Murder Is Our Mascot (22 page)

Drumming the fingers of her good hand on the steering wheel, Emily continued to run through various scenarios in her mind. Why would Helen and Jim have been arguing? Did Helen disappear because she was guilty of murdering Jim? Maybe they had been arguing, and it was all a heat-of-the-moment type of thing. Maybe Helen had been acting in self-defense. Or, worse yet, maybe Helen was the person Jim was meeting that night, but the killer got there first. But if that was the case, wouldn't Helen have discovered Jim's body and called the police? Or would the killer have waited and gotten rid of Helen too? Helen's body had not been found, but maybe that was because the police were only looking in obvious places, assuming she was alive and well. Another frightening scenario presented itself. What if Helen had discovered Jim's body, heard someone leaving, and followed and confronted that person? That sounded like the type of fearless thing Helen would do. Maybe whoever had killed Jim had then killed Helen, and if so, her body might be anywhere. Emily trembled, overcome with fear for her friend. She knew in her heart of hearts that Helen was innocent. That meant she could only hope and pray that Helen was still alive. Somewhere.

She needed to talk to Stephen Olsen. Maybe he knew something that was preventing him from coming forward. Emily pointed the car back in the direction she'd come. Mathletes' practice wasn't over yet, and with any luck, she'd be able to find the black Navigator quickly. There weren't too many of those roaming the streets of Ellington.

When Emily passed back by Masterson Real Estate, she saw Gil pacing in front of the door. The ball of dread in her stomach grew. Arlene quitting so abruptly, and then Stevie not being at school, was very odd. Surely Arlene would have come up to the school to withdraw Stevie. Yet the school hadn't heard a thing.

Her dread grew with every mile she drove. She thought about how Stevie had been adamant that Helen was innocent. He had also been close to Jim. Stevie was too young to remember anything about the Olsen case, but what if he had overheard something? Stevie was a bright kid. Had Stevie disappeared the same way Helen had? Did they both know too much? Emily pictured Arlene busily packing, completely unaware that Stevie hadn't been to school that day. She was thoroughly convinced that Arlene kept close tabs on Stevie, and if he had willingly not been at school, she would have called. However, if Stevie had never made it to school…

The thought was too horrible to finish.

Emily still wanted to locate Stephen Olsen, but right now she decided she needed to check on Stevie more. She tried Arlene's cell again. The call went straight to voice mail, but Emily chose not to leave a message, afraid she wouldn't be able to keep the fear out of her voice. Her brain told her there was a good chance that Stevie was fine and Arlene was just too busy packing to call or remember to have Stevie do it. Her heart, however, knew that the great bard had been right—something was rotten in the state of Denmark. An inexplicable sense of urgency propelled her toward the outskirts of town, her search for the black Navigator put on hold.

Arlene had bought the old Covell homestead when she and Stevie moved to Ellington the past summer. The Covells had been anxious to sell. They had finally retired and were headed for a life of rest and relaxation in Florida. Her mom had told her that Arlene had gotten the place for a song. The house itself was old, but it had been lovingly maintained. Several people had wondered why a single mom would want to mess with all that land, but Emily figured she liked the privacy. The views around the old Covell place were beautiful, with stately, old trees and gently rolling hills. Arlene was renting the ground out to a neighbor who was farming it for her for some extra income. Emily thought Arlene had made an excellent investment. Why would she want to uproot Stevie's life yet again when she had such a beautiful place to live, as well as a great job?

The old homestead was about five miles outside of town off of Highway E. Emily took the turn off of the blacktop and onto the gravel road fast enough to have the back tires spinning. She forced herself to slow down so that she could see through the churned-up dust. The tin roof of the ancient red barn that perched on the ridge behind the house came into view. Emily turned into the winding drive, trying to maintain a sedate pace. Her eyes anxiously roved the area as she parked, but the place looked deserted, left to doze in the late afternoon sun. The blinds on all the front windows were tightly closed, and there wasn't a car in sight. Emily rang the bell, pounded on the door, and called out for Arlene, but there was no response. She stood undecidedly on the front porch steps, shading her eyes so she could scan for any sign of life. The only movement was a murder of crows settling down in a nearby field. Their flight was silent, a black smudge on the pale-blue sky. The whole world seemed to be holding its breath, anticipating the worst. A cloud drifted across the pale October sun, and the landscape turned into a set from an old noir film. Emily was determined not to let the old familiar scene play out, though. She would not be the naïve, helpless damsel in distress. Today the part of the fearless, clever heroine would be played by one Emily Taylor.

Determined to make sure the place was as deserted as it appeared to be, Emily made a circuit of the house, trying all the windows and doors. As she rounded the far corner, she could have sworn she heard a muffled scream, but then a strong gust of wind had the old, rusty windmill screeching in the silence. The sound set Emily's teeth on edge, stretching her nerves taut. Emily's step faltered, and for the first time, she began to wonder if coming out here by herself had been a good idea. Still, she'd come too far to give up now.

Since the house wasn't giving up any secrets, Emily turned to the outbuildings. The large barn doors were secured with a padlock that looked like it meant business. Next to the barn was an open-front machine shed, empty but for a mama cat, who had made a home for her babies in some leftover hay. Emily gave the protective mama a wide berth as she ducked between the buildings. A ramshackle, white shed lurked in the shadows behind the hulking machine shed. From its size, Emily figured the shed had once housed gardening tools, possibly even a lawnmower. The door was locked tight, but a cursory glance showed a round window set high in the back wall. Even on her tiptoes, Emily couldn't see over the sill. She returned to the machine shed and rummaged until she unearthed a crumbling cinder block. It was awkward to heft and haul with only one good arm, but she managed. The heels of her chocolate leather boots sank into earth softened by the recent rains as she positioned the cinder block under the window, turning it on its end to give her extra height. The wind had picked up and was tugging at the hem of her plaid skirt as she balanced on one foot, leaning into the shed's wall for balance. The cinder block provided just enough height for her to see into the shed. When she'd started on this search, Emily hadn't been sure what she was looking for. But that didn't change the fact that she knew it when she found it.

Inside the shed sat a familiar blue Tahoe. A round Scentsy hanger dangled from the rearview mirror. The vehicle had been pulled in straight rather than backed in, giving her an unobstructed view of its front. The passenger side showed signs of serious damage. The bumper had been torn loose, the headlight smashed, and the door mangled almost beyond recognition. Emily stared in slack-jawed horror at the streaks of red paint amid the wreckage.

Feeling suddenly lightheaded, Emily dropped back down to the ground, carefully lowering herself to sit on the cinder block. Her heart pounded and her fingers shook. The sun retreated behind a cloud once again, and Emily let loose a gurgle of hysterical laughter as she realized she was the damsel in distress after all. She felt as weak as the kittens in the machine shed. Her world teetered precariously on the brink of this discovery, for there was no denying it—this was the vehicle that had run her and Gabby off the road, sending them plummeting to probable death. But what made this discovery even worse was the second undeniable fact—this was Helen's vehicle. Emily's mind spewed nothing but gibberish. This was too much to take in. It was like facing a geometry problem, a subject that had baffled her in high school. She now had the proof, but she still had no answer.

Why was Helen's vehicle in Arlene's garage? Had Helen run them off the road? But no, that scenario didn't make sense unless she was in cahoots with Arlene, since the vehicle was on Arlene's property. And would Helen want to hurt her and Gabby, or Jim for that matter? And didn't she see that by running away and hiding, she had only made herself look guiltier? None of this made sense.

Pacing behind the shed, Emily thought back to the moment this nightmare had started. Jim's murder. Barnes had said that Helen and Jim had argued. But about what? Why did they mention the police? Unbidden, an image of Jim's face, eyes staring, muscles slack, popped into her mind. She fought her own instinct to push the image away and focused instead on why Jim's face seemed so crucial to her in helping figure out this mess. Slowly, Jim's face, with his large, dark eyes, ready smile, and crown of dark hair morphed into a serious face with intent eyes, staring up at her from the teachers' parking lot. Jim and Stephen Olsen. She had made that connection, but now the final image fell into the kaleidoscope. With a final twist of the dial, the truth tumbled clear. She had been staring at those same dark, intent eyes since school began. Or at least she had been when they weren't hiding behind a fringe of even darker hair. Jim had sworn that he would not rest until he found his nephew. And in Ellington, Jim had found him on his own football team. Stevie Davis was Jim's nephew, the Olsen baby kidnapped seventeen years earlier.

Racing to Tad's car and her cell phone, she tried to sort through the rest of it. Arlene—fiercely protective of her son, always on the move. Jim—a caring coach who found more than just a new player. Helen—a conscientious counselor who would want to follow the proper channels to confirm Stevie's true identity with the least amount of trauma to the withdrawn seventeen-year-old boy. Once Jim had discovered the truth, he must have confided in Helen, or vice versa. Jim was ready to go to the authorities. But that could never happen. Arlene must have gotten wind of Jim's plans. Arlene would do whatever she had to in order to ensure that she never lost her son.

Emily's breath came in wheezing gulps as she rummaged through her purse for her cell phone. Desperate now, she dumped the purse's contents on the passenger seat, diving onto her phone like a diet-starved person pounces on a piece of chocolate cake. Her fingers trembled as she punched in Tad's cell number. Signal was spotty back here in the hills, but she left a message anyway. He must still be in Mathletes' practice. Surely he would get the message when he discovered his car was missing. Not for the first time in her life, she regretted her impetuous behavior. Why hadn't she let someone know where she was going? She considered driving back to town and going to speak to Detective Gangly-Arms in person. But she was afraid that if she left, this crucial piece of evidence, Helen's Tahoe, might disappear. Arlene may have cleared out, but Emily knew she was too cautious to leave behind something so incriminating. Where was she now was the question. And when would she be back?

Emily got into the car and locked the doors, grabbing up her conspicuous pink camo pepper spray can for defense. She would have preferred her .38 Special, but Tad wasn't fond of guns, so she knew there was no chance she'd find a pistol stashed in a compartment of his car. Emily tried Detective Gangly-Arms, but he wasn't in. She left a message for him to call her immediately as she had some new evidence in the Jim Layton murder case. If she was lucky, Tad would get her message soon and head this way with the detective in tow. She checked her phone again for any messages she might have missed due to the poor signal strength, but, as usual, luck was not with her. Her phone emitted one traitorous beep before her Rainbow Brite background faded to black. Her battery was dead. She hadn't charged it last night because she had forgotten her wall charger as Tad was hustling her out of her duplex.

Wind buffeted the car and dark clouds now loomed on the horizon. Emily waffled between staying put and fleeing back to town. But as soon as she left, Helen's Tahoe would disappear, and Arlene would be gone in the wind. Helen! Emily couldn't believe her own stupidity. She knew that Stevie was safe now, because no matter how unhinged Arlene became, she would never hurt her "son." But where was Helen? Had Arlene already gotten rid of that loose end? Tears flooded her eyes, and she blinked furiously, clutching her pepper spray in a death grip. She struggled to think like a psychopathic killer. It actually wasn't as hard as she'd thought it would be. Scary. But other matters ranked higher on her scale of terror right now.

If Arlene had killed Helen, why hadn't they found her body? And if Helen was still alive, like Emily hoped and prayed, it had to be because Helen still served some purpose for Arlene. But what? And how did Helen get involved in this whole mess anyway?

A faint rumble of thunder rolled in with the darkening clouds. It had been thundering when she found Jim's body, too. While Emily didn't put much stock into reading the signs of the universe, the coincidence could not be ignored. An answering rumble deep within her convinced her that she needed to act quickly if this storm was going to end with a different fate.

The homestead was deserted, so where else could Helen be? Fat raindrops plopped on the windshield, creating small puddles before rolling down the glass like tears. Emily wracked her brain, trying to keep her own tears at bay. She didn't know Arlene well enough to know where her favorite haunts might be. Where could she hide a person? Did she rent a storage facility around here? Maybe someone at Masterson Real Estate could tell her. She picked up her phone and poked the button to wake it up. The screen remained dark. Remembering the dead battery, she tossed the useless phone aside. "That battery better be the only dead thing I find tonight." She spoke the words aloud, startling herself.