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Then, for the first time since she’d awakened to find him staring at her, he took her hand in his and gave it a squeeze. The gesture gave her the strength to face whatever was ahead.
“You stay put,” he said. “You should be safe enough out here for a time. I’ll get you something to drink and be right back. Powell ought to be here soon, too.”
She nodded and watched him go. She could do this, she told herself. She’d faced the media a thousand times in the last six years. She was good at it, a natural at spinning a story. She would make Larry proud of her one last time.
An hour later, sheriff’s deputies and media were swarming all over the place. Liz stood by and tried very hard to distance herself from the reason for their presence. She didn’t want to think too much about the scene inside her home, about Larry—a man she had once loved with all her heart—being dead, about the vicious words he’d hurled at her the last time they’d talked. That exchange would live with her forever. It was a side of her husband she’d never seen before, a side that was ruthless and manipulative.
He’d made it seem as if he’d been devastated by her request for a divorce, when nothing could have been further from the truth. They’d both known for a long time that the marriage was a shell of what it should have been. There had been no passion for years now. There were no kids to distract from the fact that they had nothing in common. Larry had wanted her for her name and connections, and for Swan Ridge, second only to King Spencer’s Cedar Hill in terms of a prestigious address in the county.
Even the date of their wedding had been calculated for maximum political benefit, just when the campaign season was heating up. Somehow she had missed that when he’d been courting her with lavish gifts and whispered words of love, when they’d talked far into the night sharing their idealistic dreams for a better world that together they could help to shape. She’d been blinded by his charm and his rhetoric. Somehow she had completely missed the shallowness beneath it.
Her first clue that she’d been conned had been the lover she’d found in his hotel room when she’d unexpectedly joined him on the campaign trail. They’d been married for less than two months at the time. Larry had apologized, said the relationship was over, but the woman hadn’t accepted it yet. He’d sworn it would never happen again, and bought Liz a diamond and amethyst necklace he’d told her reminded him of the sparkle in her eyes. Maybe if he’d exchanged the extravagant necklace for a sincere apology, she would have believed him.
Even so, Liz had been determined to make the marriage work. She’d dutifully appeared by his side at every chicken dinner, every small-town parade, every campaign stop. The year of finishing school her grandfather had insisted on had made her poised. Early years in Europe with parents who had too much money and too many interests to pay attention to a little girl had taught her to fend for herself and never let them see how much their neglect hurt. For the rest of the campaign, she had smiled despite the torment.
And on the day after the hard-won election victory, she had insisted Larry fire the campaign manager he’d slept with, denying the woman the prominent place on his staff she had clearly expected.
“She goes, or I will leave you now and tell the whole world why,” she had threatened him quietly as he savored the headlines in the local paper. She had grown up over the course of the campaign. Now it was time he did the same.
It had been three months before he’d taken another lover. Another six before he traded that one in. Liz had known about most, if not all, of them, but with each one her will to fight had lessened. Her respect for her husband had vanished, and with it, the last remnants of her love. Her hopes and dreams had faded, including the plans for a family. Even if she hadn’t decided against bringing children into such a marriage, Larry’s belatedly announced timetable would have precluded it. He wanted his career on a firm footing before any children kept her from devoting her full attention to him, he had told her when she’d dared to broach the subject of starting the family they’d once talked about.
That coldly calculated timetable of his had been yet another reminder that he wasn’t the man she’d thought him to be. Even so, it had taken her a long time—too long—to admit defeat.
Now, though, as she watched her husband’s shrouded body being removed from their house, she knew the humiliation was finally over.
Or was it? Unless Tucker could find the evidence to save her, even in death Larry Chandler was going to find one more way to rip her life to shreds.
4
T ucker filled a glass with water and ice, then stood staring out the kitchen window at Mary Elizabeth. What had she been through in the last six years? What had driven her to want to put an end to her golden marriage? Had it been bad enough that she’d been driven to take drastic measures? Had she believed, even for an instant, that divorce wouldn’t end whatever hell Chandler was putting her through?
The instant the thought crossed his mind, he banished it. He would not let himself consider for one second the possibility that she was guilty of murder. Every person deserved a presumption of innocence, but it was easier for him to get to that point with Mary Elizabeth. Past history, deep feelings, gut instinct all intertwined to assure that he saw her only in the most positive light.
Which was why he’d turned the case over to Walker from the get-go. Tucker didn’t have a prayer of maintaining objectivity. He’d blindly rushed to her defense in a math class cheating scandal in tenth grade. He’d done it again on countless other occasions when her grandfather had found fault with one thing or another that she’d done. Each and every time Tucker had believed with everything in him that Mary Elizabeth was the innocent victim. Even after she’d turned her back on him years ago, he believed in her now.
How stupid was that? he wondered cynically. But breaking off a relationship was a far cry from murder. Things would have to be beyond desperate for a strong, deeply moral person to cross that kind of line.
Walker found him where he remained standing at the window, the glass of water still clutched in his hand, continuing to ponder whether things had gotten that desperate for Mary Elizabeth.
“You okay?” his brother-in-law asked.
“I’ve been better.”
“How’s she doing?”
“She’s a strong woman,” Tucker said.
“No hysterics? No grief?” Walker asked.
“She’s upset, not distraught,” Tucker conceded tightly. “The marriage was on the rocks.” He scowled at Walker’s immediate show of interest. “That doesn’t mean she wanted him dead.”
“What about money? That’s always a motive for opting for murder over divorce.”
“She had plenty of her own.”
“You sure about that? It costs a lot to maintain a place like this.”
“And she inherited more than enough from her grandfather. The Swans might have been relative latecomers to this area, but they were descended from English aristocracy. The first family member arrived here at the beginning of the eighteenth century, maybe a decade or two after the Spencers. William Swan had a head for business. So did every male descendent who came after, at least until Mary Elizabeth’s father. He was better at throwing money around than making it. He and her mother were spending the winter skiing in Switzerland when they died in an avalanche. That’s when Mary Elizabeth came here to live with her grandfather. It was the first time she’d seen him since she was a toddler. She barely even remembered him, but he took her in and devoted himself to raising her. He left her everything he had.”
“Thanks for the history lesson, but it doesn’t have much to do with what went on here last night,” Walker pointed out.
Tucker frowned. “Fine. Ignore the past and concentrate on the evidence. What have you got?”
“The forensics guys are working in there now. No signs of a struggle. Nothing out of place. We’ll have to ask Mrs. Chandler if anything’s missing, but it looks as if whoever did it had only one thing on his—or her—mind, killing Chandler and getting away.”
“I strolled around outside. I didn’t spot any signs of forced entry,” Tucker said. “How about you?”
“None I could see, either.”
“Then he let the killer in,” Tucker concluded.
“Or the killer had a key,” Walker suggested with a pointed look outside where Mary Elizabeth remained, shoulders slumped and sunshine glinting on her hair.
“She had an alibi,” Tucker reminded him.
“You checked it out?”
“No, but you will, and it will hold up. I’d bet my badge on it.”
Walker regarded him evenly. “What hours does the alibi cover?”
“All day yesterday, till around eleven last night. That’s when she found him.”
“And after that?”
“She came straight to my place.”
“You know that how?” Walker countered. “You were on duty.”
“She told me,” he began, then faltered, irritated by his own gullibility. “Damn.”
“Exactly,” Walker said sympathetically. “You don’t know for sure what time she got to your place. You don’t know for sure what time Chandler was shot. There’s a lot of wiggle room in there.”
Tucker didn’t want to agree with Walker, but he was forced to concede that Mary Elizabeth’s alibi wasn’t as airtight as he’d hoped. Now that he thought about it, even her alibi of being on the river all day long meant nothing. There was a very large dock at the edge of the property. She could have brought the boat around here from the marina, slipped inside, shot her husband and gone back to Colonial Beach without anyone being the wiser. Hell and damn!
He met Walker’s gaze. “You’re going to need to ask some questions over at the marina at the beach. She said she was out in her boat yesterday. Someone probably gassed it up, saw her on the docks, something that will confirm her story.”
Walker’s gaze shot to the dock in the distance. “Dammit, Tucker, who’s going to be able to say she didn’t make a beeline straight over here?”
“Other boaters,” Tucker countered, thankful he’d grasped the same point in time to come up with a plausible counterargument. “This time of year the river’s crawling with them, and not just on the weekends. If you don’t want to take the time to track them down, I will.”
“You can’t,” Walker shot back. “Anything you come up with will be suspect, and you know it.”
“Why? She and I have a lot of past history, that’s true, but a lot of it’s bad. Most people around here would believe I have more reasons to want to find her guilty than innocent.”
“Maybe if you were a different kind of man,” Walker agreed. “But you’re a decent guy, and your feelings for people run deep. If you loved her once, that hasn’t just disappeared.” He leveled a penetrating look straight into Tucker’s eyes. “Has it?”
“My feelings don’t have a damn thing to do with anything,” he said tightly. “You handle this case by the book. That’s all I’m asking. If Mary Elizabeth is guilty, if the evidence points to her, I won’t stand in your way. But if there’s evidence that exonerates her, I expect you to find that, too.”
“And you believe she is innocent, don’t you?”
Tucker hated his slight and very telling hesitation. “I believe in her, yes.”
“Why? Because you want to?”
“Partly that,” he conceded, forcing himself to be honest with Walker and with himself. “But mostly because she came to me. Why would she do that if she were guilty?”
“Who better to have in your corner than the sheriff?” Walker said bluntly.
Tucker started to argue, but the words died on his lips. Not once since he’d joined the sheriff’s department had anyone had any reason to doubt his credibility or his integrity. Now, in a matter of hours, anything coming out of his mouth regarding this case was going to be considered suspect. Once again, Mary Elizabeth had managed to twist his life inside out.
“I’m going outside,” he said curtly. “Let me know what’s happening.”
“I’m going to have to talk to her sooner or later,” Walker reminded him.
Tucker nodded. “She’ll be here whenever you’re ready.”
“She got a lawyer?”
“He’s on his way,” Tucker said, grateful that she’d insisted that Powell drive straight up from Richmond, rather than waiting. On that score, she’d been thinking more clearly than he had. He’d thought it would be enough to have Powell on standby. Tucker hadn’t seriously believed that Mary Elizabeth would be a suspect for much more than a minute, because his own feelings had gotten in the way. He’d wanted to believe that the real murderer would be so obvious that she’d be cleared at once. Was that the first of many errors in judgment he was likely to make? Or was the first not tossing her out on her lovely backside when he’d first found her in his bed?
Walker nodded. “We’ll talk when he gets here, then. I’m trying to put together some sort of statement for the media. They’re gathering like vultures on the front lawn. You want to look it over?”
“No.”
“They’re going to ask why you’re not involved. What should I tell them?”
“The truth, that Mrs. Chandler and I are old friends and that I wanted this case handled by someone with more objectivity and homicide experience than I have.”
“We could leave out the issue of objectivity,” Walker said. “It’ll be opening a whole can of worms that might be best left shut tight.”
“The information is out there. Someone will open it sooner or later,” Tucker replied. “It’ll be better to be up-front about it.”
“Whatever you say.”
“Walker?”
“What?”
“Don’t do her any favors, but don’t try to railroad her, either.”
His deputy regarded him with annoyance. “You didn’t need to tell me that. I know how to do my job.”
“I didn’t say that to insult you,” Tucker told him. “Under most circumstances, I’d never feel the need to say such a thing, but you’re going to hear a lot of things before this is over with, not all of them favorable to Mary Elizabeth. Daisy and my father hate her guts, and that’s just for starters.”
“What about Bobby?”
Tucker gave a rueful chuckle. “You know my brother. He’s a laid-back kind of a guy. It would take a lot of energy for him to hate anybody, so he stays neutral. He takes his cues from me.”
“And you don’t hate her?”
Tucker thought about just how complicated his feelings for Liz Chandler were, then sighed. “No,” he admitted. “I don’t hate her.” Far from it.
“Anybody else in town going to be anxious to start a lynch mob besides your father and my wife?”
“I’ll have to think about that one. In the meantime, try not to let my involvement muddy the investigative waters.”
“Just how involved do you intend to be?”
“After we get through today, I’m hoping I can turn my back and walk away and leave the whole mess in your capable hands.”
Walker snorted. “Oh, yeah. I’ll be counting on that. Tucker Spencer walking away from a lady in distress.” He shook his head. “Never going to happen, pal.”
Tucker watched Walker leave the room, then glanced back at the woman waiting for him on the terrace. Her vulnerability reached out and tugged at his heart. He hoped to hell Walker was wrong. He needed to run—not walk—away from this mess as fast as he possibly could.
Powell Knight hadn’t changed all that much, Liz noted when he walked around the side of the house. He still had the same easy confidence, the same arrogant polish, the same evidence of expensive taste he’d had way back in high school. Only the leather briefcase in his hand and the cell phone plastered to his ear were new additions.
“Yeah, yeah, yeah,” he was muttering as he walked toward her. “Just tell your client that we’re playing hardball and it will be a cold day in hell before he ever sees one single dime of that money.” He snapped the phone shut, then gave Liz a thorough once-over. A smile broke across his face. “Damn, Mary Elizabeth, you’re even prettier than you are in all those pictures I see in the Richmond papers. How did I ever let you get away?”
He reached for her and twirled her around until she was breathless.
“Put me down, you idiot,” she said, laughing despite the somber occasion and the trouble that was heading her way in the form of an interrogation with Tucker’s top deputy.
Powell shot a grin at Tucker. “What’s the deal? You’re not snatching her out of my arms, leaping to her defense? Not that long ago you’d have punched me out by now.”
“Mary Elizabeth can take care of herself,” Tucker said. “If I were you, I’d get out of range of her knee unless you want to hobble inside looking a little less than your best for this interview with the police.”
Powell put her down and gingerly stepped away. “No interviews, not until she and I have had a chance to talk.” He shot a pointed look at Tucker. “Alone.”
“He can stay,” Liz said at once.
Powell immediately shook his head. “No way, sweetcakes. He’s a cop. And in this instance, until you’re completely in the clear, the cops are not your friends.”
“It’s okay, Mary Elizabeth. He’s right. I’ll go,” Tucker said. He scowled at Powell. “For the record, though, I’m not handling this investigation. I’ve already taken myself off of it.”
“Good to know, but I still don’t want her blabbing any secrets to you. You’re liable to get the idea that you’re duty-bound to repeat them to whoever is in charge of the case.”
Tucker looked as if he might want to argue the point, but he kept his mouth clamped shut and walked away.
