Murder With Jammin’T

by R A Wallace

  Emmet shook his head and looked across the table at Daryl.

  “I think we’re good, Lynn. Thanks.” Daryl reached for the syrup.

  “Does Leah know you’re eating that?” Emmet said as he watched Daryl pour half of the syrup dispenser onto his French toast.

  “No, and you aren’t telling her either.” Daryl set the syrup down in the middle of the table.

  “It might cost you,” Emmet warned as he lifted the syrup.

  “The good things in life usually do,” Daryl said amiably before taking his first bite. He closed his eyes in appreciation when the first sugary sweetness touched his tongue.

  Emmet shook his head. “She’ll probably be able to tell when you’re bouncing off the walls later.”

  “That woman can smell sugar from a mile away,” Daryl agreed. “How are things with Jennifer?”

  Emmet smiled, the corners of his long gray mustache pulling up at the corners. He wiped his mustache and goatee with the napkin before answering.

  “She and Jim have set a date for the wedding.”

  “I’ll bet you’re happy about that,” Daryl guessed.

  “She found a good man.” Emmet’s attention was momentarily drawn to the front door when someone else entered. He thought about something he had heard and looked back at Daryl. “She’s been busy with whatever’s going on with Bert and Betty lately.”

  Daryl looked around and lowered his voice. “Yeah, what is up with that?”

  Emmet shrugged. “I have no idea. Jennifer can’t tell me anything, obviously. I heard they’re on their way to Florida though.”

  “I heard that too.” Daryl leaned back from the table when he saw Tyler approaching with a pot of coffee.

  “Top you off, gentlemen?” Tyler asked, the pot poised above Daryl’s cup.

  “You bet,” Daryl said.

  Tyler filled the two cups and emptied his pot in the process. He carried the pot back over to the coffee maker. He used the last bag of coffee when he started the next pot, so he headed into the kitchen area to get more.

  “How are things going back here?” Tyler asked as he passed through the kitchen.

  “Good,” Holly answered. “Everything seems normal so far.”

  Tyler liked the sound of that. They could do with a lot of normal right now. He went into the stock room and pulled out a box. It had already been opened on a previous day and there weren’t many bags left inside but it was enough to get them through the day. He emptied the box then flattened it.

  “Need anything while I’m back here?” Tyler asked Danny.

  Danny looked up from the dishwasher. “I’m good.”

  Tyler closed the door to the stock room and carried the box to the back door of the restaurant. He stepped outside into the chilly air and went over to the dumpsters. He lifted the lid to the recyclable dumpster and tossed the flattened box inside. As he turned to go back into the restaurant, something caught his eye on the ground next to the other dumpster. It looked like a shoe, but he knew that couldn’t be right. Wondering what it could be, he walked around to the side of the dumpster. That was when he discovered that the shoe was attached to a body.

  Tyler pulled out his phone and tried to dial for help. Nothing happened. Stepping quickly back into the restaurant, he went over to his sister and grabbed her phone from her pocket.

  “Don’t go outside, either one of you,” he ordered as he dialed for help.

  “Why not?” Holly asked, twisting around to see what he was doing.

  Tyler’s eyes locked with Holly’s as he spoke into the phone.

  “There’s a body behind the Jammin’T.”

  ***

  Holly didn’t know what to do with herself. Once the police had arrived, they’d closed down the diner. That meant that Holly had nothing to do but wait her turn until the police were ready to question her. They’d been working their way through everyone at the diner before releasing them to leave. She could only imagine the inconvenience to their daily schedule then chastised herself for the thought.

  A man had been murdered. A little inconvenience to help find whoever had done it was to be expected. She only hoped that the police didn’t find anything to tie the death to her brother. There was no way he could have had anything to do with it. No way it could be tied to the diner. It had to just be some sort of horrible coincidence. She was certain of that.

  She recognized the police officer who approached her when it was her turn to be questioned although he rarely ate in the diner. She knew that he was very health conscious. In the back of her mind, she began formulating new recipes to attract customer’s who would prefer a healthier choice than regular diner fare.

  “Miss? Are you okay?” Jerry asked.

  Holly jerked herself back to the moment. “Yes. We didn’t have anything to do with this. You know that, right?”

  “That’s what we’re trying to determine,” Jerry answered noncommittally. “I need to know about your schedule for the past day. Can you tell me when you left here yesterday and what you did after that?”

  Holly thought back and answered him as completely as she could.

  “You didn’t go behind the restaurant at any time this morning?” Jerry asked.

  Holly shook her head as she wrapped her arms around herself.

  “What about the rest of the staff here. Did you see anyone else go out?” Jerry watched the emotions cross the younger woman’s face as she shook her head again. She looked more confused than anything else.

  “Is there anything you can tell me?” he asked.

  She shook her head again. “It was a normal morning. Tyler and I get here first. I start the grill up and go through my regular routine to prep. Tyler starts prepping out on the floor with coffee cups and silverware, gets the coffee pots going. Before you know it, Lynn and whoever else is scheduled to work out on the floor is here and then Danny comes in.”

  “That’s Danny Ortega, the dishwasher?” Jerry confirmed.

  This time Holly nodded. “Do you think we’ll be able to re-open the diner today?” She glanced at her grill. She’d turned it off once she realized she wouldn’t be using it for a while.

  “Might be a while before we have an answer to that,” Jerry said. He asked her a few more questions before moving on to the next person. When he finished speaking with the dishwasher, he noticed that Erica was just finishing with one of the waitresses. He stepped over to speak with Erica.

  “They have a name for the victim yet?” Jerry asked.

  Erica looked down at her notes. “Leonard Leftwich.”

  Jerry and Erica turned toward Holly when they heard the loud clatter of the mixing bowls that fell from her hands to the floor.

  “Lefty?”

  Chapter Eleven

  He finished typing up his notes and spun around in his chair. Erica was jotting another note on the murder board. At this stage in the investigation, they had precious little information up there. Jerry laced his fingers together and rested his hands on the top of his head as he read the notes out loud.

  “Leonard ‘Lefty’ Leftwich the third. Age thirty. Dark brown hair, brown eyes, five ten. Employed periodically as a traveling carnival worker including locations where the current owners of the Jammin’T were also employed.”

  Erica stepped back and pointed at another note. “Was last seen in the Jammin’T on this day. Several witnesses watched an altercation between the victim and one of the owners.”

  “But he was complaining about the food cooked by the other owner. That gives them both motive,” Jerry pointed out.

  “Agreed.”

  Jerry rubbed the top of his head with his laced hands. “Seems like a lot of odd things going on with the two of them lately.”

  Erica moved back over toward her desk.

  “Yeah, what was the thing with the food delivery?”

  She picked up her notes and flipped through several pages.

  “Here it is. They only received a partial order. The company that shipped
it claimed that the entire order was on the truck when it left their facility.” She looked up at Jerry. “According to the company, they even have the weight of the loaded truck to prove it. They have the scales right there at the facility to check before the trucks leave. I was told they don’t want to get hit with any fines for being overweight, especially on some of the smaller roadways in remote areas that have more restrictions.”

  “If the supplies were on the truck when it left the facility but didn’t make it to the Jammin’T, what happened to them in between?” Jerry thought out loud.

  “And what does the theft of supplies have to do with murder?” Erica added.

  “Yeah, the murder of a guy that didn’t have anything to do with the company that delivers the food.” He lowered his hands from his head and sat up in his seat. “He doesn’t, right?”

  “Something to check,” she agreed. “I can’t believe there isn’t some tie-in between the murder and everything that’s been going on with those two lately. It can’t all be coincidence, right?”

  Jerry swung around in his seat and reached for his keyboard.

  “No such thing as coincidence,” he agreed.

  ***

  Megan parked her truck in front of Cy Douglass’s farm house and walked up to the front door. It was obvious that Holly and Tyler were waiting for her. Tyler opened the door before she even reached it. She saw Holly standing a few feet behind him.

  “Megan, thanks for coming so quickly,” Tyler said as he led her into the living room. “I’m sorry that we’ve been bothering you so much lately. It’s just that we have no idea what else to do.”

  “I understand,” Megan said as she took the seat he indicated. “Tell me about what happened today.”

  Megan listened as the two of them shared the story. She asked several questions as they went along. Finally, when they both agreed they had told her everything they remembered involving the death of the man, she sat in silence for a few moments as she considered it all. It was obvious that the information she did have wasn’t enough to make any determinations. She could hear Jerry Stevens’s voice in her head saying, ‘Early days yet.’

  “It seems that you two have been having more than your share of problems lately,” she murmured.

  Holly let out a frustrated sound of agreement.

  “Starting with a missing cow,” Tyler said with a shake of his head. “How weird is that?”

  “And you haven’t heard anything else about that?” Megan asked.

  “No. We reported it, of course. You know the cost of livestock.”

  “It’s up there,” she agreed.

  “Then there was part of an order that went missing,” Holly said.

  “Yeah, that’s right,” Tyler said. “The company is still insisting they shipped it. At least we didn’t end up paying for something we didn’t receive.”

  “Tell me about that incident.” Megan swung her head back and forth as Holly and Tyler jumped in with different parts of the story as they explained it.

  “After that, it was the fire at Bert and Betty’s,” Holly said.

  “I stopped at their place to talk with them before they left for Florida. They were certain that you didn’t have anything to do with that,” Megan said.

  Tyler rubbed the back of his neck. “That was before my truck tried to run them off the road.” He looked over at Holly. “We can’t blame them if they’ve started to wonder.”

  “It wasn’t your truck,” Holly said adamantly.

  “I know that, but we can’t prove it.” He turned to Megan. “I even gave permission for them to access my phone records. I figured they could track me that way and they’d know that I wasn’t anywhere near Bert and Betty.”

  Megan pulled her brows together. “They couldn’t tell?”

  Tyler shook his head in disgust. “My phone hasn’t been working. They said there wasn’t any data to corroborate my story.”

  “How did you know the victim?” Megan asked.

  “We worked at several different places with him over the years,” Tyler explained. “I mean, I wouldn’t say that we were really friends, or anything like that.”

  Megan watched Holly make a face.

  “You didn’t like him?” Megan asked.

  “Not really, no. But you have to know the life and think like a kid.” Holly looked at Tyler. “We were dragged all over the country by our parents. The only friends we had were the ones we were with for that night or for that weekend, you know? Sometimes we got lucky and the event lasted longer. You had a better chance at making a new friend then, but you were still limited to whoever else was at that event.”

  It wasn’t something Megan had considered before. It didn’t sound like a life she would have enjoyed.

  “And this Lefty, he was at a lot of the events you were at?” Megan asked.

  Holly shrugged. “Enough of them. We knew him, that’s for sure.”

  “I might have known him better than Holly,” Tyler said. “We were closer in age. That and I didn’t want him anywhere near Holly.” Tyler narrowed his eyes at his sister.

  “I didn’t want him anywhere near me either,” she said defensively.

  “What was he like?” Megan asked.

  “A jerk,” they answered in unison.

  A look of guilt crossed Holly’s face. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have said that.”

  “Yeah, me neither,” Tyler agreed. “But he really was, you know? He was always chasing after the younger girls.”

  Holly looked across the room. “Wait, I have some pictures.” She jumped up and left the room. A few moments later, she returned carrying a box. She sat down on the couch next to Megan.

  “I was looking at these just the other day.” Holly pulled out a layer of pictures and began sifting through them. She pulled one out.

  “This is me and Tyler when we were younger.” She passed the photo to Megan.

  Megan looked at the photo of the two of them. They looked even more alike back then.

  “Those were your parents?”

  Holly nodded, a wistful look on her face. “They’re both gone now.” She sifted through the pictures again.

  “Here is one of a group of us. These are some of the kids we knew because we saw them at more than one event.” Holly leaned over and pointed out some of the kids. “We saw these ones more than once. I got pretty close to this girl here. We ended up seeing each other quite a bit over the years. The others in the group were just there for that event and then we never saw them again.”

  Megan studied the photo as Holly continued to sift through others. She could tell that the photo was a little dated because of the clothing and the hair styles.

  “Here’s one more.” Holly pointed at a kid a couple of inches taller than Tyler. He had long, dark hair. “That’s Lefty.”

  Megan compared the two group photos that Holly had handed her. She could see that some of the kids in them were the same but then several were different between the photos.

  “These were taken at two different events?” Megan asked.

  “Yes, in two different states.” Holly glanced at the photos and frowned.

  “What is it?” Megan asked.

  Holly took one of the photos back from Megan and held it out to at Tyler.

  “Who is that kid on the end by Lefty?” Holly asked as Tyler took the photo from her hand.

  Tyler made a face indicating he was thinking about it.

  “He doesn’t look familiar to you?” Holly pressed.

  “He was some buddy of Lefty’s.” Tyler shook his head. That was all he could remember. “Why?”

  “I swear it’s the guy that delivered the partial order the other day,” Holly said.

  Tyler looked at the photo again.

  “You could be right.” Tyler closed his eyes for a moment. When he opened them again, there was a look of surprise in them. “You’re right! I remember now. It’s Aaron. The guy’s name is Aaron Sorenson. I swear I didn’t make the connection when I
saw him the other day.”

  Chapter Twelve

  Megan parked her truck in front of the library on Thursday morning and checked her phone for messages. She had texted the information about Aaron Sorenson to Erica when she’d gotten home the night before. Erica’s response was typical. It told her to stay out of trouble. Megan smiled as she exited the truck and walked across the street to the entrance. She found both Linda and Becca at the counter.

  “Megan,” Becca said. “Thanks for coming in.”

  “I didn’t know you worked in the mornings,” Megan said when she reached the counter.

  “Usually, I don’t and I’m not today. I came in to talk to Linda. That was when we decided to call you,” Becca explained.

  Megan watched as Becca’s eyes scanned the library before she leaned over the counter to get closer to Megan.

  “It’s like this. I’ve been spending time with Tyler,” Becca said quietly.

  Megan had been wondering about that. She nodded encouragingly.

  “The other day, I found something in one of the books here.” Becca glanced at Linda.

  Megan frowned, not making the connection.

  “It wasn’t something written in the book. She found something stuck in the pages,” Linda clarified.

  “Gotcha.” Megan still wasn’t certain where they were going with the conversation, but both Becca and Linda had helped her with puzzles several times in the past.

  Becca pulled out a note and passed it over to Megan.

  “Stay away from him.” Megan looked up at Becca after reading the note. “You’re sure this was meant for you and that they’re referring to Tyler?”

  Becca placed a photo on the counter and slid it over to Megan.

  Megan frowned down at it.

  “Well, no chances of misunderstanding that,” Megan murmured.

  “I didn’t think so either,” Becca agreed.

  “What day did you find this?” Megan asked.

  “Tuesday.” Becca glanced at Linda. “We weren’t really sure what to do about it.”