Isaac let out a deep, long sigh, his shoulders slumping. “After patrolling the streets for nearly a month and always being called away for a bar fight just when we’re about to check something, I can’t help but think?—”
“Sheriff Cummings. Sheriff Cummings!” An unmistakable Irish accent announced the speaker even though the side of the warehouse shielded her from view.
“You see what I mean.” Isaac headed out toward the street.
“He has a point.” Thomas started after Isaac. There’d been a whole heap of bar fights over the past month, and he certainlyhad his share of bruises from breaking them up. “Sheriffing isn’t a job Isaac should be handling alone.”
He stepped onto Front Street to find Isaac standing with a pale-faced Aileen Brogan.
“I th-think someone wants to kill me.” Her frantic words echoed down the street.
Thomas hurried his steps. Was her life truly in danger? And if so, was the same person threatening Miss Brogan also responsible for the fire at his wife’s building?
The crimes that had hit Eagle Harbor had to stop before someone died. But what if he and Isaac couldn’t catch the criminals before the unthinkable happened?
Chapter Twenty-One
“You’re sure the hairbrush is the only thing that was taken?”
Aileen wrapped her arms around her middle and huddled against the wall, almost as though if she got close enough, she could disappear into the lath and plaster. “I think so. But they moved so many things around, it’s hard to tell.”
Isaac glanced at her bed, where her white shift had been laid out along with Betty Ranulfson’s missing necklace and one of the knives from the bakery downstairs. The only thing missing from the eerie ensemble was animal blood splashed on the white gown.
“And you were only gone for two hours?” He’d already asked her once, but there was no harm in repeating the story, not when someone had broken into her apartment and left such a disturbing sign, yet not bothered to steal anything besides an antique silver hairbrush.
“Not even that. I had a few Christmas gifts I made for the Spritzer family. All I did was drop them off and have a cup of tea with Ellie and Mrs. Spritzer.” Aileen shivered and wrapped her arms even tighter around herself.
He picked up the necklace and held it to the light from the window. It was almost as though the thieves were taunting him. Why else leave a stolen necklace here that he’d been searching for since October?
“Th-thank ye for coming. For believing me.”
He frowned and turned back to Aileen. “Why wouldn’t I believe you?”
She glanced at his badge and then away. “Not all lawmen are willing to believe a woman like me, ye see.”
No he didn’t see, but it made him want to have a little chat with whatever lawman she’d dealt with before—the kind of chat that involved fists rather than words.
“Let’s put this away.” He nodded toward the shift on the bed while slipping the necklace into his pocket. Betty Ranulfson would be happy to have one piece of her jewelry returned before Christmas, but he’d almost rather the necklace stay lost if getting it back meant Aileen received chilling threats.
“What do ye want me to do with the other shift?” Aileen left her place against the wall and began folding the white fabric with brisk, efficient movements.
“What other shift?”
She gestured toward the traveling trunk that sat in the corner, which she probably used as a dresser. “The one they put in there.”
“They put a shift in your things?”
Redness burst onto her pale cheeks, and she swallowed. “It’s… not mine.”
“Let me see it.”
“Um…” Her cheeks grew so red they nearly matched the color of her hair. She opened the trunk and clenched a silky white garment in her hand, then thrust it at him and looked away.
One glance at the material told him this wasn’t the shift of a normal, working-class lady. He held up soft fabric, revealing agarment that was nearly all lace, a plunging neckline, and slits that would travel clear up to a woman’s hips.
“It, ah… probably belongs to one of the girls at The Penny that was robbed a few weeks ago.” Except all of the prostitutes had claimed they were locked in their rooms that night and hadn’t seen a thing. How would a burglar get a garment like this without going into one of the girls’ rooms?
“It’s not mine,” she whispered. “I don’t wear… that is, I wouldn’t… I can’t afford…” She turned away and sniffled. “Can you take it away?”
