Death Takes the Stage (A Rose Harbor Cozy Mystery Book 2)

by Ella White

  “It's the least I could do,” Barbara said. “I was passing by this way anyhow.”

  Just then Chief Wyatt walked by the desk with Delilah following close behind. Barbara did her best to keep her face hidden, but her dress must have given her away. He turned to her, almost looking happy to see her.

  “Ah, Barbara. Just the woman I wanted to talk to.”

  Delilah also stopped and turned to address her.

  “I just got this arrangement in the mail today. I thought it was one of yours to send your condolences to the cast or something like that, but then somebody left this disturbing note.”

  Barbara examined the arrangement for a second.

  “I don't think that came from our store. We sell those flowers, but the arrangement itself looks to be homemade. The flowers are too haphazardly placed, and there is no creativity to the design.”

  “Thank you, Miss Barbara,” said the chief.

  They began walking when Barbara asked, “What did the note say?”

  “It said, ‘You're welcome,’” the chief responded, shaking his head. “Must have been one colossal sicko to have thought it right to send such a cruel note.”

  “Indeed,” Barbara said. “Before you go, can I get a look at the handwriting?” She wasn't exactly sure what to look for, but she had been a school teacher in her past life, and she knew that penmanship is as unique as signatures. The chief handed her the evidence bag, and she examined its contents.

  “Are you keeping this in evidence?” Barbara asked.

  “We have to. There are no fingerprints on the flowers, so we are just going to send it back in case the killer wants to ensure that Delilah is happy with their decision.”

  Barbara was a bit impressed at the chief’s seemingly appropriate response. “So what's next?” she asked in hopes of gaining a bit more insight into the case.

  “Not going to happen, Miss Barbara, but nice try,” chief snickered as he continued walking Delilah out.

  “I don't need him. I have you,” Barbara said, turning to Eugene.

  Eugene laughed.

  “Oh yeah? What do you want to know?”

  “Have the police spoken to Jason yet?”

  “Yeah, he came in two days ago. Spent a few minutes in the conference room, but as far as I could tell, the chief has removed him from the pool of suspects.”

  “Why is that?”

  “I thought you knew. He has an iron clad alibi.”

  “He doesn't need to have been there to have taken part in planning the murder. But I thought they had said he had no alibi, how can he suddenly have one, and an iron-clad one at that?”

  Shrugging, she said, “The chief isn't saying anything to anyone about him other than that he's out. Seems they think he had nothing to do with it.”

  “And the other two suspects?”

  “He still has that director lady being watched and the other girl as well, but so far they've had no new leads.”

  “Enough about dead bodies,” Barbara said, relaxing against the counter once again. “How are the kids? I haven’t seen them in far too long.”

  Their conversation continued for another half an hour. Eugene boasted about her grandchildren at Barbara’s expense, while Barbara boasted about her flowers.

  “You know, you should quit this place and come work for me,” Barbara suggested.

  “But who would keep these killers in check?” Eugene asked.

  “Didn’t you hear? We do both down at the shop.” Both ladies laughed. It was a running joke in the town, the flower shop investigators.

  “Well, I’ll give it a thought, but no promises,” Eugene said once again caressing her flowers.

  “All right, well I better get on back to the store before the cat gets up to any more shenanigans.”

  Barbara was walking down the stairs of the station when she came upon the chief talking to who she assumed was an officer in plain clothes. She had seen him once before when the crime scene had just been discovered, but she wondered why the change and whether or not it had to do with the investigation of Tim’s death.

  By the time Barbara returned to the store, Lydia had already left.

  * * *

  Lydia walked up the steps of Jason’s modern style suburban home. As she walked up the steps, she felt a rush of excitement. She rang the doorbell and was surprised to be greeted by a cheerful little girl with pigtails and a missing tooth. Her features were so familiar, Lydia wondered if she had met her before.

  “Hi! Are you here to talk to my daddy?” she asked with a wide smile.

  Lydia was a bit taken aback. She hadn't pictured Jason as a married man, let alone as a father.

  “Kylie,” Jason said from somewhere in the house, “I told you not to answer the door.” Lydia watched as he walked towards the door clad in jeans and a polo shirt. He looked ever the handsome part he had been hired to play. She tried to keep her hormones in check. This man was a possible murder suspect, after all.

  “Hi,” Lydia said. “I’m here on behalf of a friend of mine. She works at the Town Gazette and wants to do an excerpt about the play and the murder. Can I come in?”

  He looked a bit hesitant at first, but after a moment he swung the door open and stood aside. He led her to the kitten where he looked to be preparing a batch of peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. The more domesticated she discovered he was, the less she believed he had any killer instincts.

  “I’m sorry, but I can't stop or she'll miss PB&J time,” he apologized.

  “That's all right,” Lydia exclaimed. “Is your wife around?”

  He sliced a sandwich in half before looking up at her.

  “Oh, no. My wife died eight years ago. Right after Kylie was born.”

  “Wow. I'm sorry.”

  “Don't be. We had already been separated for a few months. I had even started dating again, but when she died, I decided to devote my time to Kylie.”

  Lydia felt like a total jerk. She had no idea how she could have possibly identified a man like him as a suspect.

  “Well,” she started, “I should be going.”

  She turned and was about to leave before he stopped her.

  “Don't you have some questions to ask about Tim’s death?”

  Lydia paused and turned to meet his eyes. He was obviously amused by her behavior.

  “Oh, my apologies. Where can we do it?”

  He led her to the sitting room where his daughter lay amidst a small pillow fort eating her sandwich.

  “So what did you want to ask?”

  “I just wanted to find out if you have any information relating to the death of Tim.”

  “Well, I knew Tim for many years. We look alike and typically pursue the same type of characters, so you can imagine we ran in quite similar circles. As for his death, I told the police I knew nothing, which is the same thing I have to tell you.”

  “How did you find working with him?” Lydia plied.

  “It wasn’t always good times, that’s for sure. There were times we worked together well enough considering we were rival actors, but then there were times we could not stand each other. Tim was a bit high strung, which you can imagine would be true of someone who comes from a wealthy family, but he was also a good actor.”

  “You speak so well of him.”

  “No one wants to speak ill of the dead,” Jason shrugged.

  “That's true,” Lydia agreed. “On the night he died, what can you remember?”

  “It was long, hard day of rehearsals. Tempers were high and hot. Things were spoken, but at the end of the day it wasn't anything life threatening or new to the theatre. We are a very passionate group of people.”

  Lydia looked up to see find him looking at her in a very curious way. She wondered at the flirtatious tone in his voice.

  “I remember the chief had said you were one of the cast members without an alibi.”

  “Well, I did have one, my daughter had been sick. But I try to keep her out of the press. No one knows
she exists, and I want to keep it that way. I don't want anyone taking advantage of her.”

  Lydia understood. When children got involved, things always got more complicated. A father like Jason would try his best to protect his daughter, and she was even more impressed with him than before.

  “Do you think anyone on the cast could have been capable of killing Tim?”

  “Well, not really,” Jason said as he stood. “We were all in it together. If one person messed up, it affected the entire cast, and they all knew that.”

  Lydia watched as he began to pace back and forth with his hands in his pockets.

  “So you're telling me you don't think anyone in the cast could have killed Tim?”

  Jason stopped for a second to consider. Then he looked up.

  “From what I knew about Tim, he made enemies everywhere. The last play we did together he even managed to get into a fight with the catering service,” Jason said, shaking his head.

  “Why would he fight with them?” Lydia asked.

  “Well, the guy must have put mayo on his sandwich, which he never eats by the way, and Tim just flipped out on him and started calling him names. He threw the sandwich to the ground and stepped on it. I mean the guy literally threw himself at Tim.”

  “So he was a diva?”

  Jason laughed.

  “A diva would be much more polite than Tim ever was.”

  “What about your relationship with Jenny?”

  Jason’s expression suddenly changed.

  “What about her?” he asked.

  “Well, I've been trying to get some information on her. I found out that you two dated once.”

  “We did not date,” he replied, visibly uncomfortable. “We had a few careless nights until Delilah found out, and that was it.”

  “Is that why it ended?” she asked hoping for something valuable.

  “Well, yeah.”

  “Is that why you filed a restraining order?”

  Jason’s lip twitched into what Lydia assumed was a sign of amusement.

  “You've done your research,” he said.

  “It's my job.”

  “I thought you were a flower store owner,” he said side eyeing her.

  “Well, I can do both,” she smiled.

  “Okay, so I filed a restraining order against her a few days after we ended it. She had come up with some sort of ruse that she was pregnant, but I knew that wasn't true because I snipped a few years back. The only way she could have been impregnated was if she had gone to see my doctor and taken my goods out of cold storage.”

  “So you're saying she tried to trick you into thinking you had impregnated her? Why would she even think of doing that?”

  “I think she had some deranged idea we would get together and become the perfect stage couple. Back then she played the minor role of my mistress. It got scary to the point where I came home and heard her having a phone conversation with my daughter’s nanny, begging to see her.

  The pieces were beginning to fall into place.

  “So that's when you got the restraining order.”

  “Yeah. It seemed necessary.”

  “That was totally understandable. But then why did you have it reversed?”

  “I saw her a few days later, and she was behaving totally normal. I also spoke to Delilah who said that Jenny had made a mistake and would back off, if it meant saving the production.”

  Lydia considered the latest information for a while.

  “So now what happens when you two work together?”

  “Surprisingly, she hasn't been strange the entire time we’ve been working on this play. She always greets me the same, but there is nothing in the tone of her voice that would make me think she’s harboring anything against me. I actually think she has been able to put it past her for the sake of Delilah, who is adamant that we have no inter-cast dating.”

  “What was her relationship with Tim like?” Lydia asked.

  “Before the restraining order fiasco, she tolerated him with the same hatred most of us actors usually had towards him. When it was over, I realized she had become cold and distant toward the entire cast except for Tim and Delilah. She seemed to openly adore Delilah and her work, but she showed extremes with Tim. There were times she hated him and there were times she adored him.” He paused for a second. “Come to think about it, she mainly hated him.”

  “How did Delilah take this?”

  “She took it like any director would; gracefully. She enjoyed having someone in her corner, but she made it very evident that any attempts to get on her good side would not work unless the play was well done.”

  “Did Jenny and Tim ever get together the way you two did?” Lydia could feel herself blushing.

  “I honestly have no idea. I really wish it hadn't ended this way for Tim. Despite all his faults, he had a great career ahead of him.”

  Lydia felt like it was time for her to go. She had no place interrogating what seemed to be an honest man.

  “I think I better go now,” Lydia said, standing.

  “How about I make us both some lunch, and then you can run off to interrogate more people,” Jason replied coyly.

  Lydia did her best to not blush, but as he walked back into the kitchen, she felt herself turning beet red.

  * * *

  Lydia walked to her car with her keys in hand. She was about to head back to the store to rip Jason’s picture off the board, when something on her windshield caught her attention. She walked over to it and realized it was an envelope. There was no address, and the only writing on it was her name. She carefully opened it and removed a small scrap of paper from the gas station she had visited on her way over. The receipt was timed about the same time she had been there, which was equally strange. She turned the piece of paper to find a note scribbled on it. She didn't recognize the handwriting, but she was sure it read: “Stay the hell away. The closer you get, the more you'll regret.”

  Chapter 7

  Lydia spun around to examine the street and found it empty, save for the two cars she had passed on her way in. She tried not to panic, but she had let herself become an easy target for whoever seemed to be a deranged killer.

  She slid the note in her pocket and opened her car door. Turning around, she checked the back seats and was relieved to find that there were no gun toting spies. She drove off and headed directly to the store to tell her mother what had happened.

  Lydia walked into the store and found her mother sitting behind the counter petting the cat.

  “Finally home,” she said, when she caught sight of Lydia.

  “It’s been quite a day,” Lydia sighed, walking up to her and planting a kiss on her cheek.

  “You can say that again,” Barbara replied.

  “What have you been up to?” Lydia asked, remembering her mother had planned to visit her friend down at the station. “I thought you were going to see Eugene to find out if she knew anything.”

  “I did, but it's what happened when I was there that puzzled me.”

  “What happened?” Lydia asked, taking a seat beside her mother. There was no one in the store and Charles was out on his day off, so they were alone for the moment.

  “Well, I went down there like I always do,” Barbara whispered and looked around suspiciously. “I got to Eugene’s desk to leave her the flowers and have our usual chat. Midway through our conversation, guess who walks out of the chief’s office?”

  “Who?” Lydia asked, suddenly very interested.

  “Delilah. She came out holding a floral arrangement. The chief stopped and asked me if we made it here at the store, but I told him we hadn’t made anything like that. It was all wrong, too tall in some areas.”

  “So, someone sent her some flowers… Why did that bother you?”

  “There was a note in the arrangement. Supposedly the killer made the arrangement as a way to tell Delilah she was welcome for Tim’s death.”

  Lydia jumped out of her seat and ruffled through h
er bag to find the note that had been left in her windshield.

  “Did it look like this?” she asked, holding the envelope out to her mother.

  Barbara shook her head and took the envelope.

  “Oh dear. That's the exact same writing that was on Delilah’s note. Do you think the killer followed you to threaten you?”

  “I went to Jason’s house today. We talked, and I found out that he is a good man. We talked for a long time, but when I was about to leave, I found this on my car. It couldn't have been him because we were inside the whole time. He didn't know I would be there, and this is not the handwriting of an eight year old.”

  Barbara's eyes widened.

  “You mean to tell me that the killer was following you and could have easily killed you just like they killed Tim?”

  Both women jumped at the sound of the bell that signaled the arrival of a customer.

  “Hey, Lydia. You there?”

  They let out collective sighs of relief. It was only Gwen stopping by on her way home from work.

  “Back here,” Lydia shouted.

  Gwen walked up to the counter.

  “Is something wrong?” she asked.

  “No,” Barbara said.

  “You two look as if you've seen a ghost.”

  Lydia smiled, trying to calm her nerves.

  “Nothing like that,” Barbara smiled, “but I think I've figured out who the killer is.”

  Gwen’s face lit up.

  “Who is it?”

  “The only person unaccounted for today and the only one who has been shady with us so far: Jenny.”

  Gwen gaped at Lydia, but Lydia nodded her head.

  “I think I agree with my mother. It's just about proving it now so that the chief will have no other choice but to believe us. You know how he thinks we don’t do real investigative work.”

  “But how?” Gwen asked.

  The bell rung again as a few customers walked in.

  “We can talk about it later, when we close up.”

  “By the way, you need to call the chief,” Barbara said. “If the killer knows you're close, they could come after you.”