“You went out. I heard you leave. Where’d you go?”
“I’d like to know that myself,” Angus said, coming into the room. “I need to talk to you.”
“Let me guess,” Junior said with feigned cheerfulness, “it’s about Judge Wallace.”
“T
hat’s right.”
“And my marriage to Stacey.”
“Yes,” Angus said reluctantly.
“I’ll bet you’re going to tell me why it was so all-fired important that I marry her when I did.”
“It was for your own good.”
“That much you told me twenty-five years ago. It was a trade-off, wasn’t it? You got him to close Celina’s murder case in exchange for my marriage to Stacey. Am I getting warm? Apparently, so was Alex. When she confronted the judge with her hypothesis, he killed himself.”
Looking faint, Sarah Jo covered her mouth. Angus responded with anger. His hands flexed into fists at his sides. “It was the best thing to do at the time. I couldn’t allow an in-depth investigation. To protect my family and my business, I had no choice but to ask the judge that favor.”
“Did Stacey know about it?”
“Not from me. I doubt that Joe ever told her.”
“Thank God for that.” Junior dropped into a chair. His head hung dejectedly. “Dad, you know as well as I do that Gooney Bud was innocent.”
“I know no such thing.”
“Come on. He was harmless. You knew he didn’t kill Celina, but you let him be punished for it. Why didn’t you just let things take their natural course? In the long run, we’d all have been better off.”
“You know that’s not so, Junior.”
“Do I?” He raised his head and looked at his parents with hot, intense eyes. “You know who Reede has in his bed this morning, looking all soft and sexy and satisfied? Alex.” He flopped back against the easy chair’s cushions and rested his head. With a bitter, humorless laugh, he said, “Celina’s daughter. Jesus, can you beat that?”
“Alex spent the night with Reede?” Angus thundered.
Sarah Joe made a sniffing sound of disgust. “That doesn’t surprise me.”
“Why didn’t you keep it from happening, Junior?” Angus demanded.
Junior, sensing his father’s rising temper, shouted, “I tried!”
“Evidently, not hard enough. It’s your bed she’s supposed to be in by now, not Reede’s.”
“She’s a grown woman. She didn’t need my permission to go to bed with him. With anybody.” Junior pushed himself out of the chair and headed for the bar.
Sarah Jo blocked his path. “I don’t like the girl. She’s as trashy as her mother, but if you wanted her for yourself, why did you let Reede Lambert have her?”
“It’s more critical than that, Sarah Jo,” Angus said tightly. “Our future rested on Alex’s opinion of us. I was hoping she would become part of the family. As usual, Junior fell down on the job.”
“Don’t criticize him, Angus.”
“Why the hell not? He’s my son. I’ll criticize him if I damn well feel like it.” Then, curbing his impatience with her, he exhaled a heavy sigh. “Too late now to be bawling over spilled milk. We’ve got a bigger problem than Junior’s love life. I’m afraid we’re extremely vulnerable to prosecution.” He left the room and slammed out the front door.
At the bar, Junior poured himself a straight vodka. Sarah Jo grabbed his arm as he raised the glass to his lips. “When are you going to learn that you’re as good as Reede? Better. You’ve disappointed your father again. When are you going to do something to make him proud of you? Junior, my darling, it’s time you grew up and seized the initiative for a change.”
Alex stared at Reede with wordless disbelief. He calmly swept the spilled coffee grounds off the counter with the back of his hand and continued to fill the filtered basket of the coffee maker. Once it was dripping boiling coffee into the glass carafe, he turned to face her.