“No one is interested in me,” Harriet said, lifting her burned arm. “I’m convinced this is the result of one crazy woman and her own personal demons. It was just chance that I was standing on the stage with the quilt when she took action.”
“Do you think the local police have the resources to keep you safe with a killer on the loose?”
“They’re a small force, but diligent. I doubt they’d turn down any offers of money, if that’s what you’re asking.”
“I’ve already brought in extra security, and giving your folks money won’t help the immediate problem.”
“How did you end up with those two ex-cons who attacked my friends?” Harriet asked.
“That’s my fault. Well, Sean’s and my fault. After all these years, and everything we’ve seen, we can still be naive at times,” Colm said. “I had this idea that folks who come out of prison end up offending again for simple lack of a job. The band and I decided we were going to take a leap of faith and hire nonviolent ex-offenders for our road crew. Most of the time, it works out—Skeeter’s evidence of that. But as your friend saw, sometimes we end up with people who aren’t ready to be rehabilitated.”
“At least you’re trying to make the world a better place,” Harriet said.
“I hope you and your friends will accept our apologies.”
“Dinner’s ready,” Mavis called from the kitchen, ending their discussion.
“This looks great,” Colm said as he sat down opposite Harriet and Mavis at the dining room table.
Mavis had heated some minestrone soup from a can and made grilled cheese sandwiches. She’d also cut up celery and carrots and put them on a plate with green olives and dill pickle spears.
“We have a cook, and with the exception of concert day, when they put on a show for the backstage guests, she only makes what our nutritional consultant tells her to. At our ages, it’s the only way we can stay in the game. Sometimes I think if I eat any more skinless chicken I’m going to start clucking.”
“I hear you. My aunt sort of plays that role for me.”
“I thought you rock stars got to dictate a long list of must-haves in your dressing room—blue Skittles, brown M-and-Ms, some exotic brand of bottled water that no one’s ever heard of,” Mavis said.
“I’m sure some bands take advantage of their hosts, but most people put those detailed snack requirements at the bottom of the contract so they can tell quickly if the right people read the whole thing. We all have very specialized electronics in order to produce all the effects we use on stage—video equipment, lifts in the middle of the stage, pyrotechnics, you name it. If you walk in the dressing room and see the big bowl of blue Skittles sitting next to the brown M-and-Ms, then you know they paid attention and probably did all the wiring correctly, too. We, of course, check it out, but it gives us a clue what we’ll be dealing with.”
“How very clever,” Mavis said.
“Can I help you wash the dishes?” Colm asked Mavis when they had all finished eating. “It’s hard to believe, but it really is nice to do ordinary tasks. It gets tiresome having people wanting to do everything for you. Not for who you are, but for who you are, if that makes any sense.”
“Help yourself,” Mavis said. “Harriet’s not going to be able to help you, if you were hoping to have some one-on-one time. She needs to lie down again.”
“I do want some one-on-one time, m’lady—with you,”
“I bet you tell that to all the girls,” Mavis answered, but Harriet noticed her cheeks were ever-so-slightly pink.
“Thanks for staying to have dinner with us,” Harriet said. She stood up and started toward the stairs.
“Can I come see you in the morning before we leave town? I’ll bring something my nutritionist doesn’t approve of,” Colm said with a devilish smile. He wiggled his eyebrows for emphasis.
Harriet mentally reminded herself that she already had too many men in her life.
“That sounds wonderful,” she said. “What time should I expect you?”
“Is eight too early?”
“Eight sounds perfect.”
He stood and came to her, grasping her good hand and raising it to his lips. He went to Mavis and repeated the performance.
“Thanks again for dinner,” he said to her and headed for the kitchen.
“He’s a charmer,” Mavis said when he was gone, “but he does wash a mean dish.”
Harriet looked at her, and they both laughed. They were once again upstairs in the TV room.
“He does seem a little slick, but I’ll eat food made by his trainer if he talks to me with that accent.”
“Forget the food,” Mavis said. “I’d pay him to sit there and read the phone book.”
Harriet laughed.
“I’m surprised we haven’t heard from Aunt Beth.”
“I’m not. While you were sleeping and everyone was packing up the booths and displays, Jenny and Lauren came to help, and then Jenny said she needed to talk to us all. They were going to Jorge’s place. Jenny told me that you could tell me what she’d told you and Lauren. Lauren has your stuff in her car, by the way. She said to tell you she’ll bring it tomorrow.”
“We better make some hot cocoa, because her story is going to take a while.”
Harriet was tired by the time she finished telling Mavis what she now believed was the true story of Jenny’s life before Foggy Point.
“The problem,” she said, “is that it doesn’t get us any closer to figuring out who killed Pamela or Bobby or even who slashed Jenny’s tires. We can assume it was someone associated with the robbery, but who?”
“Sounds like there are more than a few choices. I’d imagine any of the people who got shot, went to jail or both could be contenders. So, how can we figure it out?” Mavis asked.
“Lauren is going to see if she can track each of the players, but she’s not holding out much hope. It’s likely that more than one person changed their identity as effectively as Jenny did.”
“I don’t like feeling so helpless like this,” Mavis complained. “We don’t know what’s going to happen next.”
“You can stay here with me if you’re worried. Nothing’s going to happen to me as long as you-all have me on house arrest.”
“I guess we can hope Detective Morse and her bunch will do their jobs and solve the case.”
“I like Jane, but I’m not holding my breath on this one,” Harriet said.
“Now, honey, you know she’s doing the best she can on a shoestring budget and her having to stay within the bounds of the law all the time.”
“I guess.”
“Would you like some help getting in your jammies?”
Harriet would never have admitted it if Lauren had been there, but she really did need help.
“That would be great,” she said and followed Mavis across the hall to her bedroom.
Chapter 31
Harriet woke to the sound of her cell phone buzzing on her nightstand. She saw the image of Carla holding Wendy on the screen and grabbed it, swiping to connect the call.
“Hey,” she said.
“Is it too early?”
“No, my alarm was about to go off.”
“I thought you were supposed to be resting.”
“Colm Byrne is bringing me breakfast.”
“Wow, that’s exciting,” Carla said.
“I guess. But enough about me. What did you want to talk about so badly we’re doing this at seven in the morning?”
“It’s Aiden,” she said. “He wants me to move home. I mean, to his home.”
“What do you want to do?”
“I want all this business with Michelle to never have happened,” she said.
“I’m sure, but what do you want to do now, in the real world?”
“That’s what I’m trying to figure out,” Carla said. “I’ve spent a lot of time making bad choices and being everyone’s doormat. I don’t want Wendy to think it’s okay for people to treat you bad,
and then you respond by asking them to do it again.”
“So, you don’t want to go back to Aiden’s?”
“No, I do want to go back to Aiden’s, but how do I without it being him taking advantage of me again?”
“That’s a tough one,” Harriet said. “You’re sure you want to go back?”
“Our time at Aiden’s was the first time in Wendy’s life that I didn’t have to worry where her next meal was coming from. And I liked the idea of being able to stay in one place for a while.”
“It’s not being weak wanting to provide a better life for your child. Maybe you need to talk it out with Aiden. Tell him what you just told me. Let him know how he made you feel. Let him know that if you come back, it can’t be like it was, with him letting his sister or anyone else treat you like that.”
“Won’t he fire me for being too demanding?”
“He needs you more than you need him,” Harriet told her.
“That’s not true,” Carla protested. “He has everything.”
“He has everything material. The only reason his sister could influence him like she did was because he’s lonely or emotionally fragile or something. He’s suffered a lot of loss this last year.”
“Including you?” Carla asked softly.
“That was his doing. I guess I’m in the same spot you are. Michelle has been our only real problem. I just worry that, if he ditched me so easily when his sister went off the rails, what else might do it?”
“Maybe he’s right. If either of us had a sister, maybe we’d understand why he’ll move heaven and earth to help her. Maybe she is a one-off, and nothing else would cause him to treat us so badly,” Carla said.
“Or maybe we’re being the perfect victims.”
“So what am I supposed to do?”
“I guess I’m not the right person to ask.”
“It helped to talk about it—thanks for listening. I guess I better go.”
“Let me know how it goes,” Harriet said and rang off.
“Come on, boys,” she said to her furry bed buddies. “We need to get you fed, and I need to get cleaned up before our breakfast date gets here.”
Scooter jumped off the bed and started dancing around her feet. Fred swatted at the excited dog then ran down the stairs.
True to his word, Colm Byrne was on her doorstep at three minutes after eight. She had just come downstairs, tucking her cell phone into the sling the doctor had insisted she wear when she was up and about. As far as she could tell, that was the only thing the sling was useful for.
“Hi,” she said as she opened the door. “Come on in.”
“Where can I put this?” he said and held out a white cardboard baker’s box balanced on his right hand; his guitar case he held by its handle in his left.
“Follow me.” She led him into the kitchen, where he set the guitar down. He opened the box, revealing four individual-sized pies. Two were quiche of some sort, and two looked like miniature fruit pies.
“Cook said if we ate our eggs, we could have our fruit pies. And her pies are to die for.”
“They look great and smell even better,” Harriet agreed.
She pulled two plates one-handed from her cupboard and gathered silverware and napkins.
“I hope you don’t mind eating in the kitchen,” she said.
“I prefer the kitchen. My dear mother always fed us kids in the kitchen. It makes me feel a little like I’m home.” He rolled up the cuffs of his white button-down shirt before reaching into the box to lift out the quiches and place one on each plate. Harriet noticed the edge of a tattoo on his arm.
“Is that a tattoo?” she asked. “Can I see it?”
He pulled his shirtsleeve up, revealing a familiar stylized peace sign.
“Do you like it?” he asked, rubbing his hand over it.
“I like the colors,” Harriet said, trying to think of something positive to say about the tattoo.
“This was the first one I got,” he said with a rueful smile. “My friends and I all got the same tattoo when we were eighteen years old. I was the youngest in the group, and the day after I passed my eighteenth birthday, we all went and got matching ink. My mother almost had a stroke.” He smiled. “It was my first big rebellion.”
“The first of many, I take it?” She smiled back.
“Do you have any?” he asked. “Tattoos, that is. I can see you’re a rebel at heart.”
“No, my parents would have killed me. I definitely was a rebel, but I never really had the urge to be marked in such a permanent way.”
“We considered it a rite of passage.”
“Was that peace symbol a common image when you got it?” she asked.
“There were plenty of people with peace signs, but we had the artist modify ours so it would be unique.”
Harriet knew she’d seen it before.
“Enough about me. I get bored talking about myself all the time.” He reached across the table and put his fingers lightly on the back of her hand. “How are you doing? Last night you said you weren’t getting better. What do your doctors say?”
“It’s no big deal,” Harriet said. “My burn is having a little infection trouble. They don’t really know if the woman who threw the acid purposefully contaminated the brew she threw on me or if it’s just the typical sort of infection you can get as a result of being in a hospital.”
“She’s not that clever,” Colm said, and then hurriedly added, “At least, from what I’ve read in the paper she wouldn’t be that clever. They said she was too mentally ill.”
“She did seem pretty crazy,” Harriet agreed, but she wondered at his choice of words.
“Speaking of mentally ill,” he said, changing the subject. “Have you heard anything new about the murder?”
“No, have you?”
“Not really. Most of the people I’ve heard talking agree your friend was the intended target. Do you ladies have any idea why anyone would want to kill her?”
“You seem awfully interested in our small-town murder,” Harriet said with a smile. “But don’t worry, we’ll figure out who did it.”
“I’ll just bet you will.”
“My friend Jenny would be happy if it all just goes away. She doesn’t want to know who wants her dead, she just wants them to stop.”
“She doesn’t like the attention?” he asked.
“Would you?”
“No, I suppose not,” he conceded. “But you’re willing to be the talk of the town if it means justice for the victim?”
“That ship has sailed,” she said. “A few murders ago. So, yeah, I will find out who killed Pamela and see that they pay.”
“I was afraid you were going to say that.” Colm got up, went over to his guitar case and knelt down to open it. Was he going to sing to her after this weird conversational turn? she wondered as he fumbled around in the case.
Her smile froze when he turned around, a shiny black nine-millimeter pistol in one hand, a matching silencer in his other. He began screwing the two pieces together.
“What are you doing?” she squeaked.
“Oh, I think you know,” he said. “I was hoping it wasn’t going to come to this. I gave you every chance I could. All you had to say was you were going to let it go.”
“Let what go? I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Don’t play coy with me. What have we been talking about? The murders, of course. And strangely, you may have saved your friend Jenny.”
“You?” The quiche she’d just eaten was threatening to come back up. “What have you got against Jenny?”
“Well, now, that’s an interesting story,” Colm said. “It turns out your friend Jenny is my friend Jonquil.”
Colm’s accent had changed; his last sentence wasn’t spoken in the lilting Irish she’d become familiar with. His was a distinctly American accent—Pacific Northwest, if she had to make a guess.
“Who are you?” she said.
His answer was inter
rupted by a knock on her outside door.
“Are you expecting company?” he demanded.
“It could be any of the Threads. They’ve all been spending time here since I got burned.”
“It’s not them. Your group is all at a post-festival meeting for the volunteers and vendors. I checked. Their cars were all in the parking lot when I left.”
“I can’t tell you, then. What I can tell you is if I don’t answer the door, whoever it is will likely get the hidden key and come in anyway.”
“Answer it and get rid of whoever it is,” he barked at her, and waved his gun toward the connecting door. “And don’t try anything cute, or you won’t be the only one with a hole in their head.”
Harriet got up, tilting her arm slightly down as she turned her back to Colm and went into her studio with him following at a distance.
“Aiden,” she said in surprise. “I’m so glad to see you.”
“You are?” He raised his left eyebrow. A muscle in his jaw tightened.
“Scooter’s back is really bothering him. I was afraid I was going to have to wait until one of the Threads came over to take him to see you.”
She took his hand i and pulled him into the room.
“This is Colm Byrne,” she said. “You know, the rock star.”
“I know who Colm Byrne is,” he said, giving her a questioning look.
She stared into his eyes, willing him not to go into his jealous routine.
“Nice to meet you,” he said, turning to Byrne with a smile. Colm nodded, but kept his distance, the gun held straight down, hidden behind his leg.
“Dr. Jalbert is my little dog Scooter’s doctor,” Harriet explained, realizing she was babbling but unable to stop. “He rescued Scooter from a hoarder a few months ago, and Scooter still has some health problems. He needs to check the burn on his back.”
She called Scooter, who came to the kitchen door and barked to be let into the studio. Harriet turned and went to the door, Aiden close on her heels. He saw the half-eaten pies on the kitchen table and looked back at her.
“Am I interrupting something?”
“We were eating breakfast,” Colm said.
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