Chapter Six
I was restless as I drove back to New Montgomery. My mind had twenty-five tabs open and they all wanted to vocalize at the same time. It wasn’t just regret. The one that was shouting the loudest was what had Jessica Casey been doing in the city?
Before I could really think it through, I found I was driving in the direction of the coffee shop.
When she came to the agency, she’d been very worried.
Would a fearful woman go on a random shopping trip?
Would she casually pick up a coffee, miles away, when she could have made one at home?
I wasn’t convinced. She had to have been there for something else.
The coffee shop was an independent place only a few blocks from Lily’s Bar.
I pulled up outside and watched the sidewalk traffic for a few minutes, thinking about what to do.
The shop seemed to be half the width of the other shop fronts, but just as deep.
One side made up the servers’ area with their coffee machines and glass food displays, the window piled high with baked goods.
The other half was dotted with several two-people tables pressed against the wall.
Several patrons went inside, leaving again within minutes with takeout cups and paper bags or boxes.
A couple, and an older man by himself, took the tables.
Nothing about the coffee shop stood out to me.
It wasn’t luxurious or bargain basement.
It was neither hip nor outdated. No one sat with laptops taking advantage of the free WiFi and table space.
It wasn’t overrun with parents and strollers.
There wasn’t a queue of suits, hitting the afternoon lull.
In short, it looked nice, but it wasn’t a destination.
And it was easy to pick up a coffee without a long wait in a queue.
So where had Jessica been nearby?
Around me there were two banks, a hair salon, a couple of takeout places, a café, an accountant’s office, a lawyer’s, and a post office. There was a pharmacy and several shops spanning items from childrenswear to home goods a little further along the street.
I had no idea which would interest Jessica the most. I simply didn’t know her well enough, or really, at all.
If I had promptly taken her case, I would have known her a lot better.
Discouraged, a guilty knot twisting in my stomach, I drove the few minutes to Lily’s Bar and headed inside.
“Hey,” I said to Ruby as I arrived at the bar. “Where’s Lily?”
“She’s in the back doing invoices. Can I get you anything? Drink? Late lunch? Snack?”
“I’m good. Just came by to see Lily.”
Ruby waved me through and I headed into the employees’ area, finding Lily’s door open.
“Hey!” she said, looking up from her desk and grinning. She dropped her pen on top of the paperwork and rolled her shoulders. “Slow day?”
“Terrible day,” I said, slumping into the chair in front of her desk.
“What happened?”
I launched into the basics of the story while Lily waited patiently and when I stopped, she looked at me with sympathy. “You know this isn’t your fault, right?”
“That’s what Garrett said.”
“You should listen to him. That is, listen to me first, then him. He’s my backup.”
“He said it first.”
“Doesn’t matter. He’s right and I’m right-er.”
I bit back a laugh.
“I know Ashgrove Farms,” said Lily, surprising me. “I used to go to pony camp there. It was terrific fun. I got to ride different ponies and there were trails and riding lessons. I loved it.”
“Why did you stop?”
“I don’t know. Outgrew my Olympic dreams, I guess.
I think I remember the owners were going to retire so maybe it was sold later, or their kids took over?
I don’t remember, but I do recall looking it up a few years ago and seeing the new owners focused less on the riding school and more on the training of horses.
They were training all kinds of racehorses and show-jumpers and riding ponies. ”
“Jessica said something similar. They do boarding too.”
“Oh, yeah. A few of the pony club girls had their own horses and did competitions with them. Oh! I remember now. I think their website mentioned training prize show ponies. Lucrative stuff.”
“How lucrative?”
“It doesn’t matter how great a rider you are if your horse isn’t into it. People will pay tens if not hundreds of thousands of dollars for the right pony or horse, especially if it comes from champion lines and gives them a shot at winning the big competitions.”
“I had no idea.”
“And that’s before we get into racehorses, stud horses…”
“I had no idea you were so knowledgeable about horses,” I cut in.
“I guess I just picked it up from being around the pony club girls years ago. Ooooh!” Lily’s eyes widened. “We should go.”
“Where?”
“To the farm! I would love to visit and you need to investigate!”
“I don’t think I can. My prospective client literally just died. There’s no one to take instruction from… or report to.”
“Didn’t you say she paid you?”
I frowned. She had made a deposit and I hadn’t returned it. “Yes,” I said. “She was very insistent about that.”
“Then you’re on the case. Let’s go.”
“Don’t you have work to do?”
Lily opened the top drawer of the desk, sweeping the paper inside. She dropped her pen on top and pushed the drawer shut. “Nope,” she said. “And since when do you care about paperwork?”
“I always do my paperwork!”
“Lily’s eyes narrowed. “Do you?”
“Most of the time,” I conceded.
“On time?”
“If I don’t have anything better to do! What is this, an interrogation?”
“If it were an interrogation, I’d ask where you got those pants from.” Lily pointed to my powder blue clad legs.
“They were in your giveaway pile by your front door.”
“That was my dry cleaning pile!”
“I dry cleaned them before I wore them!”
“I’ll take that as payment for your wanton theft. Let’s go. You’re driving. I need to search all the gossip online.”
“There’s no gossip, only a really terrible accident. It won’t even be in the news yet. If it ever is.”
“All the more reason to pay our respects. I think I remember Jessica. She must have been a young instructor at the time so she couldn’t be much older than us.”
“I suppose that would be a nice thing to do but I don’t want to intrude on her family’s grief.” Although, I could snoop around the farm so it wouldn’t be a wasted trip. Perhaps I’d pick something up to support Jessica’s claims? It was an intriguing proposition.
“That’s exactly what you should do,” said Lily, nodding enthusiastically now. “Pay your respects, snoop in their home.”
“Lily!”
“Don’t Lily me. We both know you’re thinking that.”
“I was thinking of snooping around the farm, actually.”
“Now we’re talking. Let’s go.” Lily grabbed the thin bomber jacket hanging around the back of her chair and followed me to the door. We waved goodbye to Ruby and headed out.
“You’re lucky we have a new bartender to help Ruby,” said Lily. “I get more time to do the necessary management stuff now.”
“Like ducking out to investigate with me?”
“I’ll try and promote our catered parties while we’re out, just so this is actually a business trip.”
“We’re so professional.” I grinned. I had come so far in life. From soul-destroying temp jobs to private investigator for me, and the weirdest jobs going to bar owner and manager for Lily. For each of us, we’d truly found our calling.
I plugged the farm into my phone’s map app and we headed out of town while I filled Lily in further on Jessica’s plea for help. When I finished, I added, “I feel truly terrible about this. What if I’d agreed to help her? She might still be alive.”
“I don’t think you can blame yourself for this. For all she knew, you were thinking things over for a few days before you called her back. She might have felt comforted by that. Plus, you didn’t return the payment. She would see that as a good sign.”
“Do you think?”
“It’s a possibility.”
“Thank you. That was kind of you to say and nicer than the alternative.”
“You shouldn’t let that cloud your thoughts. You need to think positively. Then you’ll be grounded and ready for anything.”
I cut a side glance at my bestie. “What’s gotten into you?”
“I’m listening to positivity podcasts. I listen, I absorb, I… what’s the verb for ‘be positive’?”
“Affirm.”
“No.”
“Corroborate?”
“No.”
“Practice?”
“I don’t feel it’s practicing now I’ve listened to forty-three podcasts. I think that makes me a positivity expert.”
“I’m not sure it does.”
“Sure it does. Jord listens to three different political podcasts and he definitely thinks he’s the expert on that.”
“He’s never done anything related to politics in his life.”
“I rest my case.”
“I really think the word is ‘practice’.”
“Whatever. I do positive.”
“What have you done that’s positive today?”
“Got in the car with you to solve a mystery.”
“You’re nailing positivity.” I held up a hand for a high five.
“Right?” Lily beamed and smacked my hand with hers.
I didn’t know if the road where Jessica lost her life was still closed for investigation and recovery, and I didn’t want to take it either, even though it was the quickest route, so we took a longer detour, exploring a small hamlet until we reached the farm.
We rolled past a fence that looked like it had been recently repaired when Lily called, “Turn here,” pointing to the big white sign painted with the same logo Jessica had on her T-shirt. “This is where my parents’ chauffeur would park when I had lessons.”
“We had such different childhoods.”
“Not really. I spent most of my teen years at your house.”
“True, but this bit,” I said, lifting my hand off the steering wheel to wave across the yard where two jodhpurs-clad women walked towards the stables, helmets under their arms. “This is different.”
“I don’t know if I even knew you when I came here to ride as a kid,” said Lily. “Gosh, this is a blast from the past.”
“Has any of it changed?” I asked, pulling into a parking space in front of a recently cut laurel hedge, fallen leaves drifting across the weathered blacktop, and turning off the engine.
Lily looked around. “I think the parking lot is bigger and that building used to be a paddock,” she said, pointing.
“I don’t remember a hedge being there either but there were cabins for the workers to live on site, I think.
I believe that’s them over there. The main house is over there and that’s where the owners lived.
It has its own driveway to the road but I’m sure there was a path to walk there. ”
“Let’s go to the main house,” I said. “Jessica listed it as her residence along with her husband. I think there’s a guest cottage where her sister lives.”
“I don’t remember that but it was a long time ago. There was a walkway from the parking lot. I think it was over there,” she said, nodding to a gate on the other side of the parking lot.
We hopped out, walking over to it, and Lily pushed the wooden gate open. “Yes, this is it,” she said confidently. “Do you know what you’re going to say?”
“Only that, I heard what happened and wanted to say how sorry I was. I’ll fudge some details on the fly. Should we have brought flowers? A casserole?”
“It’s too early, don’t you think?”
“I guess. Garrett will only have notified them a few hours ago. Okay, we’ll be quick.
” As I said it, we turned a corner, following the gravel path between the hedgerow and fencing, and the house appeared before us, a wide ranch-style house with a wrap-around porch and big windows overlooking the yard.
The porch was dotted with a padded wooden swing suspended from the rafter and a wicker sofa.
The path curving through the yard to the porch steps was bordered with lush planting and pretty flowers in pink and white. “This is so pretty!”
“I don’t remember any of the flowers or a path. It was all chewed up lawn when I was here. I think there was a pony that lived in the garden.”
There was no evidence of any pony now, just a very pretty garden.
We followed the path around to the front where there was a driveway with two black SUVs parked in front of the double garage.
One had a flat tire and it looked like the vehicle Jessica had gotten into when she left the agency.
The drive curved away from the house and I caught a glimpse of a small building set further back.
The main house was still. No sound came from it but I saw someone moving on the other side of the window.
We jogged up the steps and I rang the doorbell.
Footsteps sounded from the other side and a woman opened the door, startling me with how similar she looked to Jessica. Except she had red, puffy eyes, and was holding a cotton handkerchief.
“Yes?” she said.
“We’re so sorry to intrude,” I started, “we heard the terrible news about Jessica and we wanted to say how sorry we were.”
“Oh, thank you. Oh, gosh, I guess the news is starting to spread. Thank you, that’s kind of you to drop by. I’ll let Joel know you dropped by, er…”
“Lexi,” I said, “and Lily.”
“Lexi… huh.” She paused. “Lexi Gray?”
“Lexi Graves-Sol…” I started to correct her.
She took a sharp intake of breath and clasped both hands over her mouth.
“Oh, my goodness, I didn’t realize you were due today!
Oh, my gosh! Oh, I’m sorry you arrived today and you must have just heard!
Is your luggage with you? I’ll get someone to help you move it to the staff cabins.
I just… I…” She flapped a hand and sniffled.
“I’m Yvette, Jessica’s sister. She told me she’d… ”
“I’m sorry, I…?” I cut in, then trailed off, utterly confused. She must have been the same Yvette who was the owner of the car Jessica had been driving but I had no idea what she was talking about.
“Jessica said she’d hired you and you’d be here when you could. You came at just the right time. We really need you now, more than ever! I’m just… I… I’m sorry, I’m absolutely all over the place. I think it’s the shock.”
Something inside me lifted. I could do something to help after all! If Jessica had told her sister that she hired me, then she might want me to pursue the investigation too. “I’m glad I’m here,” I said. “Jessica probably told you why she hired me and…”
“Oh, yes. She told me you were the best horse trainer she’d ever known and she had to engage your services since you had a sudden opening, before you were snapped up.
She said your clinics were amazing and we’re lucky to get you.
Of course, we’ll still take you on. Jessica wanted you here so we’ll honor that.
Yes, we need you more than ever now,” Yvette added decisively.
Lily and I exchanged puzzled glances. Horse trainer? Me? I’d barely ever sat astride a horse before!
“Huh?” I said but Yvette was already pulling us inside.