Trimmed with Murder

Book 10: Seaside Knitters Mystery

by Sally Goldenbaum

Genres: Holiday books; Cozy Mystery; Female Sleuths

Synopsis

In this holiday yarn from the USA Today bestselling author of A Finely Knit Murder, all Izzy Chambers Perry wants for Christmas is to keep her brother out of jail....
 
In Sea Harbor, the holidays mean cozy fires, festive carols, and soft skeins of yarn waiting to become hats and sweaters and scarves. And this year, Izzy and the other Seaside Knitters are also knitting tiny ornaments to decorate a tree for the first annual tree-trimming contest.
 
Their holiday cheer is multiplied when Izzy’s younger brother, Charlie Chambers, unexpectedly arrives to volunteer at a local clinic. He brings with him outspoken hitchhiker Amber Hanson, who is returning to Sea Harbor to claim an inheritance. She quickly reacquaints herself with the area—and forms an unlikely friendship with Charlie. But their bond is shattered when her body is found beneath the undecorated trees on the Harbor Green.

Charlie is a suspect in the murder, so Izzy and her fellow Knitters step in to uncover the truth. Their journey takes them into Charlie’s past and tests their fierce love for him. But it’s only by peeling away long-buried secrets that they can hope to restore joy to the season and enjoy the shining lights of the newly decorated trees....

Release date: November 3, 2015

Publisher: Berkley

Print pages: 320

Sample

Nell Endicott: Former Boston nonprofit director, lives in Sea Harbor with her husband, Ben

Izzy (Isabel Chambers Perry): Boston attorney, now owner of the Seaside Knitting Studio; Nell and Ben Endicott’s niece; married to Sam Perry

Cass (Catherine Mary Theresa Halloran): Lobster fisherwoman

Birdie (Bernadette Favazza): Sea Harbor’s wealthy, wise, and generous silver-haired grand dame

Ben Endicott: Nell’s husband

Sam Perry: Award-winning photojournalist, married to Izzy

Danny Brandley: Mystery novelist and son of bookstore owners

Sonny Favazza: Birdie’s first husband

Charlie Chambers: Izzy’s younger brother

Andy Risso: Drummer in Pete Halloran’s band; son of the Gull Tavern owner

Don and Rachel Wooten: Owner of the Ocean’s Edge restaurant (Don) and city attorney (Rachel)

Ella and Harold Sampson: Birdie’s housekeeper and groundsman/driver

Gracie Santos: Owner of Gracie’s Lazy Lobster Café

Jane and Ham Brewster: Artists and cofounders of the Canary Cove Art Colony

Mary Halloran: Pete and Cass’s mother; secretary of Our Lady of Safe Seas Church

Pete Halloran: Cass’s younger brother and lead guitarist in the Fractured Fish band

Willow Adams: Fiber artist, Fishtail Gallery; Pete Halloran’s girlfriend

Alan Hamilton, MD: Family doctor

Alphonso Santos: Owner of construction company; chamber of commerce cochair; married to Liz Palazola Santos

Amber Harper: Hitchhiker whom Charlie Chambers picks up and drives to Sea Harbor

Annabelle Palazola: Owner of the Sweet Petunia Restaurant

Archie and Harriet Brandley: Owners of the Sea Harbor Bookstore

Barbara Cummings: Co-owner of Cummings Northshore Nurseries

Beatrice Scaglia: Mayor of Sea Harbor

Carly Schultz: Nurse at Ocean View

Ellie Harper: Amber Harper’s deceased mother

Esther Gibson: Police dispatcher (and Mrs. Santa Claus in season)

Father Lawrence Northcutt: Pastor of Our Lady of Safe Seas Church

Garrett O’Neal: Accountant at Cummings Northshore Nurseries

Harry and Margaret Garozzo: Owners of Garozzo’s Deli

Helen Cummings: Wife of co-owner of Cummings Northshore Nurseries

Henrietta O’Neal: Longtime resident; Garrett O’Neal’s aunt

Janie Levin: Nurse practitioner in the Sea Harbor Free Health Clinic; Tommy Porter’s girlfriend

Jerry Thompson: Police chief

Laura Danvers: Young socialite and philanthropist, mother of three; married to banker Elliot Danvers

Lydia Cummings: Owner of Cummings Northshore Nurseries

Mae Anderson: Izzy’s shop manager; twin teenage nieces, Jillian and Rose

Mary Pisano: Middle-aged newspaper columnist; owner of Ravenswood-by-the-Sea B&B

Merry Jackson: Owner of the Artist’s Palate Bar and Grill; keyboard/singer in the Fractured Fish

Polly Farrell: Owner of Polly’s Tea Shoppe

Richard Gibson: Esther’s retired husband

Stella Palazola: Realtor in Sea Harbor; Annabelle’s daughter

Stuart Cummings: Co-owner of Cummings Northshore Nurseries

Tommy Porter: Policeman

Chapter 1

Charlie hadn’t yet reached the bridge that crossed over onto Cape Ann proper when he decided it was all a terrible mistake. A cruel joke his conscience had played on him, punishing him for all the wrongs in his life.

But it was too late to turn back. He’d vowed that in this grown-up chapter of his life he’d keep promises, honor commitments. Even if the truth was that it might not matter to anyone. No one was expecting him, not tonight, at least. And maybe the doctor had exaggerated the need in her clinic. But the fact was that he had said he would come. So he would.

Gripping the steering wheel until his fingers hurt, he squinted into the black wintry night. The highway was narrow and full of curves, unfamiliar to him.

And there was the rain that had begun about the time he’d passed a big mall at the Danvers exit. It was coming down harder now, fat sloppy drops that splattered on the windshield and spread across the glass. An angry wind pulled and pushed the car across the road, and the wild trees, swaying with weather’s elemental force, seemed to reach out toward him until he found himself hugging the center line, avoiding their touch.

He approached another curve, his eyes stinging, focusing on the yellow line, the bend ahead.

He slowed slightly, pulling the wheel to the right. The shadows beside the road grew thicker here, the trees dense. At first he thought it was a sapling, a bare, slender tree bending along with its taller peers like naked dancers in the frigid, icy night.

But suddenly the road straightened and his headlights sliced through the darkness—catching the swaying figure as it stepped directly into the car’s path.

Charlie slammed his foot on the pedal, the repeated pulsing of the ABS brakes sending vibrations through his body. His body shook, his mind ragged with fear. He’d almost hit someone, or maybe an animal. It couldn’t be happening . . . not again . . . not . . .

His thoughts froze in the air. With white fingers clutching the steering wheel, he leaned forward, staring through the windshield, his eyes straining to see beyond the flapping wipers.

But there was no time to process what he was seeing. Seconds later the passenger door flew open. A rush of wind and rain filled the heated car, followed in seconds by a hooded body that slid onto the passenger seat.

The door slammed shut.

At first he felt confusion, a ringing in his ears so loud it blocked out the wind that rocked the small car. He pushed against his door, staring at the stranger.

Finally facial features appeared under the folds of the hood and he saw that it was a woman—sopping wet and disheveled—her face barely visible, but striking gray eyes luminous as they stared at him.

He glanced down at the slushy pools of water collecting on the leather car seats and dripping onto the floor of his BMW. An old backpack fell onto the floor, landing in a sea of leaves and frozen rain.

She followed his look and he thought he heard the trace of a laugh. Then she looked at him again, her eyes going up and down his body. “I thought big guys like you drove trucks.”

He ignored the comment. Instead he concentrated on the girl herself, and his medical training kicked in. He couldn’t see blood, just a wet, nondescript woman staring back at him. Was she hurt? Mentally ill?

She pushed back the hood of her parka, revealing a narrow, pale face and brown hair touching her shoulders in damp, limp strands.

But it was her eyes that stunned him, staring, challenging him. They reminded him of a piece of granite he had in his old stone collection. Granite with a touch of mica. A touch of glitter.

“Well?” she asked. “What are you waiting for?”

“Waiting for? Who the hell are you?” A foolish question—but the words came out of nowhere.

The smell of freezing rain and wet leather filled the car.

She laughed.

It was a strong laugh, but youthful. She was younger than he was, but not much. Late twenties, maybe. Lean, pretty, if she’d let herself be.

“What’s your name?” Charlie asked.

“Jane Doe,” she snapped, then buckled her seat belt and looked through the windshield at the road ahead. “Come on. Let’s go. It’s freezing.”

Charlie’s hands were on the wheel, but he kept staring at this peculiar woman who had somehow taken over his car. He forked one hand through thick, slightly curly hair. “Go where?”

Her face contorted into a frown. Then she released it, and spoke slowly, as if to a child. “From the signs along this road and the exit sign back there, I’d say we were headed for Sea Harbor.”

Charlie shifted the car into first and pulled slowly back onto the road, his head turning now and then to get a better look at his passenger. Or maybe to be sure she wasn’t slipping his phone or wallet, sitting on the console between them, into her pocket or backpack.

“You shouldn’t be hitchhiking,” he said finally. His voice was tight, with an unexpected paternalistic tone. “It’s dangerous.”

She laughed, mocking him, then said in a low tone, matching his, “You shouldn’t be picking up hitchhikers. It’s dangerous, young man.”

He glanced over, unsure if she was joking or ridiculing him.

She pulled off her soggy gloves and dropped them on the floor, then slipped one hand into the pocket of her parka while she warmed the other in front of a heat vent. She twisted in the seat, her body turning toward his.

The movement pulled Charlie’s eyes from the road again. He watched the bulge beneath the jacket grow as her fingers curled beneath the fabric.

“How do you know I’m not about to off you?” she said, her hand still in her pocket. “Maybe I’ll take your money and your Bimmer and leave you by the side of the road.”

Her look was focused and direct. It was so concentrated and sharp that Charlie squirmed in the seat. She was crazy. He was twice her bulk, a football player’s body visible even beneath his heavy jacket—but she made him nervous. He wondered briefly if she’d wandered off the grounds of a mental health place somewhere along the highway.

“Or maybe worse—maybe I’ll ravage you first,” she said. She pulled her hand out of her pocket and walked her fingers across the console, over to his leg, crawling up his thigh.

“Cut it out,” Charlie said through clenched teeth. His foot pushed down on the gas pedal, and the car skidded across the road. He held tight to the wheel and brought it back under control.

The girl pulled her hand away.

Charlie could feel the smile on her face and it irritated him.

“No gun,” she said. “No nothing. Just me.”

He swallowed a sudden swell of anger and drove across the bridge in silence. The rain was letting up slightly and on both sides of the river houses sparkled with holiday lights, cheerful and alive, defying the weather. Charlie glanced at the GPS and drove along the river road for a way, then followed the signs that welcomed him into Sea Harbor, home of the fighting Cool Cods.

The girl read the sign out loud. “I remember that. High school mascot.”

“You’re from Sea Harbor?”

“No. Well, sorta.” She kept her eyes glued to the passing neighborhoods, houses lit up for the holidays. “I haven’t been here since I was a kid. It looks different. You?”

Charlie shook his head. He felt as if he’d been there, though. All those pictures from his mother. Guilt pictures. He should have come over those many years. But he hadn’t visited. Not once. Not when his whole family came to Boston for his sister’s graduation. Not when she married their older brother’s best friend—and his good friend, too.

He couldn’t come, not then. Those were dark times for Charlie. His wandering years. Flings, morose moods. Anger. There was no room for darkness at a wedding. He’d done everyone a favor by staying away, or at least that was how he justified it in his head.

“So, why are you here?” Her voice had softened slightly and was almost friendly. He looked over. Her face had softened, too—her eyes brighter, her cheeks slightly flushed from the cold. A long straight nose. Her features fit together more pleasingly, as if the car heater had warmed more than her skin, bringing her face to life.

He looked back at the road and said, “A job.”

She nodded and repeated his words. “A job. Okay. What kind of job?”

Charlie was quiet.

“Cat got your tongue?”

“I guess it does.” He made a right turn, following signs that routed traffic to the harbor. COMMERCIAL AREA, one read. He pressed his foot on the gas and picked up some speed.

He hadn’t intended to arrive in town so late, but the rain and an accident on 95 had slowed traffic to a crawl. Since no one was expecting him, it didn’t really matter when he showed up, he supposed. The doctor had said she’d help him get settled when he arrived, but he hadn’t told her exactly when he was coming—sometime around mid-December was as close as he came to nailing it down. A cowardly act. What he was really doing was giving himself time to change his mind.

But no matter, he couldn’t show up on her doorstep unannounced, not to mention that he had no idea where her doorstep was. The only address on her card had been that of a community center. He’d find a place in town to spend the night.

Charlie looked out the side window, as if to hide his thoughts from the woman sitting inches away. There were other people living in Sea Harbor whom he could call to put him up for a night or two until he got organized. But he wouldn’t. He couldn’t. He pushed the discomforting thought to the back of his head.

“Amber,” the woman said, pulling his attention back into the car. “You can call me Amber.”

He nodded. “Charlie,” he said, and took a curve faster than necessary. “Okay, Amber. It looks like we’re in Sea Harbor. So, where can I drop you?”

She didn’t answer. She was nibbling on her bottom lip, her eyes scanning the streets as if trying to match them to a memory.

“You okay?” Charlie asked.

“I hate this place,” she said.

“But you’re here.”

“Briefly.” Her look told Charlie to stop asking questions.

Charlie nodded. Briefly. It might be the same for him. No plans beyond the month he’d promised the clinic.

The houses were starting to give way to small shops. Straight ahead, beyond the harbor lights and spread out as far as Charlie could see, lay the ocean, its only definition a series of whitecaps that repeated themselves, over and over. He pulled to the left, turning onto Harbor Road, a street lined with old-fashioned lampposts fronting bars and cafés and retail shops. Sparkling white lights wound around the posts and up and down the street, giant red bows and boughs of evergreen-decorated storefronts, restaurants, and signs.

It was a scene from a Disney movie with one exception: the streets were nearly empty of people.

•   •   •

Tommy Porter, his uniform jacket smelling of wet polyester, stood in front of Jake Risso’s Gull Tavern, just beneath the green awning. The rain had turned into a freezing drizzle and he pulled up his collar against the wet cold. Snow, Tommy predicted.

He thought about his fiancée, Janie, helping out at the big community center party in Anya Angelina Park, and he wished for the umpteenth time that night that he was with her. But then, he always wished that. And the wish made him smile. It was okay—Janie’d be ultrabusy tonight, helping run the darn thing, too busy to pay attention to him. She’d pulled her brother, Zack, into helping tonight, too—trying as always to keep the college kid on the straight and narrow path.

He couldn’t complain about not being there anyway—he had volunteered to take the Harbor Road shift tonight, knowing no one else wanted it. It’d be a cinch, there’d be no crime. The weather was too bad for bar fights. Too cold for thieves or derelicts passing through. Too close to the holidays for people to entertain ill will.

He half listened to the canned music escaping from the bar as a few fishermen straggled out. Tommy waved and watched them lumber across the street, then spotted an unfamiliar car out of the corner of his eye. It was driving toward him on Harbor Road. Not that Tommy knew every car that came in and out of Sea Harbor, but this one didn’t look homegrown. A red BMW, not new but well cared for, stood out.

And it was going too fast for the slick streets, was his second thought.

He took a few steps from beneath the awning, but before he could register anything, the car pulled over to the curb and came to a sudden stop, water spitting up around the wheels and sloshing over the curb.

Drunk driver? Probably not. Unless he was so drunk it didn’t register to him that he was pulling up in front of a policeman in full uniform.

The driver left the car running, but opened the door, stepped out, and pressed his gloved hands on the roof, calling over to the policeman, “Hey—where is everyone? It’s like a ghost town around here.”

Tommy hunched up his shoulders against the drizzle and walked over to the car, his eyes not leaving the driver. He was a decent-sized guy, shoulders wide and with a thick head of hair that blew in all directions as the wind picked up. A little older than himself, he thought. Nice-looking in a collegiate sort of way—strong cheekbones and chin, a straight nose, inquisitive blue eyes set wide apart—features that probably got him carded in a bar now and then.

Not that thieves or killers or lowlifes had a certain look, but Tommy suspected this guy wasn’t one of them.

Just then the passenger door opened and a woman climbed out, boots and jeaned legs coming first, then followed by a parka-clad figure that seemed to unfold with a certain grace from the car. Her hood was pushed back and she swept away strands of brown hair from her cheeks and eyes as she looked around, her gaze settling finally on the policeman.

She nodded, a brief and silent greeting.

Tommy held out an umbrella, but she shook her head, looking up into the black sky and letting the icy rain fall onto her cheeks.

The driver still stood on the other side of the car. Tommy looked back at him. “There’s a big event at our community center. Most everyone’s there. What do you guys need? Who are you looking for?”

It was the woman who spoke up. “Esther Gibson.”

Tommy’s eyebrows lifted. He looked more closely at her. She was attractive in a rough-around-the-edges way, maybe a little too skinny. “Esther?” He’d worked with the longtime police dispatcher since joining the force as a rookie ten years before—and he knew Esther’s granddaughter. Nieces. This woman wasn’t any of them.

“She’d be at the party.” He pointed a finger toward the far end of Harbor Road, where signs pointed out to a spit of forested land that held the center, a park, hiking trails, and picnic spots along the shore.

“Party?” Amber said.

“Yeah. It marks the beginning of the holiday season. Everyone’s there, out at the community center.”

“Is that where the free clinic is?” Charlie asked.

Tommy nodded. “Yep. Why? Are you sick?” Silly question. The dude’s driving a BMW and looks healthy as a horse.

“No. Just wondering.”

“The community center sits at the edge of a park—close to the water. They have all kinds of programs out there, parties, a great place for cross-country skiers to get warm. But the big to-do tonight is to make money for the free health clinic. It’s a great program Doc Virgilio brought to town. I guess you’ve heard of it?”

Tommy nodded. Dr. Virgilio. That was Charlie’s contact, the doctor who had spoken to his nursing school class and passed out her card. She could always use volunteers for her free clinic, she’d said. The clinic was in Massachusetts, a little town right on the water. Sea Harbor. That was when he had raised his head that day—at the words Sea Harbor.

So Charlie had taken a card when she passed them out and stuck it in his wallet. He looked out toward the water, remembering. But right now, at this very moment, he had no idea why he’d finally pulled out the card when he did all those months later. And even less why he had given the doctor a call. He must have been crazy.

He shook away the thoughts and concentrated on the man standing on the curb. The cop had answered one question anyway. He wouldn’t be able to reach the doc tonight even if he wanted to. She’d most certainly be at the benefit. “So, is there a motel around here?” he asked. He glanced over at Amber. She had pulled her backpack out of the car and was standing on the sidewalk, taking in the gaslights along the street, the sheets of rain changing the glow into panels of light. He wondered what her plans were. She seemed unconcerned about where she would be spending the night.

“Yes and no,” Tommy said. “There’s a great B and B not far from here. Ravenswood-by-the-Sea. But it’s booked solid, probably until after the New Year. There’re some places in Rockport and Gloucester, but my bet is they’re filled, too—there is some convention going on over in Gloucester, plus, people came in for our benefit here.”

Charlie looked up and down the street, thinking. It wouldn’t be the first time he had spent the night in a car. Maybe not in this weather, but it wouldn’t kill him. He’d find a parking lot somewhere, pull out the blanket in the backseat that his dog used to use.

“Hop back in your car and follow me,” Tommy said. “The community center has a few cabins that might not be full—they’re rustic, bare-bones, but they have heat and beat the sidewalk or beach. Or I can find someone at the party who can put you up. Not usually a problem.”

Amber shrugged, but Charlie didn’t move. “Yeah, well, thanks, but there’s no need for that,” he said. “Maybe you can take the girl there to find Eloise or whoever she’s looking for. I’ll be fine—”

“Call me Tommy,” he said, “and let’s go. Neither of you should be wandering around in this weather. Besides, you were driving too fast and it’s my bet you don’t have a clue where you’re going.”

Before Charlie could argue, Tommy turned and headed over to a police car parked in a narrow drive beside the bar. In the next minute he had backed out, and was waiting in the middle of the empty street for Charlie to follow.

Charlie glanced inside the car, then looked over the roof to the curb.

Amber was gone.

Chapter 2

Amber Harper stood against the side of McClucken’s hardware store in the narrow alley that ran alongside the stone building. It wasn’t more than a slice of gravel, wide enough for a Dumpster, leaving just enough room for a skinny kid or two to hide with a pack of stolen cigarettes.

A skinny kid with wild hair who didn’t quite fit in Sea Harbor.

Amber’s thoughts slid uneasily back to those years of feeling lost and angry. A gangly teenager, mad at the world. Her once-edgy hormones were more level now, her mind clear, her anger under control. And she didn’t smoke any longer; she’d grown up. But the feelings seemed to lurk in the shadows, sneaking up on her and reminding her that it’s difficult to revisit one’s past. And maybe not even a good thing.

She rummaged through her pockets for gloves but came up empty. The car, she remembered now. She had pulled them off to warm her hands on the car vent. Good gloves, too.

She stepped out from behind the metal refuse can, rubbed her hands together, and looked through the sleet and wind, watching the taillights of the police car and BMW driving away from where she stood. The cop drove slowly, carefully, probably looking for her, until both cars finally disappeared around the bend in the road.

She wasn’t sure why she’d walked away. The cop was friendly enough and wanting to help. But facing a mass of people celebrating good cheer in a community center that hadn’t existed in her other life wasn’t where she wanted to be tonight. Not to mention the possibility of seeing people she had worked at avoiding nearly her whole life, even when she lived under their roofs. Tonight was definitely not the night to break her pattern.

She needed time to adjust, to figure out why she’d even come.

She shivered, hunched her shoulders up to her ears, and walked into the wind, her backpack moving slightly back and forth.

Harbor Road was the same—but different, she thought.

The old bookstore across the street was still there. Her gray eyes lingered on the familiar sign and took her back to the hours and hours that she had spent sitting on the floor on the store’s upper level, her legs folded like a pretzel. She’d lose herself in Nancy Drew, Anne of Green Gables, A Secret Garden, and every Judy Blume she could get her hands on.

There were new stores, too—a yarn shop across the street where a beat-up bait shop once stood. Amber stared at it, thinking about Esther Gibson and her piles of yarn, the fat needles she’d used to teach Amber to knit as they sat side by side in the nursing home.

Amber shook off the memory and concentrated instead on a brightly decorated sign with a giant scooper. It was outlined in lights—an ice-cream shop. SCOOPERS, it read. Nice. And it didn’t close for the winter as some on Cape Ann did. That was nice, too. A coffee shop with a patio was nearby. Apparently life hadn’t stood still since the night that she packed the North Face backpack Esther Gibson had given her and hitchhiked her way out of Sea Harbor and into a new life.

Her hometown had grown up some.

Amber pulled up her hood and tucked a handful of wet hair beneath it, then shoved her hands into her pockets and began walking again, down Harbor Road toward the Gull Tavern. It would be warm at least. And unlike the many times she’d snuck up to the bar’s rooftop patio, this time she’d be legit. Photo ID and all. Not that anyone would card check an almost thirty-year-old who looked every bit her age and then some.

Maybe she should have gotten back into the car with the Charlie guy. He was nice enough, even in the face of her rude behavior. Lack of sleep had a habit of bringing out the worst in her. At first she hadn’t been able to gauge his age easily—something she was usually good at. The few freckles sprinkled across his nose didn’t fit well with the worried look in his blue eyes or the concerned wrinkle in his forehead. So she’d flipped open his wallet when he was concentrating on the highway signs. Half a dozen years older than she was, if she’d read it right.

The cop reminded her of some of the nice people she’d known in Sea Harbor. He’d have found Esther for her, probably, and Esther would have hugged her close against her big ample breasts, the light flowery scent of her lavender lotion bringing a strange comfort. She would have insisted on giving her the wide bed in the back of the house—and probably a glass of warm milk.

It was an easy answer to the freezing rain and no place to sleep.

But she’d be fine, she’d find a place to sleep somewhere. And she would stay in town long enough to do what she had to do—to meet with the lawyer Esther had mentioned in the e-mail, and the priest her grandmother prayed with and confessed to, and all those other things church people did.

Father Northcutt. His name came to her suddenly. He was the only person in Amber’s recollection that Lydia Cummings ever deferred to. And he was probably the reason Amber hadn’t ended up in an orphanage.

So she’d see them, sign some papers, collect whatever it was that her grandmother had left her—a toothbrush, maybe, if she was lucky.

But mostly she’d say a final good-bye to her mother.

And then she’d be on her way.

The door to the Gull Tavern opened and a noisy group of kids younger than she exited into the night. Amber slipped in as the door closed behind them, cutting off the harsh wind.

She paused just inside the door, sinking back against the wall as her eyes adjusted to the dim light. Small groups sat around the tall round tables scattered throughout the room. The long shelf that ran along the window wall was partly full, couples passing baskets of calamari and fried clams between them and washing it down with beer. Others stood or sat at the bar, elbows rubbing against elbows as they drank beer and screamed at a football game playing out on the big-screen TV abov