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“Sorry, Bon, It’s just that she looks so much like the woman I saw. If only we had the camcorder.”
“Forget the camcorder, I know who did it.” Bo
“Oh? And who could that be?”
The twinkle in her eyes made her look ten years old. “Shelia, of course. You know, and then there were none.”
I didn’t act surprised at her answer, for the same thought had crossed my mind. “I suppose Shelia could have faked her own murder—it wouldn’t be the first time that old trick’s been tried. But what is the motive? And more importantly, if the corpse isn’t Shelia, who is it?”
“I haven’t a clue. Maybe some tart she caught him with,” she answered, staring into space. “Or maybe some homeless soul they picked up on Colfax. Yes, that makes more sense.”
Bo
Fred decided to add his two-cents before Bo
“Okay, Bon, that was a bad idea,” I said before looking at Fred and adding, “Traitor.”
***
“That would explain the person I saw sneaking around in Renfield’s kitchen,” I said once we were back at Bo
Bo
I picked off a piece of meat from the chicken wing I was eating and threw it to Fred who wasn’t going to leave me alone until he got his share. Bo
“How can you be sure, Jake? You said you didn’t get a good look because she was too far away, remember?”
She had me there, memory can play tricks after a while, and now I wasn’t sure what I had seen. “Okay, suppose you are right and Shelia’s not dead. And suppose the corpse was a homeless person she and Craig lured into their home, but why? Why go to all this trouble to frame you?”
Bo
“Doppelganger?”
“Someone who looks exactly like her,” Bo
“I know what a doppelganger is, Bon. I was wondering what made you think the corpse looks anything like Shelia. And come to think of it, wouldn’t the cops want to identify the body with fingerprints, or dental records or something? I would think that would be mandatory in a murder, case.”
Bo
Fred must have detected her frustration and went over to sit by her. Or maybe it was because I didn’t have any more chicken wings and she did.
“Whoa, Bon. I was just playing devil’s advocate. I suppose it won’t hurt to check into it.”
***
Checking into Shelia pretending to be dead consisted of a futile Internet search of police regulations on body identification. One site said autopsies were mandatory in cases of murder, while another said it was at the discretion of the family. What an autopsy had to do with identifying a body that wasn’t disfigured or burnt to a crisp was beyond me, but I wasn’t surprised at the search results. I wondered if I’d be better off consulting a Ouija board.
Before I wasted anymore gray-cells trying to prove something so foolish, I decided to check and see if Shelia had ever been arrested. My twisted logic told me if she had, then her fingerprints would be on file, and I could forget about giving myself the headache of going any further, because the forensic pathologist would have checked. Once more, I knew as much as when I’d started; I couldn’t get that information without paying for it.
In the end, I decided my best bet would be to watch Craig’s house. If Shelia were hiding there, she would have to come out sooner or later.
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
“That’s the dumbest idea you’ve had yet, Jake. Just how long do you think it will be before the neighborhood watch calls the cops on you?” Bo
“I’m not going to sit out there with binoculars like some kind of pervert. In fact, I’m not even going to be there.” Her look said more than any response could have. She sat there staring at me, supporting her chin with her index finger. It looked like she might slip, and cut herself with one of her rose-red fingernails from the expensive manicure Margot had paid for a few days ago.
“The Internet, Bon,” I said, before she could ask. “I’ll leave my car parked across the street with an IP camera on the dash that I’ll disguise as a radar detector.”
“You can do that? You can watch the house over the Internet?”
“You bet. And most of those cameras are twelve volts, so with the addition of a cheap adapter, it should plug right into the cigarette lighter.”
She stopped supporting her chin and reached for her pack of cigarettes. My mention of the lighter must have flipped some kind of switch in her brain. “Only one problem, Einstein. You might as well write NSA on your Jeep, because it’ll be about as inconspicuous as a naked hooker at communion.”
The image she painted made me laugh. “And it wouldn’t surprise me if Lakewood has some kind of law against parking overnight. It would be my luck they would tow it after twenty-four hours. I guess that’s not such a great idea.”
“No, Jake. That MP camera is a stroke of genius.”
“IP, Bon, and I forgot one important fact. It needs a router to co
Bo
It was only last year I had taken a job with Jonathan in an attempt to find evidence. Shelia had threatened me with manslaughter in the death of her husband when a barbecue grill I was using exploded in her husband’s face. Long story short, I suspected Jonathan of sabotaging the grill so I talked my way into his roofing yard to search for the faulty propane bottle.
“I need to borrow one of his pickups for a couple hours. Just long enough to install the camera on the house Cory and Je
Bo
“Let me guess, you’re going to pretend to inspect their roof. That’s why you need a truck with a sign on it, so no one will ask what you’re doing there.”