She had wanted more time to study the people in the place she hoped to call home, before saying stupid things that got her scorned. She hesitated.
“We need to find Peggy’s killer before he tries to kill you,” Monty said softly. “Tell us, Fiona.”
He pronounced her name the way it was meant to be pronounced, the way her parents had said it, with the whisper of Ireland in their voices. Sipping her tea so the chai scent wafted around her, she gathered her courage and prepared for the worst. Besides, she needed to make this Monty character back off.
“I could smell fish,” she stated without inflection.
They didn’t laugh. So much for making them back off. Instead, they waited expectantly. She’d never had to explain before, though, so she wasn’t certain how to begin.
“It’s hard to describe.” She set her cup down and gestured helplessly. “The diner I worked in catered to hard-working, blue-collar types, but it also attracted another element. I call them predators. They feed on desperation, and that area of town was pretty desperate.”
“Loan sharks?” Monty suggested.
“Yeah, some of them worked for the cash loan businesses and pawn shops in the area. But mostly. . .” Fiona looked at her tea, knowing how this sounded. “Mostly, I think they were into drugs. I could smell it on them.”
“They smelled like fish?” Aaron suggested with a glimmer of understanding.
“Only because I don’t know how else to describe it. It’s an evil smell of rotten fish, dog poop, bad poultry. . . I’ve never done drugs and don’t know what they smell like, but if that’s what drug-sniffing dogs smell, we’re torturing the poor things.”
“What do I smell of?” Aaron demanded.
That caught her off guard. No one had ever asked that. Fiona stared at him. She thought he honestly wanted to know.
She pushed the tea away so it wouldn’t flavor her senses. “The usual things men use—soap, aftershave, dry-cleaning fluid from your jacket. Then there’s the mustiness of the shop, and this—I don’t know—jungle-exotic tropical scent that I don’t recognize. Plus a clean scent I acquaint with integrity.”
“No dog poop?” he asked in amusement.
“You smell trustworthy, as does our mayor.” Since they seemed to be listening, Fiona turned to the tawny-maned hunk looking as if he’d just bitten a lemon. “I’m only telling you any of this because you don’t smell of fish, or any of those other things that I associate with evil or criminal or perverted.”
“Evil exists,” Aaron announced, facing the mayor. “We keep telling you that. I agree with Fiona, whoever drove that Jag was evil.”
Frowning, Monty finished his coffee and stood. “I’m listening. I don’t like it, but I’m seeing connections. Snakebite guy and another man were in the alley, looking for something. Maybe they were after the bike or dog, just the way the Jag driver was. I think we need to visit our snakebite victim in the hospital and find out. Maybe he smells like the Jag.”
“I want to go shopping,” Fiona stubbornly insisted. “The store is right there. Sukey needs dog food and treats. Until I can have my box shipped, I need a few things. The two of you can visit the hospital. Do you have any idea of what a hospital smells like? Just not going there.”
They both frowned, but they didn’t immediately argue. She picked up her paper tea cup, prepared to stalk out and find her own way home.
Aaron spoke first. “Can you smell people on objects the way I feel them?”
She had to stop and think about that. “Maybe, if it’s something they’ve worn long enough, the way you can smell body odor or anti-perspirant on a shirt you’ve worn all day.”
Monty looked relieved. “Then we can take a picture of him to see if you can identify him, and find his clothes to bring something back for you to smell. Our phones should work here, so we’ll let you know when we’re done and ready to pick you up.”
“Fish is fish,” she warned. “And the chances of me recognizing anyone are small. I mostly worked the kitchen.”
“But knowing if he’s. . . fish. . . is helpful in itself. I doubt that I’ll get much either, but if Monty says this guy might have been stalking the alley, we should check him out.” Aaron headed for the door.
Monty lingered to study her worriedly. “Don’t run, okay? You’re with friends. I know the Lucys say the resort attracts evil the way Hillvale attracts ghosts, but that just means we’re more diligent at keeping out the bad guys. You’re safer with us than anywhere.”
She wanted to say that she was thrown out more often than she ran, but a wealthy man who’d lived in the same place all his life would never understand. She nodded. “If I’m not at the store when you come for me, then it’s because I was taken unwillingly. Okay?”
He looked grim but snorted amusement at her odd perspective. “Thanks, I really needed that threat in my head today.”
“Nothing a good oatmeal-raisin cookie won’t fix,” she assured him.
He practically tugged her out the door. “How did you know they’re my favorites?”
“I can smell your desire for them,” she said, following him down the street. “I recognize the smells of food more than all these other things you’re asking of me.”
“We used to have a cook who baked me raisin treats. I haven’t thought about them in years. My desk job is too sedentary to let me eat sugar these days.”
“Stress is as bad for you as sugar,” she warned. “Everyone should treat themselves occasionally.
“I’ll go surfing the next time I have a few minutes,” he said with self-deprecating derision. He stopped at the crosswalk where he’d have to leave her. “Want me to take the backpack and Sukey?”
Fearing she’d be stopped at the door for looking like a shoplifter wearing these thrift store clothes, Fee reluctantly removed her battered bag. She nuzzled the Yorkie, then handed her over. “Keep the car windows open. The hospital will never let her in.”
He saluted and departed, leaving her feeling oddly abandoned. She hadn’t needed anyone looking out for her in years, but it was just a little piece of nice knowing someone cared enough to be concerned.
She didn’t want it to be a rich authority figure who cared. The privileged were the most dangerous kind of predator, often because they didn’t notice who they walked on in their focus on the goal. And Mayor Monty appeared to be very focused.
She didn’t use her credit card often, but she had one. Not knowing when she’d be in town again, Fee plied it recklessly—for her. She bought Sukey treats and toys, picked up underwear on sale, and replenished her personal supplies. Since Monty still hadn’t called at that point, she added two pocket notebooks from the sale bin to give to Monty and Aaron, and a sparkly turquoise scarf for Dinah. She found a flowy flowered skirt for a steal and decided she deserved something feminine for a change. Maybe she’d get to go in Delphines front door someday.
As she paid for her purchases, she worried that the men hadn’t called. Maybe the victim was awake and talking. That would be good, wouldn’t it? If Snakebite Guy knew the Jag driver, they could lay Peggy’s spirit to rest, and justice would have been done.
Maybe she could ask Mariah-the-Computer-Expert to find out if Peggy had family to take care of her daughter.
Outside in a chilly spring wind, she studied the shopping center to see if she could do any more damage to her pocket. Spying a bakery, she headed that way. She didn’t hold out much hope. This late in the day, bakeries had a limited selection. And many bakeries bought their goods from a factory that used unnatural ingredients she wouldn’t put in her mouth.
She knew this was a good one the moment she opened the door. Her phone rang just as she handed over her card to pay for her purchase.
“We’re on our way,” Monty said into her ear.
He sounded even more unhappy than he had earlier. Fiona took the bag of cookies and headed out the door. “Did he talk?” she asked into her cell.
“Snakebite Guy and the psycho Jag driver
are the same person, and he’s dead. Aaron says it wasn’t from venom.” He clicked off.
A dark cloud passed over the sun and Fiona shivered in the increasingly chilly wind.
Ten
Wednesday, late afternoon
When presented with the Jag driver’s shirt that Monty and Aaron had confiscated from the hospital, Fiona turned gray again and shoved it away, muttering fish.
Oh hell, Monty didn’t care if a Lucy was cracked, but Fee. . . just looked as if she needed someone to feed her, and presumably not fish.
She studied his phone image of the dead man, but he saw no signs of recognition as she shook her head and handed it back to him.
By that, he deduced Snakebite Guy smelled of drugs but Fee didn’t know him. Not useful. Aaron’s weird gift hadn’t helped either since the patient had been dead and thus didn’t have any thoughts or emotions that could leave impressions.
Picking up the imprints of murderous intent on the IV bag had simply complicated life.
Before Aaron walked off to his van, Fee removed two notepads from her bags. “In case you see any more license plates,” she said, handing one to each of them. “Sometimes, paper is better.”
Aaron looked a little stunned at the sparkly notepad with the tiny pencil attached, as if no one had ever given him a gift before. The new Lucy didn’t wait for response but just performed her turtle act and slid into the Beamer’s passenger seat. Monty instantly jotted down reminders of what he needed to tell Walker when they returned to town. And then he wrote THANK YOU on a clean page and handed it to her when he got in the car.
Holding Sukey in her lap, she shot him a shy smile and tucked the note into her shirt pocket. Sometimes, paper did work better than electronics.
While Aaron took his van down the mountain, Monty drove back to Hillvale at a less than cautious speed, knowing they were late returning Fiona to work. Once he parked, she jumped out of the car, grabbed her backpack, dog, and shopping bags, and halted a second to shove a sweet-smelling paper sack at him.
“Thank you, I think,” she said, before running for her apartment.
Monty just sat there for a moment, probably looking as shell-shocked as Aaron had earlier. As best as he could tell, Fee had nothing. She’d been sleeping in a shack. He knew Dinah hadn’t paid her in anything but food. But she was giving him presents—for taking her to the store? What kind of person did that in this day and age?
He opened the fragrant bakery sack, knowing what he’d find inside. Despite the grim day they’d spent, his whole outlook brightened at the sight of the enormous cookie. Like a kid, he sat in his car, savoring plump raisins, brown sugar, and oatmeal. Eating sweets instead of exercising his frustration was a bad habit to get into, but the thoughtfulness of Fee’s small gift made it even sweeter. He’d been given bigger, more expensive gifts that hadn’t impressed him half as much as this heartfelt one.
Now that the presumed Jag driver was dead, Monty hoped Fee was safe, but if Aaron was to be believed, the driver had been murdered. People didn’t get killed in their beds for nothing. Carrying the memory of the two men in the alley, he had a nagging suspicion that this wasn’t the last they’d see of fishy strangers.
He had already phoned ahead with the news about the Jag driver. Finishing his cookie, Monty tracked Walker down in his office. His extremely competent and well-connected police chief was waiting for him with a sheaf of print-outs. At least the cookie had given him the courage to read them.
“Snakebite Guy’s name is Ramon, a Waterville gang member. The sheriff won’t be able to label him as Peggy’s killer without evidence that stands up in court. Smells and impressions don’t cut it,” Walker said curtly. “We need fingerprints and witnesses. If we’re going to accept that Ramon was actually the Jag driver, and he’s dead, I don’t see much point in wasting our limited resources to hunt evidence to prove he was Peggy’s killer. What we need to do is make the sheriff see that he was killed in his hospital bed for a reason.”
“First, you have to convince him Ramon didn’t die of snake bite so they’ll do an autopsy. They won’t buy Aaron’s reading on an IV bag.” Monty dropped into one of Walker’s ancient leather chairs. “The nurses were upset because they thought Ramon was recovering. We planted suggestions, but that’s our limit. And at the time, we didn’t know he might be connected to drugs. Fiona gave us that later, from the smell of his shirt.”
Even wanting to believe her, Monty had difficulty in doing so. He supposed drugs had a smell dogs could detect, so there was no reason Fiona couldn’t. He just didn’t think the county sheriff would listen to Lucy weirdness.
“I’ve pulled Ramon’s criminal record. It’s pretty extensive. Your girl is on the right track.”
Monty rubbed his temple. “Fee called the fishy guys evil,” he reported with a sigh.
“Evil isn’t illegal, but this character was part of a drug cartel known to operate in Waterville, which makes him a criminal.” Walker shoved another paper across the desk. “The sheriff knows all this, but he’ll still figure there’s one less crook on the street and move on. He has no reason to believe Peggy wasn’t an accident victim, and there’s nothing in Peggy’s background to connect her with Ramon—except our Lucys.”
Monty glared at the papers in the dim light from the overhead. He was pretty sure he was studying Fiona’s credit report and what appeared to be her Social Services report and not Ramon’s criminal record. He hadn’t even been able to persuade her last name out of her. “Fiona Malcolm McDonald?” he asked in incredulity.
Malcolms were extremely well connected Lucys—or had been in the past, if the Lucys were to be believed. Keegan Ives had a castle library full of their eccentric journals. The town owned a priceless painting from a Malcolm who painted the future. Did Fiona know any of this? “How the hell did you get her name and these reports?”
Walker scowled. “She could be in serious danger. I had to find out why. I called the store where you said she was shopping and got her credit card information. You’re the one who gave me her most recent address. How did you pry it out of her?”
“We convinced her that her roommate could be in trouble if bad guys were after her, and she should let Aaron pick up her stuff. Telling any Lucy that someone else might be harmed is an auto-trigger.” Studying the reports of Fee’s sad life, Monty wished his police chief hadn’t looked. No wonder she didn’t talk about herself.
A Social Services report! Weren’t they supposed to be private? He studied the huge file with long lists of addresses and names. She’d lived in all these places? For how long? What the hell kind of childhood was that?
“Good thing you got her to talk when you did,” Walker said, sitting back in his chair. “Aaron called just before you came in. He said her apartment had been broken into Monday night, just before Fee arrived in Hillvale. The roomie is freaking and moving out. The landlord said he’d been threatened by two Hispanics with guns. I have men over there now to lift fingerprints and show him pictures of some of Ramon’s pals. Some really bad people are looking for our new waitress.”
Monty’s stomach sank to his feet. Studying the lengthy list of Fiona’s childhood foster homes, he knew she couldn’t have accumulated many possessions. His gut clenched around the cookie she’d given him. “Did Aaron retrieve her box of belongings?”
“Yeah, the bastards just emptied her box all over the floor, along with everything the roommate owned. The roomie couldn’t say if anything was taken. Aaron took a look, said the box was mostly clothes and mementoes. I don’t think our girl was buying jewels and living off drug money.” Walker hesitated, then gave the bad news. “The roomie told the creeps where Fee was going.”
Monty did a mental calculation and fought down bile. “The thieves knew she was coming here before Peggy was killed? There was time for them to drive up here after they broke into her place?”
Walker nodded and pushed his chair back from the desk. “Waterville is only an hour down the mountain by car. They
asked about the dog. For what it’s worth, I think the thieves are after it and not Fee. Although judging from what they did to Peggy, they’re not above killing a witness or getting vengeance for taking the mutt.”
“She needs to move on again,” Monty said dully, wondering why that bothered him.
“She’ll never be safer than where she is now,” Walker asserted. “Aaron has security alarms and cameras all over his building. Dinah’s café is always occupied. Dinah herself is a force to be reckoned with.”
Monty wanted to believe that. He was all about circling the wagons and shooting the bad guys. But realistically. . . Fee probably wouldn’t leave Hillvale even if he bought her tickets to Paris. He suspected that under all that quiet reticence was a stubborn streak a mile wide.
Walker stood up. “The question just becomes, how much do we tell the Lucys and what do we do about the dog?”
“If you tell your wife anything, the Lucys will know more than we do by dawn,” Monty said with as much admiration as aggravation at their grapevine. Lucys would circle the wagons and arm them with ghosts. Maybe he stayed in Hillvale because it beat the hell out of watching TV.
“Good point. It’s kind of like a reverse witch hunt, where the witches do the hunting. I’d be amused, if we weren’t talking about killers.” Walker opened his office door and gestured for Monty to proceed him. “Aaron should be back shortly, so the argument of what we tell them becomes moot.”
“We’re not talking ghosts this time,” Monty said wearily. “They can’t line up ghostcatchers around town to keep out killers.”
Monty still wanted to pack up Fiona and haul her to a luxury suite in San Francisco surrounded by security guards, but he figured that was just his libido talking. And it reminded him that he still didn’t have a place of his own. He’d have to go back to the lodge tonight.
Maybe he’d set up a cot at the foot of Aaron’s stairs. The mutt could keep him company.
Azure Secrets Page 8
