by Ada Bell
“Sort of. That’s my car,” he said. “My moms gave it to me as a graduation present last year. Why?”
“Because Mayor Banister said a green Beetle was parked in front of Earl’s house on Wednesday and that places Olive at the scene of the crime.”
He let out a heavy sigh, so loud I practically felt the rush of air through the phone. “Oh, man. This is all my fault.”
“What are you talking about?”
“It’s my car. I was at Earl’s.”
Hang up, Aly! The little voice inside my head screamed. I ignored it. Sam was in the car on the highway, nowhere near Shady Grove. He couldn’t hurt me.
Also, according to his Instagram, he’d been long gone by the time Earl wandered into Missing Pieces. Sam couldn’t be the killer unless he also possessed the ability to make his car teleport. “What time were you there? And why?”
“I went right after I left Missing Pieces, so about twenty minutes before lunch.”
Long before Earl died. So long, it didn’t even make sense to bring it up. Someone really wanted Olive to look guilty. It just didn’t add up.
Sam continued, “I’ve done the books for Earl’s gardening and snowplow company since high school.”
“I thought you were just learning to be an accountant.”
“I’m just getting the MBA now, but I’ve been working with numbers for ages,” he said. “And I’ve got an accounting degree.”
“Your mom told me you and Earl were close,” I said. “I’m sorry for your loss.”
“Yeah, thanks.” His voice thickened. “Listen, I’ve got to go.”
“I didn’t mean—”
“I know. And it’s ok. I appreciate everything you’re doing for us. Most people in your shoes would have run away by now.”
Most people didn’t need their new boss to help them with the psychic powers they never knew they had. With everything going on, I’d barely had a chance to even think about what to ask her.
“Your mom’s a special lady,” I said instead. “I want to help.”
“Thanks. I’ll drop by after I talk to my moms. Meanwhile, take a break. Go get some coffee. The store will be fine for a few minutes.”
I started to object, since I didn’t have a key to lock up the store while I was gone. Then I remembered that the back door was broken. I hadn’t gotten a chance to tell Olive about it. Instead, I told Sam.
“Huh. It was fine on Wednesday.”
Wednesday morning seemed like a hundred years ago. I couldn’t believe it had only been two days. “Are you sure?”
“Positive. I hauled a bunch of trash out that way after building Mom’s bookcase. Then I locked it behind me, because that’s the best way to keep it from blowing open when it’s windy. The latch doesn’t always take.”
Huh. If the lock had worked on Wednesday, but it was broken now, someone must’ve come into the shop in the past forty-eight hours. That explained how Earl’s skillet got into the store. It gave credence to my “Olive’s been framed” theory. Now I just needed to figure out who was framing her and why. Would Sheriff Matthews have planted evidence and made up a fake tip to appease the mayor?
No. There was no time. Unless he’d brought the pan in before I overheard them. But maybe that’s what Julie was doing at the police station when I saw her—leaving a “tip.”
“Okay, thanks. I’ll talk to you later,” I said. “And Sam?”
“Yeah?”
“Call a locksmith before someone else plants murder evidence in the store.” I hung up before he could reply.
On What Grounds? was even busier than Missing Pieces, if that was possible. More people gathered in that tiny space than I realized lived in the town. I could barely breathe. The crowd made me reconsider just how badly I needed caffeine.
Nope. Not worth it. Lattes were overrated. Olive had a coffee maker in the back room. I could leave the store closed for half an hour, make my own pot, and gather my thoughts.
Just as I turned to go, a voice called my name. Darn it, Rusty. If he hadn’t spoken, no one would have seen me. To my dismay, the crowd parted, leaving me a clear path to the register.
“Hey! Sorry, I only have a few minutes. I’ll come back later.”
“Don’t be ridiculous! We know you’re busy. Here, come to the front of the line,” he said.
This must be what it felt like to be a superstar. Or, you know, the closest non-relative to a person recently arrested for committing the first murder in Shady Grove in several decades. I didn’t delude myself for a second that my long-ago movie nights with Rusty resulted in this type of service.
Today he was working the register while Julie made the drinks. Too bad, because I had a lot of questions for her at the moment. I’d need to come up with some other way of finding out what was going on with her. Like…asking her store manager. Who I sort of had an in with, if you counted those two really awkward dates where we had nothing to talk about.
Okay, maybe not.
He saw me looking and whispered out of the corner of his mouth. “Are you okay?”
I shook my head, almost imperceptibly, then raised my voice as I put a crumpled five-dollar bill on the counter. Using my debit card took longer. “I’ll have a low-fat vanilla latte with extra foam, please. To go.”
“No problem.” He reached out and put his hand over mine. “It’s on the house.”
The unexpected gesture made me look up to meet his gaze. The compassion in his eyes brought tears to mine. I blinked rapidly, refusing to shed them. “Thank you.”
“Why don’t you go back to the store?” he said. “I’ll bring it over in a few minutes.”
“Oh, I couldn’t. You’ve got a ton of people waiting.”
“It’s fine. Olive’s a friend.” He tilted his head to his left, and for the first time, I noticed the woman holding court at a table surrounded by onlookers. In fact, every head in the room that wasn’t pointed at me was watching her. Thelma glared at me with distaste evident on her face.
This was getting ridiculous. Time to take charge.
Clearing my throat, I walked toward her. “I’m sorry, but can I help you?”
She gasped. “How dare you speak to me?”
“Well, you’re staring at me like I kicked your puppy, so it seemed like you’d have something to say.” I shrugged. “Whatevs. I’ve got to get back to work. Nice to see you again.”
“You tell your boss that she’ll pay for what she did to my Earl!” The words burst out of the woman like gunfire. She held one hand to her mouth as if she wanted to take them back.
“Olive didn’t do it. But I hope they find the person who did.”
Since Rusty had already agreed to bring my coffee over when it was ready, I didn’t wait around to hear her response. My heart pounded as I exited the cafe, my overactive imagination envisioning a swarm of people following and sweeping me down the street to avenge Earl’s death. Of course, that was silly.
Lost in thought, I slipped. My left foot went out from under me. Reaching out, I struggled to keep my balance, but the alley wasn’t nearly as well-salted as the main roads. No one used the path between the store and the coffee shop except, well, me. I went down on one knee, hard. Ow. My hands plunged into the snow patch lining the edge of the building.
What on earth…?
Grumbling to myself, I got to my feet and wiped the snow and salt off my pant leg. I never should have left California. Not once while there did I trip and fall on all the glorious sunshine.
After a moment, I spotted the item that caused me to fall. It wasn’t ice, like I thought. It was like a linen bath towel, which made no sense. Then I spotted the stains and the big monogram on the center. Ew. Not a bath towel. I was holding a snotty handkerchief. What was it doing here?
I didn’t know, and I didn’t particularly want to find out. It could just stay there. Well, off the side, anyway. I flung the thing away so no one else would trip over it.
> Back inside the store, I scrubbed my hands vigorously while chanting the introduction to Star Trek twice. It only took twenty seconds to say once, but I needed to be extra thorough. Then I unlocked the front door, flipped the sign to OPEN, turned the phone forwarding off, and braced myself for whatever came next. The answer, it turned out, was not much. I spent five minutes pacing around and dusting everything before the bell over the front door jingled. Nothing I touched gave me any feelings at all, which was exactly how I liked it. It was all just stuff with dust on it that looked somewhat cleaner after I finished. Olive kept the place pretty clean to start, so my efforts didn’t make much difference.
“Aly? Are you here?”
Rusty. I’d almost forgotten that he was bringing me coffee. He stood in the doorway holding a tray covered by a battered old silver dome. Seriously old. Like, I was pretty sure he’d bought it somewhere in this store. He set the tray on the front counter and lifted the lid, revealing two massive teacups and two plates each holding a chocolate croissant.
“Oh, man. This was so unnecessary, but I could kiss you right now.”
His face turned bright red, and I thought back to those not-remotely-thrilling dates.
“I’m sorry—I didn’t mean….” Great. Now he probably thought I’d spent all this time pining for him. “Thank you.”
“I thought you could use a friend.”
I gestured toward the small table where Olive originally interviewed me. “Do you want to sit? I know you’ve got a lot of customers to get back to.”
“They can wait. Julie’s got things covered.”
Right. The owner could take care of her own store for a bit. And getting Rusty alone gave me an opportunity to ask about her relationship with Earl.
Lifting my mug, I inhaled the steam, drawing fortification from the mingling odors of milk and espresso. My body’s response was purely Pavlovian as I relaxed against the chair.
I took a big gulp, savoring the taste. And then I choked.
Chapter 13
For the third time in less than forty-eight hours, the room fell away and I found myself somewhere completely different.
I sat in a high-backed chair of the type you’d see on old British TV shows, in parlors or whatever. In a matching chair to my left sat an old man I’d never seen before, with a long scar down the side of his face. He reached one hand out to me, and I took it. The fingers reaching out to grasp his were wrinkled, knotted. Our eyes met. He mouthed, “I love you.”
Then everything went black.
The cup slammed back onto the table, spilling coffee everywhere. “What happened? What did you do?”
He tilted his head at me. “I just made a pot of lattes. Is something wrong?”
Yeah. I’ll say. Oh, man. Of all the times to get another vision. But I couldn’t tell Rusty what I saw. The whole town already looked at me funny. So I lied. “I’m sorry. It’s just…hotter than I expected.”
C is for carbon. Ca is for calcium. Cl is for chlorine…
I fanned my face several times while he studied me, probably thanking his lucky stars that we’d never gone on a third date.
“Right. Too hot.” He paused as if waiting for me to say something. Then he let out a sigh and ran his hands over his hair. “Look, I should be going. You can bring the tray back whenever. Or Julie can come and get it.”
“Thank you. Sorry. I’m just really overwhelmed by everything that’s happened. It’s only my first week on the job.”
“Of course. I’ll talk to you later.”
I watched him go, wondering why I couldn’t seem to control these things. Then a thought hit me as he reached the front door. I called out to him.
Rusty half turned. “Yeah?”
“This tea set. Does it belong to you?”
He shook his head. “No. I got it at an estate sale a few years ago. An elderly couple got it as a wedding gift, at least according to the executor. Married sixty years, then they died sitting side-by-side, holding hands.”
Exactly the scene from my vision. Whoa. This was bananas. I cleared my throat. “I, uh, like the pattern. Thought I might get something similar.”
“Yeah. It’s nice. Is that it?” He eyed me suspiciously. “Or did you have a vision when you drank your latte?”
This time, I choked for real. I hacked and coughed until tears came to my eyes. Rusty came over and patted my back helpfully.
“Thanks.”
“Nice evasion tactics.”
Well, a girl had to try. I smiled sheepishly. “How did you know? Do you have powers? Or visions? Or…whatever this is.”
He shook his head. “Man, I wish. I didn’t know, I guessed. Olive opened this place when I was a little kid, and you’re the first person she’s ever let work here besides Sam.”
Interesting that he would be so direct about my boss’s powers. For some reason, I thought they were secret. “Wait. Do people know about Olive? Can she really do what she says?”
“I don’t know what she says she can do. But my dad’s known her since they were kids. She’s always been honest, straightforward. They worked together in an electronics store when they were around our age.”
Why was Rusty telling me this? “And your dad thinks she has powers?”
“He knows it,” Rusty said. “One day this guy came in. Mean as a snake, always the class bully. He shoplifted a Walkman.”
“What’s a Walkman?”
“It’s like an iPod, but old tech. That’s not the point. Dad stopped him before he could leave the store and called the police. The bully said it belonged to him, that he brought it in from outside. He’d hidden the packaging. Dad didn’t know how to prove that it came from the store. The officer was about to let the guy go. But then Olive touched it, and....Well, Dad never understood what happened, but the other dude got arrested.”
Interesting. Rusty’s dad didn’t know what happened, but I did: as soon as Olive touched the object, she’d have seen the owner. Meaning she’d have known immediately that it was stolen.
“You don’t look all that surprised,” he said.
“Um, well, I’ve seen some weird stuff lately.” Olive’s secrets weren’t mine to tell.
If I managed to find the murder weapon and she saw the owner, that would be soon enough for us to share her powers with the rest of the town. Unless the killer had used something already in Earl’s house. Like his own skillet.
Argh!
“Is that why you’re helping me?” I asked. “You think I’m like her?”
“Not the only reason. Olive’s good people. She doesn’t deserve to be blamed for something she didn’t do.” His face fell. “So you can’t do what she does?”
I couldn’t, but that was irrelevant. We didn’t need to know who owned the murder weapon. We needed to know what it was, who used it, and why. Whatever abilities I had might potentially be more useful than hers, if only I could figure them out.
After another moment’s hesitation, I decided to trust Rusty. For one thing, I could use a friend. But he also seemed to accept the same stuff that I had trouble believing was real. Maybe he could help.
“No.” I took a deep breath. “Honestly, I’m not sure what I can do. But there’s something.”
“That’s too bad. I was hoping you could help me find out what happened to Uncle Earl.”
“I really want to,” I said. “I’m just not sure how.”
He smiled shyly. “Maybe we can figure it out together.”
If I didn’t know better, I might have thought he was flirting with me. But considering his vast disinterest after our date and recent loss, I didn’t let myself get too excited by that notion. “Tell me about your uncle.”
Rusty shrugged. “Not much to tell. What you see was what you get with Uncle Earl. I’m sorry you met him under such awkward circumstances. Generally, he was a fun guy. People loved him.”
Reaching over, I squeezed his hand. “I’m sorry for your lo
ss.”
“Thanks.”
“Do you have any idea who might have done this? Did you see Earl on Tuesday?”
“Sorry, no. I was at the coffee shop from noon to closing. Julie was teaching me some of her recipes.”
With Julie. All afternoon. Earl died after he came into Missing Pieces, so during Rusty’s shift. If Julie was working with Rusty like she’d claimed, then she couldn’t have killed Earl.
“You were both there from lunch to closing?”
“Yup. Every Tuesday.”
Great. There went my only suspect.
People on TV made this look so easy. There had to be a way to figure out what happened.
“Did he have any other family?”
“My parents. They moved to Florida a few years back. I have an aunt in Chicago, but I’m his only family in town. My grandparents died years ago.”
Something hit me from before. “Who was Nicole?”
Rusty’s eyes widened. “Aunt Nicole? We don’t talk about her. Apparently she and Earl were married before I was born, but she moved away when they divorced. I never met her.”
Well, that explained the date on the skillet.
“Did they have any kids?”
“No.”
“What about close friends? Earl and Thelma were dating, right?”
“Yeah. For a couple of years now. I think she was more into than he was, to be honest. Not to speak ill of the dead, but it seemed like he was only with her because she lived next door and he was too lazy to go meet someone else.”
Ouch. Poor Thelma. “Did she know that?”
“I doubt it. She thought they were in love.”
Not the first time I’d heard that, but I’d thought Thelma was exaggerating their relationship for the sympathy. Now it sounded like her designs on happily ever after were real, if not reciprocated.
“Did he plan to marry her?” I asked. “She seemed to think they’d be getting engaged soon.”
“No. No way.”
“You’re sure?”
“Yeah, positive,” Rusty said. “He’d been talking about breaking things off because she was too clingy. No way he was about to propose. I don’t care what Thelma said.”