Inn Over Her Head

by Dixie Davis

  “No! She liked the décor in her room, and I was changing it anyway.”

  Travis smirked. “Uh-huh.” He scooped up Dawn’s purchases and vaulted to his feet. Before he even took a step, one of the things from his lap flew free and hit the deck with a metallic crash.

  Lori leaned down and picked it up — the picture frame. The glass had cracked across the front.

  “I think Ray might have some replacement glass,” Lori offered.

  “Yeah, this is about the glass.” He scoffed. “You are so callous. They were right. You did murder her.”

  Lori gripped the arms of her chair. “Who are ‘they’? I didn’t murder anyone.”

  Travis’s eyes flashed and he set his jaw. “Sure. Murder and mockery must be your style.”

  “Stop saying that. I didn’t murder her.”

  “Then who did?”

  Before Lori named a name, she caught herself. Her evidence against Heidi, which had felt so rock solid at the meeting, suddenly seemed to evaporate into thin gossip.

  Surely Lori had collected something more substantial than being evasive when asked about spare keys to the Mayweather House.

  “I’m going to say it as long and as loud as it takes.” Travis leaned down into Lori’s face. “Because I want to see you put away for what you did.”

  “But I didn’t — what are you talking about?”

  “The police came by this morning to let me know they’d figured out the cause of the poisoning. Based on what was in her stomach, and what they found in her room, no way was it an overdose or an accident. It had to be the last thing she ate that killed her. What do you want to bet it came from your kitchen?”

  A chill ran down Lori’s spine. She’d already considered the idea, but that was with a plan to test Heidi and prove she had the key. But if the poison food really had come from her own kitchen . . .

  “This wasn’t the only place she ate.” Lori scraped together the last of her defenses, but her voice still sounded weak. “She was out all that morning. It could’ve been from anywhere.” She hadn’t noticed any takeout containers or boxes in Dawn’s room, but she wasn’t looking, and she hadn’t cleaned it.

  Travis glowered at her, suspicion all over his face, before turning on his heel and marching off.

  He really thought Lori killed Dawn. Could he be the only one?

  Or perhaps he was trying to throw suspicion her way because he himself was guilty. He was a pharmacist, and Dawn definitely could have let him in when Lori wasn’t around to see. He had half a million reasons to want her dead before she could divorce him.

  Lori wandered back through the parlor to the dining room. Joey had laid out the weekend edition of the Dusky Chronicle on the table, as if the guests might be through any minute to peruse the local paper. The main headline practically screamed at her: LOCAL B&B DEATH VIA POISON.

  Andrea was right. Travis was right. Lori tried to read the article to see if they mentioned anything about a suspect or anything she’d eaten, but her eyes just slid over the words.

  Travis thought she’d done it, and he’d talked to the police this morning. Did the police think she’d done it?

  What about Heidi having a key? What about the problems in Dawn’s marriage? Did the police know about those?

  A man cleared his throat behind her, and Lori jumped. She whirled around, but it was only Joey. “Maybe we need to make a statement to the police.”

  Lori nodded. The keys, Dawn’s talk of divorce, or even Mitch, for whatever reason — she should’ve said something sooner.

  “I mean,” Joey continued, his eyes on the paper, “you didn’t do it, did you?”

  “What? Of course not! You didn’t seriously think—”

  “Sorry, sorry, just wanted to be sure. We can get you a lawyer anyway.”

  “A lawyer? Joey, I didn’t do it, and I think I know who did.”

  His eyebrows jumped. “You do?”

  “Yes, it was most likely Dawn’s husband or Heidi Carleton. Beth’s sister,” she added at Joey’s confused look.

  “Right. That makes sense. Did you have any evidence?”

  “Yes, and I thought that was what you meant when you said we should go to the police.” She didn’t mean to raise her voice, but her tone was a little sharp.

  Of course, her fiancé had accused her of murder, so being a little upset seemed justified.

  The doorbell cut off what might have been their first true argument. Concern cropped up in her chest. Lori wasn’t expecting anyone.

  But her home was a B&B. A guest might show up at any time.

  Lori checked the peephole: Chief Branson stood on her porch. She opened the door. “I was about to call you.”

  Chief Branson glanced at the uniformed officer next to him. “You were?”

  “Yes, I’ve come up with two possible suspects in Dawn’s murder.”

  Chief Branson’s eyebrows quirked and he glanced at the other officer again, even more disbelieving than last time.

  “Her marriage wasn’t happy, and her husband was already in town when the body was discovered. Right?”

  Chief Branson nodded.

  “And Heidi Carleton would do anything to get back at me for buying the place from Beth — and I’m pretty sure she has a key.”

  “Heidi Carleton?” The chief took a deep breath and hitched up his belt on one side. Was he going to arrest that woman right now?

  As if he’d read her mind, the chief shook his head. “Now I’ve heard everything.”

  “You’re not going to talk to her?”

  “Mrs. Keyes, I didn’t come here to add to my suspect list.”

  Lori folded her arms. “You’re not even going to check to see if she really has a key?”

  He gave a mighty sigh. “I guess we’ll look into that, but we’re pretty certain we know who did it.”

  “You do?” And obviously they didn’t think it was Heidi.

  “Yes. Lori Keyes, you’re under arrest for the murder of Dawn Vogel.”

  Lori stared at the papers in front of her, but she couldn’t seem to make sense of the words over the echo of Chief Branson’s.

  “We already know you made the zucchini bread.” The chief’s voice now was somewhere between patient and weary, as if this interrogation had already gone on too long.

  “Lemon thyme zucchini bread. But I didn’t poison her!”

  “We found the leftover bread in her room.”

  Lori pursed her lips. “I saw it in the trash, yes.”

  “And we tested it.”

  A cold front crept across her shoulders. Could she have poisoned Dawn accidentally? Did Dawn have some sort of reaction to the zucchini bread? But why would she eat any if she was allergic?

  “What did you put in the bread?” Chief Branson thumbed through a report.

  “Flour, salt, sugar, baking powder and soda, lemon juice and zest.” Lori paused to think. “An egg. Zucchini, of course. Powdered sugar.”

  “And . . . ?”

  She glanced at the cinderblock walls, like they’d tell her what the chief was fishing for. “And thyme, obviously.”

  Chief Branson closed the report in front of him. “Hm. And nothing else?”

  “That’s it.”

  “No aconite, then?”

  Lori racked her brain, but no match came up. “Considering I’ve never heard of aconite, it’d be pretty hard to bake with it.”

  “Maybe you’d call it monkshood.”

  Lori only shrugged. She’d heard of it, sure, but she didn’t realize it was real. “Sorry.”

  “That’s so funny, because the lemon thyme zucchini bread you admit you baked contained enough aconite to kill five people.”

  Lori startled. “What? How can that be?”

  Had Beth replaced — or laced — an ingredient with poison? Why?

  The chief pulled a paper from the report in front of him and slid it across the table to her. A picture of a blue flower.

  A blue flower identical to the not-d
elphiniums in front of the B&B.

  “Ever seen this before?” the chief asked.

  Lori stared at the picture a long moment, then finally nodded.

  “Now we’re getting somewhere,” he muttered. “Where did you see it?”

  “Well, I thought they were delphiniums—”

  “Where?”

  Lori pursed her lips. “They were growing at the inn.”

  A smile slowly drew up one corner of Chief Branson’s mouth. As if he thought he’d caught her.

  She didn’t do this. Surely they couldn’t convict an innocent woman?

  An innocent woman who might have been framed?

  Lori’s stomach seemed to shrink. Was cooperating with the police helping her own case, or was she only giving them — and whoever framed her — enough rope to hang her?

  “Where did the time go?” Chief Branson asked.

  Lori furrowed her brow. Were they done already?

  An insistent knock sounded at the door to the tiny interrogation room, and a harried police officer stepped in. “Sorry, sir, her lawyer’s here.”

  The lawyer looked more like a used car salesman, but with the real gravity of the situation setting in, she’d take him, tacky tweed blazer, sparse mustache and all.

  “Hollis Boice.” The lawyer held out a hand to Lori and to the chief, and they both shook. “My client invokes her right to remain silent.”

  “I’m sure she does.” Chief Branson stood and cast her one last surly look. “She’s already said enough.”

  This time, the chill shot straight to her heart. This did not look good for her. Not at all.

  The door finally closed behind the chief and Hollis sank into the empty seat. “Sorry, it’s a bit of a drive from Wilmington.”

  Lori simply nodded.

  “So, you’re in some trouble.”

  “Yes, but I didn’t do it.”

  Hollis didn’t seem to care, focusing instead on riffling through his briefcase. “What’s the charge?”

  “Murder.”

  His head snapped up. “Sorry, my secretary got that mixed up. Why do they suspect you?”

  “The chief says my zucchini bread was laced with wolf’s bane. Which is growing in my garden.”

  “It is?”

  Lori sighed. “I think so. My handyman was going to take care of it, but I’m not sure if he has yet.” Mitch rooting out the “delphiniums” would only make things harder with the chief. For both of them.

  Hollis gave a low whistle. “What’s the motive supposed to be?”

  “Dawn fussed at me in public.”

  Hollis twisted his lips, his mustache poking out at odd angles. “That one’s weak, at least. Though people have killed for less.”

  “Well, I think that Travis — her soon-to-be-ex-husband — or Heidi Carleton both have better motives. Travis had a five hundred thousand dollar life insurance policy on his wife, which he wouldn’t get if they divorced. Heidi seems to think that if I own the B&B, her sister — the old owner — is never coming home.”

  The lawyer perked up at this information, but didn’t jump on it. “Nobody pulls a Matlock in real life, you know.”

  Lori’s gaze fell to the table. She didn’t know that. She didn’t know anything about crime or police or trials, other than what she’d seen on the news, or read in books.

  “Tell me what you know,” Hollis said, “and we’ll see what we can do.”

  Lori nodded and started from the beginning.

  This was one sob story that was definitely not going the direction she’d anticipated.

  “The bad news,” Hollis said once she’d finished, “is that you got arrested on a weekend, and you won’t be able to see a judge until Monday.”

  Spend the night in jail? Lori tried to ignore the nausea rising in her stomach.

  But Hollis wasn’t done. “The worse news: it’s going to be an uphill battle to prove you didn’t do this.”

  “Don’t you believe me?”

  “What I believe doesn’t matter, as long as I’m not suborning perjury.” Hollis pressed his lips together, grim. “We’ll figure something out.”

  Lori was anything but reassured.

  By the time she was taken to see the judge Monday morning, Lori had endured the single most dehumanizing, humiliating, horrible hours of her life, ones she would sooner forget than record.

  Frazzled and frayed, she stood before a judge and waited for her fate.

  “Your Honor,” the prosecutor began, “the defendant is accused of murdering the first guest at her bed and breakfast. She has no ties to the community and poses an extreme flight risk.”

  Lori flinched at each strike against her. She resisted the urge to comb her fingers through her grayish/blondish hair and bring some order to her appearance at the very least.

  “Mrs. Keyes recently purchased the inn, and that represents virtually all of her assets,” Hollis argued. “She doesn’t have the means to flee.”

  “And I’m innocent,” Lori murmured barely loud enough for her lawyer to hear.

  He nodded, but motioned for her to keep quiet.

  “She has one son in Florida, and the other currently overseas,” the prosecutor tried again.

  “Mrs. Keyes is happy to surrender her passport if that’s worrying you.”

  The prosecutor started again, but the judge held up a hand. He set the bail at an insanely high figure — more than Lori had made in any given year of her life — and tapped the gavel.

  Her freedom was worth one hundred and twenty-five thousand dollars.

  Fortunately, she was able to pledge her old house in Charlotte to pay it, and she was finally allowed to get her things and go home.

  Seeing Joey waiting for her at that last door was the best thing she’d seen in years.

  Joey wrapped her up in his arms and just held on. Normally, Lori would have cried, but she was too numb today. It felt like someone else had lived these last few days in her body, and she’d been along for the horrific ride.

  “I had an idea,” Joey said, murmuring for her ears only.

  Lori could only shake her head, so he walked her out of the building and into the blinding sunlight.

  “We’re here at the county complex,” Joey pointed out. Lori blinked until she could see what he meant. From this parking lot, she could see a few other low buildings in various shades of brick through the pine trees. Was this the same complex where she’d come to fill out the papers for the Mayweather House only a month ago?

  “Do you know what else is here?”

  “Sheriff’s office?”

  “Uh, I guess so? But not what I meant.” He started walking again, and Lori followed. They left the parking lot and continued straight as the drive curved away from their path, until they reached a sidewalk in front of another parking lot. They’d only passed the jail/sheriff’s office and one other building when he stopped in front of a cream-colored building.

  “The Register of Deeds.” Joey pointed at the building.

  Lori squinted up at him. Register? Deeds? This had something to do with the inn?

  “It’s where you get a marriage license, right?” Joey asked.

  “Oh.” Lori straightened. “Oh!” One hand drifted to her hair. Surely it stuck out in every direction after the ordeal of the weekend. After the worst days of her life, Joey still wanted to marry her?

  It was the most absurd romantic gesture she’d ever heard.

  “Don’t we need birth certificates or something?” she asked.

  “I called and they said we only needed a driver’s license. I thought it might cheer you up.”

  Lori gaped at the building. Suddenly, the amorphous dream of marrying again was really, blindingly real.

  She looked to Joey, and his wide brown eyes softened. “If you’re up for it.”

  Up for it? She felt like she’d tumbled down a hill and rolled in a dust bowl at the bottom. A not-so-fine layer of sand seemed to cover every inch of her, gritting and griming up everything f
rom her clothes to the inside of her eyelids. The last days had redefined her world, from the notion of safety and privacy to the meaning of “public toilet.”

  And Joey, sweet, clean Joey, wanted to get married.

  Lori took a deep breath. “Okay.”

  Joey beamed and took her hand, almost bounding into the office. Lori just tried to keep up. They quickly filled out a thorough but simple form, showed their licenses and paid the fee.

  The clerk double-checked all the paperwork was in order. With a nod, she picked up a Bible and held it out to them.

  “Wait!” Lori practically jumped backwards. Was she going to marry them right there? With Lori looking and feeling like she’d narrowly survived an attack from a pack of wild dogs?

  “No, no,” she rushed to say. “We don’t want you to marry us yet.”

  The clerk looked at her like she was stupider than snot. “You have to swear to the information for the license. I’m not marrying you.”

  Joey patted her shoulder, then placed his hand on the Bible. Lori followed his lead and they both attested to the truth of their forms.

  The clerk printed off their copy of the form and handed it to them. “This is valid for sixty days from today,” she began the spiel of instructions and legalese. Lori tried very hard to take it all in, but with the amount of legal instructions she’d already been through in the last few days, she didn’t have a whole lot of room in her brain.

  But that first instruction seemed most important: they had to get married within two months.

  If she wasn’t back in jail first.

  Lori didn’t say much on the drive home. When they pulled past her gnarled old oaks and around to the bright white railings on the double-decker porches, the inn had never looked more inviting and reassuring. But now Lori wasn’t sure she belonged there anymore.

  Joey made no move to get out of the car, either.

  “Thanks for taking care of the place,” Lori said, not for the first time.

  “Of course.”

  “You didn’t have to take off work—”

  “I quit.”

  She startled. “At the Caswell Inn?”

  “Yep.”

  “Oh, Joey, I didn’t mean to cost you—”