I blinked. “That’s a little . . .”
“Public?” he suggested. “Yeah, that’s what Leese and Mia said. I think part of me wanted it that way, though, so I couldn’t go back.”
I’d always heard you should never burn bridges when you left a job, but for Brad it sounded as if a scorched earth policy had been a necessity. “You’re still at the same brewery?”
His face lit up. “Absolutely. There’s this new recipe I’m trying. Flavorings of maple syrup and chocolate. What could be better, right?”
It sounded horrible, but then I wasn’t a big beer drinker. But I also didn’t see how a five-year-old argument that had ended with Brad in a career he clearly loved could also have caused him to kill his father.
I smiled and wished him well with his new beer. “Were there other guys who worked for your dad that might have . . . well, you know.”
He shook his head. “I’ve been thinking about it, but I don’t see it. What I can see is one of the guys blowing a gasket, killing dad in the heat of anger kind of thing, but not like this. Anyway, I can’t think of anyone who would go to the trouble of implicating Leese. I mean, how many people even knew she was back in the area?”
Hundreds, actually. She’d joined the chamber of commerce and was attending Rotary meetings, not to mention that article in the newspaper.
“None of your dad’s former employees were the kind of guys to carry a grudge?” I asked.
“Hard to say for sure.” He shrugged. “I just don’t see it.”
I wished I shared his conviction, but it was my feeling that hate-filled grudges could last a long time.
“Well,” he said, glancing at his watch. “I have to get to the brewery. I just wanted to stop by and say I was sorry that my mom socked you with all that work last night.”
“Don’t worry about it.”
I watched him walk out and got the feeling that both he and Mia had probably done a lot of apologizing for their parents.
• • •
Ash’s mom, Lindsey, smiled across the table at us. “It feels as if it’s been ages since I’ve seen you two. Anything new?”
We were at the Three Seasons, sitting in what had been a parlor, back when the hundred-year-old building had been a luxurious summer residence for a wealthy family. Kristen herself had advised us on what to have for dinner, which in my case was more telling than advising. As long as whatever arrived didn’t have mushrooms, I was good.
“New?” Ash repeated. “I’ve been working the night shift. Do you really want to know what kind of thing goes on at two in the morning?”
His mother was a gorgeously elegant woman who made an extremely good living as a financial consultant. I had to keep reminding myself that there was no reason to be intimidated, and mostly the reminders worked.
Lindsay tipped her head to one side, considering her son’s question. “Probably not. Unless you have some amusing anecdotes you can share.”
“Nothing funny lately,” he said, glancing at me.
Lindsey noticed the look. “Are you going to tell me what’s going on right now?” she asked. “Or shall it wait until the salad course? Because I will find out, in spite of the fact that I was out of the country researching new investments for the last week and a half.”
“Just tell her,” I suggested.
“Nah.” Ash grinned. “Make her wait. It’ll be good for her and entertaining for me.”
“You are a horrible son,” Lindsey said. “What did I ever do to deserve you?”
The horrible son’s dimpled smile bore a striking resemblance to his mother’s. “Nothing. It was sheer good luck.”
She paused, considering, then nodded. “Acknowledged, but the question remains. What’s going on?”
Before Ash could continue baiting his mother, I said, “There was another murder.”
“Oh, no.” Her face fell into sad lines. “How awful. Someone from around here? A tourist?”
I looked at Ash, because I had no idea whether or not Lindsey had known Dale. Was this going to be a shock that we should prepare her for? And how does one do that anyway?
“Dale Lacombe,” Ash said.
A variety of emotions passed over Lindsey’s face. Most of them I couldn’t catch, but I was confident of two. Surprise had been the first one, and finally resignation. Somewhere in there I thought I’d pegged satisfaction, but surely I was wrong about that.
“Well.” Her expressions settled back down. “Isn’t that interesting?”
I frowned. Her voice had been curiously flat. “It is?” I asked.
She flashed a short smile. “Hal Inwood and Ash are going to run themselves ragged trying to figure this one out.”
Ash sighed. “Mom, let it go.”
I looked from mother to son and back. “Let what go?”
Our waiter approached and there was a pause as water glasses were filled and drink orders taken, which was basically us agreeing to the bottle of wine that Kristen had recommended. When he’d left, Lindsey said quietly, “Marrying that man was the dumbest thing Bev Diesso ever did. Her parents told her not to. Her grandparents told her not to. I told her not to. But she was in love”—Lindsey sighed— “and she wouldn’t listen to any of us.”
Lindsey knew Leese’s mom? One of these days I would have to stop being surprised at the interlocking relationships I kept stumbling over. “What was so bad?” I asked.
She laughed shortly. “I can tell you never met him.”
“Mom—”
Lindsey put up a hand against Ash’s mild protest. “To put it mildly, Dale was a misogynistic ass, and I was glad to offer Bev and Leese refuge when she left him. Yes, dear, I know Dale was your father’s friend but he was never mine. Never.”
It occurred to me that not only had I never met Ash’s dad, but I didn’t know anything about him. I tucked the thought away. Now wasn’t the time. “You and Leese’s mom are friends?” I asked.
“In a way,” Lindsey said. “I’m good friends with Mary, Bev’s older sister. Bev is a few years younger than us.”
Small towns. “I know Leese, but I’ve never met her mom. Did she stay in the area?”
Lindsey nodded. “She went back to school and became a registered nurse. She’s assistant director up at Lakeview Medical Care Facility.”
“Never remarried?” I asked, hopping my chair to make sure I was out of the way of a gray-haired man using a walker who was being escorted to a nearby table.
“Not for lack of trying by a certain gentleman,” Lindsey said, smiling. “Bev is a fantastic skier and goes out to Colorado regularly. Twenty years ago she met a man who proposed after she avoided a child who fell in front of her. She did this by going airborne.”
I was a skier myself, but I couldn’t imagine having either the presence of mind or the technical ability to do something like that. “Sounds like a reasonable basis for marriage.”
“Better than many.” Lindsey laughed. “Bev wasn’t interested, though, and still isn’t. But they’ve worked out a long-distance relationship that works for them.” She made a very unladylike noise. “She would have been better off if she’d had that kind of relationship with Dale Lacombe.”
The world was truly a strange place. And if Bev was happy in her post-Dale life, there was no reason for her to strike out at him decades later. Not that I’d suspected Leese’s mom of killing her ex-husband, but it was nice to keep her off my mental suspect list.
Behind us, I heard the man with the walker murmur to the hostess that he’d prefer a table closer to the window, which was where we were sitting. I hitched my chair forward another couple of inches, just to make sure I was out of the way.
“What about the current wife?” Ash asked. “Carmen.”
His mother studied him. “Am I being questioned by an officer of the law or by my son?”