“What did he say?” Mike said.
“I told her I didn’t love her anymore,” Stanley said. “All she did was whine and complain, always wanting me to divorce Amelia. She got upset, and said that she knew I was seeing my secretary. But I wasn’t, not really.”
Amelia gasped. “What do you mean, not really?”
“Aggie said that her friends had told her they had seen me having lunch with my secretary a few times. That much was true. But what they failed to mention was that there were about five to ten people with us at any given time. They were all business lunches; she was just there to take notes.”
“Oh my god,” Amelia said, putting her hand on her chest. “You mean…you mean you weren’t cheating on me with that blonde trollop?”
“No, Amelia, I wasn’t, and I was trying my best to get rid of Aggie. We didn’t even have a relationship at that point. By the time Cecilia was one, I was tired of her. I loved you and the kids. But every time I tried to break it off with Aggie, she would remind me of what she went through having the children, and how she did it out of her love for me.”
Amelia stood up suddenly, startling Artie, who stumbled back a couple of steps. “If you had just been honest with me, none of this would have happened!” she cried. “If you had just told me the truth…”
“What are you talking about, Amelia?” I said.
“Aggie came to me a week before Stanley died,” she sniffled, “and told me that he was having an affair with his secretary. That was the final straw for me. It was bad enough that he had two children with Aggie, and I was forced to live with her and that slob of a husband she married. But when she told me that he was carrying on with someone else, I…I snapped.” She walked over to the window. “She suggested that we get rid of him. It would be easy, she said. She had it all planned out. I was so upset, I quickly agreed.”
“What was the plan?”
“I didn’t know many of the details before that day. When she heard about the meeting, she told me to make sure I went, and she would take care of the rest. It wasn’t until they called looking for me that I figured out what she had done.”
“So she’s the one that pulled the trigger,” Mike said.
“Yes,” she nodded, her back still to us. “But I didn’t know she planned to frame my son for it. By then, it was too late to back out. I had to go along with it. She threatened to tell everyone that she was the mother of my children.”
“I already knew that, Mother,” Artie said. “I found the birth certificates in Father’s desk one day.”
Amelia turned and looked at him. “I am so sorry, son. I never meant for you to find out that way. It never mattered to me that she gave birth to you. I loved you like you were my own, and you were. Nothing is ever going to change that.”
“How did you get them to close the case?” Mike asked her.
“That was my father and that policeman, Cliff Scott. He convinced my father that there would be a terrible scandal if word got out that his grandson had killed his own father. He told my father that I had been having an affair with him for over a year. Aggie and that cop backed me into a corner; I didn’t have a choice but to go along with it in order to protect my son.”
“But you conspired with Aggie to kill your husband,” I said. “That makes you just as guilty as them.”
“I know that!” Amelia said angrily. “Do you think I’m proud of that?”
“What happened after the funeral?”
Amelia sighed as she sat back down on the couch. “Aggie started spending more time in the house, even though she had no right to. I fired her and ordered her to leave. She just laughed at me, and said she was never going to leave. I sent the children to stay with my parents. One day, she came to me with some official documents. ‘I’m the one in charge now,’ she said. ‘You’re going to sign the house over to me, you’re going to give me five million dollars, and you’re going to pay Mr. Scott ten thousand dollars a month for the rest of his life. Then you’re going to take your things and get out of my house.’ It was my only way out. I couldn’t go to my father and tell him the truth. So I did what she asked, packed up all of our things, picked the children up from my parents’ house, and fled town.”
We all sat in stunned silence. What she said went with what Walt knew; he just hadn’t been told the whole truth. Just the truth as Amelia’s father knew it. And he applied pressure to Walt to protect his grandson. Amelia was right. If Stanley had been honest with her once the relationship with Aggie was over, this never would have happened. “What happened to Ray Foley?” I said.
“Aggie killed him,” Stanley said. “One day he was here, the next day, he was gone. At first, I thought he had gone on a fishing trip. He usually did that when he wanted to get away from Aggie. His trips were only five days long. I always knew when he was back because Aggie would be on the back porch cleaning fish. But when he didn’t come back after five days, I asked her about it. She laughed. ‘He’s fishing at the bottom of a well.’ She wasn’t even upset about it. She waited a while, and then filed a missing person’s report. Of course, they never found him.”
“What a cold-blooded woman,” I said.
“A couple of months ago, Cliff Scott came out here, asking questions about Ray. He told Aggie that he had found new information regarding Ray’s disappearance, but that he would keep quiet about it if she paid him a million dollars. I knew she had that kind of money. She was a shrewd businesswoman, knew all about stocks and bonds. Obviously he knew that, too. He must have really done his research on her life, because he knew everything.”
“She dumped Ray in the well, didn’t she?” Mike said.
Stanley nodded. “She used the riding lawn mower. Wrapped him in a blanket, tied rope around it, tied the rope to the back of the mower, and hauled him out there.”
I rubbed my forehead with my right hand; my head was starting to hurt again. Looking at Artie and Amelia, I said, “Which one of you killed her?”
They both denied doing it. “I did it,” Stanley said.
Chapter 46
Mike looked at him. “Impossible. You can’t pick up solid objects. You’re a ghost.”
“Actually, yes, I can. Or I used to be able to,” he said, holding up a nearly transparent hand. “I practiced for a long time. It takes a lot of energy to pick up a solid object when you’re dead. You really have to focus and concentrate. I used to practice on a candlestick holder. It sounds like a bit of cliché, but I figured since it was a smaller object, it would be easier to handle. My hand used to pass through it time after time. It was very frustrating. Then suddenly, one day, I made actual contact with it, and I was able to hold it for just a second. I kept working on it until I could hold it for longer periods of time without dropping it. Well, you know the rest. It’s the candlestick on the dining room table. You’ll find blood on it, I’m sure.”
“But who dropped her down the well?” I asked.
“I did,” Artie said. “I thought Mother had killed her, and I wanted to protect her.”
“Even though she tried to frame you for murder?” I said. He nodded. “And you hired Jake Yarborough to kill Cliff Scott?”
“Aggie came to me at the garage one night after closing. I was doing some paperwork when she walked in. She called me by my given name, and laughed when I sat there with my mouth hanging open. ‘Son, we have a problem,’ she said, and told me that Cliff Scott was threatening to reveal all of our dirty little family secrets. She gave me a slip of paper with Jake’s name on it, and told me to contact him.”
“But why go after my grandfather?” Mike said.
“I saw Cliff out at the nursing home one day when I was visiting someone, and I thought he had told Walt everything. I wasn’t about to be blackmailed by someone else.”
“And when Jake was injured after blowing up Cliff’s house…”
“No, I blew up Cliff’s house,” Artie said. “I was trying to make sure I destroyed all the files and notes, anything that could conn
ect him to my family.”
“So how did Jake get hurt?”
“The idiot went to the house to get the files for himself so he could use them against me.”
“So you got in touch with his partner and said what?”
“I told her that I needed to see him, and that I wanted to let him know I would take care of his medical expenses. She believed me, the little twit. She had no idea I planned to kill him. All she had to do was distract the police officer guarding the room. But he got suspicious of her, and when I came in that side door, he made a move for his gun. I had no choice but to shoot him.”
“And you told her that she had to finish the contract and kill Walt?” I said. He nodded. “She told us she couldn’t do it. That she didn’t have it in her to kill someone.”
“Yeah, he was on my list of things to take care of before I left town.”
“Why did you try to kill Cam?” Mike said.
“She was getting too nosy, plain and simple.”
“I was doing what your father asked me to do,” I said, glancing over at Stanley. I gasped. Everyone looked at me, then at the desk.
Stanley was gone. “You did it, Cam,” Mike said.
“What did she do?” Artie said. “What have you done to my father?”
“Like I said, I did what he asked me to do. I found his killer,” I replied, looking at Amelia.
“But I didn’t pull the trigger,” she cried.
“No, but you might as well have,” I told her. “You conspired with Aggie, and you helped cause his death. Then you framed his son for your crime. He stuck around all these years to help right a wrong.”
“I don’t understand why you did what you did today, Artie,” Mike said.
“I have connections at the police department,” he said. “I knew Mother was still pointing the finger at me, and that you were starting to investigate me. The only way the truth was going to come out was if I forced your hand, so to speak. So I blew up the car and kidnapped her. I knew you’d come after her. I knew she,” pointing at me, “would figure out I brought Mother here.”
“You may not have killed your father, but you’ve killed two people, you’ve tried to kill two other people, and you’re holding all of us at gunpoint,” Mike pointed out. “You’re still going to prison.”
“Would they really put a dying man in prison?” Artie said.
“You’re dying?” Amelia said.
“Prostate cancer. I’ve got a couple of months at the most, if I’m lucky.”
“So you’re just going to casually kill three people and skip town?” she said.
Artie shrugged. “Why not? I don’t want to die behind bars.”
I saw movement outside the window, but I didn’t react. I didn’t want to tip Artie off in case he started shooting. Amelia stood up and moved in front of her son. “You cannot kill these people,” she said. “He’s the police chief, for crying out loud. Are you trying to completely ruin this family?”
“It’s always about the family, isn’t it?” he yelled at her before shoving her down on the couch. He stood over her. “Protect the family name, protect the family reputation, don’t do anything that will bring shame on us. Why couldn’t you just worry about your children for a change, instead of worrying about the Ashton name? I’m more than a name, Mother.”
Mike got up slowly and moved toward Artie, but he must have sensed what Mike was doing, because he spun around and pointed his gun at Mike. “Don’t even think about it.”
“No!” I said. I dropped my bag on the floor and ran over, standing between them. “Don’t shoot him. You don’t have to hurt anyone else.”
“Are you insane?” Artie said. “Get out of the way.”
“No, I won’t,” I said. “There are officers on their way out here right now. They know we’re here. Someone’s out there already.”
“Where?” Artie said, glancing over his shoulder briefly before looking back at me.
“I saw someone near one of the bushes on the right a minute ago,” I told him. “Go look for yourself.”
“You’re trying to trick me,” he said. He pointed the gun at my chest. I heard Mike growl.
“I’m not, I swear it. I promise you, we won’t move. Take your mother and go look out the window. We’ll stand right here. I give you my word.”
He glared at me for a moment, then grabbed his mother’s arm, yanking her off the couch. He moved toward the window and started looking around. I took a chance and slowly put my hand behind me, raising my shirt just enough where Mike could see my gun before I dropped my hand to my side.
Artie cursed as he spotted two more police cars in the driveway. “See, I wasn’t lying to you,” I told him. “I wouldn’t do that.”
“So you say.”
“Artie, your only choice now is to give up,” Mike said. “I guarantee you one of my men is by the front door and another one is on the back porch. Any minute now, one or both of them are going to come busting through those doors, and they’re going to shoot you. Your mother might accidentally get hit by a stray bullet. You don’t want her to get hurt, do you?”
I could see the indecision on his face. “There’s no statute of limitations on murder, Artie. She’ll be arrested, too.”
A flash of light suddenly hit Artie in the eye, blinding him. Mike grabbed the Sig Sauer from my waistband and shoved me to the floor. “Get down, Mrs. Ashton!”
She did what he told her to just before Artie fired blindly in our direction. Mike returned fire, hitting Artie in the shoulder. He dropped his gun and grabbed the wound. Danny came running into the room as Mike kicked away Artie’s gun and removed his Colt from Artie’s waistband. Danny cuffed Artie’s hands in front of him because of the injury, then pulled out his radio and called in the paramedics.
Mike helped Amelia to her feet. “Are you alright?” he asked her. She nodded and sat down on the couch. Then he came over and helped me up, too. “I didn’t mean to shove you so hard, Cam.”
“I understand.”
“You sat there this whole time with your gun in the small of your back?” he said.
“I wasn’t sure if he would search me or not. I guess with this cast on my arm, he didn’t think I was much of a threat.”
Mike hugged me. “You’re crazy, you know that? And you saved our lives by shining that light in his eyes.”
“I didn’t do that.”
He held me at arm’s length. “You didn’t?”
I shook my head. “I thought you did it.”
“It wasn’t me.”
I suddenly knew who it was, but wisely kept quiet. I didn’t want to have to explain it to Danny. But I silently sent thanks to a certain ghost who had saved my life again.
Chapter 47 – The Aftermath
Artie Shatton, aka Stanley Arthur Ashton IV, died in jail, two months after his arrest. And without him around to testify against her, Amelia Ashton wasn’t charged with anything. There was just no way to prove that she had anything to do with her husband’s death.
She bought the Ashton house, then put it on the market, resigned from the board at the bank, closed out her account and Artie’s trust fund account, and left town again. But before she left, she did give Charles Prufrock $50,000 to repair the damage to his office.
I did have a chance to talk to her once before she left town. We met at the coffeehouse a week after the shooting. “I want to apologize for what my son put you through,” she said after we got something to drink. “I…I had no idea he was so unbalanced.”
“It didn’t have anything to do with being unbalanced, Amelia. I believe it was because you and Aggie Foley tried to frame him for murder. He was only fourteen years old then. When we interviewed you at the police station, you stuck with the story. It’s like you believed it after all these years, and you couldn’t remember the truth. I think Aggie let your husband hire me to investigate because she believed there was no way the truth she killed him would come out after all these years.”
She
didn’t say anything to that. There wasn’t any way she could defend what she had done to him. “Are you going to write about this?” she asked, taking a drink of her hot tea.
“I don’t know,” I said truthfully. “I’ve had a couple of calls from publishers, and some major newspapers. It’s not my story to tell.”
“Maybe you should,” she said. I looked at her, surprised. “It’s got everything a bestselling book needs: love, betrayal, money, and murder.”
“But what about protecting the family name, like Artie said?”
“If what he said is true, and he is dying, then I’ll be the only one left. I don’t plan on coming back here once I leave. How many people around here do you think already know the truth about what happened back then, and what has happened now? Truth be told, I haven’t cared what any of them have thought since I left here all those years ago. Write the story, and with my blessing. I’ll sign a release form, so you won’t get sued or anything like that. You keep whatever profits you make from the book.”
“That’s very generous and kind of you,” I said. “Thank you.”
“You’re welcome. It’s the least I can do for all the trouble we’ve caused you.”
“Have you…have you been back to the house?”
She nodded. “Once, just to see if he was there. I wandered around the house for over an hour, but he never showed up. It’s like your friend said: you did what he asked you to do. You found his killer.”
I wanted to feel sorry for her, and maybe in a way, I did. But on the other hand, I couldn’t help but blame her, too. Aggie Foley was more culpable, the mastermind behind all of it. And if Clifford Scott hadn’t gotten greedy, he’d still be alive, too.
Amelia finished her tea and stood up. “Oh, one other thing,” she said, reaching into her purse. “Here’s a key to the house. I thought you might want to go out there and look around, go through the things that are still out there. Take whatever you need for your story, if you decide to write it.” She smiled at me, a rather sad, tired smile, and left.
Who Killed the Ghost in the Library: A Ghost writer Mystery Page 28