He grasped his side and groaned. “It’s too bad you had to meddle, Mallory. I can’t just let you leave here and tell all my secrets to Truman, now can I?”
He made a final rally to aim the gun at me and promptly passed out.
* * *
Eric was carted away from his own wedding, first to the hospital on an ambulance stretcher, and several days later to the Port Quincy jail, when he was well enough to be booked and processed. He’d overdone it at his wedding, both when he’d been a cheerful groom celebrating his new marriage to Piper, and when he realized I’d cut off Pickles’ collar in the gazebo and attempted to silence me forever.
“And to think we were congratulating ourselves on hosting a wedding for the only normal couple in the bunch.” Rachel poured me a cup of coffee with shaking hands. I took a sip, grateful to be alive. Rachel and I were enjoying our breakfast on a wrought-iron table in the garden, drinking in the late-May sunshine and soft breeze.
“Hello, Dale.” I sent a smile to the local gardener who tended to Thistle Park’s blooms with skill and immense care.
“Sorry to hear about the wedding last night.” Dale pushed a wheelbarrow over with several slim bushes resting inside.
Good news travels fast.
“We’re all okay, and that’s what matters.” Rachel stood and peered into the wheelbarrow. “What are these?”
“Lemon verbena.” Dale extracted a handkerchief from his back pocket and wiped at his brow. “The ambulance at the Mother’s Day tea took out a host of plants, and I wanted something to fill in those beds.”
I leaned down to take in the sweet, subtle lemony aroma of the plants.
Eric claimed his shooter smelled of lemons.
“It’s Alma’s scent, isn’t it?” Rachel showed off her keen memory as she pulled back from the plants.
“Oh my God.” My sister was right. Alma had announced to us the day she came home from the hospital that she wore the same scent as Scarlett O’Hara’s mother.
“Yes, it is her scent. I’ve planted a whole host of lemon verbena at that ridiculous Tara of hers.” Dale cracked a smile. “Although Alma plants a fair bit of her garden herself.”
A panicked feeling raced over me. “Are you sure? Isn’t she a little frail for that?”
“Oh no.” Dale shook his head. “Why, Alma was an Olympic swimmer back in the 1950s. She’s still as strong as an ox.”
Strong enough to drown someone in a swimming pool.
“Rach, we have to go.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
“We should wait for Truman.” Rachel gestured toward Tara as I cut the engine.
“But he isn’t answering his texts.” It was a first, and I chastised myself for being surprised. He had a life too. Rachel and I waited for fifteen minutes in the Butterscotch Monster before we decided to see if Alma was even home. We rang the bell and got no answer.
“Let’s check the back.” I pressed on around the side of Tara and found myself staring at an immense pool.
“Scarlett O’Hara surely didn’t have one of these.” Rachel let out a low whistle.
Alma swam the length of the pool with long, powerful strokes. A prickle of recognition welled up in the back of my mind. I remembered the trophy case with the yellowed photograph touting a local girl making the U.S. team. The pretty young woman in the brittle photo had been Alma. The woman may have been frail when she tried to walk, but she was like a fish in the water.
Alma came up for air at one end of the pool and finally realized she had an audience. “Hello, girls. What brings you to Tara?”
I decided not to mince words. “You killed Felicity Fournier.”
It fit. Even at the age of ninety, Alma was a skilled swimmer, strong enough to overpower Felicity in Becca and Keith’s pool, especially if Felicity had been weighed down with the voluminous dress.
Alma blinked thrice, then let out a barking laugh. “Are you insane? I would never ruin a replica Scarlett O’Hara gown!” Alma splashed away as if, well, I’d just accused her of murder. When she’d reached the other end of the pool, she spoke again.
“I made it look like she tried to murder me. But I didn’t kill her.”
“You faked your own attack?” Rachel wore a genuinely puzzled look on her pretty face.
“I had to.” Alma sighed and leaned on the ledge of the pool. “Felicity was badgering me morning, noon, and night to buy my collection. I didn’t think she had the funds to make a proper offer, but I was wrong.”
“Why not just get a restraining order against Felicity, like a normal person?” I couldn’t keep the acid from my tone.
Alma gave a mirthless laugh. “I couldn’t get a restraining order against Felicity when it came to my son Rhett.”
“You planted your own collection in Felicity’s locker after she died.”
Alma nodded. “I didn’t kill her, but I wasn’t sorry she was gone. I thought it was the perfect opportunity, after I’d already faked my own attack, to finish the ruse and place my items in her locker.”
“How did you fake an attempted murder on yourself?” Rachel stared at Alma in frank confusion.
“I just used a rope to make the neck marks, and took caffeine pills to speed up my heart. Something had to be done about Felicity. She was rubbing it in my face that she was going to marry Rhett, bide her time until I died, and end up with my collection anyway.” Alma sniffed with disdain. “She even showed up here to flaunt the ring Rhett gave her!” She carefully climbed up the steps in the shallow end and exited the pool. “I’m no killer. I just wanted her out of the picture, that’s all.”
“So you were willing to frame an innocent woman to get your way.” I was disgusted with Alma, even though I believed she hadn’t killed Felicity. But she wasn’t off the hook regarding Eric.
“And why did you try to kill Eric?”
Alma rolled her eyes and reached for a towel. “I’m telling you, I’m no killer. I didn’t want him sniffing around my Becca, but I didn’t shoot him.”
“But his killer smelled of lemons.” I gestured toward the lemon verbena growing all around the pool. “It’s your signature scent.”
A tiny detail wafted up from my subconscious, took flight, and nearly slipped away.
Lemons.
Someone else had grated up a tidy pile of lemon rind for us the day of the Mother’s Day tea.
Wilkes whined somewhere inside the house.
“Does he hear us? I thought Wilkes was deaf.” I turned to see the pretty Irish Setter exit a large doggy door to come join us at poolside.
“He is,” Alma affirmed.
I realized who else had knowledge of Wilkes’s disability. Someone who, in the heat of the moment, when her own fiancé had been shot, had once said the sweet dog couldn’t even hear a gunshot.
* * *
“Who started the party without me?” Piper rounded the back of the house with a canister of something in her hands.
“Rachel, call 911.”
“It’s too late for that, Mallory.” Piper pulled a gun from her pocket and trained it on my sister. “Drop the phone, Rachel.”
My sister dutifully complied. Wilkes took one look at Piper and began a keening whine. He’d recognized Glenn’s killer from a year ago. The sun was setting fast. It was hard to see at first, until some lights on a sensor clicked on. I wished they hadn’t when I got a look at what was in Piper’s other hand. It was a gasoline container. Piper held the plastic can like a designer purse, gorgeous as usual. With her old-timey film-star good looks, she could pass for a femme fatale. Literally.
“You ladies just don’t know when to stop meddling.” Piper grabbed Alma roughly by the arm and pushed her down onto a chaise longue. She took out a skein of rope from her trench and tied Alma to the chair. With the threat of her gun, she repeated her actions with Rachel and me.
“I was just coming over to take care of Alma, but I see now I’ll have to finish you all off.” Her voice was cold, clear, and methodical. She whipped
off the cover of the gasoline can and began sloshing the pungent liquid all over the bottom of Tara.
“You set The Duchess on fire.” I struggled to loosen my hands from Piper’s skilled ties, and only succeeded in giving my wrists a rope burn.
“I had to.” Piper paused her dousing routine and gave a shrug. “Alma was bound to figure out someday that I’d killed Glenn. Plus, you’d been nosing around where you didn’t belong too.”
“You were willing to murder an entire room full of moviegoers?” Rachel’s voice was disgusted and disbelieving all at once.
“Too many people knew too much,” Piper reasoned.
“Why did you kill my poor husband?” Alma moaned from her chair, violently shivering in the now-cool air since she’d exited her heated pool.
“Glenn didn’t mean to introduce me to Eric. It just so happened I met Eric the very day your husband paid him off to leave Becca. Glenn knew Eric was helping to provide asylum only to clients who could pay him a fortune, all while pretending to run a charitable organization for human rights. Glenn didn’t want his dear, darling granddaughter mixed up in Eric’s schemes. I was waiting to meet with Glenn to get some feedback on a paper for grad school and ran into Eric on his way out.” A sick smile lit up her pretty face. “And the rest is history.” Her face fell. “But later on, Glenn decided he didn’t want his star student dating his former son-in-law. So he had to go.”
Alma let out another wail and thrashed against the ropes holding her down.
“You impersonated Alma and told each vendor the theater gala was off.”
“Very good, Mallory.” Piper shrugged. “I didn’t want Alma and Glenn’s dream to come to fruition.” She was on a roll. “And Felicity was getting too greedy. Eric found out she was replacing the emeralds he sent with her with lab replicas. I wanted Eric to get out of the gem smuggling business, move back here, and let me defend my dissertation and live a normal life.”
Um, there’s nothing normal about you, Piper.
“But Felicity wouldn’t let Eric out of their deal. So she had to go too.”
I realized then the woman Felicity had argued with in the Silver Bells dressing room had been Piper. Piper must have texted Felicity and summoned her to Becca’s house under the guise of selling the Scarlett O’Hara wedding gown.
“And you tried to kill your own fiancé too.”
Piper had grated a mountain of lemon peel for us the morning of the tea.
She nodded. “Very good, Mallory. I realized Eric might leave me for Becca. And he wasn’t going to allow us to move back from Colombia. We had a deal. He’d get to work his scheme until I finished my dissertation. Then we’d move back to the U.S. and I’d get a position, and we’d be on the straight and narrow. But he reneged. So I stole Alma’s stupid replica gun and shot him.” Her wicked grin returned.
“And now it’s time for you all to go.” She struck a match and held it to the perimeter of the large white house. It quickly took hold, engulfing the whole back of the structure in flames.
Piper grunted as she pushed Alma’s chaise into the water. The heavy metal chair, with Alma atop it, made a loud splash. It sank like a stone, and I gulped as I watched the tiny woman flail underwater, unable to break the surface. Next Rachel fell into the pool, and suffered a similar fate.
“Goodbye, Mallory.” Piper pushed me into the pool. I gulped in water in a panic and kicked at the ropes tying me to the chaise. It was no use. My lungs filled with water. As my panicked brain screamed for oxygen, I recalled a laughing Becca three weeks ago, when Helene had toppled into the pool at Alma’s hand.
Just stand up.
I struggled to grasp the edge of the pool and managed to right myself. I still stood doubled over because I was tied to the chaise, but I could just barely keep my head above surface. I pulled Rachel’s chaise, then Alma’s, to the stairs leading out of the pool, as they choked up lungs full of water. Piper stared in disbelief, right before Wilkes nudged her into the water. In the distance, sirens blared.
EPILOGUE
I felt lucky to be alive. Truman had finally checked his texts and came to the rescue. And three weeks later, I made good on my promise to Rachel to both expand our book of business and hire another assistant. On a warm June evening, I had enough time to go on a date with Garrett. We were catching a late-night screening of The Wizard of Oz.
We arrived at The Duchess theater just in time to purchase our tickets and grab a bucket of popcorn. Jacqueline waved from the ticket booth, the proud new owner of the business. Jacqueline planned on screening a colorful mix of old classics, art pieces, and current indie film hits. She’d sold out every showing her first month of helming The Duchess. She’d happily taken over because Alma was too busy with the community service projects she’d been sentenced to for faking her own assault. Rhett had slunk back to town a week after the local paper detailed Piper’s arrest for Felicity’s murder. He was no longer suspected for murder, and he tried to woo Jacqueline back, but she was firm in her decision to kick him out. Last I’d heard, he’d moved into Tara with Alma. The mother and son pair deserved each other.
Eric and Piper were safely tucked away, languishing together in the Port Quincy jail, sentenced to many years between them for their various schemes and crimes. The depth and dizzying web of mayhem they’d spun in their short time back in Port Quincy still baffled me as I reflected on the past two weeks. Piper’s desperation to keep Eric had led her to murder Glenn a year ago, and her desperation to return to the States had driven her to murder Felicity and try to kill her fiancé. She was single-minded in her pursuit to get her way, at any cost, and I could sleep better at night with her behind bars.
I’d watched Pickles while Keith and Becca took an impromptu honeymoon in the Poconos after their quick nuptials in my kitchen. I was wistful as I drove the big Maine Coon back to his owners, and had nuzzled his head and his sweet, tufted ears as I rang their bell. Becca had flung open the lacquered door and received her cat, a dazzling newlywed smile lighting up her face. As I’d turned to go, a sleek Cadillac screeched to a stop in the circular drive. A figure exited the car and sprang up the walk.
“You ruined everything!” Helene quickened her pace, a menacing, white-hot look of anger boring into me.
I gulped and took a step back, putting a small topiary cone of a tree between us.
“Mother, I won’t have you talking to my wife that way.” Keith materialized in the doorway and took Pickles from a shaking Becca’s arms. He seemed to have thought Helene was blaming Becca, but I thought she’d directed her accusation at me. Becca sent Keith a look of tender affection, and I could practically see the steam rising from Helene’s ears.
“But—”
“No exceptions. You can accept Becca as my wife, or I don’t need you in my life.” Keith sent Helene a pitying gaze, then shook his head as his mother gave a strangled yelp, tore down the path, and threw herself behind the wheel of her Cadillac. I’d restrained myself from giving Keith a high five, but instead gave Pickles another pat, inwardly cheering. Becca had mouthed a quick thanks and sent me off with a wink, and I left the newlyweds to start their new life together. The altercation with Helene had been a few weeks ago, and I’d been fortunate enough not to cross paths with her since.
June was shaping up to be serene and calm, my life settling back into mellow predictability.
I squeezed Garrett’s hand as he ushered me down the red carpet to our seats. He leaned over for a tender kiss in the brief gap of time between the lights dimming and the start of movie previews. I felt cozy and safe, elated with the state of things just as they were, happy to be in Port Quincy and following my own yellow brick road.
RECOPES
Cherry Almond Cake
Ingredients:
1¾ cup flour
1 cup white sugar
½ cup cocoa
1 tsp. baking soda
¼ tsp. salt
¾ cup oil
1 12 ounce can cherry-flavored cola
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1 tsp. almond extract
Directions:
Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Grease and flour a 9 x 9 pan. Sift together flour, sugar, cocoa, baking soda, and salt. Mix in oil, cherry-flavored cola, and almond extract. Bake in pan for 45 minutes, or until a toothpick or knife inserted in the center of the cake comes out clean.
Cherry Icing
Ingredients:
½ cup shortening
1 tsp. almond extract
3 cups powdered sugar
¼ cup cherry-flavored cola
Directions:
Beat shortening and almond extract together until light and fluffy. Add powdered sugar until mixed well. Slowly add cherry-flavored cola and beat for several minutes.
Pecan Cookies
¾ cup coconut oil
¾ cup brown sugar
2 tsp. vanilla
2 cups flour
1 cup finely chopped pecans
Directions:
Grease a cookie sheet and preheat oven to 350 degrees. Beat coconut oil, brown sugar, and vanilla until smooth. Slowly add flour and pecans. Beat until smooth. Roll spoon-size portions of dough into balls and slightly flatten. Bake for fifteen minutes.
Gown with the Wind Page 25