Close Knit Killer (4 page)

“Really? Did you work here in Fort Connor?”

“Yes, I did.” He looked off toward the Big Box shopping center across the busy avenue
that ran beside Lambspun and the golf course. “I was with a local investment group.
Colorado Investor Associates.”

Really curious now, Kelly wanted to follow up on Malcolm’s statement, but hesitated
to do so. She could sense Malcolm’s reticence when he spoke. Clearly this had been
Malcolm’s earlier life—his life before he began to abuse alcohol and start on that
downward spiral her friend Jayleen had described for her. Jayleen was a recovering
alcoholic herself. “Fourteen years sober,” she would proudly proclaim when telling
others about her former life in Colorado Springs.

Wondering what had happened in Malcolm’s life to start him on that downward path,
Kelly made a mental note to ask Jayleen what she knew of Malcolm’s earlier years.

Hal Nelson stepped outside the structure, carrying another piece of board he’d obviously
removed. “Hey, there, Kelly. You going over for another coffee break?” he greeted
her.

“You got it, Mr. Nelson. I need caffeine to keep the numbers straight on those spreadsheets.”

“Now I know why I don’t miss that work anymore,” Malcolm said with a little smile.

“You can call me Hal, Kelly,” he said good-naturedly as he walked over to the truck
and tossed the piece of wood inside.

“Rotted wood?” Kelly pointed to the truck. “Is there a lot inside?”

“There’s enough. It’s the support beams that will be the real problem. We’re gonna
have to replace most of them. Aren’t we, Malcolm?”

“Yes, sir. Several of the ones I checked so far today are rotted.”

Remembering to check her watch, Kelly turned toward the knitting shop entrance. “Well,
I’ll leave you gentlemen to the rotted wood, and I’ll return to my spreadsheets. I’ll
check in with you again. Oh, my boyfriend Steve Townsend is coming into town tonight,
so I bet he’ll stop by as well. Builders can’t resist.”

Nelson smiled. “You tell Steve to drop by anytime. I’ve worked with Steve on a couple
of his projects over the years. He’s a good guy and a damn good builder, too. I’m
really glad to hear he’s done well in Denver. Maybe he’ll be able to start up here
in Fort Connor again once this recession lets go of us.”

“I’ll tell him, Hal. Meanwhile, you two have fun with the rotted wood. I’ll play with
the numbers,” Kelly said with a smile, and she headed for the back door of the café.
There was just enough time to grab a quick shot of caffeine before she relaxed with
the spinners.

* * *

“That’s
it, nice and easy,” Madge said as she watched a young woman slowly ease the drafted
wool through her fingers and onto the turning wheel. “Find a rhythm with your feet,
nice and easy, that’s it.”

Madge stood beside the beginning spinner, not hovering, but close enough to help if
an extra hand was needed.

Kelly watched the young spinner’s face. She had an expression of intense concentration.
That seemed typical for most beginning spinners, Kelly had observed over the four
years she’d been visiting Lambspun. The spinners’ craft had always attracted Kelly.
She loved sitting with them while she knitted or worked on her client accounts. She
found it soothing and relaxing, almost as if the atmosphere around the spinners was
peaceful. She wasn’t sure whether the spinners created that peacefulness with their
ancient craft or gravitated to it like she did. Kelly had found the same peaceful
feeling while knitting quietly by herself at the shop—that relaxed state where ideas
seemed to pop into her head more quickly and easily. “Knitting meditation,” someone
had once called it.

The relaxation she experienced sitting with the spinners was also conducive to getting
her work done. Kelly found that even the numbers on her spreadsheets seemed to be
more ordered, and fewer errors appeared. Strange, Kelly had often thought. But she
didn’t have to understand why it occurred; she was simply glad it did. Cooperative
numbers were always easier to work with.

“That’s good,” Madge encouraged again. “You’re doing good, dear.” She sat down in
her chair in front of the five spinners and started drafting more of the wool fleece
from the plastic bag, turning it into “batten” or “roving,” as spinners called it.

Kelly watched Madge do what she’d seen Burt do countless times—take a handful of cleaned
and carded fleece and stretch it between both hands, gently pulling the fibers apart,
just enough to make the fleece easier to slide between his fingers and join with the
yarn twist that was already wound around the wheel. Feeding the drafted yarn onto
the wheel so that it wound around and around and onto the spindle. The spindle fattened
as the wheel turned and more yarn wound onto it. Fatter and fatter as the wheel turned.

“Did any of you see that article in the paper this morning?” asked another spinner.
A more experienced spinner, Kelly surmised, watching her rhythmic movements, feet
and fingers working together, batten sliding smoothly between her fingers and onto
the hungry wheel. “This guy’s in town to teach a financial seminar or something. But
the paper said that he’d been in prison for financial fraud.”

“Oh, yes, I saw that article,” a gray-haired older woman spoke up, her movements a
bit more hesitant than the other woman. Still, the spindle on her wheel was fattening
with Madge’s prize-winning gray wool. “He’s the thief who cheated all those people
out of their money years ago. What was his name?”

“Rizzoli,” Barbara spoke up from her chair along the wall where she sat knitting a
lime green shell.

“Rizzoli, that’s it,” the gray-haired woman said. “Now I remember. He ran an investment
firm and he cheated all his clients out of their money.”

“Oh, I remember that,” a middle-aged woman beside Barbara commented. “He was convicted
and sent to prison if I’m not mistaken.”

Kelly looked up over her laptop screen, drawn to the conversation. “What was this?
Who’s this Rizzoli guy and what did he do?”

“Rizzoli was an investment advisor who worked with several financial agencies and
banks around town. He handled all sorts of securities and had lots of clients. No
one suspected he was also running a Ponzi scheme until people began losing money.”

“It was terrible. I remember one of the women in my church lost her life savings!
She had to sell her house here and go live with her children in Kansas.”

“Lots of people lost money,” the middle-aged woman added, the gray wool sliding through
her fingers faster than some others.

“Many people lost more than that,” Madge’s soft voice spoke.

Kelly glanced to Barbara’s mother, sitting quietly, drafting the gray wool fleece
in her lap. Curious, Kelly asked, “What do you mean, Madge?”

Barbara’s firm voice spoke up instead. There was an edge to it, Kelly noticed. “My
mother means that some of us lost more than money. We lost cherished loved ones. My
father killed himself when he learned his clients’ investments were wiped out. He’d
trusted Jared Rizzoli. And Rizzoli had cheated them.”

Kelly stared at Barbara, appalled by what she’d heard. Barbara’s strong features had
hardened, as if chiseled in stone. Resentment and anger were etched into her face.
Kelly glanced around her and noticed the other spinners sat and stared as well. Even
the wheels stopped turning.

“Good Lord, Barbara . . . that’s awful,” Kelly spoke at last. “I’m so very sorry.”

The other women added their soft commiseration. Then Madge’s soft voice sounded. “Others
lost loved ones as well. It was a long time ago. Over ten years.”

“Twelve, to be exact,” Barbara’s hard voice came.

Everyone was quiet, Kelly noticed; then, one by one, the wheels began to turn until
their gentle hum was the only sound in the room.

Fo
ur

Kelly
shifted her briefcase over her shoulder as she held the cell phone to her ear. “I
just e-mailed the draft of May’s revenues and expenses to you, Don. Only two more
working days left in May, so most of those numbers will stay firm,” Kelly said into
her phone as she walked across the driveway heading to Lambspun. Spotting Malcolm
working beside the storage building, Kelly returned his wave.

“Oh, yeah, I see your e-mail now,” her client Don Warner said. “Excellent.”

“I’ll finish up on the thirty-first and send the final statements then. Meanwhile,
don’t make any plans based on the draft, okay?” Kelly warned as she sped up the wide
brick steps to the knitting shop, pausing right outside the door.

Warner chuckled. “Don’t worry, Kelly. I know how you hate to send drafts, so I promise
to be good. Listen, my other line is ringing. Gotta go. Talk to you later.”

Kelly clicked off her phone and shoved it into her pocket, about to open the front
door, when she spied a familiar truck turn down the driveway. She spotted the blond
woman driving and recognized her friend Jayleen Swinson.

Kelly watched as Colorado cowgirl Jayleen stepped down from the truck and approached
Hal Nelson and Malcolm, exchanging greetings. Jayleen glanced Kelly’s way and waved
toward her. “Hey, Kelly,” Jayleen called out.

Kelly gave her friend a thumbs-up sign before she heaved open the heavy front door
to the knitting shop and stepped inside. Hopefully she could settle at the knitting
table and start her account work. Kelly had spent practically all day working at the
shop yesterday, and planned to be here again today. That way she could be close at
hand in case Jennifer needed her to run an errand. And she’d be close by whenever
Pete called with an update on Grandpa Ben’s condition.

The only time Kelly had seen someone close to her hospitalized was years ago when
her dear father was dying from lung cancer. Both Uncle Jim and Aunt Helen had died
while she was back East, working at a Washington, DC, corporate accounting firm. Although
Pete’s grandfather was a stranger to her, Kelly felt connected because Jen and Pete
were dear friends. She recognized the worry and anxiety she saw on Jennifer’s face.
Kelly remembered how that felt, and how alone she’d felt. She didn’t have a close
network of friends back in Washington, not like she did here in Colorado. She wanted
to be able to support her friends any way she could.

Trailing her fingers across some of the tempting yarns, Kelly headed for the main
room and set her briefcase on the long library table that dominated the room. Floor-to-ceiling
shelves lined one wall and were filled with magazines and books dealing with fiber
in all its forms and all the ways it could be used—knitting, crochet, spinning, weaving,
felting, dyeing, all manner of manipulation. Both walls surrounding the archway entrance
to the room were lined with wooden bins, stacked with yarns, yarns, and more yarns.
Sometimes Kelly felt overwhelmed by it all. There was so much she didn’t know. But
the comforting thought was that Mimi knew everything about all things fiber.

Kelly pulled out her coffee mug and was about to head to the café for a refill when
she noticed Megan walking toward the knitting table, Jennifer in tow. Literally in
tow. Megan had her hand around Jennifer’s arm, guiding her toward the table. Kelly
stepped aside. She wasn’t about to get in the way of Megan on a Mission.

“See, Kelly’s here. This is a perfect time for you to take a break,” Megan declared,
releasing Jennifer’s arm before she pulled out a chair.

“I see Megan decided you needed the break,” Kelly said, smiling at her friends.

Jennifer looked over at Kelly and rolled her eyes. “I was going to come over in a
few minutes, but Megan had other ideas.”

Megan pulled out a chair for Jennifer to sit. “I’ve been knitting in the café, waiting
for you to take a break for nearly an hour. If I hadn’t dragged you out, you’d never
have left.” Megan plopped two knitting bags onto the table and sat in the chair beside
her. “I brought your bag, too.”

Kelly pulled out a chair and joined her friends. “Megan did you a favor, Jen. I know
how easy it is to get so caught up in work that you forget about yourself. I recognize
it because I do it, too.” She pulled her laptop from her briefcase. “Eduardo and Julie
and Frank can spare you for ten minutes.”

“Fifteen,” Megan decreed, pulling out a royal blue yarn from Jennifer’s bag. It looked
like a top that was halfway finished.

“All right, all right,” Jennifer said, picking up the yarn on her knitting needles
and giving it a shake. Now it looked to Kelly like a lacy-patterned sleeveless top
was being created.

Kelly slid her laptop computer several inches away and reached into another pocket
of her briefcase, withdrawing the small circular needles with the beginnings of the
yellow and white baby hat she’d started.

“Have you heard anything from Pete?” she asked Jennifer. “You said he was going over
to the hospital after he took Cassie to school.”

“Yes, he called about twenty minutes ago—”

Megan turned to her with a shocked expression. “You didn’t tell me that!”

Jennifer gave Megan a long-suffering look. “I was about to, Miss Bossy, when you grabbed
my arm and dragged me out of the café.”

“I did it for your own good,” Megan said, in her familiar self-righteous tone, fingers
moving at their usual warp speed. Kelly never could understand how someone could knit
that fast and be that accurate. Amazing.

“What did Pete say, Jen?” Kelly asked, putting her concentration on her friend rather
than the yarn in her lap.

Jennifer’s bantering expression changed to a more somber look. “He said it really
shook him up to see Ben this morning. Ben’s still not conscious because he’s taking
so many painkillers following surgery. Plus, he’s hooked up to all sorts of machines
keeping track of everything. Pete said it really sank in how serious Ben’s condition
is. I could tell just from Pete’s voice how worried he is.”

“Oh, Jen, I’m so sorry,” Megan said.

Kelly stared at her friend. “What did the doctor say?”

“The doctor explained why Ben’s hooked up to all of the machines. His condition is
very
serious. Ben has been so weakened by the heart attack that it’s going to take a long
time for him to recover.”

“Wow, that sounds like he’s going to be in the hospital quite a while,” Megan said.
“How long will Pete stay in Denver?”

Jennifer let her knitting settle into her lap as she stared off. “I don’t know. We
haven’t had a chance to talk about it yet. But he can’t stay there indefinitely. We’ll
need him back here at the café. Frank said he could work for two weeks max. That’s
all. He’s got a conflict on dates.”

Kelly could feel Jennifer’s worry coming across, so she reached over to give her friend’s
arm a squeeze. “I’m sure Pete will be coming back soon, Jen.”

“What about his niece, Cassie?” Megan said. “She can’t be left down in Denver all
by herself. Do you think Pete’s sister will be able to stay with her?”

Kelly was going to follow up on that comment when Jayleen strode into the room. “Hello,
there, gals. It’s good to see you,” she cheerfully announced, then grabbed a chair
and spun it around backward so she could sit. “How’s Pete’s grandfather, Jennifer?
I heard from Rosa what happened.”

“Not good,” Jennifer answered.

“I’m going to have to run, guys,” Megan said, shoving her blue knit top and needles
back into her bag. “Jen, keep me posted, okay? Why don’t you join us tonight over
at Kelly and Steve’s house. You need to relax with friends, not sit home alone and
worry.”

“That’s a great idea,” Kelly said. “Don’t worry about dinner. We’re ordering Indian
food. You’ll probably know more from Pete by then, so you could tell us all at the
same time.”

“Gotta run,” Megan said, waving at everyone as she hurried out.

“How bad is Pete’s grandfather’s condition?” Jayleen probed.

“Five arteries were clogged, so the surgery was pretty intensive,” Jennifer said,
starting to put away her own knitting. “The doctor told Pete that Ben would need a
long time to recover. Months, he said.”

Jayleen screwed up her face. “
Damn
. That’s gonna be hard on you folks. Didn’t Pete say he has a niece in Denver? What’s
going to happen with her? Are there any other relatives in Denver she could stay with?”

Jennifer shook her head. “Nobody that Pete or Ben would trust. Listen, I’d better
get back to the café.” She rose from her chair. “But I think I will stop by at your
house tonight, Kelly. It’ll be good to be with all of you. I don’t feel like being
alone.”

“That sounds like a good idea,” Jayleen said with a big grin. “Better to be with friends
at times like these.”

“Come on over as soon as you’re free, Jen,” Kelly said.

“Thanks, Kelly. Good to see you, Jayleen. Talk to you later,” Jen said with a smile
and walked away through the central yarn room.

“My, oh, my, are we all glad Jennifer and Pete have each other. Hard times are easier
to bear when you’re not alone,” Jayleen said, shaking her head full of blond curls.
Silver was darting through the blond hair now.

“That’s for sure. By the way, I saw you talking with Hal Nelson and Malcolm outside.
It looks like they’re making good progress on that old garage. Malcolm says there’s
a lot of rotted beams.”

“Yeah, there sure are. Hal showed me what they were dealing with. They’re gonna have
to replace a lot of those support beams. You don’t want to have the roof cave in on
one of those spinning classes.”

“You know, it took me a few minutes, but I finally realized where I’d seen Malcolm
before,” Kelly said. “I was surprised that he remembered me.”

“Sure, he does. Malcolm didn’t think he’d done much, but Jerry over at the shelter
and I made sure we kept heaping the praise on him for stepping up. He really made
a difference.” Jayleen smiled. “Malcolm’s a good guy, and I’m proud of the progress
he’s made. You’d already met Malcolm over at the Mission, so you knew he was in our
counseling program and has been coming with me to AA. It’s been over a year now.”

“It looks like he and Nelson work well together. I made sure I told Nelson how important
Malcolm had been in that investigation. Without his help, the killer would have gotten
away with murder,” Kelly added with a smile.

Jayleen grinned. “That was mighty good of you, Kelly-girl. That really helped boost
Malcolm’s self-confidence—you can bet on it.”

“You know, I’m curious about something, Jayleen,” Kelly said, remembering her conversation
with Malcolm the previous day. “When I was talking with Malcolm yesterday, I mentioned
that I had to work with numbers all the time since I was an accountant. And Malcolm
said that years ago he used to work at a financial office here in the city. Then he
kind of gazed off and didn’t say any more. I wondered if he’d ever mentioned that
to you or Jerry over at the Mission.”

Jayleen nodded. “Oh, yes. Malcolm’s got quite a story. Seems he worked for one of
the many financial firms in town that went belly-up when that crook’s Ponzi scheme
went bust. Malcolm lost everything when his company went bankrupt. His job, all his
savings, which he’d invested with them of course, even his home. Couldn’t make the
payments on that pricey real estate once the paychecks stopped coming in. Hell, even
Malcolm’s wife left him. Walked out and took whatever she could find. Poor devil.
That’s what started Malcolm on that dark road that leads only one way . . .
down
.” Jayleen gestured.

“Whoa . . . would you believe that’s the second time I’ve heard a story like that?
Barbara’s father owned one of those financial firms in town that lost everything,
too. All their clients’ money was lost with that guy’s phony investments. What’s his
name?”

“Rizzoli. Jared Rizzoli. Yeah, I read in the paper that he’s back in town giving a
financial seminar.” Jayleen gave a disgusted snort. “Paid his debt to society, he
says.
Hummph!
There’s no way that low-down thief can repay all the damage he’s done to lives of
people all over this city. People killed themselves because of that son-of-a-snake!
Paid his debt?” Jayleen added some colorful expletives Kelly hadn’t heard from her
friend in quite a while.

“Wow, he really does sound like a piece of work.”

“That, he is. Curt and I had to take a ride to cool off after we read that article
in yesterday’s paper. And today’s.” She screwed up her face again. “He said he wanted
to offer his apologies to the people in Fort Connor who suffered losses. Well, a free
financial seminar won’t put back together the families that were destroyed by his
schemes.”

“Barbara’s mother Madge is helping with one of the spinning classes. I sat in with
them yesterday, so I heard all about Rizzoli. Every person in that class had a story,
I swear.”

“Hundreds all over town have stories. Not just Fort Connor, either. All over northern
Colorado.” Jayleen pushed herself out of the chair forcefully, swinging her leg over.
“Listen, I’d better get back to the canyon and my chores. I need to get out in the
fresh air after talking about that low-down dirty snake.”

Kelly rose from her chair as well and grabbed her empty mug. “I promise I won’t mention
it again, Jayleen,” she said, following her friend into the central yarn room.

Jayleen paused on her way to the front door. “Make sure to keep Curt and me posted
about Pete and his grandfather, okay? We want to help any way we can.”

“You bet. Say hi to Curt for me,” Kelly said, heading toward the hallway, the aroma
of fresh-brewed coffee beckoning her.

“See you tomorrow, Rosa,” Kelly called to the knitting shop clerk in the front room.
“I have to finish some work across the driveway.”

“You mean your ‘office’?” Rosa teased as she sat at the yarn winder.

Kelly waved as she pushed open the front door. Then she suddenly stopped because she
almost ran into a man who was about to enter the shop.