It was still too early to head over to Russ’s house for dinner, so Tricia wandered the library, checking out its mystery section and finding a few books she’d never read. Since she’d left her to-be-read pile of books by her now inaccessible bedside table, her visit had proved to be a godsend. She applied for and received a library card, and settled down to start the latest book in the Jeff Resnick mystery series.
The next time Tricia looked at her watch, a full hour and a half had passed. She stuffed the piece of paper with Zoë’s schoolteacher’s name and number between the pages as a bookmark, gathered up her purse and the other books she’d checked out, and headed for the door.
Tricia arrived at Russ’s house ten minutes late, knocked on the door, and was soon rewarded with Russ’s smiling face. “I wondered what happened to you. You’re usually so punctual.”
“I got sidetracked,” she said, her nose wrinkling as she stepped across the entryway’s threshold. She detected a kind of fishy odor. “What is that . . . aroma?” she asked.
He brightened. “You like it?” Apparently he hadn’t heard the touch of sarcasm in her voice. “It’s my mother’s specialty: tuna noodle casserole. I figured that after what you’ve been through, you might need some good, old-fashioned comfort food.”
Tricia couldn’t quite suppress a shudder. Her life didn’t revolve around food the way Angelica’s did, and there were few things she found truly unpalatable. Unfortunately, warmed-over tuna was one of them. Was it something to do with the canning process that changed the flavor of the fish when it was heated? On other occasions, Russ had made barbeque or splendid seafood pasta dishes. Why had he resorted to this? And since her mostly uneaten sandwich still sat in Angelica’s little demonstration area’s fridge, Tricia suddenly realized how ravenously hungry she was.
“Let me take your coat,” Russ said.
Tricia shrugged out of her jacket, glancing into the living room. Russ had assembled a plate of cheese and crackers on the chrome-and-glass cocktail table, and she made a beeline for it.
“Can I get you a drink? Some sherry, perhaps?” Russ asked, over the squeal of his police scanner.
Tricia glanced across the room at the hated little black box that sat atop Russ’s TV. She turned back to him. “I’d love it,” she said, seating herself on the leather couch and grabbing the cheese spreader, smearing some Brie onto a butter cracker. She wolfed it down, glad Russ wasn’t in the room to notice. Maybe if she filled up on crackers, she wouldn’t have to eat the casserole.
Russ returned with a cordial glass of sherry for Tricia and his usual Scotch and soda, setting them down on the cocktail table and taking a seat next to Tricia. She was more interested in the Brie.
“You said you were sidetracked?” he said, raising his voice to be heard over the scanner.
“Yes. I’ve had a very long day,” she shouted in response.
“Looking into Zoë’s past, no doubt.”
“I need to get my store open and running again, and I’m sure Wendy Adams won’t be in any hurry to help me with that. She’d drag her feet for months on this investigation if she thought she could get away with it.”
“What?” he asked, over the squawk of the scanner.
“Can you please turn that down?” she practically yelled.
“Sure thing.” He got up and turned off the scanner, plunging the room into silence. He took his seat next to Tricia and daubed cheese on a cracker for himself. “What were you saying?”
She sighed. “I said Wendy Adams would probably keep my store closed forever if she thought she could get away with it.”
“Aren’t you being a little hard on her?”
“No. You haven’t heard her tone when she speaks to me. She blames me for something I never did. There’s no way I can change her misperceptions of the past.”
“I guess,” he said, and took a sip of his drink. “What else did you do today?”
“First of all, I had to soothe my employees’ ruffled feathers. They’re not happy working for Angelica, and I can’t say as I blame them. My sister’s managerial style is more militaristic than altruistic. I’m surprised she doesn’t strut up and down her shop carrying a riding crop, in case one of them steps out of line. She gives them orders, then hovers over them, waiting for them to make mistakes. Not the best way to build trust.”
“I can see why she loses so many employees.”
Tricia nodded, and spread Brie on another cracker. “I spoke to Frannie at the Chamber. She’s the eyes and ears of Stoneham, but even she hadn’t heard much about the investigation into Zoë’s death.” She took a bite.
“So far there isn’t much to tell.”
Tricia swallowed. “Oh?”
“I have a few friends in the Sheriff’s Department,” Russ admitted, “but they’re not talking, at least not about specifics. What else did you do today?”
“I spoke to a couple of Zoë’s neighbors, and Lois Kerr at the library. Do you know her?”
“Only most of my life.”
Tricia picked up the cheese spreader and had another go at the Brie. She wasn’t about to tell Russ about the possibility that Zoë hadn’t written the Forever books. Shocked? Yes. Appalled? Definitely. And how could it possibly be true? Could someone get away with that kind of deception for almost a decade? Still, both Gladys and Lois had known Zoë for years, if only from a distance, and had had plenty of time to observe her conduct and speculate what she was capable of, whereas Tricia had had only a little over an hour to observe her.
She took a sip of her sherry and noticed that the smell from the kitchen seemed to be growing stronger. She picked up another cracker and grabbed the knife again, overloading it with cheese.
“Whoa! Leave some room for dinner,” Russ chided as Tricia bit into her seventh cracker.
Tricia sank against the back of the couch, swirling what was left of the mahogany-colored liquid in her glass. “At least I managed to avoid the press for the rest of the day. They just can’t take no for an answer.”
“I hope you’re not including me in that statement,” he said, moving close enough that his breath was warm on her neck.
“Can you take no?” Tricia asked, the hint of a smile creeping onto her lips.
He pulled back slightly. “Only if you really mean it.”
Tricia sank against the back of the couch and exhaled, trying to coax her muscles to relax. “I didn’t get a chance to see the news. Did Portia McAlister find out about Zoë’s criminal past yet?”
Russ straightened. “It was the top story.”
“Rats. I would have liked to have seen the report. I wonder if they’ll post it on the station’s Web site.”
“Don’t tell me you want to look right now?”
She did, but she didn’t voice it. “Did you get a chance to look at the Stoneham Weekly News’s archives?”
“Yes, and as I suspected, Ted Moser brushed the story under the rug. There was a short article about Trident Homes going under, but no real detail.”
Scratch an official record. Unless—“Where would the case have been prosecuted? Nashua?”
“Yes.”
“I suppose I could go dig through old court reports, but I don’t think I need that kind of detail.”
“No,” Russ said, and sidled closer once again. “What’re your plans for tomorrow?” he asked, his voice almost a whisper.
Tricia sighed. “I’m going to try contacting Zoë’s former high school English teacher.”
“What for?” he said, nibbling her ear.
A flicker of unease wormed through Tricia, and she drew away. “Just looking into her background.”
“Anything else?”
“I want to talk to Kimberly again . . . if I can track her down. Say, do you remember her ever getting into trouble when she was a teenager? Apparently she was a bit of a hellion.”
“Again, that was before I took over the Stoneham Weekly News. I’ve already searched the archives once. You could do it, if you’re that interested.”
“I might be, thanks. Has there been any word on funeral arrangements for Zoë?”
Russ sighed. “I talked with my buddy Glenn at the Baker Funeral Home, who spoke to me off the record. When the body’s released by the medical examiner’s office, it’s to be cremated. Nobody’s contacted me or my staff about a paid-for obit in the paper. I’ll go with what I’ve been working on, although it’s really pretty skimpy. Fact-filled, but not personable.”
“That’s pretty much what I’ve picked up, too.”
His smile was coy. “You’d have made a pretty good reporter.”
High praise, or something else? Some quality in his tone put her on alert.
He leaned in closer once more, his mouth mere centimeters from her ear. “Tell me,” he said breathlessly, “what were you thinking when you found Zoë Carter dead in your washroom?”
Tricia sat bolt upright. First the photos, now this! “Excuse me!”
Russ straightened. “I mean . . .” He hesitated. “Come on, Tricia. Everybody in the village is wondering. Zoë was Stoneham’s only celebrity. You found her. It’s news. And giving me an exclusive would be—”
Using the couch’s arm, Tricia pushed herself to her feet. “I can’t believe it. I can’t believe you’d use me like this.”
“I’m not using you. I’m tapping you—just like you just asked me about Kimberly Peters, Zoë’s embezzlement charges, and even her funeral arrangements.”
“It’s not the same thing, and you know it.”
He sat forward, pushing his glasses up his nose. “Hey, you’re a source. What we have together has no bearing on the story I’m working on. And it’s not like I’m going to splash it over the national news. I’m a crummy little weekly. Throw me a bone, will you?”
“I’ve just told you everything I know.” Maybe that wasn’t entirely true, but it was close. “You saw her body. Can’t you tap into your own feelings? Why on earth would you have to know about and report mine?” She stormed off toward the entryway, wrenched open the closet door, and found her coat.
“Tricia, wait!”
After struggling into the sleeves, she opened the front door and stalked into the night.
“I’m sorry,” Russ called after her. “Come back. We’ll talk about it.”
She turned. “I’m so angry with you right now, I’m not sure I want to talk to you ever again.” She headed straight to her car, her anger intensifying with every step. She opened the car door, jammed the key in the ignition, and took off with tires squealing. It took nearly two blocks before her ire began to cool and she realized there was at least one consolation concerning her abbreviated evening with Russ: she wouldn’t have to eat tuna noodle casserole.
Tricia parked her car in the municipal lot and walked the block to her store. It wasn’t until she saw the crime scene tape still in place around the front door that she remembered she wasn’t allowed in. She stepped back on the sidewalk to get the full effect of the storefront. She’d gone to considerable time and expense to duplicate a certain Victorian address in London, from its white stone facade to the 221 rendered in gold leaf on the Palladian transom over the glossy, black-painted door. The sight never ceased to please her.
She sighed, realizing she’d told Angelica she might not return that evening, and a quick glance around her confirmed that Bob Kelly’s car was parked outside the Cookery.
It occurred to Tricia that although she had keys to Angelica’s store and apartment, she might not be all that welcome if Angelica was . . . entertaining . . . her friend.
Bob Kelly had never been Tricia’s favorite person. He looked too much like her ex-husband, albeit an older version, for her to feel comfortable around him. The fact that he could sometimes be a pompous ass had also colored her feelings in the past. She’d had to work at softening her dislike since Angelica had become romantically involved with the man.
It was with apprehension that Tricia pulled out her cell phone and punched in Angelica’s number. One ring. Two rings. Three rings. Hurry, or it will go to voice mail, Tricia pleaded.
“Hello.”
“Ange, it’s Tricia. Can . . . can I come up?”
“Of course you can. Why would you think otherwi . . . oh.” Her voice flattened. “Bob and I are eating dinner. Shall I set another plate?”
“Do you mind?”
“Of course not.”
“I’ll be right up.” Tricia hung up the phone, extracted the key to the shop, and let herself in, locking up behind her. She was used to the three-flight walk and wasn’t even winded as she reached the landing. Cautiously, she knocked on the apartment door.
“It’s open,” Angelica called.
Tricia hung her jacket in the closet and followed the lights and the heavenly aroma of garlic to the spacious kitchen. Several cartons had been flattened, their contents stacked on the end of the counter. So Angelica had enlisted Bob’s help for unpacking. Only another half a million boxes to go!
“Hi, guys,” Tricia said and took her seat at the table. Angelica passed the pasta bowl. Scampi, which looked as heavenly as it smelled.
“Good thing I always cook enough for an army,” Angelica said. “What happened to your dinner date with Russ?”
“Oh, he was busy. Working.” She hoped her tone indicated the subject was now verboten.
“I talked to Wendy Adams this afternoon,” Bob started conversationally, digging at his pasta and plucking a fat shrimp with his fork. “Sorry, but she insists she needs more time to collect evidence in your store. She grudgingly suggested you could be open for the weekend. I tried to push her, but she doesn’t appreciate how closing for even a few days can affect your bottom line.”
“Amen. You got more out of her than I did. I appreciate it. Thanks, Bob.” Tricia picked at her pasta. Angelica poured her a glass of wine and Tricia found herself staring at Bob. Bob, the head of the Chamber of Commerce, someone who prided himself on knowing everybody who was anybody in southern New Hampshire. And if the owners of Trident Homes had been members of the Chamber, he might have inside information. But would he share it? She’d have to tread lightly.
“Bob, did you know Zoë Carter?” Tricia asked casually.
He shook his head. “Although it was partly because of Zoë that Stoneham became a book town.”
“What do you mean?”
Bob actually blushed. “When I had the great idea to invite all the booksellers, I naturally approached Zoë. Here we had a New York Times best-selling author living right in the village. I figured she might be interested in lending her name to our first few celebrations. She ignored my calls and letters, and when I finally cornered her, she turned me down flat.”
“Did she give you an explanation?”
“No. Just that she didn’t do—” He put two fingers from each hand into the air and wiggled them to form air quotes, “ ‘—those kinds of things.’ I called her publisher and tried to get them to help me convince her. They were sympathetic. The woman I spoke to thought it was a great PR opportunity. We’d lined up press from Portland, Nashua, and even Boston, but Zoë refused to participate. Word got out that she wasn’t willing to support the village. Ticked off quite a few people. I was shocked when Angelica told me you’d talked her into the signing. And just how did you do that?”
Tricia shrugged. “I e-mailed her from the contact page on her Web site. Got a note back from her niece, Kimberly Peters, saying the date and time were fine. That was that.”
Bob frowned. “I couldn’t figure Zoë out at all. Most of the authors I’ve run into are always looking for a chance at free publicity. This woman actually seemed afraid of it. I wonder why?”
Time to introduce a tougher subject. “Could it have been her indictment for embezzlement?”
Bob cleared his throat and frowned. “That happened a long time ago.”
“It was only about a year before her first book was published.”
“But turning Stoneham into a book town was years later. She could have lent her name in some capacity. Nobody would have remembered her past.”
“Oh, but they did,” Angelica said. “I heard it on the news.”
Tricia and Bob turned to look at her. “They compared her to some other famous mystery author who was convicted of murder when she was a teenager. It was the parallels they pushed. Both were historical authors; both were convicted of felonies.”
“The writer you’re talking about was convicted in New Zealand, not the U.S. Do they even have felonies there?” Tricia asked. She shook her head.
“Well, whatever. The fact is, they both committed crimes.”
“But no one died as a result of Zoë’s crime.”
Angelica shook her head. “It doesn’t matter. Crime is crime. You, of all people, should know that.”
It was Tricia’s turn to frown. Should she mention that more than one person found it hard to believe Zoë had written the books? And passing them off as her own . . . was that another crime?
No, it was too soon to talk about Gladys Mitchell’s and Lois Kerr’s suspicions. Tricia needed facts, not innuendo, and it was just plain bad manners to spread unsubstantiated rumors about the dead. Still, the thought niggled at her brain. How could Zoë have gotten away with that kind of charade? Someone would have to have read the manuscripts—critiqued them. Very few authors worked in a vacuum.
Tricia poked her fork at her pasta, toying with a morsel of garlic. Was it possible the real author had been present at the signing just twenty-four hours before? That didn’t seem likely, either. As far as she knew, none of the readers who’d arrived to meet Zoë had any literary aspirations; at least, no one had asked the kinds of questions author wannabes tended to ask. Like “Will you read my manuscript?” and “Can I have the phone number of your agent?”
Tricia thought back to the night before and remembered something Grace Harris had said about being glad to meet Zoë under “happier circumstances.” It hadn’t meant anything at the time.
She waited for a pause in the conversation before speaking to Bob. “Did you ever hear of an argument between Grace Harris and Zoë Carter?”
He frowned. “Not an argument. Grace was the chair of a citizens committee reporting to the Board of Selectmen. I believe she approached Zoë on behalf of them and asked her to participate in one or more of the grand openings. Like me, she received a cold shoulder. I consider my persuasive skills to be top notch, but nothing compared to Grace Harris, who, like Mame, could ‘charm the blues right out of the horn.’ ”
Tricia blinked at that analogy, while Angelica fought to hold back a chuckle.
Okay.
Could the unhappy circumstances be as easily dismissed as Bob suggested? Could Zoë have been incredibly rude to Grace? She’d seemed anything but ruthless when Tricia had met her. A female milquetoast. From what she had seen and discovered in talking to others, Zoë had never mustered any kind of passion, be it love or anger.
“Speaking of the Board of Selectmen,” Angelica said, “when are they going to deal with the goose problem here in Stoneham—and more importantly, how? I’m going to have to have the carpet in my shop shampooed again if this keeps up.”
“It’s a sticky situation—in more ways than one,” Bob said, laughing at his own joke.
“I don’t think it’s funny,” Tricia said, and took another sip of her wine.
Bob ate another forkful of pasta. “No one can decide the best way to handle the geese. The problem is, they’re protected under the Migratory Bird Treaty Act. You need special permission to hunt them. We just can’t dismantle their nests or break their eggs. By law, you’re not even allowed to harass them. Half the citizens of Stoneham want them shot—and as you know, hunting season ended in September. The other half want them humanely removed. The problem is, doing it humanely takes time, and I’m afraid the majority of business owners don’t want to wait.”
“I can’t say I blame them,” Angelica said, and poured herself more wine. “I’m out there cleaning off the sidewalk in front of my shop two or three times a day.”
“What’s the humane way of dealing with them?” Tricia asked.
“Scaring them, for one. The trouble is, they get used to loud noises, so that doesn’t really work. A lot of communities have hired companies that use border collies to chase the geese. This works, but it, too, takes time. They chase away one group of birds and another flies right in. You have to keep it up. Then there’s egg oiling.”
“What does that involve?”
“Sealing the eggs so what’s in them can’t develop. But that just stops the next generation of birds, not the ones you’ve already got. And it’s very labor-intensive. What we really need to do is make Stoneham unattractive to the birds. If they don’t like where they are, they’ll go away.”
“And bother some other community,” Tricia said.
“Possibly,” he conceded.
“How do you make the village less attractive to them?” Tricia asked.
“Unfortunately, that’s difficult to do. Today’s zoning laws require the presence of retention ponds to handle storm water runoff, keeping it from messing up the sewer system. The birds don’t know the ponds aren’t real. And it doesn’t help when every stay-at-home mom in the village ignores the signs that have been posted and takes her little tykes out to feed the geese.”
“Boy, you really are into this,” Angelica said admiringly.
“I need to be informed if I’m going to represent the Chamber members’ interests.”
“What about the immediate problem?” Tricia asked. “Isn’t there some way the village can clean the sidewalks on a more regular basis?”
“And don’t forget these birds are huge. I’ve had more than one frightened wisp of an old lady tell me the things charged and hissed at her,” Angelica said.
“I know, I know,” Bob said. “They’re very territorial. That aggressive behavior could become a major liability problem. If someone gets hurt, the business owners could be financially responsible for injuries incurred.”
“Not just business owners,” Tricia said. “I was chased just this morning over on Pine Avenue— residential neighborhood.”
“Cleaning the sidewalks takes money,” Bob said, getting back to the subject, “money that hasn’t been budgeted. I’m sure the business owners wouldn’t like to see taxes go up to pay for it.”
“Not especially,” Tricia said, “since it’s us who pay them—not the building owners.”
“You all knew that when you signed the leases,” Bob said.
Yeah, and he owned half the buildings on Main Street, and had stipulated that his tenants pay those taxes when he drew up the leases.
“Frannie told me that one of the options is to ‘round up and slaughter’ them. She said it’s under consideration.” Bob’s eyes narrowed. “She had no right discussing Chamber business with you.”
“She had every right. I’m a member of the Chamber, too, you know.”
“Killing them en masse would be very controversial. A lot of people love the damn things. Exterminating them could prove to be a PR nightmare—the last thing the village needs.”
And that was what he really worried about.
As though to avoid discussing that very subject, Bob launched into an update on the weekend book fair and statue dedication, but Tricia only half listened, her mind wandering back to Zoë and the ramifications of everything she’d learned today. All the facts and innuendo swirled around in her mind in a disconnected mess.
“Something wrong with the shrimp?” a concerned Angelica asked, once Bob had wound down. “Maybe I shouldn’t go so heavy on the garlic.”
Feeling contrite, Tricia gave her sister a wan smile. “It’s perfect, Ange.” She took another bite and savored the taste, once again thankful she wasn’t sentenced to eating tuna noodle casserole.