Every Trick in the Book (13 page)

The ninety minutes allotted for the workshop went by quickly. Proudly carrying my
homemade paper, I sought out Makayla at the Espresso Yourself kiosk. Business had
slowed down when I arrived, and there were only two customers in line.

“Look what I made,” I said to her after she handed a chai latte to the person in front
of me. I held out my sheet of paper, the blue cornflower petals providing a striking
contrast to the textured, slightly beige speckled paper. I felt a little like a schoolgirl
showing off her project, but I was proud of what I had produced.

“That’s beautiful,” Makayla said, stroking the soft, fibrous sheet. “Are you going
to pen some sweet nothings to a certain hunky policeman using that special paper?”
She wriggled her eyebrows.

My peripheral vision caught a movement of black, and I immediately turned, thinking
the shadow might be Kirk Mason. A woman wearing a black sweater walked past us toward
the exit. I exhaled in relief and then saw that I’d gripped my homemade paper so tightly
that a deep crease had formed in the right-hand corner.

“Girl, you’re as jittery as a fly in a pond full of frogs,” Makayla said, touching
my shoulder. “Not that I blame you, considering what happened yesterday. I’m going
to make you a nice peppermint tea. I’m cutting off your caffeine supply.”

The refreshing mint of the tea did calm me, even while
I told Makayla about the events of the previous day. As I went on to explain why I
was sure that Kirk Mason was the murderer, she frowned.

“I wouldn’t put all my eggs in one basket,” she countered gently. “Like I already
told the police, baristas are keen observers. Yesterday, for example, I saw Melissa
Plume arguing with another woman right at this very table.” She tapped her finger
on the tabletop. “And how could I
not
remember Melissa? When that woman ordered a caramel latte and I turned and looked
at her, you could have knocked me over with a feather. She was your twin, Lila! Melissa
introduced herself and we got to talking. She seemed like a great gal.” Her face lost
its typical illumination for a moment. “What a terrible shame.”

“It’s amazing how alike we were,” I noted sadly, but if Makayla was aware of another
suspect, I needed to be fully briefed. “How did the argument start?”

“Melissa was sitting here reading through some notes when this other woman plunked
herself down in the chair opposite her. After a few minutes, things got tense between
them and the other woman kept pointing her finger angrily at Melissa. I was busy with
other customers so I didn’t hear what they were saying, but they were causing quite
a ruckus. Then the other woman got up, knocking her chair over, and shouted, ‘You’ll
regret this!’ And then she ran off. Made quite a spectacle of herself.”

“What did Melissa do?”

“She apologized to everyone, picked up the chair, and then left, too.”

I was having a difficult time envisioning a woman luring Melissa to her death using
a picture of Silas’s teddy bear, but I couldn’t mention this to Makayla since I’d
promised
Sean I wouldn’t tell anyone about the photograph. Instead, I argued, “But would a
woman have the strength to strike Melissa down?”

“This woman was pretty combative. And those finger points were meant to be a threat.
I don’t have to be an FBI profiler to read that kind of body language,” Makayla insisted.
“Besides, that wasn’t the only time I saw this crazy lady. She confronted Melissa
again last night and her claws were showing even more then.”

“When? At the costume party?”

Makayla nodded. “I was just arriving and heard raised voices in the parking lot. I
saw an Edgar Allan Poe push a vampire against a car, so I ran over to see if everything
was all right. The vampire was—”

“Melissa!” I interjected, sitting forward. “But Kirk Mason was dressed up as Edgar
Allan Poe last night. How do you know it wasn’t him?”

“I know a man when I see one, Lila,” Makayla said with a snort. “This Poe had green
eyes, auburn hair, and a whole face full of freckles. It was as if someone upturned
the pepper shaker and started sprinkling. Only one person at this festival had that
face. And no matter how tight that gal’s suit coat was, she couldn’t hide those double
Ds! Not many Poes running around with that bra size, no, ma’am.”

I sat back in my chair and sighed. “What happened after you approached them?”

“I asked if everything was okay and the green-eyed woman glared at me and said, ‘We’re
fine.’ When I looked at Melissa, she told me not to worry. But I hung around long
enough to hear the woman roar, ‘You’ll be sorry. I’ll make sure of it!’ before she
stalked off like a lioness on the prowl. Melissa and I walked into the party together,
and she told
me that the woman was an irate writer with the personality of a spoiled pop princess.”

“Do you think she was capable of murdering Melissa?”

“It didn’t occur to me then that she might be dangerous.” Makayla shook her head.
“But after I heard what happened to Melissa, I thought about her words some more and
decided that she might have gone off the deep end. So I told the police everything
that I saw.”

I pondered Makayla’s narrative. Had the green-eyed woman lured Melissa to her death?
Could her hostility have turned into a murderous rage while they were in that dark,
lonely corridor? My certainty that it had been Kirk Mason began to waver. “What did
the police say?” I wondered.

“Not much.” She frowned in disappointment. “If only I’d heard her name, the police
would stand half a chance of finding her. But Melissa never said it.”

“I wonder what they were quarreling about.”

“Maybe Melissa rejected her book and the woman took leave of her senses. Of course,
killing someone over a book is pretty damned over-the-top, but you know writers better
than most. Nuttier than a bag of circus peanuts at times, aren’t they?”

“‘There’s the scarlet thread of murder running through the colorless skein of life,’”
I said, quoting Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. We both stared blankly at the shifting crowd,
unable to comprehend the workings of a murderer’s mind.

I HAD BEEN
correct in assuming that my shift at the information desk would be a quiet one. The
festival was winding down and people didn’t approach me except to say good-bye. I
had brought along some manuscripts to read, but I
was too distracted to concentrate. I kept going over all the reasons I thought the
murderer was Kirk Mason and saw him in every thin man with black hair who walked by,
but Mason did not make an appearance. I was also watching out for a green-eyed, freckle-faced
woman with short auburn hair, but didn’t catch sight of her, either.

The tireless police officer was still at his post. I was convinced that he hadn’t
moved from his position once today. I’d yet to see him eat or drink anything, and
he’d only changed his formidable posture to exchange a few words with Sean before
resuming his military stance again.

However, with the lobby nearly empty and the members of the media aggressively intercepting
festivalgoers heading for their cars or Inspiration Valley’s train station, I assumed
Officer Bunyan would relax.

Despite the fact that I was reassured by the police presence, I couldn’t shake the
guilt I felt over my part in Melissa’s violent demise and kept thinking about the
poor little boy with the teddy bear who would grow up without his mother. Melissa’s
husband would have arrived by now, and Sean would have interviewed him. Had Mr. Delaney
given any insights that could help lead the police to an arrest?

Reaching for my cell phone I punched in Sean’s number.

“Hey,” he said, answering after one ring. “I was just about to head over there. Are
things winding down?”

I surveyed the hall. People were packing up, hugging one another, and waving good-bye.
“Yes. We close up shop in a half hour. Sean, Makayla told me about the woman Melissa
was arguing with. Have you been able to track her down?”

“I figured she’d tell you about that. No, we haven’t found the mystery woman yet.
But Makayla’s account does add
another suspect to our list. The killer may not have been Kirk Mason after all, though
we won’t know until we locate him.”

“Did you meet with Melissa’s husband? How is their little boy doing?”

“He’s young and doesn’t really understand, but while his father was on the phone with
him he kept asking for his mother.” Sean was quiet for a second. “The husband is grief-stricken,
but on the flight over he remembered something. There’s an editor at Melissa’s publishing
house who has some animosity toward her. This guy, a Mr. Ruben Felden, claims she
lured an author from him—one who subsequently ended up on the bestseller list for
nearly a year. Apparently, this author specifically requested Melissa as her editor,
even though Ruben was originally approached by her agent. He maintains that Melissa
influenced the agent to bring the author over to her. And you won’t believe this,
but Mr. Felden’s hobby is creating art with ornithological motifs. To be more specific,
he makes murals and sculptures using feathers.”

“The raven feather!” My brain was churning. “Do you think Felden could be Kirk Mason?”

“He wasn’t at the office today; in fact he’s been absent for a few days. New York’s
finest are trying to locate him. And this guy may or may not be Kirk Mason, Lila.
The general description of this man could fit, but we don’t have details yet.”

Suddenly I knew how I could help. “Sean, I can assist you with that. If I go to the
office—”

He sighed. “Please keep the investigating to the police, Lila. Remember what happened
the last time you got involved.”

I didn’t want to travel back to those memories. This time
my participation would be different. After all, I was the one who had access to information
on publishing houses and their editors. At the office I could research this man who
was angry with Melissa.

When I first became a literary agent, I hadn’t anticipated that my love of books would
end up bringing me in close contact with a murderer, but I wasn’t going to back down
now. It didn’t matter whether the killer was an aspiring writer or an established
editor. What mattered was that this warped individual had murdered a good woman during
my agency’s festival. Now, I was going to use all my resources to bring that person
to justice, and I wasn’t going to stop because the event was over or because Sean
had asked me to. This crime was personal and I was involved. End of story.

WHEN SEAN SHOWED UP AT THE OLD TOWN HALL, HIS
face was pinched and grim and I sensed he was about to deliver a piece of bad news.
Unfortunately, my instincts proved correct.

“I’m sorry, Lila,” he said softly, touching the tip of my chin tenderly. “I can’t
come for supper tonight. We’ve got a dozen interviews to conduct regarding the argument
Makayla witnessed between Melissa and a female writer, and then I’ve got a conference
call with a fellow officer in New York.”

My heart sank. I’d really needed Sean’s company tonight. It wasn’t just the murder
that had me feeling down—though Lord knows that was enough to cast a pall of gloom
over the entire weekend. There was something unaccountably disheartening about the
festival coming to an end. All around me, attendees were shouldering the ocher-colored
canvas bags provided by Novel Idea, saying good-bye to friends and
acquaintances, and heading out into the crisp October afternoon. The final classes
were almost finished and the food service kiosks were closing down. The vendors who’d
sold scores of bookmarks, writing journals, funky mouse pads, and inspirational posters
were placing their remaining wares into boxes.

“A rain check, then,” I’d told Sean, mustering a smile. After all, bringing Melissa’s
killer to justice was far more important than my having a case of the blues.

He’d hardly made it out of earshot before I began dialing my mother’s number.

She picked up after the first ring. “So you’re cooking for me tonight? And Trey, too?”

“Is there a tarot card layout that predicts supper invitations?” I asked acerbically.

Althea tried her best to soothe me. “You’ve had a hard weekend, shug,” she said gently.
“It’ll be good for you to spend some time with your family. I bet Trey would get a
kick out of givin’ treats to the little kiddos tonight—it’ll make him feel like a
tried-and-true grown-up.” She sighed nostalgically and I instantly regretted taking
out my negativity on her. “I recall the time he dressed up as a wizard. He couldn’t
have been more than six or seven and he used that pack of sparklers for his magic
wands. Remember what a ruckus that caused?”

I laughed. “How could I not? He nearly set fire to the neighbor’s rose trellis and
then
he went after their cat! He swore to me that he only wanted to change it into a dog!”
For a moment, I was lost in the past, transported to another Halloween night in which
my young son dumped his bag of treats onto the floor and begged me to pick my favorite
candy from his spoils.