A Garland of Bones

by Carolyn Haines

  “And then there was the man who would get up in the middle of the night, sneak into the kitchen, and eat every single Christmas cookie I’d baked.”

  “How many cookies?” someone asked.

  “One night it had to be three dozen. I was terrified he’d go into a diabetic coma or have a heart attack.” Darla was an engaging storyteller. Everyone was laughing. I hadn’t really considered how awful it might be to have people in her home all the time, wandering around at night, looking for snacks, going to the bathroom, or playing musical bedrooms. It wasn’t a situation I wanted to deal with. As one of those guests at Bissonnette House, I would be on my best behavior.

  I skirted the group listening to Darla and went to an alcove off the formal dining room, where an incredible mahogany table caught my eye. When I went to examine it, I found a woman sitting alone in a dim corner of the room. Her back was to me, but I recognized Kathleen.

  “Are you okay?” I asked.

  “I’m fine. It’s just a shock to think someone almost died at a Christmas party.”

  “That whole business with Bart Crenshaw was just awful. The way he tumbled down the stairs. I keep seeing it in slow motion in my brain,” I agreed.

  “Have you heard if he’s going to be okay?”

  I hadn’t, but Coleman could check for me. “I can find out.”

  “Would you?”

  “Why not? Come with me.” We left the dim corner and went outside where Coleman, Jaytee, Harold, and Oscar had escaped the buzz saw of gossip in the house. When I asked Coleman to make the call to check on Bart, he didn’t even ask why.

  A moment later, he had an update. “Bart is in a room. No broken bones. A concussion, but they don’t think it’s serious. They’re going to watch him, though.”

  “What about a brain bleed?” Kathleen went right to the darkest place possible.

  “From what the local police officer who is in the room with him said, it looks pretty good that there’s no serious injury. They’re anticipating a full recovery.”

  Kathleen blew out a breath. “Thank you. Now I should go help our hostess.” She turned away from the group.

  “Kathleen, got a minute?” I asked.

  She looked toward the doorway and actually edged in that direction, but I followed her. “Tell me about Sunny Crenshaw.”

  “Oh, Sunny comes from money. Big money. She was fabulously wealthy before she married Bart. Once his real estate business got going, they were set. They’re just wallowing in greenbacks. Everything Bart touches turns to gold.”

  “I’ve heard he’s got the magic touch with real estate.” I just wanted to keep the conversation going. The quicker I got my bearings in Columbus society, the sooner I would solve this case. “Clarissa Olson said she worked with him and he’d been very helpful to her.”

  Kathleen rolled her eyes. “She thought she was going to break up Bart and Sunny’s marriage, but Bart gave her the heave-ho. That whole real estate thing she goes on and on and on about is just to save face.”

  “So Clarissa was really into him? She made it seem like a long-ago fling.”

  “She plays it off like it was just a game of the beast with two backs, but he knew how to light her rockets, and she couldn’t get enough of him. She was reckless, forcing public displays on him. She wasn’t smart enough to keep the details to herself.”

  “How did Sunny take that … affair?”

  Kathleen slowed to a stop. She frowned. “I never really thought about it. She never let on like she knew anything was happening between them, but she had to know. Like I said, Clarissa couldn’t keep her lip zipped. She did ridiculous things like show up at his real estate office dressed as a gift box and naked as the day she was born inside the box. Everyone in town knew about it.”

  “Did Sunny retaliate with her own affair?” I wanted more than anything to make some notes, but I knew if pulled out a pad and started writing, Kathleen would flee as if her hair were on fire. Around Darla, Kathleen had a certain bravado, but she was timid alone.

  “Sunny would extract her pound of flesh, and there was talk that she had had an affair not long after they were married. You can believe that or not. But she made Bart pay, I’m sure. I don’t know how she did it, though. She may have had an affair and just been more discreet. Or she may have a nice offshore bank account plumped up by condo sales in Oxford, Mississippi. Now that’s a hot real estate market.”

  “Did Sunny go to Ole Miss?”

  “Vanderbilt. Her family is related to the Vanderbilts and she always felt she was a bit superior to all of us here in Columbus. She rubbed Bart’s nose in her aristocracy.” Kathleen had regained some of her pluck and was more comfortable talking to me. “I don’t blame him for looking for affection somewhere else. She’s a cold fish.”

  “Is she capable of attempted murder?” I was curious what she’d say.

  “I think so. In my opinion, the only thing that would hold Sunny back from committing a felony would be fear of getting caught. If she thought she could pull off a murder and get away with it, she wouldn’t blink.”

  “Tell me about Bricey Presley.” If I had a gushing fountain of information, I was going to stay awhile and drink.

  “Bricey runs around with Tulla and a few others. They’re minor-league homewreckers compared to Sunny or Clarissa.”

  “Is everyone in town having an affair?”

  She thought a minute. “Probably not. Just the ones with time on their hands.”

  I thought about that. It did take a lot of time and energy to sneak around. Women with children and jobs could do it, but it would put a crimp in their style to have to juggle schedules and free times. “Who dumped that cement in Bricey’s car, do you know?”

  “I thought it might be Bart. I heard they had a nasty breakup, and Bart knows a lot of guys with heavy equipment because he develops subdivisions and such. But so does Sunny. And Clarissa. It could be anyone.”

  “Only someone who hated Bricey.”

  “That means it could be anyone,” Kathleen repeated. “Now I have to go. I’m tired of this Christmas foolishness. I’m ready for this week to be over. Most days, Darla and I take care of her guests and we meet new and interesting people and don’t give a thought to what’s happening in Columbus. It’s just at Christmas that we kind of have to dive in headfirst.”

  “I’ll see you back at Darla’s,” I said as she took her leave.

  Tinkie was still chatting with a group of men, and from a distance I watched her work them. Tinkie had them eating out of her hand. When she saw me, she gave them a flirtatious wave and joined me. “Let’s go to the hospital to check on Bart,” she said.

  This was really the first time I’d had a chance to chat with Tinkie alone. “I saw Bricey Presley on the second floor just seconds after Bart took that tumble. He gave her the Cadillac when he broke off his affair with her.”

  Tinkie’s eyebrows hit her hairline. “Whew!” Tinkie motioned Oscar over to join us. “We’ve got a new case.”

  When Oscar started to protest, Tinkie merely kissed him. “It’s a domestic about to go bad. We’ll finish before it’s time to go home to Zinnia. No murders, no guns, no danger. Just a bunch of foolish people determined to trash their own lives.”

  “Tinkie, you’re in a delicate way,” he reminded her.

  “I’m pregnant. I haven’t turned into glass. This is a simple case, really. Nothing to worry about. The baby is my first priority, and you’re my second.”

  I took note of her gentle response to Oscar and her quick moves to alleviate his fears. Tinkie was compassionate, and she was also very smart.

  “We were just headed over to the hospital to check on Bart Crenshaw,” Tinkie said to Oscar. We waved over the rest of the crew. “Cece, when you get a minute I’d like to look through the footage of Bart’s tumble down the stairs.”

  “Sure thing. In fact, I’ll come to the hospital with you.”

  “Me, too,” Millie chimed in. “That leaves the boys to finish
their secret mission stuff.”

  It chafed me to let the guys get away with the he-man woman-haters club business, but I didn’t have a choice. Money over curiosity, as Tinkie had pointed out. Money won.

  The boys said they didn’t need the limo because they had other means of transportation—a statement that concerned me. But we loaded up and headed to the Columbus hospital. Bart had been taken to a room, and Millie occupied the floor nurses while we slipped unnoticed into his room. He was propped up in bed watching TV and looked none too pleased to see us.

  “You were at the party.” He said it as an accusation.

  “True,” I said. “We were having a fine time until you decided to see if you could bounce.”

  He moaned as he shifted positions. “Get out of here. I don’t want to talk to anyone.”

  “We’ve been hired to find out who’s attacking members of the Columbus social scene.”

  “Hired by whom?” He tried to sit up in bed and his monitors went haywire.

  Cece pressed him gently back into the pillows. “It doesn’t matter who hired Delaney Detective Agency, and you hold still.” She kept one finger on his chest.

  “Our client is afraid someone is going to get hurt, if not killed. And you’re a central player in what’s going on. We’ll leave as soon as you tell me who pushed you.”

  “Nobody. I wasn’t pushed!”

  “I saw you fall. And I saw Bricey Presley on the second floor not ten seconds after your spectacular tumble.”

  He looked from me to Tinkie to Cece. When Millie came in the room, he realized she wasn’t going to save him, either.

  “This is none of your business.”

  “I saw Bricey run off like a criminal.”

  “She was upset about her Cadillac getting destroyed. She thought maybe Sunny had dumped the cement in the car. She wanted me to make it good.”

  “Make it good?” I asked.

  “Get her a new car.”

  “And?” I said.

  “And I told her I would. Look, sometimes it’s better to write the check. Bricey isn’t all that smart, but she’s relentless. She would never give up, so I decided I’d just buy her another car.” He sighed. “She went to hug me, but I saw Sunny watching us from downstairs and I stepped back. I didn’t realize I was standing so close to the edge of the stairs. I lost my balance and that was it.”

  “You weren’t pushed?” I watched his face carefully.

  He swallowed. “No.”

  “I thought maybe Bricey Presley helped you take flight,” I said softly. “You could get her off your back if you pressed charges.”

  His eyes were bleak. “Bricey had nothing to do with it.”

  “You gave her the original Cadillac.” I leaned in a little closer. “To soften the blow of the fact you’d grown tired of her?”

  Tinkie stepped in. “A Cadillac that someone filled up with cement. Someone must have been pretty pissed at your gesture of parting.”

  “This really is none of your business.” He tried to sit up again, but Cece put her finger back on his chest. It was just enough to keep him prone.

  “We’ve been hired to prevent a tragedy,” I said. “Our client feels that things are getting out of hand here. She thinks someone may want you dead.”

  “Me?” He finally looked me fully in the face. “Why just me? And if anyone wanted me dead, it would be—”

  “Yes, who would it be?” Cece was on it.

  Bart realized he’d stepped in quicksand. His eyes narrowed. “Clarissa hired you, didn’t she? She’s the one stirring this pot. Listen to me, you should check into Clarissa’s past. Back when she lived in Oxford. Make a few phone calls. She’s been involved in suspicion of murder before. Maybe that’s why she hired you. To throw the blame on someone else. She pretends to be all worried about other people when she’s really trying to game the system. Typical Clarissa.”

  “Didn’t you have an affair with her?”

  My question pulled him up short. “Who told you that?”

  “Doesn’t matter,” Tinkie said.

  “Okay, so Clarissa and I had a fling. It’s in the past. She’s a passionate woman with a bit of kink in her. It was fun for a while, but then she got out of control. I had to end it before she ruined me all over town. Columbus is a town with solid values. Most people don’t care what you do in your private life, but they don’t like having their nose rubbed in things they find … inappropriate. I had to end it or I was going to lose all my business.”

  “Not to mention your wealthy wife,” Millie said with a bit of heat.

  Bart waved a hand. “Sunny got the ring and the marriage license. That’s what she was after. She’s happy as long as I’m there to escort her to social events. On occasion she gets her back up if I embarrass her.”

  Millie leaned in. “Are you sure about that? No woman likes to be made a fool. I don’t suppose you’d care for it if she flaunted her lovers all over town.”

  “One thing about Sunny, she’s discreet. I value that about her.”

  “Look, Crenshaw, you could have been killed. Tulla Tarbutton could have died from a lethal shock. Whoever unloaded that cement on Bricey’s Cadillac destroyed property valued at seventy grand. This is not just an aggravated lover slashing a few car tires. This has crossed a line. You may think this is all fun and games, but I’m not seeing it that way. But hey, you’re the biggest target so far. If you aren’t worried, why should I be?” I shrugged.

  “Look, I had an accident. I’m going to be fine. Just drop it, okay? Someone’s on a warpath. It will settle down if you don’t keep poking it with a stick.”

  Tinkie sat on the side of his bed and smiled sweetly. “You need to watch your back. You were lucky this time. Luck only takes a man so far. And yeah, maybe you should keep it in your pants.”

  9

  “Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas” played softly as we gave our drink orders to the waitress and settled into a dim corner of Players’ Bar. The men were out and about with their “secret” business, and we’d decided to grab a drink and chat before we went back to the Bissonnette House.

  “Let’s see that video of Bart falling,” Tinkie suggested as we all had our drinks. Tinkie sipped a cup of hot tea. She was a model of baby production.

  Cece found the video on her phone and began to play back the recording as we all hung over her shoulder.

  “There’s Bart at the top of the stairs. And look! He’s stumbling backward. Wait.” Cece started the video over. “Do you see any hands pushing him?”

  We replayed the video several times, but we couldn’t find definitive proof that Bart was pushed. It was clear he’d lost his balance and stumbled back, but we couldn’t determine why he’d stumbled. It just wasn’t shown in the video.

  But I had noticed something interesting. As Cece had panned her phone to follow Bart down the winding staircase, she’d also captured the faces of everyone in the crowd. Most were horrified or at least shocked.

  Tinkie leaned down and took off her shoes. “Ladies, I need to head back to the B and B. Maybe the men will be there.”

  That sounded like a plan to me, too. Tomorrow I had some legwork to do. And no matter how Tinkie pressed to go shopping, I was going to resist.

  On the way to the limo, Tinkie linked her arm through mine. “If we don’t resolve this before we leave, we aren’t giving her her money back.”

  I laughed. “We can finish up on this case after Christmas. Trust me, if they’re cheating now, they’ll be cheating on December 26.”

  Tinkie sighed. “You’re right about that. I’m just tired and cranky. You’ll find out when you get pregnant.”

  “Not on a dare.” I laughed out loud. Tinkie wanted that baby more than she’d ever wanted anything. “It isn’t just the pregnancy. My feet hurt, too. A bed sounds wonderful.”

  * * *

  The morning came in with a brisk wind and storm clouds. I snuggled against Coleman and decided staying in bed was the perfect answer
to a cold December day. Yes, I had a case to work, but it was a case I didn’t much like. Not a single person involved inspired me to want to put out a big effort for justice.

  Tap, tap, tap! Tap, tap, tap!

  Dang it, Tinkie was at the door. The goblins could not be pecking with more persistence. I got up, hoping to save Coleman, but it was too late. His blue eyes were wide open. “She is a morning menace,” he said.

  “Tell me about it.” I closed the bedroom door before I opened the door of the suite. “What is it?”

  “Up and at ’em.”

  “What is wrong with you? Why aren’t you and Oscar in bed, doing what married people do?”

  “Been there, done that, got the baby prize to prove it.” Tinkie grinned. “We’ve had more practice than you, Sarah Booth.”

  I couldn’t help laughing. “What’s set your tailfeathers on fire this morning?”

  “We need to work on our case. I want to clear it up before we leave. I don’t want to be driving back and forth over here. Besides, I was thinking, how hard can it be to find out which cheating person has it in for all the others? There’s a logical answer. It’s the woman—or man—who has no one. The one who got dumped or left out. Simple.”

  She was a lot better at math than I was, but somehow I wasn’t sure that motive and deed added up to that end result in this situation. “How do you propose we find out the winners and losers in the cheating game? You think if we just ask, someone will tell us all the dirty little secrets of Columbus society?”

  “No, but I’m thinking we can do a little legwork and see what turns up.”

  “What? No shopping?”

  “Millie and Cece need to write something for their Sunday column, so they’ve begged off shopping this morning. I know you hate shopping. I thought we could put this case to bed.”

  I decided to tease her a little. “I thought we were going to follow the men today. To find out what their secret mission is.” I realized I wanted to snoop and follow Coleman around. Coleman and I had our share of fun wherever we were, but in Zinnia, I couldn’t bird-dog him or play pranks. He was the sheriff, and if the citizens didn’t respect him, it could be costly. Here in Columbus, no one knew us or cared what we did.