Olive Pendleton stood at the opening to the gazebo, pointing a shiny black gun at them.
“It’s okay, Olive.” Helen waved her hand at Rupert. “We’ve got him immobilized. You’re safe.”
“You think Rupert is the killer?” Olive laughed. “He’s not man enough to kill anyone. Or smart enough. He never even suspected that the reason I sent him to the farthest store for cement was so I could have enough time to kill Susan and drag her into the freezer. He thought I was all sweaty because I was washing the patio. Had to to get rid of the blood, of course.”
“You killed your own sister?” Nans' eyes flicked from Olive to the freezer.
“I had to. I couldn’t risk not living in the manner to which I’ve become accustomed. And Rupert…” Olive looked down at her husband with disgust. “Well, he couldn’t provide for me if his life depended on it. Just like Momma and Daddy always said.”
“But why?” Ida asked. “I don’t get it.”
“Figures you wouldn’t. I noticed you’re a little slow on the uptake. I also noticed you ladies have been sniffing around where you don’t belong. Which is why I had Rupert make the foundation for the gazebo big enough to fit six. Though it looks like I’ll have to stick Rupert in there now too.”
Lexy’s eyes jerked to the foundation. That’s what had looked so strange about it. Olive had had Rupert make it large enough to stick a body in the concrete. Lexy had been so sure that Rupert had been using the concrete to weigh the body down in the pond when this whole time it had been Olive who had wanted the concrete to make a foundation to bury the body in. No wonder they’d been fooled by Olive’s lack of concern about draining the pond. She didn’t care if anyone messed around in there because the body wasn’t stashed there.
But what could they do now? She glanced over at Ida. Was Ida going to knock Olive out with the drone like she’d done to Rupert? Ida was pushing and pulling at the controls, but the drone lay dormant. It must have been damaged by the assault on Rupert. It lay there useless no matter how much Ida fiddled with the controls.
“You! The senile one. What are you doing with that gizmo?” Olive gestured to Ida with her gun. “Put that thing down.”
Ida looked conflicted, but she placed the controller down at her feet and muttered, “Stupid thing wasn’t working anymore anyway.”
Olive glanced at the drone. “Oh, so you’re the ones that belong to that thing. Well, now no one will be able to use whatever it has on it as evidence, because it’s going into the cement along with the bat and your bodies.”
Panic fluttered in Lexy’s chest. They had no weapon, and Olive had every incentive to kill them. In fact, there was no way she could let them live. She knew they owned the drone and…well…they’d seen the body that she’d admitted to killing.
Lexy wondered how she’d gotten the drone in the first place. Had she seen it buzzing around? More likely the dogs had brought it to her. Had she wondered all this time if someone had witnessed the murder through the drone’s camera, and did she have any idea there was a video of it sitting on the USB card in Lexy’s hand?
Nans had always told her that if they got into a bad situation, the best thing to do in front of the killer was to stall for time by keeping them talking. Maybe she could distract Olive with the conversation while she worked her way over to the nail gun lying on the other side of the gazebo.
“I still don’t get it,” Lexy said. “Aren’t you going to get a lot of money from your new book that comes out next week?”
“Pffft! Hardly. My publisher takes most of that. And as you can see”—Olive gestured back toward the dilapidated house—“I’m in need of funds.”
“But what about the money you inherited from your parents?” Nans asked. “I thought they were quite well off.”
“They were. But ten years is a long time, and I have to live to a certain standard. Not to mention that Rupert has very expensive tastes.”
“But Susan doesn’t have expensive tastes. Susan invested her money and saved it, didn’t she?” Lexy asked, taking a tentative step toward the nail gun.
“That’s right. Little Susan, the pretty one. Oh, everyone always fawned over her. She was so pretty, and I was supposed to be the ugly, smart one.” Olive snorted. “Well, it turns out I really was the smart one.”
“So you killed her for her share of the money,” Ida said.
“That’s right. She had plenty. Even more than what my parents left us. And that son of hers was coming around, and she wanted to reconcile with him!” Olive got a sour look on her face, and Lexy took the opportunity to sidle closer to the tools.
“And if they reconciled, she would have put him back in the will, wouldn’t she?” Helen asked.
“Yes. And I couldn’t have that happen. I’d worked very hard the last few years to get Susan to put me in as the beneficiary. Not to mention I’d worked long and hard to get her to give us money for the various projects we need to do here. If that no-good Brent came here, I’m sure he’d put a stop to that in no time. He only wanted her money, and he wouldn’t want her spending it on me.”
“Susan never went to Europe, did she?” Ruth asked, drawing Olive’s attention and allowing Lexy to move closer to the nail gun.
“That’s right. Aren’t you the smart one.”
“But you were in Paris,” Ruth continued. “You took a selfie with the paper showing the date and later on photoshopped your sister in to make it look like she was there.”
“I have other talents aside from being an author, you know.”
“That’s why the same shirt was in her closet. It was an old picture. She never wore that shirt in Paris. You cropped her out of some other picture. She drove over here that Saturday, and you killed her. That’s why her car is in the garage. Then you went to Paris alone,” Lexy said.
“Well done. That’s correct, and since my car is in the shop, it was very convenient for me to just use Susan’s,” Olive said. “After all, she wouldn’t be needing it.”
“And her dog,” Lexy said. “The little black one. You put him on the roof.”
Olive looked apologetic. “Now, I never put that dog in harm’s way. He was perfectly safe up there in the valley of the roof. I had him secured up there, but not so that Susan could notice. And now I have him here as part of my brood. I love him as much as my own dogs.”
“So you answered the letter to her son, pretending to be her. You told him you didn’t want to reconcile and were taking an extended trip to Europe.” Helen’s eyes turned sad. “You did all that so he wouldn’t come here and try to talk to her in person, didn’t you?”
Olive nodded. “Pretty clever, don’t you think? I even had Rupert stick the letter in Susan’s mailbox so that the postmark would be from her zip code. That was just a little trick I learned from one of my books.”
Lexy chanced a sideways glance. Six more feet and she’d be able to lunge for the nail gun. They had to keep Olive talking.
“And that’s why you sent Amelia on vacation,” Lexy said.
“The maid? Yes. I did like her cleaning, actually. Even used to give her my older clothes. But she was very observant. I couldn’t have her around to pick up on anything that was out of the ordinary. At least not until I’d taken care of Susan.” Olive gestured toward the freezer.
“So when you had that pamphlet at Connie’s the other day, that wasn’t really from Rupert, then?” Ruth asked.
“No, of course not. I was giving it to Rupert. I told him that Amelia’s cleaning was not sufficient anymore. He would have to find someone new. Of course, I didn’t plan on approving of anyone, but Rupert didn’t know that.” She looked down at him, giving Lexy the opportunity to take another step toward the nail gun. “He was obedient in that way. I always knew I could count on him to run little things over to Connie. Too bad I’m going to have to do away with him now too.”
“Yeah, Mrs. Jenkins said she saw Rupert going over to Connie’s quite a bit,” Helen said.
“Oh, that b
usybody,” Olive made a face. “I wish I had a spot for her in the foundation, but it’s getting quite crowded as it is.”
Ruth tilted her head and looked at Olive inquisitively. “There’s one more thing, though. The threatening note that said ‘you’d better keep quiet or you’ll be next’. Did you write that to Connie?”
Olive’s brows shot up. “How did you know about that?”
Ruth shrugged. “We have our ways.”
“Well, I suppose I could tell you, since you won’t be around to tell anyone else. As a matter fact, I did write that to Connie. She’d asked about Susan’s car in the garage and her dog being here one too many times, and I knew she was getting suspicious. So I wrote her that note. I was going to slip it under her door the day I ran into you busybodies at her house. But I couldn’t very well do that with you people watching.”
“Susan borrowed your sweater because she was frail and often cold.” Lexy remembered Kingsley’s words about Susan. It made sense that she might have borrowed it even if the day was warm.
“She was always borrowing my things. I’m glad that at least…” Olive glanced into the freezer, her face looking almost regretful. Did she have a pang of grief about missing her sister, or was her heart as frozen as Susan’s body?
“Okay, well, here’s what I don’t get,” Ida said.
Lexy took another step toward the nail gun while Olive’s attention was on Ida.
Ida continued, “Susan had several large withdrawals from her bank account this past month. We thought she was being blackmailed, but now I assume that money was going to you, wasn’t it?”
Olive’s brows shot up. “Well, aren’t you the little detective. What are you guys, some kind of amateur sleuths?”
Nan straightened her spine. “I’ll have you know we are a bona fide private investigative service. The Brook Ridge Falls Ladies Detective Club.”
“Well, excuse me if I don’t ask for your card. You’re not going to be around long enough for me to use your services. It’s too bad things had to end this way. I could have used your knowledge for my books.”
“Dang,” Ida said.
Helen shot a look at her then turned back to Olive. “If you would just answer this one question for us since we are of an inquisitive nature, we’ll go to our concrete graves with no struggle.” Helen shot a look at Lexy. Apparently she was onto Lexy’s plan about the nail gun and wanted to keep Olive occupied for her so she could get closer. “Rupert got cashier’s checks every other Tuesday. Where did he get the money for those, and what were they for?”
“Susan was always the sympathetic sap. I’d tell her about how my publisher pays me peanuts, and she’d have sympathy and give me money. I asked to borrow some money until my book release. That’s what those withdrawals were. She was withdrawing money for me. But I didn’t want to just deposit it because I didn’t want the police looking into that later on. I didn’t want to have anything that would look suspicious or tie me to her financially. Nor did I want her pesky son to figure out what was really going on in case he came back looking for her. So I had Rupert turn them into cashier’s checks. Then later on I would use them to buy things to fix up the house or get some new shoes or purses.”
“So Susan was giving you her money all along because you’d already spent all of yours,” Nans said.
“That’s right. She had plenty and I had nothing!”
“So you dipped into what she had, and even though she was generous with it, you still killed her,” Ruth added.
“I couldn’t let Brent come back and screw things up! Anyway, it’s none of your business. Enough of this idle chitchat. Get over there and meet your final resting place!” Olive jerked the gun in the direction of the foundation.
“Now hold on, Olive. We can work something out,” Nans held her hand out toward the gun, but Olive wasn’t going to hand it over that easily.
She pointed the gun right at Nans' head. “I said get over there.” She jerked the gun again, and the ladies shuffled toward the foundation.
It was now or never.
Lexy lunged for the nail gun.
“Hoot! Hoot! Hoot!” Nans, Ruth, Ida, and Helen yelled in unison.
Olive swung around in time to see Lexy pick up the nail gun and aim.
“Bang!”
White-hot pain seared Lexy’s arm. The nail gun clattered to the ground unfired.
Lexy’s energy drained as if someone had pulled a plug. She fell to her knees, her vision closing in on her.
In the distance, she heard a pack of dogs barking.
She slumped the rest of the way to the patio, her senses fading out just as she heard a strange rat-a-tat-tat.
Lexy struggled to stay conscious, her eyesight clearing just long enough to see Olive’s scowling face looming above her before she toppled onto the pavers beside Lexy.
26
“Lexy! Talk to me!” Nans' voice sounded like it was a mile away. Lexy’s head was fuzzy, and her arm stung like the time she’d been attacked by hornets that were nesting in her old metal swing set. Her cheeks felt like someone was rubbing warm, wet sandpaper on them.
Slowly she opened her eyes. She was on the ground, looking up at the lattice corners of the half-built gazebo wall at the trees above.
The gazebo!
She sat up quickly then fell back against someone who had been cradling her in her lap. “What happened?”
“Lexy! You’re alive!” Ruth, Ida and Helen rushed over, clucking about like mother hens. Four furry dogs wiggled around her, licking her face and hands and jumping into her lap.
Then Lexy remembered she’d been shot! Her head jerked to the side to inspect her arm. Nans was pressing a napkin against it—apparently one she’d used to wrap up the last scone, since the scone was now lying on the ground. Her arm didn’t look too bad. At least it was still attached.
“You were just grazed.” Nans answered her unspoken question. “You’ll be fine.”
But she must not have been fine, because she was seeing double. She wasn’t seeing just four gray-haired old ladies in black polyester pantsuits in the gazebo. She was seeing eight of them.
Was she seeing double? No, not exactly double, because Nans, Ruth, Ida, and Helen were crouched down next to her and the other polyester suits were tying Olive up with thick rope.
Lexy pushed to a sitting position, feeling much better now. “What’s going on?”
One of the other suits turned to look at her, and Lexy recognized her as the woman from the fan club who had come into her bakery.
“We got here just in the nick of time,” the woman said.
“Oh, Lexy, this is June, Sally, Belinda, and Florence. The women who run Olive’s fan club.”
“Olive’s former fan club now.” Sally scowled down at Olive’s unconscious body.
“After Olive shot you, these lovely women rushed in, and Florence grabbed the nail gun and shot Olive right in the knees,” Nans said.
“It must be really painful, because she passed out, and she’s been out ever since,” Ida added.
“If it wasn’t for these ladies, we might be in our concrete graves right now.” Ruth glanced over at the cement foundation.
“It’s very much appreciated,” Lexy said truthfully. She alternated patting first one dog then the next as they vied for her attention, seemingly unconcerned about their unconscious owners lying just feet away. “But what were you guys doing out here in the middle of the night?”
“Well, as you know, as part of our duties as fan club founders, we need to keep up on the comings and goings of Olive,” Sally said.
“There is a big conference going on right now, and there is some question as to whether Olive herself is there or if she sent her assistant Connie to impersonate her,” June added.
“So we were just doing a little midnight reconnaissance to see if we could spot her,” Belinda said.
Florence leaned toward them and whispered, “You know she can be very reclusive.”
“Anyw
ay,” Sally continued, “we were parked down the street when we saw you pull up. We wanted to see what you were up to, thinking maybe you were part of a rival fan club gang. We debated coming onto the property, but then we saw Olive come out of the house, and as we crept closer, we heard the conversation.”
“So you heard her confessing to everything then?” Lexy asked.
“Yes, we did. And when she shot you, I don’t know what came over me. I ran in, grabbed the nail gun, and shot her back.”
“It was all very exciting,” Belinda said. “Almost like being in our own mystery book.”
“But that still doesn’t explain what exactly you people are doing here,” Sally said.
“We’re private investigators,” Nans said proudly. “We witnessed the murder with this drone here, and we’ve been investigating it ever since.”
“Oh, well, we barely noticed you in those black outfits,” Florence said.
“I noticed yours are very similar.” Ruth went to stand beside Florence as they compared their outfits. “I got mine at Marshall’s. Where did you get yours?”
“I got mine there too. They were on sale last month.”
“I got mine at the same sale!”
The sound of sirens split the air, and they all looked at each other. “We should probably call the police.”
“You haven’t called them?” Lexy asked.
“No, we were more concerned with finding out if you were okay and securing Olive and then…well…we got to talking, and…” Nans shrugged.
“We figured we had the perpetrators well tied up anyway, so we had plenty of time.” Ida cocked her ear toward the street. “And if my guess is right, the police are coming here right now anyway.”
Ida’s guess was right. The siren stopped outside the Pendletons’. The police came cautiously around back, saw them in the gazebo, and used their high-powered flashlights to light the place up like the nighttime field at the Super Bowl. Lexy squinted into the bright lights, her gut clenching when she heard Jack’s voice.
“What’s going on back here? We had a call about a disturbance…dogs barking and…Lexy, is that you?”
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