A Cloud of Suspicion Read online

  Jocelyn spoke up. “It’s nice to see you out and about, Mrs. Renault.”

  “Thank you.” Charla inclined her head, ever so slightly. As always, not a single dark hair dared slip out of place or show the smallest touch of gray. In her lap, her Jack Russell terrier, Rhett, growled low in his throat.

  Charla laid a hand on the dog’s head to silence him and focused her gaze on Shelby. “I was just on my way to see you, Miss Mason.”

  Taken aback, Shelby stuttered, “You…you wanted to see me?”

  “Yes. Since my son’s untimely passing, I have been pondering how best to honor his memory in the community that he served with such devotion and dignity. I am considering making a sizable donation to the city library in his name.”

  Shelby was sure she must look like a stunned pelican with her gaping mouth. “Mrs. Renault, I’m not sure what to say.”

  Charla held up one hand, silencing Shelby as easily as she had the dog. “I’m also considering funding a scholarship in his name at the college. I would, of course, need assurance that the institution I choose will provide a lasting memorial that is befitting of the Renault name. I’d like to see a proposal from the library board on such a memorial by the end of next week.”

  “Next week?” Shelby blinked hard.

  “The dean at Loomis College assured me that a week would be sufficient time to present a plan. If you don’t feel up to the task, Miss Mason, I must wonder if you’re the right person to be in charge of our venerable and historic library.”

  As the youngest head librarian ever employed by the city, Shelby had faced her share of detractors when she applied for the job, but she knew the library was prospering under her guidance.

  Still, the city never had enough money in the budget to cover all the expenses and upkeep the “venerable and historic” building needed. Old and needy would be a more apt description of the place.

  The chance to gain a sizable donation from the Renault family was a windfall that couldn’t be ignored.

  “We have a general meeting of the board a week from Thursday, Mrs. Renault. You’re welcome to attend. I’m sure I can work up a proposal that will satisfy both your needs and the needs of our community.”

  “Good, Miss Mason. However, should it come to my attention that you’re continuing to engage in baseless gossip about my son…well, I’m sure y’all can see how that would influence my decision.”

  “Of course, Mrs. Renault.” It meant Charla would take her money elsewhere without batting an eye.

  With another slight tilt of her head, Charla maneuvered her chair down the aisle toward the door, where the owner of Café Au Lait hurried to hold it open for her.

  Wendy blew out a deep breath. “Her son’s death hasn’t changed her a bit.”

  “Why do you say that?” Jocelyn asked.

  “Because she still enjoys pitting people against each other. Shelby, you know the college will be crawling all over themselves to gain the old gal’s favor. They’ll cater to her every whim.”

  “I’ll simply have to convince her that we can provide a better memorial than they can.”

  Jocelyn gathered up her purse. “How are you going to do that?”

  Shaking her head, Shelby admitted, “I have absolutely no idea.”

  Wendy wrapped the last beignet in a napkin and stuffed it in her handbag. “Did you like him? I don’t mean to speak ill of the dead, but was Dylan Renault the kind of man who deserved to have a scholarship or a new library wing named after him?”

  Shelby smiled sadly. “I didn’t like him, but I can’t blame his mother for wanting to see that her son’s name is treated with respect. We know it doesn’t matter if a dozen libraries are named after him. God is the final judge of us all. Only He knows the soul of Dylan Renault.”

  Jocelyn laid a tip on the table. “Are you going to talk to Sam about the Christmas party?”

  Shelby hesitated. She didn’t actually know anything. It was more of a feeling. Still, Jocelyn and Ava were close friends. What if it got back to Charla that Shelby was talking about Dylan again?

  The college will be rubbing their hands with glee over their new donation, that’s what.

  “I’ll call Sam if I remember something concrete. Otherwise, don’t say anything about it. I feel silly for mentioning it.”

  After paying the check, the women left the café. With a round of quick hugs and promises to meet again next week, they parted ways. Jocelyn left for her office, while Shelby and Wendy walked toward the library. Shelby found herself checking the street for Patrick’s motorcycle, but to no avail.

  She had been stunned to see him again after all this time, but she was honest enough to admit that surprise had been only part of her pulse-pounding reaction to the man. He was dangerously attractive, even more so now than when she had last seen him.

  What she found truly disturbing was how much she wanted to see him again.

  After crossing Main Street, Shelby and Wendy cut through the park on a paved path that led toward the city library. The smell of damp, newly cut grass hung in the air and mixed with the scent of flowers and blooming shrubs. The two women hurried past the small white gazebo standing alone at the center of the park.

  At first glance, the lattice-covered structure looked picture-perfect in the setting, but on closer inspection one could see the paint was peeling and some of the slats were broken.

  People who lived in Loomis knew that a woman had been murdered inside the gazebo twenty-five years ago. The death of that young mother was the reason Loomis started their annual Mother’s Day Festival with their Mother of the Year Pageant.

  The pageant had grown from humble beginnings into the town’s biggest event with prize money worth thousands of dollars going to the mother who was chosen as the winner. Over the years, the money, gifts and prestige of winning had sparked some serious rivalries and even resulted in foul play among the women vying for Loomis’s most coveted title.

  The mystery of the woman’s death had been solved when Vera Peel confessed to killing the amateur photographer because she had been taking pictures of the bayou the day Vera killed her husband and his lover there.

  Even knowing how and why the woman had died hadn’t altered people’s perception of the gazebo. Only newcomers or visitors used it. The locals continued to give it a wide berth.

  Suddenly a creaking, scuffling sound made Shelby and Wendy spin around in fright. A dark figure sat on the floor inside the structure.

  It took a heart-stopping second for Shelby to recognize Chuck Peters, the town drunk who panhandled and did odd jobs around the city.

  “I didn’t see nothing. I didn’t,” he muttered, and lurched to his feet.

  Shelby sucked in several calming breaths, then took a step toward him. “Mr. Peters, you frightened us.”

  He swayed slightly as he peered at them through his thick, black-rimmed glasses. During one of his sober spells, Chuck had worked briefly for Shelby’s father at his woodworking shop. After her father passed away, Chuck started doing odd jobs for the reclusive Vera Peel. With his benefactress now in jail for murder, Shelby had to wonder how he was managing.

  Wendy tugged at Shelby’s arm. “Come on. Let’s go.”

  “Mr. Peters, do you need me to call Reverend Harmon for you?”

  His eyes widened with fear. “No! Don’t call him. Don’t tell anyone you saw me here. Don’t tell. Swear you won’t tell!”

  Hoping to reassure him, Shelby added quickly, “But Reverend Harmon can get you a hot meal and a place to stay.”

  “No, I like this place. I can see who’s coming.” His eyes darted around like frightened birds seeking a way out of a cage.

  “You can’t stay here. The police won’t let you,” she said gently.

  It was obvious that he was more disturbed than usual. He ran his hands through his greasy, thinning red hair. “Don’t tell ’em I’m here. I didn’t see nothing that night. You can’t say I did.”

  “What night, Mr. Peters?”r />
  “Can’t say. Don’t know. Didn’t see nothing that night.”

  Wendy pulled harder on Shelby’s arm. “Let’s go. You can’t help him if he doesn’t want it.”

  Shelby allowed herself to be led away. “I’m going to call Reverend Harmon anyway. He’s dealt with Chuck in the past.”

  “That’s a good idea. Maybe he can get the old loony back into the mental hospital where he belongs.”

  “Wendy!” Shelby glanced back, but Chuck didn’t seem to be paying attention to them. He was making his way out of the gazebo with unsteady steps.

  Beyond him, Shelby noticed another figure lurking in the shadows near the path. The man turned away abruptly before Shelby could see who it was.

  “I’m only suggesting that Reverend Harmon can supply him with the professional help he needs.” Wendy defended her suggestion. “Let’s get out of this park. It’s creepy in here.”

  Shelby had to agree, although she had always enjoyed the peace and quiet of the secluded place. Now, the tall live oak trees hung with Spanish moss seemed vaguely threatening. The thick azalea bushes laden with blooms seemed to offer hiding places for danger along with their beauty.

  Like nearly everyone in Loomis, she found the fear of an unknown killer in their midst had changed her perspective of her hometown.

  Mustiness assailed Patrick as he stepped into the front parlor. Little had changed in the years that he had been gone. The same faded area rug still covered the center of the hardwood floor. The same beige sofa sat in front of the small bay window. Dirt darkened the armrests of the matching chair across the room.

  There was an empty coffee mug and stain rings on the small table beside the chair. He could picture his stepdad sitting there, staring out the window at the town that shunned him for raising a monster.

  Patrick shook off the vision. For some odd reason his stepfather had stipulated in his will that if Patrick came back and settled the estate in person, it would all go to him. He didn’t know why. Maybe the old man wasn’t quite right in the head toward the end.

  Patrick had almost refused. But the chance to gain enough to help him secure his future overrode his reluctance. Nothing else would have brought him back to Loomis.

  He had a week or two to go through the place and get the house ready to go on the market. After that, he didn’t have to hang around to make sure someone actually bought it. His father’s attorney had been clear on that issue. All Patrick had to do was go through the belongings in the house and see to the repairs.

  Looking around, Patrick began to feel a little more hopeful. The place wasn’t a total ruin. With a little paint and elbow grease he should be able to sell it. How ironic would it be if his stepfather had actually handed him the means to make his dreams come true?

  Before today, Patrick figured it would take him another two years of scrimping and saving to buy into a partnership at the custom bike shop where he worked. His plan was to become part owner and eventually sole proprietor of Wolfwind Cycles.

  Bikes were his life. His only love. A man could count on a good machine.

  If he could make enough from the sale of this place, he could push his agenda forward by several years.

  Walking around the living room, Patrick tried to take a quick inventory but found himself touching things and thinking about them. His mother had loved the painting of the old barn over the fireplace. He picked up the small pewter unicorn from the mantel. He had given it to her for Christmas the year before she died.

  Closing his eyes, he recalled the feel of her hugs, the scent of her perfume, the happiness in her laughter. He searched for similar memories of his stepfather but couldn’t find them.

  All he could hear was his stepfather’s angry voice raised in accusations. All he could see was the disappointment and repugnance etched on the face of the only father Patrick had ever known.

  Opening his eyes, Patrick sighed. This wasn’t going to be as easy as he had hoped. Folding his fingers around the trinket, he shoved it deep in his pockets and rocked back on his heels.

  There was a stack of books on the table beside his stepfather’s chair. Picking up the top book, Patrick saw it was a murder mystery by a popular new writer. He opened the cover. The book had been checked out of the Loomis library three months before.

  Great. I’ve got overdue fines to pay.

  He snapped the book shut and returned it to the top of the stack.

  Someone, most likely the attorney, had gathered together a pile of mail and left it on the seat of the chair. Picking it up, Patrick sat and began to sort through it. Most of it was junk mail and old newspapers, but he did find a few bills he would have to take care of.

  When he came across a late notice from the library, he read the note with special interest. It was signed by Shelby Mason.

  Shelby, with the gorgeous red hair and roses in her cheeks. So she had moved from working at the college library to working at the city library. Why hadn’t she left this miserable town behind?

  She’d been a sweet kid. He had wanted to ask her about her life this morning at the café, but he had left instead when he saw the number of cold stares leveled in his direction.

  He’d cut short the conversation as much for her sake as for his. The gossip machine in Loomis could grind her up and spit her out in no time just for passing the time of day with him.

  He tossed the letter aside with a weary shake of his head. It seemed he still had a need to protect the underdog.

  What made him think Shelby Mason needed protection? In Loomis, he was the underdog. A cur no one would speak up for.

  He rose and wandered through the kitchen and down the hall that led to the back of the house. His old bedroom was the first door on the right.

  Stepping inside, he wasn’t surprised to find it stripped bare. His football trophies, his track ribbons, his posters of Easy Rider, Santana and Jennifer Lopez were all gone. His stepfather had gotten rid of every trace of him. Only the blue drapes remained to remind Patrick of the way the room once looked. He pulled the door shut.

  The next room down the hall was his father’s bedroom. Easing the door open, Patrick looked in. The bed was neatly made. There were a few clothes scattered around, but nothing of his mother’s.

  He frowned when he saw the empty bookcases lining two walls. Had his father gotten rid of his mother’s books?

  Diana Rivers had been an English teacher with a true love of literature and history and a passion for collecting old books. Some of Patrick’s fondest memories were of the two of them traveling to estate sales, rummage sales, even auctions looking for unusual books on the state’s history or first editions of her favorite authors.

  Once, at a garage sale in Covington she paid a dollar for a first edition of a Mark Twain novel and had spoken of it gleefully for months afterwards.

  A lumber mill worker like his father and his grandfather before him, Ben Rivers had put up with his wife’s odd obsession, but he never understood why words were so important to her.

  Patrick closed the bedroom door and turned to the last small room at the end of the hall. It had been his mother’s sewing room. When he pushed open the door, he found himself confronted with a room stacked full of packing boxes.

  Lifting the lid off the nearest one, he found it contained some of his mother’s clothes. A second box held more of the same, but he relaxed when he opened the third box. In it were dozens of his mother’s books.

  Sinking onto the dusty floor, Patrick drew out a novel bound with thick red leather and embossed with gold lettering. He breathed in the scent of the old paper and truly smiled for the first time since he had crossed the Louisiana state line.

  Shelby’s day passed in a busy blur at the city library. After the weekend there were always plenty of books in the drive-up return book bin to be checked in, reshelved or mended. A rush of customers in the early afternoon kept her busy and left her little time to think about the type of memorial program she could develop for Mrs. Renault.

>   As busy as she was, she still found herself thinking about Patrick Rivers and the odd way he had smiled at her.

  She’d had such a crush on him in college. Of course, he had barely noticed her.

  As the captain of a winning football team he’d had his pick of girls, but he’d been more than a jock. He’d spent plenty of late nights studying at the campus library. Sometimes, when he stayed until she had to lock up, he would walk her to her dorm. It made her feel so special.

  Looking back, her infatuation seemed silly now. Her dorm had been on the way to his place. He hadn’t really been walking her home. He’d just been walking in the same direction and being kind. It had been his kindness that made the accusations about him so hard to believe.

  Shelby recalled the night vividly. Patrick had just led their team to a regional championship. Most of the campus had turned out to celebrate the big win with a bonfire in a secluded part of the bayou.

  Shelby had watched the merrymakers with a touch of envy. It wasn’t that she wanted to drink or party, she just wanted Patrick to notice her.

  He didn’t, of course, because she stayed in the background, a shy mouse of a girl that no one noticed. Not like Coral Travis. Everyone noticed her.

  Standing by herself in the shadows that night, Shelby overheard a disturbing conversation. She recognized Coral’s voice telling someone that she was going home with Patrick, whether he knew it or not. He was her ticket out of Loomis.

  Before Shelby could retreat, Coral had come out of a stand of small trees and spied her.

  Shelby could still hear the mocking tone of Coral’s voice. “What are you doing here? Hoping some guy will get drunk enough to ask you out?”

  From some unknown source of strength, Shelby managed to reply, “Patrick deserves better than you.”

  Coral only laughed and said, “Get out of the sandbox, chubby, this is where the big kids play.”

  Mortified, Shelby watched as Coral sauntered off and insinuated herself next to Patrick. The two of them left together less than half an hour later. Shelby took her bruised ego and wounded heart home where she indulged in a good cry.