14 Christmas Spirit

by K. J. Emrick

  "Is he coming after you himself?" Jon asked. "Who is he?"

  "Doesn't matter who he is. He won't come after me himself. He'll hire someone. I won't know who's coming for me until it's too late. And I'm done running."

  "Then what…?" He let his question trail off, setting his sandwich back down on its plate. "Oh. I see."

  "That's right. I want to catch this guy, and put him away in prison."

  Jon slowly brushed his palms together, his gaze level with JoEllen's. "So, let me get this straight. You want me to find the person who will be coming to kill you, stop them before they get to you, and arrest them."

  "That's right," she said, her expression set in place.

  "And," he went on, waving a hand to show he wasn't done, "at the same time you don't want me to actually go after the guy who is hiring the killer."

  "Uh, right. No. I don't."

  "Why?"

  She looked down at the table, then shrugged. "I'm hoping if we show him I can't be reached, he'll back off and forget about me. I just need to stay hidden until whatever hired gun is coming for me gets arrested and put away."

  "While you," he continued, "the hired gun who has worked God alone knows how many contracts to kill people for money—"

  "Eleven," she told him.

  "—walk away again. Is that it? JoEllen Meyers, or whatever your real name is, goes free? What did you do to make this guy so mad at you, anyway? You were a killer. What was so bad about this one job?"

  There was silence in the kitchen for the longest time. The three of them had kept their voices down as it was, making sure not to wake Connor or let him hear what they were talking about, but when JoEllen spoke again her voice was quieter yet, and icy.

  "I didn't take this man's job," she stated in answer to what Jon had said. "He wanted me to kill two little kids. I told him no."

  That made Jon blink. Darcy stared at JoEllen, a little less certain than she had been that she knew her friend. She knew what JoEllen used to do. At least, she knew it as a fact, in a strictly intellectual way. The specifics, the ins and outs of what a contract killer might be asked to do, wasn't something she had spent much time thinking about.

  Killing little kids? Who did that?

  Not JoEllen, Darcy reminded herself. That was a line she would not cross. Apparently, for someone in her profession, that created a problem.

  "He was having trouble with his ex-wife," JoEllen continued, apparently feeling the need to unburden her soul of this terrible mess. "She wanted child support from him. She was going to get it, too. So this guy figures, hey, if there's no kids, there's no child support."

  Jon leaned forward, folding his hands on the table, and clearing his throat. "That's truly despicable. So you told him no?"

  "Of course I told him no," JoEllen snapped. "I told you before, up in Bear Ridge, that I've turned down plenty of good paying jobs. That was one of them. Now, the guy's hired someone to come after me. Kind of a quid pro quo thing."

  "Whatever happened to honor among thieves?" was Jon's comment.

  "We don't have honor," she sneered. "For that, we come to cops like you."

  Darcy expected Jon to be offended. Instead, he nodded slowly, like he and JoEllen had come to some kind of understanding. Then he cleared his throat again and stared down at his hands. "I have to say. That, uh, kind of builds up my respect for you."

  JoEllen actually laughed. "I didn't know you had any for me to begin with."

  Jon shrugged.

  "You're our friend," Darcy put in quickly, reaching over to rest her hand on top of Jon's. "We've got different ways of looking at the world, to be sure, but we've been through too much together to just turn you away."

  "I know you don't want me here, Darcy. I get that. No, no it's all right. I'm trying to turn my life around but I'm not there yet. I want to be. I do. But for now, I need your help. Connor needs your help. Yours and Jon's both."

  There was a hint of pleading in her voice which was so unlike her that Darcy felt her heart being tugged. Jon was having an argument with himself, every thought written on his face. Finally he drew in a breath. "Of course you can stay here, JoEllen."

  Darcy's jaw dropped. She had been ready to argue with him, to convince him they needed to do exactly what he had just said, to tell him that she'd take full responsibility for JoEllen and Connor if need be. Sometimes, he really could surprise her.

  "Wow, Jon," JoEllen said. "Big, tough cop has a heart of gold after all. It really is the season of miracles, ain't it?"

  "Don't push it," he said, the barest hint of a smile playing across his lips. "It's just that your timing couldn't be worse. We've got a mur— I mean, a missing person investigation going on. In fact, we're right in the middle of it now. This was supposed to be a quick lunch before we went to our next interview."

  "A mur-missing person case?" she teased. "Wow. You know, for a small town cop you get involved in a lot of serious stuff."

  "Maybe you did it?"

  "Jon!" Darcy blurted out, shocked.

  "What? I thought it was a legitimate question."

  "Whatever, Mister Police Officer," JoEllen said to him. "You two were getting into trouble long before you met me."

  He nodded his head in Darcy's direction. "I blame her."

  "Hey!" Darcy said. "It's not all my fault."

  He winked at her, but then shook his head. "It's a missing person case, officially speaking, but the victim is definitely dead."

  "Wait, what?" JoEllen asked. "How do you know the vic is dead if she's only listed as missing?"

  Darcy looked at JoEllen meaningfully.

  "Oh," the woman said. "That's how. Darcy and her mystical, magical gifts. So now you're looking for suspects, and naturally you thought of me. Is that it, Jon?"

  "You do fit my profile."

  "Dangerously smart and cute as a button?"

  "Will you two stop?" Darcy sighed.

  JoEllen waited until Jon looked away from her first. "Okay, okay. Well, why don't I help? I can maybe give you a different viewpoint on the case. You know," she said bitterly, "as someone who used to kill people from time to time."

  "Oh, no," Jon was quick to say. "First, I don't need your help. Second, no one can know it's anything more than a missing person case. Third, you're going to stay here, in this house, and not go outside, and not go near the windows, and not make any phonecalls, and—"

  "If I wanted to go to jail I'd just turn myself in," JoEllen mumbled, folding her arms and leaning back in her chair.

  "Those are the rules, JoEllen," Jon stressed. "I'm a police officer, and if I'm going to harbor a known fugitive you're not going to bring that trouble down on my career or my family."

  Darcy couldn't help but smile when he said that. His family.

  He meant her.

  "We'll help you figure out your mess," Jon promised, "but we've got to go work on this case first. It's kind of urgent, I guess you'd say."

  Unless they wanted Megan's ghost popping up on their television again, or somewhere else. Darcy had been the one to suggest there must be some urgency in this for Megan. Some ghosts could wait a decade or more before haunting anyone. The fact that Megan had come to Darcy so soon after her death told Darcy that they needed to solve this mystery sooner rather than later. Megan was telling them they were running out of town.

  "Whatever you say, Mister Police Officer," JoEllen said. She was trying to sound tough, but Darcy saw the look of relief in her eyes. "Me and the kid will just sack out on your couch and watch some TV until you get home."

  "Good. Fantastic, even," Jon said, shaking his head and standing up. "I'm going to regret this, aren't I?"

  "Not on my account, you won't." JoEllen stood up with Jon, and held her hand out to him. "I promise."

  They shook hands, and something passed between them that might have been mutual respect. Darcy smiled. It was good to see JoEllen and Connor again, no matter what the circumstances were.

  Jon was right, though. The timing
of this couldn't be worse. They had to find one killer already, in order to give Megan's spirit some peace. Now they would have to find and stop another killer to help JoEllen and her son.

  To top it all off, there was one more thing to worry about.

  Her mother was coming for Christmas dinner.

  Chapter Six

  "Couldn't she just track the guy down who is coming to kill her and kill him herself?"

  Darcy slapped her hand against Jon's shoulder. "Cut her some slack, will you? She's trying. I can't imagine how hard it is to be a career criminal and then give it all up for your child."

  Jon was just parking the car at the curb in front of a tiny house nestled between other tiny houses on Lavine Street. It was as small a house as Darcy had ever seen, painted white with pink trim around both the windows and the front door. Once upon a time, a lot of care had been put into the place to make it neat and tidy and, well, pretty. Now the paint was peeling and the little garden plots under the front windows were overgrown with dead weeds sticking up out of the snow.

  This was Blair Clinton's house, the home she had shared with Megan Bortchowski for a while. Before Megan had gone missing, and wound up dead.

  "Do you want me to stay out here while you talk to Blair?" Darcy asked.

  "No." Jon pulled the keys from the ignition and twirled them around in his fingers. "I'd actually prefer the company. Blair might be more comfortable talking to a woman, for one thing. For another, I want you in there in case Megan's… um, you know… shows up and tries to talk."

  Darcy knew he meant Megan's ghost. He was as comfortable as anyone in her life when it came to talking about her abilities or asking her to do things like go into a communication. Still, ghosts made everyone a little nervous, if they were being honest with themselves. Jon loved her, and accepted her, but she couldn't expect him to shed his very rational fears of the afterlife just because he was going to marry her.

  An involuntary smile came over her with that thought. March twentieth, she would marry Jon Tinker. Just three months from now. Not a lot of time to plan a wedding. They would have to wait until after Christmas to even think about that stuff, though. They had to plan the holidays now, plus solve this mystery for Megan Bortchowski.

  And help JoEllen stop a killer. Let's not forget that, she reminded herself.

  That sort of wiped the smile from her face.

  "About JoEllen…" Jon said.

  "Yes?"

  "You really think she can change her life just like that?"

  Darcy didn't just say yes right away. JoEllen had made her living by committing murder for years. Could she just turn her back on that? "I think so," she said with a confident nod. "She has her son now. Family changes a lot of things."

  "Like Grace and her baby," Jon suggested.

  “Well, sure. Or me and you. You know, this Christmas dinner we're planning is a time for family to be together."

  "Darcy, I know what you're going to say. Can we not talk about it right now?"

  "Your mother is your family, Jon." Darcy hadn't given up on this yet. "She should be a part of our life."

  "She's my stepmother," he reminded her, "not my real mother."

  "She was the mother you grew up with. I know how much she meant to you."

  His hands gripped the steering wheel. "Everything is just…messed up with my family now. I lost my father when I was young because he went to prison. I sent my sister to prison. Mom…my stepmom, that is, didn't take that well."

  "She was mad at your sister. Not you. I know you're worried she's going to hate you—"

  "She's got every right."

  "No, Jon, it's not like that," Darcy tried to argue. "Don't shut her out because you're afraid she'll do it to you first."

  Darcy could tell she had given him something to think about. It felt right, pushing him to not give up on his family altogether, but she didn't want to push him too hard. It had to be his choice.

  Letting go of the wheel he turned to cup her chin in one hand and lift her mouth so he could kiss her. "Thanks, Darcy. Let's talk about this later, all right? Please? Right now, let's go see what Blair thinks of family obligations."

  "You think she had something to do with Megan's death?"

  "You were the one who saw the vision. Megan was upset, right? About something she couldn't tell Blair? Statistically speaking, the majority of murders are committed by someone the victim knows."

  Darcy knew that was true. It made sense to start at home if they were looking for Megan's killer. From everything they had learned so far, it didn't sound like Megan knew that many people in Misty Hollow. Blair was the one who called the police to notify them Megan was missing in the first place, but that didn't necessarily mean she wasn't the killer.

  Murder mysteries very rarely went in a straight line.

  Knocking on the front door, Jon leaned over and looked through the one front window. "I see her. She's coming."

  Three separate locks were undone before Blair opened the door. She was a short, muscular woman with a young face and dark hair cut short around her ears. The white, ribbed tank top she was wearing emphasized an athletic figure and showed off the full color tattoos of hearts and skulls on both of her arms. Her eyes were hard. Darcy had the impression that Blair Clinton didn't back down from much.

  "Can I help you?" she asked them.

  Jon took out his badge case and flipped it open for Blair to see. "My name is Detective Jon Tinker. I'm with the police. I'm here about Megan's disappearance."

  "Well. About time someone showed up to take this seriously," Blair said sharply. "I thought you people were just going to blow me off."

  She opened the door wider, and walked away inside the house, leaving Jon and Darcy on the front step.

  Jon turned to Darcy. "I suppose we should just show ourselves in?"

  "It would be rude to just ignore such a nice invitation," Darcy agreed. She didn't think she liked Blair Clinton. She was trying to reserve her opinion on the woman, but first impressions were often times the right impressions.

  Well. Sometimes they were. She remembered absolutely hating Jon Tinker when she first met him. Now she was engaged to him.

  They went inside, closing the door behind them to follow Blair to the couch in the small living room. Darcy noticed the chain lock, the deadbolt, the slide lock, and something that might have been a magnetic alarm on the side of the door. A quick look at the window behind its faded white curtain showed her a bar type lock had been added there as well. Blair was apparently very concerned about people trying to break into her house.

  Or with keeping them out.

  "So what are you going to do about finding Megan?" Blair asked bluntly, flopping down into an old green armchair with duct tape covering a hole in one arm.

  Jon looked at Darcy, and she caught the expression on his face. Finding Megan, Blair had said. Like she was only missing, and not dead. Interesting.

  Darcy could sense a lot of anger coming from Blair. She didn't need her gifts to feel it, either. She sat close to Jon on a blue sofa, an uncomfortable thing that must have been an afterthought for the room because it didn't match anything else here. There was a fireplace set into one wall, bare and obviously used for decoration instead of for heat, with a heavy wooden mantle across the top. A few photos in frames sat there, and in two of them Darcy recognized Megan, smiling and seemingly happy.

  "I'd like to ask you a few questions, to start with," Jon said to Blair. "Can you think of any reason why Megan would just disappear like this?"

  "Of course not!" Blair answered with a sneer. "We were in love. She and I had been together for two years. It was a real relationship no matter what her parents thought. We were going to be together forever."

  Darcy saw the slight shift in Jon's body language. "Can I ask what you meant by, what Megan's parents thought? Did they have a strong opinion of your relationship with Megan?"

  "Sure did. Selfish and homophobic. That's what they are. Why, when Megan finally wo
ke up to who she was and left men to be with me instead, her father threatened to disown her! Actually told her she would regret it. I can not stand people like that."

  Jon nodded, not agreeing and not disagreeing with what Blair said. He had explained to her once how important it was in an interview not to alienate the person you were talking to by disagreeing with them. You didn't want them to shut down. At the same time, you didn't want to come right out and agree with anything they said either, if you could help it. That gave them the idea you were their best friend.

  Jon was a police officer looking for the truth. That was all.

  "Have you spoken with Megan's parents at all?" he asked Blair.

  "Of course not. I don't talk to those people, they don't talk to me." She blinked, as if hearing how bitter she sounded. "It doesn't matter. Megan would never go to them. Not without telling me first. She knew better."

  "How's that?"

  Blair waved a hand as if the answer should have been obvious to Jon. "Look, her parents don't like me. They don't like us. I told her they aren't allowed in our house. Not ever. She's not to speak to them, or go over there without asking me first. She doesn't need their influence in her life."

  "Just yours?" Jon asked abruptly.

  "You better believe it," was the quick reply. "Megan's life has been so much better now that she's with me. I know what's good for her. I'm the only one who understands her."

  Darcy fought to keep her face neutral. She'd seen these kinds of relationships before. One partner dominating the other, cutting them off from friends and family, treating them like a possession or a pet. It had all the earmarks of an abusive relationship.

  Jon had taken out his small spiral bound notebook from the inside pocket of his suitcoat and started jotting down things that Blair said. While she waited for him to finish, Blair began picking at the purple nailpolish on her fingers, her eyes cloudy.

  "Did she leave you a note?" Jon asked without looking up from his writing.

  "No, she did not leave me a note." Blair made an exasperated sound and slammed her fists down on the arms of the chair. "Listen, what good is this doing us? Huh? Shouldn't you guys be out checking with bus stations or taxi cabs or something?"