“Anything?” Liz asked.
“She’s not answering. It went to voice mail.”
14
“Liz, stop the car!” Anna shouted.
Liz hit the brakes, sending her SUV’s back end fishtailing on the icy pavement. “Good grief, what?”
“I don’t believe it.” Anna leaned forward and looked out the windshield. “Look at them.” Just up the block, Rose Price stood on the sidewalk outside the Buffalo Café, flanked by Curt MacKenzie and Tanner Ostberg, each of them with an arm around her, bobbing their heads, comforting her in her time of grief. “Why isn’t she at home?”
“I don’t know. Why does it bother you that she’s here?”
“Did they all just happen to meet on Summit Avenue after Dean was killed? Don’t you think it’s strange?”
“What I think is . . .” Liz nosed her car up the street, found a vacant space at the curb, and parked front end first. “They’re in public and they’re all together. This is the perfect time to talk to them. Come on.”
“Stay, Jackson,” Anna said, hopping down from her seat. She turned back as she shut the door and caught sight of her dog in the cargo area, quivering with expectation. She wondered for a moment if she should hook up his leash and let him out. But this conversation was going to be brief, and possibly unpleasant. “I’ll be right back,” she called through the window.
Tanner dropped his arm from Rose’s shoulder and gawked as Anna and Liz approached. “You two,” he said.
Anna braced herself for a lecture on leaving Rose—and by extension Tanner and Curt—alone, but Tanner simply said, “Did you hear about Dean?”
“Of course she did, Tanner.” Rose hastily brushed a tear from her cheek. “He died in front of her house.”
Tanner’s jaw dropped and his eyes shifted from Rose to Anna. “Why?”
“What was he doing at your house?” Curt said.
“He was on my drive, but he never got out of his car.” What else could she say? There was no reason Dean Price would visit her house, much less die parked on her driveway.
“I don’t understand,” Tanner said.
“Neither do I,” Anna said.
“He must have been coming to see you,” Curt added.
“He didn’t phone to let Anna know he was coming,” Liz said. “He didn’t even open his car door.”
Tanner looked to Liz, his eyes narrowing. “How do you know that? You’ve contacted the police already? I mean, hell, he’s only been dead a few hours. I’ll bet you already posted an article on your website.”
Liz pulled herself to her full height, which in her thick-soled snow boots was not inconsiderable. “I didn’t contact the police, I was there, at the house. That’s how I know. And I posted an article about ten minutes ago. It’s my job. Speaking of which, the Herald’s going to want a quote from Rose. Is that what you’re doing here, Tanner?”
“I’m here to be with Rose, so shut the hell up.” Tanner’s mouth tightened and his face clouded with anger.
“Stop it,” Curt said with a growl. “What’s wrong with everyone?”
“Sorry,” Liz said. “You’re right, Curt. I’m sorry, Rose.”
Rose plucked a tissue from her coat pocket and pressed it to each eye. Anna couldn’t put it into words—it wasn’t something she could point to in Rose’s demeanor—but she had a gut feeling that Rose wasn’t as heartbroken as she was making an effort to appear. She seemed to be assessing her situation and somewhat clinically taking stock of her . . . possibilities. That was it. At Dean’s death, some new world had opened up to her.
Duly chastised, Tanner mumbled an apology, though he directed it at Liz rather than Rose.
“We only have each other now,” Rose said. “Three of us left.”
Tanner looked bewildered. “We’re not going on with the club, are we?”
He had asked the same question when Melinda told the club members her father had been murdered, Anna remembered. Now that Maxwell was dead, they weren’t going to proceed with the séance, were they? When Beverly Goff said yes, Tanner was surprised. In both cases, he was the least committed of all the members, and in that he was the most sensible.
“Do you want to disband?” Curt asked. “I can’t believe my ears.”
“We could re-form when there are more members,” Tanner said, continuing to address his comments to Rose. “More members means more contacts.”
If Tanner cared so much less about the club and was ready to abandon rather than rebuild it, why had he joined? The instant Anna asked the question, she had an answer: Curt. He was no longer with the Herald, but chances were he still had influence with the publisher and editors. Maybe he had gained favor with the publisher by not quitting when he wasn’t made editor in chief. In some respects the January Club might operate as a business fraternity, the older members giving new ones a leg up in their professions. And at one time Tanner might have thought that Curt was such an older member. But no longer.
“But Tanner, you get so much from our organization,” Curt said. “Literally so much. Piles.”
Tanner pivoted slowly, head first and then body, toward Curt. It was a practiced move, intended to intimidate. “What does that mean, Dusty?”
“You’re a thief, that’s what it means.”
“It was you! You’re the one who sold me out!” Tanner jabbed his forefinger into Curt’s chest and Curt slapped it away.
“I don’t sell. People or things.”
“Soda has a record, you know? Don’t you get it?”
“A record for what?”
“Theft, you moron.”
Curt erupted with laughter. Tanner flushed red, and he leaned in close. “Do you know what you’ve done to her? She could lose her job over this.” He made a fist and pulled back his arm, causing Curt to flinch.
“You’re going to fight on the street?” Rose said. “Is that it now?” Again she dabbed her eyes with the tissue, but this time Tanner and Curt paid no attention.
“Who is this Soda Pop?” Curt said.
“Tanner’s friend,” Rose said. “Does it matter, today of all days?”
“She’s stealing from my house and I never heard of her until yesterday, when Anna mentioned her. Why does everyone but me know her?”
Curt wasn’t going to let it go, Anna thought. Once again, at the strangest and slightest provocation, he felt wronged. Everyone else knew about Soda Ashbrook. He’d been left out of the loop.
“Anna?” Tanner said, his gaze now focused on her. “You’re talking about Soda again? To Dusty now?”
A sharp retort rose in Anna’s throat—she’d talk about who she wanted to talk about and with whom she wanted to talk—but she kept her mouth shut, recognizing the pettiness of the subject and hoping it would be superseded by another argumentative statement from one of the club members. It quickly was.
“And Rose . . .” Curt cleared his throat, steeling himself. “I have to ask. Why are club gifts showing up in your galleries?”
“Whoa.” Tanner jammed a hand into his brown mop of hair and stepped back from Curt. “I’ll let her take you down, Dusty.”
“Curtis MacKenzie.” Like a gun turret rotating toward its target, Rose turned her sights on Curt. “Careful what you say to me, old friend. I do not forget.”
Hearing a snicker from Tanner, Curt used it as an opportunity to drop the question he had asked Rose. “I’m going to find out who this Soda Pop is, you square-thumbed, bean-counting mop of hair.”
Tanner let go with a bray of laughter, and for just a second, Anna thought Curt might strike him. Instead, he shoved his hands in his coat pockets as though he was afraid of what they might do on their own initiative.
Anna had been about to invite them into the Buffalo, tell them that she and Liz would buy coffees all around. They could sit and talk reasonably, get out of the biting cold. Not now. In her view all of them were unbalanced, all of them were capable of being a murderer. But of course they were. Why had she ever thought othe
rwise? People involved in the occult were supposed to be kind? Reasonable? Even Rose was capable of killing, including her own husband.
“I see the way you’re looking at us,” Rose said, shaking Anna from her thoughts. “It’s condescending. You had better look to your own circle of friends, like that Melinda Maxwell.”
“What has Melinda done?” Anna asked. Rose’s was a well-worn tactic. She could circle her troops once more by directing fire outward.
“The hatred in that woman’s eyes as she looked at my husband yesterday, even after he let her take two of our Dala horses.”
Now was her chance, Anna thought. “I’ve been meaning to ask you what you meant yesterday when you said, ‘It was more than a fair exchange.’ You said it about Henry Maxwell giving the club his things.”
Rose said nothing.
“What was the exchange?” Anna repeated.
In exasperation, Tanner puffed his cheeks and exhaled loudly. “Tell her, Rose. What, do you think you’re going to get in trouble? He’s dead. It’s not like someone at the paper is going to demand he pays back his salary.” He turned to Anna. “He got a job he didn’t deserve. That was the exchange. Getting something you don’t deserve is always the exchange. It’s the sole purpose of the club, despite the garbage about it being for encouragement. How do you think I got my job?” Appearing to enjoy his role as spiller of secrets, he chuckled. “I’ll tell you what, though. I think Maxwell was supposed to give the club his house too. Wasn’t he, Dusty?”
Curt’s eyes became slits.
“His house was never part of the exchange,” Rose said. “We’re not bloodsuckers.”
“Then he got a hell of a bargain,” Tanner said.
And Curt didn’t, Anna thought. Curt lost the job he should have had. “Melinda wondered how her father became editor in chief. He had no experience. He was just a journalism instructor at a junior college in Sheridan.”
“Be careful around her,” Rose warned. “I saw the way she looked at Dean.”
“Melinda’s not a murderer.”
“You don’t know what she is.”
“She’s a woman who lost her father, and right now she’s watching movers take from her everything he owned.”
Rose flashed a victory smile. “She most certainly is not. I was there first thing this morning to let the movers in. She and her car were gone.”
Anna cast about for an explanation. Melinda didn’t want to see the movers take away her dad’s things. She had stayed at a hotel last night and hadn’t returned yet. The phone? She had disconnected the landline because she had no intention of living in the house, and she’d turned off her cell because she couldn’t bear to talk to anyone this morning. All reasonable. “I don’t know why Melinda wasn’t at the house, but she wouldn’t murder over things.”
“Would she murder over something else?” Rose asked.
“Like what?”
“I don’t know, but I think it’s very strange that these murders happened after she showed up in town. No one in my club had a reason to murder my husband.”
Anna felt Liz tug at her jacket sleeve. “Jackson’s waiting,” she said. The sun was out, warming the inside of Liz’s SUV, but they needed to get back to her dog and, more important to Liz, get to Elise Van Rossem’s house before she packed up and left Elk Park for California. Elise had said she would stay at the house for a few days, but in her fragile condition, she might change her mind at any moment.
Anna and Liz offered their condolences to Rose and headed back to the SUV, Liz leaping over a snow berm at the curb then sliding an inch or two when her boots hit the street. The high-altitude sun had done its job heating the interior of the car, and Jackson, warm and relaxed, woke from a nap as they climbed into the front seats.
Anna, who despite the excuses she’d imagined for Melinda’s absence was finding it hard to understand why she hadn’t been there to meet the movers, said nothing as Liz headed north for Elise’s house and several times bemoaned their lost opportunity—so near and yet so far from the Buffalo and its coffee and scones.
If she had been in the same position as Melinda, Anna thought, she would never have left the house. She would have stood there, metaphorical pitchfork in hand, keeping an eye on everything the movers did. “Wait a minute,” she said.
“I’m not slamming on the brakes again.”
“How did the movers get into the Maxwell house? Melinda wasn’t there, so how did they get in?”
“Rose said she—”
“No, I spent an hour looking for signs of a break-in and Melinda neglects to mention that Rose has a key? I don’t think so.”
“Melinda might have given Rose a key after we left.”
“When? It’s been less than twenty-four hours since we were there, and there’s no way she met with Rose that night. She wouldn’t speak to that woman—or anyone else from the club.”
Liz slowed as she headed into a curve on Black Bear Road. “I remember the will now. Melinda wasn’t required to turn over the keys, but she was supposed to be at the house. So how did the movers get in?”
“What if Henry Maxwell gave Rose a key? That would explain why his things ended up in the Prices’ galleries but there’s no sign of a break-in.”
“What if Curt had the key?”
“Yes, of course.” Why hadn’t she thought of that before? What was Curt really doing at Melinda’s house yesterday? It was preposterous to think he’d come to warn her about Tanner, Dean, and Rose. He was one of them, for crying out loud. One of the January people. “He could have had the key with him, but first he knocked on the door to see if anyone was home.”
“And when he saw the three of us, he concocted a story about coming over to warn Melinda.”
“You saw through that too.”
“Those people don’t care about Melinda. Or Henry Maxwell or Beverly Goff. Notice how quickly they recovered from the death of their medium? All they can do now is squabble about who should take her place. And Dean—even Rose doesn’t care much about him.”
As they drove past Saddleback Road, Anna looked to the pine woods beyond. Hetrick and Maxwell had been murdered there. Their bodies had been found in nearly the same place. Two people had trusted in their companion, or companions, and paid for that misplaced trust with their lives.
With a shiver she thought of how few people she trusted completely. Gene, of course. Liz and Dan. Grace Bell. And Jazmin. She smiled to herself. She trusted that girl. Jazmin hadn’t been corrupted by the occult. She had held a part of herself back from it, always. There was a core of goodness, and good sense, in her.
“I do wonder about Melinda, though,” Liz said. “She had a reason to kill Dean Price.”
And a reason to kill her father, Anna thought. “When I first met her, she told me the severed finger she found wasn’t real. How could she have missed the odor of formaldehyde?”
“Some people just don’t want to know things. They lie to themselves.”
“I remember it seemed like she was trying to convince herself as much as me that the finger wasn’t real. She probably couldn’t handle knowing one more sick thing about her father.”
As Liz pulled onto Elise’s driveway, Anna spotted a white SUV parked at the top, near the house. “That’s Melinda’s car,” she said. Despite coming to the conclusion, only moments before, that Melinda was likely innocent, she felt a sense of panic rise within her.
Liz churned up the driveway, keeping the SUV’s tires moving steadily, cutting fresh tracks in the snow.
“Melinda’s car has been here for hours,” Anna said. “The driveway’s snowed in again and there’s snow covering the back window.”
“My God. Elise,” Liz said, braking hard just feet from Elise’s front door. “We should have realized.” She threw the SUV into park, and the two of them raced for the door, Anna reaching it first. She rang the doorbell, called for Elise, and shouted her own and Liz’s name to let Melinda know they were just outside and Elise was no longer alon
e.
Anna heard the slide of a dead-bolt lock. The door opened a crack. Elise, a frown creasing her brow, cautiously peered through the opening. “Anna? Liz? What’s happening?”
But for the worried look on Elise’s face, Anna would have laughed with relief. “Nothing’s happening. Sorry, we just . . . we’re idiots. Can we come in?”
Elise stepped back from the door and swung it open. Anna walked inside, quickly scanning the great room and kitchen. There at the kitchen table, surrounded by photo albums, shoe boxes, baubles, and knickknacks, was Melinda.
Anna said, “Good grief” and headed for the table, Liz right behind her.
“You found out I wasn’t at the house,” Melinda said with a grin.
“It’s not funny,” Liz said as she dropped into a chair.
Melinda’s grin vanished. “I’m sorry. Were you worried?”
“Of course we were,” Anna said, taking a seat. It was all she could do not to tell her that their real worry was for Elise, not her.
“I had to keep it a secret,” Melinda said. “I didn’t want you to have to lie for me. We didn’t plan this.” She looked toward Elise, gratitude on her face.
“No, we didn’t, but I’m glad it worked out,” Elise said, sitting across from Anna. “When Melinda came to my house yesterday, we got to talking. She told me about her father’s will, and I wanted to help.”
“And I told her about the January Club,” Melinda said.
“I asked about the January Club,” Elise corrected. “And the more I learned, the more I wanted to help Melinda move things from her father’s house to mine.”
“A couple carloads’ worth,” said Melinda, vindication in her voice. “Only some of it’s here on the table.”
“Is this yours?” Liz said, pointing to a Mission-style lamp on the floor. “It’s beautiful.”
“It’s only a reproduction, but I’ve loved it since I was a kid.”
Anna laughed, a sense of satisfaction mingling with her relief. “I wondered where you were putting things.”
“The car at first,” Melinda said. “But obviously that wasn’t going to work when the movers came.”
The Club (Anna Denning Mystery Book 4) Page 14
