Pinned for Murder (18 page)

“What’s your gut tellin’ you?”

“That I’m just trying to protect Rose.”

Margaret Louise seemed to mull over her answer, her head nodding ever so slightly as she closed her eyes momentarily. When she opened them again, her focus traveled to some distant place well beyond the confines of her station wagon. “Even someone as carin’ and sweet as you, Victoria, wouldn’t go runnin’ off on some wild-goose chase unless there was a reason.”

Shrugging, Tori, too, closed her eyes. Margaret Louise was right. “But what happens if I can’t put a finger on what that reason is? Or where the goose chase is leading me?”

“You go with it.”

“You do?” Leona asked.

Margaret Louise rolled her eyes in a mixture of amusement and disgust. “Sometimes that not-knowin’ part of your brain knows more than you realize. All we have to do is find a way to coax it out.”

“And how do you propose we do that?”

“By investigatin’, Twin. Just like Victoria planned.”

“But what, exactly, do we investigate?” Tori asked as she looked from one sister to the other.

“I don’t rightly know. But I reckon we’ll find out. ’Specially with Leona’s nose leadin’ the way.”

An audible sniff rang out from the backseat.

Shifting back into drive, Margaret Louise pressed her foot on the gas pedal and peeled back onto the road, gravel spewing upward in their wake. “So that’s what we’re gonna do.”

Tori couldn’t help but smile as they sped down one road after the other.

“Are we going anywhere dangerous?”

“For us? No. For you? Possibly.” Margaret Louise bit back a grin as her words generated a rustling in the backseat.

“For me?”

“Well, technically that depends on whether Rose is actually home.”

Leona gasped for the second time that day. “Rose? We’re going to Rose’s house? No one ever said anything about visiting that old biddy.”

“Land sakes, Twin, would it kill you to extend a little empathy in Rose’s direction just this one time?” Margaret Louise asked as she slowed the car in preparation for their final turn. “She is sufferin’, you know.”

“Suffering, schmuffering.” Leona extended her index finger into the air and pointed it smack down the middle of the front seat, Rose’s home springing into view. “Tell her to look out her window every day after breakfast. Maybe that will keep her mind off things.”

“Look out her window?” Tori followed Leona’s hand. What she was pointing out was anyone’s . . .

Ahhh.
Now she got it.

Doug, clad in a tight white T-shirt and a pair of faded blue jeans, was squatting on Rose’s roof, hammering shingles into place.

“Let me guess,” Tori said as she continued to observe Rose’s temporary employee as he repaired yet another souvenir from Roger’s visit to Sweet Briar. “You think looking at Doug would be enough to eliminate Rose’s hurt and frustration over Kenny’s part in Martha Jane’s murder?”

“He’s a man, isn’t he? A well-built, hardworking one to boot if I might add.”

“He’s a
married
man, Twin,” Margaret Louise reminded as she shifted the car into Park and turned off the ignition. “And you’ve got your hands full as it is with that one”—the woman pointed farther down the street—“over there, don’t you?”

“And he buys you clothes.” Tori opened the door and stepped out onto the sidewalk. “You can’t get much better than that.”

Clutching Paris to her bosom, Leona, too, stepped from the car, her lip slightly curled. “I could if he were a bit more attentive.”

Margaret Louise stopped midstep. “You’ve found a man who isn’t fallin’ all over you? Why, Twin, this young man of yours is gettin’ better all the time, ain’t he, Victoria?”

“He’s just preoccupied is all,” Leona insisted before peering up at Doug and elevating her voice a touch. “That roof never looked finer.”

“Why thank you, ma’am.” Doug tipped his ball cap forward, then repositioned it on his head, a grin stretching across his face as he set his hammer down beside him. “Tori, Ms. Davis . . . what brings you by?”

It was a hard question to answer, since she didn’t really know herself. But, fortunately for her, Margaret Louise fielded the question with ease.

“Martha Jane’s sister, bless her heart, has asked us to keep an eye on the place until she knows what’s happenin’.”

“Seems to me she’s got nothin’ to worry about now.”

Tori studied the man. “Nothing to worry about?”

He shrugged, then picked up his hammer once again. “That Kenny fella is sittin’ in lockup right now, ain’t he? Which stands to reason any threat to Mizz Martha Jane’s place is gone.”

Unless Kenny didn’t do it . . .

Turning to Margaret Louise, she motioned toward the victim’s home, her voice punctuated by the hammering from above. “Shall we care for the plants?”

“That sounds like a good place to start to me.” Leona’s twin waved at Doug and set off in the direction of Martha Jane’s home, Tori bringing up the rear.

“Tori?”

She looked over her shoulder.

“I’d be happy to turn a hose on those plants durin’ the day. Seems kinda silly for you to drive a country mile for somethin’ I can do just as easy from right here.” Doug ran his hand over the shingle he’d just attached and grabbed another from the pile at his feet. “Might help me feel less . . . helpless, y’know?”

She did. “That would be nice, thank you, Doug.” She motioned toward Margaret Louise. “I better head on over now before she starts hollering for me and disturbing the neighborhood.”

“Not sure how much disturbin’ she can do with all the hammerin’ and sawin’ going on here. Drowns out pretty much everything in the vicinity, includin’ my thoughts.”

“I know what you mean. Though, for me, it’s not hammering and sawing and those kinds of noises that are making it hard for me to think.”

He laughed. “Crazy kids running around the library?”

She shook her head. “I wish it were that simple. They actually listen—most of the time—to a good old-fashioned shushing.”

“Crazy boss?”

Again, she shook her head only to change it to a nod. “Actually yes, that’s exactly what it is.”

“Why the change?” he asked as dimples appeared beside his mouth.

“I was going to correct you and point out the fact that
I’m
the boss. But, with the incessant chatter going on in my head these days, the
crazy
tag applies just fine.”

“What’s it sayin’?”

“Saying?”

“The chatter in your head. What’s it sayin’?”

“Victoria, you gettin’ to the short rows yet?” Margaret Louise bellowed from somewhere out of sight.

She drew back. “Short rows?”

Doug’s laugh rained down from the roof, his eyes getting into the action. “You’re not from the south, are you?”

“How could you tell?”

“Besides the fact you talk funny?”

“
I
talk funny?”

“To me you do. And to folks in this town you do, too, I imagine.” He set the next shingle in place and grabbed hold of his hammer. “But I like it. It’s nice.”

“Thanks.” She waved up at him, her own genuine smile quieting the voices in her head for the first time in days. “I’m going to let you get back to work. I’ve taken enough of your time already.”

“You never answered my question.”

“About the chatter?”

He slipped a nail between his lips and nodded.

She looked toward Martha Jane’s house, the momentary calm their conversation had created disappearing as quickly as it had come. “It’s saying the opposite of what everyone else is saying.”

When he raised his eyebrow in lieu of using his mouth, she continued, her words serving as the reassurance she needed to be where she was at that exact moment. “Kenny didn’t do it.”

The man pulled the nail from his mouth. “You’re kid-din’ me, right?”

“I don’t know why and I have absolutely no proof to back it up . . . but I don’t think he did it. Call it a gut feeling.”

For a long moment he said nothing, his eyes squinting against the sun. Finally, though, he spoke, his southern drawl slow and lazy. “I played Clue when I was a kid, Tori. Wasn’t much good at it back then. But I know this . . . when that Mustard guy was in the kitchen with the gun and the blood, it didn’t take much to figure out he did it.”

“Meaning?”

“Meanin’ that guy was just waitin’ to explode. Add the rope and his runnin’ from back there”—he pointed toward the grove of trees behind Martha Jane’s house—“not more ’n two hours before they found her facedown and, well, I wouldn’t need to be openin’ no little yellow envelope to see who did it.”

Doug was right. She wasn’t playing a smart game. The evidence was there—right in front of her face.

Yet, still, she couldn’t accept it as truth.

Chapter 16

She was staring at the nearly completed scarf in her hand when he showed up, his presence the reprieve she hadn’t realized she needed. But interruptions were the best form of procrastination known to mankind, and right now, she’d take anything she could get.

Especially when it came carrying chocolate . . .

“Ohhh, I love these.” Ripping the corner edge open, she lifted the candy bar to her lips only to stop when he made a face. “I’m sorry, do you want some?”

He shook his head.

Lowering the candy bar to her side, she bobbed her head left then right, peering at her reflection in the window beside the door. “Do I have something on my face?”

Again, he shook his head.

“Then what?”

“I was hoping for a kiss.”

A kiss, how could she have forgotten?

She rose up on tiptoes and brushed a kiss across his lips. “Do you forgive me?”

“I suppose.” With a shy yet playful smile, Milo slid his hand to the back of her head and tipped it slightly, planting a second kiss on the very top of her forehead. “You okay? You seem distracted.”

Stopping the candy mere inches from her mouth once again, she shrugged, then led the way into the living room. “Let’s talk about something else for a little while, okay? I think my brain needs a break from its current obsession.”

He dropped onto the sofa beside her, his eyes pinning hers with a hint of worry. “You sure?”

“I’m sure.” She pointed at the scarf she’d set on the coffee table. “We’re getting there. Dixie told me she’s completed six so far. Hats, too. And Debbie, she’s at ten on both.”

“So they’ll be done by your goal date?”

“With any luck, hopefully.” Swinging them to the opposite side, she pulled her legs onto the couch and nestled her head against Milo’s shoulder. “How’s the collection booth coming?”

“It’s almost done, thanks to Curtis and Doug. Those two have made this whole project a kabillion times easier.”

She nodded.

“And with the work ethic Curtis has, and the woodworking talent Doug possesses, the finished project will be dynamite.”

“I’m glad.” And she was. It was nice to see people stepping up to the plate and helping each other out regardless of how long they had or hadn’t lived in a particular area. “The festival is Saturday, right?”

“That’s right.” He turned his head toward hers, the feel of his breath on her hair making her feel more at peace. “You don’t have to keep holding that candy bar. You
can
eat it, you know.”

She stared at it, its former appeal missing in action. “Maybe later.”

“Did you start your personal crusade yet?”

“Sort of.”

“And?”

“And . . . a big fat nothing.” She leaned forward, set the uneaten candy bar on the coffee table, and then grabbed the throw pillow from the corner of the couch and hugged it to her chest. “But Martha Jane’s plants look good.”

He hooked his finger under her chin and turned it ever so slightly until their eyes met. “I’m sorry, Tori, I really am. I was hoping that the simple act of getting out there and looking around would give you a sense of peace about all of this.”

A sense of peace . . .

“We got all excited at first.”

“We?” he asked.

“Margaret Louise was with me.” She looked down at the pillow in her arms, her mind traveling back through the day, a day that had yielded nothing more than a headache and a few bug bites. “Leona was, too, though she was hanging around Curtis most of the time, making it nearly impossible for him to make much headway on the Walker place.”

“No need to worry. Curtis is a machine. You should see how fast he is—in and out in a flash.” He picked his feet off the floor and stretched them across the coffee table. “Probably because he doesn’t say much.”

“He’s an observer.”

Milo peered down at her. “Where did that come from?”

She released her hold on the pillow, his words taking root as it fell forward onto her thighs. “I don’t know. I guess maybe from the library the other day. He stopped by to donate some books he’d finished reading and we started talking. About our memories of the libraries we visited as kids.”

“Did you show him the children’s room?”

The smile in his voice made her look up. “I did. And he loved it.”

“You’d be hard-pressed to find someone who doesn’t.” Milo scooted into the far corner of the couch, his hands pulling her with him. “Hey . . . guess what? I’ve got my first career lined up for the kids.”