by Sara Rosett
• Preservation—papers, photos, and fabrics last longer if preserved correctly and stored in a dry, low-humidity area.
Chapter Four
I jumped backward, banging into the screen with my shoulder. Mitch flicked on an inside light, flooding the entry area with light. “Gawd, you scared me to death. Mitch Avery, what are you doing here?” The female voice was coming from the far side of the room, which was still in shadow.
“Felicity?” Mitch asked, advancing into the living room. He found another light and turned it on. I stepped inside the front door, which opened into a living area that extended all the way across the house to a row of windows along the back wall.
I blinked a few times in the brightness and saw Felicity’s compact, petite form, which her new pixie haircut only emphasized, emerge from the galley kitchen that ran along the left side of the room. She hurried between the mix of mission-style furniture and recliners in the living room and enveloped Mitch in a quick hug, then shifted to embrace me. I raised my eyebrows at Mitch over her shoulder. I’d never seen her so affectionate.
“Ellie, how are you?” she asked heartily.
“Fine.” I rubbed my shoulder. “Now that my heart rate is back to normal.”
“I came by to check on Buddy,” Felicity said.
Mitch frowned. “Who?”
“The cat. He was sleeping on the porch swing. You probably scared him away.”
Mitch said, “Grandpa Franklin didn’t have a cat.”
“No, Buddy dropped by to see him every day or so,” Felicity said breezily. “I wanted to make sure Buddy hadn’t been shut up in the house with all the comings and goings. He lives with a woman about three houses away, but he’s an outdoor cat and if he doesn’t come home, she worries.” There was a smug undertone in her words that indicated she was the one in the know about Grandpa Franklin’s life and we were the interlopers here.
She linked her arm through mine and tried to turn me back to the front door. She was strong—her job as a fitness instructor involved several hours of teaching aerobic, weight training, martial arts and yoga classes each day—but I had a height advantage. Okay, I had a weight advantage, too, which wasn’t due solely to my extra inches. I knew she had more lean muscle mass than me, but I definitely had more, er—total mass. I braced my boots on the large braided rug that covered most of the hardwood floor. In the few seconds it had taken her to cross the room, I’d noticed a few interesting details. She was dressed in a black microfiber jacket and black jeans. There was a flashlight on the kitchen counter beside a brown grocery bag and a pile of opened newspapers. Two cabinet doors were open as well. She widened her green eyes. “What are you two doing here? I didn’t even know y’all were in town.”
“Obviously,” Mitch said as he strolled into the kitchen. Felicity tugged on my arm again. I didn’t budge. I was sure she could have used some of her martial arts moves to get me outside, but I guess she wasn’t willing to go quite that far to get us out of the house. Mitch casually peered inside the bag and made a tsking sound. “Robbing the dead already, Felicity?” he said as he pulled out several newspaper-wrapped bundles and peeled the paper away to reveal pink glass serving bowls and platters.
Felicity yanked her arm away from mine and advanced on Mitch. “Those are mine. Grandpa Franklin wanted me to have them.”
Mitch nodded and continued to remove bundles from the paper sack and unwrap them. “That so,” he said, mildly.
I watched the interchange with interest. Felicity was not a person I wanted to cross, but Mitch seemed unaware of her darting around him like an angry wasp. “Be careful with that piece. Don’t break it—it’s valuable.” She had quite a temper and could hold a grudge forever, something I’d discovered at the reunion. How could he have ever dated her? I suppose her diminutive frame might bring out the protective instincts in some guys, but Felicity was about as helpless as a Komodo dragon. Mitch managed to keep her hands away from the dishes and snapped a few quick pictures with his cell phone camera. “There,” he said and began rewrapping the glassware. “Just in case.”
“Just in case what?” Felicity demanded.
“I’m sure you’ll take good care of all this. But if there’s any question, any concern about where it is, or what it looked like, or how many pieces there are . . . well, we’ve got photos of what you already have.”
Felicity gaped at him for a moment, then sputtered, “But, I wasn’t taking—I mean, it’s mine.” I had to hand it to Mitch. His matter-of-fact tone was probably the only way to deal with her.
“Of course,” Mitch said as he replaced the last bundle in the bag and picked it up. “I’ll just help you carry this out to your car. It’s around the side, isn’t it?” He took her elbow and guided her to the kitchen door. As he went outside, I heard him say, “Don’t worry, Ellie and I will lock up.”
I could still hear her protesting as Mitch escorted her outside. His calmness didn’t rub off on her. If anything, it was like throwing grease on a fire. She was sputtering and protesting more loudly than before.
I went to the far end of the room and began closing the curtains. I moved into the kitchen and pulled the shade that was over the sink. I took a quick look in a few cabinets, but didn’t see any gaping holes in them, so apparently Felicity had just begun when we arrived. I ran my hand over the newspaper that was still on the counter and looked around the house. It was so sad and quiet. I folded the newspaper stack and shoved it in the trash can, then went back into the living room, my gaze on a large recliner. I’d only visited this house a few times but nothing had changed—the same furniture, the same arrangement, the same framed pictures of family scattered over the tabletops.
I walked over to Grandpa Franklin’s recliner and frowned. Something here had bothered Aunt Christine. Something had caused her to descend into incoherent mumbles and that made Mitch and his dad so concerned that they’d bundled her out of here as fast as they could. The deep tufts, padded arms, and thick cushions were covered in a dark brown fabric, which had a bit of a sheen on the arms of the chair from years of use. A lightweight brown throw dangled from one arm, its fringe brushing the braided rug on the floor. An end table on the other side held everything Grandpa Franklin could possibly need: a stack of books, his reading glasses, a mug, the remote control, a notepad and pencil, the phone, and a narrow plastic pillbox marked with the days of the week. A floor lamp perched behind the chair within easy reach.
My throat prickled as I looked at the reading glasses and the books. I swallowed and blinked a few times to clear my watery eyes. It did look like he’d just stepped into the kitchen and would return in a minute. Maybe seeing the empty recliner with all his familiar bits and pieces around it had brought home to Aunt Christine that he was gone. I could picture him clearly—his mass of white hair, still thick despite his age, his bushy eyebrows and his slightly watery brown eyes. By the time I met Mitch, Grandpa Franklin was somewhat stooped and walked with an uneven gait. He was one of those people who had the gift of storytelling. He could spin a story, even something as simple as a trip to the store, into a tale that held everyone’s attention and had us all laughing at the end. The stories I’d enjoyed the most were the ones from his past—scrapes he’d gotten into as a kid and his time in the military.
I walked over and shifted the books so I could see their covers. A new biography of Thomas Newton was on the top. A western, a memoir, and a mystery were sandwiched between another biography and a history of the fall of the Berlin Wall. The notepad was blank. Mitch returned to the room and came to stand beside me. “When I think of him, I always think of his stories,” I said. “Especially that one about driving to Macon.”
That made Mitch grin. “Yeah, he really had you going there for a few minutes, didn’t he?” Grandpa Franklin had told me he drove from Montgomery to Macon when he was fourteen because he wanted to see his uncle who lived there.
“Well, that was when I first met him. I was an easy target, I guess. I wised up after
that.” Grandpa Franklin had a huge stock of true, fascinating stories, but he’d also been able to tell a whopper of a tall tale with a straight face that always sucked in unsuspecting people, like me.
“I never was sure about that Will Rogers story. Did he really meet him on a train to California?”
“I think that one was true.”
I looked over the scene again, the chair and the end table scattered with items. “I wonder if there’s something specific here that bothered Aunt Christine?”
Mitch studied the chair and table and shook his head. I saw his jaw clench. I wrapped my arm around his waist. “It is kind of hard to look at without seeing him there, isn’t it?” I said.
Mitch nodded, then cleared his throat. “Maybe that was it—the emotions overwhelmed her.”
“Could be,” I said, resting my head on his shoulder. “But why would she be sorry? She took good care of him. Remember how hard she worked at the reunion to make sure he didn’t overexert himself in the heat and how she made sure he kept drinking water so he wouldn’t get dehydrated?”
I felt his shrug. “I don’t know. It really doesn’t make sense.” He squeezed me closer for a moment, then said, “Come on, let’s close the rest of the curtains and get out of here.”
On the opposite side of the house from the kitchen, there was a short hallway that led to two bedrooms, a bathroom, and a staircase to a third bedroom in the half story upstairs. Mitch took the master bedroom and I went into the extra bedroom at the back of the house.
I could tell right away that this was where Aunt Christine sometimes slept. There were little feminine touches around the room—lace throw pillows on the bed, a comb and curling iron along with makeup on the dresser, and a flowered robe and gown hanging on the back of the closet door.
It was also the room with the broken window. A rectangle of particle board covered the bottom portion of the window where the lowest panes of glass would have been. The floor had been mopped up and the furniture had been moved to give easier access to the window. As I pulled the curtains closed, I could see that the window locks were simple crescent locks, the kind that you pushed open or closed with your thumb. Definitely not the most burglarproof locks. The window that was boarded up was locked and I couldn’t see any damage to the lock itself or the sash around it. It didn’t look like anyone had forced their way inside. I wondered why Aunt Christine had automatically called the police when she saw the broken window.
I heard Mitch trotting down the stairs and I met him in the hallway. As we made our way back through the house, turning off lights, I asked, “So Aunt Christine’s car is out back?”
“Yes,” Mitch said as he clicked on the front porch light, then closed and locked the front door. “Let’s go out through the kitchen.”
“You handled Felicity really well,” I said.
“If there’s one thing I’ve learned in the military, it’s that there’s only one way to fight stealth . . . more stealth.”
“Did she have anything else in her car?”
We walked outside into the cool, dark night. “No. I think she was just getting started when we arrived. I’m surprised she didn’t hear us drive up.”
The back porch light threw a weak puddle of light over a white VW Golf parked close to the house. “She was on the other side of the house, so she wouldn’t have seen the headlights, and if she was wrapping things in newsprint—that can be noisy.” I’d done enough packing and unpacking of newsprint bundles that I knew all too well the racket it could make. It was enough to wake a sleeping baby or, in some cases, drown out a temper tantrum.
“I suppose,” Mitch said as he waited for me to unlock the car and get in. “It’s a stick shift—do you want me to drive it?”
“Are you kidding?” I said as I turned the key. “It’s like riding a bicycle—you never forget.”
“Okay, I’ll see you at Aunt Christine’s house,” he said as he closed the car door.
“Wait, Mitch,” I said, rolling down the window. “What kind of car did Felicity have?”
“It was an Eclipse, I think. Small, sporty.”
“What color was it?”
“Red. Why?”
“Oh, no reason. Just wondering,” I said, rolling up the window. “See you in a few.”
I heard the clank of silverware and smelled bacon. I rolled over and glanced around the dark room. Everything was in the wrong place—the door, the window, even the furniture was wrong, I thought groggily. Then I remembered we were in the guest room at Mitch’s parents’ house. I listened, but didn’t hear any noises from the rooms down the hall from us. Nathan and his cousin Jack were sleeping on sleeping bags on an inflatable mattress in Mitch’s old room, which had been transformed into an office. I wasn’t sure, but I think they’d smuggled in a rather large supply of Legos shortly before bedtime. Livvy was in the “blue room,” a room decorated in blue toile. From the way her eyes lit up when she walked in the room, I had a feeling she was going to want blue toile in her room back home. She was sharing the room with her tomboy cousin, Madison. I wasn’t sure if they’d get along since Livvy’s current favorite color was purple and she was very interested in reading, but we’d come back from Grandpa Franklin’s house and found them playing an intense game of Battleship. I didn’t hear shouting or giggling, so I burrowed back into the pillows after checking the clock. Mitch was still breathing heavily, but he shifted toward me.
It felt weird, trying to go back to sleep again at six-thirty in the morning. If we were at home at this time on a Thursday morning, I’d already be in the kitchen fixing breakfast and packing Livvy’s lunch for school. But we weren’t at home. We were here in a weird state of suspended animation. We’d spent yesterday, Wednesday, receiving flowers and food while we waited for word from Detective Kalra about the status of the investigation into Grandpa Franklin’s death and the break-in. Until the detective received the word from the county coroner about whether the death was natural or suspicious, everything was on hold. Those exact words were not mentioned, but they seemed to hover in the air, like the trace of wood smoke from the fireplace or the aroma of freshly brewed coffee that came from the kitchen all day because Caroline kept making pot after pot for the visitors who dropped by and the family who lingered, waiting for news. Caroline hadn’t attended the awards ceremony yesterday, either. She’d sent an employee from her office to accept the award, instead.
I squeezed my eyes shut and tried to banish thoughts of the casseroles that had filled up the refrigerator and the sound of the phone ringing constantly with curious friends and neighbors wanting to know the day and time of the funeral. Caroline and Bill had managed to put everyone off with vague assurances that they would get the word out as soon as something was decided. I’d even heard Caroline putting off the local obituary writer. Her tone of voice had never changed as she explained that the family was still debating which funeral home they were going to use, so they couldn’t put anything in the paper yet, but her face had looked stiff and agonized as she spoke the words. She’d hung up the phone and paused a moment with her hand on her collarbone. Uncle Kenny had said, “Don’t see why you’re even trying to keep it quiet, Caroline. You know the word will get out.”
A steely look came into her eyes and she said, “Kenny, you know as well I as do that I’m doing the right thing.”
Uncle Kenny was not a man to let anyone have the last word, but Caroline had sent him a scorching look and he’d closed his half-open mouth.
I sighed and opened my eyes. It was no use. I wasn’t going to get back to sleep. I gazed at the ceiling fan and wondered again about the secrecy. Smarr wasn’t a tiny town, so it was possible that their friends wouldn’t find out about the investigation, but if it went on any longer, the news would spread. What I couldn’t figure out was why it mattered if people knew about the investigation. Aunt Christine and Caroline had been back over to Grandpa Franklin’s house yesterday and confirmed that nothing (except the Depression glass) was missing. And t
he word “murder” hadn’t been mentioned again by anyone associated with the investigation. What was there to hide? Aunt Christine’s weird remarks? She hadn’t said anything else like the mumbled words I’d overheard and, interestingly, Roy wasn’t with her yesterday. I’d expected him to be glued to her side, but she had spent the day with us, waiting for news about the autopsy. Autopsy was another taboo word. When it was mentioned, it was in low tones. The family hadn’t requested an autopsy. The order had come from the county coroner to see if there was foul play involved in his death. We didn’t even know how long the process would take.
I gently pushed back the covers and eased out of bed. Mitch continued to sleep like a kid after an exhausting day on the playground. I think I could have been slamming doors and shouting and he would have slept right through all the noise, but I moved carefully because I didn’t want to wake the kids. I found my workout pants, a T-shirt, and a sweatshirt in my suitcase. I slipped into the clothes in the bathroom and pulled my hair back in a ponytail. I’d eaten so much yesterday and not really done anything except sit around and talk to the adults and occasionally run interference with the kids. I could use a brisk walk around the neighborhood.
The guest room was at the back of the house next to the sunroom, which opened to the backyard. The living room and sunroom were empty. A platter of bacon and pancakes sat on the long kitchen table beside a bowl of chopped melon and a stack of plates. The Realtor of the Year plaque that Caroline’s employee had accepted on her behalf yesterday was sitting on the counter. The awards banquet, the main reason for our trip, had been pushed aside and was barely thought of now. A note tucked under a row of coffee mugs read, “Had to run to the office. Help yourself to breakfast. Juice and milk in the fridge.” I recognized the elegant cursive as Caroline’s handwriting. I didn’t see Bill, or anyone else, but most of the family had gone home to their own houses last night since almost everyone else lived in the area. Only Mitch’s older sister Julia and her husband, Wes, Jack and Madison’s parents, had stayed overnight here with us.
