Cinnamon twisted, p.25
Cinnamon Twisted, page 25
Logan drove a car, and Kayla drove a truck.
Kayla was trying to convince Logan not to break into my home. Still squatting, I nearly lost my balance. The cat struggling to leap out of my arms didn’t help.
Kayla demanded, “What are you talking about?”
“Be quiet. You’ll wake her up.”
Lowering her voice only slightly, Kayla spat, “You . . . you said you were borrowing my truck that night to help someone move firewood. And then you said I should tell everyone that we’d been together that entire evening, hiking.”
Logan retorted, “You’re making things up. Let me go.”
“No. You had time, Logan. While I was hiking by myself, you had time to drive to that woman’s cabin, kill her, and come back to meet me.”
“What if someone else makes up the same crazy story? Now you see why you have to help me.”
“No! You can’t hurt Emily.”
“No one’s going to get hurt. Just do what you’re told.” Logan’s angry words jackhammered into the night. “All we have to do is get something back. It belongs to me. You help me get it, and then we can retire to a tropical island and live a life of luxury. You’ll thank me.”
“No! I’m not doing more favors for you. You think I didn’t notice you leaving in my truck the next night and coming back when the night was almost over. What did you do that for? Did you come over here? You’ve . . . you’ve been trying to harm Emily all along. You planned this when we were still in California. That’s why you sent me to Florida to worm my way into Emily’s parents’ confidence. They’re good people. We can’t hurt their daughter. Let’s leave. Come on. If Emily has something of yours, just ask her for it.”
“She’s not crazy, but you are if you think anyone would give up a treasure just because someone asked.”
“Then sue her for it.”
“That would take too long.” He added fiercely, as if he were speaking between clenched teeth. “Let go of me.”
I heard a noise like a slap. “Ow!” Kayla’s voice. Something heavy thudded onto the lawn.
I fumbled for my phone and entered a nine and two ones.
A woman’s voice came on and asked much too loudly, “Do you need police, fire, or ambulance?”
I plunked down onto the floor. Still hugging Dep, who did not want to be hugged, I whispered, “Police, please. Prowlers are fighting in my yard.” I gave the dispatcher my name and address and promised to stay on the line. The sound of flesh hitting flesh became louder. Gasps verged on screams. In an urgent whisper, I added, “I think the man is attacking the woman.”
“Are you in a safe place?”
“Yes. I’m inside my house, but the man was trying to break in through my back door.”
“Can you safely go out through the front and run to a neighbor?”
“I think so.”
“Do that.”
I made an agreeable noise, but how could I save myself and Dep while leaving Kayla, who had tried to protect me, alone with her murderous boyfriend?
I stood up and steadied myself with one hand on top of the half wall between the sunroom and kitchen.
My fingers closed around the heavy brass souvenir.
Chapter 39
Outside, my back garden was still almost totally dark. I couldn’t see the two shadowy forms I’d noticed before I ducked behind the half wall, but I could hear them fighting. Both of them must have been on the ground.
I ran on tiptoe to the switch beside the back door and turned on lights to flood the entire yard. I unlocked the back door, wrenched it open, and shoved at the screen door so quickly that if it squeaked, I didn’t notice.
Before I could grab her, Dep raced outside.
I was not far behind.
The screen door bounced against the jamb, echoing sounds I’d heard moments before. With my phone in my bathrobe pocket and the souvenir brass whorl in my right hand, I dashed around the outside corner of the sunroom. Dep streaked in the opposite direction and disappeared underneath overhanging forsythia branches.
As if lights hadn’t come on and the door hadn’t banged, Kayla and Logan rolled around on the grass pummeling each other. Logan was dressed in a burglar outfit—black jeans, black long-sleeved shirt, black shoes. He hadn’t worn socks, and the greenish artificial light turned his ankles fish-belly white. The black stocking cap on the ground had probably fallen off his surfer-blond hair.
In contrast, Kayla wore a pink T-shirt over ruffled pink sleep shorts. The rhinestone-bedecked pink flip-flops nearby must have come off her feet. I noticed that the door into my garage was standing open but didn’t have time to think about it more than to guess that Logan had broken into my garage and then into my yard.
He was yanking at Kayla’s braids as if trying to pull them out of her head.
Hiding the brass whorl behind a fold of my robe, I yelled, “Stop it!”
Logan sprang to his feet, grabbed Kayla by the armpits, and hauled her upright. Her head lolled, but she raised it. Glassy-eyed, blinking, and gasping for breath, she stared toward me, but I wasn’t sure she registered what she was seeing.
Logan held Kayla in front of him like a shield. He must have noticed that I was hiding my right hand and whatever it might be holding behind folds in the skirt of my robe. “Don’t come closer,” he warned, obviously struggling to keep Kayla from drooping out of his grasp.
I asked sensibly, “What’s going on? Why are you here?”
Kayla managed, “He . . .” She gulped for air.
Logan told me, “You have something that belongs to me. My great-great-great-grandfather was an archaeologist who left something here in the care of the daughters of another archaeologist. I am the legal heir.”
“What is it?” I couldn’t keep sarcasm from creeping into my tone.
“A bracelet. The value is sentimental, only, something the other archaeologist gave him in gratitude for the work he did.”
Archaeologist, I thought. Student of an archaeologist, more likely. And gratitude from Ernest Renniegrove for the work Otto Nobbuth did? Like wooing Ernest Renniegrove’s daughter and then pushing Ernest off a cliff to his death in hopes of obtaining a treasure that might never have existed? I asked, “What makes you think I have a bracelet that belongs to you?”
“My great-great-great-grandfather left it with the woman who owned this plot of land. For safekeeping. I inherited it. It’s mine.”
“The woman who lived here in those days had a sister.” Still keeping my right hand and the heavy souvenir whorl hidden, I pointed with my left forefinger. I didn’t think its trembling could have been noticeable to the other two. “She lived back there, on the next street. What makes you think that the bracelet would be here and not on the other side of that wall?”
“Research. I’m a scientist, remember. I planned to look in both places. But after I got to Fallingbrook, I discovered that the two sisters ended up in the same nursing home at different times, that the family who owned that nursing home back then still owns it, and that a member of the youngest generation was fired from the company. I checked her social media. She had recently moved to this area. Bingo! Word of the trea—the bracelet must have gone down through her family like it did through mine. Guessing that she was also looking for the bracelet, I went to talk to her. She tried to prove that the bracelet was hers by showing me a letter written by the woman who built your house. Supposedly your home’s first owner gave the letter to the grandmother of the woman I went to talk to, along with a key to something. It has to be the jewelry box where the woman who owned this house left the bracelet. And I knew that the house where the bracelet was had to be yours, because the woman I was talking to had written your name and address on the envelope where she’d hidden the letter. But she wouldn’t tell me where she’d put the key.”
“Many other people have owned this house since the Renniegrove sisters were alive. Any of them could have found and kept the bracelet.”
“Illegally. It’s mine.”
“Tell that to the judge. You borrowed Kayla’s truck to go talk to that woman, didn’t you, and you borrowed it a second time so you could dig in my yard at three a.m. hunting for that bracelet.”
“Three a.m.? That’s the middle of the night, and so is this.” With a sneer, he accused, “You’ve been half dreaming and half making things up.”
“You left a donut-shaped stone in my yard that morning. And then you enlisted Kayla to search my yard with a metal detector for the so-called treasure.”
Still hanging onto Kayla as a shield, he took a step back. “No one’s going to believe your cute little stories.”
“Don’t count on it.” I almost didn’t recognize the coldness in my voice. “You already have a problem with your alibi for the night that Pamela Firston was killed. The detective showed me copies of the photos you took of each other, supposedly at Fallingbrook Falls, the night the woman was murdered. But you two switched phones for part of that evening.”
Kayla’s eyes had been glazed over. She opened them wide and gave me a tiny affirmative nod.
Logan dismissed my accusations. “That was so I’d have pictures of my girlfriend on my phone. Who wouldn’t want that?”
Maybe someone who would use his girlfriend as a human shield, I thought. Ignoring his excuse, I continued to explain the theory I was developing. “A couple of the pictures from Kayla’s camera had been taken from near the ground, pointing up toward the sky. You took selfies from that angle to prevent anyone from noticing that a lake, not a river, was in the background.”
Logan arranged his face into an infuriating smirk of superiority. “My arm’s not that long.”
“You propped Kayla’s phone against a rock or a stump, set the camera’s timer, and then backed far enough away to make it clear that the picture wasn’t taken at only arm’s length.”
“You’re making this up.”
“I’m not. I just now realized that I recognized the top of a pine tree above your head in one of the pictures. That tree leans. It’s not at Fallingbrook Falls. It’s outside the cabin where Pamela Firston was killed.”
Again, Logan mocked me. “No one recognizes the top of a tree.”
I managed to say calmly, “No one has to. The police have those photos and can match them to the actual scene. The alibi you concocted is going to backfire.” I glanced at poor, terrified Kayla. Whatever she’d done or how many lies she’d told for her abusive boyfriend, she had tried to protect me before I came outside, and I needed to try to return the favor. I told Logan, “I’ll give you a break. Leave Kayla here, and you take off.” He could probably tell from the steely anger in my voice that he wouldn’t get far before I sent the full force of the law after him.
“Not without my—” He broke off.
I lifted the brass whorl where he could see it in all of its tarnished glory in the floodlit, misty yard. “Is this what you’re looking for? A couple of pounds of melted-down gold?”
Hands outstretched and greed shining in his eyes, he let Kayla go and started toward me.
As if she had no bones, Kayla slumped down onto the grass. I wasn’t sure if she had truly fainted or had faked it, but I didn’t have time to check.
Logan was only a few steps from me.
Chapter 40
“Yowl!” Fluffed to the size of a young tiger, Dep raced out of the bushes and flung herself at Logan’s knees. He staggered. Dep detached herself, landed on her feet, and fled toward the garage.
Logan regained his balance. With a low growl, he lurched toward me.
I turned my right side toward him and widened my stance. As if the whorl were a donut-shaped throwing toy, I backhanded it at him. Because of its weight, I put a lot of force into the throw.
Logan reached up a hand. “Hey! Whuh?”
The whorl grazed his hand and hit him on the forehead. He sagged down onto his side, draped over his prone girlfriend.
I ran to them and placed my fingers on the artery in Kayla’s wrist.
A man yelled, “Emily? Are you okay?”
Carrying my puffed-up cat, Daniel pelted past the wide-open door and into the yard.
Kayla’s pulse beat underneath my fingers. I gave her wrist a reassuring squeeze and then stood. I pointed down at Logan. “He was attacking her.”
Daniel set Dep down in the grass and nodded at Kayla. “Is she okay?”
Kayla said in a small voice, “Yes.” She eased herself out from underneath Logan and sat up. Her shoulders shook, and tears ran down her cheeks.
I felt for Logan’s pulse. He moaned.
Dep positioned herself beside his face, arched her back, and hissed.
Kayla scooted farther from Logan. “Call the police. He hurt me and would have hurt you, too, Emily.” Her sob came out like a hiccup.
I took off my bathrobe’s belt. “They’re on the way.”
Daniel and I wound the belt around Logan’s wrists and tied it tightly, but we needed something for his ankles.
Shirtless and barefoot, Daniel wore jeans, but no belt. Kayla sat trembling in the dewy grass. She wasn’t wearing a belt, either.
I ran into the kitchen and came out with a stack of towels. Kayla, Daniel, and I knotted them together and tied them around Logan’s ankles. “There,” I said, “that should hold him until the police get here.” I grabbed Dep and nestled her into my arms. “I don’t think we need your ferocious guarding any longer, sweetie.”
I took her into the sunroom. I planned to set her down, shut her into the house, and return to the three people on my lawn.
The doorbell rang.
Still clutching my warm but tense cat, I ran to the living room and turned on the porch light.
In apparently thrown-on jeans, T-shirt, and armored vest, Chief Agnew was on the porch.
I opened the front door.
Agnew growled, “You called about prowlers and someone having a fight?”
Did he have to sound so skeptical? Also, I wasn’t happy about my beltless bathrobe gaping over my nightgown while Dep’s attempts to flee threatened to reveal more. Car doors slammed. In their uniforms, Hooligan and his temporary partner Tyler ran toward the house. Rex Clobar was not far behind them. He’d had time to put on a dark gray suit, but his shirt collar was unbuttoned and he wasn’t wearing a tie. He’d driven an unmarked cruiser again and had parked behind Hooligan and Tyler’s marked one. Chief Agnew’s huge black SUV was in front of the line of vehicles, closest to the walkway to my porch.
I told the crowd of law enforcement, “They’re out back.” Turning on lights as I went, I led the way through the living room, dining room, kitchen, and sunroom to the back door. I gestured to the four men to go out onto the patio. Finally, I set Dep onto one of the sunroom’s wide windowsills and went outside, leaving her inside to complain about missing the wee-hours gathering.
The ridiculously early morning was chilly. I pulled my bathrobe more tightly around myself and crossed my arms over it.
Daniel stood over Logan. The brass souvenir was in his hand, and his face was strangely fierce.
Kayla was again sitting in the grass, but she was now farther from Logan. She hugged her knees close to her chest and rested her face on them. Her pink T-shirt, ruffled sleep shorts, long, bony legs, and partially undone braids made her look especially young and vulnerable.
Agnew bellowed, “Westhill and Suthlow, what have you two done, now? Killed someone else?”
Kayla raised her tear-streaked face. “Emily threw that thing at him to protect herself and me. Logan wanted to break into her house, and when I tried to stop him, he hit me.” She stumbled to her feet and stood wavering in the floodlit yard.
Hooligan was better prepared than the rest of us. He ran to her, supported her with one arm, and gave her a tissue.
Agnew yelled at Daniel, “Drop that weapon and raise your hands above your head.”
Daniel complied. The heavy brass “whorl” narrowly missed landing on one of his bare feet.
Rex Clobar asked calmly, “What happened, Emily?”
I explained concisely. Kayla nodded.
Logan, however, suddenly shouted, “Help me up!”
Rex squatted beside him. “Stay still. You might be injured.” He ordered Hooligan, “Call an ambulance.”
Hooligan said quietly. “It’s on the way.”
Logan grumbled, “I don’t need one. Just get me out of these ropes, or whatever, and let me go.” He pointed the top of his head toward me. “She tried to kill me. I was only trying to retrieve what’s legally mine. She has a gold bracelet that I inherited from my great-great-great-grandfather. It’s lawfully mine.” Our tying of the terrycloth belt around his wrists had been less than successful. He released his hands, levered himself to a sitting position, and reached toward the towels confining his ankles. “That other woman, Pamela, she knew where the bracelet was, and she had a key. All I wanted from her was the key, but she wouldn’t let me search. And to show her that I meant her no harm, I was going to give her a stone relic from a Viking settlement that I also inherited from my great-great-great-grandfather, but she wouldn’t take it. She wouldn’t give me the key, and she attacked me with a cane. I had to defend myself. I put that stone relic in this yard for safekeeping. It’s over there somewhere.” He waved a hand in the direction of the forsythia. “That woman, Pamela, didn’t want my antique stone relic, so may I have it back, please?” He looked appealingly up toward Chief Agnew, who was still standing over him, hands on hips.
Hooligan and his partner scribbled in their notebooks. Rex put down his pen and stared at Logan with something like sympathy.
My voice rang out into the silence. “I found the so-called bracelet a few hours ago. It’s not a bracelet, and it’s not gold. It’s lying beside Daniel’s feet, Detective Clobar. It’s solid, and it’s heavy, but it’s tarnished. Gold doesn’t tarnish. It’s probably brass.”
Logan ranted, “It’s gold and it’s mine! My great-great-great-grandfather buried it here. He planned to return for it immediately, but people were working here, and he had to leave. He went to California and never managed to come back, so he willed the bracelet to his daughter along with a map of this neighborhood that showed where it was. I dug in Emily’s yard but didn’t find it, and my other guess, my best one, really, was that someone moved it inside to a box that Pamela wouldn’t give me the key for. I stand in line to inherit the bracelet. I have every right to it!”
