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  The problem with Max was that he while he loved acquiring knowledge, he wasn’t much for applying his smarts for useful purposes. He was happy working the cone-dipping machine at the Frosty Freeze and felt no compunction to actually utilize his education. Maggie found this to be maddening, but she’d discovered that no amount of encouragement heaped upon him motivated Max enough to leave the ice cream stand behind.

  “You know, I’ve been immersed in my dissertation on Botticelli,” he said. “I’ll need some time to recall my Juris Doctor.”

  “You have five minutes,” Maggie said. “Get busy.”

  Max closed his eyes and tipped his head back. Maggie turned onto Main Street, stopping at the light and trying not to give in to the anxious feelings that were swamping her.

  She wondered where Claire was now and if Sam was being nice to her. Having not seen Sam in over twenty years, she really didn’t know what sort of person he had become.

  The Sam she once knew represented everything she disliked in a man. He was far too good-looking and self-assured. He’d never had to work hard at anything in his life. He’d pretty much charmed his way through high school and into a full college scholarship. He’d gotten lucky with a job on the Richmond PD and swiftly scored a sweet gig as a detective on the force, not that she had paid any attention to the constant stories of the former St. Stanley hometown football hero. Nope, not her.

  Now Sam was back in St. Stanley and had taken the job that should have been Maggie’s late husband’s, had he lived and continued to pursue a career in law enforcement.

  Okay, that wasn’t fair. She knew it. She could even admit it. But even after more than fifteen years, she had a hard time letting go of Charlie and what their life could have been together. Charlie had been killed in the line of duty, while he was a newly minted deputy on the St. Stanley force. He had never gotten the opportunities that Sam Collins had and, whether it was fair or not, Maggie couldn’t help but resent Sam for it.

  She put on her signal and turned into the parking lot for the police station. The lot was packed, and she was forced to park at the back. That was fine. The walk would give Max a chance to get his plan together.

  “Max,” she said. “We’re here.”

  Max blinked his eyes open and blew out a breath.

  “Okay, let’s do this,” he said.

  As they got out of the car, Maggie noticed Max’s attire for the first time.

  He was wearing a vintage Yoo-hoo chocolate soda T-shirt with a splat of raspberry sauce on it, paired with khaki shorts and bright red Converse high-tops. Yep, he was the epitome of lawyerly suave. Oh dear.

  Chapter 9

  “Surely you jest,” Sam said.

  “Nope, ’fraid not,” Maggie said. She stared him straight in the eye, willing him to look away first.

  “Kid, you cannot be serious,” he said. “Are you even old enough to drink?”

  “No,” Max said. “But alcohol consumption is not a requirement when offering legal representation.”

  “Your parents are Daisy and Cooter Button?” Sam asked, as if trying to wrap his brain around the scenario before him.

  Maggie supposed she couldn’t blame him. St. Stanley wasn’t Richmond. It had been a long time since he’d lived here. It was undoubtedly going to be an adjustment to get back to small-town living.

  “Yes, sir, they are my parents,” Max said.

  He didn’t flinch at the question like he used to. Maggie was proud of him for that. It had taken Max a long time to understand that where he came from didn’t make him the person that he was. Claire had been one of the first people in town to help him see that.

  Max had spent most of his formative years by himself in the town library, reading everything he could get his hands on. Small wonder—his parents only had half a brain between them, and it was usually pickled.

  Daisy and Cooter lived in a beaten-down trailer on the outskirts of town and, while their son studied the writings of Copernicus, they spent their days trying to figure out where their next shot of whiskey with a beer chaser would come from.

  Sensing things were not good at Max’s home, Claire had helped him get his part-time job at the Freeze. When he was old enough to leave his parents, she found him an apartment on the top of the town garage. The garage was walking distance to the bus stop, which took him to the University of Richmond for his studies.

  Without Claire providing constant support and guidance, Maggie shuddered to think what might have happened to Max. Of course, as a result, Max had carried a torch for Claire from the day she discovered him trying to sleep in between the stacks in the library. Maggie was pretty sure there was nothing he wouldn’t do for the kind librarian.

  “I didn’t know they had any children,” Sam said.

  “A lot has changed since you’ve been gone,” Maggie said.

  Sam met her gaze, and said, “And a lot hasn’t.”

  Maggie felt her face grow warm. What did he mean? Was he talking about her hostility toward him? Yeah, well, small wonder. She shook her head. It didn’t matter. The only reason she was here was Claire.

  They were in a small interview room at the back of the station. Claire sat at the scarred wooden table, looking the picture of misery while the sheriff stood across from her. When Maggie and Max had arrived, Sam had risen from his seat.

  “Well, now that Claire’s attorney is present, we can get on with this,” Maggie said.

  “Was there a reason you felt you needed an attorney, Ms. Freemont?” Sam asked. His voice was deceptively mild, but Maggie could sense a trap.

  “Don’t answer that, Claire,” she said. “He’s baiting you.”

  “Why are you here?” Sam asked her. A muscle was beginning to throb in his jaw, and Maggie got the feeling he was about to lose his temper.

  “To make sure you don’t railroad my friend,” Maggie said, knowing full well this was the equivalent to waving a red flag in front of an angry bull.

  “I am not the enemy. Why is everyone treating me like I’m the enemy?” Sam asked. His voice rose in volume, and his eyebrows lowered in a full-on frown.

  Maggie just shook her head and took the seat to Claire’s right and signaled for Max to take the other.

  “Ms. Freemont, are you really going to let some teenager be your first line of defense?” Sam asked. He was holding a pencil in his hand, and he tapped the eraser against the top of the table.

  “Yes,” she said. She gave Max a fond smile. “It’s really nice of you to be here. Thank you, Max.”

  Max’s face flushed red, and he glanced down at his beat-up Converse sneakers. “Have they questioned you at all?”

  “No, I told them I wanted my attorney present,” Claire said. “Are you sure you’re willing to represent me, Max?”

  “Absolutely,” he said. His voice cracked again, and Maggie fervently hoped that this thing went no further. She could not imagine Max in a trial situation. Yes, his mind was brilliant, but what would a jury make of him? She didn’t want to know.

  “Fine, then, your attorney can be present, but not her,” Sam said. He took the seat across the table from them and pointed his pencil at Maggie.

  Maggie opened her mouth to argue, but Max held up his hand. “It’s fine, Maggie, I’ve got it.”

  “You’ve got it?” she asked. She looked at him like he’d recently fallen off his skateboard and sustained a head injury.

  “Yeah,” he said, and he tipped his head to the door. He leaned behind Claire and motioned for Maggie to do the same. In a low voice, he said, “You and Sheriff Collins don’t get along. You’ll only antagonize him if you stay, which will not help Claire at all.”

  “Are you kicking me out?” she asked.

  “Yes,” Max said. His tone made it clear that he thought he couldn’t be any more obvious.

  “I’m just going to ask Ms. Freemont some questions,” Sam said. “I’m not arresting her. You don’t need to be here.”

  Maggie narrowed her eyes at him, and then
she put her hand on Claire’s shoulder. “You’ll be okay?”

  Claire nodded. “I’ll be fine.”

  “I’ll be right outside,” Maggie said. She gave Sam one more glower, and then she turned and left the room.

  Out in the hall, the police station was abuzz. Several reporters were cooling their heels, texting away on their smartphones, while waiting to interview the sheriff. Several deputies manned the front desk, and the station hummed with the frenetic energy of something really bad happening that they were all still trying to process.

  St. Stanley was a sleepy little town tucked away in the rolling hills of southern Virginia, about an hour west of the ocean. Not much happened in the pleasant little burg to cause such a stir—certainly not murder.

  Maggie wondered how the questioning was going. She wondered if she’d be able to hear if she put her ear to the door, but then she knew Sam would probably catch her, and that wouldn’t go well for any of them.

  She took a seat on a hard wooden bench that did not invite lingering and resigned herself to wait. She needed to give Max a ride back to the ice cream stand, and she didn’t want Claire to be alone after such an ordeal.

  Her mind drifted back to the body in the library basement. Where was he now? Had the state’s crime scene investigators taken him for an autopsy? Surely, no one in St. Stanley was qualified to deal with a man found stabbed.

  Maggie felt herself suddenly sit up straighter. The knife sticking out of the man’s chest, she could see it in her mind. It had been a cake knife. Claire had arrived at her house yesterday looking harried, and she said she had forgotten her cake knife. Had the one protruding from the man’s chest been Claire’s?

  Maggie glanced warily from side to side as if someone might have overheard her thoughts. The knife wasn’t Claire’s. She was sure of that…Well, even if it was Claire’s, she was sure that Claire had not been the one to shove it into the man’s chest.

  She took her phone out of her purse and dialed Ginger’s number. Ginger answered on the third ring.

  “Lancaster Accounting, how can I help you?”

  “Ginger, it’s Maggie,” she said. “What’s your schedule for today?”

  “Light,” she said. “Why? Does this involve a sale? Did you find a better deal on sneakers than two for one?”

  “Sadly, no, on all counts.” Maggie took a deep breath. “There was a dead body found in the library this morning, and Sam Collins is questioning Claire right now.”

  “A what in the where?” Ginger’s voice was shrill. “Questioning Claire? Why? What does she have to do with it other than working at the library?”

  “Apparently, she used to know the man,” Maggie said.

  “She needs an attorney,” Ginger said. “Immediately.”

  “I’ve got Max Button in with her.”

  “Good call, he’s a genius. He got my oldest through calculus. So, what are you doing now?”

  “Waiting,” Maggie said. “Sam wouldn’t let me stay in the room with them.”

  “Sam, huh,” Ginger said. “Is he as cute as ever?”

  “If you consider rattlesnakes cute.”

  “Well, if he’s a rattlesnake, he can slither onto my porch any old time.”

  “Ginger!” Maggie gasped. “What would Roger say?”

  “Oh, honey, I’m married, not dead,” Ginger said. “I’m allowed to look at eye candy, and so is Roger. We’re just not allowed to have any of it.”

  “Sam Collins is not eye candy, at least not to me.”

  “Are you ever going to forgive him for teasing you when you were kids?”

  “That would be a no,” Maggie said.

  What she didn’t add was that it wasn’t just Sam teasing her when they were kids that made her dislike him so. What no one knew, not even Ginger, was that well before she’d met Charlie there had been a few crazy weeks during the summer after her junior year of high school where Maggie had been sure that she was in love with Sam Collins and he with her. What she would ultimately never forgive him for was breaking her heart.

  Chapter 10

  Maggie agreed to stop by Ginger’s office with more information as soon as she had any, and Ginger said she would call Joanne and fill her in on what was happening. They decided an emergency meeting of the GBGs was in order for that evening.

  The door to the interview room opened, and Sam stepped out. He gave Maggie an aggravated look, and said, “The attorney needs a minute to confer with his client.”

  Maggie raised her eyebrows.

  Sam opened his mouth as if wanted to say something, but then closed it and shook his head. Maggie thought she should say something, but she found the words wouldn’t come.

  This was the first time she’d been alone with Sam Collins in twenty-four years. So many times she had fantasized about what she would say to him if the opportunity ever presented itself. It had always involved a lovely worded tirade that would leave him feeling like a pile of dung, followed by her tossing her auburn hair and slamming a door.

  Yeah, and here she was rendered mute, not a door available to slam, and she was suffering from a seriously advanced case of bike helmet hair from this morning’s jaunt to the library.

  “Coffee,” Sam growled. “You want any?”

  Maggie shook her head. At least she could manage that. He disappeared down the hall, returning a few minutes later with a steaming mug in his hand. He knocked on the door twice and then entered, shutting it behind him before Maggie could manage a peek inside. Darn it.

  And so she sat on the bench until her butt was completely numb. Finally, the door opened and Claire came out, followed by Max.

  “Thank you, Max. You were great,” Claire said to him as they joined Maggie.

  She rose stiffly, feeling the cramps flee her legs as the blood rushed back into them.

  “So, you’re free to go?” she asked.

  Sam appeared from behind them. “For now.”

  With that, he strode off, and Maggie looked at the other two with wide eyes.

  “What’s up with him?”

  “The crime scene investigators have called him back to the library,” Max said. “Looks like they’re wrapping up over there.”

  “So, what were you able to tell him about the situation?” Maggie asked.

  “The truth. I told him the truth.” Maggie just stared at her until Claire added, “Yes, I told him I used to date the victim, John Templeton, five years ago and that I haven’t seen him since I left Baltimore.”

  “That must have gone over well,” Maggie said.

  Claire and Max exchanged a look, and Maggie knew they were shutting her out of something. Had Claire confided in Max? Well, of course, she had. He was her attorney. Maggie wasn’t sure how she felt about this, even if she was the one who had put the two of them together.

  A reporter was talking to a deputy who pointed toward them.

  “Come on,” Max said. “We need to git while the gittin’ is good.”

  He took both of their elbows and led them down the hall toward the exit. The reporter looked as if she was about to call out to them, but Max pulled them in close and started whispering nonsense.

  “Fudge ripple with hot caramel sauce covered in whipped cream with chopped walnuts on the side,” he said.

  “Sounds good to me,” Maggie said. “Are you buying?”

  “I think this one is on me,” Claire said.

  They cleared the doors with no cameras or mics jammed into their faces. So no one yet knew of the connection between Claire and the dead man. Maggie fervently hoped it stayed that way. They made a beeline for Maggie’s car. Max opened the door for Claire and then climbed in back.

  Maggie hit the gas hard, leaving the station behind, and headed back to the Frosty Freeze. Not surprisingly, at least to Maggie, they found Max’s boss standing in front of the closed window, looking particularly irritated.

  “Uh-oh,” Max said from the back seat.

  “Don’t worry, I’ve got this,” Maggie said. I
t was the least she could do, since she had dragged him out of there to begin with.

  “Button!” His boss glared at the back seat of Maggie’s station wagon. “Button, are you in there? What’s the big idea, closing during the middle of the day right before the lunch crush?”

  Maggie looked around at the empty lot and then at Hugh Simpson, the owner. He was short and fat with a bad comb-over and favored plaid pants with silk shirts, unbuttoned low and topped off with a big, fat chain around his neck. Seriously, thirty plus years had passed since the era of the Hustle, and the man still hadn’t gotten the word that disco was dead.

  “It’s my fault, Hugh,” Maggie said. “There was a small emergency and we needed Max’s legal expertise.”

  “Oh, really?” Hugh asked. “I’m sorry, but show me where it says the Frosty Freeze offers free legal advice?”

  “Sorry, Mr. Simpson,” Max said.

  He climbed out of the backseat, only stopping to mutter something low to Claire. She nodded, and then he scooted through the side door of the building, back into the ice cream stand, where he pulled up the window shade and flipped the sign to OPEN.

  “Sorry?” Hugh barked, smoothing a stray strand of hair back across his dome. “Sorry doesn’t get me my lost revenue. You are fired!”

  Max poked his head out the window, rolled his eyes and shook his head. Hugh had fired him at least once a week since he’d taken the job here five years ago.

  “We’re here to order sundaes,” Maggie said to Hugh. “Will that help?”

  “If you’re paying fifty bucks a piece for them, maybe,” he snapped.

  Maggie gasped. Her thrifty soul felt violated by the mere suggestion.

  Claire came to stand beside her. She looked wan and subdued, and a spat with Hugh Simpson wasn’t going to help her in the least.

  “Tell you what,” Maggie said. “If I can get twenty people to come here in the next hour, will you let Max keep his job?”