by Beth Byers
“You look very like your dad,” I said gently as I handed him a basket of food from The 2nd Chance Diner. There were sandwiches, cookies, cake, bottled juices and waters and some chips. I’d brought four of them with food for eat least 6 in each one. It was a lot of food, but I felt so bad for them. What would it be like to run into the rest of their family for dinner?
“Yeah,” George said. “So you know about that?”
George shook his head and muttered, “I think I was the last to know.”
He was sitting in the waiting area of the police station. I had seen a couple go in before I headed into the department. I knew that they had sat one of the siblings and a wife in an interview room, another was in Carver’s office with him, and the 4th hadn’t come into the station yet. It was about as private as we were going to get.
We were catching the gazes of the people who knew me and probably guessed what I was up to. There was one of the traffic cops who raised a brow at me and a clerk for the police department who shook her head. She was probably one of the ones who thought I should mind my own business. I was pretty sure she wasn’t wrong.
“George, I’m sorry about your mom.”
“You and me both,” he said wearily. He shoved his hands through his hair, and said, “My kids are little. How am I going to explain this to them?”
I didn’t know what to tell him, so I just shook my head helplessly.
“Grandma was stolen from us, but our family hated her because she did her sister wrong. And my real dad, he died knowing she loved another man and had their whole lives. He knew it. He told me he knew it and he’d been selfish to cling to her so hard.”
I pressed my lips together, so I didn’t interrupt, but I wanted to tell him how sorry I was.
“My dad…always knew…always. He kept journals and wrote about it. He wrote about all the things he tried to get her to love him again.”
I couldn’t hold back the tear at that. “I can’t feel the sadness without all the anger.”
I glanced his way, knew myself for a stranger and then decided to just pretend I wasn’t. He needed a friend. Maybe I would do. “That seems reasonable to me. Your mom messed up in some pretty big ways.”
“Yeah she did.”
I took his hand then and said, “But she was your mom. And she loved you.”
He didn’t look up, and he was stiff as a board. I bet he was hurting too hard to function. Losing your mom was terrible. I’d seen enough pictures to know she was a big part of his life. Despite all the under currents with Keith and the man who had raised and loved George, he loved his mom.
“You deserved to have her for longer,” I said.
“She…deserved better. Even after everything.” His voice cracked as he spoke, and he didn’t move his gaze from the floor.
“I suppose that there were a lot of people who were hurt by her relationship with Keith. More than just you and your dad and Kylie.”
George grunted and then, when I waited, said, “Yeah. All of Kylie’s kids. They didn’t figure it out. I did when I did a genetics thing and realized how unlikely it was for me to have green eyes. Then I started looking for who had green eyes and saw Keith. I was like…14.”
What a terrible way to learn. “I asked my dad about it. I thought I was adopted.”
“What did he say?”
“He lied,” George said, “But he lied and I didn’t believe him, and he knew it. He started taking me out every couple of weeks after that. So I knew he loved me. He reached out extra big towards me.”
“It sounds like you were lucky to have him,” I said gently. I had to believe that his mother’s murder brought up all the old stuff again. The realization that his dad wasn’t his dad. The mourning of that. “Did it change how you felt about him?”
I was asking for Jane now. Jane and her son.
“At first, I wasn’t sure he really loved me. But after a while, I knew he did. Then I was just mad. Mad that he wasn’t my dad. Mad that he had been lied to. Mad that Mom cheated on him when he deserved better.”
I flinched for Jane and for Margaret. For George and for Jane’s son as well.
“They’re going to ask you if you have any idea who might have killed your mom,” I told him. I had seen Simon leave Carver’s office, but they didn’t come this way. I was pretty sure it was on purpose. To give me time to see if I could get anything else from him.
“I wasn’t here,” he said.
“But you must have a pretty good idea who hated her.”
His laugh was bitter and then he muttered, “They all did. Thanks for this.”
He gestured to the basket and then rose, crossing to the clerk. I, of course, let him go. I had to wonder who else realized that George wasn’t genetically a Parsons. Did they all know? Or was it just a secret among those who had figured it out. How did Keith handle it? The man who had raised George was dead. Did he just ignore that he was biologically the father? Or did Keith address it and be rebuffed? Perhaps they had a relationship? Perhaps they were friendly?
Carver took George into his office and the moment the door closed, Simon crossed to me.
“Did he say who he thought killed her?”
I shook my head and let our hands tangle together. I handed him the basket I made for the police department. It was a small, enough department that there were enough sandwiches and cookies for them all. Simon smiled as he saw it and then pressed a kiss to my forehead.
I left and found myself getting into my car. I knew I shouldn’t do it, but I did. I drove to the cottages at the edge of town and parked. The area with the barbecues, grass, and picnic tables was empty. The little string of matching cottages was not empty. One had an open door, and you could see shadows moving around inside. Another had a teenager watching two younger kids playing in the grass with cars. Through another, you could hear music playing.
I didn’t go up to the cottages because that was how you ended up trapped in a burning house, but I did stare at them too long and think. I didn’t think Kylie had killed her sister. I don’t know that I’d be all that surprised if I found out I was wrong, but I had the feeling that she knew something. That she was protecting someone. And, of course, as the matriarch of this family, it could be any of them. But I could rule out all the men, all the children, and probably all the in-laws. Which left granddaughters and daughters who’d been at that tearoom and Gertrude.
Gertrude, however, was one step removed. She might have been angry with her sister for messing up the family dynamic, but I didn’t see her murdering over what her sister did. These weren’t crazy criminals; they were a family with hurt behind them.
As I sat in the car, I made a list of all the women that could have been in the tearoom from Gertrude and Kylie down to the granddaughters. From there, I started googling them trying to find anything out about them. I learned that Gertrude worked at a local women’s shelter and organized service for it.
Kylie won an Oregon State Fair offering for orange marmalade and another for a relish for hot dogs. I gagged a little at the thought of a hot dog, but I clicked on the article that showed her picture.
One of her daughters had been interviewed by a local newspaper about an event at her kid’s school. Another had an arrest for a DUI that showed up in a small town paper.
When I saw the last article, for the last name, it all became clear. Clear and horrifying. I stared out the window of my car and realized that while I’d been openly snooping on the family, one of them had been watching me.
Our gazes met across the grassy area, and she paled. Perhaps she could see in my eyes what I knew. There was a bit of a plea in her gaze, but…I couldn’t let it go.
As much as you might want to, you didn’t let it go. You just did what you could to make things better. The problem with murder was—there was no recompense for killing someone.
Chapter 11
I walked into the police department and saw that one of the Parsons families was still there. They were in a conferenc
e room with Carver and Simon. I met Simon’s gaze, and he must have seen in my gaze that I had figured something out. He held up an index finger and then wrote something down on a piece of paper. The next moment Carver was meeting my gaze through the window. I nodded once, and he held up another index finger.
A moment later, both Simon and Carver were leaving the conference room to cross to me.
“Hey,” Simon said. It was a tenuous sort of greeting since he knew me too well. He could probably see the sorrow in my gaze. The empathy I had for what I was about to do. I was going to ruin someone’s life. Or, at least, I was going to reveal what someone had done to ruin their own life.
“Wait,” a voice called. She was breathless and there was a flood of emotion in her voice. “Wait. It was me. I did it. I…I killed Margaret.”
Carver and Simon turned from me as George Parsons who had been in the conference room rushed out.
“Aunt Kylie? What? How could you!”
“She stole my husband,” Kylie said, but it was a wooden sort of confession if you were looking to poke holes in it, you could.
“So you killed her? Why not Keith? Why not forever ago? Now? After all this time?”
“Don’t make light of it,” Kylie shouted, “What they did was wrong. They ruined everything. They…they…” She cursed.
“So she had to die? You think I wasn't hurt by them? You think you were alone in it?”
I stepped back and saw the green face of Keith Longman.
“Kylie…” Keith said, rising. “You didn’t do this.”
He was so sure. So utterly certain. There was a flat certainty in it that had even George falling silent.
“Don’t say that, Keith. You don’t know anything,” Kylie snarled. “You don’t know anything at all!”
“I know you, Kylie.”
Oh my goodness. He didn’t believe it. I knew it wasn’t true, but he was sure. There was such emotion in his voice. It was like a symphony, or perhaps a tornado of emotion. Regret. Sorrow. Devastation. Love. So much love.
“You didn’t kill her, Kylie. You wouldn’t.”
“You don’t know anything,” Kylie snarled. “Just. Shut. Up!”
I couldn’t hold back the tears that were forming. My hands were shaking as I watched the horror story in front of me. It was too much to see. I felt broken by it, and I didn’t even love them. I looked beyond Keith to the face I didn’t want to see, and I gasped.
“It was me,” Kylie said again. “It was me. I was angry. I got up after I saw what teapot had been assigned to her, and I waited until the lady was in the dining room, and I hurried into the kitchen, and I put the poison in the pot. Then I just watched her drink it down, and she got what she deserved.”
The last part was said so weakly no one could believe it.
“What kind of poison was it then?” Carver asked.
Kylie’s gaze widened and her eyes filled with tears, “Um…strychnine of course.”
I closed my eyes because the girl was crying as she watched her grandmother try to take responsibility.
“It was antifreeze,” she said softly. But we all heard her.
Kylie was shaking her head over and over again. “No, no, no, no.”
“It was me,” the girl said.
“No, no, no,” Kylie said, but she’d been joined by Keith.
George looked past them to his niece, to the girl who had been taken in by Keith and Kylie and raised after her mom had taken off. Who had probably seen firsthand what it had done to Kylie when Keith left her for her sister. Who might have known all the dirty details far better than anyone else, and she’d extended her own justice.
Carver cursed under his breath. I stepped back. I didn’t need to show them the article I’d read about the National History Day winners who had done a series of reports including one on the history of poisoners. I didn’t need to tell them about what I’d discovered about Kylie and Keith’s daughter who’d abused her kid and abandoned her.
“She’s a kid,” George said suddenly. “She couldn’t understand. She…she didn’t mean it. Didn’t understand.”
I didn’t believe that. I had talked to her. She was young and bright. She’d won the National History Day Regional competition. The write up about her talked about how she excelled in all of her classes, how she played the trumpet brilliantly and with the high school band even though she was still in 8th grade. How she worked in multiple charities helping with special needs kids camps and donating time to local single moms. She was a lot of things, but too young to understand about murder wasn’t one of them.
“She…needs a lawyer. Don’t say anything else, Marie,” Keith said. He rose, the grief faded as the protector came out. “Kylie. We need to call the best lawyer.”
Kylie nodded. She was crying as she pulled out her phone and started making calls, George wrapped his arm around Marie, whispering into her ear while Keith blocked Carver from saying anything to her.
I stepped away sick that I had anything to do with this.
“She’s a very sick little girl,” Simon said. I glanced up at him, and I could see the worry for her in his eyes. I hoped he could see it in mine. This was far too horrible. It made me feel better to see her pale, to see her cheeks bright with horror, I hoped that being a kid would help her. I hoped that she really was sick and they could intervene on her behalf. But…nothing would change that she’d killed someone.
* * * * *
I was sitting on the swing on our porch with Mama Dog and Daisy while the pups wrestled in the yard. The ancient lab was laying at my feet on his bed in the sun while Duke was sniffing along the border of the yard, tail wagging.
The tea was hot and Roxy had brought it to me, so it was a dirty chai tea rather than the typical chamomile and mint. Roxy, one of The 2nd Chance Diners wait staff was throwing sticks for the pups while Az, Simon, and Carver grilled steaks. They each held an open bottle of something or other and watched the meat cook as they talked.
Zee sat on the other side of Mama Dog with an iced tea in her hand.
“You know what the last year has taught me?” Zee’s cool, snide voice had Carver, Az, and Simon turning as Roxy looked up from the dogs and my friends, Jane and Maddie leaned forward. “How easy it is to kill someone. Who’d have thought a little bit of antifreeze in some tea would kill you.”
“Well,” Jane said, “It does have to be enough or it’ll take longer.”
“It’s not that,” Zee said, as she laid her white hair against the cushion on the swing, “It’s how fragile we are. I haven’t felt so fragile in a long time.”
“We need something good to look forward to,” Carver said. “We need to find the good and focus on that. We’re all a little worn out. That’s all.”
We were a glum bunch even though we’d been successful. The wind cracked through the trees and we all seemed to feel it a little too much.
“Maybe this will help,” Simon said. He handed Az the spatula for the grill and crossed to me, dropping onto a single knee.
“Oh my,” Zee breathed as Roxy started laughing. I could hear the exclamations of Jane
I, however, froze terrified to gasp and cause a coughing fit.
“Rosemary Baldwin,” Simon said, “I love you more than life. I want to give you all the pretty words, but all I have is my heart. Will you take it?”
He pulled out of his pocket a ring. I couldn’t see it for the tears, but I slid down in front of him, pressing my face into his chest, and nodding frantically. I wanted to shout yes, but I couldn’t seem to form words.
“Is that a yes?” He asked with a laugh.
I nodded into his neck and whispered, “Yes.”
I could barely hear my own voice, but it seemed to be enough for him. He cupped my face in his hands and gave me a kiss that was full of love, and despite all we’d gone through, hope.
THE END
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Also By Beth Byers
The 2nd Chance Diner Mysteries
Spaghetti, Meatballs, & Murder
Cookies & Catastrophe
(found in the Christmas boxset, The Three Carols of Cozy Christmas Murder)
Poison & Pie
Double Mocha Murder
Cinnamon Rolls & Cyanide
Tea & Temptation (Coming in April 2018)
Donuts & Danger (Coming in May 2018)
Scones & Scandal (Coming June 2018)
The Brightwater Bay Mysteries
(co-written with Carolyn L. Dean and Angela Blackmoore)
A Little Taste of Murder
(found in the Christmas boxset, The Three Carols of Cozy Christmas Murder)
A Tiny Dash of Death
A Sweet Spoonful of Cyanide
Also By Amanda A. Allen
The Mystic Cove Mommy Mysteries
Bedtimes & Broomsticks
Runes & Roller Skates
Costumes and Cauldrons (found in the anthology Witch or Treat)
Banshees and Babysitters
Spellbooks and Sleepovers: A Mystic Cove Short Story
Hobgoblins and Homework
Gifts and Ghouls (found in the anthology Spells and Jinglebells)
Christmas and Curses
Potions & Passions (found in the anthology Hexes and Ohs)
Valentines & Valkyries (Coming in April 2018)
Infants & Incantations (Coming Soon)