Penelope’s mind reeled, spinning back over the past weeks, trying to remember if she ever had occasion to touch Jordan’s necklace. She couldn’t think of anything, although it was possible she had. She’d hugged him a few times. Had she touched it while admiring it or by accident?
“The print is a match to one of your employees, Francis Moretti.”
“No, it’s not,” Penelope said instinctively. “That’s a mistake.”
“There’s no mistake,” Edie said, her expression remaining neutral. “His prints were already on record in the system.”
“Excuse me,” Penelope said. She hurried back down the hall to the office and knocked on the door rapidly, then opened it. Sheriff Bryson stared at her from behind the desk as Francis swiveled around in his chair. “Don’t say anything else, Francis.”
“Ms. Sutherland, excuse us please,” the sheriff began.
“No, come out with me,” she urged. “They think we’re responsible for what happened to Jordan.”
“Close the door,” Sheriff Bryson ordered. When Penelope hesitated he repeated himself, in a much louder voice. She reluctantly pulled the door closed and stood next to Francis, grasping his shoulder.
“What are you doing?” Sheriff Bryson asked.
“If you’re zeroing in on me or a member of my team, trying to say one of us killed Jordan, we have rights,” Penelope said. “You can’t question him without a lawyer.”
“Yes, I can, if he doesn’t ask for one,” Sheriff Bryson said.
“I saw your list,” Penelope said. “It’s only my team and some of the restaurant staff,” Penelope said. Francis’s shoulder shrank beneath her grip.
“You’re the ones who had the most contact with the deceased,” Sheriff Bryson said. “It’s natural we’d start with you.”
A thought suddenly came to her. “Jordan had an argument last night. One of the sales reps, Denis Billings, saw it out behind the restaurant. You should find out about that,” she said excitedly.
Sheriff Bryson eyed her with interest, then made a note on her statement. “Any other convenient memories you’d like to add?”
“No one from my crew could have done this. That’s the truth,” Penelope said firmly.
“So you say,” he said, his eyes dropping back down to Francis.
“What is the motive, then? Why would we want to hurt Jordan? I’ll tell you this, you won’t find anything. We all respected him very much,” Penelope said. She felt a small shudder go through Francis.
“We’ll see,” the sheriff said. “You’re both excused.” He waved them off and went back to studying his reports.
Penelope pulled Francis by the elbow into the powder room down the hall, closing the door behind him.
“What did he ask you about in there?”
Francis swept his gaze along the tin ceiling tiles. “Nothing. Regular stuff, what was Jordan doing the last time I saw him, how did he seem...why?”
“Did he ask you about the necklace?” Penelope urged.
“Yeah, Jordan’s.”
“What did you tell him?”
Francis shrugged.
“I said I knew the one he meant, and that I hadn’t seen it around anywhere. What’s the big deal about it?”
“They found it outside by our truck,” Penelope said.
“So he dropped it?” Francis shrugged, palms in the air.
“They say your fingerprint is on it, Francis,” Penelope whispered. “Do you remember touching it?”
Some of the color drained from Francis’s face. “I don’t know...yeah, I did. Now they think I killed Jordan and stole his necklace?”
“When did you touch it?” Penelope urged.
“It fell off one time and I picked it up off the floor mat, handed it back to him. The chain broke. He said it was getting old, that he needed to replace the chain,” Francis said.
“Good,” Penelope said. “There’s a reason your fingerprints were there.”
Francis shook his head and laughed bitterly. “Yeah, but it was just me and Jordan who saw it. They’re not going to believe me. They just want to make the quickest arrest.”
Penelope shook her head and put her palm to her forehead. “It does put you in contact with him, physical contact.”
“We were all in close physical contact with him in the kitchen. I worked close to him a couple of times, and he came out to see the truck now and then. We shook hands, slapped shoulders.”
“If they had hard evidence you killed Jordan they would have arrested you already. I’ve heard that fingerprints can stay on surfaces for a long time. It’s not enough.” She pulled her phone from her pocket and texted Joey a question about fingerprints to confirm what she thought.
“I can’t have this happening again,” Francis said. “I haven’t been in trouble in a long time, Boss.”
Penelope looked up from her phone at his pleading expression. “I know. And that stuff before...you were just a kid.”
“I was a stupid kid. I got caught shoplifting twice, and that’s on my record. They’re going to find out,” Francis said helplessly.
“You’re a different person now. I’ve got your back. Just don’t answer any more questions without me or a lawyer with you.”
“I’ve managed to land at the top of Sheriff Bryson’s suspect list. And insult him on top of it,” Penelope said in a low voice after taking a seat next to Ava at the bar. She swept a glance at the tables behind her, half of them full of crew members, a few of them eyeing her with interest. She decided it was best to keep the information about the necklace to herself for now. “Big city versus small town, something like that.”
Ava smiled wearily. “He’s a good guy, just inexperienced. This is the first murder in Forrestville for something like ten years, which would make it his only one as sheriff. He used to be a park ranger until he took over after the previous sheriff died. People don’t bother locking their doors around here.”
“Really?” Penelope asked. Unfortunately, she had never lived anywhere where serious crime, even murder, wasn’t daily news. It was something she read about in a detached way in the papers that were left around the set. If bad things occurred in neighborhoods she didn’t frequent, she could somehow distance herself from the violence, like it wasn’t part of her world. She felt a rush of shame about that now. “I’m worried he might be focusing on the out-of-towners because we’re unfamiliar.”
Ava shrugged. “I don’t think he knows what to do. I hope he can handle it.”
“What’s happened in the past? I mean, how do they normally investigate serious crimes around here?”
“It hasn’t really come up, at least since I’ve lived here. I can’t say for sure, but the sheriff doesn’t strike me as the kind of guy to turn things over to another department. That’s just a guess, but a pretty good one.”
“You’ve known Sheriff Bryson a long time?” Penelope asked.
“It feels like I’ve known everyone around here for a long time,” Ava said. “Maybe too long.” She got up and walked behind the bar, gazing at the wine bottles below the mirror-backed shelves and selecting a red. She poured herself a glass and glanced at Penelope.
“Sure,” Penelope said, eyeing at the cuckoo clock on the wall and seeing it was just past six.
Jennifer came up to them. “I think that’s everyone they wanted to talk to.” She held a notepad in her hand and glanced down at the list. “Now it’s just the restaurant people.” She wandered over to talk to another group at a nearby table.
Penelope put her chin in her palm and closed her eyes. “Did you get that list started?”
Ava squinted at her as she took a sip. “What list?”
“Of people who come in and out of the kitchen,” Penelope said. She looked around for a pad of paper and a pen as Jennifer moved through the room, stopping at each table to t
alk to her crew.
Ava sighed. “It’s not going to be anyone like that,” she said. “It had to be a complete stranger, someone who happened upon Jordan, maybe someone who was trying to rob the inn.”
“Really? Why would a random robber go to the trouble of making Jordan’s death look like a suicide? Also, what is there to steal in here?”
Ava looked up at the ceiling. “Lots of things of value up in those rooms.” She took another healthy gulp from her glass. “Whoever killed him probably assumed Jordan’s death wouldn’t be questioned, that it would be ruled a suicide and they would get away with murder.”
“But nothing was stolen,” Penelope reminded her gently. “It doesn’t seem like a random act, Ava.”
Ava’s eyes flashed. “Someone came in. Jordan was always leaving the doors unlocked, propping them open even, both here and over at Festa. I told him he shouldn’t, especially when he was alone. There was a struggle, and the robber choked Jordan to death. He panicked and tried to cover it up by staging a suicide. Then he ran out without taking anything to cover his tracks.”
Penelope considered her theory. “I guess it could have happened that way.” The scenario was highly improbable, but she was tired and didn’t want another contentious conversation.
Ava nodded quickly. “That’s the only thing that makes sense. Because everyone loved Jordan.” A tear slipped down her cheek. “It had to have been a transient. Someone who didn’t know him, or any of us.”
Penelope gently placed a hand on Ava’s forearm then picked up her glass, swirling the liquid inside. “We’re going to find out who did this.”
Chapter 14
Penelope sat up in bed, shaken from a deep sleep by a nagging feeling, the wisps of a dream evaporating into the darkness of the room. She heard a dull thud she couldn’t quite place outside, a car door maybe. Penelope went to the window that looked down on the courtyard. The clock on the nightstand said it was 3:20, the red numbers glowing in the darkness. Penelope sighed and rubbed her eyes, worrying she wouldn’t be able to get back to sleep. She stared out the window at the yellow halo of light that crept across the cobblestones and illuminated the front doors of Festa. The door on the left shifted slightly, blown open at the seam before settling back against the other. At first Penelope thought it was her imagination. She looked again, forcing her sleepy brain to focus. The doors puffed against the wind again and Penelope tried to see if the deadlock was bolted, looking for a glint of silver between the doors. She decided they couldn’t be secured if they were moving like that. All the lights were off inside, at least in the front dining room as far as she could see.
“I can’t believe the police left the doors open. They couldn’t come find me?” Penelope said quietly to herself. She considered texting Ava to see if she’d locked up when they were done, but then decided disturbing her in the middle of the night, especially after they day they’d had, wasn’t the best idea. Pulling Ava out of bed and asking her to drive over seemed ridiculous when she had a set of keys and could lock up in two minutes.
Penelope stepped into her fleece-lined snow boots and slid her puffy jacket over her flannel pajamas before heading down the front stairs of the inn. She felt for the keyring in her pocket as she made her way, the wooden steps creaking under her boots. The cuckoo clock chimed once to mark the half hour, causing her to pause. The bar and great room were deserted, and Penelope wished she was still asleep like the rest of her coworkers.
When Penelope reached the front doors of Festa, she pulled one of them open with her gloved hand, confirming they’d been left unlocked. The night air was still, not even sounds of wildlife coming from the forest. The temperature was well below freezing, and Penelope assumed most of the animals were hibernating, or at least tucking themselves away until the sun rose and warmed everything up again. She thought briefly about Randall and Max camping out in the woods and shivered.
Penelope slipped the orange key into the lock, then froze when she saw a flicker of light inside the darkened dining room. Penelope dropped the keys back into her coat pocket and stepped into the foyer, squinting through the inner vestibule door to get a better look. The hair on her arms stood on end when she saw five black pillar candles burning at the far end of the bar. The candle wax dripped down the sides, and they all sat in a puddle of liquid on the bar. They gave off a pine scent that lay thick in the air. Penelope stared at the candles as she approached the bar, certain she’d never seen them in the restaurant before. Jordan used unscented tea lights in small glass votives on the tables, preferring to not have competing aromas from candles or flowers that might detract from the flavor of the food.
Penelope reached the bar and pulled off a glove, gingerly touching the sticky substance under them with her finger and holding it up to her nose. “Whiskey,” she whispered. Her stomach did a flip when she heard a thump from behind the kitchen doors. “Ava?” she murmured, then dismissed the thought quickly, considering it was the middle of the night. Penelope reached into her coat pocket for her phone, realizing too late she’d left it on the nightstand next to her bed.
Penelope heard faint laughter and the thud of the kitchen’s back door closing. She approached the doors on shaky legs, moving carefully toward the sound. When she was pretty sure she was alone, Penelope pushed the kitchen door open with her fingertips, slowly at first then all the way. The overhead lights glared in the empty room, and Penelope sucked in her breath. Someone had been in the kitchen, and it hadn’t been Ava. Unless Ava had completely lost her mind.
Meat Is Murder! was scrawled in spray paint across the walk-in, and several boxes of food had been dumped on the floor. Penelope let the door swing closed behind her as she took in the scene. Raw steaks and chicken parts were piled on the floor, a bucket of red paint poured on top. The vibrant red was jarring and unnatural, like a cartoon.
The sound of a vehicle pulling out of the parking lot brought Penelope back to the present. She hurried to the door and pushed it open, but only saw the taillights of what she thought was a truck speeding away. Exhaust vapors wafted in the air.
“I can’t believe this,” Penelope said as she stepped back inside, heaving the door closed and sliding the deadbolt home. She shook out her hands and hurried to secure the front doors too, worrying in the back of her mind that she might be locking herself inside with someone. She dismissed the idea when she thought about the truck pulling away, doubting the vandals would leave one of their accomplices behind. But to be safe, she’d check for anyone who might be hiding. After she called the police.
“Please send someone quickly,” Penelope said to a weary-sounding woman at the police station. She tried to explain what had happened in a calm voice, forcing herself to slow down when she thought she sounded frantic. Hanging up the extension behind the bar, she blew out the candles and saw the empty whiskey bottle tucked into the well, which she hadn’t noticed until she’d stepped behind to make the call. It had been dumped completely out, the amber liquid pooling on top of the wood and dripping into the reservoir on the service side of the bar.
Penelope picked up an unopened bottle of vodka by the neck and held it like a bat as she walked to the bathrooms, quietly opening the doors and ducking to look under the stalls, confirming she was indeed alone. Afterwards, she doubled back to the kitchen’s office to wait for someone to come.
She called Ava, running her finger down the list of phone numbers pinned to the board behind the desk.
“You’ve got to be joking,” Ava said, her voice groggy.
“I’m telling you, I just missed whoever it was,” Penelope said. “The police are on the way. I thought you should know.”
“Of course,” Ava said with a heavy sigh. “I’ll be there in twenty minutes.”
Penelope hung up and walked back out to the kitchen. The pile of frozen meat and paint was a disturbing sight, and she fought the urge to start cleaning it up. She looked at the drying pai
nt on the walk-in door, the black drips sliding down from the bottoms of the letters. A small pentagram had been carved in the metal, angry scratches with some type of blade.
“Satanists?” Penelope said, thinking about the black candles on the bar. “Do Satanists not eat meat?” An upsetting image of animal sacrifice from a movie she’d seen flashed through her mind. Penelope tried to match up what she was seeing in the kitchen with what she remembered reading about those who proclaimed to worship the Devil.
Penelope went back to the office and sat behind the desk, staring at the blank computer screen. “Who would do this?” she wondered out loud.
Rubbing her chin with her finger, she turned the computer on and pulled up the admin screen. She clicked on Jordan’s avatar and scanned the files, nothing changed since the last time she’d poked around. She quickly searched online for Forrestville Indiana Satanic Cults and clicked on the top result, an article dating a few years earlier about a group of devil worshipers in the area being arrested for vandalizing cars in town. Penelope skimmed the article, none of the names sounding familiar. She zeroed in on a picture of three men who looked to be in their late teens or early twenties, the caption below saying they were ordered to pay five thousand dollars each in fines and serve probation. She jotted their names down on a piece of paper on the desk.
Hearing the familiar rapping on the back door of the kitchen, Penelope exited out of the article on the screen and went to let the police in again.
Chapter 15
“It doesn’t appear to be forced entry,” Sheriff Bryson said, eyeing the kitchen doorframe. “Not that I can tell, anyway. Either the door was left unlocked or the perpetrators had a key.”
Ava shifted her weight back and forth on her slender legs. She had on a red Indiana sweatshirt and jeans, the puffiness of sleep still on her face. “Do you think what’s happened here is connected to Jordan’s death?”
Murder Is the Main Course Page 9