Ben and Justin resumed tossing their football a little distance from the patio, and Mike tinkered with his grill. Left alone for the moment, Callie asked Lyssa, “So, what else did you find out?”
Lyssa, who had leaned back into a lounge chair, sat forward. “I asked Paula about that hidden door. She said it only leads to Ashby’s office.”
Callie was aware of some disappointment, though not sure what she’d expected. “Does it connect directly to it?”
“I don’t know. She wouldn’t let me see. Said as the person in charge for the time being, she wasn’t going to allow guests into private areas. She did say the police had been all over the place, and that should be enough.”
“Did they know about the door?”
“Paula says yes, but I’d still like to get a look at it myself, on the other side. For one thing, George said he thinks he heard noises coming from behind his wall when Ashby was still around.”
“George’s room is on the second floor?”
“Right. All the guest rooms are. His is two rooms down and across from mine.”
“It’s an old house. I’ve lived in a few older places that had squirrels in the attic. Could it have been that?”
“I asked that, too. He said the noises didn’t seem to be overhead but more like on the other side of the wall,” Lyssa said.
“Had you heard anything?”
“Nope.” Lyssa grinned. “But I don’t hear a lot. When I’m writing, I wear earplugs so I can concentrate. And once I’m in bed, I’m out like a light. It’d take a pretty loud fire alarm to wake me up.”
Callie wasn’t sure what to make of George’s noises, but she thought of something else. “You said George described Jane well enough that you recognized her?”
“Yes! Remember that gorgeous cardigan she had on this morning? All those colors swirling around? I remember thinking how cheery it was but way out of sync from her mood. But if it was all she’d packed, she could have been wearing it on Tuesday, too. George described that sweater, along with basics like hair color and such. It was her.”
“Did you ask Paula if she’d seen her?”
“I did, and she hadn’t. Tuesday was her afternoon off.”
Callie told Lyssa about her talks with Karl Eggers, Howard Graham, and the Moores. By the time they’d hashed it over, Mike was calling out that the fish was ready, and Brian and Annie were carrying out bowls of stir-fry and potato salad. Callie and Lyssa jumped up to help bring out plates and silverware, and soon everyone was digging into the food that had been laid out buffet-style.
They all pulled chairs around the fire pit to eat, and after a few bites Annie asked Lyssa about her books. “I’m afraid I haven’t read any,” she admitted. “Will they all be available at the big event?”
Lyssa laughed. “Let’s hope it’s big,” she said. “Yes, the bookstore people promised to bring copies of everything of mine still in print. God bless them. It’s a lot to handle.”
“Copies of how many books?” Mike asked after taking a swig of his beer.
Lyssa paused to think. “Nineteen. I think.”
“Nineteen!” Justin shouted. “You wrote nineteen? Who-ee! I haven’t even read that many.”
“Of course you have,” Annie said. “If you count all the Dr. Suesses. And look how many Harry Potters you’ve read.”
“Oh, yeah. And those were big!”
“I love Harry Potter,” Lyssa said. “Which one’s your favorite?”
Justin frowned, considering, and finally came up with The Chamber of Secrets.
“I liked that too,” his younger brother chimed in.
“You never read it,” Justin said accusingly. “You only saw the movie!”
Annie calmed the argument that ensued and turned back to Lyssa.
“With nineteen books under your belt, you must have started early. Or did you work at something else first? I’ve heard of authors wanting to get life experience.” Annie made air quotes on those last words.
Callie glanced at Lyssa, interested in her answer. Did one start making a living as an author immediately, or was it like it was with actors, who paid their bills by waiting tables until the breaks came? She’d heard of overnight successes in publishing, but there seemed to be more stories of long struggles. What was Lyssa’s story?
Surprisingly, Lyssa, who hadn’t struck Callie as one to hold back, appeared unwilling to share much about her beginnings. “Oh, I’ve always had stories running around in my head,” she said. “And I type fast,” she added, laughing. When she saw several pairs of eyes locked on her as the adults waited for more, she flapped a hand. “Trust me, it’s never as exciting as people imagine. What I’d like to hear, and haven’t yet, is what you two do,” she said, waving her fork between Annie and Mike.
Annie laughed. “I take care of these guys, mostly. And I help Brian at the café once in a while.”
Lyssa looking genuinely interested. “And grow your garden,” she added, which brought a smile from Annie. Lyssa then turned expectantly to Mike.
“Construction inspector,” he said. “Keeps me traveling around a bit, but it gives me a day off now and then, for fishing!” He grinned.
Lyssa asked a few questions about his work, which Mike was happy to answer, including that the job used his engineering experience and degree, something Callie hadn’t fully understood and was interested to know. Lyssa, she saw, was quite good at getting people talking. Good, too, at holding on to her own privacy. Maybe that came from years of giving publicity interviews?
The conversation moved on, and Callie scraped up the last of her meal and sipped her craft beer, feeling nicely relaxed. When the boys had run off again and it was just the adults left around the fire pit, Annie asked after Dorothy.
“I’ve heard she’s not doing well,” she said, explaining that a friend of hers had relayed this after stopping in at Stitches Thru Time.
“We saw her this morning,” Callie said. “She was upset and worn out but hanging in there.”
“Well, Rose must have stopped by after that. She said Dorothy’s cousin was handling the shop because Dorothy had taken to her bed.”
Callie and Lyssa exchanged glances. “Sorry to hear that,” Lyssa said. “We’ll check on her tomorrow.”
“I can do that,” Brian said. “I was going to take a dish over in the morning. The Keepsake Café meatloaf and sides combo she’s always liked.”
“I’d like to talk to Jane, actually,” Callie said. “How about I deliver it? I’ll make sure they know it’s from you,” she added with a grin. “Not that anyone would mistake my cooking from yours.”
Brian began to protest the cooking part, but Annie cut him off. “Brian garnered most of the culinary genes in the family, that’s for sure. Why you didn’t go to that Culinary Institute instead of studying something that ended up putting you at the Airport Authority, I’ll never know.”
Callie remembered Annie’s explanation of how Brian had ended up in Keepsake Cove as a café owner. It seemed he’d suppressed his true calling until the café opportunity in Keepsake Cove arose just as dislike for his government job reached its peak. Lucky for the Cove.
“If I’d gone to the Culinary Institute,” Brian said, “I might be stuck in some five star restaurant in New York instead of here, where I make one third as much money while working longer hours.”
“Yeah,” Annie said. “You’re right. Good call.” She said it jokingly, but Callie knew that deep down, Annie was happy her brother was nearby and close to her family. Callie was finding it very pleasant as well, though she’d vowed to take things slowly between them. After her serious misjudgment of Hank, even given her immaturity at the time, she didn’t fully trust herself to commit to another relationship. Not just yet.
Since it was a school night, it wasn’t long after the food was cleared that Annie sent her boys indoors
to get ready for bed. That reminded the rest of the group that the next day was a work day. Still, they lingered a bit longer to watch the fire die down, conversation fading comfortably along with it, until Lyssa made the first move.
“It’s been great, but I’d better get on back,” she said.
Thanks were made all around as chairs were moved back into place. As they returned to their cars, Lyssa stopped at Brian’s antique Impala and peered in.
“My dad had one of these,” she said. “I never got to drive it. But I always wanted to.”
Callie looked over at Brian, guessing what Lyssa was leading up to but also aware of what the car that Brian had spent many hours restoring meant to him. Could he bear to put it in someone else’s hands for a few miles?”
“If you wouldn’t mind driving mine back to Keepsake Cove,” Lyssa continued, “I’d be so delighted to take yours there. What do you say?”
To Callie’s amusement, Brian didn’t hesitate. “Drive yours? Sure!” He dug out his keys and tossed them to her. “No problem.”
Lyssa passed him her keys with a small smile. “You go first. Meet you in front of House of Melody.”
Callie had planned to update Brian on what Lyssa had shared with her but saw that anything she said from then on would be so much wasted breath. She took her place beside him in the amazing Corvette, buckled up, and enjoyed the motor-purring, super-cushioned ride. There’d be time for murder later.
Ten
That night, before turning out her light and as she waited for Jagger to settle down at his end of the bed, Callie did some browsing on her phone. Lyssa’s non-answer about the beginnings of her writing career had made her curious.
She typed Lyssa Hammond in the search box and groaned as several pages of results appeared. She sifted through them to find Lyssa’s website. There, Callie found plenty of information about Lyssa’s books, but very little about the author herself. The About Me page was minimal, basically saying she had grown up and currently lived in the Washington, DC, area, which Callie knew covered at least two states as well as the District. It also said she’d traveled extensively, her favorite explorations being old castles in Europe. Lyssa loved meeting her fans and invited them to come see her at various appearances, which were listed on the Events page. Callie went to that page and saw the upcoming Keepsake Cove event, Meet Lyssa Hammond, featured prominently, along with directions for getting there.
She left that website and browsed some more, but found very little of a personal nature on Lyssa. Everything online concerned her books and what various critics said about them. Callie gave up and closed her phone. Either Lyssa hadn’t drawn enough attention from the media to have her personal life looked into and picked apart, or they’d looked into it and decided it was too boring to report on. Lyssa’s claim that it wouldn’t be as exciting as anyone imagined was probably all there was to it. Callie reached over to her lamp and turned it off.
In the shop the next day, Callie glanced at the clock often, looking forward to Tabitha’s arrival so that she could head over to Stitches Thru Time. With few customers to distract her, the time passed slowly, and by the time her assistant walked in, she had dusted and polished every music box in the shop to a gleam.
“Thank goodness,” Callie said, dropping her dust cloth behind the counter. “If you’d been late, my arm might have fallen off.” She studied Tabitha’s outfit of the day. With its fringed shirt and bell-bottomed pants, it was similar to the ’60s clothing Tabitha had been wearing when Callie first met and hired her. But the strings of beads woven through her chestnut hair took things to a new level, one that Callie couldn’t quite nail.
“Give me a hint,” she said.
Tabitha began to sing. When the lyrics reached “the age of Aquarius,” Callie got it.
“Somebody from Hair ?”
“Right! Sheila. I heard they’re putting the show on at the high school this year, and that inspired me.”
“The high school! I’m guessing with a few adjustments?”
“Adjustments? Why?” Tabitha put on a blank face before breaking into a laugh. “We’ll find out.” She glanced around. “Why the burst of cleaning? I thought everything was in pretty good shape when I left yesterday.”
“It was. I just couldn’t sit still. I’m going to run over to Stitches Thru Time, for a couple of reasons.” She caught Tabitha up quickly on what Lyssa had learned, then reached for her jacket. “I should be back in a few minutes.”
As she pulled the door closed behind her, she could hear Tabitha singing another tune from Hair. Her assistant had an enviable knack for compartmentalizing and could apparently put worrisome thoughts aside easily, until needed. Callie wished she could do the same. But then, her music boxes might not be quite as shiny.
She crossed over to the Keepsake Café to pick up Brian’s dish for Dorothy. As she walked in, she saw the place was filled with the lunchtime crowd. Though space at the café was limited, Brian had managed to squeeze in enough square laminate-and-chrome-topped tables to minimize wait times, though chairs might bump if patrons didn’t slide in or out carefully. Brian had just delivered two sandwich platters to a table when he saw her.
“It’s ready in the back,” he said. “I’ll just slide it into a bag.”
As she waited at the counter, Callie picked up bits of conversations from the tables—mostly occupied by shoppers, some of whom she recognized as having been to House of Melody. Her ears perked up when she heard Stitches Thru Time mentioned.
“It was her husband!” a sharp-faced woman wearing a jack-o’-lantern-embroidered sweater said to her companion, whose eyes widened in excitement. “Probably did it for money, or, who knows, maybe he was two-timing her! I don’t see her there anymore. She’s probably been arrested, though they’re not saying anything yet.”
Callie half-slid off her stool, wanting badly to correct that statement, but stopped when she felt a hand close over hers. Brian shook his head as she turned. “It doesn’t help,” he said quietly. “I’ve tried.” He held the bagged meal out to her. “There’s directions inside on how to heat it. Let me know how she’s doing, okay?”
Callie nodded and squeezed his hand in thanks—both for the dinner and for stopping her from wasting her breath. She left, feeling angry with people who jumped to hurtful conclusions. How many customers had Dorothy lost because of it? What was it doing to her health? The truth had to be discovered, and soon, before damage to the poor woman became irreversible.
Callie had come within half a block of Stitches Thru Time when she saw a man exiting the shop. Her first thought was Good, Dorothy’s had a customer. Her second was That’s George Cole!
He was dressed differently than when Lyssa had first introduced him at the Foxwood Inn. Instead of a suit, he now wore a casual windbreaker over khakis. But his glance in Callie’s direction as he checked traffic gave her a good look at his face. He crossed the street before she could catch his eye, and, walking rapidly, soon distanced himself. Had he bought something? Callie didn’t think she’d seen a package.
She soon entered the sewing shop herself, spotting Jane standing with her back to her. Jane took a moment before turning, and when she did it was with a flushed face, though she smiled when she recognized Callie.
“Are you okay?” Callie asked.
Jane waved a hand in front of her face with some embarrassment as she nodded. “There was a gentleman just in who said some very nice things. About Dorothy, I mean, and how he hoped things would straighten out for her soon. It just caught me by surprise. It was so nice of him.”
“I saw who you mean. George Cole has been staying at the Foxwood Inn.” Callie paused. “In fact, he mentioned that he’d seen you there on the afternoon before Clifford Ashby was murdered.”
Jane was quiet for a moment before saying, “Yes, I was there. I went as a favor to Dorothy. She needed some papers she’d left behind. She�
��d called Clifford and asked for them many times, but he was ignoring her. Dorothy disliked going to see him, face-to-face, so I offered to do it.”
“I see. Were you successful?”
Jane sighed. “Clifford made it as uncomfortable as he could, I suppose because he enjoyed it. But eventually he got the papers for me.” She paused. “I did tell this to the police.”
Callie was glad to hear that, as well as the simple explanation for Jane’s being at the inn. “How is Dorothy?” she asked. “I heard she might be unwell.”
Jane shook her head. “It’s the stress. Her arthritic psoriasis has flared up because of it. I told her to rest and I’d look after the shop. The only thing that will help,” she added, her voice rising in anger, “is to have this horrible mess over and done with. I blame it all on her miserable excuse for a husband! If he’d been a halfway decent person to begin with, none of this would have happened.”
Callie felt she had a point, though Ashby obviously didn’t choose to be murdered in order to aggravate his wife. There were plenty of things to think about when picking a life partner, Callie knew. If only people actually thought of them.
“What was he like when they first met?” she asked. “How did they meet?”
“They were both working in the Maryland court system, in Annapolis. He seemed fine, then. Very personable. No one would have guessed … ” Jane flushed again. “Sorry. I just feel so bad for Dorothy. That things turned out so terribly for her.”
“I understand. Dorothy said you two were like sisters growing up. And still are, obviously, since you’re so willing to help when she needs it.” Callie looked down at the bag she held. “Oh, I almost forgot! This is from Brian Greer. It’s one of Dorothy’s favorites from his café menu. It feels heavy enough to be more than a couple of meals for you two.”
“How very kind!” Jane said, taking it. “Let me run this back to the cottage and put it in the refrigerator. Would you mind staying for just a minute?”
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