Sense of Rumor (Mount Faith Series: Book 6) (19 page)

She stood in front of the painting for so long that Arnella left her to it and looked around. They were going to have a live band. The band was setting up and doing mike tests. The piano player was already playing some tunes and Arnella bopped her head to his selections.

Maria turned to her. "You are going to be famous."

Arnella nodded. "I don't want fame, just the opportunity to paint, and be happy, and to be loved, and to love, and to..."

"Marry Alric and have his children and to go to heaven with Alric and said children." Alric said behind her.

Arnella looked around and gasped.

Maria smiled. "Sounds like a plan. I have everything covered here. You can go have fun until the auction."

Alric nodded and grinned down at Arnella and then looked at the painting. "I knew it."

"You knew what?"

"I knew that you were creative and passionate and troubled. I hear that is what makes the best paintings. This is gorgeous. And you used oil, like the old masters."

He hugged her tightly. "I picked winners, both girl and painting, and didn't even know it."

Arnella hugged him back. "I hope it gets a good price at your auction."

Alric grinned. "I can't wait to see how this will go. By the way, you look simply beautiful."

"You do too." Arnella said drinking him in with her eyes. "You clean up pretty well."

Alric grinned. Before he could respond, a group of persons, led by Maria, gathered around the painting and swamped Arnella with questions about it.

*****

The party started promptly at seven. There was dinner at eight, and the auction began at nine. Alric had secured her a seat with him at dinner. Arnella bumped into her Aunt Celeste and Uncle Ryan.

Celeste gave her a big hug. "I saw your painting. You need to do something for me. I can't have a niece with this much talent and not have an early piece at home."

Arnella grinned. "Yes ma'am."

Her uncle squeezed her affectionately. "I am proud of you."

"Thanks, Uncle Ryan." She kissed him on the cheek. They didn't chitchat for long because he was in demand.

She looked around for Alric and saw him standing in a corner with Tracy, a heavily made up, beautiful Tracy in a flattering peach dress. She was standing with her father.

Arnella dithered about going over. She looked away from them and her eyes met Natasha's. She waved. Natasha walked over to her. "You look lovely." She hugged Arnella. "I love your painting. I can't bid. Even if I could, I would be outbidded. I hear rich people talking about it. They are really excited."

Arnella laughed. "So, why are you here? If not to auction."

"Because Taj is here," Natasha said. "He got tickets to it. He thought I should play dress up for an evening. We rarely have any social events to go to up here in the hills."

Arnella nodded, "That's true."

"So, that's Miss Tracy Carr? Dressed to the nines, huh." Natasha said nodding in Tracy's direction.

"Yes," Arnella said, "and the big bulldog man beside her is her doting papa."

"Let us go and say hi," Natasha said putting on her detective face.

"No," Arnella said vigorously. "You are not here to work but to party."

"You are right," Natasha said regretfully, "but I would just love to see how Tracy behaves when she is around her Dad, and Alric. She is a tough cookie you know. I got a hint of that the other day when I called her."

"Okay let's go over," Arnella sighed. "But be warned, Mr. Carr hates me."

"Mr. Carr looks like he has a chip on those broad beefy shoulders," Natasha said walking with Arnella over to the group.

"Hello," Natasha said brightly, "Mr. Carr, Tracy."

"Hello," Mr. Carr looked at Arnella and twisted his lips. He looked back at Natasha, putting on a social smile. "I didn't get your name."

"Natasha Rowe," Natasha said brightly, "I am a student here and part time detective, working with the police force."

Mr. Carr looked at Tracy uncomfortably. "That's interesting."

"And of course, here is my girlfriend, Arnella," Alric said, taking her hands and dragging her to his side.

Mr. Carr sniffed. "I know her."

"Yes he does," Arnella said, grinning. "The last time I was at his house he cussed me to high heaven."

Tracy flicked a hunk of hair over her shoulders. "That's because you deserved it."

Arnella nodded. "I see."

"Well, it was nice meeting you Alric." Mr. Carr shook his hand and walked away. Tracy walked behind him, looking back at Arnella with venom in her gaze, and then at Alric longingly.

Natasha was shaking with laughter. "What on earth did you do to that man that was so bad, Arnella? He is treating you as if you have leprosy."

Arnella shrugged. "Who knows what his darling Tracy told him about me. Boy, was I duped into believing that she was my friend."

*****

The dinner was a lively affair. Alric had placed them around a table with some of his fellow medical students and two prominent surgeons who were hilarious and down to earth. Arnella was enjoying their company even though she had initially thought that she would have been bored to death and would have a terrible time.

After dinner, the auction began and the auctioneer read out the items that were up for bidding. She had told Alric not to reveal her name to the crowd; she wanted her work to speak for itself, and so when the auctioneer said, "A painting by AB," she smiled wildly.

Alric squeezed her hand. The bidding began with the tickets for the Olympics. The bidding was intense and was "Spurred on by the wives," Alric said to her gleefully.

She was enjoying the back and forth as persons raised their paddles and quoted increasingly huge sums. She was tickled pink when her Uncle was bidded on for over a hundred thousand dollars. He had straightened his tie, and was looking uncomfortable as more and more sums piled up for him. Finally, one portly old lady got him for $150,000.

Arnella chuckled. When her uncle saw who it was, he looked as if he had bitten a lemon. Her Aunt Celeste was looking very pleased.

When it was time for her painting, the auctioneer had it brought onto the stage and the bidding began in earnest.

"Let's start the bidding at $50, 000," the auctioneer said. Quickly it was driven up to $150,000 then $300, 000. Then there was an outright war between two bidders.

"I can't believe this," Alric said, whispering to Arnella fiercely, who had her eyes firmly fixed on the floor. She couldn't look. "Tracy's father is bidding like mad on your painting."

Arnella turned around swiftly and realized that he indeed was, along with an older gentleman with a white moustache. The older gentleman finally won at $400,000.

Arnella was shell-shocked. Her painting sold for $400, 000! She kept pinching her hand to feel if she was dreaming. It was obvious that Mr. Carr hadn't known that the painting was hers.

She felt lightheaded and readily got up with Alric to dance to the socially conscious song "Wake Up Everybody" by Teddy Prendergass.

She twirled and swung on the dance floor, laughing at Alric's dance moves. In mid laugh, she looked over her shoulder to see a scowling Mr. Carr talking to a smiling Natasha. She touched Alric's hand. "I bet Natasha just told him that he had bidded on my painting." Alric laughed.

"I think tonight is ranking right up there with my best moments in life," Arnella said brightly.

Chapter Sixteen

Natasha handed in her final assignment at the Forensic lab and was heading out of the building, a light feeling to her steps. She had accomplished one of her three major tasks. She went over the checklist in her head:
Master’s project—check, Arnella's sex video mystery—to solve, get married to the love of my life—definitely can't wait to check.

She hadn't called Miles for the past three days. She dialed his number, crossing her fingers mentally and hoping that he would have good news for her.

"Yo, Tasha. What's up?" Miles answered.

"You know what I am calling for," Natasha said. "Please, please tell me you have the address."

"I do," Miles said.

"Yes," Natasha squealed. She stopped at her car.

"Who is it?"

"The person who signed up for the account is first name, Easter. Last name Bunny."

"You have got to be kidding me." Natasha ran her hand through her hair frustratedly.

"Address: 115 North Never Never Land," Miles continued, "age 85."

"No." Natasha sighed. "They used a bogus name and address to sign up for the account."

"Yup, that's what people do when they don't want to be found." Miles laughed. "However, based on the IP address that the mail was sent from, the general area where the email was sent from is Santa Cruz, Jamaica."

"Oh no." Natasha groaned. "I waited all this time for this. Santa Cruz, Jamaica has over two hundred thousand people living there. The party was there. It could be anybody."

"Don't worry about it," Miles said. "The person sent a message on the second week in November from their telephone."

"What does that mean?" Natasha asked.

"It means that the meta data that is stored on the phone contains information on which cell phone towers were used. I took the liberty of calling the cell phone provider of the phone, and they deduced that the cell phone tower closest to where the mail was sent is at Cherry Hill."

"But that's exactly where the party was." Natasha groaned.

"Well that's where the culprit is," Miles said.

"Thanks, Miles," Natasha said, "I owe you one."

"Dinner?" Miles asked smoothly.

"I am getting married in a week." Natasha laughed. "Sorry, no dinner."

"Bomber," Miles said goodnaturedly. "All the best with your marriage. He's not a fellow officer is he?"

"No," Natasha said, "and Thanks."

She hung up the phone and pondered her options. The person who sent the video lived in Cherry Hill. She could have bet her bottom dollar that it had been Tracy. She had wanted it to be Tracy. She had thought the girl obnoxious and snide, especially after that last phone call when she had snarkily cut her off.

She had wanted to charge her with being an accessory to a crime and watch the fear leech into her eyes. Now, she was back to square one. She called Tony Beaker to see if he was available for a ride to Cherry Hill. She would just have to go to the Carr's house and bluff her way through.

*****

When Natasha and Tony reached the Carr's, darkness had just fallen. They had had to wait almost three hours to get a search warrant for the computers in the house and Natasha had to justify to the Assistant Supe why she would be doing such a thing to a prominent banker, but she remembered the way that Frederick Carr had sneered at Arnella.

The nearer they got to the house, the more she was convinced that he might have found the video and hated her enough to be tormenting her with it.

The house was located at the top of a hill overlooking the town. There was an automatic gate, and she pressed the buzzer.

"Who is it?" a disembodied voice asked.

"Natasha Rowe and Tony Beaker from Mount Faith. We have a search warrant for the computers, and computer and video related technology belonging to Frederick Carr and Cathlyn Carr."

They waited four minutes before the gate swung open. "A livid Cathlyn Carr stood on the veranda.

"What is the meaning of this, officers?"

"A crime was committed here on your property, the rape and subsequent video taping of Arnella Bancroft." Natasha said, pushing her hand in her jeans. "We have evidence to believe that videos which the boys taped and threw away were sent from this house."

Cathlyn had her hands akimbo. "I can't let you search my husband’s laptop till he gets home. He didn't carry it to work today. He is a banker. You can always search mine."

Natasha shook her head. "We can't wait on him to get here, so you'd better alert him that we are here."

Cathlyn shrugged. "Sure. I am sure you are barking up the wrong tree. How is Arnella? I remembered thinking that something was definitely off with her that morning."

"She's doing great," Natasha said. "The boys confessed their misdeeds on video and are set for trial in the new year."

"Good," Cathlyn said feelingly. "I am happy that she is getting justice. I am really sorry that it happened here too."

Natasha looked at Tony. She did not seem like the kind of person to mess with Arnella, but they still had to check. She handed them her laptop and her husband's.

"Are these all the computers in the house?" Natasha asked.

"Yes," Cathlyn said. "That's it. When can I get it back, I have a presentation on it that should be delivered three days from now?"

"Tomorrow morning at the Malvern station," Natasha said, "provided that there is no evidence related to the case."