I must say, the ceremony went much better than I anticipated. Actually, it was quite nice. The sun, dipped under the horizon just as Cherry and John took their first kiss as husband and wife. From there, they walked hand in hand with a giant torch and lit the bonfire in some sort of symbolic gesture that was lost on me. Next, the guests had a choice of getting in a line for pulled pork sandwiches or roasting a weenie on the open fire. No room for vegetarians at this gig.
It was all just crazy enough to be fun. Spirits were high and both sides of the families seemed to mix well. The band had started a lively tune when Sean approached. I couldn’t help but notice how good he looked in his dark jeans and button down shirt.
“Hey, looking good, Sean,” I said, hoping to lighten the inevitable quarrel that was sure to follow.
He gave me the once over, raised a skeptical brow, but made no comment concerning the dress I was wearing. Instead, he placed a firm hand on my back and guided me out of the food line. “We’re going down to the station together as soon as you can break away from here. I can’t believe you took off this morning. I trusted you.”
“You knew where I was. You could have come after me anytime you wanted,” I retorted.
He tensed. “That wasn’t the point. You were supposed to show up on your own recognizance. A man was murdered. Doesn’t that mean anything to you?”
Sean was getting all worked up. A guy like him didn’t like to bend the rules. He was as straight as an arrow. If anyone knew that, I did. I mean, how many times did I try to get him to break various rules? Besides, I already knew who’d murdered Alex Sokolov. I overheard the whole thing at JimDogs. So, as soon as I could get him alone, I’d fill him in on my latest discovery. It was perhaps the biggest break in the case so far. That would sooth his ruffled feathers.
I turned and placed a hand on his shoulder, giving him my most reassuring look. “No problem. I was planning on heading in soon anyway. Just let me eat, and make a little merry, and I’ll be on my way.”
“No merry. You had enough of that last night.”
“Right. Hey what’s this?” I asked, turning the collar of his shirt over.
He shrugged away, but it was too late. I knew exactly what it was—a lipstick smear.
I grabbed his collar and yanked him in for a closer inspection. “It’s a lipstick stain,” I said through a clenched jaw. “It’s …” I’d seen the shade before. I knew exactly who it belonged to—Sarah Maloney.
“Listen, Pippi. This isn’t what it seems. She—”
I swallowed a couple of times, willing myself to stay calm. “No wonder you didn’t come after me today. You were too busy with Sarah!” I spat out her name and spun on my heels. I didn’t get two steps away before he spun me back around. He had his hands on my forearms, pinning them to my sides. Try as I might, there was no way to get off a good face slap. So instead, I kicked. Only the dress was acting like an orange straight jacket around my lower torso. I kicked and kicked and only managed to land a small one on his shin. “I can’t believe you’ve gone back to her!”
“Would you settle down and let me explain.”
“Excuse me,” a voice interrupted.
I stopped kicking for a second and looked up to see Mary Frances.
“Please tell me this is some sort of new country western dance I’m not familiar with,” she said, giving me the ‘eye’.
I instantly simmered down. Sean let go of me and greeted my sister. “Hello, Mary Frances.”
Mary Frances smiled. “Always good to see you, Sean,” she said warmly. “Do you mind if I steal my sister for a few minutes? Something’s come up.”
I could tell Sean was reluctant to let me go. I’m sure he thought I might make another run for it.
“Sister Eileen just called me,” my sister said in a hushed tone once she finally pulled me away from Sean. “Morgan’s at St. Benedict.”
“St. Benedict?” I almost laughed out loud. Morgan at a convent?
“Yes, Sister says she’s in hysterics. She keeps mumbling something about sanctuary.”
“You mean like sanctuary from the law. What did she do?” My mind immediately flashed to Alex. It had been Morgan all along. How could I have missed it? She was the one with the most motive—that stupid house! She wanted that house more than anything. She’d somehow found out about the document in the book. It must have proven that Alex was entitled to his share of JimDog stock. She’d killed two women, but failed to get her hands on it. Of course, that night at the hotel she was trying to seduce him in order to get ahold of it. It must not have worked, so the only thing left to do was kill Alex. Otherwise the share of the stock holdings she’d gain from divorcing J.J. would be drastically reduced.
I glanced over to where Sean, the two-timing jerk was waiting, with his eyes glued to me. I should really tell him about this new information but then I preferred to have him feel like a stupid idiot if I single handedly solved three murders.
“Pippi!” My sister was shaking me back to reality. “We should head over to St. Benedict, don’t you think?”
“I’m supposed to make a toast—”
“Don’t worry. I’ve already talked to Maggie. She’s going to cover for you.”
“Yeah, but Sean is watching.”
She looked over at Sean and smiled sweetly. “Okay, wait here and act natural. I’ll take care of it. Just be ready to make a break for it.”
She took off before I could get an explanation. So, I headed back over to the buffet line, grabbed a plate and started loading up. I hadn’t even made it to the baked beans before Sean was next to me.
“Have you calmed down yet?” he asked. “I want to talk about this.”
I slapped a pile of beans on my plate, sending little brown splatters everywhere. “Look, Sean. I’ve had it with you,” I said, struggling over the racket coming from the pavilion where the band had started playing again. “I give up. You obviously have some sort of problem with commitment. You couldn’t commit to me, you couldn’t commit to Sarah. One day you’re flirting with me, then the next you’re kissing Sarah. Well, I’m not going to be played like this.”
He reached out for me. I backed up, wound up, and raised my plate. This guy was going to get his dinner the hard way.
“There you are!” It was Maggie. She glommed onto Sean’s arm, saving him from a face full of baked beans. “I’ve been looking for you. My daughter’s class is doing a unit on community helpers and she’s decided to do her report on police officers. Can she pick your brain for a couple of minutes? I promise I won’t keep you two apart for very long.”
I lowered my plate and gave Maggie a knowing look. Mary Frances was good.
Sean, of course, obliged Maggie’s request. As soon as they were a safe distance away, I made a break for the parking lot. Mary Frances intercepted me. “Come on, my car’s over here. I’ve already called Patricia. She was so happy to hear that Morgan’s alive. She’ll catch up with us at St. Benedict.”
It was a quiet car ride. We both were lost in our own thoughts. I’m not sure what Mary Frances was thinking about, but I was chastising myself for not seeing through Morgan’s innocent act. Here I thought that she might be in danger, when all along she was the killer. How’d she do it? She must have been partnered with Alex from the get-go. Once the deeds were done, she eliminated him, too. I was going to get a confession from her then call the police and watch her little designer-clad butt being hauled away.
Okay, maybe my sentiments were a little twisted. The girdle was making me crazy. By the time we turned into the parking lot, my face was turning blue from lack of oxygen.
“Are you feeling okay?” Mary Frances asked, parking in the circular drive in front of the main entrance.
“No. Do me a favor and unzip me, would you?”
She looked at me strangely, but complied.
Once unzipped, I yanked all two yards of pumpkin chiffon up to my neck and started maneuvering like a Cirque du Solei contortionist, which wasn’t easy
in the front seat of a Volkswagen Bug. Once I had finally freed myself from the torturous contraption, I sat back in the seat, an orange circle of chiffon around my shoulders, and let it all hang out for a few seconds of jubilant liberation.
My sister’s eyes were darting back and forth. “Well, this is the first time this has ever happened in front seat if my car. Pull your dress down; we need to get to Morgan before she decides to take off again.”
I slipped the dress back over my torso and turned for her to rezip me. She fruitlessly tugged for a minute or so, before we decided to abandon the effort and leave the dress half-zipped. No big deal. St. Benedict wasn’t full of fashion divas anyway.
As we neared the steps, I heard a rustling sound. “Did you hear that?” I asked.
“No, it’s nothing. Come on, catch up.”
As soon as we entered the chapel, Sister Eileen scurried over, her face flushed with excitement. “I didn’t think you would ever arrive, Sister. I just didn’t know what to do. She’s inconsolable.”
Mary Frances put a hand on the older woman’s shoulder. “You did great. Thank you for calling us. We’ll take it from here, if you’d like to go back to your room and rest.”
Sister Eileen looked relieved to be able to get away from Morgan’s hysterics. I assumed it was the most excitement she’d seen for a while. The poor thing was probably worn out.
I looked down at Morgan who looked like a child huddled against the wooden pew. She had her legs drawn to her chest and was rocking in unison with her sobs. The rhythmic sound of her cries mixed with the creaking of the pew made an eerie sound that echoed throughout the chapel, giving it a haunted feeling.
“Morgan, we were worried about you. Where have you been?” my sister asked, reaching out to stop Morgan’s swaying.
Morgan shrugged away and kept rocking. Mary Frances and I exchanged glances. I decided to give it a try. “Look Morgan, I’m in tight with the local police. I can help you through this. I’m sure killing Alex wasn’t premeditated.”
She stopped moving and looked at me through puffy eyes. “What are you talking about? I didn’t kill Alex.”
She seemed so earnest. “Okay,” I said, pretending to go along with her. “Then you’re here because you’re running from your father-in-law. You must be very afraid of him.”
“Of James? No. You’ve got it all wrong. I’m—”
Clicking heels echoed through the chapel, causing us to glance toward the sound. We became frozen in place as we watched Patricia make her way toward us. She was dressed to kill (literally) in black knee-high boots, tight fitting leather pants, and black gloves, which were unfortunately wrapped around the handle of what looked to be a very dangerous gun … oh my … why was Patricia carrying a gun?
Morgan scampered behind me, her shaking hands holding me out as a barricade between her and Patricia. “How did she find me?” Her tone was high pitched and frantic.
“I called her. She’d been so worried about you,” Mary Frances replied in a faint voice, stepping forward and addressing Patricia who was now standing about two feet away with the gun pointed directly at us. “Put the gun away, Patricia. You don’t want to hurt anyone.”
Patricia tilted her head back, an ugly laugh escaping through twisted lips as the gun danced in her hands. Suddenly, I had a flashback to the year before when someone I’d trusted turned a gun on me. At the time, I promised God if he got me out alive, I’d never get involved in another murder case. I realized now that I’d broken a bargain with God. That’s why this was happening. I deserved to die this time. It was just poetic justice it was going to happen in God’s house.
“Hurt someone?” Light from a row of flickering candles cast menacing shadows across Patricia’s face as little evil cackles sounded from her lips. “I’m not going to hurt someone. I’m going to kill someone, and that someone is you, and you, and you.” She pointed the gun at each of us respectively. Sharp little whimpers were coming from behind me where Morgan was crouched … or maybe they were coming from me. I couldn’t tell. I was in a complete state of panic. I should have listened to Mary Frances. I should have been more prayerful … less lustful … less dishonest … less …
“Why would you want to kill us?” Mary Frances asked. She was so brave.
“Actually, Sister, I don’t really want to kill you; you’re just in the wrong place at the wrong time. But your sister? I’ll kill her just because she’s a pain in the butt … and a horrible dresser,” she added.
There was a weird moment when everyone forgot about their impending deaths and turned to look at me. That’s when I realized I was going to die in this gawd-awful dress and it wasn’t even zipped all the way!
“It’s me she wants,” Morgan whimpered, still crouching behind me.
“That’s right. It’s you I want. Come out from behind there, dear, and let me see your face before I blow it off.”
I shivered. This woman was absolutely evil.
“Stay where you are, Morgan,” Mary Frances calmly ordered. Although I really didn’t think Morgan was going to just jump out and face the gun-wielding Patricia.
“Oh, come on now. Don’t you want to come out and tell everyone what a naughty girl you’ve been, Morgan? That’s right. Morgan isn’t as sweet and innocent as you all think. She’s very conniving. Aren’t you Morgan?”
“You’re the conniving one, Patricia.” Morgan said, finding her voice. “You’re responsible for three deaths. And why? For money?”
Patricia snarled, “That’s easy for you to say. You don’t have to put up with J.J.’s philandering; you didn’t sign a prenuptial. No, all these years I’ve had to tolerate James having an affair with that Russian woman. How do you think it’s been listening to the whispering behind my back and pity-looks from my friends? But what choice did I have? Without James, I had nothing.”
I spoke up. “Well then, why didn’t you just murder James? Why Jane and Pauline? They were innocent.” That seemed like a reasonable question to me.
“I thought about killing James, but you know how it is. The spouse is always the first suspect. My plan seemed more fun and it was foolproof, until Morgan got involved.”
“And what plan was that?” I asked, gaining more nerve by the minute. If I was going to die, I might as well have a few answers first.
“It was all about that stupid bun recipe. All that crap about it being his mother’s recipe was a lie. I knew where he got it … from Calina. She’d given it to him and had been receiving a cut of the company all these years. I knew if I got that recipe, I could barter for anything I wanted. All I had to do was threaten to go public with it. And, why shouldn’t I? I was right there with James the whole time the business was being built and I wanted a piece of it.”
“I see. What about Jane and Pauline? Why them?”
“Anna, our maid, overheard a phone conversation between Calina and James.” Patricia was so wrapped up in telling her clever plan she didn’t notice that Mary Frances was moving away from our little group. She went on, “Calina knew she was dying and wanted to wrap up a few details. She told James she’d kept the original copy of the recipe in the second volume of the book. She was too sick to send it, so she asked him to come and get it.”
“Oh, that’s why he only had the first volume of that book in his office. She had the other.”
“Yes, isn’t that romantic?” Patricia’s voice dripped with venom.
“So you decided to go after the recipe yourself? Beat James to the prize,” I asked.
“Yes, but she died quickly. The next thing I knew, Alex, that idiot, came home and sold everything from her estate,” she continued, her voice strangely void of emotion. It’s like she was on automatic pilot. “I had to get those books back.”
“So, you approached Jane Reynolds about buying them.”
“Of course, but she’d already promised them to some other buyer. She was so stubborn. I offered her twice what the other buyer was going to pay, but she insisted that she had already
committed to someone else. It got nasty between us. I had no choice but to kill her. She wouldn’t give me the books.”
“But you didn’t find the recipe in those books?”
“No. I knew that volume must have gone to a different buyer. So, after I killed the shop owner, I pitched the books to cover my tracks.”
I shivered. “And Pauline?”
“Oh, that girl. I’d found out about the Retro Metro from the auction house and was there when her boyfriend called. I overheard her telling him about the envelope she’d found. It was almost too easy. Like it was fate that I had been standing there when she called him. I simply waited until she was alone that night and…. You should have seen her beg for her life. Really,” she rolled her eyes, “so pathetic.”
Every fiber in my body screamed with repulsion. I started shaking. Not with fear; but with anger. “You must have been desperate to get that recipe,” I managed to say.
Patricia become more agitated. Not a good thing since she was pointing a gun at me. I snuck a peek at Mary Frances. She was edging toward a statue display by the candles.
I refocused on Patricia whose eyes had taken on a strange, far-away look. “Yes, you could say I was desperate. I got the recipe and arranged to meet Alex at the Huntley. I rented a room so there wouldn’t be any risk that someone might see us together.”
My eyes were instantly drawn to her leg. How could I have been so wrong? “So you were the one with Alex at the Huntley?” I asked. I was stalling for time. Out of the corner of my eye, I could tell Mary Frances had almost reached the statue. What exactly was she planning on doing?
“Yeah, you were breathing down my back. I knew you suspected those secondhand dealers were killed for something. If I came forward with the recipe all of the sudden, you’d know I was guilty of murder.”
“I see. It would make sense for Alex to have the recipe, though. It was his mother’s, after all.”
“That’s right. So I showed it to him and tried to convince him to come forward and use it to claim his shares in JimDog Corporation. With that recipe in hand, he could use it to barter for anything he wanted. I was offering him a lot of money to sell those shares to me,” Patricia went on, seemingly eager to reveal her brilliant plan. “He was all for it, too. Then, she got in the way.” She was indicating toward Morgan.
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