Chapter Thirty-Nine

“I don’t believe you made her do this!” Chris angrily railed at MacDonald. Hands on hips he looked from the chief, who sat behind his desk, to Danielle, who had just returned from the morgue.

“He didn’t make me do anything, it was my idea. And how did you know I was here?”

“I stopped by your house. Walt told me you’d come down to the police station to check on the status of the case. You know, Walt’s not going to be happy with you when I tell him.”

“I don’t get it. What did Danielle do that was so wrong? You talked to Mitcham’s spirit at the beach,” MacDonald asked.

Chris faced the chief. “Seeking out spirits—especially potentially hostile ones—can be as dangerous as using a Ouija board.”

MacDonald looked from Chris to Danielle. “Is that true?”

Danielle shrugged. “I think that might be overstating it a bit.” She sat down.

“How did Harvey and Stoddard work out for you?” Chris asked.

“Okay, I agree, they were annoying.”

“Annoying? Walt told me how Harvey almost got you killed and Stoddard tried to!”

Danielle frowned. “You and Walt have sure been chatting it up a lot lately.”

“And even if they aren’t dangerous, if they want something from you, it can be the devil to get them to leave you alone. Look at Trudy! She wouldn’t give me a moment of peace until I did what she wanted.”

“Okay, okay, you’ve made you point,” Danielle sighed. She looked up at Chris and flashed him her sweetest smile. “And we really don’t have to tell Walt about this, do we?” Chris’ only response was a noncommittal grunt.

“Anyway they’re gone now. Why don’t you sit down?”

Begrudgingly, Chris took a seat.

“What do you mean gone?” MacDonald asked.

“When I first walked in, they were doing a lot of yelling—at each other. I managed to get a little information out of them, but then, Mitcham looked at Morris and told him he didn’t intend to spend his eternity haunting a morgue with Morris, and he just—was gone.”

“Where did he go?” MacDonald asked.

Danielle shrugged. “I assume he tried to move onto wherever he’s supposed to go, which, as I always say in cases like this, may not be somewhere he really wants to go.”

“What about Morris?” Chris asked.

“After Mitcham left, Morris said there was nothing left for him here, and he just faded away. Personally, I think he did the fade thing for dramatic effect. Unlike Mitcham, who, when he decided he was outa here, just vanished—poof—like a magician in a disappearing act.”

“You said you learned something?” the chief asked.

“Mitcham figured so many people hated Morris that it would be easy to get them to hire a hit man. Imagine, having a dozen people paying you for the same hit. Of course, all the clients think they’re the only one, which is important, because he intended to blackmail the clients after he took their money for the hit.”

“Are you saying more than one person paid him to kill Morris?” Chris asked.

“I guess hating someone doesn’t necessarily mean you’re willing to have them killed. Only one of Mitcham’s clients hired him to kill Morris. That’s the one who killed him.”

“Will Wayne claimed to be blackmailed,” the chief muttered, speaking more to himself.

Danielle shook her head. “I don’t think Will is the one who hired the hit. Mitcham intended to blackmail all his clients who hated Morris, figuring at least some of them would pay up. My bet is, he mailed Will that letter right after he killed Morris, and before he met with the one client who’d hired him for the hit. If you go to Mitcham’s other clients who had a grudge against Morris, you’ll probably find they received the same blackmail letter.”

“This does not feel right. Kelly has been gone for more than an hour now,” Ian told Brian and Joe. “Even if she had just grabbed some cash and run out to the store to pick up milk, she would have been back by now.” The three men stood downstairs, inside Mitcham’s condo. Brian’s cellphone began to ring. Seeing it was the chief calling, he excused himself and went into the other room to answer the call.

“Hey, Chief. Kelly still hasn’t shown up.”

“Brian, I think your hunch was right. If Mitcham was paid to kill Morris, the person who paid for the hit is the same person who killed Mitcham.”

Brian glanced to the doorway leading to where Ian and Joe waited. “It that’s true, it looks like she may have panicked and fled. But I don’t think she’ll get that far without her purse or phone.”

After finishing his call, Brian returned to Ian and Joe. “Ian, when Kelly was researching Earthbound Spirits for you, she regularly visited a cult watch website.”

“Yeah, I know. What about it?”

“She had two separate accounts on that website.”

Ian frowned. “What do you mean? She didn’t have two accounts.”

“Yes, she posted as KellyB and JusticeNow,” Brian told him.

Ian shook his head. “Kelly wasn’t JusticeNow, Baily Bradford was.”

“Baily Bradford?” Joe asked.

“Yeah. I thought Kelly told you about her roommate.”

“She did, but what does that have to do with this Baily Bradford?” Joe asked.

“Baily is Candice’s sister.”

“Why didn’t Kelly tell us about JusticeNow?” Joe asked.

“Why would she? There were dozens of posters on that site with grievances against Morris. And Kelly was never a hundred percent certain it was Baily, she never interacted with her on the site, but she did read all her posts, which was why she was fairly certain who it was.”

“It’s true,” Joe mumbled. “There were never any postings between KellyB and JusticeNow. I figured that was because they were the same person.”

“Why are you asking about JusticeNow? Does this have something to do with where Kelly went?”

“What’s Kelly’s relationship with this Baily?” Brian asked.

Ian shrugged. “I don’t think you can say they have a relationship, per se. Their only connection was Candice, and until they ran into each other before Christmas, I don’t think Kelly had seen Baily since Candice’s funeral, and that was over seven years ago.”

“Do you know where Baily lives?” Brian asked.

“I believe she’s still living at her parent’s estate. Why?”

If she peed on the sofa’s brocade upholstery, would it be a clue to lead investigators to her body? That was just one of the crazy thoughts popping into Kelly’s head as she watched a pistol wielding Baily pace the living room, trying to decide what to do—kill Kelly here, or take her somewhere else to do the dastardly deed.

Peeing on the sofa would be fairly easy, considering Kelly had never had to use the bathroom so bad. Yet her discomfort was the least of her problems. The only reason she hadn’t started screaming for Maria—who Kelly assumed must be the maid—was that Baily had threatened to kill Maria too. Did Kelly want that on her conscience?

There was no clock in the living room, but Kelly guessed she’d been at the Bradford Estate for at least an hour, maybe longer. She was hoarse from trying to convince Baily not to do this thing—after all, they both loved Candice. What would Candice think?

The second time she asked that question, Kelly remembered the sad truth about her dear friend. Candice was always a little unbalanced, which made her easy prey for Peter Morris. Kelly had always assumed Candice’s issues stemmed from abuse at the hands of her mentally ill mother. But watching Baily, Kelly came to realize mental illness ran in the Bradford family.

“Stand up,” Baily demanded, the small pistol pointed at Kelly’s face.

“What are you going to do?” Kelly slowly stood.

“Your car’s parked outside. We’re going to move it.”

“If you just let me go, I promise, I won’t say anything. And even if I did, I couldn’t prove anything!”

“Shut up and get going!”

“What about Maria? She might see us,” Kelly reminded.

“I’ll worry about Maria, just get moving.”

In the back seat of the police car, Ian gave Joe and Brian directions to the Bradford Estate. They only planned to drive by, see if Kelly’s car was parked somewhere in the neighborhood. The moment they turned down the street leading to the Bradford Estate, they spied not only Kelly’s car, but also Kelly with another woman, walking behind the vehicle. The woman made no effort to conceal the small pistol she had pointed at Kelly’s back. It appeared the woman was leading Kelly to the driver’s side of the car.

Everything seemed to happen in an instant. Both Kelly and her kidnapper noticed the approaching police car at the same time. They each had the same reaction—run. Kelly ran toward the police car, while the gun-wielding woman fled back to her house.