Murder With All The Trimmings Part 31

"Our price range is over here with the six-footers," Josie said.

She held out a tree.

"Too skinny," Amelia said, giving it two thumbs-down.

"How about this one?"

"Looks like somebody took a bite out of it," Amelia said.

Amelia rejected more than a dozen trees. Their search took them to the dark shadows at the edge of the lot, where the rejects were stacked. Many of these trees had been cannibalized to fill in bare spots on the more expensive ones. Amelia held up a skinny tree, a broom-stick with three branches.

"What if we used this tree to fill out the hole in the second tree we looked at? You could cut off these branches, make holes in the other tree's trunk, and fill it in."

"Amelia, I want a tree, not a do-it-yourself project."

Amelia screamed, and Josie turned in surprise.

Doreen had leaped out between the rows of trees. This was the horror-movie version of Mike's ex. Her hair was a wild gray-black corona. Her eyes were red and blazing. She was dressed all in black, and her skin was sallow.

"You!" Doreen screamed. "You killed my shop. My lawyer dropped the case because you had that cake with the roach. You blamed my daughter."

"Your daughter put the roach in it," Josie said.

"She told me," Amelia said. "Heather was bragging about it."

Doreen was beyond listening to reason. She held a scrawny tree like a lance and charged Josie, trying to run her through. Josie dodged the crazed woman, tossed her cell at Amelia and yelled, "Run! Get away from here. Call 911."

Doreen came back down the aisle and nearly hit Josie with her tree. Josie picked up her tree and tried to swing it at Doreen. It was too heavy. She missed Doreen on the first swing. On the second, she clipped her on the shoulder.

Doreen made another charge with the skinny tree and Josie threw herself into a pile of trees to keep from getting impaled.

She saw Amelia's skinny tree leaning against a rack, and swung it at Doreen. She hit her in the chest, then used the tree trunk as a battering ram and hit her in the stomach.

"Oof!" Doreen said, and staggered backward, dropping her tree.

Doreen quickly found another tree from the reject pile. The two women fought, using the trees as clubs. A whole rack of trees toppled over.

Josie heard a man call, "Hey!" Then Doreen was on her, crazed with anger, determined to wipe out her enemy. She backed Josie into a display of decorative wreaths and garlands and pounded her shoulders with the tree trunk. Doreen's tree hit a string of lights and they snapped off. The corner went dark.

"You killed my store, b.i.t.c.h," Doreen shrieked like a madwoman. She hit Josie so hard with a wreath that it dazed her. Blood ran down Josie's forehead into her eyes. She could feel Doreen's fingers around her throat. Josie's world started to go black. As she sank to her knees, Josie felt something against her leg-a thick roll of evergreen garland.

That gave Josie one last surge of strength. She slung a loop of garland around Doreen's neck and pulled.

"Gotcha," Josie said.

She pulled the garland tight while Doreen clutched at it. Doreen was choking. Josie was still pulling on the garland when the tent was illuminated by flashing red lights.

Two uniformed police officers shone their flashlights on Josie and Doreen. Josie was blinded by the bright light.

"Merry Christmas, ladies," said one officer.

His partner loosened Josie's fingers from around Doreen's neck.

Epilogue: Christmas Eve The lighted Christmas tree glowed in Josie's living room. The six-foot tree was bright with fat lights, shining with homemade and store-bought ornaments. The oldest were safe at the top of the tree. The ornaments Amelia had made in grade school were discreetly tucked toward the back, in deference to her new maturity. The angel ornament from Naughty or Nice was in the middle. The tinsel was distributed the way Josie liked it, starting at the ends of the branches and working back.

"It's perfect," Amelia said.

It wasn't perfect, and Josie knew it. The tree tilted sideways, no matter how much she fiddled with the stand. But Amelia liked it, and that was what mattered at Christmas.

Josie had had to buy the tree "with the bite out of it," plus the tree she'd used to clobber Doreen. It was part of the deal Jane worked out. Josie's mother pulled rank as the second most powerful church lady at St. Philomena's and prevented the tree lot from filing charges against Josie for destruction of property. Josie had agreed to pay for the trees and volunteer four nights at the lot as an informal community service program.

Stan the Man Next Door had offered to set up the tree. He'd spent an entire evening drilling holes in the trunk of the "bitten" tree, then filling in the bare spots with branches from the reject.

While he worked, Josie noticed for the first time that Stan had serious muscles. His arms bulged. So did his pecs. His belly flab was gone.

"Have you lost weight, Stan?" Josie asked.

"About twenty-five pounds," he said."Another twenty to go. My mom got me a home workout center for my birthday. I exercise while I watch TV. I added a used treadmill I bought at a garage sale. The equipment takes up most of my living room. I was a nerd in high school gym cla.s.s, but I like working out now. The only problem is my clothes don't fit right anymore."

He grabbed the front of his dingy beige T-shirt and said, "See, it's too big." Stan lifted the shirt slightly to demonstrate, and Josie saw a major six-pack above his belt. Whoa. Where was the nerdy Stan she knew?

"You need Mom to take you shopping for some cool stuff, Stan," Amelia said. "You dress like a grandpa. You could be a hottie if you tried."

"Amelia!" Josie said. "Go to your room."

"No, don't punish her," Stan said. "She's right. I mean, I don't know if I'll ever look hot, but I do dress like an old man. That's the truth. Josie, I know you're busy, but would you do a makeover on me-hair, clothes, gla.s.ses?"

Josie had prayed for this moment for years. Stan was sweet: kind, loyal, handy around the house. Unfortunately, he was about as s.e.xy as a gla.s.s of warm milk. Stan had always resisted her tactful suggestions to dress his age, and clung to his dull wash-and-wear shirts and baggy pants.

"I'd be delighted," Josie said. "We'll start after Christmas, when men's clothes go on sale."

But Josie kept thinking about those pecs and that six-pack. Muscles like those should be shown off. The next day she bought a good black T-shirt in a size she was sure would fit the new Stan and added it to the wrapped packages under the tree. A big green box with a holly-decorated ribbon held a pair of new skates from Amelia's grandfather. He wanted to take her to Steinberg Rink before he went back to Canada. Josie bought Amelia a RAZR phone. If the kid had had her own cell phone, help would have arrived much sooner. Maybe Josie wouldn't have needed four st.i.tches in her forehead.

Josie knew her family wasn't the same. She and Amelia were still mourning Nate's loss. But the changes weren't entirely bad. Josie had faced her own lies and cover-ups. Amelia now knew she had a father who had loved her-and who'd told her so. She had a grandfather who cared about her and was there to help when she needed it. Josie had made some stupid mistakes, but that's what parents do. She hoped someday her daughter would understand.

Now it was Christmas Eve. Stan was drinking eggnog in Josie's living room, eating Alyce's Christmas cookies, and checking the water level in the tree stand. Bing Crosby's "White Christmas" sounded better in Josie's home than at the mall. The lights were low enough to hide the stains on the carpet and the sags in the couch. The living room didn't look bad at all.

"I like your tree," Stan said. "It's homey. Every ornament has a personal meaning."

"That angel on that middle branch has real personal meaning," Amelia said. "It came from that loser face Heather's store."

"What happened after Doreen attacked you in the Christmas tree lot?" Stan asked.

"The detective reopened the case," Josie said.

"He must be quite a man to admit he was wrong," Stan said.

"Definitely. Heather, Doreen's daughter, had already told Amelia that her mother had poisoned the dog next door. The detective had the dog dug up and autopsied. The body was preserved by the cold weather we'd had. The poor dog had died of antifreeze poisoning. Then the detective checked out Doreen. There was a receipt in her trash-"

"How did he get that?" Stan asked.

"I went digging in her Dumpster to find it," Josie said.

"You really are remarkable," Stan said.

"You should have smelled the car," Amelia said. "Mom had two bags of trash in it. It stunk for a week."

"I also found a water bottle in the same trash with some greenish liquid in it," Josie said. "Doreen wouldn't let her daughter keep the bottle. She went ballistic and slapped the girl. That didn't make any sense. The detective had the bottle examined, and the liquid turned out to be antifreeze. He got the security videos from the Racers Edge auto parts store showing Doreen walking to her car with two gallon jugs. She was by herself. Doreen bought the antifreeze two days before Nate and that woman were poisoned-and Doreen has an old VW that doesn't use antifreeze. The police got a search warrant and found one jug still in Doreen's storage locker, with her fingerprints all over it.

"Elsie, the owner of the Elf House, said Doreen had been in her store the morning before the poisonings. Doreen gave her a poinsettia as a gift, and she'd never demonstrated any other signs of neighborliness. Elsie thought Doreen poured the antifreeze in the chocolate sauce when Elsie was busy with customers. Elsie remembered Doreen carrying a sports drink bottle because it was so odd-Doreen never worked out, and she drank beer or coffee. Elsie didn't use the poisoned chocolate sauce until the next day "The detective arrested Doreen for two counts of murder and a.s.sault with a deadly weapon. The deadly weapon was the Douglas fir she swung at me."

"I bet he wanted to give you a medal for solving the case," Stan said. His brown eyes were wide with admiration, and would look good if they weren't hidden behind those ugly gla.s.ses. Maybe he should think about contact lenses, Josie told herself.

"Not exactly. He really chewed me out. He said, 'Who do you think you are, Jessica Fletcher? This is real life, not a TV show.'

"I told him I was trying to help. He said I was a great help-to the defense. 'How do I know you didn't plant that bottle?' he yelled at me. 'That's what they'll say and the real murderer will get away.' That's when I told him, 'Check it for fingerprints. I wore gloves the whole time. You won't find my prints on it.' "

"You're amazing," Stan said. "Most women would burst into tears if a detective yelled at them."

"I doubt that," Josie said. "My friend Alyce can stand up to the cops. I've seen her."

But Stan's praise soothed Josie's hurting heart. Mike had been angry and called her a "meddler." He'd hardly spoken to her since the police let him go.

"Still, you got Mike released," Stan said. "He must have been thrilled."

"He was surprised," Josie said. That was the truth.

"So the charges were dropped against him?" Stan asked.

"Mike's free. He has full custody of Heather, now that her mother's in jail."

"That's good news."

"It means big changes in Heather's life," Josie said. "With her mother in jail, she's going to live full-time with Mike and his dog. Mike's mother offered to take her, but Mike refused. 'Grandma is just a little too easy to fool,' he said."

"So was Mike," Amelia said. "Heather walked all over her dad and he never knew it."

"Ameliaaaaa," Josie said, drawing the word out to warn her daughter that her patience was nearing an end. "Heather is in counseling now."

"That's good," Stan said.

"I hope so," Josie said. Secretly, she wondered how much good it could do.

"So Heather didn't get in any trouble with the law?" Stan asked.

"She's on probation. The Santa suit was found at Doreen's house, rolled up in Heather's closet. Heather confessed that she wore it and shoveled the snow off the roof to scare the picketers 'because Mom made me, but I didn't mean to hurt anyone.' "

"Do you think that's true?" Stan asked.

"I think Heather was lying. But I don't care if Doreen serves time for a crime she didn't commit. She shouldn't have made that poor kid sell p.o.r.nographic Christmas ornaments."

"So Doreen killed those two people-Nate and that radio lady-for no reason."

"She killed them for a big reason," Josie said. "She wanted to ruin her rival's business. She didn't realize that she would also kill her own store. But, no, she didn't know Nate or Sheila, and didn't care."

"That's cold," Stan said.

"She makes the North Pole look like Na.s.sau," Josie said.

"I forgot to ask in all the confusion," Stan said. "How did Doreen know you were at the tree lot?"

"Her new boyfriend worked there. He called her as soon as he saw me. Doreen came over and attacked me. Oh, here. I wanted to give you a little thank-you gift."

She reached under the tree and handed Stan a package wrapped in shiny red paper.

"For me?" Stan said. He tore it open and saw the T-shirt.

"Thought we'd start that makeover early," Josie said.

Her doorbell rang. "You have company," Stan said. "I'd better go."

"No, you were invited," Josie said. "That's someone who dropped by without an invitation."

"Go put the shirt on," Amelia said. "You can change in Mom's bedroom."

The doorbell rang again and Stan vanished with his new shirt. Amelia led the way to Josie's room.

Mike was standing on Josie's porch. He looked at her candlelit living room and said, "Sorry, I didn't know you were having a party."

"Come on in," Josie said.

This was the Mike she'd first met at Alyce's-drop-dead handsome and a little shy. He looked uncomfortable, like a schoolboy asking out a girl for the first time. "Josie, I owe you an apology."

Ah, she thought. That explained the att.i.tude. Mike hated apologies.

"I was angry at you for meddling, but you were trying to get at the truth. It's better for Heather, too. I know that now. Heather's counselor said you did the right thing. I came to tell you that I'm sorry and to give you this."

He handed Josie a blue box. Josie opened it. A diamond ring in a platinum setting glittered on the dark velvet.

"Oh, Mike," she said. "It's lovely."

"So will you marry me?"

"No, Mike." There was regret in her voice.

"I thought you loved me," he said.

"I do love you," she said. "But-" I can't stand your daughter was the rest of that sentence, and Mike knew it.