The next morning, I opened the store as usual and drank copious amounts of coffee. Every little sound had woken me during the night, and each time I rose from my bed to investigate, I found Catnip doing cat things, like chasing a toy across the floor or parkouring in my living room. While he now rested quietly upstairs, I waited for the police to arrive. The previous night when I’d called, I’d been told that if I didn’t feel my life was in danger, they’d be by the next morning. I found it odd, but chalked it to small town policing.
Deputy Jordan Branson strode in right at ten. As he approached the counter grinning, I couldn’t help but think that, in Hollywood, he’d be cast as the lead detective in a cop show. His character would be played as a fair man to his people, liked by all in the department. But his wife would leave him because of his dedication to his job, and she’d be unaware of the affair he had with one of his female supervisors. He didn’t want his marriage to end and a horrible accident on the job would make his wife realize she still loved him. They’d have a second go at staying together. But depending on how many seasons the show went, he’d somehow screw it up again.
“Ms. Jones,” he greeted me. “Is it a good time to tell me what happened last night?”
“Sure. I was frankly a little surprised no one came out when I called.”
“Understandable,” he said, sighing. “As you know, we’re a small department. There was a tractor trailer incident on the highway a few miles up, and it was all hands on deck. Two people died, three went to the hospital.”
Yikes. “That’s awful. I hadn’t heard about it.” Studying his face, I now saw the exhaustion of being up most of the night—the stubble on his chin, the bags under his eyes. “Are the three people in the hospital going to make it?”
He shrugged. “I’m not sure. I haven’t received any updates. I went home at dawn, slept a few hours, and came here.”
“Well, I appreciate you stopping by. Would you like some coffee? Tea?”
“Coffee would be great, thank you. I feel like there isn’t enough coffee in the world to get me through this day.”
I chuckled as I strode into the back room. “I was just thinking the same thing,” I called over my shoulder.
As I set down the steaming mug in front of him, he pulled out a pad of paper and a pen. “Why don’t you tell me what happened last night?”
While I repeated my story, I made sure to express I was concerned about Catnip and I hadn’t gone into Bonnie’s apartment to snoop. Even though my invasion of her space had a dual function, I relayed someone had to take care of her cat.
“That’s really nice of you,” he said.
“Any decent human being would take him in,” I said, shrugging. But if Catnip didn’t start sleeping through the night, we may have to make other arrangements. “And when I grabbed him and some of his stuff and returned to my apartment, I realized I hadn’t taken the litter box, so I went back. While I was looking for it, someone pushed me from behind.”
Jordan furrowed his brow in worry. “Were you hurt?”
“No.” I held out my hands. “Just a little rug burn.” I’d already applied Calendula salve to facilitate a faster healing.
“Do you think that person was in there the first time you were in Bonnie’s apartment?”
“I have no idea.”
“Did you see them? Recognize anything about them? Could you tell if they were male or female?”
“I’m sorry, but no. They completely caught me by surprise.”
“How odd,” he muttered, jotting down some notes. “Either someone was in there when you grabbed the cat the first time, or they entered after you took the cat and before you went back for the litterbox. How much time do you think passed between your visits?”
Taking a long sip of my brew, I thought for a moment. “Maybe a half hour? Forty-five minutes?”
“So, plenty of time for someone to slip in.”
Then I remembered the odd way Catnip had been staring at the door. I’d thought he needed to use the bathroom, but perhaps he’d heard something I couldn’t… like someone entering Bonnie’s apartment.
I relayed the information to Deputy Branson, who noted the timing.
“Based on the cat, you were alone the first time you went in, but not the second.”
And that meant someone had seen me going through Bonnie’s papers. I reminded myself that just because I had glanced at a few things didn’t mean they could link me to the murder.
“You’re lucky,” he said. “That could’ve been a bad situation for you. Whoever it was didn’t want to kill you, or they would have.”
“I agree. I had no idea I wasn’t alone.” Just saying the words caused a chill to run down my spine.
Two other cops strode in, their faces lined with exhaustion, just like Jordan’s. “They’re here to do a search on Bonnie’s place, as well as the store.”
“Sure. Of course.”
“They’ll also need to look at your apartment.”
I met Jordan’s gaze and noted the apology in his eyes. Having been through a police search before while living in Los Angeles, I bristled at the idea. It had been a complete violation that time, and I couldn’t imagine it being any different now. “Why? I had nothing to do with what happened to Bonnie.”
“She owned the building, so we have to search the whole thing for evidence, including your apartment. The judge issued the warrant for the building in its entirety, not just Bonnie’s apartment.”
“Am I a suspect?”
Jordan shrugged. “Right now, everyone who knew Bonnie is a suspect.”
I swallowed past the bile rising in my throat. Flashbacks of my previous entanglement with law enforcement resurfaced. Even though I’d done nothing wrong then, they still treated me as if I had.
“We’ll be gentle with your things,” he continued. “If it’ll make you feel better, you can come stand in the doorway and watch.”
After taking a sip of my coffee, I nodded.
“Let’s start in the back room,” Jordan said, pointing the police to the doorway behind me. “And pay special attention to the back door. Let’s see if we can get prints off it.”
A dual investigation to discover who killed Bonnie and who had broken into her apartment and assaulted me. I appreciated the efficiency, and I wondered if the same person had committed both crimes.
“Can you take me through what happened again upstairs?” Jordan asked. “Walk me through your movements?”
“Sure.”
As we turned to follow the other officers into the back room, Annabelle came in through the front door. “Sam! Sam! What’s going on?!”
Today, she wore a neon pink and green track suit with a matching hair bandana. Where in the world did she shop to find these vintage items? Or maybe they were leftovers from her youth?
“It’s okay, Annabelle,” I said. “The police just want to do a quick search.”
I hadn’t mentioned the break-in to her for one simple reason: I didn’t trust her. There was a chance Annabelle could’ve murdered Bonnie. For what reason, I wasn’t quite sure, but the incidents in my recent past had given me horrible trust issues. I adored Annabelle, but I also wanted to remain alive and safe. Until I knew she had nothing to do with the murder or the break-in, I’d keep my thoughts on Bonnie’s death to myself.
As I climbed the stairs with Deputy Branson behind me, I also remembered our run in with the press the prior day. Now, I wouldn’t compare the Hollywood press to the little man of the Heywood Sentinel, but he had seemed pretty determined to get a good story. What if he’d been the one to break into Bonnie’s apartment?
“A man was here. I didn’t catch his name. He said he was from the Heywood Sentinel and was quite… pushy.”
“Looking for the big story?” Deputy Branson asked as we reached the landing.
“Yes.” I turned to him and crossed my arms over my chest. “He said he got my name from someone in the police department.”
Branson winced. “Heck. That shouldn’t have happened.”
“I agree.”
“I’m sorry about that,” he sighed. “Heywood’s a small town with not a lot going on. Unfortunately, the sheriff isn’t as skilled in murder investigations as she should be, and neither is the staff.”
“Does that include you?”
He shook his head. “I’m a transplant. A cop in Chicago in a former life. I’ve worked plenty of murders.”
Interesting. “You came from Chicago to Heywood? That’s quite the change.”
“Yes. Yes, it was.”
I longed to ask a few more questions, but I didn’t want to open up the conversation to me revealing my life prior to Heywood. “That’s Bonnie’s place,” I said, pointing to the door on my left. “And this is mine.”
“Is the cat in there?”
“Yes.”
“Okay. Is there a way for you to crate it or something while we search?”
“I’ll just hold him.”
As I opened the door, Catnip jumped from the couch and hurried over to introduce himself to the new guy. I scooped him up as the other cops joined Deputy Branson on the landing.
“We’ll split up and do both apartments at once,” he said, grinning. “That way, we’ll get out of your hair much quicker.” He really did seem like a decent human, something I hadn’t experienced with my recent dealings with LA law enforcement.
Catnip purred in my arms as the men entered Bonnie’s. We stood in the doorway while they conducted their search, which didn’t take long in the small space. Nervous butterflies tickled my belly as they picked through the stack of papers I’d glanced at last night. When the police scooped them up and put them in a bag, I turned away and paced the small landing with Catnip.
I heard the others rummaging through my private space. Clenching my teeth, I tried to prepare myself for a horrible mess, just like I had last time my house had been searched.
“Did you and Bonnie keep your doors locked?” Branson asked.
I shook my head. “Neither of us did. We were here all day long. It seemed pointless. She was also up and down the stairs constantly, always hurrying up here to grab something or other, or to check on Catnip.”
He nodded, then entered my apartment.
Once again, I paced the landing, my ire growing with each step. I hated strangers in my apartment, touching my things, especially since I’d done nothing wrong.
They’d left Bonnie’s door open and I peeked inside to see what the damage was. Stepping over the threshold, I glanced around while Catnip meowed. I felt bad taking him back into his house… like I was somehow teasing him. To my surprise, I couldn’t tell anyone had been in Bonnie’s apartment—not a thing out of place. Either the Los Angeles police had been especially rough, or the Heywood police had no idea what they were doing.
“We’re done here,” Branson said as he came out onto the landing a few moments later. “I’m really sorry for the intrusion.”
I glanced into my apartment. They’d left it just as neat as Bonnie’s, which pleased me. However, I still couldn’t get past the idea of strangers touching my things. As they filed out down the stairs, I tried to ignore them while placing Catnip into my apartment and closing the door.
“Good luck with the investigation,” I replied, and followed him down the stairs.
“Do you two need help fixing the back door?” the deputy asked as Annabelle hurried over next to me.
I had no idea how to repair it, but Annabelle shook her head. “We’ll take care of it.”
The store was busier than usual, and as I walked around and asked people if they needed any assistance, I realized that most weren’t buyers. They were in the store hoping to catch a bit of news about Bonnie’s murder.
An hour later, when most of them had gone home, Annabelle had already repaired the door and I found her in back working on some specialty tinctures.
She closed the amber bottle with a dropper, then pulled a sticker from the box and wrote the customer’s name on it, what the tincture was for, and the dosage. “You know, I’ve been thinking… we should, like, set a couple of tables out front and use them to serve tea. We could put a small stove back here and grab some pastries from Skippity Skones every morning to serve with the tea. It would be another revenue stream for the store.”
I’d had the same idea, but my internal radar screamed. How could Annabelle be making future plans unless she knew something about what happened to Bonnie’s estate?