TWENTY-FIVE

“Ready for the next case?” River asked.

“Another cup of coffee first,” Tony said. “You?”

“No, not yet. Do we still have any of those doughnuts we picked up on the way in?”

Tony smiled at her. “I’ve had two and you’ve had one. We bought half a dozen. What do you think?”

“I’m never sure. You’ve been known to scarf down four or five at a time.” Tony’s slim frame belied his love of food and how strong he really was. At least until he was shot. Since then, he’d experienced some weakness in his left arm and numbness in his feet. He hadn’t mentioned it in several weeks, nor had he shown any signs of the aphasia he’d been left with. It had caused some memory loss. Nothing major, just forgetting the names of certain things. River wondered about it from time to time, but she didn’t want to ask him. She was afraid that if she did, he’d think she was hinting that he wasn’t at full strength. Tony was the best person she’d ever known, but he was proud in his own way. It wasn’t conceit. It was that he didn’t want her to think he was inadequate. Unable to keep her safe.

“Not this time,” he said, grinning. “What would you like?”

“Any of the doughnuts with strawberry icing and sprinkles left?”

“Well, since you couldn’t pay me to eat something like that, I’d say it’s a safe bet there’s at least one.”

River laughed. “I know, if it’s not chocolate, it’s not worth your attention.”

While Tony got up to get coffee and doughnuts, River flipped through her notes to the next case. “Ready?”

Tony sighed loudly. “Sure, but so far I haven’t heard anything that makes me feel as if we’ve found something that would lead to Kevin’s murderer.”

“I know. We just have to eliminate everything we can and then look closely at the rest. I’m glad we’re going to follow up on Cheryl Armitage’s case.’”

“Yeah, me too.” He put a pod in the coffeemaker and turned around to look at River. “Even if it isn’t tied to April’s disappearance or Kevin’s murder, I think someone needs to listen to the last words of a dying woman and take them seriously.”

“I agree, but you know, the EMT might have misunderstood her. It was a tense situation.”

“You’re right,” Tony said. “Now I’m going to be running comparable phrases through my mind.”

River grinned at him. “Maybe if you put our client’s needs first, it will help redirect your slight obsession with characters from a children’s fable.”

“Okay, you win.” Tony took a doughnut out of the box on the credenza where they kept the coffeemaker and brought it to River on a small paper plate. Then he went back to get his coffee and another doughnut.

River smiled to herself. Chocolate, of course. He also pulled out a plain doughnut and broke off a piece for Watson, who was now awake and watching his master with razor-sharp focus.

“Not too much, buddy,” Tony said, carrying the piece over to the excited dog. He knelt down and held it next to Watson’s mouth. He took it gently from Tony’s hand and then wolfed it down. Then he looked up with such obvious expectation that it made River laugh. “Not now, pal,” Tony said. “Maybe later.”

Once Tony was settled back at his desk, he nodded at her. “Whenever you’re ready.”

“Okay, next we have the Virtuous Volunteer. This was eight and a half years ago, in December. Shelly Evans was twenty-three when her body was found in a ravine near Kimmswick, Missouri, on a Sunday night a little after nine at night. A police officer who’d been called out to check on a domestic dispute stopped to investigate when he saw her abandoned car. It wasn’t on a main road, it was found on one of these country roads, but still, he thought it was odd. Then he noticed her body in the ravine several yards away.”

“Kimmswick’s not too far from here, is it?” Tony asked.

“No. It’s such a charming little town. Hard to think about anything awful happening there.” Of course, it was hard to think about something awful happening anywhere, but Kimmswick was a favorite spot for many tourists as well as Missourians. Several different festivals were held there during the year, and it hosted a wonderful restaurant that was a favorite of River’s. Her father had taken the family there many times, but since he’d left, she hadn’t been back. Maybe someday soon. She looked back at her laptop. “It seems Shelly was very active in her church and volunteered with a food program in St. Louis, near where she lived in Kirkwood. A bloody rock was found next to Shelly’s head. At first, the medical examiner said it could have been accidental . . . that she struck her head on the rock when she fell into the ravine. However, Shelly had MS and couldn’t have made it from her car all the way to the edge of the ravine by herself, so it was ruled as undetermined. Although her purse was found in her car, her phone was gone. She’d tried to call her dad at one point, but by the time he answered, she’d hung up. Her car was searched, as was the area around it and where her body was found, but the phone wasn’t located. It was never recovered.”

“She was driving with MS?” Tony asked.

“Sure. Many people with MS drive. It’s only when the disease is advanced that driving is restricted.”

“And you know this how?”

River shrugged. “I had a friend in college whose mother had MS. She told me.”

“Good memory.”

“Hard to forget. At graduation, her mother had a hard time getting around. I’ll never forget my friend’s face. She was embarrassed.” She shook her head, the memory still hard to bear. “Her mother knew it. The look on her face . . .” River cleared her throat. “Sorry. I told my friend what I thought about it. That ended our friendship, but I didn’t care.”

“Maybe you helped her,” Tony said gently.

“I have no idea, but that’s a nice thought.” River forced herself to refocus on April’s notes. “April received a lot of responses to this story, but it seems almost all of them were from people praising Shelly. It appears that she touched a lot of lives.”

“No motive for the killing?”

“Doesn’t seem to be. No one could figure out why she was killed. No one had motive.”

“So, no tips at all?”

“Only one. A woman said she’d spotted Shelly’s car on the side of the road around seven the night her body was found. She slowed down to see if someone was having car trouble, but when she realized no one was inside, she decided it had been abandoned and drove on. She didn’t notice any other car nearby at that time.”

“Shelly was probably already dead,” Tony said.

“Yeah, most likely. The ME said she died instantly from her head wound. Somehow, April was able to obtain information from the autopsy. Wonder where she got this?”

“Maybe Shelly’s dad?”

“That would be my bet,” River said. “We could think about contacting him, but even though it’s been quite some time, I doubt he’d want to relive his daughter’s death unless we were working her case.”

“I agree,” Tony said. “So, anything else interesting in the autopsy results?”

River read further through April’s notes. “Not really. She wasn’t sexually assaulted, thank God. There were other bruises, but that would be normal for someone tumbling down a ravine full of weeds and rocks. Stomach contents . . . nothing out of the ordinary. Toxicology came back clean except for the meds she took for her condition.” She scrolled down and found another report from the police. “Her clothing was torn, dirty, bloody.” She looked up at Tony. “April was convinced that this was murder because Shelly was found so far away from her car—and because her phone was gone. She says Shelly’s father believed the same thing. If she’d tried to call him around the time she died, it means she obviously didn’t forget it or leave it somewhere. He suggested that someone called Shelly and asked for help since she was always doing things for people. But without someone coming forward, there simply wasn’t enough evidence for the police to do more than call it a suspicious death.”

“Okay. Any solid reason for Shelly being at the location where she was found?”

“No,” River said. “All they had was her father’s hunch. She was supposed to be at church that night, in Kirkwood.”

“What time did church start?”

“Again, you’re reading April’s mind. That’s next. She checked and church started at seven.”

“She obviously didn’t call anyone to tell them she’d be late, or it would have been mentioned,” Tony said.

“I’m sure you’re right, but there’s nothing here saying they heard from her. There’s a number written here for the detective assigned to the case. Maybe we can see if he has any other information.”

“Before we call, let’s check to see if this case has been solved.”

While Tony searched, River finished her doughnut. She got up, brewed another cup of black coffee, and snuck another piece of the plain doughnut to Watson, who wagged his tail so hard his bottom wiggled with happiness.