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So suicide was out. Divorce would take too long. But maybe Joelle could meet with an unfortunate accident.
That cheered him immensely. Hell, he could milk the hell out of being a grieving widower.
Should be worth a few votes when election time rolled around. Assuming he won—which he would—he could introduce legislation to decrease the danger of whatever it was that had killed her. He’d even name the bill after her. It was only right, after all.
The Quarter, New Orleans, Louisiana
MONDAY, JULY 25, 1:55 P.M.
Molly Sutton drove a big-ass, double-cab Toyota Tundra truck in fire-engine red, which had surprised Gabe. It seemed very conspicuous for a PI’s vehicle, but Molly had told him that it wasn’t her normal ride when he’d said as much. Normally she drove a boring sedan, but her sister had borrowed it today. After that exchange, they’d fallen quiet, Molly focused on the snarled traffic while Patty sat beside him in the back seat, her body tense, her expression frightened. Gabe knew how she felt.
He’d been foolish to think that he could keep this from her. She knew him too well.
He’d expected her to demand answers as soon as they’d closed the truck’s doors, but she hadn’t. He wondered if she was as afraid to ask as he was to explain.
Trying to redirect his own anxiety so that he didn’t feed Patty’s, Gabe sniffed, his nose detecting an earthy odor beneath the onion and garlic of Patty’s chef’s uniform. He sniffed again and concentrated.
Molly caught his eye in the rearview and smirked. “Horses.”
“Excuse me?”
“You’re smelling horses. My saddle, mainly. I usually keep it on the back seat.”
Patty had been leaning against the headrest, eyes closed. But at the word “horses,” she opened them. “You have a horse?”
Molly nodded. “We have two, my sister and I. We grew up on a farm and rode nearly every day. When we moved here, we brought our girls with us.”
“A farm where?” Patty asked, and Gabe was grateful to Molly for the distraction. His cousin wasn’t a nervous sort, but she was scared shitless right now and he couldn’t blame her.
“Western North Carolina, near Hickory. My family lived there until recently.” There was a slight catch in her voice, but Molly cleared her throat and went on. “My dad died three years ago, and we moved to New Orleans afterward.”
Her father, who’d been murdered and maybe even framed. Like Dad was. There was a story there. Gabe could look it up right now for an even bigger distraction, but Patty was hanging on Molly’s every word and, he could admit to himself, so was he.
It wasn’t Molly’s words, really. She had a soothing tone. He could imagine her using it to quiet a nervous horse.
“I’m sorry for your loss,” Patty said with genuine regret. “What about your mother?”
“She died about ten years ago. I miss her every day. She was the heart of our family.”
“My mother is, too. She’s a huge part of my life.” Patty patted Gabe’s upper arm. “Of our lives.”
Because he was alone now, his parents gone. The fear he’d felt while leaving the Choux was still present, but it was now mixed with both sadness at his loss and comfort in the knowledge that he was still part of Patty’s family. He’d never truly be alone.
“It’s just me and my sister now,” Molly offered, as if sensing his mood. “And my niece.”
“And she rides, too?” Patty asked.
Molly chuckled. “She could ride almost before she could walk. She’s a natural.”
Patty leaned forward. “What kind of horses?”
“Ginger is a mustang. We adopted her from the Bureau of Land Management after one of their sweeps. They auction off the horses every year. She’s my sister’s horse. My Shelley is a quarter horse. She’s old now—nearly twenty—but we used to do barrel racing when we were both much younger.”
“I’ve seen that on TV,” Patty said enthusiastically. She talked on and on, becoming less tense with every moment.
Not so Molly. Her tension was barely detectable, and he wouldn’t have noticed had he not been watching her so intently. Her hands tightened on the steering wheel, her jaw going tight. She flicked a glance in the rearview, but not to look at them. She was looking behind them, a sense of alertness charging the air around her.
Patty kept chatting, not seeming to notice, and Gabe didn’t want to scare her by twisting in his seat. He slid to the left a little, peering into the side mirror on the driver’s side.
