The Suspect Next Door Read online

  Nancy gave Ned a signal, held her breath, and watched.

  Ned rose quickly from the shadows and moved to the office doorway. When Trisha saw him, she nearly jumped out of her seat.

  “Who—who are you?” she gasped. “What do you want?”

  “Never mind that,” Ned said in his most threatening voice. “I know all about Dan. And the Denver connection.”

  “You—what? I don’t know what you’re talking about!” Ned’s act was working, Nancy realized. Trisha was clearly thrown. Push her, Ned! Nancy urged him silently. Don’t let her off the hook!

  “I’m talking about a tall guy in a cowboy hat,” Ned said almost as if he’d heard Nancy. “I know you’re in on it together. I know about Dan’s trips to Denver. I know about the envelope.”

  “How?” she challenged him. “How do you know?”

  “I was a friend of Dan’s. Call me his insurance policy. I know everything,” he snapped, walking over to the desk.

  Trisha’s voice was husky with fear. “What do you want from me?”

  Ned smiled, and sat down right on the desk. Leaning over to Trisha, he purred, “I want in. You let me take Dan Taylor’s place, and I keep what I know to myself.”

  There was silence as Trisha summed up the situation. The store manager was tough, Nancy thought. She wasn’t quite ready to break.

  “I—I still don’t know what you’re talking about,” she insisted.

  Time for the cavalry, Nancy thought. She gave Nikki a tap on the shoulder and nodded for her to join Ned.

  Nancy shoved a carton onto the floor. It dropped with a thud.

  “What was that?” Trisha gasped.

  Ned feigned panic. “Who’s out there?” he demanded in a shaky voice.

  At that very moment, Nikki emerged from the shadows. “I’ve heard enough!” she shrieked, a realistic edge of insanity in her voice. It raised goosebumps on Nancy’s arms. Nancy could only imagine the effect it had on Trisha Rapp.

  “I know you killed Dan!” Nikki raved, pointing her finger at Ned’s face. “You’ll never get away with it! Never!”

  Nikki pulled the starter’s pistol out of her pocket and waved it in the air.

  “No! No!” Ned shouted, as Nikki aimed the gun at his face. “It wasn’t me! She did it!” he said, pointing at the stunned Trisha.

  Nikki hesitated for a moment, as if wondering whether or not to believe Ned. Then she leveled the pistol at Trisha.

  “So you’re in this, too!” she hissed.

  Trisha backed up against the wall, terror reflected in her eyes.

  “I loved Dan Taylor!” Nikki screamed. “Nobody cared about that. You just killed him in cold blood and left me behind to take the blame! Well, you won’t get away with it. Let them put me away for a thousand years—I don’t care!”

  She cocked the gun and leveled it at Ned. He made as if to stop her, but before he could say anything, she fired. With a cry, Ned slumped to the ground and lay motionless. A pool of stage blood spread slowly on the ground around him.

  Her eyes wild with triumph, Nikki turned back to Trisha and aimed the gun again.

  That was enough for Trisha. “No! No, don’t shoot!” she screamed. “Please, please don’t kill me! I didn’t kill him, I swear it.”

  Nikki’s face took on a grim and determined expression. “You’ve got till the count of ten to tell me who did,” she said somberly. “One. Two. Three—”

  “It was Alan Harrow—one of our suppliers from Denver.”

  So that was his name, Nancy thought, the man in the cowboy hat.

  Nancy stepped out from the shadows. “Nice work, guys,” she said as Ned got up from the floor and handed her the tape recorder.

  Lifting up the phone, Nancy dialed police headquarters. “Hello, Chief McGinnis?” she said into the phone. “This is Nancy Drew. Meet me at Vanities right away. I think we’ve solved the Taylor murder.”

  Chapter

  Seventeen

  DIDN’T I TELL YOU it was the guy in the cowboy hat?” Bess had her arm around Nancy’s shoulder and was riding her mercilessly. It was the next day, and the Masters family was celebrating. A couple of Nikki’s friends were there, too.

  “Yes, Bess, you said it was him, all right,” Nancy answered lightly. “But you also mentioned everyone else on my list. There was no way you could have been wrong.”

  Everyone laughed, except Bess. George laughed loudest of all. “She’s right, Bess,” she said apologetically.

  “Seriously though, Bess,” Nancy added, soothing her friend’s ruffled feathers, “if you and George hadn’t gone to Vanities that day, I’d never have known about the Denver connection.”

  Nikki came over to them and held up a newspaper. The headline read: “Suspects Arrested in Taylor Murder.”

  “I’ll be grateful to you for the rest of my life,” said Nikki, giving Nancy a big hug. “But I’ll never understand how you figured it out!”

  Robin, seated on the couch next to Lacey, called out, “Me, neither. Like the watch. Nikki really was with Dan at ten-fourteen, wasn’t she?”

  “Nikki was with Dan at ten-fourteen, River Heights time, Robin. Dan’s watch was set for Denver time,” Nancy explained. “He must have forgotten to reset it when he got back into town.”

  “But how did the whole robbery scheme work, Nancy?” George asked. “I don’t quite get it.”

  Nancy cleared her throat. “Trisha filled me in on that when she was arrested. According to her, she knew Alan Harrow from Denver. They’d been in on little scams before, but this one was their biggest caper yet.

  “The idea was this: Trisha stole merchandise from Vanities and sent it to Denver via Dan Taylor. Al paid Dan off and resold the merchandise! Dan took Trisha’s cut back to her, and the whole round would start over again.”

  “But if she was behind it, why did Trisha tell Kate Hayes about the thefts in the first place?” Bess asked, confused.

  “I asked Kate about that when she came by the store before the police took Trisha off,” Nancy said. “I thought it was strange, too. Apparently, Charlene was about to tell her, when Trisha overheard and pointed it out. I imagine she thought it would be embarrassing for her to be store manager and not know about it.”

  George shook her head. “It’s all so weird. I mean, why take the dresses and all if she’s making good money with the stolen jewelry? It seems to me that’s where she went wrong.”

  “You’re right, George,” Ned said. “But by the end, there, I don’t think Trisha was thinking too clearly. Maybe she just got greedy.”

  “Or maybe Mr. Cowboy Hat put her up to it,” Bess suggested melodramatically.

  The room was quiet. Then Nikki spoke up.

  “But why did they have to kill Dan?” she asked, heartbroken.

  “Trisha knew if Dan accused her of anything, she could point to his reputation as a liar. But she didn’t figure on Dan having enough brains to take out ‘insurance.’ He’d been saving tags, duplicate invoices, anything he could get his hands on.

  “It says here,” said Nikki, pointing to the paper, “that they found the envelope in Harrow’s condo.”

  Nancy shook her head. “I guess he decided to keep it as insurance against Trisha. Anyway, when Dan told them he was quitting, they got worried that he was going to go to the police. That’s why Alan Harrow was in town: to shut Dan up. I think Dan knew that. And that’s why he tried to give Nikki the envelope.”

  “I can’t help thinking I let Dan down,” Nikki said softly. “Just when he needed me most, too.”

  Nancy put an arm around her neighbor’s slender shoulders. “Nikki, you did the right thing, given what you knew. Besides, you might have wound up just like Dan.”

  Nikki shuddered. “Sometimes I wonder if I’ll ever get over this,” she said.

  “Of course you will,” Nancy told her. “Sooner than you think.”

  She motioned for Ned, Bess, and George to follow her outside. It was time for Nikki to get back to her family and fr
iends—to her real, everyday world.

  Outside, it was another perfect late-summer afternoon. “Hey, nice new window, Drew!” Bess laughed as they crossed the lawn. “Who was responsible for that little stunt, by the way?”

  “Trisha,” answered Nancy matter-of-factly. “She told me in the back of the squad car on the way to the station. She actually seemed sorry about it,” she mused. “Apparently, Harrow freaked when Trisha told him I was on the case and made her do it. After you,” she gestured, allowing Bess and George to go inside.

  Before she could follow them in, Ned pulled her aside and put a small box in her hand. “I didn’t get a chance to give you this yesterday,” he apologized. Opening the box, Nancy removed an elegant gold bracelet.

  “Happy anniversary, Nan,” Ned said.

  Nancy looked up, misty eyed. “Thanks for being my boyfriend, Ned Nickerson,” she said softly. “You’re the greatest.”

  “You’re not half bad yourself,” he murmured softly, kissing her.

  Standing on the front porch, the two of them turned around to look out at the street.

  “You know,” Nancy told him, resting her head on his shoulder. “I mistrusted Trisha Rapp the first time I met her.”

  “Oh?” Ned said casually. “And why was that?”

  “She didn’t think much of River Heights!” Nancy exclaimed. “Can you imagine any decent person not liking River Heights?”

  This book is a work of fiction. Any references to historical events, real people, or real places are used fictitiously. Other names, characters, places, and events are products of the author’s imagination, and any resemblance to actual events or places or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

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