String of Lies
Page 1
Table of Contents
Title Page
Copyright Page
Dedication
Acknowledgements
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Make a Special Key Chain
Beading Tips
About the Author
“Readers will want to fire up their glue guns and join the goings-on at Jo’s Craft Corner.”*
Praise for
Wreath of Deception
“A warm and clever heroine . . . Filled with unexpected twists, peopled with entertaining characters, and sprinkled with touches of humor.”—Maddy Hunter, author of G’day to Die
“Hughes launches her series with a feisty, likable heroine and a savvy group of craft hounds.”—*Romantic Times
“A clever, crafty plot and a cast of quirky, engaging characters make Wreath of Deception a definite winner. A fun,fast-paced read.”—Maggie Sefton, author of A Killer Stitch
“Mary Ellen Hughes has a designer’s touch when it comes to murder! Her book has characters you’ll really like and crafts you’ll want to make. Get cozy and enjoy this terrific new author.”
—Laura Childs, author of the bestselling Tea Shop Mysteries
“Mary Ellen Hughes stitches together a charming mystery filled with crafty plot twists and a fun cast of characters. Read and enjoy this clever novel.”—Monica Ferris, author of Sins and Needles
“An intriguing and crafty debut.”—Tim Myers, author of A Mold for Murder
“A quintessential cozy. The writing is top-notch, the plot well-paced . . . an altogether satisfying story readers will just love.”
—Cozy Library
“An absorbing whodunit, small-town life, the joys and trials of family and friends, and some useful crafting tips all combine to make this series debut a good read.”
—MyShelf.com
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This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental. The publisher does not have any control over and does not assume any responsibility for author or third-party websites or their content.
STRING OF LIES
A Berkley Prime Crime Book / published by arrangement with the author
PRINTING HISTORY
Berkley Prime Crime mass-market edition / September 2007
Copyright © 2007 by Mary Ellen Hughes.
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced, scanned, or distributed in any printed or electronic form without permission. Please do not participate in or encourage piracy of copyrighted materials in violation of the author’s rights. Purchase only authorized editions.
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eISBN : 978-1-436-24583-8
BERKLEY® PRIME CRIME
Berkley Prime Crime Books are published by The Berkley Publishing Group,
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In memory of Mary C. and James J. Hughes
Always loving, ever giving
Acknowledgments
I am very grateful to the wonderful group at The Bead Shack in Crofton, Maryland, for introducing me to and guiding me through the fascinating world of beading. If any inaccuracies slipped in, it was entirely my fault and not theirs, for they know their craft inside and out. Thanks also to Susan Brown who generously shared her knowledge of the craft with me as well.
Many thanks to my editor, Sandra Harding, and the many hardworking people at Berkley for putting their fantastic skills to work on my behalf. I appreciate too the ongoing, generous support of my agent, Jacky Sach, without whom none of this would have begun.
Thank you, once again, to the members of the Annapolis critique group: Janet Benrey, Debbi Mack, Ray Flynt, Trish Marshall, Sherriel Mattingly, Marcia Talley, and Lynda Taylor, whose “tough love” always pushed me to do my best. I’m grateful as well to Stephen Hughes for his valuable automotive input, and to Suzanne Baker for her own very helpful knowledge of crafts and her unflagging support.
Last—but never least—my husband, Terry, who patiently played the part of my sounding board and who so often kept me from running off into a ditch: I couldn’t have done it without you.
Chapter 1
Jo should have been tipped off when things began going much too well—always a danger sign in her life, but one she still somehow managed to ignore. She couldn’t, however, ignore the huge “Closing Soon!” poster pasted in the window of Fantastic Florals by Frannie, just down the block from Jo’s Craft Corner. Jo was on her way to pick up an order of sandwiches at the Abbot’s Kitchen for Carrie and herself when she stopped dead in front of Frannie’s shop, staring in disbelief at the sign.
Closing? But Frannie’s place was always bursting with customers. Jo pulled open Frannie’s door and called out without preamble, “What’s going on, Frannie?”
Frannie, short and plump, and a regular dynamo of creativity with fresh flowers, looked down glumly from the ladder where she balanced on the third rung, holding a Teleflora poster that had previously hung on her wall. “I’m closing shop,” she answered.
“Why? I thought your business was going great.”
Frannie stepped carefully down the ladder, the top of her head gradually sinking below Jo’s until it ended about even with Jo’s shoulder. She looked up at Jo, her expression both angry and resigned, and said, “We’re being kicked out.”
“But don’t you have a lease?”
Frannie sh
ook her head. “I was just about to renew it when I found out my landlord isn’t my landlord anymore.”
“Come again?”
“My landlord sold the building. He’s not my landlord anymore.”
“He can do that?”
“Yup.” Frannie set down her poster and took hold of her ladder, sliding it sideways a few inches.
Jo automatically grabbed one leg to help. “But what about the new owner? Can’t you rent from them? You’ve obviously been a great tenant.”
Frannie looked at Jo with an expression of defeat on her face. Jo had never seen this feisty florist, a woman she had once overheard threatening a supplier with throat-constricting consequences if he didn’t get an order of wedding flowers to her pronto, look so down.
“Parker Holt doesn’t want tenants. Or this building. He wants the property, and all the other properties on this block, so he can tear them down and put up something brand-new and fancy. Mine’s the first, or at least the first we know of. Who knows how many other properties he’s gobbling up on the sly? Have you talked with your landlord lately, Jo?”
Jo felt her insides quiver. This conversation had taken a frightening turn. “Max? No, no I haven’t.”
“Well, I’d strongly suggest you do. Now, excuse me, dear. I’ve got some more dismantling to do.”
Frannie reascended her ladder, and Jo numbly left the floral shop, looking dazedly about for signs of other businesses crumbling as she continued on her way to the sandwich shop. How could this be? She thought this neighborhood was solid as a rock, the perfect spot to set up a new business.
“Parker Holt made us a good offer,” Ruthie Conway, co-owner with her husband Bert of the Abbot’s Kitchen, admitted. She reached out one age-spotted hand over the counter to pass Jo her bagged order of turkey and bacon roll-up and tuna salad on wheat. “It’s tempting, you’d better believe it. Bert and me, we’re not getting any younger, you know.”
“So you own your building?” Jo asked.
“Sure do. We bought it over thirty-five years ago, when nobody else wanted it, the condition it was in. But we fixed it up, little by little. It’d be hard to walk away from something we put so much work into. But with Bert’s back acting up more, we maybe should be thinking of retiring. I don’t know. Hate to do it, you know? We’d really miss our customers. They’re like family, most of them.”
Jo nodded. Ruthie had made her feel welcome in the neighborhood from her very first day last September. And their sandwiches, with Bert’s special sauces, were more than worth coming out for on cold January days like today. What would Jo do for lunch if Ruthie and Bert sold out? She winced as the obvious occurred to her. What if she had no business to take a lunch break from?
Jo hurried back to the Craft Corner, clutching her sandwich bag closely to her chest as the cold wind whirled about her. “Carrie,” she cried as she yanked open her shop door, sending the Christmas wreath that still hung there flying out perpendicularly. Time to replace that with something Valentiney, she thought as she rushed past.
“Carrie, who’s Parker Holt and where’s Max McGee’s Florida number?”
Carrie looked up from the diamond-shaped yarn bins she was filling with newly arrived skeins. “I suppose the number’s in your file somewhere. And why do you care about Parker Holt? Did he grab the last turkey-bacon roll-up at Ruthie’s?”
“He might be grabbing more than that.” Jo peeled off her jacket on the way to her office cubicle at the back of the shop. She dropped the sandwich bag on her desk and her jacket on the chair, then pulled open a file drawer, rifling through it for her landlord’s phone number.
“What’s going on?” Carrie asked, unwittingly echoing Jo’s very words to Frannie as she followed Jo to the back, still clutching a skein of heather blue wool.
“That’s what I have to find out.” Jo looked up at her longtime friend and part-time employee, dressed in a loose denim jumper to accommodate, she’d explained that morning with a woeful grin, her added holiday pounds. “Parker Holt bought Frannie’s building out from under her. She’s closing up shop.”
“What!”
“And he’s made an offer that might be too good to refuse to Ruthie and Bert. He’s trying to buy up the block, according to Frannie, to tear it all down.” Jo pulled her hands from the file drawer and looked at her friend. “Carrie, what will I do if I can’t stay here?”
“But you have a lease,” Carrie said, her tone hopeful.
“Only for six months, remember? I thought I was being so clever, not tying myself to the business in case it didn’t work out. But after four months, and a surprisingly good Christmas season, my books are actually starting to show some black. I want to stay, Carrie. And with all the money I’ve sunk into the place, I need to stay.”
“Oh, Jo.” Carrie looked as woebegone as Jo felt. After her husband Mike’s tragic death, Jo had come to Abbotsville mostly because of Carrie, who had suggested that Jo, with her art background, could make a go of an arts and crafts shop in the town where Carrie and her husband, Dan, had settled.
They had both helped scout out this location, and Dan, a home improvement professional, had stretched Jo’s meager funds wonderfully by setting up the shop’s interior—shelves, lighting, and everything else—for her. Carrie, with her vast needlework skills, had even volunteered to run that part of the shop, which Jo was convinced had made all the difference in drawing customers to her fledgling store.
Carrie and Dan, therefore, had good reason to feel as much pride in the Craft Corner’s budding success as she did. And would take the blow of its demise as hard.
“Well, let’s not panic until we have to,” Jo said, trying to sound a little less worried than she was. “Maybe Frannie’s landlord is the only one who’s caved in to Parker Holt. Who is this guy, anyway?”
“He’s a big developer.” Carrie set down her skein of wool on Jo’s desk and pulled up a chair. “You’ve seen Holt Meadows, haven’t you?”
Jo nodded, remembering driving, on one of her early trips down here, through the winding roads of the impressive community just outside of town. She had drooled over the houses, but knew there was no way she could afford one, needing to sink most of Mike’s modest life insurance payment into her business.
“Well,” Carrie said, “Parker is the Holt behind it.”
“Oh. Wow.”
“And he’s behind that new office building that’s going up near the center of town, where the old library used to be.”
“I’ve heard people complaining about that, how it’s changing the character of the town, and all.”
“And . . .” Carrie stopped, looking uneasy.
“What?”
“He’s also Dan’s employer, for the time being, anyway.”
“He’s the well-to-do homeowner that gave Dan the big remodeling job?”
“Uh-huh.”
“And here I was, prepared to hate him. But I know how excited you were when Dan got the job.”
“It’s an important one, for what it could lead to as much as for what it’s paying.”
Jo nodded. Her old school friends Carrie and Dan had made sacrifices to get Dan’s business off the ground, including moving away from family and friends in tiny Glenn’s Crossing to the broader possibilities of Abbotsville. It had been slow going, but Dan had gradually built a reputation for fine, honest work, and in his business, word of mouth was everything.
“Well,” Jo said, “we at least know that Parker Holt has the good sense to hire the best.”
Carrie grinned. “Yes, indeed. At least as far as his own home is concerned. Dan doesn’t have much to say about the work on some of his other projects. ‘Slapdash’ and ‘corner cutting,’ I believe were words he used. But when it comes to his place, Parker Holt pinches no pennies. But he also checks every inch of the work with a magnifying glass, according to Dan. And interrupts him all day long with constant phone calls.”
“A real control freak, huh?”
“Sounds like it.
”
“Oh,” Jo said, glancing down, “duh! Here’s Max’s number. It’s right here on my blotter, circled and everything. Let me call him, and we’ll see just how much control Mr. Parker Holt actually has.”
The shop’s door dinged, and Carrie left to take care of the customer. Jo punched in the Florida number and waited. “Come on, Max. Climb out of that pool and answer your phone,” she grumbled, drumming her fingers on her desk. But when the answering machine kicked in she calmly said, “Max, it’s Jo McAllister,” then hesitated, unsure what else to say. Are you selling my business out from under me? Sending my life once again into a tailspin? Tempting, but she added only, “It’s very important. Please call me back,” and gave her number. She hung up, feeling dissatisfied. Should she have explained her reason for calling? Would it get her a return call sooner? How soon should she try again if she didn’t hear from Max?