Birthday Party Murder Read online

  IN SEARCH OF A KILLER

  Lucy poked her head into Bob’s office. “Bob? I’m done here, but I’d like to look at Sherman’s house. Is that okay?”

  “Good idea,” said Bob, opening his drawer. “I’ve got a set of his keys here. It’s on Oak Street, number 202.”

  “Thanks,” said Lucy, taking the keys.

  “I’m the one who should thank you,” said Bob. “I really appreciate what you’re doing.”

  “I don’t know what Rachel told you, but I’m not a professional investigator. There’s no guarantee that I’ll be able to figure out what happened.”

  “I know, I know,” said Bob.

  “I just don’t want you to get your hopes up,” she said, meeting his eyes. “You’ve got to face the fact that you may never know what happened.”

  He nodded.

  Lucy sighed. “And if he was murdered, well, you’ve got to realize that most murder victims are killed by someone they know.”

  Bob swallowed hard. “By someone I know?”

  “Most likely,” said Lucy. “Do you still want me to go ahead?”

  Bob looked her straight in the eye. “Absolutely,” he said.

  “Okay,” agreed Lucy, but as she limped down the steps to the parking area she wished she had a little more to go on than a gut feeling that Sherman Cobb hadn’t committed suicide . . .

  Books by Leslie Meier

  MISTLETOE MURDER

  TIPPY TOE MURDER

  TRICK OR TREAT MURDER

  BACK TO SCHOOL MURDER

  VALENTINE MURDER

  CHRISTMAS COOKIE MURDER

  TURKEY DAY MURDER

  WEDDING DAY MURDER

  BIRTHDAY PARTY MURDER

  FATHER’S DAY MURDER

  STAR SPANGLED MURDER

  NEW YEAR’S EVE MURDER

  BAKE SALE MURDER

  CANDY CANE MURDER

  ST. PATRICK’S DAY MURDER

  MOTHER’S DAY MURDER

  Published by Kensington Publishing Corporation

  A Lucy Stone Mystery

  BIRTHDAY PARTY MURDER

  Leslie Meier

  Kensington Publishing Corp. http://www.kensingtonbooks.com

  All copyrighted material within is Attributor Protected.

  Table of Contents

  IN SEARCH OF A KILLER

  Books by Leslie Meier

  Title Page

  Dedication

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-one

  Chapter Twenty-two

  Chapter Twenty-three

  Chapter Twenty-four

  Chapter Twenty-five

  Chapter Twenty-six

  Chapter Twenty-seven

  Chapter Twenty-eight

  Chapter Twenty-nine

  Copyright Page

  For my cousin Margery Baird

  Chapter One

  Sherman Cobb wasn’t feeling well. In fact, he hadn’t been feeling well for quite some time. He couldn’t even remember the last time he woke up in the morning feeling rested and refreshed, ready to face whatever the new day brought. That was why he was sitting in Doc Ryder’s waiting room, expecting the worst.

  He’d first visited the doctor a few weeks ago, complaining of pain and tiredness. “Ordinary enough symptoms,” Doc Ryder had said in a reassuring tone of voice. But when the doctor palpated his abdomen, Sherman was sure he’d noticed an expression of alarm flicker across his face. It was quickly suppressed, but Sherman had noticed it and Doc Ryder’s usually brusque and hearty tone became cautious and guarded as he ordered a battery of tests. “Nothing to worry about—just to be on the safe side,” he’d said, but Sherman hadn’t believed him.

  Deep inside, he knew something was wrong, just like some women can tell they’re pregnant long before the strip turns blue on a pregnancy kit. He didn’t know how he knew, but he could feel death overtaking him, like the gradual chill you feel when the furnace goes out. First your hands and feet feel cold; then you notice you can’t seem to get warm and the radiator feels cool to the touch. You check the thermostat and notice the temperature has fallen a few degrees; the oil tank must be empty or perhaps the pilot light has blown out. You go down to the cellar to investigate.

  That’s what he’d done. He’d come to the doctor to find out what was wrong. But no matter what it turned out to be, he knew it wouldn’t make any difference. His pilot light was struggling to stay lit, but he knew it was just a matter of time before he finally ran out of fuel.

  He sighed and reminded himself that he’d cheated the grim reaper a few times in his life and could hardly complain that his chit had finally come due. He’d had a good life, a productive life. He’d had his share of success; he’d known great happiness. All told, he thought, there was only one thing that he wished had been different.

  Maybe it could be, he thought, wondering whether he should simply leave things be or should try to change them after all these years. And if he did, would there be enough time?

  Pausing at the kitchen door with an armful of lilac blossoms she had just cut, Julia Tilley realized Papa was angry about something. In her twenty years she had become an expert reader of his moods, always watching for the slightest flicker of his mustache, the curl of his mouth and the lowering of his brows. Not that such acute awareness was required today—she could hear his voice reverberating through the entire house, like thunder.

  Julia hesitated, unsure what to do. The lilacs would certainly wilt unless she got them into water very soon. On the other hand, Papa’s anger seemed to be directed to her older sister, Harriet, and Julia was content to leave it that way. She certainly didn’t want to draw his attention by going inside the house.

  Moving quickly, she picked up the old enamel bucket that held kitchen scraps and carried it out to the compost heap next to the garden, where she emptied it. She then took it to the pump and filled it with clean water for the lilacs. She set them in the shade and sat down on the porch steps, wondering what to do for the duration. She could walk down the drive to the mailbox, hoping Papa’s tantrum would be over by the time she returned, or she could stay here on the stoop and—well, not exactly eavesdrop because that would be wrong, like opening someone’s mail—but perhaps a phrase or two would come to her and she could figure out what all the fuss was about.

  “Damned scoundrel . . . a Communist . . . filthy New Dealer . . .”

  So, it was about Thomas O’Rourke, the young man her sister Harriet had been seeing. Julia had suspected as much. He was a labor organizer and a big supporter of Mr. Roosevelt’s New Deal. Papa, a Maine Republican, had no doubt that Mr. Roosevelt’s policies would ruin the country.

  “I love him, Papa, and you’re not going to stop me.”

  Julia’s eyebrows shot up in amazement. Harriet was daring to argue with Papa.

  “Don’t you dare talk to me like that, young lady,” was Papa’s predictable response.

  “I’m not young, Papa, don’t you see? I’m thirty years old. I’ve always done what you said and what has it gotten me? I’m an old maid—too good for anyone in this town, that’s for sure.”

  Julia considered this. It was true, she realized, with a jolt. N
one of the farmers and small tradesmen who lived in Tinker’s Cove would want a college-educated wife like Harriet. Or herself, for that matter.

  “Is that what you want? To marry some man and become his laundress, his cook, his concubine?” Papa practically spat out the words.

  On the stoop, Julia hugged herself. She could see Papa’s expression as clearly as if she were the object of his wrath. The bristly eyebrows, the narrow nose and hollow cheeks, the frowning mouth. How could Harriet bear to confront him? How could she stand his disapproval?

  “Yes, Papa,” replied Harriet, coolly. “That’s exactly what I want, more than anything. I want to feel Thomas’s arms around me, his lips pressed against mine. I want to give myself to him. I want to bear his children.”

  Julia’s jaw dropped, and apparently, so did Papa’s. There was silence. A long silence. Julia sat very still, watching the swallows’ swooping flight above the neat rows of baby lettuce in the vegetable garden.

  When Papa finally spoke, his voice was as cold and hard as ice.

  “Understand this: If you marry Thomas O’Rourke, you are no daughter of mine and you will have nothing that is mine. Marry him and you will become dead to me.”

  Julia’s lips twitched, hearing the awful words.

  Rachel reached out to gently shake Julia awake, but hesitated. Miss Tilley was almost ninety years old and, like a lot of very old people, didn’t sleep well at night. It seemed a shame to disturb her, even if lunch was ready. She had made up her mind to turn down the pot when Miss Tilley’s eyes sprang open.

  “Ah, you’re awake,” said Rachel. “Are you ready for lunch? It’s your favorite, shrimp wiggle on toast.”

  Julia Ward Howe Tilley blinked and looked around. She’d been dozing, she realized. Papa was long gone, and dear Mama. And Harriet was dead, too. Julia stroked her arthritic fingers and furrowed her brow. She was the only survivor, the last remaining member of her family. Or was she? What if Harriet had given Thomas O’Rourke a child? Her heart beat a little faster at the thought.

  Chapter Two

  Finally, a sunny day, thought Lucy Stone, wife of restoration carpenter Bill Stone, mother of four and part-time reporter. Thick, gray clouds had covered the little Maine town of Tinker’s Cove for most of March. According to the weatherman, it was global warming that brought one cold, gray, sunless day after another. There hadn’t been much warm about it, but it had certainly depressed everyone Lucy knew. But today the sun was shining and good spirits would be restored.

  Lucy reached for her bright pink turtleneck and pulled it over her head, shook out her shining cap of hair and studied her reflection in the mirror that hung over her dresser. Were those gray hairs? she wondered, leaning closer for a better look. She ran her hand through her short, dark hair and gently grasped a handful so the sun that was streaming through the window could fall on it.

  When did that happen? she asked herself. When did her hair start turning gray? And why hadn’t she noticed? She considered yanking out the gray hairs, but there were too many of them. She would have to get some hair color. Or should she leave it be and let her hair lighten naturally? She remembered her mother, who had always insisted her hair was as dark as ever, long after it had faded. No, she decided, she wasn’t ready for the salt-and-pepper look.

  As she turned her head from side to side, imagining the effect of the hair color, the shaft of sunlight fell on her face. Was that a little mustache she was sprouting on her upper lip? Lucy leaned anxiously into the mirror. No, she wasn’t sprouting a mustache; it was a series of fine lines. Little wrinkles, she realized, dismayed. And there were more, around her eyes. She’d simply have to be more careful to remember to apply moisturizer, she told herself, reaching for her favorite gray slacks.

  She pulled them over her legs and automatically reached for the button, but something was wrong. Had she somehow twisted the waistband? She looked down and saw a little pooch of flesh protruding between the two sides of the zipper. She sucked in her breath and zipped up the pants, then fastened the button. She carefully let out her breath and the button held. Just to be on the safe side, she pulled a long black sweater on over the pink turtleneck. The effect was slimming, but she knew it was only a temporary solution. Summer was coming, which meant shorts and sleeveless shirts and—she gasped in horror at the thought—a swimsuit.

  She was definitely going to have to do something, maybe exercise more or go on a diet, she told herself as she hurried out of the house and started the car. It was almost eight and she didn’t want to be late for breakfast with the girls.

  Calling themselves “the girls” was a joke—but the group of four women took their weekly Thursday morning breakfasts at Jake’s Donut Shack very seriously. All married with families and numerous commitments, they had discovered that breakfast was easier to fit into their busy schedules than lunch.

  Pulling open the door at Jake’s, Lucy headed for the corner table in the back where they always met. As usual, she was the last to arrive.

  “We ordered for you,” said Sue Finch. “Your regular.”

  “Thanks,” said Lucy, slipping into her seat and reaching for the coffeepot. “I guess I’ll start my diet at lunch.”

  “You’re going on a diet? Which one?” asked Rachel Goodman, pushing her oversize glasses back up her nose. “I’ve heard that Zone diet is very good.”

  “Not if you care about your health,” said Pam Stillings, adjusting her macrame shawl. Pam had gone to Woodstock and had never quite gotten over it. “You can’t tell me that eating nothing but meat and cheese and butter is good for you.”

  “All you ever eat is brown rice and tofu,” observed Sue, checking her perfect manicure. Sue was a faithful Vogue reader and a borderline shopaholic.

  “Well, I like it,” replied Pam, tucking her long brown hair behind her ear. “And it’s good for you.”

  “I like it, too. I like everything. That’s my problem,” moaned Lucy. “What should I do? I could barely get my pants buttoned this morning.”

  “It’s all a matter of mathematics,” said Rachel, picking up her fork and diving into a big stack of pancakes. Rachel had majored in chemistry before dropping out of college to marry law student Bob Goodman. He was now a partner in an established Tinker’s Cove law firm. “You simply have to expend more calories than you consume.”

  “Exercise more and eat less,” translated Sue, stirring some artificial sweetener into her black coffee.

  “Look at her: She lives on nothing but coffee,” declared Pam, digging into her bowl of oatmeal. “You do that and pretty soon your metabolism slows down to nothing. It’s smarter to eat plenty of fiber. It makes you feel full.”

  “Well, if I’m going on a diet, I’ll need my strength,” said Lucy, as the waitress set an overflowing plate, including a cheese omelet, sausage, home fries and buttered toast, in front of her.

  “It’s not fair,” said Rachel, who was frighteningly well informed. “Did you know that our metabolism slows down seven percent every ten years? Figure it out: We need almost twenty percent less food than we did when were twenty.”

  Lucy resolved to eat only half of her omelet, and to skip the fried potatoes and sausage.

  “That’s not the only thing that’s not fair,” said Sue. “I’m starting to get wattles under my chin.”

  Lucy’s hand reflexively went to her throat. Was it as firm as it used to be?

  “The skin on the back of my hands is getting so thin,” complained Pam. “They get all wrinkly when I bend my wrists back.”

  Lucy looked down at her hands. It was true, the skin wrinkled back like the Saggy Baggy Elephant’s.

  “Don’t you hate that?” sympathized Rachel. “But what I mind most are my disappearing lips. Where do they go? No matter how much lipstick I use, they just seem to curl under or something.”

  Lucy extended her tongue, tentatively. Her lips still seemed to be there.

  “No, the worst thing is that when I look in the mirror, I look just like my m
other,” said Sue.

  Lucy felt a shock of recognition.

  “Frightening, isn’t it? Not that I plan to follow in my mother’s footsteps. She’s addicted to plastic surgery. Just had her third face-lift.” Rachel shuddered.

  “My mother weighed two hundred and fifty pounds when she died,” said Sue, who probably wouldn’t hit the hundredand-twenty-pound mark on Doc Ryder’s scale. “But somehow, I still look like her.”

  “My mother was in denial,” confessed Lucy. “She dealt with aging by just pretending she looked the way she always had.” She paused, remembering. “She didn’t.”

  “My mom smokes like a fiend and drinks like a fish,” said Pam, shaking her head in amazement. “The only reason I can think that she’s still alive is that her liver is pickled and her lungs are smoked like hams.”

  “Thanks for the image,” complained Rachel, pushing her ham to the side of her plate. “I’ve lost my appetite, thank you.”

  “I guess the thing to do is to learn from their mistakes,” Lucy said. “Mom neglected her looks and got all washed-out looking, but I don’t have to let that happen. I’m picking up some hair color today.”

  The others nodded in agreement with Lucy, except for Rachel, who peered at them owl-like through her glasses.

  “Don’t you see what you’re doing?” she asked. “You’re all reacting to your mothers. Sue’s mom was fat, so she doesn’t eat. Pam’s mom smokes, so she not only refuses to smoke, she buys all her food at the natural foods store. Lucy’s mom didn’t take care of her looks, so Lucy’s resolved to cover her gray. We need to stop reacting . . .” She paused, collecting her thoughts. Then she spoke. “Instead of reacting we need to formulate our own personal positive paradigm for aging.”