Shades of Twilight by Linda Howard Page B

side of the room. For at least the tenth time, Harlan Ames was recounting the event as he interpreted it, and Booley was getting heartily sick of that greasy, too-loud voice.
    He sat down beside Lucinda. “Have you found Webb yet?” she asked in a strangled tone, as more tears slipped down her cheeks. For the first time, he thought, Lucinda looked her age of seventy-three. She had always given the impression of being lean and strong, like the finest stainless steel, but now she looked shrunken in her nightgown and robe.
    â€œNot yet,” he said uncomfortably. “We’re looking for him.” That was an understatement if he’d ever made one.
    There was a slight disturbance at the door, and Booley looked around, frowning, but relaxed when Yvonne Tallant, Webb’s mother, strode into the living room. Technically no one was supposed to be allowed in, but Yvonne was family, even though she had distanced herself several years back by moving out of Davencourt into her own little house across the river in Florence. Yvonne had always been a woman with an independent streak. Just now, though, Booley wished she hadn’t shown up, and he wondered how she’d found out about the trouble here tonight. Ah, hell, no use worrying about it. That was the trouble with small towns. Someone in dispatch, maybe, had called home and said something to a family member, who’d called a friend, who’d called a cousin who knew Yvonne personally and had taken it upon herself to let her know. That was always how it worked.
    Yvonne’s green eyes swept the room. She was a tall, slim woman with streaks of gray in her dark hair, the type described more as handsome than pretty. Even at this hour, she was impeccably clad in tailored slacks and a crisp whiteblouse. Her gaze lit on Booley. “Is it true?” she asked, her voice cracking a little. “About Jessie?” Despite Booley’s own reservations about Jessie, she had always seemed to get along with her mother-in-law. Besides, the Davenport and Tallant families were so close that Yvonne had known Jessie from the cradle.
    Beside him, Lucinda gulped on a sob, her entire body trembling. Booley nodded an answer at Yvonne, who closed her eyes against welling tears.
    â€œRoanna did it,” Gloria hissed, glaring across the room at the small, blanket-wrapped figure lying on the sofa.
    Yvonne’s eyes flew open, and she gave Gloria an incredulous look. “Don’t be ridiculous,” she snapped, and purposefully strode over to Roanna, crouching down beside her and stroking the tumbled hair back from the colorless face, murmuring softly to her as she did. Booley’s opinion of Yvonne jumped up several notches, though he doubted, from the look on her face, that Gloria shared it.
    Lucinda bowed her head, as if unable to look across the room at her other granddaughter. “Are you going to arrest her?” she whispered.
    Booley took one of her hands in his, feeling like a meaty, clumsy ox as his thick fingers folded around her cold, slender ones. “No, I’m not,” he said.
    Lucinda shuddered slightly, some of the tension leaving her body. “Thank God,” she whispered, her eyes squeezing shut.
    â€œI’d like to know why not!” Gloria shrilled from Lucinda’s other side, rearing up like a wet hen. Booley had never liked Gloria nearly as much as he did Lucinda. She’d always been prettier, but Lucinda had been the one who’d caught Marshall Davenport’s eye, Lucinda who had married the richest man in northwest Alabama, and envy had nearly eaten Gloria alive.
    â€œBecause I don’t think she did it,” he said flatly.
    â€œWe saw her standing right over the body! Why, her feet were in the blood!”
    Irritably, Booley wondered why that was supposed tohave any significance. He reached for patience. “From what we can tell, Jessie had already been dead for several hours before Roanna