Brooke shrank away from Nora.
“You told me you hated May,” Nora continued. “And I do believe that some part of you did. For a little while.”
“It’s not true,” Brooke said. “She was my best friend.”
“More than that.” Nora’s face softened. “You called her your sister. And I believe it.”
Brooke relaxed. “You do?”
“You loved her,” Nora said. “All of you did. But in your own way, you hated her, too - all three of you. She pushed you beyond your comfort zones, and that’s never pleasant.”
“I didn’t hate her!” Jess exclaimed.
“No?” Nora asked. “What can I say? You wrote it down in your diary. Plain as day, you said you hated her.”
Jess trembled.
“Any idea where that diary is now, Jess?” Nora asked.
Jess looked scared. “I don’t know. I haven’t seen it. I looked all over for it when…when Maybelle died. But I couldn’t find it. I thought you stole it, Nora. I thought that’s how you knew.”
“I didn’t steal it,” Nora said. “Natalie did. Isn’t that right, Natalie?”
Natalie was sitting on the armchair, her legs crossed. She had a cool smile on her face. “You should leave, Nora. Brooke’s already warned us about you. She said you’d say anything to try and get a confession. The truth is, Tyler killed Maybelle and then killed himself. End of story.”
“Is that how you’re playing it, Natalie?” Nora smiled. “Or wasn’t your intention to anonymously forward Jessica’s diary to the sheriff eventually?”
Jess stared at Natalie. “What?!”
“Don’t listen to her, Jess,” Natalie said.
“Oh, but you should listen to me, Jess,” Nora said. “Natalie’s no friend of yours. She’s your biggest enemy. I’m not sure when, exactly, she started hating you, but I’m sure the rage has been bubbling for a long time now. Probably ever since she first fell in love with James.”
Natalie’s fists clenched. “Lies.”
“May saw my daughter, Grace, a little while back, you know,” Nora said. “May told her that she wished people would move on from their high school obsessions. '...It’s hard to let go, but it has to be done. Especially if it’s obvious that you’re not a good match, you know what I mean? It’s the only way you can grow in life.' That’s what May said.”
“That means nothing!” Natalie spat.
“I thought at the time that she was talking about James’s obsession with May,” Nora said. “Only, May never thought that James was obsessed with her. She thought, rightfully, that he was just in denial about his feelings for Jess. But no. Right before May said that to Grace, she’d talked about how you needed to improve your taste in men. She even warned James more than once that you got all your ideas of romance from novels - not very healthy for an adult. May knew that you were fixated on James. May also knew that the two of you would never work out. Your personalities just weren’t a good match,” Nora said.
Brooke was staring at Natalie now. “That’s true,” Brooke said slowly. “May told me more than once that she wished you’d move on from your high school crushes and start talking to men who you’d actually have a chance with in life. She just never mentioned that James was your crush.”
“Loyal to the end,” Nora said. “May didn’t want Natalie’s secrets exposed. Sad, isn’t it? Natalie didn’t deserve such a good friend. All she cared about was herself.”
Natalie’s lower lip trembled, but her sharp eyes remained fixed on Nora. Her shoulders were thrown back and her jaw jutted out. She remained silent, however.
“I should have known when I saw you in the woods with James,” Nora said. “The whole thing felt fake. It felt like a game you were playing. But, I have to say, your acting was top notch. You played the damsel in distress, and appealed to James’s chivalry. You cast doubt on Jessica’s character, all the while pretending to be a loyal friend. What you wanted was for James to begin to suspect Jess - and it worked. From then on, he was unsure of her. What’s more, you took advantage of the moment to kiss him, and trap him into a relationship.”
Natalie shook her head, tears beginning to form in her eyes. “None of that is true!” she said.
“I never could find a motive for you to kill May,” Nora said. “Until James told me that he’d casually suggested dating you to May, only to have the idea shot down as ridiculous,” Nora said. “It was just May being herself, of course. Deciding on what was good for her friends and following through. In May’s mind, you two weren’t suited for each other. Only Jess and James were meant to be together. She saw a chemistry between them that she just didn’t see in you and James. How you must have hated her, Natalie. How you must have hated her for so casually crushing your dreams.”
“Lies!” Natalie said again. But she couldn’t disguise the slight tremor that racked through her body.
“Did you plot it from the start?” Nora asked. “Did you act sweet and concerned and ask me to investigate a so-called knitting feud, only so that I’d remain suspicious of Jess when May was murdered?”
Natalie shook her head. “You’re making all of this up. You can’t prove a thing!”
“Can’t I?” Nora asked. “You saw it as a breach of trust, didn’t you, Natalie? You, the ever loyal friend, felt like May had kicked you in the stomach when she told you that James would never be yours. She asked you to let go of your most cherished dream, and you decided you’d rather destroy her than destroy your dream. How many nights did you lie awake wondering why your best friend would tell you to let go of James, and then turn around and encourage him to chase Jess? How dare she do that to you? She didn’t deserve to live for being so callous.”
Natalie was trembling.
“Then, the final nail in May’s coffin - James confessed his own love to her, and May turned him down. May wielded her magic tongue and convinced him it was Jess that he loved all along, and betrayal hit you all over again. If she could convince James of anything, why couldn’t she convince him he loved you? Why, after all your years of loyalty, was she giving the prize away to Jess?”
Natalie clenched her jaw, the muscles in her neck straining as she stopped herself from nodding yes. Nora could see from the glitter in her eyes that she’d hit on the chink in her armor.
“So you killed her,” Nora said. “You were smart about it, too. You wanted everyone to suspect Tyler at first so that, when you planted Jessica’s stolen diary, people would turn on her. You made a disguised phone call to the cops that you knew the sheriff would ignore at first, and then wonder about later. Who was the mysterious woman caller who tipped them off? You wanted the police to think that Jess was trying to frame Tyler. Because, of course, you knew that Jess had the ideal motive - she had May’s money.”
Natalie only smiled, the smile of a piranha. “Big talk, no evidence,” she said.
“Do I really need evidence?” Nora asked gently. “I’ve done my damage, haven’t I? James believes me. So do Jess and Brooke. Even if you never end up behind bars, they’d never see you the same way again.”
Natalie’s gaze leapt to James. James looked away from her in disgust. She jumped up and reached out to him.
“James, she’s trying to trap me. Don’t believe her,” Natalie said desperately. “I was May’s most loyal friend. I could never have hurt her. Never!”
“Loyal? Don’t make me laugh. You don’t know the meaning of friendship, Natalie,” Nora said. “May was flawed, but she only ever wanted the best for you three. She was your biggest champion. She wanted you all to bloom. She worried and thought about how best to help you three. Jess and Brooke may have fought with May, but they loved her, too. Even when they hated her, they still loved her. But you, Natalie? You only cared about yourself.”
“Just stop talking!” Natalie screamed. “How do you explain Tyler? He killed himself, didn’t he?”
“You killed him,” Nora said. “But it was too late. By following Tyler’s tracks, I figured it a
ll out. See, Tyler was the one who first realized that you’d killed May.”
“How?” Jessica asked quietly. “How did Tyler realize that?”
“May must have told Tyler all about Natalie’s crush on James,” Nora explained. “She told him everything, even if he didn’t always pay attention. When he came to see me the night he disappeared, Tyler was distraught. He had all the puzzle pieces in his mind, but they were in a jumble. I told him to take a deep breath, and something suddenly clicked together for him.” Nora smiled. “Something that Brooke first told me about.”
“Me?” Brooke looked startled.
“You.” Nora nodded. “You told me that May often posted videos of herself doing yoga poses on the internet.”
Brooke’s eyes widened. “She was in her yoga gear when she died. Oh, my goodness.”
Nora nodded. “Exactly. Asking Tyler to take a deep breath reminded him of May’s yoga videos. He rushed to the house to grab the video camera. That was what you saw, Jess. You saw him run out of the house with the video camera in his hand.”
“But wouldn’t the police have had that already?” James asked, confused. “I mean, they searched the house pretty thoroughly.”
He turned to Nora but, for the first time, Nora didn’t have an answer. It was a question she’d asked herself and hoped to skip over while she got a confession out of Natalie.
“No,” Brooke said quietly. “The police never saw it. It was too well disguised.”
“What do you mean?” James asked.
“May was like all of us - she liked her interiors to be cool and fun, and wanted a camera that was as unobtrusive as possible. I remember last year she bought a small camera that fit into the palm of your hand, and she set it up near the TV.
“Well, surely the police would have seen that.”
“They wouldn’t,” Brooke said. “Because she knitted a camera case. Remember that? It was one of her projects at the knitting club. A black and red plush toy gnome that can perfectly conceal the camera inside it. She set it up leaning against the TV in her living room. It was perfect for recording her yoga moves and, after all, no guest who comes into their living room wants a big camera pointed in their face. She loved that little thing. I’d forgotten about it totally.”
“So had I!” Jess exclaimed. She stood up, glaring at Natalie. Brooke moved to stand by her.
“Yes, and so had Tyler,” Nora said. “And, of course, so had Natalie. She had no idea the camera was running. It wasn’t what she knew, it was what she didn’t know.”
“She didn’t forget,” Jess said, her voice hard. “It wouldn’t surprise me if Natalie actually didn’t know. After all, she was away for two weeks at a conference when May bought that contraption and knitted the toy.”
“Unlucky for her.” Brooke’s voice was dripping acid.
“But…but why didn’t Tyler go to the police?” James asked in frustration. “He could have had her arrested right then and there! Why was he so stupid?”
“Tyler watched you confess to May, he watched Natalie murder May,” Nora said. “I don’t think his head was on straight after that. He just wanted revenge. And he got his first bit of it by punching you in the face, James. Then, he headed to Natalie’s house, intending to kill her.”
James gasped.
“He’d lost the love of his life,” Nora said. “He didn’t care about his own life anymore. He just wanted to get his hands on the woman who’d betrayed and murdered his wife.”
“He was crazy,” Natalie said quietly, in a voice that was heavy with regret. “I didn’t want to kill him. I had to kill him. You don’t understand. He nearly murdered me. It was all self-defence.”
“The dark circles under your eyes, the sallowness of your skin...” Jess considered. “Those weren’t dark circles. They were bruises. Bruises you made sure to disguise with makeup!”
Natalie hung her head.
“You thought she’d been up all night worrying about May’s death,” Nora said. “But, really, after she killed Tyler, Natalie dumped his body into the back seat of his car, drove over the state line, pushed the car off the mountain side and then bicycled all night to get back to Milburn. I saw the bike in her backyard, I just didn’t put it together then.”
“And the camera?” Jess asked. “What happened to the camera?”
Nora shrugged. “Does it matter? Everything’s digital these days. Natalie must have realized it, too, and hoped that nobody else would. There’s sure to be a digital account linked with that device, and those videos are probably automatically stored on some company’s cloud. It will take a few warrants and a lot of phone calls, but the sheriff will get to them eventually.”
“How could you, Nat?” Jess asked, her voice shaking with rage. “How could you?”
“I let you enter my house!” Brooke said in disgust.
“I kissed you!” James closed his eyes in despair.
“It was all for you, James,” Natalie begged, coming up to him and trying to pull him into an embrace. “Don’t you get it? I’ve longed for you and longed for you…and you never even saw me.”
“Don’t touch me!” James shuddered, moving away from her.
“Did you ever consider us your friends?” Jess asked Natalie. “Or were we just stepping stones on your way to James?”
“You just don’t get it,” Natalie said. “I only wanted a family. I only wanted James. That’s it. I didn’t want to murder May. But I knew she’d always stand in my way. I knew she was just blind to my love.”
“She wasn’t blind to it,” Nora said. “She was trying to save you from your own obsessions. It’s too bad you weren’t worthy of saving.”
“You deserve whatever’s coming to you, Natalie,” Jess said.
“Now get out of my house,” Brooke snarled. “I don’t ever want to see you again.”
*****
Epilogue
“Isn’t it beautiful, Mom?” Hazel pulled at the skirt of her sundress, smiling broadly. The sky was powder blue and the sun a daffodil in the sky. Nora lounged on an Adirondack chair in her backyard, soaking in the rays. Kaylee was sitting under the shade of a tree nearby, hunched over a cell phone and muttering under her breath as video game music emanated from it. Austin and Jacob were cheering on Grace, who was locked in a semi-serious arm-wrestling competition with Harvey. Harvey winked as he let her win.
“It’s beautiful.” Nora smiled, and she didn’t just mean the sundress. The doorbell rang and everyone let out a groan.
“Fine. I’ll go get it.” Nora sighed. “It’s probably Tina, anyway.”
But it wasn’t.
Jess and Brooke stood on the doorstep, their eyes sad, but their chins held up bravely. Nora invited them into the kitchen and began pouring lemonade from a tall pitcher filled with ice.
“We came to give you this,” Jess said. She held out a knitted black and red toy gnome.
“The police found it after all?” Nora asked.
Jess shook her head. “No. They found the digital archive online, though, just as you predicted. Natalie’s going to jail. No doubt about it.”
“Jess and I just knitted this for you,” Brooke said. “Kind of like a…memorial to May.”
“Thank you,” Nora said gently, taking it from them. “I’ll treasure it.”
“We came to give you these, too.” Brooke smiled. She held out a pair of baby booties. “I know Grace won’t need them for a while yet but…there it is.”
“That baby’s going to be the warmest baby in Wyoming when winter comes.” Jess smiled. “We’re dedicating this year’s knitting to it.”
“Jess, really there’s no need-” Nora protested.
“Oh, yes, there is,” Brooke said. “I’m so ashamed of the way I acted, Nora. I tried to stop you from investigating because I really thought you’d mess things up. But, if it wasn’t for you, we’d never have found out the truth.”
Jess shuddered. “I’d never have found out just how much Natalie hated me.”
> “I’m just glad we never have to see her again,” Brooke said.
A car honked outside.
“Well, we should go.” Jess smiled. “Peter and James are getting impatient.”
“A double date?” Nora raised an eyebrow.
Jess smiled shyly. “Something like that.”
“You and James are dating, then?” Nora asked.
“We’re taking it slow,” Jess said. “But…yes. James begged me for another chance, and I decided that life’s too short to hold grudges.”
“And Peter?” Nora asked Brooke.
“Peter was only mad that I felt the need to lie to him,” Brooke said, hanging her head. “He said all I’d needed to do was tell him how I felt and he’d have stopped pressuring me.”
The car horn rang out again and Nora smiled. “We can catch up later. I suppose it’s best for you to leave now.”
“Thanks.” Jess hugged her tight, “Honestly. We owe you.”
Nora shook her head. “Thank the sheriff, too. This whole time he’s been working hard to build an airtight case against Natalie.”
“Oh, we know,” Jess said. “He’s got my vote in the next election.”
“He’ll win in a landslide for sure.” Brooke nodded.
They waved goodbye as they walked down the driveway. Nora watched them from the kitchen window, waving goodbye herself. As Peter’s sedan sped off down the street, Nora leaned against the counter and took a sip of the lemonade.
Outside, Hazel was bent over, laughing as Austin and Kaylee played hopscotch together. Grace was lazing on a chair, her hand over her growing belly, while Jacob sat behind her. Harvey was taking a million photos of the scene. The harsh winds of winter had finally passed over, and gentle sunshine was now everywhere.
Summer was finally here.
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