East Pender Boxed Set: Cozy Mystery Series Bundle of Books 1-14

by Leona Fox

  “Let's start with your names,” he said.

  “I am the amazing Nikolai!” the one on the left with the swept-back hair declared.

  “And I am the even more-amazing Alexander!” the other one said. Andy pressed his lips together and although he showed no sign of it to the brothers, Ellen could tell he was extremely annoyed.

  “Okay then, and which one of you was involved with Aurora?” he asked. The brothers spat on the ground.

  “I bet it was Ivan who told you. That guy couldn't keep a secret if his life depended on it,” Nikolai said.

  “It doesn't matter who told us. What matters is one of you was involved with her and may know information that is key to the case. So which one of you is it?” he demanded.

  Again the brothers descended into an argument. Their words shot out of their mouths like bullets and it was difficult to keep up given that Ellen and Andy did not know what language they were speaking. Then things began to get physical as Nikolai pushed Alexander and Alexander pushed back.

  “Okay, that's enough,” Andy yelled as he stepped in between them and pushed them both to the ground. They didn't weigh much and were sent flying. Andy rounded up both of them and slapped cuffs on them before they realized what was happening.

  “I think it's going to be easier if we question them separately,” he said, and Ellen nodded her agreement.

  All four of them went back to the station and then split up. Ellen took Alexander into one interview room while Andy and Nikolai took the other. Before he began, however, Andy pulled Iris aside and asked her if there had been any progress made with the photo. Iris informed him she had made copies and e-mailed various police departments throughout the country but that it could take some time, especially given that the picture wasn't the best quality. She said if they got a hit then she would let him know immediately. Andy thanked her and went into the interview room where Nikolai was tapping his fingers on the table.

  “I know my rights. I do not have to say anything,” he said.

  “No, but if you don't that puts you in the line of fire and the longer you stay in here the longer the investigation goes on, and the circus isn't going to leave town until we have figured out what happened.”

  “No, you can't do that!” Nikolai said, his eyes wide.

  “Ah, so you are concerned about the circus then?” Andy said.

  “Of course I am!” Nikolai said, leaning back in his chair and folding his arms across his wiry chest.

  “The circus is my life. You think I could be happy anywhere else?”

  “No, I don't think you could, which is why it's important you start telling me the truth. We know that Aurora was seeing one of the two of you. So you'd better start talking now. Was it you?”

  “I cannot say. Anything I say may implicate my brother or myself and I am not going to do so.”

  “You know your brother is in the other room and we're asking him the same thing? You think he's going to be as devoted to your relationship as you are?”

  “Do you have a brother, Mr. Policeman?” Nikolai asked with narrowed eyes.

  “Yes,” Andy said tersely, thinking about his own fractured relationship with his brother, wondering if, in similar circumstances, he would defend his brother so valiantly.

  “Then you should know it is not possible to do what you are asking. All you must know is that Aurora was special to one of us, and that much I will admit, but I will not tell you which one. And you cannot lock us both up.”

  “So you admit that one of you killed her?” Andy said.

  “I cannot admit what I don't know, but if you are convinced one of us did it you will have to find some other proof. I will not tell you anything about my brother or myself. Your best thing is to set this aside as a sad incident and let the circus move on. We will mourn but the circus will continue. This is not the first time it has happened and it won't be the last. The circus isn't a part of your world. So you should not treat it as though it is.”

  Andy grimaced and stared at Nikolai for a while, then left the room to let him stew. Ellen was still in her interview so he hoped she was having more luck than him. In the meantime, he went to talk to Iris to see if any progress was being made with the other little case he was working on.

  Meanwhile, Ellen was experiencing much the same frustration as Andy had been with Nikolai. Alexander was stony-faced and Ellen couldn't tell anything from his body language other than he was hiding something. If neither of them talked then there was nothing, unless the murder weapon turned up. But even then, they were identical twins and she wasn't sure if even that would be enough to put the killer away. She had to face the possibility that this was a no-win scenario, and that the killer would get away with it. It was not something she cared to think about but it was a grim possibility.

  “Alexander, please, you have to see sense here. What happened to Aurora, it wasn't right...I don't know why you killed her. You seem devoted enough to the circus. Did you not like the fact she was planning to run away?”

  As soon as Ellen said this Alexander's face fell.

  “Run away? No...she would never...” he said.

  “So you didn't know?”

  But Alexander could not answer the question for there were a million questions running through his mind. This surprised Ellen because she had been sure that Aurora would have told the brothers. But perhaps it just meant that Alexander wasn't the one Aurora had been involved with. So Ellen took the opportunity to leave the room and go tell Andy what she had discovered. She found Andy in deep conversation with Iris, and the two of them seemed distracted.

  “You didn't have any luck either?” Andy said wearily as he threw away a paper cup of water into the trash can.

  “Actually, I just found out something interesting, Alexander didn't know Aurora was leaving. So I'm thinking Nikolai was the one she was seeing.”

  “I'm there,” Andy said, glad finally to have something to take to Nikolai, to actually feel like he had the upper hand and was in control again. He strode back into the room and enjoyed the idea that he soon would be wiping that smug grin off of Nikolai's face.

  “If you're going to lie and tell me that Alexander has talked I will not believe you,” he said.

  “I know, and he hasn't. It's actually quite impressive the way you two are so devoted to each other. But it was never just the two of you, was it? There was Aurora as well. Now, I can't imagine what it must have been like for the two of you suddenly to be three and for one of you to have something the other didn't, and then to have that taken away. How did you feel when you learned she was going to leave the circus?” Andy said.

  “What?” Nikolai replied with a sharp intake of breath.

  His reaction was much the same as Alexander's, questioning the truth of this claim. Andy's heart sank. They had been pinning their hopes on finding out which of the brothers was involved with Aurora, but without that information they had nothing. So it was with a heavy heart that they had to let both of the brothers go.

  “Well, that was a waste of time,” Andy said grimly as he watched them walk along the road, this time in silence rather than their usual bickering.

  “Not necessarily. We know one thing. Ivan was the only one who knew she was planning to leave, and we already know he loved her. Perhaps he was the one who couldn't bear to see her go. And he knew what happened between her parents. I think he may even have wanted to protect her like her father wanted to do. Maybe Ivan knew her mother had moved on as well and he thought he was doing it for Aurora's sake.”

  “I thought you liked the guy,” Andy said.

  “I do, but you should know you shouldn't let sentiment get in the way of investigating a crime,” Ellen said.

  By this point it was the middle of the day and she had been hoping to have the case solved by now. It wasn't looking as though the circus was going to be able to continue, and she was sure people wouldn't want to go to see the show if they knew one of the acts was a murderer.

  “I
guess we have to go tell Mr. Mysterio that the show will not be going on tonight.”

  Chapter 8

  This time, Andy and Ellen dragged Iris along with them because they were determined to get to the heart of the matter. It frustrated them that the circus was so insular and didn't seem to think it had to play by the same rules as the rest of society. It was ironic in a way, since Ellen always had seen East Pender as somewhat removed from the rest of the world, tucked away along the Mississippi, removed from the city as though it had been protected from the progress of technological evolution.

  On her sojourns into the city she had been disheartened to see so many people with their heads bowed, locked onto their cell phones. It was a sight rarely seen in East Pender. But the circus was even a step beyond that. They had no regard for police procedure and believed they could waltz from town to town with no consequence, and if they only kept to themselves it would be fine. That was not the way of the world, though. No matter where you lived or your position there were always consequences for your actions. Whoever killed Aurora had to be made to pay for what they had done.

  The circus was alive with people keeping busy, probably to try staying distracted from the tragic air that still was permeating the atmosphere, Ellen thought. They went to see the ringmaster first. Mr. Mysterio still looked aggrieved.

  “Well, have you found my daughter's killer?” he demanded.

  “Sorry to say, but no. We're still investigating a few leads, and I must insist the circus stay until we find out the truth. If that means you have to delay your tour--” Andy said.

  “I can't delay! If we can't complete the tour, then this circus is doomed. You can't do this to me!”

  “How can you be like this? Don't you care that Aurora's killer is out there? Don't you want us to find them?”

  “Of course I do!” Mr. Mysterio said in a strained tone, as his voice was hoarse.

  He stood by his desk, his lean body looking weak and frail as though a gust of wind could have blown him over. His eyes burned with anger as the turbulent emotions rushed through him.

  “Neither of you know what I am going through right now. It is difficult enough running the circus at the best of times, let alone when I know that somebody out there, someone I trusted, murdered my only daughter. All I want to do is fall down and weep but I do not have that luxury.

  I have given my life to the circus, sacrificed everything, including my marriage, for this place. It is bad enough that Aurora is dead, but do you not see that I couldn't have the circus die too? Aurora would not want that either, not for anything. Deep down I know she loved the circus and she knew what it meant to me, to all of us. It is not just me that I am thinking about here, but everyone. You've seen them. You've spoken to all of them. Do you really think they could be happy living in a normal city? Out there they're freaks, they're weird. This is the only place they can belong, the only place I belong. We're a family and if you keep us here that family is going to be broken apart and everything I've worked for so long is going to come to nothing.”

  He inhaled deeply as he finished, having not taken a breath while he was speaking. The speech seemed to have taken the strength out of him and he fell back into his chair.

  Ellen felt a swell of sympathy for him. She, alone everyone else in East Pender, knew what the circus meant, but she couldn't believe anything would take precedence over finding the killer.

  “I'm sorry, but we need to do our jobs. The world isn't like it was. Thankfully, there's still a place for the circus, but you can't play by your own rules anymore. Someone here is guilty of murder and we can't in good conscience let them get away with it. Crimes have to be punished, no matter if they happen in the town hall, in a cafe, or in a circus. You might love the circus but I love justice, and I'm not about to let Aurora's death go unpunished. And I don't think you want to either.

  “Can you imagine what it'll be like for you all to continue working together, knowing someone murdered your daughter? How could you trust anyone again? And what if the truth came out? Would you exile them? Would you exact revenge yourself? Or what if you never found out and you'd have to go to the grave knowing the person who killed your daughter is going unpunished? You're right, I don't have a daughter and I don't run a circus but if I did I'd still want the truth. I'd want to know I had done right by the people around me, that I had set a good example for everyone else. Do you really think anyone is going to want to come to your circus when they know that there's a murderer there? I can tell you right now people in this town are not going to be happy with that. If you do put on the circus tonight you'll be playing to an empty house, and you know that word will spread wherever you go. You can't escape this. If you don't deal with it now it's going to haunt you for the rest of your life.”

  Ellen's impassioned plea seemed to strike at the heart of Mr. Mysterio, and the truth was he didn't have much, if any, fight left in him. He slumped in his chair and waved them away.

  “Do what you must,” he said, conceding defeat.

  Ellen and Andy left the trailer and conferred a little, still feeling as though they had far too much work to do. They decided to pay Ivan another visit, and confronted him with the fact that he was the only one who knew that Aurora was leaving. Ivan moved slowly. His pet monkey was resting on his shoulder, offering comfort, sensing his master was in despair.

  “I really thought she would have told the one she was seeing. I thought they had it planned out together. I can't believe I was the only one she told. I do not know what to tell you other than there's nothing in this world that would have made me harm her. I loved her more than anyone will know, more than she ever will know. Please, just find who did this to her. It has to be one of the brothers. I can think of nobody else who would have the slightest reason. Have you spoken to them yet?” he said.

  Ellen admitted they had taken the brothers in for questioning earlier in the morning. She was surprised Ivan hadn't noticed, but he said he had stayed in his trailer most of the time, wanting to mourn and grieve in his own way. But he did follow up by saying the brothers seemed to be bickering more than usual since they had returned from the station. They had been out of earshot so he couldn't tell what the brothers were saying. Still, this raised Andy and Ellen's suspicions. So they told Iris to stay with Ivan and talk with him a little more while they tried finding the brothers, determined to sit them down and get them to crack.

  However, it wasn't that easy as the brothers were not in their trailer and were nowhere to be found. After a little while Iris came up to Andy and Ellen.

  “I don't think I'm going to get anything more out of Ivan,” she said. “About that...other matter,” she said, turning to Andy.

  “Go around and see what you can find out,” Andy ordered. Iris nodded and went off. Ellen tilted her head.

  “What is all this about? You've had something else on your mind this whole time and I don't know why you're being so clandestine about it.”

  “It's nothing, really. I just had an odd feeling about one of the clowns. I wanted to figure out if he was hiding something. You know what the circus is like, they take anyone. So it wouldn't surprise me if somebody had a criminal record. It didn't pertain to Aurora's death, so I didn't think to mention it to you. It may not even come to anything; it was just a hunch. Look, let's move on and focus on this case. I think maybe we should try finding the murder weapon.”

  “That's like looking for a needle in a haystack!”

  “I know, but until we find the brothers we're useless here, and at least if we find the weapon we might find some trace of DNA or something to help us,” he said.

  Ellen sighed but she had to admit she didn't have any better alternatives. She took a moment to gaze back at the city. The problems of the cafe seemed so far away and she realized then that she hadn't even given a thought to Maggie or how her cafe was doing.

  Whenever a crime happened it always took precedence. The need for justice was unassailable and she couldn't allow anything t
o get in the way, but it was more than that. There was a time pressure for this case that she didn't ordinarily feel, and it was borne from a somewhat selfish desire to see the circus one last time before it left, to see the show in all its glory without the specter of murder hanging over it.

  In some ways Ellen felt as though she owed the circus something. It had given her so many special memories as a child that she took upon herself the responsibility to save it. She took upon herself the responsibility to get to the truth and ensure the circus could continue traveling the land, inspiring the same sense of awe and wonder that she had felt as a child.

  And so it was that she and Andy tried searching for the murder weapon, still being met with suspicious glances from all corners. Iris encountered the same thing, for she was looking for Bonzo the clown but people were being even more uncooperative with her than they were with Ellen and Andy. Bonzo the clown had been watching them carefully, so carefully he had managed to evade their attention so far.

  One would think it strange for a clown to be able to sneak away so easily but Bonzo had been used to hiding. He had spent most of his adult life on the run, even though now the dreaded day had come when his past had caught up with him. Damn Aurora, he thought, and damn the person who killed her. If it wasn't for them they never would have suspected a thing. He'd actually begun to like the circus, and the people around him, and he was going to miss the life.

  Bonzo saw the young girl poking around, asking about him, and he recognized the photo she was carrying. It was him without makeup and he knew it wouldn't be long before they found out the truth about his background, about what had happened all those years ago. Since he'd joined the circus he almost had been able to forget what he had done, lost in all the color and the laughter, but now it felt like all the laughs had gone.

  He had packed up all his things and was about ready to go. He'd managed to sneak away from the circus. He felt guilty for not having been able to tell Mr. Mysterio or say goodbye to all his friends but he knew that one day this situation would present itself and he had no time to lose. All his possessions were gathered in a small suitcase. He would get rid of his costume and makeup once he was out of the circus.