by Mary Kruger
“The right age for what?”
“To be Felicia’s daughter.”
Nancy laughed. “I wasn’t adopted.”
“I know. Rosalia was also the right age,” Ari went on, “but no one thought that she’d be the next one killed.”
That brought silence. “Why was she killed, Ari?” Nancy asked finally. “Do you know?”
“I can guess. I think she saw something she shouldn’t have.”
“Do you mean she saw the murder?”
“No. But she might have seen something else. Nancy, it shows up in your own pictures, the ones you took yesterday. I think you’re lucky to be alive.”
“What?”
“You took a picture of the murderer using the murder weapon, and you didn’t even know it.”
Again there was an outburst, of people demanding to know the identity of the murderer. Ari let it play out, and then held up the picture of the woman knitting that had so stunned her this morning. “You. Lauren Dubrowski. You killed Felicia.”
Chapter 16
Everyone in the barn gasped as they turned toward Lauren, sitting still as a stone. “Lauren, you’re the right age,” Ari went on, shuffling the pictures in her hands. Although she was certain she was right, talking about it in this way was making her nervous. “You had reason to dislike Felicia, though you claim you’re better off with your new job. But that’s not why you killed her. I think you killed her because you found out you’re her daughter.”
Lauren’s eyes widened as Ari continued. “Now, I don’t imagine your reunion was easy. You may have been angry at her for abandoning you all those years ago, so you lured her into Barn C where you could confront her in private. But when Felicia bent over to try to get the mud off her coat, you got angry. You saw your chance to hurt her for all the years she had hurt you. So you stabbed her in the back with the knitting needle.
“But I don’t think you were planning to kill her. We’ve all discussed how chancy a weapon a knitting needle is. I think you probably just meant to hurt Felicia, and you were shocked when you thought you’d actually killed her, so you panicked and fled Barn C. You thought you could talk your way out of it by being up front with the police about how Felicia had criticized your work, but then you realized there was another threat—Rosalia.
“Rosalia saw something that tied you to the murder. Something that could incriminate you and send you to jail for the rest of your life. You knew you had to get rid of her. So when we were all packing up to leave the barn, you asked her to help you carry supplies to your car. You knew about a back way into the fairgrounds because it’s printed on the registration brochure, so you had parked your SUV there out of sight. Then you knocked her out and hid her body in your car. You drove her body back here and put her in the fleece bin, where you knew she’d suffocate.
“But you didn’t want police to be suspicious, so you took Rosalia’s keys and drove her car out the main gate, making sure the police would have her vehicle on record as leaving the fairgrounds. You drove back to your own car, hidden on the back road, and switched vehicles, leaving hers there. It gave you just enough time to get to the motel to check in.”
As everyone stared at Lauren with horror, Ari watched as a strange smile appeared on Lauren’s face. The reaction unsettled her.
“I admit a lot of this is conjecture,” she went on, “but we do have solid evidence that you were seen using the murder weapon earlier in the day. You were knitting something out of light blue yarn, using the knitting needle that killed Felicia. We can prove it!”
With that, Ari shoved the picture of Lauren knitting at her. Lauren looked at the photograph closely and seemed puzzled. The others around the circle stared at Lauren. Their expressions ranged from shock on Debbie’s face to anger on Annie’s.
“Aluminum needles,” Ari went on, “and light blue yarn.”
“You’ve got to be kidding me,” Lauren finally said, putting down the picture and laughing softly. “Oh, how could you be so right and so wrong at the same time?”
Lauren’s reaction rattled Ari. For the first time, doubt crept into her mind. “What do you mean?”
“The murder weapon? Oh God.” Still laughing, Lauren reached into her knitting bag and pulled out the project shown in the picture. It was, indeed, light blue and still attached to two aluminum needles with old-fashioned buttons at the end. “How could one of these be the murder weapon if I’m still using it?” Lauren said.
Ari glanced at the doorway, suddenly disconcerted. “What are you making?” she asked stupidly.
“A baby sweater for a friend. Yes, that’s the project in that picture, but I was working on this well after Felicia’s death. Someone must have seen me. I can’t believe you think I’m the murderer.”
“Lauren, could you do something?” Debbie asked. “Say, ‘Hartford CSS.’ ”
Lauren stiffened and her smile disappeared. Ari glanced at the door. Just outside, she could see Josh, his face tense. “Why?” Lauren asked.
“Just say it.”
“Hartford CSS,” Lauren repeated. Debbie’s face fell.
“What does that mean?” Ari said, confused.
Debbie shook her head. “I didn’t know what that meant at the time, but it just came to me. ‘SS’ stands for Social Services. I think it’s the agency Felicia used to place her daughter for adoption. Someone called the office and said that.” She frowned. “But your voice isn’t the one I heard.”
“What?” Ari exclaimed.
“Lauren and I talked a few times over the phone when she was having trouble with Felicia. I’d know her voice, and that’s not the one I heard. The accent was wrong.”
“I told you,” Lauren said, relaxing into a smile. “You’re so right in some ways and so wrong in others.”
Ari glanced back at the door as her case began to collapse beneath her. Briggs was standing beside Josh. His face was impassive, but there was a gleam in his eye as he watched the other suspects. She turned to see what he was looking at, but saw only what she had before: people sitting with varying degrees of incredulity, shock, and anger on their faces. “Are you Felicia’s daughter?” Ari asked Lauren, not certain of anything anymore.
“Yes.”
“What!” Debbie exclaimed. “You never said that.”
“No,” Lauren agreed. “I never saw any reason to tell her.”
“But she was your mother,” Ari sputtered.
“No. Vivian Dubrowski was my mother.” Lauren looked straight at her, serious now. “David Dubrowski is my father. They’re the ones who raised me. Felicia only gave birth to me.”
Ari frowned. “You’re from New York, though, not Connecticut.”
“No, actually I grew up in Delaware. My parents were living in Connecticut when they adopted me, and then we moved because of my father’s job.”
“Weren’t you ever curious about Felicia?” Debbie asked, leaning forward.
“Not for a while. You see, I always knew I was adopted. When I was a teenager they sat me down and told me they’d help me find my birth mother if I wanted to. Well, I didn’t want to. I loved my parents and didn’t want to hurt them.”
“What changed your mind?”
“My best friend is pregnant.” Lauren held up the baby blanket. “I started to wonder about my medical history and realized I should find out more about my birth parents for that reason. So I hired a private investigator.”
“I thought adoptions were sealed.”
“Yes, mine was, but there are ways of finding out.”
Ari looked down at the picture again. She had been so certain she was right.
“But you did contact her, Lauren,” Josh said as he entered the room. “You sent your designs to her.”
“For what that was worth,” Lauren snorted. “We always wondered if my artistic skills came from my birth mother, but I didn’t really care. When I found out Felicia was my birth mother, it knocked me for a loop. I would have told her I was her daughter,” she said, turnin
g to Debbie, “but when she turned out to be so mean I decided not to. I didn’t call the office and say the name of the adoption agency.”
Debbie nodded. She looked shaken. “And yet she was like a mother to me.”
“Ha.” The sound came from, of all people, Annie Walker. “We all know she was a bitch.”
A sudden silence fell across the room as everyone turned to face Annie. “But she praised your work in the magazine,” Ari said.
“Yeah, but what did she say in the office? She told you it wasn’t really very good.” Annie glared at Debbie. “Don’t bother to deny it. I heard it from one of the assistants, who’s in the Knitting Guild with me.”
“Linda Doyle?”
“Yes. She was happy to tell me, too.”
“I’m going to fire her when I take over the magazine. She never could keep her mouth shut.” Debbie and Annie glared at each other.
Ari sank down into a chair, looking down at the pictures she still held in her hand. She was about to put them aside, feeling defeated since she’d publicly accused the wrong person of murder, when she glanced at the photograph on top of the pile. She stiffened. That feeling that she was missing something hit her with full force. How could she have been so blind? Someone else had been using blue yarn yesterday, and she’d seen it.
Josh. She had to speak to Josh. She looked up to see that he was watching her, his eyes intent. She gave him a look and inclined her head toward the photographs in her hands. As the women around them argued back and forth, Josh sidled up to Ari and glanced down at the top photo. He then returned her startled gaze. “Well,” he said.
“This is ridiculous,” Beth said, getting up. “I don’t know why you brought us back to this place, but I want to go back to the motel. My lawyer is going to have a field day with this.”
“I just want to go home,” Nancy said, and got up as well. As if that were a signal, the others rose angrily.
“All right, folks,” Charlie said. “Everyone just calm down. I know there’s been some confusion here, so for now we’ll take you back to the motel.”
What were the police thinking of? Ari wondered frantically. In a few minutes they’d lose the advantage they had, of being at the scene of both murders. “We need more evidence,” Josh said softly, leaning down to her.
“You need a confession,” she whispered back, and stood up as abruptly as Beth had. “Annie,” she called.
Annie turned. “What?”
“You were working on a baby blanket yesterday,” Ari said.
“No, I was working on a shawl. On bamboo circular needles, remember? You saw it.” Annie’s voice was scornful. “What would I want with an old pair of orchid aluminum needles anyway?”
“Who said they were orchid-colored?” Ari asked.
Annie’s face went wary. “Everyone knows that.” She looked around the room.
“I didn’t know what color the murder weapon was,” Lauren said.
“Neither did I,” Nancy chimed in. “The needles Lauren’s using are pink, Ari. I can see why you made that mistake.”
“Oh my God.” Debbie was staring at Annie, as if seeing her for the first time. “If you lighten her hair—”
“I saw it yesterday,” Ari interrupted her, pleased to be right about something. “When I saw Annie I thought she looked familiar, but then she said we’d met at a Knitting Guild meeting. But that’s not it. She looks like Felicia.” She stared up at Josh. “My God. Twins?”
Josh nodded. “Yes.”
“Then is Annie—”
“Felicia’s daughter? Yes.”
“She was never my mother! She deserved to die!” Annie screamed, and dashed for the side door, straight into the arms of a waiting patrolman.
“Twins,” Josh said. He and Ari were standing outside the Freeport Police station, the first chance they’d had to speak to each other since leaving the fairgrounds. “Who could have known?”
“They really don’t look alike, except for their eyes.” Ari frowned. “Is it certain?”
“That they are twins? No.” Josh shook his head. “We’ll need to get a court order to unseal the adoption records. But with Winston as executor of Felicia’s estate, we’ll probably get them.”
“I’m sorry, Josh. I made a fool out of all of us.”
“I’m not so sure,” he said. “I think Briggs had an idea all along.”
“I was wondering about that. Is that why he let me run with it?”
“Yes. Also, he knew you could connect with everyone on a different level than we could.” Josh smiled slightly. “Briggs finally had to admit that knitting murders are a little out of his experience.”
“Mm.”
“Listen.” He tilted her face up. “You weren’t totally wrong. We were all misled by that picture of Lauren. It’s just a coincidence that she’s making something similar to Annie’s project.”
“Maybe.” Ari was silent a minute. If Annie and Lauren were indeed twins, there might be a connection between them that they had never realized. “Did they know they were twins?”
“I don’t know.” He reached for the door. “Let’s go in and find out.”
A little while later, Josh, Charlie, and Briggs sat in an interrogation room at the Freeport Police station. Annie was across the table from them, handcuffed, her face angry and defiant. She had been read her rights and was glaring fiercely around the room.
Ari stood in the back of the room. She had strict instructions to stay quiet during this part of the interrogation. It had been a fiasco in the barn, her falsely accusing Lauren of a murder she didn’t commit. It had turned out right in the end, though, when she saw the picture of Annie.
With a suspect finally in custody and under arrest, the police had been able to get a search warrant, which was being executed this minute. Preliminary reports were encouraging; there was an uncompleted blanket of light blue yarn in Annie’s bag, on a stitch holder. There were no knitting needles to accompany the project. That was suggestive, but not proof of anything.
The police were far more interested in the facts that the tire prints taken from behind the barn matched Annie’s tires, and that Rosalia’s fingerprints had been found in her SUV. It looked as if they’d be able to tie her to at least one of the murders. What they didn’t know yet was why Annie had committed either one.
“Now, Annie,” Charlie said. He was leaning back in his chair, his arm slung over the back of the one next to him, by all appearances at ease and comfortable. “Is there anything you’d like? A cup of coffee?”
“No,” she said stonily. “Ask your damned questions.”
“All right.” Annie had waived her right to having a lawyer present during her questioning. She could, of course, change her mind at any moment, but Josh knew they should try to question her as much as possible before she clammed up.
“Why did you do it?” Josh asked, almost gently. “Why did you kill Felicia Barr?”
“Because she didn’t want me,” Annie spat. “All that crap that Lauren spouted about having good parents who loved her—that’s a lot of bullshit. They’re not her real parents. Real parents accept you. They don’t care where you come from. And real parents don’t give you away like you’re a dog or cat.”
“Annie, your parents would be distressed to hear about this,” Charlie said. “Are you sure you don’t want to call them?”
“They don’t give a damn about me. They never did. My father never wanted to adopt me. It was all my mother’s idea, but then she turned, too. When I was a teenager, she told me I was just like my slut of a mother. Oh God. I didn’t know what she was talking about.”
“You didn’t know you were adopted?” Josh said in surprise.
“No. My father didn’t want anyone to know. He’s a banker, very concerned about his reputation.” Her laugh was bitter. “Just like Winston Barr. How do you think he feels?”
“How did you find out about Felicia?”
“My parents said that if I wanted to act like my mother, I
should find out who she was. They hired a private detective. I think he bribed someone to get a copy of my records. That’s when I found out about Felicia…and Lauren. Twins.” Her voice was full of anguish. “She had twins, and she didn’t want either of us. How could she give us up so easily?”
“From what we’ve learned, her parents didn’t give her much choice.” Josh’s voice still held that gentle note. Rough treatment might make Annie clam up. “Did you try to contact Lauren, too?”
“Not at first. You know, one thing she said was true. I always was artistic. That’s one thing my parents liked about me, though they kept saying they didn’t know where it came from. They’re all left-brained, my dear family.”
“So she didn’t know?”
“No. I decided not to ruin her happy, middle-class suburban life.”
Ari, facing Briggs, raised her eyebrows. He looked at her a moment, and then nodded as if to say, Go ahead.
“You wanted a family, didn’t you?” Ari asked.
Annie twisted to glare at her. “What’s it to you?”
“Everyone wants to be accepted, Annie. I’d think it was natural that you’d want to meet Felicia, find out more about your past.”
“Well, she didn’t want to see me.”
“Did she tell you that?”
“No, not right away,” Annie said reluctantly.
“It had to be a shock to her.”
“I don’t care! She didn’t have to treat me like that.”
“Were you the one who called the magazine’s office?” Charlie asked.
“Yes. I’d tried to get my designs into the magazine, you know. I thought I could meet her that way. But she rejected them!”
“Were you really at that Knitting Guild meeting where you said you saw me?” Ari said.
“Yes.”
“You had to have seen Felicia then, too.”
“I didn’t know anything about her yet. I was still a kid. She didn’t mean anything to me.”
Ari nodded. “It must have hurt that she rejected your designs.”
Annie shrugged. “I expected it. But then I had to find another way to meet her, so I called her office. She didn’t want to see me at first. She didn’t believe me.”