Page 22 of A Murderous Crow
The truth was, I was just a country-bumpkin farm girl who knew how to thrift where the rich people lived so I could cosplay as one of them.
Last night had definitely opened my eyes to just how out of my league I was.
There was no reason not to call the police. The more I thought about it, the more it freaked me out that Corbett had been so… cavalier aboutnotcalling them. Like, in what worldis it more convenient to dispose of a dead body yourself versus just calling the police and telling them the truth about what had happened?
I made myself some sunshine in a cup. A warm and comforting peach tea blend I’d found in one of the Savannah tea rooms that a client had insisted on meeting at.
My hands trembled and shook, and I didn’t know what to do with all of this except go through the motions of making my tea, and go sit with things for a while. Tomorrow was Sunday, and while there was usually plenty of business to keep me going seven days a week, I was religious about taking Sunday off, even though I wasn’t a subscriber to any one particular church or faith.
I had been raised Christian, but I didn’t really belong. My family was religious, and my mother and father attended church on Sundays, but I didn’t think they really cared about it so much as they cared about my grandmother andherlove of the church.
I hadn’t been raised the kind of stringent Christian – church three days a week, youth group, and all of that kind of mess – but more of attending on holidays and with my grandparents when they had me for the weekend.
I didn’t think Corbett Prescott would survive setting foot inside a church. Given what I’d learned about him last night, he was the devil himself, and to do so would set the church ablaze – he would be fine.
Still, my main concern in all of this wasn’t him or even me. My primary concern was how I was going to keep going at the clip that I was in order to pay Uncle Sam to keep my family’s farm out of hock or whatever.
You see, my granddad was a good farmer. He grew and sold some of thebestpeaches South Carolina had to offer! What he was not was a businessman, or good with numbers – and we haddiscovered, after his passing, that the farm was in trouble when it came to the back taxes that were owed on it.
My mom and dad had taken on the management and day-to-day operations, but farming wasn’t what it used to be. It’d been a long, long time since the farm had turned enough to supportallthe things, and for some reason, my grandpa had decided the taxes were the thing that could wait… and wait… andwait, and wait, and wait.
We needed money to make regular payments, and to keep those payments up, or Uncle Sam would take the whole thing. Thus I put myself through college and took on the challenge of keeping our heads above water.
I was handling it – but barely – and I was getting to where there was a glimmer of light at the end of the tunnel. But it had required that I become the best at what I do, and to maintain being the best, you had to put in the work. I didn’t know if I could afford the distraction that was Corbett Prescott and thisindentured servitudehe seemed to delight in having me under.
While I didn’t know what I was going to do, I knew what I wasnotgoing to do – and that was panic. I was so not going to panic. Not yet, anyway.
I’d juggled so many things in the past that this was just one more thing, and I could do it. I was sure I could do it… But lord, I needed to stop, take a minute, and breathe. I couldn’t fully assess what juggling this would entail until I knew what it looked like, and so far, it looked like I didn’t have to really do anything until Corbett called. Lord knew when he would do that.
At least, hopefully, not any time soon.
I curled in the corner of my overstuffed, boneless couch and stared into the faux flames of the space heater in the fireplace, my hands wrapped around my mug of steaming tea as though a blizzard blew outside.
I was definitely in the freeze portion of fight, flight, freeze, or fawning, and freeze was okay for right now. I knew that I had plenty of fight left in me should it come to it. I wasn’t about to fawn, and there was no running. My family’s legacy depended on me staying right here and following through.
Chapter Twelve
Corvus…
I picked up my phone off my desk and texted SavannahDavenportwhile turning her real name in my mind…Kittridge.It soundedvaguelyfamiliar, but for the life of me, I couldn’t place it.
I tapped out my request, read it a time or two, considering it. I wanted to draw her in further, so I softened the wording and moved one of my pawns on the board.
What’s your calendar look like for Friday night at 8pm?
I stared at the screen, waiting, waiting, and just as it tried to go black, it lit up with a return message.
Irritated, I unlocked the phone again and tossed my head back, exasperated that it was a spam message and not from her, just as the device buzzed in my hand, alerting me to another message.
I have a client showing at 7pm, depending on how long that takes, I may still be with them at 8.
“I am not an unreasonable man…” I muttered, but still, she intrigued me.
So soon after last week?I asked her.
Time is money.Her response made me bark a laugh.
Touché. Meet me at The Olde Pink House at 9. Dress for dinner, valet your car.
