The young officer brought a folded-up plastic-wrapped blanket and Ng tore the plastic off, handed that back to the officer and held the blanket out to Jaymie. The female officer sighed, jerked the blanket out of his hands and unfolded it, then helped a shivering Jaymie drape it over her shoulders and wrap it around herself.
“Thank you,” Jaymie murmured and smiled shakily at the girl, a petite blonde who looked more like a cheerleader than a cop. To Ng, she said, “Why am I waiting? I didn’t see anything or anyone. I was just coming to the shed to bring back the pamphlets I had left at the end of the evening and I found her.”
“Just wait, please.”
A car pulled up to the curb and Detective Angela Vestry got out. She was an angular woman, with scraped-back hair and cold eyes. Jaymie had briefly met her in the trouble that had happened the month before, and thought her competent, if a little gray and grave in personality. She appeared to scan the scene, the whirling light of the cruisers parked at the curb flashing their blue and white lights across her pale face. She eyed some of the villagers gathered, dressed for the most part in parkas over housecoats and galoshes, standing at the curb in clusters, chatting among themselves. Cynthia was among them, wearing a vintage mink coat over pink silk pajamas.
The detective then looked up the rise to where Ng and Jaymie must have been framed by the lights now on in the workshop. Bill Waterman was talking to an officer down by the curb, who was taking notes as the handyman spoke. The handyman looked up the hill at Jaymie and raised his hand in a greeting. She fluttered her hand back, then regarded the detective who now approached.
“Miss Leighton, we meet again,” Detective Vestry said, with absolutely no hint of humor or reproach. “Could you tell me what happened?”
She related her evening, as crisply as it would come to her, up until her decision to call it a night. “I suppose I was the last volunteer working. I was bringing the rest of the pamphlets back to the storeroom; that’s the inner room in Bill Waterman’s shed.”
“Was he leaving it open for you?”
“No, he gave me a key,” she said, and pulled the unused key out of her hoodie pocket. “One of . . . four, I think? But the workshop was open, and when I entered I could see that the storeroom was, too, and the light was on.”
“Didn’t you wonder why?” the detective asked, watching Jaymie’s eyes intently.
“Bill was here earlier working on a speaker. I thought maybe he was still there, or back again working on it. That’s why I walked right in, and that’s when I found Shelby. Actually I thought it was her mom, Lori Wozny, at first, because of the coat.”
“The coat?”
She explained about Lori’s red plaid coat and that the woman worked at the heritage house as a custodian. “I saw them earlier, and Lori had that coat on. Shelby was wearing just a skinny leather jacket, and I thought how cold she must have been. It was starting to snow, not much, just like it is now. I saw Lori, Shelby and a guy, maybe her brother? He kind of looked like her, that’s why I thought . . . Anyway, I thought it was Lori at first, but when I turned her over I found that it was poor Shelby. She was just covered in blood! Is she going to be okay? Maybe she can tell you what happened.”
“Did you see anyone leaving, or have any impression of someone here?”
“Why?”
“Just answer the question.”
Jaymie’s stomach turned. “I didn’t see a soul. I think I paused for a moment before going in; it was such a nice night! But it was quiet. I’d have heard if anyone was still there.”
“So you saw her earlier. Did you speak to her? Or see anything?”
“I didn’t speak to her. She was arguing with the fellow that was with her and her mom, the one I think is her brother. Other than that, I didn’t see anything else.”
“It looked like you remembered something just then. What is it?”
“Nothing, except . . . earlier today she did have a couple of run-ins,” Jaymie said, and told the detective about Cody and Shelby in the Emporium, and her apparent argument with her boss, Delaney Meadows. “I think I saw Cody Wainwright here, near the band shell. But I didn’t see him anywhere near the village.”
“You can go home. I may want to see you tomorrow.”
“I’ll be out at the Queensville Historic Manor most of the day, but you can find me there,” Jaymie said. The manor was where a murder had happened just a few weeks before, so Detective Vestry definitely knew where it was. The police chief had virtually taken over that investigation, and for the first time, Jaymie wondered if that had irritated the detective, undermining her chance to solve the crime. The police chief was a different kind of guy and followed his own rules, while the detective seemed a straitlaced and unimaginative, though competent, investigator.
“I know where it is, if I need you,” the detective said.
Jaymie walked down the slope to where Bill was just finishing talking to the officer. The chatter of police radios and thrum of heavy motors filled the night air. Somewhere in the distance a dog barked, startling a flock of Canada geese that took to flight, unusual at that time of night. They honked in irritation, dark blots against the indigo sky.
“Are you okay, honey?” Bill said, grabbing her shoulders and looking into her eyes. “You don’t look like yourself.”
She was shivering, shaken to the core, and perhaps her shock showed on her face. “She was so badly hurt, Bill,” she said, wrapping the blanket more tightly around her shoulders, trying to warm up. “I hope she’s going to be okay.”
His eyes misted and he put his arm around her shoulders. “I knew her when she was just a little thing; drove the school bus for a while, and she and her brother were always going at it hammer and tongs. But just let one of the other kids taunt one of ’em and they’d stick together.”
“Are they Lori’s only kids?”
“Nah, she’s got a couple of younger ones from Walt Wozny, her ex.”
“Did you see them tonight? They were all here: Lori, Shelby and I guess her brother?”
He nodded. “Yup. Lori and I talked for a few minutes. Shelby and Travis were arguing about something, I think it was some boyfriend of hers he didn’t like, and some girl he’d been seeing. Anyway, they were going at it. She screamed at him to mind his own business and leave her love life out of it.”
Was Shelby defending Cody or Glenn? Or was there another boyfriend? Jaymie prayed that she would recover soon so she could tell the police who had done such an awful thing to her. It would be a long road to recovery, given how bad her injuries had looked to Jaymie, but she had family, and that was the most important relationship of all. “I’m so tired,” Jaymie said. “I have to be up early because I have to get everything ready for the manor house grand opening tomorrow.” She moved from foot to foot. “But I can’t stop thinking about her. The poor girl! She was beaten badly, Bill. Very badly.”
“Let me walk you home. You seem kind of woozy.”
She was grateful. She had known Bill Waterman for years, but lately, with her work on the historic house, she had the chance to work alongside him. He was dependable, helpful and gracious, a real down-to-earth guy. “I appreciate it.”
He took her arm and walked her back to her place in silence. Jaymie realized for the first time how close to home this hit for Bill. It was his workshop, and more especially his storeroom, and he’d known Shelby as a child. “How do you feel?” she asked, as they turned down her street, one streetlight fluttering and going out as they walked past it.
“I understand now how you felt last spring when that fellow was killed on your back porch. It gets you in your gut, doesn’t it?”
“It does,” she said feelingly, squeezing his arm to her side. “It feels like . . . oh, how to put it? It feels like it belongs to you somehow, like you need to see it solved.”
He nodded and sighed as they approached her front do
or. “Shelby will come through. She’s a strong girl, a real sweetheart at the core of her, though she seems a kinda tough nut.”
She gave him a quick hug and said, “We’ll keep sending good thoughts her way. And to her mom.” She paused. “Bill, one question. When I came up to the workshop tonight the storage room door was unlocked. I remember now that the padlock was hanging from the hasp, so it wasn’t jimmied with a bolt cutter or anything. Did you leave the padlock undone?”
“I did not! It was locked up right and tight when I left it after fixing the speaker.”
“Who all has keys?”
“Me, you, Jewel and I keep an extra hidden.”
“Hidden where?”
He grimaced. “On top of the door frame, in case I forget mine or need someone to open up the storage for me.”
So, not as secure as Jaymie had thought. Anyone could have known about the extra key, or have even seen him get it down. Including Cody, who had been working with Bill that very day, coming and going from the workshop.
He patted her shoulder and turned to head away. “I’ll see you tomorrow, Jaymie, at the manor. You get some sleep now, and everything will look brighter in the morning.”
• • •
IT WAS EARLY, but the day was going to be a busy one. The phone was ringing and Jaymie hopped back to her bedroom from the bathroom on one foot, her slipper coming off at the heel. She plunked down on her bed as Hoppy barked and wobbled up the steps to get up on her bed on his own. “Hello?”
It was Valetta. “Jaymie, I just heard about last night. It’s terrible!”
“It was awful, Val. I can’t believe my rotten luck.”
“Well, sure, but poor Shelby!”
“Of course you’re right,” Jaymie said, chastened. She sat down on the bed and petted Hoppy with her free hand. “Actually, I’m grateful I found her, or she would have lain there all night and may have died.”
“The church is starting a donation to help Lori out.”
“Count me in for whatever you need. I’ll check with the others and make sure Lori doesn’t have to work at the manor but still gets paid. I don’t want her to have to worry about anything but getting Shelby better.”
“Hold on a sec!” Valetta said. “I’ve got another call coming in.”
The phone went silent. Jaymie pulled her slippers off and wandered around her room with the phone to her ear, putting away a book, a contemporary Christmas tale she had finished the night before when she couldn’t sleep, and getting out another to put by her bedside. A comfort read . . . Mary Balogh, Christmas Beau, an old Regency, and a second, A Christmas Bride. They would do. She selected the three books from her shelf and stacked them on her nightstand.
She glanced out the window. It had snowed overnight, but only an inch or two; it was blowing around until she couldn’t even see her backyard at times. That made her clothing decision for the day easy. She would wear thermal leggings until she changed into her thirties-era housewife costume. This was a day she had been looking forward to for months, the official grand opening of the Queensville Historic Manor, but her enthusiasm was dampened as she thought of poor Shelby and her mom. The phone clicked again, and Valetta came back on the line.
“That was Dee,” she said. “Poor Shelby is in a coma.”
Jaymie was shocked. “Oh, no! Is it medically induced?”
“No, it’s a result of a blow to the head, from what I understand. She was not only beaten, but hit her head on something.”
“Maybe the workbench,” Jaymie said, remembering the blood on the edge of it. And the shred of fabric caught in a splinter.
“She was conscious when she got to the hospital but lapsed into a coma during the night, Dee says.”
Jaymie squeezed her eyes shut and took a deep breath, whispering a prayer. She opened her eyes. “I hope she comes out of it.”
“Me, too. I wonder if the police found out who did it yet?”
“I was hoping she’d be able to tell them. Maybe she did before she became comatose.”
“I guess we’ll know if they arrest someone. I have to get going. I’m picking up William and Eva to take them shopping so Brock can get some work done. Eva wants to buy her dad a Christmas gift. What the heck do I tell a nine-year-old to get for her father?”
“Gloves. There isn’t a man alive who has a complete pair of gloves or can keep track of them if he does have them.”
“Good thought! I’ll inspect Brock when I see him and try to finagle out his glove situation.”
“Or maybe a personalized mug!”
“Ooh, I like that better. You know how I feel about mugs.”
Jaymie got dressed and walked Hoppy, fed the animals and baked some treats to take to the manor, all the while thinking of Shelby. Just as she was taking a tray of brownies out of the oven, the phone rang. It was Jakob!
“Hey,” she said softly, smiling just thinking about him.
“Hey,” he said, his tone husky. “I heard what happened last night, that girl being hurt and you finding her. Are you okay?”
“I’m all right. It was awful, but I’m grateful I found her. She was hurt so bad.” She told him what she had heard about Shelby lapsing into a coma. “Maybe the coma is her body’s way of healing. I know doctors sometimes put someone in a coma so they can get better.”
“Poor kid.” He paused for a moment, then said, “I’ve been thinking about you all night.”
A warm glow kindled in her heart. “It was so nice to see you and Jocelyn. Are you at the store?”
“I am, and someone is with me and wants to say hello.”
There was a pause, and a high voice said, “Hello?”
“Hey, Jocie, how are you?”
“I’m very good, thank you,” she said, her manners impeccable. “Miss Jaymie, my oma asked if you would like a Lebkuchen.”
“Uh . . .” What did one say when one didn’t know what you were being offered?
She heard a whisper, Jakob’s voice in the background. Jocie protested, then came back on the line. “It’s a spice cake, Daddy said to tell you, but I said you’d know what it is because you know how to bake.”
Ah, the reliance of a child on an adult’s all knowingness! “I think I would love a Lebkuchen. My family is coming just before Christmas and I could share it with them.” A new tradition perhaps; Lebkuchen for Christmas.
“I’m putting Daddy back on. See you later!”
“Hey, me again,” Jakob said. “My mom told me to tell you that if you’re staying in Michigan, you’re welcome at her home for Christmas Eve, or Heiliger Abend. That’s when we do our big Christmas thing.”
She felt a tug at her heartstrings. “I won’t be able to,” she said, with real regret. “I’ll be on my way to Canada Christmas Eve morning. We’re headed to London to have Christmas with my grandmother and sister, Becca.”
“Oh. Of course. We’ll see you before then, though,” he said.
“I hope so.”
“I have to go. Take care today. I’ll keep that girl in my thoughts and hope she recovers.”
As he hung up, Jaymie clicked the off button on the phone in a thoughtful frame of mind. As much as she looked forward to her family Christmas, she would have given much to be with Jakob and Jocie on Christmas Eve, and to meet his family, as nervous as that made her. It was frightening how fast that imminent meeting had become so important to her.
She roused herself from her reverie; today was a big day, one she had been working toward for a while, and she had to get moving and focus. Today was the grand opening of the Queensville Historic Manor.
Eight
SHE WALKED, BECAUSE she knew that if everything went as hoped, parking would be at a premium. The heritage committee had paid a local landscaping company to mow the field beside the manor and pound fence posts into the still unfrozen ground, along wh
ich they strung several rows of wire to form a parking lot. Volunteers would direct traffic and keep it relatively orderly.
As she approached she could see the blow-up gingerbread man, a menacing look on its manic face as it wavered and gesticulated in the wind that whipped down the country road. “Whatever it takes to get people through the door,” she muttered, averting her gaze. She trotted up the steps and entered the warm home, now a hive of activity as heritage society members did last-minute touches.
Jewel, of Jewel’s Junk, was up on a tall ladder threading holly through the branches of the chandelier in the parlor, while Cynthia Turbridge, owner of the Cottage Shoppe, stood at the bottom, holding the ladder and making comments. They had both hired help for their shops in Queensville, committed to the historic home’s opening success. Mabel Bloombury was placing a flameless menorah in the center of her lovely table. Everyone had agreed that there would be no historically correct real candles used; too much chance of someone forgetting one, or a child or clumsy adult tipping one over. Haskell Lockland, president of the heritage society, was directing, as usual, while managing to do nothing. Others were bustling about, racing up and down the stairs and tweaking the decorations.
“Jaymie! Thank heaven you’re here,” Haskell said, striding toward her and taking her by the elbow. “What are we going to do about Lori Wozny? Can we expect her to work today? She was supposed to come out tonight and clean up the mess people will inevitably make. What are we going to do?”
“Mabel!” Jaymie called. “Jewel, Cynthia . . . Can you all come here?”
The women gathered in the hall and Jaymie explained her thoughts. In three minutes they had solved the crisis. Each would be responsible for their own area cleanup, and they would enlist others to help. Collectively they would clean the common areas and volunteer lounge. It would all be done. “And Lori should still be paid,” she added, meeting each woman’s eyes. All nodded. “I don’t want her having to worry while she’s at Shelby’s bedside.”
White Colander Crime Page 8
