The Trouble with Tulip (9 page)

Jo made Danny call Chief Cooper for the autopsy results, but as she listened to Danny's side of the conversation, her heart sank.

“I guess you heard from my end,” Danny said as he hung up. “Edna Pratt's death has now officially been declared an accident.”

“Why?” Jo demanded, knowing they were wrong.

“Several reasons. First, the fatal head wound matched the shape of the indentation in the windowsill. Second, she had no other bruises or marks that would indicate she had been pushed down. She had to have fallen on her own.”

“What if someone else mixed those chemicals when she wasn't looking?” Jo said. “That would've been murder.”

“I'm sorry, Jo. The chief says no go. There were no signs of breaking and entering, no indications of violence at all except the dent in the window frame. Like the coroner said, that was probably from Edna passing out and falling. The only thing out of the ordinary with this entire case are the things you heard and saw—the argument and the car. That's not enough.”

“I refuse to believe it,” Jo replied, crossing her arms in front of her chest. “Edna Pratt knew too much about cleaning to mix together the wrong chemicals. What were the chemicals in that bucket, anyway?”

“I don't know.”

“Let me borrow your phone, would you?”

She took it from him before he could respond and pressed the redial button.

“Chief Cooper?” she demanded once she had him on the phone. “Jo Tulip here. What was in the bucket that made Edna Pratt pass out?”

“I don't think it's necessary for you to know that, Miss Tulip,” Chief Cooper replied. “The case is closed.”

“I just want to know. Please? I think you owe me that much.”

The chief grunted.

“Fine, hold on.”

She could hear him flipping through papers and then he spoke.

“Bleach and ammonia.”

“Bleach and ammonia?” Jo repeated. “That makes chloramine gas! At best, it would be highly irritating to the lungs. At worst, it would be lethal.”

“Well, she's dead, isn't she?”

“But Chief, that's like housecleaning
101!
Edna Pratt would
not
have done that.”

“I'm sorry, Miss Tulip. There's just not enough evidence to call this a murder.”

Jo wanted to argue her case, but she suddenly caught sight of her mother marching determinedly down the hall toward her.

“I'll call you later,” Jo said into the phone and hung up just as her mother reached her.

“You're supposed to walk down the aisle in eleven minutes,” Helen hissed. “I think you need to get in there and finish getting out that stain!”

“Fine,” Jo replied. “I'm coming.”

Helen spun back around and marched away.

“I've got to get to the sanctuary anyway,” Danny said softly, taking back his phone. “I'll see you in there.”

Jo reached out and caught his hand and gave it a squeeze.

“Thanks, Danny,” she said softly, looking into her friend's warm blue eyes. He had to know she was thanking him not just for helping out this morning, but for all he did as her friend. He was more important to her than he could ever know.

“No sweat,” he replied. He squeezed her hand back and released it. “Now get dressed, why don't you? After all this work, I'd hate to see you getting married in a choir robe.”

Jo raced back to the room and worked at the stain, finally declaring it good enough to go. The grease wasn't completely gone, but it would do.

She pulled on the dress, and as her mother worked the tiny buttons up the back and the bridesmaids fluffed the train where the repairs had been made, Jo checked her image in the mirror, straightening the pearl tiara that held her veil in place. She usually wore her hair down, where it hung several inches past her shoulders, or pulled back in a ponytail. Today, however, her mother had talked her into an updo. Though the elaborate hairstyle did look quite elegant, Jo was wishing she hadn't been so easily swayed. Behind the fancy hair and the professionally applied makeup, she didn't quite feel herself.

“You look beautiful, honey,” Helen said, stepping back after the last button had been fastened. “A vision.”

Everyone agreed that she looked lovely and that the dress repairs weren't even noticeable.

“So tell us, Jo,” Marie said, gathering everyone's flowers from the box. “Will you put all of this in your column?”

“Oh, that stupid column,” Jo's mother interjected before she could reply, checking her own image in the mirror. “Please tell me you'll be giving up that foolishness once you're married.”

Some of the bridesmaids gasped, but Jo merely held her tongue. Helen had always been vaguely embarrassed by Tips from Tulip, first when it was written by her mother-in-law and then when it was taken over by her daughter. Many a time she had chided Jo for squandering a perfectly good college degree on “trivial household matters” that were, as she said, better left “to Heloise or Martha Stewart.”

A knock at the door saved Jo from having to reply.

“Ladies?” Pastor Beacon said. “Are you decent?”

Marie let him in, and he stepped inside, his face lighting up at the sight of them.

“I trust everyone's ready?” he asked. “Crisis averted?”

“Yep. We have it under control.”

He led them in prayer and then told them that it was time for them to go out the side door and around to the front of the church. As Jo walked among the small crowd of giggling, excited women, she thought not of the groom who waited for her at the altar or even of the music that was ringing majestically from the organ.

She thought, instead, of a bucket of bleach and ammonia. Jo promised herself that as soon as she got back from her honeymoon, she was going to pay a visit to the police chief in person and insist that he figure out who killed Edna Pratt and why.

7

J
o!” her father whispered sharply. He was waving from the top of the stairs and pointing at his watch. “Come on. It's time!”

Jo looked up at her dad, who was strikingly handsome in his tuxedo. Her mother gave her a final hug and then hurried to move to the front of the line. As Jo mounted the steps herself, she couldn't help but smile. The big moment was finally here.

“You look stunning, dear,” her father said, giving her a peck on the cheek. She looked into his eyes, surprised to see he was tearing up a bit. As Marie arranged Jo's train into place behind her, Jo slipped her hand into her father's arm and gave it a squeeze, feeling oddly touched by his show of emotion. She doubted he had ever shed a tear over her before.

“It's showtime,” Marie whispered once the train was set. “You ready?”

“Ready as I'll ever be,” Jo replied, taking a deep breath.

Marie ran up to take her place in line just as the organ music swelled from inside. As Jo held onto her father's arm and waited her turn, she thought about her parents and her own difficult childhood.

Though Jo's paternal grandparents, the Tulips, had been humble and loving, her maternal grandparents were quite another story. The Bosworths were an old money, industrialist family who fully expected their only daughter, Helen, to marry a man capable of stepping into the family business and serving it well. Kent Tulip had not disappointed them. Starting in his twenties as a district manager, over the years he had worked his way up to the position he now held, that of CEO of the entire company. In the meantime, Bosworth Industries had bought and sold so many other companies and businesses that it was now a worldwide conglomerate.

As a child, Jo had lived an odd and isolated life, relocating with her parents from country to country as her father worked to establish Bosworth's international holdings.

He always brought his wife and child with him on these long-term assignments, so consequently Jo had spent much of her youth starting over—new home, new school, new friends, often after only six months. And though there was usually an American-centric place to live and go to school wherever they ended up, Jo always found herself among children who were a lot like her: friendly, but afraid to form lasting bonds. Unable to connect. The only consistent people in her life were her grandparents and her best friend back home, Danny Watkins. More than anything, Jo treasured the times between foreign assignments when her father would work out of the main office in New York City, her parents would live in their apartment there, and Jo was allowed to stay with her father's parents in Mulberry Glen.

The summer after Jo graduated from the eighth grade, she asked her grandparents if she could live with them year-round. Much to her relief, they embraced the idea enthusiastically. Armed with their consent, she approached her parents and told them she was tired of moving, she wanted a normal high school experience, and she wanted to live with her grandparents from here on out.

Jo had expected fireworks, as both of her parents were rather stubborn and difficult people. Instead, once they had worked through a few of the details, they agreed that it might be a good idea. Jo moved permanently to her grandparents' house, into the bedroom that had always been hers anyway. And though she'd been glad to get what she wanted, she had also felt oddly hurt that her mother and father hadn't put up more of a fight to keep her.

After high school came college, and Jo attended locally there in town, content to continue living with her grandparents. She had planned to move out on her own once she graduated, but by then they were in poor health and she needed to stay for their sakes. Once they had both passed away, of course, the house became hers. After today it would be hers and Bradford's, the perfect place to begin their new life together.

“Here we go,” her mother whispered when it was her turn to head down the aisle. After that went the bridesmaids. Jo watched them slowly make their way to the front as Danny took each photo in turn.

He was so utterly adorable in his tuxedo—and so completely clueless as to his own adorableness. Jo treasured him in a way that was different from how she felt about anyone else in the world. That's why it was so difficult for her to hear his objections to her marriage.

Jo watched the flash of his camera, forming a final response in her mind.
So what if Bradford and I rushed into things? After today we will be husband and wife. And then we can spend the rest of our lives together, learning everything there is to know
.

The music changed and the congregation stood and turned.

“We're on,” Kent said softly.

Together they walked down the aisle toward Jo's future.

Bradford was standing tall at the front of the room, looking more handsome than any movie star. From his precisely cut blond hair to his tan skin and square jaw, he really did look as though he could have stepped straight from the big screen. As she walked forward, Jo studied his face and tried to lock onto his gaze, but he wouldn't quite meet her eyes.

The moment Jo reached the altar, she knew something was wrong. At first, she blamed it on the heat. The lights. The attention. Maybe Bradford wasn't used to being up in front of a crowd, especially not in a tuxedo, about to be married, so it wasn't terribly surprising that his eyes were darting about, his skin pale. But as Jo's father gave her away and she stepped into place beside the man who was about to become her husband, she couldn't help thinking it was more than that, that Bradford looked as if he were ready to faint.

Jo could see the sweat on his forehead, the shaking of his hands, the panic in his eyes. Briefly, she considered stopping the ceremony to ask if he needed a glass of water or to sit down and put his head between his legs.
Maybe a whiff of camphor on a cotton ball or a cool compress to the pulse points at his wrists would do the trick
, she thought, remembering one of her past columns, “Tips for Conquering Stage Fright.”

“Dearly beloved,” the minister said, snapping Jo from her thoughts. “We are gathered here today to unite this man and this woman in holy matrimony.”

The minister opened the ceremony with a few words of greeting and then a prayer. Jo closed her eyes for the prayer, asking God to calm the heart of the man beside her.