Sunflower Street (Rose Hill Mysteries Book 8)

by Pamela Grandstaff

  Maggie helped Ingrid clean the kitchen, and then they sat at the island and drank lemonade.

  “I’m exhausted,” Maggie said. “But you seem fine.”

  “I thrive on the chaos I create,” Ingrid said. “I’m never happier than when I have more to do than I can get done and not enough time to do it. Makes me feel alive.”

  “I don’t see how you can do this every day with no days off,” Maggie said.

  “You just haven’t worked at the bakery in a while,” Ingrid said. “I hope this doesn’t seem rude, but what will happen to it when your mother can’t work anymore?”

  Maggie shrugged.

  “We don’t talk about it,” she said. “First of all, my mother doesn’t think she’ll ever be too old, and everyone else is too afraid of her to suggest she might already be.”

  “I’ll buy it,” Ingrid said. “If it ever comes up, I would find the money somehow and buy it. I wouldn’t change the name, either, as long as the recipes come with it.”

  “I’ll keep you in mind.”

  “What did you come to see me about?”

  Maggie told her about Gigi’s murder, and their suspicions about Amber.

  “I’m not going to lie, I can imagine her doing it,” Ingrid said. “I hate to think what she’s been stealing from all my other clients.”

  “Is there anywhere here she might have hidden the evidence?” Maggie asked. “The perfume and whatever else she stole from Gigi’s house.”

  “I’ll look around,” Ingrid said. “I’ll call you if I find anything.”

  When Maggie left Ingrid’s place, she saw that she had received several texts of the S.O.S. variety from Hannah. She threw the Jeep into gear and flew down the frontage road to the strip club, where smoke was billowing out of what was left of the building, and a group of barely dressed women and a few fully dressed men were watching from a safe distance. There were also the remains of a burned out car parked at the back of the lot.

  Maggie’s heart didn’t stop pounding until she found Hannah, sitting in the bed of her pickup truck, accepting a cigarette and a light from a curvaceous blonde dressed and made up to resemble a famous, busty actress.

  “I thought you quit,” Maggie said.

  “You never really quit,” Hannah said. “You just take long pauses that sometimes seem to go on forever. Man, this is good. I can actually feel the nicotine flowing through my body. It’s like a warm bath for my nerves.”

  “Did you do this?” Maggie asked her, gesturing to the fire.

  A fire truck came wailing down the frontage road to join two others already fighting the fire. There were state, county, and local police milling around.

  “I was here when it started,” Hannah said, grinning.

  Maggie hopped up to sit next to her.

  “What happened?”

  “Well, it was like this,” Hannah said.

  When Hannah arrived at the Tiger Tail Strip Club, there was no one parked outside, so she backed her truck up under the only shade tree available and made herself comfortable. Sammy had been up the night before with a tummy ache, and she needed to catch up on her sleep.

  She woke up to two men arguing in the parking lot behind the strip club. One was Chip, and the other was an older, overweight man wearing, despite the heat, black pants, a black shirt, and a black tie. He had slicked back thinning hair dyed jet black, an intricately shaved goatee, and wore lots of gold jewelry. The gist of the argument seemed to be that someone wanted to buy the club, and Chip did not want to sell it.

  “I’m suggesting to you, in a friendly way,” the man said, “that it would be in your best interest to sell the club to us, or pay for my employer’s protection, rather than lose your investment in a sudden and most unfortunate way.”

  “I’m not afraid of your threats,” Chip said. “There are laws against extortion and I will call the F.B.I.”

  “The fact of the matter appears to be that you do not know with whom you are dealing,” the man said. “If you had been apprised of this information beforehand, in regard to the things of which we are capable, you would not hesitate to do as I am now kindly suggesting.”

  “Some small-town mob boss is not going to crowd me out,” Chip said. “This is my club, I paid for it, and I’m going to run it clean, despite whatever you threaten to do.”

  “I am warning you, one last time, as a courtesy, in regards to this matter, that it would be advisable to cooperate with my employer. If you do not, I am afraid you will be left with the sort of a mess that will not be easy to redd up.”

  The man gestured to a big black Lincoln Continental that was idling at a distance.

  “He is not a patient man. What’s it gonna be?”

  “Tell him no dice,” Chip said. “I’m not going to bend over for a bully.”

  “It is with great sorrow that I inform you that, because of your unwillingness to cooperate with my employer, I am now forced to blow up your club. You have five minutes to get everybody out.”

  “You’re bluffing.”

  The man took what looked like a remote control out of his pocket.

  “How’s come younz never believe me?” he asked.

  “That’s fake,” Chip said.

  The man pushed a button and Chip’s newly repaired BMW, parked back at the edge of parking lot closest to the highway, blew up in a ball of fire. Hannah ducked down in her seat and speed-dialed 911.

  “My car!” Chip yelled.

  “I would suggest that you make the most of the four minutes you got left to evacuate the building,” the man said.

  Chip ran to the back door, and soon after, employees spilled out into the parking lot from every exit. They congregated well away from the man with the remote control and the idling black car. When a group wandered close to Hannah’s truck, she got out and mingled with them, looking for Amber. She didn’t see her.

  Chip ran out the front entrance and raced toward the group. Behind him there was a rumbling sound, and then flames shot out of the roof.

  “My best good wig is in there,” one woman said.

  “I knew this was too good to be true,” another said. “It was nice while it lasted.”

  Chip fell to his knees in the parking lot, and several people ran forward to help him up. He was crying, in an ugly, pathetic way.

  “They destroyed it,” he said. “All my dreams, everything I worked for.”

  “Did you clean out the safe, man?” one man asked him.

  “There wasn’t time,” Chip said.

  “Anybody else would have let us burn and saved the money,” the man said. “You did the right thing.”

  “Maybe it’s fireproof,” Chip said.

  “Yeah, well,” the man said, “I’m not going to wait around to find out.”

  “Oh my God,” Maggie said. “What did the guy with the remote control do then?”

  “He got in the big black car, and they drove away, but not even fast. And here is the best part: as they passed Chip, the back window rolled down, and who do you think was in the back seat with Mr. Big?”

  “Amber?”

  “The one and only,” Hannah said. “She waved at Chip and smiled. It was so evil it gave me chill bumps.”

  “What did Chip do?”

  “He just stared,” Hannah said. “I think he was still in shock.”

  “Where is he now?”

  “He went with the state police,” Hannah said.

  They watched as the firefighters continued to douse the club with water. The roof had collapsed, and all that was left were the blackened walls and broken windows.

  “That’s a total loss,” Hannah said. “Let’s hope he has good insurance.”

  “How brazen just to do that in broad daylight with witnesses all around,” Maggie said. “Won’t the police be looking for the car?”

  “The license plate had black tape over it,” Hannah said. “They’re probably halfway back to Pittsburgh by now.”

  “There’s mafia everywhere,” Ma
ggie said. “We’ve got them in our state, too.”

  “Yeah, I know,” Hannah said. “But this guy had ‘the burg’ way of talking.”

  “Have the police questioned you?”

  “I told them I didn’t see anything,” Hannah said. “Whatta you think I am, nuts? I gotta kid. Fuggetaboudit.”

  When Maggie got home, there was a message on her landline voicemail from Ingrid.

  “I found some things I think you might be interested in,” Ingrid said. “I’ll bring them with me tomorrow to Claire’s party.”

  “How was your interview with Marigold?” Maggie asked Scott, who was eating cereal at the kitchen table.

  “Brutal,” he said. “She screamed at me and threatened to have me fired.”

  “Did you find anything out?”

  “She bought the chicken at the IGA, and nobody touched it but her until she delivered it into the caterer’s hands.”

  “Did she say where Gigi was when she delivered it?”

  “The caterer said Gigi was meeting with someone, so Marigold didn’t stay.”

  “Hmmm,” Maggie said.

  “Have you got anything you’d like to share with the class?”

  “Not really,” Maggie said. “My day was kind of boring, actually.”

  “Good,” Scott said. “Let’s keep it that way. It’s much safer.”

  When Claire got home, Eugene was sitting on the floor in the kitchen, playing a card-matching game with Sammy. Sam was cooking dinner, which smelled like chili, his favorite. The two little dogs were curled up with the two big dogs. Hannah used her phone to take a picture of the scene to send to Maggie and Claire.

  “Hello, family,” she said as she walked in.

  When Eugene looked up, she saw a bruise on his forehead.

  “What happened?” she asked him. “Did you have a seizure?”

  He nodded and shrugged.

  “Genie falled off the bed,” Sammy said. “Me telled him it’s okay, me’s falled off the bed lots of times.”

  “Why didn’t someone call me?”

  “We went to the emergency room, they looked him over, ran some tests, and Dr. Schweitzer called in orders to take him off the meds completely,” Sam said. “Eugene asked me not to bother you. We men took care of it ourselves.”

  Sammy ran out of the room and returned with a blown up blue latex glove that had been tied to make a balloon.

  “Look what’s they’s gave me at the hops pedal,” he said.

  He batted it over to Hannah and she batted it back.

  “Eugene, are you okay?” she asked.

  He nodded, and smiled sadly.

  “Is your stutter bad?” she asked.

  He nodded again.

  Hannah crouched down on the floor and hugged him.

  “We love you,” she said. “It’ll be all right, no matter what.”

  Eugene was overcome momentarily, and wiped his eyes.

  “Th, th, th, thankth,” he said.

  Sammy came over and patted his shoulder.

  “Genie be all right,” he said. “You wants to play with my hand bloon?”

  Eugene accepted the balloon, and Sammy sat down on his lap.

  “Genie’s my new brudder,” Sammy said. “Me takes care of him and he’s takes care of me.”

  Eugene gave Sammy a squeeze and smiled at Hannah.

  “Welcome to the family,” she said.

  Later that night, when Sam came to bed late, Hannah was waiting up.

  “Can’t sleep?” he asked her.

  He sat on the side of the bed and took off the two lower leg prosthesis he wore.

  “I never in a million years would have expected you to accept Eugene into our family,” Hannah said. “Every step of the way I kept waiting for you to say, ‘He’s not our responsibility’ or ‘Don’t get too attached.’ ”

  He stopped what he was doing but didn’t look at her.

  “You never leave an injured brother on the battlefield,” he said.

  Hannah touched his back and he flinched. She pulled her hand away, and rested it on her stomach. Sometimes, when he was remembering things, he couldn’t bear to be touched. After all these years, it was still hard not to take it personally.

  “Anyway,” she said. “I’m sorry for thinking less of you.”

  He shrugged. He took off the stockings he wore over the nubs of his legs, took the lotion off the nightstand, and rubbed it in.

  “Eugene is good with Sammy,” she said.

  “Sammy is good for Eugene,” Sam said. “He doesn’t see his limitations, he just sees someone to love and play with.”

  “I love you,” she said. “Even though you’re often a dick.”

  He laughed softly, and turned to her.

  “Apology not needed but accepted,” he said. “Permission to approach the wife?”

  “Permission granted,” she said, and took him in her arms.

  Chapter Ten

  Hannah called Maggie at noon.

  “Ingrid hasn’t shown up or called,” she said. “Patrick and Scooter are here setting up the stage and sound system for the music. I hate to tell ya, but it looks like our small, quiet party is going to look more like Woodstock.”

  “If you would quit telling people about it,” Maggie said.

  “I can’t help it, I’m that excited,” Hannah said. “I’m going to the IGA now to buy everything just in case Ingrid’s a no-show.”

  “It’s not like her to bail,” Maggie said. “I’ll follow up with her.”

  When no one answered her repeated calls, Maggie decided to drive out to the catering company to see what the hold-up was on Claire’s party food.

  The front parking lot was empty, and the front door was locked, so Maggie drove around back.

  Out in back of the building, Ingrid’s van was backed up to the open kitchen door.

  “Hello,” Maggie called as she walked in.

  It took a moment for her eyes to adjust from the bright sunlight outside, to see Ingrid lying face down on the floor of the kitchen, her frothy blonde hair matted with bright red blood. She knelt down and lifted Ingrid’s hair to find her neck, felt for a pulse, and was relieved to find she was still alive.

  Maggie’s heart raced as she pulled her phone out of her pocket and speed-dialed 911. Having notified the emergency operator of her location and situation, she set her phone on the kitchen island and again knelt down by Ingrid.

  She had to search through her thick hair to find the wound, which was on the back of her head, and was already clotting. She stood back up and grabbed a handful of clean kitchen towels out of a basket on the counter, and then carefully slid them under Ingrid’s head. There was a huge knot on one side of her forehead, from falling onto the tile floor, but other than that and the back of her head, Maggie couldn’t find any other obvious wounds. She carefully rested Ingrid’s head on the dish towels so she could breathe easier, but did not dare move her body for fear of additional, unseen injuries.

  Just beyond Ingrid’s body, Maggie saw a piece of paper on the floor. She reached over and retrieved it. It was a flyer from Tiger Tails featuring Amber as Mustang Sally.

  As Maggie stood back up, she heard what sounded like metal chairs falling over in the room in front of the kitchen. All the hair stood up on her arms and neck. Scanning the kitchen for a weapon, she spied a lethal looking butcher knife, and picked it up.

  The interior kitchen door was a swinging door, so there was no way to lock it. She considered her options, including piling up things to block the entrance, but considered whoever was hiding in the next room could just pull the door inward. There was no help for it, she was going to have to try to scare the person out the front entrance.

  Maggie pushed as hard as she could so that the door swung open with a crash.

  “Stop! Police!” she yelled, in as loud and deep of a voice as she could muster.

  She heard the shot, but before she could duck, the bullet zinged passed her head, and embedded in the door of the
refrigerator in the kitchen behind her. Maggie cursed and hunched down, then reached up with her hand to search the wall for the light switches. She flipped the lights on in the outer room and just caught a glimpse of a person retreating behind several tall stacks of chairs. The shooter no longer had a clear shot, but Maggie was afraid one look would reveal she was neither the police nor armed, so she reached back up for the light switch.

  On the wall above the light switch was a steel hook to which a stalwart rope was wound and tethered. Following its path upward, Maggie could see it was holding the huge, rolled-up marquis tents against the pulleys attached to the steel joists that supported the roof. Maggie turned off the lights, stood up, and sawed the ropes with the butcher knife until the weight of the marquis tents pulled it loose. There was a loud banging crash as the tents hit the chairs, then a heavy thump, and silence.

  Maggie heard the sirens, dropped the knife, ran to the front door, unlocked it, and waved her arms at the ambulance and county squad car. It was Sarah, of course, but she was all business.

  “In there,” Maggie told her. “I dropped the tents on someone who shot at me. They knocked Ingrid out; she’s in the kitchen.”

  “Is there another way in?” Sarah asked her.

  Maggie pointed around to the back.

  “Ingrid’s on the floor in the kitchen,” Maggie said.

  Sarah directed the E.M.T. team to stay back until she gave them the all clear. Maggie went with them to stand on the other side of the ambulance.

  Sarah sent her deputy around back, and waited until she heard him come through the swinging kitchen door. He turned on the lights, and then they both disappeared into the room.

  Maggie braced herself for shots to be fired, but it was silent. Her heart was pounding and her mouth had gone dry. While they waited, she described Ingrid’s injury and the E.M.T.s prepared their supplies.

  Sarah came out and told the E.M.T. team to go ahead with Ingrid first, and called for backup for the person inside the front room. They got back in the ambulance and drove it around the building, leaving Maggie standing in the middle of the parking lot.