Chapter 19

Monday afternoon, after school hours, Mr. Deedle and Mr. Grimes waited at the door to the small apartment that Annie Sadler shared with her mother. They both carried flowers as Mr. Deedle knocked lightly.

The forty-ish woman who answered the door was pleasant-looking but a more-than-casual glance revealed that she had once been very beautiful and—with just a little make-up—could be again at any time. "Oh, Mr. Deedle, I haven't seen you since the accident. Thank you so much for your support through those terrible times. I'm sorry I was not a better host."

Mr. Deedle smiled. "Nothing to apologize for, Ms. Taggert. Your focus had to be on your daughter's health. I can't imagine what you were going through."

Her return smile was wistful. "It's something we continue to go through and the doctors tell me that we're a long way from the end of this. We just hold out hope that she will someday walk again."

Mr. Deedle's smile broadened. "We might have a little good news. The money from the fundraising efforts has been found. We're here to give it to you today."

"That's wonderful! The hospital has been patient but you can see that I'm not a rich woman." She looked from the faces of the two men to their hands—which were empty.

Mr. Grimes responded to her confused look. "We've brought four students with us who were instrumental in finding the money. We thought it would be appropriate for them to present it. Is Annie available?"

The woman's facial expression faltered for a split second and her voice raised just slightly. "She's in her bed where she always is." The smile returned. "I just gave her a bath and combed her hair, so she should be presentable."

Mr. Grimes leaned out the door. "Kids, come on in."

Fred came in first. Followed by Daphne. Then Shaggy. And last, Velma. Scooby, yet again, had to stay outside.

Annie's mother smiled and shook hands with each of the four. Her smile never wavered, and no flicker of recognition crossed her eyes. "Are any of you friends with Annie?"

Fred answered. "No, ma'am. We're sophomores, Annie's a senior."

Velma asked, "Where are you two from?"

Again, nothing unusual registered in the older woman. "Originally from Utah. But we've lived most of Annie's life in Northern California before we moved here."

"Really?" Shaggy spoke. "I'm from Plainsville. How about you?"

She looked to the floor. "Oakland. Eastmont."

Shaggy's voice dropped. "Oh."

There was a subtext there that the rest of the people in the room did not get.

She looked up, smiled yet again and gestured toward Annie's bedroom door. They entered. Annie's bedroom was small to begin with and the large hospital bed made it cramped. The four teens jammed in with Mr. Grimes at the door. Mr. Deedle and Annie's mother remained in the living room.

The young woman in the bed was wearing no make-up but the areas around her eyes was slightly reddened. Even so, she was strikingly attractive. He hair was tied back in a pony-tail and she gave off an air of exhaustion. "Hi." Her voice was almost a whisper. "Sorry, if I don't get up." The smile—like the joke—was forced.

Daphne beamed. "Hi Annie. I'm Daphne. I think we found something that belongs to you."

Fred laid the heavy strongbox gently on Annie's bed.

Velma attempted one of her fake smiles. It was passable. "The people who counted it, say that there is over $125,000 in there. I know that you and your mother can put it to good use."

A tear formed in the corner of the bedridden girl's eye, escaped, and then rolled slowly down her cheek. "Most of it is going to the hospital to pay my medical bills but it will be wonderful to see Mom with one less thing to worry about."

Velma continued, "Mr. Marcus told us that last Monday was your birthday."

Daphne noted a tiny reaction to Marcus' name but said nothing as Annie kept talking. "Yes! And this is the best present I could get! Thank you all so much!" She tried to put energy into her voice but the strength just wasn't there.

Velma was now tracking. "And your mother said that you were born in Utah? That's so interesting."

This non sequitur question seemed to startle the disabled girl but the weak smile remained intact. "Yes. Moab."

It was time for the coup de grâce. Velma finished it. "The funny thing is… you died there-eighteen years ago last Tuesday."

There was a commotion from the living room as Annie's mother, who had been intently listening, bolted for the front door where she was stopped by two sheriff's deputies who had been waiting in the exterior breezeway.

Annie Sadler leaned her head back into her pillow and closed her eyes. "Marcus rolled on us." There was no anger in the voice—only resignation.

"Shut up!" The smooth West Coast accent disappeared from Ms. Taggert's voice and was replaced with pure Boston. "We don't know what they know!"

Velma shrugged. "We know most of it. But thanks for the confirmation. Once we knew what we were looking for, it all unraveled easily." She looked at Annie in the bed. "You can get up, by the way. We know the accident in Ohio was a fender bender with no injuries. There was no life flight. No hospital stay. And no expensive cross-country ambulance ride."

Annie threw back the bed covers to reveal that she was fully clothed in blue jeans under her pajama top. She started pulling bandages off her shoulders and neck. She stopped and looked around. Her accent was now light inland Carolinas. "Do you mind if we get out of this room. It's getting claustrophobic."

They worked their way into the combination living room/kitchen where Annie's 'mother' was already in cuffs. That did not stop the older woman from yelling "Keep your mouth shut!"

Annie shook her head. "The jig is up, Dale."

"Don't say names!" The older woman's voice was almost hysterical.

It was Sheriff Stone's time to shine. "Your name is Dale Hannigan and this young woman is Sally Ridover and she is not eighteen years old. She is twenty-three."

Daphne took over. "And it was that last little bit that got Mr. Marcus to 'roll on you' as you so eloquently put it. He was in love with a seventeen-year-old student named Annie whose mother had found out about their affair and threatened to press statutory rape charges if he didn't do the honorable thing and help them con the entire Crystal Cove community. Then he could run off with his young love and live happily ever after."

Velma finished. "When he found out that there was no statutory rape and no Annie, he understood that there was also no happily-ever-after."

"As if." Annie sneered.

Daphne continued. "But, until then, Mr. Marcus was willing to take the fall for his true love and would have gone to prison without talking if we hadn't figured out who you really were."

Back to Velma. "We found evidence that you were spying on us in Shaggy's backyard. You were willing to wait things out until you heard me say that I was going to be researching everyone associated with the money from the beginning. You knew that a thorough internet search would reveal that Annie Sadler was dead. That forced you to take immediate action and kidnap me. Thanks for not killing me."

Dale Hannigan (previously Annie's mother) shook her head. "That was my mistake. She wanted to."

Sally (formerly Annie) yelled back. "That's a lie! I talked you out of it!" Honor amongst thieves has a short lifespan.

Velma was reaching her crescendo. "A baby girl named 'Annie May Sadler' was stillborn eighteen years ago last week with her birth certificate and her death certificate being filled out at the same time. The death certificate had a typo. It said 'Anne' May instead of 'Annie' May.

"With the two names being different, the government computers didn't match them up. When you found this completely legal identity just sitting in the Recorder's Office of Grand County, Utah, you must have thought you had struck gold. After requesting a copy of the birth certificate, it was a simple matter to get a social security number, a passport, and a driver's license."

Fred jumped in. "Then you just needed a sap like Mr. Marcus to fall for you, get caught up in your web, and take all the risks."

This was probably Shaggy's cue to speak, but he was just a little bit stoned and not following the conversation.

Velma reached the conclusion. "So, you were going to have Mr. Marcus stash the money in the school basement and check out the key to room B014. Then he rigged the door so that you could get into the school with the key. Once you had the money, you would bolt town to find new names and new marks somewhere else while leaving Mr. Marcus to take the fall."

Dale shook her head. "And it was that close to working until you kids stumbled into the middle of everything."

Sally joined in. "I mean… who stays late at school on a Friday night?! What kind of losers are you people?"

Daphne had never been called a loser before. This was new ground. "I guess we're the kind that are not going to prison."