The Complete Honey Huckleberry Box Set

by Margaret Moseley

  “When you let me wipe you out in Heroes, then I will think you’ve changed.”

  “Don’t sulk,” I told him as we locked the van against the still shimmering heat. “You know I can’t stand it if you attack me. That’s why I only like those games where we can play partners.”

  He protested. “But that way, some of the games never end.”

  “I know. We kill all the bad guys like green and gold and purple, but we stay friends forever. That’s the way I like to play.”

  “So I’m finding out,” he muttered.

  “Playing games is hard work,” I declared between bites of my order.

  Again, to my surprise, Ms. Potter was packing away her share of gravy and biscuits. “Well, I don’t often indulge in either games or such rich food. I mostly eat fruit and salads.”

  “That accounts for your outstanding figure, Ms. Potter,” said Steven graciously.

  “And exercise. I walk four miles every day,” she added.

  “If Honey keeps on playing games and eating like a horse, she would do well to follow your example, ma’am.”

  I kicked him.

  “Hey, this is a holiday. Anything goes,” I defended. “We all go back to work on Saturday, you know. ’Cept you, Silas. And, Ms. Potter, I can’t thank you enough for joining us. We’ll have Papyrus whipped in no time.”

  “I’m still not sure what my role in all this work is going to be,” said Steven.

  “Comic relief?” I suggested and received a kick in return.

  “Hey, we should ask Bondesky to join us, too. Bet he could help Juliana with her books.” My suggestion sounded good to me.

  “He’s busy Saturday,” announced Ms. Potter. Her attack on the chocolate pie told me that she was not pleased with Bondesky’s weekend plans.

  “Doing what?” I pursued.

  “I believe he has an engagement with one of your friends,” she replied, taking a very unladylike bite of pie.

  “Clover?” I guessed.

  “I couldn’t say,” she said as she turned the fork into a weapon against the pie.

  “Clover Medlock?” Silas picked up on the conversation. “I talked to her again yesterday.”

  “What did she say?” Janie asked. “Did she know anything about the missing blood samples?”

  “I couldn’t say,” he responded.

  I still refused to believe Clover could have had something to do with Twyman’s death. “You know,” I mused out loud, “there were three other wives who were not too friendly with Twyman.”

  “Well, I’ve only met Gabriella, and she gets my vote,” said Steven. “Wow, what a witch.”

  “But she wasn’t here, and Clover was,” said Janie.

  “Wonder what Babe and Marcie are like,” I said.

  Steven and Janie exchanged a knowing glance.

  “What?” I asked.

  “Nothing,” said Steven. Then knowing I wouldn’t let it go, he added, “Okay, let’s put it this way. I’m going to your grand computer party in Jacksboro on Saturday; then you have to do something for me in return.”

  “What?” Suspicious this time.

  Steven smiled that I-hate-it-when-you-smile-at-me-that-way smile and Janie giggled.

  Uh-oh, I thought.

  TWENTY–FIVE

  Saturday was just as hot as the preceding days had been, and we used up the cool air flowing from the weak unit at Papyrus by ten in the morning. But we were having too much fun to notice.

  Divine providence had surely sent Ms. Potter to us. That woman could enter ISBN numbers into the new computer quicker than we could spout them off. The system we finally worked out was that we would gather ten books each and stand in line for her to enter them as we called out the title, author, and ISBN. Then we would reshelf the books, marking them with a Post-it or gummy dot to show that the book was successfully entered in the system.

  Janie helped keep track of which area was next in the surprisingly well-stocked bookstore. Juliana and three of her yuppie-in-training friends kept the line moving as they good-naturedly followed Janie’s orders. Steven’s job was to keep Kantor happy and Bailey entertained. I did everything else, but my main job seemed to keep everyone well-watered with cold bottles of Evian.

  Kantor had shown up with reluctant eagerness and had been welcomed with a hug from Juliana, who had known of him from her aunt, and squeals from Janie. Kantor had been her regular book rep at Pages before I took the route. After throwing up his hands at the computer system, the old man had kept us in stitches, telling stories about some of the authors we would call out to Ms. Potter.

  Kantor knew Bailey, too, from his time on South Padre, back during the days when he helped Harry get started with Sandscript.

  “He seems to remember me,” Kantor said as Bailey danced around him with happy yips.

  “Seems so,” I agreed. I had decided to bring Bailey with us, putting his crate in the van to house him if the day proved too much. I just didn’t feel I could impose on Clover again.

  “Where did you say Harry was?” asked Kantor.

  “In an enemy prison,” answered Steven.

  “Undercover,” said the irrepressible sleuth Janie.

  “With his sick mother,” I insisted.

  Kantor looked confused but just smiled and nodded at all three of our versions on the whereabouts of the missing Harry.

  “How are we doing?” I asked Ms. Potter. “Is the system going to work?”

  “Good enough for government work,” she answered. I was really beginning to like Ms. Potter.

  We had had breakfast at the Green Frog, so Kantor and Steven made a run to Herd’s for hamburgers when we took a break for lunch. It was the first time I had really gotten to speak to Juliana’s friends, Molly, Robin, and Marsha, whom everyone called Sasha.

  Like Juliana, they were all my age, but oh, lord, what worlds apart our lives were.

  As they sipped fresh bottles of Evian, they talked about foreign things like children and car pools and fitness classes. I tried to imagine me in their place and nearly freaked. The closest I had been to a child was my limited experience with Bailey, and I didn’t think that would count with these sophisticated, professional mothers. When we had been inventorying the childcare section of the bookstore, they had all been familiar with the books. I knew more than I wanted to about child rearing when we finished the section.

  Still I was curious about their lives. So, I listened and learned. It was like being in Marriage class 101.

  When Steven and Kantor returned with lunch, I whispered in his ear, “Is this the kind of life you foresaw for me when you said I should get married and settle down?”

  He smiled his Hollywood/New York show biz grin and passed the burgers to the ladies. He didn’t answer me, but the Bailey-like stupid adoration gaze he gave the barely perspiring tanned lovelies told me volumes.

  I mopped my red, wet curls out of my face, ignored him, and turned to listen to Janie and Kantor.

  Ms. Potter was also interested in their conversation, which I soon discovered revolved around Clover Medlock.

  “Then you agree?” I heard her saying. “Clover Medlock did write For All the Wrong Reasons?”

  “Remember, I knew Twyman Towerie well,” replied Kantor. “I remember his journalist endeavors. The man didn’t have an ounce of talent in him. So, yes, I always thought she was the author.”

  The conversation even interested Steven the Lothario.

  “Then what about Down by the Riverside? If Twyman didn’t write well, how do you account for that book?” he asked.

  Janie remembered. “Steven, you did say Gabriella Rusi was frightened about something when you mentioned Riverside?”

  “Hmmm, not frightened, exactly. Startled maybe. Definitely uncomfortable with my asking about it,” he said. “But believe me, I know Gabriella Rusi. She is a fantastic publicist, but I don’t think she has an ounce of imagination in her. She couldn’t have written that book.”

  “Well,” contended K
antor. “I’m willing to bet that neither did Twyman Towerie.”

  Janie wondered, “If he didn’t write Reasons or Riverside, what about Casa Rojo?”

  “Ooooh,” squealed Robin. “I loved that book. It’s my favorite Twyman Towerie book. So different than the others.”

  “But just as brilliant,” said Steven, rewarding Robin with a spare package of potato chips for her dazzling insight into literature.

  “Better students of writing than we are have asked just these questions,” said Kantor. “How did the man write three so different and yet intelligent and sensitive books? They called him a genius. I call him a fraud.”

  “Okay, he wrote Reasons while he was married to Clover, Riverside while he was married to Gabriella, and Rojo while he was married to Marcie, right?” I was trying to sort it all out.

  “No,” said Janie and Kantor.

  “Twyman didn’t write anything while he was married to Marcie. He was sick, remember, and she saved him.”

  “He was married to that movie star—what’s her name?—when he wrote Rojo,” added Kantor.

  “Babe,” said Steven.

  Leave it to him to know.

  TWENTY–SIX

  The first time one flies it should be a well-planned event. Insurance paid up and last will and testament made. That was exactly how I had planned my first flight earlier in the spring—a business trip to Boston—that was canceled when Steven Miller died in my living room. Maybe I would have actually boarded the plane. I will never know.

  One’s first flight should not be conceived in conspiracies and lies, although it would make a good movie title. One should not be coerced to drive one’s best friend to the airport, forced to park in long-term parking, and led aboard a fun flight to Las Vegas.

  Steven Hyatt thought it was so funny that he giggled. I do not like men who giggle.

  In fact, as he strapped me in my seat, having arm-wrestled me down the aisle of the plane, I found I did not like Steven Hyatt at all.

  “And Janie is in on this?” I asked.

  “Yes. Yes. She packed your bag. That’s why I borrowed your suitcase,” he said as he did the thing I hated again.

  God, I hated hating Janie, too.

  “Bailey,” I said weakly, looking for a last line of defense.

  “It’s perfect, if you stop to think about it. Janie is there to watch him.”

  “He’ll miss me.”

  “Excuse me? Who do you think took care of Bailey while we played our marathon games? He adores her.”

  Defending my motherly instincts—which we both knew was a crock—got me off the ground at D/FW. A quick emergency Bloody Mary from a smiling waitress—oops, stewardess—got the plane into the air. “I have taken care of that dog beautifully. All his meals are on time and he only eats pizza on the weekends. I have not yelled at him for chewing sofa pillows and walk him every evening when the sun goes down. He sleeps in my bed and never goes thirsty. What is that noise?”

  “It’s only the wheels retracting into the plane. Now you will hear a slam as the wheel doors shut. Trust me, Honey, I know all the sounds a plane makes, and this one is doing nicely.”

  “This is assurance from a man who doesn’t know how to shave?” Steven’s lower jaw was patched with toilet paper from two cuts from his morning’s ablutions.

  “I used your razor. We’ll pick up a new one in Vegas. They have razors in Vegas. And toothpaste, toothbrushes, and deodorant. This is not a foreign country.”

  “Tell me again why we are going to Las Vegas.” The Bloody Mary was kicking in. I was almost up to looking out the window.

  “To meet Babe,” Steven said again.

  “You’re sure she’s there?”

  “Yes, appearing at the MGM Grand. She’s a headliner in one of the rooms. Just for another week,” he added.

  “Well, if I didn’t hate you, I would say it was a good plan. But, since I do …”

  “Relax, have another drink. This is not a long flight. You should have seen what I went through to get to Australia.”

  Flying is not so bad. I could get used to it. In fact, I think a hot-air balloon is more my speed. As we skimmed over the countryside, I was amazed at how much there was. How symmetrical the farmland was laid out and how the endless brown desert stretched in all directions, its surface cracked in the summer’s heat. I imagined gliding over the mountains with their melting white caps in a gaily colored balloon. I could do this.

  “You’re almost forgiven,” I told Steven as the plane began its descent into Las Vegas. “But I’m not sure about Janie.”

  “She’s fine.”

  “I don’t think she should be left alone at this time,” I said, emphasizing at this time.

  “Janie needs some time alone,” he replied.

  “She hasn’t spoken about the separation at all,” I countered.

  “Well, not to you.”

  “To you?”

  “Women have been known to confide in me, yes.”

  “Bull honk. But that’s beside the point. What did she say?”

  Next to a man giggling, I hate a man being smug.

  “She’s afraid she will disappoint you.”

  “Me?”

  “Yes, and don’t worry. Those are the wheels opening. This has been a smooth flight. You can let go of my arm now.”

  I turned from the sight of Las Vegas ascending—it seemed that way to me—and stared at Steven. “Why me? Why should I be disappointed in her?”

  “Swallow hard and clear your head this way,” he said as he held his nose and blew into his fingers. Yuck.

  “My ears aren’t stopped up.”

  “Yes, they are. You’re shouting.”

  I did the nose and finger thing, but I used a Kleenex. He was right. The plane sounds came in too loud and too clear.

  Steven went on talking, I’m sure to keep me occupied as we dropped lower and lower, the plane looking for a place to plop itself. “It’s hard for a woman to walk away from a long relationship. Janie knew for years that her marriage wasn’t working out. She doesn’t hate her husband. Just wants out of a dead-end relationship. And she’s afraid that you will turn sour on marriage, knowing hers didn’t work out. It took lots of guts for her to walk away,” he said admiringly.

  “I’m sour on marriage, all right, but it has nothing to do with Janie.”

  “I don’t understand,” he said as the plane found its resting place. “Why? Your parents had such a good one.”

  I have never seen ground go by so fast. I turned away from the window and tried to answer Steven. “Maybe that’s it. Theirs was perfect. That’s a hard act to follow. Mother and Father were totally devoted to each other. I don’t know if I can give that much of myself up.”

  “They loved each other. That’s got to count. And they had you.”

  “Yeah, that scares me, too,” I confessed. “Kids. What do I know about kids? I can’t even take care of a dog. I can take care of myself. That’s about it.”

  Steven rented a red convertible, and we drove in from the airport with the top down. Twilight was just beginning to fade, and the unbelievable lights of Las Vegas slapped us in the face as we drove down the strip. There was excitement in the flashing neon that surpassed anything I had ever experienced. The people, the lights, and the commotion were overwhelming.

  I was speechless.

  Steven was wrong.

  Las Vegas is a foreign country.

  TWENTY–SEVEN

  Sometimes it pays to know the magic words.

  In Vegas the words were, “Babe, could I bother you for a minute of your time? My name is Honey Huckleberry from Fort Worth, Texas. And, yes, I am a fan of your work, but what I want to see you about is that I was with your ex-husband when he died. Thought you might like to hear about his death.”

  Only one lie. I was not a fan of Babe’s work. Was not even sure what it was she did except make the cover of People magazine once a quarter. And most of those mentions featured low cleavage evening
gowns shot of Babe arriving or departing at those perpetual Hollywood events that People covered so religiously for those of us who considered a trip to the local Tom Thumb grocery an outing.

  Steven was not surprised when the waiter brought our reply so quickly. It was scribbled on the bottom of my note to her. “After the show. In my dressing room. Babe.”

  We—or rather Steven—had made purchasing tickets for Babe’s performance one of the first priorities of our visit.

  My first priority was to see how much money I could lose before I hit the elevator to my room.

  “I should have known better than to bring a game addict to Las Vegas,” muttered Steven as he left the concierge’s desk at the Flamingo. He took me by the elbow and trotted me toward the elevators.

  “Did you see the cute slot machine with all the fireworks?” I asked. “Or the one with the cherries?”

  “They all have cherries.”

  “Maybe, but this one had double cherries.”

  “May I suggest the nickel slots?”

  “What? When they have five-dollar ones? Just think how fast your money would multiply.”

  “Divide,” he corrected.

  Our rooms were on the sixth floor and overlooked the penguin pond. To the left of the black and white creatures slip-sliding in their pool like a crash scene of police cars in a movie were the actual flamingos.

  “Oh, my, Steven. Just look at this. They’re alive.”

  “You really do need to get out more, Honey,” he said as he peered out the wall-sized glass window. “If you’re into animals, we could go over to the Mirage and look at their registration desk. Now that’s a sight.”

  “They have animals at the registration desk?”

  “I’m not going to touch that one.” He laughed. “I meant the mile-long fish tank behind the desk. I’ve spent hours there. There is this one fish that chases the others. He’s about two feet round and is the bully of the tank.”

  “What kind?”

  “I don’t know. A fish is a fish to me.”

  He went on to his room, and I took the time to see what Janie had packed for me. I had gone to the airport in shorts and a T-shirt, which, from what I had seen from the airport and hotel lobby, was okay for Vegas.