“Sure,” she said.
“Okay. ’Bye now. Take care.”
Dial tone.
Take care? That was his sign-off now?
There was only one thing to do. Jaymie dialed the phone again. “Valetta, what am I going to do?” she said when her friend answered. She lay back on her pile of pillows and told her friend all about Daniel’s weird behavior. “Now, normally when he signs off we, uh… well, you know… he asks what book I’m reading, tells me he hopes he’s the hero of my dreams!” Jaymie rolled her eyes; it sounded so stupid when she put it into words. “We do the loud kiss and say good night, sweet dreams, that kind of stuff.”
“Mush,” Valetta said.
“Yes, mush. Boyfriend-girlfriend stuff! And now it’s take care?” She sounded indignant, even to herself, but she felt she had a right to be.
Valetta was silent for a moment. “Well, looking at it from Daniel’s perspective, you haven’t really given him much in the way of encouragement.”
“What do you mean?”
“Look, I’m not one to talk. I don’t have a husband or even a boyfriend. But it’s always seemed to me that you’re… I don’t know.” She paused, but then said, in a rush, “You’ve always seemed to be holding back from Daniel.”
Her first reaction was anger, but Valetta never said anything that didn’t have a grain of truth. “Let me think about that,” Jaymie said, trying to be fair. “I guess I’m just not sure how I feel. I like him—I really do—but I don’t know if it’s more than that.”
“You need to figure it out for his sake and for yours. Wasn’t that what this time was all about?”
“I know, but I’m no more sure than I was three months ago.”
“That’s a problem.” Valetta yawned, the sound traveling as if they were in the same room.
“Let’s talk about something else. I’m not keeping you from anything, am I?” Reassured that she wasn’t, Jaymie then told Valetta about the discovery of the root cellar stash, the chief’s odd visit and everything else that had happened in the last couple of days, including finding the will. “I was going to ask Mrs. Stubbs about it, but she was so tired that I didn’t have the heart. I left it to another day.”
“If anyone will know how likely it is, she will. I suppose you ought to go back and talk to her again. If you can stand it.”
“Valetta, I like Mrs. Stubbs!”
“And bless you, you’re the only one in town who does. But then, you’re too young to remember her as the mom who chased kids with a broom if they misbehaved. She was older and crankier than any of the other moms. However, shouldn’t you just leave the whole will thing up to Haskell now that you’ve handed it over to him?”
“Everyone is trying to keep me from being snoopy,” Jaymie griped.
“We just know you’ve got a lot on your plate right now.”
“I know,” Jaymie acknowledged, reaching out and straightening her stack of bedside books. “Grandma Leighton would tell me not to borrow trouble.” She paused, but then rushed ahead. “Valetta, there’s something else, and I need to talk to someone about it, but it’s sensitive stuff.”
“Okay.”
“I know I can trust you.” In fact, Valetta was the only person she felt she could trust with the sensitive subject of the blood on Cynthia Turbridge’s sweater. “Do you have any free time tomorrow?”
“I’m working, but any time after work.”
“Come for dinner. I need to test out a recipe for the next Vintage Eats column!”
“Call me a guinea pig and give me a bib!”
They hung up on that, both chuckling. Jaymie hadn’t answered Zack’s text yet, but she really didn’t know what to say. And it still seemed odd to her that apparently the police chief was the one who had given his former detective Jaymie’s cell number. It kind of felt like an invasion of her privacy, but she wasn’t unhappy he had done it, so she let it go.
With the knowledge that she was going to talk to Valetta about things the next day, Jaymie was able to read for a couple of hours, cuddled with Hoppy and Denver, losing herself in Regency England and swirling on the dance floor of a ballroom decked out with kissing boughs for Christmas.
She felt refreshed and determined the next morning. There were about a dozen things bothering her, and she needed to take care of all of them at some point. But first she had to make a list of what needed to be done out at Queensville Historic Manor, as she must train herself to consistently call it. She had a free day before coming back to cook dinner for Valetta, so she clipped Hoppy’s leash on—he was wearing a maroon sweater embellished with embroidered leaves and looked adorable—and set out, cell phone in her jacket pocket.
The cell phone chimed that she had a text, and she juggled her purse, the leash and the phone, checking her messages. It was from Heidi saying that Joel was home, and could she talk to him? Jaymie paused at the end of the back lane and texted laboriously that she would be at Dumpe Manor (for the sake of a text—it was much shorter than Queensville Historic Manor), so he could come out there if he wanted. This was not something she was looking forward to, but it was one of the things on her list.
She hastened the pace, feeling the need to get on with business. Bill would be there—he was painting the parlor—so he could give her a hand if she needed it. As she walked up to the house, though, she noticed several cars in the parking lot, and when she entered, letting Hoppy off his leash to have a free run of the house, she could hear two bickering voices.
“It wouldn’t be in there. Don’t be an idiot, Imogene!”
“Tree Bellwood, now you promised not to call me that anymore. It hurts my feelings.”
“Your feelings? Good heavens… if I hear one more word about your feelings I’ll fray them like silk embroidery yarn.” A muffled thump followed this announcement.
Good Lord, it was the Snoop Sisters redux. Jaymie took a deep breath and followed the squabbling to the library, a main-floor room that hadn’t yet been touched. A sight to behold greeted her: two woolen-trouser-clad bottoms and the soles of two pairs of sensible Rockport loafers.
“What on earth are you two doing?” Jaymie cried as Hoppy dashed across the Persian-carpeted floor toward the two older ladies. He danced around them, pushing at their bottoms with his one front paw. It was a grand game for the little Yorkie-Poo.
Mrs. Bellwood, always so dignified, fell over onto her rear and looked at Jaymie in astonishment. “We didn’t hear you, Jaymie.”
“Yes, we didn’t hear you,” Mrs. Frump echoed.
“If you were a proper young lady you would come and assist your elders and call off your dog!” Mrs. Bellwood griped.
At the oddest times Mrs. Bellwood’s Queen Victoria persona would overcome her and she would begin issuing orders in a terrible English accent, as if her mouth were full of marbles. A dedicated royalist, she had been copying Queen Elizabeth II for years and always watched her Christmas Day address to the Commonwealth nations, broadcast on Canada’s CBC Television. She took Queensville’s origins and the town’s connection to Canada, across the river, very seriously.
Jaymie helped her up.
“We’re looking for the Sultan’s Eye, of course,” Mrs. Bellwood said, as Jaymie then aided Mrs. Frump.
Jaymie glanced around the library. It was lined with bookshelves, and there were quite a few books left, beautiful leather-bound volumes. She hoped the heritage committee intended to keep the books exactly as they were, a testament to how literature endures. The bottom row had been taken out and stacked neatly to one side, as the two ladies searched for the mythical Sultan’s Eye.
“Do you really believe you’re going to find it?” Jaymie asked. “Do you think it even exists?”
“We’ve looked everywhere. I just don’t think it’s here, but some people,” Mrs. Frump said, giving Mrs. Bellwood a look, “won’t let it rest.”
>
“We haven’t explored every nook and cranny yet.” Mrs. Bellwood was unfazed by their lack of success so far.
“Can I get your opinion on the kitchen?” Jaymie asked, partially to ward off another argument. “Do you mind?”
Hoppy toddled awkwardly up the stairs to the second floor to explore, while Jaymie led the two ladies to her work in progress and they looked around. In Jaymie’s absence Mabel Bloombury had cleaned the window and put up the curtains she had made. They were crisp, and not the butter yellow she had expected. The material was white, with a pattern of cherries and ivy, and she actually loved it! So cheery and lively. Good on a dull November day. Curtains gave the room a more finished look than barren windows. “Mabel did a wonderful job!” she said, touching the fabric and adjusting the ruffles.
“It’s coming along,” Mrs. Bellwood said.
“Coming along,” Mrs. Frump echoed.
It wasn’t a resounding endorsement, but better than nothing. Jaymie emptied the box of kitchen tools she had bought at auction and laid them out. There were the usual strainers, an apple corer, some spatulas and other things that she knew, but there were other tools she did not recognize. “What is this?” she asked the ladies, holding up a long-handled item with wire spiraling around a spoon shape on the end.
“It’s a whip!” Mrs. Frump said.
“A what?”
“A whip… like a whisk,” Mrs. Bellwood said.
Jaymie made a whisking motion, then shook her head. “I don’t know if it would do the job. How about this?” she asked, holding up a long-handled tool that had a metal disk on the end with swirls cut out of it.
“That is a muddler… a potato muddler. Like a masher.”
Jaymie’s eyes widened. “Really? I never would have guessed that.” She now had a Vintage Eats column in her mind, one on long-lost vintage tools. “What about this?” she said, holding up a green-handled tool with three blades and a spring.
“That’s a Foley chopper,” Mrs. Bellwood answered, turning to examine the stitching on the curtains. “It was supposed to cut down the time it takes to chop herbs or nuts.”
Just then they heard the bang of the front door being slammed.
“Halloo!” shouted a voice Jaymie recognized. The two older women frowned and glanced at each other.
“It’s Joel,” Jaymie said. “He’s meeting me here.” She raised her voice and shouted, “In the kitchen!”
Mrs. Frump’s eyes widened and she looked at her new friend/enemy with a significant nod.
Mrs. Bellwood turned to Jaymie. “And why is he meeting you here?”
Jaymie sighed. “Just to talk, nothing more. We’re still friends, for heaven’s sake!” She walked out to the entry hall to greet him instead of waiting with the two ladies, and they shared an awkward hug. Joel had never quite looked like what he was, a pharmaceutical salesman who traveled a great deal. Strangers probably guessed he was an artist or musician, his hair a little too long, his clothes a little too casual. He looked tired and had stubble on his chin, but his light brown hair had been cut shorter than he used to wear it.
“Why did Heidi send me over here?” he asked.
“Let’s go sit on the porch,” she said, not wanting to be within earshot of two of the worst Queensville gossips. The floorboards creaked as they walked, and she saw two elderly faces peeking around the doorway from the kitchen.
They sat on the steps, Jaymie burrowing her hands in her coat sleeves, and talked about work and mutual friends. There had been a lot of changes in their little town in the last few months. Finally, getting chilled and not wanting to prolong things, Jaymie just launched into the reason she needed to talk to him. “So Joel, what’s the holdup with setting a date to get married? You were the one who asked Heidi, after all; why are you dragging your feet?”
“I am not dragging my feet,” he said.
Hoppy barked to come out, so Jaymie got up and let the little dog out with them. He crawled up on Joel’s lap and licked his chin. Joel cuddled him, petting the patch of fur that always stood in a tuft on the Yorkie-Poo’s head.
“Then what’s the holdup?” Jaymie prodded, trying not to watch his hands. He had nice hands, and she had always found them enticing: square, sensitive, eloquent. “You’re lucky a girl as nice as Heidi will have you,” she said, even more bluntly, trying to goad him into responding. “You should snatch her up before she changes her mind.”
He shook his head and gloomily squinted off in the distance, across the road where there was a marshy brushland stretch, brown and sage in the dim light of late autumn. “I should never have ditched you,” he said.
Jaymie stiffened in anger. “What did you say?” she asked, carefully.
Hoppy looked up at her, knowing the tone.
“Well, you know, Heidi is needy. You were so much more easygoing,” Joel said, scrambling to explain. “You never bugged me about marriage and crap like that.”
“You are unbelievable,” she said, standing, descending a step and facing him. Hoppy jumped off his lap and started investigating the porch. “You are truly unbelievable. I can’t believe you just said that. You are so lucky you’ve found a girl who loves you. I was an idiot for letting you get away with so much crap, you know that?”
“Don’t get huffy. I hate it when you get huffy.”
Huffy… that was a word to diminish the justice of her anger. She was done with being delicate. “Joel, who the heck is Cathy? What’s going on?”
He groaned and covered his face with both hands. “I don’t know what to do!”
“How about coming clean? Who is Cathy? And what does she have to do with you not setting a date to marry Heidi?”
He didn’t say anything for a long few moments. Jaymie let the silence stretch out, but finally she gently said, “Talk to me, Joel. If there’s a problem tell me.”
“I can’t marry Heidi,” he said, staring across the road. “I’m already married.”
Sixteen
“DID I HEAR you right? You’re married?” Jaymie said, her knees buckling. She sat back down next to him.
“Yup, you heard me right.” He grimaced and sighed.
Jaymie frowned down at her toes, then lifted her gaze and turned, knee up on the step, to glare at him. “You mean, all the time you lived with me you were married? You made me… you made me the other woman?” Fury bubbled up inside of her. “You are a real piece of work, Joel Anderson, do you know that?”
“Wait!” he exclaimed, hands up in the “stop” motion, splayed out toward her. “You have to hear me out!” He talked, weaving a tale of a youthful marriage and long separation. They weren’t “really even married anymore,” in his view. How could you call them married when he hadn’t seen Cathy for years?
Jaymie snorted in disbelief at that, but decided not to interrupt.
Recently Cathy, his wife, had contacted him; she said she wanted to reconcile. Or dissolve the marriage… for a price. He believed she had somehow caught wind of his engagement to Heidi Lockland, one of the famous New York Locklands, who owned a good block of Manhattan property and had real estate investments in Las Vegas and Los Angeles, among other cities. Cathy was basically blackmailing him to end their marriage, holding him hostage to his youthful indiscretion.
“She’s been cyberstalking me or something! Heidi uses all that social networking crap. I’ve always avoided it, but Heidi has my name and pictures of me on her profile. I think Cathy found me that way.”
Jaymie paused, as the story sank in, but then said, “This is why you never take girlfriends to meet your parents, because they know you’re still married! Is this the part where I’m supposed to feel sorry for you? Really?”
“Have a heart, Jaymie,” he pleaded. “You were always the level-headed one; what am I going to do?”
“You have one option, and one option only: you tell Heidi the
truth, and you do it now.” She shivered and rubbed her arms, angry and hurt and feeling betrayed. “Tell the truth, Joel, for once in your freaking life. And don’t ever say you should have stayed with me, because I don’t want you back. Not now, not ever. I don’t want anyone right now.”
She paused and examined that thought. It was true. She had been only five months into a broken heart when she started dating Daniel. Maybe that long a time should have been enough for her to get over it and move on, but she still felt the wound. It was healed over, but still there. She was just one of those who fall deeply when they fall in love, and that was okay. Now she knew the truth; she had to tell Daniel she wasn’t ready to get serious with anyone.
Peace spiraled through her, and she breathed deeply, the first long breath she had taken in a while. She had made her decision. She was happy in her life, with her family and friends. She was filled with gratitude for the path her life was taking. She had no desire to leave Queensville, and deep in her heart she did not see Daniel settling in her beautiful old Queen Anne home. There was a restlessness in his soul, and that would always feel like a reproach to her.
She glanced down at Joel, who looked like a puppy who had been kicked. More gently she said, “Tell Heidi the truth. She really loves you.” Pausing, she gripped his shoulder. “And I think she has things she needs to tell you, too,” she added, thinking about the fact that Heidi had not told her family about him and her plans to marry, though Joel didn’t yet know that. It was not a monumental betrayal like his had been, but it was important.
Joel covered her hand on his shoulder with his own. “You’re right, Jaymie.” He met her eyes. “You’re absolutely right. I’m really sorry for how I treated you, you know. And if you not wanting anyone right now is because of me, I’m sorry. I really am.”
Don’t flatter yourself, she thought, but did not say. She took another deep breath and let it out slowly. “You did me a favor, Joel—you woke me up. I was coasting on everyone else’s dreams, but now I’m finding my own. Go home. Talk to Heidi right now.”
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