“I…umm… they said they found…” Lexy’s gaze swiveled back to her grandmother and the ladies. Ida was leaning precariously over the edge of the pond. Nans and Ruth had hold of one of her arms, their heels dug into the sloping ground as they held her in place. Ida leaned over the swampy edge of the pond, her other arm outstretched to grab something that lay in the weeds.
“Got it!” Ida held her hand up. In it was a small gold object. Lexy was relieved it was just that and not a body part. But what was it? A piece of jewelry? A ring? Hopefully not attached to a finger.
Nans and Ruth hauled Ida back, and they bent their heads together to examine what Ida had in her hand.
The remaining brunch crowd was now leaning over, talking excitedly wondering what the crazy lady had. Lexy edged down the side of the yard. She was curious to see what they’d found. Maybe they were about to solve the case.
“Is it—”
“Woof!”
“Yip!”
“Snarl!”
“Hey, what are you doing?” Rupert Pendleton came charging across the yard behind the four Peekapoos. Nans, Ruth, Ida, and Helen turned in alarm, Ida clutching the piece of jewelry, which Lexy now saw was a gold ring.
“Uh oh,” Nans said.
“We’ve got you now!” Ida held her hand up with the ring in it.
Rupert scrunched his face up. “What are you talking about?” His gaze flicked to Nans. “She’s the one that’s senile, right?”
“Senile as a sly fox,” Ida said.
“What are you people doing in my yard?” Rupert glanced up at Kingsley. “Have these ladies been bothering you, too? They’ve been lurking around my place for the past week. I think we should have them arrested.”
“I’ll have you know, we are here on official business. We are catering an event for the Kingsleys.” Nans gestured up the hill to where the tent and tables still stood, and everyone turned in that direction.
Lexy heard the Pendletons’ squeaky sliding door open, and a woman’s voice called out, “What’s going on over there?”
Everyone swiveled back to see the new arrival. Lexy’s heart skittered. Were Susan and Rupert onto them and going to confront them? But if so, what could they possibly do to them with all these witnesses?
“Oh, that’s the ring I lost last summer. Wherever did you find it?” The woman reached out and snatched the ring from Ida’s hand, looked it over, then slipped it on her finger. “Now, what in the world is going on here?”
But neither Nans, Ruth, Ida, Helen, or Lexy answered her. They were speechless, because the woman in front of them was Olive Pendleton, and she was very much alive.
16
“Well now, that’s a fine how do you do,” Ida said later on as they were piling out of Lexy’s car at the Brook Ridge Falls Retirement Center.
“That was a quick jaunt to Europe,” Nans said.
“If she was even there,” Ida pointed out.
“Well, since she isn’t the person we saw pushed, she could have left Saturday morning or earlier. Spent two days there and come back. It’s doable,” Helen said.
“But Rupert said she was napping Saturday afternoon,” Ida said.
“He probably lied.”
“She could have flown in overnight,” Nans pointed out. “When I went to Italy, I flew overnight, slept right through, and woke up there the next day. She’d have three full days there and then fly back Tuesday night.”
Ruth nodded. “This sure does put a damper on our investigation, though.”
“What’s Jack going to say?” Nans asked.
“I don’t think he’s going to be happy.” Lexy pulled her cell phone out. “I’ll text him so he doesn’t waste any more time on this.”
“Well, don’t call him off completely,” Nans said. “I’m certain we witnessed a murder through the drone, and that still needs to be investigated.”
“Yeah, but whose?” Helen asked.
“I don’t know. My money says whoever it was is in that pond.” Ruth signaled for Lexy to pop the trunk, and she wrestled the wetsuit out of it. “I didn’t get a chance to go in there today. Maybe we can go back tonight and I’ll get a chance to go looking around.”
“It’s dark at night, Ruth. Are you gonna bring a big underwater flashlight?” Helen asked.
“And besides, who wants to see you in that wetsuit anyway? You’ll scare the neighbors,” Ida added.
Ruth fisted her hands on her hips. “Hey, I still look pretty good in this thing.”
“We’re not going to go back and jump in the pond,” Nans said. “We need to go over the clues. We’ve obviously been looking at this from the wrong angle.”
“You can say that again,” Ida said sarcastically.
“I think we better stay away from the Pendletons,” Lexy said. “We were lucky that the Kingsleys talked them out of calling the cops.”
“I hope we didn’t ruin your chances at getting other catering jobs.”
Lexy’s heart warmed at the genuine concern in Ida’s voice. “I’m sure I’ll be fine. Most of the people had already left, and Kingsley did say I had done a great job. Luckily, he didn’t let your antics reflect badly on me.”
“And hopefully we haven’t gotten you into trouble with Jack either,” Ruth said.
Lexy pressed her lips together. She didn’t relish the idea of telling him that Olive Pendleton was still alive. He’d gone out on a limb to get information for them. But it wouldn’t all be for nothing. After all, someone was dead, and somebody needed to get them justice.
“I’m sure he’ll be fine. After all, somebody did die, right?” Lexy was starting to second-guess herself. She was sure no one could have survived that fall, but if Olive was alive, then who was the victim?
“Of course. We just have to figure out who it was that Rupert killed and why.” Nans started walking toward the building. “And we need to get to that whiteboard and look at the clues from this new angle.”
“It’s obvious we need to look into the maid and the assistant. If one of them was the victim, then they would have been missing for several days now. Should be pretty easy to figure out which one,” Helen said.
The whiteboard was still set up in Nans' dining room. She took her place in front of it, pointing at each clue in turn so that they could discuss them from this new perspective.
“So, our theory of Rupert having the affair with Susan and killing Olive to get her out of the way doesn’t hold water now,” Nans said.
“Maybe Rupert was having an affair, and Olive killed the person he was having the affair with,” Ruth suggested.
Nans screwed up her face. “Her own sister?”
“But Rupert swung the bat. Why would he kill his lover?” Helen asked.
“Good question,” Ida said.
“Or maybe he had a fight with the lover and killed her in the heat of passion!” Ida suggested.
“No. It was definitely premeditated. He got her on the balcony and then clonked her on the head. He had to have planned that out,” Lexy said.
Nans looked at the whiteboard and sighed. “Maybe the whole theory about Rupert’s affair was an erroneous assumption. This could be about the money.”
“Are we even sure somebody is dead?” Ruth asked.
“Of course we are,” Helen said. “No one could’ve survived that fall, and you saw the body lying there not moving a muscle.”
“That’s right.” Nans tapped the marker on the whiteboard. “We just have to figure out who it was, and as Helen pointed out, it should be fairly easy once we figure out who has been missing for the last several days.”
“We can already rule out Susan, because we found that note in the mailbox after the murder, and the fan club ladies saw her driving away from the house after the murder,” Ida said.
“Right. Before this, we thought the killers were Susan and Rupert. Maybe it was Susan and Olive,” Ruth suggested.
“But why?” Lexy asked. “What would their motive be?”
“
Well, if they were as close as people say, Olive might’ve discovered Rupert was having the affair, and she had the sister help her kill the other woman,” Ida said.
“Rupert had mud on his pants when we went over later that day from dumping the body in the pond, though.” Helen said.
“I noticed that too,” Lexy said. “But we just assumed that’s what the mud was from. It’s muddy over by the gazebo, too, and we know he’s been working over there.”
Nans shook her head. “I don’t think the theory of Olive and Susan being the killers holds water, because Rupert would notice his lover was missing. No, there has to be another motive.”
Ruth shrugged. “Then if it’s not about love, it must be about money.”
“Blackmail!” Ida said.
“Mildred did say that Rupert went in every other Tuesday and put a large sum of money into a cashier’s check.” Helen looked at Ruth. “Did Mildred happen to say who the check was made out to?”
Ruth pressed her lips together. “You know, I believe she said it was made out to cash.”
“That’s odd,” Ida said. “Why wouldn’t he just use the cash?”
“Maybe he didn’t want to carry a big wad of it around. Maybe the blackmailer didn’t want to get a thick envelope filled with money. That’s a lot of money. Maybe the drop-off point was a post office box that wasn’t large enough to hold it,” Nans suggested.
Ruth tapped her index finger on her lips. “Those are all good theories. So if someone was blackmailing Rupert, then why?”
Ida snapped her fingers. “I’ve got it! Rupert was having an affair. Maybe with the sister, or the maid or the assistant. I don’t know which one. But then someone else found out and started to blackmail him.”
“You know, that makes perfect sense,” Helen said. “Olive made the money with her books, and she had family money. Rupert didn’t have any money of his own, so naturally he couldn’t risk a divorce.”
“Jack said their finances weren’t that great, so Rupert would likely be left with nothing if he had to split from Olive,” Lexy said.
“And knowing the way her parents were, they probably forced her to have a prenup so he’d get nothing in a divorce, especially if she could prove he was having an affair.”
“But Rupert couldn’t keep paying the blackmailer. Olive was bound to notice the money was missing sooner or later,” Helen said.
“That’s why he killed the blackmailer,” Ruth added.
Nans added the words “maid” and “Connie” to the suspect list on the whiteboard. “Now if we could just figure out who he was having the affair with, that would eliminate one person. The dead person has to be the other one.”
Nans stood back from the whiteboard. “Okay then. We know we need to find more information on the maid, and we need to talk to the assistant, Connie. Now who else should we talk to?”
“The busybody neighbor, Mrs. Jensen,” Ruth suggested.
“Good idea.” Nans wrote Mrs. Jensen’s name on the whiteboard.
“What about Susan’s son?” Helen asked. “I know Caspian Kingsley said they were estranged, but she had put the letter in her mailbox, and I can’t help but think maybe they were reconciling. It seems like Susan might be mixed up in something with Rupert. Maybe the son knows something about it?”
“It might even be the reason they were estranged,” Ruth added.
“Does anyone remember the son’s name?” Nans asked.
“I do,” Ida said. “Brent Chambers, 121 Forest Ave., Oakdale, Kentucky.”
“Wow, that’s pretty good,” Lexy said.
Ida puffed up with pride. “Thank you. My mind is like a steel trap on account’a all that cypher work I did in my younger days.” Ida had a knack for deciphering codes, and Jack had actually used her a few times to decode things for the police cases.
“Oh, that reminds me!” Ida swung her purse up onto the table and rummaged inside. “This might give us some clues.” She pulled out an envelope and slapped it on the table. It was from Brook Ridge Bank. Susan’s latest bank statement.
Nans frowned at it. “What is that?”
Ida’s eyes gleamed mischievously. “When we were at Susan’s and the mailman came, I couldn’t help but do a little sleight-of-hand, and I pilfered this from the pile before stuffing the rest in her mailbox.”
Helen sucked in a breath. “Ida! That’s against the law!”
“Law schmaw.” Ida slid the envelope into the middle of the table. “Come on, I know you guys are dying to see what’s in here. Her finances could give us a big clue.”
Ruth eyed the envelope uncertainly. “Well, I suppose it would be okay. I mean, the police could get access to this information if they had probable cause. So if Jack could actually investigate this case, we’d be able to know about her financial activities. We’re simply circumventing that just a little bit.”
“And if we steamed it open and then glued it back, no one would ever know,” Helen suggested.
Nans sighed. “Okay. Fine.” She cast an uncertain glance at Lexy.
Lexy shrugged. “I’m not gonna tell Jack.”
Ida snatched the envelope up from the table and ran into the kitchen. She turned the teakettle on, tapping her fingernail on the stove impatiently as she waited for it to heat up. When it whistled, she ran the envelope through the steam, melting the glue and curling the edges of the flap until it popped open.
She slid the statement out, her eyes growing wide as she read it. “Look. Right here. This is the proof.”
She turned the statement to face them, pointing out two lines, each with a ten-thousand-dollar cash withdrawal. “She made two big withdrawals this week. You know what that means.”
“Blackmail,” Ruth said.
“If that’s true, then Rupert wasn’t the only one being blackmailed. Susan was being blackmailed along with him, which would give her just as much reason to want the blackmailer dead.”
“And who better to notice they were having an affair and put the screws to them but the maid who would see everything that was going on in the house?” Ida said.
17
“We always knew the killer must’ve had an accomplice. I don’t think they could have disposed of the body in that pond so quickly otherwise,” Nans said as they rushed out of the building on their way to Lexy’s car.
Nans had called the cleaning company, pretending to be a neighbor of the Pendletons. She’d buttered them up by saying how wonderfully clean the Pendletons’ home was and that it had passed her strict white glove inspection; then she expressed an interest in having the same person clean her house. But before she would enter into any kind of agreement, she would have to have her “people” do a background check.
The company was eager enough to give the woman’s name out—Amelia Little—and a few keystrokes later, Ruth discovered she lived in an apartment on the other side of town, to which they were now headed.
“Listen, guys, I’d love to spend all day investigating, but I have a business to run,” Lexy said.
“Oh, don’t worry, dear, we’ll help you with the business afterwards. You know five pairs of hands are better than one,” Ruth said.
Lexy angled the rearview mirror to peer back at Ruth’s eager face. It was nice of them to offer to help, but Lexy wasn’t sure how much help they actually would be. Though she did love investigating, she needed to pay attention to her bread and butter—the bakery business.
“Just this one trip, dear.” Nans gave her “the look” from the passenger seat, and Lexy snapped her attention back onto the road. “After that, Ruth can drive us around in the Olds.”
Lexy frowned as she navigated the streets. The idea of Ruth driving them around was unsettling. Maybe she could just text Cassie and see if she could watch the bakery for the rest of the day. Their part-time girl Holly was helping out all day and had been in early, since Lexy and Cassie were busy with the brunch. The bakery should be well covered, but she still hated spending so much time away from it.
“So now we’re back to Susan and Rupert being the killers. I knew we were on the right track all along,” Ida said as she stared out the side window.
“Right. We just got the victim wrong,” Helen said.
“I was kind of surprised to see that Susan has so much money in the bank. Judging by that little house she lives in, I thought she didn’t have much. Maybe she inherited a lot from her folks. But then if she did, why doesn’t Olive seem to have as much money?” Ida asked.
“It takes a lot to run that big house the Pendletons have, plus Kingsley said Susan invested her money wisely.” Nans twisted around in her seat to look at the ladies in the back, who all nodded. “Maybe Olive wasn’t as wise with her investments.”
“This is the street coming up,” Ruth said, her eyes locked on the GPS display on her phone.
Lexy turned onto the street. It was filled with two-story older apartments on small patches of land barely larger than the building itself. All the homes were nicely maintained and the yards neatly kept. Though the parked cars were older, none of them were junkers. It was the type of neighborhood where younger people with decent jobs would rent before they were able to buy their own homes.
“Pull in here.” Ruth pointed to a parking spot at the side of the road. “The house is that red one over there.”
Lexy did as told, and they all piled out of the car and gathered on the porch of the red house. Nans rang the bell.
“If Amelia is our victim, she’s not going to answer.” Ida pressed her face against the window then jumped back as a figure came from the back of the house toward the door.
A dark-haired woman of about twenty-five stood in the doorway, an inquisitive look on her face. “Can I help you?”
“We’re looking for Amelia Little,” Nans said. Amelia was a blonde, so unless she’d recently dyed her hair, the woman at the door was not her.
The woman’s eyes drifted among them. “And what is this in regard to?”
“Oh, I’m so sorry, dear, we forgot to introduce ourselves. We are the ladies’ auxiliary, and we heard from Olive Pendleton how wonderful Amelia was at cleaning, and we were hoping to secure her services.” Nans peered over the woman’s shoulder. “Is she home?”
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