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

by Vivian Conroy

  She held Cash’s gaze. “Then unexpectedly Michael and I arrived. Everett was nervous and he repeated to us what time he had arrived. He put too much stress on it I guess, because I got to thinking there was something about time I should recall. When I first heard about an incendiary device, coming to the police station to see you about Mortimer’s birds, I never thought it was a timing thing though. I only learned that tonight at the hardware store.”

  “Yes, and after I drove off to go back to the station, I got suspicious and wanted to talk to you about your little research,” Cash said. “I had a feeling you had not been asking those questions about the timer for nothing and you might be up to something. To be honest, I was a little worried you’d put your head into a hornets’ nest and get hurt.”

  He held her gaze. “When dispatch told me you had called, I went back to the store, but you had already gone. So I went to your house. You weren’t there either and when I called your mother, she didn’t know where you were. She suggested Michael Danning, but he didn’t answer his cell phone. Then I suddenly got the creeps and decided to call two more deputies and try Diane’s. If there was any place the killer might go to, it would be to her.”

  Cash shook his head at her. “You’ve taken a big risk not confiding in me.” The hint of disappointment in his eyes cut into her.

  “I only figured it out after we met,” she explained quickly. “And would you have even believed me? Everett was so…well established in town and so well liked even. OK, people thought him a little dull and docile, but they believed he was in essence a good guy. He has been a member of the city council for years, has served on all kinds of local committees.”

  “Everett confessed to killing Celine,” Diane said softly. “He even said that he could take me to the place where she is buried. I need to know where that is.”

  Her voice pitched. “I need to know that. He said something about tons of concrete. I don’t understand what it means, but at least it means it is not in a forest or something. It must narrow down the field, right? We must be able to find her now.”

  “We’ll ask him and then we’ll start a search there.” Cash reached out and patted her hand. “Don’t you worry, we will find her body and then maybe you can finally say good-bye.”

  Diane scrambled to her feet. “I’ll call my parents. I want them to come out here. I want them to be here with me when they find Celine. Then we can bury her like we should have all those years ago. Then we’ll have a place to go to.”

  She hesitated a moment. “I came here for closure. I’m not sure that will ever be possible. She was my twin; I will keep on missing her. And the way she died will always continue to hurt. It need not have been that way. But to know she is found now and her body is no longer hastily dumped by a killer, but will be decently buried by the people who loved her…”

  She smiled thinly. “That might help a lot.”

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  “You’ve got to be kidding me,” Vicky heard old Mr. Jones say. “That can’t be from the queen in England.”

  “Oh, yes,” Ms. Tennings replied. “I have the envelope right here. See the postal mark? It says Buckingham Palace. And this on the back…”

  Vicky smiled. Her store was filled to the brim with people who slowly moved past everything on display. Behind the counter Marge and Diane took payments and wrapped gifts. There was a red telephone booth piggy bank on the counter that people could fill with their change, as a gift to the Get Kids Reading program. At the end of the day Vicky would double whatever was in the piggy bank. Then it would get its permanent place in the store, with a copy of the picture book that would be provided to the families so people could see what they were donating for. They would be referred to the library for a free information package on how to start the program in their own hometown.

  Claire occupied one of the two leather armchairs with Mr. Pug and Coco in her lap. The dogs barked at everyone who came close, then wagged their tails and licked hands as they were patted. Vicky had observed how many a snack from the buffet outside on the pavement had disappeared into those two greedy little mouths. Tonight she’d have to take them for a long walk on the beach to burn the calories.

  As if he read her thoughts, Michael Danning popped up by her side. He looked great, the tension of the past swept away from his features. Vicky was still relieved that Everett’s conniving had done no real harm. He had called Michael with a message to go look at a certain place for clues, so he would have to drive out of town a long way, without being able to explain later why he had done that. An anonymous call wasn’t much of an alibi.

  People would easily have believed Michael had killed Diane, and earlier Celine. Everett had cleverly reported Michael keeping watch over Diane to the police anonymously, to make sure that in hindsight it would look as if Michael had been obsessed with Diane from the moment of her arrival, and obsessed with ways to get to her and kill her.

  It was eerie to think how close Everett had come to succeeding. If Vicky had not started suspecting Everett, and Diane had been found dead, she was not sure if she could ever have prevented Michael from taking the fall. They would probably all have had to watch helplessly while he was tried and convicted for three murders he had not committed.

  She didn’t want to think about that possibility anymore.

  Michael smiled at her. “My photographer is outside snapping pictures of the crowd at your snacks,” he said. “The Gazette will do a big feature on the opening tomorrow. Front-page picture in full color and then a big spread inside.”

  “Special favor?” she asked.

  “Could do no less for the woman who brought a killer to justice.”

  “That was a joint effort.” Vicky nodded at Marge and Diane, Ms. Tennings. “We make a great team, inside this store and out.”

  “Still,” Michael said. “You are something of a local hero now. Your store will not have opposition in Glen Cove anymore. You belong here. This place is yours.”

  He held her gaze a moment, but didn’t add more.

  Diane called for her from the counter, wanting to know if the saucers were all gone. Vicky went to look in the back and found two more. But soon she would have to start taking people’s names down for orders. That was kind of fun.

  Michael had walked over to Claire and was talking to her, patting Mr. Pug, who begged for a back rub. Claire still hadn’t recovered from the shock that her favorite for Vicky, Everett Baker, had turned out to be the cold-blooded killer that Glen Cove had never wanted to acknowledge in their midst. She refused to listen to any explanation about the case, but only said it was a shame such a good chess player had to spend the rest of his life in prison.

  That Everett had always cheated to win was something she didn’t want to hear either.

  Vicky wondered if Claire would ease up about Michael now that her favorite had fallen by the wayside. But it seemed Claire’s mind was wandering in another direction. She had told Vicky twice this morning to be nice to the cousin of the Joneses, the universally liked Bob. According to Claire, the Joneses couldn’t help it that they had been skeptical about her initiative at first. That it was all the fault of Gwenda Gill and her outrageous beauty parlor.

  Gwenda had admitted, once she had been found and asked, that Everett Baker had offered her a much better place to live, away from Glen Cove, provided she moved into it at once. She couldn’t tell anybody about it, as according to Everett he would then be obliged to give favors to half of the town.

  Desperate for a new and better life, Gwenda had followed Everett’s instructions to the letter and left on that same afternoon, unaware of the suspicions it would provoke. It turned out Everett had paid the down payment on the house himself and had told Gwenda that it had been made by a secret admirer who wanted her to have a better life. But that it was imperative Mortimer would never know or he’d come and suck her dry again. Gwenda had of course grabbed at the chance, and only the news of both Mortimer’s death and Everett’s arrest had made h
er confess to her part in the whole thing.

  Upon questioning she had admitted she had suspected Mortimer right away of having something to do with the fire in Perkins’ barn. But she had believed he had set it himself, to lie about important stuff he now held. She had never believed he actually had something for real, as to her mind Mortimer could never succeed in anything.

  Alive or dead.

  Despite her less than loving comments about her deceased ex-husband, Gwenda could not really be blamed for anything, so she had been released after questioning to go back to her new home with the dog kennels. She could now have the life insurance policy’s money and pay for the house herself, start her dog grooming service and be happy.

  Diane had said sourly that she wasn’t sure a type like Gwenda could ever be happy, but Marge had said she honestly hoped Gwenda would meet a new man who treated her nicely and would then ease up and have some more fun.

  For her part Vicky was not sorry to see the upstairs apartment go to somebody else. It wasn’t certain to whom yet, as Everett’s arrest had left his business in disarray. An accountant had discovered so many problems with transactions and tax payments he had said it would take months to sort out. Fortunately the owner of the building Vicky’s store was in had agreed she could stay in it. So her grand opening could finally take place.

  “Great party.” Lilian Haverton Rowland brushed by in a stunning lime green dress with a matching feathery fascinator in her hair. “Love your snacks. Give me the recipe for the muffins sometime, will you?”

  She leaned over and said in a whisper, “I appreciate what you did for both Deke and me. I mean, that you believed in us.”

  Vicky smiled. “Everett Baker tried to implicate and hurt a lot of people. I’m just glad I figured it out in time to prevent an innocent person from ending up in jail.”

  Lilian nodded. “The Jaguar was really just borrowed from a friend and…” She tilted her head. “What was this very important evidence Mortimer had?”

  “Not much. There was mention of a man with Celine that night and of course that could also have been Everett, just as well as it could have been any other man from Glen Cove. The description of that man was so vague he could never have been proven to be anybody specific. Nevertheless, Everett’s guilty conscience made more of it than it was. He wondered if he had made a mistake at the time and fresh eyes going over the files might spot some inconsistency. Everett only meant to burn down the barn to destroy anything that might be in those files. He believed that the interest for the old case would die down then and after Diane had left in September, everybody would forget about it again. I doubt he planned another murder at that stage.”

  Lilian listened wide-eyed.

  “But of course,” Vicky pushed on, “when Everett overheard Mortimer say to Deke on the phone that he had salvaged something before the fire, Everett thought it was best to make sure Mortimer shut up about it for good. After all, Everett knew Mortimer’d do anything for money. He went to his house and tried to buy him off, but Mortimer smelled more and pressed for a bigger payment. Even for an arrangement in which Everett would have to keep paying. For Mortimer a monthly income would have ensured he could fully focus on his birds, do the only thing he really loved.

  “Then Everett killed him. It was unpremeditated and sort of sloppy. He did think about ditching the cell phone in the trash to suggest the killer had removed it because it implicated him. That would lead the police straight to Deke. But Everett never saw the note with the phone numbers, or didn’t understand the meaning of it. He probably also didn’t know Mortimer had already called Diane and she would start talking about evidence again. That evidence was his worst problem of course. He knew it existed, but he couldn’t find it anywhere. He had to take more and more chances to get his hands on it. With Celine he had prepared the murder in advance and that worked much better.”

  Lilian looked sad. “That he actually threw her body into a pit at a building site so it would be covered with concrete the next morning…” She shuddered.

  Vicky exhaled. “Yes, that’s why the body was never found. Diane and her family will have to go through a lot to get it excavated and given back to them. But I think they are persistent enough to make it work out.”

  “Is that why Diane is staying a little longer?” Lilian threw Diane a guarded look. “I had figured she’d be eager to see her family again. I mean, her husband and children.”

  Obviously she was still worried about Deke’s old crush on Diane returning now that she was back in town.

  “Her family might be coming over here for some time.” Vicky smiled. “Diane wants to show them Glen Cove.”

  The shadows of the past had now been lifted. It was her hometown again, the place she had always loved. Diane had said she hoped she could feel at ease again. She still kept her dog, but more for a companion than a guard dog.

  Looking at playful Mr. Pug and Coco, Vicky concluded dogs were just a medicine for the soul. She herself loved to take them out at nights to walk and clear her mind. Wonder about the future for her store.

  And for herself.

  With the case over, would the emotional connection between her and Michael Danning last?

  And what about Cash Rowland? It had felt good to be in his arms after her narrow escape from the killer.

  Cash toasted her from the open door with his glass of punch, and she waved back at him. No matter how much Cash attributed to her, the town also appreciated his part in the solving of the crime. The locals now looked at Cash with a new respect. He was no longer the guy who had made sheriff almost by mistake. With Everett Baker’s arrest he had earned his badge.

  And Vicky had at last found an opportunity to ask him outright where he had been on the night of the fire. It turned out Cash and his deputy had caught two local kids joyriding and had decided not to charge them but take them home to talk to their parents and convince them of the dangers for the kids themselves and other drivers.

  Because the police dispatcher was a little talkative, they had kept it from her, and Cash had also not wanted to mention it upon arrival at the fire where the half of Glen Cove had been assembled. He had made up the bar fight on the spot, not realizing someone might check up on it and put a criminal reason behind his impromptu lie. Vicky had been reminded of Ms. Tennings’ assertion that you always had to eliminate the innocent explanations for things to get down to the real meat.

  “We are clear out of soap.” Marge stood beside her. “I’m glad we decided to order new stock even before this day, else we’d have a very empty store come Monday. Now Monday morning all the orders will come in, and Monday afternoon we can start selling again.”

  “It won’t be this crowded,” Vicky said.

  “Fortunately not.” Marge pointed at the bookshelf with cozies. “The latest in the SEE BRITAIN AND DIE series came in. I plan to sneak a peek when it is not so busy.”

  “Oh, that reminds me.” Vicky held Marge’s gaze to see how her friend would respond to the news. “Bella Brookes called me yesterday. Out of the blue. She said she’s coming to New England for a book tour and she might also come here to my store.”

  “What?” Marge grabbed her. “That’s amazing. She has to sign all my copies of her books. And she has to give a talk at the library. And…”

  Vicky listened to her friend plan on and smiled to herself. They had their work cut out for them.

  The Country Gift Shop was off to a roaring start.

  Vicky and her friends will continue sleuthing in

  GRAND PRIZE: MURDER!

  where a bookish treasure hunt takes a fatal turn.

  Loved Dead to Begin with? Then turn the page to read an excerpt from Vivian Conroy’s 1920s’ cozy mystery series:

  A PROPOSAL TO DIE FOR

  Chapter One

  ‘Marry me.’

  The whispered words reached Lady Alkmene Callender’s ears just as she was reaching for the gold lighter on the mantelpiece to relight the cigarette in her ivory hold
er.

  Freddie used to be a dear and bring her Turkish ones, but since he had been disinherited by his father for his gambling debts, his opportunities to travel had been significantly reduced, as had Alkmene’s stash of cigarettes. These ones, obtained from a tobacconist on Callenburg Square, had the taste of propriety about them that made them decidedly less appetizing than the exotic ones she had to hide from her housekeeper – who always complained the lace curtains got yellowish from the smoke.

  ‘Marry me,’ the insistent voice repeated, and Alkmene’s gaze wandered from the mirror over the mantelpiece to the table with drinks beside it.

  Behind that table was a screen of Chinese silk, decorated with tiny figures tiptoeing over bridges between temples and blossoming cherry trees.

  The voice seemed to emerge from behind the screen.

  Another voice replied, in an almost callous tone, ‘You know I cannot. The old man would die of apoplexy.’

  ‘Not that he doesn’t deserve it. If he died, you’d inherit his entire fortune and we could elope.’

  ‘Where to?’

  ‘Gretna Green, I suppose. Where else does one elope to?’

  Alkmene decided on the spot that the male speaker had a lack of fantasy, which would make him unsuitable for her adventurous mind. If you did elope, you’d better do it the right way, boarding the Orient Express.

  ‘I mean,’ the female said, in an impatient tone, ‘where would we live, how would we live? Off my fortune I suppose? I don’t think the major would give me a dime.’