Murder and Salutations (Book 3 in the Cardmaking Mysteries) (6 page)

“
Just the three of you?”
Lillian asked. “How cozy.”

I’d been avoiding telling my aunt about my
dinner plans for tomorrow night, but it was time to get it over
with. “Actually, Gail’s boyfriend, Reggie, is inviting an old
college roommate to be my dinner companion. We’re going to his
mother’s house in High Meadows.”

“
That’s so very cosmopolitan
of you. Very well, if we can’t do it after work, we’ll take a long
lunch and close the card shop.”

I stared at my aunt, not able to believe
that she was letting me off the hook that easily. “That’s it? No
third degree? I expected at least a water torture to pry more
details from me.”

“
Please, Jennifer, your
social schedule isn’t all that great a concern to me.”

“
Since when?” I asked. She’d
done everything in her power to fix me up with an eligible young
man, and now suddenly she was backing off. What was going on
here?

“
Don’t flatter yourself,
child. I’ve got more important things to think about.” She tapped
the next name on our list. “Luke was there tonight, though I didn’t
realize he was a member of the chamber. I wonder how he managed an
invitation. Or did he just crash the party to see
Eliza?”

“
Bradford will find out,” I
said, confident in my brother’s abilities to follow all of the
orthodox clues. He came up a little short sometimes only when the
killer used real imagination—something he assured me was rarer in
reality than the mysteries I liked to read.

Lillian frowned, then asked, “Why would he
kill her, though? I’ve been under the impression that for some
unfathomable reason, the man was still in love with his
ex-wife.”

“
Don’t you think any of your
exes are pining away for you?” I asked, only half joking. My aunt
could cast a spell on a man that made him lose his senses
completely.

“
I’d be terribly
disappointed if any of them have gotten over me,” she said with an
utterly straight face.

“
So he wouldn’t kill her,” I
said. “Not while he still had hope.”

“
But did he? Eliza was
seeing Bailey. Perhaps Luke took that as a threat.”

I shook my head. “That might explain it if
Bailey was the victim, but not Eliza.”

Lillian frowned. “We’ll come back to him
later, then.”

She moved her pencil to the next names on
the list. “Polly and Kaye both hated her, but did either one of
them despise the woman enough to drive a letter opener into Eliza’s
chest? That speaks of a certain level of passion I have difficulty
seeing either one of them attain.”

I thought about what I knew of the women in
question. Polly had visited the card shop twice since we’d opened,
and though I’d tried to entice her to try her hand at crafting her
own cards, she’d opted both times for a ready-made offering. While
I enjoyed the profit margin of selling cards Lillian and I made, I
was always proselytizing, trying to share just how much fun card
making was with my clientele. She’d flatly refused, though, so I’d
dropped the matter. As for Kaye, while she hadn’t been in my shop,
she had visited Sara Lynn’s a time or two when I’d worked there.
I’d found the woman abrupt and condescending, but I didn’t know if
I could see her as a murderer.

“
So what do we do next?” I
asked, as Sara Lynn walked out in her pajamas and a
robe.

At least the back of the mirror faced her,
and not the front. I sprayed the glass with some cleaner Lillian
had brought out to correct any mistakes we might make, and then
wiped away the evidence of our notes I with a paper towel as Sara
Lynn approached. She noticed me working on the mirror and said,
“It’s a little late for housecleaning, isn’t it?”

“
I just wanted to touch it
up a little,” I said as I handed the glass cleaner back to Lillian.
“There, I think that got it. Thanks, that smudge was bugging
me.

Lillian laughed, and though I could tell it
was forced, I wasn’t sure Sara Lynn could. Working closely with my
aunt over the past several months had taught me the nuances of her
actions and tones of voice better than I’d ever learned around her
in the past. “I’m hoping Jennifer finds something unsettling about
the hall carpet. I’ve been meaning to run the vacuum for the past
three days, but I just never manage to get around to it.”

She’d been teasing, but Sara Lynn was a
demon of a cleaner. “Is your vacuum still in the closet over
there?”

“
Dear, I was just trying to
be amusing. Failing at it, too, I might add.”

“
I don’t mind,” Sara Lynn
said as she retrieved the vacuum and had the hall runner clean in
no time. “Now, that’s better, isn’t it?” she said as she surveyed
the results.

“
Absolutely,” Lillian
said.

Sara Lynn said, “I just wanted to come out
and wish you two a good night. Lillian, thank you for having
us.”

“
You can stay as long as
you’d like,” she said. “You know that, don’t you?”

“
That reminds me. Jennifer,
did you tell her the news?”

“
What news is that?” I
asked, hoping Sara Lynn wasn’t going to bring up my living
arrangements. I didn’t want to fight that particular battle,
especially not this late.

“
Jennifer’s being evicted,”
Sara Lynn said, and I saw Lillian’s face cloud up.

“
What are you talking
about?”

There was no escaping it now. I brought her
up-to-date, and before I could stop her, she was reaching for her
telephone. “Don’t, Lillian, I can handle this.”

“
I got you hooked up with
Hester Taylor, and I’m not about to let her throw you out on the
street like this.”

There was no arguing with Lillian, so I kept
my thoughts to myself as she punched in her friend’s telephone
number. After a minute she hung up without saying a word. “I got
her machine. Can you believe it? She’s already gone, spouting some
nonsense about moving to the Florida Keys.”

“
I think the Keys are
beautiful,” I said.

“
I know how pretty they are,
but I didn’t think Hester would actually go through with her crazy
idea.”

“
You knew about this?” I
asked.

“
I just assumed she was
daydreaming out loud. Last year she wanted to move to Alaska. The
year before that it was Tuscany.”

“
So where is Jennifer
supposed to go now?” Sara Lynn asked.

Before Lillian could reply, I said,
“Jennifer’s going to bed. You two don’t need to worry about where
I’m going to live. I’ll find a place on my own.” Before either one
of them could say another word, I said good night and headed off to
my room. If I wasn’t there with them, they couldn’t persuade me to
do something I had no intention of doing. I crept silently into the
pink bedroom, and from the light shining in from the hallway, I
could see Oggie and Nash curled up on my pillows, one cat per
pillow. It appeared that they’d had no trouble making themselves at
home, but I hoped they didn’t get too comfortable.

There was no way I was moving in with
Lillian for more than one night.

THEMED CARDS

Want to send a special card that people will
cherish long after they receive it? Creating a unique card is as
easy as going through your photo album. Find a picture that stirs
memories for you and the card’s recipient. It can be a photograph
taken at summer camp, a birthday party or even a picnic. Make a
photocopy of the picture, cut it to the size you’d like, then glue
it onto card stock. It makes a wonderful backdrop for whatever
message you choose to convey.

Chapter 4

The next morning, I had to rush to get the
cats back to my apartment before work. Lillian had gotten up early
and had outdone herself with a feast of breakfast for the three of
us, and I’m afraid we all dawdled over coffee long past when we
should have been getting ready for the day ahead. I’d offered to
help clean up, but Lillian had refused my aid on the pretext that I
had enough to do as it was. I suspected she’d witnessed a couple of
near drops last night when I’d been rinsing her crystal and china,
and didn’t want to take any chances this morning. Sara Lynn’s
spirits seemed to be good, so I headed home to get ready for a new
day of card making.

At the card shop, I found a message on my
machine. I was just starting to play it when the telephone
rang.

“
Custom Card Creations,” I
said.

“
You’ve really got the hang
of that greeting,” Gail, my best friend in the world,
said.

“
What are you doing up this
early? I didn’t think you salespeople rolled out of bed until
noon.”

“
Don’t kid yourself. The
guys I start selling to are up at five A.M., and they expect me to
keep their bizarre working hours, if you can imagine that.” Gail
sold heavy-construction equipment, and if her expensive wardrobe
and fancy jewelry were any indication, she was very good at what
she did.

“
So what’s up?” I asked as I
sorted through the mail.

“
I just wanted to be sure
you’re still coming to dinner. I heard about what happened last
night, but I don’t want that to interfere with our
plans.”

“
Why would it?” I asked.
“I’m not involved in the murder or the investigation.”

I had to hold the telephone away from my ear
as she erupted in laughter. After she calmed herself, I asked, “Are
you through cackling yet?”

“
Sorry, I couldn’t help
myself. Jennifer Shane, I know there is no way in the world you’re
not going to poke your nose into Eliza Glade’s murder, and I’m not
silly enough to ask you not to. But I don’t want you to bail on
dinner tonight, no matter what the excuse. Reggie said his friend
is really excited about meeting you.”

“
That alone is enough to
make me worry,” I said.

“
Why’s that? You’re a
charming, beautiful woman who owns a successful small
business.”

I laughed. “Okay, first, thanks for the pep
talk, and second, I can’t imagine anyone in their right mind being
excited about a blind date.”

“
Don’t think of it that
way,” Gail said. “Consider it an opportunity to meet someone new
and interesting.”

“
In front of you, your new
boyfriend, his mother and her date. You’re right, no pressure there
to be on my best behavior.”

Gail laughed again. It was one of the things
I loved about her: she had an infectious sense of humor that I
could win over the coldest heart. “You’ll be fine. I promise.
Remember, you need to be there by seven. , Are you sure you don’t
want us to pick you up? It’s no problem, really.”

“
I can drive myself, thank
you very much. Besides, if I need an excuse to take off, I don’t
want to have to wait for a ride.”

“
Ever the skeptic, aren’t
you? See you tonight,” Gail said, then hung up.

Honestly, she was the best friend I could
ask for, but she worried about me too much. Whenever she was in
love, which was often enough, Gail wanted nothing more than the
world to be in love all around her. That meant that over the years
I’d had more than my fair share of blind dates and fix-ups, all
done to keep my best friend mollified more than in hopes of finding
the love of my life. Sometimes I wondered if I’d already found my
special someone, and we’d blown it. Greg Langston had looked pretty
cozy with his latest love the night before. So where did that leave
me? Still looking, I supposed.

The chime over the front door rang, and I
looked up expecting to see Lillian. Instead, it was an actual
customer—a welcome distraction indeed. A thin young woman with
curly blond hair came in and started to look around.

“
Is there anything I can
help you with?”

“
No thanks,” she said as she
picked up a card, read it, then put it back in the rack.

I watched her do that for ten minutes, then
said, “If you can’t find exactly what you want, I’m sure I could
help you make the perfect card yourself.”

The girl said softly, “No, that’s way too
much trouble.”

“
For you or for me?” I
asked. “Because if you’re worried about my time, I’d like nothing
better than to help you make something special. After all, that’s
why I opened the shop.”

She looked at me with uncertainty. “Really?
You’d really help me make my own card?”

“
Absolutely,” I said as I
joined her and held out my hand. “By the way, I’m
Jennifer.”

“
I’m Krystal,” she
said.

“
It’s nice to meet you,
Krystal. Now, exactly what kind of card are you looking
for?”

“
I’d like a get-well card
for my mom. She’s in the hospital.”

“
Okay,” I said as I led her
to our supplies. “First off, what’s your mother’s favorite
color?”

“
She’s a nut for anything
blue,” the girl admitted.

I led her to the card stock and fancy papers
we carried. “Pick out a shade you think she’d like.”

She did as I asked, opting for a midnight
blue. I grabbed a sheet of lighter blue, and a few other sheets,
too. “We’ll use these as complementary colors. Now what’s her
favorite thing in the world?”

Krystal didn’t even have to think about it.
“She loves her flower garden passionately.”

“
Perfect,” I said, and led
her to the selection of pressed, dried flowers we had. “Would you
like to choose some, or should I?”