“Sorry.” Roo shrugged and poured herself a mug of coffee. “Why are you all sitting around here on such a beautiful morning?” She pointed at the lineup of dishes on the counter. “And what’s with all the food? Are we having a party I’m not invited to?”
Billy and Riley exchanged a look.
“Aunt Roo,” Billy said gently. “Didn’t you get the voice mail I left you last night?”
“Hell no. I hate voice mails. They’re always from some telemarketer trying to sell me a time-share at Disney World. Now, you tell me, what does an old maid like me want with a condo in Orlando? They don’t even have a beach there.”
“Mary Roosevelt Nolan!” Evelyn snapped. “Maybe if you took the trouble to listen to the messages we leave you, you’d know what’s going on around here. For your information, Wendell is dead.”
Roo looked from Riley to her sister-in-law, and then back again.
“Wendell Griggs? Your Wendell?”
Riley nodded. “It’s true.”
Roo took a bite of the muffin and chewed slowly. “That’s awful. When was this? What happened?”
“We’ll discuss it later,” Evelyn said. “I don’t want to upset poor Riley any more than necessary.”
“It’s okay, Mama,” Riley said, taking a deep breath. “They found Wendell’s body in the water at the marina yesterday morning. He had some kind of a head wound. The sheriff doesn’t think it was an accident.”
“Murder?” Roo’s eyes shone with excitement. “Right here on Belle Isle?”
“Roo!” Evelyn shook her head in exasperation. “For God’s sake, have you no sense of propriety? My daughter has been widowed. My granddaughter has lost her daddy. We are inconsolable.”
“Sorry.” Roo leaned over and patted Riley’s hand. “Really, sweetie, even though I never really liked him, I’m sorry about Wendell. Truly.”
Riley managed to choke back a giggle. “Thanks, Aunt Roo.”
“I guess I really am the last one to know. When’s the service?”
“We can’t plan anything until the coroner releases Wendell’s body,” Riley said. “Soon, I hope. For Maggy’s sake, I don’t want to drag things out any longer than necessary.”
“Of course,” Roo said. She walked over to the counter and pointed hopefully at an oval turquoise Pyrex bowl. “Is that Sylvia’s pineapple fluff? It’s my favorite!”
13
The tide was out, and the beach on the north side of the island was a smooth expanse of silvery-gray sand. Parrish stood in the surf for a moment, letting the gentle waves lap at her ankles, allowing her toes to sink into the gritty sand. They mostly had the beach to themselves, save for a pair of men surf-casting up ahead, and a group of kids trying to throw a cast-net.
“The water feels amazing,” she called to her husband. “Come on, Ed.”
He shook his head. “No, thanks. You know how I feel about sand.”
She did know. Her husband had a pathological hatred of sand. He didn’t mind walking on the beach with her, as they did most days when they were together on Belle Isle, but he stopped short of walking barefoot, always insisting on wearing his tennis shoes.
“Riiiight,” she said. She dipped her fingers into the water and flicked some at him, but he moved away, unharmed.
She walked along behind him, stooped over, picking up stray seashells, searching, as she always did, for bits of sea glass. Which was a waste of time. She hadn’t found any sea glass in ages.
“I wonder why,” she muttered.
Ed turned around. “You wonder why what?”
Parrish laughed ruefully. “Did I say that out loud? Oh my God. I’m turning into my grandmother.”
“You could do worse.”
His comment stopped her cold. “Aww. That’s so sweet.”
“She was a grand old lady,” Ed said, turning slightly pink.
Now she’d gone and embarrassed him. Ed Godchaux didn’t like people to think he was sentimental. Or sweet.
“I was just wondering why I never find sea glass here anymore. When we first started coming to the island, when David was a baby, I could always find a piece or two. Green, blue, brown, even purple. I had jars of the stuff. But I can’t remember the last time I found a piece. Can you?”
He gave that some serious thought. Everything was serious to Ed. She’d loved that about him when they’d first started dating. He’d been a seasoned thirty-two-year-old litigator, and she was just out of law school, at her first job, but he’d always treated her as an equal, never dismissed her as “just a girl.”
He removed his sunglasses and polished them on the hem of his golf shirt. Ed didn’t own any shirts without collars. He didn’t