~ Maddie ~
The next day, the Hemlock Homicide Heroines, meet at MJ’s house for Kellen’s memorial. Olivia is there. I’m not going to lie, from the moment she arrived I’ve been scrutinizing her every move looking for a telltale sign of—anything.
Any sign that she knows I was in her house yesterday, which is unlikely.
A sign that she’s guilty.
She’s not letting on like anything is wrong.
“Thank you for including me today,” she says. Her tone isn’t very gracious.
The five of us are sitting in MJ’s screened porch keeping MJ company while she’s outside grilling chicken and burgers.
“I need some closure, too,” Olivia says. “I’ve tried to talk to my husband about Kellen, but he doesn’t get it. Just the other day, I was trying to make him understand that it’s hard to process what’s happened. Kellen and I were friends once, but we ended up having a fraught relationship. I was trying to make Gary understand that I needed to mend things with Kellen—that despite everything she did to me, I forgave her. But she’s gone now and I’ll never get that closure. No matter how badly I need it. My husband can’t seem to get that through his thick head. He actually had the nerve to say to me that the thought of her burning in hell should be enough closure. But it’s not. Right now, I just need to be around people who understand.”
We’re all silent.
Once I get past the initial cringe of Olivia making herself the injured party in another woman’s murder, it hits me that the fight with her husband was what I overheard when I snuck into her home.
Maybe it wasn’t as damming as it seemed.
Since she brought up Kellen, I decide to go for broke. “Olivia, when I was talking to Tom Corsi the other day, he divulged some information and I think it’s only fair you know what he said.”
Olivia’s face is stony, but she gives me her attention. Rather than speaking, she simply raises a brow as if saying, yeah, go on.
“He told me you received a considerable settlement from the lawsuit you brought against Kellen.”
Olivia’s cheeks color. “Was he specific?”
I nod. I don’t know what I’m expecting to discover from this, but I figure it’s worth a shot. She has been so tight-lipped over the lawsuit outcome I figure maybe my bringing it up will provoke her to spill something useful.
“Would his telling you that violate the nondisclosure agreement?” MJ hisses.
“He didn’t sign the nondisclosure,” Olivia says. “Neither did Kellen, for that matter. It was a unilateral NDA, which means I was the only one bound by the gag order, but now that she’s… dead… well, the agreement is probably void anyway. I don’t know. I’ll have to talk to my attorney.”
Everyone is so quiet we can hear virtual crickets chirp.
“Oh, I don’t know.” Olivia waves her hand as if she’s swatting away a bothersome pest. “But you know what? If Tom was talking about it, you all might as well know the facts. Yes, the judge did find in my favor. He agreed that the great Kellen Corsi did indeed lift verbatim passages from my work. She thought she could get away with it because I wasn’t published. She thought she had the upper hand, but what she didn’t realize is that an editor who almost purchased my version of the book signed an affidavit saying she’d read it two years before Kellen sold her book. What happened was Kellen sold on a partial manuscript and when she ran into trouble writing the rest of the book, she took an old version of my book and changed the names and the method of death to bee attack.
“She stole my work, people. My work got her onto the best-seller lists. By the time the lawsuit played out, she was already a hit. In exchange for me signing away all rights to my work that became The Sting of Death, she and her husband agreed to give me a half a million dollars. Are you all happy now? Your sweet Kellen Corsi wasn’t such a saint after all, was she?”
Olivia glares at me, before she pushes to her feet, and goes inside.
The four of us stare at each other in disbelief. MJ wipes her forehead with a paper towel. I don’t know how she can stand over a grill in her long-sleeved red and white striped tunic. I want to tell her, it’s just us, we don’t care about her eczema. I’m dressed appropriately, but the afternoon heat coupled with Olivia’s candid disclosure is making me dizzy. I don’t want things to be weird so I decide to go inside and see if I can smooth things over with Olivia.
“I’m going inside and get more iced tea,” I say. “Would anyone else like some?”
“That would be fabulous, Maddie,” MJ says. “You know what? Why don’t you just fill the tea pitcher up with ice all the way up to the top and bring it out here. That way we can all pour refills when we’re ready. Oh, and while you’re in there would you bring out the catsup and mustard? There are new bottles in the cabinet next to the stove. I bought fresh ones just for our cookout.”
I let myself inside and hear the muted sound of chatter outside. Clearly, they’re dishing about what they just learned.
I take a moment to enjoy the AC-cooled air. I walk over to the sink and wet a paper towel and wipe my face. I sense someone standing behind me. When I turn around, it’s Olivia. Her eyes are red. I can see that she has been crying.
“Olivia, I’m sorry—”
She shakes her head. “It’s fine, Maddie. At first, I was pissed off at you. For about two minutes. Then I realized, all these years, I’ve had to take the high road and let people think I was the crazy jealous failed writer carrying on about how my successful ex-friend stole my work. But it was the truth. She did steal from me and she ended up paying dearly for it.”
I blanch and Olivia must realize what I’m thinking.
“I’m talking about the half million dollars she had to pay me. I didn’t kill Kellen, Maddie. Why would I want her dead? Because in a weird way she set me free. I got five hundred thousand dollars for a book I couldn’t sell. I may not have gotten the glory, but if not for her, I might have never tried my hand at romance. I haven’t announced this yet because I wanted Kellen to be the first to know. But I just signed a two-book contract with Home and Hearth Publishing for two standalone romance novels. I’m still going to write the shorter series romance novels, but this is the kind of breakthrough that always seemed just out of my reach when I was writing mysteries.”
“Congratulations, Olivia, that’s fabulous news.”
Her sob surprises me. For a moment, I fear she’s going to break down, but she manages to regain her composure.
“I wanted to tell Kellen that I’m not mad at her anymore. I was so hoping that we could clear the air and start over. She could have her lane and I could stay in mine. But she’s gone now and I guess my forgiveness doesn’t matter anymore. I suppose we’ll just have to make the most out of today.”
“I think that’s a great idea,” I say.
The corners of her mouth turn up into a sad smile before she walks toward the patio.
The large settlement and Olivia’s publishing news certainly makes it seem as if she wouldn’t have a reason to want Kellen dead. But then again, she said it herself; there were all those years she had to stay quiet about the settlement to the detriment of people thinking she lost the suit. And there’s the matter of the missing note she claims to have written but no one can find.
However, she’s right. Maybe out of respect for Kellen we should put it all aside for now and make the most of today. I’ll tell Jackson what I’ve learned when I see him tonight.
We both lost some work time yesterday. Since he was talking to Olivia this morning—I’m surprised she didn’t mention it—and I’m spending time with my writer friends this afternoon, we agreed to skip our morning meetup at the Briar Patch and catch up with each other this evening at the Fourth of July festival in Central Park.
Still, I have an overwhelming urge to check my phone to see if he called. I go into the spare bedroom where MJ had us all leave our purses—taking care to enter the correct room, not Omar’s. Until today, I had no idea he had moved back with his mother until she set us straight about which room to store our purses.
“Please don’t go in Omar’s room. I’m so happy he’s home I want to respect his privacy.”
Omar’s chihuahua, Beady, growls and snaps at me when I won’t let him follow me into the guestroom with the purses. MJ warned if we left our belongings out Beady would nose through our purses looking for food. If he didn’t find anything to eat, he would chew up the handbags. Apparently, he has a taste for leather.
Hailey and Fran had snorted and muttered about Beady running the house and needing to go to obedience school. MJ smiled as if their grumbling was a compliment. She adores her grand dog.
My heart sinks when I see I have no missed calls or text messages. It feels strange to miss him this much. I shouldn’t let myself feel this way. Things changed after the kiss. We haven’t talked about it. But, really, what’s there to talk about? On one hand, not talking about or acknowledging it makes me wonder if it was a one-off, but on the other hand, yesterday things seem fine between us. I need to make sure they stay that way. I enjoy our morning talks over coffee. If things don’t work out romantically—because of our age difference, and I have a sinking feeling they won’t—I hope we can remain friends.
As I stick my phone into my back pocket and return my bag to the bed, I realize Olivia’s purse is lying right there. Unattended. I’m in a closed room where no one would see me if I took a peek inside.
Just to be safe, I turn the lock on the door handle. Then I open Olivia’s Kate Spade bucket bag and glance inside. For a purse, it’s tidy. There’s a wallet, a makeup pouch, her cell phone, a small notebook, several pens, and a couple of receipts tucked into the interior side pocket.
I start with the notebook, thumbing through. It doesn’t contain much. Only a few notes that start—add this to manuscript.
Next I pick up her cell, but the lock screen is password protected.
The receipts are from a department store and a fast-food restaurant. The wallet has a few small bills, credit cards, and her driver’s license.
None of it offers any clues.
But she’s smart. She may have cleaned out her purse before she arrived. I mean, who walks around with a purse that’s this neat?
I have no idea what I’m looking for, but I figure I’ll know it if I see it.
But there’s nothing. So, I return everything and let myself out of the room. Beady growls at me and I feel like I deserve it for invading Olivia’s privacy. Determined to play nice, I return to the kitchen where I scoop ice into the tea pitcher and open the cabinet to get the fresh condiments.
That’s when I see the jar of lavender honey from Honey Mountain Farm. Exactly like the ones I saw in Minnie’s small shop in Spartanburg.
My heart lurches and I take it from the shelf, holding it as if it will tell me something.
So what? MJ has a jar of Honey Mountain Farm honey. That doesn’t mean anything. I know Olivia has been there. Maybe she gave it to MJ? Would she give a gift of honey she considered tainted enough to warrant a lawsuit?
I turn the jar until I see a date stamp that indicates the honey was bottled three weeks ago. That’s curious. As I snap a photo of it with the camera on my phone, I add the tidbit to my mental list to tell Jackson.
Maybe she bought it locally, though I’ve never heard of Honey Mountain Farm until yesterday.
I return the honey to its place in the cabinet and then an idea hits me. I pull up the search engine on my cell phone and search purchase Honey Mountain Farm products. The only result that comes up is the shop page on the Honey Mountain Farm’s website. It says Honey Mountain Farm products are family grown and packaged and available exclusively at the shop on South Mill Spring Road, Spartanburg, South Carolina.
So, if the honey isn’t a gift from someone, MJ has been to Honey Mountain Farm.
Even if it is a coincidence, it certainly didn’t mean she’s a… murderer.
Rather than waiting to talk to him, I text the photo to Jackson with a message, “Look what I found in MJ’s cupboard.”
I wait a moment for Jackson, but he doesn’t text me back. I feel foolish.
Of course, possessing a jar of honey doesn’t mean a person is guilty. He probably thinks I’m making a needy attempt to get him to call me.
I stand there for a moment thinking, bees… what evidence would there be to prove someone stole the frame from the farm and then put it in the box from my shop?
The person would need access to a box.
MJ had purchased a fancy dress to wear at her niece’s wedding a few months ago. I had put the dress in a box as I do all dress purchases from my shop. I think it’s a nice touch—when the person gets home, it’s like unwrapping a gift to herself.
I know I’ve been gone a long time, but I glance out the kitchen window and can see everyone is engaged in conversation. They don’t look like they miss me. I know it’s now or never. I go into MJ’s bedroom and open her walk-in closet.
It’s a long shot that she’d keep the box—but maybe she uses it for storing scarves or other accessories. I scan the wire shelves that run the perimeter of the closet. Nothing.
Would it be on the floor?
I push back the longer garments, but see no sign of the box.
If she’s not using it for herself, maybe she stashed it with her wrapping paper to use for a gift. Boxes always come in handy at the holidays.
Of course, there’s a high chance that she could’ve thrown it out, who needs extra clutter, but a nagging voice tells me if I can find the box in her house I can write off the honey as a strange coincidence.
I’m about to go to the guest room where we put our purses to look for her wrapping paper when, on impulse, I open her dirty clothes hamper. There’s a wadded up garbage bag inside.
My heart is pounding as I open the bag. Inside are several white towels and a pair of gardening gloves covered in something hard and resin-like—like dried honey that’s set on the fabric.
I raise one of the towels to my nose and detect the smell of laundry detergent. Did she try to wash the dried-on honey out of the towels and gloves? If she just threw them into the washer without treating the stains first, it probably did turn the honey into resin.
But why did she keep the towels and not throw them away? With all the activity lately maybe she didn’t have time to dispose of it in a place where it wouldn’t be connected to her. Since no one suspected her, she probably thought no one would be snooping in her clothes hamper.
Oh, MJ. How could you do this?
The lavender honey in the kitchen cabinet proves that MJ knows of this obscure bee farm where the murderer stole the beehive frame. She probably wore the gloves and used the towels to pull the frame out of the beehive. Was she really so frugal that she was going to wash her towels to try get the honey out?
That actually sounded just like MJ, who hated being wasteful.
The corgis. Thank goodness she took care to corral my dogs before leaving a threatening message on the dress that Kellen was supposed to wear.
But how did she get Kellen’s box and switch the dress with the beehive frame?
I’m suddenly very aware that I am contaminating possible evidence.
I snap a photo to send to Jackson and carefully put the gloves and towels back into the bag and return it to its place in the hamper.
I send the photo to Jack and ponder whether Olivia might have brought the soiled items over to plant evidence to frame MJ?
But another strange coincidence that’s hard to ignore. MJ’s sudden bout of eczema. In the decade I’ve known her, I’ve never heard her mention the condition.
But bee stings would explain her summer turtlenecks. The heavy gloves would’ve protected her hands…
I do a quick internet search to see how long bee sting welts last. The medical page says the sting usually goes away after a few hours, but the resulting swollen bumps can last up to a week, especially if someone scratches them.
Hmm…
It’s a long shot, but I have an idea.
I walk back into the kitchen, grab the iced tea pitcher, and go back out onto the patio.
“There you are,” MJ says as she sets a platter of meat on the patio table. “I was about ready to send a search party.”
“Sorry, I got a phone call.”
“Everything okay?” she asks.
“Sure, let me pour you some tea.”
I hand her a glass, which she takes and holds out for me to fill. As I pour, I jerk my hand so that the liquid spills onto her arm, saturating her blouse from wrist to elbow.
MJ gasps and grabs at her sleeve, which is soaked by the ice-cold liquid. The reflexive movement hikes up her sleeve on her arm enough for me to see dozens of red, angry bumps that look just like the bee sting picture on the website.
“Oh! MJ, I’m so sorry!” I say. “Stay right here. Let me get you a towel so you don’t drip in the house.”
I don’t wait for her to answer, I rush back into the house intent on calling Jackson to let him know what I had discovered. A few seconds later, my phone sounds the special ringtone I set up to announce Jackson’s calls.
“Jackson!”
“Hi, Maddie. I’m on my way to MJ’s. Just stay calm and act like nothing is wrong. Are you in a place where you can talk without anyone else overhearing you?”
He sounds worried.
“Yes, I’m in MJ’s kitchen. The others are outside on the porch. But I don’t have long before someone comes in here.” Keeping my voice low and an eye on my friends through the kitchen window, I tell him about the towels with dried on-honey and the welts on MJ’s arm.
“Listen to me, Maddie. I just finished looking at the hotel’s surveillance footage. Not only does it confirm that Olivia Knowles wrote the note to Kellen. It shows Omar Stetson giving her the stationery and putting the note into his pocket after Olivia handed it to him. We zoomed in and from what we could read, it looked like a note of apology that said everything Olivia claimed. She asked Kellen to call her so they could talk. She wanted to meet her for coffee. John and Shirley English, the owners of the Hemlock Inn, said Omar Stetson knew the password to the website that stores the video surveillance footage. He lied about not having it and I think it was to protect his mother because once we got access to the video footage, I saw MJ Stetson go out to her car and switch the box you gave her with an identical one in the trunk of her car. She came back to the hotel portico and set her box down on the bellman’s cart as Fran searched through the back of your SUV.”
“Right,” I whisper. “MJ said she lost her keys and Fran found them between the back seat and the way back of the car. MJ spilled her purse when she was loading Kellen’s luggage into the back of my car at the airport.”
“When MJ picked up her purse and a box off the luggage cart, she switched boxes,” Jackson says. “You can see it clear as day on the footage.”
“Oh, my gosh, why would MJ kill Kellen?”
Suddenly someone reaches around me and the blade of a knife is on my throat.
A male voice whispers in my ear, “Don’t say a word. Drop the phone.”
I can’t see his face, but I’m sure it’s Omar holding the knife to my throat.
“Maddie? Are you there?”
“Drop the phone and I won’t hurt you. But if you don’t—”
He pushes the blade into my neck and I am afraid if I don’t do what he says, he will deliver on his promise and slit my throat. As the phone falls from my hand Jack is calling my name.
Omar crushes my phone with the heel of his shoe. Jack’s voice fades away and so do my hopes.
“Don’t make a sound. Just walk with me and you might get out of this alive.”
He laughs and I’m not confident he’s telling me the truth. As he walks me to the door off the kitchen that leads to the garage, all I know is I have to stall for as long as I can. That’s my only chance of getting out of this alive.
“Omar, I was talking to Chief Bradley on the phone. He’s on his way. You’re just making things worse for your mother.”
“Do you think I’m an idiot? I heard you on the phone with your police boyfriend. If he thinks he’s going to get my mother or me he’s going to have to remove your dead body first.”
“Yeah, but you didn’t kill Kellen, your mom did. Don’t implicate yourself for something you didn’t do. It won’t save MJ. This will just get both of you in trouble. She’s going to need you on the outside to help her.”
He pulls my hair and yanks my head back. “My mom didn’t mean to kill that uppity witch. It was an accident. She only meant to shake her up a little bit. You know, knock her off her high and mighty throne.”
He shoves me through the kitchen door that leads to the garage and shuts the door behind us.
I realize if somebody comes into the kitchen and sees my shattered phone on the floor, they will know something is wrong. But I don’t want any of them to be in danger. My best hope is to stall Omar until Jack can get here. Because surely he is on his way.
“Omar, I’ll make a deal with you. If you’ll let me go, I’ll forget this happened. You won’t get into any trouble, Omar, you’re not guilty.”
“Yeah, is that what you think? Well, you’re an uppity witch, too. Maybe the world would be better off without you. Just like it’s better off without Miss New York.”
“Omar, why would you say that? I know you don’t mean it.”
“How do you know that? Maybe I do mean it. Maybe after I kill you, I’ll go out there and kill Olivia. I could just take you out one by one.”
“You know that’s not what you want to do.”
“Don’t tell me what I want and don’t want,” he yells.
This is good. If he yells maybe somebody will hear him. Or maybe the police will get here and they will figure out what to do.
Or maybe I can figure out what to do because I don’t know what else he can do unless he wants to stand here with a knife pressed to my neck all night. Stand here like this… Or slit my throat.
“Omar? What happened with the note that Olivia gave you? Why did you say she didn’t write a note?”
“In the middle of all the excitement, I forgot about it. But then the next day, after I found out what my mom had done—she was so upset, she just started confessing everything—when I found it in my pocket, I realized it might be a chance for Olivia to take the fall instead of my mom. She is so full of herself and so greedy. With that lawsuit and all. She deserves it.”
“But why are you doing this to me? I’ve always thought the world of you. You and Jenna are good friends. And look at you, you’re managing the Hemlock Inn. That’s a prestigious job. You’ve got too much going for you to ruin it like this.”
“Yeah, but John English fired me today. So, no, I don’t have a whole lot going for me.”
Immediately, I regret bringing Jenna into this and I’m glad she decided not to come here with me today. Her friend, Ian McCoy, had called her and asked her to go to the Fourth of July festival in the park. I hope Omar won’t turn his ire on Jenna.
“Omar, please just let me go so we can talk about this. I’m sure there’s a way we can work it out.”
MJ’s voice is calling for me. Omar stiffens. He still has the knife to my neck. Now he is going to be forced to do something. Especially, if MJ comes into the garage.
But then I hear the police sirens. Omar digs the knife into my throat a little more.
“Omar, don’t,” I plead. “There’s still time for you to walk away.”
“You know what? That’s a great idea, we are going to walk. We’re going to walk around to the driver’s side of the car and you’re going to get in and not give me any problems.”
I think I see a glimmer of hope, because even if Omar makes me drive so he can wield his mighty sword, he will have to turn loose of me in order to get into the car.
“Do you even have keys?”
His hand leaves my shoulder and I feel him digging in his pocket and the next thing I know he is dangling a set of keys by my ear.
“Nice and easy, Ms. Bell. Just walk with me nice and easy and don’t make any sudden moves.”
I do as he asks. Just as we start moving, the garage door swings open.
“Omar Stetson, we have you surrounded.” It’s Jackson’s voice. “Drop the knife now. If you do, you won’t get hurt. But if you hurt her, I will put a bullet through your head.”
“Omar, please don’t hurt Maddie,” MJ calls. “Son, please, do as they say. Things are bad enough as they are. Kellen was never supposed to die. I just wanted to teach her a lesson. Scare her a little and make her feel a little pain since she stepped on so many people and left us all behind. I didn’t think she would die. I thought she had that medicine pen that would stop her from… dying. But it all went so wrong. So, please, don’t make it any worse than it already is.”
With that, Omar drops the knife and pushes me away. Jackson’s backup rushes in and cuffs Omar, reads him his rights, and walks him out to the police car.
“MJ, why did you do it?” I ask. “I know we all had our issues with Kellen, but nothing so bad it was worth killing over.”
MJ hangs her head. “Oh, you don’t even know the half of it. Kellen asked me to sign an affidavit for the lawsuit that Olivia brought against her attesting that her work was original and that Olivia’s case was frivolous. She promised to include a couple of my short stories in an anthology, which would’ve put us both on the New York Times best-seller list. So, I did it but the dates I gave were later than the date that the editor had read Olivia’s work. Since Kellen lost the suit, she felt as if she didn’t owe me anything. It would’ve been no skin off her nose to throw me a bone, but when I wasn’t useful anymore…” MJ shrugs.
Fran, Hailey, and I look at Olivia.
“It’s true,” Olivia says. “That’s one of the reasons I quit the group. Because of the nondisclosure agreement, I couldn’t say anything.”
“But you’re here today,” I say. “You forgive her?”
“One thing I’ve learned since the lawsuit wrapped up is that harboring a grudge is like drinking poison and waiting for the other person to die. Those aren’t my words. I don’t want to try and take credit for someone else’s work. Still, it’s true. I’m tired of being angry all the time.”
As another officer cuffs MJ and reads her Miranda rights, I know that this is the final chapter for the Hemlock Homicide Heroines. With one member dead, another going to jail for her murder, and a third who wants to leave the past behind, we may not have each other anymore, but at least we have the truth. Isn’t that all that any mystery writer wants?