CHAPTER FOURTEEN

 

Trudy apparently noticed that I'd stopped gophering and came over to our table. She reached hesitantly toward the chain of five or six finished blocks that were still attached by threads to each other and to Matt's sewing machine. Without taking her eyes off the blocks, she said, "May I take these over to the ironing board for you?"

Matt used a seam ripper to disconnect the chain of blocks from the one under the sewing machine foot and then from each other, since Faria had confiscated all the scissors.

As Matt tossed each one to Trudy, she smoothed it, almost as if she were patting a favorite pet, and then stacked them. She looked down at her hands as she said, "If there's anything else I can do to help you, I'd be honored."

"The honor is all mine, Trudy," he said. "I hear you're a natural-born artist with a needle, and your applique work is brilliant. I hope to see it at next year's quilt show."

"Thank you." She blushed and then finally found the nerve to look Matt directly in the eye. "I can't believe you know who I am."

"Dee and Emma have told me all about you."

"But you're Matteo. The face that launched a million trips."

"That's not really me." Now it was Matt's turn to blush, although his skin was much darker than fair Trudy's, so it was less visible. "I prefer to think of myself as an arts reporter."

"Oooh. Gorgeous and humble," Trudy whispered. "Just like in the ads."

"Time to get back to work now," Matt said, sounding a little more anxious than I'd ever heard him before. He didn't look at me as he picked up two pieces of fabric and stuffed them in front of the foot of the sewing machine.

I must have looked as confused as I felt, because Trudy explained, "You know. His videos were a viral sensation."

"I must have missed it." I'd been the epitome of someone living under a rock for the past ten years or so before I was forced to change careers, working eighty-plus-hour weeks and spending whatever free time I had studying quilts and hanging out with friends who apparently were living under their own rocks. Or perhaps it was just that we'd had so little time to spend together that we barely had time to share important things, let alone ephemera like internet celebrities. "I've never spent much time online except for checking court dockets, and those websites don't have any ads."

"But his face is everywhere," Trudy insisted. "He's the spokesmodel for an online travel agency that figured out that women make the majority of travel decisions, and they enjoy looking at a pretty face as much as men do. The agency went from obscurity to the top of the heap as soon as Matteo appeared in their advertising."

I stared at Matt. "Is that true? You weren't just a model, but a full-fledged celebrity?"

He shrugged, still not looking at me but keeping his attention on the fabric he was manipulating. "It's not that big a deal. It was an interesting experience, but I've moved on mostly. I only do the occasional special appearances now."

"I'm sorry," Trudy said, her face turning red and tears filling her eyes. "I didn't know you didn't want to talk about it. I'm so stupid. I should never have come today. I'm just making a mess of everything."

Matt abandoned his sewing and spoke gently. "You haven't made a mess of anything."

"Then why didn't Keely know all about your being a celebrity? You two are together, so if she didn't know, it's because you didn't want her to know. You were probably waiting to make sure she loved you for who you really are, not for being famous, and now I've ruined it."

"You didn't ruin anything." Now I was blushing at the thought of the entire quilt guild keeping tabs on my supposed relationship with Matt. "We only met recently."

"But we spent some real quality time together," Matt said, eyeing me defiantly. "Murder investigations tend to speed up the process of getting to know a person. At least the things that matter. We didn't talk much about my video work, because it wasn't that important."

"I'm so sorry." Trudy's tears began to fall.

"You really don't have to be," I said. "You didn't tell me anything that matters. I promise not to hold Matt's other life against him."

Trudy's tears only fell faster, and I didn't know how to convince her that she hadn't done anything wrong. If anyone was to blame, it was Matt for keeping secrets. He and I could straighten everything out between us later. For now, we needed to distract Trudy.

"Forget about Matt," I said, ignoring his anxiously affronted expression. I didn't mean it literally, but he deserved to stew a bit like I'd done for the past twelve weeks. "I've been meaning to ask to see your charm bracelet. Dee and Emma told me you've got quite a collection of thimbles on it."

Matt caught on right away, proving once again that he was more than just a pretty face. "How many different types of thimbles are there anyway?"

Trudy sniffled. "I'm still collecting them, but so far I've got twelve." She held out her wrist and started at the clasp, describing each charm in order. There was the standard thimble that everyone remembers from playing Monopoly. And then there were several variations on the same shape, but with openings at the tip for air circulation or on one side so the fingernail wouldn't be covered. There was a spoon-shaped one for using on the underneath finger to avoid pricks. And then there was one that looked a great deal like the one that had been found in the parking lot.

"Wait," I said. "Tell me more about that one."

"It's a leather thimble. Usually used on the bottom hand for the same protective reason as a spoon." She moved to the next thimble on her bracelet, which looked very similar, except there was a little circle where it would cover the pad of the finger. "If it's going to be used on the top hand, there's usually a metal reinforcement like this one has."

"I don't suppose you know anyone in the guild who uses a leather thimble," I said. "I'd love to see a demonstration of how it's used. I've never seen one before."

"Sorry. I've only been to a few guild meetings, and no one was doing any hand quilting during them, so I don't know who uses which thimble." Trudy brightened a little. "I can ask around for you."

Trudy's eagerness to help might bring a little too much attention to our interest in leather thimbles. "No, there's more-important work to do today. I'm sure Dee and Emma can arrange a demonstration when we're not so busy."

"Besides," Matt told her, "I need you to do something for me. You did say you'd help if I needed anything, right?"

She nodded.

"Good." Matt started explaining that he needed some fabric pieces that were slightly different from the standard sizes in the cutting table's baggies. It didn't make much sense to me, but Trudy nodded with obvious comprehension.

I tuned out their conversation while I reflected on this latest revelation. Matt had obviously left out a few little details when he'd first told me about his modeling career. He'd only shared the barest information, saying he'd quit at the peak of his career. I'd gotten the impression he had been a big deal within the fashion industry, but he hadn't said anything about being recognizable outside of it. A fashion model was a whole order of magnitude less recognizable than what he'd actually been, someone apparently famous enough to be known by just one name: Matteo.

I had to wonder what else he hadn't told me. Perhaps if he hadn't disappeared right after the quilt show, I might have found out before Trudy spilled the beans.

Still, it wasn't like I'd just found out he was a serial killer. It would take some time to get used to the idea of him as a celebrity, but I'd mingled with famous people before at bar association events. Of course, none of them had asked for a tour of my bank vault.

 

*   *   *

 

I realized Jayne was giving me the evil eye, so I decided I'd better get back to my gophering duties. On the way to the cutting table, I saw that Gil had finished chatting with Fred and had returned to mingling with the volunteers.

I thought about going over to see if Fred had heard anything new about the investigation, but just then he turned to peer out into the hall. A moment later Faria appeared with Stefan and Sunny, who headed straight for the back of the room and the ironing board they'd been assigned to earlier. They were wearing cheap, one-size-fits-many slippers, and Sunny's appliquéd smock had been replaced with a basic white T-shirt. Presumably, the confiscated clothes and shoes were being tested for blood spatter.

I made a quick tour of the room, delivering baggies and picking up blocks that needed to be ironed and then quilted. As I dropped some blocks on Stefan's ironing board, I saw Faria leaving again, this time escorting Matt out of the room. He was usually quick to assure people that he was just a simple arts reporter, but that didn't stop him from doing a good job when a more serious story fell in his lap, and he was probably going to ask at least as many questions as he answered.

Stefan followed my gaze. "I bet they'll let him leave. Celebrities get special treatment all the time, and it's the schmucks like me and Sunny who get stepped on."

"You know Matt isn't like that," I said. "He certainly didn't try to use his celebrity status to impress me. I didn't even know about it."

"You're right." Stefan watched Sunny iron the first of the blocks that I had delivered, and then he pulled me over to the line of chairs next to the wall. He dropped into one of them. "I didn't mean it. Matt may not care about living up to his potential, but you're right that he also doesn't take unfair advantage. It's just that I'm so worried about Sunny."

I took my time finding a comfortable position in the chair beside Stefan's. I knew better than to promise anyone that there was nothing to worry about. Unexpected and unfair bad things happened all the time. If Alan Miller had told me this morning that he was afraid he might be assaulted on his way out of the building, I'd have automatically reassured him that everything would be fine, the same way I used to calm all my anxious clients on the eve of a trial. I'd have told him that the museum was perfectly safe and nothing bad could possibly happen to him here. And I would have been completely and tragically wrong.

Still, I thought Stefan was worrying excessively. Unless maybe he'd picked up on some reason to be concerned during their official interview. "Did the detective say anything to Sunny during the interview that made her anxious?"

"They wouldn't let me sit with her during the interview," Stefan said angrily. "That's suspicious right there."

"Witnesses are always interviewed separately, so they can't coach each other or be influenced unintentionally. I was just wondering if she said anything to you about…I don't know. Perhaps reading her her rights or asking what she felt were leading and incriminating questions."

"Nothing like that," Stefan said, calmer now. "At least as far as I know. The detective said we couldn't talk about what we said in the interviews with each other, so we didn't. The only thing that worried me—and it wasn't bad enough that I felt I needed to insist on having you there—was that they kept coming back to asking me about the scissors Sunny had contributed to today's event. The detective wanted to know how many there were originally, whether she had any more in her car, that sort of thing."

"I saw Officer Faria collecting them earlier." I'd thought it was just the natural impulse of a patrol cop, nervous about so many potential weapons in a room he was responsible for overseeing. Perhaps there had been more to it.

"That's what I told Ohlsen," Stefan said. "Faria would know better than I would how many scissors there were."

I was confident Ohlsen already knew exactly how many pairs Faria had confiscated. That meant he was trying to figure out if one was missing. And that suggested he thought one had been used as a murder weapon.

Even if that was true, it didn't necessarily make Sunny the prime suspect. Anyone could have grabbed a pair of her scissors today. I'd seen them everywhere this morning, from the cutting tables to the sewing machines and even the ironing boards.

Stefan continued, "I also told him that Sunny would know exactly how many scissors she'd brought, because she's an excellent businesswoman. The only thing she wouldn't be able to account for is how many pairs might have been taken home, the same way people absently put a borrowed pen in their pocket. It happens during the shop's classes occasionally, and usually the scissors get returned as soon as the person realizes what she did. It's hardly ever intentional, and I wouldn't expect anyone here would have taken a pair on purpose. I mean, they're all volunteering their time to help out the museum. They're good people, not criminals."

"Good people commit crimes of passion." Still, I hoped Stefan was right, even as I was becoming more and more convinced that the killer was one of the people in this room. If Sunny's scissors really were the murder weapon, that certainly increased the odds that someone here had done it. The only other plausible explanation was that Alan had stolen one of the scissors, perhaps as a gift for his grandmother, and then the killer had taken them from him. Unfortunately, that could still have implicated a quilter. Sunny might have seen him with the scissors and confronted him about the theft. It was easier to imagine Jayne in a self-righteous fury, reclaiming the stolen scissors and provoking Alan into violence and then killing him with the weapon that was so conveniently right at hand.

"You need to relax," I said. "Your anxiety will only make Sunny more nervous, and then the police will start to wonder what she's so worried about."

"I can't relax," Stefan said. "I keep thinking about how the very same detective who's in charge of this case arrested the wrong person a few months ago. She hadn't done anything. They still arrested her."

"Ohlsen had been wrong then, but he wasn't entirely irrational. His suspect did have the means, motive, and opportunity to kill Randall Tremain." I wanted to say that wasn't true of Sunny, but unfortunately, I couldn't. Not honestly. Sunny did have means, motive, and opportunity in this case. She was used to working with sharp instruments, probably not just quilting tools but also medical devices, and could well have had a pair of her own custom-made scissors close at hand. She had a reason to be afraid of Alan Miller, which could lead to violence as a preemptive form of self-defense. And, since she had found the freshly dead body, it wasn't too much of a stretch to conclude she had also had the opportunity to kill him. Stefan didn't need to hear that line of reasoning though. "Anyone can make a mistake. I think Ohlsen learned from it, and this time there's no one pressuring him into making a hasty arrest."

"Are you sure?" Stefan asked

"As much as I can be while I'm stuck in here with all the rest of the witnesses," I said.

Sunny handed off a stack of ironed blocks to Trudy and came over to get Stefan. "Your turn," she told him, tugging him out of his chair and taking his place in it. "I need a break."

She watched him shuffle over to the ironing board, his pants hems dragging on the wood floor. She waited until he took up the iron to work on the latest pile of blocks that Trudy had delivered, and then she turned to me. "Do you know if they found the murder weapon?"

"Not as far as I know," I said. "I'm guessing it was one of your scissors."

She nodded. "I think so too. It was certainly something sharper than the bag of batting scraps that I was carrying." She looked relieved to be able to talk about the experience openly. Maintaining an upbeat facade for Stefan had to be draining. At least, that had been my experience while keeping my clients' spirits up over the long months of discovery leading up to the trial. My doctor had told me that the years of doing that for my clients could have contributed to my current tendency to pass out.

"If Alan was stabbed," I said, "shouldn't that exonerate you? If you'd done it, wouldn't you have been covered with blood?"

Sunny looked a little faint, reminding me that she'd gone into shock earlier from the sight of Alan's blood.

"I'm sorry," I said. "I forgot about your phobia."

"It's all right," Sunny said. "I'm not usually such a wimp that I can't even talk about blood. Back in school, I was fascinated by it. I read about it, listened to lectures about it, and wrote about it in exams. I was even okay with it in test tubes and under a microscope. It was a big surprise when I passed out the first time I saw it coming out of a real live person. I thought I'd get over it with practice, but it got worse instead of better."

I knew the feeling. I'd once thought I could control my syncope events with willpower. Instead, the stress of trying to avoid them only increased the likelihood that I'd lose consciousness. "Shock isn't something you can control. You did everything you could this morning by calling for help."

"I know, but I wish I could have done something for the young man. I'm pretty sure it was too late by the time I found him, but if I'd gotten any closer, I would have passed out, and that wouldn't have helped anyone."

"It might have given you an odd sort of alibi though. A person who passes out at the sight of blood isn't likely to stab anyone, or do anything that would risk getting blood on herself. Assuming, of course, that the killer was likely to get spattered."

"It's hard to tell how much blood the killer was exposed to. I'm pretty sure he'd have gotten some on his clothes, but it might not have been a huge amount. It depends on the cutting instrument and the angle of the cut." Sunny hugged her ribs and closed her eyes for a moment. "Maybe I'm not as good at talking about a real person's blood as I am with theoretical blood."

"I understand," I said. "I was just curious."

"I'm okay." Sunny opened her eyes again but continued to hold onto her ribs. "I wish I could be more helpful. All I remember is seeing the blood around his waist, soaking his shirt. I couldn't even tell you how many wounds there were or how long he'd been dead, let alone how much spatter there was."

"Can I ask one more bloody question?"

"Sure," she said gamely.

"Alan's quilt seems to be missing," I said. "What if it was between him and the killer when he was stabbed? Would it have absorbed all the blood?"

"The Tree of Life quilt? That would be such a shame, compounding the tragedy. Stefan pointed the quilt out to me when you were appraising it. Despite the wear and tear, it was lovely." Sunny shuddered. "The thing is, blood isn't just a wet puddle. It's got some pressure behind it. And it's sticky. It almost acts like a magnet, attracted to everything. I used to think that it was practically alive with a consciousness that made it seek me out, aware that I was so freaked out by it. Now all I can picture is the quilt's green trees on a blood-red background. I don't care how well it's cleaned. I'd never be able to look at it again if that's what happened to it."

"It's just speculation on my part," I said. "I'd like to believe Detective Ohlsen will be able to identify the killer by finding traces of blood on him even if the quilt absorbed most of the evidence."

Sunny brightened. "You're right. Even with the quilt, I'd expect there to be at least a little blood on the killer somewhere. Certainly on the hands. Unless he stabbed Alan through the quilt. All the police have to do is inspect us all for blood spatter, and they'll know I didn't do it."

I doubted it would be that simple, but there was no point in worrying Sunny. Stefan was already worried enough for both of them.