“Ah.”
Harley moved to the next person on her list. “Have you all had any encounters with Justin Wheeler?”
Samantha exhaled, blowing a stream of air across the desk. “The ghost hunter guy? Oh, yeah. What a prick. Doesn’t care for us much.”
“Why?”
“Well, Jen and I both thought he was a fake, you know … but that’s not what got his feathers up. He asked us to borrow some merchandise as props for his show—an old pocket watch, a dress, a lantern—stuff like that. When we said ‘no,’ but that we’d be happy to sell them to him instead, he got mad. I mean really mad. I thought he might even try and hit us. Needless to say, we didn’t make friends with him.”
“Any other threats?”
“No threats but a lot of dirty looks.” She sniffled. “And one of his tour attendees told us he’s been giving our shop a bad review—obviously out of revenge.”
Harley rose from her seat. There were so many things she had to consider. She didn’t even know where to start. “Well, I guess I better head back to the shop,” she said in a resigned tone.
She hated to leave Samantha and knew as soon as she stepped outside Modern Vintage’s doors, Samantha would collapse into a heap of tears.
And her face conveyed that very likelihood. Slouched behind the desk, with her bangs and tendrils stuck to her face by sweat and tears, her ponytail fighting for its release, she gave Harley a pleading look. “Harley, I …”
In that moment she seemed to want to tell Harley something. Her mind seemed to search for the right words, but when she opened her mouth to speak, she stopped herself, seeming to think better of it.
For the second time that morning, Harley felt as if Samantha was hiding something from her.
Harley spoke. “Please … you’ll let me know if I can do anything to help, right? And you know I’m here for you—anytime—day or night. Don’t hesitate.”
Samantha nodded in agreement on both counts and forced a smile.
“It’s going to be okay,” Harley said. “We’ll get through this.”
This time Samantha did not nod. Nor did she smile. Her gaze was lowered to the desk and to her hands still clutched to the balled-up tissue. Years of repairing and refinishing furniture had left her hands strong, her rough-hewn fingers belying her petite stature. Harley’s mind returned to the noose around Jennifer’s neck and to the person who had strangled her. That person had been strong, too.
Samantha broke Harley from her reverie. “I guess we’re gonna have to, huh? Get through it.”
Yes.
Grief was a terrible process, and one never really got over the loss of a loved one. You moved on, you lived your life, but it was always there, that emptiness. When Harley’s mother died when she was eight, she did not think she would ever overcome it, ever be able to live a full life again. And she had somehow blamed herself at the time, thinking that if she had been a better child, had loved her mother better, she would not have wanted to be in the military, would not have wanted to serve overseas.
Harley said goodbye to Samantha, and made her way toward the shop’s rear exit. Her heart ached for Samantha, and she did feel Samantha had truly loved Jennifer, her best friend for over thirty years. However, something just did not feel right. She sensed Samantha was involved in some way, knew more than she was telling her, maybe even feeling guilty. For a moment, Harley had been convinced Samantha had wanted to tell her something, yet had changed her mind at the last minute.
When Harley reached the back door, she pushed it open with purpose, welcoming the fresh air of the back parking lot.
48
“No Place to Lay His Head”
Harley placed her hand to her brow, shielding her eyes from the brightness of the parking lot. Being inside Modern Vintage had been like being in Santa’s workshop—warm and cozy, with holiday music, shelves of colorful trinkets, and the aroma of Christmas potpourri in the air. Now she was back in the real world of concrete, damp air, woodsmoke—and police tape.
In the parking lot, a series of strategically placed police cars blocked the entrances and exits. Uniformed policemen guarded the perimeter, while others moved in and out of Jennifer’s apartment.
When Harley moved to shut the shop’s door behind her, she nearly collided with one of Jed’s deputies. “Oh, I’m so sorry,” she said to the female officer. “Excuse me.”
Everyone on the Notchey Creek police force knew of Harley, at least by reputation. That October she had been the unlikely heroine who had solved the Middleton murder case. And while Jed had honored Harley’s wishes, that he take public credit for solving the case, everyone knew, in reality, it had been Harley.
“Oh, that’s all right, Harley,” the young female officer said. “We’re just cordoning off Ms. Williams’s apartment so we can take some prints, things like that.”
Although it saddened her that Jennifer’s most precious belongings were being pored over and handled, placed in plastic bags, and dusted for fingerprints, she was glad to hear it, knowing such actions meant getting closer to identifying her killer.
The police officer motioned to Modern Vintage. “You know if Ms. Jacobs is around?” she asked. “Jed’s asked me to break the news to her.”
Deciding not to mention she had already broken the news, Harley merely said, “She’s in the back—in the office.”
“Ah, good. Thanks.”
Harley waved goodbye to the officer and headed in the opposite direction, hoping to take a shortcut through the alleyway, then across the street to Smoky Mountain Spirits. Just as she reached the alleyway, a back door swung open ahead, ricocheting against the brick wall.
Dr. Jeremy Griggs stumbled outside, nearly falling to the pavement. His legs were like limp noodles as he caught himself and straightened his body, struggling to regain his balance.
He looked like an unmade bed.
His salt-and-pepper hair, so neatly styled on better occasions, sprung out like corkscrews from his head. He still had on the same clothes he had worn to the meeting the previous night, but they were wrinkled all over, his shirt half-tucked into his trousers.
For the first time in his life, Jeremy Griggs looked his age.
He must have spent the night in his office, Harley thought, sleeping on his psychiatry couch. Then hearing the police activity outside his window, he had stumbled outside to investigate the commotion.
He readjusted his glasses on his nose, and surveyed his surroundings. His eyes, with sleep still in their corners, widened when he noticed the police.
“The police? What’re the police doing here?”
He watched as the officers unrolled yellow police tape and lined the back perimeter of Modern Vintage. “But that’s Jennifer’s store,” he said, his voice growing frantic. “What are they doing at Jennifer’s store?”
He approached one of the uniformed officers. “What’s going on here?”
“Sorry, Dr. Griggs,” the officer said. “Police business.”
“But she’s my patient!”
The officer was unmoved. “And Sheriff Turner will come see you when it’s time. Now, I need to ask you to keep outside the perimeter here, you understand?”
Jeremy did not budge, and the officer held up his hand, and said, “Please.”
Correctly interpreting the words as a command and not a request, Jeremy turned away. When the police officer had left, he turned to Harley and asked, “Harley, do you know what’s going on? What’s happened?”
Harley wanted to dissolve into the pavement in that moment. It had been difficult enough finding Jennifer’s body that morning, then informing Samantha Jacobs about her childhood best friend’s death. Now a third person with close ties to Jennifer was asking for information, and she wasn’t sure how much more she could take.
“Dr. Griggs, I … Please.” She motioned toward Main Street. “Won’t you come back to my store, have a drink? And I’ll tell you what I know.”
At first, he seemed hesitant, but so
on the need for information overcame his reluctance. He gave a nod of assent, and in a resigned voice, he said, “Sure.”
49
“Love’s Labour’s Lost”
The walk to Smoky Mountain Spirits was a deafeningly silent one, the tension palpable. Harley was mulling over what to say to Jeremy, anticipating his questions as well as the questions she needed to ask him. Another opportunity might not arise, and besides Jennifer’s killer, Jeremy had been the last person to see her alive.
She picked up her pace down the alleyway and across Main Street, as Jeremy followed behind her.
When they reached the store, she ushered him inside, ensuring the door sign was still turned to CLOSED. The shop would have to open late that day. That was all there was to it. Even with the festival about to start, far more important things required her attention.
She closed the door behind them, locked it, and ushered Jeremy to the bar. Beside the potbellied stove, Matilda raised her head in momentary interest, and seeing it was Jeremy, and seeing he had no snacks to offer, she returned to her snoozing.
Jeremy fell into a slump on the leather bar stool, and rested his elbows on the counter before he buried his face in his hands. Unsure whether he was weeping or merely resting his eyes, Harley placed a tissue on the bar, then a mug alongside it. Being he wasn’t a regular customer, she asked, “Would you like something to drink? I’ve got coffee, cocoa, eggnog …”
“How about some eggnog?” Though they both knew his stomach wouldn’t stand for much of it.
Nonetheless, Harley filled his mug with cold eggnog, added a shot of whiskey, then garnished it with freshly grated nutmeg.
Jeremy took the smallest of sips, barely swallowing, his eyes lowered to his hands as they held the mug.
“Please,” he said at last, his voice weak, “please tell me she didn’t hurt herself.”
Hurt herself? Had he thought Jennifer had committed suicide? Obviously so.
“No,” Harley said in a near whisper. “No, she didn’t hurt herself.”
He lifted his head, then his brown eyes, the whites of which were pink and bloodshot at the edges. For a moment, he seemed relieved and a little sigh escaped his lips. Then his mind seemed to turn to the alternative, and his mouth fell open in horror.
He shook his head, his face wrenched in despair. “Don’t tell me somebody …?”
“She was found in the woods this morning,” Harley said. “In Briarwood Park. Apparently she was … killed late last night.”
“Killed? Killed by who?”
Harley gave a shrug, indicating she did not know. And she was not going to go into the particulars of how Jennifer was killed unless he asked.
“And the park?” he said. “But what in the world was she doing in there?”
“I don’t know,” Harley said. “I thought maybe you could tell me. You were the one who walked her home last night.”
“Oh—well, I … I mean, yes, I did walk her home, but we only passed through there on our way here. We didn’t stop or anything.”
“And you made it to her apartment?”
His voice sputtered. “Jennifer said she was going to bed. I told her goodnight, then watched her go up the steps.”
“That’s it?”
“That’s it. I mean, she did seem a little distracted, I guess, but then she’s been that way—ever since Larry and her mom died.”
“And you went home after that?”
He deflected his gaze to the bar and readjusted his weight in the chair, as if he were about to embark into uncomfortable territory. “I did go home. Yes. But when I got there, all of the doors were locked. Rebecca—she, well—we went to the meeting together last night, only took the one set of keys. Figured that’s all we’d need—figured we’d be going home together.”
And they had not gone home together. He’d gone home with Jennifer. And obviously because of this, Rebecca had locked him out, forcing him to sleep in his office.
“And what about Jennifer’s apartment when you came back?”
“Same as when I left. The lights were on, so I figured she was probably up reading with her tea.”
“Do you know what time that was?”
“Oh, um … I think … well, I guess it was probably around eleven or so.”
“And you didn’t hear anything outside here last night? In the parking lot?”
Harley waited while he considered the question.
“Well, I thought I might’ve heard some glass breaking somewhere, but I just figured it was somebody leaving Bud’s Pool Hall.” Bud’s Pool Hall was located about a block from Jeremy’s office. “Sometimes they drop their beer bottles in the parking lot instead of just throwing them away.”
Or, Harley thought, maybe it was the glass being shattered in Jennifer’s door.
“But I was half asleep,” he said, giving it further consideration, “so I don’t even know if it was really that or not.”
“So you’d already gone to bed at that point? When you heard the glass breaking?”
“It was pretty late. I don’t know what time. Must’ve been past midnight at least.”
“But obviously Jennifer left her apartment, at some point in the night, to go back to the park.”
“Obviously, but I didn’t see or hear her.”
“Dr. Griggs,” she said, trying a different tack, “earlier … why did you ask if Jennifer had hurt herself?”
She already knew the answer to this question, of course, but she wanted to hear the specifics from him, wanted to see the expression on his face when he told her.
“Because,” he said, linking his hands together and resting them on the bar, “she’d tried to do it before.”
Harley raised her brows. While she had anticipated his answer, and while she knew Jennifer had suffered from depression since her husband and mother died, she was surprised she had been suicidal.
“I didn’t know,” Harley said. “I … didn’t know it’d gotten that bad.”
“It did.” He gave a sigh. “And she’d seemed fine here recently. We’d been making a lot of progress. But then something happened. … I don’t know what exactly. She wouldn’t say … wouldn’t even tell me.”
Harley studied Jeremy for a moment, her gaze moving over his distressed features, then down his neck, stopping at the base of it.
There was a trace of lipstick on his collar. The same mauve shade Jennifer always wore.
She decided to tread carefully. “Do you know if Jennifer was seeing anybody?”
As a married man, it was not likely he would admit to having an affair with Jennifer, but Harley thought she might find out something else, something even more valuable.
“No,” he said simply. “No, I don’t.”
“What makes you so sure?”
He did not hesitate. “Because she was still in love with Larry—her husband—for one thing.”
He studied Harley for a moment, and correctly reading her expression, he said, “Look. I know people talk about me around town … just like they talked about Jennifer. And just like in her case, none of it’s true. It seems like if you’re friendly—friendly at all with people—if you show genuine interest—innocent interest—people take it the wrong way. See things there that aren’t there. Believe what they want to believe. But I’m here to tell you there was nothing going on between Jennifer and myself.”
“But you cared a lot about her,” Harley said. “Obviously.”
“I did care a lot about her. Yes. I care a lot about all my patients. Every single one. That’s what people don’t understand. I feel a personal responsibility toward them.”
He paused. “Do you know what it feels like, as a psychiatrist, when one of your patients takes their own life? Knowing that you weren’t a good enough doctor to help them? Knowing you couldn’t bring them out of their pain? The guilt … it never leaves you. It’s like losing a loved one or a really close friend, except it feels like you’re the one who killed them. What if I’d said this? y
ou keep asking yourself, or what if we’d tried another form of therapy instead … over and over and over. … It’s unending. So, yes, to answer your question, I did take a special interest in Jennifer because I was afraid she was going to try and kill herself again.”
But Harley was not sure if he was trying to convince her or himself.
“And Rebecca?” she asked. She had gotten this far. She might as well take it one step further.
He dropped his gaze back to the bar and suddenly grew quiet. She detected a slight change in his breathing. His chest rose and fell, and she imagined his heart quickening with little palpitations. “I’ve … I’ve only loved two women my whole entire life … and Rebecca is one of them.”
And the other? Harley thought. Who was the other one?
But she would stop there. She had already pried enough into his involvement, and she could tell by his body language, he was through with talking to her. She had caught him in a vulnerable moment, that was all. On any other given day, or any other time, he would never have divulged the things he had just told her.
But he had divulged them, and Harley realized she had probably learned more than she ever thought was possible.
Jeremy raised himself from the bar stool, not making eye contact.
For the first time in his life, it seemed Jeremy Griggs had found someone who was a better listener than he. Harley rarely spoke about herself, always giving her full attention to the person in front of her. She had an uncanny ability to get people to open up to her, almost as if they were talking to themselves instead of to another human being.
In truth, Harley had been ignored by most people for most of her life, and she was not used to getting attention from others. In her younger years, she had often stood on the sidelines, fading into the background, seemingly invisible. She was the one who saw and heard everything and everyone, but whom no one saw or heard in return.
The Ghosts of Notchey Creek Page 15