A Hoe Lot of Trouble (8 page)

Mrs. Sandowski continued to shuck corn.

Now, sitting here, just the two of us, I felt a hundred times a fool. What to do? What to say? Had I really volunteered to become embroiled in this mess? Unfortunately, it seemed as though I was already too involved to back out, that I didn't have a choice in the matter, even if I wanted to.

I leaned forward, propping my elbows on the table. "You have to trust someone, sometime, Mrs. Sandowski. Why not me? I have connections through my husband."

"Ah, yes. Detective Quinn." She said this as though she had some serious doubts about Kevin's character. Not that I blamed her. I now had serious doubts about his character too.

Grabbing an ear of corn, I ripped it open. "My point is I have access to certain information. And I can use my business as a cover while asking around about this land, and who's most interested in it. But most of all, you know me. I'd never do anything to hurt this family. I hate what's happening to all of you. And I hate that nothing's been done about it."

Lines creased her forehead as her brows dipped. "You're serious?"

I set my shucked ear with the others in a bowl near the edge of the table. "Completely."

She sighed heavily. "I don't know what you can do to help, Nina."

Corn silk clung to the table. "I'm not sure, either, but it's better than nothing being done at all, right?"

"Perhaps."

Feeling as though I'd just stumbled, flailing, over one hurdle, I pressed on, hoping to keep her talking. "When did all this start?"

Mrs. Sandowski rubbed her hands together. They were dark from the sun and dotted with liver spots. "I'd say three, four months ago. That's when we were approached by a developer about selling our land."

"Which developer?"

She picked at the strands of yellow corn silk left behind by the shucking and now covering the table. "Demming. John Demming."

Demming was a popular builder. His billboards dotted Freedom's landscape, and I thought I recalled seeing ads for his homes on TV.

"He offered us three million dollars for our house and land. Joe and I said no." Her voice cracked when she said her husband's name.

I picked another ear of corn from the pile. Softly, I said, "May I ask why?"

She shrugged, a delicate movement that said volumes. "This house was built by Timmy's great-great grandfather. I've lived here near all my life, since I married Joe at sixteen. Timmy was born in the upstairs bedroom. It's our
home
. I know it's not much to look at, but it's ours. The memories are here."

I could understand her reluctance, but three million dollars? "What happened then?"

"A few days after Demming's offer, the congressman came."

"Chanson?"

"Yes. He's a charming man, easy on the eyes, if you know what I mean, but he's arrogant."

I liked arrogant in a man. I've chalked it up to genetic defect and written it off as something I could never change. An arrogant man had confidence, was sure of himself, secure. He wasn't a pushover, and I'm sure Chanson tried every which way to get Mrs. Sandowski to sell.

"Pushy?" I'd seen Chanson on TV and he played the role of politician perfectly. Smooth, suave, amiable to a fault. He had to have some flaw, somewhere. But was he capable of murder?

"Not overly."

Well, there blew that theory.

"He has a way about him that makes you want to bend to his will. That if you don't, you're in the wrong."

"Do you think he has something to do with what's been happening here?" I dropped the gleaming golden corn on her teetering pile.

"Hard to say. He has a lot of money behind him, and he lives over there in that Vista View, so he has a stake in what happens too. I just don't know." She inhaled deeply. "He came armed with an offer of four point five million— money from a group of investors from Vista View, himself included. I said no and told him never to come back. So far, he hasn't."

She bandied about the huge sums as though they were pocket change. M
illions.
I couldn't imagine it.

"Demming came back and upped
his
offer," she said as calm as can be. "He doesn't understand about this being a home, a legacy. He thinks money can buy anything."

Glancing at the entryway, I thought it could certainly buy a new screen door, but I kept my mouth shut.

"I tried explaining to him that money wasn't everything, that it didn't buy happiness. That's when Demming offered five million."

Five million! "And you turned it down?" I said incredulously.

She shrugged, half smiled. "This house makes us happy. This is what's important to us, not padding our bank account." Swiping her hand across the table, she gathered all the corn silk into a paper bag at her feet.

She kept saying "our" and "us" as if Farmer Joe would come strolling in from the fields at any moment. It broke my heart and at the same time made me uneasy.

She glanced at me. "It was after that last refusal when the calls started."

"What were they like? Just hang-ups?"

Wiping her hands down her apron, she said, "No. Heavy breathing, then hanging up."

"Nothing was ever said?"

"No. It was always the same."

I bit my lip. "Did you try Star 69 or Caller ID?"

She shifted in her seat and began twisting her wedding ring. I looked down at my own hands, at the diamond band that seemed heavier each day.

"I tried that Star 69, but the number was unavailable."

"What about Caller ID?"

"Too expensive."

Frustrated, I picked at my nails. I had a niggling suspicion that she was holding something back from me, that she still wasn't entirely comfortable talking about her family's problems to an outsider. "Do you still get calls?" I asked.

She shook her head. "No. The calls stopped about a week after they started, and we were so relieved, but then the letters started showing up."

"Bridget mentioned them. What were they like?"

"They looked phony," she said, her voice a bit tight. "Like something copied right out of a movie. The letters were cut out of newspapers and magazines and glued onto a piece of paper, then the page was photocopied. That's what we got," she said with a frown. "The photocopied version."

"What did the notes say?"

"They always said the same thing."

"Which was?" I prompted, almost out of patience.

" 'Sell the land or face the consequences,' " she said, monotone.

Pretty blunt. "Consequences" was a fairly fancy word, so I figured whoever was sending the letters was educated, although I'd been wrong before.

I leaned in, hating the concern that wrinkled her brow. "And the police?"

"Were no help whatsoever. We let it be, figuring it would blow over once whoever this was figured out we weren't going nowhere." She paused a moment. "Bridget tell you about the sheep and the fire?"

"Yes. I'm sorry."

"At first we didn't want to involve Timmy and Bridget in our troubles, but with the sheep we knew we needed help. Unfortunately there wasn't much they could do either. Especially after they went to the police and nothing was done. The sheep were the first real sign that we were in for the long haul. We're afraid to drink our water. We still have well water. Who knows what someone may have dumped in there?"

That explained the bottled spring water. My blood pressure rose. This was why I'd volunteered to look into this. Whoever was terrorizing this family needed to be caught. And I just hoped I could be of some help.

I had a few ideas where to begin: an old friend at the fire department, meeting with Chanson, maybe Demming . . .

"I feel like we're prisoners in our own home. It's horrible."

Again, the "we're" and "our." I shifted, uncomfortable. A buzzer sounded and Mrs. Sandowski rose. She removed a bread tin from the oven and placed it on the stovetop. After pressing her fingers into the dough to test it, she turned off the oven.

"Smells good," I said, hoping she couldn't hear the rumbling of my tummy.

"You can take it with you."

"I couldn't."

"Nonsense. I have a dozen more in the freezer."

I brushed away that feeling of stealing from the poor. "Then, thank you."

She wiped her hands on a dish towel and sat down. "Do you really think you can help us?"

"I'm not sure if I
can
help, but I can try. Something has to be done."

She tugged on her plain gold wedding band. Her grief creased her forehead, tugged at the lines at her mouth. I looked up at the clock. It seemed as though I had been in the farmhouse for hours. I'd been there twenty minutes.

"Where would you start? What would you do?"

A piece of corn silk clung to the end of the table. I picked it off. A hint of worry lined her eyes and maybe a bit of fear as I said, "I need to talk to Congressman Chanson, and Demming too. The paramedics, maybe, and some friends at the police station. I might even talk with a few of the resi dents of Vista View—they know my name through my business, so I might be able to get them to talk to me. I'll see what I can find out."

She reached out, grabbed my hand, gave it a squeeze. "Thank you for helping. As much as I hate to admit it, Bridget is right. We do need help, but I just don't trust the police. Don't go to them, all right? And if they question you, you won't tell them about any of this, will you?"

I thought of Kevin and those boxers. Frankly, at the moment I never wanted to speak with him again. But if I found myself in over my head, it was nice to know I could go to him. "Not if I don't have to."

"Promise me."

Her gaze burned into me. With the pads of my fingers, I wiped the perspiration from my upper lip. "I promise," I said with reluctance.

"Please be careful."

"I will."

"And don't be worrying if you don't find anything. I have a feeling this will all be over soon."

As I drove away from the farm, a loaf of freshly baked bread and a half dozen ears of corn seat-belted in next to me, I couldn't help wondering what Mrs. Sandowski had meant by her last comment. Did she know something?

Feeling a little lost, I wondered what I had gotten myself into.

Scanning the floor as I entered the house, I grabbed the hockey stick from against the wall. Still no sign of Xena, but I wasn't going to walk around unarmed.

After finally plunging the sink and changing out of sweat-dampened jeans and into a pair of khaki shorts, I sat on the sofa, wondering where to begin my informal investigation. Chanson seemed my best bet. As a congressman and a resident of Vista View, he'd have a good overview of the whole situation.

I allowed my head to fall back against the cushion. I kept the hockey stick tightly gripped while my thoughts flitted from Xena to Bridget to Kevin to Riley, and to—of all things—my missing hoes.

The rumble of my stomach drowned out most of my coherent thoughts, so I gave up on trying to figure things out and went in search of lunch. I hadn't eaten all day and was beginning to get a bit dizzy.

Out the window I could see Mr. Cabrera carrying lumber into his backyard. "So it begins," I murmured under my breath.

From the fridge, I grabbed a Diet Coke. My stomach continued to yell at me. I was opening the drawer to grab a knife to cut into Mrs. Sandowski's bread when I saw the light blinking on the answering machine. Three messages. I figured they were all from my mother, but I decided to check. The first was from Kevin. No hello, just a tired, "What do you think you're doing?"

The kitchen echoed with my laughter. The next message, though, erased all my good humor. "This is Robert MacKenna. I'm the vice principal at Freedom High. I need to speak to you about your son, Riley. If you could call me at your earliest convenience I would appreciate it."

My mouth went dry as he read off the number. I made a quick grab for a pencil and copied it down.
Oh, Riley, Riley
.

The third message was a lot of heavy breathing and a hang-up. It shouldn't have bothered me, but it did. It was too coincidental and I didn't believe in coincidences—it's another one of my personal commandments.

My appetite vanished. I rewrapped the bread. And keeping a tight hold on the hockey stick, I checked the locks on all the doors.

As I drove to the high school to meet with Vice Principal MacKenna, I tried to ignore the memory of the hang-up phone call. It was probably just a wrong number.

Probably.

Definitely.

This wasn't merely an example of self-delusion—it really wasn't. I was flat-out lying to myself.

After I had arranged to meet with Riley's vice principal, I had called Kevin. After dodging his questions regarding the Sandowskis, I told him about the call from the school and mentioned the magazine under Riley's mattress. Kevin hadn't seemed overly concerned, but agreed to meet the vice principal with me.

Flipping on my blinker, I turned right into the high school's parking lot.

It must have been between bells because the halls were filled with teens. I spied the office and was walking toward it when someone grabbed my arm.

Whirling, I came face to face with a very angry Riley. His hand dropped as soon as I turned around.

"What are you doing here?" he whispered, looking stricken.

I stepped back. "I have an appointment to see your vice principal."

"Why?"

He seemed nervous, continually looking over his left shoulder. Following his gaze, I saw a group of boys huddled near a row of lockers.

Troublemakers. Not smash-your-mailbox troublemakers, but the real deal: drugs, stealing cars, shoplifting . . . You could tell by just looking at them. What was Riley doing?

I tried to control my temper, to not lash out and shake him until he came to his senses. I swayed slightly, a bit dizzy. "I don't know why he called me. Is there something I should know?"