No Escape Claws

Chapter 1

The first thing I saw when I made it to the back wall of the storage unit was Elvis, sitting on top of a wooden casket. He looked at me, cocking his head to one side, and his expression seemed to say, Look what I found!

“Good grief, what’s that doing in here?” I said.

He didn’t answer. Not that I expected him to, seeing as he was a small, black cat and not the swivel-hipped King of Rock and Roll.

I reached up and ran my hand over the smooth surface of the long wooden box. When I’d bought the contents of the storage space—and a second one three doors down—I’d given things a cursory check, just enough to feel comfortable about making an offer. The fact that the owner of the building had taken that offer without haggling had made me wish I’d offered a little less. At the time, I hadn’t spotted the coffin—that’s definitely what it was—sitting on several wooden packing crates by the end wall.

“Hey, Sarah, you all right?” my brother Liam called. He’d come along as muscle to help me load my SUV and the trailer it was pulling. He’d been in town for several days, consulting on the harbor front development project.

“I’m fine,” I said, raising my voice a little so he could hear me. “You won’t believe what Elvis found.”

“Let me guess. The real Elvis in one of those white jumpsuits?”

The cat Elvis, who as far as he was concerned was the real Elvis, wrinkled his nose as though he’d understood Liam’s words.

“Ha-ha. Very funny,” I said. “No, he found a coffin.” I looked around for Charlotte but couldn’t see her. Charlotte Elliot worked for me part-time. She was also one of my grandmother’s closest friends, which was how she’d ended up with a job at my shop.

“Ha-ha. Very funny back at you,” Liam retorted. I could hear him moving boxes and furniture out of the way as he made his way to me.

“I’m not joking. It has to be at least six feet long. I think someone made it.”

“It’s probably just some big wooden box.” He gave a grunt of effort and I saw a stack of boxes behind me shift sideways.

“There’s a cross carved on the top and there are four handles on the side. It’s a casket.”

Liam poked his head above a six-foot-long metal toboggan that was blocking his way and grinned at me. He was a shade over six feet himself, with blond hair and blue-gray eyes. “You better hope the person who rented this space wasn’t trying to save money in other ways besides not paying for the last six months.” He craned his neck and studied the wooden box. “Assuming that’s not the person who rented the space in the first place.”

There was an orange foam football sitting on an upside-down wooden chair that looked like it had been wrapped in zebra-print duct tape. I threw the football at his head. It bounced off his left shoulder and landed near his feet.

“Your elbow’s too high,” he said. “Your arm should be making a right angle.”

I stuck out my tongue at him.

Elvis’s curiosity seemed to be getting the better of him. He scratched at the edge of the wooden box then looked at me.

“You’re right,” I said. “We should take a look inside, but you’ll have to move.” I picked him up and put him on the seat of the flipped-over chair. My hair was coming loose from the ponytail I’d pulled it into when we’d arrived at the warehouse. I yanked the elastic loose, raked my fingers through my hair and refastened it.

“You’re not really going to look inside that thing, are you?” Liam asked.

“It’s pretty much the only way we’re going to find out what’s in there.” I looked over my shoulder at him. “And by the way, if that box actually does have an occupant they’ll hear me scream over at the shop.”

Liam snatched the foam football from the floor. “I’m ready to protect you,” he said, a grin pulling at the corners of his mouth.

“Good to know that if there’s a zombie inside you’ll bean him with a perfect spiral,” I said dryly.

He traced a finger down the outside of his left arm. “Note the perfect right angle, which is what will enable me to throw that perfect spiral, should it become necessary, baby sister.” Liam—who was technically my stepbrother—was a month older and never let me forget it.

I laughed and shook my head. He was such a smartass.

Then I hooked my fingers under the thin edge of the lid, blew out a breath and lifted. Elvis craned his neck to see. We exchanged a look.

“So?” Liam couldn’t see the inside of the casket from where he was standing.

“Well, I wasn’t expecting this,” I said. The cat murped his agreement, whiskers twitching.

“Expecting what?” Liam asked impatiently.

I glanced over my shoulder at him again.

He looked at me with one raised eyebrow. “I was only kidding before about someone actually being—” He stopped for a moment. “There isn’t, is there?”

“It’s full of tea,” I said.

“Tea?” His eyes darted from side to side and a frown knotted his forehead.

“Uh-huh,” I said. “Boxes of tea, lots of them. And two, maybe three, Pendleton blankets.” I ran my hand over the soft, cream-colored wool with the traditional green, red, yellow and black stripes at the border. “We shouldn’t have any problem selling these in the shop.”

My business, Second Chance, was a cross between a vintage store and a secondhand shop. We sold everything from furniture to dishes to guitars—mostly things from the fifties through the seventies. Some of our stock had been repurposed from its original use: a side table made from an old library card catalog cabinet or a lawyer’s bookcase turned nightstand. But much of it just needed someone to appreciate its beauty.

The store was located in an old red brick house from the late 1800s, at the edge of downtown North Harbor, Maine. We were maybe a fifteen- to twenty-minute walk from the harbor front and not far from the off-ramp for the highway, which meant we were easy for tourists to get to.

As a kid I’d spent my summers in North Harbor with my grandmother, my dad’s mom. It was where my father had grown up. Eventually I’d bought a house that I’d renovated and rented. For several years I was the host of a late-night syndicated radio show that featured classic rock music. When the media company that owned my station and seven others changed hands, I was replaced by a music feed from California and a nineteen-year-old with a tan and ombre hair who gave the temperature every hour. I’d landed on Gram’s doorstep, at the urging of my mom, to try to figure out what I wanted to do next. I’d ended up staying in North Harbor and opening Second Chance.

I picked up one of the boxes of tea and checked the label for the best-before date. “Hey, this is good for another six months.”

“You’re not really going to drink that stuff, are you?” Liam asked.

“Sarah, what brand of tea is it?” Charlotte called.

“Red Rose,” I said.

“Proper tea bags?” Charlotte took her tea very seriously.

“As far as I can tell.”

“And how many tea bags are there in the box?”

I turned it over in my hands. “Seventy-two.” I looked at the other boxes packed carefully in the wooden casket. “There must be a dozen boxes here at least.”

Charlotte appeared then behind Liam. She was wearing a chambray shirt with the sleeves rolled up. She reminded me of actress Helen Mirren. She was tall with lovely posture and white hair cut in a sleek, chin-length bob.

“And a red box,” she said, beaming at me. “Splendid!”

“Why does the color of the box matter?” Liam asked, a look of puzzlement on his face.

“Because it tells me that it’s Canadian Red Rose tea,” Charlotte said.

I nodded because I knew what she meant. Liam didn’t. He frowned. “And the nationality of the tea is important because?”

“Because it’s orange pekoe, which is Rose’s favorite,” I said.

Rose Jackson was another of my grandmother’s longtime friends, a tiny dynamo in sensible shoes. She also worked for me part-time. She swore the Canadian version of Red Rose tea made a very different cup from the tea the company sold here. Any time we went “across the lines,” as she called a trip over the US/Canadian border, our first stop was always a grocery store so Rose could replenish her stash. I knew she’d be tickled with this find.

Rose was also like a second grandmother to me and to Liam. She doted on him and he in turn would do anything for her, including, it turned out, carry a six-foot coffin outside and strap it to the trailer attached to the back of my SUV.

“I have a feeling I’d like whoever rented this storage unit,” Charlotte said, putting her arm around my shoulders. “He or she was clearly a very practical person.” She patted the top of the casket. “Short-term storage for now and long-term storage for later. Very sensible.”

Liam rolled his eyes and Charlotte winked at me.

“You’re not going to actually sell that thing in the store, are you?” he asked.

“I’m not sure,” I said. “We’ve sold some pretty odd things.” I nudged Charlotte with my hip. “Do you remember that suit of armor?”

“I most certainly do,” she said with a smile. “I’m the one who cleaned and polished it. And don’t forget about those department-store mannequins.”

I nodded in agreement. The life-sized figures had come from a department store that had gone out of business. To my amazement it turned out there were people who collected old department store mannequins. After a short stint in our front window as members of the band KISS—part of our Halloween window display—the four figures had been disassembled, packed and shipped to a man in northern Michigan.

I studied the long wooden box. “This may be pushing it, though,” I said. “But I’m pretty sure Avery will be able to come up with a way to use this in the front-window display for Halloween.”

“Whatever she does it will be creative,” Charlotte said. “You know she’s been painting pumpkins black, don’t you?”

I nodded. “She asked me for black paint, cheesecloth and twinkle lights. I don’t have any doubt that window will be creative.”

Avery wasn’t one of my grandmother’s friends. She was, however, the granddaughter of one of them, Elizabeth Emmerson Kiley French, aka Liz. The teen had come to live with her grandmother after some issues at home. Avery went to a progressive private school that only had classes in the morning. In the afternoon she worked for me, a setup that had turned out well for everyone.

Liam had wrapped the long wooden box in a couple of padded moving blankets. He checked the tension on the bungee cords holding it in place on the trailer and then straightened up, brushing off his hands. “You know Christmas is coming and Dad does like practical presents,” he began with a teasing smile.

I shook my head emphatically. “No. We are not giving Dad a casket for Christmas.”

He cocked his head to one side. “I’m serious. You know how hard it is to figure out what to get for him.” The gleam in his blue-gray eyes told me he wasn’t really that serious.

“No,” I said once more. “We’re not giving our father a gift that says Merry Christmas, Peace on Earth, Is your will up to date?” I held up one hand before he could say anything else. “However, as you like to remind me, you are older than I am, so if you want it, consider it yours.”

I’d seen Liam set the foam football on top of a cardboard carton in the trailer before he grabbed the bungee cords, so I was ready when he launched it in my direction. I snagged the ball out of the air and did my end-zone victory dance, which I admit looks a lot like the Bird Dance. Then I handed the ball to Charlotte and went back inside.

I cast a critical eye around the storage unit, trying to decide what would fit in the space we had left in the trailer and the SUV. Charlotte had discovered several boxes of books. They should fit into the back of the SUV, I decided. The books all seemed to be hardcover and would probably bring a few dollars each.

“I’ll check out all of them,” Charlotte said as we carried the cartons out. “Maybe we’ll get lucky and find a first edition or two.”

It wasn’t that far-fetched. We’d found treasures before in odder places, including a Les Paul guitar in a barn and a Marklin model train in a pack rat’s home. Our stock came from a variety of places: yard sales, flea markets, people looking to downsize. I’d once rescued a table from a ditch by the side of the road. I was also a regular customer of a couple of trash pickers. I’d already let one of those pickers—Teresa Reynard—go through the leftovers from the first storage unit we’d cleared out and I’d promised her the chance to go through the remains of this unit as well.

We strapped the toboggan Liam had discovered and a vintage wooden sled next to the casket in the trailer and filled the SUV with boxes. By the time we were ready to leave, the unit looked a lot emptier. By my estimate the contents of the first storage space would recoup more than what I paid for both, which meant the second one would be all profit.

Charlotte and I—along with Elvis—headed back to Second Chance in the SUV. Liam followed in his truck, which we’d also filled with a snow blower, a wheelbarrow and a collection of wire racks and rods that I was fairly certain was a closet organizing system, and several boxes of vintage canning jars.

I was very glad to have Liam’s help. Normally Mac, my second in command, would have been with us. Mac Mackenzie was the proverbial jack-of-all-trades. There wasn’t anything he couldn’t fix or reconfigure as far as I’d seen. He was all lean, strong muscle with light brown skin, dark eyes and close-cropped black hair.

Mac had given up his life as a financial adviser in Boston to come to Maine and sail every chance he got. Eventually he wanted to build his own wooden boat. He’d come to work with me when the shop first opened because, he’d said, he liked working with his hands. Second Chance was my store, but Mac was more partner than employee. Most important, he was my friend. Beyond that, I wasn’t sure.

I missed him like crazy. Mac had been back in Boston for the last month, spending time with his former wife who was in a rehabilitation center after a carbon monoxide leak had left her in a permanent coma. Two weeks after he’d left, his wife, Leila, had died. Liz, Rose, Rose’s gentleman friend, Alfred Peterson, and I had driven down for the memorial service. We hadn’t seen Mac since. He had stayed in Boston to wrap up Leila’s affairs. He and I often talked on the phone late at night, and more and more I found myself looking forward to those conversations and to the texts we’d sometimes exchange during the day. He’d texted me that morning.

Having a healthy breakfast?

I’d laughed at the words. Mac knew that what I most needed first thing in the morning was coffee and lots of it.

A bacon sandwich and coffee, I’d texted back.

His response made me laugh. Elvis craned his head toward my phone on the counter almost as though he were trying to see what was so funny. The four main food groups: sugar, salt, fat, caffeine.

There’s tomato in the sandwich. That’s a vegetable.

Elvis fixed his green eyes on my face and tipped his head to one side. It was the same pose he used on customers in the shop. I should have been immune, but he was cute, especially with the scar that cut across his nose. I fished a bit of bacon out of my sandwich and held it out to him.

The phone signaled another message.

Tomatoes are technically a fruit.

I smiled at the phone, wishing we were having the conversation in person. So I’m having a fruit and a vegetable.

That got me a single right bracket—Mac’s version of a smile emoji.

• • •

“Do you mind if I put my window down a little?” Charlotte asked as we headed back to the shop.

“Go ahead,” I said. It was a gorgeous September day, sunny and warm, and the slight breeze brought a hint of the ocean in through the SUV’s window.

North Harbor is located on the mid-coast of Maine. “Where the hills touch the sea” is the way the town has been described for more than two hundred and fifty years. It stretches from the Swift Hills in the north to the Atlantic Ocean in the south and is located north of Camden and Rockport, closer to Canada, which means we see lots of tourists from there. The full-time population is just over thirteen thousand, but that number triples in the summertime with summer residents and tourists. North Harbor is a lovely small town, full of beautiful old buildings, award-winning restaurants and quirky little shops. I’d never been sorry I’d decided to stay.

It didn’t take us long to unload everything once we got back to Second Chance. The boxes all went into the workroom behind the store and everything else went into the old garage at the end of the parking lot that Mac and Liam had converted to work space.

My brother was a building contractor who spent most of his time these days refurbishing older houses and sharing his expertise on other restoration projects. His specialty was passive solar technology and he was working on a plan to add solar panels to the garage work space in the spring. Liam had been back and forth to North Harbor several times since he’d started consulting on the harbor front project. He was staying with Charlotte’s son Nick.

“Where do you want the tea box?” Liam asked after everything else had been unloaded.

“Garage,” I said.

“Workroom,” Rose countered. She’d come out to see what we’d brought back. She was a good six inches shorter than me, with soft white hair and a warm smile. She fixed her gray eyes on me. “Sarah, dear, we need to unload all the tea and the blankets.” Charlotte had told her about our find. “It’ll be a lot easier to do that inside.” She ran a hand along the smooth wood of the top. “I think this is yellow birch,” she said approvingly. “An excellent choice.” She tipped her head to one side and looked at me. “Did you know shipbuilders in colonial times used yellow birch because the resin in the wood makes it more resistant to rot?”

“I didn’t,” I said, shaking my head. Rose was a former middle school teacher. She knew more about the history of the state than most of the texts in the library.

“I knew that,” Liam said, trying and failing not to look smug.

“Of course you did,” Rose said approvingly. “You were always good at history.” She reached over and patted his cheek. “You must be as dry as a covered bridge. I’ll get you a cup of coffee.”

She started for the shop and Liam gave up on trying to restrain his cat-that-swallowed-the-canary grin. “And no one likes a smartass, Liam,” she added without breaking stride or turning around.

I bit my tongue so I wouldn’t laugh until Rose was inside. Then I grinned at Liam. “She’s got your number,” I said.

He grinned back. “I swear Rose has eyes in the back of her head or maybe some kind of ESP.” He studied the wooden casket. “Do you think the two of us can get this thing inside?”

“We got it on the trailer,” I said. “Let me prop the door open and we’ll give it a try.”

I wedged the back door open while Liam undid the bungee cords and unwrapped the moving quilts. With a little grunting and more than a little swearing—not all of it on his part—we managed to get the tea-filled casket into the workroom.

Avery poked her head around the doors to the shop. “That is so awesome,” she exclaimed. Her dark hair was cut in shaggy layers and she was dressed all in black; the collection of bracelets on her left arm were the only color she wore. “When Charlotte said you found a coffin I thought she was gooning me.” She studied the long wooden box. “You think anyone’s actually used it?”

Like her grandmother, Avery wasn’t one to beat around the bush.

“Other than to store tea, no, I don’t think so,” I said.

She shrugged. “Cool,” she said and then disappeared around the door again.

Liam and I followed her into the shop. There were no customers—not surprising because Monday afternoons were usually quiet, especially in late September. The summer tourists were gone and it was too early for the leaf peepers. There was no sign of Elvis. He’d probably followed Rose upstairs for a treat. Avery was busy replenishing our covered bucket display.

In what could have turned out to be a moment of insanity I’d bought three dozen small galvanized buckets for what amounted to pennies each, from a flower shop that had gone out of business. Avery had come up with the idea to decorate the buckets with strips cut from area maps. We had a box full of them. The map-covered pails had been a big hit with tourists looking for a souvenir of their time in Maine with some practical appeal—the buckets were great for holding craft supplies or kitchen utensils.

Rose came down the stairs from the second floor then, carrying a cup of coffee for Liam and another for me.

“Thank you,” I said, taking the stoneware mug from her.

Charlotte was behind her, knotting her apron at the waist. “I thought I’d start unpacking the tea,” she said.

“You’re certain it’s Canadian tea?” Rose asked.

Charlotte looked at her friend over the top of her glasses before pushing them up her nose. “Of course I’m certain, Rose.”

Rose turned her attention to me. “And you think there could be a dozen boxes?”

“Maybe more,” I said.

She clasped her hands together and beamed at me. “Wonderful!”

I continued to look at her without saying anything.

Her cheeks turned pink, which just made her look like a naughty and adorable little girl. “I know I wasn’t exactly enthusiastic about you buying what was in those storage units.”

I nodded but still didn’t speak. “Did your cheese slide off your cracker, dear?” she’d asked when I came back from my meeting with the new owners of the storage warehouse to say I’d bought the contents of two units, close to sight unseen.

Now she reached over and patted my arm. “And I think we can all agree that this time I wasn’t as right as I usually am.”

I didn’t dare look at Liam because I knew if I did, I’d start to laugh.

Rose turned her attention back to Charlotte. “Before you get started, there was someone here looking for you.”

Charlotte frowned at her. “For me?”

“A young woman, not that much older than Avery. She said she’d be back.” Rose glanced at her watch. “Any time now.”

“Did she give you her name?” Charlotte asked.

“Mallory Pearson. I got the feeling she’s a former student.”

Charlotte nodded. “She is. She’d be close to twenty now. I wonder what she wants.”

Rose glanced out the front window at the street. “I think we’re about to find out,” she said.

Mallory Pearson came through the front door. She was tiny, as Charlotte had said, maybe twenty years old with blond hair in a thick braid over one shoulder, dressed in gray leggings and a blue hoodie. And she looked like the weight of the world was on her shoulders. She smiled when she saw Charlotte and her whole body seemed to sag with relief.

Rose shot me a look and I felt certain we were thinking the same thing. This wasn’t a social call.

Liam put a hand on my shoulder. “I’m going to get the last few boxes,” he said in a low voice.

I nodded. “I’ll be out in a minute.”

Charlotte had walked over to greet Mallory, wrapping her in a warm hug. Now she was listening intently as the young woman talked, her expression somber. Rose watched them for a moment then she leaned over to me. “I’m going to go start unpacking that tea,” she whispered.

As she turned to go Charlotte called to her. “Rose, could you wait a minute, please?”

Rose stopped, turning back around. Charlotte looked at me. “You, too, please,” she said. She put an arm around Mallory Pearson’s shoulder and they walked over to join Rose and me. “This is my friend Sarah Grayson,” she said. “She owns Second Chance.”

The young woman gave me a shy smile. “It’s nice to meet you,” she said. “I like your store.”

“Thank you,” I said.

She shifted her attention to Rose. “Hello again, Mrs. Jackson.”

Rose gave her a warm smile. “I’m glad you came back,” she said.

Charlotte gave Mallory’s shoulders a squeeze. “Tell them,” she urged.

Mallory took a breath and let it out. “I want to hire you,” she said, the words coming out in a rush. “I want you to get my father out of jail.”

I don’t know what I’d been expecting her to say but not this. Along with working for me part-time, Rose and Charlotte also ran a detective agency, Charlotte’s Angels. The team included Avery’s grandmother, Liz, and Rose’s gentleman friend, Mr. P. The name was a play on Charlie’s Angels, although for the most part they just went by the Angels. Mr. P. had met all the state’s requirements and received his private investigator’s license. The four of them were actually pretty good at solving mysteries, although they tended to pull everyone around them into their crime solving efforts—especially me.

“Who’s your father?” Rose asked.

“Mike Pearson,” Mallory said.

There was something familiar about the name but I couldn’t put it into context.

“He’s six months into a five-year sentence for criminal negligence in the death of my stepmother, Gina.” She stopped for a moment and swallowed hard before continuing. “He was beaten in jail. He has broken ribs, a concussion and bruises all over his body. He won’t make it through another four and a half years in that place.” She squared her shoulders, seeming to pull from some inner reserve of resolve. “And he doesn’t belong there anyway. He isn’t guilty of anything.”

“I remember Michael,” a voice said behind us. Liz had come in while Mallory was talking. I wasn’t sure how much of the conversation she’d heard but it seemed she’d heard enough. “He worked for the Emmerson Foundation one summer years ago.”

Mallory nodded. “I know. I’ve seen a photo of Dad with you, Mrs. French.”

Liz joined us, her heels tapping a sharp staccato on the wooden floor. She was always elegantly dressed, blond hair curled around her face. I’d never seen her in yoga pants or a sweatshirt. “Keep going,” she said to Mallory.

The young woman gave an almost imperceptible nod. “My stepmother was an alcoholic. She had been waiting for a bed in rehab. They told Dad to make sure she didn’t have access to lighters or matches. She’d started a fire once before when she was drinking. Our garage almost burned down. But that day Dad had found out that there was going to be a bed available for her in a place called Haven House.”

Now I could put the name into context. I remembered coverage of the story in the news: Gina Pearson had died in the fire that had gutted her home the previous December, just two weeks before Christmas. A barbecue lighter and a bottle of vodka had been found by her body.

“But wasn’t your stepmother’s death ruled an accident?” Rose asked, a frown creasing her forehead. “Why was your father charged with anything?”

Mallory played with the end of her long braid. “There was a witness. Our next-door neighbor who’s a retired judge, saw my dad at our house after the fire had started. He saw Dad walk away and . . . and he didn’t call 911. The police said he knew there was a chance that Gina was still inside . . .” She didn’t finish the sentence but she didn’t need to. The implication was that Mike Pearson had left his wife to die in that fire.

Mallory cleared her throat. “My father pled guilty. There was no trial. I know he only did that to spare my brothers and me. It was bad enough as it was.”

“What did your father say?” Charlotte asked. She kept her arm around the young woman’s shoulders. “How did he explain what happened?”

Mallory was already shaking her head. “That’s the thing. He didn’t. He’s never said anything about what happened.” Her chin came up and her gaze swept over us. “I know my dad. I know the kind of person he is. He wouldn’t have left Gina in that house if he’d known she was there. He wouldn’t have done that to anyone but especially not to her. She didn’t deserve him but that didn’t matter. He still loved her.”

Her mouth moved as though she were testing out what she wanted to say next. “Gina was fun before she started drinking. She was happy. She’d put on music and dance with us with that sparkly sort of look in her eyes and her hair swirling all around. Dad promised that he wouldn’t give up until she was that person again. He’s never made a promise he didn’t keep. You can ask anyone who knows him.”

“Mallory, where are you living right now?” Liz asked.

“Here, with our grandmother,” she said. “She used to live outside Washington—the city, not the state. She just came here to be with us. But she wants to move back there to give Greg and Austin, my brothers, a chance at a new start.”

She shifted to look at Charlotte. “Please, Mrs. Elliot. I won’t even be able to see Dad if we’re in Washington. He’ll die in that place and he shouldn’t even be there. Please.”

It was impossible not to feel for Mallory. Her family had been pulled apart. Why wouldn’t she want to save whatever she had left? I thought about my own dad. Technically, Peter Kennelly was my stepfather, but to me he was just Dad. And I was his child just as much as Liam was. If Dad were in prison, I would move heaven and earth to get him out.

Charlotte turned to face Mallory. “I can see how much you love your father,” she said. “I remember him when you were my student. He came to every parent-teacher night.”

“So you’ll help me?” Mallory asked. The hope etched on her face made my chest hurt.

“I have to talk to everyone else,” Charlotte said, her voice gentle. “I’m going to need a little time before I can give you an answer.”

Mallory’s face fell, but all she did was nod. She shifted her gaze to Rose and me. “Thank you for listening,” she said in a soft voice.

Charlotte walked her over to the front door. She gave Mallory a hug and the young woman left. Charlotte came back over to the three of us. I wasn’t sure what she was thinking. Her brown eyes were serious, but I couldn’t tell which way she was leaning. “So? What do you think?” she asked. “Should we take the case?”

“Yes,” Rose said, nodding her head.

Liz spoke at the same time. “No,” she said, shaking her head for emphasis.

I waited to see what Charlotte was going to say. Then I realized they were all looking at me.