by Gilian Baker
“Maybe it’s a woman, and she does Pilates. That sure does build up your arm muscles, let me tell ya. I’m all kinds of sore after my workout.”
Bringing the conversation back to the facts, I asked, “Did he see their face at all? Notice anything else that could be used to identify them?”
“Nope. No tattoos or piercings he could see. Nothing like that. He did get a look at a lock of hair that fell out from under their hoody though."
She fell silent, so I ended up prompting her. “So…what did their hair look like?”
“Oh, sorry. Brunette.”
“Well, that doesn’t help much. Too bad they weren’t a towhead or had their hair dyed a bright blue or something. Of course, Ross would’ve already them locked up, if that were the case.”
I tapped the side of my index finger on my pursed lips, thinking of the male brunettes I knew. Dillon’s hair was that color, and it was long enough on the sides to have come out of the hoody with strenuous movement. But he’d been at work. Several of the pottery students had brown hair, though they all wore it short. Besides that, they were mostly retired, and probably not strong enough to do the deed.
I mentally filed that information away for later. “Did he know if she was garroted from behind? It would make sense for the killer to come up behind her and take her by surprise. Otherwise, she would’ve clawed at him, which would make him easier to identify. She would’ve put up a heck of a struggle.”
“He knows for sure she was strangled from behind. The wire thing was still wrapped around her neck, embedded in her skin. Guess the killer figured they’d burn the murder weapon up along with her body.”
I gaped at her. “What do you mean?”
“Oh, didn’t you know dear? They were dragging the body to that big kiln in the back of the building. Sheriff guesses they were going to try to incinerate it and all the evidence along with it.”
“You’re kidding! Why didn’t the paper say anything about that?”
“I’m sure I don’t know.” She began picking up our paper plates and cups. “Well, this ain’t gettin’ my house unpacked. Let’s get back to work.”
But I was deep in thought. Now that I was starting to form a picture of what had happened, I speculated about motive. Paula had only lived in Aspen Falls for less than a year. What on earth could she have done in such a short time that would make someone kill her?
***
That night over supper, I asked Ellie why she hadn’t told me Dillon's reason for marrying Paula.
She shrugged her shoulders. “I thought you knew, since its common knowledge. They didn’t try to keep it quiet.”
“No. I did not, and it would have been good to know since it could have a bearing on her murder.”
I ignored the knowing looks and sly smiles that passed between my husband and daughter. “What do you know about Paula? Did she and Dillon always fight like they did in Tea & Sympathy?”
Ellie swallowed a mouthful of food. “I didn’t hang around with them much, Mom. But I’m guessing he regretted marrying her. There are rumors going around she was cheating on him, which makes me so mad. He’s such a great guy and deserves better than that.”
I leaned in closer to the table. “Who’s the other party? Any ideas? That could be the motive for her murder.”
“I haven’t heard any details, just that she’s not shy around men.”
“Well, we witnessed that the other day. Based on the reactions of the male population in the tea shop, it could’ve been any man in town. Keep your ears open, will you?”
She chuckled, “Sure, Mom.”
After a day of manual labor my body wasn’t accustomed to, I left Ellie in charge of cleaning up supper before leaving for Dillon’s, while I took a long soak in our Jacuzzi tub.
Stretched out with lavender-scented bubbles all around me, I deliberated on how I seemed to be the last to know things going on in the very community where I’d been born and raised. When I’d taught at the university, I’d been in the loop. Now I just felt like a has-been. The realization that I was less informed than an old woman didn’t help my melancholy either. Hoping to clear my head of increasingly negative thoughts, I took a deep breath and submerged myself fully under the water. It didn’t work.
Chapter Four
The brooding from last night still clung to me the next morning. I was up early as usual editing an eBook for a ghostwriting client when Ellie came into my office.
“Just wanted to say bye, Mom. I’ll probably stop by Dillon’s place again before I come home for supper.” She leaned down and kissed me on the head.
I spoke before thinking, “Doesn’t he have family and other friends who are helping out? Are you sure you aren’t getting in the way?” Emotions run high in a situation like his, and I didn’t want him pulling her back into a relationship.
“No, Mom. He asked me to stay with Harper while he makes the final funeral arrangements. He wants his parents to go with him and didn’t want to give Shelly a reason to come barging in again.”
“Okay.” I went on tentatively, “Your dad and I just don’t want it to seem like you're barging in too.” I looked up to see her facial expression.
“No way, Mom. The difference is we stayed friends after we stopped dating. We’re just buddies.” She seemed to be taking my concern in stride. “Shelly doesn’t seem to get that hanging all over him isn’t the way to get his attention.”
“Sure, I understand. Sorry for the unsolicited advice. It’s what moms do.” I smiled up at her.
That earned me a smile and another kiss on top of the head. “I know, Mom. I know.”
***
The printer spewed out page after page of the manuscript I needed to proofread for a client when I heard the opening chords of the Poirot theme song, signaling my cell phone was ringing.
It was Sheryl Buccanon, sheriff department dispatcher and town gossip.
“Hey, Jade. Sheriff wants you to come in sometime today to give a statement about Paula.”
My shoulders sagged. Why does everyone assume just because I work from home I’m available at the drop of a hat?
“I suppose so, if it’s important,” I said irritably.
“Now, you know the first forty-eight hours after a crime is the most important.”
“Of course I know that, Sheryl,” I said in a snippy tone. “What I don’t know is how I can help. I wasn’t there when the murder occurred, and I barely knew Paula.”
She ignored my protests. “Oh, and bring your clay cutting tool with you. Ross is still trying to work out if the murder weapon belonged to the studio or a student.”
I took a slow, calming breath. “Alright. I’ll be there in a couple of hours, and I’ll bring my cutting wire. Is that okay?”
“Yep. I’ll schedule you in for 3 p.m.”
I disconnected with a groan. I hated going out at that time of the day. There wasn’t quite enough time to really dig back into work by the time I’d get back, but it was too soon to call it a day.
On a whim, I texted my friend Gabby to see if she could meet after I gave my statement. Noticing the silence, I glanced over at the printer. Due to my neglect, the print tray had overfilled and the pages were strewn all over the floor.
After saying a few choice words, I gathered them up while internally grousing about my aging eyesight. The optometrist had promised I’d get used to bifocals in no time. Big. Fat. Lie. If I didn’t have them, I wouldn’t have needed to print out the pages of the manuscript in the first place. But, since dwelling on it wasn’t going to make a difference, I located a primitive red grease pencil and resorted to kickin’ it old school.
***
At 3 p.m. I walked into the sheriff station and was met with silence. I had a seat in one of the uncomfortable molded-plastic chairs and waited.
Deputy Doug Pitts came out of the area leading to the interview rooms and offices, escorting Natalie Fisher, another of Paula’s students, closely followed by Sheryl. Doug frowned at me, and
then pursed his lips like a little old lady who has just found neighborhood kids walking across her lawn.
A beat later, Ross came out of the same door and called me back. I couldn’t help noticing the relief on Doug’s face as I walked by him. I was pleased too. Neither of us wanted to sit in a tiny room together.
I could hear the clip-clop of Ross’s cowboy boots on the cement floor of the hallway as we walked back to his office. Once we were seated, we engaged in the usual friendly chatter for a couple of minutes before he opened one of his desk drawers and pulled out a sheet of paper.
Even though everything was now digitized, Ross’s computer monitor held an impressive layer of dust, announcing to all that the current sheriff was a luddite. Sheryl no doubt typed up his chicken-scratches onto the appropriate form later.
After grabbing a pen, he looked up at me and asked when I’d started taking pottery classes from Paula.
“Oh, I was one of the first to register, so I guess a couple of months or so now.”
“How well did you know her? Did you socialize with her outside of class?”
“No. We’d say hello of course, if we saw each other in town, but I doubt we had much in common.”
While he was distracted with filing in the form, I decided to ask a few questions of my own. “Do you have any suspected motives yet? I’ve been racking my brains about what she could have done in the short time she’d been here to become a target for murder.”
He peered up, his ink pen hovering above the paper. “No, but it’s early still.”
“You know, I heard she was cheating on Dillon. That could be the motive.”
Ross looked up from writing with his forehead wrinkled. “Who told you that?” He poised his pen again, ready to scribble down my words.
“Ellie told me last night. We were in Tea & Sympathy when Paula and Dillon had a doozy of a fight. I bet her infidelity was the cause of it.”
“Could you hear any of it?”
“Unfortunately, no.”
“Huh. Dillon didn’t mention a fight." He looked up from his scribbles. “Who was she supposedly having the affair with?”
“Ellie hadn’t heard any names, just that Paula was exceedingly friendly with someone other than her husband.”
“Oh, I’m sure you’ll be able to sniff it out.” He smiled to himself.
“Watch it, mister, or I won’t tell you the rest of what I know.”
He held up his hands in mock surrender.
“Did you know, for example, that they had to get married?”
“Yep.” He smiled.
Well, shoot.
“Did she get along with everyone in the class? Any clashes there?”
“Yeah, we all liked her.” Something nagged at my mind as I made the statement. “Oh, wait. I did see Paula having an intense whispered discussion with Betty Garber last week. Erm… must have been on Friday. It didn’t seem to be about pottery.”
He inscribed more notes on his form.
“You know…” I started slowly, the thought forming as I spoke, “with the kind of reputation Roger Garber has, maybe he was Paula’s lover. That would explain the exchange between Betty and Paula.”
Ross didn’t seem impressed. “Do you know why they moved here by any chance?”
“All I know is what she and Dillon told me. She mentioned the first day of class it had always been her dream to open her own studio, and that Aspen Falls seemed like the ideal location since it was Dillon’s hometown.”
“What was Dillon’s explanation?” he asked, his facial expression serious.
“He said it was spur of the moment. What do you think would cause a quick decision like that? Moving is always a pain, let alone when you have a two-year-old. Besides, I’d have thought Cheyenne a better location to sell pottery.”
Ross fiddled with his pen. “You know, I’ve been questioning that myself. Why not stay in the capital where there’s more people, more art? We do get some tourist trade, but I wouldn’t have thought it better than staying where she was. So it wasn’t Dillon’s idea? He didn’t want to move back home?”
“According to him, it was all her idea. And honestly, I’m not sure he got his way about anything.”
“Hmm,” he said as he scribbled on his form.
“Do you think it was one of Paula’s students? Or maybe the killer was trying to make it look like one of the students. Or, he hadn’t planned to kill her, so he just grabbed whatever was handy.”
I reached down to pull my clay tool out of my purse. “Oh, which reminds me.” It caught on something, causing a dried piece of clay to fly off in an unknown direction. “I was told to bring in this.”
After handing it to him for inspection, I sat on the edge of my chair. “So obviously there weren’t any fingerprints on the murder weapon or you’d be talking to the person who made them, not me. Was there any DNA evidence under her nails or defensive wounds?” I looked at him expectantly.
He leaned back in his chair and spread his long legs in front of him. “There was only clay and her own skin under her nails. She’d clawed at her throat trying to loosen the tension. Fingerprints had been wiped clean from the tool.”
“What about fingerprints on other surfaces, like on the door handle?”
“Fingerprints galore. Like tryin’ to fingerprint a hotel room. But since most people’s prints aren’t in the system, we aren’t sure anything will come of the ones we took. Only fingerprints on the doorknob were Homer’s.”
“So the killer wiped everything he touched down. But anyone who’s ever watched a crime drama knows to do that.”
Ross didn’t bother to respond.
“You know what’s been bugging me?” I asked. “Why drag her to the kiln? She was already dead.”
He sat straight up in his chair. “Where did you hear she was dragged to the kiln?”
I pretended to consider who’d told me. “Oh, I don’t know. I just overheard it somewhere, I guess. There are all sorts of rumors flying around.”
“Yes, I’m sure there are.” He raised his eyebrow at me, telegraphing he knew I was covering for someone. “I can guess where you got that info. You need t’ keep it to yourself. We aren’t releasing that to the public. And while you’re at it, remind your source to keep his mouth shut too.”
With that warning, we finished the interview. As I walked to the tea shop, I discovered my mood had lifted after having my little grey cells invigorated by a puzzle to decipher. I’d also gotten just as much information out of Ross as he’d gotten out of me.
***
Gabrielle Langdon, affectionately known as Gabby, was tall, dark and gorgeous—in other words, everything I wasn’t. She’d been the lawyer for Christian’s construction company and my online business ever since moving back to the village after a stint as a criminal lawyer in the city. Now, in her early thirties, she’d settled into a shared practice with her father, Aspen Fall’s other solicitor. We’d become close since working together on Liz’s case, when she’d coaxed me into investigating.
After ordering tea, we got down to the business of discussing murder.
“She was a rough diamond, but I can’t imagine being angry enough with someone to garrote them,” said Gabby after taking a sip of tea.
“I know, right?” I swallowed some tea and rubbed my throat. “And wouldn’t she have known someone was behind her? It gives me the heebie-jeebies when someone sneaks up on me.” I gave an involuntary shudder.
“Maybe she knew they were behind her, but she trusted them.”
“I’d have to feel awfully darned comfortable with someone to let them stand behind me while I worked. Although, she often had the students watch over her shoulder as she demonstrated a technique on the wheel. Maybe she was used to it.”
“And why was she there so late? Who would she have felt safe with there at that time of night?”
“Let’s see…” I started counting people off on my fingers. “Dillon, of course, maybe one of her students…though she
didn’t seem particularly chummy with any of us… and of course, whoever she was having the affair with.”
“If she was having an affair. That has yet to be substantiated.”
“Always the lawyer.” I laughed.
“We are all innocent until proven guilty.”
“But the affair is the strongest motive, don’t you think? She’d been here for less than a year, so what else could it be?”
Shelly’s voice came from behind me. “How are you ladies doing?”
I jumped. “Jeez, you scared me to death.”
Gabby, who’d seen Shelly coming, tried to hide her amusement behind her teacup.
“Sorry, Mrs. Blackwell,” Shelly crooned in a little girl’s voice. “I was just comin’ to see if you wanted more tea.”
She looked around the room and then leaned in. “You talkin’ about Paula? I reckon it was her lover who did her in.” She said in a fake whisper, “She was the type, wasn’t she? And she was out at the studio at all hours. I bet she was meeting someone there.”
Gabby and I looked at each other, not sure how to handle her pronouncement. I decided to ignore it and peeked under the lid of our tea pot. “Sure, why not?” I looked at my companion, “Same again?”
Gabby glanced at her watch. “Sure.”
“Okey-dokey. Be right back.” Shelly didn’t seem at all perturbed we’d ignored her opinion.
Once she was gone, I rolled my eyes and picked up where we’d left off. “Paula would’ve felt comfortable with her in-laws, but that seems unlikely. I can’t imagine them stooping to murder, and as for motive, is making a cuckold out of their son a good enough reason to kill her? Besides that, why would they wait to kill her at the studio when she must have dropped Harper off with them right before? I guess Joe could fit the description Phyllis gave me, though his hair is short. Stella is too short and her hair is gray.”
“You mentioned Betty talking with Paula in a secretive way. Could it be her?”
“I think it’s unlikely, though she’d probably be strong enough from working at the grain store. She doesn’t seem like the murdering type, and she doesn’t fit the description of the killer either.”
