A Quilt in Time (A Harriet Turman/Loose Threads Mystery) (29 page)

He smiled. “Sorry for your loss. I didn’t realize you’d lost a car. If you’ll allow me to, I’ll make it up to you in chocolate.”

“Say yes,” Harriet encouraged her.

Lauren looked at her and then James.

“If you say so.”

The four women were opening their menus when Hannah Pratt stopped by their table.

“Hey, Harriet, Violet.” She gestured to include Lauren and Jo. “When I saw you at the dog races with that guy, Aiden told me he was a chef at the best restaurant in town. I thought I’d try it out.”

Harriet smiled at her.

“What did you think? ‘That guy,’ as you call him, is not
a
chef here, he is
the
chef. And he owns the place. I’ve never been disappointed in anything he’s prepared.

Violet set her menu down.

“He has a real gift for chocolate. His mousse is to die for.”

Hannah grinned. “I had his Death by Chocolate. It was fabulous.”

The hostess cleared her throat discretely. Hannah looked at her and realized she was blocking access to the next table.

“I guess I better go. Hope I don’t fall asleep on the way back to work.” She waved and left.

Lauren glanced at Hannah’s back and then at the table she had just vacated. There were dishes for two people.

“I wonder who she was lunching with.”

Harriet took her napkin from beside her plate and unfolded it onto her lap.

“Apparently, someone who left before her.”

An hour and a half later, Harriet again guided her car into the drop-off area in front of the senior center. Jo unhooked her seatbelt.

“I may never eat again,” she said. “I’ve had lunch and dinner there more than once and never were we given so much food.”

“That’s the Harriet effect,” Lauren told her.

Harriet opened her door.

“I know one of James’s friends, and we went there when it first opened, before it was popular. He’s never forgotten my loyalty.”

“Yeah, right,” Lauren muttered.

“I’m going to run in and talk to Hannah for a minute,” Harriet told her.

“I’ll help carry the fabric,” Lauren said.

Jo and Violet thanked her for driving them then went with Lauren to their common room. Harriet watched until they were out of sight.

“Hey, Hannah, how’s it going?”

Hannah flipped the wand microphone she was wearing away from her face.

“Peachy. Mr. Carrigan in the memory care unit broke out a window with a chair and tried to escape.”

“Is he okay?”

“Yeah, the windows have safety glass, like in cars. It cracked into lots of little pieces, but the chair only made a small hole all the way through. The old geezer wore himself out swinging the chair, so he couldn’t climb out.”

“What will they do about it?”

“What they always do—up his meds.”

“Can I talk to you about something else?” Harriet asked.

Hannah stood and looked in all directions.

“Sure, but if you see Howard coming, walk away.”

“Okay…Are you not allowed to talk to the public? It seems like it would be part of your job.”

“The public, yes. You? No. Howard’s no fool. He knows you’re not talking to me about a new place for your aunt to live. Anyway, you better get to the point before he shows up.”

“I need to talk to Joshua.”

“Good luck with that.”

“Doesn’t he live at your dad’s?”

“Yes and no. He stays in a converted garden shed on the property, but he isn’t there any more than he has to be. Personally, I think he’s got somewhere else he crashes most of the time.”

“Back to my question. Do you know how to get hold of him?”

“He doesn’t answer his phone, and I don’t know when we’ll cross paths at home, ‘cause, frankly, I try to spend as much time away from home as he does.”

“So, what if it was an emergency?”

“I guess I could text him for you. He doesn’t answer his phone,” she repeated. She thought for a minute. “I could leave him a voice mail. Meet him in a public place.”

“Why? Do you think he’s dangerous?”

“I’m not convinced he isn’t the one who killed Seth.”

“Have you told the police that?”

“Of course not. My dad is the family spokesman. I keep my mouth shut, my head down, and look forward to the day I can live anywhere but Foggy Point.”

“What makes you think he killed Seth? Do you have proof?”

“Joshua sees himself as Cinderella and Seth as an evil stepsister. He was always jealous of Seth and told anyone who would listen all about it.”

“Was he treated differently?”

Hannah was quiet for a moment.

“I suppose. But he brought it on himself. He talked back to Dad all the time, and he got in trouble with the police. He wasn’t grateful at all for anything Dad did for him. And he and Seth didn’t get along at all.” Hannah glanced at the security monitors then back at Harriet. “Where should he contact you?”

Harriet reached into her purse and pulled out a card for her long-arm business.

“Here’s my business card. It has my phone number on it. He can call me.”

“Okay. You better go now before my dad comes.”

“Has he said something to you about me?” Harriet asked.

“Nothing specific. He’s convinced you and your group know where Sarah is, and he’s not thrilled that no one will tell him.”

“Good to know. Thanks, Hannah.”

“Sure,” she said and repositioned the microphone in front of her mouth.

Harriet went back out to the car. Lauren was already sitting in the passenger seat.

“How’d you get out here without passing the reception desk?”

“Jo’s room has a patio. Mickey called and said Howard was prowling the halls, so she let me out through her room, just as a precaution.”

“I’ll be surprised if she doesn’t turn out to be ex-CIA. She certainly is paranoid.”

“I wasn’t eager to encounter Howard. If what Violet said about him abusing Jill is true, I don’t want to run into him in a well-lit, antiseptic-smelling hallway.”

“I got the same vibe from Hannah. She seemed really spooked when I stopped to talk to her. She checked the hallways and kept an eye on her monitors. She said Howard thinks we’re withholding information about where Sarah is—which, of course, we are.”

Lauren leaned her head back against her headrest.

“Maybe it’s time for us to lay it all on the line to Detective Morse, let her deal with the crazy man.”

Harriet sighed. “Yeah, maybe. Let’s go talk to Aunt Beth and Mavis and see what they think.”

Lauren swiped her phone and dropped it into the pocket of her messenger bag.

“Your aunt and Mavis aren’t going to be available until dinnertime. One of them will arrange a dinner meeting for whoever is available and let us know. That being the case, can you drop me back at my place? I can get some work done between now and then.”

Harriet turned in the direction of Lauren’s apartment.

“Good idea, I can do some stitching, and we can both think about what we heard today.”

The women spent the rest of the trip lost in their own thoughts.

“Hey, do you have company?” Harriet asked and pointed to the nondescript beige sedan parked in Lauren’s designated spot as she pulled to the curb.

“Yes. I mean no. I don’t have company, I do have a company car. Hallelujah, we have been loosed from our bondage.”

Harriet looked at her.

“It hasn’t been that horrible, has it?”

“Getting rides from you? No. Not being able to drive anywhere, ever? Excruciating. I actually had to dig out a coffee pot and make my morning coffee at home a couple of times.”

Harriet laughed. “Oh, the pain of it all.”

Before the bombing, Harriet sometimes left her car in the driveway if she knew she was going out again. Since then, she locked it in the garage even if she was just going back into the house for five minutes. She had barely secured the door into the house and taken her coat off when she heard a soft knocking on her studio door.

Scooter ran to it before her, jumping up and down and barking. Harriet peeked out the bow window before opening the door.

“Joshua?”

“Don’t act so surprised. Hannah said you wanted to see me. Here I am.”

Not quite the public place Hannah had suggested, Harriet thought, but if she suggested meeting elsewhere at this point, she might lose him.

“Come in,” She said and stepped aside. “Can I get you something to drink? Water? Soda?”

Joshua kept his hands in his jeans pockets, rhythmically jingling his change.

“Water’s fine. Look, I’m here. Can we skip the happy hostess routine and jump to the part where you tell me why?”

Harriet led him into the kitchen, filled a glass with ice and poured filtered water into it from a pitcher in her refrigerator.