by Jana DeLeon
“I don’t think he’s looking for women in New Orleans,” Gertie said.
“Really?” Ida Belle asked. “Then what’s he doing?”
“One of the women in my knitting group said he liked to gamble. Said that’s why the woman broke up with him.”
“And is this information reliable?” I asked.
Gertie shrugged. “The woman in my group heard it from her niece, who knows the woman that dumped him. As reliable as these things get, I suppose.”
I made a note. “Marco wouldn’t be the first or last person to get in a bind over gambling. What about Clarissa?”
Ida Belle, Ally, and Gertie looked at one another, but no one spoke.
“All righty then,” I said. “Based on those looks, I can only assume that Clarissa might be trouble. Someone want to clue me in?”
“Clarissa is the younger waitress with the brown bob,” Gertie said.
“The cute one who wears her T-shirt a size too small and has boobs up under her chin?” I asked.
“That’s her,” Ida Belle said. “Clarissa has always been a bit loud and rumor has it she’s a bit wild. Smoking dope, hanging out with undesirable types at the Swamp Bar…the sort of thing Sinful frowns on.”
“Why would Francine employ someone with a questionable reputation?” I asked.
“Clarissa is her second cousin,” Ally said. “Her mother died when Clarissa was thirteen and her dad tried to raise her right, but I don’t think he knew how to handle her. She ran a little wild in high school, and I don’t think she’s stopped.”
“Then why don’t you suspect her?” I asked Ally. “She sounds like a perfect suspect to me.”
Ally shrugged. “Her dad works in the oil field and does fine. Geologist, I think. She still lives at home and doesn’t have any bills to speak of. Her dad bought her car and pays her insurance, so the only things she’s on the hook for are gas and her cell phone. From what I can see, she spends the rest on clothes, makeup, and booze. Maybe worse. But I can’t see her stealing food from Francine, and especially not potato chips. She’s hypersensitive about her weight. Eats like a bird.”
I nodded. “All of that is well reasoned, but the men she’s hanging out with probably don’t have nearly as good a setup. All they’d need to do is get a hold of the key and make a copy.”
“Oh no,” Ally said, clearly dismayed. “I hadn’t even thought of that. I told you I wasn’t any good at this.”
Gertie patted her hand. “You’ll get more cynical with age. You’ll also get crow’s feet, so don’t rush it.”
“So Clarissa and her questionable men definitely warrant looking into,” I said, then directed my gaze at Gertie. “But no trips to the Swamp Bar.”
“Party pooper,” Gertie said.
“Moving on,” I said. “Last up is Jordan.”
“Nice kid,” Gertie said. “Horrible circumstances, though.”
“Who is Jordan?” I asked. “And what happened to him?”
“Jordan is a busboy and does some prep. Young guy with dark brown hair and pretty green eyes,” Ally said.
“He’s shy but one day, he’s going to be a heartbreaker,” Gertie said.
“Oh, I know who you’re talking about,” I said. “He looks like he should be fronting for a boy band or staring in a remake of Twilight. Celia accused him of trying to steal her purse yesterday.”
“That’s him,” Gertie said. “He’s eighteen or nineteen and originally from New Orleans. Father was a loser who took off when he was a baby. His mother worked two jobs and did a good job raising him despite doing it alone, but she was killed by a drunk driver a couple years ago. Jordan came to live with his uncle here in Sinful.”
“Who’s his uncle?”
“Carl Whiting,” Gertie said. “Older guy, silver hair. Always wears a blue suit to church and sits in the second pew.”
I nodded, recalling the quiet, nondescript man who sang in a nice baritone. “What’s Carl’s story?”
“Chronic bachelor,” Ida Belle said. “He had a childhood girl that he intended to marry and set up house with here in Sinful. She had other ideas but never told Carl that until the day of high school graduation. Right after the ceremony, she took off for the city. Her family moved away a couple years later, and I don’t know what happened to her after that. But she’s never been back.”
“Carl never married anyone else?” I asked.
“Carl never even dated someone else,” Gertie said. “Like some General Store owner we know, he’s hopelessly devoted to a woman who will only continue to break his heart.”
“This isn’t about me,” Ida Belle said, changing the subject. “This is about Jordan and offhand, I can’t think of any reason for him to steal.”
“How’s the uncle set for cash?” I asked.
“He’s a truck driver for a dairy,” Gertie said. “Weekday route so he’s home nights and weekends to see what Jordan is up to. I think he’s reasonably comfortable. He doesn’t live large. Had the same pickup for twelve years. The one blue suit for at least ten.”
“Jordan’s out of high school, right?” I said. “What are his plans for the future?”
“He wants to go to college,” Ally said. “Engineering. He got a scholarship to pay for part of his tuition, but it wouldn’t cover it all and then there’s living expenses. He decided to stay in Sinful and save some money. Meantime, he’s taking some of the basics online.”
Gertie sighed. “There was a time when a person could work part time and cover living expenses for college. But nowadays, you need full-time income to cover things, especially when you’re making the minimum.”
Ally nodded. “Why do you think I stayed? No rent is a big perk. I’m saving way more here than I was in New Orleans, even though I was making more there.”
“Okay, so Jordan needs money,” I said, “but for school, not for food. Assuming his uncle is funding the grocery bill, I can’t see where stealing food would give Jordan what he needs. It’s not like the items stolen would bring in enough cash to make it worthwhile.”
I made a few notes, then leaned back in my chair. “I have to admit. None of these look overly promising. Certainly no one stands out as secretly starving or needing to bring home food to feed their family.”
“Employees eat free on shift anyway,” Ally said. “Limited menu items, but it’s still a hot meal. So there’s that as well.”
“So no loading up on steak?” I asked.
“Steak, shrimp, or desserts,” Ally said. “Francine said she’s providing fuel, not taking us out on a date.”
I smiled. Francine was my kind of woman—direct and a sense of humor. “Okay, and the missing food was two boxes of bacon, two pot roasts, four whole chickens, and a case of potato chips. Anything else to add to that list?”
“I’m amazed you remembered all that,” Ally said. “I guess it’s all that time spent around books.”
“Something like that,” I said. “Well, I suppose this is a place to start. None of them look good for it exactly, but we might as well start eliminating those with the most opportunity. If we don’t turn up anything, then we’ll broaden the search.”
Ally leaned forward in her chair. “Yes, but how are you going to eliminate people?”
“If I told you that, I’d have to kill you,” I said.
Ally laughed. “No, really.”
“Really,” Ida Belle said. “Well, maybe not death but sometimes the less you know the better when it comes to our extracurriculars.”
“I don’t understand,” Ally said.
“She means if you don’t know anything,” I said, “then you can’t be required to testify against us.”
Ally’s eyes widened. “Oh! Ha. Then I’ll just wait to hear something.” She rose from her chair. “I need to run or I’m going to be late, but if I can help with anything, let me know.”
We said goodbye and as soon as the front door closed, I looked over at Ida Belle and Gertie. “Well? What’s the plan? Kidnap and tort
ure? Break into the houses and look for the stolen goods?”
“The kidnap and torture is efficient,” Gertie said, “but more problematic. Breaking into houses will take longer but there’s probably less chance of going to prison.”
I stared at her. “I swear, sometimes I have no idea whether or not you’re joking.”
“You don’t want an answer on that one,” Ida Belle said.
I looked back at Gertie. “Since clearly, I was joking, does anyone else have an idea?”
Gertie shrugged. “We could try surveillance, but even with three of us we can’t watch all of them all the time. And the only way to catch them stealing on shift is to sit in the cooler. I still say it would be easier to hop into those homes and check out the fridge. Unless there’s something weird going on, no way someone ate two cases of bacon in that short of a time frame.”
“She’s right,” Ida Belle said.
“You too?” I asked.
“Not about breaking in,” Ida Belle said. “The reality is this is just an exercise for us. Even if we did nothing, Francine will get her answer as soon as those cameras go in, and it’s not like anyone’s life is on the line or anything.”
“Then why bother at all?” I asked. “It’s not like we don’t have other things to do.”
“But we have downtime in between,” Ida Belle said. “And I see this as an opportunity for us to address the problem like a PI would if Francine had hired one.”
“Ah,” I said, finally getting her point. “You think because this isn’t critical, we should use it as a test run for honing our investigative skills.”
Ida Belle shrugged. “Why not? If you move forward with the PI idea, you’re going to need our help with background information and we’re all going to need training.”
“What we’re going to need is some get-out-of-jail-free cards,” Gertie said.
“Well, don’t count on my dating Carter to get us any of those.”
“With your lack of girlie talents,” Gertie said, “I wouldn’t count on you to get me out of a parking ticket.”
I would have argued, but she was right. “Okay, so you guys have given me your thoughts. Obviously, if we had a legal way to search the houses, that would probably be the quickest way to figure out who has a lot of bacon and chips, but we still couldn’t prove it was from the café.”
“Yes, we could,” Ida Belle said. “I’ve been talking to Francine while she checked a delivery. They stamp her name on the boxes. The bacon boxes I saw were white with red lettering.”
“Great,” I said, “but we’re still back to not having a way to legally search the houses, so it doesn’t help us. And surveillance on the employees at home seems unlikely to yield results as the food is probably going to be consumed in place, not moved again. So?”
“So we figure out a way to get inside the houses legally,” Ida Belle said.
“Oh!” Gertie perked up. “I have a shirt from the cable company with my name on it. Just like the employees wear.”
“Why?” I asked.
“Because I might need to pretend to be a cable guy,” Gertie said. “I saw it on one of those police shows.”
“I’m pretty sure everyone in Sinful knows you don’t work for the cable company,” I said.
“That’s definitely a negative,” Gertie said.
“That’s definitely a no,” I said.
Ida Belle whistled and we both looked at her. “Dressing like the cable guy wasn’t what I had in mind,” she said, “although I’m going to keep it in reserve if we go undercover somewhere else.”
“So what did you have in mind?” I asked.
She pulled out her phone and dialed. “Hello, Braxton? This is Ida Belle. Yes, thank you, I’m doing fine. Listen, this is out of left field, but do you still have that decorative tile work that Destiny did in your kitchen? Yeah? I’m working on updating my own kitchen and wondered if I could drop by and get a picture. It’s just the sort of thing I’m looking to do. How does fifteen minutes sound? Great. See you then.”
She closed the phone and smiled. “There you go. We’ve got access to the kitchen where Clarissa lives and it’s perfectly legal. We just have to do some creative snooping once inside.”
“I take it Braxton is Clarissa’s father, but who is Destiny?”
“Her late mother,” Ida Belle said.
I frowned. “That doesn’t sound like a Sinful sort of name.”
“It’s not,” Gertie said. “Braxton broke rank and married a New Orleans stripper. And he wonders why Clarissa is wild.”
Ida Belle nodded. “She did this perfectly horrible tile work in the kitchen. So horrible it actually makes you want to diet. But Braxton is notoriously cheap so I figured there was no way he would pay to have it redone.”
“Destiny had horrible taste,” Gertie said. “Made Celia look fashion-forward.”
“I can’t wait to see this tile then.” I looked over at Ida Belle. “Nice work.”
“That’s only one,” Ida Belle said. “If we don’t find what we’re looking for there, we’ll have to come up with some way to get inside the other houses.”
“My money’s on Clarissa,” Gertie said. “Walter said Destiny used to lift things from the General Store. He could never catch her, but he was sure it was her. She had the money to buy the stuff, mind you. Some people are just wired wrong.”
“And sometimes they pass that wiring on to their children,” I said.
“She’s a logical choice,” Ida Belle said, “but if this summer has taught me anything, it’s that reality is rarely logical.”
“Since this is the only house we have access to,” I said, “let’s hope this one is the exception.”
Chapter Nine
We headed out to my Jeep and Ida Belle directed me to Braxton’s house. It was only a couple blocks away and looked like most of the other homes surrounding it. Part brick, part siding. Could use a face-lift but given Ida Belle’s comment about cheapness, neat was probably as much as the neighbors could ask for.
Ida Belle knocked on the door and a couple seconds later, it swung open and a man waved us inside.
Late forties. Spare tire on the middle. Barely enough muscle tone to walk. Looked more like an accountant than someone who married a stripper.
“You remember Gertie,” Ida Belle said as we walked inside. “And this is our friend Fortune. She’s Marge’s niece.”
He nodded. “Sorry about your aunt. She was an, uh…interesting woman.”
“Yes, she was,” I agreed. “Thank you.”
“Anyway,” he said, “the tile is still in the kitchen, although why you’d want to put it in your house, I have no idea. It doesn’t seem like the kind of thing you’d go for.”
“I’m exploring all kinds of options,” Ida Belle said. “I remember it was custom, right? An artist painted the tiles?”
Braxton nodded. “Paid a fortune to be tacky, but I’ve been looking at it for twenty-five years, so I can’t see tearing it out now. Probably have to if I ever decide to sell. It tends to offend people.”
My curiosity launched into overdrive. I understood if decor wasn’t to one’s taste, but I’d yet to see any I found offensive. And then we walked into the kitchen.
“Wow,” I said, unable to keep silent.
“It’s hard to find a nicer word, right?” Braxton asked.
The tile was a backsplash that stretched the entire length of the kitchen counter and went all the way up to the shelves mounted on the wall. The background of the tile was white and the “custom” part was black ink drawings. Nudes, to be exact. I couldn’t fathom the tile looking right anyplace other than a strip club or a brothel, but here it was, on a kitchen wall in Sinful, Louisiana.
“How is this not against the law?” I asked. “I mean, with all Sinful’s strange laws and all.”
Braxton nodded. “There was a bit of a kerfuffle when Clarissa got old enough to have friends over. The parents refused to let their kids in our house until I covered al
l the tile with cardboard and promised them it wouldn’t come down until Clarissa graduated from high school. There were still some holdouts, even with the cardboard.”
I figured the holdouts were more about the mother than the tile, but they sorta went hand in hand. What I couldn’t figure at all was why Braxton let her install the tile to begin with. There was cheap and then there was this. And this was beyond words. Clarissa’s mother must have had all kinds of talents that didn’t extend to her taste in decor.
“I don’t suppose you remember the name of the artist?” Ida Belle asked. “I know it’s been a while.”
“Not offhand,” Braxton said, “but if you give me a minute, I might be able to come up with it. I’m fairly anal with my receipts. I probably still have the original.”
“Take all the time you need,” Ida Belle said. “I’m just going to take some pictures, if that’s all right.”
Braxton nodded and headed out of the room. Gertie crept to the doorway, then turned back and pointed up, indicating he’d gone upstairs. I heard the floorboards above us creak a few seconds later and we all flew into action. Ida Belle dashed into the laundry room to dig through the deep freezer. Gertie opened the top of the refrigerator and I flung open the pantry. Several seconds later, we all collected in the kitchen again, each of us shaking our heads.
Bummer. We’d struck out.
The floorboards upstairs creaked again, so Ida Belle pulled out her cell phone and started taking pictures of the horrible tile. Seconds later, Braxton came back into the kitchen with a name and phone number written on a sticky note.
“I found it,” he said, looking pleased with himself. I assumed that was because of his record-keeping prowess and not because he wanted to recommend the tile artist.
Ida Belle took the sticky. “Thanks. I think I have enough pictures. We’ll get out of your hair. Sorry to drop in on you this way.”
“It’s no problem,” he said. “I wasn’t doing anything anyway.”
“Is Clarissa on shift at the café?” Gertie asked.
He frowned. “I don’t know where Clarissa is. She stopped checking in with me about the time she turned fifteen and discovered boys. I guess the problem would be men now, although given their behavior, I’m rather loath to give them the title.”