Suzanne hissed a bad word and, almost as if on cue, her eyes welled with fat teardrops. She held up her arm and showed Knuckles the small scratch, her bottom lip quivering. “I’m going to scar, Donald! I have a movie in less than three weeks and I’m the slowest healer ever. Hurry! Do you have some antibiotic cream?”
Cheese and rice already. I’d been shot in the foot and I didn’t cry—not even a tear, and believe you me, it more than stung. I was starting to think, even though I wanted to give her a real chance, Goose was right.
Coop jumped up from her stool and called out, “I’ll get it.” Meanwhile, Knuckles went about soothing her.
Instantly, his face was crestfallen. “Jeez, Suz. I’m sorry. Noodles is usually pretty easygoing around strangers. Maybe she’s just having a bad day. Does it hurt?”
Suzanne pouted. “Like the dickens.”
Coop returned with the antibiotic cream, and I watched as Suzanne all but ignored my demon and held her arm up to Knuckles and whispered, “Would you, please, Donald?”
Just then, Higgs pushed the front door open, carrying no less than five—five—suitcases. Pretty fancy ones, too, if you ask me. I rushed over to help him, grabbing the handle of one pink suitcase that felt like she’d packed it with lead.
“What the heck is in these?” Higgs whispered to me under his breath as he huffed his way in the door.
He’d offered to handle Suzanne’s luggage while Knuckles got her settled, but I bet he was regretting that offer now.
“Probably whatever she takes to stay looking so young, and at fifty that’s probably calls for a lot of product,” I replied, then immediately regretted my words. “Sorry. That was rude and uncalled for. I don’t know where my reaction to her is coming from.”
Higgs snickered as he hauled the cluster of suitcases into the middle of the living room. “It’s nice to see the human side of you, Trixie, even if it has a meow tacked on the end of the sentence. I think she rubs you the wrong way because of what Goose said, and you want to protect Knuckles because he’s your friend. It’s very human.”
I didn’t say anything while I pondered how petty I was being as I looked down at her multitude of bags.
“I thought Knuckles said they were only going to be here for three days. Who packs this much for three days—especially when part of the time they’re going to be naked?”
I giggled. “Suzanne does, dahling,” I drawled.
As we managed to corral all her luggage, we both stopped when we saw the local late-night news on Knuckles’s flat-screen TV. Higgs reached for the remote to turn up the sound.
“In local news,” the pretty reporter with blonde hair and a toothy smile said, “an LA man was killed today during the World Naked Bike Ride in the Cobbler Cove District of Portland. Sources tell Action News Ten, the police are calling this a homicide, but won’t comment further. A thorough investigation is underway. For the latest, join us tomorrow morning…”
Everything faded away but the sound of Suzanne’s shriek. I can tell you true, she wasn’t a scream queen for nothing. I’m sure my ears will ring for days to come.
Then she fainted. Just crumbled right in the middle of Knuckles’s hardwood floor as though she were melting ice cream under the hot July sun, her hair fanning out behind her, arm sprawled across her forehead.
And still, even in a dead faint, even with help from whatever she used to stay so youthful, I couldn’t believe she was fifty.
Do wonders never cease?
Chapter 7
“Suzanne!” Knuckles patted her dewy-soft cheek as she lay on his ultra-comfy couch, his face riddled with worry.
The second she’d dropped almost gracefully, if that were at all possible, was the second Knuckles scooped her up off the floor and carried her to the couch as though she were a mere feather.
“Suzanne! Wake up!” he repeated, pressing the cool cloth I’d run and grabbed against her forehead.
Her eyes fluttered open slowly, her long eyelashes fanning against her high cheekbones. “Donald?” she whispered. “Tell me it’s not real. Tell me the police don’t think someone killed Agnar! Who would do such a thing, Donald? It can’t be real!”
“But it is real,” Coop stated in her matter-of-fact way. “That’s exactly what they said. See?” She grabbed Higgs’s phone from him and held it under Suzanne’s nose to show her the text Tansy had just sent.
“Coop!” I reprimanded on a soft hiss of words, nudging her in the ribs. “Give that back to Higgs.”
But my demon was undaunted by my admonishment. “I was only telling the truth. You told me to always tell the truth, and that’s the truth. They think Agnar was killed. That’s what the word homicide means.”
Higgs put his hand on Coop’s shoulder, taking over for me, because I think he sensed I wanted to strangle her. I know she’s still learning all the subtleties of being human, and I know as a onetime nun, I should be more patient (which, by the by, is probably why I was considering leaving the convent anyway), but I’d had a long day and I was a little frazzled.
He held out his other hand and waited for Coop to place the phone in his palm, which she did, but not without the death glare. “Coop, Suzanne’s distressed. Let’s be sensitive to that, yes? I know you’re only trying to help, and your honesty is always appreciated, but time and place, if you get my meaning.”
Coop—my emotionless demon—rolled her eyes at Higgs. Rolled. Her. Eyes. To say I was shocked is to say a category five hurricane is just a passing storm.
In her best impression of Alexis Carrington from Dynasty, she lifted her chin and flipped her hair over her shoulder and huffed (yes! huffed). “Then if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to go feed Livingston.” With that, she sauntered off to the kitchen without looking back, her shoulders squared, her head held high.
Both Higgs and I looked at one another as we fought a snicker. Coop loved old reruns of Dynasty, and for some reason, she’d decided to model herself after the characters.
I’m guessing it was because she thought they displayed all of the emotions she so desired. What she didn’t understand was how extra they were—how they emoted everything to the nth degree.
“We’d better pay closer attention to what our Coop’s watching, Miss Lavender. We can’t have her copying JR Ewing. I don’t know if you remember, but he did get shot,” Higgs whispered on a snort.
Which made me really have to fight to keep from laughing out loud. Instead, I yanked his arm to pull him closer and gave him a stern look. “Knock it off, Higglesworth. We have a serious situation here. Straighten up and fly right, buddy, before Knuckles boots us out on our behinds.”
“Don’t you mean butt-ox?” he asked, and that was all I could take. I literally had to stuff my fingers in my mouth and cross my legs to keep from giggling like a loon or worse, wetting myself.
“Donald,” Suzanne said, sitting up and sweeping away the cloth on her forehead. “You have to help me! I have to know who killed Agnar! We can’t let whomever it is get away with it! How will I go on without answers? They’ll blame me, Donald. They always blame the wife! Please say you’ll help me, Donnie!”
Knuckles sat back on his couch and frowned. “Isn’t that what the police are for?”
She planted a hand on his arm and squeezed , her coral-painted nails sinking into his lightly tanned flesh. “Didn’t you just tell me on the way over here that you and Tipsy solved a murder last month?”
“It’s Trixie,” Coop said with a raised voice from the kitchen.
In fact, it almost sounded as though we could put an exclamation point on the end of her sentence, it was so emphatic. What the heck was happening to my demon?
But Suzanne merely waved her delicate hand in the air, her eyes beseeching. “Trixie, Dixie, Mitzie, whatever. Her name’s not the point. Isn’t that what you told me, Donnie? That you people solved a murder.”
I have to tell you, it was stranger than strange the way she called Knuckles Donnie or even Donald. I know that’s hi
s given name, but it was almost like a pet name she’d used back in a time when they’d shared intimacies I neither wanted to know nor hear about.
I can’t say why, but it made me uncomfortable, and not only because they’d been intimate and Knuckles was a lot like a father figure to me. It made me uncomfortable for reasons I can’t put my finger on.
“No,” Knuckles corrected. “I didn’t say we solved the murder. I was telling you what’s been happening in my life since I last saw you, and what led me to Cobbler Cove. Then I said I tried to help Trixie solve a murder so she could get back into Inkerbelle’s and we could open the shop. We all tried to help because Higgs’s neck was on the line.”
I held up a finger, moving closer to them, my gaze meeting Suzanne’s. “What Knuckles says is true. I sort of just happened upon the murderer. It wasn’t my expert sleuthing skills that found the killer.”
Suzanne sat up on her haunches, tucking her feet under her, her ultra-blue eyes on fire. “But isn’t the nice-looking one a police officer? I seem to remember you babbling about someone involved in law enforcement, right, Donald?”
Higgs sucked in his cheeks, and as I grew more confident at reading his emotions, I could tell he was annoyed. But if I wasn’t sure, I can tell you this—it seeped into his tone of voice enough that I heard his irritation.
He looked Suzanne directly in the eye and took on an authoritative stance. “It’s Higgs or Cross Higglesworth, Mrs. Stigsson, and yes, I was an undercover police officer. But I’m retired, and now I own the Peach Street men’s shelter, which takes up a great deal of my time. I don’t do police work anymore.”
She threw her shoulders back and thrust her chest forward, her eyes filling with tears as she reached out a hand and placed it on Higgs’s biceps, giving him a gentle squeeze.
“Oh, call me Suzanne, and won’t you consider helping me, Cross? Please?” she whispered in a watery voice as a single tear trickled down her creamy cheek. “You obviously have connections, resources, and you know your way around a crime scene. Certainly you know they always blame the wife? Please help me. I wouldn’t even know where to begin…”
Wowwowwow, was she ever good at the “you’re the big strong man and I’m the helpless female” act. She didn’t say as much in words, it had more to do with the lilt of her demure tone, the strategically placed hand on Higgs’s arm, the flutter of her eyelashes.
And I promise you, if he fell for this cutesy, flirty nonsense, I was going to knock him into next Tuesday. But he remained unmoved, or at least he appeared as such. Probably due to the fact that he was used to all sorts of people, sultry women included, trying to bribe him into doing things.
Higgs stuck his hands in the pockets of his jeans and rocked back on his sneakered feet. “Like Knuckles…er Donnie said, I’m not sure why you wouldn’t just let the police handle this, Mrs. Stigsson. That’s what we pay taxes for.”
But Suzanne wasn’t going to let Higgs off the hook. If anything, she ramped up the charm by calling up more tears. “I can’t have this marring my good name! I’m due on a movie set in Canada in three weeks. If this drags on, and they won’t let me leave, how will I ever pay the bills?”
With all the money your rich husbands pay you in alimony?
Boy, I really had the devil in me tonight, didn’t I? No pun intended. I shook off my inner thoughts. I didn’t know if that was true. Maybe she didn’t get alimony from anyone, but surely Agnar had plenty of money? He did hang around with a world-renowned chef who owned a bunch of restaurants all over the world. Didn’t money attract money?
“Suzanne,” Knuckles intercepted by patting her hand. “How about we talk this over in the morning. It’s late, and you need some sleep.”
Suddenly, her entire body deflated. Her shoulders sagged and her eyes shot to the floor. “You’re right. I’m utterly exhausted. It’s been the most horrid day, Donnie. So horrid.”
Knuckles bounced his head up and down. “Then let me help you to your room. You can get comfortable and get some rest, okay?” He grabbed her hand and pulled her up from the couch, but before she allowed him to lead her off to the back bedrooms, her small frame resting against his, she said, “Please think about it, Tipsy. Please!”
Both Higgs and I took deep breaths as we looked at one another in wonder.
He was the first to speak as he leaned into me. “Wow.”
“Tell me about it. You know she’s an actress, right? A scream queen, according to IMDB and her Facebook page.”
“You know, I would have pegged her for a mild-mannered librarian. Color me all sorts of shocked.”
My index finger immediately went to my mouth. “Shhh. She’ll hear us.”
Higgs made a face. “Can she hear anything but the sound of her own voice?”
“She’s right,” Coop called out. “If I can hear you, so can she.”
I fought a snicker. “Maybe not, but Knuckles might. Honest, Higgs, I don’t want him involved in anything that could lead to him being hurt.”
“You think he still has a thing for her?”
I sighed, mostly because I didn’t know for sure. “I don’t know. You know how old feelings can be when you’re feeling vulnerable.”
Higgs gave me a look of concern. “Is he feeling vulnerable? What’s going on?”
Sighing, I bit the inside of my cheek before answering. “He’s been a little sad lately. I think he’s missing Candice and sometimes just when you think the death of a loved on is getting easier to deal with, you get punched in the gut. Anyway, I know for sure he seems oblivious to Suzanne’s phony act. He’s giving her a pass based on the theory people change. You know how that can be. With time comes perspective, and with perspective comes the maturity of realizing the mistakes you made and making excuses for the mistakes others have made, too. We glorify—or maybe a better word is memorialize—relationships from the past and forget about the harm they caused our hearts.”
“How would you know about romantic relationships, Sister Trixie?” he asked with a teasing smile.
“It may not have been romantic, but I was in the biggest relationship of all, remember? You know, with the man upstairs? Hence, I know what it’s like to make excuses for missteps or things that don’t make sense. You forget them or sweep them under the rug in favor of the bigger picture.”
Higgs eyed me thoughtfully. “Have I ever told you how sage you are for someone so young? You make me rethink everything I thought I believed in.”
I grinned at him, crossing my arms over my chest. “That can’t be good. I can’t have you doubting your relationship with a good cheeseburger. What is Higgs without beef?”
He barked a laugh, the grooves on either side of his face deepening. “I do love a good cheeseburger. My bovine love aside, what can we do to help Knuckles?”
Wrinkling my nose, I looked at the wall in Knuckles’s dining room, full of beautifully framed pictures, and sighed. “You’re not going to like what I have to say.”
“On the contrary. I almost always like what you have to say. Unless you say you have leftovers of that crazy chicken meatball noodle soup you make. I don’t like when you say that because it means I’m going to get a Tupperware bowl full of the stuff.”
Reaching over, I pinched his arm and made a face. “Stop teasing me about that soup. It’s not that bad. Anyway, here’s what I’m going to say. You do realize she’s going to pressure Knuckles into talking us into helping her, and he will, because he still hasn’t had a recent enough reminder of what she was like back in the day—if she really was a viper like Goose says. Maybe I’m just reading her wrong, and she has changed, but you have to admit, she’s pretty dramatic about pretty much everything.”
His dark eyes narrowed, the soft lighting from the living room lamps illuminating them. “Are you saying we should help her?”
“I’m saying we should help Knuckles. He’s all I care about, Higgs. I’m sorry Suzanne’s husband is dead, but I’m not a fan of her big doe eyes and her hair twirl. Eve
rything she does is so…I dunno. Over the top is the expression, maybe? Had you ever even heard of her before tonight? Because I sure hadn’t. But then, I was a nun for a long time. We didn’t frequent the Cineplex for sinners on the reg.”
Higgs laughed. “I’m not much of a horror fan. I’m more Fast and Furious than I am Texas Chainsaw Massacre. So, no. I didn’t recognize her, but she sure behaves like I should have known who she is.”
“Regardless, will you help me help him?”
Higgs eyed me, his smile facetious. “Aside from helping Knuckles, this wouldn’t have anything to do with your love of a good murder mystery, would it, Sister Trixie? And don’t fib, because it’s not nice for ex-nuns to tell tales out of school. Besides, I’ll know. I am an ex-undercover police officer, you know,” he said on a wink.
I thought about that for a moment. I didn’t want to appear like some ambulance chaser, but I did want Suzanne out of the picture. I know, I know. As an ex-nun, you’re probably thinking rather than scorn her, I should try and talk to her about the way she approaches getting what she wants with all that cooing, cutesy nonsense. The way I would anyone else who behaved the way she does.
But she rankled me, and I’m honest enough to admit it’s because Knuckles is so dear to me—to us. And fine, in the interest of honesty, I love a good murder mystery and any excuse to snoop is good enough for me, okay? There. I said it. I felt a tingle I can’t quite describe when the news anchor said Agnar’s death was a homicide.
I don’t wish ill on anyone ever. But bad things happen all the time, so there might as well be someone like me who was willing to get in the trenches and find out who did the bad thing, right? It’s sort of similar to service to my community, right?
Looking Higgs in the eyes, I chose my words carefully. “I will neither confirm nor deny my interest in solving a murder, but I will tell you, I can’t do it without some help. I trust you, Higgs. You know the ropes. You know people who know the ropes, and while I’d never ask you to use your contacts to my advantage, I’d at least like to ask you for your advice.”
Hit and Nun Page 9