Free Dead In Red by L.L. Bartlett

She stepped out onto the concrete
porch. “I’m sorry,” she repeated, her lips going thin. “I’ve spent
most of my life apologizing for Craig, but that’s all I can offer
you.”
    “I’m not so sure. You see, I don’t think
Craig killed Walt Kaplan.”
    Her head snapped up and she gazed at me with
suspicion. “The police wouldn’t have arrested him if they weren’t
sure. What makes you think he didn’t do it?”
    I had nothing concrete. “Just a hunch.”
    “This’ll sound cruel, but getting caught for
this murder is probably the best thing that could’ve happened to
Craig. He’ll be in a place where he can be cared for—he’ll be off
the streets.”
    “And he won’t be your problem anymore,” I
guessed.
    She crossed her arms across her chest. “I’d
be lying if I didn’t agree. You have no idea of the hell Craig has
put my family through. My father left us when Craig was seven. My
mother bailed him out of one mess after another. He drove her to
bankruptcy and finally suicide because she couldn’t take it any
longer. He disrupts my life—my kids’ lives. It would be easier on
us and society in general if the cops locked him up and threw away
the key.”
    “But what if he’s innocent?”
    “Don’t be absurd. They found the knife on
him.”
    “He might’ve come across it picking through
Dumpsters.”
    Her level glare was as cold and uninviting
as her sterile house and yard.
    “He’s your brother,” I tried again, thinking
about Richard and what, in a short time, he’d come to mean to
me.
    “Excuse me, Mr. Resnick, but I really don’t
have time for this.”
    She slammed the door in my face.
    “Enjoy your freedom, Mrs. Scott.”
    As I climbed back behind the wheel of my
car, I couldn’t help but think that arresting Craig Buchanan solved
everyone’s problem. Tom was satisfied someone, anyone, had been
arrested for Walt Kaplin’s murder; the police were happy to close
the books; and Cara Scott was finally free of her space cadet
brother.
    The problem remained—he didn’t do it. And
there was still a murderer hanging around lovely, picturesque
Williamsville.
     
    # # #
     

CHAPTER 7
     
    Evening shadows filled the backyard as I
worked at emptying my third bag of mulch, carefully nestling a
blanket of fragrant cedar fragments around my begonias. The smell
of damp earth reminded me that Walt Kaplan had been committed to
the ground less than a week before, and that maybe I was the only
one who cared if his killer was caught. I left a message on Sam’s
voice mail, asking him to find out about bloodstains on Buchanan’s
clothes; now to wait and see if he followed up on it.
    Brenda approached me from the house. I
hadn’t seen her all day, but had left the box of candy on the
kitchen counter with a note. She paused about five feet away and
gazed down the east border, which had taken me more than an hour to
weed, then focused on the clump of flowers in front of me. She’d
wanted a garden and Richard had given me carte blanche to make it happen. I’d staggered
the pink and white begonias with darker vincas. After years of
neglect, the perennials were in sad shape. In the back of my mind I
had a plan for how I wanted to bring the garden back to its former
grandeur over the next couple of years, but it would take careful
planning.
    “Such industry. I can’t believe what you’ve
accomplished in this yard in such a short time. Wherever did you
garden in Manhattan?”
    I looked over my shoulder at her. “I
didn’t.”
    “Then how do you know so much about it?”
    I scattered a handful of mulch around a
pink-veined coleus. “For years I saved for a house in Jersey.
Shelley and me and a picket fence, and maybe a pack of kids. I read
up on gardening. Figured it might make a good hobby.”
    “Has it?”
    “It’s only been three weeks, but
. . . yeah. I like it—it’s calming. Plants don’t give off
weird vibes like people do.”
    “And they don’t say things to upset