“So you’re going to build a high-rise,” Kate concluded, not nearly as enthusiastic as Justina.
“Dean’s going to throw a little town money at the project,” she said. She looked jittery with excitement, but that could’ve also been the champagne.
“I’m really glad for you, Justina, but I’m not really equipped to manage building a high-rise.”
“But you are equipped to fix the place up.”
Kate cocked her head at the implication. “The high-rise already exists?”
“On the south side of town,” she supplied. “It’s a six-story building. You might have seen it if you’ve ever driven south into Kettleton. It’s a real fixer-upper. I’d like for you to get started refurbishing the units so we can start renting out right away. Then Wentworth Contractors will build vertically. They’ll go floor by floor. It’s going to be a process, and it might not look like a high-rise for a while.”
“I see.”
“There are twelve units per floor, so it's quite a bit of work. Just think of how many convicts we can tuck away as soon as you’re ready. But we’d like this to happen fast. As soon as you’ve finished an apartment, I’ll rent it out. That is, if you’d like the work.”
“I would, certainly. I’m glad you thought of me,” she said quickly, though deep down she felt apprehensive about working in a building where ex-cons would be coming and going freely. After all, crime had been following these people around, and the more murders that occurred, the more tightly linked these characters seemed to be.
“Great,” she exclaimed. “I’ll get the paperwork squared away and let you know. I’ll also contact Grayson’s to start an account so you can pick up materials freely. I know the whole submitting budgets thing was bogging you down.”
Kate shrugged, but she had to admit it had been cumbersome.
“The tides are turning,” she sang. “And it has everything to do with getting that damned Joste house off the market.”
“About that...” Kate said with a grimace. Maybe she should let Scott explain the bad news to Justina, but Kate didn’t want the real-estate agent to be furious with her for not saying something. “Perhaps it shouldn’t come from me, but I do have some information that could affect the art deco house.”
Justina’s smile fell right off her face. “Oh don’t tell me that. Someone was murdered there?”
“No, no, nothing like that.”
The woman sighed a breath of relief. “Good, because it's very hard to sell a house when you’re legally obligated to disclose someone was killed there. I’d hate for Donna to back out.”
“I can imagine,” said Kate, working up the nerve to deliver the bad news. “But I’m afraid...” she trailed off then shifted gears. “How long does escrow take to clear?”
“Typically a month, why?”
“Do you happen to know—legally, that is—what would happen regarding the sale if the buyer were to...pass away?”
Justina blinked. “What are you telling me?”
“Donna Kramer was shot this morning.”
“You have got to be kidding me.”
“I wish I was.”
Justina fell silent, considering the possibilities of what this would mean concerning the art deco house. Then she brightened. “Donna signed papers. The house is hers, even if she’s no longer living. I suppose her next of kin would get it, or perhaps she has a will that will clear up the matter of the beneficiary, but I think Carnegie Real Estate will be okay. I’ll contact our lawyer, though. Thanks for the heads up. Oh, and Kate?” she asked, since Kate had been staring at the wine in her hand. When Kate glanced up at her, she added, “Please don’t tell anyone.”
She promised she wouldn’t, but in the back of her mind, she wondered if it would make a difference. She was willing to bet Donna Kramer’s murder would be front-page news by tomorrow morning, if not broadcast on every channel with the six o’clock news.
“Congratulations again on the high-rise,” she offered. Her glass was half full, and Kate figured it would be a good cutting off point. “Just let me know when I can get started.”
Justina shot her an affirmative nod. Kate set her glass on the refreshment table and made her way through the real-estate agents who were discussing moving their party over to The Rail.
Dusk was setting over the parking lot as Kate made her way to her truck, having rounded the building along the sidewalk and cut into the back lot where the majority of Carnegie Real Estate agents liked to park their vehicles.
Kate found her truck, but as she motioned to open the driver’s side door, she spotted a news van at the far side of the lot through the windows in her truck. The van looked vacant, and there was no one else around. Perhaps the reporter and her crew couldn’t find street parking at Bean There up the block and had decided to sneak their van here. Or so she wondered until she heard voices murmuring out from behind it.
It sounded like a woman and a man, but she couldn’t be certain. The woman sounded distressed yet aggressive, and the man’s responses were calm and low enough that Kate couldn’t hear what he was saying.
Suddenly, the blonde reporter darted out from behind the van, her hands slicing the air as if she’d had enough of the argument. She was standing in profile from Kate’s perspective and the dusky light was growing darker by the second.
Then a shot rang out, startling Kate. She ducked and heard the distinct plop of a body hitting the asphalt. Cautiously, she straightened up and peered through her truck’s windows. The reporter was lying on the ground.
Kate’s heart was in her throat. Her ears pricked up, keen to detect where the shooter was. It had certainly been the man behind that van. All of a sudden, she heard footfall. The man was running away, but she couldn’t see him.
Without thinking, she ran to the reporter, shifting her gaze between the woman and the parking lot, searching for the fleeing shooter.
As she reached the reporter, she saw a man dive around the corner of the building towards the sidewalk. She had every impulse to run after him. He was headed towards a public, pedestrian-filled sidewalk, but when she looked at the reporter, she realized the woman wasn’t dead.
Dropping to her knees, Kate brushed the woman’s blond hair from her forehead then took in the sight of her. She had been shot in the chest. Her breathing was shallow.
“Hang on,” said Kate. “Don’t die on me.” Quickly, she fumbled for her cell phone and dialed 9-1-1. “Who did this to you?”
The reporter began gasping, trying to breathe and choking on air, as she tried to mouth a name, but Kate couldn’t understand her. The 9-1-1 operator blared through the earpiece and Kate rushed to explain that she needed an ambulance, a reporter had been shot behind Carnegie Real Estate. As soon as Kate got the word that help was on its way, she dropped her cell and pressed her palms to the bullet wound, hoping she had a prayer of stopping the bleeding.
“Who did this to you?” she demanded, but the reporter’s eyes were fluttering shut.
Could it have been Dark Donnie?
Or her son?
Were they one in the same?
Chapter Three
Kate sat with a blanket over her shoulders and a cup of coffee in her hands as she watched the flashing lights of cop cars and an ambulance illuminate the parking lot in stark alternation. Medics surrounded the body of the female reporter, whose name was Jenna Johansen, according to her news crew. They were standing in a cluster beside one of the police cruisers, answering the cops' questions and looking over at Jenna’s body in confused horror.
No one had said Jenna was dead—not loudly enough for Kate to hear, anyway. But they didn’t need to. The way the medics were transporting Jenna onto a gurney was without any sense of urgency. The woman was no longer living. Even though the ambulance had swung into the parking lot within three minutes of Kate’s call, it had been too late. Kate had seen the bullet wound. It was slightly lower than the reporter’s heart, but not low enough to only damage her lung. No one could
live through such a gunshot wound.
The numerous murders that had been cropping up all over Rock Ridge had everything to do with the drug ring, and Kate couldn’t help but suspect Jenna Johansen had something to do with it. It seemed highly unlikely. Jenna was young, a perky reporter from out of town, eager to make her big break. There was no way she could’ve been involved in the drug ring, not as an insider. But she had certainly been sniffing around. Maybe she learned something that would’ve risked whoever was at the top of the pyramid. It was possible, but Jenna’s argument with the shooter had seemed personal, as if she knew the guy.
Scott worked his way from police officer to police officer, getting briefed on the information they had collected from the news crew. Judging by the frown on his face, Kate guessed Jenna’s news crew hadn’t been especially helpful.
He broke from the fray and watched the medics push Jenna’s gurney into the back of the ambulance and shut the doors. As the ambulance rolled off, turning into the street, Scott strode over to Kate, who had been sitting in the bed of her truck, her legs dangling over the side.
“Did you talk to Garrison?” he asked.
“Briefly,” she said. “I didn’t see much, and I never saw the shooter. All I know is that the shooter was a man and he took off running on foot.”
“Is there any chance he saw you?”
“I really don’t think so, but I can’t say for sure.” She didn’t have to ask him why he was interested in finding out whether or not the shooter may have seen her. Kate could read the concern on his face. If the shooter were scared there had been a witness and committed Kate’s face to memory, she could easily be next. “Why a reporter?” she asked out loud.
“You think this could be connected to Donna Kramer and all the other drug-related murders?”
“Didn’t you once tell me there are no coincidences?”
“All I know is that I’ve had two murders in one day with no clue as to the killer.”
“Killer? You mean killers.”
“God, I hope not,” he said. “We won’t know until forensics has a look at Jenna’s body, but both Jenna and Donna had been shot in the heart, which tells me they could share the same killer.”
Kate prayed that wasn’t the case. At least Jason killing Donna had been in the spirit of protecting an innocent life. She didn’t want another murder to come crashing down on his head, especially if he didn’t do it. And he couldn’t have, could he? Could Kate have been in the same parking lot as her son and not sense he was there? Not sense it was him? She’d only briefly seen the shooter as he dodged around the corner. Had he looked like Jason from behind? The man had been entirely nondescript. She couldn’t even remember the color or length of his hair. It had been too dim.
“I won’t keep you here,” said Scott. “But since talking with Garrison, have you remembered anything else? Anything the guy was wearing? Anything that could help me out?”
Kate took a moment to rack her brain but nothing came to mind. “No, I’m sorry. I told Officer Garrison everything I know. I feel like I should’ve run after the guy.”
“Don’t talk like that,” he cut in. “Ever. You’re not a cop. You could’ve gotten hurt if you followed him. He could’ve turned and shot you. You did the right thing.”
“What is happening to this town?”
Scott sighed, resonating her helplessness. “Why don’t you go on home. I’ll be back as soon as I can.”
Kate slid off the back of her truck into his arms. Scott held her for a long moment, and when she urged him back to look up at him, she asked, “Any leads on Donna’s killer?”
She was almost too scared for his answer.
“We recovered a shell casing, which will tell us the weapon. Hopefully it won’t trace back to an unregistered weapon, but even if it does, there’s only one place to buy firearms in town. I’m planning on heading over to Drake’s Firing Line as soon as I get this crime scene squared away.”
“You think Drake is just going to tell you who the gun belongs to?”
“He won’t have to tell me. I’ll get a search warrant and have my IT guys comb through all his computer records.”
“How did it go at the amusement park?” she asked, as he walked her around to the driver’s side door of her truck.
Again, he sighed, but this time in frustration. “It was clean. Every inch of the place was clean. Not a trace of drugs.”
“Which means someone tipped them off.”
“Perhaps. Or maybe drugs were never there. Rumors have been flying around and it’s hard to know what’s valid and what isn’t until we check it out. But I’ll tell you one thing, we focused our man power on that park, and with Donna’s murder, the department is getting spread too thin.”
Reading between the lines, she asked, “Do you think the drug dealers know that? Do you think they wanted you to search the park so you would be distracted?”
“It crossed my mind.” He kissed her forehead and opened the door for her. “Try to relax. I’ll be home soon.”
Kate did just that, or she tried to. She drew a hot bath, plucked a novel off the bookshelf—making sure to choose a lighthearted romance and not a murder mystery—and poured herself a glass of white wine, having gotten the craving from Justina. That half glass of chardonnay hadn’t been nearly enough.
As she sipped her wine in the bath and cracked open the novel, her fast-working mind wasn’t even in the ballpark of calming down enough to get lost in the story. She drank more wine, hoping it would help soothe her worries and get her centered, but it only riled up her anxiety.
Where had Jason gone after he fled Over the Moon? He promised he wouldn’t leave town, but she hadn’t heard from him. How was she supposed to carry the weight of his secret? It had only been a day, and already it was a terrible burden. But the alternative—turning him in—was unthinkable.
Then it occurred to her. Scott was inclined to believe Donna and Jenna had the same killer. Kate was confident Jason hadn’t killed Jenna. Would it be the end of the world if Scott caught Jenna’s killer and pinned Donna’s murder on that person, as well?
She didn’t like that she was even considering it, but as a mother, how could she not? A mother never stops protecting her child, never stops caring and worrying, no matter what.
It was less than a sliver of hope, but enough to calm her mind. She sank into the bubbles, took another sip of wine, and began reading the first chapter of her book.
An hour passed, and when she finally set her book on the ledge of the tub and stepped out, her fingers were wrinkly and she felt very relaxed. She dried off and dressed in her sweats and a comfy robe.
In the living room, she sat on the couch and realized her cell phone, which she had set on the coffee table, was flashing with a voice message. She swiped the LCD screen and saw that she had not one message, but three.
The first message was from Dean Wentworth, explaining he had made the mistake of stacking too many files on a shelf. The weight of it broke the shelf and he was wondering if she could come by and fix it
The second was Jared touching base. He sounded as though he were trying to come across as calm, but there was an edge to his tone. Lastly, he asked if she had heard from Jason.
The final message was from Jason. He sounded rushed and panicked, saying that he had a lead on Becky.
Kate’s heart skipped a beat, and she sat up on the couch, listening.
“Don’t call me,” he said. “I’ll call you.”
How could he ask her not to call after leaving a message like that? It was torture. Quickly, she dialed Jared, hoping that speaking with him would shed light on his twin’s alarming message.
“Hey, Mom,” he said. It sounded like he was driving. She could hear the whirl of tires flying over a highway and light music playing from his car radio.
“What’s going on with Jason?” she cut in.
“I haven’t seen him or heard from him,” he said in a heavy voice. “These disappearing acts are dr
iving me crazy.”
He wasn’t the only one.
It killed her to lie, but she forced out, “No, I haven’t heard from him.”
“Damn,” he said.
“I’ll be at the mayor’s office tomorrow. He broke a shelf,” she offered.
“All right,” he said, his voice sounding small. “I’ll see you tomorrow then.”
“Could you tell Dean I got the message and I’ll be in?”
“Yeah, I’ll tell him when I get to the office tomorrow. See you then.”
Kate tossed her cell on the coffee table, grabbed the remote control, and flipped the TV on. The news broadcast filled the screen. The reporter, Eric Demblowski, was standing on the sidewalk right in front of the Carnegie Real Estate parking lot. In the background, the ambulance light flashed over the clustered news crew, as they spoke to the police. The very scene Kate had been a part of earlier that evening. She could barely stomach it.
Eric Demblowski, with a determined glint in his eyes, concluded the report by stating, “It’s time to get these convicts out of our town.”
She pressed the remote control, turning the TV off.
The ex-cons might have been sucked into all of this, but they weren’t behind it. They hadn’t been orchestrating the drug ring. And it set her teeth on edge that an entire group of people could be condemned on the news simply because they were the obvious culprits. As far as Kate was concerned, they were being used. Gillian O’Reilly had revealed that much to her.
One thing was true, though. The crime had to stop.
The entrance door clicked open and Scott stepped inside. She couldn’t remember the last time he had been home so early. When he walked around the foyer corner and into the living room, she said, “I’ve got wine in the fridge.”
“Won’t I need a glass,” he muttered as though truer words had never been spoken.
Mrs. Fix It Mysteries: The Complete 15-Books Cozy Mystery Series Page 78
