Cat Trick

by Sofie Kelly

  “You don’t know what she’s saying, Harry. It’s all crazy,” she said.

  He stuffed his hands in the pockets of his denim jacket. “You have time to listen.”

  Liam turned to Harry. He gestured at me. “It is crazy,” he said. “Kathleen thinks Wren hit Glazer over the head or something. I already told her Wren was miles away from here.”

  Maggie touched his arm and smiled. “Liam, loyalty is one of your very best qualities,” she said. “But you need to stop talking right now, because you aren’t helping.”

  “You found out the truth about how Mike’s brother, Gavin, died, didn’t you?” I asked Wren. “You found out that Mike was partially responsible for the death of the man you thought of as your stepfather.”

  Out of the corner of my eye, I saw a tiny muscle in Liam’s cheek begin to twitch.

  Elizabeth was still standing. “That’s ridiculous,” she said. “Why would she say what a great guy he was if she thought he had something to do with that?”

  “Because you didn’t want anyone to know how much you hated him, did you?” I said gently.

  Wren gave her head a tiny shake, the movement almost imperceptible. “No, I didn’t.”

  Elizabeth stiffened and swallowed a couple of times before she could speak. “Why?” The one word came out in a whisper.

  Wren turned from me to look at her friend. “Because I didn’t want anyone to know I killed him,” she said.

  Liam ducked his head and stared at the floor. Maggie pressed her lips together. Harry moved around the table and put his arm around his sister’s shoulders. She stood there rigidly, but she didn’t shrug him off.

  “Except you didn’t,” I said.

  “Yes, I did,” Wren repeated, pushing back the strand of hair that had fallen in her face again.

  I leaned forward and laid my hand on her arm. “I know you think you did. But you didn’t. You didn’t. Tell me what happened.”

  “I read my mother’s journals,” she said. “The first week I got here after classes ended. They were in this old leather trunk. It was out in a storage unit she had. I just picked out random ones and started reading. One of them was from the time when Gavin died.

  “Some people were saying that Mike had bought beer that night and that he’d kept telling Gavin that my mother had him whipped.” She swiped at a tear that had started to slide down her face. “My mother . . . confronted Mike, the morning of the . . . the funeral. She found out the stories were true. That was . . . that was why she never had anything to do with any of that family again.”

  “What did you do?” I asked.

  “I decided I was going to drive to Chicago and confront him. I didn’t even get out of town before my crappy car broke down. It took a while before I had the money to get it fixed.”

  Out of the corner of my eye, I could see that Elizabeth was listening, although she was looking down at the floor.

  “Then I found out he was here, in Mayville Heights,” Wren continued. “I couldn’t believe it, but I saw him crossing the street and it just seemed like a sign, you know?”

  I nodded. “Why did you wait a day and a half to go see him?”

  She folded one arm across her middle as though she were hugging herself. “I didn’t,” she said. “Not exactly. I went to the St. James—that’s where he was staying—the first night Mike got here. I don’t know what I planned to do. I was just so angry. I watched him in the bar and I realized that hurting him wasn’t going to make anything different. So I just left.”

  “But you couldn’t let the chance to talk to him go by,” I said.

  Wren nodded. “I thought about it all the next day. I couldn’t let him just go without telling him what he did to me, to my family, either. I waited for everyone to leave Wednesday night and then I confronted him.”

  Her face tightened in anger. “He didn’t recognize me, and when I told him who I was and why I was there, he tried to . . . to make excuses.” She was breathing hard. “I was so . . . so angry.”

  The hand still resting in her lap was squeezed so tightly into a fist, I thought the skin pulled white over her knuckles would split open. “There was . . . a metal table just inside the tent. I think he was using it for a desk, and I kicked it or maybe I shoved it. I don’t know. He had this leather briefcase on top, and when I hit the table it fell off. When Mike went to grab it, the table knocked him off balance.”

  She stopped to swallow and get her breath. “He went backward and he hit his head—on the ground, I think. I . . . I . . . waited for him to move . . . to get up, but he didn’t and . . . and I just ran.” She brushed another tear away. “I killed him. It was an accident, but I killed him just the same. I panicked. I used a rock to put a nail in my tire so it would go flat. I drove up onto the highway because I knew there was a good chance Liam would drive by and see me.”

  “You didn’t kill Mike, Wren,” I said. She turned her head. I leaned sideways so she had to look at me again and put a hand over hers. “I swear you didn’t kill him. He didn’t die from a head injury. He was suffocated with one of the backdrops for the booths. Whatever you were going to do . . . don’t. Please, please, please don’t.” I swallowed, but I couldn’t seem to get the lump in my throat to move.

  Marcus was standing quietly off to the side. I’d seen him come in a couple of minutes before, and now I turned to look at him. “Could you please tell her?” I said.

  His shoulders were rigid and his expression unreadable. For a moment I wasn’t sure he was going to answer my question. Then he gave an almost imperceptible nod. “Mike Glazer didn’t die from a head injury,” he said.

  22

  Elizabeth pushed her way around the table and wrapped Wren in a hug. Wren looked stunned. She was crying and shaking at the same time.

  “Ms. Magnusson, I do need to hear the whole story,” Marcus said. “Officially.” He looked at me.

  Harry stepped forward. “We’ll come over to the police station,” he said. “Soon as I line up a lawyer. You understand, Detective. No offense.”

  Marcus nodded. “Of course.”

  “Thank you, Kathleen,” Harry said quietly as he moved past me. He put one hand on Elizabeth’s back and steered both young women over to another table.

  “I’ll need to talk to you too,” Marcus said to Liam, “but that can wait until morning.”

  “I’ll be there,” Liam said. He looked at me. “She really was going to . . . hurt herself, wasn’t she?”

  I nodded. “She told you, didn’t she? That Mike had been partly responsible for what happened to his brother? It’s what you were arguing about the night he died.”

  He swallowed before he answered. “Yes.”

  “You were afraid she might be a suspect. That’s why you lied about what time you’d found her with the flat tire.”

  “I knew it would hurt a lot of people if the truth came out,” Liam said, swiping a hand over his chin. “Especially Wren. I was friends with her brother. I’ve known her since she was a little kid.” He looked over to where Wren was sitting with Elizabeth’s arm still around her shoulders. “I had no idea she would . . .” He shook his head and looked at me again. “Thank you, Kathleen.”

  Maggie gave me a hug. “You done for the night?” she whispered.

  “I’m not sure,” I said softly.

  “Call me if you need me,” she said before letting go. She touched Liam’s arm. “Let’s get something to go.” They started for the counter and Claire met them partway.

  I’d been watching Marcus out of the corner of my eye, but now I turned and looked at him directly. “Thank you,” I said.

  He stared at me for a long moment. “We need to talk, later,” he said.

  I could tell by the cool tone to his voice and the rigid way he was standing that he was angry. But I knew once he understood that Wren really had been planning to kill herself, he’d also understand why I hadn’t waited for him to call me back.

  “I know,” I said. “I’ll be home.�
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  He nodded and left.

  Eric came around the counter and walked over to me. He had a take-out cup in one hand and a paper bag in the other. He held them out to me.

  “What’s this?” I asked.

  “Coffee and cinnamon rolls,” he said. “On the house.”

  “Thank you,” I said. “I’m sorry about all this.”

  Eric smiled. “I figure you had a good reason.” He inclined his head toward the street. “Everything okay between you and the detective?”

  “I think so,” I said.

  Eric glanced over his shoulder. “I have to get back to work,” he said.

  I held up the coffee. “Thanks again.”

  Eric nodded and walked back to the counter. I headed for the truck.

  Hercules was waiting in the porch. The moment I opened the door, he meowed. “It’s all right,” I told him. I set the coffee and cinnamon rolls next to him on the bench and scooped him into a hug. I had a kind of giddy, unsettled energy. “Wren’s going to be just fine.”

  He licked my chin and then squirmed to be set down so he could investigate the bag. “Cinnamon rolls,” I said, waggling my eyebrows. There was a loud meow from the other side of the porch door. I reached over and opened it, and Owen came in. He looked from me to his brother and licked his whiskers.

  “How did you know?” I asked.

  His nose twitched.

  “You did not smell cinnamon rolls from out in the yard,” I told him. I grabbed the bag off the bench before Hercules managed to poke a hole in it with his paw.

  Once I was settled at the table with the cats at my feet, I brought them up-to-date on what had happened with Wren and Mike Glazer the night he died.

  “She gave the table a shove.” I mimed the motion. “Mike tried to grab his briefcase and he was off balance when the table hit him. He went backward and was knocked out for a minute. He was probably still groggy when whoever killed him showed up.”

  Owen’s head snapped up as though he’d had the same realization I’d just had.

  “Where did the briefcase go?” I said. I pictured the inside of the tent, working my way around it in my head. There had been no leather briefcase on the grass, no briefcase on the table. I looked at Owen. “Did you see it?” His golden eyes met mine and he gave a sharp meow.

  No.

  “The killer must have taken it,” I said. “But why?”

  Owen didn’t have an answer for that question. But it seemed Hercules did. He jumped onto the chair opposite me and poked at my laptop with one paw.

  I remembered that I hadn’t read Lise’s e-mail, so I pulled the computer closer and turned it on. “Chairs are for people,” I said to Hercules.

  He gave me a blank look. Both cats thought they were people.

  “People with two legs,” I added. “And you’re sitting on my sweater.”

  He jumped down, making complaining noises low in his throat. Then he launched himself onto my lap, a glint of triumph in his eyes.

  There was an e-mail from my sister, Sara, in my in-box too, but I opened Lise’s message first. She’d found out quite a lot in just a couple of days.

  According to Lise’s information, Alex and Chris Scott wouldn’t have been able to push Mike out of the business that easily. He apparently had a deal that entitled him to major compensation if they let him go before the fourth full year of his contract—more than a million dollars.

  “People have killed for less,” I said to Hercules. “And that would explain why Mike’s briefcase disappeared.” It also explained the way Mike Glazer had been killed. Holding something over someone’s face until they stopped breathing would take strength—it would also take a lot of anger.

  “Both Scott brothers were at that fund-raising dinner in Minneapolis,” I said to Herc. “And yes, it is a very nice coincidence that they happened to be just an hour away when their partner was killed. But how could they be there and here at the same time?”

  Hercules touched the screen with his paw as though he were pointing to Sara’s e-mail.

  “Okay, I’ll read Sara’s e-mail,” I said. “I don’t have any other ideas.”

  Sara had sent some of the photos from the video shoot. My favorite image was the guys looking like clean-cut members of a boy band in white shirts with the sleeves pushed back, vests, loosened skinny ties and not a sign of piercings, tattoos or even stubble. The shot of them in their ruffled pirate shirts was pretty funny, too. I remembered what she’d said about seeing way more of the guys than she’d ever wanted to: Best way to cover up all their ink was to airbrush. It did a great job, but none of those guys were on my list of men I wanted to see without their shirts.

  Hercules cocked his head to one side. His whiskers twitched as though he were waiting for me to make the connection. And just like that, I figured it out.

  I closed my e-mail and used a search engine to bring up all the photos I could find from the dinner in Minneapolis. I checked each one carefully. It wasn’t what I was seeing on the screen that told me who had killed Mike Glazer; it was what I wasn’t seeing.

  There were no images of Alex and Christopher Scott together. In the dozens and dozens of pictures from that night, not once had the brothers been photographed together. Because both of them hadn’t been there.

  It was a pretty outrageous plan, Christopher covering up his tattoo and pretending to be Alex for part of the evening. On the other hand, they were identical twins and it couldn’t have been the first time they had impersonated each other.

  “They planned it,” I said to Hercules. I thought about the frosting spatula belonging to Georgia Tepper that had been shoved down into the dirt by the edge of the tent. “Do you think that making it look like Georgia was involved somehow was part of the plan too?”

  He narrowed his eyes and considered the question. Marcus had said the company Georgia’s former father-in-law worked for was a longtime client of Legacy Tours. Had Alex Scott recognized Georgia and figured she’d be a good person to frame? My stomach turned over at the thought.

  “Maggie said that Liam and Alex were going to do a walk-through of the tents before tomorrow’s tasting and art show,” I said. “What if he’s going to plant some other piece of so-called evidence to implicate Georgia?”

  Owen meowed loudly. He was already on his way to the living room.

  I stood up and set Hercules down. “We have to call Maggie and see if she and Liam can stall Alex until I can get in touch with Marcus.”

  I called Marcus’s cell phone first, hoping I’d get him and not his voice mail, but I didn’t. He must have still been talking to Wren. I left a short message and then I tried Maggie. She didn’t answer at her apartment, and when I tried her cell, I got that voice mail too.

  “Where is everybody?” I asked, pulling a hand back through my hair. Owen and Hercules didn’t seem to have any more idea than I did.

  I couldn’t stop thinking about Georgia, saying maybe it was time for her and her little girl to move on. If any more “evidence” turned up, I felt certain she’d bolt. She’d leave Mayville Heights, where she had a good life, and run. She wouldn’t wait to see how things worked out. I’d already seen that in her eyes.

  I looked down at the two furry faces staring up at me. “Marcus would say I don’t know anything,” I said. “Not for sure.” So why did I feel so certain? I had no real proof the Scott brothers had killed Mike. I had no proof that Georgia would go on the run again. Still, I knew I was right. I was as certain about my instincts as Marcus always was about his facts.

  “Marcus said being a police officer is part of who he is,” I said to the boys. “This is who I am. He’ll understand that.”

  I got up, grabbed my purse and my keys and stepped into my shoes. Owen and Hercules were right behind me. They followed me out into the porch, and I decided to let them come with me. It wasn’t any crazier than anything else I was about to do.

  I opened the driver’s-side door of the truck and lifted Hercules onto the seat.
Owen jumped up on his own. I got in, started the engine and looked over at them sitting quietly beside me with what seemed to me to be a fierce look of determination on both of their furry faces. I was about to confront a potential murderer with just a couple of small cats for backup.

  I looked at the house through the windshield. I could have gone back inside and waited for Marcus to call me. I could have gone down to the police station and waited for him.

  But I didn’t.

  23

  Maggie’s bug was angled nose-in at the curb along the boardwalk, in front of the two tents. There was no sign of her or Liam. Or Alex Scott.

  “Stay here,” I told the cats. I got out of the truck, locked the door and headed for the nearest tent, where I could see lights inside.

  Larry Taylor had finished rigging the lighting, so the inside of the tent was as bright as day. The booths were all in place, following an S-shaped curve. Maggie was about a quarter of the way down the line, just past Sweet Things, which was Georgia’s booth. Alex Scott was with her. There was no sign of Liam. This wasn’t how I’d wanted things to go.

  Maggie smiled when she saw me. “Hi,” she said. “What are you doing here?”

  I shrugged, hoping I didn’t look as anxious as I felt. “I knew there was a lot to get done tonight. I just came to see if you needed any help.”

  “Thanks,” she said. “You’ve met Alex, haven’t you?”

  “A couple of times, but not officially,” I said. I walked over to them and held out my hand. “Hi, Alex. I’m Kathleen Paulson,” I said.

  “It’s nice to see you again,” he said. He was wearing jeans, a dove gray shirt and a dark blue jacket. He turned to Maggie. “Kathleen gave me directions at the library and she suggested the little café down the street.” His gaze moved back to me and he gave me a practiced smile. “The food was excellent, by the way. Thank you.”

  He was handsome and charming, but I knew that was just the outside man. If you peeled off the manners and the expensive clothes, underneath there was something dark and slimy.