Chapter Twenty
Fiona followed her sisters across the barren landscape of the Finch farm’s front yard. In the distance, a pile of rubble and black boards stuck out of the snow. She pulled her scarf tight around her neck and flexed her fingers inside her gloves, glad that she’d worn her warmest pair.
The pharmacy hadn’t been big—about ten feet by fifteen. Thankfully, they didn’t have a lot of ground to cover.
“So what do we do?” Celeste surveyed the area. “Lay it out in grids or something? Did Swain give you any instructions?”
Morgan shook her head, then glanced back over the yard toward the road. “He should be here soon.”
“Well, I’m not going to just stand here and wait for him.” Jolene stomped her feet to increase circulation. “It’s too cold out here. Let’s start digging.”
“Where do we start?” Fiona asked.
“In the west, of course.” Jolene headed to what would have been the west wall of the pharmacy and jumped down into the depression in the ground.
Fiona followed her, her heart sinking when she saw what a mess it was. “All I see is a pile of dirt, rocks and burned wood.”
“Well, the police did take most of it, but since we are actually looking for a rock, I think we better start sifting.” Jolene was already on her hands and knees, picking up rocks and tossing them aside along with charred timbers. Fiona noticed Jolene’s hands were filthy, but her black parka didn’t show any dirt.
She looked down at her own purple jacket and grimaced. Wishing she had been smart enough to wear black, too, she climbed down into the hole next to Jolene and got to work.
Morgan’s phone chirped. She looked at the display and swore under her breath. “It’s Luke.”
“So, don’t answer,” Jolene shot over her shoulder.
“He’ll just keep calling if I don’t.” Morgan sighed and put the phone up to her ear. “Hello? … Who told you that? …. Swain, oh, yeah, well we are here, but …—” Morgan held the phone out from her ear and Fiona could hear Luke yelling through it.
“Fine. Send Gordy and the guys, but I’m pretty sure we weren’t followed.” Morgan’s eyes drifted across the field to the road.
Fiona followed her gaze, but she couldn’t see the road. She remembered the black truck that had been following them earlier. Were Bly’s paranormals out there somewhere, waiting to attack? It was probably a good thing to have Luke’s guys watching over them just in case.
Fiona turned back to her digging and Morgan’s conversation with Luke faded into the background. She shoved a timber aside and a portion of it flaked off, disintegrating in a puff of black soot and spicing the air with the smell of charcoal. Her fingers grew cold despite the heavy duty gloves, and she pulled one glove off to blow warm air on the tips.
She eyed the stones in the rubble. Picking a few up, she hefted them in her hand, feeling their weight.
Would she ever be able to use them as weapons?
She glanced at Jolene … what if her sister never recovered? She’d have to do something to fill the hole in their defenses.
She clenched her fist. The jagged edges of the rocks cut into her palm. She could feel the rocks getting warmer. Did she dare open her hand? Did she dare believe in her paranormal abilities? She brought her hand up, the fist still clenched. Her fingers started to curl open—
“Hey, look at this!” Jolene’s excitement-tinged voice diverted Fiona’s focus. Her hand opened and she dropped the stones into her pocket while she scurried to Jolene’s side.
Jolene was standing over a shallow hole she’d excavated, holding a big rock in her hand. It was covered in soot, looking just like every other rock out there.
“It’s just a rock.” Celeste came up behind her and looked over her shoulder.
“I don’t think so. Look at this.” Jolene brushed away some of the soot and Fiona could see the rock was tinged with green. Then Jolene turned it over to reveal the other side, which was smoothly polished with a deep well in the center. Deep enough to be used as a mortar.
Morgan gasped and reached out for the rock. Jolene handed it over and Morgan held it in her right hand, rubbing the smooth surface with her fingertips. The polished side was beautiful swirls of green with some black mixed in.
“This is it.” Morgan stared down at the rock. “It’s the mortar … the relic.”
“No wonder the police missed it. It just looks like a rock,” Celeste said.
“Yeah, especially on the unpolished side. It was lying face down, wedged in between two boards.” Jolene’s voice was edged with wonder. “And it’s been sitting out here the whole time.”
“But where’s the pestle?” Morgan asked.
They all looked at Jolene, who glanced down at the hole. “I didn’t find one.”
“Well, it’s got to be here.” Morgan crouched down and started sifting through the dirt. Fiona and Celeste followed suit.
One hour later, Gordy and two of Luke’s guys had come to ‘guard’ them and been put to work, but no pestle was found.
“There’s got to be one.” Morgan threw down a rock she’d picked up thinking it might be the pestle. “The mortar is no good without it.”
“Right. ‘When two become one, the healing’s begun’.” Jolene quoted the epitaph. “It won’t work unless the remedy is made with the mortar and pestle together.”
“Well, it’s not here.” Fiona brushed dirt and soot off her hands. “We’ve looked through the whole thing.”
“Maybe we didn’t do it methodically enough.” Morgan glanced out at the road. “Where is Swain? He should be here helping.”
Fiona stepped back up onto level ground and surveyed the rubble. “It shouldn’t be hard to find because of the shape. It wouldn’t look like a rock like the mortar did. It would be shaped and polished. You’d think it would stick out like a sore thumb.”
“Well, if it would stick out for us, then it would stick out for anyone.” Jolene pulled her phone out and started tapping on the screen. “The list of items taken from the pharmacy fire is categorized. I didn’t see the mortar and pestle, but if the pestle was found by itself … Yes! Here it is under miscellaneous. Rounded green scepter—possibly some kind of polished rock—five inches long.
“That sounds like it! That’s the length it should be.” Morgan said. “They must not have realized it was a pestle because they didn’t find the matching mortar.”
“So, it’s at the police station?” Celeste asked.
Jolene shrugged. “It seems that way.”
Morgan tucked the mortar in the crook of her arm and turned toward the car. “Then, what are we waiting for? Let’s go get it!”
Chapter Twenty-One
The inside of the Noquitt police station was quiet, which wasn’t unusual seeing as there wasn’t much crime in Noquitt, especially in the off-season. Morgan had given the mortar to Gordy and had instructed him and the guys to meet them back at the Blackmoore house after promising they would head there themselves just as soon as they got a look at the pestle. Jolene didn’t think Brody would let them take it—they’d probably have to resort to other means to get it in their possession once they verified it really was part of the relic.
“This is from years ago. I don’t know…” Brody gave the girls a sideways glance. “The evidence room is pretty disorganized and this must be way in the back.”
“Surely no one will mind if you just bring it out for us to look at?” Jolene leaned her upper half over the counter that served as a receptionist desk to look in at the rest of the station. “It looks like no one is even here.”
Brody glanced behind him. “I’m not sure if I should…”
“Is there some official request form?” Jolene whipped out her cell phone. “I’ll text Jake and see if he can get something official filled out.”
“And if that doesn’t work, I’ll have Luke get it through his government contact,” Morgan said importantly.
Brody’s eyes narrowed at the mention of his older brother. He knew Luke worked for a clandestine government agency, and Jolene could tell he didn’t want to get on the wrong side of his brother or the government. “Well, okay. I guess it won’t hurt to let you guys have a look.” He turned and headed toward the door that led to the back of the police station. “You guys stay out here.”
Morgan’s face registered disappointment at being left in the lobby, but they stood out there dutifully as he disappeared into the inner sanctum of the police department.
Fiona and Celeste sat in the orange plastic chairs that lined one wall. Morgan paced in front of the door and Jolene tapped her fingers impatiently on the counter while they waited a long twenty minutes for Brody to return.
Just when Jolene thought he’d forgotten about them, the door opened and Brody appeared. His face was red and a bead of sweat clung to his upper lip.
“Brody, what’s wrong?” Morgan asked.
“That item you were looking for…” He looked down at the floor, a mixture of concern and embarrassment spreading on his face. “It’s missing.”
***
Morgan shot Brody an incredulous look. “What do you mean missing?”
“Well, it
was
here.” He ducked back behind the door and pulled out a box with a loose leaf notebook on top. He opened the notebook to a page of photos and pointed to one in the middle. It was obviously a malachite pestle.
The
pestle. The second half of the relic. “This is it, right?”
Morgan nodded. “Yes, it looks like it.”
“As you can see, all the items were photographed and catalogued.” Brody pointed to the loose leaf notebook with the photos in it. “So it
was
here. But when I looked for it out back, I couldn’t find it.”
“Are you sure, maybe you missed it? Its not that big.” Celeste suggested.
Brody pushed the big box toward them. “Look for yourself. These are the only items back there from the Finch case.”
Jolene frowned at the box. “That doesn’t seem like nearly as many as items as were on the list.”
“Could some of the items have been filed away somewhere else … or returned to the family?” Morgan knelt down beside the box and started sifting through the items.
“Anything is possible.” He glanced behind him then leaned in toward the sisters and lowered his voice. “The fire happened right as Overton was taking over from the old Sheriff. That was before my time, but I heard things weren’t run very well at first and there were a lot of slip-ups. These items might have been a casualty of that. Some of the chain of evidence records seem to be missing, so I can’t tell where anything went.”
Fiona’s lips pressed together. “Why did you need evidence from the fire, anyway?”
“It seems the fire was thought to be suspicious,” Brody said. “Near as I can tell, it was eventually ruled an accident. So, by rights, the family could have claimed all this stuff and taken int back. But since the records are all screwed up, I don’t know what really happened.”
“If the family did take it back, why is this box still here?” Morgan wondered.
Brody shrugged. "Like I said, it seems like things weren't run properly back then, so maybe they didn't give the family everything or maybe the family never got it back and the rest of it got lost somewhere."
Jolene turned to her sisters in frustration. “So, now what?”
Morgan stood up. “Well, It’s definitely not in there. I think there’s only one hope of finding out where it is. We need to talk to Thaddeus Finch.”
Chapter Twenty-Two
Fiona drove the TrailBlazer to the nursing home with Jolene riding shotgun.
“Hey, I have an idea.” Jolene fiddled with her phone. “Maybe the pestle
did
get returned to the Finches and it made its way to the museum and then was stolen in the break-in the other day.”
“It could be,” Celeste said. “I bet Finch would know if it was.”
“Even better,” Jolene said. “I can just look at the list of items from my email.”
“Is it on there?” Celeste asked.
Jolene scanned the list with her finger. “No.”
“Oh. Well, at least we still have Finch to talk to.” Celeste turned to Morgan. “Shouldn’t we tell Luke that we took a detour? He’s expecting us to come right home after the police station.”
Morgan’s lips tightened. “We probably should, but he won’t be happy. I turned my phone off at the dig and it won’t take long to talk to Finch. I’ll turn it on and give him an update when we leave.”
Fiona pulled into a parking spot and everyone jumped out. They rushed into the lobby. Fiona started to turn down the hallway that led to Finch’s room, but the look on the nurse's face at the receptionist station gave her pause.
“Hi, girls … I’m so sorry for your loss,” the nurse said softly.
Fiona’s brows snapped together. “Loss? What do you mean?”
The nurse looked startled. “Why, you were friends of Mr. Finch, right?”
“
Were?
Did something happen to him?”
“Oh, dear.” The nurse’s hands fluttered to her throat. “I thought you knew. “Mr. Finch passed away just over an hour ago.”
“What?” Jolene yelled. “He’s dead?”
The nurse nodded. “Sorry. I thought you’d already been told and were here to get his things.”
“No. We came to talk to him. How could he be dead? We were just here and he seemed okay.” Fiona shook her head in disbelief. Sure, Finch had seemed a little under the weather when they were there before, but she didn’t think he was only hours from death. “What happened?”
“I don’t know. The charge nurse went to check on him and he was no longer with us.” The nurse put her hand gently on Fiona’s arm. “Don’t feel bad, it was his time. He passed peacefully in his sleep, it seems.”