Stormy Day Mysteries 5-Book Cozy Murder Mystery Series Bundle

by Angela Pepper

  We stood on the porch of the Lakes' house. It was a small blue rancher, much like the other houses along the street. We'd prepared a cover story, but I had to fight the urge to giggle nervously while waiting for Mr. Lake to open the door.

  Sometimes when I'm overwhelmed, I start to giggle like a maniac. The more I try to control myself, the funnier it gets.

  As soon as John Lake opened the door, my urge to giggle dissipated.

  He looked to be about my father's age, but with a sickly pale face and sweat glistening on his brow. He nodded along while my father gave him the spiel about how we were considering buying a house up the street and wanted to know what the neighborhood was like.

  He mumbled one-word answers to our questions about schools and safety. When we got to the part where I was supposed to ask if I could use his washroom, my father gave me the signal, and I said, “Thanks for the information. Maybe we'll see you around. Goodbye!”

  He grunted an acknowledgment, shuffled back into his home, and closed the door.

  My father gave me a stern look.

  “What? It's not him,” I said.

  “I know you're thinking that old fart couldn't be the one, but trust me on this one. Guilt can look a lot like grief, and people who lie about one thing can lie about another.”

  “That poor man. He's probably devastated, with his wife missing and suspected of murder.”

  “Stormy, I never told you this job was easy.”

  “No, you didn't.” I knocked on the door. “Let's try again.”

  I put on my sweetest smile, waiting for John Lake to return.

  He didn't, so I knocked again, louder this time.

  We waited another minute, and I started to get annoyed, because I hadn't used the washroom at Sew It Goes, and I'd had a lot of coffee that morning, and I really did need the facilities.

  My father walked to the edge of the step and leaned over to look in the man's front room window. “I think he's passed out on the floor,” he reported back. “Did you smell alcohol on his breath?”

  “No, but he had a medical alert bracelet.” I joined my father in peering through the window. We couldn't see much—just legs on the floor, extending from behind an interior wall. “Did he seem confused to you? He was pale and sweaty. Diabetic?”

  “I saw a tremble in his hands. He's either passed out, or gone into a hypoglycemic coma. A married man like him probably counts on his wife to let him know when his blood sugar's getting low. She's not around, so he doesn't know how to look after himself.”

  I had my phone in my hands. “Ambulance?”

  He shook his head. “We'll break the door down.” He hobbled over to the edge of the step to get a good run at it, with his cane and everything.

  “Let's try the handle first.” I easily opened the unlocked door before Finnegan Day, the one-man battering ram, could throw himself through it.

  John Lake was diabetic after all, and had slipped into shock. It was a good thing we'd been there. The paramedics gave him a glucagon injection and revived him. He said he was feeling better, but they insisted on bringing him down to the hospital anyway.

  The paramedics kept congratulating us for being there, and thinking fast, but I only felt worse with every bit of praise.

  It was my fault Mr. Lake was in such bad shape. Not my fault, exactly, but because of me. If I hadn't gone to the junkyard and tipped the police off about the van, they wouldn't have made her a suspect. The couple would be having lunch together right now, if not for my meddling.

  My stomach pushed acid up, giving me pain in my chest. I surreptitiously raided the Lakes' medicine cabinet for some antacid. My heartburn was either from stress, or gobbling down a smoked meat sandwich while driving. Either way, it was a message from my body that this investigation stuff had consequences.

  As they loaded Mr. Lake into the ambulance, the older paramedic joked around with my father, who knew most of the local first responders. The two were on such good terms that the paramedic didn't even question why we'd been there, or why we were volunteering to stay behind in the house to make sure all the appliances were safely turned off.

  I watched the ambulance drive away, and silently promised Mr. Lake I would do what I could to get his wife home. Unless he was missing a mother-of-pearl button from a tan shirt.

  Left alone in the home, my father and I got to work quickly. Well, I used the washroom, and then we got to work.

  “You're not allowed to impersonate a police officer,” I told him. “It's part of the rules for investigators. If people don't know you're retired now, and you don't tell them you are, that might get us in trouble.”

  My father led the way to the master bedroom and opened the closet. “Someone's been thinking about her research. Does that mean you've decided?”

  “I don't know. At the moment, I'm kind of focused on finding a tan shirt with mother-of-pearl buttons.”

  “Like this?” He pulled the shirt from the closet.

  Despite the gravity of the situation, seeing the shirt we'd been looking for made me happy. I jumped up and down, clapping my hands like I'd just won the first round on a game show called Find the Killer's Shirt and Win Huge Prizes.

  We both inspected the shirt and let out a shared groan of disappointment at the result. This custom-tailored tan shirt still had all of its buttons, and the fabric underneath was in pristine condition. If a button had been ripped off this shirt, a genie had magically repaired the tear.

  We searched through the closet thoroughly, then checked the clothes hamper, plus the washer and dryer. From the look of it, Mr. Lake hadn't done laundry since his wife's disappearance. We found several custom-made shirts from Sew It Goes, but none with missing buttons, let alone missing buttons ripped from tan fabric.

  Since we were in the house already, we took a look around. We found several days' worth of unwashed dishes, but nothing suspicious, and nothing that would lead us to believe Mr. Lake was anything other than a man who was terribly lost without his wife.

  And what a wife she was.

  From the framed photos on the walls, to the inspirational signs and decorative angels placed throughout the home, Dharma was clearly someone who believed in kindness, goodness, and karma.

  My heart sank low at the idea of her being carted off to jail, her husband devastated and alone. My father might have been feeling the same way, because he didn't have much to say, not even one of his wisecracks.

  We turned off all the lights and left the house.

  Back in the car, we both checked our phones. In all the excitement, I'd forgotten about the message I'd left for Logan with his secretary.

  He'd sent me a text message: Urgent. Please meet me at the house to discuss the hot water tank.

  I showed my father the message, and we drove to my house in silence.

  Something bad was going down. I could taste it.

  Chapter 31

  Parking in my driveway and then walking to my tenant's side instead of my own felt familiar yet unsettling, like brushing your teeth with your non-dominant hand.

  Logan opened his door and waved both of us in without a word. His place was dark for the daytime, all the curtains presumably pulled shut for privacy.

  “You've met my father, Finnegan Day. He's working with me on the case,” I said. “He's retired now, but as you know, he's worked in law enforcement since before I was born. Definitely an asset to the team.”

  My father shook Logan's hand. “Sorry to be seeing you again under these circumstances.”

  Logan nodded. “It's always darkest before the dawn.”

  “Don't I know it.”

  A woman sniffed.

  We all turned toward the woman sitting on Logan's sofa with a box of tissues next to her. Dharma Lake appeared small and frail, a shadow of the energetic woman I'd seen at the Fox and Hound. The auburn dye in her hair didn't suit her at all, and made her look even more haggard.

  “Thank you for saving John's life,” she said. “He called from th
e hospital as soon as he got there.”

  My father and I exchanged a look. Her husband knew where she was, and he was still in a sorry state.

  We joined her in Logan's living room, which was arranged in the mirror image of mine. The familiarity only added to the strangeness of the situation.

  Logan dragged over a chair from his kitchen table so he could sit across from me and Dharma.

  “Your husband knows you're here?” I asked Dharma.

  “He's known for a few days. I've been using the special phone your boyfriend got for me. He's such a clever—”

  “Logan's not my boyfriend,” I said quickly.

  She looked even more lost, like she was about to slip into a catatonic state.

  I reached out and placed my hand on hers. “Sorry, please keep going. I hope your husband's feeling better now. He seems like a very nice man.”

  She forced a smile. “You've got passion, dear. You give me hope for the future.”

  Logan interrupted to ask me, “What were you two doing at the Lakes' residence, anyway?”

  I scratched the top of my head and gave Logan a look that said we probably shouldn't say everything in front of his client.

  Dharma picked up on my body language and excused herself to use the washroom.

  With her out of the room, my father and I explained the events of our day, from asking Marcy to trace the domain name, our brief visit to Kettner Insurance, then the search of Voula's house and subsequent discovery of the hidden space as well as the button, the research into the custom shirts, and finally, the call we paid to the Lake residence.

  “That's very thorough,” Logan said. “I wish all your hard work wasn't wasted.”

  “We've got more leads,” I said.

  “But I called you here to tell you it's over.”

  “Over?”

  Dharma returned to the room, taking small steps. “It's all over,” she said. “I'm sorry I've put everyone through all this fuss for nothing.”

  “Not for nothing,” I said. “Just give us a few more days. We're looking into this ghost of a movie producer, and we have other leads.”

  Dharma shook her head. Her voice weak and trembling, like her spirit had been broken, she said, “There's no need for anyone to waste their time or money. I'm turning myself in.”

  She sat next to me, then squeezed my hand, like I was the one who needed comfort. “Everything will work out,” she said.

  My father said, “We'll have you out on bail in no time, I'm sure.”

  She withdrew her hand from mine and looked down at the floor, avoiding my eyes.

  “No bail,” she said.

  “I'm sure your uncle would help,” I said.

  “There's no need,” she replied, her voice barely louder than a whisper. “I need to pay for what I did.”

  My mouth went dry, and my words came out hoarse. “What did you do?”

  She flicked her gaze up to mine. “Isn't it obvious? I shot her. I shot her to death.”

  Chapter 32

  Logan drove Dharma to the police station to turn herself in, while my father and I drove back to his house. We were both in shock, and possibly denial.

  “But she didn't do it,” he said, yet again.

  “She says she did.”

  “I've seen people confess to crimes they didn't commit. The public wants to believe every confession must be true, but it isn't. Being accused is such a nightmare for the suspect, a nightmare they desperately want to wake up from. Some of them see confessing as the only exit from the nightmare.”

  “Would they convict her based on her confession? She'll come to her senses before the trial, won't she?”

  “I don't know. Did you see how weak she was? She might not make it to trial.”

  “Don't say that.”

  He reached over and fiddled with the volume for the radio. The DJ was talking about donuts, and even though I didn't usually have any feelings about that particular radio announcer, his voice was suddenly the most irritating thing on the planet and I wanted to punch him in the mouth.

  We drove in silence while I tried to settle my anger.

  Before turning herself in, Dharma had told us everything she could remember.

  She remembered driving her van to Voula's house that morning, and how they'd had tea, then her memory got fuzzy. She did remember the feeling of the kick of the pistol in her hands, and how the shots were louder than she'd expected, even with thick earplugs in her ears. Then she was staring at Voula's body on the floor, blood pooled around her. She picked up the little doll from the floor, and then… nothing else. Her memory was a blank until after the vehicle accident, when she had some flashes of memory with an older female police officer draping a blanket over her shoulders.

  I slammed on the brakes, checked over my shoulder, and made a U-turn.

  “Dad, Dharma said shots. She said the shots hurt her ears, but Voula was only shot once.”

  “You're right. Just one wound, and the shooter didn't miss. There were no other bullet holes found in the room, but then again, the crack CSI team didn't locate the hidden room, so we can't say they're infallible.”

  “Dharma probably did fire the pistol, which was how the gunshot residue got onto her steering wheel, but what if it was at something else?”

  “Or someone else. She grabbed the gun from the killer and ran him off!”

  “The killer would have left on foot, because I only saw the van on the road. And the only other person I saw was a girl walking her dog. Does that seem suspicious to you? There's not another house around for miles.”

  “Lots of folks walk their dogs through there.” He pointed through the windshield, at the hill the house sat atop. “There's a trail from town that leads right through there. It cuts across the property, which actually extends down the back of the hill in a wide swath, well into part of the forest. The kids ride their dirt bikes around there in the summer, and I remember we had a problem a few years back when the rental company put up fences and the kids kept taking them down.”

  He filled me in on the property and surrounding area, and we went over our game plan to search the house for other bullet holes to support our new theory. He explained how the holes were smaller than a layperson would expect, easily hidden in a ceiling of rough plaster if you didn't look inch by inch.

  We pulled onto the road leading to the scary-faced house for the second time that day. The drive along the access road took us three minutes at moderate speed. I'd gotten run off the road at the midpoint, which meant… I got to use the algebra formula for two trains leaving two cities at different speeds, racing toward each other. Somewhere, a math teacher was smiling. We concluded that our mystery person could have gotten away in a vehicle unseen by me, if they'd had a one-and-a-half-minute lead on Dharma.

  We parked in front of the house, got out, and paused to look down at the town again. Dusk had descended already, well before suppertime, as it does in a mountain valley in winter. Street lamps blinked on and shone like pearl garlands decorating the town.

  My father said, “Before the sun goes down completely, we should check around the exterior. Who knows, we might get lucky and find a body under the snow.”

  “You call that lucky? I don't consider finding a body under the snow to be all that fortunate.”

  His jaw moved, but Finnegan Day was actually at a loss for words. I'd gotten him with that one.

  We trekked around the house, to the back area, which wasn't so much a yard, but a giant snowy field that sloped down toward the forest edge.

  “They planned to subdivide this land,” my father explained. “They cleared the trees, but then the developer built that house in the prime location and decided he didn't want any neighbors after all. The land's changed hands a few times over the years, but I'm guessing we won't have houses back here for a while. Nobody wants to look out of their windows at a murder house. Kinda ruins your appetite.”

  “Is that how you feel about the house next door to yours?”<
br />
  He didn't answer, so I let the topic drop.

  We kept walking. I scanned the snowy field for human-sized lumps, but found none. I did, however, see something interesting at the edge of the forest—the horizontal line of a fallen tree, with a red Coca-Cola can resting on the sideways trunk.

  “Dad!” I ran toward the can and leaned down to inspect it. “Bullet hole! Right through the letter O.”

  He was slower than me, using his cane to keep himself steady, and huffing from the exercise. By the time he reached the area, I'd used my boots and bare hands to clear away the snow underneath the horizontal log. I'd found a dozen soda cans, all empty, but only three with bullet holes.

  “We found our second victim,” he said as he stuck his pinkie finger into an indentation in the nearest standing tree.

  “Arboricide,” I said with a chuckle. “Get it? We're looking for an arborist with lousy aim.”

  He struggled to not roll his eyes at my pun.

  “These cans haven't been outside for long,” he said. “Careful not to touch that one on the log. They might be able to pull some prints. Maybe.”

  He looked over his shoulder at the house, which seemed to be watching us, even though the eye-shaped windows were on the other side.

  “Really? You think we'll get fingerprints?”

  “The little button was too small to pull prints, but this is different. We're going to have to call it in.”

  “Sounds like a plan. You can make the call.” I used my phone to take photos of the can and the target practice area, using the flash.

  We started the walk back up the slope, slower than the speed we'd come down.

  “I should send the photos of the cans to Logan,” I said. “He can show his client and hopefully give her an alternate explanation for her memory of shooting the gun.”

  In a harsh tone, he said, “Don't get your hopes up.”

  I stopped walking and waited for him to catch up. Even in the dark, I could see the look on his face was pure misery.