order?”
I guess we were. I mean, I hadn’t opened the menu, but I’ve been at the Wayside Inn often enough to know what they serve. “I’ll have the savory crepes with a side of field greens, please.”
Lynn took the other orders—Rafe was having steak with shoestring potatoes at noon—and then moved on to Mother and David. Catherine had scooted closer to them, still with Carrie on her lap, so both my children, or Rafe’s children, were getting quality time with their aunt and grandmother. It was nice to see.
Bob and Rafe decided that they were going to pay a visit on Art Mullinax in the morning, and Dix was angling to be allowed to come. I have no idea why he’d want to, but maybe he’d gotten bitten by the detective bug, too, and wanted to play.
“Can I come?” I wanted to know. “Grimaldi let me.”
They looked at one another.
“That’d be quite the delegation,” Bob said. “You, me, Yung, Tamara, Dix, Savannah…”
Rafe nodded. “Better not, darlin’. We’re just gonna go have a talk with him. If we show up with that kinda group, he’s gonna be suspicious. You and Tammy go find something else to do. You, too.” He glanced at Dix.
My brother looked mutinous. “I don’t see why I can’t come. You might need a lawyer.”
“I’ll make sure he doesn’t,” the sheriff said dryly. “You do your job, Dixon, and let us do ours.”
Dix stuck his lower lip out, but didn’t protest. I turned to Rafe, who shook his head. “Sorry, darlin’. If there’s anything there, I don’t wanna get his back up with a big group. Bad enough that the sheriff and local PD shows up.”
“And the TBI.” Not to mention the FBI.
“We’ll try to keep Leslie out of it,” Rafe said. “Nothing to do with her case, after all. And no need to mention that I’m doing double duty with the TBI, either. Better to keep it as low key as possible.”
“What are you going to use as an excuse for going out there? Because if he’s guilty of anything, he’s going to be suspicious no matter what you say.”
We discussed it until the food arrived, and then we ate. Once the food was gone, Rafe caught David’s eye down the length of the table. “Time we were getting on, if we’re gonna have time to stop by Audrey’s before we drive back to Nashville.”
David looked reluctant to be parted from Mother, but he nodded. “Sorry I can’t stay longer.”
“From what I understand,” Mother told him sternly, “you shouldn’t be here at all. Next time, you’re to stay home, where you’re safe.”
“I’m safe here.” He grinned at her, before he leaned in and kissed her cheek. “Bye.”
Mother looked momentarily stunned, and then pleased.
I took Carrie back from Catherine and we headed out. “We’ll take you home and pick up the Harley,” Rafe told me when we got to the parking lot, “that way you can keep the Volvo to go to the open house.”
“There’s no room on the Harley for Carrie,” I pointed out, while David’s eyes got big. After a second, he started to vibrate with excitement. He’d been on the back of the Harley before, but never for an hour or more on the interstate. “Besides, are you sure Ginny would approve of that?”
“By the time she finds out, it’ll be too late,” Rafe said. And added, “You suggesting I can’t be trusted to get David home safe?”
“Of course not. I know you know how to handle the beast. I just don’t know whether David’s parents are going to want him riding on it.”
“He’ll be fine,” Rafe said dismissively and opened the Volvo’s back door so I could put Carrie’s seat inside. David crawled into the back next to the carrier, and Rafe behind the wheel. “Coming?” he asked me when I didn’t climb in next to him.
“Just looking around.”
“She ain’t here,” he told me.
No. There was no sign of the tan compact. “I thought maybe Lynn…”
“She drives a blue Volkswagon,” Rafe told me. “You saw it back when we were at her house that time.”
Of course I had. “She might have switched it out.”
“Switched out a nice VW for that old import? Why would she wanna do that?”
“So she could stalk you in peace and we wouldn’t recognize the car?” I folded myself into the front seat.
He shook his head as he put the car in gear. “It ain’t Lynn. We’d have recognized her at Beulah’s the other night. Besides, Yvonne knows Lynn. If