Murder, Handcrafted (Amish Quilt Shop Mystery) (12 page)

“You don’t need to apologize, Jonah.” I stared through the windshield. Miriam still made no move to approach the car. “I wish Miriam could see that I’m trying to help too. When I showed up, I wasn’t sure if she was more upset by seeing Petunia or me.”

“It’s probably a tie. She likes you both just about the same.” The light teasing sound that was so familiar was back in his voice. He opened the car door, said good night, and walked toward the house. Before he reached her, Miriam turned her back on him and stormed inside.

Even from where I was in my car, I could see Jonah’s shoulders fall dejectedly. My heart ached for my friend, but this time I knew better than to fix this situation. In the case of Jonah and Miriam’s marriage, the only way I made any difference was by making it worse.

As I drove back to Running Stitch, I blew out a breath that I hadn’t realized I had been holding. I knew in my heart that Jonah and I would survive this. Someday soon, things would go back to the way they were. I just had to solve a murder to make sure that they did, and the sooner, the better.

B
ack on Sugartree Street, I parked my SUV in the diagonal parking space in front of Running Stitch and next to Anna’s buggy and her horse, Maggie. As I turned off the ignition, in my rearview mirror I saw a large man lumber out of the Dutchman’s Tea Shop. Willow had an eclectic crowd who partook of her tea concoctions at the shop, but I had never seen this man before. I wouldn’t have thought anything of it if I hadn’t gotten a good view of his T-shirt, which read,
BIGFOOT
IS
REAL
.

I groaned. Apparently, Willow hadn’t taken the posting on the message board down fast enough. I knew all along that it had been wishful thinking on my part that she had gotten it down in time. Nothing posted online really goes away.

I took a deep breath, debating if I should approach him. Maybe he could tell me if there were any others like him in the county.

Before I could make my decision, Anna threw open
the front door to Running Stitch and frantically waved for me to come inside.

Oliver and I headed for the shop. As I expected, all the members of my quilting circle—Anna, Rachel, Sarah, and Mattie—had beat me there. The quilt frame with the large red, yellow, and white Goosefoot quilt stretched across it was pulled into the middle of the room and, except for Anna, the other members of my quilting circle sat around it, each in their usual spots. The quilting for the night was already well under way.

Anna closed the door after me and locked it. “I told them that you went to the sheriff’s department to find out what was going on with Jonah, so you might be late. What did you learn? How’s Jonah? Where is he?” Anna asked her questions in rapid succession, which was out of character for her. Typically, she was much calmer and more thoughtful when she spoke. Then again, this was the first time her son was a prime suspect for murder.

I slung my hobo bag on the sales counter. “Jonah is back home. I was only at the sheriff’s department for a few minutes before Mitchell had finished questioning him and Jonah was free to go.”

Anna let out a sigh. “That means the sheriff doesn’t think Jonah is a suspect.”

I gave her a sympathetic look. “I wouldn’t say that. I know Mitchell, and I know that he doesn’t believe that Jonah could have killed Griffin Bright. At the same time, he won’t completely rule Jonah out as a suspect
until he has the proof to back it up. I’m sure when he does, he happily will.”

Anna frowned, and the wrinkles that I had never noticed before deepened around her mouth.

“Angie,” Sarah said. “There’s a plate of food for you there on the cutting table.”

As soon as she spoke, my nose caught a whiff of a lovely scent that made my stomach grumble. It must have had the same effect on Oliver because he waddled over to the cutting table and braced his paws on one of the table’s legs.

I clapped my hands. “Down, Oliver.”

He gave me a forlorn expression that would have put Oliver Twist, the orphan he’d been named for, to shame.

Sarah chuckled and took up her needle again. “I figured that you hadn’t eaten much of anything today with the Double Dime Diner closed.”

I removed the aluminum foil from the top of the plate. It was still warm. The heavenly smell of roasted chicken and mashed potatoes with gravy washed over me. It took everything I had to stop myself from devouring it on the spot.

Thankfully, I remembered my manners in time and carried the plate over to the quilting circle. As I took my seat, taking care to keep my plate far back from the beautiful quilt that we had been hand quilting for an English client. Anna settled in her seat and began to thread a needle.

I set a napkin on the floor and placed a piece of chicken on it for Oliver. I knew that he had had bacon
at Linda’s trailer, but it had been a very long day and he deserved a snack.

I dug my fork into the potatoes. They literally melted in my mouth.

“Angie,” Rachel said. “How can we prove to the sheriff that Jonah had nothing to do with the murder?”

I swallowed. “If he had an alibi, that would work,” I said. “Griffin died sometime between five and six this morning.” I glanced at Anna. “Can anyone at home vouch for Jonah being home at that time?”

Anna frowned. “I cannot. I saw him leave the farm in the wagon at four this morning.”

“At four?” I blinked at her over my piece of chicken. “What was he doing leaving the farm at four? He couldn’t have planned to work on my parents’ kitchen at that hour.”

She buried her quilter’s knot deep into the center of the quilt where it would never be seen. I had seen her do this hundreds of times, and every time I wondered how she did it so effortlessly and without even looking at the quilt as she concealed the knot. Anna pursed her lips. “I don’t know.”

“Does Jonah usually leave the farm at that time?” Sarah asked, leaning toward Anna. “Does he have some work to do that he had to leave so early for it?”

Anna stared down at the quilt for a moment as if taking the time to consider her answer.
“Nee,”
she said finally. “I wake up every morning at a quarter to four. I could sleep in as late as I wanted to, but I just can’t seem to do it after all those years being married to a farmer. I had to get up with Jonah’s father every day.
By four, I’m up and in my kitchen making my coffee.” She paused. “I have never seen Jonah leave the farm at that time,” Anna added.

I lowered my fork. That wasn’t the answer that I had wanted to hear. Clearly, I needed to have a conversation with Jonah about why he was leaving his farm so early in the morning and where he might have gone. I supposed it was possible that he’d gone to work at my parents’ house, but I had trouble believing that.

“Do you have suspects, Angie?” Sarah asked, shaking me from my dark thoughts.

I scooped up another forkful of mashed potatoes and held it while I answered. “Actually, I do. That’s what I have been doing ever since I left my parents’ house this morning. I have a few good ones.” I went on to tell them about my visit with Linda from the Double Dime Diner and Liam from the mercantile. “So just from today’s search we have three viable suspects: the brother, Blane Bright, and the rival electrician who lost the mercantile job, Rex Flagg, and the angry fiancée.”

Rachel made six tiny stitches on her portion of the quilt before pulling the needle through. “Could Liam Coblentz have something to do with it? I do not know him.”

I understood Rachel’s need to blame an outsider, any outsider, to Rolling Brook. I took care not to look at Mattie when Liam Coblentz’s name was mentioned. “I don’t see what motive he might have.”

“But he is still a suspect,” Rachel persisted. “Just like Jonah is. We have to believe, like the sheriff does, that everyone is a suspect until proven otherwise, don’t we?”

I could feel Mattie stiffen next to me in her seat.

“Angie?” Mattie asked. Her voice was strained, but I could tell she was doing her best to mask it. “Who was that man walking outside back and forth in front of the Dutchman’s Tea Shop when you first arrived?”

Rachel nodded, unwittingly, taking the bait to change the subject. “He was outside of the bakery when I was locking up before coming over here. He asked me if I had seen
him
, but I had no idea who
him
was. I didn’t answer and ran over here as quick as I could.”

I covered my face with my hands. “I think
him
is Bigfoot.”

The women stared at me as if I had just told them that the “him” was a Martian.

I went on to tell them about the supposed Bigfoot sighting that morning, and Willow’s ill-placed post on the Internet about it. When I lowered my hand, I found all four of them were staring at me open-mouthed.

Sarah sat back from the quilt frame. “Why, I’ve never heard of such a thing.”

“The Amish don’t share silly stories about make-believe creatures like that,” Anna said with a shake of her head. “I will never fully understand
Englischers
.”

I forced cheerfulness into my voice. “The man might have been the only one to see the message online. I’m sure he’ll leave in a day or so when he discovers there is nothing like that lurking in the woods of Holmes County.”

“Of course there’s not,” Rachel said with a slight quaver to her voice.

The tone of her voice made me wonder if she was
thinking about her father, Nahum, who lived in the forest. Was she worried the wild man that Jonah and I saw was actually Nahum, like I first thought? Or was she worried that her father might be in danger because there was a Sasquatch loose in the woods?

Sarah adjusted her glasses on the bridge of her thin nose. “What is your next move, Angie?”

“Tomorrow, I plan to talk to Blane and Rex, so that’s a start. I also want to see if there are any other viable suspects. The more we have, the better it is for Jonah.”

Anna rested her hand on the edge of the quilting frame. “How can we help?”

“I might need help covering the shop while I investigate,” I said.

Sarah’s eyes flitted in Mattie’s direction. “We’re all willing to pitch in, Angie, and mind the shop, but won’t Mattie be here to do that?”

Rachel’s forehead furrowed ever so slightly, and I knew she must be remembering our conversation that morning when I had almost told her that Mattie hadn’t been working in the shop that day. To my relief, she didn’t say anything, but that didn’t mean it wouldn’t come up later.

I opened my mouth to say something, but Mattie cut me off. Maybe she had seen Rachel’s expression too. “You don’t have to worry about the shop, Angie,” Mattie said. “I’ll be here every day just as I have been since the day that you hired me.”

Sarah cocked her head and gave Mattie a quizzical look. The curious Amish woman was picking up the clues that something was up with Mattie.

I gave Oliver one final piece of chicken and finished my plate of food, not leaving a scrap behind. “Thank you for dinner, Sarah. And thank you all for coming out tonight to talk all of this over, but I think it’s best that we call it a night. You need to be with your families, and I need to get to my parents’ house. I’ll be spending the night there.”

“Whatever for?” Sarah asked.

“To keep an eye on my father and help my mother,” I said.

“And to snoop,” Anna said as she jabbed her needle into her apple-shaped pincushion.

I sighed. Was I really that obvious? “Maybe a little.”

The women chuckled and began packing up their needles and thread to leave. I was happy the tense meeting was ending on an amusing note for them.

Mattie stood. “Angie, don’t forget that we have our quilting class tomorrow at nine in the morning.”

I rubbed my forehead. As usual, I had forgotten the class. Again, I wondered how I would be able to operate Running Stitch without Mattie there to remind me about everything that the shop had going on, which actually was quite a bit for such a small business. Our quilting classes were popular. We upped our offerings to three times per week and even had a waiting list for the Saturday class, which was the most popular day of the week for our classes. Next door, Authentic Amish Quilts also offered quilting classes, but from what I heard, they weren’t half as popular as those offered at Running Stitch. A tiny part of me reveled in that knowledge.

“We’re making the quilted pot holders,” Mattie said as if to jar my memory.

I smiled as I got up from my chair. “That’s right. I love that pattern you came up with, and the ladies of the class will too,” I said as if I hadn’t forgotten.

At the door, I said good-bye to the ladies and watched them ride away in their buggies. Oliver and I went back inside to make sure the shop was secure for the night. It was well after dark by the time I closed and locked Running Stitch’s front door. I was just turning the key in the lock when a man’s voice said behind me. “Nice night for a walk.”

I jumped and dropped my keys on the sidewalk.

M
itchell scooped my keys up off the sidewalk and balanced them in his palm. “Angie, are you all right? Did I scare you?”

I placed a hand over my heart. “Yes, you scared me. You can’t come up to people like that!”

“I’m sorry,” he said, sounding as if he meant it. “I would never set out to frighten you, especially after the day you’ve had.”

In the gas-lit street outside of my quilt shop, I could see Mitchell clearly. His face was a mask of concern. He held a leash in his hand. His precocious Boston terrier, Tux, was at the end of that leash. Oliver and Tux were the best of friends and the two small dogs touched their pushed-in noses and sniffed each other.

“What are you doing here?” I asked. “How did you know I’d be here?”

“I’m a good investigator.” He grinned. “I swung by your house and when you weren’t there, Tux and I decided to stop by here and see if we could catch you.”

“You could have just called,” I said.

His face softened and he leaned forward, kissing me. When he stepped back he said, “I can’t do that over the phone.”

I intertwined my fingers with his. “I guess not.”

He grinned. “And I wanted to see you, to make sure we were okay. You looked pretty mad at me when you were at the station earlier this evening.”

I looked up at him. “You’d taken one of my best friends to the sheriff’s department for questioning,” I said. “I think that is more than enough reason to be irritated with you.”

“I was willing to talk to Jonah at his home, but he wanted to discuss the case at the station.”

“I know,” I said. “Jonah told me that. Stop staring at me with those beautiful blue-green eyes of yours. I can never stay mad at you when you look at me like that.”

He grinned. “I know.”

“Where’s Zander?” I asked, glancing up and down the street for Mitchell’s nine-year-old son.

“He’s with Hillary tonight,” he said. “She and I both agreed it would be best if Zander stayed with her as long as the homicide investigation is going on. My hours will be erratic for the next few days.”

I straightened the strap of my hobo bag on my shoulder. “Only for the next few days? You think the case will be wrapped up that soon?”

He sighed. “Nice try, Angie.” It was amazing that he could express so much frustration in one utterance of my name.

I held up my free hand. The other was still holding Mitchell’s. Despite my annoyance at him, I couldn’t
make myself pull it from his light grasp. “I get it. You can’t tell me.”

“But you can tell me what you’ve learned,” he said.

I frowned, but rather than argue, I quickly related everything that I had learned that day with the exception of finding Mattie with the mercantile owner and the fact that Jonah had considered in his youth to leave the Amish church for me. He wasn’t the only one who could hold back information. In my case, my reserve was to protect my friends’ feelings. For Mitchell, it was all business.

“I know all that,” he said.

“Why don’t you just rub it in,” I said irritably, finally pulling my hand away from him.

“I didn’t mean to.” He ran his hand through his salt-and-pepper hair. “I’m only trying to make a point that I don’t need your help to solve this case.”

“I have to help Jonah.”

“I can’t argue with you when you dig your heels in like this.” He loosened his grasp on Tux’s leash. “Are you still going to be at your parents’ tonight?”

“Yep,” I said, trying to sound as innocent as possible. I didn’t want to give Mitchell any ideas as to what my plans were for that night. At the same time, he knew who he was talking to.

“Angie.” There was a lot of weight in the way that Mitchell could say my name at times.

“Mitchell, don’t worry.” I smiled brightly.

He groaned. “Of course I worry.

“There’s something else that I need to talk to you about,” Mitchell began.

“Does it have to do with the murder?” I asked.

“No,” he said slowly.

I yawned. “Is it pressing?”

“No.” He studied my face.

“Then can it wait until morning? I’m exhausted. I’m not used to getting up so early, and I have been on the run all day long.”

“You know, in all the time that it took you to ask all those questions, I could have told you what I needed to say, but I think you need all your working faculties to have this conversation. It’s best if I wait.”

I nodded automatically. “I should head over to my parents’ house before I keel over. I know if I check my phone I will have about fifteen hundred messages from my mother asking me where I am, and I need to swing by my house to pick up my overnight bag and Dodger.”

“You’re taking Dodger to your parents’ house?” His voice held an air of disbelief.

“He’s been home alone all day. I can’t leave him alone all night. First of all, Oliver would miss him.”

My Frenchie made a snuffling sound as if in agreement.

“And second of all, he’ll tear my house to shreds.”

“So you are going to let him tear your mother’s house to shreds instead?” He shook his head. “I wouldn’t want to be you tomorrow morning when your mother finds her favorite throw pillow in pieces.”

I grimaced because throw pillow destruction was a distinct possibility where Dodger was concerned.

He leaned forward and kissed me again. “I wish I could come over to your parents’ house and stay with
you. That’s really the only way to keep you out of trouble.”

I frowned. “Mitchell, that would never work.”

“I know. I love you, but unfortunately, I can’t trust you when it comes to situations like this.” His face broke into a smile. “So I have Deputy Anderson parked in front of your parents’ house keeping an eye on the crime scene and you.”

I scowled. “You don’t trust me?”

“Nope.” The smile widened.

I was about to argue the point when he stopped me with another kiss, one that was much more satisfactory this time around and woke me right up.

After Mitchell and I finally said good-bye, I did exactly what I had told him that I would do. I swung the SUV by my house, threw together an overnight bag, picked up Dodger, and headed to my parents’ house.

Sadly, when my SUV crested the hill and their large stone home came into view, I knew I wasn’t going to bed anytime soon.