Morning Cup of Murder

by Vanessa Gray Bartal

  “We were friends all the way through school, and Barbara was always our leader. None of us really liked her, but we were all too afraid of her to leave the group. For a long time she controlled us through verbal abuse. Anyone who crossed her became such an outcast that school was unbearable. It wasn’t until her parents died that she really flew off her rocker.

  “It started small--the hints for things she wanted from the store. None of us can figure out exactly why we started giving in to her demands, but eventually we did. And then it became a weird game of one-upmanship. Who could steal the biggest and the best item for her? We were all out of our heads.

  “I don’t know how it would have ended if Barbara hadn’t suddenly packed up and moved away. When she left, it was as if a spell had been broken and we all returned to our senses. You have no idea how ashamed and afraid we were. We knew if anyone found out what we did, our reputations would be ruined forever and we would go to jail. We vowed to keep it a secret and never tell anyone. We promised never to break the law or do anything bad again. We went on with our lives and pretended nothing had ever happened. We all got married and became respectable women again.

  “And then Barbara returned,” Rose finished bitterly. “She sent us notes saying she had proof that would send us to jail.”

  If they hadn’t been so upset, afraid, and downright pathetic, Lacy would have laughed. “But surely you know the statute of limitations on theft is very low. Even with concrete proof there’s no way you could be prosecuted after fifty years. And who do you think people would believe? A notoriously bad woman or four upstanding women of the community who are pillars of their church?”

  They looked at her, considering. “I guess we never thought of it that way,” Gladys said. “Oh. Oh, dear. We’ve acted very rashly.” She pressed her hand to her mouth and looked away, tears slowly leaking down her cheek.

  Lacy wanted to tear her hair out in frustration. “What? What else aren’t you telling me?” Surely they weren’t about to confess to Barbara’s murder, too, were they? Was protecting their reputation so important that they would kill to keep the journals covered up? And then with that question she had her answer. “Oh. You hired Bryce to come to my house and steal the journals.”

  Rose nodded. She looked miserable; they all did.

  “We’re sorry, Lacy. We tried to get a criminal we knew wasn’t the violent kind. We just wanted the journals. If he had gotten them the first time when he broke into her house, then you wouldn’t have ever even known about those blasted things.”

  A new horror began to dawn on Lacy. “So you mean you didn’t just hire him to break into my house, you hired him to break into Barbara’s house, too.”

  Janice nodded. “But only after her death, and we had nothing to do with that.”

  “No, you don’t understand. Bryce and I were in Barbara’s house at the same time. He hit me in the head and knocked me out. He could go to jail for assault. I could go to jail for breaking and entering. You could go to jail for hiring him in the first place.”

  “But we hired him on the internet,” Maya said. “He never saw us.”

  “Those internet sites are easy to trace,” Lacy said. Bryce wouldn’t confess his part in the first attack, but Jason knew. Once they ran the internet trace, the entire story would be in the open. Detective Brenner would learn her part in breaking into Barbara’s house. He would love nothing better than to throw the book at her. Everything was about to hit the fan in a big way.

  The four women blanched. Rose moaned and Gladys swayed. “What are we going to do?” Janice asked, sounding small and helpless.

  “Stay calm,” Lacy said, trying to take her own advice. “Things might still work out.” The key to everything was Jason. If she could convince him to drop the charges and let Bryce go, then no one would ever be the wiser about her break-in or the four elderly friends’ hiring of him in the first place. “I’ll work on a solution. Just stay silent and, for goodness sake, don’t do anything else.”

  “Never again,” Rose vowed. “We promise never to break the law again.”

  The vow lost some meaning when Lacy realized it was probably the second time in her life she had taken it. But, statistically speaking, she only had a few years left. That alone might guarantee that she would actually stick to her promise this time.

  There was one final thing she had to know before she left. Taking a deep breath, she forced herself to ask the dreaded question. “Was my grandmother in on it with you?”

  The other women looked at each other in surprise. “Why, no, of course not,” Gladys said. “She was two years older than us and not in our group until much later. And, knowing Lucy, if she had heard about what we were up to she probably would have had us in church confessing before the entire congregation.”

  “Could she have found out what was going on?” If her grandmother had gone to Barbara’s to try and plead her friends’ case that might explain the connection.

  “No. None of us would ever have told her; we would have been too ashamed,” Rose said.

  After reassuring them and swearing them to silence and inactivity a few more times, Lacy left feeling exhausted and dismayed. Was no one trustworthy anymore? No one besides her grandmother, that is. Lacy hated to admit it, but there was a large part of her that felt proud her grandmother hadn’t been involved in such licentious activity, even if it had happened some fifty years ago.

  Her stomach rumbled, reminding her it was lunchtime. She drove through a fast food restaurant and, on a whim, ordered enough for two. Crossing her fingers that she would find Tosh at his church, she let herself in and knocked on his office door.

  “Come in,” he called and looked up with a welcoming smile when she opened the door. “Lacy, this is a great surprise. But I thought we were on for tonight.”

  “I can’t make tonight,” she said. “I have something else to do.” Wearily, she sank into the chair across from him and resisted the urge to put her feet up.

  He leaned forward with a concerned frown. “Is everything okay?”

  “Can I ask you a pastor question?”

  “Yes. Do you want me to put my collar on?” He reached for the drawer beside him, but she stopped him with a laugh.

  “No, that’s okay. I want to talk like friends. I just meant I have an ethical dilemma, and I need your advice.”

  “Go ahead.” He crossed his hands on his desk and prepared to listen intently.

  “Do you think it’s ever okay to cover up a crime?” she asked.

  “Are you talking about your break-in at the Blake house the other night?”

  “How did you know?” she asked, astounded by his perception.

  He shrugged. “Call it pastor’s intuition. If you’re asking if it’s okay to cover up what you did to avoid getting in trouble, then the answer is no.”

  “But I thought you agreed it needed to be done,” she said indignantly.

  “I did, but that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t be willing to accept the consequences of your behavior. You had a compelling reason to break into that house, but it was still against the law. If you get caught, then you need to be willing to pay for your crime.”

  She digested that and realized she agreed with him. Covering up her actions didn’t feel right. If she was arrested, then so be it. “But what if you’re covering a crime to protect someone you love?”

  He froze and quirked an eyebrow. “Jason?”

  She frowned. “Of course not.” With a sigh, she unloaded the entire story she had just learned from her grandmother’s four friends. When she was finished, Tosh laughed.

  “I know I shouldn’t find it funny, but it’s not every day a pastor learns that four of the oldest and most conservative members of his congregation are actually criminals.”

  “Tosh, you can’t tell anyone,” she said, suddenly afraid she had said too much.

  “Of course not,” he said. “What happens in this office is confidential.” He sat back and laced his hands behind his
head. “You’ve raised a difficult question, Lacy. Is it ever right to commit or cover a crime in order to protect the person you love? My first inclination is to say no, but life is full of gray areas. I honestly don’t know.”

  “I thought pastors were supposed to know all the answers,” she said.

  He shook his head. “Pastors are supposed to know where to find all the answers,” he replied. “And I do, but it’s going to take some time while I study my bible and pray about it.”

  Tosh was possibly the only person she knew who could say that in a sentence and have it sound sincere.

  “That doesn’t help me much; I need answers now.”

  “Here’s my advice to you: you have a good head and heart. Use them.”

  “I have been accused of possessing a tender conscience,” she admitted.

  “You call it conscience, I call it God. Whatever the case, listen to that inner voice and you’ll know the right thing to do when the time comes.” He sat up and leaned forward again. “Are you sure you’re busy tonight?”

  She nodded.

  He sighed. “I guess I’m going to have to go out and actually meet some more people in this town. Do you know any other single women you could set me up with?”

  “There’s Peggy at the coffee shop. She’s never been married, and I’m fairly certain she still has all her own teeth.”

  “Do I detect a hint of jealousy?” he asked.

  “No. Peggy’s free to go out with whomever she wants.”

  He laughed. “And what are you going to be doing this evening while I’m wooing Peggy with prunes and arthritis cream?”

  “I’m going to talk to Jason.” His smile faltered, and she hurried on. “About the things you and I were just discussing. I’m going to try and convince him to let Bryce go.”

  “Do you think it will work?” he asked, sounding slightly mollified.

  “I don’t know, but I have to try. I don’t think sending four old ladies to jail is the right thing to do.”

  “There’s a chance that might not happen. They could cop pleas and avoid jail time.”

  “But their reputations would be ruined,” she said.

  “Maybe they should be,” he argued. “You could have died if Bryce had hit you any harder. They had no guarantee that he wouldn’t hurt you or kill you. They did something wrong.”

  “Yes, but they did it to me. Doesn’t that mean I should be able to forgive them if I want to? And they had no idea what they were getting into. They were naïve enough to feel invisible on the internet. They’re way over their heads here.”

  “So are you, but I think you’re very sweet and merciful. It gives me hope that you’ll extend the same grace to me someday if I mess up.”

  “I probably would, but there’s one way to know for sure,” she said.

  “What’s that?” He picked up her hand and brought it to his lips, bestowing a kiss on her palm.

  “Don’t mess up,” she said. She gave his hand a squeeze and let herself out of his office.

  Chapter 18

  Lacy worked hard to make herself look good for her evening with Jason. After her breakup with Robert, she had purged most of the things that reminded her of him, but there was one thing she was unable to get rid of: her little black dress. He had liked the dress and always complimented her profusely when she wore it. That alone would have been reason enough to do away with it except for the fact that she liked it, too.

  It was perfect--not too revealing, and not Puritanical. It hung exactly right, highlighting her curves without looking like an invitation to explore them. Somehow it could either be dressy or casual, depending on what she wanted it to be. Tonight she was aiming for casual, and with her ballet flats and low-key jewelry she succeeded in hitting the right note.

  After securing her hair in a loose chignon and touching up her makeup, she was ready to go.

  Jason lived in a small house on the far side of town, which was another surprising thing about him. They were only twenty five. Lacy couldn’t imagine owning a house yet, especially not by herself. When she was financially able, she planned to move to an apartment for a few years until she either got married or decided it was time to buy. Apartment living went with the carefree lifestyle she imagined Jason to have. A house seemed so…stable and traditional--two words she hadn’t previously associated with Jason Cantor. But she was learning there was more to him than met the eye, even though what met the eye was so appealing one was tempted to linger there forever.

  Lacy knocked on the door and stood waiting nervously for Jason to answer.

  “Lacy,” he said, blinking at her in surprise as he looked her up and down.

  “I decided to take you up on your offer tonight,” she said, trying to feign a confidence she was far from feeling.

  He closed the door, blocking her view into the room. “Oh, I wish I had known. I’m sort of busy.” He threw a furtive look over his shoulder.

  Lacy wanted to shrivel up and die. Why hadn’t she called first? “Oh, that’s okay, I was just in the neighborhood, and I…” She trailed off and turned toward her car, hoping a rescue would miraculously appear there.

  Jason chuckled. “I’m teasing you.” He opened the door wider. “Come in.” He didn’t move aside. Instead he raised his arm, forcing her to duck under. When she was right beside him, he dropped his arm like a bar, trapping her between him and the door.

  “I feel a little silly,” he said.

  “Why?” she asked, trying hard to breathe through her mouth so she wouldn’t have to inhale his mind-numbing cologne.

  “Because I thought you looked as good as possible in running shorts. I should have withheld judgment until I saw you in a dress.”

  It was happening again. Lacy felt herself almost swaying toward him, as if she were being drawn in like a fish on a line. She couldn’t do this tonight; she needed all her faculties to have a rational conversation with him. But then she looked down and saw his charcoal gray t-shirt conforming to his magnificent chest, and some of her resolve wavered. She also noticed a dish towel slung over his shoulder.

  “Did I interrupt you in the middle of something?” she asked, hating how her voice emerged as a faint squeak.

  “I was doing the dishes,” he explained.

  “You do the dishes?”

  He smiled. “Did you think I have a maid?”

  Was that a casual question or a subtle dig at Tosh who did employ a maid?

  “Have you eaten?” he asked. “I was just about to grill something.”

  “You don’t have to cook for me,” she protested. “We could go out. My treat.”

  “I was under the impression your funds were limited right now,” he said.

  Lacy’s pride prickled. “What makes you say that?”

  “You live with your grandmother and you don’t own a car.”

  “I love my grandmother, and I enjoy walking,” she snapped.

  “Okay. You’re rolling in cash. My mistake.”

  She relaxed, realizing how uptight she sounded. “Sorry. Funds are a little tight right now. Money is a sore subject. But I’m going to make it.”

  “I know you will,” he said.

  His confident tone caused some of the anxiety constricting her chest to ease a little bit.

  “Everyone thought I was crazy to leave my editing job in New York,” she confessed. “It paid well.”

  “Did you like that job?”

  “It was good,” she said.

  “Are you where you want to be and doing what you want to be doing now?” he asked.

  She laughed humorlessly. “Are you kidding me? I’m scraping bottom.”

  “If you liked your job there and don’t like it here, then why did you come back?” he asked.

  Somehow she had stumbled right into the one topic she wanted to avoid. “Sometimes you just need a change, you know?”

  “No,” he answered. “I have no plans to ever leave here.”

  “Why? You could have done anything.”


  “I’m doing what I’ve always wanted to do.” Now it was his turn to look cagey and uncomfortable. Lacy thought it was a good thing their friendship was temporary and would most likely end when she moved away. It wasn’t destined to get off the ground if neither of them was willing to open up to the other.

  Jason opened the fridge and pulled out a large steak.

  “Can I help?” Lacy asked.

  “Sure. I’ll take care of the meat. You can do the side dish.”

  “What do you want me to make?” she asked.

  “Surprise me.”

  She couldn’t believe he was giving her carte blanche to search his kitchen, but she was soon to be disappointed by what she found. His possessions were Spartan and neatly arranged, offering no surprises.

  “You’re very clean,” she said.

  “Thank you,” he replied.

  “I’m not sure that was a compliment.”

  “I am,” he said. “Tidiness is a virtue.”

  She paused in her search for a vegetable, turning to him with a smile. “Jason, you’re such a boy scout.” Her amused tone held a hint of wonder. He wasn’t turning out to be anything like what she had thought. Before tonight she would have thought his bachelor pad was a hovel, lined with pizza boxes and empty cans.

  “You think so, Lacy?” Jason asked, his tone considerably warmer than hers. “Maybe I’ll have to change your mind about that.” His glance fell to her lips, and then he picked up the platter of meat and headed outside.

  How does he do that? Lacy wondered. She opened the freezer and stuck her overheated face inside. While there, she noticed some steak fries and mixed vegetables so that when Jason reentered the house and asked her what she was doing, she was able to pull out the food and hold it up for his inspection.

  When he left again, she arranged the fries on a tray and popped them in the oven, then found a pot for the vegetables. Her grandmother had a secret white sauce recipe she always used for vegetables. Lacy crossed her fingers that Jason would have the proper ingredients, and then felt vaguely disappointed when he did. Why would a bachelor have such a well-stocked pantry if not for some female who did it for him? And since he had said his family lived far away, that must have meant that some girlfriend at one time bought him nutmeg and evaporated milk. It was too easy to imagine some female trying to worm her way into his heart and life by setting up camp in the kitchen.