Chapter Twenty-three
The smile on Roman’s face morphed into a scowl. “I found out practically nothing new on Eliza.”
“Really? I was so counting on a breakthrough of some kind. Damn. That’s depressing.” Mia took a careful sip of tea while she digested the information. “Nothing on the fentanyl?”
“I scored a big, fat strikeout on that too. Tracey Millar told me she didn’t know anyone personally who’d been dealing drugs while Maryanne was there. There were whispers about certain students, but they didn’t run in her circles. I got names and hunted down a couple of them but predictably, all I got were flat out denials. And none of them were willing to point a finger at anyone else either. Apparently, Darby College is clean as a whistle when it comes to drugs.”
“I call bullshit. But I get why no one wants to be involved.”
“Yeah. Me too. I also talked to six students who had rooms on the same floor in Maryanne’s dorm. Took them through the Sunday before she died and got another goose egg. Two of them saw Maryanne going back to her room alone after dinner. They said she seemed fine. Cheerful. One girl was in her calculus class, and they apparently discussed an upcoming test. That was the last time she saw her.”
“And no one noticed Kerry there either? After yesterday, I’m a lot more interested in her. Though looking back, she was only supporting Eliza and she really didn’t say much. She certainly wasn’t spearheading the whole thing. She reminded me of one of those hype girls that rappers used to have back in the day.”
“No one mentioned her being around. And I went back over the police report.”
“I’m guessing there wasn’t anything there?” Mia asked.
“When Finlay interviewed Kerry, she provided gas receipts from her journey to Memphis for that weekend. They also talked to the friend she was visiting, and she vouched for her all the way. Said she’d arrived on Saturday around noon and hadn’t left until the Monday. There were even ticket stubs to a local theatre production they attended on Sunday night. It doesn’t seem like she had anything to do with Maryanne’s death.”
“Figures. I knew I was reaching even as I said it. We’re back to square one, aren’t we?” She got to her feet and paced away. “What about Eliza? Can we trace her movements for that night?”
“A little.” Roman shrugged. “She posted to Instagram from a coffee shop and later snapped a picture of JP walking along the street in Nashville wearing a fancy new designer doggie coat. The police dug into it and the timestamps and GEO locational information seemed to be legit. The security cams show her entering her condo building around nine p.m., then nothing again until the next morning when she rushed out after the police had done the notification.”
Mia whirled to face him. “Was there another way in and out of the building?”
“Sure. There’s a freight elevator. It’s older and for whatever reason, they never installed security cameras. You’re supposed to book it in advance. Except when I called the building super yesterday, he said lots of people just use it whenever and since they’ve never had a problem they don’t plan on cracking down on the owners.”
“Which means she can’t prove she was there the whole night and we can’t prove she left.”
“That’s about the size of it.”
“Well, damn and double damn.”
They both sat in silence for several minutes. Mia sipped her tea and turned the case over in her mind but came up blank.
Sheryl arrived and the dogs rushed to the foyer to give her their usual warm welcome.
She appeared in the doorway of the kitchen. “Sorry to intrude, Boss. Wondered what you wanted me to get started on. I can go back to the email setup since we don’t have any anything ready to ship out this morning.”
Mia pushed away from the table. “Hang on. I’m coming. We’ll check and see what’s what. Hopefully today everything will be back to normal.”
“And on that note, I’ll leave you ladies to your work and hit my office in town,” Roman said. “I’m also going to drop by Dalton PD and see if anything’s turned up on the credit card for the bracelet order Eliza used as an ambush tactic. Make sure you forward anything new that comes in.”
“Sure. Happy hunting.”
“And happy … normalling? If that’s even a word. Basically, I hope you have a relaxing and peaceful day.”
In the workroom, Sheryl booted up the laptop while Mia studied the printouts for the three verified orders. She could definitely get those finished today and ready for shipping.
“Uh-oh,” Sheryl murmured.
Mia whirled. “Uh-oh, what? Are we slammed with fakes again?”
“Not slammed but we have eight new orders, and I don’t recognize any of the names. I guess I should verify like we did yesterday?”
“Yep.” Mia growled. “Unfortunately, that’ll have to be standard operating procedure from now on. At least until this case is wrapped up.”
“No problem. And if we’re down to just a trickle of them every day it’ll only add on a bit of extra time.”
“Great. And while you’re doing that, I’ll start on the quartz earrings for Kate Moses.”
The rest of the morning was uneventful and gradually, Mia found herself relaxing. Hopefully, Eliza had tired of this game and was moving on. With a wedding only weeks away and her social media business to run, she couldn’t have too much spare time on her hands, could she?
By early afternoon, Sheryl had managed to sort out the new orders and found only three were fakes. Mia sent her home.
“That’s enough. After yesterday, you’ve earned the rest of the day off and then some.”
“You sure? I don’t mind staying. And I really appreciated the bonus you sent last night. I’ve been eyeing up an air fryer, and I figure with the extra money in my bank I should go ahead and treat myself. You only live once, right?”
Mia shrugged. “Who knows? Maybe this is your fiftieth life already.”
Sheryl narrowed her eyes. “You don’t believe in all that reincarnation voodoo? The bible doesn’t say anything about living lots of lives. Just that we die and go to heaven. I’m sticking with that theory.”
“It’s a valid one, that’s for sure. And you should absolutely buy the air fryer. You deserve it.”
After Sheryl left, Mia had a late lunch, walked the dogs, and thought about Eliza. And Scott. And Jennifer and Thomas. She could perfectly visualize the drowning incident at the lake. Scott must have felt like an honest-to-God hero swooping in and rescuing her. And she’d just bet Eliza laid it on thick, with Kerry cheering from the sidelines. He’d have been puffed up like a peacock.
It also occurred to her that Eliza had likely staged the entire incident. Which means Scott had been specifically targeted. There was a good chance anyone staying in those upscale houses would be well-off but how many were her age, not in a relationship, and had millions of dollars to throw around?
He was the perfect mark. How on earth had she picked him out and figured the timetable so she was there during the one week he stayed with his parents?
Thomas had pegged her right. Eliza was a slippery one.
Once she got back to the house and refreshed doggie water bowls, she helped herself to a Perrier and returned to her workstation. The sun beat into the front room of the house and Mia closed all of the blinds except one to leave a patch of sun for the dogs to lie in.
She picked up the next order page and studied it. A rhodolite necklace, of all things. Her eyes flicked over to the bracelet she’d retrieved from the grass after the meetup with Eliza and Kerry. She wondered which of them had so carelessly dropped it.
Considering, she pulled the box into her lap and laid her hands on the pink and black stones then pushed out with her mind. The only thing she saw was a woman, long grey hair in a braid down her back and the skin on her hands wrinkled and covered with age spots. She sat at a table in an indoor trade fair. All around were piles of jewelry and gemstones.
Mia sighed and set the bracelet on the table again. No help to be had there apparently. And she certainly wasn’t going to reuse those stones until she’d cleared any negative energy from them. She spent a few moments picking through her stash of loose rhodolite, holding each stone and feeling its vibrational force before choosing a triangular one for the necklace.
When her phone pinged she checked the screen and saw the call was from Roman.
“Hey. Good news?” she asked.
“I’m afraid not. I just wanted to give you a heads-up. Healing Crystal was bombed with 1-star reviews on Yelp.”
“You’ve got to be kidding me. Wait. I want to see. I’ll putting you on speaker.”
She pulled her phone away from her ear and swiped over to do an internet search then scrolled down the reviews. There were at least a dozen new ones. All dated yesterday or today.
“In case you’re worried I’d feel left out, no need. Mancini Investigations got the same treatment. Apparently, I’m nothing but a fraudster ripping off old people.”
“Surely this is slander.”
“Or libel, since it’s written. And yes, it is. However, I’ll bet you a million bucks it won’t be simple to get these suckers removed,” he said.
“Eliza is the biggest pest ever. This will hurt both of us and there’s no way to calculate how many customers we’ll lose.”
“I’ve already contacted Yelp and started the process. I’m going to pull Kevin in. We have the initial incident plus all the screenshots you took from yesterday when you were dealing with the fraudulent orders. I want this stuff documented just in case.”
“But won’t he want to talk to Eliza? As much as I hate this, I don’t want her pulling back and going underground either. Not before we solve this case and make sure Scott’s safe,” Mia said.
“My thoughts exactly. But it’d be better to have everything on record in case she does something worse. Obviously, we won’t be pressing charges right now. I should be able to talk Kevin into sitting on it for the time being.”
“You said she might do something worse, meaning you’re expecting her to escalate?”
Roman sighed. “It would be logical that she does. We haven’t backed off the case.”
“But she doesn’t know that. We went to see the Lambs. If she was somehow watching us, she has no clue what happened in there. We might have told them we were done.”
“True enough. But after the Lambs, I called around about her. If she got wind of that, she knows we haven’t stopped.”
“Okay. I guess it makes sense bringing Kevin in. How far away is Darby College?” Mia asked.
“About four hours. Why?”
“I’ve been thinking maybe we need to go there. If I can get into Maryanne’s dorm room, there’s potential for me to get a vision of her death. It feels like that’s our main sticking point at the moment. If Eliza didn’t commit cold-blooded murder, we’re dealing with your basic narcissistic vampire, not someone physically dangerous. That puts an entirely different spin on things, right?”
“Yeah. It does. If you’re okay with it, we could go tomorrow.”
“Tomorrow’s Thursday? Let me make sure.” Mia swiped over to her Notion account and read through the calendar. “Other than regular stuff, I’m clear. Maybe we leave mid-morning? It’d give me time to check on the overnight orders and make sure Eliza’s not mounting a new attack. Sheryl can watch the dogs.”
“It’s a date. I’m going to keep digging with the students. See if I can find any more kids from the dorm who’ll talk to me.”
“And I’ll get going on the remaining orders so I’m all caught up.” She paused to weigh her words. “You know the college won’t roll out the red carpet for us. We might have to do some fast work to sneak into the dorm. You’re okay with that?”
“Eliza has come after us directly. Sure, it’s more nuisance stuff right now, but the threat is out there. I’m happy to talk our way onto campus and into the dorms if it’ll potentially get us more info.”
She released her breath. “Good. Just didn’t want to drive all that way if you were going ruin our chances by turning into stick-up-his-butt Detective Mancini.”
“Ouch. That’s mean. But I guess also accurate. You can’t blame me for being good at my former job though.”
“I try not to.” She chuckled. “You’re just such a rule follower.”
“And that’s how I was good at my former job. It’s ninety-nine percent rules and laws. Without them, our whole society would break down.”
“I agree. People can be stupid and sometimes mean even when you discount the truly evil among us. Still, I don’t think the rules should apply to me because I’m obviously better than that.”
Roman laughed full out. “Of course you are, babes. But maybe I’m not. Maybe the rules are the only thing keeping me from going fully rogue.”
“As if. Any rebellious notions you might have are so carefully guarded by your moral code they’re never likely to see the light of day.”
“And we’re all better off for that. Trust me.” He paused and she could hear his chair squeak and the clacking of his keyboard. “Okay. I’m going to see if I can rustle up some more students to talk to. I should be home in a couple of hours.”
“Excellent. We’re going to barbeque burgers tonight.”
“Love that idea. And unless I find a new string to tug on, no more work after. I’d say we’ve earned a night of peace and quiet.”
“I could definitely use some peace and quiet.”