by Ella White
But to her astonishment, Vickie’s office was relatively organized. There were multiple books stowed away on the shelves, probably in a pattern only Vickie knew, and the desk was clear except for the computer, a keyboard, and a few pens. Rachel was already there, sitting in one of the chairs and glancing down at her hands. Vickie pulled up another chair for Susan before taking her seat at the desk.
“So, to get you both up to speed on what I learned at the university,” Vickie began. “First, it turns out that all the teaching assistants are really close, so they probably know a great deal about each other’s problems. I’m hoping one or more of them will come forward and talk.”
“If they think they won’t get in trouble,” Rachel corrected.
“True. Luckily, one of the students already came forward,” Vickie resumed. “She told me about how Lilli and another TA named Mary Gillan were close friends until recently. They fought about something that broke up their friendship pretty badly.”
“Wasn’t Mary Gillan on that list?” Susan asked. Vickie nodded, passing the list over to her. “Yes, there she is. If she was friends with the victim, she is certainly worth looking into.”
“She’s apparently the biology TA,” Rachel added. “Why do I get the feeling she’s not going to want to talk to us?”
Susan glanced at her. “What makes you say that?”
“If she really wanted to help us find Lilli’s killer, wouldn’t she have talked to Mom already?”
“Good point. I hadn’t thought of that.” Vickie rubbed her chin in thought. “Why wouldn’t she want to help us though?”
“If Mary did fight with Lilli recently, it could mean one of two things. Either she is innocent but worried about being blamed for Lilli’s murder…”
“Or she was involved in the murder somehow and doesn’t want to be found out,” Vickie finished for her.
Susan nodded. “We are of the same mind. But either way, Mary probably doesn’t want to attract attention to herself.”
“She’s our only lead so far though.” Rachel frowned as she tried to think of a solution. “How can we approach her without giving ourselves away?”
The three women were silent for a while as they sat in thought. How could they get the information without letting their only lead know, just in case that lead turned out to be the culprit?
Vickie slowly turned her gaze to her daughter and gave her a wide smile. Rachel stared back at her in confusion.
“What?”
“How would you feel about going undercover for a bit?”
Rachel continued to stare. “What?”
“You’re young enough to still pass for a college student,” Vickie reasoned. “And Mary is the biology TA. She must talk with those students all the time. If she thinks you’re a student, you can pretend to need some help with the class and ask questions about Lilli.”
Rachel didn’t look convinced. “Won’t that be just a little suspicious?”
“Or, if Mary won’t speak to you,” Susan contributed, “integrating yourself into the student body should allow you to talk to the biology students. Perhaps they will tell you about Mary instead.”
“I guess it’s a good idea.” Rachel smiled anxiously. “I’ll just need to pretend to be a freshman again.”
“You were great at pretending to be a blogger when we were investigating Anthony’s murder.” Vickie grabbed the phone on her desk and dialed Charles’s number again. “Let me ask Charles for Mary’s schedule. Hopefully the biology class hasn’t been taught yet today.”
Rachel lowered her gaze to the floor. “Maybe I wasn’t really pretending.”
Vickie didn’t hear her, but Susan did. She looked over at the young journalist with a perplexed and concerned expression.
“You don’t have to if you don’t want to. We’re not trying to force you to do anything.”
“No, it’s okay.” Rachel raised her head again. “I just have a lot on my mind. This might actually help.”
Susan stared at her for a moment before digging through her pocket. She pulled out a chrome-colored ink pen with four buttons on its side. Susan lifted the pen up to Rachel’s face.
“This is a pen recorder,” she explained. “The red button is record. Green is play, black is stop, and yellow is rewind.”
“You expect me to use this when I talk to Mary?” Rachel raised an eyebrow. “I thought recording a suspect without their knowledge wouldn’t be admissible in court?”
“It wouldn’t, but I’d never depend on this to get a conviction anyway.” Susan placed the pen in the young woman’s hands. “This is just to help gather enough information to merit an interview with her.”
Rachel took the pen, looked it over, and put it in her pocket. She turned back to her mother, who was just finishing up her phone call.
“Yes, I’ll let you know. Thanks Charles. I really owe you one.” Vickie hung up the phone and smiled at Rachel and Susan. “One of the biology classes is a late class, around five tonight. Mary will be there, although she won’t be teaching. Charles said he’ll let the professor know Rachel will be sitting in on the class, so she won’t make a big deal over a stranger being there.”
Rachel checked her watch. “That’s about an hour and a half from now. Plenty of time for me to grab some of my old college stuff from home.”
“Old college stuff?”
“Well I have to look like a college student, don’t I?”
“I guess the kids all look the same to me.”
“That’s because you’re old.”
“Rachel!”
“In the meantime, I’ll go check the college records regarding both Lilli Graves and Mary Gillan,” Susan interjected. “Their addresses, grades, regular hang-outs, that sort of thing.”
Vickie smiled at them both, but it soon slipped from her face when she realized there was nothing for her to do. “I guess I’ll just stay here then?”
“Sorry, Vickie, but it would be best for you to act like everything’s normal.” Susan stood and headed for the door with every intention of leaving. “The teaching assistants, including Mary, know your face now. If you appear everywhere they go, it’s going to appear suspicious.”
“I can’t argue with that,” Vickie conceded with a groan. “I just wish there was more I could do.”
Susan stopped before exiting and turned back. “You’ve already done plenty. You’ve helped us find a lead. I’ll call if I find anything. Thanks!”
With that, Chief Miles was off. Vickie and Rachel stayed in their seats and watched her leave. Vickie’s eyebrows furrowed.
“Did I hear that right? Chief Susan Miles just thanked me?”
“That’s what ‘thanks’ usually means,” Rachel teased. “Dad won’t be home yet, right?”
“Right. He’s still at work.”
“I’m going to stop by my house to get my stuff.” Rachel headed for the door. “I have an idea in case I can’t get Mary to talk to me.”
Now Vickie was curious. “What’s that?”
“Well, I’m going to be a freshman student, right?” She smiled at her mother. “Just pretend you aren’t related to me. You think you can do that?”
“I can, but why—”
“You’ll see. Talk to you later.”
Rachel left the office before Vickie had a chance to say any more. She reorganized her desk (for what little it needed to be cleared) before heading back to the front of the coffee shop. She put on her apron and took her normal place at the first register.
“Rachel just left with a serious look on her face,” Kimberly reported. “And Chief Miles looked pretty determined too. What’s going on?”
“Oh, lots of things,” Vickie replied vaguely. “Don’t worry about it.”
“Is it about what happened yesterday?” her employee persisted.
“A little, but that’s all I’m saying about it.” Vickie rubbed Tyler’s head as he jumped onto the counter. “Just know that everything is under control.”
“If you insist.” Kimberly looked like she wanted to keep pressing for information, but ultimately decided against it. “I’m going on lunch break now, if that’s okay?”
“Of course. Has anyone else missed lunch?”
“Nope. Just me.”
“You have a bad habit of doing that.”
Kimberly giggled as she headed for the employee’s lounge. Vickie returned her attention to the shop, but there were only a few customers still waiting in line. Once they were taken care of, Vickie took a deep breath and released it through her teeth. Tyler glanced up at her for a second before trotting away.
“Keep it together, Vickie,” she whispered to herself. “Everything’s going to be fine. You have nothing to worry about. You just need to wait for Rachel to get back to you, and you can go from there.”
With no more customers to attend to, Vickie walked around her shop, running her fingers along the hundreds of books. She couldn’t help but worry about Lilli’s murderer. Chief Miles’s words kept rolling through her mind. ‘Whoever killed Lilli might come after you too.’ Vickie immediately connected that to someone also going after her daughter. If Mary really was the killer, then she already knew Vickie was looking for her, and she might learn that Rachel was working with her. It suddenly seemed like a huge mistake to get her daughter involved in this. If Rachel was hurt while they were investigating this murder… Well, she didn’t even want to think about that.
Mary might not even be the killer, Vickie berated herself. Don’t come to a conclusion before you have all the information.
It was a common concept she taught her students back when she was a professor. In fact, one of the most well known Sherlock Holmes quotes was something she frequently recited to her class. “It is a capital mistake to theorize before one has data,” she quoted from memory, as her hands happened to slide across The Adventures and Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes. “Insensibly one begins to twist facts to suit theories, instead of theories to suit facts.”
She released the book and smiled. “Thank you, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle.”
Vickie was summoned out of her musings by the sound of the espresso machine activating. She spun around to find Tyler sitting in front of the contraption, patiently waiting for it to fill a cup that wasn’t there. The café owner rushed over to turn the machine off, startling Tyler a little bit. He still managed to lick a few drops of hot beverage from the machine before meowing and moving over to the nearby sink. Vickie put her hands on her hips and gave him a mocking glare.
“Just what do you think you’re doing, young man?” Tyler meowed and leapt to the sink handles. “I hope you didn’t drink too much of that stuff. I don’t want to deal with a hyper cat right now.”
The cat looked inquisitively at her before pawing one of the handles, causing the water to turn on. He put his paw under the water, pads upwards, allowing a little water to gather in his paw before bringing it to his mouth. He took multiple sips this way before walking back to his owner. Butting his head into her foot, he purred and rubbed his whole body against her leg.
Vickie finally laughed and picked him up. “You know I can’t be mad at you, buddy.”
She was about to take Tyler into the back for a break when the doorbell rang again, and again, and again. She turned to the front of the shop and saw six people walk in, all in their late teens or early twenties, four women and two men. One of the older women was Rachel, who glanced over at her mother before winking.
Realization dawned on Vickie. This is what she meant by not being related.
The students all sat down at one of the larger tables and immediately took out their notes and books. Rachel did the same, although Vickie knew hers was fake. Clearly, Rachel had been unable to speak with Mary Gillan, but hopefully she could get some information from the undergraduate students.
Vickie walked over with an order pad and pen, smiling widely as she approached. “Welcome to the Sip and Read Café. I don’t believe I’ve seen some of you before.”
“I’ve never been here before,” Rachel answered. She looked around the table. “How about you guys?”
There was a round of murmurs in agreement. Apparently they didn’t even know the café existed, so Rachel introducing them to her mother’s café made for good business.
“We’re always happy to see new faces. Can I get you anything?”
A few of the students ordered some drinks, mainly dark coffee, and Vickie brought the beverages to them as swiftly as she could. As she passed them around, she took note of how they were all discussing an upcoming biology exam they were trying to study for. Vickie noticed how tired they all seemed as well. She could tell a few of the girls wore thicker cosmetics to hide the bags under their eyes, and one of the two boys looked like he could fall asleep at any moment. He was the one who took his dark roast coffee black.
“I hope you kids aren’t working too hard,” she commented as she finished delivering the drinks.
“We’re okay,” the other boy replied. “It’s just a lot to go over.”
“Why don’t we ask Mary if she can have a review session before the test? She’s the TA after all.” Rachel suggested. The other students all looked at each other before they shook their heads simultaneously. “Why not? She must be smart if she’s a teaching assistant. She could help.”
“Yeah, she’s smart all right.” The young man took a big gulp of his coffee and gasped. “Maybe too smart.”
“She’s so high-strung though,” the oldest woman (other than Rachel, of course) remarked. “She’s not exactly approachable.”
Rachel glanced around at them. “Is she really intimidating or something?”
“Yeah, you could put it that way.”
Vickie didn’t want to make the students uncomfortable, so she didn’t stay around their table much longer after asking if they needed anything else. She kept her distance from the group so she wouldn’t accidentally blow Rachel’s cover. Vickie didn’t notice anything unusual until near the end of the night, when one of the young men gathered his things together and ran out the door without so much as a goodbye to the others. None of the other students appeared to think this was strange, so she didn’t think much of it.
Chapter 5
“You’ve been spending a lot of time at home lately,” Vickie commented as she drove with her daughter to the café.
“I spent most of the afternoon and evening at either the college or the café,” Rachel reminded her.
“Yeah, but don’t you need to go to the office sometime?” her mother questioned, referring to her daughter’s job at the Carriage Cover Chronicle. “You haven’t been there in a few days.”
Rachel glanced out the window. “I needed to take a few days off. Henry said it’s fine, and James is covering for me.”
“You haven’t covered many interesting stories lately either.” Rachel sighed. Her mother was not letting this go. “The last one was about the candle-making process, and that was two weeks ago.”
“I guess the paper’s been kind of slow.”
Vickie didn’t argue with her, but she knew this wasn’t true. Thomas read the Chronicle every morning, partly to stay on top of the latest news in town and of course to see what his little girl had written. He was the one who mentioned to Vickie that Rachel barely had any stories published. That had been a while ago however, and Rachel didn’t appear to be in a hurry to do anything about it.
What is going on in this girl’s head? Vickie wondered.
They arrived at the café barely in time for opening. Their first customer was not a customer at all; in fact, it was Susan Miles standing impatiently at the door. Vickie noticed she was holding up her badge to a lot of the people in line so she could get up front more quickly. Vickie smiled and shook her head.
“You know, you could just ask to speak with me,” Vickie recommended. “I’m guessing this is about the case?”
“Of course it is. Can we go to your office?”
Vickie nodded and led her to the back of t
he coffee shop again. Susan walked faster than either Vickie or Rachel, so she arrived at the office door before they did. She shifted from one foot to the other as she waited for them to catch up.
“What’s got you so worked up?” Rachel inquired.
“Rachel, don’t talk like that to Chief Miles,” Vickie reprimanded her. Rachel walked into the office, but instead of taking a seat she leaned against one of the bookshelves and crossed her arms. “Please sit down, Chief Miles. What’s going on?”
“I had one of my guys run a check on recent activities at the college.” Susan spoke more quickly than she typically did. “And low and behold, I found something big.”
“I can’t say I’m surprised.” Vickie sat in her own chair. “I thought everything with Lilli’s murder involved the school somehow. What did you find?”
Rachel broke in. “How big are we talking about here?”
“Really big.” Susan pulled out a stack of papers and slammed them onto Vickie’s desk, causing both mother and daughter to jump. “I won’t make you read all this, but take a look at the top of the first page.”
Vickie looked down at the papers. It appeared to be a list of books, although she couldn’t tell what they were, because the titles were all in German. Vickie could not read a single word of it.
“What is this?”
“This is a list of the Third Reich Collection,” Chief Miles explained. “Publications and photographs from the libraries of Nazi leaders. Normally it’s kept in the Library of Congress.”
“Over a thousand titles,” Vickie read. She spotted one of the German titles had been circled. “What’s this one?”
“That’s the big thing I was talking about.” Susan pointed to the circled book. “This book was on loan to the Carriage Cove Community College. One of the history professors and the German professor are working on a joint project together, and they requested it for research purposes.”
“Wait, the Library of Congress?” Rachel’s eyebrows rose in surprise. “These teachers actually have the authority to get a book from there?”
