Heaven Preserve Us (21 page)

"I'll be careful. I promise."

THE SUN TRIED To break through the crumpled clouds above, mere
hints of yellow light touching a patch of wet grass here, a moss-covered tree limb there. Anywhere else in the country they'd laugh, but
in the Northwest in February we counted that as a partly sunny day.
I was just happy to have a brief reprieve from the rain, despite the
bite that remained in the air.

I drove past Caladia Acres, following Pine Street as it narrowed
and veered north, soon turning into County Road 18. Five minutes later I was well out of Cadyville and winding among small
acreages. Llamas and alpacas peered over fences, dogs lay on front
porches surveying their territories, and red barns reached gray
slate roofs toward the brightening sky. Watching the numbers
painted on mailboxes at the end of the driveways, I found 18223
and turned onto the bladed gravel road.

Ahead, the Kollers' putty-colored manufactured home was surrounded by a neat, well-maintained fence made from recycled
plastic the same dull beige of the house. Nearer the structure, the encouraging green spikes of bulbs in the precise flower beds
promised spring was indeed on the way, despite Puxatawny Phil's
usual failure to spy his shadow. A tiny two-stall horse barn sat
diagonally back from the house four hundred yards or so, with
one end open to a small paddock where a huge white horse with
shaggy feet the size of hubcaps watched my pickup approach with
laconic disinterest.

I stopped the vehicle and turned off the engine, got out, and
slammed the door. Stood there for at least a minute, facing the
house with my hands on my hips, telling myself I was giving Mandy
a chance to notice I was there, but in reality gathering enough moxie
to interview a stranger about her daughter.

Then I thought of Barr the first time I'd seen him in the hospital bed, and of Philip, gray and struggling for breath and now very,
very dead.

Across the road, crows began to gather on the bare branches of
a lone alder tree. Their harsh calls raked the clear air like claws on
a blackboard.

Following up on the emails Philip had received had to be done,
and no one else seemed willing to do it. Galvanized, I crunched
across the driveway, but before I reached the front step the door
opened, and a dark-haired woman wearing jeans and an orange
fleece zipper-front warm-up jacket stepped out to meet me. Freckles sprinkled her upturned nose, and her lips turned up in a grin
that revealed perfect white teeth.

"Hi," she said.

"Hi" I stood looking up at her, and at that moment it seemed
that the lack of sleep over the last three days would crush me into
the gravel beneath. Taking a deep breath, I said, "I'm Sophie Mae Reynolds. I have a nine-forty appointment to talk about my business accounting needs."

She beckoned me in. "Of course you are. Coffee's on. Let's see
what I can do to help you out."

The living room was overstuffed and comfortable, the kitchen
floor worn, the decor overall unimaginative and far more about
function than aesthetic. But the coffee was hot and strong enough
to strip tar off a roof, just the way I needed it, and the air smelled
of bacon and onions and other good things. We settled into the
breakfast nook tucked into the end of the kitchen, steaming cups
between us, and with a view of the muddy paddock. It was so bucolic and soothing I didn't know if I'd be able to haul my sorry
carcass out of there when my hour was up.

"Tell me about your business."

I did, explaining that I'd designed, manufactured, and marketed handmade toiletry items for a little over two years, and that
my wholesale and internet business had picked up to the point
where I really needed some help with the bookkeeping. "Taxes are
such a pain that I've been farming them out from the beginning,
but I'd really prefer someone with a better understanding of my
business do them."

She nodded her understanding. "You make soap? Like from
lye?"

"That, and melt-and-pour"

"I've done some of that, too. It's so much fun-and fascinating
how you mix a bunch of oils and butters and beeswax and stuff
together with a little lye from the cleaning aisle at the grocery store,
and you end up with something that gets you clean in the
shower."

Her enthusiasm made me smile. I knew other people who
made soap, had in fact taught several classes, but it was always nice
to meet someone who was interested. We talked about soap making for a bit, and she asked several pertinent questions about the
particulars of how I did business.

"Well, I can help you take care of the accounting side of things.
We'd work out just how much or how little help you want," she
said and quoted me her rates. They weren't too cheap, which
would have been a red flag, but they seemed manageable. I asked
for and got the names of three clients and permission to call them
for references.

"Rhea Waters gave you a huge thumbs-up," I said. "Couldn't
say enough nice things about you."

"Oh, Rhea's a sweetie, she really is. I don't think I've had a bigger cheerleader since I decided to start my own business."

"Her daughters help me out," I said. "They said they go to
school with your daughter. Lisa, isn't it?"

A shadow crossed her face, and she looked down at her cup.
"That's right. She's a senior at Cadyville High."
"

I also volunteer at Heaven House."

"Really." Now she looked wary.

"I heard about someone named Lisa who'd called in on the
Helpline, and the guy who ran the place got in some kind of trouble for the advice he gave her. Then when Kyla and Cyan were
talking about your Lisa the other day it sounded like they might
be one and the same girl."

"Philip Heaven overstepped his bounds," she said, getting up
and grabbing the coffeepot. She brought it back to the built-in
table and topped off my cup. "She ran away. Well, what she called running away, which was to go stay at her boyfriend's house for a
few days without telling me where she was. I don't even remember
what her reason was that time. We've had a lot of problems ever
since her dad died a couple years ago." She slid back into the seat
across from me and took a sip from her cup. "Drunk driver."

I nodded. "I remember that. I'm so sorry. I lost my husband
several years ago, but it was to cancer."

"I'm sorry, too, and for you. I had to try and keep things together for Lisa and her little brother and me, and it was ... hard. I
missed Steve so much-still do. Things are better now; I went back
to school and got my CPA license and I'm finally getting my feet
under me, at least financially." She took another sip of coffee and
looked out the window at her massive white horse. "Lisa had a
hard time, though. And I didn't know what to do to help. She
seemed to hate me. Still does, most of the time." Mandy sighed
and closed her eyes for a moment. "I don't know. Maybe he was
right. Maybe she is better off away from me."

That darn near broke my heart. I hardened my resolve and
plunged on. "Did you report Philip Heaven at the time?"

"Sort of. Not that I heard anything back, but I did write a letter
to the muckety-mucks at the foundation that funded that place.
Don't think it did any good. I imagine he still answers the Helpline
himself and tells anyone who calls whatever he pleases."

"Not exactly."

Something in my tone made her sit back. "What do you
mean?"

"He's dead."

Her hand flew to her mouth. "What happened?"

"Botulism poisoning. A few days ago."

She grimaced. "Oh, man. That sucks. I don't care what a jerk
he was, no one deserves that."

As I drove down Mandy Koller's driveway to the county road, I
considered our conversation. Not only did she genuinely seem to
be unaware that Philip had died, but it apparently never occurred
to her that I was sitting in her home more because of his death
than because I needed help with my accounting. I'd never met
anyone so non-defensive in my life.

It was my good luck she could be a real help to Winding Road
Bath Products. That was the upside. The downside was that I was
still no closer to discovering Philip Heaven's murderer than I had
been a couple days ago.

Or was that really true? Finding out more about the email
threats from Ann and Mandy had led me to discount them as real
suspects. They hadn't threatened him physically, after all, only
threatened to report him to the foundation. And both of them
had done exactly that.

It didn't sound like the foundation cared much about what
Philip did with his little community center brainchild. Their apathy
was no doubt due in large part to his last name being Heaven, and
the favorite grandchild of the foundation's founder. It was such a
shame, because Heaven House had a lot of potential. Now, with
Jude in charge, I hoped it would finally live up to it and become an
institution that provided real help to the citizens of Cadyville.

Anyway, I was pretty sure Ann hadn't killed Philip, and after
talking with Mandy, I was pretty sure she hadn't either. And no, the latter opinion was not influenced in the least by the fact that I
was looking forward to having her take over a big chunk of my accounting. Honest.

So who was left?

I took a deep breath. I could go home and take a quick nap before I picked Barr up, or I could drop by HH yet again and see
what I could dig up.

Oh, but a nap. The thought held magical appeal. I veered toward home.

"I CAN'T FIGURE OUT how the killer did it," I said.

Brodie cocked his corgi head at me and made a noise low in his
throat. Meghan and Erin were gone by the time I got home, presumably out in the wilds of yurtdom in the Cascade Mountains.

That left me and Brodie. I was going to take a nap, really, I was,
but my nerves were kind of jangled from all the coffee, and I was a
little afraid if I fell asleep I'd be down for the count. I had to pick
up Barr in half an hour, after all.

Now that it was right there in my face, I kept thinking about
what it would be like to have my boyfriend around the house on a
constant basis.

Good. Right? Sure. Besides, it would only be for a little while.

I sat in a rocking chair on the covered front porch, wrapped up
in a big down coat. The rain spattered down onto the pavement of
the street, causing minute movements of the grass blades in the
front yard. I'd pulled a black wool watch cap down over my ears
and no doubt presented a very pretty picture.

And I talked to the dog. He was a very good listener.

"So whoever killed Philip had to get the botulism laden beets
to him in the first place. How, exactly, do you do that? Do you have
access to his apartment? Do you give them to him personally and
take the risk he'll tell someone where he got them? How could you
be sure he'd eat them? Did he really like beets? A lot of people
don't."