“You’re right. I’ll undoubtedly rot in hell for that.”
“Works for me.” Maddie blew her nose again on another paper towel. “Ouch. Put tissues on the grocery list.”
“Will do. How about telling me what happened with your parents? You’ll feel better, I’ll feel better, we can get to those cookies, maybe save my brother’s life. . . .”
Maddie half-laughed. “Okay, all right. Quick version. Mom was depressed, and I guess she started drinking. Anyway, looking back on her behavior, that’s what I suspect. On the day of the accident, she was driving. Why, I don’t know. Dad usually did all the driving. No one told me the part about Mom being at the wheel until I’d finished college. Aunt Sadie let it slip one day. That’s about it.”
“So . . . I guess I need a longer version because I’m not connecting the dots. Did you start worrying that marrying Lucas would turn you into a drunk?”
Maddie heaved a huge sigh. “If you’re going to force me to talk about this, I really, really need to be baking.”
“Okay by me. As you can see, I’ve lined up the ingredients. The butter is at room temperature. You only have to fire up the mixer.” Olivia waved toward the neat line of flour, sugar, and extracts.
Maddie was already mixing flour and salt in a bowl, which she set aside near the mixer. “Mom was depressed. I know that much because I remember hearing one of her friends use the word, and I asked Mom what it meant. She said she was just feeling a little sad and not to worry about it. Dad was traveling a lot for work. I don’t know, maybe she was lonely. Mom and Dad had always been so close, at least until those last few months. Dad seemed to be gone all the time, and Mom must have stopped eating because she lost a lot of weight.”
“Do you think she might have been seriously ill?” Olivia put the flour away and refilled their coffee cups.
“No, Aunt Sadie would have told me. I do have to wonder if my dad was having an affair. That’s something I would never be able to dredge out of Aunt Sadie. She thinks I’m still ten and terribly vulnerable.”
“She loves you.”
“Yeah, I know.” Maddie yanked another towel off the roll. Her nose had turned red from the roughness of the paper.
While Maddie washed her hands, Olivia took a roll of toilet paper from the kitchen storage cabinet. She tore off the paper cover and plunked the whole roll on the table next to Maddie.
“Here’s the irony, though,” Maddie said as she measured sugar into the mixer bowl. “Hand me the butter, will you?”
“Irony?”
Maddie opened the wrapper and scraped globs of soft butter into the bowl with the sugar. “Mom and Dad were going off for a weekend away together the day they died. They were driving to the mountains, planning to stay in the same place they went for their honeymoon.”
“Maybe they were trying to work things out?”
“What I remember so vividly was that when Mom leaned over to kiss me good-bye, I smelled her perfume. It was the first time I’d seen her smile in a long time. That was the last time I saw her.” Maddie switched on the mixer, indicating she was done talking about her parents, and lowered the spinning blades into the sugar and butter.
Olivia reached for a hunk of toilet paper.
While Maddie made noise in the kitchen, Olivia picked up her cell and headed for the kitchen door. When Maddie paused the mixer and glanced up at her, Olivia said, “I want to call Del and find out what happened with Heather.” Maddie nodded and went back to work.
Spunky was curled in a ball on the padded seat of an antique chair near the large front window. His head lifted when he saw Olivia. “Hey, you lazy bum.” Spunky wagged his fluffy tail and tried to lick Olivia’s face as she picked him up. When she sat on the brocade-covered seat, Spunky circled in her lap and collapsed into a ball again. Olivia wove her fingers into the silky fur that tended to fall over his eyes. Time for a trim. Spunky sighed with contentment as Olivia massaged his ears and stared out the window at the park. The setting sun lent a warm glow to the collection of copper cookie cutters hanging from tiny suction cups on the window. Sometimes she felt as if she lived in a real gingerbread house . . . except, of course, the oven was used only to bake cookies. Olivia had a feeling this might be her last contemplative moment for some time.
With her free hand, Olivia opened her cell phone and called Del. He answered immediately. “Livie, are you okay?”
“Fine, Del, really. I don’t think Heather was actually aiming her truck at me. Did you find her?”
“We did, although we can’t take much credit for it. She’d pulled over only a few miles from her farm. We found her curled up on the front seat, balling her eyes out. Getting anything coherent out of her took some time. She cried all the way back to the station and through most of the interview.”
“Was I right? Is she a suspect?”
“We consider her a suspect, yes.”
In her excitement, Olivia shifted suddenly, causing Spunky to tumble off her lap.
“That’s good news for Jason,” Del said. “Heather has a motive but no alibi. A knife similar to the murder weapon was part of the loot you found in her barn, so she might have had access to another in the same set. That’s not for general consumption.”
“Understood.” Spunky lifted his front paws to Olivia’s knees, scouting out the possibility of regaining her lap. She patted her thigh, and he jumped up. “Did you find out if Heather knew about the stolen goods in her barn?”
“Denied all knowledge. Claims she didn’t know someone was hanging out there, that she rarely entered that barn.”
“I’m inclined to believe her,” Olivia said. “No horses, no cats . . . Heather loves animals. She’d have no reason to trek way out to a run-down barn unless there were animals to care for. Except . . .”
“What?”
“Well, I suppose she might have seen the stuff if she decided to check out the condition of the folding chairs. Gwen said Heather had volunteered to bring them to the baby shower. That’s why I was there, to get those chairs.”
“Thanks. I’ll follow up on that. For now, we had to let her go. We had no evidence linking her to King’s murder. However, since she has no alibi for the night of the murder, she stays on the list. Do I dare hope you will let me take it from here?”
With a light laugh, Olivia said, “One can always hope. I do have a request, and it has nothing to do with the murder. I know how busy you are, but could you see if you can find any information about the car accident that killed Maddie’s parents? They lived in Clarksville when they died, but maybe you know someone who could dig up some details? Maddie won’t check for herself, she doesn’t want to know.”
“But you think she should?”
“Long story, Del. Let’s just leave it that Maddie needs to work through a few things before she can move on to another stage in her own life. I’d like to help her do that.”
“I’ll see what I can do. Are we still on for tomorrow evening?”
“Tomorrow? Friday?”
“Tomorrow would be Friday, that is correct. Dinner?”
“Oh gosh, Del, I’m so sorry. I sort of . . .”
“Forgot. I get it,” Del said, a touch of curtness edging into his voice. “Did you make other plans?”
“Well . . . The Gingerbread House might be staying open late tomorrow for sort of a special event.”
“Sort of a special event? Is it, by any chance, the sort of event where a guest might suddenly get whacked with a blunt object?”
“Del, you are so suspicious. Although you’re a cop, so it’s understandable, and besides, you’re probably on the right track. We have so little time. I can’t help thinking there are folks who know more than they realize. I’m looking for a way get that information as fast as possible. I might decide it won’t work.”
“Well, let me know if you want me to hang around. Meanwhile, I’ll put Cody to work on the Briggs’ car accident.”
“Oh, and I have one more request.”
“Which is?
“It’s about Jason.” Olivia hesitated, searching for the right phrasing. When it eluded her, she went for blunt. “Jason needs to be here tomorrow evening. Now hear me out, Del. You and Cody can watch him every minute, as long as you’re subtle about it.”