The Marquesa's Necklace (Oak Grove Mysteries Book 1)

by P. J. MacLayne

  With my window rolled down I waited, my hands gripping the steering wheel, as the officer got out of his vehicle and came up to my car. It took an eternity. In the glow of the street light, I identified him as he approached. Officer Clearmont. This could either be very good or very bad. But I had just spent a week playing hide-n-go seek with the feds, so I should be able to handle him.

  “Evening, Ms. Duprie,” he said, as he took the brim of his hat between his thumb and index finger for the briefest of moments. “Welcome back.”

  “Thank you, Officer,” I said as pleasantly as possible under the circumstances, flashing my best fake smile. I started to ask why it was any of his business that I had been gone, but decided against it. I wasn’t ready to go into full scale bitch mode yet. “What’s up?”

  He nervously tapped the fingers of one hand against my door. I didn’t know if that should make me nervous as well or not. I withheld my decision.

  “You weren’t answering your cell phone.”

  No, it was turned off. Not against the law.

  “We didn’t have another way to reach you,” His adam’s apple bobbed as he swallowed. “Your friend Janine told us you were out of town and scheduled to be back today, so we’ve been keeping an eye out for you. Your residence was broken into two days ago.”

  Shit. Shit, shit, shit. Shit.

  “We’ve completed our initial investigation, but need you to check it out and determine what’s missing. Detective Thomason will meet us there.” The radio on his belt squawked and he turned, walked away and mumbled into his shoulder. I drummed my fingertips on the steering wheel until he returned, while visions of hordes of strangers pawing through my valuables and unmentionables ravaged my brain.

  “Detective Thomason suggested I give you a lift to your place Or, I could drive your car there for you.” He had a hopeful expression on his face as he eyed Dolores.

  “Why don’t you just follow me there, Officer?” I asked, my voice dripping with sugar. “I won’t try to lose you.” Tempting idea, but I wouldn’t. Not this time. Officer Clearmont clearly didn’t like it, but what could he do about it?

  The detective was pacing at the bottom of the stairs, and Piper was going crazy as I parked Dolores. I walked around her front and lightly touched her hood before exiting the garage and closing the door. I decided to buy her one of those heated blankets for the winter. Oak Grove isn’t in the lake effect snowfall belt, but we do get some bitterly cold temperatures.

  “Hello again, Detective Thomason,” I said, unable to think of him any other way.

  “Harmony,” he said.

  So we knew each other’s names. We got that out of the way. “Someone broke into my apartment?” I patted Piper to calm him, and me, down.

  “Yes. Your landlords reported it.” He shook his head as I scratched under Piper’s chin. “It seems this dog wouldn’t stop barking the other night, they heard noises coming from your place and called 911. The intruder or intruders left before the officer on duty got here.” He handed me a key. “The lock has already been changed.”

  “What did they take?” He knew what my place was like. Furniture not worth stealing, and I’d taken most of my measly collection of jewelry with me. I don’t keep much cash around, and what I do have is in a glass jug. Lots of coins, but not much of a haul. Even my laptop has seen better days. The most valuable things I have are some rare first edition books. Most thieves wouldn’t know what to look for on my over-packed bookshelves.

  “You’ll have to tell us.” He cleared his throat. “Whoever did this left a real mess. It appears they were looking for something in particular.”

  Okay, so he had me worried. Officer Clearmont joined us and I started up the stairs with both men following.

  I slipped the key into the unfamiliar lock and turned it. The door swung open easily without squeaking—someone must have oiled the hinges too—flipped on the lights, and stepped backwards. It’s a good thing that Detective Thomason was so close, because I might have fallen down the stairs. The expression about looking like a bomb had gone off—yeah, it was that bad.

  The cushions in my favorite easy chair were slit and the stuffing thrown all over the front room. My books lay scattered on the floor and the bookshelves pulled down on them. My African violets, inherited from my mother, had been dumped from their pots, the dirt spread everywhere. A quick glimpse of the little kitchen showed pots and pans strewn all over.

  I wanted to cry. Correction. I wanted to scream and curse and hit something and wrap my hands around someone’s neck and choke them. Either that or kick them where it would hurt the most. I did cry. And when Detective Thomason wrapped his arms around me and pulled me into his chest, I let him. I guess, despite our history, he wasn’t all bad. His aftershave smelled nice, anyway, fresh like a mountain stream. And that’s when I began to think of him as Fred.

  Chapter Seven

  I’m sure it wasn’t in his normal job duties, but Fred even found me some tissues when my sobbing quieted. He and Officer Clearmont waited in the little entryway, taking up most of the space, while I calmed down.

  Overwhelmed, I sat on the floor, and tried to scoop up enough soil to re-pot my flowers. Glancing up from my almost hopeless task, I noticed that Fred reminded me of my ghost from the library.

  They were about the same height, but the ghost had a more muscular build. Fred’s hair seemed a shade or two darker than my ghost—or maybe it was just the bad lighting in my apartment. The invaders removed a couple of light bulbs while trashing the place. At least when I checked for bugs in the hotel, I’d put the bulbs back in the lamps. Still, I thought my ghost was better looking—maybe it was the day’s growth of stubble on my ghost’s chin, or something about his eyes. I wanted to stare into those eyes. Fred’s were a nice brown, but my ghost’s—I had never seen that shade of blue before.

  I remembered seeing a bag of potting soil in the garage when Joe, Luke and I cleaned out enough space to park Dolores inside. With a small smile, I asked Officer Clearmont to go get it for me. I waited until he made it halfway down the stairs to ask Fred, “This wasn’t a robbery, was it?”

  “We won’t be able to determine that until you go through things and see if anything is missing,” he said. “But,” and he stopped.

  “But what?”

  “I’ve never seen a thief yank plants out of their pots and scatter dirt everywhere.” He squatted near me and tried to push together a pile of soil for me. “I’ve seen it a time or two when a couple breaks up. One of the pair has a tantrum and destroys everything, but you don’t have an ex who could have done this.”

  No, everyone kept assuring me Jake was still in jail. Besides, he wouldn’t blame me for his incarceration anyway. And all my other relationships had been short-term and ended amicably.

  “My working theory is that whoever did this wants something in particular.” He frowned. “Maybe something Hennessey gave you. Something valuable.”

  The suggestion put him back to Detective Thomason in my rankings. “I don’t accept expensive gifts from any of my friends, especially my boyfriends,” I said icily. “Too many things are more important than money. I can’t be bought.”

  They say everyone has a price. Perhaps, but I don’t know what mine is.

  The arrival of Officer Clearmont with the potting soil saved the detective from further scolding. He carried it into the kitchen and I cleared a space on the cupboard by dumping a bunch of pans into one side of the double sink. Detective Thomason looked chagrined as he followed with the plants.

  African Violets can be tricky, but I had a good chance of saving them. They still had damp soil around their roots.

  I started putzing around the kitchen straightening things up when someone behind me coughed. “You should check out the rest of the apartment,” Detective Thomason said.

  Yes, I should. But I didn’t want to, afraid of what I might find.

  I peeked into the bathroom first. The meager contents of the medicine cabinet lay str
ewn on the floor, along with the towels, but nothing appeared broken. I don’t use many cosmetics, and what I own went to D.C. with me.

  Next came the bedroom. My sanctuary. At least, it used to be. I took a deep breath to brace myself as I pushed open the door and promised myself I wouldn’t cry.

  It was as bad as I’d imagined. They’d pulled the mattress off the foundation and slit it in several places. The contents of my dresser were scattered all over the place and the stuffing of my home-made needlepoint pillows pulled out. Clothes from my closet lay strewn around the room. They’d torn down my Grateful Dead wall hanging and walked on it. That hurt the most. They’d deliberately walked in the dirt from the African Violets and then come in here and trampled on the tapestry. I didn’t know who hated me bad enough to do that.

  Clenching my fists, I turned and surveyed the room and caught Officer Clearmont staring at my lacy lingerie, prominently displayed on the upturned mattress. He blushed when he realized I was watching him.

  “I don’t see anything missing,” I said, looking at Detective Thomason. “But until things are cleaned things up, I can’t tell for sure.” I reached for the mattress and tried to it wrestle it back on to the frame.

  “That can wait until tomorrow,” Detective Thomason said, helping me. “Why don’t you go spend the night at your friend Janine’s house?”

  “Saturday? She’s out on a date. No, I’ll stay here.”

  “And sleep where? In your torn-up easy chair? On the floor? At least go get a hotel room, Harmony.”

  He was right. I wouldn’t sleep if I stayed here anyway. The whole night would be spent trying to restore order to my little world. I might not sleep at a hotel either, but at least I would have a TV to watch. The intruders broke mine. Trailed by the two men, I returned to the front room. I’d left my suitcases in Dolores’s trunk, so I didn’t need to pack any clothing. I spotted my laptop and pulled it out of its bag. The message “low battery” popped up when I turned it on, and it shut back down. At least it was working. I stuffed it in the case, picked up my purse and the new key, and opened the door.

  “After you, gentleman,” I said, and waited for them to start down the stairs. I sniffed, blinked away the tears, and closed and locked the door.

  *****

  By the time Janine and Sarah arrived in the morning, Luke, Joe and I had already wrestled the easy chair out to the curb. Joe was straightening up the kitchen while Luke and I restored order to the explosion of books and put them back on the shelves. Being an ex-librarian, I’m picky in how my books go, so the job was taking longer than Luke liked. When they knocked, Joe, who had self-appointed himself as my bodyguard, rushed to be the one to open it. I didn’t know what he had planned if it was an intruder—would an intruder knock? —but since he was a retired Marine, I wasn’t going to argue. Sarah and Janine stood there with their mouths hanging open, shocked by the scene. Janine gathered her wits and said, “What can we do to help?”

  Joe answered for me. “One of you can tackle the bathroom. The other can haul a load of clothes to the basement and wash them.” The defiled lingerie already sat in the garbage can next to the garage.

  An hour or so later Detective Thomason arrived. I was on my hands and knees scrubbing the kitchen floor in the spots the mop didn’t reach, when we heard a knock on the door. Joe just glared at me when I started to get up, so I let him do the honors, and returned to my cleaning.

  “What do you want?” Joe said, rather gruffly and I figured I better check it out for myself.

  Detective Thomason held a vase with a bouquet of supermarket flowers. He was wearing jeans and a T-shirt instead of a suit. Tight jeans, I might add, and the shirt did him favors that his suits never could. I thanked him and put the flowers in the middle of the kitchen table. Luke steered him towards the bedroom to figure out how to get the shredded mattress out of the apartment without knocking everything else over again. The bouquet proved to be a beacon of peace in the midst of the chaos that ruled for the rest of the day, and earned him back the name of Fred. He still didn’t rank being Freddie in my mind—not yet, anyhow.

  I spent the night with Janine. I had to stay somewhere else because Luke, Joe, and I decided we would clean the carpet in the apartment before I replaced my furniture. The soil from the African Violets was ground into the rug. And there had been more foot-traffic through my place than normal for the past year.

  The violets were wilted, but would survive. The footprints on the Grateful Dead tapestry vanished with a good beating and repeated vacuuming. Several of my books had their spines broken or their pages torn, but none of my first edition books were hurt. I had to go shopping for a new mattress, but Luke and Joe were going to give me an old loveseat they didn’t want anymore. Nothing seemed to have been taken. I got off lucky. Again.

  A not-so-tiny voice in the back of my brain told me I’d better start worrying about my luck running out.

  *****

  The Flamingo was busier than usual for a Wednesday night, and I was a celebrity, whether I liked it or not. All the regulars wanted to buy me a drink, and their generosity extended to the other girls as well. Merrilee looked a little upset when the fourth guy in a row slid into the booth and flirted with me instead of her. Sometimes I wonder about her alleged choice in sexual partners. Anyway, I was enjoying myself, and flirting back seemed harmless. In a week or two, everything would go back to normal and Merrilee would be the popular one again. I’d enjoy it while it lasted.

  It didn’t last as long as I hoped. He walked in, got a drink at the bar, and came and stood by the booth. The guy I was talking to gulped, got up, and headed for the pool tables. Detective Thomason slid into the abandoned space.

  “Hello, Harmony,” he said. “Keeping to your usual schedule, I see.”

  “Detective,” I responded. “I figured after last week I owed myself this.” I picked up my mug and took a deep gulp of my lager.

  The other girls sat silent. He glanced at them and sighed. “Do you mind if I borrow Harmony for a minute?” he asked of no one in particular. He grabbed my arm and stood. My beer sloshed in the mug but didn’t spill. “I’ll bring her right back.”

  I didn’t have much of a choice at that point, not wanting to cause a commotion, so I went with him. He led me to a small table in the back room. The few men who were occupying the other table took one look at his face and left.

  “I believe we talked about this,” he said, leaning towards me.

  “We did. And I gave it a shot, and what did it get me? My hotel room searched, followed almost everywhere I went, and my apartment destroyed. So much for varying my schedule.” I was on a roll, and let it all out. “At least here, I’ve got friends to watch over me. Almost every guy has let me know they will protect me. Some have even offered to let me stay with them. Sure, a few are hoping they can get into my pants, but others really want to help. I’m safer here than at home, Detective. It’s not like I can enter the witness protection program.” The realization gave me goose bumps. Or was it the sudden chill in his eyes?

  He leaned even closer. “You were followed in D.C.?”

  “Yes, and my room searched one night.” An idea hit me. “You wouldn’t know anything about that, would you? Maybe called in a favor from a friend? I figured it was the feds—do you have any contacts with one of the agencies there?”

  He let loose a string of curses, including a few choice words I wasn’t familiar with, and I thought I’d heard them all.

  “I didn’t have anything to do with it,” he said. “I didn’t even know you were gone until the call came in. The chief assigned me to work with the anti-graffiti task force and that took a lot of my time. Are you sure it was federal agents?”

  “No, but who else operates there?” I smirked. “They weren’t very good. I spotted them almost right away.”

  This brought on another string of curse words. I took note of a few of the more interesting ones so I could try them out later. Joe is the only other guy I knew who sw
ore like that, and he didn’t do it when I could hear him. Detective Thomason reached out and touched my cheek.

  “If I could put you in a safe house, I would, Harmony,” he said softly. “But the town doesn’t have one. Hell, everyone knows where the home for battered women is.”

  He’s right. It’s on the corner of Chestnut and Pine. But the angry-looking, black-belt wearing, .45-packing, six foot tall lady who mans the front desk at night is enough of a deterrent to keep most upset ex’s away.

  “I appreciate your concern, Detective.” And I did. “But I have a life to live.” I stood and picked up my beer. He stood too, and moved close to me. One arm snaked around my waist and he pulled me close. I looked up at him, tried to decide if I would let him kiss me, and if that’s what I wanted.

  A loud noise from the bar broke the moment and I pulled away. With one hand on the gun in his waistband—I’d figured out just where he wore it—he cocked his head to listen.

  “The home team must have scored,” I suggested.

  He stared at me for a moment, then turned abruptly and left the room. I stood staring, watching him go. “Good night, Fred,” I whispered when he was out of earshot.

  Chapter Eight

  I slid into my normal spot, with the front door in my direct line of sight. The girls studied me, and I decided to beat the rush of questions. “I’m not sure if he is just doing his duty in protecting me as a citizen, or if he is afraid something bad will happen to his favorite suspect.”