Till Death Do Us Purl (13 page)

Dana theatrically cleared her throat. “To put it mildly.”

“And what about the sibs? You haven’t filled us in yet on that conversation. You said it was very juicy,” Lucy reminded her.

“I did say that, didn’t I?” Maggie regretted that now, though it was true. “Well . . . if you all promise not to repeat anything, I’ll try to recall. It was enlightening, I must say. Let’s see . . . they noticed a lovely, dark-haired woman first, Erica Ferris. Seems she was Jeremy’s former flame and worked with him at the lab. I thought she was a real knockout. But they both seemed to think
Jeremy was very smart to break off the relationship.”

“I know who you mean.” Lucy had noticed her, too. “She sat a row or two ahead of me and Dana and had on a black sweater set?”

“Yes, that was her. Claudia and Alec tore her apart mercilessly.” She shrugged, working the small stitches on the mother bird pattern.

“Interesting. What else did they talk about?” Suzanne asked eagerly.

“Mainly about At-Las Technologies and the formula Jeremy had been working on. It seems there’s a race with Atkins’s company to perfect it and get it to the marketplace. I had no idea that was going on. Rebecca and Nora never mentioned it. But it makes sense if you think about it. The project has been a long time in the making and Atkins must have been at the company for the original idea and early research.”

“And they may not have filed a patent yet when he left, so it wasn’t protected,” Dana added.

“It sounded to me like Jeremy still hadn’t perfected it,” Maggie told the others. “Alec talked about some missing pieces to the puzzle. But Claudia claimed Jeremy had it all in his notes and all they have to do is put it together.”

“I guess the explosion and fire set them back,” Lucy said. “He must have had a lot of notes in his lab.”

“Maybe . . . maybe not. Claudia said he had saved notes off-site.”

“That’s what I should do,” Lucy said. “I’m terrible about backing up my files. If my hard
drive ever crashes, I’m in serious trouble.”

“Lucy, I can’t believe you’re bad about backing up. That’s your business,” Dana reminded her. “I have the same issue with my office records. There are services you can use. Cheap, too. But a big company like At-Las must have had all kinds of builtin backup systems. And loads of security for their trade secrets.”

“Yes, they must,” Maggie agreed. “Who knows what’s really going on? But it did give me a glimpse into the rivalries between scientists, how competitive they are, racing toward some big discovery. Sounds worse than professional sports,” she said with a small laugh. “Especially since this one is potentially so valuable. From what Claudia said, it sounds like the fate of At-Las Technologies—and the family fortune—is hanging in the balance. Another reason Jeremy’s death was such a blow.”

“Oh, yes, they talked about that, too. Alec made some sardonic remark about how their father would have kicked Jeremy out of the family, too, but he needed his brains too much.”

Dana looked up from her knitting and blinked. “Wow, that sounds positively toxic.”

“Oh, it was,” Maggie said quietly.

They all sat knitting for a few minutes without talking.

“You know, if this was a movie or book, that explosion and fire that killed Jeremy wouldn’t have been an accident,” Suzanne surmised. “It would have been corporate sabotage or something like that.”

“Sabotage . . . by whom? Lewis Atkins, you mean?” Maggie heard a certain defensive note in her tone that was surprising. Even to herself.

Lucy glanced at her. “I know you enjoyed his conversation.
But he wouldn’t be the first charming scoundrel.”

“Of course not. But . . . well, I don’t think so. He just didn’t seem the type. The things he said about Jeremy . . . It sounded like he genuinely loved him and felt real grief.”

Maggie knew she was defending him. But she felt she had an objective perspective on Atkins. She just didn’t think he had any part in Jeremy’s death.

“Maybe he didn’t think Jeremy was there. He probably knew about the wedding and thought the couple had left on their honeymoon and the lab was empty. Especially at that time of night.”

“Well, possibly. He did know about the wedding,” Maggie recalled. “But a lot of people knew about it and could have thought the same. It didn’t have to be Atkins,” Maggie pointed out. “Once you take a close look at this mix of personalities and past history . . . well, there are a few people who may have wanted to throw a wrench into At-Las Technologies’ big project.”

“That is true,” Lucy agreed. “And I’m not at all sure this notion of corporate sabotage even makes sense. The notes for this supersecret formula had to have been backed up in a few different places. If anything, the fire and explosion would have made a mess and diverted the company’s energy for a little while. But it wouldn’t have destroyed the formula altogether.”

“Not unless Jeremy didn’t have it figured out yet. Maybe that’s why he was working up to the last minute before his honeymoon trip.” Suzanne took a slice of pita bread from the platter and chewed it thoughtfully.

“I’m sorry, ladies,” Dana said. “As interesting as this corporate sabotage theory sounds, I have it on good authority
that both the fire department arson experts and the insurance investigators haven’t found anything to suggest the explosion and fire were intentionally set.”

“On good authority . . . meaning Jack has talked to people about it?” Maggie asked.

Dana’s husband, Jack, was a former police detective turned attorney and had a lot of law enforcement connections in town. If there was a hot case going on, Jack usually had the inside story, and Dana usually passed on what she could to her friends.

Maggie was glad to hear that, for some odd reason.

The notion of anyone—not just Lewis Atkins—killing poor Jeremy, just for the sake of some glue formula, was too heinous and cold-blooded to even consider.

“Let’s talk about something a little more upbeat for a while,” Maggie suggested. “Doesn’t anyone have something positive to report?”

Nobody answered. Maggie looked around the room. Her gaze gravitated to Lucy. She knew that little smile by now, though her friend did her best to hide it behind a thick veil of wavy blond hair.

“Lucy? Do you have something to tell us?”

Lucy looked up from her knitting,
staring around as if she’d just woken up from a nap.

“Well . . . actually, I do,” she said slowly. “Matt and I were talking the other night and he’s going to move in with me.”

L
ucy didn’t expect the news to surprise
anyone. Not after all their well-intentioned but needling remarks on this topic.

But her friends stared at her wide-eyed. All except Dana, who stitched away steadily with a small knowing smile.

“You’ve been sitting here the entire time and didn’t say a word?” Suzanne’s voice rose on a note of miffed surprise.

“I’m telling you right now, aren’t I?” Lucy replied calmly. “We only decided last night.”

“I think it’s great.” Dana’s smile was warm and encouraging. “You two are definitely ready. When does he move in?”

“He needs to leave his apartment by April 15.”

“That’s not very long. What is it . . . two weeks?” Maggie said.

“Did our conversation last week inspire any of this?” Suzanne shot Lucy a look.

“More like an interrogation,” Lucy reminded her. “But no . . . it didn’t figure into things at all.”

But, since Suzanne brought it up, Lucy
wondered now if their prodding had, in a very tangential way, played some part. Did the mere fact that she’d started thinking about it somehow send a silent vibe to Matt? They were uncannily in sync at times. He said so himself.

“I never mentioned it,” Lucy said. “Matt’s landlord needs the house for his mother. She can’t live alone anymore and is moving down from Vermont. Matt has to find a new place so he brought it up. I guess he’d been thinking about it, too.”

“Of course he was. He’s crazy about you,” Suzanne insisted. “It won’t be that different. I bet you guys barely notice.”

Lucy was crazy about Matt, too . . . but she knew she would notice.

The rest of the evening went by quickly. When Dana brought out coffee and tea, Lucy served the cake she’d made. It was so rich, the first bite gave her a chocolate headache, but it was well worth it.

Maggie remembered to wrap up an extralarge slice for Phoebe. “Chocolate is one of her three food groups, you know that, right? Along with Greek yogurt and black coffee.”

Lucy also took a slice for Matt. It was his favorite.

“So that’s how you hooked him,” Suzanne said between bites.

“Not quite. But it didn’t hurt,” Lucy admitted. “I hope he doesn’t expect one of these every week now. I’ll gain a hundred pounds in no time.”

“But he’ll love you anyway,” Dana reminded her.

“Watch out, Lucy. You’ll be comfortable old married people before you know it,” Suzanne predicted.

Lucy just smiled. She didn’t even want to think about that yet.

Lucy dealt with her anxiety
about Matt’s imminent change of address in her usual way. By making a list. On Monday morning she found a yellow legal pad and made a list of chores she needed to do before he arrived. “Clean closets” and “paint bedroom” were close to the top. Luckily, a break in deadlines gave her some time to prepare for this milestone.

Matt was busy packing most of the weekend, but they managed to fit in a stop at the hardware store to look at paint chips.

“I was thinking a soft, buttery yellow color. Something very Provence . . .” Lucy mused, twirling the rack.

“Hey, this one is nice.” Matt pulled out a card. “I like that,” he said flatly.

Lucy glanced at it. It was blue. Not even robin’s egg, but a dreary gray blue. Vulture’s egg blue, if she had to name it.

She took a breath. “Not so bad . . . but the curtains and bedspread and all that go better with yellow.”

“I have a nice quilt we could use. It’s gray and black with tan triangles and sort of stripes on the sides. That would go pretty well, don’t you think?”

Lucy despised that quilt. She had to grit her teeth every time she looked at it. Luckily, whenever she stayed over, it was pretty dark in the room and she was too distracted to pay it much notice.

She was really hoping that particular household item would not make its way over her threshold . . .
their
threshold, she reminded herself.

The problem was that practically everything Matt owned was black, brown, gray, or tan.
The “real man” color spectrum. Fitting his belongings in with hers was a decorating challenge. Or nightmare, depending on how you looked at it.

“You know,” she said finally, “I’m not even sure we really need to paint that room right now. Why don’t we just move your things and see how it looks?”

Matt agreed, since he didn’t have time to help her, anyway. Lucy was fine with that. She liked to paint and figured if she did the work, she got to pick the color. Right?

When the week started, Lucy was so busy getting the cottage in shape, she totally neglected her knitting . . . and keeping up with her friends. She only left the house to go to the grocery store, and didn’t walk to town once. It was too rainy to walk much anyway.

The sun finally appeared again on Wednesday. Lucy pulled back the drapes and squinted at her backyard. Everything looked so green, with spurts of grass pushing up from the dark earth and tiny buds on the trees and bushes. Birds hopped from branch to branch, driving Tink wild with their chirping.

She opened the window a crack and the dog pressed her nose against the screen, eager to do more than bird-watch. Lucy wanted to get outside, too. She leashed up Tink and headed for Maggie’s shop.

When she tied Tink to her usual spot on the porch, she noticed Maggie had changed the window display. The clever kites were gone. A flock of colorful knitted birds had taken their place, hopping around a tree Maggie had fashioned out of cardboard, complete with paper leaves.

A few of the birds perched on branches, some in a nest of cottony white and tan
roving. Maggie always had little chunks left on the spinning wheel and Lucy imagined she gathered them, much like a nesting bird herself.

A sign on the tree read
LEARN HOW TO MAKE THESE ADORABLE FEATHERED FRIENDS . . . AND MORE. IT’S EASY AND FUN. TRY OUR NEW CLASS: “BIRDS OF A FEATHER.” SIGN UP WITH A FRIEND AND GET A 50% DISCOUNT!

A large knitting tote filled to the brim with needles, yarn, and pattern books was settled next to the tree trunk. Another sign read
ENTER TO WIN THIS FABULOUS START-TO-KNIT KIT. NO PURCHASE NECESSARY. ENTRY SLIPS INSIDE.

That was Maggie. She faced a problem squarely and took action. Not enough sales and traffic in her shop? Figure out a way to bring in more customers.

Lucy entered the shop. There weren’t any customers around. But Maggie and Phoebe were busy rearranging the cubbies that held skeins of yarn built into one long wall on the right side of the shop.

“Hello, stranger.” Maggie turned, her arms full of navy blue skeins. “Have you been on another deadline?”

“Sort of.” Lucy sat down at the table and flipped open a new knitting magazine. “The Matt-moving-in deadline.”