by Emily James
His throat worked, and red crept up into his cheeks.
My phone buzzed softly in my hand. I pretended to drop my gaze to the counter.
Fun? Mandy had texted in reply.
Crap wasn’t a strong enough word. My blind texting skills weren’t up to par at all.
Saul swallowed hard. “All I could think when they told me was it wasn’t fair. Then Clement came in my first day back to drop off his new prescription for the high cholesterol meds. I decided I wasn’t going to kill myself. I wasn’t the one who deserved to die. I hadn’t done anything wrong. There were other people who deserved to be punished for ruining innocent people’s lives.”
Other people? Plural? The heat in the pharmacy felt like it’d jumped up twenty degrees.
Dear God, it wasn’t just Clement. He’d done this to others as well.
Dr. Horton’s was the only pharmacy in Fair Haven, and Saul knew enough about medications to tamper with them for anyone he wanted revenge on. Like putting something useless in his diabetic brother-in-law’s insulin syringes. Or swapping out Victor Kristoffersen’s blood thinners for a blood clotting medication. He could have killed others too that I didn’t know about.
And no one would have suspected anything because he’d orchestrated all of it to look natural.
“I wish it hadn’t been you who figured it out,” Saul said.
That made two of us. Or, at least, I wished I’d figured it out sooner, when I was somewhere safe and could have told Chief McTavish about my suspicions and had him follow up.
Saul raised the gun up a few inches, level with my heart. I sucked in a breath and held it. He lowered the muzzle a fraction again.
I had to keep him talking. He didn’t want to kill me. I wasn’t one of the people who’d wronged him. I’d been kind and friendly. Maybe I could talk him into turning himself in or delay long enough that Mandy would realize something was wrong when I didn’t reply to her.
I put my phone back in my pocket and raised my hands slowly to chest height in a gesture halfway between don’t shoot and wait. “I’m only a few months away from getting married. I just became a godmother to a beautiful little boy, and I want to see him grow up. I don’t want to die. I haven’t done anything to hurt you.”
The gun dipped another half inch, but he still didn’t lower it completely. He knew what letting me go would mean for him. He’d obviously worked hard to kill in a way that would be hard to prove and even harder to trace. I couldn’t expect him to throw the gun aside and give up at my first plea.
I moved around the counter. He followed me with the gun.
I stopped at the edge and lowered my hands to my sides, trying to be as non-threatening as possible. “I know you’re probably feeling trapped, but I can help. I can talk to the police and the prosecutor and we’ll make a deal.”
“They’re not going to offer any kind of deal I’d want to a multiple murderer.” Saul’s arm stiffened, his finger tight against the trigger. He slapped the arm of his wheelchair with his left hand. “I’m better off dead than in prison in a wheelchair.”
His gaze met mine, and I had the feeling that I realized it at the same time he did.
He was going to kill me.
25
I prayed that whatever officer responded to the scene of my murder would recognize me soon enough to call in a different medical examiner. Mark would never know that I hadn’t intentionally come here on my own to talk to a murderer. I prayed that his faith would be strong enough to see him through losing another person he loved rather than letting it destroy him.
The desire to close my eyes so that I didn’t have to watch Saul as he pulled the trigger was overwhelming. But I wasn’t going to go out that way. Without a fight.
One deep breath and I dropped and rolled backward to the counter behind me. My knee smashed into the edge and pain burned up and down, filling my head with a roaring sound.
I ignored it and scrambled the rest of the way behind the counter, using it as a shield. He couldn’t chase me in his wheelchair. If he moved around the counter island to reach me, I might be able to run for it.
I strained to listen for the sound of his wheels moving, but all I could hear was my own ragged breathing, the loudness of my blood pounding in my head. The fire in my leg made it hard to concentrate on anything other than the pain. Could I run even if I got the chance or had I injured my knee badly enough that it wouldn’t carry my weight?
“It’s not going to work,” Saul’s voice came from the same spot where I left him. “I’ll just wait for you.”
Three loud bangs sounded on the pharmacy’s outer door, rattling the glass.
“Police,” Quincey Dornbush’s voice hollered. “Open the door.”
“He has a gun,” I yelled.
“Last chance,” Quincey said. “Put the weapon down and open the door.”
I crawled around to the edge of the island counter. Saul had twisted in his chair, looking back over his shoulder in the direction of the door. He might be able to see it from where he was. I wasn’t sure.
Please Lord let this not turn into a shoot-out.
I could hide behind the counter and probably be okay, but Saul might shoot Quincey and whoever else was with him or they might shoot him. As much as I wasn’t about to let Saul kill me to hide what he’d done, I also didn’t want to see him die. Death was final. As long as there was life, there was a chance for repentance and redemption.
Besides, if he was dead, there wouldn’t be even a chance of getting him to admit to what he’d done—and that could mean Clement went to prison for the rest of his life.
The gun in Saul’s hand tilted like he was about to drop it, then his arm lifted, turning the muzzle toward his own temple.
I screamed and launched myself out from behind the counter. At the edge of my mind, I thought I heard glass shattering, but all I could think about was stopping Saul in time.
My knee gave out, and black dots spun like a carnival tilt-a-whirl across my vision. I smashed into Saul.
His chair shot backward, and the gun’s muzzle flashed past my face. Then the chair went over.
I tumbled to the side and hit the floor. Where was the gun? Had Saul managed to hold onto it?
Before I could reorient myself enough to look for it, shouting voices surrounded us and someone’s body blocked my view. At first I thought they were shouting at me, but they weren’t. The shouting was over by Saul.
The person in front of me knelt down on one knee, and Quincey’s face and balding head came into view, leaning over me, a little closer than was comfortable. His forehead was all scrunched up, and he’d lost his hat somewhere.
“Are you alright?” he asked.
I accepted his help to sit up. Except for how fast my heart was beating and the throbbing in my knee, everything else felt fairly normal. “My knee’s hurt, but I did that to myself.”
Quincey rocked back. “That’s a relief. I didn’t want to be the one to have to notify Mark if anything happened to you. I’m not sure he’d go along with the whole don’t shoot the messenger thing.” He climbed back to his feet. “Now, as soon as they get Saul secured, I’ll go out and get Mandy. She followed us here and was ready to break down the door herself if we didn’t.”
26
Clement shook my hand hard enough that I felt it all the way up into my shoulder. “I didn’t tell Darlene what you thought,” he whispered as he let my hand go. “We’ll keep that between us.”
I mouthed the words thank you. It turned out I couldn’t have been more wrong about Darlene. She hadn’t been cheating on Clement. The man she’d been meeting with was the leader of her grieving spouses support group, for people who had or were about to be widowed.
It turned out there was no knitting group. Darlene had been going to the grieving spouses group and hadn’t wanted Clement to know because she hadn’t wanted to burden him with how much she was struggling with losing him. She’d been attempting to protect him in what small way she c
ould.
He joined Darlene, who was waiting a little further down the courthouse hallway, and they walked out hand in hand.
I’d laid out all the evidence for the judge, including testimony Saul gave about how he’d given Clement extremely powerful stimulants. He’d been right when he said prisons weren’t designed for people in a wheelchair. Given how many people he’d killed, he’d spend the rest of his life in prison. I’d convinced him that he’d be better off making a deal in exchange for some small things that would make the rest of his life more bearable.
Along with the case precedent I’d found for murders committed while people were sleep-walking, that convinced the judge to let Clement go. Both the judge and the prosecutor seemed to recognize that putting Clement in front of a jury trial would be a waste of time. To most people, it’d feel like a victim was being put on trial.
Privately, Clement told me he wouldn’t have felt that way. He would carry the guilt for Gordon’s death for the rest of his life. Even though he hadn’t been responsible for his actions when Gordon died, he had hurt Saul back in high school. Saul had been offered football scholarships from multiple schools. He’d lost them when a dirty hit by a jealous Clement during a practice skirmish seriously injured Saul’s back and made it impossible for him to ever play again.
Mark and Anderson came up behind me.
Mark slid an arm around my waist and nodded toward Clement and Darlene. “I hope we’re like that twenty or thirty years from now.”
I hoped so too. I’d told Mark about Clement’s absolute faithfulness to Darlene and his refusal to even consider she might have tried to hurt him. Not only did I want to be that person for Mark, but I wanted to be able to count on him having that level of faith in me.
“I should go,” Anderson said. “I have a lot of work to do.”
He had the same clipped tone to his voice as I’d expect if I’d bumped into a stranger on the street because I wasn’t paying attention.
I glanced up at him. As a lawyer, he was good at hiding things, but I’d been trained by my parents. The muscles in his neck were too tense, and he wasn’t making eye contact.
I hadn’t thought I’d done that badly, so he shouldn’t be embarrassed to have me associated with his practice. “What’s wrong?”
He re-buttoned a perfectly fine button on his suit jacket. “You could have simply told me you didn’t want to join my firm as a partner instead of going through the charade of pretending you weren’t good in the courtroom.”
I felt a bit like I’d walked into a glass door that I hadn’t realized was there. I had succeeded in making my case and in getting Clement released. I’d even managed to be articulate most of the time, despite being rusty. “That was better than I’ve ever done before. I don’t understand what’s changed. If I could do that every time, I’d feel confident in taking on clients and joining you.”
Mark’s hand tightened on my waist. “It’s because he was innocent.”
I couldn’t keep my mouth from drooping open even though I could hear my mom in my head. You’re not a baby bird waiting to be fed, Nicole. Close your mouth.
Mark had to be right. When I’d been arguing in the courtroom, I hadn’t been thinking about how many people were listening or even how I sounded. All I’d been thinking about was Clement and Darlene and how they deserved to spend their golden years together. I’d been thinking about how it wouldn’t be fair for him to spend time in prison when he hadn’t wanted to hurt anyone. He’d thought he was protecting his home from a bear.
When I was working for my parents, I hadn’t wanted to defend people who were guilty. Even when I’d been trying to practice my public speaking skills in other forums like Toastmasters, it’d been with the end goal of defending people I knew should be in prison for what they’d done. It was like my subconscious rebelled in the only way it could, given how I felt about making my parents proud.
This time, I’d wanted to win.
I leaned into Mark. I probably should have seen it before, but at the same time, it made me feel very loved that he’d seen it.
I’d be able to argue competently in court whenever I was defending a client whose innocence I believed in. Since I’d made it clear to Anderson those were the only types of clients I was willing to defend, my last barrier was gone.
I stuck out my hand toward Anderson. “I think I will accept that offer. You have yourself a new partner.”
Bonus Recipe: Maple Syrup Truffles
INGREDIENTS:
1/4 cup softened butter
1 tablespoon maple syrup
1 1/2 cups powdered sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1/4 teaspoon maple extract
1 cup semi-sweet chocolate chips
INSTRUCTIONS:
1.Use an electric mixer to beat together butter, maple syrup, and powdered sugar. It will look sandy when you’re done.
2.Add in the vanilla extract and the maple extract. Beat again with the mixer until it turns creamy.
3.Refrigerate for 30 minutes. (Be careful not to leave it for too much longer or the mixture turns almost too hard to work with.)
4.After 30 minutes have passed, form tablespoon-sized balls of dough. Place them on a cookie sheet lined with parchment paper. (Wax paper will work as well.)
5.Refrigerate for at least another 15 minutes.
6.When you’re almost ready to bring them out of the refrigerator, melt the chocolate.
7.Remove the balls from the refrigerator, and coat each individually with the chocolate.
8.Allow the chocolate to firm up before serving.
MAKES 15-20 truffles.
EXTRA TIP: You can use any kind of chocolate you like to coat the truffles. If you prefer a less sweet treat, use dark chocolate. If you prefer a milder flavor, use white chocolate.
Letter from the Author
It’s hard to believe that we’re now only one book away from the conclusion of the Maple Syrup Mysteries. In Book 9 (End of the Line), not only is Nicole and Mark’s wedding fast approaching, but the mystery of the ongoing corruption in Fair Haven will finally be solved.
I wanted to say thank you to all of you who’ve followed along on this journey with me. Your support of this series has allowed me to pursue my dream of writing as a full-time career. I couldn’t have done this without you!
I have a brand new series planned once the Maple Syrup Mysteries are done, and I hope you’ll join me on that adventure too.
If you’d like to know as soon as Book 9 (End of the Line) releases, sign up for my newsletter at www.smarturl.it/emilyjames.
Until then, if you liked Bucket List, I’d also really appreciate it if you also took a minute to leave a rating. Ratings and reviews help me sell more books (which allows me to keep writing them), and they also help fellow readers know if this is a book they might enjoy.
Love,
Emily
About the Author
Emily James grew up watching TV shows like Matlock, Monk, and Murder She Wrote. (It’s pure coincidence that they all begin with an M.) It was no surprise to anyone when she turned into a mystery writer.
She loves cats, dogs, and coffee. Lots and lots of coffee…lots and lots of cats, too. Seriously, there’s hardly room in the bed for her husband. While they only have one dog, she’s a Great Dane, so she should count as at least two.
If you’d like to know as soon as Emily’s next mystery releases, please join her newsletter list at www.smarturl.it/emilyjames.
She also loves hearing from readers.
www.authoremilyjames.com
[email protected]
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