Booking the Crook

by Laurie Cass

  “Mrr.”

  “No idea what you’re saying. And at the bottom of the list there’s the lovelorn and wannabe film guy, Bax Tousely. Which brings up the question, how do I find out more about him? And not the surface stuff. I need the deep-secret-sometimes-scary stuff.”

  “Mrr!”

  Ding!

  Eddie yelped at the exact moment my phone dinged with an incoming text. “Nice timing.” I inched forward, almost falling off the couch in the process, and with one finger pulled my phone close enough to pick it up.

  Rafe: Whatcha doing

  Me: Sending you a text in a complete sentence.

  Rafe: Time waste

  Me: And what have you done with all that time you’ve saved?

  Rafe: Renovated house

  Me: Point to you.

  Rafe: Thx

  Me (after a short pause): Who do I know that would talk to me about Bax Tousely and keep quiet about it?

  Rafe: Rgessie

  Me (after staring at the screen for a moment): Who?

  Rafe: Fat fingers meant Thessie

  Me: Thessie Dyer?

  Rafe: Friend w Bs little sister

  Me: Thanks! You just helped with Rowan’s murder investigation.

  Rafe: Cool gotta go glue setting

  “And if that’s how easily it’s done,” I said to Eddie as I scrolled through my phone’s contacts list, “maybe this working together thing should have started a long time ago.”

  “Mrr,” Eddie said, and rotated around so that his back faced me.

  Thessie was my former bookmobile assistant, Thessie Dyer, now off at college. My thumbs hovered over the phone. If I texted her, she’d probably reply quickly, but texting would be an awkward way to do this. I hesitated, then pushed her phone number.

  After three rings, Thessie actually picked up the phone. “Minnie! What’s up?”

  “Checking that you’re still sure about majoring in library and information science.” Though I loved my job, it wasn’t for everyone, and I wanted to make sure my young friend knew the bad side as well as the good before making a major life decision.

  “Absolutely,” Thessie said. I could almost see her, nodding so hard that her long straight black hair bounced up and down. “Can’t think of anything I’d rather do. But . . .” She hesitated. “Would you mind if I didn’t come home to work in Chilson? I mean, it’s home and all, but have you ever been to the library in Grand Rapids? The main one, downtown? It’s amazing. And a friend and I are going to the East Coast for spring break—we want to see the Library of Congress. Wouldn’t it be the coolest thing in the world to work there?”

  I laughed. “It would be wonderful.” If you liked big cities, which I didn’t. “Go where life takes you and don’t look back. Except every once in a while in the summer, because it’s nice here.”

  “You got it,” Thessie said. “Now tell me why you really called.”

  “Can’t put anything past you, can I?”

  “That’s what happens when you’re trained by the best.”

  My smile slipped. “Rafe tells me you’re good friends with Bax Tousely’s younger sister.”

  “Caitlin? In middle and high school, we were pretty close. Not so much now that we’re at different colleges.”

  “Okay, but how well do you know Bax?”

  “As much as you’d know the older brother of your high school friend. Why?”

  I scrambled for a response. “A friend’s daughter might be interested in dating him, and she’s had some bad experiences. Did you ever see him lose his temper?”

  “Bax?” She sounded astonished. “I don’t think he has a temper. He never lost it, not even when Caitlin and I were messing around on his computer and accidentally ruined a video he was doing for the school’s theater group. I mean, he was mad for a second, but then he just said he’d be able to do it better and faster the second time.”

  I thanked Thessie for the information, but just as I was about to hang up, she said, “You know, I kind of forget this, but he changed after that Valentine’s thing with Anya Bennethum. He was always quiet, but that’s when he got even more quiet. Didn’t come out of his room hardly at all, except to eat.”

  Hmm. That didn’t sound good. Not at all. Thessie and I chatted a bit more, and when the call ended, I asked Eddie, “Well, what do you think?”

  All I got was a blinking stare, but I mentally moved Bax Tousely up toward the top of the suspect list.

  * * *

  • • •

  The crate of books I carried from my car into the Lakeview Medical Care Facility was heavy enough that I probably should have split it into two trips. But snow was blowing horizontally and night was coming fast, so I chose speed over being smart and staggered across the parking lot, hoping like crazy that I didn’t drop the thing and spill library books all over creation.

  Step by step, I labored my way to the front entrance. The automatic double doors swooshed open as I approached, and I heaved a huge sigh of relief as I escaped the frigid, howling wind.

  “Thought about coming to help you,” Max Compton said. “But it was more fun to watch.”

  I thumped the crate down on a handy table. “Glad I could brighten your day.” My words came out in puffs, as I was still out of breath.

  Max rolled his wheelchair a little closer. “My dearest librarian, you brighten my days with your very presence. It’s your visits that keep me alive. Without you, I would languish. I would fail to thrive. I would—”

  He stopped talking as I held out a large-print book. It was the latest from John Sandford, Max’s absolute favorite author.

  “Are you lending that to me or taunting me with it?” he asked, squinting up at me.

  “Reach out and see.”

  He grinned. “A touch of surprise to spice up the day. How delightful. But hark! Unless my ears are failing me, which wouldn’t be a surprise because the rest of my body has done that already, I hear the footsteps of our Heather.”

  It was indeed Heather, one of Lakeview’s certified nursing assistants, and one of the CNAs who’d cared for my artist friend Cade when he’d stayed there after a stroke. Having the bookmobile stop by Lakeview had been the brainchild of the three of us, and it was a rousing success. I stopped by once a month to read out loud to a group, and also stopped every couple of weeks with a crate packed full of items I’d come to learn would be popular with residents.

  “Hey there, Miss Minnie.” Heather flashed a smile. “Your timing is awesome. Mrs. Albright was just talking about that picture book she’d read to her kids. Any chance you found a copy?”

  I dug through the crate, found what I wanted, and brandished a copy of Make Way for Ducklings. “Ta-dah!”

  “You are the best,” Heather breathed, taking the slim volume. “No matter what Max says, you’re my favorite librarian ever.”

  “For crying out loud,” Max protested. “You weren’t supposed to tell her!”

  I sighed heavily. “All those other librarians who bring you books are taller, smarter, and funnier than I am, aren’t they? It’s something I should have accepted a long time ago.”

  Heather lightly bopped Max on the head with the book. “Now see what you’ve done? Fix that before she leaves. See you later, Minnie. And thanks!” She hustled away, heading off to do one of the zillions of chores that CNAs are tasked with doing.

  “We don’t have any other librarians,” Max said in a stage whisper. “So you kind of have to be our favorite.”

  I grinned. “It’s nice to be the favorite, even if I’m the only one.”

  “Excellent attitude.” Max winked. “Then again, if you’d really like a competition, we could put you into a bigger pool. Say, all the volunteers.”

  Though I did have a small streak of competitiveness, trying to be the favorite unpaid help at Lakeview was
n’t part of it. But to keep Max happy, as I unloaded the rest of the books, I asked, “Who would be my competition?”

  He stopped paging through the Sandford book and started counting on his knobby fingers. “There’s Lisa, Denise, Molly, and Emily. We have Toni, Theresa, and Tracey. And there’s Esther, Rosalind, and Maureen.”

  “I don’t know, Max,” I said, tidying the stacks of books into neat piles, because I couldn’t just plop them there all caddywampus. “That’s a lot of people. How can I possibly win?”

  Max kept naming names. “There’s Dan, Bonnie, and Bax. And on Fridays we have Rob, Callie—”

  “Hang on.” I aligned the books with the edge of the table—perfect!—and turned around. “You said Bax. Is that Baxter Tousely?”

  “Rob, Callie, Tom, Chris the girl, and Chris the boy.” He squinted at the ceiling. “Yes, I think that’s it and I have no idea what any of their last names might be. Eighty-six years old and that’s how you want me to use up what’s left of my short-term memory?”

  As if. All terms of his memory were better than mine. “How old is Bax?”

  “Younger than me.”

  Not helpful. “What does he look like?”

  Max’s attention started drifting back to the book, so I put my hand out and covered up the page. “What does he look like?” I could have asked someone at the front office, but this would be faster and easier and less likely to be spread around. If Max cooperated, that was.

  He heaved a dramatic sigh. “A little wide. Not short, not tall. Dark curly hair almost always in need of a cut. Wears one of those silly little beards so many young men have these days.”

  “Anything else?”

  Max squinted at me, and I suddenly realized I needed to justify my questions. “A friend of mine might be thinking about hiring him to do a video thing, so I thought I’d see what he’d be like to work with.” As an impromptu explanation, it had to be one of my best ever.

  “Huh.” Max’s squint didn’t go away, but it lessened in intensity. “He started showing up here a couple of years ago when his grandmother was recovering from hip surgery. Says he likes hanging out with us old folks. He’s a decent kid, but a little off. Vegetarian. Shovels his neighbor’s driveway. Finds homes for stray cats. No, I’m not making that up.” Max held up his hand. “Swear on a stack of Bibles. The kid’s the closest thing to a freaking saint I’ve ever met. I should hate him. Hasn’t happened yet, though. Maybe next week.” He sounded hopeful.

  “Anything else?” I asked.

  Max studied me. “I keep telling him he needs a girlfriend, but he says that never seems to work out. You know, he’ll probably be here in a few minutes. How about you ditch that Rafe and I set you up with Bax?”

  “Only if you want me to set you up with Lillian,” I said.

  “Nooo!” Max clutched his heart. “Cruel librarian, to threaten me with that woman. Go away and don’t come back until you have another Sandford book.”

  Laughing, I popped into the front office, collected the returns box, and headed back out into the cold.

  So Bax was the kind of guy who volunteered. Rescued cats. Helped his neighbors. He sounded like a kind and gentle soul, the kind of person who would never, ever kill someone.

  I tossed the crate into my trunk and slid into the driver’s seat.

  But as Detective Hal Inwood had told me many times, and as I’d come to learn firsthand, given the perfect storm of circumstances, pretty much everyone had the potential to be a killer.

  I started the car and sat there for a moment, letting the engine warm up enough to defrost the window. After a few shivering minutes, the last of the window fog vanished and I saw, walking toward the facility’s entrance, a man with his head down and his hands in his pockets, and even from ten feet away, I could see the sadness etched into his face. Just as I was wishing I could make him smile, I realized I was looking at Bax Tousely.

  Huh.

  A lot of things could cause that level of emotion. The death of a loved one. A bad breakup. But the paper had been free of obituaries for almost a week and his breakup with Anya had been years ago. So what was causing his melancholy? Had he been fired from his job? Did he hate winter? Was he giving up on his dream of post-video production?

  I tapped the steering wheel with my mittened fingers, feeling sympathy for a man I didn’t even know, but also wondering if what I’d first taken as sadness had instead been guilt over murder.

  Chapter 13

  I have a confession to make.”

  Aunt Frances had spoken in a tone that was quiet, shy, and would have been called reluctant if it had come from anyone other than my confident and self-assured aunt.

  “Okay,” I said, trying to match her tone. “Can I ask what this is about? Because if the police need to get involved, I have contacts with both the sheriff’s office and the city police.” She had the same contacts, of course, but I was trying to be funny. Instead of laughing, she sighed. Not a good sign.

  “It’s a civil matter, not a criminal one,” she said. A few moments ticked past, then it all came out in a rush.

  “I hate Otto’s kitchen. Can’t stand it. The design is ridiculous, those fancy cabinets with all their trim are expensive dust collectors, and I’ve always hated side-by-side refrigerators. I know some people love them, but not me, and I cringe when I think of having to use that thing the rest of my life.”

  I started to say something, but she wasn’t done.

  “And that kitchen island.” Her voice grew louder and more Aunt-Frances-like. “At best it’s a complete waste of space and a safety hazard at worst. That room isn’t big enough to have an island and I don’t know what the designer was thinking.”

  Probably that the person paying the bills wanted an island, but I didn’t say so out loud.

  “I can’t tell Otto now,” she said. “The first time I was over there, I told him I loved his house. He even asked about the kitchen specifically, and I said something like if I ever stop cooking for a full boardinghouse that I wouldn’t mind a kitchen like his.”

  “Ah.” I now understood her problem, although it was really Otto she should be confessing to and not me. But even though I understood the problem, I didn’t truly think it was that big.

  “Talk to him,” I said.

  My aunt shook her head. “Can’t. Not at this late date. He’d be so hurt. I can’t do that to him.”

  Really? Over a kitchen? “He’s a grown man,” I said. “I’m pretty sure he’ll be okay. And you know he wants you to be happy more than anything else. If a renovated kitchen is what it takes, he’ll be ripping cabinets out tomorrow morning.”

  She shook her head again. “I can’t do that to him. I don’t know what to do, I really don’t.” And the rest of the evening, nothing I said budged her from that viewpoint.

  “What do you think, Eddie?”

  My furry pal and I were snuggled in bed. He was in the crook of my right elbow, hindering my ability to read to the point that I’d given up. The book was on the nightstand, the light was off, and I was starting the drift down to sleep.

  “Is Aunt Frances having wedding jitters? Is that what the whole kitchen thing is about?”

  Eddie yawned and rolled over.

  “Or is she having second thoughts about marrying Otto?” The idea was a horrible one, and I was sorry I’d thought it, but now that it was in my head, I wasn’t sure it would go away. “What do you think?”

  Eddie, however, didn’t reply.

  * * *

  • • •

  Julia began the bookmobile day with a remarkable rendition of the theme song to Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood, which meant the day could only get better from there on out.

  When she’d finished (with open arms and upraised face), I nodded at the cat carrier. “Eddie has his paws over his ears.”

  “He does not,” she
said, then leaned forward. “Okay, so he does, but that’s because he’s tired and it’s bright out.”

  I peered up at the cloudy sky. “If this is bright, I don’t want to know what gloomy looks like.”

  “Bright for a cat,” Julia said oh-so-patiently. “Their sense of light is different from ours. Especially Eddie’s. He’s not a normal cat, you know.”

  Though this was undoubtedly true—I’d long ago decided he was his own unique species, the singular Felis Eddicus—I was also pretty sure that light sensitivity wasn’t on Eddie’s long list of unique traits.

  “And what makes you perky enough to sing this morning?” I asked.

  “Just woke up happy,” she said. “Don’t you love days when that happens?”

  “These days I typically wake up with cat hair on my lips.”

  “And isn’t it wonderful to have a furry companion who loves you so much that he sacrifices his very own fur in the name of keeping you warm on cold winter nights?”

  Now that was an idea I hadn’t once considered. “Then what’s the explanation for morning cat hair after a summer night so miserably humid that the only thing keeping me alive is the knowledge that I get to work in air-conditioning?”

  “Insulation is insulation,” Julia said. “I can’t believe you’re not more appreciative of his efforts.”

  “No?” A stop sign loomed. I braked and glanced down at my pants. One, two, three . . . I got to eleven Eddie hairs before losing track. “I’d appreciate them a lot more if his former fur matched my clothing.”

  Julia spent much of the rest of the morning trying to convince me that Eddie and I had such a deep bond that he was trying to cover me with his hair so we’d look the same.

  She failed spectacularly, of course, but Eddie and I both enjoyed her attempts, especially during the stop when he sneezed and half a hundred Eddie hairs catapulted off his body in every direction, some of them landing on me, some on Julia, and a large percentage on bookmobile patron Leon Clohessy.