Holly and Homicide (8 page)

Strangely, I learned very little about his personal life tonight; he claimed he’d been “too busy” to date much, and that I was “too tough of an act for any woman to follow.” Flattering, but a load of nonsense.

I looked at my watch and realized we’d been gone for more than two hours. Maybe Steve was at the inn by now.

Cameron searched my features. “Has our carriage turned back into a pumpkin?”

I hesitated. “This has been great fun, Cam, but I need to get back.”

He rolled his eyes and grumbled, “To Steve, aka the love of your life.”

“Yes, actually.” It was time for me to step out of the vortex and back into Steve’s arms.

“Well, okay, then. Let’s go.”

We made small talk during the short drive, admiring the lights as we slowly passed the house. Cameron drove me around to the back. Sullivan’s van was still nowhere to be seen.

“We’ll do this again as a threesome, with your lucky guy. I hope he’s good enough to deserve you.” “He is.”

“I’ll take your word for it.” He gave me one of his winning smiles.

“Right. Good night. Thanks, Cam.” I got out and, before shutting my door, asked, “Are you coming by the inn tomorrow?”

“Absolutely. Got to keep things hopping. It’s my job. See you then.” I watched as he drove away, feeling a touch of sadness, though I didn’t know why.

I started toward the door, and gasped as I spotted a man
at the corner of the house, his flashlight beam darting along the ground as he walked. I stared until I recognized him. “Henry. You startled me.”

“Sorry, Erin. I was just checking the fuses. The lights on the bridge aren’t working.”

I glanced in that direction. “That’s odd. They were working earlier. I remember checking them.”

“The fuses are all good, though. Something probably got unplugged. I’ll fix it now.”

A gust of chilly air hit me, which felt like an omen. My stomach was instantly in knots. The reaction was silly, I knew, but even so, I was worried at the thought of Henry going alone. Henry had taken a couple of steps, his boots crunching through the icy snow.

“Wait. I’ll join you.”

Henry pulled up his collar against the wind. There was an awkward pause as we headed down the hill. “Cold out tonight,” he muttered.

“Yes, it is.”

We slipped into silence, our trudging boots the only sound. He had to be curious at how Cameron had dropped me off just now and Steve had been gone all day. Finally, Henry said, “The place is starting to look real nice. You and Steve are doing a great job.”

“Thanks. I’m really—”

By the beam of Henry’s flashlight, I spotted a dark shape near the foot of the bridge. Henry spotted it, too, and cursed under his breath. “Go back to the house, Erin.”

“No.”

I hurried my step. There was enough light for me to see
that someone in a dark coat was lying facedown in the snow, and the sight terrified me. Wordlessly, both Henry and I broke into a run. Henry reached the foot of the bridge a step before me and grabbed the person’s shoulder.

“Oh, my god. Angie?” Henry cried. He rolled her onto her back. Angie was motionless—and lifeless. She’d been strangled with a string of lights that had been yanked off its hooks.

T
his is Erin Gilbert,” I said to the 911 dispatcher, my words coming out in a mindless rush. “There’s been a murder at the Goodwin estate in Snowcap Village. I’m here with Henry Goodwin, and we found Angie Woolf’s body. Outside by the creek.”

She said something, but I only caught a couple of syllables.

“Your voice is breaking up. What?”

“Are you two the only ones there on the premises?”

“No. But we’re the only ones outside. I think.”

She said something that sounded like: “Stay where you are. You’ll be hearing the sirens soon.”

Henry had already walked a short distance up the hill, partway back toward the house. I followed and told him, “The dispatcher says we’re supposed to wait where we are.”

He stopped. “I’ll watch for the police vehicles from here.”

The dispatcher said something else, but our weak connection failed completely. I hung up and stuck my cell phone in my coat pocket. Filled with dread, I kept an eye on the house, watching for familiar silhouettes in the window. Cameron and I had been gone for a couple of hours; maybe Angie wasn’t the only victim.

Henry was popping Tic Tacs in his mouth every few seconds, pacing three or four steps and then turning—like an animal in a small cage.

“Henry, how long were you outside before I arrived?”

“I can’t—What?”

“How long has it been since you were inside?”

“I don’t know. Ten, fifteen minutes.”

“Are you sure Audrey’s all right?”

“Yeah. She’s fine, Erin. We’d just spoken as I headed out the door. She was with Mikara.”

“Mikara has no idea that her sister’s dead.”

“Oh, God.” He put his hand to his head. “That’s right! I didn’t … this was such a shock, I didn’t think of that. Damn it! I need to go tell her now, so that …” He let his voice fade as sirens cut through the wintry silence.

A small chartreuse ambulance, with lights flashing,
pulled into the circular portion of the driveway behind the inn. A pair of EMT’s emerged. Seconds later Audrey and Mikara burst through the back door, donning their coats as they ran toward us.

“Erin?” Audrey called. “Is that you? What’s wrong? What’s going on?”

“There was an accident … down by the creek,” I called back.

“Are you hurt?” Mikara cried.

“No.”

“Is Henry?”

One of the paramedics hustled them back inside as the other approached Henry and me. I couldn’t overhear what was being said to Mikara. Was he telling her about her sister? Henry spoke to the second EMT and started to lead him to Angie’s body, but the EMT flicked on his powerful flashlight and told us both to wait for the police where we were. I watched from a distance as he checked Angie’s vitals, which I knew was pointless.

A patrol car arrived. Two sheriff deputies emerged and quickly separated us; one led Henry into the patrol car and one stayed with me on the high point of the path that led down to Angie’s body. The deputy took my name, birth date, address, and phone before asking me what had happened. Shivering uncontrollably despite my warm parka, I told him that I’d gone to the pub for about two and a half hours with Cameron, and had returned and spotted Henry. Then I described our grim discovery.

A crunch of car tires on gravel distracted me, and I
recognized the headlights of Steve’s van. He abandoned his car in the middle of the parking area. Another vehicle pulled into the driveway behind him—a second patrol car.

“Erin, are you okay?” Steve started to trot toward me.

“Yeah, I’m—”

“Halt!” an amplified voice boomed at us. Sheriff Mackey got out of the passenger side of the patrol car and was using a police bullhorn. “Stay right there!”

This was probably the first murder case Sergeant Mackey had ever been charged with investigating. There was no chance that he’d prove to be up to the task.

“It’s all right, Greg,” one of the EMT’s called back to Mackey. “That’s just her boyfriend.”

Jeez! This town really
was
gossip central!

“That may be so,” Mackey retorted into the bullhorn, “but he’s not allowed onto the crime scene.”

“What’s going on?!” Steve demanded.

I watched the back door; Mikara was still inside and couldn’t possibly overhear me. “Angie Woolf was murdered,” I called back. “Down by the bridge. Someone strangled her with a string of Christmas lights.”

Steve was still standing on the edge of the parking area. I could tell how perturbed he was by his stance and balled fists, though it was too dark to see his features.

“Look, Sheriff,” Steve said. “I haven’t been here all day, so I’ve got no idea of what happened. All I want to do is go talk to my partner. Can I please go do that?”

“No, sir, you cannot,” Mackey retorted. “You can wait in your vehicle, or you can wait in the house.”

“Steve, I’ll talk to you soon,” I shouted, waving at him.

“I’ll wait in my car,” he called back to me.

“Silence!” Mackey said, again using his horn. Steve returned to his van and closed the door.

“There’s really no need for the bullhorn, Greg,” Henry said, emerging from the passenger side of the patrol car. He slammed his door shut. “We can all hear you just fine.”

“That so, Goodwin?” Mackey said, his amplified voice, if anything, a notch louder.

“Yeah, that’s so! I’m still the mayor, and I appropriate the police budget, including the equipment that you’re now misusing! I’d rethink your attitude, if I were you.”

Raising his bullhorn once again, the sheriff announced, “I am in charge of this murder investigation, Mr. Mayor, and
you
are one of my suspects!” He chucked his bullhorn into his car.

“Suspects?!” Mikara shrieked, suddenly standing in the doorway. “The paramedic won’t tell us who’s been hurt! Who’s the victim? What the hell is going on?!”

“I’m so sorry, Mikara,” Mackey said, his voice kind. “Just go back inside, and I’ll explain everything in a minute or two.”

“What’s that supposed to mean … you’re ‘so sorry’? Last time you said that to me was when my dad had his—his heart attack.”

“Just … go back inside,” Mackey repeated sadly. “Please. I’ll be in as soon as I look at the crime scene.”

“Oh, my god!” Mikara cried. “Something must have happened to Angie, didn’t it?” She started trotting down the path.

“Wait!” Mackey started to follow her.

“No! I need to see my sister!”

“You can’t!” Mackey slowed his pace. “Stop! We have to keep everyone away. There are footprints in the snow. You could destroy the evidence without even realizing it.”

Mikara hesitated, but only for a moment. She tried to rush past us down the shoveled path to the creek. The deputy closest to me grabbed her arm.

“Come on, Mikara,” he said. “Let’s go back to the house. I know how hard this is, but you—”

“Don’t tell me that!” She yanked free of his grasp. “Don’t you dare tell me you know the first thing about how hard this is! Have you ever had your only sister get murdered?!”

Henry headed toward us down the path, past Mackey and one of the deputies. “Henry!” Mackey shouted. “You need to stay right where you are, or—”

“Shut up, Greg,” Henry growled. “You folks can go do whatever you need to do.
I
need to show some kindness. Nobody
else
is. You got a problem with that, you can come handcuff me and haul me away.”

Henry kept walking, and nobody made a move to stop him. He gently pulled Mikara into his arms, where she promptly broke into wracking sobs. It was excruciatingly difficult to hear someone in such agony, and it brought back painful memories of the losses in my own life.

“Why?” she cried into his shoulder. “Why would anybody kill my little sister?”

“I don’t know, Mikki. It doesn’t make any sense.”

“You were outside for so long,” Mikara cried to him. “Didn’t you see anything? Hear Angie cry for help?”

“No. Obviously, I’d have come to her rescue.”

Steve, meanwhile, got out of his car and walked beside Mikara as Henry led her back toward the house. Thank God that Henry, at least, was showing some basic human decency.

And yet, I couldn’t help but wonder if Henry had lied to me earlier about how long he’d been outside before I’d returned.

After a miserable two hours of braving the cold in separate
patrol cars, Henry and I were finally allowed to go inside; Steve had long since gone into the house, unable to convince the officers to let us do so, as well. We were directed to sit on the bench in the mudroom and remove our boots, which the deputies then collected as evidence, along with a beat-up pair of men’s boots from the cubby underneath the bench. Drops from melted snow had been left underneath those well-used boots. Henry told the sheriff and his men that he’d noticed those boots a week or two ago and had assumed Ben Orlin had left them there for use on a snowy day.

“Are you absolutely certain they’re not yours?” Mackey asked Henry. “They’re your size.”

“Yes, I’m sure. I know my own boots, for chrissake.”

“It’s important, Henry.” Mackey held the boots out for him to examine. “These are the same tread patterns that we found near Angie’s body.”

“Do you remember seeing those boots on the shelf earlier today?” I promptly asked Henry.

My question was rewarded with a dirty look from Mackey. “Hey! You’re in Snowcap now! No one gets to play Nancy Drew on my turf!”

Because Nancy would solve the murder so much faster than you could
, I thought bitterly.

Henry ignored him and turned toward me. “I have no idea if they were here or not today. I remember seeing them yesterday afternoon. I considered asking Ben about them this morning, but the whole hullabaloo with the bones was going on, and I just let it drop.”

Mackey whisked me off to a separate room to take my report again, although most of my time was spent in silence; he obviously just wanted to keep me sequestered from the others. It was almost two
A.M.
before he and his underlings finally left the house. Audrey and Steve were waiting for me by the fireplace. Steve embraced me and told me that Mikara had been given a sedative and was asleep in her room. Henry, too, had recently gone upstairs to bed. Steve and I sat down on the love seat across from Audrey.

“Were both Henry and Mikara in the house with you this evening?” I asked Audrey.

She shook her head. “Unfortunately, I had an early dinner with my producer tonight. I think I must have left the house right around the same time as you. When I got back, Mikara and I chatted for a couple of minutes, and then Henry came in from outside, saying it was ‘sure nippy out there,’ but that this was his kind of weather. Then he said he was going to take a look at all the lights you’d hung, and he left. I wasn’t paying attention to time. It must have been half an hour or so later when Mikara
and I heard the ambulance.” She sighed, her features looking a little drawn. “I nearly had a heart attack. Mikara started cursing, wondering if Henry had hurt himself and had called for an ambulance. I immediately started worrying about
you.”