Engaged in Death (A Wedding Planner Mystery) (24 page)

“Sure thing.” I’d thought we’d be here poring over architectural plans for hours and had paid for enough parking time for a quick trip to the museum. “I promised Rachel the car, but we can look around for a bit.”

Once inside, Summer made a beeline for the Hall of Architecture, shunning the modern art and the natural history portions of the museum.

“This is my favorite part!” Summer raced up the marble steps.

“Mine too.” I hurried to catch up.

We made a slow revolution around the room and examined plaster replicas of famous temples and statues.

“Mythology was my favorite unit in school last year.” Summer paused in front of a bust of Athena. Her warrior’s helmet and her breastplate were embossed with Medusa’s head.

“She’s so fierce.” Summer seemed in awe. “Do you know the crazy way she was born?”

I wracked my brain for a moment. “I think her father was Zeus and she erupted all grown up, from Zeus’s head.”

Summer nodded. “Zeus swallowed Athena’s mother when he found out she was pregnant.” She paused. “Do you think his wife, Hera, was mad?” Summer tilted her head. “About all of his affairs?”

“She was. And Zeus might have swallowed Athena’s mother to protect the baby from Hera.” Something skittered across my brain. I couldn’t grab it fast enough. And I wasn’t sure how happy Garrett would be that his thirteen-year-old daughter and I were discussing the topic of marital infidelity, whether it was based in classical mythology or not.

Summer snorted. “Why didn’t Hera just punish her husband, instead of going after his mistresses?”

“Good question. If I remember right, she also went after the children he had with them.” My toes curled in my sandals as I recalled my anger directed at Becca Cunningham, when maybe I should have focused on Keith. I was finally ready to let it go.

“Yeah, I know about Hercules. She sent snakes after him when he was a baby, in his crib.” Summer shivered.

A sick feeling gripped my stomach.

“What’s wrong?” Summer grabbed my arm as I took a step back and almost sunk to the cold marble floor.

“Honey, were you telling the truth about the night Shane Hartley died? That first day I met you, you told me you were at the house the day before, tending to the cats when it was still light out. But now that I think of it, Rachel and I didn’t see you there.”

Summer got very quiet. After a lengthy pause, she finally spoke up. “I saw you and Rachel move in. I didn’t know who you were and what you’d do with Whiskey and her kittens. I was watching from behind the carriage house, and I saw you move Whiskey and Soda inside, but not Jeeves. So I went to find him that night.”

“Did you see anything?” I tried to make my voice sound light, but it was strained.

“I did.” Summer’s voice was very soft, and she was twisting the strap of her purse around and around her arm, like a tourniquet, turning her arm red.

“What did you see, sweetie?” I reached out to still her hand and unwind the purse.

“The night Mr. Hartley was killed?” Her small voice got progressively higher and thinner.

“Summer?” Please, please,
please
let her not have seen something totally awful.

“I
was
there.” Summer trained her eyes on her flip-flops.

Crap.
I tucked my finger under her chin and slowly raised her face until it was level with mine. “What did you see?”

“It’s not like I saw him get killed or anything,” she said nervously.

Phew
. “It’s okay, but I need to know.”

“I waited until my dad and grandparents were asleep, and I climbed out my window, ’cause it’s just on the first floor. I put cat food and a bottle of water in my backpack. I used my cell phone as a flashlight, and I walked through the backyard.”

“You must have been so scared.” I wouldn’t want to walk through our backyards in the dark, even before Shane Hartley’s murder and all of the break-ins.

“I
was
scared, but I couldn’t let Jeeves stay out all night by himself. So I got to the back porch and looked around, but I couldn’t find him. He must’ve been hiding under the porch. It was too dark to see. I’d just put out the food and water when a truck pulled in.”

Shane Hartley
.

“I crouched next to the back porch. I didn’t want them to see me in their headlights. Then the truck was turned off and someone got out.”

“Who was it?”

“There was a full moon, but there wasn’t enough light to tell. And then another person pulled in.” She stopped and peered at me.

“What did the other person look like?” I tried to keep my voice even, not to sound anxious or upset. But the thought of Summer so close to the killer made me sick, even in the calm, cool safety of the museum, one month removed from the incident.

“I couldn’t see. But they were driving one of those cars, the old-fashioned ones.”

“An old-fashioned car?”

“Like in a gangster movie. The ones with the wooden sides.”

The same type of car had picked up Deanna Hartley at the hospital.

Summer wrinkled her nose. “I couldn’t tell who got out, but he seemed kinda tall. I crawled until I got to the part of the garden with the statues, and then I ran back home. I didn’t hear anything, I swear.”

My heart leapt into my throat. I came to a sickening conclusion and prayed I was wrong. Too bad the Zeuses of the world couldn’t always swallow their mistresses, to protect them.

“Summer, sweetie, let’s get out of here.”

* * *

“Where are you going?” Summer blinked as we stopped in front of her grandparents’ house. I’d resisted the urge to call Truman while Summer was in the car.

“I’m going to see your grandpa at the police station.” I wanted to be straight with her.

“You’re not going to tell him I was out that night, are you?” Summer crumpled in her seat and pouted. “It doesn’t matter now. You heard they caught the guy who did it. It’s the mayor, and it fits. He drives one of those old-fashioned cars.” She turned her hazel eyes to me, pleading.

“Maybe so.” I offered her a sad smile. “It’ll be okay, Summer.”

“My dad will be mad.” She glanced at the front door. “And Grandpa will say I held up his investigation.”

This made me burst out laughing. “They’ll just be happy you’re safe and sound. And no matter what, it was very brave of you to go back to check on Jeeves that night, even if it wasn’t exactly allowed. Now do I get to see him before I go?”

Summer unbuckled herself and nodded.

On the way home, I’d complimented her on her unwavering care of Whiskey, Soda, and Jeeves, trying to focus on the positive aspects of a thirteen-year-old girl sneaking out of her house nearly a month ago and almost witnessing a murder. Summer had perked up a bit and chatted about Jeeves. She’d begged me to come in to see how big he’d grown and the new trick he could do, a backflip.

“I don’t know where he is.” She peered under the couch in a comfortable-looking living room.

Pictures of Summer from the time she was a baby to the present adorned one wall, and pictures of Garrett depicting the same covered another.

“He usually comes out when I get home. Jeeves!”

Summer disappeared around the corner and gasped. “Grandma!”

I raced in to see a gray-haired woman tied to a chair with rope and a kitchen towel stuffed in her mouth. Her frightened eyes, swollen and red, trailed away from Summer to the woman who now had a gun trained at Summer’s head. Unfortunately, my hunch from the museum had been correct.

“I expected the girl to show up, but I didn’t think you’d be with her. Or that Lorraine would be home.” Yvette Tannenbaum stated this calmly, as if we were two girlfriends chatting over a pedicure. Her mousy hair was frizzy with perspiration, and her floral dress bore deep stains under her arms. This wasn’t meek Yvette, but strong Yvette, the one I’d glimpsed at Sylvia’s funeral, when she’d sung so incredibly. Now the power was frightening, not sublime.

“What are you doing?” I shuffled over to Summer, who was shaking.

A small whimper escaped from her mouth. Summer’s grandmother writhed against the ropes binding her, her chair inching closer to Yvette.

“Stop it.” Yvette moved the gun away from Summer’s temple and pointed it at her grandmother.

“We can work something out.” I attempted to put into play the negotiating skills I’d used as an attorney. They sounded pretty lousy right now.

Yvette snorted. “I don’t think so. I’ve already tried to kill you once. I won’t fail this time.”

A small bell went off in my stress-addled brain. “You cut my brake line! You were there the day I was at the historical society. I ran into you in the hallway.”

“Being the mechanic’s daughter comes in handy sometimes.” Yvette’s smile snaked across her face. “I came back in through the bathroom window, cutting it close when I ran into you in the hallway. I also had my car repainted that evening, in case this brat tried to trace it back to me.” I’d never seen her truly smile. Before, she’d just looked meek and dour. Now she appeared powerful, evil, and insane. I had to get her away from Summer, who was now crying freely, taking in ragged breaths.

“Don’t whine.” Yvette trained her gun on Summer. “You saw me kill Shane Hartley.”

“I didn’t. I swear!”

“You’re lying. I saw you by the light of your cell phone. Little girls should be in bed at midnight, not tiptoeing around strangers’ houses.”

“I was helping the cats.” Summer stood straight, but her knees knocked together. “Where’s my kitten?” She frantically looked around.

“Locked in the basement. Damn cat was hissing at me.”

I tried to stall for time. “Why did you kill Shane?” I thought I already knew. I hoped I was wrong. “You told me I dodged a bullet by not marrying Keith. Because he cheated on me. You killed Shane because you thought he was Bart, didn’t you?” The alternative theory was just too disgusting.

Yvette’s chapped lips twisted into a creepy smile. “Bart couldn’t control himself.” Little flecks of spit shot out of her mouth like sparks. “He was behaving like a lovesick teenager. You’d think I’d be used to it, after dealing with his infidelities for twenty years. But this time was different.”

Her eyes got a faraway look, and I tried to control my raspy breath. If I stalled her, maybe someone would figure out this madwoman was holding us hostage.

“He got her pregnant. After he’d said he didn’t want to have children, he went and got her pregnant.”

“Deanna.” Yvette’s head snapped to attention.
Oops.

She pivoted to point the gun at me. “Yes, her,” she spat. “I found a letter Bart was working on. He’s careless about everything. He was leaving me for her.”

“So you went to the place where they always met.”

Yvette nodded but didn’t move the gun. By now, Summer had slumped to the floor, and I wanted to join her, but I couldn’t let Yvette point her weapon at Summer again.

“You don’t get it.” The gun bobbed with her every movement. “I had an offer to sing opera in New York, but Bart made me stay. He wanted to be a senator.”

Summer’s grandmother made a wheezing noise. It sounded dismissive even with all of the cotton blocking her mouth.

“I know. I married a joke of a man who spent twenty years on the city council so he could finally become mayor. I didn’t know it then. I stayed here, and we gave up on children. Then he found this pretty little Texan, half his age. . . .” Her body shook.

“You thought you killed your husband, not Shane.” I could see it. Bart and Shane were both relatively short men. It would be easy to confuse them in the dark. The Hartleys’ truck had been in my driveway, and Yvette probably assumed Deanna had driven there with Bart. It wasn’t the wretched hypothesis that had bubbled up in my brain back at the museum, but it would do.

But I should have known better. One of the things you learned as an attorney was to never ask a question you didn’t know the answer to.

“No.” Yvette’s smile became even more chilling. “I thought he was Deanna.”

A bucket of ice water doused my nerves. It would be possible to mistake Shane, with his short stature and his potbelly for his wife, Deanna, with her pregnant belly and her hair in its trademark bun.

“My life was spiraling out of control.” Yvette’s voice was barely above a whisper. “Don’t you know what that feels like?”

I nodded, knowing all too well.

“I gave up everything. All of my dreams and aspirations. Why shouldn’t he?”

“Keith cheated on me, but I didn’t kill his mistress. Or Keith, although I may have wanted to when I first found out.”

“But you got out in time. You didn’t stay in Port Quincy for decades, waiting for him to carry out his dreams at the expense of yours. You didn’t find out he was slowly draining your joint bank account to finance his escape to Texas. If I’d found those paintings, it wouldn’t have mattered. But that diary was worthless.”

“
You
have Sylvia’s diary?”

Yvette nodded. “I removed it from the car after your accident. And then I misplaced it a few days later. It didn’t have any useful information.” Her arm wavered as she assessed me. “You’re very determined. Too bad you didn’t just decide to sell and move back to Pittsburgh. Then none of this would have had to happen.”

“I didn’t hear anything that night.” So Yvette had placed the threatening messages in the house. “You slashed Bev’s tires because she was spreading it around town that Shane wasn’t the father of Deanna’s baby.”

Yvette scowled at the mention of Deanna’s name. “Bev didn’t know it was my Bart,” she said possessively. “But she knew it wasn’t Shane. I couldn’t take the chance she’d figure it out. I’ll take care of her after I’m done here.” She took aim at me, then seemed to change her mind and pointed at Summer.

Summer’s grandmother’s swollen eyes went wide, and I resisted the urge to look left. I could smell my sister’s perfume. I gave a little nod and said a quick prayer.

A chair crashed down on Yvette’s head, and she shot the pistol. I knocked Summer out of the way as someone screamed and all was chaos.