1 A High-End Finish (23 page)

I shrugged. “We’ll see.”

It was such a wrong thing to say. I knew it the second the words left my mouth. I watched her ears literally perk up and she almost bounced in her chair. “Exactly what does
we’ll see
mean?”

I shook my head. “You’re incorrigible.”

“That’s right, so if you don’t want me hounding you forever, I suggest you spill your guts right now.”

I hesitated, then said, “There might’ve been a kiss.”

She froze. Then she started to shake with excitement.

“Stop it,” I said, laughing. “You nutball. It was just a kiss.”

“It was a MacKintyre Sullivan kiss.” She leaned both elbows on the table. “Tell me more.”

“There’s nothing more to tell. I brought him a basket of vegetables and a few days later he returned the basket and told me I . . . I dazzled him.”

“You dazzled him?” She pressed her hands to her heart. “That’s so sweet.”

“And then he kissed me.”

“Oh, my.” She fanned herself. “Then what?”

“And then . . . nothing,” I said. “I got conked on the head and I’ve been housebound ever since.”

“So Eric is out and Mac is in?” she wondered.

“Eric held my hand at the hospital,” I said.

She gasped. “Two men want you.”

“Not exactly,” I said, laughing. “He was giving comfort to the injured, that’s all.”

“He could’ve done that from across the room. No, he held your hand. It means something.”

“You’re a lunatic. But I love you.” I rubbed my forehead, pushed back my chair. “I need to lie down. I just hit the wall, energywise.”

She jumped up from the table, her mission suddenly clear. “We’ve got to get you feeling better. Pizza won’t do it.” She took our plates over to the kitchen counter. “Tomorrow I’m making you a big pot of healthy vegetable soup. Did you talk to the doctor? When can you take off that bandage?”

“Tomorrow morning.”

“Okay, I’ll stay in the morning and help you remove it. Then you’ll take a shower and do something with that giant Texas hairdo you’ve got going on. What is with that hair of yours, anyway?”

“It’s thick.”

“I know. I’m jealous.”

“Don’t be. Look.” I pointed to my head of hair and she nodded in sad agreement.

“Oh yeah,” she said. “That’s quite a do. Never mind—it’ll be pretty again tomorrow. And those two men won’t know what hit ’em.”

Lizzie’s vegetable soup helped. Washing my hair helped. It also helped when Mac showed up at my door to say how happy he was that I was feeling better. He didn’t stay; he was deep into the book and it was working for him, so he had to get back to it. I gave him a container of Lizzie’s soup and, in return, he kissed my cheek and then jogged back upstairs.

So that was kind of nice. Not earth-shattering, but nice. The kiss didn’t, however, bring normalcy back to my life. Nothing would truly get me back to normal until I finally made up my mind to take direct action. And now that I was feeling better, I was ready to do it, ready to find the person who had tried to kill me.

The police had sent Luisa Capello home after briefly questioning her, so I knew she wasn’t guilty of murder. No, I was convinced that Jennifer Bailey was that person.

I could’ve reported my feelings to the police chief or even to Tommy. But I didn’t want to throw accusations around and then find out I was wrong. Instead, I wanted to talk to the one person who would know the truth. And that meant I had to go and face the evil Queen of Mean herself, Whitney.

I was hesitant, and who could blame me? But Whitney was the only person around who would know what was going on with Jennifer.

I didn’t want to do it. The thought of facing Whitney made me feel physically uncomfortable and spiritually weak. And, no, I didn’t think I was being overly dramatic. The woman didn’t play by the same set of rules that I or any of my friends played by. The few times I had ever been forced to talk to her sincerely or honestly—in other words,
openly
—it had sucked my soul dry.

But I had to do it. Because for all her faults, Whitney would tell me the truth. And if she didn’t, I would threaten to go straight to the police with my theories. And I would be sure to let them know that Whitney had known all along what was going on, but chose not to tell the police—not to mention her own
husband
. Yes, it was blackmail. But it was
good
blackmail.

The whole confrontation would be unpleasant, but considering the alternative, what else could I do? I couldn’t talk to Jennifer, for God’s sake, because while Whitney was manipulative, judgmental, and cold, Jennifer was biting, spiteful, and vindictive.

Anyone could see the difference.

I dressed carefully, pulling on my best black jeans, attractive boots, a flattering red sweater Lizzie had given me last year, and my black leather jacket—the one with no holes.

Instead of letting my hair dry naturally, I had actually used a hair dryer and brush to straighten it enough that it didn’t tumble around my shoulders in a tangle of curls.

And alert the media: I even applied a bit more makeup than usual. Into this kind of battle, I had to go armed.

I figured I needed to do whatever I could to keep Whitney from focusing on everything she criticized about me—namely my looks, my clothing, my very existence—rather than focusing on the fact that her best buddy might be going around killing people.

As I drove out to Whitney’s, I thought a lot about the conversation I’d had with Lizzie the other night. Not just because it had made me realize that my dear friend was a certifiable crazy person, but also because of what she had pretended to infer about my lifestyle preferences.
It would be easy—and wrong—of someone to
infer
that sort of thing about a lot of people,
I thought. Just as Jennifer Bailey had
inferred
that I might prefer women to men.

Not that it mattered what my preferences were, but I hated what she’d been trying to do to me. She was a bully, had been one for as long as I’d known her, and I didn’t like it. And I didn’t much like
inferences
, either.

I pulled up in front of the Gallaghers’ house and gazed at the place that had been Tommy and Whitney’s since they were married. At one time, I had loathed them for buying one of my father’s designs, but now I didn’t care.

My father had always preferred the Queen Anne style of Victorian home and he had done a beautiful job with this one. The elegant millwork and thick columns of the front porch and balconies gave it a much more graceful, almost feminine look than some of the other Victorians built by his contemporaries.

And I was stalling for time.

Out of excuses, I climbed down from the truck and walked to the front steps. The closer I got, the more I regretted my decision to talk to Whitney. I knew that it wouldn’t go well, of course. But what else could I do? I kept walking, determined to follow through on my plan, no matter what. I knocked on the door and waited. After almost a minute passed, I thought of leaving, but Whitney’s car was parked in the driveway, so I knew she had to be home.

Maybe she was avoiding me. I couldn’t really blame her, since I would consider doing the same thing if I saw her standing on my doorstep.

But suddenly Whitney whipped open the door, her eyes wild with panic.

“Get out of my way!” she screamed, slammed the door behind her, and almost knocked me down trying to get out of the house and down the steps.

“What’s wrong? What is it?” I shouted, staring at her as she raced around to the driver’s side of her convertible black Jaguar. I almost laughed at her outfit. Baggy plaid flannel pajama bottoms and a sweatshirt for a top. And sneakers? Her hair wasn’t even combed. I liked the look, but what could she possibly be . . .

Had she seen me coming up the walkway? Was she trying to get away? Was it possible that Whitney was the killer? There was no way she could’ve known the reason why I was there. And I wasn’t about to let her escape if she was responsible for two deaths and one attempted murder—of
me
.

I heard the engine start up.

“Stop!” I went running after her, and before she could throw the car into reverse I grabbed the driver’s door and yanked it open. “Where do you think you’re going?”

“Get back!” she yelled, trying to grab the door handle to shut it. “What’s your problem?”

“You are,” I said. “Why are you running away?”

“Shut the damn door! I’m trying to get to the hospital.”

“Why? What happened?”

“Somebody tried to kill Jennifer!”

•   •   •

So that didn’t go quite the way I thought it would.

I sat at a table in the back room of Emily’s tea shop, sipping decaffeinated tea and taking small bites of the beautiful cookies she’d brought me. Not that I was worthy. I felt like a complete idiot.

“Tell me what happened,” she said, rubbing my shoulder before sitting down next to me and folding her hands on the table. “You look miserable.”

“I’m so stupid.” I spilled the story in halting, unfinished sentences. When I was finished, she grabbed the teapot and filled my cup.

“You’re not stupid,” she insisted in her lilting Scottish brogue. “Seems perfectly logical to think that those horrible girls were the ones who were killing men and setting you up to take the blame.”

I smiled at her. “Thanks, but clearly I was wrong. The one person I thought was the culprit is now struggling for her life in the hospital. She might be dead by now. I feel like hell for even thinking it might’ve been her.”

“Oh, now, cut yourself a bit of slack.” She grabbed a cookie and broke off a piece. “Have you checked on her condition?”

“Not yet.”

“Let’s do it right now,” she said gently. “It always helps to have as much information as possible at all times, don’t you think?”

“I guess so.”

“Do you want to use my phone?”

“No, I’ve got mine.” I pulled out my phone, took a deep breath, and called Eric’s cell.

He answered immediately. “Shannon, where are you?”

“I’m at the tea shop on the town square.”

“Stay put. I’ll be there in ten minutes.”

•   •   •

“Are these yours?” Eric asked, holding up a clear plastic bag containing a pair of thin leather workmen’s gloves.

Pink
ones.

“Oh, God.” I buried my head in my hands. “Of course they’re mine. Where did you find them?”

“Near the latest crime scene.”

I gazed up at him. Somehow he looked even bigger and more masculine surrounded by the soft pink and pale green walls of the tea shop. “The crime scene. Naturally.”

“Did you realize they were missing?”

“No. I was using them just the other day.” My eyes widened in realization. “It was the day I was attacked. I had shoved them into my purse on the way to Whitney’s house. Later, I remember setting my purse on the tailgate while I stowed the toolbox in the back of the truck. The person who hit me must have gone through my purse.”

And that pissed me off as much as anything did.

“What else can you tell me?”

I stared blankly at the wrinkled gloves. “I like them because they’re thinner than the usual work gloves. Even the ones made for women. They stretch with your hand movements. You can wear them all day for all sorts of jobs and they don’t chafe.” I pressed my fingers against my eyes. “And I’m blathering. Sorry. What else did you want to know?”

“We’ll hold on to these,” he said, placing the bag on the table. “We might be able to capture some prints off them.”

“That would be great, but they’ll probably just find my prints.”

“Someone else wore them after you did, Shannon. We’ll see what we can get.”

I pressed my lips together, hesitant to ask the next question. But I really needed to know. “What happened to Jennifer?”

“She was strangled, left for dead.”

“She’s dead?”

“No, but she’s in bad shape.”

“Someone strangled her while wearing my gloves?” I tried to swallow around the giant lump in my throat. I felt sick to my stomach and it wasn’t from cookies. The thought of a person slipping their hands into my gloves and using them to choke someone to death was hideous.

“She’s not dead,” I said, my voice barely above a whisper.

“No. She’ll survive.” He rested one arm on the table. “How well do you know her?”

“Well enough to hate her.”
Crap
. I couldn’t believe I’d said it out loud.

Eric sat back in his chair and observed me. “That’s honest, anyway.”

“You’ll find out if you ask the right people, so I might as well be the one to tell you. We really don’t like each other. She’s spiteful and calculating and just plain awful. We went to high school together and never managed to hit it off, to say the least. She pretty much tries to make my life a living hell as often as possible.”

“She was at the gym the night your equipment broke.”

“Yeah,” I said darkly. “And up until an hour ago, I was certain that she was the one who’d attacked me.”

“It seems unlikely now,” he said without humor.

“I suppose,” I said, resigned to the fact that I was dead wrong. Again. “Anyway, I don’t like her, but I don’t wish her harm, either.”

“Fair enough,” he said.

I stared at my pink gloves, dismayed that another one of my belongings had been used in such a destructive, evil way. I huffed out a breath. “So, how’s she doing?”

“She’s in a coma,” he said flatly.

I stared across the table, met his determined gaze with my own. “We really need to find this guy soon.”

He leaned toward me. “I did not just hear you say
we
. There is no
we
, Red. You’re going home and locking your doors until this creep is behind bars. Get it?”

I frowned. “Okay.”

“Because on the off chance that you missed it,” he whispered angrily, “this is another case where the killer went after a person that you don’t like. See the pattern coming back?”

My eyes widened. “Oh no.”

“Yeah, and they’re still using your own tools to try to frame you. So while someone is out there continuing to play games with your life, I would prefer that you not make yourself a target. They already tried to kill you once. Maybe more than once, considering all those so-called coincidences. I don’t want them trying it again. You got that?”

I nodded. “I got it.”

“Good.”

•   •   •

Even though I believed Eric was right, I still couldn’t stay home all day. I called him to let him know I had to go to work. I told him I’d be careful to stay where I could be seen by one of my crew at all times and I would always go home before dark.

The first day back on the job, I noticed a police cruiser driving by and slowing down. It happened five times in total that day. I was grateful, really, but it didn’t help that my guys were starting to tease me about being a fugitive from justice.

I was also a little irked when I found out that the chief had talked to Mac. So now he stood outside by the back gate every afternoon and waited for me to get home, then watched me walk into the house and lock the door behind me. The second day he did it, I turned around and watched him jog up the garage stairs and disappear into his apartment. Okay. So this routine was not exactly conducive to any sort of male-female bonding, the kind that would set Lizzie’s tender heart a-pounding. Basically, I felt like he was babysitting me.

And that made me more single-minded than ever in my quest to find the damn killer. Because until he was caught, my love life, such as it was, was going nowhere.

•   •   •

I spent a few sleepless nights worrying about my gloves and the killer who’d used them. One night I sat up in bed, turned on the light, and stared at my hands.
They’re not bad-looking,
I thought. Small, feminine, despite the kind of work I did.

But the point was, I had small hands. Whoever had used my gloves to throttle Jennifer had to have small hands, too. My mind kept returning to Whitney, but it wasn’t a viable theory. She was a bitch and I think she wore that title proudly, but she wouldn’t have committed murder. It would ruin her manicure.

“Meow,” I muttered, and smiled when Tiger hopped onto the bed and settled down next to me. I checked that Robbie had tucked himself into his doggie bed and all was right with his world. Then I fluffed my pillow, turned out the light, and fell back asleep.

•   •   •

Two days later, Jennifer was still in a coma and I was reaching the end of my rope. I ran into Tommy, who, despite my gentle requests, wouldn’t spill a damn word about the case. I was still losing sleep, the police wouldn’t talk to me, and I needed answers.