Murder on the Half Shelf by Lorna Barrett Page B

Tricia hung up her coat and hat and picked up the food and water bowls. She prepared the cat’s meal while Baker hung his jacket over the back of one of the island’s stools. He got plates out of the cupboard. “Glass of wine?” he asked. She nodded. He grabbed a glass, then retrieved the wine and a beer for himself from the fridge.
    Miss Marple sat up pretty for her food, and then Tricia joined Baker at the island.
    Baker unwrapped the sandwich, eased the smaller portion onto a plate, and handed it to Tricia.
    “Since you’ve got his house staked out, I take it Harry is aviable suspect,” she said, lifting the sesame roll to peek at the sandwich’s contents.
    “Everyone who was at the inn last night is a possible suspect, but we’ll be looking especially hard at Mr. Comfort—or Tyler, or—whoever he is. We talked earlier today and he verified your story about his identity.”
    “Thanks for all your trust,” Tricia said sarcastically. Why had he asked for oil instead of mayonnaise on the sandwich? “Do you think he’s a flight risk?” she asked, removing the onions from the ham.
    “Gut feeling?” Baker shook his head. “No.”
    “Are you ever wrong about these things?”
    “Not lately. Why? Do you want him to stay here in Stoneham?”
    For a moment Tricia wasn’t sure how to answer, but she didn’t have time to sort through her feelings just then. “I really don’t care either way.”
Lies, lies
, her conscience taunted.
    Baker said nothing.
    “I talked with Harry earlier today, too,” Tricia admitted. “I need to put my hurt aside from so long ago. It doesn’t matter anymore. And if there was anything concerning Harry Tyler that I loved, it was his writing. Hundreds of thousands of people have read
Death Beckons
. I think I can speak for them all when I say how much I’ve longed to read more of his work. His prose was luminous. His plotting flawless. His characterization superb.”
    “No mere mortal can compare with this paragon. Is that why your marriage failed? Could your ex hold a candle to Harrison Tyler?” he asked, and took an enormous bite of his sandwich—onions and all.
    Tricia felt like she’d been slapped. “Grant—why would you say such a hurtful thing to me?”
    He swallowed, then ran his tongue over his teeth to dislodge a piece of bread. “I’m sorry. It’s just…maybe I’m a little jealous.”
    “Of Harry?” That was ludicrous. “I was twenty-two. I loved his book—his characters—probably much more than I ever cared for him.”
    “Would you have said that twenty years ago?”
    Probably not, but if Baker might have to present her as a suspect in Pippa Comfort’s death, she wasn’t about to admit it.
    She changed the subject. “On the walk home, I kept thinking about that candlestick. Why would someone dump it so close to the inn?”
    “They wanted it found, probably to incriminate someone else.”
    “Exactly,” Tricia agreed. “Now all we have to do is figure out who had the motive.”
    “Now all
I
have to do is figure out who had a motive. I don’t want you to butt your nose into this. You’re in enough trouble.”
    “How can I be in trouble when I haven’t done anything wrong?”
    “You have no eyewitness as to where you were between the time you spoke with Mary Fairchild and the body was found.”
    “It couldn’t have been more than two or three minutes.”
    “Plenty of time for you to kill the poor woman, hide the candlestick in the hedge, and then very innocently call 911.”
    She was about to protest, but he held out a hand to stop her. “I’m not saying that’s how it went down. I’m saying that’s how it could be interpreted. I listened to the 911 call. You didn’t say she was dead. Just that you wanted to report an accident. You knew she was dead, didn’t you?”
    “I suspected it,” Tricia admitted, and that was all she was willing to admit without a lawyer present, and it was beginning to sound like she needed that lawyer.