Shot in Cherry Hills

by Paige Sleuth

  Stacey paled. The thought of spiders having access to come and go as they pleased didn’t seem to be sitting well with her.

  Kat craned her neck toward the staircase. “Is Tux still in the bathroom?”

  Stacey stared at the far wall a moment longer before turning around. “Huh? Oh, Tux. I haven’t let him out of the master bath yet.”

  “Well, let’s go see how he’s doing.”

  Kat pounded up the stairs, not waiting to see if Stacey followed. The closer she got to the bathroom, the larger the knot in her stomach became. If Stacey had harmed the little cat in any way, she would never forgive herself for not suspecting her sooner.

  By the time she reached the closed bathroom door, Kat was practically hyperventilating. She threw the door open and swept her eyes across the room. Her panic ratcheted up a notch when she failed to spot Tux anywhere.

  “He likes to lie in the tub.”

  Kat gasped. She hadn’t expected Stacey to be so close.

  Stacey frowned. “Are you sure you’re okay? You seem a little jumpy.”

  Kat took a deep breath. “I . . . I just thought I saw a spider.”

  Stacey’s hand drifted toward her collarbone. “Another one?”

  Kat didn’t answer. She was already rushing over to the tub, anxious to check on Tux.

  She spotted him in one corner of the Jacuzzi, curled into a tight, black-and-white ball. When he gazed up at her with his bright yellow eyes, the relief that rushed through her was so profound she felt dizzy. She had to drop onto the edge of the tub before her knees gave out.

  Tux stood up and meowed. He jumped onto her lap, then scrambled up her arm.

  His body heat seeped into her skin as he settled onto her shoulder. He began to purr when Kat reached up to pet him, the calming vibrations emanating from his chest helping to bring her blood pressure back down to a normal level.

  “He likes you,” Stacey said.

  Kat glanced across the room to where Stacey still stood by the door. Kat didn’t know if she was trying not to crowd them, or if she was afraid of how Tux might react if she came any closer.

  Or, perhaps Kat’s spider comment had frightened her away from ever entering the master bathroom again.

  Stacey tilted her head. “Do you think he’s ready for the rest of the house?”

  Kat straightened, an idea forming. If she had an excuse to linger near the Whitfields’ closet, maybe she could find out if Stacey owned anything with pink feathers.

  Kat coughed. “It might be best to let him explore your bedroom first.”

  “Okay.”

  They filed into the bedroom. Stacey shut the door while Kat worked on easing Tux off of her shoulders.

  “I’ll just set him on the floor and let him look around,” Kat said, hoping she didn’t look as nervous as she felt.

  The second his white paws made contact with the carpet, Tux seemed enthralled. He sniffed at the object closest to him, the dust ruffle lining the bottom of the bed. When he’d exhausted his interest in that, he balanced on his hind feet to peek on top of the mattress. He must not have seen anything meriting further inspection. Rather than jump up, he pivoted around and started searching for something more interesting.

  Kat scooted over to the closed closet door, hoping her presence there would draw him closer.

  Unfortunately, Tux didn’t get the hint. Kat had to wait for him to check out both nightstands, the armchair in the corner, and a small bookcase before he finally ambled in her direction.

  Kat pointed to the closet. “I should let him look in there,” she said to Stacey.

  Stacey wrung her hands together. “Does he really need to? It’s kind of a mess.”

  “I won’t let him venture too far,” Kat told her. “But he’s obviously dying to see inside, and it will make his transition to your home smoother if he satisfies his curiosity.”

  Stacey’s eyes drifted to Tux, who already appeared to be growing bored with the closet. Kat felt a ping of alarm. She would have to act fast or lose her opportunity.

  Without giving Stacey time to protest, Kat twisted the doorknob and yanked the door open, revealing a decent walk-in space filled with clothes, shoes, and other odds and ends.

  The movement of the door recaptured Tux’s attention. When he saw there was another whole room to explore, his pupils dilated and he circled back around to take a closer look. Kat felt a whoosh of relief. She could have hugged him for going along with her plan.

  She followed Tux far enough into the closet that her face was obscured from Stacey’s view. Well aware that she only had a limited amount of time, she scanned over the clothes arranged on hangers. Several pink articles caught her attention, but she didn’t see anything with feathers.

  She shifted her attention to the items on the floor. None of the shoes scattered around were pink or had feathers. Although one of the many boxes piled around could have contained something decorated with feathers, she didn’t think she could convince Stacey to let Tux look inside each one.

  Tux had taken advantage of Kat’s distraction and wandered over to an elegant white dress wrapped in plastic. He had the same look in his eye that he got before clawing his way up Kat’s shirt to reach her shoulder.

  Kat lunged, reaching Tux just as he lifted his front paws off the ground. She scooped him off the floor and set him back in the bedroom, slamming the closet door shut before she released him.

  She swallowed hard. “Well, that should let him sleep easier.”

  Stacey didn’t say anything. She just stood there with a perplexed look on her face.

  Tux pawed at the closet door for a second before giving up and turning his attention to the dresser. Kat was still working out how to persuade Stacey to let him explore the contents of each drawer when Stacey cleared her throat.

  “Do we really have to watch him?” she asked. “There’s nothing here that can hurt him, and I don’t have anything breakable out in the open.”

  Kat saw her opening and tried not to look too eager. “You can leave if you’d like. I’ll come join you when we’re done.”

  The corners of Stacey’s mouth dipped down. “He won’t be okay on his own?”

  “He would be . . .” Kat thought fast. “. . . but as part of the wellness check, I have to observe him to make sure he’s adjusting properly.”

  “Oh, I’ll wait with you then.” Stacey sat down on the edge of the bed. “This won’t take much longer, will it?”

  Kat’s heart sank. “No.” That was true enough. Without any possibility of looking through the dresser, she could see no point in prolonging this farce.

  She watched Tux wander around for another minute for appearance’s sake, then rubbed her palms together. “Well, I’ve seen all I need to.”

  Stacey’s eyes brightened. “How’d he do?”

  “Oh, he looks like he’s adjusting just fine.”

  It was the truth. Tux didn’t seem to have any qualms about being near Stacey. He’d even sniffed her shoes for a second before moving on. If he’d seen her shoot Eric, he certainly didn’t act like he remembered it.

  Maybe Andrew was right and Vern really was guilty.

  Stacey stood up and opened the bedroom door. “Should we show him the rest of the house?”

  “That might be too much for now,” Kat said. “Maybe give him another day to get used to the bedroom first.”

  “I can do that.”

  Kat followed Stacey into the hallway. Tux didn’t display any interest in joining them. He appeared to be evaluating whether the space beneath the armchair would serve as a suitable napping spot when Stacey shut the bedroom door.

  “Where’s Vern?” Kat asked as Stacey led them back the way they’d come.

  “He ran down to the hardware store for more supplies. He can wander those aisles all day.” She grinned. “Lucky me. I get a few hours of peace and quiet out of the deal.”

  Guilt swirled in Kat’s stomach. She wondered if Stacey would still consider herself lucky when Vern
was dragged out of the house in handcuffs, leaving her with all the peace and quiet she wanted.

  Stacey stopped walking when they reached the living room. “Will you be coming back tomorrow to help introduce Tuxedo to the rest of the house?”

  Kat couldn’t meet her eye. “You probably don’t need me here. Just take it slow, and maybe only let him into one additional room each day so he doesn’t get overwhelmed.”

  Stacey nodded. “Okay.”

  Movement in the corner of her eye caught Kat’s attention. She rotated around expecting to see Vern home from his shopping excursion, but it was only Anna dusting a bookshelf on the other side of the room.

  She turned back to Stacey. “If you have any questions, you can call me or Imogene. We’d be happy to help Tux adjust if he gives you any problems.”

  Stacey smiled. “Thanks.”

  Kat took a step toward the front door, but her feet froze before she could take another. The skin on the back of her neck tingled, something working its way into her consciousness.

  When she realized what was niggling at her, her stomach clenched. She whipped around, the room spinning as bits and pieces of the past two days’ events bombarded her.

  Her eyes locked on to Anna, who was still dusting the bookshelf. She had to stand on her tiptoes to reach the uppermost shelf.

  Kat couldn’t breathe as her gaze traveled up the length of Anna’s arm, stopping when it reached the object in her hand.

  An object that happened to be a feather duster.

  With pink feathers.

  Kat’s heart ceased beating, then restarted too fast. The feather duster swept across the book spines, its rhythm bordering on hypnotic.

  Could the Whitfields’ housekeeper have been the one to kill Eric?

  Being familiar with their home, she probably knew where they kept everything—including Vern’s gun. How hard would it have been for her to conceal his firearm in her clothes and sneak out of the house with it?

  The yellow gloves Kat had seen Anna wearing the day before flashed through her mind. If she’d worn those when she’d handled the gun, she wouldn’t have left any fingerprints on it. There would be nothing to connect her to the crime next door.

  Except that pink feather.

  “Kat? Are you okay?”

  Kat’s head snapped toward Stacey. She’d forgotten she was still in the room.

  She ran her tongue around her mouth, struggling to muster up some saliva. “That feather duster,” she managed to get out.

  Stacey looked over at Anna, her brow furrowed. “What about it?”

  Kat leaned against the wall, no longer sure her legs could support her. “It has pink feathers.”

  Kat swore she saw Anna stiffen. She took in the duster held above Anna’s head, picturing one of the feathers coming loose and wedging itself in Anna’s bun before drifting onto the carpet next door.

  “Anna,” Kat called out, her voice sounding much steadier than she felt.

  Anna’s arm fell down to her side. She turned around in what felt like slow motion, her deathly white face telling Kat everything she needed to know.

  CHAPTER TEN

  “It was you,” Kat said, staring at Anna.

  Anna stared back, her eyes widening with what Kat thought might be panic.

  Kat took a step forward. “You killed Eric.”

  Stacey gasped. “What?”

  Kat turned toward her but was careful not to take her eyes off of Anna. “When we were inside Eric’s house right after he died, a feather got stuck to my jeans.” She aimed a trembling finger at Anna. “It came from that feather duster.”

  Anna gaped at the duster, as if she were horrified to see it in her hand.

  “B—but that doesn’t mean she killed Eric,” Stacey stammered.

  “The feather had to have come from his house,” Kat said. “Otherwise, I would have seen it when I bent down to pick up Tux earlier.”

  Nobody said anything. Anna seemed rooted in place. Her face had drained of color, and her fingers were white around the handle of the feather duster.

  Stacey just continued to stare at Anna across the room. She looked as if she were seeing her young housekeeper in an entirely new light.

  Kat planted her hands on her hips. “Well? Am I right, Anna? You killed him, didn’t you?”

  Anna stood there paralyzed for another moment. Then her shoulders slumped, the strength seeming to leave her body in an instant. “Yes,” she said, her voice barely a whisper. “Yes, I did it.”

  A strangled sound escaped from Stacey’s throat. Kat staggered into the room and collapsed onto the edge of the sectional sofa. Although she’d already figured Anna was guilty, hearing an admission still knocked the wind from her lungs.

  “Why?” she managed.

  Anna drew in a breath. “He was going to cut off my scholarship.”

  Kat’s mind whirled. She remembered what Noreen had said about Eric continuing with the scholarship fund his mother had worked on before her death. “You’re one of the Gretchen Fund recipients?” she asked.

  “Yes.”

  Stacey’s forehead furrowed. “I thought you had to have cancer to qualify for that.”

  “You do,” Anna said. “Or one of your parents does.”

  Stacey set one hand over her heart. “Oh, Anna, do you have cancer?”

  Anna’s head hung low. “No.”

  “It’s your mother then?”

  “No.”

  “Then how do you qualify?”

  Anna lifted her face. Her eyes were dull as she met Stacey’s gaze. “I fudged it.”

  Stacey’s jaw dropped open. “You pretended to have cancer?”

  “Just for the scholarship.” Anna worried her bottom lip. “My aunt had breast cancer. I got my cousin to give me copies of some of her paperwork and doctored them up with my name. Then I submitted them with my application like I’d been the one to undergo treatment.”

  No one said anything, Anna’s confession sucking all the air from the room. Kat’s chest felt hollow, both from the gravity of pretending to have a disease as awful as cancer and how desperate Anna must have been if she’d gone through all that trouble.

  Anna leaned against the bookcase. “I needed to do something. I couldn’t earn enough money for tuition and books and everything else on my own.” She looked at the feather duster still dangling from her fingers, and her lips puckered. “I can only clean so many houses. And not going to college wasn’t an option. My mother would have been so disappointed.”

  “She couldn’t help you financially?” Stacey asked.

  Anna shook her head. “She’s a single mom, and she still has my half-sisters to support. She barely has enough to buy them school clothes.”

  “What about a loan?” Kat asked.

  Anna’s face hardened. “My father makes enough to disqualify me, even though he refuses to help me pay.”

  Stacey slumped against the wall. “I—I had no idea.”

  “How would you?” Anna swept her arm around the room. “You live here, in this big house with furniture that costs more than I could dream of making in a year. You probably can’t imagine what it’s like to worry about money. Nobody I know has a Jacuzzi in their bathroom.”

  Stacey fingered her collarbone, the guilt etched on her face impossible to miss.

  Anna sighed. “Everything would have been okay if Mr. Halstead hadn’t overheard me talking to Mr. Whitfield last week.”

  Stacey’s eyebrows crept up her forehead. “Vern knows?”

  Anna shook her head. “We weren’t talking about the scholarship. He came inside to wash his hands after finishing up something in the garage. He was telling me about how his back hurt and that I shouldn’t ever get old. I said I was lucky I’d never had any health problems.”

  Kat stilled. She could see where Anna was going. It was like watching a freight train barreling toward something on the tracks with no way to stop it.

  “The weather had cooled down enough that you guys had tur
ned off the air conditioning and opened all the windows.” Tears sprang to Anna’s eyes. “I didn’t realize Mr. Halstead was outside in his yard, listening to everything I was saying.”

  Stacey approached the sofa and lowered herself next to Kat. “Oh, Anna.”

  “Do you mind if I sit?” Anna asked her.

  Stacey motioned toward the armchair in front of the bookshelf. “Please.”

  Anna set the feather duster on the coffee table with heartbreaking care before perching on the edge of the armchair. “Mr. Halstead waited until I was leaving to approach me. He asked if we could talk, so I went over to his house. Then he told me he’d overheard everything, that he would have to terminate my scholarship.”

  Kat’s chest ached as she imagined how that conversation must have gone. “How much money are we talking about?”

  “A few thousand dollars.” Anna rubbed her temple. “I tried to reason with him. I tried to explain that no, neither my mother or myself had ever had cancer, but my aunt had. And my mother had helped her when she could, so really it affected our family too.”

  Stacey stared, slack-jawed, at Anna across the room. Her skin had taken on a waxy appearance. Kat wouldn’t be surprised if she were going into shock.

  Anna rubbed one fingertip along the chair armrest. “Mr. Halstead said he didn’t really have a choice, that the fund had been set up under his mother’s rules and it was his duty to abide by how she wanted the money distributed. But he pretended like he really understood what I was up against.”

  Stacey sat up a little. “He wasn’t pretending. Eric was a very caring man.”

  Anna didn’t seem to hear her. “He said to let him think things over for a few days, that maybe he could find another solution.” Her face crumpled. “I actually thought he’d let me keep the money.”

  “But in the end he decided not to,” Kat guessed.

  Even from across the room, Kat could see Anna’s lower lip quiver when she shook her head. “He said he was sorry about my situation, but he couldn’t condone my deception. He said if he helped me others might think it was okay to fabricate something as serious as cancer for their own financial gain.”