Off the Record (An Avery Shaw Mystery Book 10)

by Amanda M. Lee

  Off The Record

  An Avery Shaw Mystery Book Ten

  Amanda M. Lee

  WinchesterShaw Publications

  Contents

  Copyright

  Prologue

  1. One

  2. Two

  3. Three

  4. Four

  5. Five

  6. Six

  7. Seven

  8. Eight

  9. Nine

  10. Ten

  11. Eleven

  12. Twelve

  13. Thirteen

  14. Fourteen

  15. Fifteen

  16. Sixteen

  17. Seventeen

  18. Eighteen

  19. Nineteen

  20. Twenty

  21. Twenty-One

  22. Twenty-Two

  23. Twenty-Three

  24. Twenty-Four

  25. Twenty-Five

  26. Twenty-Six

  27. Twenty-Seven

  28. Twenty-Eight

  29. Twenty-Nine

  30. Thirty

  31. Thirty-One

  Mailing List

  About the Author

  Books by Amanda M. Lee

  Copyright © 2016 by Amanda M. Lee

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

  Created with Vellum

  Prologue

  13 years ago

  “What’s wrong with you?”

  My grandfather arched an eyebrow as I threw myself in one of the canvas chairs around the bonfire, crossed my arms over my chest and let loose a dramatic sigh only a teenager faced with the end of the world could muster.

  “This sucks.”

  Grandpa sipped his beer and leaned back in his chair as he regarded me. He wasn’t keen on sparing feelings, and he’d made it clear over the years that I was his most difficult grandchild. He has fifteen of them, so that’s saying something. I like to think I’m his favorite despite the complaints. Nobody likes boring people, and being difficult is the opposite of boring. What? That’s a real thing … that I just made up and don’t care if you believe.

  “Why does this suck?” Grandpa asked, angling his head when he heard screams in the shadows on the other side of the campsite. We were in the middle of the woods in northern Lower Michigan – some godawful place called Yogi Bear’s Jellystone Park in Grayling – and all I could think was that civilization felt a long way off given the dark night and haunting moon.

  “We’re camping,” I reminded him.

  “I noticed. I’m the one who picked where we’d go for the family trip this year. I picked camping for a reason.”

  “Because you wanted to torture me?”

  Grandpa chuckled. “Not everything is about you.”

  “You keep saying that, but I don’t believe it’s true,” I countered. “All clues point to the opposite of that being true.”

  “And what are the clues?”

  “I don’t like it here, and Mom said if I don’t shut my mouth she’s going to leave me here when you guys head home in two days. As much as I hate being here with … all of these people … the idea of being here alone is actually worse.”

  Grandpa’s eyebrow – which was black with a few odd gray hairs interspersed between the dark strands – arched even higher. “How does that equate to you being the center of the universe? I know you’re sixteen and it’s normal for sixteen-year-olds to believe things like that, but that doesn’t make it true.”

  I didn’t believe that for a second. “Mom seems to think I have the power to ruin everyone’s vacation,” I offered. “She said so herself. She said if I made anyone cry – including her – that I’m going to be forced to eat pine needles and fight off Bigfoot on my own. Quite frankly, I think eating pine needles sounds painful. You just know those things are going to hurt coming out the other end. Off the record, and I’ll deny it if you tell anyone I said it, that doesn’t mean I’m not willing to try eating them just to annoy her.”

  Grandpa let loose a wheezing laugh as he slapped his knee. “You’re a pip, kid. Has anyone ever told you that?”

  “Coming from you – the guy who sleeps naked on the trampoline after skinny-dipping every night – that’s a compliment.”

  “It was meant as a compliment.” Grandpa rested his head on the back of the chair and stared up at the clear sky. “What do you see when you look up there, Avery?”

  I shrugged. “It doesn’t look as if an intergalactic war between the Jedi and the Sith is happening, so I’m not all that interested.”

  “If you’re going to talk about Star Wars stuff you can mosey your little butt into the woods,” Grandpa growled. “You know I can’t stand that duck in the desert movie. It makes no sense. If the guys in the robes can control people with their minds, why do they need laser swords?”

  “Because they look cool and guys associate swords with their schlongs.”

  Grandpa’s eyes widened. “What did you just say?”

  “You heard me. It’s phallic. That’s the word, right?” English was the only class I paid attention in, so I had a rather robust vocabulary. I couldn’t finish long division without a calculator, though, so things balanced out. No one had to worry about me being termed “gifted” or anything. “Phallic means that guys like anything that reminds them of their penises. They like to wave them around and impress people.”

  “I know what phallic means,” Grandpa shot back, annoyed. “How do you know what phallic means?”

  “Everyone knows what phallic means.”

  “I’ll wager that none of your cousins know what phallic means.”

  “Perhaps that’s because I’m the smartest woman in the land,” I teased, enjoying the way Grandpa shifted as he tried to get comfortable in his chair. I have an ability to make men of all ages uncomfortable if I put my mind to it.

  “You are the smartest woman in the land,” Grandpa agreed, not missing a beat. “That’s going to get you in trouble later in life. You can’t see it now, but I can. Intelligence is a curse … and you’re cursed by multiple things.”

  “I’m pretty sure that was an insult.”

  “I’m pretty sure there’s no sense pretending your feelings are hurt, because you don’t roll that way,” Grandpa supplied. “You are cursed, though. You got my mouth. You got your mother’s judgmental streak. You got your grandmother’s martyr complex. You got … I don’t know whose confidence. When you roll all of that together you come up with … .”

  “Perfection?” I prodded, grinning.

  “I was going to say that you come up with a perfect storm of narcissism,” Grandpa countered, shaking his head. “You are literally too smart for your own good. Do you know what that means?”

  “That I’m going to win at life?”

  Grandpa clearly didn’t want to laugh, but he couldn’t help himself. “I think there’s a very good chance you’re going to win at life,” he said after a beat. “You have a tendency to wear down your enemies. You want to win at all costs, and you’re willing to experiment to do it. That will keep you on top.”

  “So … what’s the problem?”

  “The problem is that you’re not the only person in the world who likes to win,” Grandpa replied. “I liked to win as much as you do. The difference is that I’ve come to the conclusion that I can’t always win. I accept that. You need to do the same.”

  I angled my head to stare at the stars as I considered the statement. “You said you p
icked the family trip destination this year,” I said. “That’s what you just told me, right?”

  Grandpa narrowed his eyes to dangerous brown slits. “I did say that,” he confirmed. “Your grandmother wanted to stay in a hotel in Grand Rapids … go shopping and stuff. There’s some water park in Muskegon she wanted to visit.”

  “Why didn’t you want to do that?”

  “Because I hate parks … and people … and swimming in water that little kids from all over the state have probably peed in.”

  “You clearly don’t like camping,” I pointed out, gesturing around the small clearing. “You brought a portable refrigerator and enough beer to drink yourself silly should the inevitable alien invasion and human harvesting operation that we’re all expecting to end the world happen while we’re away from town.”

  Grandpa’s mouth dropped open. “That right there is why you’re so annoying. You think too fast. No one else in the world would come up with that scenario.”

  “Thank you.”

  “It wasn’t a compliment,” Grandpa snapped. “Do you know what your problem is?”

  “I’m too smart for my own good,” I automatically answered.

  Grandpa bobbed his head. “That’s right. Going through life believing you’re smarter than everyone you come into contact with will be fun … until you run into someone who is either smarter than you or is willing to play down and dirty to pretend he’s smarter.”

  “I can play down and dirty, too.”

  “You can, but you also have a weird set of morals,” Grandpa argued. “You believe in fair play. Sure, you want to win, but you’re not willing to trod on the little guy to do it. That’s one of the few reasons you’re tolerable.”

  “You silver-tongued devil,” I teased.

  Grandpa extended a finger and wagged it in my face. “That right there is one of the reasons people want to take you on a snipe hunt and hope the search party isn’t successful when they go looking for you.”

  I narrowed my eyes, perplexed. “What’s a snipe hunt?”

  I didn’t miss the momentary flash of mirth that flitted through Grandpa’s eyes, but I opted to refrain from commenting on it until he showed his cards. “Well, I haven’t done it in years, but it’s a tried and true method of family bonding.”

  “Pass.”

  Grandpa ignored my flippant response. “Snipe are very rare birds,” he volunteered. “They’re only found in this part of the country. In fact, they’re only found in this park.”

  I fought the urge to roll my eyes and kept my expression neutral. “Why are they rare?”

  “Because they’re only found in this area.”

  Yeah, I had that one coming. “Okay, why are they special?”

  “Their eggs are worth a lot of money,” Grandpa answered, rubbing his hands together. “If you can find a nest and sell the eggs you’ll be set up for life. I spent years out here looking for eggs when I was a kid.”

  “You said you’d never been here before,” I pointed out.

  “I did not.”

  “You did, too.”

  “When did I say that?”

  “When we arrived and Grandma asked where the steam room was.”

  “I … was only messing with her.” Grandpa was clearly lying, but I couldn’t decide what he hoped to gain by the subterfuge so I let him play the game. “Anyway, when I was a teenager I drove to this area so many times to look for snipe eggs I almost lost count. They’re rare and valuable.”

  “Did you ever find one?”

  “No, and it’s too bad, because I would’ve been set for life and never had to work if I did.”

  I had to hand it to him. He was a master at spinning a yarn. If I didn’t know him better, I’d almost believe the story. “Well, that’s too bad,” I said. “I’ll bet if someone found a snipe egg they’d be famous, right?”

  Grandpa bobbed his head, eager. “That’s exactly right. You should tell your cousins and put together a search party. You might leave the campground as independently wealthy individuals … and no one wants that. You’d really tick off the whole family. Your mother would be furious if you found a snipe egg.”

  He was good. “Uh-huh.”

  Apparently my expression didn’t reflect belief because Grandpa’s temper sparked. “I’m not making it up.”

  “I know you’re not.” I turned my attention to three of my younger cousins as they moved toward the bonfire, an idea niggling the back of my brain. “Hey … blond girl. What’s her name again?” I had so many cousins I often forgot their names. Okay, who am I kidding? I never bothered to learn their names. Sometimes I gave them names to match their faces, which didn’t make their mothers happy. Hey, it’s not my fault that one of them really does look as if she has a butt for a face.

  Grandpa scowled. “Marie.”

  That couldn’t be right. “No, that’s not it. I think her name is RuPaul.”

  “What? Why?”

  “Because with those shoes she looks like a drag queen,” I replied, snapping my fingers to get RuPaul’s attention. “Do you guys want to go on an adventure?”

  Grandpa’s smile was smug when I caught it out of the corner of my eye, but I held it together.

  “What kind of adventure?” RuPaul asked.

  “Yeah, what kind of adventure?” My other cousin – I think her name was Mariah Carey (you know, because she looked as if she would be talking to herself a lot as an adult) – widened her eyes.

  “You’re going on a snipe hunt,” I replied. “It’s some sort of bird. It lays golden eggs and stuff. Go look in the woods … and be careful you don’t accidentally run into Bigfoot while you’re out there.”

  “Okay.” Mariah Carey merely shrugged, turned on her heel and stalked toward the trees, RuPaul close on her heels. “I’ll find the snipe.”

  Grandpa balked. “You can’t send them into the woods by themselves. I thought you were going with them.”

  “Do I look new?”

  Grandpa frowned. “No, but … .”

  “This is a campground where they actually have people dressing up like bears and trying to steal picnic baskets,” I reminded him. “We’re not in the woods. It’s not as if this is Predator and we’re going to be attacked by an alien.”

  “You watch way too much television,” Grandpa grumbled.

  “Besides, when they find the snipe egg they’re going to be rich. What’s a few tears because they spend the night lost in the woods?”

  “You can’t just let them wander around the woods on their own,” Grandpa snapped, pushing himself to a standing position. “They could get lost or something.”

  “You had no problem sending me off into the woods on my own,” I reminded him.

  “Yes, but that’s because we’re ready to sacrifice you to the sarcasm gods,” Grandpa shot back, furious. “Do you know what your problem is?”

  I didn’t bother to hide my lazy smile as I snagged his half-empty beer can and moved it toward my lips. “No, but I’m sure you’re about to tell me.”

  Grandpa jerked the can out of my hand before I could drink and scorched me with a dark glare. “Your problem is that you don’t believe you can lose. One day you’re going to find someone who can beat you. You won’t take it well when that happens. I just hope I’m still alive to see it, because it’s going to be a proud day in this family. The day Avery Shaw doesn’t win, when she doesn’t get the outcome she wants, will become a family holiday. I’m sure of that.”

  I shrugged as I leaned back in my chair. “It won’t be today.”

  “I’ve figured that out on my own.”

  “Be careful when you search for the rugrats,” I called out. “If you accidentally bring the wrong one back you’ll get in trouble with the parents.”

  “Thank you so much for your support,” Grandpa spat. “I don’t know what I would’ve done without your mouth.”

  “Don’t mention it … and you’re very welcome.”

  Grandpa groaned as he pinched the b
ridge of his nose. “Do you know what your problem is?”

  I tuned out the rest of his diatribe as I got comfortable. Perhaps camping wasn’t so bad after all. No, wait, it sucks. On the other hand, mind games are entertaining everywhere.

  1

  One

  Present Day

  “Omigod!”

  I slapped my arm and hopped away from the outdoor bistro table, knocking over my chair in the process and causing my boyfriend, Eliot Kane, to arch an eyebrow as he nursed a beer while slumped in the chair across from me. He didn’t run to my rescue and save me from the invading force, which was beyond frustrating.

  “Did you see that?” I didn’t mean to screech the question, but my hammering heart wouldn’t allow me to remain suave. Okay, to be fair, I’m never suave. My mouth is like a vat of acid. I never have trouble stripping flesh from the bones of my enemies with simple words and the occasionally well-timed meltdown. It’s kind of like my superpower. Screeching for anything other than new Star Wars merchandise or video game preorders is unacceptable.

  “Did I see what?” Eliot’s shoulder-length hair was swept away from his face as he crossed his legs at the ankles and leaned farther back. He has the ability to look effortlessly cool in any environment, including this one. He’s the only guy I know who looks as handsome in a tux as he does in flannel. Actually, he looks better in flannel. That’s how we ended up in this position. He’s hot, and I’m trying to be a better girlfriend. He always gives, and I always take. I wanted to give for a change. That’s how we ended up here … in Hell. It’s actual Hell, mind you. He doesn’t think so, but I do. To him it’s a simple camping trip. To me it’s the first step on the road to my death in the zombie apocalypse.

  My name is Avery Shaw and I’m officially a camper. There’s a statement I never thought I’d think … or utter … or even confess. On a normal day I’m a snarky reporter. That’s a persona that fits me like a shark mitten with an attitude. This camping version is another story.