A Grizzly Discovery

11

When Sophie and I got home—Charlotte was already long gone to Portland for her medical school studies—we only had to wait about five minutes before Jason arrived as well. As soon as he heard about our encounter with Matt Smith on Main Street, he was pissed.

“So he pretty much confirmed it was him. I knew it,” Jason said, angrily pacing around the living room. Sprinkles, Sophie’s dog, was following after him, wagging his tail and trying to calm him down. Jason finally sat down on the couch and gave Sprinkles a pat on the head.

“I agree,” I said. “I wasn’t sure before, but I am now. I definitely think it was him.”

“On the bright side, maybe Chief Gary will put him in holding and accidentally lose the key,” Sophie said.

“It’s just an intimidation tactic,” I said. “He wants me to suffer for ruining his business deal. Well, too bad for him, I’m not backing down. I’m going to find an investor to buy the property.”

“Now that’s the fighting spirit from the Angie I know,” Jason grinned at me. “You will need to be more careful though. If he’s willing to vandalize your business, who knows how far he’ll go to get that property out from under you.”

“Well hopefully Chief Gary will have enough to lock him up, and then maybe he’ll get the hint and leave town,” I replied.

“Hopefully, but I wouldn’t count on it.”

“Well, I’m not going to live like a monk because one guy has it out for me,” I continued.

“Of course not. But just… be careful,” Jason said, looking worried. “I can kick his butt if he comes near you when I’m around, but if he doesn’t, well…”

I took the sandwich Jason brought over and put it on a plate, then went over to the couch and sat down next to him. Sophie took a spot on the armchair.

“I agree with Jason,” she said.

“What kind of best friend are you?” I replied through a big bite of sandwich. “You’re supposed to be on my side.”

“And you’re supposed to be able to eat like an adult,” Sophie said, scrunching up her face at my eating habits. “But Jason’s right. You need to be more careful. Maybe carry a can of mace around or something.”

“Isn’t that illegal?”

“I doubt anyone will care if you stop him from attacking you with it.”

“I don’t think that’s how the law works,” Jason piped in. “But I like the sentiment. Maybe a legal weapon of some kind.”

“If you’d like I can follow you around and claw him if I see him,” Bee said from her spot on top of the bookshelf. “I miss the feeling of human flesh under my claws.”

I smiled at my cat. With Jason around, I couldn’t answer her, and she knew it. Bee could be incredibly loyal, and also so creepy and weird at the same time.

“Ok,” I said. “I promise I’ll be careful from now on.”

“Good,” Jason said. “Also, I meant to tell you earlier, I went and saw Chief Gary late last night. I gave him the phone.”

“And so he’s going to re-open the murder investigation?” Sophie asked. Jason shook his head.

“No. He said that while it’s good that I brought it in, as long as the coroner declares the cause of death to be a bear attack, he can’t investigate anything. He said he’ll bring the new evidence to the coroner, but he doesn’t expect much. However, he did say that the search for the diamond is a separate case, and that the police are onto that now.”

I sighed. “Well that’s still not really going to help find Jeremy Wallace’s killer.”

“True, but it’s still better than nothing.”

“Yeah, I guess. Still, it’s frustrating. People are scared of bears, and the more we look into this, the more obvious it is that Jeremy Wallace was killed by a person. It’s only a matter of time before someone goes around killing the bears around Willow Bay just because they’re afraid. And it seems like Chief Gary isn’t doing anything to stop that from happening.”

“Well, saving bears isn’t his job,” Sophie pointed out. “Saving people is.”

“No, his job is to maintain law and order in Willow Bay. As far as I’m concerned, that includes not killing defenseless animals just because people are a bit scared of them.”

“It also hasn’t happened yet,” Jason added. “There have been no reports of bears killed.”

“It will, though. It’s only a matter of time. That’s why I need to solve this as fast as possible.”

I didn’t know why, but I was pissed off. I was angry. Maybe it was the combination of Chief Gary refusing to face facts, the scare Sophie and I had gotten in the hotel room and the vet clinic being vandalized. Everything was coming to the surface, and I could tell I was about to erupt with rage if I didn’t do something soon.

“I’m going out,” I declared, grabbing a jacket off the rack by the door. “I need some time to myself. I need to think about things.”

“That sounds like a good idea,” Jason replied. “We’ll be here when you get back.”

“That’s Jason politely avoiding the fact that you’re acting like a crazy person,” Sophie replied, earning herself a glare from Jason.

“I did not say that at all. Angie’s obviously stressed, and I think maybe a walk alone could be incredibly helpful.”

“Thanks, babe,” I told Jason with a small smile, and headed out the door before I said something to Sophie that I’d later regret.

“Stupid everything,” I muttered to myself as I headed down toward Main Street. I made sure to keep my head down, and I’d grabbed a hat before leaving. On top of everything else, I didn’t want to run into anyone that wanted to chat about my vet clinic being vandalized. I was going to kill Matt Smith. Well, maybe not literally. But I was definitely going to step up my efforts to find an investor interested in the shop. Maybe I should ask Lisa, Sophie’s mom. She ran an accounting business out of Portland; there was a good chance she knew a bunch of rich people. Maybe one of them would want an investment property on our side of things.

Instinctively, I began walking toward Main Street, although I made sure to avoid the vet clinic side. I began to head the other way, toward the library and the beach, when suddenly I saw a familiar face: it was Andrew, one of the men who had broken into Jeremy Wallace’s hotel room. My eyes widened for a minute, then I had a split second to make a decision. Darting into a small alleyway between two buildings, I looked around. Good, no one was around.

“Nonvideroa,” I whispered, pointing at myself, and instantly my body disappeared. I went back into the street, where Andrew was walking away from me. I followed about six feet behind him—I knew that since I was invisible, as long as I made sure not to make any noise or bump into anything, there would be no way for him to know I was there. Andrew continued down Main Street and made his way toward the library. He nodded at Rose, the librarian, on his way in, and I followed close behind him. Andrew looked like a man who knew where he was going.

Instead of making his way to the racks, Andrew went up the stairs to the second floor, where a bunch of the older historical records of Willow Bay were kept. This obviously wasn’t by accident; the second floor of the library was often completely deserted. Sure enough, Andrew and I were the only two people there now.

Andrew sat in one of the chairs at one of the tables and took out his phone. I moved over behind him, but it turned out he was only playing Clash of Clans. Great.

I moved over to the corner and waited for about five minutes. Then, there was noise coming from the stairs. A minute later, Jack showed up.

“Look who’s early, for once,” Jack said to Andrew, who looked up lazily from his phone.

“Well, it’s not like there’s anything else to do in this town. The hotel doesn’t even have decent Wi-Fi.”

“Yes, truly a tragedy for the ages.”

“Hey, if the only car on the road was a Ford Focus you’d probably get pretty antsy too,” Andrew replied. Just then, another man came up the stairs. He was tall, and beefy, with sandy blonde hair and an authoritative face. He looked like the kind of person people listened to, and when he spoke, he had the voice to match.

“Where on earth is Claire? That woman is the least punctual person I’ve ever met.”

“Relax, Kevin,” came a familiar voice from the stairs, and I realized as she made her way into the room that I’d seen her before. Claire was the girl from the coffee shop who was asking questions and told Betty and I she was from a farm in Montana! “I’m here. I’m like, two minutes late.”

“Two minutes was what got Billy Bite-me shot by the cops back in ’97,” Kevin replied.

“And we’re not on a job, so we don’t need to be on time. Besides, the cops don’t even know that Jeremy was one of us. Hell, they don’t even know we’re all here in town now.”

“I’d like to keep it that way too, so why don’t we all keep our voices down,” Jack ordered, and the four of them settled into chairs, making a loose circle. I moved to the outside of their little circle, sitting on the floor against the wall about four feet away. I could still hear them, easily, but they couldn’t see me.

“So why did you call this meeting anyway, Jack?” Kevin asked, his eyes boring into the other man. I had a feeling Kevin was the leader of the group, but Jack was definitely second-in-command.

“We need to figure this out. I know things went sideways with the group as soon as Jeremy took off with the diamond.”

“Gee, you think?” Claire mumbled under her breath, earning a glare from Jack.

“I know one of us is a murderer,” Jack said. “I don’t know who among us it is. But I also suspect that whoever it is didn’t get the secret of where the diamond was hidden from Jeremy before they killed him, which was just monumentally stupid.”

The air in the room was so thick as Jack looked around, you could cut it with a knife.

“I also know that whoever finds it now is almost certainly going to take off with it.”

“I wasn’t going to do that,” Claire argued. “You might be thinking of it, but if I find the diamond, I still say we split it four ways. It’s not like any of us are going to be in the poor house after my man in New York cuts it up for us.”

“Screw the rest of you,” Kevin growled. “It’s time to lay low. This is too risky. The job was risky to begin with, and it paid off, and then we got screwed by one of our own. I’m not going to sit around this dumb town and wait for the cops to find out about us. I’ve got about another week in me, and then I’m laying low for a while. Twelve million might be nice, but not being in jail is even nicer.”

“Enough,” Jack barked, making me jump. “The only way we’re going to find this diamond again is by working together. This is a whole new job. If you want out, go now. I’m looking at you, Kevin. But if you want to band together again, and work together to try and find the score that’s legitimately ours, well, stay here.”

There was complete and total silence for around thirty seconds while all four thieves looked at each other. Everyone seemed to look extra hard at Kevin. Finally, the man sighed.

“Fine,” he said. “I’ll stay. You’re right. Four heads are better than one. I’d rather have a quarter of something than all of nothing.”

“Good,” Jack said. “And this time around, I’m the boss.”

Kevin paused for a minute, then nodded his head once. “You got it. I should have never let Jeremy hold on to the diamond in the first place. I brought him into this job. I knew he was arrogant, but I didn’t think he’d steal from his crew. The man knew the code.”

“I thought you’d worked with him before,” Andrew said, and Kevin nodded.

“Yeah. I did. We worked together in London a few years back. Some high profile hits, we managed to take a couple major jewellery stores over three days for hundreds of millions worth of diamonds. The man was a genius at prosthetics and makeup. He’d held the bag then, and never ran off with it. That was why I trusted him now. But I guess the allure was too strong.”

“Well, the traitor paid for it in the end,” Claire muttered. “Although I’m not sure I like the idea of being in the room with a murderer.”

“We don’t have any other choice,” Kevin said. “Whoever killed Jeremy isn’t going to own up to it. Besides, it’s not like any of us disagree that he didn’t have it coming.”

“Exactly. Now, we move on. We have to find that diamond.”

“It’s one thing to keep saying it, how do we figure it out?” Andrew asked.

“Well I’ve been subtly asking around,” Claire offered. “Haven’t really gotten any good information from anyone here. Nothing that would help us. And it’s not exactly like I can go around asking anyone if they know a good spot to hide a giant diamond.”

“Look on the bright side; he could have decided to hide it in Seattle. Then we’d be completely out of luck,” Andrew said with a wry smile.

“That was probably where he was headed; it was a good thing Jack managed to follow him here and mess with his rental car at the gas station,” Jack said.

“Still, none of this gets us any closer to the diamond.”

“I might have an idea,” Jack said slowly, “but it will take a few days to sort out for sure. I vote we reconvene here on Wednesday, same time. I’ll know by then if my plan to find the diamond will work or not. In the meantime, in case it doesn’t, I want everyone to come up with a plan themselves. We discuss on Wednesday. By this time next week, we will have our diamond back. We’re not going to leave it in this random hick town for someone who thinks California is exotic to find.”

I was more than just a little bit insulted at the insult toward Willow Bay and its residents, but obviously didn’t say anything. I briefly considered “haunting” Jack for the comment, but since I’d get in major trouble for doing it, I decided it wasn’t worth the effort.

“Are you sure you’re up for this, Jack?” Claire asked. “I mean, we’re already on tenterhooks around each other. I don’t think anyone in this room trusts anyone else anymore. Should we really be getting together again to do this?”

“If you want out, say it now.”

“I’m not saying I want out. I’m saying maybe this is a bad idea to begin with.”

“If you think it’s a bad idea, leave.”

“If I had any idea where that diamond was, I would.”

Jack glared at Claire. “I could kick you out of the group just for those comments. After all, you’re the one with the diamond connection. You could run off with it and have the diamond be in 50 different pieces for resale in less than a day.”

“Yeah, I could. So doesn’t it say something that I’m actually here?” she replied, folding her arms.

“Just that you can’t figure out where the diamond is on your own and you need our help,” Jack replied. Suddenly, Kevin broke in.

“Stop it. Both of you. Claire’s right, there’s not a lot of trust in this room right now. It’s not going to get helped with arguments like this. Claire, are you in?”

Claire nodded. “Fine. Then act like it.” She scowled, but stayed silent, shooting daggers at Jack. As the meeting broke up, I could tell this was definitely not a group of people who were comfortable with one another.

I slipped out of the library behind the others and thought about what I’d learned. It seemed that none of them actually had any idea where the diamond was. If they did, they would have left and gone off with it, or shared the information with the others. I was certain now: Jeremy Wallace had died with his secret.

It was obvious from the infighting within the group that there wasn’t very much trust there, and that they were getting pretty frustrated with not having the diamond. I wondered what Jack’s plan was to find it. I supposed on Wednesday I would know. I wasn’t going to let anything get in the way of me being at that meeting again.