East Pender Boxed Set: Cozy Mystery Series Bundle of Books 1-14

by Leona Fox

  As much as she enjoyed taking on these cases she was glad for the break, since the last one had been incredibly stressful. It even had placed pressure on her relationship with Andy, given that a woman from his past had emerged and thrown doubt on the feelings she shared with him. But they had come through it stronger than ever before and to Ellen it felt as though she was embarking upon a new chapter in her life, one where she was more attuned to her emotions and was able to give herself fully to another person.

  As she was thinking about these things, the door opened and a customer walked in. Ellen glanced at the clock. There was still half an hour before the cafe was closed, but she had been thinking about closing up early.

  The man upon, seeing all the chairs on top of the tables and a broom in Ellen's hand, asked, “I'm sorry, are you closed?”

  “No, don't worry about it, still open for a little while. Come in and sit down. What can I get for you?”

  Ellen placed the broom against the counter and walked behind the bar. Scampy looked at this new person intently, his beady eyes peering at the man. Ellen didn't recognize him but he certainly had a distinctive look. He was of average height with a shock of blonde hair, and his face was marred with scars from a burn. The tarnished flesh spread along one side of his face and down his neck, and although she wondered what had caused this she knew better than to make it a focal point of the conversation, and did not acknowledge it. She poured him a cup of coffee and he went to sit down at a table and look out of the window while Ellen continued cleaning up the cafe.

  Glancing over at him, she could see he was restless, tapping his fingers on the table. His leg was jerking as well.

  “Haven't seen you before, you new in town?” she called out. He looked a little startled, not expecting her to speak to him, but seeming glad she did.

  “You could say that. I don't get here as much as I used to. I'm just back for a couple of days helping out my aunt with some home repairs.”

  “Oh, what's her name?”

  “Mary Speed. I doubt you'd know her though.”

  “You'd be surprised. I know most people.” The man grunted and didn't seem to want to talk anymore, but something about him sparked Ellen's curiosity.

  “You used to live here?”

  “Oh yeah, born and raised. I moved to West Callow years ago, though. Always keep meaning to come back to visit more often but I never can seem to find the time, it's one of those things, y'know. I'm Gary, by the way.”

  “Ellen, a pleasure to meet you,” she said.

  “It's a nice place you have here.”

  “Thanks, I've put in a lot of work to make the place what it is. I'm just glad everyone seems to enjoy it as much as I do.”

  “I'm sure. It's nice to build up something yourself. This is good coffee, by the way.”

  “Thanks. So have you ever thought of moving back here?”

  “No, I knew when I was younger I never would live my whole life here. Had to escape, you know, overbearing parents and, well, it was kinda painful to live here with all this,” he said, gesturing toward his scars. Still Ellen did not ask about them because it was not her place to pry.

  “Needed to get away. Start a new life. It's more exciting like that, I think. Get to see the world a little bit, not that West Callow is much different from this place, but it's different enough, I suppose.”

  They continued talking for a little while, although neither of them said anything of consequence. Ellen couldn't quite place her finger on anything specific but there was definitely something off about this man. His eyes darted about and they had a far-off look in them, as though he was peering beyond the veil of the universe. Still, she thought, given the mention of his parents and his scarring he evidently had been through a lot in his life, and there was probably much trauma in his past. He couldn't have found it easy being in East Pender, either, so she placed most of the reasoning on that. He didn't take long to finish his coffee, and then he returned the cup to the bar and bid Ellen farewell. He stopped to stare at Scampy for a moment, then bent down to pet the dog on the head.

  “See you around,” Ellen called out after him.

  Although Gary did not respond, she was glad for the company she had until close, having gone about the final routines of the day while she was speaking with him. As soon as he left she turned off the lights, locked up, and followed him out of the door, only to see Andy coming up the path, passing Gary on the way. Ellen beamed as they greeted each other with a kiss.

  “Always one last straggler,” Andy said, referring to Gary.

  “Yeah, he's just visiting town for a couple of days. Used to live here but I think this place has some bad memories so I doubt he'll be sticking around. He had terrible burns along the side of his face I can't imagine what must have caused them.”

  Andy placed his arm around her and they strolled along the road, making their way back to his house. “So tonight I thought we could sample a little romantic film.”

  “Romantic?”

  “Surprised?”

  “Yeah, you never choose the romance films.”

  “I know; I'm just feeling in that kind of a mood tonight. I guess it's just the effect you have on me, making me all soft.”

  “I'm not sure about that but I'm not going to argue with it, romance sounds good to me.”

  They returned to his house and snuggled up together with some hot chocolate. Ellen rested her head against him and took great delight in the steady rise and fall of his chest. She breathed in his scent and allowed her hands to explore his body. His hand gently caressed her back. The mood was relaxing. Being with him lulled her into a state of bliss where she felt as though she was floating on a cloud, and she never wanted that feeling to end. When she was with him she wondered how she ever could have been without him for so long. All that time they spent dancing around each other’s affections felt wasted, but now they were together and everything was perfect.

  Then Andy's phone rang. It's loud, shrill ring broke up the haze of the moment and dragged her back from the romantic dream in which she had been ensconced. Both of them raised their heads and groaned at the interruption. Andy reached over and took the call. Being a police chief he had to answer everything despite how much he would want to ignore it in this instance, because any call he received could have been a matter of life or death.

  Ellen yawned and rubbed her eyes, stretching her back and arms while he was on the phone. She heard a lot of 'yes' and saw a lot of nods on his end but couldn't hear who was on the other line. Andy's brow furrowed in puzzlement and when he put the phone down he looked like he couldn't believe what he just had heard.

  “It's something bad, isn't it? Has there been another murder?” Ellen asked, a foreboding feeling spreading through her body as she prepared herself for another tough case. But Andy looked at her and chuckled.

  “Actually no, that was my brother,” he said, and paused.

  Ellen tensed for he and his brother didn't have a very good relationship. It mostly was because his brother had written a series of books in which a character was based on Andy, and it was not a flattering portrayal. Personally, though, from what Ellen had read she thought Andy had more in common with the hero cop than the one who had been haunted by his failure.

  “It turns out they're making a movie based on his books. I think they're mainly adapting the first one so the character he based on me is going to have a prominent role.”

  He spoke as though he was in a daze.

  “So you're going to be famous, huh? I can't wait to tell Kelly about this,” Ellen said.

  Over the course of the following couple of days Ellen and Kelly teased Andy endlessly about it. He evidently was bothered by it, given his sense of modesty. Despite the fact he didn't particularly like the character as written on the page, as it only served to remind him of his own failures, he mostly took the ribbing in good humor.

  “It's not going to mean anything for me,” he said, downplaying the news, “my brother jus
t wanted to let me know to keep me in the loop.”

  “Aren't you curious about who is going to play you?” Ellen asked.

  “Tom Cruise. It definitely should be Tom Cruise,” Kelly said excitedly. Andy merely rolled his eyes.

  “That character is not me and while I'm happy for my brother I just would like to concentrate on my work here. That's more important to me. I'm sure once the film is out we can go see it and you can tease me to your heart's content, but until then it's not going to have any impact on our lives. So we should probably just forget about it and move on,” he said, but he knew Ellen and Kelly weren't going to let him forget until the movie was released.

  “You have to admit it's exciting, though. It's not every day you can say you're having a movie made about you,” Kelly said.

  “I'm excited for my brother but that's it. It's his book, I didn't have anything to do with the writing of it and I'm not going to have anything to do with the film. I'm surprised he told me at all, really. He never usually keeps me abreast of these things,” Andy said.

  “Well I'm excited,” Ellen said.

  However, soon enough matters in East Pender took precedence. A couple of days after Ellen first had encountered Gary they received news that he had died, and not only that, but he had been murdered. Ellen knew things never stayed quite in East Pender for long but she still wished she had had more of a chance to relax before yet another case found its way to her door.

  Chapter 2

  The circumstances surrounding Gary's death were rather mysterious. He had been found outside The Chrome Cafe laying on the ground, having suffered from multiple stab wounds. It had happened late at night and only in the wee hours of the morning had someone returning from a pub seen the body. At first this person had assumed Gary was a bum and had passed out. He went to prod Gary, and through his bleary, tired eyes had seen the trail of blood that has spread out behind his body.

  Hurriedly he had called the police and, soon enough, Andy and Ellen were on the scene, along with a number of other people. Given that the blood had left a trail along the street it had been an effort for the police to cordon off the area. So it was fortunate it was so late at night and most people were in bed. However, the commotion had woken up a few of the town residents and they had ventured outside, clad in robes, eager to find out what was going on.

  A team already had searched the body. Gary barely had had anything on him; a wallet with a driver's license, credit card, subway card, some old movie tickets, and a set of keys but, most curious of all, a small Napoleon figurine in his pocket. This had puzzled the officers but to Ellen it meant only one thing – a clue -- and her mind already was racing to solve what had happened here.

  “What are you thinking?” she asked Andy.

  “Multiple stab wounds, not accurate, probably a crime of passion. He's still got his wallet so he wasn't robbed. Came here, do you know why?”

  “Probably because this was the only place he knew. Or just the closest to where he was murdered. What do you think about the figurine?”

  “Could just be a mascot he carries around with him. There's nothing to suggest it means anything other than that. But given we don't have any information about the murder I suppose it could have some significance. We can't rule out anything. Did he mention anything to you when you met him the other night?”

  “No, he just said he was in town helping his aunt with repairs on her house and that was it. We only spoke for fifteen or twenty minutes before he left. He did seem a little off, though, I couldn't put my finger on it at the time but now that this has happened...”

  “What do you mean by 'off'? You think he was scared?”

  “I can't say for certain, but there definitely seemed to be something going on with him.”

  Andy scribbled a few notes in his book and then barked some orders at the officers on the scene. Afterward he walked over to several people who had come out and asked them a few questions, but none of them were helpful. Ellen looked up at her cafe and sighed. Yet another case that needed her attention, and this time it surrounded a mysterious man with a mysterious figurine. Was she being too hasty in declaring that a clue? She didn't know for sure, but she had been on enough of these cases to know anything unusual or out of the ordinary needed to be explored, and this certainly fell into that category.

  “None of them heard anything, not any screams or cries for help,” Andy said as he returned from the brief questioning of the residents.

  “He was probably too weak, although even if he had cried out for help there would have been few people around to listen.”

  “Which also means the killer got away freely.”

  “But somewhere in town there is someone holding a bloody knife, and we have to find out who,” Ellen said, looking at Andy with grim determination.

  “Oh, we will. Let's follow this trail and see where it leads,” he said, directing another officer to make sure nothing was disturbed in his absence.

  He and Ellen followed the trail of blood. Taking out his flashlight he could make out the scarlet path against the cobbled streets. It led them around the corner and into an alley.

  “He made it a long way,” Andy said.

  “All for nothing. There was nobody there to help him,” Ellen said, a hint of regret in her voice.

  “No, but we can help him now. We can find his killer,” Andy said.

  They followed the trail of blood into the alley, where the grisly murder had been masked from the eyes of the street. Tall buildings towered on either side of the narrow alley, the perfect place for a murder to take place. Houses and shops were on either side but nobody had been there. Ellen felt it an injustice that a crime could take place in such a public place yet have no witnesses to offer any information. Indeed, had the man who found Gary's body not been stumbling home from the pub, Gary most likely would have been left there until the morning, and nobody should be left in such an unceremonious way.

  Patches of blood stained the walls and Gary’s path was clearly marked. Ellen's mind flashed with images as she looked at the crime scene and extrapolated from that a series of events. She saw Gary being accosted and stabbed, the shock of the act silencing him. Before he knew it pain blazed through his body and blood seeped out of the stab wounds. Given the location of the wounds it was likely his organs had been punctured, probably a lung, too. It must have taken all his strength to crawl to the cafe. His killer had left him for dead. Ellen looked to either side of the alley, wondering in which direction the killer had run but there was no evidence to suggest an answer.

  “This is going to be a hard one, isn't it?” Ellen said.

  “Yep. I'd better go clean up the crime scene,” he said, and departed while she went to wake up Kelly.

  It was late at night yet Kelly often had strange sleeping hours. So Ellen didn't feel too bad at disturbing her, not until Kelly opened the door with a furious look on her face. Ellen seemed shocked.

  “What are you doing here?” Kelly asked, hair matted with sweat and face flushed red.

  In the background Ellen could hear Matthew calling out and she instantly knew she had interrupted something important.

  “I'm sorry, I should...I should leave you to it,” Ellen said. Kelly blew out her cheeks and leaned against the frame of the door.

  “You wouldn't have come here if it wasn't important. Come in,” she said, and Ellen followed her through to the lounge. Matthew threw on some clothes and came out to join them as Ellen told Kelly about the murder.

  “A murder?” Matthew asked, skin glistening with sweat. He perched himself on the arm of the chair next to Kelly and draped his arm over her shoulder.

  “I'm afraid so,” Ellen said gravely.

  “This is all too much for me, I'm too tired for this. Do you girls mind me going back to bed?” he asked.

  They shrugged and he kissed Kelly before disappearing into the bedroom. He had helped out on a few cases but Ellen wasn't surprised this was too much for him. He only had becom
e involved in their little troupe because of his relationship with Kelly and didn't have the same dedication as the two of them.

  “And you say he was only here for a few days?” Kelly asked.

  “Yeah. That's not much time for anyone to come up with a good reason for murder. Who would want to kill him in such a short space of time?”

  “That's what we've got to find out. He had a Napoleon figurine on him as well. Andy doesn't think it'll mean anything but I have a feeling it's a clue. I have no idea what it's a clue for, but I'm sure this isn't a random stabbing. Somebody wanted him dead.”

  “We need to find out more about him first. You said he was here helping out his aunt? We should go to her and see what she can tell us about him.”

  Whenever Ellen started investigating a crime her mind whirled and she was unable to sleep or rest, especially when there was little to go on and the possibilities were endless. Kelly was the same, and the two women stayed up for hours talking about the myriad reasons somebody would want someone else dead. Jealousy, greed, love, these all were valid motivations and any of them could have been accurate. The only thing they knew for sure was the killer was in East Pender, and they would have to work quickly to find out why Gary was killed.

  After checking the phone book, they found the address of one Mary Speed, and wasted no time in getting to her house. It was early in the morning and Kelly was yawning. Both women were tired but Ellen did not feel fatigued for she was invigorated by the mystery.

  They pulled up to a bungalow not far from the town center. The front yard was kept well and there were a few gnomes standing guard. Bright flowers were arranged around the edges of the yard, and a short concrete path led up to the door. To their surprise a big hulking man opened the door. They had been expecting a frail elderly lady and as such they looked at each other. The man was at least six feet four inches tall and had to crouch to fit under the door frame. He had a shaved head and beady eyes. His body was stocky, he had a gruff, intimidating demeanor, and when he spoke his voice rumbled like thunder.