part0011

But darned if I didn’t follow the plan. I got ready almost as quickly as Wilson, told the cats to behave themselves, and headed downstairs to Candy’s. Just my luck, the dreaded Carter answered the door.

I could hear Candy rushing around in the bedroom, and I could see her little poodle Puddles racing around her living room, but evidently Carter had all the time in the world.

He ushered me to the pink—yes, pink—couch, and just my luck, sat down beside me. “Long time, no see,” he said as Puddles hopped into his lap. “What’s up?”

I spoke over my shoulder. “I need Candy,” I hollered. “We have a problem.”

“Sorry, Jessie,” she called back. “But I have to get to work. Tate’s Semi-Annual Storewide Extravaganza Sale starts today.”

“Mrs. Marachini will be there,” Carter told me. “She’s Candy’s best customer.”

No kidding. I waved a hand to shush the man and continued talking over my shoulder. “I was hoping you could help me today, Sweetie. I need your moral support.”

“Maybe I can help,” Carter said.

I turned and blinked. “No, thank you,” I managed, and my luck finally changed when Candy appeared.

“No, Carter,” she said. She sat down on the pink chair opposite us and dumped two handfuls of jewelry onto her lap. “It’s already Saturday, and you have to be out by—” She stopped. “You’re busy today, remember?”

Another bit of luck—Carter recollected some other pressing obligation.

I breathed a sigh of relief and again addressed Candy, who was busy poking a plum-sized, plum-colored, earring into her earlobe. My young friend was clad in purple that day—purple mini dress, purple stilettos, purple jewelry, purple the whole nine yards. “We have an emergency,” I told her.

“Has Destiny been found out?” Carter asked, and I once again redirected my attention.

“Do her parents know her secret?”

I rolled my eyes. “We are discussing Karen.”

“Is she finally home?” Candy asked, and it dawned on me how hopelessly behind the times the woman was.

I told her to brace herself and explained the situation.

“Kidnapped!?” She dropped the bracelet she was holding and started crying, and Carter abandoned the couch to kneel beside her.

“Don’t worry,” he said. “Wilson will find her.”

“No!” She shook her head vigorously. “We don’t want Wilson to find her.”

“We don’t?” He gathered the trinket she had dropped. “Why not?”

“Because!” Candy whined. “Wilson’s Wilson Rye’s the homici—the homici—”

“Because Wilson’s been called away on another case,” I said.

Carter must have noticed my frown. “Wilson or no Wilson, how can we help?” he asked.

“You can tell me the last time you saw Karen.”

Candy jumped. “You don’t think Carter did it?”

“Why would I think Cart—” I stopped and stared aghast. “Sweetie,” I said slowly, “this kidnapping isn’t somehow connected to that surprise you keep mentioning?”

“Of course not.”

“It isn’t some sort of April Fools prank?” I asked, and Carter informed me April Fools had been weeks earlier.

Somehow we got back on track, and he reported he had last seen Karen the previous weekend. “I was here on Saturday to—”

“To walk Puddles,” he finished, and Candy reported she also had been walking Puddles the last time she saw Karen.

“But we didn’t really see her,” she added. “Just a light in her window.”

I asked when that was and learned Puddles had needed a potty break the previous Monday at around one a.m.

“He hardly ever wakes up that late,” she said. “Not unless he hears something. ”

“Maybe he heard something at Karen’s?” Carter suggested.

I sat forward. “Did he?”

Candy studied her dog. “Puddles didn’t tell me what he heard.”

My next stop, according to Wilson’s grand plan, should have been Peter Harrison’s. But by the time I reached the first floor something else occurred to me, and I made a detour. And yes, I have a key to Karen’s place. And no, I had no idea what I was looking for.

Her living room, which she uses as a carpentry workshop, was as neat and tidy as my living room. No surprise there, but something still felt wrong. I lifted my head and sniffed—no smell of sawdust. I told myself that made sense considering how long she’d been working at Pierpont’s, and moved to the bedroom.

“She’ll forgive me considering the circumstances,” I told her dresser and made a thorough search. Nothing unexpected, but I lingered at the framed photographs displayed on top of the piece. Despite her rather gruff demeanor, Karen Sembler is even more sentimental than Candy.

I smiled at the pictures of her nephews, her brothers, and her deceased parents, and I sighed at the shot of Pierpont sitting atop a horse. But Wilson had taken the picture which almost reduced me to tears. There we were—Karen, Candy, and myself—arm in arm and smiling away as if life would always be as happy as it was at that particular moment.

The tallest, thinnest, and oldest, with short spiky blonde hair, I stood on the left. Candy, the youngest, shortest, and most buxom, with long dark hair and big brown eyes, stood at the right. And Karen stood between us in every way. She’s in her forties, five feet five or so, and has shoulder-length auburn hair.

I swallowed the lump in my throat and checked the nightstand and closets, but the only things even remotely unexpected were in her linen closet. I scowled at the various wrenches, clamps, and who knows what other tools and had to wonder where the woman stores her linens.

The answer was a cabinet in the bathroom. After finishing there, I moved to the kitchen, and perhaps with the ghost of Great Uncle Oscar as inspiration, headed straight to the pantry. Two unopened packages of Oreos, a box of Girl Scout cookies, a bag of Hershey’s kisses, and some canned vegetables to round out her diet.

For some reason I opened the refrigerator. A carton of eggs, some sad-looking lettuce, two apples, three bottles of Corona, and an opened carton of milk. I pulled that out, took an ill-advised whiff, and dumped it down her sink. Which is when I noticed the light blinking on her answering machine at the counter.

The first two calls were from Wednesday. Two interior decorators left more or less the same message, asking Karen to build some furniture.

Caller number one had a client “dying” for an oak dining room suite. “Be a sweetheart, and call me back,” she said. “I know you’re busy at the Rigby place, but I hope you’ll find time for this one small project for me.”

Decorator number two needed a “teeny-tiny” wall-to-wall entertainment unit. “I’ll take the measurements for you,” he offered. “I really hope you can squeeze me in.”

No calls from Thursday, but the messages from Friday, the previous day, were equally desperate. Both decorators called back, begging Karen to contact them immediately, and wondering why she wasn’t answering her cell phone.

Candy Poppe had wondered about that also, and I listened to her call relating our plans to meet at the Stone Fountain. “I know you and Piers are real busy,” she said. “But Jessie and me miss you, and Carter and me have a surprise.”

“I do not like surprises,” I mumbled.

I jumped ten feet, and Peter Harrison stepped inside .

“Peter!” I cleared my throat. “You’re up bright and early!”

“I could say the same about you.” He pointed to the ceiling and told me he finally had the vacant place rented. “I was on my way up when I heard voices over here.” He stopped and glanced around.

“No Karen,” I said rather needlessly. “But I can explain why I’m here.”

“No you can’t.” He turned back to me. “What has happened to her, Jessie?”

I broke it to him as gently as possible, but even so, I imagine Peter’s eighty-something heart aged a few more years at the news. He asked how he could help, and I asked the basic question, “When was the last time you saw her?”

“Monday evening at 8:10.”

I raised an eyebrow. “That’s rather precise.”

It was. A retired high school music teacher, Peter gives piano lessons in his home, and had been escorting a student out of our building as Karen was walking in.

“Did she say anything?” I asked.

“She told me she couldn’t wait to get Pierpont’s plumbing D-U-N-dun.” He pointed to the answering machine. “But I interrupted you. Anything interesting?”

I mentioned the desperate decorators, and hit play again, and we listened to the last few messages.

Speaking of desperate, Piers had called several times the previous day, with each call more frantic than the last. “Are you there?” he asked in his message from nine p.m. “I know I keep bothering you, but please tell me you’re safe and sound, Karen. I need to hear your voice. Please?”

“This is painful,” I whispered, but we kept listening right up to his last message, from only an hour earlier. “You’ve been kidnapped, haven’t you?” he cried.