Feeding Gators: Book 1 in the Shiner's Bayou Series

by Gen Anne Griffin

  “You can figure it out,” he said bluntly. “You were better with computers in school than I was. Besides, I’ve already told Pappy that I’m not going to be working here forever. The rest of you might as well start paying attention to what it takes to run this store.”

  He turned on his heel and headed for his truck. He could feel the stares of everyone he’d left behind on the sidewalk burning into his back as he got into the Chevy and took off for the Coastal County Sheriff’s Department. The stench of burned rubber filled the air he’d left in his wake.

  *

  “I’ve got to go get my truck out of impound. You want to ride?”

  Gracie rolled over in the bed to find David standing over her. She blinked up at him and realized she was alone in the bed. She vaguely remembered Cal getting up to go to work and kissing her goodbye.

  “What time is it?” she asked. Cal’s diamond ring was still on her finger. She held her hand up in the morning sunlight and grinned at the sparkling rock. “It’s so pretty,” she told him.

  “If you say so. It just looks expensive to me.”

  “You are never any fun.”

  “My truck is in police impound, and you want me to be fun?”

  “Why aren’t you at the shop yet?” She sat up in bed and rubbed her eyes. “I thought you opened at 7 a.m.?”

  “I stuck your brother with it. It’s his penance for letting me get arrested by that fucking idiot Eddie.”

  “Oh. Nice.” Gracie sat up in bed and groaned as her muscles protested. She didn’t particularly want to get up out of bed, but getting left behind at David’s all day wasn’t her ideal way to spend the afternoon either. “Just give me a minute.”

  “Time’s up,” David prodded at her with the toe of his boot, which was, for some unknown reason in the middle of the bed.

  Gracie stared up at him and then held out her hand. “Pull me up. I think I might be dead.”

  “You might want to put some clothes on before I do that.”

  “Oh.” Gracie was only mildly surprised to realize she hadn’t bothered putting her pajamas back on after she and Cal had made love for the second time. She hadn’t exactly been worried about her wardrobe when she’d fallen asleep against his chest the night before. “Give me a minute and I’ll get ready to go.”

  “I’ll be waiting in the truck,” he told her as he turned to leave the room. “Hurry up.”

  *

  “Is David actually paying you to be here, or do you owe him money again?”

  Addison was welding the exhaust back together on Lee Anne Butcher’s luxury SUV when his mother interrupted his morning of mechanical solitude.

  “What?” Addison cut off the welder and took off his protective shield. His mother was standing a couple feet away from the mechanic’s lift. Her arms were crossed over her peach sweater and a familiar, weary expression was clouding her face.

  “I asked if you were finally trying to earn enough money to pay off all your defaulted credit cards or if you were just hanging out here because you like welding?” Jane May Malone was a beautiful woman who had passed her looks onto her children. Addison had always been proud of how young his pretty Mom looked. Her soft blonde hair was cut short to frame her delicate cheek bones and soft, pretty lips. Her trim figure had allowed her to claim to be 35 for the last 12 birthdays.

  Today he was surprised to see dark circles underneath her eyes and more wrinkles than he could remember crossing her forehead and framing her eyes. He laid the face shield down on the hood of the next car he was supposed to work on and went to her.

  “I owed David a favor,” he explained. He decided not to fill his mother in on Twitchy Eddie’s screw up or Uncle Wally’s agreement to give David his truck. If she didn’t already know, she probably didn’t need to.

  Jane May sighed and clucked her tongue against the roof of her mouth. He noticed she wasn’t wearing her scrubs today. He glanced at the clock that hung on the back wall. It was barely 10 a.m.. Way too early for her to be off work from her job at the nursing home.

  “What’s up?” He asked her. “Is something wrong with your van?”

  “Other than I’m tired of driving it?” Jane May shook her head no. “I’ve been trying to call you since Monday.”

  “Oh, crap. I’ve been working a lot lately.”

  “And partying when you’re not at work,” she said, frowning at him as he leaned back against the hood of the car he’d just placed the shield on. “You do realize that your – antics - get back to your father and I, don’t you?”

  Addison shifted his weight nervously. He didn’t know which antics she’d found out about this time. It was probably better for everyone if he kept his mouth shut.

  “You’re probably wondering why I’m not at work today, aren’t you?” Her voice caught in her throat for a moment and Addison took an unconscious step backwards. When Mom got mad, she cried.

  “The question had crossed my mind,” he admitted.

  “A new head nurse was hired on at the nursing home, and she hates me, Addison. Hates me. She’s cut my hours in half. You may know her. Her name is Mary Shulman.”

  “Okay. It doesn’t ring a bell.” Addison shrugged his shoulders. “I’m sorry?” He had no idea why she was here.

  Jane May narrowed her eyes at him. “You apparently took her daughter’s virginity and dumped her the next day.”

  “Oh. Um.” Addison purposely looked away from his mother. He didn’t remember a girl with the last name of Shulman, but he didn’t think now would be a good time to admit that. Clearly Mom was already on the war path.

  “Don’t even try to make any excuses,” Jane May held her hand up to him before he could even come up with an explanation he thought stood a chance of diffusing the situation. “Do you have any idea how awkward it is to have a crying middle-aged boss confront you about your child’s simply abhorrent sexual antics and lack of manners?”

  “Um, not really.” Addison admitted.

  “Of course you don’t. Your Granny Pearl said that every time a girl or her parents get mad at you, you run and hide behind David.”

  “I do not,” Addison was offended by her implications.

  “Then why are you here right now?” Jane May asked.

  “I um, well. Just helping my friend out. David had to go get his truck this morning. I offered to stay here and keep the shop open since it’s my day off.” Addison crossed his arms over his chest. “I’m not hiding from anybody.”

  “No, I don’t suppose you are since your truck is parked right out front. I’ve been trying to call you for three days, but you don’t answer your phone.”

  Addison started to admit he lost it, but then decided that confessing to misplacing yet another $400 cellphone probably wouldn’t improve his mother’s mood one bit. “You found me now,” he faked a smile.

  “I actually wasn’t looking for you,” Jane May replied, scowling at him. “I was looking for David.”

  “Why are you looking for David?” he asked, confused.

  “I keep hearing rumors. I thought maybe he might know where your sister is.”

  Addison opened his mouth and then closed it again. He definitely didn’t have a good response to that. He was suddenly overwhelmed by the desire to get his mother out of the shop before he said the wrong thing and set her off even more. Jane May was a ticking time bomb that was only moments away from blowing up.

  He realized she was watching him intently, clearly waiting on some kind of response.

  “Where Gracie is?” He tried to sound as casual as possible.

  “Right.” June May pursed her lips expectantly.

  “Isn’t she at school?” He did his best to play ignorant.

  “She’s supposed to be.” June May tapped one delicate peach colored peep-toe flat against the concrete floor. “She’s not.”

  “She’s not at school?” Addison absorbed the information with as straight as a face as possible. He hoped it meant that Cal had been successful yesterday
when he’d sent him after his kid sister. Not that Mom needed to know about that, either.

  Jane May leveled her bright blue eyes at her son. “Her adviser called me yesterday to tell me that she’s failing all her classes, Addison. He says some of her professors are concerned because she isn’t attending class regularly and seems uninterested in both her peers and the subject matter.”

  Addison was surprised, and he knew it showed. “Gracie’s failing her classes?” He asked.

  “I tried to call her so we could talk about it. She never answered a single call or text.”

  “Maybe she was just busy,” Addison suggested, hoping is mother would accept the easy solution.

  “Just like she was too busy to call me all weekend?” Mom countered. Addison recognized the suspicion in her eyes. He swallowed nervously.

  “I’m sure she’s fine,” he tried to sound reassuring.

  “She’s not fine, Addison.” Jane May glared at him openly. “I called her dorm. The R.A. said she hadn’t seen Gracie since Sunday, when she wrote her up for making out with her boyfriend in front of the entire dorm. Her resident adviser offered to talk to her roommate for me since Gracie was nowhere to be found. Gracie’s roommate is claiming Gracie’s moved out of the dorm. She says most of Gracie’s stuff is gone.”

  “That’s interesting,” Addison said, unable to come up with anything more believable. He was surprised, but not completely. He’d figured his baby sister was done with college when he’d seen her with David on Saturday. Granted, he’d also thought she had come home for Cal. Maybe now she had.

  “No, it’s not.” Jane May crossed her arms back over her chest and frowned at Addison. “When I was at church Sunday evening, Olivia Barker came up to me and asked me how I felt about my daughter making out with David Breedlove in the middle of Italiano’s for all the world and Jesus to see.”

  “Oh,” Addison flinched at the anger in his Mom’s voice. She was definitely on the warpath. “Olivia Barker is crazy. You shouldn’t believe a word she says.”

  “Where is your sister?”

  “I don’t – precisely – know,” Addison admitted.

  “But you have a pretty good idea,” Jane May purposely stepped towards him. Addison stepped backwards away from her. “Gracie is following in your footsteps, Addison, and I am not at all happy about it.”

  “My footsteps?” Addison blinked in confusion and surprise.

  “Your footsteps. When you were 18 you signed up to go into the Navy, and your Dad and I were so proud of you. Everyone in Shiner’s Bayou was proud of you. You’d been a mediocre student. We hadn’t really expected you to go to college. The Navy seemed like an ideal opportunity for you, and the recruiter got you a fabulous package. You could have really gotten yourself a nice start in life.”

  “Okay. This is ancient history, Mom.” Addison had no idea where she was going with this. Most of his memories of his very short stint in the Navy were recalled through the drunken haze he’d stayed in the entire time.

  “It’s history repeating itself,” Jane May snapped. “You seemed to do well at first. Then we started getting phone calls from your counselors and superior officers because they felt you were having a very difficult time adapting to military life. They wanted to help you. Bent over backwards to help you. You threw it all in their faces for a bottle of tequila. Next thing your Dad and I hear, you’ve wrecked a forklift while drunk and are being discharged.”

  “It was a mistake,” Addison shrugged his shoulders. “I was immature.”

  “You were discharged from the Navy as a ‘failure to adapt’.”

  “None of this has anything to do with Gracie.”

  “It has everything to do with Gracie.” She was wringing her hands now, a sure sign that she was fixing to really let loose on him. “She’s always looked up to you. You’re immature and irresponsible.”

  “Was,” Addison corrected her and wondered where she was going with this line of conversation, but he didn’t like it.

  “Are. Still. You sleep with anything that can spread its legs. You’re perfectly content living in the upper portion of your Granny’s shed. You’ve made no attempt to settle down. No attempt to take life seriously. You can’t be bothered paying your bills despite the fact that you make good money. Better money than I do, for that matter. All you care about is having fun with your friends and your next cheap thrill.”

  “That’s harsh. And has nothing to do with Gracie.” He scowled. She wasn’t telling him anything she hadn’t said before.

  “Are you listening to me at all?” Jane May countered. “Gracie could be anything in this world that she wants to be. She’s smart. She’s gorgeous. And she’s blowing it all for you.”

  “For me?” Addison repeated.

  “For you. She’s always wanted to be just like you.”

  “Look, I get that you’re pissed at me about sleeping with whoever it is I slept with that has your boss all worked up, but Gracie’s decisions aren’t my fault. Gracie is an adult, and she can make her own choices.” Addison said. “I’m not responsible for Gracie, but I’m going to stand behind her in whatever she decides to do. Have you ever considered that maybe I hated being in the Navy, and I like being who I am and the way I live? Maybe Gracie feels the same way. Maybe she doesn’t like college? Maybe she’s not happy there?”

  “Maybe I don’t like spending my days changing adult diapers and spoon feeding my parents,” Jane May snapped back at him. “Maybe I go to work every day because I’m responsible for taking care of the rest of you. Maybe I’m breaking my back working 70 hours a week to give your sister the opportunity to go to college. Maybe I don’t like having my hard work thrown back in my face by my unappreciative, irresponsible brats.”

  Jane May spun around on her heel and stormed out of the garage, leaving Addison standing stunned in her wake. Addison felt guilty but relieved as he watched her get into the mini-van she’d bought when he was in elementary school. He wished he hadn’t lost his phone. He owed it to call Gracie and warn her that Mom was on the war path. Then again, Gracie had snuck around here for God knows how long without ever bothering to tell him a damn thing. If Mom caught her in Shiner’s Bayou, maybe getting her ass chewed would serve her right. Addison caught enough flak for his own screw-ups. He was getting tired of catching the flak for his kid sister’s impulsive decisions too.

  *

  “Hey, you can’t just walk in here and do whatever you want,” Eddie glared at Cal as he rifled through the contents of Addison’s desk. He’d found the file where Alex had told him to look for it.

  Cal chose to ignore Eddie as he opened the file and flipped through the papers until a picture jumped out of him. The man’s eyes were blank and glazed over. He was even filthier than he’d been when Cal had seen him in Leon’s bar, but there was absolutely no question in Cal’s mind that he was looking at the same man.

  “Shit,” he muttered under his breath as he set the file back down, holding on the single photo.

  “I mean it, you can’t just rifle through police paperwork.”

  Cal looked up to see Eddie standing a few feet away from his. His face was flushed red and his glasses were pushed way up on his nose. Cal frowned at him. “Addison doesn’t care if I go through his desk,” he said, too distracted by his own discovery to be bothered dealing with Twitchy Eddie.

  “It’s illegal,” Eddie blustered. “You’re a civilian, and people have the right to privacy. You need to put that photo down and get out of here.”

  Cal shook his head. “Sorry, but I need to borrow this.” He held up the photo.

  “Um, no.” Eddie shook his head. “You aren’t allowed to borrow evidence from the Sheriff’s Department. No matter how much money your family donates to the department.”

  Cal’s head snapped up, irritation plain in his eyes. “I don’t have time to deal with you today,” he said plainly, folding the photo he needed and stuffing it in his pocket. He wanted Leon to confirm his identification of the d
ead man as the same man who had been in the bar with the blonde woman. He needed the picture in order to do that. He didn’t have the patience to sit around and argue with Eddie.

  “Hand over the picture.” Eddie gamely stepped in front of Cal, as if he truly meant to stop him from leaving the Sheriff’s office. Cal was pretty sure he weighed about three times as much as Eddie did. He doubted it would take much to knock the scrawny deputy on his tail but he really didn’t have any urge to.

  “No,” Cal shook his head. “Sorry. No can do.”

  “What is going on here?” Sheriff Hall stuck his head out of his office.

  “He’s trying to steal evidence,” Eddie blustered, gesturing at Cal.

  The Sheriff stared at Cal for a moment, pulling on the ends of his mustache again. “Why did I hear something over the radio earlier about Joshua trying to shoot somebody?” he asked.

  “He caught a guy trying to steal change out of the soda machine,” Cal admitted with a shrug. “You know how he is.”

  “He doesn’t need to be carrying that gun,” Sheriff Hall appeared contemplative.

  “I agree,” Cal remembered the .357 he’d left sitting on the passenger’s seat of his truck. “Which is why I took it away from him.”

  “Really? Good for you. I’ve been waiting for Jerry to take care of it and praying I wouldn’t have to. Your Pappy has been one of my best friends for a long time. I hate to embarrass a good man but that gun was a public nuisance.” Wally raised his eyebrow at Cal and then nodded his approval. “What are you stealing?” he asked, gesturing at Addison’s desk.

  “A photo of the guy who was murdered on Saturday.” Cal didn’t see any point in trying to lie to the Sheriff. He was going to be coming right back here once he found out who the killer was.

  “Why?” Wally appeared more curious then concerned. Eddie let out an irritated huff.

  “Because this idiot,” Cal gestured at Eddie, “is trying to frame my best friend for the murder.”

  “Y’all are trying to solve the case for yourselves?” Wally guessed, sounding unsurprised.

  “Right,” Cal nodded. “I think I may have a lead. I need the picture just to be sure. I could have Addison or Alex come and get the picture for me but that seemed like an unreasonable waste of time when a killer is on the loose.”