Murder With Jammin’T

by R A Wallace

  “Someplace safe,” Carl joked.

  “They’re so safe wherever they are, I may never find them,” Helen agreed.

  “At least you can still drive your car,” Willie said loudly from the far end of the table. “I lost my keys.”

  “Now I feel guilty,” Ann said. “I was complaining that I lost my bingo chips.”

  “Now, that is serious. I couldn’t do without bingo,” Sam said.

  “I don’t feel so bad now,” Joyce said. “I thought I was the only one losing things.”

  ***

  “And you have no idea how your gloves got there?” Becca asked.

  Tyler had been asking himself that very question ever since the police had shown them to him.

  “I have no idea. I can’t even remember the last time I wore them.”

  “How is Holly taking all of this?” Becca slowed the car to make a turn.

  “She isn’t saying much but that isn’t a good thing with her. Usually, I can’t get her to stop talking.”

  “As bad as it all seems now, it could be a lot worse, you know.” Becca pulled into the long drive to the state park.

  Tyler knew exactly what she meant. “I’m just so glad that Bert and Betty weren’t hurt.”

  “Exactly. Everything else will straighten itself out. You’ll see.”

  Tyler turned to look at her. “Anyway, thanks for this.”

  “For what?” Becca took the turn to the scenic road through the park.

  Tyler laughed. “I don’t know. Being in public with me. You could have run the other way and I wouldn’t have blamed you.”

  “What kind of friend does that?”

  “Smart ones.” Tyler turned toward her. “Listen, I don’t know what’s going to happen with any of this. Just know that I won’t hold it against you if you do stop talking to me.”

  Becca shot him a look before turning her focus back to the road.

  “You need to stop talking like that. Besides, you’re missing the best part of the tour.”

  Tyler looked around. The scenery was beautiful, even at this time of the year. “What part is that?”

  “The commentary.”

  He laughed again. “You have a commentary to go with the tour?”

  “Of course. I’m a librarian. We know all kinds of trivia about things.”

  “Like what?”

  “Did you know that a lot of the work completed on the parks during the depression in the early nineteen hundreds was done by the CCC?” Becca asked.

  “The Civilian Conservation Corps? I’d like to hear about that.” Tyler settled back in his seat and prepared to listen to the commentary.

  ***

  Holly carried the box from the spare bedroom down to the first floor. After setting it on the coffee table, she sat down on the couch and opened the top of the box. Although she had brought the box with them each time they had moved, she hadn’t looked inside it for a long time. She wasn’t sure why she never wanted to. Maybe it was the memories that she knew it held.

  The box contained many smaller boxes full of loose photos and a photo album holding a collection of them. They were all pictures taken throughout the years starting from the time that Tyler was born. Actually, it was even before then. There were pictures of her parents on their wedding day. Those were the ones in the photo album. She opened to the first page and looked at the young version of her parents.

  Holly had often wondered if her parents had been the ones to create the album. She doubted it. All of the photos taken after that day were just thrown together into the box. Her parents had lived like nomads and they’d dragged their children along with them. Holly had never known a real home until they’d moved to Teaberry.

  She lifted out a stack of pictures and began sifting through them. They were in no particular order in the box. Though the most current had been tossed on the top without care, some had worked their way to other parts of the box as her parents had transported it across the country in search of another event with their food truck. Consequently, the photos were somewhat grouped together by layer over time but not exactly.

  In her first handful, she found mostly recent pictures taken not long before her parents had passed away. She held one up and touched her parents’ faces gently with her fingertips. She had never wanted the nomadic life of her parents. Though they had trouble giving her the stability that she craved, they had never wavered in their love for their children.

  The first stack didn’t contain the pictures she was looking for so she set it aside and lifted out another layer. These were mostly of Holly in her teen years. It was the period she was looking for so she carefully examined each one. Finally, she found what she was looking for.

  It was a group shot taken at one of the county fairs. Holly had fond memories of the beautiful state. It wasn’t just the scenery that had attracted her. She managed to make several friends that summer. Their families had ended up following a similar circuit of events. She’d been able to see the same group of teens multiple times.

  She’d gotten close with one girl in particular, partly because their names had been so similar. Halle was the same age as Holly. Though they were both five years younger than Tyler, Halle had developed a crush on her friend’s older brother. She stood next to him in the photo Holly held now. For his part, Tyler had managed to ignore the teen adulation. He had been aware of the young girl’s feelings but had been sensitive to the age difference.

  Holly’s eyes shifted to the rest of the group. One of them hadn’t had the chivalrous restraint that her brother had. Leonard Leftwich, known as Lefty by everyone he encountered, had preyed on the young girls he met while working the rides at the events. Although Holly had never been taken in by his tactics, several of the other girls she had met over the years had.

  Holly wondered again why he had shown up in Teaberry. There were no local events to attract him. Perhaps he no longer worked the event circuit. Either way, she doubted that his presence was a good sign. Over the years, she had met thousands of people in her travels. She’d learned that a few seemed to act like magnets for bad things to happen around them. Lefty Leftwich was definitely one of those people.

  Chapter Seven

  He scooped up his keys and wallet from the dresser and pocketed them. He was about to walk out of the bedroom when the reflection in the mirror caught his eye. Turning, he walked over to the rocking chair he had placed there the evening before. It was the first project he had finished in anticipation of the new nursery. He had already selected the wood for the crib and would begin working on it next.

  He pushed on the back of the rocker and watched it swing in motion for several moments, a large smile on his face. It had turned out better than he would ever have imagined. He supposed it was because he had put so much love into it. He still couldn’t believe they were expecting a baby. Mindful of the time, he reluctantly left the bedroom and walked down the hall toward the kitchen. He stopped when he found Megan in the living room instead.

  “Are you warm enough in here?” Dan checked the fire. It looked like it had enough wood on it for now.

  “Fine, thanks.” Megan set aside her laptop.

  “I need to get to work.” Dan bent down and kissed her forehead.

  “Did you call your sister-in-law back?”

  He frowned. He’d already forgotten about that.

  “Yeah. We played phone tag for a while. I finally caught her last night.”

  Megan knew that was pretty common with LeAnn.

  “What did she want?”

  “She said she needed help with something. I told her I’d stop by when I could.” He pulled out his phone and made a note of it. He’d forget if he didn’t.

  “Is it something I can do so you don’t have to?”

  He shrugged. “I have no idea. As usual, she didn’t give me any details.”

  “Well, let me know.” Megan pulled the laptop toward her again.

  “What do you have planned today?”

  �
�I was thinking I might stop and see Bert and Betty.” She looked up at Dan.

  “Yeah? Tell them I said hello. Do you know when they’re planning to move to Florida?”

  “No, but I’m assuming the fire slowed them down a bit. They’ll need to handle everything with that first, right?”

  “You’d think. Love you. Gotta go.” He bent and kissed her again.

  Megan logged back into the web server and read what she had written about the town of Teaberry. Now that she thought of it, the Jammin’T was pretty historic. Bert and Betty had opened it over forty years ago. Maybe she should add a blurb about that? She could get some quotes from Bert and Betty before they relocate.

  She finished making the changes she had planned, then closed the laptop again. She had no idea what Bert and Betty’s plans were and she didn’t want to miss speaking with them before they left town. They might have some clues about the fire at their house.

  ***

  She looked at the kitchen in dismay. The fire department had cleared them to enter some portions of the house to retrieve anything they might want to keep. There hadn’t been anything she particularly wanted, but curiosity had compelled her to look. Betty turned around and looked at her husband.

  Bert looked as dismayed as she felt. He’d lost a few pounds since he stopped working at the Jammin’T. They were both trying to live a healthier lifestyle. He was shorter than Betty by a couple of inches. His bald head was pale. He never spent much time in the sun. The Jammin’T had been the focus of their lives. It had been a difficult transition when they’d left after Bert’s heart problems, but now they were looking forward to the future.

  “It’s not all bad,” she pointed out. Her frizzy hair, which she kept colored with an unusual shade in the red family, was covered with a kerchief. She had expected to encounter soot and filth after both the fire and the firefighters had done their thing. Her imagination hadn’t even been close to the damage they had found.

  “Yeah, we weren’t hurt.” Bert held out a gnarled hand covered in black hair.

  Betty reached for it and clasped it in her own. She leaned over and kissed him above a bushy eyebrow.

  “That’s right. And, we hardly lost anything. Not anything of value, anyway.”

  “Except the resale,” he pointed out.

  She sighed. “There is that. We’ll have to see what happens.”

  “Hello?”

  Bert turned when he heard the voice. “In here!”

  Betty couldn’t remember the name of the insurance adjuster they’d spoken to on the phone.

  “I thought the insurance adjuster was a man?” she asked.

  “Maybe they sent a different insurance adjuster?” Bert said.

  Betty smiled when she saw the young girl that appeared.

  “Megan. Have you come to see the damage?” Betty waved vaguely with her arm to encompass the house.

  “I’m so sorry about the fire.” Megan took in their appearance. Both looked tired, but otherwise okay. In comparison, the house hadn’t fared as well.

  “It’s mostly smoke damage here, as you can see, but then there’s all the water damage too from when they put the fire out.” Bert’s eyes surveyed the kitchen.

  “The fire department got here really fast. We were lucky about that,” Betty added.

  “And you weren’t hurt. That’s the important part,” Megan reminded them. “Everything else can be replaced.”

  “Actually, we can’t complain about that,” Betty said. “We had almost everything packed up to go to Florida.”

  Bert chuckled. “Yeah, the insurance company will probably think we started the fire ourselves. We’d already taken out everything we wanted.”

  “That would be our luck,” Betty agreed. “They’ll charge us with some sort of crime.”

  Megan was surprised that neither one of them mentioned Tyler.

  “Did you know about the police bringing Tyler in for questioning?” Megan asked.

  “Wasn’t that just foolishness?” Betty said, a touch of impatience in her voice. “We told them that boy didn’t have anything to do with it.”

  “They did find his gloves here,” Megan pointed out.

  Betty huffed out a breath and she crossed her arms. “There was that.”

  “Still. We hope they find out what really happened, and soon.” Bert rubbed his bald head.

  “Is the fire department certain that this was arson?”

  “Naw. Not yet, anyway. They haven’t said anything like that. They were still investigating as far as we know.” Bert looked at Betty for agreement.

  Betty made a face. “No one seems to know anything. That’s why we’re here. The insurance company is sending someone out to meet us.”

  “Are you still planning to leave soon?” Megan hadn’t heard any details about their plans.

  “Today, actually.” Betty straightened her back. “We were all packed up and ready to go. We figure we might as well just do it.”

  “Can’t stay here anyway,” Bert said with a nod.

  “We figure we’ll meet with the adjuster and see what he has to say. Then we’ll leave sometime later today,” Betty said.

  “Depending on when they clear us to go,” Bert agreed. “We might not get very far today, but the sooner we get on the road, the sooner we’ll be in sunny Florida.”

  Betty laughed. “I heard with the El Nino, it’s been pretty cold down there some days too.”

  Megan smiled. “My parents say it keeps going up and down but it’s still better than snow.” She asked them a few more questions and was about to leave when they heard another voice.

  “Hello?”

  “That must be the adjuster now.” Bert motioned toward the front of the house. “In here!”

  “I won’t keep you then. I hope you have an uneventful trip.” Megan nodded to the man she passed on the way out. She hoped for their sakes that the results of his inspection were in their favor. She was sure they could use some good news.

  ***

  Tyler scowled at the phone in his hand. He thought that Patty had the thing fixed. The phone seemed to work just fine as long as it was in her hands. It was whenever he tried to use it that the thing refused to function. Shaking his head, he stuffed it back into his pocket. He’d have to stop next door to the Jammin’T again as soon as he had a chance tomorrow. He went down the hall and poked his head into the kitchen.

  “I’m going to go out and check on the animals.”

  Holly nodded agreement as she rinsed a dish in the sink.

  Tyler thought about their day as he pulled on a jacket and headed out for the barn. It had been a busy Monday. He wasn’t going to complain. With all of the problems they’d been having lately, he was happy to see that business wasn’t falling off because of it. He knew that news traveled fast in small towns. He was certain that everyone had heard about the police taking him in for questioning about the fire at Bert and Betty’s. He had been upset at first when Rhys and Ian had come to take him in. He couldn’t believe that the two guys he’d gotten along with so well would do that to him. It was only after he had time to think about it that he realized he was better off in the hands of friends.

  The noise in the driveway caught his attention. He stepped out of the barn and watched as a police cruiser pulled into the drive. Rhys and Ian got out. Once again, the fact that they were in uniform registered with his mind. It wasn’t something he had ever paid attention to before. They didn’t look around when they walked away from their cruiser. They both made a beeline for Tyler.

  “We’re going to need you to come in and answer some more questions.” Ian removed his reflective sunglasses.

  Tyler could see the look of uncertainty in Ian’s eyes.

  “I told you everything I know about the fire, I swear it. I wasn’t anywhere near their house.” Tyler was vaguely aware of Holly running from the house toward the barn. He wanted to tell her that she shouldn’t be outside without a coat, but Rhys interrupted his train of thought.


  “We’re not here because of the fire. There’s been another incident.” Rhys said.

  Tyler’s eyes widened as he stared at Rhys. “What now?”

  “A vehicle tried to run Bert and Betty off the road when they left for Florida earlier today. According to them, the vehicle matched the description of yours.” Ian glanced at Holly. She had placed her hand on her brother’s arm. “Tyler will need to come with us. We’ll talk about it downtown.”

  “You can’t take him again. This isn’t fair. We haven’t done anything.” Holly’s voice got louder with each word that she spoke.

  “I’m sorry.” Ian’s voice was gentle when he spoke to Holly. The hand that he placed on Tyler’s shoulder was firm.

  Rhys put a hand on Tyler’s other shoulder. They led him to the police car.

  “Holly! It will be alright. Call Jennifer for me, okay?” Tyler called to his sister as they guided him into the back of the police cruiser.

  Chapter Eight

  Giselle glanced at the time. It had been a slow Tuesday at Togs so far but she knew that the high school had just let out. It wasn’t uncommon for some of the students to trickle in as they walked home from school. Few bought things when they did, but it was also common for them to return on another day with a parent who came prepared with a plastic card.

  Giselle looked up at the door when the bells rang. Just as she hoped, a young girl stepped inside. It was one that she had seen before. Giselle knew from past experience that this one had her own plastic card and she wasn’t afraid to use it when she found something she liked. Giselle offered a friendly smile from behind the counter.

  “Let me know if you need any help.”

  Julia looked over the shirt she was holding up and gave a noncommittal smile to the older woman before returning the shirt to the rack. She walked around the circular rack and pulled out another one. It didn’t pass muster either and was quickly returned. Undeterred, Julia moved on to the next rack. This one held slacks. Julia eyed them with suspicion before running her hand quickly across the fabric. She gave a subtle shake of her head and moved on to the next rack.