Dead to Begin With (A Country Gift Shop Cozy Mystery series, Book 1)

by Vivian Conroy

  He had fooled them all.

  “The dog can’t help you now, Diane.” Everett sounded calm again, terrifyingly collected. “There is no point in screaming either, because nobody is going to hear. People are busy making dinner or watching TV. And this place is isolated. There is nothing you can do, but listen to me. You are going to come with me, quietly, so we can talk. About Celine. You want that, right? You came back for the truth, leaving your family and all you love. You deserve to find out how she died.”

  “Died?” Diane echoed. “So she’s dead. She is really dead?” Her voice broke.

  Vicky knew Diane had doubted her sister could still be alive after so much time had passed. But this callous mention, by the killer no less, was too much.

  Everett smiled coldly. “You can even see where she is buried. Under hundreds of tons of concrete.”

  “Concrete?” Diane’s voice trembled as if she could barely get the words out. “What did you do to her?”

  Moments before she had looked strong and willing to fight, but now her shoulders were slumping. Soon she’d be dissolving into tears. The perfect moment for Everett Baker to strike out at her.

  Vicky’s mind was racing for a solution to this whole mess. Could she sneak out again and call the police? Everett had obviously not noticed her presence yet. But he might, the moment she moved away.

  Was Everett armed? Would he strike in despair as soon as he figured he had been made? He had killed a big man like Mortimer Gill. If he got his hands on something to strike with…

  Maybe he didn’t even need a weapon. His hands were powerful enough to strangle a woman. He was dangerous, and Vicky would never forgive herself if her wrong move caused Diane’s death.

  “Come along, Diane,” Everett repeated. “You can experience it all firsthand. Then you can join Celine.”

  “Why did you kill her?” Diane’s voice was raw with emotion. “You need not have. She did you no harm.”

  “No harm?” Everett stepped forward. “She threatened to take away everything I had.”

  Diane made a pleading gesture. “I know she rejected your offer to take her to the prom, but was that bad enough to…”

  “The prom? You think I cared for the prom? For dancing and showing off? No, that was Michael Danning’s department.” Everett snarled. “I never wanted that. I didn’t even want girls. Just chess trophies and good grades. A career. Money, respect. No more paper rounds and endless discussions with my mother about what I could and could not buy. She made sure I never had money to buy anything she didn’t want me to have. I wanted to have my own money and show her I could make up my own mind. But Celine threatened to take it all away from me.”

  His eyes gleamed feverishly. “She had found out I was cheating, Diane. That I always won my chess games because I cheated. That I got good grades because I cheated. I still cheat. I cheat so cleverly nobody finds out. I skim off the top; I deceive the IRS. I even took money out of the schoolyard fund when I was still a member of the city council and they never suspected. They can’t see through the wall of figures I throw up around myself.”

  Vicky saw the letters on his door again: CPA. Everett had turned his professional knowledge into a smoke screen nobody had been able to penetrate.

  Everett laughed. “Figures have always been my friends. I can turn them into anything I want. When my mother died, I made sure half of her property never showed up in the paperwork so I could evade the estate tax on it. I deserved to have that money, you know. She never wanted to give it to me while she was alive. But when she was dead I could do with it whatever I wanted. I had to hide it from them, or they would have taken it away too. Like I can’t handle it. But I could. I could handle them too. They never found out.”

  Everett’s expression sobered, the elation washing away. His eyes narrowed as if he reminded himself that he had something to do here. He focused on Diane again. “I will never be caught for your death, Diane. They never got me twenty-three years ago. They will never get me for Mortimer either. I wore gloves to his place. I left no prints. I took his cell phone and threw it in the trash at the back of his house. On purpose. The police will find it sooner or later and conclude the killer ditched it because it implicated him. The last number called was Deke Rowland’s, not mine. Mortimer did call me once or twice about Gwenda’s apartment, but that is long ago. My number is not in that phone, nothing to implicate me. And nobody saw me going there or coming away from it. They can never tie me to it. Never.”

  “Is that why you want to kill me?” Diane asked in a hoarse voice. “Because you are so certain of yourself? No, you’re afraid. Afraid that they are much closer than you think. You know that Michael, Vicky and I found clues. We shared them with other people too. You can’t kill them all.”

  Vicky admired Diane’s resilience in bouncing back from her initial shock that Celine was dead, by the hands of the man opposite her. She was now actually defending herself, trying to unnerve Everett.

  Everett laughed again. “Oh, but they will close the case after tonight, dear Diane. I will give them their killer. Michael Danning. He murdered Celine all those years ago, because he was jealous of her flirting with other men. He came back to Glen Cove from a misplaced sense of guilt. He was confronted with you, Celine’s mirror image, and lost his mind. First he set the fire to erase all traces of his earlier crime. Then he got convinced that Mortimer had something on him, so he murdered Mortimer and then when things got hotter and hotter, he came after you. The police will suspect him right away. You see, they already know how he became obsessed with you. They know he followed you around, watching you work out on the beach. They know because an anonymous caller gave them that information earlier.”

  “No, you can’t do that,” Diane said desperately. “Michael followed me around, that’s true, but he did it because he is my friend. He’s suffered enough from Celine’s disappearance. You can’t sacrifice him to your madness.”

  In Vicky’s purse her cell began to vibrate. Fortunately it was on silent mode, so Everett could not hear it. Her knees buckled. It had to be Cash. If only there was a way that she could answer and put it on speaker, so he could hear what was going on in this house.

  But she did not dare make a sound and attract Everett’s attention. He was unstable, volatile. Explosive.

  And right now she was Diane’s only chance for escape.

  “Michael Danning will be arrested in the morning,” Everett continued without emotion, “driving around, disorientated, not able to prove where he went, what he did, or why. He won’t have an alibi. He will not be able to explain himself. Cash Rowland never liked him. Old Perkins tried to hang the murder on him before. Believe me, Diane, they will charge him and convict him. Of three murders no less. He will die in prison.”

  Vicky’s heart beat like crazy. What had Everett done to Michael? Just lured himself from town with some story? Or drugged him? Mortimer had opened up the possibility with his note.

  Then another thought struck her. Making her legs go weak.

  If Michael was out of the picture, who would save them from Everett now?

  “I’ll get rid of all my problems in a single stroke,” Everett said. “You will disappear. You should never have come in the first place, dragging the whole thing up. Then Michael Danning, who always thought he knew better, will be in prison for the rest of his life. And Vicky Simmons will be so devastated that she leaves Glen Cove again for London. She did a good job on the store. It’s worth much more now than it was with Gwenda’s ugly traces left. I will lease her store to somebody else who can pay more. I’ll still visit her mother of course and talk to her and pat the dogs and nod at her stories. She likes me and thinks I play better chess than her dead husband. She doesn’t know I cheat either.”

  He laughed again, a high pitch.

  “But I know now.” Vicky stepped out from the kitchen area into Everett’s view. She saw him shrink back a moment. “I know it all. Even that you never made grand master because then your chea
ting would have been discovered. At a large tournament there would have been too many eyes upon you. You could never make it work out.”

  Everett shrank back as if slapped, and she pushed on to use the advantage of the moment, “I found Mortimer’s evidence. I turned it over to the police. They will be here any moment. Give it up, Everett. It’s pointless.”

  Everett looked her over. His tongue nervously flicked out and wet his lips. His hands knotted and unknotted in front of him.

  Then his gaze became steadier, and he straightened up. “You are lying. Mortimer had it hidden so good I couldn’t find it. How could you?”

  “It was hidden in my store. He hid it when he was working there.”

  Everett hissed in anger. “I looked through his house, his sheds, I even searched Gwenda’s apartment for it. And it was in your store all along?”

  “In the fireplace Mortimer made.” Vicky tried to sound strong and certain, even though Everett’s near madness made her skin creep. “He used it as a safe place because he figured nobody would look there until the thing was ready. I found it and—”

  “You would never turn it over to the police,” Everett hissed. “You don’t trust them. You would want to discuss it with Michael Danning or with Diane. That is why you came here.”

  He looked her over, eyes narrowing. “You have it on you. Give it to me.”

  Vicky hesitated. The evidence was worth very little. Perhaps as she gave it to him, he would be distracted and Diane and she would get a chance to escape.

  Let out the dog?

  She opened her purse.

  “Don’t give it to him,” Diane begged. “He will kill us and get away with it. I want him to pay for what he did to Celine. He dumped her under concrete for his stupid chess trophies.”

  “She had no right to threaten me. She felt so smart, so strong. I showed her. I killed her to shut her up for good.” Everett blinked. “Now give me the evidence.”

  Vicky handed him the folded sheets. But he didn’t look at them, like she had expected, offering her a chance to make a move. He just stuffed them into his pocket, as if the contents hardly mattered to him, never taking his eyes off the two of them.

  “This is just a little harder,” he said softly as if talking to himself. “Two of them. But the way to do it is just the same. I did it before; I can do it again. Nobody will know about it. They never did.”

  “You set the fire too, Everett,” Vicky said. She had to buy time. “That was clever. You used a time device, so it would start and be discovered when you were already with my mother. She was your alibi.”

  “You were and Michael Danning.” His eyes flashed. “You saw me sitting there on the couch eating sticky lasagna while the barn burned down. I knew it before that phone rang and a friend told your mother. But I played along and you never suspected me. Nobody will ever suspect me.”

  Vicky blinked against rising tears. Everett was backing them into a corner, having disabled Michael and making it very clear he left no traces that would ever point to him. The panic churning in her stomach told her he was probably right thinking he’d get away with this.

  Again.

  “Now here is what we do,” Everett said. “We leave the house at the back and go through the brush. There is a path there that leads away from town. We follow it. You walk ahead of me. You do not run. If one of you starts to run, I will shoot the other. You got that?”

  “You haven’t got a gun.” Diane sounded derisive. “You are the sort of coward who kills—”

  Everett launched himself at her with a furious cry. Diane flung up her hand and threw potpourri in his face. The finer dust in it caught his eyes, and he yelped, reaching up to his face. Diane turned to Vicky and cried, “Run!”

  Vicky turned and staggered to the kitchen. Behind her there was a cry, then something crashed to the floor. Looking back, she saw that Everett had caught Diane by the leg and pulled her down. He tried to crawl over her, his hands grasping.

  He was going for her throat to strangle her. With his strength and anger, it would not take long before she would be dead.

  Vicky looked round for something to use as a weapon. There was nothing useful within reach. She threw herself at Everett, grabbing him by the shoulders and trying to pull him away. He was much too strong for her to dislodge. He had Diane around the waist now and just squeezed. She screamed like crazy. But with the cottage's isolation chances were slim anybody would hear anything. And even if somebody called the police, how long would it take them to get there? By that time it would be over. Cash would be left with two more dead bodies and no clues as to who was responsible. He’d never suspect Everett. There didn’t seem to be any reason to. No motive.

  Everett half turned his upper body and swung at Vicky. His arm hit her, and she was propelled back, sliding away, into the sofa. Her backbone crunched, and for a moment she saw black dots in front of her eyes.

  “Run!” Diane’s voice screeched through the haze. “Get away! Warn somebody!”

  Vicky tried to scramble to her feet, but her limbs didn’t respond to the commands of the brain. Everett was faster and now grabbed her leg to pull her back to him. Vicky kicked at him with her free foot. The dog barked like crazy somewhere in the house. Could he free himself? Not likely.

  Then suddenly a voice called out, “Freeze or I will shoot.”

  In a haze Vicky saw Cash Rowland standing in the doorway, his gun drawn and trained on Everett. Behind him was a deputy, ashen with wide dark eyes like holes in his face.

  Everett moved with shocking agility, sliding away across the linoleum, pushing himself up in one movement and throwing himself into the kitchen. But there a second deputy popped up and put his gun against Everett’s chest. “Hold it,” he said low. “There is nowhere to go.”

  In the silence Vicky heard Diane draw in deep shaking breaths. Vicky herself sat motionless, hoping Everett would surrender and not do anything insane, provoking a shootout. There had been enough killing, enough hurt done. It had to stop now.

  Cash moved through the room, to Everett’s back, caught his wrists and pulled them together. He clicked the handcuffs on, then ordered the deputies to take him away and put him in the car. “Take him to the station at once and lock him up. Don’t take any chances of him escaping. And take everything off him that he might use for something. The greatest precautions must be taken so that he can stand trial. We owe it to the Dobbs family.”

  Everett said nothing more. He didn’t resist, but walked with his head down, as if suddenly all willpower had left him.

  Vicky still couldn’t believe that the cunning real estate agent in his crumpled suits had been their killer all along. A conniving crook, eager for money, selfish to the bone, just like Mortimer Gill had been.

  Cash had checked on Diane and now came over to Vicky. He knelt beside her and looked her in the eye. “Are you OK?”

  She nodded. Her hands felt jittery, and her lips began to wobble. If Cash hadn’t showed up when he did…

  Cash pulled her against him and held her tight. His hand patted the small of her back. He said something like everything was all right now and they had done it, had captured their man. He smelled of leather and horses, of safety.

  Cash brushed over her hair and squeezed her shoulder. “It’s over now, Vicky. He will never be free again.”

  She lifted her head and looked him in the eye. “Do you know where Michael is? Everett said something about him suggesting he tricked him into going some place or… Maybe he even drugged him?”

  She thought about Mortimer’s note on the old report again. Drunk or drugged.

  Cash shook his head. “I have no idea where he is, but we can go try and look for him.” He smiled at her, his face roguish like it had been all those years ago. “I bet Danning will be sour when he hears that I got the culprit before he did.”

  “You can squabble all you like,” Vicky said still wobbly, “but there is really only one person who got the killer first. And that is me. I knew
that Everett was the killer when I came here. He made a mistake with setting the fire.”

  She turned to Diane. “I got the scare of my life when I saw him with you.”

  Diane exhaled slowly. “He came to the back door and said he had information on Gwenda Gill, proving she had killed Mortimer. He asked me to let him in so we could talk it over. He even said he’d make a statement at the sheriff’s station so Michael would be exonerated for good. But if I’d please lock up the dog as he was so afraid of dogs. I kind of thought he was…a poor klutz, so I did what he asked. Then too late I realized it was all a cold calculating game to lure me into a trap and kill me too.”

  She hugged herself. “I had never suspected him.”

  “He fooled us all,” Cash agreed. “Twenty-three years ago he was never a suspect and to be honest, I hadn’t thought of him in relation to the Mortimer Gill killing either. There seemed to be no connection. No viable reason for him to want to kill anybody. Even if we had found his phone number in Mortimer’s house, we would have assumed it was about Gwenda’s apartment or something. Mortimer saw Everett regularly and even did some work on his offices a while back.”

  He eyed Vicky. “How on earth did you figure it out? The fire, you say?”

  “Time. Everett needed an alibi the night he burned down Perkins’ barn. I think he believed that once the barn was gone with the files, he would be safe forever. If the police found traces of the device he used to set the fire, they would simply think it belonged to old stuff that had been kept in the barn. Everett didn’t know Perkins would declare he had no old watch or clock there. Most people keep so much junk in their barn they wouldn’t know what was or wasn’t there. He had no idea that Perkins could account for everything down to the last file folder.”

  She took a deep breath. “He also never guessed Mortimer Gill had already appropriated files from the barn before he got to it. Everett believed that if he made sure nobody could tie him in with the fire, he would go scot-free. Like he had all those years ago. So he set the device to start the fire at a certain time and then went to see my mother to make sure he had an alibi. He often visited her to play checkers so it wasn’t odd at all he stopped by. He made sure to arrive just as the eight o’clock news began. My mother would recall that later and mention it to the police. Everett would have been at my mom’s at eight, while the fire would start at eight-fifteen. It was perfect.”