by Avery Aames
“U-ey,” Alexis sniffed. “For heaven’s sake, girls, can’t you stop calling him that? He’s a grown man. His name is Umberto.”
“But he likes U-ey, Mother. Go on, Charlotte.”
I didn’t tell them about Matthew’s and my foray into the winery or U-ey lambasting us. I merely said, “I suggested he take a harder look at all suspects.”
“Like Boyd Hellman,” Delilah said.
“Yes, for one.”
“The man with the red hair who wears the plaid coat?” Alexis asked.
I nodded. “That’s the one. Velma Warfield said she saw him idling outside my house the night Noelle was killed.”
Alexis shook her head. “But she couldn’t have.”
Delilah shot her mother a look. “How would you know? And don’t tell me you saw that in your crystal ball.”
“No, darling. I left my ball at home,” Alexis teased. “But I have been a little concerned about that man. He looks at you in such a way.”
“What way?”
“With googly eyes. He’s very interested in you.”
Delilah groaned. “Mother, you think every man is interested in me.”
“Not every man, but this one is smitten in the worst way, so I’ve been keeping a watch on him ever since I arrived.”
“You’ve what?” Delilah’s voice glided upward.
“Keep your voice down.” Alexis petted her daughter’s hand. “He hasn’t made any overt moves.”
Delilah sputtered. “You think he’s a stalker?”
“I wouldn’t go that far, but he was hanging outside the diner the night Charlotte’s houseguest was killed. Peeking in through the window.”
I’d seen him doing the same thing the other day. At the time, I thought he was spying on Urso. Pépère mentioned that he had seen Boyd loitering, too.
“Why, last night, Delilah,” Alexis continued, “I tailed him when he followed you to your gym class.”
“Why on earth would you do that, Mother?”
“Because I was curious and concerned. But then he did something strange. While you were working out, he popped into his car and drove north of town to the Shelton Nelson Winery. Why he wanted to go there, of all places, was beyond me. It wasn’t like they were open for wine tastings.”
“So he was the one,” I muttered.
Delilah raised an eyebrow. “The one that what?”
I recounted the entire evening.
“He hit Matthew?” Alexis clucked her tongue. “Poor dear.”
“I can’t believe you, Charlotte Erin Bessette,” Delilah said, sounding as irritated as our chief of police. “You could’ve been killed.”
I didn’t remind her that we had gone on a similar extracurricular excursion months ago. She didn’t need the grief from her mother. “What else could I do?” I said. “Matthew was adamant about going. I couldn’t let him run off half-cocked. Putting that aside, let’s return to the topic of Boyd Hellman.” I rested my forearms on the table. “If he had a verifiable alibi for the night of Noelle’s murder, like keeping an eye on you, why did he tell Urso, Matthew, and me that he was walking? That’s so darned vague.”
“Let’s ask him,” Alexis said. “He’s right outside.”
• • •
Leading the way, Alexis sneaked ahead of Delilah and me to the alley behind the diner. Her cape fluttered behind her like wings. At the corner, she halted and pointed. “There he is. Beside your car, Delilah. He’s been there all morning.”
Delilah said, “Why that—”
I hindered her from hurtling at Boyd and scaring the bejeebers out of him. “Let’s be reasonable.”
“He’s a creep.”
“He’s besotted,” Alexis said. “Look at him.”
Boyd was buffing the hood of Delilah’s car with a chamois cloth. He spit on a particular spot and went at it again.
As stealthily as if I were trying to capture a stray cat, I slinked forward. Delilah and Alexis followed. When I drew within a few feet of the car, I said, “Hi, Boyd.”
He jolted and searched right and left for an escape route. The far end of the alley was blocked by a garbage truck. Other than fleeing past us, there was no exit. He backed up a pace.
“You’re doing a nice job on Delilah’s car,” I said. “She’s not angry.”
Under her breath she rasped, “Oh yes, I am.”
“His aura is good,” her mother said. “He’s harmless.”
“Mother, please. You can’t see auras.”
“I can so.”
“Shh, you two.” I crept closer. “Boyd, do you mind if I ask you a question?”
“What kind of question?” His voice had an edge but he seemed sober. His eyes were clear.
“Why were you at the Shelton Nelson Winery last night?”
“Who says I was?”
Alexis joined ranks with me. The aroma of lavender accompanied her and brought back all sorts of childhood memories. My mother had worn a lavender-scented fragrance. “I do,” she said.
Boyd squinted. “What’s it to you?”
I cocked my head. “Boyd, you throttled my cousin.”
“No, I didn’t.”
“I don’t know who you thought you knocked down with that wine bottle, but it was my cousin Matthew. Don’t worry. He’s fine. He will not press charges. What I want to know is why you were at the winery.”
“I wasn’t—”
Alexis clucked.
“Okay, fine. I was.” Boyd wiped his hands with the chamois. “See, back in Cleveland, Noelle was acting sort of strange.”
“How would you know that?” I said. “You two had broken up.”
“That doesn’t mean I didn’t keep an eye out.”
“Did you stalk her, too?” Delilah said.
“No, I don’t stalk, I—” Boyd fixed his gaze on her for a long moment. It took a lot of effort for him to refocus on me. “Look, I asked Noelle why she was acting weird, and she said she had big plans. She said a lot was at stake.”
The same words she had said to me. I shuddered.
“But I didn’t buy it,” Boyd said. “I mean, the job she got from Shelton Nelson . . . It was stupid. He was paying her chicken feed.” He stuffed the chamois into his pocket. “I kept wondering why she would shoot down her career that way.”
“Maybe she wanted to con him,” I said.
“Nah, Noelle wouldn’t do that. Ever. She was as honest as the day is long.”
Alexis tweaked my elbow. “He’s telling the truth. I can feel waves of good vibrations from him.”
“Puh-lease.” Delilah knuckled her mother in the shoulder. Alexis countered with a swat to Delilah’s leg.
I said, “Did you tell your suspicions to Chief Urso, Boyd?”
“Sure, but I had nothing to back them up. Face it, I was a suspect in Noelle’s murder. When he interrogated me, he wanted to know if I’d gone hiking at Kindred Creek and asked to see my boots. He went to my place to check them out. There wasn’t any mud on them, but I figured he was asking because Noelle had mud on her shoes, so I got to thinking. Noelle never would have gone down to that creek place.”
“Because she wasn’t a nature girl,” I said.
“That’s right. Want to know why?” He didn’t wait for a response. “When we were in the orphanage, one of the bad girls led Noelle to this brook down the road, then she ran off and left Noelle there.” He muttered a curse beneath his breath. “Night came on fast, and Noelle became disoriented. Around ten P.M., I found her huddled in a ball, covered with scrapes and mud.”
Poor Noelle. What a traumatic life she had lived.
“See, it was the mud that got me thinking,” Boyd continued. “I work in construction.”
Which explained the brawn. I could see him digging ditches or lifting a slug of two-by-fours on his shoulder.
“I know soil,” he said. “So I went back to the precinct, and I asked Chief Urso to show me the boots. He obliged.”
That was more courtesy than Urso
would have afforded me.
“I noticed grape leaves in Noelle’s shoes and pointed them out, but the chief dismissed my findings saying Noelle had been to the winery a couple of times. Later on, I thought some more.”
“You’re a real pensive guy,” Delilah said.
“Actually, I am,” he answered. “I’m even better when I’m sober. Anyway, because of what her folks did, Noelle didn’t abide people scamming other people, so she took it upon herself to investigate. You know, she’d really delve into a person’s past. I thought maybe she’d found some dirt on Shelton Nelson.”
Like his troubled financial status, I mused.
“So I drove to the winery. If Nelson had anything to hide, I intended to find it. I saw a door open, so I sneaked in that way.”
“Through the wine cellar.”
“Yeah. But before I could get ten feet, I ran into someone. It was dark. I thought it was Nelson. Panicked, I grabbed the first thing I could”—he mimed grabbing hold of a bottle—“and swung, then I hightailed it out of there.”
“You left Charlotte’s cousin lying there,” Delilah said. “What kind of jerk are you?”
“I was scared.”
“A big guy like you?”
Alexis put one hand on Delilah’s arm and the other on mine and squeezed to make us stay put, then she moved closer to Boyd.
“Mother, stop.”
“I know what I’m doing, darling.” Alexis reached for Boyd. “Young man, take hold of my hands.”
As if mesmerized, he obeyed.
Alexis lowered her voice. “On the night your ex-girlfriend was killed, I caught you spying on my daughter.”
Boyd kicked a pebble. His eyes flickered.
“Uh-uh, Boyd,” Alexis said. “Reconnect with me.” Magically, Boyd did. Whatever technique or magic Alexis was using was working. In a soothing tone, she said, “Why did you make up that story about going walking when you had an alibi?”
“Because.”
“Because why?”
I flashed on Noelle’s rebuke when Boyd had shown up at The Cheese Shop. She had warned him to stop harassing her, or else. I said, “You lied because Noelle put a restraining order on you, didn’t she? You scared her. Did you abuse her?”
“No.” Boyd released Alexis’s hands as if he’d been singed and raised his arms in the air. “I never laid a hand on her. I swear.”
“You can swear all you want,” I said, “but it’s true. You scared her.”
“Tell the truth, Boyd,” Alexis coaxed. She didn’t reach for him again.
“I . . .” He licked his teeth. “When I drink, I have a temper. One night, I threw things around the apartment and drove my fist into a wall. That was the last straw for Noelle. I got into AA and anger management, but she wouldn’t take me back. I was good with the liquor until she died. I’ve fallen off the wagon since then, but I’m already back on track.” He gazed at Delilah. “I am. But I’m not supposed to hang around anybody for a long time.”
“You mean you’re not supposed to stalk someone,” Delilah muttered.
I nudged Alexis aside and, channeling her, grabbed Boyd’s hands. “Look at me, Boyd.”
Delilah said, “Mumbo jumbo.”
I ignored her and searched his eyes. His gaze didn’t waver. Tears pooled in the corners. After a long moment, I said, “You’re telling the truth.”
He nodded vigorously. “I’m a changed man.”
“Does Chief Urso know about your past, Boyd?” I asked.
“It’s not like I have a record or anything. I never violated the order.”
“You showed up here, you creep,” Delilah said. “You watched her.”
“From afar.”
Delilah strode to me and swatted my arm. “Hold on. He said Noelle told him there was a lot at stake. How would he know that unless he spoke to her?”
I kept a firm grip on Boyd’s hands and felt a tremor shimmy through his palms. “Boyd,” I said, drawing out his name. “The truth.”
“I called her once. Only once. That’s when she told me she was moving.” Boyd curled his chin into his chest like a boxer needing to protect his core. He tried to free himself from my grip, but I wouldn’t let go. “I followed her here to make sure she was going to be okay.”
I understood. Ever since they had met at the orphanage, he had assigned himself her protector.
“At The Cheese Shop, she warned me off, and I’ll admit I was upset, but then I saw Delilah and”—his eyes turned glossy with enchantment—“I fell hard.”
“For me?” Delilah squawked. “Swell.”
CHAPTER
26
Back at Fromagerie Bessette, I found Rebecca at the cheese counter assembling a cheese basket for the city councilwoman.
When I sidled up to her, she begged me to tell her where I had been. I started to speak but Matthew said, “Hold it. I want to listen in.” He stopped bustling around the wine annex and joined us.
“How’s your head?” I asked.
“Sore, but my hearing seems to have improved tenfold.” He grinned. “Go on.”
I glanced at the councilwoman and the other customers. None seemed to be listening in, so I told Rebecca and Matthew about how Alexis, Delilah, and I trapped Boyd behind the diner and how he admitted his affection for—obsession with—Delilah, which established his alibi.
“When you held his hands, did you really feel hoodoo energy like Delilah’s mother?” Rebecca asked, her eyes widening in awe.
“I’m not sure what I felt. I only know that Boyd was telling the truth. And thanks to Alexis’s eyewitness account, he is innocent of killing Noelle. He watched Delilah for over two hours. He knew absolutely every move she had made.”
“Hand me a jar of that California honey, would you?” Rebecca tucked a round of Cowgirl Creamery Mt Tam cheese—a rich, earthy triple cream—into the basket in front of a box of garlic potato thins. The California-themed array already held a wedge of Vella Dry Monterey Jack and Cypress Grove Truffle Tremor—a luscious union of truffles and goat cheese—and a bottle of Silver Horse Albariño wine. With its flavors of apricots and peaches, it would complement all three cheeses.
I said, “Why the West Coast flair?”
“The councilwoman’s daughter is in town. You know the one, the actress in Los Angeles. They’re celebrating. She just got a leading role on a new murder mystery series.” As Rebecca gathered the cellophane around the basket and secured it with burgundy raffia, she said, “If Boyd is innocent, we only have four suspects.”
“More,” Matthew said, “if you include people who were bilked by Noelle’s parents and want revenge.”
“But Urso didn’t come up with any names on that front, right?” Rebecca said.
“He hasn’t gone to Cleveland yet,” I said. “He got delayed.”
Rebecca shook her head. “I’d rule them out anyway, wouldn’t you? This seems personal. The weapon, the missing journal pages.”
“The picture of the stick figure in the noose,” Matthew added.
“What stick figure?” Rebecca said.
I explained and I agreed. I believed Noelle had known her killer.
Rebecca ticked off suspects on her fingertips. “We’ve got Shelton Nelson, who had two reasons to kill her, either to hide some secret that Noelle was investigating or because of some snag in their relationship. And then there’s Harold Warfield, who might have been jealous that Noelle was hired.”
“Or he was having an affair, and Noelle had compromising photos.”
Rebecca brandished a finger. “You know, I saw him looking pretty intimate with Liberty Nelson yesterday. I hadn’t thought anything about it until now.”
I gawked. “What? Where? They’re enemies.”
“They didn’t look like it to me. Liberty was leaving the grocery store, and Harold offered to carry her bags. He walked her to her car.”
“Big deal,” I said. “They didn’t kiss or anything, did they?”
“No, but it was a public
place.”
“Uh-uh.” I shook my head. “They’re not a couple. She’s engaged.”
“And he’s married,” Rebecca sniggered. “That doesn’t keep people apart.”
What if she was right? I remembered Liberty smirking when her father said how devoted Harold was to his wife. Maybe they acted like they hated each other to keep the secret.
“That’s a perfect scenario for murder,” Rebecca went on. “Like in that Hitchcock movie Strangers on the Train. You kill mine and I’ll kill yours.”
I slugged her. “You’ve been watching way too many movies. They’re corrupting you. And let’s be clear: neither Harold’s wife nor Liberty’s fiancé is dead.”
“What if Liberty’s father learned of the affair?” Rebecca persisted. “What if Noelle told him? I bet if Shelton found out that his manager and daughter were, ahem, involved, he might have killed Noelle to keep it all hush-hush.”
I said, “Why, for heaven’s sake?”
“To protect his reputation as well as his daughter’s.”
“I’m sorry, but that’s a little far-fetched. He’d more likely punish Harold, put Liberty on probation, and give Noelle a bonus.”
Matthew formed a T with his hands. “Time out. Let’s go back to Harold. He lied about his alibi.”
“To cover up his affair.”
“His wife lied, too,” I said. “She told me she saw Boyd walking up my driveway that night.” The encounter with Velma in the parking lot outside the pub still perplexed me. What did she know and when did she know it?
The door chimes jingled. A handful of female customers wearing matching tour tee shirts entered the shop and headed for the display of new cheese platters that had come in last week—beautiful ones that resembled stained glass. The women’s oohs, all in different keys, made them sound like choir members warming up.
“Don’t forget Ashley Yeats,” Rebecca continued. “He pestered Noelle, saying he knew she had a story to tell. She told him to bug off. Did that drive him to kill her? Of course, there’s Liberty Nelson, too. She might have wanted to kill the competition in order to keep her father’s affection or kill the person who knew about her affair with Harold.”