by Anne Canadeo
“I wondered about that, too. I wonder if Rob is back yet. I’m sure he had to tell the police what was really going on. At least, his side of the story. Maybe he’s told Amy, too.”
Suzanne closed her magazine. “Let’s get out of these robes and find out. I’m starting to feel like a patient in a fancy mental health facility.”
“What about your Reiki massage?”
“Reiki-schmeki. This is more important. I felt so bad when Amy said the only way we could help was to find out who murdered Morton. It wasn’t Rob. I feel sure of that. Despite his past bad blood with the not-so-good doctor, Rob is just not that sort of person.”
Lucy had trouble picturing Rob pushing Julian Morton over the edge, too. “I doubt Rob did it. But it seems he was up to something with Tanya that’s made him a prime suspect. I’d also like to get out of this robe, and this music is making me crazy,” she added in a quieter voice.
“It’s making me hungry for sushi. But that’s another problem altogether.”
The friends agreed to dress and meet back at the same spot. Suzanne was going to text Amy and find out if Rob had returned and if they wanted visitors.
Lucy was the first one dressed, but soon saw Suzanne come through the doors of the treatment area to meet her. “What did Amy say?”
“She said Rob is back. They had a long talk, and now he’s taking a nap. She wants to see us and tell us what happened. She’s coming over to our cottage.”
The rain had stopped, but it was still misty. Lucy pulled on her khaki-green jacket. “That’s a good plan. She can be more open without Rob around,” Lucy said.
Suzanne zipped up her slicker and pushed through the glass doors to the terrace outside. “Yes, she can talk more freely. I can hardly wait to hear what she has to say.”
Chapter 9
Lucy felt as if she was in a footrace, trying to keep up with Suzanne as they did a speed walk back to the cottage.
They found Maggie, Dana, and Phoebe gathered in the living room. Maggie and Dana were knitting, and Phoebe was checking photos on her digital camera.
“You got your camera back,” Lucy greeted her.
“The police called a little while after you left. Dana drove me into town in Suzanne’s car.”
Dana looked up from her knitting. “I hope you don’t mind that I borrowed the SUV without asking, Suzanne. I tried to call, but you must have been in the midst of your spa experience.”
“I did shut my phone off. At those prices, you don’t want to be interrupted by some whining adolescent, asking when you’re coming home.”
Suzanne had twin boys and an older daughter. She handled them well, considering how much time she had to spend out of the house for her job. It was quite a juggling act. Lucy didn’t envy her and could totally understand why she’d shut off her phone.
“It’s no problem at all. I’m glad you got your camera back, Phoebe. Any interesting photos?”
“I got some great shots of the birds making their nests. I’m going to edit a few and show you later.”
“I’d love to see them, too, Phoebe,” Lucy said. “Let me know when you’re done. How about the mysterious shadow in the shrubbery? Did the police say anything about that shot?”
“No, they didn’t. I’ve been looking at it again. I think it’s just fog.”
“Another dead end in the investigation. But I’m not surprised,” Maggie said.
“Never mind shadows in shrubbery. We have some real news to pick over,” Lucy said. “I was chatting with a woman at the spa. She was having a facial in the same treatment room as me. She spoke at the support circle. Helen Shelburn.”
“The Mortons’ next door neighbor?” Dana said.
“Harvey’s mom?” Phoebe added on a sadder note.
“One and the same. She told me that Tanya was definitely not having an affair with Sam Briggs, which we already knew. And she said Tanya was involved with Rob, but not romantically. Tanya told her it was more of business deal.”
“That sounds highly unlikely to me. What sort of business could they have together?” Maggie asked.
“Yes, it’s sort of fishy,” Phoebe agreed. “But maybe he was catching fish when he was out surf casting and gave them all to Tanya to sell at a farmers’ market or something. That’s why he never brought any home to Amy.”
Lucy wanted to laugh at the idea of Tanya as a fish monger at a farmers’ market, but she didn’t want to hurt Phoebe’s feelings. “I don’t think selling fish is exactly Tanya’s style. But you might be on to something, Phoebe. Maybe the surf casting was just a cover for meeting with Tanya on the beach to talk about whatever they were working on,” Lucy said.
“I was thinking the same thing,” Dana added. “It’s very secluded down there. No one would notice if a woman jogging stopped to talk to one of the fishermen. And Rob could easily park far from the other surf casters.”
“Or they could talk in his car. Or behind his car. He has a large SUV, a Volvo, I think,” Maggie said. “It would be much safer than texting or sending emails. No trail of their conversations. I’ve heard that, even if you delete emails, investigators can still find them.”
“That makes sense to me. Face-to-face conversations leave no trail. Rob is smart with technology,” Dana said.
“Okay, so we have Rob and Tanya holding secret business meetings on the beach, while Rob is pretending to be this devoted fisherman,” Lucy proposed. “We still don’t know what they were talking about.”
Suzanne flopped on the couch next to Maggie. “That question might be answered very soon. Rob got back from the police station a little while ago. Amy said they had a long talk, and now he’s taking a nap, so she’s coming over here to fill us in.”
Maggie looked up from knitting. “Good work, Suzanne. I’m interested to hear what she has to say. I’m curious, of course, but I do hope there’s some way we can help them. Just because Rob and Tanya had some secret business scheme, it still doesn’t mean he killed Dr. Morton.”
“I agree. We have to help them, if we can.” Lucy rose from her chair. “I’m going to make some tea. Would anyone like some?”
“I think we’d all like some. Make a big pot, and we’ll have some of those burnt butter sugar cookies Suzanne brought along,” Maggie suggested.
Lucy was in the kitchen, preparing the tea when she heard a knock on the door, and then, Suzanne greeting Amy as she came into the cottage. The tea kettle screeched a moment, but Lucy quickly shut off the burner, to better hear the conversation in the next room.
“How are you? How is Rob?” Suzanne asked.
“To be totally honest, I’m worn to a frazzle. And Rob is . . . well, he’s scared to death. We both are. The police have named him as a person of interest in the case. Rob’s lawyer barely got him out of there without charges. Luckily, there’s no physical evidence or witnesses that place Rob at the scene of Morton’s death. The police even checked his shoe size.”
“Lucy and I were at the crime scene,” Lucy heard Dana say. “The police took imprints of footprints on the path and in the brush. We saw the leftover plaster that they used.”
Then Maggie added, “Not anywhere as conclusive as fingerprints. But it does give them something to go on.”
“Just remember, if you kill someone, throw out the shoes you were wearing,” Phoebe said.
“Luckily, the size didn’t match.” Amy sounded relieved.
“That is lucky. Was the impression bigger or smaller?” Suzanne asked her.
“I don’t know. Rob didn’t say. I don’t think they told him.”
Lucy walked in with their tea tray, which held several cups, a plate of cookies, a brimming teapot, and all the other necessary fixings. She placed it in the middle of the coffee table.
Suzanne leaned forward and poured a cup of tea. Then she handed it to Amy. “So why did they bring him in again? You thought it was something Tanya said, in her interview last night.”
Amy nodded, her teacup clasped with both hands. “Ro
b swore to me that there’s no affair. And I believe him. But he told me Tanya had come to him, knowing how her husband had cheated Rob in the past. She told Rob that once Morton realized that Rob lived here, he bragged about how he’d stolen Rob’s idea. She told Rob her husband was just about to finish the plans on a new invention.”
“Betty Rutledge told us that. She said Morton was bragging about his new idea and claimed it would make him a fortune.”
“For obvious reasons, Tanya wasn’t going to be cut out of that payday. She told Rob she wanted to steal the plans and sell the invention herself, since she wouldn’t get anything out of the divorce. But she didn’t know how or where to market it. She asked Rob to help her, to claim it was his invention and sell it somewhere. And they’d split the profits.”
“Wow, that’s a devious proposition,” Suzanne said.
“Rob said she seemed desperate. Desperate to get away from Morton, but she didn’t want to leave without a nice chunk of his money. Tanya felt she’d earned it, being married to Morton for almost ten years.”
“She has a point there. From what we’ve heard, being Morton’s significant other must have been tortuous,” Lucy said.
“How was Rob supposed to pull this off? Was she going to give him the plans?” Maggie kept knitting but Lucy could tell by her slower pace that she was more interested in the conversation.
“That’s what she said. The final plans, along with some of the preliminary drawings and notes. She thought Rob should recopy and change them a bit, so he’d have some proof he’d been working on the same idea.”
“The little minx.” Suzanne shook her head and bit into a cookie.
Dana put her knitting aside and poured a cup of tea. “What was Rob’s response?” Dana asked. “Did he agree to do it?”
“Not at first. He claims he didn’t want to get involved, as much as he despised Morton. Two wrongs don’t make a right and all that . . .” Amy’s voice trailed off, and she sighed.
“But?” Suzanne prodded her. “Tanya got him to agree, eventually?”
Amy nodded. It was clearly hard for her to admit that her husband had entered into such a nefarious scheme. “She worked on him, he said. She wouldn’t stop bugging him and pushed a lot of old buttons. He admitted that deep down, he liked the idea of taking revenge on Morton in this way, which was just what Morton had done to him.”
“That makes sense. Anyone in Rob’s position would have been tempted,” Maggie said.
“Also, Rob finally told me he’s been feeling some financial pressure. He made a pile of money in California. That’s why we were able to retire so early. But he confessed that we’ve been overspending since we moved here, and that he’d made some bad investments that have cut into our savings. He felt embarrassed about that and didn’t want me to worry.”
“So the opportunity to plump up the nest egg was tempting,” Suzanne said.
“Very. Especially at Dr. Morton’s expense,” Amy added. “I’m not condoning what he did, but I can understand how she persuaded him.”
“I can see how it happened,” Dana said. “And Tanya has all the makings of a real siren.”
“And this is just the place to find one,” Lucy added.
“Well, my husband was tempted, I must admit. But he didn’t jump overboard. There was one major glitch to Tanya’s scheme. She found notes and drawings, but she couldn’t find the final plans for the invention. She kept promising Rob that she would find them and pass them along. But Rob was getting cold feet. And not just from standing in the icy surf in rubber boots every morning.”
Interesting twist, Lucy thought. “So, he backed out?”
“That’s what he told me, and I believe him. But I suppose we’ll never know,” Amy answered with surprising honesty. “We do know that Tanya gave the police a different story. One that paints Rob in a much more incriminating light.”
Lucy was unhappy to hear that. The version Amy had just told them was certainly bad enough, and provided plenty of motivation for murder.
Suzanne crunched down on another butter cookie. “What did she say? It was all Rob’s idea?”
“More or less. Tanya said that Rob had heard her husband boasting about his latest breakthrough invention and came to her, proposing the scheme. She said he asked her to find the notes and sketches, and the final plans, and promised he would market the project discreetly, claiming it was his idea. Tanya told the police she wouldn’t go along with the scheme at first. But when Morton stonewalled her about a divorce settlement, she felt angry, agreed to Rob’s offer. She said Rob saw her as an easy target and took advantage of her.”
“That size-zero witch.” Suzanne dipped the edge of another cookie into her tea. “Of course she’d turn it all around, to make herself look like the innocent victim.”
“Exactly.” Amy took a sip of her tea and sighed. “Tanya also claimed she could never find the final plans and told Rob she couldn’t go through with it. The complete opposite of what he says. There are no witnesses to their conversations and no way to prove who instigated the plan. But they’ve both confessed to being involved in this venture, no matter whose idea it was. And the police see it as a strong motive to murder Morton. A conspiracy, they called it.”
Amy placed her cup on the table with a shaky hand; the china rattled. She was crying and dabbed her eyes with a wad of tissues she pulled from her purse.
“I feel so . . . awful. So betrayed. How could Rob get involved in something like that, even if it wasn’t his idea? How can I believe anything he says now? It’s almost as bad as if they did have an affair.”
Suzanne patted Amy’s shoulder. “Nobody’s perfect. We all have our weak moments. Morton stung Rob badly. It was only human to want revenge when it was offered so easily. And remember, Rob said that in the end, he couldn’t go through with it.”
Amy was still crying, but stopped a moment to dry her eyes again. “If you want to believe that version of the story, and it was only because Tanya couldn’t find the plans.”
“It gave him time to think. To let his better self step up and take control,” Dana contributed.
Maggie nodded. She had put her tea aside and was knitting again. “Like Suzanne said, he was tempted, but he did the right thing and told Tanya he wouldn’t go through with it. I think you should believe him and give him the benefit of the doubt.”
Amy sat with her head bowed, twisting her wedding rings. “I do give him the benefit of the doubt. Most of the time. I’m trying hard to support him. We’ll never get through this if we don’t stick together.”
Suzanne put her arm around Amy’s shoulder. “That’s the spirit. It’s a nightmare, but Rob is innocent. The police can’t arrest him, or Tanya, just because they were seen on the beach together. Or even because they had a plan to steal Julian Morton’s invention. They have to see that and start looking in some other direction.”
Amy lifted her head and pushed her hair back from her face. “I hope so.” She sat back and picked up her purse. “Thanks for the tea and sympathy, everyone. I don’t know what I’d do if I didn’t have all of you to talk to this weekend. I’d better get back to Rob. I think it’s best if he’s not alone too much right now.”
“Sure. Let me walk you to the door.” Suzanne rose from the couch and walked with Amy toward the front door.
“Let’s talk later. I just want to know how you’re doing and if you need anything,” Lucy heard Suzanne say as she and Amy said good-bye.
When Suzanne returned, her friends were silent for a few moments. Then Lucy said, “Bad break for Amy and Rob. I didn’t want to say it in front of Amy, but that scheme with Tanya casts a very dark, deep shadow. Especially considering Rob’s history with Morton, threatening him, and the order of protection. I’m sure the investigators are factoring all that into his story now.”
“I’m sure they are.” Maggie set her knitting down in her lap. She peered at Lucy over the edge of her reading glasses. “I also believe he didn’t kill Morton. What would
be the point? Part of the joy of stealing the invention would be seeing Morton’s reaction when he was duped.”
“That’s true, Maggie.” Dana poured herself another cup of tea. “That moment of victory may have even tempted Rob more than the money.”
Suzanne took a seat on the armchair again. “I know how I feel when Marcy Devereaux steals a listing from me,” Suzanne said, mentioning her office rival. “I get mad and do everything I can to do the same to her.”
“‘Revenge is sweet and not fattening,’ ” Phoebe said, still fiddling with her camera.
Suzanne laughed. “That’s exactly the way I feel. Did you just make that up, Phoebe?”
Phoebe shook her head. “Alfred Hitchcock. I took a film studies class last semester.”
“The question of who pushed Dr. Julian Morton over the edge is worthy of a Hitchcock plot. Or an Agatha Christie novel,” Lucy said. “Now his invention is in the mix. Rob and Tanya may not have been the only ones looking for it. I wonder if the police have thought of that.”
“Good point, Lucy.” Maggie looked up briefly from her work. “Tanya wanted it because she wasn’t getting a divorce settlement. But Morton had cheated plenty of people in his life. Derek Pullman, Meredith, and Cory Morton, to name a few.”
“A very bitter young man, isn’t he?” Dana shook her head. “He clearly felt shortchanged on approval and love from his father. Not to mention financial support. It sounds like there wasn’t much child support or alimony.”
“Meredith told me Cory asked for a loan to start a business and Dr. Morton turned him down. Cory did sound terribly angry. But angry enough to kill his own father?” Lucy finally gave in to the tempting butter cookies and took a small bite. “That would be a stretch for me. But not a stretch to think he might steal the invention plans, deciding his father had shortchanged him and his mother all his life, and here was a chance to make up for it.”
“Cory may have had a chance to steal the plans if he visited his father and Tanya. And had the time to find them,” Dana said. “But it didn’t sound as if they had much of a relationship or saw each other much, either.”