“Hi, honey,” Aunt Beth said when Harriet came into the kitchen. “Did you have a good rest?”
“I do feel a little better. I don’t have any idea what to do about Aiden, but my nap did me good.”
“Why don’t you grab a cup of tea and join us in the living room? Tom brought brownies from the Renfros’. Jane is back, too.”
Harriet came into the living room a few minutes later, mug in hand.
“Where are the brownies?” she asked.
Jorge lifted the embroidered dishtowel that was draped over them, keeping them warm.
“Oh, my gosh,” she said as she bit into the warm, chewy, chocolaty goodness.
“Guess who’s coming to dinner,” Lauren announced.
“Besides Tom?”
“Hey, I earned my dinner,” he protested. “I was the one dangling out the window, unclogging the downspout.”
“And I appreciate that,” Jane Morse said. “Although I think a freight train could go through my room tonight, and I could sleep through it. We had to double up at the motel where the task force was meeting when the slide happened and we had to stay longer. The only other female detective was a very nice woman from Bremerton who unfortunately snored like a chainsaw.”
“So, honey,” Aunt Beth said. “Mavis and I were thinking we should invite Pat and Lisa to dinner.”
“Why?” Harriet asked.
“You know why,” Mavis said. “You know Marjory would expect nothing less. She has her differences with her sister, but she would be the first one to console her at the loss of her husband. And since she’s not here, we need to step up in her place.”
“But Pat’s the reason Marjory isn’t here to do it herself. Don’t you think she’ll feel like we’re betraying her?”
“Pat is her sister,” Aunt Beth said. “She’d be there for her, no matter what she’s done. Besides, we don’t know if Pat had anything to do with the scheme to try to take Marjory’s money. That could have been all Richard.”
“Maybe we should ask her, if we have to have her here.” Harriet finished her brownie and took another one.
“I wouldn’t mind asking her a few questions myself,” Jane Morse said.
“Let’s see what shape she’s in before we start planning any ambushes,” Mavis said.
“Would you like me to go pick them up?” Jorge asked.
“Thanks, but if Harriet doesn’t mind, I think it would be better she drives Beth or I over to invite them,” Mavis said. “Besides, don’t you have cooking to do?”
“I don’t like you ladies driving around by yourselves in this storm,” he protested.
“The worst of the storm has passed. We’ll be fine.” Aunt Beth assured him.
“Jorge is worried about us going out alone after dark with a murderer on the loose,” Lauren said.
“I’m available,” Tom volunteered.
“If it’s the killer you’re worried about, I’ll go,” Detective Morse said. “It would make my job easier if the bad guy found us-I could arrest him or her, and we could pick up Pat and her daughter all in one trip.”
“Enough, everyone,” Aunt Beth said. “Harriet and I will go, we’ll stay on well-traveled roads and go straight to the church and back.”
“Seems like all you need to do is stay away from Fogg Park and you should be good.” Tom said.
“I’ll be in the car waiting,” Harriet said. “The sooner we go get them, the sooner we can bring them back.”
“Good point,” Lauren said.
“Are you sure this isn’t a recipe for disaster?” Harriet asked as they made their way through the still, dark streets.
“We’re not going to let it become a disaster. The woman just lost her husband. No matter how bad the relationship is between her and Marjory, she’s grieving her loss, and we need to respect that.”
Pat and Lisa simply said yes when Aunt Beth asked them to come to dinner. Beth led them back to the car, where they got in then rode in silence until Harriet guided the car back into her garage.
Once inside, Harriet took their coats and hung them in the kitchen coat closet, and Beth guided them into the living room, offering them chairs in front of the fire.
“Have you met Jane Morse?” she asked.
“Nice try,” Pat snapped. “We were grilled by the detective earlier today at the church. My husband is dead, and she’s treating Lisa and me like criminals.”
“I’m very sorry for your loss,” Jane said. “My job is to find out who killed your husband and bring him or her to justice. Sometimes that means I have to ask questions that make people uncomfortable. I mean no offense.”
“I’m sure no offense is taken,” Aunt Beth said. “Pat, Detective Morse is staying here with us until the water recedes. She’s not here as a police officer tonight.”
“May I fix you something to drink?” Jorge asked. “We have coffee, tea and hot chocolate as well as sodas and water.”
He took drink orders and went back to the kitchen accompanied by Tom.
“Will you be holding a memorial service?” Harriet asked Pat.
“I haven’t thought about that yet.” Tears started coursing down her cheeks. “I wish Marjory was here,” she said. “She’d know what to do.”
“Should of thought about that before she sold her sister down the river,” Lauren whispered to Harriet.
“Is there anything we can do for you?” Mavis asked. “Can we call anyone for you? We have access to a satellite phone.”
“There isn’t anyone to call,” Pat sobbed. “Richard and Lisa are all I have, and now Marjory won’t talk to us, either.”
“That’s on you, Mother,” Lisa said, speaking for the first time since she’d arrived. “I told you and Daddy you should have told Aunt Marjory the truth and thrown yourself on her mercy, but no, you had to try to be all tricky and cheat her out of Gramma’s money.”
An awkward silence followed.
“I’m so sorry,” Pat said finally, looking at Lisa. “I didn’t know what to do.”
“Would you like to talk about it?” Aunt Beth said softly.
“I can’t,” Pat said, looking at each of them in turn. She started crying again. Her normally pink cheeks were turning a purple-red. Harriet was thankful Jorge and Tom were lingering in the kitchen and Jane had chosen to join them there.
“Mom,” Lisa said, raising her voice. “These people might be able to help us fix things with Aunt Marjory. Come on-it’s our only chance.”
“It might help,” Mavis coaxed.
Pat continued crying. Harriet held out a box of tissues, and she took several, blowing her nose noisily. She shuddered and took a deep breath.
“Richard was about to go to jail,” she said finally.
Harriet looked at her aunt, but Beth was waiting patiently for Pat to continue. Lauren made the circular motion with her forefinger that meant “get on with it.” She kept her hand beside her leg so only Harriet could see it.
“If we could come up with more money, Richard could buy back time,” Pat finally continued.
“What?” Lauren sounded confused.
“It’s because of the kind of crime,” Lisa explained in a matter-of-fact tone. “Dad took other people’s money. He pled guilty to avoid a trial, and the feds said if he could pay any of it back, they would reduce his time.”
“So if I rob a bank, but they get the money back, I do less time?” Lauren asked.
Harriet swatted at her and put a finger to her lips, motioning for her to hush.
“Was he trying to get other people to give him money?” she asked Pat.
“No! He wanted to get my inheritance from Marjory, and then we were going to leave.”
“Mom,” Lisa said. “Tell the truth.”
Pat went through her sighing and sagging and crying and nose-blowing again.
“Richard was trying to get my inheritance, but Lisa and I were going to tell Marjory what he was doing and beg for her mercy. We were planning on sending Richard to the store, and then while he was gone, I was going to ask Marjory if Lisa and I could live with her. Richard sold the house, our house, to buy time. He had it sold before he even talked to me about it.”
“How could he do that?” Harriet asked. “He didn’t forge your signature, did he?”
“No, it turns out I was never on the title.”
Mavis gave a little gasp.
“When he started making money,” Pat continued, “he bought a bigger house in a nicer neighborhood for me and Lisa, as a surprise. He said he was going to have my name put on the title after he gave it to me, but we got busy moving and then somehow never got around to it. He already had it sold before he told me about going to jail. He’d been hoping he could raise enough money that he wouldn’t have to do any time, but that was foolishness. He could have sold ten houses, and he still couldn’t have paid all the money back.”
“Was he embezzling from his company?” Harriet asked.
“Worse,” Lisa said.
“What could be worse than that?” Lauren asked.
“It was investment fraud,” Pat said.
“Like a Ponzi scheme?” Mavis asked.
“Exactly like that,” Pat said. “This is so embarrassing.” She put her hands over her face.
Mavis went over and put her arms around the sobbing woman.
“You’ll get through this,” she soothed. “You don’t have to solve it all right now. Let’s let it rest for tonight. We’ll eat a nice dinner, and then everyone can get a good night’s sleep, and you can start making a plan tomorrow.”
“I’ll show you where the bathroom is. You two can freshen up,” Aunt Beth said and led them past the half-bath and on upstairs to the main bathroom.
“I call Harriet,” Lauren stated when Aunt Beth came back down alone.
“What?” Harriet said.
“I call you-as a roommate. Someone has to give up their room when your aunt invites those two to stay here. It’s probably going to be me, so I choose you to double up with. Don’t worry-there are two more air mattresses upstairs. You have the biggest room, the chimney passes through your bedroom wall, so your room is the warmest and you have your own bathroom so I don’t have to share with those two.”
Harriet looked at Aunt Beth.
“We can’t make her go back to the shelter given the shape she’s in,” her aunt said.
“She could be the murderer,” Harriet protested. “For all we know, she just bought herself a big insurance pay-out.”
Aunt Beth’s shoulders sagged.
“Didn’t think of that, did you?”
“She had no reason to kill the other guy,” Mavis said.
“She might be a copycat killer,” argued Lauren. “Someone else killed Duane, and Pat decided to go for the insurance money by killing Richard and making it look like the first guy did it.”
“Sounds a little far-fetched,” Mavis said.
“I hope so,” Harriet said.
“Everyone ready for dinner?” Jorge asked as he came into the living room. “We’ve got burgers and fries ready in the kitchen. Everyone can come fill their plates.”
Pat and Lisa came back downstairs and joined everyone in the kitchen. Jorge was a master of presentation. He had cut tree-shaped slices of cheddar cheese using one of Harriet’s cookie cutters and placed them on the burgers. Detective Morse had cooked the semi-frozen French fries in two large iron skillets. Tom had put together a plate of sliced tomato, lettuce, and pickles and set out ketchup and mustard.
“Oh, this looks lovely,” Pat said as she assembled her burger on her plate.
“We haven’t had a normal meal in days,” Lisa said.
“Eat your fill, chiquita,” Jorge said. “We have plenty.”
Pat and Lisa filled their plates first, followed by Mavis and Beth. When they were safely in the dining room, Harriet filled the detective in on what had been revealed.
“I’d be surprised if it turns out Pat killed her husband, but you never know,” Morse said. “I wish we knew more about the first vic.”
“I might have something,” Harriet said, and explained about Duane’s cell phone.
“Given the circumstances, I’m going to overlook the fact that you tampered with evidence, including removing it from the scene. Next time a murder happens anywhere in this county, stay away from it. Can you promise me that?”
Harriet retrieved the phone and handed it to Morse.
“I promise, never again,” she said.
“I believe you mean that-at the moment, anyway. I can’t believe I’m saying this, but you’re probably right about the other campers destroying evidence. If you hadn’t taken the phone when you spotted it, who knows where it would be now.”
“The young alcoholic at the camp had taken Duane’s quilt at some point,” Harriet said. “And someone else had taken one of the spare quilts we’d given Joyce and covered Duane’s body with it. When Tom and I were there, right after they found Duane, they all claimed they either hadn’t been in the men’s room or they had only taken a quick look, but clearly someone covered Duane. I can’t imagine him taking a spare quilt when he had his own new one in his usual sleeping space.”
“We better join the group before they come looking for us,” Lauren suggested. Harriet, Tom and Jane followed her to the dining room.
Dinner was a strained affair. Harriet racked her brain for a topic that didn’t relate to the house Pat no longer had, the money that had evaporated or Pat’s murdered husband.
“Pat, do you quilt like your sister?” she finally asked.
“No, that was always Marjory’s thing. I tried when we were young, but my efforts were never as good as hers. My points weren’t sharp enough, my stitches weren’t small enough, my color combinations weren’t as pleasing…” She sighed.
Pat sighed a lot, Harriet noticed. She really had the long-suffering routine down.
“Mom knits really well, though,” Lisa said when the silence had stretched to the breaking point.
“What sort of things do you knit?” Mavis asked.
It turned out Lisa was telling the truth. A lively discussion of knitting ensued, with Pat pulling an intricate green lace scarf from her purse as a show-and-tell.
Tom and Jorge took the dogs out for a walk while Jane Morse and Harriet cleared the table and began washing the dishes.
“What do you know about the trucker couple?” Morse asked. “I interviewed them at the church today, but they didn’t have much to say. I was a little surprised.”
“Why?”
“They seem pretty sharp, and yet, they ate and slept with the homeless folk for several days without seeing or hearing anything? I find that hard to believe. It makes me wonder what they’re hiding.”
“I can answer that,” Harriet said. “They may have other secrets as well, but the big one is that they are homeless themselves. Kate was embarrassed and didn’t want anyone to know. They lost all their money, their business and their house in a Ponzi scheme, which considering this evening’s revelation might move them to the top of the suspect list in Richard’s death.”
“Did they say who their fund manager was?”
“I certainly would have told you if she’d said anything like that. I figured it was a coincidence that both Kate and Pat had lost all their money. Kate said they lived in Sequim when they had their business.”
“I’m definitely going to be talking to them again tomorrow,” Morse said.
“Kate was with Lauren, Tom and I in the parking lot when Richard was killed. Owen was working on their truck. I suppose he could have circled around the camp and approached from the back side. And that still leaves Duane. Isn’t it more likely the same person killed both of them?”
“Maybe there’s a connection between Duane and Richard we haven’t discovered yet,” Morse said.
“But Pat said they were coming to Foggy Point to try to get Marjory’s money. She and Lisa didn’t say anything about meeting a homeless man or anyone else.”
“Sounds like Richard kept a lot of secrets from those two. He may have seen an opportunity to take care of business with Duane and collect money from Marjory at the same time.”
“They made such a mess of trying to get Marjory’s money it’s hard to believe he could have carried off Duane’s killing without leaving a shred of evidence behind.”
“And yet he defrauded how many people out of how much money?” Morse asked.
“Point taken.”
Tom came into the kitchen from the garage, a wet Curly held in one hand, her leash in the other.
“I was starting to think you were trying to avoid me,” he said.
Detective Morse excused herself with a wink at Harriet and went into the bathroom, giving them a little privacy.
“Jane and I were just washing the dishes and cleaning up the kitchen. Besides, it was getting a little crowded in there.”
“I know what you mean. It’s a struggle to come up with things to talk about that don’t set Pat off on a crying jag.” He took Harriet’s hand and pulled her toward him as he spoke.
“I appreciate the fact that you’re here.”
“I wish we could be alone, but I’ll take what I can get, even if I have to dangle off your roof to get it.”
“Thank you for fixing my gutter,” Harriet could feel the heat in her face. “How can I ever repay you?”
“I’m sure we’ll think of something.” He leaned in for a quick kiss. “But not while you have a house full of people, and anyway, I need to go back to the Renfros to check on them. By the way, I didn’t get a chance to tell you earlier, but I heard on the truck radio when I was driving over here that they expect the Muckleshoot to go down below bridge level overnight. You want to go for a ride in the morning and check it out?”
“What time?”
“Eight?” he suggested and kissed her again.
“I’d love to go,” she said with a smile.
Tom took his jacket from the kitchen closet and left through the studio.
“I came to see if you two had drowned in the soapy water,” Lauren said.
Jane came back into the kitchen as if on cue.
“And I’m supposed to make a pot of decaf coffee,” Lauren added.
She handed the empty coffee pot to Jane to fill with water while she filled the percolator basket with coffee grounds.
“Good thing your aunt saved this old relic,” she said as she put the assembled percolator on the stove burner and turned the gas on, lighting it with a match. “Before you ask, your aunt did, indeed, ask Pat and Lisa to join our slumber party, and Jorge is leaving after coffee to take Pat to fetch their car from the church parking lot.”
“I don’t know about you two, but I’ve had enough group drama for one day.” Harriet said. “Let’s deliver the coffee then get Lauren’s bed set up in the dormitory formerly known as my bedroom. My aunt and Mavis can get Pat and Lisa settled.”