#4 Seeing and Believing (Mike & Riel Mysteries)

by Norah McClintock

  “Yeah,” Rebecca said. “I mean, if you’re right, now that Mr. Lee is dead, there’s no way the cops are going to be looking for Amanda. And they think the guys who robbed the store took the lockbox. You saw that garage, Mike. All she has to do is stash it in a corner of that dump and no one will ever find it. No one will even look.”

  She was right.

  “Unless we call the cops—” she said. She must have read the look on my face, because right away she changed it to, “We can call Crime Stoppers, so it’s anonymous. We can tell them Amanda has the lockbox from the store. Then they’ll tell the police and the police will go and search the garage and … ”

  I shook my head.

  “It doesn’t work that way, Rebecca.”

  “Sure it does,” she said. “The cops get tips all the time. We say we saw her leave the store with the box—”

  “But we didn’t.”

  “We don’t have to tell them that. We can get creative.”

  I shook my head again. There was no way I was going to lie to the cops ever again.

  “Even if we got creative,” I said, “the cops wouldn’t go and search her garage just on the basis of a tip like that. They can’t. They’d have to get a search warrant first. And to get a search warrant, Riel says you have to have probable cause—which they don’t have just based on an anonymous tip. They’d have to check her out first. They might even go and talk to her, ask her where she was that night, whether she knew the Lees, stuff like that. And she’ll do exactly what she said she’d do—she’ll lie to them. They won’t be able to arrest her. They won’t even be able to search her place right away. And say she does have the box. Say she hasn’t got rid of it yet. What’s the first thing she’s going to do after the cops leave?”

  “Get rid of it,” Rebecca said. She looked like a kid who had just opened a fancy-wrapped present only to find out it was a box of socks. Then she perked up. “So, why don’t we help the cops a little? We can tell them that she’s stolen stuff before. If they check her out, they’ll find out that she stole from the Lees before and from the video store.”

  “Nobody filed charges against her for those things, Rebecca.”

  “Yeah, but they could ask Megan.”

  “You’re going to give the cops an anonymous tip and you’re going to mention Megan by name?”

  “We could just tell them which store it was,” Rebecca said.

  “That still doesn’t make it anonymous,” I said. “And it could get Megan in trouble because she didn’t give her boss the real reason for firing Amanda. Everyone thinks Amanda got canned because she was late all the time.”

  “Okay,” Rebecca said, deflated. “So we don’t mention Megan. We tell them about the old man instead. He’s the one who caught her shoplifting.”

  “He says she was shoplifting. She says she was going to pay for what she bought and that Mrs. Lee believed her. And since Mrs. Lee didn’t file charges … ”

  “Yeah, but if we say we saw her with the missing lockbox—”

  “But we didn’t.”

  Rebecca was starting to get exasperated.

  “Okay, how about this? Forget the anonymous tip. Forget saying it’s a lockbox. We just go to the cops and we tell them we saw Amanda Brown leave the store with a box the night of the shooting. Just a box. Let them figure out that it’s the lockbox. We just tell them we think it was a metal box.”

  I knew she was trying to help, so I hated to have to keep punching holes in her plans. “I already told the cops I was home alone when it happened. If I tell them something different, they’ll get suspicious of me all over again.”

  “Okay, so I’ll tell them.”

  “Do you know how much trouble you can get into lying to the police?” I said. I sure did. “Especially if you try to say that someone was involved in a crime when they didn’t have anything to do with it?”

  “She stole the box.”

  “We think she stole the box.”

  “I thought we were sure.”

  “What if we’re wrong, Rebecca? What if she was just there, that’s all? I’m just saying, before I call the cops or go to the cops and give them a tip, I’d like to be pretty sure that she did something.” Especially after what had happened to me this morning. I was pretty sure Amanda Brown was lying about being in the store. And I didn’t like her. She was one of those hard girls. But did I want her to have to go through what I’d gone through without being one 100 percent positive she’d done something illegal?

  “Boy, Mike, I thought this was going to be easy,” Rebecca said. “It actually sounded easy until you started in with probable cause and how cops work.”

  “Yeah, well, whenever I watch a cop show on TV, Riel always grouses about what they’re doing wrong. It really bugs him.”

  “That’s what you get when you live with an ex-cop, I guess,” she said. She gave me a funny look. “Mike, do you think Amanda Brown knows as much about probable cause as you do?”

  Rebecca had a plan that wasn’t half bad. We used her cell phone to call Amanda, but I made the call because I was the one who had done most of the talking yesterday in her garage. I told her:

  “I’m going to give you until tomorrow morning to decide to do the right thing. If you don’t go to the cops and tell them the truth about where you were last Friday night when the Lees were shot, I will.”

  Amanda said, “Good luck.”

  I told her, “I’m not just going to tell them you were there, which I know you were, Amanda. I’m also going to tell them about the lockbox you stole.” I’m pretty sure I didn’t imagine the little gasp at the other end of the phone. “And I’m going to tell them about the time you were caught shoplifting at the Lees’ store and the real reason you got fired from your job at the video store. And then you know what they’re going to do, Amanda?” She didn’t answer. I hadn’t expected her to. “They’re going to get a search warrant, and they’re going to look for that box. And when they find it, you’re going to be in a lot more trouble than you would be if you just went and told them that you were there and what you saw.”

  Amanda said, “Good luck with that, too, Mike.” Then she hung up.

  “Well?” Rebecca said.

  “Well, she’s smart enough that she didn’t say anything,” I said. That was the thing. “She didn’t ask me what lockbox. She didn’t deny it. She didn’t say anything a normal person would say.” Rebecca gave me a look. “Okay, so she isn’t exactly normal. But she didn’t say anything except ‘Good luck.’ ” That’s what clinched it for me. “She took that box, Rebecca.”

  “You think she still has it?”

  I sure hoped so, because now I really wanted to get Amanda Brown.

  Fifteen minutes later we were on the corner of the street where Amanda lived. It was just a regular corner, but there was a bus stop on it, which gave us a reason to be standing there. From the bus stop we could see the front of her house.

  “What if she goes out the back?” Rebecca said.

  “I guess she could,” I said. “But the fence around her yard is pretty high. I don’t see her climbing it. Besides, her yard backs right up against another yard, so she’d have to go through that. Maybe her neighbors would make a big stink if she did. Or maybe the neighbors have a dog.” The truth was, I didn’t know which way she might go. I didn’t know if she’d leave the house at all.

  By seven o’clock, nothing had happened. I asked Rebecca if I could borrow her phone to call home. There was no answer, which surprised me. I figured Riel would have been back from his conference by then. I left a message to tell him I was out with Rebecca and not to worry about supper, we’d get something to eat.

  By eight o’clock the sun had started to go down, and I was getting antsy. A lot of buses had passed us, and we were still standing at the bus stop. If anyone in the houses nearby had noticed us, they might start wondering why we were hanging around. Some adults don’t like kids loitering outside their house. It makes them want to call the cops.


  By nine o’clock I was hungry. I’d had breakfast, and I had made myself a peanut butter sandwich before Vin’s mother picked me up. But that was it. I started thinking about a nice juicy burger and, yeah, I’d like fries with that.

  Then Rebecca said, “Is that her?”

  Someone came around the side of Amanda Brown’s house—someone small and thin, with short blond hair.

  “That’s her.”

  She was carrying a shopping bag from a clothing store or a shoe store, the kind that has plastic handles attached to it. She walked down the driveway to the sidewalk and then headed down the street away from us.

  “Come on,” I said to Rebecca.

  We hurried after her. We didn’t want to run because she might hear us coming. We were both wearing sneakers, and by booting along at double-time we were able to close in on her before she noticed us. I grabbed the bag out of her hand and gave it to Rebecca before Amanda had a chance to react. When Amanda tried to get to Rebecca to get the bag back, I blocked her and held onto her in case she decided to run. Rebecca looked into the bag. Then she looked at me and smiled.

  “And I bet it has her fingerprints all over it,” Rebecca said.

  Amanda stopped squirming.

  “Why are you doing this?” she said. “What do you want?”

  “I told you. I want you to go to the cops and tell them exactly where you were and what you saw on Friday night. I want you to help clear my friend.”

  Amanda shook her head. “You’re making a big mistake,” she said.

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  We went to a hole-in-the-wall restaurant not far from where Amanda lived, grabbed a booth near the back, and ordered Coke for me and Amanda and coffee for Rebecca. I sat on the outside of the bench next to Amanda so she couldn’t take off. Rebecca sat opposite us and put the bag where Amanda couldn’t reach it.

  “It’s not what you think,” Amanda said.

  “Right,” Rebecca said. “You didn’t steal this box from the Lees. And you weren’t trying to ditch it before Mike called the cops.”

  “I took it,” Amanda said. “But it wasn’t like I planned it.”

  “Right,” Rebecca said again.

  Amanda gave her a dirty look. “Your preppy girlfriend is really annoying, you know that?” she said to me.

  I glanced at Rebecca. She had the bad cop role all staked out. That left me to be good cop.

  “Why did you take it?” I said.

  “I liked Cecilia Lee,” Amanda said. “I know you probably don’t believe it. But I did. She was nice to me. When that old guy tried to get her to call the cops on me, she refused. She made him go away. She told him not to worry. She was always saying that. No worry, no worry. Then she gave me back the gum the old guy took off me. That’s all it was. Just a pack of gum.”

  “Which you were planning to pay for, I suppose,” Rebecca said, her tone making it clear she believed that the same way she believed in UFOs.

  “Cecilia believed me when I said I was. Most people take one look at me—at the way I used to look—and they make assumptions. But not Cecilia. She was nice to me.” She was looking right at me now and ignoring Rebecca. Maybe she was lying, but she sure sounded convincing. “So, yeah, I went back the next day to pay for the gum.”

  Rebecca rolled her eyes. I pressed the toe of my sneaker down on her foot, but gently.

  “Believe what you want,” Amanda said. “But it’s true. I tried to give her the money, but she wouldn’t take it. Then her husband came in, and he saw me, and he started screaming at me. I guess the old guy who had caught me must have told him about me. He must have described me. Anyway, her husband started pushing me out of the store and Cecilia tried to stop him. And you know what he did, the creep?”

  She looked at me and waited for me to shake my head before she answered.

  “He hit her. Right across the face. She almost fell over, he hit her so hard. Then he shoved me out of the place.” She glowered across the table at Rebecca. “I bet you didn’t read anything like that about him in the paper,” she said. “Or see anything like that on the news. It was all, Poor man, his wife was shot, he was shot, he died. Boo-hoo. The guy was a creep. He paid for her to come over here, and then he held that over her head. He kept telling her, You owe me, you owe me, I paid good money for you. I actually heard him say that one time. She worked long hours in that crummy store. She did all the cooking and cleaning on top of that. And she was pregnant.” She shuddered. “That guy was old enough to be her father.”

  “We know someone who knew Cecilia,” Rebecca said. “She didn’t say anything about Mr. Lee hitting her.”

  “You mean Megan from the video store,” Amanda said. “She probably didn’t know. Cecilia would never have told her. Cecilia would never have told anyone. She was ashamed. She wouldn’t even tell her parents when she wrote to them. Or her sisters. She had three sisters back home. She talked about them all the time. They wrote to her regularly. They wanted her to send them stuff—nice stuff.”

  I thought about all the shopping bags Rebecca had seen Amanda carrying and remembered what Megan had said.

  “I only knew what he was like because I saw him do it that time. The next time I went back to the store, I waited until I saw him leave. Then I went in and told her she should call the police on him.” She looked at me. “My—my father used to hit my mother all the time. Once they start, they don’t stop unless the cops make them.” She didn’t say anything else for a few seconds. Then, “But Cecilia was afraid to do anything about it. I guess the cops don’t have the great reputation back in China that they have here,” she said with a sneer.

  I looked at Rebecca again. She didn’t say anything.

  “Anyway,” Amanda said, “I started to go by there when her husband was out of the store. He’d go and hang out with a bunch of other old guys at some social club twice a week. He’d leave her alone in the store. And he’d be sure to count the money before he left and when he came back.”

  I couldn’t picture tattoo-eyebrow-ring-spiky-hair Amanda with sweet (according to everyone who had known her) Cecilia Lee.

  “What did you two talk about?” I said.

  Amanda glared at me. “You mean, what did a punky-looking girl like me have in common with someone like her?” she said. “People like you just see stereotypes. Me—punk. Her—immigrant who didn’t speak great English. You didn’t know her. She was cool. She liked my hair. And she wanted to know everything. She was always asking me about what people were like here, what they did, why they did it. She never judged anyone.”

  I was beginning to think that there was more to Amanda Brown than I had imagined.

  “I was teaching her more English,” she said. “I thought maybe if she could communicate better, she’d be more confident, you know? She’d see she could do better than spend the rest of her life with that old creep.”

  “What about last Friday night?” I said.

  She hesitated.

  I nodded toward the bag.

  “Rebecca can be out the door and on her way to the cops with that before you can get past me,” I said.

  She scowled at me, but she said, “Okay, so I was there. Mr. Lee went out to play cards with his old geezer friends, and I went over to keep Cecilia company. I went in the back way. Whenever her husband went out, she opened the back door for me so that I could come in without being seen by any of the nosy neighbors—like that old fart who grabbed me for that pack of gum. He had nothing better to do than watch the neighbors and report to them what was going on. So, yeah, I was there. We were hanging out. Then Cecilia saw her husband pull up in front of the store, and she told me to go, get out of there fast. I ran into the storeroom at the back. Mr. Lee came in and told her he’d forgotten something and he was going upstairs to get it. I figured I’d wait in the storeroom until he left. Once he headed back out, he’d be out all night.”

  I glanced at Rebecca. I don’t know what she was thinking, but I had the feeling that this time Am
anda was telling the truth. Her face got twisted when she talked about Mr. Lee, but whenever she mentioned Cecilia Lee, it changed. It got a little softer. She really seemed to like her.

  “Anyway, I was back there and I heard the bell above the door and this guy came in. Maybe a little shorter than you. Dark hair. Jean jacket or a sweatshirt with a hood, but the hood wasn’t up. Jeans. He walked back to the coolers along the wall where they keep the pop.”

  “Vin,” I said. “That’s my friend Vin.”

  “Whatever,” Amanda said.

  “He came in alone, right?”

  “Yeah. And then maybe, I don’t know, ten seconds later, two other guys came in.”

  “You saw them?”

  “Yeah, I saw them.”

  “Could you describe them?”

  She looked at the tabletop.

  “Could you describe them?” I said again.

  “They were wearing sweatshirts with the hoods up, but there’s one of those mirrors above the register, you know, the kind that’s bent so you can see practically the whole store in it. I saw their faces in that, so, yeah, I guess I could describe them.”

  I glanced at Rebecca. I’m sure she was thinking the same thing I was: if Cecilia Lee was her friend, and if she saw who killed her, why hadn’t she told the cops?

  “Then what happened?” I said.

  She sucked in a deep breath. “All of a sudden, one of the guys pulled out a gun and started asking for money. He seemed really jumpy, you know? I thought maybe he was on something. Anyway, he was waving the gun and demanding money while his buddy kept watch out the front window. Cecilia gave him the money that was in the register. Then, boom, just like that, he shot her. The next thing I knew, Mr. Lee came through the side entrance into the store—there’s an entrance into the store from the apartment upstairs. If you come in that way, you’re halfway between the front and back of the store. From there he had a good view of the front of the store, so I knew he saw Cecilia lying on the ground there. They shot her pretty close up, so I can only imagine what she looked like. I saw Mr. Lee turn his head and look in her direction, and then the guy with the gun shot him, too. Then the two of them ran out of the store. A few seconds later, the first guy, your friend, pulled himself together, and he ran out after them. He knocked over a bunch of stuff on the way out.”