Roses Have Thorns, page 6
“Wow,” he said, taking in Hazel and Mike’s costumes. “You two look amazing.” Then he glanced over Mike’s shoulder and spotted me coming down the stairs from the master bathroom where Hazel and I had been getting ready. He wolf whistled. “Why, Agent Carter, don’t you look snazzy?”
I grinned and did a little twirl after descending the steps, then stepped in to kiss his cheek. “And you, Captain Rogers, look divine.” I wiped away the red lip print on his face.
Since the night was mild, we opted to walk to the four blocks to the Maritime College’s campus. It was only about ten minutes and gave us the opportunity to take in the decorations of the houses and businesses along the way. The buildings we passed all had some sort of decoration, everything from a few cheap paper cut-outs on the front porch to the mayor’s elaborate display, complete with disappearing ghosts in the attic windows and a Bela Lugosi vampire rising from a coffin beneath a spreading oak tree in the front yard.
Abbot Hall was packed when we arrived and the band was playing one of my favorite Glenn Miller tunes, “A String of Pearls.” Leaving my purse and coat at a table, along with Sawyer’s shield and helmet, I pulled him out onto the dance floor, laughing as he spun me out to arm’s length and pulled me back in, gathering me up tight against his body. I looked around as we danced, spotting my mom and dad on the floor, too, dressed in their disco finest. Doug Abbot stood alone near the stage, holding what looked like a martini in one hand and an unlit cigar in the other. He was dressed in a white suit with a black shirt and a red pocket square, and I thought perhaps he was dressed as Kingpin from the Marvel comics, an image further curated by his rotundness and his towering height. I looked away, shivering with distaste, before he saw me, letting my attention drift over the rest of the crowd. It seemed as though half the village was in attendance, seated at tables, eating and drinking, talking, laughing, and dancing. There were plenty of unfamiliar faces as well, and I thought the advertisements on the streetlights downtown and in the shop windows lining Main Street had done their job of enticing plenty of tourists to attend the party and buy raffle tickets and bid on things in a silent auction.
Sawyer and I danced through “In The Mood,” “Sing Sing Sing,” and “Boogie Woogie Bugle Boy,” before falling into our seats. His face was flushed but he had a huge smile and his eyes sparkled. “I had no idea you were such a good dancer,” I said, reaching into my purse for a handkerchief to blot my face with.
He shrugged and looked over towards the bar. “It was Angel’s thing. Swing dancing.” He glanced back at me, the twinkle in his eyes dimmed.
“Oh,” I said, feeling awful for bringing up his ex-wife, even inadvertently. “Sorry.”
He waved away my apology. “Don’t worry about it. Want a drink?”
“Yes. A Manhattan. In keeping with tonight’s 1940s theme,” I added with a little smile.
“Sounds good. I’ll be right back.” He stood up and pressed a kiss to my forehead before cutting through the crowd in the direction of the bar. He was stopped at least four or five times on his way there and took a moment to talk with everyone who said hello. I shook my head, wondering at his seemingly endless well of patience and friendliness. I was convinced he could become sheriff some day, just on the strength of his people skills alone.
I felt a looming presence at my back and turned around to find Doug Abbot standing entirely too close for comfort. I looked up at his face and forced what I hoped was a friendly enough smile. “Hi, Doug. Nice costume. Kingpin?” I said, pleased that my voice didn’t hold any of the distaste I felt for the man.
“Good eye.” He gave me a smile that was every bit as unctuous as the character he was dressed as. “And you are Peggy Carter? Livingston is Captain America?” He took a sip from the martini glass he was still holding. I wondered if it was the same one he’d had earlier if if this was a fresh one.
“We are.” I desperately wished I had a drink that I could sip to cover the awkwardness that had descended. I didn’t know Doug very well, had never heard anything positive about him from the people who did know him. We didn’t have anything in common, didn’t really know the same people either. Then I remembered he’d known Rob. “I’m sorry about Rob. He was a nice man.”
Doug nodded and sipped his martini again. I watched his face and saw none of the sadness or pain I’d expected. Maybe they weren’t that close? “He was a nice guy,” he said at length. “You knew him well?”
“He gave me one of his puppies after I came home. But I wouldn’t say we were close. Still, his loss hit hard.”
“The village gossip says you found the body.”
This was the one topic of conversation that I had wanted to avoid tonight. Everyone in town knew that Rob was dead, and everyone knew that I’d found the body. So far no one had said anything to me about it, but I knew it was just a matter of time before someone brought it up. I looked away, down at my hands, which were playing idly with the hem of my jacket in my lap.
“I did,” I said, trying to keep back the myriad emotions the incident brought up—horror at seeing Rob’s body, the sadness I felt for Teresa, the anger I had for whomever had killed him. “It was awful,” I added in a hushed, ragged voice, unable to keep the shudders back.
“I’m sure it was,” Doug said, the meaty hand holding the cigar patting my forearm. There was no comfort in the gesture. He was simply going through the motions. “Does Livingston have any leads? A suspect maybe?”
I glanced up at his face and found him studying me. “Not that he’s told me about,” I said. “He doesn’t really share any information about his investigations with me. I’m not a deputy, you know.”
Doug chuckled and sipped his martini, draining the glass. “Right. It’s not a particularly appropriate topic for pillow talk, is it?” Before I could give voice to the indignation his comment brought, he said, “It was good talking with you, Juniper. Enjoy your evening.” He turned away and melted back into the crowd. I saw distaste on the faces of most of the people he passed by or stopped to chat briefly with.
I looked around for Sawyer and found him still a few feet from the bar, talking with a small knot of people. I wondered if he was getting the third degree about the murder, too. Taking a deep breath and trying to shake off the disgust Doug Abbot had left me with, I reached out and fluffed the flowers in the centerpiece. What a horrible person he was.
Joss and Brad arrived a few moments later, Joss in a slinky black dress and a long black wig, Brad in a dark grey chalked pinstripe suit and slicked back hair. Noah was dressed as Uncle Fester and rode in style in an old-fashioned black pram. As if drawn in by the presence of the baby, my mother popped up next to the table and stole Noah right out of his pram, taking him off in to the crowd. Joss watched, shaking her head in amusement. “You or Hazel need to give that woman a grandbaby soon, just so I can get my child back,” she commented. She looked me over with approval and then turned to search the crowd. “Where’s Captain Maine?”
I laughed, glad for the distraction, and nodded towards the bar, where Sawyer was now deep in conversation with Julian Paquet. “He’s glad-handing with the mayor. He’s supposed to be getting drinks, but people keep stopping him to talk. I’m dying of thirst, and he’s neglecting me.”
“Is he running in two years?”
I shrugged and looked back at her. “I have no idea. He should. He’d be very good.”
“And you’d be the sheriff’s honey. Just imagine all the speeding tickets you could get out of.”
“Josslyn! I wouldn’t. Besides, two years is a long ways away. Who knows what might happen between now and then.”
She made a noncommittal noise and smiled at Chris and Amy La Tour as they passed by our table on their way to the buffet. Along with the Abbots, the La Tours were Dawn Cove royalty. Their ancestor had been the first European to settle in the area, back in 1613. At one point, the La Tour family had owned all of the land between Main Street in the east and Whippoorwill Woods in the west, and everything south of Fort George to Penobscot Bay. They still owned most of the farmland surrounding the College and quite a number of buildings in downtown, including the one where my shop was located.
Eventually, Sawyer got our drinks and brought them back to the table. He soon fell into discussion of the stock market with Brad. I excused myself, finding talk of money and dividends and payouts terribly boring, and danced for a while with my dad, sidestepping questions about my burgeoning relationship with Sawyer in favor of asking him about Christmas plans. He’d been talking about going home to Edinburgh for the holidays, and I wanted to know how serious the talk was. I would love to see my former in-laws and maybe look up some university friends, too.
“Well, I’ve almost got yer mum talked into it,” Dad said as we danced to “Little Brown Jug.” He was light on his feet and still spry despite the osteoarthritis in both his knees. “We’d leave a few days after Christmas and stay until just after Hogmanay. Can ye leave the wee shop closed for that long?”
Hogmanay was the Scottish New Year’s celebration filled with parties, food and drink—namely a lot of whisky—and the First Footing, which starts immediately after midnight on January 1st, and involves being the first person to cross the threshold of a friend or neighbor’s house. The First Footer—usually a tall, dark-haired man, and never a red-haired woman, which meant I was stuck inside after midnight—brought with him gifts for the household: salt, whisky, shortbread, and coal were the most popular and were thought to bring luck and prosperity for the new year. In Edinburgh, huge crowds gathered along the Royal Mile and in the Princes Street Gardens to hear live music, watch fireworks, and sing Auld Lang Syne at midnight with 300,000 of their closest friends and relations.
“I’m sure Sarah would help out,” I replied. “Oh, no. Wait. She said she’s going to see Aunt Cherry in Brooklyn for Christmas.”
“We’ll figure it out, ducks. You’ll be wanting to see the Blairs?”
“Yes. Muriel extended an invitation the last time we spoke. Jenny had another baby in September, and they still call me Auntie June,” I said, feeling the familiar prick of tears when I thought about Joe’s mother and sister.
“That will be lovely then. We’ll work on Mummy together, aye?” The song ended and he pecked my cheek before going to find my mother. Sawyer was still talking with Brad and now Mike, too, while Joss and Hazel were chatting with Jess Sullivan and Ashley Williams.
I felt a tap on my shoulder and turned to see Mayor Julian standing there, dressed in a tweed jacket. A wig of nondescript brown hair was covered by a deerstalker hat, and he had an unlit Calabash Meerschaum pipe held in the corner of his mouth. I smiled and said, “Ah, yes. The redoubtable Mr. Holmes.”
Julian did not smile back. In fact, he looked annoyed. “Were you aware that your beau has dragged me, Leo, Steve, and Brad into the station for questioning in the past week?”
“No, I had no idea. Was it about...about Rob?” I glanced back at the table, finding Sawyer watching me. His eyes were narrowed a bit and he was staring at Julian, probably trying to figure out what exactly we were talking about.
“Yes, as if we had any motive to kill the man,” he said sullenly after taking the pipe out of his mouth and putting it into the pocket of his jacket. “I mean, he was one of our closest friends.”
“You all had the investment club, right? Is that why you were meeting with Doug Abbot?”
Julian’s eyes went hard and flinty at Doug’s name. “Who said we were meeting with him?”
“I think I overheard my dad and Dr. Steve talking about it recently,” I said, not wanting to throw Brad under the bus.
Julian snorted and shook his head. “Doug tried to get us to invest in something but we all turned him down. He is a terrible businessman and his proposal would have been awful for the village.” He fell silent and looked down into the half-full wine glass he was holding. “I’m going to go get another drink. See if you can’t convince your beau that the Dawn Cove Investment Club had absolutely nothing to do with Rob’s death, would you?” He was gone before I could say anything further. I stared at him, thoroughly bemused by the interaction.
“He’s not my beau,” I muttered to myself. Sawyer detached himself from Brad and Mike and came to stand next to me, his arm going around my waist, his hand coming to rest on my hip. Not my beau, huh? I thought to myself. Liar.
“You okay?” he asked, looking past me into the crowd. I followed his line of sight and found him staring after Julian. “What did he want?”
“He wants me to tell you to stop interrogating him and my dad and the rest of the investment club.” I drew away and looked up, becoming annoyed with him for some reason I couldn’t quite put my finger on.
Sawyer reached up with his free hand to press the tip of his index finger against my brow, right between my eyes, where they were drawn together in a thoughtful frown. “What’s with the frown?”
I shrugged and followed him back to the table where I finished off my Manhattan. “I guess I’m mad at you for talking with my dad without telling me. And I guess I’m annoyed by being left out of the investigation.”
“I’m sorry. When did you join the sheriff’s department?” I snorted, and he gave me the lopsided smirk. “If it’s any help, I never suspected your dad of killing Rob. I called all of Rob’s friends in to talk with them about him. You know, get some routine information from them about his other friends and business partners and things like that?”
“What about Brad and Julian and Dr. Steve?”
“Cleared them, too. Well, not Julian, but definitely Brad and Dr. Steve.”
I gaped at Sawyer, my jaw hanging open in shock. “Not Julian? Why not Julian?”
Sawyer sighed and returned his attention to the crowd for a moment before answering me. “We found something with Rob’s papers that indicated the need for a closer look at him.”
“Quit speaking in bureaucrat. What did you find?”
The band started playing “Moonlight Serenade,” and instead of answering, he grabbed my hand, leading me out to the dance floor. He pulled me close against him, but I fought him for a moment. “Please, Junie,” he said, brushing his lips against my temple. “I really can’t talk to you about this. Can’t you just let it go and dance with me?”
I sighed and flashed him a grumpy look. He smirked and pulled me close again, confident of his win. I snuggled my head against his shoulder as we swayed slowly around the floor.
The issue of Julian’s guilt or innocence was quickly forgotten as Sawyer and I danced more, drank more, and sampled the food that Jess and Ash had catered. There were tiny quiche Lorraine, lobster rolls, Nashville hot chicken sliders, chili in bread bowls, little bacon-wrapped sausages in a spicy-fruity sauce, and vegetable trays with blackened ranch dip. Dessert had also been brought in, pies and cookies and cakes made by the ladies of the village, including my mother’s famous pumpkin pie. As promised, I had made certain to snag a piece for Sarah before the pie disappeared.
Sawyer and I stayed for another hour or so after Joss and Brad left to take Noah home. As we were on our way out, Hazel grabbed me and pulled me aside. “Can you come over after church on Sunday?” she asked, her voice low and conspiratorial. “I have something I want to talk to you about.”
“Yeah, of course,” I said. “One o’clock? I’ll bring pain perdu from Last Magnolia?”
“Sounds perfect.” She hugged me and I kissed her cheek before sliding my hand into Sawyer’s and allowing him to escort me back to his truck, which was still parked outside of Hazel and Mike’s house.
CHAPTER TEN
Since the next day was Halloween, I kept the shop open for an hour and a half past our normal closing time. Most of the businesses on Main Street did as well, offering a safe place for parents and trick-or-treaters to warm up as well as big bowls of candy. Ours was filled with flower-shaped gummies. Sarah had found them in New York and brought home a huge case. The dogs, dressed as Thing One and Thing Two from Dr. Seuss’s The Cat In The Hat, and I passed out candy, marveling at the ingenuity and imagination on display in the kids’ and adults’ costumes.
Sawyer was working the overnight shift at a DUI checkpoint on Highway 166, which stretched between Dawn Cove and Orland, along the Orland River. It wasn’t a particularly highly traveled road, so poor Sawyer would most likely be bored out of his skull all night. The weather wouldn’t be good, either; we were expecting our first snowfall of the season overnight. I hoped he had his thermals on under his uniform.
I woke up on November first to find a blanket of pristine snow had covered the village overnight. The sun was out, turning the undisturbed snowfields into sparkling stretches of diamond-crusted white, perfect for snow angels, snowmen, and snowball fights. I stood at my living room window, wrapped in a thick Sherpa blanket, sipping coffee while I watched a snowplow laboring to clear Main Street.
Before making breakfast, I let the dogs out and laughed at Dundee’s reaction to the snow. He hated it and had to be physically pushed off the deck into the yard to do his business. Cornbread, on the other hand, loved it. She acted as a little snowplow, nose down and pushing through the drifts to forge paths for her dog brother. Dundee lingered only long enough to take care of necessities before he was bounding back into the kitchen; I had to entice Cornbread inside with a homemade pumpkin dog biscuit.
I ate a leisurely breakfast, lingering over the morning paper while I nibbled my crumpet and sipped more coffee. There was an article about Rob’s murder, quoting Sawyer’s bureaucrat speech. No new suspects, no new information, if anyone knew anything they should share it with the sheriff’s department, et cetera. Sawyer sent me a quick text at 8:30, just to tell me that he was home and to ask if I wanted to get dinner that night. I said yes immediately and we made plans to meet at the Pepper Mill at six-thirty.
