by J A Whiting
“Well, maybe we should go talk to Lindsey again and ask some additional questions.” Courtney closed out of the tape.
After they spoke with Detective Owen, the sisters headed to the hospital to see if they could speak with Lindsey again.
Lindsey agreed to take a break when she heard the Roselands wanted to talk with her and she met them in the garden outside of the hospital.
“Hi. I was surprised to hear you were looking for me.” Lindsey joined the young women on the benches.
Courtney said, “Sorry for interrupting your work day. We didn’t know how else to get in touch with you.”
“It’s fine. Is everything okay? Is there some news?”
“We just wanted to talk some more about what happened to our mom,” Ellie explained.
“Okay.” Lindsey nodded.
“Do you know anyone who was at the accident scene?” Jenna’s face was serious.
Lindsey started to shake her head, but then said, “Dr. Day was there. He tried to help before the ambulance came. Did you talk to him about it?”
“We did.” Jenna kept her voice even and non-accusatory. “Anyone else? Do you know anyone else who was near the street when our mother was hit?”
“I don’t think so. No one else from the hospital was there.”
“And where did you say you were?” Pulses of anxiety picked at Angie’s skin.
“I was about a block away. I heard the noise and the hubbub. Like I said before, I thought someone ran a red light or something.”
“Did you walk over to see what was going on?” Jenna pressed for more information.
“I needed to get to the hospital. I was called in to sub for someone.” Lindsey adjusted the sleeve of her shirt.
Courtney had enough of Lindsey’s evasive answers. “We saw some footage of the scene taken from a building security camera.”
“Oh. That must have been upsetting.”
“It was,” Angie said quietly. “There was someone in the crowd who looked like you.”
Lindsey’s shoulders straightened. “Me? Where?”
Courtney told the woman where the look-a-like person was standing. “She was watching Dr. Day. When the ambulance and the police came, we noticed her hurry away.”
“I was only there for about thirty seconds. When I saw someone had been hit, I left right away. I had to get to work and I didn’t want to gawk at someone’s misfortune.”
“You knew it was our mother who had been hit?” Ellie asked.
“No,” the word came out almost like a shout. “I didn’t know it was Elizabeth. Not then. I heard what happened to her later in the day.”
“Did you recognize Dr. Day?” Jenna questioned.
“No. I saw a man in a suit. He wasn’t facing me. I could only see him from the back. I didn’t wait to see who was in the crowd. I left. I learned later that George was on the scene.”
“Did you see a short, strong-looking guy with blond hair on the street?” Angie asked.
Lindsey blinked. “I might have laid eyes on the person, but I don’t recall seeing anyone who fit that description. Maybe he was there. There weren’t any faces in the crowd that registered with me. I saw the accident, I saw a woman in the street, but I didn’t realize it was Elizabeth. I didn’t want to hang around staring at what was going on. It seemed ghoulish to do that. If you were the injured person, would you want a bunch of gawkers watching everything that was happening to you? People need their privacy.”
“Why didn’t you tell us you were at the scene?” Jenna’s eyes bored into Lindsey’s.
“I didn’t see any reason to tell you. I was there for less than thirty seconds. I didn’t witness what happened. I didn’t know Elizabeth was the victim. What would be the point in mentioning I was there? I wasn’t the one who assisted medically. I can’t tell you anything about the accident.” Lindsey’s tone held a hint of defensiveness.
Angie leaned forward a little. “Did you know anyone who wanted to hurt our mother?”
“I certainly didn’t.” Lindsey’s cheeks flared red. “I would have told the police.”
“Did our mom confide in you about feeling uneasy about anything?”
“She didn’t.”
“Did you ever see a short, stocky, muscular man with blond hair around our mother?”
“I don’t recall every single person who came through the emergency room. I’m sure at some point, someone of that description interacted with your mother. With so many years of experience working in emergency, some guy with muscles and blond hair probably came in at some time.” Lindsey shook her head.
“Did our mother tell you why she was planning on leaving work early on the day she died?” Angie asked.
Lindsey blinked a few times and then answered with an even tone. “I didn’t know she was leaving early that day. Why do you ask?”
“We heard she was only working half a day at the hospital. We wondered what she had planned for the rest of the day.” Jenna fibbed knowing full well where her mother was going that afternoon.
“It was a long time ago.” Lindsey shook her head. “I’m sure whatever she had planned didn’t have anything to do with what happened to her.”
14
“I don’t like Lindsey.” Angie was lining a baking sheet with graham crackers, preparing frozen s’mores for dessert.
“Do you mean you don’t like her or you don’t like her?” Courtney asked.
Mr. Finch looked across the kitchen from the stove where he was making fudge. “I believe Miss Courtney is asking if your senses are picking up on something about the woman.”
“I feel like she’s holding back information. I feel like she knows something and is hiding it from us.” Angie whisked together vanilla pudding and milk. “My senses are telling me she can’t be trusted.”
“Okay. Interesting … because I had the same sensations.” Courtney was sitting at the table going through the case files again.
“The woman gives something off.” Angie was trying to find the right words to express herself. “It makes me want to withdraw from her.”
Euclid hissed from the top of the fridge.
“But is all of this your powers at work or is it something a normal person would pick up on?” Ellie chopped vegetables for the chili she was making.
Courtney replied, “It’s our paranormal Spidey sense at work.”
“I don’t feel anything unusual from her.” Ellie added some diced onions to the slow cooker.
“That’s because you’re blocking incoming sensations. You don’t want to feel them.”
Jenna came into the room with a baby on each hip.
“What do you think of Lindsey?” Courtney questioned.
“I don’t like her,” Jenna said as Finch helped her place the kids in the high chairs. “My inner alarms go off when she’s around warning me away from her.”
“We all feel the same way,” Angie reported. “Does it mean Lindsey is involved in Mom’s death?”
“I can’t figure that out yet.” Jenna poured a cup of tea. “There’s something she doesn’t want to tell us. Maybe she wants us to think she and Mom were good friends for some reason when we know that isn’t the case. Mom’s friend, Lara, told us Mom didn’t care for Lindsey.”
“Maybe Lindsey harbored resentment towards Mom and didn’t like her at all and was secretly glad when she died,” Courtney guessed.
Angie tilted her head considering what her sisters had said. “You might have something there. Those are good ideas. Lindsey pretends she and Mom were friendly, when in reality, Lindsey might not have liked her. That could be what I’m sensing from her, dishonesty in what she says about Mom. There’s probably nothing sinister about her.”
“Lara Deering keeps popping into my head.” Courtney got up to make a cup of coffee. “It still seems to me that she took off from Boston pretty fast. Could she have had something to do with what happened to Mom? She found us here at this Beacon Hill house claiming she heard people talking abou
t us at the conference. Is that a stretch? Who would be talking about us at the conference?”
“Maybe Lindsey was at the conference,” Jenna suggested. “She knew we were in town.”
“But she didn’t know where we were staying,” Courtney protested. “Nobody knew.”
“Well, somebody knew because Lara found us here.” Ellie seasoned the chili.
“Is that concerning?” Jenna asked. “Should we be concerned that people know where we are? Who found out? How did that person find out? Has someone been watching us?”
Everyone stopped what they were doing and turned to Jenna with worried looks.
Angie took a deep breath. “It’s easy for news to spread. Detective Owen knows where we are and so does Dr. Day. Someone mentions us and another person overhears it. People’s social networks can be very wide. Information travels fast. I don’t think people knowing where we’re staying is threatening. It’s just modern life.”
The sisters and Finch seemed to visibly relax.
“Yeah.” Courtney took a sip of her coffee. “We get wound up and distrustful and that colors our feelings about what’s going on.”
“I finished the dessert,” Angie said. “I think I’ll take Gigi for a walk around the neighborhood. I’d like to get some fresh air.”
“Dinner will be ready in about an hour,” Ellie informed her sister.
“I’d go with you, but I’m tired. I might catch a quick nap, if someone will keep an eye on Libby,” Jenna said.
“I’ll be happy to watch her,” Finch smiled.
“Me, too,” Courtney added. “I want to finish going through these case notes a second time.”
“I’ll be back in time for dinner.” Angie lifted Gigi from the high chair and carried her outside to the stroller. “Let’s go for a walk. We can go down to the Public Gardens and see the ducks.”
It was warm and pleasant as Angie pushed the stroller through the neighborhood and down past the Common. Gigi pointed and giggled at the dogs racing around the green space playing with each other or with their owners.
“See the dogs? See them playing? That one has a ball,” Angie pointed out.
They headed for the Garden and over to the pond where ducks and swans paddled around and sat in the reeds on the little island in the middle of the water. Gigi was excited to see the birds close up and she babbled away at them while Angie knelt next to the stroller and pointed to the different ones.
After a short walk along Newbury Street, the light was fading and soon it would be dark so Angie turned the stroller around and they headed back to the house.
The streetlamps flickered on as Angie walked along the sidewalks to Beacon Hill. The streets were full of shadows as the sun descended behind the buildings and a cool breeze came off the water causing Angie to shiver. She reached down and tucked a blanket around Gigi. “We’re almost back to the house, sweet girl.”
Hurrying up the hill, Angie thought she heard someone walking behind her and she took a quick glance over her shoulder. The street was deserted, but she thought she noticed someone step into the shadows of a townhouse.
Angie quickened her pace.
Again she heard the scuff of a boot on the sidewalk and she whipped around.
A dark figure stepped behind a tree so he couldn’t be seen.
Adrenaline coursed through Angie’s veins as she spun around and walked faster and faster. Her heartbeat was pounding double-time. She was one house away from where they were staying when she heard the sound again.
Lifting Gigi from the stroller, she hugged her daughter close.
“Who’s there?” Angie demanded as she peered down the dark lane. “What do you want? Show yourself.”
A man stepped into a pool of light from the streetlamp causing Angie to gasp. The man was short and stocky with short, blond hair. It was the man from the video … the one who stared at Elizabeth after she was hit.
The man took a step forward, hesitated, and then turned and jogged away.
Angie grabbed the handle bar of the stroller and pushed it with one hand, racing into the driveway. She darted for the front door and rushed inside.
Jenna was coming down the staircase. “What’s wrong?”
Breathlessly, Angie told her sister what she’d heard and seen. “I think it was the short man from the video. He ran away.”
Jenna called to Orla, Courtney, and Ellie, and when they appeared in the foyer, she asked them to follow her outside. Mr. Finch handed them two flashlights he’d found in the kitchen drawer.
“I don’t think you should go out there.” Angie hugged Gigi even tighter.
“We’ll stand on the front steps and stay in the driveway.” Courtney opened the front door and stormed outside.
“If we yell, call the police,” Ellie told Angie.
In five minutes, they all returned.
“We didn’t see anyone,” Courtney announced. “He didn’t come back.”
“But I felt his presence,” Orla said. “Someone was lurking. Why he came here, I don’t know.”
“It might have nothing to do with us,” Ellie said soothingly to try to calm Angie. “If it was the man from the video tapes, he may have been as surprised to see you as you were to see him.
They went in and sat down for dinner, asking Angie for more details.
“Maybe I overreacted. I’ve been having those nightmares about being chased. It got dark outside quicker than I anticipated. I wasn’t paying attention to the time. Maybe I just imagined it was the man from the video.”
By the end of the meal, Angie was feeling better and everyone pitched in to clean up, then Angie and Jenna brought the babies upstairs for bed, Ellie and Orla went to their rooms to read, and Mr. Finch and Courtney sat in the living room with the cats watching crime shows.
It was 2am when Angie bolted upright in her bed. She sat, frozen, listening. She was sure she’d heard a noise downstairs. Gigi. Leaping from the bed, she quietly shuffled into the hall to go check on her daughter.
Another muffled sound came from the first floor.
Jenna poked her head out of her room and Angie held her finger to her lips indicating that her sister should be quiet.
Jenna pointed to the stairs, and Angie nodded as she stepped closer to her.
“I heard it, too,” she whispered.
“Should we call the police?” Jenna spoke closely to Angie’s ear.
“Maybe we should.” Angie glanced at the door to Orla’s room and saw it was open. The sisters moved slowly to the room. Orla wasn’t inside.
“Orla must be downstairs. It’s a false alarm,” Jenna yawned.
Angie touched her arm. “No, it isn’t. If it was Orla making the noise, neither one of us would have woken up.”
Jenna’s eyes were wide.
“Orla must have heard the sound and went down to investigate. Go wake Courtney and have her get Ellie. Tell them to stay with the babies in their room. I’m going downstairs in case Orla needs help.”
“Should you go down? Maybe wait up here.”
“I don’t want Orla to be alone to face whoever is in the house. Come down once you get Courtney up.” Angie headed for the staircase and was moving carefully down the steps when she heard Euclid shriek.
Breaking into a run, Angie flew down to the foyer and then raced towards the kitchen. She saw Mr. Finch hobbling with his cane heading in the same direction from the living room. When they reached the kitchen, Angie saw the door was open to the patio and a dark figure running in the yard.
“There he goes.” Angie darted to the open door.
“Don’t go out there, Miss Angie,” Finch yelled.
Euclid and Circe stood on the patio in the dark, hissing after the intruder.
Angie came to a halt, and watched the figure as it ran around the side of the house and disappeared.
Orla hurried into the kitchen. “Did you see him, Victor?” she asked Finch.
“Just a glimpse.”
“He’s gone.” Angie c
alled to the cats and they came inside with her. She locked the door behind them and Finch switched on the lights.
“I think it was a man,” Angie said. “It was hard to tell. He was dressed all in black and was wearing a knitted winter hat.” Her face clouded. “What was he doing in here? Was it an intended robbery?”
“I heard rustling down here.” Orla was puffing trying to catch her breath. “Victor was already out of his room. Euclid and Circe raced down the hall. I went one way, and Victor went the other.”
“Let’s take a walk-through to see if anything obvious was stolen,” Finch suggested.
“I heard you talking.” Jenna came into the room and they told her what had happened. “I called the police. They should be here any minute.”
Angie sank onto a chair. “Someone followed me home. The intruder might be the same person who followed me.”
The two cats stood like sentinels watching out into the yard through the glass door.
“Your dreams may have been a warning,” Finch said. “Your subconscious may have sensed the approaching danger. Pay close attention to any new dreams or sensations, Miss Angie. Our lives may depend upon it.”
15
While Orla and Ellie cooked pancakes and veggie sausages, Angie sat at the breakfast table reading a book to Gigi who sat in her highchair listening closely to her mother.
Euclid and Circe were still sitting by the patio door keeping their eyes on the yard for any intruders.
The small television on the counter was showing the morning news, Courtney was setting the table, and Jenna was feeding some applesauce to Libby.
“That was quite the night.” Finch stood at the kitchen island cutting fruit for the fruit salad bowl. “I had no luck falling back to sleep after the intrusion.”
“I was the same way. I tossed and turned for the rest of the night.” Angie turned the page of the picture book to show Gigi the farm animals.
“Same for me. By the time the police left, there was only an hour before dawn,” Courtney agreed. “We’ll all need naps later today.”