Merry Without Malice Read online

  He laughed and took a sip of the drink. “I remember. That's why you always told me to suck on candy during exams in school. I kept that habit going through college.”

  “Do you want some candy now?” she asked with a smile.

  He shook his head. “I'm good. But let's get this last guy in here and see what he has to say about Lonnie.”

  Chapter 5

  John Drake sat across the table in the same chair as both the women had. His dark hair barely peeked out from underneath his black knit cap, and he had a green, army issue jacket on with his name stitched over his breast. His neck was held still with a metal brace.

  Jeremy set the blue phone that belonged to the suspect on the table. “Does this phone belong to you, sir?”

  The man picked it up a little higher since it seemed he was unable to bend his neck down to look at it while on the table. “Yes, it appears to be my phone.”

  “And you're John Drake. Did you serve?”

  “Yes, and yes. An IUD did a number on my back and neck, but I'm just thankful I'm not stuck in a wheelchair or a bed in the hospital, like they said I would. I have a lot to be grateful for, so I don't dwell on the past.” He still held the phone in his hand with a tight grip, the veins on the back of his hand stood out.

  Merry frowned. The man didn't seem to know that he was unconsciously gripping the phone harder. In her years as an emergency room nurse, she'd seen several men, good men, who had returned from battle with PTSD. Some of them were prone to violent fits when they were having an episode. Was this man one of those?”

  “How did you know Lonnie Klimt?”

  John's eyebrows knit. “Who?”

  Jeremy blinked. “The man who was stabbed this evening.”

  “Oh,” John said. “I don't know him at all. What would make you think that I do?”

  Merry watched her son. Jeremy's jaw was working, and he glared at the man at the table. It was hard to tell whether the suspect was lying or telling the truth. If he was lying, his poker face was fairly convincing. Jeremy leaned on the table, standing over the suspect, and making John lean back a bit in the chair in order to keep his eyes met with his.

  “You didn't answer the phone call when we dialed you, and you were one of the last people whose number is in his call history.”

  John Drake frowned and coughed a bit, covering his mouth with his hand. He picked up his phone and slid his finger across the screen, bringing up a string of text messages and cleared his throat. “Sorry, I'm battling a little bit of a bug in this cold. I did receive a phone call this evening that I ignored. Did it come from the same number as these messages?”

  Jeremy took the phone from him, and Merry tried to peer over his shoulder as discreetly as possible. There were several messages saying stuff like, “Want to know my secret? Text me back,” and “I know something you don't know.” But John had never replied.

  “For the past week I've been getting these weird messages on my phone. I don't know who they are from, but I figured it's someone phishing. So, I haven't been answering the calls or texts. I've been meaning to go down to the phone store in person to find out if I could block them entirely.” John's fingers intertwined as he set them on top of the table again. “So, you're telling me that the man who was stabbed has been phishing me?”

  Merry blinked, not quite sure what phishing was. Kaitlin leaned in toward her and whispered, “Phishing is when people try to get your personal information in order to steal from you.”

  It made sense. Merry nodded. She knew it couldn't be good.

  “Did you know the deceased, Lonnie, was Lynn Reiner's ex-boyfriend?”

  John frowned. “I wouldn't have known. We've only gone out on a few dates, so we're not at a point in our relationship where we'd share our history yet.”

  Merry and Jeremy nodded. That did seem likely to be true. John cleared his throat and coughed again, his poker face remaining unchanged.

  “Where were you at the time of the murder?” Jeremy continued.

  The man's bushy brows knit once more. “I was videotaping the lights display for my blog, 'Small Town Colorado.' STC for short. I try to go to as many events as possible and record them. I also go to restaurants and review them on both my blog and Youtube. I have over twenty thousand subscribers and make a bit of money from advertisers and sponsors. Between that and my benefits from the Army, I survive alright.”

  “Can you show us this video?” Jeremy asked, offering the man his phone.

  John took the phone and held it at eye level while he made a few swipes across the screen with his right hand. Once he'd finished he handed it back to Jeremy. Again, Merry watched the video from over his shoulder. The angles he was using were a bit different than that of his girlfriend, and he had his phone held horizontally instead of vertically, which made more sense, since in order to get the full bows in the shot, it was better to keep the screen held in that way. Once or twice, John coughed or cleared his throat, shaking the screen just slightly before it righted itself again. Merry frowned. There was something about that which was familiar as well.

  The video ended, pointed at Lynn Reiner when she asked him if they should go check out what was going on. Without question, the video appeared to give John an undeniable alibi, just as the other two ladies had had. Jeremy's shoulders fell as he set the phone down on the table. “Thank you for your cooperation with our investigation. You can go ahead and join the others. We'll check your video with the others that we have and get back to you as soon as possible.”

  John frowned. “I was supposed to do a live broadcast event on my blog tonight. Is there any chance we'll be done by eleven?”

  Jeremy checked his watch, making Merry automatically check hers. It was only a little past eight-thirty. It surprised Merry, as she thought for sure it had gotten later already. Jeremy leaned on the table. “We'll do our best to help you make your appointment, but no promises.”

  “Fair enough,” John said as he stood and offered a hand toward Jeremy to shake.

  Jeremy shook his hand and nodded toward him. “Thank you for your service.”

  That brought a smile to the man's face. “You're welcome.” And then he went under the tent flap.

  Jeremy collapsed into the chair, burying his face in his hands. When he pulled his hands away, he looked up at Merry. “So now what? We only had three suspects, and all of them have video alibis of their whereabouts. No further evidence pointing toward the possibility this was a random act. The man still had his wallet on him, and the killer even took the time to zip up his jacket before leaving his body. The killer didn't even bother taking the tools of his crime with him.”

  “Tools?” Merry asked. “As in, more than one?”

  Jeremy nodded. “The knife, and this.” He pulled a plastic bag from his pocket, and within it was a black taser gun.

  Chapter 6

  “The marks on the back of the victim's neck.” Merry snapped her fingers. “The victim has two small marks on the back of his neck. Could easily be contributed to electrical burns from a taser.”

  Jeremy sat up straighter in his seat. “Oh. This means that the victim was incapacitated before he was stabbed. Chances are that the assailant was smaller and weaker than Lonnie. Like a woman.”

  Merry frowned. “Or a vet who was injured in battle.”

  “You're right.” His shoulders fell. “That really doesn't narrow down our list of suspects at all.”

  “Let's look at the videos on the phones again. There must be a clue there. We'll concentrate on the three suspects phones only. One of the alibis must be false if one of them is the perpetrator, right?” Merry asked.

  He nodded. “You're right.”

  “Can we help?” Kaitlin asked, coming closer to the table where Merry and Jeremy hovered to look at the three phones.

  After letting out a long sigh and looking hard at the kids, Jeremy said, “What harm could it do?”

  Merry picked up the phone that belonged to the veteran, while Jeremy
picked up the new girlfriend's phone. Meanwhile, Kaitlyn and Colin hovered over the ex-girlfriend's. They each began to study the videos, looking for discrepancies. After a short while, Merry swapped phones with the kids, as their videos were only about ten minutes long compared to the half-hour of video that Jeremy had to wade through.

  The angle between the two videos was similar, but the professional blogger took his video horizontally which made much more sense than the vertical video that Lynn had taken. And they weren't at all shooting the same things. Additionally, there was something strange about the vertical video that Merry could almost grasp but couldn't quite put her finger on. When she got to the part where she and the kids walked in front of the camera, it dawned on her. She blinked, rewound, and watched herself glance in the direction of the camera before continuing to walk by. No. That didn't make sense.

  Then at the end was another bit that didn't make sense. As she closed the video, the home page image popped up of Lynn with her new boyfriend, taken at the cafe just before they came to the light display at around sunset. When she peered at the image, everything started falling into place. She knew exactly who the murderer was.

  “Jeremy!” she cried out.

  Merry stood back with the kids as the crowd began to disperse. The uniformed police officers were passing out each of the people's phones as they left the big white tent. A cold chill passed through her body as she watched. The temperature was slowly dropping, and the hot cider had long run out. Two uniformed police officers stood to either side of the suspects.

  “I don't understand why all of those people are getting to leave, but the three of us have to remain. I showed you my video. It obviously showed that I was in this very tent during the murder. I filmed the entire Christmas show, and you all found the body before the show ended, right?” Clarice's hands fisted, and her eyebrows knit together.

  The three of them stood on the opposite side of the table where they’d initially been questioned. Jeremy stood on the opposite side with Merry and the kids staying back. Even though Merry had found the clues that solved the case, she knew it was best for the professional to handle the situation.

  “Yes, ma'am,” Jeremy said, setting the three phones that belonged to the suspects on the table in front of him. “We looked at the videos on all three of these phones, and there was something about one of your videos that lead us right to the killer.”

  Clarice gasped, her hand fluttering to her chest. “Certainly not on my phone.”

  “Your video was poorly taken,” Jeremy continued, picking up the pink phone and swiping across the screen so that it showed the video of the Christmas show. “It was obviously from tonight's show, as one of the actors at minute fourteen stepped on the shoe of another actor and caused him to lose it. We interviewed some of the actors in the show and found that this event happened tonight. It was also obviously an amateur video, as it was shaky, jumpy and you did a lot of talking during the filming.”

  The woman in pink blinked up at the detective. “I... Of course, it's an amateur film. I'm not a professional. And excuse me if it doesn't meet with your approval.”

  “Actually, it meets with my approval entirely. Your alibi is credible and proven with your video.” Jeremy offered her phone back. “You're free to go home with the rest of the crowd now, if you'd like.”

  She blinked a few times, took her phone, and nodded. “Um... Thanks.” And then she marched toward the entrance of the tent that returned her to the slowly-leaving main crowd. The waft of her perfume left with her.

  “What about us?” John Drake asked, his hands shoved deep in his jacket pockets. “Our videos should be irrefutable as well. Did you see something on one of the videos? Did we tape the killer?”

  Johnathan met eyes with Merry who nodded. She had told Jeremy everything that she had found on the video and they had discussed their theories. It was no doubt in their minds who the killer was and how they did it, but they still had one more clue to uncover. The detective's eyes returned to John with the blue smartphone in his hand. “Your video footage was nothing like the footage that Ms. Brown had taken. Because you often take videos for your blog and YouTube channel, you're used to keeping your hand steady. Additionally, your footage was taken at a horizontal angle, rather than a vertical one, like Miss Reiner's.”

  Lynn Reiner stepped forward defensively. “But I'm an amateur myself. I don't have a blog like John's and was only trying to get some footage for social media.”

  “Yes, ma'am. I understand that. What I don't understand are a few more things that are different about your video. Like, why is your hand so steady if you're an amateur as well.” He picked up the black smartphone and began the video on it so that he could compare the two.

  “I don't know. Maybe I have naturally steady hands.”

  “But there's more. At this moment, on minute six of John's video, he coughs, and his video goes shaky for half a moment. At the exact same moment, when he coughs, your camera gets shaky, too.”

  Lynn blinked. “Maybe the sound of his cough surprised me? Or I might have been leaning on him a bit at the time.”

  Jeremy nodded. “Both are reasonable explanations. But then there's another funny thing about your footage compared to Mr. Drake's. If you watch John's footage, you'll see that when people step in front of his camera, they take notice that he's filming and then step to the side, out of the way of the film. It's common courtesy, and it happens four times during his filming. In your video, it didn't happen once. Even when my own mother stepped in front of your camera and looked your way, she didn't step to the side and get out of the shot. In fact, it looks as if she didn't even notice a person holding a camera in the direction she looked at all.”

  Once he'd finished talking, he paused at the exact moment that Merry, herself, had looked into the camera lens.

  Lynn's mouth went agape, and her eyes shifted as though she was avoiding the detective's gaze. “That doesn't mean anything. Maybe she didn't know I was there?”

  A huff escaped his lips. “How could she not know you were there when she looked directly at you. The crowds were thin, as you can see in all the video footage, and she's looking directly at the camera. How could she have missed you?”

  Lynn shrugged. “How am I supposed to know?”

  “Maybe it's because you weren't there at all. Maybe it's because John was holding your camera instead.”

  “What?” John exclaimed. “I was only holding one camera the whole time. I wouldn't be an accessory to murder like that.”

  “Not knowingly, no. We don't believe you would be, but unknowingly, you were.”

  John frowned and crossed his arms over his chest. “Explain.”

  Jeremy walked up to John and rested a hand on his shoulder. “Your black knit hat is folded up, like most people wear them this time of year, and is the perfect place to slip in the phone unawares. Lynn probably told you that you had something on your hat and slipped it in while she distracted you with other hand movements. This made the phone virtually undetectable to passersby as well, as it is a black phone within a black hat.”

  With deft hands, Jeremy gestured for Kaitlin to step over and he showed how easily the phone would slip into the back of her hat.

  Lynn sucked in a breath. Her frown deepening, but she didn't look up and watch Jeremy's demonstration at all.

  Jeremy slipped the phone back out of the cap and continued, “When Lynn returned, she just slipped the phone out, began recording herself and talking to you, trying to develop her alibi completely. But she failed in more than one way.”

  “How is that?” John asked, brow furrowed.

  “When filming for a blog or for a social media post, people often turn the cameras on themselves, and talk directly to the camera lens. They don't turn it upon themselves just to ask the person they are with a question. This was an obvious ploy. But what made matters worse is when she shows up right at the end of your video.” Jeremy said, pushing the video to the end and then turning the
phone around so that both of the suspects could watch.

  There on the screen, Lynn shows up, asking the same question she did before. Asking if they should check out why the crowd was forming. Jeremy paused the screen on that moment.

  John blinked at it. “Am I supposed to see something in this?”

  “Not necessarily. It's not an obvious thing. But when you compare the picture in this video to the home screen of Miss Reiner's phone, also taken tonight…” Jeremy put the two pictures side-by-side.

  The lines over John's brow deepened as he looked at them both.

  “Her gloves changed color!” Colin yelled from beside Merry.

  “Shhh!” Kaitlin slapped a gloved hand over her brother's mouth.

  Merry whispered to them both, “Stay quiet and let your father handle it, but you're right.” A proud smile spread across her lips at her grandson's ability to see the subtleties.

  John swallowed, his eyes getting bigger. “Her gloves were red in the picture we took before we started the walk-through of the lights display, but in the video, they are green. What's the significance of that?”

  Jeremy nodded. “Most people don't carry around two sets of gloves when they are out in the cold.”

  “But maybe Lynn does,” John said, his voice growing a little bit deeper, angrier.

  “Or maybe Lynn knew that Lonnie was going to be at the lights display tonight and made arrangements for you both to come together so she could use your knit cap to place her phone in and establish an alibi. She knew that your head would stay steady and record the video without moving around too much because of your neck brace.”

  “But coming to the lights display was my idea.”

  “It's Wednesday, and a strange night to choose to come to the display. Did Lynn pick the date?”

  John's frown deepened.

  “And did she, possibly even pick out your hat.”