EMBELLISHED TO DEATH (21 page)

NINETEEN

  

“You go straight to Scrap This.” Ted jabbed a finger toward me.

“But—”

“Do not pass go. Do not collect the $200. Go to the store. Sell scrapbook supplies. Spend time with your man. If you do anything else, I'll let you explain this situation to Bell.”

Since I'd rather let Ted, I nodded.

“I want more than a head shake.”

“Fine. I promise I will go to Scrap This and wait there for instructions.”

Ted charged out of the room. I waited a few minutes then stood to leave. If Ted ran into Bell, I wanted him to have time to find a private place to speak to the detective. Less chance I'd be dragged into. Right now, I needed to tell Bob about my suspicions and take a look at the membership card. Abby stopped me before I walked out of the bar without Steve's late lunch, and was kind enough to bring a to-go container for mine.

Taking care not to come in eye contact of Ted or Detective Bell, I jogged through the hotel foyer and the hallway. I couldn't hold back the shiver as I hurried through the dark, cavernous passageway. The walls seemed to shrink with each step. Yesterday, Morgan pushed me against the wall. Today, the man was in a morgue. I shuddered. I didn't think one action led to the other, but the randomness of death spooked me. Here one day, gone the next.

I walked faster. I wanted out of the hallway. I ran the last few paces and shoved open the door. Relief eased the tension in my muscles when I stepped into the conference area foyer. The doors to the cropping area were braced open.

I slowed down and stepped into the crop area. I inventoried the room, noting Lydia or Marsha weren't in the room. No surprise. My mind grabbed onto the thought and poked, prodded and marinated on it. Marsha and Lydia spent less time in the crop room than I had…and that was a major accomplishment.

Why?

I knew why Marsha played hide-and-seek during the weekend. She was sleeping off the effects of a nighttime cold remedy, or if I believed her story, running to the other Marsha's house to feed a cat. With Lydia, I had no idea. Either she was hiding out from the manager because of the account issue I overhead, or something else. It was the something else I got hung up on.

Marsha had started falling apart once the retreat started and had trouble managing the tasks given her. Did that raise alarms for Lydia?

The scavenger game Marsha had announced was a bust as she hadn't been around much to conduct it. And Lydia never tried. What if Lydia found out about the identity thief, and was trying to protect the attendees by not playing the game?

If Marsha hadn't needed help to move me from the stairwell, would something worse than a headache have happened to me? I shut the thought down quick. Keep with the facts. Stay focused on the goal—finding out if who I knew as Marsha Smith was a fake.

Lydia knew Marsha had a drinking problem. It didn't sound like a piece of information a person announced to a new business partner. Unless, Marsha lied about drinking and she
herself
was taking the nighttime cold relief to duplicate the effects of drinking. Not so much to put herself out of commission, but give her the appearance of being drunk so she had an excuse for not being around—and an alibi.

Amanda and her friends were scrapbooking away. Violet wasn't there but I couldn't see if her spot had been cleared. I headed toward the store, passing near but not right by Violet's table just in case she had been leaning over. No Violet. Her totes and spinning carousel were still there. That was good, or maybe not.

Either she didn't know I was on to her lying about her name, or else she had one more item left to do before her job was complete now that Morgan was dead—like framing me for the murder.

I paused. Over in Scrap This, Detective Bell and Steve were in an intense conversation. They must have felt eyes on them because the men turned and stared at me. Hard. Where was Ted? Had he spoken to Bell already and those angry stares were from my having potentially messed up the investigation?

I detoured over to my cropping friends. I plopped down into the vacant seat, placing the food in front of me on the cropping table. “So what's everyone working on today?”

From the scraps scattered around Gussie's work space, I'd guess she was working on my grandmothers' friendship book. There were photo cast offs of our front yards, and a horrible picture of me at the age of four with chocolate cake smeared across my face.

Darlene grinned at me. “Gussie had a better picture of that moment. That one's a little blurry.”

“Cheryl made that cake for you,” Gussie said. “It was the first thing she ever baked in her life and was so excited at how much you loved it. You almost devoured it all by yourself.”

Smiling, I placed the extra picture in my pocket. “I hope you don't mind I'm taking the double.”

“Makes my heart happy.” Gussie squeezed my shoulder.

“I'm sorry I haven't been around to help with the album.”

“You've been worried about Steve, and needed to help Bob find that woman.”

I gaped at her.

“Garrison told us,” Gussie said. “It's totally understandable. The weekend hasn't quite gone as any of us had envisioned.”

“I'm going to make time to fill out some journaling blocks for you.”

Darlene rotated her spinning carousel, examining the stickers clipped to the wire tree stand placed in the large central cubby hole in the stand. “You must have taken the long route to your room.”

“I stopped for lunch.”

“Long lunch?” Darlene asked.

Garrison cleared his throat, shaking his head. He glanced down at his phone, which he kept on the left side of him, then returned to a layout of Ted and Bob fishing.

“And a nap.” I roamed my gaze between the three of them. What were they trying to get from me without asking me?

Darlene started to speak. Gussie wadded up a piece of cardstock and threw it at Darlene.

“What's going on?” I aimed a glare at each of them.

All three shrugged in unison.

“Since your boss is here…” Detective Bell's voice carried over to me, “we can check.”

“Looks like I'm needed some place.” I stood and picked up Steve's lunch. Sooner or later, I hoped sooner, I'd figure out what those three wanted besides knowing where I was at. Neither of them seemed to believe what I told them, and there had to be a reason for it.

As Steve and Detective Bell were both in a mood, I approached Scrap This cautiously.

“I brought you lunch.” I pasted a bright smile on my face and held the bag out toward Steve.

“Thanks.” Steve didn't even attempt a smile. He took the bag and placed it beside our customer binder.

“Let's go, Mr. Davis.” Detective Bell stepped away from the table.

“His lunch. He hasn't eaten yet.” Every instinct screamed not to let Steve go. Bell questioned him last night, the only thing left was taking him into custody.

“He can bring it with him,” Bell said.

“It's getting cold. He should eat it now.” I pushed the issue.

Steve took the bag. “It won't get any warmer with you trying to convince Detective Bell to postpone this.”

“Correct. There's been a long enough of a delay.” Bell glanced at the clock on the wall then used a stylus to tap on his phone. “At least your excuse is holding up so far, Mr. Davis.”

“I could go with you.” I didn't care where they were going, all I knew was I didn't want Steve going alone with Bell.

Steve shook his head and headed for the door.

“Hold up, Mr. Davis.” Bell opened up the manila folder in his hand. “There is one thing I need to speak with Miss Hunter about.”

Steve paused.

“Do you know this woman, Miss Hunter?” He flicked the edge of a five-by-seven photograph.

A stunning woman smiled out at me. She held a champagne flute in the air. Her gray hair curled softly around her face and tumbled in controlled waves past her shoulders. A grin lit up her face. Not the woman on the membership card. There was no way anyone would mistake her for the other Marsha.

“No, I don't.”

“Are you sure?”

I nodded.

“Do you normally do business with people you don't know?”

“All the time. It's the nature of owning a store that sells product. We don't know most of the people who come in here.”

“What about the retreat?”

“We communicated through emails and the final contracts were snail mailed to me.” The questions I answered made me believe more and more that the woman I knew as co-owner of the retreat was the identity thief.

Bell closed the folder. “For people whose hobby involves pictures, it seems strange not one of you met Marsha Smith before yesterday. You'd think everyone here are strangers to each other.”

“Croppers usually stay in their group when they come to these retreats. We venture out a little bit from our established friendship pockets, but for the most part crops are the only times women get to spend a lot of time with their friends.”

“This woman was coming here to this event, and no one seems to know who she is, nor is there any record of her.” Bell tapped the folder to his chin. “Seems really odd.”

“She might have decided to come at the last minute and wasn't preregistered.” I pressed my hand to my gut, hoping it stalled its bucking and twisting. I didn't believe what I was saying and hoped Bell did. Before I told Bell what I learned, I needed to know more about him. If more-than-likely-pretend Marsha was telling the truth about her abusive ex-husband the cop, I wanted to make sure this detective would protect her and not look the other way as the wolf attacked.

“By the way, Miss Hunter, the winery in Cheat Lake is really nice. A little hard to find so I'd bring a GPS with you.” Detective Bell gave me a nod then followed after Steve.

Ted was right. I needed to work on my detecting skills. Bell saw me trying to use reading the brochure as an eavesdropping cover. I took out my phone and sent a text to Gussie and Darlene.
Spill it.
I'd have sent one to Garrison, but I didn't have his number.

Darlene rushed over, stepping over Gussie's foot. Was Gussie trying to trip her? Gussie met my gaze and drew her foot back in. She pushed away from the table and got to her feet.

“Where is Bell taking Steve?” I asked Darlene as she scrambled into the store.

“To his room,” Darlene whispered. “From what I've put together, Bell thinks Steve might have killed Morgan.”

“Utter ridiculousness,” Gussie huffed as she joined us in the store. “Steve had no reason to kill that man.”

Steve had a good motive—Morgan stalking me. Most men wouldn't stand by as another guy pushed, pawed, and threatened their girlfriend. “Morgan was harassing me.”

“That is a good motive.” Darlene made herself comfortable on the chair near the cash box.

“But Steve doesn't have a gun.” Gussie punctuated her sentence with a sharp nod of her head.

Garrison walked over, holding his cell phone in the air. “I told Bob what's going on. I'm hoping he'll head back now.”

“Where is he? Ted said the police released him.”

“Hospital.” Garrison pressed his lips together as if to stop an eruption of volatile words.

My heart thundered. Garrison's dire prediction roamed in my head and heart. “Is he okay? Did something happen last night?”

“He's fine. He went to talk to the mother of the victim.”

“I'm going to check on Steve.” I opened the cash box and snatched my room key. Bell had used the word check. He was looking for the murder weapon and wanted to see if Steve had it hidden in our room. Last night, he was probably asking Steve general questions about what happened, and for any information that would implicate Bob. Today, Bell was looking for evidence to arrest Steve.

Garrison grabbed my hand as I turned. “Ted wants you to stay here.”

“Ted knows what's going on?”

Garrison held up his cell phone. “I've been updating him with texts.”

“He went to make some urgent calls,” Gussie interjected. “He'll be back.”

“Did any of you see Ted talk with Bell recently?”

The trio went back to working on their pages.

They could scrap and keep the rest of the details to themselves; I was going to help Steve. He needed me. “Ted should be used to me not obeying him.”

“Going up there won't help Steve,” Garrison said.

Gussie plucked a roll of
Angry Bird
duct tape from under the table displaying the glitter glue. “You'll stay voluntarily, or I'll tape you to the chair.”

Darlene scrambled from the chair and pressed my arms against my side. “Just tell me when, Gussie.”

“How can I help customers if I'm taped to the chair?”

Gussie tore off a long piece of tape. “And how will you be helping customers if you're playing Miss Marple?”

Good point. “Fine. You win. I'll stay.” But I would do so under a silent protest.

  

I spotted Steve walking into the crop room as I finished ringing up a customer. He'd been gone for over an hour. When Detective Bell conducted a search, he must inspect every piece of luggage and every pocket in every shirt and pair of pants, and more than likely, every nook and cranny in the truck and trailer. I waved and blew a kiss.

Frowning, Steve headed for me.

“I thought you forgot about me,” I said.

He glowered…actually glowered at me. Not like Steve at all. He braced his hands on the table. “Where exactly did you go when you went to get the money box?”

My brow wrinkled. “I told you. I used the stairs, tripped, and rested in Marsha's room.”

“Right. You went and asked a woman you didn't trust if you could borrow her room.” Steve's gaze bore into mine.

This must be what it felt like when someone went all bad-cop on a person. I hated it. I edged back a few inches. “Marsha was there when I tripped.”