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I turned around to see Kyle standing there with an apologetic grin. “Sorry for making you jump. It’s just that I happen to have experience with both of those meals and the spaghetti is far superior in every way. Even better if you have extra red sauce and grated parmesan cheese at home.”
“Thanks. Sounds like the best choice tonight, anyhow. I’m too beat to try to think of something to put together myself. And you didn’t really scare me—I’ve just been jumpy lately.”
Kyle’s expression darkened. “I’d imagine so. I have been, too.” He paused and then said, “I guess you’ve heard about Roz. I mean, working with Luna and everything. Is Luna doing okay? And her mom?”
I nodded. “I think they’re okay. Luna wanted to come right back into work, though, to stay busy and not have as much time to think.”
“I bet she did. I’ve been trying to stay busy the last few days, myself. I helped out Scott’s mother and brother in Scott’s house today.” His expression darkened. “It was tough on them.”
“I can imagine,” I said softly.
He added slowly, “They seemed to be getting a different picture of Scott the longer we cleared his things out. Finally, they took a break and I kept going for another hour or so.”
“A different picture of him? Like how?”
He quickly said, “Oh, I don’t know. Just that Scott has always created this image of himself as being so successful. And they were realizing what bad shape his finances were in. Stuff like that.” He changed the subject. “I keep running everything through my head, trying to figure out what must have happened. But I don’t ever seem to get anywhere with it because I know everyone and I hit a wall every time. I mean, Kelly was mad at Scott. Really mad. But would she have killed him? And then murdered her best friend to cover everything up?”
I didn’t say anything and Kyle continued, “I can’t see it. I can kind of see her killing Scott in the heat of the moment. But from what I heard, the attack on Roz was planned out.”
I nodded. And I glanced around to make sure no one could overhear Kyle, but the deli section was deserted and the worker wasn’t even behind the counter.
Kyle said, “And Grace. Why would Grace have killed Scott? For ruining her party weekend?” He shook his head. “It just doesn’t add up.” He looked at me. “You didn’t even know any of the people involved, so you couldn’t have done it unless you’re some sort of psychopath or something.”
I gave a startled laugh that likely did sound like something a psychopath would utter.
He absently reached for a spaghetti dinner for himself as he continued his analysis. “Luna had no connection with Scott and she loved Roz. No reason for her to be responsible.”
“And Felicity?” I asked.
Kyle snorted as if the possibility was so outrageous it never even occurred to him. “There’s no way Felicity would ever be involved in something like this. She’s very civic-minded and contributes to society. Why on earth would she ever kill Scott Haynsworth?”
I shrugged and said in a light tone, “If we’re listing possibilities, no matter how farfetched, then surely Scott’s unwelcome attention could be considered a motive.”
Kyle scowled. “No, because she’s fully capable of handling Scott’s boorish behavior herself. And she did—by avoiding him and then turning in early.” The mention of Scott’s actions seemed to turn his mood much darker.
“And you?” I asked, still in that light tone.
“Me?” Kyle stared blankly at me.
“Well, we considered me as a possible suspect. What about you? What motives would you have had?”
Kyle shrugged as if this line of questioning was of no consequence. “I wouldn’t have. I’ve known Scott my entire life. I was devastated when I found out he was dead. Losing someone you’ve known since childhood is a terrible blow.”
I said slowly, “Someone mentioned you might carry some resentment over a long-ago business deal that went badly.”
Kyle snapped, “Someone should keep their mouth shut, especially since they don’t have the facts straight.” He blew out a sigh. “Sorry. Small towns. I’ll never get used to everyone knowing everything.”
“What did they get wrong?” I asked.
He shrugged. “The business deal wasn’t bad. Scott merely bought me out. Could it have been a better deal? Sure. In hindsight, the business ended up doing extremely well and I should have counteroffered for more money. But think about it: the business was in its infancy. How would we have known how successful it would end up? It might have done exactly the opposite and completely failed.”
“Was the decision to leave the business your idea or Scott’s?” I asked curiously.
Kyle rubbed his face. “It was long enough ago that I honestly don’t remember how it came about. But I know I wasn’t cut out for the day-to-day operation of building and running a business.” He gave me a rueful smile. “Believe it or not, Scott was the charming one. He was the frontman for us. Scott spoke with investors and was good at putting together marketing strategies and just making the whole thing work. He was a numbers guy and I was an ideas guy. So, yeah, maybe I wasn’t keen on running a business. Maybe Scott and I came to that same conclusion simultaneously. I don’t know.”
I asked, “Did you continue dreaming up business ideas? I’d think that would take a lot of ingenuity.”
Kyle gave a short laugh. “As a matter of fact, I haven’t. Maybe I was a one-trick pony and that was my only trick. The start-up took a good deal of my time to develop. I probably should have spent more of that time trying to figure out what I wanted to do with my life after the start-up. When Scott bought me out, I was suddenly left without anything. I felt like I was scrambling after that. And it probably didn’t help that Scott’s business was suddenly taking off.” He added quickly, “I was still proud that it was doing so well. I knew I had a real hand in its success. But I was . . . lost.”
“What did you do after that?” I asked.
He sighed. “Well, I put off deciding what to do. Although I actually had a fairly good reason for that—my mother was ailing and having a hard time kicking it. I helped her out and got sucked into life there. Different doctor appointments a few days a week, cleaning, helping her with her yard work. In hindsight, it was good for me because I had a place to live and a routine of sorts while I figured out what to do next. But I had one job opportunity I had to turn down because it was in another state. The problem is, my timing has always been lousy.”
“What happened then?” I asked.
“I floundered for a while. Scott was aware of it, too. He called me once and offered to take me on at the business.”
I raised my eyebrows. “But you said you weren’t interested in running a company.”
“I wasn’t. But Scott wasn’t offering to take me on as a partner—only as an employee.”
I’d detected a note of bitterness in Kyle’s voice. “That must have stung.”
He nodded. “It did. But it was still pretty nice of the guy. He offered to let me work remotely so I could stay at home with my mom. But I ended up turning it down.”
“You obviously found a direction, though,” I said, trying to encourage him.
He gave me a wry smile. “Did I somehow give that impression? I’m not sure how. No, I’m afraid I’m currently unemployed. I’ve floated from job to job like a dandelion seed. And that hasn’t helped my personal life, either. Most of my adult life I’ve been living with my mom and trying to find a solid job. It’s not easy to find dates that way.”
I said, “Felicity and you seem to have a nice connection.” I paused as he flushed. “I’m sorry, I hope you don’t think I’m being nosy.”
He shook his head, still a little flustered. “No, of course not. After all, I approached you to find out what book club Felicity was talking about. Naturally you’d be curious about that.”
“You’ve known each other for a long time,” I said.
“We have. Maybe too long. It could be one of those things where Felicity sees me as more of a brother because we’ve always hung out together. Kyle rubbed his forehead as if it was starting to hurt. “Another problem is that I have another reason for wanting to talk to Felicity. She has a lot of business contacts in neighboring towns and I wondered if she’d help me network to find another job. Not at her job, of course. That would be too weird, especially if I want to have any kind of relationship with her.”
I said gently, “Have you thought about just calling her?”
Kyle frowned. “What do you mean?”
“I mean, it seems to me like you’re knocking yourself out trying to casually run into her. You’re planning on showing up to her book club.”
Kyle said, “I like to read, though.”
“And you’ve used every opportunity to try and sit near her . . . at least, when I’ve been around. But there’s a lot going on with all of us right now. I think being direct is probably the best approach when life gets crazy.”
“You really think so?” Kyle’s expression was worried. “I don’t know. I haven’t ever really just called her up like that.” He added thoughtfully, “Although, in the past, I thought that being direct was the way to go. You probably won’t believe this, but for a while, every time Scott and I would go out to supper or catch a movie or something, he’d invited Roz to go along with us.”
“Really?” I couldn’t see Roz and Scott together. Especially after Roz had yelled at him at the party.
“Oh, not for Scott. I think he was planning on Roz and me hitting it off romantically. He’d do things like that sometimes. He liked the idea of being a matchmaker, but he never threw the right people together. And now they’re both gone.” He cleared his throat and gave me an apologetic smile. “I’ve kept you here way too long when you’re just trying to grab some supper and get back home. I’ll see you soon. At the library, I’m sure.” He gave me a crooked grin and disappeared into the cereal aisle.
I walked through the checkout line with my spaghetti and a side of mashed potatoes. I had the feeling I might be totally undoing the effects of my jogging, but I was definitely in the mood for carbs.
Fitz greeted me joyfully, as always. He was as perfect as a dog for making a person feel good. When he looked at you it was as if he was saying: You! I’ve been waiting to see you all day long. Hi, friend. I heated up my supper and Fitz immediately jumped up into the kitchen chair beside mine and seemed to smile at me as I ate. He was perfectly polite, though, and didn’t hop into my lap until I was completely finished eating and once I’d invited him to.
I was scratching Fitz under his chin and listening to his rumbling purr when my phone rang. I looked at it apprehensively. The phone calls I’d gotten lately hadn’t been the best. I reluctantly leaned forward and grabbed it from the far side of the table. My heart gave an extra couple of beats when I saw it was Grayson calling and I worked hard to keep my voice steady as I answered.
“Hi there,” he said easily. “Hope I’m not interrupting anything.”
I felt like I should mention I was actually doing something fascinating and exciting. But considering I’d just finished up a ready-to-eat meal from the grocery deli and my entertainment consisted of loving on Fitz, I decided not to. “Not a bit,” I said, trying to keep my tone as light as his. “Just hanging out with Fitz.”
“That’s good. Listen, just wanted to let you know that I’ve had great response to your library column. You did an awesome job with that.”
“Really?” My voice sounded as doubtful as I felt. I didn’t doubt that the column was decent—I figured anyone who was interested in either reading or the library would find it at least helpful. But I was certainly surprised that there would actually be feedback one way or another to the newspaper office.
“Sure. Wow, you sound surprised,” he said with a chuckle.
“It’s just that I didn’t think anyone would give you feedback,” I said.
“Are you kidding? In Whitby? The newspaper gets feedback on every tiny thing. It appears there are plenty of people here who don’t have a lot to do. I made the mistake of discontinuing what apparently was a beloved comic strip and replacing it with one of the latest, coolest strips out there.”
I smiled. “I’m guessing that strategy didn’t work out well.”
“It was catastrophic! At one point I wondered if an angry mob might gather outside the newspaper office and start throwing stones at me when I arrived for work. Believe me, I very quickly brought the favorite old strip back. I wouldn’t think about making any changes to the newspaper without lots of deliberation.”
I said teasingly, “Well, that makes me feel good, knowing the new column could have ended up instigating riots.”
“Yes, you should feel good about yourself. I got two phone calls right away on it and then a few emails. Everyone was in favor of the column and most of them were also staunch Ann Beckett fans, too. I didn’t realize I’d solicited a local celebrity for the column.” His voice was teasing too and I felt warmth course through me in response.
I chided myself. Where did I think this was going, anyway? He wasn’t interested in me the same way or we’d already be an item.
He continued, “Anyway, I thought I might start tackling the trail reviews and see what the response is to those. I know you’re busy, but I wondered if you have any breaks in your schedule and can point out some good trails to me. Or, even better, maybe go on one or two of them.”
I’d already been mulling this over since the first time he spoke with me about it. Honestly, what did I have to lose? I’ve been trying to exercise more and get out more and clearly jogging wasn’t my favorite thing. Maybe my feelings for Grayson were more of a crush, anyway, and the more time I spent with him, the more disillusioned I’d become. Maybe.
“Sure,” I said finally. “I think I’m off in a few days. If the weather’s good, let’s do it. I can give you a couple of different options for trails and see what you think: difficulty level, view, etc. I’ll email you tomorrow.”
“Great!” Grayson’s voice was pleased. “And I’ll leave you alone for the night. Give Fitz a rub for me.”
Once I hung up, I swore Fitz was looking at me with a sympathetic expression on his face. I was frequently guilty of anthropomorphizing Fitz and thinking of him as a rather small and hairy human. But then he bumped his head lovingly against my face as if to comfort me. He was more cued in to emotions than any other cat I’d ever seen.
I rubbed him under his chin in return and sighed. “Thanks, Fitz. I think it will work out all right.”
I thought Fitz’s eyes held just the slightest amount of doubt in them.
Unfortunately, between thinking and talking about Roz all day and the late conversation with Grayson, sleep proved frustratingly elusive that night. I gave up even trying to sleep around 3:30. Fitz opened a surprised eye when I got out of the bed, but he stayed curled up in a ball at the foot of my bed as if to demonstrate proper sleeping methods.
Sometimes, when I couldn’t sleep and my mind was whirling, it was better to just do a brain dump of all the things I needed to do or the thoughts I was having. If it was a task that needed to be done, I stuck it on my calendar. If it was just a nagging thought, sometimes it stopped pestering me if it was down on paper. Sitting in my robe and fuzzy socks, I scribbled in a composition notebook until I couldn’t think of anything else on my mind. I wrote ideas for walking trails with Grayson and tips for keeping it all on a professional level (i.e., no doe eyes from me when I looked at Grayson). I wrote about the Fitz’s Picks pictures and ideas for what titles to include.
Then I moved on to Scott’s and Roz’s deaths. I made little notes about Kyle’s business dealings with Scott and his interest in Felicity. I wrote about Scott needing a tax attorney. I jotted down how Felicity had been trying to ignore Scott. I made a note about Roz’s room location overlooking the pool, her comments to Kelly, and her murder. I considered Kelly and Scott’s troubled relationship. Then I put down Grace’s collection of guests and the words she’d exchanged with Scott when I’d woken up from my nap on the boat.
I read everything I’d written, and then picked up my laptop. I didn’t know as much about Felicity and Grace as I felt I did about the other guests at the party. I started searching for their names online: social media, press releases, newspaper articles.
Felicity came up a few times and it all seemed to be work-related. She headed a volunteer group that tutored in local elementary schools, she received some sort of banking award for meeting a particular goal, she joined an industry-related organization. She wore a tight smile in each photo I saw of her and her eyes looked deeply reproachful, as if she was unhappy with the photographer about taking her picture.
Grace was much the same way, except that she seemed to enjoy having her photo taken and appeared to be genuinely enjoying herself in the pictures I saw. There was an obituary for her husband, who’d been a bit older than Grace. Actually, he’d been quite a bit older. They’d been very active together in their community and were photographed at a lot of banquets and charitable events. Grace wore expensive-looking gowns, her husband wore tuxedos, and they were with people who were equally well-attired in formal settings.
I started delving into Grace’s deceased husband’s information, which took time since most of the stories about him related to philanthropy. I raised my eyebrows when I read that he was a major shareholder and board member in a pharmaceutical company. The main product for the company was an opioid that had been on the news quite a bit. I frowned. The opioid had been blamed for a lot of misery around the country in general. Maybe that explained why her husband had been such a philanthropist: he felt guilty.
The problem was that there wasn’t anything for either Felicity or Grace that went back any farther than five years or so. I decided when I got back to work that I might look in the archives at the paper and see if there was anything from when they attended college. Or, perhaps, even earlier. The paper had digitized some back issues, but it seemed it was a large, ongoing project that was only addressed when someone on staff had time . . . or maybe an intern. I decided to ask Grayson about it the next time I spoke to him. Fortunately, the library had a collection of all the newspaper archives, although some of them were still on microfiche. I’d have to see how busy we were at work.
I glanced at the clock and saw with surprise that I’d managed to burn up a couple of hours. I fed Fitz, who was now sleepily waking up, and did some stretching since I’d been hunched over my computer. I ate my breakfast, packed my lunch for the day, and tried to use makeup to address the fact that my eyes had bags under them from the sleepless night.
It still wasn’t quite time to head off to work, so I read And Then There Were None for a while, finishing it up in the process. It gave me the willies even more than usual since Roz’s murder. It also made me think. In Agatha Christie’s story, the consecutive murders were connected to sins in each person’s past. It made me even more determined to poke around in the archives. And, maybe, speak with Luna. After all, she remembered everyone from when they were in school. Maybe she could shed some light on them.