Chapter 7 Pried Floorboards and Monogrammed Clues
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Thursday morning in Black Walnut Cove broke through mountain fog rolling off the ridges like carded wool.
By eight o’clock, yellow crime scene tape looped around the ornamental iron gates of Blackwood Manor, fluttering in a brisk breeze that gave the stone estate the festive ambiance of a condemned carnival.
"Look at that tape," Birdie muttered from the passenger seat of my Subaru Outback, peering over her tortoiseshell sunglasses.
"Nothing screams 'quaint country estate sale' quite like polyethylene caution ribbon courtesy of the State Bureau of Investigation.
We might as well hang a banner across the gables that says: *Come for the Depression Glass, Stay for the Manslaughter. *"
"Sheriff Lawson promised the tape comes down off the driveway by noon," I said, easing over the crunching gravel.
"The crime lab packed up their vans at dawn.
As long as we stay outside the chalk line in the carriage house, we have permission to finish cataloging the sitting room and the upper loft. "
"Lawson didn't give us permission out of civic goodwill, Maggie. The estate’s attorney threatened an injunction if the Friday preview was delayed." Birdie smoothed her crimson jacket and steadied a white bakery box in the footwell. "Which brings me to our tactical deployment."
The buttery aroma of pastry and lemon filled the car. "Is that Mrs. Gable’s lemon meringue?"
"Six inches of toasted meringue atop three pounds of Meyer lemon curd," Birdie said smugly.
"Baked ninety minutes ago. Frank Lawson thought he outsmarted us with an armed babysitter, but he forgot Deputy Tyler Briggs is twenty-four, lives on convenience store jerky, and was in my Sunday school class for three years. "
"Birdie, bribing law enforcement is a misdemeanor."
"Bribing is cash behind a shed, Mags. This is hospitality and elder care. There’s a theological difference."
I parked beside Luke Sterling’s dark green flatbed truck near the carriage house courtyard.
Luke stepped down from the running board, tall and broad-shouldered in his canvas work jacket.
He pushed his ballcap back, his hazel eyes catching the morning light with an easy warmth that always unsettled my composure.
"Morning, ladies," Luke rumbled as Buster poked his nose out the rear window, whining softly. "Brought the heavy hand truck and furniture wrap. Lawson called around seven to say the perimeter was clear for staging, provided Tyler signs us in on the county clipboard."
"And where is our stalwart guardian of mountain justice?" Birdie asked, lifting the bakery box like an Olympic torch.
As if summoned by browned sugar, the side porch door swung open. Deputy Tyler Briggs stumbled out, clutching a radio and an oversized duty belt. When his eyes hit the grease-spotted bakery box, his stern posture melted like butter.
"Miss Birdie? Miss Maggie?" Tyler blinked. "Sheriff Lawson said y'all were coming, but he said strict-like that nobody pokes around without an escort."
"Of course not, Tyler," Birdie said smoothly, advancing with predatory maternal charm. "We'd never compromise chain of custody. We know how hard you boys work. Down at the bakery, Mrs. Gable said you've pulled double shifts without a hot meal."
Tyler’s Adam’s apple bobbed. "Well, ma'am, Mom packed a bologna sandwich, but the mayonnaise got warm in the cruiser..."
"A tragedy," Birdie declared, untying the twine.
Golden peaks of meringue shimmered under the grey sky.
"Absolute bureaucratic negligence. Look at this, Tyler. Still warm. I told Mrs. Gable, *Tyler Briggs is out there guarding the Vance heritage in the damp cold, and if anyone deserves a quarter-pie breakfast, it’s that boy. *"
Tyler’s eyes glazed over. "Is that... the Meyer lemon with the graham-pecan crust?"
"The very one," Birdie purred, producing a fork and napkins from her tote.
"Now, why don't you and I step into the sunroom where it’s warm, set up your sign-in log, and let these two sort out the brass candlesticks in the carriage house loft?
You can tell me all about what those big-city Raleigh technicians turned up. "
Tyler hesitated for half a second before his stomach issued an audible growl. "Well... the Sheriff did say the loft wasn't part of the primary exclusion zone. Just... don't go past the yellow ribbon by the cider press, Miss Maggie."
"Cross my heart, Tyler," I said, smiling innocently.
Birdie steered the mesmerized deputy through the door like a tugboat guiding a barge.
Luke watched them disappear, a slow grin spreading across his bearded face. "Remind me never to get on Birdie’s bad side. That woman could talk an owl out of a hollow oak."
"She’s a force of nature," I agreed, clipping my tape measure to my apron and grabbing my canvas tool tote. "Come on. We’ve only got three hours before the appraiser from Charlotte arrives, and I want to see what the state police left behind."
We crossed the courtyard toward the carriage house. The 1880s stone building felt noticeably colder than the autumn air. The double sliding doors hung slightly ajar, secured only by a plastic zip-tie Lawson had clipped earlier.
Luke eased the timber door back on its iron rollers, the hardware screeching in protest.
Inside, the air smelled of damp stone, ancient motor oil, dried apple mash, and the sharp chemical tang of fingerprint powder.
Dust motes drifted through high clerestory windows, cutting silver beams through the gloom.
Against the far northern wall stood the massive antique cider press—a towering apparatus of cast iron and hand-hewn oak beams.
And on the floor right in front of it lay the spray-painted outline where Julian Croft’s body had been found on Tuesday afternoon.
A chill crept up my spine. "It’s hard to believe," I murmured. "Tuesday morning he was standing in the parlor telling me my business was an amateur hobby. By Tuesday afternoon..."
"He rubbed a lot of folks the wrong way, Maggie," Luke said quietly, close enough that I could feel the reassuring heat radiating from his shoulder. "A man who makes a career out of telling people their family heirlooms are garbage usually collects an enemy or two."
"An enemy who knew he’d be out here alone," I added, scanning the space.
The ground bay held half a century of clutter: rusted tractor parts, wooden apple crates, and stacks of hand-planed timber.
"Where do you want to start?" Luke asked, setting down his heavy tool caddy. "Tyler said the loft inventory is mostly wicker furniture and trunks."
"We'll get to the loft in a minute," I said, my gaze dropping to the floor.
The floor was composed of eight-inch-wide tongue-and-groove American chestnut planks, aged to deep tobacco brown over hand-hewn oak sleeper beams.
I stepped carefully toward the cider press. Black graphite dust used by the forensic team coated the press lever and the edges of a nearby workbench like chimney soot.
"Look at this, Luke," I said, crouching down on the balls of my clogs.
Luke knelt beside me. "What are you seeing?"
"The dusting powder," I said, pointing to the dark residue scattered over the chestnut floor.
"The SBI dusted everything within ten feet of the body for latent prints.
But look right here." I pointed to a wide plank roughly three feet to the left of where Julian’s head had rested. "The dust pattern is broken."
Luke leaned down, his carpenter’s eye locking onto the wood grain. He reached out with a bare thumb, tracing the seam between two massive boards. "That’s not just a scuff from a detective’s boot, Maggie."
"No?"
"Look at the edge of the groove," Luke whispered, pointing to several pale, jagged gouges in the dark wood. "These are fresh compression marks. Steel on aged timber. Somebody shoved a flat-bar or an iron crowbar right into this seam and levered up."
My pulse took a sudden leap. "Could it have been the police? Looking for the murder weapon?"
"Lawson said the weapon was that antique brass counterweight scale on the bench," Luke replied, shaking his head. "And crime scene techs don't use a carpenter's wrecking bar with a nicked edge. Look at that splintering. Done in a hurry with brute force."
He pressed the plank. It gave with a soft, hollow creak.
"Nails are sheared," Luke noted, shining a penlight along the seam. "These forged spikes rusted through decades ago. Pop the tongue, and the whole board lifts right up."
"Someone came back here," I whispered, glancing toward the open door. "After the SBI packed their bags and Lawson locked the gate last night. Someone came back under cover of dark."
"Looking for whatever Croft didn't have on him," Luke said grimly.
"The 1845 ledger."
The leather-bound Moravian volume missing from the cherrywood secretary desk. Julian had recognized its significance on Tuesday morning. He had sneered at the desk to throw us off, but his eyes had betrayed him. He had known what was inside.
"If Croft took the ledger from the house," I reasoned, "he couldn't just walk it out to his rental car while Birdie and I were cataloging the dining room. He had to stash it somewhere safe until he could smuggly it off the mountain."
"And the carriage house was where he spent four hours before he died," Luke finished.
"Can you lift it?" I asked.
Luke pulled a clean steel five-in-one painter’s tool from his pocket. "I can ease it up without doing more damage. Hold that light."
I took the penlight, our fingers brushing briefly. Luke slipped the steel edge into the gouge, braced his forearm, and applied steady pressure.
With a dry, groaning pop, the six-foot length of chestnut plank levered upward.
A puff of dust billowed. I angled the penlight down into the cavity between floorboards and stone foundation piers.
"See anything?" Luke asked, holding the heavy timber propped on his boot.
"Cobwebs, dirt, old grease tins," I said, sweeping the beam along the joists. "Wait."