Fatal Brushstroke (An Aurora Anderson Mystery Book 1)

by Sybil Johnson

  “She surprised a burglar?”

  “Looks more like vandalism. We’ve seen a lot of it lately. No doubt kids taking advantage of all those alarm problems.”

  Rory wondered what had brought her mother to the store so late at night. They’d closed up right after the painting class ended at nine p.m. As far as Rory knew, there was no reason for Arika to return until the store opened the next day.

  One of the paramedics motioned to Detective Green. “You can talk to her now. Just keep it brief.”

  Rory hovered in the background, ready to leap in if the detective became too aggressive in his questioning.

  “I’m fine,” Arika said in a stronger voice than she’d used minutes earlier. “Just a bit of a headache. Ask me anything you want.”

  “Do you remember what happened, ma’am?” Detective Green said in a soothing tone.

  “Some of it’s a bit fuzzy.”

  “Take your time.”

  Arika took a deep breath before beginning her story. “I was driving by after taking my friend, Fern, home from the ER. I saw a light on in the store.”

  Rory now understood what her mother was doing here so late, but not why the Vista Beach police department hadn’t responded to the alarm before her mother got there.

  “So you stopped to check it out?” the detective prompted when Arika didn’t immediately continue. “Why didn’t you call the police?”

  “I didn’t want to be a bother.”

  “Mother!” The word flew out of Rory’s mouth before she could stop it. “You can’t think like that. You see suspicious activity, you call the police. You’re always telling me that.”

  “What happened next?” the detective continued, ignoring Rory’s outburst.

  “The back door was open. It was dark so I turned to find the light switch. That’s when I felt something spray on my face,” Arika touched her painted cheek, “and then someone hit me on the head. I don’t know what happened after that.”

  “Did you see who attacked you?”

  “No. There was something, though.” Arika stared off into the distance as if trying to recall an important point.

  “Was it something you heard? Or saw?” the detective prompted. “Sometimes closing your eyes and going through the events in your mind can help you remember.”

  Arika obediently followed his suggestion.

  Rory didn’t like the idea of her mother reliving the nightmare. She was about to say something when Arika opened her eyes and shook her head. “I’m sorry, it’s gone.”

  “Let me know if anything comes back to you. I assume your store has an alarm?” the detective continued.

  “I just had a new one installed.”

  Though it didn’t seem to have done much good, Rory thought.

  “So, this is the first time you used it? Could you have forgotten to set it?”

  “Why do you say that?” Rory asked before her mother could answer.

  “Someone smashed the window in the back door, but no alarm sounded.” The detective turned his attention back to Arika. “Do you remember setting the alarm, ma’am?”

  “She didn’t set it, I did.” Rory ran over the previous night’s events in her mind. She’d followed the technician’s instructions to the letter...hadn’t she? She briefly considered the possibility she’d set the alarm improperly, then dismissed the idea as unlikely. “I distinctly remember setting it,” she said with more confidence.

  Once again, the store alarm had failed to do its job. No matter what it took, Rory intended to find out why, even if that meant cornering Julian Bouquet himself and demanding answers.

  Chapter 19

  Once Detective Green finished his questioning, Rory accompanied her mother to the hospital where, for several hours, doctors poked and prodded until they declared Arika healthy enough to go home. After settling her mother in bed with Buster, her cat, Rory headed back to the store to inspect the damage.

  By the time she got there, only an hour remained before Arika’s Scrap ’n Paint was scheduled to open. With all that she had to do, Rory suspected business hours would start later than usual that day if the store opened at all. At least there were no classes to cancel.

  The police wanted her to make a list of everything that was missing. She didn’t realize how hard that would be until she stepped inside the back door.

  Rory’s heart sank as she surveyed the havoc the vandals had wreaked on the combination stock room-office. The room looked as if a particularly fierce wind had blown through it, upending boxes and depositing red paint on almost every surface. Theft didn’t seem to be the object of the break-in. The safe appeared undisturbed and the desktop computer still sat in its usual spot, although enough paint covered the keyboard they’d probably have to replace it.

  Rory picked her way across the concrete floor, stepping around broken glass, brushes, sheets of paper, and various other painting and scrapbooking tools. Most of the supplies that littered the floor seemed salvageable except for the patterned scrapbook paper the vandals had trampled over. She checked the pocket door that separated the classroom from the back room, happy to see it still slid properly.

  In the classroom, Rory found more of the same. Thankfully, the path of destruction stopped before it reached the sales floor. Her mother must have surprised the vandals before they got that far.

  After a quick tour of the front, Rory made her way back to the stock room and began documenting the damage. She’d just finished taking pictures when she heard the crunch of broken glass and turned to find Julian’s assistant standing in the alley doorway.

  “Oh, my!” Nora said. The uniformed technician who followed her whistled when he caught sight of the mess.

  Rory turned off her camera and set it down on the desk. “It’s not as bad as it looks. As far as I can tell, almost everything is fixable.”

  “What about the rest of the store?” Nora asked.

  “The sales floor wasn’t touched, thank goodness. Mom interrupted whoever did this.”

  “Sorry about your mother. She’s not here, is she?” Nora peered through rectangular lenses across the room as if expecting Arika to emerge from the neighboring classroom at any moment.

  “She got a nasty knock on the head. I convinced her to stay home and rest. I was hoping to open the store later, but there’s a lot to clean up. It’s going to take some time.” A sense of hopelessness came over Rory as she surveyed the chaos surrounding her.

  “Let me help you with that while Phil works on the alarm,” Nora said. “We’ll have this cleaned up in no time.”

  Phil tested the security system while the two of them set about the daunting task of restoring order to the room. Nora swept up the broken glass and scrubbed paint off surfaces while Rory worked on the supplies that littered the floor, setting aside anything that needed to be repaired or was too damaged to keep. She returned items to their respective boxes, taking careful note of everything that went into each one so she could compare it to the store’s records later. On a Post-it, she listed the topics she wanted to go over with her mother when she saw her next. But the little yellow square could hold only so much information, so Rory soon graduated from a Post-it note to an eight-and-a-half by eleven sheet of paper.

  Phone calls interrupted their progress as news of the vandalism spread throughout the community. After the fifth call, Rory turned the ringer off on the store phone so they could concentrate on their work.

  “What do you think of using this on a painting project?” Rory held up a flexible alphabet stencil Arika had purchased for the scrapbooking half of the store.

  Nora pursed her lips. “You could use that, I suppose.”

  “But you wouldn’t.”

  “I prefer hand lettering. So much more artistic, if you know what I mean. Wait. Are you talking about the p
resent for Samantha? I’m surprised you haven’t finished that.”

  Even though Rory had received the project only days ago, she still felt guilty she hadn’t started it yet. She knew the more experienced painter would have whipped it out within hours of it being in her possession. “I was going to, but...”

  Nora’s face softened. “...life intervened. You have too much to deal with right now. Why don’t you let me personalize that piece? I can finish it in no time.”

  “That’s very nice of you, but I’m going to start on it tonight,” Rory said with more conviction than she felt. “It’ll be good for me.”

  “Painting is good therapy. It helped me quite a bit after my husband...left. Far more than those pills the doctor prescribed.”

  The two women returned to their work. By the time they were done with the room, the only evidence of the break-in was the broken window and the paint spattered over the walls and floor that Nora hadn’t been able to remove.

  Rory was picking the last item up off the floor when the technician motioned Nora over. The two of them carried on a whispered conversation, periodically gesturing toward the alarm control box. From the looks they occasionally tossed in her direction, Rory had a feeling she wouldn’t like what they had to say. After another glance at Rory, Nora seemed to make a decision and stepped forward.

  “You’re looking serious. What did you find out?” Rory asked, fearing what they were about to tell her.

  Nora’s face turned bright red and she looked down at the floor as if too embarrassed to continue. “I hate to say this, but...could it be possible—” She looked up, but before she could say anything else, Julian walked in the back door. Moments later, Trudy appeared, wearing yoga pants and a tank top. The rolled-up mat she carried under one arm and a faint smell of sweat told Rory the woman had come from an early morning exercise class.

  The owner of H & J Security examined the damaged door and pointed to the cardboard that covered the space where glass had once been. “You shouldn’t have a window in your back door. Makes it too easy to break in. Especially since you only have a single cylinder deadbolt.”

  Up until now, Rory had thought of the window as a safety feature. Through it her mother could look into the alley to make sure it was empty if she left after dark. The alarm would protect the store from any after-hours burglars, frightening them off before they could do any damage...or so she’d believed.

  “How’s your mother?” Julian didn’t bother waiting for an answer before directing his next question to Phil who looked uncomfortable under his boss’s steady gaze. “Well, what’s the verdict?”

  Phil opened and closed his mouth a few times, but no words came out.

  “Speak up! Did you check out the alarm or not?”

  “He’s trying to be polite.” Trudy drifted around the room, poking into boxes and running her hand over the paint-smeared walls.

  “Everything checks out, sir,” Phil finally said.

  Julian threw Rory a pitying glance when he realized what his employee had been unwilling to say. He patted Rory’s shoulder. “Don’t worry. Phil will be happy to explain it to you again. Take notes this time.” The alarm company owner glanced around the room and frowned. “Trudy! I’m leaving now!” he shouted loud enough he could be heard throughout the store.

  Trudy reentered the stockroom. “That classroom’s a mess. You really should clean it.”

  Rory’s attention had been so focused on the security system she hadn’t realized Trudy had ventured into the public areas of the store. She wondered what mischief the woman had been up to in the other room.

  Julian turned to his assistant, who was standing by the doorway into the classroom shaking her head in apparent disbelief at what she saw inside. “Coming, Nora?”

  Nora turned around and glanced from her boss to Rory and back again. “I’d like to stay and help with the clean up, if that’s all right.”

  Julian frowned, obviously not used to someone going against his wishes.

  “You can take off,” Rory hastened to say, not wanting to be the cause of friction between the woman and her employer. “You’ve done enough already. I can finish.”

  “If you’re sure...?” Nora said. Rory’s nod must have satisfied the woman because moments later she followed Julian and Trudy out the door.

  The technician stayed behind to tutor Rory. She grabbed a notepad off the desk and diligently scribbled on it as he went over everything once again. After she successfully activated and deactivated the alarm to the man’s satisfaction, Phil gathered his tools and left.

  Once she was alone, Rory collapsed into a nearby chair. Lack of sleep and mental exhaustion had finally caught up with her. She couldn’t help believing the situation they now found themselves in was all her fault—her fault the alarm hadn’t sounded; her fault the vandals had been able to do their damage undetected for so long; her fault her mother had been attacked. Had she been less self-absorbed and set the alarm properly, Arika would now be chatting with the muscular deliveryman or discussing the quality of an artist’s painting instructions with a customer.

  Rory gathered the energy to finish what she’d started. Only one more area to clean, she told herself, and she could open the store and salvage part of the business day.

  Armed with a vacuum cleaner, Rory set to work on the classroom. On her initial pass through the room, she’d only seen a few bits and pieces on the floor, but after closer inspection she discovered a mess behind one of the tables. The contents of several boxes lay scattered across the carpet. Glossy pages ripped from tole painting magazines and instruction books mingled with supplies set aside for Thursday’s Rosemaling class, including wood plates now covered with splotches of red paint.

  Luckily, the bulk of Hester’s supplies had yet to be transferred from her house to the store. The only items of the painting teacher’s that had been damaged were those Liz had picked out, but hadn’t gotten around to taking home.

  Rory had never understood kids who found pleasure in destroying other people’s property. She hoped the police caught them before their crime spree left behind a string of injuries or worse.

  Unable to face the mess, she left it for later and started on the other side of the room, relatively clean in comparison. After rescuing car keys and a tiny hoop she found in a corner, she dropped the items in the lost-and-found box in case a student came looking for them and ran the vacuum over the carpet, picking up lint and shards of glass.

  Once that half of the room had been cleaned to her satisfaction, Rory started working on the muddle in the corner. She examined the spots of paint on the wood plates to see if they could be removed without damaging the bare wood. Rubbing alcohol and light sanding would probably do the trick.

  Rory was piling the wood pieces on one of the two tables in the classroom when Liz appeared in the doorway, sympathy radiating from her eyes. The tears Rory had been holding back trickled down her face. Without saying a word, Liz crossed the room and gave her friend a hug.

  “Sorry about your mother. How’s she doing?” Liz asked after Rory had dried her tears.

  “She’s a bit shaken, but should be fine.”

  “What can I do?”

  Rory motioned to the jumble in the corner. “You can help me sort that out.”

  “Holy crap! Was the rest of the place like this?”

  “The back room was worse. All that’s left to clean up is this bit.”

  Liz took off the jacket of her pantsuit and draped it over the back of a nearby chair. “Let’s get started, then.”

  The two of them reunited the supplies for Thursday’s class with the wood pieces. The project photos appeared to be in good shape, but the instructions had been damaged enough they’d have to be printed out again.

  “You never finished telling me about Kevin and what you found on his birth certif
icate,” Rory said as she examined the filbert brushes bought specifically for the Norwegian folk art class.

  “I meant to call you last night, but this one client of mine has me running ragged. What I was trying to tell you yesterday was I think it was forged. His birth certificate, I mean.”

  “The one in the county records? Unlikely. How’d you find it, anyway?”

  “Wasn’t hard once Julian told me where and when his son was born.”

  “Why would he do that? You don’t need to know where someone was born unless—Wait. You didn’t say you wanted to cast Kevin’s horoscope, did you? I thought you gave that up years ago.”

  “I’m thinking of getting new business cards made. ‘Elizabeth Tamiko Dexter, Fortunes Told, Houses Sold.’”

  Rory’s jaw dropped. She was wondering if she should call the men in white coats when she noticed the twinkle in her friend’s eyes. “Why do you think the birth certificate was forged?”

  “It lists Julian and Hester as his parents, but we know Hester never gave birth to him. No sign of his being adopted, either.”

  “There wouldn’t be.”

  “What do you mean?” Liz rummaged around in the pile on the floor, picking out all the pieces of paper and setting them on the table.

  “When a child is adopted, a new birth certificate is issued with the adoptive parents’ names on it. The original is sealed. The new one doesn’t have any special markings on it so there’s no way to find out if someone’s adopted unless they tell you.”

  “So, basically, I wasted my time.”

  “That’s not what I said. Adoption would explain the birth certificate, but we can’t know for sure.”

  “Unless we ask Kevin.”

  “No. Don’t do that.” Rory lowered her voice in case Kevin’s father had returned unexpectedly and could hear them from the other room. “I don’t think he knows he’s adopted.”