CHAPTER 21
Mia stopped two feet from the front door. “Wait, why was she at Adele’s? Who is this?” No answer; the phone call had been cut off. Mia dialed Grans’s landline. Not surprisingly, Grans had left her cell on Mia’s coffee table. A fast busy signal indicated that the phone lines were down, probably due to the storm. Why would Grans be at Adele’s? Mia’s thoughts went back to the discussion about Samuel. Grans had been sure that the photos should prove that the man killed Adele for the inheritance. Would she have walked over after Trent dropped her off just to make sure the dead woman hadn’t left a diary or some other clue?
But then who had called Mia? This whole thing stunk. But then Mia saw a vision of her grandmother crumpled at the bottom of the stairs. It couldn’t hurt just to make sure she was okay. She dialed Trent’s cell. No answer. She left a voice mail, explaining she’d gone to Adele’s to check on Grans and asking him to call her as soon as possible. His words about staying put echoed in her head.
She shouldn’t have let Trent drive Grans home. The woman was sneaky; Trent didn’t know that. But she should have seen the look before they left. She would have stayed with Grans while she grabbed fresh clothes. She would have . . . but she hadn’t. Now Grans needed her. She grabbed the spare keys to Grans’s car, started the engine, turning the defroster on full blast, and scraped the windows as clear as she could. Hopefully the roads would be plowed and her windows would finish defrosting long before she arrived at Adele’s, making the trip to the emergency room a bit safer for Grans.
Ten minutes later, after almost flying into a ditch not once, but twice, Mia pulled into a driveway filled with snow. No tire tracks, no other car. How had her grandmother even gotten over here? Who had called Mia? She pushed away the thought and ran up to the porch. The front door stood open. Fear gripped her, but she pushed through, her fingers brushing her cell in her pocket.
As she walked into the large foyer, she called out, “Grans? Are you here?” She listened to her voice echo in the hall, then heard the door slam and a lock click behind her.
A small woman stood by the door with a very large gun in her hand. Mia didn’t know anything about guns, small or large, but she did know this one looked very, very real. “I take it Grans isn’t here.”
“Sorry, a bit of a lie. I’m so glad you could make it. If we hurry, we should be able to get this done and you won’t be missed for days, living up in that old school by yourself.” The woman actually smiled, and finally Mia recognized her. Helen Marcum.
“Now we’re being polite? Like a real law professor from Chicago?” Mia tapped the screen on her cell, hoping she’d just dialed someone, anyone.
Helen stepped closer. “I figured once you found the old bat’s notes about Sam, you’d figure me out pretty quickly. It’s funny. You think if you only had money, everything would be fine. They’d treat you right. Be nice, but no. All those people in Arizona, all they remembered was my husband being a drunk and me feeding their brats at school.” She shook her head violently. “Never once did they invite us to their crappy parties, even after we bought our way into that stupid country club.”
“So you decided to move and take on a new life. Didn’t you think someone might check up on you?” Mia glanced around the room, looking for something, anything, to use as a weapon or to duck under once Helen stopped being so chatty.
“Ha. Don’t make me laugh. People don’t bother the rich. All they do is talk about how they don’t have any style or hate their choice of paint colors. Seriously, even when they didn’t know I’d been poor, they still treated me like white trash. Nuevo rich, as Miss Adele called me. Oh, not to my face. Even she didn’t have that kind of guts.”
“Wait, let me get this straight. You’re pointing a gun at me because people talk about you behind your back?” Mia spoke louder. “I don’t think I ever heard anything about you, Helen, or your husband, Travis.”
“Don’t try all that hostage negotiation crap with me. Using my name isn’t going to change the fact that you’ll be dead in”—Helen glanced at her wristwatch—“maybe ten minutes? I want you to understand why I’m shooting you. It’s the Christian thing to do.”
“How in the hell is any of this Christian?” Mia felt the heat flow to her cheeks. The woman was even crazier than she’d thought. As soon as she saw Helen blanch, Mia wondered if she’d pushed too hard.
The gun waved toward her. “Now don’t you be cussing in front of me. I’m not that kind of lady.”
She’ll shoot me, but she doesn’t want to hear the word “hell?” What the heck? Mia prayed to the Goddess. Maybe this was all a dream and she’d wake up soon. Mia realized Helen was watching, waiting for a response. An apology? She’d be damned if... Mia swallowed her pride for a few more moments to figure out a plan, “I’m sorry. I’m a little stressed. I’ve never been threatened with a gun before. I’ll listen to what you have to say.” She hesitated, then added, “It’s only right.”
“Exactly. That’s what I tried to tell Adele. When I told her I would kill her before I’d let her tell everyone I had been poor, she laughed. In my face.” Helen’s cheeks turned red at the memory. “She laughed at me. She said she was using the party to clear up a few misconceptions, one of them being me and my husband’s rightful place in the community. That we were no better than the people who worked at the Lodge or the grocery.”
“How did you kill her?” Mia felt drained, her energy being sapped by the heightened awareness she was putting out, trying to draw someone, anyone in. Okay, maybe not just anyone, but someone to take care of this crazy woman. All she had to do was keep her talking for a few more minutes. Then someone should arrive. She hoped.
“I had a carving knife I’d stolen from a buffet in Arizona. The chef there, well, I don’t know if you could call someone who worked there a chef, but he’s the one who told me about Magic Springs. That he was planning on moving here as soon as his probation was up.”
“Probation?” Mia inched closer to the entry table. The antique wood may not stop a bullet, but maybe it would slow it, or deflect it away from her. She had to be talking about James. Why had James been on probation?
“See, even you are more intrigued by the bad parts of life than the good things we do. Yes, this guy was on probation, but he said the charges had been a big misunderstanding. He’s too sweet a guy to be a thief. He said it was because he was gay. Gay people always get treated badly.” Helen sagged a bit, the gun drooping in her hand. “I don’t want to talk about that. It’s confusing. When I saw him here I thought for sure he’d rat me out. But he never did. He may figure we held each other’s secrets. But I wonder if he even recognized me. I’m a lot skinnier now. Hired my own trainer, just like the movie stars. I still work out three times a week.”
We’re talking about workouts? Mia jumped on the topic. “You can really tell. I mean, I didn’t know you before, but you look so healthy.”
Helen smiled, a cold smile that never reached her eyes. “Don’t patronize me. I know you saw that interview we did with the newspaper reporter, just like Adele.” She stopped and cocked her head toward Mia. “Now, did that person look ‘healthy?’”
Mia decided to play dumb. “I don’t understand why you keep saying I saw an article. I didn’t see anything.”
“The librarian said she gave you the flash drive. The woman’s very disappointed that you didn’t seem interested in setting up a library card.” Helen shook her head. “You aren’t fitting in very well here; maybe they’ll just think you moved home to live with that hunk of an ex-boyfriend.” Helen smiled again, looking more like an alligator this time. “I could get lucky and some animal could drag off your carcass before you’re found. That way we wouldn’t have two murders in Magic Springs in less than a month.”
“How about you just don’t kill me—that would cut down the actual crime rate.”
“Now, you know I can’t do that.” Helen nodded to the back of the house. “Where’s the back door?”
“There isn’t one. You’re going to have to take me out the front.” Something was going in her favor.
“What do you mean there isn’t a back door? All houses have a back door.” Helen frowned.
“You don’t remember seeing one when you and Samuel toured the house, do you?” Mia pressed.
Helen cocked her head, “How did you know Samuel gave us a sneak peek?” She paused. “Never mind. I have to get back to the Lodge. We’re playing bridge at four.” She waved the gun toward Mia. “Go out the front door. I don’t care; you’ll still be just as dead as soon as we get to the trees in back.”
Mia considered her options as she walked past Helen, but the woman kept the gun focused on her and Mia didn’t think she’d be able to wrestle the firearm away without getting shot in the process.
As soon as she crossed the threshold, she was yanked to the left, a hand over her mouth. Helen had been pulled to the right, and then her gun was taken away. Mia watched as Baldwin cuffed the woman.
“You okay?” Trent’s voice whispered in her ear and he removed his hand from her mouth.
“Luckily Helen didn’t want blood all over the house just in case she still got to buy it.” Mia squatted down, taking deep breaths, trying to keep from doing something stupid like passing out. She glanced up at Trent. “You’re the one I called?”
“Actually, you dialed City Hall. The receptionist got your call to Baldwin and he called me to see where you would have gone. When you said it was Helen your grandmother knew exactly where the two of you were.” Trent knelt close to her. “You want some water?”
Mia stood and shook off the dizziness. “I want to go home.”
Baldwin nodded. “I’ll stop by later to get your statement; there’s no need for you to come to the station now.”
Mia watched him walk Helen to the police cruiser that sat near the curb. “My, how things have changed.”
“Stop giving him a hard time. He’s just doing his job.” Trent held her close. “I was worried.”
“So was I.”
“I told you to stay home. Locked in the apartment.” Trent smoothed her hair with his hand. “Don’t you ever listen?”
“She said Grans had fallen, I couldn’t reach either of you. I thought she needed me.”
Trent released her from his arms and the two walked to her grandmother’s car. “Understandable, but not forgiven.”
She handed him the keys. “You making the margaritas tonight?”
“I can; why?”
Mia slumped into the passenger seat of the car. “Make mine extra-strong.”