Miss Frost Solves A Cold Case: A Nocturne Falls Mystery (Jayne Frost Book 1) (22 page)

His eyes narrowed. “What does that mean?”

I shrugged and played it off. “It’s just an elven expression.”

“You understand this could cost me my job.” His voice held an edge of seriousness I hadn’t heard from him before.

“I do understand. That’s the last thing I want. I promise, not a word to anyone.”

He pulled his hand back. The doors closed and the car started down.

I had no idea what to expect when the doors opened again, but it certainly wasn’t what lay before me.

Greyson held his hand out for me to exit first. “Welcome to the Basement.”

“Is that the official name for this place?”

“Yes. But you shouldn’t know that.”

“Got it.” I stepped out into an alcove off of a clean, well-lit hallway that was the breadth of an average street. Small signs on the walls marked directions, and lines on the floor divided the space into two throughways. “Looks like a road.”

“It is. Sometimes.”

The alcove we were in was darker, but not too much. Two doors flanked either side of the elevator, both with keypads keeping them off-limits. “What’s in those rooms?”

He shrugged. “Above both our paygrades, but probably just storage.” He lifted his brows. “You smell what I smell?”

I inhaled. There was a faint chlorine smell, but definitely nothing remotely like sewer. And more distinctively, Owen’s cologne. “The same aftershave. Owen was down here. But he’s not now. Is that why you brought me down here?”

“Essentially. I thought it would put an end to all the questions if you realized there wasn’t anything to see.”

I looked around, but there was no way to know where he’d gone or what he was doing down here. “He could have gone down one of the halls.”

“He didn’t. The scent ends here. I think he came down, looked around and went back up.”

“Same as I did.”

Greyson nodded. “You elves are a curious lot.”

I guess we were. And Owen’s curiosity definitely fell in line with my theory about the town making the elves disappear because they’d snooped. Didn’t bode well for Owen.

Or me.
Snowballs
. “Are you going to say anything to anyone about him being here?”

“Not about you or him. For all I know, he could have been brought here by one of the Ellinghams. He might even be secretly working for the town. You never know about things like that in Nocturne Falls.”

Which brought me back to my father’s original theory that someone might be poaching workers. And in this case, that someone had to be the Ellinghams. “Understood. And look, I don’t want you getting into any trouble for this. I truly don’t. I know it was a risk for you, and I really appreciate you doing that for me.”

He gave a little nod. “I trust you, Lilibeth.”

Which made me feel lousy for not telling him the truth about who I was, but I couldn’t waste too much time on that feeling. Not while I was finally getting somewhere on this case.

My first impression of the Basement was a little anti-climactic, but at least my curiosity had been satisfied. Sewer and electric. Hah. Wait until I told my father about this. Except, technically, I couldn’t because I’d promised Greyson I wouldn’t say a word to anyone. “Why is it called the Basement? That sounds so official.”

“It’s just what the place is called.”

“But why would town employees need to come down here?”

“I can’t answer that.”

I sensed I might be wearing out my welcome but I couldn’t stop myself. Not yet. “You know, Owen had a date the other night. I wonder if that date was with someone who works for the town. Maybe that’s who brought him down here. Is there anywhere in this Basement you’d take a date to impress them?”

Greyson tilted his head as though that question answered itself. “As all town employees sign an NDA, I’d have to say absolutely not. I doubt anyone would risk their job to impress a date.”

“Oh right, the non-disclosure agreement. Well, it was worth a shot.” I started toward the end of the alcove so I could look down the hall in both directions and get an idea of what else went on down here.

Greyson’s hand on my arm stopped me. “This is the end of the tour, sorry, my lovely. I know you’d like to spend the rest of the evening down here snooping around, but—”

“Hey, I don’t snoop.” Oh, I totally snooped. “I investigate.”

“Whatever you call it, it’s over.” He stepped to the side and gestured back toward the elevator. “Please.”

I walked on without another word. He’d been more than generous to bring me down here. I didn’t want to give him reason to never do it again. Or to be cross with me.

We rode up and kissed good night one more time in the vestibule, then I went to my apartment.

As I changed into my pajamas, I thought about what to tell my father. If the Ellinghams were behind this, what would that mean for the store? Most likely, the end. My dad and uncle Kris would shut it down.

Or worse, the Ellinghams might retaliate for being called on their poaching and kick the company out of Nocturne Falls. (And if they were in the process of poaching Owen, what on earth did they want him for?) If they could take the building away from the company because someone there messed with the elevator, they would definitely take it away if they found out I’d been down here. And how else would I explain what I’d found out?

Neither outcome was good. And both resulted in no more Santa’s Workshop, which meant Juniper and Buttercup would be out of jobs. Sure, Toly and Owen, too, but I’d feel the worst about the women. They were friends. I had so few of those, I wanted to protect them. Even if they decided they were done with me after my true identity came out.

I sat on the bed, trying to sort things. Spider jumped up beside me. I scratched under his chin. I couldn’t tell my dad yet. Not until I had proof. Otherwise, I might be starting something that didn’t need to be started.

Once again, I had more questions than answers. So I did the only thing I could. I went back to the employee files, searching for something I’d missed.

First, I grabbed a Dr Pepper. Then I fished the fluffy catnip ball out of my evening bag and tossed it to Spider. He leaped on it with great enthusiasm, flinging it into the air and then picking it up and tearing around the house with it. “Your uncle Greyson will be so happy to know you liked his gift.”

While Spider got further looped on nip, I spread the files on the coffee table and studied them in the hopes that a missed detail would pop out.

Ten minutes into my fruitless efforts, Spider skittered across the coffee table and sent everything flying in a snowstorm of paperwork.

“Dude!” At least the cap was on my soda. Papers floated down around me as I bent to pick up the mess. “Crazy animal.”

Everything was out of order. I scooped the whole lot into a pile and sat on the couch to sort it. The first three sheets were resignation letters from the employees. I started to put them into the files where they belonged, then stopped.

I flipped through them, looking closer. Was this the small detail I’d missed? I found the other three and compared them. These were just copies, and not great ones, but I knew Toly still had all the originals.

Copying the letters had caused a watermark on the paper to show up due to the higher contrast. I hadn’t noticed it on the ones I’d seen in Toly’s office, but now I could pick out a faint triple A mark on the lower corner.

Of every letter.

How was it possible that they’d all been written on the same brand of paper? Was it company issued? Was it the brand used in the store? That could be. Or was it the brand of paper the Ellinghams used?

I held one of the letters up to the light. Two watermarks became visible. One that had shown up because of being copied and the real one that was in the paper itself. One overlapped the other due to the copied letter being not quite straight when it had been on the machine. In Toly’s office. He’d made these copies.

What were the chances that each employee had just happened to write their resignation letter on the same brand of paper Toly used in his copier?

I was guessing pretty slim. Time for more snooping.

I changed out of my pajamas and into my ninja burglar outfit, grabbed my phone, and went back downstairs. There was no hesitation in me as I slipped beneath Toly’s office door. I stood, eyes closed for a moment to let the dizziness subside, then I brought my phone to life and navigated to the filing cabinet.

I repeated my ice pick trick and pulled the second drawer open. There, in the back half, were the past employee files. I pulled all six out and studied the letters one by one. The ink colors were different, the handwriting was different, but even by the dim light of my phone, I could tell the paper was the same. Same feel, same watermark, same color.

How had none of us noticed this before? Well, Dad and I had seen only copies, so it wouldn’t have raised a red flag that the letters were all on the same paper since they’d all been run through the same copier. And whoever handled the resignation letters after they were found probably wouldn’t have noticed because the six letters had been spaced out over the course of two and a half years.

But it would help to have some confirmation. I looked around Toly’s office for his copier. Once I found it, I picked my way through the piles of stuff to open the supply tray and take out a sheet of paper.

Yep, same stuff.

So this was company issued. Had to be. Toly was a company man. Seemed logical that he’d use what was sent to him. There was no reason to go out and buy anything else.

But that didn’t explain why employees who had just up and decided never to work at the store another day in their lives had used this paper to write their departure letters on.

If I decided to do the same thing, where would I get paper? I’d use what I had, which was that spiral-bound notebook I’d bought at the Shop-n-Save. Had none of the other employees had a notebook or anything?

Let’s say that was the case. A huge long shot, but I was going with it. How had they ended up with the same paper? No way would they have broken into Toly’s office just to write an I’m-out-of-here note. But we all had keys to the store.

I straightened up in Toly’s office, folded the sheet of paper from the copier and stuck it in my hoodie pocket, then slipped back into the warehouse.

Once I was steady on my feet, I let myself into the store with my key. After working here, I pretty much knew where most of the supplies were kept. But I didn’t spend a lot of time behind the counter on the register. That had to be where the paper was.

The counter was a maze of cubbies and drawers. Using my phone for light again, I kneeled behind the counter and started searching. Besides the stacks of merchandise bags in three sizes, I found register tape, pricing guns and rolls of stickers, a box of rubber bands, an out-of-date phone book, gift card envelopes, a spiral-bound notebook with most of the pages ripped out, and the secret stash of candy.

There was also a small cardboard box marked Lost and Found. It contained a cell phone, several pairs of sunglasses, three pacifiers (ew), and a set of earbuds.

The drawers held scissors, tape, pens, markers, paperclips, a tin of breath mints, and a bunch of takeout menus. The normal flotsam and jetsam of retail life.

But none of the paper that was in Toly’s office.

I sat back on my heels. I hadn’t searched every inch of my apartment to see if there was some sort of stationery welcome pack, but I hadn’t run across anything in my day-to-day life. And if there had been, wouldn’t it be more of a simple notepad like you got in a hotel room? Chances were good I already knew the one and only place to get that paper.

Had the employees come to Toly first? Tried to work things out, maybe? A last-ditch effort to solve whatever was driving them to leave. That could explain how all of their letters were written on that paper. He’d have asked them to put something in writing, something to go in their file.

That was plausible.

But it didn’t erase the feeling that Toly was somehow responsible for this. I tipped my head back and sighed. Without proof, what did I have? Guesses and hunches and speculation. None of which got me any closer to my goal.

I went back upstairs and got into my pajamas again, but I was too wound up to sleep, so I fired up my laptop and did some digging. Spider was happy to settle in beside me on the couch. Maybe he needed to sleep off the nip.

There was nothing of note about Toly, just an old mention in the Tombstone, the local paper, about welcoming the new Santa’s Workshop manager. It didn’t surprise me. Most elves, but especially those in the North Pole, had zero online presence. Besides electronics only working sporadically in the NP, we just didn’t do social media.

I Googled the missing employees next. Same result. Nothing except for two more mentions in the Tombstone. The first was a photo from a charity function, and the other was about one of them, Franny Isler, participating in a fun run. No surprise there, considering I’d seen her, or a woman I thought was her, in the park out for a jog.

I stared at the screen, bathed in the blue glow, and thought about all the unanswered questions in my head. Didn’t take long for me to type in a new search request.