Death of a Wolfman (A Lily Gayle Lambert Mystery Book 1) (12 page)

I turned over the clue of the shoe prints. Miss Edna had sworn she hadn’t seen anyone other than the wolf man who’d leaped her dahlia beds. Were the shoe prints connected to the wolf man? There’d been rain the day before Halloween so the prints had to have been left after that; otherwise the rain would have washed them into a blur. Who could they have belonged to? I racked my brain, thinking of the women in town who wore high heels, but couldn’t come up with a reason for a single one of them to have been out in the woods at night. And certainly not with a wolf man running around.

Why, any sane woman would’ve screamed her head off if she’d seen something like that. So that, in my mind, meant the wolf man had at least one friend in town, and that friend was a woman.

Yanking open the door of the shop, I almost tore off the string of bells attached to announce someone entering. “Hey, Dixie, thanks for helping me get out of that mess with Miss Edna yesterday. Way to be there as my best friend.”

Dixie turned from the supply shelf she was restocking, put her hands on her hips and glared. “What the heck did you expect me to do? Everybody knows Miss Edna can put the evil-eye hex on you if you get on her bad side.”

Throwing up my hands in frustration, I said, “Don’t tell me you still believe that crap from when we were kids. Miss Edna could no more put some hex on you than I could.”

Dixie raised her eyebrows. “So why didn’t you tell her to take herself back home and stay out of it? Huh?” Turning back to her restocking, she continued, “Not quite so sure of yourself now, are you?”

Flopping into one of the shop chairs, I twirled it around to keep my friend from seeing my face. “Well, for heaven’s sake, I’d just discovered a dead body that morning. I was hardly in prime condition to run off the poor old lady.”

Dixie snorted. “Poor old lady, my ass. You just don’t want to admit you’re scared of her too. Did you straighten her out about her
Triumphant Triumvirate
after I left?”

I remained silent. Dixie groaned.

“That’s just great. Now she’s going to be dropping in on you all the time with a bunch of useless talk, and when she comes in here to get her hair fixed on Wednesday, I’ll have to deal with her too. How could you?”

I stopped spinning the chair; I wasn’t fooling my oldest friend. Besides, I was making myself dizzy. “Like I said, I wasn’t in top form at the time. Do you know, I had to listen to her quiz me about LizBeth Mitchell the whole time after you left?” I blew out a breath. “That woman should work for the prison system; she’d scare even the most hardened criminal straight just to get away from her.”

Dixie’s eyes went wide. “You told her all about LizBeth before you told me? Damn it, that’s why I came over in the first place. I wanted to get the inside story first.”

“Well, you shouldn’t have shot out of there so fast. You could have gotten what you wanted. Besides, I bet the shop was buzzing with it when you got back over here anyway.”

Dixie sat in the next chair over. “Well, of course it was. But they didn’t have the real story. You wouldn’t believe some of the stuff I heard in here yesterday. It’d curl your hair.” Looking at me, she added, “If it wasn’t curly already.” She settled back in her chair. “My first appointment isn’t for another hour so I want to hear all the details from you. Was she really hanging by her hair with her throat cut to the bone?”

Where did people come up with this stuff? The missing tongue Ben had told me about was bad enough to make me cringe. Who would do something like that? Then Ben harping on squirrels and chattering came to mind. Maybe whoever did it had removed LizBeth’s tongue as some kind of warning about her talking too much. But how could the murderer have known about our meeting in the first place?

A horrific thought occurred to me. That piece-of-work brother of LizBeth’s could’ve followed her from the house to the gazebo and killed her before I arrived. Turning to Dixie, I said, “Listen, I’m going up to the manor to talk to Alexander Mitchell. I think he could have done it.”

“Her brother! Why would he kill her?”

I shrugged. “That’s what I intend to find out. When I found LizBeth, all I saw was a lot of blood down her shirt and I got the hell out of there. But Ben told me later her tongue had been cut out. Why would someone do that unless it was a warning about talking too much? Her brother was really pissed when he caught me researching his family at the library and tried to pay me double what LizBeth was to get me to stop.”

Dixie laughed. “So you’re going to march on up to the manor and accuse Alexander of killing his sister for some unknown reason and he’s going to admit it to you?”

I stood up. “Of course I’m not going to go up there and accuse him of anything.” I drew myself to my full five feet, five inches. “I’m going up there to convey my condolences to the family, and if Alexander seems suspicious to me, I’ll follow up on his alibi.”

I walked toward the door, only stopping when Dixie’s hand grabbed my arm. “Don’t go up there by yourself, Lily Gayle. I mean it. If you do, I’ll call Ben and send him right behind you. If there’s even the tiniest chance what you think is true, he isn’t going to admit anything to you. You best take this to Ben and let him do his job.”

“You wouldn’t dare!”

“Oh yes, I would!”

I glared. “You’re my best friend. Why would you sic Ben on me like that? I’m going to solve this case.”

Dixie stood firm “It’s because I’m your best friend that I can’t let you go up there by yourself. That whole family is weird, and if you think Alexander had something to do with killing his sister, he might figure out that you’re snooping and who knows what he might do?” She shook her head. “Uh-uh. You aren’t goin’ up there alone.”

I stomped my foot. “You know Ben will never let me get near the place if he thinks I’m looking for clues.”

Dixie nodded. “Yep. That’s the whole idea.”

“I never thought you’d pull something like this. You’ve always been on my side when I helped Ben out with solving crimes. Why’re you being like this now?”

“First off, because I don’t want something to happen to you. There are already two dead bodies in this town. The other things weren’t murder, they were”—Dixie frowned—“I guess you’d call them more blue-collar crimes. But murder is a whole different ball game. Why don’t you go on back home and work on that family history LizBeth wanted you to do if you feel the need to do something for her?”

I yanked my arm out of her grasp. “She’s dead, and her brother made it really clear to me at the library he didn’t want me snooping around in the family history. So what’s the point in working on it now? No one at the manor will care.”

“But don’t you see? You’ve always wanted to check up on that family. Even though LizBeth’s dead, you still got her permission to dig around. Why don’t you do that and let Ben solve the murder?”

I couldn’t believe Dixie was taking this attitude. Couldn’t she see this was the most exciting case ever? I’d just let Dixie think I was heading home to look into the family history records, then go on up to the manor anyway. What Dixie didn’t know wouldn’t hurt her…and she couldn’t report to Ben.

I let my shoulders sag. “You’re right. I have wanted to dig into that family tree for a long time. I’ll go on home and work on it some more. I found a couple of interesting things I wanted to follow up on anyway.”

Dixie smiled. “Good. I’ll see you later this afternoon and you can fill me in.”

Saluting as I headed out the door, I hollered back, “You bet. I’m sure to find something juicy if I dig enough.”

Walking down the street in the direction of my own house, just in case Dixie was watching through the window, I chewed over the situation. Two dead bodies. One a member of the oldest family in town and one a wolf man. What could the two have in common? Or were they unrelated? Some strange alchemy of fate that put them on the morgue table within days of each other?

Almost skipping, I headed around back of my house, hopped on my bike and took the path through the woods I’d taken yesterday morning for my meeting with LizBeth.

CHAPTER TWELVE

Leaning my bike against the stone balustrade surrounding the lowest level of the entryway to Mitchell Manor, I looked with awe at the house before me. Never having been this close to the house before, I drank in the incredible architectural detail. The granite, which from a distance looked solid gray, now sparkled with black, pink and cream from close up, giving the stone a quality of being alive and shimmering in the sunlight.

Just inside the stone balustrade ran a wide area of gray flagstones, creating a kind of courtyard effect sweeping to the steps leading up to a wide porch surrounded with a matching stonework rail. Twelve steps led up to the magnificent stone porch. I almost turned tail and ran from sheer intimidation. Who was I to march up those steps and begin investigating the death of the daughter of this house?

Feeling very small and insignificant, I marshaled my courage and strode quickly up the steps to confront the two massive oak doors behind which the family resided. Would someone hear me if I simply knocked, as was customary in this part of the world? Remembering LizBeth ringing my own doorbell rather than knocking made me decide to push the recessed button next to the massive carved oak. Would a butler answer the door and send me on my way with a sneer? The Mitchells didn’t hire anyone local to work in the manor so I had no way of knowing who might answer the bell.

After what seemed an eternity the door opened on silent hinges. Holding my breath, I waited to see who was on the other side. When Alexander Mitchell’s face appeared in the half-open door, I let out a breath. Just the person I’d come to see.

“Hello, Mr. Mitchell. I’ve come to offer my condolences to your family.”

His icy-blue eyes looked me over from head to foot. I could have sworn a quick sneer appeared, then disappeared on his face. “I accept your condolences on behalf of the family.” The door started to swing shut.

I couldn’t have that. I stuck my foot in the door just before it shut completely. With a look of astonishment, Alexander pulled the door partially open again.

“I was just wondering when would be a good time for the ladies in town to bring by cakes and casseroles for the family.”

Alexander shuddered. “That is totally unnecessary. We have a cook who is perfectly capable of providing food for the family. We don’t want the people from town coming up here to satisfy their own curiosity under the pretense of offering sympathy to us.”

“Now wait just a minute here. You can’t insult everyone in town like that. Bringing food is traditional when someone dies. That’s just the way things are done. How dare you imply we’d only be coming here to get a look at this cold-ass pile of stone no one gives a damn about anyway?”

Alexander stared me down. “We don’t adhere to the customs of the locals. Be sure you tell everyone they are not welcome here. We will take care of our dead the same way we take care of our living. By our own traditions.” With that, the door slammed firmly in my face.

Well, I
never
. Turning away, I walked back down the steps to my bike. Glancing once up at the façade of the house, I thought I saw a face at one of the third-story windows, but right at that moment sunlight glinted on the glass so I might have been mistaken.

All the way back to town, I pedaled furiously, trying to work off my snit. How dare that man sneer at the customs of the town? They were just as old and revered as anything that cold family might have, and a damn sight friendlier too. The fact that I’d wanted to do exactly what Alexander thought I did wasn’t the point. There are rituals for these things and everyone knows it. Now I’d have to admit to Ben I’d been up to the manor because I’d have to let all the ladies in town know they weren’t going up there with dishes.

Ben wouldn’t be fooled by the condolence call. He’d know exactly what I’d been up to and want to know exactly why I’d been up to it at all after I’d promised to stay out of the case. I comforted myself with the thought that I’d promised Ben to stay out of the wolf man case but not LizBeth’s. But I knew that wasn’t going to cut any ice with him. He’d point out that a murder case was a murder case and I had no business at the manor today.

Rounding the corner of my house, I saw Ben’s cruiser parked in my driveway. Great. Had Dixie called him after all? No. He’d have caught me up at the manor if that was the case. He must have come by to talk to me again about finding LizBeth. Trying to wring any additional information from me he could to help solve the murder. I hadn’t held anything back, but Ben was a firm believer in questioning people several times in case they might remember something later that had seemed insignificant the first time around.

With a sigh, I put my bike on the porch and entered the house. I found Ben in the kitchen, helping himself to some of the coffee he’d claimed was crap just the day before.

“Where’ve you been? I thought I’d find you here still resting your knees.”

Until he’d mentioned them, the knees in question hadn’t bothered me much once I’d gotten going that morning, but now, with the ride to and from the Mitchell place, they were complaining again. Loudly. Trying to move without showing how much I’d overworked them, I settled into the chair across from Ben.