.
Now she pulled back from her mother and tried on a smile. Her father was at the store, and her mother would be too, if Delta hadn’t needed support.
“Dad’s okay by himself?”
“For a little while,” her mother agreed.
“Okay. I’d better get going then.”
“You sure?” Mom frowned. “I don’t like thinking of you alone.”
“I’m sure.” As much as she loved and relied on both of them, today she was antsy and uncomfortable. Amanda’s television interview hadn’t really helped all that much. Just hearing about herself made her feel like a criminal.
She left around 1:00, feeling somewhat lost. Zora was gone. Another one of their group. Owen was at school. It did feel lonely.
She thought about calling McCrae, but she didn’t know what he thought of her after she’d confessed about the knives. Everything just felt . . . fraught.
Back at her house—no press outside, thank God—she remembered about checking in with Woody about the guy who’d fought with Tanner over the fende
r bender. She imagined the police had already talked to him, and there wasn’t anything for her to really do, but . . .
She had a glass of sparkling water, thought about some rosé, then decided it was still too early in the afternoon and stuck with the water. After listening to the quiet of the house, she headed out. She hadn’t really seen Woody since the reunion, apart from across the street in downtown West Knoll once and at Danny O’s another time, when she’d taken Owen when he was about three. Both times, he’d given her a sardonic smile and a salute, which she’d taken to be a comment on her escalating social status as Dr. Tanner Stahd’s wife.
Candy had opened the clinic on a limited basis. She’d called Delta and given her condolences, and then had said they really weren’t having much business. Tanner’s father’s screaming decimation of Delta had apparently cooled the community’s interest in the clinic.
If I’m in charge, it’s not safe to go.
That was a further depressing thought.
She went to Woody’s Auto Body, but there was no one there. A clock-face sign on the door had an arrow pointed to a return of 3:00 p.m.
“One helluva lunch hour, Woody,” she murmured. But maybe he was on the job somewhere.
She phoned Amanda again, but the call went to voice mail once more. This time she left a message. “Hi, Amanda, it’s Delta. Just checking in. I saw your interview with Ellie. It was nice to be defended. Um . . . I told McCrae the truth about the knife. It just . . . happened. Anyway, thanks. Call when you can.”
She clicked off and decided to go to lunch herself at Danny O’s. Might as well kill some time.
* * *
