by Misty Simon
I wished there was more I could do for her, but I still had to work the jobs, too.
My phone rang in the cup holder between the seats. I glanced at the screen and saw “Chief Eek”—my nickname for Burton. I hoped he never saw that, but it often made me giggle. Not today. If he was going to tell me I wasn’t working fast enough, then I didn’t want to hear it.
Since I had a few minutes before Letty showed up and got her things out of her car, I decided to answer. It wouldn’t be better to leave him hanging. He’d just call back until I answered, leaving stoic messages to call him right away. It was a pattern.
There were a lot of patterns in my life. Some I needed to break, but some I kept because they were too good.
“What?” I was not nice when I answered the phone. I wasn’t feeling nice at the moment.
“What are you doing, Tallie?”
“Should you even be asking me that since you’re on administrative leave? I thought you were out for the next six weeks.” I could be snooty too.
He sighed, and I imagined him pinching the bridge of his nose. “Tallie.”
“Burton.”
“Look, don’t get me started. Things are about to go to hell at the station. Hammond is pulling out all the stops to make as many changes as he can while I’m not there. I know you’re not exactly a pro at this, but I need info. You’re the only one I can trust to get it for me. I need you to look around and use that incredible sniffer you have to seek out clues about who killed Eli and why Hammond isn’t taking this as more than a health-related death.”
I sat stunned in my cushy front seat. I didn’t even know how to respond to that. Not only was he asking me to help when normally he was yelling at me to keep my sniffer out, but he’d also given me a compliment. I wasn’t sure what to do with that.
“Did you hear me?” he asked.
That I could answer. “Yes, I did, and I appreciate you asking, and for the compliment, but I can only do so much and so fast. I did think of something last night.”
He waited, the silence vibrating across the connection. I finally sucked it up and carried on.
“What if I’m wrong? What if he really did just die? What if I’m making too much out of this? I haven’t been able to find anything.” And I was not ready to tell him about only Rhoda being mobile and in the house and someone closing the door as I got a good look at Eli St. James. That was speculation. I was not going to ruin the life of a dear friend when I didn’t have the facts, or even a solid motive.
I kept the info about Eli blackmailing, or trying to blackmail, Mrs. Koser, to myself. Forty-year-old babies that she obviously felt weren’t a secret probably didn’t matter. Her claim that he had been blackmailing her, though, might need to be taken with a grain of salt, considering it came from a drama queen who’d been practicing her own funeral for fifteen years.
“Don’t flake out on me now. You might not have anyone involved with this dead body in this instance—they don’t think it was you, and I’m not looking into any of your friends. But if someone killed Eli, then we have to know who. I can’t do anything about it. I need you to dive in like you’ve done before, only this time you’re helping me instead of working against me. Somehow Hammond got Doc Jerome to sign off on a death without checking the deceased fully. Even Matt said that the guy’s neck looked wrong, but when he tried to put it in his report Hammond shut him down.”
“Isn’t that illegal?” Oh, now, we might be getting somewhere.
More sighing. Were breathing exercises part of his rehabilitation program? If not, they should be.
“Only if I can prove it,” he said.
And there was the crux of the situation. My clues often came to me through sticky fingers and some not-so-legal practices. Normally, I had no fear, but if Burton was going to try to build a case, then he would need legitimate stuff. That I didn’t know if I could supply.
I told him as much, and he laughed.
“Just go about it as you have in the past. I’ll make sure it looks pristine while coming from the right channels. You have a vivid imagination. Use it to get creative.”
No, I didn’t, and told him as much. “I can’t even draw a stick figure. I failed every creative-writing anything I ever took. I looked at the facts and went with what happened just like I’ve done the other two times. And isn’t falsifying where things came from illegal, too?”
“Not if I do it right. This is my job on the line and my town, Tallie. I want to keep it safe. Something about Hammond puts my antenna on full alert.”
We said goodbye, and I sat for a moment, not sure what to do. This was a whole new game. It was my town, too, and if Hammond was dirty, I wanted him gone. Matt could step in for the moment, if need be, or Burton could get back early from leave. In the meantime, I guess the whole thing was up to me and my sidekick, Daphne/Gina. I texted her to let her know we’d talk later. Within seconds, she sent me back a smiley face. At least it wasn’t a string of strange emojis like she sent when talking about my brother.
Letty fortunately pulled up at that moment and took me out of thinking and into action.
“Hey, boss, you sure you want to do this? I really can handle it on my own.” She pulled the vacuum cleaner from the back of her little hatchback and a bucket full of supplies. She was a hard worker, and I was more than happy to have her on my team. I didn’t even make money off her jobs, to be honest, but she didn’t want to be her own boss. So, I paid her what I got minus taxes. It worked for both of us.
Previously I had left all the taxes to my ex-husband and that got me in trouble. I had feared doing my taxes this year with Letty onboard as an employee. But now that I had a tax boyfriend, I figured he might relish trying to do the chaos I called my taxes next year.
“I’ll at least come in to keep them out of your hair.” The Rockwells liked to hover and go around behind you to make sure you were cleaning to their standards. The funny thing was that our standards were actually quite a bit higher than theirs. A distraction would make Letty’s job easier in the long run. As a bonus, I intended to give her all the money for it.
“Okay, just thought I’d offer,” she said.
“I know and I appreciate it, but I’ll take one for the team here.”
She laughed, pulling the rest of her stuff out of the car. The last thing she retrieved was a little caddy stuffed with her tools that I envied fiercely. Every time I saw it I kept meaning to ask her where she got it. I missed my chance this time, too, since she was already at the door, which Mr. Rockwell opened. I’d have to remember to ask later.
I followed along behind her by about thirty seconds only to find that Mrs. Rockwell already had Letty cornered in the foyer.
“Now, I know that many people are okay with a little dust in this corner or that corner, but we here at the estate like it clean. So clean I’d like to be able to eat out of any of those corners.”
I rolled my eyes before I fully cleared the front door, then went in like I owned the place.
“Fiona, how nice to see you.” I took her hand and shook it, then shook her husband’s. Letty, smart girl that she was, took the opportunity to scurry off in the direction of the living room.
“Oh, Tallie, I didn’t realize you were going to be here. Are there problems with the help that you have to manage?”
I had been afraid she might assume that, so I shut her down immediately with my previously well-thought-out response. “Oh, gosh, no. I’m actually here to learn some tips from her. She has such a wonderful touch. I get it right, but she does it magnificently. It’s hard to see her in action unless we have a house in need of a real, deep cleaning. When I realized you were on the schedule today, I thought I’d come along.” Backhanded compliment and scathing setdown all delivered in one sentence. Don’t let anyone tell you that I didn’t learn a thing or two during my time as one of the elite.
Fiona laughed. “It’s so interesting to see you in a servile kind of position, dear. I remember when you would be the harde
st party planner to please. Now, you’re cleaning up after them. It must be quite a difference.” And Fiona wasn’t bad at the game either.
I was done playing, though. “I have a question for you while Letty does her thing. Do you guys know anything about Eli St. James? I heard you had him out here to do an assessment.”
Of course, I hadn’t heard anything of the kind, but Marianne had been able to access the data at the office when she went back in this morning and pulled together a few names of people I might know. Fortunately, I had three of them scheduled for today since it seemed Eli did a brisk business in the rich community.
“Are you looking to have your penthouse at the funeral home assessed?” Fiona asked with an arched, perfectly shaped eyebrow. “I hardly think your father would approve of that.”
I did not roll my eyes or choke her. I would pat myself on the back later for both of those things. “Actually, I’m looking at buying a house with the money Waldo left behind, and so I started with recommendations from the man who did the assessment in the first place.”
“Bad idea. Very bad idea,” Mr. Rockwell—or Roll, for short—said. Yes, he totally had people call him Roll. To go with the Rock. Don’t ask.
“Why?”
The frown on his face was fierce, and the way he clenched his hand did not give me the warm fuzzies, either.
“The man was a swindler and a cheat. Any report or findings from him should not be trusted.”
I kept to myself that those usually were the same thing. Another point in my favor. “Oh?” Generally, if you were vague with Roll he was happy to fill in all the blanks.
“He wanted money from us to make our house pass the assessment. Said there were too many code violations for him to be able to give us the certificate unless we could see our way to cover his expenses.”
“Expenses?” Interesting.
“Yes, apparently he felt that if he was going to be able to sign the certificate, we were going to have to pay him to approve shoddy work. But my brother was the architect for the add-on, and my cousin was the builder. Both have stalwart reputations. Never did anything shoddy in their lives. Once we told him we weren’t going to pay him, he started to get nasty until I threw him out on his ear.”
“And you were magnificent, dear.” Fiona said, petting his arm.
He puffed out his meager chest. “Of course I was. I don’t need a home inspector trying to shame me into paying for something I already have. I’m smarter than that.”
“Smart enough to marry me, dearest.” Fiona giggled.
I almost gagged. That was three points for good behavior, and I thought I was pretty much done for the day. “So, when you didn’t pay him did he threaten you?”
Roll barked out a short laugh. “He knew better. I was more than willing to let him go and try his hand elsewhere. What other people do is none of our business. But I wasn’t paying him a dime more. I hired someone new immediately. We did file a formal complaint, but it didn’t go anywhere. For two reasons. One, his brother is on the assessment board for the county, and two, I believe it was buried deep. How else is it that no charges have ever surfaced against him? I know plenty of people who were unhappy with his services and yet it’s all been kept hushed.”
So, Eli had been playing pay-me-off with the local rich people, and maybe even ones who were not so rich. And how many might have paid knowing he could lower their house’s assessment so they wouldn’t have to pay as much in taxes every year? Or he could jack it up and get more taxes for his brother. It was a nice little scheme. But had it gotten him killed?
I would have to look into both possibilities, though I wondered if Burton knew about this at all. And now that Eli had done something illegal, would Burton have to bring Hammond in again?
Questions to ponder later. Fiona and Roll were both talking about the pool party they were planning in six months and asked me if I knew anyone who cleaned pools, since their own pool boy had been put in jail courtesy of me several months ago. They never asked me to actually come to the party, which was fine with me. I tried to keep them entertained so Letty could do her job.
It didn’t kill me, but it was close. At one point, I did step away to the powder room. Pulling out my little notebook, I sat on the closed toilet lid and made notes.
At least now I had something concrete to give Burton. I’d have preferred a killer. Yeah, never thought I’d ever say that even eighteen months ago.
Ah, how life changes.
Chapter Nine
When we finally left, I was relieved. And I was pretty sure that Letty took extra long, knowing the torture I was going through. It might have been the way she giggled as we left. Or maybe when she reminded me I used to be one of them. Possibly it was both, the brat. Once we got into our cars, I jetted to the Bean to see if Gina had heard anything or had any prophetic Scooby-Doo dreams.
Mama Shirley manned the counter and Gina was nowhere in sight. I ordered, then let Mama do her thing before I started grilling her on local gossip. Gina and I hadn’t talked about whether she was going to tell her mother she was helping me so I did not want to be the one to tell her first.
“Is Gina on a break or something?” I asked nonchalantly as I sipped on a chocolate milkshake. A deviation from my normal caffeine high, but without working as hard as I normally did, I couldn’t have all that excess energy racing through my veins with nothing to do and no way to get rid of it. My wrist still hurt and so did my hip. I couldn’t even go to the gym or run it off. Not that I normally went to the gym, but the thought did cross my mind.
“Not a break.” Mama Shirley wiped down the counter, shooting me a look that I couldn’t read. I was baffled. I prided myself on being able to read them all.
“Okay.” I drew the word out, not sure what else to say.
She shook her head at me. “Your Jeremy is here. My girl’s trying to explain to him that her time will be taken up for a little while.” Mama patted her frosted blond hair and pursed her heavily painted mouth as an angry scream erupted from the back. Not three seconds later, Gina busted through the double swinging doors like a bull through a red cape.
“He’s your brother, you talk to him,” she demanded.
Oh no. That was certainly not going to happen.
Jeremy came flying out behind her, his tie askew, which was so unlike him, and his normally perfectly plastered hair standing up straight. “She’s your best friend, you talk to her.”
Yeah, that wasn’t happening, either. I looked at Mama Shirley to help me. The cagey woman just smiled and crossed her arms.
Gina whipped around and said, “You do not tell me what to do.” Fortunately, the Bean was empty for once. I wouldn’t be surprised if that was the only reason Mama Shirley wasn’t berating her daughter for her unprofessionalism.
Groaning, Jeremy put his hands on his slim hips. “I’m not telling you anything. I asked you very nicely, at first, to please not put yourself in danger, or to follow around behind my ridiculous sister. I thought you were smarter than that.”
Okay, now those were fighting words. I caught Mama Shirley’s smile growing wider. I didn’t care.
“Jeremy, you’re a jerk.” I had no problem whatsoever stepping in now.
“What?” He turned to me, his tie flapping over his shoulder. “It’s true. You are ridiculous. You need a hobby, or to step up and finally take your place at the funeral home. Though I don’t quite get why Dad thinks it would be a good idea to have someone who chases the dead around the actual dead.”
“You bastard.” I rose from my chair, taking a loud slurp of the milkshake to keep myself from saying more.
“Now you know that’s not true. We both have the same mother and father, darling sister.”
“Unless they found you under a rock like you used to tell me.”
He snorted, the jerk. “Oh, don’t start bringing up stuff like that.”
“You used to tell your sister she was found under a rock?” Mama Shirley thwapped the dish towel she�
��d been holding over her shoulder, staring him down from across the counter.
His face flamed as he cleared his throat and smoothed his hair and then his tie. “I was young and stupid.”
“And now you’re older and stupider,” Gina cut in.
He turned back to her in a flash. “You think I’m stupid? I don’t know why you’d want to be with someone like that. Go find your dead people with my sister. If you figure out where this all went wrong, give me a call.”
That was not going to fly well with either Mama Shirley or Gina.
“You can leave,” they both said at the same time with the same flat tone.
I almost felt sorry for Jeremy when he realized the gravity of what he’d said and to whom he’d said it. Almost. Until he frowned at me.
“You’d better be there tonight and be ready to explain yourself at dinner. Dad is not going to like that you went against his wishes and are looking into this. Especially when no one thinks it’s a murder in the first place except you.”
I did not tell him about anything I’d found out or the call from Burton. I was only going to share that with Gina. And then I wanted to get Marianne on the phone and ask her for a few files from the office.
At the moment, I would not engage him further. For both our sakes. I just kept my eyes on my brother until he gave a disgusted groan and walked out the door.
He never looked back.
Well, not until he crossed the street. His shoulders drooped and his head hung low as he looked back through the window of the Bean and zeroed in on Gina. I could have done something here, probably, but honestly, I’d promised myself when they’d first started dating a few months ago that I wasn’t going to get between them. My best friend and my brother, there was no way one could win out over the other.
“I have something to get your mind off the dolt.” I sat back down and swung side to side on the stool at the lunch counter.
Gina swiped a quick fingertip under her eye. Oh no.
“He’s not a dolt,” she said as she sniffed. “I probably shouldn’t have kicked him out. He does have concerns. Valid ones. I should have handled that better.” She sat down next to me and cradled her forehead in her hands.