He didn’t seem to appreciate my sarcasm. “Tools aren’t a big deal,” he said. “But there was something the guy who owned the shed didn’t report.”
One part of my mind was paying attention to the conversation, while the other was wondering how could anyone have mistaken Ford Harrison for Robin. He was tall and thin, so maybe his silhouette was similar. And at night, the darker cast of his skin might not be apparent. But Ford had a little goatee, close-clipped hair, and his arms were brawny and tattooed. His face was wider than Robin’s, his neck longer.
Stupid Jonathan Cohen.
“You used those keys again?” Virginia said. If I had to describe her expression, it would be “bewildered.” “You tried to steal Aurora’s purse? You went in her house?”
“I tried to look around while I was helping Arnie. But that Robin caught me. And the next day, the security system would be done, and they’d arm it. So I had to get back in,” Ford said. Virginia’s ex-boyfriend was looking angrier by the minute. Abruptly, I realized we should rein in the blaming. We didn’t need to emphasize the man’s stupidity.
Ford didn’t seem to have a gun, or at least it wasn’t visible—but he might have another weapon. Any minute he was going to make a decision as to how he’d proceed.
“Why’d you call these people, Marcy?” He glared at Virginia’s mother. “You’re always against me. Always telling Virgie how bad I am.”
I looked down so he wouldn’t see my face.
“I didn’t call them,” Marcy said, more calmly than I would have managed. “The minister here, he called me. He thought I’d be grieving because I didn’t know where my daughter was. He wanted to help. I thought maybe if Virginia explained…”
“You’ve known all along where Virginia was?” I could not help myself. I had to know.
“He brought her straight to my house because he has roommates in his apartment and he knew they couldn’t keep quiet about it. So she’s been hiding here since then. It’s been hard to keep the neighbors out. They all wanted to sympathize.”
All those police spending all those hours looking for Virginia, when she’d been here with her mother all along. I risked looking at Aubrey directly. He wasn’t overtly frightened, but he was very alert. He understood this was a bad situation. I couldn’t see it ending well for all of us.
I thought, None of them have a plan, either. I assumed Marcy had wanted me to hear her daughter’s side, so I wouldn’t be angry with Virginia for abandoning us. (It hadn’t worked, by the way.) Virginia had wanted to tell her story because she felt guilty, and because she knew she’d done a stupid thing by not calling the police immediately.
Ford Harrison was faced with a situation he couldn’t see a way out of; I could tell from his face that the man simply didn’t know what to do next.
Would he stop us if we tried to go? Would he hurt us? I couldn’t even guess.
“Who do you think killed Tracy Beal?” I asked Virginia directly. “I guess you read the newspaper stories, and you know she was a stalker.”
“It wasn’t me,” Virginia said. “And it wasn’t Ford, because I watched him drive away before I saw her in the house.”
“That’s all I care about,” I said, lying outright. “I understand why you left, and why you took Robin’s keys, and even why Ford wanted to get my purse back any way he could.” I hoped my nose wasn’t growing longer by the second. “I just want to know who killed Tracy.”
After all, how many people could have been prowling around our yard in the dark with a storm approaching? I had a sudden, simple association of ideas, but this wasn’t the time to pursue it. I had to get out of this impasse first.
“Ford, are you going to let us walk out of here?” I said. I stood to go, and Aubrey stood with me. I had no idea what he was thinking, but at least he wasn’t putting a spoke in my wheels. “You know this story has to be told. You know there’s no way around it.” I nodded at Aubrey. “We both have families. They know where we are. They’ll miss us.”
Ford looked baffled. He hadn’t thought this through when he’d come in Virginia’s mom’s back door. Maybe he was realizing that if he’d stayed out of it, this moment would have been much easier for everyone, including him. Virginia had explained her boyfriend’s actions much better than he could, though there seemed to be something he hadn’t yet told us. Ford shook his head like a bull pestered by a fly. “You’d better not tell the cops,” he said. But his threat was empty and pointless.
To make the moment absolutely excruciating, Virginia began crying. My nerves frayed a bit more. My unsettled hormones set up a dance in my system, and my anger grew to explosive levels. I could barely hold myself in check.
I’d thought we were possibly going to leave without any further trouble, but the sound of Virginia’s sobs triggered something in Ford.
“It’s your fault coming here,” he said with real anger in his voice, and he lunged at Aubrey, who was totally unprepared. Ford’s fist drew back to punch Aubrey in the head, and I just snapped. Before I could think, I leaped into the air and crashed into Ford and hit him upside his head with all the force I could muster.
He staggered sideways, tripped on an ottoman, and banged his head on the arm of a rocking chair as he went down.
I fared better. I staggered forward, but I was able to catch myself before I hit the floor.
“You killed him!” shrieked Virginia, as Aubrey pulled out his phone and dialed 911.
I almost said, I hope so. But that wasn’t true … well, not completely.
Chapter Twenty-three
The police had been parked outside the whole time. After studying Virginia’s phone, they’d concluded that it was obvious her ex-boyfriend knew what had happened that night. He hadn’t been at his apartment, so they’d staked out the Mitchell house. They didn’t know Virginia was there, but they figured it was likely Ford would at least stop in.
So they were inside in seconds after Aubrey’s call.
At least I got to talk to some different police.
It was a confusing hour.
Aubrey and I tried to explain why we were at Marcy Mitchell’s house. I tried to explain why I had hit Ford. Marcy tried to explain why she had consented to our visit. Virginia tried to tell the police that Ford wasn’t guilty of any wrongdoing. When they begged to differ, she behaved as though he was being dragged off to be burned at the stake, when in fact he was being taken to the nearest hospital to have a head X-ray.
Ford had come to right away, if he’d ever really been knocked out. He was highly indignant while he told the Truman police how I’d attacked him.
The largest cop started laughing.
“You’re really going to claim she knocked you out?” Officer Dale Finch said, when he could talk. He was a big, bluff man with a weathered face and thinning sandy hair. If you’d seen an entry for “cop” in a dictionary, Finch’s picture would have been right beside it.
Ford glowered down at me from his six foot plus. “She did, man.”