Thrown Off: A Cozy Mystery (Brenna Battle Book 3) (16 page)

“It must be really awkward for Lizzie, working here, where everyone’s grieving Millie, and—”

“And she was awful to her! Just awful!” Amy choked back a sob.

I gave her a hug. “How are you handling working with her?”

“She took some time off. Like she’s the one who needs time off, and not Millie’s friends! But at least she hasn’t been around since Saturday.”

Saturday. The Day of the Freezer. I had my girl. Lizzie Meyers. I had to tell Will.

#

I parked along the curb in front of Will’s house. It was hardly the typical bachelor’s pad, and it took my breath away every time I saw it. It was painted a creamy color—not quite buttery, with trim in kelly green and a deep, dark green. The combination was striking. Will was a pretty handy guy, and a smart man, too. He’d been buying fixer-uppers and restoring them since he was twenty years old. This old house was what had initially led him to Bonney Bay. The historic home was now fully restored—by Will. In the process, he’d fallen in love with the house, and with Bonney Bay.

And I was in love with him. There was no denying that miserable reality. I took a deep breath and strode up the front walk to the porch. I knocked on the door with the antique knocker. I felt weak in the knees. The cushioned bench on the porch called to me, promising to catch me if I just let myself collapse into a wobbly, blobbly mess of wimpiness.

Before my knees caved in, the door opened and a sleek, velvety brown figure slipped out the door and lunged into me. “Hi, there, Chloe-girl!” I knelt down and rubbed Will’s chocolate lab behind the ears. She nuzzled my face and whined entreatingly. Her tail thumped against the porch. Oh, she thought I was here to take her for a run. Poor girl. I hated to disappoint her.

“She thinks you’re here for her.”

I looked up. Will stood there in a black T-shirt and khaki shorts, his phone in hand. There was a little bit of a question in his tone, like he was saying,
You aren’t, are you? You’re here for me, right?

My thudding heart melted like butter over real, homemade popcorn. “Unfortunately for Chloe, I came to see you.”

He held up his phone. There was a picture of me, in my gi, sweaty and smiling. “I was just calling you.”

“Really?” I rose and Chloe wrapped herself around my legs.

“Come inside,” he said.

I sat at the kitchen table and Will brought me a nice, cold Coke. Chloe waited patiently on her haunches, chin in my lap. Probably trying to tell me what a good girl she was so I’d take her for a run.

Will took a seat next to me with a glass of iced tea. He smiled. His dimples showed, and I wished I hadn’t come to talk about Millie’s death. I wished I didn’t have to bring up anything about it. I wished he felt the same way about me that I did about him.

There it was again—that lump in my throat. It was horrible, feeling this way. Why would anyone ever want to be in love? I wanted to disappear.

Will reached for my hand. He kissed it. “I’m sorry. About what happened at the station. Look at me, Brenna.”

I did. I looked right into his deep, brown eyes.

“It was terrible timing,” I said.

“Like trying to foot-sweep someone, and just kicking them in the shins instead.”

“Ouch.” I winced. Foot-sweeps were some of the hardest techniques to master in judo. If the timing was just slightly off, not only did the opponent not fall, but he or she ended up getting whacked in the shins. Sometimes the person trying to do the sweeping even broke a foot. “Well, I never said I was good at sweeping anyone off their feet outside of judo,” I told him.

Will laughed, and I did too. It felt good to laugh at myself. I probably should try that a little more often.

“I guess I could just consider it payback for the completely non-metaphorical kicking I did on your shins last week,” Will said.

Shortly after I’d met Will, I’d promised him judo lessons. He’d done judo in college and made it to brown belt, then started a judo club for adults through the Bonney Bay Police Athletic Club before Blythe and I moved here. He wanted to learn more. He wanted to get better, to become more qualified to teach. The Saturday before last, we’d been working on foot-sweeps.

“I still have bruises.” I lifted up my leg so he could see.

Will pulled my foot onto his lap. He kissed my shin. Then he pulled me into his arms, and his lips met mine. “I love you, Brenna.”

“What did you say?”

“You know what I said.”

I folded my arms. “Say it again.”

“Brenna Battle, you are stubborn and difficult and we have a lot to work out, but you’re also smart and compassionate and strong, and you make me crazy, and I love you.”

“Are you sure, because—”

Will pulled me into another kiss. “I’m sure, alright?”

I couldn’t help smiling, with the sound of those precious words echoing in my heart and the feel of his kiss on my mouth. “I believe you.”

“Good. I felt awful about yesterday. I was angry, and then, I was angrier that you chose that time to tell me! And,” he said sheepishly, “that you beat me to it.”

“Is that why you were calling me?”

His face fell a little. “Actually, I was calling to tell you we found out who Hayley was talking to on the phone.”

“So, you found out Lizzie Myers shut me in the freezer?”

“That’s right. She didn’t like you snooping around, asking questions about Hayley. Brenna, I’m not telling you this because we’re together. I’m telling you because you’re the victim in this alleged crime.”

“So, can I press charges?”

“Probably something like Reckless Endangerment.”

“Good. Maybe then you can find out whether Hayley put her up to pushing Millie off the ladder, or she did it all on her own.”

He looked away.

“You don’t think she’s responsible for Millie’s death?”

“I think she’s heartless scum. She’s glad Millie’s gone, just because her friend hated her. But she’s not the killer.”

I felt my muscles tense and my face harden. I wanted to shake some sense into him. Carlos was not the killer. I felt it in my gut.

Will touched my cheek. “Look, I really want to spend the Fourth with you. I want to show you everything…”

I don’t want to fight about this case.
He didn’t have to say it. I knew it, and I didn’t want to fight about it either. I just didn’t know if I could let it go. But right now, I didn’t know what else I could do to help Carlos. I could see if I could find out more about Gunter. I could follow up on that somehow. But Hayley and Lizzie, they were in the Bonney Bay PD’s hands.

#

At seven on the dot, Blythe and I were downstairs in the dojo, at our desks, waiting for Jessie to come and tell us how we’d traumatized her little angels—in person this time.

Blythe’s probing into what Kathy, from The Engine, knew about the Browns’ money issues had been fruitless. Kathy didn’t know of anyone who’d helped Marvin finance the store, besides Millie. While we waited for Jessie, I browsed online, checking out possible sources for T-shirts for our Battlers. I’d just found a nice, royal blue tee in the full range of sizes when Jessie came in. At ten after seven.

Blythe tried to keep things civil, but Jessie started laying into us right away. “So, I hope you two are ready to explain yourselves,” she said after her initial tirade. She sat down with a huff, in one of the chairs across from our desks.

“Well, Jessie, I can explain what happened with the boys.” Blythe described the situation matter-of-factly.

“Jessie,” I said, “I care about your boys. I want them to have a good life. But Holden doesn’t think about anyone before he acts. He has no self-control. And when he hurts someone, he shows no compassion for them. Neither does Allen. In fact, Allen seems like he’s constantly plotting how to hurt someone. He’s sneaky and calculated. I can’t turn my back on him.”

“I make it a point to model compassion for my boys,” Jessie said.

I leaned forward in my chair. “You model it, but do you demand it from them?”

“Demand? I don’t make demands of my children!”

Funny, she sure was making demands of us.

“They don’t have any friends,” Blythe said in her gentlest voice.

“No one trusts them or wants to be around them,” I said. “And they made the decision not to practice, not to be part of the parade.”

Jessie shook her head. “I don’t believe that. I talked to my boys and I believe their truth.”

I held up my hand. “Excuse me, did you say
their
truth?”

“Well, yes. Of course.” She scrunched her face up and looked at me like I was nuts.

“What does that even mean?” I said.

“It means exactly what I said.
Their
truth.”

“Not
the
truth?”

“Well, we all have our own truth. You must know
that
. One person feels one thing happened, the other feels another thing happened…”

“Facts and feelings are not the same thing.” Hey, I have my gut feelings, and I usually regret it when I don’t go with them. Feelings can lead to facts, sure. But feelings aren’t facts.

“Well, that’s how
you
feel, but—”

“What we just told you is
the
truth, no matter how you feel about it.”

Blythe said, “We can’t run a judo program without discipline. It’s not safe, it’s not fun, and it’s hard for the kids to learn anything.”

“Kind of like the rest of life,” I added. “Rules make all that possible. And rules can’t do their job without consequences. That’s discipline. Rules, with consequences for breaking them.”

“Well, I see that’s your truth.” Jessie got up. “I guess I’ll have to talk with the boys about whether they want to continue here.”

Yes! It was all I could do not to fist-pump the air. I tried to look serious, not jubilant, as I said, “Please make sure the boys understand that if they want to be part of our program, they’ll need to follow the rules.”

Jessie nodded curtly.

“We understand if something less structured will be a better fit,” Blythe said as she went to open the door for Jessie. “Have a nice night!”

Blythe sat back down with a sigh. “Those poor boys.”

“Don’t worry. Reality will bite their mom in the heiney sooner or later.”

“The sooner, the better, for their sakes.”

27

Blythe and I met up with Will on Pioneer Street, Bonney Bay’s main drag, at noon. The parade was scheduled to start at two, which meant we had to be in the staging area by one-thirty. We had an hour-and-a-half to enjoy the street fair. Will would be driving his cruiser at the head of the parade, clearing the way for all of us. After that, he’d be patrolling, keeping an eye on things for all the locals and visitors gathered in Bonney Bay to enjoy the holiday, through to the end of the fireworks.

Craft booths and food trucks lined both sides of Pioneer Street. Handmade wind chimes sang and sparkled in the breeze. Beaded jewelry glinted in the sun. A tented table showing off ceramic creations caught my eye. The banner in front of the booth said,
Creations by Bonney Bay’s own Gunter Hatton
. A fifty-ish man with a neatly trimmed salt-and-pepper beard chatted about the creations with a couple of women who’d stopped to admire them. Everything about him was neat, fit, and trim. Far from the artist stereotype. He would’ve been quite a catch for Millie—if she weren’t married, and if he didn’t have the unfortunate character flaw of obsessing over a married woman.

He looked a little subdued. His eyes betrayed a wounded sort of sadness. But the easy way he talked with the apparent strangers, the warmth of his smile, gave me the impression he was typically outgoing and cheerful.

Could this really be Gunter? After my conversation with Ken, I’d expected someone who’d spent quite a while consumed with envy and bitterness.
 

I nodded at the sign, and Blythe raised her eyebrows.

“What?” Will said.

“I heard a lot about Gunter Hatton when Ken Yi was cutting my hair. Is that him?”

“Yeah, that’s him.”

The two ladies drifted around the table, to another display of Gunter’s work. I seized the opening. Okay, I might’ve come just a little to close to pouncing on Gunter. “Hi, there. You must be Gunter Hatton. I’m Brenna Battle.” I held my hand out for him to shake.

“Oh, wonderful! I finally get to meet Bonney Bay’s new superstars.”

I hardly even flinched at the word
superstar
. That was classy of him to include Blythe in his compliment. So many people left her out, ignored her. She didn’t mind, but it always ticked me off on her behalf. We chatted with him about his work for a few minutes while Will wandered over to the next booth, which was selling dog accessories in Seattle Seahawks colors.

Blythe broke the ice about the case. “I’m so sorry about Millie,” she said. “I heard you two knew each other through your art.”

Was that pain darting through his eyes, or guilt? Could it be both? Maybe it had been a crime of passion, and he hadn’t meant for her to be seriously hurt or killed.

“Yes, she was a friend for a long time. It’s been a very rough few days. It was great meeting you, but I’d better help these ladies over here.” He turned away from us abruptly. There was a hard undertone to his words.

But I couldn’t blame him for that. If he didn’t kill Millie, then he was grieving, and he was understandably unhappy about being reminded of that right now.

“It was nice to meet you, too,” Blythe said.

Blythe felt awful, I could tell. “It had to be done,” I whispered. We walked a few steps away, and I said, “What do you think?”

“He seemed genuinely nice. But then, sociopaths are supposed to come off that way, aren’t they?”

“Yes, they are. Do you think a sociopath would set off my creep-o-meter?”

“It’s hard to say. If we’ve ever known any sociopaths, would we know it?”

“Good point. What if Ken was exaggerating?”

“Maybe he just likes being able to stretch a good story.”

Will came up alongside us. “Hey.”

“Hey,” I said.

“What are you two up to?”

“What do you mean?” I tried to look innocent.

“I know you, Brenna. You, too, Blythe. What are you up to?”