Nine

“Let me have the knife,” Hank talked gingerly to Abby.

She looked down at her hand as though she didn’t realize she was holding a knife. She blinked a few times, like she was trying to bring herself back to reality. Like a robot, she lifted her hand in the air.

Hank grabbed the handkerchief out of his pocket and took the knife. As I watched, I knew he was doing his detective thing by taking the knife so as not to disturb the fingerprints. After I’d helped him a few other cases in the past months, I’d watched more crime television than one woman should in a lifetime.

“Why don’t you just come out here and sit.” Hank guided her out of the office and completely ignored me like I wasn’t even there.

Nadine White’s eyes were open. Her clothes were tidy and neat, but the blood was still gushing from the side of her neck where there appeared to be a stab wound to her carotid artery. I bent down next to her, careful to barely breathe and not touch a thing, to see if there were any signs of life. Her chest was still. I put my hand over top her mouth and nose and there was nothing coming out.

“What are you doing! Get back!” Hank had turned into the Hank I didn’t like.

“I was just seeing if she was alive,” I tried to explain myself, pushing off my knees to stand.

“Listen, I know you’re trying to help here, but I’ve called backup and the best thing you can do is go out there and talk to Abby. Find out what the heck happened here.” He ran his large hand through his hair before he bent down and used his hands to feel for a pulse.

There was an icy twist around my heart with the sudden realization that Hank thought Abby had done this.

“Wait, you don’t think Abby had anything to do with this?” I asked him like he was out of his mind.

“Do you see anyone else?” He asked me sarcastically. “She had the knife. She was stunned.”

“She’s in shock,” I reminded him as I left the room before I took the knife and did a number on him myself.

Abby was sitting in the swivel chair at the reference desk where she sat most days to welcome library patrons. Her face was pasty white. Her eyes stared blankly in front of her. Her hands were shaking.

“Abby,” I whispered her name to let her know I was coming up behind her. “Abby.”

When I touched her she flinched, jerking around with her hands fisted in front of her.

“It’s okay.” There wasn’t life in her eyes. “It’s me, Mae,” I reminded her who I was because she didn’t look at me. She looked through me, so I wasn’t sure if she was seeing me even though I was the only one standing right there.

With the same look on her face, she put her shaky hands back down in her lap. Her chest lifted up and down.

“Abby.” I squatted down next to her. “Do you know me?”

Slowly she nodded, her eyes slide over to look into mine. She blinked a few times, finally focusing on me. Her mouth gaped open. Her breath heaved in and out.

“Mae,” she gasped in desperation. “Nadine is dead.”

“Yes, honey.” I ran a hand down her hair. “I know.”

“She. . .she. . .,” her voice trembled. Her head turned, eyes glazed over facing the library, away from me. “She was lying there.”

“Lying there?” My inner voice alerted my brain to ask more questions, even in Abby’s fragile state. “Abby, what do you mean by she was lying there.”

“She was lying there. Her eyes open. The knife. . .” Her nostrils flared up and down, her chest heaved up and down as the sound of her breath went in and out of her nose. “Oh my God, Mae,” she cried out, her eyes filled with tears. “Nadine is dead.” She buried her head in her hands.

I stood back up and bent over her, wrapping my arms around her while she sobbed. A couple police officers rushed past us and filed into the office where Hank was.

“Abby. I’m going to need you to help me out here.” I pulled away when I felt her breathing return to normal. “What happened between you and Nadine?”

“What do you mean?” She gulped for breath.

“Did you get into another argument?” I asked. “Did you fight?”

“What are you talking about?” Her brows furrowed. She was obviously in shock and not in her right mind.

“You do understand that Nadine White was found dead in your office with you standing over her with a knife,” I looked her square in the eyes.

“Yes. I found her there.” She nodded, searching my face.

“You found her in your office and you fought with her?” I asked, trying to get to what happened or jar her memory.

“She was dead. I pulled the knife out of her neck,” she cried out, sobbing again.

“Wait.” I bent back down and put my hand on her leg. “Are you telling me that you found her in your office already stabbed?”

“Yes.” She nodded.

“This changes everything,” I muttered.

“Do you think I stabbed her?” Abby looked at me like I had five heads. “Mae?”

“I’ve got to get you out of here.” I glanced around to see who was near us. “Abby, I need you to focus more than ever on me.” I held her face and made her look into my eyes. “Hank and I found you standing over Nadine’s body, holding the knife. It looks like you killed her, and Hank is going to think that.”

“I didn’t.” She jerked her head around, looking behind her. “Where is he? I’ll tell him.”

“You’re going to have to get it together.” I glanced over at the library’s complimentary Keurig station. “You sit right here, and I’ll grab us a cup of coffee.”

“I don’t want a coffee.” Abby shrugged.

“I’m going to need you to drink a coffee to get you out of this fog. We. . . I need to know exactly what happened tonight.” I didn’t leave her any room for arguing with me. She didn’t realize the severity of the situation and what it looked like for her.

The Keurig rumbled to life when I put the pod in the holder and pressed the largest option available.

“Keep an eye on her.” I overheard one of the officers say to another one. “She’s the killer. From what Hank said, he’s not had a minute to ask her anything.”

Killer? The word knotted in my gut. Abby couldn’t kill anyone. 

I doctored up my coffee with creamer and slowly stirred it in, more than usual, so I could hear more conversations between the two cops.

“Why’d she kill her? Do we know?” One of them asked.

“Fan turned psycho. I’ve seen it all now.” The other’s voice dripped with a hint of laughter.

I grabbed my cup and moseyed over to Abby just in case I heard anything else, but I didn’t. The rest of officers were standing watching Colonel Holz push the church cart through the automatic front doors of the library.

Colonel Holz was the county coroner. I’d yet to meet him properly and there was no better time than now, especially since I was going to have to figure out, with his help no doubt, who really killed Nadine White.

“Hi, Dr. Holz.” I walked next to the church cart. “I’m Mae West and Nadine White had rented a camper in my campground. I sure hate that she’s dead. What do you think I should tell the family?”

I pulled that question out of nowhere, a little proud of myself. There was a place on the rental form that asked for next of kin. Since we were a hiking and camping community, there were more than just hiking accidents, there were also critters to deal with, including dangerous ones. I liked to have the emergency contact or next of kin on the form, so we had a way of getting in touch with someone.

“Well, you’re gonna have to take that up with Detective Sharp. I’m not sure what’s going on until I take a look at the body. I suggest you let Detective Sharp call the family.” The Colonel wasn’t budging.

Abby’s face flushed white again when she noticed the coroner. She started to sob all over again. It didn’t go unnoticed that the two officers next to the Keurig station nudged each other.

“Abby.” I rushed over to her with the coffee. I held it out to her. She waved it off. “Listen, I know you’re in shock.”

“Outta the way!” The boisterous voice pushed through the officers. When they parted, Queenie was leading The Laundry Club gals straight over to us. “What are you lookin’ at, Violet Rhinehammer?” Queenie stopped and looked at a woman who’d come in right before them. “You better sweep your own back porch before sweeping somebody else’s.” Queenie pointed to the notebook Violet had in her hand. “You can quote me too.”

After Queenie said that, I recognized Violet as the new reporter for the local newspaper. There’d been some gossip down at The Laundry Club about her, but I reckoned it was all talk and Queenie was just flapping her gums. I wished I’d listened a little more closely now.

From what I knew about reporters from the crime shows, they could be valuable with information and with ways on how they got that information.

“What is the blue blazes is going on here?” Dottie asked, assessing Abby.

Betts Hager had already rushed to Abby’s side and was talking to her like a good pastor’s wife. She had a natural ability to comfort and soothe. I wanted to get to the bottom of it.

“I can’t get much out of Abby, but I found her standing over Nadine White’s body holding a bloody knife.” I heard the words come out of my mouth and knew it didn’t sound good.

“We need to get her out of here.” Queenie’s brows lifted underneath her purple headband. “Or they’ll arrest her on the spot.”

“Where we going to take her?” Dottie asked.

“We can take her to my place,” I suggested. “I don’t have a car, so someone else is going to have to drive us.”

Out of the corner of my eye, I noticed one of the officers next to the Keurig had walked into the library office.

 “That’s right.” Dottie smacked the air with her hand. “How was the big date? I seen you two leaving Happy Trails.”

“We can talk about that later.” Betts had left Abby’s side. “We need to get her out now.”

Queenie already had Abby on her feet and Dottie had grabbed Abby’s coat along with her purse. I helped Abby put her arm in the sleeve of her coat.

“My phone.” She pointed to the phone next to the computer on the reference desk and Dottie grabbed it on our way out towards the door.

“Mae, where do you think you’re taking her?” Hank’s voice came from behind us. We all stopped and slowly turned around. “Abby, you can’t leave. I need to question you.”

“Question her?”

“Hank?” Violet walked over to us. I didn’t like how she said his name with her sweet, small, accented tone. “I’d love to talk to you.” She ran a fingernail down his arm with a little wink.

“Hold on, Violet.” He looked back at me. “Abby needs to stay here right now.”

Violet started to scribble away on that pad of hers. I wanted to grab it and rip it apart.

“Abby is in no state of mind to be here and unless you want to arrest her she’s going home with me. You can come by there if you need to question her.” I gave Violet a good hard stare. “You know exactly where I live since you picked me up for our date there earlier.”

“Date?” Violet questioned with a dumbfounded look.

“Yeah, honey. Your nest isn’t the only one he’s been buzzing around.” Queenie grabbed Abby by the elbow and walked her out of the library.

“Mae,” Hank hurried to my side. My pace had quickened after I heard Queenie’s words. “I need to question her.” He pulled me to the side when we made it outside. “You and I both know what we saw.”

“I’m not saying we didn’t see her standing over the body with the knife.” I wanted to be clear to what I saw. “But she didn’t do it.”

“Mae,” he said with an exhausted sigh, running his hand through his hair. “You’ve got to be kidding me. It’s cut and dry. Even you said earlier that Abby was devasted her idol was a fraud.”

“I didn’t say those exact words.” I’d forgotten about me telling him about that and now I wished I’d just kept my big mouth shut.

“That’s what you meant and you know it. I can’t just forget what happened between them. Plus we saw Nadine walking into the library with that basket of stuff to make an apology, according to you.” He had the memory of a steel trap.

“According to Valerie, her agent.” I snapped my fingers. “By the way, where’s she at? She might’ve set this whole thing up, making Abby look like the killer. Valerie and Nadine had an argument earlier at the campground.”

Hank’s chest expanded as he took a silent deep breath. I knew he knew I was right. There could be more than just one person not happy with Nadine.

“Listen, I’m going to let you take her out of here, but you have to go straight to the department before you take her to your place. I want her fingerprinted and her nails checked and to see if there are any indications of a struggle or anything else on her body that has to do with Nadine White.” He stopped talking when the doors slid open and Colonel was pushing the church cart back out of the library with a sheet covering Nadine’s body.

Betts already had Dottie, Abby, and Queenie loaded up in her minivan.

“Got it?” He asked.

“Fine.” I over exaggerated the word to prove my point that I wasn’t happy about it.

“And I’m sorry our date ended like this.” He leaned in as though he was about to give me a goodnight kiss.

“Yeah, yeah.” I took a few steps backwards, meeting his eyes and seeing his confusion. “See ya.”