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“You’re unhappy. Or angry. Or something,” he said. “Tell me what it is and we’ll work on it.”
“I think it’s mostly frustration,” I said, giving him the opening for some crack about how he could take care of that.
“Explain,” he said, and I realized he really did want to talk, which was so not like him, so I sat up, piled the pillows behind me, and leaned against the headboard. He did the same.
“The factory,” I said. “Cash suggested we work on it together, figure out how to use it, and I shot him down. Then I thought about it, thought about how much good it could do Burney and changed my mind.” I thought he’d say something there about me not working with Cash, but he just nodded, so I went on. “So I went back to the factory and he was there in Cleve’s office looking at the papers I’d sorted. I think he was looking for some paperwork he needs because he’s made a deal with some developer to sell it so they could tear it down and build box stores. Evidently land in Burney is a lot more expensive now. So that’s it. That’s done. Next week, the factory comes down.”
“What are you going to do?”
“Well, my first thought was to key Cash’s car.”
“Satisfying but not helpful,” Vince said.
“There’s something else,” I said. “Something I found hidden in Cleve’s office. Some kind of accounting ledger. But some of it’s in code. And I don’t have a clue how to decipher it. So no factory and no community center or theater . . .” I heard my voice go up and stopped before I burst into tears. Honestly, it was just an old factory, nothing to get upset about.
“Well, I can see why you’re upset,” Vince said. “Let me see the ledger.”
I got out of bed and found it in my laptop bag and broughtThe Blue Fairy Bookback to him, crawling in beside him as he flipped it open.
“Open in the middle,” I said.
Vince did so, revealing the cutout and the blue journal. He pried it out and opened it. “That’s weird.” He paged through the book. “A lot of money moving in and out. Probably all illegal. And the three letter things? That’s similar to what was on that bank statement I found in Navy’s car. I’ll have to compare them."
“It doesn’t matter,” I said, sinking back onto the pillows. “The factory is done for.”
“It matters,” Vince said. “Cleve was into some really bad stuff. If he kept a record of the money, it matters a lot. And the fact that he kept who he was getting it from and sending it to in code meant that he didn’t want anybody else reading it. I bet it has something to do with the money the Wolves were delivering to him. I believe Senator Wilcox, that’s Alex Wilcox, the current senator’s dead husband, is in here. This could be big, Liz. Tomorrow I’ll compare with the statement. See if anything doesn’t match. If nothing turns up, we’ll figure out Plan B.” He put the ledger on the table beside him and wrapped his arms around me. “So what are we going to do until then?”
I laughed because he was trying to make me laugh and because he was helping me without question and because he was Vince, which was all I needed, and then he kissed me, and I forgot about the factory and codes and frustration.
If there’s one thing Vince Cooper is good at, it’s fixing frustration.
FRIDAY
CHAPTER 31
The next morning Vince went to work, braced for whatever fresh hell O’Toole and Bartlett had dreamed up, and I put on my punctuation tee—a comma saying “Wait” and a question mark saying “What?”—figuring it was time Peri learned punctuation—and went up to run my five and devour one of Marianne’s breakfasts—baked omelets this time with lots of cheese and some kind of mushroom wine sauce that I would have thought was more steak-related but that turned out to be divine on baked eggs—and to take Peri to swim class. Olivia was at breakfast and Faye wasn’t, which was a huge improvement. Evidently Faye had yelled at Marianne about the lock on the fridge, and Anemone had suggested that Faye take her meals separately. In another building. Far away.
Olivia had already filled them in on the fight at JB’s, and I spent the drive to and from swim class explaining to Peri that fighting was bad. She said that Olivia had told her that I’d shoved some guy on the floor, and I explained that the guy had hit Vince, which undercut my argument but made perfect sense to Peri, who was also against people hitting Vince. When we got back to the Pink House Anemone and Olivia and I and, inevitably, Peri sat down and went over the plans for my house, while Veronica nestled in among Peri’s enormous pile of teddy bears and watched us carefully for signs of food. Or possibly badgers. I made a note to get her that stuffed badger. Veronica was also paying too much attention to the big Red Bear, mostly by peeing on it. They’d been spraying it down, trying to counteract the smell, but it was getting to be a problem.
Peri thought the house was too small—it would pretty much fit into the living room of the Pink House—but I told her that was what I wanted, so she nodded and asked where she’d be sleeping when she stayed over. Eyes on the prize, that’s our girl. I told her there’d be a daybed in the living room, and she said that was acceptable, so we were good on that one.
After lunch—brats on brioche buns piled high with sauerkraut, stringy melted cheese, and what I was pretty sure was homemade relish along with French fries sprinkled with salt and vinegar and a side salad to fool us into thinking we were eating healthy—I went to the factory, told Cash I’d already had lunch with Anemone when he asked me out to eat, and went through the books, looking for ones that shouldn’t be destroyed after he sold the place.
At that point, it was almost four, so I took a break and sat in Cleve’s creaky old office chair and looked around the place while I cleaned off my dusty fingers with a lemon scented wipe from the package Anemone had stuffed in my bag on my way out the door after lunch.
It was a beautiful room, with those eye windows and the blue paint even if it was cracked. And the soot-stained coffered ceiling was gorgeous, four sections around a center section that looked like, from where I sat at the desk, a monogram: CB. Cleveland Blue, master of all he surveyed. Then I looked closer. Those four coffers around the center had things painted in them, too.
I borrowed a ladder from one of the workers below and dragged it upstairs. I also borrowed some of their cleaning supplies and went to work on the ceiling, scrubbing gently to get off most of the soot on the coffers to see what was painted in each of them. When I’d got enough off to be able to see the paintings, I took a break and lay down on the floor to get my breath back—that had been a lot of scrubbing with my head at a weird angle—and tried to figure out what they meant.
The first section over the desk had an anchor in it over a blue sort of sea-looking background. The second section was yellow flowers on a branch. The third section was a sprig of purple flowers. And the fourth was a night sky, which is when I got it: Cleve’s three kids: Navy the anchor, Lavender the plant, and Skye the sky.
It was the second section, the yellow flowers, that was the stumper. Cleve only had three kids. And this one was a bunch of yellow flowers on a branch . . .
I think my subconscious got it before I did because I felt myself going cold, trying not to comprehend what—
My cell rang and I picked up and said, breathlessly, “What?”
“Liz?” Vince said, and my voice must have sounded funny, because he added, “what’s wrong?”
