Hide & Find (Mayfield Cozy Mystery Book 3) (11 page)

I might have screeched a little bit.

He grinned, but also held up a finger in front of his lips.

“Bodie?” I rasped. “What on earth?”

“Found ‘em,” he said.

My mouth fell open. I had so many rushing questions, they jammed up in the opening and nothing came out. Bodie was one of the boys Walt had brought to the fire last night. Although calling him a boy probably wasn’t quite accurate. Without a birth certificate, we couldn’t verify, but he had most likely reached the age of majority.

He also must have noticed something while fighting the fire that set him on this quest. He knew all about hiding in the woods since he’d run away from his abusive, survivalist family. If anyone could find our vagrants, it would be him. I should have thought of that sooner.

I finally settled on the most important question. “Do they know you’ve seen them?”

Emmie’s hand crept into mine, and we both watched Bodie anxiously.

He tugged the knit hat down over his cold-pinked ears. “One of them speaks pretty good English.”

“Are they afraid?” Emmie whispered.

I squeezed my eyes shut and held her hand even more tightly. Would I ever be able to get Emmie to a point where her default root emotion wasn’t fear?

Bodie knelt in front of her, at eye level, and my heart melted at his sensitivity. He’d left behind younger sisters; maybe he recognized the trepidation in her voice.

“A little,” he said. “But Chet told me they released Wilbur, Orville, and the Terminator before the fire spread through the whole shed. He said they were so hungry, they thought about eating them, but they realized the animals were pets.”

“Chet?” Emmie wrinkled her nose.

Bodie shrugged. “It’s his name.”

“Where?” I asked.

“Down in the ravine.” Bodie rose to standing and gestured toward a wall of brush behind him. I absolutely would have walked right past that hiding spot even though, now that I was concentrating, I could hear the rushing of a small stream at the bottom.

“Do you think you can get them to come to the mansion?” I asked. “Tell them we have lots of food and warm beds.”

“I think so. After dark. I’ll stay with them until then.”

I nodded. “Come in through the coal room. We’ll be ready.”

Bodie paused, then said in a rush. “He knows your name, Nora. Chet — he asked after you specifically. Wanted to know if you were the one in the white dress last night. I think he meant that robe you were wearing.”

I blinked. “The woman in white. It’s my firefighting outfit. The height of fashion,” I muttered to mask my shock. Was Chet a criminal threat? I’d spent all day rationalizing why the homeless family couldn’t possibly be associated with anyone from Skip’s circle of business associates.

“How many?” I blurted.

“Seven.”

“Kids?”

Bodie nodded. “Two. A boy and a girl. They’re sick — runny noses and bad coughs.”

And that settled it. I squeezed Bodie’s shoulder. “Thank you. Bring them as soon as you can.”

CHAPTER 12

We didn’t have much time. Darkness fell early this close to the winter solstice.

I was starting to worry about Clarice. Her absence was stretching longer than I’d anticipated. Although she was probably trying to give us plenty of buffer for our secret operation.

Emmie and I decided that the family might feel uncomfortable at being split up in their new, unfamiliar accommodations, so we made up several beds in a single, large basement room with Clarice’s freshly laundered sheets. The room might originally have been an infirmary of sorts, because a row of cupboards and countertops with several sinks filled one end.

There were some scary-looking implements still in the cupboards, the kinds of things that might constitute a beginner chemistry set — glass beakers, a Bunsen burner, tubes and Petri dishes, needleless syringes and dust-covered bandages. The poor farm had been filled to occupancy in a time when there was not yet a vaccine for polio and tuberculosis and scarlet fever proliferated unchecked. No doubt the later nursing home residents had also had their own conditions that required quarantine.

It was a bleak room with no windows, but it was secluded and safe and big enough for a family of seven. Emmie brought down some of her books — the ones with the most pictures — and arranged them on a bedside table for the children. I cranked the knobs on the radiators, and they started hissing and ticking to life.

Clanging from the end of the hall announced our visitors. Emmie and I trotted to meet them in the coal room.

They were lean and shivering in completely inadequate garments. And they looked terrified. Bodie slammed the door shut, which made everyone jump.

He pointed to a young man. “Chet.” Then at me. “Nora.”

“Ahh.” The lithe man plunged forward and pumped my hand. “Skip told me you would be here.” He pointed at his own upper lip and then at mine. “With the scar. I recognize you. The paintings are in your possession?” His dark eyes darted anxiously over my face.

“That was you? The paintings?” I forgot to breathe for a moment. “All this time?”

I had to pinch myself to get my thoughts running parallel again. But it did make sense and matched up with Skip’s recording. I nodded. “Yes. Safe.” At least as much as could be expected at the Six Shooter Storage Solutions unit.

I had a flood of questions for the slight, unassuming man in front of me, but we had more pressing practical matters to attend to. I glanced at the other sets of apprehensive dark eyes appraising me, not to mention Bodie’s and Emmie’s questioning stares, trying to decide where to start.

“Yooohoooo!” Clarice’s unmistakable ex-smoker’s voice hollered from the other end of the mansion. Then the heavy, rapid clomp of her feet on the stairs, and I was saved — for the moment.

If I was a shock to our visitors’ timid expectations, then the sight of Clarice just about required a defibrillator. All of them except Chet shrank back against the wall, and Chet waffled a bit too, his brown skin turning a more milky shade.

“Huh.” Clarice peered at them and sniffed. Her weathered cheeks were appallingly rosy, as though she’d overdosed on fresh air, and her short hair was unflatteringly mashed. “Scrawny. As I expected. We’ll soon put that to rights.” She turned to glare at me. “I left my knight in shining armor in the kitchen, so watch what you say when you put in an appearance. Dinner’s in half an hour. I’ll arrange room service for our guests.”

I stood staring at her retreating back until Chet coughed nervously.

“It’s all right,” I said automatically. “Yes, she’s always like that, but she has a heart of gold.” I frowned. “That’s an idiom. Do you know what it means?”

Chet chuckled faintly. “Scary, but not sincerely so. More bark than bite?”

I grinned. “Do any of the others speak English?”

He half shrugged. “A few words only. They speak French better.” He pointed to each member of the small band in turn and announced their names. One auntie, one nephew, and the rest seemed to be cousins. They gave us shy nods of their heads in return.

I wondered if they were actually biologically related or if the labels were meant to be polite terms of attachment or respect. Regardless, I wanted them to feel at ease. I released Bodie from his chaperoning duty and showed them down the hall to their room.

As the women examined the accommodations and murmured between themselves, I asked Chet, “Where are you from?”

“Laos.”

“Illegal?”

He dipped his head. “I am now. My visa expired almost a month ago. I came for my sister—”

I laid a hand on his arm and cut him off. “I know some of it because Skip left me instructions, but I do want to hear your whole story — later.” I glanced toward the others. “Do they know?”

“They only know about our missing family members. They tried to help, but what could they do?” Chet gave another small shrug indicating the futility of peons fighting against a monstrous, evil organization, but his eyes were fierce, and I knew why Skip had conscripted him.

I squeezed his hand. “First food. Then we’ll talk. Please wait here, and quietly.”

“Unfortunately, we have become very good at that,” Chet replied.

I collected Emmie from the corner where she and the two children had been sitting together in companionable but curious silence. “This is our secret,” I whispered to her as we crept down the hall. “Clarice wants us not to say anything in front of whoever is visiting in the kitchen, okay?”

Emmie nodded, and I could have sworn her golden-brown eyes twinkled just a bit behind the pale seriousness of her face. Proof she was my girl in spirit, if not in flesh.

I was bracing myself for another round of fleet-footed fabrications when I followed Emmie through the door to the kitchen. Except it wasn’t Matt or Violet or any other stuffy, law-and-order type assisting Clarice with chopping onions. The enormous, coverall-clad mound with a head that seemed to sprout out of an overabundance of beard was none other than our friend and mechanic and postmaster, Gus O’Malley.

“Ho, ho,” he rumbled at the sight of Emmie, and for a second I thought I’d entered an alternate dimension somewhere near the North Pole.

She grinned back at him. His size intimidates most adults, but she didn’t seem fazed in the least.

Gus is the kind of man you can seriously snuggle, and so I did. Plus, we’ve been through some life-or-death situations together. He’s a rock.

“Hey, punkin.” He patted my back. “Don’t want to get onion juice on you.”

“What’s this about a knight in shining armor?” I asked.

Clarice made a strangled sound, shoved in front of me to reach a jar of paprika, and simultaneously planted a very heavy foot on my own. Stomped, actually.

“Ow.” It came out more as an exhale than an actual word. And that’s when I realized the knight in shining armor bit was exactly the part I had been warned not to discuss. I scowled at Clarice. How am I supposed to understand the code all the time?

“And my trusty steed,” Gus said as he turned back to the chopping board, apparently oblivious to the female ESP bristling through the air. “This fine lady was in distress. Gonna need to special order some parts.”

“Parts?” I bleated.

“Had an incident with the Subaru,” Clarice mumbled.

“What? You should have called.” I grabbed her shoulder. “Are you okay?”

But she just glared hard at me and turned back to the stove and a burbling roux which she vigorously whisked into a velouté sauce.

And then even more understanding dawned. Tiny birds twittered in my brain. The diversionary ploy. She’d sacrificed her beloved station wagon — maybe not intentionally, but that appeared to be the end result.

“Details,” I demanded and lifted a stack of plates out of the cupboard.

“Slid off the driveway just before the gate,” Clarice said. “It’s a sheet of ice out there.”

I squinched my eyes shut and pictured the private-property side of our motion sensor controlled gate. The few meters of driveway before the opening were lined with saplings and other medium-sized trees as a sort of natural barrier. I had a hunch there was nothing accidental about the sliding.

“Hit something else,” Gus added. “Had a chunk of metal and plastic stuck in her grill. Looked like a camera lens. With some wires attached.” He rinsed his hands at the sink, looked around for a dish towel and, not finding one, wiped his big paws on the edge of Clarice’s ruffled apron.

I was pretty sure her flush had to do with more than just the steam rising from the pot on the stovetop.

“You took out one of their posts.” I tried to hide my smirk. I knew it was there, of course, but I hadn’t actually seen it for all the leafy, needled greenness that a forest entails.

“Post? Nope. Definitely electronic equipment,” Gus said. “Although I do think there’s an old fence on your property line along the county road. Buried in the trees now. Maybe what Clarice collected was leftover from a previous gate contraption. Strange, though.” He chuckled, and his merry eyes had me thinking that he knew exactly what I was referring to.

“Tow truck dragged out more wires. They were all over the place. Destroying our natural beauty,” Clarice sniffed. “What were they thinking?”

“Coup d'état,” I whispered. “Seems it’s French immersion night.”

“What’s a coup?” Emmie asked from where she was folding paper napkins into airplanes to adorn the table service. She’s so quiet that sometimes I forget her ears don’t turn off.

“Just a little skirmish, sweetheart,” Gus answered, but he pitched a furry eyebrow at me. “If you need French, I might be able to help. Spent most of my Green Beret years in Southeast Asia. Know enough of the language to get into trouble and probably out of it, too.”

“Will wonders never cease?” I murmured.

“Not while out-of-towners spend the few pennies they have on basic canned goods at the general store.” Gus released a deep belly laugh and wiped the corners of his eyes. “Even though Etherea only encountered one, she figured there were a bunch of them and that they were out here. You’re certainly the nexus for our excitement these days.”

“What’s a nexus?” Emmie asked.

I pulled her in for a tight hug. “You. You’re my nexus.” I nuzzled her ear.

She giggled and squirmed out of my grasp.

“I’m sorry about your Subaru,” I said, straightening.

“’Bout time I blended in, looked like one of the locals,” Clarice grunted. “Needed dents for that.” But her wrinkled mouth was unsuccessfully pinching back a satisfied smile.

I also thought that there was no way on God’s green earth that Clarice was going to let Loretta have all the fun. She’d cashed in her rain check for a Harley ride with Gus. It was the only way I could account for their combined presence in the kitchen if the Subaru was incapacitated.

I also happened to know that Clarice had a thing for men in uniform. I didn’t know if the current coveralls complete with name patch counted in Gus’s favor, but his previous tours in camouflage sure did. And now she was on the verge of actually feeding a multi-lingual veteran in her very own kitchen, and she’d put an FBI surveillance post out of commission. I’d call that a productive day.

oOo

Gus held a position of honor. He was the first outsider we allowed into the basement. Our sacrosanct refuge of dubious dealings — hidden money and hidden people. Of course, we didn’t show him the money. We trooped straight to the infirmary with trays laden with the yummy creamy chicken and pasta dish Clarice had prepared.

The food put everyone at ease. From the way our refugees devoured their portions and requested seconds, it was clear they hadn’t eaten anything that didn’t come straight out of a can or box in a very long time, and that they hadn’t eaten sufficiently in even longer.

And then the conversation flowed — a clunky conglomeration of English, French and Laotian that put my head on a swivel. It was like watching a ping pong match with twenty balls in the air.

Very quickly, it became apparent that Emmie shouldn’t be present for even the snips of English that were cropping up. She was far too astute, and she’d be able to put enough together that she’d ask difficult questions later. Clarice and I engaged in a set of rapid eyes-only communiqués over her head, then Clarice led her off for another early bath and bedtime.

Poor kid. She was probably the cleanest little girl in the state for the number of times lately that she’d been removed from scenes to spare her innocence. Good thing she liked to read under the covers. I didn’t want her to think it was a punishment.

The two Laotian children in our group had lived through much of what was being discussed, and they nestled quietly against the oldest woman, their eyes drooping sleepily.

Gus translated for me, murmuring softly near my ear so as not to interrupt the rapid exchange. Each refugee had opinions, input, details to share, but Chet was clearly their leader, and he worked hard to synthesize and lay out a sequence of events for me.