Cross-Stitch Before Dying

by Amanda Lee

  “They went through your stuff too?” he asked.

  “Yep. Mom is the one who found Henry’s body,” I said. “Didn’t they tell you that?”

  “They didn’t tell me much of anything.” He took another bite of muffin. “I still say it wasn’t Eileen, though. I’ve known her for a long time. A killer, she ain’t.”

  “Then it just about had to be someone here,” I said. “How did Henry seem when you saw him?”

  “He was jittery . . . sweating, breathing hard. . . . He kept putting his hands up to his temples.” Sonny took a drink of his coffee. “I didn’t want to leave him like that, so I asked him to let me call an ambulance for him.”

  “What did he say?”

  “He said no—said he probably just had a little touch of food poisoning from his breakfast,” he said.

  “Maybe that’s it,” I said. “Maybe somebody bribed one of the hotel workers to put the poison in Henry’s food.”

  “I’m sure the police are taking all that into consideration. Don’t get so worked up.”

  “How can I not get worked up, Sonny? My mother is under suspicion for Henry’s death . . . and so are you. How can you not get worked up?”

  “I know I’m innocent,” he said. “And I believe in our justice system. Let the police do their jobs. That’s what I’m doing.”

  “Okay,” I said. I looked at my watch, even though I had nowhere I had to be at any particular time. “I really should be going.”

  “Well, now, you just trust that everything will be all right,” Sonny said. “And thank you for the muffins. They’re delicious.”

  “You’re welcome.” I turned back toward him when I got to the door. “If you think of anything, will you let me know?”

  “Sure,” he said.

  Somehow, I wasn’t very confident about that.

  As I was waiting for the elevator, Ron Fitzpatrick came down the hall.

  “Hey, Marcy,” he said. “What’re you doing here?”

  “I stopped by to see Sonny for a minute. He seems pretty upset over Henry’s death,” I said.

  “Yeah, we all are.”

  The elevator doors opened, and Ron and I walked inside.

  “I’m going to breakfast,” he said, as the doors closed. “Want to join me?”

  “No, thanks. I need to get home and check on Mom. This past week has really taken a toll on her,” I said.

  “I heard that.” He shook his head. “First Babs and then Henry? It’s like somebody’s gone nuts . . . like the whole world has gone nuts!”

  “I know. Hey, you mentioned you had promo and outtake footage that you submitted to news and entertainment outlets,” I said. “I’d love to see it.”

  “And I’d be happy to show it to you, but I really am starving.”

  “Can we do it later today?” I asked. “You could come to my house, we could have snacks. . . . Angus would try to cajole you into a game of fetch. . . .”

  “Yeah, sounds good,” he said. “Just tell me when and where.”

  I gave him my address, and he agreed to come by at around one o’clock that afternoon.

  When I got out to the Jeep, I called Ted and asked if he could make it.

  “I’ll be there,” he said. “But are you sure a movie clip party is really what your mom needs right now?”

  “I think it might be exactly what we all need. Maybe we’ll see something that will help us find the person who killed both Babs and Henry.”

  He chuckled. “All right, Inch-High. I’ll see you at one.”

  Okay, I’ll admit it was a stretch. No one was going to walk by wearing a sandwich sign reading I hate Babs on one side and I hate Henry on the other. But we might see something that would give us a clue.

  • • •

  I pulled onto my street and noticed a strange car parked in my driveway. It was a black sedan, and my fear that it was a police officer or journalist hassling my mother made me whip into the driveway sideways, throw the Jeep into park, and rush into the house with guns-a-blazing. Not that I had any guns to blaze, but I’m talking attitude here. I had attitude—plenty of attitude.

  “Mom! Are you all right?” I called as I opened the door, ready to do battle with the unknown, unwanted guest.

  “I’m in the kitchen, darling. Come and meet Eileen,” Mom said.

  Eileen. Eileen Beaumont. So I’d overreacted. But, in my defense, Eileen still hadn’t been ruled out as a killer yet . . . at least not in my book.

  “I’ll be right there!” I called. I went back outside, got in the Jeep—whose door I’d left open—and parked properly . . . and then I got out, closed the door, and went back into the house.

  When I went into the kitchen, I saw that Mom was making crepes.

  “Hi, sweetie,” Mom said. “Are you hungry?”

  “No, thanks,” I said. I walked to the table and extended my right hand toward Eileen. “Hi, I’m Marcy.”

  “We’ve met before actually,” said Eileen, a woman with wavy caramel brown hair and dark eyes. “You were just a little girl then. I’m not surprised you don’t remember me.”

  “Wait. It was at a cast party, wasn’t it?” I asked, vaguely remembering Eileen Beaumont in a long peach gown smiling and nodding at everyone who spoke to her.

  “It was,” Eileen said.

  “See?” Mom asked. “I told you she’d remember.”

  I pulled out a chair and sat down. “I’m sorry for your loss, Eileen. It must’ve come as quite a shock.”

  “Yes, it did,” she said. “I keep turning the whole thing over and over in my mind. First Babs and then Henry. I can’t imagine who’d want to hurt either of them . . . but both? It’s almost unbelievable.” Her eyes filled with tears. “And yet the person whose face I keep seeing in my mind is that of Mita Trublonski. I can’t help but feel that somehow she’s responsible for everything.”

  Chapter Twenty-two

  Eileen Beaumont had left long before Ron Fitzpatrick had arrived, but what she’d said about Mita Trublonski lingered. I couldn’t imagine Mita harming her own child, but if she thought Henry was responsible for Babs’ death, she might strike out at him. I intended to look at the footage closely to see if Ms. Trublonski was in any of the footage and, if she was, how she’d behaved toward Henry.

  Ted had called me back before coming over and asked if I’d mind another set of experienced eyes seeing the film footage. I’d said of course I didn’t, so Manu and Reggie joined our viewing party. Ted and the Singhs arrived in separate vehicles but at roughly the same time. Ron arrived at one o’clock on the dot. I’d baked some mini-quiches I had in the freezer along with brownies and peanut butter cookies. Mom had made a cheese ball and placed it on a tray with an assortment of crackers. I felt as if we were in good shape refreshment-wise.

  We arranged everything on a decorative platter and took it into the living room. It was a mild, sunny day, so I put Angus out into the backyard with a granola bone until after everyone had had their fill of the refreshments. Even with the platter placed on the highest surface of the living room, it wouldn’t be safe from a dog of Angus’s considerable height . . . and appetite.

  “Hey,” Ron said when he came in carrying his equipment bag. “I didn’t know there’d be so many people here.”

  “Well, you know Reggie,” I said. “This is her husband Manu, and this is Ted Nash.” I decided not to reiterate the fact that we were looking for murder suspects, especially since Ron seemed a little nervous. “At the rate things are going, this might be our only chance to see any of the movie.”

  “Yeah,” he said. “It might. Hope not, though. That’d be a shame. I saw Angus outside—told him I’d play with him before I leave.”

  “I thought I’d bring him back in after we have our snacks,” I said.

  He glanced over at the platter. “Oh, that’s smart.
Chocolate is bad for dogs.”

  “I know.” I smiled. “Is there anything you need to get set up?”

  “Nope. I’ll just plug into your TV, if that’s all right.”

  “That’s fine,” I told him.

  Ted, Mom, and Reggie were sitting on the sofa. Manu was on the armchair. I was planning to sit on the ottoman, but that left Ron without a seat. I went into the kitchen to retrieve a chair. By the time I got back, Ron had set up a computer with the digital equipment on the ottoman and pulled it close enough to the television to hook in the required cables. I went back for another chair.

  Instead of sitting on a chair, however, Ron sat on the floor in front of the ottoman so he could work the equipment to show us the film footage. I placed my chair beside Manu. He gave me a smile and a nod, as if to reassure me that we’d certainly see something in Ron’s footage that would help us to discover the identity of Babs’ and Henry’s murderer or murderers. I doubted he was really all that confident. I wasn’t, but like everything else as far as investigating this case went, it couldn’t hurt.

  The first clip that came up on my TV screen featured Babs in full Sonam Zakaria costume back in San Francisco. She was batting her lashes and flirting with someone offscreen. She even blew the person a kiss.

  “Okay,” Henry was saying. “Can we please get the shot this time? We’re getting behind schedule. Babs, sweetie, I know you’ll nail it this time.” His I know sounded more like an I’m praying.

  Babs gave him a saucy shrug and then sauntered over to her mark.

  Henry gave the command to “Roll ’em.”

  Babs said her line and apparently did well because Henry called “Cut” and Babs walked off the set, winking at the camera as she did so.

  The next clip was from Oregon. Again, Babs was in a flirtatious frame of mind. This time she was flirting with both Sonny and Henry. Someone said in a singsong voice that Babs had a boyfriend, and she told the man in an angry tone to shut up. The camera panned around to the other people who were on the set. I recognized Ron, a makeup artist, and Deputy Preston.

  “What’s Deputy Preston doing there?” I asked.

  “He was one of the patrolmen assigned to security detail,” Ron said.

  On-screen, Babs was shouting, “Where’s my phone?” She followed up with the same question followed by a few choice expletives.

  Ron laughed. The rest of us didn’t.

  “Did she ever find her phone?” Manu asked.

  “Oh, sure. It was found in her dressing room later that day,” Ron said. “It had probably been there all along.”

  “I didn’t know her—I only met her once,” Reggie said. “But Babs seemed to have been pretty bratty.”

  “She wasn’t after you got to know her,” Ron said. “Sure, she could be difficult—all great actresses can be—but she was so beautiful and so talented. . . . I think any man would’ve gone overboard to please her.” He laughed. “You should’ve seen us all scrambling around trying to find her phone.”

  “Did Mita Trublonski visit the set often?” I asked.

  “She didn’t drop by all that much,” Ron said. “When she did, though, I could tell that Babs and her mom didn’t have the world’s best relationship. I always got the impression that Mita was jealous of Babs . . . that she wanted Babs’ fame and attention.”

  “What about Mita and Henry?” Ted asked. “Did they get along well?”

  “They were civil.” Ron pulled up the next clip. “Mostly, though, they avoided each other.”

  The rest of the footage contained scenes from the movie with a couple outtakes of actors—other than Babs—flubbing their lines.

  “Didn’t Babs ever make a mistake?” Reggie asked.

  Ron grinned. “Not that she’d let us retain on film.”

  • • •

  After Ron left, Angus lay at Reggie’s feet and enjoyed having her scratch behind his ears.

  “He certainly was infatuated with Babs, wasn’t he?” Reggie asked.

  “Yes, he was,” Mom said. “And I, for one, disagree with his assessment that she got along well with all the men. A few of them might’ve been hoodwinked like Ron, but many of them saw through her petty, manipulative machinations.”

  “If I were investigating this for the Tallulah County Police Department, I’d first try to determine whether we were dealing with one killer or two,” Manu said. “Detectives Bailey and Ray are adamant that Babs was killed by a blow to the head and they maintain that they have the murder weapon.”

  “And yet a couple people still insist that Babs’ death might’ve been an accident,” I said.

  “Maybe that’s what they want to believe . . . or want you to think they believe,” Ted said.

  “Here’s what I’m thinking,” Manu said. “What if Henry’s killer thought Henry killed Babs?” He turned to Mom. “Beverly, didn’t you say you saw Henry headed in Babs’ direction after you left her that morning?”

  “Yes, I did. But I never thought he killed her,” Mom said. “I mean, the thought crossed my mind, but I dismissed it as being ridiculous. What made me angry toward Henry was the thought that he was the father of Babs’ baby.”

  “And that’s something else that could’ve made the killer angry,” Ted pointed out. “No one seemed to know Babs was pregnant until after she was dead.”

  “So what we need to determine—I mean, what Detectives Ray and Bailey need to determine—is whether they’re dealing with one killer or two and the motives behind the murders,” Reggie said.

  Ted had a white dry-erase board across an entire wall in his home office. I wish I had something similar to help us brainstorm. Since I didn’t, I went into the kitchen and got a piece of paper. I made five columns: One Killer, Two Killers, Movie-Related Motive, Love Motive, and Other.

  “Let’s list everything we know or can guess into these columns,” I said. “If it supports the one-killer theory, we’ll put it in that column. That way, we can sort out our thoughts and see what we’ve got when we’re finished.”

  “Okay,” Manu said. “Put unrequited love into the two-killers column.”

  “What about Eileen Beaumont?” I asked. “Should we put her into a column?”

  Manu frowned. “I don’t know anything about her. Is she the wife of the deceased?” He shook his head as if to clear out the police jargon. “I mean, is she Henry’s wife?”

  “She is,” Mom said. “She’s in town trying to learn whatever she can from the police, and she came to brunch today. I believe she’s innocent, but Marcella seems to think Eileen was upset enough over learning that Henry had an affair more than twenty years ago to slip some poison into his shampoo.”

  “He had an affair that produced a child,” I said.

  “Marcy has a point,” Reggie said. “No matter how nice someone seems, that person could still turn out to be the killer. But since Eileen Beaumont was in San Francisco—wasn’t she?—when Babs died, I think we should put her in the two-killers column too.”

  “What about Ron?” I asked. “Do you think it’s possible he could’ve found out Babs was pregnant and been enraged enough at both her and Henry to kill them both?”

  “Maybe, but it’s doubtful,” Ted said. “He wasn’t on the surveillance tape visiting Henry’s room that day.”

  “But he could’ve put the poison in something some time other than that morning,” I said.

  “All right then. Put him in the one-killer column,” Ted said with a grin.

  “I’m just trying to cover all the bases,” I said.

  “I know,” he said. “And you’re wonderful.”

  “Don’t you guys start with the lovey-dovey stuff,” Manu teased. “We’re brainstorming here. What about Mita Trublonski? Does she raise any red flags with anyone?”

  “She did with Eileen,” Mom said. “Eileen seems to think everything
is Mita’s fault. She was bitterly adamant about that.”

  “Which goes back to my reasoning that she could be our killer,” I said. “Even if she was in San Francisco, she could’ve got someone to hit Babs over the head and push her over the ledge.”

  “We’ve moved on from the subject of Eileen,” Mom said. “Right now, we’re talking about Mita Trublonski and the fact that she’s just as probable a suspect as anyone.”

  “She might do Henry in,” I said. “But I don’t think she’d kill her own daughter.”

  “I can’t imagine her killing either one,” Reggie said. “She didn’t really strike me as a woman of much substance. Why would she get rid of either of her meal tickets?”

  “What about the movie angle?” Ted asked. “Could there be someone that was so desperate this movie not be made that they were willing to kill to stop it?”

  “I don’t know why they would,” Manu said. “Sonam Zakaria isn’t that big a name in the United States. I can’t imagine any of her family or fellow countrymen sabotaging the movie because they dislike its content.”

  “Maybe they were spending too much money on it,” Mom said. “Henry was pulling out all the stops for his little princess. I wouldn’t be surprised to learn that the film was over budget despite the short time we’d been filming.”

  I looked over at Ted who had his chin resting on his steepled fingers. “What is it?” I asked him. “You’re giving something some serious thought.”

  “I keep thinking back to the gunman we found dead there on Monday morning,” he said. “Maybe instead of looking at the possibility of there being three isolated murders, we should consider the fact that they might all be related somehow.”

  Manu inclined his head. “I wonder if Detectives Bailey and Ray have looked at that.”

  “We should find out,” Ted said.

  Chapter Twenty-three

  Monday morning, I was sitting in the sit-and-stitch square working on my impressionist cross-stitch project. Once again, Angus had stayed home with Mom. I missed him, but I realized she needed him right now. He’d hopefully be back at the Seven-Year Stitch where he belonged soon, and Mom would be out from under the dark cloud of suspicion and back at work.