Like I said, my friend attracted trouble, and it had been that way since I’d known her.
After several minutes, the tears finally slowed. Wiping her eyes, she looked around nervously. “Is your mother home?”
“Nope. She’s playing bridge. You’re safe.”
My mother, who insisted I call her Thelma, didn’t know the meaning of tact. She’d always resented my friendship with Callie and didn’t hide it, making rude comments about her agoraphobia and even stooping to insult her family when she could. It was all veiled, of course. But my mother had a mean streak in her, especially when it came to Callie, and as much as I loved her, she frequently galled me to red-faced fury. At times I was certain I’d been adopted.
Callie started to shiver, so I wrapped her in a navy blue throw that we kept folded on the back of the couch. “Are you cold, honey?” I tucked it around her. She was so tiny and looked as though she’d lost weight again. “There you go. It’ll be okay.”
She closed her eyes. “Where’s Quinn?”
“Relax. He’s up at the barn, refinishing that set of Eastlake chairs we just got in.”
“When will he be back?”
“Not for hours.”
Her agoraphobia didn’t end with the outdoors. She’d also managed to cultivate a severe case of social anxiety, and even my sweet, dear husband scared her.
Quinn Black Eagle Hollister was the unique result of the union between his British playwright father, who died very young, and a beautiful Seneca Indian, White Dawn. She’d raised Quinn to be one with nature, to abhor artificial anything, and to be incredibly clean. My sweet spouse insisted on doing all of our housework, since my attempts never passed muster. And although it sounded weird, it never once detracted from his raw masculinity.
With his lean, strong body, lovely dark skin, and angular face, he resembled an Indian brave, with the exception of his startling turquoise eyes he’d inherited from his father. The color of the stones in Native American jewelry, they had the effect of seeing right into my inner core. It was hard for me to imagine anyone being afraid of Quinn, but I empathized as best I could with poor Callie’s fears.
She leaned back and closed her eyes, still hiccupping a few sobs. “I haven’t seen you in so long, Marcie. God.”
As frustrating as it was to wait for her to open up, I knew I needed to be patient. And I felt a little guilty, because since we’d reinvested in our antique shop to expand the old barn and fix up the place, I’d had very few free days to take the boat over to her place on the other side of the lake. I think she’d gotten even more reclusive since, and I struggled not to let myself feel too much blame for her loneliness.
Of course, Honeoye, one of the Finger Lakes in upstate New York, wasn’t exactly a remote location. The shores were populated with residents and renters alike, and although it wasn’t as people-packed as a city, there were plenty of folks to socialize with, including those who’d graduated from our high school. But dear Callie only hung out with me, a responsibility I’d shouldered from day one without resentment. I loved Callie like a sister, and taking care of her was a privilege.
She shifted closer to me, but still looked scared. “The only one you have to worry about is Ruby, and she’s sleeping.” I chuckled and pointed to our prize-winning ring-necked parakeet, whose rosy-tangerine color had won her best in class last summer. She snoozed on her perch. She’d been doing that a lot since her mother passed away two weeks ago. Poor old Sarafina had succumbed to some rare condition Doc West had mumbled and I hadn’t understood. Ruby’s reaction—not eating and sleeping most of the time—had been immediate. The doctor called it clinical depression, but I called it natural.
Callie looked at Ruby briefly and buried her head in her hands. “Okay. I… I can’t breathe. Marcie. Help me.” In seconds, fat tears soaked her cheeks.
I pulled her toward me, trying not to stare at the box on the coffee table. “Callie. Honey. What is it?”
She shuddered against me, then sat up and sighed, pointing to the box. “It’s from Sky. And I’m too scared to open it.”
My throat almost closed. “What? When did it arrive?” I balanced the heavy carton on my knees. Battered and stained, it looked to have been around the world and back. Callie’s name and address were printed neatly on a label. There was no return address, but its postmark was no more exotic than Speculator, New York.
“It arrived this morning.”
I started to tear the packing tape off the box, then stopped and looked at Callie’s devastated face. “Wait a minute. How can you know it’s from Sky?”
Callie looked down at her delicate hands. She whispered so softly I barely heard her. “I got a phone call last night. After midnight.”
My heart beat faster and my hands grew clammy. “From Sky?”
Could he still be alive?
She shook her head, cascading loose locks over her cheeks. “No.”
Frustration welled inside me. “Then who called you?”
“He didn’t say. Or if he did, I couldn’t tell. The connection was bad. It was someone who knew him. Knows him.” She sobbed. “I’m not even sure if he’s still alive, Marcie. But the guy said Sky wanted me to have this. Whatever the hell it is.”
I wanted to shake her, but I knew it wouldn’t help shed any more light on Sky’s eighteen-year disappearance. If she knew anything, she would have told me. I ripped into the box and tore at the ragged foam that surrounded an olive green knapsack. I stared at familiar peace symbol buttons and the patches I’d sewn onto the bag for Sky when we were teens. “Oh my God. This is the same bag he had in high school.”
She reached for it and held it to her, rubbing her face against it as if it were Sky’s hand.
A strong scent rose from the bag. It was pungent, yet sweet. Strong, yet enticing. I gently disentangled Callie’s fingers from the strap and unbuckled it. The scent grew stronger. Peppermint? Lavender? And something that reminded me of the ceremonies in a Catholic church.
Callie’s big eyes grew wider. “What is that smell?”
I pulled out a dark maroon zippered case. Lumpy and heavy, the fabric was blotted with stains. “Let’s see.” I unzipped it and flipped back the top. Inside were nestled dozens of brown glass bottles with colorful labels.
I picked up the first. “White Angelica.” Unscrewing the cap, I sniffed it. “Wow. What is this?”
I held it to Callie’s nose. “Nice, huh?”
She frowned. “Yeah. It’s beautiful. Is it perfume?”
“I don’t think so.” I rubbed my fingers over the bottles, turning them up to read the labels. “Wintergreen. Balsam fir. Lemon. Frankincense. Lavender. Thieves. Inner Child.” I opened the balsam fir and sniffed it. “Wow. Strong. It really smells like the tree.”
“What’s it say on the label? And why would Sky send me these?”
“Good question.” I grabbed my reading glasses from the coffee table and brought one of the bottles to the window to read the fine print. “Young Living Essential Oils.” I rotated the bottle. “One hundred percent peppermint oil.” I almost forgot about Sky for a moment, so intrigued with the collection of exotic smells. “Cool.”
“What are they for?” Callie asked. As if Sky had sent her a box of chocolates, she started opening and sniffing each one. Heady aromas filled the air. “Mmm. This one is beautiful.”
“Let me try.” I reached for the bottle marked Valor and inhaled deeply. “Wow.” Turning it in the light again, I read the ingredients. “Spruce, rosewood, blue tansy, and frankincense. Frankincense? Man. That’s what one of the wise men brought Baby Jesus, right? I didn’t know it was real.”
“Me neither.” Callie’s eyes shone. “Marcie. Sky wanted me to have these.” She took both my hands in hers as if I’d know the answer. “But, why?”
With my heart pounding, I set the box of oils aside and dug deeper into the backpack. “I don’t know. But let’s see what else is in here. Maybe we’ll find some answers.”
Chapt
er 2
I plunged my hand deeper into the knapsack. My fingers closed over a thick book. I half expected it to be a Bible, since we’d just been talking about the Baby Jesus. But it wasn’t. I thumped the heavy volume on the table. Dark green, with a heavily worn cover, it smelled like the oils in the bottles, as if it had been opened in a room where they were used a lot. “Wow. This is an old one.”
“What’s it about?” Callie asked, still stroking the knapsack as if it brought her closer to Sky.
I leafed through the first few pages. “It looks like some kind of holistic health guide. Let’s see…Okay. Here’s a section on illnesses and remedies.” I flipped through and opened to a page dealing with skin burns. “Apply pure lavender oil liberally over burned area. Frankincense and melrose are also useful for healing skin, and a blend of all three may prove beneficial to general skin disorders.” I absentmindedly scratched at the fine rash on the back on my left hand. “Huh. Maybe I should put some of these on my hand.”
While I flipped through pages, Callie reached into the bag to pull out the last few items. She looped a long hemp necklace with a small vial attached to it around her neck, then held the bottle up to the light, gently sloshing the liquid back and forth. “This one must be really special.” She examined the strands of hemp carefully. “He wore it often. It’s really frayed.”
“Why would he wear one of these oils around his neck? Think he was warding off evil spirits?”
Callie chuckled for the first time. “It’s not garlic, silly. It’s something really special. I can just feel it. I think it was sacred to him.”
She laid the last items on the coffee table and shook the bag to be sure there was nothing left inside. Before us sat a slim leather-bound book of Shakespeare’s sonnets, an amber crystal, about the size of an egg, and a moth-eaten velvet pouch with a drawstring.
I stared at the items, praying they weren’t Sky’s final effects. Could this have been all of value that was left of him? Had he kept these treasures in the ratty old backpack, close to his side? Had he whispered on his deathbed to his doctor or companion, asking them to send it to Callie?
Callie reached for the velvet pouch.
My brain began to work overtime. “Callie?”
She loosened the string. “Yeah?”
“Did you get that call on your cell phone or home phone?”
“The house phone.”
“Did you try dialing star-six-nine to call them back?”
She looked at me blankly. “No. I didn’t even think of that.” With a shake of her head, she spilled the contents of the velvet bag onto the coffee table. I couldn’t ask her more, because my mouth had dropped open. “What the…”
Callie’s hand flew to her mouth. “My God.”
A pile of green stones glistened in the afternoon sun streaming through my windows. I didn’t know much about gems, but they sparkled as if they were delighted to be out of their dark prison.
Callie picked up the largest one and held it between her thumb and forefinger. Her lips spread in a huge smile. “I think they’re emeralds. Look how they shine.” A far away look stole across her face. “Emeralds, Marcie.”
I ran my finger gingerly over the pile of jewels. They spilled to the side, revealing something black and distinctly non-gemlike beneath the pile. “What’s this?”
Callie couldn’t take her eyes off the big stone in her fingers. “I dunno. This would sure make a pretty ring.”
I fished a small Sony memory stick out of the stones and palmed it. The white letters on the side claimed it held one hundred and twenty-eight gigabytes of memory. “It’s a memory stick, Callie. A pretty new one, I’d say.” I’d just sprung for a sixteen-gig stick the week before. Prices were coming down fast, and I got it for less than twenty dollars. But this one had probably cost a pretty penny. At least a couple hundred bucks, maybe more.
She finally put the emerald down and opened her hand for the stick. “What’s on it?”
I exchanged a serious glance with her. “That’s what we’re about to find out. I’m getting my MacBook.”
Before I could unzip my computer case, a car pulled into the drive.
Callie froze and all color drained from her face. “Someone’s here.”
She said the words as if proclaiming the couch on fire. Her eyes nearly rolled back in her head, so intense was her panic. She shoved the emeralds into the pouch, tossed the crystal and the Shakespeare book into the backpack, and stuffed the hemp necklace inside as well. Holding the backpack to her chest, she practically disappeared between the couch cushions. The heavy reference guide lay open on the coffee table beside the bottles of oil.
I approached her like I would a nervous filly. “It’s okay, honey. Why don’t you go in the bathroom to freshen up, and I’ll see who it is?”
Like a shot, she tore down the hall and vanished.
Knuckles thudded against the door. When I’d first heard the car arrive, I thought maybe my mother’s card game had been canceled, or Quinn had forgotten something. But neither of them would knock. And most people didn’t knock like they were slamming the door with a ten-pound bag of potatoes.
I shook off my damp towel and shrugged into a dry beach wraparound. Tightening the belt around me, I swung the door wide open to find an environmental officer in olive green shirt and shorts standing with one hand on his gun hilt. The other hand held a clipboard. “Is…” He frowned down at the board. “…California Lissoneau here?”
I chuckled. “Bet you never knew anyone named California before, huh?”
He stared at me with flat eyes.
I guessed the idea of charming him with my humor wasn’t going to fly. I slid outside and drew the door closed behind me. “Callie’s my friend. What’s going on, officer?”
He glanced down at his clipboard. “We had a report that she drove across the lake without a boating license.”
“A report?”
“Er. Yes. Called in by a Miss Willow Lissoneau.”
His widened eyes made me realize he hadn’t connected the two last names until this point.
“Oh. Did Willow call in again?” I shook my head and smirked. “She’s always trying to get her poor little sister in trouble. Must be the tenth time this summer.”
He grimaced and wrote on the clipboard. “A family squabble? Damn.”
I approached him, pointing to the board. “Do you really have to see her? She’s pretty upset.”
He looked at me—for the first time, actually—and his features softened. A quizzical expression filled his eyes for a brief moment, as if he thought he recognized me, then he went right back to business. “I need to see the vessel. And her license.”
I exaggerated a little. “Listen. Callie just found out someone died. She needed to see me. Really bad. I’m her best friend.” I pointed to the bathroom window. “She’s inside now, crying her eyes out.”
His eyes followed my finger and he flinched a little. Not much, just enough to show me how uncomfortable he’d be with a crying woman.
“I have a valid boating license. That’s my bass boat out there, on the other side of the dock. I’ll drive her back, officer. Honest. And I’ll make sure she updates her license. I’m sure it’s just a few weeks out of date.”
He looked at his clipboard. “Try twenty-four years. I’m afraid your friend’s gonna be under arrest.”
A hand flew to my mouth, as if I were surprised. Of course, inside I cringed. I knew Callie hadn’t renewed her license since her life had fallen apart. “The timing really sucks.”
He started to walk toward the front of the house and out onto the dock toward the pontoon boat. I followed.
“This it?”
I shot a nervous glance back toward the house. “Uh huh.”
It was when he turned to examine the boat that I recognized him. Trent Small. He’d been in my senior English Lit class in high school. I touched his sleeve and he looked at my hand as if I’d committed a felony.
“Trent? I
s that you? I didn’t recognize you in those dark glasses and that cap. My God, it’s been years, but I remember you used to sit beside me in Mr. Framson’s English Lit class. Senior year. Remember?”
He took off his glasses, squinted in the sun, and finally smiled. “I thought you looked familiar. Marcella Montel?”
I reached for his hand to shake it. “It’s Marcella Hollister now. I’m married. And you?”
His smile broadened. “Me too. Married Nicki Patterson right after college. We have three boys. Twelve, nine, and a little surprise born two weeks ago.”
I laughed and gushed more than I should have. I really wanted to get Callie off the hook. “My God, that’s wonderful! I remember Nicki. She was a runner, wasn’t she? Didn’t she help us win the sectionals that year?”
His smile spread to a ridiculously proud grin. “That’s right. She broke the school’s record for the 5K. And now my oldest, Brent, is following in her footsteps. You should see him hurdle.”
I continued to play along, as if the discovery of a guy I’d barely noticed in school had made me the happiest woman alive. “Want to come in for a beer or iced tea? Maybe we could talk about old times, and…”
His serious expression came back. “Sorry, no. I need to wrap this up and bring your friend in to be charged.”
My devastated expression must have triggered his empathy. He looked up and down the lake, as if everyone on the shore would be judging him if he let Callie off the hook. “Look. I’m sorry.”
I slumped into the chair by the dock. “It will kill her, Trent. She’s very fragile right now. Isn’t there any way you could—”
Tall Pines Mysteries: A Mystery/Suspense Boxed Set Page 25