An Ale of Two Cities by Sarah Fox

Author:Sarah Fox
Language: eng
Format: epub, azw3, mobi
Publisher: Kensington Books
Published: 2019-10-01T16:00:00+00:00

Chapter 16

I pushed the remains of my scone aside, my appetite slinking away.

“You killed Freddy?” I asked, my voice barely audible.

Although I’d already suspected she might have been the one to stab Freddy with Mel’s ice pick, my voice betrayed how horrified I was to find myself sitting across from someone confessing to murder.

Penny’s eyes widened to a startling size. “No!”

She said it so loudly that a few glances skittered our way.

Her cheeks turned bright pink and she stared at the tabletop. When all the gazes we’d drawn had focused elsewhere, she wrapped her hands tightly around her cup and lowered her voice. “Of course I didn’t kill him. I could never do such a thing.”

“But you said you did something terrible,” I reminded her.

“And I did. Just . . . not that.”

I waited for her to elaborate, but instead she closed her eyes and began crying silently.

I reached across the table and squeezed her arm. “What is it, Penny? If you didn’t kill him, then surely whatever you’ve done can’t be too bad.”

“It’s still pretty awful.” She wiped her face with her tissue and drew in a deep, shuddery breath. The tears in her eyes subsided and she seemed to gather control of herself. “I spoke to a reporter about Freddy.”

I turned those words over in my mind, connecting some dots. “The reporter who wrote the article everyone’s talking about today?”

Penny nodded, staring into her cup. “It was a terrible thing to do. I wish I’d kept quiet, but now it’s too late to change things.”

“How did you end up talking to the reporter?”

“There were a few of them here from out of town to cover the ice-sculpting competition. Really, to cover Freddy’s participation in the competition. He was well known in Boston’s foodie circles and he’d won several ice sculpture competitions across the country.”

“I remember seeing the reporters on the green,” I said. “They did seem to be focused on Freddy, and he looked like he enjoyed the attention.”

“He always did like to be in the spotlight.” Penny turned her cup in a slow circle. “I went over to say hi to him. We didn’t part on the best of terms years ago when we broke up—when he dumped me—but I wanted to know what he’d say when he saw me face to face. I should have let it be, but I couldn’t, you know?”

I nodded, staying quiet, not wanting to interrupt her narrative.

“Freddy pretended he didn’t know me. I could see in his eyes that he did, of course. But he wanted me to feel like I wasn’t even worth remembering. We were together for seven years and he wanted me to believe he didn’t recognize me.” She gulped down the last of her latte and set the cup down hard, her grip on the handle so tight that her knuckles turned white. “I was so stunned at the time that I just turned and walked away. But one of the reporters had overheard. He approached me, saying he wanted to write an article about Freddy.

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