Lemon Larceny (The Donut Mysteries)

by Jessica Beck

  “Thanks, but that won’t be necessary,” I said.

  “Nonsense. I’m happy to do it.”

  Did this woman honestly think that she was offering me something I needed from her in order to get into my good graces? I wasn’t sure how to tell her that she’d most likely just muddy the waters instead of helping our investigation.

  “No, I really don’t think that’s a good idea,” I said, much firmer this time. I might have been a little too strong, because the woman clearly shut down instantly.

  “Of course. I understand. Sorry to bother you with my offer.” Then the daft woman stood and walked toward her front door. What was she doing? “If you will excuse me, I have a few phone calls to make.” After Anna said that, she added quickly, “Nothing about Jean, rest assured. You don’t have to worry about me doing that now.”

  In the end, Momma and I had no recourse but to leave.

  As we were walking out the door, I said, “If you think of anything else, you know where to find us.”

  “I sure do. You’ll be up there, staying in my dream house.”

  “Is that woman actually serious?” Momma asked as we drove the short distance to my aunt’s house. It would be all mine soon enough, I supposed, though I was in no hurry to inherit it, or anything else Aunt Jean had left me. I would have rather had her back with me, laughing and joking, than a thousand times the money Anna had just offered me for her home.

  “She’s obsessed,” I said as Momma pulled up and parked outside. I looked up at the rambling old house. “I don’t get it. It needs a coat of paint and a landscaper at the very least, and we both know it has more than its share of flaws on the inside.”

  “That’s no way to speak of your late aunt’s home,” Momma said.

  “You’re right. I’m sorry. I didn’t mean any disrespect to Aunt Jean. I just don’t know why Anna wants this place so badly.”

  “Is there any chance that what she told us is the complete and unvarnished truth?” Momma asked me.

  “Do you think she’s really lusted after this place her entire life?”

  “It’s possible,” my mother said. “Some people focus on one thing in their lives, believing that it will finally make them truly happy. It’s only after they get it that most times they find that they were wrong all along.”

  “It’s sad to put that much stock in material things,” I said.

  “I agree, but it seems to be the way of the world these days, and if I’m being honest about it, it’s probably been like that for a very long time. Lust, even for someone’s physical possessions, can drive reason out the door.”

  “Are you saying that Anna might have killed Aunt Jean when she wouldn’t sell her this house?” I asked as I unlocked the front door.

  “It’s a possibility that we have to consider,” Momma admitted.

  “So that means that she didn’t kill Aunt Jean out of malice; she just wanted the house. Or she did kill her believing that was the only way it would ever be for sale?”

  “I can imagine either scenario being true,” my mother said.

  “Sadly, I can, but that still doesn’t do us any good. We’re no closer to finding the killer than we were when we first got here.”

  “There’s something I’ve been wanting to mention,” Momma said. “Have we been taking Jean’s journal entries and her suspicions too seriously?”

  “What do you mean?” I asked as I looked out the window. It was clouding up again, and I had a hunch that we were in for another storm.

  “Suzanne, what if it all was just a tragic accident like everyone else believes?”

  I shrugged. “I suppose it’s possible, but what good does it do us to accept that? If it was an accident, then there’s no one to punish. We just lost someone we both love for no reason at all.”

  “It is a sad way to look at it, isn’t it?” Momma asked.

  “Yes, but I have to admit that I’ve been thinking about the possibility, too. I have an idea what we can do about it, though.”

  “Go on, I’m listening,” Momma said.

  “Why don’t we look for actual proof?”

  My mother looked startled by the question. “How do you suggest we go about that? We looked everywhere, but we couldn’t find any video cameras.”

  “Maybe not, but there might be other clues that everyone else has missed so far,” I said as I mounted the steps to the landing where my aunt taken her fall.

  “Do you actually believe that we might be able to find something that the police missed?” Momma asked. “That’s too incredible to even consider, Suzanne.”

  “You never know. After all, it’s happened before,” I said as I knelt down on the top step. “Sometimes it helps if you have an overly suspicious mind.”

  “Well, you’ve certainly got one of those. What exactly is it that you are you looking for?”

  “To be honest with you, I’m not sure yet,” I said as I examined the upper baluster. Was there something there, a slight indentation, perhaps? “Momma, would you grab one of the most powerful flashlights that you can find for me?”

  As she glanced out the nearest window, Momma said, “Suzanne, I know the sky is growing cloudy, but it’s not raining yet.”

  “It’s not for a power outage. I want to be able to see something better,” I said as I rubbed my fingertip across the indentation again and again.

  “Certainly,” Momma said, and she was back in a flash. She handed a large flashlight to me, and I turned it on. Once I had the new and more focused light source, I ran it across the wood where my fingers had noticed the trace of a depression.

  “Check this out,” I said.

  Momma knelt beside me, and then she studied where I held the beam of light. “What exactly am I looking for?”

  “It might help if you feel it first,” I said. I took her hand in mine and rubbed it over the indentation. “There. Do you feel that?”

  “Yes, there’s something obviously there. But what does it have to do with what happened to my sister?”

  “Momma, I think someone strung a taut, thin wire here, maybe fishing line, across the top balusters,” I said as played the beam over the opposing post. It was slighter there, but I felt an indentation in the wood there as well. “That settles it. Someone must have slipped in after she was in bed and booby-trapped these steps. When her foot reached out for the first one, it must have caught on the line and sent her tumbling down the stairs. In her weakened condition, it didn’t take much to kill her.”

  I looked up to see Momma dialing her phone.

  I grabbed her hand and stopped her before she could complete the call.

  “What did you do that for?” she asked me.

  “Who were you about to call?” I asked her.

  “Chief Kessler, of course,” she said.

  “Do you mean one of our suspects?” I asked her levelly.

  “Yes, I can see where that might be an issue. I have another idea, though,” she said as she cleared the number and started to dial another one.

  I stopped her again.

  “Suzanne, would you please stop doing that? It’s most irritating.”

  “I don’t even have to guess who you’re calling now. You were about to phone your new husband, weren’t you?”

  “What if I were?” Momma asked. “He’s perfectly capable of solving this crime.”

  “He is, but he’s not the right choice for this one.”

  Momma frowned at me. “And I suppose your boyfriend is, is that what you’re thinking?”

  “Momma, I know that Chief Martin is a good cop, but it has to be Jake.”

  “Would you mind explaining why?”

  “As a state police investigator, he has jurisdiction within the entire state of North Carolina, whereas your husband does not.”

  That seemed to mollify my mother. As she put her phone away, she said, “I see your point.”

  “Thank you. It’s nothing personal,” I said.

  “Suzanne, what are you waiting for?
We have direct evidence that someone killed my sister, and we need Jake here to see it.”

  “Momma, I’ll try to reach him, but he’s on a case right now across the state.”

  “He’ll drop it if you ask him to. After all, it’s not like he hasn’t done it before,” Momma said.

  “True, but those circumstances were pretty dire, weren’t they?”

  “And these aren’t? Are you telling me that your aunt deserves anything less than we can provide for her? Suzanne, need I remind you that now that she’s gone, we’re the only advocates left for her? At least call Jake and ask him.”

  “You’re right,” I said as I grabbed my own cellphone. “I’ll call him, but I’m not making any promises.”

  “All you can do is try,” she said.

  “Tell me the truth. This was your intention all along, wasn’t it?”

  “Of course not,” she protested, even though it sounded rather insincere to me.

  “Momma,” I said.

  “Perhaps the thought crossed my mind, but only because your arguments made so much sense.”

  It was clear that she wasn’t going to admit what she’d done, so I decided to drop it. I stepped away and dialed Jake’s number, hoping that he’d be able to come.

  Unfortunately, my call went straight to voicemail, which meant that something was happening that required all of Jake’s attention on his end. When I got the suggestion to leave him a message, I said, “Jake, this is Suzanne. Call me as soon as you get this, day or night. There’s been a development that I need to discuss with you.” I suddenly realized how dire that might sound to him, so before the message ended, I added, “Momma and I are both safe, so you don’t have to drop everything and rush up here, but I need to talk to you about something that we found. Did I make that clear enough? It’s important, but not life threatening. I hate these machines—”

  It cut me off before I could finish my thought, which was probably just as well.

  “It sounded as though you left him a message,” Momma said as I rejoined her.

  “I really didn’t have much choice,” I said. “Don’t worry. He’ll call me back as soon as he can.”

  “I know that Jake is reliable. The next question is, what do we do in the meantime?”

  “I don’t know about you, but I could eat a bite.”

  “Suzanne, we had lunch not three hours ago, and now you’re telling me that you’re hungry again?”

  “What can I say? I feel like nibbling on something. Care to join me raiding Aunt Jean’s cupboards?”

  “Why not?” Momma said, a hint of exasperation clear in her voice.

  We never got that snack, though, at least not as soon as I’d hoped.

  After rooting around in her pantry for a few minutes, I found something that made me lose my appetite altogether.

  Chapter 15

  “What’s that?” Momma asked as she spied what was in my hand.

  “It’s fishing line,” I said solemnly.

  My mother inhaled deeply as she stared at it, and then she asked me, “Do you think it might be the murder weapon?”

  “It’s got my vote,” I said as I tucked it into my pocket.

  “Should you be touching it?” she asked. “What about fingerprints?”

  “It’s a little late for that now,” I said. “Besides, whoever used it must have wiped the reel clean.”

  “How could you possibly know that?” she asked.

  “Smell it. Someone wiped the surface with an ammonia-based cleaner,” I said as I held it up for her to smell.

  “You’re right. But why didn’t they take it with them?”

  I considered her question before I gave her my answer. “Maybe they were paranoid after killing Aunt Jean. At least I hope they weren’t in their right mind. If the killer were stopped for any reason leaving the house with evidence of the murder on them, it would be very bad for them. Besides, who’s going to notice a little fishing line tucked away in the pantry if they don’t know what it might mean? Whatever the motivation, I’m glad they did it. It adds one more piece to the puzzle, and the more we fill in, the closer we’ll get to finding the killer.”

  Still staring at the line in my hands, Momma asked, “What should we do now?”

  “We keep looking for something to eat,” I said as I continued to look for something good to eat.

  “You’re not going to do anything about what we just found?” Momma asked me incredulously.

  “What would you like me to do? We’ve called the only cop we trust who has jurisdiction in this area, and we’ve secured the evidence. Short of bringing in the FBI, I don’t know what else we can do right now.”

  “There’s no need to get snippy with me, young lady,” Momma said.

  “I’m sorry. Was I snippy? I apologize. I guess I’m just hungry, and you know how I get when I need something to eat.”

  “All too well,” Momma said. “Let’s see if we can at least find something good for you.”

  We ended up having a cheese omelet when the pantry turned out mostly to be a bust. At least there were eggs, cheese, bread, and a little milk around.

  I started to clean up after we ate when Momma said, “I’ll take care of that, Suzanne.”

  “But you cooked. The least I can do is wash the dishes.”

  “Nonsense. Making an omelet hardly qualifies as cooking. Besides, you need to use those sleuthing abilities to see if there are any more clues lurking somewhere in this house that we might have missed before.”

  “Okay, if you’re sure,” I said.

  “I’m positive.”

  That being settled, I started a more thorough and detailed search of the house and the basement, hoping to find another clue that might help us name my aunt’s killer. If there had been any doubt in my mind before that it had been murder, that was all gone now.

  That indentations coupled with fishing line being where it had no business being, not to mention my aunt’s theories about her own murder, told me that Momma and I were on the right track.

  We just needed to keep at it until we found something concrete that we could use to catch the killer.

  Jake finally called just as Momma and I were finishing up a late dinner. It hadn’t been anything fancy, just a jar of spaghetti sauce and some noodles we’d found in Aunt Jean’s panty, but I’d discovered during my time helping Jake recover that if I squeezed in four meals over the course of a day instead of the normal three that I could stay awake longer, though the regime wasn’t doing my waistline any good.

  “It’s Jake,” I said.

  “By all means, answer it. I’ll take care of these.”

  “Thanks,” I told her as I started to walk out of the kitchen.

  “Would you mind doing it here so that I can hear?” she asked.

  “Sure thing,” I said, and then I answered the phone. “Hey, Jake. Thanks for calling me back.”

  “Sorry that it took me so long, but I’ve got a problem here, and I’m not sure what to do about it.”

  “Can I help?” I asked him. It wasn’t that outrageous a question. After all, with some help from my friends, I’d solved more than one murder over the years myself.

  “No, the solution is clear enough,” he said. “I’m just not sure what the best way to handle it is.”

  “Is it anything that you can talk about?”

  “No, not even in generalities. Right now all I have is a gnawing suspicion without any real evidence to back it up, but I know in my gut that I’m right, no matter how distasteful it might be.”

  “I’m so sorry,” I said. “It sounds awful.”

  “Enough about my problems. What’s going on with you? How are you holding up? Your voicemail sounded urgent.”

  “It’s more than that, now.” I caught him up to date on what we’d found, as well as my suspicions about what it all meant.

  “I hate to hear that it was murder,” Jake said.

  “So then, you agree with us?”

  “Us? Is Grace w
orking on this with you, too? I didn’t know she was there,” he said.

  “Actually, my mother is helping me out on this case,” I admitted.

  “Seriously?”

  “I’m as serious as I can be.”

  After a few moments, Jake asked, “How’s that working out?”

  “Beyond my wildest expectations,” I said. “You never said if you agreed with our conclusion or not, Jake. We’re not overreacting, are we?”

  “No, it sounds like murder to me. What I can’t figure is how the police chief missed it. Is he incompetent, sloppy, or just plain old lazy?”

  “You missed another possibility.”

  “What’s that?” Jake asked.

  “What if he’s the one who did it?” I asked.

  “It’s certainly something that you’re going to have to consider, based on what you read in your aunt’s journal. It sounds like you need some outside help.”

  “We probably do, but you’re tied up with something of your own. What’s Terry Hanlan doing?” Officer Hanlan had been a tremendous help to us both when Jake had been injured, and I now considered him a friend.

  “Actually, he’s over in Murphy dealing with a problem of his own.”

  “Is there anybody else that you can send?” I asked.

  “Let me make a few phone calls,” Jake said. “How long will you be up?”

  “For a few more hours, at least,” I said.

  “How are you managing that? Are you still adding an extra meal to your day?”

  It was tough to slip anything past a trained state police investigator, whether he was working on a case or not. I decided not to answer that particular question, though.

  “Don’t worry about me. I’ll be awake,” I said.

  He got the message. “Then I’ll talk to you soon,” he said.

  “Well? Where do things stand? Is he on his way?” Momma asked me as she continued to clear the table.

  “No, he can’t make it, and neither can Terry Hanlan.”

  “That’s disappointing,” Momma said.

  “I agree, but Jake’s going to find someone he can trust to come help us,” I said as I pitched in and started to help her clean up.

  “Suzanne, I must say that I’m pleased that you aren’t afraid to ask for help. You don’t usually look for outside assistance.”