A Deadly Deletion

by Lorna Barrett

  “What are your plans for the evening?” Tricia asked Becca as she drove back to the municipal parking lot.

  “I got some boxes from the liquor store in Milford. I’ve got a date with a bottle of wine and a big roll of packing tape. I intend to get as much done as I can tonight. Why?”

  Tricia shrugged. She’d thought about inviting Becca to share happy hour with her and Angelica but quickly nixed that idea. She wouldn’t be able to talk freely about the day’s experiences if she had an audience.

  “Are you still considering staying here in Stoneham after what happened today?” Tricia asked instead.

  “I don’t know. It seems like there’s a lot of death and mayhem going on. I’m surprised Gene wanted to stay in a place like this.”

  “Stoneham once claimed the title of the safest village in the state.”

  “Good luck trying to get that back,” Becca muttered.

  Becca pulled into the lot, parked the van, and the women got out. They walked across the lot to the sidewalk that flanked the street, which was devoid of traffic—both foot and vehicular, as all the shops along it had closed some twenty minutes before.

  “Thanks for letting me pick your brain for the past few hours,” Becca said.

  “There wasn’t much else to do while we waited until the chief said we could leave.”

  Becca nodded.

  Tricia paused when they arrived at the Cookery. The interior was darkened, as was Haven’t Got a Clue’s. After sending her a text earlier in the afternoon, good old Pixie had closed the shop once again.

  “I’ll let you know what I decide—about staying here in Stoneham,” Becca said.

  “Okay. I’m sorry the village hasn’t shown you its good side. It really is a very pretty and relatively safe place to live.”

  Becca gave Tricia a sidelong glance. “If you say so.”

  “Have a good night,” Tricia said, and Becca waved as she continued down the sidewalk.

  Tricia let herself into the Cookery and made for the back of the shop and to the door marked private, and the evening ritual began with a hearty welcome from Sarge, the distribution of dog biscuits, and a greeting from Angelica.

  “My, but you’re late tonight,” she said. “I was afraid the stem glasses might shatter, as they’ve been in the fridge so long.”

  Unlikely.

  “So, what kept you so late? Did you get an influx of customers right at the end of the day?” Angelica asked as she retrieved the martini pitcher from the fridge.

  Tricia sighed and sank onto one of the island’s stools. “No. I’ve been at the self-storage unit since I left you after lunch.”

  “That was hours ago!”

  “Tell me about it.”

  “So, what did Marshall have stashed in his unit? More smut?”

  “As a matter of fact, we found Mark Jameson’s dead body.”

  “What?” Angelica cried, and pivoted.

  Tricia explained while Angelica dumped some pretzel sticks into a bowl and scooped out some of the Bee’s Knees honey mustard from a jar, placing it into a small bowl.

  “Wow. You have had a day. My biggest accomplishment was making a sub for our supper.”

  “I haven’t had a sub in ages.”

  “Neither have I. I thought it might be fun.”

  “Provolone or Swiss cheese?” Tricia asked.

  “Swiss, of course!”

  Tricia picked up the tray of drinks and snacks and took them into the living room, while Angelica zoomed along behind her with her little knee scooter and settled on the chaise end of the sectional. “I’m sorry to hear Mark is dead. His passing will no doubt hold up receiving our photo packages.”

  “Ange, how can you think about such a thing at a time like this?”

  Angelica held her hands out in submission. “I have so little to look forward to being stuck here at home. I almost wish I hadn’t gone through with the foot surgery. If I’d known how long it was going to hurt and heal, I might’ve held off for another couple of years.”

  Tricia passed out the drinks and sat back in her chair. “What a day,” she lamented, taking a gulp of her martini.

  “What did you and Becca talk about for all those hours you had to wait?” Angelica asked, and picked up a pretzel, dipping it into the mustard.

  “She’s thinking of staying in Stoneham and running the Armchair Tourist.”

  “Really? I wouldn’t have thought she’d have the temperament for it—or want to, for that matter.”

  “Me, either, but it sounds like she isn’t as financially set as one would think of a former star tennis player. And I wasn’t about to ask for details.”

  “No, that probably wouldn’t have been well received. Do you think Becca could be a success at running a business?”

  Tricia shrugged. “I don’t know. She’s kind of brusque. Ava isn’t sure she wants to stay under Becca’s leadership. It’s all just supposition at this point. I suspect Becca will find retail boring after a week or two and move on. But I sure enjoyed the way she handled Grant this afternoon. Maybe I should learn to be more brusque.”

  Angelica shook her head in disapproval and took a sip of her drink. “So, who do you think killed Mark?”

  “I have no idea. But let’s face it, he wasn’t a very nice man.”

  “Well, maybe now that he’s gone you can run for the Chamber presidency.”

  “No way.”

  “But you’d be so good at the job—and good for the village.”

  “Mary and Terry think so. Dan and Mark were adamant that I wouldn’t be the one running.”

  “The heck with them. Male chauvinist pigs,” Angelica added under her breath.

  Tricia stared into her drink.

  “What else is wrong?” Angelica asked.

  “I feel awful about Mark. And Becca was right. If she didn’t kill him—and why would she?—someone else had to have had another key to the padlock on that storage unit.”

  “It has to be Louise.”

  “Maybe. I suspect it’ll come out that Mark was holding the copyright of her work over her head to keep her from . . . doing something.”

  “Maybe leaving him,” Angelica remarked.

  “Maybe.”

  “But that’s not all that’s bothering you, is it?” Angelica prompted.

  Tricia leaned forward and grabbed a pretzel stick, gouging out some of the honey mustard and eating it. “The thing is . . .” she began. She wasn’t sure she could say the words out loud. But then, during the past couple of years, she and Angelica had had fewer secrets between them. “It really bothers me that I let myself be conned by Marshall. He was charming.”

  “Most con men are.”

  “Yes, but he was also a felon. Most who enter the Witness Protection Program are only there because they’re really bad people. If nothing else, he was a cheat.”

  Angelica eyed her sister. “That’s not all that’s got you irked.”

  Tricia sighed. “I’m really cheesed that Marshall only asked me to marry him after Louise turned him down. . . .”

  “Oh, Trish, you’re not still torturing yourself over that.”

  “I know! I keep reminding myself that I wasn’t about to accept his proposal, anyway.”

  “Probably because you instinctively knew it would never work out.”

  “Definitely. If there was ever a rebound relationship that was doomed from the start, it was Marshall and me,” Tricia said.

  “Don’t look at it that way,” Angelica scolded. “Now, admit it. You were perfectly fine with the way things were. And the fact that Marshall asked you to marry him definitely screwed up everything.”

  “I hate to admit it, but you’re right.”

  “Of course I am,” Angelica stated. She sighed. “What is it you really want, Tricia?”


  “Peace and quiet,” she blurted without thinking. “I don’t want to have to worry about pleasing anyone else. I’ve gotten to the point where all I want is to please myself.”

  “Well, it’s about time,” Angelica said. “Don’t let anyone—even me—tell you how to live. Goodness knows I’d never have married four times if I’d only paid attention to what I really wanted.”

  “And what was that?”

  Angelica swallowed, and her mouth trembled. When she spoke, her voice cracked. “To be Antonio’s mother. It took far, far too long before I made it happen. I kept thinking—I need a man in my life. Well, being with Bob Kelly finally proved me wrong. The only man I need in my life right now is Antonio . . . and hopefully a new grandson.”

  “You wouldn’t want another granddaughter?”

  “Of course I would. It would just be nice to have one of each. You know, to carry on the family name.”

  “The Miles name stops with us,” Tricia muttered.

  “And maybe that’s not such a bad thing,” Angelica groused. “But we’ll leave a proud legacy, and I can’t say that of Daddy.”

  Another con man Tricia had loved . . . still did. But the less said about the sisters’ parents, the better.

  Tricia polished off the rest of her drink. “I’m starved. Let’s have our sub with our next drink. It’s too bad we don’t have a bag of potato chips.”

  “Who says we don’t?” Angelica said.

  Tricia smiled.

  Her evening was looking just a little bit brighter.

  TWENTY-EIGHT

  Tricia woke up to a gloomy day, which was destined to have a detrimental effect on sales in her shop. Leaf peepers were deterred by gray skies, wet weather, and the muted colors as the saturated leaves dropped from the branches in droves and stuck to the roads as though with glue. The one bright spot was that she’d get to spend the day with Mr. Everett while Pixie worked her magic on the locals with her acrylic nail designs at Booked for Beauty.

  After showering and dressing, Tricia headed down to Haven’t Got a Clue to make sure the shop was ready for any customers who braved the inclement weather. She was about to start the coffee when her cell phone rang. It was Becca calling.

  “Hi, Becca. Long time, no hear from,” Tricia said, her mood buoyant despite the outside conditions.

  “What do you know about some joker named Barbero?” she asked angrily.

  Uh-oh.

  “Uh, he’s a friend. He’s just taken over the Stoneham Weekly News, in fact. Why?”

  “Because he just accosted me in the Bookshelf Diner.”

  “Accosted you? That doesn’t sound like Antonio.”

  “Yeah, well, there I was eating my egg-white omelet and he came up to my table. I figured he might be a fan or someone wanting an autograph. Instead, he said he was writing an obit for that pitiful little rag Gene almost stuck me with and he said he’d heard about me from his wife. Who the hell is that?”

  Tricia cringed. She’d dragged her feet on writing Marshall’s death notice and had promised to have it to Antonio the day before. but it had slipped her mind with everything else she’d gone through since the night Marshall had been killed. And her growing annoyance with the dead man had caused what positive feelings she had for him to dissipate. “Uh, his wife? That would be Ginny,” she answered sheepishly.

  “Did you have her rat on me?”

  “What do you mean ‘rat’? Half the village knows you’re here and who you were—uh, are,” Tricia quickly amended. “What was he asking you about?”

  “He wanted to know how I could be Marshall’s ex-wife when my Wikipedia entry lists Gene Chandler as my ex-husband. He wanted to know when Marshall and I were married.”

  Tricia’s head drooped. “I did warn you just the other night that it was bound to come out. What did you tell him?”

  “That it was none of his damn business! But he kept pestering me with questions and wouldn’t take no for an answer.”

  Tricia sighed. “He is a journalist, and that’s what journalists do.”

  Becca snorted a laugh. “Oh, please!”

  “No, really. Antonio took journalism in college.”

  “What college? Hokey Pokey University?” Becca retorted.

  “I’m not exactly sure. But his stepmother told me about his degree.”

  “And who’s that?”

  “Nigela Ricita.”

  Becca was quiet for a moment. She knew Nigela’s outstanding reputation in the village and that she owned or rented a good deal of the properties or businesses in the area. “Isn’t everything about this whole village all just a little incestuous?”

  “ ‘Nepotism’ might be a better word,” Tricia corrected, “but only because the people Nigela hires have the qualifications for the jobs they hold.”

  Good grief. Was keeping Angelica’s secret as bad as the truths Marshall kept from her? But then, Angelica wasn’t a felon. Her motivations were all altruistic—or at least the majority of them were.

  “I thought you were supposed to be writing Gene’s obit for the paper—and not mentioning anything about his past,” Becca accused.

  Tricia cringed. Yes, she had said she would do it.

  “Look, I’m sorry you’re upset, but what do you want me to do about it?”

  “Tell that man to never bother me again!”

  “By the time the story comes out, Marshall will have been dead nearly three weeks,” Tricia pointed out. “Even Mark Jameson’s death will be a week old by then.”

  “Yes, but what if some of the bigger news outlets pick up the story?”

  That really would be a coup for Antonio, unlikely as it was to happen.

  “I don’t think you should worry about it.”

  “Says you, who has never been the subject of such bad press.”

  Not to the extent Becca had experienced. But Russ Smith had printed a number of unflattering stories about Tricia in the Stoneham Weekly News that were just as searchable on the World Wide Web.

  “So, you won’t help your friend?”

  Tricia blinked in confusion. “Friend?”

  “Me!” Becca wailed so loud Tricia had to back the phone away from her ear.

  Friendly enemy, possibly. Acquaintance was probably the most charitable term Tricia could think of.

  “I’ll . . . I’ll speak to him,” Tricia said. “But I can’t make any promises. The content of the Stoneham Weekly News is up to its editor, and that’s Antonio. And you know that once a reporter gets his or her teeth in a story, they’re as tenacious as a terrier.”

  “Don’t I know it. I’ve had more bad press than I care to remember.”

  Tricia idly wondered if, thanks to her interest in tennis, Angelica would remember. Of course, all Tricia had to do was hit the Internet and do a little research and all those tales would be available in a split second. But she’d ask her sister just the same.

  “I’d better go,” Becca said. “I only hope I can get Chief Baker to let me back into Gene’s storage unit. I’m not paying that company another dime to hold on to whatever junk he collected.”

  They’d been able to see only piles of stacked cartons with no idea what was in any of them. Knowing Marshall, he’d probably made an inventory. Heaven only knew where it would be. Most likely on his personal or store computer. Did Becca have access to his passwords? Probably not. Tricia didn’t bother to mention it.

  “Talk to you later,” she said.

  “Sure thing.”

  Tricia set her phone down. She supposed she could take a few minutes to pop over to the newspaper that morning. It opened at eight. She still had more than an hour to kill before Haven’t Got a Clue opened.

  Grabbing her jacket, Tricia left her store and started north up the sidewalk. Crossing the street at the light, she made her way up Main Street. Booked for Bea
uty was packed with customers getting cuts and color jobs, and as she looked in the big display window, Tricia could see Pixie at her nail station busy working on a twentysomething’s manicure. She happened to look up and waved cheerfully. Tricia waved back. Pixie gave her a quick thumbs-up and went back to work, and Tricia continued on to the Stoneham Weekly News.

  As expected, Patti was behind the counter, sitting before a computer screen, but Ginger was nowhere to be found. Tricia pushed through the door and an annoying buzzer sounded. She much preferred the tinkle of the little bell that rang when her shop door opened.

  Patti looked up. “Hey, Tricia, what brings you here today? Ready to place another ad?”

  “I was hoping I might speak to Antonio. Is he in?”

  The door to the inner sanctum opened and a smiling Antonio entered the reception area. “Tricia! I thought I heard a familiar voice.” He waved his hand in a grand gesture. “Welcome to my new home.”

  Tricia winced at the description. As far as she knew, the Barbero family was still hunkered down in the suite at the Sheer Comfort Inn and might be for weeks.

  “Won’t you come in and sit?” Antonio invited her.

  “I’d love to,” Tricia said, and sidled around the counter to go back to Antonio’s office.

  The décor had changed since Russ Smith’s departure. For one thing, it was tidy and the desktop was clear of clutter, and all evidence of the destruction Russ’s son, Russell, had inflicted had been erased. The room still needed a fresh coat of paint, but Antonio would probably take care of that in due time.

  Tricia took the guest chair and gave Antonio a smile. “How did you like your first full week working on the Stoneham Weekly News?”

  Antonio leaned back into the chair and grinned. “Magnifico! This is what I was born to do.”

  “I’m so glad you’re getting to finally fulfill your life’s dream. I’m sorry I didn’t get back to you with the paragraph on Marshall’s death. I could tinker with it tonight and get it to you by tomorrow morning.”

  “It is not necessary. I have been working on it,” Antonio said, sounding confident. Perhaps a little too confident.