The ice cream began to melt fairly quickly in the sun and Bellamy was like a little kid as he rushed to lick each and every drop of mint choc chip before it ran down the wafer to his fingers. Blythe chuckled as she watched him. Even Rose, who didn’t know what to make of this persistent fish-out-water act, had to admit he seemed genuine. Enough to be disarming, at least. But her PI curiosity wasn’t about to sit on the sidelines while he charmed her mom at this crucial time of her illness.

“So, how did you two first get in touch?” she asked. It was time to get to the bottom of this liaison.

“Your mother wanted a review of her affairs,” replied Bellamy. “I was uniquely positioned to grant her request.”

Rose quirked an eyebrow. “What does uniquely positioned mean?”

“Now, now,” interrupted Blythe. “Let’s leave the interrogation for another time. Try to switch off the Agatha Christie, just this once, okay, sweetheart?”

In frustration, Rose bit off an unladylike mouthful of ice cream and lobbed the remainder into the trash. It gave her brain freeze, and she had to squeeze her temples to ride out the discomfort. On to the duck pond they strode. The grassy area surrounding the water was packed with picnickers and sunbathers and dog-walkers, who had to keep their pets leashed; too many dogs had jumped in after the ducks, and the authorities had put signs up all around the enclosure. Yeah, like that had ever worked. Rose counted three dogs paddling in the shallow areas and another, a black Lab, swimming after a stick in the middle of the pond.

Blythe picked a spot over near the reeds and the old, discolored fountain feature that still spat a trickle of water. The ducks were more sheltered here, and they flocked in when the first chunk of bread crust rippled the surface.

For once, Bellamy didn’t seem bemused or out of his element as he distributed his crusts with perfect precision, landing them exactly in the path of each new bird, and making sure the same few greedy alphas didn’t hog the feast.

“When was the last time you did this?” Rose asked him.

“A long time ago—at least, that’s what it seems like.”

“In England?”

“I don’t remember. It was…”

“A long time ago. Yeah, I got that part. You seem to like it. I take it you’re more into feeding ducks than shooting them? Just an impression.”

“I wouldn’t want to kill anything for sport,” he replied. “I don’t understand why a civilized person would want to end life purely for amusement.”

“Unusual, coming from a Texan. And you spent time in Britain? I hear their Royals like to hunt things for fun.”

Bellamy narrowed his eyes out across the water. “They should set a better example.”