A Crafty Killing

by Lorraine Bartlett

  She nodded, avoiding his warm brown eyes.

  With one finger, Seth tilted her chin upward. “I’m offering myself in the role of big brother ... if you’ll accept me.”

  “I never had a big brother.”

  “And I’ve never been one. What do you say we struggle through it together?”

  Tears burned her eyes, but Katie managed a smile. “I accept.”

  “Then are we still on for dinner?” Seth asked.

  Katie sniffled. “I forgot it was Halloween. I’d kind of like to see the kids all dressed up in their costumes. How about a rain check?”

  “How about tomorrow night?” Seth asked.

  “Sounds great. I have a lot of stuff to tell you. And I’ve got that copy of the loan agreement Gerald Hilton signed that you wanted.” She got up, fumbled in the file cabinet, and extracted the paper. She folded it into thirds and stuffed it into a business-sized envelope from the box on the top of the cabinet. Seth took it and thrust it into his raincoat’s inner breast pocket. Again, he took both Katie’s hands in his own. They were warm and dry, the touch giving Katie a feeling of security—something she hadn’t felt since Chad’s betrayal almost a year before.

  “I guess I’ll see you tomorrow, then,” Katie said.

  Seth leaned forward and gave her a quick, brotherly peck on the cheek. This time, it made her happy. “See you then,” he said.

  With both her purse and Chad’s journal tucked under her arm, Katie turned the key in Artisans Alley’s back door lock.

  “Happy Halloween!” Rose called brightly as she headed for her car.

  Katie waved, and then hurried through the drizzle to her own car. Rain on Halloween was just plain no fun. She felt sorry for all the little kids in their soggy costumes, their wet paper sacks dragging on the ground until they tore, leaving a trail of candy treasure behind them. She got in her car, tossed the book and her purse onto the passenger seat, buckled up, and then started the engine. The windshield wipers thumped as she headed for the parking lot’s exit. She paused behind Rose’s car, which was turning left.

  Katie looked over at the pizzeria on her left, saw Andy in the window, and waved. He tossed pizza dough in the air and waved back, which messed up his timing. The dough came down on the brim of his baseball cap and tore in half. Katie laughed, feeling better than she had in months, then pulled forward, and checked oncoming traffic before she turned right.

  Daylight was quickly fading as she headed east on shiny streets for Ezra’s house. She’d have to stop at the grocery store on the way home to pick up Halloween candy. Her apartment complex was a favorite spot for McKinlay Mill’s kid population. Many doors in a small area expanded the potential for chocolate bars, peanut butter cups, and other sweets.

  Katie pulled into Ezra’s darkened gravel drive. How had he ever gotten out of it in the winter when lake-effect snow pummeled the region? She turned off the engine. Only the sound of raindrops tapping on her car roof broke the silence. Fingers clutching the door handle, she hesitated before opening it. Why hadn’t she changed that burned-out bulb over the house’s side door? And why hadn’t she left a light on in the house for Della when she’d left that morning? No other cars lurked in the drive or out by the barn. Had Detective Davenport been out to check on Ashby’s merchandise? She really should check on that herself, but not tonight. Suddenly every nerve in her body was on alert.

  Ridiculous! There’s nothing to be afraid of, she told herself. Except that two people associated with this property had ended up murdered.

  Katie switched on the car’s dome light and sorted through the set of keys Seth had given her. On impulse, she grabbed Chad’s journal. Maybe she’d spend a few minutes with Della, getting to know her better, and read a few more passages. And maybe she wouldn’t feel so alone and skittish in the strange house if she had Chad by her side. Well, what was left of him anyway.

  Clutching the book and her purse, Katie bolted from the car, dashing for the back door. Her hand trembled as she fumbled to insert the key into the lock. She practically fell into the kitchen, slamming the door and locking it in one fluid motion.

  Della was waiting and launched herself at Katie, purring and meowing at once—happy, yet scolding Katie for being late.

  Katie turned on the kitchen lights, then dropped her keys and purse on the counter. She stooped to pick up the empty kitty bowl from the floor. “I’m going as fast as I can,” she told Della, swishing the bowl with a wet paper towel. She opened another can of food, dumping it into the bowl. “You’re going to a new home on Monday, little girl. You’ll probably have to live in the spare room while I’m at work—at least for the first week or so. But you won’t be stuck out here all alone anymore. I don’t know how your new brother will feel about that, but we’ll manage somehow, won’t we? Hey, we’ll both have new big brothers,” she said, smiling, the thought warming her.

  Della wound around and around her ankles, more interested in dinner than talk of her new living arrangements.

  As she attended to the cat’s needs, Katie wondered if she ought to start calling estate liquidators. There was no sense in waiting. Maybe Rose or one of the other Alley artisans knew of someone who did that kind of thing. She’d have to ask. Of course, the house was probably filled with items Ezra would not like to see on the auction block. Photos, personal mementos, the family Bible ... She’d have to let Gerald go through the house and take what he wanted in the way of personal effects. That was the decent thing to do, even if Gerald hadn’t acted decently himself.

  While Della, nose buried in her dish, happily lapped up her food, Katie grabbed Chad’s journal from the counter and wandered into the living room, turning on lights as she went.

  She sank into Ezra’s easy chair and opened the book. What had Chad’s last recorded thoughts been, she wondered, flipping to the last few pages of entries.

  March 14th

  She came to see me again today, making sure he saw her first, of course. I don’t want her here. If Katie saw her hanging around, she might think I was interested, and I don’t want anything to interfere with us getting back together.

  Katie blinked. She? Who? Her gaze dipped back to the journal.

  Katie’s the best thing that ever happened to me. We talked on the phone for a while tonight. She said Mason misses me. I miss him, too. But not as much as I miss Katie.

  Katie well remembered that conversation. It had been their last. And they’d said good night on good terms. But whom had he written about?

  She read the next entry, written only two days later.

  March 16th

  Damn that woman! I swear it was her car that nearly ran me off the road last night. I confronted her this afternoon, but she swore up and down she was home—that it couldn’t have been her.

  Yeah. Right.

  Katie’s stomach tightened. Someone had tried to run Chad off the road only days before he died? Was that possible? Could someone—some woman—have actually tried to kill him? What for? Who could it have been? Another teacher at the school? She hadn’t heard from any of Chad’s colleagues that he’d had a problem at work. But if he’d turned down someone’s advances, could the spurned woman have been angry—humiliated—enough to take revenge?

  No. That was silly. That was impossible.

  Then why did her stomach feel so tense?

  Was there a pattern to the deaths? Chad? Ezra? Ashby?

  A lake-effect snowstorm had hit that March afternoon. Chad had stayed late at school finishing a lesson plan. At least, that’s what the police had told her. Could someone have lain in wait for him?

  No. The police said Chad lost control of his car on the icy road. Nobody mentioned any other tracks or skid marks.

  Katie sprang to her feet, jostling the chair-side table, knocking over one of Ezra’s framed photos, dropping the journal on the floor. Her paranoia was definitely getting out of control.

  With unsteady hands she retrieved the photo, setting it back on the little yellowed doilie
s. Too many pairs of dead eyes stared at her from the faded photos around the room.

  Katie was drawn to the framed snapshot she’d just set down. Ronnie, holding a chain saw in one hand. It was the tool of his trade, she remembered. Had Ezra sat in his worn recliner, night after night, brooding over the picture? Maybe, but then, Ezra hadn’t been entirely lonely these last few years. First he’d sought companionship from Nona Fiske, and more recently Mary Elliott.

  Della sauntered into the room, then jumped on the back of the shabby recliner, the first stop to her perch atop the bookshelf, where she began to groom her paws.

  Katie looked back at the snapshot, squinting under the inadequate lamplight. She thought again how handsome Ezra’s son had been—like Seth—and noticed that the photo inside the frame looked bunched on one side, as though it had been folded over. On impulse, she slid off the frame’s backing, took the photo out, and unfolded it.

  Katie gazed at the picture, her face going lax as snatches of conversations filled her head. Gossip, innuendo, and all the myriad pieces of information she had gathered during the past week suddenly fell together, and she thought she knew just who had murdered Ezra, Peter Ashby—and probably Chad, too.

  Twenty-two

  Katie stared at the photo still clutched in her hands. Okay, so she had a good idea who might have killed Ezra. But what was the motive, and how could she prove it? And how in the world would she ever convince Detective Davenport to accept it?

  She let out a breath, feeling deflated. Davenport already thought she was a borderline crackpot, and possibly his prime suspect. He wasn’t likely to believe her newest wild theory. But somehow it all made sense ... in a weird, convoluted way.

  As she placed the framed picture back onto its crocheted tidy, she heard a knock at the kitchen door and glanced at her watch. Could it be trick-or-treaters?

  Katie hurried to the back door, again wishing she’d had time to change the damned burned-out bulb over the back door. The man in the dark raincoat who peered up at her from the middle step was the last person Katie expected to see.

  She unlocked the heavy wooden door, more annoyed than frightened. “What are you doing here, Gerald?”

  “I followed you,” he said, brushing past her and entering the kitchen, dripping onto the linoleum.

  “What for?”

  “To talk—away from Artisans Alley. You’re too emotionally involved with that place. I hoped you’d be more rational in another location.”

  Fat chance, Katie wanted to blurt out, but that would only support his argument. She folded her arms across her chest. “I don’t have time for this right now, Gerald. I need to get home. Couldn’t we talk about it tomorrow morning? Maybe we could have brunch at Del’s Diner to discuss—”

  “No! I want to settle this tonight. You’ve been obstinate and damned self-centered. You haven’t taken me into account in any of your plans. Uncle Ezra left me half the estate’s assets. Artisans Alley is only one part of it. I want what’s rightfully mine. I want—”

  “You’ll get what’s rightfully yours, but you can’t have it now. My God, Gerald, Ezra’s only been in his grave four days. It’s going to take months, maybe even a year, before either of us sees any money. Can’t you get that through your thick head?”

  Hilton glowered at her, a puddle forming around his wet shoes. “I’m running out of time. Can’t you see I’ve got to—”

  He stopped, and suddenly it wasn’t greed that seemed to shine from the man’s eyes, it was something else Katie well recognized: desperation.

  “You borrowed five thousand dollars from Ezra last year. Why?” Katie demanded.

  Hilton’s eyes blazed. “How do you know about that?”

  “I found the original agreement you made with Ezra. Did you think I wouldn’t?”

  “I ... I hoped you wouldn’t,” he said, sounding embarrassed.

  “Is that why you broke into Artisans Alley and ransacked Ezra’s office?”

  Hilton said nothing.

  “Paying back that five thousand dollars could help keep Artisans Alley in business.”

  “I don’t have the money. I—”

  “Of course not,” Katie shot back, her own anger getting the best of her. “You paid off your credit card debts, but you didn’t pay back Ezra. Instead you spent money on a new car.”

  Hilton let out a breath. “I needed that car. I have to drive—”

  “Where? To the nearest mall? Or how about a casino?”

  “I don’t know where you got your information on me, Mrs. High-and-Mighty Bonner, but it sounds like you only got half the story!”

  “Then why don’t you fill me in.”

  Hilton tore his gaze from Katie’s, letting out a ragged breath as his anger dissolved. “You don’t bring up your children to be drug addicts—but it doesn’t take much experimenting before they’re hooked.”

  Katie’s breath caught in her throat, as though he’d punched her in the gut. “Drugs?”

  “Our HMO decided my daughter Miranda only needed two months of outpatient treatment.” Hilton’s laugh of derision sounded more like a strangled sob. “Seeing her so close to the edge—and being told they won’t do anything more . . . I did max out my credit cards. Do you think I would’ve asked that miserable old skinflint for cash if I hadn’t been desperate?”

  “But you bought a new car,” Katie protested.

  “My fourteen-year-old station wagon died. How else was I going to get to work?” Gerald pushed himself away from the stove, his eyes shadowed with misery.

  “Why didn’t you tell Ezra you needed the money for your daughter?”

  “My uncle believed drug addicts come from broken homes where there’s little or no parental guidance, but it can happen in any family. Miranda was an honor student—had never been in trouble—before her sophomore year.”

  Oh dear, Katie thought. No wonder Hilton had been in such a state.

  Then Andy’s words came back to her: “Don’t let anyone bamboozle you, Katie. Not Seth, not Gerald. Not Rose, not Tracy. Nobody.”

  Was Hilton lying? Was he only giving her a sob story to gain her sympathy?

  She studied Hilton’s eyes. No one could fake such desolation. “Ezra lost his only child—your cousin Ronnie. Didn’t it occur to you that he might have wanted to help your child?”

  “When Ronnie died, Uncle Ezra’s compassion died with him. He wouldn’t have—”

  “How could you know for sure? You never gave him a chance.”

  “You didn’t know him like I did.”

  Katie motioned him to follow her into the living room. She marched to the end table by Ezra’s chair, grabbed the photograph she’d returned to its frame only minutes before, and shoved it under his nose. “A man who lacks compassion wouldn’t keep pictures of his dead child on the walls and every flat surface to remind him of his loss.”

  Hilton stared at the picture of his dead cousin, his eyes shining. “I never heard the old man speak of Ronnie after the funeral. He never let on that he—”

  “What? That he missed his son? Oh, Gerald . . .” Instead of anger, Katie could only muster sympathy for the pitiable man in front of her. Her next news would depress him more. “I have some bad news. The motel offer has been rescinded.”

  Hilton’s head snapped up. “You’re lying.”

  Katie shook her head. “They’ve chosen another parcel of land midway between the new marina and the village. The deal will be completed by next week.”

  “Who told you that?”

  “Seth Landers. He said he’d be glad to talk to you about it, too. And by the way, it wasn’t the high-end Radisson chain that wanted the land—it was Motel Six, a lot further down on the hotel scale, and their offer was nowhere near a million dollars.”

  Gerald paled, turning away. “My God, I’m ruined. I was counting on that money to help Miranda, to—”

  “There are other options,” Katie said, “but selling Artisans Alley should not be one of them. Victoria Squa
re is on the verge of a real breakthrough. It would be better for McKinlay Mill—better for you and me—to give it a fighting chance to survive. We could sell this house, the barn, and the acreage—they’ve got to be worth a couple hundred thousand at least—that would keep you afloat for a while. You can have it, Gerald. You can have all this. I won’t allow a child to suffer in order to keep Ezra’s and Chad’s dream alive. But let me try to make a go of Artisans Alley. Don’t you see, if I can bring it into solvency, it could be a constant stream of income for both of us.”

  “I’d like to believe you, Mrs. Bonner. I—”

  “Call me Katie.”

  “Katie,” Hilton said, and for the first time there was no hint of animosity in his voice.

  “Will you come back to McKinlay Mill tomorrow? We can talk this through. We should make plans for the future. There have got to be ways we can make this work—for both of us.”

  For a long time Hilton said nothing. Then, grudgingly, “Okay.”

  Katie offered her hand. “Partners?”

  Hilton stared at it for a long moment. Finally he reached out, took her hand, and shook on it.

  “How touching,” came a sour voice from the open doorway. Katie hadn’t heard the side door open, hadn’t heard the intruder come into the kitchen.

  “It’s too bad neither of you will live to see a penny of Ezra’s estate.”

  Slowly, Katie turned to face Ezra Hilton’s killer.

  Twenty-three

  Katie eyed the intruder, apprehension growing within her. “Hello, Tracy.”

  “What’s she talking about?” Hilton asked, looking puzzled.

  “Yes, Tracy, why don’t you explain,” Katie said, sounding calmer than she felt. “You can start by telling us why you killed Ezra.”

  Hilton’s eyes widened with alarm.

  Katie glanced at a scowling Tracy. Her dark eyes were hard. Funny Katie hadn’t noticed that before.