Booked 4 Murder

by J. C. Eaton

  I rinsed off my coffee cup as my mother turned up the sound to the TV. I could hear the commercials all the way to the shower.

  Chapter 12

  Nolan and Nolan Realty had a large office on the main drag, perpendicular to a pharmacy and bank. When my parents first started looking at retirement communities, they visited Florida. It wasn’t the humidity or bugs that swayed them away from the ocean. It was the fact that every corner seemed to have a bank, a florist, and a funeral home. That’s when my mother insisted on Arizona. In no uncertain terms.

  “You can forget Florida all together. It’s like they’re saying ‘Give us your money and drop dead!’”

  At least in Sun City West the funeral homes were tucked away. As for the banks, heck, they all wanted our money. I laughed to myself when I thought of my mother’s commentary. I think I was still smiling when I walked into Nolan and Nolan.

  The reception area was tastefully decorated in a Southwestern theme with a fancy oval table featuring information about the community. Off to the left was a side table with a large Keurig coffeemaker and all the fixings. The receptionist had a spot on the right and there were smaller, private offices on both sides.

  I walked into the room just as the thirty-something behind the desk got off the phone.

  “Hi! Can I help you?”

  “Yes, I’m here to see Josie Nolan.”

  “Oh”—she glanced at her computer—“do you have an appointment? I don’t see anything listed, but Josie sometimes makes appointments and forgets to tell me.”

  “No, I didn’t make an appointment. I was hoping to catch her since it’s so early.”

  “Hang on a second. I’ll get her.”

  Just then, a tall, middle-aged man strode into the office, and the minute he removed his sunglasses, I knew exactly who he was—the other half of Nolan and Nolan. I recognized him from that night in the Italian restaurant. Tall, salt and pepper hair. I took a seat quickly and pretended to busy myself with some of the brochures as he spoke to the receptionist.

  “Non-shedding bichon-poodle, or whatever you call it, my ass! Just look at all the white hairs on my trousers! And the dog drooled on me. Happens every time I go over there to do business. That gutter mutt costs me a fortune in dry cleaning. Any messages for me, Chelsea?”

  “I left them on your desk, Mr. Nolan. And before I forget, your sister stopped by and wanted you to call her. Something about your broker. I told her you’d be back soon, but she didn’t want to wait. She was with a girlfriend. Same one who comes in all the time for the coffee.”

  “Okay. Okay. I’ll get to it. Darn this dog hair. It’s all over me. I’d better not have any showings until I can run home and change. I don’t want people thinking I work for a kennel.”

  With that, Tom Nolan disappeared into his office and, seconds later, Josie Nolan emerged from hers. Without her wide sunhat and dark glasses, I was able to get a good look at her face. Highlighted hair. Young fifties, maybe. Tasteful makeup. Perhaps even a session or two with Juvéderm. She reached out her hand and greeted me as if we were old friends.

  “Hey there, I recognize you. You were at the pool the other day. Visiting from out of state. I hope you’re here to tell me you’ve decided to buy property in Sun City West.”

  I opened my mouth, but nothing came out. I’d better come up with something.

  I cleared my throat and smiled. Too wide. Too toothy. I better not overdo this.

  “Yeah, uh, I really enjoyed the pool. It’s a great community. I’m far from retiring, but I was thinking of getting a small vacation place that I could rent out. I’m from Minnesota and it would be a good investment. No snow emergencies to deal with here.”

  Real estate’s always a solid investment. Look at Donald Trump. I could really do this.

  “That’s for sure, Miss . . . ? Miss . . . ?”

  “Kimball. Call me Phee.”

  “Okay, Phee. Why don’t you take a seat in the waiting area, and if you don’t mind, fill out one of our short questionnaires describing what you’re looking for and your price range. It’s much easier that way and will save us time. I’ll be happy to go over some of the listings with you when you’re done. Chelsea will give you the form and a pen. And help yourself to coffee and those little cupcakes. They’re terrific. Local baker.”

  “Sure. Great. Talk to you in a few minutes.”

  Josie said something to Chelsea as I eyeballed the cupcakes. I wasn’t really in the mood for more coffee, but a tempting treat made by a local baker was too much to resist. I got up and walked over to the table. A small plastic server held packets of artificial sweeteners and Half & Half cups, while the real sugar was in a glass bowl with a spoon. Nice touch.

  Suddenly, my mind flashed to that piece of litter I found on the ground where someone had sprinkled enough sugar to attract an entire hive of bees. It was a long shot, but something told me I was staring at evidence.

  As I reached to help myself to a cupcake, I studied the table. It wasn’t so much a side table as a credenza. It had cabinets on the bottom. Probably where they stored the cups, plates, napkins, and sweeteners. Chelsea, the receptionist, was busy on her computer, and Josie had gone back inside her office. The coast was clear.

  I leaned in and opened one of the cabinets slightly. Just enough for me to glance down. Phooey. Piles of stuff from the Chamber of Commerce. I moved farther to the center and tried again. Getting closer—paper plates and cups. Only one more cabinet to go, Sherlock!

  My neck made a weird creaking sound as I turned my head to scan the room again. This time voices drifted from another office. Someone was finishing up a conversation and would be in here at any minute. I pulled the cabinet door open and sure enough I saw the familiar blue and white box of cane sugar. So what? It’s the most popular brand on the market.

  Acting as if I knew what I was doing, I picked up the box and started to pour a bit of sugar into the bowl. Innocent enough if anyone caught me. Part of the cardboard edge of the box had been pulled off in order to pour the sugar in the first place. Was I staring at the actual box that someone used to lure the bees to the pool? Without comparing it to the paper edge I pocketed that day, there was no way of knowing.

  Then I had a thought. I’d tear the edge off farther to see if it matched the one I had back at the house. My heart started pounding as if I was about to break into a safe. Still, no one was looking as I leaned across the table. I tore the cardboard slowly so as not to make a sugar mess. It was just about off the box when the voices grew behind me. They were a few feet from me. A man and a woman. Stay focused. Tear the rest of that sucker off!

  With a quick snap, I had freed the paper and grasped it in my hand. Then I slowly bent down and put the sugar back before stuffing the cupcake into my mouth and taking a seat near the coffee table.

  Were they looking at me? Had they noticed what I was doing? I hadn’t been that self-conscious since junior high. No one was looking at me. The man and woman were having their own conversation, and it was a doozy. Apparently I wasn’t the only one to catch the morning news.

  “Oh, for God sakes, Valerie! You know how the media blows things out of proportion. There’s no curse on Sun City West. People have accidents. People die all the time,” the man said.

  “But you heard that TV woman, George. She said there’s no such thing as a coincidence.”

  “Never mind what she said. She just wanted to get viewers. Now come on, Val. Are we going to see this place or not?”

  They were out the door before I could hear the rest of their conversation. One thing stuck, however. “There’s no curse on Sun City West.” Was this rumor expanding to the point of a city-wide curse instead of a book-club curse? I walked over to Chelsea.

  “Please tell Josie I’m sorry. I just remembered I have to take my mother to an appointment. I’ll take this form home and drop it off later. Thanks so much.”

  “Sure. No problem.”

  I was out the door, cardboard edge tucked safely i
n my bag. I couldn’t wait to put that little puzzle together. Again, I hurried to Mom’s and prayed no one noticed how fast I was going.

  No sooner had I pulled into the driveway when I saw my mother standing at the front door.

  “Get back in the car! Hurry up!” she yelled.

  “What? What’s going on?”

  “That blue sporty car that’s always at Jeanette’s house just turned right at the corner. Follow it! Follow it and find out who it is!”

  “Mom, I was about to—”

  “Whatever you were about to do can wait. Get going! We need to know who the boyfriend is.”

  My mother blocked the door like a goalie in the NHL. I shrugged and started toward the car.

  “Wait! Phee! Wait! Maybe you should take a can of something with you, just in case.”

  “A can of something? You have pepper spray?”

  “Pepper spray? No, that stuff’s dangerous. I have Lysol.”

  “Oh, geez. Never mind. He’s probably gone by now.”

  “Not if you hurry. The speed limit is twenty-five, and he didn’t appear to be speeding. You can catch up.”

  Sure. I’ll just pretend I’m Steve McQueen in Bullitt. Then again, that didn’t end too well for the guy in the Charger.

  I backed out of the driveway and turned right at the corner. Sure enough, the blue car was still visible down the long block. Picking up speed, I managed to situate myself three or four car lengths behind him. The blue Mazda made a left-hand turn onto U.S. Route 60, or Grand Avenue, as it was known to the locals. We were heading south, into the city of Surprise. Good thing, too, because the other direction would have taken me to Wickenburg and eventually Las Vegas. Grand Avenue was the only diagonal street that ran across Phoenix’s rigid grid design. I read somewhere it was built to create a gateway to California in the late 1920s.

  Someone from the middle lane made a quick move, and I was now one car removed from the Mazda. Still, I could see where it was headed. Straight down Bell Road, the busiest and most highly trafficked road in that city. I watched carefully, expecting the guy to turn into one of the malls or shopping centers. Instead, he kept on going until he finally turned into a development.

  A left. A right. A long circle. A twisting street. Another circle. Who the heck designed this community, and how much were they drinking before they penciled in the streets? The blue Mazda pulled into a driveway of a two-story beige house on a cul-de-sac, and I was only a few yards behind, praying he hadn’t noticed me. I pulled up past the driveway and circled quickly around until I was in front of the house directly across from him. I expected his garage door to open, but instead, he got out of the car and walked to the front door.

  Meanwhile, I reached down to the catchall between the two front seats of my rental car and pulled out a pen I’d stashed there. Using the back of a receipt from the gas station, I wrote down two numbers—the house and his license plate, all the while glancing at the man and waiting for him to take out his key.

  Instead, the door opened and a tall, young blond woman motioned for him to come inside. Very formal. Very deliberate. Nice going. This isn’t his house. More like a house call. I didn’t stick around to wait. Whatever business this guy was up to, it was none of mine.

  After circling around that development a few times, I finally found my way out and headed back to Mom’s. My hands were itching to take out that piece of cardboard from Nolan and Nolan to see if it was a match to the one I found under the bush at the pool.

  I was relieved when I finally pulled into her driveway. As I walked to the front door, I glanced across the street to see if there were any other questionable cars in front of Jeanette’s house. The last thing I felt like doing was chasing another one down. Thankfully the street was quiet and vacant. No cars in driveways and none on the street. No sooner had I turned the spare key in the door lock and pushed open the door than my mother appeared a few feet away.

  “Lock the door behind you. I have to show you something. It was a threat. Someone put it on our security door—see for yourself.”

  She shoved a letter-size piece of white paper at me. “So? What do you think? It’s a threat, huh? We’re next on the book curse list.”

  “Slow down and give me a second.”

  The paper had two sentences in big bold print: “Bug Off!” and “OR ELSE!”

  “I’m right, Phee. Aren’t I? Whoever taped that paper to our door must know we’re on to them.”

  I stared at the paper again and started to laugh.

  “You think it’s funny?” my mother said. “Marilyn, Minnie, Edna, and Thelmalee didn’t think so.”

  “Mom, take a closer look. This paper is printed. Printed. No one wrote you a note and if anyone did, I doubt they’d take the time to have it professionally printed. It’s got to be part of something else. Maybe something came loose and we didn’t see it.”

  Before my mother had a chance to say anything, I stepped outside and looked around. Sure enough, wedged into one of the small cacti was another piece of paper. The sticky tape that was supposed to secure it to the other sheet had come loose.

  “See for yourself, Mom. It’s not a threat.”

  The second sheet looked just like the first one, only it had more information.

  BUG OFF!

  Welcome to the West Valley’s

  newest exterminating services!

  OR ELSE!

  Run the risk of unwanted

  scorpions, spiders, and pests!

  THIS COUPON GOOD FOR

  $25 OFF YOUR FIRST VISIT!

  A phone number and address appeared at the bottom of the page.

  My mother was furious.

  “They shouldn’t advertise like that. Someone could have a heart attack.”

  “It’s just an attention-getting gimmick. And most people wouldn’t overreact.”

  “Most people aren’t dealing with unexplained deaths from a book curse.”

  I ignored her last comment and headed for the couch.

  “Don’t make yourself comfortable, Phee. We’re meeting Lucinda, Shirley, and Louise from the book club at Bagels ‘N More for lunch. You didn’t meet Louise. Louise Munson. Very nice lady. Taught home economics before they just handed you a microwave and told you to push a button. Anyway, when I started to make my calls, Lucinda was at Louise’s house, and both of them thought we should talk about this. She was going to call Shirley to tell her. So, what did you find out from the blue Mazda? Who is he? Is he married?”

  I paused for a moment, letting everything she had just said sink in. I kept my response brief. “You’ll be pleased to know I engaged in a very specific police tactic.”

  My mother’s eyes got wide.

  “It even has a technical name.”

  By now, she was practically salivating. “What name?”

  I responded slowly and deliberately. “Wild. Goose. Chase.”

  Chapter 13

  Bagels ‘N More was about two miles from my mother’s house. It was a stand-alone restaurant flanked by a discount tire shop and a taco place. Judging from its parking lot, it appeared most of its customers were getting their tires taken care of. Same could be said for the taco joint. The nice thing about Bagels ‘N More was its large patio with green and orange umbrellas shading the round tables like lily pads. As the name suggested, it featured all kinds of bagels and fixings, plus breads, muffins, and cakes.

  When we got there, Shirley, Lucinda, and the lady who I presumed to be Louise were all gathered around a large table in the rear. As my mother and I sat, Shirley announced Myrna would be joining us.

  I cleared my throat while reaching for the menu. “Myrna? Who’s that?”

  Shirley immediately responded. “Myrna Mittleson. She’s in the book club, too.”

  Then, in a grand gesture, my mother sighed and leaned into the table. “I guess I’ll have to hold off on what I was about to say until she gets here. I hate repeating things.”

  For a second, I was almost caught off gua
rd. She hates repeating things? She LIVES to repeat things. Over and over again. Growing up, I could have sworn she invented the word “nagging.” I tried not to laugh and buried my face in the menu.

  “There’s Myrna now. Over here, Myrna!” someone shouted.

  I looked up from the menu to see a tall brunette with bedazzled glasses approach us. She and my mother apparently shared the same flair for style.

  After some quick introductions and some not-so-quick orders (My God, if I were that waitress I’d commit hari-kari with the bagel slicer!), my mother finally got to the real reason we were here.

  “The book curse, our book curse, was all over Channel Five this morning. Someone in our group had to have called that TV station and I, for one, would like to know who.”

  Lucinda was practically indignant. “You don’t think any of us would call, do you, Harriet?”

  Before my mother could respond, Louise stated that “maybe someone would do such a thing if they wanted attention,” but Shirley would have no part of it.

  “Good Lord! It makes us look like we stepped out of the Middle Ages.” Myrna, who was otherwise preoccupied trying to find a coffee cup, suddenly joined the conversation. “I’ll tell you what it does! It gets everyone going in the wrong direction so if one of those women was really murdered, it would be blamed on the curse.”

  Lucinda made a tsk tsk sound, shook her head, and looked directly at Myrna.

  “That curse is a bunch of hooey. But do you think someone was really murdered? Who? Not Marilyn. The sheriff’s department ruled that out. And Minnie had a bad heart. And Thelmalee, an allergy. And Edna Mae—”

  “We know, Lucinda, we know,” my mother said. “We don’t have to go over the entire list. So, once and for all, did anyone here call the TV station?”

  Silence. Dead silence. Everyone looked at one another, and I looked at all of them. I’d seen enough crime shows to look for the signs—someone looking down, someone fidgeting, someone biting a lip . . . Nothing. They were all waiting for someone to confess, only no confession came. The only thing that came was our food, and I’d never seen bagels so welcomed in all my life.