“What’s the bad news?”
“Keith and Becca broke up. She’s moved into Thistle Park.” I said it in a rush, hoping swift delivery of the bad news would somehow lessen the blow.
“She what?” Piper hopped off Eric’s lap and began pacing the hall. “Absolutely not. I won’t stand for it.”
“Now, now,” Eric soothed. “It’s a great big house. We can just ignore her.”
But Piper was already gone. She stalked away from Eric into the recesses of the house, leaving the two of us alone together.
“I can show you the new elevator,” I added lamely. We’d just had one installed in a thin shaft of hallway at the rear of the kitchen, where the back staircase resided.
Eric gave me a kind smile. “Don’t worry about Piper. She’ll be all right. She knows I only have eyes for her.”
But Becca didn’t know that, and that was what I was worried about.
My ears picked up the sound of a vehicle out front, and I flung open the front door to witness Keith extracting more of Becca’s belongings from the trunk and backseat of his BMW. A whiplash of déjà vu hit me hard. He’d performed the same ritual last summer with my things. Eric peered around me and couldn’t resist coming onto the front porch to gloat.
“I’m sorry to hear about you and Becca.”
Keith emerged from his car with a small bowl in his hand. “You don’t know what you’re talking about.”
I held my breath as Keith advanced up the walk and the stairs to the front door.
“I think I do.” Eric wheeled back into the B and B and tossed a final parting shot as he made his way toward the elevator. “Good news travels fast in Port Quincy.”
I was left alone with Keith. I could sniff out some ulterior motive a mile away, stronger than his cologne.
“I didn’t pack this. It’s Pickles’s favorite cat dish.” He held up the small ceramic bowl embossed with purple and silver paws and began to walk it to the kitchen.
I eyed the bowl warily, thinking it was a Trojan horse kind of a cat dish, designed to get Keith through the door and into the house that had once belonged to his grandmother.
“Well, thanks so much. I’m sure Becca and Pickles will appreciate it.”
But Keith made no moves to go. Instead, he dropped into a kitchen chair with a heavy sigh.
“I just wanted to talk.”
Bingo.
I was willing to therapize the brides I worked with, and help them figure out knotty problems associated with their weddings. But I’d be damned if I was going to include Keith in my ministrations.
“I’m sorry you and Becca broke up. But this is a very busy time. You came here to drop off Becca’s belongings, and you’ve done that. So it would be best if you’d go now.”
Keith stood and placed his hands on my shoulders. “I made a grave mistake last summer.”
Alarm bells clanged on DEFCON one and I attempted to slither out of Keith’s grasp.
“You’re the one I should be with, Mallory.”
And with that Keith planted a kiss on my lips.
And all hell broke loose.
“Get off me!” I broke away from his octopus grasp and put five feet between us.
“You hussy!” Becca stormed into the kitchen with a look of vengeance etched on her pretty features. And behind her stood Garrett, a stunned and miserable look on his handsome face.
“Whoa, whoa, whoa.” I turned in a slow circle, not sure whom to address first. “That was not a sanctioned kiss, Keith.”
“I know what I saw.” Becca crossed her arms in front of her, seeming to forget that she was no longer engaged to Keith.
“You heard the lady.” Garrett took a step toward Keith, with murder in his lovely hazel eyes. “You can’t just go around planting kisses on people who don’t want to reciprocate.”
Keith stared at me, then Garrett, and finally seemed to realize the gravity of his mistake.
“I’ll be going now.” His voice was small and dejected. He made his way out the back door, Becca trailing after him.
I crossed the room in three steps and buried my head in Garrett’s chest. He wrapped his arms around me, and I knew then he believed me.
* * *
Garrett left almost as swiftly as he’d arrived. I’d assured him that Keith had forced the kiss, and being the wonderful, calm, and collected man I’d come to love, of course he knew it was true. The one person who didn’t trust me was Becca. She stared glumly out from the parlor, but interestingly made no moves to leave.
“I never would’ve moved in here if I’d known you’d try to poach Keith the minute my back was turned.” She glared at me from behind the cover of the Italian Vogue she was reading. I ignored Becca and retreated to the library. There was no use stating my position again that Keith had kissed me and not the other way around. I booted up my laptop and made a stop at the online version of the Port Quincy Eagle Herald. The screaming digital headline made my heart stop.
Area Man Arrested In the Attempted
Murder of Eric Dempsey
The article was accompanied by a grainy mug shot of Tanner Frost, Felicity’s fiancé. I skimmed the article in disbelief. While I’d had a hunch Tanner had argued with Eric in the gazebo that fateful Sunday of the Mother’s Day tea, I didn’t think it had been possible for him to shoot Eric. We’d ended our conversation before the shots rang out, but Tanner had been in my line of sight the entire time. I snapped the laptop shut and headed for the front door.
“Where are you going?” Becca’s voice was plaintive and needy. I poked my head into the parlor.
“To the police station.”
“You’re sure you’re not off to canoodle with Keith?” Her voice was laden with hurt. I stopped myself from rolling my eyes at the last minute and controlled my voice as well. “Don’t be silly, Becca.”
I willed myself to obey all the stop signs and traffic lights on my way to the Port Quincy jail. I got stuck behind a poky truck, and the trip downtown over hill and dale seemed interminable. I finally arrived at the jail and handed over my purse for inspection. I shuffled through the metal detector and soon nervously sat in the visitor’s waiting room, not sure if Tanner would consent to see me. But after a ten-minute wait, Felicity’s former fiancé was led into the room in an orange jumpsuit. The fabric was ridiculously loose for his skinny frame and hung off his body at weird angles.
“Mallory.” Tanner took a seat across from me and folded his hands in front of him.
“I know you didn’t do it.” Our time was brief, and I wanted to cut to the chase.
“Which crime?” A rueful smile temporarily turned up one corner of Tanner’s mouth. He was oddly professorial, even in his prison garb.
“Eric’s attempted murder. I remembered I could see you in the garden when Eric was shot.”
“Tell that to the police.” Tanner seemed to scoff at my words.
“I intend to remind them.”
“Well, I’m their man now, and I doubt they’ll just let me go.” He glumly picked at a hangnail and slouched down further in his metal chair. I wondered where his proud professor persona had gone.
“I shouldn’t have been carrying around that stupid ring.”
“The one they found in the gazebo.”
Tanner nodded. “Felicity flung it at me the day she died. She told me she no longer wanted to get married.” He took a deep breath and went on. “I knew she was having an affair. I just couldn’t figure out who the guy was.”
“Do you think he murdered her?” I was willing to bet if the police thought Tanner was their perpetrator for Eric’s shooting, the assumption would be that he’d killed his cheating fiancée Felicity as well.
Tanner considered my query. He was silent for an excruciatingly long time, seeming to weigh his options. “Felicity was a mysterious woman. At first it excited me, but later in our relationship, it just became tiresome. She had so many secrets she wouldn’t share, and now I can’t piece them together to figure out who
killed her.”
“Like what?”
Tanner glanced around the room, but we were the only ones in the visitors’ area.
“Well, for one, she started bringing peanut butter on her trips to Colombia.”
“Peanut butter?” I frowned. “What could she want with that?”
“She told me she just wanted some snacks, and that it was hard to find what she wanted in Bogota. But I realized later she was probably smuggling something.”
It fit. I recalled Truman’s admission that Felicity had amassed a questionable fortune that didn’t line up with her small salary at the family jewelry store.
“Did you tell Truman that?” I couldn’t imagine the chief would hold Tanner if he knew the whole story.
Tanner let out a gruff laugh. “He has his man, and I’m it.”
I tore out of the jail and headed on foot toward the municipal building that housed the police headquarters. I passed the pink palace of a courthouse on my way to the low-slung, 1960s’ limestone building covered in the same soot Alma had powerwashed off The Duchess. I took the steps two at a time in my haste, and burst into the front office.
“Truman Davies, please.”
I tapped my foot against a metal chair leg as I waited what seemed an endless amount of time but was really only twenty minutes. I couldn’t expect someone as busy as Truman to be able to see me at a moment’s notice. But an innocent man was currently reposing in the Port Quincy jail for a crime I knew he couldn’t have committed.
“This had better be good, Mallory.” Truman materialized in front of me. His bark was worse than his bite. He sounded annoyed, but the twinkle in his hazel eyes belied his good nature.
“Tanner Frost is innocent.”
The kind look in Truman’s eyes evaporated in a haze of annoyance. “Back to my office. Now.”
I nearly trotted to keep up with his lanky frame as he made it back to his desk in record time.
He shut the door behind him and crossed his fingers in front of him. “And why do you think Tanner Frost is innocent?”
“Okay, so he probably was arguing with Eric in the gazebo. That’d be when I heard two male voices.”
Truman nodded. “And?”
“And I’d just finished talking to Tanner about Glenn when the shots rang out. I could see Tanner walking away from me. It would have been impossible for him to shoot Eric then. He couldn’t have been in two places at once.”
Truman ignored my revelation and instead focused on the other part of my declaration.
“And just why were you talking to Tanner about Glenn Cunningham’s death?”
I squirmed in my chair under Truman’s microscopic gaze.
Time to come clean.
“Um. Because Alma sort of asked me to look around regarding the murder of Glenn.”
“Dammit, Mallory.” Truman hit his desk with his fist. A framed photograph of Truman, Lorraine, Summer, and Garrett jumped off the desk, then resettled. “Don’t ever deputize yourself in one of these cases. What if the killer thought you knew something important, something you didn’t even realize you knew?” His eyes welled up with concern. “I consider you to be family.” His hazel eyes pierced mine, as caring and concerned as his son’s. “I just don’t want you to get hurt.”
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
Truman’s declaration that he considered me to be family was like a knife twisted in my heart. I hadn’t meant to deceive him or cause him any strife. I’d just wanted to help Alma. But now I saw I couldn’t do both without the prospect of someone getting hurt. And his concern about the effects of my sleuthing made ice run in my veins. What if someone did target me, or someone I loved, as the result of poking around in places where I had no business?
I’d left Truman, but not without delivering a heartfelt apology. He’d grudgingly accepted it, but made me promise not to stick my nose where it didn’t belong with renegade, unauthorized sleuthing. I’d vowed to stick to wedding planning rather than detective work and had shuffled out of his office with a dejected cloud hanging over my head.
I emerged from police headquarters to a light rain that had just begun to fall. The weather mirrored my chagrin, the sky a leaden gray. I turned my face up toward the rain and let the light mist cool my still-heated cheeks. I’d been so embarrassed to admit I’d been looking into the string of violent crimes at the behest of Alma that my face had still felt warm when I’d left Truman’s office.
My phone snapped me back to reality. I answered a call from Rachel as I hustled back to the Butterscotch Monster before I became completely drenched.
“He’s getting a ring.”
“What?” My heart accelerated, and the sound of a distant ocean came coursing into my ears with a rush of blood to my head.
“I saw Garrett in Fournier’s Jewelry Store picking out a ring! He’s going to pop the question, Mallory.” Rachel’s jubilation was easy to hear over the phone, and I could picture her dancing a jig as she informed me of the good news.
But was it good news?
I’m just not ready.
It was the truth. I loved Garrett, his daughter Summer, and his family. But I didn’t want to rush into another engagement. Not to please my sister or my mother. Not to adhere to an invisible timeline decreed by the denizens of Port Quincy. Not to avenge my broken engagement with Keith.
A thought skittered through my mind. Truman had said he was upset about the prospect of me getting hurt because I was like family. My mouth went dry. Maybe Garrett really was planning to pop the question. And I was the last one to know.
Rachel’s voice became more insistent. “Say something! Mallory, this is fantastic. I just knew your engagement would be right around the corner. We’ll have a blast planning your wedding. I know you were going to wed Keith in June, but how do you feel about winter? It would be all cozy and fresh. You could have the small wedding you always wanted. Mallory? Are you there?” Rachel trailed off in a confused tone and waited for my response.
“How can you be sure Garrett is going to propose? Maybe he was in Fournier’s for another reason. Like getting a new set of cuff links.”
“Garrett doesn’t wear cuff links, Mallory.” Rachel’s sigh was practically loud enough to be heard without the aid of the cell phone. “Tell you what. You seem skittish about this, even though it’ll be the happiest time in your life, I promise. Let’s just find out right now.”
“You mean ask Garrett if he’s going to propose?” My question came out in a high-pitched squeak.
“No, silly. We’ll just pop on over to the jewelry store and find out what he bought for you. Easy-peasy.”
“Rach, I’m not so sure that’s a good idea.” I’d just promised Truman I’d lay off the sleuthing.
My sister seemed to read my mind. “This isn’t like prying into a murder investigation. We’ll just drop some hints that you’re the soon-to-be lucky lady, and we want to confirm that Garrett was indeed buying an engagement ring.”
“Won’t that ruin the surprise?” My breath was coming fast now, and I was trying to stall in any way possible.
“That’s just it, Mall. You don’t want this to be a surprise. I’ll meet you at Fournier’s in ten minutes.”
My sister hung up on me. I jammed my phone into my purse and took the long way to the jewelry store, willing my pulse to slow down. Finding concrete evidence that Garrett was about to propose would make the possibility too real, and too near. I felt like I was on a collision course to a place in my destiny I wasn’t sure I was ready to comprehend.
The light drizzle tapered off, and the sun showed its face from behind a break in the slate-gray cloud cover. A passerby gasped, and I followed her line of sight. A gorgeous rainbow stretched from the Monongahela River in an impressive arc over the town of Port Quincy. The lines of color were defiantly bold against the dark sky in the west, backlit by the rays of the newly emergent sun.
No matter what happens, it will all be okay.
I thought back to Garrett pulling me f
rom the smoky depths of The Duchess theater, and soon after cradling me in his arms. About the first kiss we’d shared, and the joy of spending time with his daughter Summer.
A feeling of peace and clarity stole over me as I gazed at the rainbow. I would be ready for the next step, whatever that may be.
“You showed.” Rachel grabbed my hand and gestured toward the window display at Fournier’s. It was more subdued than Bev’s riotous paean to spring but no less dazzling. A bed of rich brown velvet served as garden soil, where gems and sparkling wares reposed like newly planted seeds. A silver shovel and spade lay next to the display, and a watering can suspended from the ceiling poured out a rain of crystals suspended by invisible fishing lines, mimicking water droplets in the sun. The tiny prisms cast mini rainbows over the display, echoing the natural rainbow currently presiding over Port Quincy.
But Rachel didn’t have time to marvel at the wonders of Mother Nature. “I can’t wait to see what he’s considering for you.” Rachel nearly pulled me into the shop, where the tinkling of bells announced our arrival.
“Can I help you two ladies?” Roger Fournier greeted us with a failed attempt at a smile that didn’t reach his dark brown eyes. I couldn’t blame him for not feigning enthusiasm. His daughter was to be buried today.
“We were wondering where your engagement rings are kept.” Rachel hungrily took in the glass cases laden with decadent jewels and rich platinum and gold.
“Where in the store?” Mr. Fournier raised one brow and gestured to the middle of the displays. I’ll admit it was an odd-sounding request. “These four cases house our more traditional offerings. Most feature diamonds, although some contain gems like sapphires and rubies as complementary stones.” He paused and seemed to try to get a read on Rachel. “Was there anything in particular you had in mind?”
Rachel’s eyes twinkled conspiratorially. “It’s for my sister,” she said in a rush. “I saw her boyfriend in here, but he wasn’t looking in these cases. I always thought he’d be a diamond man, but he must be getting her something more unique.”
You’d have thought Rachel had pulled out a can of paint and begun spraying graffiti in the resplendent space. Mr. Fournier drew himself up to his full height and glared at my sister. “I will not be giving out information about what my customers have purchased.”
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