The Bad Daughter(20)
“Well, you know,” Melanie said. “It’s hard to tell for sure.”
“Can I see him?”
“Sure.” Melanie moved toward the staircase. “Landon! Kenny’s here.”
There was no response.
“You might as well go on up.”
“Great.” Kenny was halfway up the stairs when he stopped and turned back toward Robin. “Nice meeting you.”
“You, too.” Robin watched him disappear at the top of the stairs, heard the door to Landon’s bedroom open and close. “He seems like a nice boy.”
Melanie shrugged.
“It was thoughtful of him to come by.”
“I guess.” She started back toward the kitchen. “You feel like some ice cream? I think there’s some in the freezer.”
“Ice cream sounds great,” Robin said.
“It’s nothing fancy. Just plain old vanilla.”
“Vanilla’s my favorite.”
“Really? Mine, too. Guess we’re related, after all.” She scooped the ice cream into two small bowls, then tossed the now-empty container into the garbage bin under the sink.
The sisters resumed their seats at the table, the only sound the scrape of their spoons against the sides of the ice cream bowls. “Do you think Kenny’s right that Dad and Cassidy will somehow pull through?” Robin asked after a silence of several minutes.
“Well, Cassidy’s young and she might stand a chance,” her sister said. “But Dad was shot multiple times from close range, once in the head. To be honest, I don’t know how he’s managed to hang on this long.”
“Can I ask you something else?” Robin asked.
“Can I stop you?”
Robin smiled in spite of herself. “Was he different?”
“What do you mean?”
“After he married Tara. Did he change?”
“You mean, did he cheat?”
“No. I meant change, in general. Wait. Why? Did he?”
“Who knows? Maybe. There were rumors…”
“What kind of rumors?”
“You know the kind.”
“That he was cheating?”
“Well, there are no videos, if that’s what you’re after.”
“Had Tara heard the rumors?”
“Beats me. We weren’t exactly confidantes.”
“But you lived in the same house, you managed to get along…”
“Maybe because we minded our own business,” Melanie said pointedly.
Robin felt fresh stabs of anxiety poking at her chest. “I can’t imagine Tara putting up with Dad cheating on her.”
“Yeah, well, she wasn’t exactly Miss Innocent in that department, from what I understand.” Melanie got up from the table, gathering the empty dishes and depositing them in the dishwasher.
“What are you saying? That Tara was cheating, too?”
What’s good for the goose…
Melanie shrugged.
“Does Sheriff Prescott know about this?”
“I can’t imagine he doesn’t.”
“Holy shit,” Robin said.
Melanie slammed the dishwasher shut. “That pretty much sums it up.”
CHAPTER EIGHT
Robin had just slipped into her nightgown when her cell phone rang.
“Blake?”
“Alec,” her brother said.
“Where are you?”
“In my apartment. You?”
“I think this might actually qualify as hell.”
“Which means you’re home. Congratulations. You’re a better man than I am, Gunga Din.”
“Are you coming?”
“Are you crazy?”
“Tara’s dead.”
Silence.
“Alec? Are you still there?”
“Tara’s dead,” he repeated, his voice flat, without inflection.
“She died this morning without regaining consciousness.”
Another silence, longer this time. “So she never talked to the police. They don’t know who…”
Robin heard the despair in his voice. “Despair or relief?” she heard Melanie whisper in her ear. “I’m so sorry, Alec,” she said, pushing Melanie’s imagined voice out of her mind. She knew her brother still harbored feelings for his former fiancée, even after all this time and despite everything. He would never…He could never…
Robin filled him in on what had happened since her bus arrived in Red Bluff. She refrained from telling him about the recent rumors regarding both their father and Tara, not sure how he’d react.
“Dad’s still hanging in there, I take it?”
“He’s a tough old dog,” Robin said.
“So Tara dies and he survives. Figures.”
“Come home, Alec,” Robin urged. “I could really use the support.”
“Where’s Blake? Isn’t that his job?”
Robin had been wondering the same thing. “He’s pretty busy these days. He just can’t pick up and leave whenever—”
“Whenever his fiancée’s family gets slaughtered?”