The Club (Anna Denning Mystery Book 4)

by Karin Kaufman

  “Yes.”

  “I read about him in the paper, but I didn’t know him.” Curt stood abruptly. “Ladies, I’m going. Melinda, I’ve said what I came to say.”

  “Interesting news,” Liz said, holding up her phone. “Tanner Ostberg and Soda Ashbrook have been arrested on suspicion of theft and receiving stolen property. They found a boatload of stolen items in Tanner’s apartment.”

  Curt sniffed. “Good for the police. It doesn’t have anything to do with me.”

  “Yes, it does,” Anna said. “He was stealing from your house.”

  Curt froze. Looking at him, Anna thought of that old cliché—the one about blowing someone over with a feather. Because at that moment, if she’d stood and gently pressed a finger to his chest, Curt would have fallen like a bag of bones.

  12

  Gene tossed a balled-up paper towel into the pizza box, sighed contentedly, and propped both his feet on the coffee table. “Oh yeah,” he said with a smile. Jackson and Riley, drifting toward sleep near the woodstove, lifted their heads momentarily before laying back down.

  “I second that,” Anna said. They’d had a long dinner—longer than pizza and wine should take—and to Anna’s surprise, Gene had told her he had no problem with Liz showing up after eight o’clock so they could continue their research. She figured it took the pressure off him by putting a time limit on their talk about Buckhorn’s finances, a discussion he was probably dreading.

  “Here’s the deal,” he said, staring at the toes of his hiking boots. “I might have to close the store at the end of February.”

  Anna had expected him to ease his way into the subject, like one dips a toe into cold water, but he had leaped straight into it. “It’s that bad?”

  “We had the worst Christmas season in the history of the store.”

  “But one season doesn’t—”

  “Anna, when you’re barely keeping your head above water, all it takes is one bad season.” He shook his head. “My first full December running the store.”

  “It’s not your fault. Everyone’s having a hard time. Dan and Liz, everyone.”

  He turned to her, a don’t-condescend-to-me look on his face. His expression wasn’t unkind, but it was firm. Gene was all about the facts, and the facts were plain: the store was failing on his watch. “I have to deal with reality. If I close the store . . .” He hesitated before continuing. “Jazmin will lose her job, and the odds of the store reopening for tourist season in the spring are about zero.”

  “Would your dad sell it?”

  “I think he’d have to. Though honestly, that’s the one bright spot. The building’s worth a lot more than he paid for it twenty years ago.”

  Anna sat quietly, letting it all sink in. Buckhorn’s gone, Jazmin without a job, Gene with no job and a mortgage to pay. And then there was the wedding. Gene had insisted on footing the bill. Anna’s parents had passed years ago, and Roger Westfall, Gene’s father, was now on a fixed income.

  “You need to do two things,” she said.

  “Cut expenses and increase income.”

  “First things first. The wedding plans are off.”

  “Wait a minute.”

  “Not the wedding itself, just all the sideshow stuff. The cake, the flowers, the reception, the dinner.”

  “But you love that.”

  “Sometimes I don’t think you know me at all,” Anna said with a laugh. “I don’t love it. Have you ever known me to order a fancy cake? Have you ever seen me in a dress? I want to marry you, and I don’t need a cake or dress to do it.”

  “What about the guests?”

  “We’ll tell them we’re marrying at Grace Church, and if they can come, great. We can put a couple people up at our houses, but everyone else will have to find a hotel—on their own. Most of the people I know will be thrilled they don’t have to attend a long ceremony and reception.”

  Gene swung his feet off the coffee table and sat straight. “Same here.”

  “And no fancy clothes. Jeans and cowboy boots.”

  “You’re okay with that?”

  “Totally.” This wedding was going to be fun, come to think of it. Thankfully she had been running late on booking a florist, a baker, and the rest. And she hadn’t even picked the invitations, let alone sent them. Now she could forget about all that. The financial burden was gone, and so too was the stress of planning the whole complicated extravaganza. “Will that keep you going for another month or two while we figure out what to do next?”

  “Yeah, I think it will.” He watched her, piercing her with his light brown eyes, then leaned in and kissed her. “Jeans and cowboy boots,” he said with a grin. He kissed her again. “Well all right.”

  He gathered the pizza box and plates and headed into the kitchen, and Anna, feeling lighter than she had in weeks, threw her feet up on the coffee table. It was far from over—they had to talk about how to cut expenses and increase revenue—but for a few days they could relax, and Anna could focus on the two jobs she had taken on. One of them, untangling the mystery of Johannes Sorg and the January Club, had the potential to solve three murders and land her a paid position, or at least a more frequently paid position, with the Elk Park Police Department. The other, Melinda’s genealogy, she had put on the back burner for too long.

  “This morning you asked me about Rose and Dean Price’s art galleries,” he called out.

  Anna heard the sound of plates clattering in the sink and saw Gene turn on the faucet. “Have you ever been inside the Columbine Galleria?” she asked, fighting the urge to nap by rising to her feet.

  “I wandered in after I took over Buckhorn’s and introduced myself to Dean Price.”

  “What did you think of him?” Any man who would do the dishes without announcing he was about to do so or making a showy display of it, well . . . She shuffled to the kitchen, grabbed a clean towel, and took the first rinsed plate from his hands.

  “He seemed nice enough, but store owners tend to be friendly with other owners and managers on Summit. Is he involved in one of your cases?”

  Cases. He know how to give her ego a boost at just the right time. “He’s a co-founder of the January Club, along with Rose. I think they have a very shady but lucrative deal going on with club members.”

  “How so?” he said, handing her the second plate.

  “For certain benefits, which I haven’t quite figured out yet, club members hand over prized possessions. Some of those possessions end up on display at the club, and some end up in the Prices’ art galleries.” Anna put the dried plates in a cabinet and mopped the counter with her towel. “And some end up in the personal possession of one of the members and the woman he’s having an affair with. He was arrested a few hours ago for theft and receiving stolen property.”

  “He won’t be a club member for long then.”

  “I’m not so sure. I think Dean and Rose knew what he was up to and were using him as a conduit for getting Maxwell’s things to their galleries.”

  “If Henry Maxwell voluntarily gave his things to the club, and the Prices are club co-founders, how do you prove theft?”

  For the next few minutes Anna laid out the bare facts of the Maxwell and Hetrick jobs: Hetrick’s missing finger, the Herald’s unwarranted hiring of Henry Maxwell, Beverly Goff’s sudden death, the elusive Johannes Sorg, Curt MacKenzie and his house—as well as Curt’s surprise on hearing that Tanner Ostberg had been arrested and his utter shock on hearing her accuse Tanner of stealing from his house. “Three people murdered, and all of them with a connection to the January Club,” she finished.

  “This first murder,” Gene said, heading back to the couch.

  “Jordan Hetrick.”

  “Without a doubt he’s connected to the club?”

  “He has to be. It’s not just his finger at Maxwell’s house. The name Johannes Sorg was found on his body, written on a piece of paper. Plus he was murdered by the same kind of weapon that killed Beverly Goff.” She followed him into
the living room and took the armchair opposite the couch. It was fine to sit near him when she could keep herself busy with pizza and a wine glass, but now, with nothing to do but talk, a little common sense was required. June was a long way off. “Hetrick’s wife told me she’s never heard of the January Club, and I believe her, but I think Curt MacKenzie was lying when he pretended not to recognize Hetrick’s name.”

  “Could Hetrick have been a member? Maybe he promised to hand over some of his things and reneged on the deal. Do you know if he had a will?”

  Anna thought back to Elise Van Rossem’s house. There was no way Hetrick had a will. He didn’t own anything. The house, the car—it all belonged to Elise. “Hetrick may have had a few personal items, but that’s all. He was going through bankruptcy when he married, so everything is in his wife’s name.”

  “What about this Soda Ashbrook woman who followed you?”

  “It looks like she and Tanner are having an affair. He gave her some of the things he took from Curt’s house. Or . . .” Did she have that right? What she saw was plain—Tanner pulling things from his pockets and giving them to Soda, he and Soda kissing—but was there another explanation for it? But she had already told Curt that Tanner was stealing from him. It was a little late to rethink what she saw.

  “Or?”

  “No, that’s what Liz and I saw. Tanner coming out of Curt’s house and handing things, I don’t know what things, to Soda, then Soda putting them in her car. Then they kissed.”

  “And they’re married to other people?”

  “Liz says Soda’s not married, but Tanner wears a wedding ring.”

  “That doesn’t mean anything.”

  That was true. She herself had worn Sean’s wedding ring for more than two years following his death. Might Tanner be doing the same? “For all we know Soda could be in a relationship with someone else. Maybe Soda and Tanner get all affectionate when they steal together.”

  Gene laughed, again stirring the dogs from their slumber by the woodstove. Jackson yawned, stretched his legs, and nestled closer to Riley. Anna loved seeing the two dogs together, especially curled by the warm stove on a winter night. She got Gene, and Jackson got Riley. Quite the package deal.

  “Well, you’ve got three murders,” Gene said, “all connected in some way. And you’ve got a cast of characters, all of them connected in some way. What’s the one thing that connects them?”

  “The January Club.”

  Gene sat forward. “You know Hetrick is connected to the January Club, but his wife says she’s never heard of the club. And you think this Curt MacKenzie is lying about knowing him. Are your instincts telling you that the starting point is Hetrick?”

  “He was the first victim.”

  “Why was he the first victim?”

  Anna slid forward in her seat, half-formed thoughts and fragments of information tumbling like leaves in the wind. “Yeah, why was he? He was from Elk Park originally, but he got married in California, and he lived there until this past October. He moved back to Elk Park less than three months ago. What happened in those three months?”

  “Did he make an enemy?”

  “Or did he already have an enemy? Right here in Elk Park all this time.”

  “Could his wife be in danger?”

  Anna thought for a moment before answering. “I don’t think so. Whoever killed Jordan Hetrick has known for a week where she lives. If she was a target, she’d be dead by now.” Like Hetrick, Maxwell, and Goff. The thought sent shivers up her spine. Was this about money and stolen trinkets for art galleries—even archaeological finds? Or was someone settling a score? What was worth the deaths of three people?

  “I wonder if the police are staking out her house,” Gene said. “That’s the right term, isn’t it? Staking out?”

  Before Anna could respond, the doorbell rang. “That’s Liz,” she said, heading for the front door. Halfway there she spun back to Gene. “You stay right there and relax,” she commanded. “Read, watch TV. We’ll work at the table.”

  “I’ll need to head home in an hour.”

  “Take Riley with you when you go. Liz might stay overnight.”

  “Oh?”

  “Dan’s still out of town,” Anna said in a loud whisper.

  “Gotcha.”

  The instant Anna opened the door, Liz announced that she had spoken to Tanner Ostberg an hour ago. “He was released on bail, one thousand dollars,” she said, setting her laptop on the kitchen table. “Soda for five hundred dollars. Both paid by Dean Price.”

  “Well isn’t that interesting,” Anna said, pulling up a chair and sitting across from Liz. “Tanner didn’t have the money?”

  “You’d think he would considering everything the police found in his apartment. Some of it, like Celtic bronzes, had to be Henry Maxwell’s.”

  “If Tanner had no money, he wasn’t selling on the black market. Everything he stole was going to the Prices and he was getting a piddling amount of cash in return.”

  Liz had that look on her face. The one that meant her investigation had taken an unexpected twist. “That’s not what Tanner claims. He told me he never sold anything on his own and never gave anything to the Prices. He knows nothing about their galleries.”

  “Naturally Dean Price would confirm that.”

  “Naturally.” Liz gave Anna a wry smile. “Tanner told me they were gifts for his wife and he’s so, so sorry he took them.”

  “That’s ridiculous.”

  “My contact says the police interviewed his wife—Katie’s her name—and she had no idea this big stash of stolen items was in her house. Tanner had hidden it all in a large canvas bag at the back of a closet. I saw her when she came to pick Tanner up. The poor woman looked shell shocked.”

  “What about Soda Ashbrook?”

  “I told my contact where Soda and Tanner were last night—and what we saw.”

  “But Liz, we’re not sure what—”

  “And that we don’t know for sure that Tanner was giving her stolen property. It only looked like that. Exactly like that.”

  Anna sucked in her breath. What if Soda had nothing to do with the thefts? But really, how likely was that?

  “We saw what we saw, Anna. Sooner or later we had to say something. We should have told the police.”

  “Right, right.” Anna reached for her laptop and notebook in the middle of the table and pulled them toward her.

  “Where do we go from here?” Liz said, switching on her computer and pulling a notebook from her purse. “I mean, where to first?”

  “You start with Jordan Hetrick. He moved back here last October. Why did he leave Elk Park and why did he come back? What was he doing in California? I’m going to do some research on Melinda’s grandparents and get that out of the way. I’ve been slacking off on her genealogy.”

  Liz clicked only a few keys on her laptop before stopping. Anna looked up and watched as her friend’s head turned longingly toward the coffee maker. “I’m not having any,” Anna said. “But go ahead and make some. There’s hazelnut and vanilla, take your pick.”

  While Liz poured water into the machine’s reservoir and spooned coffee grounds, Anna called up her favorite genealogy website and began the search for Melinda’s grandparents. Before Liz had poured her first mug, Anna had discovered the birth dates and places of Melinda’s grandparents on her father’s side, as well as their address in Wyoming as of three years ago. “That was too easy,” she said as Liz returned to her seat. “Why couldn’t Melinda have found this?”

  “You forget that what’s easy for you isn’t for other people. It doesn’t occur to them to subscribe to a genealogy website, do reverse searches, and all that.”

  “Mmm.” Anna navigated to another database link, clicked on it, and scrolled down the page. “They never left Wyoming, but they moved from Sheridan to Cody at least fifteen years ago.”

  Liz sipped noisily at her coffee. “Maybe they moved right after Henry Maxwell left Sheridan for Colorado.
Sounds like they didn’t want to be found.”

  “It sure does.” Anna jotted down the information she’d found, pleased that she had uncovered it so quickly. This was paid work, necessary for her livelihood, but her mind was on the Hetrick investigation. Or rather, the Hetrick-Maxwell-Goff investigation. She was sure the solution to one murder would be the solution to the other two.

  Four websites and an hour later, Anna had what she needed to fulfill her obligation to Melinda, except of course the answers to her whys: Why did her father leave Wyoming? Why did he cut off all contact with his and his wife’s families? Now and then genealogical facts answered whys, but not this time. Still, Melinda would now have the last known addresses of all four of her grandparents, and that was a good start. She would also have the names of her great-grandparents and various uncles and aunts, many of whom still lived in Wyoming.

  “I wonder why Melinda asked about her grandparents’ medical backgrounds,” Anna said, writing down the last known address of an aunt in Gillette, Wyoming.

  “Maybe she has a hereditary condition—or wants to know if she does.”

  “Sleepwalking, night terrors,” Anna said offhandedly. She stopped writing. The idea that Melinda might have a history of sleep disturbances wasn’t so farfetched. It would explain her over-the-top nightmares, though Anna still believed someone, a January Club someone, had entered the Maxwell house while Melinda was sleeping. He or she might even have a key to the house. Henry Maxwell had handed the club just about everything he owned, so why not give one or more of the members a key?

  Liz exhaled dramatically and flopped back in her chair. “I can’t find any records on Hetrick,” she said. “He didn’t have a police record in Colorado. My town office contacts told me that days ago. What do we do now?”

  As Anna pondered the question, her thoughts returned to her conversation with Elise Van Rossem. “Elise said he was job hunting, so he didn’t have any work friends, and he was lying about the hunting trip. So who picked him up at his house? Besides Elise, who knew him?”

  “He’s kind of a blank slate, isn’t he?”