Cranberry Crimes

by Jessica Beck

  “I’m sure they would have had plenty to eat without your donation,” she said as she surveyed the kitchen’s chaotic collection of food.

  “Maybe, but they wouldn’t have had as much fun eating them as they have,” I said. Bethesda looked around as we talked, and I had to wonder if she’d lost something the day before. “Are you looking for something in particular?” I asked her.

  “No, nothing of importance,” she said. After glancing around the kitchen, she said, “It’s clear there’s nothing I can do here. I’m leaving.”

  “Thanks for coming by,” I said with as straight a face as I could manage.

  “Sure,” she said, uncertain of exactly how to react to that. “I suppose I’ll see you at the viewing tonight, or the funeral tomorrow.”

  “Are you going, too?” I asked her. “I’ll be there, since I’ve known Jasper for years, but it surprises me that you’ll be there.”

  “I thought it would be fitting for me to attend, given our history,” she said.

  I was about to reply when the kitchen door opened yet again. This place was getting busier than the beach at spring break.

  At least this was the visit that I’d been expecting.

  Ethan didn’t look at all pleased to find me there with Bethesda. Phillip shrugged when no one else was looking in his direction. He’d given me more time than I’d had any right to expect, but it appeared that the opportunity was now over.

  At least that’s what I thought until I heard the doorbell ring.

  With any luck, it would be yet another distraction for Ethan, and Phillip and I would have more opportunities to snoop around the place while we could.

  Chapter 14

  “Suzanne. Chief. What are you two doing here?” Chief Grant asked us the moment he saw us standing behind Ethan and Bethesda.

  “We brought donuts,” I said lamely.

  It didn’t impress him nearly as much as I’d hoped it would. “Uh huh. I need to see Perry Kilroy,” he told Ethan officiously.

  “I haven’t seen him all morning,” Ethan said, and then he turned to Bethesda. “Have you?”

  “I just got here myself,” she said. “I have no idea where the man is.”

  “Why is that, by the way? Why are you here?” Ethan asked her. “You understand that we’re under no obligation to pay you past yesterday, don’t you?”

  “This visit is free of charge. I’m doing it as a friend of the family,” she said. “I just wanted to see if I could help out.”

  “I don’t see how you could, but thanks for offering,” he said coldly. “I do believe that you’ve done enough.”

  “I’ll just be going then,” she said as she walked past Chief Grant. “Excuse me.”

  “It’s fine,” the chief said, and then he turned back to Ethan. As long as he was ignoring us for the moment, that was all that I cared about. “Where is Mr. Kilroy staying?”

  “Somewhere upstairs,” Ethan said as he waved his hand in that general direction. “You’ll have to go look for yourself.”

  “Why don’t you show me?” the chief asked. It was clear that it was not a request.

  “Fine,” Ethan said with a sigh. “Follow me.”

  As Jasper’s grandson started up the stairs, the chief looked at me as I trailed behind him. “Seriously? You’re going to push your luck with me even more?”

  “We’re just as curious about him as you are, Chief,” Phillip said.

  “You should know better, sir,” Chief Grant told his former boss.

  “I do, but I just can’t seem to find enough caring inside for it to matter anymore,” my stepfather said without a hint of regret or remorse in his voice.

  “Coming, Constable?” Ethan asked as he paused at the top of the steps.

  “It’s Chief,” the three of us corrected him simultaneously.

  “Whatever. Perry Kilroy was given this room last night. If you’d care to wake him, be my guest. It’s high time he was up, anyway.”

  The chief stepped up to the door and rapped on it soundly.

  When there was no response, he tried it again.

  “You don’t suppose he’s dead too, do you?” Ethan asked, clearly aghast at the prospect.

  “There’s only one way to find out,” Chief Grant said as he pulled out his revolver and put his free hand on the doorknob. “I’m coming in,” he announced loudly. With that, he opened the door and quickly stepped into the room.

  It turned out that there had been no need for such dramatics.

  The place was empty.

  Not only that, but it was pretty obvious that the bed hadn’t been slept in the night before, either.

  It looked as though we had ourselves a runner.

  “I don’t understand this,” Ethan said as he looked around the clearly empty room. “You told him to stay here last night, didn’t you?”

  “I did,” Chief Grant said as he grabbed his radio. After reporting the man missing and putting out an alert for him, he turned back to us. “Don’t worry. We’ll find him soon enough.”

  “If you say so,” Ethan said. “Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have arrangements to see to in town.”

  “I won’t keep you from it,” Chief Grant said.

  Ethan didn’t even look in our direction as he left.

  “Now, what am I going to do with the two of you?” the police chief asked once we were all alone.

  “It’s all really perfectly innocent,” Phillip said, and he was beginning to explain when the current police chief shut him down.

  “Save it, sir,” he said, adding the last bit to make it a little easier to go down. “I’d appreciate it if you two would quit mucking about in my crime scene.”

  “Getting ready to solve it, are you?” Phillip asked him with a taunt in his voice.

  “I’m following up on some solid leads and making real progress,” Chief Grant said.

  Phillip was clearly unimpressed. “Save it for Ray Blake. You can’t doublespeak me, young man. You should know better.”

  “As a matter of fact, I do,” Chief Grant said with a sigh. As he stood there, I could almost see the years being added to his face and posture. The job was wearing on him, and I wished that I could somehow help, but if there was any way for me to do it, I couldn’t fathom what it might be. “Are you two about finished here?”

  “If you don’t mind, I’d love to speak with Phyllis and Henry, as long as we’re here,” I said, knowing that I should probably just shut up and count my blessings. Unfortunately, that had never been my strong suit.

  “Well, you can’t. They’re in town at the moment making arrangements for Jasper’s cremation and urn,” he explained.

  “How did you happen to know that?” I asked him.

  “You two aren’t the only ones trying to solve this case,” Chief Grant said with another, longer sigh.

  “For the record, I just came along to keep Suzanne company,” Phillip said.

  “Am I really supposed to believe that?”

  “It’s your choice, but you should know that it has the added benefit of being the total, unvarnished truth.” Phillip’s tone lightened considerably as he put a hand on his former officer’s shoulder. “It’s a stumper, Stephen. Don’t beat yourself up about not solving it right away. Give yourself a break.”

  “Would you have?” the current chief asked.

  “Of course not,” Phillip said. “But then again, that’s why I’m not on the job anymore. We’ll get out of your hair. How does that sound?”

  “I’d appreciate it,” he said.

  Once we were downstairs again, I asked Phillip, “What was that all about?”

  “He needed a few words of encouragement. That’s all,” my stepfather explained.

  “I’m not talkin
g about that. Why did you volunteer for us to leave?”

  “Who else was there for us to speak with? I was with you when you interviewed Ethan, and we overheard you chatting with Bobby on our way back. If you didn’t grill Bethesda when you had the chance, then I must not know you very well after all.”

  “I spoke with her,” I admitted. “She acted as though she was looking for something the entire time we were talking.”

  “Did she find it?” Phillip asked.

  “If she did, I didn’t notice what it possibly could have been. She gave up awfully quickly when Ethan suggested that she leave.”

  “What choice did she have?” he asked me. “It was practically an engraved invitation for her to get out, and not everyone is as brazen as you.”

  As we got into the Jeep to head back into town, I said, “Thanks for the diversion, by the way.”

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Phillip said with a grin.

  “Okay, is that the way we’re playing it?”

  “I just want a clear conscience when I speak with your mother again,” he admitted.

  “Do you mean about the donuts?” I asked him with a smile.

  “Hey, I thought we had an understanding about those,” he said with a frown.

  “We do. If she finds out, it won’t be from me.”

  My stepfather took his phone out and started to dial.

  “Who are you calling?”

  “Your mother,” he said.

  “Don’t give yourself up without a fight,” I encouraged him.

  “This call isn’t about that. Hang on. Hey, Dot. Yes, Suzanne and I are having ourselves a little field trip. Of course we were at the Finney place. Hang on. Would you take a breath and let me get a word in edgewise?”

  It was a daring tack to take with my mother, but I could hear her laughter on the other end of the phone. Phillip continued, “How hard would it be to find out about Jasper’s will?”

  I was about to protest that we already knew about it when he held up one hand to silence me. Wow, this man really was bold. “No, not the current one. I want to know what the one before it said and when it was changed to the final version. Can you find that out without breaking too many laws or calling in too many favors? Yes, it might help Suzanne. Okay. We’ll see you soon.” After he hung up, he said, “She’s on it.”

  “You want to know if the will was changed. I get that. It could give one of our suspects a motive if anything drastic changed. But why do you want to know when it happened? Hang on. Don’t answer that. You want to know if everyone involved learned of the changes made before Jasper was murdered. Not bad, Chief.”

  “It’s just Phillip these days,” he said, though it was clear that he was pleased with the title, even if it had been given only temporarily. “Your mother is better at uncovering those things than I ever could be. Unless I miss my guess, she’ll have the answers for us by the time we get there, unless you want to chase Phyllis and Henry down first. Hang on, that gives me another idea.” Before I could say anything, he took his phone out again and dialed a new number. After asking a few questions, he ended the call. “They just left the mortuary, and they are on their way to Union Square for lunch. Unless you want to try to track them down there, I suggest we go see what your mother was able to find out.”

  “Sometimes I forget how good you could be at your job,” I told him with a hint of admiration in my voice.

  “What can I say? I had my moments,” the former chief said.

  When we got to the cottage that Phillip shared with my mother, I was surprised to find Momma standing out by the curb waiting for us. After I stopped, she hopped in the back.

  “Were we going somewhere?” I asked her.

  “Lunch,” she said agreeably. “I’m starving.”

  My stomach began to grumble as well. We could go to Union Square and try to track down the last two folks I wanted to talk to, which might take hours, or we could go grab a bite at the Boxcar Grill, which also would give me the opportunity to check up on Trish. “How’s the Boxcar Grill sound to you?” I asked.

  “Where else?” Momma replied.

  When we got there, the place was relatively empty, which was good for my chances of having a conversation with Trish but bad for business.

  The owner seemed unusually chipper when we walked in.

  “Did you find something out?” I asked her excitedly. “Is the ticket yours?”

  “No, I’m afraid not,” Trish said with a smile.

  I was more than a little puzzled by her behavior. “Then why are you so happy?”

  “Suzanne, I never realized it before, but until I found out that I hadn’t won, I didn’t quite get just how happy I was with my life the way it was right now,” she explained.

  “Did you at least speak with Logan?” Momma asked her.

  “Oh, yes. He’s good. In fact, it took him less than ten seconds to prove that I didn’t have a claim on the money.”

  “I knew that he was able, but I never suspected he was capable of working miracles,” Momma said. “How did he manage that?”

  “He did something I failed to do. I’d made a copy of the front of the ticket as a precaution and put the real thing in my safe. He wanted to see the original, and that was that.”

  “Would someone please explain it to me?” I asked them.

  “The ticket was already endorsed in someone else’s name,” Momma guessed.

  “You are correct. The real winner has promised me a finder’s fee, but I doubt it will be enough to change my life,” Trish said. “And you know what? That’s just fine with me. Sit wherever you’d like.”

  “How are the girls in back taking it?” I asked, wanting to know their moods before I placed my order.

  “They couldn’t be any happier,” she said. “All is right with my world again.”

  “Happy to hear it,” I said, and then I hugged her. “As long as you’re pleased with the outcome, then so am I.”

  “Hey, don’t get me wrong. It was fun being rich for a little bit, but honestly, it caused me more headaches than I ever could have imagined,” Trish said.

  After we placed our orders, I marveled as the grill owner seemed to skip as she walked away. “I never would have figured that for an outcome,” I said.

  “It doesn’t surprise me a bit,” Momma said. “Life can be a real burden when it comes to having money.”

  “Fortunately, that’s something I don’t have to worry about running Donut Hearts,” I said with a smile.

  “Someday you will, though,” Momma said. If she was implying that she wasn’t going to be with me forever, I didn’t want to hear it. I couldn’t imagine my life without my mother in it. In fact, the mere thought of it would send me into a spiraling depression that I might never recover from, so I did the adult thing.

  I chose to stick my head in the sand and ignore that it would ever be a possibility.

  “Did you have any luck getting the info about Jasper’s will Phillip asked you about?” I asked her, pretending to study my surroundings, though I knew them almost as well as I knew my donut shop.

  “I was able to speak with someone at the courthouse who was most helpful,” she said. “The will was changed only four days ago.”

  “Wow, that was quick,” I said. “Who was added? Bobby?”

  “No, as a matter of fact, it was Ethan’s name that had been absent until then.”

  That was a real shocker. “So, Bobby and Phyllis were going to split everything, and Jasper was cutting his own grandson out of the picture entirely?”

  “That sums it up,” Momma said. “I took the liberty of making a few other calls, and it turns out that Ethan has been written into and out of Jasper’s will at least half a dozen times over the past three years. They w
ould reconcile, then they would fight, and then they would reconcile again.”

  I frowned. “I don’t like the sound of that.”

  “Some families are just that way, Suzanne,” Momma said.

  “That’s not what I meant. If Ethan wasn’t sure how long he’d be in the will this time, it might give him enough incentive to make sure that this version was Jasper’s truly last will and testament.”

  “I hadn’t thought of it that way,” Momma said.

  Phillip patted my hand. “Good work, Detective,” he said.

  “I’m no detective,” I said as I felt a blush begin.

  “I beg to differ. Wow, that was quick.” Phillip was commenting on the arrival of three specials. The plates were heaped with meatloaf smothered in sauce, green beans that looked fresh, not canned, and loaded mashed potatoes that contained several secret additions of their own.

  “Three specials,” Trish said as she delivered them with a flourish.

  As the three of us ate, we talked about a great many things, but my mind kept going back to Ethan Finney. Could he have slain his own grandfather just to get out of debt? I knew the answer to that without even having to voice it as a question to the others. Over the years, I’d seen people commit a variety of vile acts in the name of greed. Then again, just because Ethan had been included in the latest version of Jasper’s will didn’t mean that Bobby or Phyllis were necessarily innocent. Evidently they all had a desperate need for money. That left Perry Kilroy on my list, whose missing status didn’t help me believe that he was innocent of the murder. Bethesda Long seemed to keep popping up as well, but I didn’t have a motive for her.

  At least not yet.

  “Momma, how good are your ties in Union Square?”

  “They are fairly strong,” she replied as she took another bite of meatloaf. “Is that green pepper I’m tasting? Yes, I’m sure of it. There’s something else, though. Barbeque sauce, perhaps?”