Searching for Yesterday (14 page)

I hesitated, trying without success to think of some way to soften what I was about to say. “If Lenny killed your mother in the winter, then he couldn't have buried her.”

Annie's hand flew up to cover her mouth. Her face was very pale.

“Do you want to do this some other time?” I asked her.

“No,” she shook her head. “No, definitely not. It's just hard to hear ... hard to think about. But I want to move forward with this. If Lenny ... killed my mother, I want him to pay for it, and as soon as possible.”

“Okay. Like I said, he couldn't have buried her if it was winter — the ground would have been too frozen.”

“And?”

“He had to hide her body somewhere — somewhere that it hasn't been discovered all this time. But somewhere that's accessible without digging.”

“Right.”

“And, since Lenny never came back to Little River until this summer, then it's ... uh,
she's
still where he put her. But like I said, it's got to be somewhere that could be discovered without digging, which means it's possible someone could have come upon it by accident at some point in time.”

“But no one did,” Annie said. “Or it would have been in the papers.”

“No one did,” I agreed. “But what if someone had? What if someone had even seen Lenny hide it all those years ago, and had stayed quiet about it, waiting for the day when Lenny would be back?”

“I don't follow. Who do you think ...”

“No, no,” I cut in. “That didn't happen, but it
could
have happened. I mean, it's not impossible.”

“You've lost me completely,” Annie admitted.

“Sorry, I got ahead of myself.” I sat down and passed Annie a letter I'd drafted earlier that morning. “I remembered hearing something once about how it can be effective to use a criminal's own tactics against them, and I got thinking that just might work in this case.”

“You mean
murder
?” Annie leaned away from me.

“Well, that's the crime,” I said, almost laughing at the expression on her face. “But I'm talking about the way Lenny went about convincing everyone that your mother was running off to the city with him. He did it with a series of lies ... and notes. We can use his own methods against him.”

I pointed to the sheet of paper. On it were these words:

You thought you got away with it, but I know what you did all those years ago. I saw you hide her. And then you took off, but I knew you'd be back. I was patient. Now here you are. So, it's time you and I made a little deal. I want the deed to your house and ten thousand dollars, or I go to the authorities and tell them where they can find her. I'll be in touch next week with full instructions.

P.S. I heard the kid is snooping around lately. Maybe she'd be interested in making some kind of deal if you aren't.

Annie's eyes drifted down to the page. She read through it slowly, her lips moving with the words. Then she laid it on the table and looked over at me.

“So we send this and Lenny believes someone is blackmailing him. What's that going to do?”

“I think he's going to reason it all through, just like he did eight years ago when he was figuring out how to get away with what he did in the first place. He's going to think about it, and the most logical conclusion he can reach is that if he moves the body, then even if the blackmailer goes to the police, they won't be able to do anything because there'll be no evidence for them to use against him. It'll be Lenny's word against the blackmailer's.”

“And?”

“We need to time this so Lenny gets the letter next Friday. If he's going to make a move, I think he'll do it that night, or maybe Saturday night.

Annie was staring at me with a funny look on her face. “How will we know where he goes?” she asked.

“We'll figure a way to hide out and follow him,” I said, as if that was an easy, everyday thing to do.

“Follow him ....” Her expression didn't exactly boost my confidence.

“If this works, he'll lead us right to where he hid, the, uh, your ...”

“My mom's body,” she said. Her voice was flat, as though what she was talking about had no real connection to her. “I told you: just say what you mean.”

“Right. Sorry. Anyway, I think it could work.”

“It could,” she said, but she still sounded doubtful.

“Well, we'd better hope so, because this is about the best chance we have.”

Annie's lack of enthusiasm for the plan bothered me. It might not be the greatest idea in the world, but at least it gave us something to try, which had to be better than sitting around suspecting that Lenny had killed her mother, and doing nothing about it. I had to remind myself that the whole thing must be pretty hard for her to deal with, and that it was natural for her to shut down a little.

“You want me to do
what
?”

Greg's question really didn't surprise me. After all, I'd just asked him to help follow a possible murderer around in the middle of the night.

“It's just that you can borrow your dad's car, and we really need a car for this,” I said, hoping I was managing to sound casual — as if that might make the whole thing seem perfectly reasonable.

“Yeah, well forget it. Even if my father was willing to give me the car for something like this — and trust me, he wouldn't be — there's no way I'm helping you put yourself in danger. Again.”

I ignored the very pointed way he'd said, “again.”

“Greg, think how Annie feels, not knowing what happened to her mother.”

“You know perfectly well I'd do anything I could to help, but skulking around in the dead of night isn't on
the list. If something happened to you ...”

He let that trail off while I tried to think of something to say that would change his mind.

“Look, Shelby, if you really think this guy is going to rush off to someplace he's hidden a body, then go to the police. They're trained for stuff like this. Let them handle it.”

“We thought about that. There's not enough proof,” I said. “Besides, I think we might technically be doing something wrong, sending him that letter.”

“
Really
? You mean extortion is against the law?” he asked.

“No need to be sarcastic. Besides we're not
actually
trying to extort anything — we just want to trick him,” I pointed out. “And if we go to the police they'll investigate the normal way and that will ruin our chances. We'll never have another shot to trick Lenny into leading us to Gina Berkley ... and Annie will never be able to see her mother properly buried.”

Greg shook his head. “Even if I did what you want, there's no way we could follow this guy at night without him realizing it. Little River is too quiet a place — he'd notice the same car behind him in about three minutes.”

“So, what if I've
already
got someone else?” I said, happy to be a step ahead of him. “Two cars could tail him without him realizing it.” Annie and I had realized that we'd need more than one car in order to keep from tipping Lenny off. We had our first driver lined up — Kayla!

Persuading Kayla to do it had been a cinch compared to Greg, but then, Kayla had been Gina's best friend for years.

“I must be crazy,” Greg said, which was the same as saying he'd do it. I threw my arms around his neck and kissed him, kind of butting noses a bit because I was bouncing up and down in excitement.

Greg laughed a bit at my exuberance but then he went into this long and, quite honestly, boring rave about how we weren't going to be taking any chances and the kinds of precautions we should take and so on. I nodded and agreed without actually hearing much of it, but that didn't matter because it's not like I was going to do anything dangerous anyway. After all, I'm into figuring things out — not risking my neck!

And that's more than I can say for Betts. Wow ... I almost said “my former friend, Betts!” That scared me because it sounds like I just accept that we're not friends anymore, which I definitely do not — or that there's no hope things will smooth out between us, which I hope and believe will happen.

But that's not the point. The point is, two days after I last heard from Betts, Mrs. Thompson showed up at our door. Her face was strained and tired looking and her eyes were scared.

“Shelby, I'm sorry to intrude ... I just wondered if you happened to have seen Betts today.”

“Betts is pretty mad at me right now,” I said. “This
is about the last place she'd be.”

“I see.” Her eyes told me she knew that was at least partly her fault, but she didn't comment on it. Instead, she asked, “Well, is there anywhere else ... I mean, can you suggest somewhere that I could check? Another friend's place? A favourite hangout?” Her questions surprised me, not because they weren't reasonable but because she needed to ask them in the first place. You'd think she'd know who Betts's other friends were, or the places she might happen to go.

Before I could answer, and much to my horror, Mrs. Thompson started to cry. I hardly knew how to react, except to tell her to come into the kitchen and sit down. She did, almost collapsing into the chair and covering her face with her hands as she sobbed. Feeling useless, I asked her if she'd like a cup of tea. She managed to say “no thank you,” but I felt like I should get her something, so I poured a glass of water from the fridge and sat in on the table in front of her. I added a box of Kleenex a moment later and then sat there helplessly as she plucked out a few, dabbed her eyes, and blew her nose.

“I don't know why I'm bothering you with this,” she said when she'd pulled herself together. “After all, it's not as though I don't know perfectly well where Betts is.”

“You
do
?”

“She's with that, that
creature
.”

“Kruel? Uh, I mean Edgar?”

“Who else?”

“But I thought she wasn't allowed to see him anymore.”

“What she is and isn't allowed to do suddenly means nothing to Betts. I can't believe the hold he has on her. And from what? A few dates? She's gone from being a pretty decent kid to lying, sneaking around, and fighting us every step of the way.

“Last night she said she had a headache and was going to bed. I went to check on her later and she'd climbed out her window and was gone. I lay awake — worried sick — until past three, when I finally heard her come in. And this morning, when I tried to talk to her about it, she called me a ...”

Whatever Betts had called her mother, Mrs. Thompson apparently decided not to repeat it. Instead, she looked as though she might burst into tears again. I spoke up quickly, hoping to distract her before that happened.

“Are you
sure
she's with him?”

“I didn't
see
her go with him, but yes, I'm quite sure. I was hoping that maybe you could talk to her.”

“I wish I could help,” I said, then, reluctantly, I filled her in on the gist of my last conversation with Betts.

Mrs. Thompson shook her head, her face disbelieving. “I can't believe she'd turn against you like that.”

“Well, I think she felt betrayed when I told you about Kr— ... Edgar,” I said, trying to keep it from sounding
like an accusation. “I'm hoping she'll change her mind when she cools off.”

“Of course she will!” Mrs. Thompson said. I wondered how other people could seem so sure about that, when I had such serious doubts that things would ever be the same with Betts and me again, but I didn't tell her that.

“It's beyond me why Betts would want to go out with this Edgar person anyway,” she continued a moment later.

“I can sort of see it,” I admitted. “He's older, he's got his own car, and he's in a band. Betts is probably flattered that he's interested in her.”

“But
why
is he interested in her?” Mrs. Thompson sighed. “Either he's
really
immature, or he's got a thing for young girls. Men in their mid twenties don't date teenaged girls unless there's some kind of serious flaw.”

I thought it was pretty creepy, too, but I didn't want to say so to Mrs. Thompson. In her present state of anxiety, she might easily repeat something I'd said to Betts, making the gap between us even wider.

“I just don't know what to
do
,” she said, looking shattered. Then she added, “There doesn't seem to be anything I
can
do.”

I thought I knew how she felt! Angry and hurt all at once, but mostly helpless. Just the way I felt about how Betts had acted toward me.

I dreaded the thought of school going back in on
Monday and wondered how it would be — alienated from my best friend.

I'd expected it to be weird at school, but it turned out not to be as much of a problem as I'd expected. Lunch hour was the main time I usually saw Betts, but she never came to the cafeteria all week. Not once.

It didn't take long to find out why. Kruel was picking her up at noon. I did my best fielding questions and mumbled something vague anytime someone asked me who he was. Mostly, I tried not to think too much about the whole situation.

And anyway, I was pretty focused on the plan to trap Lenny. I'd had five days to think of all the things that could go wrong with it and I'd come up with quite a list by the time Friday arrived. What if the letter hadn't reached Lenny on time? We wouldn't even know it! Or, what if he didn't take the bait right away? We only had two possible nights to follow him. And there were a whole bunch of other things, from car trouble to Lenny spotting us.