Buried in Bargains (Good Buy Girls) (19 page)

“Yes, why?” Janice asked. “Maggie, are you all right? You don’t look so good.”

“Was he wearing a camel-colored overcoat?” Maggie asked.

“Yes, yes, he was,” she said.

“Janice, I need this picture,” Maggie said. “It’s imperative.”

“I don’t understand,” Janice said.

“I think this picture will lead us to Leann Winthrop’s killer,” Maggie said.

Janice blinked at her and took the frame from her hands. She managed to loosen the back of the frame with just her fingernails and took the picture out.

“You’ll explain this to me later?” she asked as she handed the photo to Maggie.

“I promise.”

Maggie took the photo and carefully put it in her purse. She glanced at her phone to check the time. With any luck, Sam would still be at the station talking to PI Joel.

“Thanks, Janice,” she called as she dashed out the door and into the street.

She’d recognized the photo in her purse, not because the model was famous, but because it had been shown to her before. Blake Caulfield, on the day she had met him, had shown her the picture of his fiancée, a picture he’d kept in his wallet.

Except now Maggie knew that she wasn’t his fiancée. She was just a picture he’d taken out of a frame to pretend he had a fiancée. The question was why? But then it was obvious, wasn’t it? Having a photo that he showed around as his fiancée made him look innocent of his real intent, didn’t it?

Maggie fumbled with her phone. She needed to call Laura and tell her to stay away from Blake until they knew what was going on. Several people called greetings to her as she ran toward the station and used her phone at the same time. Laura didn’t answer, so Maggie paused and sent her a quick text. She didn’t want to write anything that Blake might read while he was with her, so she kept it simple.

Need to talk to you about Sam. Call me as soon as you get this.

Maggie knew that the message would be irresistible to Laura and yet would give nothing away.

She hurried into the station to see that Deputy Wilson was back and working the front counter.

“Hello, Maggie.” Dot greeted her with a warm smile, which quickly faded as she took in Maggie’s face. “What’s wrong?”

“I need to speak to Sam,” Maggie said. “I think I know who murdered Leann Winthrop.”

Chapter 24

Dot moved with a swiftness that belied her stocky build. She snapped up the counter that led to the back offices and gestured for Maggie to come through.

Maggie followed Dot into the back. Dot paused to rap on a closed wooden door.

“Sheriff, Maggie is here to see you,” Dot said.

“Come in,” Sam said without any hesitation.

Dot pushed open the door, and they saw Sam and Joel. Both men were standing, examining several crime-scene pictures that were spread across the top of the desk. Maggie didn’t look. She’d seen it live and really didn’t want to relive the grisly memory.

“What is it, Maggie?” Sam asked. His eyes narrowed as he took in her expression, and Maggie wondered if she looked as shell-shocked as she felt.

She fished in her purse for the picture she’d found at the stationery store. She took it out of her bag with shaking fingers and handed it to Sam. He glanced at the small, wallet-size photo and then at her, clearly not understanding the relevance, but how could he have?

“This picture came from a frame in Janice’s shop,” Maggie said. “I recognized it because Blake Caulfield showed me the same photo a few weeks ago and told me it was his fiancée, but obviously she’s not. It was just a stock picture from a frame he’d bought at Janice’s. She remembered him. So, his whole story about a fiancée is a lie. But why would he lie unless he has something to hide, like the fact that he is Leann’s stalker and murderer?”

“Isn’t Caulfield the guy Laura has been spending so much time with?” Sam asked.

Maggie nodded. She could feel the panic thumping through her. She checked her phone, but there had been no incoming messages or calls. Why hadn’t Laura returned her text?

“Maggie, I know it looks bad, but there could be another explanation,” Sam said. “What do we know about Blake?”

“He bought the Anne Barge dress that’s in the window of my shop,” she said. “He told me it was for his fiancée, but then he returned it, saying she’d broken things off with him.”

“When, Maggie? When did he return it?” Sam asked. His voice took on an intensity that made Maggie’s skin prickle.

“I don’t know. . . . Wait.” She tried to picture when it had happened, and her stomach dropped to her feet. It was hard to speak around her throat, which had suddenly gone dry. “I was in the hospital with Joanne when Laura called to tell me he had returned it. It was after Leann’s murder.”

Sam reached out to her as if he thought she might faint. Maggie looked at him, and she knew her terror was in her voice when she said, “I texted Laura, but she hasn’t answered.”

“How did he pay for the gown?” Joel asked. “If it was a credit card transaction, we could try to trace him that way.”

“It was cash,” Maggie said. She felt woozy. “He even made a joke about how he hadn’t planned to blow his whole shopping budget on one gift. Oh, god, I thought he was being romantic.”

“What did Laura tell you the last time you spoke with her?” Sam asked.

Maggie started to pace. What had Laura said exactly?

“It was when she was leaving the reception,” Maggie said. “She said she was going for coffee with friends.”

“That could include Max and Bianca or Aaron, right?” Sam asked. He pulled out his phone. “I’ll call Max.”

“Yes, she definitely said
friends
plural,” Maggie said. She took out her phone, too, and called Bianca.

Both Joel and Dot stood quietly watching them as Maggie and Sam talked.

“Max, it’s Sam. Have you seen Laura?” Sam asked.

“Bianca, it’s Maggie. Is Laura with you?” Maggie said a second later. She was trying to listen to Sam’s conversation and have her own at the same time.

“No,” Bianca answered. “We were at the Daily Grind together, but she and Blake left a while ago.”

“Where did they go?” Maggie asked.

“When did they leave?” Sam asked.

“A half an hour ago, maybe more,” Bianca said. “Maggie, you sound funny. Is everything okay?”

Maggie glanced at Sam. She didn’t know how much to say, so she listened as he said, “If you see or hear from Laura, tell her to get in touch immediately. And if you see or hear from Blake Caulfield, let me know. It’s important. No, I can’t go into the details right now.”

Maggie repeated what Sam said and then ended her call. She looked at Sam, and asked, “Now what?”

“Now we find Laura,” he said. “Does she have your car? What does Caulfield’s car look like?”

“My car is at my shop,” Maggie said. “I only saw Blake’s car once, at night, when he picked Laura up to go see a band at the Daily Grind. It was a generic silver sedan.”

“Does Laura have a GPS app on her phone?” Joel asked.

“Not that I know of,” Maggie said. “But I don’t know half of what she has on there. Why?”

“That would be the easiest way to track her,” Joel said. “Give me all the info you know about her phone, and I’ll see what I can do.”

While Joel turned his attention to Sam’s computer, Dot and Maggie each began calling around town to anyone who might have seen Laura. Maggie started with Sandy and Jake in case Laura had gone home. She hadn’t. Sandy and Jake packed Josh into his car seat and went looking for her. Then she called the Good Buy Girls. No one had seen her. Ginger put Roger and her boys on high alert, and Roger and Aaron went out looking for her. Claire let everyone at the library know to be on the lookout, and Joanne started calling around to the stores that Laura was known to frequent to see if she was shopping for gifts.

Sam radioed all of the deputies who were on duty and let them know to be on the lookout for Laura, and then he called in all of the deputies who were off duty and told them to pick up cars at the station and start searching.

Joel worked away on Sam’s office computer to see if he could track her through the cell phone information Maggie had just given him.

As Maggie ended her call with Joanne, she tried to find comfort in the flurry of activity around her, but the reality was that Laura was a type-A personality. She got top marks in school, she was never late, she always said please and thank you and she always answered her phone, especially if it was Maggie calling.

Down in the deepest part of herself, Maggie knew that Laura was in trouble. She could feel her insides fracturing from the weight of the terror that was crushing her, but she knew she couldn’t give in to it. She had to stay strong; she had to think; she had to find her daughter.

As everyone finished their calls, only the clicking of the computer keys under Joel’s fingers broke the silence of the room.

“How’s it going, Joel?” Sam asked.

“It’ll take time,” he said. “I’m going to use the SS7 public switched network routes to try to pinpoint the location of her cell phone number. It includes the home location register, which cellular networks use to determine phone location.”

“In English?” Sam asked.

“I’m piggybacking onto other networks and searching for her,” he said.

“How do you have access to this information?” Sam asked. “Never mind. I’m not sure I want to know.”

Joel gave him a shifty glance. “Let’s just leave it at ‘I’m a computer geek.’”

“If you ever have a hankering to be a deputy in Virginia . . .” Sam began, and Joel interrupted, “I’ll let you know.”

The sound of voices came from the lobby, and Dot ducked out to see what was happening.

“Maggie,” her voice said over the intercom a moment later, “you’ve got people here.”

Maggie hurried out to the front. Claire and Ginger stood there, looking wide-eyed and worried. Maggie went right into their arms. What little strength she had in reserve was slipping away from her like sand through an hourglass with every minute that Laura was unaccounted for.

“Any sign of her yet?” Claire asked.

“None,” Maggie said.

Sam stepped out of his office, shrugging on his jacket as he went.

“I’m going out to look for her,” he said. “I want you to stay here.”

“No!” Maggie protested. “I have to go, too. I have to try to find her.”

“I can’t let you do that,” Sam said.

“I’m sorry, but I don’t think you have a heck of a lot to say about it,” Maggie said. All of her fear was rapidly boiling into misdirected rage. This was her daughter, and she would do whatever it took to find her.

“I got it!” Joel hurried into the main part of the station with a printout in his hand. “Her phone is showing a location off River Road. It looks like an industrial building.”

“The abandoned wire factory,” Sam and Maggie said together.

Maggie made for the door, but Sam grabbed her elbow.

“Let me go!” she snapped as she tried to jerk free.

“Maggie, no!” Sam’s voice was fierce. “You can’t go.”

“She’s my baby, Sam,” she protested.

“And if you go barging in there, you’ll likely get her killed,” he said.

Maggie stilled. That was the last thing she wanted. Sam cupped her face and forced her to meet his gaze.

“This is my job. This is what I do,” he said. “I’ll get Laura for you, but you have to stay here . . . because I love you, Maggie, and I can’t do my job if I’m worried about you.”

His blue eyes were steady, and Maggie felt her breath catch.

She took a deep breath. Laura was the most precious thing in the world to her, and she knew if anyone was going to be able to get her home safely, it was Sam. Still, she felt it was the biggest leap of faith she’d ever taken when she said, “Go get our girl.”

Sam gave her a swift kiss and strode out the door, calling to Joel after him, “Come on.”

“Mind the phones for me,” Dot called as she followed them out.

The station was alarmingly quiet after their departure, and Maggie shivered. She was cold all the way to her bones, and she knew it wasn’t from the temperature in the toasty-warm building. She started to straighten the flyers on the bulletin board.

It was a haphazard collection of notices about everything from the curfew ordinance for teens to picking up after your dog. Each flyer was layered over another, rendering the entire board useless.

She began pulling flyers off and soon Ginger and Claire joined her. In minutes the entire bulletin board had been denuded. Maggie stared at the plain brown board. Her insides felt equally as barren.

There was a crackle and squawk on the radio as the other deputies radioed in that they were on their way. It made her jump, and she noticed that Claire and Ginger were equally tense.

She wanted to yell and scream and rip at her hair, but she knew that if she lost it, she might never regain control, so instead, she sifted through the flyers, sorting out the older ones, which had been superseded by newer ones.

Wordlessly, Claire gathered all of the thumbtacks while Ginger continued with the sorting. As Ginger handed her each notice, Maggie took thumbtacks from Claire and fastened the papers so that each was visible by pushing the thumbtacks into the corkboard. Feeling the points stab into the board was satisfying, and the repetitive busywork kept her from having a complete mental collapse. All too soon the board was done, the older papers recycled and the station house quiet.

When the phone rang, the three of them started, and Maggie swallowed hard. This could be very good or very bad. Either way, she had to know.

She snatched up the receiver and said, “Sam.”

“I’ve got her, and she’s fine,” he said.

A sob of relief gushed out of Maggie in a guttural noise that made both Claire and Ginger step forward as if to brace her.

“Thank you, Sam.” Maggie was full-on crying now, and she looked at the others, and said, “She’s okay.”

Ginger and Claire let out whoops of joy and hugged each other.

“Mom.” A voice came on the phone, and Maggie pressed it close to her ear.

“Hi, baby,” she said. “Are you all right?”

“Well, I’m here,” Laura said. Her voice was shaky. “And up until fifteen minutes ago, I wasn’t sure I would be, so, yeah, I’m good.”

“Oh, honey,” Maggie said. She wanted to hug her daughter so badly she ached with the need.

“It was Blake, Mom,” Laura said. Her voice cracked, and Maggie could tell she was sobbing.

“I know, baby,” Maggie said. “But it’s all right. He can’t hurt you now.”

“I love you, Mom,” Laura said.

“I love you, too,” Maggie said.

She heard a low voice in the background, and Laura said, “Sam wants the EMTs to look me over.”

“That’s probably a good idea.”

“I’ll see you in a little bit.”

“I’ll be here.”

Maggie closed her eyes, trying to regroup as a riot of emotions coursed through her, leaving her insides as wrecked as if they’d been caught in the path of a hurricane.

“Maggie, listen.” Sam was back on the phone now. “We didn’t find Blake. I don’t know if he heard us coming and split or what.”

“Oh no,” Maggie said. “You don’t think he’ll come after Laura again, do you?”

“I don’t know. For now I’m keeping her with me, and I’m sending an extra deputy over to the Claramottas,” he said.

“Are they—?” Maggie began, but Sam interrupted.

“They’re fine, but I want to be cautious until we apprehend Caulfield. He may be afraid that Michael will remember him and try to get rid of him. We’re going to have to be very careful. Speaking of which, I want you to stay at the station.”