Meltdown in Christmas River

by Meg Muldoon

  But Liv having his baby?

  That was lower than the sandy bottom of Crater Lake.

  Moira had dragged all of our names through the mud, the way she’d dragged so many names through the mud over the years.

  But she wasn’t going to get away with it.

  Not this time.

  I lumbered through the downtown neighborhood streets like Jack Torrance at the end of The Shining – minus the ax but with bad intentions, all the same. The snow was already up to my knees, and heavy, dense flakes were still falling. I was having trouble seeing more than a few feet out in front of me, and a bitterly cold breeze blew hard into my face. My legs were going numb, but I hardly noticed.

  I had my anger to keep me warm.

  It was six blocks to Moira’s little house from the station. Six long blocks. But I was going to get there, come ice, snow, white-out conditions, or Kris Kringle himself.

  Along the way, I rehearsed what I was going to say when I saw that wrinkly, bulldog face of hers.

  I know it was you, Moira.

  What is wrong with you?

  How dare you do this to—

  Just as I turned down her street, my phone let out a muffled buzz from the pocket of my down jacket.

  I struggled getting my mittens off to answer.

  “Cin – where are you right now?” he said.

  “Walking. Where are you?”

  “At the pie shop. I was out on a call, but once I heard what people were saying, I came directly here.”

  I stumbled along through the snow, breathing hard.

  “Cin – where are you going?”

  “Where do you think, Daniel?” I said, seething anger crawling up the back of my throat as her small house came into view. “I’m going to see the woman responsible for today’s little story hour.”

  Through the snowflakes, I saw that her car was still in the driveway. A thin stream of smoke was curling up from the chimney.

  She was home.

  I picked up the pace.

  “Why don’t you stay where you are, and I’ll come pick you up?” he said in a calm, gentle voice. “You shouldn’t be walking in that weather, and it’ll only take me a couple of minutes to get there.”

  He let out a sigh when I didn’t answer.

  “I think it would be for the best,” he added.

  “No thanks,” I said. “I think I’ll just ask Moira if I can come in for a cup of coffee and some cookies – seeing as how generous she is with her hospitality and conversation.”

  The speaker crackled with another sigh.

  “I know you’re upset, Cin. So am I. But take a moment. Don’t do something you’ll later regret. We’ll get this all straightened out when I get there if you just wait for me.”

  “Moira and I are going to get plenty straight in just a minute here.”

  “Cin, I’m on my way. Just wai—”

  The line went dead.

  “Daniel?”

  There was no response.

  I supposed it was the storm wreaking havoc on the reception.

  But I’d already made up my mind anyway.

  Maybe I should have waited until he got there. I should have taken a breath. I should have stopped before I added more fuel to the fire.

  But I wasn’t thinking straight that morning.

  And, as it turned out, I would live to regret it.

  Chapter 25

  “Moira?! I know you’re in there!”

  I pounded on the front door again with my bare hands. My knuckles hurt and were turning red and blue.

  Once again, there was no response.

  She was hiding – her Hyundai was still in the driveway with its trunk open, as if she’d been getting ready to load something up and leave.

  I could just picture her in there now – sitting by the fire, having a cup of tea, enjoying the havoc she had created. Probably smiling as she listened to my angry shouts for her to open the door.

  I let out a grunt of frustration and left the front porch. I went around the side of the house to one of the windows that had its curtains drawn. I cupped my hands around my face, peering into the living room through a thin slit in the fabric.

  The flames in the fireplace were down to their last embers, casting a glow against the floral wallpaper. A cup of tea, still steaming, sat next to her ugly pink rocking chair, untouched.

  She had to be in there somewhere.

  I went back to the door, pounding again.

  Nothing.

  I’d had enough.

  She couldn’t hide from me. Not after what she’d done.

  I reached for the doorknob and gave it a try. To my surprise, it clicked and popped open.

  I waited there in the doorway for a long moment.

  “Moira?”

  I stepped into the house and stood in the living room, a strange feeling coming over me.

  “Are you here?”

  There was no response.

  I waited a few more seconds.

  Maybe it was some ray of common sense breaking through the blind rage that had turned me into a trespassing madwoman, but I suddenly felt something like shame.

  I shouldn’t have been in there.

  And despite what Moira had done, I shouldn’t be pounding on her door and harassing her like this.

  Daniel was right.

  I should’ve waited for him.

  I backed away and went out the door, closing it behind me. I walked down the front porch, flipped my jacket hood over my head, and trekked through the snow. I followed my own footprints, which were quickly disappearing in a fresh layer falling hard from the stone-colored skies.

  I felt completely out of control.

  I wasn’t normally an angry person. In fact, I couldn’t remember the last time that something had gotten to me like this. The last time I had marched over to someone’s house, started pounding on their door like a maniac, and wanted to—

  The strong aroma of roses filled my nostrils and I lost my footing.

  Before I could say the word klutz, I was falling face first into a snowdrift in Moira Stewart’s driveway.

  My bare hands sank into the snow and I let out a bitter gasp.

  The white stuff was so cold that tears crowded my eyes the second my bare skin touched it.

  I let out a grunt and pushed back, stumbling to my feet. I staggered around, clumsily trying to regain my footing.

  When I did, I leaned forward, wincing in pain at my raw, freezing hands.

  I guess the fall served me right for coming over here like this.

  I pulled on my mittens and was about to start walking when I smelled it again.

  Roses.

  I glanced back behind me.

  Something round and black was sticking out of the snowdrift.

  That’s when I realized that I hadn’t just slipped in the snow – I’d tripped over something.

  I peered down at it, puzzled.

  What was it doing out here, buried in the snow?

  Moira didn’t seem like the type who would thoughtlessly leave a good pair of shoes out in a storm. She was far too frugal for that.

  I bent down and began pulling the black loafer from the drift.

  It was heavier than I expected it to be and it didn’t seem to want to—

  I dropped it.

  I backed away, gasping like a dying fish.

  It wasn’t just a shoe.

  It was much more than just a shoe.

  My screams were lost in the storm.

  Chapter 26

  We watched as the ambulance turned the corner and barreled down the street toward us. Its blue and red lights bounced off the snow, reminding me of flashing Christmas bulbs.

  Only these held no good tidings.

  Daniel squeezed my hand.

  “They’re here now, Cin. It’s okay.”

  I didn’t see how it would be okay. There was nothing the paramedics in the ambulance could do for the woman lying in the driveway.

  Nothing anybod
y could do, for that matter.

  Because she was face-down, not breathing, with no heartbeat – a massive wound covering the back of her head.

  The paramedics now arriving didn’t need to confirm it for me.

  Moira Stewart was dead as dead could be.

  My eyes wandered back over to the lump in the snow. Though Daniel had dug her out, he couldn’t keep up with the falling snow and she was disappearing under it again.

  I shuddered.

  “She’s over there,” Daniel said, nodding to an EMT who had just emerged from the ambulance.

  “How are her vitals?” the young woman asked.

  Daniel shook his head.

  The EMT suddenly didn’t seem to be in such a hurry.

  A moment later, a Sheriff’s cruiser came zooming around the corner, kicking up snow in the street. Shortly after, it was followed by another.

  “Cin, I think it’s best if you sit in the car for now,” Daniel said. “I’ve got to talk to Lt. Delgado and update her on the situation. She’ll be taking lead on this.”

  “Why not you?”

  He didn’t look at me.

  “There’s a… well, I have a pretty big conflict of interest here.”

  I bit my lip, watching the paramedics’ slow, delayed movements as they danced around the lump.

  “Vicky will want to talk to you. But for now, you should go and get warm. We’ll take care of things here.”

  “Okay,” I finally said, numbly. “Okay.”

  Daniel opened the door of his truck for me, then slid out of his jacket and placed it across my shoulders. He reached over, started the truck up, and turned the heater up to full-blast.

  He turned the radio on and set it to a random station.

  “You need your jacket,” I said.

  “You need it more. You’re shivering, Cin.”

  I hadn’t noticed until he said it.

  “Don’t think too much about any of this, darlin.’ Try to think of something else. Anything else. About Christmas coming up or a new pie recipe or that chatty, foolish old timer you call your grandfather.”

  I tried to smile, but I couldn’t hold it.

  I was shaking too badly.

  “I’ll just make sure things are under control and then we’ll get out of here. It’ll only be a few minutes. Vicky just pulled up.”

  I nodded.

  He closed the door gently and I watched his reflection in the outside mirror as he headed back over to the body.

  It didn’t seem to matter how high I turned the heater up.

  I couldn’t stop shaking.

  Chapter 27

  I peered out through the thick film of white covering the windshield, squinting at the figure making her way down the street.

  What was she doing home?

  She should have been up at Pam Dallas’s lodge right now.

  I popped the passenger’s side door open just as a gust of wind howled into the truck. I closed my eyes against it as wet flakes peppered my face.

  I pulled my hood on and struggled to get to her through the snow.

  She was still in her pajamas and was wearing an old pink robe. She cupped a hand over her mouth as she gazed at the flashing lights of the ambulance.

  “What happened, Cin?”

  I gulped hard.

  “It’s… it’s Moira.”

  She gazed past my shoulder again, the flashing lights reflecting in her wide eyes.

  “Was it a heart attack? I know that Moira’s dad died of a—”

  “It wasn’t like that,” I said.

  Kara furrowed her brow.

  “Not like that… What do you mean?”

  I shook my head.

  “Cin – what does that mean—”

  “I found her, Kara. And it wasn’t any heart attack or stroke that did that to her. It was…”

  I trailed off, feeling a hot tear slide down my cheek.

  I was too scared to utter anything more.

  But I didn’t need to.

  Kara understood without me saying it.

  She knew that something evil had happened at Moira Stewart’s house that morning.

  Chapter 28

  All the hot peppermint tea in the world couldn’t warm me up that afternoon.

  Not after what I’d seen.

  Not after finding Moira like that, buried in the snow.

  Lifeless.

  But I kept drinking that tea anyway, hoping it would kick in. I sat at the kitchen island of the pie shop, bringing a third cup of the steaming minty water up to my lips, closing my eyes.

  “And tell me again, Ms. Peters, why did you go to Moira Stewart’s house this morning?”

  Lt. Vicky Delgado’s questions from earlier echoed in my head, along with my own poorly-worded responses.

  “I had to talk to her about... She was responsible for a rumor about Daniel. And I knew I shouldn’t have gone over there to confront her, but I was very… upset.”

  “Upset? By that, do you mean angry?”

  “…Yes.”

  “Did you see anybody else near the house or on the street when you arrived?”

  “No. But it was hard to see in the storm.”

  “Did you see Ms. Stewart’s wallet or purse anywhere, Cinnamon?”

  I shuddered, remembering the interview at the Sheriff’s Office earlier.

  I didn’t know Vicky that well since Daniel had only recently hired her as a lieutenant, but I knew that she’d come with the highest recommendations from the Portland Police Department. Daniel trusted her as an investigator, and as I answered her questions, I sensed that she was good at what she did. She seemed fair and straightforward and sensible.

  I just hoped that she hadn’t gotten any wrong ideas about me.

  Daniel had said that it was important to tell Vicky the truth about what I was doing there that morning, but I was beginning to have doubts now. It didn’t seem like the best idea to tell her just how angry I’d been with Moira. Because any good investigator worth her salt would be looking for motive in a case like this, and it just so happened that when I marched over to Moira’s house that morning, I had one heck of motive.

  And the whole town knew it, too.

  “You sure you don’t want to go home, Cin? Maybe put on some slippers and the Hallmark Channel and relax?” Kara asked, bringing the teapot over and adding more hot water to my half-empty mug. “There’s a new Christmas movie playing today. Something about a gingerbread house competition, too. It’s right up your alley.”

  “No, it’ll be better if I just keep busy,” I said, getting up and going back over to the oven, checking on the Hazelnut Chocolate pies for what had to have been the sixth time in the last ten minutes. “I can’t handle a silly romantic comedy right now, anyway.”

  “Are you sure? I don’t think that too many people are going to be stopping by the shop this afternoon.”

  She was right – the place was a ghost town. It appeared that most folks had enough sense to stay off the roads and watch the storm from the safety of their houses. I’d sent Tiana, Ian, and Tobias home for the day as well on account of the weather, and it was just Kara and me left in the shop.

  “It doesn’t matter,” I said. “I just want to keep baking.”

  Daniel was going to be at the Sheriff’s Office a little while longer to help organize the investigation, and I knew that if I stopped working, I’d start thinking about the smell of roses and that loafer sticking out from the snow and the way it felt when I grabbed it and—

  “I’m so sorry that you had to be the one to find her, Cin,” Kara said, taking a seat back down on the barstool. “You know, I bet she would have been buried out there all winter if you hadn’t come by and found…”

  She trailed off when she noticed the expression on my face.

  “Sorry,” she mumbled.

  Kara was taking Moira’s demise surprisingly well, especially considering that the two of them had been neighbors and former friends. But then again, I knew that everyon
e dealt with news like this in their own way.

  “I’m just glad you’re here with me, Kara. I thought for sure you’d be at your writing workshop all day today.”

  “I had planned on going. But then I woke up this morning with a massive headache and decided to skip the morning critique session.”

  She smiled a little sheepishly.

  “I had too good of a time at Warren’s fundraiser last night, I guess.”

  “You’re not the only one,” I said. “I think half the town’s hungover.”

  I thought of Billy Jasper. Daniel had said he’d called in sick to work this morning, and I had a feeling that that kind of thing was happening all over town today.

  “Yeah. But after I took some Advil, I felt a lot better and it ended up being a pretty nice morning at home by myself,” Kara said. “John was at work and Edna was babysitting Laila. It was peaceful. But then I heard the sirens and… I just had this feeling, you know? That something was really wrong.”

  She gnawed on her lip.

  “Did you see anybody out there on the street this morning?” I asked. “Anyone or anything unusual?”

  She paused a long moment, then shook her head.

  “No. Like I told that new lady lieutenant when she questioned me – I was in bed all morning going over some edits on my book.”

  Kara played absentmindedly with the tea bag label, staring down at the butcher block.

  “Damn Moira,” she mumbled. “Why did she have to be so… Moira? Why did she have to go and spread those nasty rumors about you? Or about me?”

  Since she’d spent the morning alone at home, Kara was about the only person in town who hadn’t heard the rumor that Daniel had stolen funds from the Sheriff’s Office and was now running away with his pregnant mistress. I had to fill Kara in on the cruel rumor.

  She glanced at me, looking uncomfortable.

  “Aw, hell – I need something stronger than tea, Cin. You?”

  “I’ve got some bourbon.”

  I went over to the cupboard and pulled down the bottle of Wild Turkey that was a staple in my Whiskey Apple pies. I poured her a glass and started looking for some ice in the freezer, but by the time I found some, she had already downed half of it.