Seven Threadly Sins (13 page)

I
changed the sign on the door from
Come Back Later
to
Welcome
.

Neffting was still sitting in his car.

“Thanks for the coffee, Willow,” Dora said. “I guess I’d better return to Blueberry Cottage before that detective comes to look down his pointy nose at the evidence we collected. Mind if I take a shortcut through your apartment?”

“Of course not.” I might as well give her a key and let her supervise my life.

“Thanks. That hill in your side yard is too steep. I need your young man.” She clumped down the stairs.

What young man?
Dora could come and go through my apartment as she pleased, any time of the day or night, and she might never encounter the man she insisted on calling mine. I sighed.

Vicki’s cruiser pulled up behind Detective Neffting’s. Together, they headed for my side gate.

My phone rang. It was Mona. “I have the most fabulous idea!”

She’s going to ask me to do something that takes all of my time. Get ready to say no.

“I’ve told that gorgeous hunk from TADAM that I want to buy all of the outfits from the fashion show that we seven Threadville ladies made.”

“Gorgeous hunk?”

“You know, that guy with the sulky, damn-your-eyes look. Kent somebody or other.”

Kent, a gorgeous hunk? To each her own.

Then I realized what else she’d said. “How can you buy all the outfits? It was a silent auction. The highest bidders are entitled to the clothes.”

She let out a careless burble of laughter. “That would be me. I bid on some of them, but the auction was never properly completed, and now I’ve told Kent that I will pay two dollars over the top bids on
all
of the outfits that we made.”

Rumor had it that at least one of Mona’s ex-husbands was looking after her very well, financially. Still, some of the outfits had received no bids, and Mona would be able to strut around in my Gluttony cocktail dress and matching bloomers for only two dollars. Lucky her.

I asked cautiously, “What are you going to do with them?”
Resell them at a profit to the people who made them? No, thanks . . .

“Kent—don’t you just love that name? So distinguished.
Kent
said I can’t have them yet. The police took the clothes we wore in the fashion show as evidence against that sourpuss who was married to that poor, sweet man who died.”

Sweet? He’d been male, though, which had probably been enough for Mona. “Evidence against Paula?” And Dora and I weren’t suspects? That would be a relief.

“Well, Kent didn’t
say
that, but of course she did it. She couldn’t have made it more obvious that she hated her husband for the way he ogled the rest of us. As if it were his fault that Threadville just teems with beautiful women, and
she
just let herself go!”

“But—”

Mona went on as if I hadn’t tried to speak. “I know you think you’re the only one in the world who can solve
murders, but I intend to prove that Paula murdered her husband. Then we can have the outfits back.”

“I think they keep evidence until after convictions, and sometimes for years beyond that, in case of appeals.”

“Then you can make them all again! It will be easy for you, having already practiced.”

I didn’t dispute her or point out that the other Threadville proprietors and I hadn’t necessarily enjoyed making those outfits in the first place, and certainly wouldn’t be thrilled about making duplicates. I asked, “Why do you want them? It’s not like they were beautiful or elegant.”

“That’s just it!”

I was missing something. “Just
what
?”

“That hunky Kent is going to help me put on a play, and we’ll donate most of the proceeds to TADAM’s scholarship fund. What do you think of that?”

I think
I may consider moving out of Threadville
. “Do you have experience putting on plays?” I asked.

“I wrote one in elementary school and played the lead. How difficult can it be?”

That depends on whether or not you want people to enjoy it . . .
“Why do you need the outfits we wore in the fashion show?”

“For costumes. And they’ll only fit certain people, so we all have to be in the play! And guess what the play’s title is!” Without waiting for my answer, she crowed, “
The Seven Threadly Sins
!”

There’s another Threadville, in Mississippi. Maybe I can convince Haylee and her three mothers to move there with me, and we can all open new shops . . .
“But we’re not actors.”

“Not a problem! All you have to do is memorize your lines and act them out. Easy peasy. Besides, I’ll help you. And I’ll have most of the lines, anyway. You’ll barely need to do more than you did in the fashion show—just go onstage and prance around. You hammed it up. You know how to act. You and Edna both do, and the others will learn.”

“Mona, I’m sorry, but I can’t take the time. When In Stitches is not open, I have custom machine embroidery orders to fill.” I did my best to sound firm.

It did no good. “Don’t forget the scholarship fund. I’ve told Kent that my one requirement before I pay for the outfits, if I can wangle them from the police, is that I am to be a member of the scholarship selection committee. At this point, the committee is only the widow, who will be in prison by the time the play winds up, that gorgeous Kent, and that woman with the hair.”

“Loretta.”

“Yes, her. I told him that I’d expect to get a scholarship for our little Ashley, and do you know what he said? He said that girl had a lot of talent, and he’d vote with me. So, we have to do it.”

And it would give us a chance to see more of him and find out if his printing was bold, stylish, and angry. Plus, as annoying as Mona could be, she was a Threadville proprietor, one of us, and we shouldn’t leave the woman alone with Kent, much as she might like that, as long as we suspected he could be a killer.

“I . . . guess I can do it.”

“Great! I’ll tell the others that you’re helping. Want to be assistant director?”

Gulp. “I wouldn’t know a thing about it.”

“No problies.
Your
hunk and his employees can build the set and be our stagehands. See what you can do to convince him, okay, before I tackle him?” She giggled. “Not physically, of course, but just give me the word anytime you change your mind about him, and I’ll be happy to take over.”

Yes, she’d made that obvious. And she apparently didn’t know that Loretta was the one doing the tackling these days. I wasn’t going to tell her, though. “He works long hours. He might like to do it but not have time.”

“Nonsense. He built that haunted graveyard and chapel for that other gorgeous hunk, Ben. He’ll make time for an important charity like this.”

From the corner of my eye, I saw Threadville buses from Erie and from northeastern Ohio stop outside the shop.

“Today’s Threadville tourists are here, Mona. We’d better stop chatting.”

“They are? Okay.” As usual, I didn’t see any of the women head toward Mona’s decorating shop, Country Chic. She kept saying she was going to offer courses and workshops, but after a couple of years in Threadville, she had yet to offer her first one. Nearly everything she sold was already made and decorated, and I didn’t think she had a clue how to actually create anything herself, besides working up a yearning for every man between the ages of twenty and sixty-five.

The women from our morning embroidery class came into In Stitches.

“What are we doing today, Willow?” they asked.

“Crewel work.”

Rosemary, who drove the tour bus from Erie, asked, “How can we do crewel embroidery with machines? Aren’t you supposed to use thick wool yarn? That won’t fit through the eyes of our needles.”

Georgina, a frequent attendee who actually lived within walking distance of the Threadville shops, guessed, “Bobbins? We’re going to work upside down?”

Women clowned, pretending to stand on their heads.

I admitted, “I haven’t tried it myself yet. Is everyone game?”

Of course they were. We chose flower designs that might have been in Jacobean tapestries and hooped our fabric right side down instead of right side up, with our stabilizer on top, in plain view for once.

We threaded bobbins with the heaviest weight of embroidery thread I’d been able to order. It was sort of woolly and came in many beautiful tones.

In machine embroidery, a little of the thread that goes through the needle is pulled around to the back of embroidery motifs so that the bobbin thread does not accidentally show on top.

But now we wanted the bobbin side of the design to
actually be the top, so every time we changed to a new color of bobbin thread, we changed the thread in the needle to a matching color of normal weight, matte finish thread. I hoped that, when we turned over our embroidery to view it from the proper side, the thinner thread would hide among the heavier, woolly stitches.

We loaded our designs into our sewing machines and stitched them. They looked pretty from the top, which would eventually be the bottom, but we could hardly wait to take our hoops out of our machines.

My design didn’t look really great, but some of my students who were extremely talented and patient ended up with floral motifs that they really liked. One woman had even managed to put her crewel embroidery on velvet, by pressing the velvet onto a sheet of my new super-sticky stabilizer on the bottom side of her hoop.

Before we broke for lunch, many people bought several spools of heavy embroidery thread.

Rosemary groaned. “Why do you keep doing this to us, Willow? I’m going to need lots more colors of this thread.”

Sometime during the morning, Detective Neffting’s and Police Chief Vicki Smallwood’s cars disappeared from Lake Street.

In my afternoon workshop, we again practiced crewel machine embroidery. I turned down my machine’s top tension and was happier with this version of upside-down crewel embroidery. Adjusting tension was always trial and error, and none of us particularly liked trial and error. We all wanted trial and perfect the first time.

Ashley came to work in the shop after school. During a lull, I asked if she had her notes from the night before. “And the sketches that Antonio gave you for your outfits?”

She rummaged in her backpack and pulled them out.

I pointed to one of the sketches that Antonio had given her. “Look at the printing on these sketches. Does it look like Loretta’s?”

She studied the sketches, then paged through the notes
she’d taken in our abbreviated night school class. “Yes, it does.” She wrinkled her nose. “You were here with me when he gave me my sketches. He told me that
he
had drawn them. But we know for certain that he did not draw that dress on the easel last night, because we saw Loretta do it, and we saw how she printed words like ‘shoulder seam’ on the sketch. She must have drawn all of the sketches that Antonio gave us.”

After we closed In Stitches, my animals and I had our suppers and a quick outing before firefighting practice.

Those of us who lived in downtown Threadville could have walked to firefighting, but we needed enough vehicles at the ball field for everyone, in case we were called to an emergency during firefighting practice. The dogs and I always went with Haylee in her pickup truck, mainly because it was as red as the village’s fire trucks, which seemed like a good idea, but that meant that I always had two largish dogs in my lap all the way to and from the baseball field.

Haylee parked and we all tumbled out. I took Tally’s leash and gave Haylee Sally’s. Firefighters jogged around the baseball diamond.

Ben strode toward us. Sally and Tally pulled us to him. He gave us a smile that would have melted anyone’s heart. Sally and Tally wagged their tails even faster. Ben squatted down and rubbed their ears.

Behind me, I heard the hum of a large, well-maintained engine. Clay’s pickup truck? Anticipation ran through me like sweet syrup. We were back to our usual schedule—firefighting practice, and then all going out together afterward. Everything between Clay and me would be fine.

Ben stood and stared toward the parking lot. The vehicle’s engine shut off.

Although warned by Ben’s sudden frown, I couldn’t help turning around.

Clay’s truck was beside Haylee’s.

A vision in tight jeans and an even tighter T-shirt, Loretta climbed down from Clay’s passenger seat.

C
lay had brought Loretta to fir
efighting practice.

I didn’t know what to do. My first two choices—becoming invisible or propelling myself into outer space—weren’t exactly feasible, and no deep holes seemed about to gape open anywhere near me, either.

Luckily, I had mentors. My dogs might be uneasy in certain situations, especially when I was nervous, but this time they ignored my insecurity. Catching sight of Clay across the field, they charged toward him.

Haylee and I had the choice of letting go of their leashes, being dragged face-first to the parking lot, or charging along.

We charged along. Ben came with us.

Our speed as we ran across the field didn’t give me much time to decide how to act or what to say, other than to remind myself that Loretta could be a murderer and I needed to learn as much as I could about her. And although Clay was ordinarily capable of looking after himself, he could be dazzled by Loretta’s beauty and her obvious adoration of him.

Someone should keep an eye on the man.

Sally-Forth and Tally-Ho were obviously assigning themselves that job, so if they were my mentors, I would have to imitate them, and help protect him.

But that didn’t answer the most crucial question. How should I act when we reached him? Aloof? Courteous? Again, I decided to take my cues from Sally-Forth and Tally-Ho.

By the time we reached Clay and Loretta, I was breathless and laughing, but at least I managed real smiles. Fortunately, Sally and Tally weren’t the drooliest of dogs, and I maintained something resembling dignity. I didn’t even pant.

As usual, Clay crouched to enjoy the dogs’ thrilled greeting. It turned out that the dogs were a bit slobbery, all over his face.

Okay, that was enough of following their leadership.

Looking slightly pained, Loretta stood aside.

Clay stood. “Willow, Haylee, and Ben, you’ve all met Loretta. She’s joining the volunteer fire department.”

Great.

All three of us welcomed her. Since we spoke in unison, maybe no one noticed that my voice was a few rungs lower than sincere.

Clay asked Haylee, “How’s your ankle?”

By the look on her face, I could tell she’d forgotten about her “injury.” “All better,” she said. “Thank you for the ice advice.”

Wanting to giggle at how she had avoided saying that she had actually iced her ankle, I turned to Loretta and asked politely, “Were you a firefighter where you lived before?”

She dimpled prettily. “No, but I’ve always wanted to be one, even back in the days when I first met Clay.” She tilted her head and looked up at him. “Didn’t you bring a fire truck to show-and-tell?”

Clay looked puzzled. “I don’t remember. Not a full-sized one, anyway.”

She elbowed him. “You always did have something funny to say. Maybe I was thinking of your best friend. What was his name?”

Clay reached for Tally’s leash. “Chief?”

Loretta clapped her hand on her forehead. “How would I forget that name?”

Noticing that Clay now had his leash, Tally lunged forward. Tally was especially fond of routines, and on Tuesday evenings at firefighting practice, Tally always raced around the baseball diamond with Clay. “We run laps, first,” Clay called over his shoulder to Loretta as he loped behind Tally.

Sally was not about to be left behind, and all of us followed Clay and Tally, round and round the bases. Loretta didn’t wimp out early, as I’d hoped she might, though she did seem more winded than the rest of us, who had been doing this every week for a couple of years.

However, Loretta wasn’t the only one who couldn’t quite catch her breath. The youngest firefighters were teenage boys, and they seemed to be having trouble not gawking at Loretta and her auburn curls, tight jeans, and tighter T-shirt. They vied with each other to offer to help her suit up in firefighting gear. However, the fire chief assigned Haylee and me the job, after the boys demonstrated, without too many blunders (the jacket goes on
after
the suspenders are placed on the shoulders), how it should be done.

Our fire chief was always happy to review the basics, and it didn’t hurt any of us to be reminded of them. He stressed teamwork and always having each other’s back.

Loretta squirmed. Was she paying attention to anyone besides Clay? I chided myself for being almost as bad, though in addition to being keenly aware of Clay, I was watching my dogs. Okay, I was paying more attention than necessary to Loretta. Maybe those tight jeans were causing her squirming.

After the chief had us show Loretta almost everything we kept stowed on our fire truck, he dismissed us, and we all headed for our vehicles. Loretta made a beeline for Clay’s truck. Following her, Clay turned around and gave me a look that resembled a plea, as if he wanted me to somehow clamber into his two-seater truck with Loretta and him.

Hanging on to Tally’s leash beside Haylee, who had
Sally’s, I merely smiled. Clay had brought Loretta. He could take her back.

Haylee drove the dogs and me into the center of Threadville and stopped her truck outside In Stitches. “Don’t even
think
of not coming to Pier 42 with the rest of us, Willow,” she ordered. “You can’t just hand Clay to Loretta.”

“Don’t worry, I won’t. I’m coming. Did you notice that I gave her a chance to tell us where she used to live, and she cleverly did not answer? I wonder if she really knew him in fourth grade. Let’s see if we can get her to name the town where she first met Clay. He may be telling her that right now, though.”

“I sensed caution on his part,” Haylee said. “When you get a chance, ask him if he really had a best friend named ‘Chief.’ I thought he threw that out to see how she’d react.”

“I wondered about that, too. Chief was probably his dog.”

Laughing, Haylee drove off to park while I shut Sally-Forth and Tally-Ho into my apartment, and then as usual, Haylee and I met again near the entrance to the parking lot behind her and her mothers’ shops, across the street from Pier 42.

Ben was waiting for us outside the pub. “The others have already gone in.” He scrutinized me as if afraid I might burst into tears.

I smiled and shrugged. Why did everyone expect me to act like I owned Clay?

Ben opened the doors for us. Haylee went in first, then stopped in her tracks and made a noise that would not have seemed out of place in a farmyard. I half expected to see Clay and Loretta cuddled together in a booth in the back of the restaurant, but I followed Haylee’s gaze and nearly made a few strange grunts, myself.

Mona sat with her back to us at a table for two. Her dining partner stared into her face. His eyes smoldered with dark intensity.

Kent.

Why did I suspect that Mona was not asking Kent
leading questions about the possible murder of Antonio, also known as Anthony Drudge?

To our left, Clay sat beside Loretta in a booth next to windows overlooking the street. He grinned at me, stood, and let me scoot into the seat beside Loretta. Ben sat across from Loretta, and Haylee took the spot beside him, across from me. Clay slipped in next to me. It was a little crowded, so I edged closer to Clay. I couldn’t help that, could I?

I was suddenly feeling much better about the situation, possibly because I was almost certain that Loretta was miffed at Clay for putting me between him and her.

Haylee and Ben gave me big smiles.

Pier 42 carried locally brewed craft beers on draft, and every Tuesday evening, each of the firefighters who was old enough to drink downed at least one frosty mug, along with an assortment of tasty, salty snacks.

As usual, we carried on a light banter, and Loretta joined in, often leaning forward so she could see around me and speak directly to Clay.

Haylee and I talked about our childhoods, mine near Charleston, and Haylee’s near Cleveland. Ben chimed in with stories about living as a boy in the Adirondacks. Clay said nothing. He appeared embarrassed, as if he didn’t remember Loretta and didn’t want to hurt her by telling her so. Loretta mentioned only generalities.

Finally, when all of our hints failed to yield answers, Haylee asked Loretta point-blank where she’d grown up.

Loretta slowly wrapped one auburn curl around a forefinger. “Lots of places,” she finally said with barely concealed sadness. “My dad was in the army and we moved around a lot. That’s how I lost touch with Clay.” She let go of the curl and tossed the mane of hair over one shoulder.

It was a perfect opportunity for Clay to divulge where he’d lived in fourth grade.

Clay didn’t take the bait. I knew that he’d spent most of his childhood in a suburb west of Boston. He’d lost the New England accent, though, so I didn’t think anyone could have guessed. And, I noticed, Loretta didn’t have a New England
accent, either. But she didn’t have any strong accent, and might have been honest about being an army brat.

Clay asked, “Anyone want something from the bar?” He unfolded himself from the seat.

Mona had appeared from the back of the restaurant. She grabbed his arm, looked past him at me, and demanded, “Did you ask Clay yet?”

Flustered, I couldn’t remember what I was supposed to have asked him. “What?” Was I supposed to ask him if he was falling for the lovely Loretta? If I was reading him correctly, he wasn’t. I hoped I was right.

Mona smiled up at Clay. “I’m putting on a play and I need you to build the sets.”

Poor Clay looked almost desperate to escape. “I . . . um . . . what?” Maybe both of us becoming identically inarticulate would strengthen the bond between us. A girl could hope.

Mona offered, “Willow’s going to be in it.”

Clay looked down at me. An amused twinkle in his chocolaty brown eyes, he answered, “Then I guess I’d better help in my spare time.”

“Of which he doesn’t have much,” Haylee contributed helpfully.

Mona stared pointedly at Ben. “Haylee’s in the production, also.”

Ben gallantly answered, “Then I’ll help Clay, but he’s the expert.”

“I can nail boards together,” Loretta said. “And paint scenery.” She glanced beyond Mona. “Can’t I, Kent?”

I hadn’t noticed Kent, eclipsed by the larger-than-life Mona. “She can draw clothes,” he said.

Mona clapped her hands. “That’s perfect, as Kent knows. The play I’m writing is about fashion and will be called
The Seven Threadly Sins
.”

“Antonio’s little pun will live on,” Loretta commented without enthusiasm. “Clay, I hope you will have time to do the renovations to the carriage house. We’ll need to get together and plan—”

Clay was uncharacteristically abrupt. “I need to consult with my design team, first.”

She began, “Oh, but I’m—”

Again, he interrupted her. “I wouldn’t think of tackling the project without input from Haylee, Ben, Willow, and Dora.”

Loretta gave him a blank look. “Dora?”

“Edna’s mother,” Clay supplied.

“That old woman who took a swing at poor Antonio and didn’t recognize expensive crystal when she saw it?”

I corrected Loretta. “She didn’t hit him. He collapsed and fell all by himself.”

“And she’s not old,” Haylee said.

I added, “And no way was it crystal. It was glass. Cheap glass.”

Clay provided the clincher. “Dora’s a designer with years of experience.”

Loretta sat back and folded her arms.

Mona turned to Kent. “Walk me home? This village doesn’t always feel safe.”

And being with Kent, a possible murderer, would be?

Haylee and I traded glances. “I should go,” Haylee said.

I slid out of the booth to stand beside Clay. “Me, too.”

Loretta followed me out of the booth. “Clay, we came in your truck. You’re going to drive me home, right?”

He pretended to stagger. “Not right after a beer, and if no one wants more, I’ll walk you home, then come back for my truck.”

She gave him a brilliant smile. “If you have my sketches in your truck let’s get them and then look at them together over coffee in my apartment.”

“They’re at my office,” he said.

Mona led the way out, with Kent right behind her.

Loretta grabbed my arm and muttered, “You’d better follow Kent and your friend if you want her to get home safely.”

I must have looked as startled as I felt.

She whispered, “Kent has a record for assault. Antonio knew about it and hired him anyway.”