A Midwinter's Tail

11

Marcus called about nine thirty. “Can you take a break in about half an hour?” he asked.

Mary and I were walking around the main floor of the building trying to decide on the best places for the new Christmas tree.

“I can,” I said. “Are you coming over?”

“I need to ask you a few more questions about Thursday night,” he said.

“I’ll make a new pot of coffee.”

“You two are adorable,” Mary said after I’d hung up.

I made a face at her.

Marcus showed up exactly at ten o’clock, carrying two white cardboard boxes that I knew had come from Eric’s. He was wearing his heavy dark blue hooded parka and there were a few snowflakes dusting his dark hair.

He handed me the smaller of the two and took the other one over to Mary at the circulation desk. “Happy National Pastry Day,” he said.

Mary beamed at him and took the box. “Thank you. Happy National Pastry Day to you, too,” she said.

I gestured at the second-floor stairs. “We’ll be in my office,” I said.

“What’s in the box you gave Mary?” I asked once we were upstairs.

“The same thing that’s in the box you’re holding.”

I used a fingernail to slit the tape on the edge, lifted the lid and breathed in the scent of cranberries and lemon. The box held two of Eric’s cranberry lemon scones. Since I was wearing heels I didn’t have to stand on tiptoe to kiss his cheek. “Thank you,” I said. “And thank you on behalf of my staff.”

He smiled. “You’re both welcome.”

“You made up National Pastry Day, didn’t you?” I said.

He shrugged off his jacket and shook his head. “No, I didn’t. Ask Eric. He’s the one who told me it was National Pastry Day today.” He hung the parka on the back of the closest chair. “I can’t vouch for whether he made it up, though.”

I got coffee for both of us from the staff room and we settled in the two chairs in front of my desk. “So, what did you want to ask me?” I said. His wavy dark hair was a bit overdue for a cut and I thought about threading my fingers in it and pulling him over for a kiss. Pay attention, I told myself sternly.

Marcus leaned back in his chair and stretched out his long legs. My train of thought almost got derailed again.

“First of all, tell me again what Dayna said to you.”

I took a deep breath. “She said ‘live.’ I told her she was going to be okay. She said ‘package,’ which I think meant the box of chocolates. Then she stopped breathing.”

He nodded. “The fundraiser was almost completely sold out in advance?”

I reached for one of the two scones. “There were maybe a dozen or so tickets left and Abigail had taken those.”

“Did you know she’d sold them all?”

“No. Not until we got to the theater and I talked to her. On Thursday afternoon she picked up the chocolate boxes from Olivia, took them over to the Stratton and then went home to get ready, as far as I know. I’m guessing that Dayna happened to catch her at the theater. That was just luck.” Bad luck, I added silently

I broke the end off my scone, popped it in my mouth and made a little grunt of happiness. I had a second bite and hoped Marcus didn’t notice me licking the crumbs off my thumb.

He took a sip of his coffee. “Who decided when to hand the chocolates out to people?”

“I did,” I said. “Everett was going to welcome everyone and make his pitch for donations. Then I was going to talk a bit about Reading Buddies. I thought if everyone had a little gift in their hand, it might put people in a giving mood.”

He gave a slight nod. “So Taylor King and Mariah Taylor handed out the boxes.”

I nodded over my coffee cup. “Yes, along with Olivia herself.”

“Could you see Dayna?” He broke the end off his own scone and ate it.

“Uh-huh. She was just a table away from where I was standing, talking to Burtis and Lita.” In my mind I could see the stage at the Stratton, filled with people. I could hear the jazz quartet and people talking.

“Did you see Dayna actually take a box?” Marcus asked.

In my mind I could see Olivia offering the tray and Burtis handing one tiny chocolate box to Lita and then giving the other one to Dayna.

“Kathleen?” Marcus was looking at me, eyes narrowed in speculation.

I took a deep breath. “Olivia offered the tray, but Dayna didn’t take a box. Burtis handed one to her.”

He gave another slight nod. “Then what happened?” He wasn’t surprised.

“You already knew Burtis gave her the box.”

“Yes,” he said. He ate the last piece of his scone and followed it with a long drink of coffee.

“You talked to Burtis?”

He crumpled his napkin and dropped it in the garbage can. “I’ve talked to a lot of people—including Burtis.”

“They had an argument—a difference of opinion, something—at the party, not long before Dayna had the chocolate that killed her,” I said. I ate another bite of my scone and waited to see what Marcus would say.

What he said was “I know.”

I brushed crumbs off my dark skirt. “Burtis told you himself.” Before Marcus could say anything I held up one hand. “Can we just skip the part where you say, ‘I can’t tell you that,’ and then I say, ‘That’s the same as a yes’?”

That got me the hint of a smile. “Okay,” he said.

“Burtis didn’t kill his ex-wife.”

He set his cup on my desk. “Right now all we’re trying to do is put together what happened on Thursday night. No one is focusing on Burtis, or anyone else, for that matter. Just the facts.”

I shifted in my chair so I was facing him a little more directly. “Burtis wouldn’t kill anyone,” I said. “To me, that’s a fact.”

“You like him,” Marcus said.

I nodded. “Yes. He’s my friend. No different from Oren or Harry or Everett.”

I leaned on the arm of the chair. “Seriously, Marcus, if Burtis was going to kill someone, do you see him doing it with a chocolate? A two-by-four, maybe. Or a sledgehammer. But doctoring a chocolate? There’s too much subterfuge involved. It’s way too indirect. That’s not Burtis.”

“He has had a couple of brushes with the law in the past,” Marcus said, rubbing his thumb around the rim of his cup.

“I doubt either one of them had anything to do with someone’s death,” I said. “Anyway, what reason would he have had for killing Dayna? She’d been out of his life for more than twenty years.”

He raked a hand back through his hair and looked away, out my office window, just a bit too soon. I stopped myself from putting my hand on his leg.

“Marcus, what aren’t you saying?” I asked. “You know something about Burtis. More than just him arguing with Dayna and handing her that box of chocolates.”

In the past we would have argued and he would have gotten up and left. Instead, he got to his feet and I did the same.

“This stays between us,” he said, reaching out to brush a strand of hair back off my face. “It’ll hit the paper tomorrow because it seems like Bridget has all the same sources we do.”

“I won’t say anything,” I said.

Marcus folded his arms over his midsection and shrugged. “Burtis and Dayna Chapman were still legally married.”