Elizabeth Lynn Casey - Southern Sewing Circle 08 - Remnants of Murder (24 page)

Tori was onto the second clue in the down column
when the jingle of the door-mounted bell won out over the day’s crossword puzzle in the battle for her attention. Glancing up, she smiled at Kate and beckoned her over to the high-topped table she had secured near the back of the bakery. While not necessarily the table she usually chose, it was the best choice for the nature of their meeting.

“Sorry I’m late,” Kate said as she pushed the sleeves of her simple knit cardigan halfway up her forearms and slid into the empty seat across from Tori. “I was determined to write two pages before leaving to come here.”

“And did you?” Tori hooked her thumb in the direction of the glass case on the other side of the dining area. “Can I get you a muffin or a scone? Or maybe a cinnamon roll or something?”

Kate waved off her last question in favor of the first. “It’s like any writing ability I had was contingent on sitting in one particular chair, in one particular room, in one particular house … none of which I have access to anymore.”

“How about a cup of coffee?” she asked.

Again, Kate waved off the notion. “No, I’m fine. I already had two cups this morning, and if I have another, I’ll be even more jittery than I am right now. So what can I do for you, Victoria?”

Pushing the daily paper to the side, she took a quick sip of hot chocolate and then got to the point. The sooner she got her answers, the sooner she could move on to the next step. “I don’t know if you’ve heard or not, but Clyde Montgomery’s death has been classified as a murder.”

Kate’s face drained of all color, prompting Tori to reach across the table and grab hold of the woman’s hand. “Kate? Kate? Are you okay—”

“Did you say m-murder?” Kate rasped.

At Tori’s slow nod, Kate gripped the edges of the round table and made a visual effort to steady her breathing. “But—but how? And …
why
?” The woman’s voice grew shriller as a steady stream of questions began to pour from her mouth in rapid succession. “
Who?
Who did it? Who would want to hurt such a sweet, sweet man?”

Her heart ached for Kate as the enormity of Tori’s words took root and spread. “We know the how, but beyond that, everything is just speculation.”

Kate’s eyes bored into hers. “How? How was he killed?”

Tori took a deep breath and released it slowly, her decision to call Kate suddenly crossing into the bad judgment category. “Look, Kate, I’m sorry I called you here this morning. Maybe hitting you with this right now wasn’t such a smart decision.”

“You think that letting me read it in the newspaper would have been better?”

Tori wrapped her hands around her to-go cup and shrugged. “I guess not.”

“So please, tell me what you know.”

Slowly, she looked up, desperate for a way to fill in the blanks without making the whole situation any worse than it already was. “He was poisoned. Slowly.”

“Poisoned?” Kate echoed in disbelief.

“Arsenic.”

Releasing the table from her death grip, Kate raked her hands through her hair and shuddered. “But how? He didn’t take any pills or anything.”

“That’s the thing with arsenic. It can be added to food. How much is added at any given time determines how quickly death will occur.”

“But he ate simple stuff like soup from a can, or sandwiches with virtually no condiments,” Kate protested before reversing her own plea as quickly as it had been spoken. “Except for lunch! His lunch came from that meal delivery program the town started up last year!”

“Home Fare.” Tori glanced around the dining area to get a feel for the bakery’s clientele at that moment and then lowered her voice to just above a whisper. “I’m sure the police will be looking at them thoroughly. But from what I gather from my friend Dixie, Home Fare didn’t start delivering to Clyde until after the visual decline in his health started. Do you know if that’s right?”

Kate’s line of vision moved to somewhere just over Tori’s head as she appeared to count something out in her head. “Actually, I think that’s right. He talked about feeling tired and not quite like himself in early March. I remember that because I’d just heard from a writing contest I’d submitted to, and while he was excited that I placed, his reaction seemed to leave him unusually subdued. Thinking back, it was as if the simple act of raising his hands into the air left him winded.”

“So you suggested he call Home Fare?”

Kate shook her head. “I didn’t, Councilman Haggarty did.”

“Travis Haggarty?”

“He came over and went fishing with Clyde sometimes. He said sending the Home Fare folks over with food was the least the town could do for Clyde after all the agida they caused him.”

Her curiosity aroused, Tori leaned her shoulders across the table in an attempt to lessen their distance and therefore the listening ability of any would-be eavesdroppers. “How do you mean?”

“The people in this town were always after him to sell his land. They’d bring charts and reports and ten-page pleas in the hopes of making him change his mind. I imagine it would have infuriated them to know he’d merely push them to the side of the table and drink his tea without so much as a glance their way.” Dropping her hands back down to the table, Kate exhaled, blowing a random piece of hair off her face, only to roll her eyes as it returned to the same place, undaunted. “There are very few places in this whole state that are as picturesque and untouched as Clyde’s land.”

“Would they bring anything else?”

“Would they ever,” Kate mumbled in a half laugh, half snort. “The other councilman, Granville Adams, would bring a pie just about every other day. If it were me, I’d have quit answering the door after the first few attempts, but Clyde found it all fairly amusing. He liked to tell Granville he had a different favorite flavor every time the man would show up with a new pie. One day Clyde would say apple, the next day he’d say pecan … or custard … or pumpkin … or chess pie. Kind of made me feel a little bad for the councilman’s wife, who was no doubt tasked with making them.”

“How long did that go on?”

Kate’s shoulders rose and fell in a shrug. “That started once Clyde grew tired of throwing away all those charts and figures. He said it was a waste of good trees and he was done with all the pitches. He went so far as to tell the man from the resort company that he’d charge him with trespassing if he stepped foot on his land again. Even made sure his son, Beau, knew where to find the rifle in the event they didn’t listen.”

Tori drew back. “And when was that exactly?”

“I’m thinking it was around the middle of February because I remember Clyde asking if the pie was a Valentine’s Day present or a political bribe designed to help Granville get reelected in the fall.”

Valentine’s Day. February fourteenth.

The timing certainly worked …

“Any other premade food start coming into the house at about that same time?” Tori asked.

Kate started to shake her head then stopped, her eyes widening as she did. “It doesn’t work with the timing, but there were the chocolate-covered cherries from Shelby’s Sweet Shoppe. Showed up every Friday like clockwork.”

“And that started in February, too?”

“That’s where the timing doesn’t line up. He started getting those delivered late last year. But it was about six weeks ago when those boxes started showing up with a beautiful blue ribbon and a brochure.”

“You mean like a sales pamphlet or something?”

Again Kate shook her head, only this time she didn’t cut the motion short. “No. Like a full-fledged color brochure for the biggest thorn in Clyde’s side.”

And then she knew. “Nirvana Resorts?”

“That’s it!” Kate said, snapping her right hand in the air. “How’d you know that?”

“Because Shelby Jenkins is the daughter of one of Nirvana’s biggest executives.”

Kate’s mouth formed a perfect O, yet no sound came out. Instead, she rolled her eyes skyward and laughed. “And here I was thinking she must have been another person Clyde had helped along the way and that she was simply paying it back by sending him a box of his favorite treats each week.”

“Did he say that they were friends?” she asked.

“No. But he never said they weren’t. He’d just untie the box, toss the brochure in the trash, and dig in like a little boy who’d just gotten the Christmas present he’d been waiting on all year.”

Tori took a moment to digest everything she’d heard so far and compare it with what she already knew. While none of it was new, it certainly helped bring her two top suspects firmly into the foreground. Sure, there were others on her list, but after talking to Milo the previous night, she had to admit that people like Bruce Waters and Carter Johnson didn’t have as much motive. Tourists at a vacation resort really wouldn’t have a need for hammers and nails, and while Johnson’s Diner would probably appeal to some vacationers, the existing building really couldn’t accommodate more customers. Besides, Carter was one of those people who was wary of outsiders being in his restaurant.

“Wait.”

At the hushed tone of Kate’s voice, Tori forced her thoughts back to the present and the woman seated across the table from her. “Is something wrong, Kate?”

Kate propped her elbow on the table and rested her chin atop her hand, her hazel eyes slowly making their way around the bakery before coming to rest on Tori. “What about the scones?”

Tori stared at Kate. “Scones? What scones?”

“The ones Beau brought when he and Clyde would have their morning tea.” Kate jerked her chin in the direction of the cash register on the other side of the room. “The ones he got from
this
place.”

“D-Debbie’s?” she stammered as the room began to spin.

“He stopped here all the time. The box was always in the trash when I came by after lunch.”

“And he just started buying those in February?”

“No. He started bringing those shortly after I began visiting Clyde on a regular basis.”

“Which started after Clyde’s wife died, right?”

Kate nodded. “Been almost four years now.”

She felt the blast of relief Kate’s time frame ushered in. “Then that pretty much negates the scones. Clyde didn’t start exhibiting signs of being sick until about a month ago, right?”

“True.”

“And this threat he made toward the Nirvana rep? That was when again?”

“Early February.”

Early February. About two to three weeks before Clyde’s health began its rapid descent …

She let that latest tidbit roll around in her thoughts for a moment, the time frame only shoring up what she’d already suspected. “His murder has to be related.”

“Agreed,” Kate whispered. “And that’s why I don’t think you can rule out the scones. Or the tea.”

She followed the woman’s gaze back to the counter. No, she refused to believe Debbie could ever be involved in something so sinister. It went against everything good about the bakery owner. “I’m sorry,” she finally said. “Murder isn’t in Debbie Calhoun’s makeup.”

“Does that one ever do any of the baking?”

“That one?” Tori repeated before shifting her focus to the freckle-faced college student standing behind the register. “You mean Emma? Sure she does some of the baking. She’s been working here since she was sixteen. Debbie has trained her well enough she could essentially hold down the fort all by herself if Debbie needed her to. And beyond all of that, the customers love her.”

Kate said nothing, the woman’s weighted silence making the proverbial hair on the back of Tori’s neck stand at attention.

“Kate? Am I missing something here?”

Swinging her focus back to Tori, Kate’s voice hardened. “Her name is Emma Adams, isn’t it?”

“Yeah, I guess but …” Her words trailed off as reality sank in.

Emma Adams.

Granville’s daughter.

Chapter 24

Tori guided the pair of scissors through the flowered
fabric, each movement of her hand putting more distance between herself and the mountain of stress that made it difficult to concentrate on much of anything.

“Sometimes I wish I could be here with you every day, Rose,” she said as she reached the end of the table and gathered the measured square into her hands. “When I’m here, I feel like I did when my great-grandmother was alive. Like no matter what life hurls my way, it’s all going to be okay … because you’re here.”

Rose looked up from the assorted fabric pieces she was stacking on the coffee table and waved away Tori’s words. “I only wish that were true.”

“Trust me, Rose, it’s true.” Stepping around the back side of the love seat, Tori sat down beside the elderly woman. “Being here always feels good.”

“You don’t look like everything is going to be okay.” Rose hijacked the delicately flowered square from Tori’s hands and added it to the pile on her lap. “So why don’t you tell me what’s wrong?”

She stared down at the wooden sewing box she’d placed on the floor upon arriving and contemplated her choices. One of the reasons she’d invited herself over to sew was because she needed a distraction. Then again, she’d been in Sweet Briar long enough to know that her need to see Rose went far deeper than something so trivial.