Til Death Do Us Part (A Darcy Sweet Cozy Mystery Book 16) (2 page)

***

It was Connor who challenged them to the game of Uno.  Darcy had forgotten how the simple card game could easily take up an entire evening.  The dinner dishes were washed and put away, and now she sat at the kitchen table with him and his mother, strategically putting down different colored cards and holding on to the Wilds and the Draw Fours.

Ellen’s little boy wasn’t so little anymore.  Connor was going to have his eleventh birthday in a few months.  He was older than his years, though.  He’d been through a lot.  Sometimes Darcy worried he was a young boy trapped inside an old man’s soul.

Other times, he could play and laugh just like every kid his age.  Especially when Izzy’s daughter Lilly was over from next door.  Maybe they should have invited them over tonight.  Jon would be late, as usual, thanks to his new position as police chief.  This was one night of many when Darcy wouldn’t see him until later.  For now, it was just her, and Connor, and Ellen.

When Connor played a Draw Four, Ellen sighed out a big dramatic breath and ruffled her son’s puffy blonde hair.  Hers used to be the same color before she had begun dying it a deep auburn with dark highlights.  The color of his hair wasn’t the only thing that Connor got from his mom.  His face had the same chin, and his laugh was unmistakably Ellen’s.

“I can’t believe you’re going to make your poor mother lose,” she whined.

“That’s the name of the game,” Connor said with a grin, happily changing the color to yellow, knowing his mother didn’t have any.

“Really?” Ellen asked in mock surprise.  “I thought the name of the game was Uno.”

“Oh, Mom.”

They played two more rounds, and then it was time for Connor to go to bed.  Ellen had been homeschooling him, keeping him out of the public schools, but she still insisted on an eight-thirty bedtime. 

Darcy brewed tea while Ellen tucked her son into his bed in one of the spare bedrooms upstairs.  She wondered, not for the first time, how long Ellen and Connor would be staying with them.  Although she and Jon had been able to stop the people trying to kill Ellen, at least for now, there were still a lot of skeletons in that woman’s past.  Was it only a matter of time before someone else came looking for her?  Her new identity as Ellen Gless wouldn’t keep her safe forever.  Eventually someone else would come looking for JoEllen Meyers, the name she had worn in her past life.

Wouldn’t she and Jon be safer without Ellen and Connor in their house?

Probably, Darcy answered her own question for the hundredth time, but they’d promised to help Ellen.  They were friends, and she wasn’t going to turn her back on them now.

“He’s not going to fall asleep anytime soon,” Ellen said as she came tiptoeing downstairs again.  “You know that, right?”

“Of course.  I remember being that age and having my mind running a mile a minute.”  She caught the kettle as it whistled.  “It’s hard to get mad at him for it when he’s always such a good kid.”

Ellen just smiled as she accepted a cup of tea from Darcy.  “He was asking if Lilly could come over tomorrow.  His little face kind of turned red when he said it.  I guess I’ll have to start worrying about things like that now, won’t I?”

“I wish I knew.”  Darcy folded herself onto the living room couch, settling the cuffs of her pants and tucking her bare feet under her.  “I’ve never had children.”

“You will,” Ellen promised her.  “You and Jon?  I can see you guys having a family of your own real soon.  A big one.”

Darcy hoped Ellen was right.  She had talked about it with Jon, and talked some more, and both of them agreed they wanted to try starting a family.  A boy or a girl to start with.  Just one little baby to hold and love and raise up like Ellen had done with Connor…

She hadn’t realized she was smiling into her tea until she caught how Ellen was looking at her.  The thought of having kids with Jon was scary and exciting and she knew it was written all over her face.

Clearing her throat, she set her cup down on the low table between the couch and the comfy overstuffed chair Ellen was sitting in.  “You could try letting him go to regular school with Lilly,” she suggested, meaning Connor.  “It would be good for him to get more friends his own age.”

Ellen’s scowl spoke volumes.

“I know,” Darcy said, understanding all the reasons hanging heavy over Ellen’s head.  “But you can’t keep him in a bubble for the rest of his life.”

“Yes I can.  I’m his mother.”

Darcy smiled in what she hoped was an understanding way.  After a time, Ellen blew out her breath as she rolled her eyes.  “I know, Darcy.  I really do.  He doesn’t deserve this life.  And I know how much of a strain it is on you and Jon to have us here.  I just don’t know how else to do this.  For now.”

Smudge, Darcy’s black and white tomcat who always had something to add to the conversation, came bounding in at that moment and jumped up on Darcy’s lap.  Then down to the floor.  Then up on Ellen.  Then down on the floor to spin around in a complete circle before zipping out of the living room and into the kitchen.

“What’s with your cat?” Ellen asked.  “He’s being a complete idiot.”

“I’m not sure.”  Smudge was always a little eccentric.  Half the time Darcy was positive he thought of himself as a person.  This running around like his tail was on fire was new, though.  “Maybe he got into some catnip.”

“Ah, he’s into the hard stuff.”

Smudge ran in again, stopped in the middle of the room, and sneezed.

From the top of the stairs, Connor laughed.  “Your cat is funny.”

“Hey, kiddo,” Ellen called up to him.  “You’re supposed to be in bed.”

“I couldn’t sleep.”

“Why not?”

“Millie’s mad at Smudge.”

Darcy stared at him.  Millie loved Smudge.  They got along like best friends.  Cats could always sense ghosts.  More than sense them, they could interact with the spirts of the departed.  Smudge had been her go-between with the spirit world for years.  So why would Millie be mad at the little ball of fluff?

And how did Connor even know about Millie, anyway?

“Lilly told me,” he said, looking from Darcy to Ellen, correctly guessing the questions they were going to ask.  “She says Millie’s a lot of fun.  She sure is mad today.”

“You saw her?” Darcy asked.  “Aunt Millie?  You saw her?”

Connor shrugged.

Darcy wanted to ask him what that meant.  She didn’t have the chance.  The front door opened, and then closed again.  She hadn’t heard Jon’s car pulling in the driveway but now she heard him dropping his shoes at the front door.

“Darcy?” he said.  “You guys home?”

Ellen smiled and stood up.  “You and Mister Police Man catch up.  I’ll get Connor back into bed.”

“Aw, mom.  I’m really not tired.”

“Then you can stay up as long as you want.”

“Really?” the boy asked, all excited.

“No.  Not really.  Come on.”

She ushered him back upstairs by tickling him until he moved.  Darcy knew Ellen would stay with him for a while to make sure he stayed in bed this time.  Maybe read him a story or just talk.  Ellen was a better mother than she realized.

“There you are.”  Jon leaned in the doorway from the kitchen as he loosened his tie to slip it off over his head.  “You’ll never guess what happened at work today.”

“Did my sister finally snap and punch someone in the face?”

Jon knew she was joking, if only just barely.  “No, Grace is fine.  She wants to have dinner with us later this week.  I told her you’d pick a day.”

“Okay.  Sounds good.  So what happened at work?”

“You know the new county coroner, Baxter Sams?  Well, he was looking through the previous coroner’s stuff for something.  I can’t remember what but it isn’t important.  He’s looking through this stuff and he finds—”

“A box of bones?” she finished for him.

“Uh, that’s right.”  He came in and dropped his tie across the back of the couch, sinking down to sit close to her.  “How in the world did you know that?”

“It’s kind of all over town.”  She turned to snuggle into him and picked up his arm to drape around her.  It always felt nice when he was finally home.

“I’m just glad this is one mystery we won’t have to look into.  It’s out of your jurisdiction.”

“Yeah, about that.”

Craning her head back, she searched his eyes.  “You can’t be serious.  The bones were found outside of Misty Hollow.  Right?  You don’t have jurisdiction?”

“I don’t.”  He leaned down to kiss her forehead.  “But there was a name on the box that the bones were in.  Two names, actually.  The State Police asked all the local department Chiefs to check the cemeteries in their towns.  It was a long shot, but the bones were old and it made sense that they might have been dug up from graves somewhere.”

“You can’t be serious,” she said again.

“I am.”  He sighed, pulling her closer.  “The bones came from the cemetery right here in town.”

The list of names on Jon’s desk was lengthy.  It dated back to 1923, the first year that Misty Hollow had kept official town records for births and deaths.  Before that it had been the responsibility of the local churches to keep track of who had died, in what year, and where they had been buried.

Oscar and Florence Salvatore, husband and wife, had both died in 1947.  The record of their burial plot in the Misty Hollow cemetery was the yellow highlighted line.  The Town Clerk’s report was one of several.

“Are you sure I should be in here?” Darcy asked, leaning over Jon’s shoulder as he sat at his desk so they could both read through the pages the State Police had faxed over.

Jon rubbed his temples then combed his fingers back through his perfect black hair.  She could smell his aftershave, and feel the heat from his body where she pressed against him.  The desire to kiss him here in his private office filled her thoughts, not for the first time. 

He didn’t look up at her as he answered.  Hard to kiss him when he was so focused on his work.

“Yes, I think you should be in here.  How many times did Joe Daleson invite you into the chief’s office?”

“Well, lots, but usually only because he had to.”

“Okay.  Well, now I’m the chief and I say you’re an official consultant of the Misty Hollow Police Department.  There.  Done.”

“Hmm.  It’s nice to know powerful people.”

“What are you talking about?  You’ve been friends with the mayor for years.  Even before she was the mayor.”

“That’s true.  Hey,” Darcy said in a teasing way, “that means my friend is your boss.”

“Sure.”  This time he did look up at her, and wink.  “But you aren’t sleeping with her.”

Now Darcy stole that kiss.  She held out her left hand to admire her engagement ring while Jon flipped another page in the report.  Mrs. Darcy Tinker.  Was she ready for that?  Ready for such a big change in her life?

She already knew the answer.  Yes.  She definitely was.

She’d have to give serious consideration to keeping her maiden name, though.  Somehow Darcy Tinker didn’t sound right to her.

“There’s not much to go on right now,” Jon was saying.  He neatened up the pile of papers and slid them into their manila folder.  “Names and a preliminary report from Baxter Sams.  We’ll have to wait for more.”

“Do you think they were murdered?  The Salvatore’s, I mean?”

He shrugged.  “I don’t know.  If they were, it will be one of the coldest cases I’ve ever laid hands on.  All we know for sure is that the names on the box match names on two graves in our town.  That doesn’t mean the bones belong to those names, I suppose.  The box might have been mislabeled.  The names could have been put on there for some other reason.”

Darcy had read the same pages Jon had.  There were definitely the remains of two different people in the box Baxter Sams had found.  Complete skeletons.  Baxter had been able to tell one was a man and one was a woman easily enough.  Something about the angle of the pelvic bones.  Darcy didn’t completely understand it all but she didn’t have any reason to doubt it was correct.

Jon had raised an interesting question, though.  The bones in that box might not be the Salvatore’s.  The box might have been nothing more than a convenient place to store old bones.

Wow.  That might have been the craziest thought she’d ever had.  Who stores old bones in a convenient place?  Or any place, for that matter.  No.  It had to be the right names.

So, if the Salvatore’s were in the box, who was in their graves?

“Have you been out to the cemetery yet?” she asked Jon.  “Shouldn’t we do that first?”

“We need a court order to exhume a grave.  Even if there’s nothing there.”

He stood up, stretching his hands up over his head.  They had stayed up late last night, talking about the new case, about their wedding, even about Smudge and Millie.  Jon hadn’t liked that topic much.  He might accept that Millie would always be a part of Darcy’s life, but sharing a house with a ghost still unsettled him.

This morning they’d woken up early, deciding to do their investigating here at the police station.  It seemed like the best choice.  There would be things they needed to talk about that Connor didn’t need to hear.

Jon took her hand, heading for the door.  “It’s nine o’clock now.  I guess that’s a decent hour to bother a judge.  Coffee first?”

“Oh,” she said, “yes please.  And a donut.  I’m starving.”
 

***

District courts were a means used by rural areas to save money.  Instead of each town hiring their own judge, several jurisdictions used the same court.  Jon had explained all of this to her before.

Darcy couldn’t care less how much money Misty Hollow was saving by being part of this district court.  As long as it gave her the opportunity for a half hour drive with Jon to get to the home of Judge Jayne Phillips, she was for it.

“Jayne would have met us at the court over in Meadowood,” Jon told her as they pulled into the judge’s driveway.  “But she asked if I’d meet her here instead.”

The two story home was comprised of stone and heavy wooden trim.  It was very imposing, radiating wealth like rarified air, especially sitting like it was on an acre or so of carefully manicured lawn just starting to turn a lush green. 

“Being a district judge must pay well,” Darcy noted, looking up at the gabled roof through the windshield.

Jon shut the car off and took the case folder from above the visor.  “Not really.  It’s a modest salary.  Probably a little less than what I’m making, even.  Judge Phillips comes from money.  Her family owns a couple of oil fields.”

Darcy blinked incredulously.  “They own an oil field?”

“A couple of them.”

She couldn’t help staring at him.

“What?”

“Oh, nothing,” she said sarcastically.  “I’m just trying to process that.  Who owns an oil field?”

“Oil fields.  Plural.”

“How do you do that?  Do you just go out and buy land until you find oil?”  She looked up at the house again, with its wrap-around porch and its towering white pillars.  “I mean, seriously.  It’s not like they could buy an oil field off E-bay, for Pete’s sake.”

“Plural,” he reminded her, apparently enjoying her reaction.  “Hey, it doesn’t matter to me if she’s rich or if she can’t find two pennies to rub together.  So long as she’s fair when she’s on the bench that’s all I care about.  That, and getting her to sign this exhumation order.”

Darcy knew he was right, but still.  Oil fields?

Plural?

When Jon knocked on the front door with the brass ring held in an ornately carved lion’s mouth, it was Judge Phillips herself opened it for them.  After what Jon had said, Darcy was expecting a butler to answer the door and ask to take their coats in a heavy British accent.

Instead, a squat and wide woman with silver-gray hair met them.  She pushed heavy glasses further up the bridge of her aquiline nose.  With a wide smile, she thrust a hand out to Jon.  “So good to see you again!  And congratulations on making chief!  I haven’t had the chance to see you since the big announcement.”

“Thanks, Jayne.  Really.  I’m still trying to fill the shoes Joe Daleson left for me when he retired.”

Darcy could tell Jon was embarrassed by Jayne’s praise.  She was glad to see that other people had the same high opinion of him that she did.  Jon was a great police officer, and he would be a great chief.

“Yes,” Jayne said, leading them through the large rooms of her house to an equally lavish office somewhere near the back.  “Joe didn’t have to retire.  That whole business was such a sad affair.  I offered to help him but he’s such a proud man, after all.”

She sat down behind her desk as Jon and Darcy exchanged a glance.  What problems had Joe been having?  He didn’t say anything at all to either of them.  Darcy had always thought he retired rather quickly, especially when he’d moved down south just a few days later, but she hadn’t thought it was anything other than his own decision.

Jayne settled herself in her big leather wing-backed chair and held her hand out for the folder Jon was carrying.  Whatever she had meant about Joe’s business would have to wait for another time.  “Let’s see what you’ve got for me.”

While Jayne reviewed the application and the photocopied reports that went along with it, turning each page only after a thorough reading and a lot of murmured words like “interesting” and “I see,” Darcy looked at the room around her.  Thick books lined shelves in glass-doored cabinets.  Oil paintings in ornate frames hung on the walls.  She recognized a Frederick Remington sculpture of a cowboy on a bucking horse.  She wouldn’t be surprised to learn it was an original instead of a copy.

The judge’s office was a display of wealth.    Darcy had to wonder why anyone with this much money would choose a life of public service.  Surely Jayne Phillips didn’t need the paycheck that came with the job.

“Interesting case,” Jayne said after she’d examined the last page.  “I don’t suppose we suspect Maven Sirles of doing anything illegal?  That woman was always a little odd but she was a good coroner.  Very dedicated to her job.”

“I’m not leaning that way at the moment,” was all Jon would say.

“Of course, she did have two dead bodies tucked into a box in her house.”  Jayne tapped the end of a pen against her chin.  “Hmm.  Well.  Something to think about, I suppose.”

From a drawer in her desk, Jayne took out a single piece of paper.  Darcy caught the heading on the page as the judge began filling it out.  “Warrant to Exhume.”

“Don’t believe I have ever signed one of these,” Jayne told them.  “I had to find the form on the internet, actually.  Not something I keep here—”

They were interrupted by a knock on the office door.  “Mom, I’m going out,” a young man said, leaning in through the door.

Darcy thought maybe she recognized him from around town.  He looked familiar.  Tall and skinny, with a short mess of red hair, he reminded her a little of what she pictured Ichabod Crane to look like in the story of the Headless Horseman.  His crisp white shirt was open three buttons down, showing off a gold chain resting against a pale chest. 

When he noticed Darcy, he gave her a nod and a wink.  “Hey.  How’s it going?”

Darcy wasn’t impressed.  He was nineteen or so.  Maybe in his early twenties.  He was trying for sophisticated but only managed to look like a self-centered jerk.  Which was probably what he was.  She smiled a greeting but decided not to encourage him.

“Leo, honey, where are you going?” Jayne asked her son, in a voice that was falsely sweet.  She obviously didn’t like the idea of his “going out.”

“Just…out,” was the answer.  Leo’s eyes stayed on Darcy a little too long, then he finally looked up at his mom.  “I’ll be back later.”

“I think we discussed this, didn’t we?”

Leo pretended not to hear what Jayne had said.  “I’ve got a thing tomorrow, too.  Bye.”

He left behind an awkward silence as Jayne’s eyes darkened.  Then she blinked several times and went back to smiling.  “I’m sorry about that, Jon, Darcy.  My son Leo is, well, headstrong.  Ever since his father died I’m afraid he’s been rather aimless.  He spends through his allowance like it will last forever and…um.  Well.  You don’t want to hear about that.  You want to go dig up a couple of graves.”

Jon turned his explosive laugh into a cough.  “It’s not that I want to dig them up, your honor.  I just don’t see any way around it.”

After a little bit of small talk about the Radford investigation Jon’s department was still conducting, they left with their warrant in hand.  Jon waited until they were in the car and backing out of the driveway to say what they were both thinking.

“Jayne has her hands full with that son of hers.”

“I don’t get it,” Darcy had to admit.  “She just lets him spend through her money?  Why doesn’t she take his name off their bank account and make him get a job?”

They were back on the county road now, headed toward Misty Hollow.  “I’m not going to guess at how they do things in her family,” Jon said, “but some parents have a hard time pushing their kids out of the nest.”

“I wonder what we’d do.”

“Hmm?”

“If we had a son, and he was acting like that,” Darcy clarified.  “What would we do?”

“Give him a quick kick in the seat of his pants?” Jon suggested.

Darcy smiled.  Just what she’d been thinking.

His hand reached over and held hers.  “We would figure it out.  That’s what we would do.  That’s what we will do, I mean.  When we have kids.  After we’re married.”

“Oh my gosh!” Darcy exclaimed.  “The wedding.  We have so much left to do!  We have to get everyone fitted for the tuxes and the dresses, we have to get the wedding license signed…Jon, we haven’t even ordered the cake yet!”

He was laughing at her, and she pouted at him even though she wanted to laugh, too.  “What’s so funny?” she asked.  “You know I’m right.”

“Sure I know.  But we’ll get it done.  Grace is helping, and your mom will be here in a few days, right?”

Family and friends.  They had a lot to be grateful for.  Here they were, planning their wedding and talking about someday having kids of their own.  Life couldn’t be much better, she thought.  This was everything she had wanted for so long.