Death Before Facebook

turned to Sugar. “Mother, did you call Nina?”
    Hebert shook her head.
    “I’m going to get her to come over.” He left in as much of a flurry as he’d arrived in.
    Glad to get out, probably, Skip thought. Something about him didn’t strike her as intensely filial.
    She and Sugar got back in the car. “How are you feeling?” she asked.
    “Kind of numb. I wish Reed were here.”
    “Tell me about her.”
    Hebert looked dumbstruck. “Tell you what?”
    “What she’s like. Where she’d go if she needed a safe haven.”
    “A safe haven?” Sugar pondered, as if unsure what the words meant. “That just isn’t Reed. People would come to her to be safe.”
    “Does she have friends?”
    “Nina. The woman my son’s calling. She works for us at the restaurant—she’s kind of Reed’s assistant.”
    “You mean her secretary?”
    “Oh, no. I mean her right-hand woman. She was Reed’s maid of honor.”
    “Does Reed have other friends?”
    Sugar thought. “Not really. She’s pretty busy with Sally and Dennis and the restaurant and everything.”
    “How about Dennis?”
    “Oh. Well. His business partner. They run a nursery— Dennis likes plants. Like his mother-in-law.”
    “Ah,
you
like plants.”
    “Flowers. I paint them.”
    “Tell me something, Mrs. Hebert. If you were someone outside the family, how would you describe Dennis and Reed?”
    “A lovely, hard-working young couple. Absolutely devoted to their little girl. Arthur would never give Reed credit—” Her eyes flashed and her voice started to rise, but she stopped. “I guess that’s family business.”
    Skip let it go for now. She could afford to be patient; before she was done, every secret the Heberts had, every scrap of “family business,” was going to be picked over and examined.
    “Could you do me a favor? Could you step outside with me and point out your car? And Arthur’s and your daughter’s?”
    “There’s mine over there. And Arthur’s in the driveway.”
    “I’d like you to show me Reed’s.”
    Sugar opened the car door. “I’ll try.”
    It was dark now. But when she noticed, apparently for the first time, that most of the neighbors were outside, she retreated back to the car. “I don’t think I’m up to it. Is that all right?”
    “Sure.” Skip could get Grady to do it. “Do you have a picture of Dennis and Reed?”
    “Inside—shall I go get it for you?”
    “I can get it.”
    “It’s on the little table in the living room.”
    “How about one of Sally?”
    “In my purse—on the table in the foyer.”
    Skip found the purse, checked it for weapons, and asked Paul Gottschalk to photograph and dust it. While he did that she went in to get a good look at the dining room, to fix the crime scene in her mind, and then found the picture of Dennis and Reed.
    It was a wedding picture that showed only faces—Reed’s radiant, surrounded by tulle, Dennis’s a little daunting. Reed was a classic Southern beauty, natural-looking with straight brown hair and straight white teeth—teeth whose straightness had not come cheap, Skip imagined, but the orthodonture was worth it.
    Dennis was another matter. His features were very distinct, his lips generous, his eyes intense. He had a little baby fat like the young Brando that softened him, made him slightly vulnerable. But there was something brooding about him.
    Heathcliff,
Skip thought, but a man who liked begonias—or whatever he had at his nursery—didn’t fit the stereotype.
    For now, she left the photo, giving Paul a little time to get it dusted, and retrieved the purse.
    She went back to Sugar. “May I borrow the picture?”
    “Of course.” But she hesitated.
    “For the investigation,” Skip said, and Sugar nodded. “May I see the one of Sally? And could you check your purse to see if anything’s been stolen? I looked, but I didn’t see a gun. Do you carry one?”
    Sugar gave her a quizzical look. “No. Arthur says…but never mind. I don’t.” Quickly, She checked her credit cards, checkbook, and money. “Everything’s here,” she said and drew from her wallet an Easter snapshot of a pretty towhead in a pink dress. The girl was holding a basket of eggs.
    “Can you tell me what they were all wearing? And their heights, weight, eye color—all that?”
    To Skip’s surprise, Sugar’s lip started to tremble. She tried to control her face, but lost the battle. An anguished rasp escaped her, not quite a sob. “Sally!” she managed to