Sins & Needles

by Reagan Davis

  “I understand, Bean,” my dad concedes. “I’ll do my best.”

  “Thank you,” I say.

  My dad and I should have had this conversation years ago. I should have stood up for Adam when we were married instead of two years after we split up. I won’t make the same mistake with Eric.

  “Now,” my dad says, standing up and rubbing his hands together. “Can I leave Sophie here while I go to Latte Da and get another caffeine fix?”

  “Of course,” I say, glancing at Sophie who is sound asleep on her bed.

  “Can I get you anything?”

  “I’d love a maple pecan latte,” I tell him. “Let me give you my loyalty card. I think my next coffee is free.”

  I pull out my purse from under the counter and rummage through it, looking for my wallet. Because my purse is a black hole of lost and forgotten items, I empty it item by item onto the counter. Keys... lip balm... sunglasses... knitting... tissues… business card. I stop and look at the business card. It’s the one Brooks Wiley gave me when he asked me to pass his card along to my dad.

  “Here.” I slide Brooks’s card across the counter toward my dad. “It’s from Claire’s agent, Brooks Wiley. He asked me to give it to you in case you’re in the market for a new literary agent.”

  “I’ve already got one,” my dad says, patting his breast pocket. “You can keep it.” He slides the card back toward me.

  “Where did you get Brooks Wiley’s business card?” I ask.

  “He gave it to me,” my dad explains. “A few minutes before we got here. Sophie and I were walking through the park across the street, and Brooks walked up to us and introduced himself. I’m happy with my agent, but I took the card to be polite.”

  “Was Brooks alone?” I ask, wondering if he and Jules Janssen were having a secret rendezvous in the park.

  “He was with a woman,” my dad replies, confirming my suspicion. “You should have seen her, Bean. She was wearing authentic 1800s mourning attire and eating one of the bookish cookies Tamara made.” He shakes his head and gestures to his chest. “There were cookie crumbs all over her bodice.”

  Brooks Wiley hanging out with Piper Peters? If it weren’t for my dad’s accurate description of Piper’s attire, I wouldn’t believe it. There can’t be two British women walking around Harmony Lake in mourning attire, can there? Yesterday, I watched Brooks run away from Piper and hide behind a police officer at the rental cottage. Why would he hang out with her in the park?

  “Are you sure?” I ask, dumbfounded.

  “About which part?” he asks back. “I’m certain about her outfit. I did a double take. It’s not everyday you see a British woman in full period attire, Bean.”

  “How do you know she’s British?” I ask.

  “They were talking and laughing as Sophie and I walked past them,” he explains. “Her accent was clear as a bell.”

  If they were laughing, it doesn’t sound like Piper ambushed Brooks or was harassing him.

  “Dad, did Brooks seem scared to you?”

  “Scared?” he asks, astonished. “Scared of what? Of me?”

  “No,” I clarify. “Did he seem nervous about the woman he was with?”

  “Not at all,” my dad replies. “Like I said, they were laughing and smiling.” He shrugs one shoulder. “They seemed to have a pleasant conversation. When I walked by, he excused himself from her and told her he’d be right back.”

  “Did you hear what they were talking about?”

  He shakes his head. “No, but I wasn’t eavesdropping, Bean. From what I hear about your sleuthing hobby, eavesdropping is more your thing than mine,” he teases.

  This is so strange, it’s hard to believe. Maybe it wasn’t Brooks?

  “What did Brooks look like?” I ask, starting to sound like I’m interrogating my father.

  “Handsome,” he responds. “Expensive Italian suit, clean-shaven head… he has a unique accent. At first, I thought he was British, too, like his friend, but he has a distinct, Caribbean inflection.”

  Sounds like Brooks to a tee.

  He kisses Jules Janssen in secret, has lunch with Dina even though he insinuates he doesn’t like her, and now he’s going for a walk in the park with Piper Peters, a woman he claimed to be frightened of yesterday. I need to talk to Brooks.

  After a lovely potluck dinner, everyone leaves with full bellies and containers of leftovers.

  Adam was the last to leave and, to my and Zoe’s surprise, Mitchell offers to walk him to his car. Under the guise of finishing an already complete crossword puzzle, Zoe makes herself comfortable in the living room chair with the best view of the driveway. I think she’s just as curious as me about Mitchell walking Adam to his car.

  “Have you seen my laptop cord?” Eric asks. I shake my head and sink into the family room sofa. “I could’ve sworn it was here,” he mumbles, checking all the outlets, in case the cord is plugged into one of them. “Maybe I left it at the office.”

  “You can use my laptop,” I offer.

  “Thanks, but I can’t access work stuff on your laptop,” he replies, sitting next to me. “I’ll use my phone until I get to the office tomorrow.” He unlocks his phone and opens his email. “The forensics team didn’t find any traces of nuts on the items we confiscated from the cottage. How did the peanut oil get onto Claire’s fingertips?” He blows out an exasperated breath.

  “Maybe the killer took the murder weapon with them,” I propose.

  “That’s what I assume,” he responds. “I wish I had an inkling of what it might be. We’ve checked the woods around the cottage for clues, but we’ve found nothing. I was hoping the killer tossed the murder weapon into the trees when they left.”

  “I guess the killer didn’t leave behind anything obvious like a hair or some fingerprints?”

  “The forensics people only found two sets of fingerprints,” he says. “Claire’s and Dina’s.”

  “Does that mean the killer wore gloves?” I ask.

  Eric shrugs. “Either they wore gloves, or they didn’t touch anything,” he speculates.

  He’s looking at crime scene photos on his phone, and I’m looking at them, too, over his shoulder.

  “How did the killer leave if the door was locked from the inside, and Claire had the only key?” I ask.

  “The landlord says there’s another key,” Eric discloses. “It’s missing. We contacted the people who rented the cottage before Claire and Dina, in case they accidentally took the second key with them when they left. They say they don’t have it.” He looks at me. “I think the killer took the key with them when they left, probably because it had their fingerprints on it.”

  “I assumed they left through the window,” I say. “It’s a large window, and it’s on the main floor.” I point to the photo on his phone. “The drapes are billowing in this photo. The window was open when you found Claire’s body,” I deduce.

  “That’s the other theory,” Eric admits. “The window makes sense because the killer could avoid walking through the cottage, and Dina wouldn’t see them because the window in the den faces the opposite direction from the dock where she was sitting. Or the killer waited inside the den until Dina came back to the cottage, then snuck out the window. This way they wouldn’t risk bumping into her outside.”

  The thought of being that close to a murder-in-progress makes me shudder.

  “I guess it’s a good thing the second key was missing. If Dina found the spare key, she would’ve found Claire, and she would see that image in her mind’s eye forever.” Sadly, I speak from experience; finding a dead friend is something you can never unsee.

  “Dina didn’t look for the spare key,” Eric explains. “She didn’t know about the spare key. She said there was only one key when they arrived at the cottage over a week ago.”

  Did the killer plan Claire’s murder far enough in advance to sneak into the cottage and steal the spare key before Claire and Dina even arrived?

  “Why did Claire lock th
e door?” I wonder aloud. “Dina was the only other person there, and she was sitting by the dock. Claire didn’t have to lock the door to be alone.”

  “Dina says Claire always locks herself away to work.” He shrugs. “Apparently it’s part of her creative process.”

  I guess it’s not weirder than driving without a cell phone being part of my dad’s creative process. But part of me wonders if Claire locking herself in the office is less related to her creative process and more related to Brooks’s claim that Claire and Dina were having a loud argument that day.

  “Did you ask the landlord about the spare key?” I ask.

  Eric nods. “He says he was unaware the key was missing until I told him. But he also said he doesn’t check for both keys when he inspects the cottage between renters. We asked the cleaner when she last saw the key, and she has no recollection.” He lets out a frustrated sigh. “For all we know, that second key has been missing for months.”

  “Or the killer has it,” I remind him.

  “The other weird thing is we found more of Dina’s fingerprints in the den than Claire’s.” He looks at me. “Does that seem odd to you? Dina said Claire used the den as her office, and she said Claire likes to work alone, in silence. Wouldn’t you expect to find more of Claire’s fingerprints than Dina’s?”

  I shrug, and I’m about to tell him I don’t know when Zoe appears in the doorway.

  “That doesn’t sound odd to me,” Zoe chimes in. “If the police investigated Mitchell’s home office, I’m sure they’d find more of my fingerprints than his.”

  “Why?” Eric asks.

  “Because even though I don’t spend as much time in Mitchell’s office as he does, when I’m in there I touch more stuff,” she explains. “Mitchell sits at his desk and types. He touches a few things on and around his desk, but I’m the one who tidies up after him, restocks his supplies, and organizes the things he moved around.”

  I guess that makes sense. I wonder if the police investigated Knitorious, if they’d find just as many of Connie and Marla’s fingerprints as mine?

  Chapter 17

  Sunday, April 18th

  “Good morning, Bean!” my dad says without looking up from his laptop.

  “Good morning, Dad. Do you always start work this early?” The sun just rose, and it looks like he’s been hard at work for a while.

  “Only when I’m up against a deadline,” he replies with a chuckle. “I was just taking a break and reading some of Claire’s online obituaries.”

  “Yes, there are some lovely articles about her life and career,” I observe. “I read a few yesterday.” I open the back door and let Sophie out, then freshen her water and fix her breakfast.

  “Until today, I’d never read articles about her or interviews she gave,” my dad explains. “It’s strange… she said she always wanted to be an author. She said writing was her dream from the time she was a child.”

  “Why is that strange?” I ask.

  “Because it’s the complete opposite to what she told me when I hired her as my assistant,” he replies. “The Claire Rivera I knew had no interest in writing. She wasn’t even a keen reader. As I recall, she preferred gossip magazines and tabloid newspapers to books. She didn’t study writing, she studied graphic design in college.”

  “Why would she lie to you?” I wonder out loud. “Maybe she thought you wouldn’t hire an aspiring author?” I suggest.

  He shakes his head. “Poppycock. I’ve mentored plenty of young authors,” my dad insists. “I don’t think Claire lied to me, I think she lied in all these interviews.” He gestures to his laptop.

  “Why?” I ask.

  He shrugs. “Maybe her publisher’s PR people thought it was a good idea,” he offers.

  “She also talked a lot about her needle-felting hobby in those interviews,” I comment. “She said needle felting was such an important part of her life that she included it in her book series as the main character’s hobby. Did you know Claire was a needle felter?”

  My dad shakes his head and closes his laptop. “I never saw her do it, and she never mentioned it to me,” he says, opening the back door so Sophie can come inside.

  It’s possible Claire discovered her love of needle felting after she quit as my dad’s assistant.

  “Dad, why are you certain Claire took your idea and turned it into the Familia series?”

  “It’s a bit of a coincidence that when Claire worked for me, I was in the planning stages of a books series about an organized crime family headed up by a matriarch who knits, then less than a year after she quit, she released the first Familia book,” he alleges.

  “Do you think she copied your computer files?” I ask. “Or did you talk to her about your idea?”

  My dad shakes his head. “I never give my assistants access to my computer or my files,” he insists. “And the only person I bounce ideas off is Zoe. I think Claire pieced it together by going through my notebooks and the notes I collect.”

  “Ah,” I respond with a nod.

  My dad likes to capture ideas as soon as they come into his head. He keeps notebooks around his house, in his car, and even in his pocket for this purpose. In the event he has an idea when there isn’t a notebook within arm’s reach, he’ll jot it down on whatever is handy. A napkin, the back of an envelope, a sticky note. When I was ten years old, he stopped the car and jotted down a note on a ten-dollar bill.

  “I’m convinced Claire lied to me, Bean.” His face is clouded with sadness. “She must’ve planned to use me all along. It makes little sense, but that’s the only explanation.”

  “Claire came to see me the day before she died,” I tell him. “She asked me to set up a meeting with you and her. She wanted to bury the hatchet.”

  We sit in silence while Mitchell takes a moment to contemplate what I said.

  “I’m sad Claire died without resolving the issues between us, but I’m not sure I would have agreed to meet her, Bean,” he admits.

  There are too many inconsistencies between Claire Rivera, who worked as my father’s author assistant, and Claire Rivera, the best-selling author. I can’t help but think that hidden somewhere in all the inconsistencies is the reason someone wanted Claire dead.

  “You got a waffle maker?” I ask, more excited than the sight of a countertop appliance should warrant. “I love waffles!” I approach the waffle maker on Adam’s sleek and modern kitchen counter and open the lid.

  “I know,” he says. “You’re the perfect guinea pig for me to try it out.”

  Every Sunday, Adam and I have brunch with our daughter, Hannah. Adam and I meet in person, and Hannah joins us by video chat. We alternate between his place and mine, but Adam always cooks. Since we split, Adam has become a culinary hobbyist, and I’m more than happy to let him cook brunch every week. Especially since I did all the cooking during our twenty-year marriage.

  While Adam makes waffle batter, I cut up strawberries and prepare other waffle toppings.

  “Thank you again for helping my dad and Zoe yesterday,” I say, putting the strawberry pieces in a bowl. “I know Mitchell didn’t seem appreciative, but he was.”

  “He thanked me last night,” Adam says.

  “When he walked you to your car after dinner?” I ask.

  Adam nods. “Yup. He thanked me for helping him and Zoe yesterday, and he apologized for not liking me.”

  “That’s how he said it?” I ask, shocked. “He said, I’m sorry for not liking you?”

  “No, Meg. He was more sincere than that.”

  “Wow.” I can’t believe my dad apologized to Adam.

  “He hugged me too.”

  “He hugged you?” I wipe my hands and sit down.

  Adam nods. “I don’t know what you said to him, Meg, but it worked. He’s trying to make amends for over two decades of resentment and contempt.”

  “What makes you think I had anything to do with it?”

  “Either you said something to Mitchell, or he’s in the earl
y stages of dementia,” Adam replies.

  “I asked him to be nice to you. I reminded him you’re Hannah’s dad,” I confess. “And I might have cleared up a few misconceptions he had about our relationship.” I open the fridge and find the whipped cream, then I look at Adam. “I regret not standing up for you sooner. I should’ve set Mitchell straight years ago, and I’m sorry I didn’t.”

  “I don’t think he would have been ready to hear it years ago,” Adam says. “Mitchell needed someone to blame when you didn’t choose the life he wanted for you, and I was the most logical choice.”

  “I get that now,” I acknowledge, “and I cleared up his misconceptions.”

  “I bet he’ll still kill me in his next book,” Adam teases with a chuckle.

  “Speaking of books,” I say, changing the subject. “How was your photo op at Jules Janssen’s book signing yesterday? I saw a photo of you and her on The Front Page. Are you starstruck?”

  “I’m not starstruck, Meg,” he replies, rolling his eyes at the suggestion that he could be awestruck by a gorgeous, charismatic, A-list celebrity. “Our meet and greet was short and sweet.” We carry the waffles and toppings to the table. “She seemed friendly, but her handlers whisked her off as soon as the photographer got the shot. She mentioned she thinks Harmony Lake is a beautiful town, and she thinks it would be an ideal location for part of the Familia movie.”

  “I don’t think there will be a Familia movie,” I comment, picking up Adam’s iPad and FaceTiming our daughter.

  “That’s what I said!” Adam agrees. “But Jules said she’s optimistic. She said she just eliminated a major obstacle. She said she believes she’s close to acquiring the movie rights.”

  Is it me, or does Jules’ claim about eliminating a major obstacle sound like a confession?

  While we eat waffles and drink fresh-squeezed orange juice, Adam and I have an enjoyable virtual visit with Hannah. She’ll be home for the summer in less than two weeks. It’s incredible how much I still miss her. I assumed I’d get used to her living away from home, since this is the end of her second year of university, but it’s still hard to be so far away from her.