Juniper Grove Cozy Mystery Box Set 2

by Karin Kaufman

  Julia snapped off the radio. “Wait a minute. Weren’t you all eating Christmas cookies?”

  Nodding, I eased up on the accelerator. “Ellen Lambert made special ones, just for the Santas, and Bonnie Eskew grabbed them and took them to the door when the Santas arrived.”

  “Ellen would never hurt anyone,” Julia said. “I’ve known her for years.”

  I braked and pulled to the curb. “But then we all went to the kitchen, where there were more cookies on the island. The Santas were snapping them up like they hadn’t eaten in days.”

  Julia seized my hand. “Did you have any?”

  I made a face. “Did I have any cookies? Really?”

  She let go of me. “But you didn’t even get sick, so it couldn’t have been the cookies.”

  “I didn’t try every kind.”

  “Still . . .”

  “Still, handing out randomly poisoned cookies to a crowd of people isn’t an efficient way to murder someone. Anyway, we all had coffee too.” I recalled Micah removing his giant Santa mittens to take a mug from Ellen. “No, that’s not right. I don’t think Micah drank from his mug. But anyway, we’ll know soon enough if it was poison. Underhill collected cookies from every plate and drew samples from all the coffee mugs. There’s nothing to do until the medical examiner releases his findings and the food is tested.”

  I continued west on Main Street, heading for home. Julia, who wasn’t in the mood for murder at Christmas, talked about her tree-decorating plans and the delectable aroma of our cookies on the backseat of my car. We agreed to help each other take in our trees and decided we’d have two mini-decorating parties to make sure both our trees were up and running by Friday.

  I turned onto Finch Hill Road, and as I neared my house, I saw a lone figure sitting on my front porch steps. Wearing a cobalt-colored ski coat. “That’s Sonya,” I said. Her hands were jammed in her pockets and her collar was up around her neck. By the looks of her, she’d been sitting on my steps since leaving the police station. When I parked at the curb outside my house, she rose, and as I walked to my picket gate, I could hear Julia huffing behind me, still angry over Sonya’s deception.

  “Rachel, I have to explain,” Sonya said, meeting me at the gate. Her long blonde hair, as wispy and gleaming as a child’s, rose and fell with the wind. “I didn’t mean to lie to you. I have to tell you something. It’s very important.”

  “Then you can help us with our trees first,” Julia said.

  “Of course!” Sonya said, glancing at my car. “My uncle always said I was strong.”

  As we worked to free the trees from my car rack, a text tone sounded from Sonya’s coat. She jerked as if an alarm had gone off and snatched a phone from her pocket. As she read the message, her hands shook and a look of fear swept across her face.

  “Sonya?” I said.

  “What is it now?” Julia said impatiently.

  “I have to leave,” Sonya said, pocketing her phone. “I shouldn’t have come here. I shouldn’t have told you.”

  Exasperated, I flung my hands in the air. “You haven’t told me anything. How can I help you if you keep running away?”

  “Do you have a car?” Julia said.

  “I need to get away,” Sonya said, panic filling her eyes. “People are awful. Rachel, be careful.” She bolted and scrambled down the sidewalk, her feet slipping in the tramped-down snow.

  “Call the police!” I shouted after her. “Tell Gilroy!”

  CHAPTER 5

  Not trusting Sonya to do the sensible thing, I called Gilroy myself. Having been burned once by the woman, he was a little skeptical, but this time, I told him, she really was frightened. Out-of-her-mind frightened. I knew he would do what he could, which probably wasn’t very much. Sonya was an adult and could go wherever she wanted. Even vanish from Juniper Grove, if she chose.

  Julia and I managed to get our trees down from my car and inside our houses, and we even propped them up in tree stands. After that I carried the extra branches into my house and we took a break in her kitchen, diving into our Holly’s Sweets boxes, sampling the cookies. As though I hadn’t had enough cookies in the past few days.

  I left her house a little later, frustrated that Sonya had implied she’d involved me in something dangerous but wouldn’t tell me what it was. And somewhat childishly annoyed that I couldn’t start decorating my tree and making a wreath. Every time I thought of decorating or relaxing, I saw Micah Schultz’s face and heard his voice. Find out. Please. So maybe Sonya was on the overly dramatic side—Micah had said she was younger than her forty-four years—but as far as I could see, Micah had been a normal, average guy. Just a man rightly concerned about his niece.

  Reluctantly, I headed out to my car. I didn’t know where Sonya was, but if I wanted a shot at finding her, a talk with Ellen Lambert was in order. The afternoon sun was setting behind the mountains as I drove off, turning the sky a soft purple. By the time I left Ellen’s house, it would be dark. This time of year, the Colorado sun set early behind the mountains.

  Ellen was surprised to see me, but she welcomed me enthusiastically at her door and led me to her kitchen, telling me her husband was at work and commanding me to have a few cookies from a platter on the island while she made coffee. I noticed right away that the drapes on the French doors were still closed.

  I decided to skip both the cookies and the small talk. “I saw Sonya a little while ago. She was at my house.”

  Ellen let a weak sigh escape her lips. She scooped coffee, flicked on the coffeemaker, and leaned back against the counter. “I am so sorry I didn’t tell you or Chief Gilroy that Sonya was here.”

  “Where were you?”

  “Upstairs with my husband at first. Sonya came running up, begging us to hide her. My husband said no, but she had me convinced that something terrible would happen to her if we didn’t. She trusted you at first, and then she got it into her head that she shouldn’t. Then I realized one of us had to make an appearance downstairs or Chief Gilroy would get suspicious.” Ellen’s shoulders rose in a shrug. “Turns out he got suspicious anyway.”

  “If Sonya was so scared, why did she go to Holly’s Sweets after we all left? Holly Kavanagh recognized her.”

  “Because she acts impulsively, and she thinks she’s safe if she goes someplace on the spur of the moment. If people know where she is, she’s in danger.”

  “Is that why she’s not here now?”

  “Probably, but she could come back for all I know. The one place I think she won’t go is her apartment.”

  I was growing irritable, tired of the off-and-on cloak-and-dagger stuff. Sonya wanted my help, then didn’t want it. She was afraid for her life, but she felt comfortable enough to make a bakery stop in the middle of town. “Do you think Sonya is really in danger?”

  Ellen pondered the question before answering. “I do now. When she asked me if she could hide upstairs, I thought, oh boy, here we go again. She may be acting incoherently and foolishly, but I think her fear is real, and someone or something real caused it. Anyway, Micah was convinced her life was in danger, and his judgment was sound.” She poured coffee into two mugs and headed into the dining room, where we took our seats at opposite ends of a couch.

  I slipped out of my coat and blew across my steaming coffee before I took a sip. Only then did it cross my mind that my coffee might be laced with poison. But surely Ellen wouldn’t act so brazenly?

  “I’ve been trying to work out who might be threatening her,” Ellen said.

  “Any conclusions?” I asked.

  “Until these threats started, Sonya never had a bad thing to say about anyone, and vice versa.”

  “Why didn’t Sonya report the threatening phone calls when she first started getting them?”

  “That’s Sonya. If it’s out of sight, it didn’t actually happen. She and her boss decided the matter was best left alone.”

  “They did?” I hadn’t heard that before. Anyone running a business would contact the po
lice about anonymous calls—pronto. “I knew she’d had phone calls at work, but why would her boss not report them to the police?”

  “Those threats are phony, Rachel. But if word spreads around town that someone is making those kind of phone calls, they’re bad for the charity. When you’re asking people for money, it’s vital you have a clean reputation.”

  “Micah said the caller told Sonya’s boss she’d done things she hadn’t. Do you know what he meant by that?”

  “No idea.”

  We drank our coffee and gazed at the snow through Ellen’s large picture window. I was hoping the caffeine would help clear my mental fog about Sonya’s troubles. I was sure she wouldn’t be returning to her apartment, and I doubted she’d be staying at Micah’s home after what had happened to him. Truthfully, I hoped she would make her way back to the Lamberts’ house, even though I suspected Mr. Lambert didn’t want her as a house guest.

  “Sorry,” I said, pulling my vibrating phone from my jeans pocket. “My friend Holly,” I mumbled, reading the text she’d sent. It seemed that the ever-gabby Officer Underhill had stopped in for a late donut and let slip that Micah Schultz had been poisoned. Gilroy had asked the medical examiner to put a rush on various tests. “Cookies or coffee?” I texted back.

  “Cookies,” came the reply. “No poison residue in any mug.”

  I willed myself to look calm as I slid my phone back in my jeans. Somewhere between Ellen Lambert’s porch and kitchen, someone had given Micah, and just Micah, a poisoned cookie. And who would have been in a better position to do that than the woman I was now chatting amiably with, on the couch?

  “Anything wrong?” she asked.

  “No, I was just thinking about Sonya.” I set my cup on the coffee table, reached for my coat, and got to my feet. “And I’ve got errands to run. Thanks for the coffee.”

  “Do you think Sonya will come back here?”

  “I don’t know,” I said honestly. I moved for the door, Ellen at my heels.

  “I haven’t seen her since we were at the police station,” she said.

  “What about her job? I heard she works at a charity.”

  “Downtown. Micah got her a temp job at the Juniper Charities office.”

  Just to be safe, I opened the door. It wasn’t just Ellen who was worrying me, it was also her husband. Was he really at work? Or was he upstairs? “A temp job? Not to be nosy, but it doesn’t sound like she makes much money.”

  “She doesn’t, but Micah was always there for her.”

  “You mean financially?”

  “He was well off.”

  “But why . . . ?” I hesitated. Sonya was forty-four years old. Why was she working a temporary job and depending on her uncle for money? Was there a polite way to ask? Luckily, Ellen understood what I was asking before I could finish my question.

  “You want to know why Sonya isn’t taking care of herself.”

  “Micah said she was younger than her years.”

  “She’s challenged, Rachel. She does very well by herself—living alone, I mean. But certain things, like long work hours at a well-paying job, are beyond her.”

  I should have known. There had been hints from the very beginning. “Why didn’t anyone tell me?”

  “When was I supposed to tell you?” Ellen said, a twinkle in her eye. “When I introduced her?”

  “No, of course not. I’m sorry. It’s just that this puts a new light on everything, and now I’m really worried about her.”

  “She’s not helpless, Rachel. You’ve seen that. She can be pretty resourceful. Actually, she’s the one who threw Micah’s Santa hat on the porch and left the door open. She told me you and Chief Gilroy would think she’d run away.”

  That was clever, I had to admit, and it might have made me feel better about her wandering Juniper Grove except for one thing: I was now convinced her life was in immediate danger. I walked out on the porch and looked back at Ellen. “She doesn’t have a car?”

  “No, she walks everywhere, but she enjoys it.”

  “Can you give me her phone number?”

  “Let me punch it in.” Ellen held out her hand and I gave her my cell phone.

  “Besides her apartment, where would she go? Her job?”

  “It’s possible. She might think it’s a way to get out of the cold.”

  “Do you know who her boss is?”

  “Oliver Morris.”

  I was dumbfounded. “One of the Four Santas?”

  “Yes, you met him this morning.” She handed me back my phone. “The Four Santas raise money for charity, and since Oliver is retired, he donates his time.”

  After Ellen gave me the address of Juniper Charities, I hopped into my Forester, drove downtown, and quickly found the small brick office building on Orchard Street. The building’s front door was hung with a wreath I was pretty sure my new wreath-making friends had put together—spruce on the bottom of each bundle, pine in the middle, cedar on top, all of it finished with a red ribbon. A signboard in the minuscule lobby sent me to office 7A. At the end of the hall, as it turned out.

  I knocked on the office’s open door. A gray-haired woman, who was busy trying to loosen the lid on her Thermos, looked up from her desk and smiled as I entered. “What can I help you with?”

  “I’m looking for Sonya Quinn. I understand she works here.”

  A shadow passed over the woman’s expression. “Sonya hasn’t been in for two days. I’ve tried calling her, but she doesn’t answer. Thank goodness Oliver said he saw her this morning.” She grimaced. “Poor Micah. We’re going to miss him. Have you heard?”

  “I have. I’m so sorry.”

  “He was Sonya’s knight in shining armor. Her protector.” She resumed her struggle with the Thermos.

  “Can I?” I asked, holding out my hands.

  “Thank you. Younger fingers are better.”

  “I don’t know about that. Lately I’ve seen some older women doing some amazing things with their fingers.” I tossed my head in the direction of the front door. “Like that wreath on your building.”

  “Isn’t it lovely? But Amber de Witte made that, and she’s in her thirties.” She winked at me and stood, her spindly legs carrying her three steps closer to an open door to her right. “Oliver? Can you come out here?” She shuffled back to her desk, and I placed the now-open Thermos in front of her.

  Oliver, hardly recognizable without his Santa beard, strolled out the open door. Except for his Santa-white hair and the Santa-like paunch perched above his belt, he wasn’t a Santa at all. He had a sharp nose and gray, manicured eyebrows, and when he gave my hand a hearty shake, I noticed how small and smooth his own hands were. Like the hands of a man who had worked an office job the whole of his life.

  “Rachel Stowe, what a surprise,” he said.

  “I’m sorry to bother you, but I’m looking for Sonya Quinn.”

  His perfectly shaped brows rose. “The last I saw her she was at Ellen’s house.”

  “Do you know anything about the threats she’s been getting?” Of course he knew—he had told Sonya to keep quiet about them—but I didn’t want to set off alarm bells, so I broached the subject as delicately as possible. It was a risk to ask him, especially in front of his Thermos-fighting receptionist, but I needed to make headway in this baffling case, and so far, I’d gone nowhere.

  To my surprise, he didn’t balk. “She told me about them. They started about a week ago, I think. I got a few myself, on my private line in my office.”

  “Oh, yes,” the receptionist said.

  “Good news is there haven’t been any today,” Oliver said, smiling weakly.

  “Can I ask you what the caller said? It’s important.”

  “The calls I got? They were electronic. Man or woman, I don’t know, but they were always something generic like ‘You’re going to get it now.’ And before you ask, I don’t know what that might mean. The first day, I thought kids were pulling a prank, but then Sonya told me she’d gotten some
calls at home.”

  “Do you believe her?”

  “Yes, yes,” Oliver said firmly.

  “Sonya doesn’t lie,” the receptionist added.

  “Did you ask her not to report the calls to the police?”

  Oliver puffed out his cheeks. “Never. I would never tell her something so stupid.”

  “Then why do some people think you did?” Hoping that Ellen’s interpretation of Oliver’s order to keep quiet was most likely an honest misunderstanding, I didn’t mention her name.

  “No, no, no,” Oliver said with a shake of his head. “I asked Sonya not to talk about the calls while she was working in the office, that’s all. We had people walking in off the street, trying to write us checks for our Christmas drive, and Sonya would start telling them about robots making threats. She scared some of them off.”

  “But you kept her on?”

  Offended, Oliver pulled in his chin. “I’d never fire that girl. Her problems are not her fault, and she’s kindness itself. And even if she wasn’t . . .” Tears glistened in his eyes, and he took a shuddering breath. “Micah was a good friend. From a long way back. And Sonya was his only family in Colorado.”

  Oliver excused himself, went back to his office, and closed the door behind him.

  “Is Sonya all right?” the receptionist asked.

  I recalled the fear in Sonya’s face when she read the text message outside my house. How she had dashed down the sidewalk, nearly falling in her rush to get away. How she had warned me to be careful. “Would you call me if you see her?” I said. I jotted my number on her desk calendar and wished her a merry Christmas.

  Back in my car, I dialed Sonya’s number. There was no answer.

  CHAPTER 6

  Every shop on Main Street was lit with Christmas lights, and there were wreaths—tied in glittering silver, gold, and red bows—in almost every shop window. Gilroy and I walked in silence, sipping hot cocoa from Grove Coffee, now and then wishing a merry Christmas to people passing by—some of them complete strangers to me. And possibly to Gilroy. But this was Juniper Grove, where people still waved at each other across the street when they stepped outside to pick up their morning papers and nodded at one another as they passed on the sidewalk.