by Diane Weiner
“I’m sure Megan and Ron will get to the bottom of it. Just relax.” He pushed the hassock over and lifted her feet onto it.”
Maddy said, “Ava’s moving back to Georgia next week. She’s pretty upset about it.”
“I thought they were staying here, at least until the end of the school year?”
“Her Dad’s boss called and said if he doesn’t go back now, he’s fired.”
“Certainly he has to think about providing for the girls,” said Henry.
“Is Tilly moving back with them? That will make the transition easier.” Emily took a sip of her tea.
“She really wants to, but Ava’s father said he didn’t have the money to keep her on. Besides, he has family in Georgia to help with the girls. Ava said Tilly hasn’t stopped crying since he made the announcement.”
Emily said, “She really cares for those girls. She’ll find another family who needs her and I’m sure she’ll stay in touch with them.”
Henry’s phone vibrated. “Hi, Pat. Yes, she’s fine. It could have ended much worse to be sure. I’ll tell her. What? Chickened out again? You’ve got to take the bull by the horns and ask her to marry you before she gets fed up and finds someone new. Only kidding. Yes, I’ll ask them. Take care, buddy.”
“What did he chicken out of?” asked Emily. “Another aborted proposal attempt?”
“Yep. Poor guy’s trying too hard. He should just simply ask her already.”
Maddy said, “I think I have an idea.”
“Well, don’t kept it to yourself,” said Henry.
“Megan’s been taking a Spanish class all year.”
Emily said, “I know. Her dream is to visit her relatives in Barcelona one day. She said so over dinner the other night.”
“Give me a day to work on it.” She got up, kissed Emily and Henry on the cheeks and said, “I’m going to bed now.” She scooped up Chester.
Too exhausted to press further, Emily said, “Me, too.”
Emily slept like a baby. In the morning, she woke to the aroma of coffee and decided to skip her run. Henry was working on his Sudoku when she went downstairs.
“You were out like a light last night,” said Henry.
“Yesterday was quite a day.”
“You can relax now.”
“Not really. After all that, we still don’t know who killed Faith.”
“Megan and Ron will have to change direction but they’ll solve this. With Kyle in jail, is your plan for your next book a no-go?”
“I think it would hurt Rona and doubt she’d consent to it. I’ll find a new idea.”
“I know you will.”
Emily said, “With Rona off the suspect list, I wonder who they’ll go after next.”
“Sam Benson?”
“He’s the only one of the original suspects without an alibi. And Summer. What if he and Summer worked together? She had access to the kitchen and they both stand to profit from the charter school project forging ahead.”
Henry poured a second cup of coffee. “Not to change the subject, but Maddy wants us to keep tonight free. She has a surprise planned.”
“A surprise?”
“She needs our help is all she said. She said something about dinner at the inn.”
“Well, I’ll take any excuse not to have to cook tonight. I do need to get to work, though. I’ve pawned off my class to my TA a little too often this semester.” She looked out the window. “The weather is supposed to get bad. I was kind of hoping they’d cancel classes.”
“I’ve got to get going, too.” He finished his coffee and put the mug in the sink. “I’ll see you tonight.”
When Henry got to the hospital, a nurse told him that Tilly and Mila were waiting in a cubicle. He went to see them first.
“Tilly, what happened? Another seizure?”
“She says she threw up this morning in the bathroom. Her father is busy making arrangements to move them back to Georgia so I offered to bring her over.”
Henry said, “Mila, did you actually throw up this time or just feel like you were going to, like last time?”
Mila crossed her arms over her chest and didn’t answer.
“Mila, the doctor is talking to you. He can’t help you if you don’t talk to him.”
Mila grunted and turned away. Henry tried to coax her to answer, but she refused.
“Mila, the doctor has lots of sick people who need his help. If you don’t want him to help you, let’s go. I can drop you off at school on my way home.”
Mila said, “I don’t want to move to Georgia. I want to stay here with you and be in Miss Pratt’s class.”
Tilly said, “Sweetheart, I’d love nothing more than for you to do just that, but your father has a job waiting. I’ll visit you and we can do Facetime every single day.” She turned to Henry. “I love this girl and her sister like they’re my own.”
“Do you have children of your own?”
Tilly looked away, appearing to compose herself before answering. “I did. I had a daughter. She’s no longer with us. I’ll never get over it.”
“I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean to…”
“Of course, you didn’t. It’s always hard when people ask me that. If I say no, I feel like I’m denying she ever existed. If I say yes, I have to explain.”
Mila said, “I need the bathroom.” She hopped out of bed.
“I’ll take you.”
Henry said, “No need. There’s one right outside the cubicle.” He pulled the curtain open. “Right there.”
“I’m sorry we wasted your time.”
“Not a problem. The little girl has been through a lot.”
“And she’s about to go through more. I told Dave to leave the girls here with me for the rest of the school year, but he refused.”
“He probably needs them as much as they need him right now. He and Faith were on the outs but they were once married and in love. They had kids together. I’m sure he’s grieving, too.”
Mila came back into the cubicle. “Feeling better?” asked Tilly.
“Yeah. I want to go back to school.”
“That’s okay, right, Doctor Fox?”
“Sure. Bye, Mila. I think there are lollipops at the desk if it’s okay with Tilly.”
“Of course, it is,” said Tilly. “Am I too old for one? Just kidding. My own doctor would kill me. I haven’t been very good about monitoring my blood sugar.”
“Are you diabetic?”
“Who isn’t these days? I started on pills recently but my plan is to lose fifteen pounds and start walking once the weather warms up. Doctor says I should be able to control it that way and won’t need the pills.”
“Sounds like a plan.”
“Let’s go, Mila. Thanks again, Dr. Fox.”
Henry finished with his patients, then went down to the morgue to visit Pat.
“Hey, buddy. How’s Emily?”
“No worse for the wear. I could have killed her myself for getting herself in the situation she did. If Rona hadn’t shown up…”
“But she did. And a killer is off the streets thanks to her.”
“Too bad it isn’t the killer she was after, but hey. She made Megan’s job a little easier, right?”
“Speaking of Megan, your daughter left me a cryptic text.”
“Maddy texted you?”
“She said Megan and I should meet you guys at the inn for dinner at 7 sharp and to dress nicely.”
“Hmm. She did tell Em and me to keep tonight free.”
“Spill it. What has she got in mind?” said Pat.
“I swear, I haven’t a clue. Guess we’ll find out together.”
Pat’s phone buzzed. “Hey, Megan. Yeah? Okay. You can still meet for dinner, right? Maddy says to dress up. She probably won an award or something. Yeah. Love you, too.”
After he ended the call with Megan, Henry asked, “What award?”
“I don’t know. She’s always winning stuff, right? Anyhow, Megan says Kyle Smyth c
onfessed to murdering his grandparents. He swore he had nothing to do with Faith Maguire’s death. Megan says his alibi checks out for that night, just like his mother’s. They were both eating dinner with a family friend.”
“So what now?”
“They keep investigating. It’s only been a couple of weeks. These things take time. Can you hand me my coffee?” He took a sip of the coffee and spit it out. “Yuck, too bitter. I thought I added sugar at home but I guess I didn’t.”
Henry froze, coffee in hand. “You normally add the sugar at home. This time, you have to add it here—not in your kitchen. You didn’t add it in the kitchen. You’re a genius!”
“That’s been established. What in this moment impressed you? The fact I forgot to do what I do as a habit?”
“You forgot to add sugar in your kitchen, but you were able to add it here. What if Faith’s killer didn’t sneak into the kitchen to add the meds? Faith took her dessert home with her. What if someone added it back at her house, not at Coralee’s?”
“I suppose you’re right. It could have happened that way.”
“That’s a game changer. Instead of asking who had access to Coralee’s kitchen, we should be asking who had access to Faith’s kitchen! I’ve got to tell Emily.”
“And is there anything you want me to tell Megan, since she is a detective and all?”
“Tell her to look at who had access to the medication as well as Faith’s fridge.”
Henry’s half-day shift was nearly over. He checked to make sure the ER was under control, then got into his car. Did Dave Maguire poison the cheesecake? If the girls knew he was already in town, Ava may have left a door unlocked or given him a key. Faith had diabetes meds in the house. Tilly just admitted to having diabetes herself. Plenty of pharmaceuticals lying around to drop blood sugar. How many pills would he have needed to piece together a dose capable of killing Faith? He picked up the phone to call Emily, but realized she was still in class.
As soon as he got home, he took off his coat and found his drug reference handbook. Then he cross referenced the information with what he found on the pharmaceutical website. Whether or not Dave had enough pills to kill Faith depended on what Faith had left in her prescription bottle. He called Megan.
“Megan, I have a question for you. When the police gathered evidence from the Maguire house, how many pills were left in Faith Maguire’s diabetes prescription? Sure, I’ll wait.”
He tried to determine how many pills Dave could have swiped without Tilly noticing. If Faith’s prescription was nearly empty and was ready for a refill, he couldn’t have come up with enough pills. However, if she’d recently had it filled, then…”
“Yes, Megan. I’m still here. The bottle was empty? Okay, look at the date of the last refill. She had just gotten a refill the day before she died? I think you need to consider bringing in Dave Maguire for questioning before he leaves town. Thanks, see you tonight.”
Henry made himself a sandwich and continued the Sudoku he’d started before work. Emily and Maddy wouldn’t be home for a couple of hours. Perhaps he’d even sneak in a nap.
Before he finished lunch, his phone buzzed.
“Maddy? Is everything okay? Maybe Ava didn’t feel well and went home.”
Maddy said, “We ate lunch together. She was fine and said she’d see me in geometry but she never showed.”
“Is she skipping class? Maybe she didn’t finish her homework and was afraid to get a zero or something.”
“She’d never skip class. She’d have asked to copy mine instead. Besides, I texted Jessica. She said Mila is absent today.”
“That’s because she was at the hospital this morning. She had another anxiety attack—told Tilly she was going to throw up. She was worried about having to move back to Georgia. The three of us had a talk and Tilly was going to drop her off at school. She seemed fine when she left, but maybe Tilly changed her mind and took her home instead.”
“Can you go over to their house and check? I tried calling Ava but it goes straight to voicemail and I don’t have a number for the housekeeper.”
“Okay. I’ll take care of it and get back to you.”
Henry went to his laptop and accessed the patient files to get a number for Tilly. When he called, it went to voicemail as well. He took Dave Maguire’s number from the emergency contacts. Again, voicemail.
The last thing he felt like doing was trading his nap for a visit to the Maguire house, but Maddy was worried and he’d promised he’d look into it. Making it worse, freezing rain pelted his Jeep and he had to scrape ice off the windshield before taking off.
When he got to Ava’s, the driveway was empty. He pulled up his hood and knocked on the front door. No answer.
He peeked in the window and saw a purse on the floor, contents spilling out. He recognized it as the purse Tilly was carrying at the hospital that morning. Why would she have left the house without it? And if she were to leave it behind, would she have left the contents all over the floor? Something wasn’t right. She didn’t leave voluntarily. Dave Maguire! What if he’d kidnapped them? What if he talked to Tilly and found out he’d questioned her about the diabetes meds?
He called Megan on the way home. He hoped the police could catch up with Dave Maguire before he skipped town. Where was Tilly’s car? Dave must be driving it. He called Megan back to give her that piece of information.
When he got home, Emily was waiting.
“I thought you had office hours after class today.”
“I did, but Maddy called and said she was worried Ava disappeared. She thought Ava might show up at our house.”
“I was just over at the Maguire’s. Tilly’s car is gone and her purse is spilled out on the floor in the foyer.”
“I tried calling Dave but it went to voicemail.”
“I know. I think he kidnapped Tilly and the girls.”
“Why? He has custody now.”
“I saw Tilly and Mila in the ER again this morning. I asked Tilly about her diabetes meds and if it was the same thing Faith had taken. I don’t know, but I think she may have spoken to Dave and he got suspicious.”
“Of what?”
“Faith had just picked up a refill of her meds the day before she died. With what was in the bottle plus a few pills from Tilly, Dave could have snuck into the house and poisoned the cheesecake while it was in the fridge. I think he knows I figured it out.”
“He stole pills from Tilly and Faith?”
“Yes. He’s a bright guy. Surely he knew the risk of an overdose. Tilly takes a newer drug but it has the same effect—dropping blood sugar. And if it dropped during the night while Faith was asleep…”
“Okay. You called the police. Where is Dave taking them? Leaving the country?”
“He’d need passports and Mila is seven. I kind of doubt the kids have passports. And last minute plane tickets to anywhere would be expensive. Besides, Tilly isn’t willingly getting on a plane. She’d alert the authorities as soon as she got inside the airport.”
“So assume he’s driving. He isn’t familiar with the area. Where would he go?”
“If he’s worried about being chased, he’ll avoid the major highways. Canada?”
“Passports, remember?”
“I have no clue. I hope the police have an idea.”
They both jumped when they heard someone pounding on the front door.
“I’ll get it,” said Henry. Emily followed him to the door. When he opened it, they both gasped. It was Dave Maguire!
Chapter 25
“Dave? Are the girls in the car? Is everyone all right?” asked Henry.
“Huh? Can I come in? I’m getting wet.”
“The police are looking all over for you. If you turn yourself in now…”
“What are you talking about?” shouted Dave. “My girls are missing. The school called. Is Ava here?”
“No, we thought you had her,” said Emily.
“Me? Why? They’re supposed to be at school.
”
“We tried calling you but it went straight to voicemail.”
“I was on the phone with my boss all morning. Had to be near a fax machine. Not easy to find a place with one around here. Had to work through some client issues. I’m lucky my boss gave me a few days to get back there.”
“Did you talk to Tilly?”
“I called. She didn’t pick up. Neither did Ava. I stopped here on my way home in case she was with Maddy. What’s going on here?”
“Maddy called. Ava disappeared from school and Mila never showed up. I saw Mila at the hospital this morning.”
“The hospital? What happened?”
“Another anxiety attack, like when you brought her in the other day. She’s fine. Tilly was going to drop her off at school but she didn’t. They aren’t home and it looks like Tilly left in a hurry. Do you know where she may have taken the girls?”
“No! I told her as soon as the girls got home from school we needed to pack. I bought plane tickets for tomorrow.”
“Was Tilly okay with you taking the girls back to Georgia?”
“What does that matter? She’s just the housekeeper. She seemed sad. Practically begged me to take her with us, but I can’t afford to do that. Besides, I have family to help in Georgia.”
“Would she have run away with the girls? Is that possible?”
“I don’t know her all that well. She seems very attached to them.”
Emily said, “I’ll call Megan and tell her Dave is with us. Meanwhile, let’s go to the house. If Tilly kidnapped the girls, perhaps she left a clue as to where she was headed.”
When they got to the house, Emily picked up the items on the foyer floor that had spilled out of the purse. “She sure left in a hurry. The wallet’s gone, but she left the rest of her things here.”
Dave flew up the stairs. “The girls’ things are all here. The drawers are full and Ava’s laptop is sitting on her bed. If they’d planned to leave, Ava would have taken it with her. Her phone charger is here too. She certainly would have packed it if she knew they were leaving.”
What did Megan say?” asked Henry.
“They have an APB out for Tilly’s car. They’ll check credit card records. Eventually Tilly will need gas and food.”