Mooved to Murder Read online

  Blurb

  Chelsea Lawson is a ride-or-die friend. When her best friend Tilly asked her to stay at her place to watch her six-year-old daughter and pets for a while, Chelsea didn’t hesitate to say yes. What she didn’t realize was that “Tilly’s place” was a micro-farm and “a few pets” included a cow and two goats as well as a child who was too smart for her own good.

  Chelsea was already in over her head before the dead body turned up.

  When the local community, instead of offering support, tries to run her out of town, Chelsea suspects something is going on. Something big and rotten. The mayor makes it clear she’s not wanted and the townspeople give her the cold shoulder, but that only makes Chelsea more determined to uncover their secrets.

  But no one expected the repercussions those secrets would have, especially Chelsea. Now life on the farm is in balance. Will Chelsea ever be able to wake up from this nightmare?

  Mooved to Murder

  CeeCee James

  Copyright © 2019 by CeeCee James

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

  Cover by Mallory Rock

  For my family, my own personal zoo. Love you to the mooon and back!

  Contents

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 1

  I’ve had a recurring dream ever since I was a little girl. I actually don’t know when it first started. The dream has always been a part of me, ingrained in my physical body like my hands, feet and arms. I don’t remember what life is like without it.

  In it, I’m walking down a dirt road. It’s just me, Chelsea Lawson, no-one else, and it’s hot outside, the kind of heat that makes everything appear framed with a shimmer. A scorcher that drives everyone who’s outside, man and animal, to search for some sort of shade, and when even a sliver is located, you’ll stand, panting, wishing you didn’t have to breathe.

  In this particular dream, I am forced to walk. The air is filled with a heavy scent of strawberries, and the road stretches far ahead of me, the end hidden in a cascade of mirages. I have no idea what’s waiting at the end. There’s a feeling inside me that I’ll know it when I get there.

  The road is lined with street signs. As I pass the first sign, I try to read it, and that’s when the dream turns nightmarish. Panic hits me, and I start to run.

  It’s soon after this that I wake up. Usually, I’m twisted in the sheets, sweating as my heart hammers against my ribs.

  The funny thing is I’m not sure what’s in the dream that has me so scared. There’s nothing that hints at danger. Just a long dirt road lined with street signs.

  And strawberries.

  But the dream haunts me just the same. And with it comes a vague feeling that I know the place, that I should remember. That I need to remember. Yet as hard as I try, I never can.

  Mom sent me to counseling back when I was in middle school in hope that I would finally be able to resolve it. I think she was tired of hearing me cry out in the middle of the night. And it must have helped because I’ve rarely had the dream since.

  But I had it this morning. As I lay in bed, heart pounding, nothing looked familiar. I tried to place where I was. Blue curtains, quilt. And a creepy feeling that someone was staring at me.

  A heavy exhale shuddered from the left. I jerked my gaze in that direction and clutched my blankets tighter to my chest. At the end of the bed, a six-year-old girl stood leaning against the footboard. She had shoulder-length mousy brown hair, awfully similar to mine, and a sprinkle of freckles.

  “Hi!” she said when she caught my gaze. Casually, she swung by one hand from the bed post, the silver stars on her pajamas winking from the light escaping through the cracked window blinds.

  “Emma! Hi. Wow, is it early!” I rubbed my eyes and stretched and tried to pull myself together.

  Emma was my friend Tilly’s daughter. Matilda Miller was Tilly’s full name, but we’d met in Kindergarten more than twenty years ago, and I’d immediately shortened it to Tilly. In return, she’d split her chocolate cupcake with me. We’ve been best friends ever since.

  We used to do everything together. Then, as adults, life happened, and we’d gone our separate ways, her to a marriage and then a divorce, and me to college and then to a very boring job with an accounting firm in Charlotte, never even moving out of the city we grew up in.

  Of course, we talked on the phone, and no matter how much time passed, we always managed to pick right back up from where we left off. That was a mark of a true friend, in my opinion, when you could talk to a person like they were there all along.

  It was why I responded the way I did two weeks ago when she phoned in a panic. “Chelz!” That’s what she called me. My name didn’t shorten nearly as cute as hers. “I’m so glad you answered.”

  “What’s the matter?” I asked, worry filling me.

  “Chelsea, I need your help.”

  It turned out the kind of help she needed was for someone to stay with her daughter and to take care of what she termed were a few “pets” while she flew to Australia for her first ever photo shoot. Ever since her divorce she’d been trying to get back into photography and this was her big chance. Her ex-husband was great, but as an airline pilot he couldn’t watch Emma.

  I, of course, agreed right away. I was due for vacation, which they didn’t want to grant despite it being my first, so I actually ended up putting in my notice. After all, I could always get another job, and I wasn’t sure how long Tilly might need me for. Which is how I found myself here in Cedar Falls, North Carolina with a deep bruise on my leg and a first grader staring at me.

  How did I get the bruise, you might ask? Oh, that was from one of Tilly’s little pets, a cow named Rosy, who kicked me instead of going into her stall for the evening. Yes, you read that right. A cow. And she had horns. Apparently all Holsteins do. The entire menagerie included her, a couple of goats, two rabbits, a cat and a dog. I didn’t know how I got myself talked into these things, other than I had this not so healthy drive to help people, and I couldn’t say no. But this was no time for deep introspection.

  I eyed Emma now. “What are you doing up so early?”

  “Watching you.”

  “What are you watching me for?”

  “I wanted to see what an old person looked like so I can draw them.” She lifted a notepad. “See?”

  On the paper was a stick figure of a person with Xs for eyes and a frowny mouth with a squiggle. My shoulder-length hair was indicated with straight lines sticking out from the head like porcupine quills.

  “Lovely,” I breathed. “What’s that by the mouth?”

  “Drool.” she answered simply.

  I flopped back to the pillow and asked myself once again what had I gotten myself into. Not for the last time!

  “How long have you been sitting there?”

  “Oh, ages.”

  Had she heard me cr
y out from the dream? “Aren’t there some cartoons or something on?”

  “We don’t get TV.”

  No TV? How was I suppose to watch my Housewives shows? I groaned. “Did you wake me for a reason?”

  “Yes. Did you know there’s a dead body in the barn?”

  I bolted up like I’d been stuck with a pin. “A dead body?”

  “A dead person. With Freckles.”

  “Who’s Freckles?”

  “He’s the ghost that lives in there too.”

  Okay, no worries. This was a case of a kid with an overactive imagination.

  Emma hopped up, jostling the bed, and crawled over to my side. She reached for my hand and yanked. I swear three of my fingers popped. “Come on,” she insisted.

  “Ow! Be careful.” I snatched back my hand and shook it. “Come on, what?”

  “You have to see it. Poor Freckles might get scared being out there all alone.” She grabbed my hand again and pulled harder.

  She was not going to give up. “All right. All right. Give me a second. Go on and wait outside.”

  “I know how that works. I’m six, you know.”

  “How what works?”

  “I wait outside and then you fall back to sleep. Mommy does it all the time. But come on. I need you.”

  I pushed back the covers and sat up. “Let me get dressed. You too. I’ll meet you in the hall in a minute. I promise I’m coming.”

  Reluctantly, Emma left, with me shooing her one last time at the doorway when she turned to give me another beseeching glance.

  The door finally closed. I groaned and rubbed my eyes, then slowly rolled to the side of the bed and stood. I call it standing, but my spine was more like a curved bow as every muscle in my body screamed. Just one night of taking care of the cow and the goats had done this to me.

  I tried to stretch it out, but it wasn’t having it. Grumbling, I tugged on a hoodie and slithered into a pair of sweat pants and then found my flip-flops. I ran a brush through my hair and tucked it behind my ears. My mouth tasted like a litter box, and I needed coffee. This was all too early. I yanked open the door.

  Emma fell in from where she’d been leaning on the other side.

  “Oh, my goodness! Are you okay?” I asked.

  “Yeah. Let’s go.” She’d must have moved like lighting when leaving my room the first time, because she was out of her pj’s and into a t-shirt and a pair of shorts. It was a cold September morning. I was going to have to get her to change.

  But first let’s figure out this dead body thing. And who was Freckles, anyway? What a funny name.

  She clutched my hand and dragged me down the stairs and through the house.

  We walked outside into crisp air and green and sunshine. So bright I squinted.

  “Come on. Just this way,” she urged.

  “I’m coming. I’m coming,” I grunted, attempting one eye open.

  Rosy mooed from the field as if to spur me on, a tuft of clover hanging from her moving jaws.

  The grass was wet which made me immediately regret my choice for footwear. Water seeped between my toes before I was twenty feet away from the house.

  “You were already out here?” I asked, glancing at the red barn.

  “Yeah. I wanted to see if Freckles knew where the cat was keeping her new kittens. But instead I saw that person.” We’d reached it by now, and she yanked open the barn door and pointed with gusto.

  I rolled my eyes, ready to break into a spiel about how imaginations were lovely but we had to use them for good and not for….

  There was a dead body on the floor.

  I screamed.

  “I told you! I told you!” Emma danced around me delighted.

  What do I do? Where’s my phone? I kicked myself when I realized I’d left it in the house.

  “Stay here, kid," I said as I started to jog back. Wait, what was I saying? “I mean, follow me. Come with me now! Emma! Quit poking that body with a stick!”

  Emma dropped the stick and scampered after me as I reached for her hand. Together, we ran for the house. It was only as I hit the front porch that I realized I’d lost a flip-flop along the way.

  Quickly, I dialed 911.

  “911 here, this is Miss Betsy. What is your emergency?” a decidedly elderly voice warbled.

  What in the world? Was this real?

  “Hi. Uh, my name is Chelsea Lawson, and I have a dead body in the barn.”

  “And what is your address?”

  WHAT WAS our address? I stared at Emma who’d scampered up on the kitchen stool and sat, swinging her legs. “Emma,” I wheedled. “Do you know where you live?”

  “Oh, Emma Miller? I’ll send an officer right out.”

  “Okay. Thank you,” I said into the phone, shocked she knew, but relieved. But I didn’t have time to think about that. Because, like a deranged bunny after the first carrot of the season, Jasper popped out the open front door and took off across the yard like he had a rocket tied to his hind quarters.

  Straight toward the open barn.

  Chapter 2

  No! Mentally, I kicked myself. Why had I left the barn door open? It was like throwing out a welcome mat for him to come in and have a nice long sniff. What on earth had I been thinking?

  I hung up the phone and ran out the door in a panic, screaming the dog’s name. Jasper didn’t respond. Now, I’m not much of an animal person, but I realized right about then that screaming might not be the best tactic to cajole a dog back when there was a dead body to smell, especially an animal who didn’t know me very well.

  He was fast approaching the barn’s open doorway. I stooped to wheedling bribes. “Cookie!” I yelled. “Treat!”

  “Try bath time,” suggested Emma with a tilt of her head.

  Without hesitating, I yelled, “Bath time!”

  I swear that dog kicked up his feet and ran faster. I shot Emma a look. She hid her mouth behind her hands, laughing like a loon.

  Luckily, Jasper appeared to hate baths with such a passion that he must have decided he didn’t want to be trapped in the barn. With grass clumps flying at his heels, he veered away and headed to the vacant area behind the building. The last I saw of him, he was a brown streak racing through the field before finally disappearing into the woods beyond.

  A colorful string of words started to escape my mouth until I saw Emma watching me, her brown eyes rounded with delight. Oh, no way. I wasn’t going to give her one more piece of ammunition to tattle on me with.

  I stomped back to the house, locating my flip-flop along the way.

  “I’m hungry,” Emma announced as we hit the front porch.

  Well sure. Perfect timing. Cops on their way and a dead body in the barn. Must be time for breakfast.

  I stalked into the kitchen with Emma hot on my heels. After opening and shutting a few cupboards I located the bread and a glass for milk.

  “Where’s the toaster?” I asked Emma.

  She shrugged and hopped up on the stool to watch me with her chin propped up on her hand. Her little feet thumped against the railing.

  “Anywhere? No where?” I threw out.

  She shrugged again. “Want to play hot and cold?”

  Rolling my eyes, I started opening the cupboards again.

  “Cold… colder,” sang Emma helpfully.

  I stepped away and moved toward the oven.

  “Hot.”

  I raised my hand above the oven. “Cold.”

  She pointed a tiny finger. I followed the gesture to see a door. I approached it slowly, unsure of if this was another joke of hers. What if this was the stairwell to the basement? Or filled with bouncing balls? Who knew with her impish nature.

  “Hotter! Burning hot!” she squealed.

  I jerked the door open, prepared to bat off whatever might come flying out. Instead it was a rather boring pantry. I located the toaster and brought it out with a grateful grunt in her direction. Then I popped in the bread. “You want jelly?”

  She sh
ook her head. “Cinnamon and sugar.”

  I harrumphed. Still, she did help me find the appliance, so I set to finding the ingredients for her.

  While it was toasting, I found some pain-reliever. Between the nightmare and the dead body, I was brewing up a storm of a headache. I swallowed the pills while Emma watched with interest.

  “Don’t ever touch these,” I said. “Or you might need this.” I lifted my shirt and showed her my appendix scar. I’d had it removed when I was around eight. I quickly buttered her toast and sprinkled it with the sugar and spice.

  She narrowed her eyes. “I don’t believe you. My mom takes the same medicine when she has a sore head. So that medicine has to be helping you.”

  She was a smart kid, I had to give her that. “Yeah, it’s true. These do help me. But if you take medicine when you don’t need it, you can get very sick. Got it?”

  Emma nodded, apparently appeased with my amended story. She jumped down from the stool and took her toast outside.

  I peeked through the window to make sure she wasn’t headed toward the barn and was happy to see her running in the opposite direction. I should have followed her, but I was already exhausted. She’d probably be okay, I thought. After all this was her place.

  Okay. I needed to text Tilly. But should I wait until I had more information? I checked my watch. It was late there, I’d definitely be waking her.

  I popped more bread in the toaster and poured a mug of coffee. But I didn’t even get a chance to have a sip. There’s the saying there’s no rest for the wicked, and I was learning that must be true, because at that exact moment two very unrestful things happened. A cop car pulled into the driveway, and Emma began screaming at the top of her lungs.