Candy Cane Murder (Hannah Swensen #9.5)(40)

“The first thing I need is the name of Melinda’s gardener.”

“Why do you need that?”

Hannah was all ready with her excuse. She’d devised it on her drive out to the mall. “I told Mother about Melinda’s beautiful solarium and one of her friends wants to hire her gardener to do something similar on a smaller scale for her.”

“Okay. It’s Curtis something-or-other. I can’t think of his last name right now, but he comes tomorrow and I’ll get his card for you.”

“There’s one more thing.”

“What’s that?”

“I’m having trouble with the timeline on the night that Wayne was killed. I saw him leave the inn the back way, wearing his Santa suit. And that’s the last time I saw him alive. I found his body later in the evening.”

“Right. What’s troubling about that?”

“Cyril Murphy was out in front of the inn, working on Florence Evans’s car. He didn’t see Wayne walk past and 138

Joanne Fluke

Wayne had to walk past him to get to the path where I found him.”

“That’s easy to explain. Come with me for a second. I need to turn off more lights.” Hannah walked into the interior of the store with Cory as he continued to talk. “Wayne wouldn’t have said anything to Cyril. For one thing, they were on the outs because of the limousine thing. And for another thing, Wayne had laryngitis. If Cyril didn’t see him, Wayne probably hurried on by and figured that was a good thing.”

“That’s exactly what I thought, at first. But when I went out to the inn tonight, I talked to one of Sally’s guests and her room has a perfect view of the side of the building and the path to the parking lot. She was in her room when Wayne left the stage. She heard the applause he got. That’s when she started watching for him to pass by her window. But he never did.”

“She must have looked away for a minute or two and missed him. I watched him walk around the corner and then I dashed back in. It was cold out there! And I know he didn’t come back inside for any reason. I was standing right there waiting for you, and I would have seen him down at the end of the hall.”

“I’m sure you would have.” Hannah gave a quick nod.

“It’s not like he could blend with the party crowd. That Santa suit would stick out like a sore thumb.”

“You’re absolutely right. Do you mind if I take this off, Hannah? These things are really heavy.”

“Go ahead.”

Hannah watched while Cory took off the top part of his Santa suit. He was wearing a regular shirt under it and that gave her an idea. “Think about this, Cory,” she said. “What if Wayne was wearing regular clothes under his Santa suit?

Then he could have taken off the suit, hidden it somewhere, and slipped back inside. Would you have seen him if he’d done that?”

CANDY CANE MURDER

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Cory began to frown. “I’m not sure. Maybe not.”

“Was Wayne in the habit of wearing regular clothes under his Santa suit?”

Cory’s frown deepened. “I don’t know. Let me call Melinda and I’ll find out.”

As Cory disappeared around the corner, Hannah came close to laughing. He looked ridiculous in big red Santa pants with white fur cuffs, topped by a regular shirt. It reminded her a bit of a centaur, the top half of a man rising from the back half of a horse. If he’d greeted her that way at the door, she would have recognized him immediately. But it was almost impossible to tell who was inside a Santa suit. Unless you recognized the voice, of course.

It was one of those frightening moments of clarity when the pieces of the puzzle flew together from every direction.

They locked into place with a series of lightning fast clicks, sounding like a million tiny firecrackers that illuminated the dim and confused picture in her mind. Cory killed Wayne.

He’d rolled Wayne’s body behind the snow bank, planted the candy canes so someone would discover him, and then, while everyone was waiting for Wayne to appear as Santa, he’d put on another Santa suit, perhaps even the one he was wearing tonight, and appeared in Sally’s kitchen as Santa Wayne with laryngitis. It was the reason he’d seemed a bit confused when Sally had handed him the receipt from Mayor Bascomb.

Santa Wayne would have known what it was, but Santa Cory didn’t.

Immediately after the party, Santa Cory had stepped outside the back door, ditched his Santa suit, and stepped back in, dressed for the party.

He used me as his alibi and I fell for it! Hannah thought, gritting her teeth. Norman’s gut is right. Cory is probably in it with Melinda. And at almost the same time she had another thought that had her moving at top speed toward the door. He knows I know and he’s going to kill me!

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A third thought, one in bright neon capital letters for emphasis, flashed across the screen in her mind. RUN, it said.

RUN FAST!

Hannah ran faster than she’d ever run in her life, and she arrived at the heavy glass door, breathless. Locked. It was locked and Cory had the keys. There had to be another way out!

Another thought flashed through Hannah’s mind. They expect another shipment of trees and I parked in the loading zone. The moment it occurred to her, Hannah rushed toward the annex.

The annex was a large enclosure with three cinderblock walls. The fourth wall was the back wall of the store. In the summer, this area was used as a garden center and shade cloth was attached to form a temporary roof. In December, a sliding roof was attached. It was capable of being opened when the weather permitted, and closed at night when the store was locked. Right now it was locked and a single rope of white twinkle lights were strung across the ceiling to provide a bit of light. Tall space heaters, the type used in patio restaurants, sat every few feet to provide warmth. Now they were cold and dead, the way Hannah would be if she didn’t get out the delivery door and into her truck before Cory caught her.