by Donna Doyle
John Parmenter had been dead when his body was thrown in the lake. Despite the decomposition of the body, the coroner had discovered a bullet hole at the base of his neck that had killed him. Whoever had done it had probably not realized that with the arrival of spring, people would be going to their camps and the lake that was deserted through the cold months would be a busy place.
Discovery of the body was inevitable, and sooner rather than later. Which indicated that perhaps the killer was not familiar with local habits.
But that was only one possibility. The other possibility was Reverend Meachem, who returned home after the birth of his infant son on the evening of Easter Sunday to find the state police at his doorstep, wanting to question him about his argument with John Parmenter.
Troy already knew, because Kelly had told him, that the minister had gone up to John Parmenter’s camp on the Saturday before Easter to talk to his truculent church member but hadn’t seen John. At least, that was what he said.
The state police were inclined to believe him because the scenario seemed unlikely. Still, he was the only suspect they had, and they had made it clear that they would be investigating further.
Leo was filling Kyle and Troy in on the findings so far when Leo’s phone rang.
“Mia, what’s wrong? I’ll be right there!”
He got up from his desk. “He’s behind this, I know he is!”
“Leo, let me take this call,” Troy said, just as a call came in. Kyle took it.
“Okay,” he said. “We’ll send someone out. Thank you.”
“What?” Leo demanded.
“Truman Avenue.”
“Not Destiny again!”
“Sounds pretty bad this time.”
“Leo, you go out to Destiny. I’ll go to Mia.”
At first, Leo argued, but then he gave way. “You’re right,” he said resignedly. “She needs a cop, not a dad, for this. Kyle, you’ll hold things down in here?”
Kyle nodded. “I guess parking tickets can wait until you come back.”
“They’ll have to.”
Mia Shaw was waiting outside when Troy arrived. She was in tears, her breathing broken by her sobs. It took a while for her to get her story out.
She pointed to the heap of broken bicycle pieces on the small stoop that served as a porch.
“I bought Mason a bike for Easter,” she said. “It’s at my parents’ house. He—he was so excited. I found this out here this morning.”
Troy bent down. The pieces of the bike were in disarray, as if someone had broken the two-wheel bike with no real purpose except destruction. But the parts didn’t look new. There were scratches on the handlebar, and the seat was torn.
“Did you buy him a new bike?” Troy asked. “Or a used bike?”
Mia was incensed by the question. “A new bike, of course,” she said, “I’m working now. I saved for it. I bought him a bike and I bought Lucia a doll house.”
“And the toys are at your parents’ house?’
She nodded. “Why?”
“I don’t think this is your son’s bike, not if it’s new. I think someone got a kid’s bike and destroyed it, but that doesn’t mean that your son’s bike was taken. Did you call your mom and ask her?”
“No, I called Dad right away when I saw this.”
Troy nodded and rose. “I don’t think your mom is going to find anything she shouldn’t when she looks for your son’s bike.”
“But—someone knows what I got him. That means that someone is watching my kids.”
“Do you have a box? I want to take these parts to the station. We can have someone look at it.”
“For fingerprints?”
“For evidence,” Troy said, not committing himself to the hope that fingerprints would reveal the culprit.
Leo wasn’t back yet when Troy arrived at the police station, but Kyle filled him in.
“This time, Destiny went in the ambulance,” he told Troy. “Leo said he didn’t have to insist; she’s got some broken bones. She says Ollie took off.”
“Good riddance. What about the kids?”
“Her mom is going to let them stay with her while Destiny is in the hospital.”
“She’s going to be admitted?” That did sound serious.
“Tests . . . they know she was beaten. They might want to give her some time to think about pressing charges.”
“You said that he took off.”
“Doesn’t mean he’ll stay away, does it?” Kyle asked, sounding more cynical than his usual chipper self.
“I hope he does. Maybe, with any luck, he’ll get run over by a train before he hooks up with some other poor woman who’ll let him screw up her life.”
“Maybe,” Kyle said dubiously.
But it didn’t often happen that way. He knew that. Troy knew that. The troublemakers spread their emotional mayhem, and their physical travail, everywhere they went. Women put up with it, kids endured it, and the cycle never seemed to end.
“I know we’ve always had these things,” Kyle said, readying his scooter to return to his delayed work issuing tickets. “But does it ever seem like it’s gotten worse!”
“Drugs don’t help the situation.”
“No, they don’t. I didn’t used to think Settler Springs had a big drug problem, not like other places. I’m not so sure. Jimmy Patton stopped by to make sure we have Narcan. He said they had two ODs last night. They saved one. It was too late for the other. Jimmy wants to know why we don’t know when drug deliveries are made in town; he said the ambulance crews always know.”
“They know after the fact,” Troy said hotly, irritated at the implication that the police were complicit in the dealing. “They don’t know when they come in, just when the results show up.”
“That’s pretty much what I told him. No sense getting mad at Jimmy,” Kyle
advised. “We’re all in the same boat when it comes to drugs in Settler Springs. You know, I can’t help but wonder how much Chief Stark knew about what his son was doing.”
“Yeah.” Troy remembered that it was not so long ago when Kyle had accepted things as they were in Settler Springs and it would not have occurred to him to question the decisions or actions of his superiors. But three murders in seven months was shaking people’s confidence in the stability of the lives they were accustomed to living.
It didn’t explain the reasons for the murders, though. Even though Travis Shaw was in prison for the murder of Lyola Knesbit, his motives for murdering her seemed fractured. Robbery was one thing, but why murder her when all he had to do was steal her purse and run off with it? And John Parmenter; unless Rev. Meachem really was the killer, there didn’t seem to be a purpose for that crime, either.
What was it that Kelly had said when she brought him dinner on Easter Sunday? Something about a book, where all the characters were killed because each one had a guilty secret. But what secrets, shared by John Parmenter and Lyola Knesbit, were so dangerous that they had led to murder?
When he broached the notion, Leo was dismissive. Leo, usually the most easy-going of men, was on a short fuse these days. The murder investigation had all of the force working longer hours, even Kyle, despite the mayor’s intention to cut him from the force. But he was proving that he was valuable at more than just issuing parking tickets as he took calls and manned the office while Leo and Troy were out on patrol and responding to citizen issues.
“Except for the fact that they both went to the same church, there’s nothing linking them,” Leo said. “I don’t know why Parmenter was murdered. Doesn’t make sense. Mrs. Knesbit—I don’t know. I still don’t buy the robbery-turned-deadly angle, but Travis Shaw is in prison and that’s all that matters to me. I’ve got enough going on right now.”
“Maybe there will be fingerprints on the bike pieces,” Troy said.
Leo grimaced. “Every two-bit crook knows to wear gloves these days. I doubt if anything will turn up. I checked with Millie. Mason’s bike is fine, but she br
ought it inside, just to be safe. She told him she doesn’t want it out in the rain. I tell you, Troy, the thought that someone is watching those kids, and knows things like when Mason got a bike, that makes me real uneasy. Someone is trying to scare Mia. But I don’t get why.”
“What about Destiny?”
“She’ll be getting patched up for a few days. The hospital will hook her up with a social worker. She says Ollie took off. And you know what? Bad as he is for her, I think she wants him back. Where’s the sense in that?’
“Why did he take off?”
“She doesn’t know. She said he’s been moody the past few days and he didn’t come home over Easter weekend. She figured he didn’t want to be around the kids when they were getting their baskets and acting like kids, you know, noisy, rambunctious. Kids. Then, this morning, he let loose and lit into her. But she said she hadn’t done anything. He just started on her, after he got home from work and the kids got off to school. She said he’s never been this violent before. Then he took off, packed his stuff and drove off.”
“What kind of car?”
“I don’t know. She won’t charge him, so we can’t put a search out for him. Why?”
“I don’t know. But we might be seeing him again.”
Leo made a derisive sound. “I hope not. There are enough low-lifes these days in Settler Springs. With him gone, that’s one less for us to deal with.”
14
Confrontation
Mrs. Stark had gotten into the habit of arriving at unpredictable times in the morning before the library opened. Finding themselves alone in the library before patrons arrived, Kelly took advantage of their privacy to tell Carmela about Mrs. Stark’s accusation that Lucas had stolen the check she and her husband had written out to the library.
Carmela’s lips twisted in a sour expression. “She just wants to show off being able to produce one thousand dollars in cash,” she said. “Why would Lucas go into the moneybox? He threw eggs at the mayor’s house; he didn’t steal from him.”
“She says he can’t come into the library anymore.”
“Mrs. Stark ought to worry more about all these new people in town. Transients.” Carmela, whose family had been residents of Settler Springs since the early years of the previous century, looked askance at newcomers. The Krymanskis had a reputation for getting into trouble, but they’d been residents of the town for as many generations as Carmela’s ancestors. “There were two overdoses last week.”
“I know. I wish we could come up with a program that would help.”
“They aren’t the kind of people who go to a library,” Carmela said.
“They might, if we had something they wanted.”
“They’d probably check out the DVDs and never bring them back.”
Kelly didn’t answer, and when the women heard the sound of the back door opening, neither one spoke. Mrs. Stark entered the main room, her gaze traveling rapidly over Carmela and Kelly as if their silence were reason for suspicion.
“Good morning,” Kelly said, determined to be civil if not actually sincere about it.
“I made the deposit on Saturday,” Mrs. Stark answered, hanging up her coat on the coat rack in Kelly’s office.
“Yes, you said you were going to.”
“You told that Krymanski boy that he’s not allowed in here anymore.”
“No,” Kelly answered, although Mrs. Stark had framed the remark as a statement not a question. “It’s your rule. You tell him.”
“That’s your job. You’re the director.”
“Why isn’t Lucas allowed in the library?” Carmela asked, feigning ignorance.
“Because he stole a check out of the moneybox. It was the check from me and my husband. A one-thousand-dollar check.”
“How did he know there was a check from you in the moneybox?” Carmela asked.
“He probably went into the moneybox to steal something.”
“He couldn’t,” Carmela said. “The cabinet is locked. Kelly and I keep it locked when we take something out of it. And Lucas isn’t a thief. He helps us when we’re setting up for programs.”
“You, Kelly, and Chloe will have to manage without him.”
“What proof do you have that Lucas got into the moneybox?”
“The check was missing. It’s well known that he has a grudge against my family. He saw the check and took it.”
“What good would it do him if it was made out to the library? A teenager isn’t going to waste time taking a check if he’s going to steal something. Not when there’s cash. You can’t accuse him on a flimsy reason like that.”
“Carmela, would you take this week’s books to Mrs. Hammond?” Kelly intervened. The changing array of colors beneath Mrs. Stark’s expertly applied make-up was a signal that if the exchange went on for much longer, Carmela might pay for what the board president was likely to regard as insubordination.
“She’s at the high-rise now, she’s not living over the jewelry shop anymore.”
It wasn’t in Carmela’s nature to back down from a fight, especially when she was in the full throes of a grudge against someone. Particularly when that someone was Mrs. Stark, who had placed Carmela on leave when the murder investigation of Mrs. Knesbit was ongoing and Carmela was a witness, or, as Mrs. Stark viewed it, a suspect.
Nonetheless, Carmela rose from her chair at the circulation desk in response, put on her coat, picked up the bag of books, and walked out of the library.
“I don’t like her attitude,” Mrs. Stark commented.
Kelly heard the remark. But she didn’t reply. Instead, she continued to focus upon the computer screen, where she was creating the outline of the sleepover program scheduled for the weekend.
“I’m not sure she’s the kind of employee who reflects the temperament that we want in our library.”
Don’t respond, Kelly thought to herself. She wants you to rise to her bait so that she can accuse me and Carmela of being hostile to her authority. Do not respond.
“When are you going to give her review?”
“In December, as always, before raises go into effect with the January pay period.”
“I don’t know if we can afford raises this year,” Mrs. Stark said. “Funds are tight.”
“Reviews are given regardless of raises.”
“Yes. I’ll be giving your review. I’m revamping the Personnel Committee. Did you hear me?” Mrs. Stark asked when Kelly failed to respond. “I said that I’m going to revamp the Personnel Committee. I think there’s too much favoritism being shown.”
“I’ll put it on the agenda for the meeting.”
“I’ve just told you—”
“It has to be voted on,” Kelly said. “Committee rosters are approved by the board, not the board president. That’s in the bylaws.”
“We’ll see about that!”
“Yes,” Kelly said, turning in her chair to meet Mrs. Stark’s gaze. “We’ll see about that.”
Mrs. Stark glared. Kelly held the gaze without backing down. It was Mrs. Stark who faltered. She went into Kelly’s office to hang up her coat. When she emerged, she asked Kelly where the book catalogs were; she wanted to begin ordering the books she was purchasing with her memorial donation. She seemed to expect resistance and Kelly knew that she could have objected; ordering books was the director’s job.
But she wanted nothing to do with the thousand-dollar donation that had come at too high a price if it meant barring Lucas from the library. Let Mrs. Stark order her pristine titles that hearkened to a bygone time when life was orderly and families consisted of a mother and a father and their children, a time when divorce and drugs and the fraying of a society that had lost its bearings were, so those who believed in the nostalgia of yesterday, unimaginable. It wasn’t enough to lament the passing of an era without offering a reason why so much had changed so inexplicably, Kelly felt.
As Mrs. Stark ought to know. Her son was in jail for murdering his girlfriend because she was pregnant
.
She was relieved when five o’clock came and Mrs. Stark left for the day. There was a church meeting that Kelly had to attend, and she would have been uneasy at the prospect of leaving Carmela and Mrs. Stark alone without a mediator.
She was the last one to arrive at the meeting.
“Where’s Rev. Dal?” she asked as she took off her coat.
“Under the circumstances, we felt it better not to include him,” said Anne Colb.
Kelly noticed that Hayley wasn’t there either. Or Joe. Julie was there, but it was apparent from her expression that she, too, was troubled by the absence of those not in attendance.
“What do you mean?”
“Our minister is a suspect in a murder,” Anne pointed out. “The Parmenters have asked their own pastor to conduct the funeral.”
“That’s not a surprise,” Kelly said. “John left LifeLight but his family didn’t.”
“We have to address the situation, Kelly. It’s no good pretending that everything is all right. It’s not.”
“Is Rev. Meachem a suspect?”
“The police have been at his house several times.”
“Has he been arrested?”
“No,” Anne said after a pause. “But it’s not a good situation for the church. Leonora Wilson hasn’t been back to church since that whole Maundy Thursday
debacle. I’ve heard that she’s going to Son Light since before Easter.”
Kelly made a mental note to ask Carmela, who was the treasurer at Son Light Church, if Leonora Wilson had been attending services there.
“If Mrs. Wilson has a quarrel with this church or with Rev. Dal, she needs to bring it out in the open,” Kelly said. “Meeting like this won’t solve the problem. And treating Rev. Dal as if he’s a criminal when he hasn’t even been accused of anything isn’t what we should be doing.”
“I don’t like this any more than you do, Kelly,” spoke up Richard Hoffman, a member of the council who was not prone to rushing into judgments and spoke sparingly during meetings. “But something like this is going to hurt the church. Giving has already dropped off since people learned about Rev. Meachem and that argument with John at last month’s council meeting. Easter is usually a good season for giving. But not this year. People don’t trust him.”