Free Suspicions with Murder (A Rilynne Evans Mystery, Book Four) by Jenn Vakey Page B

line and you’ll find a path,” Lisa said. “It weaves around a bit, so it’ll give you a decent run. Just stay away from the driveway or Mrs. Lewis might flay you alive. Brittney was running on a path that ran parallel to it once, but she was still visible to cars driving in. Mrs. Lewis saw her and I thought for sure she was going to get fired.”
    “She may have been good at her job, but she wasn’t exactly known for making the best decisions,” Casey said dryly. Sydney laughed in agreement, but neither said anything further.
    “So I guess she wasn’t as well liked as I thought,” Rilynne said with a playful grin. The expressions on the faces around the table ranged from guilt to amusement, but no one seemed to know what to say. “I’m actually relieved. Replacing someone who was held in such high regard by everyone else is a little intimidating.”
    Casey grinned and leaned back in his seat. “Trust me; you don’t have anything to worry about. Brittney was far from perfect.”
    She looked around hoping someone would elaborate, but no one did. Instead, they started getting up to carry the empty dishes to the sink.
    “Well, I’m going to head back to my room and see if I can dig up anything on this Ben Davis guy,” Nancy said as she made her way toward the door. Rilynne considered hanging around to try to get more out of the others, but decided that she had probed enough for one night. She followed Nancy out of the kitchen and back toward their rooms.
    “See you tomorrow,” Nancy said shortly when they neared the end of the west wing. Before Rilynne could say goodnight, Nancy stepped into her room and shut the door. Rilynne shook her head and walked to her own room, checking for anyone coming down the hall before closing the door behind her.
    After pulling off her uniform, she grabbed her phone and dropped into her corner chair.
    “Do you have any idea why Ben would be attending the event at the manor tonight?” she asked when Matthews answered.
    “I-” he hesitated. “I think you’ll probably need to ask him that one. What did the guest list look like?”
    She sighed and sank down in the seat. “I saw the chief of police and the mayor. Oh, and your friend, Ryan Carnes. There were close to fifty people here tonight, all dressed up and important looking. The party did allow me a little time to take a look around. I went through the underground tunnels, but the only exits lead back into the house. I also checked all three stair cases within the tunnel, but they’re all clean.”
    “Were you able to look around the rest of the manor?” he asked.
    “I tried, but I kept getting interrupted. I’ll have to do the majority of that while I’m working, or it could raise too much suspicion,” she explained. “I’ve made a list of several possibilities for the item used to strike her, and I’ll start examining the ones I can tomorrow. I would have started today, but I got stuck cleaning up a monstrous mess Jared Lewis made. He really is as eccentric as everyone said.”
    “We tried to warn you,” he said with a small chuckle.
    “I did get the impression that there might have been something going on between him and Brittney,” she said.
    “Like an affair?”
    “I’m not sure,” she said hesitantly. “I know he was always pulling her away from her duties for special tasks, but I didn’t get more information than that. The chauffeur insists that it wasn’t anything salacious, but it’s certainly worth looking into.”
    “He definitely wouldn’t be the first wealthy man to have an affair with a member of the household staff,” he said. “Affairs are always a good motive for murder. Either he could have killed her to prevent his wife from finding out, or the wife could have found out and killed her. I’ll see if I can find anything on my end.”
    Matthews had a point. She had worked several cases where someone had been killed due to an affair, although usually the spouse was killed. Either