Fixing To Die

An’gel couldn’t blame her. She herself felt horribly embarrassed now. The whole situation had woefully backfired, but she had only herself to blame. She should never have questioned Alesha Jackson about the story without having more information to back it up. Marcelline had seemed so sincere, so convincing, and An’gel had taken her at her word because she had known her for many years. But, she realized belatedly, not well enough.

Alesha Jackson could be lying, An’gel knew. Alesha could still be guilty of murder. Her father’s death was due to Nathan Gamble’s negligence, allegedly. Whether Alesha Jackson was related to the Gambles through Marshall Turner didn’t affect the woman’s potential motive. Denying the relationship made no difference in that respect. So why deny it? Because it wasn’t true. Marcelline had lied.

On the whole, An’gel believed Alesha’s denial of the relationship. If Alesha could prove that her grandmother had no contact with Marshall Turner after she left his employment and her son was born after her marriage to another man, that settled it.

Maybe Marcelline had simply confused Alesha Jackson’s grandmother with someone else. An’gel found it all so easy to believe that Marshall Turner had impregnated a servant. She wouldn’t have put anything past the old goat. At the distance of over fifty years, Marcelline’s memory could have failed her and she only thought the woman from the past resembled Alesha.

An’gel thought about it. Marcelline could have read about Alesha’s father’s death in the paper. She could have seen the obituary, and the name Arletta Jackson stuck in her mind, to be confused for that of another woman. That was too convoluted, An’gel decided. The simple answer was that Marcelline had lied.

An’gel was left with the question of why. Had she made up the story out of whole cloth to point suspicion toward Alesha Jackson? Away from herself?

Or away from someone she wanted to protect?

The one person who Marcelline would like to protect was Mary Turner. That thought chilled An’gel. Did Marcelline think Mary Turner murdered her cousin?

An’gel recalled how upset Mary Turner was earlier when she recounted her conversation with Serenity Foster and Serenity’s threat. If Mary Turner had really believed that Nathan Gamble meant to destroy her family, her whole birthright really, would she have been angry enough, desperate enough, to kill him?

That didn’t jibe with the Mary Turner she thought she knew. She recalled Henry Howard’s deep frustration with his wife over her devotion to the house. He obviously felt it was a threat to their marriage. Why else would he have tried such a bizarre scheme to frighten Mary Turner? And me, An’gel thought. He did get under my skin a little, I have to admit that. But she had never been frightened to the point—and never would have been, she thought—that she would encourage Mary Turner to let go of the house.

Had Henry Howard ever sat down with Mary Turner and shared all his frustration with her? Made her see clearly how it was affecting him, and thus their relationship? Henry Howard had never seemed the type to relish confrontation, in An’gel’s opinion, so it wouldn’t surprise her if he had been reluctant to force the point with Mary Turner.

Even if he had, An’gel wondered, would Mary Turner have believed him? Or was she so blinded by her obsession with the house that it didn’t matter? Obsession was a strong word, An’gel knew, and perhaps it was inappropriate and simply wrong in this case, but it was sounding more and more like Mary Turner’s sense of proportion was a little out of whack at the very least.

What about Serenity Foster? An’gel thought it was pretty certain what she and her brother had argued about. Money—the money Serenity evidently needed to help her in the custody battle. If Nathan continued to prove obdurate about helping her, Serenity might have decided that the only way to get the money was to get rid of her brother—permanently.

That only worked, however, if Serenity was Nathan Gamble’s heir. There was no guarantee that she was. Nathan could have left everything to his partner, Truss Wilbanks. The lawyer was still rather a dark horse in this matter. He might have become so bitter and enraged against his lover for Nathan’s treatment of him that he killed him in a moment of anger. Based on what An’gel had seen of the man since yesterday, she somehow doubted the man had it in him to commit a crime of passion.

An’gel ran through the list of suspects in her mind.

Serenity Foster—desperate for money, and her brother refused to help her.

Alesha Jackson—out for revenge for her father’s wrongful death, and also money from Nathan’s company.

Truss Wilbanks—out of passion from mistreatment by his lover, and perhaps for money as well from the business.

Marcelline Beaupré—in order to protect Mary Turner and her beloved house.