Chapter 34
“Stop!” The shrieking takes form into a single word, and it thrusts me back to the waterfall when I witnessed Fred with the other woman whose similar panicked “stop!” still reverberates in my nightmares.
I’m dragged back to the present as the screams get closer, louder, and the voice more familiar. “No! No, you can’t take my dad!”
Bursting through her front door is Freida Cobb, trailing Detective Yankovic who hauls Fred out of the house in handcuffs. The police are not here for me after all. My brain stutters to life. The cops… they’re not swarming my driveway. They’re arresting Fred.
“Please stop!” Freida’s begging and sobbing and yanking on the detective’s arms, pulling at him with all her might.
Her elbow connects with his chin as she pries at his massive chest, clawing to release her father.
Using his shoulder, Detective Yankovic partially covers his face from her blows, then shields himself by turning his back on her, which also swings Fred around like a rag doll in his arms. This whole time Fred remains calm, compliant even, not trying to break free.
“Get ‘er off me!” the detective yells, and another officer intercedes by wrapping his arms around Freida’s chest to restrain her.
“Freida, please don’t!” Fred glances back at her mournfully, shaking his head for her stay back, to stay safe. “Everything will be fine. I promise.”
It’s a paternal love you can’t fake, and this makes me question all the evil I assumed about Fred. He’s protecting his daughter, and she’s protecting her father. How could I ever think Fred would hurt Freida? But then what are they arresting him for?
“Just tell me what’s happening!” Freida cries, wriggling and attempting to free herself from the officer’s grip.
The crowd on the curb thickens—neighbors wearing pajamas, bathrobes, one woman holding a mixing bowl like she sprinted out mid-brownie prep. Doomwood Falls loves drama. They might as well sell tickets to this.
I, too, gravitate toward the disorder, desperately wanting answers. Does Fred’s arrest mean they found Ivory’s body? Has Fred been the one stalking me, planting evidence against me? And most importantly, does this mean it’s all over?
Fred shouts something, but I can’t hear it over Freida’s wails and the growing crowd and police radio chatter. As Detective Yankovic leads Fred toward his car, Freida’s face twists with fury.
Zala appears beside me, then exhales sharply at the crowd of looky-loos out on the street. “I always thought there was something odd about Fred.”
Of course everyone says that after the fact, but I never saw Fred as anything but a decent husband and loving father until just recently.
But clearly my judge of character is wrong.
Fred Cobb is not the good guy we all thought he was.
He is a—a what? A killer? Because I still don’t know what happened to Ivory.
“I’ll be back,” I tell Zala before sprinting across the street, shoving through the wall of rubberneckers.
Fingertips catch my shoulder, barely holding me back from Detective Yankovic, who is wrestling Fred into a squad car.
I squirm until I break free of the officer’s light grip, coming face to face with Detective Yankovic himself.
He waves another officer to stand guard over Fred and turns to me, his cheek already bruising from where Freida’s elbow made contact.
“Detective,” I gasp, catching my breath, “what’s going on? Did you find Ivory? Is she—”
He raises a hand sharply. “Ms. Catalano, stand back please.”
“No!” I shout, my defiance surprising even myself. “I just want to know about Ivory. Did Fred kill her?”
Yankovic stares at me, then sighs the tired sigh of a man who hasn’t slept since his last big bust in the nineties.
“We’re arresting Frederick Cobb,” he says, “for the murder of private investigator Janet Vick.”
I stagger back a step. Poor, relentless Janet met her demise. I still don’t know why Fred would kill her, but I honestly don’t care. All I care about is Ivory.
“I knew it,” I say. “Fred killed her, and probably his mistress too. Wait, did you find the mistress? And Ivory—” My voice cracks. “Have you found Ivory yet? You have to make Fred talk!”
My whole body is shaking as I’m pleading for just an ounce of mercy, that I’ll finally know what happened to my best friend.
Detective Yankovic’s expression hardens. “I can’t answer your questions, Ms. Catalano.”
“Can’t or won’t?”
“It’s an active investigation,” he reminds me, sounding like he’s reciting it from a handbook. “I can’t disclose anything else.”
“But Detective—”
“There is, however,” he cuts in, “one thing I can answer.”
My hand involuntarily shoots out to grab his. “What?”
He turns and points toward the nearest police cruiser. “Go look.”
The back door opens. A Bernese mountain dog hops out, tongue lolling and happy to be the center of all the excitement.
Detective Yankovic leans down, patting his thighs and calling for the dog, who scampers toward him with the enthusiasm of a toddler getting candy. I recognize the pooch as Janet Vick’s.
“The dog? I don’t understand.”
“No, the dog was Janet Vick’s and now apparently my new partner. Just wait.”
Then someone else steps out of the vehicle behind the dog, flanked by officers.