St Kilda Consulting 01 - Always Time to Die

way in the years to come.”
    The other man nodded. Like Josh, the priest knew that many of the citizens in the state were Catholic. Any good deeds done for the Catholic church by the governor would please a lot of voters.
    “May I come and talk with you as I did your father?” Roybal asked.
    “Unlike the Senator, I’m content in my religion,” Josh said easily. “If that changes, I’ll seek your counsel.”
    Roybal was young and ambitious, but he wasn’t stupid. He accepted the refusal with grace. “I will keep your family in my prayers.”
    “Thank you, Father.” Josh took Anne’s elbow to help her over the frozen earth toward the hearse. “Prayers are always welcome.”
    Carly watched the state’s first couple head toward the relative warmth of the hearse, followed by the Protestant minister and the Catholic priest. Each man of God had his own modest car. Vehicle doors opened and closed in a series of sharp noises.
    She glanced at Winifred hopefully. The old woman was looking into the grave with an odd expression on her face. It could have been regret or even pleasure. It could have been indigestion. Carly didn’t know Winifred well enough to judge. But if Carly had to bet, she’d go with a grim kind of pleasure.
    “Carly?” Andy said. “Why don’t you ride back with us? There’s plenty of room. We could talk about family and things.”
    Winifred shot him a black look. “I’m paying her, not you. When I want her to interview you, I’ll tell you.”
    “Hey. Indentured servitude is passé,” Andy said. “She’s a fully grown woman. She can talk for herself.”
    “She certainly can,” Carly said distinctly. “Thank you for the offer of a ride, but Miss Simmons y Castillo and I have a lot to discuss before I’ll be ready to interview family members.”
    “I won’t be here long,” Andy warned.
    Thank God. Carly managed a smile. “Telephones work for me.”
    “They aren’t very personal.”
    “Handicaps just make a job more interesting.”
    Andy’s blue eyes narrowed. He turned and stalked after his parents.
    Winifred laughed, a sound almost as rusty as a raven’s warning cry. “Just like the Senator. Doesn’t think there’s a female alive that won’t spread her legs for him.”
    Carly hesitated, then decided that it had to be covered sometime, and now was as good as any. “My research hinted that the Senator was rumored to be very, um, sexually active when he was young.”
    “He lifted every skirt he could get his hands on, and he got his hands on most. When he was too old to perform, he got those erection pills and kept at it until he died.”
    Carly’s eyebrows rose. “He managed to keep his romantic life out of the media.”
    “Romance had nothing to do with it.” Winifred’s thin upper lip curled. “Lust, that’s all. The reporters always knew how he spent his nights and lunch breaks. But back then, a politician could fornicate with anything willing or unwilling and no one said a word. Then Clinton came along.” Winifred made a dismissive gesture. “By that time the Senator was on his way out of elected public life. Stories about his shopgirls and prostitutes weren’t news anymore.”
    Carly made her all-purpose sound that said she was listening. It was what she was best at: listening.
    And remembering.
    “Who are those people?” she asked, looking beyond the fence. “The ones who didn’t come to the graveside.”
    Winifred looked at the couple waiting patiently just outside the gate. “Pete and Melissa Moore. Employees. He’s the Senator’s accountant. She’s the housekeeper.”
    The one who forgot I was coming?
    But Carly didn’t say it aloud. The Senator’s death must have thrown the household into turmoil. She would find out when she met Melissa if there was anything deliberate in the oversight. Carly hoped there wasn’t and at the same time was prepared for the opposite. It wouldn’t be the first time she hadn’t been welcomed by some members of the household whose history she’d been hired to record. An important part of her job was to disarm hostile people, getting them to relax and open up to her.
    “Well, no need to stand here freezing,” Winifred said. “Leave the diggers to finish their work. Then I’m going to buy some shiny red shoes and dance on that philandering bastard’s grave.”
    The old woman marched toward the waiting car with the stride of a woman decades younger than her nearly eighty years.
    Carly glanced for the