She huffed out a breath. “Honestly, Owen. You make me sound like a walking talking disaster.”
“Well, I’m sorry you feel that way, but I’m only looking out for you.”
“In case you hadn’t noticed, I’m a fully grown adult. I can take care of myself.”
His dubious expression said otherwise, but Owen didn’t rise to the bait. “I’ll see you around,” he murmured. A brief nod at Becky, and then he sauntered away.
Becky made a ‘tch’ sound at the back of her throat. “Aw, isn’t that sweet? The man’s worried about you.”
“That’s not sweet. It’s annoying.”
A dimple appeared in Becky’s cheek. “There’s definitely something going on between you two. Too bad you’re both too stubborn to admit it.”
***
By noon the yard sale was over, and the stall holders were busy packing up. Emma surveyed her mostly empty table with some satisfaction. By slashing her prices in the final hour, she’d managed to sell almost all of her goods and had netted almost a thousand dollars. The local business council would be pleased about the extra funding. It wouldn’t take long to pack up the remaining goods, and then, as instructed, she would drop them off at the local thrift store.
As she bent down to retrieve the boxes underneath the tables, she caught sight of a large green-and-yellow shopping bag resting between two cartons. Pulling it out, she heaved a deep sigh. This was Faye’s shopping bag; she was sure of it. She distinctly remembered seeing it clutched in Faye’s hands when the older woman had blocked Emma from inspecting it. And now, after all that, it appeared Faye had forgotten the bag altogether.
Before she could resist, Emma opened it and peeked inside. A hodgepodge of items lay there, including some she recalled putting out for sale. Shutting the bag, she rose to her feet and scanned the immediate vicinity, but there was no sign of a short, auburn-haired woman. Only tired stall holders remained, clearing up and eager to go home. She was tired, too, and home was calling. Faye Seymour lived about five blocks away from her, so she could easily drop the bag off on her way home.
Decision made, she hurried through her remaining tasks. She packed the unsold goods into a box, broke down the empty cartons, and loaded everything into her car. A few minutes past one pm, with the leftover stock deposited at the thrift store, she pulled up outside Faye’s house.
Faye lived in a solid brick California bungalow painted white with blue trim. The front yard was regimentally neat with clipped lawns and tidy shrubs, the driveway swept clear. The entire property was spick and span, not a leaf or blade of grass out of place. Emma had never been inside the house; as a kid she’d avoided knocking on that particular door at Halloween, preferring to forego the candy rather than be trapped by Faye’s garrulous tongue. Faye had lived here for as long as Emma could remember. She vaguely recalled that the house had belonged to Faye’s parents, and Faye, being single, had remained, while her sister Lorraine had moved out when she got married.
The hot afternoon sun beat down on Emma’s head as she climbed out of her car and walked up the path to the house, the green-and-yellow shopping bag under her arm. Faye’s beige, late model Honda stood in the driveway, and behind the screen door, the front door stood open, indicating she was at home.
“Hello, Faye,” Emma called out as she rang the bell next to the screen door. No answer came back. She knocked and called out again, with the same result. Faye must be out the back.
She descended the porch steps and made her way around the house. The lot was larger than she’d realized. On this side of the property were several well-tended peach trees, each of them heavy with fruit, which were greenish yellow at the moment, a few weeks off their peak. She followed the brick path that meandered through the peach trees. The severe tidiness of Faye’s yard seemed to rebuke the sprawling messiness of the neighboring property. Purple lantana smothered a side fence, threatening to overwhelm it and explode onto Faye’s side. Gaps in the sagging paling revealed a yard choked by rampant weeds, shrubs, and building detritus.
A muffled cry rose in the air. Emma glanced up. Had it come from the back of the house? She took off running, the shopping bag bumping against her hip. She rounded the house. Here, the land sloped away from the house. A flight of wooden stairs led up to a rear deck. At the foot of the stairs lay a crumpled figure, the auburn hair, beige slacks, and sensible shoes instantly recognizable.
“Faye!” Emma ran to the woman and dropped to her knees beside her.
Faye sprawled face-first on the grass, one foot on the bottom stair, arms spread out as if she had tried to break her fall. She must have tripped and tumbled down those wooden stairs. Her left foot seemed to be wrenched at a strange angle. Emma gingerly touched her shoulder, fearful of moving her and causing further injury.
“Faye?” she murmured. “Can you hear me?”
The woman didn’t stir. Near her head was a stone urn filled with flowering petunias, its rim decorated with a few smears of blood. Faye must have hit her head against the urn. Emma’s heart thumped a little harder. Surely Faye couldn’t be…dead?
Then, a sudden rustling in the yard had her staring wide-eyed over her shoulder. The bushes bordering the edge of the property vibrated, but there was barely any breeze on this stifling hot afternoon. Could it be a dog, maybe? Or a person?
Faye uttered a weak groan. Relief flooded Emma as the old woman shifted and slowly rolled onto her side. At least she wasn’t dead, though that nasty cut on the forehead looked serious.
“Faye, thank God you’re alive.” Her hands shook as she fumbled in her purse for her cell phone.
The elderly lady’s eyes flickered open. She looked dazed and bewildered. “My…ankle,” she moaned.
“Don’t worry. I’m dialing 911. Help will be here soon.”
Faye’s gaze focused on Emma, and her face twisted.
“Emma Cassidy!” she barked out, her voice quavering but determined. “You pushed me down the stairs. You tried to kill me!”
Emma gaped in horror, too stunned to speak. Before she could utter a protest, Faye’s eyelids fluttered close, and she slid into unconsciousness.
Chapter Seven
Two paramedics arrived, and Emma could have kissed them. Less than ten minutes had passed since she’d put in the call, but every one of those minutes had crawled by at a snail’s pace. She had spent those minutes alternating between hovering at Faye’s side and dashing to the front of the house to check if help had arrived.
Now, the paramedics followed Emma to the back of the house where Faye’s comatose figure lay. After her initial accusatory outburst, she had drifted in and out of consciousness, unaware of Emma’s presence. Despite the heat, Emma had grabbed a picnic blanket off the rear deck and spread it over Faye, thinking it might help with the shock. The paramedics began to examine Faye, working calmly and methodically.
“Is she going to be all right?” Emma asked, unable to bear the suspense any longer.
“We’ll know more when we get her to the hospital,” the older, salt-and-pepper-haired paramedic replied. “Are you her daughter?”
“Oh, no. Just a…um, friend.” The description wasn’t strictly true, but then she didn’t know how to quantify her relationship with Faye. “She has a sister, Lorraine. I’ll let her know.” She rubbed her upper arms as she thought about Lorraine and her likely reaction to the news. This wasn’t a call she looked forward to.
The two men loaded Faye onto a gurney and transferred her into the ambulance. Minutes later, they drove off. They hadn’t put on the siren, Emma noted, which must be good sign, right?
A few curious bystanders had gathered outside the house. A woman in shorts and gardening gloves walked purposefully up to Emma.
“Hi. I’m from next door.” She waved to the newish, double-story house on the other side of Faye’s. “What happened to the old lady?”
“Looks like she fell down the stairs of her deck,” Emma replied.
“Oh, that’s too bad.” The
neighbor pulled a sympathetic face. “Are you her daughter?”
“No, no.” Once more Emma shook her head. “I was just dropping something off when I found Faye.”
“Ah, yes. Faye Seymour, that’s her name, I remember now.” As if sensing Emma’s curiosity, the woman added, “My husband and I only moved in a few weeks ago. I’m Celine.”
“Nice to meet you, Celine. I’m Emma. So you don’t know Faye too well?”
Celine shook her head. “Not really. Mrs. Seymour did drop in last week with some cookies. So neighborly of her, but, well…” Her polite grimace indicated Faye’s neighborly zeal had been a little on the strong side. “Mark and I both work long hours, so we aren’t at home very often,” she added almost apologetically. “Well, I’d better get back to my gardening. I do hope she’ll be all right.” With a brisk wave, she retreated to her house.
The other neighbors had melted away too, leaving Emma alone and feeling rather shaky and wound up. After all the drama, she was more than ready to go home, but something nagged at her. She retraced her steps to the backyard. The picnic blanket lay tossed aside. The lawn looked a little trampled. Potted petunias and violets bloomed in the sunshine. Other than the bloodstains on the stone urn where Faye had hit her head, the yard seemed eerily peaceful. A shiver ran down Emma’s spine. She rolled her shoulders, irritated by her nervousness. What was wrong with her? Why was she so on edge?
Maybe because she could feel someone watching her.
She scanned the yard. The bushes over there…two eyes in a pale face stared at her. Anxiety prickled on her nape.
“Hello?” She took a few steps toward the bushes, determined not to be spooked. “Can I help you?”
The man—a ragged beard covered the lower half of his face—started, and then vanished, crashing through the bushes as if in fear of his life. For some reason Emma found herself running after him. She battled her way through the thicket, trying to see her way through the dense foliage. Beyond the bushes grew even more shrubbery, as thick and impenetrable as a tropical rainforest. That must be the property next door, and these bushes must form the boundary line.
She stopped to haul in a breath. The vegetation was so profuse and dusty she was beginning to feel suffocated. The man she had startled had disappeared long ago. No point in trudging after him. As she turned to retrace her steps, she caught sight of a matchstick lying on the ground. It was the kind you tore out of a matchbook, and from its clean appearance, it seemed it had been dropped fairly recently. Maybe by the man she’d spotted. Shrugging, she resumed forcing her way back to Faye’s yard.
Sweaty and grimy, she stumbled out of the bushes. A female police officer stood in front of her, legs spread apart, one hand resting on the revolver in her belt. She wrinkled her nose when she caught sight of Emma.
“Huh. Emma.”
Emma groaned silently. “Hey,” she replied, swiping the back of her hand across her damp brow. Trust Sherilee Ackerman to catch her looking disheveled and dirty.
She and Sherilee had a long history together, not much of it amicable. They’d both grown up in Greenville and gone to the same school. They might have been friends except they inevitably rubbed each other up the wrong way. Sherilee had always been a rule-follower, a humorless stickler in Emma’s opinion. It was inevitable that Sherilee had chosen a career in law enforcement. Emma didn’t mind that. In fact, a few months back Sherilee had rescued her from a crazed killer. Emma fully admitted that Sherilee was a competent cop. But that didn’t mean she had to like her. And judging by Sherilee’s expression, the feeling was mutual.
“What are you doing here?” Emma asked. When it came to Sherilee, she invariably and instinctively became terse.
“Doing my job. Did you call the ambulance for Faye Seymour?”
“Yes.” Emma walked to the deck stairs and took a seat on the second step. What did Sherilee mean by doing her job? Had Faye woken up and told someone that Emma had pushed her down the stairs? Is that why Sherilee was here? Anxiety jittered through her.
“I found her here.” She indicated the spot at the bottom of the stairs. “She must have tripped or lost her footing,” she added a little louder.
“Mm.” Sherilee made a noncommittal hum, her eyes never leaving Emma. Her uniform was crisp and clean, her hair smoothed back into a bun at the base of her neck. She even had lipstick and eyeliner, which made Emma feel more at a disadvantage, given her damp and disheveled appearance after her plunge through the bushes.
Sherilee transferred her attention to the deck. Bending over, she inspected the boards, testing each one for looseness. They were all smoothly finished and securely fastened. Sherilee motioned to Emma to stand up, and then went through the same procedure with each of the treads. Everything appeared nailed down. The wood was dry and clean of any water, oil, or other slippery substances.
Sherilee’s poker face and her continued silence began to wear on Emma’s nerves. What was the cop thinking? Did she suspect something sinister?
“Did you notice anyone hanging around when you got here?” Sherilee eventually asked.
Emma hesitated. “No, but…” The officer raised an eyebrow. “I think I heard something moving in the bushes.”
“Those bushes?” Sherilee tilted her head at the thicket that Emma had emerged from.
“Yeah. I don’t know what it was.”
“Why were you in there when I arrived?”
“Because I saw someone. A man—”
“A man?” Sherilee interrupted, eyes narrowing. “But you said you didn’t know what it was.”
“I heard something first, and then I saw the man later, after the paramedics took Faye.” Emma glared at Sherilee, nettled and irritated with herself. It might be standard procedure for Sherilee to treat her with suspicion, but why did she have to react so crankily every time? Why couldn’t she ignore the need for gamesmanship? “He’s probably the next door neighbor. I tried to talk to him, but he got spooked and vanished.”
“And you decided to run after him.” Sherilee lifted her hands and let them fall in an exasperated gesture. “You really shouldn’t meddle in a police investigation.”
“Investigation? So you think there’s been foul play?”
Sherilee shifted her feet and ran a finger under her collar. She seemed rather hot and annoyed; probably because Emma was getting under her skin. Well, at least the bad vibes weren’t one-sided.
“No, I don’t,” Sherilee huffed. “At this stage there’s no reason to think this is anything more than an unfortunate accident. But we’ll keep an open mind and see what Faye says when she wakes up.”
Perspiration broke out on Emma’s brow. What would Faye blurt out when she regained consciousness? Was she going to accuse Emma of pushing her down the stairs? That was attempted murder, wasn’t it? Her mouth suddenly dried.
“…Emma? Are you okay?”
Belatedly she realized that Sherilee was squinting at her, and she hastily tried to pin a bland expression on her face. “Uh, yeah. I’m just a little tired. I’ve had a long day at the yard sale. Soooo, guess now that you’re here, I can go.” She began to edge past Sherilee.
“Wait.” The frown had returned to Sherilee’s brow. Emma wiped a bead of sweat that trickled down her neck. “Why were you here in the first place? You’re not close friends with Faye.”
“Faye forgot her shopping bag at the yard sale. I was dropping it off on my way home.”
“Where’s the shopping bag?”
Oh God, where was the dratted thing? Emma glanced about the yard. “I can’t remember. I was in such a panic when I saw her lying there.”
The slight compression of Sherilee’s lip indicated skepticism. Damn, what had she done with the bag? Had she dropped it somewhere? Then, as she scanned the deck again, she spotted something green-and-yellow under the bench where she’d found the picnic blanket. She bounded up the stairs and retrieved the shopping bag.
“Here it is,” she said in relief as she handed it to Sherile
e.
The cop took a brief peek at the contents. “I’ll leave this inside and lock up the house. Then I’ll call her sister.” The hand mic on her shoulder crackled into life, a scratchy voice calling out something. Sherilee held up a finger at Emma before walking away to talk to the dispatcher. Moments later, she returned. “I have another call I need to get to. I’ll secure the property before I go, and I’ll come back later to talk to the neighbor, but can you do me a favor and tell Faye’s sister about the accident? You know Lorraine Atkins. You were always her favorite in art class.”
Emma had never thought herself a favorite of any teacher. What a strange thing for Sherilee to say.
“Sure, fine,” Emma said, eager to leave.
“You will remember to call Lorraine, won’t you?”
The Mom-tone in Sherilee’s voice made Emma feel thirteen again. “Sheesh, give me a break. What do you think I’m going to do? Forget about Lorraine and get my nails done instead for my hot date tonight?”
Not waiting for a reply, Emma walked off. There was no hot date for her tonight, but Sherilee didn’t have to know that.
Chapter Eight
“Oh my lord! Oh, no,” Lorraine moaned over and over.
Emma chewed her fingernail, wondering if it might have been better to drive over to Lorraine’s house instead of giving her the news over the phone. “I’m sure Faye is going to be all right. You know your sister. She’s a fighter.”
Lorraine let out a shaky breath. “Yes, she is. Hardly spent a day in hospital all her life. She doesn’t have a high opinion of doctors, you know.”
That was hardly a surprise. “The paramedics said they were taking her to County Hospital over in La Quinta.”
“County Hospital?” Another quavering exhale. “Oh, dear…”
Clearly Lorraine wasn’t coping well with the unexpected news. Emma was at home in the living room. She had the house to herself. A DVD was cued up on the television. A bowl sat ready to receive hot popcorn. The couch was calling to her. She cast a wistful glance at the couch and breathed out a silent sigh.
Pushed to the Limit (an Emma Cassidy Mystery Book 2) Page 5