B.J. Daniels - A Woman With A Mystery

The first Christmas after their mother’s murder had been the worst, with both parents gone. But the chief and Norma Curtis had helped them start new traditions and Slade had gone along with it for his sister. As far as he was concerned, he could skip the holiday all together and never miss it.

“This is one of my favorites,” she said, stopping to admire a small porcelain Santa. “I remember it from pictures of when we were just babies.”

Their mother had loved collecting Christmas ornaments. She could recount where she’d gotten each, many from friends or family, and what year. Each one had special meaning for her.

He watched his sister cradle the Santa in her palm and couldn’t help but think about the Santa bell-ringer below his office window earlier. It kept him from thinking about other Christmases—and his mother.

After he’d missed catching the Santa bell-ringer, he’d returned to his office and tried to call Holly Barrows in Pinedale. Of course there was no listing. Why wasn’t he surprised? She’d probably made up the name.

Not that he knew what he’d have said even if he’d found a number for her. I think Santa Claus had my building staked out and I think he was looking for you? He would sound as crazy as she had.

But he couldn’t quit worrying about her. Or worse, worrying that she might be in real trouble—and he hadn’t taken her seriously. Between that, and worrying about his mother’s letter—and the possible implications of her words, the last thing he wanted to be doing tonight was decorating a Christmas tree. He felt antsy and anxious. Both incidents had shaken him—and during a season when he didn’t feel all that grounded anyway.

He and Shelley had just finished decorating the tree when the chief and his wife arrived.

“Slade, get them some wine,” Shelley said as she took their coats and shook off the snow. “You must be freezing.”

“Nothing like a white Christmas!” Norma exclaimed and moved to the fireplace. “Oh, your tree is just lovely!”

“Want to help me with the wine?” Slade asked the police chief pointedly.

Curtis sighed but followed him into the kitchen. Chief Curtis was built like a battering ram, neckless and balding, with a florid complexion, a reputation for being outspoken to the point of being rude and as tough as a rabid pit bull off his chain. Slade knew the chief’s bark was worse than his bite, but he still had a healthy respect for the man.

He handed him the letter, then proceeded to fill two glasses with wine, knowing Shelley would get suspicious if they took too long.

“Do we have to do this now?” Curtis asked, looking down at the yellowed envelope in his hand. “Damn, Slade, it’s Christmas Eve.”

“Roy Vogel didn’t kill her. Now I know there was someone else. A man. A secret lover who wanted to remain secret. Maybe at all costs.”

Curtis shook his head. “You just aren’t going to let this go, are you?”

“No. I can’t. And considering how my parents felt about you, I wouldn’t think you could either.”

Curtis shot him a withering look, then slowly opened the flap and withdrew the handwritten pages. They crackled in his thick fingers as he unfolded them with obvious hesitancy.

“Well?” Slade demanded when Curtis had finished reading.

“It’s vague as hell,” the cop said with his usual conviction. But Slade noticed that the older man’s hands shook a little as he folded the paper, forced the pages back into the envelope and handed it to him. The letter had obviously upset him as much as it had Slade.

“She admitted she’d been secretly meeting someone she didn’t want Joe to know about, and she pleaded with Ethel not to give away her secret,” Slade said as he put the letter back into his pocket. “What’s vague about that?”

“She didn’t say she was having an affair,” Curtis pointed out, keeping his voice down so the women couldn’t hear in the next room.

“I’m going to find out who she’d been meeting,” Slade told him as he handed the chief a glass of wine. “Are you going to help me? Someone had to know. Maybe one of her friends. Or her hairdresser. Or the damned meter reader. Someone.”

“You’re going off half-cocked,” Curtis warned. “Even if there was someone, it doesn’t mean he killed her.”

“There was someone. The letter makes that clear. And if Roy Vogel didn’t kill her—”

With an oath, Curtis shook his head. “Why did he confess then?”

“Who knows? The guy was always weird and not quite right in the head. But for that very reason, Mom would never have let him into the house, let alone offered him a drink. You do remember the second, half-empty glass on the coffee table?”

“Both glasses had only your mother’s fingerprints on them,” Curtis pointed out as if he’d said it a million times to Slade. He probably had.

“So the killer wore gloves. It was December. Right before Christmas. It was cold that year. Or he never touched his drink.”

Curtis shook his head. “I should never have allowed you to have a copy of the file. What do you do, dig it out and reread it every night before bed?”

“Don’t have to. I know it by heart.” He didn’t tell the chief that he no longer had the file. It was one of the cases the mysterious Holly Barrows, if that was really her name, had stolen, along with a half dozen other older cases. There was no rhyme or reason to the ones she’d taken. None of the cases current—or interesting enough to steal. Probably because the woman was unstable.

“Your father went over that case with a fine-tooth comb. If he’d thought for a moment that Roy Vogel hadn’t been guilty—”

“What if he knew about her affair, maybe even knew who it was?” Slade interrupted. Joe Rawlins had died of a heart attack not six months after his wife’s murder. But Joe had never had a bad heart. That’s why Slade had always believed it had been heartbreak that had killed him.

Curtis let out an oath. “You think a cop like your father would let Marcella’s murderer go free?”

“Maybe there was a reason Dad didn’t go after the real killer. Or couldn’t.” All Slade had was a gut instinct, one that had told him years ago that the wrong man had died for the crime.

Curtis shook his head. “You’re opening up a can of worms here. Have you thought at all about Shelley and what this is going to do to her?”

“I always think of Shelley,” Slade snapped.

Curtis raised a brow as Shelley called from the other room.

“What’s keeping you two? No work! It’s Christmas Eve!”

Curtis reached for the glass of wine Slade had poured for Norma. “Isn’t it bad enough that your mother was murdered? You want to murder her reputation as well? And for what? Roy Vogel killed her.”

“Then you think she was having an affair,” Slade said.

Curtis swore. “If she was, I for one don’t want to know about it.”

Slade fell silent, thinking about what Curtis had said as he followed the chief back into the living room. The conversation turned to the holidays and food and parties.

He stared at the fire, the bright hot flames licking up from the logs, and tried to follow the conversation. But he couldn’t quit thinking. About his mother’s murder. About the young woman who’d come up to his office. He wondered what she was doing tonight and if she was all right. If she’d ever been all right. And if it was possible she’d given birth to his baby.

He couldn’t help but remember in detail how it had been between them and wonder…what if her memory of him were to come back—

He reminded himself that she was a thief and, more than likely, a liar. She’d stolen more than his money and his files. She’d stolen his heart.