Marked Down for Murder (Good Buy Girls) (14 page)

Sure enough, Blair glanced from Sam to Maggie and snapped, “What is
she
doing here?”

Sam glanced at Maggie, who held up her cup as her first line of defense. He smiled.

“I don’t know,” he said. “But, as always, I am delighted to see her.”

“I refuse to discuss my case with her here,” Blair said.

She looked as if she were going to dig her spiky heels into Pete’s wood floor. Maggie rose from her seat. She wasn’t going to cause a scene just because she might die of curiosity.

“Mama, stop it!” Summer snapped. “Maggie and her people have been really helpful to us, and you’re being just awful.”

“Ah!” Blair gasped. “How could you? How could you side with them against your own mama?”

“Because without them, I would be up for murder,” Summer said. “That’s how I could. Now, please, sit down and shut up.”

Maggie glanced at Summer in surprise. She had gone from accusing Maggie of shooting her mother to getting Tyler arrested for defending her. Frankly, it was getting hard to keep up with the woman’s moods. She wondered if this was part of her appeal to Tyler. His personality was pretty much steady as it goes. Maybe Summer goosed that a bit for him.

The fire in Summer’s eyes must have clued Blair in to the seriousness of her words, because Blair let out an indignant huff and stomped forward clutching her arm in its sling close to her chest.

Max hastily stood up and pulled out a chair for her. Blair sank into it as if she was about to expire at any moment.

Sam pulled up a chair from another table and wedged it in next to Maggie’s while Summer took the remaining seat.

“I can go,” Maggie said. “I was only passing by and saw Max and Ginger. I need to get back anyway. I don’t want to abuse Mrs. Kellerman’s generosity in watching the shop.”

Sam looked at her and shook his head. “No, you’re good. After careful consideration, I think it’s safer to have you in the loop than out.”

“Because I’m so insightful and helpful?” she asked.

“More accurately, so you don’t go rogue on me and get yourself killed,” he said.

Maggie gave him a small smile. She knew that he really didn’t want her involved but that he was beginning to understand that in a community this small, everyone was involved. He squeezed her knee and then turned to the table.

“All right, Ginger, tell us what you know,” he said.

Ginger frowned. “First, I have to ask Blair and Summer a few questions. To start with, did Bruce go to Switzerland often?”

Blair raised her eyebrows in surprise. “No, he hated traveling. He was deathly afraid of flying. We had to drive everywhere. He didn’t even own a passport.”

“Huh,” Ginger said as she looked back down at her papers. “Did he have family over there?”

“No, he had no family.”

“Did he own a business?”

“In Switzerland?” Blair asked. She sounded exasperated. “No! Why?”

“Are you absolutely sure?” Ginger asked.

“Yes, I’m positive. I was married to him, after all,” Blair said. “I would think I would know if he was doing business in a foreign country, wouldn’t I?”

Ginger closed her eyes and took a deep breath through her nose as if she was gathering every ounce of patience she possessed. She slowly exhaled through her mouth and opened her eyes.

“Okay, this is going to be more difficult than I thought,” Ginger said. She gave Max an apologetic look and he nodded.

“Why do you keep asking about Switzerland?” Blair asked.

“Oh, you mean you
don’t
know?” Ginger asked.

“Know what?” Blair growled. “What are you not telling me?”

“Well, as you said, you were married to him, so one would think you’d know that he was sending money to Switzerland every month.” Ginger paused to give her a pointed look. “Oh, and maybe you could tell us why. You were married to him, after all.”

“Money?” Blair asked. Ginger’s sarcasm was lost on her. The details of her money being sent out of the country, however, were not. “My money was being sent to Switzerland every month?”

“Yes, Bruce sent several thousand dollars to Switzerland every month for the past ten years,” Ginger said. “Although it gets a bit spotty about two years ago—Bruce started sending less, and not as regularly.”

“That would be when we got married,” Blair said. She studied the large diamond on her ring finger. “Bruce liked to buy me pretty things, and he did once say something about having to reallocate his funds if he was going to keep me happy.”

Maggie glanced at Summer, who was looking at her mother with a tiny frown marring her forehead. She got the feeling that Summer was seeing her mother and her mother’s life choices clearly for the very first time.

“Don’t frown, dear,” Blair chastised her daughter. “You’ll wrinkle.”

Summer let out a sigh worthy of a teen in the rocky throes of adolescence. Maggie felt sorry for her. Henpecked and nitpicked her entire life by Blair—was it any wonder Summer had turned out as she had?

“Is there any way to tell who or what the money was going to?” Sam asked.

“No, the Swiss bank privacy laws are pretty strict about that sort of thing,” Ginger said. “They won’t even verify the account. I only know of its existence because Bruce left a paper trail on this end.”

“Blair, I know you refuse to accept that Bruce was married before you,” Sam said. “But you have to consider that the money he was sending to this Swiss account was for Sela Cassidy, his first wife. It makes sense that she’d be in Europe, as she was a professional downhill skier until she blew out one of her knees. It could be that they are legitimately divorced and this is alimony. We just haven’t found the paperwork yet.”

Blair’s eyebrows lowered, and her mouth turned up on one side in a snarl.

“He was never married before,” she said. “Why won’t anyone believe me?”

“Because it doesn’t make any sense, Mama,” Summer said. Her tone was gentle. “I know you want to believe that you were his only wife, but you have to see that there were things Bruce didn’t tell you, and it looks like having a previous wife and depositing money in a foreign bank account were two of them.”

Blair blinked and turned to her daughter with large, sad eyes. “But he told me that I was the only woman he had ever married. Why would he lie?”

Summer shrugged. “I don’t know. Men lie. It’s what they do.”

Sam and Max cleared their throats and Ginger said, “Present company excepted, of course.”

They looked somewhat mollified. Maggie could feel Sam’s gaze on her, and she squeezed his hand to assure him that she did not think like that.

“I just don’t understand,” Blair sobbed as she leaned heavily on Summer’s shoulder. “He could have told me he was married before. I wouldn’t judge. I mean, it’s not like I was a virgin bride.”

Maggie choked on her coffee and Blair shot her a nasty look.

“Sorry, wrong pipe,” she said. Ginger glanced away and Maggie knew she was trying not to laugh.

Sam’s phone buzzed and he took it out of his pocket. Glancing at the display, he stood and said, “Excuse me. I have to take this.”

He stepped away from the table, and Maggie watched him go. His body was outlined by the window, and she admired his straight posture and broad shoulders. Although the years were beginning to tell, with the start of wrinkles and gray hair, he was just as handsome as he’d been when they were in high school.

“Isn’t that right, Maggie?” Max asked.

Hearing her name, Maggie turned back to the table with an undignified, “Huh? What?”

“I was saying that it’s in Blair’s best interest for Cassidy to have been married before,” Max said.

“How do you figure that?” Blair asked. She looked cranky.

“Because it gives us someone to look for who may have wanted to murder him.”

Blair blanched, and Max looked contrite.

“Sorry, that was tactless of me,” he said. “But you see my point.”

“No, it’s not that,” Blair said. “Well, it was tactless, but that’s not why I’m upset.”

“What is it, Mama?” Summer asked.

“If he lied to me about being married, how do I know he didn’t lie to me about other things?” she asked. “What if he has children out there? Or siblings? Or parents? Heavens, there could be a whole entourage of Cassidys that I’m going to have to deal with.”

“Anything is possible,” Summer said. “But hiding an ex-wife is one thing; hiding children would be much more difficult.”

“Agreed,” Ginger said. “And as a mother of four, I know what I’m talking about.”

“I hope you’re right,” Blair said. “Because I am not sharing my inheritance with any surprise snot-nosed brats.”

More than anything else, her incredible selfishness reassured Maggie that Blair was fine. If there was one truth about Blair, it was that she would always look out for her own interests first and everyone else’s second.

“Mama, that’s not very nice,” Summer chastised her mother.

“I’m not trying to be nice. And if anyone tries to take what’s mine they’re going to see just how not nice I can be,” Blair said.

Summer sighed, and Max frowned and said, “That’s the sort of comment you might want to hold in so as not to look too greedy when we go to probate.”

Now it was Blair’s turn to look put-upon. Maggie didn’t think she was up for any more histrionics. She glanced back at Sam and saw him slip his phone back into his pocket. He looked grim when he approached the table.

“Well, Blair, it appears you were right,” Sam said. “Your husband wasn’t married before you.”

Blair tossed her black bob and looked vindicated. “I knew it. I was Bruce’s one true love. He always said so.”

“Well, that’s where it gets a bit more interesting,” Sam said.

They all turned to look at him as he resumed his seat at the table.

“You weren’t married to Bruce Cassidy,” he said. “You were married to a man named Terry Knox.”

“That’s impossible,” Blair said. She looked at Sam as
if he were a complete idiot. “Honestly, do you even know what you are doing? A first wife, foreign bank accounts, and now you say his name isn’t his. It’s like you’re not investigating my husband’s murder at all.”

“Blair, as far as I know, I am now investigating the murder of a man named Terry Knox. Whether he was really your husband or not, I don’t know,” Sam said. “The medical examiner matched the fingerprints of our victim to those of a man named Terry Knox whose last known residence was in San Diego, California. That’s the same city your husband was from, yes?”

Blair looked horrified. She turned to Summer, who looked equally stunned. Then she turned back to Sam and said, “Yes, Bruce was from San Diego. He said he was retired military and had a small cottage just north of the city on the water.”

“Well, his fingerprints identify him as someone else entirely. I’m going back to the station to see what I can find out about Terry Knox,” Sam said. His voice was gentle when he continued, “Blair, I suggest you find any documentation you can about your husband. Birth certificate, marriage license, driver’s license—anything that might help us unravel this mess.”

“We have a safe-deposit box at the bank,” she said. “Bruce rented it when we arrived in town.”

“I’m going to need to see the contents,” Sam said. “I’ll have Deputy Wilson go with you to the bank.”

“I’ll come, too,” Summer said.

“Contact me at the station if you need anything,” Sam said. He rose from his seat, and Maggie rose with him.

“I’ll walk with you,” she said. “I need to get back to the shop.”

“I’m going to call Judge Harding,” Max said. “He might be able to give us some direction as to what to do next, because if you weren’t even married to Bruce Cassidy, then you’re not really his widow—”

Blair let loose with a wail that could have shattered glass. With an apologetic wave to Pete behind the counter and to the others, Sam and Maggie beat feet toward the door. Once outside, they didn’t slow down, but hurried away as if fleeing the scene of a crime.

“Scale of one to ten,” Maggie huffed as they hurried down the street, “how mad do you think Ginger will be at me for leaving her in that train wreck?”

“Max convinced Blair to hire Ginger to go through the financials, right?” Sam asked as he grabbed her hand and guided her across the street.

“Right,” Maggie said as she stepped up onto the curb beside him.

“Then she’s getting paid, so she really can’t complain, now can she?”

“I suppose not.”

“Text me when you get to the shop,” he said.

Maggie looked at him in question.

“I worry,” he said. “There’s a murderer out there, and now our vic isn’t who he seems, making it even more curious, not to mention dangerous.”

“You love this stuff, don’t you?” she asked. There was no way he could deny the sparkle in his eye as he tried to figure out what exactly was happening in their sleepy little town.

“I’m not happy that someone was murdered, but I’m damn determined to catch the killer,” he said.

“I’ll text you,” Maggie said. “Promise.”

“Thanks.”

He paused to plant a quick kiss on her lips before turning down the sidewalk that would take him to the station while she continued on to her shop. A few steps away and Maggie turned back and grabbed his hand, stopping him.

“I worry, too, just so you know,” she said, squeezing his fingers with hers. “Please be careful.”

“I promise,” he said. “I have an awful lot to live for and I don’t intend to let anything mess it up. I’ll swing by the shop later.” Then he stopped and leveled her with an intense stare. “I love you, Maggie.”

“I love you, too,” she said.

She gave him a quick wave and then hurried toward her shop. Maybe it was the weird twist the case had taken, but Maggie couldn’t help but feel creeped out that there was a murderer among them who had successfully bludgeoned one person and nearly shot another to death.

Was Blair their target, and if so, why? And if Terry Knox really wasn’t Bruce Cassidy, then why was he murdered? Was it someone out to get Bruce Cassidy or Terry Knox? Maggie’s head was spinning with questions, but with no more information, she couldn’t even hazard a guess. It was maddening.

Maggie spent the afternoon wondering what, if anything, Sam had discovered about Terry Knox. She hadn’t heard from Ginger, and she worried about that, too. Blair was high maintenance on a normal day; Maggie could only imagine what she was like now.

Thankfully, Ginger arrived just before Maggie was about to close the shop, with Claire in tow. One look at her face and Maggie knew the day had been a long one. Ginger collapsed onto the couch and flung her forearm over her forehead. She was the picture of distress.

“Rough day?” Maggie asked.

“Nothing a tranquilizer gun couldn’t have cured,” Ginger said. “Pity I don’t carry one.”

Claire pushed her black-framed glasses up onto her nose and nodded in agreement.

“Apparently, Blair is not processing the news that her husband wasn’t who she thought he was very well,” she said. “Max stopped by the library to do some research after he dropped Blair and Summer off at Doc Franklin’s. He was hoping Doc could help ease Blair’s panic attack.”

“Since my phone stopped ringing incessantly about an hour ago, I’d say he succeeded,” Ginger said. “Remind me to bake Doc Franklin a pound cake.”

“Why was your phone ringing?” Claire asked.

“Well, after the sheriff and company ditched us in the coffee shop,” Ginger said with a pointed look at Maggie, who gave a sheepish shrug, “Blair went right into full-on money panic mode.”

“She’s afraid she’s going to lose it all?” Maggie guessed.

“You got it,” Ginger said. “If Terry Knox stole Bruce Cassidy’s identity as well as all of his money, then there really isn’t anything for her to inherit, especially if their marriage was a fraud.”

“Wow, if her marriage is invalid, she loses it all?” Claire said. “That is a huge kick in the pants.”

“Especially, if you’re as used to spending money as she is,” Ginger said. “Honestly, going over her financials has been eye-opening to say the least.”

“I take it Blair is not up for membership in the Good Buy Girls?” Maggie asked.

“Huh,” Ginger huffed. “She may have to have an initiation by fire.”

Claire wrinkled her nose. “Thrift is a gift—either you have it or you don’t.”

“It’s true,” Ginger said. “You can imitate but never replicate the skills of those blessed in the consumer arts.”

Maggie laughed, not only at Ginger’s words but at the thought of Blair Cassidy buying anything on sale ever. It boggled.

Claire’s phone chimed, and so did Ginger’s. Maggie knew immediately what that meant. She raced to the break room to grab her purse, and sure enough, there was a text from Michael. He and Joanne were on their way to the hospital—again.

Maggie hurried back into the shop. She glanced at the others to see that they were already headed toward the door.

“Maybe we should order a pizza,” Claire said. “Probably this is false labor again, and a pizza will cheer Joanne up more than hugs at the end of this ordeal.”

“Agreed,” Ginger said. “Last week she was craving anchovies—bleck. Is she over that?”

“Yes, I think she’s moved on to green olives and sausage,” Maggie said as she locked the door behind them.

“My car?” Ginger asked.

Maggie and Claire followed her to her minivan. They hurriedly got in, and Maggie took her phone out to text Sam. Since they were supposed to meet up later, she wanted him to know what was happening so that he didn’t worry.

Claire took her phone out, too, and ordered a pizza to be delivered to the maternity ward.

“Done,” she said. “And I asked for extra olives.”

They zipped into the visitor’s lot at the hospital and together they hurried up to the third floor. The woman at the information desk was used to seeing them by now, and she waved at them as they passed.

“Tell Joanne and Michael we’re all rooting for them,” she said.

Maggie and the others waved in acknowledgment. Once in the large waiting room, Ginger went to verify that Joanne was already there, and the maternity ward nurse confirmed that she had just been brought in.

They were the only ones in the waiting room, so they took over the television, turning on a romantic comedy while thumbing through the magazines. The pizza arrived, and they had just tucked into it when the doors to the ward burst open and Michael appeared.

“Oh, no, not again,” Claire said. “Poor Joanne, is she terribly disappointed?”

“No, in fact, I just came out to tell you that she’s dilated to five centimeters and one hundred percent effaced. We’re having this baby!” Michael cried.

The three of them erupted from their seats and began to jump up and down.

“Dilated and effaced is good, right?” Claire asked, still jumping with the others. Ginger burst out laughing and wrapped her arms around Claire.

“It’s wonderful,” she said. “That baby has finally made up its mind to join us.”

“Can we see her?” Maggie asked. She wiped her pizza fingers on a napkin, trying to clean up to go into the ward.

“You know what they say,” Ginger said. “It’s easier to seek forgiveness than permission. Let’s just go. They’ll kick us out if they have to.”

Michael led the way back through the doors to the ward. Given the late hour, it was quiet. The occasional cry of a baby was the only loud noise, and it mingled with the muted sound of the televisions in the birthing rooms.

At the end of the corridor, he turned right and pushed through a wide swinging door.

Half sitting, hugging her big belly with her arms, was Joanne.

“Hee hee hee hi,” she said. “The baby’s . . . hee hee . . . coming.”

“Oh my god!” Claire cried. “This is so exciting! Can I get you anything? What do you need? Are you in pain?”

Ginger and Maggie exchanged a glance. Joanne’s dark brown hair was up on her head in its usual ponytail, but strands heavy with sweat had escaped the elastic and were plastered to her neck and the sides of her face. As to Claire’s last question, Maggie had no doubt Joanne was in excruciating pain.

“No, nothing, a little bit,” Joanne answered in between breaths.

Ginger moved in close and gave her a solid hug. Claire was next, and then Maggie.

“You’re doing great,” Maggie said. “Just keep breathing.”

“Did you have an epidural with Laura?” Joanne asked.

“Yes,” she said.

“What about you . . . hee hee . . . Ginger?” Joanne asked.

“For the first two,” she said. “The second two just sort of fell out when I sneezed.”

Claire looked horrified, but Maggie laughed. “I remember that. Forty-five minutes of labor and
bang
—baby.”

“It was crazy,” Ginger said. “We were sure Dante was going to be born in the car. As it was, we just made it through the front door when he started to crown.”

“I wanted . . . hee hee . . . to have a natural childbirth,” Joanne said. “But there’s one thing they don’t tell you.”

“What’s that?” Claire asked.

“It hurts like—”

The machine that Joanne was hooked up to let out a chirping noise, cutting off what she was about to say. Maggie watched the monitor.

“What’s happening?” Claire asked. Her eyes were huge as Michael elbowed his way back to his wife’s side and took her hand in his.

“She’s having a contraction,” Ginger said. “It’ll pass.”

“Unnngh!” Joanne let out a growling grunt that sounded as if it came all the way up from her toes.

“We’d better leave them to it,” Maggie said. She stepped up to Joanne’s other side and quickly kissed her head. “We’re here if you need us.”

Ginger moved in after her and did the same. “Keep breathing, honey. Your sweet bundle is on its way.”

Joanne gave her a smile that was more bared teeth than upturned lips, but Ginger had been through it four times herself and knew the drill.

“Go, girl!” Claire said. She glanced at Joanne’s belly, which, even under her hospital johnnie, looked rock hard in the midst of her contraction. Claire stepped back as if the condition were contagious. She slapped Michael on the back and said, “Take care of our girl.”

She bolted out the door as if escaping the plague. Maggie and Ginger exchanged grins as they followed her out.

“Oh my god,” Claire said as soon as they met her outside. “Did you see her belly? The whole thing was like granite. I didn’t even know the body could do that.”

“Which is why I’ve always maintained that simulated contractions would be all the birth control some women would ever need,” Ginger said.

“Birthing is not for the weak,” Maggie agreed.

“That would be me,” Claire said. “Sheesh, as soon as I see Pete, I am going to kiss him right on the mouth and thank him for not wanting to be a dad.”

Maggie felt a spurt of annoyance that Claire had had the smarts to iron that talk out in the very early stages of dating while she, being a dope, had not, and now she had no idea if Sam wanted kids. And truthfully, it was kind of freaking her out.

They resumed their spots in the still-vacant waiting room. Ginger paced for a bit before she settled down. Maggie debated going for coffee but as the time wore on, she didn’t want to have caffeine ruin her ability to nap. When two hours had passed, Claire looked like she was about to explode.