A Murder of Taste: A Queen Bees Quilt Mystery (27 page)

Kate moved slightly and Bill took her arm, pinching it tightly. He looked back at Po. “I thought I could talk to her. But she didn’t want to talk—she wanted to ruin me, and she wouldn’t back down. She wouldn’t listen …” His voice trailed off as if his mind was going in different directions at once. The carefully held together Bill McKay was unraveling. “Janna—she’s a bright girl, if a little drab. And her family situation more than makes up for that. But she’s like all women—too nosey and manipulating—and she almost ruined it. She thought I was meeting a woman that night and she was jealous. So she followed me and hid in the bushes. She knew it all. Knew the wine guy was blackmailing me. Knew how Laurel died—”

“And where,” Kate said. “Janna was the one who mentioned where Laurel was killed, Po. I finally remembered.”

“And the bleach on the quilt, that was Janna, wasn’t it?”

Po asked. “She couldn’t bear the thought of losing you to prison. She wanted to protect you.”

Bill shook his head at the memory. “That fat woman in the bakery told me about the bleach, and I knew immediately from the look on Janna’s face that she had done it. I was furious. She could have ruined everything.”

Kate’s brows pulled together when Billy pushed the metal more forcefully into her shoulder blades, but she kept talking. “Janna hung around us enough to know that we were getting closer. And she would have given her life to protect the only man who had ever paid any attention to her.”

“She’s as bad as the rest of them. Doesn’t think logically.”

“She loves you, Billy. And now you’re ruining her life, too,” Kate said.

“Stop—all of you. Let me think.” He rubbed his temples and looked around the room, like a kid looking for a place to hide. Then he backed up toward the door, his gun still pressed into Kate’s side.

“We’ll go to the quarry,” he said at last. “That’s where I met Jason Sands that night.” He laughed lightly. “Now why did Laurel confide in that useless guy? She wasn’t very good at picking her men, was she? Come, friends, let’s go.”

“I don’t think so, Billy.” And before Bill could register that the voice was directly behind him, P.J. knocked the gun to the floor, twisted Billy’s arm in a painful grip, and shoved him into the hands of half the Crestwood police force, waiting with open arms on the front steps.

“Po, you’ve got to start locking your doors,” P.J. muttered, and then he filled his arms with the woman who had disappeared from the dance floor an hour before, and never returned. “You’re supposed to dance with the one who brung you,” he whispered into her neck. “Not run off with the quarterback.”

Po watched the two of them as she wiped the tears from her eyes, her heart still pounding as the sirens and cars started up and tore down the street.
Oh, Liz
, Po moaned softly.
That was surely a close one.

EPILOGUE

It was bouillabaisse, of course, that was featured at the unveiling of Picasso’s quilt. And a fine arugula salad, with greens from the new organic farm that Picasso had discovered just south of town. He’d baked the baguettes that morning, and whipped up bowls of butter with snips of rosemary tossed in for color and flavor. The restaurant was closed to the public for the evening, and only special friends and Elderberry merchants filled the small restaurant.

A warm breeze filled the restaurant with the smells of May—lilac and tulips, violets and pansies. Beside the restaurant, flowering crab apple trees and pink dogwoods, lit from beneath with tiny lights, welcomed the guests.

All of the Queen Bees were there, having worked feverishly all month to finish the quilt. Max Elliott came, and the whole street of Elderberry merchants and spouses. Ambrose and Jesse provided the champagne, and Andy Haynes played his guitar in the background. When Picasso pulled the sheet down and revealed the French Quarter quilt, its boiling pot a shiny blue-black image at the bottom, and the brilliant, colorful fish soaring across the pieced background, there wasn’t a dry eye in the room.

“It is perfect,” Picasso declared, lifting his glass of champagne. “And you are friends like none other.”

The toasts echoed around the room, cheers and hoots and sighs of relief.

Janna Hathaway had disappeared from town, scooped up by another domineering father. Selma wasn’t going to press charges for the damaged quilt—it was such a minor thing, done out of fear for a man not worthy of her love. And Janna had suffered tremendously in the process.

Billy had felt nothing for Janna, the Bees had conjectured. She was a stepping-stone for him. And that was just another sad, cruel piece of the whole horrible story.

“Po, what will you do with your quilt?” Picasso asked as the happy crowd milled around them.

“A perfect solution, Picasso. The one good thing to come out of all of this is SafeHome. They made a hunk of money at the gala, and donations are still coming in, so it will become a reality. Meredith Mellon has taken over the whole project, so you know it will happen. I suggested she call it Laurel’s Place—and the quilt will hang in the entry.”

Picasso leaned over and kissed her on the cheek. Tears glistened in his eyes, but his face was full of happiness. Waiters appeared then, as if by magic, carrying colorful bowls heaped full of steaming bouillabaisse, and people moved toward the white-clothed tables.

“Where’s Kate?” Po asked as Max took her elbow and directed her to a table by the window?” Po knew that Kate had had nightmares following Bill McKay’s arrest, and she was filled with an anger that Po knew would take her awhile to shake. But as Kate would do, she was purging it in an appropriate way—using her summer photography class to focus on images of strong women, taking charge of their lives. They’d have a show at the end of summer, and sell the framed photos to benefit Laurel’s Place. P.J. had found it difficult to be apart from Kate for more than a few minutes at a time after the events of the past weeks. And Po knew that she would no longer be the only one looking out for her best friend’s daughter.

“I saw her near the kitchen door earlier,” Phoebe said, as she scooped Emma up in her arms. Jimmy followed close behind with little Jude toddling beside him.

Po smiled at the twins, then moved around the room, searching for the bright red blouse Kate had worn that night. As she wove her way through the crowd toward the back of the restaurant, a flash of red through a rear window caught her eye. Po walked over to the back door and looked out into the dark night. “Kate?” she said softly.

There was no answer, and Po stood there for a minute, her eyes adjusting to the darkness. And then a sound drew her eyes to the flowering crab that Picasso had planted out in the alley. A touch of beauty, he called it.

And that it was, Po thought, as she saw the two figures beneath its branches. She stood there for just a brief moment, watching P.J. and Kate. They were wrapped in one another’s arms, shadowed from moonlight by the branches of the tree. The nightmares had stopped for Kate, Po thought, and she nodded at the sight that filled her heart to overflowing.

I told you it would be okay, Liz, she whispered to her best friend. Have I ever let you down? And with a lighter step, Po joined her friends over a heaping bowl of bouillabaisse, some laughter, and bonds of friendship that lit the small restaurant from within.