AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“Go ahead, take them,” she said wearily. She minded, but she’d go along with anything to get this over. What she hadn’t planned on was that they would take everything that had been in the washer, which put a serious dent in her wardrobe. She stood in mute shock as they took her clothing into custody. They were thorough, all right. Then she caught Eric eyeing the pile of sheets on the floor, and the thought that he might be getting some pleasure from remembering the night before sent a rush of anger through her that almost took off the top of her head.
“I’m sorry about the smell in here,” she said sweetly. “A skunk must have peed on those sheets. I’ll have to burn them, because no way do I want them now.”
They were in the car before Garvey broke out in a broad grin. “Wilder, I hate to tell you this, but I don’t think she’s very happy with you right now.”
Eric grunted. “I kind of noticed.” Not only had she looked everywhere but at him, but the crack about the skunk and the sheets had been a dead giveaway.
“For what it’s worth, I don’t get the vibe off her. I think she’s probably clean.”
“I know.” Her shock had been too profound; not even the best actress in the world could make herself go pale, or change the size of her pupils. Everything she’d said had jibed with what Mrs. DeWitt had told them, too. She had washed her clothes, but that in itself wasn’t suspicious, and if there was any blood on them it would show up in examination. She hadn’t used bleach, which would have destroyed trace evidence, but as she’d said, who used bleach on dark clothes?
She wouldn’t have gone to meet her mother at Claire’s if there had been blood on her clothing. She wasn’t in the clear, though. She could have left Claire’s, gone back to the reception hall to fetch her briefcase, and had another confrontation with Carrie Edwards, one that had ended with her stabbing Carrie with the kabob skewers.
Knowing her briefcase was there, though, would she have left it a second time? She struck him as too organized and together for that, but if she’d killed Carrie in a fit of rage she’d have been in shock at what she’d done, and her most likely response would have been to run.
The trouble with that scenario would be that it would have required Carrie to hang around the empty reception hall for about an hour, doing nothing and seeing no one.
Then there was the unknown man Jaclyn had seen arrive. Mrs. DeWitt hadn’t mentioned anyone else being there, but she’d been in her office the whole time, so it was possible.
He concentrated on the myriad details they had to run down: the other vendors, two of whom had had their own problems with Ms. Edwards; the unknown man; the previous calls on Carrie’s cell phone, logs to get from the cell carriers to make certain no calls had been deleted from the phone’s memory. Jaclyn wasn’t clear, but neither did he think she was guilty. As Garvey had said, the vibe just wasn’t there. Until she was definitely cleared, though, he had to treat this as he would any other case.
She’d said she was going to burn the sheets, the ones they’d slept on. He’d recognized them, gold with white dots. She probably would, too, because she’d been fuming.
Fuck. She’d probably never speak to him again.
Chapter Eleven
MADELYN SMILED ACROSS THE ROOM AT THE BRIDE’S mother, a sweet woman who’d been on pins and needles for the past two weeks and was now enjoying some liquid help in unwinding. Between them stretched a crowded dance floor where most of the recently fed friends and family danced to a live band—a good one, too. Everyone was dressed to the nines, and quite a few of them were more than a little tipsy. From her point of view, that was a mixed blessing. The good thing was, they were having a good time. The bad thing was, when people were tipsy, Things Could Happen that could result in people being injured, embarrassed, or arrested. At this point, though, it was out of her hands; all she could do was cross her fingers and hope everyone simply had a good time.
The wedding had gone off without a hitch, the bridal pictures had been taken, and the reception was in full swing. Thanks to Peach’s makeup-wizard friend, the bridesmaid with the black eye looked as beautiful and unblemished as all the others. Currently the bridesmaids—all pretty blondes in sleek black satin—were posing for an informal photo, champagne glasses in hand. They were a striking contrast to the brunette bride in a cascade of white. Madelyn knew for certain at least one of the bridesmaids hadn’t been a blonde before, but had bleached her hair at the bride’s request. After all, the visual impact was important.
There was plenty of visual impact in the gown alone. For a relatively small wedding, the bride had gone all out with her gown. She could fit the groom and the best man under the full ballroom skirt, and no one would be the wiser, except maybe the devilish five-year-old ring-bearer, who had decided he had to see what was under that foaming, belling mountain of fabric. He had given everyone in the wedding party a good laugh, even the bride, who was both pretty and good-natured and had wanted to look like a princess for her wedding.
About two hundred guests had attended the ceremony, which had been held in a quaint chapel decked out in creamy-white flowers and flickering candles, giving it a dreamy quality that had charmed even her. She wasn’t a romantic, marriage to Jacky Wilde had cured her of that, but sometimes one of the weddings would get to her. Maybe it had more to do with the bride and groom than the trappings, and this particular bride and groom were so besotted with each other it was difficult not to smile when you looked at them. She was happy for them that the wedding ceremony had been perfect.
The wedding party had then moved to a nearby hall that was a
ll but impossible to book on a weekend without at least a six-month lead time; a year was better, for getting the exact date you wanted. Hence the midweek wedding, which was unusual, but if that was the only way the bride and groom could get the venue they wanted on short notice, it wasn’t a bad way to go.
For the moment Madelyn’s job here was done, so she could take a breather, but the operative term was “for the moment.” Until the bride and groom actually left, her job wasn’t finished. She had to make sure the departure went as planned, and then she’d be well and truly done for the night. One down, four more to go. If Peach was here they could have passed the time discussing the upcoming weddings and rehearsals, critiqued the food and fashions, and maybe gossiped a bit. This job hadn’t required the efforts of two, though, and in a week when they were all working extra hours it didn’t make sense to bring Peach into the mix tonight just for the company. For the next few days, they’d all be swamped.
She took a glass of champagne from a passing server, took a single sip, and made a circuit of the room. That single sip was all she’d allow herself, but she continued to carry the glass as she said hello to those she knew, and graciously accepted compliments from family members who were pleased with the way the wedding had gone. She made the time to speak to them all, because that was part of the game. Everyone here was a potential client—well, almost everyone, because she didn’t think the ninety-two-year-old great-grandfather of the bride was likely to need Premier’s services—and it was important to make a good impression without coming off like a snake oil salesman hawking her goods. She didn’t press a single card into a single hand; those who were impressed would remember the name of the company that had handled the details of the event, and those who were either unimpressed or uninterested would just throw the card away. There was no telling how many trees she’d saved by not handing out business cards.
Sometimes it struck her how lucky she’d been that she and Jaclyn had somehow stumbled onto the perfect jobs for them both. Opening Premier with Jaclyn had certainly been the smartest decision she herself had ever made. She’d made some bone-headed ones—witness Jacky—but Premier had been a stroke of genius. She was her own boss, and she and Jaclyn had a wonderfully close relationship. Not every woman could work with her own child, she understood that, but the two of them had made it not only work, but work well. Peach and Diedra, added to the mix as their success had grown, had become like family. Well, Peach had been like family for a long time, but working together deepened the relationship.
For Madelyn, the long, sometimes hectic days usually helped distract her from the feeling that she was too young to have given up on men. Usually … but not always.
Marriages were like roller coasters. There were ups and downs, twists and turns, and sometimes they turned you on your head and made you puke. Being involved in weddings—which were like that exciting first moment when you climbed into the shiny little car and buckled in, ready for a fun ride, stomach full of butterflies—was maybe an odd choice for a woman whose own marriage had derailed, sailed off a cliff, crashed and burned. There were a lot of ways to describe being married to Jacky Wilde.
Her years with him had been quite a ride; there had been lots of ups, plenty of downs. If she’d known then what she knew now … she still would’ve married the bastard. He’d broken her heart, but there had been some good times with him, especially at first. And above all else, he’d given her Jaclyn.
She adored her daughter, loved her so much not just because she was her child but because she genuinely loved her as a person. Even if they weren’t related, Madelyn thought Jaclyn would still be her favorite person in the whole world. It depressed her to think that her own marriage made her daughter so cautious that she might never let herself get lost in the almost frightening ecstasy of a romantic relationship. It didn’t help that Jaclyn’s own marriage had ended so soon. Even worse, there hadn’t been any major drama in Jaclyn’s divorce; they had both simply walked away, as if they realized there was nothing there worth fighting for.
And as for the example Jacky had set, with his five marriages … well, the less said about that, the better.
Madelyn wanted her child to know love, to take a risk, to climb into the shiny car at the starting gate not knowing where it would take her, and it made her sad to think that might never happen, that Jaclyn might never truly fall in love. Falling in love meant taking a leap of faith, it meant trusting someone else and letting them be important to you. So far, Jaclyn was very nimble at avoiding any emotional risk.
The caterer, a woman who worked Atlanta-area weddings often enough that she and Madelyn could call themselves well acquainted, walked up behind Madelyn and grabbed her arm. Madelyn jumped, startled both by the touch and by who had approached her. Shirley never left the kitchen during an event, so she could only imagine that there had been a kitchen catastrophe.
