Aunt Beth and Jorge arrived, she with an armload of paper plates and cups, he with a large bowl of salad.
“Mavis and Connie will both bring things to drink.”
Harriet had come downstairs when she heard them.
“Thank you for bringing this,” she said, taking the paper goods. Luke, who had answered the door, took the bowl of salad and carried it to the dining room.
Beth hung her coat in the kitchen closet before pulling Harriet into a fierce hug. Her eyes glistened with unshed tears.
“I just don’t know what I’d do if something happened to you.”
Harriet patted her aunt’s back and leaned back to look her in the eye.
“Nothing’s going to happen to me. I’m right here, and I’m fine.”
Beth moved far enough to take Harriet’s hands in hers.
“How many times can you get into these terrible situations and then escape by a gnat’s eyelash. I’m just afraid the next time things won’t work out, and the bad person is going to…”
Harriet knew her aunt couldn’t bring herself to say kill you.
“You of all people know I don’t go looking for trouble. And I have been able to get out of it so far. I have no plan to find any future trouble, but if I do, I have no reason to believe I won’t get out of whatever it is as well.”
“Oh, honey,” Beth said, and hugged her again. “If only the world were that simple. I’m so glad you moved back to Foggy Point, but I can’t help but think you were safer before you did.”
“Don’t even say that. I’ve never been happier than I am right now, here in Foggy Point with you and James and Luke and the Loose Threads and—”
Beth hugged her tighter. Then James came in and wrapped his arms around both of them.
“Can anyone join this love fest?”
Aunt Beth pulled a tissue from her cardigan pocket, dabbed at her eyes, and cleared her throat.
“What can we help you with?”
James opened a drawer and took out two pizza cutters.
“You can take these to Jorge in the dining room, and then we just need to wait for the pizzas to come out of the ovens.” He waited until Beth was out of the room to continue. “Are you okay? I heard part of what she said. I’m sure she doesn’t really think you should leave Foggy Point.”
Harriet smiled and put her arm around his waist.
“Don’t worry, I’m not going anywhere.”
Jenny, Robin, and DeAnn had been unable to come for pizza, but the rest of the Threads sat around the table, the remains of their dinner on their plates in front of them. James had insisted they all eat the pizzas while they were hot, so Harriet had only just finished her story of what had transpired at the cupcake bakery.
“Diós mio,” Connie said. “Valery fooled everyone.”
Mavis shook her head.
“It’s hard to imagine the amount of pain he must have been in after the death of his daughter to cause him to snap like that.”
Lauren sipped her glass of water and set it back on the table.
“Maybe it was the accumulation of loss that did him in. I mean, his wife left, then his son was diagnosed with AIDS—or maybe those events were reversed—then his beloved daughter died, and when he sued Vern, the court determined her death was an accident.
“From what I’ve been able to find on the internet, his daughter didn’t just drown, she was underwater, fished out, and then lingered in the hospital for months before they finally declared her brain-dead and he had to make the terrible decision to pull the plug. Her care, and his insistence on seeking multiple additional opinions, nearly bankrupted him.”
“He probably did feel like he’d lost everything,” Harriet agreed.
“That’s still no excuse to go around killing people,” James said.
Jorge wiped his large hands on his napkin.
“There is nothing more dangerous than a man who feels like he’s got nothing left to lose.”
“It must be a real relief for Jade and Sunny and Vern and Millie and whoever else he might have been blackmailing,” Connie said. “Now they can pull their businesses back together.”
A knock sounded on the studio door. James got up to answer it.
“I hope you don’t mind,” Beth said, “but I invited Detective Morse to join us if she could when Luke called me. I thought she might be able to explain a few things after talking to Melnyk. Besides, she eats too much junk from that machine at the station. She needs some real food.”
Lauren looked at Harriet, and they both laughed.
“I guess James’s homemade pizza rises above the junk-food designation,” Harriet said.
Jorge made a space at the table and set a plate with several pieces of pizza on it down as the detective arrived.
“Water, soda, or beer?” he asked her when she’d settled.
“Cola would be fine.” She’d combed her hair and reapplied her lipstick, so she didn’t look as haggard as she sometimes did after several hours spent questioning a suspect. Maybe it was the holidays, Harriet mused.
The group let her finish her first piece of pizza in peace; she sipped her cola and set her cup down.
“I know you have a lot of questions, and I also know you all know there is a limit to what I can tell you about an active case. However, I think you’ve guessed most of what I’ve learned.
“Mr. Melnyk appears to have perpetrated the recent crimes. We believe his motive was revenge for the death of his daughter. His targets are all people he believed contributed to her death, and to the illness of his son. It’s not obvious any of what he believes is true. His daughter had dabbled in drugs supplied by Jade, and in the occult with Sunny; but at the time of her death, she was clean and sober, and there’s nothing to suggest her death was anything but what it appeared to be. She rolled her kayak and became tangled in the underwater roots close to shore, hitting her head in the process. It was nothing but a tragic accident, pure and simple.”
Harriet processed that information.
“What about Will Crowe, Millie’s employee?”
“That was really unfortunate.” Morse paused for a moment. “Of course, it’s all unfortunate, but Crowe is what might be called collateral damage. He had the misfortune of going to pick up a print order for Millie while Valery was stringing Daniel up.
“He apparently called out and poked around, finally finding his printing and leaving. He looked through the small window in the door to the press room but didn’t see anything. At least, he never told Millie he saw anything. But Valery saw him and decided to eliminate the possibility of a witness.”
“That is sad,” Mavis said.
Harriet sliced a skinny piece of pepperoni pizza for herself. She chewed thoughtfully while Mavis and Connie asked additional questions about Mark.
“What I want to know,” she said when she’d finished, “is why was he so obsessed with Jade’s horse.”
Morse smiled.
“Now, that’s interesting. It made no sense to me, either, until my partner Jason Martinez did some digging. It turns out Jade’s horse used to belong to Valery’s daughter. By all accounts, she was never very interested, but nonetheless, he was very invested in the idea of her learning to ride. Then, after her accident, when he needed cash to bring in international medical specialists, he sold the horse to Jade.
“It appears his attempt to buy the horse back, and Jade’s refusal to sell, is what caused him to hatch the blackmail plan. I guess once he got it going, and Jade still refused to sell, he decided to exact revenge on everyone he felt contributed to the situation.”
“So, was he the one who had people following me?” Harriet asked.
Morse picked up another piece of pizza.
“This is really good,” she said with a nod to James. “Yes, that was Valery’s people. They were following you to get to Jade and the horse.”
Mavis blew out a breath.
“Grief does terrible things to people.”
“I have a question,” Lauren said as she picked little bits of leftover crust from the remains of her third piece of pizza. “Why were the hard drives stolen from the murder victims, and why burn Jade’s shop?”
“That’s two questions,” Morse said with a smile. “You can thank Martinez for that one, too. That little jerk Chris Baker at the computer store had been installing spyware on the hard drives of all the computers he was repairing so he could steal customer information. We haven’t figured out if he was selling customer lists or if he was actually stealing identities. That will remain to be seen. He was afraid, with the murders, someone would take a deep dive into the computers looking for clues and discover his handiwork.”
“Wow, that little jerk,” Harriet said.
“Uh-oh,” Mavis said. “He just did some work on my computer.”
Lauren, who was sitting beside her, patted her back.
“Not to worry. I can fix it for you. I’ve got time while most of my clients are on holiday breaks.”
Mavis started to protest.
“Don’t argue. You can bake Carter some of those dog bones you make.”
Harriet could tell Mavis wanted to argue some more about not taking up Lauren’s valuable time, but she didn’t say anything.
“As for the arson at Jade’s shop, he was afraid she’d left incriminating evidence behind when she ‘disappeared’. He was searching for emails and letters they’d exchanged about him demanding ‘his’ horse back.”
“What will happen to Jade and Sunny?” Harriet asked.
Morse sat back and rubbed her stomach.
“Oh, I think they’ll be okay. I wish Jade hadn’t hidden from us, but that’s not a crime. And I suspect Sunny’s brother may have an outstanding warrant or two, but I also suspect he’s already left town. There’s no reason for us to pursue him. He didn’t do anything here we know of.”
Jorge started stacking empty plates and napkins.
“So, Foggy Point can go back to being a sleepy little town?”
Morse laughed. “Foggy Point hasn’t been that for quite a while.”
Harriet passed her plate to Jorge.
“I have one more question. What about the body Valery used to fool everyone?”
“Right now, we don’t have any idea. He doesn’t match any of our open missing-persons files. We’ll do DNA, of course.”
“I might be able to help,” Harriet said. “Joyce at the homeless camp has been looking for a guy they call Smokey Joe. He doesn’t usually leave without telling anyone, but he went missing right before this all started.”
Morse pulled her notebook from her pocket and made a note.
“I’ll go out tomorrow and get a description and see if they can tell us anything concrete that will help verify his identity. As you know, the body was cremated, so it will be hard. It makes sense, though.”
Harriet stood and picked up the plates Jorge had stacked.
“Thanks for coming and telling us what you did.”
“Thank you for the great pizza.”
Luke brought the teakettle full of hot water to the table and set it on a hot pad before returning with the basket of tea Harriet kept in the cupboard. Harriet smiled at him.
“What?” he asked. “Isn’t this what you guys do when you get together?”
“Yes, sweetie, it is. I’m just amazed you noticed. Not a lot of guys your age would.”
Luke’s face turned red, and he retreated to the kitchen.
“He’s such a good boy,” Beth said. “It’s amazing, really, given his early life.”
“He is a good boy,” Harriet agreed.