Cinnamon Toasted (32 page)

“Wait a minute!” Troy plowed his fingers through his sun-bleached locks. “What’s this about you two sleeping together?”

Cheryl pressed her lips together. “Your performance in the bedroom could stand improvement,” she said, her voice frigid.

“You can sort your love lives out
later.” I focused my attention on Cheryl. “I have reason to believe that Troy wasn’t with you during the time your husband died as you claimed. A witness can testify that your rental car wasn’t in the motel’s parking lot. That leaves Troy without an alibi.”

“Is that true?” Felicity asked, interested in spite of herself.

A dull red crept beneath Troy’s golden tan. “Cheryl’s high maintenance.
She forgot to pack her antiaging, antiwrinkle serum. She insisted I get her another and not return without it. The nearest mall is nearly an hour’s drive. I got to Dillard’s just before closing. If you don’t believe me, I saved the receipt with a time stamp. Afterwards, I called Kyle and we talked. He’ll vouch for me.”

Cheryl whirled to confront him. “Kyle? Who’s Kyle?”

“He’s my friend,” Troy
admitted, albeit reluctantly. “My
very
good friend. As a matter of fact, I’m going to call him right now and ask him to pick me up at LAX tomorrow.”

Troy turned and left the rest of us staring after him. “Well, don’t that beat all,” Reba Mae said to no one in particular.

So much for Troy not having an alibi, but that still left Rusty. I fixed him with a hard stare. “What about you, Rusty? Do
you still expect us to believe that you were in your room? It would have been child’s play to slip out the back, shove your partner down Melly’s stairs, and return with no one knowing.”

Rusty snorted, a very unmetrosexual reaction to my accusation. “All you have to do is check the call log on my phone. I had FaceTime with Jessica Moran for hours that night.”

“Jessica Moran?” Tulip batted his
shoulder with her hand. “You’ve been fooling around with my best friend? I knew you were a player, Rusty Tulley, but this is a new low even for you. I’m out of here.”

She turned and fled up the stairs with Rusty chasing after her. “Tulip, wait up. I can explain.”

“Piper Prescott”—Felicity glared—“it’s high time you stop this nonsense and leave the crime-solving to the police. If you ever pull
a stunt like this again, I won’t be so lenient. Please leave this instant before I suffer a change of heart and have you and your sidekick arrested.”

I didn’t need further encouragement to do as requested. Melly, Reba Mae, and I were a subdued trio as we returned to my VW and drove away.

“I don’t think I’ve ever seen Felicity so upset,” Melly said. “Or so angry.”

“Look at the bright side, honeybun,”
Reba Mae counseled from the backseat. “Felicity Driscoll is one more person you can cross off your Christmas card list. Think of the money you’ll save on postage.”

C
HAPTER
34

“Y
OU’VE HAD DUMB
ideas in the past, Piper, but tonight’s takes the prize.” Melly stared straight ahead out the windshield, her Vera Bradley tote bag in her lap. “Why I agreed to go along with your harebrained scheme, I’ll never know. I should have my head examined.”

Melly hadn’t stopped haranguing me since dropping off Reba Mae. Problem was, I deserved it. Dumb idea? Check. Harebrained
scheme? Check. Need a shrink? Check.

“A word of advice, dear. From now on, leave the detective work to a
real
detective.”

“Yes, ma’am,” I said meekly. “At least I gave everyone a chance to unburden their secrets.”

“Oh, they unburdened their secrets, all right, no doubt about it. Let me see”—Melly ticked off the revelations on her fingers—“Rusty was having an affair with Tulip’s best friend.
Cheryl has a secret trust fund. And as for Troy, well, Troy has Kyle.”

I felt like a complete fool. An idiot. “If McBride gets wind of this, he’ll laugh himself silly. Even worse, if Dottie Hemmings or Jolene Tucker hears about what happened tonight, she’ll spread the story while playing bunco. The next morning, I’ll be a laughingstock.”

“Don’t worry, dear. Fortunately for you, by tomorrow your
suspects will be gone.”

“Great.” I flipped on the turn signal and headed for the business district. Besides Melly, that left only Reba Mae and Felicity as witnesses to my folly.

“Well, at least one good thing will come from this night. We’ll have a brand-new garbage disposal by the time we get home.” Melly patted the paisley tote bag on her lap. “Now that Ned’s headaches have disappeared, he
wanted to finish the job he started.”

I turned down the street behind my shop, where I usually parked—a city ordinance forbade overnight parking on Main Street—to find a white cargo van in my usual space. “What’s the van from Gray’s Hardware doing behind my shop?”

Melly couldn’t come up with a plausible explanation as we trooped up the stairs to my apartment. The lower half of Ned Feeney’s body
protruded from the cabinet below the kitchen sink. Thompson Gray squatted next to him. “Give that bolt another quarter turn,” Thompson instructed, “and the job’s done.”

“Thompson,” Melly said, depositing her tote on the counter. “What are you doing here?”

“Yes, Thompson, what
are
you doing here? And,” I said, looking around, “where’s Casey?”

Thompson got to his feet. “Your dog thought Ned’s
tools were chew toys, so we put him in the bedroom to keep him out of mischief.”

Ned scooted out from beneath the cabinet. “Hope you don’t mind me askin’ Thompson over. Garbage disposals are tricky buggers. I didn’t want to make any more mistakes.”

“I’m thinking of stocking this particular model so folks don’t have to drive all the way to Lowe’s,” Thompson explained.

I bit back a retort. I
didn’t feel it prudent to remind Thompson that his prices were the real reason people were willing to make the drive.

Ned pulled a handkerchief from a back pocket to wipe his hands. “Mr. Gray is goin’ to appoint me his chief installer once I get the hang of things—and quit droppin’ the dang thing on my head.”

Thompson ran a hand over his mousy hair. “You ladies have a pleasant evening?”

“I’d
hardly call it pleasant.” Melly slipped off the light sweater she had worn on the way home. “Piper insisted on playing amateur detective and took me along as her assistant.”

Ned shoved up the bill of his ball cap. “Did you find out who shoved the guy down Miz Melly’s stairs?”

“No.” I must have sounded as dejected as I felt. “At first, I was certain it was Cheryl Balboa in collusion with her
friend Troy. Next, I thought Chip’s partner, Rusty Tulley, might be the culprit.”

Melly folded her sweater neatly and set it alongside her tote bag. “Turns out they all had ironclad alibis.”

Thompson began helping Ned collect the assortment of tools scattered about. “For the life of me, I don’t understand why McBride is trying to turn a simple fall into a murder investigation. Personally, I’m
convinced the man likes being in the limelight. Don’t think I haven’t noticed the way women follow his every move.”

“Well, I’m not one to give up easily.” I stooped to pick pliers off the floor and handed them to Ned. “I plan to keep asking questions until I find out who’s responsible for killing Chip Balboa.”

“Chief will figure it out.” Ned shoved the pliers into his tool belt. “In the meantime,
be extra careful. Good thing you have Mr. Gray watchin’ your back, Miz Melly. I was takin’ a shortcut through your yard—hope you don’t mind—the night that feller got hisself killed. I saw Mr. Gray comin’ out your back door. I said ‘hey,’ but he musta not heard me. When I asked him about it later, he said he was checkin’ your locks. If that ain’t bein’ neighborly, I don’t know what is.” Ned tipped
his hat. “G’night, ladies.”

Thompson made no move to follow.

I stole a glance at Melly, but she fiddled with her pearls and avoided looking at me. “Thompson,” I said slowly, “why were you at Melly’s the night Chip was killed?”

He shrugged. “Ned was mistaken. You know he’s not the sharpest tool in the shed.”

Hard to argue Ned’s mental acuity, still … Tipping my head to one side, I watched Thompson
closely. “Even so, Ned was quite specific about the exact night.”

“Piper, really,” Melly objected, but her protest sounded weak.

Why didn’t Thompson leave? Did he expect us to offer coffee and cookies? Furthermore, it made no sense that he had been at Melly’s the night Chip was shoved down her basement stairs. I felt my stomach knot. Unless …

But that didn’t make sense, either. What reason
could Thompson possibly have to kill Chip?

Thompson stood in front of the door leading to the stairs, effectively blocking the exit. “You just can’t stop nosing around, can you, Piper? You can’t leave well enough alone.”

“I need to check on Casey,” Melly said, making a move toward the bedroom. “The poor thing must be tired of being cooped up.”

“Stay where you are!” Thompson snapped. He reached
under his loose-fitting shirt and withdrew a small but lethal-looking revolver from a holster clipped to his belt.

My eyes widened at the sight of a gun in his hand.
Oh my God!
Melly saw it, too, and let out a strangled scream that set Casey barking and scratching at the closed bedroom door.

“Keep that mutt quiet before I shoot it.”

“Casey!” I called out in my sternest pet-owner voice, terrified
Thompson would make good his threat. “Hush!”

“Thompson, put that thing away before it goes off,” Melly ordered, a quaver in her voice in spite of her bravado.

My thoughts flew to Lindsey. Thank goodness she was spending the night at CJ’s. I needed to do something. But what? It was hard to think, to plan, above the buzzing in my head. All I could do was stare at the pistol, which seemed as big
as the cannon in the town square.

“Um, Thompson, what were you really doing at Melly’s that night?” I asked, stalling for time. “And don’t lie about checking the locks. Melly never locked her back door. She had no reason to ask you to check it—until
after
Chip was killed.”

“It’s all your fault, Piper. Or should I call you Nancy Drew?” he sneered. “You just can’t resist meddling, can you?”

I noticed Thompson’s hand shaking, which only added to my fear. “Thompson, why don’t you do as Melly suggested and put the gun down before someone gets hurt? It’ll only make matters worse.”

“And then what?” he said with a choked laugh. “You call that cop friend of yours and have me arrested?”

Melly edged closer to me, her face blanched of color. “Why are you doing this, Thompson? You’ve always
been such a good boy, never given your mother a moment’s worry.”

A trickle of sweat ran down his temple. “I’m tired of being a ‘good boy.’ I’m tired of my life. I saw a chance to change things, but you had to come along and ruin everything.”

“M-me?” Melly stammered. “What did I ever do to you?”

“I designed a software modification of my own, superior to yours in every way”—he swiped at the sweat—“but
while I was tweaking it, working out the bugs, you submitted your version. Can’t prove it, but I think you even stole my ideas.”

Melly’s hand fluttered to her chest. “Thompson, I’d never steal from you. You know me better than that.”

All this chitchat was enlightening; however, it wasn’t removing the gun from his hand. I looked around frantically, searching for a weapon. I had knives, of course—didn’t
every cook?—but Thompson stood close to the knife drawer. I had household chemicals I could throw in his face, but I’d first have to wrestle off the childproof, tamperproof screw tops.

Stall, stall. Think, think.

“Why did you kill Chip?” Not exactly brilliant repartee, but at least I’d die with my curiosity satisfied.

“I invited him to visit my workroom at the back of the hardware store. I
wanted, practically pleaded with him, to reconsider my proposal. I was willing to accept a fraction of what he’d offered Melly.” Thompson nervously licked his lips. “Once there, I offered him a drink of an expensive scotch I’d bought especially for the occasion. He drank my scotch, then laughed in my face. Said I must be crazy if I thought my product compared to Melly’s. He humiliated me. I was furious!”

My cell phone was in my purse, which I’d carelessly tossed on the kitchen table. Did I have time to make a dive for it? How good a shot was Thompson, anyway? Everyone in town knew he had a concealed carry permit and kept a loaded .38 under the counter to thwart robbers, but how often did he visit the gun range? Was shooting a skill you had to practice to maintain? Or was it more like riding a
bike—once learned, you never forgot? If I lived through this, I’d ask McBride.

“And then what did you do?” I asked Thompson, barely able to form the words. My mouth felt drier than the Sahara during a drought.

“I remembered a scene from my all-time favorite movie,
The Wedding Crashers,
where this guy put eyedrops in another guy’s drink to give him diarrhea. Payback time. A joke. The long hours
staring at a computer screen gives me eyestrain. I always keep Visine near my computer. When Balboa wasn’t looking, I gave the bottle a good squeeze—right into his scotch. Nothing happened at first, so I assumed the trick wasn’t working.”

“How did Chip wind up dead in my basement?” Melly inched closer to me still and clutched my arm.

Thompson gestured with his gun hand. “Balboa told me he was
meeting you, so I followed. I watched the two of you through the kitchen window. When you went upstairs, I thought, what the heck, one last pitch. He refused to listen. Complained about feeling dizzy. Said if I didn’t leave, he’d call the police. He got up—guess he thought fresh air might help—but he opened the door to the basement by mistake. He’d made me so angry by this time, I shoved him hard
as I could.”

“And Melly would have gone to prison for a crime she didn’t commit.”

“My software program was my ticket out of here. I spent years of my life working on it only to discover that I’d wasted my time. With the money I’d earn from my software, I thought I’d go to an island in the Caribbean, maybe buy a boat.”