M&M Surprise Murder: A Donut Hole Cozy Mystery - Book 17 (6 page)

“Oh my gosh,” Amy said and clapped her
hands. “You can’t tell me that the swimming isn’t the most exciting sport in
the Olympics. Look at Michael Phelps. You could slap a pair of gills on this
guy, and it wouldn’t make a difference.”

Lilly fed popcorn between her lips and
chewed. Crunch, crunch, crunch. Her eyes were wide as donuts. “That’s the guy
in the front?”

“Gold medalist, yeah. C’mon, Lils,
you’ve got to know Phelps.”

“I don’t like sports that much. Not
boy sports, anyway,” Lilly replied.

“Atta girl.” Heather gave her a thumbs
up from her sofa, directly opposite the wide-screen TV. “Exercise is important,
but this kind of competition is really tough on people. Psychologically and
physically.” Her thoughts skipped back to Leticia Jackson.

The poor woman’s voice had strained
talking about Kyle.

“Who’s the guy in that green cap?”
Lilly asked.

Amy harrumphed, then buried her
disdain in her donut. She narrowed her eyes at the screen.

“That’s Chad Le Clos. He won this race
at the last Olympics,” Heather said and rolled her eyes at her bestie.

“Wait, I thought you said our guy was
the best?” Lilly asked.

“He is the best,” Amy replied, and
pointed with her donut. “And don’t you forget it.”

“Le Clos beat him last year. In this
race.” Heather grinned at Amy. Her bestie took this kind of competition way too
seriously. It was important, but it wasn’t everything. “But this year, Le Clos’
had some personal issues. Both his parents have been fighting cancer.”

“What?” Amy asked. “That’s terrible. I
had no idea. And he’s still at the Olympics?”

“Yeah.”

“Ooh, ooh, that Phelks guy is
winning,” Lilly said and bounced up and down on the spot. “Look!”

“Phelps,” Amy corrected, then turned
to the TV. “And yeah he is, whooo! Go Phelps!”

The ladies clapped and cheered. Dave
barked and hopped off the sofa and jogged up and down in front of the TV,
wagging his tails.

“He’s going to win,” Amy yelled.

Phelps touched the wall, and Lils and
Amy jumped off the sofa and danced around on the spot. They cheered and hugged
each other. Heather chuckled and sat back. She couldn’t bring herself to
celebrate, now.

The front door slammed, and heavy
footsteps stomped down the hall. “What’s all this noise?” Ryan asked, and
stepped into the living room. He stared at the rain of popcorn on the hardwood
floor. “And what’s all this mess?”

“Phelks won!” Lilly said, beaming from
ear-to-ear.

Dave set to work vacuuming up stray
popcorn kernels.

“Hey, honey,” Heather said. She rose
from her spot on the sofa and strode to the door. She kissed her husband on the
lips, then gave him a hug. “How was work?”

Ryan shook his head, lips taut. “Not
good.”

“Why? What’s the matter?” Heather
asked.

“I need to talk to you.” Ryan crooked
a finger. “It’s important.”

Heather looked back at Amy and Heather.
The two of them mushed themselves onto the sofa to watch the rest of the
highlights. Lilly offered Dave a bite of her donut, then spotted Heather’s gaze
and snapped it out of reach.

“Sorry,” she said, “I forgot.”

“Yeah, yeah,” Heather replied. “I’ll
be right back, you too.”

Ryan grasped her arm and drew her into
the hall. His somber expression didn’t waver.

“What’s wrong? You’re creeping me out
here.”

“The killer struck again,” Ryan said,
lowering his voice.

Another race had started in the living
room. The commentator blared on the TV, announcing names and comparing
swimmers.

“What? Where? How?” Heather’s mind
froze solid. She blinked and processed Ryan’s words.

“Leticia Jackson,” Ryan said. “She was
shot in the Hillside High fields about half an hour again.”

Chills sprang up on the backs of
Heather’s arms, and she stumbled left.

Ryan caught her by the arm and held
her upright. “What is it?”

“I was there. The killer must’ve
attacked her shortly after I left. If I’d stayed a second, a minute, Leticia
would still be alive.” Heather stared into Ryan’s eyes. “It’s my fault she was
there. I interviewed her. I thought it would be the best place. How could I be
so stupid?”

Ryan shook her gently. “Honey, relax.
Leticia’s not dead. The killer missed her heart but got her in the shoulder.
She’s at Hillside Regional, under police protection.”

“Oh my gosh,” Heather said, and her
knees gave out.

 Ryan embraced her and lifted her onto
her feet again. “She’s fine. As fine as she can be given the circumstances.”

“Did she see anything?”

“No,” Ryan said. “She was shot and
then passed out from the pain. The killer removed the arrow from her shoulder,
so we don’t know what she was shot with.”

Heather’s sleuthin’ mind kicked into
high gear. “Wait, the killer removed the arrow but didn’t try to finish Leticia
off?” She grimaced at the turn of phrase.

“They probably thought she was dead.”

“Or they panicked. Maybe this attack
wasn’t planned out properly. Not premeditated.” Heather sucked her bottom lip.
“But why? Why Leticia.”

“Your guess is as good as mine,” Ryan
replied.

“No. No guessing,” Heather said.
“Leticia Jackson knows something. Why else would the killer have attacked her?”

“Psychopathy?” Ryan suggested. He let
go of Heather, and stepped back, then leaned against the wall. “What are you
thinking?”

“I believe that I need to pay Leticia
a visit tomorrow. For her sake and the benefit of every other resident of
Hillside.” Heather exhaled slowly. Her heart rate had returned to normal, at
last. “This killer clearly has no trouble with the idea of killing again. We
can’t allow that.”

“I agree,” Ryan said. “Now, let’s go
back into the living room and enjoy ourselves. Have a donut. The sugar will do
you good.” He slipped his hand beneath her elbow and guided her toward the
cheers in the living room.

Leticia Jackson. Her name burned
through Heather’s mind. What did the gold medalist know? And what had driven
the killer to strike again?

“Tomorrow,” Heather whispered.

Leticia’s drip bag hovered to the left
of her bed, but the room was silent. No heart rate monitors, or steady blip,
blip noise to make sure she didn’t go into cardiac arrest. The Olympian sat
bolt upright in bed, her arm bandaged tight.

“I thought you might come to see me,”
she said.

“I’m used to more noise in these
rooms,” Heather replied. “Kinda quiet isn’t it?”

“I made them turn off all those
beeping machines. Totally unnecessary. I was shot in the arm, not through the
heart, for heaven’s sake.”

Pragmatic as ever. Leticia leaned back
against her pillows, a small smile playing on her mouth. “Like I said, I
thought you might come visit.”

“Why were you so sure?”

Leticia’s smile split into a grin.
“Because I know intelligence when I see it. And you’re one of a kind, Mrs.
Shepherd.”

“I’m flattered,” Heather said and
grasped the Donut Delights box in her left hand. She’d loaded it up with every
type of donut she could fit inside. Heather pointed at the chair beside the
hospital bed. “Mind if I sit down?”

“Only if I can have one of those
donuts,” Leticia replied.

Heather popped the box on the judge’s
lap. “Help yourself.” She sat down in the chair, then propped her elbows on her
knees and leaned on them.

Leticia opened the donut box and
brought out an M&M Surprise. “Oh, I love M&Ms,” she said. “My guilty
pleasure.”

“You’re in the hospital. No guilt.”

Leticia took a bite of the donut, then
groaned. “Delicious.” She chewed in silence, swallowed, then speared Heather
with a gaze. “And yeah, there’s some guilt floating around in this room. All of
it is mine, though.”

“No, I claim some of it.”

“What?” Leticia asked, and took
another bite. “Why?”

“Because I was the one who asked you
to meet me at the fields. If you hadn’t been there…”

“It would’ve happened anyway,” Leticia
replied. “I have my suspicions about who did it, I’m sure you do too, but
first, you need to hear what I have to say.”

“I’m all ears,” Heather replied.
Leticia was a woman after her own heart. She got straight to the point and
didn’t linger on formalities.

“I omitted some information during our
talk yesterday,” she said.

“Oh yeah?”

“Yeah,” Leticia replied. “A couple of
days ago, the afternoon before the competition was supposed to start. Jessica
Laverne came to see me.”

Jinx? Heather forced puzzle pieces,
but they didn’t click into place, just yet. She’d need more than that. “What
did she want?”

“Oh, just to talk. She came into the
woman’s locker room, all sugar and sweetness. Complimented me on my gold medal,
said she looked forward to the competition. You know, the usual stuff someone
says when they’re trying to butter you up.”

“Okay. Then what happened?”

Leticia ate the last bit of her donut,
then licked the glaze off her fingers. “She cut to the point, eventually. Okay,
so I told her to cut to the point because I didn’t buy the honey she’d tried to
sell me.”

“All right.”

“She offered me a thousand dollars to
fix the competition and announce her the winner.”

Heather gasped. She couldn’t help it.
Bribery? The papers had said that Jinx’s father had tried to throw the games,
not her. Unless, she’d taken up the habit after her father had passed on.

“A thousand dollars.”

“I didn’t take it,” Leticia said.
“Before you ask. I explained to her, politely, that the judging system wasn’t
just reliant on me, but my co-judge, and that it was largely electronic.”

“What do you mean?”

“Nobody uses pure human judging for
archery. That would be ridiculous. The High School provided the facility, but a
lot of bigger sponsors chipped in for this competition to provide equipment.
Specifically, the targets, the scoreboard, and the scoring system. They had to
bring in technicians to get it all installed, correctly.”

So that was why the school hadn’t
taken down the range, yet. They didn’t have the know-how.

“How did Jessica react?”

“Oh, as you would expect. All that
honey slipped right off her face. No more sweet-cutesy talk to the judge. She
went hard as nails. She told me that anything was possible and if I wasn’t
willing to throw the match, she’d find someone else who would. The other
judge.”

“Huh,” Heather said. “But the other
judge was Kyle. She’d have to know that he’d never take a bribe from her, after
their history together.”

Leticia opened the lid of the donut
box and studied the contents. “That’s the thing,” she said. “I don’t think
Jessica knew who the other judge was yet. We didn’t have Kyle on board until
the very last minute. They hadn’t even printed his name in the programs yet.
She didn’t know, and I didn’t tell her.”

Heather mulled it over in her mind.
“So, you rejected her bribe, and she probably went to find Kyle. Did you hear
anything else? See anything?”

Leticia sighed. “No. I left afterward.
I was pretty irritated that she thought she could pay me off. People need to
have integrity in any sport, and she doesn’t.”

Heather chewed the inside of her cheek
and narrowed her eyes.

“She’s the killer,” Leticia said and
brought out a Choc Revolution donut. “I’m telling you. It’s her. I feel it in
my guts.”

“I want to agree with you,” Heather
said, “but I learned my lesson when it came to making assumptions like that.
I’ve accused way too many people of being murderers.”

Leticia burst out laughing, then
winced and pressed her hand to her bandage. “Ouch.”

“Besides, the murderer keeps shooting
with carbon arrows, and Jessica uses graphite. I need the arrow you were shot
with before I can prove anything.” Not to mention that a bribe seemed like weak
motivation to kill someone.

After all, this wasn’t the Olympics.
This was a small town competition. It wasn’t as if she had anything to gain
from this but minor notoriety.

“Suit yourself. But please, make sure
those cops out there stay on my door until Jessica is behind bars or out of
this town.” Leticia bit into the Choc Revolution donut, then moaned. “You know
what else should be a crime?” She asked, around a mouthful of cream.

“What?” Heather asked, burning through
the possibilities in her mind’s eye.

“How good these donuts are, wow.”

Heather laughed, but joy didn’t bubble
through her at the compliment. Jessica Laverne? Maybe, but it felt as if a
piece of the puzzle had dropped off the board.