Along with politely giving Jonathan and me some privacy, Socrates tended to stick to a routine bedtime, and it was getting late.
“So, how have you been since you ran from my house?” Jonathan teased, sitting down on my love seat and gesturing for me to join him. If his ego was bruised by my failure to respond in kind to his declaration of love, it didn’t show, just like how he hadn’t seemed embarrassed when I’d once turned him down for a date. On the contrary, I saw a glimmer of amusement in his eyes as I slipped onto the soft cushion next to him. The sofa left me no choice but to basically rest against him, which wasn’t a bad thing. “And how was the shower?” he asked. “The one with the guests—not the one you just took.”
I knew he hadn’t traveled to Winding Hill to get an update on a painting party or my time in the bathroom, and I said, “Jonathan, about last night, and the stupid things that came out of my mouth . . .”
He’d taken a sip of tea, but he set down his mug and squeezed my wrist. “Daphne, it’s okay. I didn’t tell you that I love you to force your hand and make you say it back. I was just stating a fact. And I came here to make sure things are all right between us. Because you seemed a little spooked.” He grinned. “A lot spooked.”
“I was just caught off guard,” I told him, thinking that was an understatement. I cringed every time I pictured myself babbling and darting to my van. “And things are fine. In fact—”
I started to tell him that I loved him, too, although it didn’t seem like the right moment or mood. It was probably a good thing that he interrupted by pulling something out of the pocket of the soft, striped button-down shirt he was wearing open over a white tee that emphasized the tan he’d gotten in California. “Here.” He shook out a folded piece of paper. “You wanted this, for some reason.”
“What is it?” I asked, scanning the document, which looked like some kind of scientific report. I tried to make sense of the jumble of words and letters, which were like Greek, or at least a lot of Greek roots, to me.
Stereo microscope . . . FT-IR . . . microspectrophoto-meter. . .
“I’m reading, but nothing’s registering,” I admitted, before noticing one thing I could decipher: Coroner Vonda Shakes’s name on the official letterhead. I shoved Jonathan’s shoulder, because he was already laughing at me. “And don’t say I’d be able to understand this if I’d attended the police academy.”
“Well, that would probably be true,” he said, taking the paper from my fingers and placing it on the trunk. He settled back again, and I sank even closer to him. “To summarize, it’s the report on the fibers found on Abigail’s body. Doebler shared a copy with me.”
I was immediately intrigued. “So what did the strands come from?”
“The exact source hasn’t been identified yet, but the fibers are a mix of blue and white silk.”
I winced again as I recalled how I’d tried to strangle myself with a rag. That exercise seemed even more pointless in the wake of the report. “So they weren’t fibers you’d find in, say, a dish towel from a restaurant supply company?”
“No, I imagine those would be cotton,” Jonathan surmised, as Tinkleston ran down the steps, following Ms. Peebles into the kitchen. A moment later, I heard them both eating from their bowls, which were now side by side. “Why did you ask about a towel?” he inquired, seeming oblivious to the miracle of feline camaraderie I’d just witnessed. “And why did you want this report in the first place?”
I reached for my tea. “When Daisy Carpenter was considering fleeing town, I saw a stack of blue-and-white striped towels in a box at In a Pickle. And I later remembered that she’d been using one in the same pattern to wipe down the counter at Artful Engagements the night Abigail was killed.”
Jonathan was giving me a look that said I probably should’ve shared that earlier.
“I didn’t say anything because I didn’t want to make things needlessly worse for Daisy if the report would rule out the towels—as seems to be the case,” I reminded him. I felt some heat creep into my cheeks, but nevertheless confessed, “Plus, I tried to choke myself with a similar rag to see if it would be possible, and it seemed difficult to get a good enough grip.”
“That sounds very scientific.”
“Hey, I don’t have an FT-IR, whatever that is,” I pointed out, sipping my tea and placing the mug on the trunk, next to the report. “And you’ll note that I reached the same conclusion as the doohickey—”
“The Fourier-transform infrared spectroscope.”
“Yes, that. Which also ruled out the towel. If not Daisy.”
I hadn’t meant to mention my continued nagging, if weak, suspicion of Daisy, and, of course, Jonathan jumped right on it. He shifted on the love seat, facing me more fully and resting one arm across the back. “I thought you were fairly certain Daisy isn’t the killer.”
“For someone who’s not on the case, you are very interested in my theories and observations.”
He smiled, and I could hardly believe I’d managed to keep from blurting out that I was crazy for him when he’d whispered in my ear. But it definitely wasn’t the right time then, and I stayed quiet as he told me, “We share an undeniable fascination with solving puzzles. So tell me more about Daisy.”
I was glad Socrates was upstairs, because I didn’t want to again worry him about Snowdrop’s future, which would certainly be in jeopardy if Daisy Carpenter really was somehow involved in a crime. I lowered my voice. “I saw Daisy tonight, with Laci Chalmers, in a shadowy spot near the woods. And, while I couldn’t hear them, it looked like they were arguing.” I pantomimed the hand gestures I’d seen both women use. “Laci was jabbing her finger at Daisy, and Daisy was raising her hands, like she was warding off blows.”
“And you’re linking this to the murder because ... ?”
He’d connected the argument to Abigail’s death, too. In the brief time I’d been talking, I’d seen the wheels spinning and associations forming in Jonathan’s mind. He just wanted to know if I was drawing the same conclusions.
“They were likely the last two people at Artful Engagements the night of the murder—with the exception of Dexter Shipley, who outright lied to me about the events of that evening.”
Jonathan leaned forward. I might as well have been under a spotlight down at the station. “How so?”
“He told me that he left the party after escorting Beverly Berendt to her car, because it was raining and he had an umbrella. But Bev says that’s not the case.” All at once, I doubted my doubts. “Then again, he might have mistaken Mom for Bev. They were both dressed almost exactly alike. And Mom was wearing a silk blouse.”
Jonathan’s arm, draped across the couch, moved slightly. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw that Tinkleston had slunk into the room at some point and levitated up from the floor, in his spooky way. He was perched on the back of the seat, allowing Jonathan to scratch his ears. Like Jonathan, I acted like this was no big deal. “Why is your mother’s shirt important?” he asked as a faint mewling sound emanated from behind the overstuffed sofa.
Apparently, Ms. Peebles had tried to levitate, too, but had gotten herself wedged between the furniture and the wall.
Kneeling and reaching over the seat back, which disturbed Tinks’s moment with Jonathan, I reached down and pulled her free.
Both cats ran off again, yowling loudly to each other, but in a companionable way, while I settled back into my seat. “Dexter said the woman complained that the rain would ruin her outfit. It was a detail that made his story believable.”
“That does sound like your mother,” Jonathan noted. “So, forgetting Shipley for a moment, let’s assume Laci and Daisy were the last two employees to leave the event.”
“What if one of them saw the other do something fishy?” My repeated use of that phrase must’ve been related to my increasing concern over my looming boat ride, which I again shelved away in the back of my mind. “They might have fought about keeping it quiet.”
Jonathan nod
ded agreement, but slowly. He was still thinking. Then he suggested a possibility that hadn’t even crossed my mind. “Or what if they were both involved in the killing in some way? Conspirators who are now afraid one might sell the other out.”
“That’s a pretty classic scenario,” I conceded. “But doesn’t it sort of imply premeditation? It’s hard to imagine two normal people getting blindly furious enough to kill someone at the exact same time. And the crime seems like one of passion, or at least done on impulse, right?”
“Yes, I don’t think it was premeditated,” Jonathan agreed. “And you’re right. It’s not likely that two individuals, however aggrieved with the same employer, would be pushed to commit such a violent act simultaneously.”
The conversation lagged for a minute, but only because we were both considering other options. Jonathan was the first to speak, posing a question I had also failed to ask. “Do we know Laci’s, or Daisy’s, sexual orientation?”
Piper had reminded me that, if Abigail had been involved with someone, that person hadn’t necessarily been male. But I hadn’t even considered Daisy or Laci as possible romantic partners for her.
Jonathan had suddenly raised so many possibilities that gears started spinning wildly in my head, too. And something Daisy had said the night of Abigail’s murder suddenly took on a potentially different meaning.
Daisy had been angry with Abigail and had started to accuse her of something, saying, “You keep holding me . . .”
I hadn’t known what to make of that when I’d witnessed the altercation, and it had only made sense when Daisy had told me how Abigail had basically blackmailed her. I’d assumed, then, that Daisy had been about to say “hostage.”
But what if she’d meant “hold” in a different, physical sense?
Daisy and Abigail, or Abigail and Laci, certainly wouldn’t have been the first people to engage in destructive, even abusive, love-hate relationships.
“You’re thinking one of them might not have been leaving at all that night,” I said, trying to put numerous disconnected pieces together. “Hence the suitcase on the bed. Or there was a love triangle. One in which Abigail was either the desired object, or a jilted party . . .” I rubbed my head. “You have really opened a possible can of worms. And given the way Laci and Daisy were huddled together in the darkness, I certainly can’t rule out the idea of some sort of romantic entanglement.”
“You’ve twice mentioned the woods. Where, exactly, were you all?”
“At the Owl & Crescent Art Barn—or, more accurately, behind the barn.”
Jonathan suddenly seemed concerned. “That’s where you held the shower?”
I nodded. “How do you even know the place?”
“There was a homicide on that property not too long ago. The detective on the case . . .” Jonathan took a second to recall the person’s name, then said, “Turner . . . Lucien Turner ... contacted me to ask if I had any suggestions for cracking the inner circle of a small town when you’re coming in as an outsider. In his case, from New Orleans.”
“What did you tell him?”
“Team up with a nosy pet sitter, if there’s one around, and let her do half the work.”
“Very funny,” I said. “And I knew about the murder. The proprietor, Willow, mentioned it when I called to book the gathering. I told her that a homicide wouldn’t scare off the Templeton party, then completely forgot about her concerns—even when I was down near the creek, talking with Beverly Berendt.”
I could tell that Jonathan was thinking that I was expanding my range when it came to getting mixed up in murders and potentially falling into danger. “Why . . . ?”
“Bev wanted to pick my brain about Dorinda. To see if I believed she might be the killer.”
Jonathan didn’t seem surprised to hear that a mother doubted her own daughter. All he said was, “Doebler tells me Dorinda left town.”
I was glad Jonathan’s partner knew that. I’d still been debating sharing Dorinda’s note with him. “I guess that doesn’t look good for her.”
“I really don’t think Dorinda’s a suspect,” he said, surprising me. “A lot of people saw her at the Wild Hog around the time of Abigail’s death.”
“I think everyone agrees that most of those individuals aren’t trustworthy.”
“But some of them are, and I was able to vouch for a few of the witnesses Doebler tracked down. They all said Dorinda was in the bar until Roger showed up. Then they went up to her apartment.”
“That’s great,” I said, not sure why he hadn’t mentioned this before. “That means Roger’s probably off the hook, too, right?”
“I’m afraid not. There’s still a gap between the time Roger was dropped off at his house and the time he showed up at the Wild Hog. A gap that includes a phone call to Abigail Sinclair.”
I suddenly felt a little queasy. I’d considered the evidence against Roger before, but to hear Jonathan lay out the timeline so succinctly was unsettling.
“I’m sorry to burst your bubble,” Jonathan said, rising, like he was leaving. “I know you’re hopeful that Roger will be cleared soon. And, as his best man, I certainly feel the same way.”
I stood up, too, and we moved to the door. “You don’t think there’s any chance he did it, do you?”
I was asking him to judge the facts and assure me that he had full faith in Roger before he stood next to him in the chapel.
“I can’t argue that facts are stacked against him, and if I were on the case as an objective investigator, I would be watching him closely,” Jonathan admitted. “But I’m not objective, and I can’t seriously consider him a suspect. Which is why, for all our speculation and my conversations with Doebler, I’m not really on the case.”
That reminder once again spotlighted the elephant that was always lurking in the room with us, unleashing it to rampage through my tiny home. However, this time, I tried to keep in mind that Jonathan wasn’t looking for a reason to leave Sylvan Creek, or me—even if he did end up taking the job in California. In the meantime, I would try to take my own advice and live in the moment, honestly, with him.
I stepped closer to him and took his hands, for a change. “Jonathan, about what you said . . .”
“I don’t want you to feel pressured,” he reminded me. But I knew he realized I was letting my guard down, just like I always wanted him to do. Still, he told me, more quietly, “You don’t have to say anything.”
“But I want to,” I told him. “I wanted to last night. I was just so surprised.”
Jonathan smiled down at me. “Really, Daphne? I’ve given you no hints? Not in the way I look at you, or work to win over a cat with a horrible attitude, just to make you happy?”
Tinkleston and Ms. Peebles had taken over our spots on the couch, and Tinks yowled in complaint.
Jonathan wasn’t working too hard. He completely ignored the rebuke, telling me, “Not to mention the time I called in a bunch of favors to bring Socrates’ ‘girlfriend’ back to town. And my arrangement of a sleigh ride for you, as well as the multiple times I’ve rescued you from perilous situations—”
“The rescues were all professional obligations,” I reminded him. “I’m pretty sure you would’ve saved anyone from a locked walk-in refrigerator.”
Jonathan unclasped our fingers and rested his hands on my hips. “Not with the same sense of desperate urgency, to make sure you were okay.”
I slipped my arms up around his neck, enjoying the warmth and strength of his body against mine, and the way his voice was growing more tender and deeper. “You were really desperate?” I asked, my stomach prickling in a pleasant way.
“You’re not going to make me admit that again, are you?”
He was grinning, but I’d grown serious. “How about what you said last night? Would you admit that again?”
His voice was even lower, quieter, and the warmth in his eyes melted me. “You know I love you, Daphne.”
“I love you, too,” I promised, as he be
nt to brush his lips against mine.
My heart was pounding, and, although I knew there was a good chance our deepening relationship might soon be tested by distance, a tiny part of me might’ve imagined the kind of future Piper was about to enjoy, with a wonderful partner by her side.
All at once, reality intruded on the moment Jonathan and I were sharing, and I rested one hand on his chest, stopping the kiss.
Piper can’t marry Roger unless the real killer is found.
Someone used a blue-and-white weapon at an event where the water ran red.
White and blue, mixed with red water to make a pale shade of purple . . .
“What’s wrong?” Jonathan sounded concerned.
I could tell that he thought I’d lost my nerve again and was going to run off. Or, more likely, shove him out the door, because we were at my house.
But I hadn’t lost anything.
On the contrary, I was pretty sure I’d found something important.
“I love you,” I repeated, a little breathlessly. I wanted him to know that I hadn’t gotten cold feet before I shared some news that might really mess up a wonderful moment. Yet I had to tell him: “And I think the murder weapon is in Piper’s barn.”
Chapter 27
Jonathan wasn’t even on the case, let alone the lead investigator, but he was in the thick of things at Piper’s barn when Detective Doebler and some uniformed officers showed up to hunt for the silver gift bag that contained a damp, stretched-out purple garter.
Well, the garter was almost certainly dry by then, and I hoped that wouldn’t mess up any attempts to confirm that it had been used to throttle Abigail Sinclair, as I suspected.
“How did I not think of that possibility?” I mused, shuffling and rubbing my arms, because the temperatures had dipped even lower, becoming unseasonably cool as the night wore on. “It was such a weird gift. Strange enough that even Moxie thought it was unusual. And she hardly raises an eyebrow at anything!”
Socrates, who’d reluctantly woken up and joined Jonathan’s and my trek from Plum Cottage to the barn, yawned, like he wasn’t surprised by anything humans did. He was also probably very tired, like me and Piper, who stood next to me near the antique truck, wearing a bathrobe and pair of rubber gardening shoes. We’d dragged her out of a sound sleep, too.
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