invited them to sit down. When Drew had gotten tired of standing, he’d taken a seat in one of the woman’s posh chairs, and Toni had done the same.
She was glad Drew had finally sat down. Watching the woman’s gaze roaming up and down his body, from head to toe, with feminine appreciation in her eyes, was getting really old.
“And why was that?” she asked the woman. “Why didn’t the two of you get along?”
The woman rolled her eyes. “I told you. My father married her mother.”
“People marry all the time. Had the two carried on an affair while he was married to your mother or something?” Drew asked.
“Of course not. There is no way my father would have had an affair with Constance while my mother was alive. Mom died when I was twelve. Constance went to work for him when I was in high school.”
“So why did that bother you so much? Didn’t you want him to be happy?” Toni asked.
Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Drew glance over at her and she knew why. In the early days of their affair, she’d admitted that she didn’t believe in love or marriage. He was probably wondering if her thoughts on that had changed, or if she was feeding Jennifer Evans a line just to keep her talking.
“Constance only married my father for his wealth. He owned several car dealerships in town, and Constance worked at one of them. She had a child at eighteen and didn’t finish college. Yet he hired her as part of his management team.”
“How long after that did they marry?” Drew asked.
“Less than a year. He moved her into our house—Constance and that homely looking daughter of hers.”
Homely looking daughter? Granted, Toni hadn’t known Maria Tindal while she was alive, but even dead, it was clear to see she’d been very attractive. Although Jennifer was good-looking enough, with light brown hair and dark eyes, Toni thought Maria had been far more attractive than the woman sitting with them.
She glanced over at Drew and guessed that he was thinking the same thing. “How long were they married?” Toni asked.
“Five years too long. I tried to get him to divorce Constance, but he wouldn’t. He claimed he loved her in a way he hadn’t loved my mother. Can you believe that?”
Toni appreciated Drew sparing her the need to answer the woman when he asked, “I understand they were murdered during a home invasion.”
Jennifer rolled her eyes. “That’s what a couple of lazy detectives determined. Had they done their homework, they would have discovered my father was deliberately murdered.”
Lazy detectives? Jennifer Evans definitely didn’t have a problem stating her opinion about anything. “Deliberately murdered?” Toni asked, frowning.
“Yes. I’ve never believed that home invasion story.”
“Why not?” Drew asked. Toni fought back a grin. She recognized that Andrew Logan look. He was eyeing the woman as if he expected her to grow fangs and pointed ears at any moment.
“Because I knew what was in the will. In order for Constance to inherit any of my father’s money, they had to be married at least five years and one month. They were married five years and fifteen days. I figured she paid someone to bump Dad off so she could get her inheritance.”
“If that was the plan, why did she die that night, as well?” Drew asked.
“She was not supposed to be in town that night.”
“Then, why was she?” Toni asked. They were here to investigate the Tindal murder, yet now, because of Jennifer Evans’s bizarre imagination, they were wasting their time discussing a cold case.
“I figured she somehow discovered she was getting rid of my father two weeks too soon and rushed back home to try to cancel the hit on him. It was too late. Both of them were taken out.”
Neither Toni nor Drew said anything. They quickly glanced over at each other, and again Toni figured they were thinking the same thing—this woman had read one thriller novel too many.
Drew cleared his throat. “Back to Maria Tindal’s murder.”
Jennifer smiled. “Yes, back to Maria. The only good thing about my father’s death was that since her mother wasn’t married to Dad for the allotted time, Maria didn’t inherit anything either,” she said almost gleefully. “I got it all and didn’t share a dime with her. Not one red cent. She had to get a student loan to pay for college, and was made to move out of that sweet little apartment Dad had been footing