Reap What You Sew (25 page)

He seemed to take that in, mull it around. “I guess she’d do whatever she had to do… kiss a few butts, sleep with the right folks, maybe spread lies about her competition.”

“Kill off anyone who stands in her way?” She sat up tall, mortified the question had passed her mental filter and made its way out of her mouth.

He pinned her with a squirm-inducing stare. “Excuse me?”

Desperate, she searched for a way to salvage any shot she had of getting her real questions answered. She opted for the dumb female routine complete with a giggle. “You can tell I fell asleep last night watching a crime show, huh?”

Stan said nothing as his death stare continued.

She leapt to her feet, her hands retreating into her purse and withdrawing the first thing she could find…

A picture of Milo.

Ggrreeaatt…

And then it hit her. A way to get the answers she needed without looking like an idiot any longer. “My fiancé is a third grade teacher at Sweet Briar Elementary. Every year, he brings in people representing different careers to talk to the students. So they can learn about all sorts of jobs for the future.”

The man’s stance softened ever so slightly. “And you want me to come and talk about being a security guard?”

Bypassing the truth in favor of pulling her foot from her mouth, Tori nodded. “I—uh, think the little boys would love to hear about what you do.”

“When?”

She blurted out the first answer that came to mind. “Tomorrow? Say around two o’clock?”

“I suppose I might be able to accommodate that. If I can find someone to cover me, of course.”

“Of course.” Squaring her shoulders against the lie that would have her in debt to Milo for the next umpteen years, she posed another one. “Do you think we could get someone connected to the movie, too?”

The legs of Stan’s chair hit the pavement. “Mr. Shoemaker is much too busy.”

She rushed to explain. “Oh, I get that, I really do. Besides, I’m not sure if a bunch of third graders would really grasp the role of a director. But someone who deals with extras or sets or something like that might be interesting. Maybe someone like Rick?”

Stan laughed. “You mean the kid who takes a break every chance he gets? The one who pawns his work off on Margot, Glenda, and just about anyone else he can find? The one who tries to get Todd fired every chance he gets?”

She opened her mouth to speak but let it shut as the security guard continued. “You think Mr. Hotshot-in-Training would be interested in talking to a bunch of kids?”

“If there was a human interest reporter there, perhaps…”

A second, louder laugh followed the first. “Will it be picked up by the wire services?”

Her shoulders sank. She could only pull so many strings. “I doubt it.”

“Then he ain’t coming. Unless…” Stan tapped a finger to his chin. “Unless I concoct some reason he
has
to do it. Then he’d actually have to work for twenty minutes or however long it takes without expecting everyone around him to pick up his slack and make him look like he’s a superstar in Mr. Shoemaker’s eyes.”

“I—”

A mischievous grin crossed Stan’s lips as he took his plan one step further. “Any chance this fiancé of yours has some real stinkers in his class? Kids who could send Rick screaming for the hills?”

Although she was a pretty levelheaded person, Tori had certainly made her fair share of bad choices. Some had hurt her terribly—like falling for her ex-fiancé, Jeff. And some had kept her from the truth. But inviting Stan Kelly and Rick Manning to a career day in Milo’s classroom that Milo, himself, didn’t know about?
That
took the cake.

Yet even as she stepped onto her front porch and saw him sitting there, waiting, she knew he’d agree to play along with her crazy idea. Chances are, he wouldn’t even pepper her with questions.

“I’m sorry I’m late. I stopped by the set to have a quick word with Stan Kelly.”

Milo rose from the wicker rocker and met her midway, his arms pulling her close. “No worries. I haven’t been waiting more than five minutes.”

“Five minutes?” she teased, reveling in the warmth of his touch.

“Okay, maybe ten.” He whispered a kiss across the top of her head then dropped it to her lips for a kind of hello that made her knees week. Pulling back, he flashed a smile. “Fifteen, at the most.”

“Sorry—”

He hushed away all further apologies with the tip of his finger before pointing to the wicker swing that hung from heavy chains affixed to the porch ceiling. Following his lead, she set her purse on the ground and sat down beside him, resting her head on his shoulder.

“So who is Stan Kelly?” he asked.

“The security guard for the movie set. He’s the one who caught Annabelle swiping items during her tour just before all hell broke loose.”

“Ahhh.” With a quick tap of his foot, they began to swing, the gentle motion calming. “Is there something wrong?”

“I wanted to ask him about one of the people working on the crew.”

“Oh?”

She nodded against his shoulder. “From what I’ve been able to gather so far, this guy, Rick Manning, has a really poor work ethic yet expects his fellow crew members to cover for him.”

“I hope they don’t.”

“He’s Warren Shoemaker’s cousin.”

Milo’s snicker echoed in her ear. “So he’s got the nepotism thing going on, huh?”

She nodded again. “So when Leona made Warren think twice about a title switch Rick wanted, he wasn’t exactly happy. In fact, he threatened her.”

Bracing his foot against the floor, he stopped the swing. “This kid threatened Leona?”

“Leona is fine. I was shopping with her today, remember?” Without waiting for a response, she continued, the slow rhythmic sway of the swing resuming once again. “Anyway, that threat got me thinking…”

She felt him smile against the top of her head. “Is that what they call investigating these days?”

Popping her head out from underneath his chin, she stared up at him. “Think about it, Milo. Maybe Anita did something to threaten his stance in his cousin’s eyes. Or maybe she was
planning
to. Maybe he killed her to keep her quiet. Or maybe he killed her to frame Leona.”

He reached out, traced the side of her face with his finger. “That’s a lot of maybes, Tori.”

She gave him that. “But that’s why I want to ask him some questions. Good ones.” Leaning forward, she plucked her purse off the ground and extricated her notebook from its depths. She flipped it open to the page of questions she’d compiled prior to talking with Stan Kelly. “See?”

His eyes skimmed her list then came to rest on her once again. “Yeah, but other than the first three, those aren’t exactly the kind of questions you can come right out and ask him. Not if you want the truth, anyway.”

Milo was right. But still, his answers to the first three would certainly give her a better feeling about the next three… .

“Chief Dallas is already circling. He’s talked to Margaret Louise and me. Leona, too. But the more I think about it, the more I’m starting to think Leona is being used as a scapegoat. She brought the means with which to kill Anita and provided a perfect person to pin it on. And, unfortunately, if Leona goes down for the murder, Margaret Louise stands to go down with her as an accomplice.”

He nodded. “I saw Margaret Louise today. She was so distracted she walked right past me on the way out of church. Passed by Lulu, too.”

Tori stopped the swing. “Oh, Milo, seeing her like this is killing me. For Margaret Louise to walk by one of her grandbabies and not notice them?”

“What struck me most when I saw her was how sad she looked. I’ve honestly never seen that woman without a smile from ear to ear.”

“Between doing what’s right by Annabelle, and the guilt I know she’s feeling over having baked a treat that ultimately killed someone, Margaret Louise is carrying the weight of the world on her shoulders.” Pushing off the swing, she stood up, wandered around the porch, Milo’s eyes tracking her every step of the way. “Margaret Louise has stood by me since the moment I moved here. It’s my turn to do the same for her.”

“How can I help?”

She stopped mid-step and turned to face the man she loved more and more each passing day. “You can forgive me for volunteering your class for something tomorrow afternoon.”

His left eyebrow shot upward. “My class?”

She took a deep breath, found her best sales voice. “For a very special Career Day that features people who work behind the scenes of a movie.”

A sparkle lit Milo’s eyes a full five seconds before being joined by a smile. “What a wonderful idea, Miss Sinclair. Perhaps you could be on hand with some homemade cookies… and maybe a few questions to get the kids started.”

She crossed back to the swing and into Milo’s waiting arms. “Why, Mr. Wentworth, I’d be happy to help.”

Chapter 22

Talking to twenty wiggly third graders was no small task, but somehow, Stan Kelly made it look easy. Bypassing the chair Milo had set out for him, the security guard sat on the floor among the kids, regaling them with the kind of stories that kept eight-and nine-year-old boys wide-eyed.

There’d been a stint in a movie theater that had him dealing with teenagers who snuck from one movie to the other, paying for just one.

There’d been a few months in a local mall that had him spying on petty shoplifters as they stuffed their pockets with compact discs and makeup.

There’d been a one-month-long job at a bus station that had landed him on the front page of a newspaper for thwarting an attempted kidnapping.

Job by job, Stan took them through the past two years of his life until he got to his work on the movie set. Suddenly, the little girls in the class, who’d remained relatively quiet during his talk thus far, came to life, peppering the guard with question after question.

What movie stars had he met?

Did he get to go to the Nickelodeon Kids’ Choice Awards?

How many autographs did he have hanging on his wall?

And without so much as a flinch or an eye roll, Stan answered each and every one as if they were the cleverest questions he’d ever heard.

Tori smiled at Milo as he, too, raised his hand with a question.

Stan nodded in his direction.

“How did you get involved in the movie set to begin with?” Milo asked. “And where are you from?”

“I grew up in Havlock, which is about thirty minutes west of here. Worked as a guard in a prison there for nearly twenty-five years.”

“You mean a jail?” a little boy with white-blond hair asked.

“Yes, I do,” Stan replied. “Best job I ever had.”

“Why did you stop?” a petite brunette asked from the other side of the circle.

“The jail was closing. So I needed to find a job that would enable me to support myself and my boy.” Stan released a long, tired sigh. “Had to leave him behind with his mamma while I found work where I could.”

The brunette cocked her head and stared up at the man. “I bet you missed him bunches.”

Stan said nothing for several long moments and then finally, “I missed his growing up on account of all that job chasing. But no more. And I’m gonna make it up to him by staying close to home and being a part of my grandchildren’s lives.”

A hand shot up next to the brunette, this one belonging to a stocky little redhead named Seth. “My Daddy says there ain’t gonna be no movie here anymore ’cause some lady ate a brownie that killed her.”

Stan shrugged. “We’ll have to wait and see about that. But the company I’m with will just find me something else to do in the area if that happens.”

“Whoa!” Seth suddenly rocked forward and pointed at Stan’s waistband. “Are those real-life handcuffs?”

“You bet they are.” Stan pulled the silver rings from their clip and held them out for the kids to see. “You only have to worry about these if you do something wrong.”

“I won’t do nothin’ wrong,” Seth said.

“Me neither,” chorused the rest of the children.

“I’m sure Mr. Kelly is as happy to hear that as I am,” Milo said. “Now let’s thank Mr. Kelly for taking time out of his busy day to come and see us.”

“It was my pleasure,” Stan said, as he rose to his feet and came to stand beside Tori with his left foot braced against the wall.

All eyes turned toward the door as Rick Manning jogged in, his hair and his clothes a dead giveaway to a late night spent doing any number of things except sleeping. Tori sent a worried glance in Milo’s direction.

“Class, we have one more person from the movie set today. His name is Rick Manning and he…” Milo met Rick’s eyes. “I’m sorry, Rick, I’m not sure exactly what you do on set.”

“Everything.”

Stan snorted. “If everything means hiding behind Mr. Shoemaker’s trailer while everyone else works, I have to say he’s exceptional at what he does,” the guard mumbled.

“Why does Warren keep him if he’s really that bad?” she whispered back as the children welcomed Rick to their classroom.

“Obligation, I guess.” Stan paused long enough to send a contemptuous glance in his coworker’s direction. “One of the rest of us makes a mistake and our head’s on the chopping block. But Rick? He makes one, he spins it off on someone else.”