Thompson Bay

Chapter 8

Stella stood back from the window listening on the phone. Her attention was split between the nervous caller and Roger, who was bagging leaves and twigs they had raked from the lawn around the cottage. She scowled when he dropped the rake and yanked his pants back up over his butt and wondered what the attraction had been when they first met in Vegas. He was an easy mark for marriage, that's why. If she had known back then what a pig he was she might have looked harder.

Elwood's whining brought her back and she placed her mouth against the phone.

"You have to be mad calling me here," She spat.

"What was I supposed to do? He knows, I'm sure."

"He doesn't know anything. He's guessing, Elwood, nothing more. There is no way he can know unless you tell him."

"But he pointed out the discrepancy!"

"You told him it was for cleaning up didn't you?"

"Yes but then he wanted to know who did it!"

Roger tossed his rake on the grass again and lumbered up toward the house. "I have to go. I'll call you later. Don't say another word to anyone." Stella closed her phone and hurried into the bathroom just as Roger barged in the door.

"Where the hell are you? I thought this was a job for both of us?"

"I'm in the bathroom, Rog. Be out in a minute. Sorry."

"Sorry, shit," he muttered heading for the fridge and a cold beer.

Elwood hung up slowly and chewed on his lip. He had been an idiot letting Stella talk him into her scheme. Charging the students extra and then passing the money onto her seemed nothing special at the time, he didn't even understand the reason... but now... The result of that decision suddenly made him squirm and he shot a glance at his receptionist in case she noticed his distress.

Stella had always gone along with his flirting, sometimes to the point that he actually thought they might get together, but it turned out to be nothing more than flirting on her part. It wasn't until she came with the lease papers that it went from the usual tease to an outright overture, which he greedily accepted right there in his office. The experience thoroughly controlled him; he enjoyed most of it with his eyes closed. Only when it was over did she show him the image captured on her cell phone camera.

"Just a little insurance for your discretion, Woody," she had said. What had he been thinking? He slapped his forehead at the memory. What he was always thinking, that was his problem.

******

Hilda Meyers sounded like a jolly, plump aunt, more than happy to help a stranger with a problem. Without a qualm she'd given Ray the home phone number of Carol Walther and wished him a pleasant day as she hung up. He chuckled at how easily some people treated personal information. Carol Walther was a different animal. She questioned Ray more than he had the opportunity to question her but in the end agreed to retell what she saw and what had happened as far as she knew.

The car—and Carol insisted there was one—was revealed to have been a sedan, by the silhouette, and that it had something on the roof like racks for skis or luggage. When he asked her how come that wasn't in her statement she snapped back that it certainly had been; the police just didn't want to listen because they found no evidence of a vehicle being parked there.

After a few more testy replies, Carol closed with a request he not bother her again and hung up. Ray figured that if she had been that bitchy it was no wonder the cops hadn't wanted to listen. He thought about the roof racks and circled the note in his binder as he lay down on the bed.