Murder in Plain Sight

“Did you look inside?” The longer they stood and talked, the longer he could put off the moment at which he’d have to go in.

Jonas inclined his head. “I took a look, ja. Thinking it might have been teenagers, tearing places up. It did not seem anything was disturbed, so I thought it best to let it be until you could see.”

He couldn’t delay any longer. “Let’s have a look, then.”

He strode toward the cabin. The hunting cabin, they’d always called it, although Dad had never had much taste for hunting. Trey and his brother had gone through a phase of wanting to bag a buck when they were in their teens, and Dad had gone along with them, more to see them safe, he supposed, than because Dad wanted to shoot anything.

Still, they’d come out here often enough, whenever Dad wanted to get away from the telephone and have a bit of quiet. They’d fish the stream, cook out over an open fire and go to sleep watching the stars.

Good memories, plenty of them. Unfortunately they didn’t seem to cancel out the one terrible one.

Jonas stood back to let him go up the steps first. Trey crossed to the door and bent to examine the padlock. It wasn’t obviously damaged. He put his hand on the rough wood panel of the door, blanked out his thoughts as best he could and opened it.

At first glance, nothing seemed wrong. His gaze touched the kitchen table and skittered away. Nausea rose in his throat. He wanted to leave. The need pushed at him, pounded in his temples.

He couldn’t. Jonas’s sense of responsibility had brought him here. Trey’s own sense of responsibility forced him to stay, even though he ought to be back at Leo Frost’s office right now, keeping tabs on Jessica’s activities.

The cabin wasn’t large—a big room downstairs, divided into kitchen and living area, three tiny bedrooms upstairs, the smallest not much bigger than a closet.

He moved cautiously around the living room area, feeling as if any sudden gesture would set loose the pain that clawed at him.

Jonas made his own circuit. He stopped at the massive fieldstone fireplace that took up much of the outside wall. He squatted. “Someone has had a fire here. The hearth was clean and empty the last time I looked.”

Trey looked for himself. Jonas was right. “So someone’s been here, but not the usual teenage party crowd. They’d make more of a mess than this.”

“Ja, they would. A tramp, you think? Chust looking for shelter?”

“Could be.” Trey frowned. That didn’t feel right. They didn’t have tramps any longer, and Lancaster’s homeless wouldn’t be likely to come clear out here to find a roof.

Jonas had moved on to the kitchen, and Trey forced himself to follow. The memories were out in the open now. His mother’s worries when Dad didn’t come home that night. His own conviction that Dad needed a little time alone to deal with the bad news the doctor had delivered. Cancer. Serious, but something that could be fought.

But Dad hadn’t chosen to fight. The man Trey had always thought the bravest person he knew had put a gun to his head instead of battling the cancer. It didn’t make sense to him. It never had. He’d spent months trying to find a way to make that fact fit, but he couldn’t. If there had been something else troubling his father—

Trey looked at the table. He’d come in the door cautiously that morning, calling his father’s name, embarrassed at intruding on what he’d thought was a spiritual retreat on his father’s part. And found him dead.

The table and floor had been scrubbed clean since then, the table moved to a slightly different position. Jonas must have done that—Trey had certainly been in no shape to think of having it done.

He cleared his throat. “You cleaned up in here, after. Thank you.”

Jonas looked embarrassed at being thanked. “Ach, it was little enough to do for him. Your father was a fine man. Everyone knows that.”

Trey could only nod. Yes, everyone had known that.

“Trey—” Jonas hesitated for a moment. “It seems to me that only God can know what was in your father’s mind and heart in the last moments of his life. Only God can judge.”

Endless comforting platitudes had been aimed at Trey when he’d been in no shape to listen to them. Now, oddly enough, he found comfort in Jonas’s simple words.

“Thank you.”

Jonas was already turning away, with the typical Amish reluctance to accept thanks or compliments. He moved to the sink and stopped. “Look at this.”

Trey looked. An empty wine bottle lay in the sink. A moderately expensive bottle, not the sort of thing he’d expect the local teenagers to favor.

“Someone has been here,” Jonas said again.

“Yes. But I doubt we’re going to know who. Or why.” Some married man, meeting with a girlfriend on the sly? The thought sickened him—that someone would use the place his father died for such a purpose.

He straightened abruptly, leaving the bottle untouched. “I’ll get a new padlock and drop it off at your place, if you don’t mind putting it on. That’s all we can do.”

Jonas nodded. “It makes no trouble. I will take care of the lock.”

Turning his back on the table, Trey headed for the door. Maybe the best thing would be to put the place on the market. He didn’t see the family wanting to spend time here ever again. Let someone else worry about break-ins.

He was nearly at the door when a shaft of sunlight from the side window picked up a pinpoint of light reflecting from the leg of a wooden straight chair. He bent, running his hand down the leg.

His fingers touched a rough spot, jagged enough to snag a piece of fabric. He pulled the fabric free and looked at it.

A tiny red scrap, maybe an inch long and not more than an eighth of an inch wide. Tiny red sequins glittered when he moved it in his fingers.

Nothing. It meant nothing. It was the sort of thing someone who liked cheap finery would have worn. An image of Cherry Wilson popped into his mind, and he pushed it away. This had nothing to do with her.

CHAPTER FIVE

“THANK YOU, MR. FROST.” Jessica held out her hand to the elderly attorney. “I really appreciate your sharing your expertise with me.” Her interview with Frost had been helpful, and he’d been cooperative. Because of the Morgan connection with the case? Maybe, but she still appreciated it.

Gray eyes twinkled behind wire-rimmed glasses. “For a small-town fuddy-duddy, you mean.”

Was her embarrassment showing? That had been exactly the impression she’d had when she’d entered an office that looked as if it hadn’t changed since the 1930s and met the white-haired, stooped gentleman who’d risen from his rolltop desk at her approach. It had only taken a few minutes of conversation to realize how wrong she was.

“You’re as up-to-date as I am, and you have years more experience, as well. I’m surprised you’re not defending Thomas yourself.” An unpleasant thought occurred to her. “Is it because you’re convinced he’s guilty?”

Frost shook his head. “Even if I did, I’d still think he deserved a fair trial, unlike some people I could name, such as our esteemed district attorney.”

He sent an annoyed glance toward the newspaper lying on the corner of his desk. She’d already seen it. It contained a front-page interview with the district attorney, who seemed, by the way he spoke, to have Thomas already convicted and on his way to the state penitentiary.

“Is he usually that—” she considered several words and eliminated them “—outspoken?”

“Preston Connelly is ambitious. A case like this has already drawn regional attention. He’ll make the most of it, I’m sure.”

“Does that mean it would hurt your practice if you took on the case?” That would be a very good reason for bringing in an outsider.

“No, I’m stepping aside on doctor’s orders.” Frost patted his chest. “The old ticker’s been acting up a bit. Oh, I’m fine for routine jobs, but I’m afraid a high-profile murder case is too much.”

“I’m sorry.” She wasn’t sure what else to say.

“Don’t look so mournful.” He chuckled. “I’m not going to drop dead yet, but I am in the midst of retiring. Still, if you need any help, you can come to me. Strictly in confidence. Henderson, Dawes and Henderson don’t have to know a thing about it.”

“Thanks. I just might take you up on that.” Somewhat to her surprise, she realized she meant it. It wasn’t in her nature to trust easily, but Leo Frost’s integrity seemed to shine through everything he said.