by Tonya Kappes
“That’s great.” I liked to see her get some time out from behind the counter. Sometimes dealing with the public could be brutal, especially if one had been at the window for five hours straight with no help and a line out the door. Grumbling mail customers weren’t fun to deal with. That was why I loved my walking route.
“I already sorted your mail though,” she told me on the way into the building.
That was part of her job as a clerk. She broke down all the mail and sorted it. It was my job to get the parcels, certified mail, and other special deliveries sorted according to my loop. I was lucky I was able to get my deliveries sorted by how I delivered my route. I always did all of downtown along with the small neighborhood with the front porch ladies as my first loop. Then I stopped back into the post office to get my second batch for the remaining stops on my route, the neighborhoods beyond the post office. I sort of wished I was doing the country club neighborhood so I could be a little nosy.
Then I noticed Mac had gotten another letter addressed in the same girly handwriting. I knew it had to be from Tasha and wondered if she’d written him a letter about the argument and why he’d said she was no longer going to be an issue in his life. I wanted so badly to hold it up to the light since there wasn’t a return address and see if I could see anything, but that was illegal…if I got caught. Instead, I slipped it into my bag with the rest of today’s first loop.
I was way too early for most of my stops. All but one—the Sugar Creek Gap Nursing home.
It was the only place where customers weren’t waiting on me. Half the time, their mailboxes were still full from the previous day’s delivery or beyond.
“You’re here awfully early.” Vince’s voice cause me to jump around.
“Vince.” I gasped and put my hand up to my chest when I noticed him in the wingback chair near the entrance of the building. “I didn’t see you there.”
“I usually start my day here and then take my coffee out on the porch.” He dog-eared the newspaper he was reading and looked over it. “I read here that you are the one who found Chuck Shilling.”
“It was awful.” I walked over to him and took a seat in a matching chair next to his. “I never thought my day would end up like it did after I left you that morning.”
“I saw you at the emergency meeting.” He rested his arms in his lap. The paper crunched shut. “You think your friend Mac Tabor did it?”
“Heck no.” I shook my head. There were a lot of things I was realizing I didn’t know about Mac Tabor, but I knew he wasn’t a killer. “And I’ve vowed to keep my eyes and ears open to figure out who just might’ve killed Chuck, because a lot of people had reason.”
“Is that so?” Vince’s tone made me think he wanted to hear more.
“For instance, I overheard Chuck’s business partner saying how he was not happy with Chuck and they’d gotten into an argument the night before. He could’ve been keeping an eye on Chuck, and when he saw Chuck leave Mac’s, he confronted him and killed him. I’m not sure what their contract would’ve said about Chuck’s sixty percent of the country club, but I’d assume it’d go to Dennis. That’s motive.”
Vince shrugged as if he wasn’t convinced.
“What?” I asked.
“It all depends on if Dennis has an alibi. How did Chuck get to the bridge? Was he killed there? Dumped? How long had he been there? Shot at close range? Far away?” Vince asked all sorts of questions.
“You, my dear friend, have been watching too much of that one channel.” I snapped my fingers to try to remember.
“MeTv?” He laughed. “That’s a great channel, and I love Matlock, but nope.” He rubbed his knees with his hands. “I’m a retired agent with the FBI.”
“Good one.” I laughed and dug through my mail to get his out.
“I’m serious.” He didn’t smile like he normally did. “I’ve been retired for fifteen years now. I’m not from here, as you know, and when I left the Bureau, I wanted a small, quiet little town with a good view.”
“You’re not joking.” I sat back up and looked at him. “You’re serious.”
“As y’all say around here, as a heart attack.” He smiled. “That’s why I don’t think Dennis Kuntz did it. He wouldn’t be going around making all sorts of veiled threats. And…” He hesitated. “I’ve done a little digging of my own.”
“You have?” This really got my interest piqued.
“Dennis Kuntz’s mother lives in the assisted part of the facility.” He nodded toward the door. “I sit on that porch every single night to watch the sun set. Every single Thursday night, Dennis Kuntz comes to visit his mother. They watch Jeopardy, and he usually watches a few other shows with her until she falls asleep.”
“Then he’d been awake to have killed Chuck. Maybe he was driving down Main Street and saw Chuck. They took a walk.” I was throwing things out there. “We do know…” I grabbed my phone from my back pocket and pulled up the notes. “Thursday night, Mac Tabor had Tasha over to his house after the city council meeting. Chuck Shilling stopped by Mac’s house to tell him he wasn’t sure if he was going to go through with the deal because the town had gone nuts. Then Tasha and Mac had a fight, she left, and Mac followed her to Madame’s.”
“Madame’s? Whoa.” Vince’s eyes lit up. “I’ve always wanted to get an Uber there.”
I rolled my eyes and sighed.
“Anyways, Mac claims Chuck was there. That’s the last time he saw him alive.” I put my phone down and looked at Vince.
“What else do you have on that phone?” He leaned a little closer.
“Well, I have Ashley Williams as a suspect because she lives in the neighborhood. She claims that she’d do anything to stop the sale of the club because of the riffraff and traffic it would cause, but I think her main motive is her family.” The more I talked out loud, the more my theories started to come together cohesively. “She said they moved there to bring their daughter up in a great community. She wants that life, and like my mama said, when people’s lives get turned upside down, they don’t know how they are going to live in them, and that’s motive enough.”
I scrolled down a little more.
“I hate to even think maybe Kenneth Simpson had something to do with it.” There was a twinge of sadness when I thought about him and Emmalynn. They were such nice people, but nice people sometimes did bad things. “He’s the golf pro there and apparently being blamed for the bankruptcy of the country club. I’m going to ask Audrey about them today when I drop off some of the leftover pumpkin sugar cookies. And it just so happens Emmalynn said they had a meeting with a lawyer about some important business.” I could see by the look on Vince’s face that he was taking it all in. “They even missed their daughter cheering last night to take care of this business. That’s suspicious to me. Plus his reputation has been dragged through the wringer, and if the club did go under, who is going to give him a good recommendation?”
“You’ve done your due diligence.” Vince sat back and drummed his fingers over his belly.
“Which makes me wonder if he or Ashley were the ones who spray-painted the golf course.” I wiggled my brows and typed that into my notes so I wouldn’t forget.
“The only way to see if any of your theories are true is to snake them out.” Vince’s eyes twinkled.
“You’re enjoying this.” I smiled and gave him the side-eye.
“It’s not easy living a life of detective work and then retiring. That’s why I go to all the council meetings and trials down at the courthouse. Keeps me in the game without being in the game.” A slow smile crossed his lips. “Not that I’m happy anyone was murdered, but I can’t help but think I’d like to get in on a little sleuthing myself.”
“Like partners?” I asked.
“Yeah. You are the eyes and ears on the street. I’ve got connections.” He leaned over a little like he didn’t want anyone hear. Like there was even someone up this early to hear us. “I even have my online logins from being w
ith the bureau.” He snickered. “I guess I was an oversight.” He winked.
“Like secret things?” I asked, having no idea what I was even talking about. His actions made me think it was very important though.
“I’ve got ways of finding things out about people and money, things that might help us figure out why so many people are against the club. Things that might help us hack into security cameras, like the ones at the country club.”
His words made my jaw drop. “You mean you can break into the country club cameras to see if a certain someone was spray-painting something?” I asked.
“I’m not saying I’ll be able to jump on the library computer here at the nursing home and get it immediately, because I might be a little rusty, but I’ll be able to figure it out.” He winked, folded the paper up, and set it on the small round table between us. “Deal?” He stuck out his bony little hand.
“Deal.” I gave him a good handshake. Or thought I did.
“You aren’t going to break my bones.” He kept his hand extended. “We are partners, and I need a firm handshake.”
“You are something else, Vince.” I did exactly what he asked to seal our deal. “So, now what?”
“First, you need to find out everything about Mac’s night and find the woman. We not only need her account of Mac’s whereabouts to help me out, but she might’ve seen something at the Madame he didn’t.”
Vince was asking me to do something that was pretty tricky, considering the situation of my friendship with him.
“Okay.” I nodded in agreement even though I had no idea how I was going to approach this situation. “I can do that.”
“Then you need to see Gill Tillett down at the General Store. We need to know who bought spray paint.” His eyes lowered as if a thought had come into his head. “I’m thinking this is a local job, the murdering, and probably a little premeditated if someone went to all the trouble to get a gun from Mac’s house. You need to ask all them widow women if they heard anything else that night.”
“Okay.” I nodded and realized there was going to be a whole lot more to this sleuthing than I even thought.
“I’m going to need you to also get me one of those burner phones from the General Store.” He reached around and pulled a hundred-dollar bill from his wallet. “We are going to have to communicate somehow, and I don’t want it traced back to me.”
“Got it.” I took the money.
“You just come back here after your work shift and give it to me along with reporting in on what you found out.” His eyes twinkled. I could see the excitement and thrill this type of work gave him.
After the plan we made, I was able to get the mail delivered to all the little mailboxes. I also took the time to write down in my notes app exactly what Vince wanted me to do so I didn’t forget something.
I did wonder why he’d not addressed me finding out anything about the other suspects like Dennis Kuntz, Ashley Williams, or Kenneth Simpson. He was the expert, and maybe it was some sort of way the FBI weeded out the little things, so I went along with him, and happy to do it.
I ran my hand over the outside of my mail carrier bag, knowing the new letter for Mac was in there. I certainly was looking forward to finding out exactly who Tasha was to Mac.
ELEVEN
The courthouse opened at seven a.m. on Saturday and closed at noon. This was the only day I reversed my downtown loop and started with the courthouse first. Normally, I delivered the mail to the nursing home last, but this was not a normal day by any stretch of the means.
I tugged the edges of my scarf up around my neck and put my hands in the pockets of my jacket. The weather was changing fast, and a bitter wind was coming in, which told me the first signs of winter were coming.
The old mill echoed its groans with each turn, giving Main Street an eerie feel. The lampposts glowed in the dark. The sunrise wouldn’t show itself for another half hour. I loved the fall, and when I did this route on Saturdays, I generally enjoyed the quiet peace and serenity of the water rushing over the wooden wheel.
But today, there was something in the air that brought goose bumps along my spine, and they weren’t caused by the chilly wind.
It was as if I felt someone watching me.
I hurried down the sidewalk as quickly as I could and passed all the shops I’d be visiting around the nine a.m. hour when they opened. The lights from inside the courthouse glowed, a welcome sight once I was past the old mill.
Once inside, I stopped briefly at the door and let out a long sigh, happy the courthouse opened early every morning.
“That was a loud sigh.” I heard Trudy Evans before I’d even seen her.
“Hey, Trudy.” There was a bit of relief when I saw her.
“You okay?” She looked at me with a cup of coffee in her hands. “Here. You look like you need this more than me.”
“That’s okay. You know, with finding a body and all, I might be a little creeped out.” It sounded so dumb to be scared.
“Honey, there’s a killer on the loose if you don’t believe Mac did it.” She walked over and handed me the coffee. “And I’m not so sure the sheriff’s department thinks he did do it.”
“Why do you say that?” I questioned, keeping my ears open like Vince had told me.
“Because that coffee.” She pointed to it. “I get it every morning from the sheriff’s department, and this morning I overheard someone saying the preliminary autopsy was back, and Chuck was killed at close range. No fingerprints on the gun. One of the officers said it looked like someone wiped the prints off, which doesn’t make sense if it’s Mac’s, because his prints would be all over it since it’s in his house and he put it there.” She took a step closer when someone came through the doors of the courthouse. “They didn’t find the gun in Mac’s house. It was in the bushes next to his front porch.”
“You’re kidding.” My jaw dropped. There was so much information in what Trudy had told me that I wasn’t sure if I needed to go back and tell Vince or just keep going about my day and check off the list of things he wanted me to do.
“What else did you hear?” I asked her.
“Nothing,” she snarled. “They caught me listening in. One of them said, ‘Ain’t you got to get to work, Trudy Evans?’” She rolled her eyes then waved her hand in the air. “Which I do. You enjoy that coffee and stay safe out there.” She winked and smiled. “There is a killer on the loose.”
I didn’t find anything funny in any part of her saying there was a killer on the loose. It didn’t entertain me in the least bit, but this little bit of gossip she gave me could help in Mac’s case.
After I delivered the mail to the various branches of government in the courthouse, I walked up the big marble steps to where the businesses who rented from the local government were located. I was looking for Tim Crouse specifically.
“Any mail today?” I asked Tim when I popped into his office.
“Not today, Bernadette.” He took his glasses off and set them on top of his desk. “Have you talked to Mac?”
He gestured for me to sit down. I did and put the mailbag on the floor between my legs.
“I talked to him at the game last night.” I took a sip of the coffee. “How’s the case?”
“I can’t really discuss it with you, but he’s going to need a friend to lean on.” The corners of Tim’s eyes dipped. He looked as if he knew something that he couldn’t tell me, and it made me worry Mac was guilty.
“What about Tasha?” Not only didn’t I expect him to really answer me, but I didn’t expect the shocked reaction on his face. “Have you found her? Mac was with her the night of Chuck’s murder, and I’m assuming you’d want to question her.”
“Mac told you about Tasha?”
“Listen, Mac has been amazing to me and Grady. Grady is off and married. A grown-up. And just in case you hadn’t noticed all the bags under my eyes, lines around them, and this”—I pointed to my chin— “I’m an old broad. I didn’t expect and never
wanted Mac to stay single and feel like he needed to take care of me and Grady.”
“It’s the friendship.” A little snort of laughter escaped Tim’s nose. “I wish I had as good a friend as Mac was to Richard…and you.”
“So did you get in touch with her?” I wondered but left out the part about the papers he wanted Mac to have her sign.
“Her phone has been turned off.” He drummed his fingers on the top of his desk. “I’m guessing she wants nothing to do with Mac or this investigation.”
He only fueled me more to find out what really happened to Chuck Shilling.
“What if she doesn’t want anything to do with it because she knows something? Good or bad?” I shrugged.
“Whose side are you on?” I knew he was joking, but my loyalty should never be questioned.
“Mac’s, of course. Or I wouldn’t be going through a list of suspects I’ve collected.” I probably shouldn’t’ve told him that.
“What list?”
Yep, judging by the look on his face, I should’ve kept my mouth shut.
“I’ve been doing a lot of thinking. I hear things as a mail carrier. I can’t help but think that Ashley Williams could’ve done it because she’s leading the charge to stop the condos going up. She framed Mac. Plus, she’s been very vocal about how nothing is going to stop her even if she has to lay over your threshold.” I pointed to his door. “Then there’s Dennis Kuntz. He’s got everything to gain because I’m sure he’s going to get all of Chuck’s part now that Chuck is dead.”
Tim leaned back in his chair and drummed his fingers together.
“What about Kenneth Simpson? He is being blamed for the country club going bankrupt, forcing them to sell it. Plus, Emmalynn and Kenneth didn’t show up to watch Teri cheer last night, which is odd. They’ve come to every game.” The words continued to spill out of my mouth as if my brain was doing some sort of dump. “Emmalynn told someone they weren’t coming because they needed to see a lawyer. Now, were they seeing a lawyer because they knew it was only a matter of time before Kenneth was named Chuck’s killer?”