by Avery Aames
“Ownership isn’t all it’s cracked up to be.”
“But a new landlord could kick us out.”
“I doubt they’d want to do that.”
I stopped a couple feet shy of Jordan, and for a moment we simply stared at each other. He, with his head tilted, a sly smile on his face. Me, my head tilted the other way, probably looking starstruck. Pinching myself to rouse from my daydream would have been a dead giveaway. I took a step back and hitched a thumb toward the door. “Well, I should get going. Thanks for the tour. Can’t wait to tout your latest successes.”
“Hold on a sec.” He closed the gap and put his hand on my arm. His face grew serious. He drew in a long breath. Was he bracing to tell me bad news? I couldn’t handle it if he did. “Would you like to, you know, go—?”
“Jordan!”
Mystery Woman appeared in the doorway.
CHAPTER 15
I glanced from Mystery Woman to Jordan and back to Mystery Woman, who looked dynamite in a slinky tank top and wraparound skirt, her left arm raised, hand propped on the doorjamb, dark hair tousled just so. Cue the wind machines and a model in Vogue magazine couldn’t have looked more seductive. I would never measure up.
But that wasn’t what really sent my get-the-heck-out-of-here signals on full alert. It was the glistening diamond ring on the fourth finger of her raised hand. Was she Jordan’s wife? His ex-wife? Her gaze seemed so familiar, so intimate. With her well-toned physique, she looked like a perfect match for him.
“Sorry to barge in, but we need to talk about the loan.” She broke her pose and rifled through her oversized designer purse. Her hand emerged with a document.
Jordan eyed the papers on his desk, then looked at me. Had he bought the house next to my grandparents for Mystery Woman? Was he planning on moving in with her?
I blurted, “I’ve got to go. I’ll . . . be in touch . . . okay?”
I rushed past Mystery Woman and out of the office. As I drove from the farm, the skies opened up and rain teemed down, mirroring the tears streaming down my face. I wanted to kick myself for being jealous, but dang, I liked Jordan, secrets and all. By the time I returned to The Cheese Shop, the rain had stopped and my mood had elevated to something better than bleak. Only slightly better.
I slapped a smile on my face that probably didn’t reach my eyes and told Rebecca to grab some fresh air while the sun broke through the clouds. We had one customer, Ipo Ho, the Hawaiian beekeeper whom I had visited earlier in the afternoon. He didn’t seem to notice my arrival, too intent on reading the labels of every condiment jar in the shop.
“Where’s Matthew?” I asked as I tossed on an apron.
“Out.”
“Out, as in outside in the garden, or out as in gone?”
“Gone.” Rebecca hung her apron on the hook and plucked the front of her light blue blouse to align the buttons. A new blouse, I noted, and wondered whether I should talk to her about managing her finances. Another day, I thought, too weary to have the conversation, not to mention it was none of my business.
“Do you know where he went?” I was a little concerned. Not that Rebecca couldn’t handle a swarm of customers on her own, but Matthew and I had agreed that we would try to have two people in the shop at all times. With Pépère attending to Grandmère, we were a little shorthanded.
“Shopping,” Rebecca said.
My mouth fell open. We weren’t serving any appetizers with the wine tasting. We had plenty of napkins with our brown and gold logo on them. I strode to the arch and peered into the annex. Matthew had set up the bar, and he had put out tasting glasses. Cards identifying the different wines we were offering sat stacked on one of the mosaic tables. Matthew hadn’t neglected his duties. I gave up worrying about him and returned to the cheese counter to inspect the appearance of our wares.
As I did, the grape-leaf-shaped chimes jingled, and Vivian glided into the shop, a dry umbrella in one hand, a number of festive bags looped over her left arm. “Charlotte, I’m so glad you’re here.” She slotted her umbrella into the brass stand by the door, then sailed to the cheese counter and set her purchases on the floor. “What’s with Meredith Vance?”
“What do you mean?” I kept my face impartial, despite my current distress with Meredith.
“She snubbed me.”
My ears perked up. Perhaps I wasn’t the only one on Meredith’s ex-friend list.
Rebecca scooted in beside me at the counter and said, “Why don’t I stick around until Matthew returns?” Apparently gossip held a bigger appeal than a well-deserved break.
“I was helping out the economy a tad . . .” Vivian confessed.
Everybody except me seemed to be spending the fruits of their labors. Perhaps a day of shopping therapy should go on my agenda.
“. . . and I stopped into the Silver Trader,” Vivian went on. “Meredith was at the counter. The clerk was wrapping up some kind of locket, putting it in one of their pretty silver boxes. You know the one, with the luxurious bow?”
I nodded, wishing she would hurry to the end of her story.
“I said hello, and Meredith whipped around like I had caught her with her hand in the till. She didn’t say a word, grabbed her bag, and red-faced, sprinted out of the store. It’s as if she didn’t want me to know what she had purchased.”
“Or what she had been given.” Rebecca lowered her voice. “I heard a rumor. From him.” She gave her head a quick tilt, indicating Ipo, who was still studying labels. “He said that Ed Woodhouse was involved in some unsavory real estate dealings—leasing projects that were making a ton of money. And he had a partner who was his lover.”
“Lover?” Vivian gasped. “Are you sure?”
“Meredith is not Ed’s lover,” I blurted.
“No? Get this.” Rebecca tapped a fingernail on the counter to make her point. “Ed was buying his lover lots of little trinkets.”
“You can’t possibly think Meredith was his lover,” Vivian said. “Why, she’s young enough to be his daughter.”
“No way Meredith was involved with Ed,” I repeated, prepared to defend my friend to the end, except a chilly tingle shot up my spine. Could that be why she had been avoiding me? Was she embarrassed about her association with Ed? I flashed on Ed at the gala event, slithering up beside Meredith. He had placed his hand on her rear end, and she had rebuffed him. At the time, I hadn’t even considered there was something between them.
No, no, no! I still wouldn’t.
“Ipo,” Rebecca called.
He had iPod buds plugged into his ears, the cord from the earplugs leading to his pocket.
“Oh, Ipo, yoo-hoo!” Rebecca flipped her hair over her shoulders and grinned. Ipo looked our way. Her dulcet voice must have cut through his iPod-o-sphere. “His name means daring in Hawaiian. Isn’t that sweet?” she confided, then smiled brighter, like an actress auditioning for a toothpaste commercial. “Ipo, do you have a second?”
Ipo was a big, brawny guy who used to twirl fire batons at luaus, but when he looked at Rebecca right then, he reminded me of a puppy hungry for a lap to crawl into. Hers. How I wished Jordan Pace would look at me that way. Ipo unhooked the iPod buds and traipsed to us, his meaty thumbs slung into the pockets of his jeans.
“Hey, Rebecca,” he said, his voice a husky sexy. “You look, really . . . you know, cool.”
“Tell them what you told me about Ed Woodhouse. You know, when we were talking about that episode of Murder, She Wrote.” Rebecca tapped Ipo once on his shoulder, using her index finger like a magic wand.
He brushed a curl of black hair off his forehead and started in. “Oh, yeah, well, I was just saying that people think a beekeeper doesn’t hear things, you know, with the hood on and all. Like it’s made of metal or something. Anyway, like, I was at the farm and Lois, you know, from the B&B, comes over. She had to restock her honey. She’s serving high tea nowadays.” Once he got going, he couldn’t seem to stop talking. His words ran together. “Anyway she was, like, in a r
ush, and—”
“Ipo.” Rebecca cut him off. “The point.”
“Oh, yeah, right, cool. See, Lois was with this other gal. Swoozie something from Cleveland.”
The voluptuous tour guide who favored tight T-shirts and strands of silver necklaces.
“Lois was, like, giving her a tour of my farm, and they were talking about Ed and his partner and how they had some not-so-legit real estate deals in Cleveland.”
“Not so legit?” I asked.
“They were landlords who gouged the renters,” Ipo explained.
“He and his partner made tons of money.” Rebecca rubbed her fingers together like a moneylender. “Not to mention, Ed was giving the partner”—she paused for effect—“aka lover, extra tokens of his appreciation.”
Ipo nodded. “Swoozie told Lois to warn her sister because, like, see . . . Miss Hassleton had some business deal with Ed.”
The museum donations, I’d bet.
“Swoozie didn’t mention who the business partner was, but there you have it.” Rebecca extended her hands like a magician encouraging Vivian and me to applaud her wizardry. “Meredith was Ed’s partner.”
I shook my head. “I don’t believe it.”
“Meredith has lots of new jewelry and new clothes,” Rebecca countered.
“She doesn’t make that kind of money, does she? For all we know, the partner could be Kristine,” I said.
Vivian snorted. “I can’t see Lois referring to Kristine as Ed’s lover.”
“What about the tour guide herself?” I said, desperate to divert suspicion from my friend. “Or Felicia? Maybe she already knew about Ed’s lease-gouging practices and was in on it.”
“But why kill him?” Vivian said.
“Because he was going to end the relationship and end the partnership,” I explained. “He was selling off assets. This building. Yours.”
Ipo shifted feet. “I saw on Law & Order where this woman killed her business partner because, like, he got the partnership invalidated.”
“Invalidated?” Vivian said.
“That wasn’t Law & Order.” Rebecca huffed. “That was—”
“There are lawyers who handle those kinds of disputes,” I cut in.
Rebecca raised a finger. “What if Meredith killed him because she’s a teacher and she wanted to preserve her reputation?”
“Oh, please.”
“Maybe she wanted to end their affair, and Ed threatened to tell the world that she was involved in dirty business,” Rebecca said. “Can you imagine the headlines?”
“Ridiculous!”
“How else can you explain Meredith’s odd behavior since Ed’s murder?” Rebecca went on. “She hasn’t returned your phone calls. She’s raced away from Miss Williams. And she wore diamond studs to Fromagerie Bessette’s gala event. Studs she couldn’t have afforded on her teacher’s salary.”
I flashed on Meredith clapping her hand over the sapphire necklace when I’d asked about it at the Country Kitchen.
“And what about her new, expensive, off-the-rack clothes?” Rebecca said, cross-examining with the flamboyant flair of a TV attorney.
She had me there. To maintain her budget, Meredith sewed her own clothes. She was a master seamstress with a Singer. So, why had she purchased so many new clothes?
“It’s not possible,” I muttered.
“I agree.” Vivian gripped my elbow. “Meredith is not a cold-blooded killer. You’ve got to look at Kristine as your suspect. If Ed had that many lovers, she might have killed him out of jealousy.”
“Broken vows and distrust can drive a woman mad,” Rebecca said, as if quoting from a TV Guide. “Why don’t you go to Meredith’s house and ask her, Charlotte? Isn’t she home by this time?”
“Yes, but—”
The three of them stared at me like I held the key to some ancient treasure-filled tomb. If I wanted answers, I had to act.
I smacked my hands together. “Rebecca, you man the shop. Vivian—”
“I’ll come with you,” Vivian said. “I’m not letting you approach a murderer alone.”
Didn’t she just swear Meredith was not a murderer?
I whipped off my apron and grabbed my purse. “Rebecca, call Matthew. Better yet, see if he’s hanging out at Providence Patisserie. If he is, let him know where I’m headed.”
“What about Chief Urso?” Vivian fished in her purse and pulled out her cell phone. “Should I call him?”
The front door of the shop opened and Jordan hustled in. He looked flushed, as if he had run the ten miles from his farm to town. “Can we talk?”
“Sorry. I’m on my way out.” I started past him, but he clutched my elbow.
“You sped off before I could—”
“I can’t talk, Jordan. Later, please?” My love life wasn’t important right now. Meredith was.
“What about calling Urso?” Vivian wiggled her cell phone.
“Why do you need to call Chief Urso?” Jordan released my arm and looked from me to Vivian and back again, his forehead creased with concern.
“No, Vivian, don’t call him,” I said. “Not yet. We don’t have any proof.”
I strode out the door. Vivian fetched her packages and umbrella and scuttled behind me.
Jordan followed us both to the sidewalk. “What’s going on? Where are you headed?”
I hurried along the sidewalk, which was still damp with rainwater, and veered south on Cherry Orchard. Meredith didn’t live far from my grandparents. Jordan kept pace.
“Charlotte, talk to me!”
Vivian filled Jordan in on what Ipo had said at the shop.
“Nonsense,” Jordan countered. “Meredith is no more a killer than I am. You’re jumping to conclusions. Did you ever consider that Ed’s partner could have been a man?”
I gaped at Jordan. Maybe I hadn’t considered all the people who had motive to kill Ed. Lois could have gotten her information wrong. Perhaps Ed’s partner in his unsavory business deals was a man. Maybe the lover issue was a moot point. What did I know about Jordan? Everything about him was a mystery. His past. Everything.
Stop it, I told myself. Jordan was not a killer.
And neither is Meredith! a voice inside my mind shouted.
But something was up, and I intended to get to the bottom of it.
I reached the front walk leading to the baby blue Victorian that was left to Meredith by her grandparents. The leggy rosebushes required pruning. The chipped porch begged to be sanded. The roof sagged and looked in need of new shingles. The gate hung open, the hinge busted. This was not the house of a wealthy woman.
Jordan braced me by the shoulders. “Don’t go up there, Charlotte. You’ll regret it.”
“I need answers.”
Meredith’s car stood in the driveway. She was home.
“You’re feeling the pressure of opening the shop and having your grandmother under house arrest,” Jordan said. “Stand down for a moment. Give this a little thought.”
I shook free of Jordan, skirted around the broken gate, and strode up the walk. The front door stood slightly ajar. I rang the doorbell.
No one answered. I didn’t hear movement.
A flurry of panic cut through me. Had someone stolen into Meredith’s house? I opened the door wider and peered around the edge. No one lay in wait behind the door. The study and hall to the kitchen were empty.
“Don’t do it, Charlotte!” Jordan charged up the path.
“She could be in danger. The door’s open.”
“The lock might be damaged, that’s all,” Vivian said. “Listen to Jordan.”
I stepped into the foyer and heard voices. Coming from upstairs. It sounded like Meredith was trying to speak but someone was hushing her.
Fueled by adrenaline, feeling sure that Jordan and Vivian would run in after me, I sprinted up the stairs, taking them two at a time.
CHAPTER 16
I thrust open Meredith’s bedroom door and came to a grinding halt. I stared at the
brass bed in utter shock. A flush of mortification coursed through me.
Meredith shrieked and yanked the rim of the floral bedspread to her neck. My cousin Matthew sat beside her, bare-chested, his lips pressed together, his shoulders shuddering. Not with fear. With laughter.
“You’re . . . you’re . . .” I sputtered, heat rushing up my neck and into my cheeks. “Oh, my, I’m so sorry, I . . .”
Jordan and Vivian arrived and peered over my shoulders.
“What the—?” Jordan breathed heavily in my ear.
“Don’t say ‘I told you so,’” I whispered.
He didn’t. Instead, he slunk quietly back into the hallway. I heard his footsteps retreating down the stairs and felt a sinking feeling in my stomach. My rashness might have just cost me a relationship with Jordan. Vivian remained steadfastly to my right.
“Guess it’s no longer a secret, huh?” Meredith pulled strands of her tawny hair around her face, then laid her arms on top of the covers, the sheet still snug around her curves. “We were trying so hard to . . .” She glanced at Matthew, love obvious in her gaze. “We’ve been together for a while.”
“You read her poetry?” I blurted.
“A rose, by any other name . . .” Matthew chuckled.
Meredith elbowed him. “Stop laughing.”
He tried, but failed.
“We worried about the girls,” Meredith went on. “We didn’t want them to think that I was acting friendly with them simply because I liked their father. I wanted to build my relationship with them slowly. Get them to trust me. They had such a bad row of it, because of their mother. And if this doesn’t work out between us—”
“It will,” Matthew said. “It has.” He weaved his fingers through hers. His thumb caressed her forefinger with tenderness. “This is the real deal.”
How could he be so sure? He had only known her a month. How could he possibly know that their love was going to last forever? He was way too quick with his affections, in my humble opinion, but that wasn’t what bothered me most. Was I going to lose my friend? Had I? To my cousin?
