“I’ve talked to him a few times. I don’t think he’s smart enough.”
“That leaves Tad and Aiken.”
“Jake isn’t ruling out Elizabeth Justice either,” I offered. “I don’t believe it’s her – her reaction at the clerk’s office was too sincere to be faked – but Jake isn’t ruling her out, so technically she’s still a suspect. I’m leaning away from her, though.”
“So we’re back to Tad and Aiken,” Eliot said. “I know Tad well enough to state unequivocally that he would screw over his mother for money and acclaim. I definitely think it’s him.”
“But is he smart enough to engage Mary in his subterfuge? Do you think he could think up something like that?”
“He was smart enough to get the documents,” Eliot pointed out. “I wouldn’t have thought he was smart enough for that, but apparently he was.”
“Unless he wasn’t.” I rested my head against the couch and stared at an empty space on the wall. “What if Tad had the documents but didn’t realize what he had?”
Eliot slid me a sidelong look. “How does that work?”
“He might’ve somehow got his hands on the documents – although that means someone in the clerk’s office helped him. I have no idea who that would be – but he didn’t realize what he was looking at so he had Brucker asking questions.”
“And you think Brucker asked the wrong question of someone and ended up dead.”
“Yeah. That’s another reason I don’t think it’s Tad. Why would Tad hand over documents on himself?”
“You’ve got me there. Unless someone else had the documents and Tad sent Brucker to steal them. Perhaps Brucker was caught with the documents and Ludington killed him in a fit of rage because he didn’t come back with them.”
“That seems like a stretch.”
“Baby, it all seems like a stretch until we have actual evidence.”
“I know. We’re missing part of the puzzle.”
“And it might be days before we get it.”
That’s exactly what I feared.
29 Twenty-Nine
Jake and Derrick didn’t update me.
I don’t know what I expected, but I thought I’d hear at least a hint of information from them. Instead, I got a big burst of nothing.
That didn’t make me happy.
The first thing I did upon waking the next morning was call Fish. Once he informed me the sheriff’s department had not sent out a news release and wouldn’t be holding a conference, my temper flared to Darth Vader proportions.
We were basically in a holding pattern. There was nothing I could do but wait. Fish instructed me to head downtown and watch the clerk’s office. There was bound to be some activity regarding Mary Winters – who apparently managed to slip the sheriff’s department’s net – and Fish figured that was the best place to start. I wanted to argue with him, but he wasn’t wrong.
“I guess you’ll be able to reclaim your parking spot tomorrow,” I mused as Eliot and I walked from the dingy back parking area toward his shop. “That will be a relief, huh?”
Eliot snickered. “Yes. The parking situation has been driving me to distraction. Oh, wait, no it hasn’t. It’s been driving you to distraction.” He poked my side to perk me up.
I attempted – but failed – to muster a smile.
Eliot let loose a long-suffering sigh that only someone who spent a lot of time with me and recognized the signs of an imminent meltdown was entitled to. I think he learned how to do it so perfectly from my mother. “Avery, you can’t get down on yourself for this. I mean … you did everything humanly possible to figure out the puzzle.”
“I didn’t figure it out, though.”
“No, but you gave all the pieces to the sheriff’s department. They wouldn’t even be looking for anyone if you didn’t lay it out for them.”
That didn’t make me feel better. “I don’t know what to do.” I shifted my eyes toward the trio of government buildings sitting side by side on Main Street. “Fish wants me to check in at the clerk’s office.”
“Are you going to do it?”
I shrugged. “I don’t see that I have much choice.” I felt Eliot’s eyes boring into me so I slowly turned to him. “What?”
“I can tell you’re going to need some cheering up.” He leaned closer and pressed a kiss to my mouth. “How about I promise to order your favorite pizza tonight and we’ll watch the election results from my old apartment? How does that sound?”
I wasn’t sure how that was supposed to cheer me up. “Um … good?”
Eliot snorted. “You really need to learn to be more expressive with your face.” He flicked my nose. “I figure we’ll be comfortable in the old apartment and you’ll be close to the clerk’s office if something breaks. Also, there’s something I want to talk to you about.”
My antenna went up. “What?”
“What what?”
“What do you want to talk to me about?”
“Oh, that.” Eliot let loose with a dismissive wave. “It’s nothing big. We’ll talk about it after the election. That’s going to take up most of your day and I know you won’t want to be far from the action. My old bed is still up there, so we can even sleep here if things go late.”
I narrowed my eyes. “Why do you need a bed in your office?”
“Because you tire me out and I need a lot of naps.” Eliot grinned. “Are you up for pizza and watching the election results with me?”
I nodded without hesitation. “Yeah. For now, though, I need to go to the clerk’s office. If I’m lucky, someone will have heard something.”
“Well, let’s hope you get lucky.” Eliot realized what he said after it was too late to take it back. “Actually, maybe we’ll both get lucky tonight, huh? That might be fun.”
“It will definitely be a first for me on election night because I’m generally with Marvin on those days,” I chortled. “I’ll text you if I get any information. We can meet up for lunch or something later.”
Eliot waved. “Sounds like a plan. I’ll see you then.”
DOWNTOWN BUSTLED with activity, but it was of the physical rather than intellectual sort as workers toiled to tear down the carnival and return Main Street to its normal appearance. I was mildly disappointed to see the junk food stands already gone, but I skirted around the workers after getting a few dirty looks and stuck to the sidewalk. I was in front of the clerk’s office within a few minutes, standing next to the parking lot entrance as I studied the assembled cars.
I wasn’t expecting Mary to be there – that would be pure lunacy – but I felt lost without somewhere to look. Loitering downtown and hoping someone in the clerk’s office would let something slip seemed a rotten way to spend a day.
“What are you doing down here?”
I jolted at the voice, turning to look over my shoulder. My stomach flipped due to a mixture of annoyance and exhaustion when I realized Aiken was going to help me start out the day with a potential migraine … and definite acid reflux.
“I was going to ask you the same thing.” I turned back to the parking lot. “I would’ve thought you’d be making the rounds today. Don’t you have babies to kiss and service clubs to visit? Isn’t that what most politicians do right before an election?”
“I have all those things scheduled.” Aiken’s expression was hard to read as he stared at the same parking lot I did. I expected him to be excited about the final push, but he seemed more muted than anything else. “I had a few other things to finish up before I can return to my regularly scheduled life.”
That was one of the oddest statements I’d ever heard, and the look I shot Aiken was full of questions. “I don’t know what that means.”
“I’m sure you don’t.” Aiken folded his arms over his chest. “You must be proud of yourself.”
The change in topic caught me off guard. “That’s kind of a loaded statement,” I offered. “I’m often proud of myself. So far this morning, though, the only thing I’ve done to
be proud about is the fact that I ate my weight in breakfast foods and made plans with my boyfriend for naughty time while watching the election results tonight.”
I had no idea why I overshared that way. I didn’t know Aiken, but I recognized that the tidbit would make him uncomfortable. He so often filled me with discomfort it only seemed fair. The way he squirmed told me I was right – not that I take pride in that or anything – and he shifted from one foot to the other as he made a huffing sound.
Since the moment I’d met him he’d bothered me. He crawled under my skin and made me uncomfortable. It was something that would probably never dwindle, and I would simply have to get used to it.
“Well, at least you have a plan.” Aiken’s smile was flat and uninspired. “I had a plan, you know.”
His tone caused the hair on the back of my neck to stand on end. It wasn’t the same amiable but condescending tone he often used when talking to me. This was something different.
“Oh, yeah?” I cocked an eyebrow as I glanced back to Main Street. The carnival workers remained but they weren’t looking in our direction. They also weren’t close enough to help should Aiken go crazy, which seemed to be exactly the direction he was leaning. “What was your plan?”
“I was going to be governor.”
Despite my unease, I couldn’t help being intrigued. I fixed my full attention on Aiken so I would be ready if he made a move on me. “Governor, huh? How do you figure that?”
“It was going to start here.” Aiken gestured toward the county building. “I was going to serve two years as a county commissioner. Then I was going to run for mayor of the city. Then I was going to run for a county office, either executive or prosecutor … I hadn’t decided which. I wanted to put forth a ‘tough on crime’ campaign. People love those.”
He looked almost whimsical.
“You’re talking about things in the past tense,” I noted. “Why?”
“The sheriff stopped in to see me last night. It seems the clerk was helping a candidate hide funds and she took off to a tropical location before telling him which candidate.”
“I heard.” I struggled to maintain my sense of calm even though something warned me I was walking a very fine line. “I was shocked by the news. Mary always seemed so … diligent. To go out this way will be a real smear on her reputation.”
Aiken turned haughty. “How so? What did she really do?”
“Helped a candidate launder money through his financial accounts.”
“That’s such an ugly word. Launder, I mean. It seems a bit of an exaggeration.”
“It’s the correct word.”
“I don’t happen to believe so.” Aiken was firm. “Our taxes are already out of control. If money is going to be used for an election – or for multiple elections – why does it matter when or how it’s moved into an account?”
“I guess you’ll have to talk to those pesky election finance people for an answer to that,” I replied. “I’m not up on the hows or whys.”
“No, and yet you somehow found the documents.” Aiken was back to being grim. “I would like to know how you did that.”
It was him. I should’ve known. I always suspected him. I was the only one, though. Jake and Eliot told me I was overreacting – quite frankly they told me that daily and it was rarely true – but I knew there was something off about Aiken. I wasn’t remotely surprised he was the culprit. I was, however, surprised by his reaction … and the fact that he bothered to track me down when he should be fleeing.
“I didn’t find the documents.” There was no reason to lie. We were out in the open. If Aiken opted to attack I’d have no choice but to defend myself. Hopefully I could do it long enough – well enough – to hold out until the workers on the street ran over to help. That was my only option at the moment.
“You clearly found them somehow,” Aiken pressed.
“Honestly, I didn’t. I mean … I found them in a bush, but that was a fluke because I was trying to avoid a fight with my boyfriend. I didn’t even know I had anything until the following day. Even then, I didn’t know how good it was for a long time after that. Until just now, I still didn’t know who I was dealing with.”
“Really?” Aiken was intrigued. “Who else did you consider a suspect?”
“Truthfully, Justice was my main suspect because she had relatives popping up all over the election landscape,” I replied. “Her daughter was working for Tad’s campaign and her cousin worked in the clerk’s office. She seemed the obvious choice. Plus, well, she was a little intense.”
“And what turned you off her?”
“Her cousin works in records and deeds and had no access to election documents. And she was far too gleeful when I questioned her about the campaign fund misappropriation,” I answered. “She wanted to nail one of you guys, which made me realize it couldn’t possibly be her. She’s not that good an actress.”
“Yes, well, I agree with you there.”
Aiken tapped his fingers on his chin, causing me to jolt. He didn’t look to have a weapon, but I was keenly aware of his presence, and past experience with madmen taught me that they could strike at the oddest of times.
“Even then you didn’t know it was me,” Aiken continued. “I guess I’m a little surprised. You never seemed to like me, and I assumed I was always your top choice. Perhaps my ego gets in the way where you’re concerned. That’s an interesting tidbit to file away for extended thought later.”
I tilted my head, considering the statement. “I guess it’s fair to say I never liked you. You didn’t imagine that.”
“And why is that?”
“Because I recognized from the start what you were. You were a bigot hiding behind doubletalk and money. You thought you would be elected and no one would ever know how you really felt about poor people … and black people … and whatever other minority you happen to hate.”
“I’m not very fond of women,” Aiken admitted. “Especially right now.” His eyes gleamed when they locked with mine, making my discomfort grow.
“If Jake questioned you, why are you here?”
“He’s waiting to get a warrant. I know it’s only a matter of time before he comes after me. I had a few errands to run before my arrest. I was hoping to avoid a scene on election day … but that doesn’t seem to be an option.”
“Jake questioned you?”
“He wouldn’t tell me exactly what he had, but I could see the disappointment in his eyes and understood that he was trying to reconcile our friendship with the information he had coming in,” Aiken supplied. “He will come for me today. He didn’t say so, but it’s what he left unsaid that I find most interesting. The promise was in the silence.”
“Oh, that was almost poetic.” I rubbed the back of my neck. “What kind of defense are you going to use?”
“Ignorance.”
“That should go over well.”
“I’m hoping so.” Aiken kept his gaze on the parking lot. “You said you found the documents in a bush. How did they end up there?”
“Terry Brucker.” I stumbled over the name as I uttered it. “He had the financial documents because Tad somehow got his hands on them. I’m still not certain how.”
“I see. I was told that Mr. Brucker’s documents were all accounted for after his death.”
My skin crawled thanks to the easy manner in which Aiken talked about the man he had murdered. Oh, I knew he wasn’t the type to get his hands dirty, get up the gumption to pull the trigger himself, but he clearly hired someone to kill the young college student. “Apparently not.” I licked my lips. “You’ll have to turn over the guy you hired to kill Brucker and go after me if you want a deal.”
“Was that where I made my fatal mistake?” Aiken asked. “I wasn’t trying to kill you that night. I simply wanted to frighten you. I can’t help but wonder if that’s what turned you against me. Or perhaps it was the note I left on your windshield that night at your family’s restaurant. That was meant as a warnin
g. I didn’t want things to turn ugly for you.”
Even though he said the words in a calm manner, I knew he was lying. Rage bubbled beneath his calm countenance and he was ready to strike. I could feel it. “The conversation we had at the last festival when you made your opinion of black people known is what turned me against you,” I clarified. “You thought you were slick, but I could see beneath the veneer.”
“Despite that, don’t you think I’m a better candidate than everyone else?”
He had to be joking. “No.”
“Not even Mr. Ludington?”
“A slug is a better candidate than Tad,” I said. “You’re below the slug, though. Tad may be a lowlife pervert with a dried-up raisin for a heart, but he’s not a murderer.”
“I didn’t want to kill Mr. Brucker,” Aiken offered. “I had no choice. The boy was trying to blackmail me for the documents. He wanted money in return for his silence. I knew if I paid once I’d be paying for the rest of my life. I couldn’t allow that.”
That was the final piece of the puzzle I was looking for. “I wondered about that. Brucker must’ve realized what was going to happen shortly before he died. He had the foresight to hide the documents in the bushes. Sure, he couldn’t guarantee they would be discovered, but he thought ahead.”
“Yes, he was definitely smarter than I anticipated. He split the documents in half and let my associate see him dump that set of paperwork. The important set, though – the one you found – he managed to hide when no one was looking. I can’t believe he managed to pull it off.” Aiken ran this thumb over his bottom lip, his eyes cloudy. “What do you think will happen to me?”
“I think you’ll get a deal if you roll over on the actual triggerman. You’ll still get at least twenty years in prison. You won’t make it to the governor’s mansion either.”
“No. That’s a pity. I had big plans for moving Michigan forward.”
I remembered the dark words he said the day of the other festival. “Somehow I think we’ll be better off in the past if you’re the future.”
“Yes, well.” Aiken heaved out a sigh. “I guess I should be going.”
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