Marco lived. I got out and walked up to her porch to ring the bell, but the front door opened before I reached the steps.
“Carly, this is a surprise,” Sandy said as she walked out onto the porch, closing the door behind her.
“I just feel awful about Pam,” I said. “I know you must feel ten times worse and, well, my mother always seemed to think food helped heal all wounds, so I made a batch of brownies and brought some to you.” I’d said the part about my mother as an excuse to show up at Sandy’s front door uninvited, but it hit me that my mother really had believed that to be true. She’d made my favorite lunch for dinner on days I was sad—chicken salad—and my favorite dessert for celebrations. She’d done the same thing for my father…before it had all turned upside down.
“Is that why you work in food service?”
“What? No,” I said truthfully. “Max offered me a job after my car broke down in Drum. By the time I could afford a new one, I liked the people I worked with far too much to leave.”
“And you’re livin’ with Hank Chalmers?” she asked with narrowed eyes.
“That’s right.”
“No family or friends worried about you?”
“No,” I said, wondering how this had gotten turned around so that she was the inquisitor. “I had a best friend—a fiancé—but he died.” It was somewhat truthful. Jake might not be buried in the ground, but he was dead to me. “It was hard to get close to people after that. Especially since Atlanta’s such a big city.” I wondered if I was giving her too much information. Sure, I’d eventually shared as much with Max and Ruth, who’d started asking more questions about my past. They’d been sympathetic enough about my quote, unquote tragedy not to press, but Sandy seemed like a dog after a bone.
“You’re from Michigan, right?”
“That’s right.”
“I’ve got relatives in Michigan.”
“No kidding. Which part?” I asked.
“Detroit.”
“I grew up near Traverse City.”
“Mighty cold winters up there.”
I gave her a grin. “Why do you think I moved to Atlanta?”
She studied me for a moment, then gestured to the two wicker chairs on her front porch, looking out over multiple flowerbeds. “Where are my manners? Have a seat.”
Did that mean I’d passed a test? Or was she preparing for round two? “Thanks. I’d love to.” I handed her the plate, then lowered into the chair farthest from the door.
Once she was settled in her own seat, I said, “I hope this isn’t an imposition.”
“No,” she said, setting the plate on the table between us. “No one who comes calling with brownies could be an imposition.”
“It’s just that I’m still pretty shook up over Pam,” I said quietly. “I realize I didn’t know her that well, but I’m just… Well, it’s all I can think about, and no one else seems to get it. So I thought I might come see you.” I gave her an earnest look. “You always seem like you know exactly what to say and do. I guess I hoped you could help me make sense of it all.”
“I would do that if I understood it myself,” she said, shaking her head. “I have no idea what happened.”
“People are saying that her husband beat her one too many times, so she lost it and went to Ewing just looking for someone to shoot.”
“The beatin’ her one too many times part might be accurate,” Sandy said, “but Pam couldn’t even put out traps for mice. She didn’t want to kill them. I just can’t fathom her killin’ a human being.”
I sat up and turned in my seat to face her. “Could they have arrested the wrong person?”
“Sadly, no. There’s a surveillance video that shows her parkin’ her car in the Palmer’s Insurance parking lot and then leaving less than twenty seconds later, the gun still in her hand.”
“And they’re sure it was her?”
“I recognized the green shirt,” Sandy said, her voice breaking. “It’s her favorite.”
We sat in silence for a moment. “It just seems so random,” I finally said. “Was he even her insurance agent? One of the rumors goin’ round is that Jim Palmer was her agent when her youngest son got a DUI.”
“No, she’s had Travis Keeling since Ashlynn started driving. Their insurance went up, and Travis got her a better deal.”
“Could she have switched from Jim to Travis?”
“I don’t think so,” she said with a frown, “but I don’t remember. We didn’t make a habit of