Don't Be Afraid by Rebecca Drake

causing this reaction.”
    “So who did it?” Richard said in his typical blunt fashion when he deigned to join them. Amy had seen him in conversation with a good-looking blond woman, but then he’d caught her eye and made his way over to them. She tried to suppress the little flutter of excitement she always felt in Richard’s presence. “Pure sex appeal,” Sheila had declared. “They should bottle him.”
    “They don’t know who killed her,” Amy answered him. “But they think it might be her ex.”
    “Ultimately, she couldn’t escape him,” Penelope said in a mournful voice. She wore a voluminous purple dress that covered her billowing figure and ended somewhere around her ankles. “Men are such shits.”
    Charlie sniffed loudly, looking offended, but Richard gave her a short, hard smile. “I don’t think the shit factor is limited to the male species, Penny.”
    “It’s Penelope,” the woman said. “I don’t like Penny, I never have.”
    “Too small a name?” Richard said.
    Penelope sniffed. “I’ll see you tonight,” she said and stalked away, her dress gently swaying against her large hips.
    Audrey tittered and slapped at Richard’s arm. “Oh, that was cruel.”
    “Only if you think there’s something wrong with being large,” Richard said. He managed, as always, Amy thought, to keep everyone at a distance, maintaining the illusion that his interest in everything extended only as far as his own amusement.
    Amy spotted Detective Juarez talking to Douglas. She wanted to move closer, hoping she could overhear that conversation, but Jackson blocked her view.
    “You gave my name to the police?” he demanded.
    “They asked me for the names of Sheila’s friends,” Amy said, but he cut her off.
    “You should have asked me first,” he said, scowling. “I don’t need police calling and asking me questions.”
    “I’m sorry,” Amy said, “but they asked me for names.”
    “So you served all of us up as suspects?” Charlie said. “Thanks a bunch.”
    “I’m sure you’re not suspects,” Amy protested, but she knew it wasn’t true. They were all suspects until Sheila’s killer was caught. She wondered again about Trevor. Could he really have taken those photos? It seemed so unlike the man that her friend had described.
    “I thought you said they were looking for Trevor?” Audrey said. “I don’t want them asking me questions. I’m no good with that sort of thing. I feel guilty when I haven’t even done anything. This is all so, so strange.”
    Poppy Braxton hailed Amy with a fluttery wave and she excused herself and fended her way through the crowd to the older woman’s side. There was no small talk or cheek bussing with Poppy, no matter how sweetly Waspy she might look. “Meredith Chomsky just called me,” she said without preamble. “I don’t have to tell you what that means, do I?”
    “I talked to her yesterday.”
    “Well, she says you’re not doing enough. She says you promised to have the fliers for the open house done three days ago.”
    “I was a little distracted by Sheila’s murder,” Amy said, making sure the irony was in her voice.
    “I know, I know,” Poppy said. “I’m just telling you what she told me. Oh, and she says there’s still no sign on her lawn.”
    “I’ll take care of it.”
    “Today, okay?” Poppy gave her the winning smile of a skilled businesswoman. “I really don’t want to get another call from her.” She paused. “If you can’t handle it, Amy, you could turn this one over to another realtor. Everybody would understand.”
    “I can handle it.” Amy needed this commission. With the Towle sale in question, she couldn’t lose this one.
    “I hope so, Amy, because Meredith is a big client and we don’t want to lose her to another company. If you fail to make this sale, it reflects on all of us at Braxton.”
     
     
    Meredith Chomsky, née Rubin Maxwell Sloane, took another sip of her mocha latte and contemplated the