Belinda Blake and the Birds of a Feather

by Heather Day Gilbert

  It didn’t.

  I sighed. Why on earth would someone be motivated to lock me in the church fellowship hall? Was I being followed by some kind of prankster now? Or was it something more sinister and personal?

  Were they outside the door now, planning to burst in whenever they were ready?

  I glanced at the clock on the wall—it was already ten forty. I was supposed to meet Jonas at eleven. He’d miss me and call Mom, I was sure of it. He’d track me down.

  I walked over to one of the small windows and tried to peer out, but I couldn’t see through the frosted-style glass. I could bash the window out, but given its size, there was no way I could climb through it.

  Nope, the door was the only way out.

  I examined the doorknob again. It must be one of those privacy knob locks, one you simply turned to lock. There was a keyhole on my side.

  I walked over and grabbed the main church key, figuring it was worth a shot to try it. To my surprise, it worked the first time. I clutched the knife in one hand and opened the door, easing into the hallway. Someone had turned off the lights, so I kicked the fellowship hall door open wider and a trickle of light spilled out.

  The person could be hiding in any of the Sunday school classrooms, since the doors were all closed. I had the surreal feeling I was playing one of my military recon-type video games, except this time I didn’t have the advantage of being armed to the teeth. Should I bash all the doors in, like I would in the game? Or should I just make a wild run for the basement door?

  I decided on the door. Since it locked from the inside, there was no way they could’ve locked me in that way. I took off toward it at top speed. Turning the handle the moment my hand could touch it, I raced through the unlocked door and slammed it shut behind me.

  I kept running, straight out the church’s side door and over to the parsonage. After I jammed the doorbell several times, the new pastor opened his door. Although he gave me his full attention, it took him several minutes to process what I was saying. He finally agreed to call one of the deacons over so they could check out the basement area.

  I looked at my phone and saw that none of my texts had gone through. Instead of re-sending them, I jumped in Bluebell and drove directly toward Jonas’s house. I’d call the police from there. Maybe they could send a car over to make sure Peter Bear was at home.

  Because Peter was the only one I could think of who would be following me around like this. Adrian couldn’t do it, because his mom had taken him to some kind of emergency appointment. Professor Baruch probably had classes today, so he didn’t have time to run around trailing me.

  My Halo text tone sounded and I glanced at my phone, only to see that it was Ella. I pulled over to read the text. She said she’d gotten a teacher to drop her off at home, since she’d gotten sick at school. But there was a red pumpkin smashed against the front door of her house, and she was worried someone might be around. Since her mom and Adrian were out, I was the only other adult she could think of to contact.

  A charge of unadulterated fear ran through me for Ella’s sake. The teen could be walking into a dangerous situation if someone had targeted the van Dusens like they were targeting me.

  I turned around and drove toward the van Dusen place, trying to make sense of what was going on. The hooded intruder, the red pumpkins, the lock-in at the church—everything seemed designed to make me afraid. And now a blood-colored pumpkin had showed up on the van Dusens’ front doorstep. Was it a type of warning? Did someone think we knew too much?

  Adrian knew more than he was saying, but he was hardly a threat to anyone at this point. He hadn’t breathed a word of what he saw to the police over the years, and it seemed unlikely he’d do so now. He said he hadn’t talked to his mom about it, and he must be telling the truth—if Tracy found out that Peter Bear had been there when Claire died, she would’ve gone straight to the cops.

  Maybe someone had followed me to the van Dusen’s earlier, when I picked up the macaroni salad. I hadn’t glanced at the front door before I left, so it was possible the stalker had tossed the pumpkin at the door while I was inside, or even after I left. In that case, all the animosity was still directly aimed at me, for whatever reason.

  I pulled up the van Dusen drive. Ella stepped out of the garden shed, waving me down, so I pulled to a quick stop.

  I jumped out and rushed toward the girl, who had lost all her teen bravado at this point. Her face was pale, and she couldn’t stop glancing toward the house.

  “I didn’t even go inside once I saw that pumpkin—I just hid out here,” she said. “Sorry to text you, but my teacher had already pulled away, or I would’ve had her stay with me.”

  “It’s no problem. You did the right thing,” I said. “You said you’re feeling sick? Is it a stomach bug?”

  She nodded. “I think so. I threw up at school so I knew I needed to get home. I’m a little queasy now, but I didn’t eat anything for breakfast, so there’s not much left in my stomach.”

  “Is there a place to sit down in the shed?” I asked. “You look a little shaky.”

  She led the way into the shed, which was crowded with shovels and shelves of garden tools. She sank into a dirty plastic chair and motioned me toward another one. “Mom used to work in her flowerbeds,” she said. “Dad had someone build this shed for her. But that was before Claire died.” She got quiet and didn’t continue.

  “I’m so sorry about Claire,” I said, sensing a rare moment when Ella’s defenses were down. “Were you about ten years old when it happened?”

  Her light maple-colored hair swung over her face, hiding her eyes. “Yeah.”

  I glanced out the window. If anyone drove up, they’d see my car and know I was here. There weren’t many blue Volvos in Larches Corner.

  “It hit Adrian hard, didn’t it?” I asked gently, trying to draw her out.

  Her voice hardened and she pulled her knees to her chin. “Adrian can’t deal with it. Mom can’t deal with it. Dad avoids us because he can’t deal, either.”

  “And what about you?”

  She tossed her hair to the side, giving me a heated glare. “They’re not the only ones who’ve suffered.”

  “Do people at school give you a hard time?” I guessed.

  “I’ve been bullied, sure. Because I’m too tall, or because my brother is crazy, or because my sister got run over by a train, that kind of stuff.”

  I watched the window, unwilling to stop and call anyone at this juncture because I didn’t want to break my connection with Ella. I doubted Tracy had ever talked with her daughter about how Claire’s death had affected her life—she was too busy trying to keep Adrian stable.

  I knew it must be eleven by now, and Jonas would be waiting for me. Maybe he’d call Mom and she’d in turn call the pastor and get the story of my lock-in. I should at least shoot them a text that I was okay, but I’d wait a few more minutes.

  “You have a lot of things to deal with,” I said.

  “Tell me about it,” Ella said grimly.

  22

  Ella gave a groan and hunched over, as if she had stomach cramps.

  “Do you want me to get you some water?” I asked. “I think I have a fresh bottle in my car.”

  She shook her head. “I’ll be okay.”

  I tried a different tack, hoping to distract her from the way she was feeling. “My parents said you’re enjoying working at the vet clinic. I’m so glad.”

  “You’re lucky,” she said, her voice barely above a whisper. “You have a dad and mom who are always around.”

  “Is that why you’ve been cutting class?” I asked. “Because your parents don’t pay you much attention?”

  She gave a slight nod.

  I looked out at the house, but as far as I could tell, there hadn’t been any movement. I realized that if the stalker had followed me from the churc
h, they might already be here. Maybe they’d parked on the road and were walking toward us now.

  “I should probably call the police,” I said.

  “Don’t bother,” Ella said. “It was just a pumpkin.”

  “No, it might be more. See, I’ve had someone kind of following me around, and I’m thinking he could’ve trailed me here again. That pumpkin might’ve been meant for me.”

  “Do you really think so?” she asked, standing to stretch.

  “I do. Someone showed up at my house last night with the same kind of pumpkin.”

  She reached for something under the shelving. “Were they by any chance carrying something like this?” she asked, pulling a scythe out and brandishing it in front of me.

  I felt numb. “How did you know? Wait—did you see Adrian—”

  She gave a short laugh. “I saw a lot more than anyone thought I did, I can tell you that.”

  I looked out the window. “Ella, if you saw something, that puts you in danger, too. Get serious and put down that scythe. Tell me what you’ve seen.”

  * * * *

  Ella obediently propped the scythe against the wall and sat down again. “I know quite a few things, but I also know how to keep my mouth shut,” she said. “I found a journal of Adrian’s in a shoebox in his closet.”

  “So you were spying on him?” I had to admit, I would also stoop to using that kind of information-gathering technique.

  “I guess so…mostly I just wanted to know why he’d changed so much. He used to protect me in school, before Claire died. He was like my best friend. We played together in the woods and down at the creek.”

  “Claire’s death is what changed him,” I said.

  “Sort of, but that wasn’t all.” She gave me a defiant look.

  “Okay, I’ll bite. What else?”

  “He saw what happened that night. He wrote it all in the journal. He followed her into the woods and saw that she was fighting with Peter Bear. Then he saw Peter wrestle with her until she was on the tracks.”

  Adrian had told me as much, but I tried to act surprised. “So he thinks Peter killed her?”

  Ella shrugged. “I don’t know. I mean, he was a little vague and all, but I could read between the lines that’s what happened. Oh, and there were three other people there, too. Those supposed friends of Claire’s—Tori, Rosalee, and Jackson.”

  “Did he say anything else?”

  She bit her lip. “Well, he saw Rosalee and Peter kissing, back when Peter was supposed to be Claire’s boyfriend. So maybe that ties in with Peter killing her somehow.”

  “But why would he kill her in front of three people? That’s what I can’t understand.”

  “Don’t you watch TV? It’s what they’d call a crime of passion. That means it was in the heat of the moment.”

  I sighed. We were going over the same facts I already knew, and they made little difference in the grand scheme of things.

  “What about that scythe? How’d you know someone brought that over to my house last night? Did you see Adrian with it?”

  She shook her head. “It wasn’t Adrian.”

  My mind went into overdrive. Surely Tracy wouldn’t have done something so crazy—and why would she have thrown a painted pumpkin at her own porch this morning? Or had Hendrik been lying about his work travels, and instead he was hanging out somewhere in Larches Corner, trying to keep me out of his family’s business?

  My eyes traveled around the interior of the shed. For the first time, I noticed a half-open gallon of paint—with a red swatch on top of it.

  Someone with access to this shed had been vandalizing people. Was it one of the van Dusens? I looked out the window again, unsure if I needed to be on the alert when Tracy returned.

  “They’re not coming.” Ella’s words sounded flat.

  I tried to comfort her. “I know it seems like your family doesn’t have much time for you, but I know they love you, Ella.” Although I was still trying to work out why one of them would’ve thrown a painted pumpkin at their own door.

  Ella stood again. “Oh, I know they do. I just meant they’ll be at Adrian’s appointment for a while. He went off the deep end last night. I wonder what set him off.”

  I didn’t want to admit it might have been me and our video game questioning session. “What do you mean, ‘he went off the deep end’? What did he do?” I was hoping she’d say she saw Adrian donning the hooded cloak and picking up the scythe.

  “He was rambling on about Peter Bear,” she said. “But I guess Peter will have to pay the piper soon enough.”

  “What do you mean?” I asked, wondering if Ella had somehow heard about Tori’s death. Chloe’s news article hadn’t even come out yet.

  “I just mean he’ll get what’s coming to him.” She looked down at me. “He was there when Rosalee died after their party, right? I mean, he’s the obvious suspect.”

  “I guess so…but there were other people around that night. Even your brother,” I said.

  “Yeah, it is the kind of house where people can just come and go,” she said thoughtfully. “I’ve visited their pool a couple of times—their daughter’s a grade ahead of me and she’s had some birthday parties there. I remember thinking how easy it would be to slip into that back yard unnoticed.”

  I realized time was ticking and looked at my phone. Eleven twenty. My heart sank. Would Jonas and I ever have that talk?

  “Ella, I need to get—” I looked up and my words died in my mouth.

  Ella was holding a revolver. And she was pointing it right at my chest.

  She laughed. “I wish you could’ve seen your face! You didn’t see that coming, did you? Guess I don’t look like that other murderer you tracked down in Greenwich.” She gestured toward the seat behind me. “Sit back down and drop the phone on the floor.”

  I thought about bolting for the door, but the gun barrel was way too close. Ella could hardly miss, no matter what kind of shot she was. I lowered into the chair, placing my phone on the concrete floor.

  She loomed over me, holding the gun tight in both hands. “I knew you were a threat to me the moment you told me about hunting that murderer in Greenwich. So I had to keep an eye on you. Why was I skipping school? That’s easy—I needed time to watch you and to do the other things I needed to do.”

  “But wait…are you saying you’re some kind of murderer?” A thirteen-year-old girl?

  Her zealous eyes met my own, and suddenly I saw the truth. Adrian might have come visibly unhinged when his sister died, but Ella had taken her trauma underground. And where Adrian had retreated from life, Ella had charged ahead to right all the wrongs.

  She had killed people—maybe all of them.

  She gave a slow nod. “You’re wondering how I did it, of course. Once I decided to rid the world of the vermin who killed my sister, I came up with attack plans that couldn’t possibly point to me. After all, I’m just a kid, right? I can’t even drive!” She laughed.

  “Why’d you wait all these years?” I asked.

  “Because I didn’t find the journal until Adrian dropped out of college this September. His panic attacks were the last straw for me. I searched his room one day when Mom took him to the mall for new shoes.”

  “Then you started killing club members? Did you kill them in some kind of special order?” I still couldn’t believe what we were discussing.

  “Yes, I was saving the best for last. I wanted Peter to feel the same kind of torment I’ve felt. He was the one who made my sister angry that last night, he was the one who shoved her on the tracks, he was the one who didn’t stay true to Claire and got engaged to Rosalee. I wanted him to go to prison for so many crimes, he’d never come up for air again.”

  “You framed him,” I said.

  “I sure did. I’m surprised it’s taking so long for police to announce that Pe
ter’s car hit Jackson, although they’ll never realize I was the one driving it.” She looked proud as she admitted it. “It was easy to steal Peter’s car—he left the keys right under the seat. I waited until he was out of the house, then I drove it into town and waited for Jackson.”

  “How’d you know Jackson would be at the bar that night?”

  “I called him from the pay phone out by the school,” she said simply. “I asked him to meet me in the alley because I wanted to discuss Claire’s death. He seemed nervous, asking if I’d told anyone else.” She gave me an unconvincing look of trepidation. “I mean, who knows, he might’ve tried to kill me that night, if he thought I had something on him.”

  “Most people don’t act on their fear or anger when they factor in the consequences of murdering someone else,” I said sternly.

  She huffed. “Whatever. Anyway, when I saw him come out—kind of drunk, like I figured he’d be—I had time to back the car up and build up speed as I headed for him. It felt like a release when he bounced off the front.”

  I didn’t know if she was trying to make me despise her, but she was certainly going about it the right way. “But how’d you figure out how to drive?”

  “That’s one of the only things my dad has bothered to teach me. He’s always said that an independent woman should know how to drive—maybe because Adrian lost interest in driving after Claire. Dad made me drive the lawnmower, too. So I’ve had a lot of practice in the yard.”

  I couldn’t process the fact that this child had run someone down. “What about Rosalee? You’re saying you killed her, too?”

  “Yes, she was easy. I crushed up a few of Adrian’s Ativan pills and poured them into her champagne glass when the crowd was breaking up that night. Like I said, the Meiers’ backyard isn’t exactly hard to break into, and I was wearing a scarf over my head. Then I texted her to come out to the pool because I had something special I thought Claire would want her to have.”

  What a low blow. “Did you sneak up behind her and shove her into the pool?” I asked, knowing the drugged Rosalee would have been an easy target.