Let's Fake a Deal

Book 7: Sarah W. Garage Sale Mystery

by Sherry Harris

Genres: Amateur Sleuth; Cozy Mystery; Female Sleuths

Synopsis

As a former military spouse, Sarah Winston’s learned a little about organizing, packing, and moving. Her latest project sounds promising: a couple of tech-industry hipsters, newly arrived in her Massachusetts town, who need to downsize. Unfortunately, when Sarah tries to sell their stuff, she discovers it’s all stolen — and she’s the unwitting fence.

Michelle, an old friend of Sarah’s from the Air Force base, is in line for a promotion — but not everyone is happy about it, and she’s been hit with an anonymous discrimination complaint. When one of the men she suspects is behind the accusations turns up dead in Michelle’s car, Sarah needs to clear Michelle’s name — as well as her own for selling hot merchandise. And she’ll have to do it while also organizing a cat lady’s gigantic collection of feline memorabilia, or they’ll be making room for Sarah in a jail cell.

Release date: July 30, 2019

Publisher: Kensington Books

Print pages: 288

Sample

Two police cars squealed to a halt at the end of the driveway, lights flashing, front bumpers almost touching. I stared at them and then at the half dozen people milling around the garage sale that had started fifteen minutes ago at 7:30 a.m. Everyone stopped browsing and turned to stare, too. Doors popped open. Three officers jumped out. Unusual in these days of budget cuts and officers riding alone that two were together. I didn’t recognize any of them because I was in Billerica, Massachusetts, just north of where I lived in Ellington.

“Who’s in charge here?” one of the officers called. His thick shoulders and apparent lack of neck looked menacing against the cloudy late September sky.

“Me. I’m Sarah Winston.” I gave a little wave of my hand and stepped forward. It seemed like the carpenter’s apron I was wearing with SARAH WINSTON GARAGE SALES embroidered across the front was enough to identify me.

The officer put out a hand the size of a baseball glove to stop me. “Stay. The rest of you, put everything down and see the two officers over there.”

What the heck? I stayed put, having had enough experience with policing through my ex-husband’s military and civilian careers in law enforcement to know to listen to this man no matter what I thought. Several people glanced at me but did as they were told. I stood in the center of the driveway all by myself. One by one the people spoke to the police officers and scurried off. Five minutes later it was me and the three cops. Thankfully, it wasn’t hot out here like it would be in August.

“What’s going on?” I asked.

“Do you have any weapons?”

“No.” I looked down at the carpenter’s apron tied around my waist. It had four pockets for holding things. “There’s a measuring tape, some cash, and a roll of quarters in the pockets.” Ugh, would he think that was a weapon? I’d heard that if you held a roll in your fist and punched someone, it was as good as brass knuckles. “Oh, and my phone. Do you want to see?”

“Put your hands on the back of your head and then kneel,” he ordered.

I started to protest but shut my mouth and complied. Something was terribly wrong. Thank heavens I’d worn jeans today instead of a dress.

“Now lay face-first on the ground.”

I looked at the distance between my face and the ground. I couldn’t just flop forward. It would smash my nose. I hunched down as much as I could, rolled to one side, and then onto my stomach. The roll of quarters made their presence known, digging into my already roiling stomach. The driveway was warm and rough against my cheek. A pair of highly polished black boots came into sight. I felt the apron being untied, and I was quickly patted down. Then I was yanked up by the big officer. My carpenter’s apron looked forlorn laying on the driveway.

“Please tell me, what’s this about?” I asked again.

The big guy glared down at me, hands on his hips. His left hand was a little closer to his gun than made me comfortable. If this was an effort to intimidate me, it was working on every level.

“We had a tip that everything being sold here was stolen.”

Cold. Cold like someone had just dumped one of those big icy containers of liquid over my head. The kind they dumped on the winning coach at a football game. Only I wasn’t the winner here. The cold reached through my skin and gripped my heart. “Stolen? That’s not possible.”

“Is anyone else here?” the officer asked. His nameplate said JONES.

“Yes. The two people who hired me are in the house.” I pointed, thumb over shoulder, to the large two-story colonial house behind me.

“Do they have any weapons?”

“No. No one has weapons. It’s a garage sale. I won’t let anyone sell weapons at the garage sales I run.” I stared at the officer, hoping I’d see some sign in his face that he believed me. I didn’t. “I was hired to run this garage sale. It’s my job.”

“By who?” The other two officers headed to the house. One stood by the front door and the other went around the side of the house toward the back.

Why did this guy sound so freaking skeptical? “A young couple. Kate and Alex Green.” I remembered the day we met at a Dunkin’ Donuts in Ellington. I’d instantly labeled them as hipsters with their skinny jeans, flannel shirts, fresh faces, and black-rimmed glasses. Kate and Alex had been shy but eager at the same time. Alex had just gotten a job at Tufts University in tech services. “They just moved here from Indiana and didn’t realize how expensive everything is. They owned a huge house in Indiana but once they got here realized they were going to have to downsize.”

I almost chuckled thinking about their wide-eyed explanation of how the money they got for their home in Indiana would only buy a small cape-style house far from Boston in this area. Sticker shock was a real thing for anyone who moved here.

“Once they realized they had to get rid of two thirds of their stuff, they decided to reduce their carbon footprint,” I said, “and to buy one of those tiny houses. Me? I couldn’t live in one. Not that my one-bedroom apartment is that big, but those loft bedrooms? You have to climb up some little ladder. The bed’s just a mattress on the floor. How do you make the beds without hitting your head?” I shuddered. “Claustrophobic, don’t you think?”

Officer Jones stared at me. I was rambling. Just answer the question he asked, I reminded myself.

“So where did all of this stuff come from?” he asked, sweeping his arm toward the carefully set out tables full of items.

“From the Greens. They put it all in storage when they got here from Indiana.” I remembered their excited faces as they told me that they’d moved into a one-bedroom apartment in a complex on the north side of Ellington to prepare for their new lifestyle. “I priced everything at the storage unit, and then they moved it over here. This is their friends’ house.” I waved a hand at the house. “And their friends decided to sell some stuff, too. Stuff I didn’t know about.” I pointed to a group of tables that held computers, TVs, and cell phones. Then over to a bunch of furniture. “They priced all of the electronics. Personally, I thought their prices were a little bit high, but I don’t usually deal with electronics.”

“What do you usually deal with?” Jones asked. He stepped in closer. His coffee breath swept over me.

He sounded like he expected my answer to be “drugs.” I glanced toward the house, hoping the Greens would be out here in a second to explain all this to Officer Jones. How they owned all of this stuff and it was some kind of terrible mistake. But the only person by the house was the officer knocking on the door.

“My favorite things to sell are antiques, furniture, linens, old glassware, but I sell pretty much whatever my customers want me to. And you wouldn’t believe the stuff some of them want to sell.” Officer Jones didn’t crack a smile. “The rest of it they said to price as people expressed interest. Personally, I think everything should be priced in advance, but the customer is always right.” I shut up. I was volunteering too much again.

“I’ll need you to let us into the house so we can talk to the Greens,” Officer Jones said. He glanced over at the officer standing at the front door.

“I’d be happy to,” I said as we walked to the front door. “They went in to make some coffee for everyone since it’s chilly out here. Then they were coming back out to help run the sale.” If they worked the sale, then I didn’t have to hire anyone to help me, which meant we all pocketed more money.

The officer by the door stepped aside as I opened the door but followed Officer Jones and me into the foyer.

“Kate?” I called. “Alex?” No answer. “The kitchen is just down the hall.” They should have heard me. Why didn’t they answer?

The two officers exchanged a look. One that gave me prickles of discomfort.

“Miss Winston, would you mind stepping back outside while we take a look around?” Officer Jones asked.

The prickles turned into waves. I called to the Greens again. Nothing. “I’d be happy to wait outside.”

Officer Jones looked at his fellow officer. “Go with her.”

The other officer didn’t look happy, but Jones’s message seemed clear. Make sure she doesn’t take off. I went back out onto the porch and walked down the steps to the sidewalk that led from the driveway to the house. The other officer followed me out. We stood awkwardly while avoiding looking at each other. A few minutes later Officer Jones came back out along with the officer who had gone around the back.

“Where are the Greens?” I asked, trying to look past the officers toward the house.

“No one’s in there. The place is empty,” Officer Jones said.

Empty? Although empty was better than him saying there was someone dead in there. “I saw them go in there a half hour ago.” It hit me that it didn’t take a half an hour to make coffee. But I’d been busy enough that until now I hadn’t realized how much time had passed. I paused. “By empty do you mean empty of people?”

“Empty of almost everything,” the other officer said. He didn’t look at me, but at Jones. They both looked at all the furniture on the lawn.

“This didn’t come from the house, did it?” I asked. I didn’t have to wait for an answer. I could tell by the expression on the officer’s face it must have. How could I have been so naive?

I turned to look at the house again. It had one of those historic plaques by the door that said it had been built in the early 1700s. Where were the Greens? If only the plaque could tell me that. The house was a colonial style from the early eighteenth century. It was at the top of a hill. I’d read a bit about its history. The house had been a place where the townspeople went during Indian attacks. It had a tunnel that led from the basement to the nearby woods that was a last-resort escape route if things went south. The woods were long gone, and in their place were rows of small houses with small yards.

“There’s a tunnel. From the basement to someplace around the back. Maybe they went out that way,” I said. The officers just looked at me. “If this is all stolen, they’re the ones that did it. Shouldn’t you send someone after them? They stole the stuff.”

The smaller officer stepped away and talked into his shoulder mike.

Jones turned to me. “Do you know where the entrance to the tunnel is?”

I nodded. “Yes. Do you want me to show you?”

Minutes later I was down in the basement or cellar or whatever people from New England called them. Basements were few and far between where I grew up in Pacific Grove, California. This one had rough dirt walls and wasn’t fit to be a rec room or man cave. It was creepy enough to be a madman’s cave, though. Damp air flowed around us with its musty, rotting smell.

Jones and the two other officers studied the primitive-looking wooden door with its rusty lock, hinges, and doorknob. It was set into the back wall of the foundation.

“So if you didn’t know anything about this house, how did you know this was here?” Jones asked.

“I noticed the historic plaque by the front door the first time I came over, so I read about the history of the house online.”

“When was the first time you came over?”

“Two days ago. To see where I could set everything up.”

Jones and one of the other officers looked at each other. All of this exchanging looks and no explanations was making me very nervous. Cops. Jones reached over and turned the knob on the door to the tunnel. It moved easily in his hand, but as he pulled on the door the hinges groaned, resisting. The door snagged on the rough dirt floor. Even only open an inch, the smell of stagnant air pushed me back a couple of steps.

“I don’t think I need to be here for this,” I said. I was afraid of what was on the other side of that door. Spiders, rats, bats—with my luck a dead body.

But Jones lifted the door just enough to clear the spot where the door had snagged. We all peered in but saw nothing but darkness.

Jones flipped on a powerful flashlight. The tunnel went for about twenty yards before the darkness took over again. Lots of spiderwebs hung, but they looked recently disturbed to me. I shuddered thinking about having to plow through them.

“Let’s go,” Jones said.

“I’m not going in there,” I said. “No reason to. Could be dangerous, and you don’t want to put an innocent civilian in harm’s way.” I accented the innocent.

Jones stared down at me but must have seen the sense in my words. If anything I told him was true, the Greens had fled down the tunnel to escape. They could be waiting farther down beyond where we could see. “You two go down,” Jones said to the other two officers. “We’ll go to the backyard and try to figure out where you’ll come out.”

A backyard in daylight sounded good to me. We hustled up the steps, around the house, and into the backyard. There was a large deck leading down to a beautifully landscaped yard. A hedge of boxwoods made a natural fence that separated the flattest part of the lawn from where it dropped steeply to the houses below. We skirted the boxwoods and peered down the steep slope.

“It looks like there’s some kind of entrance down there,” I said, pointing.

From up here we could see a rickety door in the hill.

Maybe something awful had happened to the Greens. “Maybe they were kidnapped,” I said to Officer Jones. I didn’t want to believe that sweet couple had stolen goods.

“If there even are people named the Greens.”

“There are.” I looked at Officer Jones, but he wouldn’t look at me. The kidnapping story didn’t ring true even to me. It was wishful thinking on my part. Most of the stuff that sat out front were items the Greens had had me pricing in a storage unit they had rented. They said it was theirs. I clenched my fist.

“Seems kind of odd to have a garage sale on a Thursday,” Officer Jones said. “I thought most people had them on the weekend.”

Even that sounded like an accusation of some kind. “It’s when they asked me to do it. The customer’s always right.”

Officer Jones stared at me until I looked away. In this case the customer had been far from right, the lousy, cheating Greens.

A few moments later the door below us swung outward, and the two officers blinked in the light. After they looked around, they climbed the hill toward us.

“Did anyone come out ahead of us?” one of the officers asked.

“No,” I said. Jones gave me a look like this was his show and I’d better sit back and watch.

“Anything in there?” Jones asked them.

“Nothing but cobwebs and rats. A few footprints in a damp spot.”

“They looked fresh,” the other officer added.

They all turned to me, and I didn’t like the looks they had on their faces, like I was some kind of great prize they’d just won at a state fair. I put my hands out as if I could somehow ward off their thoughts.

“I don’t know what’s going on here. But I didn’t steal that stuff.” I gestured toward the front of the house. We headed back that way. Nothing had changed out front. The Greens weren’t standing there waiting to explain themselves.

“Do you know what kind of car the Greens drove?” Jones asked.

I thought about it. “I met them at the Dunkin’s on Great Road in Ellington the first time we met. I didn’t walk in or out with them, so I didn’t see what their car looked like. After I finished pricing things at the storage unit, they showed up there in a big box truck they’d rented from somewhere.”

“What company did they rent it from?” Officer Jones asked.

I shook my head. “I’m not sure. It wasn’t one of the big-name places. I didn’t pay that much attention. There was no reason to at the time.” Back when I’d thought they were honest, trustworthy innocents from Indiana. “I have their phone number. In my phone. Over there.” My carpenter’s apron looked abandoned and lonely on the driveway.

Jones nodded and walked me over. He picked up the apron and pulled out my phone, looking at it suspiciously before handing it over. I pulled up the number and gave it to him. “Why don’t I try calling? Maybe we can get this all straightened out.”

Part of me still wanted to believe that the Greens were the people they portrayed themselves as being. Jones let me try to call them. I put my phone on speaker. The call just rang. There was no “Hi, this is the Greens” or any other sort of message. It went to voice mail after it rang five times. Officer Jones reached over and disconnected.

“Give me the best description of the so-called couple you can,” Jones said.

“I took some pictures of the sale earlier, before I opened. Maybe they are in one. Can I look?”

Jones nodded and I started swiping through pictures.

“This is the only one,” I said, holding out my phone. It was disappointingly bad. They both wore nondescript hooded sweatshirts, one black, one gray. And they were looking down at something on one of the tables. Plus they were way across the yard from me. At least the house was in the background, so he could see I’d taken the picture here and wasn’t making people up. I made the picture bigger and cropped it to focus on their heads. Alex had a small birthmark on his right cheek that looked like a comma.

“This doesn’t help much,” I said. I was so disappointed, but I pointed out the birthmark, which was a blurry blob. Officer Jones squinted at it as I described them. It was my best shot. I was still uncertain whether he believed me or not. I was leaning toward not.

After I finished describing them, Officer Jones used the mic on his shoulder to call someone. He repeated my descriptions. I assumed he was putting some kind of APB out on them. Maybe the all-points bulletin me. . .