Val turned just in time to see Johnny run at her. He had some sort of farming implement in his hand, and was poised to stab her with it. Not missing a beat, Val raised the shovel and swung. It caught him full in the face as he ran towards her, and he fell over like a toppled tree.
Lilah reached them just as Johnny was struggling to get up. Val had hit him with such force that the shovel had been knocked out of her hands, and the pitchfork that Johnny had been carrying had also been knocked away. His face was streaming blood from a broken nose and split lip, but the hit hadn’t knocked him out. Gabby was frozen, watching in horror as the scene unfolded in front of her.
Not knowing what else to do, Lilah picked up the shovel and hit him in the shoulder with it. He fell to his side, groaning. She kept a firm grip on the shovel, keenly aware that it was the only weapon that they had between the three of them.
“Don’t move,” she warned. “Or I’ll hit you again.”
“You’re crazy,” he muttered. “You’re protecting a bad lady.”
“What do you mean?” Lilah glanced over at Gabby, wondering if they had been hoodwinked. Was it possible that she was the killer after all? Had she been the one who had slashed all of their tires? She hated being so unsure.
“She’s a bad lady. She hurt Mrs. Perry. She shouldn’t have been with a married man,” Johnny mumbled. He seemed somewhat incoherent, probably from the blow to his face he had sustained a few moments ago.
“He loved me!” Gabby cut in. “He would have left her for me like he promised if he hadn’t been killed.”
“I know,” Johnny said. “I had to stop him. He was a bad man. He hurt Mrs. Perry too.”
Lilah and Val exchanged a look. Had he just confessed to killing the farm manager?
“I’m calling the police,” Gabby announced. “They’ll figure all of this out. You’re going to rot in prison for life if you killed my Mark, Johnny. And you’ll deserve every second behind bars.”
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
* * *
The next few hours passed in a blur of too-bright lights and faceless people in uniform. Lilah was questioned multiple times, asked to relay her story first to the police, then to the paramedics who showed up to look over Val and Gabby, then by a news crew that had somehow gotten wind of what had happened. She answered what felt like hundreds of questions, but didn’t get a chance to ask any of her own. It wasn’t until the next day that she got answers when she tuned in to the local news station during breakfast.
Johnny, it turned out, had confessed everything to the police that night. He had killed Mark in a fit of rage after discovering that Mark was planning on leaving Mrs. Perry and taking everything he could with him. The farm manager’s wife had helped Johnny out of a tight spot before, and he was fiercely loyal to her.
He swore that he hadn’t been trying to kill Gabby that night. He had lost his temper when he saw her, the adulteress, leaving flowers for another woman’s husband. It wasn’t until he saw that Gabby had found the other two women and had heard them talk about going to the police that he realized he might have made a mistake. He admitted, the news reported, that he was going to kill them all and hide their bodies in the cornfield. He said he liked Val and Lilah, but he was more concerned about going to jail.
It was a chilling story, and Lilah switched off the television as soon as it was over. She had liked Johnny. She had worked with him quite often over the last couple of weeks. It still seemed surreal that he had been the killer all along.
She was washing her breakfast dishes when someone knocked on her front door. Turning the water off and wiping her hands on the dish towel, she went to see who it was. The peephole showed Margie’s familiar, comforting face. Nudging Winnie aside with her foot, she opened the door and invited her friend in with a smile.
“It’s good to see you. I’m still a bit freaked out by everything that happened last night.”
“I don’t blame you,” the older woman said, giving a delicate shudder. “I can’t imagine going through everything you went through. How are you holding up?”
“It’s not too bad. It’s good knowing he’s in jail. I think this is going to be the hardest for Mrs. Perry and Gabby. They both knew Johnny, and he killed a man that they both cared about.”
She opened the door wider and invited Margie in, then went back to cleaning the breakfast dishes. “I’m sorry again about your car,” she added. “I’ll pay for all new tires.”
“It wasn’t your fault. They should make Johnny pay for it, as far as I’m concerned,” her friend said. “Anyway, I didn’t come here to talk about all of that. I figured you could use something to distract you, so I thought we’d start making a business plan.”
“A business plan?”
“For the cookie shop,” Margie said with a smile. “That is, if you still think you might want to do it.”
“I’d have to be crazy not to want to make a living making cookies,” Lilah said. She finished drying the last dish and sat at the breakfast table next to her friend. “Do you really it could be successful?”
“Why wouldn’t it be? Everyone loves cookies, and you’ll get plenty of repeat customers. If Greg Motts thinks he can open a toy shop and make a profit, then someone with your inherent gifts and your knowledge of the business world should be able to do the same with cookies.”
“There’s so much to think about,” she said, overwhelmed. “There can’t be that many empty buildings zoned for retail in town, and I’ll need one with a kitchen area already set up. And then there’s finding suppliers for bulk ingredients, marketing, figuring out what sort of licensure I need to sell food… this is going to be a huge project, Margie.”
“I’m up to it, if you are,” her friend said, her eyes twinkling. “I haven’t been so excited about something in years.”
“Neither have I,” Lilah admitted. She took a deep breath. “All right. Let’s do it.”
Killer Halloween Cookies: Book 2 in The Killer Cookie Cozy Mysteries Page 8