Purrfect Alibi: A Hazel Hart Cozy Mystery Three

by Louise Lynn

  Sheriff Cross said to keep Violet out of trouble, but he didn’t say Hazel couldn’t enlist her help in an innocent project.

  And the girl had a sharp eye. She could be of some use. “Do you have a laptop?”

  Violet nodded earnestly. “Of course.”

  When Hazel explained what she wanted Violet to do, the girl happily obliged.

  Two hours later, Hazel put the finishing touches on the photomontage. She hadn’t found anything incriminating in the photos. There were a few of the oil lamp in the background, with Brandon in the frame, but none of him tipping it over or the oil lamp itself being broken.

  But something about that oil lamp seemed important. Like Violet said. Something about this whole case didn’t add up. It was too convenient.

  She was missing something.

  For one, why would Jay risk life in prison just to protect his nephew from a broken heart? Especially when Travis obviously didn’t want Brandon dead. That made no sense. Sure, Jay was angry at Brandon that night, yet nothing about his anger spelled murder.

  But the video with the timestamp proved her wrong.

  Jay had been there twenty minutes before Brandon was killed.

  She couldn’t deny that, unless–

  “The timestamp. He could’ve changed the timestamp,” she said more to herself than anyone else. It would explain why the fight in the video looked like the one she saw in person, but why would Tyson Bridger do that?

  Violet glanced up from her screen. “Who?”

  Hazel explained, and Violet’s eyes widened. “Is that possible?”

  Hazel frowned. “It is with a photo. A lot of the pictures the kids sent me have the right timestamp because their phones are connected to the Internet, so they’re accurate. But a few of my cameras,” Hazel said and pulled up a few pictures of her own. “The timestamps are wrong because I never changed the date or time on the camera itself. I could change it to anything I like, but with a video–”

  Violet set her laptop aside. “He said the system was old, didn’t he? And he was going over all of it before he gave anything to my uncle. That’s suspicious.”

  Hazel had to agree, but she still didn’t know why a man like Tyson Bridger would kill someone he didn’t know, for pretty much no reason. She sighed. “It doesn’t make any sense, and even if he did do it, we have no proof. If we found Brandon’s phone, maybe we’d have some new evidence. But as it stands, it’s just conjecture. We can’t prove he changed the timestamp, and we don’t have a motive. Jay looks the guiltiest, considering the evidence. But Amber could’ve done it too, though she doesn’t show up on any of the video.”

  “But you think Tyson Bridger killed Brandon?” Violet said and leaned her elbows on her knees. “Maybe Brandon can tell us who did it with the spirit board.”

  Hazel felt a frown pull at her brow and shook her head. “I think Tyson Bridger is not a very nice man, but I’m not sure if he’s a killer. The thing about catching the right culprit is it involves stumbling across the wrong ones too. And the spirit board is useless—unless you brain someone with it. Plus, as your uncle keeps reminding me, Tyson Bridger has a solid alibi.”

  Violet’s expression fell. “But your mom said—”

  “My mom says a lot of things. Half of it is rubbish. Plus, even if the spirit board did work, it wouldn’t matter. Dead people’s statements aren’t admissible evidence,” Hazel said and yawned.

  Anthony Ray and Violet followed suit. “But if his ghost told us where his phone was hidden?”

  Hazel smiled. “Yeah. That might be helpful, but it’s a big fat if. You should probably get to bed. You have school in the morning, and I stayed up way too late last night.” Hazel got up to stretch.

  Violet frowned and gathered up her laptop and charger. “You’re right. See you in the morning. And, thanks for letting me crash with you. This place is much better than Uncle Colton’s. But don’t tell him I said that. He’s sensitive about stuff.”

  Hazel chuckled. Sheriff Cross sensitive about stuff? She never would have guessed.

  She bade Violet good night and settled down to glance at the last few photos, her eyes stinging.

  She almost didn’t notice the picture at first since there was a lot of activity in the foreground. Brandon was there, laughing, and something slick stained his pants. In the background, Hazel noticed the oil lamp tipped over, and half of Tyson Bridger’s face in an angry glare. The rest of him was out of the frame, and Hazel sighed.

  Once again, it didn’t prove anything. And the person with the strongest motive was Amber, since she was also probably lying. But, the look on Tyson Bridger’s face bothered Hazel more than she knew what to do with.

  Not only that, but the day before, Tyson Bridger had been skulking around outside of the police tape. Sure, it was his own property, but he was also wearing gardening boots and gloves. And he was upset they were there.

  Odd behavior, though she knew Sheriff Cross would say it didn’t prove anything.

  It all came back to that missing cell phone. If she could find that, Hazel was sure she could put everything together. Fill in all those little missing pieces.

  As she drifted off to sleep, she knew what she had to do. Go back to the Rockwell Manor and find the missing phone, first thing tomorrow morning.

  Chapter 20

  “Hazel, wake up. It’s important,” a voice called from far away, and Hazel squinted into the darkness.

  Anthony Ray let out a tired meow, and a light flickered on in the corner of the room.

  “Dad? What time is it?” Hazel said and rubbed her eyes.

  Her father stood in the doorway of her room, wearing his navy-blue bathrobe and house slippers, and he tugged at his beard incessantly. “Your mother’s gone. I woke up to go to the bathroom, and she wasn’t in our room. I went downstairs, and she’s not there either. I think our houseguest went with her.”

  That woke Hazel up. She climbed out of bed and glanced around for something to put over her pajamas. “Is the car here?”

  Her father shook his head.

  “Where would they go in the middle of the night? This isn’t Reno. Nothing is open right now,” she said as if he might know.

  A quick glance at the time told her it was just after one a.m.

  A sinking pit filled her stomach. That talk they had at dinner about trying to figure out who did it, and her mother’s insistence the spirit board would help. Not to mention Violet saying the same thing right before Hazel sent her to bed.

  She groaned and shook her head. “Doesn’t she know it’s trespassing?”

  Her father blinked. “Do you know where they went?”

  Hazel nodded. “I have an idea, and it’s a terrible one. Which means that’s probably where they are.”

  And considering the time, she didn’t have any to lose.

  She threw her jacket on over her pajamas and shoved her feet into her tennis shoes. Then got Anthony Ray in his leash and harness and rushed out to her truck, her father on her heels.

  “You’re going alone?”

  Hazel looked over her shoulder. “Do you want the whole family to be arrested for trespassing tonight?”

  Her father gave her a slight smile. “Esther’s not here, so it wouldn’t be the whole family.”

  Hazel sighed, and they climbed into her truck. She hoped, as she turned her truck toward the Rockwell Manor, that she got there before her mother did anything silly.

  Or before Tyson Bridger found her and called the cops.

  The twenty-five-minute drive dragged, and as they went, Hazel explained the case to her father, something she realized she hadn’t completely done yet.

  “Do you really think Jay Turner is a murderer?” her father asked.

  Hazel shrugged. “Honestly, I don’t know, but I feel like I’m second-guessing myself. I don’t want to discount him just because of Celia. He’s the type of person who could be involved in something shady.”

  “I’ve heard stories about his troubled pas
t, but murder is a different thing altogether. Maybe you and the sheriff are looking at it from the wrong angle. What are the two most common motives for killing someone?”

  She thought about what her old detective friends at the LAPD said. “Love and greed.” And the love angle had hit a brick wall, in a few ways. But the greed angle was wide open. “There might be something to that, but we should find Mom and Violet first.”

  The exterior lights around the Rockwell Manor shone as she pulled up the drive toward it. Her heart stuck in her throat when she noticed her mom’s blue hatchback in the back of the parking lot near the entrance to the garden. Of course, she was here. And with the sheriff’s niece to boot.

  “I hope he hasn’t called the police yet,” Hazel said as she climbed out with Anthony Ray.

  Her father joined her. “Who? No one lives here. I mean, that Bridger fellow owns the place, but he wouldn’t live in it. That would decrease its value. He said so last time I went on the tour.”

  That was right. She remembered him telling the sheriff that he’d left before all the teenagers had the night of the dance. That the Manor had been locked. And yet, Amber swore Brandon stepped back inside.

  Was there surveillance video of that?

  She’d noticed the surveillance cameras on the front porch. In fact, Tyson Bridger himself said there was one at every entrance.

  “So, if he doesn’t live here, the lights are just a security measure?”

  Her father nodded. “Probably. Plus, the cameras need them to catch anyone trespassing. No point having a camera without any light.”

  That was a good point. One Hazel would’ve come to herself if she wasn’t so busy worried about the trouble her mother might’ve gotten into.

  But if Tyson Bridger didn’t live here, he had no reason to find them trespassing on his property so late at night.

  Which meant, they could get out before anyone was the wiser. She explained her assessment to her father, and he nodded his agreement.

  Then she took a deep breath of the chilly spring air and let Anthony Ray lead the way.

  If anyone could find her mother and Violet, it would be him.

  Chapter 21

  “Why are you going toward the Manor?” Hazel hissed at Anthony Ray, but he paid her no mind.

  The leash pulled her closer, and Hazel hoped they stayed out of range of the security cameras.

  Her father plodded after her, still wearing his house slippers. “I forgot to put my shoes on,” he admitted, unnecessarily.

  Hazel gave him a helpless smile. She’d done the same thing once and hadn’t even realized it until she got to her studio. Thankfully, it was a quick drive home to change. In this case, he’d have to stick it out. “You can wait in the truck if you want.”

  He shook his head and bent to examine one of the tulips, hardly visible in the shadows.

  “Find mom, Anthony Ray,” Hazel said, but the black cat kept marching toward the back porch. If he was trying to get inside…

  Suddenly, he veered toward the side of the porch and wandered into the flower planter. Hazel glanced about. “If you have to go to the bathroom you could’ve gone anywhere.”

  Her father padded closer to the gardens. “What did Maureen say at dinner? The best place for the spirit board reading was at the scene of the crime?”

  “Yes,” Hazel whispered, though she didn’t know why. They were alone, as far as she could tell. But the noise in the darkness seemed to carry better than it did in the light. However, she didn’t hear Violet or her mother at all.

  Strange.

  Anthony Ray yowled, and Hazel shone the flashlight on him.

  He sat surrounded by yellow tulips in the same spot he’d tried to dig on Saturday, with a pleased expression on his face, and she noticed something behind him. Something blue and white.

  “Did you just dig that up?” she said and knelt to get a better look.

  Sure enough, instead of going to the bathroom, he’d gone into the planter to dig instead. The scent struck her nose before she saw what it was—that heavy floral scent that clung to Brandon Sizemore’s body. The oil from the burner. And this was the burner itself.

  “What have you found?” her father asked and peered over her shoulder.

  Hazel pulled it out carefully with a tissue she kept in her coat pocket. “The missing Nara era oil lamp I told you about,” she said and carefully turned it over.

  “That’s not Nara era. It’s a modern reproduction, albeit a good one. Look.” Her father pointed at the seal on the bottom. “That’s a stamp. They didn’t have stamps in Nara era Japan, not yet. Any seal would have been hand-written.”

  Something Violet had mentioned the other day fit with that. “People often put the real antique in a safe and displayed fakes, so this was a fake Nara era oil lamp. But Tyson Bridger claimed it was authentic and missing,” she said and looked at her dad.

  His eyes widened. “Sounds like greed to me.”

  It sure did. Plus, she’d overheard Tyson talking to that insurance agent about it the day they were looking for Brandon before anyone knew he was dead.

  If he lied about that, what else had he lied about?

  “What’s that?” her father said and pointed behind the area that the oil lamp was buried. A piece of white cloth stuck out of the soil.

  Hazel carefully tugged it free. “Looks like a dress shirt. The one Tyson Bridger wore the night of the dance,” she said and pointed at the buttons. Black. They stood out to her as more high-quality than the rented tuxedos and suits that most of the other attendees wore that evening.

  And, in the bright beam of her flashlight, she noticed a large stain on the arm. Yellow and smelling strongly of the same floral oil that filled the burner. The same burner that Brandon had tipped over. There were also dark brownish red flecks on it.

  Blood, she guessed.

  “What does this mean?” she breathed.

  Her father’s eyebrows danced above his eyes. “Tyson Bridger is keeping more secrets than we knew about. And it means we should probably find your mother as quickly as we can.”

  Hazel nodded, and carefully tucked the evidence back behind the tulips.

  Anthony Ray was already tugging her in another direction, past the carriage house and toward the gardens beyond. However, as they approached, she noticed the door to this carriage house was open. The last time she’d been there it was closed, as it wasn’t part of the museum, but used for storage and whatnot according to Mr. Bridger.

  However, now it stored a car—a familiar black sedan.

  Hazel stopped dead and her breath clogged in her throat. She grabbed her dad’s arm. “That’s the car. The one at my house last night.”

  Her father took her flashlight and flicked it off.

  For a moment, they stood in silence and both listened. The only sound Hazel heard was the slight rustling of wind through the trees and the call of a nocturnal bird. Plus, her pounding heart and Anthony Ray’s footsteps on the gravel.

  She dug into her pocket and pulled out her truck keys and pressed them into her dad’s hand. “Get back to the truck and call Sheriff Cross. I’m faster than you, so don’t argue with me. Please,” she said, and her voice trembled.

  Her father squeezed her hand and let out a sigh. “You’re right about being faster. Especially since I’m in slippers. But don’t do anything dangerous. If you see the man, hide.”

  She nodded and tucked herself against the carriage house as his shadow disappeared behind the Manor and toward the parking lot. Hazel waited until she heard the sound of her truck door close before she finally moved again.

  At least her dad was safe, and the police would be here soon.

  Now she had to find Violet and her mother before whoever owned that car did.

  Her thoughts raced as she moved toward the hedge maze, the half-moon guiding her way. So, this all came down to greed. But did the buried oil lamp and shirt mean Tyson killed Brandon?

  Anthony Ray tugged her toward the garde
n, and she walked as quietly as she could across the gravel. It was difficult since every step displaced the rocks beneath her feet. And she decided against using the flashlight lest someone see it.

  The car in the carriage house was another strike against him, but that didn’t mean he was here. It could be a spare car. She knew the man was rich enough to afford one. Though he didn’t act it, always complaining about not having enough.

  The cold bit into her skin past her flannel pajamas, and Hazel wished she thought to put on a hat. Her breath came out in white puffs. It could still freeze this time of the year at night, and it felt close to it. Her fingers were stiff with cold, and she hadn’t seen any sign of her mother or Violet besides the hatchback.

  With every passing moment, dread filled her bones.

  It would take Sheriff Cross at least twenty-five minutes to send deputies here. What if Tyson Bridger found her mother and Violet and killed them to protect some secret she hadn’t figured out yet?

  Suddenly, Anthony Ray stopped, and his ears perked. He let out a low growl.

  Well, that could mean any number of things. Raccoon. Possum. Bobcat. Or, just a person he didn’t like.

  Hazel stood silent, and she heard a step on the gravel near her.

  Anthony Ray turned toward the hedge to her left and let out another growl.

  Another step, this one obviously human.

  Boots against gravel.

  Fear clogged Hazel’s throat, and she swallowed it. She was in the hedge maze at the Rockwell Manor possibly with a killer.

  Her mother or Violet wouldn’t be sneaking around like that, would they?

  No.

  First of all, she knew her mother much too well. Maureen Hart would be yammering the whole time.

  So, whoever this was, in all likelihood, wasn’t friendly.

  Hazel looked behind her and her heart dropped into her shoes. The hedge maze opened to the left about ten yards from where she stood, and whoever was on that side could easily look around and spot her.

  There was only one thing to do.

  Run.

  Hazel did.

  Her legs pumped, and her feet skidded across the gravel as she charged in the opposite direction of the ominous footsteps.