Page 78 of The Murder Club

“Her husband isn’t dead. Or at least he wasn’t when she left.” Bailey thought back to the conversation that she’d overheard at the nursing home. “And Logan knew. Why lie about it?”

“I’m sure she had her reason.”

Bailey studied her friend. The older woman was still keeping something from her.

“What did Lorene say about returning home?”

“She said that she would cut her own throat before she went back.”

Bailey grimaced. “That’s a little dramatic.”

“I thought so too,” Dorinda agreed. “Until I heard the slap.”

“Lorene slapped the old lady?”

Dorinda shook her head. “No, I heard a crack, and then Lorene cried out in pain. I peeked out of the window and I could see she was on her knees with her arms covering her head, as if she expected more blows.”

Bailey abruptly understood why her friend felt sympathy for Lorene. “Could the older woman have been her mother?”

“That was my first guess,” Dorinda admitted. “Or maybe her mother-in-law. It made me fear that Lorene was running from an abusive situation.”

Bailey slowly nodded. Certainly the stranger was violent if she’d slapped Lorene. But if Lorene had been in danger from her family, why hadn’t her husband run away with her? Unless he’d been equally violent? She frowned, struck by a sudden thought.

“You said the older woman mentioned a husband and family. It could mean anything. Parents or siblings, but . . .” She allowed the words to trail away and Dorinda nodded.

“Yes, I did wonder if there were other children.” Dorinda bit her bottom lip. “Children she left behind.”

Chapter 16

Dom studied Bailey’s pale face, sipping the wine he’d found in Kayden’s private stash. It was a rare vintage that cost a fortune, but at the moment Dom didn’t care. He’d returned to the house after collecting the pizza he’d ordered from Bella’s to discover Bailey at the table, eating the last of the cake straight out of the pan. Never a good sign. Scooting aside the cake, he’d divvied out the pizza and gone in search of the best wine he could find.

Thankfully, lunch had visibly eased the tension humming through Bailey to a dull buzz. At least enough for Dom to ask the question that was burning his tongue.

“I know I ask this a lot,” he murmured, “but are you okay?”

She wrinkled her nose. “I’m just trying to make some sense out of what’s happened today.”

“Tell me,” he urged.

In clipped tones, she shared the conversation she’d overheard between Logan and his mother, Ward Bennett’s unexpected arrival at her house, followed by her conversation with Dorinda and the fact that Lorene might have secrets from her past. In turn, Dom shared his encounter with Eric Criswell and his suspicion he was meeting Logan.

“We went from not enough information to too much information,” Bailey muttered, echoing his own frustration. “It’s giving me a headache.”

“Me too,” he admitted in dry tones. “Maybe it will help if we put it in order.”

“Okay.” She paused, as if trying to organize her thoughts. “This morning we discovered that our latest suspect was found dead in his grandmother’s house from an overdose.”

“Along with the fact that Kevin was in possession of the phone that sent you texts,” Dom added.

“He was also the heir to his grandmother’s estate, just like Gage Warren.”

“It’s certainly interesting that Ward Bennett was the legal representative for both Nellie Warren and Pauline Hartford,” he agreed. “The question is whether he had any other involvement in what happened to the older women.”

“And even more interesting is that at least half of Nellie’s wealth will be handed over to the Donaldsons,” Bailey retorted.

Dom dismissed Ward Bennett from his mind. Right now they didn’t have enough information about the older man to assume he was anything other than an attorney doing his job. As Bailey said, the Donaldsons were more interesting.

“We haven’t really considered Logan as a possible suspect.”