Spooky Business

by S. E. Harmon

  Well, good luck with that. I looked at his profile, the strong line of his jaw and those firm, kissable lips I knew as well as I knew my own. He was mine, and whatever we had to do to make it work, we would. As if he could feel the weight of my regard, he glanced over and sent me a faint smile. I didn’t give a damn what his mother said.

  This time, I wasn't going anywhere.

  Chapter 8

  The next morning, I was up with the crows… and by crows, I meant Danny, who was extra noisy while getting dressed. He was bright-eyed and bushy-tailed, eager to pick up his Uncle Charlie and get started on roof repair. Blearily, I watched as he zipped his jeans and pulled on an old shirt. The whistling as he pulled on his boots made me briefly doubt our love for one another. I informed him that I didn’t want to see his face again unless it was accompanied by a mug of coffee, and he agreed to my terms.

  I decided to let him live.

  Left alone—fucking finally—my eyes drifted shut again. God realized I was about to get some fitful sleep and routed a call to my phone, waking me right back up. It’s required by law that you groan the word “whyyy” into a pillow when someone calls at the butt crack of dawn on a Saturday. So I did.

  When I finally stopped suffocating myself and glanced at the phone, a familiar face was on the screen. I put it on speaker and buried my face back in the pillow. “Chevy, my love. What can I do for you so early in the morning?”

  “I think a better question is, what have I done for you?” I could hear the smile in her voice. She liked to complain, but there was nothing she loved better than accomplishing a Sisyphean task. “I think I know where Thomas Kane’s wife went.”

  “Do tell,” I murmured.

  “Well, first I had to clear my mind of any preconceived notions I had of Kane killing her, which was hard to do,” she said pointedly. “Just so you know.”

  “Understandable.”

  “You also know you can never go wrong following the money. So, I tried to think like a woman who was planning an escape, and that led me to wonder how she socked away cash without Kane noticing.”

  “There was no activity on her bank account or any of her credit cards after the eighth of August, the year she disappeared.”

  “Exactly. That brought me back to the notion that he chopped her up and buried her in the backyard.”

  “Once again, understandable.”

  “So, I combed through the records of her florist shop—”

  “There was no activity on the business account,” I said with a yawn, nuzzling my pillow some more. God, it was too damn early for all this talking and conjecturing. “I already checked those.”

  “Can I finish?”

  “Sorry, go ahead.”

  “There wasn’t any activity on the corporate card, no. But I searched for all large transactions for that entire year. In July, a few weeks before she disappeared, there was a huge invoice marked paid from a company in Delaney Shores. Over five grand. When I did a keyword search for that city, I found over twenty invoices over two years. Some little, some big.”

  “What was the name on the invoices?”

  “A corporation named Blue Heron Inc.”

  “Maybe they were just suppliers.”

  “Exactly what I thought, but I did a little digging, and Blue Heron Incorporated doesn’t exist.”

  “Hmmm. Delaney Shores.” The name of the city teased at the edges of my brain. I was almost a hundred percent certain I’d heard the name before. Then, it clicked. “Hey, isn’t that where—”

  “Valerie Carr lives, Delilah’s old college roommate,” she hurried to say, and I grinned. Chevy hated being preempted. “I think Delilah created this fake corporation to funnel money to her friend in preparation for her escape.”

  “That tracks,” I murmured. “Valerie’s been lying to protect her friend so long that she probably doesn’t know how to tell the truth about it anymore. Not to mention, I’m fairly certain Delilah was supposed to be the last flower in Kane’s Rose garden.”

  “He’s been locked up for twenty plus years,” she pointed out. “There’s nothing he can do to her now.”

  “You’d be surprised what these guys can manage behind bars,” I said. “It’s maddening. It only takes a word to the guy in the cell next to you who’s getting out on good behavior. You let him know that you have a problem that needs taking care of, and family on the outside who will foot the bill for his services.”

  “That’s damned good incentive to stay hidden until Kane is good and dead,” she muttered.

  “I’ll say. What else did you learn about Valerie?”

  “Nothing all that interesting. She was a secretary at a local church for over twenty-five years before she finally retired. You already know about her son, Joseph Carr, the social worker.” I heard keys clicking on her end. “She was married twice and has four stepchildren, all grown and living in different states.”

  “Can you send me Valerie’s—” My phone dinged with a text and I chuckled. “Thanks.”

  “No sweat, doll.” She popped her gum. “Just imagine, if you came back to BAU, we could do this kind of thing all the time.”

  “Worst sales pitch ever,” I informed her.

  “Have you even told Danny about the job offer?”

  Have I told who about what’s that now? Speakerphone was such a bitch sometimes. It certainly didn’t help that Chevy’s voice only had two volume levels—microphone and megaphone.

  I took her off speaker and put the phone to my ear. “It wasn’t really a job offer,” I hissed.

  “Then why is your nameplate on the door of that corner office?”

  Graycie was such a presumptuous bastard. “I certainly didn’t tell him to—wait, did you say corner office?”

  “Mm-hmm. Big windows. Nice view.” She paused as I digested that. “If you’re moving back to DC, it’s kind of perfect timing. I’m thinking about buying a house and subletting my apartment. I put a lot of expensive renovations into that place, and I’d love it to go to a friend.”

  “I’m not moving to DC,” I said firmly.

  “That’s not what your parking space says.”

  “He gave me a parking….” I shook my head. “Gotta go, Chev. Thanks for your help.”

  I hung up and tossed the phone on the bed. Talking to Valerie Carr had just leap-frogged past every other item on my to-do list. She’d lied to me about Delilah, but that was to be expected. If I had a dollar for every person who lied to me during an investigation, I’d be a very wealthy man. I was more interested in what else she’d lied to me about. Had she kept in contact with her friend secretly all these years?

  I also wanted more detail about her son’s murder. I certainly wasn’t going to get it from him.

  “Did I hear Chevy?”

  Danny’s voice made me inhale swiftly. I glanced over my shoulder, wondering what else he’d heard. He didn’t seem particularly perturbed but that didn’t mean much. Out of the two of us, I was the one who wore my every thought on my face. Danny’s poker face was so legendary, he could take it to Vegas and run the tables.

  I frowned. Maybe I was getting a little too accustomed to keeping secrets from Danny. It wasn’t as though I wasn’t going to tell him about the job offer. Just not right now. I didn’t want to know how he felt about it… not until I knew how I felt about it.

  “Maybe that question was a little too complicated,” he said with a raised eyebrow. “Should I try another?”

  “Sorry, I was woolgathering,” I said, “but yeah, that was Chevy. She has a lead for me to follow up.”

  “A lead?” He held out a cup of steaming hot coffee, and I rolled over to take it. “Anything I should know about?”

  I took a sip of life-giving nectar. “Soon,” I promised.

  His other eyebrow joined the first. “Soon like the boxes?”

  I narrowed my eyes at him over my coffee cup. “I’m starting to think you’re obsessed.”

  He leaned over and dropped a kiss in my b
ird’s nest of tangled blond hair. “And I’m starting to think you’re a hobo who just likes living out of boxes.”

  “This weekend. The latest,” I assured him.

  He smiled at me crookedly before he headed for the door. “You’re lucky you’re cute.”

  “I knew it,” I called after him.

  *

  Delaney Shores was a little beachside town, far removed from the bustle of the city. If Delilah Rose did indeed flee to her friend’s house for refuge, it was a ballsy move. I certainly wouldn’t have relied on the hiding-in-plain-sight methodology with a man like Kane on my tail. I’d probably rent bunker space from a survivalist and say goodbye to sunlight. Are amenities like ammunition and freeze-dried meals included in the rent or what?

  I pulled up to the curb and parked, surveying Valerie Carr’s smart little cottage. It sat back from the road a bit, surrounded by an actual picket fence. The star of the property was the tidy yard, trimmed within an inch of its’ life and chock-full of colorful plants. The flower beds were perfectly manicured, and as I headed up the cobblestone walkway, I didn’t see so much as a stray leaf.

  A large German shepherd was snoozing on the porch. I glanced at him warily, but when I mounted the steps, he only lifted his head briefly to eyeball me with dark eyes. I half crouched, having a brief internal debate on whether petting would be welcome.

  Yes, his steady gaze said. Do it.

  I cocked my head skeptically. “You’re not going to bite?”

  Of course not. There’s a reason all dogs go to heaven, you know.

  “We don’t know that for sure,” I murmured. “That could just be dog propaganda.”

  I barely have any teeth. He yawned as his eyes closed. Pet me, you chicken.

  I realized I was having an imaginary conversation with a dog and put a stop to it immediately. I rubbed his gray-speckled fur lightly, only to find he’d already fallen back asleep. I gave him one last pat and stood. He let out a loud fart and startled himself back awake, and his gaze landed on me accusingly before drifting shut again.

  Well. My lips twitched in amusement while my nose twitched from the smell. Someone’s certainly doing a bang-up job guarding the threshold.

  I knocked on the door for a while before heading around to the side yard. I spotted a woman in a pastel jogging suit hunched over a table. A large jug was on the table, along with a bunch of Mason jars. As I watched, she pushed a tap on the jug, and something golden and viscous emerged into the mason jar waiting below.

  “Ms. Carr?”

  She startled, shoulders jumping as she nearly fumbled the jar. As it was, a good portion of the liquid spilled over the side and onto the grass. “Well, there goes the honey,” she said, resting the jar on the table and frowning up at me. “You startled me darn near to death.”

  “Sorry about that.”

  “Who are you anyway?”

  “Detective Christiansen.” I cleared my throat at her blank look. “We spoke on the phone?”

  “Where’s Walter?” she asked worriedly. “He’s usually so good about alerting me.”

  If Walter was that hound on the porch who barely blinked as I hammered at the door for ten minutes, I seriously doubted the veracity of that claim. Walter was retired as fuck. “He’s fine, I think. I saw him on the porch taking a little nap.”

  “Yes, well, he does that at his age.” She blinked at me owlishly from behind Coke bottle glasses. “Detective Christiansen, you said?”

  “Yes.” When she continued to stare at me, I raised an eyebrow. “Something on my face?”

  She looked startled. “What? No. You just… you like somebody that I used to know.” She held up a jar of honey. “Would you like to try some? Once you try it, you’ll never go back to the supermarket stuff.”

  “Oh, that’s—”

  “I’ll make sure you go home with a jar,” she said definitively, as if that was all settled. “Detective, I’m not sure why you’re here. I’ve already told you that I haven’t seen Delilah in many years. I don’t know what else I can say on the subject.”

  “Valerie,” I paused as I tried to think of the best way—the polite way—to call an elderly woman a dirty damn liar. “I know you’re not being upfront with me.”

  “Detective—”

  “I looked into the paperwork you filed for Blue Heron, Inc. All in your handwriting, filed under your name and address.” She began filling another jar as if I hadn’t spoken at all, but the tension in her shoulders said she heard me just fine. I went on doggedly. “I know you were just trying to help your friend. I understand where you were coming from.”

  “You don’t understand a damn thing.” She let out a long sigh. “Delilah was a very dear friend, but we lost touch after she married Kane. I feel bad about that, but life just… got busy. We had jobs and families and responsibilities. It was hard to keep in touch as much as we should’ve, and Kane certainly didn’t help matters.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “He wanted to control her, and he took great pleasure in isolating her from her friends. At first, I kept trying to connect with her, but I grew tired of his games. He would interrupt our conversations and hang up on me and rip up any letters I sent. Eventually, I guess I just… moved on.” She sent me a guilty look. “I feel bad about that. I always missed her, though.”

  “Were you surprised when she called, asking for your help?”

  “God, yes. I never thought she’d leave that man, but I was all for it.”

  “Was it your idea to do it quietly?”

  “Yes. I knew he was dangerous, though not as dangerous as he turned out to be, mind you. I just thought he was aggressive and possessive and pushy, and I knew he wouldn’t take her leaving him well.” She capped the mason jar and put it in a crate with the rest. “I started sending her invoices, like a supplier. And when she paid, I would tuck away the money.”

  “And you gave her that money when she arrived?”

  “Of course.” She frowned. “Why wouldn’t I?”

  It was my job to suspect everyone. She certainly wouldn’t be the first to help herself to someone else’s money. After all, who would Delilah tell?

  “Where is Delilah now?” I asked. “I need to speak with her to verify your account of events.”

  “I don’t know.”

  I sighed inwardly. If we were going to go back to the beginning every five minutes, I needed to grab some Gatorade and a power bar. “Valerie.”

  “I’m telling you the truth this time,” she said defensively. “The plan went off without a hitch, and she stayed here for six months. We had such a good time. It was like when we were in college all over again.”

  “Then why did she leave?”

  “Kane showed up one day looking for her. She had just enough time to hide in the closet under some clothes.” She looked nervous just remembering that day. “He was his usual aggressive self, posturing and shouting. He insisted upon searching my house, even knocked me out of the way when I tried to block the door.”

  “Did he find her?”

  “No. And even though he smacked me around a little, I didn’t tell him a damned thing.”

  She sounded proud of herself, but I felt sick to my stomach. I’d been on the receiving end of that menacing presence at the prison. The thought of him towering over someone her size and then actually hitting her was unthinkable.

  “I saw him in the area a week later, driving by in his pickup. Delilah thought it was too risky to stay. She said he would be watching, and we’d slip up eventually. Then he’d kill us both. I told her we’d figure something out.”

  “So what did she do?”

  “One morning when I woke up, she was gone,” Valerie said tearfully. “She knew I would’ve fought tooth and nail to keep her here, so she took off while I was sleeping.”

  “I’m sorry,” I said, feeling a little inadequate to comfort her.

  Luckily, she pulled herself together after a few moments, dabbing at her eyes. “So that�
��s Delilah’s story. I thought for sure she’d come back when Kane got put away, but she never did. Frankly, if you want to do her a favor, you’ll let her stay lost. At least until that husband of hers is dead.” She squinted up at me. “He’s not dead yet, is he?”

  “No, not quite.”

  “Hmph. That’s too bad.”

  Yeah, a lot of people seemed to feel the same way. I was tempted to put a sign up with an arrow that read: The line starts here for spitting on Thomas Kane’s dead body.

  I cleared my throat. “Delilah isn’t the only reason I’m here. I’d like to talk to you about your son, Joseph.”

  “Oh, my Joey.” She dabbed at her eyes again. “You’re just determined to make me cry today, Detective.”

  “I am sorry for bringing up painful memories, but I need to ask a few questions.”

  “I don’t suppose it would do me any good to refuse.”

  “Probably not.”

  She sighed. “Then go ahead. But my Joey has been gone for seven years now. I don’t know what you expect to find after all this time. Haven’t you read his file?”

  I nodded. I’d perused the admittedly sparse file over breakfast. His boss had been concerned after Joseph missed work and called the police for a welfare check. Joseph had been a conscientious employee, early to come in and late to leave each day. Skipping work without calling just hadn’t been in his repertoire.

  The officer who’d done the welfare check had found the apartment undisturbed, the door locked and the alarm set. It wasn’t until the next day that a fair worker found his car in the parking lot at Zappa Fair.

  The pictures of the crime scene were gruesome and peaceful, all at the same time. The driver’s side window and the windshield were covered with a spray of blood, while Joseph was slumped over his steering wheel. A half unwrapped sandwich was on the floorboards, indicating he’d been about to eat. He almost looked like he was sleeping… minus the bullet lodged in the back of his head.

  The lead detective had labeled the ex-boyfriend, Alexander Gilroy, a person of interest, but his suspicions seemed based on conjecture. There was precious little evidence, forensic or otherwise, which was surprising considering the bloody crime scene. Obviously, the killer had come prepared.