Copper's words replayed in my mind. I looked at the twins. I didn't exactly consider them trustworthy news sources, either.
“Look, I don't think I care about Harvey and you and Delilah,” I told them. “All I care about is the fact that you guys are running around, vandalizing other people's property. You have your choices. We call the police or you go talk to Delilah. Now.”
They both stared at me with sour expressions, like I'd just forced them to swallow lemons.
“We'll go to Delilah,” Carrie said, pouting. “Just don't call the police.”
“Yeah,” her sister echoed. “Don't call the police.”
They were both very anxious to avoid the police, which I understood because no one liked dealing with the police, especially when they were guilty of doing something wrong. Still, I couldn't help but wonder if there was another reason they were looking to avoid the law.
“Did you see Harvey?” I asked. Jake gave me a warning look but I pressed on. “I mean, before he died?”
“Well, duh,” Mary said. “We saw him a lot.”
It was an uncomfortable thing to be mocked by someone I was beginning to think of as a not-so-bright psychopath. “I meant right before he died.”
“Oh,” Mary said, then looked at her sister. “I don't know. Did we?”
Carrie glanced at the sky, like she was trying to remember. “Yeah, we saw him. He was always around. And we saw him with that creepy dude. Hacker-whatever.”
“Wayne Hackerman?” I asked.
“The guy with the big black bus,” Mary said. “And the really mean kids.”
“Those kids spit at us,” Carrie told me. Her green eyes narrowed into slits. “I hate them.”
“And the boy ran over my foot on his bike,” Mary said. “Yeah, I hate that kid.”
“But you saw Harvey with Hackerman?” Jake said, trying to get them back on task.
Carrie nodded. “Yeah, that guy. They were arguing or something. And Harvey never argued.”
“By the laundry room?” I asked. “That's where they were arguing?”
“Yeah,” Carrie said. She leaned up against the sliding glass door. “Were you there?”
I shook my head. “No. Just heard about it. You didn't ask him about it? About the fight?”
“No, because Harvey told me if I came near him again, he was going to ban me from Windy Vista,” Carrie said.
“Me, too,” Mary said.
“But I overheard him,” Carrie said, a small smile appearing on her lips.
“You did?”
She nodded.
“What were they fighting about?”
Carrie's smile widened. “They were fighting about the medallion.”
TWENTY FOUR
“So you really don't think those two dimwits did anything to him?”
Jake and I were sitting at the table on our deck the next morning. We'd followed the girls to Delilah's place, made sure she answered the door, then let her deal with them and headed back to our cabin. We'd spent the rest of the evening parked on the couch. Jake had started a movie on Netflix and I knew the reason why: so I wouldn't hound him incessantly with my suspicions and theories. Even with a million thoughts swirling through my head, I'd managed to fall asleep with my feet propped in Jake's lap. Somehow, he'd persuaded me into my pajamas and into bed. But I didn't remember either.
Jake shook his head and shoveled a forkful of eggs into his mouth. I'd made bacon and eggs and toast. “No.”
“That's it? That's all you have to say?”
We were sitting out on the deck, the morning breeze rustling the trees, the sunlight filtering through the canopy of leaves.
“What else do you want me to say?”
“I don't know.” I bit into a piece of toast. “Discuss it with me?”
“Discuss or investigate?” he asked, his eyes narrowing.
I smiled innocently. “Discuss.”
He scooped eggs on to his slice of toast and took a bite. “Fine. Discuss.”
“Why do you think they didn't kill Harvey?”
“Because they liked him.”
I took a sip of my coffee. “Well, duh. But people sometimes do stupid, irrational things when they're in love. Crimes of passion.”
“Those two are definitely stupid,” Jake commented.
I gave him a look and he sighed.
“Okay,” he said. He swallowed a mouthful of orange juice. “A couple of reasons. One, they seemed genuinely afraid he would ban them, so whatever he said to get them to stay away from him worked. And, two, I'm not sure those two would have been smart enough to hide his body if they'd been the ones that killed him. They probably would've propped him up on their couch and pretended he was still alive.” He shook his head again. “Because, as we both know, those two aren't all there.”
“No kidding,” I said, breaking my piece of bacon in half. “But they also give me kind of a Fatal Attraction vibe. Like they might try to take Harvey out so no one else could have him.”
He frowned. “Maybe, but I didn't get much of that from them. They're more troublesome than dangerous, I think.”
He was probably right, but when I felt like we still hadn't heard much about who might've killed Harvey, I was looking for anything that might help out Delilah.
“Do you believe the stuff about him and Delilah?” Jake asked, scraping the last of the eggs off the plate.
“No.” I poured orange juice into my half-empty cup. “I really don't. I just don't get that feel from her. I didn't even get that feeling from his mother at the restaurant, you know?”
He nodded. “Agreed. I think they might've been close, but people are always quick to whisper.”
“I'd really like to know what he and Hackerman were arguing about, though,” I said. “Now that guy totally seems capable of killing someone.”
Jake shrugged. “I don't know. The guy's a weasel, but what does a killer really look like or act like? There isn't exactly a type and he sort of strikes me as a coward. Lots of bluster, but doesn't do a whole lot to back that up in any way.” Then he shrugged again. “But who knows? All of these people seem to have brought a little of the crazy with them.”
I agreed with him that you couldn't know what a killer looked like. Rex, our home inspector, didn't want to recommend an exterminator for the mice that were living in our house before we moved in, because he was adverse to killing things. Yet he'd been the one to dump Olaf Stunderson's body in the coal chute. So maybe we couldn't tell a killer just by looking at someone. But Hackerman just gave me the creeps and I could see him getting in an argument with Harvey and doing something stupid. Hackerman seemed more than capable of doing a lot of stupid things.
We finished breakfast and cleaned up the table and did the dishes together. Jake was feeling sluggish and wanted to go for a run. Since I only ran when chased, I declined to accompany him. After he left, I walked down to the clubhouse and saw Delilah scurrying around the picnic tables on the pavilion, trying to move them all by herself.
“Do you need some help?” I asked.
She brushed the wisps of hair from her face and planted her hands on her hips. “I'd like to say no, but yes. I do.” She rubbed the small of her back. “I'm not in any shape to be moving these around by myself anymore.”
I walked over to the opposite end of the table she was standing at. “What do you have going on today?”
“Camper potluck,” she said, lifting her end of the table. “Everyone brings something and we provide burgers and hot dogs.”
“But the barbeque was just the other night...”
“I know.” She offered a tired smile. “We had a schedule goof-up and didn't realize we'd put both events in the same week. It was too late to change dates so we just had to go with it. Besides, people like the get-togethers.”
I picked up my end and we scooted it over to the empty space she'd been angling for. “I'm sure they do.”
She took a deep breath and let it out. “Yeah, they really do. And it's usually fun and low-key.”