Laurie nodded without lifting her head from Nevvie’s shoulder. “I’ll pay you back,” she muffled against Nevvie’s shoulder. “Free babysitting.”
Nevvie laughed and made her sit up. “No, this is a gift from me to you. I think you and I both need the distraction. Do you think you can stay awake until after everyone else goes to bed?”
She nodded again. “I don’t feel like going to sleep right now.” She frowned. “And…” She looked down at her hands. “I’ll need something to wear to the funeral.”
“You don’t have to go if you don’t want to. You didn’t know her. You never even met her. No one will be upset if you don’t go.”
“I want to go. For Grandma and Tom and Karen and everyone. I want to be there for them.”
Nevvie reached out and stroked her hair, hair the same color as hers. “You’re a really good kid. I couldn’t have asked for a better little sister.”
* * * *
Around eleven, Nevvie finally coaxed the last of the well-meaning visitors out the door and helped Andrew get Peggy to their room. The other sisters went home, and Clay and the twins went to bed as well. Andrew returned to the kitchen a few minutes later.
“You wanted to talk to me, love?”
Laurie appeared, fully dressed, in the kitchen doorway. “I hate to ask this, Dad,” Nevvie said, “but can you cover for us for a while?”
“Cover?”
“I’m going to take Laurie to Walmart. Get some groceries and stuff for the next few days. And get some things Laurie’s going to need.”
He waved Laurie into the kitchen and over to them. “Are you all right, my dear?”
She nodded as he enveloped her in a hug. “I’ll be okay, Grandpa.”
Nevvie didn’t miss how Andrew always brightened over her calling him that. “You two go have some girl time. And I’ve already started a grocery list, there on the refrigerator.”
Nevvie grabbed it. “Thanks, Dad.” She quickly kissed him on the cheek and went to get her purse and keys.
It was nearly two hours later when they returned. Andrew sat up waiting for them in the living room, watching TV. He walked out to help them unload. “Gracious, you weren’t kidding, were you?”
“No, Dad, I wasn’t.” She handed him three bags containing cold food items. “These are the only things that have to be put up tonight. I’ll take care of the rest in the morning. We’ll just leave them on the table.” She helped Laurie haul the groceries to the kitchen and the bags of purchases, which in addition to clothes included basics like underwear, socks, sneakers, shoes, and bath supplies, to Laurie’s room. It also included school supplies, because the back-to-school displays had already been set up at the store. When Nevvie asked a clerk when school started in the area, she was startled to learn it would begin in just a couple of weeks.
She’d mentally added helping Kelly get Laurie enrolled in middle school to her to-do list.
Nevvie felt like she barely had time to strip and fall into bed when her cell rang. She started to ignore it when she realized the light in the room looked weird. Grabbing her phone, she answered it.
“Ty?”
“Love? Are you all right? You sound horrid.”
“What time is it?” She sat up, wiping at the sleep in her eyes.
“I’m assuming it’s the same time there as it is here,” he said in a tone she recognized as an attempt to be humorous. “And here it’s nearly seven.”
“Oh, holy crap!” She sprang up out of bed.
“What?”
“No, nothing. Sorry. Laurie and I went on a midnight shopping run and I totally passed out. I should have been up over an hour ago to help Mom.”
“Well, I just wanted to let you know our little merry band is pulling out of here. We’re going to have to take a rather circuitous route up US 19 to avoid a lot of traffic and problems obtaining gas. Kelly is following us in her car. It might be quite late before we arrive tonight. Oh, and are you sure you don’t have that address book with you? I looked everywhere, love, and it’s just not here. Perhaps it’s out in the RV?”
“Drat. I could have sworn I left it on the kitchen counter. Never mind. I’ll look here. How’s Tommy?”
Tyler hesitated before answering. Then his voice sounded softer. “He’s vertical, love.”
“Let me talk to him.”
“Right. Love you.”
“Love you, too.” There was a pause before he came on the line.
“Nev?”
He sounded heartbroken. She wanted to wrap her arms around him and hold him.
“Hi, sweetie. Don’t give Ty a hard time, okay? If I didn’t kill him over the shit bath in Yellowstone, you can’t give him a hard time coming up here.”
She thought she heard the faintest sign of something resembling a chuckle. “I won’t. He’s taking good care of me. Love you. I’m going to get off here now. We’re getting in the car.”
“Love you.” She stared at her phone for a moment before remembering she had overslept.
In the kitchen, Andrew stood at the counter with Laurie, showing her how to make Peggy’s famous cinnamon rolls.
We’ll all gain fifty pounds at this rate. “Good morning. Sorry I overslept. Where’s Mom?” She leaned in for a kiss from Andrew.
“She’s still in bed,” he said.
Nevvie frowned. “Do we need to get her to a doctor?”
He pressed his lips together and shook his head, his eyes darting to Laurie before returning to Nevvie.
Oh. Message received. “Do you want me to take over in here?” She arched an eyebrow at him, also quickly glancing at Laurie.
He gave her another shake of his head. “But I do believe there are two little boys who will be getting rambunctious fairly soon.” He kissed the top of Laurie’s head. “You’ve been an amazing help this morning, sweetheart. Why don’t you take care of the little cretins for us?”
Laurie looked up at him. “Is that my new title, Grandpa? Cretin wrangler?” She grinned.
Nevvie, who’d been taking a sip of coffee, narrowly avoided spraying it on them as she burst into laughter.
Andrew laughed with her. “Sounds good to me, love. Head Cretin Wrangler you shall now be.”
Laurie washed her hands and headed out of the kitchen to the boys’ room.
Nevvie watched her go before leaning against the counter next to Andrew. She kept her voice low. “How is Mom?”
He sighed. “Devastated, of course. She wanted to get up and I ordered her to stay in bed until I came to get her.” He finished the rolls and put them in the oven. He turned to Nevvie. “Child, in case I never made it plain before, I do so love you.”
“I love you, too, Dad. What brought that on?”
“That’s what Peggy kept repeating to me last night. That she wished she’d been able to tell Emily one last time that she loved her. That she wished things hadn’t been left hanging the way they were without a chance to make amends on both sides of the fence.” He put his hands on Nevvie’s shoulders and lightly squeezed. “I don’t ever wish to leave those sentiments unsaid to my loved ones.”
She hugged him. “You aren’t getting rid of me that easily, Dad.”
“Nor me, love. May I let you in on a secret that might cheer you up?”
“Hell, yes. Please.”
“Well, Sunday night, I had asked Peggy to marry me.” He sighed again. “Obviously, yesterday’s events precluded us sharing the news.”
“That’s great! Well, you know what I mean. I hope she said yes?”
“She did. I knew it was fast, and I honestly had intended on waiting.” He frowned. “I don’t know whatever made me say it. I…” His face reddened, and Nevvie suspected what the circumstances had been for the proposal. “Well, let’s just say the mood overcame me.”
She smiled. “Love makes us do crazy things.”
“I did tell her last night that if she wanted to reconsider, I’d understand.”
“What’d she say?”
&n
bsp; He smiled. “That it hadn’t been so long since she’d fired one of those shotguns that she couldn’t take my legs out if I tried to escape. And that if I did try to escape, she’d have Tom introduce me to the quaint Southern custom of a shotgun wedding.”
She burst out laughing. “That sounds like something she’d say.”
“We are, however, going to wait to tell people, of course. I thought you would want to know. I knew it might brighten your day.”
* * * *
Tuesday passed in a blur for Nevvie. She drove Clay and the twins as they had more interviews with detectives, followed by a trip to the funeral home with them and Peggy while Andrew stayed at home with the kids. Laurie helped field phone calls and acted once again as head cretin wrangler. One of the cousins from Tom’s father’s side was a senior in high school, and she came over to help Laurie.
They’d already given up locking the shed because they were taking overflow offerings of food to the spare refrigerator out there. Nevvie worried most about Peggy, who was more quiet than Nevvie had ever seen. She looked haunted, her eyes perpetually red from crying. Andrew hovered at her side, offering comfort to her and the remaining sisters, who’d already come to accept him as a dad in the absence of their own father. The other sisters weren’t faring much better than their mom, with Karen seemingly the strongest of them all.
Before dinner, Karen walked into the kitchen and started rummaging through one of the upper kitchen cabinets.
“It’s not there,” Nevvie told her.
“Dammit. She’s out?”
“No.” Nevvie pointed to a different cabinet. “She moved it.”
Karen pulled down the bottle of bourbon and found a glass. She poured herself three fingers, neat, before putting the bottle back and taking a seat at the table. “I still hope someone’s going to show up and tell us this was a horrible practical joke gone wrong. That Em’s alive and wanted to just teach us a lesson or something.” She took a swallow, wincing. “She was a damn bitch, but I loved her. I didn’t want her to die.” She looked at Nevvie. “I can’t believe she’s gone.”
It was a phrase all the sisters had uttered more than once.
“I know,” Nevvie said. It was the only thing she could think to say in reply.
“And I just want to have it out with her, you know? Shake her and say what the fuck were you thinking?” She sipped her bourbon. “I’ve always heard those talking heads on the TV talk show saying how you should let bygones be bygones and tell people how you feel. I never got a chance to do that with her. She always thought she was right and everyone else was wrong.” She took another sip. “I can’t believe she’s gone.”
“I know.”
Bill walked into the kitchen, frowning when he spotted Karen, then schooling his face into a concerned expression. “Hey, hon. You all right?”
She looked into her glass. “No.”
Nevvie took that as her cue to clear out while he went over and knelt next to her chair. When she passed the kitchen doorway a few minutes later on her way to the dining room, she saw Karen crying on Bill’s shoulder.
I need to move that bourbon bottle again, Nevvie thought. If it wasn’t for the twins she carried, she would have already been tempted to finish it off herself even though she wasn’t much of a drinker. She wanted to take any temptation out of Karen’s way, as well as the twins and Clay. They had enough misery to deal with without anyone getting drunk and hungover.
Visitors and friends of the family, as well as extended family, stopped by to visit throughout the day. Nevvie didn’t miss how Laurie seemed to have a natural way about her as gatekeeper, seemingly sensing when Peggy and the sisters needed a break and gently informing incoming visitors to keep their visit brief, or asking callers to hold off their visits until the next day, if possible.
I’m sooo buying that girl a flat-screen TV and DVD and stereo for her new bedroom. She’s earned it.
Bill drove Karen home after dinner, leaving her car there, much to Nevvie’s relief. A little after ten in the evening, they ushered the final visitor out. The twins went to bed, leaving Clay sitting up in the living room with Andrew and Peggy, who refused to go to bed yet.
Laurie looked at Nevvie. “You can go to bed, too, if you want,” Nevvie told her.
“I’d like to wait up for my mom.”
Nevvie mentally smacked herself. “I’m sorry, of course.” She went into the kitchen to make a fresh pot of coffee. She wouldn’t sleep much tonight anyway once the boys were home. After the funeral, she could catch up on her rest. For now, she wanted to stay up and be there for her family.
Clay followed her to the kitchen and gave her a hug. “Thank you, Nevvie.”
“How are you doing?” She’d noticed how he’d mostly stayed in the background, there for his children and Peggy and the other sisters.
He shrugged.
She stared at him until he finally sighed and leaned against the counter. “I’ve had better days, let’s put it that way.”
“You were married a lot of years. It’s okay to be upset.”
“I think I’m worried most about Elle. I think she feels really guilty.”
“Wouldn’t be a bad idea for the three of you to sit down with a grief counselor.”
“How are you doing?”
“We’re sooo not going there.” She offered him a kind smile. “This is not about me. And I want you to feel free to lean on me and Andrew to get y’all through this.”
“Karen said something about a hidden stash of bourbon?”
“Neat, or on the rocks?”
“On the rocks, please.” He sat at the kitchen table. Nevvie poured him a few fingers over ice and handed it to him.
She looked up at the sound of rain pattering on the roof. She wished it’d stop, but they were directly in a line of showers being pulled along by Edgar heading out into the open Atlantic.
“I’ve wondered if I hadn’t left her if she’d still be alive.”
Nevvie threw a sharp look his way. “That kind of thinking will drive you crazy.”
“I can’t help it.”
“You can help it. There’s any number of permutations you can throw out there like that, but none of them will change a damn thing. None of them might have made any difference anyway. There’s no reason to torture yourself. No one blames you.”
He took another swallow. “This feels unreal.”
She reached out and squeezed his hand. “We’ll get through it as a family.”
* * * *
Nevvie managed to talk Clay out of a second drink and got him sent to bed. She gave up trying to get Peggy to do the same. Peggy sat on the couch, nestled against Andrew while they watched one late-night talk show after another.
Laurie busied herself helping Nevvie fold laundry and doing other chores. When Nevvie spotted headlights in the driveway a little before two o’clock in the morning, she let out a sigh of relief.
She practically ran out the door to tackle Tom when he stepped out of the passenger side of Tyler’s car. “Hey, mister.”
He buried his face in her hair. “Hi, baby girl.”
“And he didn’t kill me, love.”
She smiled across the roof of the car at Tyler. “I’ll get to you in a minute.” She palmed Tom’s cheek and made him look her in the eye. “Are you okay?”
He nodded. “Just tired and glad to be home.” He paused. “Well, you know what I mean.”
“Home,” she said.
Laurie gave her mom a hug when she got her car parked. “We can unload in the morning,” Kelly said. “I need sleep more than anything.”
“Agreed,” Tyler said, walking around the car to give Nevvie a hug and a kiss.
“Is Momma still up?” Tom asked.
“Yeah.” Nevvie slipped her arm around Tom’s waist and walked with him. “She wanted to see you when you got here.”
“Is she okay?”
“She’s holding up.”
In the living room, Peggy stood at Tom?
??s entrance. He rushed over to her and engulfed her in a hug.
Nevvie looked at Tyler and tipped her head toward the kitchen. He caught her meaning and followed her. There, he gave her another hug and kiss, holding her tightly.
She rested her head against his shoulder and felt her tears start again. “I was so worried about you guys.”
“Shh, it’s all right, love. We’re here now. Let go.”
She hadn’t meant to cry, had meant to keep it together, but the sudden relief of knowing she didn’t have to go it alone any longer overwhelmed her.
Eventually, Nevvie managed to pull herself together. She washed her face at the kitchen sink. “Did you guys eat?”
“We’re fine, love. I just want to go to bed.”
“That makes two of us,” Tom said from the doorway. He looked haggard, his eyes red and puffy. “Momma and Dad just went to bed.” He scrubbed his face with his hand. “Andrew, I mean,” he said. Then he let out a sigh. “I don’t know what I mean. I’m so damned tired.”
Nevvie hugged him again. “Let’s go to bed.”
Despite her heart aching for Tom, it felt damned good to once again be sandwiched between her men in bed. She spooned with Tom, his arms wrapped around her from behind and his face pressed against the back of her neck. Tyler cuddled in close in front of her, his fingers laced through hers.
Harley, not wanting to be left out, settled in at the bottom of the bed between Nevvie and Tyler.
Like that, Nevvie had the best night’s sleep she’d had in over a week.
Chapter Thirteen
Alex looked himself over in the mirror of the darkened bathroom. The house, obviously a bank foreclosure from the sticker on the door and lack of yard upkeep, was vacant and had no electricity. At least it was shelter from the rain and a safe temporary hideout. He’d found it ridiculously easy to jimmy the rear sliding glass door to get in, and it was only a few streets over from Emily’s house. He’d left his stuff there when he went to pay Emily a visit, and it was where he returned after killing her.