One Deadly Sin (31 page)

38

A
t ten, Lucy pulled her pickup into the No Parking zone in front of the building in downtown Nashville where Cole and Tyrrell had offices.

“Sure you don’t want moral support?” she asked Edie.

A summer thunderstorm had threatened all the way in, leaving the sky a smear of charcoal. Skycrapers blocked out the little light left, turning the morning into eerie night. But it suited the mood. The mystery behind the strange bequest, the plunge, once more, into the muddy past.

Behind them, traffic hummed the way it never did in Redbud. For half a minute Edie pictured losing herself in the heavier flow of people inside the dark city. Wouldn’t be hard. She’d wave good-bye to Lucy, enter the building, count to thirty, and exit again. Poof. She’d disappear.

But she’d leave behind too many things. Her innocence, for one. And for another… her mouth tingled with the remembered feel of Holt’s kiss.

You’re a fool, Edie Swann.

“Thanks,” she said to Lucy. “But I wouldn’t want to rob you of a perfectly good shopping opportunity.” She got out and plunged into the heart of the building.

The lawyers’ offices were on the twenty-fourth floor. Her ears popped in the elevator, and she stared down at her feet. Her clothes had been trashed at the motel, leaving her with the denim mini and the T-shirt she had on the day before. But she’d been able to replace the flip-flops with a pair of sandals from Lucy, so at least her feet were presentable.

The office doors were thick and weighty. Entering them was like stepping into an inner sanctum. Puffed and stuffed, richly carpeted, the air leaden with silence. Bulky leather armchairs were trimmed with brass studs, and paintings of people in red hunting habits hung on the walls.

The receptionist was equal to the rest of the place. Not exactly a stuffed head on the wall, but the well-formed suit over her ample body, the heavy gold earrings and matching gold necklace did give the impression of red-faced jowled men gorging on roast beef.

Edie gave her name, and although the woman said nothing, she managed to look Edie over, taking in the short skirt, the rumpled shirt, and lingering ever so slightly on the pinup girl embossed on her arm.

Edie grinned. “I don’t think he’s expecting me.”

She waited while the receptionist went to inform her boss that his ten o’clock had shown up after all.

Bradley Cole proved to be a big man, his girth made more so by the suit and vest he wore. He rose the minute she stepped into his office. Came around his desk, ostensibly to greet her.

But Edie stopped dead. Bradley Cole was not alone.

Sitting in the chair across from his large cherry desk was Amy Lyle.

Fred Lyle’s widow looked at Edie coldly.

“You said you’d call,” Cole said.

Impulsive, brash Edie. When would she learn? “Sorry,” she said to no one in particular. Then turned to go. To run. To find a place—anyplace—where she could breathe.

“Stay.” It was the first time Edie had heard Mrs. Lyle’s voice since that night at the bar. A repeat wasn’t exactly what Edie had in mind.

Her hand behind her on the doorknob, Edie scrunched up her nose. “Probably not a good idea. Too early in the day for physical violence.”

Mrs. Lyle had the grace to look ashamed. She straightened in her chair, reshuffled her grasp on the purse in her lap. “I apologize for that,” she said stiffly. “I wasn’t myself.”

“Still—”

“Amy, dear,” Cole said gently, “maybe it would be better if we did this another time.”

Amy dear looked directly at Edie. “Is that what you’d prefer, Miss Swanford?”

Edie recognized a challenge when she heard one. She dropped her hold on the knob, pulled her shoulders back. “It’s Swann. And I’m fine if you are.”

Silence. Then with a regal nod of her head, the widow indicated the other chair in front of Bradley Cole’s desk. Slowly, Edie took the seat.

Cole himself regained the outsized leather chair behind his desk. Cleared his throat. Swiveled to reach for a stack of papers. Perused one.

“You are Eden Swanford, daughter of Charles and Evelyn?”

“I am. I was. Like I said, it’s Swann now.”

“And this is the court record of that name change?” He showed her a copy of the official document she had stashed away in a safety deposit box in Memphis.

“Yes.”

“And you have some kind of proof of this?”

“I can produce the original. And there’s always my driver’s license.”

“That will be fine.”

She dug in her pocket, found the card, handed it over.

“Why did you change your name?” Amy Lyle spoke for the first time.

Edie shot the other woman a sideways glance. What did she owe her? All Edie had done was deliver a message. If Fred Lyle keeled over because of it, how was that her fault?

Uh huh.

“I didn’t want to be Eden Swanford anymore,” she said.

Amy’s gaze bore into hers, asking without asking.

Edie sighed. “My father killed himself. My mother died in a psych ward. Swanford seemed like too big a package to carry around. Okay? That satisfy you?”

“I didn’t know about your mother.” The other woman’s voice and body softened slightly.

“Not something I like to trumpet around.”

“Miss Swann,” Cole began, but Mrs. Lyle held up a hand.

“Tell me about her. Was she dark-haired like you?”

Edie gaped at the other woman warily. “Why? What difference does it make?”

“Indulge me.”

“No, she was fair. My father was the dark one. Welsh, they tell me.” Amy looked confused suddenly. “What?” Edie asked her.

She shook her head. “So you look like your father?”

“I guess.”

She cleared her throat. “Did your mother ever… did she ever indicate… maybe not in so many words, but… hint perhaps that—” Amy turned to the attorney with a helpless wave of her hand and an imploring look.

Edie turned her attention to the lawyer.

“What Mrs. Lyle is trying to ask,” Cole began, “is a question of… paternity. Did you ever doubt or did your mother or any other relative ever give you reason to doubt that your father was, well, your father?”

Edie blinked. What the hell…? “No. And believe me, there were plenty of times growing up when I would have loved to know he wasn’t”—she looked away, embarrassed to admit this—“you know, wasn’t mine.”

Another silence settled over the room. Broken, at last, by Mrs. Lyle.

“Then why—?”

Edie looked from her to the lawyer. “Why what?”

Bradley Cole clasped his hands over the stack of papers on his desk. “You know Mrs. Lyle’s husband mentioned you in his will. I drew up the codicil myself.”

“So?”

“So why did he do it?” Amy burst out. “If you weren’t his—his child, why—”

“His child?”

“He declined to take me into his confidence when he asked me to add this to his will,” Cole said. “Mrs. Lyle has no idea why her husband would leave so much money to a complete stranger. The natural assumption is—”

“Oh.” Understanding dawned. “I see. A love child. Your husband and my mother.” She nearly laughed. “No, my parents were devoted to each other. My mother completely fell apart when my father died. I mean unhinged. Entirely.”

“And… you?”

“Me?”

“Were you and my husband…” She clutched the arm of the chair. Anguish edged her voice.

“No, no,” Edie rushed to assure her. “Absolutely not. No. Never. I didn’t even know him.”

“Then why?” Amy Lyle cried. “Who were you to him?” Hurt and anger and frustration showed on her face.

A rush of unwanted compassion flooded Edie. She turned to Cole. “How much are we talking about?”

“A quarter of a million dollars,” the lawyer replied succinctly.

The words hung in the air, suspended in disbelief. Edie opened her mouth, but only uttered a strangled squeak. Cole quickly poured a glass of water from a pitcher on a stand and handed it to Edie. She gulped it down.

“You had no idea,” Amy Lyle said.

Edie shook her head. Found she could breathe again.

“And you have no clue why?”

“I have a theory,” Edie managed to say at last. “But you’re not going to like it. In fact, you should probably stick to the whole love child thing.”

“I want to know the truth, Miss Swann.” Amy kneaded her purse. “I need to know it.”

“Okay, then. Here goes. I think Mr. Lyle had something to do with my father’s death.”

Bradley Cole’s brows rose. Amy Lyle’s gaze sharpened. “No,” she said. “Impossible.”

“What other explanation makes sense? It’s blood money, Mrs. Lyle. Payoff for a guilty conscience.”

“That’s ridiculous.”

“Is it?”

“You’re saying my husband…” She shifted in her seat. Tried again. “You’re implying that Fred—”

“Murdered my father. Yeah. That’s it.”

39

E
die and Lucy headed back to Redbud just as the storm finally broke. Rain fell in gulps that splattered on the windshield. Lucy had packed the crawl space behind the seats with bags from Ross and TJ Maxx, and Edie used the packages to put off the inevitable questions. It wasn’t that she wanted to keep her meeting private, it was that she wasn’t sure how she felt about it yet. So she thumbed over her shoulder at the parcels.

“You buy out the town?”

“Hell, yeah,” Lucy said. “Not much point in coming all the way in without making a dent in the old bank account.” She regaled Edie with a list of bargains, giving her a chance to think about Amy Lyle.

The woman’s whole world had been flung upside down, and Edie couldn’t help feeling… sorry. If anyone knew what losing their world was like, it was Edie. And she didn’t wish that on anyone. Okay, maybe on the people responsible for taking hers.

Maybe.

Truth was, she hadn’t realized what her headlong mission would do. That it might end up hurting people she didn’t want to hurt. Or hurting them in ways she hadn’t intended.

Mrs. Lyle hadn’t fallen apart again, thank God. Not like that night in the bar. She’d clutched her purse as if it was the only thing holding her up, but she’d listened. Protested. Proclaimed her husband’s innocence. But behind the denials there’d been a flicker of doubt. A doubt that might never be answered with certainty. Edie knew what it was like to live with that kind of doubt, too.