The receptionist gave me a bored smirk before depressing a button on her phone. “One moment.”
I heard laughter bellowing down the hallway, coming from a room with an open door and a fluorescent light flooding the dim corridor. Then there was a commotion, and Chief James appeared outside the door, making eye contact with me immediately.
Just seeing him again filled me to the brim with such annoyance, I had to ask the Holy Spirit to help me tamp it down. Why did this man annoy me so much?
The receptionist looked up. “You can go to the chief’s office now.”
The whole exchange was weird and stiff, but at least I was getting an audience with the illustrious Chief of Police. I patted my canvas bookbag as though it was carrying the Holy Grail and traipsed down the hall toward the door the chief had just slipped into.
“Ms. Baker,” he said, interlacing his fingers on his desk. “To what do I owe the pleasure?”
It was a polite thing to say, but it didn’t sound polite coming from his mouth. “We found this…” I carefully set the book bag down on top of his desk, which was nearly empty save for his keyboard, monitor, and a metal file tray that contained exactly three manila folders and an interoffice mail envelope.
After he briefly examined the canvas bag, Chief James’s wide, round brown eyes bore into me. “What’s this?”
“It’s the Founders’ Bible,” I said matter-of-factly.
If he was surprised, he hid it exceptionally well. He merely cleared his throat and ramped up the intensity of his gaze. “Are you sure it’s the real deal?”
I scrunched up my nose as I returned his glare. “Yes, of course I am!”
I knew I shouldn’t touch it because it was too fragile, but I decided to put on gloves and open it up to make sure it was the genuine article. No sense in throwing my friend under the bus if it wasn’t the actual relic. The Bible was displayed open to the signatures of Nathaniel Bryce and the other founding fathers. I scoped out the signature page, and they were all there. It would be nearly impossible for someone to forge a legitimate-looking copy and make it look as old and decaying as the original.
He started to open the bag to have a look for himself, when I stopped him with a cold, hard stare. “You need to wear gloves.”
You wouldn’t think I’d have to say that to the Chief of Police, but…
He grunted under his breath, reached into a drawer to pull out a pair of gloves, then tugged them on. He pulled out the book, which I’d wrapped in a towel because the leather binding was so brittle and delicate that it was flaking away in parts. We’d had a preservationist shore up the Bible as much as possible before we put it on display, but they couldn’t make it new again, obviously.
“This looks legit,” he said. “Why do you have it?”
I swallowed hard and met his penetrating stare again. “My colleague and I found it at another colleague’s house.”
His back straightened in his chair as he looked back down at the Bible and then up to me again. “What colleague? What were you doing there? Why did you move it without calling us first?”
So many questions fired at me at once! A deep breath inflated my lungs as I tried to figure out how to answer. “Evangeline Dupree. She was sick, and our boss asked us to go check on her. Apparently, Susan tried to check on her yesterday morning, but she wasn’t at home, which Susan found odd since Evangeline was supposedly sick.”
“Go on,” came his deep, baritone voice.
“So, Molly Simmons, the children’s librarian, and I went to check on her last night. We got to the door, and it didn’t look like she’d left for a couple of days. She looked terrible, all wrapped up in a blanket, her nose all red, and her eyes ringed with dark circles.”
His lips thinned to a straight line. “Can you cut to the part where you found the Bible?”
“I’m getting to that,” I snapped back, then instantly regretted taking a snarky attitude with the Chief of Police. What if he didn’t believe my story and thought I stole the Bible? I was standing right next to the mayor when it happened. Who would actually believe I was behind the heist? Though I supposed some might accuse me of being an accomplice. I definitely had access to the donations too…
Wait! What am I saying?! I definitely had nothing to do with this, and if Evangeline was the guilty party, I had no clue she was involved until yesterday. That was another reason I was here. If I didn’t come forward, wouldn’t I be an accessory to her crime?
“We went out and got Evangeline some chicken soup; then, when we came back—we never went inside her house because, eww, germs… But, anyway, I got her mail and went to take her trash cans behind her house, and that’s where I saw the Bible in this strange circle of candles and nature-type stuff, like it was part of some sort of, I don’t know, pagan ritual!”
This actually sparked a reaction from Mr. Stone-faced. His eyes widened at the phrase “pagan ritual.”
“Did you take any photographs?”
Darn it. I knew I was forgetting something important. Okay, so I had a lot to learn about detective work. “No, sir, I’m sorry. I was so…shocked to see it, I just rushed onto the porch—the door was unlocked—grabbed the Bible, I mean, carefully, of course, and then Molly and I made a quick getaway.”
“And your friend never said anything about this to you before, never made you suspicious she might have been involved?” he questioned.
“No! I still have no idea why she could have wanted the Bible. I mean, the funds, okay, well, who doesn’t want money?” This was the issue I kept having every time I tried to dissect this case. I just couldn’t figure out where Evangeline was coming from, what her endgame was.
“Your friend has no alibi for the time when the Bible and donations went missing?” he pressed.
I thought back to what Molly said. “I was with the mayor during the commotion, but Molly said Evangeline went upstairs to get her coat from the activities room. She did go upstairs, but Susan claimed she didn’t see her in the activities room. So it’s possible she went upstairs, snuck around to the other staircase that goes to the lobby, came downstairs, smashed the glass display case, and then headed back to steal the funds from the workroom. She appeared in the crowd later.”
“I see,” was the only nugget of reaction Chief James would give me.
I wished I felt better about this turn of events, but the truth was, my stomach was a churning, knotted mess. I hated this conclusion. I wanted to go back and write a different ending. A happy ending.
But you couldn’t argue with the evidence.
Chief James’s lack of comment only made me want to keep talking. For a librarian, I was rather averse to silence, and this huge, hulking man sitting in front of me made that switch in my brain, the one that turned off my mouth when I started to ramble on, seriously malfunction.
“Of course, my initial thought was Camille Steyer stole the money, and her two little besties orchestrated the Bible theft to create a distraction for her. I even collected a hair to try to match it to a strand left at the crime scene. I interviewed Camille to see if I could glean any more evidence, and she claimed Willa Bryce Monroe had motive because she was down on her luck, and maybe she passed a bad check and wanted to cover it up by stealing the gala donations.
“So I followed up on that lead and spoke with Willa Bryce Monroe a couple days ago. Not only did she say that the Steyers were bad news and probably involved, but she also accused Evangeline Dupree of being a witch, so…” I was starting to doubt my judge of character at this point.
The chief sucked in a deep breath, moving the badge and other pins on his uniform up and back down again as he let it hiss out of his mouth slowly. “Ms. Baker, what is it you do at the library again?”
“Uh, I’m the Young Adult Librarian.”
He rubbed the top of his bald head, eyes searching the ceiling for a big helping of patience, before settling his dark gaze on me again. “Why don’t you stick to librarianship and leave the crime solving to the
professionals, okay?”
I couldn’t tell him that I was following my boss’s orders when it came to this little sleuthing adventure. “Can you just answer one more question for me?” I pleaded. “Okay, two more questions?”
“What’s that?” He sounded completely, undeniably unamused.
“Are you going to arrest Evangeline?” I felt like I should give her some notice, let her get her affairs in order before being hauled off to jail. Was I a horrible friend for giving her up on a silver platter, or was I just a good citizen who loved my town and my library? I hadn’t been so conflicted since high school when I was forced to choose between ‘NSync and the Backstreet Boys.
“That’s none of your business,” he reminded me.
I sighed. I had a feeling he wouldn’t give that info up, but that didn’t stop me from asking, “Susan Gooch said that at least one of the stolen checks from the gala was deposited into an account in the Cayman Islands.”
His lips thinned, nostrils flaring as he surveyed me, but he didn’t respond.
“Do you know if the check was stamped with a ‘For Deposit Only’ stamp and the library’s logo on the back? Do you know the name on the account?”
“Librarianship, Ms. Baker. That’s your wheelhouse. Leave this investigation to the pros. Now, I need to get back to work. Have a pleasant day.” He stood up, scooting his chair loud enough to make a horrible grinding noise against the gray tile floor.
He tried to pull the top manila file folder off the stack on his metal tray as I stood up to leave, but I inadvertently bumped the corner of the tray with my hip and sent it crashing to the floor right at my feet. My face flushed with embarrassment as something like a growl rumbled out of his mouth.
“I’m so sorry!” I bent down to retrieve the files, and the top one had fallen opened. It was clearly related to our Bryce Beach Bandit case. The printout was from a bank account in the Cayman Islands, and it had the bank logo at the top. I was just getting ready to take a mental photograph of the account holder’s name when Chief James stepped around the desk and tapped me on the shoulder.
“Hand it over,” he barked.
Before I could fully absorb the logo or the name, I had to surrender the evidence. I left his office as fast as my feet could carry me, my fingers trembling at losing my chance to discover where the library’s money had gone.
Twelve
I snuck in the back door at work, hoping no one would notice I’d come in so late. When I made it to the YA area, across the room from the children’s area, Molly looked like she was about to combust, bouncing up and down in her chair with suspense.
I lifted a finger in the air when my phone rang. It was Susan’s line, so I knew I needed to answer it. “Yes?”
“What happened when you went to check on Evangeline last night?” she demanded without any semblance of a preamble.
I was already feeling on edge after my meeting with Chief James, but now my nervous system was really revved up. Jitters danced up and down my limbs like I was the victim of caffeine overload, when I had, in fact, only guzzled down a mere two cups.
“Uh, she’s actually sick,” I answered, which was the whole truth and nothing but the truth. “We didn’t go inside because she looked so awful, and whatever she has looked like something neither of us wanted to catch. We went out and got her some chicken noodle soup and brought it back to her.”
“Oh,” was all my boss said. And then after a few beats, she asked, “You didn’t go inside her house at all then?”
“No, ma’am, didn’t want to run the risk of picking up any of her germs.”
“Aren’t you forgetting a detail or two?” she pressed, her voice full of suspicion.
My mind raced as I wondered how she would know about the Bible we found.
“Chief James just called me,” she said. “I know you found the Bible over there.”
“Oh…” I scrambled for an explanation. “Sorry, I didn’t know if I was allowed to speak to that.”
“It’s my library, Baker!” she roared. “Everything that happens here is my business. And I told you to be the eyes and ears of this case!”
Earlier in the week, she was devastated and crying. I guessed the anger stage had kicked in, because she sure was fuming now. What a difference a few days makes!
When I didn’t respond, her tone softened. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to yell at you. I just wanted you to know you did the right thing. I know you and Evangeline are friends, but there’s too much at stake here, and you don’t want to be an accessory to a crime, right?”
“No, of course not!”
“Well, let’s just hope the police can recover the money from that account,” she said. “The library’s days are numbered if we don’t get our hands on those donations.”
The ominous tone of her voice clanged in my ears like a gong as I hung up the phone and lifted my gaze to Molly, who was about to come unglued as she watched my conversation from across the room.
The floor was empty, no patrons in sight in our area, and Tom was occupied with helping a patron at one of the computers across from the circulation desk. I raced over to Molly’s desk.
“Well?!” she burst out as though the words were rocket-fueled.
“The chief already called Susan to tell her about the Bible. He told me to quit playing amateur detective.” I rolled my eyes as Molly scoffed.
“You were only doing what Susan asked you to do!”
“I know!” I retorted. “He told me to stick to librarianship and leave the detective work to the professionals.”
“Whatever. You’d think he would at least thank you for recovering the Bible. That’s more than his detectives did!”
“Thank you! You’re right!” I vigorously nodded. He never once said thank you or showed any gratitude for my help at all.
“I mean, you basically solved his whole case and delivered it to him on a silver platter,” Molly continued.
“No kidding.” Now I was even more annoyed than I was earlier today when I met with him. The nerve of that guy to not even say thank you. “He’s just jealous I did a better job at his job than he did.”
Molly let out a breath as she slumped in the chair behind her desk. “Wow, I can’t believe it’s over.” Her shoulders sagged as she lifted her pale blue eyes to me.
Her words sank in, leaving me with a similarly deflated feeling. “It is, isn’t it?”
“We’re going to get the Bible back, and it’s only a matter of time until they arrest Evangeline and they’re able to access her account.”
“Will they be able to, though? If it’s in a foreign country?”
“I don’t know exactly how it works,” Molly admitted. “But you know who would?”
I was almost afraid to hear her answer. “Who?”
She glanced over at Tom, who had finished helping the patron and was strolling back to his desk.
“Oh, no. No thank you. The last time I talked to him, I got an earful about an amphibious World War II tank.”
Molly laughed. “Well, he’d know the answer; I’m sure of it. I imagine they can recover the money, but it’s going to take some time.”
“As long as we get it, that’s all that matters.” Even though I still felt sick about Evangeline’s betrayal, I did feel like a huge burden had been lifted from my chest. I hopefully wouldn’t be losing my job.
My friend patted me on the back. “Well, nice job solving the mystery!”
“You helped! I couldn’t have done it without you.” I wanted to celebrate, but knowing Evangeline had duped us all left a big, gaping hole right in the middle of my heart.
Spotting the defeated look on Molly’s face, I had an inkling she felt the exact same way. “Maybe we could go walk on the beach tonight? Stop by The Candy Shoppe to pick up a little something?”
“Are we celebrating or commiserating?” I sighed.
She tilted her head thoughtfully. “I think a little of both.”
Brisk spring air, the sme
ll of the sea air, and fresh fudge were rather therapeutic, if I said so myself. My best friend and I walked along the surf with our sandals dangling by our index fingers as chilly waves rushed up around our feet and ankles. My toes were numb by the time we made it back to the boardwalk, but I didn’t even care. The chilling effect seemed to soothe my soul, which was in tatters after learning the third member of our librarian trifecta had betrayed us.
I was saying goodbye to Molly and walking back to my car when my phone rang. I didn’t recognize the number, but it was local, so I took a chance and answered it. “Hello?”
“Call from Bryce Beach City Jail. Do you accept?” came a static female voice that sounded like a recording. “Press ‘one’ for yes, ‘two’ for no, and ‘zero’ for the operator.”
I had a bad feeling about this but pressed “one” anyway. “Hello?”
“Sunshine!” came a desperate plea on the other end. “Sunshine, you have to come down here right now!”
“Evangeline?” I’d never heard her sound so out-of-sorts before, though I supposed being tossed in the slammer would have that effect on you. I was surprised she wanted anything to do with me if she figured out Molly and I were the ones to make the discovery on her patio.
“Please,” she said, “I’m begging you. Tell them I didn’t steal the Bible. Tell them I’m not a witch. Please! You know I would never do anything like that. They set the bail very high, Sunshine. I don’t know what to do. I don’t have any family around here, and no one to help me. Can you please come down here?”
An anguished wail sounded down the line, and I felt like my heart was being ripped in two. Oh, Lord, what do I do? I prayed, hoping an answer would become clear as soon as I filled my lungs with air and let it out again slowly.
“I’ll come down there,” I decided, “but I don’t know if there’s anything I can do to help. Evangeline, Molly and I found the Bible at your house last night when we were there.”
“I know,” she answered. “But I didn’t put it there. Please, you have to believe me! Please help me. You know I couldn’t have done anything like that. I could never put money in an account in the Cayman Islands. You know how much I hate the Caribbean and anything to do with sun or beach or sand. Cayman Islands? No freaking thank you! I would have put it someplace cool, both in temperature and hipness. Sunshine, c’mon, you have to believe me!”
Dangerous Curves Boxed Set 1: 3 Cozy Christian Mysteries Page 11
