by Maia Chance
“Yeah, but, uh, could we not talk about this, Agnes?”
“Sorry.” I fiddled with my Diet Coke glass. “So … the police know you’re innocent, right?”
“They should, except…”
I leaned in. “Except what?”
Otis sighed. “I dunno. It seems like the detective—Detective Albright?—wants to believe I’m guilty. But they couldn’t hold me or make an arrest, because obviously they don’t have the evidence to do that.” He shook his head. “This is so surreal.”
“The police will find a more realistic suspect soon,” I said, “and then you’ll be off the hook. And it’s not like you had a motive to kill your own employee. I mean, give me a break!”
“Actually…”
My stomach went into free fall. “What?”
“Never mind. It’s nothing.”
“Don’t mind us, dear,” Lo called. “We’re from out of town anyway, so what does it matter what we hear?”
Otis sighed, leaned back, and folded his arms.
I tried not to ogle the way his biceps pressed against his sleeves. I am in love with Otis’s heart, mind, and soul, but I am not going to pretend I have a problem with his bod.
“The point is, until the police find a better suspect, I’m all they’ve got,” he said, “and that means I can’t leave town, and that means we may not be able to go up to the Adirondacks next week like we planned. I’m sorry, Agnes. I know you were really looking forward to it. So was I. The mountains are beautiful this time of year.”
Noooooooo! The trip to my dad’s lake cabin was to be Otis’s and my first getaway together. It was where I’d planned to squeeze an “I love you” out of him. Not to mention go canoeing, cozy up in front of a fire, stroll through the crisp, sunlit forest hand-in-hand, and snuggle under a pile of crocheted afghans.
Right then and there, I knew what I had to do. Since Detective Albright had put Otis at the top of his murder suspect list, I had to find better suspects.
“So,” I said in what I hoped was a nonchalant voice, “who do you think would want to kill Mikey?”
“Why do you sound so professional all of a sudden?”
“Professional?” I sipped my Diet Coke.
“Yeah. Almost like you’re planning on … sleuthing.”
“What is this, a Nancy Drew novel?”
“You tell me, Agnes.”
“Okay, fine. Would it be so bad to ask a few questions around town to see if I can dig up some real suspects for the police? Then I can clue them in on the more viable alternatives, and they’ll let you off the hook, and, um—” I swallowed. “—and we’ll be able to go to the Adirondacks.”
“Detective Albright has to be looking into other suspects already, Agnes.”
“I wouldn’t be so sure. The dude fixates on things.”
“You mean, he fixates on you.”
“No.” Yes. My ears burned.
“Hey, I’m not jealous, Agnes. I can tell Albright has a thing for you. When we ran into him at the bowling alley last week, he couldn’t tear his eyes away from your Doctor Who T-shirt, and I can’t blame him. But just because you and your Aunt Effie solved one murder doesn’t mean you should make a hobby of it. You didn’t see Mikey’s body, but I did—”
“So did we,” Hank called from the other booth.
“—and it was really…” Otis’s eyes glazed over. “It was brutal. Whoever did that to him isn’t in their right mind. If they’re capable of doing that once, they’re capable of doing it again. Poking into things would be really, really dangerous, Agnes, and I’m asking you—begging you—not to do it. Okay?”
I didn’t want to lie to Otis. And honestly, the prospect of asking around about a violent killer gave me the creeps.
Foremost in my mind, however, were all the instances I’d heard about in the news of people being imprisoned—or worse—when they were actually innocent. It happens. I wasn’t about to let it happen to the love of my life.
So, I was opening my mouth to lie to Otis and say “Okay” when blonde curling-iron curls swung into view, right beside Otis.
Well, well, well. If it wasn’t Delilah Fortune from Crumble + Fluff, peeking around from the next booth over. “Hi, you guys!” she said. “I happened to overhear your little convo. You know what? I’m going to sleuth, too. It’s just so mean that the police are treating you like a criminal, Otis.”
“Delilah,” Otis said. “Hi.”
They knew each other? And—I watched Otis smiling at Delilah—should I be concerned about that?
“Like I was telling Agnes,” Otis said to Delilah, “sleuthing isn’t a good idea. It could be really dangerous.”
“How long have you been eavesdropping on us?” I asked Delilah.
“Long enough to know you’re into Doctor Who. So. I guess we’ll just have to see which one of us is the better detective, right Agnes?”
That settled it. I was going to figure out who killed Mikey Brown before Delilah did or die trying.
Delilah stood and smiled down at Otis and me. “Oh, and I read every single Nancy Drew book when I was a kid. Twice. See you guys later—it looks like my takeout salad is up.”
She swished away toward the hostess desk, where a takeout bag sat.
Otis raked his hand through his hair. “Now two of you are going to sleuth?” he said with a groan. “This is not going to end well. Don’t do it, Agnes.”
“Wouldn’t dream of it.” I slurped up the last drops of Diet Coke.
*
After that, dinner was a little stilted. I was pretty sure Otis knew I was going to sleuth, but he didn’t bring it up because he’s a nice a guy and bringing it up would entail calling me a liar. Then there were all the looks Otis was getting as the Cup ’n’ Clatter filled up with patrons. The news of Mikey’s death and Otis having been questioned—maybe even Otis’s bloodstained shirt—was in full, super-deluxe circulation. That Otis had not been arrested didn’t seem to matter.
“I’m really, really wiped out,” Otis said when he had finished his burger. “I feel like I could sleep for a year.”
“The aftermath of adrenaline,” I said.
“That must be it.” A shadow flickered across Otis’s face.
“Is there … is there more to the story?”
“Nope.” This was clipped, too cheerful, and Otis wasn’t exactly meeting my eye.
Crud. He wasn’t telling me everything about what had happened out there at Hatch Automotive. This was like a kung fu kick to the love handles. Didn’t he trust me?
Excuse me? A snotty little voice in the back of my mind said. This was my conscience, I guess. For some reason I always picture it like a cartoon bug in a waistcoat. You’re not being honest with him, either!
I told the little voice to stuff it.
“I’m going to swing by and visit Mikey’s brother and sister-in-law who live here in town,” Otis said. “Make sure they’re okay, see if they need anything. I don’t think he had any other local relatives. Then I’m going home to get some sleep.”
I waited for him to ask me to come over and, I don’t know, tuck him in or something.
Nothing.
“Who are Mikey’s brother and sister-in-law?” I asked.
“Mark and Karen Brown. Mark is some kind of technical freelance writer. Works at home. Karen runs that day spa across the str—wait.” Otis narrowed his eyes. “Why do you want to know?”
Fantastic. My plan to clear Otis’s name was making him suspicious of me.
“Why do I want to know? No reason,” I said. “Just curious. I know Mikey was a bachelor, but I didn’t think about whether or not he had family in town.”
“Mark and Mikey grew up in Naneda, but their parents moved to Phoenix or someplace.”
“Did Mikey have a girlfriend?”
“Not that I know of. Any more questions?”
“Oh. Um. Nope. Hope you feel better.”
“Thanks. Good luck with your guests. Call me.” Otis peeled some c
ash from his wallet and left it on the tabletop. He stood, kissed the top of my head again, and then he was gone.
Lo maneuvered herself into the seat across from me. “I saw that, honey. He kissed the top of your head. I don’t care what you do behind closed doors—he certainly isn’t your boyfriend if that’s how he kisses you out in public.”
Dessert. I needed dessert.
Chapter 5
The sky was dissolving into orange and pink over the hills when I turned the Dustbuster off the far end of Main Street. Here, businesses gave way to large home lots and, further along, open countryside. I steered through a gap in a bushy laurel hedge and bounced down the shadowy drive.
“This is it?” Hank said when I reached the end of the drive and braked in front of the Stagecoach Inn. “This?”
I’ll be totally honest about the condition of the Stagecoach Inn. It was bipolar. On the one hand, you had this hulking grayish building with peeling paint and a few boarded-up windows that looked like it could be a horror movie set. The hanging pots of yellow chrysanthemums on the porch were as out of place as lip gloss on a pig.
On the other hand, you had the lawn sweeping from the long porch down to the shores of Lake Naneda and the huge old trees that seemed to anchor the property in time and place. Aunt Effie had put together an album of black-and-white photographs of the inn during its heyday—kids splashing in the lake, laughing diners in the restaurant, a whole row of shiny old-time cars lined up in the drive—and I knew it was something worth trying to revive. Like, with a defibrillator.
I told myself my motivations were about preserving an important artifact of Naneda’s history, because hey, I had majored in anthropology. More confusing was the weird heartstring tug the ramshackle place gave me. What was that?
Effie was there to meet us at the front door, swinging it wide and treating everyone to gushy, bony hugs and a flurry of Euro-style air kisses. “Hello, hello! Oh, it’s simply fabulous to have our very first guests! What a delight! You must be Dorothea, who I spoke to on the telephone—yes? What a lovely coat! And you are—? Hank! Delightful! And Myron, and—? Lo! Is that short for something? Oh, Lorraine, of course! Come in, come in—I was hoping you would all join me in the library for an after-dinner drink—I heard all about the murder on Shore 7 news; you poor dears must have been terrified—this way, just through here…”
Wow. She was a natural.
I, meanwhile, was playing bellhop again, which felt totally unnatural. I set two suitcases in a corner of the entry hall and went outside for more.
Chester joined me at the back of the Dustbuster, chewing on something. “What are you, Agnes Blythe, Slayer of Suitcases?”
“Hey,” I said, dropping a duffle bag at his feet. “Are the rooms all ready?”
“More or less. It’s not the Four Seasons, but it should be okay for one night. It’s not like anybody can leave us a bad review, since we’re not even registered on any of the inn review or booking sites.”
“True.”
Chester told me what he and Aunt Effie had been up to while I’d been gone. First, they had vacuumed and dusted the upstairs hallway, the three best bedrooms overlooking the lake, and the bathroom. The guests would have to share the one bathroom with its rust-stained claw-foot tub, marble sink, and guacamole-hued linoleum floor. Next, Chester and burly Boyd—they had hired him to help—had dragged three of the new mattresses from the garage loft and removed their plastic wrappings. Then they’d installed antique dressers and armchairs—from Aunt Effie’s hoard in the garage—in each of the rooms. In the meantime, Effie had driven to Bella’s Bedding Boutique to stock up on sheets, pillows, blankets, and towels for the three rooms.
“The rooms are spotless,” Chester said, “and naturally Aunt Effie splurged on the most expensive bedding imaginable, woven from unicorn silk or something. Yes, the guests will be sleeping on mattresses on the floor since Aunt Effie hasn’t yet managed to buy priceless antique bedframes, but they’ll be doing it in style. Oh—and she also stopped by the liquor store while she was out and came back with cases of liquor. The bar in the library is stocked.”
Just last week Effie had purchased a beautiful mirrored sideboard at an estate sale, which had been installed in the library to serve as the bar. Little had we known that we’d be using it so soon.
“So the strategy is to keep the guests tipsy twenty-four/seven,” I said.
“Of course.” Chester bent and grabbed the duffel bag handles. “This is Aunt Effie we’re talking about.”
“Is it legal to serve them booze? I mean, we don’t have a liquor license.”
“Sure. They’re private, nonpaying guests. It’s like serving alcohol to friends in your home.”
Chester and I hauled all the luggage inside and placed it in the prepared upstairs bedrooms.
I had to admit that Effie and Chester had done a nice job making the rooms pretty and comfortable in such short order. There were even white gauzy curtains on suspension rods in the windows, and all three rooms had big, fragrant bouquets of fresh flowers. Stacks of milky-white towels sat on antique chairs, and brand-new cotton spa slippers were arranged on the floor beside them. Heck, I wanted to move in.
“About the attic bathroom that we started gutting,” I said.
“Press the pause button until these folks are gone,” Chester said. “We can’t deal with that on top of everything else.”
*
A few hours later, Dorothea, Hank, Myron, and Lo had gone upstairs tipsy and exuding well-being, having been treated to Effie’s strong cocktails and a string of anecdotes from her careers as fashion model, trophy wife, and globe-trotting alimony recipient. Even Hank had submitted to a small glass of red wine, saying its antioxidants would be good for his heart.
I helped Effie clean up the bar and carry the glasses, shaker, discarded fruit, and jiggers to the inn’s big old kitchen at the back of the building. We loaded the dishwasher—a brand-new, industrial quality stainless steel number that looked totally out of place amid the 1950s salmon-pink cabinetry and sparkly Formica countertops. Then Effie sat down at the kitchen table for a cigarette. Tiger Boy, who had barged into the kitchen through his newly installed cat flap, leapt onto her lap and commenced purring.
I rinsed out the sink, gave the garbage disposal a whirl (another new addition), and then, drying my hands on a dish towel, turned to Effie. “So … I know I have to squeeze it in around work at the inn, but … I’m going to investigate Mikey Brown’s murder.”
“How exciting. Any particular reason?”
“Because, as of earlier this evening, anyway, Otis is Detective Albright’s favorite suspect.”
“Ah.” Effie blew smoke. “And I suppose Otis can’t leave town, which is bringing your weekend in the Adirondacks crashing down?”
How was she so annoyingly astute? Was it the vitamin B shots she got every Thursday?
“Yeah,” I said. “There is that, but that’s not the main reason. I can’t bear seeing Otis wrongfully accused. He’s too good of a person. And what if he were arrested, down the line? No. I mean, believe in—in justice, Aunt Effie. I have to nip this in the bud.”
“Mm. Detective Albright is sweet on you, Agnes. That can’t help matters. Every time he sees you, he—”
“I do not want to discuss this! Should you be smoking with the cat on your lap? You’re going to kill him with secondhand smoke.”
“I’ll help you.”
“What?”
“I’ll help you catch the murderer. How fun! Where do we begin?”
Why had I mentioned this to her, again?
“Well, we begin with trying to figure out who might have wanted Mikey Brown dead,” I said.
“Any leads?”
“Yeah, actually. A couple. First of all, Clifford Prentiss was there at Hatch Automotive picking up guests when the crime scene was in full swing—”
“Wearing plaid and that putrid braided leather belt?”
“As always. And he said ‘Good ri
ddance’ about Mikey’s death.”
“Monstrous!”
“So we could try to find out what’s going on there. And then Delilah Fortune at the cupcake shop acted a little weird about the whole thing, suggesting that Mikey was madly in love with her or something.” Also, she is trying to steal my not-quite-boyfriend by out-sleuthing me. “So it may not be a bad idea to look into her a little. And then Otis mentioned that the lady who owns some spa on Main Street is Mikey’s sister-in-law, so I thought I’d pay her a visit.”
“Karen Brown. She owns Lilting Waves Day Spa on Main.”
“Do you know her?”
“We both met her at the Chamber of Commerce breakfast. Curvy blonde with amazing skin and tired eyes?”
“Oh, yeah. Now I remember. Okay. I have to turn in. Good night, Aunt Effie.”
“Good night, Agnes.”
*
I climbed the steep back stairs to the third floor.
This was my domain. Aunt Effie had claimed a couple of rooms and a private bathroom on the second floor, in the wing opposite that in which our guests were staying. (Guests. Can you believe it?) Chester didn’t live at the inn, preferring to keep both his night shift job as custodian at the middle school (benefits!) and the tiny basement-level apartment his salary afforded.
I, on the other hand, having being kicked out of the apartment I shared with my ex-fiancé Roger, had lived for a spell at my dad’s house. But Dad and his housekeeper/girlfriend Cordelia had made me feel as if I were crashing their love nest, so when the inn’s electricity and plumbing were given the seal of okayness, I had moved in. Hey, it was rent free.
The inn supposedly had a ghost. Lucky for me, my days of floor scrubbing, wallpaper stripping, and junk hauling were so exhausting, I always slept like a baby. Also, I don’t believe in ghosts.
Picking my way around the claw-foot tub sitting in the hallway, I went into the bathroom. The lone, bare lightbulb flickered. A balled-up rag protruding from a hole in the floor was the only clue as to where the toilet had been a few days ago. Crackled, dog barf–green linoleum curled up at the edges of the room. Decades of foot traffic had faded most of the linoleum’s design, but where the bathtub had stood, the faux-Mexican-tile motif was pristine. Blech.
