Deadly Reunion (25 page)

“I still don’t understand why you were at the high school.”

Kyle quickly explained that they were looking for the binder Crystal had been carrying around that night and asked her if she had noticed it.

Nodding her head
, she said, “I saw it. I just figured it had something to do with the reunion. What do you think was in it?”

“Were not completely sure.
We had just found it when we noticed the smoke,” Grace said.

“
Did you read any of it?” Melodie asked, slipping her hand into Kyle’s.

Kyle shook his head, while trying to stifle another yawn.

“We think it may have something to do with Sam,” Grace said.

Melodie’s head turned sharply toward Grace. “Sam? Sam Baxter? What on earth does Sam have to do with anything?” she snapped.

Grace and Kyle exchanged glances
.

“We’re starting to think t
hat maybe Sam was murdered, too,” Grace said.

Melodie
turned her head from Grace to Kyle and back again. “Sam committed suicide,” she said sharply.

Grace shook her head. “Do you know anyone who would have wanted to kill Sam?”

Stunned, Melodie shook her head. “No. Everyone loved Sam.”

“Do you know if he was seeing someone besides Crystal?” Kyle asked.

“Besides Crystal?” Melodie asked slowly.

“We think he may have been secretly meeting som
eone behind your sister’s back. They might know what happened to him. Do you have any idea who it could be?”

“What could this possibly have to do with Crystal’s death?” she asked coldly. “I’m paying you to find out who killed my sister
, not about what happened to Sam.”

Kyle glanced at
Grace, before smiling broadly. “We haven’t lost sight of that. Don’t worry we’re going to find out who killed your sister.”

“We just think the two deaths might be connected,” Grace added.

“I really don’t see how,” Melodie said as she pushed her chair back and stood up. “It’s late—”

Not wanting to end the conversation and let
Melodie run off, Grace changed the subject. “I was really sorry to hear about Larry, Mel.”

“
Thank you, but to be perfectly honest, it had been over for quite some time now.” She smiled at Kyle. “We had a somewhat stormy relationship.”

“What really happened between you and Crystal?” Grace asked.

Dragging her eyes away from Kyle’s, Melodie said quickly, “I keep telling you. Nothing. We had a fight, but we got over it.”

Kyle
reached up and held her hand. “We know that she must have been difficult to live with at times.”

Melodie
looked at Grace and then Kyle before sighing. “She wasn’t always bad, you know? It’s just . . . in the last few years she got desperate. She started getting into debt. She ran through her inheritance. Tom just doesn’t make a lot working for the state, but she was hoping that, eventually, he would run for office. He finally told her that it wasn’t happening. She sort of became needier after that.”

“Is that when she started to blackmail Larry,” Kyle asked gently.

“You know about that?” When he nodded, Melodie sat back down and said, “I didn’t find out about the blackmail until after Larry’s . . . accident. I wish I had known. Larry might still be alive.”

“Why do you say that?”
Grace asked.

Melodie
hesitated. “I found out about the affair, shortly after it happened. I should have confronted Larry right then, but I was so angry. I decided to put the screws to him. Scare him, a bit. Make him sweat before I asked for a divorce. Unfortunately, I didn’t realize my own sister was putting the screws to him, too and bankrupting me in the process.”

“How did
you find out about your husband’s affair?” Grace asked.

“Oh,
you don’t know? Crystal hired a detective to catch Larry cheating. She wasn’t going to tell me, of course, but the detective couldn’t wait to talk.”

“
Steve?” Grace guessed.

Melodie
nodded. “She brought him back from Denver. He was more than happy to do it, too. Once he took the pictures, he ran right over to show them to me. I guess it was his way of getting back at Larry and probably me, too.”

Grace stifled a yawn.
“What do you mean?”

“
Steve had asked me to marry him right before my freshman year at college. I, of course, told him no. I mean, Larry and I had just gotten back together, but Steve wouldn’t take no for an answer. He kept harassing me. Showing up wherever I was. Sending me flowers. He was becoming even more of a nuisance than usual. He was even starting to bug Crystal, too. So she told Larry that Steve was dangerous. She even told him he had threatened to kill me. Well, you remember what Larry was like. He went ballistic.” Melodie smiled fondly. “Larry wasn’t that great of a boyfriend or a husband, but he was very protective. I always felt very safe around him.”

“Did Steve threaten you?” Grace asked.

“
No. Steve’s a pain, but he would never hurt me. I think he still loves me.” At their shocked expressions, she added quickly. “It was Crystal’s idea. She’s the one who actually told Larry that. I just . . . didn’t disagree. I wasn’t happy about it when I found out, but by then, the damage was already done.” She shrugged her shoulder, causing the shoulder of her dressing gown to fall down her arm. “Anyway, like I said, Larry went crazy. He beat Steve up and told him if he came near me ever again, he’d kill him. Steve was terrified. Larry wasn’t like David or any of the other guys I’ve ever dated.”

At Kyle’s questioning look, Grace added, “Larry was
six-foot-four. Built like a house.”

“Steve was at a slight disadvantage. He lef
t the next day,” Melodie said. “Now Larry’s gone, Steve’s back and I’m all alone.”

“So
, when Crystal asked him to investigate Larry, he jumped at the chance,” Grace said.

“I’m sure he’s following me,”
Melodie said, standing up and pulling back the kitchen curtain hanging by the table. “That’s how he got to the school so fast.”

“Was Crystal blackmailing Steve
for what happened with David Hart?” Kyle asked.

“Not that I know of
, but Crystal didn’t share that part of her life with me,” Melodie said bitterly.

A sudden thought occurred to Grace. “How did Larry feel about David Hart?”

Melodie smiled ruefully. “He hated him. He was so jealous when he found out I was dating him.”

“Did he know that David
had hit you?”

“Absolutely not. Larry would have killed him if he knew
.”

Grace looked down at the table. She was so tired, it was becoming difficult to think
, but an idea just flashed through her mind. “How do you know that it wasn’t Larry who pushed David down the stairs and destroyed his studio?”

Angry
, Melodie shook her head. “I told you, Larry didn’t know. Besides, Crystal told me that it was Steve that did that.”

“Did she see Steve
do it?”

Melodie
said, “No. I don’t think so, but she was pretty sure.”

“We heard a rumor
that you might have been the one to push him down the stairs,” Kyle said gently.

Melodie
looked from Kyle to Grace. “I didn’t hurt anyone. I know what this is about. It’s not about David Hart or Sam Baxter.” Her voice grew shrill. “You think I had something to do with my sister’s death, but I didn’t!”

Kyle reached out and took her hand again. “Calm down. We’re not accusing you of anything. We’re just trying to sort everything out.
I know you wouldn’t do something like that.”

Mollified
, she lowered her voice. “Listen, I’ll admit I was angry when I found out. I was very angry, but I eventually forgave her. She apologized. She begged my forgiveness and promised she would change. I had to forgive her. She was my sister, after all.”

Remembering
Melodie’s strange behavior to Crystal at the reunion, Grace said, “You were still angry at her. I remember seeing you and her at the reunion. You could barely stand to sit next to her.”

“True
, but I didn’t kill her. I made my displeasure known in other ways.”

Kyle leaned closer
. “How so?”

Melodie
laughed bitterly. “Completely juvenile ways. Hope didn’t win the Reunion Queen crown, you know. Crystal won. It was close, but I decided to help Hope stuff the ballot box . . . I just wanted to watch Crystal freak out. I regretted it the moment I did it.” Laughing she added, “I still can’t believe Crystal made us go through a recount.”

“Did you also destroy the
charcoal drawing and the ‘most likely to’ board?” Grace asked.

Melodie
shook her head. “No. That wasn’t me. You should talk to your sister about that. I saw her carrying around a big red marker at some point during the reunion. Just like the one used to deface the ‘most likely to’ board.”

*  *  *  *

When Grace woke up, it was a quarter past noon. A persistent buzzing was coming from the nightstand. Groggily, she reached for the alarm clock, before realizing the buzzing was the vibration from her cell phone. She managed to open the phone before it transferred to voice mail.

“Hello?” she
muttered sleepily, before turning her face back into her pillow.

“Grace?” S
he bolted up in bed, recognizing Adam’s voice. “Grace, are you okay? I was so worried about you. What happened?”

Grace reached down beside the bed and shook Kyle awake. When they had reached Grace’s home
, Kyle had insisted on staying over. Grace wasn’t sure if he was worried about her safety or his own, but too tired to argue, she let him sneak upstairs and sleep in her room. She fell asleep the moment she laid down on the bed and didn’t realize he had slept on the floor until she had fallen over him on a late-night trip to the bathroom.

Grace turned on t
he speakerphone. “What happened? That’s what we would like to know. What happened to you?”

“Grace, I was so worried about you.”

“Knock it off, Adam,” she said angrily. “You weren’t worried about me. If you were, it wouldn’t have taken you almost twelve hours to call.”

“I didn’t find out about the fire until I saw it on the news five minutes ago.
I swear I had no idea that you were in any danger until just now. That’s why I’m calling now.”

“Why did you run away then?”

“I heard a noise. I thought it was the cops, so I took off. Please, tell me you’re okay.”

“I’m fine.
” She looked over at Kyle, whose handsome features were twisted into a scowl. “We’re both fine.”

“Thank God.”

Softening Grace asked, “Are you—”

“Did you find anything last night?”

“Yes, we found Crystal’s scrapbook. We even saw her ledger.”

Adam gave a small yelp. “That’s great! I knew I
could count on you. That’s wonderful, Grace! This is what I want you to do. You need—”

Grace smiled.
It was almost worth losing a key piece of evidence, just so she could ruin his day. “Bad news, Adam.”

“What?”

“Unfortunately, it’s ashes.”

“It burned . . . you lost it?” Disbelief and then anger colored his voice. “How could you possibly have let that happen? I can’t believe this. I hired you—”

“Why did you hire us
, Adam?”

“What do you mean?”

“You haven’t really been helpful. You certainly haven’t given us all the information.”

“What are you talking about?
”

“You told us you didn’t have a motive
for killing Crystal, but you did.”

“Grace, we’ve already gone over this. Why would I kill Crystal? I needed her for my movie.”

“Because she was blackmailing you. We found your name in her book. You’ve been paying her a small fortune for quite some time.” When Adam didn’t say anything, Grace continued, “I heard a rumor that you stole Sam’s screenplay.”

“Who told you that?
No, wait. Let me guess. Steve told you that. Why would you believe him? He’s a creep.”

“I didn’t hear that particular rumor from Steve.”

“Whatever. I didn’t kill Crystal. It’s true that Sam and I discussed writing a screenplay together, but it was never more than that.”

“
Then why were you paying Crystal?”

“Crystal said she had proof that I plagiarized my screenplay.
She said that she had Sam’s handwritten notes, and that they were identical to my screenplay. I knew that she couldn’t have though, because I’m the one who actually wrote the thing! I’m the one who fleshed it out! I’m the one who made it real! Not Sam! But, I couldn’t take the chance, so I paid her, but I didn’t kill her.”