by Dana Moss
Taffy frowned. “I’ll take it and get them tested if you want.”
He looked down at the baggie.
“I suppose that would be all right.” He handed the baggie to her.
Taffy tucked it into her purse. “If Rex was even partly responsible for Tyler’s death, I’m going to find out. Just because he’s a star pitcher and the mayor’s grandson doesn’t mean he’s above the law.”
Taffy walked out of the high school with her incriminating evidence. She looked back once and saw Mr. Ainsley watching her, a bemused smile on his face.
From her car, she called Maria.
In a singsong voice, Taffy said, “I have a surprise for you.”
“Uh oh. Your tone of voice just made the little hairs on the back of my hand stand up. What is it?”
“I think it would be better if I gave it to you in person. I’m going to drive over to the station.”
“But—”
Taffy was too excited to listen to “but” answers. She sped out of the school parking lot and aimed the Bentley at the police station.
CHAPTER TWENTY
Taffy dropped the baggie on Maria’s desk. The similarity to the first baggie was unmistakable, and that got Maria’s attention.
Grinning like a cat with a bird in its mouth, Taffy said. “Found that in Rex’s locker.”
That got Maria’s attention too. “You found it?”
“Uh huh. All by myself.” She left out the embarrassing caught-in-the-act part of the scene when she was laughed at by the entire baseball team.
Maria sighed heavily. “Just to clarify, you searched Rex’s locker on your own, with no one else around?”
“And happened to find the evidence that links Rex to the murder!” She was bursting with pride.
Maria sighed again, leaned back in her chair, and shook her head. “Poisonous fruit.”
Taffy wasn’t entirely sure what Maria was referring to but she thought that would make a good name for a new line of candy and wanted to make a note so she could tell Ellie. Maybe fruit-flavored hard candies with super-sour, fizzy centers?
Maria leaned forward a little. “Taffy, you can’t go searching people’s property without permission or warrants. Police procedure 101.”
“But I’m not the police.”
“My point exactly.”
“I’m like the vigilante police, sneaking in where the police are afraid to go—” She used her hand to weave a little trail through the air. She was a rogue detective, intent on capturing criminals at any cost.
Maria sighed. “It won’t count.”
That got Taffy’s attention. “But it proves Rex was involved in whatever went down at the campground.”
“If you had waited until I’d gotten a warrant—”
“You weren’t going to!”
“Or even asked Janice or Mr. Ainsley to look in the locker for you, that would have been okay, because they’re like the school’s property owners and they can legally do searches like that.”
“Mr. Ainsley was there!”
“Did he open the locker?”
“Well, he did, but—”
“Did he find the baggie?”
Taffy shook her head.
“Then it’s unusable.”
Taffy looked at the hard—and embarrassingly—won little baggie on the desk.
“Can you maybe test it to see if it’s the same as the other one? Then at least we’ll know.”
“We might know, but we won’t be able to pin it on Rex like this.” Maria pulled out a lab requisition form. “Everyone knows we’re friends, and they’ll think I put you up to it. That baggie quickly becomes fruit of the poisonous tree.”
“Then I’ll just have to find something else.”
“Taff.” Maria stopped what she was doing, laid a hand on Taffy’s wrist. “I’ll get this tested and all, because you’re so keen to know, but you can’t go all wild on me. I’m already dealing with pressure from the chief and the mayor.”
“He’s involved, I know he is. He gave Jenny drugs. Did you know that? Do you know where she is right now?”
Maria nodded. “I just got off the phone with Mrs. Hughes.”
“We have to stop him.”
“We will, don’t worry.” Maria sighed. “We’re still going to the movie tonight, right?”
Taffy nodded. “Oh, shoot. I forgot I still have to drop off Ethan’s beer at the bar. I’ll meet you after that.”
~
Taffy left the police station and drove out to Ted’s karaoke bar. She pulled up behind the squat, windowless building and knocked on the back door. Julie, the assistant manager, opened it.
“Hey, Taffy. This ale from Ethan? I’ll get James to grab the dolly and load it in. Come on in.”
Taffy stepped into the cool back room and then on through to the bar. The happy hour crowd was getting happy. Julie poured her an iced tea.
“Ted around tonight?” Taffy asked, squeezing her lemon wedge over her glass.
“I sent him off to pick up more tonic water. He’ll be back soon. I hear you tried the new bistro.”
“It’s so good!”
Julie smiled. “I’m going tomorrow night. Can’t wait. The two businesses have Ted a little frazzled though.”
“No doubt. Lucky he has you. Ethan’s super busy, too, with the coffee shop and the park.”
“He’s hired himself an assistant, though, hasn’t he? I met her the other day. She’s super sweet.”
“Guess so.” Taffy sucked on her straw.
“She offered to babysit my nephew when I told her my sister was having surgery. Isn’t that nice?”
Taffy bit her lip. “Nice. Uh huh.” Taffy hadn’t known Julie had a nephew or a sister, let alone one having surgery. “Where’d you meet Melanie?”
“She was volunteering at the school’s plant sale fundraiser. Lugging in massive ferns, shoveling soil. She’s a hard worker. Stronger than she looks. A great addition to our little town.”
Taffy was beginning to wonder if this little town might not be too small for the both of them.
She drained her iced tea and was planning to head home when someone said her name. She turned.
“Mr. Ainsley, what are you doing here?”
He smiled shyly. “On Fridays, I stop in on my way home from work.”
“Listen, I’m really embarrassed about this afternoon. And sorry. I just think—”
“I’ve got a booth over here. Why not join me for a drink?”
“I really should get—”
“Just one? I’d love to talk to you about your mom.”
Julie picked up her empty glass of iced tea. “I’ll get you a refill.”
Taffy followed Mr. Ainsley to his booth. Julie brought over the iced tea. Then she went back to help James get the beer in the fridge.
Mr. Ainsley said, “This place wasn’t here when your mom came to visit, but I would have liked to have taken her out to a place like this. She was an uptown girl, but she had a wild side, you know? I liked that about her.”
“Sadly, that wild side killed her.”
He raised his pint glass. “Only the good die young?”
Taffy didn’t feel comfortable drinking to that, but Ainsley wasn’t waiting for her anyway.
“Mr. Ainsley, what can you tell me about Rex Gifford? Does he ever get in trouble at school?”
“Oh, he’s had his wrist slapped a few times, I guess.”
“Anything to do with drugs? He says those aren’t his pills, but I think he’s lying.”
Ainsley frowned and looked down into his drink.
“Let’s not talk about Rex.” He looked up at Taffy’s hair. His frown turned into a smile as his gazed drifted a little above and to the side of her hair clip. “Your mom parted her hair on the other side. I loved it when she wore headbands.”
“Why aren’t you taking this situation with Rex more seriously?”
“She was the most beautiful girl I’d ever seen.”
Taffy cleared her throat and took a sip of her iced tea. “Mr. Ainsley, about Rex—”
“Please, call me Ernest.” His elbow was propped on the table, and his palm held his chin up as he continued to stare at her. He seemed to be caught in some thick nostalgic fog. His gaze drifted from Taffy’s hair to her chin and then to the V-neck of her silk sleeveless blouse.
“Ernest. Does everyone look the other way when Rex breaks rules?”
He kept looking at her blouse. “She was classy, just like you. The right side of the tracks and all that. Caused quite a stir in our little town when she deigned to visit with her father.”
Taffy tried to catch his eye. “Is Rex sort of protected in the school? In the town?”
He sighed heavily. “Why do you keep bringing up Rex? You’re here with me now. We have a second chance…”
Taffy seemed to have a time-warp effect on Ainsley. He’d drifted back thirty years and acted like he was sitting with his teen sweetheart.
“Maybe it’s time for me to go.” She started to slide from the booth. He grabbed her hand, held it pinned to the table.
“Wait.” He seemed to realize he’d crossed a line. He released her hand and looked around the bar as if remembering where he was.
Sighing, he said, “Your mother would have liked Rex.” He frowned and sipped back the last of his beer. “I mean, she would have been stupid for being attracted to him. But she did like guys like that. The ones that got whatever they wanted, with barely a little finger raised in effort. They could provide the lifestyle she was used to.” He looked into his empty beer glass, still frowning. “In the end, I lost her to a rock ’n roller.”
Taffy leaned forward. “Did you actually date my mother years ago?”
His gaze tripped over her slightly exposed cleavage, and he laughed nervously. They would have been fifteen, maybe sixteen. It was possible they’d had a summer romance. Ainsley might have looked all right back in the day, when he’d had all his hair and the slimness of youth.
“I wish,” he said. “She never even knew I existed. But I dreamt about her every night that summer I turned seventeen. I would wake up from those dreams and—”
“Another round here?” Julie picked up Ainsley’s empty glass. Taffy breathed a sigh of relief at the interruption.
“I’m good,” she said. “And I have to get going soon. My friends are expecting me at the movie theater.”
Ainsley ordered a coffee. “Best not go home with beer on the breath.”
Was he married? He wasn’t wearing a wedding ring. She tried to remember if he’d been wearing one the other day at the high school.
“My sister still berates me when I drink,” he added. So he lived with his sister. Maybe he’d never been married. And he still carried a torch of unrequited love for Taffy’s mother. She felt a bit sorry for him.
When his coffee arrived, he stirred cream and sugar into his cup and then watched the ripples settle. His fog seemed to have lifted.
“You probably think I sound crazy.”
Taffy wasn’t planning to say anything to his face.
He took a sip of coffee and said, “Life, like death, doesn’t always turn out the way you hoped it would. For a brief period, your mother was a ray of light in my life, a ray of hope. Seeing you again brought that hope back. Thanks for indulging me.”
Taffy was grateful he wasn’t pressing for more indulgence. Earlier, she’d been thinking she’d have to call Julie over, or James. But it seemed he’d come back to the present now, back to reality.
“Can you tell me anything more about Rex Gifford?”
“I try to do right by those kids, but they barely listen. Rex has had his hand slapped repeatedly for fights, suspicion of selling drugs, but if there are any stains on his record, his baseball scholarship would be at risk. Everyone believes he’ll make varsity in college and eventually go pro. Scouts spotted him at the games this week over in Salem. It’s important to the Gifford family. For the town actually.”
“Because of that, you’ve kept his school record clean?”
“Off the record, we all make small sacrifices to keep the peace, don’t we?” He looked toward the bar as if he still longed for that second pint. Then he refocused on Taffy.
“I left out something the other day at the office. Tyler did have a conflict with someone. Rex. You might think it was because Jenny was his girlfriend, which is part of it, but there was something more, and it may have had to do with drugs, but I don’t know that for a fact. Tyler came to see me last week making all kinds of accusations about Rex dealing to some of the other students. He was really angry. And worried about Jenny. I said I’d look into it, but I decided to wait until after the games in Salem.”
“Are you looking into it now?”
“Maybe I don’t have to. Since you are.”
“You know where Jenny is right now, don’t you?”
“Hawaii?”
“Jenny’s mom lied to you, too?’
He stirred his coffee and sighed heavily. “No,” he confessed. “I know where she is.”
Taffy leaned forward. “If a kid like Rex brings drugs into the school and other kids look up to him and are willing to protect his reputation…and so are teachers and even the principal, then what happens? Does a kid like Tyler get sacrificed to the lies?”
“But you don’t know for sure if—”
“Mr. Ainsley. Tyler, who wasn’t known to take drugs, was on something the night he died. It may be what killed him. If Rex gave him something, whether to get back at him or maybe accidentally, that’s going to have to come out in the open.”
Ainsley shook his head. “I can’t believe Rex would get himself in this deep. In spite of all his privilege and occasional poor judgment, he’s a good kid, and a really good pitcher. He’s supposed to make his family and this town proud one day.”
“Like you said, life doesn’t always turn out like you hoped. Even for guys like Rex.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
Maria, Finn, and Taffy got to the movie theater on time. Ethan arrived late again. They’d already paid for tickets and bought popcorn and drinks, and now they were waiting in line until the screening room door opened.
Ethan caught up to them and reached for a handful of Taffy’s extra-buttered popcorn. “Sorry I’m late. I had to drive Mel home. Car trouble. ”
It was always something with Mel. Taffy pulled her popcorn closer to her.
“What happened?” Maria asked. “The way you talk about her, she could probably fix anything that went wrong under a hood.”
Ethan laughed. “Probably, but not this. She crashed into a garbage bin on her way to work this morning. Her car’s gonna be in the shop for a few days.”
Finn said, “Guess driving’s not her forté?”
“So she’s not perfect!” Taffy was unable to explain the glee rising from her belly.
“Nobody said she was.”
Taffy bit down on her lip. She needed to keep her mouth shut about Melanie.
“She’s actually a very experienced driver, but this morning she had company. A massive spider dropped down from the visor in front of her face. For all her outdoor toughness, she’s deathly afraid of spiders.”
Taffy sucked in her breath and then let out a snorting giggle.
Ethan looked at her. “I know you don’t like her for some reason, but I sure hope it’s not for the reason I think.”
Taffy had no idea what Ethan was talking about. She tried to backpedal. “I hardly know her. How can I not like her?”
Maria, standing next to Finn, rolled her eyes so only Taffy could see.
“We got off on the wrong foot is all.” Taffy’s stiletto-sheathed foot compared to Melanie’s Timberland-booted one.
Ethan shrugged. “All I know is she’s scared of you for some reason.”
“Scared of me?”
“And I can’t afford to lose a worker this summer.”
“Aren’t there plenty of other park assistants you could h
ire?”
Maria muttered, so only Taffy could hear, “Fat and harelipped maybe?”
Taffy sent her a surreptitious glare.
“Actually, no,” Ethan said. “There’s been a huge demand at all the state parks, so no. Melanie is it. I have to keep her happy or I’ll be short staffed, which means overworked, all summer.”
Taffy had stopped listening when Ethan said, “I have to keep her happy.”
Finn said, “At least your assistant sounds more effective than mine. The temp agency sent me a doozy. She keeps dropping things. Files, pens, and, this morning, the coffee maker. And it was full.” He shook his head. “She’s sweet and all, really wants to do a good job, but I’ve half a mind to trade her in. You can do that with temps, can’t you?”
“Give her another chance,” Maria said with a smile. “She’s probably just nervous. Don’t you remember being nervous your first days on a new job?”
“Yeah, but—”
“I’ll bet she’ll work out fine.” Maria glanced at Taffy with a gloating smile, as if to say, “See, this is how it’s done.”
Taffy was relieved when the theater doors opened and they filed in to take their seats.
~
After the movie, they all went out for dessert at a little café called Towering Confections that served huge slabs of any kind of layer cake you might want as well as eight-inch-tall wedges of pie, including chocolate banana cream. The candy factory kept the café stocked in sprinkles, as well as marshmallows for their ’Smore Tiramisu, and Taffy always got a discount.
Ethan stabbed a slice of banana. “I give it three stars. A few too many explosions, but the final fistfight was pretty good.”
Taffy rolled her eyes and let the guys compare notes on the action-packed super hero film that had been the Friday night show. She was hoping for a period piece or a comedy as the next film at Abandon’s one-screen cinema. They changed it every two weeks, and the four of them usually went on one of the Fridays, unless it was a particularly gruesome horror flick that drew most of the local teens. Maria liked the crime thrillers, as did Taffy, but it had been a while since a film like that had come to town. And they had their own unsolved crime to contend with now.