I figured as much. “What about Travis McCoy?”
“What? The singer?” Amelia asked, nose scrunched up as if she smelled something bad.
“Yeah, him. Do either of you listen to him?”
“Ew, no.” Amelia glanced at Maya, who shook her head.
“Not my type of music.”
It wasn’t mine either. Honestly, I wasn’t sure why I’d asked. It wasn’t like it had anything to do with the investigation.
“I didn’t think so, but thought I’d double-check to be sure.”
“Did he do something?” Amelia asked. “Like, is he a suspect or something?”
“No. He was arrested earlier today for punching someone. It turned the police station into a madhouse.”
“I’m not surprised,” Amelia said. “He’s always trending on Twitter for doing something he shouldn’t.”
“It’s often someone’s wife,” Maya added.
That definitely sounded like the man Officer Grace described. “All right,” I said. “I’ll leave you two alone.” I started to close the door, but then remembered my original reason for coming upstairs. “Has anyone called for me while I was out?”
Amelia glanced at Maya before she gave an apologetic shrug. “I wasn’t paying attention to the phone. Sorry.”
“I didn’t hear anything,” Maya said.
“All right. I’ll be downstairs in case you hear something back.” I aimed the last at Maya, who gave me a thumbs-up.
I hesitated at the door a moment. Amelia had opened her laptop again and was focused on whatever was on the screen, and Maya was checking her phone. With a sigh, I closed the door and headed back downstairs.
The cats were already done eating and were snoozing in the living room by the time I returned. I found a cat brush in the dining room hutch, and carried it with me as I headed for the phone. Sheamus needed a brushing, but something else needed to be done first.
I hated having to do it, but I picked up the phone and called Stacy Hildebrand.
“Hi, Stacy,” I said when she answered. “It’s Liz Denton with Furever Pets. I—”
“Do you have my dog? Where is he?”
Even though she couldn’t see me, I plastered a smile onto my face in the hopes that it would come through when I spoke. “He’s here. While I have yet to receive documentation from you, I’ve come to the conclusion that the Chihuahua in my possession is indeed your Chico. I was wond—”
“I told you as much!” she shouted, cutting me off. “I was right there in your driveway, and told you that you had my dog. Thief. I’ve already reported you to everyone I could think of. I hope your business collapses.”
The smile was becoming harder and harder to hold in place. “I had nothing to do with your dog ending up here,” I said. “He was delivered to my house by someone else.” I desperately wanted to point the finger at Courtney, but I refused to stoop to her level. “I took him in on good faith. I promise you, I didn’t take your dog from you.”
There was a long stretch of silence where I hoped Stacy was actually thinking about what I’d said, but when she spoke, I realized she’d merely been seething.
“You have a lot of nerve trying to blame someone else for your transgressions,” she said. “I can’t believe you’d stand there and lie to me. You were caught red-handed. You are going to have to deal with the consequences of your actions.”
It was my turn to remain silent while I composed myself. I couldn’t believe this woman. Sure, I’d be angry if someone had taken my beloved Wheels from me, but to outright refuse to listen to what they had to say?
“I’m sorry you feel that way, Ms. Hildebrand.” Somehow, I kept my cool. “I only want what’s best for Chico. He’s back from the vet with a clean bill of health, and you, of course, won’t be charged for his checkup. If you would like to pick him up, or if you’d prefer to have me deliver him to you, we can set something up for today.”
“That doesn’t work for me.”
I blinked. “What doesn’t?”
“I can’t get him today. You’re just going to have to take care of him for another day or so.”
After the fit she’d thrown in my driveway, and now on the phone, she was going to pull this? “I’m sorry, I don’t understand.”
“I can’t drop everything to help you fix your mistakes.” I could feel the venom dripping off her words. “I have a life, and I refuse to bow to your whims just because it would be convenient for you.”
“I see.” I didn’t know what else to say.
“Bring him to me tomorrow morning. I expect him to be in perfect health. If so much as one hair is displaced on his head, I’m going to sue you for all you’re worth.”
I was stunned into silence. This woman had thrown a huge hissy fit about getting her dog back and now she was going to make me wait until tomorrow to return him? What was wrong with her?
A thought trickled into my head. What if Courtney had set this whole thing up? Could Stacy and Courtney have worked together, all in an effort to smear my name?
Don’t be paranoid, Liz. Not even Courtney would stoop that low.
Would she?
“Nine sharp,” Stacy snapped. “Any later and I’ll call the cops.”
I had to shake my head to clear it. This wasn’t how I’d expected the conversation to go. “I’ll need your address.”
Stacy rattled off an address so quickly, I knew she was trying to trip me up on purpose. I made her repeat it twice, then recited it right back to her before I was satisfied.
“I’ll see you tomorr—” This time, I was cut off by the sound of the phone clicking off.
My mouth worked, forming words best not said aloud. I managed not to utter them, but it was a near thing. I didn’t know if this was a setup or not, but I did know I was going to have serious words with Courtney when I saw her next.
I was clutching the brush so hard, my fingers ached. I forced myself to loosen my grip before I headed into the living room where Sheamus was napping on the couch. I sat down next to him and ran the brush down his back once.
He was on his feet immediately, purring so loud, I swear Amelia had to hear it all the way upstairs.
“You like that?” I asked him, some of the tension bleeding away as I brushed him. “I bet you do, don’t you?”
Sheamus leapt off the couch so he could rub against my legs as I continued to brush the tangles out of his fur. He didn’t mind me working at them, even when I got to his underside. The cat truly did love his brushing, and I couldn’t say that I minded it either. It was almost as relaxing for me as it was for him.
It took ten minutes to work all the tangles free. By the time I was done, Sheamus’s coat was sleek and shiny. He rubbed up against my leg once more, wrapped his long tail around me, and then walked over to Wheels to wash her.
Apparently, he liked giving as much as he did receiving.
That done, I brought out my phone—which I’d remembered to take out of the van’s cupholder for once in my life—and added a reminder to deliver Chico tomorrow.
I was about to tuck the phone away when I changed my mind and did a quick search. I found Wayne Hastings’s number, and added it to the note. Once I was done dealing with Stacy—and very likely Courtney—I thought I might just go ahead and give him a call. I wasn’t officially working on the investigation, but if I could help Amelia get in good with her boss, why not?
A door slammed open upstairs, causing me to startle to my feet. Footsteps pounded down the stairs, and both Amelia and Maya burst into the room, eyes wide and excited.
“Mom!” Amelia said, spotting me immediately. “You’re not going to believe this.”
“What’s happened?” I asked, not sure if I should be excited or scared. After a quick look at the two of them, I settled on worriedly excited.
“Someone got back to me,” Maya said, holding up her phone as if in proof. “I know who Christine’s birth parents were.” Her grin was triumphant. “And I think it might be the rea
son Joe Danvers was killed.”
14
“Christine Danvers was originally Christine Hemingway,” Maya said. “Her parents, Joan and Hue Hemingway, were killed just after her eighth birthday.”
“Geez,” Amelia said with a sad shake of her head. “That’s awful.”
Maya checked her phone before going on. “I don’t have a ton of information on what happened as of yet, but it does say that her parents were murdered, so it wasn’t an accident.” She met my eye. “Christine was there when it happened.”
“She saw the killer?” I asked.
“That’s what it says, but she couldn’t ID the guy. I guess when you’re eight, you don’t notice stuff like that.”
“It wouldn’t surprise me if she blocked it out,” Amelia said. “Trauma can do that.”
“It says here that the Hemingways were upstanding people. No arrest records, nothing. A motive was never discovered for their murder. No suspects, either. The cops in charge at the time determined it a random killing and, apparently, moved on.”
We all fell silent as we thought about it. It appeared as if Christine’s life was rife with misery. Her parents were murdered, and then she was forced to flee her husband and home, all while pregnant with his child.
And then, just after she died, her husband was murdered.
“Do you think she ran into her parents’ killer fifteen years later?” Amelia asked.
“I was thinking the same thing,” Maya said, tucking her phone away. “If she saw the murder happen as a kid, and then came across the killer later, it wouldn’t surprise me if she recognized him, even if she’d blocked him, and the memory, out.”
“Which, in turn, caused her to run,” I said, thinking it through.
“Yeah, she sees him, and maybe he recognizes her too. Threats are made, and she decides that to protect her husband and unborn son, she needs to escape Grey Falls before something can happen to them too.” Amelia tapped her chin. “Or she’s told to go, or else they would be next.”
“But why not call the police?” Maya asked. “I know if I saw a murder and I found the killer years later, I wouldn’t hesitate.”
“Maybe he’s a cop,” Amelia said. “It could explain why she couldn’t ID the killer the first time. She was only eight back then. If the cop was there, asking the questions, he could have messed with her head somehow, made her doubt what she remembered.”
“Or intimidated her,” I added.
“Do you think the same person killed Joe, then?” Maya asked.
I did some mental math. “That would put the killer at what? At least fifty? Sixty?” I couldn’t see a teenager as a murderer, though I supposed it was possible.
“There’s not many cops left on the force at that age,” Maya said.
“No, but that doesn’t mean they don’t still live in Grey Falls.” My mind went instantly to the detective who’d worked Christine’s disappearance, Wayne Hastings. Could he have killed her parents and then chased her out of town later?
Quite suddenly, I wasn’t so keen on paying Detective Hastings a visit by myself.
“All of this assumes the killer is the same man,” Amelia said. “Or even if it is a man. We can’t be sure the two crimes are connected without some sort of unifying proof.”
“But it’s awfully convenient if it’s not,” Maya said. “I mean, who has that bad of luck?”
“We should call Chester,” Amelia said. “Let him know what we found. Maybe he’ll know something we don’t.”
“That’s a good idea,” Maya said. “This could be big.”
“If he does, let me know, all right?” I said as they started for the stairs.
“Will do, Mom.”
And then the both of them were gone, leaving me to digest what they’d discovered on my own. Could Joe’s death have been almost fifty years in the making? That’s a long time to hold a grudge.
But if Amelia was right and a cop was involved in the Hemingway murders, then it stood to reason the man had a lot to lose if Joe started poking around in his wife’s disappearance again.
But if that was the case, why was Harry Davis so interested in the case? He didn’t strike me as a man who’d have friends on the police force, but what did I know? I didn’t know that many cops.
A part of me wanted to call Detective Hastings and try to weasel some information out of him, but I was mentally and physically exhausted. I’d been going pretty hard the last couple of days, and thanks to Courtney, I had more than just a cat and a murder to deal with.
I spent the next hour doing what I could for Sheamus and Chico. I still had to find a new home for Sheamus, and while I liked the cat, I couldn’t keep him. Wheels was all the cat I needed, especially since I always had animals in and out of the house. I didn’t know how Sheamus would react if I ever had an influx of hyperactive puppies.
Manny came home not long after, looking as if he’d had a rough day. He kissed me on the cheek before he collapsed onto the couch.
“Want to talk about it?” I asked him.
“Not yet.” His chest heaved and I realized it must have been one of those days. He tried not to let it show how much it bothered him when he couldn’t help someone’s pet, but I saw it in his posture, and in his eyes. He was torn up inside and wouldn’t want to drag me down with him.
“All right.” I squeezed his shoulder and let him work through it on his own. He’d let me know what happened in his own time.
I threw on a quick dinner of spaghetti since it was easy and I had no idea what Maya might like. Neither she nor Amelia had left Amelia’s room since they’d vanished upstairs to call Chester, and I wondered if they were making progress on Joe’s murder. It would be nice if it all came together nice and tidy, and we could put it all behind us.
Just as I finished dumping the spaghetti into the pan, Ben waltzed through the door, grinning ear to ear.
“Hey, Mom, what’s cooking?”
“Your favorite.” I held up a bottle of spaghetti sauce.
“Blech.” He stuck out his tongue. “Are you sure we can’t just dump some tomato sauce on strips of cardboard? It’d amount to the same thing.”
“Feel free,” I said. “But the rest of us will stick with pasta.”
Ben got out the saucepan for me and set it on the stove. “Just think, if I finally move out of here, you won’t have to cook for me anymore.”
“You mean, you won’t have to suffer my cooking anymore.”
He laughed. “That too.”
While I poured the sauce into the pan, Ben retrieved the parmesan from the fridge. He took it, along with a stack of plates, to the table.
I watched him work without making it obvious as to what I was doing. My heart ached thinking about him moving out, but I’d come to terms with it. There’s a point where a grown man living with his parents to help out with a business goes from sweet to pathetic.
As much as I hated to admit it, we were definitely nearing the pathetic end of the spectrum.
“You’ll need to grab one more plate,” I said as he returned to the kitchen. “Amelia has a friend over.”
“A boyfriend?” he asked.
“More like a work friend.”
“Uh-huh.” But he grabbed the plate anyway.
Dinner was a surprisingly calm affair. I fully expected Ben to hit on Maya, which would, in turn, cause Amelia to get on him for being such a playboy. He must truly be in love with his latest girlfriend, because he was nothing but respectful to Maya. Even Manny seemed surprised.
Somehow, we made it through dinner without talking about Joe’s murder. I could tell it was on both Maya’s and Amelia’s minds. Every so often they’d glance at one another, and I could almost read the questions behind those gazes. It was torture for me to sit there and not ask them if Chester had anything to add to what they’d learned, but I managed.
Manny helped me clean up the table once we were done eating.
“You doing okay?” I asked him as I scrubbed at a dish.
He was quieter at dinner than usual, telling me that this was a bad one.
“I’ll be fine.” He flashed me a smile that didn’t reach his eyes. He left it at that.
I wanted to press since I knew keeping it in wasn’t going to do him any favors, but everyone processed grief in their own way. Manny always kept everything inside and tried to go on with life as if nothing had changed. When I last asked him why, he’d simply told me that there was no point in upsetting everyone when it was his pain to bear.
I didn’t always agree with his assessment, but I wouldn’t push him. Sometimes, sharing pain was the only way to get through a tough time. It was what I was there for.
As I handed Manny the last dish to dry, Amelia and Maya entered the kitchen. They were each carrying a laptop bag, and Amelia had her backpack tossed over one shoulder.
“Going somewhere?” I asked.
“I’m going to stay with Maya tonight,” Amelia said. “It’s kind of crowded in here and it will be easier to work without all the distractions.”
“We plan to pull an all-nighter on this,” Maya said.
Once again, I wondered what Chester might have told them, but since neither was offering up the information, I let it slide. For now.
“Will you be home for breakfast tomorrow?” Manny asked.
“Doubt it.” Amelia elbowed Maya. “I’m going to make her cook me breakfast.”
“You might not survive it,” Maya said.
“Well, let me know if you learn anything. I might be talking to Detective Cavanaugh soon, so if there’s anything he should know . . .”
Amelia rolled her eyes. “Don’t worry, Mom, I’ll let you know if anything pops.”
“Don’t work too hard,” Manny said.
Amelia and Maya turned and headed for the door. Just as they stepped outside, I heard Maya say, “I like your parents,” and then they were gone.
“They didn’t invite me,” Ben said, coming into the room.
“Looking for another girlfriend already?” It was meant as a joke, but he ignored it.
Dial 'M' for Maine Coon Page 12
