Pushed to the Limit (an Emma Cassidy Mystery Book 2) (14 page)

But then Jackie surprised her by nodding at
the open trunk of Emma’s car and saying, “Need any help with that?”

After a moment’s hesitation, Emma replied, “Sure,
that’d be great.”

Emma handed her one of the bags of food,
grabbed the other one, and shut her car. She led the way into the house and
through to the kitchen where she dumped her bag on the table. Jackie followed
suit, looking around her with frank curiosity.

“Nice place,” Jackie said, running her hand
over one of the counters.

“Uh-huh,” Emma politely agreed though
privately Faye’s house didn’t do anything for her. “Come and meet Pepper.”

She moved to the dining room with Jackie
following behind, and showed her the parrot. Unfortunately, Jackie didn’t
appear too impressed by the parrot even when he greeted them with a raucous “Good
afternoon!” Jackie seemed more interested in the furnishings. She ambled around
the room, drifting her fingers over the table, chairs, and cabinets, her eyes
wide and curiously avid. She looked, Emma thought, like an auctioneer mentally
valuing each piece of furniture. How weird.

“Oh, I like this Tiffany lamp,” Jackie
said, stroking the ornate, red-and –blue lamp sitting on a sideboard. She moved
on and stopped in front of a glass-fronted display cabinet filled with Faye’s
collection of porcelain and other knick-knacks. “So pretty,” she murmured.
Bending, she peered more closely at the pieces. She studied them for a few
moments, then shook her head and turned around. When she caught Emma’s eye, she
seemed to realize how odd her behavior looked, and gave a self-deprecating
shrug. “I, er, I used to collect china myself.” Her small white teeth worried
her bottom lip. “Before I…had to leave.”

Her voice faltered, and guilt twinged in
Emma. “I’m sorry. It must have been difficult to leave everything behind.”

“Not that difficult.” Jackie shrugged. “But
sometimes I miss the pretty things I used to own.”

“Maybe you can start a new collection.”
Emma didn’t quite know what to say; didn’t know if she was being horribly
insensitive or cloyingly upbeat. “Once your life is settled, of course,” she
added, not knowing anything of Jackie’s circumstances and reluctant to pry.

Jackie let out a protracted sigh as if the
prospect of a settled life was a long way off. “One day, perhaps.” She glanced
back at Emma. “I was wondering…maybe…no, it’s too much to ask.”

“Ask what?”

Jackie shook her head. “Doesn’t matter.”

“Please, I’d like to help if I can.”

“Well…” Jackie shifted from one foot to the
other, her expression doubtful. “I was wondering if maybe I could house-sit
here for you. You must be real busy at work, and you probably don’t have time
for this—” She fluttered a hand around her to indicate the house. “Whereas I’m
not that occupied at the moment, and it would give me real pleasure to look
after this house.” She glanced about the room again, a hint of possessiveness
in her expression as if she were already picturing herself living here.

For a few moments Emma was too startled to
speak. Of all the things Jackie could have asked her, this was the least
expected. Her initial instinct was to grab Jackie’s hand and say “Oh, yes,
please!” But hadn’t Jackie labeled Faye a ‘cow’ and a ‘busybody’ at the yard
sale? Why would she offer to housesit? And besides, Faye would most definitely
not like a stranger living in her house. The old woman might be annoying and interfering,
but she had asked Emma to look after her house, and Emma couldn’t delegate this
duty to someone she barely knew.

“That’s very kind of you to offer,” Emma
said in an apologetic tone, “and I would love to accept, but I’m afraid I
can’t.”

“Oh.” Jackie glanced away, but not before
Emma caught a strange flash of resentment in the woman’s eyes. “I’m not a
thief, if that’s what you’re thinking.”

“I wasn’t thinking anything of the kind,”
Emma quickly replied. “It’s just that I don’t think Faye would like it if I
handed over the house-sitting to someone else who she doesn’t know.”

Jackie shrugged, still offended. “Hey, I
was only trying to help.”

“Of course, and I appreciate the offer.
It’s very generous of you.”

Scuffing her feet on the polished
floorboards, Jackie muttered something that sounded like “Silly bitch.”

Emma frowned, sure she’d misheard. “Excuse
me?”

Jackie jerked her head up and blinked at
Emma. “Oh, don’t mind me. I’m always saying inappropriate things. Used to get
me into trouble with my ex. Well, I should go. Don’t want to get in your way
here.”

Emma followed her out the house, wishing
they weren’t leaving on such an awkward note. “I hope I’ll see you at the music
festival tomorrow night. Stacey said she’d be going.”

Jackie grabbed her bike from the front lawn
and clambered onto it. “I don’t know. I don’t like big crowds.” She put a foot
to the pedal and pushed off, wavering about the street for a few yards. “Bye,”
she called perfunctorily over her shoulder.

“Goodbye. See you around.”

Emma watched as Jackie zigzagged down the
road. If only the visit had been more pleasant, but somehow, she had managed to
upset Jackie.

“That’s a weird thing to do,” Jason
commented. He had managed to wash off the ‘cow’, but it looked like he still
had plenty of work ahead.

Emma turned to him. “What’s weird?”

“Riding a bike when she’s that old.”

To Jason anyone over the age of twenty-five
was ancient, Emma surmised. “She’s not that old. And she said she needs the
exercise.”

“Didn’t look like she was exercising.” With
a shrug, he returned to his cleaning.

Emma sighed and went back into the house.

An hour later, the
pizza she’d ordered arrived, and she took it and a couple of cans of soda
outside to share with Jason, who had just about finished cleaning the graffiti.
Emma sat on a bench on the front porch, while Jason lounged against the porch
railings.

“Thanks, this is great,” he said as he
reached for his third slice.

Emma, barely through her first, nodded.
“You’re welcome.” She was glad to see his mood had improved. “You must be
hungry after all your hard work.”

He pulled a face. “Guess the graffiti was a
stupid thing to do. Only made things worse for me.”

“Look on the bright side. You got off
lightly. You’re still young. You can still go back to college and graduate some
day. And your parents are behind you.”

Jason peered at her through his lank hair,
as if seeing her for the first time. “You grew up here, didn’t you? Did you go
to college nearby?”

“No, I went to a university in upstate New
York.”

His eyebrows lifted; he seemed impressed.
“Wish I could go to a school away from here.”

“Have you looked into it? Admission
criteria, costs, etcetera?”

“Not really.”

She wasn’t surprised. According to his
mother, since he’d dropped out of college, Jason had frittered away his days
not doing much. But Emma wasn’t going to nag him. That was his parents’ job.

“Well, it could be good for you to get a
fresh start elsewhere. You might want to find out more.”

“Yeah, maybe. It might make my mom happy,
and she hasn’t been happy for ages. Ever since Dad’s retirement party, she’s
been really uptight.”

Emma paused midway through her slice. Hmm.
Was Helen Wylie uptight because she’d pushed Faye down the stairs in a fit of
maternal anger?

“Helen’s a good mom,” she said casually.
“She helped you pack up your stall after the yard sale, didn’t she?”

Jason was busy crunching his teeth into the
crust of his slice. “Yeah, she and my dad. I had a lot of stuff to move. Didn’t
manage to sell very much.”

He was too relaxed to be fibbing, Emma
felt. He was a straightforward young man who wasn’t used to subterfuge. Jason
was telling the truth, which meant Helen can’t have attacked Faye, as much as
she secretly would’ve liked to.

Breathing a little easier, Emma reached for
her soda.

***

Darkness surrounded
Emma as she sat up, pulled out of her sleep by an out-of-place noise. For a few
moments she blinked in confusion before she remembered where she was. Not
tucked up in her own bed, but slouched on an uncomfortable settee, the TV
muttering in the corner, a lone lamp casting a dull light over Faye’s living
room. Yawning, she got to her feet, stretched her arms, and clicked off the TV.
Time for bed.

But as she padded barefoot across the
carpet, another sound reached her. Faint, yet distinct. It seemed to be coming
from the front porch. Emma’s heart rate quickly ratcheted up. Was someone
trying to break into Faye’s house again? Where was her cell phone? Probably
still in her bag, but where on earth had she left that?

The noise came again, a sort of shuffling
sound like feet scraping back and forth. She was standing only yards away from
a window that looked straight onto the porch. Tension gripped her, stifling her
lungs so she could barely breathe. She ought to tiptoe out of the living room,
find a phone, and call the police. But if she did that, whoever was outside
might hear her and run away before the cops arrived. The urge to know who was
out there flared up, overriding her initial fear. She was safe inside the
house, the doors and windows were secure. She could take a quick peek out the
window and see who was trespassing outside.

Hardly daring to breathe, she slid toward
the window, her bare soles feeling hot against the floorboards. Heavy maroon
drapes hung over the window. With fingers that felt shaky and clumsy, she lifted
the fabric away from the wall and peeped through the gap. Just a few inches
away, separated from her by a mere pane of glass, a man sat on the bench on the
front porch. His back was to her, and his shoulders were hunched. He appeared
to be dressed all in black, with a beanie covering his head.

Why was this guy sitting on the front
porch? What did he want? And who the heck was he?

Indignation welled in her. Tired of being
afraid, she yanked the drapes apart and rapped her knuckles on the glass. “Hey,
you! What are you doing there?”

The man leaped up as if he’d been bitten by
a snake and spun around. The outside light wasn’t on, meaning the porch was
deep in shadow, but Emma managed to catch a glimpse of the man’s startled face.

She gaped at him. “Alvin?”

Letting the drapes fall shut, she raced for
the front door. She tugged it open just in time to see the dark figure pelting
down the road.

“Alvin!” she called out, but it was
useless. He had already disappeared.

She peered at the bench where he’d sat but saw
nothing. She went back into the house, slamming the door shut before making
sure it was firmly locked. She went through the entire house checking every
window and door until she was satisfied that the house was secure. Finding her
bag in the kitchen, she fished out her cell phone and contemplated it. She
should call the police and tell them what had happened. But was she prepared to
tell them Alvin Tucker had been sitting in the dark on Faye’s porch dressed
like a burglar? Why had he been there? Had he been psyching himself up before
breaking in? But why would he want to break into Faye’s house? Sure, he stood
to lose a whole heap of money if Faye went ahead and sued him, but how could he
prevent that by forcing his way into her house? There was nothing here that
might prevent her from suing. Apart from kidnapping Pepper and holding the
parrot to ransom. She shook her head. No, that was a ridiculous idea. Alvin
wasn’t that desperate, was he?

She brought up Alvin’s number on her phone
and called him, but he didn’t pick up. Probably because he could see her caller
ID and the last thing he wanted was to talk to her. Fine. But he couldn’t avoid
her forever. First thing tomorrow morning, she would track him down and find
out what was behind his bizarre behavior.

She brushed her teeth and changed into
sleep shorts and T-shirt. After checking the house one more time, she slid
between the sheets of the narrow twin bed in the guest room. But adrenaline was
still coursing through her veins, and she doubted she’d be able to sleep for a
while. Her cell phone was right next to her on the nightstand. She had also
selected a heavy iron skillet from the kitchen and placed it under the bed. It
might not offer any real protection, but it made her feel better, as did
leaving her lamp and the hallway lights on.

Despite her tension, she somehow managed to
drift off, only to jerk awake sometime later. Once again muffled sounds came
from the front porch. Emma groaned silently. Not Alvin again. Was he drunk or
something?

Rolling out of bed, she grabbed her phone
and the skillet. She marched down the hallway toward the front door, making no
effort to disguise her footsteps. Raising the skillet in one hand, she used the
other to bang on the door.

“If you don’t clear off right now, I’m calling
the police!” she called out in what she hoped was an authoritative voice.

Not a sound came from the other side of the
door, but she fancied she sensed a sudden intake of breath.

“I’m not kidding. Scram, now. You’ve got
three seconds.”

Then came the sound of footsteps scuttling
away. Only one pair, she was sure. She stood there for a full ten minutes, ears
peeled for the slightest noise, but the night was eerily quiet. Eventually she
grew tired of holding the skillet. She made her rounds of the house, checked on
Pepper, and finally returned to the guest room. This time, every light in the
house remained on. To hell with Faye’s electricity bill. She wasn’t going to
stay up all night in a dark house.