Pineapple Turtles

by Amy Vansant

  “This way,” cajoled Charlotte, easing the pup in the right direction. She wanted to walk by the house of the unhappy parents once, loop around and pass again to see if she saw anything. Siofra could be parked on the block right now, casing the place, watching Charlotte walk her hamster.

  She started down the street, Harley trotting along beside her, taking seven hundred steps for each of hers, stopping to sniff every few feet, just like a normal-sized dog. She found it bizarre the doll-like creature acted like a dog, though she didn’t know how she thought it would act.

  Charlotte looked up at the sky, a little worried a hawk or osprey might plunge out of the sky and snatch Harley away. She also wasn’t sure what to do when the dog paused, other than let it pause. When Abby paused too long and refused to listen to reason, she pulled the leash until the dog relented. With Harley, she was afraid the tiniest tug might pop the miniature Yorkie’s head right off her tiny body.

  The two of them made their stop-and-go way down the street, past the parked cars in which Charlotte hoped to spot someone Siofra-like. No one sat inside any of them. She strolled three blocks past the parents’ house and then started back up the street in the opposite direction, Harley never tiring. Any farther away would be too far for anyone to effectively surveille the parents’ house.

  So terrible.

  Her mind drifted to the ways, if faced with a similar situation, she might tell Abby apart from another identical dog. Once when Abby was young, Mariska had taken her to be groomed and her baby came back looking like an alien. She’d spent a week running Abby through a battery of tests to make sure it was her. After that ordeal, she’d even taught the Wheaton a special trick to make sure she would always know the difference—

  “Hello.”

  Charlotte looked up from her thoughts and found the unlucky couple’s next door neighbor staring back at her. A moment earlier he was mowing his lawn. He’d just stopped the engine and now stood wiping his age-speckled brow.

  Perfect.

  “Hello,” she said, pushing her grin to grow. She wanted to look super-friendly in the hopes of killing two birds with one stone. Sure, she’d wanted to mill around for a bit like a random neighbor walking a dog, searching for Siofra watching the house. But as much as solving the baby-napping crime wasn’t her primary mission, it couldn’t hurt to find out a little more information about the case. It was interesting. There had to be things the police didn’t share with the news, because nothing about the case made sense.

  Who trades their own baby for another?

  Her best guess was someone had stolen a baby for another couple looking to gain a child by any means possible. Though that didn’t explain the return of a different baby. Did the couple find the first baby lacking and ‘returned it to the store for an exchange,’ so to speak? Did the kidnapper hope returning the first baby to the parents of the second baby would fool them and keep at least one kidnapping undiscovered?

  So bizarre.

  Charlotte had given the entire situation a lot of thought, and that scenario was the only one that made sense. The idea of someone giving away their own child felt too awful to be a possibility. But to swap one random baby for another...that seemed more likely. Though, she hadn’t found any other local reports of kidnapped babies to support her theory.

  The neighbor stooped over a flower bed to pluck a weed and his motion drew Charlotte from her thoughts.

  He tossed the weed into his lawn and she could tell he was about to fire-up his lawn mower again.

  Say something.

  “Hey, did they find their baby?” she asked in a more conspiratorial tone. Since it had already been reported on the news the baby had been swapped, she hoped her question would make him think she was a neighbor and not a lookie-loo.

  Heck, I’m not even reading the news. How could I be up to no-good?

  The man glanced nervously at the house next door and shook his head. He took a step forward and lowered his voice as well.

  “Terrible thing.”

  “What?”

  “They didn’t get the baby back.”

  “What?” asked Charlotte with her best shocked-face. “They didn’t? Why did I think they they did?”

  He grimaced. “The police were here all day yesterday. In the end, they were off to get the baby back—”

  “Right…”

  “—but it wasn’t their baby.”

  Cue even-more-shocked face.

  “What? I don’t understand.”

  I’m an idiot. Please tell me everything.

  The man sighed. “It was another baby. Not theirs.”

  “The baby they went to get?”

  He nodded, looking as grim as a human could.

  Charlotte raised her hand to cover her gaping mouth. “You’re kidding. The kidnappers returned a different baby? Who does that?”

  The man’s expression lit, as if he’d been waiting all day to share his inside information with someone who hadn’t read the paper. “That’s what my wife said. She talked to Shana, as best she could—the woman was screaming and crying something about a blind baby.”

  Charlotte found herself dumbstruck.

  A blind baby?

  The plot thickens.

  Without knowing why, she scooped up Harley and held the dog close to her. “You’re saying someone took their baby and then returned a blind baby to them?”

  He nodded. “That’s what my wife thinks. She said it was all very chaotic and she thinks Shana was on some kind of sedative.” He clucked his tongue. “Leaving her baby on the floor for someone to steal it. Irresponsible. I’d leave that woman if I were Carl.”

  Charlotte physically recoiled at the man’s lack of sympathy, clutching Harley even tighter. “I’m sure she never dreamed someone would take him.”

  He shook his head. “These days you can never be too careful. She should have known better.”

  Charlotte took a deep breath.

  Now isn’t the time to chastise this guy for his lack of empathy.

  “Well it’s just terrible,” she said. “Hey, you didn’t see a woman go in there, did you?”

  “A woman? Into Carl’s house? Who?”

  Charlotte paused.

  Um...

  She didn’t exactly know what Siofra looked like at the moment. Before she had to make something up, the old man kept talking.

  “I saw a lady cop or two milling around outside while they were waiting for the kidnappers to call.”

  Charlotte looked away, thinking.

  Could Siofra be masquerading as a cop?

  Probably not. Too risky.

  “No, I was thinking more of a private investigator. Looks like me a little?”

  Probably. Maybe. Hard to tell from an old picture and a dubious family connection.

  The man tucked back his chin and eyeballed her. “No. I think I’d remember that.” He grinned with a set of perfect veneers and she felt her skin crawl a little.

  Ick.

  “Ah. Well. I guess we’d better get going.” She looked at Harley as if the dog had asked her to get a move on.

  The neighbor took a step to the right as if he were trying to block her from leaving, though he stopped short of moving from his yard to the sidewalk. “Which house are you? I haven’t seen you before.”

  “Me? Oh, that one,” she said flicking her finger in the direction she was heading, pointing somewhere in the middle of the street. “I’ll see you around.”

  “See you.” He winked.

  Not if I see you first.

  She hurried away with Harley tucked in her armpit.

  Ugh.

  Old guy with just enough money to think he had a chance with a much younger woman. Florida was full of them, though not so much in Charlotte’s neighborhood. The modest retirement incomes of the Pineapple Port cruisers kept them in check with the younger ladies. When it came to women their own age, all they had to do was sit back and wait for a hungry widow to find them. The lopsided numbers of men to women p
laced the men firmly in the catbird seats in Pineapple Port.

  Once back in her car, Charlotte set down the dog and tapped her finger against her steering wheel.

  That was stupid.

  She shouldn’t have talked to the man. It would be twice as hard to remain undetected now there was someone on the block who could recognize her. Certainly, if he spotted her, he’d wonder what she was doing sitting in her car staring at her neighbor’s house.

  A careless move, but she did get a juicy tidbit of information out of Creepy McNeighbor. The replacement baby was blind. The police hadn’t released that fact to the press. Someone tried to swap a blind baby for another. That certainly gave her ‘defective baby exchange’ theory some credence.

  Unbelievable.

  She’d stopped being shocked by the news years ago, but baby swapping was even weirder than most stories. If there was one thing the Internet had done, besides making case research a lot easier, it was make Charlotte realize how strange people could be. She felt as if she could make up any story, no matter how outrageous, and someone out there, somewhere, had already done it or, at least, thought about doing it.

  Terrifying.

  Charlotte stared at Shana and Carl Bennett’s house. She couldn’t see much, thanks to a large hedge wall separating the house from the street. Feeling something wet flick against her forearm, she glanced at Harley. The dog had found a spot curled on the passenger seat, lazily licking the hand Charlotte had resting on the center handbrake. Harley seemed tired. The short walk had probably felt like a marathon to little Peewee Muffin-head.

  Charlotte peered in her side mirror and watched the neighbor mow his lawn. She didn’t want to continue walking to the opposite end of the block until he went inside. She didn’t want to give him any more reason to suspect her of anything.

  Instead, she mulled the case. The blind baby information had opened a few more possibilities.

  Would someone be willing to trade their own child if it was blind?

  The idea was almost unspeakable, but again, she’d read about worse things. It was completely possible someone was that selfish.

  But if that’s what happened…How do you find the parents of a blind baby?

  Maybe those parents hadn’t even told anyone their child was blind. If they had, and then suddenly had a child who could see, they’d have a lot of explaining to do. If they told their friends and family a miracle happened, the news could end up online. Who hears about a blind baby with restored vision and doesn’t post it on Facebook? People would be eager to believe such a happy blessing had occurred. People always believed what they wanted to believe. And people loved to share miracles.

  But she couldn’t sit back and hope the case would be solved by Facebook posts.

  The missing child was six months old, so the blind baby was near the same age. Did the parents diagnose the blind child’s condition themselves? How do you know a six-month child is blind? He didn’t say. It’s not like they tossed him a baseball and he didn’t try to catch it—

  Charlotte gasped.

  A doctor.

  Chances were good somewhere there was a doctor who’d told those parents their baby was blind. Even if they’d suspected something was wrong, they would have taken the baby to a doctor to confirm those suspicions.

  This was a thread that could be followed. The police needed to find a doctor who’d recently diagnosed a blind baby.

  Though, that task might be harder than it sounded. There was no guarantee the baby was local—that might have been the whole point. The parents might have driven or flown from anywhere to enact their kidnapping plan.

  But probably not.

  This kidnapping didn’t seem terribly planned.

  The woman who perpetrated the crime had her own baby with her when she stole Shana’s—that implied a spur of the moment idea. It had been nothing but luck that she’d parked out of the view of the parking lot cameras.

  Probably.

  Charlotte caught a movement from the corner of her eye and turned to face the Bennetts’ house. She watched two police officers push through the gate. She perked, but as fast as her spine straightened, it curved back down.

  Oh no.

  What am I doing? I’m supposed to be looking for Siofra.

  She realized she wanted to solve the case. But, if she did, Siofra wouldn’t have to and they might miss their chance to spot her.

  Hm.

  But it wouldn’t be right of her not to help.

  Would it?

  Maybe she could just help the police a little.

  Scooping up Harley, she left the car and walked to the officers standing on the sidewalk outside the courtyard, one male and one female. She moved quickly to avoid giving herself time to rethink her plan.

  “Excuse me,” she said.

  Two heads turned towards her.

  “Yes?” asked the man.

  “I’ve had an idea about the case.”

  The female officer laughed. “Thanks, but I think we have it covered.”

  “Are you talking to doctors?”

  “Who?” They said in unison, their expressions growing equally grim.

  Charlotte suffered a stab of doubt.

  Ah well. Too late now.

  She plunged ahead.

  “Um, I was just thinking it would be a good idea to find the doctor who diagnosed the baby as blind—you probably already thought of that but—”

  “Who told you the baby was blind?” asked the male officer. His badge read Jackson.

  Charlotte opened her mouth but nothing came out. She’d forgotten the baby being blind wasn’t common knowledge. “Uh, the neighbor, actually, I guess his wife is friends with—”

  “Why don’t you come inside with us?” asked the female of the pair.

  Charlotte put the hand not holding Harley on her chest. “Me?”

  The female officer nodded. “Sure. You could tell your idea to the captain.”

  Something about the expressions on the faces of the officers told Charlotte they weren’t asking her in because they were so impressed with her idea.

  They think I’m involved.

  She took a step back. “No, it’s okay. It was just an idea—”

  She started to turn, but the female cop reached out to put a hand on her arm. According to her badge, her name was Rosey, but she didn’t seem very rosey as she glared at Charlotte.

  “I’m afraid I’m going to have to insist,” said Rosey, making unsettling eye contact with her.

  Shoot.

  Charlotte could tell she’d passed the point of sweet-talking her way out of her predicament.

  “Fine.”

  She fell into step behind Officer Rosey. Jackson took a spot behind her, no doubt to keep her from running.

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  The officers led Charlotte through the hedge gate and into the Bennetts’ house. Inside, a woman who appeared near her own age stood on her tippy toes in the kitchen, retrieving a plate from a high shelf. Her head turned as the officers entered and she froze, still on her toes, before lowering to her feet.

  “Is that her?” she asked, paling.

  The officers shook their heads. “We found her outside. Do you recognize her?”

  The pretty woman took a step forward. Charlotte could see every part of Shana straining to recognize her as the kidnapper, but after a moment, her body sagged as if someone had released her strings and she shook her head. “No.”

  A man appeared from a hallway located between the front room and the kitchen.

  “Who’s this?” he asked. Charlotte assumed he was Carl.

  “This woman was outside asking questions about the investigation. Do you recognize her?”

  The man shook his head. “No. Should I?”

  Charlotte offered the confused couple a smile. Both of them looked as if they hadn’t slept in days, dark circles bagged beneath their eyes. “This is all a misunderstanding. I was just asking your neighbor if the baby had been found yet.�
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  “Is that who told you the baby was blind?” asked Officer Rosey.

  Charlotte nodded. “Yes. That’s what I was trying to tell you outside—”

  “Is that possible?” Rosey frowned at the couple.

  “No,” said the husband, quickly. “You told us not to tell anyone.”

  He looked at his wife, and she looked away.

  “Ask her,” suggested Charlotte.

  Rosey glared at her and Charlotte could almost see the words you shut up in her eyes. She zipped it.

  The officers locked their gazes on the wife, whose own eyes pointed towards the floor as if pulled there by a magnet.

  “I might have told Judith next door,” she mumbled. “By accident.”

  The husband’s face flashed red. “Shana, you weren’t supposed to tell anyone—”

  “I know, I’m sorry, I just needed to tell someone and it slipped—”

  Her husband raised both hands into the air. “So you tell the woman who’s married to the biggest busybody on the street?”

  Shana’s eyes brimmed with tears. “She said she wouldn’t tell.”

  The husband decided to turn his anger on Charlotte. “What are you doing asking around anyway? It’s none of your business.”

  Charlotte felt the eyes of the officers on either side of her burning into her skin. They clearly wanted to know the answer to that same question.

  She decided to come clean. “I’m a freelance private investigator. I was trying to help.”

  Shana took a step forward, the plate still hanging in her hand. “Do you think you can help?”

  “All right,” said Officer Jackson, motioning for Shana to stop. “We only wanted to see if you recognized her. We’ll take her to the station and get this worked out.”

  “To the station?” peeped Charlotte, her voice growing pitchy. “But I haven’t done anything.”

  “That’s what we’re going to figure out,” said Jackson, taking her arm and pulling it behind her back. Charlotte heard the jingle of cuffs.

  “Are you kidding?”

  “Give me your other hand.”

  “I can’t.” Charlotte held up Harley.

  Officer Rosey took the dog and Jackson finished cuffing her. “We’ll work this out.”