Ho-Ho-Homicide (A Liss MacCrimmon Mystery Book 8)

by Kaitlyn Dunnett

  She said good night to Sherri and Pete, intent on following her husband.

  “Hold on, Liss,” Sherri called after her. “We need to talk about this. I’ve got questions.”

  “Tomorrow,” Liss promised. “When I have a working brain.”

  Dan wasn’t in the downstairs bedroom when she got there. He’d detoured into the nearby bathroom. She glanced at the dresser and nightstand, but she was too exhausted to go through with her earlier plan to search the room. It took all her remaining energy to change into a nightgown. She fell into the bed, dragging the covers up to her neck. She heard Dan’s crutches thumping along the hallway, heading her way. She meant to apologize to him for keeping secrets, and maybe cuddle a little, but by the time he climbed into bed beside her, she was already asleep.

  Wednesday morning dawned clear and bright and warm enough for the remaining snow to continue melting. Liss had little appetite, but she forced herself to get up and make coffee. When Sherri appeared, she didn’t want more than cold cereal, but Pete arrived hungry for scrambled eggs. Dan came into the kitchen last and opted for a full breakfast.

  When the four of them were gathered around the table, each with a mug of coffee, Liss turned to Sherri. “I’m ready to be interrogated, Officer.”

  “Good,” Dan said, “because there are some things I want to know, too. I still don’t buy that my fall wasn’t an accident. Why would anyone want me to hurt myself?”

  No one answered him. Instead, Sherri asked him a question. “You were parked in a busy grocery store lot when it happened, right?”

  Dan nodded. “It’s shared by a market and a hardware store.”

  “Describe it.”

  Liss closed her eyes in an effort to picture the scene as Dan spoke.

  “Two rows of parking. Six cars in a row? Maybe eight. I’m not sure. Cars and trucks were pulling in and out. It was late afternoon. People, mostly women, were stopping in to make last-minute purchases before they headed home to cook supper. That’s why I chose a spot along the side of the lot, out of the way of all that backing and forthing. There were about a dozen parking slots over under some trees. Maybe more.”

  Shielded by the trees and with the gathering dusk, Liss remembered, it had been difficult to see well. It would have been easy for someone to lay a trap without being noticed. An enterprising soul might even have backed in next to Dan’s truck and poured oil on the pavement without ever getting out of his . . . or her . . . vehicle.

  “Liss, are you certain the slick spot was olive oil?” Sherri asked.

  “I didn’t imagine the smell!”

  “But you can’t prove it was olive oil, either,” Pete pointed out. “It’s too late to look for evidence on the blacktop. By now, between the weather and traffic, there won’t be anything left to find.”

  “I knelt in the oil after Dan fell,” Liss said. “It’s still on my slacks.”

  Sherri perked up. “A stain on fabric can be tested. Of course, it’s still not proof. Even if it is olive oil, who’s to say you didn’t spatter some on yourself while you were cooking?”

  “Who’s to say? Me! That’s who!” Liss felt herself getting riled up all over again. “Why did you bother coming here if you won’t believe me?”

  “It’s not that we don’t believe you, Liss,” Pete said. “It’s that your theory makes no sense. There’s no obvious reason for someone to have pulled such a stunt. And you’re short on proof that there was any foul play.”

  Liss shot out of her chair, taking her empty coffee mug with her. She slammed it down in the sink so hard that it broke on impact. A shard pierced her thumb. She stared at it in confusion.

  Sherri was at her side an instant later. “For heaven’s sake, Liss! Let me see that.”

  She forced her friend’s hand under cold running water and cleaned the small cut. In short order she’d dabbed it with disinfectant cream and bandaged it. Pete cleared away the broken bits of ceramic.

  “I get that you’re upset that we doubt you,” Sherri said when they were once more seated around the kitchen table, “but you said yourself that you had second thoughts. Let’s take this one step at a time. That stain needs to be preserved. I’ll send your slacks to the lab to be tested.”

  “Tell me the truth. If I wasn’t your friend, wouldn’t you write me off as a nutcase?”

  “Maybe,” Sherri admitted, “but you are and there’s certainly something strange going on. I won’t feel easy in my mind until I know what it is.”

  “We wouldn’t have come if we didn’t think there was reason to be concerned,” Pete said, “but playing devil’s advocate is the best way to find any flaws in your logic.”

  “What’s the plan, then?” Dan asked.

  “More questions, based on the list of names Liss sent me while you were still in the hospital.”

  “A list? Why doesn’t that surprise me?”

  Sherri ignored Dan’s rhetorical question and turned to Liss. “You may know more than you realize about some of these people.” From the pocket of her jeans she produced the printout, now much folded, that she’d made of Liss’s e-mail. “I want your first impression,” she instructed, “especially anything that struck you as off-kilter. Dan, feel free to chime in with your observations. Let’s start with Andy Dutton.”

  Liss studied her hands and the bandage that stood out like . . . well, like a sore thumb. “I thought Andy was a guy until she took off her motorcycle helmet.” She described their first meeting, then added, “I liked her. But I could tell she wasn’t a happy camper when I mentioned that Gina might open up a cut-your-own place. Later, after Mrs. Purvey told me Andy had been in trouble with the law when she was younger, I had to wonder if she might be planning to siphon off some trees to sell on her own. It was a relief when you told me that the juvenile record was only for minor stuff. And, as of yesterday morning, I know what she was really up to, and it’s all good.”

  After Liss had filled them in on that youthful entrepreneur’s business plan, Sherri picked another name off the list—the town manager, Steve Wilton.

  “No red flags there,” Liss said.

  “What about Beatrice Purvey?”

  Liss made a face. “She’d be my prime suspect if she had anything to gain by it. But there’s no way she could have set the fire last night. She’s seventy if she’s a day and probably older.”

  “I know a lot of spry older women,” Pete said.

  “Oh, she can trot pretty fast on solid flooring, but over snow-covered fields in the dark? I don’t think so.”

  “First impressions?” Sherri prompted her.

  “At the town office she acted skittish, as if the very name Simeon Snowe spooked her a little. Then, at the grocery store, she was on the defensive, almost angry at us for being critical of her hometown and, more particularly, her son. Then she started dropping hints about Andy’s criminal past.”

  “How did she get onto that topic?”

  Liss had to think a moment before she could answer. “I asked her about workers Simeon Snowe might have hired to help harvest his trees. I have those names now. I found them when I went through Snowe’s business papers.”

  “Good. We’ll check them out later. For now tell me about Wyatt Purvey.”

  “I didn’t like him.”

  “Why not?”

  “He’s the type who’d tell a woman not to worry her pretty little head about anything, because the big strong man will take care of it. Except that he’s not all that big or strong. And I loathe his voice. Words can’t describe it. You’ll have to hear him speak for yourself.”

  Sherri gave a low whistle. “You really don’t like him, do you?”

  “Not at all.” She paused and reflected. “It really ticked me off that he ignored me and talked only to Dan. He was dismissive when he mentioned Andy, too.” She gave them a brief recap of Purvey’s visit to the Snowe farm.

  “Did he say how he knew Andy Dutton?”

  Liss shook her head. “When you get right dow
n to it, he didn’t say much at all.”

  “The first time we met him,” Dan interjected, “I got the impression that he didn’t know much.”

  “I thought he just didn’t care what had happened to that John Doe,” Liss said. “The unidentified man wasn’t anybody local, so he didn’t matter to Purvey.”

  Sherri sighed. “That seven-year-old murder has got to be the key to what’s happening now. That’s what called attention to Snowe’s Christmas tree farm. It was probably the reason Snowe disappeared, too. I wonder if John Doe might have been one of the itinerant laborers Snowe hired.”

  “In that case, wouldn’t Andy have recognized him?” Liss asked.

  “That depends. If all they showed the locals was a photograph taken of his face after he was dead, he might not have looked much like himself. I wonder if they also did an artist’s reconstruction?”

  “I wouldn’t mind seeing what he looked like myself,” Liss said. “I’m guessing he wasn’t a big bruiser. A large man wouldn’t have fit through the netter.”

  “Something to consider,” Sherri murmured. “Sometimes size does matter. When we’re done with first impressions, I’ll have you two go through the list and jot down approximate heights and weights for each of these people. Best guess on ages, too. That information may come in handy later. Okay, on to Mike Jennings. I’m guessing he struck you more favorably than Purvey did.”

  “Definitely.” Liss summarized what Jennings had told her and Dan. “About John Doe and the search for Simeon Snowe . . . ,” she said before Sherri could go on to the next name on the list. “Do you know any more about the dead guy?”

  It was Sherri’s turn to make a face. “My hands have been tied because this isn’t my case. I didn’t have a reason to access official police reports from New York, although I did e-mail some questions to someone I know from a police Listserv. The only good thing about that fire last night is that if it was arson, that may give me some leverage. We’ll have to wait and see what the fire marshal says.”

  “The man in the netter is an unusual case,” Pete said, “and not only because of where he was found. Nowadays there’s usually something available to base an ID on—fingerprints, DNA, dental records, facial recognition software.” He shook his head, as if he had trouble believing what he was saying. “For this guy, they apparently turned up zip. Nada. Nothing. He was a John Doe when they found him, and he’s still listed that way.”

  “That’s what Officer Jennings said,” Dan agreed, “but I don’t understand how someone could be that far off the radar.”

  “Could be he was just an ordinary guy who never came to anybody’s attention,” Sherri said. “Or there may be records somewhere. Without a name to use to search for them, you’re flat out of luck.”

  “Or he was a very clever criminal who knew how to avoid leaving a record. Oh, don’t look at me like that!” Liss accompanied the order with a strained laugh. “Why should we ignore the possibility that the mob is involved? It’s no crazier than using olive oil in a booby trap.”

  Sherri shoved her mug, still half full of coffee, to one side and leaned across the table to take Liss’s hands in hers. “I’m not going to ignore anything, no matter how far-fetched. This guy ended up being murdered. Regular joes don’t usually get stuffed through a netting machine and shipped out of state.”

  “The thing that makes the least sense to me is that no one recognized his photo,” Liss said. “I don’t mean to give him a name,” she added quickly, “but because they’d seen him around town.”

  “No one admitted to seeing him,” Sherri said. “Isn’t that what Mike Jennings told you?” She held up a hand to stop Liss from answering. “Never mind. Forget about the dead guy for now. We’ve gotten off track. Whoever tried to hurt Dan, it wasn’t John Doe.” She glanced at the list. “You went to lunch after you talked to Purvey and Jennings, right?”

  Liss nodded and made short work of eliminating the next few people on her list as serious suspects. Miranda Madison and her employee and Harlan Woolgar seemed unlikely villains. “The dog’s name is Jonas,” Liss added. “I don’t think he did it, either.”

  “What about patrons in the café?”

  “Any of them could have overheard us talking about the maze,” Liss admitted, “but I don’t know who they were, and I wouldn’t recognize any of them if I tripped over them.”

  Sherri went on to the next entry. “What about Juliette Cressy?”

  “She runs the local dance studio.” Liss didn’t need to explain to an old friend like Sherri why she’d stopped at Dance-Ex.

  “First impression?”

  “Rather rude and abrupt for someone whose success depends on attracting and keeping clients. Not as good a teacher as Zara, but not awful.”

  “So you’ve taken one of her classes?”

  “I’ve been to aerobics twice. We meet every morning at ten. Rowena Luckenbill is part of the group, too. Oh, and Kitty Sloan. That’s the young woman I met on her way into Dance-Ex.” She pointed to Kitty’s description. “I didn’t know her name until Monday.” As Liss described their first brief encounter, Sherri wrote Kitty’s name on the printout.

  “I’ll check her out. Now, what about Ms. Luckenbill?”

  “She owns the occult shop a few doors down from Dance-Ex. We stopped in there because we’d realized that some of the trees had been planted in the shape of a maze. I bought a book on mazes. Rowena struck me as pleasant but a little strange. I’ve gotten to know her better since then, since she’s in my aerobics class, which is how I discovered that she and Simeon Snowe were an item back in the day. He probably planted that maze as a surprise for her. It’s kind of sweet, really. I also found a poem he wrote to her.”

  Pete snickered. “Be still, my beating heart. Geriatric romance.”

  “They were only in their fifties at the time,” Liss protested, even though she knew he was kidding. “That’s hardly over the hill.”

  “You should be so lucky at that age,” Sherri said sotto voce and jabbed him in the ribs with the eraser end of her pencil.

  Pete threw his hands into the air in mock surrender.

  Ignoring this byplay, Liss reached for the printout and scanned it. “That’s everyone we encountered before Dan was hurt, except for the clerk in the grocery store and the old guy in the market’s parking lot, the one who was not helpful with directions to the Christmas tree farm, and the woman who suggested we try asking for information at the town office. No one else would have had any idea who we were or why we were in New Boston.”

  “Except Gina,” Sherri said.

  “Have you lost your mind?” Liss asked. “Gina’s the one who sent us here. Why would she try to scare us off?”

  “I wasn’t thinking of her for that. I was wondering where she was when her great-uncle disappeared.”

  “You seriously think Gina would go that far on the off chance of inheriting a Christmas tree farm?” Dan asked.

  “I think Gina Snowe would bulldoze right over anyone who got in her way to something she wanted. John Doe. Her uncle. Anyone. And we know she was in the area earlier that year.”

  “Of course she was—for our tenth high school reunion in the summer, months before John Doe turned up in New York and Simeon Snowe vanished.”

  “All the same, I bet she knows more than she’s told you.”

  Liss opened her mouth to deny it and abruptly shut it again. “You’re probably right. Do you want me to phone her again?”

  “Later. First, while Dan writes down height, weight, and age—he’s better at guessing that sort of thing than you are—you and I are going to search the downstairs bedroom. Unless you’ve already done it?”

  “Not yet.”

  They’d barely begun looking for clues when Liss heard the sound of a car engine.

  “Oh, goody,” she muttered, lifting the curtain to take a look at the parking area. “My favorite cop has turned up again.”

  Sherri closed a dresser drawer. “Purvey?”

>   “Who else?”

  “How much do you want to tell him?”

  “Why should we tell him anything?” Her lips twisted into a rueful smile. “And what, exactly, can we tell him that he’ll believe? I’m still having a hard time believing it myself. If not for the fire—”

  “There’s no question that it was deliberately set,” Sherri said. “Even if we don’t see how that connects to someone using olive oil to cause Dan to fall, the coincidence factor is way too great to discount. Somehow, everything is connected—John Doe’s murder and Simeon Snowe’s disappearance, too.”

  “Don’t count on Purvey agreeing with that. That man has a mind so tightly closed that a sunbeam couldn’t find a way inside.”

  Liss opened the front door before Purvey could go around to the kitchen entrance and invited him in. The stench of burnt trees still hung in the crisp morning air.

  “Your husband around?” asked the chief of police.

  “He’s in the kitchen,” Liss said with forced politeness. “Please go on through.” With Sherri beside her, she trailed along after him.

  “Chief Purvey!” Pete exclaimed, jumping up and holding out his hand. “Pete Campbell here. I’m a deputy sheriff over to Carrabassett County. I went through the criminal justice academy at the same time as one of your men. Guy named Jennings. Mike, is it?”

  As usual, Purvey’s expression gave nothing away, but he did agree that Officer Jennings was named Michael.

  Putting a great deal of insincere warmth into her voice, Liss offered Purvey a cup of coffee. He shifted his attention away from Dan and Pete long enough to refuse. He had yet to acknowledge Sherri’s presence in any way.

  Liss wondered if Wyatt Purvey had any inkling how offensive his behavior was to an entire gender. Having met his overprotective mother, she’d have liked to stuff him into a pigeonhole labeled “middle-aged Mama’s boy,” but people were always more complex than stereotypes. She warned herself not to underestimate him, either. Or tick him off.