Mrs. Fix It Mysteries: The Complete 15-Books Cozy Mystery Series

by Belle Knudson

  “Well, what else could it have been?”

  “This is a library,” he explained, theorizing out loud. “They could’ve wanted any number of things: information, a particular patrons records, a list of all the credit cards on file. And we won’t know if they got such information until my team goes through everything.”

  Kate wasn’t hearing a solid reason for why she would need to be careful, but she nodded anyway.

  “Where are you headed?” he asked.

  “I have to swing by the mayor’s office and then I’ll be at the old Victorian house for the rest of the day.”

  “The mayor’s?”

  She knew what he was thinking. Since Maxwell wasn’t with her at the moment, she would obviously be alone until she returned to the Victorian house. “I’ll be fine,” she told him before kissing his cheek.

  “What about dinner at Daisy’s?” he asked.

  She agreed, but mentioned, “This town needs more restaurants.”

  On her way out, she stopped at the counter where Hazel had managed only two names.

  “Hey,” she said softly. “I’m heading out, but don’t get too worked up over this, okay? Scott knows you didn’t do it.”

  “Kate,” she said very quietly, as she leaned over the counter. “I’m really worried.”

  “Don’t be. I promise he doesn’t suspect you.”

  “But he will,” she whispered. When Kate furrowed her brow confusedly, she clarified. “I went into the office.”

  “What? When?”

  “I swear she was alive when I went in there. It was about an hour ago—”

  “You have to tell Scott. That greatly narrows down the window on the time of death.”

  “I can’t,” she insisted.

  “Why?”

  “Because we got into a terrible fight.”

  “What?”

  Hazel grimaced and discretely pulled up her sweater sleeve, showing Kate four deep scratches on her arm. “I’d accidentally left a few books in the office and the patron was here to pick them up. Mrs. Briar was downright nasty to me when I walked in even though I apologized. When I reached for the books on the desk, she snatched them. So I grabbed at them, and that’s when she clawed me to get me out of the room.”

  “Oh, no, Hazel. We have to tell Scott.”

  “He’ll think I killed her,” she said in a distressed tone.

  “Don’t you understand? Once the Medical Examiner finds skin under her fingernails everyone is going to think it belongs to the killer. Sooner or later they’ll figure out it’s your skin and you’ll be arrested.”

  Hazel frowned. “But I’m not in the system,” she countered.

  “That’s not going to matter. They’ll figure it out. It’s best to be honest now. Explain what happened.”

  The older woman seemed to think it over. “Okay,” she said finally. “I’ll tell him.”

  Expectantly, Kate waited, but Hazel didn’t round the desk.

  “I’ve got to write this list first,” she explained.

  “No, you don’t. Come on.”

  “Just...” she trailed off, bewildered. “Just give me a few minutes.”

  “I don’t have a few minutes.”

  Fretting, Hazel set her pen down. “I have a bad feeling about this.”

  “You didn’t kill Mrs. Briar so there’s nothing to worry about,” she offered.

  Timid as she was, Hazel stepped out from behind the counter, clutching the slip of paper. She swallowed hard and allowed Kate to lead her over to Scott who was in the midst of a phone call.

  They waited patiently for Scott to wrap his call up.

  “Hazel has something she needs to tell you,” said Kate as soon as he had tucked his cellphone into his slacks.

  “Well...” Hazel began just as Kate’s cellphone began vibrating.

  She stepped aside, trusting that the librarian was launching into the events that had happened.

  “Yes?” asked Kate, answering the call.

  “It’s Dean again. Where are you?”

  “Shoot,” she said, briefly checking the time on her cellphone. “Give me a half hour and I’ll be right over.”

  Scott and Hazel appeared to be in the thick of it when Kate glanced over her shoulder. She didn’t want to interrupt them to say goodbye, so she started for the entrance door, zipping her winter coat up as she went.

  Figuring she was already running late, she sent Maxwell an abbreviated text message instructing him to go ahead and order flowers from Sunshine Florist, and then she climbed into her truck. After letting the motor idle for a few minutes to warm the engine, she set off through the parking lot.

  As she drove through the center of town, the lit-up sign for Bean There caught her eye, and she impulsively pulled up to the curb. Dr. Faulkner, along with her OB/GYN permitted her one cup of decaf coffee a day and now seemed as good a time as any.

  The coffee shop was quiet when Kate stepped inside. Though there were a few customers seated at the tables near the heater, Bean There wasn’t nearly as busy as it used to be during the summer or even autumn. The bad weather and frigid temperatures were enough of an excuse for people to stay either at home or at their offices and as Kate approached the counter, she could tell from Clara’s expression that the barista and coffee shop owner was anxious because of it.

  “Kate,” she said with a weary smile. “Nice of you to venture out.”

  “I’ve gotta pay the bills somehow,” she said, as Clara wasted no time filling a large to-go cup with hazelnut decaf.

  “Tell me about it,” she said, setting the full cup on the counter. “Would you like some sweets? A fudgy-pop? A yogurt muffin? Some cake?”

  “Ah...” Kate eyed the options under the glass. She had already eaten half a cheese pizza and she knew that dinner at Daisy’s wouldn’t present the healthiest options. But it seemed the bagels and Panini press sandwiches were all gone. Clara looked so hopeful about making a few extra bucks that Kate didn’t have the heart to turn her down. “Sure. I’ll take a yogurt muffin,” she said, figuring it was the healthiest option.

  “Blueberry or chocolate chip?”

  Before she had even thought it through, the words, “chocolate chip” flew out of her and she sighed. The baby must have a sweet tooth, she thought.

  As Clara placed a muffin inside of a bag for her, she commented, “To think I used to complain about all those reporters last summer. I was making a virtual fortune.”

  “How are your online sales coming along?”

  Clara shrugged. “I really need to partner with a baker. I miss Cookie. She was a marketing genius. I’m selling online, but the wholesale cost to buy the goods isn’t leaving me with much of a margin.”

  Kate nodded in commiseration and handed her cash, and then when Clara passed her the change, she dropped it into the tip jar.

  “So is it true?” asked Clara before Kate could turn for the door. “That Mrs. Briar was strangled to death in the library?”

  “Unfortunately,” said Kate. “How did you hear so quickly?”

  Clara shot her a clever glance. “How could I not hear so quickly? You know word travels faster than wildfire around here.”

  Kate glanced at the few customers in the store.

  “Oh,” said Clara. “My friend Gillian told me.”

  “Gillian’s your friend now?” she asked. Kate had a fondness for the ex-convict who had turned her life around as of two years ago after narrowly escaping the underground drug ring that had nearly destroyed Rock Ridge.

  Clara shrugged. “She’s a nice girl and she’s been helping out around here a few days a week. Apparently, Over the Moon hasn’t been doing so great either. Her hours as a receptionist got cut pretty badly last month.”

  Everyone was feeling the sting of the nasty weather. Kate cocked her brow. “How did Gillian know?”

  “She was there,” said Clara. “She ducked out as soon as she saw a police cruiser rolling through the parking lot.”

  “So
she didn’t speak with police?”

  “Can you blame her?” asked Clara. “With her criminal record, she really can’t afford to be caught anywhere near a dead body.”

  Kate agreed, but avoiding the police would only make her look suspicious.

  After thanking her for the coffee, Kate made her way outside. The sleet was back, but in her estimation it was thicker than it had been that morning. She was loath to hope for the temperature to drop enough for the icy downpour to turn into snow, but snow would be a heck of a lot more tolerable.

  She checked her cellphone as soon as she had climbed in behind the steering wheel and fastened her seatbelt. She had texted Maxwell, but he still hadn’t responded, so she placed a call. He didn’t pick up, which was unlike him. She left a brief voice message to ask him to give her a call with an update mentioning she needed to do a quick job for the mayor. Kate glanced up and down the street. It looked desolate. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d seen Main Street so empty.

  As she pulled her truck out into the road, she got excited about the espresso machine at Grayson’s, and then she remembered she was pregnant. “Ugh,” she groaned, drinking down her decaf. If only she could forget how rich and delightful a real cup of coffee was, the decaf wouldn’t taste so bland.

  Grayson’s looked gray as she rolled her truck through the parking lot. Though a few other pickups were parked in the lot, she could tell Larry was probably also stressed about the lost income. A lot of contract work around town, especially the bigger builds, slowed to a crawl during the winter.

  If Rock Ridge thrived in summer, it hibernated in the winter months.

  She climbed out of her truck and knocked back the last of her decaf then grabbed her muffin from the passenger’s seat, which was a trick to reach for. After breaking off a piece of the muffin top and popping it into her mouth, she started for the entrance.

  Larry wasn’t behind the counter when she reached it so she tapped the metal bell and glanced up a few aisles.

  “Be right with you!” he called out from the very back of the store.

  “Take your time, Larry!”

  “Kate?”

  “Yeah,” she said, staring at the espresso machine.

  Soon Larry emerged from the aisle with two paint cans in his hands. He set them on the counter, asking, “What can I do for you?”

  “I need to insulate Dean’s windows at the mayor’s office.”

  Larry twisted his mouth to the side. “I can see what I have in the back, but I’m pretty sure we sold out.”

  “Oh, no, don’t tell me that. He’s desperate.”

  “Give me a second,” he told her, as he quickly made his way through the hardware store.

  Kate followed after him, keeping at his heels.

  “You’re still working in full force?” he asked over his shoulder as they stepped into the back supply room where he also kept machinery to rent out.

  “With a little help, yes,” she admitted.

  Larry began searching the shelves and finally said, “Oh good,” taking a window insulation kit down. “You’ll need a hair dryer to melt the tape to the plastic, but this ought to tide Dean over until I restock my shelves.”

  “You’re a lifesaver,” she said and they started back for the cash register.

  “So Maxwell is still helping you out?” he asked as he scanned the insulation kit into the cash register.

  “He is,” she said with a smile.

  “Has Holly Griffin nosed in yet?”

  “Who’s Holly Griffin?”

  Larry’s eyebrows shot up to his hairline. “You’re lucky if you don’t know.” When Kate tilted her head, curious, he went on, “She is hands down the pushiest woman I have ever met. She moved here a good month ago looking for work. Don’t ask me why she decided to relocate to one of the sleepiest towns in all of Pennsylvania during the dead of winter, but that’s what she did. She stopped in here, and she didn’t ask for a job—she demanded one. I told her that my hands were tied. I don’t have the customers to afford another salary. Well, not a day later and she was in Sunshine Florist, yelling at Carly and demanding the same thing. Unbelievable! No one can afford to take someone on this time of year.”

  It made Kate wonder: if Holly Griffin had been making the rounds, had she stopped off at the library?

  Larry added, “If she swings by the old Victorian demanding work, be firm with her and turn her down right away. I was too soft about it. Well, in my defense I didn’t realize how aggressive she was until it was too late. It took me nearly a week to shake her.”

  “Thanks for the heads up,” she said, handing him her debit card.

  “Are you sure you don’t want to put this on your tab?” he asked.

  “Would that be a problem? I know times are tight.”

  “But they’re tight for you as well, and you have Maxwell to pay.”

  She sighed and accepted his offer.

  A moment later he had applied the window insulation kit to her tab and told her to have a great day and stay warm.

  One chocolate chip muffin later, Kate was both stuffed and pulling up to the curb outside of the old Victorian house. The fact that Maxwell hadn’t responded to her text message or voice mail was nagging at Kate badly, but she decided not to explode at him, not yet anyway. First she needed to make it up the walkway.

  She used slow, cautious steps. The sleet had made the slushy asphalt especially slick and soon her thighs were burning. It wasn’t until she stepped through the door that she realized her heart rate had rocketed through the roof. She was breathing heavily and felt strange, as though her chest had broken out into a cold sweat.

  “Maxwell?” she called out, but not as loudly as she would’ve thought.

  After closing the door behind her, she edged through the foyer, expecting to see Maxwell, but he wasn’t there.

  “Max?”

  Grumbling, she inched toward the stairs and grabbed the railing. Her heart rate should be lowering by now, she thought, but it didn’t stop her from hoisting herself up the first three steps.

  “Maxwell, do not make me yell and yell for you, please!”

  Annoyed that he was probably working with his headphones on, which Kate had warned him against time and again, she began climbing the stairs. It felt like gravity was working against her, but she refused to be limited just because she was as big as a house.

  When she reached the landing, she called his name one more time. It didn’t sound like he was up there, though. Even if he was listening to music at full volume, she would at least hear his feet shuffling on the hard wood floors.

  Nevertheless, she made her way up the hallway and into the master bedroom. It was staged beautifully with a four-poster bed and a dresser. She smelled flowers, which she soon realized were set across the windowsill. It looked like Maxwell had ordered pink roses from Sunshine Florist and Carly had delivered quickly.

  She stood for a moment, racking her brain to remember if she had seen Maxwell’s beat-up Volvo on her way inside. But all she could remember was the hazy wash of gray sleet on a dreary afternoon that was fast approaching dusk.

  Where would he have gone?

  It made no sense and aggravated her to no end.

  Digging deep, she inhaled a lung full of air and then shouted, “Maxwell?” But her effort had been too great.

  Immediately, she felt her belly tighten and then a sharp stabbing sensation hit her deep in her gut. Keeling over and crying out, she suddenly feared the worst.

  Something was wrong with the baby.

  Chapter Four

  Kate was lying in a hospital bed in the maternity ward of Rock Ridge Mercy. She was anchored to a plethora of monitors that beeped and whooshed. Some of the monitor pads were stuck to her head and heart, but most were on the mound of her bare stomach.

  Scott held her hand and looked even more concerned than she felt. They had been waiting for the OB/GYN, Dr. Willard for an awfully long time.

  Getting to the hospi
tal had been a disaster. Kate had been in so much pain that she’d plummeted to her knees in the master bedroom. Her winter coat had been bundled too tight. Unzipping it in order to find her cellphone had been a Herculean feat. It felt like an eternity had lapsed before the ambulance finally arrived, and just as the medics had rushed up the stairs, she’d passed out from the pain, waking only once in the back of the ambulance when it hit a sheet of black-ice and careened off the road.

  Several times she had demanded that the medics call Scott, but they had been too busy transporting her on a gurney through the raging sleet into a second ambulance since the first had pitched onto a snow bank, rendering it nondrivable.

  She wasn’t sure which had been worse for the baby, the early contractions or the stress Kate suffered at not being able to get a hold of her husband.

  At least he was here now, she thought, but it did little to comfort her from the agony of waiting for her doctor to arrive.

  Finally, Dr. Willard burst through the door with one nurse in tow who was rolling in an ultrasound machine.

  “Apologies for the delay,” she explained, plowing her fingers through her short, sandy-blond hair.

  Though it shouldn’t be a reason for Kate not to trust the gynecologist, in her mind it didn’t bode well that Dr. Willard was also pregnant, though only in her second trimester.

  “Let’s see how the little guy is doing,” she suggested.

  Which sent Scott into a tizzy. “Little guy? Guy? It’s a boy?”

  “No,” said Dr. Willard with a smile. “I know not to tell you the sex of your child. It was just a turn of phrase.”

  Scott let out a loud huff. To Kate he looked like he was about to throttle the woman.

  After squeezing some gel onto her instrument, Dr. Willard began rolling the ultra sound wand over Kate’s belly and fell eerily silent.

  Nervously, Kate asked, “Why did this happen?”

  “You said you had just climbed the stairs?” asked the doctor, and Scott glared at Kate.