by Lauren Carr
“If the murderer intended to shoot Edna …” Mac allowed David to lead him down the hallway to the church’s main office. Through the glass door, he could see the desk behind a welcome counter. “The door to this office was closed when we got here. The light was off.”
“Edna stated that her office was locked when she arrived. She unlocked it and went in to put her purse away, turned on the light, and then went down the hall to see what Gnarly was fussing about.” The police chief added, “Plus, the front door to the church building was locked when we got here. Remember? We both saw Deborah unlock it.”
“That’s right,” Mac recalled. “Gnarly was trying to get into the building until Deborah arrived. As soon as she unlocked and opened the door, he tore in. Did Eugene have a key to the church office?”
“Yes, but the money was in the safe in the back office where he was shot,” David said.
“Think about it,” Mac said. “Ruth was on the other side of the building.”
“Running the vacuum, which is loud.”
“Eugene was counting money in the office down the hallway with the door shut. So if someone walked in—”
“They couldn’t have come in unless they came in the back door,” David reminded him. “Eugene wouldn’t have left that door unlocked because he didn’t want people walking in from off the street. He didn’t like dealing with the public. Remember what Deborah told us about the woman who came in wanting a divorce and she got snot all over his shirt.”
“He said never again.” Mac nodded his head. “Whoever murdered Eugene either had a key or—”
“Or they came in the back door,” David said.
“Most people leave as soon as they try the front door and find it locked,” Mac said. “They wouldn’t go all the way around to the back unless they really wanted in.”
“Like an enraged former church member who blamed the church for breaking up his marriage.” David pressed through the front door.
“Let’s get a list from Deborah of everyone who has keys to the building.” Mac followed him into the parking lot.
Outside, they encountered a robust man in a chef’s jacket and a red and green ballcap with Carmine’s Pizza emblazoned across the front. Upon seeing the police chief badge, he scurried around the crime scene tape and up to the front door.
“Chief O’Callaghan …” He took off his cap to reveal a head of thick dark hair. His Roman nose would have appeared larger if it weren’t for his chubby cheeks that gave his face the appearance of being as round as a pizza pie. “I’m sorry to bother you, sir. I’m Carmine Romano, one of the church’s trustees. I just got a call from one of our members …”
“Carmine.” Seeing the chubby restaurateur brought an involuntary smile to David’s face.
“That’s my name.”
David stuck out his hand. “You own Carmine’s Pizza in McHenry. My friends and I used to hang out at your restaurant when I was in school.”
The always happy grin flashed across Carmine’s face. “A lot of kids have hung out at my place throughout the years.”
“Carmine only has the best pizza in the area,” David told Mac. “Friday night was never Friday night without one of his pizzas.”
Reminded by the police cars of their reason for meeting, Carmine swallowed. “I heard something happened to Eugene, our head trustee.”
David gently nodded his head. “I’m sorry, Carmine.”
Instantly, tears came to the pizza man’s eyes. “No … not Eugene.” His lips quivering, he shook his head. “He can’t be … dead? He and Marilyn came into my restaurant for lunch only yesterday.”
“They did everything they could—” Mac said.
“How?” Carmine clutched his chest. “What happened? How did he die? Tell me he didn’t suffer?”
“Someone shot him,” David said while being careful to be vague. By keeping the details to himself, the killer might unwittingly reveal himself.
Carmine hung his head to his chest. “Poor … Marilyn? Does she know?”
Concerned that he was about to collapse with a heart attack, David and Mac grasped his arms and ushered him to a bench next to the front door.
“Your pastor is going to the hospital to meet her,” Mac said while helping the older man to sit down.
“Is Bogie on the case?”
“Yes,” David said. “Do you know Bogie?”
“Sure do.” A small grin came to Carmine’s lips. “He’ll get the evil monster who did this and I want to be there when he does.” He paused. “Maybe not. I’ll strangle the creep with my own bare hands.” He gazed down at his thick fingers.
Mac sat down beside him. “Carmine, do you have any immediate thoughts about who would want to hurt Eugene?”
“He has been one of my closest friends,” Carmine said. “I’ve known him for nearly twenty years. He and Marilyn … everyone here …” Abruptly, he jumped to his feet. “Ruth? Where’s Ruth? Was she hurt? Did they hurt her?” His dark eyes were round with fear when he grabbed both of Mac’s arms. “Ruth was cleaning the church today. Tell me that the maniac who killed Eugene didn’t hurt her.”
“Ruth is fine,” Mac assured him. “They took her to the police station to get her statement.”
“What about Natalie? Ruth’s daughter. Is she okay?”
“She’s with the pastor’s son Chase,” David said. “They’re right next door.”
The big Italian checked the time on his watch. “They’re all going to be hungry when they get back. I wonder if Deborah has anything in her kitchen. That woman doesn’t ever have anything except lettuce and salmon.” He continued muttering, “Lucky for them I was at the grocery store when I got the call. There’s nothing like a nice robust lasagna, fresh Italian bread, and a hearty Chianti after a police interrogation.”
With a shake of his finger in Mac’s direction, Carmine turned to leave, only to have the detective circle around to cut him off. “Wait a minute. What about Eugene?”
“Oh,” Carmine gasped. “That’s right, you wanted to know who would want to kill him.”
“That would be good to know,” Mac said. “It would give us an edge in our murder investigation.”
“Have you talked to Helga Thorpe?” Carmine asked.
“We’ve met her,” David said. “Yes.”
“She’s one of our trustees,” Carmine said, “but you wouldn’t know it by the way she bad mouths Deborah and the way Eugene managed the trustees and the church. It all started a couple of years ago. Eugene has been on the board for twenty years. He’s been chief of the trustees and in charge of the church finances for almost that long. Well, Helga got it in her head that she wanted to be chief of the trustees and started a campaign to have Eugene voted out. She failed—miserably.”
“Why?” David asked, even though he suspected.
The corners of Carmine’s thick lips curled. “The chief trustee is virtually the middle man between the pastor and the members of the church’s congregation. He has to work closely with the clergy. Deborah and Eugene are close friends. He was there for her when her husband died. He helped her get on her feet financially and adjust to being a single mother.”
“Helga Thorpe didn’t have what it took to be chief trustee?” Mac asked.
“It would have been a disaster,” Carmine said. “You met her.”
“Yes, I did.”
“If Helga was made chief trustee, Deborah would have killed her. We would have had to cover it up on account of there being a scandal. There would have been a major police investigation. Our pastor would have gone to jail, Chase would have been without a mother as well as a father, and we all would have gone to hell for an eternity.” Carmine peered into Mac’s eyes. “Do you know how long an eternity is?”
Feeling drawn to answer, Mac replied, “A really long time?”
“Seems even longer when
you’re in hell with a bunch of stupid atheists. After five minutes of saying, ‘I told you so,’ then what are you going to do?” With a shake of his head, Carmine shrugged his shoulders. “No way Helga could have been chief trustee.”
“Did she take losing the chief trustee spot poorly?” David asked.
“Very,” Carmine said. “She’s been undermining everything Eugene does ever since. She’d revealed to one of our former church members that Eugene was blind-copying the board in his emails to him. It was totally above board, but Helga made like it was something else and this guy wasn’t wrapped too tight to begin with. He ended up attacking Eugene.”
“So we heard,” David said. “Do you think Chip Van Dorn was capable of killing Eugene?”
Carmine’s dark eyes narrowed in deep thought. “Not a year later. Van Dorn has a short fuse all right, but he lives too much in the moment. If you’re looking for someone who’s diabolical, look at Helga Thorpe.” He leaned in to whisper, “She even started rumors accusing Eugene and Edna …” He arched his thick dark eyebrows.
With thoughts of the attractive office manager having a secret affair with the married trustee, David asked with all seriousness. “Were they?”
“No way!” Carmine said with force. “Obviously you haven’t met Marilyn Newton!” He shook a thick index finger at the police chief by way of chastising him for thinking such a thing. “Edna is a good woman! Get your mind out of the gutter, Chief.”
“You were the one who brought it up,” David said in his defense. Seeing Mac snickering behind the restaurateur’s back, he fired off a glare in his direction.
“Helga only started those rumors after the ones about Eugene embezzling from the church funds got laughed out of the building,” Carmine said. “We have an audit every year, at Eugene’s insistence. He always comes out clean.”
David had to ask, “Why would Helga continue coming to this church if she thinks so poorly of it?”
“To torture all of us?” Carmine replied. “Deborah was taking action to have Helga fired from the board of trustees and kicked out of the church, which has never happened in all of our church history.” He nodded his head. “Yep, that’s why Helga was the first one who came to my mind just now when you told me Eugene was dead.”
A shriek came from across the parking lot.
With a purple hat in his mouth, Gnarly raced from around the corner of the church building. He made a beeline for David’s cruiser.
David’s radio crackled. “Code K!” an officer shouted. “We have a Code K in process.”
David tapped the button. “Evacuate the canine. Repeat, evacuate the canine—ASAP.”
Seeing the dog galloping toward the police cruiser, Mac threw open the rear door to allow Gnarly to jump into the back. Then, he casually opened the passenger door to climb in. Equally casual, David slipped into the driver’s seat and started the engine.
“Has anybody seen my hat?” Helga Thorpe raced into the parking lot from the bike path through the pine grove that separated the church grounds from the parsonage next door. “There was a gust of wind from off the lake and I turned around to catch my hat and suddenly—it has to be here someplace!”
While stomping across the parking lot, she continued ranting to anyone who would listen. “Someone must have picked it up. I’ll bet it was the pastor’s kid. I wouldn’t be surprised if Chase Hess stole it right off my head somehow. It couldn’t have blown completely away. He’s evil, I tell you! He absolutely refused to let me in the house just now. Says Natalie is too upset!” She scoffed. “Upset, my eye! Those two are having sex, I tell you! S-E-X! Right now. I’ll bet you money! They’re having sex while laughing about stealing my hat!”
“Ma’am,” one of David’s officers suggested gently while pointing out onto the water, “I think I just saw your hat out on the lake. A pelican had it.”
While Helga followed the direction of the officer’s finger, behind him, David turned his cruiser, in which Gnarly was crouched in the back seat with his ill-gotten good, onto the lake shore road.
“What does a pelican need with a hat?” Spinning on her high-heels, Helga slammed the uniformed officer on top of his head with her handbag.
“Sirrus! We’re leaving!” Upon seeing the empty space where her husband’s truck had been parked earlier, she refocused her fury. “Sirrus, where are you, you twit!”
Chapter Five
McHenry was located on the opposite end of Deep Creek Lake, the man-made body of water that was the center of the resort area in western Maryland. The small town consisted of the lakeshore and a mountain, at the top of which rested The Wisp Resort.
Homes spotted the landscape all the way up the mountaintop. Some were luxurious with fabulous views of the lake and countryside. Others were cozy, tranquil, and secluded among the heavily wooded area.
Abby Harmon’s home fit in with the latter. Tina Van Dorn’s mother lived in a small, three bedroom home that was tucked deep into the woods off a side road halfway up the mountain. It barely afforded a view of lake.
During the short drive to the other end of the lake, Mac wrestled with Gnarly to keep him from swallowing the styrofoam bird he had captured at the church. While Mac won that battle, Helga’s hat was a casualty of the war. Gnarly had managed to shred it into a hundred pieces. Holding up the mangled bird to show David, Mac announced, “Yet another police cover-up thanks to Gnarly.”
“We’ll frame the seagulls,” David said. “It’ll be easy. We’ll wait until it gets dark, and plant the feathers along the lakeshore. Helga will never know … unless one of us breaks down and confesses during interrogation.”
Eying Gnarly, who was still tearing into the hat, Mac said, “My money’s on Gnarly for being the weak link.”
In the rearview mirror, David glanced at the huge German shepherd growling and digging at the purple hat with both front claws. “Nah, Gnarly’s tough. He won’t break.” With a wicked grin, he added, “I think you’ll be the first to cut a deal.”
Seeing the emergency vehicles lined up along the mountain road, the police chief said, “Looks like a full house.” He continued past the cruisers until he came upon a sheriff’s deputy he knew. Stopping, he rolled down the driver’s side window and held up his police chief’s badge. Since he was still dressed in plain clothes, David didn’t want to take a chance on being mistaken for a “civilian,” as if the cruiser he was driving was not enough of a clue that he was on official business.
After the deputy indicated with a nod of his head that he recognized the police shield, David clipped it back on his belt. “What’s the situation inside?”
“We got here to find a bunch of cars filling the driveway,” the deputy said. “The sheriff went in to check it out and he hasn’t come out yet. Deputy Chief Bogart is inside, too.”
“Guess that means it’s safe,” Mac told David. “We might as well join the party.” He turned around to Gnarly. “Guard the car … and don’t steal anymore hats.”
Inside the Harmon home, they found Abby Harmon’s living room filled with a dozen women taking up every available chair. They all sat with their fingers and toes gingerly extended while freshly applied nail polish dried. Some of the lucky ladies held their hands under one of the two driers set up in the kitchen to speed things along.
Two of the women were soaking their feet in plastic tubs filled with sudsy water.
Flustered to have her party interrupted by a team of uniformed officers, the beauty consultant, a busty redhead with big hair and heavy make-up clad in a white linen robe, offered a bowl of fruit on ice. “Grapes, gentlemen? I do have products for men, if you’re interested in a manicure.” She flashed a nervous grin.
While Mac shook his head, David accepted a handful of the fruit. “We’re looking for Tina Van Dorn,” he said before popping a grape into his mouth.
Instead of answering, she grabbed David’s hand. �
��You have great hands.” She squeezed. “Strong, and such long, elegant fingers.” An eyebrow arched. “You know what they say about men with long fingers, don’t you?” She wet her full lips.
Mac stepped forward. “Tina Van Dorn, please?”
She pointed toward the kitchen. “In there with her mother, talking to the sheriff.”
After they brushed past her, she thrust a business card into David’s hand. “Call me to make an appointment. I would love to give your hands a massage.”
“I don’t think she’ll stop with your hands,” Mac muttered while dragging David through the crowd of women, being careful not to mess up any of their freshly polished nails.
In the tiny kitchen, they found a teary eyed young woman holding out her hands flat on the table. Her fingernails were painted bright purple. She sat with cotton balls wedged between her toes to protect the wet polish that matched her fingernails.
Unable to move for fear of messing up the beauty treatment, Tina Van Dorn relied on her mother to dab the tears that seeped from her eyes.
“I take it Chip Van Dorn isn’t here,” David whispered to Sheriff Christopher Turow, a middle-aged man with a military haircut.
Bogie had taken a position near the kitchen window. Regularly, he would peer out the window to check in case Chip Van Dorn was planning to make a surprise visit.
“She spoke to him first thing this morning,” the sheriff said.
“He sounded really strange,” Tina sobbed. “I should have called the police, but … I guess I’ve been in denial about his sanity.”
“What did he say when you spoke to him?” Mac asked.
“He said that he was calling to say good-bye,” she answered.
“I told her that he was leaving town,” Tina’s mother said. “I knew he was a jerk, but I didn’t think he was—”
“Oh, Chip has a horrible temper,” Tina said. “It was scary sometimes. That’s why I was always glad that we didn’t have a gun. I mean, Chip was the type that if he had a weapon, he would just grab it and shoot someone without thinking about it.”
