Ready, Aim, Under Fire (Lexi Graves Mysteries, 10)

by Camilla Chafer

  “Did she ever mention her desire to move there? Or any other country?”

  “I don’t think so but I can’t say for certain.”

  “You said she’d been found?” said Art. “Why are you asking all these questions if she’s okay? She is okay, isn’t she?”

  “She appears to be fine. We’re just checking up on some background information before we close the case,” I told him. Addressing Kara, I asked, “Was she friendly with anyone else at the firm?”

  “She wasn’t unfriendly, just a little shy. She talked to everyone else but we sat together so I guess we were friendliest.”

  “There was that time…” Art began.

  “Oh, I know what you mean. That thing with the other girl who got hired before Debby?”

  “What happened?” I asked.

  “One of our original employees left and there was a good position to fill. Debby applied for it and so did the other girl. What was her name?”

  “Tanya,” supplied Kara.

  “Yeah, Tanya. Tanya got the job and Debby was so pissed. She trash-talked Tanya in front of the whole office. I had to take her aside and tell her that wasn’t cool.”

  “What kind of trash talk?”

  “That Tanya wasn’t a good employee and didn’t deserve the promotion. Neither statement was true. Debby was talented but Tanya was just a better fit. Plus, she had worked for us almost a year longer than Debby and quite frankly, had earned it.”

  “What happened afterward?”

  “Nothing. Debby promised it wouldn’t happen again and I don’t think anyone ever mentioned it after that.”

  “Do you know where I could find Tanya?”

  “Sure. She married an English guy and moved to London three years ago. She’s having a baby next month.”

  I eliminated Tanya from my suspect list. There was no way she was flying anywhere. “Aside from that, did you have any other problems with her?”

  “I had to give her a warning once when she took off for a long weekend without telling anyone. I told her she had to put a leave request in. It wasn’t a big deal though. I don’t think I ever refused anyone leave,” said Art.

  “Art was always too soft to run a company,” said Kara.

  “True. Anyway, she said she just forgot and shrugged it off.”

  “What did the other employees think of her?”

  “We all got on pretty well but I think there were the occasional comments about Debby getting a little too big for her boots, especially after the Tanya incident. They would get pissed when she got a coffee from the kitchen and didn’t offer anyone else a cup,” Art replied. “She was inconsiderate like that.”

  “It’s so sad what happened,” said Kara. She wrinkled her nose, her confusion etched on her face. “Actually, it was sad when we thought she disappeared, but I guess that’s not the case anymore. I was starting a new job the week after she disappeared. She was supposed to come to my goodbye dinner the following week but she never showed up for work Monday morning.”

  “She mentioned she’d been getting headaches more often, so we thought she was sick and simply hadn’t called in. Nobody worried about her for a couple of days,” added Art.

  “Was it unlike her not to call in?”

  “We weren’t exactly strict when it came to company policy, but she knew she was supposed to. I left her a message Monday afternoon and when she didn’t call back by Wednesday, I called again, then again on Thursday and Friday. Like Kara said, she didn’t show up for her party on Friday. We never saw her again. I just figured she’d taken off.”

  “We didn’t even know she was officially missing for another couple of weeks,” said Kara.

  “By that time, I’d already fired her,” said Art. “I felt so bad about that when the police came by and said she was a missing person. And now, you said she’s okay, I don’t know… I think I’m kinda pissed. We were worried sick about her for months and she just took off to go traveling?” He stopped and shook his head angrily, setting his jaw in a stiff line. Kara reached over and placed her hand over his.

  “Did she miss any other planned meetings? Or contact anyone else to explain her absence?” I asked.

  “We were supposed to meet for cocktails after work when I started my new job but after she didn’t show for my dinner and wasn’t answering any of my calls or texts, I didn’t go. I don’t know if she made it there or not. Art and I had just started dating too, so he told me what happened when the police came to speak to him.”

  “Did you leave the firm because you were dating?” I wondered.

  Kara glanced at Art and smiled. “Ultimately, yes. We flirted for a long time until it became a case of: are we going to do this? I didn’t want to work for my boyfriend because if it went wrong, it would be terribly awkward, so I found another job. In the end, I figured I couldn’t find another Art.”

  “Did you speak to the police too?”

  “Yes, but I couldn’t tell them anymore than I’m telling you now.”

  “I really appreciate your time,” I said, standing up and holding out my business card. “If you think of anything else that might be relevant, will you call me?”

  “Sure. We’re relieved to hear Debby is okay,” said Kara as they showed me out. “I’m glad nothing terrible happened to her although I feel a little insulted that she cut me out of her life completely. I guess something serious was going on with her that none of us knew about if she felt she had to take off so abruptly without any word.”

  “I wonder why she didn’t stay gone,” added Art. “She didn’t care enough about anyone here to let us know she was fine.”

  I apologized for not being able to comment on an ongoing case and left the warmth of their home behind. I would add them to the list of people still puzzled by Debby’s sudden disappearance. I could also add them to another list: the one with people she hadn’t contacted since her unannounced return. Perhaps it was embarrassment that held her back or maybe it was exactly what Garrett thought; if Debby were a different person, and an impostor, the fewer people from her old life she encountered, the better. But it still didn’t explain why her parents were so adamant their daughter had truly returned.

  Climbing into my car, I pondered what the Pattersons’ motivation could be. Why would they accept an impostor? I felt more than sure that my parents wouldn’t accept a fake me. They might briefly consider it, but I couldn’t see that lasting more than ten seconds. “If you’re not Debby, why would your parents want you?” I asked. I tapped my fingers on the steering wheel, wracking my mind for the possibilities. “One, they want something from you. Two, you’re blackmailing them in some way. Three, they know what happened to the real Debby and you’re helping them, willingly or unwillingly, to cover it up. Four, they’re jerks. Five… I don’t have five options!”

  What I needed to do was wait for Garrett to confirm his interview. Perhaps then, I could extract some information from Debby before I approached her parents again. Surely, if they were complicit in the ruse, they would eventually slip up somewhere? I turned on the engine, firing the car to life. “What if they just don’t know?” I asked the empty car as I drove to the next intersection and put the blinker on for a left turn. “Could they be short-sighted, hard of hearing, or just not very bright? Scratch that. Mr. Patterson is actually Dr. Patterson. His wife is a teacher. Neither of them are stupid but it has been ten years.”

  Ten years changes a person. Sometimes drastically. I remembered an old classmate of mine. High school Cindy Hathaway was quite overweight with frizzy hair and a terrible sense of style. Now she was running the Hot to Trot Travel Agency, and looked damn good in every way except for her appalling taste in sweaters. She was the perfect example of how someone could become unrecognizable in just a decade. Personally, I didn’t think I changed too much except for a fun interlude as a blonde and my current aversion to the gym. Aside from that, the only thing that had really changed about me was a couple of wrinkles creeping around my eyes and a few smal
l scars acquired through my PI work.

  There was only one way to ask a mother’s perspective: to throw myself straight into the fire pit. So instead of heading back to the agency, I pointed the car in the direction of my parents’ house.

  ~

  “Lexi, I wasn’t expecting you.” Mom said, looking furtively over her shoulder as I stepped into the house.

  “What are you up to?” I asked, my suspicion immediately rising at her odd behavior. “Is it dangerous?”

  Mom gave a shrill laugh. “What a strange question!”

  I sniffed the air. Something acrid wafted nearby. “Is something burning?”

  “No!”

  “It is, isn’t it? What are you doing?” I stepped past her, following the faint scent of smoke into the kitchen. The garden door was wide open and I heard voices outside. I stepped out and my mother immediately followed me into a circle of women sitting cross-legged on the ground. In the middle of them was a bucket. Inside it, something burned, the flames barely licking the rim of the bucket.

  “We’re performing a ritual,” said Mom. “You remember Janel, Mary Jo, Ruthie, and Dee?”

  “Absolutely,” I said, wondering who was whom. I was fairly sure I’d met them all before and at multiple events but my parents had a lot of friends, not to mention, our huge family. Sometimes it was hard to remember everyone’s names correctly. “Great to see you all again.”

  “Are you the one getting married the first time or the second?” asked a small woman with spiky, gray hair and pink tips.

  “First time,” I told her. Apparently, I wasn’t the only one who couldn’t work out who was whom. It was rare, however, that anyone mixed me up with my sister, Serena. For many years, Serena ruled as the golden child. Until I came along, she was the only girl in the family. Top grades, accomplishments in everything achievable, a scholarship to Harvard, and a terrific job. Her great job ended around the same time as her first marriage but she managed to pull through that difficult event and start her own business. She is also a fantastic single parent to her little girl, Victoria. I, however, chose a very different route in life.

  The small woman turned to my mom. “Maybe she shouldn’t be here.”

  “What are you doing?” I asked again. “What kind of ritual?”

  The larger woman picked a photo off a stack of ephemera and trinkets in her lap and dropped it into the bucket. “A getting divorced ritual. I’m cleansing my life of all the toxicity infused by my ex-husband.”

  “Janel’s husband is a total bastard,” said the woman to her left. “He ran off with a twinkie called Loulah. She’s a Hula-Hoop performer.”

  “What? That’s a job?” I asked.

  “That’s what I said!” answered my mom. “Janel, I knew it wasn’t a job.”

  “She Hula-Hooped Ed’s wedding ring right off his damn finger,” said the woman referred to as Janel. “And now they’re hooping it up together. Good riddance!” She dropped a folded piece of paper into the bucket. The flames quickly consumed it.

  “Not all married life is like that,” said the small woman.

  “Sometimes it’s worse, Mary Jo,” replied the other lady. “Sometimes they stay just to bore you to death.”

  “Your Carl bored himself to death,” said Mary Jo, receiving a chorus of agreement from my mother and the other ladies.

  “Solomon isn’t boring,” said Mom. “Lexi will never be bored.”

  “Thanks, Mom, for the vote of confidence.”

  “He’s the one I told you about,” she said to her friends.

  Mary Jo’s eyes widened. “The detective turned FBI agent with twinkling eyes and the sexy…?” she asked breathlessly.

  Mom shook her head. “No, he’s the one that got away. Solomon is the mysterious one.”

  “I like a man with one name,” said Janel. She picked a small box from her pile of things and toyed with it. “Like Bono.”

  “He’s nothing like Bono,” I told her.

  “Sting? Eminem? Prince?” she continued.

  “No, no, and no.”

  “Seal?” All the ladies fanned themselves.

  “No!”

  “Liberace?” asked Mary Jo.

  I pulled a face. “No! He has another name. John. John Solomon.” I rolled my eyes at my mother, wondering what kind of hormonal hotbed of retired ladies I had mistakenly walked into. I didn’t dare wonder what they’d been saying about Maddox.

  There were some disapproving noises until I realized what Janel held in her hand. It looked suspiciously like a deodorant can. She took the cap off and sniffed it. “I can never smell this again,” she proclaimed as she tossed it into the bucket.

  I yelled, “No!”

  They all looked at me like I had two heads. At first, nothing happened; then the flames caught hold of the pressurized canister and launched into the air with a boom! We all dived for cover.

  Scrambling to my feet, I opened my mouth to admonish Janel for the explosion but Mary Jo beat me to it, saying, “Maybe you should only throw photos and letters into the fire?” They all mumbled their agreement and Janel dug into her pile before extracting two bottles of aftershave. She stacked them on one side as I breathed a long sigh of relief. With my fingers, I checked both my eyebrows to make sure they were still where they were supposed to be and relaxed.

  “Can I borrow you for a moment, Mom?” I asked.

  “Sure,” said Mom without moving, her eyes still transfixed on the burning bucket. “Do you think I should get a bigger bucket?” she asked, glancing towards Janel before she dropped another photo into the fire.

  “I think you should consider putting out the fire altogether,” I said.

  “No!” shouted Janel, stuffing several more items into the bucket. A plume of black smoke trailed upwards. “I must burn it all! Do you think I can fit his sweaters in here?”

  “Why don’t you return his sweaters to him?” I suggested, shrinking back as all the women’s disapproving eyes fastened on me. “Mom?” I tugged her sleeve.

  “Mmm-hmm?” replied my transfixed mom.

  “If I disappeared for ten years, would you recognize me when I came back?”

  This time, she looked at me with narrowed eyes. “Where are you going? And why? What are you involved in now?”

  “Nowhere, I promise, but you would know me, wouldn’t you?”

  “Sure. I would know you anywhere.”

  “Even after ten years?”

  “Absolutely. I knew it wasn’t you when you were an hour old and the hospital gave me a different baby to nurse.”

  “What?” I squealed.

  “Don’t worry. I made sure they knew they gave me the wrong baby.”

  “How long did it take you to convince them?”

  “Not long.”

  “But… but… how do I know you didn’t take the wrong baby home?” My heart began to race, making my palms hot and sweaty as my breath quickened. What if I wasn’t really me? What if the real Lexi Graves was out there leading a whole other life? We would have to meet each other. I would have different parents. What if Garrett, Daniel, Jord, and Serena weren’t my true siblings? Would there be a TV drama? Most importantly, who would play me?

  “Calm down,” said Mom. “I knew you were born a girl and they gave me a boy. It was an easy mistake.”

  “That doesn’t sound so easy. It sounds stupid and very worrying.” But my heart rate did begin to slow.

  “It was stupid but a mother knows her own baby and I would always know you.”

  “What if I disappeared for ten years and someone came back, pretending to be me?”

  “Is she nice?” asked Mom.

  “Um… probably.”

  “Smart, presentable, hard-working, helpful to her parents?”

  I thought about Debby. She was stylish and had worked her way around the world. “Probably.”

  Mom cocked her head. “I might keep her.”

  “Mom!”

  “Oh, fine.” Mom rolled her eyes. “I w
ould know if she weren’t you. Why are you asking me weird questions?”

  “Just curious. Would you tell anyone that I wasn’t me?”

  “I would tell the whole damn world if my daughter disappeared and someone was pretending to be her. Is that what you wanted to know?”

  “That’s exactly what I wanted to know.” I stopped as a loud banging sounded from the front door. “I’ll get it,” I told her. “You make sure nothing else dangerous goes into that bucket. Maybe move the aftershave over, just in case?”

  “Got it. What about the trunk?”

  “What trunk?”

  Mom pointed to a large case, bursting at the zippers. I couldn’t fathom what was in it but felt reasonably sure it wouldn’t fit into the bucket on the patio. I shook my head and she sighed. “I’ll tell Janel,” she said. “You get the door. If it’s Ed, we aren’t here.”

  I walked through the house, and the banging grew increasingly louder the closer I got to the front door. I pulled it open and the space instantly filled with several large firemen.

  “We got reports of an explosion and fire burning,” said the one at the front.

  “In the garden,” I said, pointing to the back of the house without further explanation. Oh boy, those ladies were about to get the thrill of their lives.

  Chapter Seven

  Garrett texted me that the meeting was arranged before I made it back to the office so I drove over to the station, parking on the street nearby. As I walked over, I sent him a text telling him I was on my way in. By the time I stepped through the doors in the lobby, he was waiting for me.

  “I didn’t think you would be here so fast,” he said, crossing over to greet me. “Let’s walk.”

  “Where are we going?”

  “Interview room.”