Killer Campaign (Lisa Chance Cozy Mysteries Book 3)

by Estelle Richards

  Lisa bit her lip. “Sorry, but we’re not actually here to join the protest.”

  “Oh. Hmph. What about muffins? Did you bring more of those muffins?”

  Lisa spread her hands out. “I don’t have a single crumb on me. I wish I had thought of it.”

  Olivia nodded solemnly. “An army travels on its stomach.”

  Lisa gave her aunt a quick hug and took Mo’s hand to go inside. Behind her, Olivia lifted a megaphone to her mouth.

  “Hey hey, ho ho, Bargain Box has got to go!” she chanted, trying to stir up the wilted crowd of protesters.

  As Lisa and Mo were approaching the doors, a sleek black car pulled up at the curb and let out a passenger. Lisa recognized her customer from earlier, Ryan Regent, from his leather jacket and the aviator sunglasses he was still wearing.

  A ripple of anger flowed through the crowd, who started to boo and hiss as he passed.

  “Corporate vermin!”

  “We know who you are!”

  “Moss Creek won’t be another one of Bargain Box’s victims!”

  Ryan compressed his lips into a firm line and ignored the taunts as he strode past the crowd to the front door.

  Mo opened the door to let Lisa go inside, and they were both surprised when Ryan slipped past her to go in first. Lisa and Mo exchanged a look. Lisa shrugged. They followed Ryan into City Hall, letting the heavy door swing shut and muffle the protesters’ shouts.

  Lisa peered around the foyer of City Hall. The Depression era look continued inside in the form of tile mosaic work on the floor depicting the arrival of the town’s founders in covered wagons, surrounded by ponderosa pines.

  A sign indicated the room where the City Council would meet, and Lisa and Mo pushed the door open and crept inside. The room reminded Lisa of a miniature version of the high school auditorium. A conference table and chairs sat on a raised platform at one end of the room, with rows of stackable chairs facing the platform. To the left of the door through which Lisa and Mo had entered, a long table held a coffee pot and water pitcher, a sleeve of cups, and a tray of cookies.

  Lisa cast an eye at the tray of cookies and noted they were from the supermarket. She wondered if the council might prefer muffins from a local business, and whom she could ask. She took two cups and filled them with water before handing one to Mo and looking for seats. They settled on a pair of seats by the aisle in the third row. Only a smattering of chairs were filled.

  A door next to the raised platform opened, and the city council members spilled out into the room, along with the mayor. Lisa recognized the city councilors from their campaign posters.

  Charlene Albert and Herbert Rogerson walked side by side, bickering amiably. Each was a party stalwart, one from either party, and she knew from the local paper that they had a record of never once in twenty years voting the same way on any proposal put before the city council.

  The third councilor, independent and swing vote Bennett Parsons, walked a few steps behind them, listening in on their bickering and shaking his head every so often.

  The mayor, Ethan Valentine, resplendent in his usual expensively tailored suit, was flanked by a younger man with a clipboard. Mayor Valentine nodded absently as his assistant briefed him from the notes on the clipboard.

  After a minute, the mayor waived off his assistant and took a seat in the center of the table on the platform. The assistant stood in the back corner of the little stage, watching the proceedings attentively. The overhead light glinted off his highly polished shoes. Lisa made a note to herself to talk to him about a possible muffin order after the meeting.

  The city council members took their seats at the table, and the mayor gaveled the meeting to order. The meeting began with the reading of the minutes of the previous meeting. Lisa’s mind started to wander. She leaned over to whisper in Mo’s ear.

  “Do you know when they get to the part where we can speak?”

  He gave a half shrug and whispered back, “I think it’s at the end.”

  Lisa sighed and tried not to slump in her chair. She didn’t want to give the city council a bad impression of herself just before asking for the money for the spay and neuter clinic.

  They finished with the minutes and moved on to a discussion of garbage trucks. Herbert Rogerson argued that the present trucks had at least two more years of use in them. Almost before the words had left his mouth, Charlene Albert jumped in with a passionate rebuttal, claiming the town had a dire need to procure replacement trucks. They volleyed the topic back and forth until Bennett Parsons moved to request a maintenance report on the trucks from the truck operators and table the discussion until the following month.

  The council moved on to the next order of business. Lisa suppressed a yawn, expecting another tedious argument about minutia. When Ryan Regent was invited to speak, Lisa sat up in surprise.

  “Good evening. I’m Ryan Regent. I’m here in the lovely community of Moss Creek to speak on behalf of the Bargain Box Corporation. We have studied the—”

  Before he could utter another word, the doors in the back of the room burst open and the protesters swarmed in. Olivia led them in her chant against Bargain Box. Billy Jack stood beside her, yelling the chant, spittle flying.

  “Mr. Mayor,” Ryan said, waving a hand at the protesters.

  Mayor Valentine banged the gavel again and again. The protesters ignored him and chanted louder. The mayor turned briefly to his assistant, who pulled out a cell phone and made a call.

  Ryan folded his arms and sneered at the protesters.

  Billy Jack threw down his sign and charged forward, grabbing for the microphone in front of Ryan. The microphone squealed with feedback as they tussled for control of it.

  In between piercing squeals, Lisa could hear snippets like, “Dirty hippie!” and “Corporate pig!” being traded back and forth.

  The mayor banged his gavel some more, then snapped his fingers at his assistant, who pocketed the phone and rushed off the platform. He wrestled with Billy Jack, yanking the microphone away from him and marching him out of the room.

  Chapter 5

  For a minute, nobody moved. Silence ruled the room until someone coughed, someone else shuffled a piece of paper, and the spell was broken.

  Ryan Regent resumed his smooth corporate speech, telling Moss Creek what a fine location it would make for a new Bargain Box megastore.

  After he finished, Herbert Rogerson and Charlene Albert each asked him a question as a preamble to another round of bickering with each other. Bennett Parsons once again moved to get more information and table the discussion until the following meeting. Lisa wondered if every city council meeting went exactly this way, and if it did, how they ever got anything done.

  At last the mayor called for citizens to line up at the microphone if they wished to speak for up to two minutes. Mo nudged Lisa, and she stood up and got in line.

  After listening to a demand for a stricter noise ordinance, a complaint about raccoons, and a rambling account of alien abductions and government cover-ups, it was Lisa’s turn.

  “Mr. Mayor, City Council members, my name is Lisa Chance. I’m here tonight to ask for your help with an important problem in the town of Moss Creek. Every spring, many litters of unwanted puppies and kittens are born, putting a strain on public animal welfare resources. Many of those unwanted animals turn feral, become public nuisances, or even cause accidents on our roads.

  “While local rescue groups try to foster and adopt out these animals, many of them have to be put down. But we can do something about this annual cycle. An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure. If we could hold a free spay and neuter clinic, we could provide that ounce of prevention.

  “Dr. Morris, the veterinarian at Moss Creek Veterinary, is willing to volunteer his time to this spay and neuter clinic, but he needs funding to make the project happen. We’ve prepared a flier with budget information.” She held up a handful of fliers.

  Mayor Valentine smiled blandly at her. “Thank
you, Miss Chance. Is there anyone else waiting to speak?”

  One of the protesters elbowed his way past Lisa to the microphone and started a rant about the evils of the Bargain Box Corporation.

  Lisa blinked, waiting for someone to address her funding request or at least take the budget fliers.

  The ranting protester waved his arms in the air, making it clear that he believed in deodorant about as much as he believed in Bargain Box. Lisa moved away from the microphone stand and slunk back to her seat.

  Mo took her hand and squeezed it. “You were great,” he whispered.

  “They didn’t say anything, though. They didn’t even take the fliers,” she said.

  “We’ll just hang around until the meeting is done and give them the fliers then. How could they say no to the chance to help animals?”

  Lisa smiled at him. Mo would never turn down the chance to help an animal, but she wasn’t so sure the mayor or the city council felt the same way.

  When the last citizen finished speaking, the mayor gaveled the meeting closed. Lisa and Mo stood up to go hand out the fliers. Before they could get halfway up the aisle, the mayor and the councilors scooted off the platform and out the door next to it.

  Lisa and Mo looked at each other, perplexed.

  “I would have thought politicians would hang out and press the flesh afterwards,” Lisa said.

  Mo nodded. “Me too.”

  “I wonder if that means the rumor is true,” Lisa mused.

  “What rumor?”

  “That Ethan Valentine isn’t planning to run for reelection this fall.”

  “I hadn’t heard that.”

  “It’s just something my mother said.”

  Mo wrinkled his brow. “Should we go after them? Try to find them?”

  Lisa looked around the room. A cluster of people stood by the refreshment table at the back, and no one was guarding the door the politicians had used to leave. She took a step in that direction.

  “Yes,” she said.

  “Maybe I should stay here in case they come back.”

  “Ok, see you soon.” Lisa went to the door and tried the handle, expecting it to be locked. To her surprise, the door opened easily.

  She stepped through into an empty hallway. At the end of the hallway a red exit sign glowed above a door. She went to the door and peaked through the window. The door led to a small parking area behind the building. A Mercedes with a Valentine For Mayor bumper sticker was just pulling out of the otherwise empty lot. Lisa sighed and went back to the auditorium.

  Mo was standing next to the refreshment table, munching on a cookie. Lisa walked up to him and brushed some crumbs off his sleeve.

  “Any luck?” he said.

  She shook her head. “They slipped out the back before I got there.”

  “I had a little.”

  “Luck?”

  He nodded. “The mayor’s assistant came by the cookie table and I gave him a budget flier.”

  Lisa recalled her wish to talk to the mayor’s assistant about muffins for the refreshment table. “Did he introduce himself? Is he still here?” She looked around at the dwindling crowd for the young man with the well-shined shoes.

  “His name is Dan Weston.” Mo looked around too. “I don’t see him.”

  “Oh, well. Let’s get going.”

  They made their way outside. The protesters had packed up their chairs and signs and coolers and gone home.

  A chilly March wind whipped across the town square, making Lisa shiver.

  “Are you cold?” Mo said.

  “A little.” Lisa pressed her lips together, wondering how she’d managed to leave the house without her coat in March.

  “You can have my jacket.”

  Before she could protest, he’d whipped off his jacket and placed it around her shoulders. She slipped her arms in the sleeves, savoring the warmth and inhaling the scent of Mo embedded in the soft fabric lining.

  “Thanks,” she said. “Are you ok without it?”

  “I’m warm-blooded. Don’t worry about me.”

  Lisa tucked her hands in the jacket pockets. She felt a scrap of paper in the right-hand pocket and pulled it out. It wasn’t the budget flier she was expecting.

  “What’s this?” she said, stopping under a street lamp to look at the paper.

  “A receipt, maybe?” Mo said.

  Lisa unfolded the paper. “It’s a note,” she said.

  They peered at it together. “If you want to talk funding, come to 347 Pine Grove Circle tomorrow at 10pm,” the note said. It was unsigned.

  Lisa turned the paper over, looking for more information. She looked up at Mo. “Where did this come from?”

  His mouth opened and closed as he shook his head slowly from side to side. “I have no idea.”

  The wind blew frigid air across the square, making Lisa shiver inside Mo’s jacket. “Let’s get back to the Folly and really look this over,” she said.

  They held hands and trotted across the square and back to the Folly. As always, seeing the lovely 1870s house lit up to welcome her home warmed Lisa’s spirit.

  They went inside and climbed the stairs to Lisa’s second floor apartment. Lisa set about making them cocoa while Mo sat at the kitchen table turning the note over and over in his hands.

  The warm mugs ready, Lisa sat down at the table with him. Fragrant steam rose through the little piles of marshmallows. Mama Cat appeared in the doorway and sauntered over to jump into Mo’s lap.

  Lisa reached for the note. “May I?”

  Mo handed it over.

  “Nothing special about the paper. No name. You really have no idea where it came from?”

  “All I know is I didn’t put it there,” Mo said.

  “Well, it mentions the funding, so I think that means it was put there tonight at the meeting.”

  Mo nodded slowly. “I’m fairly certain it wasn’t in my pocket when we got there.”

  “Did anyone brush up against you?”

  Mo shrugged. “Plenty of people, I suppose. It got pretty crowded around that cookie table.”

  Lisa sipped her cocoa. “I guess there’s only one way to find out who it’s from.”

  Mo raised his eyebrows inquisitively.

  “We’ve got to go to that address tomorrow night.”

  “We?” Mo’s eyes widened. “Babe, doesn’t that seem kind of risky?”

  Lisa stood up and paced the length of the little kitchen, then looked out the window at the darkness. She sighed. “I guess so. But aren’t you curious?”

  “It could be a set-up. Like those muggers who used Pokémon Go to lure people to secluded locations and rob them.”

  Lisa laughed. “Pokémon Go?”

  “It was on the news.”

  “But what if someone really is willing to fund the spay and neuter clinic?” Lisa said.

  “Why would they slip me an anonymous note? Why not just talk to me?”

  “I don’t know,” Lisa said. “All I know is we could help a lot of animals if this funding comes through.”

  Mo came to the window and stood behind Lisa. He put his arms around her and kissed the top of her head. “If you really think I should go, then I guess I should go.”

  Chapter 6

  The next morning, Lisa was serving coffee when her aunt came in, a wild look in her eye.

  “I’ll need my coffee to go. And two muffins,” Olivia said, pacing back and forth.

  “Is everything ok?” Lisa said, putting the muffins in a bag.

  Olivia stopped and stared at her. “You were there last night. You know it’s not ok!”

  Lisa cocked her head. “What do you mean?”

  Olivia resumed her pacing. “I can’t believe my own son arrested him.”

  “Arrested whom?”

  “Billy Jack, of course!”

  “He was arrested?” Lisa said. “I only saw him removed from the meeting.”

  “We were both betrayed by family,” Olivia said, smacking her fist in
to her palm and shaking her head.

  “Is Billy Jack related to Toby somehow?”

  “No. But that snake, Dan Weston, is.”

  “Dan Weston, the mayor’s assistant? I didn’t know he was related to Toby.”

  “No, aren’t you listening? Dan Weston is related to Billy Jack. He called the police on his own family.”

  Olivia followed Lisa back to the kitchen, still pounding her fist in her palm. Lisa poured the coffee.

  “Are they father and son, or…?”

  Olivia shook her head. “Second cousins, I think. Once removed. Or maybe twice. But still, family.”

  “I’m sure he was just doing his job.”

  Olivia glowered at her. “So were the Nazis.” She leaned forward to hug her niece before taking the coffee and muffins.

  “Toby is hardly a Nazi,” Lisa protested.

  “Toby is my son and I love him, but if he sides with the likes of the Bargain Box Corporation, I just don’t know,” Olivia said, shaking her head.

  “What’s he been up to? I haven’t seen much of him lately.”

  “Other than arresting my special friend? I don’t know. Some kind of big investigation has been keeping him busy.”

  “Sounds exciting,” Lisa said.

  The bell on the front door jingled to announce the arrival of another customer.

  “I should get back to work,” Lisa said.

  “I have to go bail Billy Jack out now. I still can’t believe my own son would treat me this way,” Olivia muttered as she left the café.

  *

  By 9:45 that evening, Lisa’d had time to rethink the plan to go to the address on the anonymous note. Mo arrived at the Folly dressed all in black. Lisa opened the door before he could knock.

  “What are you supposed to be?” she said, seeing his attire.

  He smoothed his sleeve and pulled back the hood of his sweatshirt. “I wanted to be prepared.”

  “Are you a cat burglar now in addition to a cat doctor?”

  “We don’t know what I’ll find at that address.”