Deadly Pumpkin Slice (A Sinful Sweets Cozy Mystery) (8 page)

“Kenneth. . .
Jeffreys?
” Grace asked.

“Yeah, you know of him?”

“No, but I’ve heard his name before.”

“His daughter-in-law is a local illustrator for children’s books,” Allison offered.

Grace knew, then, that Arthur must be his son. If he’d known someone was skimming off the top of his father’s legacy, could that have driven him to kill?

“I have to get inside, did you want to join us? There’ll be a quick ceremony to introduce me as the new librarian, likely a short statement about Aaron, and I could introduce you to Marilyn, the illustrator, if you want.”

“We’d love to join you,” Grace answered for both of them.

Sydney and Grace took a seat at the back of the small room. It was clear that everyone else knew each other. Westhedge was about the same size as Twin Peaks, and Sydney hoped beyond hope that she wouldn’t be recognized. It’d been six years since she’d moved, but had she changed that much to be unrecognizable to the community?

“Thank you all for joining us this afternoon,” a man in a business suit began. He exuded wealth. This could have easily been Lewis or Arthur. “We’re here today to welcome Allison to our community. She comes with years of experience and will be an asset to Westhedge and the library. As you know, we lost our long-time friend and librarian, Aaron, this week. Tonight is his wake and his funeral will be this weekend. If you’d like more information about either, please approach any of the Commissioners you see up front. I’d now like to hand the mic over to Lewis, the chair of the Library Commission.”

That cleared things up for Sydney. Now she knew who was who.

Lewis stood at the front of the room in another business suit. “Thank you, Arthur. We’re all very pleased to have Allison joining us today. As was already mentioned, she has years of experience. She has also already been active in our community, creating an initiative to get iPads into the kids’ section of the library here. . .”

Lewis continued talking, but Sydney’s mind was reeling. Why had she been creating programs in Westhedge when she was still working in Twin Peaks? Had this all been premeditated—she’d been planning for months to kill Aaron and she’d already have a great reputation here so there wouldn’t have been any competition to get the job? Sure, she had the funding here for the program, but why hadn’t she looked for funding to create the program in Twin Peaks?

Grace elbowed Sydney. Everyone else was clapping and Sydney joined in.

Allison had already addressed the small crowd while Sydney was in her own mind. She now came over to the two of them sitting in the back and asked if they’d like to meet Marilyn.

“Sure,” Grace said, still waiting for Sydney to be fully herself again.

Marilyn was standing at her husband’s side, acting the part of the dutiful wife. “Marilyn, I’d like you to meet some of my friends from Twin Peaks—Sydney and Grace. Sydney owns Sinful Sweets, the best bakery in the state,” Allison said proudly.

“Sydney. Grace. Nice to meet you.” Marilyn’s husband turned to join their conversation. “This is my husband, Arthur.”

“Nice to meet you both,” Sydney said. “Allison tells us that you’re a wonderful illustrator.”

“I’ve been doing it for years. I just love what I do. And a bakery? I think I’ve heard of Sinful Sweets. Yes, Arthur, dear, isn’t the place that Lewis and Linda were talking about earlier? They were just introduced to it.”

Arthur nodded absently, neither agreeing with nor denying his wife’s claim.

“They said they’d like to become regulars.” Marilyn laughed.

Neither Sydney nor Grace were really present in the conversation. They did their best to keep up with Marilyn, but she didn’t seem to be going anywhere. Allison had moved on to mingle with the few other guests. Sydney and Grace tried to eavesdrop on other conversations. At their earliest opportunity, they left Marilyn and went outside.

“We have to go to Aaron’s house,” Sydney said as soon as they stepped outside.

“Aaron’s house? I was thinking Lewis and Linda. Their names keep coming up, and they’d have the means to hide embezzlement.”

“Aaron’s the key link in all of this. If he was stealing from the fund, there would be something at his house. And if he wasn’t but found out someone else was, then maybe we’d find that proof there too.”

“But we won’t find any poison there. We’d find it at the killer’s house, and we still have too many people on our list! The Pages, the Jeffreys. I think either of them could have been involved.”

“Let’s go to Aaron’s first. The wake is about to start, so no one will be there. If we don’t find anything, we’ll find a way to get into one of the other houses.”

Sydney started walking toward her car, not giving Grace an opportunity to come up with a different plan, but Grace had to admit that Sydney was probably right.

***

“Are you sure this is the right plan?” Grace hissed to Sydney as they approached Aaron’s house. They were lucky that the time had recently changed so they could hide under the cover of darkness earlier in the evening. They knew the wake started at five, so they had timed their arrival to coincide with the departure of family from his house.

“We have to get to the bottom of this, the police aren’t pursuing any leads,” Sydney hissed back.

“Maybe we should have fed them some of our information.”

“Too late, come on.”

Sydney slipped around back and started checking for a key. Nothing. When she’d lived there, it had always been hidden under the welcome mat on the back step. She started trying windows instead.

“Grace, come here!” she called as loudly as she dared. Grace had been keeping a watch out for anyone coming while Sydney tried her luck at finding anything open. “This one opens into the basement. Shine the light on your phone while I let myself in. Then I’ll help you down.”

She was thankful they were both thin and could fit through a small window.

Beneath the window, Sydney felt a pile of boxes. She’d have to be careful not to tip them over as she lowered herself down.

When her feet landed on the hard ground, she fished her own phone out of her pocket. “Grace, careful of the boxes, I’ll guide your feet down.”

Grace’s entrance was much smoother and they soon found themselves heading upstairs.

“What, exactly, are we looking for?” Grace asked.

“Anything incriminating. A record book of funds, bank statements, passwords to accounts so we can check them out online, letters from the Library Commission. Anything that might point us to the real killer.”

They’d reached the top of the stairs and Sydney paused before opening the door. She listened for any noises—if he had a dog, this search could be over.

“I’ll take the kitchen and office, you search the living room and bedroom,” Sydney directed her friend.

Sydney started in the kitchen. When she’d live with him, she’d remodeled the place and knew where all of the secret crevices were from the imperfect builders. She’d shown him where they all were when they were trying to get money back for the sloppy job.

There was a small space between the stove and the adjacent cabinet. She shined her light into the crack, hoping to see shadows of documents he was trying to hide.

Moving on from there, she checked the space between two cabinets that were supposed to be sharing a wall.

She was nearing the end of her search when she opened the pan storage under the oven. Bingo. An envelope addressed to Aaron. The return address had been omitted, but this was a start.

Sydney took the envelope into the living room and interrupted Grace’s search. “I found something. Sit down.”

Together, they opened the envelope and were surprised by its contents. Inside were numerous photos. Each contained Aaron with a different beautiful woman. The photos looked like they’d been taken from afar, using a zoom lens. He wasn’t looking in the direction of the camera in any of them, but he wasn’t trying to hide either. He likely didn’t know they were being taken.

And Sydney didn’t know why they were being taken.

“What do you think these are for?” Grace asked when they reached the end of the photos.

“I have no idea. Let’s keep looking and see if we can find any more clues.”

Sydney moved into the office. His computer was off, and she knew he was particular about his passwords, so she wouldn’t even bother looking unless she found a list of passwords. She suspected he wouldn’t have been careless enough to leave them lying around, though.

He had two filing cabinets. She couldn’t imagine what a librarian was doing with so many files. Especially at home. Unless he had a side business that had gotten him in trouble. He’d always talked about starting his own business, but she didn’t think he had it in him to do so.

She tried the first drawer and was surprised to find it unlocked. It was full of folders of library related paperwork. Some was almost 20 years old—well before he’d been working there.

The rest of the drawers were locked, so Sydney started looking for the key. As soon as she found the key taped to the bottom of his chair, she saw headlights turn up the driveway.

Sydney froze. Had either of them turned on lights that would make someone suspicious? Had they been here so long that the wake was over?

Sydney rushed out of the office and over to the bedroom. It was in the back of the house so Grace wouldn’t have seen the lights.

“We gotta go, someone’s here,” Sydney whispered with fear in her voice.

“Just. . .one. . .more. . .place to look. Got it. OK, let’s go!”

Sydney and Grace ran down the stairs as quietly as they could. Luckily it was carpeted so their footsteps were muffled. Sydney unlocked the back door just as the front door was opening. Somehow they managed to sneak out of the door before any lights were turned on. They crouched below the window and crawled along the side of the house, out of view from anyone inside.

“What now?” Sydney whispered.

“We have to get back to your car before they see us.”

Sydney had parked two blocks down, but she knew that everyone would know her car belonged to a stranger. Neighborhoods were protective like that.

They got to the front corner of the house and saw lights turning on in the backyard. They took their chances and got up to run across the street. Sydney looked back and saw the silhouette of a woman, the light reflecting off long blond hair.

They didn’t stop running until they were back in Sydney’s car.

As soon as they both closed their doors, Sydney’s phone rang. They exchanged a look of fear. Her phone hadn’t been on silent and it could have given them away while they were trying to escape.

“Hello?” she said into the phone. She’d been so surprised by the ringing that she hadn’t looked to see who it was.

“Sydney, it’s Mia. I think I have something for you.”

“Where are you?” Sydney asked.

“I’m sitting in my car outside the wake. Are you still in
Westhedge?”

“Yeah. We’ll meet you at your house in a half hour. Let’s get out of here.”

“Perfect. See you then.”

“Sydney, you’ve got to read this,” Grace said, handing over the letter she had been reading while Sydney was on the phone. They exchanged envelopes and Grace started leafing through the photos again, taking her time to study them.

Dear Mr. Gibbs,