Drape Expectations

by Karen Rose Smith

  Valentine was sleeping on Nana’s lap right now as she talked to Bella in the living room.

  “I’m glad she’s bringing Nana some joy.”

  “She is. Your uncle isn’t.”

  “Everything that happened, happened a long time ago,” Caprice suggested.

  “Maybe so. But consequences from it are still rippling. He cut us out of his life. How could he just do that? Your father seems to understand a whole lot better than I do.”

  “They’re brothers, Mom. Think about me and Bella and Nikki and Vince. Wouldn’t we forgive anything?”

  Her mom dropped the pasta a handful at a time into the huge pot of boiling water. “I suppose you would. We could blame the whole disaster on Ronnie. We could blame it all on love. Apparently, Dom made her the center of his world, and he wanted to make her happy. But he should have stood his ground, even if she didn’t want contact with us. He should have made an effort to unite us all. After all, your aunt Maria is in Montana, but she sends us pictures. She invites us to come stay with them. She visits us every couple of years. We understand the distance. We understand the expense. But e-mails go a long way. So do texts and phone conversations. Your uncle cut himself off completely.”

  Aunt Maria, her father’s sister, had always lived across the country and they rarely saw her. But she did keep in touch. “Do you think he cut himself off because he didn’t want to deal with Ronnie’s reaction?” Caprice guessed.

  “Most probably. He doesn’t like conflict. None of us do. But family is worth fighting for.”

  Family was worth fighting for. Caprice knew that to be true.

  The doorbell chimed.

  Fran’s fierce expression, and her conviction about family, eased into a knowing smile. “You’d better answer that. It could be somebody you want to see.” Her mother knew she had invited Grant.

  “You mean Vince and Roz or Nikki?”

  Her mom’s smile broadened. “Hardly. They wouldn’t have rung the bell.”

  Caprice hurried from the kitchen, then through the dining room, with its long mahogany table now dressed with a white tablecloth and her mother’s good china. The cuckoo clock, which had hung in the dining room for as long as Caprice could remember, emitted a small cuckoo bird. It cuckooed five times.

  Grant was right on time.

  When she opened the door, they both just stood there for a minute or so, unsure of how to proceed. He’d never come here as her guest before.

  In his arms, he carried a basket with fresh fruit. Noticing Patches wasn’t at his feet, she used that as a stepping-stone. “Didn’t you bring Patches?”

  Grant chuckled. “He’s already playing out back with Lady. I stopped to say hello to your dad and Joe, and they introduced me to your uncle.”

  Caprice lowered her voice. “There’s tension around all of them that they’re going to have to work out.”

  “Your uncle Dom said he’s been searching the job sites, looking for work. Do you think he’ll stay in the area?”

  Caprice gave a shrug. “Nobody knows what’s going to happen. But that doesn’t mean we can’t enjoy the meal and conversation and everybody’s company. I’m glad you came.”

  She was, and she might as well be honest about it.

  Grant hefted the fruit basket he had in his arms from one side to the other. “Where would you like me to put this?”

  “Let’s put it on the buffet in the dining room for now. It looks so pretty. I hate to tear it apart.”

  “I ran into Detective Carstead yesterday at the police station. I had to stop in to pick up some paperwork on a client.”

  “Did you talk to him about Alanna’s murder?”

  “You know how closemouthed he is. He soaks up information like a sponge, but he doesn’t give any out. He did say they hope to have some movement in the case after they know what’s in the will.”

  “Does he think Alanna changed it to leave everything to Ace?” Caprice asked, wondering if she had.

  “That’s certainly a possibility.”

  “He doesn’t need it,” Caprice said.

  “Do you know that for sure? He has a tour coming up that’s going to be costing a pretty penny. Half a million is what I heard. Until money starts flowing in, he has this estate he just bought in Kismet and a condo in L.A. He might have expenses you wouldn’t even think of. He could be in the hole. His divorce could have put him in debt.”

  “So we have to hope he’s not the beneficiary.”

  “I don’t think hope is going to have much to do with this,” Grant said with a grimace.

  “I had breakfast with Twyla Horton—Alanna’s sister—on Friday. She called me after she got to town. Since I took Mirabelle, she feels I’m a contact of sorts.”

  “Did you learn anything from her?”

  “Not a lot. But she did bring up the possibility that Alanna had some enemies from Barton Goodwin’s business dealings. She was a member of the board, and some of the other members didn’t like the way Alanna was going to vote on an expansion project.”

  “So there are lots of leads.”

  “Yet nothing concrete. The truth is, Len and Alanna’s association bothers me a lot.”

  “Yeah, it’s still under Ace’s skin, too,” Grant agreed. “He can’t very well stay away from Len, with Len in his band, and them having rehearsals together and picking a new band member. But I told him to pretend he knows nothing. His freedom could depend on it.”

  Caprice felt so comfortable talking to Grant like this, about the ins and outs of an investigation. Grant was dressed in khakis and a black oxford shirt, with its sleeves rolled up his forearms. Her pulse quickened because she was aware of her attraction to him. Was he attracted to her?

  Suddenly the door flew open and Vince and Roz walked in, followed by Nikki. They were all carrying something to contribute to dinner. Vince brought wine. Roz carried a bouquet of tulips and a huge box of candy. Nikki had hold of a Crock-Pot wrapped in a towel.

  “Cream of cauliflower soup,” she said. “I just have to plug it back in.”

  With the bread her mom had baked, and the cannoli Nana had filled, this meal would be another feast.

  Grant moved to take the Crock-Pot from Nikki. “Next to the fruit basket?” he asked Caprice. “I saw a receptacle there.”

  “That would be perfect.” She exchanged a look and a smile with him that the others couldn’t help but catch.

  Vince’s brows arched.

  Roz winked.

  And Nikki?

  Nikki had an absent expression on her face that was unusual. What was up with her?

  As Grant strode with the Crock-Pot into the dining room, Roz and Vince followed him.

  “Mom will have a vase for those,” Caprice called after Roz. “They’re gorgeous.” She turned back to Nikki.

  After removing her Windbreaker, Nikki laid it across a ladder-back chair, which sat against the wall.

  “What’s wrong?” Caprice asked, because she knew something was.

  Nikki didn’t even think twice before she blurted out, “Drew Pierson is going to open his own catering business. He’s going to be in direct competition with me here in Kismet.”

  In February, Nikki had decided to look for a partner for her business so she could get more time to herself, more time to live a normal life instead of working sixty hours a week. Among the chefs she’d interviewed was Drew Pierson. At first, they’d seemed to work well together. He went along on a couple of Nikki’s catering jobs, one of the open houses Caprice had planned, and the Valentine’s Day dance. But there had seemed to be a spark between him and Nikki that had gotten in the way of work. Nikki had wanted Drew to work for her for a while to see if their association could hold up. But he’d wanted a partnership or nothing, and she hadn’t been ready to commit to that. So she’d decided on nothing.

  Vince returned to the foyer, obviously overhearing their conversation. “Why are you worried? You have a good business going now. Why should that change?”

>   “Drew’s food is good. I’m afraid he’s going to take a huge bite out of my business. Scuttlebutt is he has connections at the Country Squire Golf and Recreation Club.”

  “Don’t you have connections there? You’ve catered events for them.”

  “It’s not the same. I know some of the staff. They helped me make inroads. But apparently he knows members of the club. He knows the influential people, and the ones who hold the purse strings.”

  Vince settled his arm around Nikki’s shoulders. “Come on, sis, really. If you do your best work, you’ll be fine.”

  Caprice saw that Vince was trying to be the supportive brother. But the reality was—both she and Nikki didn’t know if that was true.

  Would Nikki’s Catered Capers be fine if Drew Pierson’s company was in direct competition?

  Chapter Eight

  Caprice didn’t know what to expect when she arrived at Alanna’s house early Monday afternoon. Twyla had called her around 10:00 A.M. and asked her to stop over.

  “I know what’s in the will now,” she’d said. “I’m probably a suspect, along with everybody else. But there’s someone else on the list, too.”

  “Who?” Caprice had asked.

  “Archer Ford.”

  “Who’s Archer Ford?”

  “Barton’s illegitimate son.”

  Caprice had asked Twyla if she wanted to talk about it, and Twyla did. For her side of it, Caprice wanted to know who this Archer Ford was and what his connection to Alanna could be, so she’d accepted Twyla’s invitation to stop at White Pillars.

  Twyla greeted her at the front door in jeans and T-shirt, her feet bare. She said, “Let’s go into the parlor. I can’t stand being in the living room. It creeps me out.”

  Caprice could see how it would, staying in a house where someone had been murdered. On the other hand, Caprice had staged the smaller parlor to be a comfortable sitting area. She’d added aqua to the dark greens, off-white pillows to the settee. She and Twyla both sat there.

  Twyla motioned to the glasses of iced tea and shortbread cookies on a tray on a side table. “It’s sweet tea,” she said. “The way we make it down home.”

  “The cookies look home-baked.”

  “I needed something to do last night, and I wanted to fill this place with good smells. Do you know what I mean?”

  Caprice did know. Every house had its own unique aroma as well as ambience. Cinnamon and sugar added pleasantly to the mix. She sampled one of the cookies. “These are good.” After she took a sip of the tea, she realized it was sweet.

  Twyla had folded her hands in her lap and looked a little lost. “Alanna left me this house. I never expected that. I never expected anything, really. Actually, I thought Alanna might leave her estate to charity. She and Barton donated to several foundations.”

  “She was your sister.”

  “Yes, she was. But we weren’t so close in our adult years. Our lifestyles were very different. Alanna spent her teenage years trying to get away from our hometown. And Barton finally took her away. But I made a life there, a good life. I have a boyfriend and a little bungalow with a yard.”

  “From what I understand, Alanna had a hefty estate.”

  “She did. She left a third of it to charity, a third of it to me, and a third of it to Archer Ford. The business was a separate entity.”

  “So tell me about this man, Archer Ford. Besides inheriting Alanna’s estate, did he have any other reason to want her dead?”

  “He might. After Barton and Alanna moved to Kismet, Archer approached Barton, claiming he was his son.”

  “Why wait until Barton moved here? Was Archer Ford from around here?”

  “He lived in D.C. When his mother died, she left him a letter with the information that Barton was his father. Apparently, Barton flew to the D.C. area a lot because of government contracts.”

  “How old is Archer Ford?”

  Twyla thought about it. “He must be around thirty. Barton supposedly had the affair early in his first marriage.”

  From what she’d learned online, Caprice was already familiar with the basic facts. Barton was twenty years older than Alanna and had been married and divorced before he met her.

  Twyla confirmed that info when she said, “Barton was two decades older than my sister. She thought he was stable and faithful. But when Archer came out of the woodwork, then she found out that Barton had cheated on his first wife.”

  That would be a shock if a woman believed the man she’d married adhered to the same values she did. Then Caprice considered another aspect of this family drama. “Alanna was Archer Ford’s stepmother, so to speak.” She couldn’t imagine the Southern beauty liking that idea.

  “Not exactly his stepmother. Barton denied paternity to Archer. He didn’t want a scandal to damage his reputation.”

  “Would that matter to a businessman?”

  “Maybe not in the old-fashioned sense, because infidelity is more common today. But it might have changed the terms of his divorce settlement if his ex-wife found out about it.”

  “What if Archer went to the press?”

  “Without a paternity or DNA test, Barton would still have denied it and probably would have convinced his connections to squelch it.”

  “Barton sounds like a hard man.”

  Twyla took a bite of one of the cookies and nodded. “He was. When Alanna told me about it—in confidence, of course—she said she felt sorry for Archer. She liked him. He even moved to York so he could be close by Barton, hoping he’d change his mind. After his mother died, he didn’t have any other real family. So Alanna kept in contact with him. I think she felt Barton would eventually soften toward Archer and accept him. But Barton never did. When he died, he didn’t leave anything to him. He left his fortune to Alanna. That had to be a disappointment to Archer that his father wouldn’t even acknowledge him in death.”

  Was that motive for murder? If Archer knew he’d inherit if Alanna died ... Caprice guessed there was more to this story. After nibbling the rest of her cookie, she sipped more tea. She could get used to the sweetened iced tea.

  “This feels like a soap opera,” she said. “What happened next?”

  Twyla glanced away for a while, as though thinking better of telling Caprice all of this. Family matters were sacred to some families. Then again, most families didn’t have to deal with murder.

  After a long lull in their conversation, Twyla admitted, “I looked you up on the computer.”

  That could be good or bad. “And what did you find?”

  “Everything about your success as a home stager, of course. I can see why Alanna wanted to use you to sell the house. But I also read about the murders you’ve solved.”

  “I sort of fell into doing it by accident.”

  Twyla canvassed her face as if trying to decide about her trustworthiness. Finally she said, “I want you to know all this so you can find out who killed Alanna. That’s what you’re going to do, aren’t you? Because Ace is your friend?”

  “I won’t get in the way of the police investigation, but if I can give them more information, I will. And if you have anything they should know—”

  “I’m not sure if I should tell them about Archer or not.” After a bit more hesitation, Twyla confided, “After Barton died, Alanna and Archer had a fling. I asked her about it at Christmas, if it was still going on. She told me she’d just ended it before Christmas. Archer just didn’t move in the right circles, or have the clout of a man like Barton—or Ace Richland.”

  Caprice didn’t act surprised, because she wasn’t. “Alanna liked her lifestyle.”

  Twyla shrugged. “She had enough money to keep her lifestyle with what she inherited from Barton.”

  After considering what Twyla said, Caprice shook her head. Maybe she knew Alanna better than she thought she did. “Yes, she had Barton’s money. But she didn’t want to be alone and she wanted a man who could bring to a relationship or marriage as much power as she did. If she dumped
Archer for Ace . . . that could definitely give Archer a motive for murder. I wonder if Archer knew he’d inherit when Alanna died.”

  Twyla shrugged. “I have no idea. Sometimes Alanna was like the wind. She’d change direction in a matter of minutes. I thought she really felt something for Archer, but then she just dropped him.”

  Caprice suddenly wanted to meet this disappointed lover. Jealousy was a powerful motive for murder. Most likely, he’d attend Alanna’s funeral.

  Her mind and Twyla’s must have run in the same direction, for Twyla said, “I made arrangements for Alanna’s funeral. It’s on Wednesday. I have another appointment with the funeral director this afternoon.”

  To move away from that morbid topic, Caprice asked, “Do you think you’ll be staying in Kismet?”

  Twyla looked a little lost again, as if she was overwhelmed by all of it. “I just don’t know.”

  Caprice understood her confusion. Maybe after Alanna’s funeral, Twyla could make up her mind whether to stay ... or return to her life in Mississippi.

  There was no way for Caprice to know whom the police considered their main suspect for Alanna’s murder. Two suspects headed the top of her list—Archer Ford and Len Lowery. Hopefully, she could meet Archer Ford at Alanna’s funeral. And Len . . .

  She needed to know more. She wouldn’t mess with Len himself. That might be too dangerous. But she could have a talk with Zeke Stoltz and find out why he’d quit Ace’s band.

  Dulcina worked at home as a medical transcriber, so Caprice phoned her to see if she could puppysit Lady for a couple of hours. Dulcina assured Caprice she could. With the holiday, her workload had been lighter.

  After Caprice handed Lady into Dulcina’s care, after she tucked Mirabelle into the guest bedroom for safekeeping, she drove her Camaro to Harrisburg’s west shore, where Zeke lived. He and his wife rented a town house there.

  Caprice had phoned Zeke to set up a meeting and he’d tried to shut her down. But she’d played her best card. “This is a murder that happened, Mr. Stoltz. If the police haven’t talked to you yet, they will. Ace is my friend. I’m trying to figure out the best way to help him. I promise I won’t take up much of your time. I have to be back in Kismet by six for a class I’m taking tonight.” Her self-defense course began this evening at seven and she didn’t intend to be late.