by Tonya Kappes
“What on earth are you smiling at?” Finn asked and turned back around.
“Nothing.” I sighed. Eventually I knew I was going to have to tell Finn my little secret about my ghost deputy. I just didn’t know when.
Chapter Sixteen
“And you’re going through the trash already?” Finn smiled and plucked the handle of the gate that lead into my backyard open. His perfect teeth glistened in the early evening sun. My heart tumbled inside. “I thought I’d give you a few minutes to get Duke fed and settled, but you just dove right on in.”
“I don’t let the grass grow under my feet.” I held up a piece of half-eaten Derby pie. “Shame.” I looked at the pie and frowned. “Someone wasted a great piece of pie.”
Duke ran over to Finn with a ball in his mouth. They played a little tug of war until Duke finally let Finn win and dropped it.
“I went to see Nanette on my way over here.” He chucked the ball into the far right corner of the yard. Duke took off in a dead sprint.
“Oh yeah?” I looked up at him with my hand dug deep into one of the bags.
“She said that she didn’t feel comfortable giving you a statement because she really liked you and your family. She didn’t want to be the cause of any bad feelings.” He picked up the ball Duke brought back and dropped at his feet.
“I can understand that, but I took an oath to uphold my duties as sheriff no matter what the cost. Including Mama’s freedom.” As hard as it would be to lock Mama up in jail, a murderer had to be brought to justice. “I’m just looking at all the other possibilities when it comes to strange things like Mundy’s hotel room.” I did take my responsibilities as the sheriff very seriously and I held the office above my relationships. It was part of the job.
“She confirmed that Viv asked for Frank’s room number and that the occupant in room six complained about noise.” He took his phone out of his pocket and with the pad of his forefinger scrolled through.
“They did?” I looked up at him.
“Yeah. She took the complaint.” He held the phone out. “Here’s a photo of the complaint.”
I took his phone and read through it.
“It says here that they were in the hallway and that they didn’t see Mama go into Frank’s room.” That was good. “And that Mama kept yelling ‘it’s not my pot pie.’ Which is what Mama told me.”
“And the time was around five forty-five. Which tells me that Frank had eaten some of the pot pie because he was already in the middle of writing that review.” Finn walked over and pointed to the photo. He smelled so good, which made it difficult to concentrate. “The hotel guest said they’d called down to the office to complain and that’s when Malina told them to come down and make a formal statement. As they were going down to the office, they passed someone with a tray and a drink that looked like someone from room service.”
“But Nanette doesn’t do room service,” I noted.
“Right. The person with the drink knocked on Frank’s door. They said a couple of words to each other before Frank took the drink, but they couldn’t hear what they were saying.” Finn had stumbled upon some really good stuff. “This makes me wonder if the empty glass we found on the desk was how he was poisoned and not the pot pie.”
“I need to check if those labs from the crime scene are back yet.” I’d put the glass in an evidence bag. Actually, I’d bagged everything. “But according to Max, the sodium fluoroacetate was found in the food in Frank’s stomach.”
Both of us stood there. We really wanted to find a way to prove that Mama wasn’t the main suspect.
“After I left the hotel on my way over here, I stopped by the office to see if any of the labs were back and they aren’t.” Finn’s eyes narrowed.
“If we find that frozen dinner box the zipper came from, maybe we can pull prints. I’m looking for the box.” My gag reflexes kicked in when I pulled out more half-eaten food. “Thank goodness I have a lot more gloves.”
“You are insane.” Finn laughed and took a seat next to me. He grabbed a couple of gloves and slipped them on.
“I guess our next step until the labs come in is to talk to Mundy?” Finn asked.
“Yes. First thing in the morning I’m going to look into his past a little deeper,” I said.
“Why would Mundy want to kill Frank?” Finn asked.
“I don’t know. Maybe their paths crossed. Maybe to hurt Ben’s business. Who knows.” My body tensed. “Did Frank give him a bad review?”
“That’s it!” Poppa appeared in the back of the yard with one of Duke’s balls near his feet. Duke was bouncing around, wanting Poppa to throw his ball.
I gulped and prayed Poppa wouldn’t throw it. Duke already looked like he had a head worm or something, bouncing and barking at the air—at least from Finn’s standpoint.
“You can check out all the reviews Frank did. Anyone could find out where Frank was and kill him. There was no forced entry into the inn’s room. Whoever it was, he opened the door. They fed him. He had to trust them enough to eat their food,” Poppa said. He kicked the ball with his toe just enough to make Duke lunge for it.
“Is Duke okay?” Finn asked. “He’s acting so weird.”
“He’s fine. Just been cooped up all day.” I glanced at Poppa with an uneasy glare. “Another thing. How well did Ben know Mundy? Did Mundy and Frank know each other? Frank did let the killer in. He ate the food. I don’t eat anyone’s food I don’t trust.”
“I don’t eat anyone’s food if I haven’t seen their kitchen.” He surprised me.
“Really?” My thoughts darted to my kitchen, which happened to be a mess right now. “Speaking of food, I thought that maybe you and I could grab a bite to eat after the meeting.”
He grabbed another bag of trash and opened it.
“That was a mess.” He set the first bag of trash aside.
“While we look through the trash, we can listen to the first time Camille was interviewed at the scene. Maybe she said something that would point to Mundy as the killer,” I suggested, because sometimes we did miss key evidence the first time. I dragged off my gloves and took the tape recorder out of my bag.
I pushed the play button. Camille began to tell her story from the time she was summoned to the Tattered Book and Inn.
We listened to her describe what had happened. “That’s when he stood up, grabbed his chest and fell to the ground.” She huffed a few times. “I think I’m going to be sick.”
“That’s when she went to the bathroom and got sick,” I told Finn. The recording should’ve stopped there and gone to his interview with her, but it didn’t.
The sound of paper came through the recorder. Finn and I both stopped.
“What’s that?” he asked.
“I have no idea. I thought I stopped recording after she went to the bathroom, because I think you came in after that.” I stopped talking to him when I heard my voice.
“There is nothing here that says Mama did him in.” My voice sounded very nervous. “I shouldn’t’ve ignored her behavior like I did.”
There was a long pause before my big mouth started yapping again.
“I can keep the review and shred it. I can flush the pot pie or throw it in my bag. No one will immediately know he was eating it. Though Max will find it in his belly. It’ll buy us time to get her a lawyer. A real lawyer, not Wally Lamb.”
Shock flew threw me, and with the dirty gloves on, I reached over to grab the tape recorder.
“What was that?” Finn stood up and took the recorder before I could get it.
“It’s not what you think.” I shook my head and pulled the gloves off my hands. “I was just out of my head. Thinking out loud.”
My words sounded really bad. It was when I’d been talking to Poppa after Camille had run to the bathroom. It sounded like I was going to hide all of the evidence
against Mama. Very illegal, especially for a sheriff. Something I could go to jail for a long time for.
“You were going to hide evidence?” The look on Finn’s face told me that he was upset and in disbelief.
“No.” I reached out and put my hand on his arm. He jerked away and stood up.
“It sure sounded like it to me.” His lips were open. His chest heaved up and down.
“I thought about it.” The words rushed out of my mouth as I defended myself. My integrity. “I didn’t do it.”
“Thinking about it is almost as bad as actually doing it.” His words stung. “What happens next time you think about it and follow through?”
“Are you serious?” My brows crunched as I watched him shove his hands in his pockets, along with the tape recorder.
“I’m dead serious, Kenni. You’re the sheriff in this town. You are the accountable one. Maybe you shouldn’t be on this case.”
There was a look of distrust and disgust on his face I’d never seen.
“You can’t see the facts clearly. That’s all I’m saying. You’ve spent the better part of this investigation looking for ways to clear your mama, not trying to find the real killer.” His words stung, but he was right. “I’m going to get ready for the meeting. I’ll see you there.”
He gave me a quick kiss on the top of my head before he left. I could tell he was shocked and upset that I would’ve even thought about withholding evidence.
“You’re human. She’s your mama,” Poppa reminded me.
Chapter Seventeen
“Are you sore at me?” Poppa hung on to the handle grip on the roof of the Jeep as I took the corner of Main and Oak on my way to the council meeting.
Duke’s head hung out the window. He gave a few low barks as we passed by people walking on the sidewalk who seemed to be taking advantage of the wonderful spring night.
“What on earth would give you that idea?” I asked Poppa with a sour tone.
“You are driving a little erratically and...”
I interrupted, “You know what? I’m mad at me. I’m mad at me because I know better than to talk to you outside of the confines of my...um...our house.”
My nerves felt like a bundle of live wires. Finn thinking I’d withhold evidence really upset me.
“Finn thinks that my morals have been compromised because of the conversation I had with you. I’m mad at myself for letting my guard down.” I looked over at Poppa. “At some point I’ve got to tell Finn that I can see you.”
“I’m not so sure that’d be good,” Poppa said. “Then he’d really think you couldn’t do your job.”
“I love that you and I continue to solve crimes, but I can’t let Finn think I’d do something illegal,” I said.
“You didn’t do something illegal. A thought’s not illegal, or we’d all be in jail for wishing someone dead,” he joked. When I didn’t laugh, he said, “You only thought about it. Though Deputy Vincent seems to be taking the moral high ground, the law is based on evidence, not what he believes.”
I parked the Jeep behind Jolee’s food truck. Duke ran up to her side door and gave a loud bark to let her know he was there, and like every other time, she opened the door with a tasty treat in her hand for him.
“Hey there.” She greeted me with a hot cup of coffee. “Things sure have taken a strange turn since I went to help Ben.”
“What do you mean?” I took a sip, looking around to make sure no one was around.
“Business has been booming. I told him that I had to do my food truck tonight and left him swamped. He even hired two new bus boys. Can you believe it?” She smiled. “I got my old Ben back.”
“That’s great.” I brought the hot coffee to my lips. It was a much-welcomed salve for my troubled soul.
Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Finn walking into the basement through the door located at the side of Luke’s house.
“I have to head up to the mall tomorrow. Do you want to go?” Jolee asked.
“I can’t. I’ve got to check out some leads,” I said.
Mundy was on my mind. I needed to get his history and fast. I also hoped Tom Geary would get back to me with some preliminary results from the items from Chef Mundy’s room at the inn. “I better get inside.” I turned and headed toward the door.
The crowd outside of Luke Jones’s house had made its way into the basement. Cottonwood didn’t have a traditional town-council room to meet in. Though we had a small courthouse, it was only used for things like car titles and taxes. It just had a small courtroom that wouldn’t hold all the citizens that came to the council meetings. Most of the council meetings were about upcoming events and the budgets. Mayor Ryland loved to talk, and people came because they wanted to hear any gossip going on around town.
“You don’t want to go in there.” Poppa ghosted next to me and Duke. “They’re planning to pull you off the case.”
“What?” I jerked around and looked at him. “How could Mayor Ryland do that without telling me?”
“Shhh.” Poppa put his finger up to his lips. “You didn’t call him back like you said you were going to,” Poppa reminded me.
I glared at him, my eyes narrowed. It looks like I made my own bed and now it was time to lie in it, like the old saying went.
“There’s not much you can do about it now. You’ve got to go in there and be smart. Remember not to let your mouth override your tail.” He shook that finger at me. “It might not be a bad thing to get pulled.”
He was right. I had to go in there levelheaded and listen. Not fly off the handle.
“How so?” I questioned him.
“You could do more snooping around and really dig deep without that uniform on.” Poppa did teach me the trick that people talked more when I had on street clothes and not the official sheriff uniform.
The theater had been transformed from full of comfy couches to full of the rickety old fold-out chairs that formed rows facing the front of the room. The movie screen had been rolled up to the ceiling and replaced by a wooden podium where Mayor Ryland would preside over the meeting. Too bad the popcorn machine had been put away. I’d have gotten a bag and thrown pieces at the mayor as he tried to pull me off the case.
Mayor Ryland was bent over by the podium whispering into Finn’s ear. His slicked-back salt-and-pepper hair was perfectly coiffed. His jaw tensed underneath his manscaped goatee as he spoke. His eyes swept up past the heads of the citizens sitting in the chairs and focused on me. His lips moved quickly before he stood up and tugged down the edges of his suit coat. Finn took a step back and turned his head, looking straight at me. Our eyes met. He mouthed “I’m sorry.”
He closed his eyes and when he opened them, he focused on something else in the room. I sucked in a deep breath, pulled back my shoulders, and took the first step into the lion’s den.
Too bad Duke had no idea he was trotting into enemy lines. He accepted every single head pat on our way up the middle aisle to find my seat right next to Finn.
“You aren’t going to like what the mayor is going to propose.” Finn had enough decency to think he was warning me.
“Finn.” I gave one of my best southern grins. Poppa’s head popped over Finn’s shoulder. He had a big grin on his face too. “I’m not the new face around here. You are. I’ve seen what Chance does when things don’t go his way. I’ve borne the brunt of his dislike for a few years now, so I’m sure he’s going to suggest I be taken off the case.”
“Because of your mama.” Poppa nodded. He knew what they’d said from his ghostly eavesdropping.
“Because my mama is tied to the investigation,” I repeated.
“And because you don’t have the right mindset to remain unbiased,” Poppa continued.
“Because he thinks I don’t have the right mindset to remain unbiased.” I kept my eyes on Finn and my peripheral visi
on on Poppa.
“He also thinks Finn needs to distance himself from you and Finn should run against you for sheriff in next year’s election.” Poppa’s words stung me more than Finn thinking I’d done something to damage the badge I wore so proudly.
“Not to mention,” my voice cracked, “he wants you to distance yourself from me personally so you can run against me in the election.”
It was no secret that Mayor Ryland wasn’t my number-one fan. But I couldn’t please everyone.
“Kenni,” Finn put his hand on my knee, “I’d never...”
“Order!” Mayor Ryland banged the gavel on the wood podium. “Good citizens of Cottonwood, it’s time to bring things to order.”
“Kenni,” Finn whispered. “You know that’ll never happen.”
I offered a weak smile. Finn truly was amazing, and even though I was in a tight spot, I knew I was very lucky to have him on my side.
“We called this emergency meeting,” Mayor Ryland spoke after the crowd hushed, “because it’s come to my attention,” he looked directly at Finn, “that Sheriff Lowry is in a very compromising position given the nature of the suspects in our latest murder.”
The gasp of the citizens behind me broke the polite silence in the room, forcing Mayor Ryland to bang the gavel again.
Come to his attention? I wiggled my foot around as it dangled from my crossed legs. I tried to remind myself that it was a strange position to be in, but I knew I could keep the case from my personal life. Chance was probably right. The town wouldn’t see it that way. It was going to be interesting to see how this all played out.
“I’m sorry, Sheriff.” Chance offered an insincere apology. The smirk on his face was all too familiar to me. “We,” he gestured to the council members sitting behind him that included Myrna Savage, Peter Parker, Ruby Smith, and Doolittle Bowman, “feel it’s best that Deputy Vincent take the lead in the case since your number-one suspect is Vivian Lowry, the sheriff’s mother.”