Rebecca raised an eyebrow. “You’re clearly putting a lot of thought into this. What are you going to do about the keys?”
“One of the other campers knew who the keys belong to. I will at least have a chat with her and see if she knows anything about the alpaca going missing. She had to have lost them recently because I couldn’t imagine being without keys for very long.”
Rebecca shook her head. “This whole thing doesn’t make any sense to me. Why would someone want to steal an alpaca? And why does Gabriella think we did it? That woman is a chatterbox. She’ll have talked everyone’s ear off by lunchtime.”
“I’ve been asking myself the same questions all morning,” said June, taking a seat at the dinette. She paused, glancing around. “Where’s Nathan?”
“He’s measuring things on the fifth-wheel again. He’s always got some big idea for improving something on the rig. I almost wish you would have taken him up on the offer to get your blinds replaced, but then you would have come back with him showing you a bunch of options.” She seemed half-annoyed, half-amused by her husband’s behavior.
“Good luck with that,” said June. Her own husband had been a construction worker. She’d had her fair share of days wishing that he would stop fixing things so that her life could go back to normal.
June grabbed her phone out of her back pocket and remembered how spotty the internet was here. “I wish I could look up how much an alpaca sold for.”
Rebecca sat down across from her. “It could be worse. At least the occasional text seems to go through.” She paused. “You know, we have to figure out who took the alpaca. Nathan and I might even have to make a video explaining our side of things if they try anything. We could stand to lose fans if people think we were involved in this.”
“Have you already put the video out about the alpacas?” asked June. “If there’s no evidence that you were even in there…”
Rebecca shook her head. “Nathan scheduled it last night. It would have gone out hours ago.”
“You could pull it down,” said June.
“That never works. It would just make us look guilty if we did. You have to be really careful about this sort of stuff. Nathan and I are going to approach this very cautiously.”
June grabbed her daughter’s hand and gave it a squeeze. “Nothing’s happened yet. We just have an old lady gossiping, that’s all. Besides, I’m going to go talk to Melanie and see what I can figure out. They’re her keys.”
Rebecca smirked. “You do love a good mystery, Mom. You always have. Besides, you’re probably sick of hiking with Nathan and I.”
June scoffed. “I bet you two are sick of waiting around for me to huff and puff my way anywhere.” She paused. “Doesn’t vacation involve more sitting around and not doing anything?”
Rebecca tapped on the table with her white-painted nails. There was a good chance that they’d be a different color the following day, depending on where they were going and if they were filming again. “Not everyone wants the same vacation as everyone else. You’ve never been good at lounging around, especially not when you’re supposed to be.” She gave June a knowing glance.
Yes, it was definitely time for June to get back on her own two feet and stop relying on her daughter so much.
“So, you’re not going to change your plans?” June asked.
Rebecca sighed. “I’m going to have to talk to Nathan about it, but I doubt that he’ll want to let a bunch of old ladies’ gossip change anything.”
“Hey, I’m an old lady. You better watch it,” said June, smirking devilishly.
Rebecca chuckled, getting up from the dinette. “You’re the only one who gets to change anything. Besides, we’ll have internet access when we’re in town and I could figure out how much an alpaca sells for.”
June thought about something else that had been bothering her all morning. She tucked one of her gray strands behind her ear. “I couldn’t help but notice that we’re the only ones double-parked in a spot. Did Blanche bend the rules just for us?”
Rebecca shrugged. “The channel is finally growing and it’s good for the camp, so I would call it a fair trade. They’re happy and we got a spot for all of us. It’s a perk that has only recently started showing up now that we’re gaining some traction. I just hope the whole stupid thing with the alpacas doesn’t ruin all our hard work.”
“Speaking of that, what are your plans for today? I half expected that you’d be out on another adventure by now.”
“Nathan and I are going to be gone for the rest of the day. He wants to get some video with the drone at sunset. Hopefully, he hasn’t taken anything apart in the RV yet.”
“Will you be back in time for dinner?” June asked.
Rebecca smirked. “If you’re cooking, Nathan wants to be here.”
June pushed up her glasses, which had begun sliding down her nose. “You two have fun.”
Rebecca paused before going down the steps “You know, Mom, if you ever want to be in the videos, our audience would eat it up.”
June sighed. “I can’t imagine why anyone would want to watch a pudgy old lady limp around and explain things. Your audience is used to watching super young, fit and attractive people.”
Rebecca gave her a kiss on the cheek. “They still want to see you. You’re a survivor and my mom. Those are two really great things.” She paused. “Just be careful. Don’t let the bad guys who took the alpaca know you’re on their trail.” She almost grabbed the handle on her way out the door. “Mom, you got mud everywhere!”
Chapter Nine
Rebecca and Nathan decided to stick to their original plan and get some recording done. As Nathan put it, “There’s no sense getting all riled up about some gossiping old ladies.”
June, however, was already riled up. She wanted to know who took the alpaca and if they had intended for her family to take the blame. She wanted to march out and confront whoever did it, but she didn’t know who that was and she wasn’t going to get anywhere very fast if her hip seized up. Sighing, she forced herself to go through her physical therapy exercises, which always took longer than she expected. When she finished, it was already lunchtime.
As she sliced into the red tomato, she thought about how many meals she had barely tasted. It was an unfortunate reality of the food industry; a caterer or chef spent her days preparing and plating amazing foods, pastries, and drinks but usually only got to enjoy the fruits of her labor after the event was over and sometimes not at all. Most of the time, she and her partner’s meals were eaten standing up and wolfed down as quickly as possible. One of the caterers she had worked for early in her career had called that ‘eating like a chef’ and it turned out to be one of the truest statements about the job she’d ever heard.
But this time, June wasn’t at work. She sat at her dinette and ate in silence, enjoying every bite, even if it was just a sandwich. It wasn’t anything amazing, as she had limited ingredients, but she whipped up a homemade aioli spread and the tomato she had picked up at a farmer’s roadside stand the day before was perfectly ripe. She paused on the last bite, thinking how much her life had changed and how much it would again when she finally went back to work.
There was a thought; back to the busy schedules, the racing every which way, the scrambling to have things coming out of the oven at just the right moment. She sighed, pushing herself to her feet. “You can’t have everything,” she told Mr. Bigglesworth, who was now only half in the spot of sun she had originally fallen asleep in.
By the time she eaten her lunch and tidied up the RV, a task that never seemed to end, the morning chill had completely burned off. June grabbed Melanie’s keys and stuffed them into her pocket.
She stepped outside, trying to ignore how much the steps groaned under her weight. The campground was bustling with activity now that it was nicer out. She noticed a couple women chatting and heading to the laundry room near Ronald’s trailer. There was a big sign outside it proclaiming him host and listed a number t
o contact if he didn’t answer his door.
A wiry man with long hair leaned over the front of a truck. He seemed to be tugging on an unseen bolt. His long, white beard did not quite touch the grime of the engine.
Someone else a few sites down grilled up burgers for lunch while three small children chanted how hungry they were in unison. “Food, food, food, now, now, now,” they sang, banging their small fists on the table. The sight brought back memories from when her kids were younger. She’d had three just like that a lifetime ago and Harold used to love to grill. She blinked misty lashes at the memory.
She walked over to the nice fifth wheel that Danielle had pointed out as Melanie’s. It was significantly bigger than her motorhome, and it looked much newer, all white with one of those big, swoopy designs across the side. There was a bevy of potted plants clustered in a sunny spot near the door and a slightly rusty bike leaning against the RV in the shade of a tree. She knocked and waited. After nearly a minute, she knocked again, listening for any tell-tale sign of movement. The nice thing about motorhomes and trailers is the whole rig seemed to flex and groan when people walked around in them, making it easy to tell if someone was home, even if they didn’t want to answer the door.
Then again, when it was your own rig and someone got up to go to the bathroom in the middle of the night, it woke you up. Luckily, she didn’t have to worry much about that, and Mr. Bigglesworth wasn’t fat enough to creak her motorhome…at least not yet. The cat didn’t seem to be getting enough exercise on this trip, a concern that had crept up on her. Since they were headed back to Illinois soon, it wouldn’t be an issue. Hopefully, Mr. Bigglesworth would go back to chasing things around the back yard once they were home.
As June raised her hand to knock a third time, she noticed a small round button just to the side of the handle—a doorbell. Feeling silly, she pressed it. She didn’t realize motorhomes could come with doorbells.
Still, no response. This was turning into a decidedly uneventful investigation.
An older-model, dusky blue dually pickup was parked in front of the fifth-wheel. Maybe she was out on a walk or something?
June probably should have come over earlier this morning. Now she was going to have to watch carefully for when Melanie came back, not that she even knew what the woman looked like.
“She’s not here,” said a male voice behind her.
Chapter Ten
June turned to see the same thin man with the big beard who had been working on the truck earlier. His dark brown eyes glittered under white eyebrows, as if he found something amusing. He wore jeans and a t-shirt that were so covered in various dirt and oil stains that she wondered how long it had been since they’d been laundered. Then again, oil stains didn’t exactly come out in the wash. They could have been cleaned yesterday and no one would be able to tell.
He wiped his hand on his grease-stained jeans and held it out in greeting.
June’s father’s hands had looked like that, whether he had scrubbed them clean or not. Grease seemed to get deep into his fingerprints until they never looked clean, not even with the fancy soap he bought. It was a cheap if dirty way of tattooing your hands and branding yourself as a mechanic.
“Name’s Jameson,” the bearded man said, “Jameson Bouchard.” His accent was hard to pinpoint. It was decidedly far-north-eastern, possibly even Canadian, given how he pronounced his vowels, but June could almost hear a bit of a southern twang in there as well. Maybe he was just well-traveled? It was hard not to pick up a Deep South phrase or two when visiting.
“June Winters,” she said, shaking his hand. “It’s nice to meet you.” She wanted to explain that she was investigating the missing alpaca, but decided that a good detective probably would keep her knowledge close to her vest and simply ask for simple facts. Besides, he might agree with Gabriella for all she knew.
“If Melanie’s not here, where is she?” June asked. “I was hoping to ask her a question.”
He shrugged a skinny shoulder. “Well, it’s going to be a couple days before she gets back. Is there something I can help you with?”
“How could she have gone somewhere without her truck and keys?” June pulled the keys out of her pocket to show him. They glinted in the sunlight.
Only one of Jameson’s eyebrows shot up in surprise. After a few seconds, he pointed backwards with a thumb toward the large truck parked in front of Melanie’s fifth-wheel. “Well, that is a curiosity to be sure, as I’m pretty positive I was the last one to drive that truck of hers. I dropped her off at the airport a little over a week ago. Then I brought the truck back here and parked it right where you see it now. Don’t think anyone has driven it since. Her daughter had another baby and she always goes to help out for a week or two. I was supposed to keep an eye on her place while she was gone, which is why I came over when I noticed you knocking on her door.” He gave her a long look before jutting his chin out toward the keys. “How did you end up with those?”
June tapped her lips with one finger. Was it possible that Jameson had taken the alpaca then and dropped Melanie’s keys in the process? Or maybe she wasn’t really gone? She could have used her absence to take the alpaca when no one was looking. She might have left so that no one suspected her when the alpaca went missing. A horse trailer would probably be better at transporting the animals, but a truck, especially a big crew cab one like Melanie’s might work in a pinch. Alpacas weren’t that large and could probably fit easily in the back seat.
Despite his wiry frame, Jameson was probably strong enough to move the trough on his own. Maybe the two were working together? But why would he admit to having driven it if he was guilty? “If you don’t mind my asking, where were the keys the last time you saw them?”
“I put them under the pot, of course.” He pointed to one of the many potted plants near the front door of Melanie’s RV. “That’s where she keeps them. Almost everyone knows where they are. We share a lot of things around here.” He took a deep breath. “Look, I’d really appreciate it if you’d put them back. I’m going to have to go pick her up from the airport in a couple days.” He gestured toward his own vehicle. “My truck is currently not working.” He gave her that squinty look again. “You still haven’t told me how you got them.”
June pursed her lips and finally decided to tell him. “I found them right in front of the trough in the same pen where one of the alpacas went missing.”
Rebecca’s admonition echoed in her mind. Don’t let the bad guys know you’re on to them.
His eyes narrowed as he realized the implication. “And you think I took Penelope?”
“You tell me,” said June, crossing her arms. She expected an explanation about how it couldn’t possibly be him, but all she got was a little shrug.
“Old Albert is an escape artist, if you haven’t heard. Are you sure Penelope didn’t just figure out his trick to popping open the gate? She could be anywhere at this point.”
“That doesn’t explain why the keys were in the pen to begin with,” June replied. He was trying to change the subject, and she wasn’t going to let him get away with it.
“Look, I didn’t put them in the pen and I don’t go hanging out with the alpaca all that often. I’ve got plenty of other things to do around here than fuss over them.”
“Hmm.” That didn’t answer her question, either. Maybe silence would be a better tactic on him. She waited.
The silence stretched.
In the background, children ran and played. A couple laughed over something and a light breeze whispered through the trees, but she ignored all of it. She wanted to know who had taken that alpaca.
Jameson rolled his eyes. “The alpaca are cute and fuzzy and all, but everyone else seems obsessed with them. I’m sorry that one of them is missing, but I didn’t have anything to do with it.”
June watched him closely before speaking again, but she had the sinking feeling that she wasn’t going to get any more information out of him. “I hear they sell for a
fair amount,” she lied. She still had no idea about that, but she hadn’t meant it to come out as an accusation. The moment the words left her mouth, she realized that’s exactly what it sounded like.
To her surprise, Jameson chuckled. “If you’re suggesting that I took the alpaca to sell it, you’re barking up the wrong tree, lady. I have everything I need right here.” He spread his skinny arms wide. “I have a place to stay, people to hang out with and enough money to get me by. Don’t need nothing else. Why would I endanger all of this by stealing one of the owner’s alpacas? I live here for free in trade for work. It’s a pretty sweet deal, and not one that I’d ever jeopardize.”
His reaction wasn’t at all what she had expected, and now that she thought about it, he seemed pleasant enough, even if he was a bit evasive. Besides, if everyone knew where Melanie kept the keys, anyone could have stolen them and planted them in the alpaca’s pen. That put her back at square one, a missing alpaca and a set of keys that anyone could have stolen.
June sighed. “I’m sorry if it sounded like I was accusing you of stealing the alpaca. Someone has to have, though. What I heard earlier today was that the females never leave the pen, even when Prince Albert leaves the gate open for them.” She cocked her head to one side, remembering something he’d said. “You said you live here for free. Do you work for Blanche, like Ronald?” June asked. She was starting to believe that he was telling the truth.
He rubbed the back of his neck. “Not really. I’m a camper here, just like you, but instead of paying for my spot, I earn my keep by fixing things.”
“So, Blanche hired you?”
“Nah, she wasn’t the one who gave me my meal-ticket. It was her dad.” Jameson tapped his shirt pocket, hitting a square-ish object inside.
June didn’t want to press him on what was in his pocket or what it had to do with staying at the campground. She felt like she had badgered him long enough.
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