by Dee Ernst
“He was. Mrs. Winship took him to the nurse because he started to cry. I felt kinda bad.”
“Well, baby, it wasn’t your fault. You were trying to be kind.”
She shrugged and finished her cereal in silence. Then she went upstairs and left me with Boot. I looked down at her soft brown eyes, then I stood up and looked out the window at the Mitchell house.
What the heck was going on there? Where was Lacey Mitchell?
“I think you’re being ridiculous,” Carol said. We were done with all the hills, and were on the walking path around the lake. This was my favorite part of our walk, through the tall oaks that rimmed the water. Since the path was maintained by the county, the walking trail was wide and well tended, no ruts or sizable rocks to contend with.
“I think the whole thing stinks,” Shelly said.
“Maybe,” Maggie said. “But what can we do about it?”
“I was thinking about talking to the police,” I said.
“And tell them what?” Carol asked.
I had no answer. I’d been running stuff over in my mind, and I had no idea what I thought, let alone what to do.
“Last night, you were convinced we were all overreacting,” Shelly said. “Now you want to call the police? What happened?”
“Doug spent most of the night pacing around his bedroom.”
Shelly raised an eyebrow. “And we know that how?”
I made a face. “I couldn’t sleep. Every time I got up, the light was on, and I could see him pacing.”
“Still,” Carol said. “That means nothing.”
“This morning Tessa told me that she tried to talk to Jordan about the sick grandpa, and Jordan got upset and said his grandpa got killed.” I looked around. “And I just happened to be walking Boot past the Mitchell house last night, and she was following something into the garage, and the one door happened to be open, and I saw that Lacey's car was missing.”
“Grandpa got killed?” Maggie echoed.
“Lacey’s car is missing?” Carol asked. “Now that sounds like something.”
“Let’s look at this,” I said. “Lacey’s father died suddenly, or was possibly killed, and left a lot of money to someone, maybe Lacey, because for some reason the wife wasn’t even mentioned in the obituary. At all. Lacey is gone, and her husband lied about her whereabouts. Her car is gone. And he told us he took her to the train station. We heard him say that. Her sons are really upset about something.”
“You might have something,” Carol said slowly. “It’s starting to get more complicated. Maybe you could just, you know, talk to a detective or something? In fact, you could go and see Sam Kinali.”
“Who?” I asked.
She carefully stepped over a stray tree branch. “He’s a detective with Lawrence Township. I’ve met him a few times. He presented a few programs at the main library, and he seemed very friendly. In fact, I’m closing today and don’t have to be a work until four, so I’ll go with you.”
Going to the police. So, we were going to find out what had happened to Lacey and become neighborhood heroes, or we’d discover that nothing had happened at all and become neighborhood laughing stocks.
We walked a little farther, and Carol spoke again.
“So, I met someone on Fish.”
Carol had started dating. Her husband had been dead for almost five years, and recently she’d decided to sign up for every dating site she could find. Her conversations were peppered these days with a sort of cyber-dating shorthand—Fish, JDate, FOB and SOH. Fish was Plenty of Fish, a dating site, as was JDate. FWB meant friends with benefits (a big no-no for Carol), and SOH meant sense of humor (a must-have).
“Leon. He’s age appropriate and financially secure. He wants to meet for coffee.”
“Excellent,” Shelly said.
“I think so.” Carol was the type of woman who still wrote thank-you notes and used linen napkins when she had us all over for lunch. She approached dating with the same efficient sensibility that she used for changing her seasonal house decorations, sending out Christmas cards, and having her tires rotated. For her, there was a proper time and place for everything. Right now, Leon fit in perfectly.
“Does he have a friend for Ellie?” Shelly asked.
“Ellie,” I said loudly, “doesn’t need his friend.”
“Yes, you do,” Maggie said. “Do you want to grow old alone?”
I slowed to give Boot the chance to pee all over a fallen log. “I have children, Maggie. I’m never going to be alone.”
“Okay, then,” she countered. “Do you want Cait choosing your nursing home?“
What could I say to these women? Sure, they were all my friends, and yes, I’d throw myself in front of a bus for them. But I could never admit, not even to these best of confidants that I was still madly in love with my ex-husband.
“I’m sure Cait will do an excellent job, but thanks for thinking of me.”
We walked the rest of the way in silence. We all liked to talk, but we all also enjoyed that moment, halfway around the lake, when the only thing you could hear was birdsong and the sound of our breathing.
It appeared that any Lacey Mitchell conversation was closed until we found ourselves directly in front of the Mitchell house. We all stopped and stared.
“I wonder if her car is still gone,” Shelly asked no one in particular.
“Are you thinking that someone returned it in the middle of the night?” Carol asked.
We all walked up the driveway. The left-side door of the garage was open, as it always was during the day. Yes, I suppose anyone could have snuck in and stolen any number of empty garbage cans or rakes or shovels, but that usually wasn’t a problem in Mt. Abrams.
We walked into the garage. No Suburban.
We started back down the drive, when Shelly stopped short. “The back door is open,” she said.
We looked. Yes. The screen was shut tight, but the actual door stood ajar.
“I wonder if somebody’s in there,” Maggie said in a somewhat hushed voice.
Shelly climbed the back steps, opened the screen, and yelled, “Hello.”
Silence.
Shelly opened the door further and yelled again.
“What are you doing?” Carol hissed.
“Checking to see if everything is all right,” Shelly said.
“What are you hoping to find?” I called softly.
She turned and grinned. “Who knows? But don’t you really want to see what the inside looks like?”
Maggie bounded up the back steps. “Right with you.”
Carol cleared her throat. “I refuse to participate in breaking and entering.”
“That’s fine. Then hold the dogs and yell if somebody comes.” I handed her Boot’s and Buster’s leashes.
She glared at me. “This is actually illegal,” she warned.
I climbed the steps behind Maggie and went into the Mitchell house.
“It’s very clean.” Maggie whispered.
“Why are you whispering?” Shelly asked. “No one is here, remember?”
“What if Lacey is tied up in the attic?” Maggie said, voice still hushed.
“Then she’d probably want to hear another voice so she can stomp on the floor and get rescued,” I said. “Do you hear her pounding on the attic floor with her tied-up feet?” We all stopped and stared up at the ceiling. Nothing.
“Okay, then,” Maggie said in her normal voice. “It’s really clean.”
It was. The kitchen had been redone in that pseudo-country style, with whitewashed cabinets, a farmer’s sink, and butcher block on the large island. We walked slowly through the kitchen into the dining room, then into the living room, turned left through the hall to a small office, then back into the hall to the stairs.
“And it’s pretty,” Shelly said.
She was right. The rooms were beautifully decorated, but showed no personality at all. There were no framed photos, no kid art on the side of the refrigerator. The pi
llows had obviously never been used to smack a younger brother, and nobody had dared to kick at the rungs of the dining room chairs.
It was very quiet. I could hear a clock ticking somewhere, but that was all. All the windows were shut, and the air had a faint potpourri scent. “It’s really quiet,” I said. My house was always talking to me—a creak of the floorboards, the wind through an off-center window frame, the rustling of leaves against the side of the house.
“With two boys, how is this so clean?” Maggie asked. “Where are all the toys?”
“They must have a maid,” Shelly said.
“Maybe they’re waiting for Country Living magazine to come by for a photo shoot,” I said. I put my hand on the stairway banister and looked up the stairway. “What do you think?”
“Well, in for a penny, in for a pound,” Maggie said, pushing me up the stairs.
The landing was big enough to function as the family room, and it looked like people lived there. The remote control was on the floor, and video games were crammed into a very large, and I knew, expensive Longaberger basket.
“I’ll take the master,” Shelly called. “You guys take the boys’ rooms.”
I stared after her. “Since when did we become Charlie’s Angels?” I muttered. Maggie giggled and slipped into a bedroom.
I walked into Jordan’s room. I’d like to say I used a clever detecting technique to figure out whose room it was, but since his name was spelled out on the wall in large wooden letters, I couldn’t boast too much. His bed was made. All his Legos were in bins, his completed sets on a shelf. There were lots of age-appropriate books on his nightstand and a very scruffy stuffed panda on the bed.
“Guys, come here,” Shelly called.
I went back out and followed Maggie into the master bedroom.
Shelly stood in front of the walk-in closet. A walk-in? In Mt. Abrams? Most of the old Victorians had a single closet for the whole family. A walk-in was unheard of.
“Wow,” Maggie said reverently. “Look at all that space.”
I looked. She was right. There was a lot of room in the closet, because it was half empty. Only men’s clothes hung there.
“Her clothes are all gone,” Maggie said.
I turned and looked around. There was nothing on the vanity, no perfume bottles, not even a comb. I crossed the room to start opening dresser drawers. They were all empty until I came to one filled with men’s socks.
“Nobody packs everything they own just to take a trip, no matter how long they think they’ll be gone.” I said, closing the last drawer slowly.
“Where did all her clothes go, if she didn’t pack them in her car and drive away?” Shelly asked.
Maggie shuddered. “Let’s get out of here. This place is too perfect. It’s giving me the creeps.”
As I stepped back into the landing, I looked up and saw the attic access panel. I stopped so short that Shelly bumped me from behind.
“What?” she asked, then followed my stare. “Do you think?”
I shrugged and reached up, grabbing the chain, and pulling open the attic steps.
My house had the same access. I unfolded the ladder, and we all looked up into the darkness.
“I went up the stairs first,” I said. “Somebody else can climb up there first.”
Maggie took a deep breath and climbed up the ladder.
I guess I was expecting her to scream in horror, or at least gasp. What she did is laugh and come back down the steps.
“Cleanest attic I have ever seen,” she said, refolding the ladder and pushing it back up. “Neatly arranged file boxes and an empty clothing rack. Totally boring.”
We went back downstairs and out the back door. Carol was sitting on the picnic table bench, a dog leash in each hand, and a disgusted expression on her face.
“Done? What were you all thinking, just going into that man’s house like that? You should all be ashamed of yourselves. And I bet you didn’t learn a thing.”
I took Boot’s leash and shook my head. “Wrong there. We did learn something. Lacey doesn’t live here anymore.”
Chapter 4
We were in my kitchen, drinking coffee, not talking. I had three projects waiting for me upstairs, and I wouldn’t get paid this week if I didn’t finish them, but all I could think about was the empty dresser drawers in the Mitchell house.
Shelly had spooned sugar into her coffee and was still stirring it, and the spoon was making soft clinking noises as it hit the sides of the mug. I had been listening to it for what seemed to be ten minutes.
“Shel, stop stirring,” I growled. “I think your sugar has dissolved by now.”
She shot me a look. “What’s with you anyway? You’re a bit touchy.”
“I think something awful happened to Lacey,” I blurted out. “I can’t stop thinking about her. Which is so weird, because I don’t know her well and certainly don’t like her very much. Carol, do you have a number for this Sam person?”
She shook her head. “No, but I can get one. I’ll see if we can get an appointment later this morning.” She pushed away from the table, got up, and put her mug in the sink. “Shelly, all her clothes were really gone? How very distressing. And before Mother’s Day. Poor Lacey. And her poor little boys.”
I could hear Cait on the stairs, and she came into the kitchen wearing a T-shirt and a thong. She froze, looked around, then glared at me.
“Gee, Mom, thanks for the warning.”
I waved a hand. “Why are you worried? Shelly used to see you naked. So did Carol. You usually aren’t up this early.”
“Yeah, I know. It’s weird. Hey, everyone, just comin’ by for coffee.” She waved and popped a pod in the Keurig. “Are you having a meeting or something? You look pretty serious.”
“We’re going to the police about Lacey Mitchell,” I told her.
She nodded. “Wow. Well. Are you going to take it to Missing Persons?”
Carol shook her head. “No, dear, I know a detective there. Sam Kinali. Your mother told me about France. How very exciting for you.”
Caitlyn actually blushed. Cait grew up loving words, and for her, the library was almost sacred, which put Carol on some sort of pedestal from which she would never be able to climb down. “Thanks, Mrs. B. Yeah, I’m pretty stoked. You make sure Mom doesn’t go too crazy.”
Carol smiled graciously and left. Shelly sat back and stared at Cait. “Are you sure this isn’t about some boy?”
Cait looked at her in surprise. “Boy? You mean like go all the way to France just to be with some guy?”
Shelly shrugged. “Or to go all the way to France to not be with some guy.”
My daughter turned beet red as she added cream to her coffee mug.
“Cait?” I stared at her, then at Shelly. “Who?”
“It’s nothing,” Cait muttered and practically ran from the kitchen.
I pushed my coffee away from me and glared at Shelly. “What do you know that I don’t?”
Shelly looked very innocent. “Kyle Lieberman.”
I frowned. “You mean Kyle Lieberman who was her best friend in third grade? Skinny Kyle with the awful nose and big blue eyes?”
Shelly was smirking. “Yep. Only his nose isn’t awful any more, and his eyes are still as blue. Just graduated from Wharton. MBA. He’s been coming home to pack up his things from his parents’ house, and I know for a fact he and Cait were seen together down at Zeke’s.”
Zeke’s was Ezekiel’s Tavern, an old-style pub right next to the train station, with craft beers on tap and the best burgers in the county. It was a favorite of just about everyone in Mt. Abrams, not just for the food, but also because of its location.
I hardened my gaze at Shelly. “And you didn’t tell me because?”
“I just heard last night. Honestly. I would have said something this morning, but the conversation got hijacked.”
“Was that the guy in the beemer?” Maggie asked. She lived behind the Lieberman’s house. “He was way cute.�
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My daughter and Kyle Lieberman. Cait, who according to our brief and infrequent conversations on the subject, had spent the last few years going from one casual hook up to another, was perhaps finally finding happiness with the boy almost next door.
Talk about the world being full of mysteries.
Lawrence Township may sound small and country-like, but it was in fact, a very large, sprawling town of over fifty thousand people in an area of over twenty-five square miles, thirty minutes due west of New York City. The police station had been rebuilt about ten years ago, and it was a large, imposing place adjacent to the municipal court right across the courtyard from Town Hall.
Carol and I walked through the glass doors into a small lobby, past the bulletin board to a thick window. A very young-looking officer behind the glass leaned forward to speak into a microphone.
“Yes?”
“I have an appointment with Detective Kinali,” Carol said.
The officer nodded, spoke into a phone, and a few seconds later, the door clicked and swung open.
“Come on through,” he said.
We walked through the door into a short empty corridor. A door on the other end opened and a man stood there, smiling.
“Mrs. Anderson. How lovely to see you,” he said, and we followed him into the squad room.
There were a dozen or so desks, half of them empty, and a buzz in the room, but there didn’t seem to be much actually happening. No jaded hookers slumped in a chair, no shivering junkies, not even a happy drunk. Crime in Lawrence Township appeared to be nonexistent. Detective Kinali led us to a small glass-enclosed room, held the door open, then closed it behind us and sat across the small metal table from us. He took out a small notebook and asked us for our names, spelled out, please, then our addresses and phone numbers. He closed his notebook and folded his hands in front of him. “Now, what can I do for you?”
I almost said “marry me.” He was pretty much the sexiest man I had ever seen in real life, and I think my tongue was hanging down to the floor.
He was big. Not just tall, although he was probably over six feet, but big everywhere—broad shoulders and a barrel chest, thick neck and large, strong-looking hands. He was probably my age, maybe older, his hair turning silver, with a slight softening at the jaw.
