Free The Murder of a Queen Bee by Meera Lester

inside that cabin.”
    â€œGun? He’s armed?”
    â€œAnd dangerous. Took a shot at me.”
    â€œAbby, get out of there. Now. I’ll send a couple of officers to pick him up. Says here Kramer has a warrant for assault and breaking and entering. I’ve already notified the county sheriff.”
    Abby breathed a sigh of relief. “Thank you. Listen, I can meet your officers if you like.”
    â€œNot necessary. What I want is for you to get off that mountain. There’s no point in you staying in harm’s way. We’ve got the doc’s address, and one of the officers I’m sending grew up not far from there.”
    â€œRight. Listen . . . it’s good to know you’ve still got my back,” said Abby.
    Now wouldn’t be the time to tell Kat that Abby hadn’t yet finished her business in the mountains. There was still the location of Fiona’s car to check out. The police would have collected the car, of course, and taken it to the impound lot. But a visit to a crime scene could produce intangibles, such as a feeling, an intuitive insight, or a previously overlooked connection.
    Sugar hunkered down on the seat; her large brown eyes focused on Abby. The dog whined.
    â€œYou put up with a lot today, sweetie pie. I promise I’m going to make it up to you.”
    After driving past the landmark red barn, Abby took the next cutoff to Kilbride Lake. She knew Fiona hadn’t filed a report against Timothy Kramer, but she wondered if the assault on Fiona had been the only contact between the two. Might Timothy Kramer have had the motive to kill Fiona? Had he been stalking her? Was that why Fiona had wanted to talk to Abby and Kat? Had Fiona believed that she needed police protection from Kramer?
    Abby put Sugar on the leash, and they took a long walk along the old Indian trail still used by the canal patrol officers and forest rangers. When Sugar seemed sufficiently exhausted and had slurped her fill of water, Abby secured the leash with an extension that allowed Sugar to rest in the dappled sunlight. Ambling away from Sugar and the Jeep toward where Fiona’s car had been found, Abby walked slowly, eyes on the ground. She had not gone far when her cell went off. She didn’t recognize the number. But after the call clicked off, she listened to the message. The volume of the man’s voice rose only slightly above the din in his background. “Hope you got my postcard, Abby. It’s been a while . . . way too long. Can’t wait to see you. You know who this is, right?”
    She stiffened. Her heart galloped. Oh, she knew who it was, all right. Hearing Clay Calhoun’s husky voice took her instantly back to Valentine’s Day the year before, when he’d left her in shock because he’d accepted a job on the East Coast. After planting a perfunctory kiss on Abby’s cheek—as though he’d be home by dinner—Clay had driven off into his new life. Around the edges of her heart for months afterward, Abby had felt an inner wound that no herbal poultice could heal.
    Her thoughts raced. What postcard? There had been nothing from him since he left. And what did he mean by “Can’t wait to see you”?
    Abby shook her head in dismay. Who knows what he meant by that? She congratulated herself for not taking the call. Talking with Clay would only confound her; it would be too confusing, and it was a conversation she didn’t want to have. Right now, she had murder on her mind.
    * * *
    By late afternoon, Abby arrived at her mailbox on Farm Hill Road. After pulling down the hatch of the metal box with the chicken on top, she reached in and retrieved the contents, then flipped through the bills and the assorted junk mail. Then she saw it—the postcard. Her stomach knotted. Inhaling and letting go a long exhale, she flipped over the picture of Seattle’s Space Needle to read the sprawling handwriting on the reverse.