by Leslie Nagel
“George Drummond is a horse’s patoot.” When Charley and Frankie burst out laughing, Sharon joined in. “How come we never hang out, Charley?”
Charley tilted her head. “I think we’re hanging out right now.”
Sharon laughed again. “I do like you. I know I haven’t always acted that way, and I am sorry for that. With this job, it’s tough to make friends. And, for the record, I have a big problem with what’s going on here. I’m a scientist, and this political infighting is counterproductive. Do you have any leads?”
The abruptness of her question left Charley groping for a response. Could she trust this woman? Most of their past encounters had been just this side of hostile. Frankie, however, had no such qualms. She quickly filled Sharon in on all they’d learned and theorized, including, to Charley’s dismay, the shocking truth about Pippo Sharpe. She even plucked the latest issue of the Oakwood Register from a wire rack near the entrance, folding it open to display the letter from “A Tortured Soul.”
“You think Paxton killed Sarah to stop her from revealing past sexual abuse?” Sharon looked thoughtful. “The statute of limitations has expired, but I see your point about the scandal aspect. Motive isn’t really my thing, though. I deal in physical evidence. If the man’s guilty, does it matter why he did it?”
“It might, if Investigating Sergeant Patoot can’t prove it.” Frankie’s expression morphed from excited to glum in an instant.
Sharon chuckled. “He’s not totally incompetent, so don’t despair.” She sipped her coffee. “Drummond appears to be focusing his efforts on both Paxton and Brandon Sharpe. He mentioned—at the top of his lungs in a crowded briefing room—questioning both men ‘again,’ implying he’s already talked to them. Who is Oliver?”
Charley found she was getting used to Sharon’s lightning-quick mental leapfrogging, an agility she herself had been accused of possessing more than once. “Sarah’s secret high school boyfriend. Possibly. We don’t even know if he exists.”
“And if he does exist? How is he relevant to her murder?”
“We don’t know that he is.” Charley’s cellphone buzzed with a text message from Marc, asking her to call him. “It’s just that there are so many secrets swirling around this family, and we wondered whether Sarah was actually pregnant when she ran away. If so, it might suggest another line of inquiry, one that George Drummond is unlikely to pursue,” she finished distractedly, her mind on possible reasons for Marc’s message.
“I see.” Sharon finished her coffee and stood abruptly. “Dwight Zehring is very old-school,” she announced in yet another apparent non sequitur. “Insists on paper, even though email is so much quicker. I’d better clean up a bit more before I present him with his copy of the Weller autopsy report.” She picked up her messenger bag and set it on the table. “Watch this for me, will you?” With a smile, she turned and headed for the restroom.
“Well, that was subtle.”
“What are you—” Charley looked up from her cellphone to find Frankie staring at her. She swiveled her gaze to Sharon’s bag, then back to Charley. With a jolt of comprehension, Charley realized what Frankie was suggesting. At the same instant, it hit her fully whom she’d been talking to.
What this woman did for a living. What she might know.
Frankie tipped her head toward the bag, eyebrows raised.
“Don’t even think about it,” Charley warned, even as temptation warred with her better instincts.
“Think about what?” Frankie leaned her elbows on the table. With a sharp movement, she jabbed Sharon’s bag, knocking it to the floor. “Oops.” Before Charley could react, Frankie was under the table. “Oh, my. Better help me pick up these papers before she comes back.”
“What the actual hell, Frankie?” Charley dropped to her knees. A manila folder lay open, its contents miraculously spilling out directly under her nose. “We cannot snoop through Sharon’s bag.”
“Even though she practically engraved an invitation? And don’t tell me you weren’t basically asking her if Sarah had ever given birth.” Frankie peeked around the table base at her. “Better hurry. People are starting to stare.”
“I was not.” Muttering curses, Charley began collecting a half-dozen typed pages into a pile, trying her utmost not to read anything. I’ll just double-check the page numbers, she told herself. Make sure they’re in the proper—
She froze with a page in her hand, a phrase near the top leaping out as if in bold type: “Cervix shows distinctive oval shape and residual scarring resulting from vaginal birth. Age/ status of delivery undetermined.”
Charley drew in a breath. “My holy rolling grandmother. She really did have a baby,” she murmured.
“Wow” was Frankie’s succinct response. “Anything else? Did the good doctor identify the murder weapon? John says sometimes they include little diagrams.”
“I’m not going to sit on the floor and read the entire thing,” Charley hissed. She quickly shuffled the pages into the proper order, determined to restore the file to Sharon’s bag without further delay. Nevertheless, Frankie’s comment caused her eye to snag on a hand-drawn image on the mostly blank last page. The sketch depicted a rectangular object with a square tip. A side view revealed that it wasn’t thin, like a normal knife blade. Also, the squared end wasn’t blunt, but actually tapered out to form a sharp edge. It reminded Charley of a screwdriver or chisel, or maybe the skinny spatula thingy Lawrence used to frost cakes. Almost against her will, she read the brief description:
“Length 9.8 cm (3.86 inch) minimum based on penetration, width 18 mm (¾ inch). Thickness max. 3.7 mm tapering last 5 mm forming beveled leading edge. Trace amts of white paint embedded in wound, likely xfer from weapon. Insufficient amt to perform mass spectrometer to determine mnfctr.”
“Paint?” Charley asked aloud. Sarah was an artist. Did artists use anything like this weapon? Rachel Howard had mentioned Sarah’s affinity for the work of Bob Ross. Palette knives, she imagined, came in all shapes and sizes. A tool with “knife” in the name probably had at least one sharp edge. Had there been any art supplies in that basement? Charley didn’t recall any, but she supposed Sarah could have had an easel set up in another room in the house.
“Better hurry up, Carpo,” Frankie warned as she reclaimed her seat.
Charley glared at her friend’s shins, tempted to give them a whack. “Now she’s in a hurry.” She shoved the papers back in the file and slid it into the messenger bag, which she slipped onto Sharon’s vacant chair before climbing, rather breathless and red-faced, back into her seat. “There will be repercussions,” she stated grimly.
“You can’t punch me out. I’m pregnant.”
“I have other weapons,” Charley promised, as Sharon approached from the back of the café. Her blond hair was neatly combed, and her face and neck appeared freshly rinsed.
“Much better.” Without batting an eye, Sharon hoisted the messenger bag from its new location and hitched the strap over one shoulder. “This was fun. Next time, let’s grab craft beer flights at Warped Wing Brewery. My treat.”
“It’s, um, a date,” Charley said weakly. The moment Sharon was out of sight, Charley slumped back in her chair. “What the hell just happened?”
Frankie tossed her curls. “You sleuthed out a couple of clues, that’s what, thanks to me.”
“I should pound you like a nail,” Charley replied, but even she could tell her heart wasn’t in it. Once again, Sharon’s behavior seemed to indicate she wanted Charley to get involved in the case. How weird is that? “So Sarah Weller did have a baby,” she mused. “By itself, that fact proves nothing. It could’ve happened four years ago or fourteen.”
“Remember four hours ago, when we weren’t investigating?” Frankie asked, her wide blue eyes sparkling. “The plot thickens, big-time.”
Charley closed her eyes, inhaling t
he aroma of freshly ground coffee, letting the buzz of a dozen conversations wash over her. She needed time to sort through the avalanche of new information that the past few hours had produced. How much of what they’d uncovered was relevant to Sarah’s murder, and how much was just background noise? Their entire case against Paxton was built on one unfounded supposition after another. Until she confirmed her suspicions about Jackie’s identity, she couldn’t prove Sarah had written that letter. Even if she did that, she couldn’t prove whether Sarah or Paxton knew about Pippo, or even whether the truth of Pippo’s gender had anything to do with anything.
Perhaps Sharon had the right of it, Charley thought. It didn’t really matter why, just who. Marc had lectured her on this point more than once.
“Only amateurs think they can solve a murder based on motive,” he’d declared one night as they discussed a circumstantial case over dinner. “Nine times out of ten, you don’t discover the motive until you’ve found your killer. No, it’s far better odds to focus on means and opportunity. Those are quantifiable.”
Maybe she should just stay out of it, let Drummond grill Paxton and Brandon until one of them confessed, or until Sharon’s lab found some sort of tangible, “quantifiable” evidence that proved who the killer was. Charley sighed and opened her eyes. “Are we wasting our time?”
“Absolutely not,” Frankie said firmly. “Remember Pippo.”
“I haven’t forgotten.” Charley straightened as she came to a decision. “Okay. I might not be able to prove who killed Sarah, but I can make Judith talk to me, if only to safeguard Pippo’s welfare. Besides, it’s not like I have Old Hat to occupy my time.”
As she spoke, Charley realized she had yet to tell Marc about the possible sabotage and her desire for more patrols. Her stalled construction project was the last thing on her mind right now. She’d missed her daily meeting with Dale Penwater, although he’d called to assure her that the paint clean was proceeding as well as could be expected. Actually, she did owe Marc a call. Her foray into confidential document theft had driven his earlier text clean out of her mind.
Frankie gathered her purse and stood. “I need to get moving if I’m going to make my appointment. Drop you at home? Or do you want to swing by the Safety Building and drag Marc into a supply closet?” She waggled her eyebrows. “I’d be climbing the walls if I hadn’t gotten naked with John in over a week.”
“Pervert.”
“Nun.”
Before Charley could fire off another retort, her cellphone chimed with another incoming text. SOMETHING GOING DOWN. CAN U FACE TIME NOW? She noted the sender with surprise and immediately hit the call button. Her screen filled with the image of a sixteen-year-old girl with spiky purple hair, heavy green eye shadow, and blue lipstick. Charley’s surprise turned to concern when she saw the girl’s worried expression.
“Katie? What’s wrong? Are you okay?”
Katie O’Malley—a straight-A high school sophomore whose rebellious streak was, for the most part, confined to her personal grooming—had recently joined Charley’s growing band of local, mostly teenage, informants. Charley had secretly dubbed them her “Park Avenue Irregulars,” after the famous fictional street team of Sherlock Holmes. She hadn’t recruited any of them. Nevertheless, shortly after her role in solving the Book Club Murders case became headline news, they’d started drifting into Old Hat, singly or in small groups, ostensibly to browse the vintage clothing, but in reality there to check her out. At first, she’d put it down to the usual fascination most people have with places and people they’ve seen on TV. Her shop certainly saw its fair share of gawkers in the aftermath of that case. Most of them bought something as a souvenir of their visit, so she tolerated the ogling and rang up the sales with a smile. But these kids had come with a different agenda.
Contrary to popular adult opinion, most teenagers crave security. They also have a strong aversion to things they deem “unfair.” These two driving forces often translate into a surprising desire for law and order. That was Charley’s theory for why, after sizing her up, her new fan club had begun dropping hints or delivering more explicit information about underground activities brewing on their turf, activities that she, in turn, either pursued herself or, depending on the nature of the crime, passed along to the proper authorities. Several of Charley’s more notable sleuthing successes had resulted from tips produced by an Irregular.
“Hey, Charley,” her caller now said. “I’m good, but I’m not so sure about Miss Lillian. I stopped by the Register to pick up my paycheck, and I ran into this.”
Katie disappeared as she turned her cellphone. Charley saw a blur of trees, grass, and asphalt. Then the image focused, and she found herself looking at a squad car with its light bar flashing blue and red. Behind it was an unmarked police-issue sedan she recognized as Marc’s usual work ride. Both vehicles were parked in front of a small building covered with weathered brown shingles. A sign in the yard read The Oakwood Register. Miss Lillian, Charley knew, meant the OR’s editor in chief, Lillian Vardonis. Charley wondered if this was what Marc’s earlier text had been about.
The image blurred again, and Katie’s face, pale and tense, reappeared. “The cops kicked me out, but I heard one of them say the office was ransacked last night. Can you find out if she’s okay? And let me know? Miss Lillian is the best.”
Ransacked? Charley’s sleuthing meter was redlining. “Ask Jackie” originated from that little brown building. Could there be a connection between this break-in and Sarah’s murder?
She managed an encouraging smile for the worried teen. “There’s no ambulance, sweetie. I’m sure Lillian’s fine. Now, get to school. The afternoon bell rings in twelve minutes.” Oakwood schools had an open-lunch policy, meaning students could leave the building during their hour-long break. Most older students took advantage of the freedom, especially in nice weather. “You wouldn’t want to be late for one of Mr. Jacobi’s scintillating history lectures.”
“Yeah, yeah.” Katie grinned. “I can’t wait till you reopen.”
“Me either.” Charley clicked off and turned to Frankie. “Change of plans. I’ll take that ride, but it doesn’t look like I’m going home just yet.”
Chapter 10
Charley stepped inside the screened porch of the down-at-heel converted cottage housing the galactic headquarters of the Oakwood Register. Since her last visit here—for an interview about a rash of lawn-art thefts she’d helped solve—little had changed. Wire racks held back issues of the weekly paper, and a few shabby wicker chairs with faded cushions provided seating for those desiring to catch up on their local news. Charley noticed a new addition to the decor, a large basket on a folding table bearing the placard: LETTERS TO “ASK JACKIE” HERE! The basket was currently empty.
She turned at the sound of the front door creaking open. Marc stood framed in the doorway, his warm blue gaze traveling up and down her body, eyes glowing with appreciation. She felt herself blush and cursed her traitorous complexion. This man had seen her dressed in far less than she wore now, yet his perusal could still reduce her to mush.
“That look really works for me. Very…schoolmarmish.”
“Down, boy.”
He grinned, then sobered. Glancing behind him, he stepped into the porch and pulled the door closed.
“I assume Katie called you. She’s one of your snitches, isn’t she?”
Charley nodded. “Is Lillian all right? Katie’s really worried. All Lillian’s paper carriers are crazy about her.”
“She’s unhurt but pretty distraught.” Marc frowned. “You need to be careful there, Charley. One of these days that gang of yours might get in over their heads.”
“Don’t think I haven’t thought of that. But they’re not mine. They don’t answer to me.”
“They worship you. They’ll listen to you.”
Charley folded her arms. “I’ll be s
ure to address personal safety at the next staff meeting.”
Without warning he grabbed her by the waist and hauled her against him. “God, I’ve missed you.” He kissed her. “You and that smart mouth.”
He kissed her again, slow and deep, taking his time, one large, warm hand holding her securely against him as his free hand tangled in her hair. She slid her arms around his neck and kissed him back, loving the feel of him, reveling in his unique scent, a hint of coffee and the sandalwood soap he preferred.
By the time he finally broke the kiss, they were both breathing hard. “See you tonight?”
“Sounds—”
A barrage of high-pitched barking, somewhere at the upper range of human hearing, erupted behind them. They pulled apart as a tiny Chihuahua on a jeweled leash scolded at the top of its lungs. An enormously fat woman in a purple tracksuit teetered on the top step in three-inch platform sandals, frowning at them with disapproval.
“Do you mind?” Speechless, Charley and Marc merely shook their heads. The woman stepped forward with an acid green envelope in her hand. Charley moved aside to allow her to drop it into the “ask jackie” basket. The dog was now growling at Marc, snarling and nipping at his trouser cuff.
“If that dog bites me, I’ll have it impounded,” he stated, glaring down at his would-be attacker.
“Humph! She’s got far better taste than that. Come along, Bernice.” With some difficulty, the woman hauled the dog across the porch and down the steps. It struggled, barking and lunging at Marc every step of the way. When the strange pair had disappeared down the sidewalk, Charley turned to Marc.
“Bernice.” They stared at one another, then burst out laughing. Marc kissed her swiftly before turning to the door.
“The only reason I’m letting you in here is because Ms. Vardonis keeps asking when you’ll be joining us. She demanded I call you in to ‘consult on her case.’ ” He made air quotes with his fingers, his expression more resigned than annoyed. “Maybe you can calm her down so I can get a coherent statement.”
