“Shauna!” Mrs. Tallomore raises a gloved hand and waves from the opposite side of the church’s front lawn.
Mom eases onto the wooden park bench set beneath the historic war memorial and sighs. “Help me with this, would you? She can be a lot.”
I chuckle, settling beside her. “Still?” Lucy Tallomore was a whirlwind of gossip and speculation when I was in school, starting arguments between the PTA mothers and getting kids in trouble through her incessant need to meddle. Seems she hasn’t found reason to be any different as the years have gone on.
“So glad I caught you,” the woman gushes as she approaches, gaze casting warily over me before it returns to Mom. “Frank has been meaning to pop down to the station to talk with Marty, but I wanted to ask you girl-to-girl, without all the bureaucracy and formalities.”
“Ask me what?” Mom sets her hands in her lap, one atop the other, a gentle smile on her face for the woman looming over us.
I frown at the lace frill on Mrs. Tallomore’s delicate white gloves, then catch myself before she deigns to look my way again. I shift my attention to Dad instead, who nods sagely to a small gathering of men that speak in turn near the church steps—one of whom is Lucy’s husband.
“Is it true? They found a body at that awful mess of land the motorcycle club owns?”
Mom doesn’t waver. Doesn’t blink more than once. She draws a subtle breath and answers. “Why, I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Oh, come on, Shauna.” Sally shuffles position as though eager to take the weight off her feet as well. “You don’t need to play coy with little old me.”
I opt not to offer her my seat. The more uncomfortable she is, the quicker this will go.
“Mom’s not being coy,” I assure the woman. “Dad doesn’t talk about work at home, and we don’t expect him to when it concerns the private affairs of others.”
The skin beside her eyes grows taut, yet she manages to keep a congenial expression. “Of course, not. Surely you heard about the discovery, though? It was all the talk after that fire.”
Fire?
“Everyone knows about the arson,” Mom says. “You’re right. However, I haven’t heard anything about a body. Who told you that?”
Sally wears the expression of a cat backed into a corner. “Oh, I can’t remember who exactly. I heard it one day while I was in town. You know how it is.”
“Oh, I sure do,” Mom states, one eyebrow raised.
Sally’s gaze flicks over both of us. “Well, you enjoy the rest of your Sunday.”
“Give my best to Frank,” Mom calls after the woman as she flees to the familiar safety of her circle of friends.
“Wow.” I lean back against the bench. “She has a lot of audacity asking the Sheriff’s wife to disclose police matters.”
“It wouldn’t be the first time.” Mom pops her purse open and pulls out a sleeve of gum. “Like one?”
“Thanks.”
She plops a pellet into my hand.
“Why haven’t I heard about the fire, though?”
Mom chews, putting the remaining gum back in her purse with a shrug. “I guess because they resolved the case. That commercial scrap of land the club has out on the fringes was setalight. Definitely arson, but whatever the club and your father discussed, the Sheriff’s office dropped the investigation.”
“Wonder why they did that.” What on earth could the Kings of Anarchy offer, or hold over, my father to get him to work the law in their favor?
He’s always given the impression he’d rather pluck out his nails with rusty pliers than do anything that could benefit the club—directly or indirectly.
“I don’t know,” Mom answers in hushed tones. “But I’d say it had something to do with the bodies they found.”
My eyes go wide, and I stare at this duplicitous woman while she nonchalantly chews her gum, watching the other wives.
“You’re going to drop that little nugget and then just sit there like you didn’t?” I jest.
She meets my gaze with a sly smirk. “Men sometimes forget how far their voices carry.” In other words, Dad took a work call at home and thought Mom wasn’t in earshot.
