Murder with Clotted Cream

by Karen Rose Smith

  “I understand if you don’t want to talk about this.”

  “It hurts me because I didn’t do a better job of staying in touch with Margaret.”

  “What happened immediately after she left?”

  “She did write me letters then, basic ones that I looked through, but they didn’t have much information. They were all about her need to get away. She found a job in a bar. My mom would have been scandalized. But Margaret insisted she could make more with tips as a waitress in a bar than any of the day jobs she tried to get. Later, I received a few e-mails, but they were lost. E-mail servers changed. I deleted many.”

  Vanna suddenly went quiet.

  Daisy waited, wondering what the woman was thinking.

  “Vanna? Did something you found make you sad?”

  “When I couldn’t find anything else, I sorted through years of photos of my husband and kids. I found one of Margaret too. She sent it to me about a year before she met Rowan. Do you want to see it?”

  “Sure, I do.”

  Vanna pulled her purse from a desk drawer. She slipped the photo out of a zippered pocket and showed it to Daisy.

  Daisy stared at the photo. It was of Margaret in front of a building. She’d written on the back, Mother and Dad would be proud of what I’m doing now, but I still hope to find an acting job in the future.

  “I wonder what that means,” Daisy said. “What kind of job did she have?”

  “I don’t have a clue. I didn’t hear from her again until she married Rowan. She was acting off-Broadway when she met him. There are so many holes in her history. Do you think Glenda knows more than she’s saying?”

  “I think it’s certainly possible.” If only Daisy could tap into Glenda’s history too. What kind of information would flow out?

  Chapter Eighteen

  After work Daisy locked up the tea garden, made sure the security alarm was set, and walked the back route to Jonas’s store. Jazzi had a peer counseling meeting tonight after school, and Daisy would have to pick her up in about half an hour. That gave her time to talk to Jonas about what she’d discovered with Vanna.

  As she walked along the back of the properties, the clear cold night swung itself around her with a breeze. She hadn’t worn her hat. Instead of putting up the hood to her jacket, she slipped the band from her ponytail and let her hair blow free. There were times like this when she just wanted to be alone with her thoughts, letting air with the scent of woodsmoke clear any clouds away.

  She was anxious to see Jonas for many reasons. One of them was that she missed him when she didn’t see him. She was so used to talking to him every day that when she didn’t, something in her life just felt missing. Jonas seemed to want to be with her too, dropping in at the tea garden or coming over to the house, not even minding if she was babysitting Sammy. Together just seemed to be better than apart.

  The path was wet from melting snow as she walked over gravel, macadam, and grass. Each of the stores had motion detector lights to the rear of their property as well as on the front. As she approached the back of Woods, she could see that Jonas’s truck was still parked there. She knew he had collected reclaimed wood recently and was probably building something special with that.

  She knocked on the back door to his workshop. If he wasn’t in there, if he was in the main store, he might not hear. It was possible she’d have to traipse around to the front.

  But she didn’t. He opened the door and when he saw it was her, he took her into his arms and gave her a walloping kiss. “I’ve missed you,” he said into her hair.

  “I missed you too.”

  With his arm around her, he brought her into the workshop. “No reason to stand out there in the cold. You have time to kill?”

  Often when Jazzi had a meeting, Daisy stopped in to spend time with Jonas. “I wouldn’t say I was killing time. I came to see what you’re working on.”

  “How did you know it was something new?”

  “You can’t look at a pile of reclaimed wood and not imagine what you’re going to do with it. What did you do with it?”

  He laughed and Daisy unzipped her jacket. She laid it on the bench, then she saw exactly what Jonas had been working on—a beautiful island. He’d used the barn wood for the base of the cabinet. Along with that, he’d added barn doors to open and shut the cabinets. The top of the island was glossy gray and white quartz that looked a bit pebbled with mother-of-pearl glimmers. The cabinet itself was a pale distressed green.

  She ran her hand over the top. “This is beautiful, Jonas. Do you have a buyer for it?”

  “No one knows about it yet. Elijah and I are going to set it in the window tomorrow morning. We’ll leave it there for a week and see if we have any interest. If not, I do have some buyers who want me to call them when I have new pieces. With that combination, we should sell it soon.”

  She slid the small barn doors back and forth and noticed the shelves inside. Jonas had made the piece not only elegantly rustic but usable too.

  “Elijah thinks we should do some kind of special event,” Jonas said, “with all reclaimed wood pieces. He thinks it would create an awareness of the history of the area, as well as what can be done with reclaimed wood. He has a finish product that will even re-porcelain old sinks. Can you imagine an old farmhouse sink in a cabinet like this?”

  “I can. A complete kitchen of reclaimed wood would be gorgeous. When Wyatt Troyer designed my kitchen, we used reclaimed wood on one of the walls because it had come from the barn. He refinished the boards and no one seems to notice it, but I know. I wanted to keep as much of the old barn in play as possible.”

  “It makes your kitchen distinctive,” Jonas agreed. “I was thinking of making a library table out of reclaimed wood for Vi and Foster for Christmas. Do you think they’d like that? I could even put shelves under it so they’d have a place for books. I know Foster has a lot of them.”

  “That’s a wonderful idea, and I’m certain they’d appreciate it. They could even set their computers there when they aren’t using them. Foster doesn’t always like to go downstairs to the garage office to work because he wants to be close to Vi and the baby. That might change as he knows Vi is feeling better and the baby might not need as much care.”

  “Do you think Vi really is better? She’s not faking it?” After a serious consideration, Daisy answered, “No, she’s not faking it. I saw her at her worst, and I know her moods. When she looks at Sammy, there’s love in her eyes. When she looks at me now, sometimes I see the old sparkle back. She’s enthusiastic about the christening and I don’t see how she could fake that either.”

  “I just wonder because sometimes depressed people can put on a good front,” Jonas offered.

  “I know, but I really think she’s coming out of the depression. Not overnight, and not every day, but it’s happening.”

  Jonas nodded. “Is Jazzi going to come along with us to the bonfire tomorrow night?” The bonfire was a holiday tradition for Willow Creek the first week of December.

  “No, she says she doesn’t want to get cold. She’ll stay home with the cats or spend the evening with Vi.”

  Jonas leaned against a bookcase that appeared ready to be moved into the showroom. He crossed one ankle over the other and his arms across his chest. “Have you made any more progress about Margaret?”

  “I don’t know if I have or not. Vanna showed me something and I wanted to show you.” She plucked her phone from her purse, tapped on her photo gallery, and brought up a photo. She’d snapped a pic of Vanna’s photo. “Vanna said that Margaret sent her this photo about a year before she met Rowan. With it, she had said something like her mother and dad would be proud of her now but she still hoped to find an acting job.”

  “That means she wasn’t acting.”

  “That’s right. But Vanna didn’t know what she was doing.”

  With his fingers, Jonas spread the picture so some elements of it came into closer focus.

  “You don’t seem to be con
centrating on Margaret’s face. What are you looking at?”

  “At where the photo was taken. It looks familiar.” He pointed to one aspect of the photo. “See these brick walls and the arch?” He pointed to something else. “Look at these ball lights.”

  “Do you think you recognize the place?”

  “I’ve only been to New York City a few times on a case, but I have a friend in the police department there who knows it well. I could send it to him and see what he says.”

  When Daisy looked into Jonas’s eyes, seeing the lines around them that came from his experience in the PD, when she studied the scar down his face and his expression as he studied her, she knew one thing for sure—he wanted her to make this choice. With each question she asked, and with each answer she found, she stepped deeper into the case. However, sometimes curiosity did get the best of her. It wouldn’t hurt to find out where the photo was taken.

  Right now, the photo wasn’t as important as what she’d just figured out about Jonas. “You’re never going to make decisions for me, are you?”

  His mouth twisted into a wry smile. “Would you want me to?”

  “No, I wouldn’t. I want to stand on my own and make my own choices. I just figured out that you’d let me do that.” They stared at each other for seconds that seemed to spin very slowly.

  He held her shoulders. “I know you’re a separate person from me, Daisy. My thoughts aren’t yours. We’re in sync a lot of the time. But I’d rather know what you’re thinking than guess at it.”

  She leaned closer to him and laid her hand along his cheek that was marked by the scar. “My feelings for you are growing deeper than I want to admit,” she said honestly.

  He covered her hand with his free one. “That’s good to hear.” Leaning forward, he kissed her forehead.

  How could that slight show of affection make her quiver so inside?

  After he leaned away, he asked her, “So . . . should I send my friend the picture?”

  “Yes, send it.”

  “Are you going on a wild goose chase?”

  Shrugging, she said lightly, “Maybe I’ll catch a goose.”

  * * *

  The bonfire at the community pond was always festive. This December night was drop-below-thirty-two cold but clear enough to spot constellations. Residents of Willow Creek could wander around the pond under the light of a crescent moon. The volunteer fire company had organized the evening. They handled the bonfire, made sure everything fell within safety guidelines, and even set up tables with hot cider, coffee, and hot chocolate. Pine garlands and wreaths with red bows decorated the tables.

  As did most of the residents of Willow Creek who appreciated the bonfire and wanted to attend, Daisy and Jonas brought along folding lawn chairs that they set up about ten yards from the bonfire. Jonas set them close together and hooked his arm into Daisy’s as they sipped cups of hot cider. Daisy stared into the flames of the bonfire, fascinated by the white yellow to blue colors that hopped and danced over the logs and deadwood branches. She’d worn a calf-length yellow down jacket to keep her warm tonight along with heavy jeans, wool socks, and fleece-lined boots. Wearing a hat under the hood of her jacket, she’d tied the strings under her chin. A long cranberry-colored scarf dangled down the zipper of the jacket, its fringes brushing her jeans.

  Glancing away from the bonfire, she breathed in deeply a pocket of the cutting cold air tinged with woodsmoke and the scent of the pines that bordered a section of the pond. She eyed some of the Willow Creek residents who stood by the snack tables, sat on blankets, or walked back and forth around the perimeter of the pond.

  The production of Christmas in the North Woods had scheduled a matinee today. She’d heard the show had gone very well. Apparently, the cast was in a rhythm that worked without further changes. They knew what they were doing. Arden had told her that Glenda had shown up for each performance and had been very quiet and talked to no one.

  Daisy caught sight of Arden Botterill along with Amelia Wiseman and her husband. Ward Cooper wore a long black wool coat and a red scarf tied decoratively around his neck. Red earmuffs covered his ears. She thought she spotted Tamlyn, Rowan’s housekeeper, but she wasn’t sure. With hats and scarves and coats, everyone looked a bit different . . . except for Jonas. In black jeans, a black leather bomber jacket, a flannel shirt, and a black watch cap, she’d recognize him anywhere.

  She looked up at the moon and, after a sideways glance at Jonas, saw that he was doing the same. A breeze whipped the edges of Daisy’s scarf.

  Jonas unhooked his arm from hers and squeezed her gloved hand. “Are you too cold to stay?”

  “I’d like to stay a little longer. Did you ever wonder what the tips of the moon would look like if they froze?”

  A chuckle rumbled in Jonas’s chest. “You do have an imagination, don’t you? Do you wonder if there’s ice cream up there too?”

  She bumped her elbow into his ribs. “It’s just that sometimes the crescent doesn’t look as if it has points.”

  “That’s because of clouds.”

  “Maybe, but that’s such a realistic conclusion.”

  He squeezed her hand again. “Do you and the girls go ice-skating on the pond when it freezes over?”

  “We have. I think last year we only came out here once. When I was little, Dad would bring me. It was such fun. He and I would skate until we couldn’t feel our feet or our noses.”

  “Not Camellia?”

  “She always had better things to do. Maybe if Dad had just invited her, she might have come with him. I don’t know. Mom wasn’t the type to ice-skate, so she and Camellia would find other things to do. One year when Dad and I got back from skating, Mom and Camellia had made perfume. Mom had bought a kit and they’d had fun doing it for the afternoon.”

  “Did you feel left out?”

  “Not any more than Camellia felt left out of ice-skating. I don’t know. It was just the way it was. I think as a child you can accept things easier than as an adult.”

  “Or else you felt powerless to do anything about it,” Jonas suggested. “I felt that way after my father died until I decided to become a cop. That made me feel as if I had some control over destiny. At least it did until Brenda was killed. Then I knew no one had control over anything, certainly not other human beings.”

  “Did you and Brenda celebrate the holidays with family and friends?”

  She felt Jonas tense a bit, but then that tension seemed to dissipate. “Officially we kept our relationship secret. We were partners. It was against policy to be involved. So if we celebrated, we did it alone. Only a few people knew about us—Zeke, Brenda’s parents, another good friend of mine who had nothing to do with the police department. Once in a while we went there together and had a night of playing cards.”

  “The friends who were at the barbecue last year and I couldn’t go?” Her cancellation of their last-minute plans had caused a misunderstanding between them. It had happened around the time Violet had found out she was pregnant, and everything had been complicated by that.

  Suddenly someone tapped Daisy on the shoulder. It was Tamlyn. “Hi there,” Daisy said. “I thought I saw you, but I wasn’t sure with you wearing that fluffy hat.”

  Tamlyn rubbed her hands together. “Anything to keep warm. I’m not sure why I came, maybe just to get out of that house for a while. I think I’m going to resign my position and try to find something else. Mr. Vaughn doesn’t really need me.”

  “Does he cook for himself?” Daisy asked.

  “Oh, no. Ms. Nurmi was doing some of the cooking, but she hasn’t been there the past few days.”

  Since the night the police had brought her in for questioning? Daisy wondered. If Glenda and Rowan were having an affair, that could be motive for murder. Daisy supposed Glenda was wise to keep her distance from Rowan.

  “I thought I’d start looking around before Mr. Vaughn decides to sell the house. I heard him talking to a real estate agent. I can’t imagine him staying
there all by himself. I’m not sure he even liked the place from the beginning. Margaret’s the one who wanted it, from what I understand.”

  “It’s a beautiful old home,” Jonas said.

  “It needs somebody rich to own it. There’s a lot of upkeep. Mr. Vaughn’s always calling one handyman or another.”

  Suddenly there seemed to be a ruckus about ten yards away—raised male voices. One of the volunteer firemen strode in that direction.

  “I think that’s Zeke over there,” Jonas said, getting to his feet. “It looks like Zeke and Jasper Lazar are having some kind of altercation. I’m going to head over that way,” he told Daisy.

  Daisy wasn’t content to stay put, so she followed Jonas, trying to keep up with his stride.

  When they reached the area, Daisy saw that Zeke was pointing a finger at Jasper Lazar’s chest. “You know more than you’re letting on,” he said.

  Jasper shot back, “You’re crazy.”

  It was possibly true that Jasper knew more, but Zeke shouldn’t be having this conversation with Jasper here. If there was any merit to his accusation, it should be done in private. This atmosphere was anything but private.

  Her assessment must have been the same as the one Jonas was making. The wind had picked up and was slapping against Daisy’s jacket. She was chilled, but the drama in front of her made her adrenaline level accelerate and warmth spread through her. Someone had to stop this before either Jasper or Zeke took a swing. If Zeke was going to take Jasper in for questioning, he could do that quietly.

  The firefighter who had been studying what was going on turned to Jonas. They nodded to each other as if they knew each other.

  “Hi, Frank,” Jonas said. Then in a lower voice, he asked, “What’s going on?”

  “I’m not sure, but Zeke Willet’s been drinking.”

  “If he’s drinking, then he’s not on duty. He shouldn’t even be questioning a witness.”

  Frank nodded. “That’s what I thought. But I have no authority to do anything.”

  “I don’t either,” Jonas admitted.