“Mr. Meagher knew what time we were having Easter dinner.”
“Of course he did. So did you.”
A.J. said reluctantly, “Did he know you were leaving the house to go buy milk?”
“Of course n-” Elysia’s face froze.
Seeing her startled expression, A.J.’s heart sank. “Did he know?”
Elysia whispered, “He called to verify at what time we were eating just as I was leaving for the shop. I told him I was running out to buy a tin of milk.”
A.J. wasn’t sure what to say.
Elysia straightened. “This is bloody ludicrous,” she snapped. “Bradley Meagher is no more a murderer than I am. The case against him is utterly and ridiculously circumstantial. I refuse to discuss this line of reasoning any further.” Her eyes were very bright.
“Okay,” A.J. said mildly. She turned the page of the legal pad.
“Bradley is not a murderer.”
“Got it.” A.J. glanced over the scrawled notes on the next page. “That leaves Dicky’s vengeful ex-lovers.”
“Dora.”
“Besides Dora.”
“We don’t know any of his ex-lovers except for Maddie. Which reminds me. Maddie’s death is somehow connected to Dicky’s, and Bradley Meagher wouldn’t have harmed a hair on Maddie’s head.”
A.J. said thoughtfully, “That’s a good point. What if Dicky and Maddie’s deaths have nothing to do with blackmail at all?”
“What do you mean?” Elysia looked wary, still on guard against further attempts to implicate Bradley Meagher. “They were divorced. What other connection could there be?”
“I’m not sure. I’m just brainstorming here. They were divorced, but what if there was still some financial connection? Some property or business interest they jointly owned?”
Elysia brightened. “That’s very good. Perhaps Maddie never changed her will? She was quite wealthy; although I think she spent a small fortune on that money pit she called a renovation.”
“But Dicky died first,” A.J. pointed out. “So I don’t see how that helps even if Maddie didn’t change her will. Dicky died first so anything he might have inherited from Maddie would surely be null and void.” A.J. propped her chin on her hand, thinking it over. “And where does Peggy Graham tie into this? Assuming she was murdered.”
“She had to have been murdered.”
“Maybe. But if Peggy’s tied into it, then we can probably eliminate the antiquities theft line of investigation.”
“Not so fast,” Elysia said. “Don’t forget that Mart Crowley said her sister was on a number of boards for charities and the arts. Perhaps she was on the board of some museum? Perhaps her death does tie in with the illegal sale of antiquities.”
“Not bad.” A.J. made a note to follow up on that. “There aren’t any bones in that, are there?” she added as Elysia tossed Monster a piece of chicken skin.
Monster caught it in one snap, like a hungry shark.
“Of course not.”
“There is one other theory we haven’t really even considered.”
“What’s that?”
“Maybe Dicky was telling the truth all along.”
“About what?”
“About you. Maybe he was serious about giving up his life of crime for you.”
To her surprise, Elysia flushed. “That’s sweet, lovie. But you needn’t worry about sparing my feelings. There were no illusions on my side.”
“But hear me out. Suppose Dicky did want out of this hypothetical blackmail ring. Suppose he wanted you to make an honest man of him. We’ve already established-well, theorized at least-that there are potentially ruthless people running some kind of extortion racket targeting single, middle-aged women. If we’re right about all that, and if it’s true that these people silenced Peggy Graham, then what wouldn’t they be willing to do to stop Dicky from bailing out?”
“Why wouldn’t they just let him go? He was hardly the type to incriminate himself by going to the police.”
“Maybe your reputation preceded you. Or maybe mine did.”
“Your what?”
“I know it’s a stretch, but hear me out. There was a write-up on us in the Stillbrook Streamer last summer after we solved Nicole’s murder. Maybe the amateur sleuth thing factored in for Dicky’s partners in crime.” A.J. added with triumph, “And maybe that’s why he was killed in your front yard. Maybe it wasn’t someone taking a big chance, maybe it wasn’t by chance after all. Maybe it was a deliberate attempt to throw suspicion on you!”
Twenty
Lily called in sick on Friday morning and A.J.’s sleuthing had to take a backseat to the scramble of trying to cover the Number One Instructor’s classes.
“She’s flexing her muscles,” Emma remarked as A.J. glanced over Lily’s calendar. “She really doesn’t think this place could survive without her. Do you know she hasn’t taken a vacation of more than two days in a row in over five years?”
“I know she hasn’t taken one in the last year.”
“Five years,” Emma said doggedly. “This studio is her life.”
“She probably heard from Mara Allen yesterday that I’m not going to sell Sacred Balance.”
Emma looked relieved. “I can see that might make her feel a mite queasy.”
A.J. studied Lily’s schedule and decided they could manage without trying to call Denise Farber in from her day off. “If Suze can take Lily’s Teens class and Simon can take the Teacher Training class and her Yin Yoga we can do this. It’s my heavy day, but I can take her Vinyasa and still catch my Restorative evening class.”
“Don’t go throwing your back out after you’ve just got on your feet again.”
“I won’t. I think these months of yoga are to thank for my being back on my feet so quickly. The last time my back went out I was out of action for six weeks.”
“Just don’t overdo it.”
A.J. looked up, smiling. “I think this might work pretty well, actually. I’m going to hold a mini staff meeting before the evening sessions start. I want to put to bed the rumor that I’m selling once and for all.”
“I think that’s a wise move,” Emma said.
A.J. went back to her office and ordered pizzas to be delivered for lunch. It was clearly going to be one of those days.
From that moment on it felt like she never stopped moving. When she had finally had a free moment late in the morning, she phoned Jake.
He didn’t pick up. The most likely explanation was that he was busy and it wasn’t convenient, but with their changed relationship, A.J. was finding an unexpected streak of paranoia within herself.
“Hey there, it’s me,” she said pleasantly as she left a message for him. “I have a… well, maybe not a lead, but Dora Beauford mentioned that she’d sicced the Department of Homeland Security on Massri. She wanted him thrown out of the country. Since that never happened, she assumed the DHS never acted on her call. I’m wondering if that’s true. She believed he’d entered the country illegally. If he didn’t enter illegally, that could be a lead. Immigrants still have to be sponsored or married to a US citizen, as far as I know.”
She hung up and waited for a few minutes but she didn’t really expect him to call back this quickly. It wasn’t an emergency after all. She left her office and went to cover the Yoga for Teens class.
The pizza delivery was a big success and the rest of the afternoon passed relatively quickly despite numerous complaints about having eaten way too much to possibly do yoga.
At the end of the afternoon during the two-hour break between the day and evening sessions, A.J. held a quick and informal staff meeting.
“It’s come to my attention that there are some rumors flying around. Rumors about my personal plans and my plans for Sacred Balance. Some of you may even have heard that I met with Mara Allen of Yoga Meridian yesterday for lunch.”