Pinned for Murder (30 page)

It took everything she had not to pull Milo out the door the second he returned, the picture that had begun to form in her head begging to be discussed and dissected. But, once again, the opportunity to do so rested on the ringing of the final bell.

Something that was still a good thirty minutes away.

“You okay, Tori?” he asked as he waited for his students to return to their desks. “You look as if you’ve seen a ghost.”

She swallowed back the urge to scream. “The
truth
is more like it.”

“The truth? What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Mr. Wentworth? Todd just kicked the back of my chair.”

He looked up at the ceiling and sighed.

“We’ll talk later.” She turned toward the door only to stop midway and retrace her steps. “Can I take this with me? I promise I’ll be careful . . . with the flag.”

“Yeah, sure, I guess.” Handing the case to her, he held it a second longer than necessary. “Can you at least tell me if you’re okay?”

“I’m okay,” she repeated. “But call me as soon as you’re done for the day. We need to talk.”

He studied her for a moment, his eyes a dead giveaway to the pull he felt in her direction. “Can you hang tight until then? Because if you can’t, I can get another teacher to cover me.”

“No. I’ll wait. It’s only thirty minutes.”

A glance at the clock confirmed her words, chasing the worry from his eyes. “Okay. Thirty minutes.”

She looked down at the case in her hands, her eyes riveted on the crude carving on the back.

M.T.B.

Could it really be?

She knew the answer. Felt it with every fiber of her being.

But why? Why would Doug take a flag case from a dead woman’s home? Unless . . .

Her feet froze in the hallway as a reality she hadn’t even considered reared its head with such clarity it couldn’t be ignored any longer.

“Maybe she wasn’t dead. Maybe he killed her,” she whispered, her words echoing against the tiled walls of Sweet Briar Elementary.

But why? Was a case really worth murdering someone?

She had to know.

Flipping her phone open, she dialed Rose’s number.

“Hello?”

“Rose, it’s Tori . . . I mean, Victoria.”

“You sound awful.”

“I have to ask you a question. But I don’t want to say why I’m asking just yet. In case I’m wrong.”

“What is it?”

She inhaled, mustering up every ounce of courage she could find. “Do you, by any chance, have an extra key to Martha Jane’s house?”

Silence was followed by a faint sound in the background. “I have one right here in my drawer.”

“Can I borrow it for a few minutes?”

More silence followed.

“Rose? Are you still there?”

“You said no questions, right?”

She smiled in spite of the knowledge she held. “Yes.”

“Then you may borrow it.”

“You’re a lifesaver, Rose.”

Rose sighed in her ear. “If that were the case, Martha Jane would be alive.”

She let herself in the back door, her feet sounding suspiciously guilty as she made her way down the same hall she’d traveled just the day before. Only this time there was no notebook in her hand. Simply a key . . .

A key that would hopefully lead her to the truth once and for all. A truth she was more apt to see with a focused eye.

Once again, the bedroom door was shut, the room closed tight by Chief Dallas. And, once again, she turned the knob and pushed the door open, the same stale air that had greeted her the day before welcoming her back for a second visit.

Only this time she didn’t head straight for the window. Instead, she made her way over to the dresser, her gaze focused on the jewelry box on the top of the mahogany dresser.

“
M.T.B.
,” she whispered as she took hold of the box and turned it upside down.

Sure enough, the same crude initials she’d seen just an hour earlier were duplicated on the bottom of the box. Initials Martha Jane had said her great-grandfather carved into the bottom of the piece.

She set the box down and lifted the frame off the nightstand. Once again, the same dark cherry wood was used, the same three letters carved into the back.

She turned toward the case on the wall, the same case she’d inventoried just the day before, the use of pine suddenly standing out from the rest in a way she couldn’t believe she’d missed.

Pulling it from its nail, she turned it over and studied the back.

Not a single solitary initial anywhere.

Aware of her heart beating double time inside her chest, she turned the case over once again, her gaze drawn to the town’s chosen symbols—the flame, the white picket fence bathed in sunlight, and the bricks.

Six bricks.

“Six,” she repeated aloud.

She closed her eyes and willed herself to return to the moment she’d stood beside the elderly woman and learned about the town’s historic flag. But there was nothing.

Opening her eyes, she stared at the details of the flag.

The picket fence bathed in sunlight represented warmth and friendliness—that she could remember. It had struck a chord with her, one she’d shared with Martha Jane.

“Hogwash is what it is. Except for the pile of bricks. That one at least is accurate. Or was for about three weeks . . . before the founders ordered a new one on account of their feeling that six bricks represented strength better than three.”

“Then why are there six?” she mumbled as she counted the bricks for the umpteenth time, the final total one she could see as easily as she could count.

Turning the case over once again, she swiveled each of the three metal flaps to the side and pulled the back cover out and onto the dresser. Once that was complete, she grabbed hold of the flag and lifted it from the case, slowly unfolding it across the bed. The fabric, the stitching, and the thread were exact duplicates of Rose’s current efforts.

Which meant one thing . . .

The flag stretched before her now was a new flag.

But why would someone replace the old flag with a new—

“. . . the souvenirs I bring back from each trip helps. Teaches them things, too . . .”

She covered her mouth as a series of chilling conversations swept through every corner of her mind.

He’d been to Chicago . . .

“Brought my kids back a jar of water from the lake. Didn’t work so well. My son and my daughter each want something different . . .”

And then, less than an hour ago, he’d mentioned an idea he had for his son, something that would document Doug’s time in Sweet Briar . . .

“. . . I’m considerin’ a book on Sweet Briar’s history as a souvenir for my son . . .”

She swallowed against the bile that rose in her throat.

Doug had said his children didn’t like to share. Which meant one thing. His daughter still needed something from Sweet Briar . . .

“The town’s very first flag would certainly fit that bill,” she whispered, the sound of her cell phone cutting through her words.

Looking at the display screen, she heaved a sigh of relief and headed toward the window. “Milo, hi. I’m so glad you called.”

She tucked the phone under her cheek and slid the window up, the late afternoon breeze lifting her hair from her face.

“So what’s going on? Why did you look so upset when you left? And why did you want my flag case?”

“Because it was the clue I’ve been looking for.” Spinning around, she leaned against the wall beside the window, her gaze riveted on the outstretched flag that adorned Martha Jane’s empty bed.

“Clue?”

“To Kenny’s innocence.”

“I thought you’d given up on that.”

She inhaled deeply, the truth she’d assembled over the past hour bringing a sense of peace she hadn’t felt in days.

“I had.”

“So what changed?”

“Reality.”

“Huh?”

“I know who killed Martha Jane. And it wasn’t Kenny. I’m positive of that now.”

A sound outside the window startled her and she pushed off the wall for a closer look.

Nothing.

Nothing except for one of Paris’s many kinfolk.

“It wasn’t until I saw the initials on the back of your flag case that I started to put two and two together,” she continued.

“Initials? What initials?”

“On the back of the case. Martha Jane told me about them that day I was here . . .” Her words trailed off as she heard another sound, this time coming from the hallway outside Martha Jane’s room. “Milo, can you hang on a second? I think Rose might be looking for me . . .”

A large calloused hand reached around the corner and through the open doorway, Doug’s face emerging just as he smacked the phone from her hand. “Did you tell him?” he hissed through a mouth that no longer sported the endearing smile she’d come to associate with the drifter who’d shown up on Rose’s doorstep looking for work.

“Tell who, what?” she asked as she looked down at the still-open phone. “Milo! I’m at M—”

His hand swept down and grabbed the phone, shutting it inside his strong hands. “You couldn’t leave well enough alone, could you?”

She backed up, her legs bumping into Martha Jane’s bed. “Was a flag really that important?”

“It shouldn’t have been. But that old hag came in just as I was takin’ it off the wall. She started squawkin’ about lazy bums and good-for-nothin’ drifters and I snapped.” He leaned his face toward hers. “I just snapped. It happens.”

“Murdering an innocent woman doesn’t just
happen
.”

“It does when she threatens to have you arrested.”

“You were trying to
steal
from her, Doug,” she shouted. “What was she supposed to do?”

“She was supposed to stay away until I’d gotten the damn thing off the wall and out of the room.”

“How did you even know about it?” she asked as she tried everything she could think of to buy herself some time.

“Anyone within a quarter-mile radius heard her talkin’ to you that afternoon. About her precious money . . . her precious flag . . . the two lazy bums working just outside that window”—he pointed toward the back wall—“and that idiot who hung around Rose’s house all the time. The one she was so certain stole her money.”

“Idiot?” she hissed through clenched teeth.

“Did you ever hear him talk? That guy could barely string a sentence together without tripping over his words. But he worked out well for me.”

She stared at him, anger raging through every muscle. “You mean he was the perfect scapegoat.”

He nodded. “Couldn’t ask for better.”

“And now?”

His face clouded. “You mean with you?”

Fear begin to surface through the anger as she realized no one knew where she was except Rose. And she’d all but begged her not to ask questions . . .

“I suppose you’ll have an unfortunate fall . . . unless you have a better idea. Something I can duplicate from a book, perhaps?”

A book . . .

She felt her mouth turn upward a smidge. “They’re going to figure it out.”

“Who?”

“The cops. Milo. Rose. Everyone. They’ll figure it out when they go through the notebook I gave Chief Dallas yesterday. Martha Jane’s sister will realize the flag case doesn’t match . . . that the flag is wrong.”

He shrugged. “And what if she does? I’ll be long gone by then.” He jumped forward, his face mere centimeters from hers. “I am a drifter after all, right?”

“You mean a carpetbagger, don’t you?”

Doug whirled around as Tori’s anger ballooned into full-fledged fear—for the woman standing in the doorway with a telephone in her hand.

“Get out of here, Rose!” she shouted. “Go! Now!”

“I heard what you said”—Rose stammered—“about Kenny. And I heard what you did to Martha Jane.”

He looked back over his shoulder, Tori’s gaze following his to the open window.

“Two of us can’t fall, Doug,” she pleaded, her worry for her elderly friend far more tangible than the fear she had for herself. She could put up a fight. Rose couldn’t.

“I don’t see why not.” He reached out, wrapped his elbow around Tori’s neck and dragged her toward the door. “It’s not like Rose has anything left in her.”

“Freeze. You’re under arrest,” Chief Dallas yelled as he moved into place behind Rose.

The elderly woman nodded toward the policeman, a slow but deliberate smile making its way across her face. “I’ve got more left than you know, young man.”

Chapter 29

She woke to the sun streaming through her window, her mind relatively quiet for the first time in days.

There’d been nothing to keep her staring at the clock, nothing to make her reach for the phone in the middle of the night, nothing to make her stomach feel as if she were perched on the top of a ninety degree hill with no seat belt to hold her in place.

In fact, there’d been nothing but peace . . .

A peace that came from knowing the truth had finally been revealed, freeing a wrongly accused man and putting the right one behind bars in the process.

It was as it should be.

Although the part about Curtis still bothered her.