Sleuthing Women II

by Lois Winston

  “Never heard of him,” said the second officer, a lean, younger man who was amusing himself righting the two wastebaskets and restoring their contents to them.

  Now my string was really short. “Not him. Her. Married to Mike Shandy.”

  That brought an immediate change of attitude, and I could hardly keep from smirking.

  “Oh, yeah, they got some trouble goin’ on, don’t they?”

  “You might say that.”

  He began to give orders, “Riley, check the back. See if you can find a jimmy or something out back. I’ll call for the print crew.”

  “Probably some homeless guy,” I echoed.

  After all, in the end, they couldn’t find anything. Even Mike said it was probably coincidental, but I asked why they chose our office? The accountant next door might have had cash.

  Kelly remained unconvinced, and even I doubted the little voice that told me the police were right. After all, did they expect to find Gracie in the office? A spare key to the house clearly labeled? An alarm code. Whoever broke in and left that mess wasn’t smart enough to think through finding something to use to kidnap the baby.

  Fear colors everything.

  Other than that one incident, our plan seemed to be working because business didn’t suffer. I was proud of my record—three houses undergoing renovation—Anthony said I was keeping an old man too busy—two houses sold in two weeks, and five new listings three of them re-dos and two in move-in condition. I shared daily bulletins with Kelly, asked her advice, encouraged her to call a few old clients. It was good distraction, I figure. I never knew how well it worked though because she’d hold Gracie in one hand and dial the phone with the other.

  ~*~

  Conroy came to give Kelly and Mike the DNA report on the cigarette in the back yard. “Nothing. Nada.” He was sprawled on the couch, as though he were in the privacy of his own home in a muscle shirt, drinking a beer. “Definitely not Hollister, but nobody the national database recognizes.”

  “What does that mean?” Kelly perched on the edge of her chair, nervous, as though ready to bolt. Gracie lay on a blanket on the floor, idly toying with a rubber something but not really playing.

  “Damned if I know what it means. Wasn’t Hollister, wasn’t anyone we can identify. Some stranger threw a cigarette butt into your yard—may have been in the yard, may have just pitched it over the fence, though high as that fence is, that seems unlikely. Who goes to all the trouble to throw a butt over a six-foot fence?”

  “Some deranged person” Kelly retorted, her voice harsh. “This is no help toward finding out who’s threatening Gracie, is it?”

  “No, ma’am. It’s not. We go another couple of days, and I’m gonna have to conclude it was a hoax and pull the protection.”

  Kelly bit her lip—I could see her do it. After a long minute, she spoke to Conroy as though she were trying to make a friend of him.

  “Buck, help me here. I don’t know what I think. A big part of me would love to believe this was all a hoax and the nightmare is over. We can go back to our lives and to being happy people. But that’s like swimming in water over my head—I’m afraid. And yet I don’t see anywhere for your investigation to go. No leads, no nothing. I keep coming back to Hollister. It’s got to be him, carrying a grudge.”

  Buck got almost fatherly, and I thought I’d drop my teeth. “Kelly, we haven’t given up yet. No, that butt was no help, but we’ll keep digging and looking for Hollister. You hang on a couple more days?”

  Tears were streaming down Kelly’s face, but she looked at him and nodded.

  Buck Conroy patted her head, said, “Atta girl,” and left. I’d have backhanded him, but Kelly just nodded. I thought sure the hell had frozen over if those two were now on friendly terms.

  After he left, I said, “It’s no hoax.” What I didn’t say was, “It’s Hollister.” But I knew that too. Mike and Kelly believed my sixth sense, but Conroy would have laughed or worse. I wasn’t offering him my insight.

  Two days. That’s all Conroy asked for. After his two days were up, the police presence disappeared from the Shandy property, except for Mike and that of course was different. He wasn’t out front patrolling the property.

  And then I saw the homeless man across the street.

  FIVE

  Though it was April and the days were warm, he wore a battered ski jacket and a wool cap pulled down over his ears so that no hair showed. His beard as brown and scruffy. He was seated on a curb across the street, the ubiquitous grocery cart beside him filled with what looked like an old sleeping bag and some dishes.

  I just happened to walk by the living room windows, with their sheer curtains, and glance out when he caught my eye. I don’t think he saw me, but he was staring directly at the Shandy house. Just sitting there, staring.

  Was it Bruce Hollister? I’d seen Bruce Hollister, mostly on TV, but my vision was of a tall, slim silver-haired man who dressed impeccably in custom-tailored suits. If this man was him, he seemed to have shrunk into himself, although it was hard to tell unless he stood up. And I couldn’t stay there and watch, because that would make Kelly ask what I was looking at. I wasn’t about to tell her someone was watching the house.

  On the pretext of the call of nature, I locked myself in the privacy of the bathroom and called Mike, whispering my message.

  He was terse, just said, “We’ll check it out.”

  Just our luck. The man had vanished by the time Mike came speeding up in his personal car. No black-and-white for him. Later, he told me that he drove the neighborhood, but we both knew that the homeless can vanish from sight in an instant. They disappear into alleys and backyards and dead-end street, knowing the map of the area better than most legitimate residents. No, you can’t get DNA from a metal grocery cart. At least not this one.

  Later Mike told me quietly he found an abandoned cart, empty, two blocks from the house. “We’ll never know, but it’s on the record. I told Buck.”

  My heart sank at the idea of Buck Conroy chasing down a homeless man based on my description. He wouldn’t exactly be gentle with whoever he decided looked like the man I’d described—and he looked to me like almost every homeless person I’d seen.

  ~*~

  That afternoon Maggie and Em had their first major fight, a sign of how deeply we were in real trouble. A real hair-pulling, pushing, shoving fight, not the quarrels, unhappy and loud but never physical, that I’d grown used to from them over the years.

  Lord knows what started those girls on a spat, but after I delivered them from school I stayed around, hoping for a peaceful glass of wine at the end of the day. Instead of peace, I got screaming and yelling. The moved from their bedrooms, where it had started, to the middle of the living room, facing off at each other. Gracie, no doubt frightened, screamed her head off, and Clyde added to the turmoil by barking.

  “Girls! Girls! You’re scaring the baby! Stop it this minute!”

  Maggie turned on her mom, in an unprecedented way, and screamed, “The baby! That’s all anyone around here cares about! The baby!”

  Kelly turned and fled to the kitchen, while the girls continued to quarrel, although they had turned the volume down. Talk about unprecedented! Their mother walked back into the room, carrying a glass of ice water, and while I watched, literally unable to move, she threw half the glass on each girl.

  Maggie and Em both went limp, as though paralyzed by the icy shock of the cold water. They stood, gaping at their mother and casting occasional, furtive glances at each other. Em saw me first and looked at me and then, quickly, at the carpet, as if embarrassed. Maggie’s eyes followed Em’s and she just stared at me. Was there defiance in those eyes? She turned and stalked off to her bedroom, only to be called back by her mom.

  “Maggie! Em! I’m going to enforce a rule from your early childhood. I want you to hug and apologize. Real hugs, no faking it. And a clearly spoken apology so both Keisha and I can hear. No mumbling. Then you may each go to your rooms until
I call you.”

  The apologies were almost sincere, but tinged with threats, “Don’t ever….,” and accusations, “You started it…” Nonetheless Kelly, busy holding Gracie and quieting her, was apparently satisfied for she dismissed the girls with a curt nod of her head.

  After a few minutes, I was settled on the couch with my long-anticipated glass of wine, but I wasn’t enjoying the peace and quiet as much as I’d expected. For this household, it was eerily quiet.

  Kelly walked in from the kitchen, holding the baby and a bottle. She thrust both at me, saying, “Here. I have to go visit with the girls.”

  Gracie and I had a long visit, during which she drank the bottle and fell asleep in my arms. I couldn’t help but look down at this precious bundle and think how much happiness she had brought at first and, lately, how much misery. Oh, it wasn’t her fault. She was an innocent victim herself, but because of her, this once-loving family was at each other’s throats.

  That’s where we were when Mike came in from work. “Keisha? Where’s Kelly? Give me my baby.”

  He reached out to take her out of my arms, but I said, “Mike Shandy, didn’t anyone ever tell you not to disturb sleeping babies and dogs?”

  Clyde lay at my feet, sleeping so peacefully that he let out an occasional snort.

  Mike grinned and took Gracie so gently that she never stirred in her sleep.

  Two members of the family and the dog are happy. It’s a start.

  I fetched—I use that word deliberately—a beer for him, poured myself another half glass of wine, and sat back down on the couch.

  “It’s strangely quiet,” Mike said, “What’s going on? Where are Kelly and the girls? Should I worry?”

  “Yeah, Mike, probably you should worry. The girls had a knock-down this afternoon, and Kelly’s in talking to each of them.”

  “A real fight?”

  “Hair-pulling, fists, the whole nine yards. Yessir.”

  “Not my girls. I don’t believe it.” He looked stricken.

  I just shrugged but Kelly came back about that time, saw Mike, and crumpled into the couch next to him. “We can’t go on this way, Mike. Let’s take the girls, Gracie, and move to Tahiti. Keisha will rent the house for us.”

  “Tahiti! Kelly O’Connell, what are you talking about?”

  “Not living under this tension,” she said, tears rolling down her face. “When my girls have a physical fight, I know it’s gone too far. It’s getting to all of us. Even you and me. We aren’t the people we were three or four months ago. We aren’t a couple—we’re just two people living under one roof with kids and a great big fear. That’s not living…and we have no idea when it will end.”

  In her hands, she knotted a soggy Kleenex. I replaced it with a fresh one and removed the old one. And then I slipped out of the house. Neither one noticed, but I knew there was a heavy discussion ahead, and they didn’t need me.

  And now Mike and I shared a frightening secret.

  ~*~

  Far as I could figure, Tahiti was still on the table the next morning when I went to pick up the girls for school, but at least there was no homeless man sitting on the curb. The front door was still barred, and I had to wait while someone took down Mike’s heavy safety boards. Inside the house the atmosphere was tense. I said hello and was greeted with mumbles. The girls were at the door, anxious to leave and be out of there.

  After dropping the girls at their schools, I circled back by the house. That day would find me driving by so often I thought sure Kelly would catch me. Guess she didn’t look out the window, but she did call. “Aren’t you coming over here?”

  I had deliberately stayed in the office ‘cause I had no idea what to say to her. Seemed to me nothin’ could make things any better, and it would be too easy to make them worse. And I guess a part of me was afraid would let something slip about the homeless man.

  Things gradually eased around the house over the next few days. Maggie and Em were subdued but obedient. Mike and I didn’t tell Kelly about the homeless man, though I kept careful watch—from both inside and outside the house, which meant I got in my car five times a day.

  And I saw him. Clearly casing the house. Three times. No matter how hard I looked, I couldn’t tell if it was Bruce Hollister, but I asked myself why any other homeless man would be staring at the house.

  Mike stopped by the office one morning, so we could talk about the man. “It makes sense that Hollister would be homeless, and I can believe he’d come back to Fort Worth. So that nails it—he’s the one sending threatening letters, and he’s watching the house. Kelly saw him this morning.”

  I dropped my coffee cup back on to my desk so hard it splashed all over my shirt front. “What did she say?”

  He looked perplexed. “She just asked how long he’d been there. Then she shrugged and said, ‘You could have told me. I’m prepared.’ I have no idea what that meant.”

  What it meant was that Kelly was packing her bags. I discovered that when I took the girls home after school. She was meticulously folding her clothes and Gracie’s tiny things. Apparently she meant to leave Mike and the girls behind. But she wouldn’t talk to me. She was sort of detached, as though she had left reality behind.

  Maggie and Em were busy getting themselves snacks and settling down to homework. They had no idea of the scary drama I was watching. I did what I always did—I texted Mike.

  But when he came home, our whole world changed.

  Bruce Hollister was dead. Found in a homeless camp, beaten to death probably by a fellow camper. The news caught all of us completely by surprise. My sixth sense had let me down this time. I didn’t have a clue.

  Kelly burst into tears. I guess they were tears of relief. When she finally stopped sobbing, she hovered over Gracie. “Now we’ll never know. We’ll live our entire lives in fear, not knowing if someone is still out there.”

  Mike wrapped his arms around her and said, “No, Kelly, it’s over. Hollister was the one. When they found him, he had on the same clothes as the man who watched the house.”

  “The homeless all look alike,” she protested. My Kelly, the girl I loved, hadn’t come back yet. I wondered how Mike felt.

  ~*~

  Slowly a few days later the story came out, because the homeless, like everyone else, have a grapevine. There’s always someone who will talk. Seems Hollister hung out with another homeless guy called Cowboy. They hauled Cowboy in—he’s an addict so they take anything he says with a healthy dose of doubt. But, per Conroy via Mike, Hollister promised Cowboy a lot of money, said he had a plan. From Cowboy’s ramblings, they are pretty sure it was the kidnapping scheme. They’re running DNA to see if he’s a match for the ransom notes or the cigarette butt. I doubt that. It’s probably random.”

  Kelly was silent. “I don’t know that I can live with random. I’ll still be looking under every bush, around every corner. I’ll never let Gracie out of my sight.”

  She would eventually. I knew it, and so did she. But it would take time. This trauma would not disappear from their lives either quickly or easily. How badly they were all scarred, including Maggie and Em, remained to be seen.

  Bruce Hollister no longer walks this earth, but I believe he knows he got his revenge. Fear may the mightiest revenge known to man. Now my task if to help Mike, Kelly, and those precious girls bring bright colors back into their lives.

  ~*~

  Follow Kelly O’Connell’s adventures in Skeleton in a Dead Space, No Neighborhood for Old Women, Trouble in a Big Box, Danger Comes Home, Deception in Strange Places, and Desperate for Death.

  About the Author

  In addition to the Kelly O’Connell Mysteries, award-winning novelist Judy Alter is the author of the Blue Plate Café Mysteries—Murder at the Blue Plate Café, Murder at the Tremont House and Murder at Peacock Mansion. With the 2014 The Perfect Coed, she introduced the Oak Grove Mysteries. That series continues with the September 2017 publication of Pigface and The Perfect Dog. In 2016, she return
ed to her Chicago roots to write the historical novel, The Gilded Cage, which uses one unusual woman’s life to examine social structure and labor relations in the late 19th Century.

  Judy’s historical fiction, stories of women of the nineteenth-century American West, and her mysteries are available in print and ebook on several platforms. Retired after twenty years as director of a small academic press, Judy is single parent of four and grandparent of seven. She lives in Texas, sharing her cozy cottage with her Bordoodle, Sophie.

  Connect with Judy at the following sites:

  Email: j.alter@tcu.edu

  Website: http://www.judyalter.com

  Judy’s Stew blog: http://www.judys-stew.blogspot.com

  Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/Judy-Alter-Author-366948676705857/

  Twitter: https://twitter.com/JudyAlter

  Sign up for Judy’s newsletter: http://www.judyalter.com

  Books by Judy Alter

  Blue Plate Café Mysteries

  Murder at The Blue Plate Café

  Murder at The Tremont Inn

  Murder at Peacock Mansion

  Oak Grove Mysteries

  The Perfect Coed

  Pigface and The Perfect Dog

  Historical Fiction

  Mattie

  Libbie

  Jessie

  Cherokee Rose

  Sundance, Butch and Me

  The Gilded Cage

  Multi-Author Boxed Sets

  Sleuthing Woman: 10 First-in-Series Mysteries

  Sleuthing Women II: 10 Mystery Novellas

  PAPA’S GHOST

  A Gladdy Gold Mystery Novella

  By Rita Lakin

  In this novella addition to the critically acclaimed Gladdy

  Gold Comedy Mystery Series, which takes place in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, Gladdy realizes her girls, (her sister Evvie and their three friends) are bored, and grumpy. Even though they are all in their seventies and eighties, they still think of one another as “girls.” Their Private Eyes business hasn’t had a job in a long time. And they are driving Gladdy crazy. Finally, a phone call and job offer - in Key West. They grab it, looking forward to going to a famous resort area along with crime solving. It isn’t until they get there, Gladdy has doubts. There is something strange about the whole setup. When they realize who their client is and about the strange death they need to prove is murder, when everyone else calls it suicide, they know they’ve bitten off more than they can chew. In their usual inimitable, hilarious way, Gladdy and her girls muddle through to cheerful success.