Chapter Twelve
Of course, old buildings were not without their drawbacks.
She was on the fourth floor with no elevator and a winding, overly ornate staircase, which gave her calves like a pantyhose model as a result.
It was small, drafty, and often noisy from the light rail passing right outside her window, but it was close to all the best restaurants and she didn’t need a car to get around.
Which was good, because she couldn’t have found a parking place within a ten-mile radius.
Plus, there weren’t any reasonably priced hotels within walking distance for her parents to stay, so they hardly ever visited.
It was, however, on the small side for a murder investigation.
Juliette had never actually built a murder board, but how hard could it really be?
She’d seen enough of them on procedural TV shows and read about Loretta’s elaborate whiteboarding in Kate’s murder mysteries.
She’d even gotten a peek of Kate’s real-life murder board/murder attic last year at Kennedy’s wedding.
And she’d seen that ridiculous Charlie Day meme online, so she figured she had the basic mechanics down.
Except she didn’t have a whiteboard, or string, or mug shots.
She barely had paper, considering it was the twenty-first century and everything was digital these days.
She used to buy journals by the dozens when she was in high school, before her mother said it was bordering on an addiction and she would register her for a support group if she didn’t stop coming home with gorgeous leather-bound books crafted with handmade paper. Now she didn’t have the space for it.
But having at least one empty notebook would have helped the start of her murder boarding.
She had to make do with the backs of old utility bills and a pen she’d swiped from the bank because it had a nice grip.
She didn’t have any tape, either, so she couldn’t put the papers up anywhere, and she had to resort to spreading them out on the floor.
Which was fine until she realized she hadn’t left herself a path to the kitchen or the bathroom.
“This is ridiculous,” she said, gathering her half-scribbled lists and crumpling them up to stuff them in the trash. “I’ll just look online. There’s got to be an app for murder boards, right? There’s an app for everything now.”
Someone knocked on her door, the rhythm perky and syncopated, like they were amusing themselves by playing a song.
Juliette crossed to the door cautiously, picking up one of the heavier cookbooks Simon Says published last year on her way over.
Swung at the right angle, she bet it could do some damage.
“Who is it?” she called out.
“A murderer,” came the chipper voice from the other side.
“Are you kidding…” Juliette slid the chain and flipped the dead bolt, swinging her door open in irritation. “What are you doing here? How did you even know where I lived?”
Kate Valentine stood in the hall with a large bag, and even as Juliette swung the door open, she pulled a rolling whiteboard into view, angling it to fit through the opening.
“Veeta gave me your address,” she said, wrestling with the board. “Do you mind?”
“I mind a lot, actually,” said Juliette, but she opened the door wider and stepped out of the way so Kate could wheel the board into her apartment. “How did you get that thing up the stairs? And how the hell did Veeta know my address?”
“Because Kennedy gave it to me,” Veeta huffed as they appeared at the top of the steps a moment later, weighed down by several loaded reusable grocery bags.
“How very helpful of Kennedy,” Juliette muttered.
“We ran into your landlady downstairs,” Kate said, pushing the board in front of Juliette’s lone bookshelf. “I told her we were delivering this for you and she made two random guys on the street haul it up the stairs for us. She is terrified of you.”
“I worked hard to cultivate that relationship,” Juliette said, staring in wonder as Veeta trooped right in after Kate and unsaddled their groceries on her kitchen counter like they lived there. “Why is Kennedy handing out my address like she bought the building?”
“Because I had to get the good dry-erase markers from the office, so I was running late,” said Kennedy from the door, perky and put together as usual as she held up a plastic case of what Juliette knew indeed were the fine markers, mainly because they hadn’t been able to afford to replace the ones that had run out in the last six months.
“Where did you get those?” Juliette asked, bewildered by the whole proceeding.
“Second drawer in Spencer’s desk behind the extra glasses case?” Kate called, digging into her bag to pull out various office supplies.
“Right where you said they would be,” Kennedy said, closing the door behind her and putting the markers on Juliette’s coffee table next to a bottle of red wine and a cheese board that Veeta had set out. “Ooh, a Malbec, nice.”
“I knew almost marrying Spencer would be good for something,” Kate said, sticking magnets to the board. Kennedy only laughed, which showed how far the two women had come since last year when Kate was accused of poisoning Kennedy the night before her wedding.
“What is happening here?” Juliette asked, trying to reestablish some dominance in her own apartment.
“We’re here to help you murder board,” Kate said, like it was the most obvious thing in the world. When Juliette’s expression didn’t change, she waved a hand at her. “Don’t worry, I brought my own string. And color-coordinated sticky notes.”
“I brought snacks,” Veeta offered.
“And I’m here for moral support,” Kennedy said, taking a seat on Juliette’s love seat and reaching for the cheese plate. “Kate, there’s Port Salut.”
“Cracker me,” Kate said, holding out one hand as she wrote headings on the whiteboard. “Suspects, Motive, Means, Evidence. I don’t suppose you have photographs?”
“Hang on,” Juliette said, putting both hands up and blocking the cracker Kennedy extended toward Kate. “I really don’t need any help.”
“Of course you do,” Kate said. “You don’t even have a proper murder board yet. That’s where we come in.”
“There’s no we to this,” Juliette said, picking up Kate’s color-coordinated sticky notes and shoving them back in her bag. “Even if I were going to poke around and ask questions, which I’m not saying I will, I have to do it quietly. Which I can’t do with the three of you in tow.”
“Oh, because you were doing just fine with your stack of old receipts and takeout menus before we arrived?” Kate said, looking meaningfully at her trash where she’d tried to hide her pathetic previous attempt to create her suspects and evidence list. “Juliette, I have a lot of practice with this kind of thing. Not to mention solving an actual murder last year. We have supplies, and a cheese board, and you need help. So let us help.”
She didn’t want to admit that she might be in over her head with this murder board business, but she could admit that Kate seemed far more prepared supply-wise.
She had no intention of letting any of them get involved in the actual investigation, but she could use the whiteboard and the sticky notes.
And the wine. And Veeta’s impeccable note-taking skills. But that was it.
Juliette sighed, dumping the colored sticky notes back on the table. “Fine. Where do we start?”