Diane Greenwood Muir - Bellingwood 06 - A Season of Change (28 page)

Lori stared back, her look venomous. “You have no idea what you’re talking about.”

“I’m not too far off, though, am I? You’ve destroyed your son’s childhood. You killed his father and managed to get yourself caught stealing Bruce’s work.”

“I have every right to that wine. I was the one who sacrificed everything so Bruce could work all of those hours. I didn’t say anything when he came home late at night and went back early the next day. He got to spend time with Seth after I’d done everything to make that boy happy. He played with Seth while I made sure his diapers were changed and cleaned up his messes. He owed me.”

“So, you did kill him?”
             

“I’m not sorry he’s gone.”

“It had to be you, but if it wasn’t, who then? If you were stealing wine out of the building every night, you had to have known when it happened.”

Lori looked down and took a deep breath. “You’re so quick to accuse me, but have you looked at the blonde bitch and her boyfriend?”

“Annalise? She killed him?”             

“I’m not saying who did.”

“Simon isn’t her brother?”

“Hell no.”

“How do you know that?”

“Because, you stupid twit, I’m her sister.”

“What?” Polly was completely shocked. “How has no one known this? You don’t look at all alike.”

“Our dads are different people.”

Polly shook her head, trying to comprehend how long they’d kept this information from everyone they knew.

“Patrick didn’t know?” she asked.

It was as if a switch had been flipped in Lori’s face. She lost most of her defiance and became resigned to the fact that it was all over and began speaking, but more quietly this time.

“He saw her and became totally infatuated, so I broke up with him. One of us was getting our hands on him. If it wasn’t going to be me, then it was Annalise. When he started talking about building a winery, we saw all of the money from the gaming company fly out of our hands, so I knew we had to get to Iowa and figure out how to stay close to it. I found Bruce and got him involved so we’d be part of it.” She looked at Polly. “Do you know how long I waited? There wasn’t going to be any damned payout. The only way to get out of this with anything was to steal the wine and re-sell it. It won’t be much, but at least I won’t have to wait any longer.”

“But you had a son with him and that little boy needed you? How could you do that?”

“Sometimes things just happen. It’s not Seth’s fault.”

“Who is Barry then?”

“An old friend.” Lori glanced backward. Barry was still sitting on the tailgate of the truck.

“Were you two in love?” Polly asked.

“Once upon a time. But he understood that I had to move on.”

“Did he kill Bruce?”

Lori creased her brow. “I’m not saying anything.”

“What about Simon?”

“Oh, he’s a completely self-involved jackass. Just like his pretty little girlfriend.”

“Annalise?”

“Yeah. They’ve been a thing since forever. The only way she could keep him around all the time was to say he was her brother.”

“One more question,” Polly said. “Why now? What happened to make you steal all of this now?”

“Barry came up every once in a while and we’d
take a few cases of wine out. He sold them in Missouri to a small winery for extra money. After Bruce died, I knew we needed to move quickly. One of these days they’d change all the locks on the door and I would have no more access. We took car loads out every night.” She shrugged. “After he left today, I was going to wait a couple of weeks and then pack up and move out. No one would question it. I couldn’t stay in town any longer since I had to move on and find a job. I was going to meet up with him in Missouri and start over.”

“How is Annalise involved in this?” Polly asked.

“She and Simon caught us hauling the rest of it out last night. I told her that if she wanted to stay out of trouble, she’d better keep quiet.”

“Did she know what happened to Bruce?”

Lori didn’t respond, just shrugged her shoulders.

“Was she involved in his death?”

The woman put her head down and shook it in the negative. “No,” she said. “Just let her go. Her only fault is that she’s an idiot.” Lori looked up at Polly. “I have no reason to expect your help, but if I give you a couple of phone numbers, will you call Bruce’s parents and have them come get Seth?”

“I thought you said they didn’t like him.”

“I know. I lied. They adore him. I know I might never get him back, but they should come take their grandson home for now.”

“Where’s he at?”

“He’s with a neighbor girl.”

“He can’t stay with her.”

“I know,” Lori said. “Could you?”

“Oh, for Pete’s sake, yes.” Polly pulled out her phone and opened the note program. “Give me the numbers. Lydia will help with Seth and we’ll take care of him until they get here.”

Lori gave her names and phone numbers and Polly stepped back in time to see a sheriff’s vehicle come into the parking lot.

He pulled in behind Henry and got out, looked at Polly and said, “I’m guessing you’re Polly Giller. Am I right? We know all about you.”

“That’s me.” Polly said. She pointed at the truck. “That’s the stolen wine and I’m guessing that these two are responsible for Bruce Victor’s death.”

Barry Manush didn’t say anything, just set his jaw and glared at her.

“So you think you’ve solved this?” the deputy asked.

“No, I don’t think I have. But at least I have some more answers and won’t have to bother your boss any longer.” She grinned at him. “What’s your name?”

“Will Kellar. Have they admitted everything to you?”

“No, but I could keep asking questions if you’d like.” Polly laughed, then said, “I’m not going to hear the end of this from you guys, am I?”

“No ma’am. That’s why you have your own special file at the office. Sheriff Merritt keeps saying you should hang out another shingle and start a body retrieval and investigation business.”

Henry stepped in and put his arm around Polly’s waist. “Don’t you dare give her any ideas, young man. She’ll find a way to make them happen. Are you done here, Polly?”

“Am I finished, Deputy Will?” she asked.

“As far as I’m concerned, if you promise to call the Sheriff, you’re done here.”

“It was nice meeting you today.” Polly put her hand out and shook his. “Stop in for coffee anytime you’re in Bellingwood.”

He tipped his hat at her and said, “Yes, ma’am.”

Two more vehicles came in and waited for Henry to pull out. He took a deep breath as he drove back through the parking lot and said, “The death of me. You’re going to be the death of me.”

“I hope so, in about seventy or eighty years. Now, I want McDonalds,” Polly said to Henry. “I’m starving.”

“Of course you are. Any good investigator needs food after solving the case.”

CHAPTER
TWENTY-EIGHT

“You can’t be mad at me,” Polly said to Aaron when he answered his phone. “I knew it was going to be okay.”

“Will tells me you cornered our suspects,” he said. “Polly, you can’t do things like this. You are going to give me a heart attack.”

“Aaron, I knew that wine was in the U-Haul and I had Henry there to take care of me. If they were the killers and I think they are, no one used a gun. It’s not like they were going to shoot me in the middle of the day in Boone, Iowa.” She heard Henry take in a quick breath and ignored him.

“You can’t know those things,” Aaron said. “Why do you think that we have trained law enforcement? It’s to keep people safe. You have to stop threatening my poor heart!”

“I’ll try,” she said. “I’ll really try. But now I need your wife’s help. Lori asked me to contact Bruce’s parents about coming to Iowa to get Seth. She gave me the number and said he’s with a neighbor girl right now. She was coming back to Bellingwood to get him and thought her boyfriend would be long gone.”

“Lydia and I will go over and get the child. I might as well keep some part of this investigation on a professional level.”

“I’m sorry,” Polly said, though she didn’t really feel apologetic. “I just couldn’t stop myself. I had to know what was going on.”

“You aren’t telling me anything new. Have you figured out who killed Bruce Victor for me, too?”

“Barry Manush was involved. He didn’t deny it when I asked.”

Aaron groaned loudly. “I’m not putting you on the payroll, Polly.”

“Oh, this is all pro bono,” she said, laughing. “I’m glad to Support My Local Sheriff!” Polly waited for him to get the reference. He didn’t say anything.

“Have you talked to Annalise Stephens?” she asked. “Have you talked to Will? She and Lori Victor are actually sisters and she’s not related to that Simon guy? Lori implied those two were lovers and that they kept up the ruse of being siblings so he could be around her and they could still siphon money from Patrick. And by the way, I think Annalise was there at the winery last night when Lori and Barry took out the last load of wine. That’s probably why her hairpin was there.”

“That’s interesting. I didn’t see that one coming.”

“Neither did I! This is all really twisted and convoluted. Have you been able to find Annalise?”

“Not yet. They aren’t at her home in Ames. I wish I’d known that before today.”

“Well, if they didn’t steal the wine and they didn’t kill Bruce Victor, maybe they’re just two young lovers who got caught up in something they couldn’t control,” she said.

“It’s bad timing.”

“For Patrick. This
will kill him. He was set up from the very beginning. Those two women planned to get his money. No one expected him to reinvest in a winery in the middle of Iowa.”

Polly held the phone away from her ear and said to Henr
y, “Do you know where Patrick lives in Ames?”

He nodded and she said back to Aaron. “We’re going over to his house. I want to make sure he’s okay.”

Henry picked his hands up from the steering wheel and slammed them back down. “No we’re not.”

Aaron chuckled on the other end of the phone call. “Tell Henry that when you’re done in Ames, I want to hear everything you’ve uncovered. Lydia and I will pick Seth up and then I need to get to Boone and deal with the county’s new residents.”

Polly swiped to end the phone call and looked over at Henry. “Please? If Annalise is gone, he’ll need support. And someone is going to have to tell him the truth of what he’s been dealing with. J. J. and Ryan are the last people he’ll want to hear from - it will destroy their relationship. It might as well be someone he respects and if you don’t want to do it, then it should be your wife.”

“I’ve been married to you for less than twenty-four hours and now I have spiking pains shooting through my head,” he said. “Why does this have to be our problem?”

“You heard J. J. They need you. And right now Patrick is in a mess.”

“You are a worse busybody than Lydia, by far.”

Polly patted his hand. “But you love me.”

“I don’t love this. I don’t love this at all.”

“Fine then,” she said. “Go back to Sycamore House. I’ll drop you and Obiwan off and drive to Ames by myself. I’m not going to let him do this alone and I’m fine with you staying in town.”

He glared at her.

“No. Really. I’m not mad at you or anything. I’ll go.”

Henry drove straight through Bellingwood, ignoring the Sycamore House entrance. “I’m going, I’m going. This really is how it’s going to be, isn’t it.”

“See, before we were married, you could just go home and ignore all of my bad behavior. Now you have to know everything.” She gave him an evil grin. “It will always be entertaining.”

“I really do love you, but you’re going to wear me out,” he said. “I think I’m going to be very glad that my business has so many clients. I can’t be part of this every day.”

“The worst thing is,” she said. “I have more confidence when you’re around. I don’t think I’d have cornered Lori Victor if you weren’t there, but I knew I was totally safe, so I just did it.”

“Great. I’m an enabler. Don’t tell Aaron about that, okay?”

Henry drove up to a beautiful home and Polly was surprised to see Patrick sitting on the front steps, his head in his hands. He was dressed in sweats and running shoes. “You go,” she said to Henry. “I’ll be right behind you.”

Henry
scowled at her, then opened his door and called out, “Hey, Patrick. What are you doing out here?”

The young man looked up at the two of them, streaks of tears still evident on his cheeks. “I don’t want to talk about it,” he said.

“That’s what they all say, but truth is, you want to get it out there.” Henry sat down on the steps beside him.

“She’s gone,” Patrick moaned. “She took everything.”

“What do you mean?”

Patrick handed Henry a piece of paper. He read it and handed it up to Polly.

This isn’t going to work. Simon and I are leaving. I’m selling the house. Don’t look for me, you’ll never find me. And by the way, you’re a fool. No one loves you. Lori and I played your ass. I put up with your whiny behavior long enough. It’s never going to get better. You’re never going to be successful in this dirthole of a state. I hate it here, I hate your friends, I hate the winery, and I hate everything about you. When you sign the divorce papers, you can get your things out of the house. Everything else is mine and is going up for auction. If that’s all the money I can get from you, it will be enough for me to get out from under you and your awful life.

“Wow,” Polly said. “She can sell the house?”

“We had a pre-nup, but I paid cash for the place and she said that it should be in her name in case anything happened to me. That way the boys couldn’t get their hands on it. It made sense at the time, but I didn’t expect this. I have no place to live and I’m not going to my dad’s home. Maybe J. J. or Ryan …” He dropped his head. “Damn, I don’t want to hear it from them.”

Polly walked away from the two of them and heard Henry speaking quietly to Patrick. She made a call.

“I’m getting ready for a wedding, Polly,” Jeff said when he answered.

“I know. Do we have another room available?”

“I haven’t already done enough for you?”

“Is that a no?”

“Not until Tuesday and that was the room upstairs that you and Henry were going to move into.”

“Right. Okay.”

“Who are you trying to rescue now?”

“I’ll tell you later. Thanks anyway.”

She made one more call and smiled when it was finished, then went back to the two men. “Come on back to Bellingwood with us, Patrick. I just talked to your mom, Henry, and he can stay there until he figures out what’s next.”

Henry started to chuckle. “You are such a busybody! I had no idea it was this bad.”

“Where else were you going to stay?” she asked Patrick.

“I could have gotten a hotel room. I just hadn’t thought the whole thing through yet.”

“Whatever you want. But, Marie is looking forward to having you there for as long as you want to stay. I tried to see if there was room at Sycamore House, but we’re full up, unless you want to stay in the basement.”

“I might as well come with you. The bitch locked me out of the house while I was out taking a run. She must have been waiting for me to leave. I can’t even get inside and get my car keys. I have nothing except my phone. My wallet is in there, too.”

He looked at them in a panic. “My wallet has all of my credit cards and my ID. She could lay waste to me.”

“Let’s get you back to Bill and Marie’s. You can start making phone calls and shut her down,” Henry said. He stood and held a hand out to Patrick. “Welcome back to Iowa. Where we stick our nose in your business so you don’t fall apart by yourself.”

Patrick gave him a weak smile and took the hand, then stood and followed them to the truck. Polly got in the back seat with Obiwan and put her hand on Patrick’s shoulder once he settled.

“I know this is the worst day of your life,” she said. “And I’m sorry.”

“It’s okay. I guess at some level I knew there was something off about her. I loved her so much I didn’t want to think the worst.” He rolled his neck “J. J. and Ryan are never going to let me forget this. I’ve always been the level headed one and J. J. has been the screwup. I really did it on this one. I guess I deserve whatever they hand me.”

“They’re not going to do anything,” Henry said, “and by the way, I’m pretty sure Sheriff Merritt can get you back into your house to get your things. Your office is there, right?”

Patrick nodded.

“She can’t keep you from doing business, no matter what she says. Close your personal accounts now and then ask your partners to help you manage the rest of this. That’s why you are in business together. You’re a team.”

“You’re right,” Patrick said, with confidence. “I’ll get through this.” His shoulders drooped again. “What was I thinking, though? Why was I so stupid?”

Polly let them talk and leaned against Obiwan. Her ears heard the voices, but she quit paying attention to their conversation. Before she knew it, Henry was touching her knee. “We’re home, honey. Patrick is at my house and we’re sitting in our garage.”

“I fell asleep!” she said.

“You fell asleep hard. You missed me stopping at my house
, my call to Aaron and a conversation with Lydia. We’re invited to her house tonight for dinner. I told her we’d be there.”

“She knows something, doesn’t she?” Polly asked.

“I hope not. My butt is on the line as much as yours this time.” He got out of the truck and waited while Polly and Obiwan climbed down and then held the door open to the back hallway. “The kids are going to be upstairs, aren’t they?”

She grimaced, “Probably. If I tell them to be quiet, we might be able to take a nap.”

“But nothing else.”

“No, nothing else, you horn dog.”

“I want to get into that other room as soon as possible. I don’t like this. There is way too much traffic in our bedroom.”

“Let’s go face the hordes.” They went upstairs to the apartment, only to find it completely empty.

“Where is everyone?” Polly asked.

She texted Sylvie,
Where is everyone?

In
a moment, Sylvie texted back,
Jason is at the barn. He’ll be there all day. Andrew and Rebecca are at the library. Joss called and asked if they’d like to help her with some of the younger children. She’s feeding them lunch. They’ll be gone until three and I’ll make them knock on the front door. You’re all alone. Enjoy!

There was a wink emoticon at the end of the message and Polly ran in and jumped on the bed. “No one is here. The place is all ours!”

Henry leered at her. “You have to be kidding me. How did that happen?”

“I think it has something to do with my terrific friends. Jason is at the barn and the kids are at the library until three.” Polly crooked her index finger at him, “Come here, big boy. I have plans for you.”