by Raven Snow
“She found out, but this isn’t about that.” Rowen had given a lot of thought to what she needed to say. Somehow, the right words escaped her now. “This is about… something else she told us.”
“We know, Trevor.” Margo was more direct with him. “We know what happened to Stephanie Nielson. Jessica told us.”
Trevor’s eyes grew large. He took a step away from them and looked around, like he was expecting police to come rushing out of the woods. “Y-you know? Why did- What did she say?”
“She told us everything.” Rowen took a step forward, closing some of the distance between herself and Trevor. She held her hands up in what she hoped was a gesture that communicated she meant no harm. “We haven’t told anyone else, and we don’t think you’re a bad person. It was an accident. We know it was an accident.”
Trevor still looked uncertain. He stood there, tense, looking from Rowen to Margo and back again. He looked ready to run. “It was an accident,” he said, even though Rowen had just made it clear that this was something they already knew.
“We know.” Rowen offered him a sympathetic smile. “Does anyone else know? Have you told anyone?”
“I don’t –” Trevor took a deep breath. He looked shaky. “It happened so fast. I didn’t… I haven’t told anyone. I mean, my mom knows. She was there. She told me to say it was her. I wouldn’t have tried to pin it on her. I didn’t want her to go to jail for this!”
“Do you suspect anyone else knows?” asked Rowen. “Like, say, Billy Nielson?”
“No. I haven’t told anyone. I don’t think anyone else –” Trevor’s eyes were looking past Rowen all of a sudden. He focused on something behind them.
Rowen and Margo both turned around. Terrence was coming from the woods. His eyes were big, and he looked uneasy. He’d heard everything. “What are you doing here?” asked Margo, like he somehow had less of a right to sneak through the woods than they had.
“I saw you two weirdos following my brother, and… Is this true?” Terrance looked at Trevor who, all at once, broke down sobbing.
“I didn’t mean to! I should have told you! I should have told everyone!” He dropped his bag and rubbed furiously at his eyes. He took a deep breath, trying to compose himself. It seemed to be a losing battle.
“Okay, okay.” Terrance hurried to his brother, pulling him into a hug. He was clearly surprised by the news, but maybe not as surprised as he should have been. “I guess I suspected. I don’t… I mean, it’s all right. Well, obviously it’s not all right, but I don’t blame you.”
“You suspected?” Rowen asked. She hated to interrupt this moment between them, but those words stuck with her.
Terrance nodded. “He hasn’t been the same since it happened. I guess that’s to be expected even if he hadn’t been driving, but… It’s always felt like you’ve been keeping something from me.”
“I’m so sorry.”
“Do you think anyone else suspects?” asked Rowen.
Again, Terrance nodded. “Billy has always been kind of suspicious, I guess. I kept telling him to shove it, but…”
Margo looked at Rowen. “Is that who you suspect in this?”
“Not anymore.” Rowen frowned. “The way Billy talked, I thought he might suspect it was really Trevor. He probably blames Jessica, but if he blames Trevor more, why go after her first?”
“Who tried to killed Rhonda then?”
“I don’t know.” Rowen was getting frustrated. Was this whole thing just another dead end? Darn it! If only she could ask Grammy for help. If only Grammy’s advice was still dependable. “Wait.” It hit her all at once. “I have an idea.”
“What?”
“Beatrice’s visitation is today, right?”
“So?”
Rowen had a gut feeling of her own now. “We need to get there.”
The Lainswich Funeral Home didn’t have an outrageous number of cars in the parking lot. In Rowen’s experience viewings were the sort of thing where people came and went. She hoped the person she was there to see wasn’t in the latter category already. She parked and headed inside, Margo still following along behind her, confused.
Reverend Byers was at the door. He looked surprised to see the Greensmiths there. “Ah, Rowen. It’s good to see you here.” It was difficult to tell whether he actually thought that or not. “Here to pay your respects?”
“Looking for someone actually,” said Rowen, already scanning their surroundings.
“But also to pay our respects,” Margo added, elbowing her.
Reverend Byers raised an eyebrow, but he didn’t tell them to leave. “Well, there’s a guest book if you’d like to sign that. The funeral itself is tomorrow.”
Rowen moved toward the guest book, still scanning the room. There was a casket in the corner. Several people were gathered around it, and it was there that Rowen spotted the person she was looking for. “Ms. Coldgrove,” she said, going to her.
Stephanie’s old teacher jumped. She turned and faced Rowen. There were tears in her eyes. “Oh. Oh, hello there. I-I didn’t know you knew Beatrice.”
“I didn’t know you did either,” Rowen said in return. “Are you a member of the Sunset Valley’s congregation.”
“Oh, I’m not very religious. I just go sometimes. Why do you ask?”
“By that, do you mean you sometimes help them with their charitable works?”
Ms. Coldgrove suddenly looked very uncomfortable. “W-what do you mean? What are you saying.”
“Maybe we should step outside,” whispered Margo. They were attracting some attention, after all.
“I don’t think I want to go anywhere with you,” Ms. Coldgrove whispered, but Rowen was persistent.
“You’re just as bad as Jessica, you know. She didn’t mean to kill an innocent person either. Now you’ve had a hand in killing two.” Rowen had whispered the words, but if she was wrong they would still be exceptionally out of line.
Ms. Coldgrove went pale. “Let’s… Let’s talk outside.” She moved toward the door like a doomed woman being led to her execution. She dragged her feet until they were alone in the parking lot. Rowen was afraid she might make a run for it, but she never did. “I didn’t mean for any of this.”
“You poisoned the dessert,” Margo gathered, frowning. “You poisoned it, and you dropped it off at the church assuming she would be the only one to eat it given her unique allergies. Why? Why go that far?”
“I couldn’t stop thinking about it! That little girl! I just… I just wanted justice for her. It wasn’t enough. Children are so innocent. They’re the only truly good things in this world.” Ms. Coldgrove looked down at her feet. “I feel like I failed her in life. I never did anything about that horrible family of hers. I wanted to do something right by her now.”
“Then why not help her brother?” Rowen snapped, she couldn’t help it. “Margo, call Ben, will you?”
Margo seemed hesitant to step away, but she did. She pulled out her phone and made the call. Meanwhile, Ms. Coldgrove just stood there, staring absently at the ground. “I never meant for any of this.”
Rowen wasn’t feeling as forgiving here as she had with Trevor. “Well, it happened and it’s your fault.” She could see that those words hurt her, that she knew the truth of them. Rowen felt the urge to tell her another bit of truth. It felt risky to tell her, but she had another one of those gut feelings. This was the right thing to do. “It wasn’t Jessica who accidentally hit that little girl.”
“What?”
“I found it out while investigating. It was Trevor. It was still an accident. Jessica just took the fall.” Rowen saw that Ms. Coldgrove was staring at her now. She didn’t question her. She didn’t ask how she knew. She just stared. “Would you have done the same if you had known it was him? Would you have killed Trevor? He was just fifteen at the time. Is he an innocent too or what?”
Ms. Coldgrove began to cry, and Rowen decided to leave her alone. She’d said enough. The police could take it fro
m here. At least she had found out the truth. She couldn’t have, she realized, without Grammy’s help. Grammy was the one who had led them to the school. She was the one who had insisted that she wasn’t wrong, that there was a clue there that was crucial. Looking back on it, she felt silly for ever having doubted her.
After speaking with Ben and a couple of other officers, Rowen headed home. She would no doubt have to deal with making more statements later. After more than an hour of standing around, waiting for someone to speak to her, she was finally told she could just go home. They would give her a call when they needed her, Ben said. She looked tired and there was no sense in standing around indefinitely.
Margo pounced on the chance to head home. There was no need to convince her. The police statement and paper work portion of this job had never been a favorite of hers.
They both headed home. Rowen wasn’t sure if Margo had plans for the remainder of her day, but she certainly didn’t. She’d solved mysteries in the past. Uncovering this sort of unhappy truth never got any easier. She considered giving Eric a call, but the prospect of talking to him on the phone right now and explaining everything felt too exhausting. She’d fill him in when he got home. Until then, a nap sounded heavenly.
Rowen sighed as she pulled up outside of her home. There was a car in the driveway already. She recognized it as Aunt Lydia’s, though she had the sneaking suspicion that Lydia wasn’t the one who had driven there in it. So much for that nap. She parked the car and headed inside. It appeared that her visitor had already let themselves inside. She stepped in through the front door. “You could have called like a normal person,” she said, dropping her purse on the table beneath her coatrack.
Tiffany looked over the back of the sofa at her daughter. “That felt too impersonal. She stood, offering Rowen an apologetic smile. It wavered a bit, like she wasn’t sure a peace offering would be accepted. “We should talk.”
Rowen rolled her eyes, not sure how she hadn’t seen this coming before now. “I’m not sure what there is to talk about.” It wasn’t like she had ever been able to change her mother’s mind about anything. Besides, it wasn’t her place to do so. Tiffany was a grown woman. She made her own decisions. “It’s been a really long day. Can we do this another time?”
Tiffany frowned. “You just want to get rid of me.”
“I thought the problem was that I wanted you to stay?” Rowen shot back, even though she knew that wasn’t what her mother had meant. She wasn’t wrong either. She did want her to leave right now. She’d far prefer a post-mystery nap to an argument.
Tiffany winced but didn’t have a response at first. She looked down at the floor, her lips pursed, expression thoughtful. “I’m sorry I wasn’t here for you when you were a little girl.”
Rowen took a deep breath. She really wasn’t up for this. She’d had enough drama today. She thought of all the families she had been dealing with lately, the sort of strain that had been placed on them. She should count herself lucky in comparison. Not that she wasn’t still upset with her mother… But what good was being angry? “You can go.”
Tiffany stood up a little straighter. Her eyes lit up. “You don’t mind?”
“Oh, I mind,” Rowen assured her. “I hate the idea of you moving away. I think it sucks, but you’re an adult and I’m definitely not a kid anymore.”
Tiffany frowned again, like she wasn’t quite sure how to take that. Finally, she opted for cautious optimism. She must really want to leave town and find herself some adventure. “How about one more Tarot reading for the road?”
Rowen wasn’t in the mood for a Tarot reading. She felt utterly drained. All she really wanted was to crash in bed. Her mother was already pulling her deck from her purse, smiling as if hopeful it would do something to mend the rift between them. She did love her Tarot decks.
Tiffany’s smile sagged a little. She must have noticed that Rowen didn’t really look into it. “A little one,” she amended. “It’ll be a very short reading.”
Rowen nodded and followed her mother to the bar. She watched her quickly shuffle the deck. “I’ll do both of us,” Tiffany announced, laying the cards flat. “One card each. Me then you.”
“All right.” Rowen didn’t have much of a choice in the matter at this point. Besides, it shouldn’t take long; as much as she might act like she didn’t, she really did like this sort of stuff, sitting down with her mom, watching her pore over her cards.
Tiffany drew the first card. “This one is mine.” She flipped it over and laid it flat on the bar. It was a card from the Major Arcana--The Fool.
Rowen couldn’t help it, she gave a snort and laughed. She had to stop when her mother landed a sharp elbow to her ribs. “Sorry, sorry,” she blurted. “It’s just too perfect.”
Tiffany took a deep breath and shot her daughter a dirty look. “It’s the perfect card for me right now. It means a journey. I’m about to go on an important journey.”
Rowen knew from her mother teaching her that it meant a great many other things. “Well, good luck with your trip, Fool.”
That earned Rowen another glare, but she didn’t say anything. She just drew the next card, Rowen’s card. It was of the Major Arcana again. Rowen stared. “Death,” said Tiffany, like that needed saying. She turned to her daughter with a smile. “That’s not bad, Sweetie. It just means change.”
“Drastic change,” Rowen grumbled, her thoughts racing. “And that change could be death!”
Tiffany put her cards back into their pouch. She reached out and placed a hand on her daughter’s cheek. “Maybe this town will change, maybe you will. Maybe both! You’re going through a lot of changes right now. I wish I could be there for them.”
“Then stay.”
Tiffany took a deep breath “I can’t.”
“You could. You just don’t want to.” Rowen wasn’t even trying to cast any blame. She just wanted to hear the truth from her mother.
Tiffany fidgeted a bit where she stood. “I’ll be back. I always come back.”
Rowen knew that her mother was telling the truth there, but she didn’t really care. People like Rose and Margo could change in little ways, but there was no changing the more fundamental parts of family members. Tiffany would always be something of a wanderer. She would never be the devoted, dependable mother Rowen wanted. That didn’t really matter. What mattered was that Rowen and everyone she cared about were happy with their lives. And you know what? They all seemed to be. “I’ll be here when you get back then,” she told her mother. She really couldn’t imagine being anywhere else.
Epilogue
Aunt Lydia had really outdone herself. The roast on the table smelled delicious. It was almost torture to have to wait on everyone to arrive. “This is what you get,” said Lydia, slapping the back of Willow’s hand with a spoon when she reached for a roll. “All my babies move out, so now you have to wait for everyone to get here. It was so much easier when you were all living upstairs.”
“I haven’t moved out yet,” Peony pointed out.
“I know, Dear. You’re one of the good ones. You can have a roll.”
Willow glared at her sister as she grabbed herself a buttery morsel to snack on. Peony smirked back at her. They still fought like sisters, but they were on better terms now. Aunt Nadine seemed relieved by that, but Rowen had known it was only a matter of time. Those two were inseparable.
“Rose better hurry up,” Willow grumbled, slouching in her seat and folding her arms over her chest. She frowned at Benji who had tagged along for dinner but wasn’t even paying attention to her current dilemma. He was too busy showing Margo something or another on his phone. “What’s that?” asked Willow.
“Huh?” Benji glanced up. “Oh, it’s the footage from the pie festival. It’s that piece Channel 2 is doing with your paper. Remember?”
“Oh.” Willow looked less interested now.
“Looks good. Let me see it again once it’s edited,” said Margo. She was acting as an ambassador of
sorts to Channel 2. There was a rumor that they were keeping her on for damage control purposes. Margo was undecided on whether or not to take them up on it. She had considered striking it out on her own as a PR expert. She’d gathered a lot of connections traveling with David she said. Rowen thought she should take the job at Channel 2. She should start small. Still, Rowen was happy that she seemed to have found her calling. It was kind of fitting that that calling was drama.
The front door opened. “Sorry I’m late!” Rose called.
“Finally!” Willow said loud enough so that she could definitely hear her.
“Sorry,” Rose said again, hurrying into the dining room.
“No Ben?” Lydia asked her daughter, frowning.
“He’s busy with the Landis case.” Rose didn’t need to explain any more than that. They all knew it had become a nightmare for the police department. Jessica and Trevor had come clean about the truth of the accident. It was all over the news. No one was sure quite what to do about it yet, but the town didn’t seem to hate the Landis family quite as much anymore. People couldn’t sympathize with an adult child killer, but they could sympathize with a woman who was just trying to protect her son. Even the Nielsons had come around some. The son had anyway. Rowen liked to think the truth coming out had given Billy a certain sense of peace that he had been lacking. Last Rowen had heard, he had started talking to Terrance more. They’d been spotted hanging around his father’s garage, fixing cars together. That was nice, Rowen thought. They both had a lot of issues that needed to be worked through.
It was all for the best. Once the chaos and the media storm was over, Trevor would probably find some peace himself. Ms. Coldgrove probably wouldn’t for a while, but that was just fine. She didn’t deserve to yet.
“Can we eat or what?” asked Willow as Rose sat down next to her mother.
Aunt Lydia sighed. “Fine, fine. Go right ahead.”
Rowen didn’t make a grab for the food immediately. She looked around the table at her family. Most of them were there; her cousins, her aunts, her uncle, her husband, even Benji. Grammy was missing, but she could handle herself. Tiffany was missing, but Rowen could handle herself. Things changed, but they were still good. Rowen was okay with that.
