Guidebook to Murder (21 page)

An owl hooted down the street, and the hair on the back of my neck stood up. I'd been an idiot to come out here in the first place. I had one thought running through my head:
Get back to the house and call Greg.

That option seemed logical, and I started trotting back to the house. Just a few more feet and I'd be at the back porch, where Aunt Jackie waited to unlock the door for me. Passing the Dumpster, I heard a moan.

Dodging through the first pallet of siding near the Dumpster, I saw a blue jean–clad leg sticking out of the darkness. I peeked around the pallet. Toby lay crumpled next to the Dumpster, in a half-sitting position, blood running down his face from a gash on his head. I glanced around. Nobody. Rushing over to Toby, I reached down for his hand, warm. I shook it.

“Toby,” I whispered. “Toby, can you hear me?” No response. Everything I'd ever heard said to leave people the way they were until help arrived. But what if the person who did this came back?

I examined Toby again. He had one of those police walkie-talkie things on his pants. Maybe, just maybe, Greg or Esmeralda was still at the office listening, just in case. I pulled the black box off the clip on Toby's belt and found a button on the side.
Here goes nothing. . . .

“Greg, are you there? We need help. Toby's been hurt. Hello, can you hear me?” I shook the stupid thing and then realized I needed to let go of the button on the side. The speaker crackled to life.

“Jill? Is that you?”

Relief flooded me as I realized my message hadn't just gone to a cosmic message machine.

“Help us. Toby's been hurt.” A searing pain started at the back of my neck, and I found myself falling into Toby before the blackness took me.

S
o many lights flashed I thought I'd fallen asleep at the carnival on the pier. I tried to sit up and found two sets of hands restraining me, one with latex gloves. The non-gloved pair was attached to my aunt. “Where am I?”

“Getting ready to be sent to Bakerstown Hospital. Are you all right?” Aunt Jackie's words came slowly through to my brain. I felt like I was processing a new language.

“Toby?” I could see Toby's face as I fell into him. Did the stack of siding fall in on me?

“Toby's already gone.” Aunt Jackie stroked my face.

“Dead?” I fought to sit up, but the EMS guy had strapped me down while I talked to my aunt.

“No, honey, he's on the way to the hospital.” Aunt Jackie put both hands on my shoulders and pushed me back down to the gurney. “You saved his life.”

“Greg heard me?”

“He heard you, called me to lock up the house, and arrived with the rest of the cavalry in minutes. That boy certainly has a fast speed and a way of taking charge.” Aunt Jackie sniffed. “Although why he thought I needed to lock myself in rather than come help you, I'll never know.”

Thank God for Greg—otherwise my aunt could have been in the gurney next to me rather than sitting here sulking about not saving me. “He was probably just concerned for your safety. Who did this?”

“By the time Greg got here, there wasn't anyone around. Greg thinks it's the same person who's been writing you notes and tearing up your fence. You probably interrupted his plans to finish trashing the house to stop you from meeting the council's timeline.”

“A vandal did this?” The world got fuzzy again. I lay back down on the gurney.

A man's face filled my view. A very cute face. “We're heading in to the hospital now.” The EMT smiled over at my aunt. “I need to ask if you'll follow us. County rules don't allow any passengers.”

Aunt Jackie sniffed. “Well, it's not like there's anywhere for me to sit anyway.” She grabbed my hand. “Just relax and I'll see you at the hospital. I'll go lock up the house.”

“A lot of good that will do,” I mumbled to her retreating back. Gazing at the dark-haired, tanned paramedic, I asked, “So, what's wrong with me?”

“I'd say someone cracked you upside the back of your head. But I'm not a doctor, so I'm not allowed to give opinions.” He grinned, showing off a mouthful of white teeth worthy of an actor on a corny television show. Or the cover of one of the romance books I stocked for several of the women in town.

“My head doesn't hurt at all.” I thought maybe this was all a mistake.

“It will later, chica.” He nodded at the tube attached to my arm. “We put some happy juice in your IV for the ride.” He set the straps on the gurney to attach it to the side of the ambulance. “You're lucky. When I worked in the city, they didn't allow us to give out any pain drugs without prior approval from the trauma nurse. Here, they are a little more relaxed. Although if you are a serial drug seeker, you went a long way to get this dose.”

My eyelids were getting heavy. “I don't understand.” I could hear his words but they didn't make any sense.

“Don't worry about it, chica. Just close your eyes, and we'll be in Bakerstown before you know it.” He slapped the cab of the ambulance. “Horace, we're all set back here.”

I heard the engine start and thought about Toby crumpled against the Dumpster, lifeless. I whispered a prayer for his recovery, and like all good girls after prayer, promptly fell asleep.

I woke up in a hospital bed. A nurse stood by my side, checking out the array of machines now attached in some way or another to my body.

“Hey there.” The nurse focused on me. “I was beginning to worry about you. Those ambulance jockeys tend to overdo it with their pain med dosage.” She put her hand on my chest. “Lift up for me so I can check your dressing. The doctor got you stitched up as soon as you got here and you slept right through it.”

I lifted a hand to my throbbing head and felt bandages. “I had a cut?”

“A gash, I'd call it.” The nurse gently grabbed my hand and put it down by my side. “Seventeen stitches, from the chart. In a little while, we'll run you down to CT to get some pictures to make sure nothing's happening inside that cute little head of yours.”

I glanced down at my shirt and found a hospital gown. “My clothes?”

“Honey, you were blood from head to foot when they got you here. I'm thinking you're going to want to throw those clothes away, especially since they cut you out of them.”

“How long have I been here?” Light streamed in the window, and I could hear birds chirping outside.

“Just since last night. I sent your poor aunt home to get some sleep, but you have a visitor in the waiting room.” The nurse checked on my IV drip and raised my bed. “I'll tell them to come on in while I call down to get you in to a scan.”

I straightened the covers, not knowing who might be coming in. Call me a freak, but being naked except for a hospital gown and some sheets didn't make me feel like entertaining company. And with my luck it would be Mayor Baylor telling me that I'd missed my deadline on getting the house fixed up.

Greg peeked around the corner as he knocked on the door. “All right if I come in?”

Concern showed on his face. He wore the same clothes he'd had on when he left the house yesterday and the shadow of a beard had turned into the real thing.

I patted the bed beside me. “I have to tell you something. Come in.”

“I think I have to tell you something first. I'm so sorry for leaving you last night. If I hadn't been so convinced that Sabrina was behind all this, I would have been there instead of Toby.” Greg stood by the bed, his head drooping as he talked.

“Greg, look at me. This isn't your fault. You saved us.” I paused. “Oh my God, is Toby dead? Is that what you have to tell me?”

Greg started. “What? No. Toby's fine. He's camped out in a room two doors down with both of his girlfriends fighting over who's going to fluff his pillow.”

“Toby has two girlfriends? I didn't know that.”

“Apparently neither did they. I thought I would have to haul both of them out of there, but I guess they came to some sort of an agreement, at least while he's here. After he gets released, I'm thinking there is going to be a come-to-Jesus meeting for Mr. Toby.”

I started laughing until the pain shooting through my head stopped me. “Ouch, stop that. I can't be having fun in my condition.”

Greg took my hand. “Sorry, only serious talk from now on. But you should have seen when they first got here.”

“You're evil. Tell me all about it.” I found the bed controls and inched myself into a seated position.

“Later. Right now I want to let you know that after John Paul identified the picture of Sabrina as the woman who sold him the paintings, we arrested her at her house. She's over at the station not talking and waiting for her lawyer to show up.”

“I knew it. So, why did she kill Miss Emily? And where is Amy?” I paused for a second and put my hand to my bandaged head. “Oh my God, she did this, too?”

Greg pulled my hand away. “Hold on, Sabrina didn't attack you and Toby. That was George.”

“George, skinny, no-balls George?”

“George with a two-by-four in his hand to give him courage. I caught him in the shed digging through the old furniture when I arrived.”

“Aunt Jackie said the guy got away.”

Greg's lips curled into a smile. “I didn't want her to kill him.”

“So, why did he want the furniture?” I wasn't sure if it was the painkillers or my head injury, but none of this made much sense.

“He heard Jim talking down at the diner about the mission wall and the history guy you've got researching the place. George told me in the police car that Bob had insisted he had real pirate gold when they were kids. Then Sabrina told him you'd moved all the old furniture out to the shed.”

“Money.” It was all about money. I leaned back, feelings of sadness overwhelming me. Closing my eyes, I asked, “Why is it always all about the money?”

“Money can make people change. Look at you. Once you got the inheritance, you became a house restorer and everyone's target.”

My eyes flew open. “You can't really be blaming me for inheriting the money?”

“Just seeing if you were still awake. So, both Sabrina and George have an alibi for the night Miss Emily was killed. I'd already checked it out. They were at a spa in Arizona for the entire week.”

“So, they could have hired someone,” I protested.

“I haven't ruled them out entirely, but it's looking like they just didn't do that. And they claim they had nothing to do with Amy's disappearance. Believe me, if one of them had dirt on the other, we'd be hearing about it. I've never met a couple so intent on throwing the other spouse under the bus.”

I sank back into my pillow.

If it wasn't Sabrina, who else would it be? And where the heck was Amy?

Amy's name rolled around my brain a few times. There was something I needed to tell Greg about Amy, but I couldn't remember.

Sally, my nurse, hustled into the room. “You're up next for the scan. Your buddy was set for the slot, but there's been some kind of argument over who's going to accompany him?”

Greg chuckled and squeezed my hand before he stood up. “I guess I'd better get back over there and referee the girls. I'll check on you tonight. Rest—that's an order.”

“You're not the boss of me.” I watched Greg leaving the room and let Sally lower the bed down to set it up to wheel me through the halls.

“Don't bet on it.” Greg waved as he left the room.

“Your boyfriend's cute,” Sally commented as she started pushing me toward the hallway.

“He's not my boyfriend.”

“Really? I guess I just got that vibe.”

The bed slowed as we eased through the doorway and headed down to the lower floor where the radiology department was housed.

“He's a police detective.” Why was I explaining myself to my nurse?

“Well, if he's single, maybe I should be a little nicer next time when I see him?” Sally's voice echoed in the empty hallway. “And maybe then he'll look at me the way he looks at you.”

My body tightened. Could Sally be right? Was there something happening between Greg and me? I knew I didn't want to go back to just nodding on the street when we ran into each other. My best memory of the house that was trying to kill me was of Greg and me sitting out on the porch, watching the sun set. Now that George and Sabrina were in custody, would this be over?

I couldn't think of a response. Sally was nice enough to leave me with my thoughts. A few turns and a short elevator ride and we were at radiology. Wheeling me into a room with a machine in the middle, Sally left, promising to have my lunch ready for me when I came back. Except for the pounding headache and the medical supplies all over the place, the hospital was the closest thing to a spa that I'd been at for a long time.

 

“I can't believe they sent you home after only one night,” Jackie grumbled from the driver's seat as she negotiated the turns on the highway. I stared out the window, watching the ocean for random whale sightings. It was the wrong time of year, but maybe I'd get lucky. I needed some luck.

Turning toward her, I tried to calm her down. “I'm glad they did. My insurance is expensive enough as it is. I don't want them to jack up our policy. Especially now that I have employees to consider.”

Jackie smiled, the first smile I'd seen on her face since waking up at the hospital. “I don't need much, just a supplement for my Medicare. I do appreciate you letting me stay on. Did I tell you I signed the papers letting them take over my lease?”

“No.” I stared out at the waves again. The painkillers were wearing off, and my head throbbed.

“They cut me a nice little check to have my stuff out of there by the end of next week. So, I wondered if I could have the movers start with moving your stuff out of the apartment on Thursday and then they can bring my stuff on Friday.”

“Wait, what?” All of a sudden, I felt I missed something.

“Dear, if I'm going to be living here, I need room for my own furniture. Not that what you have isn't nice,” Aunt Jackie hedged.

“Yeah, that's fine.” I went back to my ocean watch. I hadn't wanted to jinx my good fortune about keeping the house until I got the council's seal of approval on the remodel, but my aunt was right. It was time to jump into the fight. First thing on the agenda when I got home would be to call Jimmy Marcum. If they were going to throw lawyers and summons at me, I'd better play their game.