Plum Deadly (4 page)

A huge old magnolia tree stood in the front yard with a few brick-outlined flowerbeds that held azaleas and boxwoods. Maggie remembered red and yellow tulips blooming here every spring from her childhood.

Everything about the house spoke of neglect, Maggie noticed as they walked up the cracked concrete stairs to the house. She supposed after Uncle Fred had died, it had been hard for Aunt Clara to get the larger things done. After straightening up her aunt’s ledgers on the computer, Maggie was painfully aware that the pie shop barely made ends meet.

Inside the house were the same carpets and furniture that had been there for as long as Maggie could recall. She’d never seen a dust bunny on any of the hardwood floors, but the walls needed painting and the whole place needed some sprucing up.

There was no way she could help now—at least not until she found another job. She regretted the years she could have and didn’t act. She hadn’t even thought her aunt might need help.

It had taken a fall from privilege and grace to wake her up. Maggie was grateful to realize how blind she’d been and she was determined to make it up to her aunt in some way.

For now, she was going to have to focus on getting her job back. If Lou knew she was innocent, someone else must know too. She still had some contacts, people who could check into it for her. If nothing else, she could call the New York police and tell them what had happened.

The two women dropped into wood chairs with flower cushions in the kitchen. For a long time, they simply sat and stared, too upset to speak, as the evening waned into night.

“Well, this will never do.” Aunt Clara finally got up and went to the refrigerator. “I’ve got this eggplant in here, Maggie. I’m going to fry it up and we’ll eat it. Uncle Fred always loved eggplant, remember?”

“I remember.” Maggie smiled. “He loved it with a ton of cheese and tomato sauce on it. I don’t think he really liked the eggplant.”

Aunt Clara laughed. “I think you’re right. I’m not crazy about it either, still I don’t want to see it go to waste. Mrs. Thompson gave me a bunch of it from her garden.”

Maggie agreed and snapped some green beans, also from Mrs. Thompson.

Clara peeled and sliced then fried the breaded eggplant. “You know, we’ve got some curry in there that Raji gave us too.”

“Sounds like a feast to me!”

After Maggie had made the sweet tea and poured it into tall ice-filled glasses, the two women were sitting down to eat when the doorbell rang.

“I’m Ryan Summerour,” the man on the porch said when Maggie opened the door. “I’m with the
Durham Weekly
. I wanted to talk with Maggie Grady or Clara Lowder. Are they in?”

Maggie knew trouble when she saw it.

The reporter had slightly curly blond hair, big blue eyes, and a flirty smile Maggie didn’t trust. He looked to be in his late thirties, maybe forty. He wore jeans and a Duke jacket that he looked good in. He probably knew it too.

Maggie didn’t buy it. This was bad news for her and her aunt. It meant the local newspaper wanted to cover the story about Lou’s death.

She’d had her fill of reporters when she left the bank. Their questions had been insulting and horrible.

Before she could say no thanks and slam the door in Ryan Summerour’s face, Aunt Clara came from the kitchen and welcomed him into her home.

“I read your paper every week, cover to cover,” she told the reporter. “I don’t like the daily, you know. It’s such a rag. Nothing but crime and traffic accidents.”

“Thanks,” he responded. “I appreciate that—?”

“Oh! I’m Clara Lowder and this is my niece, Maggie Grady.”

“It’s nice to meet you, Mrs. Lowder.”

He was talking to Aunt Clara, Maggie noticed, though he was looking at her. She was sure he already knew what had happened. He’d come to torture them about it. She had to find a way to get rid of him, despite Aunt Clara’s hero worship.

“We were sitting down for dinner.” Maggie thought that might deter him until she could talk to her aunt and warn her about interviews.

“Maggie’s right.” Aunt Clara smiled and took his arm. “Lucky we have plenty. Maybe you could join us.”

Ryan’s gaze zeroed in on Maggie again. “I’d be delighted.”

Great.

They walked back to the kitchen together where the eggplant, green beans, and curry were waiting. Aunt Clara asked him to sit down and had Maggie get him a glass of tea.

“I heard that you had some bad news at your shop today,” Ryan began pleasantly. “I was wondering if you’d like to talk about it for the paper.”

“Certainly!” Aunt Clara danced around the kitchen getting more napkins. “I think that would be fine.”

Maggie smiled at the reporter. “Will you excuse us, Mr. Summerour?”

She grabbed Aunt Clara’s hand and pulled her out of the kitchen, closing the door behind them. “We can’t talk to him,” she whispered.

“Why not?”

“Because he’ll put it in the paper,” Maggie said. “You don’t want that.”

“Of course I do!” Aunt Clara grinned impishly, her wrinkled face showing some of her youth. “Ryan Summerour is a trustworthy journalist, like his father before him. He’ll do right by us. Now come and eat before everything gets cold.”

“Aunt Clara—”

“Cheer up, Maggie,” her aunt advised. “It’s not like we killed someone!”

R
yan Summerour was
witty, charming, and never pushed for the story they all knew he wanted. He raved about the eggplant and the green beans and even helped do the dishes when the meal was over.

Aunt Clara rambled on about everything under the sun—from the pie shop to Fred’s death and Maggie coming home in disgrace.

It was a good thing Ryan seemed to have a big appetite, because Maggie couldn’t eat a thing. It was bad enough that he was a reporter. Aunt Clara didn’t seem to understand
that he could print anything she told him. Trusting him to do the right thing was crazy.

Maggie was angry too. She knew the reporter was leading Aunt Clara on to get his story. No telling what kind of awful garbage he would end up saying about them in the paper. She had to find a way to end the evening with him.

They went into the living room when the kitchen was clean. Clara had barely sat down when she remembered that she had some Amazing Apple pie in the refrigerator and went to put on some coffee. She refused both their offers of help, and even winked at Maggie before she left.

Oh no.

Maggie knew what that meant. Aunt Clara had always been fond of matchmaking. It hadn’t happened since Maggie had come back. The past, though, was another story. Her aunt had managed to set her up with her friends’ sons and nephews a few times in college.

“Your aunt is quite a woman,” Ryan said when they were alone.

“She is,” Maggie replied in an irritable voice. She’d reached her limit with this tell-all. Now that they were alone, she could tell him to get out.

“You must be very proud of her.”

“I am.”

“I get the feeling you aren’t as happy about me being here as your aunt.”

“Really? I think you should leave now. I’d appreciate it if you’d keep Aunt Clara out of your story. She doesn’t know anything about what happened. She doesn’t deserve to be ridiculed for the benefit of your readers. She’s an old lady
who just sees the good in everyone. You shouldn’t use her to sell papers. I don’t care what you say about me.”

Maggie got to her feet for good measure.

Ryan seemed unfazed by her rant. “That’s fine. I appreciate your honesty. But if you don’t want me to ask your aunt questions about what happened today at Pie in the Sky, I suggest you start giving me some information I can use. You’re the involved party here, right?”

He was tougher than she’d thought, though not as mean spirited. The last thing she’d wanted was to come back home from ruining her own reputation just to ruin her aunt’s.

“What does that mean?” she demanded. “Do you think I had something to do with Lou’s death?”

“The only thing I know right now is that the police have you listed as a person of interest in the case. I’ve been involved with several murder cases. That usually means they think you were involved in some way. I won’t be the only reporter on your doorstep once all of this gets out.”

That’s just great.

Maggie tried to think of a way to defuse this situation—she’d have to deal with the rest of it later. Obviously, Ryan was going to print something about what had happened. Maybe she could convince him to print her side of it.

“I’ll tell you as much as I know,” she said. “You’d better be as trustworthy as my aunt thinks you are.”

Carefully, with halting words and long pauses, she poured out her whole story to him. She was angry, but she’d managed not to cry. It was a relief, in a way, to tell it from start to finish. The ending, for that moment at least, being Lou’s death.

Ryan nodded as he quickly wrote down everything she said in a battered notebook. “So you think your ex-boss was killed to keep the real story about the bank theft quiet?”

Maggie got up and paced the room, across the worn Persian carpet, between the Windsor chairs, as the antique mantel clock chimed nine. “I don’t know. It seems far-fetched. He probably had a heart attack. He wasn’t in the best shape.”

“But you have suspicions?”

“The police made me think there might be something more. I guess that’s why you’re here too, Mr. Summerour.”

“Please, call me Ryan.”

“All right, Ryan. You can call me Maggie.” She paced again for a moment. “Lou said he’d called a press conference for tomorrow morning where he’d expose the real thief to the world. He was good at grand gestures. I’m sure that’s why he didn’t tell me who it was. He wanted me to be as surprised as everyone else. That was Lou—always looking for the drama.”

Ryan raised his eyebrows. “If he did announce a press conference, he didn’t tell my paper. Have you heard about it from any other news source?”

She could tell from the way he’d said it that it was an unforgivable slight. “Maybe he sent it to one of the other reporters at your paper.”

“I’m it,” he confessed. “Owner. Publisher. Reporter. Janitor. If I didn’t get word—”

“Maybe he meant TV news.”

He put his notebook away and studied her for a moment. “I’d like to give you the benefit of the doubt on this, Maggie.
My paper is a weekly, so it doesn’t come out again until next Wednesday. Let’s see what happens between now and then. The case could have broken wide open by then. It’s the curse of publishing a weekly.”

She was completely amazed by his attitude. Maybe Aunt Clara was right and he wasn’t so bad. She didn’t quite trust him. At this point, it would be hard to trust anyone. “Thanks. I really appreciate that.”

“You have to be honest with me.” He got to his feet. “I want to help you and your aunt. If anything else comes up that the police don’t know about, you have to share it with me. Don’t let me read some groundbreaking evidence on someone’s blog.”

“Okay. I can do that. You promise to leave Aunt Clara out of it?”

“I do.”

Aunt Clara came in at that moment, pulling the tea cart laden with coffee, cups, and slices of apple pie. Her timing was perfect, of course, since she’d been listening to their conversation from around the corner. “Who wants dessert?”

• • •

R
yan stayed for
another half hour. He regaled them with funny stories about the newspaper business that he’d grown up in. He made them laugh when he told them about helping his parents with everything from rolling papers to being hoisted up on his father’s shoulders to take pictures. It seemed that he’d been destined to work as a newspaper reporter.

After he’d said good night, Aunt Clara saw him to the door and returned with a brilliant smile.

“Wasn’t he a nice man? Did you find out if he was single? I didn’t see a wedding band on his finger when he took his pie and coffee, did you?”

Maggie grimaced. “I
knew
that’s what you were thinking. How could you even consider matchmaking at a time like this? I didn’t ask him if he was single. I didn’t even think about it.”

“But he’s very handsome too, don’t you think?”

“I didn’t notice,” Maggie lied as she took the dirty plates and cups to the kitchen. She’d noticed that Ryan was good looking. She wasn’t blind. It just wasn’t the right time or place for romance.

Aunt Clara looked hurt. “I’m worried about you. I don’t want you to be alone when something happens to me. You need someone to love you and share this house with you, when the time comes. Although, it would be nice if you’d have a few babies
before
the time came.”

Maggie put her arm around her aunt and kissed her cheek. “I know I’ve been a rotten niece. I’m going to try and make that up to you. I don’t know if I can find a husband and have children right away, but I’ll do anything else I can to make your life better.”

“I have a wonderful life already,” her aunt protested.

As they turned out the lights in the front of the house, Maggie said, “I was thinking when I get my old job back, or another job, that we could sell the pie shop and the house. You could come and live with me in New York. What do you think about that?”