I parked on the street in front of my house and stared at the all-too-familiar green pickup truck in my driveway. A shiver traveled down my spine. Should I call Chief Rose? Timothy? Both?
Before I could make up my mind, the front door opened. Dylan stepped onto the front porch followed by Curt and Brock. I jumped out of the Bug. “Dylan! What’s going on here?”
A slow smile moved across Curt’s face. “What’s the matter, Red?”
Dylan walked down the porch steps. “What’s wrong? I told you I’d be working on the house today.”
“I knew you were, but you didn’t tell me that they’d be here,” I hissed.
“They are helping me with the restoration. I told you I might have some workers with me.”
“Yes.” I didn’t want to get into my history with Curt and Brock. “Please, ask them to leave.”
Snow fell onto Dylan’s dark head, like dandruff. He brushed the snow away. “I can’t ask them to leave now. We just started.”
“I’m sorry, Dylan, but you will.”
Curt and Brock poked at each other on my front porch, reminding me of the two boys at the cheese shop.
“Where’s Becky? Is she here?” It made me queasy to think of Becky being in the same house with Curt and Brock.
“She left for work a half hour ago.” Dylan’s voice sounded close to a whine.
“She let them inside our house?”
“No, Curt and Brock were late.” He flushed slightly. “She left before they got here.”
“I want them out, Dylan. Now. They aren’t welcome in my house.”
He glared at me. “It’s not your house. You sound like my wife. I can make decisions too.”
I stepped back. “I’m sure you can, but if they are going to be on the property, Becky and I are moving out.”
“You can’t do that—you have a lease.” He gave me a lopsided smile. “Besides, they said they were friends of yours.”
“Do they look like my friends?”
Brock lumbered down the steps. “Aw, Red, that hurts. It really does.”
“You two have to leave.” My voice shook.
Curt moseyed over. “Why’s that? We’re working.”
“If you don’t leave right now, I’ll call the police.” I pulled my cell from my coat pocket.
“No reason to get your dander up, Red.” Brock held up his hands in mock surrender. The snow crunched under his feet as he took a step back.
Curt turned to Dylan. “If you have another job, give us a call. This one’s not going to work out for us.”
Dylan’s mouth fell open. “But . . .”
Tobacco juice flecked onto Curt’s cheek. “See you around, Red.”
He and Brock sauntered to their pickup. Seeing the two of them around was becoming more frequent by the day.
After the green truck roared down the street, Dylan threw up his hands. “Now, I have to find someone else for the job.”
I tried to keep my voice level, but I heard it shake. “Curt and Brock aren’t welcome here. The Troyer family and I have a history with them. I don’t want to talk about it. If you want to know what it is, read last summer’s edition of the Mount Vernon newspaper.”
“This is my investment. I can’t tiptoe around when I have progress to make.”
“I live here, and you should respect my wishes,” I snapped. “Timothy offered to help you.”
“I don’t want any Amish help,” he said through gritted teeth. “And I most certainly don’t want Timothy’s help.”
“Timothy’s a professional.”
“Are you saying I’m not?” he asked. “Kara, you don’t trust me at all.”
I froze. “Who’s Kara?”
He blinked at me as if waking up from a dream.
“Kara is your wife, isn’t she?” I whispered.
He turned and stalked to his car in the driveway. “Next time I show up with a work crew, we are going to work. I don’t care if you approve or not.” He slammed his car door.
I stood on the frozen lawn in stunned silence. Timothy’s truck came up the street from the opposite direction. He turned into my driveway and hopped out, holding a small brown sack in his hand. “It’s freezing. What are you doing outside?” He stepped closer to me. “Chloe, what’s wrong?”
I told him.
Timothy clenched the fist holding the paper sack. The brown paper crunched under the pressure. “I think you and Becky may need to find another place to live.”
I silently agreed. It no longer felt like home. It no longer felt safe.
“You’re going to catch a chill. Let’s go inside.” He steered me in the direction of the house.
Gigabyte crawled out from under the sofa when we stepped through the front door. He yowled.
I scooped up the cat. “Oh, Gig. Are you okay? They didn’t hurt you, did they?”
He yowled again.
Timothy placed the sack on the coffee table and removed his coat. “I’m going to take a look around.”
I perched on the edge of the armchair with Gig in my lap and listened as Timothy moved from room to room.
He was back within minutes. “I didn’t notice anything out of the ordinary . . .” He stared at the wall that separated the living room from the mudroom and kitchen.
“What is it?”
Timothy traced his finger along the wall.
I stood up, still carrying my cat, and stood by him. There was a faint penciled X on the wall.
Timothy knocked on the wall there. “This is hollow.” He peered up. “See at the ceiling line the plaster is a lighter color? This wall was added after the original construction of the house.”
I pointed at the X. “Becky and I didn’t do that.”
He shook his head. “I didn’t think you did. Dylan drew this line. He’s going to knock down this wall.”
“What?” I squeezed Gigabyte to my chest. He kicked at me with his back claws, and I dropped him to the floor. “He can’t do that.”
“We need to talk to Chief Rose about this and maybe Becky’s lawyer too.” Timothy dropped his hand from the wall.
“I don’t think they were here very long.” I crossed my arms. “Dylan said they came after Becky left for work, so they were here all of twenty minutes before I arrived.”
“Good thing. You might have returned to find a hole in your wall.” He sighed. “I wish I’d been here sooner.”
“Why are you here?” I paused. “Not that I don’t appreciate it.”
Timothy walked over to the brown bag on the coffee table. “To bring you this.” He handed it to me.
I opened the bag and saw a delicate African violet inside. The leaves were velvety and deep jungle green, the petals soft and almost black purple. “It’s beautiful.”
“I know it’s not very big, but I saw it at Young’s gift shop today and thought of you.”
Unwittingly, my eyes glanced at Dylan’s mum arrangement by the front window. It was lavish, bright, and over the top. In comparison, the violet was small, understated, and alive. I bit my lip, hoping that my black thumb would keep it that way.
Timothy misread my expression. “I know it’s not as big as Dylan’s flowers.”
I placed a hand on his arm. “It’s perfect. I love it. Thank you.”
A smile broke on his face. “Ellie thought you’d like it too. She wrapped it up for me.” He reached into his jeans pocket and handed me a folded piece of loose-leaf paper. “She wrote down the directions on how to care for it too.”
“These will help.” I took the paper. “Is Ellie back at work?”
“No, she just happened to be in the shop when I made the purchase.”
“When is the funeral?” I placed the violet on an end table by the front window. It was a miniature next to Dylan’s mums.
“Tomorrow.”
“I’d like to talk to Uri about his brother.”
Timothy sat on the couch. Gig jumped into his lap, turned twice, and lay down. Timothy stroked Gig’s back. “That makes sense. Uri knew his brother best.”
“Do you think I can talk to him today?”
Timothy’s brows knit together. “I don’t know. I suppose we can go over to Young’s and see if he’s in the office. He planned to be there most of the day. Really, he should be sitting at home with his mother.”
I told him about my visit with Sadie Hooley and Debbie Stutzman. “I can’t help but think Leah, Debbie, and Abby know more than they are telling. Sadie too, but I think she knows something different from the other three girls.”
“I could see Abby knowing something because Ezekiel is her uncle. And yes, now that I’ve thought about it, I do think it’s strange that two members of the same family were attacked.”
“Thank you.”
“But what would Sadie Hooley know about any of it? She was an innocent victim as far as I could tell.”
I sat back in my chair. “She knows more than you think. She and Ezekiel were secretly engaged.”
“What? Sadie Hooley and Ezekiel Young? I don’t believe it! She’s so quiet and sweet, and he was . . . well . . . not.”
“It’s true. She’s brokenhearted by his death. She says I’m the only one who knows about it. Now, you know too. You can’t tell anyone. From what she says, her father would not approve of the match.”
“I’m not surprised. The Youngs are one of the more liberal families in the district. How did she keep it a secret?”
“The question isn’t how they did it—it’s whether they were able to do it. I think there might be a connection between the engagement and the murder and haircutting.”
“That may be true, but it still doesn’t account for what happened to Grossdaddi or those three girls.”
I frowned. “You’re right.” I paused. “What about James Zug?”
“No luck. I talked to my friend who works at the auction stables. James was there until after ten bedding down his sheep for the night. My friend saw him when he did his rounds at three, five, seven, and nine. James was with his sheep each time. When did you find Ezekiel?”
“Six thirty.”
“That ends it, then. The auction barn is twenty miles from Young’s. There’s no way he could have been gone for a long period of time without someone noticing, and it would have taken almost an hour to get to Young’s from the barn by buggy. That’s one way.”
“That leaves us with Uri,” I said.
He removed his cell from his pocket. “Let me call Uri’s office. If he’s there, we can head over now.” Timothy punched a number into his cell phone. When the person on the other end of the line answered, he hung up. “He’s there.”
“You hung up on him. He’s going to know it was you who called and try to phone you back.”
He laughed. “Chloe, the Amish don’t have caller ID, even for their businesses.”
He held out his hand and helped me out of the chair. Spontaneously, he pulled me into a hug and whispered into my hair. “Please be careful.” After a beat, he added, “For me.”
I swallowed hard and promised him I would.