by S F Bose
Josh shifted in his chair and his right knee bounced up and down nervously a few times.
“I didn’t want to talk to them yet. I’ll explain everything when I see them.”
“Are you planning to return to the B&B today?” I asked Josh quietly.
“Of course. I’ll be back by 5:00 p.m. for dinner,” Josh replied.
“That’s good. Your parents will be relieved,” said Sam, sipping his tea. Then he cleared his throat and glanced at me. “There’s another thing you might be able to help us with.”
“What’s that?” Josh asked, drinking more tea.
“Last night you played poker with two other families at the B&B,” Sam said.
“Right. The Wescotts and the Cloutiers. First, I chatted with Dante and Ray about sports. I force myself to engage with strangers,” Josh replied and grinned. “I don’t think I did very well last night, though. They invited me to sit in on the game, but we didn’t play for long.”
“Did you happen to see anyone go near Marie Wescott’s purse, either when you were sitting with your family or afterwards?” asked Sam.
“Her purse?” Josh repeated.
“It was on the floor next to her on the left side of her chair,” I replied. “Between her and Dante Cloutier.”
Josh frowned and shook his head slowly. “No, I don’t remember any purse. Why?”
“Marie is missing a ring. She took it off and thought she dropped it into her purse during the poker game,” I said.
Josh’s face reddened. “Wait a minute. Her ring is missing, and you think I took it? Let me be clear. I’m not crazy. I’m not planning to avenge anyone. And I’m most definitely not a thief.”
“Josh, we don’t think you’re a suspect,” Sam replied evenly. “We view you as a possible witness. Okay?”
Josh clenched his jaw. Finally, he replied, “Okay.”
“Good. So you didn’t see her ring, anything suspicious, or anybody who approached Marie Wescott at the poker game last night?” Sam asked.
Josh shook his head. “No, I don’t remember anything about her ring or anything related to her. After I sat down at their table, I got nervous. I just watched my cards and played poker. I didn’t really chat or look at any of them.”
Sam and I both nodded at the same time. I was relieved because it clearly seemed to me Josh was telling the truth.
“We had to ask, Josh. You were our best potential witness,” I said. Then I turned to Sam. “I know Marie doesn’t want us to talk to her husband. But when we get back I’ll ask the Cloutiers if they saw anything.”
“Look, I don’t want to get anyone else in trouble. But have you considered the possibility that Dante Cloutier took her ring?” Josh asked, and my heart jumped. “He was sitting right next to her.”
I thought about what Josh had said and glanced at Sam.
“Did you see Dante go near Marie’s purse?” Sam asked.
“No, but that doesn’t mean it didn’t happen,” Josh replied. Sam stared at Josh and then nodded slowly.
“We’ll check it out,” Sam agreed.
At that moment, we heard the front door open and close. A young man with a shaved head, camo jacket, hoodie, and jeans approached. He was smiling and carrying a shopping bag. When he saw us, his smile faded. He stopped next to Josh’s chair. “What’s going on?” he asked.
“This is my son, Nick. He went on a donut run for us,” Dan said and introduced us. The lean Nick English I remembered from high school had grown up into a handsome and muscular young man.
“Pleasure,” I said, and Sam nodded.
Nick looked from his father and Josh to us. “Yeah, nice to meet you.” He put the shopping bag on the floor and watched us warily.
“Liz and Sam were both at the B&B. Josh’s parents were worried and asked them to try to find him. They did,” said Dan and smiled. Nick glanced at his father and nodded. Then he stared at me.
“You look familiar,” he finally said.
“You have a good memory. We went to high school together, but I was two classes ahead of you,” I replied.
“Hunh,” he said and slid his hands into the pockets of his jeans.
“Before you ask, Nick and I were both in the Marines, but I never met him before today,” Josh said. I smiled and nodded.
Sam stood. “Well, we’ll let you get back to your day. Sorry for the intrusion.”
Josh stood. “Do me a favor and don’t tell my parents I’m at Dan’s house. I’ll explain everything to them at dinner, but I don’t want them coming over here.”
“Okay,” I agreed. “We’ll tell them we found you and you’re okay. But if you’re not back by dinner time we’ll have to tell them about Dan.”
“Fair enough,” Josh agreed. Neither Josh nor Nick said goodbye.
Dan English walked us out. He made a point to shake our hands. “Don’t worry. Things will be as right as they can be,” he said in a low voice, looking back and forth between us.
“What does that mean, exactly?” I asked.
Dan smiled. “It means that everything will be okay,” he replied.
Sam took out his pen and little notebook. “Can I get your phone number in case we have more questions later?”
“Sure,” Dan agreed and rattled off a number that Sam wrote down in his notebook. “That’s my cellphone,” he added.
“Thanks,” Sam replied.
“You really should come to the B&B for dinner some night. Everyone would love to see you,” I said spontaneously.
“Thank you. I just might do that,” Dan replied. Please give my regards to Addie, Anna, Millie, and Tillie.”
I smiled. “I will. But I know they’d all rather see you in person.”
Dan English’s smile didn’t reach his eyes.
As we walked out of the house, my neck tingled. Something was definitely off.
Chapter 12
Sam’s foot was heavy on the accelerator on the drive back, but I didn’t care. I wanted to get back to the B&B too.
“Is there something you want to tell me?” he asked.
Confused, I looked over at him. “About what?”
“You said you carried a Glock 19,” he replied, glancing at me with narrowed eyes. “That’s not the gun you pulled back there.”
Busted! “Oh that. Yeah, I carry two guns. I carry the Kahr in one of my pockets for quick access. The Glock is always in my waistband holster.”
“Why two guns?”
I looked out the window at the passing farmland. I didn’t want to tell Sam about Nate or how special his gun was to me. I shrugged. “It’s something I learned at Worldhead. Whenever we traveled to areas where we had to be armed, everyone carried two guns. Now it’s just force of habit.”
Sam didn’t say anything for a minute. “I guess the bigger question is why didn’t you tell me?”
I shrugged. “I don’t know, Sam. I should have. Sorry.”
We drove in silence for a few minutes, Then Sam shifted in his seat. “Okay, let’s forget that. What do you think about Josh, Dan, and Nick?” he asked.
I glanced over at him. He drove with his right hand at the top of the steering wheel. With his Irish cap pulled down on his forehead, he looked like a getaway driver.
I sighed. “Well, on the plus side we can tell the DeMarcos that Josh is okay and will be back by dinner. I also don’t think he stole Marie Wescott’s ring. On the minus side, something is off with Dan, Josh, and Nick.”
Sam yawned and shifted in his seat. “Yeah, I tend to agree. It’s obvious Dan and Josh didn’t want to share the nature of their business with us. Dan was friendly enough, but Josh and Nick both seemed on guard. Let’s hope that when Josh explains things at dinner that it’s something innocent.”
“I hope so. After we update the DeMarcos, we need to talk to Dante and Shelly Cloutier. Josh made a good point that Dante was seated next to Marie, which gave him opportunity. But my spidey sense tells me he didn’t take her ring.”
“Spidey sense?” S
am asked, glancing over at me.
“It’s what I call my gut instinct,” I replied with a grin. I didn’t tell him my spidey sense hadn’t seemed all that accurate lately.
Sam smiled. “Well, Josh’s point about Dante bears following up on. I’d also like to meet the Cloutiers.”
I looked at him. “Sam, I’d like to take the lead with Dante and Shelly. They know me and would be more open.” His jaw tightened, and his eyebrows pulled down into a frown. Our friendly moment has passed, I thought.
“Liz, I do question people for a living, you know.” There was an edge of anger in his voice.
“I understand. But I still want to take the lead. I promised Marie the questioning would be discreet.”
“I can be discreet!” Sam said loudly.
I looked at him and said quietly, “Sam…”
He took a deep breath and exhaled loudly. After glancing at me, he gave in. “Okay, but I want to be there.”
I thought about it for a second. “Sounds good,” I agreed.
We drove in silence for a while. I felt unsettled. I should have been happy that we found Josh unharmed. Instead, I was glum that after talking to him we still didn’t know what he was really up to.
“Hey Liz, cheer up. This is a victory, you know. Thanks to Millie, we found Josh and he’s alive and well. It could have turned out badly, but it didn’t. Enjoy the victory.”
When I looked at Sam, he smiled and wiggled his eyebrows.
The eyebrow wiggling took me by surprise and I laughed. “It is a victory isn’t it? Not exactly what I expected, but it’s still a win.”
Sam nodded. “It is indeed a win. When Josh walks in the B&B dining room, we can call it case closed. Now we have more time to find that missing ring.”
“You’re right,” I agreed. However, as I looked out the passenger window, I still felt a niggling doubt about what Josh and Dan were up to. This time I kept it to myself.
Chapter 13
When we arrived back at the B&B, I led Sam around to the west side of the house, up the porch stairs, and to the mudroom entrance. There, I shifted my messenger bag to my left shoulder and entered the lock code. After the deadbolt whirred open, I turned the knob and opened the door.
“This is one of the doors on this side of the house that guests can’t access,” I explained as we walked inside.
I stopped and scanned the mudroom. On the east wall across from us, there were nine built-in, kid-sized closets with doors. Below each cabinet, there was an open cubby for wet boots or shoes. On the west wall, there were two taller closets with doors and a wooden bench. A closed door to our right prevented B&B guests from entering the mudroom from the corridor. Everything was painted white.
The windows on the west wall provided lighting during the day. A red, olive green, and turquoise braided country runner protected the floor and provided color.
I smiled. “When we were kids, each of us had our own closet here and a place for our boots. There were two extra for kids who came over to play. The larger closets over there were for adults,” I said. Sam smiled and looked around.
I remembered my younger sister, Katie, and I losing many fights to Brian and Becky, our older brother and sister, in this room. Then when Aunt Grace returned to Mystic Grove with her three kids, everything changed. Although they lived in the coach house back then, Ryan, Chloe, and Olivia each got their own closet here. More importantly, they banded together with Katie and me in fighting Brian and Becky. The balance of kid power shifted, I thought and smiled.
“Liz?” Sam said, and I jumped.
“Sorry. Lots of memories here. Okay, so this west hallway runs from the front of the B&B all the way back to the kitchen. We keep that access door locked so that B&B guests can’t cut through here. It has a keypad lock so only the staff and family can open it. If you’re on this side of the door, though, you don’t need a lock code.”
Walking over, Sam opened the access door and stared down the hallway.
I moved next to him. “If you follow the hall to the end and turn left, you’re right at the check-in room by the front door.”
Sam frowned and closed the door. “So nobody could come in the front door, up the west hallway, and get through that door?” Sam asked.
I shook my head. “No. Again, if they’re not a current guest, staff member, or family, they can’t even get through the front door.”
Sam closed his eyes for a few seconds. Then they popped open. “What if a current guest gave the lock code to someone else? Someone who wasn’t a guest.” He looked at me.
I opened my mouth and then closed it. I ran that scenario though my head and grunted. “If that happened, the person could get in the front door or one of the side doors toward the front of the B&B. But they couldn’t get through this door,” I said nodding at the access door in front of us.
Sam looked disappointed. “No way for an intruder to use this hallway then?”
I thought about his question, running through different scenarios in my head. “Actually, if a current guest gave his or her lock code to someone, there’s another way for the intruder to move through the B&B. We have stairs off the main hallway in the front of the B&B and in the back by the dining room,” I said.
“We took the front stairs this morning,” Sam replied.
“Right. You probably didn’t notice this morning but when you go up those stairs, you have two options at the first landing. You can turn and go up to the second floor or you can walk straight down a short hall. If you take the short hall and go down a few steps, you’re in the west hallway.”
I opened the access door and pointed to the end of the hallway.
“But they still couldn’t get through this door?” Sam asked.
“No. But here’s the thing. If they came in the front door and took the stairs up to the second floor, they could walk to the back of the B&B. Then they could go down the back stairs to the main hallway by the dining room,” I said.
Sam nodded. “Then when they left, they could take the stairs straight across to the west hallway and leave the B&B through the mudroom door. Why don’t you block stairway access to the west hallway?”
“Fire laws. We need to provide as many ways out of the B&B as we can for guests on the second floor and our family on the third floor. This way, guests can come down the front or back stairs and exit through any of the outside doors on the west side of the B&B. They can also take the stairs down to the main hallway and leave through the front door.”
“That makes sense,” Sam agreed. “So that could be a possible access path for an intruder.”
I shook my head. “Sam, it’s technically possible, but that scenario is still pretty weak. Even if someone got the lock code from a current guest and made it to the dining room, we would have noticed a stranger coming in from the main hallway. Non-B&B guests come and go through the outside dining room door. If a non-B&B guest came in through the inside dining room door, Dad, Grandma Addie, or someone else on staff would notice right away. And how would a person from outside know about Marie’s ring, much less get close enough to her purse to steal it?” I asked.
Sam chewed his lip for a minute. “Someone on the inside could have called the intruder and given him or her that information. You’re right, though. It’s a weak scenario. I don’t know how they would have gotten close enough to Marie’s bag to steal the ring.”
“I agree,” I replied.
“Okay,” Sam said, sounding resigned. “We have to consider all possibilities.”
I shut the access door and headed back up the west hallway toward the kitchen.
When I went through the back kitchen door, the wonderful smells of turkey, stuffing, sweet potatoes, simmering soups, baking pies, and pastries hit me at once. I stopped and moaned.
“You okay?” Sam asked, looking at me in alarm.
I nodded. “I’m great. I just love everything about Thanksgiving, especially the food.” Sam made a noncommittal sound and I remembered that food didn�
�t seem very important to him.
I hung my messenger bag on the back of one of the kitchen chairs and unzipped my parka. After stuffing my gloves and hat into my parka pockets, I walked toward Grandma Addie. She stood at the center island reading a sheet of paper, probably one of her recipes. I waved at Dad and Ryan who stood at the front of the kitchen. They were still cooking turkeys and ham. Nana Anna looked up from beating cake batter. Tillie was stirring a sauce and Millie chopped vegetables.
“Hi Grandma,” I said stopping at the center island. Sam was right behind me. Grandma jumped and made a high-pitched sound.
“Liz Bean, you startled me,” she said, nailing me with her baby blue eyes.
Nana Anna rolled her eyes. “Maybe if you drank less coffee you’d be less jumpy.”
“Well if that isn’t the pot calling the kettle black,” Grandma said with a sniff and glared at Nana. I smiled. Nana Anna could definitely hold her own at any coffee bar.
“Did you find Josh DeMarco?” Millie asked, wiping her hands on a towel.
“Is Dan English okay?” Tillie asked. She looked worried.
Dad came over to the center island. He eyed his mother warily. At that moment, Grace came through the swinging doors from the dining room.
“What’s going on?” she asked. Everyone’s eyes lasered into me.
“Josh DeMarco is okay. He did go over to Dan English’s house. They have some sort of business with each other, but he didn’t share the details. He promised to be back for dinner. Sam and I are going to talk to the DeMarcos now. Josh asked that we not tell his family that he’s at Dan’s house. For the moment, we’re going to honor that request,” I said.
“And Dan’s okay?” asked Tillie.
“Right as rain,” Sam replied. “Both he and his son, Nick, looked good.”
Both Millie and Tillie exhaled. “What a relief,” Millie said.
“We were a bit worried,” Tillie added.
“That’s good news! Thank you,” Grandma said, smiling at Sam and me. “I knew you two would be a good team.” An electric current buzzed in my head. I glanced at Sam and he looked as uncomfortable as I felt.