by Raven Snow
“This doesn’t make sense,” Rose said again, looking shaken.
“Come on,” said Rowen, taking her cousin by the wrist and dragging her back down the hallway, back to where Eric and Ben were waiting.
Eric was still looking down at the phone Ben had loaned him. Ben was still pacing but stopped when Rowen and Rose appeared. “Well?” he prompted. “How did it go?”
Rose stared. “I think she’s going to admit to murder.”
“What?” Ben began to rush past Rose, probably to go ask his mother about this himself.
“Wait,” called Eric, looking up from the phone. Ben paused but didn’t look happy to do so. “I think I know what happened. Do you think we could get into the crime scene?”
“What?” Ben asked again, looking torn between going to his mother and the ridiculousness of Eric’s request.
“Just for a minute,” said Eric. “We don’t even have to touch anything. Just let us in there for a minute.”
Ben looked skeptical. He definitely didn’t want to go anywhere right then, but he must have known there wasn’t a whole lot he could do for his mother just pacing around the station. It wasn’t like he was going to change her mind if she had already made it up. She was hard-headed. “Don’t tell me you’re going there so Rowen can commune with spirits or some nonsense like that.”
“I won’t lie to you,” Eric said carefully. “It’s something a whole lot like that.”
Ben groaned. “Get in my car.”
Chapter Fifteen
Fortunately, Julia Martinez and her news van weren’t lurking around the Williamson household. There was still a cop car there, but Ben said it wouldn’t be a problem. The officer was just sitting there, making sure no one disturbed things. Ben got out and had a word with him. “Go on in,” he said once he came back. “Just don’t touch anything and stay close to me.”
Rowen got out of the car and headed inside with the others. She wasn’t quite sure what she was looking for. Eric wouldn’t tell her. He said he didn’t want to give her any kind of bias. He just wanted to see what she sensed.
A lot of feeling hit Rowen at once as she stepped through the front door. If this place had held bad memories before, it was awash with them now. They were difficult to sort through, especially since Rowen still wasn’t sure what it was she was looking for. Rose and Eric stood off to one side. Ben stopped short as Rowen took a few careful steps toward the dining room.
There was still some debris on the floor. The place wasn’t trashed, but it was certainly a mess compared to how spotless it normally looked. She could feel a heavy sense of sadness and desperation. She continued on to where the body had been, and that’s when it hit her.
Rowen closed her eyes. She tried to let the emotions she was feeling wash over her. She tried to process them. There was sadness, resignation, but mostly there was just anger. There was a whole lot of anger. “Eric,” she called.
Eric came over. “What are you getting?” she asked.
“I’m not sure,” Rowen admitted. “I think, maybe…Trish really did kill herself?”
Eric nodded. “That was my guess.”
“But why?” asked Rowen.
“Revenge?” Eric ventured. “I think it was a set-up. I think both Willard and Trish killed themselves. I think they were trying to frame their sister for it.”
“So, you’re saying Trish set all this up? She called Rose on purpose?”
Eric nodded. “Before she even came up here, I think she set up this journal. It’s too perfect. It’s supposed to be a personal journal, but there’s an entry dated for when we went down to interview her. She writes about our visit but not about the séance. It’s like she didn’t want anyone who read it later to think she was crazy. She expected other people to read it.”
Rowen closed her eyes and concentrated again. She wasn’t sure, but this close to where both deaths had happened, she thought she could make contact without setting up a séance. She was right. Contact was almost instantaneous. “Did you both kill yourselves?” she asked, speaking quietly so Ben wouldn’t have to overhear her.
Immediately, Rowen was hit with a feeling a guilt. There was some regret there too. It felt like both of them were together now at least.
“Why did you do this?” asked Rowen.
There was a rush of anger in the air again. Mostly, there was sadness, though. Maybe they had planned on doing something like this anyway. Maybe taking their sister down with them had been an added bonus they had hoped for. Rowen couldn’t be sure.
Rowen didn’t point out that she wasn’t going to let Anita go down for it. She was fairly certain that they already knew. “I think you should move on,” Rowen said instead, not quite sure whether to be upset with these two or feel sorry for them. It felt a lot like a mix of both.
Rowen expected a struggle. She expected the two to hold on, to try and drag it out. Maybe they would even go to their sister and harass her a bit from beyond the grave, but they didn’t. They left. Rowen wondered if they had been present when their sister decided to take the blame. Maybe that was all they had ever wanted.
“Is something going on?” asked Ben, approaching Rowen and Eric with Rose following close behind him.
“Yeah,” said Rowen. “But it’s over now.”
Epilogue
Clearing Anita Williamson’s name was easier said than done. She was all set on pleading guilty. It was unclear whether she was afraid one of her children would go down for the crime or that she felt responsible for the strange suicide pact her younger siblings had made. It was likely a mix of both.
In the end, the evidence just lined up better with Rowen and Eric’s version of events. Fortunately, Lainswich seemed to exist in a bubble. The story didn’t really get coverage outside of town. Even so, it didn’t seem like life was going to go back to the way it had been for Mrs. Williamson. The people here had a long memory, and she was a changed woman.
Maybe it was for the best. Mrs. Williamson was a bit more approachable now. She had let the cat out of the bag when she admitted to Rose that she liked her. She couldn’t exactly take that back.
Rose was with Ben today. They were both at the grand opening of the Greensmith’s newest establishment. It really wasn’t much of a grand opening. If they were being honest, it was just a regular opening. Willow and Peony were just making a big deal out of it because they wanted a slightly longer break from work.
Everyone in the Lainswich Inquirer office had dropped what they were doing and come out on the sidewalk to go a few feet to the right. Ben had already been there having lunch with Rose, so he had come too.
Rowen looked at Rose now and smiled. She and Ben had their arms interlocked. They were whispering something back and forth, laughing occasionally. It was probably something at Rowen and Eric’s expense, but she didn’t even mind. She was just happy to see those two together again. It had been such a relief to find out that silly break of theirs had ended. They made too cute a couple. Even Mrs. Williamson could see that.
“Are we going to do a ribbon cutting?” asked Willow. She was already holding scissors.
“Do you see a ribbon?” asked Rowen, raising an eyebrow at her cousin.
Willow shrugged. “I don’t know. I was hoping there would be a ribbon. We didn’t get to do one for this building, and we didn’t get to do one for Odds & Ends. I was hoping we’d at least do one here.”
Peony nodded as if conceding a valid point. “The Greensmiths have opened businesses three times now, and there have been zero ribbon cuttings.”
Rowen rolled her eyes. “Technically it’s the same building, you know? A big opening seems silly. Besides, it’s not like this place is a store. No one is going to be lining up.” A new building had felt too extravagant. She wasn’t going to make that big of a commitment. They had just built a few rooms onto the Inquirer building. It was definitely preferable. That way, she could stay close and continue to work with the paper.
Rowen pulled out the keys the pe
ople laying down the new carpet had handed over this morning. She stepped forward and unlocked the door to the new Greensmith Investigations offices. Rowen thought it seemed ridiculous, but Eric had been really on board with it. He had been looking for something new to sink his time into, and he had the money. Who was she to crush his dreams before he could give them a try?
Everyone headed inside. Eric was the first, shouldering his way past everyone to get in the door. Rowen chuckled as she watched him go. Only Rose hung back. She stood by her cousin, surveying the building from the outside. It made a handsome addition to the Lainswich Inquirer. It gave the place a certain hard boiled mystique.
“Are you sure about this?” asked Rose.
Rowen looked over at her cousin and laughed. “No,” she said. “Of course I’m not. Seems like it’s worth a try though, doesn’t it?”
“And the paper?” Rose asked, even though they had talked this through dozens of times already.
“You’ll do fine,” Rowen assured her. It wasn’t like she was leaving. She would still work for the Inquirer. It was right next door. The only change was that Rose was officially in charge. It wasn’t like she hadn’t been doing the lion’s share of the work nearly this entire time anyway. “Maybe this place will even give us some good stories to write about…It’ll probably just be boring stuff, though. Cheating spouses and the like. You know.”
“I do?” Rose rolled her eyes. “The only thing I know is that this is going to be anything but boring. Trouble always finds us, and you just put a sign on your door inviting it in.”
“I did, didn’t I?” Rowen smiled. “Well, at least now I’ll get paid for it.”
*The End*
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