Chapter 21
CHAPTER 21
T he wind swirls around Josie Coffee and me here at Point Pleasant Park, and thankfully it’s not Merritt who’s causing the gust this time.
Merritt smirks my way as if she heard and her dark hair blows back with its own supernatural breeze with a river of dark stars embedded in it.
“Well? Get on with it,” she barks. “If this twit killed me, I’m going to find a way to kill her, too.”
Lovely.
Just what I need moments before my big day with Ransom—a double homicide.
I clear my throat as I turn to Josie. Her eyes are kind, but there’s a flicker of something else in them—exhaustion, maybe grief. It’s probably both.
“So how are you holding up?” I ask as I nod us over to the picnic table and we take a seat as the fall foliage around us glitters in bold hues of red as if the leaves were made of rubies. “It must be tough losing Merritt like that. I mean, you were her literary agent and she was a prolific author, a successful one at that. You must have been close.”
“Oh, we were.” Her eyes enlarge for a moment as she sighs. “The funny thing is that Merritt wasn’t really close to anyone— unless you count destruction. That woman was a tempest in a teapot if ever there was one.”
We share a quick laugh over that and a growl emits from above.
“She says it like it’s a bad thing,” Merritt grouses.
I blink in her direction before reverting my attention to Josie, whom I would hardly call a suspect. The woman seems so genuine.
“Anyway”—Josie shudders as the breeze grows icy—“she was my biggest client.”
“That I was.” Merritt wiggles her shoulders smugly. “I hit all the big lists with my last ten releases and that equaled quite the decent payday for both of us. She never appreciated what I did for her.” She hisses out that last bit like a threat.
“Wow,” I say. “You must be really good at what you do to have landed her on all the big lists.”
Josie laughs—and so does Merritt.
“Please,” Merritt growls. “The woman sat back and collected a paycheck. I wanted more deals, more publishers, more books that went to auction—and she refused to deliver. I should have walked away years ago.”
“I did my best for her,” Josie says with a tick of her head. “But that never seemed like enough for Merritt. I guess you could say she was difficult to please.”
“Women should be,” Merritt shoots back. “If I were complacent, my books would have been stuck in Dudsville along with the rest of her clients.”
Josie gives a half-smile. “She was always pushing. She was driven, I’ll give her that. Professionally, at least. And she was just as notorious with the men. It’s odd because she always went for the unavailable men. I mean, she had available men after her, too—nice men, good-looking, well-off men. But Merritt, being Merritt, insisted on stirring up trouble. She liked men who were already in romantic entanglements.”
“I know all too well.” I shed a mournful laugh. “When I was in high school, I thought John Mackenzie was the love of my life, and I’m still convinced that if he had a pure heart for me and me alone, we would have married. But Merritt proved his intentions were less than pure.”
“Oh my sweet John,” Merritt coos, and I can’t tell if she’s being sarcastic or not. Most likely yes.
“Let me tell you,” I go on. “It was the single most painful event I had ever gone through up until that point. When I found out about his disloyalty, it was like having my heart carved out of my chest with a dull razor. And Merritt? She reveled in every moment of my misery.”
“It was poetry in motion,” she coos once again, this time twirling a lock of glowing hair while staring out at the horizon.
She’s such a psychopath.
“I’m so sorry.” Josie winces. “And I can tell you she hadn’t changed. I lost count of how many events we went to where she was confronted by the wives whose families she helped destroy. She was a real-life pariah, all right.”
“That’s horrible. Do you think that’s why someone killed her? I mean, revenge is a powerful motivator.”
“ Please .” Merritt sputters a dark laugh. “None of those house fraus had it in them to do something like this. Those men stepped out on their wives because they were weak. They wanted a strong woman in their bed, if only for a night.”
Wonderful.
Josie shakes her head. “I would assume that whoever strangled Merritt to death felt very passionately about wanting her gone. Oddly, I never felt threatened by her in that way. She once made googly eyes at my husband, and I told her if she ever wanted to see her name on the New York Times big list she had better behave. That was right when we were starting out. And I landed her on the list and she held up her end, too.”
“She landed me on the list?” Merritt huffs at the thought. “Did she come up with the ideas for my books? Did she pen a single word? She didn’t even have a hand in edits. All Josie Coffee ever did was hold up the dumb end of the stick.”
“Well, I’m glad she behaved,” I tell Josie—even though ironically Merritt is so not behaving.
“My marriage is glad, too.” Josie laughs. “Oh, my husband and I went on to have two kids, both heading into a private university in the fall. The oldest is going in as a transfer student.”
“Congratulations! That says a lot about your parenting.”
“Well, I’m elated, but I took one look at those tuition fees and about died. My husband works retail, and he’s been laid off more than he’s been on, so we’ve relied solely on my income for as long as I can remember. We were just scraping by until Merritt hit it big. I never thought I’d see so much money rolling in from just one client. I would have had to switch careers long ago if it wasn’t for Merritt. I guess you could say I owe her a lot.”
“She never said that to me.” Merritt sniffs in the wind, and as much as I’d love to inspect her for a supernatural teardrop rolling down her cheek, I don’t dare take my eyes off of Josie.
“I guess that’s another reason to miss her,” I say softly. “I mean, she’s not here to write any more of her well-sought-after books.”
“Oh, that doesn’t matter.” Josie flicks her wrist. “Now that she’s gone, her books will remain with my agency in perpetuity. She has no heirs to speak of, so I’ve already put in a word to my attorney to see that the rights are reverted to me. I was her closest friend and, dare I say, only friend. Well, as close a friend as Merritt could have had.” She shakes her head. “I always felt she was jealous of me.”
Merritt’s entire being turns a shade of dark purple followed by a candy apple red.
That can’t be good.
“What do you think she was jealous of?” I ask, almost regretting the words as they came out of my mouth. Merritt looks as if she’s about to cause a nuclear detonation.
“My family, my kids, our stability.” She pauses, glancing away. “I always felt like she envied those things in me. And the thing is, she could have easily had them with just about anyone.”
“I couldn’t,” Merritt howls as she rises into the sky. “Don’t you see? You can’t have that with someone once they’re dead!” Her ghostly form expands until it covers the entire sky like a crimson umbrella.
Oh, good grief. She’s always been one for dramatics, but now she’s not even making sense. Obviously, Josie meant that Merritt could have easily achieved a family while she was still living.
“Did you hear that?” Josie shudders. “I think I heard thunder.” She rises to her feet and so do I. “Thank you for everything, Trixie. The class was a lot of fun.” She starts to walk off and a slight panic fills me.
“Josie, wait,” I call out and the woman turns around. “You said you were her only friend. What about Visalia? I mean, they looked pretty friendly.”
Josie grimaces for a moment. “Maybe.” She shrugs. “I guess you’d have to ask Visalia. But in my opinion? Those two women couldn’t stand one another.”
She takes off and I look up at the pesky poltergeist turning the skies blood-red.
“Why exactly could you and Visalia not stand one another?” I ask as Merritt’s countenance grows darker by the moment.
“Why should I help a little thief like you?” she thunders, and with that she up and disappears with a scream that nearly takes my eardrums with her.
What did she mean by thief?
And as for Visalia Jones, I guess I’ll have to ask her the hard questions myself.