“You’re here,” I said. “That was fast. The woman at the healing center told me you were coming from Kenosha.”
“No,” Lori said. “I live in Kenosha, but I was in Green Bay at my parents’ house. That’s only like three hours.”
I motioned for her to follow me into my office. “Come talk with me.”
Once seated, she said, “Jola . . . is that her name?” I nodded. “Jola told me what was going on. I’m glad Angel didn’t have a car here.”
Now she was worried? I bit back my irritation the best I could. “You all left him here. Didn’t you notice something was wrong with him?”
Lori matched my irritation and countered with defensiveness. “You know, we were all pretty messed up right then. We were all devastated by Barry’s death and couldn’t handle being here anymore. Angel refused, I mean he flat out refused to get in a car. He said he wanted to stay and work through things. Said he’d figure out his own way home.”
The look on her face as she talked about Angel struck me. “You didn’t want to leave him, did you?”
“Of course not.” She shifted positions in the chair. “I’ve been really worried. That’s why I went to my parents’ house, so I’d be a little closer. Stupid cell phones don’t work here, so I kept calling the cottage to check on him. Yesterday, he didn’t answer, so I called the rental office. They told me they thought he went to the healing center. I called there, and Jola said he needed a ride.”
I watched her expressions and body language. She felt more than friendship for this man.
“You went through a lot to find out if he was okay,” I said.
“Yeah, well . . .”
“You’re in love with him.”
She started to deny it and glanced out toward his jail cell.
“He can’t hear you from here,” I promised. “Just keep your voice low.”
She nodded, blushed, and wouldn’t look at me. “You guessed my secret.”
“Things are kind of a mess with your group, aren’t they?”
Lori snorted a laugh and lifted her head. “You aren’t kidding. Angel liked Marissa but that upset Barry. Then Marissa hooks up with Rochelle which only makes the other two more determined to get her. I honestly feel like the only reason either Barry or Angel wanted Marissa was to keep the other from getting her.”
“So now what?” I asked.
Lori smiled. “I know this will probably sound inappropriate considering the circumstances, and I don’t mean it to be. I’m hoping now that Barry isn’t a factor anymore, maybe Angel will move on from Marissa and notice me.” She shrugged. “That’s awful, isn’t it?”
“No, I understand what you mean.”
Total mess. Hormones have flared, Gran had written about The Pack. Romance was in the air.
Or was it rivalry? Like that guy in high school who only wanted to go out with me when I was dating someone else, maybe Angel and Barry simply couldn’t stand for one to have what the other couldn’t.
Was that what had been going on with Flavia, too? She simply couldn’t stand for Reeva to have what she didn’t?
“Sheriff?”
I blinked to find Lori looking at me like she wondered where I’d gone. “Sorry, lost in a thought. You’ll make sure that Angel gets help, right?”
“Jola made arrangements.” She pointed in the general direction of the healing center. “I stopped there first. There’s a clinic outside of Milwaukee waiting for him. I’ll bring him straight there.”
Before letting him go, I spoke with Angel as well.
“I get that it wasn’t my fault,” he said from inside his cell, “but I can’t help thinking that Barry died because I couldn’t let stuff go and walk away. I’m too wrapped up in myself. I gotta start thinking more about other people.”
“You’re saying the right things. That’s a good start.” I couldn’t help but think it sounded rehearsed, though. “For now, I want you to get home safely. Lori’s going to take you to a clinic.”
Angel nodded. “Jola told me. If I don’t show up at that clinic, she’s gonna call the police.”
“Then I won’t ask you to call and check in with me.”
I let him out of the cell, wished them safe travels, and sent them on their way.
It was past noon by the time they left. I was torn between wanting to go get lunch and wanting to continue with the journal. As it had at nearly every turn, the journal won, and I settled for a lunch of two who-knew-how-old granola bars Sheriff Brighton had left in a desk drawer and water from the cooler in the interview room.
From late April:
Priscilla’s baby was born last night. A little boy. We’ll have a blessing ceremony for him at the next full moon.
From mid-June:
Dillon reports that there are new tensions within The Pack. Now that Priscilla’s baby is here, she wants a family. Velma keeps assuring her that the three of them are a family, but Priscilla wants a father for this baby. She still hasn’t revealed the birth father, but Dillon says that her sights are now set on Gabe. Problem is, Gabe is devoted to Rae.
The rest of the summer passed along with this tension hanging over the group members. Everyone wanted Priscilla and her baby to have a good home, but everyone also wanted Gabe and Rae to stay together. Everyone except for Flavia. Just when I was sure I would never find out the real reason that Gran hid these books, I came to the final weekend of summer 1979.
I don’t know exactly what happened last night, but Priscilla is dead, and Dillon claims Rae is responsible. Around moments of sobbing so hard he couldn’t speak, he told me what happened.
Flavia summoned Rae, Gabe, and Priscilla to the Meditation Circle last night proclaiming that the love triangle drama between them needed to get straightened out. Rae told Briar, who gathered the rest of The Pack, but by the time they got there, things were already very heated. Flavia had positioned Priscilla and Rae face-to-face and told them that if they both really wanted Gabe they needed to plead their cases to him.
Teenagers never cease to boggle the mind. The entire village knows that Gabe and Rae have been together for a long time. A person can’t ‘plead their case’ and take someone’s partner. But it seems that Priscilla wanted Gabe, and Flavia was determined to make it happen.
As the rest of the group circled around, Rae and Priscilla shouted horrible things at each other while Flavia egged them on. If anyone from the group tried to put a stop to the face-off, Flavia would silence them, saying they needed to resolve this. By the time the rest realized things were going to get violent, it was too late. There was a lot of pushing and shoving and Priscilla ended up falling and hitting her head on one of the large rocks that make up the fire ring. The kids immediately tried to help her, but it was already too late.
I stood from my desk, my mind spinning as much as Gran’s must have been at this revelation, and paced my office, Meeka following me like my shadow.
“So, Flavia—” I started to say out loud and then realized Reed was back at his desk again. And Reed, I’d learned, had the hearing of a bat.
“What about my mother?” he called.
There was no way I could involve him in this. What was I supposed to say? I’m pretty sure your mother was complicit in a girl’s death nearly forty years ago. Yeah, that would go over like a spotlight at a new moon ritual. I tried ignoring him and hoped that he’d let it go.
He appeared in my doorway. “What did you say about my mother?”
The thing was, as Briar had so perfectly pointed out to me not too long ago, any information gathered from a witness to a crime were the events filtered through the witness’ point of view. This was why, as a police officer, I spoke with everyone who’d been in the area where a crime had been committed. Then I’d compare all the statements I’d gathered with those the other officers had taken, keep the things that matched, and get rid of the outliers. The only thing I could keep from Gran’s written statement, a recounting from an emotionally distraught mother which had been fil
tered through her emotionally distraught son, was that Priscilla had died and a crowd had been there to witness it. If I wanted to figure out the truth of what had happened to Priscilla, I needed to talk with everyone who had been there that night.
“I’ve been reading my grandmother’s journals,” I told Reed. “Did you know that an Original named Priscilla was murdered in 1979? Well, that’s the accusation. I don’t have proof that it was murder. Could have been accidental.”
If the report in Gran’s journal was accurate, Rae might be guilty of involuntary manslaughter, and Flavia could be charged with aiding and abetting. Unless, of course, Flavia had wanted Priscilla dead. Or, maybe Rae had been the intended target and Priscilla got caught in the crossfire.
I shook my head. “I’m getting ahead of myself.”
Reed’s forehead wrinkled with confusion. “Ahead of yourself about what?”
I had to stop expressing my thoughts out loud. I tapped my head. “I’m trying to figure out what happened the night this Priscilla girl died.” I glanced at him. “Did your mom ever mention that incident to you? According to the journal entry, she was there.”
Reed leaned back, arms crossed over his chest, seemingly scanning his memory. “No, can’t say as I remember hearing about that.”
“I need to figure this out. There are people in the village who were there at the time. I’m going to talk with them.” I grabbed my car keys, Meeka’s leash, and the raincoat on the back of my office door. “I’ll be at The Fortune Tellers’ Triangle.”
Chapter 20
From the parking lot on the west side of town, Meeka and I followed a well-trodden path that ran beneath the highway and through the forest until we came to a clearing. There, a dozen brightly colored wagons and a few canvas tents were scattered about, and twenty or thirty people waited patiently to have their fortunes told. Despite the steady falling drizzle, the area was relatively dry due to a heavy canopy of pine branches overhead.
Large signs on each wagon, hand painted with fanciful fonts, revealed the teller within. Effie and Cybil, being the grand dames of the fortune tellers, had prime front and center spots for their wagons. Because The Triangle was so busy at that moment, I figured I’d be waiting a while before I could talk with either of them, but it turned out wearing a sheriff’s uniform afforded privilege.
“Well, Jayne, what a surprise,” Effie crooned as she stepped out of her wagon. The woman following her was crying what appeared to be happy tears. The man behind her looked shell-shocked. Effie leaned in close to me, “I just told them that by this time next year, they’ll have triplets.”
“That explains the look on his face,” I empathized.
“What brings you here, dear?” Effie asked.
“I need to talk with you and Cybil.” I quickly added, “I don’t need a reading.”
She gasped and placed her hands palms together, seemingly excited by this. “Official business. That bumps you to the head of the line.”
“Oh, no, these people have been waiting.”
She leaned in to me again. “And if they truly want their futures foretold, they’ll wait as long as necessary.” She held a hand out toward her wagon. “Go on inside and make yourself comfortable. I’ll catch Cybil as soon as she’s done. And before you ask, of course, Meeka is welcome.”
Effie smiled down at my little dog. If we were anyplace else in the world, I’d wonder how she’d known what I was about to ask.
I was relieved to find that the inside of her wagon did not match the outside, which was top-to-bottom shades of purple from the palest lavender to the boldest violet. I understood having a signature shade, but if I had to sit inside an all-purple room day-in and day-out, I’d get nauseous. Instead, the twelve-foot by twenty-foot space was a bohemian dream. Multicolored scarves covered the windows as well as the round table at the back half of the wagon. Two simple wooden chairs sat on one side of the table while a beautiful tapestry-covered armchair—Effie’s throne, I assumed—sat on the other. A clear crystal ball, about the size of a bowling ball, sat on a silver filigree stand at the center of the table. A deck of tarot cards and candles in various shapes and sizes surrounded the ball.
The front half of the wagon resembled a living room. An old overstuffed loveseat, also covered in tapestry fabric, sat to my right. Two overstuffed chairs across from the loveseat were covered in shades of all lavender.
“Wouldn’t be complete without an all-lavender something.”
It seemed that because nothing matched, it all went together perfectly. Like the herb bundles in Morgan’s shop. Or the people who lived in this village. I chose the loveseat while Meeka decided that beneath the covered crystal ball table was the best place for her.
A minute later, Effie entered the wagon with Cybil in tow.
“The sheriff is here,” Cybil stated as she dropped with a groan into one of the lavender chairs across from me. “We must be in trouble.”
“No trouble,” I assured her. “Thanks for bumping me to the front of the line. This shouldn’t take long; I just have a few questions. First one being, did either of you know that Gran kept journals?”
The first sign that I was on to something helpful was the fact that they instantly looked at each other instead of me.
“Effie knew,” Cybil said.
Effie swatted her arm. “You did, too. Yes, Lucy proudly took on the role of village historian. That’s really what her journals were, after all. Her version of the history of Whispering Pines.”
“Interesting that you call it ‘her version,’” I noted. “I’m here to get your versions of some events I read about. What can you two tell me about The Pack?”
Again, they looked at each other.
Cybil spoke up first. “That was Lucy’s nickname for our kids. They were constantly together. A single cohesive unit.”
“They were the best of friends,” Effie recalled with a fond smile. “It started out with Dillon . . . your father, and Briar Barlow. They were the first two kids here and really only had each other, but as more and more came, their circle grew.”
“Your dad and my son Gabe got to be good buddies,” Cybil said.
“Don’t forget Horace,” Effie reminded. “He was in with them as well. Thick as thieves those boys.”
“I could tell from Gran’s journals that the group was very close. Then something happened to divide them. Do you know what caused that?”
Effie inspected her long, multicolored fingernails. Cybil shook her head.
“What caused the divide?” Something between sadness and anger flashed in Cybil’s eyes. “Two things. I assume you read about the pregnancy.”
“You mean Priscilla’s,” I said.
“Yes, Priscilla’s. Everyone in The Pack, and in the village, wanted to know who the father was. The girls, I believe, were afraid that she had been attacked and wanted to know who to be wary of.” Then Cybil chuckled, a mischievous sound. “The boys probably wanted to know who to get instructions from.”
“Cybil.” Effie swatted her again, shocked by the crass statement.
“Stop hitting me. I’ll be black-and-blue.”
“The kids,” Effie amended, “wanted to know because they cared about their friend. They were worried that she’d been assaulted and wanted to help. I’m sure you know how it can be when all you want to do is help and that’s the last thing the person will let you do.”
Barry and Angel. Not exactly the same thing, but I fully understood the desire to help only to be shut out.
“Had Priscilla been dating anyone? Gran never mentioned a boy in the journals.”
The two turban-wrapped heads shook in unison.
“What happened to the baby?” I asked.
“Velma sent it away,” Effie said with a dramatic sweep of her hand. “Couldn’t handle caring for a baby at her age.”
It, not he or another more endearing term. This was a baby we were talking about. There was more behind her statement. Much more behind this entire situation
.
“The other thing that caused the divide,” Cybil continued, “well, I’m sure you can guess.”
I made a mental note to come back to the baby and said, “Flavia.”
“Flavia,” Cybil confirmed. “She was obsessed then, as she is now, with being at the top of the leaderboard.”
“Gran wrote that Flavia and Priscilla were close.” They nodded but didn’t reply verbally, so I prodded for more. “Something other than the pregnancy happened to Priscilla.”
“The poor girl.” Effie blinked her eyes again and again.
“Do you know what happened?” I asked. “I mean, I know that she fell and hit her head. I know that’s how she died. Do you know how the fall happened?”
Cybil cleared her throat. “Do you mean, do we know who pushed her?”
Pushed her? I didn’t say anything about her being pushed. I gave a small nod but remained quiet, jotting the word pushed in my notebook and circling it a few times while waiting for them to supply more information.
“What we know,” Effie said, “was that there was a misunderstanding—”
“Misunderstanding?” Cybil blurted. “Effie, come on. If you’re going to tell the story, tell it.”
Effie closed her eyes and released a weary sigh. She tapped her long multi-colored fingernails together, almost like a meditation, and then looked me square in the eye.
“Priscilla and my daughter Rae disliked each other.” She held a hand up to Cybil who was about to interrupt again. “Some might say they hated each other. What I know, as does anyone who was here then, is that my daughter and Cybil’s son were an item.”
Softly, Cybil interjected, “They were crazy about each other.”
Effie patted her friend’s knee. “Priscilla set her sights on Gabe. Rae said that Flavia put the thought in Priscilla’s head that out of all the boys in the group, he could give Priscilla and her baby the best life.”
“He did have a bright future,” Cybil said, smiling like a very proud mama. Then she picked up the story. “Gabe told me that Priscilla would corner him. She’d ask him to walk her home and then try to seduce him right there in the woods. The little tramp.”
Original Secrets: A Whispering Pines Mystery, Book 3 Page 16
