I felt a blush creep up my neck. “Yes, well. If I have to pick one, I’d prefer scared. Trust me when I say that one relationship with a man is quite enough to handle.”
“I think most women feel that way,” Angel said. “It’s a shame Molly didn’t trust herself to find a good man. I can’t help but think everything would have been different if she hadn’t hooked up with Dexter.”
“If I told you that Dexter found a document in Molly’s handwriting stating that she was leaving the catering business to a friend of mine, and he went nuts, claiming that Molly had promised the business to him…what would you say to that?”
“No way!” Angel’s eyes widened. “Molly would never leave her business to Dexter. She loved that business more than anything. It was her salvation. Dexter couldn’t even cook toast without burning it. What would he do with a catering business?”
“Sell it, maybe?” I suggested.
Angel frowned. “I hadn’t thought…I was just thinking about the actual day-to-day work of the business, but I suppose it might be worth something to somebody interested in getting started or an existing company looking to expand. Surely Dexter wouldn’t be stupid enough to think if he killed her that he’d get her business based on his word.”
“Killing her might not have been planned,” Ida Belle said. “Maybe he just got mad and it happened. We saw them both earlier that day. Molly had just worked him over in the cage and he didn’t look none too happy about it. Maybe temper got the best of him and now he’s trying to salvage something from it.”
“That wouldn’t surprise me,” Angel said. “He’s definitely a hothead. If you don’t mind my asking, who did he claim Molly left the business to?”
“Ally Lemarque,” I said.
“That name sounds familiar,” Angel said. “Oh, she’s a baker, right?”
“Unofficially, she provides baked goods all around the area,” Gertie said. “But she’s hoping to open her own bakery soon.”
Angel nodded. “I remember Molly talking about her now. She said she’d brought her food to an event and they’d insisted she take a small dessert tray of Ally’s goods home with her. She claimed it was the best sweets she’d ever had.”
“The thing is, Ally had only spoken to Molly a couple times and it was only in a professional capacity,” I said. “So she barely knew her and has no idea why Molly would leave her the catering business, assuming that’s all legal and aboveboard.”
Angel shrugged. “Well, I couldn’t do it, and Molly knew that. I’m sure she wanted it to go to someone who loved and appreciated food as much as she did. Molly wasn’t a complex person. Not really. If you understood where she came from and what she lived through, then she wasn’t that hard to figure out.”
“So the phone call is why you don’t think this was an accident?” I asked.
“That’s actually the least of the reasons,” she said. “Molly was an excellent boater and after what happened to Johnny, she was extra careful about everything. She went over every square inch of her boats every single time she came back to the dock.”
“How was she as a swimmer?” Ida Belle asked.
“Olympic good. Silas used to make Johnny and Molly swim back and forth across the channel, even when the tide was at its strongest. He said everyone living on the water needed to know how to handle it. Honestly, I think he was just being mean but it didn’t turn her off from it. She had a gym membership somewhere close to the city. She drove in a couple times a week to use the pool and if she had time, she’d drop by for a visit. An hour of laps was her regular workout.”
I watched her face as she delivered that information. She was so certain, so earnest in her words, that I had no doubt she believed something had happened to her friend besides a tragic accident. But was that correct or were she and Nickel just refusing to believe that the same fate could befall two people they cared about? Which made me wonder…
“Do you think Johnny’s death was an accident?” I asked.
Her eyes widened a bit, then she stared at the floor, not speaking for some time before she finally looked back at me. “Honestly, I have my doubts there as well. I know what it looks like. I never got over Johnny’s death—and I guess that’s