Free Spackled and Spooked by Jennie Bentley Page A

medical examiner’s office, for autopsy, and there was no doubt what had happened, anyway. Brian Murphy killed his wife and her parents, who were in town on a visit, and before his son could come back with help, he killed himself. The gun was his, and the fingerprints on it were his as well. The boy saw his dad walk from the master bedroom to the guest bedroom, where his grandparents slept, with the gun in his hand, after the first shot had woken him up.”
    “And the police didn’t find any other reason why he might have wanted to go out in a blaze of glory? Was he sick? Depressed? Was his wife leaving him for someone else and threatening to take Patrick, and he decided if he couldn’t have her, no one could?”
    Across the table from me, Cora moved on her chair. Our eyes met for a moment before she looked down. I glanced at Dr. Ben, but he seemed to have missed the byplay. So had Derek, apparently. When my boyfriend is involved in something he enjoys, like eating, he doesn’t care about anything else. I’ve gotten used to it. Sometimes, it’s even convenient.
    “If the medical examiner found anything wrong, I didn’t hear about it,” Ben Ellis said, “and I never treated Brian, either. I only ever saw Patrick. And whatever Brian’s problems were, they didn’t extend to hurting his child. I never saw anything wrong with the boy beyond the usual childhood complaints. Measles, flu, the occasional broken bone, a few stitches from falling off a bike or out of a tree . . .”
    Cora looked over at him, a question in her eyes. Obviously she was well aware of the fact that broken bones, bruises, and cuts are common signs of abuse.
    The doctor shook his head. “The boy didn’t show any of the symptoms of abuse. He was a healthy, normal child, well-adjusted, and seemed genuinely happy and fond of his parents. I’m sure the injuries were gotten the way they said, by falling off bikes and out of trees.”
    That was something to be grateful for, anyway. What had happened was still just as horrific, and the boy was still just as alone, but at least the nightmare hadn’t gone on for long.
    When dinner was over, I offered to help Cora clean up while the men made themselves comfortable in the re cliners. It seemed the least I could do, and I wanted to talk to her. Bending over the sink, I asked softly, “Was Peggy Murphy leaving her husband, Cora? Were her parents helping her move? Is that why he killed her?”
    Cora avoided my eyes. “I don’t know, Avery.”
    “Was she having an affair with someone?”
    She shrugged, her softly rounded body moving gently under a printed cotton blouse. Cora is a very comfortable person, someone you’d have no qualms confiding in, knowing she’d know the right words to say and would make you feel better after you’d told her everything. I wondered if Peggy Murphy had felt the same way. “I don’t know that, either. Although I wondered.”
    “About what? Or who?”
    Cora hesitated. “A few months before the murders, Peggy changed. Colored her hair to get rid of the gray that had crept in, bought some new clothes, and started wearing makeup. . . .”
    I was rinsing dishes in the sink then handing them to Cora to put in the dishwasher. “Who was she seeing?”
    “I’m not sure she was seeing anyone,” Cora said. “She went to work when Patrick started kindergarten. At some antique store downtown. Part-time, so she could get home before the school bus dropped him off in the afternoons.”
    “And that’s when she started changing?”
    “A few months later,” Cora said, and shut the dishwasher door decisively. “Help me serve the coffee, Avery. I baked a cake, too. There are cups and plates in the cabinet and forks in the drawer.”
    “Yes, ma’am,” I answered, opening the cabinet door. I’d worry about Peggy Murphy and her phantom lover later.

5

    It wasn’t until we pulled to a stop outside Aunt Inga’s house—my house—on Bayberry Lane that I realized what I had