I don’t know how long we lay there, face down in the snow. The cold was seeping through my clothes. Poppy had stopped crying. At last we heard voices and one of the officers, the younger one, raced toward us.
“It’s okay,” he said, practically lifting Poppy to her feet. “It was just kids.”
“Kids with a rifle?” I gasped, getting to my feet, brushing snow off of my clothes.
“Toy guns,” the officer said. I recognized him now as Tommy Childers. He looked barely old enough to be out of high school, much less wearing a police uniform and chasing would-be snipers through the woods. “See the orange tips?”
I looked to where he was pointing. The other officer was speaking sternly to two boys about ten years old dressed from head to toe in camo. They carried what looked like assault rifles and they did, indeed, have an orange tip.
“That’s so we can tell right away that they’re toys,” Tommy explained, struggling to catch his breath.
At last the boys were dismissed. Shamefaced, they turned and trudged through the snow back down to the walking path. I could only imagine the stories they were going to tell their friends.
As the second officer reached us, huffing and puffing in the cold air, I recognized him as Andy Sykes. Fresh out of the academy, he’d been on our police force maybe six months. Behind me, Tommy knelt in the snow at Mr. Nettle’s foot just like I had done earlier. He was clearly at a loss as to what to do next.
The blood stain surrounding Mr. Nettle’s head and shoulders was turning pink in the snow.
Andy squatted near Mr. Nettle, pulled off a heavy, leather glove and checked for a pulse. Then he turned to Tommy and shook his head. Obviously Andy Sykes knew his way around a dead body.
“He’s dead.” He sounded pretty sure of himself. “I don’t see a weapon but it could be underneath him.”
“Suicide?” I said before I could stop myself. “Mr. Nettle?”
“I just want to be sure and cover all the angles, Miss Starla,” he said, flashing a quick smile in my direction. His stubbled cheeks were red from the wind and cold.
“Go back to the vehicle and notify the state boys. We don’t have a police chief anymore and I’m not experienced enough to handle this. They’re going to have to take over,” he instructed his partner. “I’ll secure the perimeter.”
Tommy stood up and nodded He was white as a ghost and looked thankful for something to do.
“I guess you might want to contact the coroner’s office, too. It’s too late for rescue.”
Then Andy turned to me. “Once I get the area secure, I’ll have to ask you ladies some questions. Please don’t leave.”
Poppy and I huddled together against the snow that was coming down harder than before.
Tommy returned shortly and the three of us stood and watched as Andy slogged through the deepening snow, expertly stringing yellow crime scene tape around the closest trees and benches. When that was complete, Andy began taking pictures from all angles with his cell phone.
“Did you ladies notice any footprints close to the body?” Andy asked, breathless.
Both of us shook our heads.
Andy nodded. “Just wanted to make sure. I didn’t see any either.”
“We didn’t hear anything either,” I volunteered.
“We were all bundled up and walking and talking so we might have missed something,” Poppy finished with a shrug.
“Perfectly understandable,” Andy assured us. “Did you see anyone?”
Poppy and I looked at each other.
“A man, I think,” I said.
“A man?”
“Yes, he was walking the wrong way on the path,” Poppy told him.
“So, coming toward you?”
“Yes.”
“Did you recognize him at all?” Andy asked.
Both of us shook our heads again.
“He was dressed for the weather, all bundled up, even wearing a ski mask,” I offered. “He didn’t act like he knew us.”
“So there should be some kind of footprints leading to...” Andy muttered to himself.
“Leading to here,” I told him. “When we passed each other, we stepped over into the path he’d made in the snow and he walked in ours. When we saw where his lead, we followed it just to see...” I explained, pointing to where we’d come through the trees.
At that point, I realized we had destroyed any footprint evidence there might have been. “Oh, no...”
“Okay, no worries,” Andy said, but disappointment was evident on his face.
Another vehicle arrived, engine grumbling. The white of the coroner’s van looked kind of a sickly yellow against the bright snow. Andy nodded to Tommy who climbed the bank and met the newcomers at the tree line.
“Let’s get you ladies out of this cold,” Andy said, gently.
Poppy and I held hands, helping each other up the bank and back into the trees. Andy hung back and I saw him speak to the doctor. Together they walked over to Mr. Nettle’s body. The corner squatted in the snow and gently rolled him to the side. I couldn’t see what was there but Andy shook his head, patted the coroner on one sloping shoulder and followed us up the bank.
Once out of the wind, inside the police issued SUV, it was much warmer. Poppy and I sat in the back seat. She hugged herself and rocked gently back and forth, keeping her eyes on the place where we had entered the trees.
Andy climbed into the driver’s seat and turned to look at us. “Okay, we’ve alerted the state police. They’ll be sending someone here soon to start the investigation,” he explained. He actually sounded relieved.
“Do we need to wait?” I asked.
“It’s hard to know what to do,” Andy confessed, his gaze following Poppy’s.
I felt so sorry for him. Something evil and dangerous had found our little town and he was no more prepared for it than the rest of us.
Chapter Four
“If you want us to wait here, we can,” I assured him. “Just let me call Barbara Ellen so she’ll know where we’re at...”
But Andy was already shaking his head, reaching for the keys in the ignition. “That won’t be necessary, Miss Starla. You have a business to run and I don’t imagine you ladies are going anywhere in this snow.”
Poppy continued to be eerily silent as he drove carefully through the snow covered streets. When we reached the diner, he opened the door for us and we slid out.
“I’m sure they’ll be by later to get a statement,” Andy said, following us into the nearly empty diner. The lunch rush hadn’t started yet and I didn’t imagine there would be much of a rush this day.
Barbara Ellen looked up when we came in with a flurry of snow and that unrelenting wind that nearly took my breath away. She was already pouring coffee in a Styrofoam cup for Andy.
“Thanks,” he said and reached for his wallet.
I shook my head. “This one’s on the house. You’ve got a long afternoon ahead of you. Take one to Tommy, too.”
“Andy, tell your mama I said hello,” Barbara Ellen said as she poured a second cup, snapped on the lid and handed it to him.
“Yes, ma’am.” He saluted us with one cup and stepped back outside into the snow. I didn’t envy him his job.
“Let’s get you two warmed up,” Barbara Ellen said. She reached for our coats and ushered us toward the closest booth as if we were children.
I didn’t want to sit in the booth. I wanted to run upstairs to my little apartment and not come out again until spring. Instead I obeyed, handed off my coat to Barbara Ellen and took the seat across from Poppy.
“You’re awfully quiet,” I whispered.
“It’s just...” She stopped and swallowed hard. “We just saw him in the diner. How could this happen?”
“Honey, they’ll figure it out,” I said, squeezing her cold hands.
“Until then, someone is going around shooting people. What if he has more targets in mind? What if it’s us? What if it’s Tom?”
“What
if it’s not?” I said, stopping her before her fears got out of control. “What if it was an accident? Don’t borrow trouble, Poppy.”
I shook my head. Even to my own ears, I sounded more like my grandmother every day.
That seemed to calm her down somewhat. “If it was an accident, why didn’t the shooter call the police, get Mr. Nettle help. He could have saved his life.”
Before I could answer, Barbara Ellen returned with two bowls of loaded potato soup and a small plate of biscuits. Motioning for Poppy to scoot over, she slid into the booth beside her.
“So what happened to Mr. Nettle?” she asked, crossing her skinny arms over her chest.
Barbara Ellen’s black hair was pulled back into a tight bun like she always wore it, a pencil tucked behind her ear. Behind those red cat’s eye glasses, her emerald green eyes pinned me to the seat. Barbara Ellen had worked at the diner for at least twenty years. Could probably run the place single handed even at the busiest of times. But right at that moment, behind her brash exterior, she looked as vulnerable and fragile as I felt.
News travels fast in a tiny town like Sugar Hill so I wasn’t surprised that she already knew pretty much what had happened. She just wanted first-hand information. I explained what we knew, telling her about finding the old mailman and then getting scared by the toy guns.
“Oh, that’s right, schools are closed,” she said quietly.
“Someone will need to call Adam,” Poppy reminded me about Mr. Nettle’s son in Atlanta.
I nodded. “I’m sure Mayor Gillespie will take care of that.”
“Can Andy handle an investigation into something like this?” Barbara Ellen asked.
“They’ve called the state police in to take over,” I told her.
Before she could respond to that, the door to the diner burst open. A blast of cold air and a mountain of snow followed Tom Brown inside.
“Tom,” Poppy called out and I was afraid she was going to leap over Barbara Ellen to get to him.
“There you are, baby,” he said, pulling her into a big bear hug. “I heard the news about Mr. Nettle on the scanner and then one of the guys on the job said you and Starla found him and...”
“It’s okay. We’re alright but I was so scared,” Poppy said, her voice muffled by his coat.
“I’ll get him some soup,” Barbara Ellen told me, patted my hand, and headed for the kitchen.
Poppy and Tom returned to the booth and Tom wanted to know exactly what had happened. For some reason, I thought maybe we shouldn’t tell everyone everything, afraid that something might get left out when it came time to tell the state police what we’d seen and heard. But Poppy was already telling him the whole story while I quietly buttered a biscuit and dunked it into my soup.
My cell chimed and when I saw Joe’s name on the screen, I swiped it to answer.
“Hello.”
“Hey, are you at the diner?” he asked.
“Yes.”
“I’m at the crime scene, taking pictures, getting information for the story. I just wanted to check on you.” He sounded breathless.
I pictured this handsome northerner, with his inky black hair and that ever present leather jacket, busy, asking questions of Andy and Tommy. I imagined him scribbling notes in the little notebook her carried, moving in that quick way of his around the scene taking pictures for the paper. This might be the biggest story in the whole county this year.
Before I could respond, he said. “The state police just arrived. I need to talk to them. I’ll stop by the diner later.”
“Okay,” I said.
He had already ended the call.
Gladys’s creamy potato soup and the warmth of the diner was finally settling in to my bones.
“I’m heading back out to the job site,” Tom said, kissing Poppy’s cheek. “Why don’t you stay here with Starla and I’ll come back by for dinner and take you home.”
She nodded and we watched him walk out the door.
“Let’s go upstairs, get into some dry clothes and try to relax a bit,” I suggested. “I’m sure someone from the state police will be here to get a statement soon.”
I told Barbara Ellen to call if things got too busy and got a stern look from her as if to say, ‘what are you talking about?’ Then she shooed us upstairs to my apartment above the diner.
Just inside the back door of the diner, a set of stairs led up to my little one-bedroom apartment. My cozy rooms were my haven, my sanctuary, and I really needed their protective walls right now.
I sold the house I’d inherited from my grandmother to help pay for the diner and moved into this apartment right after that. The wide-planked wooden floors needed some work, but they were clean. I filled the space with second hand furniture and colorful, gently used rugs that I found here and there. There was something purple in each and every room, which always made me happy. Today I unlocked the door and stepped inside, barely noticing my favorite things.
“I’ll make tea,” I said, moving into my tiny kitchen.
“Okay,” Poppy said, flopping down on the sofa.
While waiting for the water to boil, I went into the bedroom and found a pair of fuzzy orange sweats and a long sleeved pink t-shirt with a glittery star emblazoned across the chest. They sort of matched but I didn’t care. I’d already decided to close the diner early and take the rest of the day off. We probably wouldn’t have much business anyway and all of our employees needed to be safe at home before dark.
Rooting around in my clothes, I found a gray pair of sweat pants that might not be too big for Poppy. She had none of my curvy problems when it came to clothing. A gray sweatshirt completed my ensemble for her and I carried it back into the living room.
“Why don’t I get a colorful outfit like yours?” she wanted to know when I offered her the clothing.
At that moment, sirens shrieked through the air and my breath caught in my throat. What else could happen on this strange, snowy day?
“Tea. It’s the tea,” Poppy said, taking the clothes from me.
Relief flooded through me and I ran for the kitchen to turn off the stove.
I prepared two purple mugs of tea and carried them back into the living room.
“So, have you thought about which cupcakes you’re going to enter into the contest?”
“What?”
“The Winter Festival? The baking contest?” she reminded me.
“Well, I’ve been a little bit busy today,” I said. “I haven’t had much time to think about it.”
“It’s only two weeks away,” she reminded me.
“I know when it is,” I said, letting the steam from the cup caress my face.
“You don’t have to be so grumpy about it.”
“I’m not being grumpy, I’m just...
“I’m taking a hot shower,” Poppy said, interrupting me. She took her tea with her and headed for my small bathroom.
It made me happy to know that Poppy was as comfortable in my home as I was in hers.
While I listened to the water running, I remembered the flyer I’d picked up at the bank. The Winter Festival, held the last week in January every year, was originally designed to get people out of the house. Winters can be long and cold in the mountains of Virginia and the Community Trust took the opportunity to let everyone show off their crafts such as quilting, sewing, candy making and woodworking. They charged a nominal fee to rent a booth at the Armory and then took a tiny percentage of what the vendors made from the sale of their wares.
The only competition was for baking and that included everything from breads to pies to cakes. Since my specialty is cupcakes, I’d only placed a couple of times but never won. That was fine with me. The Dessert Festival, held later in the year, had always been my big goal.
This year, however, I just knew that Eva and Anna Lord and Tiffany Samples were going to enter. Since the Dessert Festival last fall, there had been an unspoken rivalry between us, a challenge of sorts. I could see it in their eyes when they
came into the diner or when we passed on the street. I could hear it in their voices when they asked if I was planning on entering this year.
“They’ve actually got categories this year,” I told Poppy who had returned with a towel wrapped around her head.
“Yeah, I saw that. You might have a chance...”
“The only one I’d be interested in entering is more of a decorating contest than a baking one,” I told her.
“You need to do it for the diner,” Polly said, taking my now empty cup and heading for the kitchen.
“I don’t imagine Eva, Anna or Tiffany have any more decorating skills than I do,” I said, listening to her making more tea for the two of us.
“You probably have more than you know,” she said, placing my steaming cup on the coffee table. “And there are always YouTube videos.”
My laughter was interrupted by the sound of heavy footsteps on the stairs leading up to my apartment, and then a loud knock at the door.
That brought both Poppy and I to our feet. I started for the door but Poppy caught my hand, stopping me.
“Who is it?” she asked, her brown eyes were big and round.
“State police, ma’am,” said a deep voice from the other side of the door. “We just need to ask you a few questions about this mornin’.”
Poppy relaxed, let go of my hand and I opened the door.
And came face to face with a man I hadn’t seen in fourteen years.
Chapter Five
“Tucker?” I gasped. “Tucker Ashe?”
“That’s Tucker with a T, Miss Starla,” he said, grinning broadly and removing his wide-brimmed hat.
My heart leaped into my throat. There was that dimple right at the corner of his mouth, that strong jaw and those beautiful blue eyes that always made him look like he was up to something.
Until fourteen years ago, he’d literally been the boy next door, sweet, good natured Tucker with those sparkling blue eyes and ready smile. A year or so older than me, Tucker had taught me how to defend myself, and listened to me cry when some boy at school broke my heart or when the skinny girls picked on me. Now, here he stood at my door in the perfectly pressed gray uniform of the Virginia State Police, stomping snow off his boots, hat in hand.
Fireside Homicide Cozy Mystery Bundle Page 3
