Free Death of a Second Wife (A Dotsy Lamb Travel Mystery) by Maria Hudgins

celebrating a marriage right now. Can you, Lettie?”
    Lettie raised her chin, looked down her nose at Babs. “No. And before you go any further with your plans, you should talk things over with Patrick.”
    “But by Thursday, surely, this will be behind us.”
    “Thursday’s only three days away.”
    “Busy, busy! You realize, don’t you, that everything Gisele and Stephanie were planning to take care of—the bar, the wine, the coffee—all of that will have to be done by the caterers now. Unless you and Lettie could take over.”
    I didn’t answer her. I couldn’t. I elbowed Lettie and mumbled, “Get me away from here before I hit her.”
    * * * * *
    Back at the house, I found Brian and Patrick in the pool room. Patrick, fully clothed, sat on the side of the pool, pant legs rolled up and his feet on the top step in ankle-deep water. Brian was swimming laps. I wondered where he had found the swim trunks. In my heavy wool sweater I was uncomfortably warm in the room’s balmy atmosphere. Condensation dripped down the windows in rivulets, and the whole room smelled of chlorine.
    I told Patrick he needed to talk to Erin as soon as possible. “Babs is assuming the wedding will come off as planned on Thursday. Do you really think that’s wise?”
    “The wedding? Thursday?” His head jerked around. “No! Not with all this!” He stood up and stepped out of the water. “I’ve hardly had time to . . . what I mean is, I don’t think it’s a good idea now. This Matterhorn thing was cool before, but now it’s not. I’m thinking a wedding back home, maybe later in the summer, would make more sense.”
    “I agree. More of our family and Erin’s would be able to attend. And your father needs time to mend.”
    Patrick, his pant legs still rolled up, grabbed his shoes and padded across the tile floor to the stairs. Brian, meanwhile, had climbed out and grabbed a towel. He scrubbed his hair, draped the towel around his shoulders and pulled up a deck chair to face the one I had taken.
    “Where’s Detective Kronenberg?” I asked.
    “Gone. Helicopter took off a half-hour ago.”
    “How’s your father doing?”
    “It’s hard to tell, isn’t it? He’s gone all broody, but that’s getting to be his norm.”
    “So you’ve told me.”
    “This makes no sense, Mom. Stephanie’s the last person I’d expect to kill herself. There must have been something going on that we don’t know about.” Brian blew a drop of water off the tip of his nose and wiped his face with the towel.
    “What about the business? What shape is the John Deere franchise in?”
    “Aha! Damn you, Mom. You’re always a step ahead of me! That’s exactly what I’m worried about.”
    “Tell me.”
    “There’s money missing. I’ve been chalking up the sad state of our balance sheet to the economy. Sales are off. Farmers are hurting. They can’t afford to float any more loans so they can’t buy new equipment. That’s part of it, but not all of it. We haven’t actually been selling that much less than we were five years ago, but—” Brian folded one hand inside the other and cracked his knuckles, then gazed out a fogged-up window.
    “Go on.”
    “I had another accountant, a friend of mine, take a look at our books. As a favor to me. I don’t understand all the little conventions and devices those guys use, but he told me there’s money missing.”
    “How much?”
    “Maybe a couple million.”
    “Ouch!” That sounded like big money to me, but in the heavy machinery business one tractor can cost a couple hundred thousand, and most of the money on the books is in a sort of revolving credit account they call a floor plan.
    “Our business is basically bankrupt. We’re robbing Peter to pay Paul.”
    “I assume you’ve discussed this with your father.” I searched Brian’s face, his eyes, the tightness of his jaw line. My sweet baby’s forehead was developing deep lines.
    “Sure. But he doesn’t want to talk about it. You know