“Hey, if I didn’t do this, then we wouldn’t know Jeremy Wallace was one of the diamond thieves anyway.”
“Angie’s right,” Sophie said. “We can’t go to Chief Gary. We can’t admit we were in that hotel room. Besides, he thinks it was a bear attack anyway.”
“And he might change his mind if he knew that there were four people out there with a perfect motive to kill someone,” Charlotte argued. I would never admit it, but she had a point.
“We have to find a different way to let Chief Gary know what happened,” I said.
“How?”
“I don’t know.”
“That’s not exactly helpful.”
“I’ve only had like, thirty seconds to think of a solution. I don’t see you coming up with anything, either.”
“I have come up with a solution. Tell Chief Gary what you did. He’s not going to throw you in jail.”
“You don’t know that. And I’m not admitting to him that I committed a crime. Not a chance. Give me like, at least a few hours to come up with something.”
“Fine,” Charlotte said.
I texted Jason to see if he wanted to grab some dinner. He texted back that he was, so I left Sophie and Charlotte and made my way to the Ship’s Anchor, the local pub in Willow Bay. The music there was loud enough, and the booths private enough, that I could tell Jason everything I’d learned without fear of being overheard by anyone.
Rather than drive down, I decided to walk to the pub to give myself a little bit of time to gather my thoughts and think about everything I’d learned today. Even though the sky was overcast, it didn’t look like it was going to rain, but I grabbed an umbrella just in case. I could always get Jason to drive me home if the weather changed over dinner.
As I made my way down the streets of Willow Bay, the sky darkening just enough to cause the streetlights to turn on automatically as I walked beneath them, I considered everything Sophie and I had discovered that afternoon.
Jason Wallace had been a diamond thief. There were four others in the group with him. He stole the diamond, hid it somewhere, then was killed. Presumably all four of the others were in Willow Bay.
But there were questions. Most pressingly: why did the killer murder Wallace without finding the location of the diamond? If Jason Wallace had died without telling them the diamond’s location, then they had no way of finding it. He couldn’t have told the killer; the others were still in Willow Bay looking for the stone. Unless one of them already had it in their possession and was only pretending to still be looking. That didn’t make any sense either though; whoever had the diamond would probably leave straight away to avoid detection.
This flurry of thoughts sped through my brain as I headed down Main Street toward the pub. Suddenly, I heard a noise to my left. I looked over and saw a black and an orange cat darting away from me and behind Betty’s Café at top speed.
“Bee? Buster?” I asked, confused. The cats certainly looked like mine. And now that I thought about it, when we’d gotten home I hadn’t seen Bee at all. The cats were gone so fast, a part of me wondered if my mind was just playing tricks on me. It certainly looked like Bee, but Bee wasn’t the kind of cat to wander off and get into trouble on her own. She was just far too apathetic for that.
I shook my head. It must have been a couple of other cats. The fact that they were black and orange was just a coincidence; I must have made myself think it was them because of the colors.
Putting the cats out of my head, three minutes later I walked into the Ship’s Anchor. Sure enough, Livin’ on a Prayer was blasting out of the speakers. I saw Jason already sitting in a corner booth, so I made my way over to him. The Ship’s Anchor was modeled after the kind of bar you’d expect to see in Pirates of the Caribbean, but without the dive-bar clientele. The provincial furniture, corner fireplace and dim lighting certainly gave a rustic impression, but the clientele was definitely not the type to toast each other at two in the morning. I walked past Betty having dinner with a friend, and Leanne Chu sitting at a corner table by herself with her laptop and a beer.
I slipped into the booth next to Jason and leaned my head on his shoulder.
“Hey,” he told me, kissing me on top of the head. I closed my eyes and enjoyed his closeness for a minute until the waitress came by with a menu. She was noticeably cool toward me, and incredibly warm toward Jason. I was used to that by now. I ordered a vodka and orange juice—I figured after the day I’d had I deserved a stiff drink—and began to speak.
“So,” I said, perusing the menu even though I already knew I was going to get the black bean quesadilla with tortilla chips on the side. It was my usual here. “I actually do have a reason for this last-minute dinner.”
“You mean you didn’t miss me so much that you couldn’t stand going another minute without having me in your presence?” Jason asked with a grin.
“Well, there is that,” I conceded. “But also, I have a huge scoop for you.”
“Ooooh, do tell!” Jason said, his eyes twinkling.
“Seriously, you’ve never had a scoop this big,” I told him.
“I’m not going to have it at all if you don’t tell me what it is.”
“Fine,” I said, sticking my tongue out at him. “Jeremy Wallace was one of five people involved in stealing the Helena diamond. He stole it from the rest of the thieves and hid it somewhere in Willow Bay before he was killed.”
I didn’t think I’d ever seen Jason actually look surprised before. He was the least flappable person I’d ever met; Willow Bay probably didn’t come close to what he’d seen in New York, even with all the crazy events of the last few months. But this time, his mouth dropped open and his eyes widened.
“You’re kidding.”
“I’m one-hundred-percent serious.”
He let out a low whistle and closed his eyes. “You know, Willow Bay was advertised to me as a small, seaside resort where nothing interesting ever happens. And now you’re telling me on top of four, probably five murders since I’ve arrived here, a band of criminals are searching for one of the most famous diamonds in the world that’s hidden here somewhere?”
“Technically Caroline Gibson was murdered in Wawnee, and Jessica Oliver’s body was just dumped here,” I replied with a shrug. “But yeah. If it helps, apart from the group of thieves, I’m pretty sure the four of us are the only people who know about this.”
“So you think one of the four thieves killed Jeremy Wallace?”
“Yup.”
“How did you find this out, anyway?”
I lowered my voice to barely more than a whisper; Jason had to lean in to hear me.
“Sophie and I broke into Jeremy Wallace’s hotel room; we found a hidden burner phone and then two of the other thieves broke in as well.”
“And they didn’t see you?”
“We hid in the bathroom,” I replied, inwardly cursing myself for forgetting about the magic part. At least it wasn’t a total lie.
“That’s crazy,” Jason told me. “You two realize you could have been seriously hurt, or killed, if they’d found you? One of them could be the murderer.”
“I know, but we couldn’t know that two of the other thieves were going to break in at the exact same time we did,” I argued, although secretly it warmed my heart that Jason cared so much about my safety.
Jason shook his head. “I’m glad you’re safe. And I’m glad you found that information. Can I have a look at the phone?”
I nodded and pulled it out of my purse, handing it over to Jason. Suddenly, I had an idea.
“You could actually solve one of our problems!” I exclaimed.
“Oh?”
“We want to get the phone to Chief Gary. After all, we want him to know that Jeremy Wallace was one of the diamond thieves, and that there are people out there with reason to kill him. But we didn’t know how to do it without admitting that Sophie and I broke into his hotel room where there was a police seal.”
A small smile
crept up Jason’s face. “And here when I first met you I thought you were a goody two shoes. So you want me to take the phone and tell Chief Gary a source gave it to me?”
“Exactly!” I replied.
“I can do that,” Jason said. “He’ll probably know where it came from though. There aren’t a lot of people around who have been digging into Jeremy Wallace’s life. Everyone seems to have accepted that he was killed by a bear. By the way, I’ve been reading the letters to the editor. At least four of them have called for a bear cull. I recommend that you write one for the bears; I’ll make sure it gets top billing.”
“Thanks,” I replied with a sigh. People were just so scared of bears. I mentally added writing a letter to the editor to my to-do list for the next day. “I’ll email it over to you in the next day or so.”
“Sounds good,” Jason said. “I’ll copy the messages on the phone and send them to you before giving this to Chief Gary.”
“Thanks,” I replied with a smile. This was good. This way Chief Gary would have to admit there were people out there willing to kill Jeremy Wallace, and he might give the case another look.
“I’m impressed that you found this out,” Jason told me after the waitress came by to take our orders then left. “Seriously. If you ever decide that veterinary medicine isn’t for you, please take up investigative journalism.”
“Thanks,” I told Jason, shooting him a smile.
“And if you’re going to be committing any crimes with Sophie in the future, please remember that I make a pretty good bodyguard.”
“I figured that you aren’t really supposed to commit crimes to get a story.”
“It only counts as a crime if you get caught,” he replied with a wink, and I laughed.
“So how are you going to figure out which of the four people killed Jeremy Wallace?”
“I have absolutely no idea,” I replied. “We only found out about it a couple of hours ago. Luckily, Sophie and I now know what two of them look like. We snuck a look at them while we were hiding.” I winced inwardly at the lie. What did the Witches’ Council know, anyway? Who were they to decide who was allowed to know about magic and who wasn’t?
“So you could draw a picture of them?”
“Well, Sophie and I both have the artistry skills of an uncoordinated elephant, so that’s probably not the best idea. If Chief Gary wants to match us up with a sketch artist—if he even has access to a sketch artist—we can probably do a pretty good mock-up. I know I’d recognize them if I saw them again, though.”
“So now you have to figure out who the other two—Keith and Claire—are.”
“Yeah, find the two people who don’t belong in a town full of tourists. Piece of cake.”
“Look on the bright side, a week ago there were about a hundred times the number of tourists than are here now.”
“That’s true,” I conceded. “Well, I look forward to looking at everyone who’s not from Willow Bay as being suspicious from now on.”
“You’ve never sounded more like a small-town person,” Jason joked, and I punched him lightly in the arm.
“Not everyone from a small town is suspicious of outsiders,” I replied.
“Yesterday Elise Grobin spent fifteen minutes asking me about every member of my extended family, and wrote down all their names so she could look them up on Facebook.”
I laughed. “I’m surprised Elise Grobin even owns a computer.”
“Yeah, her daughter was there. When she was finished Elle apologized to me and told me her mom doesn’t even own a computer, she just heard Rose from the library telling someone you could look people up on Facebook.”
I laughed even harder. “That sounds about right.”
Just then the waitress came by with our food, and I dug into the quesadilla as Jason and I continued to share our stories from this small town I was very proud to call home.
10
I woke up Monday morning to the sound of my phone going off, but it wasn’t my alarm.
It couldn’t be my alarm. The vet clinic was closed on Mondays and I always made sure that it was off so I could sleep in. I’d stayed up late the night before, telling Charlotte and Sophie what Jason and I had discussed, and trying to figure out if Bee was telling the truth when she said she’d been in the house the whole time but had been hiding in a pile of fresh laundry before because it was warm and my voice was too loud and scratchy to listen to.
The tune was also that of an incoming call. Someone was phoning me.
I reached around in a half-dazed state until my hand found the phone, and I vaguely looked at the call display before pressing accept. It was Chief Gary.
“Hello?” I answered, trying to sound like I was already awake and failing miserably.
“Hi, Angela? Sorry to wake you,” came Chief Gary’s voice on the other line.
“No, don’t worry, I was already awake,” I lied. “What’s going on?”
“You’re going to want to come down to the vet clinic. I’m afraid somebody vandalized it last night.”
Instantly my blood went cold. “What?” I had expected him to be calling about the phone Jason was going to hand in to him. The first thought that ran through my head was that thank goodness we didn’t have any animals staying overnight right now.
“Yeah. There are some broken windows, and it looks like your computer’s all smashed up. I’ve got a few guys covering the place for now, but you’re going to want to get down here.”
“I’ll be there in ten minutes,” I replied, hanging up the phone and throwing on whatever clothes I could find lying on the floor. This wasn’t a time to be worried about my appearance. I texted Jason as I ran through the living room.
“What’s wrong?” Sophie asked as I rushed through the living room toward the door.
“Someone broke into the vet clinic,” I replied.
“Oh, crap!” Sophie exclaimed. “I’m coming with you.”
The two of us rushed out of the house and Sophie drove like a maniac to make it down to Main Street in about three minutes. She double parked on the side of the road and we pushed past the crowd of people mingling in front of the vet clinic to have a look at the carnage.
As soon as I saw the front of the office, my heart sunk. The front window had been completely smashed; shards of glass lined the tiled floor inside and the sidewalk outside. Yellow police tape was strung across the hole, and a police officer I didn’t recognize was trying to keep people back.
“I’m so sorry Angela.”
“Who could have done this sort of thing?”
“Don’t worry dear, things will fix themselves up.”
“The police will definitely find the people who did this.”
I tried to thank the people offering me their good wishes, but I could barely even speak. All I could do was look at the shop. Sophie pushed past everyone and led me to the front door. We walked into it, and when I saw the word WHORE spray painted in big, red letters against the wall my mouth went dry.
Who would do this sort of thing?
Suddenly, a solid hand slipped into mine. I looked up to find Jason standing next to me, his face grim.
“Are you all right?” he asked, and I nodded.
“Yeah. Yeah, I’m fine. I wasn’t here when this happened. I just got a phone call from Chief Gary about it a few minutes ago.”
“What’s the damage?” Jason asked, and I opened my mouth to tell him I wasn’t sure yet when Chief Gary himself came over and answered instead.
“A few thousand dollars,” he told Jason. “There’s the spray paint, and the broken window. Also, the main reception computer was smashed up, and a bunch of files from the cabinet were tossed around. I’ll need Angela to tell me if any of them are missing.”
“Oh, Karen will know that a lot better than I will,” I replied.
“Ok, I’ll talk to her about it. It looks as though the vandal or vandals tried to get into the back room, but they didn’t manage it.”
“That�
��s a relief, at least,” I replied. The back room was where all of the expensive equipment, as well as all the drugs, were kept.
“Do you have any idea who could have done this?” Chief Gary asked me, and I shook my head no.
“I do,” Jason replied. “Matt Smith.”
Chief Gary looked a little bit surprised.
“Him? What does he have against Angela?”
Jason explained to Chief Gary about Matt Smith’s attempt to buy the property, and my negotiation with the property owner to put it off for six months.
“Would he really do something like this, though?” I asked. “I mean, it’s one thing to get mad and complain about me, but to actually break into my vet clinic and vandalize it? That’s a whole new ball game.”
“Remember that he threatened you that night outside the restaurant,” Jason reminded me.
“What was that?” Chief Gary asked, interested. Jason explained the situation to Chief Gary.
“I wish the two of you would have told me,” Chief Gary said. “I don’t like this man threatening Angela.”
“It’s fine, really,” I said, trying to hide how shaken up I really was about this. Jason wrapped his arm around my shoulder and I leaned into him. Having him here made me feel so much safer.
“It’s not fine, Angela,” Chief Gary said. “This might just be some kids deciding to have a laugh. But it might be a lot worse, as well. I want you to be careful in the future, ok? I’ll be sure to have a chat with Matt Smith.”
“I will,” I promised Chief Gary, who nodded and went back to speak with another one of his officers.
“Can we go into one of the exam rooms?” I asked Jason. “I feel like half the town is staring at me here.”
“Of course,” Jason replied. Sophie followed us in and I sat down on a chair in the corner. Jason grabbed me a cup of water from the sink and handed it to me.
“I think it looks a lot worse than it is,” Sophie told me when the door was closed. “I hated the color of those walls anyway.”
Despite everything, I cracked a smile. “Fine, you get to choose the color we paint them next, as long as it’s not something weird.”
A Grizzly Discovery (A Paranormal Cozy Mystery) (Willow Bay Witches Book 5) Page 6