Oreo Sprinkled Murder: A Donut Hole Cozy Mystery - Book 22 Read online

  Heather hung up, then dialed the cell number again and put the phone against her ear. It rang twice.

  “Hello?” The doc answered, then gasped two breaths. “This better be worth it. I had to run back to the golf cart for this.”

  Heather blinked at that revelation. “Doctor Williams? This is Heather Shepherd. I spoke with you recently about prescription medication.”

  “Right, yeah, I remember. The oxycodone,” he replied. “How may I help?”

  Heather sucked in a breath. This was a long shot. He might not have the information she needed, after all. “I need to know if you prescribed any form of drugs for a guy by the name of Joe Potts. Pain medication. Opiates.”

  “No,” the doctor replied, immediately. “I haven’t prescribed anything like that to anyone in months.”

  “You’re absolutely sure about that?”

  “Positive.”

  “Thank you for your time, doctor. I’ll let you get back to your golf game,” she said, then hung up.

  “What was that about?” Ryan asked. He frowned and tilted his head to one side. “Is everything okay?”

  Heather strode to the dressing table and placed the phone on the wood. “I’m not sure. Actually, no.”

  “What’s going on, hon? Enlighten me.”

  “We need to reopen the case,” Heather said. “The murder case, at least.”

  Ryan froze and narrowed his eyes at her. He shook his head from side to side. “Heather, no. You’re flogging a dead horse.”

  “That’s a distasteful turn of phrase,” Heather replied. “And I’m serious. Just let me explain.”

  Ryan walked backward to the bed and sat down on the edge. “All right. I’m listening.”

  Heather had nothing but gratitude for her husband. He always gave her the opportunity to air her views. He was fair, and that was what made him a great police officer and an even better husband.

  “We know that the cause of death for curator Boddington was an overdose on opiates, right?”

  “Right.”

  “But Joe Potts didn’t have access to any opiates. The doctor just told me so. And when you called around to the hospital, they gave you similar information. We still don’t know where the drugs came from and who had access to them. There’s conclusive evidence that he stole the Egg, but none that he murdered Boddington.” Heather broke off and heaved in deep breaths.

  Ryan stared at her in silence. He rose from the bed, then walked to their window and looked out on their garden outside. He’d put up a tire swing for Lilly, last weekend, and it swayed back and forth on its rope.

  “You have a good point,” Ryan replied. “But I don’t see a way forward right now. I don’t have another lead for this case.”

  “Neither do I,” Heather replied. “That’s the problem. Joe might not have killed Boddington. Sara Hines is the only suspect who looks close to a fit for the case, but there are too many discrepancies. She had meds but not the right kind. She wanted to meet with the curator but never did.”

  Ryan massaged the back of his neck. “We just have to keep looking, Mrs. Shepherd. I can’t officially re-open the case until we have a solid lead.”

  “What does that mean?”

  Ryan turned to his wife. “It means that time is running out for Joe. If we don’t find evidence which exonerates him from the murder charge, he will be arraigned and charged for it, as well as the theft of the Egg.”

  Heather’s heart skipped a beat. “Are you saying he’d go to prison for this? For something he possibly didn’t do?”

  Ryan stroked a hand across his forehead. “That’s correct. We’ve got to work fast.”

  But she didn’t have a clue where to start. Sara Hines was clammed up. The evidence at the scene pointed to Joe Potts, and the curator couldn’t exactly tell them who’d done it.

  “Don’t worry, love. We’ll figure it out. We always do.” Ryan drew her into a hug.

  She rested her head on his shoulder. The anxiety didn’t leave her.

  Chapter 16

  “How’s the homework going?” Heather asked, and adjusted her laptop. She curled her feet underneath herself and leaned back against the sofa cushions.

  Dave snored beside her.

  “We’ve got this big presentation on crustaceans tomorrow,” Lilly replied, and fiddled on her own laptop.

  Ryan had bought it for her as a welcome home gift, and she’d been attached to it ever since.

  “Wait, what? You’ve got a presentation on crustaceans?” Heather asked.

  “That’s right. All kinds. Lobsters, crabs, that kind of thing.” Lilly said, and clicked on the mousepad. She pressed her lips into a thin line and shook her head. “Luckily, I know how to use this PowerPoint thing.”

  “Are you doing a presentation on how to cook them or something?” Heather asked.

  Lilly burst out laughing. “No, Au-Heather. Not everything is about food.”

  “All right, smartie pants. Then what’s it about?”

  “It’s a science thing. We have to identify their orders and classes and stuff.”

  “Boy, school sure has changed since I was young,” Heather replied. “In the age of the dinosaurs, you know. We didn’t have to do presentations on crustaceans.”

  Lilly stuck out her tongue and returned to her work. They’d muted the TV, but images of polar bears flashed across the screen. Heather smiled, but the happiness was skin deep, this evening.

  She couldn’t shake the sense of responsibility for Emily’s brother. There wasn’t a thing she could do until she got a better lead.

  Heather tilted her head to the side and stared at her emails.

  Sara Hines had taken pills for an injury. She’d recently lost a lot of money. She had a jewelry store and had wanted to meet with curator Boddington.

  Jabby Joe Potts had stolen the Egg, but he’d never had access to the kind of medication which had killed Henry.

  “But what about Kerry?” Heather whispered.

  Lilly didn’t look up from her screen. She was accustomed to Heather’s moments of ‘discovery’ by now.

  Kerry Boddington hadn’t done anything suspicious, as far as Heather had discovered. Apart from the… “Wheelchair!” Heather bolted upright. “Wheelchair. Meds. Wheelchair.”

  Dave barked and flipped onto his stomach, then looked around the room.

  “Is this a game?” Lilly asked. “Because talking about wheelchairs and stuff isn’t that fun.”

  “Sorry, honey. I just had a bit of a revelation. Okay, a big revelation.” Heather grasped the edges of her laptop and stared at a frolicking polar bear on the screen.

  Why hadn’t she realized it before? Henry Boddington had acted strangely on the day of the grand opening of the museum. He’d been pale and shaky. He’d slurred his words.

  Couple that fact with the wheelchair in Kerry’s kitchen and the use of drugs… but, wait, where had the drugs come from if they hadn’t been doled out by Doctor Williams or anyone at the Hillside Regional?

  Heather tapped her fingers on the sides of her keyboard. There had to be an answer to this.

  “What did she say?” Heather whispered. She cast her mind back to their interview.

  Henry’s life dream was to open the museum in Hillside. They’d come back a few weeks ago, and Henry had worked nonstop.

  A few weeks was a short time to get anything running, let alone a museum up and ready to be opened to the public.

  The email notification on Heather’s laptop pinged, and she shifted on the sofa.

  A new email? The subject line read: I’m sorry. I couldn’t tell you in person.

  Heather opened it. An empty space greeted her apart from the name, Kerry Boddington, at the bottom of the page. An attachment awaited her.

  Heather clicked, and a pdf opened on the screen. A scanned copy of a handwritten letter. She leaned closer to the screen. Her heart beat against the inside of her ribcage.

  My darling,

  This has been a long journey fo
r us both. I’ve finally achieved what I wanted to achieve. I can only hope you will help me with this. I know this is difficult for you. I don’t want to upset you.

  This is something that I need more than anything else. I can’t stand the thought of living a life in a wheelchair. Of watching you look after me, day in and day out.

  I wouldn’t ask you to do this unless I believed it was the only way.

  Please help me. Please.

  I love you.

  Henry.

  Heather wiped tears from the corners of her eyes.

  “What’s wrong?” Lilly asked. “Are you all right?”

  “I’m fine, honey. I just got some sad news. That’s all.” Heather gave Lilly a wan smile, then read the letter again.

  This explained everything. The method of death. The reason she lacked evidence in the case.

  Heather forwarded the email to Ryan, then shut the laptop lid and sat back. “Honey, I’m going to call Amy to come over and spend some time with you.”

  “Heather, I’m eleven, not two. You can leave me alone at home.” Lilly rolled her eyes.

  “I know what you’ll get up to. Raiding the fridge. Feeding Dave donuts. No, I’ll call Amy,” Heather said and winked at the young girl.

  She’d have to call her husband right after. They had a widow to arrest for the mercy killing of her husband.

  Heather’s stomach sank into her shoes.

  Chapter 17

  “Are you sure you want to do this?” Ryan asked, and tucked his police hat under his arm.

  Heather met his gaze, head on. “I have to. I need to know why and how. I can’t go just on what she sent me.” That wasn’t the only reason Heather had come with.

  She had to finish the case. She couldn’t step out when things got emotionally tough for her. What kind of role model would she be for Lilly?

  No, Heather had to be strong.

  She glanced up at the Boddington residence and blinked in the glare of the late afternoon sun.

  “Wait, who’s that?” Heather asked.

  A lone figure strode up the garden path to the front steps. Fiery red hair. Uh oh, what did she have to do with this?

  “That’s another suspect. Or she was until we arrested Joe Potts.”

  “Sara Hines.” Heather shook her head. “This might be messy. Let’s get up there.”

  “Whatever you say, boss,” Ryan replied. He popped his police hat on the dashboard, then opened his car door and heaved himself out into the afternoon.

  Heather followed his example.

  Trees lined the street. Their leaves waved in hues of red, orange, gold and brown.

  Sara Hines rapped her knuckles on the pale, front door of the house.

  “Hurry,” Heather said and strode up the path. Ryan followed, hot on her heels.

  The front door swung inward, and Kerry Boddington appeared.

  “Your stupid husband,” Sara yelled.

  Kerry gasped and took a step back. Heather rattled up the front stairs and stopped just behind Sara Hines. The woman shook her red mane of hair and placed her fists on her hips.

  She hadn’t noticed them yet.

  “What are you talking about?” Kerry asked. Her gaze flickered past Sara’s shoulder and rested on Heather for a brief moment, then traveled away again.

  “Your husband wouldn’t sell me that stupid Goose’s Egg. He wouldn’t do it. Do you have any idea how much I could’ve made off that thing?”

  “I –”

  “But no, he had to go and get himself killed before we could complete the transaction. And worse, he let that darn Egg get stolen. Now, it’s in some evidence room or something, and I’ll never see it again,” Sara said, she threw her hands up in the air.

  What a random diatribe. Did the woman have no shame?

  Kerry drew in a deep breath and held it.

  “This is all your fault, you know. If you had just told your husband to sell me the Egg, he wouldn’t be dead.” Hines jabbed her finger at the widow. “But I guess you got what you deserved, didn’t you?”

  “I –”

  “I’m not interested in anything you have to say,” Sara growled, then spun on the spot. Her anger vanished, absorbed by the look of shock which replaced it. “Uh.”

  “Ma’am, I’m going to have to ask you to leave. You’re trespassing on private property, and if you don’t, I’ll be forced to arrest you,” Ryan said and touched the handcuffs which hung from his belt.

  Hines’ eyes nearly popped clean out of her skull. “I, err, good evening, officer,” she said, then rushed past them and down the path. She glanced back every few steps but didn’t stop.

  Heather sighed and turned to face Kerry Boddington. The woman clung to the doorframe. She stared at Ryan’s handcuffs.

  “Kerry,” Heather said, softly. “I got your email.”

  The widow jerked and looked up. “Hello, Mrs. Shepherd. I assume this is your husband?”

  “That’s correct,” Heather replied. She didn’t have to tell her why he’d come.

  “Can we talk before this happens?” Kerry asked. “Inside, would be good.”

  Ryan gestured for the widow Boddington to lead the way, and she turned and shuffled back into her home. Her dark hair, streaked with gray, hung loosely around her shoulders.

  The hems of her jeans had frayed.

  Heather followed her into her kitchen, then sat down in the squeaky chair next to her wooden table. The wheelchair sat in the corner, as it’d been on her previous visit.

  “Where do I start?” Kerry asked, and grasped the countertop behind her. “My husband was ill for a very long time.” She squeezed her eyes shut, then snapped them open again.

  Ryan stood behind Heather and placed his palm on her shoulder. “Please, go on, Mrs. Boddington.”

  “He had Multiple Sclerosis,” she said. “And a lot of pain most of the time. He got seizures. He could barely walk some days. It wouldn’t have been too bad, but he hated taking his medication and he knew that one day, it would all catch up to him.”

  Heather pressed her lips together. What had this woman gone through these past weeks?

  “I told you he dreamed of bringing the Goose’s Egg back to Hillside, right?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Well, that was his goal. We spoke a lot about the future, and he was always vehement on one particular point,” Kerry said and bit her bottom lip. “He wanted to die after he’d opened the museum. And he wanted me to run it for him.”

  “Oh gosh,” Heather whispered.

  “I told him I couldn’t do it. I took his medication away in case he tried to do it himself, and rationed him. I handled all his medical stuff because he needed all his strength to focus on that dream,” she said.

  Ryan squeezed Heather’s shoulder. “What changed your mind?”

  “The night before the opening, he had a seizure. I’m used to helping him through them. When we first got married, I found them terrifying, but after a few months, they didn’t bother me anymore,” she said. “But this time was different. It last longer and it hurt more after. Henry cried.”

  Beams of sunlight broke through the clouds outside and struck the tiles.

  “And Henry never cried. No matter how much he hurt or how dizzy he felt. He was a rock. This time, he cried. Then he wrote me the letter I sent you and the night of the grand opening I gave him his pills, and I stood in the office with him and held him until he was gone.”

  A mercy killing. Although, could it be classed as a mercy killing if Henry had taken the pills himself. Wouldn’t the charge be something less if she’d only been an accomplice to the death?

  Heaven knew, Kerry didn’t deserve years in prison for her attempt to help her husband.

  “I helped my husband kill himself,” Kerry replied. “And I couldn’t let another man go to prison for it, in good faith. I couldn’t let that happen. Henry was a good man, and I strive to be the same type of person he was.” She sucked in a breath, then extended her wrists. “So
, please, arrest me, detective.”

  Heather rose and walked from the room. She couldn’t watch what would happen next.

  Chapter 18

  Lilly slurped on the end of her straw and kicked her feet up on the sofa. She stared at the dinosaur on the screen, eyes wide.

  “Ha, I thought Jurassic Park was boring,” Amy said.

  “Shush! The best part is coming up,” Lilly replied, around the end of the straw. She pointed to the screen. “The dinosaur eats the goat.”

  “I’ve only seen it about a hundred bajillion times, Lils.” Amy rose from her seat beside the young girl, then ruffled Dave’s ears. She walked to Heather’s side of the room, then plonked down on the sofa beside her.

  Heather stared at the T-Rex and didn’t meet her bestie’s gaze. Amy had a radar for her emotions.

  “I hear Kerry’s going to be out soon. Bail.”

  Heather dragged her teeth across her bottom lip, then finally met her bestie’s gaze. “She’ll have to face charges for what she did. Reduced charges, but still.”

  “How does that make you feel?” Amy asked, and tilted her head to one side.

  “The psychologist bit? Really?”

  “No, I’m being serious. How do you feel about the completion of this case?”

  Heather wriggled her nose. “Not good. This is the first case that’s made me feel bad about my investigation. I mean, there was that time with Samantha James, but that wasn’t as bad because it was self-defense.”

  “Yeah, I hear she’s totally off the hook,” Amy replied.

  “Good,” Heather said. “But this, ugh, this is just a depressing case and a depressing outcome.” She rolled her shoulders, then glanced at Lilly.

  The girl hadn’t heard a word. The straw dangled from her lips. Her eyes widened at the roars on the screen. “No, don’t got to the toilet. What are you doing! Don’t go to the toilet!”

  “Cheer up, girl. This isn’t the last case you’ll handle and it sure isn’t the first. You’ve got everything to be happy about.” Amy nodded toward Lilly and Dave. “Them, your husband, the successes at Donut Delights. I mean, we’re selling donuts by the case.”