Knot in My Backyard (A Quilting Mystery) Read Free Page B

from the morning’s shock, so Lucy made some tea and we went to my sewing room to audition some red fabric for a new quilt. The room was painted in a soft dove gray, the perfect neutral background for evaluating colors.
    Quilters have a special relationship with cotton cloth. Most of us can’t resist buying quite a few of the thousands of choices available in stores. Fabric comes in all sizes, from five-inch squares to many yards.
    Over time, I’ve collected hundreds of pieces for my stash. The amount I buy depends on what I think I’ll use it for—small pieces for quilt blocks, larger ones for background and borders, and up to nine yards for the backing of a large bed-sized quilt.
    I pulled out a number of red prints and smiled at Lucy. “One of my favorite things about designing a new quilt is going through my stash and fondling the fabric. My fingertips feel happy.”
    “I know what you mean.” She smiled back. “Sorting through your fabric is like visiting old friends.”
    We lined up the other materials I previously selected for my new quilt and placed each red piece with them to see how they worked together. If the color was off or had too much contrast, we rejected it. High-contrast prints jumped out and dominated the design to the detriment of the overall pattern. Prints that were too much alike made the quilt look dull. Choosing just the right components, however, created sparkle.
    Eventually we found three perfect candidates and I decided to use them all: crimson polka dots scattered on cream, scarlet roses on a light blue field, and a tiny black motif marching in orderly lines across a cherry-colored background. I loved traditional quilts made with as many different prints and hues as possible. The more fabrics—the more interesting the quilt.
    By the time we were through, the events of the morning seemed far away.
    “So, how are things between you and Arlo? Still good?”
    “Yeah. Why wouldn’t they be?”
    “Well, he did seem a little perturbed back at Ed’s house.” Lucy was too polite to say the words “pissed off.” She almost never used crude language. I thought her restraint came from years of trying to set a good example for her now-grown five sons.
    There was a knock on my front door. An officer stood in a blue uniform. “Ms. Rose? I’ve come to give you a ride to the station. You need to give us a statement about the body you found this morning.”
    I shivered with disgust as I remembered my last ride in the back of a police car four months ago. I was arrested and detained overnight in the Van Nuys Jail under grossly unsanitary conditions. I didn’t want to repeat any part of the experience.
    “Can’t I give my statement here? Why do I have to go to the station? I don’t have much to tell you. I discovered the body and called the police. That’s about all there is.”
    “The detectives will want to ask you questions, ma’am. Detective Beavers asked me to provide you with transportation to the station.”
    I looked at Lucy. Is she just as puzzled as I am? Why doesn’t he come here to interview me? Why not drive me himself ? What’s going on?
    Lucy shrugged and gave a slight shake of her head.
    I turned back to the officer. “Okay, I’m coming, but I’ll drive myself. I don’t like riding in police cars.”
    Lucy took out her keys. “I’ll drive. You’re in no shape to be behind the wheel right now.”
    I took one last gulp of tea, locked the front door, and slid onto the creamy leather seat of Lucy’s vintage black Caddy, the kind with huge shark fins on the back.
    I left Lucy waiting near the front desk while the officer escorted me into a blue interview room of the West Valley Police Station on Vanowen Street. I waited for fifteen minutes, expecting Beavers to show up. When the door finally opened, I stiffened. Kaplan walked in.
    Detective Kaplan was Beavers’s younger partner. The jerk arrested me four months ago, causing me a lot of unnecessary grief. In the