Alibis and Amethysts

by Sharon Pape

  “No,” Elaine said finally. “I don’t see the point. It’s not like we’re buddies or anything. I know what you’ve been up to. I have friends in this town, good friends. You want to find a scapegoat to blame for Peggy’s murder. I have to get back to work now.” Without another word, she turned on her heel and disappeared back into the storeroom, foam and all.

  Giving up didn’t come naturally to Jaye, but she’d had enough experience with lost causes to recognize one when it smacked her in the face. She decided it would be lovely if Elaine turned out to be the killer. Unfortunately, without a decent photograph, they might never know. She could ask Daniel or Sierra to try their luck, but Elaine was sure to become suspicious if a second person she barely knew asked her to pose for a photo within the same week. There was only one option left—ambush Elaine and take the photo without her permission. The method certainly worked for the paparazzi.

  She went across the street to Cravings! to ask Ruth if she’d ever noticed what time Elaine stepped out to walk her dog. There was no point in asking Sierra, who spent most of the day in the rear of the shop baking or catching up on paperwork. But Ruth was always behind the counter with a front row seat to the comings and goings of the world outside.

  “She generally walks Mayhem around noon and again around four,” Ruth said. “Now that’s just an approximate time, mind you. I’ve seen her out there an hour or so either way. I imagine she has to wait until there are no customers to attend to.”

  Jaye borrowed Daniel’s Jeep with the tinted windows again. Not only had Elaine never seen her in that vehicle before, but the dark windows also provided a place for her to lie in wait for her target. She parked directly in front of Elaine’s shop at noon the next day. She kept count of all the people who entered the shop and left, some carrying bags with new purchases, others empty-handed. Although the shop was never crowded, there was a steady stream of customers. An hour went by before there was a lull in the action. Seconds after the last person walked out of the store, Elaine emerged with Mayhem, who must have been ready to burst, because Elaine didn’t even pause to lock the door. She swept past the Jeep so quickly that Jaye never had time to make it out of the vehicle, much less snap a picture. She’d forgotten how swiftly Elaine could move for a person of her girth. As Elaine and Mayhem made their way down the block, Elaine kept looking over her shoulder as though trying to keep an eye on her shop. After Mayhem paused to hydrate two bushes and a hydrant, Elaine executed a quick U-turn and started back.

  Jaye gave herself a pep talk. This is it. You have to get the picture this time. You can do it. You know you can do it. She opened the door of the Jeep and stepped down using the door as a shield. If anyone saw her squatting there, camera in hand, she prayed they’d mind their own business. Elaine was nearly back to the Jeep, but her face was turned toward her shop and a young couple who had just entered it. If Jaye took the shot now she’d wind up with the back of Elaine’s head, or at best her profile. She stood up and shut the Jeep’s door. As Elaine was about to reenter her shop, Jaye called out her name so loudly that all the passersby on that side of the street turned to see who was shouting. Elaine spun around so fast on her ballet-slippered feet that she wobbled precariously, a spinning top about to succumb to the pull of gravity. At the last moment, she managed to regain her balance and avert disaster. Jaye snapped the picture, capturing her with her mouth wide open in distress.

  The instant Elaine realized who’d called her name and why, her face boiled red with rage. “If you ever come anywhere near me again, I’ll report you to the police!” she shouted, providing additional entertainment to the people who were waiting to see what would happen next. “I’ll press charges—harassment, stalking, endangering my life!”

  Jaye didn’t stay to defend herself. What she’d done was basically indefensible.

  ***

  The phone was ringing when Jaye walked into her apartment after closing Crystal Clear for the night. She grabbed the receiver just before it went to voice mail. Spencer Arthur was on the other end.

  “I have an answer for you with regard to Mr. Grayson and the question of forgery,” he said once they’d inquired about each other’s health.

  “That’s great,” Jaye said, instantly as alert and focused as if she’d downed a high-octane dose of caffeine.

  “I spent quite some time studying the print I purchased from Mr. Grayson. As you can well imagine, one doesn’t accuse a person of forgery, or any crime for that matter, without a high degree of certainty.”

  “Of course,” she said, since he’d clearly paused in expectation of her comment. She wondered if he knew how it felt to wait for an answer that was so maddeningly slow in coming.

  “Based on my professional background and years of experience in the field of art,” he went on in his measured speech, “it is my considered opinion that the name on the print is most definitely a forgery. Now, I cannot say the same for any other painting or print in the Grayson Gallery without also subjecting said pieces to similar scrutiny. I’ll be e-mailing you a copy of my report if that method is agreeable to you.”

  “Yes, sure,” Jaye said absently, trying to comprehend the magnitude of what he’d told her.

  Although this wasn’t proof that Adam had killed Peggy, the desire to remain out of prison did make for a fine motive. It also explained why Peggy had taken such pains to hide the photo that showed him engaged in the commission of the crime.

  “The next logical step is to inform the police,” Spencer continued, “which I’ll take care of in person tomorrow morning.”

  Alarms went off in Jaye’s head. That was the worst thing he could do at this point. She hadn’t considered the issue of timing when she’d hired him to check out Adam’s gallery. As a private investigator, she still had an awful lot to learn. “I’m afraid I have to ask you to hold off on reporting this to the police,” she said urgently. “I know it sounds crazy, but Grayson is also a suspect in a murder case, and I need a few more days to determine if he is in fact the killer.”

  There was a long pause while Spencer considered her request. “I don’t know quite what to say. I mean, wouldn’t this crime lend support to the murder charge?”

  “It might, but I’m afraid to spook him when we’re so close to apprehending the killer.”

  “I wasn’t aware that you were a private investigator.” There was a sharp edge of suspicion in Spencer’s tone.

  “Technically, I’m not,” she admitted. She’d hoped to avoid having to relate all the details to him, but she could tell he wasn’t about to let this go without a thorough explanation.

  “I see,” he said after she’d laid the whole story out for him. “Although I think you’re being overly cautious, I can understand your anxiety about rocking the boat at this juncture. And since I have no idea how I would react under similar circumstances, I’m willing to give you a bit of leeway here. How much time do you need to get all your ducks, as they say, in a row?”

  “A week at most,” she said, afraid that asking for more might wind up netting her less.

  “A week it is, then. But sooner would be better, since my hesitation in contacting the authorities could well be construed as withholding evidence or obstructing justice.”

  “That can only happen if they’re aware of the date you completed your report,” Jaye pointed out. “I don’t know about you, but I’m terrible at remembering dates.”

  “Yes, I am as well. Yet you know what they say.”

  “What’s that?” she asked.

  “No good deed goes unpunished.”

  ***

  Jaye and Raffles ate a simple dinner of egg salad, Jaye’s on honey whole wheat from Cravings! and the not-a-cat’s straight on a dish. Raffles liked her carbs well enough, but when given a choice she always went for the protein like any normal cat or dog. Jaye found similarities like that comforting, especially
since all signs pointed to the mind-boggling possibility that Raffles was not a native resident of planet Earth.

  She cleaned up the kitchen and was ready when her sleuthing partners arrived for a food-free meeting. They’d been able to carve out only half an hour for that night’s get-together. Daniel had to pick up a tour group for a sunset ride through the red rocks, and Sierra had to wake up earlier than usual the next morning to bake for a teacher’s retirement luncheon. But this meeting couldn’t be postponed. With every day that passed, time was running out. Although Brock and Anastos had been stripped of their fur evidence, they might still have enough of a case to make a nuisance arrest as payback. Even if the city attorney refused to prosecute on the basis of that evidence, the women could wind up spending valuable hours or days in jail. And now they had the additional deadline of one week before Spencer went to the police to charge Adam with forgery.

  They sat in the living room, Jaye and Daniel on one of the love seats, Sierra on the other. Raffles took up a position beside Sierra, from which she could keep an eye on the proceedings. She licked her lips with her petite catlike tongue as if expecting food to appear at any moment.

  “Time for show-and-tell,” Daniel said, starting things off by opening the manila envelope he’d brought with him. He withdrew a five-by-seven glossy of the solemn-looking Newirths and placed it on the coffee table for his partners to view.

  “Great shot,” Jaye said.

  “I told them I was a freelancer for the local paper and I wanted to do a story on their missing dog. It couldn’t have been easier.”

  Jaye had her two photos on her lap. She put the one of the Finnegans down beside the one of the Newirths. “Quinn was adamant about having his wife in the picture, but other than that he seemed flattered that I’d asked. Elaine gave me a rough time though.” Jaye added her photo to the display.

  Daniel laughed when he saw Elaine’s startled expression. “Did you sneak up behind her and yell ‘boo’?”

  “Pretty much,” Jaye said. Thinking about it now, she realized how funny their encounter must have looked to everyone who witnessed it.

  “It looks like I’m the only one who struck out,” Sierra said.

  Jaye didn’t bother to hide her surprise. Sierra made friends faster than anyone she’d ever known. “You’re kidding. What happened?”

  “Adam’s either seen us together enough to assume we’re good friends or he’s been asking around about you, because right off the bat he asked where you were. I tried to play dumb, but he wouldn’t let it go. Every time I tried to change the subject, he kept turning it back to you. He wanted to know what you’d told me about your date with him and why you were playing hard to get. I said you’d never talked to me about him. He called me a liar, among other things, and told me to get out of his gallery. He’s quite the charmer.”

  “It’s a good thing we didn’t let Jaye go in there again,” Daniel muttered. “Sounds like Grayson’s obsessed with her.”

  Jaye didn’t like being referred to in the third person when she was sitting right there, but she didn’t say anything. This wasn’t the time for petty annoyances to take center stage. There was too much at stake. “This isn’t good,” she said instead. “We can’t move forward without a photo of him.”

  “What about the one Peggy hid?” Sierra asked. “It might be too damaged to prove he was committing forgery, but we can still try showing it around for ID purposes.”

  “It’s only his profile,” Jaye said, “so I don’t know if that’ll work.” She sprang up from the love seat and disappeared into the bedroom. A moment later, she returned with the photo and handed it to Sierra.

  “I forgot how bad the damage is,” Sierra said glumly, passing it along to Daniel.

  “It’s pretty useless. The only reason I can identify him here is because I already know it’s a picture of him. I could always try the freelancer bit again, though I doubt he’s as naive as the Newirths. Or we could go with Jaye’s method of sneaking up and scaring him to death.”

  Jaye shook her head. “It’s probably not a good idea to startle someone who might have anger management issues and, for all we know, an Uzi in his desk drawer.” They were all quiet for a minute. Sierra tried unsuccessfully to stifle a yawn, which made Jaye yawn as well. “Hey,” she said, “we’re all tired. How about we sleep on it? Maybe one of us will have a stroke of genius by morning.” The suggestion won immediate and unanimous approval.

  Jaye was asleep a second after her head hit the pillow. She awoke once during the night to use the bathroom and noticed that Raffles wasn’t there. She didn’t look for her elsewhere in the apartment. During the day the not-a-cat napped in a variety of places, including the bathtub on occasion, but she always spent the nights curled up in Jaye’s bed. Since the bedroom window was open, it was a good bet she was out on the prowl. Jaye crawled back into bed, and the next thing she knew it was morning and her bedmate was once again asleep near her feet.

  Jaye padded through the living room into the kitchen, following the aroma of freshly brewed coffee. This was one of those mornings when she was sure that programmable coffeemakers were the best invention of the twentieth century. She poured herself a cup, added milk and went back to the living room to turn on the TV for the news and weather. The photographs were still laid out on the coffee table where she’d left them before going to bed. She set her cup on the end table, where she couldn’t accidentally spill it on the photos, and started to gather them up. That’s when she noticed the photo of Adam Grayson smiling for the camera. She picked it up for closer scrutiny, half expecting it to disappear like a hallucination. But it didn’t. In the picture, Adam was seated at a table with Peggy in what looked like Dahl & Di Luca, the same restaurant where he’d also taken Jaye. But none of that was important. What had her eyes glued to the photo was the fact that she’d never seen it before. And then she realized where it had come from and who had found it. She jumped up and ran into the kitchen for the phone.

  “Raffles is the only one who could have brought it here,” she said after describing it to Sierra.

  Sierra was already deep into baking, and her voice faded in and out as if the phone were wedged between her ear and shoulder. “I don’t remember seeing any photograph like that when we were in Peggy’s house, did you?”

  “No,” Jaye replied, “but we were so focused on looking for something hidden, we weren’t paying much attention to what was out in the open.”

  “I know I should be doing some kind of happy dance about the picture,” Sierra said, “but I don’t get it. How did Raffles know what we needed and where to find it?”

  “I’m having a hard time wrapping my brain around it too. She must have seen the picture the day we were in Peggy’s house, maybe in an album. We certainly didn’t have her in sight the whole time we were there. And last night she must have figured out from the other pictures on the table and from bits of what we were saying that we needed a better shot of Adam—one as big and clear as the others. She already knew how to get into Peggy’s house, so she went back and took it.”

  “That’s pretty impressive,” Sierra said. “I think Raffles just earned herself a salmon dinner.”

  Chapter 32

  The partners divided up the list Jaye had compiled of all the dog groomers, animal shelters, doggie day cares or any place where one might find the fur of a variety of dogs. They’d decided not to include veterinarians, because they were likely to clean their exam rooms more often and more thoroughly. Of course, there was also the issue of trying to elicit information from a medical practice, even one for four-legged, furry patients. The staff was sure to balk when it came to answering questions with regard to their clients. Sierra pointed out they could also cut Dee’s from the list, since Frosty went there almost every day and there was none of his fur in the sample.

  Armed with her copies of the suspects’ photos, Jay
e set out to canvass the local places she’d drawn. They were starting with the half dozen right in Sedona, after which they’d move out in a widening circle. They hadn’t discussed a contingency plan in the event that their quest came up empty; they were fresh out of ideas anyway. Jaye had decided to hit the groomers in the late afternoon, when they might be running late, wanting to get home and therefore more willing to bend the rules. Her first stop was Lap of Luxury, advertised as the new, posh doggie salon and spa. She had no trouble finding it in a strip mall in West Sedona. From the parking lot, it didn’t look any more special than any storefront in any strip mall, but stepping inside was a game changer. Jaye found herself in a waiting room where no one was presently waiting. Plush banquettes covered in an earth-toned tweed hugged the walls, the pattern probably chosen to mask both light and dark shades of fur. The focal point of the room was an elaborate French provincial reception desk, presided over by a beautifully coiffed and manicured blonde with kohl-rimmed eyes and enough blush and lipstick to supply a small beauty pageant. Jaye wondered if she’d been done up by the stylists in the salon. She gave herself a mental slap—bad girl.

  Classical music was playing softly, punctuated by the barking and yapping of a chorus of dogs who clearly didn’t appreciate the genius of Bach, Beethoven and others of their ilk. The receptionist seemed to be of the same mind, because she’d been wearing earphones and swaying to a very different beat when Jaye arrived. As soon as she saw a potential customer come through the door, she ditched the earphones and whipped out a welcome wagon smile. Okay—Jaye had found herself a rule breaker right off the bat.

  “May I help you?” the blonde asked in a hushed voice, as if not to disturb her clientele, who were raising such a racket at that moment that they wouldn’t have heard her if she’d been using a megaphone.

  “Hi, Corinne,” Jaye said, reading the nameplate on her desk. “What a great place you have here.”

  Corinne laughed. “Thanks, but it’s not mine.”