On Pins and Needles

“And you were a big hit there, too,” Megan guessed.

“I handed out every card and coupon I had with me and then started writing our office phone number and the ten-percent-off deal on bar napkins. And all the while I talked about the good acupuncture can do, too. I know it was unconventional but I really think I drummed up some business yesterday and last night.”

“Great.”

Nissa moved to the kitchen sink to set the tea ball in it to drain just as Megan said, “I had a pretty amazing night myself.”

“What in the world…”

Nissa wasn’t commenting on what Megan had said. Megan knew that her sister had just caught sight of the crime scene tape around the hole that stood between the house and the dilapidated barn out back. It was the opening Megan had been waiting for and she finally filled Nissa in on the events of the previous evening.

When she’d finished, she said, “Do you remember anything unusual about the time just before we left here? Anything that might help identify who the man was or what happened to him?”

Nissa shrugged and shook her head at once. “No. I remember the two of us crying because we didn’t want to go and not liking the idea of living on a bus, but that’s about all. It was a long time ago.”

“My point exactly! But Josh Brimley refuses to see that.”

“And he’s convinced Mom and Dad had some thing to do with whatever happened?” Nissa asked, referring to that portion of what Megan had told her.

“So convinced that if they were here now I think he’d have them locked up already,” Megan confirmed.

“That’s just crazy. They wouldn’t hurt anyone.”

“Also what I told him. His only answer was that it’s hard for people to believe the worst of their family.”

“That’s true, but still, Mom and Dad wouldn’t hurt a flea, let alone another human being.”

“Josh Brimley isn’t going to take your word any more than he took mine.”

“Did you put the call in to Peru?” Nissa asked as she came to sit at the table with Megan, in the same chair Josh Brimley had occupied the evening before.

The same chair Megan had spent too much time this morning staring at and picturing him in the night before. All handsome and muscular…

And suspicious. Don’t lose sight of that, she told herself.

“I called the number the folks gave us if we needed to reach them,” Megan said when she’d leashed her thoughts. “But there’s no telling how long it will take to get the message out to them and arrange long-distance ship-to-shore contact. The person I spoke to warned me that it could be days.”

“I don’t suppose the sheriff will be happy to hear that.”

“You can bet on it.” Of course he had shown a little pleasure in certain things the previous evening, but none of them had had to do with being denied his requests or a delay in doing his bidding.

“Had you done his acupuncture before all this happened?” Nissa asked then.

“No, he was in the process of telling me that he thought it was hocus-pocus or voodoo or some thing.”

“Ah, he’s one of those.”

“It didn’t bother me at first. I thought he was just being honest about his skepticism, and that I’d win him over. But later… Well, he made me mad with his barely veiled accusations of Mom and Dad, and I changed my mind.”

Nissa laughed. “It bothered you belatedly?”

“Some thing like that. But by then everything about him bothered me.”

“Oh?” There was a lilt in her sister’s tone that made Nissa seem more interested in that than in anything else they’d been talking about. “What else about him bothered you?”

“His tunnel-vision. His close-mind ed ness. The fact that he has a basketful of preconceived notions about me and acupuncture and our whole family—including that Mom and Dad could be murderers, of all things. He’s definitely what I swore to myself I’d never get involved with again after Noel, that’s for sure.”

“Were we talking about you getting involved with him?”

“No, I’m just saying—”

“But obviously the thought occurred to you.”

Her sister knew her too well and Megan realized there was no sense in denying that the vague thought of some fleeting kind of involvement with Josh Brimley had flitted through her mind.

“Okay, maybe, just in passing,” she conceded. “He’s a great big, good-looking guy. It would have occurred to anyone.”

“So you were attracted to him.”

“I wouldn’t say attracted, no. I just did some objective observation.”

“And came to the conclusion that he was a great big, good-looking guy,” Nissa repeated, teasing her now.

“That’s not a conclusion I needed to come to. It’s an empirical fact.”

“An empirical fact that you took note of.”

“Do you want to talk about the problems this man is determined to cause us or about his appearance?”

“Maybe you could flirt us out of problems with him,” Nissa joked.

“You definitely don’t know Josh Brimley.” Although there had been some flirting going on in the under currents.

Or had she only imagined it? Maybe at the same time she’d been imagining him kissing her…

“This is serious, Nissa,” Megan claimed as if her own mind hadn’t just wandered from the weightiness of the situation. “I don’t think it’s a good idea to take it lightly.”

Nissa shrugged again. “No matter how we take it, what can we do about it? I assume this Josh Brimley is going to investigate and find out what really happened all those years ago and who did it.”

“But will he find out the truth if he doesn’t look at any scenario that doesn’t put the blame on Mom and Dad? Because as it stands now, he seems to believe that our leaving Elk Creek was a sign of their guilt, that they were running away.”

“I have to think that the truth will out,” Nissa said, honestly sounding un concerned as she took her cup and headed for the shower.

But Megan couldn’t be so confident. She didn’t for a minute doubt her parents’ innocence. But she did doubt that Josh Brimley would explore other possibilities since he’d seemed to have his heels dug into suspecting them.

So what was she going to do about it? she asked herself.

But she didn’t have an instant answer.