Sugar Coated Sins (2 page)

Chapter
3

“What’s going on?” I asked Jake
later as I walked into his office.
 
He’d
given me the green light on lunch, but he’d told me that he had some things to
take care of first, so I’d finished my daily sales report, made my bank
deposit, and closed up Donut Hearts after another completed session of making
and selling donuts to the citizens of April Springs.
 
I felt downright domestic going to take my
husband out to lunch after I was finished with my job for that day.
 
For years, while we’d been dating, he’d been
in other cities working all over North Carolina as a state police
investigator.
 
After we’d married, he’d
left his job in order to be closer to me.

“Phillip just found something,”
Jake said grimly.

“It’s a time capsule,” I said as I
looked at the odd assortment of objects and packets spread out on Jake’s
desktop.
 
“What did you expect, for it to
be empty?”

My stepfather spoke up.
 
“Suzanne, do you remember when this was
buried fifteen years ago?
 
I’d just been
promoted to sheriff.”

“I was away at college at the
time,” I said.
 
“Though Momma called me
and told me all about it.
 
The town made
a pretty big production of it, didn’t they?”

“It was quite an event.
 
The mayor at the time decided to bury a time
capsule with instructions to dig it up in a hundred years,” Phillip
explained.
 
“We included newspapers,
magazines, toys, records, that kind of thing, but we also held a raffle for ten
people to write letters to include in it as well.
 
Mayor Jonas thought it would add some
interesting viewpoints from ordinary slices of life.”

“He sounds like a natural
politician,” I said.
 
“I still don’t get
why the two of you are upset.”

“I looked through the letters as a
matter of curiosity,” Phillip said a little guiltily.
 
“It’s not like they were sealed or anything,
and I was interested in what folks had to say.”

“So, what did you find?”

“Of the ten letters included, five
of them clearly identified the author.
 
Five were not, and while four of them were about what you’d expect, the
last one is the one that’s been so troubling.”

“May I see it?” I asked.

Jake frowned a moment, and then he
shrugged.
 
“I don’t see what it would
hurt, but I need to ask you to keep this to yourself.”

Before I’d take it, I asked
Phillip, “You’re not telling Momma about it?”

“I don’t see how I can avoid it,”
he admitted.

“Good.
 
Then I don’t have to.
 
Let me see it,” I said.
 
I didn’t keep secrets from my husband or my
mother, so if they both were going to know already, it wasn’t that hard a
promise for me to make.

Jake handed me a sheet of paper enclosed
in a plastic bag.
 
The print was written
by hand in block letters, and I knew that identifying its source might be
difficult.

As I read it, I felt the blood in
my veins go cold.

It said,

“
Benjamin
Port did not die by accident; I poisoned him.

I’m not sorry that I did it; i really had no choice.

I didn’t count on the nightmares, though.

will they ever end, or will they haunt me for the rest of my life?
”

“Wow, is this legitimate?” I asked
after reading it twice.
 
“Who exactly was
Benjamin Port? I’m not familiar with that name.”

“He was a local,” Phillip
said.
 
“As a matter of fact, he died a
month before the time capsule was buried.”

“Was it murder?” I asked.

“Nobody thought so at the time,
but this note certainly puts that assumption under suspicion,” Phillip said.

“What’s your take on it?” I asked
Jake.

“If it’s true, then it’s
troubling,” he admitted.
 
“I’m going to
dig into this, Suzanne.
 
I hate the idea
of a killer getting away with murder, even if it wasn’t on my watch.”

My stepfather added quickly, “It
wasn’t during my tenure, either.
 
I was
just a deputy when it happened; Port’s death didn’t even cross my desk.”

“Nobody’s blaming you,” Jake told
him softly.
 
“Do you remember many
details about exactly how he died?
 
We might
need to have his body exhumed so tests can be run on his remains.”

“Sadly, that’s not going to
happen.
 
He was cremated,” Phillip
answered.

“How do you happen to know that?”
I asked.

The former sheriff shook his
head.
 
“His sister asked permission to spread
his ashes at the park, and when the sheriff refused, she did it anyway.
 
Sheriff Guthrie wanted to arrest her, but we
talked him out of it.
 
He never liked the
woman, and it showed.”

“Was it possible that it was
because he suspected that she killed her brother?” I offered.

“No, she stood Guthrie up for the
prom to go with somebody else, and he held a grudge every day after it.”

“Wow, that’s a long time to be mad
at someone,” I said.

“That’s just the kind of man he
was,” Phillip said.

“Regardless, we should talk to
him,” Jake said.

“If we can find him,” Phillip
said.

“He’s not dead, too, is he?” I
asked.

“No, but the last I heard, he was
in a motorhome, driving across the country, seeing America.
 
I don’t even think he has a permanent address
anymore.”

“So he’s out,” Jake said.
 
“How about his files?
 
They may give us some insight into what
really happened.”

“Those are all in storage,”
Phillip said, “but I doubt they’ll do you any good.
 
Everyone thought it was an accident at the
time, so I doubt that even the most basic report was ever filed.”

“That’s just plain bad police
work,” Jake said, and then he realized that Phillip had a relationship with the
man he’d just criticized.
 
“Sorry.”

“It’s true enough,” Phillip
admitted.
 
“I cleaned up more than one mess
Guthrie left behind for me, so there was never any love lost there between the
two of us.”

“How exactly did Benjamin Port
die?” I asked.
 
“Was he really
poisoned?
 
You never said.”

“At the time, we thought that he
got accidental food poisoning,” Phillip said.
 
“There was an opened homemade canned chicken found at his house, so
nobody thought two things about it.”

Jake was really unhappy now.
 
“We can’t prove anything, though.
 
There’s literally no evidence left.
 
The body’s gone, no report of any substance
was made, and we can’t even determine if the cause of death cited was
accurate.
 
It might have been poison, but
it could have been something else entirely, despite what that note said.”
 
He looked at Phillip as he asked, “Who was
your medical examiner back then?
 
Is he
gone, too?”

“No, as a matter of fact, he’s
living in Union Square.
 
Doc Nance
retired years ago, but the last I heard, he was still alive and kicking.”

“I need to speak with him as soon
as possible,” Jake said.
 
“Suzanne, would
you care to go for a ride with me?
 
We
can grab lunch while we’re there.”

“Sure; I’m wide open,” I said.

Phillip coughed.
 
“Jake, do you mind if I tag along, too?”

“This wasn’t your fault, Phillip,”
Jake said.

“Maybe not, but I still need to
know what happened.”

Jake looked at me for a moment and
raised one eyebrow.
 
I shrugged, and he
replied, “Why not?
 
The more the
merrier.
 
Let’s go.”

“What about the note?” I asked.

“I’m taking a copy of it with us,”
Jake said.
 
“Maybe the doctor will have
some insight into what really happened.”

“I hope so,” I said.
 
“I didn’t know Benjamin Port, but I still
hope we can find justice for the man, even if it is fifteen years too late.”

“The important thing to remember is
that there’s no statute of limitations on murder,” Jake said gravely, and I
knew that my husband had finally found something challenging enough for his
particular set of skills as a law enforcement officer.

“Hey, Doc.
 
Do you have a second?” Phillip Martin asked
the older man sitting on a bench in the park in Union Square.
 
Though I knew that he was retired, the
physician still wore a shirt and tie, as though he’d just left his office.
 
He had a five-pound bag of black-oil
sunflower seeds beside him, and from the littered shells all around him, it
appeared that he’d been feeding the local wildlife for quite some time.

“Phillip, what are you doing
here?
 
I haven’t seen you in ages.”
 
The doctor looked past the former sheriff and
studied my husband and me for a few seconds before he followed that up.
 
“Who are your friends?”

“I’d like you to meet my
stepdaughter, Suzanne, and her husband, Jake.
 
He’s the new sheriff for April Springs.”

“Pleased to meet you both,” the
retired doctor said.
 
“My name’s William
Nance.”

“It’s a pleasure to meet you, Dr.
Nance,” Jake said as he offered his hand.
 
“We were wondering if we could ask you about something that happened
while you were practicing medicine in April Springs fifteen years ago.”

Nance looked a little confused by
Jake’s request, and he turned to my stepfather.
 
“What’s going on, Phillip?
 
Am I
in some kind of trouble?”

“Not at all,” Phillip reassured
him.
 
“We’re just looking for some
information.
 
Do you remember Benjamin
Port?”

The doctor frowned the moment he
heard the name.
 
“Of course I do.
 
He was a bit of a cad in life, as I
remember.
 
He died of suspected
accidental food poisoning.
 
What about
him?”

“New evidence has just come to our
attention that his death might not have been accidental after all,” Jake
explained.

The doctor’s face went ashen.
 
“I knew it,” he whispered.

“Knew what?” I asked.

“I told the coroner at the time
that we needed an autopsy, but he refused, and I didn’t have the power to
overrule him.
 
Why the state sees fit to
elect coroners like county clerks is beyond me.
 
The man was a mortician, not a physician.
 
I can’t help but wonder how many murderers
went free because of his incompetence.”

“Why were you suspicious of the
death at the time?” I asked him.
 
Jake
and Phillip both looked at me oddly for speaking out of turn, but I hadn’t been
able to help myself.

“Well, there were too many folks
who seemed to be relieved when he died, for one thing.
 
For another, I had someone snoop around his
home, and they couldn’t find another single canned chicken, or anything else
home preserved there, for that matter.
 
It all seemed suspicious to me.”

“How did you manage to get someone
to look around inside his place if everyone else thought it was an accident?”
Phillip asked him.

The doctor shrugged.
 
“Ben’s cleaning lady took care of my place,
too.
 
I asked her to check things out
when she went back to clean for one last time, and she was happy to help.
 
She was probably one of the few folks in
April Springs who actually liked the man.”

“You weren’t a fan of him
yourself?” I asked.

“Not particularly, but that didn’t
mean that I wanted someone to get away with killing him.
 
It kept gnawing at me that I could have done
more, and by the time I finally decided to act, it was too late.
 
He was cremated, and that was that.”

Phillip looked surprised by the
statement.
 
“Did you tell Sheriff Guthrie
about your suspicions?”

“In my defense, I tried to, but he
refused to listen.”

My stepfather looked truly
concerned by this news.
 
“You could have
come to me, Will,” he said softly.

“Phillip, if you started digging
into what happened to Benjamin Port, Guthrie might have fired you, and I knew
that you were next in line for his job.
 
I couldn’t do that to you, or the town of April Springs.
 
You were a good sheriff, which was a fresh
breeze after enduring Guthrie’s reign.”

Phillip Martin just shrugged.
 
I knew how much being sheriff had meant to
him, but I still believed that he’d have given it all up to catch a
killer.
 
It sounded as though he’d never
had a chance to make that decision for himself, though.

“Do you happen to know who might
have wanted him dead or what might have actually killed him if it wasn’t bad
chicken?” I asked.