Tall Pines Mysteries: A Mystery/Suspense Boxed Set

by Aaron Paul Lazar

  “I’m sorry, baby. We thought it was better not to tell you.”

  “I know. And if I think about it logically, I didn’t need to know. He was a fantastic father. The best. I just wish I’d known Roberta. She’s a real sweetheart.” I watched a nuthatch climb upside down on the tree trunk nearest, and wondered if it was the same one who’d followed me through the woods last week. “But I’m not mad at you. I understand where you were coming from.”

  She shuddered a sigh of relief. “I was afraid you’d hate me.”

  “How could I ever hate you?” I slipped out of my sandals and rubbed my toes in the soft, warm dirt. “But I do have a question.”

  “Another one?” She sounded tired.

  “Yes. This one’s really important. I know you didn’t admit to it earlier, but you knew about Dad’s history with the Green Valley Bank heist, right?”

  Silence.

  “What the heck are you talking about, Marcella Theresa Hollister?” The shock in her voice made me shiver. And I knew I’d really taken her aback, because she never used my whole name unless she was either mad or unsettled.

  I explained to my mother about Ramona’s job as a bank security guard driver, how Tiramisu had forced her at gunpoint to drive away with the loot, and how she’d been wounded and indicted by circumstance.

  She asked dozens of questions, cried a little, and when it was over, I was finally able to ask mine.

  “So here’s the question. If Dad really did invest all the money from the robbery in overseas accounts, and if he spent it all on the land he donated to the state, how in the world did the authorities trace marked bills to you after he died?”

  I heard her open the refrigerator door and slam it shut. She cracked open a can of something that popped and fizzed. “I don’t know about that, but I’ll tell you where the money came from. Let me just do a little self-medicating first.” A few guzzles later, she started to talk.

  “Dad had one bad habit, darling.”

  I was scared to learn more. “What?”

  “He liked to gamble. When we were first married, he used to go every month to the casino at the reservation.”

  “He gambled?” The idea seemed totally off to me. He’d been a paragon of virtue when I was growing up. The perfect family man, he’d always been there for my mother and me, had never smoked, drank very little, and never even looked at another woman.

  She let out a little burp. “Excuse me. Yes, well, I believed he gambled, because he always came back with bags stuffed with money. Lots of money.”

  “What?”

  “He said he was going to invest it for our future, and I thought he did. I didn’t know it was from the robbery, or that he would buy that land. When he died, he had plenty in his 401K. He’d put twelve percent into it for his whole career, and in the rising market back then, it grew to almost three million. I figured that part of it came from those gambling trips.”

  “So he lied to you about the gambling, and really took the money from the stash from beneath Tall Pines to launder overseas.”

  She sniffled a little and her voice cracked. “I guess he did. And to think I trusted him.”

  I interrupted her, trying to forestall a crying jag. “But Thelma, don’t you get it? He did it to protect you. He probably was afraid you’d be vulnerable if you knew anything about it. I’m sure he did it to keep you safe. In case Tiramisu ever found him.”

  She wept a little, then blew her nose. I murmured comforting sounds while she pulled herself together. “At first Tiramisu thought I was Ramona. His flunkies kept calling me that, and I couldn’t for the life of me figure it out. I knew that had been Raoul’s name when he was a girl, but I didn’t know about this Tiramisu character and just didn’t put it together. When Tiramisu actually saw me, after his goons kidnapped me, he was furious that I wasn’t Ramona!” I heard the refrigerator open and shut again. “I just need another beer.” I heard the top pop and her take a few sips. “Now I get it. I started spending the money and that alerted them to me. Tiramisu assumed I was the grown-up Ramona, until he saw me. He knew nothing about the sex change. No one but Roberta and her vet husband did.”

  “Wait a minute. What money? I thought you didn’t know about the robbery?”

  She hesitated a few seconds. “I didn’t. Let me explain.”

  I rolled my eyes to the sky. “Please. Just blurt it out. You’re starting to confuse me.”

  “I took some of his winnings. Each time he came back from a trip to the casino, or what I thought was the casino, I’d dip into his bag while he was asleep. I figured it wouldn’t matter if I skimmed a little ‘pin’ money off the top, just for a rainy day. I put it in the secret drawer in my grandmother’s desk, and over the years it added up to quite a bit. When he died, I figured we deserved a little break, and that’s when I broke it out to pay for this trip.

  It all started to gel. “You pilfered from the stolen money?”

  “But I didn’t know it was stolen money!”

  “I know, Thelma. But you’ll probably have to pay it back.”

  “I know. I’ll have to take it out of my retirement fund. Do you think they’ll arrest me?”

  “God, I hope not. McCann’s meeting us up here tomorrow, and I’m going to tell him everything. But since Tiramisu and Raoul are gone now, the expectation to recover the money must be low. Very low. Everyone involved in the robbery is dead.”

  Quinn stuck his head out the porch storm door. “Supper’s ready.”

  “Thelma? I’ve gotta go. Quinn’s got dinner on. I’ll call you tomorrow, okay?”

  “Okay, honey. You try to get some rest now, you hear?”

  After we said goodnight, I swept my eyes across the river, soaking in the peaceful majesty of the scene. In my heart I knew the land had come clean again, washed of its bloody events by the rushing water that scrubbed the stones and rocks along the shore and riverbed. All traces of the evil had been rinsed away, dispersed and diluted downriver, where it could hurt no one ever again.

  Chapter 48

  Quinn rolled away from me, his face coated with a sheen of fine perspiration. A slow smile spread across his face. “Oh, babe.”

  I flopped onto my pillow, making the antique bedsprings squeak again. “Wow.”

  He whistled long and low. “Is it me? Or is that just about the best sex we’ve ever had?”

  “It’s not you.” I chuckled. “I mean, it was you. Wow.” I stretched like a cat and felt like purring.

  He opened the window wider. “I think it’s the river.” The rumble of the rushing water grew louder and a fresh cool breeze blew in the scent of balsam. Moonlight spilled over us, glinting on the bureau mirror. “It’s so…”

  “Powerful?”

  He leaned on his elbow, facing me. “Yeah. But more than that. It’s sort of all knowing. Like a presence, or a spirit.”

  I moved closer to him. He laid back and I rested my head on his chest, running my fingers over his belly in slow circles. “But gentle. Like an old woman with streaming white silky hair and big, loving eyes who sits children on her knee to tell stories. You know she’s seen a lot. Terrible things. Wonderful things.”

  “Like we’ve seen these past three weeks,” he said.

  I nodded against his chest. “Yeah.”

  “Are you gonna be okay? That news about Raoul was pretty shocking.”

  I looked up at his worried turquoise eyes. The love that flowed from them warmed me all the way to my toes. “I suppose it’ll take a while to accept everything. The transgender thing was a surprise, but somehow that part didn’t really bother me. ‘Cause I knew him all my life as a man. A great man. A loving man. He proved what a super father he was, and I not only loved him, but admired the hell out of him. I guess that’s why it mattered most to me that he didn’t willingly rob a bank. He just got caught in the wrong place at the wrong time.”

  “Do you think if he’d given himself up way back then they would’ve acquitted him?”

  “I
don’t know. He was shot and wounded, drove away from the scene with the money in the truck… how would he prove that Tiramisu had a gun in his side the whole time?”

  “Maybe he should’ve left the money somewhere—like on the steps of a church or something,” Quinn said.

  “Like a baby?” I laughed and kissed his mouth. “He could have. But then some passerby could have stolen it all over again.”

  “True.” He stifled a yawn. “And that whole thing about donating the land to the state was brilliant. What a way to give it back.”

  I pictured Lone Owl Lake shimmering cerulean under a sky filled with birds and dragonflies. The image morphed to a starry night scene, with a glittering ceiling of stars overhead and smooth black glassy water rippling beneath. The hoot of the owl remained strong in my memory. I was sure it had been a sign from Dad.

  “I know. I want to go back there a lot, Quinn. Especially on his birthday.”

  “Good idea.” Quinn’s eyes grew heavy, and his words slurred a bit.

  I slid off him and grabbed one of his neatly folded tee shirts from the bureau. I slipped into it and pulled on some white cotton socks. The floorboards were already getting chilly. When I hopped back into bed, the soft sound of snoring greeted me. I pulled the comforter up over us and snuggled close to his warmth with the rhythmic sound of crickets chirping outside the window.

  Chapter 49

  My dreams were vibrant and luscious, filled with little chickadees with bibs eating butterscotch sundaes, a lavender-colored heron who perched on a rock and played a fiddle, and a hundred baby bunnies who slept beside me in a meadow. I’d never dreamed with such freedom, and didn’t want to wake up.

  I woke to the smell of bacon, wood smoke, and a booming conversation between Quinn and McCann. Startled, I snatched my watch from the nightstand and stared. Ten o’clock? I wobbled out of bed and looked at the mess in the mirror. My eyes were puffy, and I had pillow creases on my cheeks. Holy crap. I hadn’t slept for twelve hours since I was a teen.

  I slipped into some fresh underwear, my jeans, an orange tee shirt, and a navy blue sweatshirt, then found my sneakers beneath the bed. I slid into them and laced them up. The morning air was cold, in spite of the sun splashing over the bed and walls. I shivered and grabbed a hairbrush from my purse. After pulling my hair into a thick ponytail and rubbing my teeth with a tissue, I popped a minty strip of Listerine in my mouth, slipped my purse over my shoulder, and braved an entrance.

  The warmth from the woodstove greeted me as soon as I opened the bedroom door. McCann sat close to it, cradling a cup of coffee in his hands. Quinn stood at the stove in an apron. I tried not to laugh. I’d seen the barbecue-style garment hanging from the hook on the wall, but hadn’t pictured him wearing it.

  “Morning, Marcella,” McCann said.

  “Good morning, Gordon.” I slithered toward the kitchen en route to the bathroom.

  Quinn brandished a spatula. “Sleep well, hon?”

  I pointed to the bathroom. “Uh huh. Just have to freshen up and I’ll be right back.”

  “Don’t be long. Eggs are almost ready.”

  I whisked myself into the bathroom that must have been tacked onto the outside of the cabin after the outhouse outlived its usefulness. I looked out the window at the old two-seater structure with the door rotting on the ground, thought about the fifty million that had been buried behind it, and realized how ingenious the spot had been. Who would want to root around in the ground behind such a place? I stared at it for a while, glad I didn’t have to traipse through the woods to get to the outhouse when I had to go. Imagine in the winter? I could barely picture myself having to run out there in the middle of the night in summer, never mind in two feet of snow.

  A space heater was attached to the wall over the toilet. I turned it on, and the room warmed up in minutes. After a birdbath with a warm washcloth, I brushed my teeth and felt more presentable.

  “Breakfast is ready, baby.” Quinn had set the table and was sliding eggs onto my plate when I stepped into the room. “Come on, it’ll get cold.”

  McCann sat opposite me, smearing jam on his toast. “This is my second breakfast. I had an Egg McMuffin at seven.”

  I took several sips of coffee and smiled at him over the rim. “You’ve got to keep your strength up, Detective.”

  He patted his bulging stomach. “Yeah. Mustn’t lose any strength.”

  Quinn finally sat between us and poured cranberry juice in our glasses. “I already told him everything, Marcella. He’s been here for an hour.”

  McCann tore into a forkful of eggs. “Mm hmm.” He held up one finger while he finished. “Can’t believe that story about the land.”

  I took a bite of crispy bacon. “Did you tell him about Ramona?”

  Quinn shook out his napkin and laid it in his lap. “Of course I did.”

  To his credit, he acted as though the topic were the most natural in the world. A sudden surge of affection washed over me. He hadn’t reacted like many macho types might have—horrified that he’d been friends with Raoul, or judgmental because his own manliness had been threatened. He’d simply accepted the truth as if we discovered Raoul wore red socks with his sneakers instead of white.

  We ate in silence for a few minutes, while McCann demolished his food. He wiped his mouth with a paper napkin, drained his juice glass, and pushed back. “Yeah. Quinn told me everything. About the twins. About Tiramisu forcing Ramona to drive the truck away from the bank, about the sex change, and about the land grant.”

  I searched his face for signs of distrust or disapproval. I found neither.

  He took his coffee into the kitchen to refill the cup, but talked to us over the half wall that divided the two rooms. “It all makes sense now. Tell you the truth, I’m glad there was no bag of money in the end. Especially glad that bitch Jaworski didn’t get her hands on it.”

  I watched Quinn cut his second piece of toast into perfect little squares. He dabbed a half-teaspoon of strawberry jam onto each piece, then spread each dot so that it evenly covered the little toast squares.

  McCann watched, but didn’t comment. I finished my food and sipped my coffee, watching McCann watch Quinn.

  “Detective?” I asked. “Is it true that the FBI used you to trip up Jaworski?”

  His eyes clouded. “The bastards set me up. No warning. Nothing. Just played me like a fool.”

  I set my coffee cup down carefully and met his eyes. “Will they keep the case open now that everyone’s dead?”

  A small smile crept over his lips. “I doubt it. When I give them the facts about the land purchase and donation, they’ll close the case. They might want to interview Roberta. And maybe the guy Raoul bought the land from. But it should be a done deal.”

  “So they wouldn’t keep a trace out for the bills from the robbery?” I asked.

  He shot Quinn a sly smile. “I’m going to tell them it all went into the land. That’s what Roberta will testify to. And after it’s all over, that should be the end of it. Until Hollywood decides to make a movie about it.”

  He surprised me again with his sense of humor. I took Quinn’s hand. “So they won’t bother my mother? She won’t be in trouble?”

  McCann looked at me as if I were dense, and enunciated the words carefully. “What I’m trying to tell you, Mrs. Hollister, is that there’s no reason to bring your mother into this. When I give you the word, you can feel free to use whatever funds remain in your mother’s ‘pin money’ cache. Those bastards don’t deserve to know about that pittance, anyway.”

  I raised one eyebrow. “I’m not sure how much there is, really.”

  He waved a hand at me. “It can’t be much. Besides. The bank was federally insured back then. They got all their money back from the government. And right now I’m not feeling too inclined to help out a government agency. Especially if it involves a lousy couple of hundred bucks.”

  Hope stirred in my chest. “So my mom’s in the clear.” I pushed back from the tabl
e and walked around to give McCann a hug. “Thank you.”

  He looked toward the river. “Your mother went through enough on that island. Blount almost killed her.” He rose, put his hands in his pockets, and stared out the window toward the river. “Seems to me we owe her a little something.”

  Quinn got up and encircled my waist with his arm. “I agree. There can’t be much in her stash. I’ll bet she already spent most of it for our trip to the bird show. Never mind the hospital bills, hotel bill, and helping us with the car rental.”

  McCann continued to stare at the Blackbird Island. “Exactly. So what’s done is done.” He turned and reached for his jacket slung on the back of the chair. “And speaking of done, it looks like my job here is finished. I’m off.”

  He shook hands with both of us, endured another hug from me, got into his cruiser, and headed out on the bumpy trail.

  Quinn finished up the dishes while I called my mother. She’d barely believed me when I told her she could keep the money. Her tone of voice—almost hysterical in its glee—made me wonder how much she’d actually put away. I told her we’d be home the next day, and dragged Quinn outside to sit with me by the river for the rest of the morning.

  Chapter 50

  “What time is the cleaning crew coming again?” Quinn asked. He’d just stepped out of the shower in the cabin and toweled himself off with old beach towels we’d brought from home. Definitely not like the plush terry towels we’d enjoyed at the hotel.

  I turned off the hair dryer and fluffed my hair, trying to make it stay in place. “At noon, baby. We have to leave by noon.”

  “Right.”

  I surreptitiously watched as he dried off, remembering the second night of passion we’d shared in the squeaky but very comfortable bed. The river had done its job again, and its effect was just as powerful as the night before. I wondered if we could record the sound of its murmurings and play it back at home.