Male/Male Mystery and Suspense Box Set: 6 Novellas

by Lanyon, Josh

  Jeff replied, “Blythe and I see each other now and then. And I see other people now and then.” He smiled at Carson.

  Auntie Eudie looked disappointed. “The Gillespies are lovely people. An old and respectable family. I believe they own a pine-tree plantation down Middle Georgia way.”

  Austin murmured politely, his ear attuned to Cormac and Jeff’s cool exchange. Not that it was any of his business.

  Faulkner appeared in the doorway. He waited till the Cashels had stopped bickering and fallen silent. When he had their attention, he spoke to Roark using that exaggerated accent. “The pohleece are heah, suh.”

  Roark knocked back the rest of his drink. “Show them in, Faulkner.”

  Chapter Three

  The Morgan County sheriffs turned out to be a paunchy, gray-haired investigator and an eager, young black officer, both in spick-and-span powder blue uniforms. Austin was expecting shades of In the Heat of the Night, but the two sheriffs were professional and courteous. Captain Thompson, the senior partner, greeted Jeff by name and invited him to accompany them downstairs, asking the rest of the family to wait in the parlor.

  “Well!” Auntie Eudie remarked after Jeff and the sheriffs disappeared down the hallway.

  “I told you there’s something not right about him,” Cormac said triumphantly.

  “Where did you say you know that young man from, Carson?” Roark demanded.

  “We went to the same high school, Daddy. Jeff was starting quarterback the two years the Bulldogs won the league championships.”

  “I thought he moved to Savannah,” Cormac said. Clearly, he felt Jeff should have stayed in Savannah.

  “He did, silly. To go to college. He came back.” Carson was smiling at her brother; a smile both teasing and understanding. It seemed to appease Cormac in some indefinable way. The resemblance between them was really striking. Not just brother and sister, Austin thought. Fraternal twins.

  Confirming his thoughts, Carson ruffled her brother’s hair. She said to Austin, “Corrie is the baby of the family.”

  “By ten minutes!” protested Cormac, flushing.

  “Jefferson Brady!” Auntie Eudie exclaimed. “I thought I recognized him. He has the Brady eyes. A very distinct color. Myrtle green,” she informed Austin. He nodded politely. “Yes, there have been Bradys in Morgan County as long as there have been Cashels. Maybe longer. I expect Jefferson came home after his daddy died. Such a tragedy.”

  “What was?” Austin asked. He couldn’t pretend that he wasn’t curious about Jeff Brady.

  “Richmond Brady killing himself like that. He shot himself right beneath the portrait of old Gideon Brady.” Austin must have been looking blank, because she added helpfully, “The general.”

  “Eudora, nobody gives a rat’s ass about Jefferson Brady’s family,” Roark informed her.

  Eudora’s cheeks went pink. “Mr. Gillespie does.”

  “It’s none of Mr. Gillespie’s business,” Roark returned. “You shouldn’t be discussing our friends and neighbors with a Yankee wine merchant.”

  It was so outrageous that Austin nearly laughed. With the exception of Jeff and the sheriffs, they were all like something out of a play. Though more along the lines of While the Lights Were Out than A Streetcar Named Desire.

  “Now, Daddy.” Carson came to join Austin, perching gracefully on the arm of the old sofa.

  Roark ignored her. “Did you find those bottles?” he demanded of Austin.

  “The Lee bottles? Not yet.”

  “They’re not there,” Roark said with bitter satisfaction.

  “You’ve looked for them?”

  “Of course not. They were never there.”

  Something about the way Roark said that didn’t quite ring true. Was that because he feared the bottles had never been a reality or because he knew what had happened to them? “You know that for a fact?” Austin inquired.

  “Daddy,” warned Carson.

  “Don’t Daddy me. You know as well as I do your granddaddy’s warped sense of humor. He’s laughing in hell right this minute at the notion of us thinking our fortunes are saved because of those damned wine bottles.”

  “If those bottles are real, they’re worth a fortune,” Austin told him.

  “Those bottles are a myth. Robert E. Lee was not a drinking man. Anyone who knows anything about him knows that much. Lee understood the Southern gentleman’s duty to present an example at all times.” Roark drained his glass and set it on the cabinet. He dropped into a spindle-legged chair upholstered in faded silver grape leaves and directed a challenging look Austin’s way.

  “Lee was a man of temperate habits. That’s true,” Austin said. “I’ve done a lot of research on him in the past weeks. He kept a fully stocked wine cellar, as befitted his rank and position. We know that for a fact because we have the letters his wife wrote him regarding moving the contents of the cellar before the Federal occupation of Arlington House in the spring of 1861.”

  “Take that, Daddy.” Carson’s fingers lightly played with the hair at the back of Austin’s collar. He started at that playful graze of fingertips. She winked. “Your collar was turned inside out.”

  Cormac said suddenly, “I’ve been reading your ‘Message in a Bottle’ column.”

  “Oh?” Everything Cormac said was in that same intense, semibrooding manner, so Austin had no clue whether that was a compliment or a prelude to vivisection.

  “I want to be a writer too.”

  “You should read Cormac’s stories. They’re wonderful,” Carson said. Austin’s collar was still not right. He tried not to jump this time, but it was weird, right? This tickling the back of his neck in a room full of people?

  “Cormac is such a clever boy,” Auntie Eudie sighed. “Although I do wish everyone didn’t die or go mad in his stories.”

  “I want to write novels,” Cormac said, scowling as though he expected someone to object.

  “That’s great,” Austin said. “I only write nonfiction.”

  “Yes,” Cormac said grimly, obliquely.

  Who knows where that might have gone, because Jeff and the sheriffs tromped back in.

  “Folks, the crime-scene people have arrived, and we’re going to let them get down to business,” Captain Thompson stated. “Meanwhile, we’re going to interview each of you privately.” His gaze fell on Austin.

  Pick me, pick me. He wanted out of this nuthouse posthaste. It was obvious he wasn’t going to be doing a cellar appraisal anytime soon, so the faster he got back to Maryland and his endangered job, the better. He didn’t trust whatever machinations Whitney might be up to in his absence.

  But after that considering appraisal, Captain Thompson said, “Why don’t we start with the ladies. Ma’am?” That was addressed to Auntie Eudie, who rose all aflutter, tugging nervously at her woolly pink cardigan and touching her hair as she led the sheriffs to a room where they could “set up camp.”

  Jeff took her place on the sofa beside Austin.

  “How’re you holding up?” He offered a glimpse of that spectacular smile, although his eyes were serious.

  “Fine. Good.” Austin realized he was nervously tugging at loose threads on the sofa arm and stilled his hand before the last of the upholstery unraveled.

  Jeff started to speak, but Faulkner appeared in the doorway.

  “Shall I serve sandwiches and coffee here in the parlor, Miz Carson?”

  “Oh!” Carson looked perplexed. Austin saw the dilemma. They needed to eat, but sitting down to luncheon with a murder investigation going on around them was a tad socially awkward. Sandwiches on a tray was probably the ideal solution, although the idea of food sent his own stomach somersaulting.

  A loud snoring interrupted Carson’s response. They all glanced to the corner where Roark slumped in his chair, sleeping. His mouth was slightly ajar, his face twitching as though he was still arguing in his dreams.

  “That would be lovely, Faulkner,” Carson said with the perfect self-possession devel
oped by generations of Southern beauties in the face of flood, famine, and Civil War. “I guess you better serve those sheriffs something to eat too. We don’t want them to get in a bad mood and arrest somebody.”

  Faulkner nodded graciously and withdrew.

  “Where are you staying tonight?” Jeff quietly inquired of Austin.

  “The Stonewall Jackson Inn in Madison.” Why were they practically whispering? Austin wasn’t sure, but he was increasingly confused by Jeff Brady’s signals. Assuming they were signals and not just Southern discourse.

  “Very nice,” Jeff commented.

  Austin nodded. The hotel was nice. Nineteen individually themed, luxury guest rooms’ worth of nice. Distractedly, he checked his watch. One thirty. He couldn’t believe how late it was. He mustn’t forget to phone Ernest.

  “I guess you’ll be driving back tomorrow morning?” Jeff persisted.

  “I suppose so. Assuming they don’t arrest me.”

  Jeff chuckled.

  Auntie Eudie returned with sparkling eyes and flushed cheeks. She looked like she’d been having a wonderful time.

  “They want to see you next, honey,” she said to Carson.

  Carson left the room. Jeff rose so that Auntie Eudie could take his place on the sagging sofa. He sauntered across the room and leaned against the wall beneath a gold-framed portrait of a dashing-looking Confederate officer. There was, Austin thought wryly, a marked resemblance, although presumably Jeff wasn’t aware of it. Folding his arms, he studied the others without seeming to pay them much attention.

  “It was very exciting,” Auntie Eudie informed Austin. “They showed me a snapshot of the dead man and asked me if I recognized him.”

  “Did you?”

  “No. He does have the Williams eyebrows. I wonder if he might be a relation.”

  Jeff asked, “Did you ever see him around here?”

  Roark spluttered in his sleep.

  “No.” Miss Eudie was definite. “I’ve never seen him before.”

  Cormac said suddenly, roughly, “I was wondering if you’d like to take a look at my work.”

  Austin realized he was being addressed. “Now?”

  Cormac nodded, scowling.

  “I don’t think we’re supposed to wander around till we’ve been interviewed, do you?” Austin was asking Jeff. Possibly because Jeff seemed like the only normal person in the house. Although that was stretching a point.

  “Naw. Nobody gets to leave till everyone has been questioned.”

  Cormac said accusingly, “You were wandering around!”

  Jeff shrugged.

  “He was wandering around,” Cormac informed Austin. Was Austin supposed to take sides?

  Faulkner reeled into the room, bearing an enormous silver tray, and just managed to lug it to the table in the corner without overbalancing.

  “Thank you, Faulkner,” Auntie Eudie said vaguely. “I suppose we ought to feed those police persons too.”

  Faulkner gave her a speaking look and departed.

  “Why are you so tight with the police anyway?” Cormac asked Jeff. “Are you a cop?”

  “Naw.” Jeff pushed lazily away from the wall and went to the table where Auntie Eudie was examining the insides of sandwiches and making pleased noises.

  “Ham or turkey?” Jeff asked Austin.

  Austin consulted his stomach and decided turkey was the lesser of two evils.

  He rose as Auntie Eudie asked, “How do you take your coffee, Mr. Gillespie?”

  “In a Starbucks cup, I bet,” Cormac said.

  “I don’t drink Starbucks.” Austin nearly added or wine from a box, but that really was snobbery. Besides, he’d had some decent boxed wines. He took a cup from Auntie Eudie. “Turkey, please,” he told Jeff.

  Jeff started to hand him a plate with a sandwich.

  “Now that’s woman’s work!” Auntie Eudie exclaimed, and Jeff reddened and dropped the plate as though it were on fire.

  “Corrie, they want you now,” Carson said, returning to the room.

  Cormac swore.

  “It’s not so bad, honey.” Carson came straight to the table where the others stood exchanging plates and cups. “Well, what do you think?” she said to Jeff.

  Jeff seemed to be studiously avoiding Austin’s gaze. “What’s that, honey?”

  “The dead man is Dominic Williams.”

  “I knew I recognized those eyebrows,” Auntie Eudie mumbled through a mouthful of ham sandwich. “But I don’t recall a Williams boy named Dominic. Who is he?”

  “Among other things, he’s the master sommelier at Old Plantation House.” Carson was looking directly at Austin. “Now what do y’all think of that?”

  “The master sommelier?” Austin repeated uneasily.

  “What is a sommelier?” Auntie Eudie inquired.

  “A wine steward with a fancy title,” Jeff replied. He was studying Austin too, his expression unrevealing.

  “That can’t be a coincidence,” Austin said slowly.

  “Nope. I’d say not.”

  “Did you know Dominic?” Auntie Eudie asked Austin.

  “Me? No.” At least…he didn’t think so. It was always possible he’d run across Williams professionally at a wine tasting or a workshop or some other industry event. It was hard to judge by the one glimpse he’d had of him.

  “The sheriffs sure don’t think it was any coincidence,” Carson said. She selected a ham sandwich. “I must say it was a terrible shock seeing Dom like that.”

  “How exactly did you know this gentleman? You never brought him here.” Auntie Eudie turned to Austin. “You’re not eating anything, Mr. Gillespie?”

  Austin picked up a sandwich and tried to look like he was between bites.

  “Dom and I used to run into each other now and then.” Carson was blushing.

  Jeff gave a wicked chuckle, and Carson laughed, but she still looked uneasy. “I just don’t see why Dom would be in our cellar.”

  “Maybe he missed you?” Jeff teased. “Maybe he was hoping for a midnight assignation.”

  Carson seemed to give this serious thought, chewing contemplatively.

  “Or maybe he was searching for those wine bottles.” Jeff was looking at Austin as though he thought Austin might have a theory.

  “If the plan is to auction off the cellar, maybe he was trying to get a firsthand look at the inventory,” Austin offered. It seemed unlikely the sommelier of a fine restaurant would have to resort to sneaking through his neighbors’ cellar, but then everything that had happened since he’d arrived in this house seemed unlikely.

  “Maybe.”

  Carson said, “If he wasn’t in our cellar, I’d say Henry knocked him off.”

  “Henry?” Austin looked from Carson to Jeff, who had started to speak but instead took a bite of sandwich.

  “Henrietta. The current Mrs. Williams. I never met a more jealous hag than Henrietta Williams. We were at school together.”

  Cormac returned, looking grouchier than ever. “Daddy!” He shook his father awake. “Daddy, the sheriffs want to talk to you.”

  Roark came awake blinking and mumbling, “The light was green when I entered the intersection.”

  “You’ll never guess who the man in our cellar is,” Cormac informed them. “It’s that good-for-nothing lowlife Dominic Williams. The one who was sniffing around Carson all this winter.”

  Roark took his hand from his face and snarled, “Why, I told that bastard if I saw him around here one more time, I’d fill him full of lead.”

  Jeff suddenly laughed. Austin looked at him. “Your expression,” Jeff said. “You look like you think you wandered into a Flannery O’Connor story.”

  “All that’s missing are the peacocks.”

  “We used to have peacocks,” Auntie Eudie said. “Faulkner’s nephew shot them all with his BB gun when he was thirteen, bless his heart.”

  “They’re saying they think Williams might have fallen and hit his head outside. He could have crawled
into the cellar and died,” Cormac said. “The storm doors are unlocked.”

  In the peculiar silence that followed, Roark rose unsteadily and left the room.

  Though no one had argued, Cormac insisted, “It could have happened like that.”

  “Hit his head on what?” Jeff was frowning.

  “On…anything. On the brick path. On the corner of the house. Hell, on a rock in the road. Who cares?”

  “Why are the storm doors unlocked?” Jeff persisted.

  “’Cause somebody unlocked them,” Cormac shot back.

  Austin took his sandwich back to the sofa, the better to hide the fact that he wasn’t eating and wasn’t likely to start anytime soon. The sheriffs would summon him any minute, and he could tell his story and get out of there. There was no reason to feel so nervous. No one could seriously think he had anything to do with this accident, or whatever it was.

  Jeff believed it was murder.

  Austin wasn’t sure how he knew that, especially since he didn’t know Jeff from Adam, but he could tell Jeff wasn’t buying the theory of Dominic Williams’s conveniently knocking himself out and then staggering into the Cashels’ cellar to quietly die. And he wasn’t sure the Cashels themselves bought that theory, although if they didn’t, they seemed to take homicide in stride.

  That was the only alternative, right? If Williams hadn’t met with a fatal accident, someone in this house had killed him. Well, perhaps not in the house, but close enough that hiding him in the Cashels’ cellar seemed a good plan. Austin couldn’t fault the logic. In the normal course of things, Dominic Williams could probably have mummified down there with the oversize spiders and withered potatoes—no one the wiser.

  But was that true? There was no reason to think Austin’s visit was a secret. Didn’t that support the idea of a tragic accident? Unless someone had wanted Williams’s body to be discovered.

  “Maybe the colonel killed him,” Auntie Eudie remarked.

  Carson giggled nervously.

  “The colonel?” repeated Jeff.

  “Colonel Sterling Cashel,” Auntie Eudie said proudly. She gestured to the gold-framed oval painting on the wall of the Confederate officer in full regalia. “According to the family legend, the colonel will rise from his grave when the Cashels most have need of him.”