Hemlock Bay by Catherine Coulter Page A

back a moment, then said, “It seems very likely to me that Tennyson killed his first wife as well as trying to kill Lily. Was Daddy in on it with him? Very likely. Doesn’t matter. I don’t want to take any more chances. I want Lily out of here. I want you to take her to that very nice bed-and-breakfast we stayed at once in Eureka. What was it?”
    “The Mermaid’s Tail, just off Calistoga Street. It’s late fall. Tourist season is over so they’ll have room. What will you do?”
    “I’m going to have a nice vegetarian dinner with Tennyson. I love lasagna. I’m going to see if I can get him to admit to anything useful. I really want to nail him. I’ll join you and Lily later.”
    He rose and pulled her tightly against him. “Take MAX with you. Keep after him to find out all he can about Daddy Frasier’s efforts to get that public road built to the lovely resort spot on the coast he’s so hot to build. Without the state legislature passing it, the project would be doomed. He’s having trouble. Maybe they ran out of bribery money.”
    “Don’t forget the condos he’s planning, too—Golden Sunset.”
    “Yes, lots of potential profit from those as well. Elcott Frasier has lots and lots of bucks already invested. I wonder if they ran into more roadblocks. Maybe that’s why they wanted Lily out of the way. They were in deep financial trouble again. Now, let’s get you guys packed up and out of this house.”
    But Lily didn’t cooperate. She was awake, she still didn’t hurt very much at all, and she was very clearheaded. She smacked her palm to the side of her head and announced, delight and wonder in her voice, “Would you look at me—I’m not depressed. In fact I can’t imagine being depressed. Nope, everything inside there is rattling around clockwise, just as it should be.”
    They were in the hallway outside her bedroom. Lily was dressed in loose jeans and a baggy sweater, hair pulled back in a ponytail, no makeup, hands on hips, reminding Savich of his once sixteen-year-old sister who stood tall and defiant in front of their parents, who were dressing her down but good for her latest bookie scheme. “No, Dillon, I won’t just turn tail and leave. I want to read everything MAX has come up with so far. I want to speak to Tennyson, confront him with all this. It’s my right to find out if my husband of eleven months married me only to kill me off. Oh, dear. There’s a big problem here. Why would he do it? I don’t have any money.”
    “Unfortunately, sweetheart,” Savich said, his voice very gentle, “you are very rich. All us kids tend to forget what Grandmother left us.”
    “Oh, my Sarah Elliott paintings. You’re right, I forget about them, since they’re always on loan to a museum.”
    “Yes, but they’re legally yours, all eight paintings, willed to you. I just e-mailed Simon Russo in New York. You remember him, don’t you? You met him way back when he and I were in college.”
    “I remember. That was way back in the dark ages before I started screwing up big time.”
    “No, you were screwing up then, too,” Savich said, lightly punching her arm. “Remember that point spread you had on the Army-Navy game? And Dad found out that you’d gotten twenty dollars off Mr. Hodges next door?”
    “I hid out in your room, under your bed, until he calmed down.”
    They laughed. It sounded especially good to Sherlock, who beamed at both of them. Lily depressed? It was hard, looking at her now, to believe that she’d ever been depressed.
    Lily said, “Yes, I remember Simon Russo. He was a real pain in the butt and you said yeah, that was true enough, but it didn’t matter because he was such a good wide receiver.”
    “That’s Simon. He’s neck-deep in the art world, you know. He got back to me right away, said eight Sarah Elliotts are worth in the neighborhood of eight to ten million dollars.”
    Lily stared at him blank-faced. She was shaking her head. “That’s unbelievable. No,