Cut to the Corpse (18 page)

It was white with green trim; neatly pruned hedges hemmed the house and an American flag flapped in the light breeze from its holder above the front door.

Brenna parked her Jeep in the drive and made her way up the walkway toward the door. Three steps up and she rang the bell. She could hear it echo inside the house and a dog, small from the yappy sound of the bark, answered with a chorus of yips.

“Hush, Jasmine,” a voice commanded. The dog kept barking.

The large wooden door swung in and a gray-haired, middle-aged woman, wearing jeans and a cotton blouse, peered out at her. She had a little white dog, presumably Jasmine, tucked under her arm.

“May I help you?” she asked. She didn’t smile.

“Hi, I hope so. I’m Brenna Miller. I’m looking for Mrs. Sutton, Lisa’s mother.”

The woman stiffened. “I’m her mother. Is there news? Have you seen her?”

Brenna was taken aback by the desperation in the woman’s hazel eyes. Mrs. Sutton studied Brenna’s face, and then her shoulders slumped. “You’d think after three years, I’d give up hope, but I just can’t.”

“I’m sorry,” Brenna said. “I didn’t mean to upset you. I’m a friend of the girl who is accused of killing Clue Parker, and I just wondered if Lisa knew anything about Clue that might help solve his murder.”

“I really couldn’t say,” Mrs. Sutton said. “As far as I know, no one has heard from her since she left. The rumor is that she went to be a chef in Boston, but why wouldn’t she tell us? My husband and I tried to find her. We even hired a private detective, but he didn’t find anything. It’s like she vanished into thin air.”

Jasmine wiggled in her arms, trying to get to Brenna. Mrs. Sutton gestured for Brenna to follow her into the house. They stood on a tiled foyer with a short flight of stairs leading down and another leading up. Mrs. Sutton led the way up the stairs into a large sitting room, kept light by the bay window that looked out onto the front yard.

“Can I get you anything?” Mrs. Sutton asked.

“No, thank you,” Brenna said. A hutch stood against the far wall. It was covered in pictures of a pretty brunette girl, Lisa, from infancy to her early twenties. Her infectious smile was captured by the camera in almost every pose, except for one. It was black and white and sat on the far corner of the shelf. It was a profile picture of Lisa and she looked pensive as if she had just received terrible news and was trying to decide what to do.

Brenna was drawn to the picture. She wanted to know what the young woman was thinking, what decision she was trying to make. She noticed Lisa was fingering a small angel pendant worked in a delicate gold.

“That’s the last picture ever taken of her,” Mrs. Sutton said from behind her. “My son Tommy took it for his photography class at school. The next day Lisa was gone.”

“Why?” Brenna asked. “Why did she leave and never return?”

“The gossips say that she was in love with Jake and that he rejected her because of his friendship with Clue. People think she ran away because she was heartbroken, but I don’t believe that.”

“No?”

“I think Jake was in love with her, too,” Mrs. Sutton said. “What’s more, I think Jake would have left with her if she asked him.”

Brenna sank down onto the burgundy sofa while Mrs. Sutton sat in the matching armchair across from her.

“What makes you think that?”

“I overheard them together,” Mrs. Sutton said. “I walked in on them while they were out on our sunporch. They didn’t hear me, but I heard them. I saw the way Jake looked at her and I heard her ask him to leave Morse Point and run away with her where they could be together, away from Clue. When I asked her about it, she said it was just silly talk.”

Brenna was stunned. She hadn’t seen this coming.

“Did you ever ask Jake about it?”

“Oh, yes, he was devastated. She left him her angel.” Mrs. Sutton motioned to the pendant Lisa held in the somber picture. “No note. No explanation. Just the angel.”

“Mrs. Sutton, what do you think happened?” she asked.

“I think Clue Parker found out what they were planning, and I think he chased her away. I never liked him. He was cruel, and he bragged about how no woman could resist him. He would have hated having Lisa dump him for his friend,” she said. Her lips trembled a bit. “That’s why I was hoping with him dead, maybe she would come home.”

“Did you tell Chief Barker all of this?” Brenna asked.

“Oh, yes, when she went missing, I told him everything,” Mrs. Sutton said. “He’s a good man and he questioned Clue mercilessly, but Clue denied knowing anything about Lisa’s whereabouts. And Jake, well, he had the angel. He was about as heartbroken as I was.”

“I’m so sorry, Mrs. Sutton, I can’t imagine how hard it must be for you to not know where she is,” Brenna said.

Mrs. Sutton patted a stray gray hair back into place as if trying to restore order to her world. “Thank you. If you hear anything about Lisa, anything at all, will you let me know?”

“Absolutely,” Brenna said. “I promise.”

She left the Sutton house, after rubbing Jasmine’s tummy, and headed back to town. Mrs. Sutton’s story certainly checked out with what Marie Porter had said about Lisa loving Jake, but the endings were vastly different.

Why had Lisa suddenly left Morse Point? Had Clue threatened her? Again, Brenna thought of the way Clue had looked at Tara on the night of the bachelorette party. It was certainly possible. Had he threatened others? If so, had someone finally had enough and murdered him? It was also a good possibility, but the question was who?

 

“My mother thinks I’m working on a decoupage project with you,” Tara said.

“So, you are,” Brenna said, and she pulled Tara over to the worktable where she was gluing on the last few squares of Betty Cartwright’s hope chest.

She handed Tara a brayer and motioned for her to roll over the squares she had recently put on. Tara gently ran the brayer and then Brenna handed her a wet cloth to dab up the glue that was pushed out from under the papers.

“You’re a natural,” Tenley said from the other side of the chest.

Tara gave her a shy smile, and the three of them continued to work in silence until the last square was in place and Tara had rolled over it and dabbed up the excess glue.

They all stood back and studied their work. Brenna had been dubious when she had first conceived the piece but now, she had to admit, it was spectacular.

“Wow,” breathed Tara, endearing herself even more to the two women.

“Let’s leave it to dry,” Brenna said, gathering her materials while Tenley did the same. They rinsed the brushes and washed the bowls and put the glue back in the break room.

“Now I think all of that hard work deserves a nice glass of iced tea at the Fife and Drum, don’t you?” Brenna asked Tenley, who promptly excused herself to go freshen up.

“I don’t know,” Tara said. “I’m nervous.”

“Are you afraid people will be nasty and whisper about you?” Brenna asked.

“No,” Tara said with a shake of her head. “I think I’m actually getting used to that.”

“Then what is it?”

“What if we do all this and I still can’t remember?”

“You’ll be no worse off than you are now,” Brenna said. “But I don’t want to pressure you; the decision is yours.”

Tara bit her lip while she considered her options. “All right, let’s do it.”

“ ’Atta girl,” Brenna cheered her, and she smiled.

Twenty minutes later, the three women strolled into the Fife and Drum. The bar was crowded and the faint sound of clattering plates and murmured dinner conversations could just be heard behind the doors to the restaurant beyond.

The interior of the Fife and Drum was dark. Black wainscoting lined the lower walls, with a rich burgundy wallpaper, sporting black fleur-de-lis, was placed atop it. Candles were lit on every table and the waitstaff, which moved at a clip, wore white dress shirts with black vests over black pants.

Matt was behind the bar, dressed in a white dress shirt but with the sleeves rolled up to his elbows, and Tenley led the way there. She slid onto a stool and Tara took the one beside her. Brenna opted to stand.

Matt looked at Tenley and his eyes glowed. “Well, this is a pleasant surprise.”

Tenley beamed.

“What can I get you ladies?”

“Iced tea all around,” Brenna answered. “We need to keep our wits about us.”

“Why would that be?” a low voice drawled from behind her.

Brenna jumped and spun around to find Nate standing right behind her.

“Ah!” She put her hand over her heart. “You scared me.”

“Sorry,” he said.

Brenna noticed his gray eyes looked amused and not one iota repentant.

“Yeah, right,” she said.

“So, what are you ladies up to tonight?” he asked.

“We’re re-creating the night of the . . .” Tara began but Brenna interrupted with a fake cough.

“I’m sorry, I didn’t catch that,” Nate said and leaned closer to Tara.

She gave Brenna a confused look and then said, “The night of the murder.”

Nate turned back to Brenna, but this time there was no amusement in his glance.

“Explain,” he said.

Brenna looked to Tenley for help, but she and Matt were cozied up talking, while Tara was blinking at her with a wide-eyed innocence that indicated she had no idea what she had just done.
Oy.

“It’s really very simple,” Brenna said. “Tara can’t remember the events of that night, so we are retracing her steps and hoping to jog her memory.”

“How is that butting out?” Nate asked. He ran a hand through his hair, which Brenna knew was not a good sign.

“I’m just trying to help a friend,” she said.

“You can’t—” Nate started to lecture, but Tara let out a squeak and they both turned to see what had alarmed her.

Standing in the doorway to the bar was Jake. He looked devastated to see Tara, as if he couldn’t decide whether to hug her close or run for his life. Brenna realized that no matter what had happened that night, Jake was still very much in love with his bride to be.

He turned to leave, but she called out, “Jake!”

He stopped, waited for a second, and then slowly turned around. Brenna crossed the room in five strides. She wanted to catch him before he changed his mind.

“Jake, listen, we’re trying to figure out what happened that night,” she said. “Do you want to help us?”

She felt Nate step up behind her. She knew he didn’t agree with what she was doing, but she was grateful for his presence at her back.

“I can’t,” Jake said. “I don’t want to know if . . .”

“What? If your worst fears are true?” Nate asked from behind her. “Wouldn’t it be better to know?”

“I don’t think I could bear it,” Jake said.

“What if it goes the other way?” Brenna asked. “What if nothing happened between them and she is innocent?”

The young man sucked a breath through his teeth, as if he’d just suffered a body blow. Brenna suspected he desperately wanted that outcome but was afraid to hope for it.

“Please, Jake,” Tara said as she joined their group. “If you ever loved me, help me now. Help me find out what happened that night.”

A shudder rippled through his shoulders and he tossed back his head, a gladiator ready to fight to the death.

“All right,” he said. “I’m in.”

“Where do we start?” Matt asked as he and Tenley joined the group. Brenna noticed that he had his arm draped over her shoulders and she was beaming.

“You’re coming, too?” she asked.

“I just got off my shift,” he said. “I figure I can act as a stand-in.”

“Me, too,” Nate volunteered.

“Excellent,” Brenna said. “Okay, let’s start here. Everyone take your positions from when the bachelorette party started.”

“You were behind the bar, flirting with that buxom bridesmaid,” Tenley said to Matt. “I can’t remember her name.”

“Britney,” he said, and Tenley frowned. “I remember because she was so not my type. I’m more of a leg man.”

Tenley flushed a lovely shade of pink and shooed him back behind the bar.

“Nate, will you stand in for Clue?” Brenna asked. “Tara and Jake were hugging. Go ahead.”

Tara and Jake awkwardly stepped into each other’s arms. Jake didn’t seem to know where to put his hands and Tara kept trying to see his face to make sure he was okay. Finally, she just gave in and hugged him fiercely. Jake leaned his chin down into her hair and took a deep breath. Then he, too, wrapped his arms about her and held her close.

“Okay, now Nate, you look at Tara,” Brenna said. He did but she shook her head. “No, look at her as if you don’t like her.”

Jake and Tara both gave Brenna a questioning glance. Nate glowered at Tara, but it lacked any heat. Still, it made Brenna remember what happened next.

“Now, look at me,” she said. Nate did but his gray eyes were warm and she didn’t feel the scary shiver that she had when Clue looked at her.

“What are you remembering?” he asked.

“Jake, how did Clue feel about you getting married?” she asked.

“He was okay with it,” he said. He didn’t meet her gaze and Brenna stared at him with one eyebrow raised.

“How did he feel?” Tara asked, stepping back from Jake.

“Not happy,” Jake sighed. “He thought I was crazy to give up my freedom.”

“You never told me that,” Tara said.

“I didn’t want to hurt your feelings,” Jake said. “Besides, I knew I wanted to spend my life with you. I didn’t care what he thought.”

“I think Clue was more than a little angry about you marrying Tara,” Brenna said. “I saw it in his face when he looked at the two of you. It was scary.”

Jake blew out a breath as he took this in. “I didn’t know.”

They were all silent for a moment, and then Nate asked, “What happened next?”