* * *
“Are you sure you don’t want the baby to have a big, furry dog?” I asked Rox over the din of the 1970s one-hit wonder wailing through the speakers mounted above the bar.
She tossed a coaster in front of me. “No takers yet, huh?”
“Not only no takers, not even one phone call about him.”
“Awwww. Sorry, hon. Maybe it’s a sign that you’re supposed to keep him.”
Leaning on the bar, I cupped my chin in my palm. “I can’t keep him. A dog needs a yard to run around in.”
“Did he have that before?”
“No. He had an apartment a lot like mine.”
Rox cocked her head. “Then what’s the problem in keeping him?”
“I don’t need or want a roommate right now.” Especially one that needed to be walked three times a day.
“Uh-oh. What’d he do?”
“Nothing. What goes in has to come out on a fairly regular basis.”
“I meant the two-legged male that you’re not spending the evening with.”
I sighed. “I just came from his place.”
“And?”
“Let’s just say that we’re not good company for one another tonight.”
“Sounds like you’d better tell Roxie all about it over a drink.” She pulled out a bottle of chardonnay from under the bar. “Am I pouring, or are you sticking to your water rations?”
I’d already blown my diet with all those chicken wings. What did another couple hundred calories matter? “Pour.”
“Hey, Eric,” Rox called out, looking toward the other end of the bar as she placed the wine glass in front of me. “Does your place have a fenced yard?”
Sporting a sky blue Ferguson Ford bowling shirt, Eric Caldwell approached with an empty beer pitcher and a wry smile. “Yeah. Why?”
Rox took the pitcher from him and headed to the nearest tap. “Char has a dog your kids would love to have.”
“Sorry,” he said to me, not looking the least bit apologetic. “I already have a dog that I think you met when you came out to the house.”
I was fine with that answer, even with the bit of snark that he had injected into it, because I had no intention of handing over Fozzie’s leash to this jerk.
“I did, and while you taking Fozzie would keep him in the family—”
“This is Colt’s dog that we’re talking about?”
I nodded. “I sort of have temporary custody of him while I try to find him a home.”
“That’s good news then, ‘cause my cousin was worried about the dog running off.”
“There’s some mystery about how he got out of the apartment, but he’s safe now,” I said to the back of Eric’s head as he directed his attention to the pitcher Rox was sliding toward him.
Not that you care.
“Glad to hear it.” He glanced back, dialing up the wattage of his car salesman smile. “Good seeing you. Now, be sure to look me up when you’re ready for those new wheels.”
“You betcha.”
Rox wiped away the few drips that Eric’s pitcher had left on the surface of the bar. “Are you getting a new car?”
I reached for my drink. “Not anytime soon.” And definitely not from Eric Caldwell.
Chapter Nineteen
“YOU REALIZE THAT you just growled at the only person who’s called and expressed any interest in adopting you, right?” I said to Fozzie as we left the dog park after six the next evening. “The next time someone calls, remember that good boys get adopted, and bad boys have to come home with me.”
Fozzie glanced back at me with a doggie grin.
“Yeah, that didn’t come out right, but you catch my drift. That guy we rushed over here to meet has kids and a yard. You would have had fun there. Instead, you’re alone all day in an apartment.”
Much like most of the men that had come and gone in my life, Fozzie didn’t appear to be listening to me. Instead, he picked up the pace once he spotted my car and we power-walked to the parking lot.
“I’m not saying that you and I aren’t good for one another. It’s not that at all.” As my hips would attest, since trying to keep up with him had been providing me with quite the daily workout. “But I’m more like your transitional girl after a big breakup—the one you might like hanging around with, but you both know it’s not meant to last forever.”
Crap.
I stopped in my tracks with the realization that I’d just described my relationship with Steve.
Looking up at me, Fozzie barked.
“I know. Guys don’t like talking about this kind of stuff, but sometimes things need to be said.”
No matter how difficult finding the words for that conversation might be.
Not necessarily tonight, I thought almost ten minutes later, when I didn’t see Steve’s truck parked in his driveway. But soon.
My more immediate need was to do something about the knock in my car that Rusty’s paint crew buddy had warned me to fix pronto. Did I truly expect the Jag to do its cowbell swan song in the next twenty-four hours? No. But I didn’t want to be out on some remote county road when that eventuality came to pass.
Since it was Friday, I figured that one of the mechanics at Bassett’s Motor Works could look at it over the weekend if I could get it over there before the shop closed at seven. Which should have been no problem since that gave me over thirty minutes, but my grandmother’s Honda wasn’t parked in her carport, and that was the car I was counting on borrowing this weekend.
Dang it.
Just as I was about to pull out of her driveway, the back door opened and Marietta waved at me.
Her lips were moving but I couldn’t hear her over the engine noise.
I rolled my window down. “What?”
“Good heavens, sugar. Is that your car making that horrible racket?”
“Yep. I was just going over to Bassett’s to have them fix it.”
“What are you doing afterward?”
“Walking home to my apartment since I won’t have a car.”
My mother’s eyes brightened. “I have access to one if you want to have a girls’ night out.”
I didn’t. I just needed to think of a way to let her down gently. “I…uh…” Need to get up early for work?
No, tomorrow was Saturday.
I’m expecting an important call?
I’d have my cell phone with me, so that wouldn’t work either.
Steve’s coming over?
He wasn’t and probably didn’t want to see me right now, but my mother didn’t know that. “Actually—”
“Barry’s out with his son tonight and your grandmother is at some garden club function, so it’s a perfect opportunity for you and I to spend some time together.” She reached through the window and playfully nudged my shoulder. “Come on. It’ll be fun.”
For whom?
“Just give me two secs to get my purse,” she said, dashing to the house in her stilettos.
Shifting in his seat impatiently, Fozzie huffed a breath.
“Don’t say it. I know.”
A minute later, Marietta glared at him through the open passenger side window. “You neglected to tell me that he was with you.”
Good grief. “He was sitting right here in plain sight.”
“In my seat.”
“Which now has dog hair on it, so don’t feel like you’re obligated to come with me.”
Marietta crawled into my back seat. “Don’t be ridiculous. I don’t get to see you that often, so I’m not about to let a little dog hair stop me.”
Swell.
“Drive to Barry’s on M Street,” she said, flicking her bangle-adorned wrist at me as if I were her taxi driver. “And I’ll get the DeLorean and meet you at your apartment after you’re done at Bassett’s.”
I wasn’t so sure that her fiancé would be all that keen about her borrowing the car she had driven on her 1980s TV show, especially after making it her engagement present to him. “Are you sure tha
t’s a good idea?”
She scoffed at me. “Absolutely. What’s the worst that could happen?”
* * *
After Fozzie and I walked home to my apartment, I tucked him in for the evening and then headed down to the visitor parking area, where Marietta was showing off the DeLorean to a couple of my neighbors.
“Ah, mah daughtah’s here,” she said, reverting back to the southern accent she’d used in public since the day she was cast in the Georgia-based show that had made her famous. She flashed her bright white smile at the couple. “Lovely to meet you.”
The second they walked away, I held out my hand to her. “Keys, please.”
My mother blinked. “Excuse me?”
“I’m driving.”
“You most certainly are not.”
“For your safety and for everyone out and about in Port Merritt tonight, I think it’s for the best.”
Folding her arms under her double Ds, she pursed her lips. “I drove this car almost every day for three years, and I’m perfectly capable—”
“That was thirty years ago on a closed set. You’ve already totaled two cars in this town. Do you really want to crush your fiancé’s new toy like a tin can and make it three?”
Marietta fingered the pendant at the base of her throat. “I declare. You weren’t even around when those unfortunate incidents occurred, so I don’t think you’ve earned the right to dredge up ancient history.”
True enough. But since I was the only one standing between “Mayhem” Moreau and the classic car from her TV series, the task had fallen on me to make sure that history didn’t repeat itself tonight.
Like I’d discovered as a teenager accompanying my mother to one of her movie premieres, the most effective way to influence her decisions was to leverage her fear of bad publicity. “I’m sure the regional papers would eat that story up with a spoon.”
Heaving a heavy sigh, she dropped her key ring in my hand.
“Good decision,” I said, sliding behind the steering wheel.
“Whatever.” She wriggled into the bucket seat next to me. “So, where’re we going?”
I had absolutely no desire to spend the next few hours with her public persona, so all bars and restaurants were out. “How about if we head back to Gram’s and we can open up a bottle of that fumé blanc that you like and maybe watch a movie?”
“Perfect.” She did her wrist flick thing again. “Drive on.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
After taking a minute to familiarize myself with her old car, I eased it out of the parking lot and took the right on 2nd Street as a slight detour so that I could satisfy my curiosity about a recently painted house.
Marietta shot me a sideways glance. “Why are you going this way?”
“I wanted to show you a house up here.”
She sucked in a breath. “One that you’re thinking about buying?”
On my salary? “No. It’s a Victorian that just got updated with new paint.”
“Okay, but it’s getting dark. We won’t be able to see much of anything.”
I stepped on the gas as we went up the hill toward J Street. “Then we’d better see what this baby can do.”
She gripped the center console. “Sugar, I’m not that interested in looking at paint.”
“I am.” And then some.
“Nice, huh?” I asked, after we parked in front of the house across the street.
There were no vehicles besides ours in the immediate vicinity, but with any luck, I’d find that the owners of the house were enjoying a quiet evening at home. Preferably with some sort of security system in place if Rusty planned to make this an upcoming crime scene.
“Oh, it is nice.” My mother pulled out her cell phone. “I’ll have to show this to Barry. Give him some color ideas for his house, which is begging to be painted, if you ask me.”
I’m sure he hadn’t been asking, but she was his home decorating problem, not mine.
But Marietta Moreau, local celebrity, could come in very handy when I wanted a stranger to invite me into their home.
I just needed to come up with a good reason for her to join me on their front porch. “Need to go to the bathroom?”
A two-year-old could hold her water better than my mother, so I was confident of the answer.
She snapped a photo through the side window. “Not urgently. I can wait until we get home.”
Wrong answer. “Okay, but I’d like to see what they did on the inside, so maybe you’d like to—”
“Ooooh, I do believe that I could use a comfort station,” she said, opening her door.
“Excellent.” I inspected the key ring in my hand as I climbed out of the DeLorean. “Where’s the remote to lock the car?”
She tsked. “You’re so young. Use the key, my darling.”
“The key—how quaint,” I muttered, manually locking the doors.
Crossing the street, I joined Marietta. “Okay, here’s the plan. I’m going to knock on their door and say that we were driving by and you noticed that they painted their house. That’s when I’d like you to be your charming self so that they’ll invite us in.”
She straightened, her nose in the air as she strutted toward the front door walkway. “I’ll have you know that I’m always charming.”
Sure you are.
I reached for the doorbell button. “Ready?”
Marietta moistened her ruby red lips as if a director was about to shout Action. “I’m ready.”
I rang the bell but didn’t hear anything but a dog barking in the neighborhood, so I rapped on the door.
“Maybe they’re not home,” Marietta said, watching me press my ear to the door.
“Looks that way.” Which made me all the more concerned about Rusty showing up to take advantage of the situation later this evening.
I handed the key ring to my mother. “Why don’t you make yourself comfortable in the car while I check out the back of the house.” And make sure that the doors I saw yesterday were securely locked.
“Chah-maine, I really don’t think we should invite ourselves into their backyard without an invitation.”
The owners weren’t home to defend their property. That was invitation enough for me.
I shooed her away and proceeded to trace my steps from yesterday. “I’ll just be a minute.”
“Ooooh,” she said, following me. “I love the burgundy trim. It’s probably a bit much for Barry’s house, but I should get a picture of this to show him.”
“Whatever.” I was only interested in the door surrounded by the trim and was relieved to find it locked.
“Honey, move out of the shot if you would please.”
I stifled a sigh and stepped off the back deck to test the lock of the garage door, but the second I reached for the knob I heard some loud barking next door.
“Hey! What do you think you’re doing?” asked the burly sixty-something man standing next to the snarling chocolate lab on the other side of a chain link fence.
I held out my hands while my heart battered my ribcage. “Nothing. I was just making sure that the doors were locked after the paint crew left.”
“Right.” Sneering, he pulled a cell phone from his back pocket. “Maybe you’d like to tell that story to the cops.”
“Oh my,” Marietta uttered, her voice mainly breath. “Chah-maine, I think it’s time to go.”
Understatement of the year.
I pasted a smile on my face. “Sir, you don’t need to call the police. We were just leaving.”
With his phone to his ear, the neighbor pointed at me. “Stay right where you are.”
And spend the next few hours explaining to Steve what I was doing here? No, thanks.
I climbed back onto the deck and grabbed my mother by the arm. “Run!”
While we ran for the car, I could hear the neighbor yelling at us to stop.
“Well, this was a very bad idea,” Marietta huffed as I pulled her toward the street.
“You can get mad at me later. Right now, let’s just focus on getting out of here.”
“I don’t think he got a good look at me, so unless he knows you—”
“He doesn’t.”
“Then we should be home free.”
Except a local reporter jogging with a golden retriever on a leash was approaching the DeLorean at about the same pace that we were.
“Act casual,” I said, slowing our advance on our getaway vehicle.
Marietta jerked out of my grasp. “My heels are sinking in this grass and you want me to act casual?”
“Yep, because that’s a reporter waiting for us over by your car.”
She stiffened, uttering a string of obscenities.
I stepped in front of her. “Let me handle this.”
Renee Ireland’s eyes gleamed with interest as I crossed the street. “Well, fancy meeting you here. Visiting friends in the neighborhood?”
“Actually, we were just admiring this paint job.” Of course the neighbor standing at the end of his driveway, telling the nine-one-one dispatcher about us trying to get away in a DeLorean didn’t lend any credence to my story.
The reporter extended her hand to my mother. “Renee Ireland. I’m happy to meet you, Ms. Moreau. I’m a big fan.”
“Ah’m always thrilled to chat with mah fans—”
“The cops are on their way, so don’t you even think about leaving!” shouted the man across the street.
“But Ah wonder if we could do this at a more opportune time.”
Renee’s eyes widened as the retriever strained to sniff at Marietta’s feet. “What’s going on?”
“Just a little misunderstandin’,” Marietta said, working the key into the lock.
Renee glanced over at the neighbor. “He called the police on you? Doesn’t he know who you are?”
No, and I was pretty sure that my mother hoped it would stay that way.
Tittering nervously, she gave me an anguished look over the roof of the car. “The lock seems to be stuck.”
I formed a basket with my hands. “Toss me the keys.”
While I coaxed the door open, Renee pulled her cell phone from the fanny pack strapped around her waist. “Is this the same car that you drove in your show?”
“Of course,” Marietta said, looking back in the direction of the siren getting louder with each thump of my heart.
Dogs, Lies, and Alibis: A Humorous Cozy Mystery (A Workings Stiffs Mystery Book 5) Page 14