The Ugly Truth

by Jill Orr

  We will try again tomorrow with Self-Care Exercise #2 that will focus on packing up your emotional baggage and hope for a better outcome. #bonvoyage #hastalavistapsychictrauma

  Yours in Loving Alignment,

  Regina H,

  Personal Romance Concierge™ and F.L.Y.

  Guy™-in-training

  Click.com

  CHAPTER 11

  TUESDAY

  Our editorial obituary for Sunday’s paper was for a man named Jonathan Klondike, the founder of the local chapter of the Kiwanis Club. He’d died from complications of a staph infection he’d contracted after going on a church mission to help flood victims. He’d lived an admirable life and touched many in our community. I was excited to read Flick’s obit as both another set of eyes and his protégée. I always learned something when I read Flick’s writing. He started writing obituaries later in his career, like Granddaddy, and maybe because of that, his read more like profile pieces than tributes. It was a true talent to make readers forget the subject they were reading about had recently died, something Flick did quite well. He’d often receive letters from friends and families thanking him for bringing their loved ones to life again on the page.

  I went by Flick’s office to see if he was in yet, but the lights were off, door closed. I walked down the hall to Holman’s office, same deal there. He hadn’t texted or called since yesterday, which wasn’t totally unusual, but radio silence from him was never a good sign. I knocked on the door to Kay’s office.

  “Have you heard from Holman today?”

  “Mmm,” she said, distracted. “No, I don’t think so.”

  “Me neither. Maybe the Stormer Window investigation is heating up?”

  “What Stormer Window investigation?” she asked without taking her eyes off her laptop screen.

  “You know, the piece he’s working on about the complaints to the BBB and possible tax fraud?”

  Kay looked up at me, blank. “First I’m hearing of it.”

  Holman had told me specifically that Kay had given him that story. Why would he lie about that? I didn’t want to throw Holman under the bus if he was working on something privately. “Oh, well,” I said, “maybe I got it wrong.”

  Kay nodded and went back to reading whatever was on her computer screen, which was clearly more important to her than Holman’s current whereabouts. I left her to her work and went back to my cubicle to call Holman. He picked up on the second ring.

  “So what’s on your agenda today?” I asked, trying to keep my voice casual. I didn’t want to tip him off that I was on to him.

  “I’ve got some sensitive sources to follow up with, so I’m making calls from home.”

  “On the Stormer piece?”

  A brief pause. “Yes.”

  “How’s it going? You getting anywhere?”

  “Um, yes,” he said, suddenly sounding less sure of himself. “It’s a complex story.”

  “BZZT!” I blurted out. Several heads in the newsroom turned. I pressed the phone to my ear and lowered my voice. “I just talked to Kay. I know there’s no Stormer investigation!”

  Another brief pause. “Good work, Riley. I am actually very impressed—”

  “Don’t even try to change the subject by complimenting me!” I whisper-hissed. “What are you working on? And why are you lying to me about it?”

  Holman sighed. “I take no pleasure in lying to you, believe me, so you have to know that the only reason I would is if I thought it was in your best interest.”

  “What does that even mean? Does this have something to do with Flick?” I said, thinking that was exactly the same kind of overly protective rationale Flick was using to keep me in the dark about Granddaddy.

  “Flick? No, why?”

  The surprise in his voice was enough to convince me his behavior and Flick’s were unrelated. “Never mind,” I snapped. “Tell me what you’re working on that’s so important you have to lie to me about it!”

  “I can’t do that,” he said softly. “I’m sorry.”

  “I can’t believe you don’t trust me, Holman. After everything we’ve been through.”

  “It’s not that…it’s just…complicated.”

  I was about to launch into a rant about how that is the lamest excuse ever when my phone bleeped, alerting me I had another call. I checked the screen: Hal Flick. Of course now he calls. I growled into the phone, “I have to go, but make no mistake: This isn’t over.” And before I even waited for his goodbye, I clicked over.

  “Riley?” I could barely hear Flick’s voice over the noise in the background. It sounded like he was standing on a runway or something, a combination of high-pitched whining and the deeper whooshing sound of air being displaced. “Can you hear me?”

  “Barely,” I said. “Where are you?”

  “Riley, if you can hear me, I want you to know I’m going on another trip, but I’ll be back in a couple of days. The Klondike obit is done. I just need you to give it a final proof. I’ll email it to you. Can you do that?”

  The machinery sounds were getting louder. I could hear the beeping sound of a truck backing up along with some shouting between anonymous personnel in the background. I pushed the phone closer to my ear. “Yeah sure, but…is everything all right?”

  “I’m sorry,” Flick was practically screaming now. “I can’t hear you real well, but everything’s fine. I don’t want you to worry. I’m following a lead over on Chincoteague Island.”

  “Chincoteague?” I felt a few people look over. I was talking too loud for the relatively quiet newsroom, but I didn’t care.

  “They’re telling me I have to go,” Flick shouted. The repetitive thump-woosh-thump-woosh sound was quickening. It sounded like a helicopter getting ready for takeoff. “Don’t worry. I’ll be in touch as soon as I can.”

  And then the line went dead.

  CHAPTER 12

  I spent the next forty-five minutes going through the Klondike piece Flick sent and trying not to perseverate over what he was looking into on Chincoteague Island. He’d promised I could be his partner on this investigation when “the time was right”—whatever that meant—so there was no point obsessing about it until he decided to share.

  It was a chilly, gray day, typical of Virginia in November, and I’d chosen to drive to work that morning instead of braving the ten-minute walk. I had parked my green Nissan Cube, which I’d affectionately named Oscar, around back of the Times office in the shared parking lot for a few of the businesses on our side of the square. I glanced over to the spot where Rosalee would normally be parked, expecting it would be empty as it had been every day since she disappeared. But it wasn’t. Ryan’s massive truck was there. I knocked on the back door of the Tavern.

  “Hi!” A fresh-faced Ridley beamed at me as she opened the door. She wore no makeup but looked like she had just walked out of one of those commercials for face wash—bright-eyed and smooth-skinned—and when she leaned in to kiss me on both cheeks, I noticed her long blond hair felt even thicker and silkier than normal. Motherhood definitely agreed with her.

  “So happy you came by! Come in, come in!” She looked down at my bandaged pinky finger. “What happened to your hand?”

  “Collateral damage from self-care.”

  She crinkled her brows together, still smiling widely like she wasn’t sure if I was joking or not.

  “Just a minor burn. It’s nothing.”

  “I have the perfect salve for burns! It’s an old family recipe—my mother taught me never to be in a kitchen without it. I have some in my purse, c’mon.”

  I followed her through the narrow hallway toward the kitchen. She had on a black-and-white-striped three-quarter sleeve T-shirt with faded (pre-pregnancy) jeans and tall black Hunter boots. She wore Lizzie, the perfect accessory, against her chest in one of those brightly colored baby slings.

  Ryan, who was moving boxes around the cramped kitchen, looked up when I walked in. “Hey, Riles. What’re you doing here?” I couldn’t he
lp but notice his voice didn’t have its usual warmth. And that there was no hug hello this time.

  “Just passing by and saw your truck,” I said. “So you guys are really doing this?”

  “We are going to open for business tomorrow!” Ridley practically squealed with delight.

  “Where do you want these?” Ryan asked Ridley, holding up two large cardboard file boxes.

  “Um,” Ridley said, looking around the small space, “put them in the office for now. I’ll try to find a better place later.”

  Ridley and I flattened ourselves against the walls while Ryan scooted past us to put the boxes away.

  “I don’t know how Rosalee functioned in here—it’s tiny,” Ridley said.

  “So,” I said, looking around the chaotic kitchen. “Tomorrow? Really?”

  She nodded and went back to stacking cans on the wire shelves against the back wall. “Yes. Melvin will cook, Maddie will come over and work the lunch shift like always, I’ll keep everything moving along—it’ll be great! We’re just going to do breakfast and lunch at first while we figure out what we’re doing, but isn’t it exciting?”

  Exciting wasn’t exactly the word I would have chosen. Rosalee was missing and suspected of some very serious criminal activity—not the least of which was murder—and Ridley and Ryan were just moving right on into her restaurant and taking over. It was kind of unbelievable.

  “So Rosalee is really okay with this?”

  “I told you,” Ryan said, sounding slightly irritated. “She said she was fine with Ridley running things for her while she’s gone.”

  “Yeah, but…” I wasn’t sure exactly how to articulate my concerns. They were both acting so blasé about the whole thing. “Is she even planning to come back? She’s in a lot of trouble, you know.”

  “She actually seemed really concerned about her customers. I think she feels a real responsibility to the people of Tuttle Corner,” Ridley said.

  I thought that was a little dramatic. It wasn’t like the people of Tuttle Corner were going to starve if Rosalee’s Tavern remained closed. Why would a woman on the run, wanted for questioning in the deaths of two people, be so concerned with keeping her business open? But both Ryan and Ridley didn’t see it as strange, or they didn’t want to talk about it, so I changed the subject. “Hey, did Rosalee buy anything else when she was in your store that day?” I asked Ryan.

  “Yeah,” Ryan said. “Carl asked me the same thing. She had a key made.”

  “Like a house key?”

  “Nah,” he said, relocating a large cardboard box to the other side of the stainless-steel island. “I don’t think so, it was shorter and thinner than that. Cash had a helluva time finding a blank that would match it.”

  “Do you know what it was for?”

  He shook his head. “You know Rosalee. She didn’t say a whole lot, and it wasn’t my business to ask.”

  “Ridley,” I said, turning my attention to her. “You said you didn’t know where Rosalee was contacting you from, only that she was safe. What did she say exactly when she called you?”

  “She didn’t call, she texted.”

  “What did the text say?”

  She took out her phone, scrolled through, and then handed it to me. The text read: Had to leave sooner than I thought. Melvin has keys, deliveries made after close on M,W,F. Thank u.

  “Hmm,” I said. “Not much there.”

  Ryan took a step closer to Ridley and said, “Remember you’re talking to the press here, babe.”

  Babe?

  “Riley isn’t the press,” Ridley said, flashing a warm smile my way. “Well, she isn’t only the press—she’s our friend. And she’s Rosalee’s friend too.”

  “He’s right,” I said, still a little thrown off at Ryan’s use of the word babe. “I mean, I am your friend, but I’m also a reporter working on this story. I’m trying to find out the truth.”

  “Of course,” Ridley said.

  Just then Lizzie started crying.

  “Oh min älskling, are you hungry?” Ridley looked down at the fussing baby. “Does it bother you if I feed her?” She already had her hand down her shirt. Of course I didn’t mind, but in another second or two I’d be confronted with what was undoubtedly the most perfect breast since Aphrodite roamed the planet. I didn’t think my ego could take that.

  “Go right ahead,” I said, turning away. “I’ll give you some privacy. I’ve got to get going anyway. I’ll call you later, though, okay?”

  “Okay,” Ryan and Ridley said in unison.

  We all stopped for half a second as the oddity of the interaction set in. Two months ago, that comment could only have been meant for Ryan, but now…now we had this three-headed monster of a friendship going on. It was strange, new territory for us all.

  “I meant Ridley,” I said awkwardly.

  “I win,” Ridley winked at Ryan, who turned away, annoyed, and I made a beeline for the back door, ready to leave Ryan and Ridley (and her perfect breasts) behind.

  CHAPTER 13

  While I was out, I decided to check in with the mysterious Mr. Holman. Or maybe check up on him was a better way to put it. I pulled into the parking lot of Holman’s apartment complex and saw his car. Sweet, I thought, he’s home.

  I had only been to Holman’s apartment a couple of times before. If we hung out away from the office, it was usually at my house or a coffee shop. His place was a first-floor, two-bedroom unit and typical of a single guy’s—kind of messy and not a lot of emphasis on décor. Unless you count Lego sets as décor. Holman had put up IKEA shelving units on three of the four walls in his living room for the sole purpose of showcasing his Lego sets. He had the Millennium Falcon, the Hogwarts Castle, and all of the Lord of the Rings sets. I estimated that over the course of his lifetime, Will Holman had probably spent the GDP of a small country on Legos.

  Holman finally came to the door after I knocked a second time. “Riley.” He did not sound happy to see me. That was definitely unusual.

  “Hey,” I said, “just thought I’d come by and make sure you’re doing okay.” I tried to peek around him.

  “That is very kind of you,” he said without moving or inviting me inside. “I’m fine. Just busy.”

  “Busy with what?”

  “Work.”

  “The story you can’t tell me about?”

  His eyes darted to the side. “Yes. And I actually have an appointment, so I really have to get goin—”

  Holman was an interesting guy for a lot of reasons, but one of them was that he had certain peculiarities. He ate the same thing for lunch every day for the past three years (a peanut butter and jelly sandwich on whole-grain white Bunny bread). He wore only light khaki pants from American Eagle, size 32 × 36. And he was almost incapable of lying. And yet he stood before me, for the second time in as many days, and lied right to my face.

  “What are you hiding from me, Will Holman?”

  He blinked. Then he blinked again. And again.

  “Don’t bother denying it. Your nervous blinking is a dead giveaway.” I pushed on the door and moved past him into the living room, expecting to see something shocking. I was ready to let out a triumphant “aha!” but when I got into the room, there was nothing there. His laptop sat open on the ottoman across from his ugly brown cloth sofa, a can of ginger ale on the side table next to him.

  “Riley,” Holman said as he walked over to his laptop and closed it, “I told you. I’m working on something that I’m just not ready to share with you yet.”

  I looked around his place like a jealous girlfriend. I glanced into the kitchen, peered down the hallway, peeked behind the curtains. I was looking for any evidence that might explain his strange behavior but didn’t see anything suspicious. I did, however, smell something.

  I sniffed the air. “What is that?”

  Holman blinked rapidly three times. “What is what?”

  “That smell.” I moved closer to the kitchen. “It smells buttery and toasty…” I
t was too late for lunch and too early for dinner, and besides, this didn’t smell like Holman-food. It smelled heavenly. And vaguely familiar, but I couldn’t put my finger on what it was.

  “Are you cooking something?” I stepped past him to get closer to the kitchen and was hit with another scent. “And are you wearing cologne?”

  “Riley, I’m really going to have to ask you to lea—” Holman was now blinking like a toad in a hailstorm.

  And then things started to lock into place. The secrecy. The cooking. The blinking. The cologne. Maybe Holman wasn’t hiding something work-related from me. Maybe he was hiding something of a more personal nature.

  “Holman,” I said, a grin sliding across my face. “Do you have a date?”

  For a moment he looked so uncomfortable that he might spontaneously combust, but an instant later his face changed. “Yes, that is it. You’ve figured it out.” He put two long-fingered hands on each of my shoulders and led me toward the door. “I have a date. And she’ll be here soon, so you understand why I’m in such a hurry.”

  Holman had a date? I couldn’t believe it. I had never heard him say anything remotely resembling a romantic interest in a woman—or man, for that matter—in all the months I’d known him. I was shocked. “Who is she?” I asked. “Anyone I know?”

  “No.” Holman had the door open and me halfway out. “She’s new to the area, and I don’t want her to get the wrong idea if she gets here and sees me pushing a pretty girl out the door…”

  Aw, he said I was pretty. “Okay, okay, I’ll go,” I said, smiling. “But text me later and tell me how it went. Promise?”

  Holman’s face was fifty shades of red. “Fine. Okay.”

  I walked down the concrete path toward the parking lot, but before I got far I turned back around. “And Holman, maybe don’t analyze the symmetry of her face. Or comment on the size of her feet. Or guess her IQ.”