The Last Stop Read online

  The Last Stop

  A Dear Abby Cozy Mystery

  SONIA PARIN

  Copyright © 2018 Sonia Parin

  All Rights Reserved

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are the product of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, organizations, events or locales is entirely coincidental.

  No part of this publication may be reproduced in any form or by any means, without the prior written permission of the author, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

  Dear Reader

  Cozy mystery readers have certain expectations, which might not appeal to readers not acquainted with the genre. I recently came across a definition of cozy mysteries which might help. “Cozy mysteries, also referred to simply as “cozies”, are a sub-genre of crime fiction mysteries in which sex and violence are downplayed or treated humorously, and the crime and detection take place in a small, socially intimate community. The crime solver is an amateur sleuth, usually but not always a woman, who is thrust into the aftermath of the murder.”

  About this book

  It’s been months since Abby Maguire made the move from Seattle to the small alpine town of Eden, Australia. Now her Iowa based travel phobic mom is coming to visit… virtually. Abby will give her the grand tour via a video link to prove Eden is a safe town. All goes well until her mom joins a tour group and one of her fellow passengers dies. There's enough circumstantial evidence to warrant looking into the death and while Abby's focus is on keeping her mom in the dark, it doesn't take long for her mom to suspect Mr. Howington is not just camera shy but is in fact dead.

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  Contents

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Epilogue

  Next: The Last Dance

  Chapter One

  “AND THIS IS WHERE I PICKED up Doyle.” Abby slowed down and pointed at the side of the road. “I think he’d been trying to get across the road but collapsed from exhaustion. He had a layer of mud on him and could barely whimper.” Abby continued on her way, making sure she didn’t exceed the speed limit. “Isn’t the scenery pretty, mom? Winding roads. Lush green trees.” Abby hummed under her breath.

  She’d spent the last twenty-four hours in the air, and on the road, making her way from Iowa, to LAX, and finally, to Melbourne airport. She’d now been driving for three hours on this last stretch of road leading to the small alpine town of Eden. Soon, she’d arrive in her adopted home.

  “The trees are whizzing by again, Abby. I think you’re driving too fast.”

  Swirling the cell phone to face her, Abby saw her mom frown and shake her head.

  Abby smiled. “You wouldn’t say that if you were sitting in the car with me. The cell phone distorts images.”

  “Please keep both hands on the steering wheel and set the phone straight again. I need to see where we’re going.”

  Abby readjusted the cell to face forward just as her mom yelped.

  “Watch out for kangaroos.”

  Abby laughed. “Nothing to worry about, mom. Those signs are everywhere. I’ve yet to spot a kangaroo. Apparently, they come out at night. We’ll be right.”

  “Still, you should slow down.”

  If they did, they’d never get there. Belatedly, Abby wished she hadn’t propped the cell phone on the dashboard where her mom could get a full view of the road ahead.

  “You’ve had a long flight,” her mom continued. “I think you should have taken a day off to catch up on your sleep. Three hours is a long time to drive.”

  “I slept on the plane, mom. And, I made a couple of pit stops.”

  “You put your cell phone on airplane mode. I don’t know what you did during all those hours.”

  “I didn’t have a choice, mom.” Seeing the Welcome to Eden sign, Abby straightened. Home at last, she thought. Her two-week mini vacation to visit her mom in Iowa had been exhausting. Everyone in town had wanted to catch up with her and hear about her tales from down under. Abby had done her best to paint a rosy picture but her mom had interjected at every opportunity, reminding everyone about Abby’s first day in Eden.

  “Fancy flying half way around the world and stumbling upon a dead body,” Abby mouthed under her breath. “I fear for my daughter’s life. That town is plagued with killers.”

  “What was that?” her mom asked.

  “Nothing, mom.”

  “Promise you won’t disconnect me.”

  Abby couldn’t help cringing. Her mom had dropped off several times but now that they were getting close to the township the connection had become stable. “We’ll be fine once I can switch over to wi-fi. I’ll need to re-charge my cell phone. Faith will have the laptop all set up. I made sure of that. Besides, why would I disconnect you? That would defeat the purpose.”

  Somehow, she had to make her mom believe the small town of Eden was as safe as anywhere else. In fact, safer. Everyone had been put on notice. Behave, or else… “You’ll see for yourself soon enough. Eden is an idyllic little town where everyone knows my name.”

  “How could they not know your name. When you first arrived, everyone thought you were a killer.”

  Abby grinned. “They only suspected me for a couple of hours.” Reaching for the cell phone, Abby held it up. “We’re about to arrive. I don’t want you to miss this.” She slowed down and pointed out the pub where she lived. “That’s the Gloriana.”

  “It would be impossible to miss it,” her mom said. “Has it always been painted red? Oh, and look, you weren’t kidding about the ship’s figurehead hanging by the door.”

  “Yes, as I told you, it came from a shipwreck. The first Faydon to travel out to Australia in the 1800s nearly lost his life when his ship was caught in a storm. He organized a rescue team to haul the figurehead out and then he carted it all the way inland to Eden. Although, at the time, the town was nothing but an idea waiting to be seeded.” Slowing down, she parked her car and breathed a sigh of relief. She’d made it in one piece. “We’ll go in first. I need to recharge my phone. Then I need to get Doyle.” She’d arranged for Doyle to have sleepovers at the vet’s but her office assistant, Faith, had taken him during the day.

  They’d arrived just after the lunchtime rush hour so Abby didn’t expect to find many people at the pub. Leaving her luggage in the car, she strode in and nearly jumped out of her skin.

  A chorus of welcome home exclamations greeted her. Half the town had shown up at the pub and crowded around her.

  “Oh, my. This is overwhelming,” her mom said. “Look at all these people.”

  Abby made her way to the counter. Before she reached it, Faith rushed toward her and threw her arms around her. While Abby had been on vacation, her office assistant had been holding the fort at the Eden Rise Gazette where they both worked. They’d chatted almost every day and Abby had been surprised to feel pangs of home sickness for the town she had landed in only a few months before.

  “You’re back. You have no idea how much we missed you. Everything has been so dull since you left.”

  Really?

  “What’s going on?” her mom asked. “I can’t see anything.”

  “Faith. You’re still hugging me and I can barely breathe.”

&nbs
p; “I know. I’ve just missed you so much.”

  “Okay. I’m back and I’m not alone.” When Faith stepped away, Abby held up her cell phone. “My mom’s here.”

  Everyone waved and called out a hello.

  “Hang on, if you’re here, where’s Doyle?” Abby looked around her.

  Faith pointed toward the fireplace. Being on the other side of the world meant she’d left summer behind and had stepped straight into the middle of winter.

  Doyle had clambered up onto Markus Faydon’s shoulder. The pub’s co-owner emerged from his special chair by the fireplace, his perpetual scowl in place as he re-united Abby with Doyle.

  Wrapping him in her arms, Abby lapped up Doyle’s excitement to see her again. “Here’s my boy.” As she lavished him with attention, she caught sight of the local health inspector. He’d been the first local to turn a blind eye and bestow Doyle with special privileges at the pub to come and go as he pleased, so long as he stayed away from the kitchen. Abby smiled and thought the warm reception would go a long way toward setting her mom’s mind at ease.

  “Did you bring my laptop?” Abby asked.

  Nodding, Faith waved her toward the counter. “It’s all set up.”

  “Good.” Holding up her cell phone, she smiled at her mom. “I’ll have to disconnect you for a bit, mom. But I’ll get you back online on the laptop. Talk to you soon.” She disconnected the video chat and sank down on a stool. “You have no idea what it’s been like having my mom with me during the drive over. At least on the plane I had the excuse of putting the cell on airplane mode. I’ve never seen my mom so jittery. Would you believe she got car sick?”

  Mitch Faydon, the co-owner of the pub Abby lived in, smiled. “Beer?”

  “Yes, please.” She checked her watch. “I think I’m going to sleep for twenty-four hours. This should help.” Abby looked around her. “I can’t believe all these people turned up to welcome me back.”

  Mitch cleared his throat. “Actually, they didn’t.”

  “Huh? Did you rent a crowd?

  “Most of them are tourists. Their bus broke down so I’m putting them up until it’s fixed.”

  “Oh, I see.” Abby plugged her phone to the computer so it could recharge.

  “What was that? I only heard half of it,” her mom said as Faith connected the video chat on the laptop.

  When Abby explained about the tourists, her mom’s interest perked up. “That would be fun. Can we go on a bus tour?”

  Abby had already scheduled a few sightseeing trips around the area but since she’d made it her priority to keep her mom happy, she agreed.

  “I’ll look into it and take care of all the details,” Faith said.

  Her mom yelped. “What’s he doing here? Has someone been murdered?”

  Turning, Abby saw Detective Joshua Ryan making a beeline for her. “Mom, he’s just here to say hello.” She hoped.

  “Hello, Eleanor. How was your trip over?” Joshua asked.

  “Puzzling. I still don’t understand why y’all have to drive on the wrong side of the road. Knowing about it is one thing. Seeing it for myself… Well, it’s disconcerting.”

  Joshua straightened his tie and winked at Abby. “Eleanor, you’re down under now. Everything is on the other side. Your right is our left and your up is our down. All those states you have up north, we have them down south and all the sunny states you have down south, we have them up north. Even the water swirls down the drain in the opposite direction. I know it all sounds topsy-turvy, but you’ll get used to it in no time.”

  When his cell phone rang, he excused himself.

  “Is that a crime in progress call?” her mom asked. “Abby? What’s going on? Did someone get killed?”

  “No, mom.” The town had been put under strict orders to be on its best behavior. Faith had promised she would spread the word around…

  “You have nothing to worry about, Eleanor. Statistically speaking,” Mitch said, “Our town is the safest place to be in. In fact, up until your daughter showed up, we had a clean record with zero crimes.”

  “Are you suggesting trouble follows my daughter around?” her mom asked.

  Mitch shifted. “Well, some people believe what you think about, you bring about. When Abby first arrived, she wanted to establish herself and make an impression on her new employer. Her thoughts would have been focused on getting a scoop and she did.” Mitch grinned.

  Her mom’s eyes widened. “Yes, by discovering a dead body.”

  Abby rolled her eyes. “Not helping, Mitch,” she mouthed. Seeing the detective step back inside the pub, she strode over to him. “Joshua. Please tell me there isn’t a crime in progress. I told you, I need two weeks. If anything happens while my mom is visiting, you need to sweep it under the rug.” Abby looked over her shoulder at the laptop on the counter. “My mom will be keeping a close eye on absolutely everything.”

  “You actually said that with a straight face,” Joshua smiled. “Your mom’s not exactly here.”

  “This is a practice run. It will only work if we all do our bit and pretend that she is here.”

  Taking her elbow, Joshua drew her aside.

  “What?”

  “Don’t look now. You’re being filmed.”

  Slanting her gaze toward the bar, Abby looked at the mirror and caught the reflection of a couple of people holding up their phones and aiming them toward her.

  “They’re with that tourist bus that broke down,” Joshua explained.

  “Why are they filming me?”

  Joshua lowered his head and smiled. “Well… They’ve been in town for a couple of days and Mitch has been entertaining them with stories about you.”

  Her voice hitched. “Why would he do that?”

  “Because they asked. Joyce got the ball rolling when they stopped by the café while the local mechanic towed the bus away. You can’t blame them for trying to cash in on the opportunity. Most tourist buses drive straight through Eden on their way up to Bright and the ski slopes. That’s a lot of tourist dollars driving by. Relax. They should be on their way soon. Come on, let’s go get you a beer. I’m buying.”

  Abby’s eyebrows drew downward. “I’m being used as a tourist attraction.”

  ***

  ABBY PEELED AN EYE OPEN and stared straight into Doyle’s large brown eyes. “I guess I made it upstairs.” She looked around to make sure she’d landed in the right room. “Please tell me that’s the sun shining in my face and I slept right through the night.” She gave Doyle a scratch behind the ear. “Yeah, I know. If you could talk, you’d tell me. Okay. I’m awake now and I’m going to assume it is morning and you want to be fed because the alternative is that it’s several mornings later and you were just about to take a bite out of me.”

  She reached for her cell phone. The whole idea of her mom joining her on a virtual visit was to actually have her around throughout the entire day so she might as well get used to it.

  “Hey, how did I get to my room? I only had a couple of beers and I remember asking you to lead the way. Did you herd me back?” Abby sat up. “Hang on. I think I might have tried to go into another room by mistake. I remember apologizing.” She groaned. She supposed the jetlag had already caught up with her…

  “Okay. This is weird. I can’t get a connection.” After several more attempts and failing, she decided to feed Doyle, have a shower and get some food into her and then try to connect the video chat.

  Half an hour later, she made her way downstairs and headed toward the dining room. Along the way, she bumped into Mitch. “Hey. Is something wrong with the internet this morning? I’m trying to get my mom on-line.”

  “It’s working perfectly fine,” Mitch said.

  “There must be something wrong.” Abby gasped. Had something happened to her mom? “She’s not answering. She always answers.”

  “Who?” Mitch asked.

  “My mom.”

  “Oh. She came down earlier.”

  “Huh?”
>
  Mitch grinned. “I’m trying to get into the spirit of it all. Your virtual mom came down about an hour ago.”

  “What are you talking about?” Abby waved her cell phone. “She can’t have come down by herself.”

  “You must be jetlagged. She’s in the dining room.”

  Abby swayed.

  “Are you right there?”

  “Please explain.”

  “Last night, she exchanged numbers with a few people from the tour group and arranged to connect with them this morning.” Mitch clicked his fingers in front of her eyes. “Wakey-wakey. Remember, when your cell phone recharged, you handed it over to the person sitting next to you and your mom made the rounds so she could chat with people.”

  Swinging around, Abby rushed toward the dining room and called out, “Who has my mom?”

  Several people turned to look at her.

  “Mom?” Abby called out again.

  “Over here, Abby.”

  “That’s her,” someone said.

  Seeing a group of diners all huddled together, Abby approached their table. “Excuse me, please. I believe you have my mom.”

  “They’ve been keeping me company while you slept, Abby.” Her mom introduced the group. The names went in one ear and out the other but Abby noticed they all wore name tags, to make the tour bus driver’s life easier, one woman explained.

  “You go on and have your breakfast. I’ll be fine here,” her mom assured her. “They’ve been telling me about all the places they’ve visited. Would you believe it? They’ll be traveling right around the country. Go on. We’ll catch up later.”

  Abby stepped back. Feeling slightly dazed, she strode over to a table.

  “Looks like your mom ditched you,” Markus said in his gruff tone. “Makes you wonder what they have that you don’t.”

  “I hate to admit it, but I do feel slighted.” Abby glanced over at the group. “Could I have breakfast and lots of it, please.” Doyle curled up by her feet and settled into one of his morning snoozes. Noticing Markus still hovering by her table, she looked up. “I’m giving you carte blanche. You can bring me whatever you want.”