A Corpse for Yew Read online

  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright Page

  Dedication

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Epilogue

  Peggy’s Garden Journal

  Teaser chapter

  Praise for the Peggy Lee Garden Mysteries

  Perfect Poison

  “A fabulous whodunit that will keep readers guessing and happily turning pages to the unexpected end. Peggy Lee is a most entertaining sleuth and her Southern gentility is like a breath of fresh air . . . A keeper!”—Fresh Fiction

  “Another homerun for Jim and Joyce Lavene. A top-of-the-notch, over the fence mystery read with beloved characters, a fast paced storyline, and a wallop of an ending.”

  —Midwest Book Review

  “Joyce and Jim Lavene provide a fascinating whodunit with unusual but plausible twists and plenty of red herrings.”

  —Genre Go Round Reviews

  “You will enjoy this to no end. Highly recommended.”

  —Mystery Scene Magazine

  “Joyce and Jim Lavene have done it again! This book is filled with plot twists and surprises as the story unfolds, taking us right alongside Peggy as she sifts through the clues to unravel the mystery.” —The Muse Book Reviews

  “A story that would be a perfect combination for plant lovers and mystery buffs.” —Mystery Morgue

  Poisoned Petals

  “Joyce and Jim Lavene are a fabulous team who create poignant, entertaining mysteries. The investigation is cleverly plotted and potted . . . A delightful botany mystery.”

  —The Best Reviews

  “Poisoned Petals blends a love of gardening with a well-plotted murder mystery. It’s an enjoyable and cozy read, perfectly suited for lounging in the garden on a summer day.” —The Muse Book Reviews

  Fruit of the Poisoned Tree

  “I cannot recommend this work highly enough. It has everything: mystery, wonderful characters, sinister plot, humor, and even romance.” —Midwest Book Review

  “All the characters are well drawn and cleverly individualized. The botanical information never gets in the way of the story, and the plot is just complex enough to keep the reader in suspense.”—ReviewingTheEvidence.com

  “I love the world of Dr. Peggy Lee! The Lavenes have a wonderful way of drawing their readers into the world of well-rounded and sympathetic characters . . . Well crafted with a satisfying end that will leave readers wanting more!”

  —Fresh Fiction

  “The authors do a wonderful job of crafting a mystery that is organic to both Peggy’s area of expertise and her personal involvement. Information about plants and gardening is woven seamlessly into the narrative . . . I’m looking forward to much more in this series.”

  —The Romance Readers Connection

  Pretty Poison

  “A fun and informative reading experience . . . With a touch of romance added to this delightful mystery, one can only hope many more Peggy Lee mysteries will be hitting shelves soon!” —Roundtable Reviews

  “A fantastic amateur sleuth mystery . . . Will appeal to men and women of all ages . . . A great tale.” —The Best Reviews

  “Peggy is a great character . . . For anyone with even a modicum of interest in gardening, this book is a lot of fun. There are even gardening tips included.”

  —The Romance Readers Connection

  “The perfect book if you’re looking for a great suspense . . . Pretty Poison is the first in the Peggy Lee Garden Mystery series, and I can’t wait for the next!” —Romance Junkies

  “Joyce and Jim Lavene have crafted an outstanding whodunit in Pretty Poison, with plenty of twists and turns that will keep the reader entranced to the final page. Peggy Lee is a likable, believable sleuth and the supporting characters add spice, intrigue, and humor to the story.” —Fresh Fiction

  “Complete with gardening tips, this is a smartly penned, charming cozy, the first book in a new series. The mystery is intricate and well plotted. Green thumbs and nongardeners alike will enjoy this book.” —Romantic Times

  Berkley Prime Crime titles by Joyce and Jim Lavene

  Peggy Lee Garden Mysteries

  PRETTY POISON

  FRUIT OF THE POISONED TREE

  POISONED PETALS

  PERFECT POISON

  A CORPSE FOR YEW

  Renaissance Faire Mysteries

  WICKED WEAVES

  THE BERKLEY PUBLISHING GROUP

  Published by the Penguin Group

  Penguin Group (USA) Inc.

  375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014, USA

  Penguin Group (Canada), 90 Eglinton Avenue East, Suite 700, Toronto, Ontario M4P 2Y3, Canada

  (a division of Pearson Penguin Canada Inc.)

  Penguin Books Ltd., 80 Strand, London WC2R 0RL, England

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  (a division of Pearson Australia Group Pty. Ltd.)

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  (a division of Pearson New Zealand Ltd.)

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  South Africa

  Penguin Books Ltd., Registered Offices: 80 Strand, London WC2R 0RL, England

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the authors’ imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental. The publisher does not have any control over and does not assume any responsibility for author or third-party websites or their content.

  A CORPSE FOR YEW

  A Berkley Prime Crime Book / published by arrangement with authors

  PRINTING HISTORY

  Berkley Prime Crime mass-market edition / May 2009

  Copyright © 2009 by Joyce Lavene and Jim Lavene.

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced, scanned, or distributed in any printed or electronic form

  without permission. Please do not participate in or encourage piracy of copyrighted materials in

  violation of the authors’ rights. Purchase only authorized editions.

  For information, address: The Berkley Publishing Group,

  a division of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.,

  375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014.

  eISBN : 978-1-101-05059-0

  BERKLEY® PRIME CRIME

  Berkley Prime Crime Books are published by The Berkley Publishing Group,

  a division of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.,

  375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014.

  BERKLEY® PRIME CRIME and the PRIME CRIME logo are trademarks of Penguin Group

  (USA) Inc.

  http://us.penguingroup.com

  For Pat Long,

  publisher of the Weekly Post.

  A great editor
, gardener,

  and friend.

  1

  Muscadine

  Botanical: Vitis rotundifolia

  These grapes are native to the southern United States. They were discovered by Sir Walter Raleigh, who wrote home of their abundance. The Algonquins called muscadine Ascopa, meaning “sweet berry tree.” The Mother Vine is the oldest living vine known, dating from the time of Raleigh, and still grows on the coast of North Carolina. Some vines are male and some are female. Male vines provide pollen but do not produce grapes. Female vines produce flowers that catch the wind-driven pollen from the male vines, and produce fruit.

  “YOU STOMPED ON THAT SKULL, Margaret. Mind your feet!”

  Peggy Lee pulled her booted foot out of the knee-deep mud and debris. She still couldn’t believe she’d agreed to accompany her mother on her outing with the Shamrock Historical Society. One of the first things her mother had done after moving to Charlotte last month was to entrench herself with the local history museum. Somehow, she’d managed to drag Peggy into the group as well.

  It wasn’t that she didn’t enjoy and appreciate history, but plants were more her thing, and she wished she was home in her garden. She looked at some nice, fat cattails as they swayed gently in the afternoon breeze.

  “We need you over here.” Lilla Cranshaw Hughes beckoned her daughter, then lowered her voice. “Please stop daydreaming. You’re making me look bad in front of Mrs. Waynewright. You know she won’t tolerate that.”

  Peggy slogged away from her mother, her redhead’s temper bubbling beneath her calm exterior. Just because her hair was mostly white now didn’t mean she didn’t get just as angry. Especially with her mother. Why she couldn’t be more like her pleasant, even-tempered father, she’d never understand. And why her mother always brought out the worst in her was a lifelong mystery.

  One thing was for sure: She had to find a polite, well-mannered way to get herself out of the historical group with its petty jealousies and problems. She had more important things to do. She had a life her mother’s intrusion had disrupted. She was probably needed at the Potting Shed, her garden shop in Center City. But her cell phone, miserable, traitorous wretch that it was, hadn’t rung in over an hour. Next time, she’d tell her assistant, Selena, to call her.

  Peggy rehearsed over and over what she was going to say to get herself away from her mother for at least an hour. She decided she’d lie, if needed, and tell her that Selena had called, and she had to leave right away. She’d have to call someone to come and get her, since she’d made the mistake of coming out with the group in the museum van. But she wasn’t above that, or lying, to get out of this mess, although a fifty-plus daughter shouldn’t have to lie to her mother anymore.

  “Grab this bucket, Margaret.” Lilla shoved a yellow plastic container toward her daughter. “You can at least do that. Jonathon will take care of handling the bones and such that we find. You probably aren’t trained for that, are you?”

  Peggy snatched the yellow container. She wouldn’t have said if she’d trained twenty years for the job. “No, Mom. I’m a forensic botanist. We look at living matter on bones only if we have to. And I hate to tell you this, but Selena just called from the Potting Shed. I have to go back. Something’s wrong with a shipment, and she needs me.”

  It wasn’t too big a lie, really, Peggy soothed her conscience. Selena was having problems with her boyfriend. She pushed aside a low-hanging muscadine vine as she inched through the heavy mud. A trickle of the spring-fed creek still ran under the mud, keeping it moist, making walking through the stuff even more difficult.

  “They’ll get along without you,” her mother said. “We need you here. Have you ever seen such a mess?”

  Peggy looked around. The worst drought North Carolina had ever seen had brought lake levels down so low that piers stood five feet above dirt where water had once been. Boats were dry-docked. People who lived in expensive lake houses tried to decide if they should get out before it got worse.

  Already many cities in the Piedmont, including Charlotte, were down to less than a three-months’ supply of water. The governor and city officials had declared states of emergency, restricting people to lower water consumption and raising the price of the water they used. The governor had challenged the populace to emulate his twenty-six-second showers in the face of the calamity.

  Brown grass and dirty cars had become badges of heroism in the area as people did without, trying to wait out the drought. Those with green lawns who secretly watered at night paid the price with stiff penalties such as having their water service interrupted. Stores were emptied of low-flow showerheads, and residents put bricks in their toilet tanks to use less water per flush.

  The local wildlife and fish were suffering as well, as the lakes and other water resources dried up in the baking-hot fall sun. Sweltering temperatures added to the problem, causing evaporation and massive fish kills. Deer migrated into the city to find shelter when the leaves fell from the dry trees, and frogs and other amphibians retreated into an early hibernation away from the parched topsoil.

  But Peggy thought the strangest thing she’d seen was Lake Whitley. The hundred-acre lake, created by damming Little Whitley Creek, had completely dried up. Besides the expected pieces of old boats and lost fishing poles where the bottom of the lake had been, there were almost a hundred graves.

  “It’s amazing, isn’t it?” Jonathon Underwood was standing beside Peggy as the ladies of the group—Jonathon was the only man present—argued over who was going to take photos of the find. “Who would’ve thought we’d ever see this village again?”

  “Or these graves.” Peggy looked up at him. Jonathon was well over six feet. She moved her foot away from a chest cavity separated from the head and arms. “Why didn’t they move the graves before they dammed the creek?”

  “They did move some of them, actually,” he told her. “These were the ones left behind. The state charged the relatives of the dead with collecting them and making sure they were moved to higher ground. These people didn’t have any family left to take care of them. Most of the graves are from the early 1800s. As you can imagine, many of their relatives had moved away from the village or died by the early 1900s, when this happened.”

  Peggy had met Jonathon only that morning when they all set out together for the dry lake. He was a sober, serious man with gentle brown eyes and a boyish mop of brown hair. He was the director of the Mecklenburg County History Museum, and was far more patient with her mother and the other ladies than she’d ever be. “Did you know this was under the lake all these years?”

  “Oh, yes. There are maps of the village. You can see over there where the town hall stood.” He pointed to what was left of the structure, little more than four partial stone walls. “And over there is where the school was. Whitley Village was one of the first towns in this area to have its own academy. Teachers came here from across the state to train in their profession, then went on to other schools.”

  There was even less of the impressive academy left. The gray stones were nearly buried in the mud and debris that had covered them for more than a century. “If this place was so important, why did they cover it up? Why not move it?”

  “People were eager for the wealth that electricity would bring to the area.” Jonathon shrugged his shoulders beneath a green T-shirt. “In comparison, history and schooling didn’t mean very much.”

  “So now you reap what you can find out here.” Peggy looked at the scattered bones and upended wooden coffins that filled the mud around them. “What will happen to the bones?”

  “Your mother and the other ladies will make sure they get a proper burial. Mrs. Waynewright is cataloging the bones as we take them out.” He waved to the senior member of the historical society, cheerfully referred to by the other members as the Iron Matron. She didn’t wave back. She was seated on the heavy moss that covered the sides of the lake, a large ledger in her lap. “Most of the graves that were moved earlier are located in
a cemetery over there in the woods. These new remains will be added to that cemetery.” Jonathon looked at Peggy across the top of his wire-rimmed glasses. “Did I hear you say you’re trained as a forensic botanist?”

  “Yes, she is.” Lilla stepped into the conversation. “She taught botany at Queens University for many years. Her specialty is botanical poisons. Now she helps the police and the sheriff’s office investigate crimes. Except when she’s running that little garden shop of hers.”

  “You’re very accomplished.” Jonathon grinned. “I took the six-week course in Raleigh and sometimes work with the police as a forensic historian.”

  “Really?” Peggy’s mother slipped her hand through his arm. “You’re very accomplished as well, Jonathon. Just what does a forensic historian do?”

  “Well, it’s similar to being a forensic botanist,” he explained. “I help discover and sort historical evidence the police can use from a crime scene. I imagine I get a lot fewer calls than Dr. Lee. There aren’t many crimes that involve historical artifacts.”

  “Please, call her Peggy.” Lilla smiled and patted his arm. “She’s a very good cook, too. And she lives in an estate on Queens Road. It’s not actually hers. It belongs to her late husband’s family, but she can live there as long as she likes. Where do you live, Jonathon?”

  Peggy felt the slight bubbling of her temper turn into a full boil. What was she doing? It was obvious. Only her mother would think of setting her up with a man she’d barely met!

  Her phone actually started ringing in the pocket of her jeans. Finally! Grateful for the reprieve, Peggy passed the yellow bucket to her mother and pushed through the bone-littered mud to a rock, where she sat down. “Please tell me something horrible has happened and I have to come home.”