“Absolutely.”
At Santa’s Village parking lot, we found Laura and Tommy waiting for us with big smiles on their faces.
“What’s Santa doing here if he lives in the North Pole?” Tommy asked when he was in the car.
In the rearview mirror, I saw Laura tousle Tommy’s hair. “This is his summer home,” she said.
“Did you know Santa had a summer home, Mrs. T?” Tommy asked.
“He spends a lot of time here in the summer so I guess it’s his summer home,” I said.
I had told Tommy to call me Pat, but he still called me Mrs. T. “He’ll start calling you Mom one of these day,” Tracy had said, but I wasn’t sure about that. I could never replace his mother.
The drive back to Black Bear Lake was a quiet one. The excitement of seeing Santa and his helpers had worn out Tommy, and he fell asleep curled up against Laura. She spent most of the trip back with her eyes closed, her iBuds in her ears. Maxie had also flaked out on the backseat, her head on Laura’s lap. And Bruce seemed to be lost in thought in the seat beside me.
We passed Glencoe Self-Storage and turned north onto Highway 123. The orange storage lockers brought my thoughts back to Frank Prentice. He hadn’t been seen on Falcon Avenue for weeks. Then three days before, Vi Stohl’s body had been found in the locker he’d rented. What was the connection between Frank and Vi’s killer?
I dropped Laura, Tommy and Maxie off at Black Bear Lake, and followed Bruce’s Chevy into Braeloch.
Highland Ridge was at the edge of town where Main Street turned into Highway 123. It appeared to be a fairly new building. The ceilings on the ground floor were high, and large windows let in plenty of light. Plants had transformed the back wall of the reception area into a tropical garden.
Bruce asked for Carol McCann, Highland Ridge’s director, at the reception desk.
“Ms. McCann doesn’t work weekends,” the male receptionist said. “But Sheila Sommers, our assistant director, is here. Take a seat across the hall.”
Five minutes later, a stout woman bundled into a tight pink suit came over to us. “Hello, Bruce. How are you doing?”
He bobbed his head and introduced me to Sheila. When we were seated in front of her desk, he told her we had some questions about the day Vi disappeared.
“I’ll try to answer them,” she said with a smile.
“I understand that Vi sat beside a woman from her floor on the return bus trip,” I began.
“Yes, Anne Crawford,” Sheila said.
“Did anyone see Vi after she got off the bus?” I asked. “Did someone take her to her room?”
Sheila looked thoughtful. “That’s what the police asked, and it’s what I’ve been asking myself since she went missing. Myrna Pettigrew was in charge of the day trip, and she did a roll call on the bus on the way home. Everyone was accounted for. The bus pulled up in the driveway outside the front door a little after four. There was a rush into the building. We only have the two elevators, so some residents had to wait in the lobby for a while.”
“Did your mother use a walker?” I asked Bruce.
“No,” he said. “She didn’t even use a cane.”
While the care workers helped the less mobile residents, Vi may have wandered off outside without anyone noticing.
I looked at Sheila. “Vi never got to her room?”
She took a deep breath. “Everyone who returned to the building was escorted to his or her room.”
“If Vi came into the building, she would have been taken to her room,” I said. “If she didn’t…”
“She may not have entered the building.” Sheila looked at Bruce. “I’m sorry, Bruce, but that’s what may have happened.”
“Was there an event here on Wednesday afternoon that drew visitors?” I asked. “Tea party? Bake sale?”
“Nothing. We hold our big social events on weekends so that family members who are working can participate.”
“Were any strangers in the building that afternoon?” I asked.
“No,” Sheila said, “just a few of our residents’ regular visitors.”
“Who were they?” I asked.
“I gave their names to the police officers. They’re talking to them.”
Which meant she wasn’t about to tell us.
“Can I take Pat to Mom’s room?” Bruce asked.
“I’m sorry, Bruce,” Sheila said, “but the room is already occupied. We have a long waiting list. When a room becomes free, the person who is notified has to move in within forty-eight hours.”
“I’d like to see where it’s located,” I said.
She hoisted herself out of her chair and took us to an elevator down the hall. The elevator stopped on the second floor, and we stepped into a small hallway between two glass doors. Sheila punched a code into a security pad on the wall, and one of the doors buzzed open.
Like the ground floor, the wing was bright and attractively decorated. Sheila waved as we passed the nursing station. The woman behind the desk smiled at her and said hello to Bruce. He led the way to a room further down the hall. “This was Mom’s,” he said.
The sign beside the door told us that Dorothy Baxter was now in residence. From the doorway, I saw a white-haired woman asleep in a chair beside the window.
The room’s entrance was in full view of the nursing station. “Is there always someone at the nursing station?” I asked Sheila.
“Not always,” she said. “Staff may be with a resident, or at the morning or afternoon meetings.”
“What time was the meeting on Wednesday afternoon?”
“It’s held at three o’clock when the shift changes. Staff who are leaving for the day update those who’ve just come on duty.”
“So the meeting was over when the residents returned from their trip on Wednesday?”
“Long over.”
I walked down the hall. A door with an exit sign above it was at the end of the corridor. A security pad was on the wall beside the door.
“Where does this go?” I asked Sheila and Bruce who had followed me.
“It opens onto a staircase that goes up to the third floor and downstairs to an exit,” Sheila said.
“What’s outside the exit door?” I asked.
“The visitors’ parking lot.”
The parking lot was at the back of the building where we had left our cars.
“Do many people use these stairs?” I asked.
“Most of us take the elevator,” Sheila said. “The wing on the other side of this floor has a similar set of stairs. They go down to an exit on the side of the building.”
“An alarm goes off when you open the door at the bottom of the stairs,” Bruce said. “I set it off one day when I tried to leave that way.”
“Did the alarm sound on Wednesday afternoon?” I asked Shelia.
“No,” she said. “The police asked us about that. We keep a record of any alarms that go off.”
We took the elevator back to the ground floor, and I thanked Sheila for the tour.
“Let me know if there’s anything else I can do,” she said. “A terrible thing happened this week. Highland Ridge was built to protect vulnerable people.”
On our way out, Bruce held the front door open for a dark-haired young woman. “Beautiful day,” she said with a smile that lit up her face.
“I don’t think your mother made it into the building,” I said to Bruce when we were outside. “She disappeared while the staff was helping the other residents get off the bus.”
He shook his head. “And nobody saw her.”
“They were too busy to see where she went.”
We were standing on the driveway in front of the building. “The bus dropped its passengers off here,” I said.
“There’s a garden on the side of the building. Mom may have gone in there.”
We walked over to a trellis fence covered with honeysuckle, and through an archway into the garden. Raised flower beds allowed Highland Ridge residents to see plants at
close range, and paved paths made it easier for them to move around the garden. A young couple sat chatting with an elderly man on a wrought-iron bench.
Another archway at the back of the garden led to the visitor’s parking lot. “Not a very secure garden,” I said.
“The residents come here with their families,” Bruce said.
“Your mother may have gone through there.” I pointed to the back archway.
He held my gaze for several beats. “Into the parking lot.”
“Yes.”
“Someone had to be with Mom, but who? And why would anyone want to harm her?”
Who and why indeed?
Laura and I were busy in the kitchen when the telephone rang before dinner. Tommy picked up the extension in the living room.
“For you, Mrs. T,” he called out.
Bill Vasey was on the line. I told him I’d gone to visit Frank Prentice that day and saw that his home was up for sale. “Do you know where I can reach Frank?” I asked. “I need to speak to him about something urgent, and the phone number I have for him has been disconnected.”
There was silence on the other end of the line so I repeated my question.
“Frank Prentice is dead,” Vasey said. “His mother gave us the listing.”
Dead. My head was reeling, but I needed to follow up while I had Vasey on the line. “How long has the house been on the market?” I asked.
“Eight weeks. Are you interested in the property? I can take you through the house tomorrow.”
“No, I was looking for Frank. Can you give me his mother’s name and phone number?”
“We don’t give out client information, but I’ll tell her you want to speak to her. I can give her your number.”
“What’s her name? So I’ll recognize it if she calls.”
He hesitated. “I don’t know if I should do this…well, I suppose it’s okay. Her name is Ella Prentice.”
Laura glanced up from the chopping board when I returned to the kitchen. “You look like you’ve seen a ghost,” she said.
“The man who rented the storage locker is dead.”
Laura’s eyebrows nearly hit her hairline. “He was murdered, too? What’s with that locker?”
“I don’t know how Frank died, but his house in Bracebridge has been up for sale for eight weeks. His mother arranged the listing.”
“So he’s been dead at least eight weeks,” Laura said.
“Which means he had nothing to do with Vi’s death.”
“But somebody probably knew about his storage locker and got hold of the key.” She placed the knife on the chopping board. “Would the police know this, Mom?”
“They must. Glencoe Self-Storage would have given them Frank’s address. They would’ve spoken to Frank’s mother by now.”
I wanted to speak to Ella Prentice as well. Noreen had sent an auction notice to Frank’s home, so Ella knew that he had rented a storage locker. And she probably found the key to its lock in his home.
CHAPTER SIX
I heard Laura in the bathroom while I was dressing the next morning. Her morning sickness wasn’t over. When I got downstairs, she was sitting in the kitchen staring morosely at a teabag in an empty mug.
“You don’t look happy,” I said as I took the boiling kettle off the stove.
“Well, I’d rather not be pregnant right now. I’d rather be looking forward to going to university in September.”
“You should have thought of that—”
She turned to glare at me. “Okay, I made a mistake. You must be happy to hear me say that.”
I poured boiling water into her mug. “I’m happy to hear you owning up to your mistake, but it doesn’t solve your problem.”
“Look, I’m taking responsibility for what I did. Kyle and I both want to do the responsible thing.”
“And that is…?”
“To raise our child.”
“But will you be able to raise this child?” I asked.
“It will be difficult…for both of us. We’ll have to find jobs.” She looked down at the mug of tea. “We’ll have to ask our families for help.”
That was my cue to tell her what I was prepared to do. I sat down beside her. “You and the baby will live with me while you’re in school. You’ll need to start looking at programs in Toronto that you can start next year. But you’ll have to pay for child care when you’re at school.”
“I’ll get a part-time job. And Kyle will help. He’s decided he’s not going to Guelph. He was accepted at the University of Toronto, and he never turned them down.”
“What do his parents say about the baby?”
“They think it’s great. They’re going to be grandparents.” She rolled her eyes. “They want us to get married.”
I’d been meaning to talk to Kyle’s parents, but I wanted to discuss it with Laura first. This wasn’t the right time, however; Nate Johnston would be at the branch in forty minutes.
“We’ll talk more tonight.” I gave Laura a hug. “Make sure Tommy has fun today.”
“I’m supposed to be on holiday.”
“So is Tommy. There’s no reason why you can’t enjoy your holidays together.”
I found Soupy perched on Ivy’s desk when I arrived at the branch with a box of doughnuts. “Our new manager is the last one in today,” he said.
“Good morning to you too, Soupy. Good morning, Ivy,” I said. “It’s just past eight thirty, and we don’t open till nine.”
Ivy lowered her eyes and played with a pen on her desk. I placed the box of doughnuts in front of her. “Pot of coffee, Ivy?” I said.
At eight forty-five, the front door opened, and a man in his late thirties walked into the branch. He had cropped brown hair, a medium build and a homely face redeemed by a warm smile. I recognized Nate Johnston from the photo on his former employer’s website.
He walked over to me. “You must be Pat Tierney. Nate Johnston.” He held out his hand, and I took it. He had a nice, firm handshake.
“This is Paul Campbell, our junior advisor.” I gave Soupy a no-nonsense look. “Everyone calls him Soupy.”
Nate held out his hand again. Soupy took it but didn’t return Nate’s smile.
“Ivy Barker, our administrative assistant, is making coffee,” I said.
Ivy stepped out of the kitchenette behind the reception area. “Hi, Nate. I know you’ll like working here.”
I checked that the front door was locked, and the Closed sign was in the window. “Let’s have coffee and doughnuts.”
While Nate settled into his front office, I stopped in to see Soupy down the hall.
“As we’ve discussed, I’m transferring my client accounts to Nate,” I said. “Over the next two weeks, I’ll invite every one of those clients into the branch, or visit them at their homes, so that I can introduce them to Nate. You’ll carry on with the accounts you have.”
Our previous discussions on the subject had not gone well. Soupy wanted to take over the accounts I’d been handling as much as he wanted to run the branch.
He scowled. “Our clients won’t take to an outsider.”
“Nonsense. I’m new to this community, and every client I’ve worked with was fine with that.”
“They knew you were just filling in.”
I wanted to shake him. “You’ve been in this business long enough to know that we need experienced people to get this branch up and running.”
I would have gone on, but I saw a flustered Ivy standing in the doorway. “Pat, Mr. Kulas from head office…”
Keith Kulas, Norris Cassidy’s CEO, and Nate appeared behind her. Keith had a hand on Nate’s shoulder. “I’ll have a chat with our new Braeloch manager in his office, then we’ll all go out for lunch,” Keith said. “Ivy, book us a table at the Winigami for twelve thirty.”
That lunch reminded me why I’d decided to leave the firm and start my own business.
After we’d ordered from the menu, and had drinks in front of us, Keith raised his w
ine glass. “To Nate, and the terrific job he’ll do running our Braeloch branch.”
The rest of us raised our glasses and took sips of our drinks. Keith raised his glass again. “And to Pat and her plans.” His tone of voice made it sound like I intended to take up knitting.
I pasted a smile on my face.
“The Braeloch branch is doing well,” Keith went on, “and Nate will make it do even better. Our goal is to have $5 million in AUM by the beginning of October.”
Assets under management don’t accumulate overnight. Norris Cassidy was a new player in the Glencoe Highlands, and word of mouth from existing clients was the way for it to grow. Keith was setting an impossible goal.
“We’ve got one more seminar scheduled for next week,” Soupy said, his eyes on Keith. “Cottage succession planning, a hot topic in these parts. That’ll be it for the summer, but we’ll start up our seminars again in September. I’ve got six great topics planned for the fall.”
The seminar series had been the idea of our former branch manager, but to hear Soupy talk, you’d think he was the one who’d dreamed it up. He and I had come up with those six topics together.
“The seminars have more than doubled our client base,” Soupy added.
I felt like throwing a spoon at our junior advisor. Doubling the client base doesn’t mean much when you’ve started a business from scratch.
“Nice job, son.” Keith slapped Soupy on the back. “Shows initiative. I like that. Nate, maybe you can take a lesson from our young friend.”
Beside me, Nate said, “I expect to learn a lot here.” His pleasant face gave nothing away, but I detected a trace of sarcasm in his voice.
“You’ll make your mark here, Nate. A man with your credentials.” Keith looked around the table. “Nate has a master’s degree in business administration, and an alphabet soup of industry designations.”
“Good for him,” Soupy mumbled.
The smile never left Nate’s face. “I’ve been looking forward to coming to Braeloch,” he said, “and building this business with you. I only wish Pat was on our team.”
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