Fatal Frost (Dewberry Farm Mysteries Book 2)

by Karen MacInerney

  “Mindy,” he repeated. “Lovely name. If you’ll leave me a card . . .”

  “Shoot. I don’t have them with me. Why don’t I write down my number?”

  “That will work,” he said as she scrawled a number on a scrap of paper. He smiled when she handed it to him. “Hope to see you Sunday!” he said, glancing over his shoulder as Wanda ushered him into the adjoining office like a shepherd herding a wayward sheep.

  The three of us walked into the hallway, which was festooned with invitations to hand our troubles over to Jesus and our paychecks over to the Word of the Lord Church. Mindy hurried past us. “Good to see you,” she said. “It’s probably best he had a meeting; I’ve got another appointment with the real estate agent. Wish me luck!”

  “Of course,” I said.

  “She didn’t say what kind of luck,” Quinn pointed out as Mindy hurried out of the building.

  “What did you think of all that?” I asked Quinn.

  “Pastor Matheson’s a whiz at fundraising, I’ll give him that. And he certainly has an eye for the ladies.”

  “You’re right; he sure seems to know how to get big donations,” I said. “Is that in return for campaign support? It seems like an awful lot of money for a small-town election.”

  “I wouldn’t be surprised,” Quinn said as we walked down the hall. We’d almost reached the end when something caught my eye.

  “Look at this,” I said, pointing to a Bible verse printed on a piece of construction paper.

  “Charming,” Quinn said, scanning the verse.

  “I don’t mean the verse, silly. I mean the handwriting.”

  She stared at it, looking puzzled.

  “Look familiar?”

  Her eyes widened as she realized what I was saying. “It’s just like the handwriting in the letter I got.”

  “And the one Krystal got, too,” I said. “Think Wanda knows who wrote out the verse? Think she’d tell us if she did?” I pulled up the picture of the letter at Krystal’s on my phone, and compared the two. The handwriting on the wall was less jagged, and had been written with less pressure, but was markedly similar. “See the hook on the ‘t’?” I asked.

  “And that weird ‘g,’” Quinn pointed out.

  I unclipped the page from the wall. “Shall we ask? I’ll bet her meeting’s over now that we’re gone,” I said, grinning.

  We walked back to the secretary’s office together. She was talking on the phone; I put a hand up to stop Quinn, and we paused outside the door to listen.

  “Yes,” she said. “You can have the microphone at the next rally, and Pastor Matheson told me he’ll find a way to work you into the sermon.” She paused for a moment. “Hold on and I’ll put you through.” We waited a moment, then walked back into the office. Wanda’s lips thinned when she saw us.

  “Short meeting,” Quinn remarked.

  Wanda just pursed her lips tighter.

  “This may seem like an odd question,” I said, holding up the piece of paper, “but do you know who wrote this?”

  “Why?” she asked.

  “It’s such unusual handwriting,” I said. “I’m interested in handwriting analysis.”

  She squinted at it. “It must have been done by one of the Sunday school teachers,” she said.

  “How many of those are there?”

  “Twenty,” she said.

  “And no idea who wrote this?”

  “No,” she said shortly.

  “Do you have a list of teachers?”

  “Like I said, we don’t talk about parishioners. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’m very busy.” Her friendly demeanor had been replaced by iciness bordering on rudeness. She didn’t like questions, that was for sure. Was the church this secretive about everything?

  “Thanks,” I said, taking the page with me as we walked out into the hallway. Maybe someone else at the church would recognize it—maybe this Sunday.

  “Well, that was a dead end,” I said when we were out of earshot of the office.

  “Not completely,” Quinn said. “We know the poison-pen writer is a Sunday school teacher.”

  “And we also know Mindy’s up to something,” I reflected.

  “You think?”

  “She looked like an investigator on a trail,” I said. Which at least gave her a reason other than Tobias for being in Buttercup. I was glad to get at least a bit of confirmation for what Tobias had suggested to me. “I’m wondering who hired her—and why?”

  Opal Gruber looked unusually rattled when we walked into the little house that operated as the sheriff’s office.

  “How’s Molly doing?” I asked.

  “Poor thing hasn’t slept a wink,” she said. “And I’m still trying to figure out where Brittany went.”

  “I heard someone saw Bryce in La Grange,” I said.

  “I heard that, too, but I’m coming up blank,” Opal said, adjusting her cat-eye glasses. “And I still think Sheriff Kocurek’s got the wrong woman. Like I said, Molly brought me a loaf of bread just last week, and we ate the whole thing. Don’t see anything wrong with me, do you?”

  “So Dougie shared it with you?” I asked.

  “He did.”

  “Did you make any more with the starter?”

  She squinted at me. “Why?”

  “I was just curious what it tasted like is all. I’ve heard it’s delicious.”

  “It is. Anyway, I can’t seem to convince the sheriff to look any further than Molly,” Opal said, her round face looking grim. “He said the instructions that came with the loaf were from her.”

  “Molly copied the instructions onto card stock,” I said. “Anyone could have used the starter and baked a new loaf to give to Krystal. I was hoping to get a list of people she gave it to.”

  “Well, I didn’t do it,” Opal said, “so you can count me out.”

  “Of course not,” I said, not mentioning my suspicions about her cousin, Dougie.

  “Sheriff Kocurek thinks Molly’s gone round the bend, but I don’t buy it,” Opal said. “She was upset about her daughter gallivanting around with that Matheson boy, and she blamed Krystal for introducing them.”

  “I’ve heard that, but I still can’t believe he’s taking that seriously,” Quinn said.

  “I know. You’d think she’d poison the boyfriend instead, wouldn’t you?”

  As Opal finished talking, Rooster strode into the room, his thumbs in his belt, his prodigious paunch spilling out over the silver buckle. He squinted at us as if we were two flies who had showed up on his barbecue sandwich. “What do you gals want?”

  “We’re here to see Molly,” I said. “And find out if you’ve made any progress on finding Brittany.”

  He shrugged. “Nothing yet.”

  “Do you really believe Molly poisoned Krystal?” Quinn blurted.

  “What are you, the FBI?” he asked. “Little lady, if I were you, I’d get back to your kitchen and mind your own business.”

  I resisted the urge to take the letter opener off of Opal’s desk and plunge it into Rooster; instead, I smiled and said, “I’m curious. What was Molly’s motive?”

  Rooster reached for a handful of M&M’S from the bowl on Opal’s desk and dismissed the question. “That’s police information.”

  “A woman’s life is at stake,” I said. “I think it’s a reasonable question. Did you talk to Buster Jenkins about the coins he found?” I asked.

  His infuriatingly blasé look was temporarily replaced by a flash of mild confusion. “What coins?”

  “He brought them into Fannie at Fannie’s Antiques. And Monica Espinoza said Krystal deposited a big cashier’s check a few days before she died; you might want to talk to the folks at the Buttercup Bank.”

  “How do you know that?”

  “Word travels in a small town,” I said vaguely. “There was a nasty letter in her house, too,” I told him. “I have a picture of it on my phone. Whoever wrote it is a Sunday school teacher at Word of the Lord Church; the writing matc
hes up. Quinn got one from the same writer—anonymously—also.”

  “How do you know Krystal Jenkins got a letter?”

  “I found it when I was trying to find information on the puppy we found in her house. There were some certificates of authenticity for some Civil War–era coins, too. Someone’s been digging out back of my house and hit me over the head with a shovel the other day; it could be related.”

  “You went into Krystal’s house?” he asked, ignoring what I’d said about the certificates—and my head.

  “We were just trying to figure out who the puppy belonged to,” I lied.

  “Well, if you were snooping around pretending to be an investigator, you shouldn’t have wasted your time. I already found the killer,” he said. “Now, if you little ladies will excuse me,” he said in a very nasty tone, “I have real work to do.”

  “You’re not even going to check out the cashier’s check—or the gold coins?”

  “You can leave the info with Opal, if you want,” he threw over his padded polyester shoulder as he tossed another handful of M&M’S into his mouth and sauntered past us to the door.

  “Hmm,” Opal said as the door swung shut behind him. “That didn’t go very well.”

  “Not surprising, really,” I sighed. “He’s not going to check anything out, is he?”

  Opal pursed her lips. “I hate to say it, but I doubt it. I’ll keep pestering him, though . . . I promise.”

  “Thanks,” I said. “Can we see her?”

  She glanced toward the door Rooster had just walked through.

  “Officially Rooster told me no, but what he doesn’t know won’t hurt him.”

  She opened a desk drawer and pulled out a key, then led us to the back of the station. “She’s in here,” she said, unlocking a door at the end of the hall.

  The cell was a small white room with a high, barred window. Molly sat on the narrow bed in the corner, looking like she hadn’t slept in days.

  She rose as soon as she saw us. “Did you find her?”

  “Not yet. Oh, Molly.” I sat down next to her and hugged her solid shoulders. “I wish I could do more to help.”

  “You could find Brittany, for starters,” she said with a forlorn look.

  “I’m working on that,” I said.

  “I just want my baby back,” Molly said, her eyes filling with tears. I’d never seen my perky, can-do friend look like this before; it made my heart twist.

  “Molly,” I said, taking her gently by the shoulders. “We’ll find her. But we also need to find out who killed Krystal so you can get out of here.”

  She sniffed, and Quinn fished in her purse for a tissue and handed it to her. Molly wiped her eyes and blew her nose, then apologized. “It’s just . . . I can’t believe all this has happened.”

  “I know,” I said, squeezing her shoulder gently. “We’re going to do everything we can to solve this, but we’re going to need your help. Okay?”

  She nodded.

  “Now,” I said. “Do remember who you gave bread to?”

  “Why?”

  “Because whoever gave that poisoned bread to Krystal had access to your recipe card.”

  Her face lightened a fraction. “Oh,” she said. “Why didn’t I think of that?”

  “You’ve had a bit on your mind, my friend,” I said.

  “The list is on the computer,” Molly said, “but I remember.”

  I turned to Quinn. “Do you have a pen in that bag?”

  “And paper,” she said, producing an empty envelope.

  “Okay,” Molly said. “Let’s see. Myrtle down at the library. Edna Orzak. One of Ethan’s teachers—Deb Gehring—Quinn, Tobias, Father Mikeska, Mayor Niederberger, Opal Gruber, Peter Swenson, and the Mathesons, of course.”

  “The Mathesons?” I asked.

  “It’s the season of Christian giving,” she said. “I was trying to be civil. Open lines of communication.”

  “A card would have been easier,” I pointed out. “And it’s hard to poison someone with a card.”

  She gave me a look.

  “You didn’t give one to Krystal?”

  “No. I didn’t know her that well, to be honest. She only came over to the house once.”

  “When was that?” I asked.

  “She came for Thanksgiving dinner, actually. Buster wasn’t exactly rolling out the red carpet for her, so I told Brittany to invite her to join us.”

  “No turkey with Uncle Buster?”

  “I get the impression he’s not much of a cook,” Molly said. From what I’d seen of his place, I was guessing she was right. Which didn’t bode well for my suspect list. Although maybe he made an exception for poisoned friendship bread.

  “She did say she’d seen him recently, though. I got the impression it didn’t go well.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “He was trying to talk her into something, I think. Brittany would know more.” Her face crumpled, and I gave her a squeeze.

  “We’ll find her,” I said, thinking that was the second time I’d heard about Buster trying to convince Brittany to do something.

  “I know Krystal was twenty-five, but I always thought of her as younger—more like Brittany’s age. Naive, somehow. I guess that’s why she was taken in by the whole church thing.”

  “She’s not the only one. A lot of women—of all ages—seem to be drawn to Pastor Matheson,” Quinn said.

  “And a lot of people seem to be donating a lot of money, too,” I said. “Unless he’s got a trust fund, that is. That wasn’t a cheap house.”

  “You’re right about that,” Molly said.

  “Quinn and I were at the church office, and the donations are rolling in. O’Neill gave a ton of money, and a lot of the older women are signing over their social security checks.”

  “O’Neill gave twenty-five thousand dollars,” Quinn said.

  “Which sounds suspicious to me,” I said, thinking of what Buster had said about Ben O’Neill. He seemed to be throwing around an awful lot of money. But why?

  “I still can’t believe someone put poison in my friendship bread,” Molly said, and I put my thoughts about O’Neill aside. “I keep going through that list in my head . . . I can’t think of anyone who would want to kill Krystal. I liked all those people—except the Mathesons—and I can’t think why they’d want to poison anyone.”

  “Just a thought,” I said, “but what about the Mathesons? Is it possible Krystal was seeing the pastor?”

  “If his wife found out about it—or he was worried about the scandal—that would explain why he called it off,” Quinn suggested.

  “But why kill her?” Molly asked.

  “Maybe she threatened to talk about it,” I said. “That would kill the TV contract—and maybe his position as pastor.”

  “Not to mention his marriage,” Quinn added. “Although having met the woman, that might be considered a plus.”

  “Besides,” I said to Molly, “there’s no love lost between you and the Mathesons. Why not frame you?”

  “That’s terrible,” Molly said, “but it makes sense.”

  “So who do you think is most likely? The pastor, or his wife?” Quinn said.

  Molly’s brow furrowed. “It could be either one. I didn’t leave it at their house; I dropped the bread and the starter off at the church,” she said. “The secretary put it on the pastor’s desk.”

  “If he brought it home, either one of them could have used the starter to bake the poisoned loaf,” Quinn said.

  “Except I’m not sure the pastor knows how to operate an oven,” I pointed out.

  “Or a coffeemaker,” Molly said. “Assuming it was the Mathesons, I’d put my money on Phoebe.” She looked more hopeful than I’d seen her.

  “The thing is, how do we prove it?” Quinn asked.

  “She must have bought the datura—Jimsonweed seeds—somewhere,” I said.

  “Maybe check down at the Red and White,” Molly suggested. “They have all kind
s of seeds.”

  “What does datura look like, anyway?” Quinn asked.

  “I’ve seen the plants; they’re called Angel’s Trumpet or Jimsonweed. They’ve got beautiful trumpet-like flowers; they do pretty well around here,” I said. “The whole plant is poisonous. I’m guessing whoever made the bread may have substituted the seeds for poppy seeds.”

  “I just wish we had a starting point for finding Brittany,” Molly said.

  “We’re still working on that,” I told her. “But John Chovanek thought he saw Bryce in La Grange, so they may be close by.”

  She sagged back down. “All I want is for her to come home,” she said in a low, defeated voice.

  “We’ll find her,” Quinn said.

  “Any word on when you’ll get out of here?” I asked.

  “There’s a bail hearing today,” Molly said. “Alfie’s ready to cash out our retirement; I told him not to, but he’s insisting.”

  “He loves you,” I said. “You’ll get the bail money back; it’s better for you to be home.”

  “I’m so worried about Brittany,” she said.

  “I know. And we’re worried about you, too,” I said.

  “Remind Alfie to make sure Ethan’s getting his homework in, okay? And give the kids a big hug for me.”

  “Of course,” I said. “Can we get you anything?”

  “A file?” she said wryly, glancing up at the barred window.

  “We’ll get you out of here,” Quinn said. “No files needed.”

  “I hope you’re right,” she said. “And I hope Brittany comes home soon.”

  So did I, I thought, trying to stay optimistic.

  The thumping from the undercarriage of the truck was beginning to sound like a high school drummer having a temper tantrum by the time I made it back to the farm. I rolled up to the driveway just as the mail carrier, Alma Holz, was pausing at my mailbox. She waved to me; I slowed down to greet her. I liked Alma; she was just a few years older than me, and despite the rather punishing temperatures she endured, she always had a smile on her broad, tanned face. She lived with her father, Gus, whose passion was the birdhouses he made and sold outside the post office. I’d bought one for the back fence; I was hoping a bluebird would take up residence this coming spring.