Quilt As Desired Read online

  Chapter Eleven

  Darcy came through the door from the kitchen to the studio.

  "We'll need to get fingerprint samples from you both for exclusionary purposes,” she said. “It'd be good if we could get prints from your aunt, too."

  "I think she had to be fingerprinted when she signed up to teach quilting at the middle school,” Harriet said.

  "I'll check when we get back to the lab, but that would help if she did."

  "How does the rest of the house look?"

  "Not too bad, actually. The studio was clearly the focus of the attack. A few drawers and closets were dumped, but it looks like they didn't do much more than pass through most of the rooms. I tried to wipe the print powder up as we went but watch for it. We don't need that on the quilts on top of everything else."

  "Oh, my God,” Mavis said from the outside door. She picked up the brass bells that lay silent on the floor and hung them in their customary place on the doorknob. She crossed the room and pulled Harriet into a warm hug. “Oh, honey, I'm so sorry."

  Harriet felt stiff in her arms. She wondered what she was supposed to do—stand like a sack of flower and let the air be squeezed out of her? Or was she supposed to squeeze back? How did one accomplish that when their arms were being pinned to their sides?

  Mavis released her. “Jenny should be here any minute. Connie is babysitting her granddaughter while her daughter works the night shift at the Best Western in Port Angeles. She'll come as soon as her daughter picks up the little one. I left a message for Robin, and talked to DeAnn, who will be along soon, also.” She turned back to survey the room and seemed to notice Aiden for the first time. “What happened to you?” she asked.

  Aiden had changed his bloody shirt and washed his face, but he still had an impressive-looking gash on his forehead.

  "She hit me,” he said, and pointed at Harriet.

  "Well, you must have needed it,” she said. She turned to survey the room again. She picked up a shoebox-sized plastic bin and handed it to him. “Here, pick up spools of thread and put them in this box.” She moved to the cutting table. “Let's take a good look at each quilt and then sort them by what type of repair they need. We can separate the show quilts from the rest, too."

  Jenny arrived and joined them. The women spoke only when they needed to discuss the disposition of an item. Aiden picked up all the thread then started on scissors, pins, cutters and other small tools. A sense of calm returned to the room.

  "Anyone want coffee or tea?” he asked as he discovered the electric hot water pot. “The cups in here are toast, but I could go look in the kitchen."

  "I think that's a splendid idea, honey,” Mavis said. She looked at Harriet.

  "Sure,” she said. “Cups are to the right of the sink, or at least they used to be. I'll come with you.” She folded Connie's quilt and set it on the pile that had come through the night's ordeal unscathed. She followed Aiden into the kitchen.

  He had found the coffee mugs and was opening cabinets looking for coffee and tea when she came in.

  "The coffee is in the refrigerator,” she said. “And the tea is in the cabinet to the left.” She pointed. “I'm going to look for a tray in the hall closet."

  She stepped into the hall just as a streak of grey flashed down from the bookcase and raced up the stairs.

  "Fred,” she called. “Here, kitty.” She headed for the stairs.

  "He'll probably do better if you just leave him alone for a while,” Aiden said from the kitchen doorway. “Cats don't usually like help with their problems."

  Harriet resented the implication that an outsider might know more about Fred than she did. 0n the other hand, she had to admit that most of the emotional support in her relationship with Fred had been one-way. She turned back, got a tray from the closet and went back into the kitchen.

  "He'll probably be fine tomorrow,” Aiden offered.

  "No, he won't,” she said. “He will never be fine again. His sense of security, which wasn't very good after the move anyway, will be gone. And he'll blame me."

  Aiden looked at her. He grabbed a handful of teabags and put them on the tray along with six mugs. “I have a headache where I got clubbed, thanks for asking,” he said.

  Harriet took the tray and headed for the studio. “You'll probably be fine tomorrow."

  "Dios mio!” Connie said as Harriet walked over to the cutting table and set the tray down. “What happened?"

  "A rival gang of quilters wanted to insure a win,” Aiden said, and tipped the piecrust table back onto its feet. He put the electric kettle on it and plugged it in. “Tea anyone?"

  Connie ignored him. “What do you think happened?” she asked Harriet.

  "I wish I knew. I can't imagine my aunt having enemies, and I don't think enough people even know I'm here for me to be a target. So far, it doesn't look like anything big has been stolen. The sewing machines are here, the TV, VCR and computer are all here. It really does look like the quilts were the target."

  Connie raised her eyebrows, “Maybe Lauren really does want to insure a win."

  "Come on,” Mavis said. “Let's not start any rumors."

  "Okay, so what do we have here?” Connie asked.

  "Harriet and I are sorting quilts,” Mavis said. “I think we've found all the show entries. The two piles on the cutting table are the barely damaged and the really hurting. Jenny is dividing the damaged ones into categories according to type of repair. The ones in the chair seem to be okay. They need to be checked a second time and dusted off if they were on the floor."

  "I'll work on reattaching binding. Those quilts have a chance of making it.” With that, Connie grabbed a pastel floral-blended quilt and started pinning the binding back into place.

  DeAnn arrived, and the women settled in to some serious stitching. Aiden stayed another hour picking up tools, spools and broken glass.

  "Before I forget, I've got my mom's quilt in my car. Should I bring it in?” he asked.

  Harriet nodded.

  The dry cleaners had gotten most of the bloodstains out, and where they hadn't it looked like part of the dye pattern.

  "At least one person in the group will have a repair-free entry,” DeAnn said.

  Aiden shot a panicked glance at Harriet, and then looked relieved when she kept silent.

  "Is there anything else you ladies would like me to do before I go?"

  "Unless you can sew binding with an invisible stitch, I guess not,” Mavis said.

  Harriet walked him to the door. “Thanks for your help tonight. And I am sorry about your head. I'll pay if you want to go to the doctor."

  "I am the doctor. Besides, I've been in Africa, remember? This is just a scratch.” He lowered his voice to a whisper and looked intently at her with those big pale eyes. “Thanks for your help with my mom's quilt.” He held her gaze a moment longer then turned and walked out the door and got in his car.

  Harriet took a deep breath and shut the door behind him. A slight flutter awakened in her stomach, but she pushed it down as quickly as it had appeared.

  The women stitched for two more hours, fixing everything that could be salvaged without extensive reworking. DeAnn's quilt was a total loss, but she said she had one she'd made for her sister but had not yet mailed off she could substitute. Harriet agreed to pick it up on her way to Tacoma.

  Mavis stood up and stretched. “I think we've done all we can here,” she said. “Try to get some sleep before you leave."

  "You want me to stay here with you?” Connie asked. “Give me a pillow and a quilt, and I'm good to go."

  Harriet was touched.

  "No, but thanks. The police are going to drive by every hour. And Darcy gave me a door alarm to hang on my bedroom doorknob. She uses it when she travels."

  After crawling into bed late one night when she'd returned from girl's night at the movies and rubbing her foot up Steve's cold dead shin, she'd needed several years of therapy just to be able to sleep in a bed again. Several more ye
ars with the shrink, and she'd learned that sleep is a great way to escape anything and everything. Probably not Dr. Weber's idea of a successful outcome, but the net result was the same.

  The women left, and Harriet turned off the lights in the studio and went upstairs. When she came out of the bathroom in her pajamas, Fred was lying on her pillow. She set her alarm and crawled into the flannel sheets. In spite of everything, she fell into a deep, dreamless sleep almost immediately.

  Chapter Twelve

  A furry head butt woke Harriet up a half-hour before her alarm would have gone off at the ungodly hour of five-thirty a.m. Four hours of sleep had left her feeling as though wet sweatsocks had been stuffed into her head. Her eyes felt swollen, and her mouth was dry.

  The night's excitement had apparently had the opposite affect on Fred. He was hungry and ready to start his day. She pushed him off the bed, but he jumped right back onto her chest and started licking her eyelids.

  "Can't you be a normal cat and hole up somewhere for hours if not days to recover from your trauma?” she asked him. “Food is not the answer to everything.” She wasn't sure how well she could sell that one, since she tended toward chocolate ice cream and M&M's in a crisis. “Come on, let's go see if we can find your food."

  She pulled the plaid flannel robe Aunt Beth had loaned her on over the Oakland A's T-shirt that doubled as a nightshirt in her wardrobe. Fred wove in and out of her legs as she headed for the stairs.

  He was in luck—the food cabinets in the kitchen were untouched. His bowl proved a little harder to find. There was a puddle on the placemat where his water dish had been.

  She finally found the dishes under the dining room table. She could imagine her thief kicking them in frustration. Good, she thought. I hope he was real frustrated.

  Now that she'd had a little rest, she was mad. The beautiful quilts her friends had made for the show had been vandalized for no apparent reason, and her aunt's studio—her studio—had been trashed. And she hadn't done anything to deserve it.

  She fed Fred then called the police station. She was ready for some answers. Unfortunately, no one was ready to provide them. The desk sergeant assured her no one knew anything more than they had last night, and that they were doing everything that could be done to find out who was responsible. He also suggested she might want to call her insurance person.

  Harriet made a mental note to call Bill Young when she got back. She didn't know what kind of coverage Aunt Beth had, but in Foggy Point, if you had insurance you bought it from Bill.

  She ate a quick bowl of cereal then went into the studio to box up the show quilts. She grabbed a can of Dr. Pepper from the six-pack she'd kept hidden in her car until her aunt had departed. She hid them behind the orange juice in the refrigerator, just in case the diet police had the box bugged. She was trying to cut back on caffeine, but she'd earned this one.

  The Loose Threads had gotten the quilts repaired and put back in their various carry bags, but she needed to find the show entry forms each person had filled out.

  It was a shock all over again to walk into the studio. Aiden had picked everything up off the floor, but books, papers, batting and scraps of fabric were piled on every available flat surface, waiting for her to make some sense of them. She picked up a pile of papers and sat in the wing chair and started sorting.

  It took most of an hour, but she found forms for all the entrants save one—Avanell's was missing. She thought back over the sequence of events the night before. Aiden had brought his mother's quilt into the studio just before he left for the night. She couldn't quite remember if she had seen a sheet of paper with it or not.

  She was reluctant to call Aiden before seven in the morning after keeping him up so late. Besides, she was beginning to feel a little guilty about hitting him in the head with the sprinkler. In the end, she decided that, after a quick shower, she'd swing by the Vitamin Factory and have Avanell fill out a new entry. Avanell had told her at lunch she'd made a practice of arriving thirty minutes before her factory workers, no matter what. She claimed it had curbed an epidemic of tardiness a few years back, and she'd found the quiet time at the start of her day so useful, she'd just kept it up. Harriet hoped she wouldn't mind an intrusion.

  With the quilts safely stowed on the backseat of her Honda and the paperwork on the passenger seat beside her purse, Harriet locked the house and studio and drove through the grey light of dawn to the Vitamin Factory.

  There were two cars in the parking lot when she pulled into a visitor spot near the door marked office. She recognized Avanell's silver Mercedes. Harriet was surprised there weren't more cars. She certainly wasn't an expert on manufacturing, and she was probably being simplistic, but if Avanell was having trouble finding employees and the factory was falling behind schedule, shouldn't there be some people here working overtime? And shouldn't there be some underling sharing the burden? And what about her business-partner brother? If only Aunt Beth were here, Harriet thought. She probably would have some answers.

  * * * *

  It should only take a few minutes to get Avanell's signature on the form, and she could be on her way. She stepped through the door. A plain young woman with long sandy hair and freckles sat at a scarred wooden desk.

  "Can I help you?” she said in a voice that made it clear she would rather do anything but. She chewed a tired wad of gum and slowly flipped the pages of a magazine.

  "I need to speak to Avanell,” Harriet said.

  "I haven't seen her yet today."

  "Isn't that her car in the parking lot?"

  The woman kept her eyes on the magazine that was clearly more interesting than Harriet's questions. “Silver Mercedes? Yeah, that's hers. Maybe she's in the back. Sometimes she helps out in shipping this time of the month."

  "Could you check for me?"

  "They're too cheap to have an intercom here. You're welcome to go back and check yourself if you want. Just go through that door and follow the smell of vitamins.” She pointed at a blue door marked “Employees Only."

  "Thanks for your help,” Harriet said and knew her sarcasm was lost on the girl.

  "No problem,” she said without looking up.

  The door opened into a hallway. A large glass window on the right revealed an employee locker room; identical white smocks floated like ghosts on a garment rack. The shelf above it held what looked like fabric shower caps. On the opposite wall was a bank of grey gym-style lockers with combination locks hanging from their clasps. A wooden bench cut the room in half. Assorted pairs of white shoes were lined up underneath. She could almost imagine the workers who would inhabit the costumes within the hour.

  She wondered if she would be contaminating their space if she walked out into the production area in her street clothes. She could have gone back and asked the receptionist but was pretty sure it would be a waste of time.

  Another blue door led into the vitamin processing room. Large funnel-shaped bags hung over narrow conveyer belts full of brown bottles that snaked through the area. A metal contraption that resembled a giant stamp hovered over the end of the conveyer. A large box of white safety caps sat on the floor next to a table with three chairs around it. Open boxes of surgical gloves were scattered throughout. This was obviously where vitamins were bottled and sealed.

  Avanell was not in evidence, so Harriet crossed the room and exited through the door opposite the one she'd come in. She was in a short hallway. Restrooms were to the left. The first room to the right held printing and labeling equipment. The lights were off.

  She chose the second door on the right. It opened into the large, high-ceilinged room that was the packing and shipping area as well as warehouse space.

  "Avanell?” she called.

  A single light fixture illuminated a corner at the back of the building. Harriet headed toward it. The warehouse had a concrete floor, and the heels of her shoes made a loud clacking noise that echoed off the rafters.

  "Avanell,” she called again.

&
nbsp; She stopped. The silence was deafening. A compressor started. She resumed her path toward what she hoped was Avanell.

  "Hello?” she said in a louder voice. “Avanell?"

  She arrived at the lighted corner. A large worktable was surrounded by stacks of boxes. A single chair was pushed back from the lone workstation. She came around the end of the table.

  "Avanell!" she screamed.

  Avanell Jalbert lay collapsed on the cold cement floor. It was as if an unseen puppet-master had abruptly cut her strings. Harriet dropped to her knees, avoiding the red stain that extended like a dark halo around Avanell's head

  "Oh, Avanell,” she whispered. “What happened to you?"

  A thin thread of blood had trickled from the corner of her mouth and joined the congealed pool under her head. Harriet looked away and fumbled in her pocket for her cell phone. She dropped it, and when she picked it up again, her hand was shaking so hard she had to punch the numbers in three times before she connected to the 911 operator.

  "You have to come to the Vitamin Factory now,” she said. “Avanell Jalbert is dead ... Of course, I'm sure.” She reached toward Avanell; by sheer force of will, she touched the outstretched hand. She recoiled. It was cold, the fingers unbending. She fought to calm her lurching stomach. Avanell was definitely dead.

  She told the operator to send the paramedics to the back of the factory and then hung up to wait. She stood and moved a few steps away. A horrible feeling of déjà vu washed over her. She wished she was a strong enough person to hold Avanell's cold hand until someone arrived, but all the therapy in the world wouldn't have made that possible.

  It was while she was avoiding looking at Avanell that Harriet noticed her friend's purse lying on the floor. It was upside down, its contents in a pile on the floor. She looked back at Avanell, and saw the rayon lining of her left skirt pocket sticking out. Someone had searched her after they killed her.

  For the second time in twenty-four hours, Harriet heard the sound of Foggy Point's police sirens approaching. The factory was soon engulfed by a rush of firemen, paramedics and police. Avanell was quickly pronounced dead and the warehouse declared a crime scene. Harriet was hustled back to the front office. She'd given a brief statement to the uniformed officer who had arrived first and been asked to wait for the major crimes detectives.