Marriage and Murder: Solving for Pie: Cletus and Jenn Mysteries Series Book #2

by Penny Reid

  Maybe if I’d been feeling less sorry for myself, or maybe if I’d been feeling less frustrated and cheated by life, or maybe if the banana cake I’d baked for Mrs. Lavery’s tea luncheon tomorrow hadn’t fallen like a skydiver with no parachute, I would’ve taken notice. The illegally dark tint to the windows meant, no matter what, I wouldn’t have observed the lack of a person in the driver’s seat as I approached.

  But, if I’d been thinking, I would’ve paused upon opening the door. I would’ve glanced inside before getting in.

  Instead, I’d opened the passenger side door, slid in, closed the door, and had been promptly chloroformed from behind. Granted, I couldn’t be sure the big towel they’d smashed against my nose and mouth contained chloroform specifically, but the end result had been the same. I’d lost consciousness.

  When I awoke sometime later, my hands were tightly bound at 3 and 9 o’clock to the Geo’s steering wheel. I sat in the driver’s seat, and I felt like I’d been lying in the bed of a dump truck while garbage had been piled on top of me.

  “Wake up, precious,” a woman’s voice said moments before I felt a rough slap against my cheek. “Rise and shine, my wittle banana cake quween.”

  I tried to swallow but my head hurt too much. I realize the two actions should be unrelated to each other, but those were the facts.

  “It’s time for us to go on a wittle drive,” the woman sing-songed sweetly, too sweetly, like she’d seasoned the words with sugar, honey, maple syrup, and agave nectar.

  When I continued to blink slowly, struggling to focus, I felt something cold and hard press against my temple. “Wake the fuck up, princess. Or I’ll paint the window with your brains.”

  Click.

  I stiffened, my eyes flying open, and quite suddenly I was awake. In pain, but awake.

  “That’s better.” She removed the gun.

  I exhaled a shaky breath, glancing over as my heart pinged around my chest, and a bolt of something both freezing and scorching jolted up my spine, neck, and into the back of my brain as I realized who sat in the seat next to me, holding the gun pointed at my face.

  “Elena.”

  “That’s right.” She smiled sweetly. But her eyes were terrifying and her voice again shifted to something different, almost child-like. “I’ll turn the engine, and you drive. Mm-kay? Think you can handle that, pumpkin?”

  Gripping the wheel, I nodded, trying to catch up. What is going on? “Where am I?”

  Think, Jenn. Think! Make a list. What do you see? What do you know?

  I could see Elena had been crying. She wasn’t crying anymore. It was dark outside. The car’s headlights were off, but the interior lights were on. I couldn’t see past the hood. I smelled . . . something bad. Real bad. Like dead animal bad. And it was close, pressing, like I was on top of the smell. I gagged.

  “Throw up if you need to, I don’t care.” Keeping the gun trained on me, she reached forward and turned the key. The engine came to life. She then put the car into drive. It started to move even before I’d put my foot on the gas. At that point I realized she’d backed us into a scenic pull-off I didn’t recognize—or couldn’t recognize due to the lack of exterior visibility.

  “I—I need the headlights,” I croaked, my tongue like a lead weight.

  “Press the gas,” she whispered.

  “And—can you turn the lights off in here? I can’t see.”

  “Shut up and press the gas,” another whisper, like she was egging me on.

  I had the presence of mind to not press the gas, but it didn’t matter, the car glided forward anyway, my visibility zero. Breathing in through my mouth, I ground my teeth and pressed on the brakes. I wasn’t going anywhere until I could see. I wasn’t—

  Wait.

  What the—

  Nothing happened.

  I pumped the brakes again. Again, nothing happened. “The brakes—”

  “What brakes?” she asked sweetly, and giggled. “There are no brakes, there are no lights, there are no seatbelts, there is just forward. Forward and the end.”

  Unthinkingly, I glanced down at myself even as we glided forward. Oh shit oh shit oh shit. I didn’t have a seatbelt on. I looked at her, ready to yell, and I saw she didn’t have one on either.

  “Oh my God.” I steered. I was blind, but I steered, careful not to press the gas. It didn’t matter, we were on a decline. We were picking up speed. It didn’t matter what I did, we were going to crash.

  Think. Think. Think.

  “Turn on the lights! I can’t see. You’re going to die too.”

  “I know. I’m ready.” She sighed, like this was no matter. “And Kenneth is already dead, so don’t worry about him.” Elena tossed a thumb over her shoulder, and on reflex I looked in the back seat and—

  “Oh my God.” My words were more breath than sound. I swallowed the rising bile, blinked away the tears in my eyes. Mr. Miller’s corpse lay in the back seat. From the look—not to mention the smell—he’d been dead for a while.

  What do I do?

  “That’s what Kenneth gets for trying to blackmail me, trying to force me to give him back the farm. But, surprise! It wasn’t mine to give. It was yours.”

  “He—what?” This was happening too fast. Too fast.

  What do I do?

  “Your brother is responsible. Everything had been going swimmingly until he showed up with his big gun and shot Kip. Why did he do that? Kip was already dead. I know because I killed him with the fishing rope from his STUPID FUCKING BOAT!”

  I winced at the volume and level of insanity in her voice, my shoulders curling forward. “You—you—”

  “Yes. I strangled him. I killed him. I hated him.”

  “I thought—”

  “That I loved him? Oh, I did. But he let my sister go to jail, and that, I can’t forgive him for that. And I hate fishing. I hate it. I hate Florida. I hate the Keys. I hate Kip. And I really hate you.” She didn’t seem to be talking to me, and I couldn’t really make sense of what she was saying anyway.

  I was too focused on trying not to die.

  “Shit!” I jerked the wheel as we almost careened over the side of a cliff, the switchback coming upon me suddenly. My whole body shook.

  What do I do?

  Meanwhile, Elena giggled with glee. “That was a close one!”

  What do I do?

  Images, faces of people I loved—the Winstons, my mother, my brother, the children I would never have, Cletus—flashed through my mind. Regret. Agony. Fear. Pain. A tsunami rising, choking me, pulling me under, blinding me further.

  I can’t think about any of that.

  I pushed it away, all of it.

  THINK!

  “Your brother should also be in the back seat. It’s my one regret, not killing him too. He tried to frame me, did you know that?”

  “Frame you?” What the hell? “I thought you said—”

  “He shot your already dead father.” Elena started laughing again, like she couldn’t control it, like this was the biggest joke ever. “He shot him and then—and then he chased me.” Her laughter ended abruptly, her voice growing faint, reflective. “He got me. He took off my glove. He put my hand on the gun. And then the bastard knocked me out, left me there to take the blame. But I had Miller. He didn’t know I had Miller.”

  What do I do?

  I opened my mouth to say something but jerked the wheel away from another cliff just in time, the wheels skidding off the side of the road for a breathless three seconds before I regained control.

  “Miller shouldn’t have betrayed me. He should’ve rescued me.” She sounded sad, so sad. “I told him I’d take care of it. Why didn’t he rescue me? Our plan would’ve worked. Except . . . then you took it all.”

  “You were working with Miller?” I turned the wheel to keep us from crashing into a wall of trees at the other side of the switchback, my throat on fire because I knew the next turn would lead over the edge of a cliff again. I needed to be ready for it
, but we were going faster with every inch of road.

  What do I do?

  “Of course. Of course. Don’t you see? He came first, we came second. I needed the room cleared of the pesky police so everyone could see and watch your mother lose her fucking mind.” She giggled again. “They all love to watch. Miller did his part, he even got your mother to the lot, and it was all so perfect—” She pressed her fists into her eyes for a short second and then tore them away. “No, no. I want to see. I want to see you die.”

  By the skin of my teeth, I turned the wheel just in time to avoid the cliff.

  DAMMIT! WHAT DO I DO?

  “It’s only a matter of time, sweet, stupid Jennifer.” In my peripheral vision, I saw she’d pushed out and turned down her bottom lip, her eyes on me. “You’re going off the side of the mountain and you’ll die. Or you’re going to crash into the mountain, fly out the window, and you’ll die. Those are your options. Pick one.”

  Think. Think. Thi—

  “Wait,” I said. “Wait!”

  And I knew.

  I knew what I had to do. We were only going to go faster. If we went off the side of the cliff, I would die. But if I could crash into the trees—

  Lifting my feet from the floor, I braced them directly on either side of the wheel against the dashboard and pointed the car at the wall of trees on the inside of the road. The car was too old to have airbags. Without a seatbelt, my legs would be the only things keeping me from flying out the windshield. I felt her eyes on me, her confusion, and I stiffened my arms, tensed my legs.

  Now or never.

  The last thing I heard was Elena saying, “What are you doing?” followed by the sound of broken glass, snapping, crunching metal. We collided, head-on, and pain—so much pain—shot up my legs.

  And then all was black.

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  *Cletus*

  “Men outlive their love, but they don’t outlive the consequences of their recklessness.”

  George Eliot, Middlemarch

  I couldn’t kill Elena for kidnapping Jennifer because the woman was already dead. Or so I’d been told by Jackson when he called me with the news, suggesting I meet Jennifer’s ambulance at the hospital because she was unconscious. She’d been in a car crash. And both her legs were broken.

  Dear God.

  Lowering the phone, I tucked it in my back pocket and closed my eyes, working to reseal the lid on my temper and panic.

  Earlier in the evening, when Blythe had called and told me someone had kidnapped Jennifer using my two door Geo, I’d taken great care to gather each and every unwieldy emotion, stuff it down, seal it up. Far, far down. I would not be caught unprepared, distracted, or agitated. Not like Jenn’s arrest.

  She’d watched dumbfounded from the bakery window as a woman squeezed out of the back using the front passenger door, which when open revealed Jenn unconscious in the front. The lady then ran around the hood, got in the driver’s seat, and took off.

  This time, I would be chill. Like a fucking sea turtle.

  Speaking of sea turtles. . .

  I eyeballed this piece of excrement tied to the chair across from me. Finding Isaac hadn’t been difficult, though I hadn’t told Burro why I required Isaac’s—sorry, Twilight’s—precise location. Billy had been my next call. We’d converged on Twilight at the Pink Pony with nary a sound, causing no scene nor any objection from the strippers or the owner.

  My older brother—who I could always count on whenever I required retaliatory action against the Wraiths, no matter how violent—had been standing patiently by during the last half hour as I’d questioned Twilight.

  I’d learned nothing substantive so far, unsurprisingly, as the man was a sea turtle of chill.

  I’d asked why he’d shot Kip. No reaction.

  I’d asked where the murder weapon was. No reaction.

  I’d asked whether his momma knew he’d done it. No reaction.

  I’d asked whether Repo knew he’d done it. No reaction.

  The only reaction we got—at all—was to my very first questions: “What did you do with her? Where is she?”

  He’d seemed genuinely confused. “Who? Jenn? What happened to Jenn?” he’d asked, an edge of concern in his tone and behind his eyes.

  “You know who. Where is she?” I’d repeated.

  He glared at me, confusion and concern still lingering, but that could’ve been an act.

  Twilight was lucky Jackson had called when he did. Billy, growing less patient with each passing minute, had taken off his suit jacket. He’d taken off his suit shirt leaving him in just a T-shirt and suit pants. He’d cracked his neck. He’d been looking at the back of Twilight’s head like it was a cantaloupe he couldn’t wait to crack open. Billy didn’t eat cantaloupe usually, more of a watermelon man, but that didn’t matter.

  My brother Billy never needed a reason to fuck up a Wraith. Didn’t matter which Wraith, any Wraith would do. If he could, he’d hand out beatings to Wraiths like Oprah handed out her favorite things to audience members—you get a beating and you get a beating!

  Point was, beating Wraiths within an inch of their lives seemed to be one of only two things he loved more than his family. The other “thing” was a person. So, not a thing, but still a noun.

  I digress.

  “So, I might not have been forthcoming earlier,” I said while unrolling the sleeves of my shirt. I’d rolled them up earlier to keep blood splatters off the fabric, when or if the necessity had arisen. I didn’t want blood on my shirt, I would’ve had to change my clothes.

  Isaac merely stared at me, but his jaw ticked. A small tell. He was interested in what I would say next. Therefore—ignoring the urgency working to steal my breath and shove me out of this room so I could get to the hospital ASAP—I waited for Twilight to ask me.

  Eventually, after looking down and to the side, grinding he teeth, flashing his eyes, he did. “Who was that? Is this about Jennifer? Is she okay? Where is she?” The questions burst forth and he tried to lean forward, toward me, as though forgetting Billy had taken great pleasure in tying him up.

  “That was Jackson,” I said lightly, smiling a little. “Now it’s your turn.”

  He frowned. “What? What the fuck does that mean?”

  “I answer a question, you answer a question.” I inspected my nails. Specifically, I inspected the black grease that never went away, no matter how much time I spent scrubbing. No biggie. Getting my hands dirty never bothered me.

  “Fuck. You.”

  “I don’t believe I asked a question which would warrant that answer.” I glanced over Twilight’s head to Billy. “Did I?”

  My brother smirked, shook his head. “I don’t recall any.”

  “Hmm . . .” I tapped my chin. “What to do.”

  Billy walked up behind Twilight, stopped just behind him, and eyeballed the back of his head. “I have an idea.”

  Twilight sucked in a breath, no longer looking chill. “You dumb motherfuckers. You think I won’t be missed?”

  “By whom?” I asked, honestly curious. “Jennifer? Nooo.” I shook my head. “She knows what you are. People don’t miss trash.”

  “By the Wraiths?” Billy seemed to mull this over. “I doubt it.”

  “I know!” I lifted a finger into the air. “By the DEA, right?”

  Twilight blinked twice, real fast. Meanwhile, I ignored the look Billy was giving me. I could guess what it looked like since I’d neglected to mention that Twilight was likely, in fact, undercover DEA. But what I didn’t know was whether Twilight’s tapping of Jenn’s house had been sanctioned by the DEA or if he’d gone rogue. I couldn’t imagine Kip being murdered had been sanctioned . . .

  “No, son. The DEA doesn’t give a shit about you.” I said, giving my head a somber shake. “You shot your daddy, so he’s gone. You framed your mother for it, so I doubt she’s going to—”

  “I didn’t frame her. I framed Elena!” In a fit of unveiled rage, Twilight attempted
to surge to his feet. I didn’t flinch because Billy placed a hand on the blond man’s shoulder, forcing him back down like he was swatting a fly.

  Twilight was big, strong. Billy was bigger, stronger.

  “You framed Elena. Okay. That sorta answers a question.” A surge of urgency, shouting that I wrap this up and get a move on, repeated loudly and insistently inside my brain. Hurry! the urgency pleaded. Hurry up hurry up hurry the fuck up!

  I ignored it.

  I would be chill. Nothing would distract me ever again because I would never be caught unawares ever again. Jennifer’s future safety depended on it. If she has a future . . .

  Swallowing against a rough thickness, I shoved that thought away. I couldn’t think about that. I wouldn’t think about that.

  Instead, I pressed onward. “Jackson called to tell me Elena—the woman you supposedly framed for your father’s death—kidnapped Jenn. Your turn.”

  I could feel the weight of Billy’s gaze on me, searching, worried.

  I ignored him.

  “You don’t want to—I don’t know—get going, then?” Twilight asked, sounding angry and looking at me like I was insane.

  I shook my head. “Your turn. How did you frame Elena? Actually, no.” I shook my head faster. “I want you to tell me the whole damn story. We’ll see what I choose to answer next.”

  Twilight glared at me but surprised me by responding almost immediately. “Fine. Elena reached out to me before your engagement party. Weeks before. She wanted my help killing my—killing Kip. I met with her and she told me her plan. She’d brought this fishing rope—you know the kind used for crabbing?—back from their last trip to the Florida Keys, took it off the boat. She really wanted to kill him with it.”

  “She took it off his boat?” I had an ah ha! moment and subsequently felt like an idiot. Of course. I should’ve realized Kip’s big boat in the Keys had been the source of the rope.

  “Yes. Said she hated the boat, hated Florida, hated him. She’d already somehow swiped one of the Donner Lodge’s credit cards, ordered a roll of it to be sent to the lodge. She then planted it in my mother’s office and cut off a length matching the one she had from Kip’s boat.”