“All in favor?” Walt asked.
Five hands rose in unison, everyone except Dash, who had learned to go with the flow when it came to the eccentricities of our group.
Bea set to work with the skill of someone who’d spent decades perfecting the art of afternoon drinking.
“We need him to confess,” I said, my fingers unconsciously finding the pearl necklace at my throat. “Crenshaw’s testimony won’t be enough. Not after forty years of everyone believing Sutton was above reproach.”
Through the window, I caught Mrs. Pembroke pretending to water her already drowned petunias while obviously watching my house. Her hose had been trained on the same pot for five minutes, creating a small flood that was currently threatening her garden gnomes. And I’d noticed Patsy Hindman had been lingering across the street, pretending to let her golden retriever, Oscar, sniff around the palm trees while she surreptitiously glanced toward my front porch.
“Look at that,” Walt muttered, following my gaze. “Better than security cameras, having those two as neighbors.”
I moved to the murder board, studying the timeline we’d constructed. “He’s controlled this narrative for forty years. Given us just enough truth to make us trust him while steering us away from himself.” I found myself humming Only a Paper Moon—appropriate, given how we’d all been fooled by something that wasn’t real.
“What pulls a man like Sutton?” Walt asked, his tactical mind already working. “Pride. Ego. The need to be the smartest person in the room.”
“Exactly,” Dash said. “He can’t resist showing off his intelligence. It’s why he gave us Pickering’s journal—he wanted us to see how clever he’d been, using it to point us everywhere but at himself.”
“What if I call him, tell him we’ve found something in the evidence—something we can’t quite understand. Appeal to his expertise, his superior knowledge of the people involved.”
“Make him think he’s still in control,” Dottie added, understanding immediately. “That we need his wisdom to interpret what we’ve found.”
“He won’t be able to resist,” Bea said. “Men like him never can when you tell them they’re the only one smart enough to help.”
I picked up my phone. It rang three times before Sutton answered. “Mabel. This is unexpected. It’s not often I get calls from members who belong to the other church in town.” He laughed at his own joke and I followed suit, trying to play it nice and easy.
“Reverend, I’m so sorry to bother you, but you know we’ve been tasked with the Pickering-Bailey cold case and we found something strange in one of the evidence boxes that Milton locked away.”
“I’d heard you lost everything in the fire at your tea shop,” he said, sympathetically. “Such a tragedy. For the case and for your business. But I know you’ll bounce back stronger than before. Patrick would be very proud of your tenacity.”
I narrowed my eyes and felt the flush of anger creep up my neck. And then I burst his bubble.
“Oh, I know everything will be okay. The Lord always provides. And Walt was able to save all the work we’d done from the fire. You know how prepared he always is.”
“Of course,” Sutton said slowly, though I could hear the disappointment in his voice. “It’s good you’ve got mentors with such wisdom.”
“I was calling because there’s just something we have to be missing. There’s a pattern we can’t quite figure out. You knew these people better than anyone—could you possibly come by—just so we could get your personal insight on everyone involved?”
“A pattern?” His voice sharpened with interest. “What kind of pattern?”
“Something about the dates and the way things line up. Thursday deposits, but that’s not all. There’s more, but I don’t want to influence your interpretation. You might see something we’re missing.”
“Of course. I see this as my Christian duty and civic responsibility to try to right the wrongs George made against our community. I can be there in about fifteen minutes.”
“You know where I live?” I asked.
“Of course,” he said. “Everyone on the island knows your house. See you soon.”
The line went dead, and I set the phone down carefully.
“Ten minutes,” Dash said, calling into dispatch. “I need unmarked units posted around the neighborhood. Stay out of sight.”
We arranged the evidence strategically—financial records visible but not obviously incriminating, the timeline prominent but incomplete, as if we were still trying to connect dots that wouldn’t quite align.
Exactly fifteen minutes later, the doorbell rang with the punctuality of a man who believed tardiness was a sin just below embezzlement and murder.
I opened the door to find him in a black suit, his thin frame held with righteousness. He smelled of peppermint and old books, the scent of dusty absolution.
“Reverend, thank you for coming. Please come in and make yourself comfortable. We’re just baffled.”
