“What’s this?” Krystal glared at Sara. “You think you can shut me up with coffee?”
Sara suddenly looked as angry as Jack.
Kate leaned forward. Damn! This was like trying to deal with her uncles. She knew she’d only win them over by being on their side. “What did Jack do to you?” She heard his intake of breath but she ignored it.
Krystal’s anger was taking on new life. “He’s telling everyone that my husband killed those women.”
“Actually,” Kate said with exaggerated calm, “he’s been trying to prove the opposite. We were told that Roy was the murderer and that, since he’s passed away, we were to leave it alone. Jack insisted that we do whatever was necessary to prove his father was innocent.”
Krystal leaned back to look at Kate. “You’re a real sweet talker, aren’t you?” The way she said it wasnota compliment.
But Kate acted as though it was meant as one. “Thank you.” She picked up the newspaper. “Mind if I read this?”
“Sure. Go ahead.”
There was an adorable photo of Jack, younger than when he knew Cheryl, and a picture of Cheryl looking about twenty-five. It set the tone of the story that something was not right.
Tree Murders Solved
by Elliot Hughes
Rage. Lust. Child abuse. It’s all there in the twenty-year-old double homicide that was recently discovered in the tiny, quaint town of Lachlan, Florida. When a giant poinciana came down, two skeletons were found tangled in the roots. Sheriff Daryl Flynn of the Broward County Sheriff’s Department has now completed his intensive investigation.
The late Roy Wyatt was the town’s bad boy: dark and handsome, quick-tempered, practically lived on a big black Harley. He was in and out of jail from the time he was a teenager. Never stayed inside for long and some said it was because he could coax a peacock out of its plumage.
But one thing Roy was serious about was his eldest son, his little Mini-Me, Jackson Charles Wyatt.
Back in 1997, when Roy discovered that a teenage girl was abusing his young son by... Well, no one really knows what happened—or at least isn’t telling the sordid details.
What people do know is that twenty years later, the girl and her mother—who charged for being the town’s good-time gal—were found buried under a tree. And the property had recently been purchased by Jack Wyatt, the aforementioned son. How’s that for a cosmic coincidence?
Sheriff Flynn says there’s no proof—and never will be—of anybody’s guilt, but he now knows enough that he’s closing the case. “Sometimes a man has to do what he has to do,” he said, leaving it to the imagination of the listener as to what Roy Wyatt did or didn’t do to protect his child.
It looks like the town bad boy may have posthumously redeemed himself. But we’ll never know, will we? As Sheriff Flynn told us, “We should let the dead rest in peace.”
I say that it looks like what goes around, comes around.
When Kate put down the newspaper, her hands were shaking. Sara had moved behind her and she took it.
“This isn’t true,” Kate said. “Not any of it.”
Krystal shot a hateful look at Jack. “He’s been sleeping with her.”
Kate looked at Jack but he didn’t react. “With Cheryl? All that about the child abuse isn’t true. It was made up by—”
“Not her.” Krystal grabbed the newspaper.“Her!”She was punching it.
“Elliot Hughes is female,” Jack said but made no expression.
Kate gave him a narrowed-eye glance. So Elliot was the newscaster she’d heard he was dating? He should have told them of this complication. “That doesn’t mean—”
Krystal cut her off. She was staring at Jack. “Donna is in tears. She’s had to hear people say that her son is a murderer.” She looked at Sara. “I bet you like anything that causes her pain.”
“If you think—” Sara began.
Kate put her hand on her aunt’s arm, then looked at them. For all the softness she saw, their faces might as well be on Mount Rushmore. “Oh, the hell with all this,” Kate said, then turned to Krystal. “You have two choices. You can yell and scream and spit venom at us, or you can help us prove that Roy didn’t do it. Your choice.”
Kate got up and stalked into her room. She stood in front of the window, her arms crossed over her chest. She had to calm her own anger down. She’d spent a lifetime dealing with relatives who only knew anger. Orders. Decrees. Threats. Never any reasoning about anything.
