Oven Baked Secrets (Eugeena Patterson Mysteries Book 2) by Tyora Moody Page A

chill go down my spine. He recognized her, but he’d never seen her before. I thought out loud, “I wondered if Bill recognized August and Louise’s features in your mother’s face.”
    “I guess that could be true. My grandfather’s sisters said they could even see some of August in me and my brother, especially my brother.  I think that’s why I was scared when Louise’s son showed up on Sunday. I just knew he wasn’t going to be there. There was a nurse who was really friendly to me. She told me he didn’t come to see her much.”
    So Jocelyn had been doing some homework. “You talked to Pat before seeing Louise.”
    “Yes, Pat is her name.  I talked to her a few times. When I finally got my nerve up, Pat helped me get into see Mrs. Hopkins on Sunday.” Jocelyn twisted her hands like a little girl. “Ms. Eugeena, I had gotten so close to her. I felt like she knew my mother in that photo was her daughter. I saw it in her eyes. You did too. Right, Ms. Eugeena?”
    Jocelyn’s large eyes were brimming with tears now. I looked at her then over at Carmen, who was just as teary. With Carmen being an adoptee too, I know she was soaking up the conversation and longing to look for her own biological parents.
    I nodded to give myself a chance to get my mouth to move. “I believe that Louise would want to get to know you and your mother.”
    Jocelyn wiped her eyes. “I wanted to set up a meeting for my mom with Louise. She’s been down ever since my dad’s death. I know meeting her biological mother is still on her mind. My dad tried his best to encourage her to try again before he passed.”
    Carmen interrupted. “Jocelyn, do you think William would have reacted to you like his father did to your mother? He couldn’t have possibly known anything about you or having another sibling? Do you, Ms. Eugeena? I mean it’s really very convenient that someone killed him and kind of made sure he was out of the way, if you catch my drift.”
    Jocelyn turned to Carmen. “Carmen, we’ve been best friends forever and you know me and my family. None of us would have anything to do with killing William. If anything we would have embraced him as a member of the family.”
    Carmen grabbed Jocelyn’s hands. “Of course not, girl. You know I’ve been supporting you from day one ever since we found out that Ms. Louise could be your grandmother. I’m just saying, it’s kind of weird.”
    Carmen turned to me. “I’m sorry, Ms. Eugeena, to catch you off guard like this, but I have been helping Jocelyn get to know Ms. Louise. From what I have found out about Ms. Louise she’s never worked, her family was wealthy, owning a plantation back at the turn of the last century. Bill Hopkins was a pretty popular businessman here in Charleston. Sugar Creek isn’t upscale, so you couldn’t tell it, but I don’t believe Louise was hurting for money. I suspect when she died, she probably would have left William a lot of money.”
    I responded, “It would be hard to tell from the outside that Louise did have money. The Hopkinses enjoyed the simple life and believed in investing money. I don’t think their son learned too well how to manage money.  Jocelyn, while I don’t agree with Detective Wilkes’ approach to her investigation, I guess it is smart to look more in the direction of money and who benefits from an inheritance.”
    Jocelyn yelped. “Well, that just puts this murder on me, like I’m trying to find a way to get to Louise’s money. Carmen helped me find out some family history, but I didn’t know anything about her money nor do I care. I just wanted to reunite my mother with the one parent she has left.”
    “I believe you.” I assured Jocelyn. I felt like there were a lot more questions that should be asked by the police. Like why did William decide all these years to return to Charleston? I figured when he put his mom in the nursing home, he planned to keep living his nomadic lifestyle, but William clearly had