Close to Home: A Bear and Mandy Logan Mystery (Bear & Mandy Logan Book 1)

by L. T. Ryan

  “What about Jeremy Olsen?”

  Eileen’s eyebrows knit together. “Jeremy? What does he have to do with this?”

  “He was the previous owner of the house before I moved in there,” Bear explained. “We’re wondering if he could’ve had something to do with Katie’s disappearance.”

  After Olsen’s name had surfaced, McKinnon had tried to locate him, to no avail. It was a good line of questioning. Perhaps Eileen knew him and had kept in touch.

  Eileen paled. “Jeremy was a friend of Katie’s dad. I never knew how they knew each other. Mr. Lamoureux worked at HealTek, but I don’t think Jeremy did. He was always hanging around, doing odd jobs for the family, and for other people, too.”

  “What kind of jobs?”

  “Picking stuff up. Dropping stuff off. Fixing this and that.” She leveled them with a look. “For a while there, I thought he was a good person. I always saw him mediating fights between people. I’d hear him say he’d go talk to this person or that person. Now, I realized he was probably the muscle.”

  “For who?”

  Eileen shrugged. “Mr. Lamoureux? Someone else? HealTek in general? I’m not sure.”

  McKinnon leaned forward on the table. “You seemed pretty scared when you heard his name.”

  “He was nice to me when Katie and I were kids. He was in his early twenties at the time. We both had a crush on him, you know. He was in shape. Good looking. And he paid attention to us. Made us feel good about ourselves.”

  “Did anything ever happen between you two?”

  Eileen looked away. “Not until later. I wouldn’t drop the Katie thing. He kept coming around, trying to convince me to just let it go. That it wasn’t worth it. We hooked up a few times. I’ll admit,” her voice bitter now, “he kept me distracted for a while.”

  “But not forever?”

  “I’ve thought of Katie every day for the past fifteen years. I needed answers. I needed someone to be responsible. I thought Jeremy was helping me cope. But he was just trying to make me forget.”

  “What else happened?”

  “We had a fight. Everything blew up that night. He threatened me in a parking lot.” She looked away and clenched her fist as though she hadn’t moved past this. “Mr. Donovan was actually the one to break it up. He’s the only one I trust from back home. He told me to get out. I didn’t want to at first. When Jeremy came back later that night, I ran. Didn’t have a dollar to my name. But I ran.”

  “You made the right choice.” McKinnon took out her notepad and jotted down a few words. “Do you have any idea where Jeremy Olsen is now?”

  “No clue. We didn’t exactly stay in touch.”

  Bear shifted in his seat, drawing the young girl’s attention. “Does the last name Weinberger mean anything to you?”

  “Yeah, I know the Weinberger’s. Well, not personally. That whole family worked at HealTek when I lived back home. The father—dead now—was high up in the company. Right there with Katie’s dad. And his eldest son took over his role when he retired. I never liked any of them. You could tell they didn’t care about what the company was doing. All they cared about was money.”

  “In all these years,” McKinnon started, “did you ever find anything on Mr. Lamoureux or HealTek or Jeremy?”

  Eileen took a deep breath and blew it out, her bangs fluttering in the disturbance. “Let’s just say that Mr. Lamoureux was nothing like his father. He was a terrible worker who always did the bare minimum to get by. He was given a C-level position in the company, but he cared more about the title than the actual work. Liked to flaunt it in other people’s faces without actually contributing to HealTek’s agenda.”

  “Which was what?” Bear asked.

  She shrugged. “Hell if I know. Most of that was confidential. But this was a post-9/11 world. There were rumors about biological weapons and super soldier serums.” She waved her hand. “Crazy stuff. But Katie’s dad liked to run his mouth.”

  “He got in trouble,” McKinnon said. “A warning?”

  “A few, from what I heard. Not many people liked him.” She picked at her cuticles again. “I think Katie was his final warning. He packed up his wife and they hightailed it out of there within a few months. I think they knew she was dead. Even without a body. Everyone did. And I think we all knew who did it, even if we didn’t say it out loud. The police didn’t even bother chasing them when they moved out of state.”

  Bear’s phone vibrated in his pocket. He thought about ignoring it, not wanting to disrupt the flow of Eileen’s story, but then he remembered what was happening to Mandy the last time she tried to call him. He stepped away to answer it.

  “Bear?” Mandy’s voice was small on the other line.

  “What’s wrong?”

  “Nothing, I’m okay.” Her words were fast, and he could tell she was holding something back. “But I need you to pick me up from the hospital. And, uh, Sheriff needs to come back, too.”

  “What happened?” Bear hated the way his brain sifted through a thousand scenarios in a matter of seconds. “Are you hurt?”

  “Not hurt,” Mandy said. Her voice was strained. “Just in trouble. Big trouble.”

  26

  Bear hadn’t looked Mandy in the eye since they’d picked her up from the hospital. The doctor who’d caught Mandy breaking and entering, Dr. Sing, had left the hospital without instructions for what to do with Mandy. When Sheriff McKinnon showed up, security handed the girl over.

  Mandy sat in the back of the police cruiser. Bear stared straight out the windshield, gathering his thoughts. McKinnon looked like she wanted to say something, maybe even tell Bear not to go too hard on Mandy, but she didn’t dare.

  After a short period, Bear found some words. “You shouldn’t have done that, Mandy.”

  “Break into the office?” Mandy asked. “Or get caught?”

  Smart ass. “You know what I mean.” Bear kept his voice even, but as he twisted around in his seat to look at her, he felt his temperature rise. The least she could do was look remorseful. “That was stupid, Mandy. And you know it. You could be in serious trouble right now.”

  “I know, and I’m sorry. Really. I shouldn’t have done that.” A little smile formed on her lips. “And I definitely shouldn’t have gotten caught.”

  Bear ignored the joke. “What were you thinking? I know you want to help. You can’t do it like this. We—the two adults in the car—had it handled.”

  “I don’t agree.” Mandy stared him in the eyes. “And if you did, how would I know that? You don’t tell me anything.”

  “You’re fourteen. You’re a kid. You don’t get to know everything.”

  “That’s ridiculous.” Now Mandy was the one with some growl in her voice. “You want to keep me safe? Then keep me informed. I can’t be smart when I’m in the dark.”

  “I’m supposed to be smart for you. You’re supposed to listen to me.”

  “You told me a long time ago not to rely on anyone but myself. You trained me to keep myself safe. I understand you don’t want me in the middle of this—and hey, it’s not like I have a death wish or something—but I can help you. Laura Lynn is my friend. I have to do something.”

  McKinnon turned to Bear, wearing her neutral cop expression. “She has a point.”

  Bear turned away. He cracked his window to let some cool air in. “So now you condone this behavior?”

  “Absolutely not.” McKinnon turned to face Mandy. “That was dumb, Mandy. You shouldn’t have done it, and you definitely shouldn’t have gotten caught.” Mandy giggled, but when Bear twisted around to glare at her, she had already wiped the grin clear and tried to appear innocent. Wide eyes and all. “You could be in serious trouble right now, but you’re lucky Dr. Sing isn’t looking to teach you a lesson.”

  “I know.” Mandy sounded like she was getting the message. “I’m really, really sorry.” She looked down at her knees, then back up. “But don’t you want to know what I found?”

  Curiosity ro
se in Bear. He tried to squash it back down. It was no use. He had to know. “All right, I’ll bite.”

  Mandy had the good sense not to sound too smug. “Dr. Sing has a hidden compartment in her office!” The words rushed out as one long blurred sound, leaving her breathless, like she’d been dying to tell them. “On the far side, kind of behind one of the filing cabinets, you could press the wall in, and a little panel would pop open. Inside, there was paperwork she obviously didn’t want anyone else to see.”

  “Why her?” McKinnon asked. “How did you know to go to her office?”

  “I didn’t.” Mandy looked away. Bear knew she was hiding something. “It was a lucky guess. My friend Marcus’ mom is friends with Dr. Sing. I figured I’d see if she was hiding anything.”

  “What was in the compartment?” Bear asked. He didn’t approve, but he didn’t want Mandy to get into any more trouble. And he definitely didn’t want to drag Marcus or his family into it.

  “All these shipping orders for antivenom. Like, thousands of vials of it.”

  “Antivenom? For snakes?”

  She nodded. “I thought that was weird, too. It was too much for this hospital. I mean, I don’t think I’ve seen a single snake since we moved here. Why would she need that much?”

  “No idea.” Bear wracked his brain. It was such a random and specific thing. There had to be a purpose for it. “Anything else?”

  “I found journals in there. I couldn’t read her handwriting, but it sounded like they were testing something. She had written out a bunch of results for a clinical trial. I wasn’t sure what it all meant, but it’s pretty weird that she was hiding it, right?”

  “Yeah,” McKinnon said, her voice faraway. “Pretty weird.”

  “Did you tell the Sheriff what I found earlier?” Mandy’s voice was hesitant, like she was worried about getting into more trouble. “On the computer?”

  “No, but you might as well.”

  “I, uh, came across some information,” Mandy began.

  “Came across some information?” McKinnon asked.

  Bear waved a hand half-heartedly. “It’s better if you don’t ask.”

  “Okay.” McKinnon looked skeptical for a moment, but when she turned to Mandy, she’d smoothed her face. “Go on.”

  “I saw Laura Lynn’s charts. Information about her in the hospital’s computer system.” Mandy flushed, but she hurried on. “She’s really sick. Like she’s been poisoned. I wasn’t sure what all the chemicals meant or all the words, but it’s obvious something’s been building in her system. Then we searched for her same symptoms in the system.”

  McKinnon raised an eyebrow. “We?”

  “Me.” Mandy flushed deeper. “I searched for her symptoms. There are a lot of people who’ve been sick lately. They show the same symptoms at first, but it ends up being different diseases. Some recover. Some don’t. A lot don’t. But it usually runs in families.”

  “What do you mean?” McKinnon was wading into the deep end.

  “The people who are sick, it’s usually the whole family. Like Laura Lynn and her parents. People who share the same last name. So, I presume they live in the same household.”

  “You presume, huh?” McKinnon looked like she was caught between being amused and being impressed. “Why would that be important?”

  “Because that can help us figure out how people are getting sick. Or at least narrow it down. Like food poisoning. If there’s bad food, the entire family is gonna get sick. Whoever is doing this isn’t trying to target one person. Or, if they are, they don’t care if there’s collateral damage. And it always seems like the kids get it worse.”

  “Collateral damage?” She turned to Bear. “Who is this kid?”

  Bear shrugged.

  “The kids’ immune systems probably aren’t as strong,” McKinnon said. “And they’re smaller, so they’ll get sick faster.”

  “Exactly.” Mandy was on a roll now. “So, maybe if we figure out the method, we can work backwards and figure out what’s going on.”

  “Could be food,” Bear said. “But how would they guarantee the family eats it? What if they decide to make meatloaf instead of spaghetti and tomatoes from the neighbor’s garden?”

  “What about in the air?” Mandy said. “Could it be something they pump into the house?”

  “Unlikely.” Bear’s mind was racing now. “That’s a lot harder to control. And whoever is doing this would have to be careful to avoid it themselves.”

  “If we think HealTek is involved,” McKinnon began, “maybe it’s something the employees are bringing home with them.”

  “You think HealTek is involved?” Mandy sat forward. “Since when?”

  “Since this afternoon.” Bear’s voice indicated she shouldn’t expect any further explanation. “But if it is something from the company, then what? Meds? Can’t guarantee everyone will take them. Food? It’d be kind of obvious that some people were eating it and others weren’t. And again, can’t guarantee it gets eaten when it comes home.”

  There was silence in the car as everyone wracked their brains.

  Bear broke it. “If we put pressure on Dr. Sing, she might talk.”

  “I’m going to pretend your intent isn’t as ominous as it sounds,” McKinnon said. “But if she’s got HealTek behind her, she’s probably smart enough to keep her trap shut.”

  “Any chance we can get a warrant?” he asked.

  “Not without proof.”

  “About that.” Mandy pulled her phone out and handed it to Bear. “Will this help?”

  Bear looked down at the phone and swiped through the pictures Mandy had taken in Dr. Sing’s office. The shipping orders were more significant than she’d realized, and Bear was able to paint a mental picture. Not only was Dr. Sing ordering vast quantities of drugs, but also altering the original order in the hospital’s records, replacing the name for the antivenom with a name for a common drug. Dr. Sing was falsifying evidence.

  27

  Three hours later, McKinnon had a warrant. She and Bear put together their plan of attack in the hospital parking lot.

  “What’d you end up doing with Mandy?” McKinnon asked.

  “I tried to get Marcus’ mother to take her again, but she refused.”

  “Mandy did almost get her son arrested.”

  Bear waved away the comment. “They seem like a family with a good lawyer.”

  “You have a point there.” She chuckled. “So, where is she now?”

  “Movie night at the library.”

  “Oh, I’m sure she loves that.”

  It was Bear’s turn to chuckle. “It was ten and under, too. We had to tell them she was big for her age. She’s not going to forget this one. Might not forgive, either.”

  “It’s for her own good,” McKinnon said. “She understands that, even if she doesn’t like it.”

  He nodded. “The library has plenty of places to hide. Several exits. She’s smart. And that’s only if these guys are dumb enough to attack a bunch of kids in public. They may have half the town working for them, but that’s a little bold, even for them.”

  “We can only hope. Still not sure how they have gotten away with everything.”

  “Money. Manipulation. A charming personality, you would think. That’s always benefited me.”

  McKinnon laughed and said nothing.

  Bear pointed to the paper she’d just pulled out of her pocket. “How was getting the warrant?”

  “Smooth enough. A little push back. The falsified records made the difference.”

  “Did they ask where you got the pictures from?”

  “Oh yeah. Told them it was an anonymous informant. Needed to remain that way until after their testimony. We need to protect the sanctity of the investigation.”

  “And they bought that?”

  She shrugged. “More or less.” McKinnon took a deep breath, held it, then blew it out. “You ready for this?”

  “Always.”

  “Come on.”
As they made their way across the parking lot, McKinnon cleared her throat. “By the way, we may need to rely on your charming personality.”

  “Oh?”

  “There’s a security guard at the hospital who doesn’t like me very much, and I’m pretty sure he’s on duty.”

  “What’d you do to him?”

  “I arrested him for a DUI a couple of years back. His name’s Billy Stewart. He was a cop, and he asked me to drop the charges in the name of ‘solidarity amongst officers.’ I didn’t. He got fired. Now he works in security.”

  “And he’s been your arch nemesis ever since.”

  “Pretty much.” McKinnon pulled the door open for Bear, and the two of them made their way back to the security desk. A short, muscular man with a week’s worth of stubble sat behind the desk, playing on his phone. “Hey, Billy.”

  He looked up, his face falling as he took in the pair of them. He placed his phone on his desk, face down. “It’s Security Officer Stewart.”

  “Billy.” Bear leaned on the counter. “We’re gonna need you to unlock Dr. Sing’s office. Sheriff here has some official police business to conduct.”

  Billy sized up Bear. Apparently didn’t like what he found because he ignored him and turned to McKinnon. “If you want to get into the doctor’s office, you either need her direct permission or a warrant to—”

  McKinnon slid the piece of paper across the desk. “Right there.”

  Billy took his sweet time picking up the warrant and reading every word. As the seconds ticked by, Bear felt his patience wearing thinner. His hand curled into a fist, and McKinnon shot him a look. It wouldn’t be good for their investigation if he caused a scene here. Bear was sure it’d make him feel better briefly.

  “This says you’re allowed to explore anything within the confines of Dr. Sing’s office, including her computer and physical files.”

  McKinnon stared him down. “I’m aware. I requested the warrant.”

  “Just making sure we’re all following the rules here.”

  “I hear you’re a rule-breaker yourself.” Bear didn’t hide his smirk.