Playing with magic, p.23
Playing with Magic, page 23
“That can’t be that unusual for someone who’s traveling. Who wants to pack a half dozen suits for a trip to a little town in the mountains?”
At this, she scoffed. “Phoebe, while you may not want to impress anyone with your wardrobe, that doesn’t mean everyone else is equally careless about their appearance.”
For a moment I wondered if I was still wearing my soaked ensemble from earlier that afternoon, but when I looked down, I confirmed I had on a nice pair of cinnamon-colored corduroy pants and a black short-sleeved blouse with Victorian lace details on the sleeves and collar. If anything, I looked dressed up compared to my usual tee-and-jeans uniform.
I let the barb slide off me, trying not to take it too personally. When I didn’t rise to her bait, Dierdre continued. “A man in that position should have at least two or three good suits with him at all times. He wore the same one to every meeting. I could tell because it kept getting more and more rumpled, like he wasn’t even bothering to iron or steam it every day.”
I was about to ask who traveled with their own steamer, but I was sure that would just make her call me a wrinkly disaster, so I let it go.
“And then there were his shoes.”
“His . . . his shoes?”
“Yes. Loafers.” Her nose wrinkled so fiercely that I wondered if she had smelled something bad, only to realize it was her opinion about loafers in general. I was happy in that moment to be wearing my Chelsea rain boots and not my usual loafers, because I wasn’t sure I would have survived the withering judgment.
“I’m sorry, what’s wrong with loafers?”
“Why nothing, if you’re a seventy-eight-year-old man with a time slot booked at the shuffleboard court. Or if you run a bookstore, I suppose.” There it was. “But a lawyer in the business of brokering multimillion-dollar details . . . loafers? Absolutely not. Shined oxfords. A classic brogue if you’re an especially elegant gentleman. But certainly not a loafer.”
I had absolutely no idea what any of the terms she had just used meant, but she said them with such conviction I had to believe her.
“So he had one suit and bad shoes. Maybe he wasn’t fashion forward. If he was busy running around for his clients, maybe he didn’t have time to shop.”
“Phoebe, my dear. The man wore Drakkar Noir cologne.” She raised a meaningful eyebrow at me, as if this final piece of her puzzle should explain beyond a shadow of a doubt what she was trying to convey, but I was at a loss. My snobbery didn’t cut as deep as hers.
She sighed, obviously frustrated by my stupidity. “He was poor,” she declared. “He was not the lawyer of a wealthy firm. If you represent billionaires, you have to put yourself forward at the value they expect. No one doing business deals for a Fortune 500 company wears Drakkar Noir and loafers. A real lawyer wouldn’t need to trick people out of their money the way he was. And given how he was presenting himself, it sounds to me like he wasn’t particularly good at scamming people either.”
I suddenly understood what she was saying, and I was momentarily too shocked to give words to the thoughts.
She waited for me to speak, a smug little smirk at the corners of her lips.
“Dierdre, are you saying you think this guy was just a straight-up con artist?”
“I didn’t see it at first either, I must admit. He had a silver tongue, that one. And on the surface he had the right look. The Rolex was a nice touch. Probably a knock-off, but a good one. And when he pitched me the idea of an investment property portfolio, I had to admit that at first I was really intrigued. He certainly did his homework.”
“But he was a fake?”
“Well, he certainly wasn’t a lawyer for a major grocery chain or real estate mogul. I don’t know what he was actually here for, but I think it’s probably a good thing no one jumped when he made those offers. Or gave him any money for his investment schemes.”
Offers she herself had tried to convince me to take only days earlier. I bit my tongue hard to keep from mentioning that part.
Something else rang a bell in my mind.
Dierdre had said Andrew had been in Leavenworth before coming here.
Leavenworth had been the last stop on Sebastian’s book tour before he came to Raven Creek.
I somehow didn’t think that was a coincidence.
Thirty-Two
Everywhere this case brought me was somewhere new I hadn’t expected to find myself. Perhaps there was a reason I wasn’t a professional investigator like Rich or a police officer like Detectives Martin and Kim, because it always shocked the heck out of me to learn that people were being dishonest.
And such a big lie too.
If Dierdre’s assertions were correct and Andrew had been a con man, then what was he trying to achieve? He hadn’t managed to convince anyone to sign his cruel sales deal. But if Dierdre was right and he was also asking them to put money back into the town through some sort of investment scheme in Raven Creek’s future, then there might be something to what he was trying to do.
Based on Leo’s reaction and what I’d heard from Amy and other business owners, Andrew had been more off-putting than he was convincing. He’d had Dierdre going for a bit, but he’d needed her help to try to convince other locals, so his approach hadn’t been one of hostility with her.
And if he had managed to convince someone to make an investment, they were going to realize quickly they were investing in nothing. At least I hoped my friends and neighbors had been smart enough to see through a scam.
What his ploy did do, however, was create an entirely new web of suspects for who could have killed the fake lawyer. If one of the homeowners or tenants he approached on his quest had agreed to take the deal he offered, then realized it was all a fake-out . . . well, there was plenty of motive.
The amount of rage someone in that scenario might feel was astronomical.
I recalled the way Audrey had wistfully talked about retiring early to a beach in Bali with all her financial concerns gone, then imagined it all amplified by a hundred for someone who had towering debt and a family to take care of. The right person pushed the wrong way might have decided that the lawyer had to pay for his lies.
So now it wasn’t just a question of where Melody and Deacon were but the additional quandary of whether or not the entire town might have a motive to kill the man. I wished I could ask Leo exactly what Andrew had said that had set him off so badly. It might give me an idea of who else’s buttons he could have pushed.
The other big problem was that I needed to share this information with the detectives, but I wasn’t sure how to do that without letting them know I was still poking around. I could say I’d just bumped into Dierdre and we were discussing her nephew’s lease when the topic had come up, but even in my head that sounded like a lie.
I should have asked Dierdre to call the police and tell them herself, but there was no way she’d do that without mentioning me, so I’d be screwed no matter what.
I was just going to have to take the heat and hope that the intel provided was helpful enough that they’d overlook my transgression.
A voice in the back of my head told me that the police might not even need to hear it from me. Surely they had run a background check on Andrew that would show he didn’t work for a massive corporation.
But if it showed he was a lawyer, they might just assume he was being honest. Files between lawyers and clients were confidential, and since he hadn’t told anyone the name of his client, there was no way to disprove him on paper. The notion that he was scamming people was just Dierdre’s hunch, but it rang too true for me to ignore it.
Thinking about Andrew, I realized I hadn’t checked my phone today to see if Sam had gotten back to me, and in fact, he had. There was a surprisingly long text—atypical of Sam—that read, Dude is a real piece of work, notorious history of making terrible contracts that border on elder abuse. Multiple bar complaints, but he’s still practicing. If you’re thinking of doing business with him, DON’T.
So Andrew was a real lawyer but not a very highly regarded one.
I sighed as I jogged down Main Street, clinging to my umbrella. I’d text Patsy as soon as I got home. Of the two detectives, she would go easier on me, and this kind of information was what she’d hoped I might be able to help with in the first place. I wasn’t at a crime scene and I wasn’t following suspects; I was just talking to another person in town.
They couldn’t get too mad at me for that, I hoped.
The street was vacant, but I still had the creeping sensation someone was watching me. I looked over my shoulder, expecting to see a shadowy figure, but there was nothing. Still, I picked up my pace.
The store was still open when I arrived, and I was surprised by how early it was, even though the cloud cover made it feel like it was almost time to go to bed. Imogen was making tea for someone when I walked in, shaking my umbrella outside the door, and Daphne was at the cash desk with a whole packet of chalk pens spilled out on the counter.
As the door chimed, the pair of them looked up and smiled, then, realizing it was me, made exclamations of surprise.
“We weren’t expecting you back today,” Daphne said.
“Is everything okay with Leo?” Imogen asked, in almost the same breath.
“Mreow?” inquired Bob.
“Hello, hi, nice to see everyone. I’m back for my cat and my car, and then I promise to stop cramping your style. Leo is not under arrest; he had voluntarily submitted to questioning.” I said that loud enough for any gossipy ears in the building to hear. “And no, I didn’t bring you any treats,” I concluded to Bob.
He returned to his place by the kennels.
“How’s it been?”
“Slow. That weird social media kid was here for ages after you left. He asked a ton of questions about Leo and what we thought about the murders.” Imogen made a face. “Little freaky, if you ask me.”
“Immie, you’re so mean,” Daphne scolded. “Connor worked so hard for that job with Sebastian, and he was really good at what he did. It sounds like he had a really hard life, and with no degree or previous experience, no one wanted to take a chance on him until Sebastian hired him. He gave me some great tips for our social feeds.” She beamed excitedly. “I have so many ideas.”
Leave it to Daphne to turn Connor into her new best friend. I smiled at her. “That’s awesome. You know I have no clue what works on socials; I’m still posting pictures of my food on Instagram, so I trust you. What are you working on there?” I pointed to the pile of markers in front of her.
“Oh, you’ll love this,” Imogen said, handing the tea over to her customer and thanking them. I was surprised that her tone wasn’t sarcastic.
Daphne held up one of the little chalkboards that we had for the kennels. She had drawn Indigo’s name in fancy script and added an adorable cartoon portrait of him next to his name. Underneath, in a variety of hand-drawn fonts and colors, she had given key word descriptions of him and his behavior but had also added cute fake information like one might find on a dating profile. Likes: Churu treats, lap cuddles, and the Sunday New York Times (to lay on). Dislikes: Being asked when the Indigo Girls are getting back together and going to the vet.
The sign was unbelievably eye-catching and charming and way more detailed than anything I’d have expected.
“Daphne, that’s incredible.”
She blushed. “Oh, I was happy to do it. I have great ideas for Coco.”
“Has she come out at all?”
Imogen joined Daphne at the counter. “She very briefly emerged from her Coco-cocoon to sniff Bob, which I think made his entire afternoon, and then she went back into hiding. But it was a positive sign. A couple people already asked to take Indigo out, and he seems to love the attention. At least for now we’ve told people that Coco is just to be observed until she warms up to her new temporary home.”
Imogen’s thoughtfulness about the cat’s needs warmed my heart. I was delighted to see my stoic and usually grouchy friend was getting involved in this new venture.
Daphne went to affix the new sign to Indigo’s cage door, taking down the leaflet from the shelter that was there as a placeholder. She stopped and spent a good minute cooing at him through the cage bars before crouching down to give Bob a scratch behind the ears so he wouldn’t feel left out.
As promised, I collected my cat and car and left the ladies to finish their shift without the boss looming over their shoulders. I was a good boss, and at least from my side of things I considered both of them friends as well as employees, but I also knew perfectly well the euphoric release that occurred the moment your boss walked out the door at the end of your shift. I wasn’t sure what their little no-Phoebe freedoms were—whether it was the freedom to use their phones (something I allowed anyway) or to read at the counter (something else I allowed)—but I knew they didn’t bother me.
Bob protested loudly when I collected him to go home, and I had to assure him that Coco would be fine without him for one night.
The fact that he hadn’t moved from her side all day did not escape my notice.
Phoebe, no.
The rain was easing up slightly when I parked my car in front of Lane End House, so I scooped up Bob’s backpack without bothering to open my umbrella and made a run for the porch. The old boards on the steps creaked under my heavy footfalls, but the newly replaced boards in front of my door were as silent as a whisper. A good sign.
Once inside the house, I released the wild beast from his shackles, and he set about sniffing around the entire main floor like he’d lost something. Was he looking for Coco?
Does Bob need a friend?
It was an idea I wasn’t quite ready to give voice to just yet, and it was far too soon in Coco’s stay to even consider it. But still, the idea was there, and Bob was feeding it with each new room he entered looking for a cat who wasn’t there. Once he even let out a sad, long meow, like he was calling for someone other than me, and it was a lot for my tender, stupid, cat-loving heart to deal with.
I ended up feeding him dinner two hours too early in hopes that it would distract him.
I was moving the sitting room furniture back into place from where it had been moved the previous night when something caught my eye over the fireplace. I didn’t spend much time in this room and spent even less of it at this vantage point on the floor, so I’d never really noticed a particular piece of Eudora’s art mounted above the fireplace mantel.
With the coffee table back where it belonged, I walked over to the hearth and stared up. The piece really blended in if you were looking at it from eye level, which might explain why I simply walked past it every time I entered the room, but if I tilted my head at a certain angle, the low light from the dim overhead bulbs caught it just right.
It was a long, bronzed branch, maybe three feet long and the thickness of my thumb. On the branch were about a dozen chubby birds, huddled together like it was winter and they were hoping to get warm. Perhaps that was why Eudora had placed it over the fire—so the little metal birds could absorb the warmth all winter long.
But something about the birds bothered me. They were adorable, and I enjoyed the piece now that I knew it was there—I might move it to the kitchen side of the two-sided fireplace so I could appreciate it more—but it also made me think of something I couldn’t quite put my finger on.
Birds over a fire.
Why was I thinking of birds over a fire as meaning something important?
And then it hit me.
When Honey told me about her dream, she’d said she had dreamed of a cluster of birds over a house, and in the end, the birds all flew away as the house burned to the ground.
A chill swept through me.
She’d said it was how she’d known that the wrong person had died.
Looking up at that sculpture when I did might have been the very thing that saved my life when the fire poker sliced through the air over my right shoulder and smashed into the rocky edifice of the fireplace hearth.
The poker sticking in the grate on its way up was also a big help.
Later, I might wonder if my aunt’s spirit had anything to do with my luck, but in the moment, I spun backward, tripping over the coffee table I had just moved back into the center of the room and smacking my head on the love seat behind me.
A figure wearing all black with a thick woolen ski mask over their face was struggling to regain their grasp on the heavy metal poker.
From my place awkwardly stuck between the coffee table and the love seat, I couldn’t manage to right myself, and a horrible thought occurred to me.
If they get that poker free, I’m going to die.
In different circumstances, at other points in my life, my probability magic might have kicked in at that moment to freeze time, help me get untangled and out the door. But that didn’t happen this time.
Instead, Bob came into the room, and my would-be killer and I noticed him at the exact same moment, when Bob pinned his ears back and hissed at the person in head-to-toe black.
Bob hadn’t been looking for another cat earlier after all; he’d been trying to warn me that something wasn’t right.
My attacker wrenched the poker free and took one step, then two steps, not toward me but toward my cat. The same horrific certainty I’d felt about my own imminent death shifted, and a ripple of the most blood-curdling, horrific fear I’d ever felt in my life ran through my body from the roots of my hair to the tips of my toes.
I wanted to throw up and scream in equal measure, because this person, this monster who had tried to kill me, was about to attack my cat, and I knew in that moment I loved that fluffy ball of fur more than I’d loved most of the people I’d known in my life.
I’m not sure when it happened or how, but the coffee table was suddenly on its side and the love seat was three feet away from me against the far wall of the room. The already dim overhead lights were flickering, and the once-cold fireplace was suddenly roaring to life with a fire that threatened to overtake its confinements.
The room felt small and everything in it more distant than it had only a minute earlier, but I didn’t have time to think about why. I just saw someone standing over my cat, and my entire being became attuned to making sure that nothing happened to Bob.
