Sara waited for an answer.
“I don’t think they were real.”
Sara knew that what they had found inside Derek Oliver’s skull was very real. “Is that what she told you?”To keep you from stealing them?she wondered.
Rachel looked confused. “I didn’t ask. They seemed too big and too gaudy to be genuine.” She paused. “What do I do about Gil?”
“You seem to really like him. And Quinn.”
Rachel looked at her teacup, then up at Sara. “I’ve had men in my life. Not many, but some.”
“Like your husband?” Sara said.
“I did what I was supposed to do,” she said softly.
Sara nodded at that. Like all women, she’d done that.
“But Gil and Quinn are different. How in the world is he single? I don’t understand. Are women stupid?”
With that question, Sara softened. She loved Gil. And she’d watched Quinn grow up. Their time with Jack had bonded all of them. “I think so,” Sara said. Rachel was waiting for more information, so Sara began doing what she did best in the world: she told a story. She told of Gil’s one-night stand that had produced Quinn and all Gil had done since then to keep his son.
Rachel listened in enraptured silence. When Sara finished, she leaned back against her chair. “That poor man.” She looked at her watch. “If I’m going to bake anything, I better go.” She stood up. “I didn’t kill Derek Oliver, and I don’t think Greer did either. She didn’t like the things he said to her, but she knew it was temporary so she could laugh at them.”
“Even when he said she was ugly?”
“Shewasugly. But that was only on the outside. Ask the others if Greer ever did anything bad to them. You will hear only good.”
“What about you and Reid?”
Rachel blinked a few times, seeming to be surprised that Sara knew about that. “It meant nothing.”
“Not to Reid.”
“We were kids.” Rachel looked at her watch again.
Sara was still seated. “What happened to Kate’s hedgehog?”
Rachel frowned. “I don’t know. She was very attached to it. Her dad said someone she loved gave it to her. When she couldn’t find it, Kate got onto Lea’s lap and cried and cried. It was heartbreaking.” She looked around the room. “I’d like to take this place apart. I figure that little animal fell down a crack somewhere. It wouldn’t mean as much now, but I’d still like to know what happened to it.” Her head came up. “Did that hideous man steal it? He saw how much Kate loved it so he took it? It’s like something he’d do.”
“He did,” Sara said. “Sort of.”
“How do you know that?”
“I can’t tell everything I’ve found out, but Oliver did take the hedgehog, so to speak.”
“What a vile man!” She took a step backward.
“Go,” Sara said. “Bake a pie for Gil and Quinn.” She thought,And I hope he overlooks that he saw you kissing Reid.
“Thanks,” Rachel said and hurried out the door.
Sara sat where she was. As far as she could tell, she had managed to get no information whatever from Rachel. Instead, she’d been the one to tell all.
But Sara’s biggest surprise was that she now liked the woman. That Rachel could see how wonderful Gil and his son were had won her over.
She sighed. Now she had to face the others and tell them she had completely and totally failed in her interview.
Eighteen
