by Jane Hinchey
Galloway laughed. “I take it they’ve gone?”
“They have.”
“Right, so tell me about this theory of yours.”
“Was there a single earring in Noreen’s bag? Specifically, a pearl one?”
“Hang on, lemme check.” I could hear him typing, then a few seconds of silence as he read whatever appeared on his screen. “Actually, there was. Why?”
“Do you know what strikes me as odd about that?”
“What, that a woman has a stray earring in her handbag? Maybe she took it off to talk on the phone, or maybe she just lost one and took the other out, so she’s not walking around with one earring?”
“Both valid reasons.” I agreed. “But Noreen Bellamy does not have pierced ears.”
Silence for a moment, then Galloway said, “it’s not her earring.”
“Correct.”
“But you know who’s earring it is, I’m assuming?”
“I think so. What about the EpiPen and syringe? Did you get prints?”
“Nah, they’d been wiped.”
I shook my head with a sigh. “I really don’t think Noreen is the killer. Why would you go to the trouble of wiping your prints off the murder weapon and then leave it in your handbag?”
“Agreed. I’d say it was planted.”
“What does Noreen say about it?”
“She’s confessed to embezzling but categorically denies spiking Anita’s food and stealing her EpiPen. I’m inclined to believe her. There’s nothing to suggest that Anita was on to her. Noreen kept delivering altered profit-and-loss statements to the committee, and they were buying it. Noreen had no motive to want Anita dead. Plus, the committee wasn’t Noreen’s only victim. Any of her clients could have suspected she was stealing from them, what was she going to do, kill them all?”
Fair point. “And Keagan?”
“Same story. Anita, in particular, had no reason to distrust what Keagan had told them about the painting. Neither she nor the committee had been sniffing around asking questions. Plus, he’d almost finished with the reproduction he was going to give them. If we hadn’t have caught him, it would have all gone to plan, so again, no motive for him to have killed Anita.”
There was a moment’s silence, then Galloway asked, “how did it go with Lacey? You went to see her?”
“I did. I got Anita’s necklace back.” I patted my pocket where I’d tucked the pendant. Logan and Tyler would be pleased to have it returned. I filled Galloway in on everything Lacey had told me.
“So our three prime suspects are looking innocent,” Galloway said.
“I’ve got a new lead. It could be nothing, though,” I added hastily.
“Is this about the earring?”
“Yeah. I think it belongs to Mary Wilson.” Flashbacks of when I’d first gone to the historical society this morning popped into my head, and I was sure Mary had been wearing both earrings, yet when I’d returned later, only one.
“And she is?”
“The secretary of the historical society. A woman who is, it seems, desperate to be the president.”
“And you think she killed off the current president so she could take her place?” His voice belied just how far-fetched he thought that theory was.
“Stranger things have happened.” I shot back. “But finding her earring in Noreen’s bag means nothing. Noreen may have found it on the ground and picked it up, recognizing it, and intending to return it to Mary. Or Mary could have been standing next to Noreen when it fell off, and it landed in her bag. It could mean absolutely nothing.”
“I’ll ask Noreen about it, see if she knows how it came to be in her bag,” he said.
After hanging up, I pondered what I knew about Mary Wilson, and it wasn’t much. She was in her mid-sixties, a round woman with arthritic knees who got around on a canary yellow mobility scooter. I remember Anita introducing me to Mary at Friday night’s dinner, and yesterday she’d given me free rein to the society’s computer, not the actions of someone with something to hide.
Back at home, I hurried into my office and pulled up the files I’d copied on to the USB.
“What’s up?” Ben asked, hovering behind me and reading over my shoulder.
“I’m searching for anything that Mary was involved in. With the society.” I added.
“Mary was involved with all of our projects,” Anita said, hovering over my other shoulder. Between the two of them, an icy chill was snaking up my spine.
“How involved?”
“What do you mean?” I could hear the puzzlement in Anita’s voice and glanced at her. “Was Mary running any of the projects or events? What was she responsible for?” For it struck me if Mary was gunning for presidency, she’d have her finger in every pie available.
“Oh, right. Ummm, let me think. You see…” I could feel the air shift behind me, knew Anita was pacing. “Mary is a very enthusiastic member of the society.”
“So I understand.”
“But as president, I took the lead on most—if not all—events.”
“Was there any in particular that Mary was more passionate about? That maybe she pushed you to let her run?”
“Why? What are you getting at?” Ben asked.
“Bob and Ron said that Mary was keen to step up. That she had her sights set on being president of the historical society.”
“Yes, yes, that’s true,” Anita confirmed what I already knew. Then she froze and looked at me aghast. “You don’t think this was Mary? That she killed me so she could become president?”
I shrugged. “I want to know if there was anything she was working on or wanted to work on, but was denied, that pushed her over the edge. That made her take action. Against you.”
Ben nodded, crossing his arms over his chest. “You’re looking for a motive. Outside of the general ‘she wants to be president’ thing.”
“Yes. Why now? If it was her, why now? What changed?”
“And you think a clue is in the historical societies files?” He quizzed.
I turned back to the screen. “I hope so.”
“Oh,” Anita whispered. I swiveled to look at her. “You thought of something?”
She nodded, hand over her mouth, eyes wide.
“What is it?” I asked.
Dropping her hand, she said softly, “it was the carousel. The restoration of the carousel. Mary’s grandfather built it. She wanted to lead the restoration of it.”
“But?”
“But I told her it wasn’t necessary because Logan was a carpenter, and between him and Tyler, they could take care of it, we didn’t need her input.”
“Ouch,” Ben hissed.
Anita looked distraught. “How could I have been so insensitive? I remember it now. The meeting where we discussed it. Mary brought all these original photographs, taken when the carousel was first built. She was so proud. And I dismissed her. It wasn’t a priority, we had so much going on that I waved her aside and said Finley Constructions would take care of it. I didn’t even look at the photographs.”
“When was that?”
“Last month.” She pointed to the list of files on the screen. “It should be documented in last month’s minutes.”
I opened the document and scanned through the transcript of the minutes. A scant sentence had been written about the carousel restoration. “And Mary takes the minutes?”
“She does.”
“And have these been distributed? Or do you read through them at the next meeting?”
“No, they get distributed as soon as they’re ready, and we pass them at the next meeting. These were sent out last week.”
I chewed my lip. “But it wouldn’t have come as a shock to Mary. She was the one who took the minutes. But I think we can agree that the carousel was probably a stressor for her.”
“I feel awful,” Anita whispered, and Ben slung a comforting arm around her shoulders. “She worked hard for the society, and I disregarded her input on something very dear to h
er.”
“I’m going to talk to her.” Snatching up my bag and keys, I headed back out. I was reasonably confident mild-mannered Mary Wilson was our killer.
18
“Back again, dear?” Mary was exactly where I expected her to be. At the historical society. I found her in the boardroom, photographs of the carousel spread out over the large oak table.
“I see you’re working on the carousel.” I nodded toward the photographs.
“Yes, yes,” she rose to her feet and smiled. “It’s a project dear to my heart.”
“I hear your grandfather helped build the original?”
“Helped?” She stiffened. “He built it himself.”
“Sorry, my mistake.” I wandered to the opposite side of the table and looked at the black and white prints. “He was clearly a very talented craftsman.” I picked up a yellowed sheet of paper, on it, the hand-drawn design for the carousel.
Mary’s eyes locked on to the blueprint in my hand. “Yes. He was.”
“Must have annoyed you to have the project handed over to Finley Construction with no input from you.”
She sniffed. “Somewhat. Do you mind putting that down? The paper is very old, it’s quite delicate.”
“Right.” I placed the document back on the table. “Is that why you killed Anita?”
She didn’t so much as blink. “I didn’t intend to kill her. I just wanted her out of commission for a while.”
“Why?”
“So that her husband would stay home and take care of her.”
The penny dropped. “Leaving the restoration project to you. Why didn’t you want Finley Constructions to work on it?”
“It wasn’t that I didn’t want them, per se. I just wanted a say in who we hired. I wanted someone who would be interested in looking at these—” she waved at the photographs on the table. “Someone who appreciated the historical relevance, that would care. To Anita’s husband, it was just another job.”
“He didn’t want to see the original blueprints?” That surprised me. For someone undertaking a restoration project having the original design to work from would be priceless.
Mary couldn’t meet my eyes, and as I continued to study her, I realized the truth. “You didn’t give him a chance, did you? Did you even tell Anita these existed?”
“I tried to!” She exclaimed. “At the last meeting, but she was in too much of a hurry, more interested in talking about the Kelsh estate than anything else. When it was time to discuss the carousel, she just said that Finley Constructions will take care of it at a discounted rate. Before I could blink, she’d moved on to the next item on the agenda.”
“This is all my fault,” Anita whispered. She and Ben had joined me, and while I’d been talking with Mary, Anita had been studying the old photographs. “These really are magnificent, and I paid her no heed. She’s right. I didn’t give her a chance. And Logan would have loved to have seen the original blueprints. He still can. You’ll tell her that, right?”
“So, what happened? You slipped back here after Friday night’s dinner and dosed one of the noodle cups. How did you know Anita would take them?”
“I overheard her and Lacey talking. Anita said she may drop in and pick them up the next day when she headed out to the Kelsh estate, but only if no one else wanted them.”
Anita gasped. “That’s right. I did. I’d forgotten that.”
“When did you steal her EpiPen?”
“Friday night at the dinner. I was watching her and Lacey talking with you. You’d just taken a mouthful of Eleanor’s seafood surprise. That’s when the idea hit me. I could use Anita’s allergy against her. Make her sick. I knew Lacey always made a lot of noodle cups because Anita liked them so much, so that part was easy. I knew she carried her EpiPen with her everywhere, so it was simple enough to duck into the cloakroom and take it from her purse.”
“And put it in Noreen’s.”
She snorted. “Actually, no. I didn’t put that stuff in Noreen’s bag until yesterday. All this time, I thought Anita had been exaggerating when she said her allergy was deadly. I put just the tiniest drop of oyster sauce on that noodle cup. Turns out, she was right. Without her EpiPen…” she sighed. “Well, I couldn’t take it back, could I? What’s done is done. So I had to get rid of the evidence. I figured the police would be by sooner or later, so when Noreen came in, I waited until she went to the kitchen to make a coffee. I slipped the EpiPen and oyster sauce into her bag.”
“You know something, Fitz?” Ben, who’d been standing behind Mary, said to me over her shoulder. “She’s giving this up way too easily. And look how calm she is. She’s not distraught. No tears. No remorse.”
He had a point. I kept my eyes on Mary but listened to Ben and Anita, who asked, “what does that mean?”
“It means she doesn’t intend for Audrey to repeat this. Fitz, you need to get out of here.”
I stiffened. He was right. I’d been lulled into Mary’s sweet little old lady persona. Still, intentionally or not, she’d killed a woman, yet here she stood, calm as a cucumber, telling me all about it. And just as soon as I’d thought it, Mary surprised me by pulling a gun.
“Whoa!” I held up both hands, surprised beyond measure that this round, harmless-looking woman was carrying a firearm. And just where had she been keeping it?
“It’s been nice chatting, Audrey, but now it’s time to go.” She motioned with the gun, indicating I should move my ass toward the door. Digging my heels in, I stayed put.
“It’s not too late to fix this,” I said.
She laughed. “What? Turn myself in? I don’t think so.”
“The police already know about you.” I blurted. “Notice anything missing?”
“Missing? What do you mean?”
I touched both of my earlobes between my thumbs and index fingers. Holding the gun in one hand, she mimicked the move with the other, freezing when she discovered the missing earring.
“You didn’t notice, but when you stashed that stuff in Noreen’s bag, you dropped an earring.”
“Pft. Circumstantial.”
“Noreen’s in custody. Oh, not for Anita’s murder, despite your plan to frame her. She’s been skimming from her clients’ accounts. The historical societies included. And when the police took her in, they discovered the EpiPen, the oyster sauce, and the syringe. But the odd part? They’d been wiped down. No fingerprints. That made them look closer. And that’s when they found a pearl earring in her bag.”
She clenched her jaw. “Can’t prove it’s mine.”
“It’s not Noreen’s. She doesn’t have pierced ears. And I happened to notice yesterday that you had a missing earring. A missing pearl earring. I’d be willing to bet that earring has your DNA all over it.”
That rattled her. She turned her back and began pacing. With her distracted, I took the opportunity to pull the stun gun from my bag and tuck it in the back of my waistband. I’d need to get close enough to use it before she could pull the trigger on the gun. Either that or pray that she was a rotten aim.
“What was that?” She pivoted and raised the gun. “What did you just do?”
“What? Nothing!” I protested.
“Give me your bag.” She demanded. “Slide it across the table.”
I did as instructed, watched while she dug inside and pulled out my phone, squinting at the screen, seemingly satisfied that it was blank, that I hadn’t made a call. Then she threw it on the floor and slammed her heel down on it, the screen crunching under her weight.
“Hey!” I protested. “That was expensive.” And the second phone I’d been through in a matter of months.
“Doesn’t matter, you won’t be needing it where you’re going.” She jerked the gun at me again. “Get moving.”
“You won’t get away with this, Mary. Turn yourself in now, before you make matters worse.”
“Move!” For the first time in this entire situation, her voice rose, startling me, but I stood my ground. If she i
ntended to shoot me, she was going to have to do it here, not some convenient spot where she could hide the evidence.
“I’m going to see what I can do with this,” Ben said, crouching behind Mary.
“With what?” I asked, unable to see what he was up to.
“Your phone. She’s busted the screen for sure, but some components inside may still work.”
“Who are you talking to?” Mary demanded, looking behind her and then back at me.
“No one.”
Anita approached Ben, standing on Mary’s other side. “But how will you call for help if you can’t touch anything?”
“I discovered I can kinda manipulate technology, like the data itself. I don’t understand the science of it, but when I put my hand just inside a phone, I can see everything stored on the phone.”
“Really?” Anita sounded excited. “I want to try.”
“Guys,” I warned. “Now is hardly the time.”
“Try on Mary’s phone. She’s gotta have one here somewhere. I’m going to see if I can send a signal to Galloway.”
“Who are you talking to?” Mary demanded again, edging around the table toward me. Yes, come closer, close enough so I can stun you.
“You’re imagining things,” I replied. “I didn’t say anything.”
She waved the gun, and I almost lunged for it, but she wasn’t close enough. Ignoring the trickle of sweat that ran down my back and the thundering of my pulse in my ears, I tried to remain calm and not freak out.
“You’re trying to trick me.” She accused. One more step. Okay, maybe two, she had short legs.
“How’s it going?” I asked Ben, casting a quick glance in his direction before turning my attention back to the approaching grandma brandishing a weapon at me.
“Something’s happening, but I’m not sure what.” Ben glanced up over the back of the chairs. “It’s all static to me, but maybe something will get through. You okay with her?” He was watching Mary with a frown on his face.
“All good.”
“You’re doing that to try to distract me!” Mary accused. “Well, it’s not going to work, I said move!” Now she was close enough. Reaching my right hand behind my back, I grabbed the stun gun while simultaneously reaching forward with my left to seize her wrist and jerk her arm up, so the gun was aiming at the ceiling and not at me.
