“Any news?” she whispered.
“Not yet. The guy who might’ve seen Naomi’s car isn’t exactly credible. Turns out he was out night hunting, and it wasn’t for turkeys, which are about all that’s in season now. But not at night andnot with a rifle. Both illegal.” He checked his phone again. “I’m waiting for a call.” His phone buzzed in his hand. “Okay, here we go. Moment of truth.” He turned and walked out of the door.
Nikki wasn’t about to be left out. She made her excuses and left as soon as she could break away.
“You’ve got Mom,” she said to Kyle, as Charlene, intent on talking to Blanche, was moving through the crowd more quickly than Nikki could have imagined.
“Fine,” Kyle said. “We won’t be here long.”
“Don’t count on it.” Charlene was in her element, making small talk, mingling, putting on a sad face, even though she’d hated Mavis Greenlee in life. However, today, the stingy, adulterous, self-centered Mavis, who had neglected her parents, was an angel on her way to heaven. While some people seemed genuinely saddened by her passing, or even appeared to be taking heart in her rising to the pearly gates, others were quietly gossiping. Over the clink of silverware and glasses, Nikki heard, in the hum of conversation, Naomi’s name mentioned more often than not, and some were even speculating on the other murders as well.
“I’ll call you later,” she promised her mother. “Kyle will take you home.” She was rewarded by a dismissive wave of Charlene’s gloved hand.
Good enough.
Nikki was out the door of the stuffy building. Spying Pierce waiting near his Jeep, in the shade of a magnolia tree near the edge of the parking lot, she hurried to where his Jeep was parked. As she reached him, he said, “I figured you would want to come out to the river.”
“The river?” she repeated.
“At the bend near the old Cranston place … That’s where a drone spotted a submerged car this morning.”
“Oh.” She felt a thrill of excitement, with a heavy measure of dread. “Naomi?” she asked.
“Unknown. But the car is white and looks like a Mercedes.”
Her heart nose-dived. She’d hoped Naomi would reappear, but this sounded bad. “Oh, no. Do you think—?”
“No need to speculate.” Then he heard his curt tone and cleared his throat. “It doesn’t look good, but we don’t know yet. Let’s go. Divers are there now, the tow truck on its way.”
“That point in the river is close to Knox Quinlan’s place,” she thought aloud and mentally calculated the distance, figuring it was less than a mile as the crow flew.
Pierce gave a curt nod, having apparently already reached the same conclusion. “Right.” He opened the door of his Jeep. “Coming?”
“No. I’ve got my car here. I’ll drive. Kyle’s in charge of Mom.”
“Bet he loves that.”
“Right. But it’s his turn.” After all, Kyle had been virtually missing in action for years. “I’ll call Lily and let her know that I might be late.”
“Good.” He turned to leave, but she caught him on the elbow.
“And this is my story, right?”
“That’s what you’re worried about?” he asked.
“No. But it’s my job. You do yours, no matter what the circumstances, no matter how distasteful. And I’ll do mine.”
“Fair enough,” he agreed, as she released her grip on his sleeve. “But I can’t control the situation if other reporters are there. These days, information spreads like wildfire.”
She couldn’t argue that point. But she could get to the site on the river and watch the car being dredged and report it to their online content via her phone if she couldn’t get a photographer out to the spot. Either way, she couldn’t get a story to press ahead of what would be a flood of information over the Internet, but at least some of it would display under her byline for theSentinel.
Pierce was already leaving by the time she climbed inside the warm interior of her rental and rolled down the windows and slipped on her sunglasses.
Before she left the lot, she turned on the air-conditioning and called her sister to sketch out what was happening. “… it’s all on the down-low for now,” she said.
“Oh, dear God. Naomi?”
“No one knows yet.” Nikki put the car into reverse. “I could be a while.”