Cassidy Kincaid Mysteries Box Set

by Amy Waeschle

  The white stone patio held a free-standing bench swing and two other chairs made of shiny, honey-colored wood. Several large trees sprouted from a green planter between the garage and the entrance to the house, creating a swath of shade. Cassidy’s flip flops scuffed the stone pavers dusted with windblown grit and pine needles. Either Charlie wasn’t the housekeeping type, or he wasn’t here.

  Or he’s too busy with a house guest to sweep his patio.

  Swallowing the sour lump in her throat, Cassidy stepped up to the front door and knocked. Cassidy couldn’t resist peeking inside the dark windows. A shaded hallway led to another room in the back of the house. The space was empty. A gust of hot wind swirled around the corners of the house, stirring the scraggly pine branches. After a long moment of waiting, she moved to the side of the house and peered in the windows again. This room was an office and showed signs of use. She noticed small, neat piles of 8 ½ x 11 paper stacked on the floor—chapters. She realized that she was looking at Charlie’s book. Several coffee cups had been abandoned in various places: the desk, the small table beside the large leather chair in the corner, the floor near a red pen.

  So Charlie was here, just . . . out. But was Izzy with him? Cassidy imagined the two of them enjoying a luxurious lunch together, with Izzy entertaining him of stories about the weeks of field camp he’d missed.

  Cassidy moved to the rear of the house, passing a guest room—bed tightly made, vacuum marks on the carpet)—to a view of the kitchen through a large patio door. Though the space was neat—no dirty dishes in the sink, for example, Cassidy noticed little clues of occupancy, like the stools at the breakfast bar unevenly pushed in, a glass of water sitting on the counter, the silver fridge door surface marred with smudges. With a tight feeling in her gut, she noticed the large basket of brightly colored toys on the floor. As well, there was a sandbox off of the patio with a child’s oversized yellow dump truck on its side and a set of lime-green teacups and pink teakettle set up in one of the corners. These had to be for Charlie’s young children.

  Continuing around the house, the dry ground grinding beneath her soles, Cassidy tried to think up a plan. Should she wait for Charlie to return? Bend was too big of a town to go looking for him. His papers were here, so he would be back, but when?

  And would Izzy be with him?

  A noise coming from the edge of the woods startled her, and she jumped back, her heart racing. Panic filled her chest and it became difficult to get a breath. Her eyes darted everywhere, searching for the threat.

  “Charlie?” she called out.

  A deer lifted her head from where she had been grazing twenty feet away, her ears twitching. Her perfect coloring had helped her blend seamlessly into the clump of shadowed trees. Still spooked, Cassidy took a few steps forward to get a better view of the driveway. Her car waited patiently, engine still ticking as it cooled, the hood and windshield splattered with crushed bugs, but otherwise empty. Cassidy sighed, her shoulders rolling forward in relief. Cassidy continued around the house, peeking in the garage’s side windows, noticing a snow blower, shelves of boxes, a rusty chest freezer. But no vehicle.

  Completing her loop back to the driveway, Cassidy heard the sound of an engine. She squinted, finding the vehicle by tracing the line of dust in the air. Charlie’s white truck came into view, flashing in and out of the trees. She watched him spot her car as he neared, an unmistakable frown that he quickly hid by the time he pulled into the driveway.

  “Dr. Kincaid, what a surprise,” he said, stepping down from his side of the truck and swinging the door shut. He flashed her his signature charismatic smile, his blue eyes crinkling at the edges. It was no secret that students developed quarter-long crushes on him, with his perpetually tanned face, lively blue eyes, and an athletic frame, though she could never remember from what sport—rugby? Water polo? She had always admired his patience with students and his enthusiasm for teaching—her weaknesses—but was glad she didn’t have students fawning over her. The idea made her want to puke.

  “Why aren’t you in Hawaii?” he asked. “I thought you were headed there to save the day.”

  Cassidy shook her head, stifling the retort on her tongue. “I leave Tuesday,” she replied, her voice sounding strained. “I’ve been trying to call you,” Cassidy said, switching gears. A feather of nerves scraped against her insides at what she was about to say.

  He gave her a playful scorn. “Is this about the belt?” he asked. “Don’t tell me you drove all the way out here to return it,” he added, lifting an eyebrow.

  “No, I . . . gave it to Martin,” she said, her smile feeling tight. “I didn’t think I’d see you so soon.”

  Charlie’s face shifted, his eyes filling with confusion for just an instant. Then, a flash of something else. Fear, maybe?

  “Izzy Ford is missing,” she said.

  “What do you mean, ‘missing’?” he asked, tilting his head slightly, as if he couldn’t quite hear her.

  Cassidy crossed her arms and leaned against the hot hood of her car. She told Charlie everything she knew about the gas station, Izzy’s abandoned backpack, and the pressure to find her.

  Charlie’s face slowly paled. “She’s not here,” he said.

  Cassidy squinted. “Have you seen her?”

  “No,” he replied.

  “You didn’t give her a ride from Biggs?”

  “No,” he said, more forcefully.

  “Okay,” Cassidy said. “Has she tried to contact you?” she continued, trying to determine if he might be lying. The highway at that intersection led directly here. All Izzy would have had to do is flash some skin and stick out her thumb. Or call Charlie from town for a ride.

  Charlie shook his head, his trademark faded hiking boots scuffing the pavers as he scraped away a tuft of dry grass poking through a crack.

  “Look, a lot of shit is going to rain down on us if I don’t find her. You know who her dad is, right?”

  Charlie’s head popped up. “Yeah, I know.” His eyes looked pinched.

  “I stood there at that intersection in Biggs,” Cassidy said. “There’s nothing there, Charlie. I have two ideas. One is that she came here to see you.” She paused to take in his reaction, but his face didn’t change. “Or two, she was on her way south. Sacramento, maybe, or further, I don’t know.”

  “Huh,” Charlie said.

  “I don’t care what you two did, if she was here,” Cassidy said, remembering the rumor Martin had told her about. She thought again of the toys in the kitchen and the sandbox.

  “We didn’t do anything!” Charlie hissed. He ran his hand through his hair. “Fuck! She was here, okay?”

  Cassidy’s chest cavity emptied in a sudden whoosh. “She was?”

  “Yes,” Charlie growled, looking like he’d just swallowed a lemon.

  “Is she still here?” Cassidy asked, peering at the windows of the truck, as if she might find Izzy’s face framed there. Or was she in the house, hiding?

  “She left this morning,” Charlie said, pinching the bridge of his nose. “I was just out looking for her.”

  “Oh,” Cassidy said, the questions she had been planning to pepper Charlie with evaporating. “Why were you looking for her?”

  “I don’t know,” he sighed. “She was . . . upset, last night. I was worried, I guess.”

  “Upset about what?” Cassidy asked.

  “She wouldn’t tell me,” Charlie replied. A sing-song ring tone chirped from his pocket. Immediately, Charlie checked the screen, then tucked the phone back into his pocket.

  “Is it Izzy?” Cassidy asked.

  “No!” he growled.

  Cassidy huffed in frustration. “If you’ve slept with her, this whole thing is going to blow up, Charlie!”

  “Is that what you think?” He ran his hand through his hair again. “Fuck.” A long pause strained the silence between them.

  “Did she text you yesterday?” Cassidy asked, thinking of how Izzy had been so absorbed in her texting
at the rest area that Martin had yelled at her to get in the van.

  “No,” Charlie said, shaking his head. “Before yesterday, I hadn’t heard from her since I left field camp.” He gave her a sideways look, and she could see the strain in his eyes. “She shows up here last night,” he finally said. “I had my phone off. I was writing all day.” He flicked a tuft of pine needles from the hood of his truck. “She said she wanted to see my place.” He shook his head. “She’s a good kid.” He seemed to chew on this for a minute, then sighed. “I let her stay the night, but that’s all,” he added, his voice calmer, though Cassidy heard the effort behind it. “This morning I wake up and she’s gone. I don’t know where she is now.”

  “Okay,” Cassidy said, trying to suppress her irritation. “Can we sit down and talk about this?” she asked, wanting to get a look inside the cabin.

  “There’s nothing more to talk about.” He pushed off his truck. “I’ve told you all I know.”

  “You haven’t told me why she was upset. Or why she came here in the first place. Or how she knew your address. I had to get it from Martin.”

  Charlie grimaced.

  “Martin will never be able to teach again because of this. Is that what you want? For his career to be ruined? Things aren’t looking too rosy for me either.”

  “Of course I don’t want that,” Charlie scoffed, his eyes angry.

  “He’ll be charged with neglect. I will too, probably, even though I wasn’t driving the van.”

  “But it sounds like Izzy took off. That’s hardly anyone’s fault.”

  “We’re talking about Preston Ford, here, remember?”

  Charlie hugged himself and exhaled a hard breath.

  “Also, Richard is being pressured to keep this quiet because of Dominique Gilardi.” Cassidy watched Charlie’s eyes widen. “If we can avoid another story about a missing student, the dean would appreciate it.” Cassidy paused. “If I can find her, I can fix this.”

  Cassidy was about to explain the impact this would have on field camp, which could be axed for this. Nobody would come to school at U. of O. for geology again. Cassidy could see the department slowly crumpling on itself. Without students, the professors wouldn’t have teaching jobs, and without that, they wouldn’t be able to do their research. Grant money would dry up. It might take a few years, but the department would lose everything—the labs, their reputation, the staff. Everything.

  But Charlie had closed his eyes, looking pale. “Shit,” he said.

  Cassidy could almost see the gears turning in his head. “What’s wrong?” she asked.

  “Dominique,” Charlie said, finally making eye contact with her again. “I forgot.”

  “Forgot what?” Cassidy said, her frustration boiling out of control. “Charlie, what the hell is going on?” Every volcano had its trigger—whether it be pressure, an earthquake, or movement of the tectonic plates beneath. Right now, Cassidy was at her trigger point.

  “I forgot that they were friends.” He shook his head. “When Dominique disappeared, Izzy came to my office, really upset.”

  “Was she with Dominique last night?” Cassidy asked, bracing herself for Charlie’s answer.

  He shook his head. “But I think she may have talked to her.”

  Cassidy felt the air leave her lungs. “Okay, tell me everything.”

  “None of this gets to my wife,” Charlie said in a quiet voice. “Okay?” He looked at her for understanding. “It has nothing to do with where she went, anyways. I’m sure of it.”

  Cassidy felt a rush of goosebumps rise on her arms. “Okay,” she said.

  Charlie took a deep breath. “So, she shows up here.” He glanced at the front door. “Out of the blue. Big smile, all that.”

  Cassidy imagined herself as a bird perched high in the aspen tree near the front door, observing Izzy’s long hair loose and her lean, tanned legs.

  “I let her in. She didn’t say anything about ditching field camp. I would have made her set things right if I had known that.” He looked at her. “That’s the truth.”

  “I believe you,” Cassidy said, which was true.

  Charlie gazed to a point somewhere beyond Cassidy’s shoulder. “She said she was just passing through.”

  “But she didn’t have a car. Didn’t you think that was weird?”

  Charlie shrugged. “She said she was on a road trip with friends.”

  “Then where were they?”

  Charlie’s face flashed with irritation. “C’mon, I’m not her mother. She caught me off guard. I honestly didn’t give it much thought.”

  Cassidy let it go. She needed his cooperation more than she needed to scold him for fucking this up.

  “She said she was camping and would meet up with her friends later.” Charlie took a slow breath, and Cassidy wondered if he was reliving whatever had happened between them one last time so he could sweep it under the rug. A shudder passed through her—how could Charlie, a professor, seduce one of his own students?

  “It got late,” he finally said. “I let her stay.”

  “You said she was upset.”

  “Yeah,” he said, his voice easier now, as if having the evening with Izzy behind him made it so. “Something was bugging her. She kept checking her phone. Later, she locked herself in the bathroom for a while. But when she came out, I could tell she was upset though she wouldn’t talk about it.”

  “Any idea what upset her?”

  Charlie shook his head.

  “Did you get a look at her phone?”

  “No,” he scoffed, scowling so tight his eyebrows looked like caterpillars. “She did call someone though,” he added. “I heard her voice through the walls.”

  “Dominique?” Cassidy asked.

  Charlie shook his head. “No idea, but her voice was kind of . . . I don’t know, pleading. Then she got angry.”

  “When did she leave?”

  Another pause. Was he about to lie? “I woke up at about five thirty. She was gone.”

  “No note, nothing?” Cassidy asked.

  “No,” he said.

  “Did she talk about the plans she’d made with these friends? Where they were headed, anything?”

  “It didn’t . . . come up.”

  Cassidy waited, her mind spinning with questions she had no answers for.

  Charlie exhaled hard, his jaw flexing. “Look, we didn’t sleep together, okay? It got late. I offered her the extra bed. End of story.”

  “I just find it interesting that she ditches the van to come here for a sleepover.”

  “Think what you want,” Charlie said shaking his head, his eyes focused on the ground where his left foot had returned to worry the tuft of grass poking through the crack in the pavers. “It was a pattern. Not her staying over,” he added quickly. “But she came to my office hours pretty regularly. We talked.” His head shot up. “It always started with school, but then she told me about stuff that was going on. She’s actually had a rough go of it.”

  “Rough go of what?”

  He shrugged. “Life. School. Dominique’s disappearance. Her dad. He’s never around, and though she doesn’t talk about it, it’s had a very clear impact on her life.” His eyes connected with hers. “Did you know that her freshman year she was assaulted at a party?” he said.

  Cassidy inhaled a slow breath. “No, I didn’t know,” she said. “That’s awful. Did she tell you about it?”

  Charlie shook his head. “I sort of found out by accident.”

  A wave of compassion flooded through her.

  “She talks about her mom sometimes,” Charlie said. “I got the sense she’s worried about her.”

  “Why? Is she in trouble?” Cassidy asked.

  Charlie shrugged. “Her mom’s alone, I guess.”

  Izzy sounds like the one who’s alone, Cassidy thought as a twinge of emotion crept into her thoughts. She knew all too well how it felt. Though sleeping with her married professor wouldn’t solve that pain.

  Charlie
tilted his head back and paused, eyeing her. “You sure she’s not back in Eugene by now?”

  “If I can’t pick up her trail here, then that’s next,” Cassidy said, still unsure if Izzy and Charlie had slept together, or if it mattered. Maybe Izzy had just needed to be with someone she trusted.

  “If it comes out that Izzy was here, what will you tell your wife?”

  “The truth,” Charlie replied in a quiet voice.

  Eleven

  Cassidy drove down the dusty gravel road, the windows wide open, her mind whirling.

  Was Izzy in contact with Dominique somehow? Could Izzy be trying to help her? Was that the emergency?

  And why leave Charlie’s so early in the morning? Cassidy tried to imagine herself as Izzy, spending time with Professor Handsome in his cozy cabin.

  The only reason I’d leave my lover’s bed in the middle of the night is if I was afraid. Immediately, a memory of herself rushing to pack her things at Mel’s tree house in the dark fell over her eyes like a veil. Images of him undressing her in her hotel room mixed with the feel of his hands holding her down before injecting her. The slide show continued: she saw herself in Mel’s jeep, heading to the treehouse, feeling so lucky and safe; she saw the two of them dancing to the sound of the jungle, his firm surfer’s body pressed close to hers; and then that same body that had delivered such tenderness was throwing her onto her back and slamming the knife from her hand.

  Cassidy gripped the steering wheel and took two long breaths, trying to focus on what was real: the dry, scented air, the sound of her tires on gravel, the view of the cindery landscape. Slowly the panicky feeling ebbed, and she breathed a long, slow breath.

  She thought of a few more reasons someone might leave their lover’s bed: shame, guilt.

  If only I knew what her phone call was about, Cassidy thought. In her mind, she listed the events as she understood them: Izzy comes to Bend to see Charlie, for reasons she may never know. He lets her in, it gets late, he invites her to stay. During the evening, she gets several messages, then locks herself in the bathroom. She makes a call, maybe to Dominique, maybe to someone else. She gets angry. Then after Charlie is asleep, she slips away.