Heart of Gold

by B. J Daniels

  “Baby,” he said, stepping to her and kissing her. “You’re nose is as cold as a snowman’s. I should have gone for the food,” he said as he planted kisses down the slope of her throat to her collarbone. “You’re too good to me. How can I make it up to you?” He drew back to meet her gaze. “I’m not all that hungry yet. I was thinking—”

  She knew exactly what he was thinking. “There’s something I need to tell you first.”

  He froze. “You’re not...”

  “Pregnant?” She shook her head. “Could we just sit down?”

  With a big sigh, he led the way into the living room and dropped into one of the recliners angled at the huge television taking up one wall. There was some kind of game on.

  “Sit with me,” she said, taking a spot on the couch. “Could you turn off the TV?”

  He shoved himself up, found the remote and muted the television before coming over to the couch. She tried not to let his moaning and groaning irritate her. “I’ve never told you about my past.”

  “If this is about some other boyfriend, can’t it wait? The food is getting cold.”

  Now he was worried about the food getting cold? “I had a stepsister named Lindy. She was murdered.”

  His eyes widened. At least now she had his attention.

  “I’ve always blamed myself. She and I were fighting that night and I locked her out of the house. I’m not sure exactly what happened, just that she was screaming to be let back in and then she wasn’t. I opened the door. She wasn’t there. I left the door unlocked and went back upstairs. I heard someone come in. I just assumed it was her... Now I realize that it could have been the killer. That he’d come into the house for me—after he’d killed her.”

  “Whoa. That’s horrible.”

  She nodded. “The only thing that saved me is that a policeman stopped by. There’d been an accident. My father and stepmother had gone off the road on their way back from a party. I don’t know if they got a desperate call from Lindy when she came back into the house or if they were just headed home on their own. They’d been drinking and my father was probably driving too fast.

  “Anyway, my father was killed. My stepmother was hospitalized after she was found unconscious downstream later. I was fourteen and taken by social services to be put into a foster home. I think they assumed my stepmother would take me after that. She never did.”

  Daniel sat back shaking his head. “Wow, Charlie, I’m so sorry. That’s terrible. Thanks for sharing that. I know it must have been tough.”

  She could tell that he was relieved to have the story over. He reached for her, since he still had only one thing on his mind.

  “That’s only part of it,” she said, moving so he couldn’t draw her to him. She saw impatience flicker across his expression.

  “There’s more?”

  “The more part is why I’ve been putting you off lately when you called or wanted to come up to my apartment. I’ve been seeing Lindy, my dead stepsister.”

  “Seeing her?” he asked slowly.

  “I saw her standing across the street a couple of times. Then I found my favorite doll destroyed on my doorstep.”

  “Your doll?”

  “From when I was fourteen. My father had given it to me. It was a collector’s edition. Anyway, today I ran into Lindy—literally. I looked into her eyes. It was her.”

  “So...she’s not dead? This is good news, right?”

  “I don’t know. But I have someone looking into what is going on. He’s an old friend from a long time ago.”

  “Like a PI?”

  “Something like that. He’s staying with me.”

  “That’s cool,” Daniel said and reached again to put his arm around her. “So we’re good?”

  She shook off his arm again and stood. “I don’t think you understand. Someone is stalking me. My dead stepsister. And my boss at work... I think he has a crush on me and his fiancée is insanely jealous. So there is nothing cool about what I’m going through right now.”

  He sighed heavily. “What do you want me to do? You said you’ve got some PI looking into it. I’m sure he’ll figure it out. Are you afraid I’ll think you’re crazy or something? I mean your story is rather unbelievable, but...hey. If you say you saw a dead woman...” He shrugged. “Now can we—”

  “No, we can’t,” she said, hating that she was seeing Daniel through Shep’s eyes. Daniel was just an overgrown kid who made a living playing video games. Who only thought about beer, food and sex and not always in that order. “This isn’t working for me.”

  Daniel threw himself back on the couch as he swore. “I saw this coming. You’ve been acting so weird lately.”

  “I just told you why I’ve been acting so...weird, as you call it.”

  His gaze took her in for a moment. “I said I’m sorry. Whatever is going on will pass so don’t blow it out of proportion just because you’re upset about this stepsister of yours. You and I are good together.” He stood up and moved toward her. “Maybe if you’d let me show you...”

  “Forget it. I’m done.” She started toward the kitchen just as his roommate came in, stomping snow off his shoes.

  “Oops, looks like I came back too early?” Jason asked and laughed. He worked at the same video game company as Daniel. “Or maybe I was gone just long enough?”

  Charlie wanted to slap that sneer off Jason’s face. She hadn’t liked him from the first. Oh, you’ll get used to him. He likes you, Daniel had said. He’s always asking about you.

  She pulled on her coat and boots and started to leave when she saw the bag of food she’d brought still sitting on the kitchen table. Storming over, she grabbed it up and headed for the door.

  “She’s taking the food?” she heard Jason say. “Now that’s cold. You must have really pissed her off.”

  “Shut up, Jas,” Daniel said.

  She slammed the door behind her and stepped out into the falling snow. She hadn’t gone but a few feet when Shep fell in beside her.

  She glared over at him. “What if I hadn’t left until morning?”

  He shrugged.

  “You were that sure I wasn’t staying long?”

  “What’s in the sack?”

  She shoved it at him. “Dinner. On Daniel.”

  Out of the corner of her eye she saw Shep smile. “Even better.”

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  SHEP WATCHED CHARLIE help herself to another pulled pork slider as she wailed, “You must think I’m the biggest fool on the planet.” They were curled up on the couch, Friday night dinner spread across the coffee table, a home remodeling show on the television and a bottle of wine half gone.

  “Do not say, I told you so,” she warned him before he could comment.

  He merely nodded and let her talk as he dipped French fries into ranch dressing.

  “You were right,” she concluded. “He was just this big, overgrown boy who thinks fart jokes are funny. How did I not see that sooner?” She groaned and pushed the last of the sliders in his direction along with her remaining fries.

  Pouring herself more wine, she tucked her bare feet under her and snuggled into the corner of the couch facing him. “You still don’t think I saw Lindy.”

  “Truthfully, I don’t know what to think. I called the judge and he had someone pick up the scarf to take to the lab. Apparently he is pulling some strings until the time when we have to call in law enforcement. I noticed there were numerous strands of blond hair caught in the fabric.”

  “If they’re Lindy’s, then she’s alive.”

  He couldn’t bring himself to go that far. Lindy was dead. The police wouldn’t have misidentified the body. But if it hadn’t been Lindy who was found murdered behind the house, then who was it? Some random blond girl passing by?

  They watched the television show for a while, making fun of th
e couple arguing over the size of the master bathroom.

  “It’s really over with you and Daniel?” he asked after a while.

  “Don’t sound so happy about it,” she said and sipped her wine, glowering at him over the rim of her glass.

  “I’m not happy. I’m sorry. Truly. But he wasn’t right for you.”

  “And you are?”

  He let out a nervous laugh. “I didn’t know I was an option on the table.”

  Her cheeks flamed and she looked away. “Don’t pay any attention to me. I don’t know what I’m saying. Grief and wine. A bad mix.”

  “Grief?”

  “I’m burying my relationship with Daniel.” She started as her cell phone rang. He worried it was Daniel coming to his senses.

  Charlie answered it. “She is? No, I’ll be right there.” She disconnected. “It’s my friend from work, Tara. She’s in labor. Her husband is taking her to the hospital now. I promised I would be there.”

  Shep put down his wineglass. “Let’s take my truck. You can navigate.”

  Just as they entered the hospital, Shep got a call from the judge. “I’ll find you,” he said and stepped back outside.

  “I just heard back from the lab,” the judge said without preamble. “There were two sets of fingerprints on the doll, but only the one set was in the system.”

  Shep waited impatiently for a few moments before he said, “And?”

  The judge cleared his throat. “The clearest set, the one in the system, belonged to Lindy Parker.”

  Shep couldn’t contain his shock. “How is that possible?”

  “She must have handled the doll.”

  “She’s been dead fifteen years.”

  “Because of the surface material, the prints obviously stayed. Fingerprints can last on some surfaces as long as forty years.”

  Shep knew that was the reasonable explanation, but it wasn’t going to be one that Charlie accepted. She was convinced that Lindy was alive.

  “And the other prints?” Shep asked.

  “Your guess is as good as mine until we have a suspect to compare them with.”

  * * *

  CHARLIE WAS TIRED after a long emotional night, but still in awe on the ride back to her apartment. “It was so...incredible. I’ve never seen anything like that before. Did I tell you that Tara is going to name her daughter after me?”

  Shep chuckled. “You mentioned that.”

  “I was holding Tara’s hand when the baby came into the world. The doctor placed the baby girl on Tara’s chest.” Charlie looked over at him. “You should have seen it. I cried harder than the baby. She is just so...perfect. So small and so beautiful.”

  She took a breath and frowned, remembering he’d gotten a call just as they arrived at the hospital. “Did the judge call you earlier?”

  He nodded and glanced over at her.

  “It’s bad news, right?”

  “Not necessarily,” he said without looking at her. He sounded irritated that bad news had been her first thought. Wait until he got to really know her. “The lab found prints on the doll.”

  Charlie held her breath as she stared at him. Clearly he didn’t want to tell her, which told her that she already knew. “Whose were they?”

  “Lindy’s.”

  Expecting nothing less, she still gasped.

  “Now, don’t go jumping to conclusions,” he warned quickly.

  How could she not?

  “The judge said because of the doll’s surface material, the prints must have been on there from fifteen years ago.”

  Charlie let out a snort. “And you believe that?”

  “The judge told me that fingerprints can last up to forty years on some surfaces if not disturbed.”

  She found that hard to believe, but if the judge said it was true... “But the doll had been disturbed.”

  He seemed to ignore that. “There was another set of prints, but they didn’t come up in the national AFIS system, he said.”

  Charlie fell a chill rattle up her spine. “I guess we’ll know when the blond hair on the scarf comes back, won’t we?”

  Shep said nothing as he parked the pickup in front of her apartment and they got out. Her earlier euphoria hadn’t dimmed with the news. Lindy had touched her doll. But when?

  * * *

  SHEP SENSED SOMETHING was wrong the moment Charlie started to unlock the door to her apartment and he saw the fresh marks in the wood near the lock.

  “Don’t move,” he whispered close to her ear and quickly stepped past her to open the door.

  It didn’t take but a minute to search the small apartment. The place had obviously been broken into but the intruder was long gone. He could guess what the person had been looking for. The scarf.

  He came back into the living room to find Charlie where he’d left her.

  “It was Lindy,” she said. “I can smell her perfume.” Shep caught the familiar scent as well. “She was looking for the scarf.”

  “Someone was looking for the scarf,” he said, only able to agree to a point.

  Charlie sighed and took off her coat to hang it by the door. “At least she didn’t make too big of a mess.” She began picking up the coats that had been thrown on the floor by the coat rack.

  “I’ll do this if you want to see to the bedroom since it’s so late,” Shep said. The mess in the living room and kitchen weren’t bad. Whoever had done this had also emptied out all the dresser drawers in the bedroom and ransacked the closet.

  A while later, she came out of the bedroom saying she was finished. There was a knock at the door and they exchanged looks. Daniel? She motioned for him to go into the bedroom as she headed for the door.

  Shep was wondering why he still had to hide when he heard Charlie say through the locked door, “Who is it?”

  “It’s me. Amanda. I have to talk to you.”

  He looked back at Charlie from the bedroom door. She groaned and motioned him away before she opened the apartment door. Like before, he left the door ajar so he could listen. If this was the woman who’d doctored Charlie’s food at the restaurant, he wasn’t about to leave them alone in the same room without hearing what was going on.

  “Amanda?” Charlie said. “Do you realize what time it is?”

  “I’ve been waiting for you to get home,” Amanda snapped, like it was Charlie’s fault she was at her door so late.

  “What are you doing here?”

  “We have to talk.”

  “It’s the middle of the night. Can’t it wait until Monday?”

  “No.”

  He got a glimpse of the blonde forcing her way in before he stepped back out of sight, still leaving the bedroom door ajar.

  * * *

  “WHAT IS SO important that it can’t wait?” Charlie said, taking a step back as Amanda forced her way in. “I just got back from the hospital. Tara had her baby. A girl.” She closed the door and turned to find Amanda standing in the middle of the apartment, taking it all in with a critical eye. Clearly she wasn’t impressed with what she saw.

  “I figured you were out with one of your boyfriends,” the woman said, completely ignoring the part about Tara and her baby girl. “One is apparently not enough for you.”

  Charlie shot a glance toward the partially open bedroom door before crossing her arms over her chest and demanding, “What is it you want, Amanda?”

  “Something is going on with Greg, but you wouldn’t know anything about that, would you?”

  “No, I wouldn’t.”

  Amanda made a rude noise. “I know about the two of you.”

  “There is no two of us. Greg’s my boss. That’s it.”

  “Then how do you explain the two of you in the bar down the street from the office?”

  How did she explain that? “If you must know, I’d f
orgotten Tara’s baby shower gift at my apartment. I stepped into the bar to get out of the snow to decide whether to go home for the gift or just go to the shower. It was that simple. Apparently Greg came out of our building and saw me. He insisted I have a glass of wine before going back out in the storm.”

  Amanda sneered at her. “What did you talk about?”

  “Nothing exciting. I asked him if he hired a headhunter to get me to come to work for him. He said he did—along with others besides me. We talked about my latest client and my presentation.” At least she thought they might have. She wasn’t about to tell Amanda that Greg had been in a peculiar mood and had seemed to want to talk about his past—and possibly present—relationships.

  Amanda looked hurt. “He didn’t mention me?”

  “He said the wedding was coming up quickly. I might have missed what else he said because I was thinking about what I would get you for a wedding present. I finished my wine, excused myself and went back to my apartment for Tara’s gift.”

  Amanda glared at her. “That’s not what the bartender told me. He said you went to the ladies’ room before you had a drink with him. Were you expecting Greg to come join you maybe?”

  “No!” Charlie realized she might have said it a little too sharply, a little too I-can’t-imagine-anything-more-disgusting. Amanda was studying her openly. “Amanda, have you asked yourself why you are so insecure about this relationship?”

  “I beg your pardon?”

  “You don’t seem to trust Greg. Why is that?”

  Amanda tossed her hair. “Because of women like you.”

  She meant women like her. “I’ve told you,” Charlie said. “I’m not interested in Greg. Tonight I broke up with Daniel and—”

  Just then, Shep came out of her bedroom. His hair was still wet from a shower and he wore nothing but a towel wrapped around his slim hips.

  “I’m sorry, am I interrupting?” he asked.

  Amanda looked at him agape. Charlie was doing the same thing. She hadn’t seen Shep like this in years. Everything about him appeared to have only improved since then—as if that were possible.