Murder, Money, and Moving On

by Stacey Alabaster

  I was so excited to see him that I didn’t even notice that my sling had come off. I raced up to him and got down on my knees as he ran to me. I threw my arms around him for a big hug.

  “Oh, I knew you would come back to me…” He must have done just as I’d thought he would—waited for his chance to escape Alice’s clutches and then ran all the way down the hill to Pottsville.

  He was sitting down. He didn’t seem very puffed. In fact, he seemed very calm and well-rested for a dog who had just ran fifty miles.

  Someone with long, ever-so-slightly frizzy auburn hair was walking toward me. “Hello, George,” Alice said brightly.

  I stood up. “It’s Georgina.” George was only for close friends. Even though I far preferred it and usually told everyone to call me by that, I didn’t want Alice thinking we were anything close to friends.

  “Sorry, Georgina.”

  “What are you doing here, Alice?”

  “Adam…uh…” She looked uncomfortable as it dawned on her that I had genuinely no idea why she was there. “He called me up and asked if I would bring Jasper into town for the big day.” She was dressed in a black dress that I thought was a little inappropriate for a wedding, where most of the people were wearing pastel shades and a lot of florals. I was wearing all white.

  I felt my whole body tense up. Adam had mentioned nothing about this to me.

  “Did you not know that Jasper and I would be here?” Alice asked, looking awkward.

  “Of course I did.” I smiled confidently. “I just temporarily forgot. The head injury, you see.” Better to lie than to let Adam get the best of me.

  Adam was walking amongst the guests, shaking their hands and accepting their offers of congratulations. When he got to me, I wasn’t quite sure what to do. A handshake didn’t seem quite right. When Adam went for the shake, I reached over and hugged him and we ended with a weird kiss on the cheeks.

  He cleared his throat and quickly turned his attention to Alice and Jasper. “So glad you could make it here today, boy.”

  “I’m sorry,” Alice said. “We can’t stay for the reception, I’m afraid. I want to get back to the farm before it gets dark. Congratulations again. It was a lovely ceremony.”

  Adam shook her hand and said he understood. But I didn’t. I wasn’t ready for Jasper to leave again. Alice was already heading toward her car. She called out for Jasper to come with her.

  Jasper tried to leap up onto my chest, like he was telling me he wanted to stay with me.

  “Oh, Jasper,” I said, my heart catching in my throat. “I am so sorry, boy. I can’t take you—” For a split-second, thoughts of kidnapping—well, dognapping—did run through my head. What did I have to lose? I could just grab him now and make a run for it.

  But Alice already had his leash clipped to his collar and was dragging him back toward her blue car.

  He watched me out of the back window, his face looking so sad as they drove away.

  11

  If it wasn’t enough that I was at the wedding of my ex-husband, my mood had soured even further. I took a flute of champagne and quickly drank it, using my right arm. I’d completely forgotten I’d arrived at the wedding with a sling.

  “We can leave if you want,” Ryan said, seeing how upset I was, then added, “Hang on, don’t you have to give a speech?”

  “I’m not well enough to do that,” I mumbled, placing the empty flute back on a tray. “And leaving does sound like a good idea. Let’s do it.” We’d traveled down the road to the local winery for the reception, and as objectively lovely as it was, nothing could put me in a good mood.

  But all of a sudden, I wasn’t so sure I wanted to leave. “Hang on,” I said, making an excuse to leave Ryan alone for a moment. I had just spotted a familiar face with rusty red hair walk in through the door. Huh. I didn’t even know that Les and Adam knew each other.

  “Fancy seeing you here,” I said, approaching Les as he stuffed a mini-quiche into his mouth. His eyes bulged out of his head and he almost choked on the pastry. “Not so pleased to see me then, are you?”

  He managed to swallow without choking, but there was a fair bit of coughing and thumping of the chest as he recovered.

  “I should have gotten a restraining order against you. After that night I caught you sneaking around the side of my house.”

  But you didn’t, was all I could think. Besides, I had more right than he did to be at the wedding. He was the one who would have to leave.

  I smiled at him and grabbed a glass of champagne as one of the waiters passed me with a tray. “Relax, Les, we are all just here to have a good time, right?” I raised my glass to him while he took another quiche from a different passing tray. Brave man.

  He popped the quiche into his mouth. “Yeah. Sure. Whatever you say.” He mumbled an excuse to leave and mingle with the rest of the guests.

  “I thought you wanted to leave?” Ryan asked me.

  “I’m feeling a lot better now.”

  I may not have been in the most celebratory mood, but with Les at the reception, it was the perfect chance to follow him without fear of being caught spying. After all, we were both invited guests, weren’t we? It turned out that Les was such a regular at the grocery store where Adam worked that they had become friends over the past year. Small town, small world.

  Somehow, I’d wound up right next to Adam and there was no one else around to interrupt. “Congratulations again,” I said and Adam smiled, but it was like it was a forced smile, for the benefit of the watching crowd and not for me. Uh oh. What had I done this time?

  He grabbed my left arm and pulled me away from the crowd. Now his happy mask had slipped and he just looked plain angry.

  “I cannot believe you, George,” he said. “I cannot believe you did this.”

  I didn’t know for certain what he was talking about, but I assumed that he was referring to me bringing Ryan along as my date. Which I thought he had no right to be mad about.

  “Wow, hang on,” I said. “Isn’t it me who should be angry with you? Inviting Jasper here without even telling me?”

  “I saw you,” Adam said. “When Jasper was here.”

  “What are you talking about…” I stopped and looked down, realizing my sling was gone.

  “Your arm is fine, isn’t it? And I assume your head is much the same?”

  I just stood there. I wasn’t sure how much of the truth to come clean about. In the end, I just hung my head and hoped he would forgive me if I told him the full truth. “The doctor gave me the all clear when I went in to see him the other day, okay? I lied to you about what he said. I’m sorry, Adam.”

  He didn’t say anything and I was still standing there staring at his shoes.

  “Why didn’t you tell me the truth?”

  I finally looked up. “It was just too hard, okay? To give the speech…to get up there and talk about how well I know you and all our history…” I stared into my champagne flute. “Especially after what happened the other night at my place. In the kitchen.”

  “I understand.”

  The music started and the MC asked for Adam and Fiona to take the first dance. Thank goodness. I was rescued. Ryan came and took my hand, and we danced together once it was time for all the guests to join in. “There’s still time to give the speech,” he pointed out.

  But I shook my head. I just couldn’t do it.

  Shoot. Les looked like he was planning to leave. He was at the corner of the buffet table, right next to the exit, taking a few for the road.

  “Hey!” I called out as I approached him.

  Les was startled. “It’s not against the law to take a few snacks from a wedding buffet,” he said. “What are you going to do, tell that cop boyfriend of yours?”

  That wasn’t what I cared about. I had a hunch about something, and I needed to see if I was right. I mustered all my confidence so that he couldn’t tell it was a bluff. It was now or never, in case he really did get that restraining order against me. “
Les,” I said. “I need to know what you were doing on the night that Lleyton was killed. I know that you were up there on that roof.”

  I’d expected him to turn red, to splutter, to deny it. But he was cool and calm. “Why don’t you ask your good friend about that…” he muttered before stuffing more mini quiches into his pockets and shuffling off toward the door.

  Thinking he was talking about Ryan again, I chased after him.

  “What does Ryan know about any of this?” I asked, thinking that Ryan knew something about the case that he hadn’t shared with me.

  Les shook his head and turned back one last time. “Not the cop,” he muttered. “Your friend. That one you run the store with. Brenda.”

  “What are you talking about, Les?”

  “She was the one who was up on the roof that night.”

  I was stunned. Surely he was lying.

  Then I remembered. The ringtone. I’d called Brenda’s phone that night, and heard her ring tone. I’d thought she’d just left her phone in the shop.

  But she’d been up on the roof.

  Ryan was trying to lighten the air by talking about a football game he’d watched on TV. When that didn’t get my attention, I have no idea why he thought it would, he turned on the TV and asked if I felt like watching a cheesy reality show. The house still seemed so very quiet. I opened a can of food for Casper and placed it on a plate for her by the door. She ate it in dainty mouthfuls. I smiled at her and laughed a little, then remembered the way that Jasper inhaled his meal in one big bite. The sadness punched me in the stomach. I tried not to think about his face as he had been driven away.

  Ryan sighed and turned off the TV.

  “I guess it has just been a long day,” I said. “I’m sorry. I’m just not going to be the best company tonight.”

  Ryan nodded. “A lot of memories from the past must have been dredged up.”

  I laughed a little. “You can say that again.” Not that Fiona and Adam’s wedding had been anything like Adam’s wedding with me. We’d been married at a courthouse, and I’d worn jeans and a t-shirt. We hadn’t cared about anything at the time, though. We’d been young and dumb and in love.

  Ryan was thoughtful. “Do you think you’d ever want to get married again?”

  The laugh escaped my lips before I could stop it. “For a fifth time? Nah. I am done with all of that.”

  I caught the look on Ryan’s face and realized that I had said the wrong thing. He didn’t find it such a hilarious prospect “I only meant that… Well, who knows what can happen in the future, right?” I tried to shrug it off.

  Ryan was young, only just about to turn twenty-nine. He had never been married. Nor had kids. Or settled down at all really. All of that was still ahead of him. If he wanted it, that was.

  I leaned forward and poured us each a glass of red.

  “What about children?” he asked.

  Oh gosh. I took an extra-long time to drink my wine, trying to think of an appropriate answer. Oh, would you look at that? The whole glass was empty

  “I think I am a little too old for all that now,” I said, finally. “I am Brenda’s age, remember.”

  I had Brenda on the mind. What had she been doing up on the roof that night? Part of me was looking forward to Ryan leaving so I could finally investigate the case more. But only part of me.

  I glanced over at Ryan, who was sitting there, looking so trusting. It wasn’t right to hold this information from him. But I just had a feeling that this was something I needed to keep to myself for the time being. At least until I figured out what it all meant.

  “I guess I knew we would have to have this discussion sooner or later,” I said, referring to the talk about children. About our relationship. About what it was we were actually doing. “Ryan, this has been fun. But you are young…”

  “I’m not that young,” he interrupted.

  “Fine. But younger than me. By quite a bit. And there are things you want to do with your life that I’ve already done. Or decided not to do…”

  “Are you saying that this is over, George?” He hadn’t even touched his wine. He was looking up at me with the same sad puppy dog eyes that Jasper had thrown at me a few hours earlier.

  I took a deep breath. “I’m just saying… We need to stay reasonable about this. Not make promises that we can’t keep.”

  Ryan reached for my hand and promised me that he would make no such promises.

  “That sounds like a promise,” I pointed out.

  He stood up, ready to leave. “I can tell that there is something on your mind, distracting you today. I should leave, let you process it on your own for a while.”

  I knew that he thought that this ‘thing’ on my mind was Adam. But it was something else entirely. Just something I couldn’t talk to him about. Not yet.

  I waited until he was away to pull out the information I had gotten from an old friend. I had a spy, of sorts, who lived on the coast, in the town of Sandy Point. She had spotted someone near her house recently. Someone that looked like someone I knew. Someone that had recently started wearing fur coats.

  I looked down at the address in my hands.

  It was time for a road trip.

  And I was going to need my best friend along with me.

  12

  This time, I didn’t bother parking the rental car around the corner. I wasn’t trying to hide anything. “Jasper!” I called out as soon as Alice pulled the door open. He came running right up to me, almost barreling me over as he leapt up and put his paws on my chest.

  “Georgina…” Alice looked shocked to see me, while I explained what I was doing there. That I was already halfway to my destination and that it would be so disappointing if she said no, considering how much Jasper loved the beach, and how much I needed his help.

  “I—I’m not sure it is such a good idea to unsettle him like this,” Alice said nervously.

  “Please,” I said, still petting an excited Jasper. “I am not going to dognap him. The thought has crossed my mind, true, I will admit that…but I honestly only want Jasper to be happy. And I can see that he is happy here with you.”

  “He really is,” Alice said firmly.

  “I just need him for this trip. One last time, to help me with the case.”

  Alice nodded. “Okay,” she said. “Of course.”

  “We’ll only be two days. Three at the most. Come on, Jasper!”

  It was a bit of a pity that Jasper’s reunion with me involved a car ride—he looked very nervous as he sat on the front seat—but after a while, once we had gotten a few miles out of the mountains and back onto the flat highway, he started to relax. I think it was because the scenery started to look familiar to him as we got closer and closer to the coast. It had been less than a year since we’d last visited Sandy Point and the trip had been one of our best times together. Of course, there had been a dead body or two along the way to confuse matters. But Jasper wouldn’t remember that. He’d just remember running along the sand and playing in the water.

  “George?” Agatha dropped the basket of flowers she was carrying and ran up to greet me. “What are you doing here?” She laughed a jolly laugh. She was wearing a sunhat and a blouse that was blowing in the sea-breeze while she attended to one of her crafting projects on the sand. It looked like she was collecting seashells. I knew she liked to stick them on other items in decorative fashions and sell them at the local craft fair. That was her ‘thing.’ Beachy crafts in bright colors and designs.

  I let Jasper out of the car and he sprinted to the edge of the ocean. I grinned at Agatha. “Just thought I would drop in and surprise you…”

  I filled her in on the whole thing over a pot of tea and some English scones as we sat on her porch and watched Jasper tire himself out in the very shallow waves. There was something about the serenity of Sandy Point that made all my problems seem less severe, more dulled around the edges. I told Agatha how suddenly Brenda had left after winning the lotto. Not even waiting f
or Tom before she’d moved.

  “Well,” Agatha said, wide-eyed as she stared at me over the top of her teacup. “It does sound like she is trying to run away from something, doesn’t it?”

  “Sounds like she is trying to skip town, yes.” I set my teacup down. “But I am not going to let her get away with it.” I smiled at Agatha.

  “Well, I don’t know the exact address,” Agatha said, digging through her purse for the real estate brochure. “But there have only been a few houses for sale here in the last month or so, so if she has moved her, there’s a certainly a short list of places it can be.”

  The sun was starting to set. Jasper came out of the ocean, soaking wet and panting, lapping up the bowl of water that Agatha had provided him. “Let’s call it a night,” we decided. We’d need all our energy to track Brenda down the following day.

  The sun hit my closed eyelids. I’d forgotten to pack my sleeping mask. I rolled over and Jasper was not by my bed. For a moment, I panicked, thinking I’d lost not just my dog but someone’s else dog, until I raced into the kitchen and saw that Agatha had already let him outside to play on the sand.

  “Phew,” I said, pouring a mug of coffee.

  “Jasper loves the beach, doesn’t he?” Agatha was dressed in a bright blue sundress and I could see she already had her purse packed and ready to go. There was sun cream sticking out the top of it beside a floppy straw hat.

  “He does,” I said a little wistfully as I watched him frolic. He seemed to like it far more than the mountains.

  “You two should move to Sandy Point,” Agatha suggested with a grin, in a way that was only half-joking. She burst out laughing.

  I dropped my head. I didn’t have the heart to tell her that Jasper was no longer mine. That any move I made would not involve him.

  I took another sip of coffee and thought about my own dreams of moving to the beach. They seemed to get further and further away with every repair bill that came in the mail. Agatha broke through my thoughts with a holler. She was already in the driveway, telling me that Jasper was safe back in the house.