“Why do you think Cletus killed Travis?”

  “I don’t think.” She opened a cabinet and removed a small sugar dish and a crock of honey, took two tiny spoons from a drawer, and set it all on the table. “I know. Travis had been working some with Cletus back in those days. Odds and ends. Construction. That kind of thing. Then one day we get this notice in the mail from an insurance company about Travis needin’ to come in for a physical to complete his life insurance policy. Only, he hadn’t signed up for any policy. We thought it was junk mail and tossed it. The next week, he and Cletus were working on Travis’s truck.” Her bottom lip pushed out as her jaw clenched. “Next thing I know, Travis is dead.”

  “I’m sorry,” I said.

  “Me, too. More than you know. I loved that man somethin’ fierce. Still do.” She unwrapped the tea bags and put them in the mugs. “Anyway, ’bout a week later, my mama’s asking if Travis had a physical before he died. It was then that I put it together. She and Cletus had tried to take a policy out on Travis and were too high to realize it wouldn’t be processed without him taking a physical and having his signature.”

  “Did you go to the police?”

  “I did. They said they didn’t have enough evidence that a crime was committed. But I knew. And they knew I knew.”

  “Did you tell Jamie Lynn?”

  She shook her head. “It would have hurt her too much to know her mama was a murderer. But I did forbid contact with them, using their addiction as an excuse. But if Cletus had her signature on those papers, she’s been seeing them somehow.”

  “Here, every Friday while you’re at the garden meeting.” I told her how Delia and I bumped into her mama. And also how Jamie Lynn believed her mama deserved a second chance.

  “I should have told her more about them. Maybe this wouldn’t have happened.”

  “You were trying to protect her.” It made sense now why Lyla had always kept a tight rein on her little sister.

  “Fat lot of good that did me.”

  The tea kettle whistled and she poured steaming water into the mugs and carried them over to the table. Wearily, she sat next to me. If she’d had a wink of sleep the night before, I’d be surprised.

  “I have these,” I said, reaching into my purse and pulling out the stack of letters I’d taken from Katie Sue’s house.

  Her mouth dropped open. “My Lord! I thought these were lost and gone forever. I’m so glad you have them. Jamie Lynn will most definitely want them now.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “She stubbornly refused to read them when she was younger. She’d write ‘return to sender’ on them and stick them back in the mailbox.”

  I stirred a little honey into my tea, swirling the liquid round and round. “Jamie Lynn sent them back? Not you?”

  “Not me. I wanted Jamie Lynn to have a relationship with Katie Sue. It was Katie Sue and her stubbornness that segregated herself from us.”

  “I’m confused. I thought you refused to let Katie Sue see Jamie Lynn unless Katie Sue gave you money.”

  She spooned sugar into her tea. “Not true. I never asked for money.”

  I almost choked on my tea. “Then I have this story all wrong.”

  “Most people do. Because I didn’t make my side public. I didn’t want to put Jamie Lynn through that. I’ve never said a bad word about Katie Sue in front of my sister, and I never will.”

  “What’s true?”

  “It’s true I sued for custody and won. Everything else is . . . muddled. I never wanted Jamie Lynn’s money. It was hers. She earned it, just like Katie Sue had earned hers. All I wanted was to give Jamie Lynn a home with a surrogate mother and father to replace the crappy ones she’d been born to. I wanted her to know love and comfort . . . and safety. I’d grown up in the years after I moved out and realized what a brat I’d been about not helping with my granddaddy. But I was twenty-five, Travis and I had just bought this place, my gardens were taking off, and we were making decent livings. I was in a good place. I was happy. I thought it was time Katie Sue had a chance at happiness, too.”

  “All the court battles . . .”

  “Katie Sue wouldn’t let it go. She never could just walk away. She wanted Jamie Lynn and that was that. She couldn’t see the bigger picture if it hit her in the face.”

  I sipped. “What bigger picture?”

  “That I was also trying to help Katie Sue.”

  A chill went through me, another warning, and I wrapped my hands around the mug for warmth. I listened again, but there was no hint that we weren’t alone in the house. “How so?”

  Tears filled Lyla’s eyes and she backhanded them away. “She had the whole world in front of her. She was so smart. So motivated. She was always telling me how she was going to go to her fancy college, get her fancy degree. Could she really do that with a ten-year-old girl to look after? I wanted her to live her dream.”

  “Did you tell her that?”

  “Of course. She wouldn’t listen. She was convinced I only wanted the money, that I couldn’t have anyone’s best interests at heart other than my own. She said I was just like my mama.”

  “Ouch.” Dinah Perrywinkle Cobb had certainly made her mark on this family.

  “Yeah. She laid down an ultimatum. Either I let Jamie Lynn live with her, or Katie Sue would never see any of us ever again.” Lyla slid her mug side to side between her hands. “I thought she was bluffing.”

  “She wasn’t.”

  “No.”

  “Then the letters starting coming, and Jamie Lynn was so hurt by Katie Sue’s leaving that she sent them straight back. Eventually, they stopped coming, and we never saw hide or hair of Katie Sue again until this week.”

  “When you tracked me down in Dèjá Brew and told me to keep Katie Sue away from Jamie Lynn . . . You were protecting her again, weren’t you?”

  Biting her lip, she nodded. “It about killed Jamie Lynn the first time Katie Sue left, and she’d been healthy as horse. I didn’t want Katie Sue doing it to her again. She’s been so frail . . . Maybe I was wrong about it, but I couldn’t take the risk. Jamie Lynn is everything to me.” She picked up the stack. “I’ll bring them with me to the hospital.”

  It was time for me to go. I pushed away from the table. “I have a stop to make first, but then I’ll see you over there.” Another shiver went down my spine. “And be careful, okay? Cletus and Dinah are still out there somewhere.”

  “I will.” She walked me to the door. “Thanks for everything, Carly. I have to admit I might have been wrong about you.”

  I stepped on the porch and looked back at her. “I might have been wrong about you, too. So we’re even.”

  As I drove off, headed toward my mama’s I couldn’t help but feel sorry for all the Perrywinkle girls and the scars left behind by their childhoods. It was too late for Katie Sue to heal those wounds, but I prayed there was time enough for Jamie Lynn and Lyla.

  Chapter Thirty

  “This is going to take a few trips,” Delia said not ten minutes later as we were loading up our cars with flower arrangements. My mama and daddy were busy getting the chapel ready for the four weddings today, but occasionally would pop out with an armful of flowers. I had the feeling it was going to be an all-day process.

  “More than a few, I’d say.” Good thing it was only a little past eight. I shoved an arrangement of beautiful pink-tipped white hydrangeas in the back of my Jeep and when I straightened up, my head spun. I leaned against the open door.

  “You okay?” Delia asked.

  “A little woozy.” I shook my head a bit trying to clear my vision.

  “What’ve you eaten today?”

  “A cup of tea.”

  She smiled. “We’ll stop for some food on the way to the hospital. You shouldn’t skip breakfast.”

  “Yes, Mom,” I teased. I’d agreed to go, but I wasn’t hungry. In fact, my stomach roiled angrily.

  Delia said, “Your mama would be lecturing you worse than me.” She turned to go back into the chapel for another load.

  I tried to pick up another of the hydrangea arrangements from the curb, but my legs wouldn’t move. My hands started to tremble and my heart thudded erratically. I was suddenly having trouble breathing. I gasped for breath. Panic sluiced through me.

  Black spots swam in front of my eyes. “Del—” I tried calling for Delia, but her name had wedged in my throat. I slumped to the ground, gasping, writhing in pain.

  Delia was by my side in a flash. Sheer terror clouded her eyes. I had the feeling she just read my energy and knew exactly how bad off I was.

  I tried to speak, but there were no words. My airway was closing.

  “Help!” I heard her shriek. “Someone help!”

  Delia disappeared, leaving me alone as my lungs shut down. I couldn’t even cry out in pain, even though my whole body felt as though it was being put through a grinder. All I could do was gasp for breath as I tried to fight off the darkness clouding my vision. I stared helplessly at the hydrangeas, so beautiful for such an ugly moment. But they, too, had an ugly side, I remembered. They were highly toxic.

  As soon as the thought wandered in my head, I realized what was happening to me. I squeezed my eyes closed, already knowing what my ultimate fate would be.

  I’d been poisoned. Just like Jamie Lynn.

  Delia yelled, “Don’t you dare die on me!”

  I opened my eyes, and I could feel the tears leaking from their corners, but I was powerless to tell her what was happening.

  She knelt next to me, busily doing something . . . I couldn’t quite see. Items were flying left and right. “Yes!” she shouted, apparently finding what she was looking for. She stuck her face right in mine and said, “You’re going to be fine. Just hang on!”

  I wanted to believe her, I did. But the pain was too much, and my chest felt ready to explode.

  Her determined face was the last thing I saw before I slipped into the darkness.

  * * *

  “Your dreams suck,” I said two hours later. I was propped up in my bed, the ceiling fan circling lazily above my head. Roly and Poly hadn’t left my side since my daddy carried me up here.

  “What’d they do now?” Delia asked, making the mattress dip as she shifted to face me.

  “Well, they certainly didn’t warn you that I was going to be poisoned this morning, did they?”

  “Can’t blame them for that—I never went to sleep last night. I was so wound up about what went down at the hospital that I didn’t go to bed. How about we talk about you ignoring your witchy senses?”

  I rolled my eyes and rubbed Poly’s chubby belly. “I didn’t ignore them. I acknowledged them. I just didn’t know why I was getting them.”

  “How about they were trying to tell you not to eat the poisoned honey?”

  “Yeah, I missed that part.” A quick call to Jamie Lynn at the hospital verified that her mama had given her the honey. The police went and confiscated the crock, and we’d have the results soon as to what was in it.

  It was the perfect plan by Cletus and Dinah. To slowly poison Jamie Lynn until she eventually succumbed to her mystery illness. Lyla had been safe from the poison only because she was allergic to honey. Had Dinah even remembered that? Or had it been part of the master plan to hide the poison in plain sight?

  The current speculation was that the honey held a low dose of poison, meant to take a toll over time, until Dinah and Cletus got wind that Jamie Lynn was feeling better. It was my guess that when Delia and I saw Dinah coming out of Lyla’s house the other day that she’d added more poison to the honey to push Jamie Lynn’s health over the edge. I’d seen a syringe in Dinah’s pocket and assumed it had been for drugs, but now I suspected it had held poison meant to kill her daughter.

  Fortunately, it hadn’t. Jamie Lynn had made a full and complete recovery and was being released today. The Leilara had completely cured her. There would be no lingering symptoms.

  But she wouldn’t be truly safe until the Cobbs were found. There was hope that would occur really soon. Dylan practically had to be pried from my side when a call had come in from someone who’d spotted the truck belonging to Cletus and Dinah. He promised he’d be back as soon as possible. I didn’t bother to tell him that there was no rush, that I was perfectly fine and in fact felt better than ever. I’d seen the look in his eye when he rushed to Mama’s chapel and saw me still lying on the ground. He could come back. And he could stay as long as he wanted.

  Delia fluffed a pillow behind her back. “And, now we know why my dream told me to accompany you to the hospital last night, don’t we?”

  “I suppose,” I said grudgingly as I watched Roly knead my stomach. I rubbed her head.

  It had been the Leilara that saved me. Delia remembered I had put the vial with the leftover tears in my purse the night before. She’d laughed as she told me how she’d tipped my head back and dumped what was left of the vial into my mouth, and then squished my jaw shut so no liquid would seep out.

  I came to only seconds later, amazingly none the worse for wear. Even the paramedics had agreed I didn’t need to be taken to the hospital, but I could have sworn I heard my daddy ask them if they had any tranquilizers for my mama. She claimed I took ten years off her life. Then she amended it to fifteen. By tomorrow, it would be twenty.

  If Delia hadn’t gone with me to the hospital, hadn’t seen me use the Leilara and slip it back into my bag . . . I would be dead.

  Voices floated up the stairs. I had a really full house down there. My parents. The Odd Ducks. Ainsley and Carter. Caleb. I could hear my mama rehashing what had happened, her voice rising and falling dramatically. They’d all been up to see me, and it had been too much for my senses, so I pleaded that I needed to rest. I volunteered Delia to watch over me, because no one trusted that I wasn’t going to just up and quit breathing. They’d insisted I needed someone with me at all times until they truly believed I wasn’t about to die.

  “So,” Delia said, stretching out her long legs. “I think we can both agree my dreams trump your witchy senses any day.”

  “Maybe so.” I glanced at her.

  “What?”

  “You know that was your chance to get rid of me forever, right? With my death the Leilara secrets would be passed on to you.”

  “Oh,” she said, linking arms with me and resting her head against mine, “damn. I didn’t have time to think things through.”

  “You’re wicked.”

  She laughed. “How could I have let you die? I’m just starting to really like you.”

  Smiling, I said, “I really like you, too.”

  “Well, that’s good. Now, how about you promise not to get poisoned anymore?”

  “I promise. Thanks for saving me.”

  “You’re welcome.” After a moment, she added, “How long are you going to humor your parents by staying in bed?”

  “I’ll give it another hour.”

  “I bet you won’t last twenty more minutes.”

  She might be right about that. I was already itching to get up. To do something. To live. The only thing keeping me up here was all the energy swirling around downstairs.

  There were heavy footsteps on the stairs, and Delia and I both craned our necks to see who it was.

  “Knock, knock,” Dylan said, tapping on the door. “Oh, good, you’re still alive.”

  “How long?” I asked. “How long until people forget I almost died today?”

  “Never, that’s when.” Dylan came over to the side of the bed, kicked off his shoes, took off his gun and set it on the nightstand. “Scoot.”

  Delia, the cats, and I scooted over. Dylan climbed in next to me, and suddenly my queen-size bed felt like a twin.

  He dropped his head back on the headboard and said, “I just have a few minutes, but wanted to give you an update.”

  “Did you find Cletus and Dinah?” Delia asked.

  My whole left side was pressed against his body, and he took hold of my hand and held it tight.

  “Found them down at an old hunting shack along the river. They’re both in custody, blaming each other for everything that happened. You’ve never seen two people turn on each other so fast. They’re both looking at life sentences and possibly death penalties.”

  Good riddance.

  “That’s not all. Jamie Lynn’s will and a syringe were found in their truck. The syringe is being sent for testing to see if it did in fact have poison in it.”

  “Case closed?” I asked.

  “Case closed,” he said.

  He stayed with us a while longer until finally leaving to deal with a “mess of paperwork” as he put it, but agreed to come by for supper.

  Delia slid off the bed and said, “I should go, too. I need to check on my shop and Boo.”

  “You’ll come for supper, too?”

  She swung her locket on its chain and smiled. “I’ll bring dessert.”

  “Something chocolaty?”

  “Is there another kind of dessert?”

  “It’s like we’re related or something,” I quipped.

  “Yeah,” she said, heading for the door. Then she stopped and said, “I was thinking earlier that there was a time when I never dreamed you’d be part of my life. And now I can’t imagine life without you in it. That’s so strange, isn’t it?”

  Emotion swelled in my throat, stung my nose. “Definitely strange. And completely wonderful.”

  She smiled, then sailed through the doorway, her cape flying out behind her.

  Chapter Thirty-one

  I’d lasted in bed only fifteen minutes before almost losing my mind with boredom. I cleaned my room for another hour before finally going downstairs.

 

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