A Quilt in Time (A Harriet Turman/Loose Threads Mystery) (41 page)

“Thanks for helping them. You could probably tell, they don’t get much attention from either of their parents.”

“No problem,” Harriet said. “I better get my dog food and get moving, I’ve got stitching to do.”

“Want me to bring take-out Chinese by later?”

“Assuming it’s not an attempt to keep me from going to the senior center, yes, I’d like that.” She smiled at him then picked up her purse and left.

Harriet went back home and put her next customer quilt on the long-arm machine, but she was too restless to start stitching on it. Her phone rang, and she hurried to answer it, but it was only Lauren.

“I can only talk a minute. My client is out on a smoke break,” she said. “Did you talk to Joshua?”

“No, but I did hear something interesting from Jo.” She gave Lauren an abbreviated version of her talk with the older woman. “I promised Aiden I’d tell Detective Morse about it. I left her a message but haven’t heard back. I asked Hannah to have Joshua call me, but I haven’t heard anything from him, either.”

“You must be going nuts waiting for something to happen.”

“Indeed, I am. I’m afraid to stitch on my client’s quilt I’m so distracted. I guess I’ll make a few more grandmother’s flower garden blocks for the women’s shelter quilt.”

“Here comes my client. Let me know if anything happens.”

Harriet’s phone rang three more times before Joshua called. Aiden and Aunt Beth called to make sure she wasn’t talking to Joshua or Jo by herself, and Lauren checked to see if she’d left on either mission.

“Fred, you keep an eye on Scooter while I’m in the bathroom,” Harriet told the cat as she filled her upstairs bathtub with warm water infused with lavender-scented bubble bath. “If I can’t get any stitching done, at least I can be relaxed when Aiden gets here.”

She picked him up and set him down in the hallway, closing the door as she came back into the bathroom. She set a thick Ken Follett historical novel on her tub shelf beside her cup of herb tea. She’d just shrugged her jeans past her hips when the phone rang.

“Really?” she said to no one. She pulled her pants back up and made a run for the phone. It quit ringing just as she picked up the receiver. “Arghhh!”

She turned to go back to the bathroom, Fred on her heels, when the phone started ringing again.

“Hello,” she said before the receiver was even up to her ear.

“Harriet,” said a whispery voice.

“Joshua? Is that you? Your voice sounds odd. Are you okay?”

She heard a sharp intake of breath.

“Joshua?”

“I’m here. I’m a little under the weather, that’s all. I must have picked up a bug somewhere.”

“I was hoping to talk to you, but if you aren’t well, it can wait.”

“No, today would be…fine. I sound worse…than I am.”

Harriet heard a muffled gurgling cough, as if he’d turned away from the phone.

“Now’s good…can you come…now?”

“Are you sure? You really sound terrible. Can I call someone to help you?”

Joshua made a gasping noise. Harriet realized it was an attempt to laugh. “Who would that be?” he spat out finally. “I told you…there’s no one.”

“Can I bring you anything?” Harriet asked.

Joshua grunted. “Sure.” He coughed again. “Bring something to drink.”

“What would you like? Juice, soda, mineral water?”

“Harriet…please…come now…I’m at the garden shed.”

“Sure. See you in a few minutes.”

Harriet stroked Fred’s head.

“That was weird.” She picked up the phone again and dialed Lauren’s cell number. She listened to it ring and then go to voicemail.

“Lauren. Joshua called and can see me today. In fact, he was pretty insistent that it be now.”

She tried Detective Morse’s cell phone with the same result. She didn’t leave a message, since she’d left one earlier.

Fred jumped to the arm of the upholstered chair she was sitting on in her TV room. She thought for a moment then dialed Aunt Beth’s cell phone. Her aunt had been planning a long day preparing for the rummage sale. Beth’s phone went to voicemail immediately. Harriet repeated the same message she’d left Lauren, explaining that she was taking advantage of the opportunity to talk to Joshua.

“Besides, he sounds sick. I’m taking him some Seven-Up and crackers. It’ll be my good deed for the day,” she said and pressed the end call button.

“Well, Fred, I tried—you’re my witness. You watch your brother. Show him how to be a good pet.” She rubbed his ears, went back to the bathroom and drained the tub.

From her house, it would have been quicker to go over Miller Hill and drop down to the residential neighborhood Sarah’s parents lived in. Instead, she drove through downtown Foggy Point, stopping at Swan’s market to get Joshua’s soda and crackers before driving on past the dock area and the rocky beach then turning inland. The Pratt property was one of the older homes in the development. It was located at the far side, where the homes backed up on a forested green space.

Twenty minutes after Joshua called, Harriet was easing her car down the gravel driveway, past the main house to a wide parking area. An older Honda sedan with at least three colors of peeling paint sat next to a late-model BMW. She got out and looked around. There were several outbuildings, but only one looked like it could be lived in. It had a cement porch, and the windows had curtains and screens. There was a pot of flowers sitting to the left of the door. This had to be Joshua’s “shed.”

She picked up the paper bag with Joshua’s supplies and went to the door. She raised her hand to knock, but the door swung open before her knuckles reached the wood.

“Run, Harriet,” came a strangled voice from inside.

She whirled, but before she could take a step, someone grabbed her arm roughly and pulled her inside, pushing her onto a sagging purple couch beside Joshua. She looked around wildly. The room was the size of a single-car garage. She was in the sitting/sleeping area. The couch, with a bookcase on one end and a table and lamp on the other, filled this end of the room. An oval kitchen table with mismatched chairs occupied the other end, and to the side of the table, an unpainted door led to what was probably the bathroom. Kitchen counters with a small sink and-two burner stove lined the back wall.

“Hannah? What are you doing?”

“I’m putting an end to a nuisance. Two nuisances, really.”

Joshua leaned into Harriet. His face was gray.

“I’m sorry,” he whispered without looking at her. His eyes were fixed on the gun in Hannah’s hand.

Harriet looked at the shiny revolver and then at Joshua. The appliqué quilt she had seen at Sarah’s cabin was now draped across his lap. An irregular red stain blossomed in the white area between two blocks where it lay on his leg. Her eyes grew wide as she realized the stain was growing.

Hannah waved the gun back and forth between Harriet and Joshua.

“It’s just a flesh wound,” she said. “He wasn’t going to call you, so I had to give him some incentive. Besides, it’s nothing compared to what
you’re
going to do to him.”

Harriet stared at her.

“That’s right,” Hannah continued. “You and Joshua are going to have a shootout. He’s going to go nuts on you, and you’re going to shoot him.”

“I don’t have a gun,” Harriet told her.

“Of course you don’t. You’re too nice to carry a gun. I have one for you. You found it lying on the table here.” She bent and pulled a second gun from a backpack on the floor, keeping her weapon trained on Harriet the whole time. She backed up and set the second gun on the table.

Harriet glanced at Joshua. His breathing was uneven. She turned back to Hannah.

“Why are you doing this?”

“There you go with the questions. That’s exactly why I’m doing this. You are too nosy for your own good. Seth wasn’t
your
brother. How and why he was killed is none of your business. But you couldn’t leave it alone. You wouldn’t leave Sarah alone when she was at the senior center, and then you hid her. And my dad said you’ve been trying to damage his reputation, too. Now you have the residents of the senior center all riled up.”

“You’re not making any sense. I didn’t hide Sarah, and the people at the senior center don’t need my help.”

“I heard them call you today at the clinic. You were going there tonight to hear what they think they know about my dad.”

“Hannah, listen to you. If your dad killed your mother, don’t you want to know that?”

“My dad didn’t kill my mom. She killed herself and dragging it all up again isn’t going to change that. All those old people can do is hurt my dad’s reputation and cause people to not want to come to the senior center.”

“Is that all that matters to you? How the business does? Don’t you even care about your own mother?”

Hannah cocked the revolver she was holding.

“Don’t you presume to tell me how to feel about my mother. You don’t know anything about it.”

Harriet felt Joshua stiffen where his good leg was touching her.

“How can you keep defending that monster?” he rasped at Hannah. “He beat our mother, he beat Sarah, and you know what he did to you. Even if our mother did kill herself, it was because of him. Her life was so miserable. Are you hearing me?”

Hannah sighed. “I’m way beyond caring about anyone but me. Everyone in this family is screwed up. I’m a survivor. You never learned that lesson, big brother—or I should say big half-brother.

“If Howard had been your real dad, you’d understand. We Pratts are practical. You do what you need to do to stay on top. Right now, what I need to do is clean up my mess. Dad said if I clean up my mess, I can go to veterinary school, and he’ll hire a pharmacist.

“Don’t you see, Josh? If you had been a little more respectful, he probably would have let you be his drug guy.”

Harriet looked at Joshua.

“What’s she talking about? What mess is she cleaning up?”

He shuddered.

“Haven’t you figured it out? It took me a while, but I finally got there.” He took a deep breath. “I couldn’t understand why anyone would kill Seth. Howard needed him to keep his drug-cutting scam going, and he needed Seth to date Sarah to keep her in line until he could make his move to take the center from her, though I admit I didn’t realize the lengths to which he would go.

“When Hannah told me Howard was making her go to pharmacy school, it became clear. He didn’t kill Seth or have anyone else do it. Why would he? So, who
would
kill Seth? Sarah had motive, but she was too in love with him so, no one.” He stopped talking and took a series of shallow breaths.

“We’ve all been looking at the wrong victim,” Harriet said. “Seth wasn’t the intended victim. It was Sarah. With Sarah gone, her mom would inherit the senior center, and we all know what happens to Howard’s wives. It all makes sense.

“Howard wanted Sarah dead, and whoever was trying to kill her hit Seth instead. Maybe the bullet deflected when it went through the window, or maybe Seth moved into the way at the last second. In any case, he took the bullet intended for Sarah.

“I’m still confused, though,” she said and looked back to Hannah and the gun. All of a sudden it became clear. “You’re the shooter? Why?”