Murder Crashes The Christmas Wedding: A Dodo Dorchester Mystery by Ann Sutton

Author:Ann Sutton [Sutton, Ann]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Wild Poppy Publishing
Published: 2025-12-20T00:00:00+00:00

At lunch her father harangued the family about the threat of a jewel theft. Waving his knife and fork around, he gasped, “Can you believe the cheek of the fellow? But I would have had the last laugh. That safe is state of the art. Uncrackable, so they say. What is the clergy coming to?”

“He wasn’t a real clergyman, Daddy,” Dodo explained. “Somehow, he had changed places with the real Reverend Duckworth. He was a con artist.”

“That would explain the quality of his sermons and his pass at me,” said her mother. “Though I worry about what happened to the real vicar, I can’t tell you how relieved I am to hear that the man who made such inappropriate advances was not actually a man of the cloth.”

“Are you worried about the tiara at all, sir?” Rupert asked between courses.

Her father’s face drew tight, giving the effect of an indignant walrus. “No! I challenge anyone to bypass that lock. My safe is solid as a rock.”

With her father ranting on in the background, Dodo continued to pore over the things they had learned. The impostor must have discovered the safe was impregnable. Which would account for his change of plans. Would he really have attempted to remove the tiara from her head while she was wearing it, or was the idea to grab it when she changed out of her wedding dress? If he had intended to steal it at the breakfast surrounded by witnesses, he was more than audacious. He was a fool.

Still, she shivered at the thought. Imagine, the happiest day of her life, transformed into a crime scene. Her tiara ripped from her head, guests screaming, the impostor fleeing through the chaos. A darker thought emerged: had he planned violence if anyone tried to stop him?

She raised her head and found Rupert staring at her across the table. He must be having similar thoughts, if the grim expression on his features was anything to go by. That bally villain had intended to deliberately ruin their wedding festivities and possibly cause harm to those they loved most. She was almost grateful someone had stopped him.

Her thoughts diverted. Had the killer murdered the false Duckworth to stop the theft? Or was this about something else entirely?

"We need to search that vicarage again," she said quietly. "If Baldwin found blueprints and sketches, there must be more evidence that didn’t seem of importance to the police who had no idea the deceased was a fake.” She tapped the table with a painted nail. “The impostor didn't spring fully formed into Little Piddleton. He came from somewhere and planned this for weeks, perhaps months. And not knowing he was going to die, there has to be something in that place that tells us who he really was."

"And why someone wanted him dead," Rupert added, understanding her immediately.

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