“Is that fair? I don’t think Rita’s in this for the money.”
A longer pause this time. Then Carla mumbled, “Maybe not. But I wasn’t doing nothin’. Just hangin’ with my buddies.”
Kate counted mentally to ten. She’d had this conversation with Carla so many times she felt like screaming. Why aren’t you getting this, Carly? What does it take from all of us? Finally she said, “It’s all about communicating, Carla. Let people know where you are and when you’re coming home. Call, for heaven’s sake.”
A hoarse laugh drifted through the line. “If I’d’a called, Rita would’ve told me to get home. And I was having a good time—you know, with my buds.”
Kate knew better than to malign Carla’s friends. She’d seen Rita do it and it always brought Carla rushing emotionally to their defense. Besides, she’d heard all the excuses. Carla could pull them out of the air like a magician popping rabbits from a hat.
“So now what?” Kate asked, softening her voice.
“My last chance. Kim said next time she’ll have to send me to a group home. Out in the suburbs!”
Kate might have laughed at this final indignity, obviously a fate worse than death, were it not for the catch in Carla’s voice. The threat of a group home was now suddenly very clear to her. Kate sighed again. It had taken six months of “last chances” for that sober reality to register with Carla.
“Carla, be cool, okay? Look, my plans for the summer have altered a bit. I’ll have more time than I thought. We can do some things together.”
“Like go shopping?”
Kate smiled at Carla’s raised inflection on the last word. “Sure. Things like that. Maybe check out a museum or art gallery, too.”
“Yeah,” Carla murmured, less enthusiastic now.
“I’ll call you tomorrow about two and we’ll set a definite time and place. All right?”
Carla agreed and hung up quickly. Before I changed my mind? Kate wondered. Or because she had an incoming call? Kate shook her head as she set the receiver down. In spite of Carla’s attitude, she hadn’t yet crossed the line into serious trouble. Kate just hoped she could deflect the girl from that course before it was too late.
The remainder of the afternoon was spent in completing errands that Kate had postponed. She was grateful for the chance to be busy, thus removing thoughts of Joanna from her mind. Until she returned from feeding her neighbor’s cat and picked up the phone to order a pizza. There was a message for her from the law firm representing Joanna Barnes.
Kate sat down on the armchair next to the phone and listened. The cheery voice on the line requested her to attend a reading of Joanna’s will the next day at ten in the morning. Please bring some identification. After the message finished, Kate sat and stared into space, her sweaty palm clamped onto the receiver.
WHEN THE ELEVATOR DOORS parted, the man who’d spoken to her in the church after Joanna’s funeral was standing on the other side. The look of incredulity in his face must have matched her own, Kate thought, for they stood gaping at each other until she murmured a faint “hello” and stepped out onto the carpeted hall.
He’d obviously been about to enter the elevator, but turned on his heel to follow her into the reception area.
“Miss, uh…”
“Reilly.”
“I don’t know if you remember me—Matt Sinclair, from Joanna’s funeral.”
“It was only four days ago.”
He looked offended at her brusque tone. “Right. So you’re here for…?”
Kate flushed with annoyance. Subtlety definitely wasn’t his style. “I’ve an appointment with Collier and Associates. Why do you ask?”
“Sorry. I suppose I’m being rude, but I’m just curious. Are you here for the reading of Joanna’s will?”
Kate raised her chin to stare directly into his face. A handsome face, in spite of the knotted eyebrows and the glint in his eyes. Too bad he was so irritating.
“Yes, I am, Mr. Sinclair. Not that it’s any concern of yours.” She started to walk toward the reception desk where a young woman was watching them with interest.
He reached out a hand to her elbow. “I take it, then, that you’re more than just an acquaintance of Joanna’s, after all. Since you’re a beneficiary.”
Kate stared blankly at him. She’d been tormented by that very realization all night. What exactly was I to Joanna? But she wasn’t about to confide in someone like Matt Sinclair.
“And I suppose, since you were about to leave, that you are not. A beneficiary,” she clarified, and looked pointedly at his fingers splayed lightly on her arm.
Coloring, he dropped his hand. “No. I’ve been to see Marchant—his offices are farther along.”
Kate swung around to head for the desk.
“You just seemed different, that’s all.”
She stopped and faced him again.
“From Joanna’s pack of friends,” he said.
Kate’s eyes swept over him from head to toe before she resumed her course to the receptionist and asked for Mr. Collier. From behind, she heard the elevator door open and close. When she turned to head for the man’s office, Matt Sinclair was gone.
The brief walk down the hall was long enough to calm her, although Kate knew her face was still warm when she tapped on the lawyer’s opened office door.
“Miss Reilly? Come in, please.” Greg Collier rose from his desk chair.
He was in his mid-fifties and had the air of a suave used-car salesman. Or so Kate thought after a mere five minutes into their conversation. When he asked her if she’d known Joanna long, she derived some satisfaction from his surprise when she replied, “About nineteen years.” She followed him into a small boardroom where a handful of people sat around an oval mahogany table. Lance Marchant was pouring coffee from a stainless-steel jug at the head of the table and glanced up as Kate walked into the room.
Her arrival appeared to puzzle him momentarily, but he recovered almost instantly, setting down the jug and beaming in her direction.
“Kate Reilly?”
When she nodded, he moved around the chairs to her side, extending his right hand as he did so. “I’m Lance Marchant, Joanna’s husband.”
“Yes,” she murmured.
He frowned, studying her face. “Have we met?”
“I was at Joanna’s funeral,” she explained.
“Aah.” He nodded his head thoughtfully, obviously conducting a quick mental search of the day and still coming up blank. He was about to say something more when Joanna’s lawyer went to the head of the table, pushing aside the tray of coffee items as he withdrew a sheaf of papers from a briefcase. He put on his reading glasses cleared his throat and gestured toward the table.
“Shall we begin?” he asked, pausing while Lance returned to his chair and Kate sat down. “As all of you know, you’ve been requested to be here today for the reading of the late Joanna Barnes’s will, dated April 1, 2001.” He glanced over the rim of his glasses to smile. “Yes, that was Joanna’s idea of a little joke, though she assured me the will’s contents were quite serious.” He then began to read the legal preamble and Kate found her attention shifting to the others around the table.
Lance Marchant took a place to the right of Greg Collier. The lawyer’s secretary sat on his left and was jotting on a steno pad. The elderly woman sitting across from Kate had been introduced as Joanna’s housekeeper, and the thin, nervous-looking man with an earring in his right ear