“Don’t wish that,” I tell him. “You’re going to be happier because of this. You’re starting a new chapter in your life. We had to close one door to open another one. You’ll see.”
“You would see it that way. You’re always positive.”
“Why aren’t you?” I ask. “You’re the same person you were before we met. You’ll take care of yourself. You’ll find a way to build a life you love. I know you will.”
“That’s just the thing. I realized today I don’t want another life. I want what we had. I realized it when I was walking down Main Street with Pauline and I ran into you on the way to the bakery. I would have given anything to be going there with you instead of her. I just wanted to be with you and to talk to you the way we used to.”
“Nothing is stopping you from doing that,” I reply. “I’m still here, and I’m still your friend.”
“Just friends,” he murmurs. “I threw away the best thing I ever had, and for what?”
“For your daughter,” I tell him. “That’s what for, and that’s no small thing. It’s huge, and I understand why you did it. It’s for the best. You’ll see.”
He pushes himself off the counter and shakes his head. “It’s going to take a lot to convince me of that. I better be going. You have a pleasant evening without me.”
Before I can protest, he strides out of the house. A second later, I listen to his bootheels clipping over the porch and down the path to the sidewalk. His car hums out of the neighborhood, and silence envelops everything again.
Part of me wants to tell him I won’t be having a pleasant evening without him. I don’t want him to think he was something superfluous in my life. Then again, I will be having a pleasant evening without him.
If I’m just as happy having broken up with him, does that mean he was superfluous? Does that mean I never really cared about him? Why am I not heartbroken and depressed without him?
At the same time, he has to learn to take care of himself without me. If he’s going to do that, he should start now, and he should start away from me. I can’t do it for him. My mothering instinct might like to, but that’s not the best thing for both of us right now.
After I finish the kitchen, I wander around the living room for a while. I end up back on the couch with my laptop in front of me. I toodle around on the internet. I go back on my own website. I stare at the homepage. That’s me. I’m a private investigator, and someone hired me to investigate Mark Sheridan’s death, so what am I doing sitting around the house? I should be out investigating.
Something shifts in my mind. I stare blankly into space, and a lot of competing ideas whizz together in a confused soup. We have proof enough that Bea Donohue could have killed Mark. We have a paper trail showing she was exposed to dog hair that was washed in Floral Glow Dog Shampoo, and she had a large supply of it, all ready to inject into the victim’s neck.
All we need is the purchase agreement. It isn’t at the lawyer’s and it isn’t at Mark’s house, so where is it? Neither of the Donohues would be fretting about it if they had it.
That doesn’t leave many options where it could be. The real problem is that now Bea knows we don’t know where it is. If she is the killer, she’ll be as hot to find it as we are, maybe more so.
I clap my laptop shut and leap off the couch. I don’t bother telling Zack where I’m going. He’ll be dead to the world until morning. I grab my jacket and march out the door.
12
I wind my way through the darkened streets of West End, but I don’t look right or left. I head for Mark Sheridan’s house. Don’t ask what I hope to find there after a team of trained forensic technicians already surveyed the place more than once.
I slow my pace when I get near the house. To my surprise, I don’t see the yellow cordon tape across the yard anymore. David must have taken it down when the forensics team finished their work. Why should they cordon off the house when there’s nothing to find?
I climb the porch and find the door unlocked. I let myself in and head straight for Mark’s desk. The forensics team would have gone through every paperclip in the place. They might be trained experts, but they obviously missed something.
I stand behind the roll-top desk and switch on the lamp. Where’s the first place a businessman would put a sensitive purchase agreement he just scored? Any businessman worth his salt would have scanned it and emailed it straight to his lawyer.
I start ransacking Mark’s desk and find the printer/scanner in the cabinet nearby. All the wires and power cable come through the cabinet’s back wall. I pull the machine out and start going over it with a fine-toothed comb.
There’s nothing under the cover and nothing in the paper tray, so Mark didn’t print anything. What other alternative explanation is there? Let’s say he scanned it, but the lawyer never received it. How could that happen?
I fall on the desk again. I rifle every piece of paper and pull open more cabinets. I freeze in my tracks when I find an old-fashioned fax machine in the cabinet next to the printer. Is it possible someone in the world still uses these things?
Back in ancient times, people faxed documents like this, but the forensics team would have searched that, too. I crouch down in front of the cabinet. Between Mark Sheridan’s attaché case and the lawyer’s office, this dinosaur of a machine acts as the gatekeeper upon which all other operations depend.
I put out my hand to touch it, but I shrink away at the last second. Some part of me recoils from reverting to a Neanderthal state by making contact with this relic of a bygone era. Then I pull myself together and seize the thing.
To my amazement, it’s all hooked up with wires in the back just like the printer. A phone cable comes from it and leads through a hole in the cupboard. When I push the power button, lights come on and the thing starts beeping.
I set it on the floor between my knees. Like the printer, I don’t find any document in the feed tray or the outlet slot. I flick through the stack of blank paper ready to glide into the machine. What am I doing? This is getting me nowhere.
Just then, an alarm sounds on the display screen. A blinking icon of a fax machine with paper sticking out winks on and off in front of my eyes. An error signal flashes and disappears. I can’t understand the signal, but I understand that icon. The machine is jammed.
I flip it over and grope all over it with curious fingers. I find a flap that opens to reveal the ink carriage sliding back and forth across the paper roller. What do you know! A large wad of pages sits crumpled and off-kilter between the two rollers.
I grab hold and pull, but they’re too tightly wedged to move. They’re also so crumpled I can’t get a decent purchase on the corner. I jab and curse the thing in desperation. If it is the purchase agreement, I can’t leave it here. I even consider taking the whole stupid machine back to my house. I’ll hand it over to David and let the police can figure it out.
All at once, my finger hits something. The bottom roller pivots out of place and my fingers close around the documents. I exert steady pressure, and they slide out into my hands.
I drop the fax machine with my heart in my mouth. Is this the motherlode? I straighten out the ink-stained pages and read the lettering at the top. Agreement of Purchase. A little farther down the page, I catch sight of more words, Toys Galore! Ltd. Patrick Donohue, Owner…. agrees to…..Sheridan Enterprises…..
This is it. Everyone concerned with this case is looking for this document, and now I have it. I have to do something with it and keep it safe.
I struggle to control my shaking hands while I fold the documents and slide the bundle into the inner pocket of my jacket. I put the fax machine back in the cabinet and close the doors. I have to tell David what I found. He’ll be ecstatic.
I stand up in front of the roll-top desk. I take out my phone. A fleeting thought flits across my mind. He’s the only person who understands how I could get so excited about this. He’s the only other person in the world with whom I can share this victory.
He means a lot to me. He’s not superfluous to my life. He’s essential, even if we can’t be romantically involved anymore. I navigate to my text messages and tap on his name. I can’t wait to tell him!
Out of nowhere, a smashing blow hits me in the head and I crumple to the floor. My head would have cracked on the desk if my arms hadn’t hit it first. I bounce off and land in a heap. The world goes black in a sickening pool of pain.
When I come to, blinding pain makes me squeeze my eyes shut before I can fully think straight. A throbbing mass on the back of my skull drums agony into my brain. I try to lift my hand to touch it, but I can’t move.
I try again, and a rope cuts into my wrists. My hands are tied behind my back. My eyes snap open in alarm. I look around me. The lamp shines onto the carpet behind me. I have my head wedged under the roll-top desk. I can see a pair of legs by the cabinet and the rest of the library beyond.
A voice whispers above my head. “Where the heck is it? It has to be here somewhere.”
From my awkward position, I can’t see the person’s face or distinguish if the voice is male or female, but I know one thing. The killer hit me on the head. Now they’re looking for the purchase agreement. That could be only one person. Both Patrick and Bea Donohue talked to David this afternoon trying to locate the documents. They both know the police haven’t found them. Only one of them cares enough to ransack Mark Sheridan’s house to get them before the police do.
I freeze in place. I pray like anything Bea forgets I exist. If she finds out I have the documents in my pocket, that I read them and that I was about to hand them over to the detective in charge of Mark’s murder, I’ll be her next victim. Bea is just desperate enough to do something crazy.
She slams the cabinet shut. She tears into the desk drawers and curses under her breath. How long have I been out? This could have been going on for a long time. I make a quick mental calculation. No one knows where I am. Zack will sleep until morning before he realizes something’s wrong.
I make another futile attempt to move my hands, but they’re just as tied as before. I don’t want to accept that fact. If I can only reach my phone, I could call for help, but no luck.
A sudden crash startles me out of my mind. I jump and try to turn around to see the legs kick the desk. “Crap!” It’s definitely a female voice.
The next minute, she squats down and leers at me through the opening where the desk chair ought to go. I come face to face with Bea Donohue, and she doesn’t look like a nice lady behind the toy counter.
She bares her teeth. “You have it, don’t you?”
My voice quavers, and my blood zings in my veins. “I have what?”
“You found the purchase agreement, didn’t you?” she snaps. “You found it before me. Where is it? If you don’t hand it over, I swear I’ll kill you.”
She grabs my legs and starts to haul me out from under the desk. I want to scream, but my voice won’t work. I don’t know what to do. I kick, but she turns out to be a lot stronger than I am.
Why, oh why did I want to become a private investigator? Why couldn’t I just be an ordinary candy store owner? Why did I have to develop these pretensions to be something I’m not?
A thousand questions and doubts flood my mind. My thoughts blur, and I fly into a blind panic. I kick and struggle, but I can’t do much with my hands tied behind me. I slide across the carpet. The lamp shines into my eyes.
At that moment, the door slams open and half a dozen male voices boom through the night. “Freeze! This is the police. Get down on the ground with your hands behind your head.”
The next instant, dozens of feet run all around me. I watch in stunned shock as five uniformed police officers tackle Bea to the floor. They kneel on her back and zip handcuffs around her wrists.
David Graham’s face appears in front of me. “Are you okay, Margaret? I had an idea, and I went back to your house to ask you about it. I knocked, but you didn’t answer. The living room light was on and your bedroom light was off, so I peeked through the window. I didn’t see you, so I thought you might have come over here.”
I swallow hard, but I can’t make a sound. He cuts the rope holding my wrists together and helps me up. Police pour into the house.
“I’m so glad you’re okay,” David goes on. “I should have known you would get yourself into a pickle like this.”
I can’t laugh about it. I’m still too overwrought. “What was your idea?”
“I thought maybe after my conversation with Bea that she would come here and try to find the documents. When I realized you might have come here, too, I called out the cavalry.”
“Thank you,” I breathe. “I owe you big time for this—again.”
“Forget it. Did you find anything?”
I retrieve the documents from my pocket and hand them over. As excited as I was about sharing this moment with him, I can’t enjoy it. I’m just glad to get them off my hands and into the care of the authorities.
A yell attracts our attention to Bea. The officers haul her to her feet. They start to wrestle her out of the house. As she passes us, she growls and snarls, first at us and then at the papers in David’s hands. She makes a lunge to get near them, but he moves them out of her way.
“No, you don’t,” David tells her. “You’re not getting anywhere near this. I suppose you thought you would sneak in here and destroy it before someone took it into evidence. You probably thought you could stop Patrick from selling the toy store.”
“Of course, I did,” Bea snarls. “I put my blood, sweat, and tears into that store while he sat around on his keister doing jack squat. When things didn’t go his way, he decided to sell out. He never gave a hoot about me or what I wanted. He never even bothered to ask.
David nods. “I thought so, but there was one thing you didn’t count on.”
“What?” Bea fires back.
“You didn’t think that maybe Patrick would just find someone else to buy the store,” David replies. “He owns it. He can do what he wants with it. Even if you had found these papers, and even if you had managed to destroy all trace that he agreed to sell it to Mark Sheridan, and even if you somehow got a judge to throw it out and declare it void, Patrick would just find another buyer. You see, Bea? You killed Mark for nothing.”
Bea looks up at him with an expression of utter devastation written across her features. Her lip quivers and her eyebrows tremble. The next instant, she shifts gears and roars in ferocious rage. She makes another primal lunge for him before the officers hustle her out of the library.
David leads me onto the porch. He waves me toward his car, but my knees give out. I collapse into a chair near the steps, and my head sinks into my hands.
I shudder to myself. “I don’t think I’m cut out to be a private investigator.”
David lowers himself into the chair next to me. “The good news is you don’t have to be one if you don’t want to.”
“It seems like I already am,” I tell him. “I don’t seem to be able to get out of it, even when I try.”
“When have you tried?” he asks. “You always look so enthusiastic from the outside.”
“Maybe that’s the problem. Maybe I should stop being so enthusiastic about solving crimes that have nothing to do with me.”
He gazes into the dark neighborhood. “That would be a terrible shame. I’ve said all along you’re really good at this. I would hate to see you quit.”
“But I keep getting hurt or in trouble,” I point out. “This is the second time I almost got killed doing this. It’s ridiculous. Nothing is worth this.”
“Don’t give up,” he argues. “I’ve never known you to give up yet, so you better not start now. I might have to reevaluate my whole opinion of you.” He puts out his hand, but instead of touching me, he lets it fall on the armrest. That simple gesture makes me ache for what we lost.
I always had his arms and his hands and his kiss to encourage me at the end of a case. Now I don’t have
that anymore, and I really wish I could crawl into his presence again. Somehow, I can’t face it without that.
He stands up. “Come on. I’ll drive you home. Ten o’clock at night is no time for a young lady like you to be at large in a dangerous neighborhood like this.”
I laugh in spite of myself. He’s still here. He’s still the same guy I fell for that first week I arrived in West End, and he’s still by my side when it counts.
He escorts me to his car. I buckle myself into the familiar seat. The doors close around me and block out all the ugliness and danger of a few minutes ago. He drives me through town to my own house, but when we park at the curb, I don’t want to get out.
He turns to me. “Thanks doesn’t really cut it in situations like this. I don’t know what to say.”
“Look, David…” I begin.
“No, let me. I know we said we would take some time off to get our lives straightened out. I just want to say that, when you’re ready to come back, I’ll be waiting. I never wanted anything to come between us, and I don’t want anybody else. I realize it was my screw up that spoiled things, and I’ll do anything to make it up to you and to prove myself worthy of you.”
I blush to the roots of my hair. “Thank you. I want that, too.”
“I also realize it’s me that is going to change with this whole thing,” he goes on. “I know things can’t go back to the way they were now that I have a daughter, but I still hold out hope for something between us. I don’t want one of you to push the other out of my life. I still hold out hope that there is room for all of us in this.”
“There is.” I look at him in sudden understanding. “I don’t want you to give her up for me.”
“I don’t want to give you up for her, either,” he returns. “That’s what I’m trying to say. You and I had a strong connection even before I knew she existed. I don’t want to lose that. If we can ever be romantically involved again is up to you, but I still want to be a part of your life, Margaret, even if it’s only as friends.”
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