The First Ladies Club Box Set

by J B Hawker

  “Oh, there are; men and dogs, and we’ll find her, too. Why not save us all the time and money and just tell us where you stashed her body.”

  Scott paled at this casual reference to Naidenne’s dead body.

  She was still alive, somewhere. She had to be.

  “That’s enough. I want a lawyer.”

  “Why do you need a lawyer, if you’re so innocent? Come on, man, tell the truth and get it over with.”

  “Lawyer,” Scott replied through clenched teeth, then put his head down on the table and began to pray.

  The detective threw Scott a look of disgust and went out, slamming the door.

  Chapter Seventeen

  Shirley Griffith returned home from the Sheriff’s Office, where she had gone to support Scott. She had called him that morning and was shocked to learn of Naidenne’s disappearance.

  “Jack, you won’t believe this!”

  “What is it, Hon? How’s Scott holding up?”

  “I wasn’t allowed to see him. The officers acted like he’s a suspect in Naidenne’s disappearance, or something.”

  “That’s ridiculous! Scott doesn’t actually worship his wife, but she’s up there right under the Lord in his heart, I know.”

  “Exactly. I don’t know what they can be thinking.”

  “Oh, I suppose they have to consider the husband whenever a wife goes missing, but one look should have convinced them that was a non-starter in this case.”

  “I’m just so worried about Naidenne and now this. What can we do?”

  “We can be character witnesses for Scott, if it comes to that, I guess. In the meantime, we can pray,” Jack suggested.

  “Of course!” Shirley exclaimed and ran to the phone to start the prayer chain for Naidenne and Scott.

  *

  At the Boatworks coffee shop, Bill Odem slid into the booth next to Josiah, who was sitting across from Orville.

  “Is it true what’s on the prayer chain? Did the pastor finally snap and do away with his pretty wife?” Bill asked.

  “He was surely angry when he left the meeting. Looked mad enough to kill, all right,” Josiah said.

  “Now, we don’t know anything, for sure. Innocent until proven, and all that. Still, it’s got me thinkin’…” Orville paused.

  “Thinkin’ what?” Josiah asked.

  “Pastor Scott was the one who found Maureen’s body all wrapped up like a burrito, right?”

  “Yeah?” Bill prompted.

  “Well, what if he’s the one knocked her in the head and rolled her up in the carpet? He never did get along with her, we all know that.”

  “Was she knocked in the head? I thought nobody knew how she died,” Bill said.

  “Well, no one’s said, yet, but it could have happened that way.”

  “Just think, the man’s been our pastor for years and no one ever guessed in all that time he was a wolf in shepherd’s clothing,” Bill said.

  “They’re sayin’ over to the Sheriff’s Office they think he did away with that sister of his, too,” Josiah said.

  “I wondered why we hadn’t seen her in church, lately. She’s such a busybody, always flitting here and there, telling the ladies what cookies to bring, and all.”

  “It’s going to put a kink in our plans for the roof, though,” Josiah said.

  “What d’ya mean?” Orville asked.

  “With the preacher in jail, he sure won’t be on the payroll, anymore, so we can’t deduct the money to pay for the roof from his paycheck.”

  “Heck, we will be saving his whole salary, until we call a new pastor. If we drag our feet long enough, the roof will be paid for,” Orville assured the others.

  “I hadn’t thought of that. We will want to take our time picking a new guy, anyway. Don’t want another Jack-the-Ripper in the pulpit,” Josiah said.

  “You just never know about people, do you?” Bill said.

  “Nope. It’s a real shame, too. I’m going to have some of that marionberry pie, how about you guys?” Orville said and signaled to the waitress.

  *

  “Thanks for letting me know, Elizabeth. You’re right. We will have to do something ourselves, after all.”

  The news Elizabeth had shared was even more shocking than Naidenne’s disappearance. Eskaletha found it hard to believe the authorities could be accusing Scott of doing something to his dear wife.

  Eskaletha sat on the chintz-covered loveseat in her sunroom and prayed for God’s leading.

  She sometimes seemed like a person who liked to be in complete charge, but she never began anything new without bathing it in prayer and asking for divine guidance.

  It was many minutes before she lifted her head and reached again for her phone and began to make calls.

  *

  The women of the First Ladies Club were gathered in Naidenne’s real estate office.

  Eskaletha’s first call was to Shirley Griffith, who met the group and let them in. She was seated at Naidenne’s computer, pulling up information as Eskaletha directed.

  “Ladies, we are lucky that Naidenne hasn’t had too many houses on her books in the past few months. That will make our jobs a little easier. After Shirley prints out the addresses, we will divide them up among ourselves and check out each one. It is possible Naidenne was called out to show a house to a prospective buyer and became ill or had an accident.”

  “Or it could have been one of those scammers who lured her out for nefarious purposes, like those Craigslist robbers,” Judy piped up.

  “Yes, unfortunately, that is also a possibility. So we will go in groups of three, each with a well-charged Smartphone. This is serious business; we don’t know what we might find and it could be dangerous.”

  “If either group sees anything suspicious, we need to contact the other groups and the sheriff, right away,” Elizabeth added.

  “I heard they have some officers with dogs out searching, too. What if we run into them at a house?” Gwennie asked.

  “If the officers are already at a location, there’s no reason for us to search it,” Eskaletha replied.

  “Okay, ladies. I’ve got your lists and keys to the lock boxes on the houses. Now who goes where? I want to come, too. I’m not in your club, but Deenie was, er...I mean is, my best friend,” Shirley said, with tears in her eyes.

  *

  Carver Schramm came to, damp and cold and with a terrible headache.

  He got to his feet and climbed with effort back to the roadway.

  When he reached the asphalt and looked back toward the car, he discovered the wreck was well below his line of sight. He had accidentally found the perfect spot to ditch it.

  It took him a few moments to reorient himself and remember which way he’d come. Eventually, he started walking back in the direction of the house, picking up the pace as he thought of all the delights awaiting him in that windowless, sound-proofed room.

  He’d driven a few miles before driving off the road the night before and he hiked more than an hour before spying the house where he’d left Naidenne.

  Making a quick tour of the property, to be sure no one had been there in his absence, he went inside, where he flung open the door to the empty media room.

  Where was she? The bottles were there, but the woman was gone.

  He noticed smears of blood leading to one side of the room, where they stopped abruptly in front of the built-in cabinets.

  He jerked open all the cabinet doors, revealing only more empty shelves.

  She seemed to have disappeared.

  The blood trail must have been a trick, but with her knees and ankles bound and her hands tied behind her, she couldn’t have gotten far.

  Schramm began searching the house. Not finding her on the main floor, or in the empty upstairs rooms, he opened the basement door and stepped carefully down the narrow stairs to the dark and dank-smelling underground rooms.

  There were narrow basement windows looking out on weed-filled window wells on one exterior wall,
allowing very little light to penetrate the gloom.

  Feeling his way along the walls, Schramm attempted a thorough search, finding nothing but dust, grime and mold. The basement seemed to be empty.

  Carver stood at the bottom of the steps, thinking.

  He was wasting his time in this creepy cellar; no way the woman could have climbed down the stairs trussed up like she was.

  Climbing up the stairs in defeat, he paused when he thought he heard a noise from behind one wall. He stood completely still and strained to hear, but as there was no repeat of the sound, he shrugged, assuming it was the rustling of some woodland creature, and left the basement to search the grounds, again.

  Behind the false wall concealing the ancient kitchen area, Naidenne moved again and moaned as she regained consciousness.

  She lay crumpled at the bottom of the abandoned dumbwaiter where she’d fallen. There was pain in her head and shoulder from her impact on the pile of rags and cardboard boxes in the bottom of the chute.

  Struggling to wriggle out of the cramped space introduced more aches and pains, but she ignored them. She had to try to straighten up to assess the damage she’d caused in her swan dive to freedom.

  Uppermost in Naidenne’s mind was the safety of her baby. So far, she hadn’t felt any abdominal pain or cramping, so her hopes were high the child remained unharmed.

  Dim light filtered through the narrow and filthy basement windows into the closed-off room, allowing Naidenne to get a good look at her surroundings.

  The kitchen fittings had been left in place when this room was boarded up.

  She spied the drawers beneath the metal draining board. If only the owners had overlooked a knife or can opener when clearing out this area, she might have a chance to cut through the fabric ties restricting her movements and find a way out. If not, she had only exchanged a torture chamber for solitary confinement, or possibly, a tomb.

  She pushed hard with her legs and flopped out onto the floor on her stomach.

  Inching across the room on her knees and shoulders was painful on the cold, rough cement, but she was determined to reach the drawers.

  Once across the room, she got her knees under her and lifted her head and shoulders, bringing her mouth level with the drawer handles.

  Gripping the cold metal handle made her teeth ache.

  Pulling back the first time failed to budge the drawer. The handle slipped from between her teeth and her jaws clicked jarringly together, bringing tears to her eyes.

  She tried again and again before the drawer, finally, began to move.

  Images flitted through Naidenne’s mind of how snaggle-toothed she was going to be after this adventure, but she kept at it.

  When the drawer was half-open, she tried to use her chin to pull herself up, but fell back to the floor on her side, feeling as helpless as a supine turtle.

  How was she ever going to get to her feet without the use of her hands?

  *

  Carver decided to check the nearby grounds more thoroughly.

  Walking a dry creek bed leading from the house, he heard a vehicle pass on the road above and saw a Sheriff’s unit driving by.

  If they were looking for the woman out this way, it was only a matter of time before the empty house caught someone’s attention.

  When he’d returned to find the room empty, Schramm briefly considered the whole episode might have been a fantasy brought on by booze and the crash.

  Seeing the empty bottles and the blood in the media room reassured him it was all real.

  Real or not, it was time to abandon his dream girl and get back on the trek to the Yukon and safety.

  He hadn’t been able to act out many of his fantasies, but what he had seen and done would provide fuel for richer, more graphic dreams in the future; fantasies he knew now he could live out whenever he chose, any time he found a tall, shapely woman with wild red-gold hair.

  Carver had tasted of the reality and hungered for more.

  With renewed determination, he plunged deeply into the woods, striking out for the freedom of the far north.

  Chapter Eighteen

  “Thanks, Will. I’m sorry to get you mixed up in this, but when they started accusing me of hurting Naidenne, I knew I needed a good, honest lawyer,” Scott addressed the casually dressed man sitting across the interview room table.

  “I’m glad you called me, Scott. I only just got in from a camping trip with the boys in my church youth group when I got your message. I came straight here. Now, tell me everything…”

  After Scott told his friend what had been happening, he stood up, hands clenched at his sides.

  “None of this is finding my wife! What’s happening to her while these stupid people play out their TV detective fantasies with my life?”

  *

  “I’d hate to be checking out these empty houses at night. They are creepy, even in broad daylight,” Judy commented to her search party companions, Peggy and Shirley.

  “Too bad we didn’t get a list of houses in town, instead of all these clear out here in the boonies,” Peggy agreed.

  “If Deenie ran into trouble in one of the houses in a downtown neighborhood, don’t you think she would have been able to call for help, before now?” Shirley said. “I think our list has some of the best prospects on it.”

  “Have you known Naidenne a long time, Shirley?” Peggy asked.

  “Only a few years, actually. We were introduced by a mutual friend. But we’ve grown really close. In spite of the difference in our ages, we have so much in common, I feel as if I’ve known her forever.”

  “That’s the way I feel about all my friends in the First Ladies Club. We come from different backgrounds, cultures, decades and denominations, but we love the same God,” Peggy said. “And we wouldn’t have ever gotten to know each other, if not for Naidenne.”

  “We’ve just got to find her!” Judy said.

  “What if something really bad’s happened to her? I don’t know if I want to be the one to find her that way,” Peggy admitted.

  “We can’t think like that. She’s going to be okay and we are going to help find her,” Shirley insisted.

  “Here we are, this is the next place on our list,” Judy said, turning the car between two rock columns standing sentry at the entrance to a gravel driveway.

  *

  Inside the rustic log cabin chalet at the end of the winding drive, Bunny Banks was busily airing out the place, opening doors and windows and putting fresh linens on the bed in the loft.

  “I wonder where everyone could be?” she murmured, talking to herself as she worked.

  “Naidenne never answered my calls or emails, and she must not have gotten my voice mail message asking her to open up the cabin, either. I guess I should have waited in Idaho at my sister’s place until I got in touch with the folks here. I probably would have, if Linda hadn’t gotten on my nerves trying to help me ‘work through’ my bereavement.”

  Bunny had been looking forward to a return to her vacation home in Bannoch for months…ever since she’d gotten over the shock of Max’s death.

  “I was sort of anticipating a much warmer welcome than this, though.”

  Stepping out onto the porch to shake out a comforter, she saw a car coming up the drive.

  “That must be my welcoming party now! I guess I can stop feeling sorry for myself, after all.”

  She leaned over the railing to wave at her approaching guests.

  “Bunny! That’s Bunny!” Shirley squawked.

  “Who?” Peggy asked.

  “What? I’m going to hit a bunny? I don’t see any rabbits,” Judy said.

  “No, that woman up there. That’s my friend, Bunny. She’s Naidenne’s friend, too.”

  “Maybe she will know where Naidenne went,” Peggy offered.

  “You don’t suppose they are having some sort of gal pals retreat, do you?” Judy said.

  “…and causing all this trouble? How thoughtless,” Peggy added.

>   The car stopped and Shirley jumped out. She ran up the porch stairs and greeted her friend with an enthusiastic hug, almost tumbling them both over the railing.

  “Bunny! When did you get here? Why didn’t you let someone know you were coming?”

  “Hi, Shirley,” Bunny replied with a grin. “I just got in a few hours ago. Didn’t anyone get my messages at Naidenne’s office?”

  “No, we haven’t been working today…” Shirley began.

  “Then how did you know to come here?” Bunny interrupted. “Who have you got with you in the car? Welcome, ladies! Come on up.”

  “Bunny, these women are friends of Naidenne’s; members of the First Ladies Club she belongs to, Judy Falls and Peggy Burt.”

  “I’m happy to meet you. I was beginning to think I wasn’t going to have much of a welcome in Bannoch. Come inside and I’ll fix us some tea.”

  “We aren’t on a social call, I’m afraid,” Shirley said.

  “What do you mean?”

  “I didn’t know you owned this chalet. It was still on Naidenne’s property listing.”

  “That’s probably because, after we bought it, she agreed to look after the place when we aren’t here. But I still don’t understand…”

  “Naidenne is missing,” Judy stated. “No one’s seen her since yesterday afternoon.”

  “We’re part of the search party,” Peggy added.

  “Your place was on our list of empty properties to search,” Shirley said.

  Bunny grabbed the porch railing. Her knees had gone weak.

  “How can she be missing? Where is Scott?”

  “I’m afraid the police are holding him. They suspect he might be responsible,” Shirley told her.

  “Please come inside and tell me everything. I’ve got to sit down.”

  Bunny led the ladies into the great room, where they sat on built-in banquettes in the conversation pit in front of an empty river rock fireplace.

  “Please tell me everything you know,” she asked again.