Murder on Ice Read online

  Copyright © Bety Comerford (B.T. Lord)

  All rights reserved.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental and not intended by the author.

  No part of this book may be reproduced or utilized in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the author.

  ISBN-13: 978-1540846730

  ISBN-10: 1540846733

  Cover art by Michelle Motuzas

  Cover design by Alison Ouellette

  Books in the Twin Ponds Murder Mystery Series:

  Murder on Ice

  Murder by Misadventure

  A Perfect Case of Murder

  Murder by Duplicity

  To Larry and Mamacita

  The dreamers dream…

  PROLOGUE

  Sheriff Cammie Farnsworth slowly approached the corpse.

  “Jesus Christ,” she whispered under her breath.

  He was lying on the bed, his hands near his body, looking as though he were asleep. She withdrew a pen from her pocket and gently moved the expensively tailored jacket to one side. The bullet hole near his heart told her what had occurred.

  But not everything.

  Emotion welled up as a thousand thoughts ran through her head, all of them much too painful to be dealt with at that moment. A momentary panic set in as she struggled to pull back all the strands of memories and feelings and the worst feeling of all – the finality of death, while maintaining her professional façade.

  With over ten years in law enforcement, she’d seen far too many casualties of violence. In a moment of stark clarity, she realized she’d foolishly allowed herself the fantasy of believing that she’d finally found a place where she wouldn’t have to face the horrors of what people were capable of doing to each other. But it had followed her even here. And swallowed up the one person who had almost destroyed her and if she wasn’t careful, would do so again.

  Even in death.

  She shook off the pall of the past and took in the scene with a practiced eye, all the while wondering how this could have happened. Who would want to kill him? He was a hero to this small town. A legend to the world. People practically genuflected when he walked past. All that he had done – and hadn’t done - to this town was forgiven when he’d hit icon status.

  Or was it? Had she forgiven him?

  It didn’t matter. Not right now, anyway. What mattered was that he’d brought a darkness back with him. Or, she recognized with a sudden chill, had resurrected one that had lain dormant all these years, patiently waiting for that moment when he’d come back.

  Well, he had come back. And released the monster that was murder. It was now up to her to deal with the aftermath, a task made doubly difficult by her relationship with the victim.

  And with the murderer.

  CHAPTER ONE

  One Week Before

  Cammie nervously bit her lower lip. She stared out the windshield of her Ford Explorer and cursed for the hundredth time her decision to run for County Sheriff. It didn’t matter that she’d won with ninety percent of the popular vote. Or that she’d been able to keep the peace in this remote part of northwestern Maine where, surrounded by wilderness on all sides, the majority of her duties involved drunk drivers and week-end warriors who went out into the forest or the two ponds the town was named after and ended up lost or half drowned.

  What mattered right here, right now was her inability to get out of her Explorer and interview the victim.

  She shifted in her seat, looking out at the light snowfall starting to build up on the hood of her vehicle, and continued to bite her lower lip.

  During her years as a police officer in Seattle, then as a private investigator in Boston, she’d faced down the worst society could conjure up. She’d been shot at, punched at, almost run over in the line of duty. She’d twice been awarded the Medal of Honor for risking her life to rescue fellow officers wounded during gang crossfire.

  So why was she sitting here, slowly losing feeling in her fingers and toes, because she didn’t have the guts to interview an eighty-nine year old woman? Who, standing five feet next to her own height of 5 ft. 8 inches, she towered over? Who was half blind? And weighed all of ninety pounds?

  Because no matter how small or scrawny the package, hate is scary. And the victim absolutely, positively hates you.

  “We’ve been sitting here for ten minutes,” her deputy Rick Belleveau replied. “I’ve lost circulation in my toes. My nose is turning white with frostbite. If any other body part gets frostbitten, I’m personally suing you.”

  “I’m just trying to figure out the right words to say that won’t set Cora off.”

  Not too bad a lie. But one look at Rick’s face and she knew he wasn’t buying it.

  “Just hearing hello from you is enough to set her off.”

  For the past two weeks, tiny Clarke County and its largest town of Twin Ponds, had been subjected to a strange rash of burglaries. Instead of snowmobiles, cars or computers disappearing, the thief was making off with birdfeeders.

  Old, paint-chipped, birdshit-encrusted birdfeeders.

  If this were happening in an urban setting, the thefts would be shoved to the bottom of the pile, behind murders, rapes and assaults. However, in this small spot of civilization in the midst of dense, majestic wilderness, the burglary of bird feeders was big news. Nestled near the Canadian border, winters in Twin Ponds were long and harsh. It bred self-reliant, independent people with stern exteriors and soft hearts who took their bird feeding very seriously.

  Her past law enforcement career notwithstanding, these thefts were turning into the first real test of Cammie’s abilities as the only female elected sheriff of Clarke County. If she couldn’t solve the burglaries of some decrepit birdfeeders, what was going to happen when a real crime took place?

  Cora Cameron was the latest victim. In a town that had its fair share of eccentrics, Cora stood out. She lived with ten other elderly couples in a small trailer park ten miles west of Twin Ponds. Their tiny community lay at the foot of Crow Mountain, a craggy outcrop of granite that legend claimed was where the real witches of Salem, Massachusetts fled to escape the witch trials centuries before.

  Even if the stories weren’t true, there was something unnerving about Crow Mountain. The area was dark and forbidding, the black denseness of the forest adding to its notorious reputation. When Cammie was a teenager, she and a group of friends climbed to the top to see if, as the old-timers claimed, the spirits of those witches returned every Halloween to perform a Samhain ritual. She never forgot the strange noises, or the way the trees seemed to whisper and groan all around them, reaching out with their skeletal-like branches to snatch away a careless teenager. Nor could she shake the unmistakable feeling they were being watched. As if they were prey ready to be devoured. It was too much. They all lost their nerve and ran out of the forest as fast as they could. The memory of that night was still enough to make her shudder, and it made her question why anyone in their right mind would want to live in its shadow.

  Although she never produced any proof to back up her story, Cora was convinced she was descended from one of the original witches. It wasn’t unusual to see her wandering up and down Main Street, uttering incantations and prophesies on the end of the world.

  The townspeople considered her harmless, addled perhaps by too many years spent alone in cold, frigid winters that blanketed this northernmost county. Yet that harmlessness could suddenly turn violent whenever she caught a glimps
e of Cammie. Just the sight of the sheriff going about her business would produce an explosion of screeched gibberish while lobbing bundles of feathers, pine cones and who knew what else at the hapless officer. Cammie quickly learned to avoid Cora at all costs. Yet here she was, at the crazy woman’s doorstep, reluctant to climb out of the rapidly freezing SUV.

  The gangbangers and drug dealers she’d once dealt with looked tame compared to Cora.

  Seated next to her, Rick tapped his boots against the floor in a continuing effort to keep warm. As a man in whose blood ran a mix of Native American and French Canadian ancestry, he’d grown up with the folklore and superstitions of both races. He respected Cora’s other worldly abilities, and on the drive over had already intoned an Abenaki prayer of protection over Cammie.

  Twice.

  “Look, I’ll do the talking,” he said as he blew on his gloved hands. “She likes me.”

  “Every woman over the age of two likes you.”

  Following Rick’s love life was a task only someone who loved to torture themselves with convoluted puzzles would take on. He had a new woman every week and although Cammie had long ago stopped trying to keep up with his paramours, she did constantly marvel at how he was able to jump from one relationship to another without incurring the wrath of the ladies he’d left behind. It had to be more than charm or sexual prowess that kept his social calendar full and drama free.

  As if reading her mind, Rick grinned. “What can I say? I’m part French and I look like my Native ancestors. That’s a pretty powerful combination.” He tilted his head back and, to emphasize his point, ran his slender fingers through his shoulder length raven black hair that he kept tied back in a ponytail whenever he was on duty.

  Cammie rolled her eyes. “If you remember, I didn’t ask you to come along.”

  “I had to. How else was I going to do that protection prayer on you?” She threw him a look. He shrugged. “Just trying to save your soul from wandering in the wilderness for all eternity.”

  “Despite Cora’s feelings towards me, this is part of an ongoing investigation. If you want to be helpful, just take notes while I interview her.”

  “What if she throws a curse at you?”

  It was Cammie’s turn to shrug as she climbed out of the Explorer. “I expect you to do what any ambitious deputy would do. Throw yourself over me and take on the curse.”

  “What makes you think I’m ambitious?”

  The snow crunched under their boots as Cammie and Rick slowly squeezed their way over a tiny, shoveled out path only a stick figure could fit on. Poking up here and there through the snow were the old woman’s version of garden decor - frozen pinwheels, rusted pentagrams and other undecipherable shapes and symbols.

  The miniscule trailer’s original color was impossible to tell beneath the green and brown mold that had grown up on its exterior over the years. Hanging on the doorframe were bird feathers tied in bundles, half rotted plastic vines and what looked like little tuffs of fur bound in red yarn. Everyone considered these symbols of Cora’s power.

  Cammie knew about rituals, about those people with a special gift who could communicate with the Other Side. One of her dearest friends, Paul Langevin, was a shaman. Living across Mkazawi Pond from her own cabin, he’d saved her sanity countless times when she was younger. She saw his crystals, his feathers, his pouches with healing stones and herbs and understood their power.

  Cora’s symbols, on the other hand, smacked of insanity and a need to be something she wasn’t. Or at least Cammie thought so, though she was careful to keep these opinions to herself. Just in case.

  They’d just reached the halfway mark on the path when the door to the trailer abruptly swung open and the five foot bag of bones stood in all her terrifying glory. She wore an oversized navy blue parka that came down to her scrawny knees. In her gloved hand she waved a cane, sending the curlers tightly wound in her iron grey hair bobbing back and forth furiously. She glared at Cammie for a long moment before snapping, “About time you arrived. I called over an hour ago. What’s so important that you can’t come out here when a tax paying citizen needs help?”

  Cammie opened her mouth to respond only to find herself cut off when Rick forced himself next to her on the narrow path, almost knocking her into the snow.

  “I apologize for the delay, Miss Cameron. The roads were pretty slick and we wanted to make sure we got here in one piece so we could offer you any and all assistance to get your birdfeeder back.”

  Cammie narrowed her hazel eyes at him and suppressed the urge to kick him in the shins. She stubbornly turned back to Cora, determined to take back control of this interview when her jaw dropped in disbelief. Was she hallucinating? Had Rick spiked her morning coffee with something stronger than half and half? Was it possible the old battle axe was actually smiling?

  “My mother gave me that feeder. She and I painted it together when I was a youngster. Means a lot to me.”

  “We totally understand,” Rick continued, his voice dripping with charm. “We’re going to do our best to get it back for you. Now if you could tell us where the birdfeeder was located, that would be a big help.”

  Cora raised her cane and pointed to a rusted iron hanger that stood near the entrance to her trailer. It was leaning precariously close to the ground. Dangling from it was a hook, the last remains of the missing birdfeeder. Below the hook lay a small circular trench that had been carefully shoveled out.

  “Did you dig around the hanger?” Rick asked.

  “Of course I did. Wanted to make sure it didn’t fall during the storm last night.”

  If there was any chance of finding a clue, the storm and Cora’s digging had destroyed it. Still, Cammie and Rick poked around, hoping the thief might have dropped something or left a trail of bird seed pointing the direction he had come in. However, to neither’s surprise, they found nothing. Not so much as an errant sunflower seed.

  “When did you discover the feeder gone?” Rick asked as he whipped out his notebook and pen and started jotting down her responses.

  “I check on it every morning. These poor birds get hungry, especially when it snows, and I wanted to make sure they had enough food.”

  “And the last time you saw it was…?”

  “Last night around ten. Come to think of it, I thought I heard something outside. Like a thud. But when I looked out the window, the wind and snow were blowing so hard, you could barely see your hand in front of your face. But I did see my feeder.” She grumbled under her breath. “I’ll bet you that thud was the thief. I’m going to have to put a spell on him. Make sure something falls off to teach him never to touch my things again.”

  Rick and Cammie politely ignored her threats. If anything was going to fall off, it would be Cora’s curlers hanging for dear life on her thin brittle hair.

  The deputy finished writing up Cora’s words, then closed the notebook and shoved it into his parka’s breast pocket.

  “We’ll interview your neighbors. Maybe they saw something that might help us discover who’s doing this. As soon as we find out anything, we’ll immediately let you know.”

  Turning back towards the Explorer, Cammie was overcome with a ridiculous need to assert her authority. It was bad enough to be seen running away from Cora on Main Street. But this was an official investigation. Her investigation. She didn’t appreciate having her position as sheriff usurped by a junior officer, even if that junior officer was only trying to avoid a mini-Armageddon. She plastered her professional smile on her face and turned back to Cora.

  “Don’t worry, Miss Cameron. We’ll get your birdfeeder back.”

  Rick stopped dead in his tracks and glared at Cammie.

  “You have a death wish?” he hissed under his breath. That just egged Cammie on. Throwing caution to the wind, she continued smiling her jaw aching smile. “If there’s ever anything else you need, don’t hesitate to call us.”

  Rick hung his head and groaned. The air around them suddenly grew silent.
The shadows from the surrounding forest scudded forward, waiting, anticipating. The winds died down in tense expectation.

  The response wasn’t long in coming.

  Cora raised her arm and pointed a long, arthritic finger at Cammie.

  “Expect your past to collide with your present,” she intoned in a fierce voice. “All that you hold dear will disintegrate and you will be left alone, with nothing, with no one. Blood and death will trail your footsteps. Heed my words, Camilla Farnsworth and prepare to be swallowed up by the darkness! So mote it be!”

  With a dramatic swirl of her parka, Cora turned and entered her trailer, slamming the door behind her.

  Cammie stood in the icy snow in stunned silence. On the other side of the Explorer she heard Rick click his tongue.

  “You’re in deep shit now,” he announced.

  CHAPTER TWO

  It had been a long day. Made longer by Cora’s pronouncement which Cammie, no matter how hard she tried, could not dislodge from her brain as it ran round and round like a maniacal, out-of-control carousel.

  Sitting in her office, surrounded by flip charts and a large eraser board filled with scribbled lists concerning what she and her staff had nicknamed “the Birdman” thefts, she tried to remain focused on the task at hand. But it was no use. She sat back in her chair with a frustrated thud.

  Glancing at the clock, she saw it was six pm. With Rick gone on a hot date, and their receptionist/dispatcher Emmy Madachuck off to her knitting klatch, Cammie was left alone in an empty office with Cora’s angry words staring her in the face.

  Twin Ponds’ police station was located mid-way down Main Street, a wide thoroughfare in which the majority of small businesses and shops were located. Cammie’s office, a glass walled square that was large enough to hold a desk, a file cabinet, two guest chairs and a small couch was located near the back of the station, down a short corridor. Next to Cammie was an even smaller conference/interro-gation room. Beyond that was a bathroom. The corridor then turned right towards the back door and left towards two jail cells. At the entrance to the station was a counter, behind which Emmy and Rick had their desks and where the most important piece of equipment was located – the coffee machine.