Mistletoe is Murder Read online

  Chapter 12

  Jessie glanced down at the screen of her phone. The chief’s name was flashing up on it.

  “Chief Daly,” she said, trying to keep the hopefulness out of her voice. She hadn’t heard from him all day. She prayed he was calling about a break in the case.

  “Don’t get your hopes up, Jessie,” he said gravely. “I’m just calling to tell you that Lottie is about to be released on bail.”

  Jessie exhaled with relief. “That’s great news.”

  “The charges stand.”

  Jessie massaged her temple with her free hand. It was simply unbelievable to her that Lottie could be the murderer. But she swallowed her protests—there was no sense in berating the chief when he was just trying to do his job.

  “Anything else? DNA matches?”

  Chief Daly cleared his throat. “Yes, there has been. The lab confirmed that the hair samples they found on the jacket match those taken from Lottie.”

  Jessie’s heart sank. “So it was her suit.”

  “Yes, Jessie. It appears that way.”

  “No other samples or fibers on there?”

  “I’m afraid not. They found some short hairs but those turned out to be animal hairs. Probably Buster’s.”

  “Hmm.” Jessie didn’t like that one bit. “Is there a chance that the suspect was very careful? That they managed not to get any hair or other fiber onto that jacket?”

  The chief sighed. “Jessie, you’d have to ask the guys at the lab. I know you want this to be somebody else, but I think it’s time to face facts here. Lottie might be going away for a very long time. They found her fingerprints on the murder weapon.”

  Jessie grasped behind her for something steady to grip a hold of. “They what?”

  He exhaled through his teeth. Even though Jessie couldn’t see him, she could picture the grave expression he probably wore at that moment. She didn’t envy him having to tell her all of this.

  “There’s nothing else? What about her phone records?” It was the only shred of hope Jessie had left. If she could prove her friend had an alibi, then it might buy them some time to find the real killer.

  “Nothing yet,” the chief sighed. “They promised they’d have them to me yesterday. I swear these people are getting younger and more incompetent. The man I spoke to this morning sounded all of about twelve.”

  Jessie gasped.

  “Oh, Jessie, I know this is hard for you. I’m doing everything I can to be as thorough as possible, but it’s not looking good. I can’t find anyone else in town with a motive to kill David.”

  “No,” Jessie managed. “No, you’ve just reminded me of something,” she said excitedly. “The kid. Remember? Karen Palmer’s son called out that he saw Santa.”

  A shiver ran down Jessie’s back. She had thought little Ricky was just being overexcited at the Christmas party. But what if he wasn’t? What if he saw something that could clear Lottie’s name?

  “It’s worth a try,” the chief said unconvinced. “Give her a call. Let’s get over there and see what he’s got to say.”

  ***

  “Hi Ricky,” Jessie said brightly, trying to keep the apprehension from her face. She wasn’t really a child person, and the five-year-old sitting on the sofa opposite seemed to sense that.

  “Hi,” he muttered.

  “Now, Ricky,” Karen scolded. “Sit up straight and answer Ms. Henderson properly. We don’t slouch in this house.”

  Jessie smiled gratefully. “I wanted to ask you a question or two about the party,” she said gently.

  “Is that okay, buddy?” Chief Daly asked, making a big show of taking out his notebook and perching it on his lap.

  Ricky nodded. “I guess.”

  “Okay,” Jessie said, trying to smile so her voice would sound calm and casual. She didn’t want to rattle the kid and make him clam up. “Remember the party? In the café?”

  He made no response. Jessie decided to carry on.

  “Do you remember Santa?”

  Ricky looked up at her and then glanced at the chief. “He’s not Santa,” he said sullenly. “Santa’s gone.”

  “Oh I know,” Jessie said, as if they were sharing a confidence. “He’s Chief Daly. The Chief of Police here in Springdale.”

  “I know that,” Ricky said.

  Karen shuffled closer to her son. “I don’t want him mixed up in a murder investigation,” she said, wrapping her arm around him.

  The chief shook his head. “He’s not going to be wrapped up in a murder investigation. We just want to ask him some questions, that’s all.”

  Jessie bit her lip and looked from mother to son. “How did you know that’s what we were here for?” she asked. News had spread through the town by now, but they hadn’t released details of the Santa suit. Karen couldn’t have known about that.

  Karen glared at Jessie. “Do you think I’m an idiot? I’m fed up with people speaking to me like I’m a fool just because I choose to stay home and look after Ricky. Don’t you think it’s obvious? A man is killed and you show up wanting to ask my son questions about the same party. Really?”

  Jessie was dumbfounded. “I’m so sorry,” she whispered. “That’s not what I meant; not at all.” She glanced at the chief, who was looking away.

  “You like school, Ricky?” he asked patiently.

  Ricky nodded. “I guess.”

  “What’s your favorite subject?”

  Jessie brimmed with impatience, but she didn’t dare interrupt and tell the chief how to run his own investigation.

  “Art, I think,” Ricky said.

  “You like painting?”

  Ricky nodded.

  Chief Daly smiled. “Jessie here is a big fan of sculpture. You know, like play dough.”

  Jessie cringed. “I thought I was. But I haven’t been able to do much since I moved here.”

  The boy was watching her. “What do you make?” he asked at last.

  Jessie tried to hide her surprise at his interest. “I’m just getting started,” she told him. “I’ve made some pots out of clay. And some figurines that didn’t turn out so good.”

  He nodded knowingly. “It breaks.”

  Jessie nodded, surprised. “Yeah, exactly that. When they came out of the kiln over in Stanleyton, they were brittle and the arms just came off.”

  “That’s why I like painting the best,” he smiled. “And because of the colors.”

  “I might have to give that a try,” Jessie admitted. “At least until I build up my skills. You’ll have to show me how.”

  Ricky beamed happily. “Okay. Just tell me when.”

  “Ricky,” the chief said softly. “Remember that day at the party? You yelled—quite rightly—that I wasn’t Santa.”

  Karen clasped her hand to her throat. “Chief, I’m so sorry about that. He can be a little blunt, but he didn’t mean anything by it.”

  Chief Daly held up his hand. “It’s quite alright, Ms. Palmer. I wasn’t offended. I just want to ask Ricky something about that day.”

  She nodded.

  “Who were you expecting to see?”

  Ricky shrugged as if it was the dumbest question in the world. “Santa,” he said simply.

  “Is it a man or a woman?” Jessie burst in.

  Ricky seemed to retreat into himself a little. Jessie glanced past him, to his mother, who was twirling the pendant around her neck with such force that Jessie worried the delicate silver chain would snap apart. “Are you okay, Karen?”

  Karen seemed to come to in response to the question. “Yes, yes of course. Why wouldn’t I be? It’s just so terrible what happened to that poor man. Terrible.”

  Jessie nodded.

  The chief tried again. “Ricky, can you describe Santa? You’ve seen Santa before the party?”

  The child looked unsure.

  “You must have. Otherwise, how would you have known that I wasn’t him?”

  “Because you’re the chief. You can’t be chief and Santa at the same
time. And you don’t live on the North Pole.”

  Jessie smiled. “You saw the real Santa earlier that day?”

  Ricky looked up at his mother, who patted his shoulder. “I don’t remember. I… I…”

  “It’s okay, son,” Chief Daly said, smiling and standing up. “You’ve been—”

  “No,” Ricky said decisively. “Not that day. We see him at the funny store. Don’t we, Mom?”

  Karen Palmer’s face looked like it had turned to stone.

  “What’s the funny store, Ricky?” Jessie asked, heart pounding.

  Ricky glanced up at his mother. “With the animals. You know, cows and stuff.” He sighed and sunk into the chair. “Mom said to be on the lookout for Santa but he never came to talk to me.”

  ***

  “Is that it?” Jessie asked, as they walked down the long driveway to the cruiser.

  The chief shrugged. “I suppose it has to be. The child doesn’t remember anything.”

  “Maybe if we persisted? There’s something very weird going on. Karen Palmer was complaining about Lottie to anyone who’d listen. What if she’s behind this?”

  “He’s five years old. We can’t just bundle him into the back of the cruiser and take him down to the station for questioning.”

  “No, I suppose not,” Jessie said, staring out the window.

  “Look,” he said kindly. “It was worth a shot. But he’s young.”

  “What about Karen knowing immediately that we were coming to ask questions about the murder? Nobody outside of me, you and Aunt Bee knows about the jacket we found outside the café.”

  He shook his head and turned the key to start the car. “That’s true, Jessie. But everybody knows about the murder, just like she said. It really wasn’t that hard for her to put two and two together.”

  Jessie nodded and stared out the window as they headed back to Springdale.

  “Don’t worry,” the chief muttered. “We’ll get to the bottom of this. But you’re going to have to prepare yourself for the possibility that it was Lottie after all.”

  Chapter 13

  “Jessie is that you?” Aunt Bee called before she had even reached the top step of Bee’s cottage.

  “Yeah?” Jessie said hesitantly. She had a sixth sense for when her aunt was in a strange mood, and this seemed like one of those times. “What’s up?”

  Bee pulled open the door. “Oh thank goodness you’re here. Come, come.”

  Jessie stepped through the door. After speaking with Karen Palmer, she had gone to help Julia unpack a consignment in her antique book store. She’d had no contact with Bee or the chief. “Has there been a development in the case?”

  Bee looked at her like she was speaking in a foreign language.

  “You know, the David Fairway case.”

  Bee shook her head. “You’re the one who’s working on it. No, I haven’t heard from Charles all afternoon.” There was a trace of irritation in her voice.

  “Oh,” Jessie said, deflated. “It’s just that you seem a little… irritated.”

  Bee rolled her eyes and turned on her heel. Jessie followed her into the small kitchen/living room and gasped. The usually neat room was brimming with clutter.

  “What is all this?” Jessie asked, looking around in astonishment. “Should I call that TV show about hoarders? Tell them to send a crew ASAP?”

  “Don’t be ridiculous, Jessie. Where’s that cousin of yours?”

  Jessie shrugged. “I don’t know. I haven’t spoken to her since this morning. What is all this, Bee? You’re usually so neat.”

  Her aunt didn’t answer. Instead, she stomped to the dinner table and stood over it, muttering something. Alarmed, Jessie glanced first at her aunt and then at the phone, wondering if she could call emergency services.

  Finally, Bee let out a heartwrenching sigh. “How am I supposed to decide between the ivory damask and the white with silver piping?”

  “No offense, Aunt Bee,” Jessie said, rushing over to her. “But I haven’t the faintest idea what you’re talking about.”

  Aunt Bee turned around and held two pieces of shimmery card aloft in either hand. “The wedding invitations. And that’s just the tip of the iceberg. How was I to know that there’s a whole industry built around this stuff? That I’m supposed to color-coordinate the invitations to the colors the bridal party will wear?” She threw her hands up. “Decorations for the chairs. Centerpieces. My goodness, I don’t know what I’ve signed up to.”

  Seeing the distress underneath her aunt’s frustration, Jessie pulled out a chair and helped her aunt into it. “I thought you guys had decided you wanted something small? Something low-key?”

  Bee sighed. “We did. But then I started looking into all of this.” She pointed at the stack of bridal magazines on the coffee table. “Jessie, you wouldn’t believe the number of things there are to organize. I’m lost.”

  Jessie took her aunt’s hands in her own. “I have a fairly good idea of what you’re going through,” she said gently. “I’ve been married before, remember?”

  Aunt Bee nodded.

  “A lot of this stuff…” Jessie trailed off. She didn’t want to be the Grinch that played down her aunt’s big day, but she had seen it herself firsthand—a lavish wedding didn’t guarantee a happy marriage. “You and the chief are perfect for each other. Do you need to spend a fortune and give yourself a heart attack to prove that? It’s already obvious.”

  Bee sighed. “I suppose it’s just what you do nowadays, isn’t it? I’m not exactly going to be a blushing bride in the first flush of youth—I know that. But I’d still like to look nice; to put on a fine party.”

  “But you will look nice, Aunt Bee. You love the chief. And that love and happiness is going to radiate off you on the day, regardless of whether you go for the ivory or the white invites.”

  “That’s just the start of it,” Bee said morosely. “There are seating plans and entertainment. And catering and the bar.”

  “But you love that stuff,” Jessie said. “The Christmas party was your idea and you had so much fun organizing it.”

  Bee shrugged. “This is different.”

  Jessie sighed. Bee was the one person she wouldn’t have expected to bend under wedding pressure. “Look, we’ll get everything organized. I’ll do the catering for starters.”

  “You can’t,” Bee said, face stony. “You’re one of the guests of honor, along with your cousin. I can’t have you off in the kitchen out of sight.”

  Jessie squeezed her hand. “Well then, we’ll find somebody else to do it. This is going to be fine, okay?” she stared at Bee’s face, relieved to see she looked slightly more relaxed. She had never seen her aunt so stressed before and she didn’t like it one bit.

  “I don’t know. It’s a lot of organizing. And you know Charles—he’s got no interest in this type of stuff.”

  Jessie nodded. “Yeah, I can imagine. But you don’t seem to be either. Are you sure you’re doing this because you want to and not because you’ve been swept up in what your wedding should be like?”

  Aunt Bee smiled slowly and leaned over to pat Jessie’s cheek. “Thank you, Jessie. You’ve always been a good soul. You’re right. I suppose I’m nervous about the day itself and that’s coming across in the way I’m reacting to silly decisions about paper.”

  Jessie shrugged. “I’ve been there. Don’t you remember? I almost had a mental breakdown when the paper I ordered weren’t the right shade of cream.”

  Bee nodded. “I remember well.”

  “Even the best of us can turn into bridezillas. Just remember—the day is about you and the chief, nothing else.” Her phone buzzed on the table. “Speak of the devil. Let me just get this.”

  Jessie swiped the screen and held the phone to her ear. “Hi, Chief.”

  “Jessie,” he said, with none of his usual friendliness. “I’ve got my hands on those phone records.”

  “Wow,” Jessie gasped. “Well? Do they show she called when she s
aid she did?”

  He sighed impatiently. “Unfortunately it’s not as clear-cut as that. Can you come to the station?”

  Jessie glanced at Bee who nodded and mouthed “go”. “Okay,” she gasped. “I’ll be there as soon as I can.”

  Chapter 14

  Jessie pushed open the door and walked through the foyer of the station, not even stopping to chat to Officer Pete Kendall like she usually would.

  “Chief?” she said, knocking on the frame of his open office door.

  He looked up and nodded.

  Jessie closed the door and rushed across the room, stomach churning. “Tell me it’s good news.”

  He sighed and slid a sheaf of paper across the desk to her. Jessie looked up bewildered. “What am I looking at? Can’t you just tell me? Even if it’s bad news, we’ll find a way through it.”

  He sighed and tapped the pile with his pen. “The problem is, Jessie, that there’s no ‘good’ or ‘bad’ answer. It’s complex. You’re looking at printouts of Lottie’s phone records—cell and landline—for the past month. They also send me the records for Clintock’s Meats.”

  “And?” Jessie said, scanning the first page. She wasn’t being difficult—without context, it was just a bunch of numbers on the page. She looked at the top and recognized the number in the heading. “Wait, this is Lottie’s cell, right?”

  Chief Daly glanced at the sheet and nodded. “Yes,” he sighed. “So. I think it’s the third page—that was the day of the party. You’ll see where I’ve highlighted a number. I’ve cross-checked and she did indeed speak to somebody at Clintock at that time and for thirty minutes.”

  A knot tightened in Jessie’s stomach. That sounded like good news, but there had to be a reason for the chief’s hesitation.

  He cleared his throat and reached for a blank sheet of paper. “It’s easier to understand if we sketch out a timeline. We discovered the victim at two fifteen. The meal started at one thirty, so that’s the window we’re looking at.”

  Jessie stared at the cell company printout. “And that fits. Lottie was on the phone for a half hour from one thirty. There’s no way she could have gotten from her home back to the café in fifteen minutes, murdered somebody and then left again.”