Murder at the Lakeside Library

by Holly Danvers

  The comment from Julia made Rain wince. The last thing she wanted to find was a photo of her mother with that man. That would be just plain awful. “Maybe Jace took them?” she suggested, but Rain really hoped not. She wasn’t sure she was ready to explain her theory to the police either.

  “Let’s take a quick tour of the house to get our bearings. Whatddaya say?” Julia asked as her eyes darted around the space.

  “Sounds like a good place to start,” Rain answered, taking the lead. She traveled up the open loft stairs and down a long carpeted hallway, where bedrooms flanked both sides. As she opened each door to peek inside, she noticed the beds were perfectly made, as if they’d never been slept in. She then shared her musings with her friend over her shoulder. “I don’t think these rooms were even used. Maybe Thornton wasn’t too keen on company?”

  “Who knows. Doesn’t seem like he was making a lot of friends here in Lofty Pines except for …” Julia stopped short and cuffed her hand over her mouth.

  Rain heard her friend stop short and knew exactly what she was implying—her mother. She shook her head when Julia replied with a sheepish look.

  When they finally arrived at the end of the hall, they both took a collective breath before stepping inside the master bedroom. The room was bright white, just like the others, and Rain wondered how anyone could get any sleep, as she almost had to shield her eyes from the starkness of it all.

  Julia walked around the queen-sized bed and stood by the bedside table. “Seriously, who lives like this? There’re no personal items? No photos? It’s weird, isn’t it? It’s like walking into a freaking hotel room.” She picked up a small blank notepad and flapped it in the air. “Nothing.”

  “Let me see that.” Rain reached for the notepad and squinted. “If you look closely, the top sheet has indents. I’m going to take this home and shade it with a pencil. Maybe I can lift a phone number or something.”

  “You do that, Nancy Drew,” Julia teased, brushing her pink hair off her forehead and then tucking it neatly behind her ears.

  Rain ripped the top sheet of paper and slipped it inside her back pocket before laying the notepad back on the bedside table. “Hey, you never know. Right?”

  “Do you think the police took everything? This is crazy? I wonder if the Browns came over and took stuff out to donate after the police were done? It really doesn’t even look like anyone was living here.” Julia’s eyes tracked floor to ceiling before walking over to the closet.

  Julia opened the closet door, flicked the light, and ducked her head inside. “There are clothes still in here. So, I’m guessing someone has been living here.” Julia’s words started to muffle as she walked deeper inside. Rain followed to see for herself. She was thrilled upon quick inspection not to see any women’s clothing hanging there, including anything belonging to her mother. She just wasn’t ready for that kind of heartbreak.

  “Lots of suits for living in the Northwoods. He never would have made it as a Laker. Check this out,” Julia said, pulling out a suit jacket for a closer view. “This looks like it could be Armani.”

  “You sound like Frankie. Clearly, Thornton didn’t understand the casual attire people wear up north,” Rain said as she fingered a silk tie hanging on a tie rack. “He had great taste, though, if not better for city living. Or living on either coast.”

  “Yeah, these clothes must’ve cost a fortune. Maybe money is the motive? You think?”

  “That’s what we’re here to find out, Nancy Drew,” Rain said, returning her friend’s earlier jibe.

  Julia rehung the suit jacket and then retreated out of the closet. “All right, let’s go clean that refrigerator or we’re going to be here all day.” Julia waited for Rain to step outside before flicking off the light and closing the closet door.

  Rain followed Julia into the kitchen where her friend continued to search for snapshots along their path. “No photos? I just think it’s weird, that’s all,” she said. “That in itself is a clue. The lack of something can be just as telling as pure evidence. I can’t remember where I heard that, or read it, but it stuck with me.”

  “Makes sense to me. So, what is it telling us?”

  “Maybe it’s telling us he doesn’t want anyone to know anything about his past. Maybe it’s seedy and dark!” Julia rolled her hands together and made a spooky face.

  “You’re a goof.” Rain laughed. “And I love you for it.”

  Rain opened the oversized stainless-steel refrigerator and was relieved to find it wasn’t chock full of food. “Looks like our victim preferred take-out,” she said after eyeing a Chinese takeout box.

  “Thank God. Otherwise we’d be here all day!” Julia huffed.

  “What do you want to do with all of this? Take it home with you?”

  “Yep, that’s what I was told to do. If there’s anything worth saving.” Julia hung on the door of the refrigerator, waiting. As if she didn’t even want to begin the task at hand.

  Rain opened a lower cabinet door beneath the sink and found a box of trash bags. “Wanna use these?” she waved the box in the air and Julia gave a thumbs up.

  “Sure. I’ll hold the bag open.” Julia took a bag and shook it open and held it with two hands waiting.

  “This is weird, right? Emptying the contents of a dead man’s fridge? Like he’s never coming back? Poor guy,” Rain said reaching for the carton of milk. When she did so, Julia bumped her arm accidentally, and the carton flew out of her hands and crashed to the floor.

  “Oh no! What happened? Did I do that? I’m so sorry!” Julia jumped backwards dropping the trash bag to the floor and reaching for a nearby towel that hung neatly on the stove.

  “Not your fault, it was as light as a kite for some reason. It literally flew outta my hands.” Rain went to grab the carton off the floor, and something made her stop short. “Wait. Didn’t you just mention that the absence of something means something?”

  Julia stared at her with incomprehension before coming to an understanding. “Oh, I get it. Why isn’t the carton leaking milk all over the floor?” she asked as she handed over the towel.

  “Exactly my dear Watson. You’re reading my mind” Rain said as she plucked the carton from the ground and felt its lightness again. After shaking it she said, “It’s empty?”

  “Why would someone put an empty carton of milk back into the refrigerator? That’s ridiculous!”

  “You’re asking me to climb into the mind of a dead man? And figure out Thornton’s lazy cleaning habits? Seriously?” Rain huffed before attempting to toss it into the trash bag.

  “Hang on, listen to what you just said. That’s just the thing. Look around this place, it’s neat. It doesn’t fit his profile to put back an empty carton. Do you see any garbage laying around here? Hold on a second.” Julia reached for the carton and dropped the empty trash bag to the floor. “Give it here.”

  Rain folded her arms across her chest while she watched Julia open the milk carton and give it a sniff. She then investigated the carton closer by eyeing the inside. “This doesn’t smell like milk; it smells like cash.”

  “Cash?” Rain took a step backward.

  Julia gasped.

  “What?” Rain threw up her hands, but a chill ran down her spine when Julia began to empty the contents upon the kitchen counter.

  A slew of five-hundred-dollar bills fell from the carton onto the counter. There had to be hundreds of them.

  “Are these real?” Rain stuttered. “I’ve never seen a five-hundred-dollar bill in my life!”

  “Sure, looks like they’re the real deal.” Julia frowned. “I hate to say this, but I think we may have just found our motive. I bet these are worth a whole lot more than what’s printed on them. I bet they’re rare. I think we better call Jace. We are so busted. He’s never gonna believe that we were here to clean. Mom couldn’t even get me to clean my room when I was a kid.”

  “Yeah, and while he’s here I’ll alert him to the neighbor’s boat. Maybe then he can fi
nd out if Frankie has more than carp blood on his hands.

  Chapter Seventeen

  After a long day of cleaning, and then a tongue lashing from Jace about why they never should’ve entered Thornton’s rental and used a cleaning business as a ruse, Rain was ready for an escape from reality. Jace had mentioned that the discovery of so many large bills was a significant clue in the case but had refused to elaborate. She and Julia would have to dig deeper into it to find out, but for now, her mind was numb.

  Earlier, she had blasted the air conditioner in the library to seventy degrees, with the future promise that she’d be able to snuggle deep within her nylon sleeping bag long into the night. How she longed for Max’s solid arms, that formerly wrapped her tight. Tonight, the sleeping bag would have to suffice. The nights were the toughest for Rain. Too much time for her to be alone, to feel the starkness of an empty bedside. And too much time in her head, to think, to feel, and to grieve.

  Instead, Rain made a conscious decision to revert to memories from her childhood and allow the comfort of the library and escape of books to encircle her as it once had. She didn’t feel so isolated when encouraged by the words that had been put to page, as the result of an author’s dream. And she was aware she was never alone in her pain. She knew if she searched for printed validation, she could find pain similar to hers, shelved among one of the many books that surrounded her. Pain that could only transfer from the page to the reader, because a pain like it had certainly, at one time, been felt by the author.

  Rain wriggled her toes and nestled deeper into the soft polycotton fabric, wrapping her icy feet in, and feeling nice and toasty. She held her grandfather’s book, Always You, in one hand, and sipped a mug of tepid herbal tea in the other. The comfort of the hand-hewn logs of the library walls engulfed and protected her, as if her great-grandfather, Lorenzo, stood watching over her. Instead of using the overhead deer antler chandelier, that often cast a shadow when lit at night, Rain resurrected a dim reading lamp from the storage boxes that had traveled with her from Milwaukee. The beam of light kept the room bright enough to read but still provided a comfortable muted glow and shadowed the rest of the space.

  Rain flipped to the next chapter, surprised at how much she could relate to Grandfather Luis’s words. So stunned was she that her eyes lifted from the page to the tongue and groove pine ceiling in order to reflect on the sentences she had just read:

  “I long for you, my love. An ache so deep, I can barely breathe. I’m suffocating, and I don’t know how much more my heart can take. Missing you doesn’t provide ample words to express …”

  What was her grandfather talking about? As she read deeper into the novel, Rain discovered that the book that had been found near the body of Thornton Hughes was that of a tragic love story. A story of death and sadness. A love story so wrought with emotion, Rain hardly believed a man had written it, never mind her own grandfather. She knew the book was a work of fiction—but still. The feelings hit too close to reality, to not hide some sort of hidden buried truth.

  Rain remembered her grandfather, Luis, as a kind man, a man whose bulbous nose had twitched, whose hazel eyes had always danced and crinkled in laughter as he’d chased her playfully around the yard. A man who liked to tinker with old things and build bird houses for her to paint to then dangle in the trees. A man who had crafted a wooden swing to hang from a mighty oak for Rain to spend hours pumping her legs, until her leg muscles would burn, and she could no longer take it. A man whose stark white hair had often been disturbingly askew and flapped haphazardly in the breeze. That was the man she remembered. And she missed him.

  Rain hadn’t experienced a man who could write with such sadness and desperate longing for another. So much melancholy was infused in the written words, that the book surprised her. She flipped the cover to see the date of publication, remembering back to the year when her grandfather Luis was born. After doing the math in her head, she realized he had published Always You, long into his forties. But he couldn’t have been talking about her grandmother that he’d been aching for? She’d outlived him by eighteen months. So, how did grandfather get the emotions of anguish so vividly right? Had Luis known such pain? He must’ve experienced something similar, as the words were so raw and relatable. She couldn’t fathom how a “little research” could transfer so knowingly, so vividly and honestly, to the page. She’d known her grandfather only as a jolly figure and couldn’t recall ever having a deep conversation with him. It was as if she was getting a peek behind the curtain, to understand him on a more intimate level. One that she’d never had the chance to experience growing up.

  After some thought, she realized she could ask Marge about all these musings in the morning, when the older woman was due to arrive for her shift at the library. After all, Marge had grown up with Luis, and probably discussed at length with her grandfather how he’d come to write this book. Maybe Marge would be able to provide a backstory.

  With new resolve, Rain bookmarked the page and closed the novel. She drained the remainder of her tepid tea and then set the mug aside. Her eyes were growing heavy despite her mind still needing to ponder. She inched deeper into the sleeping bag and reached to turn off the light. Even in the darkened room, she felt safe, as the scent of long-ago written novels and rugged pine boards, lulled her to sleep.

  * * *

  A knock at the library door sent Rain to shift inside the sleeping bag. The knock grew louder and more insistent, and then Rain blinked her eyes when she heard, “Rain? Hellooo? Are you in there?”

  Rain unzipped the sleeping bag and crawled out from it. She then stumbled toward the door, “I’m coming!”

  Rain heard a muffled, “Oh, thank God!” before opening the door to Julia who stood juggling a reusable shopping bag which dangled from one arm, and a tray holding two disposable cups in the other hand. “I ran into town for doughnuts at The Brewin’ Time and when I knocked on the cabin door over an hour ago and you didn’t answer, it sent my mind in a tailspin. Especially with your car in the driveway, I figured you went for a walk or something, so I came back, and you still weren’t answering the door. Are you all right? You scared the crap outta me! What are you doing in the library before breakfast? Didn’t I mention last night that I’d bring breakfast over?”

  Rain smoothed her tongue over her teeth and then blew into her hand to check to see if she had morning breath before opening the door wider for Julia and her twenty questions to enter.

  “Wait,” Julia said as she stepped deeper into the room. “Did you sleep in here last night?” Rain watched Julia’s eyes move over to the rumpled sleeping bag in the corner and then back to her.

  Rain shrugged sheepishly.

  “You did, didn’t you?” Julia looked at her as if she’d fallen off the deep end.

  Rain nodded. “I did.” She brushed the hair out of her eyes and smoothed the static to lay down by licking her fingers to tame the few flyaway strands. She then rubbed at her eyes to remove the sleepy crusts to awaken fully.

  “How late were you up? If you wanted to work at the library last night you could’ve called. I would’ve come over in a heartbeat and helped, you know?” Julia set the tray down on a nearby table and pointed. “I brought you coffee. Looks like you could use some,” she chuckled. “Although, it might be cold by now …”

  “Thanks, I’ll take it!” Rain said reaching for the cup with coffee scribbled in loose handwriting on the side. “No, it’s not that; I wasn’t working,” Rain said accepting the doughnut hole that Julia was now handing her to go with the beverage. “I wanted to hang out in here alone and do some reading. Although I normally shy away from romance, I started reading my grandfather’s novel. It’s a rather interesting read. Have you read it?”

  Julia nodded and took a bite of a chocolate-covered doughnut hole, covering her lips in dark smears, and then licking it off. “Man, I love these.” She said as she looked at the pastry longingly. “Try it,” she encouraged, lifting her doughnut so close to Rai
n’s face, the pastry almost hit her on the nose.

  Rain stepped back and then took a bite of her own. “Wow, I can see why they do quite a business. This is delicious, thank you. It’s every bit as good as their brownies, eh?” She licked her finger where the chocolate had dripped. “So, have you ever read Grandfather Luis’s books? Or specifically, have you read Always You?”

  Julia polished off her doughnut and with a mouthful mumbled, “Yeah, but it was a long time ago. You know I read so many books a year … You’ll have to refresh my memory. What’s it about again?”

  “It’s a love story about a man who loses his first love because their families didn’t approve of their relationship. It’s so wrought with emotion, it’s almost hard to believe a man wrote it. Never mind my own grandfather. It’s a bit telling. To be honest, I didn’t expect it. Totally different from the man I remember, I can’t imagine the man I knew from my youth even writing it.”

  “Well, it’s fiction, right? Oh yeah! Now I remember …” Julia snapped her fingers. Her eyes moved to the ceiling as if to recall more. “Is that the one where the girl finds out she’s pregnant and his parents want her to get rid of the baby? Right?”

  “I didn’t get that far, I’m only on chapter ten, so … maybe?”

  “Oh shoot, I’m sorry. I hope I didn’t ruin the plot for you?” Julia grimaced and then wiped her hands on a napkin that she’d found after digging inside the bag. “Let me see it. May I?”

  “Sure,” Rain finished her doughnut, licked her fingers, and then reached for the novel beside the sleeping bag and handed it to Julia.

  Julia wiped again with the napkin before accepting the book. She flipped through the pages. “Yesss, of everything your grandfather wrote, this was my favorite. The characters just leapt from the page! Your grandfather had a way of sucking you right into this book. If I remember correctly, this one was incredibly giving, and realistic. This one made me cry at the end!” Julia said, holding it to her heart and then handing back the book. “I hope you enjoy it; I’m not gonna give away more, you’ll have to see for yourself.” She smiled. “I think you should read in its entirety—even if I did spoil it a bit. It’s so cool that you have an author in your family, I can’t help but say I’m a bit jealous.” She grinned.