Page 23 of Death By Llama (Friendship Harbor Mysteries #7)

SIXTEEN

Justin took a seat at the table behind the Boston thespians. Brandy gave me a grin and a “watch this” expression and went over to join him.

“Hi, baby!” she said cheerfully, leaning in to give him a giant kiss. She plopped herself in his lap as he wrapped his arm around her lower back.

“I don’t know how she is doing that with a straight face,” Oliver murmured under his breath, leaning against the bar top.

Brandy played her part perfectly in making it seem like Justin was there for social reasons only. Granted, this wasn’t that much of a performance for her, but she still had taken it up a notch.

“I applaud her efforts. Besides, I’m starting to think Justin actually likes how over-the-top she is. He seems to want someone who is all in on a relationship.”

“She is that. But you’d better make your move.”

“Yep.”

It was now or never.

I straightened my spine and took the tray of drinks Dave had passed over to me and hoisted it up on my palm.

Most of the trivia night attendees had departed and with my parents retired to my house behind the pub, this was the perfect opportunity to resolve the matter and clear my llama’s name forever.

“Here you go,” I said to the table as I started passing around the drinks. “You have all had such a trying weekend, I can’t believe you’re still vertical. I would be passed out asleep if I had been through all this.”

Vance took his beer from me and raised his glass. “I think we can all agree that our minds are racing.”

The juggler nodded. “I don’t know how I’m going to go back to work tomorrow.” He glanced over at me as I deposited his bourbon on the table. “I’m a high school science teacher. I just juggle on the side.”

“Oh, that’s a very impactful career,” I said. “Being a teacher.” Then I worried that sounded rude. “And a juggler.”

Daphne shuddered. I had to assume it was because of Nick’s death, not the juggler’s day job. “I’m going to have nightmares for weeks after seeing Nick lying there like that.”

“It’s just so awful,” I said sympathetically. “I guess at least Nick went out doing what he loved.”

That didn’t sound quite the way I had intended it to. I was trying to find a way to bring up acting but that seemed like a bit of a misfire. Vance was scowling, the juggler looked at me like I was in need of medical attention, and Daphne started crying. The blonde, Gemma, wrinkled her nose.

“What do you mean?” she asked. “Did Nick love to jump off cliffs?”

“No, of course not. I mean, not that I know of. I just meant that he was here for the festival because he loved acting. Being an actor.” I was stumbling over my words a bit. I passed a glass of wine to Gemma and tried to think of a way to regroup.

I definitely should have at least asked the juggler his name. It seemed too late to worry about that now. I plowed ahead.

“The costuming for the festival yesterday was incredible. I can’t believe how authentic all of you looked.”

“That’s par for the course when you’re with an excellent troupe,” the juggler said. “Nick did look dashing as St. Nicholas, didn’t he?”

I leaped on the nostalgic look on Juggler’s face.

“He was an actor for the ages,” I said. That might be laying it on a little thick, but whatever.

“Isn’t it just amazing the petty reasons someone would be willing to take a life?

” I clutched my now empty tray to my chest and gripped it, turning on my own acting skills.

I was going to Museful Monologue. “They say there are only three reasons for ninety percent of murders.” I wasn’t sure if that percentage was even remotely accurate or not, but in my own personal experience the three reasons bit was definitely accurate.

“What are you talking about?” Vance asked disdainfully. “Aren’t you just our server?”

“I own this pub. And my boyfriend, Cameron, is the one who hired all of you. Anyway, I was saying that most people are killed for one of three reasons—money, revenge, or love. Or lust. I mean, it depends on the circumstance with that last one, but we can lump them together. Which one do you think was the reason for Nick’s demise? ”

“I have no idea why two santas would be slayed,” Juggler said. Then he made a face. “Slayed. Sleighed. Good grief. Anyway, I can’t imagine Nick was loaded up on life insurance. He was never married and has no kids.”

“That does seem to leave revenge or love,” I said sympathetically. I tried to catch Daphne’s eye but she was staring into her wine like the key to the universe was floating in it. “Or maybe revenge and love together?”

I knew Daphne wasn’t the killer but I wanted to disarm the real culprit. Lull him into complacency.

“I think we should leave all this business to the police,” Gemma said. She rubbed her chest. “This wine tastes like vinegar. It’s giving me heartburn.”

That gave me pause. Maybe my mother wasn’t just being picky. Maybe the wine really was bad.

Mental note to self: Check the wine after you catch a killer.

“You’re so right,” I told Gemma. I tilted my head toward Justin, who had his fingers buried in Brandy’s hair and was kissing the stuffing out of her. “The sheriff looks like he’s on it.”

Okay, so that was throwing Justin under the bus a little, because he knew full well I was trying to elicit a confession and he was trying to look like a bumbling and innocuous law enforcement officer, but it still made me internally wince.

They all turned and took in the sight. Vance harrumphed. Gemma made a sound of distress. Daphne gasped.

The juggler actually burst out laughing, before coughing into his hand. “Sorry.”

“I’m very uncomfortable right now,” Gemma said. “Tyler, I would like to leave.”

Tyler! Finally, the juggler had a name.

“Let me finish my drink,” Tyler the juggler said. “Then we can head back. Though I don’t know how I’m going to sleep tonight knowing there’s a killer on the loose.”

It was the wrong—but for my purposes right—thing to say. Gemma gave a little moan and Daphne lost what little color had remained in her face.

Vance smacked Tyler’s arm. “Think before you speak.”

“Whoops. Sorry, ladies.”

It seemed like the perfect moment to drop the item in my pocket onto the table. “Does anyone know what this is? I found it down on the rocks where Nick was found.”

It was such a “bam!” moment that I enjoyed it far more than was appropriate given two men had died. But I couldn’t help myself.

There were frowns all around and Tyler shrugged. “No idea.”

“That’s a cloak clasp,” Daphne said.

Vance tossed his beer back and shoved his chair back. “I think it’s time to go. I’m bored with this town and locals who don’t know when to take a hint.” He gave me a pointed look.

“Oh, am I bothering you?” I asked. “I’m so sorry. I just thought maybe your friends would like to know that you’re the one who pushed Nick over that cliff.”

Vance’s face turned red.

Gemma and Daphne gasped.

“Why would you think that?” Gemma asked.

“Because I have it on good authority,” I didn’t look back to Justin, because I was a little scared of what I might see. Brandy was putting her heart, soul and lips into her role tonight, “this was clutched in his hand when he was found at the bottom of the cliff.”

I waved for Dave to come forward with the cloak we’d put in the trash bag. I took it and whipped the cloak out--or sort of did, it wasn’t quite the same dramatic moment that clasp had been

“And I found this cloak in Vance’s room.”

“What the devil are you doing in my room?”

“I think you can see this impression in the velvet?” I made a show of walking the cloak around the table to see the flatten places on the material.

They all nodded when shown, but I could tell what this proved wasn’t clear to them.

“I think you will see that the marks on the velvet perfectly match the shape and size of the cloak clasp.”

“This is ludicrous. This proves nothing,” Vance said, although his own acting was slipping. He couldn’t mask the nervousness in his eyes.

“Also, Cameron installed security cameras on the inn last week and a review of the footage revealed you walking toward the cliff with Nick.” That was actually a lie, but cops did that all the time in interrogations. It always seemed to get the desired result.

It did in this case as well.

Vance stood up, menacingly. “It was an accident. Yes, I was with him, but he tripped. He grabbed my cloak to save himself.”

“Why on earth were you wearing a cloak?” Gemma asked.

That seemed monstrously unimportant to me at the moment considering she’d just discovered her friend was a killer, but maybe she believed him. It was plausible, truth be told.

“Wearing Nick’s cloak,” Daphne added. She looked around the table. “That was the cloak he wore at the festival. I’m sure of that.”

“And if all this evidence isn’t enough proof for you,” I said, my voice calm but cutting, “I’m sure when they do a DNA analysis on the cloak, they’re going to find Nick’s blood.”

Vance glared at me, his face shifting between anger and panic. “What are you talking about? It was his cloak. He could’ve gotten his blood on it at any time. That has nothing to do with me.”

“Ah, so you do agree that it’s his cloak,” Daphne chimed in, her expression shocked.

“And it was in your room,” Gemma added, clearly playing catch-up with the conversation.

Vance opened his mouth, then shut it again, his jaw tight. For a moment, he looked like he might lunge at someone, but instead, he stayed planted where he was, his fists clenched.

Justin disentangled himself from Brandy, who was either overacting or not acting at all. He stepped forward and positioned himself firmly beside me. “Vance, I think it’s pretty clear you’re going to be proven guilty. We already have more than enough evidence to move forward.”

Vance swallowed hard, his composure fraying. Suddenly, he blurted out, “He didn’t deserve that part in the movie. He didn’t deserve the commercials he got. You know, I tried out for those too. I did a great job.”

He glanced around the room, his face flush with frustration, his voice rising as he continued. “I made it look like I loved that hair gel. I made it look like my hemorrhoids had never felt better. I would have been the better Saint Nick!”

I stared at him, the rant leaving me momentarily stunned. For the first time, it dawned on me that Vance might be just slightly unhinged—or maybe years of rejection and failed auditions had finally cracked something inside him. Heaven knows I understood how soul-crushing that could feel.

I drew on the frustration I remembered from casting calls.

Reaching out, I gently touched Vance’s arm.

“I understand how you feel. I was an actor too. I know what it’s like to be overlooked by casting for people who are less talented.

I totally get it. And I’m not even going to say Nick didn’t deserve it.

Clearly, he was using people, and he was arrogant. But I’m confused. Why kill Peanut?”

Vance frowned. “Peanut?”

“Yeah, the little guy who was the other Santa,” Tyler clarified. “The one Nick was fighting with.

“His name was Peanut?” Vance looked as if he didn’t believe us.

I nodded, leaning in.

Vance sighed. “Well, that was honestly an accident. I was over by the wall, sneaking a cigarette, and he wandered over there too. I was in a bad mood. He bumped into me, and I…elbowed him. He fell. He was completely drunk and he lost his footing. That’s the truth.”

His voice lowered as he looked down. “But then I had this thought, you know? Maybe people would look at Nick as a potential suspect because he’d just fought with the old guy.

He had a motive, right? But, of course, that didn’t happen.

Nobody questioned it. Nobody even considered Nick because Nick was untouchable.

” He smirked bitterly and met my gaze. “Of course, Nick wasn’t so untouchable once he met me. ”

I stared at Vance. Yep. This guy was unhinged—at least when it came to Nick.

Justin stepped forward, handcuffs in hand. “I’m sorry, but I’m going to have to take you down to the station. Accident or not, you did nothing to help Peanut. So you’re going to be charged with two deaths.”

I watched as Justin led him out of the pub. The table of actors slowly began to clap. Even Dave and Brandy joined in.

“That was amazing,” Gemma said. “Just like theater.”

Maybe all these actors were a little nuts.

I guess we all were.