1 Dead Wrong

by Leighann Dobbs

  Her gaze went immediately to the front of the shop where she could see Cal squinting into a magnifying glass that he held about two inches away from a coin sitting on the glass display case that doubled as a counter. Cal looked up, smiling when he recognized her. His dimples and sparkling blue eyes highlighted the boyish good looks.

  “Jeez, Cal, it’s so cold in here, I can see my breath.” She made a big show of blowing out for effect.

  Cal laughed. “Sorry, sometimes it can get pretty heated in here when I am negotiating so I like to keep it frosty.”

  “How was your trip? Who was it this time? Sophie? Janice? Amanda?”

  “Actually, none of the above.” Cal grimaced at Fiona’s raised brows. “Hey, I can’t help it if my social calendar is too full. It’s a real problem trying to fit all the ladies in, you know.”

  Jake laughed. “Sounds like a problem I wouldn’t mind having.”

  Fiona felt a momentary pang in her stomach. Jealousy? No, probably just indigestion from wolfing down a jalapeno burger at home before Jake picked her up.

  “Cal, this is my friend Jake.” Fiona ignored Cal’s raised eyebrow and watched the two shake hands.

  “So, what exactly is it you guys are looking for?”

  “Apparently a necklace was taken from Prudence Littlefield when she was murdered. It was an initial necklace, a gold ‘P’. We were wondering if you had heard of anyone trying to sell it. We’re hoping to get a line on the killer to help out Morgan’s case.”

  Cal looked out the window, his brow creased in thought. “You know, I think something like that came in while I was out. Let me check out back.”

  Cal disappeared through a door and returned a split second later with a small transparent bag in his hand. “Is this it? These two items came in together the other day.”

  Jake held the bag up and Fiona stood on her tiptoes to peer into it over his shoulder. She felt her breath catch when she saw it held a gold chain with a large ‘P’ in script and a chunky ring.

  “Looks like it could be, but I’m not sure about the ring.” Jake said.

  Cal put a black velvet jeweler’s square on the top of the glass display case and emptied the pieces out onto it.

  “The necklace and charm are both 18K gold and the ring is 14K.” Cal read from the slip that had been in the bag.

  “Ed said Prudence’s necklace was 18K. Who consigned these?”

  Cal glanced at the slip “Joshua Gray.”

  Fiona gasped. “Then he must have killed Prudence.”

  “Maybe,” Jake said, “But what about the ring? It’s way too big for Prudence and Ed didn’t say anything about a ring being missing.”

  Fiona bent down to get a better look at the ring. It had what looked like a family crest on it — a shield, a crow and two sheaves of wheat crossed in an X.”

  “Maybe he stole it from someone else.”

  “Maybe. I’ll call into the station and see if anything like that has been reported stolen.” Jake looked at Cal. “You better set these aside. They may be part of a police investigation.”

  Calvin raised his brows and Jake added. “Besides, your consigner was found dead last night, so I don’t think he’ll be needing the money.”

  ***

  “But why would Josh Gray want to kill Prudence Littlefield?” Fiona asked Jake as he pulled his Suburban away from the curb in front of Cal’s store.

  “I’m not sure. That’s what we need to figure out.”

  “But now that we have this evidence, Morgan will be in the clear, right?”

  “Not necessarily.”

  “What? But Josh had the necklace.”

  “That doesn’t really prove anything. Someone could have given him the necklace, or he could have found it in the woods after the murder.”

  Fiona’s heart dropped. She looked out the window at the passing scenery of downtown Noquitt. It was prime tourist season now and the streets were loaded with people walking down the sidewalks and browsing through the shops. But Fiona didn’t see any of it. She was busy worrying about what was going to happen to Morgan.

  Jake startled her out of her reverie by putting his hand on her knee.

  “Don’t worry, we’ll get to the bottom of this and find the real killer.”

  Fiona’s heart melted when she saw the genuine concern in his gray eyes.

  “Thanks.”

  She noticed he didn’t remove his hand and her heart started beating a little faster. A few minutes later, Morgan was the furthest thing from her mind as Jake pulled the truck into her driveway.

  Fiona pushed the door handle. It opened smoothly this time, much to her disappointment. She was surprised when Jake turned off the engine. Should she invite him in?

  “I’ll walk you to the door,” Jake said. “With all the things that are happening around you girls, you can’t be too safe.”

  Fiona nodded and slipped out of the car, waiting for Jake to come round the front. Her heart skittered in her chest when he put his hand on the small of her back to lead her up the walkway to the porch.

  They climbed the steps and she stopped at the door. She turned to say good night and realized he was standing close. Very close. Her stomach flip-flopped. The urge to run away swept over her. She felt like a teenager on her first date—awkward and unsure of what to do.

  Jake must have been sure of what to do, though. He gently captured her slender wrists in his large hands kicking her pulse into overload. She wondered if he could feel it beating through her veins.

  “Fiona, I want you to promise me that you and Morgan won’t do anything … you know, like go to question a possible killer … without calling me first.”

  Fiona’s mouth was too dry to speak so she simply nodded. He ran his hands from her wrists to her upper arms and she could feel the electricity buzzing between them.

  Slowly, Jake leaned toward her. He gently brushed his lips against hers. Casual, at first as if he wasn’t sure how she would react.

  Fiona’s breath caught in the back of her throat. The cool breeze of the ocean air, the chirping of peepers, and the spicy, sweet smell of Jake flooded her senses. She pressed closer to him, parting her lips.

  Jake teased her lower lip with his tongue then slid it in further to meet her own sending jolts of pleasure through her body. She moaned and snaked her arms around his neck, pressing closer to him. How long had it been since someone had kissed her like this? Too long, Fiona thought, hoping Jake couldn’t sense how badly she wanted him.

  ***

  The feel of Fiona’s body against his drove Jake almost to the brink of no return. The scent of her strawberry shampoo, silky feel of her skin and eager thrust of her tongue heated his veins.

  He wrapped his arms around her waist and melded their bodies together, crushing his lips against hers almost hard enough to bruise them.

  His hands caressed her back, as their tongues wrestled. She moved her hips closer to his and his hand instinctively cupped her bottom grinding her even closer. A deep moan ripped from his throat.

  Jake knew he better back off before he couldn’t stop himself. He was well aware of the disasters of taking things too far too soon and he wanted Fiona too badly to screw things up now.

  He slid his hands back up to her hips. Pulling back he looked down at her upturned face. Her eyes still closed, lips swollen from their kiss. Feeling things stir in him that had lain dormant for a long time, he brushed a long red curl back from her face.

  She opened her icy-blue eyes and Jake felt like he could get lost in them. He traced the curve of her jaw with his thumb.

  “Maybe next time, we could have a more traditional date instead of doing detective work to track down a killer,” Jake said.

  She laughed and Jake placed a quick kiss on her forehead, then turned down the steps.

  He looked back at her over his shoulder. “Don’t forget, no detecting on your own.”

  She nodded and he watched her open the door and disappear into the house before he trotted
to the Suburban.

  Jake got in his truck and stared back at the house, his lips still burning from the kiss. He thought about the two murders and how Overton was hell bent on implicating one or more of the Blackmoore girls and his gut churned with worry.

  He knew Fiona must be just as worried. Maybe more. He hoped she’d remember her promise not to investigate on her own, but he doubted her feisty, impulsive nature would let her. That was one of the things that attracted him to her even though, in this case, it could prove to be quite dangerous.

  Jake sighed as he started the truck and put it in gear. All the more reason to step up his own investigation and find the real killer, fast. The stakes were too high for him to fail.

  Chapter Twenty Four

  Fiona floated through the next day, completing several orders for custom jewelry and dodging Morgan’s probing questions.

  When she and Morgan arrived home that evening, she felt like she was on top of the world … well except for the little matter of two murders that the police seemed hell bent on accusing Morgan of.

  “Let’s order pizza and eat it out on the patio,” Morgan said as they breezed through the large foyer, down the hall and into the kitchen.

  “Sounds gre—”

  Fiona’s words froze in her throat when she saw the look on Celeste’s face. Her sister was standing at the sink holding a letter, her skin almost as pale as the paper.

  “What’s wrong?” Morgan rushed over to Celeste.

  “The tax bill came.”

  Fiona’s heart lurched. With everything else going on she’d forgotten about the property taxes which were due in June. Their house and the cottage which housed Sticks and Stones had been handed down through the generations so they had no mortgage, but the property taxes were a killer—especially for the twenty-four room ocean side property.

  “How much is it?” Celeste handed the paper over. Fiona’s heart squeezed when she saw the amount.

  “Do we have that much saved?”

  Fiona shook her head. “I knew taxes were going up, but this is a big jump. We need another five thousand.”

  The girls stared at each other. “How are we going to get five thousand dollars in the next four weeks?”

  The girls made enough to get by—pay the utilities, put food on the table and, usually, pay the taxes. But they had to scrape to save enough money for all that. There was no way they could come up with that much extra in such a short time.

  Fiona felt tears prick the backs of her eyes. Would they have to sell one of their properties to pay the taxes?

  “Meow.”

  Belladonna appeared at the bottom of the back stairs, staring at them with her ice-blue eyes. Fiona looked over, expecting the cat to trot to her food dish and demand someone fill it, but she stayed by the stairs, performing various gyrations of head butting and purring on the bottom step before looking back at the girls then running back up the stairs.

  “That’s it!” Morgan snapped her fingers. Celeste and Fiona looked at her with raised brows.

  “We’ll just go up into the attic and find something we can use to pay the taxes. You found that necklace up there, Fi, there’s bound to be more valuable stuff up there.”

  “I don’t know,” Celeste glanced up at the ceiling. “I feel awful selling off our family heirlooms.”

  “Well, it’s either that or sell the house. I say we take a look.” Morgan started for the stairs.

  Fiona exchanged a look with Celeste, shrugged and then followed Morgan.

  “Let’s look around the area where you found the necklace. Maybe there is more jewelry near it.” Morgan stepped aside for Fiona to lead the way.

  “I think it was over here.” Fiona started off toward the right.

  Belladonna let out a meow over to their left and Fiona spun around. “No wait. It was over there.” She recognized the window and rocking chair.

  The girls picked their way over then started rummaging through boxes. They pawed through boxes of linens, old scrapbooks and even a pile of old newspapers.

  “Is any of this stuff valuable?” Celeste pulled a lace doily out of a box.

  “I don’t know. Maybe we should get Cal to come and look through some of it. He has a good idea about antiques.”

  Fiona sneezed as a dust cloud flew up into her nose from an old wooden box. Too bad that was all that was in it. “I don’t see any more jewelry,” she said, her heart sinking as she turned around to scan the area.

  Belladonna weaved her way from sister to sister meowing and purring. She made her way over to Celeste then scratched at her leg and took off into the depths of the attic.

  “Ouch.” Celeste bent down to rub her leg.

  “Meow.” Belladonna brought their attention to an old bookshelf over by the wall.

  “Hey, is that where you found that old book?”

  Fiona craned her neck, looking around the various boxes and pieces of furniture to where Celeste stood. “Yes, that’s it on the shelf … the one without a layer of dust.”

  She turned back to the task of looking for valuable jewelry while Celeste picked the book out and set it on the table.

  Fiona and Morgan picked their way over toward Celeste, stopping to look in any boxes that piqued their interest.

  “This book seems to be a journal from the 1700s,” Celeste said.

  “That’s pretty darn old. It must be from the original relative that built this house.” Morgan bent down picking up a small wooden box.

  “Yeah, it looks like a journal of his sailing trips and some of the stuff he brought back. There’s even some entries about building this house. At least I think. It’s hard to decipher the writing.”

  Fiona had made her way over to Celeste. She glanced over her shoulder at the book. “I wonder what that is worth.”

  Celeste jerked her head up, a look of horror on her face. “We would never sell something like this, this is our family history.”

  Fiona glanced back at the bookshelf. “Well, there’s a ton of them here.” She squatted down looking at the titles.

  “This case is full of journals, ledgers, town history books. Hey, this one looks interesting.” She pulled out a book on the families of Noquitt and started to leaf through it.

  “Hey guys. Don’t forget were up here to find something we can sell to pay the taxes.” Morgan pulled an oak bureau away from the wall and started opening the drawers.

  Fiona was about to put the book back and help Morgan when something caught her eye. A family crest—exactly like the one on the ring Josh had consigned to Cal. She stared at it, her photographic memory bringing up the image of the ring she had looked at just the day before. Her eyes flew to the top of the page. Her heart jerked in her chest when she saw whose family crest it was.

  Stark.

  “Why would Joshua Gray have a ring with the Stark family crest on it?” She looked up at her sisters who shrugged in unison.

  A noise at the entrance to the attic caught their attention. All three of them swiveled their heads in that direction. Jolene stood at the top of the stairs, a piece of paper in her hand.

  “I think I have a pretty good idea.”

  Chapter Twenty Five

  Jake bent over the plain manila envelope that held Josh Gray’s autopsy report and studied the notes from the medical examiner. Josh had been killed with a seven inch knife just like the M.E. had said on the scene. But what he didn’t say on the scene was that Josh’s septum had been ripped. Like someone had pulled something out of his nose. Like the nose ring they had found at the scene of Prudence’s murder.

  Jake rubbed the stubble on his face wishing he had found that nose ring in an official capacity. The nose ring combined with the jewelry Josh had consigned to Cal would have made powerful evidence that Josh killed Prudence. But now it was too late to admit the nose ring, unless he went back and planted it at the scene and somehow got Overton to agree to going over there again. That wasn’t likely to happen.

  At least he’d been able to l
og the jewelry from Cal’s using the proper procedures. Too bad that ring hadn’t been reported stolen. Knowing where the ring came from could be a vital clue.

  With the evidence, Jake was sure Gray had killed Prudence. But why? And then, who had killed Gray? And why?

  Jake flipped the folder shut with a sigh. He got up from his desk making his way over to the coffee station just outside Overton’s office. He had been trying to keep tabs on Overton and had discovered the best way was to linger at the coffee area since Overton had such a big mouth, he could be heard easily outside his office.

  Jake peeked through an opening in the blinds that shielded Overton’s office from the squad room. The Sheriff sat in his chair, feet up on the desk, toothpick in his mouth and phone pressed to his ear. Jake slowly poured thick, black sludge from the coffee pot into his mug.

  “I’m telling you, those girls have something to do with these murders.” Overton’s voice wafted out of his office. Jake strained to hear while he slowly opened the creamer and poured it in his coffee.

  “I think the oldest one killed Littlefield, but Gray must have seen her and she had to silence him. Her and the redhead were probably in on that one together.”

  Jake poured some sugar into his cup.

  “I don’t care how long their family has been in town.”

  Jake picked up a wooden stirrer and stirred his coffee, mindless of everything else except Overton’s voice.

  “I want a search warrant issued A.S.A.P—I’m sure they have vital evidence hidden somewhere on that property.”

  Jake thought about the nose ring on the kitchen counter and the scarf in Fiona’s room. If Overton got that warrant, the girls could be screwed.

  He pulled out his cell phone and bolted for his office.

  Fiona didn’t answer, so he tried Morgan. No answer. He slammed the phone shut, his heart pounding in his chest. Where were they?

  His eyes darted around the office. He was on duty, and, technically not supposed to leave the station unless he was dispatched on a call, but screw it. He had to warn Fiona and Morgan. He grabbed his gun, shoved his chair back and ran out to his car.