Elizabeth Lynn Casey - Southern Sewing Circle 08 - Remnants of Murder (18 page)

“I stopped by Leona’s on the way here and she asked me to bring Mama with me. Said she needed to swing by the spa first.”

“Does that sister of yours ever do anything besides have her nails done?” Dixie laid the rectangular fabric across her thighs then reached into her bag for her box of colored thread.

“This time it wasn’t for her.” Margaret Louise tucked her hand through Annabelle’s and gently escorted her mother to the end of the couch that was bathed in the most light. “It was for Paris.”

“Paris?” Tori and Dixie said in unison.

Once Annabelle was settled in a comfy corner, Margaret Louise claimed one of the folding chairs Tori had set up next to the couch and lowered herself onto it with only a few quiet grunts and groans. “I tell you, that bunny lives better than I do. Why, do you know when I last had my nails done? Never. That’s right—never. Ain’t never had the time or the inclination to have someone messin’ with my fingers like that. Specially not when I spend most my days playin’ in the dirt with one of them grandbabies of mine.”

Tori cast a sideways glance in Dixie’s direction to see if she’d heard their friend correctly. The gaped mouth she saw on her predecessor’s face brought a smile to her own. “Wait. Are you telling us that
Paris
got her nails done?”

“That’s what I’m sayin’. Clipped and polished if you can believe it.”

Dixie opened her mouth to speak but could only manage a sputter.

“Clipped and polished?” Tori echoed on her behalf. “Are you serious?”

Margaret Louise nodded once, twice. “Seems that vet that opened up shop halfway between here and Lawry is offerin’ a spa for animals—washin’, shampooin’, and nail clippin’. So my twin asked ’bout nail paintin’, too. From what she told me, they didn’t even blink. They just told Leona to bring Paris over and they’d pamper her for the afternoon.”

Again, Dixie tried to speak. Again, she sputtered. Only this time Tori didn’t have to offer a translation thanks to the arrival of three more of their sewing circle sisters. Jumping up from the corner of the chair she’d briefly inhabited while Margaret Louise regaled them with stories of bunny manicures, Tori greeted Debbie and Beatrice with a smile while simultaneously slipping her hand beneath Rose’s upper arm and helping the group’s matriarch to the open spot on the couch beside Annabelle.

“Rose it is so good to see you. We missed you at the last meeting.” Then in an effort to keep from fussing too much, she gestured toward the rest of the group. “Well, we’re almost a full house tonight. All we’re waiting on now is
Leona
and”—she glanced at Margaret Louise for confirmation—“
Melissa
… and … Georgina.”

She was grateful when Margaret Louise chimed in with Melissa’s baby-related no-show and hoped the distraction would cover for the tone shift in her own voice at the mention of the mayor. It didn’t matter what vibe Georgina had given off that morning or even that the elected official was out of line when she told Tori to leave Clyde’s death alone. The only thing that mattered inside the confines of their sewing circle was loyalty to one another.

Georgina was one of them and had been since long before Tori ever dreamed of living in Sweet Briar. To share her disappointment about Georgina’s behavior with the women assembled around her would be a recipe for disaster.

Inhaling deeply, Tori took advantage of Margaret Louise’s update on grandchild number eight to claim a chair of her own and get her own sewing items situated within easy reach. When she was done, she looked up to find Rose watching her closely. “Georgina isn’t coming this evening, either.”

Margaret Louise sent her latest photo of Melissa’s new son around the circle then turned to address Rose’s proclamation with its appropriate due. “She have some sort of town meetin’ tonight?”

Rose pulled the flaps of her cotton sweater closer against her body and shook her head.

“She bein’ treated to dinner by someone lookin’ for a favor?”

Rose shook her head a second time, her gaze never leaving Tori’s.

“She visitin’ that rascal ex-husband of hers in the pokey?”

A chorus of moans rang up around the room, negating any need for Rose to shake her head a third time.

“I know … I know,” Margaret Louise said around her belly laugh. “Georgina would no more visit that man than my sister would shop for clothes at a secondhand store.”

“Then why did you ask?” Rose groused.

“Just bein’ funny, I guess.” Margaret Louise reached across the divide that separated her folding chair from the corner of the couch where her mother sat and gently patted the woman’s leg. “So why ain’t she comin’? Does anyone know?”

“She’s angry at Victoria, that’s why.”

Heads turned toward the front hallway and the stylishly clad woman who’d managed to let herself into the room without anyone noticing. Rising to her feet, Tori shot a glare to end all glares at Leona.

“Don’t look at me like that, dear,” Leona admonished over the top of her stylish glasses. “You know it’s true. Pretending otherwise is a waste of time and effort.”

Without waiting for a reply, Leona crossed the living room in her dusty rose stilettos and eased herself into the armchair Tori had purchased shortly after moving to Sweet Briar. The chair itself was as cozy as it was pretty and had become Leona’s official spot anytime she came to visit. The fact that Tori made sure to put Paris’s travel bed at its base prior to those visits only helped to underscore Leona’s claim to the chair.

“When I stopped at the spa just now, everyone just went on and on about how wonderful Paris was for all her procedures.”

“Her procedures?” Beatrice looked up from the Easter outfit she was making for her charge, her brows furrowed.

Leona turned Paris so everyone could see the bunny’s bright pink bow and matching nail tips. “They washed and groomed her, and gave her her very first official manicure. Doesn’t she look precious?”

A quick glance around the circle revealed more than a few open mouths and raised eyebrows. But only Rose had the courage to speak.

“Has one of those lip-plumping shots you take gone to your brain, Leona?”

Instantly, Leona’s head dipped forward, affording her eyes an uninhibited view of Rose from atop her glasses. “I don’t use anything artificial to enhance my looks, you old goat.”

A soft laugh escaped Rose’s own thinning lips, the sound soliciting a smile from everyone in the room except Leona. “Do you honestly think I was born yesterday, Leona?”

Seconds turned to minutes as Leona continued to stare at Rose before finally breaking eye contact and setting Paris in her bed. “I’m well aware of the date you were born, Rose. In fact, I believe your birthday predates dirt.”

A collective gasp echoed around the room, only to disappear with a wave of Rose’s arthritic hand. “Ladies, please. Gasps like that should be saved for surprises. Leona’s classless comments no longer qualify.”

Leona’s hand flew to the base of her neck in horror as a second, louder round of gasping circulated the room. “Did you say
classless
?”

“If the shoe fits,” grumbled Rose. Then, turning her head a hairbreadth to the right, the elderly woman focused on Tori. “So why is Georgina upset with you? What did you do?”

A sudden surge of warmth crept its way into Tori’s cheeks as all eyes left the Leona-Rose battlefield and focused squarely on her. “I, um, I’m not sure exactly.”

“Oh, Victoria, quit your hemming and hawing as my sister likes to say.” Leona opened her latest travel magazine and lifted it up to reading level. “You know very well why Georgina is cross with you. She made it perfectly clear over breakfast this morning, dear.”

Like an active Ping-Pong match, all eyes left Leona and returned to Tori, waiting.

“Victoria?”

She looked from the floor to Rose and swallowed, the concern on the matriarch’s face warming her own all over again. “Dixie has asked me to help her figure out what happened to Clyde Montgomery.”

Dixie’s needle-holding hand stilled mere inches above the rectangular fabric on her lap. “Clyde was murdered, you know.”

“You’re still hanging on to that one with both gums, Dixie?” Rose scooted forward on the sofa to take a closer look at Dixie’s project.

“I am. And so is Victoria.”

Her attention still on Dixie’s lap, Rose addressed Tori once again. “Victoria? Is that true?”

She took a deep breath, her answer forming before she’d completed a full exhale. “Something doesn’t add up about his death, Rose. I mean, I get that he was ninety-one, but I’m having a hard time accepting the speed with which he deteriorated over the past month. Especially in light of the fact that virtually every business owner in this town was livid over his decision to hold on to his land in spite of their ongoing campaign to make him change his mind.”

“Y-You actually think someone wanted that resort so badly they’d kill a man to see it happen?” Debbie stammered.

A few days ago, Tori had still felt some of the same incredulousness she heard in Debbie’s voice, but now, after everything she’d seen and learned that day, she couldn’t help but see Dixie’s suspicions in a whole new light. “I think it’s very possible.”

“Why?”

The simple question, posed without a shred of sarcasm or second-guessing, allowed her to not only take another breath but to actually relish it this time. When she was ready to answer, she gave Rose her full attention. “I went with Leona to a business owners’ meeting at Johnson’s Diner today and virtually every single person in that room was happy about Clyde’s death …
happy
that his passing will now pave the way for some big resort company to set up shop here in Sweet Briar.

“They even had a cake to celebrate his death, Rose.
A cake
.”

“Cake?” Debbie parroted. “You mean the one I made?”

At Tori’s nod, the bakery owner leapt to her feet and began pacing around the living room. “Carter asked me to make a cake for the meeting. He told me not to write ‘Happy Birthday’ on it the way I usually do, but he never said what it was for …”

Rose cleared her throat, pulling her sweater still tighter against her body in an attempt to ward off a chill only she felt. “Go on, Victoria …”

“Anyway, it bothered me, really bothered me. I mean, I can’t say I knew Clyde because I really didn’t, but he was a person, Rose. A person who loved his land because of the connection it provided to his past. How was that wrong?”

When no one answered, she continued, the anger she felt at the diner rising to the surface all over again. “So when I got to the library, I decided to do a little checking. During lulls in patron traffic I began researching towns like Sweet Briar who have turned to tourism as the main source of income. And, Rose? The kind of money a resort like Nirvana can generate for a town is absolutely unbelievable. Stores that were once struggling are now more successful than their owners ever thought possible. Restaurants that were on the verge of closing down are now opening second and third locations. Even the schools in these towns have benefited from the increased tax dollars … allowing them to offer bigger and better after-school programs. I mean, it’s been an absolute windfall for these places.”

“And the negative side to these resorts?” Rose countered.

“Not big enough to offset the good.” It was a simple reply but accurate nonetheless.

“And Georgina is mad ’cause why?”

Tori took a moment to consider Margaret Louise’s question, knowing the answer had her walking through a potential minefield. “Because she loves this town and everyone in it. Accusing one of its residents of a crime that was committed for the express purpose of benefiting the town probably hits a little too close to home.”

“If you ask me, my money is on Shelby Jenkins.” Leona lowered her magazine long enough to inspect her own French manicure. “She had motive, she had means, and she’s got to do something to please the only man who’ll ever think she’s pretty.”

Debbie looked up from her own box of colored thread and made a face. “Shelby Jenkins? You can’t be serious, Leona. She’s as sweet as the candy she makes.”

“And if she poisoned some of that candy, would it still be sweet?”

“I—”

With a nod of satisfaction at the job her manicurist had done, Leona turned her attention squarely on the bakery shop owner. “When you hand dip the same candy for the same man each week, it certainly provides a clever way to administer poison on an ongoing basis. Watch any one of those detective shows on TV and you’ll see I’m right.”

Tori rewound Leona’s initial statement in her head, hitting pause when she reached the part that made her internal radar ping. “What did you mean by having to please the only man who’ll ever think she’s pretty?”

Leona slid forward on the armchair and perched primly at its edge, her moment in the spotlight demanding a straight back and crossed ankles. “You saw her this morning, dear. How she batted her lashes and fairly drooled all over herself every time John Peter Hendricks so much as sneezed in her vicinity … but it didn’t work. She’s too needy, too obvious. That’s why she spends her evenings alone.”

“Okay …”

“Her father, from what I hear, thinks the sun rises and sets on darling Shelby. He purchased that shop for her, helped her get her business off the ground, and pays all the expenses so she can stay busy doing what she wants. Therefore, it stands to reason she’d try to help him out in return.”

“You mean because her father is a bigwig at Nirvana Resorts?” It had taken a moment, but she’d finally picked up Leona’s line of thought.

“Precisely.”

“Her father’s connection to the big picture is certainly noteworthy, but there are an awful lot of people in town whose quality of life would improve significantly with that kind of tourism revenue,” Tori reminded her.

“Like who?” Beatrice asked.

“Essentially anyone who owns a shop in the town square, for starters.”

“Hmmm.” Rose lifted her chin and pinned Leona with a stare. “That would certainly include
you
, Leona, wouldn’t it?”

“If I needed my antique shop to survive, you old goat, I’d be a suspect, too. But since I don’t, you can just wipe that smug look off your face.”