Point Blank

broke it off because he thought your mom was too old for him?”
    “Hmm, I never thought of that. What a thought, Gordon dropping her because she was too old? He said that? Talk about the pot and kettle.” She grinned. “Well, duh.”
    Dix and Ruth left her office ten minutes after they’d entered it. Dix said to Henry O on their way out, “
    We forgot our handcuffs. Can you believe that? You keep an eye on Ms. Stanford for us, all right, Henry? Make sure she doesn’t try to make a break for it.”
    Henry O stood tall. “You’ve got to pay me more if you want me to be your deputy, Sheriff.”

CHAPTER 29
    MAESTRO, VIRGINIA FRIDAY AFTERNOON
    DIX AND RUTH could hear Cynthia Holcombe’s voice a good fifteen feet from Tara’s front door. Dix placed a finger to his lips, stepped off the flagstone walkway before they reached the Gothic columns, and walked over the snow-covered lawn toward the side of the house. “The only person she yells at is Chappy. Well, usually. I’m betting they’re in the library. Let’s go see if I’m right.”
    It was forty-one degrees under a sunless, steel-beam sky, fat snow clouds huddled over the mountains in front of them. A library window was cracked open and Cynthia Holcombe’s voice boomed out, loud and clear.
    “You miserable old codger, there’s nothing wrong with me, and Tony would never divorce me! We’ve been trying for a year to have a grandchild for you. And stop talking to my mother, she doesn’t know anything about it. Another thing, I don’t sleep with other men. How many times do I have to tell you?”
    “She knew enough to tell me you don’t like children. As for my poor son, he’s at his wit’s end, said you were lying to him, taking the pill on the sly and telling him you’re all excited about getting pregnant.”
    “I’m not on the bloody pill! Why do you keep making these things up? Are you that bored? Why don’t you consider getting yourself a life? At least go spew your venom on someone else for a change.”
    “Your mother insisted I couldn’t trust a thing you said, she—”
    There was the sound of glass crashing against a wall, then Chappy chuckling. Cynthia was panting as she yelled, “Anyone who listens to my mother deserves what they get, you hear me? You want the truth, old man? I’m beginning to wonder if I want to have a child with your weak-willed son! I can’t believe he’s even able to walk since he has no backbone. He lets you kick him around until I want to scream.”
    “Oh dear,” Ruth said.
    Dix said, “Not quite what I expected. Time to break it up before she connects a vase to Chappy’s head. Then I’d have to arrest her, and that thought scares me.”
    Ruth put a smile on for Cynthia when she jerked the front door open. “Well, what do—Dix, hello. Do come in. Oh, you. So you’re still here? Sorry, but I don’t remember your name. You’re some kind of police officer, too, aren’t you?”
    “Some kind, yes,” Ruth said agreeably. “Agent Ruth Warnecki. I believe we had lunch together, what was it, two days ago? They say memory is the first to go.”
    Cynthia said, “Yes, I’ve heard that, too. But why would I even want to remember you?”
    “Good one,” Ruth said.
    Dix said, “Ruth and I heard you and Chappy fighting from outside. You should have closed the library window.”
    Cynthia shrugged, looking completely unconcerned. “Well?”
    Dix walked right at her, and she moved at the last instant so he wouldn’t mow her down. He headed toward the library, Ruth at his side, Cynthia reluctantly trailing after them. The thing about the library, Ruth thought, looking around, was that it wasn’t a room for books, it was a room for CDs, hundreds of them, scrolled labels categorizing them—jazz, blues, three or four dozen classical composers listed by name. What books there were appeared to be the oversized coffee table sort. Dix waved her to a deep burgundy sofa. He sat on a hundred-year-old pale green brocade chair next to her. Cynthia sat opposite them, looking like she’d rather be in a dentist’s chair. Chappy wasn’t in the room. Dix said to her, “You and Chappy developed some new material. I never heard you insult Tony before. I
    ’m sorry it’s come to that, Cynthia.”
    “You’re not married to him, Dix. You don’t see him fold whenever Chappy so much as frowns at him. He can’t imagine losing his position at the bank, as if that would ever happen.”
    “What’d you throw at