Pretty Poison

Mort put the flower in place on the arrangement. “If you tell anyone else, I’ll deny it.”

“So she’s bought flowers here before?” She held her breath waiting for his answer.

“Only this one time.” He snapped the end off another carnation. “The woman knew what she wanted. I think she knew what those flowers meant.”

“I owe you a cup of coffee, Mort. Good luck with the wedding.”

“Just remember,” he said as she was leaving, “you didn’t hear it from me.”

PEGGY MET WITH AL for a few minutes while he ate a late lunch. She told him everything she suspected about Julie Warner, including what Ronda told her about the threatening phone call.

Al ate his Reuben sandwich and listened politely. Then he pointed his pickle at her and blasted her theory. “I can’t believe you were married to a detective for twenty years and don’t have any faith in us getting the job done.”

“I have faith in you, Al, but—”

“But you’re still sneaking around pretending to be a private detective or something!” He took a bite of his pickle. “We know about the threatening phone call to Ronda McGee. We checked it out, but we couldn’t trace it. As for all this flower business, I know you don’t think the lieutenant is going to listen to a bunch of stuff about funeral wreaths having meaning.”

“It’s no more ridiculous than making poison from anemones,” she argued. “You may not understand it, but it makes sense to people who do. It would be like saying a threat in French was less dangerous than a threat in English!”

“Don’t you think we considered Julie Warner as a suspect? We checked her out. She was home with a sick child. A housekeeper saw her there all night, and she talked to her child’s doctor at about the same time as the murder. We’re not incompetent.”

Peggy tapped her fingers on the desk. “The housekeeper would do anything for her. She hated Mark and felt like he took advantage of Julie. Lying to police isn’t that big a deal. As far as talking to her doctor, she could’ve called him while she was standing over her husband’s dead body.”

Al stared at her. “You really hate this woman, don’t you?”

“I don’t hate her at all,” she defended. “I’m looking for the truth.”

“The truth that doesn’t involve your friend.”

“I know Keeley is innocent. Can you say the same about Julie?”

He wiped his hands on a napkin. “You see, that’s what separates a detective from everybody else. I’m surprised you didn’t realize it sooner. A detective is objective. I don’t have a friend involved in this. If I did, I’d exclude myself from the case. You’re too emotional, Peggy. You can’t see the facts clearly.”

She got to her feet. “Thanks for listening anyway. I have to go to the shop.”

Al didn’t try to keep her, shaking his head as she walked to the door. “No hard feelings?”

She smiled at him. “No. I know you mean well. You’ve got a blob of mustard on your chin. You might want to wipe it off before you see Jonas again. Next time, get an extra napkin.”

SAM WAS AT THE Potting Shed with Hunter, Selena, and Keeley. They were sitting behind the counter while a few customers walked through the store. Peggy wasn’t sure if she should tell them her theory about Julie. It was likely they’d be too receptive. After all, as Al pointed out, they were emotionally involved.

As she walked toward them, Steve came in through the front door. The lights in the courtyard were flickering on in the gloomy twilight. Another storm front was getting ready to pounce on the city. The weather warmed in anticipation, but the depressing atmosphere weighed heavily on them all.

“I think we need to have a party,” Sam said, giving Peggy his chair. “Hey, Steve. How’s it going?”

“Fine.” Steve went to stand beside Peggy, squeezing her shoulder. “What’s with all the gloom and doom?”

Peggy smiled at him, a little zing zooming through her at his touch. Still, she wondered why he hadn’t called.

“The police are about to arrest Keeley,” Hunter told him. “My car had a flat, and I chipped my nail trying to change it.”

“That’s nothing,” Selena told them. “I had a man try to return two hundred pounds of fertilizer today. He insisted it smelled bad and wanted some that smelled good.”

Peggy laughed. “What did you do?”

“I sent Keeley to the drugstore for some baby powder, then I sprinkled it into the fertilizer. He was happy. I couldn’t tell any difference, but whatever works, right?”

“I hate to top everybody’s bad day,” Keeley added. “But my lawyer thinks the police are about to arrest me, and they probably have an airtight case so they don’t look stupid again. I think I get the prize for the worst day. We won’t go into the fact that they ripped my apartment into shreds looking for evidence. Then they descended on my car. They’re like locusts.”

Everyone sympathized with her. Peggy offered to take them all out for pizza if they’d help close up the shop. “Maybe we can sit down and come up with something brilliant to turn all of this around.”

Hunter shook her head. “It’s too late for my nail, Peggy. And I’ll still have to get a new tire. Have you seen those potholes on Trade Street? I was lucky they didn’t swallow my car.”

It only took five minutes to close the shop after the last customer left. Hunter offered to drive them to a pizza place on Park Road. They all piled into her SUV, ignoring the undersized spare tire in the front.