Checked Out (A Ricki Rydell Mystery Book 1)

by Abby Matthews

  “Me cop, you writer. Get it?”

  “Come on. I’ll give you information, you give me the dirt. Together we can solve this crime.”

  “In our Mystery Machine?” He did his best Shaggy impersonation.

  Ricki took note of the date and time her brother, the stick in the mud, cracked a joke. “Did you just Scooby Doo me?”

  “Maybe.”

  “Are you going to help me?”

  “No. Are you going to keep out of trouble?”

  “No. Was Jennifer poisoned?”

  “Yes.”

  “Gotcha.”

  Fifteen

  Ricki tossed and turned in her bed, sighing each time she shifted her body. She didn’t fight much with her brother, but when it happened, the words, no matter how minor they may have been, haunted her for long after. Even if it was a small fight—mostly a disagreement of whether Ricki should get involved in solving a murder investigation and Chris wanting to stop her—she couldn’t let it go. And then there was the death threat lying on her doorstep. Overall, it was a pretty poopy evening. Since she couldn’t sleep, she did what most people did in the middle of the night: logged onto her computer and surfed the Internet.

  Jennifer was poisoned. Chris so much as admitted it. It was probably somebody she knew well, maybe even a coworker. According to everyone else, Jennifer wasn’t married but had an active sex life that often involved other women’s husbands or fiancés. If someone wanted to kill her then maybe it was the spouse or girlfriend of the men she slept with. Although Unionville was a small city, Ricki didn’t know everyone and didn’t know everyone’s personal life. Mostly because she didn’t care to know that much about everyone else—she believed ignorance truly was bliss. But all of a sudden she was knee-deep in an investigation and had to start caring about what people were doing, who they were doing, and who they were blackmailing. Like Becca said, it was great fodder for books but not so great for her sanity. So much for the drama free zone she tried to maintain in her life.

  Other than placing books on hold, Ricki never used the library website for much. It was put together well—easy to navigate, not loaded with graphics or animated gifs, everything clearly labeled, and oh, look at that, a list of volunteers. She clicked the link and up popped a page filled with over a hundred library volunteers. That was a lot of people for a library of that size, but as she read along she saw that this was a list of volunteers past and present. Still, it made her job of putting a list of suspects together virtually impossible. More than half of the people on the list she had never heard of.

  She then clicked on the link for the staff. Twelve employees were listed, complete with a picture and a small bio. One picture was noticeably absent. Boy, they didn’t waste any time getting rid of Jennifer Barnes, did they?

  Becca didn’t gather any more dirt on Jennifer from the Mommy Brigade, so Ricki had nothing new to work with. But she knew of at least one person who absolutely hated Jennifer, even if she tried to hide it, and that was the volunteer coordinator, Victoria. On the day Jennifer died, Ricki caught her and another woman in the stacks, talking smack on Jennifer, but unfortunately, she didn’t know who the other person was. That gave Ricki one suspect. Who else?

  Digging around in the site a little deeper, she came upon the pictures of the Volunteer Appreciation Day picnic. Some of the faces looked familiar, but Ricki couldn’t pin a name on them even if she tried. She was good with faces, lousy with names. But the lady that was speaking to Victoria the day Jennifer died stood next to her in one of the pictures. Close friends, maybe? There were a few staff pictures. The happy looking employees huddled together tight while a sour faced Jennifer stood off to the side, half a foot of space between her and the group. As she scrolled further down the page, she spotted a picture of Jennifer sitting alone at a picnic table. Around her, all the other tables were filled with groups of folks laughing and talking like old friends. This picture of the lone Jennifer encapsulated what everyone thought of her: she was ostracized, exiled, voted off the island, the weakest link. They sent a loud and clear message: we don’t like you.

  After an hour of playing around online, Ricki was still restless. Rumpus was snoozing on her bed. Chris was snoring in the spare bedroom. She put on a pair of sweatpants and a light sweatshirt, slipped her shoes on, and woke Rumpus at the last minute. She didn’t mention the L word, which was leash, and she didn’t mention the R word, which was ride, because if she said anything to him, he’d start barking and wake her brother. Beagles have the most distinctive bark. It’s long, loud, and gravelly. A bark you could hear from miles away. She couldn’t have him waking her brother or he’d try to stop her if he knew where she was going.

  Thankfully, the garage was detached from the rest of the house so he wouldn’t hear the rumble when she opened the door. She stopped at the corkboard in her office and removed the picture of the books on the truck that sat by Jennifer’s desk, the ones Ricki suspected might have been addresses. At the very last minute, she hooked Rumpus’ leash to his collar, grabbed the car keys, and headed outside.

  Not entirely sure where she was going, she punched one of the addresses into the GPS. She kept the headlights off until she was on the street and ready to go.

  The navigation system led her about ten miles away to an older housing development full of your standard ranches and split-levels. It was a nice, established neighborhood with grown trees lining the streets. When the annoying lady’s voice on the GPS announced that Ricki would arrive at her destination on the right, she found a small colonial style home. There was no name on the mailbox, no cars in the driveway, no evidence of who lived there. She had hoped to at least find a last name. How disappointing, but she could find who owned the house when she searched the address online. She turned in the cul-de-sac and headed out of the housing development. At the stop sign, she punched in the other address. According to the GPS, it would take her half an hour to get there. She was still very wound up and full of energy, so why not.

  Rumpus didn’t enjoy driving around at nighttime as much as during the day. He couldn’t see anything, but with the window down he could at least stick his head out and enjoy the breeze blowing in his face. He stood with his front paws on the arm rest of the passenger side door, his ears and jowls flapping in the wind, slobber running down the window of her car. “Guess I’m going to have to get the car washed soon.”

  As she got closer to her destination she recognized where she was. This was the part of Unionville where most of the public officials lived. She stopped right in front of the mayor’s house. “Huh. Look at that, Rumpus.” He let out a sharp sniff. “How did I not recognize the address sooner?” As if she weren’t already awake, that woke her up even more. Jennifer wrote about two high profile people having an affair—one a politician, the other someone who was sort of in the public eye. Well, she knew Mayor David Burns lived at this address. Did his lover live at the other address?

  On the drive home, she turned the clues over in her mind. Jennifer was speaking from the grave. Jennifer knew she was going to die, that someone was going to kill her. Why didn’t she say anything to anyone? Or did she? Despite the argument she had with her brother earlier, and despite the fact that he told her not to get involved, and despite the fact that he said she could be hindering an investigation, she had to find a way to tell him what she learned without getting him angry.

  When she pulled in the garage, a light was on inside the house. Her brother was up. “Darn it. I’m so not in the mood for another argument.” She walked Rumpus around the yard one last time for the night, preparing herself for the inevitable stand-off with her brother. He sat at the table, sipping a glass of chocolate milk, not looking at all happy. Instead of giving him a chance to grill her about what she was doing out in the middle of the night with her dog, she decided to go on the offensive.

  “Did you know the mayor was having an affair?”

  “Do you remember how I asked you not to get involved?”

&nb
sp; “I asked you first.”

  Sixteen

  It was eight o’clock in the morning on a Thursday. This would have been Ricki’s third day of volunteering at the library, but since she got fired, she decided to park her butt at The Bean and get started outlining her next book. That was her excuse. What she was really doing, was waiting for Damon to show up.

  After she came home from her nighttime excursion trying to learn who lived at the addresses Jennifer gave clue to, she got into another argument with her brother. It wasn’t a bad one, but both decided to agree to disagree on their approach to this investigation. He wanted her to stay out of it; she didn’t want to stay out of it.

  During their fight, Chris brought up how rude she was to Damon the day he came to visit her. It wasn’t like her brother to play dirty, but he was losing the argument and pulled the Damon card out of his pocket in order to prove a point. His point? He said she was changing all of a sudden. He said he didn’t recognize her anymore. He said since she was his twin, she always felt like his right arm and now she was starting to feel like his left. But since he brought it up, and she had somehow managed to put it out of her memory, she thought it would be a good idea to make amends with Damon. He didn’t deserve her bad mood that day. It wasn’t his fault that she got fired.

  In an effort to make things right, she invited him out for coffee. To talk. She kindly, and casually, told him this wasn’t a date and that she only wanted to apologize. She thought since she mentioned the word apologize to him while talking on the phone that he would just accept her apology then and there, hoping to avoid actually having to meet him for coffee. But that didn’t happen. He wasn’t going to let her get out of this meeting, so there she was waiting for him to show up at The Bean.

  While she waited, she texted Becca. Did you learn anything about Jennifer? Since she was completely out of it the night they had dinner, Ricki gave her time to get over her hangover and hadn’t talked to her in a couple of days.

  She texted back: Busy getting Megan’s vaccinations. Will call later.

  Ricki sighed, hoping for a juicier answer. Still no sign of Damon, she checked the time on her cell. Just then, he walked in. He was dressed in crisply pressed khakis, a button-down Polo shirt, and a sports jacket. His blond hair was neatly parted with just enough gel to make it look natural. As he approached the table, the smell of his cologne tickled her nose pleasantly.

  “Did you order yet?” he said, smiling.

  His smile caught her off guard. She was only here to apologize, not to find him attractive. “I was waiting for you before I ordered.”

  “What’ll you have?”

  “No, let me. I asked you and since I was the one who was the meanie, it’s only right I should pay.”

  “Stop. It’s only coffee. I’m not buying you a car or anything.”

  He wasn’t at all how she remembered him from school and from the times he hung out playing video games with Chris in his bedroom. “In that case, a cappuccino, double shot.”

  As she watched him at the counter ordering their drinks, she admired his backside. Maybe this was another consequence of writing too much romance and not having enough of it in her own life, but he was starting to look good. Or maybe she was just starting to grow weak. Maybe she was still tired from last night’s excursion. She had been awake for almost twenty-four hours so far. That must’ve been it. To keep her eyes off his butt, she played around on her computer. She was supposed to be outlining her next novel anyway, but what she was really doing was cleaning up old files and playing solitaire and looking at cat pictures online. Procrastination at its finest. Damon came back with two cups of coffee, placing one before her. She pushed her laptop out of the way, hoping he’d see that she still had things she needed to do and that this was going to be a short coffee…um, date. Not wanting to take time away from trying to beat her highest score on solitaire, she got right to the point.

  “I wanted to apologize for the way I treated you when you stopped by my house. I had a bad morning and took it out on you, but you didn’t deserve it. I hope you can forgive me.”

  “No problem. I could tell by the look on your face when I pulled in the driveway that I caught you at a bad time. You looked like a sourpuss. Whatever it was that made you angry, I hope it wasn’t too serious.”

  Sourpuss? Okay, she deserved that. There was no way on this green earth she was going to tell him why she was in a bad mood. It was humiliating enough that her brother already knew and laughed at her for it. “It’s all better now.” She took a sip of her coffee. “So, what brings you back to Unionville?” Not that she didn’t already know the answer to this, but since she was horrible at small talk she couldn’t just sit there in an embarrassed silence.

  “About a year ago, I learned there was a possibility for development in the area, and since I had enough experience working construction in California, I thought, why not bring it back here? Keep it in the family, so to speak.”

  “I was one of the protesters when they announced they were going to develop the waterfront on Lake Somerset.”

  He raised his eyebrows. “It looks like we’re sworn enemies already.”

  “It looks that way.” Over Damon’s shoulder, Ricki spied Jon, the library associate she manipulated into letting her into the library, walking in the door. His presence distracted her, and she felt a sudden urge to ditch Damon just so she could talk with him. She hadn’t spoken or seen him since she got let go and got him in trouble. He was another person she needed to apologize to, but unfortunately it didn’t look like Damon was leaving any time soon. He mentioned he had an early meeting but didn’t say how early. As much as she tried to hint that she had her own work to do, he wasn’t picking up on her clues and leaving. He sipped his extra-large coffee like he was settling in for the winter. Jon met eyes with her. At first he seemed shocked to see her, then he seemed pleased, but then he saw the guy sitting at the table in front of her and turned away.

  Now, how to get rid of Damon so she could talk with Jon?

  “What time is your meeting?” It was a subtle attempt at reminding him that he wasn’t going to stick around for much longer.

  He checked his cellphone. “In about half an hour.”

  Ricki didn’t know if Jon was going to stick around either, and since she wasn’t allowed back in the Unionville Public Library, she had to figure out a way to talk to him or she might not have the chance to apologize to him ever again. “Could you excuse me for a second?”

  Ricki marched up to the counter and nudged Jon with her elbow.

  “Good, you saw me,” he whispered.

  “Can you stick around? We need to talk.”

  “Who’s the guy?”

  “He’s leaving in about a half an hour. Are you headed to work? Please tell me you’re headed to work.”

  “I only have a few minutes.”

  “All right. I’ll think of something to get rid of him. Come over when you order your drink.”

  On her way back to the table, she thought of how she was going to successfully get rid of Damon without making it look like she was trying to get rid of him. She really needed to talk with Jon. He was the only one who might know something about Jennifer.

  “Is everything all right?” Damon asked. He eyed Jon over his shoulder.

  Just be honest, Ricki. “Actually, no. I need to speak with the guy I was just talking with up there, and he only has a little bit of time left, so I’m going to have to cut our meeting short. I hope that’s okay.” That wasn’t so bad.

  “He seems a little too young to be a boyfriend, so I guess it’s okay. Okay, let me get out what I came to your house to say.”

  “Oh, okay.” Ricki braced herself for the inevitable question of him asking her out and her inevitable rejection.

  “Your brother is under the impression I need a girlfriend and that you need a boyfriend.”

  She figured her brother had something to do with all of this. “Sounds about right.”

  �
�At first I was cool with the idea, but I can see you don’t need help with that, and I don’t really like being fixed up. So, you can relax. I’m not going to go there. I prefer nature to take its course, anyway.”

  Ricki exhaled. “Me, too.” That’s what she said, but a second later she felt offended. She got rejected by the guy she wasn’t even interested in. She got rejected by the guy she was just about to reject. This past week had been unkind. To save face, she played it off. “Getting fixed up sucks.”

  “So we’re cool?”

  “We’re cool.” She extended her hand confidently. They shook and parted as friends. That was quick and relatively painless.

  The sting of rejection disappeared when she caught sight of Jon slinking across the restaurant. He slithered into the seat in front of her as if he were on some stealth mission trying to go undetected. Which, considering the open floor plan in the coffee shop, made her laugh. There was no hiding in this restaurant. It was early morning, the lights were on, and this place was full of windows.

  Since she knew he didn’t have long before he had to get to work, she plowed right through. It seemed to be the morning to get straight to the apologies. “I just wanted to say I’m sorry for getting you in trouble.” But in a way, she didn’t feel sorry at all because he told on her. “How much trouble did you get in?”

  “I’ve been coming here every morning since this happened, hoping to run into you. I don’t even like coffee that much. I only come here once a week as a treat, and unfortunately, all this coffee is making my stomach hurt.”

  “The coffee in this place is strong enough to peel paint off a car.”

  He pushed on his stomach. “I’m glad I ran into you because now I can stop drinking it.”

  “What did you want to see me about?”

  “I don’t know how they found out that you came to the library with me that morning. I never said a word to anyone, Ricki, I swear.”