Page 143 of The Woman Left Behind

The fortunate part was, Harry had a good deal of experience with both of those.

It was on this thought a call came in.

It was from Polly.

He took it. “Hey, Polly.”

“Heya, Harry. Karen just briefed me, she’s off somewhere with Rus now, so she wanted me to touch base with you. They ran down that credit card number. The card belongs to a woman named Tamara Barbeau. She lives up in Vancouver. Karen gave her a call, and Tamara had a lot to say.”

“And what’s that?”

“She said her husband just upped and left a few days ago. The thing is, he took a bunch of stuff when he did. Her emergency stash of money. Some necklace her granny gave her that she treasures. But it’s also worth some cash. Even swiped the money out of her purse, along with her credit card.”

From what Trey said, it sounded like Jenna had run that purchase, so obviously the card hadn’t been reported yet.

Even so, he queried, “Did she report this stuff stolen?”

“She said he could get into pickles. She thought he was maybe just in another pickle, he’d figure it out like he normally does and come home. A little girl talk with Karen, this seems to be a thing with her man. Taking money, precious and valuable items would go missing, he’d get hold of her ATM card and make withdrawals. Karen obviously was a little surprised Tamara put up with this, but Tamara said she loved him, and once he got his life sorted out, it’d all be good. We can say she wasn’t really happy when she heard he was using her card to buy his ex-wife flowers and gifts.”

“One guess, her husband is Willie Zowkower.”

“No, her husband is John Berringer. But when Karen asked for a description, John sounded a whole lot like Willie. So Karen sent a photo of Willie, and whaddaya know? Her husband married her under a false identity. We can just say Tamara wasn’t thrilled to learn that either.”

Jesus, what was Willie up to?

“Karen run down John Berringer with the Vancouver police?” Harry asked.

“She said she’s going to get on that when she gets back.”

Maybe instinct, maybe just practice in taking in his surroundings at all times, Harry turned his head, and at what he saw, he lightened his foot on the accelerator.

“Right, I’m headed back to the station,” he told Polly, even if he had just decided on a detour. “I can’t touch that investigation either, so let Karen know you’re going to keep some fires burning while she’s out in the field, and you call Vancouver and see if they’ve had any run-ins with a John Berringer. Be sure to link it with our earlier inquiries about Willie Zowkower.”

“Will do, Harry. See you soon.”

“See you,” Harry said as he swung into a spot at the side of Frick Park.

This park was going to be one of Megan’s many lasting legacies.

At the end of Main Street, the site had once been a thriving department store, which had gone out of business when Harry was just a kid. Nothing really took there, because the space was so vast. There were murmurings of a variety of different projects, turning it into apartments, or condos, or breaking it up and making it a kind of mall.

Nothing ever came of it, and in the meantime, the building became derelict and was eventually condemned.

It didn’t look bad from the outside, but it was a ghostly reminder of a once thriving local business that had been edged out by chains and eventually online shopping.

With Megan’s magic, she got the property transferred to the town, the building was demolished, a public vote had been instigated, and the people of Misted Pines decided to honor Eliza Frick, Misted Pines’s illustrious suffragette, who also happened to be a staunch prohibitionist.

Prohibition had been an epic fail, but the results of Eliza’s efforts cleared Main Street of the bars and bordellos that had been their main feature since the West was being won, opening it to shops, cafes, tea rooms, and eventually their cinema and more.

In the end, Eliza was the architect of what became of Misted Pines, which had once been a den of sin frequented by trappers, hunters, gold and silver prospectors, and railroad workers. To that day, there wasn’t a single bar close to the town center, and that meant it was peaceful in the evenings, and sleepy in the late evenings, and for the most part, safe.

Now that park had a border of low hedges, lawns of thick grass, graveled pathways to a center feature of a fountain surrounded by flowers and urns, this ringed by benches that had been donated by local businesses and prominent families.

Misted Pines’s infamous coven unsurprisingly maintained it, clipping the hedges, de-weeding and fertilizing the lawns, and planting the flowers. Come March, hyacinths and daffodils poked through the retreating snow. Tulips came next. Through the summer months, there were riots of flowers in the beds and hanging from the lampposts.

MP citizens picnicked there. They fed the birds there. They walked their dogs there.

But now, the foliage had been cleared and Harry knew they were preparing to decorate it for Halloween.

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