A Dollhouse to Die For (A Deadly Notions Mystery)

by Cate Price

“Looks like it’s going to be raining cats and dogs here soon,” he called as he drove off down Main Street.

  I went into the sunroom and gathered together my finds from the flea market. I wanted to give Laura the skeleton keys before she left for the day.

  Cats and dogs.

  Holy crap. Cyril’s cat! When was the last time I’d fed him?

  A chill ran through me as I struggled to remember. Sunday? Yes, Sunday, that was it. And now it was Tuesday afternoon. Cyril had said he’d be fine on his own for a couple of days, but still . . .

  I was a horrible person and a worse pet sitter. I’d go see the little guy right now.

  I raced down to the store with my armful of vintage treasures. Laura was just about to lock up, so I gave her the antique keys and told her I’d see her on Friday.

  After she left, I put the squid vase in the front display window and was scurrying to set the linens down on the Welsh dresser when I tripped over the sad iron.

  Aargh!

  Stars danced around inside my eyeballs and I huffed out a long series of agonized breaths. As if that could seriously dull the almighty pain that stabbed through my big toe. I’d be lucky if the damn thing wasn’t broken.

  Why wouldn’t someone buy this stupid thing already? And why the hell did Laura keep moving it around?

  My toe throbbing, I hopped around some more, conjuring up all the choice words I could remember from my days in the high school teachers’ break room.

  Alice didn’t exactly raise her eyebrows, but I could clearly see the reproof in her eyes.

  “Sorry, Alice,” I gasped. “It’s just that I’ve banged my toe on this freaking thing for the last time. I can’t take it anymore.”

  I know. I’d bring it with me to Cyril’s. It would feel at home there with the other old crappy rusty things. Screw the five bucks I might get by selling it. It wasn’t worth all this agony.

  I dumped the offending item in my bag and tentatively tried taking one step, and then another. The sooner I got back home and put some ice on my foot, the better.

  The walk to the salvage yard took a lifetime. The sad iron skulking in my pocketbook had increased its weight by at least a hundred pounds and the strap cut savagely into my shoulder. This had to be the most ludicrous idea I’d ever come up with.

  Finally I opened the door to the trailer, set my bag on the kitchen floor, and picked up the container of dry cat food.

  I knelt down and poured some kibble into the dish and suddenly my heart almost stopped as I heard the magnificent sound of a cat purring.

  I didn’t move. I didn’t breathe. The tiny black cat padded closer to the bowl. He paused to rub slightly against my side before he delicately lowered his head and began to eat. I smiled as I heard the soft crunching noise between his little teeth.

  I’d never heard anything so wonderful.

  I hadn’t killed Cyril’s pet. Thank God. He even had some water left.

  Cyril and Martha were due to come home tomorrow, and it wouldn’t be a minute too soon for me. I missed them both, more than I’d ever imagined.

  I watched until the cat had eaten about half of the food, and refilled the water bowl with fresh water.

  “See you later, His Nibs,” I whispered, and picking up my pocketbook, I let myself out. I locked the door and turned around to see Ardine Smalls standing in the semidarkness.

  “Hi, Daisy.”

  I tried to swallow in order to be able to speak, but I couldn’t.

  She grinned, showing those horse-like teeth. “Marge called. Said you were poking around, asking all kinds of questions about me.”

  Shock loosened the wedge in my throat. “Marge? But she seemed so . . .”

  “Like your best friend, right?” She stepped over a grappling hook and came closer. “Yeah, Marge is anybody’s best friend for the right price. We have a real sweet deal going on. She sends me patients, and I give her a cut of the commission.”

  Ardine wrinkled her nose as she looked around. “It should be easy enough to hide a body somewhere in this pile of junk,” she murmured, as if to herself.

  She took a long syringe out of her old-fashioned purse. God knows what was in it. All I knew was that if I let her get close enough to stick me with that thing, I was toast.

  My heart bounced. “You killed Harriet and Sophie.” It didn’t seem worth beating around the bush.

  “Yep, and now I’m going to get rid of you, too.”

  There was only one clear path up to the trailer among the piles of miscellaneous salvage, and she was standing in it.

  To my right were stacks of oil drums and the cap to a pickup truck, and to the left was an avalanche of iron bed frames, bathtubs, and stacks of wooden shutters. If I tried climbing over that lot, I’d be a slow, easy target.

  Going back into the trailer wouldn’t work either. It would take too much time to unlock the door.

  I stared into her eyes and realized how completely crazy she was. But how could she kill me? We’d become friends, sort of.

  “Why, for the love of God?” My breath was coming in short puffs, but I tried to keep my expression calm.

  Ardine waved the syringe in the air. “Harriet and I were best friends once. Bestest friends. But when she met that bitch, Sophie Rosenthal, she discarded me like a used prophylactic. I couldn’t believe it. So I took Sophie down. I thought once she was out of the picture, things would go back to the way they were, but Harriet still wanted nothing to do with me.”

  I glanced up the lane that led to the salvage yard. Even if I somehow got past her, I’d never make it to the main road. Ardine was an ungainly runner, but she was used to running, and much younger than me.

  “So you snuck into Sophie’s house, paired up the second remote—”

  “While she was in the shower, and then I climbed out the window. Instead of shutting it all the way, I left it open a crack so she’d notice the cold air and shut and lock it from the inside.”

  “You’re so clever,” I said.

  It’s often the guys who are too nice, too helpful, that you need to consider. Serrano’s words came back to haunt me. Hadn’t she been such a great help the day we found the stuff at Harriet’s house?

  “Don’t patronize me, Daisy.” Ardine’s voice was frigid, completely missing its usual nerdy tone. “I realized you were getting close. Too close to figuring things out.”

  So you threw me the information about the serial number to disarm me.

  “And Chip? Why did you kill him?”

  She wrinkled her nose again. “I didn’t. Must have been someone else.”

  “But you planted the remote in his apartment, right?”

  “Yeah.” She smiled, a hideous smile. “Angus gave me the idea when he said that whoever found the remote would find the killer. And once Chip conveniently turned up dead, well, that wrapped things up very neatly. Except for one loose thread. You.”

  “How did you get into his place?” I wasn’t sure why I kept her talking. It was the classic trite ploy you see in the movies, but I guess I didn’t feel like dying right that minute.

  Raindrops began to fall, misty against my skin. How long before Ardine decided she didn’t want to get wet and ended this little chat?

  I was also clinging to something else Serrano had said, which was that the two other killings were “hands-off.” Did she really have the nerve to kill me face-to-face?

  “I rocked the Audi, and when the alarm went off and he came running down to see if someone was stealing it, he left his apartment door open,” she said. “I didn’t have time to find a great hiding spot, so I just tossed it in the bathroom cabinet.”

  As she talked, I scanned the yard in the fading light, trying in vain to see a way through the rusty obstacle course.

  Suddenly I had another horrible thought. “Ardine, did you kill your mother, too?
”

  She grinned. “I told you, she tripped and fell down the stairs. Now, I might have loosened the banister some . . .” She took another step closer, her arm raised with the deadly syringe, and her face twisted into a snarl. “The old witch was always after my money, always putting me down.”

  Another hands-off killing. Serrano’s cool, detached voice seemed to be speaking inside my head. She doesn’t have the guts to do you in. You can take her, Daisy.

  Out of the corner of my eye, I caught a glimpse of twin pricks of light in the gathering fog. Cyril’s cat was creeping along the top of a nearby bed frame, his eyes like flat green glass, muscles slithering in perfect unison as he stalked closer.

  Control your breathing. Get ready.

  Suddenly he dove past Ardine, a black flying shadow.

  She screamed. “What’s that? A bat?”

  I swung my pocketbook holding the hefty sad iron in a wide arc, bashing Ardine in the ribs. She moaned and staggered, but didn’t fall, still holding the syringe, still intent on stabbing me.

  In that split second, I remembered hearing once that women were always afraid to hurt someone, even in a fight. Another body blow wouldn’t do much to stop her, but even so, I hesitated.

  Daisy, she killed three people for Christ’s sake! Serrano was practically shouting inside my head now.

  I gritted my teeth and kicked Ardine Smalls in the crotch.

  “Aargh!” With an unholy yowl she crumpled to the ground and I hauled the bag back again and gave one final smash, whacking her in the head and shoulder.

  I didn’t wait to see how much damage I’d done as I threw the bag down and leapt over her. I ran harder than I’d ever run in my life, dodging old tires and engine parts as I headed for the road. I couldn’t hear the sound of footsteps behind me, but I didn’t dare look back.

  In a couple of minutes, I was heaving for breath, and soaking wet from the rain. Halfway to the intersection with the main road, I slowed to a stagger, but I kept going, my lungs screaming in my chest. I prayed that I’d knocked Ardine out long enough to keep her down until I could reach the road and relative safety.

  I’d almost made it when a car going about eighty miles an hour came flying into the lane, illuminating me in its high beams. It swerved and came screeching to a halt, spraying mud all over me.

  A few seconds later, Serrano appeared through the fog and wrapped me in his arms.

  I clung to him, trying to tell him about Ardine and the syringe, but all that came out was a garbled mess.

  Serrano’s clipped voice cut through my incoherent babbling. “Calm down, Daisy. Where is she?”

  I pointed toward the trailer with a shaking finger.

  “Get in the car.”

  “I’m all muddy.”

  “Come on.”

  I hobbled around to the passenger side, got in, and he took off at high speed. I gripped the armrest, thrown back against the seat as we nearly went airborne bumping over potholes. Behind us, I could see headlights in the wing mirror from two more cruisers pulling into the lane.

  Serrano slammed the brakes on when the piles of salvage blocked our way and jumped out of the car, gun drawn. “Stay here, Daisy.”

  The other officers followed him, splashing through mud, and I watched as they all ran over to where Ardine lay on the ground, not moving.

  Holy crap. Had I killed her?

  Despite strict instructions to the contrary, I got out of the car. Serrano glanced at me, but didn’t tell me to go back as I stumbled up alongside him.

  I gasped as I stared down at the body of Ardine Smalls, the deadly syringe still clutched in her hand, but now sticking out of the side of her neck.

  Chapter Twenty-two

  A few hours later, after a visit to the station to give my statement, and then a long hot shower, I was ensconced on our leather couch in the study, my foot bandaged and propped up on the steamer trunk. The toe wasn’t broken, just badly bruised. Eleanor and Serrano sat facing me on the other couch.

  Joe was at the bar cart, fixing drinks. A bottle of Belgian beer for Serrano, an ice-cold Beefeater martini for Eleanor, and a glass of merlot for me.

  “So, Serrano, how did you know to look for Daisy? How did you know she was in danger?” Eleanor asked.

  “That hair I pulled off Ardine’s coat?” He nodded at me. “We’d found a few dog hairs at Harriet’s house, but of course she didn’t own any pets. I got the lab result back this afternoon and it was a match. Told you the killer always leaves something behind.”

  He took a sip of his beer. “Then I got your message, Daisy, and everything came together for me. I called Joe and he said you’d probably gone to feed the cat.”

  He chuckled. “What do you call that iron thing again that you planned to drop off at Cyril’s? We might have to institute a new standard-issue weapon for the department.”

  I glanced at my bag sitting on the floor. “A sad iron,” I mumbled.

  Eleanor narrowed her gaze at me. “You were getting rid of my gift?”

  “Yes, sorry, I was, but I guess I should keep it now. After all, it did save my life. Actually it was Cyril’s cat who really saved me. He distracted Ardine so I could get in a good enough shot to whack her with it.”

  The corners of Serrano’s mouth quirked up. “I would have loved to have seen that.”

  “What the heck was in that syringe anyway?” I asked.

  “A powerful muscle relaxant. Part of the cocktail they use for lethal injections. The part that leads to respiratory arrest.”

  “Is there any kind of antidote?” Eleanor asked.

  “There is, but it would have to be administered within a couple of minutes. If she’d stabbed you, I don’t think you’d be sitting here right now, Daisy.”

  I took a large gulp of my merlot. And then another.

  Joe shook his head. “I know this is going to sound weird, but poor Ardine. She had such a sad little life. Why did she have to kill herself?”

  “She knew,” Serrano said. “Three murders and one attempted? It would be a case of simply throwing away the key, if not the death penalty. She just beat us to it.”

  Eleanor popped an olive into her mouth. “I always thought she was wickety-wackety-woo.”

  There was a hard knocking at the front door. Jasper leapt to his feet, barking. Joe went to answer it, and then a few moments later, PJ Avery sauntered into the study.

  “Saw the Challenger outside,” she said to me. “Figured you were getting yourself into something interesting.”

  She nodded at Eleanor and Serrano in curt acknowledgement.

  “Well, that’s convenient,” I snapped, “because I wanted a word with you anyway.”

  “Yeah?”

  “Yeah. What’s with printing all that crap in the paper and inferring that I said it? And what’s with the elderly bit?”

  “Sorry. Drama makes for a better story?”

  I glared at her, but suddenly, in a peculiar way, I felt like I was looking at a younger version of myself. Cocky and ready to take on the world, consequences be damned.

  My daughter, Sarah, and I were nothing alike, but in PJ I recognized the same reckless passion I’d been fired up with in my youth. Heck, I was still like that, barging ahead without sufficient regard to my own safety. Was it possible that I could somehow help her not make the same mistakes?

  “What’s your poison, PJ?” Joe asked cheerfully, pointing to everyone’s drinks.

  I shuddered. “Joe, please.”

  “Sorry.”

  PJ shoved her hands in her pockets and rolled forward on the balls of her feet. “Tequila. Rocks. Lime. Salt. Thanks.”

  Joe grinned at me, but he hadn’t even picked up a glass before the doorbell rang again in a long burst. I heard a commotion in the foyer, and Martha and Cyril came rushing in.

  “Well,
this is a fine state of affairs, I must say.” Martha couldn’t get out any more than that before, overcome, she enveloped me in her arms. I hugged her back, as much as I could from my seated position.

  “What are you guys doing here?” I managed. “Aren’t you supposed to be on vacation until tomorrow?”

  Martha sniffed. “Well. It appears that there has been an inordinate amount of murderous activity in this village so we came back early. Not that my two best friends bothered to let me know, mind you. And now come to find out, there’s a party going on.”

  Joe handed Cyril a Newcastle Brown Ale and gave PJ her tequila on the rocks.

  “Martha, I’m so glad you’re back,” he said to her. “I have a bottle of Veuve Clicquot in the fridge that I’ve been saving for a special occasion, and I’d love an excuse to open it. Will you have a glass with me?”

  God, he was good.

  Somewhat mollified, she said, “That sounds delightful. Thank you, Joe.”

  He hurried off into the kitchen.

  Cyril took a swig of his beer. “Aye up, so old Chip fell off his perch, did he?”

  I nodded. “In a manner of speaking.”

  “Let me tell you, I am not planning on going away again for a very long time,” Martha declared. “Of course, I enjoyed being with my dear Cyril for those few precious days, but it’s just so hard to catch up.”

  Cyril winked triumphantly at me and I stifled a chuckle.

  Joe came back in, opened the champagne with a gentle hiss, and filled two flutes.

  After everyone had their drinks, I had to repeat the whole story that I’d already told to the police and then again to Eleanor, while PJ took a notepad out of her back pocket and scribbled furiously. We still called her PJ in spite of the fact that her name was really Margaret Jane, but she seemed to prefer it.

  Cyril made me tell the part twice about his cat diving in front of Ardine to distract her. “Good old His Nibs. Ah’m right chuffed about that.” He pointed his beer bottle at me. “And yer a jammy dodger.”

  I wasn’t quite sure what he meant, but I think the gist of it was that I was lucky I’d dodged a bullet. Or a lethal syringe, to be precise.