Hot Enough to Kill

by Paula Boyd

  Mother had very kindly asked if I wanted to stop, and I'd very kindly said my usual "no." She'd just shaken her head and lectured me on denial and growing up and being mature. All in all, it was about the same speech she had used on me when I was an obnoxious fifteen-year-old. It was no more effective on the obnoxious forty-three-year-old, but I nodded and made sincere statements about doing better next time. We both knew I was lying. Some things never changed.

  One thing that did change, however, was the identity of the deputy sentenced to watch us on the way home. They all seemed to like the job just about as much as we liked having them there, which was not at all.

  Mother and I were pretty worn out from the funeral so neither of us had felt like harassing the night crew. I did get a little snippy when they told me I could not go to see Jerry nor could I call to check on him because nobody was going to tell me a single solitary thing. I went to bed early and fell asleep trying to make sense of the bits of weirdness I'd experienced.

  When morning rolled around I was no clearer on much of anything, but I was wishing for another distraction--as long as it wasn't a funeral. As it turned out, there were several other things I could have omitted from my wish list, the first being the delivery of the daily newspaper.

  "That idiotic little twit," Lucille spat, shoving the newspaper across the kitchen table. "Never in my life have I heard of such a thing. It's not like BigJohn was the King of England or anything. Why on earth would they put his funeral on the front page of the paper? And why would anybody in their right mind spend their time watching every move we made and then writing it down for the whole world to see?"

  I peered over Mother's shoulder at the article, and my blood pressure thumped higher with every word. "Whispering and pointing throughout the service!" I read on, blah, blah, blah…There was some speculation as to who and what they were discussing during the service as neither appeared interested in the memorial for the deceased."I can't believe she wrote that…about us…in this so-called news story!"

  "This is just not right," Mother said, snarling and glaring at me as if I had either a clue or control over any of it. "How is she getting away with this, Jolene?"

  My stock response to this sort of thing is usually "Welcome to the Bubble City," meaning Redwater Falls. I've had various theories about the mentality of the place, which ranged from "it's something they put in the water," to suspecting the city fathers (there are no city mothers) of a Stepford wives kind of thing, to a plain old "we do what we want around here" attitude. To my credit, I again kept my traitorous thoughts to myself.

  The truth was, Redwater was a generally friendly and down-to-earth kind of place, but the world here worked in a predetermined manner, and nothing was going to change that--most especially not me. Nevertheless, I was obligated to try to rein in the loose cannon I'd lit a fire under. Kimberlee Fletcher needed her unprofessional little fuse dipped in a bucket of cold water--and fast.

  Obviously, there was no point in complaining to a higher-up, either in the cosmos or at the newspaper, since somebody had to approve the printing of the trash. Maybe a Dallas paper would be interested in the situation. Yeah, and maybe they already knew--and were laughing their big city heads off. Redwater has a rather dubious reputation in the state, so I'm not the only one who picks on them. Fresh out of ideas on how to fix anything, I moved on to more pleasing options. "Well, Mother, I'm just about starved for one of those tasty chicken baskets. How about we go make a run up the street?"

  Lucille glanced around to where our personal deputy sat in the living room, reading a NRA magazine with a look that could only be described as lust. "What about him?"

  "What's he going to do, pull a gun on us? If he's a good boy I'll buy him an early lunch too. Otherwise, I'll leave him here. Either way, I'm getting out of this house."

  As it turned out, the deputy didn't take too much coaxing, and we loaded up in the patrol car and took the three-minute, non-scenic drive to the one and only eating establishment.

  There was a merry little throng at the DQ, at least until we three waltzed in and the world stopped turning. A quick study in the Lucille Jackson school of nonchalance, I pretended not to notice the wide-eyed stares or the reverberating silence and sauntered up to the counter to place our order.

  The deputy, who was now looking like he regretted his decision to spring us, was scanning the room for either a killer or a place to hide. I suspected the latter. Lucky for him there was a booth open in the corner. He ushered Mother over to have a seat. She went, but very slowly, stopping at each and every table to speak and nod to those in her favor. The queen and her court. That makes me, what, the jester? Well, yes, and I take my position seriously.

  When Mother finally settled herself at the royal table, I paid the tab, collected the drinks and paper tag number and wandered back to the assigned seat. Maybe I'd been cooped up too long, or maybe it is just inherent in my personality, but I was possessed to say something to these people, particularly since the only sound in the place was the deep fryer crackling behind the counter.

  "Ya'll having a nice day?" I said, smiling stupidly as I sat the tray on the table. "We are too. Just hope we don't get shot at again. I'm getting a little annoyed with this guns and bullets stuff."

  "I am too," said a thick gravelly voice. Leroy Harper stood up.

  How had I missed seeing him?

  Leroy had a big thick bandage taped across his forehead and a patch over one eye. The uncovered eye was red and puffy. He wasn't acting all that mad though, relatively speaking. Maybe he was going to express his gratitude for me heroically plucking the brick from his face.

  "How's the head?" I asked, mostly sincerely.

  He frowned and reached up to his brow. "Took them about two hours to dig out all the chips of brick. I've got eight stitches under here, Jolene," he said, pointing to the bandage and implying that this was somehow my fault. "Eight."

  "You're welcome." I waited for him to get a clue, but he didn't, so I said, "No, really, Leroy, glad you're up and around and doing better."

  "I'm still officially in charge," he said, puffing his chest. "I'm supposed to take it easy until next week, but it's still my job and I'll get to the bottom of this." He sounded serious. A bullet nearly killing your own personal self can do that. "Nobody's gonna get away with what they done to me."

  I walked back to my table and sat down with my really good iced tea.

  Leroy followed, stopping beside the uniformed babysitter across the booth from us. "Deputy," he said, "you were under orders not to let these two leave the old lady's house until the shooter's under arrest."

  "Old lady, my hind foot, why, you...you…" Lucille started to sputter, grabbing for her purse.

  I nudged Mother gently lest she sputter out something to really annoy Leroy, or worse, whack him with her purse. "We're not staying in that house every single minute, Leroy, particularly when I don't see anybody with even a guess at who the killer is. We're not under arrest, you know.

  "No, we surely are not," Lucille said, scowling, her hand on her purse.

  Leroy narrowed one eye, the patch keeping me from seeing if he narrowed the other one at the same time.

  "Quite frankly," I said, lifting my big Styrofoam cup and taking a long swig of iced tea, crunching on some of the soft little slivers of ice. "The sheriff's department seems to need more protective custody than we do."

  "I'm in charge here and what I say goes," Leroy grumbled then spun on his heel and stomped away.

  Mother shook her head at the deputy across from us. "How on earth can you work for that fool?"

  The deputy got a pained look on his face and shrugged. He was wise enough to see that any answer he gave would get him into trouble one way or another. "I'll go check on our order," he said, zipping from the booth and scuttling toward the safety of the front counter.

  He was in no hurry to come back and join us, so Mother and I sat sipping our drinks, waiting for the chicken to fry.

  And wai
ting.

  A good twenty minutes later, we were still waiting. Finally, I just had to say it, "Wonder why it's taking so long?"

  "They're probably too busy speculating and gossiping about us to remember they have work to do." Lucille turned and eyeballed the counter. "There's not a soul up there anywhere that I can see. You'd think they'd closed up and gone home."

  "Maybe they have," I said, contemplating how long it would take me to figure out how to fix the food myself. "I think I'll mosey on up there and see when they think they'll be back to mixing gravy, grilling toast and running the deep fryers."

  "Wait a minute." Lucille snapped her head around, scanning the room. "Where's our deputy? Where'd he run off to?"

  I glance around the room didn't answer the question. A look outside did. "He's in his car on the phone or the radio."

  "Well, if he's supposed to be guarding us, he ought to be in here doing it, and if he's not, we need to get ourselves out of here and get on with our lives."

  I scooted to the edge of the booth. "First things first, I want food." As I started to stand, another sheriff's car flew into the parking lot. It skidded to a stop beside the first, covering both in a cloud of dust. Leroy hopped out and scurried over to the deputy. "Something's up," I said to Mother. "Leroy's back."

  We watched as Leroy talked and pointed, and the deputy took notes, shook his head, nodded and made more notes.

  "He's looking right in here at us and pointing," Mother said. "I don't like it."

  I didn't like it either. But I liked the idea of going outside with a bulls eye on my forehead to get the scoop a whole lot less. "Let's just stay put and see what happens."

  "You think there's been another shooting?" Mother asked, echoing my own thoughts.

  Before I could give a vague non-answer, Leroy marched back inside the DQ, his big arms waving and his face flushed. "Relax, people. Looks like this thing is all but over. We got us a suspect in custody."

  "That was fast," I muttered, glancing at Lucille.

  The DQ turned into a buzzing beehive of chatter. Sighs of relief mixed with various versions of "I wonder who it is" and "It must be so and so."

  I wondered too, of course, but I also wondered why the big-shot acting sheriff wasn't still on the scene, making a nuisance of himself. Since he was headed our way, I'd be asking. "So, how did all this go down? Psychic revelation, random house-to-house search, what? And why aren't you still on the scene running the show?"

  Leroy frowned then puffed out his chest. "Don't you be worrying about how I knew what or where I went. I told you I give the orders around here."

  Yes, that much was nauseatingly clear. "So, I'm guessing you found the murder weapon."

  "Yes, ma'am, Miss Hotshot Know-it-all, we sure did. We found a shotgun in the closet, and that was just the beginning." Leroy puffed up even more. "They'll be working this for days. Yep, this thing is big, really big."

  "Minor detail here, Leroy, but there's probably a shotgun in the closet of every male in this county, maybe even the state. Don't you think you're jumping the gun a little, no pun intended."

  He looked down his nose at me. "We're not worried about quail and dove hunters, Jolene," he said, as if talking to an imbecile. "We had good reason to search the house, and it just broke wide open from there. I'd known all along what was going on out there, and this just proves it. It's big, just like I said."

  "Really big. Got it." Murder was a big deal--I got that--but his comments really didn't make sense in that context. If I had even a guess at what he was implying, I'd cleverly get more details, but I didn't, so I moved on to the obvious conclusion. "I guess if you've solved the case the we don't need a keeper," I said, nodding to the deputy walking toward us. "We're free to go."

  Leroy frowned, indicating he hadn't thought that far in advance. "Well, now, I don't know about that."

  "Well, I do," Lucille said, fairly leaping out of her seat. "Get our order to go, Jolene, and let's get out of here. We'll finish it at home while we're getting ready. I haven't been to the mall in nearly a week and I'm going."

  Leroy started to object on general principals then thought better of it and begrudgingly released us.

  All the fuss in the dining room had apparently lit a fire under the kitchen staff, because not only had they magically reappeared, they'd somehow cooked our food and thoughtfully packed it to go. Escort deputy nabbed it on our way out the door and we all piled into the patrol car and headed home.

  He didn't turn the lights on, but he probably should have since he was going a good 20 mph over the speed limit. Since it cut our three-minute drive down to less than two, I couldn't complain. He zipped up to the back door, hustled us inside then fled, taking his chicken basket with him. He was as glad to be done with the fiasco as we were.

  Over a not-so-leisurely lunch at the kitchen table, Mother and I made plans for our separate outings--hers to the mall, mine to the hospital. I'd argued with her about driving and going alone, but she'd huffed and told me she was perfectly capable of taking care of herself. She also made it perfectly clear that she didn't want me going with her because she wanted time alone. Ditto for me, but I wasn't so sure all was safe and sound in Happy Valley. Even if they did have a suspect behind bars, something told me it wasn't the right one--or maybe the only one--and she was still at risk. Still, it was a waste of breath saying so. I like to think I'm in charge every now and then, but clearly I am not.

  Mother scurried to her Buick and I hopped in the Tahoe. With the air conditioner on max, my mood perked up for every degree the temperature went down. It was good to be behind the wheel. At least I felt like I had a little control over my life again. I could go wherever I wanted to, and right now, I knew exactly where I wanted to go--to Jerry. If we were free, he would be, too.

  * * * *

  When I arrived at Redwater General, I was shocked to find that Jerry had been moved to a private room. I was even more shocked to see him propped up in the bed, watching "Hogan's Heroes" on the TV. I hoped his move from ICU was because he was making a miraculous recovery and not because somebody screwed up. Medical care is somewhat iffy in these parts, although I had to give them credit for saving Jerry's life. They'd sure come through with flying colors on that one.

  His eyes were closed so I watched the inmates bring a beauty queen up out of the floor then hide her and put the floor back before Sergeant Schultz came marching in. We'd watched the show together after school on many occasions. That and the original "Star Trek." I guess Jerry was always my Colonel Hogan and Captain Kirk: strong, virile, sexy and a different woman chasing him every week. Whoa. Rewind that. I should have stopped while I was ahead. Trying to vanquish an all-too-clear image of my hero with a certain gorgeous blonde, I noticed he'd opened his eyes and was staring at me.

  I walked over to his bed. "Hey, you look great," I said, forgetting everything except that he really did look good. Healthy, strong, handsome and, most importantly, alive. I'd spent so much time away from Jerry that I never realized how much I missed being with him until we were together. And this had so much more attached to it. He had very nearly died--in my mother's breakfast nook. The concept was still hard to come to terms with.

  We had never really been physically together over a few minutes at a time in the last twenty-five years, but he was still always "there" if I needed him--or if he needed me. For the most part it had always been a mutual give-and-take friendship, and I never wanted to lose that--or him. "I was pretty worried about you," I said, trying to smile away the mist that had gathered in my eyes. "They wouldn't let me in to see you there for a while."

  "I know," he said, his soft Texas drawl rumbling across the room like a tornado, sucking me in as it always did. "Sorry."

  I took the hand he held out to me and leaned over and kissed his cheek. "I'm glad you're okay."

  His smile faded just a little. "I'm glad you're okay, too, Jolene. Leroy told me what happened. Crowed about it, actually. He was quite impressed with your first-ai
d skills."

  Huh? Leroy, bragging about me? I couldn't imagine that--and really didn't want to--so I moved on to his latest pronouncements. "He said they made an arrest, which is why I'm free and here."

  He shook his head in disgust. "I know. I think it was a mistake, but the commissioners are pushing for some kind of action, so they rounded up Dewayne Schuman."

  "I didn't know who," I said, flashing back to the funeral scene. Dwayne had been laughing and carrying on with the new mayor, at least until he got called on the carpet by his wife or girlfriend or whatever she was. "I guess it makes sense, but making merry with the new mayor at the funeral of the one you just killed takes poor taste to a new level. You'd think he'd at least have waited until later to celebrate."

  "Dewayne Schuman's no saint," Jerry said. "His list of illegal dealings gets longer daily, not to mention that Bennett may have been blackmailing him. But, aside from him acting like an idiot at the funeral, there's nothing substantial to base a murder arrest on. Besides, everyone knows Dewayne has more guns than brains. That shotgun in his closet probably hasn't been fired since last dove season. They're going to have to let him go and we'll still have a killer on the loose."

  I'd figured the same thing. Jerry just had good reasons for it. "Whose idea was it to home in on Dewayne?"

  "An anonymous tip was called in with a laundry list of accusations. When the deputies went to check them out, they found guns at the house and made the arrest."

  "Must have been a doozy of a tip, because seriously, what house around here doesn't have guns in it? Sure makes you wonder who called in the tip--and why."

  Jerry sighed and shifted around in the bed, looking as peeved about his physical limitations as the official business ones. "I've got to get out of here, Jolene. This is making me crazy. I'm feeling fine, but they won't let me go home. It's just ridiculous. I'm a grown man and I know what I can handle and what I can't."

  I smiled at him, amused to see the always-calm Jerry getting a little cranky. And while I empathized with his plight, I was also relieved that he was here where he wouldn't be hurt again. I could surely see how a wife would worry about a husband who did what Jerry did for a living. I've never been very good at compartmentalizing my life, and I'm afraid I'd worry worse than Amy ever did, probably to the point of being psychotic. "I met Amy." The words slipped out before I realized I'd said them.