A Waffle Death, page 3
“No. I think I’ve seen enough—” Erin broke off. She didn’t want to talk about how many dead bodies she had seen since coming to Bald Eagle Falls. That was sort of a sensitive topic, and she didn’t want to think about it. “I know the difference between someone dead and someone who is just playing a prank.”
Though she had argued with herself that maybe he could still be revived, Erin doubted that was true. That was just her brain looking for a way out of the situation she found herself in. She was just trying to rationalize. The man had been dead. There could be no doubt of that fact.
“Was he…” Terry looked uncomfortable. He sat in the chair across from her and put his hand over hers. “When you touched him, you couldn’t find a pulse.”
“No.”
“What did the body feel like?”
“I don’t want to think about that!”
“I need to know. How warm or cool it was. How stiff. Any details you can tell me to help get this sorted out.”
“He was warm. His skin didn’t feel… it felt normal. Not stiff.”
“So, if he was dead, he hadn’t been that way very long.”
“He was dead!”
He just continued to look at her, waiting for her to consider his statement.
“Yes. He hadn’t been that way for very long,” Erin agreed. “I thought that if I got help… they might still be able to do something for him. Like they did for Jack.”
“Jack?” Terry looked blank. “What does Jack have to do with this? Jack Ward?”
“Because he was stabbed. Like Jack. I was hoping that… if they treated him… they could save him, like Jack.”
“But Jack was conscious when you found him. He wasn’t dead.”
“I know. But… he had the knife in him. Buried to the hilt.”
“Jack did? Or the body in The Book Nook.”
“Both. That’s why… I thought maybe if they repaired the damage, they could get his heart going, and he would be okay. I mean…” Erin looked away from Terry, knowing that her thoughts had not been logical, “I know that’s crazy. I know there’s no one in Bald Eagle Falls who could do that, and it would take too long to get him to the city. But that’s just what my brain was doing… trying to find a way that he might still be okay. I know that… they wouldn’t actually be able to do anything for him.”
Terry nodded sympathetically. “I understand. Tell me about this knife. Where was he stabbed? What kind of a knife was it?”
“It was in his chest. I don’t know what kind…” Erin tried to picture it again in her mind. She had not taken much in, but she had stared at the knife handle for long enough that she should be able to give him some description. “I think… similar to the one that Jack was stabbed with. It wasn’t a folding knife, like a pocketknife. Or a kitchen knife. But… something meant for fighting.”
“A combat knife.”
“I guess so, yes.”
“Can you describe the handle?”
“Black… with indentations on it, for grip, you know? Shaped for your hand?”
Terry nodded, writing it down. “Okay. And can you describe the man?”
Erin didn’t want to. She wanted to forget what she had seen. She didn’t want to talk about it and cement it into her memory. She wanted to forget she had ever seen his face. She shook her head and covered her eyes with both hands.
“I’m sorry, Erin.” Terry squeezed her hand. “I’m sorry that you saw this and that it happened to you. But I need to get as many details as possible about what happened and who this man was. Without a body, it’s pretty hard to identify him, but maybe if there is a missing person report, we’ll be able to figure it out. For that, I need a physical description.”
She shook her head again, hands still over her eyes. “He was… a man, white, brown eyes and hair. Going a little bit gray, I guess. Forties, I think, but looked older… dressed in a t-shirt.”
“Hair was long or short?”
“Short… thinning a bit in front, longer in the back, down to his collar or a little below it.”
“I know height and weight would be pretty difficult to describe when you only saw him lying on the floor…”
“A little overweight. He was a— he was a little heavy in the face, if you know what I mean? Bags under his eyes, a bit jowly, sagging.” She touched her throat, then shrugged. “Past his prime.”
“It wouldn’t be easy to move him.”
Erin knew he wasn’t trying to criticize her or say that he doubted her story, but the statement still angered her.
“Are you saying that he wasn’t there? Or that I must not be telling you everything? That I helped to move him?”
“No. None of that. We’re just trying to figure out what happened.”
“I’m telling you what I saw.”
“You saw a man who had been stabbed to death lying in The Book Nook basement. And five minutes later, when we got here, he was gone.”
“I don’t know the second part. But if you say so.”
She could play the doubt game too. Maybe he was the one who was lying or mistaken about what he had found at the bookstore. Erin rubbed her forehead and folded her hands on the table. She didn’t understand how any of this could be happening.
“Maybe you don’t think that I found anyone there at all. Maybe you think it was just a hallucination or I am looking for attention.”
“No. I don’t. Even if I did, there’s the state of your apron.”
Erin looked down and realized she wasn’t wearing it anymore. Of course not. Terry had taken it away. Because it had been smeared with red. “Right. I forgot.”
“I know that you saw something, that you were down there and got blood on your apron. But I’m telling you, there’s no one down there now. So, something about your story doesn’t square. There wasn’t long enough for someone to get a body out of the basement. Bodies are not easy to move. And it means that someone was in the bookstore when you were there. Probably more than one person, to be able to get it out so quickly.”
Erin shook her head. “There wasn’t anyone else there.”
“How do you know that?”
“I didn’t see anyone,” Erin insisted. “I looked through the store before I went down to the basement. If there had been anyone there, I would have seen them.”
“They could have ducked behind a shelf so that you couldn’t see them. Or hidden in the bathroom. Did you check? And there is a back room on the main floor, just a small one, with a coffee service counter. And the loading dock. Did you go in there?”
Erin nodded. “I looked out the back door because I thought Naomi might be taking her trash to the bins. So I had to walk through the back room.”
“And there was no one there? No one could have been hiding anywhere?”
Erin shook her head. She didn’t want to think that there could have been anyone in the store with her. Watching her. Maybe wondering if he were going to have to stab her to death too. She shuddered. “I didn’t see anyone. I walked through the whole store. If someone else had been there, I would have known it.”
Terry made a couple more notes in his notepad. But Erin was afraid that he wasn’t writing down what she said, that there couldn’t have been anyone else in the store. Instead, he was writing down how she was wrong. How there must have been someone else in The Book Nook just waiting for her to leave again so he could remove the body from the scene.
“Vic, maybe you could get Erin a cup of coffee?” Terry said, raising his voice slightly. “Hot and sweet. For shock.”
“I don’t need anything. I’m fine.”
“I can see you shaking. You should have something to calm your nerves and keep you focused.”
She wasn’t shaking because of fear, but shuddering at the thought of someone else being in the bookstore. Over what she had seen in the basement. Over the idea that the killer had probably stood just a few feet away from her, watching and waiting to see what she would do.
“Have something to warm you up,” Terry insisted. “I really think you need it.”
“In this heat? I need something to cool me down, not warm me up. I was soaking wet when I got back here.” Erin plucked at the sleeve of her limp blouse. “I don’t even remember my feet touching the stairs.”
“Well, they must have,” Terry gave her a smile. No dimple this time. He was too serious, too concerned about her. “I’m pretty sure you didn’t learn to fly overnight.”
“I wish I could. That would be really convenient.” Erin’s mind wandered, thinking of all of the things she could get done more efficiently if she could fly from one place to another instead of having to drive or walk. Zip here, zip there. Quick as a wink.
Vic brought two cups of coffee over to the table, setting them down gently in front of Terry and Erin. Erin picked hers up and took a tiny sip. It was too hot. She didn’t want to scald her throat.
“There’s really no one in the basement?” she asked Terry, not sure she believed it.
“Well, Stayner is over there now. Whoever else has arrived since I left. But a body… no, I’m afraid not.”
CHAPTER 5
Erin had answered all of the questions she could, posed first by Terry and then by Sheriff Wilmot as they tried to sort out what had happened to the body between the time Erin had abandoned it and the time that Terry and Stayner went down the stairs to look for it. And what had happened before that—how the man had gotten into the basement in the first place and been stabbed, and by whom. None of it made any sense. So after having answered everything she possibly could, Erin went home. Terry asked Vic to keep an eye on her, which wouldn’t be hard, since Vic lived in the loft above Erin’s garage and spent much of her time in the house. She wouldn’t have left Erin alone anyway. She didn’t need anyone telling her to make sure Erin was okay.
“This is crazy,” Vic said, putting the kettle on to boil. “How could a body just disappear like that? And what was it doing down there in the first place? It isn’t like Naomi killed someone! There’s no way.”
“No,” Erin agreed. It was true that anyone could be a killer if pushed far enough, if the stakes were high enough, but if someone had been pushing Naomi like that, they would have known about it. They would have seen the stress in her life, how she was becoming increasingly desperate. But Naomi was always pleasant, relaxed, and laid back. When things when wrong for a library event, she always made lemons into lemonade and came out on top, smiling away and not even breaking a sweat. Erin admired her for her poise.
They would have known if something was wrong.
“Do you know who it was?” Vic asked.
Erin looked at her, not following the question. “That killed him?”
“No, who the victim was. You didn’t say. Just that there was a man, a body, it wasn’t anyone you knew?”
“No one from Bald Eagle Falls,” Erin confirmed, shaking her head.
“Yeah. That’s really weird. What would some out-of-towner be doing in the basement of The Book Nook to begin with? He just walked into the bookstore and went downstairs? No one noticed him come in or sneak off?”
“I don’t know… Naomi wasn’t there. No one was there. Why would the door be left unlocked with no one there to mind the store?”
Vic picked up the whistling teapot and poured water into a couple of mugs. She was frowning. “You don’t think something happened to her, do you? To Naomi? Is she missing? Was she abducted by whoever killed the man?” She placed one mug on the table in front of Erin.
“No.” Erin picked a teabag and dangled it into her cup. “Terry called her and she was okay. She just had an appointment this afternoon. She wasn’t planning to be there. She said that Dave was supposed to lock up.”
“And was Terry able to get ahold of him?”
“He was trying. He didn’t answer, but people don’t always answer right away. He might have turned it off for dinner or a movie, or be out of the calling area.”
“Terry doesn’t think that anything happened to him?”
“There wasn’t any other sign of violence. No sign that there’d been a fight or burglary or abduction.”
“Just a dead guy in the basement,” Vic summarized, shaking her head.
“Yeah. Perfectly normal, right?”
Vic rolled her eyes. “For Bald Eagle Falls? I’m beginning to think so.”
They sipped their tea in silence for a few minutes.
Orange Blossom finished eating his dinner and, seeing as Erin was still in the kitchen, he rubbed against her legs and yowled, waiting for her to realize that she hadn’t given him enough food. Erin shushed him and scratched his ears. “You’ve had plenty. It’s time to curl up and have a nap.”
But he kept getting progressively louder. Erin winced. She hated it when he got so loud and she had to start worrying about neighbor complaints. Besides the fact that she couldn’t hold a conversation in the same room with him or hear herself think.
“Blossom. Blossom!”
The cat quieted slightly to see what she had to say.
“Be quiet! You’re finished eating. No more.”
He gave a long, low, drawn-out meow that was almost a growl. Erin shook her finger at him. “That’s enough! Go find Marshmallow. Have a nap.”
Marshmallow, the rabbit, never begged for more. He was always placidly happy with whatever she gave him and would lollop back into the living room when he was done, to lie down on his side in front of the couch. Or behind it, if there were too many people around or he didn’t want any attention.
Orange Blossom started to yowl again, and Erin pushed him away with the side of her foot. “No more. Be quiet now.”
Each time he started to make noise, she pushed him away, until he finally withdrew into the living room in a huff, leaving Vic and Erin to their tea.
“Do you think Dave forgot to lock up?” Vic asked. “Could he have just walked away without locking the front door?”
“I guess anything is possible. Some people are forgetful or easily distracted.”
Erin had never known Dave to be absent-minded, but anyone could be distracted by bad news, or excitement over his evening plans, or could be on a medication that made him forget things he would otherwise have remembered.
“Someone could have picked the lock,” Erin said. “It wasn’t very secure.”
“Who would know how to do that? And wouldn’t the police be able to tell if the lock was picked?”
“More people than you think. On TV, the police can always tell, but if a person is careful, he can pick a lock without scratching it. Or if it is old, it already has a bunch of scratches and nicks. They can tell if it was forced with a crowbar—but it wasn’t. But if an expert picked it, they wouldn’t know the difference.”
“Could you have picked the lock?”
Erin shrugged. “It wasn’t very secure,” she repeated.
Vic gave a knowing smile and chuckled. She sipped her tea. “So it was unlocked when you got there, right? You didn’t decide to pick the lock instead of waiting until tomorrow to get the trays back?”
“Why would I do that? They weren’t that important. And why would I go poking through the rest of the store? I would just grab the platters and lock the door again. Naomi had already washed them and put them to the side for me.”
Vic sighed dramatically. “Well then, why do you think someone broke in?”
“Maybe they didn’t break in. Maybe the victim let them in. Maybe he had hidden out in the basement just so he could let his accomplice in. And then…” Erin tried to think of the next step. “Then they met…”
“And the victim’s accomplice stabbed him? For no reason?”
“I’m sure he had a reason. I just… don’t know what. They were fighting over something of value. Maybe… a rare book. A first edition or a misprint, or something that just came out and he had to get his hands on it.” Erin knew that none of her ideas made any sense. Naomi didn’t sell used books or antiques. She sold new books. Popular stuff that would sell well. If she had to special order something obscure, she demanded upfront payment, so that the person couldn’t change their mind when it got there. Naomi might complain about the skyrocketing prices of books with the pulp shortage, but she didn’t have a bunch of really valuable books lying around or a lot of cash in the till any more than Erin did.
CHAPTER 6
“So…” Erin stared through the kitchen window behind Vic, which looked from the kitchen into the backyard, eyes lingering on the gravel parking pad on the other side of the fence where Willie’s truck would have been parked if he were home. She wanted to talk about something other than the man who had been stabbed in the basement of the bookstore. Really, anything other than that. “Where’s Willie tonight?”
Vic looked over her shoulder as if she, too had to check to see if Willie’s truck might be there. “I don’t know. He didn’t say what he was doing tonight.”
“You’re not expecting him?”
“No. He said he probably wouldn’t be around. Working late or going on a trip, I guess. I don’t know.”
Erin would have found it challenging to live with a man who was as secretive as Willie. Private was probably a better word. It wasn’t that he had anything to hide, just that he saw his business matters as his own business. And when someone worked in mining precious minerals, he had to keep things to himself to keep anyone else from jumping his claim. Did people still jump claims like in the westerns? Or was that a thing of the past with modern land title registries?
She liked Willie and had once considered pursuing a deeper relationship with him, but Erin had backed off when it had become clear that Vic was interested in him. Erin had also been interested in Terry, so it seemed like the gracious thing to leave Willie to Vic. On reflection, she was glad that she had. Vic’s temperament was better suited to someone as independent as Willie. She wasn’t concerned that he wasn’t home every night and didn’t tell her everything he was doing. Erin was afraid she would have given up on the relationship long ago.
“What?” Vic asked, looking at Erin. “I don’t need to know where he is every minute of the day.”
