Building Blocks of Murder

by Vanessa Gray Bartal

  “Hi, Grandma,” Lacy said. She glanced around the room to give her grandmother time to compose herself. She had no idea why her grandmother had so much trouble revealing her thoughts and emotions to others. Maybe it was a generational thing. Whatever the reason, Lacy was thankful she didn’t seem to be holding herself away from Mr. Middleton.

  The doorbell rang, providing Lacy with an opportunity to take a step back and answer.

  Jason stood on the other side, smiling devilishly. “Hey, Red, I think it’s time we talked about that kiss.”

  Chapter 2

  Behind Lacy, Mr. Middleton purposefully cleared his throat. Jason had the good sense to look sheepish.

  “So, you’re not alone,” he said.

  “No, she isn’t,” Mr. Middleton said. Apparently he suffered no compunctions about playing the role of the strict relative. Lacy wondered if he was about to tell Jason to have her home early, or something else out of the You’re Dating My Granddaughter handbook.

  “Hi, Mr. Middleton,” Jason said, pivoting around Lacy and stepping inside. “Hello, Mrs. Craig.”

  “Hello, Jason.” The two older adults spoke as a unit, although Lacy’s grandmother was smiling pleasantly and her grandfather was frowning.

  Lucinda came forward and laid a hand on Mr. Middleton’s bicep. “Tom, hadn’t we better get going?”

  “I don’t know,” he muttered darkly, his sharp gaze shooting between Lacy and Jason. Lacy resisted the urge to squirm under his inspection.

  “We should go,” Lucinda reaffirmed. “You kids take care.” She took Mr. Middleton’s hand and began tugging as she walked toward the door.

  Reluctantly, he followed her, but when he reached the door, he paused and turned back to Jason. “Remember that time your junior year I found you and Madison Thompson behind the stage during sixth period?”

  “Yes,” Jason said. Lacy had never heard his voice crack before.

  “I’d better not find you that way with my granddaughter. Ever.” With that, he turned and walked out of the house, closing the door firmly behind him.

  Lacy wanted to ask exactly how he had been found with Madison Thompson, but as soon as her grandparents left the house, so did her courage. There was a reason she hadn’t spoken to him in the two weeks since they kissed; she had no idea what to say.

  Jason, however, seemed immensely relieved when the door closed. He turned to Lacy with a grin. “Mr. Middleton never gets any less scary, you know? He’s like the Dick Clark of principals—timeless.”

  Lacy stared blankly at him until his smile slipped.

  “C’mon, Lacy, you’re not still mad at me, are you?”

  That provoked a reply. “Mad at you? Why would I be mad at you?”

  “Because I kissed you. You said no kissing or we couldn’t be friends.”

  “You didn’t kiss me; I kissed you,” she argued.

  “That’s not how I remember it,” Jason said. “You were crying, and I kissed you to make you feel better.”

  “No.” Lacy shook her head. “I was crying and I kissed you to make myself feel better.”

  “And then you ran away.”

  She looked away then, searching for anything other than his face to focus on. “I had to. I was embarrassed.”

  “Why were you embarrassed? It was a good kiss, great even. Shakespeare could have written sonnets about that kiss.” He paused and now it was his turn to look down. “I haven’t been able to stop thinking about it, actually.”

  That drew her attention back to him. “Really?” She hadn’t made a total fool of herself? She hadn’t sent him screaming for cover by blatantly throwing herself at him?

  He looked up and their eyes locked. “Really.”

  The air between them crackled for a few beats, and then she was in his arms with no recollection of how she got there. His hands grasped her biceps while his head dipped toward her, but then he paused.

  “Should we be doing this?” he asked. “Don’t we need to talk about it first?”

  “When did you become a girl?” she asked. “No talking; just kiss me.”

  He smiled. “Yes, ma’am,” he said, and then he kissed her.

  He was much taller than she, and the height difference made kissing while standing awkward, especially when she was wearing flat-heeled sneakers as she was today. She pressed him against the back of the couch behind him, vaguely urging him to sit down. But when he bumped the couch, he overbalanced. Toppling backward, he latched onto her to try to right himself, not realizing that since she was smaller she would simply fall with him.

  Together, they somersaulted over the couch, bumped into the coffee table, scattered a stack of newspapers into the air, and landed hard on the floor with Jason solidly on top of Lacy, his shoulder smashing her face.

  “Are you okay?” he said when he found enough air to speak.

  “I think so,” she replied, her voice muffled against his shirt. He shimmied down in order to free her face so that when he spoke again they were nose to nose.

  “Please tell me that little incident wasn’t actually your plan when you backed me into the couch.”

  “I just wanted to sit down, but you should know up front that my plans never work out so well.” She smiled. He smiled. She closed her eyes and tipped her face up to receive his kiss, but it never came. When she opened her eyes a few seconds later, she realized that a headline from one of the newspapers had caught his attention.

  His lips moved as he silently read the words, and then he rolled off her and snatched up the paper. Lacy peered over her shoulder and smiled self-consciously when she read her own name.

  “What is this?” Jason asked. He held out the paper in her direction and looked up.

  “I’ve been freelancing for the paper,” Lacy said, fighting a blush. Though the article had originally been intended for their small town’s local paper, it had been picked up by a wire service before quickly going national. Lacy’s name was now in some of the largest papers in the country, and her grandparents had bought them all, which was why so many papers were now scattered around the living room after Jason and Lacy crashed into them.

  “Are you kidding me?” Jason asked, incredulous.

  Lacy was just about to reassure him that her newly attained notoriety was no big deal, but then he continued.

  “Are you insane? I can’t believe you would do this to me.”

  She sat up and scooted away from him and he did the same so there were now two feet between them. “What are you talking about? I didn’t do anything to you.”

  “Really? Because I would call writing a scathing article about the sheriff’s department a pretty lousy thing to do to me.”

  “Jason,” she implored. “The article has nothing to do with you. It’s all about Detective Brenner and his incompetence.”

  “No, Lacy, it’s not. It’s a reflection on the entire department and it makes us all look like a bunch of hick yokel bumbling idiots. This article does nothing but reinforce the stereotype of the ignorant small-town cop.” He finished speaking and threw the paper down in disgust.

  “It does no such thing,” Lacy argued. She picked the paper up and tapped it for emphasis. “This isn’t simply about how he mishandled my grandmother’s case. I went back for the last few years since he’s been head detective and found a whole handful of cases that he mishandled.”

  Jason slapped his palm to his forehead. “That’s what the subpoena was about.”

  “What subpoena?” she asked.

  “The subpoena I received today about an old closed case from years ago when I first started on the force. I caught and arrested the bad guy, but Detective Brenner was the officer in charge of the case. Now, thanks to you, lawyers are going to have a heyday reopening all the old cases and letting guilty men go free.”

  “That’s not going to happen,” Lacy said with slightly less conviction.

  “Don’t be naïve, Lacy. That’s exactly what’s going to happen. You could have filed a formal complaint a
gainst Brenner and opened an official investigation into his handling of your grandmother’s case but, no, you had to vet your issues in a national forum and now my entire department is going to get dragged through the mud. And everyone is going to blame me because you’re my…because we…” He broke off with a disgusted grunt before jumping nimbly to his feet.

  Lacy also dashed to her feet, although far less gracefully. “Why are you taking this so personally? This has nothing to do with you and everything to do with him.”

  “Why am I taking this personally? Because it is personal, Lacy. This is my job, my life. It wasn’t enough that you had to stick your nose in your grandmother’s case and almost get yourself killed, but now you’re sticking your finger in cases that are none of your business. Do you have any idea how much trouble you’ve just caused?”

  “If Detective Brenner’s bumbling has put even one innocent person in jail and this investigation helps make him free, then it will all be worth it.”

  Jason pressed his palms to his eye sockets and groaned. “You and your ideals.”

  “Yes, me and my ideals,” she said. “Don’t you want to see justice served? Don’t you want to see the innocent protected?”

  He dropped his hands from his eyes and gave her a weary look. “What about me? I’m innocent, but now I’m going to be dragged through the mud until the mess you’ve caused gets cleared up.”

  “That’s not going to happen,” she assured him. “You’re a good cop, Jason, and everyone knows it.” Her hand reached out to rest on his forearm, but he took a step back.

  “Don’t, just don’t. I can’t deal with this right now.”

  “You mean you can’t deal with me right now,” she said.

  He didn’t deny it. Instead, he turned and let himself quietly out the door.

  What just happened here? How had things gone so quickly from kissing to yelling? Lacy shook her head and headed for the kitchen. Really, she wasn’t any worse off with Jason than she had been before the encounter, except now she knew for sure he was upset with her. She could only hope that, given time, he might cool off and think rationally. When the hubbub her article had caused piped down and nothing bad happened to Jason or the department, he would realize Lacy had been correct. Or, at the very least, maybe he wouldn’t hate her anymore.

  She ate a lonely supper of reheated leftovers while watching the news on television. What was wrong with her life that her grandmother was on a hot date while she, Lacy, sat eating reheated meatloaf and watching a segment about obesity in farm animals?

  There was no excuse not to go to the SAD meeting at the town hall, but she didn’t want to go alone. Knowing Tosh wouldn’t be able to answer his phone during the middle of an all-important bingo event, she texted him and asked him to meet her there when bingo was over.

  In addition to Shelia, there were a handful of angry-looking elderly people at the meeting. Lacy sat in the back, but Shelia still whipped her head around to smile in delight at her appearance. Lacy smiled self-consciously in return, and the meeting came to order.

  For the first half hour, mundane town business was discussed. Lacy wished she had brought a book to read as the mayor spent a long time extolling the virtues of the new street salt supplier the city would be using in the winter. Lacy had no idea anyone could talk so long or so lovingly about salt.

  Just as she began to despair of staying awake long enough to talk about the Stakely building, Tosh slipped into the seat beside her, and Sheila took the floor.

  “Mayor, council members, I respectfully ask you to refrain from tearing down the Stakely building.” After that opening parry, she began extolling the virtues of the Stakely building, beginning with its history. After hearing the building had been constructed in the late eighteen hundreds and used as a candy factory, Lacy was even more intrigued.

  “And so I implore you not to lose this historic treasure.” Sheila finished speaking and scanned the faces of the town council behind her. Lacy did the same, and was disheartened by what she saw. Without exception, all of them looked bored and resolute. She knew then that the decision to tear it down was a foregone conclusion and they had simply been humoring Sheila.

  “Well, that was a fine speech, Sheila,” Mayor Watkins began. “But as I told you, we’ve already voted. The building will be sold, and the developers can do what they want with it.”

  Lacy gasped. “That’s terrible,” she whispered to Tosh. “They’re not even listening. Someone needs to say something.”

  “Don’t look at me,” he said. “I’m a new pastor in this community; I’m not getting involved in local politics.”

  Before she could talk herself out of it, Lacy shot to her feet. The council looked at her in surprise. Sheila beamed.

  “Please, you can’t tear down the Stakely building,” she blurted. “Don’t you realize it’s the epicenter of our downtown, the only thing that gives us distinction? A strip mall would take away the one piece of character we have going for us.”

  Disconcerted murmurs rippled through the crowd. The mayor gave a hushing glare around the room.

  “Young lady, I can’t possibly expect you to understand the finer points of business. The wheels of progress must sometimes be greased with pain. I understand that some have a certain attachment to the Stakely building, but it’s a behemoth. The cost to renovate it, let alone keep up on it, is more than anyone is willing to pay. Right now we have a company that wants to buy it and put in profitable businesses that could bring jobs to our community. Why should we say no to that?”

  “Because as a town we would be selling our souls.” The audience gasped. Lacy wondered if this was as much excitement as a town council meeting had ever produced. “Can’t you understand that by taking the easy road, we would be cutting off our noses to spite our faces? Yes, some cheap stores will filter in when the strip mall comes, but the jobs they bring will be minimum wage at best, and the clientele those establishments attract will make the downtown a red light district.”

  The mayor wasn’t listening, Lacy could tell. He shook his head obstinately and gave her a patronizing smile. “I couldn’t possibly expect you to understand the ins and outs of business. We have an offer on the table, and good business sense tells us to accept it.”

  Lacy slumped into her chair, angrier than she had been in a long time. She hated condescension, either because of her age or her gender, and the mayor seemed to be employing both in one fell swoop.

  “Someone should do something,” she muttered. “Someone should buy that building.”

  Tosh leaned over to whisper in her ear. “Uh, Lacy, you’re a millionaire.”

  Lacy sat up in alarm and looked at Tosh. She had completely forgotten about Barbara Blake’s money. Could she do this? Could she buy this building and save it?

  She shot to her feet once again. The mayor tried to ignore her, but she spoke anyway. “How much are the developers going to pay for the Stakely building?”

  The mayor ignored her, but Sheila spoke up. “A hundred and fifty thousand.”

  “That’s it?” Lacy asked, incredulous.

  Sheila nodded sadly. “We’ve raised some support to try and buy it ourselves, but everything has happened so suddenly we only have a few thousand dollars.”

  Lacy hesitated. Should she really do what she was thinking? Tosh nudged her, urging her into action. “I’ll buy it,” she announced before she could change her mind.

  That got everyone’s attention. The mayor finally looked at her with a frown. “There’s no time for you to go through the process of trying to get a loan, if you could even get one, which I doubt.”

  “I don’t need a loan,” Lacy said. “I’ll pay for it in cash.” She tipped her chin stubbornly, aware that she was treading on dangerous ground when her pride had been lanced.

  Now the mayor looked flustered. “But we’ve already agreed to sell to the developers.”

  “Have papers been signed? Has money changed hands?” Lacy pressed.

  “We
ll, no, but we have a gentleman’s agreement,” the mayor hedged.

  “There are no gentlemen in business,” Lacy said, trying to sound like she knew what she was talking about. “You have nothing legal from them, and I’m offering to sign the papers tonight. And, really, do you want people to know that you turned down a chance to save the Stakely building in favor of outsiders who are going to tear it down?”

  Behind the mayor, the council members were wavering.

  “You let this go, Hal, and I’ll make sure everyone knows,” Sheila threatened.

  Reluctantly, the mayor agreed, and just like that Lacy owned a building.

  She signed the papers in dismay, having no idea how such a thing came about. Tosh hovered approvingly in the background, handing her a pen whenever the need arose.

  “That was awesome,” he said as they finally exited the building late that night after all the bureaucracy had been handled. “I can’t believe you were like, ‘I’ll buy your building.’ Take that, city council!”

  Lacy pressed her fingertips to her throbbing temples. “I can’t believe I just did that.” She spun and studied the town hall. “Do you think it’s too late to back out?”

  Tosh took her hand and steered her once again toward the parking lot. “What’s the big deal? You bought a building. My family buys buildings all the time. My dad says real estate is always a good investment.”

  “My family doesn’t buy buildings all the time. We buy a house when we can afford the down payment and spend the next thirty years paying it off.” Lacy stopped and bent over, sucking oxygen. “I can’t believe I just did that. I think I’m going to be sick.”

  Tosh pressed his palm to her back. “Lacy, it’s no big deal. You could have bought ten of those buildings with what you have in the bank. If you don’t want to keep it, just find another buyer and resell it.”

  How could she explain to a trust-fund baby the dynamics of growing up middle class? She couldn’t, she realized. While Tosh was down to earth on many levels, he had no grasp of finances. He had no concept of how most people lived week to week, paycheck to paycheck, just hoping to get ahead. Before Lacy’s inheritance came through, she’d had exactly three hundred dollars to her name.