13. Emmie
13
EMMIE
“ W ell, that’s a suspect crossed off our list.”
“Too bad he was my number-one pick,” Marius said as he unloaded three of the massive candles in the back of his trunk along with a pack of light bulbs to replace the broken one in the alley behind my café.
I hadn’t even asked him—he’d just picked them up.
Brooks would never have done that.
To be fair, any man looked great compared to Brooks.
Especially since Brooks is dead, I thought hysterically.
“I don’t believe him about breaking into your shop, though. Both you and I saw him in your alley.”
“We saw someone,” I said uncertainly. “Maybe Charles is telling the truth.”
“If he is,” Marius said as he started the car, “who was breaking into your shop, and who murdered Brooks?”
“You don’t have to keep spending time with me, you know,” I told Marius. “You already rescued me from a jail cell and bought me a candle.”
My new giant candle had been overtaken by cats, several of which were napping in it.
Marius’s Bengal cat was hissing at a big white one.
“I thought you were giving some of these away for adoption.” Marius frowned and handed me a plastic bag.
“You don’t have to keep giving me gifts. I know I’m not your girlfriend, just your charity case. You probably have lots of women falling all over you in the city.”
He gave me a slightly pained smile. “Not exactly. They all want hedge fund managers or big-time lawyers. I’m a corporate lawyer with in-house legal. That’s seen as, like, the mommy track because I work normal hours. I like to have a life. I don’t want to be a slave to my job. I like having time to be able to help people. Not cupcake murderers”—he nudged me—“but like an underemployed single mom who can’t afford a lawyer for her kid who was just in the wrong place at the wrong time. I want time to spend with my family and friends. That’s seen as being not committed among the type-A lawyers in the city who pull one-hundred-hour weeks.”
“Yikes.” I grimaced. “I’m sure that works for some people, but I like to be home at a reasonable hour.”
“Exactly. I’ve worked for a ton of big shot lawyers. With them, it’s all work all the time, then they wake up in their forties and fifties, and their kids don’t talk to them, they’re on wife number three, and their pets act like they’re strangers.”
“Well, thank you anyway.” I held up the bag. “It means a lot to me—not just the gifts but all of it. Your time—”
“This isn’t a gift—it’s Brooks’s personal effects. As his wife, you’re entitled to them. The police released them to you. They kept his phone,” Marius told me. “For evidence.”
I slowly emptied the bag onto the counter. His watch. A pack of gum. A small blue box…
“He was going to propose to Oakley.” I bit back the tears. “Because she’s the mother of his child.”
Marius took the box out of my hands, set it on the counter, and cupped my face. “Trust me. You dodged a bullet. You’re better off not being that monster’s brood mare. There are a number of sane men out there who would love to call you their wife and give you the family and children you always dreamed of.”
Is it crazy that, for a moment, I was hoping he’d say, “And one of those men is me”?
“Are you sure you still want to attend the town hall meeting?” Marius asked, buttoning up his long wool overcoat.
“I always go to the town halls,” I said firmly, “and I won’t have the murderer driving me off.”
I wondered if maybe I should have skipped this one when I walked into the crowded historic city hall building. The interior had been decorated for Christmas. Along one side, Zoe had set up the catering and was yelling at the townspeople to back off, only one cup of punch per person.
“Be careful,” I warned Marius when he was handed a glass. “It’s spiked.”
“You’re such a good friend,” Gran was saying to Beatrice, “to fetch Oakley a snack. Her baby’s due soon, and I remember how hard it was to get around at her size.”
If I wasn’t mistaken, anger flashed on Beatrice’s face when Gran said that.
“Yes, well, we do have to help our friends when they’re in need, and if you’re in need, they return the favor.”
“Sometimes,” Cora added then reddened.
Beatrice shot her a nasty look. “Yes, sometimes.” She stalked off.
Gran grabbed Marius’s arm and started talking his ear off.
I wanted to press Cora for info about Beatrice. “How’s she doing?” I asked. “You guys are friends, right? Beatrice doesn’t seem her usual self.”
“I think Oakley’s running her ragged,” Cora admitted to me under her breath as I accepted two spinach pastries and a cup of punch.
Over on the other side of the hall, Oakley, with hands clasped firmly on her belly, was berating Beatrice about the food she’d brought her.
“Beatrice is probably sad about Brooks too,” I said lightly.
“Oh?”
“Well, they were all close friends,” I said, hoping she’d take the hint and spill a clue. “You know, always hanging out, going off to remote cabins together. Women were always attracted to Brooks. Football captain, homecoming king.”
We wound our way to our seats.
“I’d say you could sit next to us,” Cora said to me, “but I don’t think Alice and Gertrude are going to like that.”
“Yoo-hoo!” Gran waved from where Marius was sitting stoically in his seat. She patted the chair next to her.
There was shuffling of the seniors, then I was sitting right next to Marius. The chairs in the town hall were narrow, and Marius was not a small man. Even though I scrunched up in my seat, my leg kept inadvertently bumping his, then I’d panic.
The third time I almost spilled the punch on his bespoke suit, he grabbed my knee, his hand warm through my tights.
I chugged the rest of my punch, feeling a little woozy from the rum and whatever else was in there.
“Order!” Mayor Meghan Loring called out, banging her gavel on the lectern. “Order!”
The loud talking quieted.
“Merry Christmas, everyone. We’d like to remind everyone that the tourists are guests in our quaint historic town of Harrogate, and we need to make them feel welcome. That does not mean fleecing them for murder tours,” she said to several unrepentant blond teenage boys.
Her husband, Hunter Svensson, stood over them, his face stony.
“Before we move on to new business… yes, Ida, the sex festival in tandem with the Valentine’s Day market is on the agenda, but just be warned it does not have the support of the council.”
“Send it to a referendum!” Ida demanded.
“That is new business,” Meghan said firmly. “The first old-business item: the feral-cat colonies.”
The feral-cat committee members jumped up and started chanting in the middle of the hall. “Cats belong in compost, not café!”
Marius stood up. “Excuse me. Is this town seriously advocating killing cats and throwing them into compost piles?” Marius’s courtroom voice—smooth, assured—carried throughout the hall.
Several townspeople started muttering and glaring at the feral-cat committee.
Townspeople who’d gotten there early and were on their third round of punch started throwing napkins and empty paper cups at Gertrude and Alice.
“It seems to me,” Marius continued, “that the Santa Claws Café has found a wonderful way to help these cats find homes. I understand it’s a pilot program, however. It needs to be expanded. There have been multiple complaints from businesses on Main Street about the unhoused cats. Charles, I believe you had issues with rogue feral cats?”
Charles gulped and squeaked out, “Yes,” then half covered his face.
“Perhaps the mayor would like to put her name on an initiative for more cat cafés to help all needy cats find homes this Christmas,” Marius said to Meghan.
“That boy is smooth,” Gran whispered. “Bet he does anal like that too.”
I was not thinking about that this Christmas.
“The feral-cat committee is firmly against cat cafés!” Gertrude said shrilly.
“Shut up, you cat hoarder,” Ida booed. “You all constantly ask for donations, and there are cats everywhere, running amok in town. It’s not even a cool animal like the town of Waverly, which has all those chickens. Cats don’t lay eggs.”
“More cat cafés!” Zoe chanted form the back of the room. “Cats belong in cafés, not compost piles!”
The rest of the crowd drunkenly joined in.
Marius was smug when he sat back down.
The mayor called for a second to vote on expanding the area for cat cafés, provided they be geared for adoption.
I noticed the angry looks Gertrude and Alice were giving me.
Murderous looks, one might say.