by Lisa D Jones
There’s no way I can get into the Order of the Elks Lodge building without a current member in tow so this one will have to go into the “later” stack.
I quickly skimmed through the rest of the files: locating a lost relative for an inheritance (why the hell can’t I have a problem like that?), tracking down some guy’s car that he had in high school, arsenic poisoning, along with a few “who’s cheating on who?” cases.
I decided to take a closer look at the arsenic case. Julian Carter believes that his wife has been using arsenic to poison him. He realized that every time she had prepared him just one glass of vodka with cranberry juice, he would be sick for the rest of the night and sometimes longer.
The police aren’t taking his accusations seriously, since there has been no trace of arsenic in the vodka or cranberry juice (or anywhere else in their home, for that matter) on any of the occasions that he reported the incidents.
Mr. Carter lives near Amarillo. Hmmm. Maybe getting away from here for a while would be the safest thing for me to do. I picked up my mobile phone and called Jessica.
“Feel like taking a five hour road trip to the Amarillo area with me? A town called Barnette?” I asked.
“Why? What’s in Barnette?” asked Jessica.
“Tumbleweeds, free beer, and a client who says his wife has been poisoning him with arsenic”, I replied.
“Nice. Count me in”, said Jessica. “By the way, you had me at ‘free beer’. I’ll call Wendy and see if she can get away for a few days with us.”
“The more, the merrier. I have a few things I need to finish up here before we head out. Y’all meet me outside my office in about an hour”, I said and disconnected.
When I saw Wendy and Jessica pull up out front, I told Keith and Claudia where we were going then we hit the road.
We had stopped for snacks and filled up the gas tank just outside of Hopeville, but that was 9 hours ago. Now we’re close to Amarillo and I can hear the dinner bell ringing in my ear and in my empty stomach.
Apparently, Wendy had the same idea and suggested looking for a place to eat then look for a motel. It was getting late and there was a better chance of finding a motel after supper than the other way around. Things tend to shut down pretty early in a small town, except for the motels and local bars.
Just off of the main road we managed to find a little restaurant. The neon sign hanging in the window flashed on and off except for the letter “E” in “OPEN”. None of us felt like driving around for any other possible food options, so we pulled into the parking lot of The Blue Bird Café.
I took my taser off of my car charger and carefully put it into my purse. I slid my gun between my waistband and the small of my back, covering it with my t-shirt. We were a long way from home, but I still wasn’t willing to take any unnecessary chances.
Wendy was armed as well. She was sporting a sheathed knife with a five and half inch blade tucked into her left boot and a heavy-as-hell purse that could knock the dog shit out of any poor unsuspecting idiot that crossed her path.
Jessica on the other hand, was unarmed…well, sort of. She holds a third degree black belt in Tae Kwon Do. While she’s capable of using hand-held weapons, she doesn’t need them. She’d beat the living shit out of a would-be attacker with her tall, limber legs alone.
The Blue Bird Café looks pretty much like what you would expect from a hole-in-the-wall type of establishment in any small, Texas town. The booths were aged, along with some of their customers. The walls looked like they hadn’t seen a fresh coat of paint at any point in my lifetime. To top it off, the roof was leaking in the corner, which was made painfully obvious by the drip drip drip sound as the water hit the inside of the white, five gallon bucket sitting below the leak. Chinese water torture, anyone?
Oddly enough, none of us noticed any of this when we first walked through the door. We were greatly distracted by the smell of bacon, pancakes, and overly strong, fresh brewed coffee.
We sat down at the counter and stared at the menu on the wall, just above the register. It was one of those plastic wall hangings with the removable, black, plastic letters and equally boring black, plastic numbers.
Being a small diner type café, there weren’t very many menu items to choose from and I was okay with that. We were reading and debating which ones to expose our digestive systems to.
“All I can think about are the pancakes and bacon that I’ve been smelling since we walked in the front door”, said Jessica.
“And coffee”, said Wendy.
“Yeah, that sounds like a plan”, I said and raised my hand slightly to get the closest waitress’s attention.
She nodded then smiled and said, “Be right with you, hun”. She was pouring coffee from the pot in her right hand and carrying a pitcher of water in her left.
She was about five foot six and her long, brown hair was pulled up in a ponytail, surrounded by a little paper waitress’s hat. Her uniform looked a bit like they did in the old days, even though it was fairly new. It was pale mint green with a white apron covering most of the front side. Her name tag said, “Jacey”.
She placed the coffee pot back on the warmer and the pitcher of water on the counter next to the coffee.
As she walked over to us with short, bouncy steps, she pulled her order book from her apron pocket and the pencil from behind her ear.
“Hi, ladies! What can I get y’all to drink?”
“Coffee all around”, said Jessica.
“You got it! I’ll be right back”, said Jacey. Her smile was genuine and so was her happy, perky attitude.
It didn’t take her long to come back with the coffee and enough cups for the three of us.
“The special tonight is the meat loaf. Let me know when you’re ready to order”. She leaned over the counter to us and quietly said “I strongly suggest that you don’t eat the meat loaf.”
“How are the pancakes?” asked Wendy.
“Is the bacon safe?” I asked.
“Pancakes and bacon are deliciously wonderful choices for the Blue Bird Café!” exclaimed Jacey. “Same all around for the food too?”
We all nodded in agreement.
She smiled her perky smile and said she’d have it out to us in a jiffy. She turned in our order to the cook then walked over to the drink station and started brewing a fresh pot of coffee.
“Savannah, how are we supposed to find this guy?” asked Wendy.
“I sent him an email before we left town to let him know we were coming out here”, I said. “He said he’d call tomorrow afternoon and let us know where to meet him.”
I looked around the room then leaned towards Wendy and Jessica and whispered, “Let’s talk about this later.”
Wendy and Jessica nodded just as Jacey returned with our food.
“Did I hear you say you were looking for someone?” asked Jacey. “Maybe I can help. Barnette is a small everybody-knows-everybody kind of place.”
“No, we were saying we need to look for somewhere to stay tonight”, said Jessica.
“Ah, well then I suggest The Rain Tree Motel. It’s not the closest motel from here, but it is the cleanest. The closest place rents by the hour, if you know what I mean.”
“The Rain Tree Motel sounds great. Where exactly is it from here?” asked Wendy.
“I’ll write down the directions for you, hun”, said Jacey.
“You don’t need directions”, said one of the customers from the opposite side of the room (very loudly, I might add). “I’ll take you.”
“Thank you”, I said, “but that’s not necessary.”
“Nonsense”, said the man as he walked over to us. With an outstretched hand, he introduced himself as Sheriff Jared Cane.
“Jacey here is my wife, if that’s any consolation. The café is closing in about another half an hour, so we’ll be heading home then. We’ll be driving right past the Rain Tree, so you can follow us there.”
“Well in that case, thank you very much. We’d
appreciate it”, I said.
“Well, I hope you enjoy your stay. You should take a tour of downtown before you head out. Nice little piece of history there”, said Jared. He nodded at the three of us and said, “Enjoy your dinner” then returned to his seat.
An hour later, we checked into the Rain Tree Motel. We got some ice and some sodas then settled into our room for the night. I emailed Mr. Carter and told him where we were staying.
Originally, he had planned on meeting with us tomorrow, but he said his wife had taken a sleeping pill and was out like a light. He said it would only take him a few minutes, so he’d get dressed and head our way.
The three of us had our specific jobs to do for this case. Wendy would be physically (and visibly) taking notes. Jessica would be sitting on the bed, with her back against the headboard and wearing headphones. The plan was for her to pretend she was listening to music, while she was actually recording the entire conversation. I was going to be asking direct questions along with what would seem to him like random questions to gather more intel.
Over the years, I have found that my clients tend to be less receptive and/or forthcoming if they actually know they are being recorded, so I usually keep that little tidbit of information for myself. More times than not, there’s more to the story than what they actually tell me, so the recordings help me “read between the lines”, so to speak.
You’d be surprised how many times my clients lie to me in a half-witted effort to get the results that they want instead of the actual truth. Sometimes this works out in their favor and other times not so much.
Twenty minutes after receiving Julian Carter’s email, he was sitting at the small square table in our motel room. The table had been pushed up against the window, so we moved it nearer to the bathroom. I didn’t want Mr. Carter to freak out and make a run for it before I got his non-refundable cash deposit.
He was nice enough, I guess, cordial even, but there was still something off about him that I just couldn’t put my finger on. I’ve found that most people don’t pay much attention to the little voice in their head, good or bad. Personally, I ALWAYS listen. Listening to that nagging feeling that something’s just not right tends to work out in my favor. So far, listening to it has kept me alive. Right now, that little voice was thumping me in my ear, trying to get my attention.
The loudest that “little voice” has ever gotten was on September 13, 2001, two days after the attacks of 9/11 in New York.
I live out in the boon docks, so it’s rare that I hear my doorbell ring. The few neighbors that I have usually just yell at me from my front porch.
The man was light-skinned but had a slightly heavy middle-eastern accent. He had short, scraggly, jet black hair and dark eyes. He was dressed in light blue denim jeans, slightly worn athletic shoes, and a black turtleneck t-shirt.
His right hand was empty and in his left was a bottle of liquid laundry detergent. He claimed he was selling vacuum cleaners, but there wasn’t a single vacuum cleaner in sight.
He repeatedly kept trying to stick his foot in the doorway and seemed like he was trying to look past me. My guess was that he was trying to see if I was home alone.
I told him I had wooden floors and was not interested in purchasing a vacuum cleaner. He ignored me and tried to get his foot in the doorway, yet again. I started closing the door, little by little. I didn’t want to spook him into doing something rash seeing as how I was unarmed at the time. My gun was on the kitchen table, in pieces. I had been cleaning it when the doorbell rang.
I didn’t have a taser back then, so my only weapon would have been any of the knives from the kitchen or my autographed baseball bat from the 1997 Texas Lone Stars. There was no way in hell I was going to destroy that bat if I could help it, so my best chance was to not allow him to get into the house at all.
I braced myself with my right leg and blocked the doorway with my left, closing the door a little bit more as I did. I told him he needed to leave, so he backed away from the door. I shut it the rest of the way and secured the locks.
I could see from different window views throughout my house that he was still in my yard, pacing back and forth. It was as if he was trying to figure out how to get me to let my guard down enough to allow him into the house.
I finished cleaning my gun, put it back together, and checked the windows again. I didn’t see him, but I didn’t feel comfortable with just letting out a sigh of relief and being happy about it. I quietly slipped out the back door and around to the front of the house, gun in hand. He was nowhere in sight, so I went back into the house and relocked the door.
Later that evening, my closest neighbor, Lane Driscoll, hollered at me from the porch as he usually does.
“Hey, Savannah! You home?” asked Lane.
“Yeah, gimme a minute”, I hollered back as I grabbed a couple of beers from the fridge and headed towards the door.
“What’s up?” I asked as I handed him a beer.
“Thanks. Hey, did that foreign guy come to your house too?” asked Lane. “Earlier today, that is.”
“If you mean the one selling the non-existent vacuum cleaners, then yes”, I said.
Lane paused and looked concerned.
“You didn’t let him into the house, did you? Please tell me you didn’t.”
“No, I didn’t. Why?”
“He’s wanted for multiple, brutal rapes all over the state. If he comes by again, shoot him. I know I damn sure will”, said Lane. “Thanks for the beer”, he said as he left my porch and started walking towards his property.
I went back inside and made sure all of the doors and windows were locked tight. Ever since that day, I have done nothing but listen to that little voice in my head. It hasn’t been wrong yet, so when something about Julian Carter seemed a bit off, I made doubly sure to keep my eyes open. I’d hate to miss something important with all those red flags figuratively flying overhead.
“So, will you be taking my case, Miss Hartman?” asked Mr. Carter.
“Huh? Oh. Yes, I will take your case”, I said, nodding. I was off in my own little world, so for a moment, I had forgotten where I was and what we were doing there.
This is another reason why I record the conversations with potential clients. Not only are they liars most of the time, but they are usually boring as hell. I usually drift off in thought with my extremely short attention span.
After Mr. Carter left for the evening, we went over the notes we took and listened to the recording.
“Something doesn’t add up”, said Jessica. “If he thought his wife was poisoning him with arsenic via his vodka and cranberry juice, why did he keep drinking it? It just doesn’t make sense.”
“We need to talk to his wife somehow”, I said.
“And without him knowing about it”, said Wendy.
“Definitely. The only problem is that we can’t tip either one of them off as to what we’re really up to: finding out how much truth is in Mr. Carter’s version of the story”, I said. “Let’s sleep on it and figure out our next move in the morning.”
There were two double beds and a pull-out couch to choose from. Wendy took one for the team and opted for the couch. I was asleep almost as soon as my head hit the pillow.
My alarm went off at nine. We all slept for several hours but to me it felt like it had only been a few minutes. We all regretfully got up, got ready, and headed out to the Blue Bird Café for breakfast. The pancakes, bacon, and strong coffee were calling our names.
“Welcome back, ladies!” exclaimed Jacey. “Are y’all heading out today?” She’s even perky in the mornings, but I probably shouldn’t kill her for it since her husband is the sheriff.
“We’re planning on it. We have a few things to take care of first”, I said.
“I hope one of those things is a guided tour of historic downtown Barnette led by yours truly”, said Jared.
“Offer accepted, Sheriff”, I said.
“Let me know when you’re ready for the
tour”, said the sheriff. He smiled and tipped his hat then sat down on his regular stool at the other end of the counter.
“What can I get for y’all?” asked Jacey.
“Is it too soon to say ‘the usual’?” asked Wendy.
Jacey smiled a genuine, happy smile and said “Pancakes, bacon, and very strong coffee coming right up”. She scooted over to the pickup window and dropped off our order.
“I guess we can see some sights with the sheriff then get to work on Mr. Carter’s case. We can try to find us a bar somewhere tonight and head home tomorrow”, I said.
“It would be nice to go out, have fun, and not have to worry about psycho stalkers for a change”, said Jessica.
“I seriously need a break. Do y’all want to take an extra day here just to relax after we get all the info we can on the case?” I asked.
“Add free beer to the mix and we’re in”, said Wendy.
Jacey came back to us with the coffee and three empty mugs. She placed each mug on the counter and proceeded to fill each of them a half inch from the rim.
“Your food’s almost ready. I’ll bring it out to you in a bit”, said Jacey.
She smiled her perky, genuine smile, returned the coffee pot to the warmer, and disappeared to the back room. She returned a few minutes later, just in time to hear the cook ring the annoying little bell sitting on the pickup counter.
After we finished breakfast, Jared took us on a short ride-along tour of the town in his county issued cruiser.
“There’s not much to see in our little town, I admit, but it’s home”, he said.
He drove us two blocks down and parked in what he said was “the heart and soul of historic downtown Barnette”. To me, it just looked like a huge, fenced in yard with a house smack dab in the middle of it, surrounded by a narrow roadway and four rows of buildings. It almost seemed like a concrete moat.
“The house you see over there in the middle of the town square is the oldest structure in Barnette. It was originally owned by the Miller family, who lived in it until about twelve years ago when the last of the siblings that had actually lived in the house passed away. Their descendants chose to sell the home and four acres of land to the city. Today, the Miller home is the Barnette Public Library, with part of the home only open for tours given by the local historical society.”