Page 22 of You Can Leave Your Hat On

By the time they both got home that evening, it was time to scramble for dinner and head back to the school. Murielle had a school play that night, and she’d been practicing her lines every night. Maisey’s mom had made her costume?she was a sunflower?and it was adorable. When it was over, they stopped for ice cream to celebrate her stage debut, then drove home. By the time they got there, she was sound asleep in the back seat, so Aaron carried her in, and Maisey helped him dress her for bed and tuck her in.

But it was still early, so Aaron dragged all of the files in, spread them out on the table, and he and Maisey started reading through them. HazelPuckett had been a middle school teacher in KnoxCounty. According to her file, she’d never had so much as a parking ticket. Interviews were conducted with her friends. Then Aaron picked up another document and murmured, “Well, this is interesting.”

“What’s that?”

“It’s an interview with one of her coworkers. Woman named ReginaFields. She said Hazel drove a Porsche Cayman.”

“Porsche Cayman? Don’t you mean a Cayenne?” Maisey asked. She’d seen those around town.

“No. A Cayman. It’s a sports car. And a GT4 at that. We’re talking in excess of a hundred grand.”

“What? A hundred-thousand-dollar car for a teacher?”

Aaron shrugged. “That’s what it says. Don’t know how old it was, but it was pricey.” When he put that report down, he picked up another one. “Oh, this is really interesting.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah. This interview is with a realtor. Said he was contacted three months before she disappeared and asked him to list her house. Said she was having trouble making the payments and was afraid she’d go into foreclosure.”

“Should’ve gotten rid of her car and gotten something cheaper,” Maisey said, then felt judgmental. Who was she to decide what was right for the young woman?

“Oh, I don’t think that would help. The realtor valued the house at one point five million.”

“What?” Maisey couldn’t believe what he’d just said. A million and a half for a house on a teacher’s salary?

“Yeah. That’s what it says. Something’s fishy here. On her salary, this woman should’ve been driving a ten-year-old Camry and living in an apartment. She wasn’t even making fifty thousand a year.”

“Then how was she affording all of this?”

“That’s what we’ve got to find out. I see nothing in here about financials, and that’s odd. You’d think they would’ve studied all of that. Finding out where the money came from could clear the whole thing up and give us a suspect.”

“How do we get those?”

“I request them. Might have to make a few phone calls to get them turned loose, but it can be done.” Aaron dropped the report, leaned back, and stretched his arms above his head. “It’s late. I can get back on this in the morning. I think it’s bedtime.”

“Am I putting on the hat tonight?” she asked quietly, hoping he’d say no.

Relief swept over her when Aaron answered, “No. I think we both need some rest. This is getting weird real fast, and I want to be rested so I can actually make a plan in the morning to pull all of this together. You can put on the hat tomorrow night.”

“Agreed.” It had been a long day, and Maisey was really tired. HazelPuckett had been driving an expensive sports car and living in a mansion on a teacher’s salary. That wasn’t normal. Something was wrong, and it was up to them to figure it out.

No one else had found her killer, and Maisey wanted justice for her. Hazel deserved at least that much.

Maisey had just stopped in front of a client’s house the next day when her text messaging app pinged, and she peeked at her phone screen.

Boy oh boy, this is ripe.

She shot him back a quick reply.

Sorry, babe. At an appointment. I’ll call as soon as I’m finished. Love you.

Aaron sent back heart and thumbs-up emojis, so Maisey shoved her phone back into her purse and knocked on the door.

An hour and a half later, she was back in the car, and she hit her hands-free unit as soon as she’d pulled away from the curb. “Hey, beautiful,” that deep, warm voice purred from the phone.

“Hi, sexy guy. Sorry I couldn’t talk.”

“No biggie. But what I found this morning… Real biggie. You need to see all of this.”

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