Éclair and Present Danger (10 page)

M
ore times than she probably should have, Winnie found herself stealing glances in Mark Reilly's direction as he flitted around the private room, sharing memories of his stepfather with a tear in his eye.

With Mr. Nelson, he'd looked back fondly on his mom and Bart's annual flower beds, sharing a behind-the-scenes account that included tales of drawings and spreadsheets in the weeks leading up to planting season.

With Bridget, Mark lamented his good fortune in being raised by a man like Bart.

With Peggy Landon, one of Serenity Lane's earliest settlers, he recounted the patience his stepfather had shown him when he'd resisted riding his first bike as a young boy.

Observing (and, yes, eavesdropping) from a distance, it was easy to view each and every encounter as insincere—a show put forth by a very viable suspect in Bart's murder. Yet, the moment Mark got around to Winnie and started talking about how much her peach pie promise to his
mother had truly meant to Bart, she couldn't help but want to scratch his name off her mental suspect list.

Up close, Mark's grief over Bart's death seemed sincere.

Up close, his outrage over the manner in which Bart died seemed true.

But was it?

“Nice article in this morning's paper.”

She looked up from her half-eaten lunch to find Greg Stevens's dimples on full display. “Oh. Greg. Hi.” Pushing her plate forward, she wiggled out of her chair and extended her hand to the uniformed man. “I didn't know you knew Bart.”

Greg's broad shoulders shrugged beneath the dark blue fabric of his shirt. “I didn't, really. But Chuck”—she followed the line of his finger to the redhead talking to Mark at the far end of the table—“over there wanted to stop by.”

“Do you always go to the funerals of people you aren't able to save?”

“Sometimes. Depends on the circumstances.” He took inventory of Winnie's dress and then gestured to her hair. “I like your hair down like that. It's really pretty.”

“Thank you.”

“We wanted to come by the service, but a call on the other side of town prevented us from being able to do that. So here we are at the repast—although we're not staying to eat.”

Mr. Nelson pushed his chair into the gap between them and pointed up at Greg. “That's right, young fella, there's meat . . . but it's a bit rubbery if you ask me.”

The dimples disappeared as Greg drew back, confused. “I'm sorry, I—”

She reached out, placed one hand on Greg's forearm and one hand on Mr. Nelson's shoulder. “Mr. Nelson, he said
eat
 . . . not
meat
. And he's not staying to do that.”

“Smart man,” Mr. Nelson muttered as he scooted his
chair back to the table and resumed his conversation with the thirty-something brunette on his other side.

A flicker of amusement brought the paramedic's dimples back in play. “You know this guy?” Greg asked, lowering his voice to a near whisper.

Unsure of how to take the question, she merely nodded.

“A bit hard of hearing, I take it?”

“He does okay.” She heard the defensive note to her tone and, instead, let her gaze return to the far end of the table and the two men now in full-blown conversation. “So you came to accompany Chuck?”

“We're riding together today.”

“I see.” But she really didn't. She was still trying to decide whether his comment about Mr. Nelson had been a simple case of making conversation or the first sign of a person she didn't care to continue knowing.

“Turns out, Chuck has known the victim for a while.”

“Oh?”

“From what I gather, Mr. Wagner used to run some sort of collectors club in town and Chuck started attending meetings with his dad when he was a kid.” Greg widened his stance and rocked back on his heels. “I think his dad was into old Lionel trains and Chuck did something with baseball cards. When Chuck's parents moved to Florida a few years ago, Chuck stayed on with the club.

“Anyway, enough of that. I saw the article in the weekend section of the
Herald
this morning. You must be really excited.”

“I am. Bridget did a great job.”

“Have you slept at all in the last day or so?” he asked.

She hated that her hands moved to her face as she revisited her brief look in the bathroom mirror at the church, but she couldn't help it. “It's that obvious, huh?”

Again his dimples disappeared as reality dawned across his handsome face. “No. That's not what I meant. You—you
look fine—great, actually. I just saw the pictures of the inside of the ambulance and know it must have taken some time to doctor it up like that.”

“Oh.” She brought her hands back down to her sides and resisted the urge to hug Chuck for the distraction that came from his sudden appearance at her elbow. “It's—it's nice to see you again, Chuck.”

“You, too, Winnie.” Chuck looked from Greg to Winnie and back again before clearing his throat awkwardly. “So, uh . . . nice piece in the paper this morning. Are you excited to get going on Monday?”

“Excited, and a little bit scared, too.”

“Scared?” Greg echoed.

She reached across the top edge of her chair and rescued her water glass from the table. “Sure. This whole business idea could be the cleverest thing in the world. But it won't matter if no one calls and places an order.”

“They'll call.” Bridget sidled up alongside Greg, locked gazes with Winnie, and hooked her thumb in the paramedic's direction.

The gesture alone was embarrassing all on its own, but it was the not-so-subtle cluck of appreciation that accompanied the gesture that had Winnie trading her next sip for a gulp.

“I agree.”

She knew she should acknowledge Greg's faith in her idea with something more than a quick glare in Bridget's direction, but she couldn't. Not at that moment, anyway. No, what she truly needed (and desperately wanted) at that exact moment was a trapdoor beneath her feet.

*   *   *

S
he leaned back against the lip of the porch and watched as Lovey jumped off her housemate's lap and wandered toward the staircase on which Winnie sat. “So what did you think about the service and the repast today, Mr. Nelson?”

Mr. Nelson moved his white knight, smiled
triumphantly, and then glanced up from his chessboard. “I think the showing from Serenity Lane was nice to see . . .”

“Minus the Donovans, of course.”

“That's just as well. Not sure I'd have been able to hold my tongue about that intentional flowerbed trampling the other day.” Mr. Nelson leaned back in his chair and lifted his chin to the gentle late afternoon breeze. “The service was nice. Father Deagen did a fine job, although he needs to secure a different organist.”

“I thought the organist was fine.”

“That's because I was sitting
between
you and Bridget.”

Lovey lowered her body to the floor, flapped her tail from side to side, and then darted past Winnie in an attempt to kill a lone dandelion swaying in the breeze. “What does your placement between Bridget and me have to do with the organist?” she asked.

“His playing encouraged her to sing.”

“We were at a funeral, Mr. Nelson. That's what we were supposed to do.”

Mr. Nelson crinkled his nose and then dropped his gaze back to the dark brown pieces on the table in front of him. “I will say, I found myself wondering, from time to time, if a reevaluation of Mark Reilly was in order. Especially at the repast.”

She sat up tall. “You, too?”

He paused his hand on the rook, mumbled something unintelligible, and then switched to the bishop. “Seems as if Bart meant a good deal to that young man.”

Seems . . .

There was that word again. Only this time, it wasn't just taking up space inside her head.

“Do you believe it?” she asked.

Mr. Nelson moved the rook four spots, held it between his fingertips a few beats, and then backed it up one spot. “I know he gave his parents a hard time for a lot of years. He was one who always wanted things handed to him—second
chances, money, accolades, you name it. But Mark wouldn't be the first person to look back on his youth and realize he could have been more appreciative.”

She processed her friend's words while simultaneously watching Lovey stalk her way around the yard—a leaf, another dandelion, a butterfly . . . “I wish I'd had the courage to ask him outright about the house, but it just didn't seem to be the appropriate time or place, you know?”

“
I
asked him.”

She turned in time to watch Mr. Nelson remove his hand from the rook and gesture toward his nonexistent opponent. “You
asked
him?”

“I sure did.”

“What did he say?”

“He didn't. Someone came over and tapped him on the shoulder the second I finished the question.”

“Okay, but did you see any sort of reaction before he turned away?”

Mr. Nelson caressed his stubbled chin and contemplated the white side's next move. “You mean other than the way his eyes darted around his head and the color drained from his face?”

“Interesting . . .”

“That's one word for it.” Mr. Nelson moved his white knight around his forward-most pawn and sat back. “The one that came to mind at the time, though, was
guilty
.”

“But he seemed so sincere, so genuinely distraught over losing them both so quickly.”

“I take it Bart or Ethel never told you what Mark pursued in college?”

She searched her memory bank for an answer to the question but came up empty. “I thought Mark dropped out of college . . .”

“He did. But he went for a few months.”

“Okay . . .”

“He wanted to be an actor. And, from what I saw when he was in high school, he was quite good at it. One minute he could be a swashbuckling pirate in
Treasure Island
, and the next he could be down on his luck in
Death of a Salesman
.”

“So you think he was faking today?”

“I can't say for sure.” Mr. Nelson reached for his cane and used it to steady himself as he stood. “But I've got my eye on that young man, Winnie Girl. If Mark had something to do with Bart's death, I will do everything I can to see that he pays for his crime.”

“I know you will, Mr. Nelson. And I'll help.”

Mr. Nelson caned his way over to the stairs, winked at Winnie, and then looked out over their shared front yard. “You're a good girl, Winnie Johnson. A real blessing to all of us, you know that?”

“The feeling is mutual, Mr. Nelson.” And it was. She'd be lost without her friends. They kept her grounded as to what mattered most in life.

“Now, if we can just get Lovey to realize how lucky she is to have you as her new owner, we'll be all set.”

She didn't mean to snort when she laughed, but she couldn't help it. Some things just seemed impossible to imagine. Lovey warming up to her was one of those things.

“I don't know what Gertie was thinking when she left Lovey to me. It's not like I've ever really had a pet before.”

“That's not what I heard.”

She opened her mouth to protest but closed it as a certain pixie-haired female flitted her way through Winnie's thoughts. “You've been talking to Renee, haven't you?”

“Don't worry, Winnie, your secret is safe with me.”

“It
shook
!” she insisted. “I was
three
! How was I supposed to know?”

Holding tight to his cane with his right hand, Mr. Nelson started to lean down to pat her shoulder but stopped
and pointed across the yard instead. “There she goes again, that little rascal.”

“Little ras—” Winnie turned in time to see a flash of brown and white hightail it across the street and around the back corner of Bart and Ethel's house—a gap in the late couple's basement window Lovey's likely destination.

“G
ood heavens, Parker, you bring new meaning to the word
slow
,” Bridget said mid-moan.

Mr. Nelson inserted the key in the top lock and turned it to the right, the answering click exactly the same as it had been the first five times he'd tried. “Hush, woman, this is tricky business!”

“Top lock to the right, bottom lock to the left is tricky business?” Bridget rolled her eyes up to the porch ceiling and released an audible breath of air through her nose. “Do you hear this, Winnie? This is why the youth of America write us off once we hit seventy. Because we lose our common sense.”

Winnie stepped forward, reached around Mr. Nelson, and laid her hand atop his. “How about I give it a try?”

For a moment, she thought the man was going to protest, his trembling grip on the key as determined as ever. Eventually, though, he let go and took a step backward, mumbling under his breath. “I tell you, Winnie Girl, if I'd have wanted to be nagged all the time, I'd have gotten married.”

At any other time, she probably would have laughed, but this wasn't any other time. In fact, when it came right down to it, what they were doing was probably illegal. That is, if she could actually unlock the door—which she couldn't. “And you're sure it's okay for us to be letting ourselves into Bart's house like this?”

“That's why I have a key,” Mr. Nelson said for what had to be the fifth time. “Got it from Bart, myself.”

“But Bart's dead now. Shouldn't we be checking with his son, first—”

“Excuse me. Can I help you with something?”

Winnie, Bridget, and Mr. Nelson turned in unison toward the road and the thirty-something bearded man staring back at them across the front seat of a now-familiar silver two-door sedan that had seen better days.

“Oh, Mr. Nelson . . . Ms. O'Keefe . . . Winnie . . . I didn't realize it was you.” Lance Reed's face rescinded from view through the open window only to reappear across the roof of the car via his now-open driver's side door. “Sorry about that. I just knew Mr. Wagner had passed and was afraid someone was trying to break in.”

Bridget crossed to the railing. “That would imply that Parker had actually managed to open the door.”

Winnie could feel the defeat that weighed Mr. Nelson's shoulders down and rushed to make things right. “My new cat went and got herself into Bart's house via a bad screen out back. Last time she did this, she came back out on her own. This time, she's being a bit of a pill.”

“And that, right there, is why I've always been a dog owner.” Lance raked a hand through his coarse auburn-colored hair and then let it thump back down on the top of his car. “A lot less stress.”

“And this, right here, Lance,” Mr. Nelson said, pointing the end of his cane at Bridget, “is why I've always been single.”

She was grateful for the instinct that had her biting back
the laugh Lance didn't. After all, Bridget's glares were legendary around Silver Lake. Still, Winnie didn't want Serenity Lane's latest newcomer to bear the brunt of Bridget's wrath (a wrath that could mean exclusion from the annual summer block party invite list if he wasn't careful), so she, too, stepped over to the rail. “Thank you for paying such close attention, though. Awareness is what will keep another tragedy from happening on this street.”

Bingo.

Sure enough, any irritation Bridget harbored on the heels of Lance's ill-advised laugh gave way to an energetic and heartfelt nod from Winnie's left and right.

“Yes. Winnie is right, Mr. Reed. Thank you.”

“My pleasure, Ms. O'Keefe.” Lance tapped his hands on the roof of his car and then stepped back. “Well, I better get home. I spent way too much time at the car lot this morning, and I've got to start preparing for Monday's class.”

“Finally getting a new car, eh, young man?” Mr. Nelson asked.

Despite the expanse of front yard between them, there was no mistaking the smile that accompanied Lance back into his car. Then, shifting the car into drive, he leaned across the seat one last time. “Wait until you see it, Mr. Nelson. It's a real beauty.”

They watched as the man drove away, the small white ranch home on the end of the quiet street his final destination.

“Well, that's one less body at the block party this summer,” Bridget groused as she returned to the door and the key still poised in the lock.

Slowly, Mr. Nelson turned his back on the now-empty street. “Decided not to come this year, eh, Bridget?”

Bridget's wrist turned to the right.

Click.

Bridget's wrist turned to the left.

Click.

“Ha-ha, you old goat.” Pulling the key from the second lock, Bridget pushed the door open with her free hand. “I'll be there, Parker. Will you?”

With a rare burst of speed, Mr. Nelson hobbled past Bridget and into Bart's house. “I will be. Winnie will be. Lance will be. It's a block party, Bridget. You don't get to call the shots.”

Bridget stamped her foot against the porch floor. “
I
send out the invites.”

“I'll send 'em,” Mr. Nelson snapped.

“I bring the tablecloths!”

“We'll go without!”

“I—”

Winnie took hold of Bridget's upper arm and propelled the woman through the door and into Bart's foyer, the closed-up feel of the once-welcoming entry point making it difficult to remember why they were there in the first place. “Please, you two. Now is not the time. We need to concentrate on finding Lovey. The sooner we do that, the sooner we can be on our way.”

She braced herself for residual protest from one or both camps, but there was nothing. Instead, Mr. Nelson caned his way toward the living room while Bridget went straight. Moments later, Winnie realized she was the only one actually calling for Lovey.

In fact, with the exception of her own voice and the irritation she was unable to keep out of it, she heard little more than the tapping of Bridget's sensible shoes toward the back of the house, and an occasional grunt from the living room.

She stopped at the base of the stairs that led to the second floor and strained to hear a third set of sounds—a meow, a scratching, a purr . . .

“Lovey?” she called again. “Show yourself, cat!”

A loud gasp from the kitchen pulled her feet in that direction. “Did you find her, Bridget?”

“Winnie, come quick!”

She picked up the pace only to whack her stomach against a kitchen counter. Resisting the instinct to double over in salute of the pain, she bit her bottom lip and powered through. “What's wrong, Bridget? Are you okay?”

Bridget held a piece of paper in Winnie's direction and then pulled it back so she could read it aloud. “Mr. Wagner, I realize you have been mourning the death of your wife these last six weeks, but that doesn't give you the right to treat people the way you treated my daughter, Ava, this afternoon. She's eight. She stepped on your flowers. Who the hell do you think you are yelling at her the way you did? She's not your child. You had no right to speak to her the way that you did. It is because of you that she fell and lost her tooth. It is because of you that she will no doubt have nightmares for months to come. And it is because of you that her ability to go to college is now in jeopardy. If you think this behavior of yours will go unchecked, you're wrong.”

Releasing her hold on her stomach (and her lip), Winnie walked toward Bridget only to stop as the woman looked up, her face ashen. “
D-Dead
wrong.” Then, holding the paper out to Winnie once again, she added, “It-it s-says that, Winnie. It says,
dead wrong
.”

Winnie accepted the paper from the elderly woman, the words in front of her exactly as Bridget had read them.

“She did it, Winnie,” Bridget said between labored breaths. “Sissy Donovan actually killed Bart. I didn't want to believe a mother could do that . . . but she did!”

“Whoa. Slow down a minute.” She reread the letter a second and third time and then let her gaze drop back down to the table and the pile of unopened mail that had obviously been accumulating for some time. A peek at a few of the postmarks confirmed that Bart had simply stopped opening anything for a good two weeks prior to his death. However, there on the top of the pile was a plain
white envelope with no evidence of having been delivered by the post office. “And this letter? It was sitting on top of this envelope?”

Bridget's eyes cast downward.

“Bridget?” she asked again. “This letter was sitting open on top of the envelope, yes?”

After what seemed like an eternity of silence, Winnie's next-door neighbor finally answered by way of a quick head shake.

“Where was the letter, then?”

“In the envelope.”

Winnie looked from the tri-folded letter in her hand to the envelope and its broken seal atop the table and waited for Bridget to speak. When the woman finally did, it was in a voice barely above a whisper. “I recognized Sissy's handwriting from those ridiculous little updates she sticks in everyone's mailboxes every time Ava wins another pageant.”

“Okay . . .” She saw where this was going and didn't like it. Not one little bit.

“I knew I didn't have one in my mailbox and so I wanted to see what I'd been left out of and why.” Bridget propped her elbows on the table and rested her chin on her hands. “But it's a good thing I did. Now we have motive.”

“Motive that's been compromised by your hands and mine.” She looked again at the letter, the words branding themselves in her head. “Oh, Bridget, you shouldn't have opened this.”

“Why not? Now we have proof!”

“Proof of what, exactly?” she challenged.

Bridget's hands dropped to the table with a thump, and Winnie found herself on the receiving end of the kind of exasperated eye rolls usually reserved for Mr. Nelson. “Proof Sissy killed Bart, of course. She threatened him right there in that letter!”

“What's going on in here?”

“I found proof!” Bridget shouted.

“A hoof?” Mr. Nelson said, making his way into the kitchen and over to the table. “What kind of hoof?”

Bridget reached up, stuck her finger in the man's left ear, and pressed. “Proof! I found proof!”

“Proof of what?” Mr. Nelson asked.

“Proof that Sissy Donovan killed Bart!” Bridget gestured toward Winnie and the letter. “Sissy wrote a letter to Bart the day before he was murdered and threatened him!”

Mr. Nelson tightened his hold on his cane as he shifted his weight more evenly across his lower half. “Is that true, Winnie?”

She nodded. “Looks that way.”

Lifting his free hand to his head, Mr. Nelson scratched at a dry patch near his part line and then leaned forward, his nose mere inches from the paper in Winnie's hands. “You . . . will . . . be . . . hearing . . . from . . . my . . . lawyer.”

Winnie stared at her friend as he straightened up and released an irritated breath. “That's the problem with people today. Always calling lawyers and muddying the waters. That didn't go on back in the day. No, people settled things in two ways. With fists or by walking away.”

Confused, she flipped the letter over.

You will be hearing from my lawyer.

—Sissy Donovan

She shook the paper at Bridget and did her best to keep her own irritation in check. “She wasn't threatening Bart
harm
 . . . she was threatening
legal action
.”

A hint of red reared itself in Bridget's cheeks just before the woman stood and brushed a hand down the front of her floral blouse. “I suppose we should move on. We are here, after all, to find Lovey, are we not?”

Snatching the letter from Winnie's hands, Bridget folded
the page and thrust it back into the envelope. Then, shooting her finger upward, the elderly woman commanded silence as she cocked her ear toward the hallway.

Meow . . .

“Lovey?” Winnie called out.

Meow . . .

Bridget retracted her finger and held her hand up in front of Winnie. “Don't move. If she sees you, she'll take off again.”

She started to protest but stopped when Mr. Nelson nodded.

“Great,” she muttered. “Just great.”

Relegated to kitchen stander, she watched as Mr. Nelson and Bridget crept around the corner of the room and into the hallway, each trying to outdo the other with soothing sounds designed to lure the tabby cat out into the open. While she waited, Winnie looked around, her gaze skirting and then narrowing in on a lone dish and cup in the sink.

It was hard not to feel sorry for Bart—for the emptiness he felt without his beloved Ethel, and for the overwhelming grief that had tainted the man's otherwise blemish-free existence. Grief and loneliness had been the man's constant companions in the days leading up to his death. Neither had needed a plate or a glass, of course, but they'd been there, sitting beside Bart that last morning just as surely as Winnie was standing in his kitchen at that very moment.