All that mattered was I had the envelope now. “Hey.” I waved away the apology. “Just goes to show I should have cleaned up there since I moved in. This isn’t your fault, and at least I have it now.”
“Is it important?”
“Maybe.” I wasn’t going to open it with him here.
“I’ll open it later and find out. Now, Mom told me you stopped in to talk to Martha about properties on the town books, and you’re considering pulling an Everly. My folks will be thrilled if you decide to stay in Mooselick River, and I hate to admit it, but you’ve grown on me, Barrington.”
“Pulling an Everly, huh? Not quite. You lucked out buying this place. Catherine kept the place in great condition, but she was one of a kind.”
The banter distracted him from asking more questions about the envelope.
“That she was. Is Martha pushing you toward a particular property?”
David pulled out bowls, served us both, and took a seat at the table while I washed up.
“Oh, she’s got something in mind.” There was both humor and exasperation in his tone. “She thinks I should buy the Marlow.”
“The Marlow? I didn’t know it was even up for bids. What would you do with an abandoned inn?”
I couldn’t picture David as an innkeeper, but I half hoped he’d buy it just so I could get a look inside the place.
“Restore it to its former glory and sell it. I prowled around the outside, and the structure looks solid, but I’m not buying it without a thorough inspection of the interior. Maybe you could use your connections with Martha to get me the keys.”
“Done. But only if you let me go with you when you look at it. I’m dying to see the inside.”
With the deal struck, we chit-chatted our way through lunch, then David rinsed his bowl and put it in the dishwasher.
As soon as the door clicked shut behind him, I grabbed the envelope, dumping keys all over the table, and opened the flap. Then I stopped, realized it was the weekend, and shot off a text to Patrea.
—Where are you?
She and Chris were still hot and heavy despite her dire prediction otherwise, and since he had time on his hands until spring planting, they alternated between his place and hers. I didn’t think that arrangement would last forever, but for now, they made it work.
Instead of messaging me back, she called. “I’m at the farm, why?” Or I thought that’s what she said because the connection was horrible.
“You’re breaking up. If you can hear me, I found the envelope from Albert. Do you want me to open it or wait for you?”
I caught about half of what she said, but it sounded like she would be at my place in fifteen minutes. I could wait that long.
“Amber. Are you around?”
Dead silence. I felt like an idiot and wished I’d asked Kat for a little more practical advice. “Amber. Hell-ooo.”
“Keep your pants on. I can hear you, it just takes me a minute to gather myself together.”
I made a mental note to ask more about that later, but for now, I didn’t want to say anything that would force her to leave.
“Look what I found.” I held up the envelope. “Well, David found it, to be honest.”
“What’s in it?” Amber crowded close enough to send shivers over my body. “I’m dying to know.”
“I didn’t look yet. Patrea’s on her way, but I wanted you to be here, too. Just stay out of our personal space, okay? I’ll make sure you can see, and remember, I can’t answer questions while Patrea’s here.”
The way Amber pouted, you’d have thought I’d told her she had body odor or something. “She already thinks the house is haunted, so you could just do us both a favor and tell her about me.”
“You sound like a jealous mistress,” I said. “What would happen if I did? Huh? Can you show yourself to her?”
Spencer Charles, my second ghost, had made contact with Jacy, but that had been a matter of life and death, and he didn’t tell me how he’d done it. Maybe I should have asked, but at the time, I’d been a little busy catching his killer.
Amber sighed. “Probably not. You’re easy, but if I had that kind of energy, I’d use it to contact my dad.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
AMBER TRIED TO distract me by chattering inanely about the personal lives of people she’d worked with, but the fifteen minutes I waited for Patrea felt more like an hour. But I resisted the temptation to peek at the envelope’s contents until she walked through the door, tossed her coat over the newel post at the bottom of the stairs, and kicked off her boots to keep from tracking snow through the house.
“Before we open this bad boy up,” I said while she shed her layers and made her way to the kitchen, “I talked to that cop today, the one who’s working Albert’s case and Winston’s murder, and I have some tidbits to share.”
At home in my kitchen, Patrea poured herself a glass of iced tea. “Did you mention the argument?”
“I did. And then she asked if he owned a Ruger LCP. That’s a handgun, by the way.”
“Sure. LCP stands for Lightweight Compact Pistol. Easy to handle, small enough to tuck into a purse, perfect for concealed carry.”
For a moment, I couldn’t do anything but stare at her.
“What? I can’t know about guns?”
“No, I just … anyway. To my knowledge, Paul has never even fired a gun, so I said no, and then she asked if I could think of anywhere he might go. They’ve already checked all the family properties, including the camp on the lake, which is only accessible this time of year by snowmobile. I don’t think I was much help because I couldn’t think of any place they hadn’t already looked. But she did let it slip that he hasn’t used his credit or debit cards since he checked out of the hotel.”
Arching a brow, Patrea asked, “Does he carry a lot of cash?”
“Bassett asked me the same question, and he didn’t carry cash when we were married. Who knows what he does now. While she had me on the phone, she also asked if we owned a metal baseball bat at the time of Albert’s attack.”
If we had, I might have used it on Paul the day I found him in bed with Reva. In retrospect, I was glad that answer was also a no. Otherwise, I’d probably still be in jail.
“And finally, she pressed me more about my thoughts on the video footage from that day. I stood firm that I didn’t think it was Paul, and not just because of the bat. The clothes were all wrong, too.”
While Amber hover-paced, Patrea played devil’s advocate. “He could have bought a bat and the clothes.”
“I suppose you’re right. I can’t help thinking whatever’s in the envelope has something to do with the attack, and that makes me feel horrible.”
“You didn’t ask for Albert to slip you information. That was a choice he made on his own.”
“Thanks for trying to make me feel better, but I won’t until he’s out of the hospital, and someone is in jail. I really hope there’s something in here that can help make that happen.” I picked up the envelope.
“Where was it?”
I gestured toward the top of the Hoosier cabinet. “Up there … and yes, I know you probably clean the tops of your cabinets once a month.”
Patrea ignored the comment. “What are you waiting for?”
“Nothing, I guess.” I peeled back the flap and pulled out a sheaf of photos printed in black and white on plain paper.
“From that angle, it looks like it was taken by a security camera.” Amber perused the top image. Patrea echoed the sentiment.
“This is security footage. You recognize the office? Is it yours?”
There was no under-watered plant on the desk, so the answer to the last question was no. “It’s not mine. Look at the windows … the view, I mean. That’s Paul’s office in the corporate building.”
Getting a little too close, Amber sent a shiver over me when she pointed. “Look at the time/date stamp.”
Patrea moved the first photo over and started a new pile. The se
cond was another still shot of the empty office, and from the same angle, only the time stamps proved we were looking at a series taken on the same night. As we ran through the progression, the office door opened, showed a cleaning cart in the hallway, and finally, a member of the cleaning staff going about her job.
I looked at Patrea, and she looked at me, her baffled expression mirroring my own.
“Is this supposed to be something?” she said. “Doesn’t look like anything out of the ordinary to me.”
Amber had a different opinion. “Oh, it’s something all right. Look closer at the woman doing the cleaning. Doesn’t she look familiar to you at all?”
When Patrea slid that sheet away to reveal the next image, I thought she did.
And so did she. “Is that …? No, it can’t be.”
“It is, isn’t it?”
Minus makeup, wearing a custodial uniform, her hair in a wild tangle of curls, Reva McKinnon apparently had no idea she was on camera as she closed the office door and went to work. The slant of the camera gave us a decent view as she pulled a pin from her hair, and used it on the desk lock.
The timestamp said it took less than two minutes before the drawer popped open. The next image showed her opening the file cabinet with the key she undoubtedly took from the desk drawer.
We kept flipping and flipping. Watched Reva go back to her cart and return with a folder. Watched her scrawl Paul’s name on some papers and substitute them for the ones in the file cabinet. Watched her make the office look the way she’d found it.
The real shocker, though, was the final image. It was taken from the front of the building as Reva got into a waiting car and exchanged a passionate kiss with the driver who was …
Wait for it …
None other than Winston Durham.
“Oh no, she did not just do that.” Amber voiced my reaction perfectly, but the look on Patrea’s face was even better.
“Ew,” was all she said before she leafed through the images to get back to the one with the documents.
“Do you have a magnifying glass?”
I did. Or rather, Catherine the Queen of Hoarding did. I got it from the desk and handed it to her.
“I can’t make anything out. The text is completely blurred.” Patrea set the magnifying glass back down, drummed her fingers on the table. “She forged something, and while all of this is damning evidence, without the document itself, probably not enough for a conviction.”
“Well, that’s that, then.” I gathered the images into a pile and grabbed the envelope to stuff them back in, my movements sharp with frustration.
Something rattled across the bottom.
Eyes wide, I tipped up the envelope and out slide a tiny thumb drive.
“Albert. You wily rascal.” Patrea seized the drive, waved it around. “Where’s your laptop?”
I was already headed for the bedroom to get it. I flipped the lid and hit the wake-up button on my way back to the kitchen.
Patrea plugged in the drive.
“Wah, wah, wah,” Amber intoned when a password protection box appeared.
The celebration over, my mood fell into the basement.
“He meant this for you.” Patrea typed my first name into the box. Then my first and last. Then tried again with combinations of capital and lowercase letters. “Okay, that’s a no-go.”
“Try Alicia,” I said, but the results were the same.
We spent a good half hour using combinations of her name and my name. His name and her name. Numbers, symbols. Nothing worked.
“Think about Albert. What do you know about him outside work? Or at work. Does he have a car he loves or a pet? Did you share any little jokes together? It has to be something meaningful to you.”
“Or else he intended to tell you the password later,” Amber said.
“775 reading 782 math.” In my excitement, I spoke louder than necessary. Patrea winced.
“Try it. I know that’s it.” I said.
On the third combo of spaces and capital letters, we hit pay dirt.
I didn’t even notice the chill from Amber crowding in to watch Patrea scroll through the documents.
“Ding, ding, ding. I think we just found ourselves some evidence. Let me send myself a copy of these files, and tomorrow, I’ll show them to someone I trust who can tell us exactly what we’re looking at. I’d like to make sure both you and Albert are protected when all of this comes to light. In the meantime, put this envelope away somewhere safe.”
I did as she requested and put it right back where David had found it. It had been safe enough up there for months—one more day shouldn’t matter.
Patrea hadn’t been gone a half-hour when my phone played the alert for the camera on the back porch. On the way back there to check, I tapped the notification to bring up the video feed. Nothing there. Just as expected, but as soon as I headed in that direction, Molly decided she needed to go out.
“You’re on your own this time, girl. We’ll play ball later.” She shot past me, and as the door clicked shut, I heard the unmistakable sound of my front door opening.
“Hello, Everly. We really need to talk.”
My pulse ramped up to high speed, and I did the only thing I had time to do, tapped 9-1-1, and hit send. As I turned to face Reva and the gun in her hand, I slipped my phone into my pocket and hoped help would come in time.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
WITHOUT WARNING, REVA reared back, swung the gun in an arc that landed hard on my temple. My ears ringing, I went down, and for good measure, she delivered a kick to my side. Pain flared hot and bright, and wet warmth trickled toward my cheek.
“Not so high and mighty now, are you, Everly?” Reva snarled, but I only saw the barrel of the gun staring me in the face. Her voice went in and out, keeping time with the throbbing where she’d clocked me on the temple.
Concussion, I thought. Probably mild, and not helped at all by Amber shrieking profanities at the top of her astral lungs. I wanted to beg her to be quiet, but I didn’t dare. Undirected, her fury vibrated through the house, but without enough force to be helpful. Even thrusting her arm through Reva’s head had no effect. It shouldn’t have come as a shock to me that Reva was insensitive to ghostly energy.
There would be no ghost bowling today. No handy mannequin head to save the day. With Molly penned in the backyard, there was only me. Unarmed and, if not quite alone, pretty close.
“You underestimated me just like that idiot you married. He’s lousy in bed, don’t you think? Come on, you can say it. We’ll keep it just between us girls. Absolutely no imagination whatsoever, that one.”
He did sleep with you, so I suppose you’re right.” Like an idiot, I earned myself another kick in the side. While she talked about my ex, I ordered myself to breathe through the pain, to use it to sharpen my resolve.
“Is that a Ruger LCP?”
The gun wavered. “This old thing? Sure.”
“It’s the gun you used to murder Winston.” Not a question. I didn’t need to ask, only to have her confirm what I already knew. “And it was you who beat Albert nearly to death.”
“Now you see, I felt a little bit bad about that one. If he hadn’t changed shifts with someone at the wrong time, he wouldn’t have recognized me from my night job. I haven’t decided what to do with him.”
“Leave Albert alone. He can’t remember anything about the attack, and he has a daughter who’ll be going to college next year. Kill me if you must, but don’t hurt him.”
Reva frowned. “I’m not an animal. I don’t actually like killing people.” Her tone turned conversational. “This is all your fault, you know. If you’d just have taken the blame and gone to jail like I wanted, everyone would have lived happily ever after.”
“Everyone?”
“Well, everyone who counts. And by that, I mean me. I had the perfect plan. I was going to marry Paul.”
“Didn’t you say he was bad in bed?”
Reva laughed again. “Sur
e, but he does have millions of other attractive attributes.”
I shook my head in disgust, then regretted it when the pain pounded through my skull. “Brains isn’t one of them.”
“You can tell him what you think of him when you see him again.”
For a moment, hope flared. Maybe she didn’t mean to kill me.
“I’ll give you a few minutes for a happy little reunion. It’s the least I can do since we were all such good friends. If he’s still among the living.”
“Where is Paul?” I’d fallen on my phone. Probably not hard enough to break it, but I had no idea if Ernie—or anyone else—had picked up, or could hear. On the off chance, I figured it was best to get as much information out there as I could. “What have you done to him?”
“Oh, he’s all tied up at the moment.” She laughed at what I assumed was an attempt at a bad pun. “I gave him a little cocktail to keep him nice and quiet and put the Do Not Disturb sign out so he could sleep. Paul hasn’t been feeling too well the past few days. Why, I think he might even kill you for what he thinks you did to Winston. But we both know Paul is a bit of a wuss.”
The woman was mad. Utterly mad.
She trilled out a laugh. “He won’t be able to live with himself, but there’s always that nice bottle of pills the doctor prescribed to help calm his nerves.”
I used to make fun of the way bad guys in movies always felt the need to unburden their souls at the crucial moment, but I didn’t anymore. It’s a thing.
“Now,” Reva barked. “Get up!”
When I didn’t immediately comply, she kicked me again, the pointy toe of her boot jamming into my ribs. “On your feet. Now!”
There were two of her, then one, then two again, and my stomach did a slow roll as I struggled to stand. She waved the gun toward the door. “Get your coat, take your purse. We’re going for a little ride.”
She might hesitate to fire that gun in here where the neighbors lived close enough to hear it, but if I got in the car with her, I was dead.
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