“So what do you think happened? Why would he lie? Who took Becky?”
“My guys are still out there looking. The search dog picked up Becky’s scent, and the team found a shoe of hers and about half a mile later a sweater.”
“Well that’s good isn’t it?”
“There’s something not right about it, Kate. Those articles of clothing, the necklace, the particular route through the woods... it all looked staged, fake, phony, just like Jason’s story.”
“So what are you trying to tell me?”
Scott fell silent and took a moment to drink his wine. When he set the glass on the table, all he said was, “Currently, I’m looking into Becky’s debit card, her bank statements—”
“But there was no robbery. We’re all in agreement on that.”
“I’m not looking into it because I think the abductor stole her credit cards. I’m looking into it to get a sense of her finances, and Jason’s.”
“Becky’s parents have a net worth of over—”
“I know how Becky’s parents are doing financially,” he interrupted. “And you don’t know if they were passing it along to their daughter. You don’t know if they were upset with her for getting involved with a blue-collar family. Jason works in construction now. You don’t know if they cut their own daughter off. You don’t know anything.”
“So how would Becky going missing gain them money?” she pressed.
Scott lifted his white-eye brows, holding her gaze.
“The second Becky turns up safe, you can bet every media outlet is going to be knocking on her door. Hell, they’re already floating into town, writing articles on the mustard princess gone missing in the one town in Pennsylvania where five murders took place two years prior. If and when Becky gets found, and I’m emphasizing ‘when’ and using the term ‘found’ loosely, she and Jason will be able to name their price for interviews. Twenty thousand for Fox News, fifty thousand for ABC. Heck, Barbara Walters could pay them five hundred thousand each for an exclusive. This is going to make national headlines.”
Kate couldn’t believe what she was hearing. Jason would never do such a thing. It would be immoral and unethical and downright despicable to waste police resources, and she was appalled at Scott that he was entertaining this outlandish theory.
But there was no sense arguing against him. She would have to put her time and energy into disproving him. And after she silently resolved to do so, she ate dinner and tried not to fathom that Clifford Green could very well be right about the Rock Ridge police.
Chapter Ten
The next day, Kate woke up with her alarm, and when she rolled over, she discovered Scott was already gone. In the haze of her waking mind, it slowly dawned on her all over again that her husband suspected her very own son of perhaps staging Becky’s abduction as some horrendous ploy to get money, and as it did, her stomach dropped.
The only thing that got her out of bed that morning was a sense of faith that she knew her son and because of it, she knew he wasn’t capable of doing anything like that. The truth would come out soon enough, and until it did, she would have to stay strong, be there for Jason as much as possible, and get to the bottom of this herself.
After a quick shower and changing into a pair of overalls that happened to also be shorts—each day felt hotter than the last—she made her way into the kitchen where she saw Scott had left her half a pot of coffee. She took a moment to smell it, checking that it wasn’t stale. It was fresh, so she poured the contents of the carafe into her thermos and started off into the warm day.
As she climbed into her truck, she felt her cell phone vibrating. Dean Wentworth’s number was flashing across the screen so she swiped to answer the call.
“Good morning, Dean.”
“Hi, Kate. I hope I didn’t wake you.”
“Oh please,” she teased. “You know I get up much earlier than this.”
He laughed good-naturedly then said, “I know it’s last minute, but I could use your help. My office door all but fell off its hinges this morning. It was gradually reaching disrepair, but I’ve been too busy to fix it. Do you think you could swing by?”
Kate checked the clock on the dashboard. Grayson’s would be open, and she would need to buy new hinges. “I can make that work,” she said. “I’ll be over in ten minutes.”
After driving over to Grayson’s Hardware and chatting briefly with Larry, who mentioned he was leaning towards voting in favor of the amusement park, Kate started a tab for the hinges she needed to buy since she felt too pressed for time to write out a check.
“How do you think you’ll vote?” he asked, as he walked her out to her truck.
“I’m not sure it’s going to matter how anyone votes,” she said. “Have you driven by the camping area? Construction is already underway.”
Larry looked surprised to hear that, but she didn’t have time to discuss the matter further. She climbed into her truck and drove off towards the center of town where the Mayor’s office was located.
As she walked into the building and found her way up to Dean’s floor, she realized she was smiling. Seeing Jared—or either of her boys—was always a treat. After years of them being away at college and spending their summers abroad in various programs, it felt so nice to know they lived right here in Rock Ridge with her. She would never take for granted the fact that they were close.
“Hi, honey,” she said to Jared, who was carrying some files through the anteroom.
“You must be here about the door,” he said, kissing her on the cheek, as he juggled the files in his arms. “Go on in. Dean is wrapping up a phone call.”
Kate carried her toolkit back into Dean’s office and tried not to make too much noise as she investigated the problem with the door. It had come off its hinges at the top rungs, but not on the bottom, though those were hanging on by a thread.
Selecting the right screwdriver, a Philips-head, she began removing the bottom hinges, and soon the door was completely free of the frame.
Dean ended his phone call, setting his phone in its cradle.
“Can you salvage it without having to redo the molding?” he asked, stepping up beside her and examining the wooden molding that framed the doorway.
“I think so,” she said.
“Good,” he said, sounding satisfied.
As she got to work, he rounded his desk and sat.
She debated with herself whether or not to bring up the whole farce of voting on the amusement park, and finally, the itch had to be scratched.
“I happened to drive past the camping area the other day,” she began then shot him a glaring look. “Anything you want to tell me?”
“Only that I’m glad to be getting my ducks in a row.”
“Is that what you call it?” she challenged. “Dean,” she went on in a leveling tone, “it’s obvious you’re going ahead with the build. Why did you host a town meeting and tell people there would be a vote when it won’t matter which way the vote lands?”
“Because,” he said with a sigh, “at the time I really was going to take a vote. But building the amusement park makes sense.”
“Financially, it might look that way on paper, but a giant park like that is going to change this town, and change it for the worst.”
“I disagree. It might change Rock Ridge, but only for the better. I truly believe that.”
She held her response, while she plugged in her electric screwdriver and angled the bit to the new hinges, drilling them in, screw by screw with quick, noisy blasts. Then she set the electric screwdriver down, and said, “One of your arguments was that literally building the amusement park would create jobs for the unemployed. So who is building the park if no one in town knows it’s going up?”
Again, he sighed. “That was a bit of a complication.”
“Complication?”
“A misunderstanding. When I spoke with Six Flags, I was under the impression we could hire people to build the park. Then after I signed contr
acts—”
“You signed contracts?”
“I had to. But I discovered the fine print was that only their union teams could build it.”
“Dean—”
“I know what you’re going to say, but it will still create jobs, and the real money maker is going to be the tourism it brings in.”
Kate was not pleased.
As if he could change the subject and she’d drop the argument, Dean said, “What do you make of Cookie Halpert’s murder?”
She let her eyes glaze over when she looked at him. “Seriously?”
“I heard you were looking into it,” he said innocently.
“I’m not dropping the whole Six Flags argument,” she countered. “I’ll get everyone in town to sign a petition if I have to.”
“I’m sure you will,” he said dryly. “Look, I’m not the bad guy here. I’m good at running this town. And you’re good at solving murders.”
She smirked sarcastically and rolled her eyes. “You mean fixing things.”
“If you want to make a pun of the situation, sure.” Dean stood, rounded his desk, and then sat on the edge of it, watching her attach the door into its new hinges. Then he said, “I wonder how Gunther’s holding up.”
“Gunther?” she asked, caught off guard by how random the comment was. “Officer Gunther?”
“Yeah. You didn’t hear?”
“Hear what?”
“Gunther had a thing for Cookie.”
“He did?”
“She didn’t exactly reciprocate as far as I heard, but he definitely had a crush on her, and to get her attention, he offered to fund her whole website, hiring extra bakers to help fill her online orders, the whole nine yards. Gunther had to be her biggest supporter.”
“Really?” she said, highly curious.
“He must be devastated.”
As Kate began writing up an invoice, she wracked her brain for the precise date that Cookie had started her new website. It was about a month ago. Right around the same time she began getting agitated according to Clara. Then three weeks ago she bought a gun and incidentally Clifford came to town. What if Clara and Clifford were right? What if Clifford wasn’t the reason she was agitated and felt compelled to get a gun?
Then she nearly gasped when she realized what might have happened that night on the side of the road.
“Kate?” asked Dean. She turned to him and he added, “You look pale.”
“I’m fine,” she said. “Just in a hurry.”
“Jared can handle writing out a check. Thanks so much for coming by.”
Grabbing her toolkit, she walked out into the anteroom, found Jared behind his desk, and set the invoice down.
“Just a second, Mom,” he said, buried in a financial report.
“It’s okay; you can mail the check or drop it off.”
“Sure thing,” he said without looking up, but she was already out the door.
It wasn’t connected. Cookie hadn’t been mistaken for Becky, as Clara had suspected. Kate could feel it in her gut. But feeling it and proving it were two entirely different matters. No wonder Cookie had kept her fears to herself. Whom could she tell? She wouldn’t have been able to go to the police. They were all friends with Officer Gunther. They’d known him for years, and likely wouldn’t believe that he could possibly pose a threat to Cookie since it was his job to uphold the law.
And Clara, being Cookie’s close friend, had only meant to help her friend and business partner by calling Clifford to town. But Kate suspected that it was Clifford’s arrival that set Gunther off. If Gunther had been harboring a dangerous obsession with Cookie and then discovered her meeting with an old boyfriend, it would stand to reason that he could’ve gone into a jealous rage, driven by her car on the side of the road that night, and done the unthinkable.
Kate realized she was driving at breakneck speed through the center of town, so she hit the brakes and eased up to the curb in front of the police station.
How would she possibly handle this? Could she call Scott? Or should she try a different tactic, one that would be more likely to catch Gunther doing something incriminating? Should she even trust this hunch? Or had she lost her mind? Had the stress of knowing Jason was under such scrutiny somehow scrambled her thinking so badly that she was inventing killers that weren’t there?
Kate leaned back in her seat and tried to still her racing mind. Suddenly, she had an idea. Using her cell phone and keeping her eye on the precinct across the street, she dialed the front desk and asked to be connected to Officer Gunther’s line.
“One moment, please,” said the receptionist, who was just green enough not to ask her what the call was in regard to.
When Gunther came through the line, stating his name, Kate wasted no time to set her trap.
“Hi, Gunther, it’s Kate Flaherty. I couldn’t get ahold of Scott, but I just received important information regarding Cookie’s murder.”
“Yes?” he said urgently.
“Well, I can’t say for sure whether this is total gossip or worth your time, but I feel compelled to pass it along.”
“That’s fine, Kate. Just tell me what’s going on.”
“Okay, I don’t want to name names—”
“It’s fine,” he snapped. “Please go on.”
Fashioning a quick lie based on all she knew about cars, she dove into the most believable trap she could formulate on such short notice.
“I heard Cookie had gotten so paranoid that she installed an audio recorder in her VW. I don’t know if it’s true or not, but if it is, wouldn’t it have recorded the killer taking her life? Maybe she and the killer exchanged words. You would know in an instant who it was.”
Officer Gunther fell silent on the other end of the line. Then all he said was a single word. “Where?”
“It was rumored to be inside the car alarm, you know the little box underneath the steering console?”
Rushing to get off the phone, Gunther said, “I’ll tell Scott right away,” and then hung up.
She stared at the precinct and held her breath. Not one minute later, she saw Gunther barreling through the front doors. He walked briskly to his cruiser in the lot, and then jumped in behind the wheel. Needless to say, he did not have his partner with him. And she was willing to bet money, he would hightail it to the impound lot where Cookie’s car was being held.
She watched his cruiser pull out into traffic, and then Kate pulled into the lane, two cars behind his. It crossed her mind to call Scott on the way, but she didn’t want to be accused of spouting fiction. Instead, she cued up the audio recorder app on her cell phone, being careful not to take her eyes off the road for too long. And by the time Gunther was arching into the impound lot, she was ready.
She tucked her cell phone, which was already recording, into the front pocket of her overalls then made a cautious left hand turn into the lot, as Gunther’s cruiser disappeared into one of the garages.
Kate pulled to a stop then hopped out of her truck and quickly jogged over to the garage, being sure to stay tucked around the corner to stay out of sight.
She listened, as Gunther got out of his cruiser and then she peaked around the corner, watching him approach Cookie’s red VW bug and then throw the driver’s side door open.
When he kneeled, placing himself in a better position to yank out the car alarm box, Kate tiptoed deeper into the garage.
Soon Gunther was grunting and swearing and wrestling the little black box off the console, and the second he freed it, wires twisting and snapping off, he slammed it onto the concrete and stomped on it with his boot.
If that wasn’t a guilty action, Kate didn’t know what was, but until she had a confession, none of this would hold up in a court of law.
“I should’ve mentioned on the phone,” she said, stealing his attention. “I listened to it.”
“You what?” he asked turning white.
“It was Clara who told me about the recording. Cookie had it hooked up
to record into the cloud, and I listened to it.”
His eyes widened.
“So I know why you didn’t call Scott about it.”
Suddenly, Gunther was breathing heavily.
“How could you do it?” she pressed. “How could you do something like that when it’s your job to protect and serve?”
“You don’t know what she was like,” he snapped.
“I have an idea. No one knew about you two, so I imagine she was ashamed of you,” she said, hoping to instigate his confession. “She thought you weren’t good enough.”
“How could I not be good enough? I gave her thousands for her website. And the next thing I knew she got back together with her old boyfriend, a convict of all things?”
“Is that why you killed her?”
“No!” he yelled, and suddenly tears sprang to his eyes. “I didn’t mean to kill her!”
Kate held her breath. Was that enough? Was that a confession?
“I was only trying to get the gun out of her hands so she wouldn’t hurt herself! So she wouldn’t hurt me! But she wouldn’t let go, and I had to twist it out of her grasp. I wasn’t paying attention. I didn’t realize it was pointing at her chest all of a sudden!”
“And you killed her.”
Gunther dropped to his knees, hanging his head and wailing, “It was an accident!”
It was all she needed. And Gunther had balled himself on the concrete, which gave her just the opportunity to get Scott on the phone. Easing backwards, tiptoeing away, she pulled her cell from her overalls, stopped and saved the recording, and then dialed Scott.
As soon as she heard his voice on the line, she said urgently, “You need to get to the car impound now. Gunther is here. He confessed.”
“What?”
“To Cookie’s murder.”
Then she hung up and kept her gaze on Gunther, praying like hell that Scott and the police would show up before the killer could lift his head.
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