Maggie and the Empty Noose Page 12

  "Dad!" he called when his father got out of Frank's truck and walked briskly to the porch.

  They hugged, and then Shane stepped back, looking embarrassed.

  "You must have enjoyed the flight," Maggie commented, noticing his barely concealed excitement.

  "It was pretty good," he said. He held up his phone. "But then Nora called."

  "What about?"

  "It's over," he said with a grin. "Cassidy Carter did it. She killed Olivia and poisoned me."

  "She what?" Maggie pulled out her phone and called Ibarra. He picked up, told her he didn't have time to deal with her right now, and hung up.

  She texted Lauren. Lauren sent a quick reply that she was on duty and couldn't talk.

  She picked up the working end of her spiral rope, and resumed her beadwork, and listened silently while Reese explained what he'd learned.

  Frank came up and leaned on the porch railing while Reese told the story he'd gotten from Nora.

  Two different witnesses had seen Cassidy on The Row that night, walking alone near Casablanca. She had looked upset, and had turned her head away when they spotted her.

  Cassidy had offered the police a lame excuse about going jogging at that hour, but the witnesses said she was wearing high heels and a skimpy dress.

  The Hollywood Housewives casting agent confirmed that Olivia had beat out Cassidy for the part. The allure of Reese Stevens's son being on the show had made them pick Olivia, with Cassidy their second choice.

  Cassidy had a friend in the production office. She'd gotten the news she lost the part just the day before the murder, even though nothing had been officially announced.

  Now that Olivia was conveniently out of the way, Cassidy was going to become the latest Hot Hollywood Housewife.

  She had killed Olivia to get the part, and she had poisoned Reese to divert suspicion from herself.

  "It's great," Frank said, looking relieved. "It's all over now." He slapped Reese on the back, congratulating him.

  But Reese had noticed Maggie keeping her head down and working away on the endless spiral rope.

  He came over and stood there. She ignored him.

  He knelt down in front of her, so he was in her line of sight even though she kept her eyes focused on the project in her lap.

  She picked up three blue seed beads with the needle and ran them down the thread to their spot in the pattern.

  He knelt there, saying nothing, and she continued to ignore him, picking up a gold bead and going through the same process.

  Finally he said, "Maggie, what is it?"

  She shook her head. "It's great. I'm glad it's over."

  "No, you're not."

  She finally met his eyes. She had chosen well. The lapis blue beads were the exact same shade as his eyes. But the beads, of course, were just pieces of glass. They didn't have the cleverness of his eyes, the powers of observation that could be so disconcerting.

  She tried a smile. "I am glad. Glad it's over. Glad we can all get back to our normal lives."

  "But?" He said it softly, so the others didn't hear.

  "But I don't believe it," she whispered. "I know I said Cassidy's behavior was suspicious. But come on? She put Olivia in your bed? Poisoned you? All because of a reality show role?" She shook her head, and ran the thread through the last bead in the sequence before looking for another blue bead. "I can just see Cassidy climbing those stairs in high heels carrying Olivia's body," she muttered. "A likely story."

  "The police pointed out that she's very tall and actually very strong. And that Olivia had dieted herself down to such a low weight that she wouldn't be that hard to lift."

  "Sure," Maggie said. Then she glanced at him. "Forget it. Forget what I said. I'm sure I'm just overthinking it. The police know what they're doing. My gut is telling me this isn't the answer, but what do I know?"

  He stood up. Looked down at her, all his joy at the news gone. "I'd trust your gut instinct more than the entire police department," he said quietly.

  She wrapped the long rope into a coil and put it into the carrying case. Then snapped the lid shut and stood up. "Well, don't. It's over. We can go home and get back to normalcy now."

  She noticed Frank had stopped smiling, too, and was watching them with a worried look.

  She smiled, a bit faintly, but making the effort to be happy. "Besides, I just ran out of seed beads, so I need to raid my stash at the bead shop for more if I want to finish my lasso."

  So it was over. Cassidy Carter had been arrested for the murder of her rival. A stupid crime, borne of greed and revenge.

  Maggie felt like she ought to be happy about it. But it all felt so random and senseless, and it was hard to be happy when Shane had lost his mother. No matter how awful she had been, she'd loved her son, and she was gone.

  Maggie sat with Mrs. Tibbets on the farmhouse porch, watching the sun set over the mountains in the distance. Jasper lay with his head resting on her foot, holding her in place.

  They watched Reese and Shane walking in the pasture across the way. The two blond heads were bent together, then Reese put his arm around his son, and Shane leaned into him.

  When they got back to the porch, Shane sat down on the porch swing next to his grandma, and she stroked his hair and cooed comforting words to him.

  Reese explained to Maggie that Shane would stay with his grandparents for another week or two, as far away from the press as possible. "I'll fly back up and get you when you're ready," he said to his son.

  Shane nodded.

  "I need his help," Shane's grandma said briskly, with a catch in her voice. Her eyes were red, but she was smiling. "We've got to pick out the new dog we're going to adopt from the shelter, and Shane is going to help us decide." She turned to Reese. "And don't you worry. We've got plenty of chores to keep a young man busy around here."

  "Oh, I remember," Reese said. "You ready to go home?" he asked Maggie, and she nodded.

  Paige and Eddie came over with the kids, and Shane took the Zimmer girls to see Jasper's favorite calf.

  It turned out Paige had decided to stay in Deep Creek for a while, too. The grandchildren were a balm to the Zimmer's bruised souls, she told Maggie.

  "But I need to hitch a ride back with you," Eddie told Reese. "The police want me to give a formal statement about what I heard that night. And I need to get back anyway. The charity is taking a huge hit from the bad publicity, and I've got to change the narrative, or all our work will suffer."

  So it was just the three of them boarding the private jet late that evening.

  Four, actually. Jasper barked his goodbye to his cow friends in the field next to the little airstrip. Then he followed at Maggie's heel up the steps and into the waiting Gulfstream.

  Maggie's phone beeped when she was settling into her seat.

  Ibarra's text read:

  CASSIDY NOT KILLER. WAS WITH MARRIED MAN ON THE ROW AT TIME. THEY HAD ARGUED, AND THAT WAS WHY SHE WAS WALKING HOME UPSET. HE CONFIRMED HER ALIBI. BACK TO SQUARE ONE.

  The fact that Maggie had half-expected the news didn't soften the blow. Her gut had told her the solution was too easy, too trite. Cassidy had no real motive to make up such a complicated scheme. You could maybe argue she hated Olivia enough to kill her. Maybe. But to put the body in Reese's bed, slip opiates into his orange juice, and frame him? That took deliberate planning and premeditation that she just couldn't picture from the ditzy Cassidy.

  She settled into the soft leather seat. Jasper lay on her feet to make sure she wouldn't leave him on the scary airplane all alone.

  Across the aisle, Reese flopped into his seat and stared out the window. He couldn't smoke on the plane, so his fingers tapped restlessly on the arms of the seat.

  The flight attendant came around, offering drinks. Reese hesitated, and Maggie watched the internal struggle. Then he said he'd like water.

  Eddie waved the attendant away and offered Reese a bottle of Tibetan mineral water. "It's ethically sourced," he explained to
Reese, and Maggie couldn't even bring herself to smile.

  The pilot's voice came over the speaker: "We've filed our flight plan and will be taking off shortly. We plan to be in the air 57 minutes. You can expect touchdown in Carita at 11:53 PM. Enjoy your flight."

  Maggie looked out the window at the field next to the runway. Planes were parked there in a tidy row. She wondered if Frank's bright yellow crop duster was out there, but it was too dark to tell.

  Frank dealt with his demons by flying, lifting himself up in the sky far away from all the people and memories that haunted him. What could Reese do to find that same peace of mind?

  We've filed our flight plan…. We expect to be in the air 57 minutes.

  Frank had gone out flying that night, like he did so many nights.

  What if someone, someone still haunted by his past, someone who went flying to get away from it all, decided to fly to Carita for some reason?

  She glanced at Reese and Eddie across the aisle.

  Reese gave her a weak smile, obviously distracted.

  She tried to smile back, then put her head down, hoping he couldn't see what she was thinking.

  What she didn't want to think. Frank was Reese's brother. The four boys from Deep Creek had been closer than anyone could be, closer even than family, bound together by the surreal experience they shared.

  She pulled out her phone and texted Ibarra.

  THEORETICALLY, COULD YOU FIND OUT IF SOMEONE FLEW FROM DEEP CREEK TO CARITA ON THE NIGHT OF THE MURDER?

  His reply came back quickly enough to tell her he was still at work, probably struggling to figure out his next move after losing his prime suspect.

  WHO DO YOU HAVE IN MIND?

  She replied, typing with her thumbs as quickly as possible.

  I SAID THEORETICALLY, WILL. I'M NOT ACCUSING ANYONE. DO YOU KNOW THE ANSWER?

  He typed back:

  NO. BUT I WILL IN AN HOUR.

  They would be landing in an hour. She put her phone in her purse and tried to relax.

  Chapter Nineteen

  They landed at the small executive airport outside Carita close to midnight. They disembarked and went into the terminal. The place was eerily quiet, with only the few staff around, and the industrial lighting overhead mimicking daylight a bit too brightly for comfort.

  Maggie's phone beeped and she checked it. It was from Ibarra.

  POSSIBLY. IF THEY FILED A FLIGHT PLAN. OR COULD QUESTION WITNESSES WHO MIGHT REMEMBER LANDING. WHO DO YOU SUSPECT?

  She closed the text app and put the phone in her pocket. She wasn't ready to answer that yet. But she had a feeling that a bright yellow cropdusting plane landing at an airport more used to Gulfstream jets would be remembered. If she didn't answer Ibarra, he was going to start asking around on his own.

  She realized she had stopped walking. Reese smiled at her and motioned toward the exit. She looked away.

  Jasper decided this would be a perfect time to let out one of his signature barks, and everyone turned to stare. When the sound had finished echoing off all the glass and cement, Maggie gave him the Quiet command, and he smiled at her, glad he was doing it right.

  She sighed. "Whatever. Let's go, pup."

  The glass entry doors whooshed open as they approached, and Maggie and Jasper went through, Reese and Eddie trailing behind with the luggage.

  Nora's orange vintage 1966 VW Bug was where she had said she'd leave it for them, at the far end of the parking lot. Maggie got Nora's keys out of her purse and unlocked it.

  The men put the suitcases in the trunk. Maggie put Jasper into the back seat and attached his leash to the seat belt.

  Then she got in the driver's seat, Reese beside her, and Eddie in back next to Jasper.

  She put the key into the ignition.

  "Uh oh," she said softly.

  "What?" Reese asked.

  "I think—yeah, I think this is a manual transmission."

  "You don't know how to drive a stick?" Reese asked. She heard the wary tone in his voice.

  "Sorry. I don't." She glanced in the rearview mirror at Eddie, who was looking forlorn at leaving his wife and kids in Deep Creek. "Eddie?" she asked.

  "What?"

  "I don't suppose you know how to drive a stick."

  He shook his head and slumped in his seat.

  She pulled the key out of the ignition and handed it across to Reese. "I know your Spyder's a stick shift. So that leaves you."

  He took a deep breath. She knew how hard this was for him, but she was too tired and stressed to think of any other option. "It's only a few miles down the coast. Let's go home."

  He closed his hand around the key ring. Then, without a word, got out and came around to the driver's side.

  He opened the door for her and gave her a hand to get out.

  "Here goes nothing," he said when they had changed places. He put the car in gear and they left.

  The road was quiet, with no paparazzi apparently realizing they had returned this way. So they drove on the airport road surrounded by artichoke fields until they reached the coast highway, then turned south.

  Jasper lay down on the seat with a grunt and began to snore.

  The tension in the car was palpable. None of them had any answers, and had no idea when their lives would be able to return to normal—if ever. And she sat in the passenger seat, holding a secret accusation in her heart, and praying it was not possible that Reese could have been betrayed by his own brother.

  Reese pulled a cigarette out of his shirt pocket and lit it with the gold lighter that echoed the sheen of his hair. The orange flame illuminated his face in the darkness, emphasizing the shadowed lines and rough growth of beard that made him look, for the first time since she'd known him, like an old man.

  He cranked the driver's side window open. It came down with a creak, and then the ocean breeze rushed in, slapping Maggie in the face like a cool cloth, waking her up.

  Reese tapped his ash out the window onto the road that streamed by.

  "Ow!" she said when the ashes were blown back into the car and hit her face.

  "Sorry," he muttered. "You okay?"

  She nodded.

  There was a little contraption that straddled the center bump in the vintage car. It held Kleenex, pens, and an empty Starbucks cup from Nora's last coffee run.

  Reese popped the plastic lid off the cup one-handed and tapped his cigarette ashes into it.

  She watched his hands. The only feeling she could conjure up was exhaustion. She was numb and tired and just wanted this day to be over.

  Reese held the steering wheel with his fingers, the burning cigarette in his left hand, and the paper cup in his right.

  He set the paper cup back into the center console, then took a drag on his cigarette. The orange tip was the only light in the car. Then he exhaled and the car was dark again.

  Reese reached across again, this time picking up the cup to move it to the left side of the steering wheel. He muttered a curse under his breath when he found there was no cup holder on the left side, and set it back in its original spot in the center of the car.

  The wind kept blowing the cigarette smoke into her face, so she rolled down the passenger window to even out the airflow.

  It helped a little, but not much.

  Maggie rested her head against the seat back, and listened to Jasper's snoring, and tried not to worry.

  Reese reached awkwardly across his chest to tap the ash into the paper cup again.

  And Maggie realized why Olivia was dead.

  Right there, in that moment, as the cold air rushed into her face, pinning her in her seat. Keeping her from screaming. Keeping her from throwing up at the horror that filled her mind.

  Right up until that instant, she would have said that suspecting Reese's brother Frank of killing his lover Olivia was the most horrible solution to the crime she could have imagined.

  But there was something worse. A crime that, in the end, wasn't really about Olivia at all.


  That's why she hadn't been able to figure it out. She had been looking for business associates. For lovers. For someone motivated by greed. By lust. By anger. By revenge.

  But the murder of Olivia Sigworth Stevens hadn't been about any of those things.

  It had been about a crime so cruel and callous it had never even crossed her mind.

  Reese did it again, and her eyes followed his movements, fascinated, as he reached across his chest to tap out the cigarette ash into the cup in the center of the car.

  She got out her phone. Sat there in the passenger seat with the chugging of the old car and the roar of the wind, and the tense, beautiful, demon-haunted man chain smoking and cursing under his breath.

  And she found the picture online.

  That stunningly composed, artistic picture of the crash that had destroyed Deep Creek.

  The picture of a dead young man, covered by a palm frond where he lay crushed in a car accident after a drug-fueled reckless driving spree.

  The picture of David Zimmer, gifted guitarist, and more importantly, friend, son, and brother.

  Chapter Twenty

  The glowing image on the phone was as beautiful and terrible as ever. But now she understood it. Understood what no one had seen before.

  She moved her fingers on the image to enlarge it.

  And saw exactly what she expected.

  She was currently sitting in a little vintage Volkswagen Beetle built in the 1960s. Back then, no one had yet conceived of Starbucks. No one had yet imagined long commutes through crazy traffic, where workers drove for hours in portable living rooms on wheels, equipped with every convenience from GPS navigation, to hands-free phone service, to five-dollar coffee in paper cups that would require cars with a dozen drink holders to store them conveniently for each passenger's use.

  Nora had added the funky contraption in the center of the Bug. It was a plastic bin that hugged the center bump of the car, and held her tissues, and her spare change, and her Starbucks cup.