She led us out to a cedar toolshed with a barn-shaped door and colorful flowers planted neatly along the front. I probably would have admired it if she wasn't planning to kill me in it. She made Kenny slide the door open and we peered into a dark, windowless interior filled with rakes, shovels and other tools. A potting bench stood at one end. The overwhelming odor of kerosene churned my stomach.
She pressed the gun to Kenny's back. "Get inside."
He stepped in and she put her palm on my back and pushed. I stumbled, my injured shoulder exploding in pain as I smashed into a hook on the wall. My legs turned to jelly and I collapsed to the floor. I was in no shape to try to take her, even though I could see Kenny was thinking about it.
"What are you going to do?" I asked.
"You've been a thorn in my side, so I'm getting rid of you. If only you'd butted out and not asked so many questions. But I could tell it was only a matter of time before you figured out who really killed Paisley." Brenda beamed with pride. "And this is the perfect set-up to get rid of both of you. With Kenny's past accusations with the lumberyard fire, no one will think twice about him getting revenge on his sister's killer and burning you in the shed. Too bad he's going to get caught in the fire himself," she said.
I stared at her. "You're crazy. Why would I be in your shed? How are you going to explain that?"
"Simple. You came to steal the portfolio from me because it proved that you killed Paisley." The white cat wove around Brenda's ankles, purring as she talked
"Huh? What proof? No one is going to believe that."
"Oh, they will. Especially once I slip the note in there that you wrote demanding to meet with Paisley the night she died. That's all the proof I will need."
"You mean a note just like the ones you sent to Paisley and Maisie?" I asked.
Brenda nodded. "Yes, wasn't that clever? I got Maisie to the shop with the note and she and Paisley had it out. I timed it just right so that I could make sure Sophie would see them together when I was at the pharmacy. Then I snuck in the back and waited for Maisie to leave. I clonked Paisley and took a picture of Maisie getting into her car to make it look like Paisley had gotten off the shot as she lay dying. Maisie is so slow, I had plenty of time. Of course, I didn't count on George setting the place on fire and damaging the camera … or on you messing things up with your meddling. But no worries, I can adapt."
"But I have no motive."
"Sure you do. Jealousy. You see, you were in love with Neil Lane."
"What?" I struggled to stand up, but my legs didn't want to cooperate. "I didn't even know him."
"That’s where you were so clever, Willa. You kept it a secret from everyone. You didn't want your sheriff boyfriend to find out because you wanted to keep him available to feed you information, so you could meddle in these investigations." She smiled. "But I have a picture of you at Neil's house on one of your secret rendezvous. Yes, I know you were there with your tea-pushing friend Pepper, but I cleverly cropped her out of the picture. So everyone will just see you meeting Neil Lane at his house in the woods."
"And what about him." I jerked my head in Kenny's direction.
"Why, Kenny here found out and confronted you. He suspected you killed Paisley and followed you here. It's funny, because that's not too far from the truth."
"And how do you plan to explain us both being in your shed?" I tried to keep her talking while Kenny figured out a way to get us out of this. At least I hoped that's what he was doing, because with my brain as confused as it was, I was in no condition to do it.
"Easy. I was just in the wrong place at the wrong time. Kenny came over in a mad rage to kill you. Unfortunately, there was nothing I could do to save you. He knocked me out and when I woke up, you were both dead already. Of course, clonking myself on the back of the head to make it look authentic won’t be easy, but I'll have to do it. I've practiced a few times already. I'm just lucky he didn't kill me, too. Silly boy, he must have gotten caught in his own fire. But that makes it nice and tidy for the police."
I didn't doubt Brenda had practice clocking herself on the head already. She was acting like she had scrambled her brains.
"That’s crazy. No one is going to believe that." Would they?
Brenda's eyes narrowed. "I think they will. It wasn't my original plan, but this is even better because now instead of just framing Kenny, he will be dead here in the shed. Apparently, he was knocked out while setting the fire. Caught in his own trap, so to speak. He won't be able to deny it or prove that he didn't do it. Of course, I will have to disable him because now I can't lock the shed door to keep you in, or the police will wonder how it got locked with Kenny inside. It's too bad I didn't get to offer him any of my lemonade. That would render him useless, just like it did to you." Brenda nodded at the way I was trying to scramble up onto my Jell-O legs. "You know, Willa, it's too bad you didn't drink more of that. You'd be passed out now. You wouldn't feel a thing. But instead, now you will burn alive. Drinking more of the lemonade would really have been best, and there's no worry of it coming out in a toxicology report since your bodies will be burned to a crisp."
My stomach crunched and Kenny made a move to jump Brenda, but she jerked the gun up level with his head and it stopped him cold. "Don't try it. I will put a bullet in you. I don't want to unless I have to, though, because a bullet hole might raise questions with the police. Unless I make it look like Willa shot you."
"No, that's not a good idea," Kenny said.
"Why not? Maybe just a graze that the police won't be able to see with all the charring and all." She pursed her lips in thought. "No, I think this is better."
She kept the gun trained on him, then bent down and picked up a wooden baseball bat. I could see it had blood on it already. Was that what she'd hit Paisley with? I realized I hadn't even thought about the murder weapon because I'd assumed Paisley had died in the fire. Before I could ask about it, she raised it overhead and smashed it down on Kenny.
I guess she was pretty good at clonking people, because he crumpled to the ground. I wondered who else she'd practiced on besides herself and Paisley.
The white cat sniffed Kenny, then glared at me. Its amber eyes seemed to glow and I felt a shiver run up my spine.
I struggled to get up, but my legs kept sliding out from under me.
She threw the baseball bat into the shed. "Now you can be found with the murder weapon, too. Just to seal the deal that you are the real killer."
"I don't think the police are going to fall for this," I said.
Brenda cocked her head at me. "Of course they will. They fell for what I told them before when I burned the lumberyard."
Then she stepped back and slid the door shut. It rammed into the other side with a bang and I was left in darkness.
It was silent except for my own frantic heartbeat. And then I heard the sound of a match head striking flint and a whoosh of fire.
Chapter Twenty-Eight
I struggled to get to my feet, but it was no use. I could hear the fire crackling at the sides of the wooden shed and it was getting warm. Very warm. We had to get out of there or we would be burned alive, just like Brenda had described.
“Kenny! Kenny!” I glanced at his slumped form which I could just barely make out in the dark. He didn’t move or make any noise. He was out cold and I was on my own. If only my head wasn’t so fuzzy I was sure I could figure out a way to get out. The door wasn’t even locked and I was surrounded by tools. But without being able to use my legs it was impossible to get at them.
To make matters worse, the shed was filling up with smoke and it was getting hard to breathe. I put the bottom of my T-shirt over my nose and mouth as if that could filter out the smoke. Something to my left caught my eye and I looked over, my stomach plummeting when I saw orange flames licking the inside of the wall.
I started to feel faint. Was I succumbing to smoke inhalation? I guess that would be a more pleasant death than burning.
“Meow!” The fra
ntic cry came from just outside the door. Was it Pandora? I hoped she didn’t get too close to the fire—no sense in both of us burning. As I struggled to stay conscious, I heard a cacophony of cat yowls and hissing. What was going on out there?
Then the cat yells stopped. In fact, things got eerily silent. Even the fire stopped crackling. Actually, the fire seemed to have gone out—I couldn’t see the flames anymore.
Scratch. Scratch. Scratch.
It was coming from the shed door.
Squeak.
The door slid open a fraction of an inch, letting a thin slice of light in and giving me a burst of adrenaline. Coughing, I struggled onto my stomach and pulled myself forward toward the door.
Scratch. Scratch.
A gray paw appeared in the doorway. Pandora was out there and she was trying to get at me. I wriggled forward, crying out as the tines of a metal rake jabbed into my ribs.
Scratch. Scratch. Squeak.
The door moved another fraction of an inch and more fresh air swirled in. I crawled another inch closer. And another, until I was close enough. I reached my arm out. My fingertips grasped the edge of the door and I pushed. Hope flooded my chest as I felt the door give. I pushed it is far open as I could and sucked in a lungful of fresh air.
Brenda lay just outside the door. Had she actually knocked herself out? Or did she have help? Judging by the way Pandora was looking at me and the scratches on Brenda’s arm, I wondered.
The fluffy, white cat lay beside her head. He was very still and I wondered if Brenda had clonked him on the head, too … but why would she? As I looked at him, something dark moved on his back. I recoiled as I realized it was a spider—one of the biggest I’d ever seen.
The strangest thing was that the fire had completely gone out, which seemed impossible, given that the place was doused with kerosene.
Next to Pandora, the young cat from the porch sat licking her singed paw. She looked at me with her strange face and winked her green eye. I wondered how she’d gotten out. Probably Pandora had sliced the screen, which was fine with me. I was no longer worried about having to replace it.
I didn’t have time to lie around looking at cats. I had to get Kenny up before Brenda came-to.
“Kenny, are you okay!” I tried to push the door open wider as I drank in the fresh air. I heard Kenny moan behind me.
“What happened?”
I opened my mouth to answer him, but didn’t get a chance to form the words because just then, Striker and Gus came running from the other side of the house.
“Willa! Are you all right?” Striker rushed over to me, ignoring Brenda and pulling me to my feet. My legs trembled beneath me like a newborn colt but I managed to remain upright. “What happened to you?”
I looked up into his concerned, gray eyes. “She drugged me and was going to burn me in the shed.”
“What were you doing here?” Gus asked, then turned her eyes on Kenny. “And that goes for you, too.”
We filled them in on how Brenda had killed Paisley to keep the photos from being seen and her plot to frame me for the killing and then frame Kenny for my death as Gus put wrist ties on Brenda, who slept through the whole thing. They seemed oddly unsurprised.
When Gus was done with Brenda, she stood with her hands on her hips, giving me ‘the look’. “Didn’t Jimmy tell you to back off? We had things under control.”
“What do you mean?” I noticed that my legs were less shaky. Whatever Brenda had given me must have been wearing off. I wriggled out of Striker’s grasp and managed to stand on my own. “You guys were busy arresting Maisie and she didn’t even do it. Somebody had to find the real killer.”
Gus and Striker exchanged a look. “Did you ever think that maybe we were trying to find the real killer?”
My brows pulled together. “What do you mean? You knew it wasn’t Maisie all along?”
“Let’s just say we might know how to do our jobs a little better than you think we do and sometimes doing that job might involve a little bit of misdirection so that the real killer lets their guard down.”
I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. Had they known Brenda was the killer all along? Why didn’t anyone say anything to me?
“So, you arrested Maisie thinking that Brenda would get complacent and screw up?” Kenny asked.
“When we saw the picture of Maisie on the camera, we figured it was someone trying to frame her. We didn’t really think Maisie would kill Paisley over the art show. We got Brenda’s fingerprint from the charm that Willa gave us. It really didn’t prove much since she could’ve lost it outside at any time, but it was another strike against her,” Gus said.
“We also knew Brenda had access to her sister's black truck. But we didn’t understand what her motive would be, though, so we were waiting before we took action,” Striker added.
I felt like a jerk. I’d almost screwed things up and got myself killed in the process. “So you were waiting for her to trip up and I screwed things up for you.”
Gus’s face softened. “Well, I really wouldn’t say you screwed things up.”
“In fact, you might have sped things along,” Striker added.
“What do you mean? You were expecting me to come here and get Brenda to do something drastic?”
Gus shrugged. “Well, you are rather predictable.”
“You mean you guys used me as bait?” I shook my head. “No, you guys wouldn’t do that, would you?”
Gus and Striker looked at each other and smiled. “Of course we wouldn’t.”
Chapter Twenty-Nine
“So, Brenda killed her own sister?” Cordelia peered at me over the rim of her Styrofoam cup.
“Yes, but not on purpose. She didn’t know Amanda had run back to the lumberyard.”
“That’s so sad,” Pepper said from her seat on the couch where she was serving Neil Lane one of her special teas.
“I’m glad the cat is getting a good home,” Hattie said.
We all looked over at the little chimera, who sat in the window next to Pandora staring back at us with her odd two-toned face. I glanced past the window to the photography store across the street. It was a hive of activity with people clearing out the debris and fixing up the shop so it could open for business.
I’d been over there helping earlier myself, but my shoulder had started to ache so I had come back to take a coffee break. Across the way, I could see Bing washing the windows and Josiah helping Kenny move a table. Even Gus and Striker were over there pitching in.
Warmth flooded my chest. Kenny had turned out to be a good guy, just like Paisley had said. He was going to rent the store and keep it as a photography shop specializing in old cameras and vintage prints. He already had a good head-start with Paisley’s camera collection.
“I’ll bet that cat was very special to Brenda because of the way Amanda saved it,” Hattie said.
I pressed my lips together. “I’m not so sure Brenda thought the cat was special. She kept her on the porch and didn’t seem to be very affectionate toward her at all. In fact, she seemed wary of her. Almost as if the cat was a witness to her burning the lumberyard and was on the verge of telling everyone.”
“The kitten probably did have a view to a kill.” Hattie made quote marks with her fingers for the last five words.
“Don’t you mean a mew to a kill?” Cordelia asked and we all laughed.
“Did she really need the money bad enough to burn down her business?” Pepper asked.
“Yep. The police checked into it and they were going bankrupt. It turns out Amanda and Brenda didn’t know how to manage the lumberyard. They were going to lose everything. But their parents had great insurance and Brenda took advantage of that,” I said.
“And she had the perfect alibi, being out of town at the convention. It turned out she’d bribed a few people to lie that they’d seen her there, so any of the evidence the police found that pointed to her was immediately dismissed,” Pepper said. “I heard she even tried to frame K
enny for that.”
I nodded. “She did, but lucky for him he had an airtight alibi. He was with Father Tim.”
“Too bad for Amanda that she wasn’t somewhere else at the time, too,” Neal said.
“Well, at least the little one survived.” Cordelia nodded towards the cat.
“I heard Kenny was going to take her in,” Pepper said.
“Yep. It turns out that Kenny helped Amanda with some of the stray cats that would turn up at the lumberyard. This one was special, so he's decided to take her himself. He’s naming her Hope,” I said. “He’ll be able to afford a place of his own with the life insurance settlement from Paisley’s death.”
“It must be bittersweet for him.” Hattie’s voice was laced with sympathy.
“Yes, but he’s going to do a lot of good with that money. He’s using some of it to put himself through veterinary school at night while he runs the photography store during the day and he’s donating a good chunk to the feral cats of Mystic Notch.”
“Veterinary school is a good fit for him. He really is a cat lover,” Pepper said. “He risked quite a bit to take that pregnant cat in.”
I nodded. I never found the pregnant cat Paisley had mentioned because Kenny had taken the cat as soon as he found out about the fire. He knew it wasn’t safe for the cat to stay there, so he brought her to his room at the halfway house. It turned out that’s what he was hiding in there the whole time, the mother cat and her five kittens. Pets weren’t allowed in the halfway house.
“Has he found homes for them yet?” Hattie asked.
“Well at least one is going to Neil, right?” Pepper beamed at Neil.
Neil smiled, sipping from the porcelain teacup that looked too small and dainty for him. “That’s right. I’ve picked out a little tiger cat and I might get his sister, too. It’ll be good to have some company. My place is a bit out of the way and I get lonely sometimes. Especially now that Paisley’s gone.” My heart pinched at the sadness in his eyes.
A Mew to a Kill Page 18
