by A J Sherwood
“Pity,” Neil muttered to himself, then he checked the clipboard at his hand. “She annoyed me enough I would have liked to pin it on her. Alright, well, we only have one more lined up for today. The other three are out of town right now, and the last person on the list has actually moved to Nashville and wasn’t here during the murder, so he’s out.”
With a sigh, Neil pushed his chair away from the table. “I’ll go see if he’s here yet.”
I took the relative privacy to come stand behind Jon. Putting both hands on his shoulders, I dug in with my thumbs, aiming for those knots of tension. He groaned and let his head flop forward. “Good?”
“You have magic hands.”
I chuckled and kept working him loose.
Unfortunately, it couldn’t last long. The last interviewee was coming in any second. We were close enough to five o’clock we’d be able to knock off after this, maybe find a beer somewhere. I could certainly use a beer. My lover looked ready to crawl into a corner for a while and veg out.
Andrew Stephenson, the last interviewee, stepped inside the room. I knew him to be of Neil and Caleb’s generation, in his early sixties. Not as well preserved, though. He ran to stodgy fat around his trunk, a double chin creeping up on him. The man looked a little worn-in with life, as if he carried around stress that made him brittle and edgy. I could feel every muscle under my hands lock as Jon tensed, apparently reading something in the man’s lines that put him automatically on edge. Well. This wasn’t good.
Neil followed in behind, closing the door, and took a seat like nothing was wrong. I could see him watch Jon out of the corner of his eye, though. He’d sensed something was up.
I wasn’t comfortable leaving Jon at the table without me right next to him. In two long strides, I went to the camera and hit the record button, intending to come right back to Jon. As I turned toward him, he propped his elbow up on the table, a fisted T under his chin. I read our signal easily: Trouble.
Dammit. Was this our guy?
It took effort, but I kept my face bland, not giving the game away as I went and sat next to Jon. I kept quiet, but of course there was no way for me to be unobtrusive. People always noticed me. Stephenson gave me a wary look before focusing on Neil.
“Neil, what’s this about?” Stephenson demanded, pulling his sports coat open to accommodate his beer belly as he dropped into the chair.
“It’s about the protest you signed for the Wheatlands Plantation house,” Neil responded patiently. He’d mentioned before that he knew the man casually. They’d gone to high school together many years ago. Neil gave a good show of being relaxed, just talking to an old friend. “We just have a few questions about it. Why did you protest it?”
“Well, it’s heritage, isn’t it? And Witherspoon’s plans weren’t going to preserve that.”
Jon propped up the file folder in front of him so he could discreetly write: Lie.
Neil barely gave him a glance, his expression a study of professional curiosity and nothing more. “Was that all there was to it? I’ve read the protest and it was…well. Very strongly worded.”
Stephenson cleared his throat and looked a touch uneasy, shifting in his chair. “Truth is, I was part of the last renovation and it was…a hack job in some ways. I wasn’t comfortable with what had been done. I think Witherspoon’s plans would in part reverse things, but…well. He wouldn’t bend on his plans. We just wanted him to adjust what he was doing, not do the full renovation like he wanted. Leave parts of the house alone. But he wasn’t willing to compromise.”
“I see. Did you see him at all after you talked with him, filed the protest?”
“No.”
Jon interrupted with his own question. “Did you visit Wheatlands Plantation at all in the past few weeks?”
“No.”
Jon wrote ‘truth’ then under that scribbled, ‘wait.’ “Mr. Stephenson, we’re having a hard time really understanding the full scope of the renovation plans and the issues people had with it. Can you tell me exactly which rooms you wanted left alone? Which parts of the renovation plans you didn’t like?”
“Sure.” Stephenson pinned a smile on his face that looked as fake as something on a wax doll. He ticked each point off on his fingers as he went. “The far guest bedroom in the right wing of the house was fine—it didn’t need any changes. We wanted the kitchen to stay as it was, the dining room, and of course the parlor. The parlor floor is what draws visitors, what with that bloodstain in the wood.”
“So you’re aware of all the stories of death and hauntings of the house?” Neil interrupted.
Stephenson gave him a nod and shrug. “I think most people in this area are. I brushed up on it a little when we went to do the protest, of course. I had to write up a good reason to leave the mansion alone, and reminding people of its history is the best way to do that.”
Jon pressed a little further, his charm open as he gently led Stephenson back on point. “Were those the only rooms you wanted untouched? I don’t think Witherspoon had any real intent to change those rooms.”
“Well, no. There were a few others. He’d planned to refurbish the back furnace room, which really should be left alone. That, and the distillery. He wanted to get that back up and running, make it operational. Which, really, it’s not possible to do without replacing half the equipment. It would never meet a health code the way it is right now, and much of the equipment is in such bad condition it would crumble if touched. Better to leave it as it is, so people can at least see a glimpse of what it used to be.” Stephenson shrugged, as if this was all perfectly reasonable.
A smile graced Jon’s face, one that put Stephenson at ease. It shouldn’t have. I knew that expression well; the man had just given something major away to Jon.
Jon turned to Neil with that slightly smug expression and said genially, “I don’t have anything else to ask him at the moment, unless you need to ask him something?”
Neil didn’t know Jon as well as I did, but he still seemed aware something was up and was slow to respond. “No, not at this point. Stephenson, we might need to follow up with you a bit later, if that’s alright? We’re trying to put this petition thing to bed.”
“You think the petition will fail?” Stephenson asked with genuine worry.
“No, I doubt it,” Neil denied with a shake of his head. “I think the renovations are at a complete halt and are unlikely to continue, considering.”
“Oh.” Stephenson’s body language melted with relief. “That’s good. I’m very happy to hear it. Alright, well, call me if you have more questions. Of course I’ll help.”
“Thanks for your time.” Neil showed him out the door, chatting amiably with Stephenson as he went.
As soon as they were out, I leaned in next to Jon and hissed, “What was that?”
“Camera,” he reminded me, staring straight ahead, a thoughtful frown gathering his brows together.
Dammit. I hopped up and immediately stopped the recording before shutting it off and sticking it into the EMP case. If Jon wanted me to turn the camera off, it meant what he said next shouldn’t be on record just yet. That, or he wanted to buy a second for Neil to get back in the room so he didn’t have to repeat himself.
As I latched the case shut, Neil came back in and shut the conference door behind him before demanding, “What just happened?”
“A Jonism just happened,” I answered, coming back to my chair. “Alright, babe, what did you see?”
Jon gave us both a fleeting smile, although his eyes tightened at the corners in an unhappy manner. “That man is a murderer.”
My jaw dropped as I stared at him. “Seriously?”
Neil just swore before leaning in, his hands flat against the surface of the table. “You’re absolutely sure.”
“No way to mix up a murderer with something else.” Jon still had that thoughtful look, as if he were thinking things through on one level while answering us on another. “Sometimes, a person feels so guilty about s
elf-defense that it reads as a murder, but not usually. Usually the distinction is clear. This man is definitely a murderer, and it’s years old. He did this quite some time ago and there’s no absolution in him, so I doubt he served any time for it.”
“Stephenson’s never even had a parking ticket that I know of,” Neil spluttered. “Murder. Seriously?”
“Mmm,” Jon hummed in confirmation. Kicking back, he stared up at the ceiling blankly. “And it somehow ties into the renovation. The real reason why he didn’t want it to go through was that he didn’t want Witherspoon digging up evidence of an old crime. It had something to do with the distillery. He was very panicked when talking about that room.”
“It’s true, he went into a lot of detail why that one should be left alone.” I hadn’t thought it odd compared to the rants from the other protesters. They’d gone on and on about why something should be left as it was. But that was the only place he’d listed reasons for leaving be. “Jon. You don’t think there’s a body stashed in there, do you?”
“I lay good odds on it, actually. Or at least the site of the murder was in there. I’m more inclined to think the body’s still in there, though. He really didn’t like the idea of anyone disturbing the building.”
Neil had an inscrutable look on his face. Then again, it had to be disturbing to think someone you’d known for decades was a murderer. “Sounds like I need to pull records for missing people. You said this murder was old, years old. How many years?”
Jon met his eyes levelly. “My guess? You’re looking for someone missing in 1976.”
He hissed in a breath through clenched teeth. “The last renovation.”
“I think something happened during that last renovation. I don’t know what—the lines couldn’t tell me—but something very wrong happened. This ghost has been riding on Stephenson’s shoulders for decades. I’ll bet you dollars to donuts that whoever he killed went missing in 1976.”
Neil didn’t like this at all, but as I watched, his expression closed down into one of grim determination. “I’ll pull the records. See who our possibilities are. If I can find something that belonged to the victim, can Carol find us a body?”
“She can do that with a name. People are easy to identify with names. It’s objects that work a little differently. And yeah, she should be able to get us within a five-yard radius of the body. We have a good idea of where to look, after all.” Jon prepared to stand and then paused, thinking better of it before adding, “By the way, he was telling the truth when he said he hadn’t seen Witherspoon since filing the protest. And he hadn’t been back to Wheatlands either.”
“So…” I trailed off, putting the pieces together. “Does that mean he didn’t kill Witherspoon? But he wanted to stop the renovation.”
“Maybe he got someone else to do it?” Neil slowly straightened, removing his hands as he levered himself up.
Jon shook his head slightly, lips pursed. “I didn’t see that. But I might have missed it when I was focusing on everything else. We’ll need to ask him more questions later, I think.”
“Right now, I can’t pull him back in for anything unless we have a body.” Neil looked distinctly unhappy about that. “And I want your father on hand if we’re going hunting for an old corpse.”
The rule of habeus corpus applied here. Without a body, there wasn’t a murder. The law was very literal on this point. “Then let’s go find us a body.”
13
Well this day wasn’t going according to plan. At all.
I wasn’t convinced Stephenson had anything to do with Witherspoon’s murder, but it tied in too coincidentally to not raise some questions. It could be I’d missed something in the reading, or I hadn’t asked the right question. While rare, it did happen. I wasn’t infallible.
As Neil dove into the missing persons records, Donovan and I held a conference call with Carol and Jim. Donovan put the phone on speaker and set it on the table so I could update my colleagues. They’d chosen to lounge at the hotel pool and kick back for a day while we used the conference room. Bastards. I envied them the time off to relax, as I hadn’t gotten that for over two weeks. I may have harbored a bit of evil glee while calling them and informing them we had yet another case.
Jim parroted back to me, “You found another murder? What the hell does that mean?”
“Exactly as it sounds. While we were conducting interviews, one of the men who had filed a protest turned out to be a murderer. I believe whoever he killed was stashed somewhere in the distillery. He was very panicked about the idea of us going in there.”
“Does that mean he killed Witherspoon to keep him from finding a corpse?” Carol demanded. She sounded in equal parts excited and repulsed. Old corpses were never pretty.
“I don’t think so? I didn’t read that from him. Regardless, we need to solve this mystery too.”
Jim agreed instantly. “Well of course we do. If this ties in somehow, we need to know. And if not, we’re just sitting here twiddling our thumbs at the moment anyway. Might as well earn our pay.”
“Jon,” Carol interrupted, “can Neil get me a name of missing people?”
“He’s doing that now,” Donovan assured her. “According to him, there’s not many missing people in Tennessee, and certainly not in this area. He thinks it will only take him a few minutes to pull up missing people from 1976.”
“Oooh,” Carol intoned. “The plot thickens. Why 1976?”
“Because I’m fairly certain the murder occurred during the last renovation,” I said. “Anyway, this is your heads-up. Set up for a reading. We’ll give you a name and then head over.”
“I’m all over that. Meet me at the plantation. Might as well get close to the scene of the crime.” Carol abruptly hung up.
“I’ll meet you there too.” Then Jim hung up as well.
Donovan put the phone away, tilting his body a little to slide the phone into his pocket without standing. He turned in his chair to face me more directly, studying me. “You’re looking very…smug?”
I shrugged, unable to deny it. “Yeah. It’s just, with this other case, even if it doesn’t solve ours, it gives us a viable reason to stay here a little longer. And things are going so well between me and Neil and Caleb, I don’t want to leave just yet.”
His face softened into a smile. “Yeah, I can see that. You guys are getting along pretty well. And you’re happy to work with him, too. Show off a little.”
Was I that transparent? Or did he just know me that well? Hopefully the latter. “I’d like to see them in action, too. It’s always cool to see a parent working.”
“I always found it fun to shadow my dad at work. Despite not wanting to be a carpenter, it was cool to watch him.”
I didn’t think Donovan wanted to go back to Nashville, himself, but I’d learned to ask things like that. Even if I could read his emotions, sometimes expressing interest was more important than silently assuming you knew how the other person felt. “If you’d like to go home a little sooner, I understand. If you feel a little the odd man out, I mean.”
He shook his head without hesitation. “No, babe. Your fathers have been great to me. And they’re both cool guys, I haven’t minded the chance to get to know them.”
That was what I’d read from him, but I was still relieved to hear him say it. “Good.”
Neil stuck his head into the conference room, leaning his weight on one leg. “Got a name. Only person missing in this area between 1975 and 1977. Jenny Cartwright.”
Donovan immediately pulled his phone back out and texted that information over. I stood, giving Neil a smile. “Caleb ready to go?”
“He said he’ll meet us there. He’s packing up the ERV.”
“Okay.” A tingle of anticipation raced up my spine. I did love catching the bad guys. “Let’s go prove a murder.”
Despite the short trip between the police station and Wheatlands Plantation, we were one of the last to arrive. Carol was already situated at the big dining
room table, her map, focusing crystals, and cards all laid out precisely so. Sharon was lighting the sage incense as we came in. Sho had a camera directly pointed at her in order to record the reading.
Neil came around us to stand at her side. “Carol, you just need the name, correct? I pulled up a picture of her if that will help at all.”
“Sure,” Carol agreed. “I wouldn’t mind seeing it. It will help me visualize her better as a person instead of just a name.”
He handed her his phone and she took a good look, a frown drawing down the corners of her mouth. Her lines flashed with the violet of pensiveness and the deeper ultraviolet of sadness. “God, she was young.”
“Nineteen,” Neil confirmed, equally sad and grim in measure. “She’d been accepted at Tennessee Tech with a full ride scholarship right before she disappeared. I remember the talk going around about her, that she’d eloped with some boy. But I never did buy into it. I knew her. I was always convinced something had happened.”
“Turns out you were right,” Sharon said, stepping back from the table to join me, out of the way. “Although I think we’d have all preferred if she really had eloped.”
“Yeah,” Neil sighed heavily. “Alright, Sho, you ready for us?”
Sho didn’t look up from the small screen in front of him as he said, “Ready. Camera’s rolling.”
Facing the camera squarely, Neil started the interview. “I’m Detective Neil Singleton with the Sevierville Police Department. Today is October 24th, 2019. Time is 4:55 pm. I’m here with Psychic Carol Palmer. She will be doing a reading regarding the cold case of Jenny Cartwright, missing since 1976.”
“I’m Carol Palmer, license number 1098236.” Carol completed the necessary information without more than a glance up. Her hands already stretched out, the light blue of her aura swirling around them as she activated her psychic ability. “I will now commence my reading to locate Jenny Cartwright, alive or dead.”
Donovan leaned into my side and whispered near my ear, “Why didn’t anyone ask a psychic to locate her sooner?”