When Brian returned to the police station, he found Heather with the chief in his office.
“Any luck?” Brian asked after walking into the room and closing the door behind him.
“If you mean, did I find Betty’s ghost? Nope. No sign of her at the morgue or at her house. If she hasn’t moved on, then maybe she’s wandering around in our neighborhood. And I’m wondering if Max is wrong. Perhaps it was Betty he saw at Marlow House and not Olivia,” Heather suggested.
Brian sat down on the chair next to Heather while saying, “They look nothing alike.”
“He’s a cat, Brian. He could be wrong. Don’t all humans look alike?” Heather asked.
Brian shrugged, and the chief asked, “What did you find out this morning?”
“I spoke to Eden. She saw Betty leave early yesterday morning. Time matches with what Josephine told us. But Eden wasn’t there when Betty returned. I found something interesting. It seems Becca and Betty had some sort of falling-out about a month ago.”
The chief leaned back in his chair while folding his arms across his chest. Looking over his desk at Brian and Heather, he let out a sigh. “That’s interesting. The cellphone we found in Betty’s car, we got it open, and that phone call Josephine said Betty received before she left her house, it was from Becca.”
“Makes sense since she was a couple of houses from Becca’s house. She must have been going there, but why?” Brian asked.
“When are you going to talk to Becca?” Heather asked.
“Do you know her?” the chief asked.
Heather shrugged. “Just who she is. I’ve seen her on our street. We’ve talked a few times. More like very casual acquaintances.”
“I was planning to go over there now,” Brian said. “I thought I could drop Heather off at her house first if you’re done with her.” Both Brian and Heather looked at the chief.
“Yes. And I appreciate all your help, Heather.”
“No problem.” Heather looked at Brian. “You can drop me off at Marlow House instead of my place. I’ll call Danielle first. I don’t really feel like being home alone right now. Not with a potential killer who knows I’m a witness. I keep thinking about our conversation this morning. Both of us ignoring the elephant in the room. I don’t believe she didn’t see me when she was with Betty. She looked me right in the eyes, and we stared at each other for a few moments. It’s beyond creepy.”
“It makes little sense,” the chief said. “All the evidence shows she was on that flight. Even the car dealer backs it up, and he had photos. She must have a doppelgänger out there.”
“Right. With the same jacket,” Heather scoffed.
“I’ll be curious to see that security footage when it arrives,” Brian said.
“If she was really on that flight, then she has a twin,” Heather insisted.
After Brian dropped Heather off at Marlow House, he drove up the street to Becca Hammond’s. Yesterday when stopping by her house, she hadn’t been home. While he had her phone number, he and the chief agreed it was best to catch her at home instead of giving her additional time to consider what she wanted to say to the police while on the way to the station. When he arrived, he found a car in her driveway. It hadn’t been there the day before.
Dave Hammond answered the front door a few minutes later.
“Brian, hello,” Dave greeted him. He opened the door wider and said, “I assume this is about Betty?”
“Then you heard?”
“On the radio when we were on our way home. Please come in.” Dave stepped aside while holding the door open. Brian entered.
“From what we heard on the radio, no one’s been arrested.”
Brian shook his head. “No. It’s still an active investigation. I was hoping I could talk to Becca.”
Dave showed Brian into the living room and motioned to a chair. “I’ll go get her. She’s lying down. The news hit her pretty hard. But she’ll want to talk to you. If there is any way she can help, she’ll want to.”
After Brian took a seat, Dave left the room to get his wife. A few minutes later, Becca and Dave returned. By Dave’s words, Brian assumed Becca had retreated to her bedroom to cry, but her clear eyes gave no indication of tears.
“Hello, Brian,” Becca said quietly. “Dave said you were here to talk to me about Betty?” Becca took a seat on the sofa, facing Brian, her husband by her side.
“Dave tells me you just found out about Betty this morning?” Brian asked.
Becca nodded. “Yes. Yesterday we left for Salem to attend my niece’s wedding. We spent the night. Just got back in town, and on the way home, heard the news. I heard on the radio they found her body on our street.”
“Yes. What time did you leave yesterday?” Brian asked.
“Early. Before six o’clock. The wedding wasn’t until the evening, but we needed to get there early to help my sister,” Becca explained.
“And you didn’t see Betty yesterday morning? Either of you?”
Becca and Dave exchanged brief glances and then looked at Brian and shook their heads.
“Can you tell me about your falling-out with Betty?”
Becca frowned at Brian. “Falling-out? Who said we had a falling-out?”
“According to one of Betty’s neighbors, you were in front of Betty’s house about a month ago, yelling at her. And later, Betty said something to the effect that you two were no longer friends.”
“Eden Langdon? Right?” Becca asked.
“That didn’t happen?”
Becca shifted in her chair and looked at Brian. “Yes, I was upset that day. But I wasn’t yelling. Eden has a tendency to exaggerate.”
“Can you tell me why you were upset?”
“You certainly don’t think I had anything to do with Betty’s death, do you? You think I killed my friend and then traipsed off on my merry way to a wedding?”
“Honey, don’t get so upset. I understand this is hard, but just answer Brian’s questions,” Dave urged.
Becca glanced at her husband, barely concealing a glare. After a moment, she looked back at Brian and said, “The library had an exhibit a while back. The lost art of letter writing, or something like that. I have—had—this antique letter opener that belonged to my grandmother. Betty thought it would be a great addition to the display. I really didn’t want to loan it to the library. It’s not that it’s extremely valuable—but it had sentimental value. Betty kept nagging me about it. And finally, I agreed. I let her use it in the display. And then someone took it.”
“I don’t remember a police report,” Brian said.
“Really? It was my understanding they were making one. But it doesn’t surprise me. Betty begged me not to say anything about it, because it would make the library look bad. She promised she would get it back.”
“If she made that promise, sounds like she had an idea who took it,” Brian said.
Becca shrugged. “Yeah, that’s kind of what I thought, too. But I was pretty pissed. I considered Betty a friend, but if she wanted something, she could be relentless. I think I was so pissed because she knew that I really didn’t feel comfortable lending the letter opener for the display, but she just wouldn’t let up. She didn’t respect my no. And I was also pissed at myself for allowing her to bully me into doing something I didn’t want to do. Honestly, I had this nagging gut feeling not to loan the letter opener to the library for the display. But I ignored the feeling because Betty kept bugging me. And yes, I told her how I felt after it disappeared. That’s what Eden witnessed. After that, I avoided Betty. But I certainly wouldn’t want something bad to happen to her.”
“Can you tell me what you talked about yesterday morning?” Brian asked.
Becca frowned. “Why do you want to know what Dave and I talked about?”
“I didn’t mean you and Dave. What did you and Betty talk about yesterday morning? Why did you call her?”
Becca frowned. “I didn’t call her. And I didn’t talk with her yesterday. Who said I did?”
“Yesterday morning, Betty was over at Josephine Barker’s house, sorting through some boxes for the library, when she got a phone call and then left abruptly. The only phone call Betty received yesterday morning was from you. It lasted just under two minutes.”
“No. That’s not right. I didn’t call Betty yesterday. And we certainly didn’t talk on the phone,” Becca insisted.
Brian pulled a small piece of paper out of his shirt pocket. He unfolded it, looked at it and then said, “Is your phone number…” He read a phone number out loud.
“Yes. That’s my cellphone number. But I didn’t call her. I’ll prove it.” Becca stood up, walked to the coatrack by the front door, and retrieved her purse. She brought it back to where she had been sitting, sat down, and pulled her cellphone from the purse. A moment later, she opened her phone app. Instead of handing the phone to Brian, she stared at her phone.
After a moment of silence, Dave asked, “What’s wrong?”
“This makes no sense,” Becca muttered. She looked up from her phone to Brian. “It looks like I called her yesterday morning, but I didn’t. And we were on the road to Salem when this call was supposedly made.”
“Can I look at it?” Brian asked.
Hesitantly, Becca handed the phone to Brian. Brian read aloud the time of the phone call.
“Becca’s right. We were on the road to Salem when that call was made. That’s too early to call anyone, especially someone you haven’t talked to in a month. I drove yesterday, and Becca was in the car with me. She never made a call.”
“Did you have this phone with you?” Brian asked.
Becca looked at Brian. “Yes. But I didn’t call Betty.”
“If the phone was with you, as you say it was, can you explain why it shows you called her at that time and were on the phone for two minutes?”