“I had told her that she should tell Roger right away, but Brianna was afraid that he might leave her; so, she kept it a secret, but the night before the wedding, she couldn’t do it anymore. She told Roger that night in the gazebo. Words were said and he left the party to clear his head.
“Roger told me later that even before he had learned of Brianna’s death, he had decided to marry her anyway and raise the child as his own. He loved her that much and was willing to forgive her for her mistake.”
“Are you sure he wasn’t just saying that?”
“I know you have to ask, but if you had seen his face the day he learned of her death, you would have no doubt of his innocence. The man was torn apart and didn’t speak to anyone for a week. The police and the D.A. took it as a sign of his guilt, but I knew better.”
“Do you think that he could be the one breaking into those stores?” I asked.
“Roger is no thief,” replied Beverly.
“He has been in prison for 20 years and that can change a person. You said that he always maintained his innocence. Isn’t it possible that he believes those stores might have something that could prove it. It was a photography studio at the time of his incarceration and you said yourself that the man who owned it was hired to do the wedding pictures.”
“It’s possible. Poor Mr. King. He was a quirky individual, but I don’t know much about him, other than that he loved photographing lightning. And we had one heck of a lightning storm that night. If only he hadn’t gone out there when he did.”
“Beverly,” I said, recalling that she wanted to be called by her first name, “are you in contact with Roger?”
“What?”
“You are the only person who ever believed him and now he is back on the streets. I don’t know about you, but if I were him, I would reach out to the one person who believed my innocence. Has he contacted you?”
“Yes,” whispered Beverly.
“Will you tell me how I can reach him?”
Mrs. Waverly looked at me, unsure if she could trust me. I couldn’t blame her. No one had ever believed her or Roger and I knew that she thought I might be setting a trap for him.
“Look, I know he has been breaking into the stores. It’s the only thing that makes sense. No none else would have a reason to.”
“He only searched the one store,” said Beverly.
“Excuse me?” This was news.
“I searched the others.”
“You do realize that that is a crime?” I said.
“I know.” Beverly sighed in a manner that told me she was glad to get it all out. “I heard about the Candle Shoppe and knew it was Roger, so I met with him and warned him that if he got caught, he would go straight back to prison for the rest of his life. So, I volunteered to do the searching for him.”
“What was he looking for?” I asked.
“It doesn’t matter,” Beverly replied. “I never found it. I’ll talk to him and ask him to call you. You aren’t going to turn him in, are you?”
“You admitted to committing a crime. I’m under obligation to tell the police.”
“Please don’t.” Beverly’s face looked worried and I pitied her. “Talk to Roger first. He will call you. I’ll see to that. If you say anything now, he will be sent back to prison and we’ll never learn who really killed Brianna.”
I relented. I just couldn’t tear out Mrs. Waverly’s heart and I wanted to know who had murdered Beverly as well, if Roger was innocent. Besides, I still hadn’t learned what he was looking for. “All right,” I said. “I’ll wait until after I talk to Roger, but I encourage you to tell the police about your involvement in the break-ins. You can’t ask me to keep this a secret indefinitely.”
“Fair enough. After you speak with Roger, I’ll tell the police myself.”
We finished our meal and paid our check, with Beverly promising me, again, that she would turn herself in to the police after I had met with Roger.
Once we parted, I ran into none other than Jillian. If I never saw that woman again, it wouldn’t be soon enough.
“Stirring up the past, are we?” she asked in a snide tone.
“There is no ‘we’,” I growled at her.
“So, how does it feel, no longer having the trust of the public behind you?”
“Why don’t you tell me?” I spat.
“Miss Summers!” Up walked Detective Henderson. “I was hoping that I would run into you.” She looked at Jillian. “Is there something you need?”
“I was just talking with Mel, here,” replied Jillian.
“Your conversation will have to wait,” said Detective Henderson.
“I don’t think you know…”
“I know who you are, Miss Modsen,” snapped Detective Henderson. “But if you’ll excuse me, I have some important matters to discuss with Miss Summers.”
Detective Henderson held her arm out, indicating that I should follow her, which I was more than happy to do just to get away from Jillian, and led me down the walk with a disappointed Jillian skulking away.
“I happened to be passing by,” said Detective Henderson, “and I noticed you speaking to Mrs. Waverly.”
“Happened?” I replied. “You mean you were following me.”
“I wouldn’t…”
“Cut to the chase, detective,” I said. I did not appreciate being followed and I knew that this was no chance meeting.
“As you wish. You remember that I had wanted you to find a way to speak with her. Well, now you have and I am most interested in what she told you.”
“You might also recall that I never agreed to help you. I had run into her by chance yesterday and she invited me out for lunch today.”
“Must I remind you that if she said anything that pertains to this case, you are obligated to tell me.”
“I am under no such obligation.” I did my best to keep a straight face. I had promised Beverly that I would say nothing about the break-ins, at least for a few days, giving her the chance to come forward on her own. I wasn’t about to go back on my word. “She reiterated her belief of Roger Croukman’s innocence.”
That much was true enough.
Detective Henderson gave me a doubtful look, but I had no intention of telling her what she wanted to know. “Detective Shorts always spoke highly of you.”
“He also never asked me to do his job for him.”
“No… you just tend to do it anyway.”
She started to get on my nerves. I didn’t know this woman. What did she think I was? Someone to just help her out because she wanted me to? “Will that be all, detective?”
“For now. And, might I remind you, impeding a police investigation is a crime.”
“So everyone keeps telling me, but if you all knew how to do your jobs in the first place, you wouldn’t need me to do it for you.”
I could have kicked myself for saying that last part. Me and my pride; one of these days it would get me into trouble. Before Detective Henderson could say anything, or do anything, I left and hurried down the icy sidewalk.
“OOOO,” said Rachel when I had gotten a few yards away. “Look at you, getting an attitude with the cops. I may make a spunky woman out of you yet.”
I looked at her, wondering how long she had been there and realized that she had probably overheard the entire exchange between me and the detective. “Anything interesting about Edmond?” I asked, changing the subject.
“The guy is a complete bore,” said Rachel. “He didn’t do much. Picked up a few groceries for his mother and ran a few other errands. Honestly, he didn’t do anything out of the ordinary. You might be wrong about him on this one.”
It was possible. Edmond had been helpful and courteous. “What about the groundskeeper?”
“Donald? Not much either. He’s shifty and doesn’t seem to trust anyone, not to mention his personality lacks a bit of friendliness. but I didn’t notice anything that screamed murderer.”
“Thanks, Rachel.” I still didn�
��t like Mrs. Waverly’s groundskeeper. Something about him seemed familiar and I couldn’t shake the feeling that I had seen him before. “Keep me informed will you?”
“Sure thing!” She vanished, leaving me alone on the sidewalk among the swirling snow that dropped from the sky, forming a thick blanket on the ground. If it didn’t let up, we would be buried under millions of ice crystals.
My phone buzzed. Jackie had sent me a text with a link in it. I tapped on the link and suddenly wished I hadn’t. Jillian had posted another article about me that morning, which explained why I ran into her a few minutes ago; she wanted more dirt on me.
A Psychic Indeed
Jillian Modsen
Self-proclaimed psychic, Mellow Summers, shows no inclination that she knows anything about the latest string of break-ins, nor has she been able to lead police to the person responsible for an attempt on the life of a local police detective.
In looking into Miss Summers’ previous encounters with the police, it becomes clear that she suffers from delusions of grandeur. Her friends fair little better, accompanying her on her amateur sleuthing as she rushes to investigate what should be left to the local police, thus endangering herself and the lives of others.
One example of the blundering of this supposed psychic is the Pen Mills Estate, a landmark in these parts, that no longer exists. Though she did assist in capturing a band of thieves, and recovering the Rose pendant, Miss Summers’ rash actions resulted in the burning down of this historic landmark. It didn’t have to happen that way. After learning where the thieves were, all she had to do was call the police and let them do their jobs. After all, as a psychic, she must have known that her actions would lead to the destruction of a structure that was worth more than all of the cases she has supposedly helped solve combined.
Perhaps our overly enthusiastic psychic ought to take a vacation before we lose another treasured piece of history.
And let us not forget that Miss Summers, herself, was once the prime suspect in a murder investigation. Her only defense at the time was that she remembered nothing. That doesn’t bode well if you are supposed to have mediumistic abilities. The charges were eventually dropped by the District Attorney, who took a month long vacation afterwards, though it is unclear why.
That bitch. Words could not convey what I thought or felt about her. Didn’t her editor see that she was on some sort of crusade to destroy me? Or were these articles bringing in new readership that he didn’t care, so long as the number of subscriptions to the local paper went up.
I didn’t know if there as anything I could do about this. Jillian wasn’t wrong about the Pen Mills Estate. After I had helped Rachel solve her murder, I ran into another ghost that had insisted that he had been murdered there. As it turned out, he had died from a severe asthma attack, but there had had been a string of robberies around town at the same time and the people involved had taken up residence at the estate. It had been abandoned and most locals feared going there because of stories about it being haunted, stories that turned out to be true. I did find the thieves there and Jackie and I were tied up and left to die, after our captors had set the place on fire to cover their tracks.
I guess one could argue that it was sort of my fault that the Pen Mills Estate had burned down, being reduced to smoldering ruins that the city had still done nothing with. Though, Greg had once told me that they probably would have set the place on fire anyway, but such a statement did little to comfort me. I still felt bad about it.
And the bit about me being a prime suspect in a murder investigation wasn’t too far off either. Soon after the Pen Mills fiasco, I had woken up in a strange motel room covered in someone else’s blood. Later, a corpse showed up and the D.A. pointed his finger at me. If it hadn’t been for Rachel and my aunt Ethel, I don’t think I ever would have proven my innocence.
I stood on the sidewalk, wondering what I should do. I didn’t feel like going home and I had a class later in the afternoon. In the end, I decided to go visit Detective Shorts. He must have been going stir crazy in the hospital.
As it turned out, the detective wasn’t going as crazy as I thought. I found him sitting up in his bed, reading through police reports, looking rather spry for someone who had gotten shot two days ago.
“Miss Summers,” he said. “What a surprise.”
“I thought I would check in on you,” I replied. “See how you were doing.”
“Well enough. These doctors still won’t let me go though.”
I smiled a bit. “It shouldn’t be too much longer.”
“So, I hear that you have been enlisted to help the new Detective Henderson.”
“Not really.”
“What did she ask you to do?”
“She wanted me to speak with Beverly Waverly.”
Detective Shorts’ eyebrows arched. “So she is looking into that possible connection.”
“What can you tell me about her?”
“Probably nothing that you haven’t already been able to figure out. And I don’t want you looking into it.”
Too late. And he should know by now that I never back away from something like this.
“You should also know that I am starting to believe that she was right about Roger.”
What? That was news. “What do you mean?”
“As I said before, when the flower shop was broken into, I decided to start looking into the old case files. I knew that the strip had been a photography studio once. The owner of that studio was the photographer for Roger Croukman’s wedding. I thought it strange that soon after he is released from prison these break-ins took place.”
“And that is what made you change your mind?”
“There were discrepancies in the way the investigation was conducted, but what made me change my mind was the fact that someone took a shot at me. The only person who would do that would be the real murderer. Roger would have no reason to get rid of a detective trying to prove his innocence, besides the fact that he has a solid alibi.”
“How do you know that it wasn’t someone you’ve angered in the past by arresting them?” I asked.
“It’s a possibility, but the timing tells me that it is more than mere coincidence.”
I checked my watch. It was almost time for my class. “I’ll see you later.”
“I mean it, Mel,” said Detective Shorts, using my nickname, something he never did unless he was worried about me getting into trouble, “be careful. If you keep probing into this, you might become the next target.”
“I’ll be fine.”
“I could give Tiny a call. I’m sure he would keep you out of trouble.”
“Tiny is out of commission due to a severe cold. I was at his place yesterday, forcing him to take some medicine.”
“I would have loved to have seen that,” chuckled Detective Shorts and I knew he was picturing me force-feeding Tiny cough syrup.
“Anyway, I do have a class to get to.”
Detective Shorts gave me a look, the one that says he knew I was up to something, but chose to remain quiet.
Chapter 15
When I arrived at the college, it looked as though it had been buried under snow, almost like mother nature was trying to wipe its memory from existence. I parked as close to the building where my class was located as I could, but everyone else had the same idea. The wind ripped the car door from my hands, blasting me with shards of pin-sized ice as I got out and bolted to the double doors, relieved when I walked through them and into the warmth that awaited me inside.
The faces of students stared at me. Great. They must have read Jillian’s latest about me. I ignored them and hurried down the hall, my sneakers squeaking against the floor with each step.
“Hey, look,” said one student, munching on an ice cream sandwich, “it’s our psychic! How long is this storm going to last?”
Before he knew it, something ripped his ice cream sandwich from his hands and smacked him in the face with it, smearing vanilla ice cream al
l over. “Why don’t you shut up?” said Rachel, remaining invisible.
I continued to my class and sat in the first available seat.
“I can’t stand these idiots.” Rachel appeared in the desk next to me. “Predict this. Predict that. As though that is how all of this works.”
“Rachel,” I whispered as her voice attracted some odd looks.
“What?”
“You’re attracting attention.”
“Good!”
Someone walked in with his arms full of books and papers, fumbling with them as he navigated his way to an empty desk. Rachel watched and I knew she planned something because she got that mischievous look on her face.
“What out! It bites!” she screamed at the poor man, causing him to jump. She ignored my disapproving glare as she cackled with glee, pleased with herself.
She spotted a piece of paper hanging on the blackboard with my picture on it: one of Jillian’s stories about me. I had noticed it when I came in, but chose to ignore it, thinking that if I didn’t bring attention to it, maybe this whole thing would blow over. Rachel, on the other hand, was a different story. She snatched the paper from its position on the board and held it up in midair, frightening the people in the classroom.
“Who did this?” she demanded, waving the yellowed paper amidst a bunch of wide-eyed people who couldn’t understand what was happening. She must have realized that they didn’t see her because she materialized in front of them. “Who!” She stamped her foot.
No one said anything. No doubt they were having trouble comprehending the fact that a ghost screamed at them.
“May-may-maybe the last class did it,” stammered one person in the front of the class.
Rachel glared at him, her hand on her hip as she held the paper article about me.
“So you all think this is funny.”
Double, Double, Nothing But Trouble (A Mellow Summers Paranormal Mystery Book 10) Page 11