Murder Between the Covers

by Maddie Cochere

  Kelly giggled, and Pepper shot her one of her trademark shut up looks.

  “I’ll have Glenn check it tomorrow,” I said and gave it a little push. “It looks like it will be fine for tonight.”

  The freshly cut tree quickly filled the room with a pleasing pine smell.

  “Mom brought some of Grandmama’s decorations,” Kelly said.

  “You and Glenn haven’t had time to get a tree, and it’ll be Christmas before you know it,” Pepper said. “Kelly thought it would be a good idea if we gave you a hand.”

  “Aww, that’s sweet,” I said to Kelly. “How did you get the decorations away from your grandmama?”

  “Mom stole them from her,” Keith said.

  “I did not. Before the flea market burned down, she was going to give them to Roger to sell. I took them before she could.”

  “Does she know you have them?” he asked. “Because if she doesn’t, you stole them.”

  “She won’t care,” Pepper said and began pulling decorations out of boxes. “Besides, Jo and I made some of these.” She held up two of the ugliest ornaments I had ever seen.

  “Put those in the back,” I told Keith.

  Kelly pulled out her phone and used an app for Christmas music. The music was soothing, and I felt better than I had all day.

  I made hot cocoa for everyone, and in no time, we had a tree that looked just like one of Mama’s when we were kids. I loved the multi-colored lights and the silver garland Kelly had wound around the tree. Keith grabbed a dining room chair to stand on and topped the tree with a Santa hat. We couldn’t find a star or an angel in any of the boxes, but there was a Santa hat. It was the perfect topper.

  “Aunt Jo, we’re baking cookies tomorrow night,” Kelly said. “Come over and help us. You can bring some home for you and Glenn.”

  Baking with Pepper and the kids sounded like fun. I hadn’t baked cookies in a long time. I agreed to come over after Glenn and I had dinner.

  After they left for home, I walked into the dining room to turn off the light. I looked over the photos once more and knew Keith was right about the ladder. This accident had been staged.

  A shadow on the side of Meredith’s face caught my eye. I picked up the loupe and looked closely. It was a red mark. She was either struck in the face, or she hit her cheek when she fell. I checked the photos again and concluded someone hit her. There wasn’t anything she could have struck as she fell, and she certainly didn’t hit her face on the floor unless she was capable of bouncing from one side to the other.

  I turned off the light and checked to be sure the doors were locked. The house was chilly tonight. Our days were still mild, but the nights were getting colder, and the temperature was expected to dip to freezing tonight. I adjusted the thermostat on the furnace and listened for telltale sounds it was working.

  The first sound caused me to shudder. I didn’t know if I would ever get used to the horrible noises coming from that monstrosity. The house was built in 1903, and I think the furnace was installed back then, too. Glenn said it was probably forty years old, but it looked and sounded much older than that.

  I grabbed my phone out of my bag, went upstairs, and changed into flannel pajamas with bunnies on them. I wasn’t particularly fond of the bunny pattern, but it was the last pair in my size when I went shopping for flannel nightwear.

  I grabbed the remote and turned on the television. Glenn had been right. After fussing about not wanting a television in the bedroom, I did enjoy climbing into bed at night and falling asleep to a crime show.

  A Bones rerun was my choice tonight.

  I woke during the night and sensed something was wrong. The television was still on with a slasher flick on the screen. A girl screamed as a man raised his arm with a knife in his hand, ready to plunge it into her.

  The screaming continued while I scrambled to find the remote in the bed. The girl had scooted away from the man, and I was happy to hit the off button before witnessing her demise.

  The house was quiet.

  I could hear the downstairs toilet running, but it was so far away, it was too faint to hear the groaning pipes. However, in the next instant, I did hear someone break down the front door.

  I scooted across the bed, fully prepared to run downstairs and confront whoever it was, but I stopped. I didn’t have a weapon. I grabbed my phone from the nightstand, pulled it under the covers with me, and hit the speed dial number for Glenn’s cell phone.

  He answered right away.

  “Glenn,” I whispered. “Someone’s in the house. I think they broke down the front door.”

  “Where are you?” he asked.

  “I’m in bed. I’d go downstairs, but I don’t have a baseball bat – or a gun.”

  “We’re on our way. Get out of bed and hide in a closet. You’re a sitting duck if someone walks in on you.

  He was right. I hung up, jumped out of bed, and rushed to stand at the top of the stairs. If someone was coming up for me, I wanted to see who it was.

  The house was quiet. I didn’t hear anyone moving around. It was only a few minutes before I saw flashing police lights illuminate the small window below me on the landing. I moved down a few more steps until I could peek around the corner and see the front door. It was closed.

  Glenn opened it with his key, his gun drawn in his other hand. Clay was behind him and flashed his flashlight in my face before sweeping it across the room.

  Both men burst into laughter.

  Glenn hit the light switch and sent an endearing smile my way. “Come down here.”

  I stood beside him and said, “That’s Keith’s handiwork.”

  The tall Christmas tree had fallen forward into the room. Clay reached in to grab the trunk and pick it up.

  “Let it go,” Glenn said. “It’ll just fall over again. I have a better stand in the basement, and I’ll take care of it in the morning.”

  Clay nodded and said, “We should check the house just to be sure the tree fell on its own. Don’t you think?”

  “Yep,” Glenn said. “Stay here, Jo. We’ll only be a minute.”

  After checking the kitchen and the basement, Glenn went upstairs. Clay flipped the light switch in the dining room.

  “Holy mackerel. What’s all this?”

  “Nothing.”

  I didn’t know how I felt about Clay. I first met him when I helped Pepper sell homemade crafts at a farmer’s market. He knew about my unfortunate arrest by the Patterson police two summers ago and had laughed in my face when he realized he was talking to The Jo Ravens.

  But after joining the force in Buxley, he never mentioned the incident again, and Glenn liked partnering with him, so I made an effort to be pleasant.

  “It’s not nothing,” he said. “Does Sergeant Rorski know you have these pictures?”

  Glenn came into the room. “The Sarge and Jo share information on a need-to-know basis.”

  “Well, I think he might need to know about these.” He picked up one of the pictures of Meredith. “I went to the station a couple hours early to finish up paperwork from last week, and I heard him giving Winnie the riot act for not taking more men with him to Peggy’s. He was especially mad there weren’t any photos taken by the department.”

  Glenn and I looked at each other.

  “That may have been my fault,” I said. “I called it in as an accident, and I think Bill treated it that way from the get-go. When Howard showed up, he was talking accident, too, so no one treated it as a crime scene.”

  Clay looked at me with a serious expression and asked, “Is it a crime scene?”

  “No,” Glenn said, answering for me.

  Clay pushed a few pictures around and stopped at one of the copper-haired woman and her white convertible. He didn’t ask about her. “I won’t volunteer anything to Sarge, but if it comes up, I’m going to let him know you have photos.”

  “Fair enough,” Glenn said.

  Clay pushed a few more pictures and picked up the one of Collins
on the bicycle. A smile crossed his face. “Did you know he caught the guy?”

  “I haven’t had a chance to tell her yet,” Glenn said.

  My mouth fell open. “Are you telling me Tom caught up to the guy and gave him a ticket?” I rarely used Officer Collins’ first name, but more and more I was becoming on a first name basis with all the guys on the force.

  Clay nodded. “I told him he’s going to ruin it for all of us. We want to get rid of the bikes, and he’s out there busting his hump doing a good job on one.”

  Glenn filled me in. “The guy got held up at a traffic light. Collins rode up and rapped on his window. He wrote the ticket and never got off the bike.”

  I shoved the pictures together and made one stack.

  “Let’s get going,” Glenn said to Clay.

  I walked them to the door. Clay stepped out onto the porch, while Glenn held back.

  He wrapped his arms around me and said, “I’m glad it was just the tree.” He gave me a kiss and lowered his hands to give my bottom a squeeze. “Don’t get up in the morning. I’ll be home by seven, and you can go in to work a little late.”

  He left, and I leaned against the closed door, a warm flush running through my body. Sometimes, he left me breathless.

  I headed for the stairs to go back to bed. The toilet off the kitchen began to run, and the furnace came on. I knew they were conspiring against me.

  Chapter Six

  The last of Glenn’s boxers were folded and stacked neatly in my laundry basket. There was only one load of towels left, and they were still in a dryer.

  I glanced around the laundromat and was glad I had come. The thought of doing laundry in the basement gave me the willies. Until I could get this nonsense under control, I wasn’t doing laundry at home unless I had to.

  The owner sat at a desk in a room without a door. A large opening had been cut from the wall to allow him a clear view of the patrons and machines. I would have put a window up for some measure of privacy, but he had left the space open. Occasionally, someone would come in and lean on the ledge to talk with him. I couldn’t tell if any of these visitors were friends or business acquaintances.

  Three across caught my attention. I grabbed my puzzle book and began working the crossword again. Cupid’s projectile. Five letters. I filled in the word arrow.

  Arnie had suggested working crossword puzzles. He said they would give me something to do and help me stay awake when running surveillance. He was right. Reading a book had been a problem. I’d be so engrossed in the story, I’d forget to watch what was going on around me. With a crossword, I could easily look up between every clue and word written. I really need to get a harder puzzle book though.

  I looked up now and saw the black Escalade pull up in front of the building. If Agent Roberts knew I was in here when his suspect arrived, we’d be fired for sure. I’d have to be careful to keep a low profile.

  I jotted down the current time at the top of my puzzle page before pulling my camera out of my bag. I slipped the camera into the laundry basket and positioned it so the lens faced out through one of the holes in the side.

  I grabbed my towels from the dryer, dropped them beside the basket on the table, and began folding them. The man with the moustache walked in carrying a long, narrow box under his arm. The size was right for it to contain several hundred blank IDs or even credit cards.

  His eyes made a quick sweep of the room before he walked to the owner’s desk and set the box down. I reached into the basket and snapped several pictures in rapid succession. The owner slipped the man an envelope. They exchanged a few words, but I couldn’t hear anything over the noise of the machines. The man walked out.

  I made note of the time on the crossword page again. His entire visit lasted less than two minutes.

  I was rather proud of myself. We’d not only be able to report that we knew the man in the black Escalade had moved his operation to the laundromat, but we’d be able to prove it with photos. The owner didn’t know me, so I wasn’t worried he would nark me out to the man.

  I folded the rest of my towels and placed them in the basket on top of my camera. I would put it back in my bag when I returned to my truck.

  I shoved the puzzle book into my bag, tossed my coffee cup in the trash, and put my detergent and fabric softener on top of the towels. Just as I picked up the basket to leave, the door opened. I was directly in the man’s sights.

  “Jo Ravens,” he called out cheerfully.

  I quickly glanced at the laundromat owner to see if he heard. He not only heard, he was looking directly at me.

  “You’re just the person I wanted to see,” he said.

  “Hello, Mayor,” I said dully.

  “Jo, how many times do I have to tell you? Call me Bubba.”

  Every time. He was going to have to tell me every time.

  “What can I do for you, Bubba?” His name sounded like something disgusting as it came out of my mouth. I honestly didn’t intend to be so rude. I couldn’t help myself.

  “When I saw you at the book sale last week, you mentioned you found some old books. Did you buy them? I’m still trying to track down a copy of Treasure Island and wondered if maybe you had one.”

  “I wouldn’t know. I saw the books in a couple of boxes and grabbed them. I only looked at a few of them before I gave them to Pepper. I’ll ask her if there was a Treasure Island in either of the boxes when I see her tonight. Peggy had four copies of the book on her desk yesterday. Have you checked with her?”

  “I check in with her every day. Of course, she’s not open today after the unfortunate accident yesterday, but I’ve seen everything she has in stock, and none of them are the right one.”

  My uncontrollable rudeness continued. “I have to go,” I said.

  I grabbed my basket and headed for the door. He called out after me, “Good luck catching the bad guys.”

  He was an idiot.

  I stood on the sidewalk and debated whether I should walk to my truck at the health food store or walk over to our offices. Now that the laundromat owner knew my name, it was only a matter of time before he knew what I did for a living and became suspicious. For all I knew, the mayor was telling him right now that I was a private investigator.

  “Jo!”

  I turned around and saw Aunt Bee at a meter three parking spaces down. I lugged my basket down to her.

  “Hi, stranger,” I said. “I haven’t seen you in a while.”

  “Max and I have been busy helping your mother and Roger get the flea market ready for the grand opening Saturday. You know, the town has really rallied around the two of them, and they’ve been given a lot of donations and help. The mayor is even going to hold a ribbon-cutting ceremony.”

  She noticed I bristled at the mention of the mayor.

  “What? You don’t like our new mayor?”

  I balanced the laundry basket on my hip. “Can you take a few minutes when you’re done here and meet me in my office? I’d like to chat with you.”

  She gave the suggestion thought for a few moments and said, “Sure. Let me finish checking the meters in the next block, and then I’ll come over.”

  Nancy was on the telephone when I walked in. The door to Arnie’s office was partially closed. I couldn’t tell if he was in there or not. I took my laundry basket and deposited it in the corner of my office.

  I grabbed my notebook from my bag and made notes based on my observations at the laundromat. The encounter with the mayor had been unsettling. In the back of my mind, I felt his big mouth could have put me in danger. I dreaded telling Arnie what happened, but I had to tell him right away.

  I walked out to Nancy’s desk. “Is he in there?”

  She nodded.

  I pushed the door open and knocked lightly on it at the same time. He looked up from his paperwork and leaned back in his chair. I sat in the chair opposite his desk.

  “I’m afraid of Glenn’s basement.”

  A slight smile crossed his face. “
There’s probably an app for that,” he said.

  I could only muster a half-hearted smile.

  “The water pipes groan like they’re dying, and the furnace thinks it’s a prehistoric monster. I can’t deal with it, and I’ll probably need professional help to get over it.”

  “There’s no insurance plan here, Jo. Marry Glenn and use his.”

  “I went to the laundromat this morning to do our laundry, so I wouldn’t have to go in the basement. It was great. I could watch what was going on and do my laundry at the same time. The black Escalade showed up, and the driver came in. He was carrying a box, and he made an exchange with the owner. The owner gave him an envelope. I took pictures of everything.”

  He nodded his head. “That’s good, but you’re jumpy. What gives?”

  “The driver saw me outside the bookstore yesterday when he made his drive-by. We made eye contact. He saw me today, too. It probably wasn’t a problem, but the mayor came in when I was leaving. He called me by name and wished me good luck catching the bad guys. The owner was clearly interested, and I suspect good old Bubba filled him in on who I was.”

  Arnie clenched his teeth and nodded his head. “Get the pictures to me. I’ll notify Agent Roberts right away.”

  “I’m sorry, Arnie. I know I shouldn’t have gone in.”

  “Don’t worry ‘bout it. Our instructions were to observe but not talk to anyone. You did what you were told.”

  I went back to my office, grabbed my camera from the basket, and handed it to Nancy. “I took pictures at the laundromat this morning. Would you download them and give copies to Arnie?”

  Aunt Bee walked in. We went into my office, and I closed the door.

  “I know you hear a lot of news and gossip around town,” I said. “What do you know about the mayor?”

  She smiled. “That’s a broad question. I know people tend to like him or hate him. They like the changes he’s making, or they hate them. He’s very polarizing, and plenty of people regret voting for him.”

  “But what do you know about him?”

  She shrugged her shoulders. “Nothing other than what he said during his campaign. Do we need or want to know anything more about him?”