“I’m beginning to think I should have rented a house in town,” Aunt Ginny said as I hunted for my gloves. “What are you going to do in the winter?”
“I’ll walk.” It was just under two miles. At most it would take me half an hour.
“In the snow? On a road with no sidewalks? When you’re coming home from school at dusk?” Aunt Ginny shook her head. “I don’t think so. I’ll have to sign you up for the school bus.”
I groaned. The school bus would mean dashing out of school as soon as the bell rang to avoid being left behind in the parking lot. I wouldn’t be able to stay to hang out with my friends unless Aunt Ginny was able to pick me up or someone’s parents could give me a lift. There had to be another way. I didn’t want to lose my freedom the first time it snowed.
I locked up my bike at the side of the Wainwrights’ house and was cutting across their rolling lawn when a man came down off the porch, head lowered as he jotted something in the small notebook he was carrying. When he got to the sidewalk, he headed for the house next door. He glanced at me but didn’t seem to recognize me. He marched up the front walk of Ashleigh’s neighbors and rang the doorbell. I did the same thing at Ashleigh’s house. While I waited for an answer, I heard the man ask to speak to the lady of the house.
“What was he doing here?” I asked after Ashleigh ushered me into her foyer.
“Who?”
“That man I just saw on your porch.”
“Oh. He’s looking for work. I’ve seen him around. He goes door to door, asking people if they have any odd jobs that need doing. I think he did some work for the Slocums up the street. Why?”
“He’s the caretaker at the Pines.” I remembered him from when we were posting Have You Seen This Girl? flyers.
“I guess he doesn’t have enough to keep him busy out there. You want a blueberry muffin? My mom just made them. They’re still warm.”
“Did you talk to him?” I asked.
“Who?”
“The man who was just here.”
She shook her head. “He asked to speak to the lady of the house. I let my mom handle it.”
That sounded just like the man who had knocked on our door and spoken to Aunt Ginny. He’d used the word lady on the wrong person that day.
I wheeled around and went back out the front door, groping in my pocket for my phone.
“Hey, where are you going?”
I ran down the porch steps and looked up the street. There was no sign of him. Where had he gone? Was he inside the neighbors’ house? If he was, he would have to come out soon.
“Mind telling me what we’re waiting for?” Ashleigh asked when she joined me on the sidewalk.
“I want to get a picture of that man.”
“The handyman? What for?”
“His name is Gord Cooper. At least, that’s what he told me.”
“At least?”
“He’s new around here. I’m sure of it.” I had thought long and hard about a turn of phrase he’d used—from what I hear, no one comes here this time of year except by accident. He wouldn’t have said it that way if he were speaking from experience. “And he’s been going door to door, asking to speak to the lady of the house.”
“Okay. And…?”
“What if he’s not really looking for odd jobs to do?” I said slowly. “What if he’s looking for someone? A woman?”
Ashleigh’s expression went from puzzlement to a glimmer of understanding.
“Are you saying—?”
“What if he’s looking for his wife? And what if he knows that she and his son are somewhere around here, Ashleigh? She said he found her once before. What if he thinks he’s close to finding her again, but so far he hasn’t had any luck? You saw how that woman at the antiques store reacted when we asked her if she’d seen a woman. It wasn’t the first time she’d been asked something like that. And Marjorie at the bakery is definitely protecting her. But what if he somehow found out that Alicia was tutoring his son?”
“You think he’s Jennifer’s husband?”
“What if he followed Alicia? What if he tried to get her to tell him where Jennifer is hiding and she refused, and he killed her?”
“You can’t be serious,” Ashleigh said. “It’s not enough that everyone thinks Alicia was an angel. Now you want to turn her into a saint who died protecting a woman and a child from some maniac?”
But if Carrie hadn’t killed Alicia, someone else had.
And if Gord Cooper wasn’t who he said he was, I could be onto something.
“We have to get a picture of him. I want to show it to Jennifer. I want to know if Gord Cooper is her husband.”
“Even if he is, that doesn’t necessarily mean he killed Alicia,” Ashleigh said.
“Maybe. But we still have to warn Jennifer.” I ran for my bike. “Come on,” I called over my shoulder.
Ashleigh had to dash back to lock the house. She grabbed her helmet, jumped on her bike and followed me.
“Where are we going?” she asked between gasps.
“If we see Cooper, I’ll take his picture. If not, we go to the Pines.”
Ashleigh groaned. “Do you know how far that is?”
“A couple of miles.”
“What if he’s there when we get there?”
“We take his picture.”
“And if he isn’t there?”
“We see what else we can find out.”
We didn’t spot Gord Cooper on our way out of town, nor did any cars or trucks pass us on the way to the Pines. It didn’t surprise me, then, when we finally reached the red-roofed cabins of the Pines and didn’t see a vehicle anywhere on the property.
“So what’s the plan, Stan?” Ashleigh whispered. She dismounted her bike and looked around warily.
“I’m going to check the office. If he’s here, I take his picture.”
“Just like that?”
“I’ll think up some excuse.”
“And he won’t be suspicious? Especially if he turns out to be who you think he is.”
Her negativity was getting me down.
“Do you have a better idea?”
“Actually, I do,” she said. “You go and take his picture, and I’ll wait here. If you’re right about him, and if he tries to kill you, I’ll call for help.”
“Very funny.”
“I’m not joking.”
“I’ll ask to use his phone. I’ll say mine is out of power. I think I can take his picture without him noticing.”
“Great. I’ll wait here.”
I set my bike on its kickstand and headed for the office, leaving her on the driveway.
The door was locked. I peered in through the window. The place looked deserted. I circled the building to see if there was another door or if any windows had been left open. No luck. By the time I got back to the front, Ashleigh was gone, and my cell phone pinged. It was a text. From Ashleigh. CABIN 12.
I followed a graveled path to the cabins behind the office. They were arranged in two broad arcs. Cabin 12 was to the extreme right. Ashleigh’s bike was leaning against one side of it, out of view of the office, and Ashleigh was standing in its open door.
“It’s his.”
“Did he leave it unlocked?” I asked.
“As good as.” She held up her bank card. “The locks on these cabins are pathetic. If the Big Bad Wolf came along and huffed and puffed…” She stood aside to let me pass. “I don’t think you’re going to need that picture.”
I stood in the open doorway and gazed at the cabin’s interior. More precisely, I was transfixed by the wall opposite the end of the bed. It was plastered with photographs—of a woman and a small boy. In all but one of them, the woman’s figure had been either blacked out or smeared with red paint—at least, I assumed it was paint. The one exception was the largest of the photos, blown up to the point that it had become pixelated. In that one, a knife pierced the woman’s heart, its point buried deep in the cabin wall behind it. The woman in the ph
oto had blond hair, not brown, and her face was fuller, less angular than now, but there was no mistaking those watchful eyes, the tentative smile on those bow-shaped lips, that long, slender nose. It was Jennifer.
“It looks like you were right about him,” Ashleigh said. “Do you think he—”
I shushed her. What was that quick dull clunk? A car door?
I waited, holding my breath. Was he back?
Ashleigh opened her mouth to speak. I held up a hand to silence her.
“What?” Ashleigh hissed. “What’s going—”
I clamped a hand over her mouth and waited for a few seconds, straining to listen.
“I thought I heard something.” Still uneasy, I stepped into the cabin and took a closer look at the wall of photos. In a few of them—not many, but enough—Cooper appeared along with Jennifer. Most, though, appeared to have been taken by him.
There it was again. A clunk, followed by a voice. “Hello? Hel-lo?”
I had left my bike in the driveway near the office. He knew someone was here.
“Take pictures of him,” I said. “Quick! Then call my aunt Ginny. Tell her where we are. Tell her what’s happening.”
“What about you?” Ashleigh said.
“Just do what I said.” I shoved her inside the cabin and pulled the door shut.
Cooper came around the side of the office. His eyes zeroed in on me immediately. “Hey, you!” he shouted. “What are you doing there?”
He scowled at me, and for a split second our eyes locked. Then I took off for the woods at a dead run, leading him away from Ashleigh so that she could call the cops. With luck, I hoped to lose him in the trees.
I ran as fast as I could, my eyes focused on the ground so my feet wouldn’t tangle with a tree root. Cooper thundered after me. I swear I felt the earth tremble. Or maybe it was my body shaking to the beat of my hammering heart.
I ran. I wasn’t following a path. I was just running away from the Pines as fast as I could. I glanced back over my shoulder. Cooper was gaining on me. He was close enough that I caught the look of grim determination on his face. Fighting panic—maybe acting as a decoy wasn’t such a good idea after all—I turned forward again and saw the trunk of a fallen hemlock. I raced toward it, jumped and cleared it with no problem—until I landed. The ground on the other side of the fallen tree sloped downward, and I lost my balance. When I tried to compensate, I felt a sharp twinge in one ankle. I crashed to the forest floor. Everything switched to slow motion after that.
I hit the ground hard. Cooper was close enough for me to see the cruel grin of satisfaction on his lips. I tried to get to my feet. Cooper’s hand came up. He was holding a gun. It was pointed at me. My brain screamed, Run! But my feet refused to cooperate. The barrel of the gun loomed as large as a cannon. Behind it was a pair of hard, hateful eyes. I scrabbled backward on my hands and one good foot, like a three-legged crab. Cooper took aim.
BLAM!
BLAM!
I opened my eyes. Cooper lay spread-eagle on his back in a bed of moss and dead leaves. Ten yards away, Rafe lowered his shotgun. He crunched slowly through the shag of autumn leaves, his eyes steady on Cooper.
“You okay, young lady?” he said without looking at me.
“Yeah. Yeah, I guess.” I was trembling all over, even in my hoodie and jacket. My eyes kept going back to Cooper, his chest slick and red with blood, his arms outstretched. I scanned the ground around him.
“He had a gun.” Rafe’s voice was grim, all business. “I see it.”
When he got to Cooper, the first thing he did was pick up Cooper’s gun with the filthiest cotton handkerchief I had ever seen. He dropped it into the same leather bag he had used for the snared rabbit. “For safekeeping,” he said.
He knelt beside Cooper and pressed two fingers to the side of his neck.
“Is he st-still alive?” My teeth were chattering like a pair of wind-up dentures.
Rafe shook his head. He got to his feet and peeled off his knee-length leather coat and draped it around my shoulders.
“You got a phone with you, young lady?”
As if on cue, my phone buzzed, signaling a text message. Where r u?
“Guess you better call someone.”
I called Ashleigh, who was breathless.
“I heard shots. Did you hear shots? I swear I heard shots.”
“Did you call Aunt Ginny?”
“Yeah. She’s really hard to talk to, do you know that?” Ashleigh said. “It was like she was mad at me or something. She kept asking me how did I know everything.”
“Is she coming or isn’t she, Ashleigh?”
I guess I was a little abrupt, because when Ashleigh spoke again, I heard surprise and hurt in her voice. “Yes. And she wants to know where you are.”
I looked up at Rafe. “How do I give directions to here?”
“From where?”
“The Pines.”
“We’re southeast of there, maybe half a mile.”
I relayed the information to Ashleigh.
“Why don’t you just come back here?” Ashleigh asked. “And who are you talking to? What happened?”
“I have to stay here. I’ll explain later.”
“But your aunt is coming here.” She sounded nervous. She still didn’t know Aunt Ginny well. Most of the time, all she saw was stern cop.
“Tell her I can explain, and she’ll leave you alone,” I said.
“Okay.” One word, laced with doubt.
I struggled to my feet and gingerly put a little weight on my hurt ankle. Then a little more. It still hurt, and I was probably going to have a mammoth bruise, but I could walk on it. I sat on a rock away from Cooper and waited. Rafe stood nearby, one leathery hand wrapped around the barrel of his rifle. He didn’t say a word. Didn’t ask a single question. Until he heard someone crunching and crackling toward us from a northerly direction.
“That’ll be the police.” He still didn’t move. He just waited patiently for Aunt Ginny to appear, which she did, a tiny version of herself in the distance, a flash of her navy jacket, her face, a hand.
“Riley! Answer me if you can!”
“Over here, Aunt Ginny!” I called. “Over here!” I waved my hands over my head to give her a visual.
She appeared fully a moment later, her gun drawn and clasped in both hands, her eyes going first to Rafe and his rifle, and then to Cooper on the ground.
“Ashleigh said she heard shots.” Her eyes were on Rafe as she said this. When he started to reach into his bag, Aunt Ginny tensed and raised her weapon.
“He’s okay, Aunt Ginny,” I said quickly. “That’s Rafe. He saved my life.”
Aunt Ginny’s eyes snapped back to me. She reached in her pocket for her phone and placed a call. Then she turned to Rafe and held out her hand. He plunged his rag-wrapped hand into the leather pouch and brought out Cooper’s gun. He passed it butt end first to Aunt Ginny, still wrapped in the raggedy handkerchief. Aunt Ginny nodded. She asked Rafe to stay until more police officers came. He went to lean against a rock outcropping a few yards away. Aunt Ginny came and stood in front of me.
“Why don’t you tell me what this is all about?”
I told her everything, including my theory about Gord Cooper as a prime suspect in Alicia’s murder. She listened without interruption, but her pinched frown gathered in more and more of her face as I talked, until she was all pointy-faced.
“That man had a gun,” she said. “He could have killed you.”
“I know, but—”
“You can’t do things like that, Riley.”
More cops arrived, led by Josh Martin.
“You stay put,” Aunt Ginny said. “We’ll talk later.” She went to meet Josh and fill him in on what had happened.
TWELVE
“So we figured that the husband found out that Alicia was tutoring his son,” Ashleigh said to Charlie. She had texted him from the back of the squad car that drove us to the police station to make formal stateme
nts. He was waiting for us when we were finally let go, and we’d walked to Ashleigh’s house, which was the closest. Aunt Ginny was going to be tied up for a while. Either she would pick me up later or I would spend the night at Ashleigh’s again. Jennifer was brought in before Ashleigh and I were told we could leave. I didn’t see her, but I did see one of the uniforms doing his best to amuse Teddy.
Ashleigh was relishing her tale. “And then we figured out—”
“We figured out?” I hated to interrupt, but…
Charlie grinned. Ashleigh ignored me.
“Alicia was supposed to tutor the kid the day she died, but she never showed up. We figure Cooper must have killed her when she refused to tell him where his wife was hiding. Because he’d been looking for her, Charlie. We figured that’s why he was going door to door asking to speak to the lady of the house. He was looking for his wife. He followed Alicia and tried to force her to tell him where his wife was. She refused. He killed her.”
Charlie frowned. “Why would he do that? Why kill her? The way you have it figured, Cooper knew that Alicia knew where his wife was, and he killed her trying to find out, right?”
Ashleigh nodded.
“Well,” Charlie continued, “leaving aside the question of how he knew that when no one else did, not even her parents or her boyfriend, why would he have killed her? If he wanted to find his wife, why didn’t he just follow her instead? She would have led him straight to her.”
It was an excellent question, but Ashleigh brushed it aside.
“The man has assaulted his wife. More than once. She’s terrified of him. For sure he has anger-management issues. Guys like that always do. He lost his temper when Alicia refused to tell him, and he did what he did to his wife—he beat her. That’s how she died, Charlie. She was beaten over the head.”
Charlie blanched when she said that, and I kicked Ashleigh under the table. Charlie had found her. If he was anything like me, he’d been having trouble getting the picture of her out of his mind.
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