Chapter Five
John led Clancy into the house, apologizing for his son again as she looked around the spacious room.
The warmth hit her first, that and the sound of crackling wood in the sizable fireplace.
A huge leather couch and matching chairs sat in front of the fire, a large, thick rug on the wood floor in front of it.
“The guest room’s down this wing away from our part of the house,” the rancher was saying. “That way we won’t wake you up before daylight when me and the boys get up to do chores.”
They walked past the kitchen adjacent to a roomy ranch kitchen with a massive wooden table and chairs that could feed a dozen people.
It looked clean and neat, with touches of bright-colored decor on the walls.
She hadn’t expected the house to look so inviting, having assumed there would be no woman’s touch.
The rancher had mentioned his wife had been gone for six years.
Maybe Tanner and his brother were married or had live-in girlfriends or wives.
It didn’t look like a house with three bachelors living here.
The rancher walked her down the hallway, opened a door and turned on a light. “Our guest room and bath,” he said. “Please make yourself at home. Get a hot bath if you like. Once you get into some dry clothes, come on back to the living room. I’ll go see about dinner.”
He didn’t give her a chance to decline dinner. Even as her stomach growled, she thought it best if she stayed in her room. There would be questions at dinner if Tanner had anything to do with it. Clancy would just as soon skip an interrogation.
Once in the room with the door locked, she put her backpack on the bed and pulled out her cell phone.
She had turned it off earlier. But now she saw that she had another text from Sarah, who sounded frantic to know if she was all right.
As she started to text her back, she saw that her battery was extremely low.
She began to look for her charging cord but soon realized that she would never find it in this overstuffed backpack.
Dumping everything on the bed, she shifted through her things but didn’t see the cord.
Had she forgotten it at the trailer? She couldn’t bear the thought of not having her phone until she got to Billings and could buy another cord.
As she desperately dug through her things, her fingers touched something that made her recoil.
She stared down in horror. It was the plastic bag of jewelry that Esther had tried to give her.
Just the sight of the bag filled with cheap jewelry turned her stomach.
If anyone knew she had this… Surely they wouldn’t think that she’d killed Esther for it, would they?
Clancy stumbled back from the bed, furious and even more scared.
For a moment, she couldn’t imagine how it had gotten into her backpack. She had refused to take the cheap jewelry as payment. She and Esther had been arguing. Had the woman put the bag in her backpack when Clancy had turned her back to leave?
Her hands balled into fists. If she could have gotten hold of Esther at that moment she would have strangled the woman.
As soon as she had that thought, she felt sick.
Someone had killed Esther that very night, after Clancy had left.
She tried to convince herself that Esther’s death had nothing to do with a bag of worthless costume jewelry.
Unfortunately, she kept remembering how adamant Esther had been about her taking the jewelry and how upset the older woman had seemed, almost as if she’d been afraid she would get caught with the stolen loot.
Of course, it was stolen from the residents, and that was why Esther had been so anxious to get rid of it.
Lately, more and more residents had been complaining about Esther.
But what if there was more to it? “I mean, who kills some old lady for a bag of worthless junk?” she said to the empty room.
Well, she would get rid of it the first chance she got.
Tomorrow, John would take her to the highway and maybe she’d throw a piece at a time into the trees as she hitchhiked.
The last thing she wanted to do was get caught with it because it would make her look guilty of Esther’s murder. Not even Sarah would believe her.
She heard her phone ping as she got another text. Picking up her cell, she saw that it was from Sarah.
Where RU? All hell breaking loose here. RU all right?
Clancy started to text her back but realized Sarah would be on her break now. She desperately wanted to find out what was going on. It wouldn’t hurt to hear a friendly voice either.
The phone rang twice before it was answered.
She could hear noise in the background before Sarah whispered, “Clancy?” A door closed and in the silence that followed, she knew Sarah had stepped into the storage closet off the kitchen. Sarah let out a breath. “Are you all right? I was so worried about you.”
“It’s a long story, but I’m okay.” At least she hoped so as she looked around the room and reminded herself it was just for one night. “Tell me the sheriff is getting close to finding the killer.”
“Not that I’ve heard. He has all the cops in the state out looking for you, though. You know I would have helped you if you were in trouble. They can’t believe that you killed Esther, right?”
Clancy hated to tell her. “Of course not, but I did something so foolish. I went back to Shady Rest last night. I know I shouldn’t have, but I was determined to make Esther pay me what she owed me. I had almost enough money to leave once I got paid at both jobs.”
Silence, then a whispered, “What happened?”
She told her friend about rigging the back door earlier that afternoon so she could get in and out without the alarm going off.
“I would have let you in after hours and not told anyone,” Sarah said.
“I didn’t want to put you in that position where you’d have to lie and could have gotten fired.” She went on to tell her how she’d gone in before lockdown at ten and hidden in the storage room until she thought everyone was asleep.
“So you did get your money?”
“No.” She groaned at her own foolishness. “I fell asleep in the storage room. I didn’t wake until almost midnight. Then when I got to Esther’s apartment door, I heard voices and realized she wasn’t alone. I waited for a while, then gave up and left.”
“I don’t understand. Why can’t you just tell the sheriff that? Vernon might fire you for coming back after hours and sneaking in and out, but you wouldn’t be wanted by the law.”
Clancy knew that she had to tell Sarah the rest. “As I was leaving, I realized someone was standing at Esther’s window watching me. The person was looking directly at me, and after what I now know, it wasn’t Esther.”
“Who was it?” Sarah asked, sounding a little breathless.
“That’s just it, I couldn’t tell with the face in shadow.
I assumed it was Esther. But it was after midnight by then.
I remember because I’d just looked at my phone.
Sarah, it had to be the killer. According to what you texted me, Esther was already dead.
” The silence on the other end of the line stretched out so long that Clancy was afraid they’d been disconnected.
“I don’t know what to say.”
“I didn’t kill her,” Clancy said quickly.
“I swear I didn’t, but something told me it wasn’t Esther at that window even before I knew she was already dead.
” She shuddered even now in the warm bedroom.
“The killer saw me! I figured whoever it was would come after me thinking I could recognize him. Or her.”
“But you didn’t get a good look?”
“No, so I don’t really have anything to tell the sheriff that would help him find the person. Hasn’t he turned up anything at the rest home?” she asked hopefully.
“Not that I know of except… Did you know Esther was a kleptomaniac? She’d been stealing from everyone. Everyone thinks one of the residents killed her because of something she took from her room.”
“Like what?” Clancy looked at the bed, where the plastic bag of jewelry lay.
“Something valuable that they wanted back.”
“Valuable? Really? From what I saw, all she had was a bunch of ugly costume jewelry.”
“You saw some of it?” Sarah asked, sounding surprised.
“She had this plastic bag with a bunch of junk jewelry in it that she tried to pay me with instead of cash.”
“What did you do with it?”
“I refused to take it! I could tell how badly she wanted to get rid of it. I figured she’d stolen it and didn’t want to be caught with it.”
“So you don’t have it?”
Clancy heard a noise out in the hall. Had someone been outside the guest room, listening in on her call? “I have to go, but I’ll call back when I can.” She disconnected quickly and stood listening. How much could a person standing outside her room have heard of her conversation? Too much.
By the time she’d taken a quick shower and dressed in clean, warm clothing, she heard a tap at her door announcing the food was ready.
Clancy thought about Shady Rest and the sheriff.
He was looking for her, had law officers across the state on her trail.
With a groan, she told herself that she should have stayed instead of taking off the way she had.
Too late for that now, she thought, unable to tell if she was more hungry or exhausted or maybe just running scared.
Hunger won out as she opened the bedroom door and followed the sound of voices and the wonderful scent of food down the hallway.
As she came in view of the kitchen, she saw John setting the table and Tanner dishing up food into large bowls.
She wondered who all was joining them, but then noticed that the rancher had only put out table settings for four people.
She hoped she wasn’t expected to eat all that food.