Chapter 31
“Reckless assault and battery. The subject engaged in conduct that caused bodily harm to another person.” Detective Lincoln Butterfield had escorted Fiona, Colin, Annie, and Kevin into the same room where, only days ago, Roger Flanagan had been planted in a chair, declaring that Fiona was a liar.
“So Nicole can be arrested for trying to make me sick?” Fiona asked.
“It’s a felony. With a sentence of up to five years in a state house of correction. As a woman, she’ll go to Framingham. If she gets two and a half years or less, she’ll go to a house of correction. But not the one here on the island.Women have to go to Barnstable, over on the Cape.”
Annie and the others listened in stunned silence. Like her, apparently none of the others had expected Nicole Flanagan would go to jail.
“Of course,” he continued, “we have to prove it.”
Annie cleared her throat. “We can. Nicole used Taylor Winsted to bring the cake into the house. When you talk with Taylor, I think you’ll agree she didn’t know the honey was bad.” Unless the rest of those details were needed—about Taylor being Jonas’s mother, or about the “deal” the Flanagans had made in trade for their grandson—little seemed to be gained by telling all to the detective.
“Nicole knew I wouldn’t be able to resist the cake,” Fiona added.
Then Colin jumped in. “The day before, I saw Nicole on the boat. She said I could use it to make my sister sick. Then the plan was to intimidate her by threatening the lawsuits, and that then she’d agree to sell the house.”
“Which shows intent,” Kevin added.
Annie edged forward on her chair. She knew that no matter how many mysteries she’d written, she’d never know every law. But bit by bit, she was learning.
“Tainted honey is rarely fatal in humans,” Lincoln continued. “But . . .” Then he read the statute that said if someone knowingly gives another person food that contains a foreign substance, it doesn’t need to be lethal; they only need to have known it could be harmful or cause discomfort. “I think it’s safe to call poisoned honey a foreign substance.”
“Wow,” Kevin and Colin said simultaneously.
Fiona looked paler than when they’d walked in. “For all she knew, I could have died.”
Lincoln shifted on his chair. “And you’re sure Roger wasn’t in on the plan?”
“No. We’re not,” Annie replied. “But I am sure you’ll find out.”
The detective winked at her. “I’m glad you saved some of the work for us.”
“You’re all so busy right now. . . .”
He nodded like a patient father. “Still, you should have come to us as soon as you’d spoken with Myrna.”
She nodded. “Next time you can count on it.”
Then the door opened. Roger Flanagan walked in first, followed by Nicole. Annie let out a small squeak when she saw who came in after them: John.
“I believe you all know Mr. and Mrs. Flanagan,” John said.
Everyone stared.
“Mrs. Flanagan has something to say.”
Nicole raised her chin, a gesture that helped tighten her neck flesh so it nearly equaled the skin on her face. “I did it,” she said, her voice sweet and syrupy, as Earl would have expected if he were there. She looked at Fiona. “I am so sorry, my dear. I didn’t mean to cause such a stir. But you’d become terribly disagreeable.”
That’s when Annie noticed that Nicole’s hands were behind her back; John must have put her in handcuffs.
“Apology to the victim duly noted,” Lincoln commented.
“I do have one question,” Annie interrupted. “Nicole, how did you get the filmmaker to agree to whisk Colin off the island?”
Nicole grinned. “That was easy. We knew Colin hadn’t had a film made in a long time. Fenterly and Roger have been friends forever. He is Dana’s godfather; he adores her. I told him Colin might try to disrupt the reception, that he still loved Dana and was angry she’d broken off with him.”
“I don’t still love her, Nicole,” Colin said. “She’s not even thirty-five and she’s on her third marriage. We were kids when we dated, but she’s never grown up, has she?”
Nicole aimed daggers at him with her eyes.
“I’ll take her over to Booking,” John said. “Roger, I suppose it’s all right for you to join us.” The trio left the room.
Annie thought for a moment, then asked Lincoln, “You already knew about Nicole?”
Lincoln laughed. “Word travels fast around here. And to ease all your minds, whether or not she winds up in jail, no one has to worry about the Flanagans anymore. Rumor has it their place is up for sale. They’ll be moving to Nantucket.”
No one in the room seemed sorry to hear that.
* * *
Once they were outside, they stood in the parking lot, next to the errant Porsche, which, Colin confessed, belonged to one of his friends in New York.
“I can’t imagine who told John about Nicole,” Annie said. Her list of suspects, however, was short.
Kevin’s face reddened.
“You called him last night?” Annie asked.
“No. I told Earl. He must have called him.”
“Or Claire did,” Annie said, “if Earl had told her.”
“Or Taylor,” Colin added.
Yup, Annie mused for the millionth time, definitely a small island.
Fiona shook her head. “Enough! It doesn’t matter. Nicole didn’t get away with it. Though I’d like to think she thought the poison would scare me, not kill me.”
“My sister believes that all people are inherently good,” Colin said.
Kevin chuckled as if he understood. “I assume you’re headed back to New York?”
“We both are,” Fiona said. “But I’m not going to fly. I’m riding with Colin. We want to get to know each other again. Especially since we’ll be working together.”
“Really?” Annie asked.
Fiona nodded. “We’re starting our own documentary production company. Our first film will be a history of ballet in New York, from the genius of Balanchine to today’s schools for kids. I’m too old to dance now, and I was never prima material. But I know the industry, and I think others might like to see behind the scenes.”
“No more war films, Colin?” Annie asked.
“Nope. Littlefield Productions will focus on the arts. Next we’ll do art museums. Best of all, by selling the damn house, we won’t have to hunt for investors.”
Fiona rolled her eyes. “Or beg our sister, Sheila.”
Annie could have offered to share the research on museums that she’d amassed for her novel, but she knew every artist needed to follow his or her own heart. Instead, she said, “If you’re looking for a budding artist to feature, there’s always Jonas.”
Colin snorted. “You do know that whole thing was a scheme, don’t you? That getting you out of the cottage was part of the plan so Nicole would be able to tear down their house, ours, and the cottage, too?”
“For her mega-mansion ‘show palace’ and its breathtaking grounds,” Annie said.
“Yup. I wonder what kind of palace she’ll build in prison.”
“I don’t care!” Fiona cried. “It’s done! We’ll be back for the trial, if there is one. Otherwise, I hope I never have to see the Flanagans again. Even Dana. Who might have been in on it, too, for all we know.” She reached over and hugged Annie. “Thank you, my new friend. For everything.” Then she hugged Kevin, too. “And you. I know you were a big help. Thanks for believing in me.”
Colin hugged Annie, then shook hands with Kevin. “Nice to meet you both. Good luck with the inn. I have a feeling it will be a smashing success. Which will piss off the Flanagans even more.”
Annie and Kevin watched the Littlefield siblings climb into the Porsche. Colin turned on the ignition and the engine rumbled to life—once again reminding Annie of Mark’s car, the symbol of her ex-husband’s material world. She wondered what he was driving now, wherever he was. Then she waved to Fiona and Colin, knowing that her life had grown too precious to waste any more of it thinking about Mark.
As she turned to walk toward her car, Kevin’s text alert sounded. He looked at the screen and said, “Huh,” then, “Wow.”
“Something interesting?” Annie asked.
“You might say so. That was Taylor. She wants you to know she’s going to audition with Monsieur LeChance’s ensemble, whatever that means. She also said that Jonas is moving into her garage apartment.”
“Wow,” Annie echoed his reaction. “That’s incredible.”
“Yup,” Kevin said. Then his phone actually rang. He checked the screen again and smiled.
“Hey, Mom,” he said, “you’re on speakerphone. I’m on the Vineyard with Annie. How’s the cruise?”
“You’re on Martha’s Vineyard?” she cried with what sounded like delight. “How wonderful! The cruise has been fabulous. I’ve made some nice friends. But Duncan’s gone, no love lost there. He hooked up with one of the showgirls and disembarked in Sydney. So much for old men. But I’m so glad you two are together! How do you like the island, Kevin?”
He looked at Annie as if stifling a hearty guffaw. “It’s an interesting place.”
“Annie, did he tell you it was my idea for him to visit you?”
“No!” Annie cried, her mouth dropping open. “Seriously?”
“Guilty,” her brother replied.
Donna’s happy voice resonated through the phone. “I can’t wait to hear about your adventures when I come home next month.”
“Absolutely,” Kevin said, because Annie was too flabbergasted to speak. “There’s lots to tell.”
They passed “love you’s” around, then Kevin hung up. “Well, that woman is in for a surprise.”
“I guess none of us is ever too old for surprises,” Annie said. “I feel like there’s been a giant conspiracy around me all this time!”
“If there has, it’s only been with the best intentions for you to be happy,” Kevin said.
“And John’s back,” she said, her head, her heart, warming.
“Right. And I’ll start camping out on Earl and Claire’s couch tonight. Lucy arrives tomorrow on the ten forty-five.”
Annie’s eyes quickly welled up. She gave her brother the biggest bear hug she could manage because, in that moment, she felt like the luckiest woman in the world.
Another cliché! Murphy whispered with disdain. What would your editor say?
And Annie laughed, safe in the knowledge she would meet the deadline for her manuscript, safe in the love of her twenty-first-century family, safe in the home that she’d found, at last, and intended to never leave.