Chapter 9
CHAPTER 9
“ I am so sorry I lost Mo, Pepper,” my mom said, her cheeks wet from crying when I arrived at the cemetery after my dad.
“Mo doesn’t get lost, Sally,” my dad said, holding her close.
“Dad’s right, Mom,” I assured her. “Mo knows how to find his way home. But tell me, did you command him to retrieve your purse?”
“No, I would never command him to go after anyone. I’d be too afraid of him getting hurt. He took off after the man on his own. Isn’t that something you taught him?”
“Only if I command him to do so. Otherwise, he knows to remain at my side.”
“I saw it all, but I was too far away to reach Sally fast enough,” Dan said, looking upset. “But Mo didn’t waste a minute. He was off sniffing around while Sally and I talked. Then I went to my truck to get some drawings I did for the beautification project and that’s when I heard Sally yell. I turned to see the guy grab her purse and give her a shove hard enough to knock her to the ground.”
My dad’s face flared with anger hearing that, and his arm tightened around her.
“I ran toward Sally, and Mo made a beeline for the guy. He had speed to him, but Mo kept on his tail. We followed them after I helped Sally to her feet and saw them reach here, the oldest section of the cemetery, then they disappeared into the woods that border this area.” He pointed to the spot. “Sally shouted out to Mo, but he didn’t respond.”
“Mo will be fine,” Amy whispered in my ear, offering reassurance, though the quiver in her voice told me that she was looking for reassurance from me that she was right.
“He will be. He knows to come home,” I said and hurried to the edge of the woods and let loose with a whistle, then shouted. “MO, RETURN!”
I heard my dad telling my mom that EMS was on the way to check her out. She argued that she was fine. I heard Josh’s voice as well, but none of it mattered. My only thoughts were on Mo and that he might be hurt, though it nagged at me why he went after the guy without a command from my mom.
I whistled and shouted for him one more time and when I got no response, I decided that was it. I was going into the woods to search for him.
A hand on my arm stopped me. I went to yank it free when I saw that it was Ian.
“Did you take that new dog tracker off Mo’s vest that was sent to you to try out and recommend?” Ian asked.
My eyes went wide. “No, I didn’t. I forgot all about that.”
“We tried it out a couple times and Mo stayed put where you told him to so you could see how the tracker worked,” Ian reminded me. “Maybe he’s sitting somewhere waiting for you.”
“You are brilliant. I could kiss you,” I said, reaching for my cell in my pocket, grateful I didn’t forget it.
“I would not object to that,” Ian said with his usual appealing smile that calmed my heart in one way and fluttered it in another.
I barely opened the app when we heard a bark.
“MO!” My shout was returned with a bark, and I shouted his name again. Another bark was heard, and I didn’t hesitate, I hurried into the woods, Ian keeping pace with me. My heart soared with relief when I spotted Mo heading my way, my mom’s purse hanging from his mouth.
Mo picked up speed when he caught sight of me, his tail wagging, and I wished I had a treat with me to give him. I smiled when Ian handed me one.
“I am getting used to keeping them handy,” he said with a wink.
I was all smiles until Mo reached me, and I saw the blood on the fur around his mouth as he happily dropped my mom’s bag at my feet.
“Don’t touch around his mouth, Pepper, until I get a sample of that blood and leave the purse where it is,” Josh warned, coming up behind us. “I’ll go get a blood sample kit.”
I was about to crouch down to hug Mo and give him the treat when my mom shouted his name. He snatched up the bag with his teeth before I could stop him and rushed to her.
“Mo! You are my hero,” my mom sang out and hurried out of my dad’s arms to drop down, against my dad’s warning not to, and hugged Mo after he dropped her purse at her feet.
She rained kisses all over his head as she hugged him, then she slipped her hand into her large purse and retrieved a sizeable bone, that she no doubt had planned on giving him at the end of the day. Now I knew why he was so intent on finding her purse. He had smelled the bone inside and there was no way he was going to let anyone take that away from him.
“We should have known that Mo had an ulterior motive for pursuing that guy,” Amy said as she and Beau joined Ian and me.
“Mo not only retrieved his bone, but he also got a blood sample of the assailant,” Beau said. “He really is a hero.”
“We are not taking Mo to lunch. You are going to go home.” I heard my dad say and knew his stern order was not going to go over big with my mom.
“Nonsense. I have work to do, and you promised me and Mo lunch at the diner,” my mom argued, stretching her hand out for my dad to help her up.
I smiled, watching Mo’s head snap back and forth between my mom and dad as they continued to debate the issue, the large bone clamped firmly in his mouth.
I finally stepped in. “I’m sure Mom could use a cup of tea, Dad. Amy and I can go with her and Mo to the diner, and you can join us when you’re done here.”
“She needs to give a statement about the incident,” my dad said as if that settled it.
“I will give you a statement, Warren, when you join us for at least coffee,” my mom said, her words sounding more like the final one.
My dad capitulated on condition that my mom let the EMS workers give her a quick once-over.
“Come, Mo, I will introduce you to some wonderful people,” my mom said, and Mo kept pace beside her. She stopped and turned her head, Mo doing the same. “My bag.”
“It needs to be tested for fingerprints and blood. I’ll bring it home later,” my dad said.
“Right,” my mom said and smiled. “I told you keeping a copy of my license in the car would come in handy, Warren.”
My dad shook his head.
“You should be used to Mom always being right,” Josh joked with a laugh.
My dad grinned. “The same fate awaits you one day.”
Josh stopped laughing. “Never.”
“We’ll see about that,” my dad said, still grinning. “Get a search going in the woods to see if anything can be found and I assume you already sent out an alert to the hospital and local doctors to report any dog bites.”
Josh nodded. “All done. The blood sample is on its way to the lab and?—”
I didn’t hear my brother say anymore, Ian’s arm went around me to usher me a few feet away.
“Beau and I need to go, Pep,” he said.
I saw the reluctance on his face to leave me and his concern once again made me realize how lucky I was to fall in love with a great guy. “No worries, Ian, go do what you need to do. But I am thankful that you rushed to my aid. My worry had me completely forgetting about that tracker, which is going to receive high reviews from me, and I’m so glad you remembered it.”
“I would never leave you on your own to face an upsetting situation. I’m here for you, Pep, always.”
Okay, so my heart fluttered a bit at his endearing declaration. Once again, I felt myself in one of Amy’s romance books, only this time I didn’t think it was a bad place to be.
“I didn’t waste any time in getting to you once I saw your text, which meant pausing the meeting and the reason I need to leave now and resume the meeting.” He gave me a quick kiss. “Let me know if you learn any more later.”
I joined Amy. Beau was already in the SUV waiting for Ian.
My dad turned a parent look on me, the kind that says that you better pay attention to what I’m about to say, but I beat him to it.
“I will tell you everything Mom tells me about the incident, but I cannot promise I can get her to go home after lunch and rest, though I will try for your sake. And I will not threaten to take Mo away from her for the rest of the day.”
“You’re stubborn,” my dad said.
“And who did I get that from?” I asked innocently and heard Amy laugh.
My dad ignored my quip and asked, “Any idea what the guy was looking for in your mom’s purse?”
“Actually, I believe I do,” I said to his surprise. “Keys! More specifically, the keys to Willow Mansion, which are sitting on my kitchen counter.”
My dad muttered, shaking his head. “I thought we laid to rest the tale of a Willow family treasure years ago.”
“You know about a possible Willow treasure?” Amy asked.
“It’s been speculated about through the years, different rumors circulating. Myths being born from a few,” my dad said.
“What myths?” I asked.
“Ask your mom while at lunch. She knows more about them than I do. I only know there is not a bit of truth to any of them.”
“Endless rumors,” my mom confirmed what my dad had said once at the diner. She took a sip of tea and checked on Mo, lying at her feet beneath the table. “He is upset that you wouldn’t let him bring his bone in here with him.”
“It’s no place for him to be chewing on a bone and he’s lucky Zelda lets him in here and he can’t be too upset since he’s sleeping. And most importantly, you need him nice and rested so he can finish out the day with you.”
My mom smiled. “So, you’re not going to tell me to go home and rest?”
I recalled my promise to my dad. “You should go home and rest, but I doubt you will.”
My mom laughed. “Now that you have fulfilled your promise to your dad?—”
“You know him too well, Mom,” I said.
My mom continued to chuckle. “I know all of you better than you know yourselves.”
I didn’t even try debating that one.
We placed our lunch orders before I asked, “So, what kind of treasure rumors are we talking about?”
“And why haven’t we ever heard about them?” Amy chimed in.
“It was way before you girls were born. It all started when a good-sized ruby was found during the restoration of the Willow Mansion.,” my mom explained. “Rumors started spreading, and then some local news reporter wrote an article suggesting the ruby was part of a dowry that Ignatius Willow had started for his daughter that included a family heirloom, a diamond and pearl necklace. No proof was ever found of that but once a rumor gets started it grows and once it does there is no stopping it. Soon treasure hunters descended on the place, most believing a dowry had been buried with Verbena. It took a while but thanks to Effie’s efforts the rumor got squashed and laid to rest. A few stragglers persisted for a while, then died off completely. I don’t see how after all these years the rumor started up again.”
“The necklace was mentioned briefly in the book The History of Willow Lake,” Amy said.
“Which, if I remember correctly, was only published about six months ago,” I said.
“That made it into the book?” my mom asked, scrunching her brow. “The Willow Lake Historical Society had final approval on the book, and I don’t recall reading that in the final edit.”
“The author was Professor Pierce Anderson, maybe he slipped it in,” I said, recalling the name.
My mom shook her head. “I doubt that very much. Pierce is a history professor at the local community college and a stickler for accuracy. He went over all the historical society’s files and the Willow family church files and found nothing concerning a dowry, though the necklace does exist. Claire Willow is wearing it in the family portrait. I’m going to have to look into this.”
“Didn’t you read the book after it was published?” Amy asked.
“I glanced through it. Having read it endless times before publication, I didn’t see any reason to read it again, and the few pages I did read were as I recalled them.”
“Does the Willow Lake Historical Society get any money from the sale of the book?” Amy asked.
“A very small percentage. Pierce was commissioned by a small publishing company to write books on local towns, Willow Lake being one of them,” my mom explained. “Though the historical society is looking into publishing some books on our own.”
“The Willow Lake Historical Society should consider having a book written on the Willow family and the restoration of the mansion,” Amy said. “You could sell it at the mansion’s store and make it available online.”
My mom smiled. “You are definitely going to be an asset to the historical society, Amy.”
“I wish I had taken an interest in it sooner,” Amy said.
“You weren’t ready then. You are now,” my mom assured her. “I am so pleased the place will be in such good hands in the future.”
“What about the guy who snatched your purse?” I asked, recalling the other promise I made to my dad to find out what I could from my mom about her assailant, though I was curious myself to see if she recalled more.
“I know from your dad that the police question people at a crime scene right away before they lose recall of the incident, but I find time allows me to think and remember more precisely. The man wore a dark hoody, but what men nowadays don’t wear them? And a dark mask that covered all but his eyes. He certainly didn’t want to be identified or perhaps he was known to me.”
“A possibility,” I said, then turned quiet so she would continue.
“He wore black boots.” She wiggled her fingers at Amy. “I know there must be a notepad and pen in that cavernous satchel purse of yours.”
Amy laughed. “I do carry a lot with me.” She dug around in her bag and pulled out a notepad and pen and handed them to my mom.
“Motorcycle boots,” Amy and I said in unison when she turned the pad around to show us her quick drawing.
She turned to another blank page and started drawing again.
I was always amazed at watching my mom draw. She had a natural talent. I inherited some of it but nowhere near the talent my mom possessed.
“Wow,” Amy and I once again said in unison, staring at a drawing of the head of a guy in a hoody with a mask covering all but his eyes, intense eyes.
I felt Mo’s tail wag against my leg and looked to see my dad headed our way.
Zelda, the owner of Star Diner, had a mug filled with coffee on the table before he reached us.
“That is one intense person,” Zelda said, casting a glance at the drawing before acknowledging my dad with a nod and walking off to answer the calls for more coffee.
My mom slid over in the booth to make room for my dad as she warned, “Don’t step on Mo.”
He didn’t have to worry. Mo moved curling himself up against my leg.
“That is amazing, Sally,” my dad said with pride. “Put a hoody and mask on a suspect and from this drawing his eyes will betray him.”
“Find anything in the woods?” I asked my dad after he finished taking a sip of his hot coffee.
“Josh found a brief blood trail. We figured the guy probably wrapped his wound to stop the bleeding. We’ll compare that blood with the sample we got from Mo and if they match, we know we have the right guy.”
When my dad saw the drawing of the motorcycle boots, he said, “I’ll be visiting with that motorcycle gang again.”
My dad asked my mom a few more questions about the incident, finished his coffee, and stood. “I’ve got to get back to work.” He leaned over to give my mom a peck on the cheek. “Please do not exhaust yourself, Sally.”
“I won’t. I intend to be in top shape for tomorrow night,” she said with a smile.
I could see my dad panic, silently asking himself—what’s tomorrow night?
I felt bad for him, so I helped him out. “Are you looking forward to the talk at the college, Dad?”
He sent me a bless-you-daughter smile, then with a look of concern at my mom said, “You need to rest after what you have been through lately, Sally. Maybe we should skip the lecture.”
“I know you don’t want to go, Warren, so I won’t force you,” my mom said to my surprise and Amy’s as well since she poked me in the side with her elbow.
My dad looked relieved, not so much my mom.
“Maybe Professor Pierce Anderson will be there, and you can speak to him about the book,” I suggested, hoping to lift her spirits and was surprised when my mom looked like she was about to cringe.
“I’ll go with you,” my dad snapped and walked away mumbling to himself.
“What’s that all about, Mom?” I asked.
“Oh, your dad has it in his head that Pierce is interested in me,” my mom said as if it was unimportant.
“What makes him think that?” Amy asked as curiously as I was to find out why.
“A little misunderstanding.”
“What misunderstanding,” I all but demanded since I could tell my mom didn’t want to say anymore, but I wanted to hear what caused my dad to get annoyed and change his mind so suddenly.
My mom capitulated. “Your dad caught Pierce trying to kiss me.”