“I know you think I’m being nosy, but the man was murdered in back of my shop, with something of mine. We won’t even discuss the fact that the sheriff is sure my husband did it. I can’t just let it go.”
“I realize that. Just don’t let David get involved if you can help it.”
We were heading on to that unsure ground, so I had to watch what I said. “How is your son? Will he be at work today?”
Hannah frowned as she finished her coffee. “I tried to convince him that he needed more rest, but he’s raring to go. After he finishes his shift, he wants to go car shopping. Can you believe that? If I’d had a wreck like that, it would take me weeks to get behind the wheel again.”
“Maybe he wants to get back on the horse that threw him before he loses his nerve.”
She nodded. “You’re probably right. That car of his wasn’t worth much, so we’re probably not even going to bother filing a claim with the insurance company. I’ll find something good for him around town.”
“You should talk to Butch Hardcastle,” I said as we both got up from our table and threw our cups away. “He knows how to get some good deals.”
“If it’s all the same to you, I’d just as soon get something that wasn’t stolen,” Hannah said. She wasn’t Butch’s biggest fan, but I was.
“He’s a good guy, Hannah. You need to give him the benefit of the doubt.”
“Let’s just say I’m reserving my judgment.” We were outside in front of the coffee shop, and Hannah added, “I’m going to be late. My teaching assistant is going through some kind of personal crisis, and I’m picking up the slack.”
“You have a bigger heart than you’d like to admit,” I said.
“Don’t let that get out at Travers, or I’ll never be able to look my fellow professors in the eye.”
I strolled to Fire at Will along the River Walk, enjoying the quiet nature of the morning before I’d have to face the inundation of tourists. Our season was definitely in full swing, and I was happy to be busy, for so many reasons. The income would help ease my anxiety about taking the building on as my own, and the distractions offered by vacationing families painting pottery would fill my days. I’d still find time to do a little digging, but even if I didn’t, I had the Firing Squad working on Charlie Cobb’s murder for me.
Apparently more than I realized.
Martha Knotts was waiting for me when I got to Fire at Will. She was a petite young woman with sparkling eyes, and every time I saw her, I was amazed that she had five children at home.
I smiled at her as I unlocked the door. “Good morning. You’re out awfully early, aren’t you?”
“I had an aerobics class this morning, and my dear husband agreed to stay with the kids until I get back.” She grinned impishly. “Now I’m shamelessly taking advantage of him.”
“Good for you,” I said. “Would you like to come in?”
“No, I’d really better get back home. I just wanted to tell you something I heard in class today.”
I knew Martha had the best connections and networking web across town with her activities schedule. Between the children and her own varied interests, Martha was a one-woman grapevine. “Go on, I’m listening.”
She glanced toward Rose Colored Glasses. “Rose Nygren just lost a boyfriend, and she’s been taking it pretty hard.”
“I know. She’s been crying on my shoulder.”
Martha looked a little disappointed that I’d already heard the news. “Did you know who she was dating?”
“No, I haven’t been able to get that out of her yet,” I admitted. “Why, do you know?”
“That’s what makes it so interesting. My source wasn’t sure, but she had it narrowed down to one of two men. Charlie Cobb made the short list,” she said triumphantly.
That confirmed my own recent suspicions. “So that implies that she might have had something to do with what happened to him,” I said.
“Maybe, but there’s something else. Do you want to know who the other candidate is?”
“You’ve certainly got my attention.”
Martha smiled slightly. “His brother, Rick. He owns the Thirsty Swan.”
“We’ve met,” I said.
Martha added, “My friend says there’s another twist to this, but I’m not sure if it’s true.”
“When has that ever stopped us from talking about it before?” I asked. “Sometimes we have to sort through the fantasy to get to the fact.”
Martha nodded. “For what it’s worth, my friend seems to think that Rose may have been dating them both at the same time. When the brothers found out what she was up to, they both dumped her. I thought it was motive enough for murder, either for Rose or Rick, so I came straight to you.”
“Thanks. Let me see what I can uncover,” I said.
“Keep me in the loop, okay? Inquiring minds and all that,” Martha said, smiling as she left.
As I got ready to open the shop for business, I thought about what Martha had told me. Could Rose Nygren really have been dating two men at the same time? Anything was possible. The older I got, the more I realized that. In matters of the heart, we never seemed to gain much wisdom, and there weren’t many actions more foolhardy than dating brothers in such a small town and trying to keep it a secret.
But at this point, it was just a rumor, and I was going to treat it as such until I found proof one way or the other. Still, if it were true, would it have been enough to lead her to murder? And if so, why did she kill Charlie, especially when his brother, Rick, was such a nastier customer? I was still puttering around the shop, not getting much of anything done, when David walked in.
“Good morning,” he said. The bandage on his cheek was smaller today, further proof that he was starting to heal.
“Morning,” I replied. I glanced out the window and saw Rose opening her shop. “I’ll be right back.”
“I’m fine, thank you. And you?”
I looked at David and saw him smiling. “Sorry, I’m a little distracted. How are you feeling today?”
He flexed his arms. “The stiffness is almost gone. I’m ready to tackle the world again.” His fingers gingerly touched the bandage on his face. “I was able to change this down to a manageable size, too.”
“If I’d been in your shoes, I would have stayed in bed for a month,” I said.
“I don’t believe it for a second,” he said.
“It’s true. Anyway, I’ve got everything ready to open, and I should be back before then.”
David nodded. “Take your time. After all, you are the boss.”
“That’s right, I am, aren’t I? I’ll be at Rose’s if you need me.”
He mounted the stool behind the register and said, “I’ll be fine. My class is today, don’t forget.”
“You’re taking something at the college in the daytime?” I asked. That would put a serious cramp in my style, but I couldn’t begrudge him his education.
“No, I’m talking about my pottery lessons. You gave me your permission, remember?”
“Of course I do, I’m not daft. I just figured you’d cancel or at least postpone them.”
“Why in the world would I want to do that?”
“You were just in an accident, David. Is it a good idea for you to teach right now?”
He shook his head. “You’re as bad as—”
“Don’t say it,” I warned him.
“I won’t, but you are. Besides, how much heavy lifting am I going to have to do? I believe in low-impact pottery.”
“I’m sure you do. It’s your students I’m not so sure about. Don’t worry, I’ll be back in plenty of time for you to teach your star pupils.”
I doubted the coeds who’d signed up were all that interested in pottery. If David had been teaching rug hooking or scuba diving, they would have been first in line for lessons as well. Not that it should matter to me. The classes would add a little income to our bottom line, and that was never a bad thing.
I left him, s
till smiling, and I walked over to Rose’s. It was time the two of us had a talk.
I had to get by Kendra’s gauntlet first, though. The woman was out in front of shop waiting to swoop down on the next passerby, and before I could scurry past her shop, she got her hooks into me.
Chapter 9
“Carolyn Emerson, don’t you ever call me a busybody again, do you hear me?”
“Kendra, when have I ever called you that before?” I asked. I hadn’t, either, at least not to her face.
“The implication’s been there, and there’s no use trying to deny it.”
“Then I won’t. So, why do I have to stop?”
“Because you’re a thousand times worse than I am, and you know it. I’ve heard you’ve been digging into every mystery that’s happened in Maple Ridge in the past twenty years.”
I tried my best to look innocent. “If that’s true, which I’m not admitting for a second, how did you find out about it? Have you been doing some snooping on your own?”
She managed to look offended, but I was willing to bet a month’s income at my shop against her closet full of muumuus that I was right. “Can I help it if people choose to unload their spiritual woes and burdens onto me? Would you have me turn them away?”
“I really don’t have time for this,” I said as I tried to brush past her. “I need to talk to Rose.”
“She’s what I’m talking about. You’re just dying to know who she was dating, aren’t you?”
“Come on, Kendra, you need to keep up with the times. That’s yesterday’s news.” Though, I’d received the information less than an hour earlier, I figured a little embellishment never hurt now and then.
She didn’t even try to hide her disappointment. “Where exactly did you hear about that? I sincerely doubt Rose told you.”
“For that matter, I’m willing to bet she didn’t confide in you, either,” I said.
Kendra shrugged. “I can’t help but hear things around town. You should be careful. Nate has a nastier bite than you might think.”
“Now how on earth did you hear about that?” The woman was absolutely amazing.
She looked at me smugly as she said, “You were overheard. Do you honestly think that Charlie Cobb was the only one in town who ever drank and drove back when Winnie was run down?”
How on earth had she learned the gist of my conversation with Nate so soon after it had happened? The only thing I could think of was that she had a spy at In the Grounds. She had to. I promised myself to watch what I said around the place until I found her connection. She’d raised an intriguing point, though.
“Who else could have done it?” I asked.
“Think about one thing, Carolyn. Nate has held on to the memory of his wife for an extraordinarily long time, don’t you think?”
“He loved her,” I said. “What’s wrong with that?”
“Nothing. I happen to believe that, too, no matter what my personal track record might indicate. But other people suffer tragic losses, and they manage to move on with their lives. Not Nate, though.”
“If there’s one thing I’ve learned over the years,” I said, “it’s that everybody is different, and they react to tragedies in different ways.”
“That’s true, but have you ever stopped to think that Nate might be feeling more than his loss? How about a measure of guilt thrown in?”
“Are you saying that you believe Nate killed his own wife?” The idea was so far beyond any scope of rational thought, I couldn’t accept it.
“Not necessarily, but he was a heavy drinker back then, and after he crawled out of the bottle, he never had another drink as far as I know.”
“Still, I can’t see him doing it,” I said.
“It’s a possibility our sheriff considered for a while, I know that. You should ask him about it.”
“He doesn’t exactly take me into his confidence these days,” I said. “Why should he talk to me about what he thinks?”
“Because he hates the fact that he never solved the case. There’s something you don’t know about John Hodges. He wants to retire with all of the major cases on his desk solved, and Winnie Walker’s death is a nagging loose thread he wants to tie off. You might just be surprised to find out he’s an ally.”
“Why do you care?” I asked Kendra point-blank. “Forgive me for saying so, but you’ve never shown all that much interest in helping me in the past.”
“Take it for what it’s worth,” she said. “I just thought you should know that not everything is as it seems.”
Kendra ducked back into her shop, and I made my way to Rose’s. Could the woman be right about Nate and his wife? Was his obsession with Winnie simply a distraught husband’s anguish, or was there a healthy dose of guilt thrown in? Either way, I was going to have to focus more of my resources on Nate Walker’s life, both past and present.
But before I could do that, I needed to talk to Rose. She was still a viable suspect on my list, no matter what Kendra had told me. Then it struck me. Was that why Kendra had been so forthright about Nate? Was she doing it to muddy the waters to try to protect Rose? And if that was true, why did Rose need protection from anybody, especially me? The more I learned about my fellow townsfolk in Maple Ridge, the more I wondered exactly how well I really knew my friends and neighbors.
“Hi, Rose,” I said as I neared her shop. She was setting up a display of sun catchers that managed to catch the slightest breath of wind. Many times when I looked out my window, I saw them dancing in the breeze. It was a great way to capture attention for her shop.
“Hello, Carolyn. I wish I had time to chat, but I’m in a bit of a hurry.”
“This won’t take long. You wouldn’t believe the stories I’ve been hearing about you around town. I thought you should know, before any of them got back to you.”
“I don’t think I could care less about what anyone might have to say about me,” she said.
“It’s not at all flattering. I could defend you better if I knew what the truth was. Were you dating Charlie and Rick Cobb at the same time?”
Rose’s stunned expression left me no doubt that she was innocent, at least of double-dating a pair of brothers.
“I never went out with Charlie Cobb in my life,” Rose said firmly, and I believed her. “And now that Rick has dumped me, I’m through with men forever.”
On the last point I wasn’t convinced. I knew Rose had given up on men at least half a dozen times in her life so far. “Why did he break up with you, then?”
She whimpered a little, then said, “I don’t want to talk about it.”
“I’m a good listener, or so I’ve been told,” I said.
Rose looked up and down the street, and perhaps I imagined it, but her gaze seemd to linger in Kendra’s direction a little longer than it did anywhere else. “It was about money,” she said.
That wasn’t what I was expecting. “Did he want yours?”
She shook her head. “No, that was the problem. The second he found out Charlie was dead, Rick brushed me off. He said now that he was loaded, he could do a whole lot better than me.” That brought on a full torrent of tears, and I wished I’d waited to confront her until we’d gotten inside her shop. I maneuvered her inside, then closed the door behind us. As I hugged her, Rose let it out, shaking me with her sobs. “What’s wrong with me, Carolyn? Why can’t I keep a boyfriend?”
I wasn’t about to venture into those uncharted waters. “Honey, it’s not you. The world is full of idiots. You just seem to catch more than your share of them.”
“You’re right; all men are pigs.”
I pulled away from her. “Wait a second, that’s not true. I know for a fact that there are good men out there. I married one myself.”
She dabbed at her cheeks. “You’ve been married thirty years. How do you know there are any good ones left?”
“I see them all the time, and you would, too, if you weren’t so busy going out with the wrong guys.” It was blunt talk, but s
he’d asked me, and I wasn’t about to tiptoe around it.
“How can you tell the good ones from the bad ones?” she asked.
“Listen to your head, as well as your heart.”
“That advice is too general to do me any good,” Rose said. “I need more than that.”
“Okay, for a starter, ask yourself some questions. Is he polite? Does he listen to your answer when he asks you a question, or is he just waiting for his turn to talk? Is he nice to people he doesn’t have to be nice to? How does he treat his mother? Is he willing to pick up the check every now and then? Things like that.”
“I guess that helps a little,” she said reluctantly.
“Well, that’s all I have time for,” I said. “You could always ask someone else for advice.”
Rose frowned. “Not Kendra. She doesn’t want me to date anyone. She thinks I’m too good for them all.”
“That’s dangerous advice to heed,” I said. “Leave yourself open to new experiences. Go places you wouldn’t ordinarily go. Take a different way home. Find a new hobby. I know Maple Ridge isn’t all that big a town, but we’re in the heart of our tourist season. There must be a thousand ways to put yourself out there. Oh, and one more thing.”
“What’s that?”
“Stay away from married men. Especially mine,” I added with a grin.
She tried to return the smile, but she managed only a small, crooked grin. How on earth had I gotten myself into this conversation? It was my own fault, asking her about her love life, but how else would I have known if the rumors I’d been hearing were true? A question lingered in my mind. Why did Rick wait until Charlie was dead to dump Rose? Was there really that big a difference between inheriting four million dollars and inheriting two? Or had he just used that as an excuse to sever their relationship? And more important, how was I going to find out? I wondered if Butch had had any luck tracking down Rick. If he hadn’t, I had a few more questions to add to the list.
I escaped Rose’s grasp as quickly as I could and hurried back to Fire at Will. At least Kendra was now inside, so I didn’t have to physically duck out of her way as I passed her shop.
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