Maple Syrup Mysteries Box Set 1: Books 1-3

by Emily James

  Oliver took the turn out of Sugarwood’s driveway a little fast, and I grabbed onto the door handle to steady myself. If I’d known he was that kind of a driver, I would have suggested I follow him in Russ’ truck. Fast turns wouldn’t have made me edgy on clear, dry roads, but we’d had another snow last night, and the roads could still be slick. Just because Oliver grew up with snow didn’t mean he knew how to drive safely in it, and I really didn’t want to end up in a ditch with him. That would definitely set people talking.

  An aqua-colored car pulled out of the Sugarwood driveway not long after us. It was the only one I’d seen all day. Our tour bookings were half of what Russ had on record from last year.

  Who could I have hurt badly enough that they’d do this to all of us? To Noah?

  Oliver hit the brakes a bit late for the red light and an empty soda bottle and a hand-sized rectangular box slid out from under the seat. I nudged the soda bottle back and touched my heel to the box to do the same.

  The blue color and the size—close to the length and width of my palm—made me stop. It looked a lot like the chocolate-covered raisin box left on my porch. But that was silly.

  A zing hit me in the chest. Unless it wasn’t silly.

  Oliver smelled like gasoline, even when he wasn’t wearing his work clothes, and I’d gotten a fume headache when I stepped into the barn the day I found Noah. Oliver had a reason to hate me. He had the technical knowledge to sabotage the reverse osmosis machine and Mark’s truck, and he’d had access to Noah’s keys. And he’d been with Russ when I asked him to take my dogs because I was afraid of someone poisoning them.

  I tried to make it look like I was kicking the discarded box back under the seat as well while trying to shift it for a better look at the box to see if it had the smiling chocolate-covered raisin. If it was the same box, I could jump out of this truck and run before the light turned green. If I was wrong about Oliver, the worst that would happen is I’d look crazy. Most people in town thought I was a heartbreaking floosy anyway, so crazy seemed like a step up.

  I squished the box too hard between my heel and the arch of my other foot. It popped up onto its side, flashing the smiling chocolate-covered raisin image at me.

  And drawing Oliver’s gaze.

  My gaze met Oliver’s, and the expression on his face, like a falcon that’d spotted its prey, told me more than the box did. It’d been him all along.

  22

  I hit the button on my seat belt with one hand and reached for the door handle with the other. My seatbelt released, but the door stayed closed. I yanked again.

  “Doors automatically lock when the truck’s in drive,” Oliver said, his voice overly calm, as if I hadn’t just tried to leap from his vehicle.

  Some trucks had those tiny sliding windows in the back windshield. I glanced back, and my chest caved in. His rear window was solid.

  The aqua car from Sugarwood pulled to a stop behind us. I could try to signal the driver for help, but they’d probably only think I was waving at them.

  I turned back to the front. The light turned green, and Oliver hit the gas, pushing me back against the seat. I snapped my seatbelt into place. As little as I wanted to be here with him, I wanted to be thrown through his windshield even less.

  “This was only supposed to be about getting pictures I could send to Mark, showing you cheating on him,” Oliver said. “I already sent him an anonymous text telling him you were. But now that you’ve figured it out, I’m going to have to get rid of you and the drunk I hired to take the photos.”

  My head spun and my stomach went queasy like I was carsick even though I’d never struggled with motion sickness before. Being in a car with someone who wanted to hurt you was one of the worst possible scenarios because you were trapped. I had to keep a clear head. I had to find a way out. Otherwise, not only would I be dead, but Mark would think another woman had abandoned him.

  My mouth was dry enough that I had to lick my lips before I could get any words out. “You’ve planned all this carefully up until now. That means you’re smart enough to realize that spur-of-the-moment murders are sloppy murders. You’ll get caught.”

  Oliver’s slow blink-blink sent a shiver over my arms.

  “I am smart. Smarter than you. All I need to do is disappear as well and send Mark a text from your phone telling him you’re running away with me. I can easily start over anywhere, and with the reputation you have in Fair Haven, no one will think you didn’t take off with me.”

  I pressed a hand over my mouth and swallowed down bile. Would Mark believe it? It wouldn’t matter to me either way—I’d be dead—but it’d destroy him if he did. As if not dying wasn’t a strong enough motivator, that thought alone gave me an extra reason to need to escape.

  Except all Oliver needed to do was keep the doors locked, and he’d be able to overpower me when we stopped. In a space where I could move, I knew enough about self-defense that I might be able to fight him off and run. In the truck, he could use his superior size and strength to pin me and crush my windpipe, and I wasn’t going to be able to stop him.

  I could try one more tactic to talk him out of this, but it seemed like a vain hope. “Why would you want to hurt Mark that way? I thought you liked him. And Russ.”

  “This isn’t about hurting them.” Oliver squinched his nose up. “It was about hurting you and taking away the things you care about the same way you took away the things I cared about. My job at the police station. The one relative I had who was worth something. You’re the one who had to be nosy about that box and wreck everything.”

  As if I’d asked to be taken out into the woods and murdered. Talking to him was not going to work, but I wanted to know one thing in case I didn’t make it out of this. “If it was all about hurting me, then why kill your own cousin?”

  “Shut up.” Oliver’s voice was so cold that it sent an image of him torturing me before killing me spiraling through my head. “Noah betrayed me. I asked him to help me sabotage Sugarwood so you’d lose the farm, and he refused. He said he’d go to the police if I did anything. I’d already cut your sap lines, so he didn’t leave me a choice, either. I knew he’d figure it out.”

  His failure to kill Noah outright showed some remorse. I could capitalize on that. “Noah only wanted what was best for you. He knew that if he helped you, you’d both eventually be caught.” That wasn’t going to be enough to convince him to let me go. Maybe if I showed him that I’d help him and make up for what he thought I’d taken from him. “If you stop now, I’ll testify at your trial and ask for leniency. And the job at Sugarwood will still be yours when you get out.”

  Oliver laughed—actually laughed—but it sounded more like dry bones rattling together than it did like joy.

  There was no way this was going to end well unless I found a way out of this truck.

  If I could find something to smash the back windshield… I glanced at it again.

  The aqua car was still behind us. It was farther back and small now, but it was definitely still there. Like it was following us the same way Elise had been following me before when she thought I’d had something to do with the attack on Noah. The odds that it was Elise, though, were slim. She had no reason to be spying on me now.

  Even if it wasn’t Elise, even if it wasn’t actually following us, it was a witness, and a witness meant a way out, but I’d have to act before we came to another intersection where that car could turn off.

  If I’d shown any skill at all since coming to Fair Haven, it was that I knew how to run a car off the road.

  I grabbed the steering wheel and yanked. The truck swerved to the right, and Oliver swore, calling me names that would have made my ever-proper mother punch him in the nose.

  The wheels hit the shoulder, and the momentum tugged the car closer to the ditch. I pulled at the wheel again, but Oliver was ready for me this time. He held tight and smashed his fist into the crook of my elbow.

  My arm went numb down into my fingers. I los
t my grip with that hand.

  I wouldn’t win against him in a battle of strength.

  I let go of the wheel and clawed at his face. The truck jerked left, and then started spinning.

  The scream ringing in my ears must have been mine. I doubted Oliver would sound that much like a girl.

  The back of the truck smashed into something and flung me sideways as far as the seatbelt would allow. The airbags deployed.

  The next thing I knew, the truck had stopped, and I felt dizzy and queasy and like someone had punched me in the face.

  You have to get out of the car, the voice of reason yelled in my head. Get out or he’ll kill you.

  I released my seatbelt, but all my movements felt too slow and clumsy. Maybe it wouldn’t matter. Maybe Oliver had been knocked unconscious.

  A hand twisted me around by the hair and shoved me back against the door. Oliver had released his seatbelt as well. Blood ran from the corner of his lip, and one eye was already beginning to swell.

  He pinned me with his body weight before I could kick out at him. His hands closed around my neck.

  Where was the other car? No one in Fair Haven would see a crash and drive past, would they?

  I tried to scream, but I couldn’t get air. His fingers dug in, sending lines of pain down my throat and up my neck and into my face. Black stars flickered in my vision. I shoved against him, but he didn’t even budge.

  And all I could think was that Mark was going to have to autopsy my body and how that might destroy him, too.

  Shouting came from outside. A woman’s voice.

  A woman wouldn’t be able to overpower him. He’d kill her, too, and it would be all my fault, like all of this was my fault.

  I scratched at his face again, dragging my nails as deep as I could. Instead of letting go, he spit at me and drove his thumbs deeper into my neck. I squeezed my eyes closed. My lungs burned like I was drowning, and the yelling outside faded farther away.

  The glass overhead shattered and shards spattered my face along with something wet and warm. Oliver’s hands fell away from my neck, and he slumped on top of me, then slid off toward the floor. I gasped in a huge breath, then another. Even that wasn’t enough.

  The door behind my back dropped away and hands looped under my arm pits.

  “Don’t look,” Elise’s voice said. “I’ll help you get out. Don’t look.”

  I could guess what had happened and what she didn’t want me to see. It wouldn’t be the first body, or even the first head shot, I’d witnessed, but I didn’t want to see another if I could help it. I kept my eyes closed and relaxed back into her hold as she dragged me out of the car and into the snow. I wasn’t in any shape to argue anyway. My throat felt like I’d eaten sand.

  “Can you stand up, or do you want to stay put?” Elise asked. “I radioed for help as soon as I saw the truck swerve. That’s when I figured it out.”

  I opened my eyes. She crouched next to me, in her uniform, and the aqua car sat parked in the middle of the street. Her personal car, based on the Proud Mom of an Honor Student sticker on the bumper.

  I probably could stand, but I wasn’t sure I wanted to try yet. The cold snow actually felt good against my undoubtedly bruised body.

  Elise sank down into the snow beside me and rested her head back against the truck’s fender. “I ordered him to stop, but he wouldn’t. I thought he was going to kill you.”

  The shell-shocked tone to Elise’s voice snapped me out of my own bubble. This was her first investigation. If she’d worked in Fair Haven her whole career, it was likely the first person she’d shot, let alone the first person she’d killed.

  “You had to do it. He was going to kill me.” I slid an arm around her shoulders and ran a hand over my neck where his fingers had gouged my skin. Even the light touch ached. “He was supposed to be taking me to the hospital. He said Noah died. But then once I was in the car, I figured out that he was the one behind everything.”

  “That’s what the hug was about,” Elise said, her voice a mixture of comprehension and exhaustion. “The text to Mark was a set up.”

  So Elise following us hadn’t been a coincidence. She had been spying on me, thinking that text spoke the truth. Her distrust had saved my life, but instead of feeling grateful, I felt very alone.

  I lowered my arm and scooted sideways a touch. “I wouldn’t cheat on Mark.”

  The daisy chain of events crashed down on me. Oliver sabotaging our sap lines and reverse osmosis machine, injuring Russ and Nancy. Oliver attacking Noah because he refused to help him and then framing Stacey and Tony. Oliver plotting to destroy my relationship with Mark. All of it on my shoulders, and yet none of it truly my fault.

  “I didn’t even cost Oliver his job at the station. Erik fired him because he violated protocol.”

  Elise moved close and put her arm around me this time. She smelled like rosemary shampoo, and in a strange way it reminded me of Ahanti, who always smelled like lavender.

  “I shouldn’t have believed that text,” Elise said. “Mark didn’t even want to show it to me, but I was there, on my way to work, when it came in, and I grabbed the phone when I saw the look on his face. I’ve had trouble with trust ever since my ex left, but that’s no excuse. I was wrong.”

  Sirens blared in the distance. If I kept this up, I’d be on a first name basis with the paramedics as well.

  I leaned my head into Elise’s. I’d take her apology and keep my friend. At least I didn’t have to wait for the paramedics alone.

  23

  It turned out that Oliver had been telling the truth about Noah’s passing. I’d hoped that he’d made that up as well, even though his original plan had been simply to get pictures while taking me to the hospital to see Noah’s body. It’d seemed too cold even for Oliver that he’d exploit his cousin’s death that way, but he had. I’d never been hated with that level of intensity before.

  With Oliver gone, Russ took over arranging Noah’s funeral, and he and I split the cost. Mark had invited me to attend the funeral with him and Elise—Meagan and Grant were working, since Cavanaugh’s was the only funeral home in town—but I’d thought I should go with the Sugarwood employees. Many of them had known Noah for years, and it felt like I should show solidarity with the ones who hadn’t quit us during the trials Oliver created.

  Mark and Elise came and stood with our Sugarwood group at the graveside after the service, and Mark took my hand, a public declaration of our new status. I prayed it wouldn’t be the last.

  With all that’d happened in the past couple of days, I hadn’t had a chance to talk to Mark alone about the text Oliver sent, the one that told him I was cheating on him.

  The way he stayed by my side suggested he hadn’t believed it, but that might simply be because Elise had told him it was a lie rather than because he’d never believed it. I’d experienced more than once that one of Mark’s flaws was jealousy, and there was a difference between I never believed it and I believed it until someone told me I shouldn’t. To me, that was an essential distinction.

  As everyone left the graveside and headed for their cars, I held Mark back. “We need to talk.”

  Mark’s hold on my hand loosened almost imperceptibly, but I felt it all the way down to my core. “I don’t like the sound of that. Do I need to be worried?”

  I didn’t know how to answer.

  I’d had too many people in my life that I couldn’t trust, starting with my dad. I knew I could trust Mark—he’d earned it multiple times over—but I also needed him to trust me. Because if he didn’t, it said something about the type of person he thought I was. I didn’t want him looking at me the way I now looked at my dad.

  If he did, it doomed us. If this relationship was going anywhere, he had to be the person in my life who believed the best of me rather than the worst.

  Mark dropped my hand completely. “Maybe we should go somewhere else for this conversation.”

  He mimed to Elise that he was riding with me. We
rode in silence, and as we passed through the center of town, I considered driving in circles and apologizing to him and pretending like it didn’t matter. I hadn’t thought to ask him where we should take the conversation, so I drove us to my house. If this went badly, at least I wouldn’t have to drive myself home while crying.

  The dogs mobbed us as soon as I let them out of their crates, but they quickly settled in on their doggie beds with their toys.

  I motioned Mark to the couch and kept enough distance between us that our legs didn’t touch. Past experience had taught me that I didn’t think clearly when Mark touched me. I wanted a clear head.

  My throat refused to swallow. It felt like I’d tried to eat a pillow whole. “Did you…” My voice hadn’t shaken this hard since the last time I tried to speak in front of a jury. “Did you believe the text message that said I was cheating on you?”

  The statue-like rigidity in Mark’s body relaxed, and he brushed the hair back from my face with the fingers half hidden in the splint for his broken wrist. “That’s what you wanted to talk about? I thought you were going to break up with me.”

  For a second, I forgot what I’d been saying. I’d been in a place before, with Peter, where I let my physical reactions overwhelm my common sense and instincts. I couldn’t start another relationship that way. I turned my face away from his touch. “This matters. Elise believed it.”

  She’d apologized again when we were at the hospital, but it’d still left a sting in my soul. And left me wondering what would have happened to me if she’d written me off and had gone back to tell Mark what she’d seen rather than tagging along to try to get photographic evidence.

  “Nikki,” Mark’s voice was soft, “I know you better than that now. The only reason I believed the rumors about you and Erik was because some of the situations we were in made it seem like you were with him. I never once thought you were involved with Noah or Dave or anyone else.” He turned my face back toward him. “I know you better than that.”