| |
Remi whirled around, gasping. As she did, Beatrice struck her from behind as hard as she could with the chicken dinner. Remi’s grip loosened on the gun and Beatrice grabbed it from her. Unfamiliar with weapons, she shuttled it over to Quinn, who leveled it at Remi.
When the cell phone guy walked in with a cheerful, “Helloooo?” he froze, stunned, gaping at the sight of Quinn training the gun at Remi, fried chicken and coffee all over the floor, and the minister’s wife right in the middle of it.
Beatrice had never been so grateful to see anyone in her life.
Ramsay had finally checked his messages, spoken to Meadow, or both, and was on the scene moments later, followed quickly by the state police. The cell phone guy (Beatrice realized she should think of him as Ace, instead) briefly gave a statement to Ramsay, set the food from the care committee in the fridge, and hastily vacated the premises. Beatrice promised herself she’d never roll her eyes at his ringing phone again.
“What’s happened here, Remi?” asked Ramsay, looking grim.
Remi shook her head. “I’m not going to speak with you or any of the other cops. I want to talk with a lawyer.
Ramsay nodded. One of the officers from the state police formally arrested Remi and took her to the station.
Ramsay glanced around the living room. Beatrice noticed that the addition of fried chicken and coffee definitely made the already-messy house look even worse, if that were even possible.
Quinn said, “We can sit in the kitchen, if that’s better, Ramsay. I know it’s a wreck in here. I’ll just need a hand getting off the sofa.”
“No, no. You just stay put. Beatrice and I can make this work, can’t we?”
Beatrice nodded and sat in a chair across from Quinn and next to Ramsay. Her heart was still pounding so hard that she didn’t trust herself to speak.
Ramsay studied both of them. “Are you two okay? It looks like a lot happened here. Do we need to get an ambulance for you?”
Beatrice shook her head, still feeling shaky.
Quinn said wryly, “Please, no more hospitals. I’m bandaged up enough.” He gestured to his collection of injuries. Although his tone was light, his face was ashen.
Ramsay nodded. “I hear that. Okay, which of you wants to start out with the recap?”
Quinn and Beatrice looked at each other. “You should go ahead,” said Quinn. “Maybe hearing you talk about it will help me to get it straight in my head. My mind is still spinning.”
Beatrice took a deep breath. “Well, I guess it started when I spoke with Remi. She’d said in passing that she’d never been to Summer’s house. But Piper mentioned to me later that she had.”
Ramsay said, “One of those inconsistencies you mentioned in your message.”
“Right. But, you know—I figured that maybe Remi had forgotten she’d been to Summer’s house or that Piper could have been wrong. Things got a bit more muddled when I was talking with Savannah. She told me Summer had been very successful on the stock market and had been handing out investment advice to people.”
Ramsay quirked an eyebrow. “I’m sure Savannah didn’t think much of that.”
“Exactly. She thought stock market advising should be left to the professionals. I guess Summer had either a streak of luck or had really good acumen when it came to stocks. It sounded like people around town liked to get stock tips from her.”
Quinn said wryly, “Summer probably enjoyed that. She’d have liked being the community expert on the stock market. And she probably did know exactly what she was doing on there. I’m not saying Summer wasn’t lucky, but she also was the kind of person who’d carefully research things before she jumped into them. If she gave bad investment advice, I bet it’s because she wanted to give bad investment advice.”
“That’s interesting. I hadn’t even considered the fact that she might have given bad advice as a way of messing with people,” said Beatrice. “Anyway, I started thinking about Remi’s sudden lack of funds and her falling out with Summer. I’d thought Remi was upset with Summer because she’d failed as a go-between.”
Quinn frowned. “A go-between?”
“Remi sent Summer on a mission to find out if you might be interested in dating her.”
Quinn’s eyes opened wide. “Did she? I didn’t know anything about that.” His expression stated that he was relieved he hadn’t dated Remi.
Beatrice nodded. “I guess Remi had always thought there was a connection between the two of you but wasn’t confident about acting on it. She asked Summer, who said she was a friend of yours, to reach out to you and see if you might have lunch or a coffee with her or something. Except that Summer didn’t do it. She didn’t approach you, but she came back to Remi and said that you wanted to just stay friends.”
Ramsay said, “At some point, I guess Remi realized Summer hadn’t gotten in touch with Quinn? Did Summer tell her that, or was it something Remi just guessed?”
“Remi said she could tell the next time Quinn came into the library that Summer hadn’t said anything to him about it. She said Quinn acted just as he usually did and there wasn’t any awkwardness between them at all. That’s when she suspected Summer might have double-crossed her. Then Quinn and Tobi started dating and got married. And, sometime later, Quinn and Summer had an affair.”
Ramsay raised his eyebrows. “So Remi felt double-crossed by Summer a couple of times over. That must have really riled her up.”
“I think it made her mad, sure. But not enough to kill someone,” said Beatrice. “Which might have been why I thought she couldn’t really have murdered Summer. Missing an opportunity to date someone hardly seemed like a motive for murder.”
“And also because killer librarians are pretty rare,” said Quinn, his color returning a little.
Beatrice smiled at him. “True. They can be fierce, but are generally non-violent. But then I realized Remi could have been a friend Summer had given investment advice to. Remi seemed to trust Summer. Maybe Summer gave Remi investment advice around the same time she was supposed to be the intermediary between Remi and you. At that point, she still trusted Summer. She could have been interested in trying to duplicate the success Summer had had on the stock market and buffered her nest egg a bit. If Remi had lost all her savings, that could have been significant enough for her to want revenge.”
“Especially considering that she was already upset about the Quinn thing,” said Ramsay.
“So I left a message for you, Ramsay, and headed over to see Quinn and deliver some food to him.”
Ramsay snorted. “And probably ask Quinn questions.”
Beatrice reddened a little. “Probably.”
Quinn said fervently, “I’m glad you came over, no matter what the reason was. If you hadn’t been here, I’d be dead right now. There’s no way, in the condition I’m in right now, that I’d have been able to put up any kind of fight. And when Remi was pointing a gun at me, I realized just how much I wanted to have a fresh start on life.” He shivered. “I couldn’t believe how cold she looked. Maybe she did have a crush on me before, but she was totally ready to murder me without a second thought to save her own skin.”
“So Beatrice, you delivered the food to Quinn.” Ramsay’s gaze cast over the coffee and chicken mess on the floor again. But Remi was already here when you arrived?”
“I didn’t know she was here at first. Her car wasn’t here, for one thing.”
Ramsay said, “I noticed driving in that her car is parked far away from the house, so Remi couldn’t be spotted. So how did you know she was inside?”
“When I got closer to the house, I could hear raised voices. I heard Quinn saying Remi’s name and realized what was going on. And I think Quinn should take it from here.”
Quinn nodded. “I wondered if Remi had killed Summer because I spotted her car in the vicinity of Summer’s house that morning. It was also parked down the road a bit. Like I mentioned to you at the park, I thought everyone would think I’d killed Summer if I called the police. Plus, the fact we’d had an affair would become public knowledge, too. And I didn’t particularly want to deal with an angry husband, thinking I’d offed his wife for some reason. I just left.”
“Why didn’t you mention to me at the park that you knew Remi had been at Summer’s house the morning she died?” asked Ramsay.
Quinn spread out his hands. “I’d only just realized at that moment that it had been Remi’s car I’d seen. I wanted to get back home and digest that. Anyway, after I found Summer, I wanted to get away from her house as fast as I could, and undetected. I think I was in shock, too. It was awful—finding Summer there like that. She’d always been so alive and vibrant. I couldn’t believe she was gone. The rest of the day was sort of a blur. I didn’t really remember any details from that morning. At the park, I remembered I’d passed a car on the way out. I realized I’d seen that car at the library before and that it had a library-related bumper sticker on it. I knew it had to be Remi.”
“How did she know you suspected her?” asked Ramsay.
“I called her. You have to remember that Remi and I were friends. I’d talk to her at the library whenever I was picking up a book. I didn’t want to just give her up to the police if there was a legitimate reason why her car was there. I figured she might have been on her way to work and her car broke down or something. I called her up.”
“And she came over,” said Ramsay.
“That’s right. And I was a little surprised at that, but I figured she just wanted to chat. After all, we were friends, like I said. Maybe we’d talk about books a little and then she’d laugh and tell me about her car trouble. But when she came inside, she looked agitated and edgy. I knew right then that something was up.”
“You still let her in the house, though,” said Ramsay.
Quinn sighed. “Yeah, I shouldn’t have done that. But I didn’t really think she was involved. I didn’t want to believe she was involved. I mean, those were two really ruthless murders. That’s why I wanted to give her the chance to explain before I talked to you. I guess I figured I could handle whatever the situation was.”
“Maybe you could before your accident, but those injuries were going to slow you down,” noted Ramsay. “Plus, you wouldn’t have been much use against a gun, whether you’d been in an accident or not.”
“I had no idea she was carrying,” said Quinn, raising his hands. “I’d never have let her inside if I had.”
Ramsay nodded. “You let her in, and she pulled a gun on you right away?”
“No. She seemed like she was trying to figure out exactly what it was that I knew. But then it was pretty obvious that she was the one responsible. Like I said, her face was almost devoid of any emotion. Except anger.”
Ramsay said, “Did she talk about the crimes at all? Give any information or details?”
“Not really. Remi did say that she had to kill Sylvia for the same reason—that she knew too much, just like me. It was sort of a warning to let me know she meant business.” Quinn gave a slight shiver, thinking about it.
“So Beatrice came over and heard you two arguing,” prompted Ramsay.
Quinn said in a fervent voice. “She did. I don’t know if was really the both of us arguing; I think it was mainly me sounding increasingly panicked and Remi getting really angry. I’m so thankful Beatrice came by right at that moment. I was feeling really desperate because I knew there was no way I could get out of the situation, especially as broken up as I am right now. Remi had the gun pointed at me and she was deadly serious. There was no way she was planning on letting me leave that room alive.”
Beatrice said, “The front door was unlocked, so I slipped inside to see what was going on. I could hear that Quinn was in trouble.”
“And it sounded like you needed to intervene? That his life was in danger?”
“I heard Quinn say that Remi had a gun. I knew I had to do something or else Quinn would end up like Summer and Sylvia.” Beatrice pointed to the chicken and coffee all over the floor and furniture. “That’s what’s left of the meal I brought. I flung the coffee at Remi, and Quinn tried to grab the gun. I didn’t see anything else around me to use as a weapon.”
“Grabbing the gun didn’t work out too well,” said Quinn ruefully. “It’s like Remi had a death grip on that pistol.”
Ramsay nodded. “That’s when the guy from church came in with the care committee’s food, I suppose.”
“Ace, yes. I’ll never say another bad thing about his phone incessantly ringing in church,” vowed Beatrice. “Hearing Joyful, Joyful, We Adore Thee surprised Remi enough for us to get out of here alive.”
Quinn said, “I think Remi also sort of gave up at that point. She realized there was no way she was going to control three of us.”
“I’d like to think hearing a hymn reminded her that what she was about to do wasn’t the right thing. But I have to agree with Quinn—it was more as if she just gave up.”
Ramsay nodded and put away his notebook. “Got it. Okay, I’ll speak with Remi and get her to fill me in the rest of the way. Good job here, Beatrice.”
Beatrice said wryly, “Good timing, is more like it.”
Quinn fervently thanked her again, but Beatrice waved him off.
Beatrice said, “Quinn, I’m just glad you’re okay. It looks like Ace stuck the casseroles in the fridge for you so you can have them whenever you’re ready. Is there anything else you need before I head out? Anyone I can call to come over?”
Although Tobi must have been the first person to come to mind, Quinn shook his head. With a rueful smile, he said, “Honestly, now I just want to take a nap. You’d think I’d be too keyed up to be able to sleep, but I’m absolutely exhausted.”
“Okay. But I am going to clean up this chicken and coffee from the floor.”
Quinn quickly tried to dissuade her from doing so, but Beatrice held up a hand. “Nope.”
“But the whole house is trashed,” said Quinn.
“That may or may not be. But I didn’t trash the rest of the house. I’m going to clean up the bit that I did. Besides, I don’t think you can even get to the floor to pick this stuff up.”
Fifteen minutes later, the chicken was in the trash and the stickiness of the coffee was off the floor. Beatrice was able to put her blinders on and not automatically start cleaning up the rest of the mess.
Quinn looked sheepish. “I think you’re inspiring me. After I take that nap, I’m going to pick up a little bit.”
“Just don’t overdo it.”
Quinn said, “I’ll just clear off some of the surfaces. That’ll make things look a lot better.” He paused. “Now I really do want to turn things around. The fact that I just barely escaped being murdered is probably behind that.”
Beatrice nodded. “Definitely. Do you need a hand getting to your room?”
“Just a little help standing up, since it’s been a while and I’ve gotten stiff.”
Quinn struggled up with Beatrice’s assistance and his crutches.
After that, she took her leave. Beatrice was getting into her car, her mind still whirling, when Wyatt drove up, looking white as a sheet.
“Are you okay?” he asked in a rush as he got out of the car.
“I’m fine. Who told you?”
Wyatt wrapped his arms around her, and she gave him a tight hug. Some of the stress seeped away.
“Meadow did,” he murmured into her hair. “Ramsay was at home when he got your message.”
Beatrice snorted. “I’m surprised Meadow isn’t over here herself.”
“Oh, I’m sure she would have been if she hadn’t been watching Will.”
Beatrice nodded. There was no way Meadow would have brought her precious grandchild into any sort of dangerous situation.
“Are you okay to drive?” asked Wyatt.
“I’m much better now. I’ve been helping Quinn get situated, and it steadied my nerves. Why don’t you just follow me home? I’ll pull over if I’m too shaky.”
And so he did. Noo-noo eagerly greeted her at the door and Beatrice drew the furry girl close to her, letting her lick her on the neck. Wyatt poured her a glass of white wine and put some soft music on. Back in the safety of the cozy cottage, everything was suddenly right in her world . . . and in Dappled Hills.