A Murder Between the Pages

by Amy Lillard

  “I don’t know,” Arlo said. Too much at one time, and all the crazy thoughts and theories were starting to give her a headache. The last thing she needed on a Saturday.

  “I’ll tell you why. Because Weston Whitney found out that she was carrying his baby. See, the two of them were having an affair.”

  Arlo shook her head. “Wait, wait, wait. Where’d you get all that?”

  “Just hear me out,” Fern said. “This is a deductive reasoning at its finest.”

  Arlo had her doubts about that.

  “Now, where was I?” Fern continued. “The affair. Right.”

  Arlo glanced around the bookstore to make sure her customers were all okay and no one needed any help before returning her attention to Fern.

  “Weston and Mary Kennedy were having an affair. She told him she was pregnant. He killed her, put her and her car in the lake, placed the necklace in there so that she could be accused of stealing it, and the rest is history, as they say.”

  Or an unsolved mystery.

  “Then why wasn’t her body in the car?” Arlo asked.

  “I don’t know. Maybe she’s out there buried in all that mud somewhere.”

  And that just didn’t make sense.

  “Weston Whitney couldn’t have been the father of her baby,” Arlo said. “Everyone in town knows that they couldn’t have children. That’s why Judith and Weston adopted Baxter.”

  Sam took that minute to come into the bookstore from the third-floor door. At least this time he didn’t scare the bejesus out of her.

  “I thought you were taking today off,” she said.

  “Duty calls,” Sam quipped.

  “I bet Sam agrees with me,” Fern said.

  “About what?”

  “You had to ask,” Arlo said in return.

  Fern explained to him her theory of the affair between Weston and Mary Kennedy, about the planted necklace, undiscovered murder, and a car that had been purposely concealed for the last fifty years.

  “It does make some sense though,” Sam said.

  “Don’t you start too.” Arlo shook her head. “There’s no way that Weston Whitney could be the father of Mary Kennedy’s baby if she was indeed pregnant when she disappeared because he and Judith couldn’t have children. And everyone knows that it wasn’t Judith’s fault.”

  Sam tapped his finger on his chin thoughtfully. “And how do you know that it was Judith’s fault and not Weston’s?”

  How did she know? She knew because everyone in town knew. That was the kind of town Sugar Springs was. “The grapevine, I guess.”

  “And the grapevine is never wrong,” Fern scoffed.

  “All I’m saying is we don’t have any proof,” Arlo said. “As entertaining as this is, it’s simply speculation.”

  Fern’s eyes twinkled with a triumphant gleam. “That’s why I took Weston’s file too.” She raised the other file into the air as if holding the Olympic torch of crime solving.

  “I feel very confident in saying there is no way both of these files were out in the open; you went behind the glass.” Arlo frowned.

  Fern just shrugged “Weston Whitney’s file claims that he is not sterile. The reason they couldn’t have children was Judith. She was barren.”

  “Did you take her file too?”

  “I didn’t have to. But I want to take this to Mads.” Fern held up both files, at least a little lower this time and not quite so triumphantly.

  “Mads doesn’t want to open this case again,” Arlo said. As bad as the girls wanted Mads to, Arlo could see his point of view on the matter. This was a decades-old murder, and most everyone involved in it was dead. It wasn’t like they could bring Mary Kennedy’s killer to justice. Not unless her killer was Judith; she was the only one left alive. A zing of something shot through Arlo. What if…?

  “See,” Fern said. “Now you’re thinking. I saw the look on your face. You know it’s true.”

  “Indigestion,” Arlo lied.

  “I’m going to take these to Mads.” Fern indicated the two folders she held.

  “You’re going to take stolen medical records to the police chief with the hope that he will reopen a murder case?” Arlo asked. “Am I getting all this?”

  Sam chuckled, and Arlo shot him a look. He immediately sobered. “Maybe that isn’t the best idea.”

  She glared at him. “You think?”

  “Fine,” Fern huffed. She collapsed back to the sofa in the reading nook and set the files down next to her. “But I’m not taking them back either.”

  “Whatever does it for you,” Arlo said.

  “I doubt anyone will even miss them.” Fern crossed her arms in a defiant gesture.

  “She’s probably right, you know,” Sam said where only Arlo could hear.

  “Don’t you dare encourage her.”

  “Want to do lunch today?”

  Arlo blinked at Sam. “I thought you were busy.”

  He nodded. “I am. But everybody has to stop for lunch. What say I run by The Diner and pick you up something?”

  A warm and greasy hamburger compared to the cold peanut butter and jelly sandwich she had in her lunch box? No contest.

  “I’ll take you up on that, but I have to eat here. Chloe and Jayden are having an adjustment period.”

  “I wouldn’t have it any other way.” And with that, Sam gave her his patented carefree smile and made his way back upstairs.

  Chapter 22

  Monday came, and everyone was talking again, but this time the conversation had shifted.

  “Say that again,” Helen instructed just after Fern had breezed in with her big announcement. It was early afternoon, the usual time for the book club to gather, except Fern was late, and Camille hadn’t shown up at all.

  Arlo couldn’t decide if she should be sad or mournful. Was her book club experiment completely fizzling out?

  “Courtney is at the police station telling Mads about how she and Dylan went to Corinth together on the day Haley was killed. She said there was no way that Dylan could be guilty because he was with her.”

  “They were together at the very time Haley was pushed down the stairs?” Helen asked.

  “She wasn’t pushed down the stairs. At least that’s not what killed her,” Fern reminded them. “But yes. At the very same time that she was conked on the head at the mansion with an ugly statuette, Courtney and Dylan were in Corinth.”

  “I don’t understand,” Helen said. “I thought they had him on CCTV at the mansion.”

  “Apparently the date was wrong.”

  Arlo and Chloe exchanged a look.

  “Where’s Camille?” Chloe asked. “Is she not coming?”

  Helen shrugged. “Out with Joe, I guess.”

  “What were you doing at the police station?” Chloe asked.

  “I went to take Frances some of my strawberries,” Fern said.

  Helen sniffed. “You haven’t brought me any of your strawberries.”

  Fern shot her a look. “You haven’t asked.”

  “So you went to the police station and overheard Courtney talking to Mads,” Chloe reiterated.

  “You got it.”

  “What do you think?” Chloe asked, looking to Arlo.

  “It’s possible, I guess,” she replied.

  “That I went to the police station or that I overheard the conversation I was just talking about?” Fern asked with a stern frown.

  “Both,” Arlo replied with a cheeky smile.

  “What I want to know is why they went to Corinth together,” Helen said.

  “Let’s go to Corinth!” Faulkner intoned. “Lots to do in Corinth.”

  “Well, it’s obvious that he’s never been there,” Sam joked.

  While they had been talking, he had come down the stairs to join them.
/>
  “Hey, Sam.” Fern waved, then continued her story. “She told Mads that she and Dylan had gone to look at promise rings.”

  A moment of silence fell between them. Dylan had been about to pledge his love to his girl, and unbeknownst to him, she was being murdered at the very time he was picking out her ring.

  “If they went at all, you mean,” Helen said.

  “You doubt it?” Chloe asked. “It seems like a logical enough reason to me.”

  Arlo turned to Sam. “You want to weigh in on this?”

  Sam shrugged. “Not sure what I can add since I missed the first part.”

  Fern took a quick moment to fill Sam in on the details of how she had gone into the police station that morning and overheard Courtney supplying Dylan with an alibi.

  “What she’s saying can be easily checked,” Sam said. “She most likely has a list of the jewelry stores where they went. All she’ll have to do is give it to Jason or Mads, and they will go over to Corinth and ask around.”

  “Can they do that?” Fern asked. “They don’t have any jurisdiction there.”

  Arlo had to credit Sam with keeping a straight face as he replied. “They don’t need jurisdiction to ask questions. But I’m sure they’ll contact the Corinth police before they go. Mads knows not to step on toes.”

  “So they go to Corinth and ask around,” Helen said. “What then?”

  “Hopefully they will find a jewelry store clerk who remembers Courtney and Dylan and can corroborate their story. Or if they purchased something, that would be even better.”

  “Because their receipt will have a time stamp on it.” Fern nodded in understanding.

  “You hope. Some of those stores in Corinth can be a little behind the times.”

  Fern shot Helen a look. “Yes, and Sugar Springs is an edgy metropolis.”

  “I’m just saying,” Helen confirmed, “if they went downtown, there are a lot of older, family-owned stores there who still write hand receipts.”

  “She’s right,” Arlo said.

  “The date might be enough,” Sam said.

  “Courtney’s a pretty girl,” Helen said. “Enough that most red-blooded American males would remember her.”

  She hoped. They all did. None of them wanted to see Dylan in trouble.

  “What about his confession?” Arlo asked.

  “How can he have a confession and an alibi?” Chloe wanted to know. “That doesn’t make much sense to me.” She turned as Phil came in from next door.

  He gave her a quick nod, and she started his usual without a word exchanged between them.

  “Confessions can be tricky. Especially if coerced,” Sam said. He made his way around the sofa and perched on the edge of the chair closest to Faulkner’s cage.

  “The butler did it! He’s guilty.” Remarkably Faulkner made a sound similar to a gavel being banged.

  Sam looked to Arlo.

  She shrugged. She honestly had no idea where he picked up the things he did. When she had first gotten the bird, he’d known a few choice phrases, but since then, Arlo had managed to weed out most of his more questionable vocabulary. But it seemed as if he picked up words and phrases in his sleep.

  “You think he was coerced?” Helen whistled low. “That doesn’t mark good for Jason or Mads.”

  Sam held both hands up as if surrendering. “I’m not saying he was coerced. You were there when he confessed.”

  They all nodded. They had all been there.

  “Maybe he’s just impressionable?” Arlo asked.

  “He’s not even twenty years old,” Sam explained. “You remember what it was like for you at nineteen?”

  “No,” Helen said with a shake of her head.

  “Yes,” Fern replied, a dreamy quality to her voice.

  “Well, I do,” Sam said. “I thought I knew everything. I thought I was grown, that I could make good decisions. I thought I had it all and a bag of chips.”

  Arlo had felt the same, but looking back, she realized just how dumb and immature she had been. But at the time she had been dang near bulletproof, chips and all. Yet she understood. Dylan had been questioned as an adult. He was legally that, but the scary truth was, he was nothing more than a half-grown kid.

  “I would like to think that at his age I wouldn’t have done anything like confess to a murder that I didn’t commit, but I can’t say that it’s the truth. I did some dumb things when I was that age,” Sam admitted.

  Hadn’t they all?

  Sam looked up and caught Arlo’s gaze. So many questions raised themselves, and none of them had anything to do with Dylan and Haley, and everything to do with her, Mads, and Sam. Oh, the mistakes she had made. Perhaps they had all made.

  But a person couldn’t go back. They couldn’t change anything. And she knew for a fact that she wouldn’t be the same person she was today had she not lived the life she had lived and made the mistakes that she had made.

  Sam looked away, and Arlo did too, but her gaze collided with Chloe’s. Her best friend raised a brow in question, but Arlo had nothing she could say about the matter. Nothing she could say here, in front of everyone, and in truth, nothing she could really say at all. Sam wanted to talk, but they had yet to do so. Maybe soon…

  “What happens now?” Chloe asked.

  She had given Phil his coffee, but instead of returning to his store, he propped one elbow on the bar and waited for the story to continue.

  “I suppose the DA will look over evidence and see if he thinks there’s enough to keep the charges against him.”

  “She,” Helen corrected. “We have a lady DA now.”

  “You don’t say,” Sam drawled. “Northeast Mississippi will get into the twenty-first century yet.”

  “Don’t count on it,” Fern quipped.

  “And if she doesn’t think there’s enough evidence?”

  Sam shrugged. “She’ll let him go.”

  Fern winced. “Jason is not going to like that one bit.”

  “Like it or not, that’s what will happen.”

  “And it’s certainly not right to keep an innocent person in jail,” Phil said.

  “Hear, hear.” Chloe raised her water bottle in salute.

  “If Jason still thinks he’s guilty, then he’ll have to find more compelling evidence against him,” Sam explained. “But if he is innocent…”

  “Then Jason needs to find another suspect,” Helen finished for him.

  “Or some more leads,” Sam said.

  “Against who?” Arlo asked. Who could have been angry enough or hateful enough to bludgeon a young premed student with an ugly, overpriced statue? What sort of enemies did a girl like Haley have? Arlo had no clue. But she wasn’t the only one.

  Sam shook his head. “I have no idea.”

  * * *

  “I know who did it,” Fern declared, sweeping into the Books and More the following day. It was noon, and both Camille and Sam had managed to make today’s meeting, though Helen was running behind. She had called Arlo to tell her that she had a guest coming in and would need to be there when they arrived. Of course, that guest was running late, and when they got there, then she would be on her way.

  “Who?” Camille said. She was on her feet in a second.

  Fern eyed her coolly. “So good of you to join us.”

  “Jealous much?” Camille asked.

  Fern waved away the words. “Guess,” she said, pinning Arlo with an ardent look.

  “Guess what?” Arlo asked. Somewhere between Fern coming in and shelving books in the religion section, she had lost the thread.

  “Who killed Haley,” Fern said impatiently.

  “I got this,” Chloe said. As usual, her friend and business partner was manning the coffee bar, preparing for the midmorning rush of toddlers when the mommy and me group let out a f
ew doors down. “Who killed Haley?”

  “Anastasia Whitney.” Fern stopped, perhaps waiting for applause. None was coming. Everyone around looked a bit stunned.

  “Anastasia?” Arlo asked. “Judith’s granddaughter?”

  “Yes.” Fern nodded so vigorously that she almost slung her hat from her head.

  “Did I miss something?” Helen asked, coming into the bookstore.

  “Yes,” Fern said with a glare.

  “I think we all did,” Arlo said.

  Fern gave them all a stern look as if they hadn’t been paying good enough attention, and the confusion was their own fault and had nothing to do with her cryptic speech. “Let me reiterate,” she said. “I believe that Anastasia Whitney, daughter of Baxter and Katherine, and granddaughter of Judith and Weston, is responsible for Haley Adams’s murder.”

  “That’s some accusation.”

  Fern shot Sam an indulgent smile. “Stay with me here. It’ll all be clear in a sec.”

  “I sure hope so,” Arlo murmured.

  “What if Anastasia was written out of the will?” Fern asked.

  “That’s a mighty big what-if,” Sam pointed out.

  “I know,” Fern replied. “But hear me out.”

  “Go on,” Helen said. She took her usual seat in the overstuffed armchair and waited for Fern to continue.

  In fact, they all waited.

  “Everyone in town knows that Judith is paying for Haley’s education.”

  “They do?” Sam asked.

  “Ditto,” Arlo said.

  “That’s right.” Camille nodded.

  “And everybody knows?” Arlo asked.

  “Everyone who goes to Dye Me a River more than two times a decade,” Helen quipped.

  Arlo supposed that it must be true, or at the very least it was a common belief in the beauty parlor circuits, for Helen did not dispute her.

  “I figured she was grooming her to be her own personal doctor. You know,” Helen said. “Like Elvis had. And Michael Jackson.”

  Arlo frowned. “I don’t think anyone under the pay rate of Elvis or Michael Jackson can afford their own physician.”

  “You’d be surprised,” Fern said.