Free False Front by Diane Fanning

do, Mr Eagleton. My mother was murdered,’ Lucinda said.
    Mark gave her a hard stare. ‘You’re serious, aren’t you?’
    ‘Yes.’
    ‘Were you there?’
    Lucinda forced down the lump in her throat and kept her expression blank. ‘Yes. Yes I was.’
    ‘Is that when you injured your face?’
    ‘We are not here to discuss my past trauma, Mr Eagleton, but the answer is no. I only shared that information with you in hope that you would accept my sincerity and realize that I am not here to play games with you or trick you in any way. We are here to share information together and nothing more.’
    ‘When will you release my mother’s body?’
    ‘That is out of my hands at the moment. When all the necessary information is gathered for the autopsy report, you’ll be informed and a funeral home can transport the body for the service.’
    ‘I guess it’s taking longer because Mom wanted to be cremated.’
    ‘Actually, that’s not the case. We were unaware of her wishes.’
    ‘I’ll have to take your word for that, I suppose. You’re certain it’s not suicide?’
    ‘You think it might be?’ Lucinda asked.
    ‘Nothing she did would surprise me.’
    ‘What do you mean by that, Mr Eagleton?’
    ‘Please, call me Mark. When you say Mr Eagleton, I think my dad’s in the room.’
    ‘Why wouldn’t you be surprised by a suicide, Mark?’
    ‘My mother was unpredictable. Moody. Overly dramatic.’
    ‘Difficult to live with?’
    ‘Most definitely. I don’t know how my dad stood it sometimes.’
    ‘According to your father, he loved her.’
    ‘Yes. There was that. He seemed to dote on her. For the life of me, I don’t understand why. Sure, I loved her. She was my mom. But as an adult, I’ve stepped back and looked at her objectively. If she were my wife, I’d go nuts. I’d either kill myself or kill her. I couldn’t take it.’
    ‘Is that what you think happened here? Your father just couldn’t take it any longer?’
    Mark drew back. ‘Absolutely not. That was a figure of speech and besides I was talking about me and not my dad. There is no way . . .’
    ‘Are you sure?’
    ‘Oh, I see. You’ve talked to my sister, haven’t you?’
    ‘Yes, I have.’
    ‘She always took mom’s side. She thought Dad was a tyrant. He wasn’t.’
    ‘Molly said that your mother had a plan. She was about to leave your father.’
    ‘Oh, please. Where would she go? How could she possibly maintain that elevated lifestyle she enjoys so much?’ Mark paused and squinted his eyes. ‘Unless she found another man. Is that what happened?’
    ‘At this point, we have no evidence pointing to that conclusion.’
    ‘Which means you’re considering the possibility?’
    ‘We’re considering all the possibilities, Mark. What if she did have a plan . . .?’
    ‘My mother always had a plan. If it wasn’t one thing, it was another. And she never worried about the legality of any of her whacked-out ideas.’
    ‘Meaning . . .?’
    ‘When I was seventeen, she found a small stash of pot in my room. Typical teenage experimentation was all it was. But my mom was anything but typical. She offered to bankroll me if I wanted to be entrepreneurial with it.’
    ‘Excuse me?’ Lucinda asked.
    ‘She said she’d give me upfront money if I wanted to deal. She explained how I could give people good value for their dollar and be able to have all the pot I wanted for my own use at no cost.’
    Mother of the Year, Lucinda thought. ‘Was she serious?’
    ‘Seemed like it to me. She made a budget, calculated revenue projections and did a risk assessment analysis. She figured I could stay in business until I went to college with minimal risk of being arrested if I were careful. Then, she thought I could re-establish my enterprise wherever I went. She also assured me that Dad could buy my way out of any trouble I encountered. When she said that, I understood.’
    ‘Understood what?’
    ‘That she really wanted me to do it and she wanted