by A J Rivers
"The woman who moved into the house across the street from you?" he asks, sounding confused. "What woman?"
"Ruby." I dig back through my mind to the first time I saw her. "Baker. She moved in just a few days ago."
He turns around in his wheeled chair and pulls his feet like a Flintstones car to get to the file cabinet against the wall.
"You say it's the house across the street from yours?"
"Yes. Next to Janet and Paul Francis. The house with the extra lot as part of their yard and the attached garage. 2021."
He opens one of the drawers in the file cabinet and flips through the folders inside. It's strange to see a company that hasn't gone completely digital, but Derrick follows in the footsteps of his father and his father before him. Finally, he pulls out a folder and wheels his chair back to the desk.
"2021 Candlewood," he muses, opening the folder and scanning the papers inside for a few seconds. His expression changes. "Hmmm. Give me just a second."
He picks up the phone on his desk and hits a button. I hear it ring in the front of the building.
"Can you come in here for a second?"
The voice on the other end of the phone is muffled, so I don't hear it coming through the partially closed door. But the sharp click of the footsteps approaching the office tells me everything I need to know. Those are the clicks of gaudy leopard print heels too high for the office. And I know exactly who's attached to them.
"What do you need?" Pamela asks as she comes into the office.
"Tell me about 2021 Candlewood," Derrick says.
Her expression contorts with confusion.
"What do you mean?" she asks.
"Emma is concerned about a woman who moved into that house.”
"What are you talking about?" she asks.
"My new neighbor. She moved in a couple days ago," I explain.
"No, she didn't," Pamela frowns.
"I met her. She's come to my house twice," I say. "I saw her at the house."
"No one was at that house," Pamela insists. "It isn't for rent, it's for sale. There's been no interest."
"Thank you, Pamela," Derrick says.
She leaves, tossing me a glare as she goes. As soon as she leaves, I push the door closed and turn back to Derrick.
"Obviously, there's been some interest. She was there. Her stuff was all over the house," I say.
"Emma, I checked the file on that house. It has been available for quite some time and we haven't shown it to anyone. Pamela is the agent representing that particular property, so I wanted to ask her about it just in case she didn't put the proper notations into the records. That's one drawback to keeping paper records. Sometimes people don't want to keep up with them."
"Derrick, I met this woman. I saw her stuff in the house," I insist.
"The only thing I can think is it was a scam," Derrick says.
"What kind of scam would that even be?”
"I'm sure you've heard of real estate scams during your time in the Bureau."
"Not exactly my department," I tell him.
"Well, there's a fairly common scam involving properties available for sale. Someone presents themselves as the owner or landlord and fraudulently rents the property to a person willing to pay them in cash. Once they have the money, they disappear. The person eventually figures it out and has to leave," he explains.
"So, you're telling me you think I met a woman who was scammed into thinking she rented the house? And she disappeared in the middle of the night because she figured it out?" I ask.
I fight against the compulsion to mention the murder. I still need them to admit she was there in the first place.
"It's an explanation for how something like that could happen," he says. "But the people who do that usually access the property by stealing keys from a lockbox on the outside. We don't use lockboxes or allow potential buyers or renters to tour properties themselves. In order for someone to go into that house, they would need a key, and all the keys to that house are accounted for here."
Derrick stands and walks over to a large cabinet on the wall. He inputs a code into a keypad, and a light flashes green, allowing him to open the door. He picks one out and holds it out at eye level.
“Right here,” he says, holding it up to show me the thick plastic identification tag but purposely not letting me touch it. “2021 Candlewood.”
Chapter Nineteen
“Do you want to explain to me what happened at the Lionheart office today?” Sam asks as he comes into the kitchen that evening.
“Shit. They called you?” I ask.
“Pamela did,” he says, reaching into the pan on the stove to steal out one of the mushrooms I have browning.
“Of course she did. Did she conveniently slip in a note about what she was wearing, too?” I ask.
I walk over to the spice cabinet and start pulling out bottles.
“Leopard heels? Is that a thing?” he asks.
I glare at him over my shoulder, then roll my eyes and finally find the garlic powder.
“It is.”
“Good to know, but you’re not going to distract me. What happened up there today?”
I feel like somebody tattled on me to the principal. As I sprinkle the garlic into the mushrooms, I nod toward the large pot sitting in the sink.
“Can you fill that up?”
He nods and heads to the sink to put in the water for the pasta. Over the sound of the water, I finally admit it.
"I went around the neighborhood today asking people about Ruby," I tell him.
"Emma," he says, the name drawn out like he wants to pack as much meaning into the sound of it as he possibly can, so he doesn't have to use other words.
"When I first met her, she said she was going up and down the street, introducing herself with the neighbors. I can explain away why she might not have encountered Janet and Paul, but I figured there had to be someone who saw her. Or some sign of her at least," I plunge ahead.
"Alright. And?"
"No one saw her or knew about her or even met her. One did tell me he saw a landscaping truck outside the house. It's Davis Landscaping Solutions, the company Lionheart contracts with to take care of the houses they manage."
"So, a landscaping company that takes care of empty houses was at the house, and you think that's proof she was really there?" he asks.
"They don't just take care of empty houses. They do landscaping for people all around town. But the main point is he saw the truck twice in one week," I say.
"Okay?"
"It's November, Sam," I point out. "Why would a landscaping company need to go to a house twice in November?"
"That is strange, but we don't know exactly what the crew was doing there. One of the ornamental trees could have fallen, or there might have been problems with their equipment the first time they came that week. There could be a lot of explanations.”
“Exactly, which is why I decided I needed to find them. So, I went up to talk to Derrick.”
“And that's when you had your run-in with Pamela,” he says.
“I wouldn't exactly call it a run-in? Just our customary unpleasantness.”
“But she did tell you nobody lives in that house,” he points out.
“You already knew what happened, and you still had me go through the explanation?” I ask.
“I needed to know what you were going to say about it. She told me you were in their ranting and raving, and no one has gotten anywhere near that house in months except for the landscaping crew,” Sam says.
“So, now you think I'm crazy just like she does?”
“That's not what I'm saying. I'm just trying to figure all this out like you are. Pamela is the one who handles the house. She would be the one who would sell it or rent it out, and she hasn't done either.”
“I'm telling you, there was a woman in that house. Her name is Ruby Baker. Or, at least it was. Look.” I walk over to the counter and pick up the cake stand. “She baked me a cake. This
is her cake stand. A few days ago, when you called me in the morning, she was here. She came over to borrow some sugar and spend a little time here talking. Then she came back with the cake the next day. She told me she came to Sherwood because she was running from a really abusive relationship. He was apparently horrible to her, and she was afraid for her life. It looks like that was justified. Only nobody will believe that I saw her, much less that she was killed. So, he's going to get away with it.”
“What do you want to do?” he asks. “What would make you feel better about this whole situation?”
“Call Pamela back,” I say.
“What? Why would I do that?”
“Because she's the one who directly manages the house. Call her and ask her to let us inside. If we can get into the house, I can show you Ruby was there. Just because you didn't see her, doesn't mean her ex didn't take her body away. Get Pamela to let us inside to search the house.”
Sam doesn't look convinced, but he takes out his phone and calls Pamela. He stands in the kitchen while I get the pasta cooking. and I hear him explain to Pamela he wants to do a sweep of the house. He asks for somebody to send over a key, and a few seconds later gets off the phone.
“She's going to come over tomorrow and let us inside,” he says. “She doesn't let anybody take the key out without her being there.”
“Great,” I mutter.
I'm not exactly thrilled that she has to come along, but it makes sense. If she's the one responsible for the house, she's the one that’s going to take the heat for Ruby being there without Pamela making the proper records. She's going to want to come along and try to talk her way out of the sticky situation.
The next day I wait anxiously for Pamela to show up. She slides her dark red Miata up in front of my house five minutes late. I can't help but think it's intentional. She takes her sweet time, sweeping her hair back over her shoulder and adjusting the sunglasses on the bridge of her nose. With an exaggerated flourish, she sends a wry smile across the top of the car toward me on the porch.
"Sorry to be late. I got delayed at a showing for an actual person wanting to buy a house on Bayberry," she says.
I bite my tongue until the retort swelling in my throat finally fades away.
"Thanks for doing this," Sam says. "It shouldn't take long."
"I hope not. You're not going to find anything. No one has even looked at this house in months. I'm not sure why. It's a really cute house. Three bedrooms, two and a half baths. Living room, den, dining room, bonus room. Full basement," Pamela rattles off.
"We aren't looking to buy it,” I tell her.
Pamela's eyes slide over to me.
“Maybe it's the neighborhood,” she says.
“There has to be an explanation,” Sam says. “Emma has reason to believe the woman she met is in severe danger. So, I'm just going to take a look around and see if I can figure anything out.”
It's the first moment I feel a small bit of hope. Maybe Sam's right. Maybe when I looked into the window and saw Ruby on the floor, she was just unconscious. Maybe it’s possible she is still alive, and we can find her. All that matters is getting into the house and proving she was there so we can put our focus on what happened to her.
Pamela leads us across the street and takes the same key Derrick showed me yesterday out of her pocket. She unlocks the door and steps inside, getting out of the way to let us follow her. My heart squeezes painfully in my chest as soon as I step into the living room.
It's immaculate. It's completely empty, with no sign of any of the boxes or other items I saw there.
“See?” Pamela asks. “We had it cleaned after the last people moved out, and it's been this way since.”
The thought of the chocolate cake at the front of my mind, I rush into the kitchen. It's just as clean and stark as the living room, and my eyes lock on the oven. It's brand new, the door still secured shut, and a plastic bag with the owners’ manual taped to the front.
"The oven… " I start.
"Is new. Installed after the last people left, just like all the other appliances. None of them have ever been used," Pamela says.
"I'm going to look at the rest of the house," I say, walking past them.
"Be my guest. Just please don't mess anything up. If we ever can catch interest from someone, I'll like the house to still be presentable when I show them," she calls after me.
I rush from room to room, desperate for any small sign Ruby was here. Every room is as empty as the others. Even the garage has nothing in it but a single bucket of paint likely left over from touch-ups done after the last people left.
"How about the basement?" I ask.
Pamela shows me the door, and I hurry down the stairs so fast I almost lose my footing.
"What does she think she's going to find?" Pamela mutters to Sam as they both follow me more slowly.
Sam doesn't respond, but his silence presses in on me almost as much as if he did say something to her. I look around in the faint light of the unfinished basement. Suddenly, I notice something.
"There," I point. "Look."
Sam comes up beside me and follows where I'm pointing.
"What am I looking at?" he asks.
"There are two footprints on the floor," I explain. "Like someone walked in mud and thought they wiped their feet before they came in."
"It could be," Pamela says. "When the landscapers were redoing the backyard in the spring, this door was open so they could come in if they needed to. There's a small bathroom in the back. But the door to the rest of the house was locked. Is that everything? Have you seen enough? Because I really need to be getting back to the office."
"Thanks for doing this," Sam says.
We walk out of the house and back across the street, but I'm not done. I'm not satisfied. Those footprints haven't been there for almost a year. Something is very wrong, and I need to find out what it is.
Chapter Twenty
"I don't understand what's going on over there," I say, storming back into my house. "It doesn't make any sense."
"Emma…" Sam starts.
"She was right here. In my house. We sat at the kitchen table, and she told me all about her ex-boyfriend Frank and what she went through with him after her divorce."
"Emma…"
"She baked me a chocolate cake. Look, I even have some of it left." I go to the refrigerator and pull out the platter with the leftover portion of the cake. Some of the fudge icing peels off when I take off the aluminum foil. "She made a joke about actually borrowing sugar because she brought it back."
Sam walks up to me and takes the platter from my hands. He deliberately sets it down on the counter, then takes me by the upper arms, so I look him in the eye.
"Emma, you need to calm down. We did what you wanted to do. We went over to the house and looked around. We went into all the rooms. You looked at the oven, the garage, the basement. You didn't find anything. It's time to let it go," he says.
I pull away from him. "Let it go? You just want me to… what? Pretend I conjured the image of a woman on three different occasions, then imagined a murder?"
"I'm not saying that."
"Then what are you saying, Sam? Because it certainly sounds like you think I made it all up."
"Tell me something, Emma. Other than the other night with the confrontation and you thinking you saw her body on the living room floor, have you seen Ruby actually inside the house?" he asks.
I start to answer that obviously I have, but then I stop. I realize I didn't actually see her go into the house or come out of it. Just stand near it.
"No," I tell him. "But her stuff was inside, whole stacks of boxes. And there was a car in the driveway the other night. She said her brother was going to build shelves on the living room wall for her, so I'm guessing that was him."
"Shelves?" he asks, sounding confused.
"Apparently, she has a lot of books."
"There are already shelves on the wall," he says.
&nbs
p; "He must have built them."
"No. They've been there. I knew a guy who lived there when we were younger. You probably don't remember him. Allen Mulroney. He was only here for about a year before his father got another new job. But I went to the house, and I remember there being shelves on the wall in the living room. They were actually built into the wall. I noticed them because the family didn't have any books on them, just some candles, and I thought it was strange."
I shake my head. "I don't understand what's going on."
"Look, this is obviously working you up. You haven't been sleeping well. You've got a lot going on. You just need to think about something else. Let's talk about the fundraiser some more," he suggests.
"Every time I think about the fairgrounds, I see that noose. It reminds me of…"
I let my voice drift off, not wanting to bring up any of the bad memories for him.
"Everly Zara?" he asks.
I nod. "It just wasn't what I was expecting to find in there."
"I know. But it was a haunted house. Just a prop. Come on. Let's talk about the kinds of food we'll have."
The enthusiasm in his eyes makes me laugh. Somehow this has gone from a small event he was going to throw together, to something I was going to handle, to sounding like he’s planning a giant birthday party for himself. His excitement is adorable, but I only hope it's contagious. I don't want to think about a carnival when my mind won't go far from the house across the street and the woman I know was there.
I try to force myself to think about the plans and listen to Sam's ideas. He still wants me to head up the organization, but his visions are much clearer. Not long after we sit down in the living room to talk, his phone rings. He talks for a second, then looks at me regretfully as he tucks it away.
"This is going to have to wait. I have to go assist with a traffic stop," he tells me.
"People certainly are getting rowdy in Sherwood the last couple of days," I comment.
"Holidays coming up makes people crazy," he shrugs. He leans down and gives me a kiss. "I'll call you later."
