Near the faceplate where the lock would go into the jamb, wood had been gouged out. Aghast, I pointed. “Someone did break in, Lois.” And someone broke into Lois’s best friend’s house, too, and killed her. Panicking, I turned to Lois.
She stared at the spot and flushed. She didn’t speak right away, which I found suspicious. Eventually, she said, “That was like that when I moved in. I use the dead bolt at night, though, not that flimsy thing that people can supposedly open with a credit card, so I haven’t bothered having it fixed.”
“Keep locking your door with that dead bolt, both night and day.” I tried imitating one of Misty’s stern expressions, brows low, chin firm, lips thinned. “Evenings, too.”
“Okay.”
I went outside and waited on the porch until I heard the bolt shoot into place. On the other side of the door, Lois urged, “C’mon, Tiger, you can have another sardine while we wait for your other mother to get to your yard.”
I ran down the porch steps. The evening was still warm, but no one was around. I jogged home.
In my living room, the quilt I’d spread over Misty was folded on the couch, and a note was on it. “I guess you went off to bed. Thanks for the quilt. Misty.”
Dep was already waiting outside my kitchen door. I let her in and gave her some of her favorite canned food. She looked at it and left. I followed her into the living room. She jumped up onto the couch and briskly scrubbed her paws and whiskers. “You can’t live on a diet of sardines,” I informed her. “Cat food is good for you.” Apparently, Dep didn’t want to hear about it. She rubbed a paw over one ear.
I was uneasy about Lois’s safety. What if her attacker had waited for me to go away? Leaving the cat to her activities, which might include eating cat food if I wasn’t there to see her do it, I went out onto the front porch and locked the door—with the dead bolt—behind me. Setting my sneakered feet down quietly, alert for potential attackers, I walked to Lois’s house.
The light was still on in her living room.
Her sheers were pulled, but I could see through them. The bookshelf that had been mostly empty now held many of the photo albums that had been on the floor. Lois was sitting on her couch underneath the painting I’d admired. She turned a page of an album on her lap. Suddenly she placed one hand on her mouth and stared, wide-eyed, straight toward me.
Could she see me? She was in her glowing living room while I was out on the sidewalk, in shadows underneath a maple. If Lois recognized me through her sheers, she would probably come outside or wave.
Slowly, she closed the photo album. She eased off the couch and put the album to the left of the other albums. She aligned their spines, and then turned out the light and headed for the stairway, lit by a frilly glass sconce. She climbed out of sight. The downstairs sconce went out and an upstairs light cast stripes through the railing.
I walked home. Everything in the neighborhood seemed peaceful.
I wasn’t.
Was someone going around attacking Fallingbrook’s older women? Or had Lois been targeted specifically because she and Georgia were friends? Had someone watched Georgia’s house and followed Lois’s van as she dropped all of us off, and then followed Lois home?
Even if I explained my suspicions to Misty or Tom, they’d say I had no evidence, and that I was basing my theories on hunches, especially if Lois denied it all.
I reminded myself that I was no longer a 911 operator. The safety of Fallingbrook’s citizens was not my responsibility. My job was to give everyone in town a place to relax and enjoy one another’s company along with the best coffee and donuts in northern Wisconsin.
But I liked Lois. And if someone harmed her again, I would blame myself.
Sometimes I wished I couldn’t care. But Alec had cared. Tom cared. Misty and Samantha, and yes, Detective Brent Fyne, too—they all took on other people’s problems. They couldn’t help it, and I admired them for it. I wasn’t as strong as they were, or I would have stayed at 911, but I couldn’t help fretting and wanting their advice.
Dep greeted me at the front door and accompanied me upstairs to my comfy Wedgwood blue bedroom.
The light upstairs in Lois’s house went out.
I changed into jammies, moved the antique doll—a gift from Georgia—away from the tailored Wedgwood pillow shams, and set my alarm for eleven fifteen. I was still reading when the alarm went off. I called Lois. Her greeting was sprightly. She claimed she had not yet fallen asleep.
At twelve fifteen, I swung my feet over the side of the bed and called her again. This time I must have awakened her. She sounded groggy. I told her my name.
“Don’t tell anyone.” Her words were slurred.
“Tell them what?”
“That someone hit me.”
“When, just now?” I was wide awake.
“No, earlier, when I was petting Tiger. Don’t tell. You’ll put me in grave danger.”
“From what?”
“Matthias . . .”
Hairs on the back of my neck rose. Matthias had been dead for five years.
Chapter 7
“And you’ll be in danger, too,” Lois added. “Don’t tell anyone.”
Pulling my comforter tighter around my shoulders, I sat up straighter. “What do you mean? How will you and I be in danger?”
There was a long pause, then a yawn. “Oh, it’s you, my neighbor, Tiger’s other mother? Emily. What was I saying?”
“That if I told anyone you were attacked, you and I would both be in danger. From Matthias.”
Fingernails clicked against her phone. “Matthias? That’s nonsense. I must have been dreaming. I’ve been having nightmares about Georgia.” She heaved a deep, grief-filled sigh.
“Lois, what if you weren’t dreaming it, entirely? Maybe your subconscious is telling you something, and your conscious is resisting. Maybe, deep down inside, you know you were attacked. We should report it to the police. I’ll call them, if you like.”
“No! Maybe my subconscious is right about the danger to both of us if we report it.” She put a smile in her voice, as if she could be trying to distract me. “Not that I was attacked.”
“How do you feel? Do you have a headache?”
“No, I’m fine. I just had trouble waking up.”
Although skeptical, I let her go, and called again at one fifteen. The phone rang and rang. I was considering throwing on clothes and dashing to her house when she picked up. This time, she was alert. She apologized for not answering quickly. “I wanted to be sure I was awake before I started talking.”
I asked her to tell me the date and her address. She answered both questions correctly.
At two fifteen, she sounded okay, but grumpy. At three fifteen, she said, “You know, if I was unconscious, it was only for a few seconds, and the cut on my head is barely a scratch. You don’t have to keep calling. You need to get up soon and feed all those cops their donuts, right?”
“I get up at five.”
“Okay, call me then.”
I slept until my alarm started playing its tune. I was beginning to hate that tune.
I called Lois.
“I’m fine,” she told me, “except when I think about Georgia. I’ll see you—and the Knitpickers—in a few hours.” She made me promise not to tell anyone about what she called her silly little fall.
* * *
Despite the many times I had awakened her during the night, Lois was the first knitter to arrive at Deputy Donut in the morning.
I hurried out of the kitchen and gave her a hug. She had dressed in blue jeans and a red sweater. I wondered if she had purposely matched Georgia’s last outfit.
“Is the back of my head still bleeding?” she asked.
I ducked behind her and checked. “No. I think I see a small scab underneath your hair.”
“Good. I don’t want those Knitpickers to worry, so we’ll just keep my fall secret, okay?”
“Okay. You do seem fine. . . .” And I reserve the right to ask fo
r help for you if you need it.
“I’ll prove that I’m fine. I’ll make supper for you tonight. Bring Tiger. I mean Dep.”
“Sounds great.” Visiting her would give me another chance to find out what she knew but wasn’t telling me about the previous night. Also, when I was spying through the sheers before bedtime, something in one of her photo albums had appeared to surprise, shock, or maybe even frighten her, and I knew where she’d placed that album.... “What should I bring?”
“Nothing. I enjoy creating a meal, start to finish.” Her eyes were red and tired.
So were the eyes of the other five Knitpickers when they arrived. We all hugged one another. Each woman was wearing a hand-knit sweater, a couple of them made from the pattern Georgia had used for the sweater she’d been wearing when she died. I asked, “Did you plan to put on similar sweaters today?”
One of them answered quietly, “We didn’t discuss it, but I guess we all wanted to pay tribute to Georgia with sweaters we knit here, with her.”
The others nodded.
Word of Georgia’s death must have spread throughout Fallingbrook. Folks kept pouring in—strangers, neighboring shopkeepers, and people I’d seen in stores, the library, and The Craft Croft.
One of the retired men who stationed themselves at a table near the door most mornings asked every police officer who entered if he or she knew whether foul play had been involved. The answer was always the same. We don’t know. Not yet.
All morning, whenever she wasn’t catnapping, Dep watched us. I could tell she didn’t understand why she couldn’t wander through the dining room and decide which customers should pay her homage. I was sure she wanted to fish around in Lois’s knitting tote in case Lois had hidden sardines in it.
As usual, I helped the Knitpickers with the door when they were leaving at noon.
Lois gave me a smile. “See you and Dep tonight, Emily.” I thought I saw a certain wariness behind her eyes.
Our afternoon was busy, too. Even our fire chief, Scott Ritsorf, a lanky blond guy who never seemed to gain an ounce, came in. He was wearing his fireman’s work clothes: dark blue chinos, and matching short-sleeved shirt with a badge embroidered in front and the letters FFD across the back. Scott had been two years ahead of Misty, Samantha, and me at Fallingbrook High, but I hadn’t gotten to know him well until my 911 days. Alec had liked and respected him, and I did, too. He perched on a stool at the front counter, shook my hand, and asked how I was doing.
“Fine.”
His sky blue eyes seemed to search mine. Did everyone expect me to fall apart because Georgia’s death would remind me of her son’s murder, a case that Alec had tried to solve before he was shot?
I asked Scott what I could get him.
“What’s good?”
“Everything.”
He laughed and ordered a large cup of the day’s featured coffee, a subtle medium roast from Mt. Kilimanjaro, and three raised donuts with chocolate icing and toasted coconut on top.
While I was plating Scott’s donuts, Oliver Rossimer came in and sat beside him. Oliver was the same age as Scott. At Fallingbrook High, Samantha, Misty, and I had barely noticed skinny, studious Scott, but we’d all had crushes on Oliver. He’d been a football star and had always made the honor roll. His singing voice had guaranteed him starring roles, usually as the heartthrob, in school musicals, and he was elected student council president his junior and senior years. Now he was president of the Chamber of Commerce. He was more handsome than ever, with deep brown eyes and dark hair. Whenever I caught sight of him, I couldn’t help a giddy burst of shyness in honor of my girlhood self.
He’d married his high school sweetheart, and they’d divorced amicably a few years later. Samantha and I liked to tease Misty that Oliver would be perfect for her, and she’d tried to convince each of us to go after him. I wasn’t interested in anyone, but if I were, I might look at Oliver more carefully, if only because, unlike Alec had been, Oliver was in a safe profession. He sold heavy construction machinery, from an office, in his own dealership. Even if he got behind the wheel or whatever of one of those big earth crawlers or cranes, Oliver would know how to operate it without endangering himself.
Our last customers left at four thirty. Tom and I went into the pantry, the large storage room next to the kitchen. It was bright, with white-painted walls, a window overlooking the parking lot, and a door leading to our small loading dock. We double-checked our inventory of ingredients, and straightened mixing bowls and baking sheets on their stainless-steel wire shelves. Spoons and spatulas dangled neatly from hooks. We tidied the rest of shop for the Jolly Cops Cleaning Crew, who came in around midnight and did the heavy cleaning, including replenishing the oil in the deep fryers.
At five thirty, Tom drove off to deposit the day’s receipts at the bank, and Dep and I strolled home through the late afternoon glow. Well, I strolled. Dep pursued falling leaves. She seemed very proud of herself for nabbing one before it hit the sidewalk. When I was a kid, I ran around trying to catch leaves while they were in the air. Whenever I succeeded, I made a wish. I didn’t remember exactly what those wishes were, except that they’d had a lot to do with birthday and Christmas presents. If Dep shared that human superstition, what would she wish for? Sardines, probably. Or maybe she’d want to be transformed into a real tiger.
Lois must have been watching for us. She opened her front door the second we stepped onto the porch. She offered me a seat in her living room. “I’ll go get the appetizers.”
I unleashed Dep. “I can come to the kitchen.” Dep bounded toward the back of the house.
“Stay there. I work best by myself.” A meow came from the kitchen. Lois laughed. “Tiger expects her sardine.”
I stood still, listening. The fridge door opened. I tiptoed to the bookshelf and pulled out the photo album that had seemed to shock Lois the night before.
The fridge door closed. Lois murmured. Dep meowed.
I flipped pages.
Near the middle of the book, I found a pair of pages missing their photos. The prints weren’t completely gone. Bits of paper backing were still glued to the pages.
In the kitchen, the oven door squeaked and a plate clacked onto a counter. I shoved the photo album onto the shelf and slipped into Lois’s overstuffed wing chair.
Lois came in carrying a warmed Brie, a dish of hot pepper jelly, and a basket of homemade crackers. She set the tray on the coffee table. “Help yourself. I’m having a Bloody Mary. Would you like one, too?”
I reached for the cheese knife. “Yes, please.”
A minute later, she brought out two tall glasses filled with tomato juice and ice, with stalks of celery sticking out above the salt-rimmed tops. She handed me a glass, took hers to the couch, and sat down.
She’d been generous with both the vodka and the hot sauce. The drink packed a punch, in a good way. I licked salt off my lips. “This is the best Bloody Mary I’ve ever tasted.”
She thanked me. “Usually, I cook only for myself, so it’s nice to have someone over. I was widowed when I was twenty-two. We’d been married less than a year.” She jumped and patted her mouth. “I’m sorry. I should have asked if you had someone you wanted to bring. Last night, you said ‘my cat’ and ‘my house,’ and I assumed you live alone.”
“I do.” I slathered melted Brie on a cracker and topped it with a dollop of hot pepper jelly. “I’m a widow, too, but I was married four years before Alec was shot while on duty. He was a detective. I was nearly twenty-six when it happened.” He’d been thirty-seven. Three years had passed, and I was getting used to the dull ache of loss.
“Emily, I’m so sorry.” She turned the worn wedding ring on her finger. “I see you also still wear your wedding ring.”
“I don’t know if I’ll ever take it off.” Alec . . .
“They say time heals all hurts. It’s been over fifty years, but I’m far from healed. The pain has become more distant, though.” She made a brave attempt at a smile. “
I would have married again, if I’d ever found anyone I liked as much, but I never did. So, my advice to you might sound a teensy bit off.” She tilted her head as if asking if she could continue.
I nodded.
She seemed to take time to choose her words. “Loving again is a testament to the love you felt, still feel, and will always feel for your husband.”
“He told me the same thing. He said he wanted me to always be happy, and if anything ever happened to him, I wasn’t to feel I was betraying him if I fell in love with someone else.” I was tense, like a turtle who couldn’t pull its head all the way into its shell. “I suppose it could happen, but I’m not about to go looking for it.”
“You’re not tempted by online dating sites?”
I jerked my head up. “Are you?” Maybe someone she’d contacted through a dating site had attacked her last night.
“Not at all,” she said. “I’m happy living by myself.” She smiled. “But I do enjoy visits from your cat.” She brushed one knee with a hand. “Do you have family in the area?”
“I grew up in Fallingbrook, so I have friends that I’ve known most of my life. I don’t have brothers or sisters. I was a surprise—a welcome one—when my parents were in their late thirties. They’ve retired to Florida, but they come back when the weather here heats up enough for them.” I grinned. “They won’t be back before June.”
“Humph,” Lois said. “Madison was too far south for me.”
“I know what you mean. I like cool weather and four distinct seasons. And the scenery.” I nodded toward the painting on the wall above the couch. Since the night before, Lois had replaced the relaxing river with an angry sky—storm clouds piled above a blood red setting sun. It was startling, but I managed to say calmly, “You changed your painting.”
“I like to rotate through my collection. The colors in the other one go better with my couch, but I’m thinking of redecorating and reupholstering, and I’m trying out different paintings as a focal point.”
Maybe she had a painting that wouldn’t be as disturbing as this one. But I only told her again that I admired her skill.
Survival of the Fritters Page 5
