by Ellery Adams
Nora shook her head. “He won’t do it. Despite the words he spoke when he first became an EMT, he made it crystal clear that he can’t afford to lose his job. Something happened to him. Something that caused him to move here and start over. Just like the rest of us. I can’t force him to tell me about that event. I already know that he isn’t willing to talk about it. Not yet. And if I push him, he’ll only regret that he decided to trust me with that detail about Fenton in the first place.”
“You like him too,” Hester said, her grin widening. “That’s why you don’t want to push him.”
June raised a hand, forestalling Nora’s protest. “We all have to step out of our comfort zones. They’re going to come after you again, Nora. That rose was a warning. Think about it. How did Collin know about it in the first place unless he’d already been watching you? Think of the effort it took to locate the bush that wild rose came from. You got a serious warning from a dangerous man.” June pointed a stiff finger at Nora. “You didn’t heed that warning, so someone decided to push you off the side of a mountain. There were two people in that car: the driver and the person who shoved you. This confirms our theory that we’re not dealing with a single murderer.”
“The witness is the key,” Nora said, looking at Hester. “We need to know who they are and what they think they saw Estella do.”
She’d patiently waited for June to finish, but she was angry now. Not at June, but at herself. Instead of coercing Jed into helping them, she’d shut down. She’d hidden behind her bookshelves and safe subjects like her shelf enhancers and food. Always books. Books were her way of staying connected to other people without letting any individual person get too close.
“Even if I learn the name of the witness from Deputy Andrews, I don’t see how that changes things,” Hester said. “We’d have to discredit him. Or her. How can we do that if the sheriff is in on the scheme?”
“We use the newspaper to expose them,” Nora said. “And we start a social-media campaign as a backup. But this can only happen if we get the witness to admit that they fabricated the story about seeing Estella the night of Fenton’s murder.”
June grunted. “There’s the rub. No one’s scared of us.” “That’s their mistake,” Nora said. The space where her pinkie used to be started to tingle. “They have no clue what we’re made of. If they did, they’d be seriously frightened.”
The next evening, Hester sent Nora and June a group text. It was short and to the point.
ANDREWS IS STILL HERE. I SNUCK TO THE BACK TO SEND THIS. THE WITNESS IS VANESSA MACCAVITY. SHE SWORE SHE SAW ESTELLA AND FENTON TOGETHER IN THE GARDEN AROUND 10, KISSING. SHE ALSO SAYS SHE SAW AN EMPTY MARTINI GLASS NEAR FENTON BUT ESTELLA WASN’T DRINKING OR HAD NO GLASS.
“How convenient,” June said to Nora when she called less than a minute after Hester’s text came through. “There are no security cameras in the garden. The paths are illuminated at night, but the gazebo isn’t lit because the management doesn’t want to attract bugs to the structure.”
“Any luck finding out how Vanessa has spent her time since she arrived in Miracle Springs? Other than lying about Estella’s movements?” Nora asked in a tight voice. Her blood was already rising in temperature as it surged through her veins. She wanted a piece of this woman—Vanessa—for possibly precipitating Estella’s arrest. Nora also wanted to know who tried to kill her on that mountain road. And she wanted to look into the face of Neil’s murderer and feel that she and the Secret, Book, and Scone Society had sought—and achieved—justice for a stranger.
“According to Bob, who’s been collecting gossip for us like a truck-stop waitress since I asked for his help, Vanessa divides her time between lounging at the pool sipping cocktails, receiving massages and facial treatments, and talking on the phone in her suite. The housekeepers can’t tidy up while Vanessa’s inside because she always hangs the DO NOT DISTURB sign on her doorknob. Her suite has three rooms. She could easily move from one to the other while the staff cleaned, but she won’t let them in. They can hear her on the phone. Apparently, she has a short fuse and a nasty tongue.”
A plan began to take shape in Nora’s mind. “One of my customers mentioned a party taking place tomorrow night at the lodge. An alfresco event with food, music, and fireworks.” She looked to June for confirmation. “Is this right?”
“It is,” June said. “Are you thinking of going?”
“We all are.” Nora smiled. “The three of us are crashing this party. And by the end of the night, we’ll have what we need to take care of the vermin infesting our town.”
June hooted in enthusiastic agreement. “Pass me the rat killer, sister. I am ready to do some exterminating.”
Chapter 16
Green was the silence, wet was the light, the month of June trembled like a butterfly.
—Pablo Neruda
“Jedediah Craig. It’s a pleasure to officially meet you.” Jed shook hands with Hester and June on a wide veranda overlooking the lodge grounds. “The night we first saw each other, I was on duty.”
Nora gave a self-effacing shrug. “That wasn’t my finest hour. But don’t worry, I’m not wearing heels tonight.”
“That’s because your fairy godmother can’t lend you any,” Hester muttered softly, referring to Estella.
Nora gave Hester a pointed look. This was not the time to raise serious subjects. There would be opportunities for that later. For now, Nora wanted Jed to relax and enjoy himself. Hopefully, he’d have a few drinks—enough to leave him open to suggestion—and then Nora could convince him to take a risk in the name of justice.
“No fairy godmother? It sure looks like someone waved a magic wand.” Though Jed spoke to Hester, his eyes were on Nora. He was drinking her in. He stared at her face for a long moment before his gaze slowly moved down the length of her body and back up again. “If you brought yours from Ollivan-der’s, what do you think it would be made of?” he asked Nora.
Nora’s skin was prickly with heat from watching Jed caress her body with his appreciative glance. During those long, slow seconds, she fantasized about Jed leading her to a secluded garden nook. He’d stand behind her, sweeping her long hair to one side as he untied the strings at the base of her neck—the strings holding the top of her coral sundress in place. Nora would welcome the kiss of the moist night air on her skin, just as she’d welcome the feel of Jed’s fingertips sliding down her naked shoulders, over the smooth ridge of her collarbone and the swell of her breasts.
“Ollivander’s?” Hester cocked her head. “Isn’t that from Harry Potter?”
Nora was still caught up in thoughts of how she would like Jed to put his hands and his lips—anywhere and everywhere on her body—but she managed to reply in a normal, if slightly hoarse voice.
“The wand chooses the wizard, Mr. Craig,” she said. “I took one of those online quizzes, and the results were that my wand would be dogwood with a phoenix core.”
“Phoenix. Born again through fire.” Jed gently covered Nora’s scarred hand with his own. “That sounds about right.”
Jed could have reached for either hand, but he’d chosen her disfigured hand over the unblemished one. Nora didn’t know what to make of this. She was so surprised by her feelings for Jed that she couldn’t think clearly at all.
“Have fun, you two!” June suddenly said, looping her arm through Hester’s. “We’re off to do some damage at the buffet. My employee discount really helped with tonight’s tickets, but I’m still going to eat every penny’s worth of that steep price.”
Nora feared Jed might offer to reimburse her for the tickets. Instead he said, “Let me take care of the drinks tonight. Maybe we can grab some cocktails and find a quiet corner where we can see the sky. I really like that about your house. Because you have a view of the train tracks, it feels like your place could be sitting on the edge of anywhere.”
“There were tons of lightning bugs when I was out on the deck waiting for June to pick me up,” Nora said as they
headed for the outdoor bar. “They were hovering around the berry bushes, which made me think about running into you there. And of the other times we’ve bumped into each other. We’ve had some unusual encounters.”
“It’s better than meeting through some online dating site,” Jed said. “Makes for a better story.”
“Stories matter,” Nora replied with a smile.
When they reached the bar, Nora saw that Bob wasn’t on duty, and she wondered if he was working his usual shift at the Oasis. After looking over the alfresco bar menu, Nora and Jed decided on mojitos.
“Make mine a virgin, please,” Nora whispered to the barkeep when Jed was distracted by the sight of two burly chefs in starched white coats carrying a wood board bearing a roasted pig.
They were greeted with applause by a throng of expectant diners who parted to allow the chefs to place the board in the center of the buffet. As soon as the men retreated, the guests began collecting plates and scooping food onto them before the lodge manager could finish his welcome speech.
Someone made a comment about the film Babe, which made Nora think of sheepdogs. That thought reminded her to ask after Jed’s dog.
“How’s Henry Higgins doing?”
Jed handed Nora her mojito and raised his own in a toast. “To summer nights and excellent company.” He and Nora drank from their glasses. Jed took a second sip before replying to Nora’s question. “Henry Higgins is about the same, but I like the idea of changing his diet, so we’re starting with that. My mom can’t do the massages—it’s just too much for her to handle. I’ll give the hands-on stuff a go once Double H is here.”
They continued talking, sticking to safe subjects like work, books, food, and films. Though Jed hadn’t been to a movie theater in ages, he confessed that he had a large collection of movies on DVD and tended to watch them over and over. As he was telling Nora the plot of a war movie she hadn’t seen and was unlikely to watch, she spotted Vanessa MacCavity heading their way.
“Ready to grab some dinner?” Nora asked, interrupting Jed’s description of the storming of the Normandy beach.
Jed glanced at the buffet. “Sure. It looks like there’s a break in the action. And I promise not to talk about that scene while we’re eating.”
Nora knew he wouldn’t have the chance anyway. The plan was for Hester and June to give them a few minutes alone before sitting down at their table. Since the tables were oversized picnic tables, this wouldn’t seem out of place.
At this point, June, who had more medical experience than Nora and Hester put together, would ease into reminiscences of her encounters with paramedics during her tenure at the assisted-living facility. Once she had Jed engrossed in a dramatic rescue tale featuring an elderly gentleman and the frozen pond near the facility, Hester would pretend to receive a disturbing text. She’d begin to cry and would rush off in distress. After signaling Jed that she’d be right back, Nora would chase after her friend.
June would act concerned for a minute or two. Then, she’d order a round of drinks and raise the subject of potassium-chloride poisoning and her belief that it was unlikely Fenton Greer would have consumed a cocktail mixed with enough potassium to set off a cardiac arrest. June’s task was to raise doubt about Greer’s cause of death, and to inspire Jed to speak with the medical examiner.
Nora was so focused on what was supposed to happen after she and Jed sat down that she barely paid attention to the bounty of food on the buffet. She selected a spinach salad, corn on the cob, bacon-wrapped tenderloin, and a slice of watermelon without giving the items much thought. She’d had a few bites of salad and tasted her meat when her friends appeared.
“Mind if we join you?” June asked Nora.
After the briefest pause, during which she shot Jed an apologetic smile, Nora made room on her side of the bench.
Five minutes later, she was trailing Hester across the lawn toward the main building.
“It felt good to cry,” Hester said once they were alone in the stairwell. “I’m so nervous that it was nice to have a release, even if I was pretending. You should try it.”
Nora increased her pace. “I’m not the crying type.”
She was nervous, though. The Secret, Book, and Scone Society was pinning their hopes on gathering enough incriminating evidence from Vanessa’s room to turn the tables on the collective who’d murdered two people, framed Estella, and tried to silence Nora.
At the fourth-floor stairwell, Hester held open the door and waited for Nora to walk with her, side by side, down the carpeted hallway. They passed no one on the way to Vanessa’s suite. As Nora watched Hester pull out a plastic key card from her handbag, she whispered, “Are you sure you want to do this?”
Hester nodded firmly, waved the key card in front of the magnetic reader, and shoved open the door. Together, the two friends darted into the suite and let the door shut behind them.
Thanks to Bob, they knew the layout of the suite by heart. For Estella’s sake, Bob had procured the key card and a floor plan. He’d given these items to June during her lunch break.
All Nora had to do now was affix the recording device she’d bought from a flea-market vendor to a wall of Vanessa’s suite. This was Nora’s first purchase from the man’s actual shop, which was two train stops away from Miracle Springs. The Bunker specialized in “guns, ammo, and war-related items.” Nora knew the motto well because the owner, Denny, had it emblazed on the banners festooned all over his flea-market booth. It was also stitched into the back of his leather vest, along with various skulls, flags, and crossed-rifle patches.
Denny’s booth had never interested Nora. She had no need for camo outfits, weapons, or war-related items in her line of work.
Until now.
And when she’d visited the Bunker, she knew that she’d come to the right place. Denny listened closely as she explained that she was on the hunt for an unobtrusive recording device that wouldn’t break the bank.
“I’ve got just the thing,” he’d said and led her over to the covert-ops section of the store. “Lots of choices, here. Smoke detectors with built-in cameras and recording devices. Alarm clocks. MP-three players. That’s my favorite.” He’d pointed to what looked like an electrical outlet. “All you’ve got to do is stick it on the wall. Nobody will notice an extra outlet behind a table or a chair.”
Especially a guest in a hotel room, Nora thought. The housekeeping staff would most certainly notice, however, so she’d have to place the outlet out of sight.
Denny had showed her how the outlet face slid off to reveal the camera and recorder. He’d then briefly described how to operate the device, accepted her cash payment, and wished her a nice day.
Thinking that the world had become a very strange place, Nora had thanked him and headed for the train station.
Now she surveyed the suite’s spacious living room and tried to decide where to affix the outlet. The obvious choice was near the table where Vanessa kept her laptop, appointment book, and cell-phone charger. As Hester hurried into the adjacent bedroom to have a look around, Nora grabbed a wing chair covered in a silk-floral brocade fabric by its arms and shimmied it forward. Judging from the imprints its feet left in the carpet, the chair was seldom moved, so Nora dropped to her knees and pressed the spy gadget against the wall directly behind the chair. After pushing the chair back into place, she decided to risk another minute taking photos of Vanessa’s appointment book.
Hester returned to the living room and nodded. Nora responded with a thumbs-up before peering out a crack in the suite’s door.
The hallway was clear.
The women exited the suite and made for the stairwell.
“Anything in the bedroom?” Nora asked in a hushed voice.
“Vanessa MacCavity likes to shop,” Hester said. “And she has expensive taste. Some of her clothes still have the price tags attached. I’d have to save for a month to pay for a single item in her wardrobe.” On the landing between the third and second floor, Hester stop
ped. “I know she’s a guest at a four-star hotel and it’s summertime, but Vanessa has a ridiculous amount of resort wear.”
Nora gave a little shrug. “Bob said that she spent most of her time at the spa or on her phone by the pool. I guess she doesn’t need to wear skirt suits to do her job.”
“She has to be doing something besides placing newspaper ads to merit a salary that allows for three swimsuits at two hundred dollars apiece.”
Nora whistled. “Hopefully, we’ll learn soon enough.” She glanced at her watch. “Not bad. All told, we’ve been gone fifteen minutes. Jed should be squirming, but not suspicious.”
When they returned to the table, however, Jed was gone.
“He told me to tell you that he was sorry,” June said. “His pager went off. He had to go.”
Since the other diners had gathered around a huge fire pit to roast gourmet s’mores, June had the oversized picnic table to herself. Nora and Hester began picking at their uneaten meals. “Did you know that he was on call?” Hester asked. She buttered a piece of dill roll and popped it in her mouth.
With a nod, Nora turned to June. “Did you have any luck?”
“We had a polite argument and Jedediah raised a good point.” June lowered her voice. “If Greer had a preexisting heart condition, consuming that much potassium chloride on an empty stomach might have killed him. Naturally, I asked your man to check on that for us.”
“He’s not my man,” Nora said.
June shrugged. “I think he’d like to be. He—” She stopped and leaned closer to her plate. “Don’t look now, but Vanessa has her phone to her ear and she’s making a face like she just tasted sour milk. Oh, there she goes. No dessert or dancing on the lawn for her. She’s leaving the party. Were there any dead bodies in her closets?”