Killer Keepsakes

by Jane K. Cleland

  I recounted the events of the day, sticking to the facts and not venturing into the murky arenas of opinion or speculation. “What do you think it all means?” I asked Ty when I was done.

  “If they find Gretchen, you’ll hear about it soon enough,” he said. “As for Vince’s alibi—alibis are funny things. Johnny might be convinced that Vince was there for fifteen minutes, but the truth might be that it only felt like fifteen minutes. It’s possible Vince was only there for five minutes. About the police timing how long it takes to drive that circuit, well, maybe, for whatever reason, there was no traffic the day Boulanger was killed, and Vince hit every light just right. So now the trip that they say takes no less than an hour and a half actually took Vince an hour and twenty-five minutes. So add the ten minutes Johnny was off to the five minutes the police were off and you have fifteen minutes, plenty of time to shoot someone and clean up the scene of the crime if you put your mind to it.”

  “That makes a lot of sense.” I paused. “You know what I’m going to do, Ty?”

  “What?”

  “Go home and make soup.” I glanced out the window at what was shaping up to be a major snowstorm. The tree branches were covered with crusty snow, and the parking lot was totally white. “I’ll stop at the store, so you don’t need to.”

  _____

  I’d said good-bye to everyone and had my coat on and my umbrella in hand when the phone rang. Cara told me it was Sam Bartlett. I stared at her for a moment, trying to place the name, then ran upstairs to take the call. With my coat half off, I snatched up the receiver and said, “This is Josie. Mr. Bartlett?”

  “Yes. I’m calling to thank you. I just got back from the police station. I understand you’re the person who connected the dots between Amelia’s murder and your missing employee, Marie—I mean, Gretchen. That’s what she’s calling herself now, right? That’s quite a job you did.”

  “Thank you.” I looked out toward the woods. It was still snowing, but the flakes were fluffy now. It was warming up. “Am I right in thinking that Gretchen—Marie—and Amelia were close?”

  “Like mother and daughter.”

  “And you and Amelia were like brother and sister. It occurs to me that maybe Gretchen—I mean Marie—might consider you an uncle. If I was in trouble and had an uncle I loved and trusted, I’d call him.”

  He paused so long I thought I’d offended him. Finally he said, “I wish she had.”

  “Then you don’t think she had anything to do with Amelia’s death?”

  “Hell, no. Never did. Forget the fact that Marie really did love Amelia like a mother, and never in a million years would have killed her, did you know that Amelia kept nearly five thousand dollars cash in her safe?”

  “I knew she kept cash—but not how much.”

  “Not one dime was taken. This crime shouted Morgan. No one ever thought Marie was involved. It was his fingerprints on that chair leg, and it was, as the police say, a crime of passion. Whoever killed Amelia was out-of-his-head angry. Marie didn’t have a temper, not that kind of temper—but Morgan did.”

  I thought of Morgan, and then I thought of Vince. He had that kind of temper, too. Gretchen escaped Morgan while Mandy made excuses for Vince. How far would Mandy go to protect him?

  “Poor Marie,” I said.

  We exchanged contact information and agreed to stay in touch.

  “If you hear from her,” Sam said, “tell her she’s welcome anytime.”

  CHAPTER THIRTY

  Z

  oë invited us for dessert. “I made a peach pie, so you have to come over.”

  I laughed. “Why does your making a peach pie mean we have to come over?”

  “Because if you don’t, I’ll eat it all.”

  “Well, only because we love you so much, we’ll throw ourselves on the sword of your peach pie.”

  We jogged to Zoë’s through steadily falling snow. The weatherman on the local news station was predicting that we’d have a foot by morning. April snowstorms weren’t unusual, but I’d gotten myself mentally ready for spring—I was tired of winter.

  Zoë told us that the kids were asleep upstairs and to get ourselves settled in the living room. She had a fire burning. I took the club chair nearest the fire. Ty sat on a leather chair next to the couch. Toys, dolls, and games leaned against the outside wall, stretching the entire length of the room.

  “Creative storage,” I said to Zoë as she walked in carrying a tray containing half a pie and the fixings for coffee.

  “I call it the poor man’s baseboard.”

  “Very avant-garde.”

  “Thanks.” She placed the tray near me. “Go ahead and cut the pie, will you, Josie?”

  I reached for the knife as Zoë got situated on the sofa. She put her feet up on the coffee table and crossed her ankles. “Any news about Gretchen?” she asked.

  I served pie as I filled her in.

  Zoë sipped coffee. “What do you know about Morgan Boulanger?” she asked.

  “He was Gretchen’s husband. He was a jerk.”

  “He beat her, right?”

  “Several times, apparently, according to the Denver police.”

  “And killed that store owner—the woman Gretchen worked for?”

  “Right.”

  “And the police think Gretchen was an accomplice in the murder?” she asked.

  “They think maybe she was an accomplice,” I corrected. “There’s an APB out for her.”

  “Do the police know whether Gretchen left her apartment voluntarily?”

  “I don’t think so—no, well, maybe . . . I mean, her purse and suitcase are gone, too. That sounds kind of voluntary, I guess.”

  “Maybe she left them in her car because she was just running up to her apartment for a second.”

  “Why would she do that?” I asked. “She’d already been gone for two weeks.”

  Zoë tilted her head, her eyes serious, even somber, her mouth twisted into a wry grin. “Jeez, Josie, I can’t imagine. Whatever would keep a young woman from going home?”

  A man! I thought. Maybe the man she met in Hawaii—Jack Stene. I shook my head. “She would have surfaced by now. The man she met, Jack, was checked out and came out clean.”

  “Maybe. Maybe not. Let’s say that Gretchen goes off with Mr. Right on Wednesday as soon as she picks up her car, hears the news that Morgan is dead on Thursday morning while she’s getting ready for work, and something about it flips her out—I mean, more than the normal flip-out one would expect on hearing there’s a dead guy in your living room. Maybe she knew who killed him.” She paused. “Maybe she’s convinced that the killer is coming after her next. What would she do? She’d run, or she’d go into deep hiding somewhere she felt safe.”

  I thought for almost a minute, considering this new slant. “What about the luggage tag I saw in Gretchen’s entry way?”

  Zoë shrugged. “Beats me.”

  I sighed. “There’s so much about Gretchen I don’t know.”

  Zoë nodded. “I think that’s right. I think you haven’t given full consideration to her mental condition. Beaten women act differently,” she said. “When someone abuses you, it changes how you feel, and it changes how you act. You’re guarded and worried about offending your attacker. You’re wary.”

  “Gretchen’s not like that.”

  “No, because she got free.” Zoë watched for a moment as I tried to process what she was saying, then continued. “Apparently this Morgan asshole—excuse my French—kept his ego in his fist. Which means Gretchen had no alternative but to escape as quickly and as quietly as she could. His murder of her boss gave her the cover she needed to get out. The dirtbag was so busy worrying about saving his own skin, he took his eye off of her long enough for her to get away. From where I sit, Gretchen isn’t guilty of anything but terrible taste in men.”

  “Gretchen once said that there wasn’t a loser within a hundred miles who hadn’t found her and who she didn’t think was kind of cute and
for sure worth saving,” I suddenly remembered. “Then she’d roll her eyes the way she did and say, ‘What a judge of men am I.’ ” I shook my head. “I thought she was being funny.”

  Zoë leaned back with a quirky-sad smile. “Isn’t that something? She was aware that she had that—what should we call it? A proclivity? A weakness? A bad habit? Whatever. She was aware that, for whatever reason, she attracted the wrong sort of men—and, obviously, she wanted to change but couldn’t. The same kind of guys kept coming around. It was like she was wired wrong or something.”

  “When I was with the police, I heard variations on this story all the time,” Ty remarked. “Any expert will tell you that most battered women think, on some level at least, that they deserve what they get. There’s another point, too, that lends credence to Zoë’s hypothesis. The last stats I saw on stalkers were pretty disheartening. Something like twenty-five percent of battered women are stalked by their abuser after they leave.”

  “It’s like you hear about all the time—a woman gets a restraining order and the guy comes around anyway.” Poor Gretchen, I thought.

  “Exactly,” Ty said. “Boulanger might be one of those guys who wouldn’t take no for an answer. Gretchen got away once and thought she was safe, but in reality, he never stopped trying to find her. He knew she liked working in an antiques store and would probably gravitate to a similar job, so he regularly read that magazine—what’s it called, Josie?”

  “Antiques Insights.”

  “And if Morgan showed up again after all those years,” Zoë said, “with Gretchen thinking she’d finally got rid of him—bam, she’d flip.” She snapped her fingers as she spoke. “I know I would. Luckily, my ex is just a bum, not a stalker.”

  “Did he beat you?” I asked, shaken at the thought.

  “Beat? No, he never beat me exactly. He slapped me once, and once was enough. He’s one of those guys who can’t hold a job, but, mind you, it’s never his fault. He had more bad bosses in a year than most of us have in a lifetime. What really got under my skin was that he was lazy around the house. He didn’t work, but he wouldn’t wash a dish.” She shrugged. “I’d thought about leaving him for years, but I had kids, you know? I thought it was marginally better for the kids to be in a two-parent household even though one of the parents was an idiot.” She paused. “Then he slapped me. If you’ve never been there, you don’t know how easy it is to think that maybe you did something so bad, you earned the slap.” She shook her head. “I packed up and was outta there in about two hours, but I gotta tell you, I almost stayed—even after he hit me, shame on me. I bet most women would have. I got out because I got lucky and because I’m me. My uncle died and left me a house and a rental property and a little money—and I’m filled with piss and vinegar. No one hits me. No one.”

  “I’m so lucky you’re my friend,” I said, tears moistening my eyes as she spoke. I took a deep breath. “Do you think Gretchen was in a similar situation?”

  “Sounds like it—except a lot worse. If she got away from Morgan the way I’m picturing, on impulse and fast, can you imagine how she must have felt when she realized that she hadn’t escaped after all? She wouldn’t just be terrified—she’d be heartbroken. Maybe she went crazy, killed him, and took off. Or she saw him already dead in her apartment, knew that whoever had killed him was gunning for her next, and took off.” She shrugged. “I would have done the same thing.”

  “Which brings us full circle,” I objected. “If what you say is true, why wouldn’t she contact me? Or Sam Bartlett? She has to know that we’d help her.”

  “I think you’re missing part of the complexity, Josie. Probably she’s ashamed that she ever married such a snake in the first place. Meanwhile, she’s been living a lie for years. Now she’s spending most of her energy keeping herself alive—just coping. If I’m right, she has no idea that she has friends who would stand up for her. Plus, she might be scared to go back to Denver. As far as she knows, Morgan’s family and friends still live there, and she might expect them to blame her for his death just like they blamed her for everything else when she lived with him. So that lets out Sam Bartlett. As for you—she knows that you’d never lie. She’d figure that if she asked you for help, you’d tell her to turn herself in and you’d get her a good lawyer. My guess is that she doesn’t trust the system. If she’s like many battered women, reporting Morgan to the cops only got her a worse beating. All she knows now is that her life is in danger and she has to be very, very careful or she’ll get caught and killed.”

  It was one thing to hear that Gretchen had been a battered wife—but it was another thing altogether to listen to Zoë’s emotionally charged description of what being a battered wife felt like.

  Zoë looked at me. “You’ve got to reach out to her with unconditional support.”

  “How? I don’t know where she is.”

  “Somehow,” Zoë insisted.

  “You know how to reach her,” Ty told me.

  “I do? How?”

  “Think about it,” he said, then turned to Zoë. “Good pie. I wouldn’t mind another slice.”

  He met my gaze but didn’t speak. It took me about ten seconds to catch up. Got it, I thought, and I wondered why it hadn’t occurred to me long before now. Of course I knew how to find her.

  “Excuse me,” I said. “I need to make a phone call.”

  CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE

  T

  he next morning, just before seven, I ran downstairs and turned on my computer. I went to the Seacoast Star’s Web site. Wes’s article was the lead story. The headline screamed:

  GRETCHEN BROCK INNOCENT!

  JOSIE PRESCOTT SAYS “I’LL PROVE IT!”

  I thought I might faint. I reached for the phone and dialed Wes. Before the call connected, call waiting clicked in. I looked at the display. It was the Rocky Point police station number—I’d called it a million times when Ty had worked there.

  I answered with as much pep as I could marshal. “This is Josie.”

  “It’s Detective Brownley,” she stated, her tone icy. “I got in early today to do some paperwork. Imagine my surprise at seeing this morning’s Seacoast Star.”

  “I can explain.”

  “Good. Because if the article is accurate, if you can prove Gretchen’s innocence, it would seem that you’re withholding evidence in a criminal investigation.”

  “No, no,” I gasped. “It’s not like that at all. I just saw the article myself. Wes misquoted me. What I said was ‘I believe Gretchen is innocent of all charges, and if she can get in touch with me, I’ll help her prove it.’ That’s different from what he wrote.”

  “What’s happened to convince you of her innocence?”

  “Nothing. I did it because I know in my heart she’s innocent. Don’t laugh. I know it sounds lame, but I know.”

  “Why now? What’s happened?”

  “Nothing.” I paused, thinking how to explain. “I want her to trust me, is all. I want her to believe that no matter what, I can help her. If she’s frightened, I could hire a bodyguard. If she needs a lawyer, Max will represent her. I hadn’t realized the impact of her past abuse—now I do. Don’t you see? She’s traumatized, and she doesn’t know I’ll support her.”

  I listened to silence for several seconds. Then Detective Brownley said, “If you hear from her, you’ve got to call me right away. Do you understand? She’ll be opposed to your doing so, but you must. I’m not her enemy, Josie. No one hopes she’s innocent more than I do. If you don’t call me right away, though, you’ll be guilty of obstructing justice, and I’ll see that you’re charged.”

  I promised to do as she said. After she hung up, I sat and stared at the computer monitor for a long time, then walked slowly into the kitchen to get coffee started.

  “Detective Brownley called,” I said as Ty entered the kitchen around seven thirty.

  He was dressed in a suit and tie, meeting attire. Today he was scheduled to attend a high-level strategy session in Boston.
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  “She saw the Seacoast Star headline,” I continued, describing the article’s contents. “I don’t think she’s very impressed with my tactics.”

  “I’m not so sure she’s right. Let’s assume Gretchen is able to read the article. The story will get her thinking. She may be ready, or close to ready, to surrender—being on the run isn’t for the faint of heart—and if she believes what you say, it could tip the balance. Maybe not today, but soon.”

  I reached out and touched his cheek. “Thank you,” I said.

  The storm had passed overnight, leaving fourteen inches of fluffy snow in its wake. The sky was cloudless, the sun strong. The snow had already begun to melt.

  I drove by the Winton Farm job site. The police were still there. I saw flashes of uniforms through one of the front windows.

  As soon as I arrived at Prescott’s, Cara told me that reporters from the Manchester Daily, the Boston Inquirer, and Maine Record had called. Also, a producer from the local New Hampshire TV station wanted to schedule me for an on-air interview.

  “Someone from the Denver Globe, too,” Cara said. “Think about that: They’re on Mountain Time! It wasn’t even seven in the morning there when they called.”

  “From now on, tell them I have no further comment, okay? No matter what they ask or how they rephrase their questions, just keep saying that I have no further comment. Of course, it goes without saying that you have no comment, either.”

  “I don’t know anything to comment about!”

  “That won’t stop them from asking.”

  “Good point. I’ll be careful.”

  “Thank you. This is the voice of painfully earned experience speaking—the best way to be careful is to be mindful of what you’re saying every time you open your mouth.”

  “Got it. Chip Davidson called, too.”

  “Really? It’s been a busy morning. What did he say?”

  “It was a very quick call. He asked for Gretchen, and when I said she wasn’t here, he thanked me and hung up.”