Hidden Secrets: Blackmoore Sisters Cozy Mystery Series Book 9 Read online

  Alma looked at her sharply. “Bennie? Why do you say that?”

  Morgan pressed her lips together. Why was Alma acting like she didn’t know a thing about Benedict? Denial? She thought Alma had summoned her to give her some evidence about him. Was she going to protect him with a lie? Morgan didn’t have time for that. She might as well poke the hornet’s nest now and help Alma come to her senses.

  “Yes… well, I’d heard a rumor…” Morgan let her voice trail off to judge Alma’s reaction.

  Alma gave her a sharp look. Morgan could see the anguish in her eyes. “What do you mean?”

  “That maybe Benedict had eyes for Clementine.”

  Alma scowled, but Morgan sensed a hesitation, as if Alma were warring with herself. Trying to come to terms with Benedict’s betrayal. Wait. Could her intuition be returning? She’d sensed Alma’s inner turmoil. That was a good thing, right? And perfect timing. Now all she had to do was let her intuition guide her as to how to get Alma to spit out her suspicions about Benedict.

  “That’s absurd. Benedict is my boyfriend.” Alma said the words, but she didn’t sound so sure of herself.

  Morgan felt a stab of sympathy for the woman. Maybe she shouldn’t have brought it up at all. But now that she had, it was best to plow on through to get the answers she needed. “So, you’re sure there was nothing going on between Clementine and Benedict?”

  “I told you no. Of course not. He was committed to me.” Alma’s eyes narrowed. “Where did you hear that anyway? Harriett? You’d do well to avoid the local gossip too. Harriett Fletcher likes to stick her nose where it doesn’t belong. One of these days, she’s going to poke it into the wrong place and have to pay the price.”

  For such a small, elderly woman, the vehemence on those words froze Morgan to the bone. Deep inside her, a wisp of power curled, a shadow of her normally strong intuition. The feeling of foreboding grew, as if it were trying desperately to tell her something. Alma now looked defensive and more than a tad angry as she fiddled with the amethyst bracelet at her wrist.

  The bracelet. There was something about it. Her intuition was coming back. And then she felt the irresistible urge to look at the glass-door cabinets.

  Everything on the shelves was perfectly placed. Even the canisters on the countertop were lined up perfectly and facing the same direction. The wisp inside her strengthened to a fog, filling every inch of Morgan’s body, sending tingles of knowledge through her. Morgan would bet good money every item on those shelves and those canisters were equal distances apart too. Harriett had mentioned Alma’s coffee cakes had all been perfectly wrapped and tied to match at the bake sale. Glancing around the kitchen, Morgan saw that not an item was out of place. It was obvious that Alma liked her things to be “just so.” She herself had even said that she hated it when things were messy that day they’d run into her at Clementine’s.

  Morgan bit her lip to hold back the rush of adrenaline now pumping through her bloodstream. It was all starting to make sense.

  “What is it, dear?” Alma asked, her tone neutral as she tracked Morgan’s gaze to the cupboard. “You’ve gone awfully quiet all of a sudden. Something wrong?”

  “No, nothing.” Morgan stared at the bracelet. It was practically slipping off Alma’s wrist. She knew why Alma had asked her to come, and it wasn’t what she’d originally thought. Now she would have to be extremely clever and call upon her gifts—if they had in fact come back—to get evidence against Clementine’s killer without ending up dead herself.

  The image they’d seen in Rose’s crystal ball flashed through her mind: Benedict walking in the snow near the big oak tree between Alma and Clementine’s house. He’d been on Clementine’s side, but not for the reason she’d suspected.

  “I was just looking out the window over your sink. You’ve got a good view of Clementine’s house through the tree line there, haven’t you?”

  “I suppose,” Alma said, her frown deepening. “Why?”

  “Sheriff White questioned me, that’s all, after you reported seeing a truck similar to mine at Clementine’s on the day of the murder. And you said you kept an eye on her place that day you stopped my sisters and me in the road too. I’m guessing that you probably saw all kinds of people going in and out of Clementine’s house. Maybe even people you know. Maybe even Benedict.”

  “What?” Alma turned her bracelet around her wrist faster. “No. I don’t think so. Why would he go over there? He didn’t believe in all her mumbo-jumbo tricks. Besides, he was with me. We were a couple.”

  “Uh-huh.” Morgan slipped her hand into her pocket to get strength from the moonstone. Her fingers brushed against the cold stone, and energy surged through her. She also felt around for her cell phone while she was at it. She might need that if she got in over her head.

  “You’d originally told us that day in the street that you and Benedict were at the church bake sale at the time Clementine was killed, but when we spoke to Harriett Fletcher, she said she didn’t see you or Benedict for a while after the argument. Could that argument have been about Clementine?”

  “I told you that there was nothing between my Bennie and that woman.” Alma pushed to her feet and stalked over to an ornately carved credenza and riffled through the drawer, the amethyst bracelet clanking against the edge.

  “Oh no? Then what about that bracelet? Benedict didn’t want us to mention it to you. At first, we thought it was because he was planning a surprise, but that wasn’t it, was it? It was because the bracelet wasn’t for you. It was for Clementine!” As soon as the words were out, Morgan was sure she was right. She knew exactly what had happened the day Clementine died. The mark on Clementine’s wrist wasn’t from a paranormal. It had happened when the killer had ripped the bracelet off. And that killer was Alma.

  Alma spun around. Apparently she’d found what she had been looking for in the drawer, because she was pointing a dainty pearl-handled revolver in Morgan’s direction.

  Darn. Guess the old intuition wasn’t working at full capacity, or she would have seen that one coming. Now what was she going to do?

  MORGAN HELD her hands up in surrender until she could think of another way out of this.

  “You Blackmoore girls really are too nosy for your own good,” Alma snarled, moving closer. “Sheriff White is right to be wary of you and your family.”

  “We’ve done nothing wrong.” Morgan closed her eyes and concentrated, calling on her gifts for all she was worth, hoping to strengthen the fog inside her into full power. If she could just figure out what move Alma would make beforehand, perhaps she could get the gun away from her.

  The sinister snick of the hammer being cocked had her opening her eyes again. Morgan swallowed hard and fumbled for words. “You can’t just shoot me. People will ask questions. My sisters will come looking for me.”

  “Then I guess I’ll just have to tell them that Clementine’s killer came back,” Alma said, her tone growing more high-pitched and urgent. More desperate. “The killer’s red Toyota is even parked in my driveway to prove it.”

  “What? You know darn well that truck was not there when Clementine was killed. You were supposed to be at the bake sale, so how could you have even seen it?” Morgan’s eyes narrowed. “Of course, you were purposely vague about the timing of when you saw it, weren’t you?”

  Alma smiled, but it wasn’t pretty. “Yes, I was. Though when I realized that my alibi was the bake sale, I had to act like a flustered old lady. I was actually hoping the sheriff would pin it on those hooligans that went over there that morning.”

  The paranormals? So, they really had gone to Clementine’s.

  At Morgan’s quizzical look, Alma continued. “Yes, right after you left and before I saw Benedict go in, those nasty boys came over to Clementine’s. I really did hear yelling then. They left in a hurry, and one of them lost his hat. I found it in the snow. Even planted it in her kitchen. Cops must not be too smart though, as it doesn’t appear as if they ever followed up.”
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br />   Too busy trying to pin it on me, Morgan thought.

  “But I guess that doesn’t matter now.” Alma waved the gun maniacally. “You’ve given me the perfect opportunity to stop you from snooping and present the cops with their killer. I’ll tell them that the murderer must’ve spotted me that day and needed to finish the job. I killed them in self-defense. Sheriff White will believe me. She can’t stand you or your family anyway, and besides, you’ve been accused of murder before. Now get up and move.”

  Alma gestured toward the back door with the gun, and Morgan rose and headed that way, her mind reeling.

  “I’ll tell the sheriff you were trying to break in,” Alma said, moving in closer to Morgan now. “I’ll say I recognized your truck from the day of the murder and was frightened. You came at me, trying to attack me, and I had no choice.”

  As the seconds ticked by, Morgan tried harder and harder to summon her gifts, to focus on the gun, to try and get the weapon away from Alma. Rose’s words from the other night echoed in her head.

  Focus on the victories.

  Her tea had worked on Jolene. Her gut had told her to look at the cups in the cabinet. She’d felt there was something about the bracelet.

  Her gifts were still there. She just had to believe in them.

  First, though, she needed to keep Alma busy talking so she wouldn’t shoot.

  “If you’re going to kill me anyway, why not tell me what really happened? Get your story out,” Morgan urged, stalling for time. “Holding all those messy secrets inside must feel terrible for someone who loves order as much as you do.”

  Alma gave her a steely stare, her jaw tight. For a moment, Morgan thought she might just pull the trigger. Time seemed to slow, and Morgan braced herself for the pain.

  But then the older woman huffed, and truth flowed out.

  “Like I said to the sheriff, I saw your truck there. I like to keep track of who’s coming and going from Clementine’s because there’s so much customer traffic, and it has become a hobby of mine to call the cops and complain about it. Plus, I’d just had my weekly reading at Rose Degarmo’s, and she’d mentioned my love life might be rocky. Of course, I’d heard the rumors spreading about my Bennie and Clementine, and I wanted to make sure for myself they weren’t true.” Alma’s lips compressed into a thin white line before a small hiccupping sob escaped her. If the woman hadn’t been pointing a loaded gun at Morgan’s chest, she almost might have felt sorry for her. Almost. “After you left, those hooligans showed up at Clementine’s, but they didn’t stay long. Then Benedict drove up the street. We were supposed to go to the bake sale together, and I thought he came early because he couldn’t wait to see me, but he didn’t park where he usually did. He turned off on a side street. Looking back now, I know that’s because he didn’t want me to see his car.” Her tone deepened, became more brittle. “He walked through the woods and went into Clementine’s house through the back door.”

  Morgan’s gaze flicked from Alma’s face to the gun still pointed at her chest.

  “Naturally, I was upset. Benedict was my boyfriend. I loved him first. Then at the bake sale, when I questioned him about it, he lied.” Alma’s expression hardened. “That’s when I knew there really was something going on.”

  “So you snuck away from the bake sale and killed her?”

  “After we fought, Bennie stormed off. I was mad, so I went over to confront Clementine. She tried to hide it, play it off, said she’d turned him down, didn’t like him like that. Had never liked him like that. She even made tea like we were old friends or something. I wasn’t having it.” Tears streamed down Alma’s face now, and her gaze grew distant as she remembered her crimes. “We argued. Clementine told me all that, but I knew then that my Bennie liked her better. Our fight got nastier, and that’s when the truth came out. She said Bennie was afraid of me. Said he told her he was going to break things off with me but was scared of my vindictive nature.” She snorted. “He was right. I am vindictive. He should’ve been scared. They both should’ve been scared. Clementine lied, telling me she had no interest in Benedict, but I knew the truth. I knew why Rose hesitated at my reading when she looked at my love line. I knew it was about my relationship with Bennie.”

  “How did you kill her?” Morgan asked not because she wanted the gory details but to keep her assailant busy. The tingles of power flowing through her were stronger now, strengthening, reemerging, but she needed more time. “And how did a piece of one of Rose’s tarot cards get there?”

  Alma laughed, a maniacal, unpleasant sound. “I showed it to her. I’d swiped it from my reading earlier with Rose. The ten of swords. A sure sign of betrayal, of being stabbed in the back by those you trusted. Clementine didn’t buy it, of course. She’d never liked Rose Degarmo, never believed in her gifts. She laughed at me. She took the tarot card and ripped it up. Tossed it in the air like confetti.”

  “So Clementine was acting like she wasn’t interested in Bennie so that the rumor mill would think nothing was going on? Buying time until he could break it off with you?” Morgan asked.

  “Yep. But I guess she didn’t want to pretend anymore. That’s when she flaunted the amethyst bracelet in my face. Bennie had given it to her. That bracelet should have been for me. And that’s when I saw red.”

  The older lady shifted slightly, still keeping the gun trained on Morgan. “I’d had it with her and her snide remarks and her lies. I grabbed a heavy iron pot from her stove and clonked Clementine over the head with it when she was busy admiring her bracelet. At first, I’d not meant to kill her, just hurt her like she’d hurt me, but then she didn’t move, didn’t breathe. Good riddance, I say. I picked up all the pieces of the tarot card, washed out the teacups to remove any of my DNA. I don’t watch all those cop shows on TV for nothing. Then I put them back in her cupboard and left the way I’d come, but not before ripping the bracelet off her wrist.” Alma glanced down at the bracelet. “It should have been mine anyway.”

  Alma was herding her toward the back door, and Morgan made one last-ditch attempt to distract Alma by playing on her jealousy. “My sister told me that Benedict had that bracelet especially made for Clementine. And a matching pair of earrings. He must’ve cared for her deeply.”

  Alma’s hand flew to her ears. No earrings there. She grimaced and waved the gun at Morgan. “Open the back door. Time to get this done.”

  Oops. Maybe she shouldn’t have said something that would make Alma so angry. Morgan opened the door as told, feeling suddenly calm, as if her intuition was telling her it would be all right.

  Frigid air blasted into the room as Morgan stepped out onto the back stoop, beyond grateful she’d not taken her coat off inside. Alma was behind her and had to be freezing in just that sweater, but she gave no indication of being aware of the cold temperature. Murdering someone probably did that to a person, Morgan supposed.

  “Out!” Alma shoved Morgan hard from behind, but the move caused Alma to slip on the icy stoop. Morgan seized her opportunity and whirled fast, lunging for the gun. Alma regained her footing and moved back, but Morgan’s gifts came through at last. A premonition flashed through her mind like lightning: Alma pointing the gun at Morgan’s head.

  Using that information, Morgan ducked low and rushed the older woman, tackling her to the ground. The gun flew from Alma’s hand, and they grappled for it in the snow. More premonitions flooded Morgan’s mind, like a bottle of champagne that was shaken to the point of bursting. All of Alma’s future moves cascaded over Morgan like a tsunami, allowing her to wrestle the gun away and restrain Alma with an old garden hose lying in the back yard.

  Out of breath yet exhilarated at the same time, Morgan stood beside a tied-up and struggling Alma on the frozen ground and pulled out her cell phone to dial 9-1-1. “Yes, I’d like to report the capture of Clementine Vega’s murderer, please.”

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  The next day, Morgan and her sisters were sitting at the house under their blankets before anothe
r roaring fire with fresh hot cocoa in their mugs while fluffy white flakes of snow swirled outside the window.

  Belladonna was once again curled up at Morgan’s feet, but her usual accusing glare was gone, and she purred happily. It was as if the cat knew that her gifts were back and everything would be okay now. Or at least that she wasn’t outwardly lying to her sisters anymore.

  “So, explain to me how you figured out Alma was the killer,” Jolene said.

  Morgan went over how she’d put the clues together from what Harriett had told them and from what they’d seen at Rose’s in the crystal ball. About how, at the crucial moment, her intuition kicked into hyperdrive, and everything just fell into place. It wasn’t the whole truth—hopefully that would never come out—but it was enough to satisfy their curiosity.

  “And you just figured all this out when you went back to Sticks and Stones to get that intuition-boosting herbal concoction?” Jolene asked.

  “Yep.” Morgan nodded, her gut tightening at the lie. Hopefully this would be the last one. “I took some of it and then… bam! It all kicked in. Well, except I thought it was Benedict and not Alma. Guess I still have some work to do nurturing my gifts.” At least that was one part she didn’t need to lie about.

  “Don’t we all?” Johanna shot Morgan a knowing look as she slid a plate of sugar cookies onto the coffee table before returning to the kitchen. Did her mother suspect what had been going on with her? She couldn’t tell, and if her intuition knew, it wasn’t signaling.

  “That was pretty dangerous going there alone, sis. Even if you thought Benedict was the killer. Who’s to say that Alma might not have tried to act in her man’s best interest to protect him?” Fiona asked, giving her a disapproving look. “You should’ve called one of us. We would’ve had your back.”

  “I know.” Morgan reached over to snag a cookie. “I just wanted to go by her place on the way home before we got into it with those paranormals. Just to ask a few questions about Benedict, because I figured if I was right, then we didn’t need to stir up trouble with the treasure seekers. By the time I realized the killer was really Alma, it was too late. I was already in her house, and she was right there. It wasn’t like I could just pull out my phone casually to call for help. Plus, it was my vehicle Alma said she saw that day, and that’s what got us all involved in this in the first place. I felt like it was my responsibility to get us out of it.”