He colored slightly. “If I have time.”

  Onstage, Jack and his friends were warming up their instruments.

  “Is Jack playing here tonight?” I asked.

  “Yeah,” McKenzie said. “He arranged a gig at this place and called the other guys to get down here ASAP. He wants to stay close to me while we’re waiting for the cops to release my dad’s body. Isn’t that nice of him?” She looked at Simon as she spoke. “Not that we’re a serious item or anything. Just casual, you know.”

  Simon drank his beer and didn’t reply.

  “Where’s my other dear brother?” McKenzie asked Dave, and Dave told her.

  McKenzie howled with laughter. I got the impression this wasn’t her first bar stop of the night. “Oh my gosh. That’s too perfect. She got him into foreign films? What do you suppose is next? Abstract art? Decorating his minuscule studio apartment in Art Deco?”

  “I like Art Deco,” Samantha said. “I also like abstract art. You might like those things, too, McKenzie. If you knew what they were.”

  “Well pardon me for teasing,” McKenzie huffed. “I absolutely adore both my brothers,” she told me. “They always know when I’m having fun with them.”

  Dave snorted and took a long drink. He raised his hand to call for another beer.

  Onstage, Jack spoke into the mic. “Good evening, North Augusta. How’s everyone on this fine night?”

  A scattering of people in the audience mumbled, “Okay.”

  “Don’t let your enthusiasm get ahead of you, now,” he said. A couple of people cheered and several laughed.

  Jack introduced himself and his bandmates and they swung into their first set. A deep, slow, bluesy number.

  They were surprisingly good. Extremely good, in fact. Jack played lead guitar and he was also the main singer. His voice was rich, strong, and emotional, perfectly suited to the songs they performed. The rest of the band, I realized, were not of the same quality as Jack, but he easily carried them along.

  Gradually conversation around us fell off as people began paying attention.

  McKenzie had pulled her chair between Simon and me. He leaned around her and whispered to me, “Guy’s got a great voice.” McKenzie grabbed his arm and pulled him toward her. “He sure does.”

  Simon gave her a stiff smile before edging away.

  From the other side of the table, between Matt and Simon, Samantha gave me a shrug. Dave and Ivan drank their beer and said nothing.

  The set ended to raucous applause and even a few cheers. While his bandmates headed for the bar, Jack came to our table.

  “Hi, all. Nice to see you here. What’d you think?”

  “You chaps are brilliant,” Simon said.

  Jack’s smile was genuine. “Thanks. We try.”

  McKenzie tucked her arm into Simon’s and cuddled up to him. “Told you so,” she said. Simon shifted slightly to one side. His ears turned a lurid pink.

  “Can I buy you a drink?” Matt asked.

  “That’d be great, thanks,” Jack replied. “Bourbon on the rocks.”

  Another chair was found and space made between McKenzie and me. Putting me even farther away from Simon.

  “Do you get a lot of gigs in the city?” Bernie asked. “I hope you do, you guys are good.”

  “A few. Enough to pay some of the bills at any rate. I don’t suppose any of you have any contacts in the music biz?”

  Bernie laughed. “I’m a forensic accountant. If you want someone to handle your millions, when you start to make them, call on me. Otherwise, no use to you. Sorry.”

  “I’m a baker,” I said. “Simon’s a gardener. We’re even less use to you than a forensic accountant.”

  Jack smiled at us. He hadn’t expected anything else. The waitress placed a fresh round of drinks on the table. Jack lifted his glass in a toast and said, “Cheers.”

  A couple of early-twentysomething women in excessive amounts of makeup and short sparkly dresses sitting at the bar were giving Jack flirtatious looks. He didn’t seem to notice, and they soon turned their attention to his bandmates.

  “You could be in the big leagues,” Bernie said. “I mean that, seriously. If you want to that is. Some artists are happy just doing their art. I mean, you’ve got an appreciative audience here.”

  “Big leagues.” Jack thew back most of his drink. “I can’t say I wouldn’t grab the brass ring mighty quick if it was offered to me. But it hasn’t been offered. You need a great deal more than talent these days, or even luck. Contacts and money’s all that counts.”

  “You need money to make money,” Bernie said.

  “Yeah. Seed money to get the right gigs in the right places, make demo records and get them distributed. Get the notice of the people who can make a difference.” He waved his glass in the air. “The sort of people who don’t frequent bars like this one.” Jack glanced at McKenzie as he spoke. She’d wiggled her chair closer to Simon, who was doing a failing job of trying to keep a respectable distance. I tried to read Jack’s face. He’d glanced at her when they began discussing the money involved in getting a music career started, but he didn’t seem all that concerned that she was flirting so outrageously with Simon. Maybe it was normal behavior for her and he was used to it. Maybe he didn’t much care. I wondered if he was with her because he wanted her to help him get his foot in the musical door, financially speaking. If so, from what I knew about her family’s situation, he was going to be seriously disappointed.

  As, eventually, was she.

  Bernie caught my eye, jerked her head toward McKenzie, and rolled her eyes. Simon was just about falling off his chair by now.

  Jack put his glass down and stood up. “I need to talk to the guys about the next set. Catch you later. You planning to stay to the end, Mac?”

  “Might as well,” she said, “as the company’s so good and the drinks are flowing so nicely.”

  Matt attempted to come to his friend’s rescue. “So, McKenzie. What do you do for a living?”

  “As little as possible,” she said.

  “McKenzie dabbles in jewelry,” Samantha said. “You know the homemade hobby stuff people buy for their coworkers for the holidays, because they don’t know what they like. Or for their grandmothers.”

  Ivan coughed into his glass. Dave looked at Samantha with what might have been approval.

  McKenzie finally tore her attention away from Simon and peered at Samantha through narrowed eyes.

  Samantha pushed her chair back. “It’s late enough for me. Perhaps I’ll see you lot tomorrow.”

  “Would you like me to walk you to your hotel?” Ivan asked.

  “No, thanks. It’s not far; it’s early, and they tell me this is a safe town.”

  “You can ask my father about that,” McKenzie said.

  “How’s Hannah doing?” I asked Samantha.

  “Okay. Under the circumstances.”

  “Tell her I’d love to have her and Greg to my tearoom again. As my guests. And her mother. If . . . uh . . . she’s free.”

  “You mean if she’s not in jail,” McKenzie said.

  “Low blow, Mac,” Ivan said.

  “That’s not what I meant,” I said. Although it had been.

  McKenzie shrugged.

  “Anything new happening regarding your father’s case?” Matt asked.

  “Not that the police are telling us,” Ivan said. “All they have is questions. No information.”

  “Normal enough,” Matt said.

  “I don’t know Hannah very well, just through Greg,” Ivan said. “And I don’t know her mom at all, but I don’t see a woman like her killing a man, do you?”

  “You’d be surprised,” Matt said, “at what people can do if they think they’ve been pushed far enough.”

  “Matt knows all about that sort of thing,” Bernie added.

  “Are you a cop? Lawyer?”

  “I’m a writer,” Matt said.

  Ivan’s look was one of instant dismissal. “The cops have had a lot of questions for me about our family business. We’re big in tools, you know.”

  “Not that big,” Dave muttered.

  “In what?” Simon said.

  “Tools. Hardware. You’re a gardener. I bet you have some Reynolds garden equipment in your shed.”

  “Yeah, I do. Didn’t make the connection.”

  “In my great-grandad’s day, the company made all our stuff here in good old USA. Most of it’s manufactured overseas now, so the business is more about negotiating contracts, managing supply chains, running just-in-time inventory, and getting the product where it’s needed when it’s needed. Better profit margins this way. Also fits my skill set better than overseeing a factory. The cops have been asking about the company, but I assured them we’re totally legit. Not a whisper of underhanded deals has ever touched us.” Ivan smiled at everyone around the table, quite pleased with himself.

  “You might want to check further into some of that,” Bernie said.

  Stung at her failure to appreciate his business acumen, Ivan snapped, “What does that mean?”

  “Nothing. Like I said. I’m a forensic accountant.”

  “I thought you were a writer,” Dave said. “And an assistant cook and waitress.”

  “A woman of many talents,” I said.

  “None of which,” Simon mumbled, “involve cooking.”

  “Professionally speaking, I’m an accountant,” Bernie said. “Therefore, I have a suspicious mind. Although I’ve given up the accounting gig for a while. I’m writing a book.”

  “Yeah,” Ivan said. “Like everyone else.”

  Samantha had picked up her purse but made no further move to leave. “I’m glad they’re looking into more than Jenny. Any idea that Jenny Hill, of all people, killed a man, is preposterous. I’ve an idea, McKenzie, you can walk me back to the hotel.”

  “I’m fine here, thanks.” McKenzie waved the waitress down and asked for another glass of wine, without asking if anyone else wanted anything.

  “I thought maybe you’d like to check up on your future sister-in-law,” Samantha said. “None of this is easy for Hannah, you know.”

  “She’s fine,” McKenzie said. “She’s got Greg.”

  Samantha’s dark eyes stared at McKenzie, until the other woman turned to look at Jack, another drink in his hand, chatting to his bandmates and a circle of admirers. Not very subtly, she wiggled her chair a few inches away from Simon.

  “Lucky her,” Samantha said.

  “How’s your grandmother bearing up?” Matt asked Ivan. “And your mother? It’s got to be hard on them.”

  If that was an attempt to move the conversation away from McKenzie, it failed spectacularly.

  “Bearing up, is hardly the word,” she said. “Grandma’s about as grief-stricken as she was when Granddad died. Meaning not much. As for Mom: she’s pretending to be all the grieving widow but—”

  “Leave it, Mac,” Ivan said. “These people don’t want to hear about our dirty laundry.”

  Sure we do, I thought.

  “Sure they do,” she said. “Doesn’t everyone want to hear the down and dirty about other people’s families? Makes them feel so superior.”

  Matt, true-crime writer, a man who made his living out of the down and dirty of other people’s families, threw a look at Bernie. She opened her eyes wide and pressed her lips into a circle.

  “I don’t know why my mom’s even putting up the pretense of grief,” McKenzie continued. “It’s not as though they had a happy marriage. I suppose at some time they might have actually liked each other. I mean they have three kids, right? Although, giving her grandchildren might have been nothing more than Mom’s way of trying to get into Grandma’s good books. Never worked though. It must have been a heck of a shock to Mom when she realized how much control Grandma had over Dad. Including controlling all his money. Yeah, he had his income from his job at the company but anything extra? Grandma gave him an allowance. Can you imagine? I’m not supposed to know that, but I do. Grandma never hesitates to brag about herself. She even holds the mortgage on the house.”

  “McKenzie,” Ivan said in a low growl.

  “Is anyone surprised Greg wants no part of that?” Dave said.

  McKenzie took another long drink of wine. Samantha remained where she was, making no further move to leave.

  “I’d have expected Mom to pop the champagne once he finally shuffled off this mortal coil. I mean, come on, brother dear. Everyone knew Dad’s been fooling around on her for years. And not going to much trouble to hide it.”

  I remembered our speculation earlier as to if Samantha had been the one paying a late-night call on Ralph in his room. She showed no signs of shock or of being upset to hear what McKenzie was saying. The slight smile on her lips and sparkle in her eyes indicated nothing more than she was enjoying listening to good gossip.

  “In any other family, Grandma would have threatened to cut his allowance, but Grandma didn’t want him to marry Mom in the first place. Grandma wanted Dad to marry a woman with money. If not money, then some business sense, like she has. I sometimes wonder if he ever loved Mom or just wanted to show Grandma he could make up his own mind.” She giggled. “That never works out.”

  She stopped talking at last. Silence fell over the table as we all shifted uncomfortably under the barrage of McKenzie’s cattiness toward her own parents.

  “Strange about that last present Hannah opened at her shower.” Samantha focused on McKenzie. “We never did find out who gave her that, did we? You’d think whoever played a prank like that would fess up. That they’d want everyone to know who’d been responsible for such a great joke.”

  “My father’s death,” Ivan said, “has taken up most of our thoughts.”

  “Yeah. I see that. But I haven’t forgotten. I think I’ve seen the exact same silver wrapping paper another time. Recently, too. I can’t quite put my finger on where that had been. Do you remember, McKenzie?”

  “Why are you asking me?”

  “No reason. Have another drink, why don’t you?” Samantha stood up and walked away.

  “Well, pooh her,” McKenzie said as the waitress put her drink in front of her. “She’s no fun.”

  “Sometimes,” Bernie said, “life is about more than fun.”

  McKenzie lifted her glass in a toast. “Yours might be. I intend to make sure mine isn’t. That fat girl in the ugly blouse is getting a bit over friendly with my man. I’d better sort her out, right quick.” She stood up and headed for the bar.

  Ivan had the grace to look embarrassed. “My sister sometimes talks too much. Pay no attention to anything she says. She likes to think of herself as a party girl. My grandmother indulges her. She’s really not that much of an airhead.” His phone rang, and he dug into his pocket. A deep frown crossed his face when he saw who was calling and he groaned. “Not again. I have to take this. And then I should head back. Nice chatting to you. Night all.”

  Ivan stood up and walked away, talking into his phone. “I’m in a public place. I can’t hear you.” He didn’t bother to leave any money for his and his sister’s drinks.

  Dave was next to leave. “Band’s getting ready to start again. I’m going to grab a seat at the bar.”

  “Odd family,” Simon said when the four of us were alone once again.

  “Did you think Samantha pretty much came out and accused McKenzie of giving Hannah the headless doll?” Bernie asked me.

  “Yes. Doesn’t mean she did, though. McKenzie didn’t confess. It did serve to remind me, however, that the doll’s a part of this puzzle we shouldn’t forget. I wonder if the police found any fingerprints on it.”

  “Why do you want to know that?” Simon asked. “You’re not investigating, are you?”

  Chapter 19

  As Simon and I both get up early for work, we didn’t stay at the bar much longer, just long enough to listen to another set. Which was even better than the first.

  McKenzie didn’t return to our table or join Dave at the bar. She ended up sitting with a group of women who’d been making friendly with Jack’s bandmates.

  Matt and Bernie (neither of whom had to get up for work at some unnatural hour) decided to head for the pier for ice cream. Simon and I declined.

  “I’ll take Lily home,” Simon said.

  I eyed him warily. “I hope you don’t intend to put me on that bike?”

  He chuckled and took my hand. “Let’s grab a cab. I can pick the bike up tomorrow. I only have one helmet with me anyway. We should plan a day out soon. Take the bike along the coast. Best way to see the scenery.”

  I shuddered. I’m from Manhattan. Driving a car is a feat of daring for me. Never mind sitting on the back of a motorcycle, clinging to the driver, as he makes sharp, fast turns on cliffside paths as gigantic, overloaded trucks whiz past.

  “McKenzie would like to go with you,” I said, unable to help myself.

  “Right piece of work that one is,” he replied, gripping my hand all the tighter.

  * * *

  “A great garden,” Simon said, “looks good no matter the time of day, or the time of year. Even in winter it should have a different sort of appeal: sculptural branches, long grasses, burlap on the bushes lightly dusted with snow.”

  I said nothing. Was he reminding me our time together was short? That he wouldn’t be here to see the gardens at Victoria-on-Sea in their winter display? Was he hinting he’d like me to ask him to stay on?

  Or was he merely making polite conversation, commenting on the properties of a well-established garden, as together we watched Éclair’s stubby tail wagging as she sniffed around the rosebushes?

  “Even at night, a good garden should shine, although only in reflected light.”

  I let out a small sigh of relief. He was just commenting. No need for me to search for deeper meanings. “It should appear to glow from within.”

  “And this is a great garden,” I said.

  “The number one garden attraction in all of North Augusta,” he chuckled.

  We stood close together, holding hands, enjoying each other and the night, watching Éclair sniff about the property on her final outing of the day.