A Crafty Killing

Table of Contents

 

 

A VEILED THREAT?

“I already own ten percent of Artisans Alley. Legally, I’m the only one who can make any decisions about the business. When probate is completed, I’ll own fifty-five percent of Artisans Alley. It’s unfortunate for you, Mr. Hilton, but the person with the biggest portion of the pie gets to call the shots.”

Gerald Hilton said nothing, but his eyes bulged, his temper smoldering.

He paced the short distance to the door and back. “It would seem we’ve come to an impasse. There has to be a compromise.”

Katie didn’t bat an eye. “I don’t think so.”

“You’re being unreasonable.”

“I’m sure you heard what I told the artists. I don’t intend to run Artisans Alley as your uncle did. I don’t consider it a hobby. You may be right. McKinlay Mill could be on the verge of an economic explosion. And if it is, Artisans Alley can be a large part of the draw. The future of Victoria Square depends in part on its survival, and so do the livelihoods of a lot of other people in the village.”

“I’m not interested in other people,” Hilton declared.

“Why am I not surprised?”

Hilton’s eyes narrowed. “You’ll change your mind, Ms. Bonner. I guarantee it.”

Katie straightened to her full height. “Not in this lifetime.”

“You said it,” Hilton grated. “I didn’t.”

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This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental. The publisher does not have any control over and does not assume any responsibility for author or third-party websites or their content.

 

A CRAFTY KILLING

 

A Berkley Prime Crime Book / published by arrangement with the author

 

PRINTING HISTORY

Berkley Prime Crime mass-market edition / February 2011

 

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Tales of Victoria Square have been with me for a long time, and I’m so glad that I’m finally getting a chance to share them with readers.

I’d like to thank my critique partners, and all-around cheerleaders, Gwen Nelson and Liz Eng. I also got reader input from my Guppy Sisters in Crime Sandra Parshall, Nan Higginson, Marilyn Levinson, and Jan Fudala, as well as Kat Henry Doran, and members of the 13th Precinct Writers.

Thanks, too, to my editor, Tom Colgan; his former assistant, Niti Bagchi; and all the terrific people at Berkley Prime Crime; and to my wonderful agent, Jessica Faust.

I hope you’ll visit my website and sign up for my periodic newsletter at
www.LorraineBartlett.com
.

Ezra Hilton lay sprawled at the bottom step of the staircase, facedown in a puddle of his own congealed blood. He’d probably broken his long, proud nose when he hit Artisans Alley’s carpet-covered concrete floor, Katie Bonner decided. She wondered if McKinlay Mill’s funeral director could make Ezra look presentable for a viewing.

Katie took a ragged breath and cursed her practicality. But that would be what Ezra would have wanted. At least, that’s what she
thought
he would have wanted.

“Are you okay, ma’ am?” asked the lanky, uniformed deputy, Schuler by the name tag on his breast pocket.

“No. But I guess that’s to be expected. Mr. Hilton was my husband’s business partner. My business partner now, I guess. My husband died in a car accident last winter,” she explained unnecessarily. She didn’t add that they’d been separated at the time. It was still too painful to revisit those memories.

After putting two fingers through the left leg of her panty hose that morning, Katie knew it was going to be one of those days. She’d had no idea it was going to be
this
bad. Not that the death of a seventy-five-year-old man should have come as a shock. But Ezra had been such a lively old coot. And dying so soon after Chad ...

“Did Mr. Hilton have any enemies?” the deputy asked.

“Enemies?” Katie repeated. “Ezra? Of course not.”

The deputy looked toward the cash desks at the front of the store. “The cash register’s empty. The drawer was open when we got here. Do you know how much would’ve been in the till?”

Katie blinked, open-mouthed. “No. We could run the total, though—”

The deputy caught her by the arm before she could move more than a foot in that direction. “We’ll wait for the tech team to dust for prints.”

“Oh, of course.” Then it dawned on her just what the deputy was saying. “You can’t think that someone”—she had to swallow before voicing the impossible—“that someone killed him?”

Schuler looked back down at the dead man. “Looks like blunt trauma to the back of the head,” he said without emotion. “The ME will have to determine the time of death.”

Katie looked down at the still form on the floor and the rusty patch of dried blood staining the snowy hair on the back of Ezra’s head. Tears stung her eyes and a lump rose in her throat. “Robbery?” she ventured.

“Most likely,” the deputy agreed.

Katie had to take a shaky breath before she could speak again. “Thursdays are typically slow in this business.” Not that she knew from personal experience. Her late husband had told her that on more than one occasion. “There couldn’t have been more than a couple hundred dollars in the drawer.”

“People have been murdered for a lot less,” Schuler said.

“The side door was unlocked. Could someone have had an appointment with Mr. Hilton after hours?”

“I don’t know. I have a regular job. I’m not part of the day-to-day routine here at Artisans Alley. I was on my way to work when I saw the patrol cars in the lot and figured I should stop in to see what was up.”

Schuler nodded. “Is there any chance Mr. Hilton kept an appointment calendar?”

“I could look,” Katie said and took a step to her left, in the direction of Ezra’s office.

Again Schuler held her back. “We’ll wait until our chief investigator gets here.”

Katie’s gaze returned to the still figure on the floor. Ezra dying peacefully in his sleep wouldn’t have been a shock, but murder? Katie searched the pockets of her suit jacket, found a balled-up tissue, and wiped her nose.

She wasn’t the only one who needed a hanky. A woman older than she sat on a Victorian horsehair sofa in the dreary cluttered booth across the way, wiping away tears as she answered another uniformed deputy’s questions.

“Did she find him?” Katie asked, with a nod in the stranger’s direction.

Schuler nodded. “Do you know her?”

Katie shook her head.

“Her name is Mary Elliott. She says she’s the co-owner of the tea shop across the Square.”

Though her face was twisted with grief, the woman conveyed an aura of mature elegance that her pastel blue jogging suit couldn’t disguise. The shoulder-length blond hair in a loose ponytail at her neck accentuated the firm lines of her neck and chin. She had to be at least twenty years older than Katie’s thirty, but she carried it well. Two spilled cups of take-out coffee stained the rug near Artisans Alley’s side door. The woman must have dropped them upon finding the body.

Embarrassed to witness the other woman’s flood of emotion, Katie brushed a piece of fuzz from her drab gray wool skirt, the pleated one that always made her feel pudgy, and studied the toes of her scruffy sneakers. She’d change out of them once—if—she ever made it to work.

Shouldn’t she be crying, too? Ezra was her business partner, for God’s sake. But she couldn’t break down. At least not yet. She’d shed far too many tears in the last year. Instead, Katie rummaged through her purse for a peppermint. She unwrapped it, popped it into her mouth, and immediately scrunched it, the sharp, sweet flavor instantly delivering what was, to her, comfort. She tucked the wrapper into her pocket.

Outside, a car door slammed. A man appeared in the open doorway, carrying what looked like a big green tackle box. He had to be the medical examiner, Katie realized, who was closely followed by a plainclothes cop, his badge pinned to the lapel of his raincoat. Was that a lab team and a crime photographer behind them?

“Do you need me?” Katie asked Schuler, glancing down at Ezra’s polished Florsheims. “I’ll need to make some calls in the office. And I’ll look for Ezra’s calendar, too.”

“Oh, no,” the deputy warned. “You’ll have to make your calls from another phone. This entire building is now considered a crime scene. We don’t know if anything else was taken.”

“Okay. I’ll be in my car—the blue Ford Focus in the lot.”

Again Schuler nodded, and left her to confer with the other police personnel.

Katie turned, hugging herself against the morning chill as she headed back to her little sedan. She really should call her boss, Josh, first, but decided against it; she wasn’t up to an argument. Why couldn’t he have gone to Syracuse on business today and not yesterday?

Katie settled herself behind the car’s steering wheel, grabbed the small address book from her purse, and hunted for attorney Seth Landers’s name. As McKinlay Mill’s only lawyer, Seth knew just about everyone in the village. He’d handled the legalities when Chad bought into Artisans Alley, and he’d advised Katie after Chad’s death. Katie and Chad hadn’t filed any paperwork on their separation. Maybe she’d been in denial, hoping they’d reconcile. It hadn’t mattered in the long run.