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

by Belle Knudson

“Barbara,” she said firmly. “Who was the customer?”

  Reluctantly, she said, “Dean and Jessica Wentworth.”

  Chapter Six

  “What do you mean Zack never showed up for work?” Kate asked, alarmed that Maxwell hadn’t mentioned the fact as soon as she set foot in the inn. “Where is he?”

  “I don’t know,” he said. “I called him and left a message and also sent him a text.”

  Kate figured that Zack was having a hard time accepting that his close friend had died, but it was still no excuse for not calling her or Maxwell to explain he needed a few days to himself.

  She sighed, pacing away from the stacked materials behind the inn. Now she was down two contractors. She had tucked the stack of resumes Amelia had given her into her tool kit, so she popped the lid and began reviewing her options more carefully as Maxwell instructed Mitchell and Carter to continue building the balcony structure.

  The first few applicants looked promising. They had both worked on the amusement park and for the past two years had been handling large-scale jobs with Wentworth Contractors. Dean crossed her mind. It was highly peculiar that he hadn’t mentioned he had known Eddie Jackson and that the man had built the guesthouse behind the home he shared with his wife, Jessica. According to Barbara, Eddie had been paranoid about Dean. Would Dean have tried to intimidate the contractor because he suspected Eddie had pocketed a portion of the money the mayor had laid out for the job?

  She shook the notion from her mind, as Josephine gurgled and coughed on Kate’s back. She decided to give the first two applicants a call. Who knew if they would be available on such short notice? As she grabbed her cellphone out of her pocket, she saw that the third resume was a female applicant, which interested her. There were few female contractors in Rock Ridge, and though Kate would need someone as strong as Zack, if the giant man weren't planning on returning to work, she liked the idea of getting to know another handywoman in town.

  After placing all three calls and setting up impromptu interviews to take place in the lounge over the next hour, Kate reviewed the blueprints, offering directives to her team and reminding Maxwell of specific details before he could accidentally skip over them.

  The first applicant, Craig Clark had mentioned he could be at the inn within ten minutes since he lived close, so she checked that Maxwell’s work was on target, checking her level at the base of the balcony structure and a few other points to be certain the structure wouldn’t tilt off kilter, and then started for the front of the inn.

  Josephine had been making her hungry noises, and Kate wondered if she could get away with a few minutes of breastfeeding before Craig arrived. Deciding that she could, Kate wriggled Josie’s carrier off her shoulders, popped the passenger-side door of her truck open, and sat with her daughter in her arms. She kept a vigilant lookout as she fed Josephine and made a mental note that she needed to buy more breastfeeding-friendly shirts. Her overalls were cumbersome enough, but fitting her daughter under her tee shirt was twice as bad.

  Soon a beat-up Dodge Ram came crawling into the parking lot. Kate quickly lifted Josie out from under her shirt, fastened her overall straps, and fit her daughter back into the carrier, which she slung over her shoulders. As the truck pulled into a parking spot, she shut the passenger-side door and locked her own truck, then started for Craig’s vehicle.

  “You must be Kate,” he said, stepping out of his truck.

  Craig Clark was younger than she would’ve thought from his resume. He appeared to be in his mid-twenties and wore a backwards baseball cap, a ratty gray t-shirt, tight work jeans, and oil-stained work boots.

  After shaking hands and welcoming him to follow her into the lounge, Kate asked about any recent jobs he might have done that weren’t included on his resume.

  “I did a few simple jobs for that real estate company,” he explained, “putting up new doors inside the high-rise apartment complex on the south side of town.” He smiled at Josephine then returned his gaze to Kate as they crossed through the lounge toward a set of upholstered chairs. “Your taking a month off after your daughter was born was good for business. But I’ve been out of work for the past three weeks. I’m glad you gave me a call.”

  She invited him to sit, and she took the adjacent chair. She dove into her interview questions, which ranged from his experience handling heavy materials without the assistance of a power-lift or other hydraulic machines, to whether or not he would be willing to work over time. He was agreeable with every scenario, and Kate couldn’t help but notice his responses seemed poised as though he had prepared for every possible question during his drive over.

  Concluding the interview, she thanked him and explained that she would make her decision before the end of the day.

  Craig saw himself out, and as he strolled through the lobby, Kate grabbed her cellphone, riddled with guilt over replacing Zack so soon.

  She sent a call through to the absentee contractor, but like Maxwell, she was met with Zack’s outgoing voice message.

  “Zack, this is Kate. You can’t just disappear like this. If you don’t return my call and give me an idea of when you’ll be back to work, I’ll have no choice but to replace you.”

  She punched the end call button on the LCD screen and let out an annoyed sigh just as a woman stepped into the lounge. It had to be Patty Nealson. She was tall and the t-shirt she wore showed off her muscular arms, but those physical traits weren’t what stole Kate’s attention. Patty was wearing overalls and her hair was a fiery shade of red. She looked like Kate’s clone.

  “Hi, Patty?” she asked, approaching the woman, as Josephine kicked her little legs against Kate’s ribs.

  “Yeah, thanks for giving me a call,” she said in a tone that was surprisingly deep. “I can start immediately,” she added, gesturing to the tool kit in her hands.

  “That’s good to know, but I have a few questions to make sure you’re the right fit.”

  As Kate led her to the chairs, Patty mentioned, “I can do any job. I have a ton of experience, but I’m no babysitter.”

  “Huh?”

  “Just because I’m a woman doesn’t mean I’m going to change dirty diapers and keep an eye on your kid,” she asserted.

  “No, I wouldn’t expect you to,” she assured her, all the while wondering where this was coming from. Though it was fair of Patty to assert as much—Kate had dealt with similar sexist assumptions years back when she was first starting out. The fact of the matter was that Kate hadn’t indicated any such help with her daughter would be required, so it seemed as though Patty had defensively jumped the gun.

  Nevertheless, Kate conducted the interview. Patty’s responses were adequate and equally defensive, and though Kate was dying to ask her if she realized she looked exactly like Kate, she held her tongue.

  As Kate concluded her questions, an idea struck her and she asked, “Would you be willing to work on a trial basis for the next few days…at the same pay rate, of course?”

  Patty seemed skeptical but agreed, so Kate directed her to walk around to the back of the inn and report to Maxwell. As the clone contractor started off in that direction, Kate placed a quick call to Craig, inviting him to work on a trial basis as well. Her plan was to get a huge head start and a ton of work done on the balcony with the extra helping hands, that way she could appease Amelia’s ever-shortening timeline. It would also give Kate a chance to get to know each of the new guys, so she would be able to make her decision on whom to hire permanently a lot more easily.

  When Alexander arrived, she raced through the same interview questions and proposed a trial-basis hire, which the contractor also agreed to.

  By the time she was walking Alexander around the side of the inn, Craig jogged up behind them, having driven back. Kate introduced them to Maxwell as well as Mitchell and Carter, and just as she was turning to head back into the inn since she needed to use the bathroom, she locked eyes with another woman. She was dressed in a purple skirt suit and black high heels, a
nd she was stalking through the muddy grass with a sense of entitlement.

  A reporter.

  Kate grumbled and was quick to meet her before the reporter could accost her contractors.

  “You can’t be back here,” she asserted. “This is private property.”

  Lifting a handheld tape recorder to Kate’s mouth, the reporter asked, “Did you witness the murder of Eddie Jackson.”

  “No comment. You have to leave.”

  “Were you outside when he was killed?” she pressed.

  “I just told you I’m not commenting. Now you can either leave peacefully or I’ll have the owner call the police.”

  “Calm down,” she snapped. “Amelia Langley invited me here. I’m doing an expose for the Rock Ridge Tribune and—”

  “Amelia asked you to come?” she asked, alarmed.

  “That’s right. She gave me full permission to interview you and all of your contractors.”

  Amelia had been hell-bent on insisting that Kate hurry up with the construction of the balcony, and yet she thought Kate and her entire team had time to answer a reporter’s questions?

  It took all of two seconds for Kate to realize what Amelia was doing—promoting her murder tour, generating buzz with news articles and hoping once again to profit big.

  But Kate wasn’t having it. “Amelia doesn’t have the right to consent to an interview on my behalf, so I won’t be making any comments and neither will any of my contractors. You might as well leave. You’re wasting your time.”

  “Zack Bristow was willing to speak with me.”

  “Good for you,” she said dryly. “Now leave. I’m not going to ask you again.”

  “No, you’re not,” she agreed, smiling smugly, as she continued on toward the back of the inn where Maxwell was shouting orders at his new team of contractors.

  Unnerved, Kate walked briskly along the side of the inn and when she entered into the lobby, she demanded, “I need to speak with Amelia,” and Holly snapped her eyes up immediately.

  “Is something wrong?”

  “Yes, something’s wrong. Where’s Amelia?”

  “Just a second,” said Holly, lifting the desk phone to her ear and punching in an extension. It took three calls before she located the innkeeper and as she returned her phone to its cradle on the desk, she mentioned, “Amelia will be right down.”

  It took longer than a minute, and Kate was further annoyed that she really needed to use the bathroom. But soon Amelia breezed into the lobby from the lounge.

  “Yes?”

  “You’re tying my contractors up with some reporter? How am I supposed to get your balcony finished if my guys are stuck answering questions?”

  “Oh, Wanda will only take a few minutes of their time.”

  “We don’t have a few minutes,” she insisted.

  “Yes, you do. Now, is there anything else you needed to discuss?”

  Perturbed, Kate told her that there wasn’t and Amelia breezed off again, disappearing into the lounge.

  After quickly using the restroom at the back of the lobby, Kate emerged, blotting her damp hands on her overalls. Zack Bristow hadn’t answered any calls from Maxwell or Kate, but he’d sat down for an interview with some reporter named Wanda?

  Kate had a good mind to drive over to Zack’s apartment and confront him, but first she needed to check on Maxwell and make sure he would be okay overseeing the contractors for an hour or so.

  When she reached the back of the inn, Mitchell and Carter were struggling to hold a tall, wooden post in place while Patty and Craig poured cement in the foundation at its base.

  “Hey,” she said, getting Maxwell’s attention. “I’m going to go to Zack’s.”

  “We have more than enough hands,” he countered.

  “Still,” she said, falling into deep thought. “I think it would be worthwhile.”

  “Do you want to leave Josie with me?” he offered.

  “No, I’ve got her. Call me if anything happens.”

  Maxwell nodded that he would, and she started off for the parking lot. Her office boiled down to an accordion file folder that she kept behind the driver’s seat. It contained all of her employees' forms along with her project budget and all of the receipts she had collected of materials she’d purchased for the build. She found Zack Bristow’s W-4 and noted the address then returned the sheet to the filing folder.

  After getting Josephine situated in her car seat, Kate climbed in behind the steering wheel and hoped that when she reached Zack’s house, he would still be there.

  Zack Bristow lived on the south side of town not far from Justina’s high-rise apartment complex, which Kate had renovated a few years back.

  As she drove her truck up the short, dirt driveway, she saw movement through the windows on the first floor, indicating Zack was home.

  Kate lifted Josie from the car seat after parking, climbing out of her truck, and opening the rear door. It took a moment to slip her daughter into the carrier. Josie was getting fussy and her little legs kept squirming, but soon Kate had her daughter on her back.

  At the front door of Zack’s one-story bungalow, which looked as though it hadn’t been renovated since the 70’s, Kate knocked and took a few steps back.

  From within the house, Zack yelled, “Who is it?”

  But instead of announcing herself—obviously the contractor had been avoiding her, so if he knew she was the one waiting outside, he might ignore her altogether—she knocked again.

  “Damn it, who’s there?” he yelled.

  Kate stepped toward the door so he wouldn’t be able to see her if he peeked through the windows and pounded again.

  But he didn’t answer the door, so mimicking the reporter’s assertive and high-pitched tone, she called out, “I forgot to ask you something. It’s Wanda!”

  Immediately the door popped inward, but as soon as Zack realized Kate had duped him, he tried to slam the door closed. She smacked her palm against it, however, preventing him from getting rid of her so easily.

  “What are you doing? You didn’t show up for work,” she stated. “You didn’t pick up when I called and now you don’t want to talk to me? What did I do?”

  “I should’ve quit formally,” he admitted. “I can’t deal with any of this right now.”

  “Because Eddie’s death is consuming you?”

  “Not death,” he corrected her, “murder. Eddie was murdered and the only person who’s doing anything about it is Amelia Langley.”

  “You think that just because she invited a reporter to investigate that means she’s doing something about it?” she challenged. “The only reason she asked that reporter to come was for her own personal gain.”

  “At least it’s something. The police aren’t doing anything.”

  “I’m doing something about it.”

  Skeptically, he asked, “What are you doing about it?”

  “I’ve been asking around. I talked to Eddie’s wife, Barbara.”

  “Barbara couldn’t stand Eddie,” he said as though the fact meant that his wife had no vested interest in catching Eddie’s killer.

  In order to prove otherwise, Kate said, “She told me that Eddie was perhaps intimidated by the mayor. She said Eddie had been working on Dean Wentworth’s guest house, and Dean accused him of misappropriating funds meant for building materials.”

  “Eddie didn’t steal any money.”

  “But if Dean thought he did, then the confrontation Barbara told me about could’ve been true.”

  “You think the mayor killed my best friend.” he said in a condescending tone.

  “Do you have a different idea?”

  All of the animosity rushed out of him, and Zack slumped into a defeated hunch. “I don’t know, but at least Wanda is using her reporting muscle to demand answers.”

  Kate pressed her mouth into a sympathetic line then asked, “So, I’m going to lose you? You’re not coming back to work?”

  “You’ll get by.”

/>   “Don’t you need the money?”

  “Not as much as I need my sanity,” he countered. “Plus, Barbara isn’t stepping up to the plate in terms of making Eddie’s funeral arrangements. I’m not going to let the town put my best friend in a plywood box. He’s going to have a nice funeral, and making those arrangements is too time consuming to manage along with working ten hours a day at the inn.”

  “Understood,” she said. After holding his gaze for a long moment, Kate regretfully turned to start down the walkway, but he stopped her.

  “Someone left a note on my car, on the windshield specifically.”

  She glanced over her shoulder at him. “A threat to make you back off?”

  “How did you know?”

  “I got a similar threat,” she said.

  “What is so weird about it was that I had gotten two threats, but since talking with Wanda over the phone the other day, I haven’t gotten any more notes on my windshield. You’d think that talking to a reporter would provoke whoever left the note to threaten me worse than they already had...”

  It was strange.

  She asked, “Do you think there’s any validity to Eddie’s fear of the mayor?”

  “I really don’t know,” he said. “But Dean didn’t pay Eddie.”

  “He didn’t?”

  “Not the last payment. Dean had given Eddie money up front, mostly for materials plus a small portion of Eddie’s contracting fee. Eddie was expecting a big payoff after finishing the guesthouse, but he never got it. Maybe Eddie confronted him and Dean turned the tables, accusing him of pocketing funds. I don’t know. It’s all I’ve got to go on at this point.”

  “Is that what you told Wanda?”

  “For the most part.”

  Kate grimaced. She had known Dean for years, and though he had a sordid past before he’d moved to Rock Ridge, she couldn’t imagine him having anything to do with Eddie’s murder. But the fact that he hadn’t mentioned Eddie had been working on his guesthouse gave her a bad feeling. She thanked Zack for his time and told him that if he changed his mind about working for her, he just needed to say the word and he could come back.