A Deal to Die For

by Josie Belle

  “Sorry,” she said. She stepped back. “I thought you were someone else.”

  “Are you sure?” he asked. He smiled at her, and she liked the way his blue eyes crinkled in the corners. “You looked like you were going to roundhouse me. Sort of reminded me of the days you’d get all miffy on the playground.”

  “I did not get miffy,” she protested. She turned back around and resumed her walk to Dr. Franklin’s. “I was plain old mad at you, and if I clobbered you, you had it coming.”

  “How do you figure?” he asked. He fell into step beside her. His low voice sounded serious, but Maggie could hear the laughter in it as well.

  “You were so mean to me,” she said. “You followed me around and made fun of my red hair and you got everyone else to do it, too. My only regret is that I didn’t hit you harder.”

  “Maggie, Maggie, Maggie,” he said her name and shook his head. “Don’t you know that boys only tease girls when they have a crush on them?”

  She opened her mouth to respond but found her throat was too tight for words. She cleared it and tried again.

  “That’s ridiculous,” she said. “You did not have a crush on me. You just really enjoyed torturing me.”

  She turned down the gravel drive that led to the historic estate that had been remodeled into an assisted-care facility. To her surprise, Sam stayed with her.

  “I did not enjoy it,” he argued. “I just couldn’t help myself when you were around, but it was hard to tell you that after you broke my nose.”

  “I’m sorry about that…mostly,” she said. “But other than to pick on me, you never spoke to me. You never even noticed me.”

  “Oh, I noticed you,” he said.

  Maggie felt her heart pound hard in her chest. She glanced at him out of the corner of her eye. Why was he telling her this now? A few months ago, they had agreed to try to be friends. Was he just messing with her?

  “Morning, Ms. Maggie,” a deep voice called.

  Maggie looked up and saw Ray Roberson, the facility’s bus driver, sitting in his bus with his feet on the dashboard, reading his newspaper.

  Ray was an older black man who had been an elementary school bus driver until he retired to live at Spring Gardens. Since he bought his bus when he retired to have it retire with him, the management let him live at Spring Gardens rent free in exchange for being the on-call bus driver.

  “Hi, Ray,” she called back. “How are you?”

  “I’m fine,” he said, studying the two of them over the top of the sports section. “Not as fine as young Sheriff Collins with the pretty date, but fine nonetheless.”

  “Good to see you, Ray,” Sam greeted the older man with a grin.

  “You, too,” Ray responded.

  They exchanged a look that Maggie found suspect.

  She whipped her head from one to the other. “This is not a date.”

  “You sure about that?” Sam asked. He grinned at her. “I could take you—”

  “Don’t you have some place to be?” she interrupted.

  She was feeling slightly panicked at the thought of a date with Sam Collins, and she wasn’t sure why, except for the fact that if there was unfinished business between them, she didn’t think she was ready to deal with it just yet.

  “Nope, it’s my day off,” he said. He gestured to his jeans and Ravens sweatshirt, which Maggie noticed emphasized his former-football-player shoulders a little bit too well.

  “What about you?” he asked. “I thought you’d be at the flea market today; at least that’s what Pete at the coffee shop said.”

  “Pete?” she asked.

  “Yeah, funny thing, for a new resident here, Pete seems to know an awful lot about you, like how you like your coffee and how you just bought a shop down the street from his. In fact, when I was in there earlier, he was telling Tyler Fawkes that he was thinking of asking you out.”

  Ray gave a low whistle and raised his paper as if he could imagine Maggie’s response to that and that it wouldn’t be good.

  Maggie blinked at Sam. Now it was all coming into focus. She scowled and stomped toward Dr. Franklin’s office on the side of the building.

  “What?” Sam asked, following her.

  “So, that’s why you followed me,” she said. “That’s why you’re teasing me about boys having crushes on girls. You think it’s funny that Pete likes me. You’re just here to tease me again. You haven’t changed a bit, Sam Collins, not one little bit.”

  “That’s not exactly accurate,” he said. “I did follow you because of what Pete said, but—”

  “Save it,” she said. She put up her hand in the universal sign for Stop right there, buster. “I don’t want to hear it.”

  “Maggie, you’ve got it all wrong,” he said.

  “Do I?” she asked. “I know you, Sam Collins. I’ve been the butt of your jokes before.”

  “Well, you got one part of that right. You do know me better than most,” he said. His look was significant, and Maggie felt her face grow hot.

  Wasn’t that just like a man? To bring up their brief—very brief—time spent in a relationship to see if he could knock her off-kilter. Well, it wasn’t going to work.

  “Let me tell you something,” she said. “It’s none of your business if Pete asks me out or not, and it’s certainly none of your business if I say yes.”

  “Are you going to say yes?” he asked.

  “As if I would tell you,” she said. “What did you not understand about my personal life being none of your business?”

  Sam looked like he wanted to argue, but she was too mad to give him the chance. She turned her back on him and yanked open the door to the office. She took three steps into the room and stumbled to a halt, causing Sam to slam into her back.

  He grabbed her before she fell forward, which was good, because lying on the reception room floor was Vera Madison, and kneeling over her with a syringe in his hand was Dr. John Franklin.

  Chapter 4

  “Doc, what’s wrong? Is Vera all right?” Maggie asked. She broke out of Sam’s grasp and hurried forward, dropping to her knees beside him. Sam crouched down on his other side.

  Dr. Franklin looked pale. His white hair was standing up in tufts on his head, and his hands were shaking.

  “No, she isn’t,” he said. “She’s dead.”

  Sam and Maggie exchanged a look over his head. Sam gave her a curt nod and checked Vera’s vital signs for himself. Maggie watched silently until Sam leaned back and shook his head.

  “What do you have there, Doc?” Sam asked.

  Maggie looked down and noticed the syringe that Doc still had in his hands.

  “I don’t know,” Dr. Franklin said. “What I mean is, I don’t know what was in it. I found it on the floor beside her.”

  “Wait here,” Sam said. He got up and disappeared into one of the examination rooms. He came back with a plastic bag. “Let’s put it in here until we know what it is.”

  Sam bagged the syringe and then did a quick visual inspection of Vera. Maggie did the same. None of her clothes seemed out of place. There were no signs of a struggle or anything to indicate that Vera had fought off an attacker.

  “I don’t like this,” Sam muttered.

  Maggie gave him a sharp look. He was in detective mode. She could tell. He scanned the room as if looking for a bad guy lurking behind the minimally padded waiting room chairs.

  Maggie rested her hand on Doc’s shoulder while Sam checked the office and the waiting rooms. Maggie’s late husband had been a deputy, so she was familiar with police protocol. She knew Sam was doing the customary suspicious-activity check. She glanced around the room, too, but everything was exactly as it always was.

  Sam came back and gave Doc a searching look. “I’m going to call the medical examiner’s office. They’re going to need to send someone out. I’ll be right back.”

  Dr. Franklin nodded, but Maggie got the feeling he hadn’t heard him.

  She glanced down at Vera.
Her face was slack in death, accentuating her high cheekbones and the aristocratic tip of her nose. Her scrupulously maintained auburn hair was styled as she’d always worn it, in a top knot on her head. She wore a cream-colored turtleneck and a men’s pale blue dress shirt over a pair of Sigrid Olsen charcoal slacks, a perfect outfit for working at the local flea market. She always looked very Kate Hepburn.

  Dr. Franklin cradled her cold hand in his and stared at her face. Maggie wondered if it was because they were of an age. As far as she knew, Vera Madison had never been a patient of Dr. Franklin’s, nor did they know one another socially.

  “We should cover her up,” Maggie said.

  “No, I’ll sit with her,” Dr. Franklin said. “I don’t want her to be alone.”

  There was a tender quality to his voice that surprised Maggie. It was different from his usual, concerned physician’s voice. It was softer and more fragile somehow. She studied his face. His pale blue eyes were watery, as if he were holding back tears. Vera Madison’s death was cutting Dr. Franklin deeper than most.

  “All right,” Maggie said. She shifted to sit beside him. “I didn’t know that you and Vera knew each other.”

  “It was a long time ago,” Dr. Franklin said. “St. Stanley is a small town after all.”

  Maggie nodded. She saw Sam pacing at the far end of the room while he talked on the phone. He looked so much like he had when they were in high school together, with the same single-minded focus and coiled energy. Ironically, the only person who knew what Sam had once meant to her was Doc. Even Ginger, who was Maggie’s oldest and dearest friend, didn’t know. St. Stanley was indeed a small town, and Maggie couldn’t help wondering if Doc and Vera had had the kind of relationship she and Sam had once shared.

  Sam ended his call and came over to sit beside them.

  “Can you tell me what happened, Doc?” he asked.

  “I don’t know. I don’t generally work on Saturdays,” Dr. Franklin said. “In fact, I was on my way to the country club for a round of golf when I got an urgent message from my answering service.”

  “What did they say?” Sam asked.

  “Just that there was an emergency with one of my patients, and that the patient would meet me at my office,” he said. “Normally, I would have referred them to nine-one-one, but I have a few patients that I’ve been monitoring closely here in Spring Gardens, and I thought it was one of them. Besides, I was only two minutes away.”

  He paused as if remembering the events, and Sam asked, “What happened next?”

  “When I got here, no one was here,” Doc said. “I thought maybe they were feeling better, so I called my answering service to see if they’d gotten a follow-up call. I was on the phone in my office when I heard someone out in the waiting room. I hung up and ran out front, and that’s when I found Vera.”

  He glanced up and looked at Maggie. His eyes were cloudy with confusion, and Maggie felt a nervous flutter in her belly. Dr. Franklin was well into his sixties, as his white hair and lined face attested, but he was the smartest person she’d ever known, with a hawk-like gaze that missed nothing—until now.

  “Why was she here?” he asked. “She’s not my patient. She hasn’t been for years. Why was she here today?”

  Maggie shrugged. “Bianca said they were setting up for the flea market and Vera started to feel ill and came to see you.”

  “But she would never…” Dr. Franklin’s voice trailed off.

  “Let me help you up, Doc,” Maggie said.

  “No, no, I’ll stay with her,” he said. He didn’t let go of Vera’s hand.

  Sam was watching Doc with a concerned expression, as if he, too, knew this wasn’t Dr. Franklin’s typical behavior. “I’m having Deputy Wilson bring Bianca over.”

  Dr. Franklin looked up. Maggie felt her chest get tight. In all of the years she had known Dr. Franklin, which were many, she had never seen him look as vulnerable as he did right now. It made her heart hurt.

  “I’m going to cover Vera now,” Sam said.

  Dr. Franklin shook his head in protest.

  “We have to, Doc,” Sam said. “For her daughter, Bianca—to lessen the shock.”

  Maggie met Sam’s gaze. The fine lines around his eyes were creased with concern. She gently took Vera’s cold hand out of Doc’s and pulled him to his feet.

  “Come on over here and sit,” she said. “I’m going to have Alice come and get you. You’ve had quite a shock yourself, and I don’t think you should drive.”

  While Sam covered Vera with a plain white sheet, Dr. Franklin sat in one of the unforgiving waiting room chairs and stared down at his hands, held clasped in his lap.

  Maggie hurried over to the water cooler in the corner. She took one of the small paper cups and filled it with water. She didn’t suppose Doc really needed water, but she needed to do something for him, ridiculous as it seemed.

  She hurried back to his side and handed him the cup. He glanced up without really seeing her and gave her a grateful nod. More than anything, the devastation on Doc’s face scared Maggie. She didn’t understand what was happening or how to help, and it left her feeling useless and powerless.

  She patted Doc’s shoulder and went over to the reception desk, where the main phone to the office sat. Maggie knew the Franklins’ home number by heart. Being Doc’s bookkeeper for the past twenty-plus years, she’d had to call him at home frequently to go over last-minute issues with the patient billing.

  Alice, his wife of thirty-seven years, answered on the second ring.

  “Hello,” she answered.

  “Hi, Alice, it’s Maggie.”

  “Maggie, oh, I was just thinking about you yesterday,” Alice said. “I was over shopping in Dumontville, and there was a pre-holiday sale going on at Stegner’s. They had loads of handbags for seventy-five percent off. I found the cutest Coach clutch, and I was thinking you should really pick up a few to stock at your store.”

  “Oh, well, thanks for the tip, Alice,” Maggie said.

  She wasn’t sure how to segue into telling her about Vera Madison, and just as she was about to, Alice was off and running. Maggie took the time to gather her thoughts.

  “You know,” Alice said, “when you have your grand opening, we should really get the word out by taking a full-color ad in the St. Stanley Gazette. I bet John could get Mitch Kowalski to give you a discount. He’s been advertising in the paper for years, and Mitch owes him a favor for being such a loyal customer. Besides, I work the toy drive at the church with Mitch’s wife, and I know I could get her to lean on him. What do you think?”

  “Yeah, that sounds great,” Maggie said. “Um…I…”

  “Oh, listen to me going on and on,” Alice said with a laugh. “We really need to get together over lunch and catch up properly. Why, I’m not even giving you a chance to speak. I’m just so excited for your shop.”

  Maggie felt her lips curve up. Alice Franklin was the nicest, most upbeat person Maggie had ever known. Maggie could picture her in her kitchen wearing her navy blue bib apron and rolling out a pie crust. Alice was especially known for her apple pies and, this being November, it was her season to shine.

  The picture was so rich and warm and completely the opposite of the image of Vera Madison on the floor that Maggie felt her throat get tight. She wasn’t sure how to say what she had to say.

  “Maggie, dear, what is it?” Alice asked. “You sound upset. Did you need John? He’s out golfing at the club, but you can probably reach his cell phone, assuming he remembered it. You know, the man is hopeless with that phone.”

  As if sensing Maggie was struggling, Sam rose from where he was crouched beside Vera. His gaze was fastened on Maggie’s face as if he was trying to assess her well-being. Maggie did not want to burst into tears in front of Sam. It would be a sign of vulnerability that she preferred he never see. She supposed it went back to their childhood, when he used to tease her. She’d never let him see her cry then either. Instead she’d popped him in the nose.<
br />
  Even after they’d broken up, the few times she’d run into him over the years when he came to town to visit his family, she’d just ignored him. He seemed to accept it, and he had never tried to speak to her either.

  Since he’d moved back, he’d been virtually impossible to ignore. And even though they were trying to be friends, Maggie would prefer he not see her in a weakened state. She was not ready for that and probably never would be.

  She forced herself to swallow the knot in her throat. She could do this. She wasn’t going to let Sam Collins see her lose it. Not now. Not ever.

  She turned her back to him in what she hoped was a casual move and lowered her head to look at the desk in front of her.

  “Alice, I’m at the office, and Doc is here with me,” Maggie said. “Something’s happened.”

  “What? I don’t understand,” Alice said. “Oh, honey, are you okay?”

  “I’m fine.”

  “Is it John? Is he all right?” Alice asked. Her voice sounded faint, as if she could barely get the words out.

  “No, he’s fine, too,” Maggie said. “We’re both fine. But he’s pretty shaken up. Alice, he found Vera Madison in his office and she’s…well, she’s dead.”

  There was a pause while Alice absorbed the news. Her voice when it came through the receiver was devoid of any of the warmth Maggie had always associated with Alice Franklin. Instead, it was cold and sharp, like an icicle hanging off an eave, waiting to fall.

  “Well, ding-dong, the wicked witch is dead,” Alice said.

  Chapter 5

  Maggie gasped. She couldn’t help it. Never in all her years of knowing Alice Franklin could she have imagined her saying anything so mean.

  “Alice!” she gasped. “Surely, you don’t mean—”

  “Oh yes, I do,” Alice said. “Vera Madison was the most selfish person I ever had the misfortune to know. Anything she wanted she got, and if people didn’t give her what she wanted willingly then she took it.”

  “I don’t think this is the time…” Maggie said. She could feel Sam’s gaze burning on her back and she kept her voice low, hoping he couldn’t hear Alice’s very loud side of the conversation.