Chapter Nine

~ Maddie ~

When Jackson finally leaves, Jenna and I look at each other.

She looks shell-shocked. I’m holding my breath, because I’m not sure what to say. I should be able to make this better. But I don’t know how, other than to take a deep dive into the handful of people who might have wanted to see Riley Buxston dead.

“Are you okay?” I ask.

“I don’t know.” She props her elbows on her desk and buries her face in her hands. “I don’t know what to think. One minute he’s asking me questions and the next, he’s saying he thinks I’m capable of murder.”

“He didn’t say you were capable of murder—”

“He said anyone is capable of committing murder.”

Jenna starts crying and it breaks my heart.

“I didn’t do it, Mom. Please say you believe me.”

“Of course I believe you.” I walk around to the other side of her glass-top desk and pull her into my arms. “You don’t even have to say that. I know you wouldn’t hurt anyone. Jackson just has to follow police procedure. Cooperate with him and he’ll know you didn’t do it. He will clear you. It’s going to be okay.”

“I don’t know how it’s going to be okay. Riley is dead, Mom. Someone killed him. Who would do that?”

“I know. As I said earlier, I think we—or I—need to start investigating to figure out who did it.”

Jenna blinks and swipes at her tears. “You’re really serious about getting involved?”

“Deadly serious.” Jenna winces. “Sorry, bad choice of words. If I can write about solving murder, I can do it in real life.”

“Yeah, but, Mom, you deal in fiction.”

I shrug. “I don’t think there’s a big difference between fiction and real life. I draw on real crimes. The heroine of my books, Aubrey Christiansen, solves murders based on real methodology. Writing has taught me that there’s a pattern to solving a murder. The murderer needs a means, a motive, and the opportunity to have killed Riley. We make a list of suspects and eliminate them following those guidelines until we find the killer. It’s as simple as that.”

Jenna is staring at me as if she doesn’t quite know what to say.

“Hey, when someone accuses my daughter of murder, I refuse to sit by and do nothing.”

“I can’t let you do this by yourself. There’s a real murderer out there on the loose. It’s hard enough dealing with the loss of Riley, but if something happened to you? I don’t know if I could stand it. If you’re serious about this, we’re going to investigate together.”

“Then we both need to be careful.” I’m apprehensive about letting her get involved.

She’s already potentially in enough trouble, but I recognize the determined look on my daughter’s face.

“All right,” I say. “If you’re in, we might as well get started right now. I’ve been making a list of all the possible suspects and the people we need to interview to prove your innocence.”

I take my notebook out of my purse, open to the page I titled People to Interview. I hand it to Jenna then wheel my chair over to her desk.

“The first person we need to talk to is Mrs. Wimberly.” Jenna points to her name on the list. “I want to know exactly what she saw before she starts talking to the chief. Oh! And I just remembered something important. Last night Riley said to her that Grace Marie said she’d kill him if she found out he was fooling around with me. We need to make sure she tells the chief that.”

Jenna moves her finger down the page. “After Mrs. Wimberly, we should double-team Grace Marie and see if we can get to the bottom of her weirdness. Let’s talk about her for a minute. All signs point to her being the likely suspect, but why would she do it?”

“She has the perfect motive. Jealousy,” I say.

“But why would she kill Riley and not me?”

“Don’t give her any ideas,” I say.

Jenna rolls her eyes. “No, think about it. It’s been mentioned that she might have been marrying Riley for his family’s money. Why kill him before the wedding? She gets nothing.”

“Good point. Unless, somehow, she discovered that Riley wasn’t going through with wedding and she was so furious that she hit him over the head with that piece of crystal.”

“Ugh.” Jenna puts her hands over her face. “I can see that happening.”

I nod. “I can, too.”

“Well, if we’re talking money, Ben Buxston has a motive, too. Now that Riley is back in his parents’ good graces, Ben’s inheritance has been split in half.”

During one of the planning sessions, Patricia mentioned that she was thrilled that her husband had agreed to reinstate Riley in the will after disinheriting him when Riley was at his low point—before meeting Grace Marie. It was embarrassingly obvious that she was tossing out that little tidbit to show Jenna what she was missing. As if money was the answer to everything. Could it be more blatantly clear it caused nothing but trouble?

“We need to be sure we talk to Nicole Reynolds before she leaves town,” I add. “I’m convinced she knows a lot more than what she said today. Oh, and add that Marco Yolo character. Might as well write Todd’s name down, too.”

“I talked to him before I left the church. He has an alibi.”

“Who?”

“He said he was with his assistant. He ran into her at the Hideaway, that bar that Riley, Todd, and Ben went to last night. I think he said her name is Brianna? Apparently, she broke up with her boyfriend and was crying on Todd’s shoulder.”

I smirk. “Is that what they call it these days?”

“Mom. No. Todd seems like a decent guy. I don’t think he’s like that.”

“Really? The Todd Devlin who showed up shoeless and hungover this morning?”

“But didn’t he come through for you when you needed him?”

“That’s true. He was good about driving me back to the church and looking after Charles. I still think we need to talk to his friend Brianna. If she was at the Hideaway last night, maybe she saw something.”

Jenna adds Brianna’s name to the list. “We have our work cut out for us.”

The color has returned to Jenna’s face, proving there’s nothing like being proactive to make a person feel better.

“Let’s talk about Ben,” she says. “His Uber alibi is strong. We have to admit it. We do need to find out if Elizabeth can back up that he was home for the rest of the night after he left Riley.

“From day one, he’s acted super irritated about being in the wedding,” she continues. “Like being his brother’s best man was a big inconvenience. It almost seemed like he’d been strong-armed into it. I know he has a family of his own and other responsibilities, but most people would be happy for their little brother. I mean, it’s not as if his best man duties lasted a lifetime.”

“Then again, Riley isn’t the easiest person in the world to keep in line,” I say. “Did Ben say anything specific to make you think he might’ve killed his younger brother?”

“Ben didn’t say anything, but Riley did. He told me that his brother hated him because of the thing with the will.

“Riley said Ben was furious because he’d worked hard his entire life to gain his father’s trust. He resented Riley because he’d always been a screwup—my words, not his. I think he resents that their father has given him so many second chances. Riley told me this during one of the planning sessions when Grace Marie wasn’t in town. Why would you begrudge your own brother a chance to make his life right?”

I frown and pull my notebook back in front of me so I can jot down this tidbit in my notes.

“Having your inheritance cut in half is a strong motive for murder. If your brother is out of the way, you don’t have to share.”

We sit silently, with that thought hanging in the air between us.

I know the Buxstons well enough to know that while Charles was hard on Riley, Patricia coddled him.

Patricia had been vocal about her youngest son’s challenges with dyslexia and attention deficit disorder. Despite his academic challenges, his athletic abilities had won him a football scholarship to the University of North Carolina. He and Jenna had planned on attending together. However, in his senior year, at one of the playoff games for the state football championship, Riley had torn his ACL and had been forced to forfeit his scholarship. He had placed so much of his identity and self-worth on football because there had been talk about him having the talent to turn pro. When he suffered the injury, he’d gone off the deep end and started living recklessly. If he’d taken care of himself, he might’ve healed and gone on to achieve his dream. Instead, he’d wallowed in self-pity.

Too much partying and rumors of cheating had caused Jenna to turn down his proposal and the two of them had broken up. After that, months of excessive drinking and calling in sick or showing up late for his job at Buxston-Fox Development led to warnings. The unheeded warnings led to Charles Buxston firing his younger son.

“Don’t forget what Riley said last night,” Jenna says. “That he’d done some bad things and he didn’t want to drag Grace Marie into it.”

“Now that you’ve had a chance to think about it, do you have any idea what he meant?” I ask as I start a new page and add the note under the heading, Riley Buxston—Clues.

“I have no idea, and now I could kick myself for not asking him to elaborate. I thought it was just a bunch of drunken ramblings because right after that, he started going on and on about how he would always love me because I was the only one in the world who had ever understood him.” A sob escapes Jenna’s throat.

I reach out and squeeze her hand. “Oh, honey, I’m sorry. I know this is hard for you.”

Jenna shrugs. “I cared for him in a way that you care for someone you have a history with, but what makes me sad is that he was so wrong. I didn’t understand him. I never did. I just let him ramble and then I was too busy trying to get him to be quiet so he didn’t make Mrs. Wimberly’s dogs bark. I’m so glad I didn’t tell him I never understood him. If that was his last thought of me, I’m glad. I’m glad I didn’t set him straight.”

All I can do is nod. In absence of a solid alibi, if this isn’t proof she isn’t capable of murder, what more could Jackson want? Jenna couldn’t even bring herself to hurt Riley’s feelings much less inflict bodily harm on him.

Solving this murder might be important to her healing.

Jenna sniffs and blots her eyes with a tissue. “Okay, let’s do this. Let’s go talk to Mrs. Wimberly.”

“Do you want to talk to her together?” I ask. “Or do you want to do it by yourself?”

“Maybe we could do it together,” Jenna says. “You’re better at this than I am. You can show me the ropes. I have no idea what questions to ask when you’re interviewing someone about a murder.”

“But you do know your side of the story,” I say. “In case she remembers something wrong, you’ll be there to set the record straight.”

Jenna frowns. “This isn’t witness tampering is it?”

“Heavens no. We’re just talking to our neighbor. Did you even tell Jackson that she heard Riley last night?”

Jenna shakes her head. “I forgot to mention it. But, Mom, I want to make sure that we’re not doing anything wrong by talking to people. Jackson has already made me feel as if I’m in enough trouble for something I didn’t do. I don’t want to dig myself in deeper.”

I look at the time on my phone. “It’s almost 5:00. Let’s go talk to Mrs. Wimberly now. Because you really should tell Jackson about her coming outside when Riley was there, and this way we will have talked to her before she officially becomes a witness. But you know I’m happy to do this alone if you don’t think you should.”

Jenna shakes her head again. “No. We’re in this together. Let me close up things here.”

Her cell phone rings and Jenna looks at the caller ID. “Hold on a second, Mom. It’s Alicia.”

She is calling from the sales floor, which probably means there are customers in the shop. Otherwise she would deliver the message in person.

“Hi, Alicia,” Jenna says.

“Jenna, Ben Buxston is here to see you. Shall I send him back?”

I can hear her voice even though the phone is pressed to Jenna’s ear. She and I exchange a look.

“Tell him I’ll be out in a moment, Alicia. I’m wrapping up another meeting right now.”

I shoot Jenna a quizzical look. After she hangs up the phone, she says, “Ben Buxston is here to see me. He’s acting as the point person for the family and I called him when I was on my way back to the office to tell him that I’d talked to the florist and the caterer. He didn’t pick up. So I left a message. I guess he decided to answer me in person.”

“This is good,” I say. “After you discuss business you can ask him some questions. Are you up for it? He’s at the top of our list and he’s come to you. It doesn’t get any easier than that.”

When Jenna hesitates, I say, “I was going to go over to the Briar Patch to get something to sweeten up Bertha Wimberly when we go over and talk to her. But if you’re not comfortable, I can wait until after we talk to Ben.”

Jenna shrugs. “Would you mind staying? I’ve never done anything like this. I mean, I’ve never interrogated someone about a crime. I’m afraid I might not do it right.”

I laugh. “I haven’t either. At least not in real life. Only with characters on a page. So maybe it is best if we do this together.”

Plus, the reality hits me like a hammer. If Ben is the killer and he thinks Jenna is onto him, it might not be smart to leave her alone with him.

“I’d be more comfortable,” Jenna says. “Ben Buxston makes me uncomfortable. He never smiles, and every time I asked him something about the wedding, he seemed so irritated.”

“Do you really think he killed Riley?”

Jenna grimaces. “I don’t know. I’d like to believe he didn’t. But there’s a reason he’s on our list.” She stands. “I’ll go get him. Do you think you should act busy so that he doesn’t think we’re getting ready to tag-team him?” Jenna picks up a bridal magazine off her desk and hands it to me. “Here. Read this.”

“I’m supposed to sit here and read a magazine? Oh, no, that won’t look suspicious at all.”

“Okay, if you don’t want to do that, go sit at your desk, and act like you’re doing something businessy. Or change the toner cartridge in the copy machine. It’s giving that message again.”

“I thought you changed it,” I say.

“Every time I mess with that machine, I break it. We have to call someone out to undo what I did. Just pretend like you’re doing something on your computer.”

“Let’s not overthink it,” I say. “We share an office. We both have every right to be in here. He stopped by unannounced.”

“Okay. Okay.” Jenna takes a deep breath. “Let’s just act natural.”