The 12 Quilts of Christmas

by Arlene Sachitano

  Annie leaned forward with her elbows on the table.

  “That was a weird funeral. I mean, they followed their script, but it seems like someone at some point would get up and say something personal.”

  Connie accepted a cup of the spicy tea from the barista.

  “I was thinking the same thing. It was very impersonal. And who were the two men in suits. Are they supposed to be relatives?”

  Harriet sipped her tea.

  “James was told there were Ukrainian relatives who had to leave town before Christmas. They seem like the only possibilities.”

  Annie set her mug down.

  “If they were related, they must have been from the other side of his family. I mean, they must have been at least a foot taller than Valery.”

  “They seemed more like bodyguards than relatives, if you ask me,” Harriet commented.

  Annie gestured to her worker, and a moment later, a tray of biscotti was delivered. She took one and passed the tray to Harriet.

  “I saw you talking to the son. Did he have anything interesting to say?”

  Harriet plucked a tea biscuit from the tray and passed the tray on.

  “He said he no longer lives in the area, and he actually was in town for Daniel Muhler’s funeral, which is planned for after the holidays. He said they met at an HIV support group in Seattle.”

  “Did he know if Daniel had any enemies?” Beth asked.

  Harriet shook her head.

  “I didn’t get to ask. One of the thugs-in-a-suit interrupted and took Ole away before I could ask.”

  Annie dipped her biscotti in her tea and took a bite.

  “I feel sorry for the boy. I know he wasn’t very close with his father after he came out, but after his sister died, Valery was all he had left. Valery told me once that his wife had cut off contact after she went back to Ukraine. He said they’d never divorced, but from what he heard from friends, she’s moved on.”

  Harriet sat back in her chair.

  “What are you thinking?” Lauren asked her.

  “I’m thinking Valery’s wife might have decided to end their relationship in a more permanent way. Maybe the two thugs are her family, sent here to take care of Valery and make sure Ole didn’t raise any suspicions at the funeral.”

  Lauren sipped her tea thoughtfully.

  “I wonder if she benefits financially. Be nice to know if she had an interest in the gallery. And before anyone asks, given the current political climate, I’m not going to hack anything remotely near Russia.”

  “Can’t we check his business license at the courthouse?” Connie asked.

  “Good thought,” Beth agreed.

  Lauren blew across the top of her steaming tea.

  “I’m not sure it would do her any good, given what we know about business in Foggy Point lately.”

  Harriet sat up straight.

  “Let’s think about that. Valery might not have many sales of his European artwork in Foggy Point, but maybe his inventory is worth more if she took it back to Ukraine.”

  Lauren pulled out her tablet and made a note. “That I can look up.”

  Harriet finished her cup of tea.

  “I better get going. Luke still has a little shopping to do.”

  Beth reached out and stopped her. “Have you noticed that gray car parked on your street again?”

  “No, why?”

  “I’m pretty sure it was in the church parking lot when we came in.”

  “Did you get the license number?” Lauren asked.

  Beth hung her head.

  “I was focused on getting into the funeral. I’m sorry.”

  “We don’t know if it was the same car—a lot of people have gray sedans—so it doesn’t matter if you got the license or not,” Harriet reassured her.

  CHAPTER 23

  Harriet had just finished making a sandwich for Luke when he came home from school. His cheeks were rosy from the cold and he smiled when he saw Harriet set the sandwich at his normal place at the table.

  “Can we go to the barn?” he asked around a bite of his sandwich.

  Harriet sat down opposite him.

  “I have an alternative. We both have a little more shopping to do, and it turns out the shops are open late every night until Christmas.” She glanced at the kitchen clock. “I think we have just enough time to get our shopping done after you’ve eaten, and then tomorrow you’ll be available whenever works best for the horses.”

  Luke set his sandwich down. Harriet could see he was disappointed.

  “I’m worried about Major. He’s really sensitive, you know?”

  “Why don’t you call Emily or Marcia and ask how he’s doing? If he’s upset, I’ll take you out tonight. If he’s okay, you can wait until tomorrow.”

  He picked up his sandwich.

  “That works,” he said, and took a big bite. Both dogs sat at his feet begging.

  “I’ll take these two clowns out while you finish,” she said and picked up a dog in each arm.

  Luke stopped in the middle of a toy aisle in Walmart and turned slowly around.

  “How am I supposed to figure out what to buy?”

  Harriet pulled a folded piece of paper from her back jeans pocket.

  “Lucky for you, while you were at school, I did my homework. I looked up the most popular Christmas gifts in several age ranges.” She held the list out to him.

  “Whew,” he said. “This’ll help a lot.” He took the list from her and scanned it. He was quiet for a moment.

  “What do you think?” she asked.

  “I’m kind of torn. It would be good for him to get the electrical circuits kit because educational stuff would help him. I’m just not sure if he would be interested enough to use it, or if anyone would help him with it.” He looked from the paper to Harriet. “I don’t want to sound all judgmental now that I live in a better place, but Ta’Shawn’s mom isn’t the sharpest knife in the drawer.”

  Harriet laughed.

  “It’s not judgmental if it’s true. You’re probably right—if you don’t know your brother’s interests or the amount of help he’ll get, it’s probably safer to give him a toy or game this first time.”

  “I was thinking maybe I could get him a Razor scooter. It’s twenty-eight dollars.”

  “That sounds good. I’ll get a few smaller things for any younger siblings. If there aren’t any living with her, we can donate the stuff to the church toy drive.”

  They agreed to meet in fifteen minutes at check stand seven, and each set off to their target aisles.

  Harriet was waiting at the designated checkout with a shopping cart half-full of toys, pet gifts, wrapping paper, ribbon, cellophane tape, and a couple of decorations that were too cute to pass up. Luke walked up carrying the boxed scooter.

  “Should I go get wrapping paper for this?”

  “No, I’ve got enough for you, me, James, both dogs, and Fred, should they all decide to buy us gifts.”

  He laughed. “I wouldn’t count on them for anything.”

  “You’re right. Here, you go first, since you only have one thing.”

  Harriet parked in front of the Outdoor Store, two doors down from Millie’s yarn store. She scanned the parked cars up and down the block. There were three gray sedans; any of them could have been Aunt Beth’s suspicious car. Even if one of them was the same car her aunt had seen, she wasn’t sure what she was supposed to do about it. Perhaps call the police and tell them she’d seen the same gray car three times? She could imagine Officer Nguyen hanging up on her.

  Luke still needed to buy yarn for Aunt Beth, and Harriet decided she would pick up a couple of skeins for James’s mother. She’d just taken up knitting and was pretty anxious to build her skills to the point she could make herself a shawl.

  A bell dangling from the inside doorknob jingled as they came in. Harriet looked to the checkout counter on her left but didn’t see Millie or her employee, William.

  “Hello?” she called out. Luk
e started to go past her toward the back of the store. She held her hand out, stopping him. “Did you hear that?”

  He shook his head.

  “Hello?” she called again and moved quietly to her right. An L-shaped yarn case defined one side of the front area of the store. Behind it were a series of small rooms with closed doors. A storeroom shared a wall with Millie’s office, with stairs to the basement and then a restroom taking up the rest of the wall.

  Harriet entered the office. The chair behind the desk was tipped over, and papers were scattered around the floor.

  “Millie?”

  Luke came up beside her.

  “I heard it that time. Sounds muffled. Like someone is trying to talk through a gag or something.”

  Harriet backed out of the office and opened the door to the basement.

  “Wait here,” she told Luke and started slowly down the stairs. She stopped to listen, and Luke bumped into her back. “I told you to wait up there,” she whispered, glancing up at the landing.

  Luke’s eyes were wide, but he had a determined look on his face.

  “If you’re going down, I’m going down.”

  “Millie?” Harriet descended two more steps.

  The muffled response was louder here. This time, it sounded like Millie saying . “Down here.”

  Harriet hurried down the last few steps, Luke on her heels. The scene they stumbled into was terrifying.

  Millie sat in a chair facing the foot of the stairs, her hands and feet bound tightly, shiny gray duct tape wrapped several times around her head, covering her mouth. William lay motionless on the dirt floor a few feet to her right; blood seeped from a nasty indentation that started on his forehead and continued into his gray hair. More blood pooled around his head.

  Harriet started toward William.

  “Take another step, and it will be your last,” an electronically altered voice said.

  She froze.

  “Now, turn around,” the voice said. “Slowly.”

  She did as she was told and sucked in a breath as she saw a tall figure clad in black, left arm pointing a nasty-looking gun at Luke, a smartphone held in the right hand. A black balaclava pulled over the face and black gloves on the hands made it impossible to tell if the figure was a male or a tall female.

  The figure poked Luke in the side with the gun, indicating he should move to a dusty card table on Millie’s left that had three more chairs pulled up to it.

  “Bring two chairs.” The distorted voice came through the phone.

  Luke obeyed, pulling two chairs over and setting them in line with Millie’s.

  “Apart,” the figure said, indicating he should space the chairs a few feet from each other.

  When Luke had the chairs positioned to the satisfaction of their captor, he was handed several zip ties. The figure pointed the gun at Harriet.

  “Sit.” She did as instructed. “Restrain her,” the distorted voice ordered Luke.

  When that was finished, the figure inspected Luke’s work to be sure Harriet was tied tightly, hand and foot. Luke was then instructed to sit in the third chair and was similarly bound.

  With everyone secured, the dark figure slid the gun into their waistband and picked up a roll of duct tape from a workbench. He quickly wrapped several layers of tape around their mouths.

  It felt like an hour had passed by the time the figure stood up and, with barely a glance at William, went up the stairs. Harriet realized it had more likely been less than five minutes.

  They heard the door at the top of the stairs close, and the click of a lock.

  Harriet looked from Millie to Luke. He was working his jaw up and down. She began doing the same, and within a few minutes, they both had slipped the lower part of their mouths free.

  “Are you okay?” Harriet asked Luke.

  He sighed. “That gun was scary.”

  She noticed that being bound up didn’t seem to panic him nearly as much as it did her. She wondered if binding was a form of babysitting that had been used on him in the past.

  She watched as he raised his hands above his head, elbows out, and quickly brought his arms down and toward his belly. The zip-ties broke apart.

  “How did you learn to do that?”

  His face turned red.

  “On the internet. It’s come in handy a few times. It takes a few tries to get the snapping motion just right. And it does hurt a little, but you can do it.”

  Luke was busy unraveling the bulky cord bracelet he wore on his left wrist.

  “It’s paracord,” he explained.

  She watched as he took the now long, single cord and slipped it under the zip-tie binding his ankles. He began sawing it back and forth.

  “Are you okay?” she asked Millie as she picked the tape off her face with her still-bound hands.

  “I’m fine,” the older woman replied when she’d gotten the tape away from the bottom of her mouth. “But, William…” Tears ran down her cheeks.

  Harriet stood and hopped over to Millie’s chair, unwinding the tape from around Millie’s head. It was pretty clear William was beyond anything either of them could do for him.

  Harriet slid her phone from her pocket, but as she’d suspected, there was no signal in the dank basement.

  “Who did this to you?”

  “I don’t know,” Millie sobbed. Harriet rubbed her back. “Will and I were in my office going over inventory lists. This person burst in and grabbed Will around the neck, pointing the gun at him. He told me to head for the basement, or he would shoot us both right there.”

  “You say he,” Harriet said. “Did he use the voice distorter the whole time or did you hear his real voice.”

  Millie pressed her lips together.

  “I assumed it was a man. Why would a woman do this to us?”

  Harriet imagined there could be an angry wife, mother, sister, or other female person related to William’s victim who might bear a grudge.

  “We can’t assume anything. Did you notice anything about the person that might help us figure out who it is?”

  Millie thought.

  “He…I mean, they…walked funny. Like he was wearing a brace on one leg.”

  With a grunt, Luke pulled the paracord through the last bit of the weakened zip-tie.

  “I’ll go find scissors,” he said and headed for the stairs.

  “He locked the door on his way out,” Millie reminded him.

  He reached the top of the stairs and, raising his leg, kicked the door open.

  “Call nine-one-one while you’re up there,” Harriet called after him, and she heard him speaking a moment later. He reappeared with a large pair of shears and cut the ties from her wrists and ankles. Harriet took the shears and did the same for Millie.

  “Probably best not to touch William,” she cautioned as Millie stepped toward him.

  “Shouldn’t we try CPR?”

  Harriet stepped over and guided her away.

  “I’ve been watching him, and his chest hasn’t moved. Besides, that dent in his head is pretty deep. I don’t think you survive that sort of blow.” She led Millie to the chair farthest from William as Luke hurried down the stairs and came up behind them.

  “Is he really dead?” he whispered.

  “I’m afraid so,” she whispered back.

  The sound of approaching sirens forestalled their conversation. They heard the jangle of bells as police officers entered the shop.

  “Down here,” Harriet called.

  Officer Nguyen let a parade of police officers, firemen, and paramedics down the stairs.

  “Luke and I came here to Christmas shop,” she said when she saw him.

  He shook his head and walked past her and over to William. Detective Morse came down at the end of the initial rush. She stopped by Harriet.

  “What’s going on?”

  “Luke and I came in to shop and walked in on this.” She swept her arm in front of her from Millie to William. “He was on the floor, as you see
him. Millie was tied in a chair at the bottom of the stairs, and someone all in black was in the shadows. I say ‘someone’ because they wore a balaclava over their face and gloves. They were tall and slender and walked with a limp. They also carried a big black gun. I’m not sure why William has a head wound instead of a gunshot.”

  Millie had been sitting in her chair, hands covering her face; but when Harriet finished, she looked up.

  “I can tell you that. The robber came in when William and I were in the office. He used the gun to force us downstairs. William went for the gun when we got down here, and they struggled around until the robber grabbed a pipe wrench from the workbench and hit him in the head.”

  Morse looked at William’s body, surrounded by paramedics standing around with nothing to do. She tilted her head at Luke, now sitting next to Millie.

  “Why don’t you take him and meet me back at the station. Millie, too, if you don’t mind.”

  Harriet put her hand on Millie’s back. “Can you walk upstairs?”

  “Yes, just give me a minute,” Millie replied. “Can we call my daughter?”

  “Sure, you can call her from the car,” Harriet said, then followed the shopkeeper up the stairs.

  CHAPTER 24

  Harriet, Luke, and Millie sat in an interview room at the Foggy Point Police Department as James, followed by Robin, Aunt Beth, Jorge and Mavis and, finally, Millie’s daughter, Amanda.

  The desk sergeant moved Harriet and Luke to a conference room as their guests accumulated. Millie stayed in the interview room with Amanda.

  Jorge arrived carrying two white bags. He gave one to the desk sergeant and took the other to the conference room.

  “I figured after this trauma, you might need some sugar,” he said. Harriet reached for the bag, but Jorge pulled it back and handed it to Luke.

  “What?” she complained.

  Luke looked at her and grinned.

  “I’ll share,” he said. He pulled a handful of cookies out and then passed her the bag.

  The door opened, and Morse came in. She took the bag from Harriet and helped herself to the cookies. James stood behind Harriet, his hands on her shoulders.