If Onions Could Spring Leeks (13 page)

As I left the crime lab, my head—now being mostly but not entirely freed from worrying about Cliff's potential hurt feelings—reeled with everything else.

What had happened to Grace when we were at Lynn's? Did Derek jump into Grace's ghostly skin, or was it another ghost? If so, who? Why else would Grace have appeared at Lynn's if it wasn't Derek?

You should have told me.

Told me absolutely nothing, but I knew the phrase was vastly important. There was no way that Grace could have somehow been tied to Lynn, was there? I'd have to ask Jake to explore, but I would be surprised if there was a connection.

It was an easy walk to the doctor's office from the new crime lab and my thoughts rattled around in my head as I dodged tourists and a swarm of actors that was heading
toward the other end of the street to either round up some cattle or stage a fake gunfight.

I recognized the Explorer out front as the same one I'd seen earlier in front of Lynn's house. Whatever Ridley had been up to, it hadn't taken her very long. I glanced inside the front passenger window as I meandered by. Even though it was a nurse's vehicle, I was surprised to see typical nurse items on the front passenger seat—a stethoscope, some medical tape, and some gauze. I wondered if any of the items had been used on Lynn and, if so, why. Lynn hadn't appeared injured or ill when Gram and I had been at her house. I remembered seeing Ridley exit her car; she hadn't carried anything with her.

“What time's your appointment?” the front receptionist said when I came in. There was no one else in the small waiting room and she looked perplexed by my arrival.

“No appointment. I was here a couple days ago and I wondered if there was a nurse I could talk to about my continuing headache.”

“Oh, actually, I think the doctor would prefer to see you himself.”

Darnit.

She continued. “But he's not here at the moment. Let me talk to Ridley and I'll have her determine if she wants to call him back in.”

That worked. Sometimes you just get lucky.

“Thanks.”

The receptionist reappeared a few moments later and signaled me in through the side door. She deposited me in one of the examination rooms I hadn't yet been in. It was a small room down a side hall, and it was decorated with cowboy wallpaper. In the rest of the world, it might have been
considered a children's examination room, but since this was Broken Rope it was probably just something that Dr. Callahan had done to keep up with the town's theme.

Ridley entered the room only a brief instant later. The door opened almost the second the receptionist had closed it.

“Hi, Betts, how are you feeling?” she asked.

“Not terrible. I'm still a little headache-y though.”

“Dizzy?”

“No.”

“Any nausea?”

“No.”

“Funny vision?”

“No.”

“Tell me more about the headache. On a one-to-ten scale, how bad is it? What kind of pain—sharp or dull—and where is it located?”

“It's about a two is all, and it's mostly that the knot on my head is tender to the touch. I can't really get comfortable on my pillow.”

“I see,” she said as she reached to the knot on my head. She touched it very gently. “Right here?”

“Yes.”

She stepped back. “And you're not having any other pain?”

“Not really.”

“Hmm. Well, when's the last time you took some Tylenol?”

“Yesterday.”

“You'd do better if you kept on a well-timed schedule of Tylenol for a few more days. You should feel as good as new very quickly.”

She was probably wondering how I managed to fare in
a kitchen, with knives and other sharp things, if I couldn't handle a two-on-the-pain-scale headache.

“Of course. I should have thought of that. I'm sorry. I feel kind of dumb,” I said.

“Not at all. You should come see us any time you have any questions or problems. That's what we're here for. Anything else?”

“Yeah,” I said, and then I hesitated awkwardly. “You know, I really want to thank you for taking care of me the other day. I'm sure it was very difficult considering what happened to Derek.”

Surprise lit her eyes briefly. “It's okay. It's my job.”

I slid off the examination table. “I know, but still, thank you.”

“You're welcome.”

“Boy, I sure have heard some odd things about Derek's mom lately,” I said, ever so un-smoothly.

“Really? Like what?” She had her hand on the doorknob but removed it and crossed her arms in front of herself.

“Like she was pretty meddlesome in his marriages. That had to be hard.”

She knew the door was closed because she had never opened it, but she glanced at it nonetheless as if to confirm that it was shut tight.

“I don't know what you mean,” she said with such a quaver to her voice that she had to clear her throat when she was done.

“Nobody can hear us, Ridley. I'm sorry if Lynn mistreated you—or any of Derek's wives for that matter.”

Ridley laughed nervously and then looked at the door again. “Look, I don't know what you've been told or what you've
heard, but I promise whatever it is or was, it wasn't accurate. Rumors never are,” she said.

“So, Lynn was a good mother-in-law?”

Ridley's eyes became fierce. The sudden change was shocking, but I tried to hide my reaction.

“Why do you care? Derek's dead.”

“I'm sorry, Ridley. I never meant anything by it. I was just curious about Lynn, not really Derek.”

“Then you should probably ask Lynn about Lynn. She's still alive.”

“That's true,” I agreed.

The fire in Ridley's eyes lessened to something more smoldering than volcanic. “I'm sorry. I'm sensitive and, of course, sad right now. I should not talk to a patient the way I just spoke to you.”

“No problem. I'm doing fine,” I said, not completely fessing up to my transparent plot.

Ridley looked at the floor and took a deep breath. She looked back at me a moment later, her hand now firmly back on the knob. “You're good to go. Let us know if you have any other issues.” She left me to find my own way. I didn't blame her.

I sat on the examination table a few seconds more. Was there anything I could do to ease the strife I'd just created? Probably not; at least not anything that would make it better. There were many ways, however, I could make it worse. Leaving was the best option.

As I slid off the table, my phone buzzed. Jake texted, telling me he'd found more train stations.

I was glad for something to do that might not make
someone angry at me. Since the receptionist wasn't still out front, I managed to leave the doctor's office without having to say anything more to anyone.

•   •   •

“Okay, though a search for ‘plain, boring train stations' pulls up just about nothing, a simple search for ‘historical Missouri train stations' did result in several pictures. I don't know if the one you saw was in Missouri, but I thought I would start there, and I found a few really simple stations, one that looks lots like your description.”

“I'm ready,” I said. I kept the Nova parked down the street but I'd grabbed Paul's sketches from it and brought them with me to Jake's. We decided to look at the station pictures before we looked at the sketches.

“Okay,” Jake said as he lifted the pictures, one at a time, from the short pile he'd made. He turned them over and placed them in a line. “This is the Katy station in the Flat Branch area in Columbia.” He moved back to the first picture and pointed at it.

The Katy station was fairly simple and small, but not simple enough. It wasn't a wide building either, but more like a house that extended backward.

“Nope, not the one,” I said.

“This is Eldon.” He pointed.

Eldon's station was also simple. It was wider than it was long, but it still wasn't simple enough. It had a couple of dormer windows on its second floor. The station I was looking for had neither dormer windows nor a second floor.

“Closer, but still no cigar,” I said.

“Scruggs station,” Jake said as he pointed at the third picture.

“Not even close,” I said as I looked at the building made of stone with wooden pillars along the platform.

“I didn't think so, but it's so beautiful; I had to show it to you.”

“It is definitely beautiful.”

“This is the Russellville station. Keep in mind, I'm not just staying close to Broken Rope, in case she went farther.”

“Got it, and this one is pretty similar, but still not it. This one isn't fancy, but the one I saw was even wider.”

“Okay, this one is Olean.”

“Wait.” I picked it up and inspected the fuzzy black and white picture. “This one's even closer, Jake, but I still don't think it's the one. This looks whitewashed and there's something different about the placement of the doors, but I'm not sure what it is.”

“Well, the white-wash might not be a big deal, but if the door placement is off, then it's probably not the one. I saved the best for last.”

With his typical dramatic flair, Jake turned over the last picture in the stack.

“This is a better picture of the Frankland station,” he said. I heard the unspoken “ta-da” in my head.

“That's it! That's the one, I have no doubt. Why did you save it for last?” I said as I looked at the wide, simple—really simple—wood plank building.

Jake shrugged. “I thought it would be fun for you to see them all.”

“Okay. It was.”

“Good. Well, here it is, then. The station
was
the Frankland
station, like you thought; it was a couple of stops before Broken Rope, on the route I think Grace would have taken from Mississippi.”

“Do you think she was killed there?” I said.

“I would hate to speculate, but it must mean something.”

I moved my thoughts back to the moments I first met Grace as I looked at the picture even more closely. There was no doubt in my mind that the station in the picture in front of me was the same one where I'd met her.

“Jake,” I said. “I don't know how you would begin to do this, but is there any chance you could see if Lynn and Grace are somehow connected?”

“That sounds like a big challenge. What'd I miss?”

I told Jake about Grace's appearance at Lynn's house. He listened with his normal interest, but the note he jotted down didn't give me much hope.

Grace and Lynn????

“Wild-goose chase?” I said.

“I've been on wilder. I'll let you know. Now, I'd love to see how Paul did for Miz.”

I grabbed the rolled-up sketches. “Okay, this one is, without a doubt, Robert,” I said as I unrolled the first paper and spread it on the table.

“Excellent,” Jake said. “Paul is really good, isn't he?”

I nodded. “I should tell you everything that happened when he was there sketching. At some point or another you'll probably hear about it from either Paul or Cliff or both.”

“Uh-oh, that doesn't sound good. Tell me.”

I went over the details and, again, he listened intently. His eyes widened slightly when I told him about the kiss, but he didn't add a comment.

“So, other than that moment, you haven't seen or heard from Jerome since?” he said.

“That's your first thought—where's Jerome?” I said.

“Yes, but for a good reason. He's trying to get here, which means your life must be in danger. How and why—and if something is stopping him from saving you, how strong must that ghost or thing or person be? It's worrisome.”

“Gram and I are choosing to look at it differently. I think my life
might
have been in danger, but when I didn't die with Derek, I escaped the danger,” I said.

“Maybe, but there's still a killer on the loose.”

“Derek's killer.”

“Who hit you on the head, Betts! Probably not with the intention of you getting up and back to your life so quickly. The killer might think you saw something and still want you dead.”

“No, they know I didn't see anything. They came at me from behind, and I was out.”

“Right, but Roy said you talked to him, so you weren't as out as you think you were.”

“I promise I'll be careful.”

“I hope so, and I hope Jerome gets here on time, and in his own ghostly body, if his services are needed.” Jake took a deep cleansing breath. “All right, I'd like to see the other sketch.”

I unrolled the second piece of paper. He looked at it a long moment and then he looked up at me, his eyes big.

“I know this man,” he said.

“You do?”

“I do. Hang on.”

Jake practically leapt to his computer chair and rolled it close to his desk.