A Root Awakening: A Flower Shop Mystery (22 page)

“Do you see why you have to act fast? Sandra knows that I know that Daisy isn’t hers, and once she tells Norm about my visit, he’ll pull another disappearing act and those kids might be gone forever.”

“I hate to burst your bubble, Abby, but all I’ve heard so far is conjecture. Where’s this proof you mentioned?”

“Well, I have the sketch you faxed to me that you could compare with the actual child.”

“That’s it?”

“Wait. I have a hair from Daisy’s head that I found at their former residence. Long black hair with a red root.”

“And how do we prove it belongs to the girl without DNA testing?”

“Hold it up to her head, Reilly. The red roots and the rest of the length that was dyed black will be a perfect match.”

“Abby, seriously, do you think we could get a search warrant based on that?”

“Don’t you care about these kids, Reilly? They were taken from their parents. You have kids. Imagine what that would feel like. We can’t let the Joneses abscond with them again.”

“I understand your concern, Abby. I feel for their parents, too, but my hands are tied by the law. I can’t knock on their door and demand they hand over the kids. An investigation will have to be made based on more than a strand of hair and a five-year-old sketch.”

“So get it started, then.” I was boiling over with frustration. “Look, Reilly, at least find out if a little girl matching Daisy’s description was kidnapped about two years ago.”

“How do you know it was two years?”

“I don’t know for sure. It’s a hunch. Daisy is six and has vague memories of her mom and her dog, which would be consistent with a four-year-old’s memories. Don’t memories start at around the age of four? So do the math.” I had a sudden thought and said, “She might have been taken from a Maraville preschool. Norm Jones has been working as a janitor within the school system, and maybe that’s by design.”

Reilly let out a deep sigh. “Let me run it past the detectives. I’ll get back to you.”

“When? We might have only a day, Reilly.”

“I’ll try to talk to someone today. But even if I get them interested, nothing’s going to happen overnight.”

And overnight would be all it took to lose the kidnappers. It looked as though it would be up to Marco and me to stop them.

B
ack at my brother’s house, I had to stifle my impatience when Tara wanted to show me the results of her Internet search. I had only an hour until Marco was due home, and I wanted to do a search of my own that was much more important than pricing a bench.

“I couldn’t find anything like what Grandpa made, Auntie A,” my niece said, sitting on the sofa in their family room, her laptop on her knees, “so I took the closest things to it and made a list of links to them with their prices. Here, I’ll show you.”

“Could you put it in an e-mail and send it to me?” I asked, trying to snap Seedy’s leash onto her collar. It was proving difficult because she and Seedling were romping on the living room rug. “I have to get home. Seedy, come on! Hold still.”

“Sure, but what’s your rush?” Tara asked. “It’s your day off.”

“Unfortunately, Uncle Marco and I have to go to a funeral. Seedling, let go of the leash. Seedy, let go of Seedling’s stuffed dinosaur. Tara, would you help me, please?”

“Chill out, Aunt Abby,” Tara said as she picked up her puppy. “Nothing’s that important.”

She had no idea.

I finally got Seedy home and was relieved when she hobbled straight to her bed and curled up for a nap. I took a quick shower, then dressed in a tan silk shirt, black skirt, and black dress boots, made myself a sandwich, and fired up the laptop. I got into Marco’s favorite database and began a hunt for a four- or five-year-old kidnap victim in the Maraville area.

I’d barely begun when I heard the key in the lock.

“Hey,” Marco said with a smile, appearing in the doorway. “How’s my bird-of-paradise today?” He stopped to glance through the mail lying on a table by the door.

Setting aside the computer, I said, “You won’t believe what happened today.”

Without looking up, he said, “Let me shower and then you can tell me while I’m dressing.”

He’d obviously missed the urgency in my voice. I glanced at my watch, the gesture reminding me of Sandra. “We’ve got plenty of time. I’d rather tell you while everything is still fresh in my mind.”

Finally he looked at me. “This sounds serious.”

“It is serious. Children’s lives are at stake.”

Marco sat on the sofa beside me. “Tell me.”

I pulled out my cell phone and found the photos of Lorelei at the attic window. “First I need to start with what I discovered at the Victorian this morning.”

“You went back to see the house?”

“Just wait.” I showed him the photos and explained what I’d deduced about Sergio’s fall.

Marco took my phone and scrolled through the
photos a second time, his forehead furrowed. “What reason would Sandra have for pushing Sergio?”

“I don’t know yet, but I do know that Sandra and Norm are kidnappers.”

“Wait a minute, Abby. You’re confusing me. Let’s take one case at a time.”

“No, Marco, they’re not separate cases. Sergio did or saw something that morning that alarmed Sandra. She grabbed the mop and pushed him. Remember when I first spoke with her in front of the Victorian? The only thing she wanted to know was whether Sergio was dead. And when he didn’t die, they left town.

“We’ve been looking at the wrong suspects, Marco. And now that Sandra knows I’m onto them, they’ll leave again. I tried to get Reilly interested, but he gave me the usual blah-blah about the law and how his hands are tied.”

“Back up.” Marco sat back and folded his arms. “How does Sandra know you’re onto them?”

We really didn’t have much time, so I gave Marco the details of my visit as succinctly as possible.

“Okay, don’t scowl, Marco—I know I should have taken you with me. But here’s the kicker. Almost right after I noticed her red roots, Daisy said to me, ‘You look like my mommy.’ Now seriously, you remember Sandra. There’s no way I could have reminded Daisy of her. Daisy was talking about her real mother, who must have had red hair like mine. That’s why she gave me that odd look the first time we met.

“And here’s another thing. Twice now Daisy has insisted that she had a dog. The first time, Sandra brushed it off as an imaginary playmate. Today, though, Daisy got
a sharp rebuke. But she said back to Sandra almost defiantly, ‘I’m not telling a fib.’

“I believe her, Marco. And if she remembers having a dog, and her mom being a redhead, then she wasn’t taken as a baby like Bud was. She would’ve been at least four years old to remember things from her past.”

“You’re jumping all over the place, Sunshine. How do you know Bud was taken as an infant?”

I backed up once again and told him, wishing I’d thought to start at the beginning in the first place. But I was so agitated that I was in a rush to get him to help.

“Reilly said he’d talk to one of the detectives, but something needs to be done right away, like after the funeral, because the Joneses will move again—I can just feel it. You saw how fast they got out of New Chapel. I don’t want that to happen again, because we might never find them.”

“Other than what the nurse and Norm’s brother and the former neighbor told you, do you have any actual proof that these children aren’t the Joneses’?”

I jumped up and took the plastic bag out of my purse. “I have one of Daisy’s hairs. Look. You can see the red root.”

“Abby, you’re savvy enough by now to know that to prove this hair came from Daisy’s head, and not some previous tenant’s, a DNA test would have to be done on it. And then they’d have to compare it to Daisy’s DNA, which they’d have to have permission to take. Imagine getting Sandra’s approval for that if she is a kidnapper. And I haven’t even addressed your theory of how Sergio fell. If Sandra pushed him, what was her motive?”

“Like I said, I haven’t figured that out yet. But do you see the urgency?”

“What would you have us do? Kidnap them back?”

“Now you’re just being difficult. We’d have to set up a surveillance so we can follow them if they take off.”

“And then what?”

“Then—I don’t know. You’re the expert. How about we figure out how to get a sample of Daisy’s DNA for starters?”

Marco stood up. “Let’s get through the funeral and then we can talk about it.”

“But there’s no time to talk about it. Don’t you get it? If the cops won’t do something, we have to.”

Marco glanced at his watch. “Right now, I’m going to take a shower and get dressed. And then we are going to the funeral. And
then
we will talk about it.”

“I hate it when you go all dictator on me, Marco.”

“I’m not exactly loving it that you went rogue on this case, Abby. You put yourself in danger today, and I didn’t even know where you were. Did anyone know?”

When I didn’t answer, he said, “Not only that, but you lied several times about what you were doing in your free time.”

“That’s because you would have acted just like you are now.”

Marco was about to argue back but must have realized he would have proved my point. Clamping his mouth shut, he strode off to take a shower, and I returned to my computer to search for kidnapped little girls.

*   *   *

We were still at odds with each other as we took seats in the small chapel of the Happy Dreams Funeral Home. I
didn’t like being angry at Marco—it was hard to be angry and in love at the same time—but I felt justified. There was no way I was going to let the Joneses get away with kidnapping those kids. Somewhere there were heartbroken parents who needed our help. If Marco wouldn’t work with me, and if the cops wouldn’t get involved until they had more proof, then I’d go rogue again.

That very night.

*   *   *

Marco and I sat in a row with my mom and dad and Lottie and Grace, but we didn’t talk to each other. After the service, Rosa’s family had organized a dinner in the nearby Mexican restaurant’s upstairs banquet room, but I had made a unilateral decision not to attend the dinner, even though Lottie and Grace urged me to join them. I wasn’t in any frame of mind to sit and make small talk. I had children to save.

We were standing in a huddle—Lottie, Grace, Mom, Dad, Marco, and me—arguing about my leaving when Rosa came over to thank us for coming.

“You will come to the dinner, won’t you?” she asked, holding Lottie and Grace’s hands. “I would be honored.”

“Of course we will, love,” Grace said.

“You betcha, sweetie,” Lottie said. “We wouldn’t miss it.”

They gave me pointed looks.

“That helps more than I can say,” Rosa said, glancing at us with tears in her eyes. “I had more bad news yesterday.”

“Oh, no!” Grace said.

“What is it?” Lottie asked.

“My boss is having financial difficulties and cannot
even afford to buy his employees insurance now. He is cutting me back to part-time employment.”

“Oh, Rosa,” Mom said, stepping up to give her a hug. “I’m so sorry. But maybe this is your opportunity to find something even better.”

“That’s exactly what it is,” Lottie said. “You have to think positive thoughts, Rosa, so positive things will happen. It’s the law of attraction. You’re gonna find something you like even better. Watch and see.”

“Where?” Rosa asked with a shrug. “No one is hiring these days. It was only with Mr. Appleruth’s help that I managed to get this job.”

Lottie looked at me. Then Grace looked at me. Then Marco looked at me. Mom was still talking to Rosa, but Dad was looking at me, too. I knew they wanted me to offer Rosa a full-time job, but I couldn’t afford that. And even if I could, Bloomers was my sanctuary. My paradise. I didn’t want Rosa to claim it as hers, too. And why was it suddenly my responsibility to employ her?

I looked away. I felt awful, like the worst ogre there ever was.

“Well, I’d better wash my face and try to make myself presentable before I go over to the restaurant,” Rosa said. “I’ll see you all there, right?”

“Of course you will, love,” Grace said.

“We’ll be along in a jiffy,” Mom said.

They waited until Rosa had left the room to pounce on me. “Hire her, Abigail,” Mom said. “You’ll be doing a wonderful thing.”

“Do hire her, love,” Grace said. “She’ll appreciate it forever.”

“We don’t need another full-time person,” I said.

“Then make her a full-time part-timer,” Lottie said. “That way she can stay at her current position and work for us, too.”

I folded my arms across my chest and let them make their cases: Rosa would be an asset and a great teammate (that from Marco); a great draw for the Hispanic community; another pair of hands in the workroom, a talent-in-the-making (way to rub a raw nerve, Grace); and on and on.

“So what’s your problem with Rosa?” Marco asked. Marco, the man of my dreams–turned-dictator. “I thought we had this solved.”

“Solved?” Had I become just another case for him to
solve
?

“Figured out,” he corrected.

“Rosa has a temper,” I said. “I’m not convinced we would work well together, spending that much time with each other.”

“Well, there’s the pot calling the kettle black,” Grace said sotto voce.

“Oh, boy,” Dad said. “She’s got that stubborn look on her face. Pack it in, everyone. Our Abracadabra isn’t going to be swayed today.”

He had that right.

*   *   *

I stayed at the restaurant for one torturous hour, all the time imagining the furious packing that was no doubt happening at the Joneses’ house. With my nerves ready to snap, I said quietly to Marco, “I’m leaving. If you want to stay, my parents will bring you home.”

“Why would I stay without you?”

“Because you think I’m being a stubborn idiot.”

He didn’t argue, but he did come with me.

When we got home, Marco snapped the leash on Seedy’s collar to take her for a walk, so I said, “I’ll be gone when you get back. I’m heading to Maraville to stake out the Joneses’ house.”

“Did you think this through, Abby? What will you do if they take off?”

“Follow them. I’m not about to let those kids disappear.”

“What if they’re moving back to Bowling Green? Or fleeing to Canada?”

“Then I guess I’ll follow them there.”

He studied me, his eyes narrowed, so I calmly returned his gaze. Finally, he shook his head and muttered, “Stubborn woman.” Leading Seedy to the door, he paused to say, “I’ll be back in five minutes. Don’t leave without me.”

I turned away before he saw my elation. I had been hoping he’d say that.

After he and Seedy returned, we donned our black stakeout garb, packed some supplies in Marco’s duffel bag, and headed out.

*   *   *

We sat in the Prius a few doors away from our target, not talking. Finally Marco said, “Can we call a truce?”

“As long as there’s no pressure to hire Rosa.”

“Hey, you’re the boss at Bloomers. It’s your call.”

I turned toward him with a smile. “That’s what I’ve been waiting for everyone to remember. I’ll know when the time is right to hire more help.”

“Truce?”

“Truce.”

Marco held out his hand for me to shake. When I reached for it, he drew me into his arms instead. “I don’t like it when we argue, Sunshine. It really does take the sunshine out of my life.”

“I don’t like it when we argue, either—
Ouch
. The console is digging into my ribs.”