Sweat Tea Revenge Read Online Free PDF

to find true love. But who doesn’t want love? To experience the thrill and heart-thumping happiness that it brings? Wanting to love someone, to be in love, was certainly nothing she could hold against Delaine.
    “Now what’s Delaine going to do?” Haley wondered.
    “She’ll be in mourning for a decorous period of time,” said Drayton. “And then she’ll find herself another boyfriend.” He popped a bite of scone into his mouth and peered at Theodosia. “Don’t you think?”
    “Probably,” said Theodosia. But what else was Delaine supposed to do? Shuffle around in an ankle-length black hopsack dress and light candles under the moonlight? Mourn her lost fiancé until the end of time? Hardly. Life goes on. Albeit at a somewhat slower pace when one resided in Charleston.
    “Have you spoken to Delaine?” asked Haley.
    Drayton raised his eyebrows at Theodosia. “I’m pretty sure that question was directed at you.”
    “Yes,” said Theodosia. “She called me last night.”
    “How was she holding up?” asked Drayton. He really did have a spot of sympathy for Delaine. But he was the stiff-upper-lip type who prided himself on displaying the minimum allowable amount of emotion.
    “She’s miserable and angry and sad,” said Theodosia. “And absolutely furious at Tidwell.”
    “Is Delaine really a suspect?” asked Haley.
    “I think we’re all suspects,” said Drayton.
    “Anyway,” said Theodosia, “if there’s a very weak bright spot in all of this, it’s that Delaine has finally accepted Granville’s death.”
    “She’s dealing with the harsh reality,” said Drayton. “Processing it.”
    “Poor Delaine,” Haley said again. “I really do feel sorry for her.”
    “My sympathy also lies with Detective Tidwell,” said Drayton. “Even though he questioned a number of people, there isn’t much to go on. If Granville’s death was, in fact, a murder.”
    Haley looked puzzled. “I thought you guys said somebody conked him on the head with one of those fat glass paperweights.”
    “Could have been an accident,” said Drayton. “He could have been, um, imbibing in his drug of choice and the paperweight rolled off and hit him.”
    Could it really? Theodosia wondered. Did heavy glass paperweights just levitate off the shelf of their own accord? And then strike someone’s cranium with such brute force that his brain was mortally compromised? No, she thought not. It had to be murder. The big question was, who was the mysterious killer who had insinuated his way into Granville’s room?
    Could it have been the mysterious guest in room 314? Or had there been a secret enemy among the downstairs wedding guests? Someone who’d sneaked up the back stairs and dealt that deadly blow? Or was it someone else? Theodosia knew it could be someone from Granville’s not-so-distant past who wanted to settle a score. An angry, unhappy client perhaps, or someone involved with DG Stogies, his cigar store venture.
    But cocaine was involved, Theodosia mused. So it must have started out as a druggie rendezvous. From the looks of things, Granville had sat down with someone for a chummy, prewedding toot of coke. Of course, the presence of cocaine seemed to add an extra element of danger. But who in Granville’s or Delaine’s inner circle might have been—or still was—a drug user? Or, worse yet, a drug dealer?
    “Tell me about the cocaine,” said Haley, almost as if she’d been reading Theodosia’s mind.
    “It was spilled on the table,” said Drayton. “And there was white powder under Granville’s nose.”
    “Wow,” said Haley. “That’s crazy weird.” She thought for a moment. “That tells me Granville wasn’t straight at all. He was kind of out there. A doper.”
    “Obviously,” said Drayton, rolling his eyes.
    “Maybe he got the coke from his stepson,” said Haley. “What’s the guy’s name again?”
    “Charles Horton,” said Theodosia.
    “That’s awfully harsh, Haley,” said Drayton.