by Kate Bell
“I appreciate your cooperation, Mr. Gallo. I’ll be in touch,” Alec said and I heard him turn and head for the door.
“Hey! Hey, I didn’t do nothin’ to that freak!” Rudy called after him.
Alec didn’t answer him. I heard the bell over the door tinkle and I knew Alec was gone. Now I had the problem of getting out of there without Rudy remembering I had been here and had heard the whole thing.
I heard Rudy muttering and heard his shuffling footsteps receding. I realized he was heading for the storeroom, so I tip-toed toward the front door. I peeked around a display and the coast was clear, so I made a run for the door and was out before Rudy remembered I was in there.
Alec was still sitting in his car, so I got in the passenger side and closed the door. “So what do you think?”
“I think there’s definitely something there. It looks like the girl was telling the truth and Rudy does seem to have a temper,” he said calmly gazing at the side door of Rudy’s shop.
“Sounds like it to me, too,” I said. “I think he did it.”
“You always think everyone did it,” he said, glancing at me.
“We haven’t got any other suspects, so it seems like a good guess to me.”
“That’s true, but I try not to rely too heavily on guesses,” he said.
“Where to now?” I asked.
“I am going to interview George Dillard and see if he really hated Todd as much as Jane Marshall said he did,” he answered.
“Great! Two interrogations in one day,” I said.
“And you can’t come long,” he said.
“Awe,” I said, crestfallen. “Oh, but you know, I do need to get some Pepsi,” I said brightening. “I heard it’s on sale at the Gas and Go.”
Alec sighed, and I got out of his car and got into mine.
Chapter Eighteen
The Gas and Go’s gas tanks were roped off in yellow tape and a big moving truck was parked in front of the store. It looked like George Dillard hadn’t been able to get a loan to fix them after all. I usually bought gas at the station on Cypress, and I hadn’t been over on this side of town in a while.
I parked on the far side of the building, and Alec followed me over and parked beside me.
“Doesn’t look good,” I said, getting out of my car.
“Sure doesn’t,” he agreed, and we walked into the store together.
It was shocking to see almost empty shelves. A handful of people milled about, picking through the leftovers.
“Why are all the cans dented?” a little old lady asked, holding up a can of peaches with its side nearly caved in.
“That’s the way it came,” replied the freckled face kid that was leaning on the register. He didn’t look old enough to be out of school and working and I wondered if he was George’s kid.
“I don’t think that’s true,” the older lady muttered, and put the can back on the shelf.
I spotted George leaning against a wall, watching a man in a Pepsi uniform unplug a Pepsi refrigerator.
I nodded at Alec and motioned toward George.
Alec headed toward him. “Mr. Dillard?” he asked. I followed along behind him, hoping I wouldn’t be noticed and told not to come along.
George looked at him, assessing. “Ayup,” he finally said.
“Mr. Dillard, I’m Detective Blanchard, may I have a few words with you?”
George shrugged, but still leaned against the wall. I stepped forward. “George, I didn’t know you were going out of business.”
Alec glanced at me, but didn’t say anything.
He snorted. “Neither did I. But apparently when you don’t pass inspection and your tanks are leaking, you lose your license to sell gas. Without tanks, there isn’t much point in a gas station.”
“Oh, I’m sorry,” I said. I knew George from around town. I really couldn’t remember when the first time was that I had met him.
“Mr. Dillard, did you know Todd Spellman?” Alec asked.
George swore up a blue streak and then spit on the floor. Todd seemed to have that effect on people.
“Yeah, I knew him. And if you ask me, he got what he had comin’. This town is better off without him,” he said.
The Pepsi man suddenly got in a hurry to put the refrigerator on his hand truck and get it out of the store. He nearly hit a store shelf on his way out.
Alec had the notebook out. “Those are rather strong words, Mr. Dillard. Would you care to elaborate on why you feel that way?”
“Oh, come on! Everyone knows Todd Spellman was a backstabber. He would come on all friendly to you and tell you to come down and get a loan to expand your business. Then, he goes and tells the loan department at the bank not to give you the loan!” George’s face had quickly turned a bright shade of red and I could see where Jane Marshall had been concerned that he might have a stroke when he had gotten into an argument with Todd at the bank.
“I see. Mr. Dillard, did you ever see Todd Spellman on a personal basis? Did you ever go to his home?” Alec asked, scribbling in his notebook and not looking up at him.
“Oh, yeah, sure. He had a barbecue for business owners a while back. He kept talking up all the good deeds he did. Always talking about charitable contributions he was making. Then he tried to get everyone to give him money for some charity he was starting up. Had the nerve to ask for one thousand dollars from everyone in the room!”
“What kind of charity?” I asked. I knew Todd had been involved in all sorts of civic endeavors and had even organized a March of Dimes Walk several years ago, but that was all I was aware of.
“Oh, he had some highfalutin name for it. Something like Peace Keepers of Maine or something stupid like that. He planned to raise all this money and then distribute it to different charities. His plan was to get local business owners to donate and then he would advertise the business owners that did. But if you wanted to be included, you had to give big on a regular basis,” he said and snorted. “Distribute it! Sure, that’s how he paid for that new BMW!”
I glanced at Alec. Todd had bought a new BMW several weeks before he died. It looked like it was top of the line and I had wondered how he managed to pay for it the first time I saw it. I hadn’t given it another thought after that.
“Did many business owners decide to contribute?” Alec asked.
George shrugged. “I don’t know. Some of them weren’t too happy about what he was asking for. One thousand to start it off, then five hundred a month to stay included. I said no thanks. Then I had the inspection and went for the loan and was turned down. It doesn’t take a genius to know why.”
“Why didn’t you go to another bank and get a loan?” I asked.
He sighed heavily. “Because. My credit is crap. I already had one loan on the business and I was late on a couple of payments. Maybe a few. But I tell you, it ain’t right to extort money and tell people it’s for charity and spend it on yourself.”
“Mr. Dillard, do you have anything to add as far as Todd Spellman’s death? Maybe you’ve heard something around town?” Alec asked.
He shook his head. “No. But whoever done it, done us all a favor.”
Alec watched him for a few moments, thinking. “It’s rumored that someone broke out all of Todd Spellman’s windows in his house. You wouldn’t happen to know who did that, would you?”
George smiled big. “Are you asking if I did it? No. I didn’t do it. But if I had known someone was going over there to do it, I would have gladly gone along to help.”
“All right, thank you for your time,” Alec said. “I’ll be in touch.”
“Sorry for your trouble, George,” I said as I turned to leave.
“Ah, it ain’t nothin’. I’ll pick up and start over somewhere else. I guess with my track record with money, it was bound to happen.”
“I’m sorry just the same,” I said and followed Alec out.
We leaned up against my car, out of sight of the store windows. “Well, he didn’t hold anything
back,” I said.
“It doesn’t appear that he did. Right now, it looks like we’ve got two people that had motive to kill Todd Spellman,” he said thoughtfully.
“I still have to wonder about that phone call I got. Connie wasn’t very friendly when I brought cookies to her. It just makes me wonder,” I said.
“Connie Sutton didn’t want your cookies?” Alec asked with one eyebrow cocked.
“I don’t know what her problem was. I was just being neighborly. They had a bunch of boxes with paperwork lying around the living room.”
“Well, I would imagine they have a lot to sort through,” he said, being pragmatic again.
“I guess so,” I relented. “What’s next?”
“What’s next is that you are going to stay out of trouble,” he said.
“Hey, what about checking at the lumber yard to see if anyone bought lumber for a deer stand?” I asked.
He chuckled. “It’s deer season. How many people do you think have done that and actually went hunting deer and not people? And besides, the lumber was old.”
“Sorry, I forgot. I guess it’s pointless to see how many deer rifles were sold then?” I said, already knowing the answer.
“I would imagine so,” he said.
“Oh, I almost forgot! We’re having dinner at Lucy’s tonight at six. Pick me up?”
“Sure,” he said. “Sounds like a plan.”
Chapter Nineteen
Alec had one hand on the steering wheel and one hand in mine as we drove over to Lucy’s. I thought I would never be this happy again. It had been such a short time since we met, but I felt as if we had always known each other.
“You know what I want to do for Christmas?” I asked him.
“What?”
“Take a trip to Alabama to introduce you to my mama,” I said, looking at him. I fought back the thoughts that said I was rushing things. I wasn’t. And I knew it.
“Really?” he asked, glancing at me.
“Yes. Really. We’ll take the kids. It’s been a couple of years since Thad has gone. I’ll show you the kitchen where my grandmama taught me to bake pies and the lake where my older brother taught me to fish.”
He smiled, eyes on the road. “That sounds like fun.”
“I think you’ll like it there. We’ll have to teach you to say ya’ll,” I said.
“Well, I can’t wait for that,” he said. “And why is it that you always say your grandmama taught you to bake pies, and not your mother? Certainly she must have taught you some of what you know.”
“Nope. Not a thing. Well, I take that back,” I said. “She did teach me to catch lightning bugs and put them in a jar. That’s important, you know.”
He chuckled. “Indeed, it is. But why didn’t she teach you to bake?”
“Because she couldn’t. Every now and then she would give it a try, but her crust always came out hard as concrete and her fillings were usually mush. One time she tried to make a lemon merengue pie, and she put so much cornstarch in it the filling had a texture similar to rubber. She couldn’t get the egg whites stiff enough to make a meringue, so she skipped that part. It was probably safer for all of us that way.”
“So, don’t let your mother make Christmas dinner?” he asked.
“She can cook better than anyone I know. It’s the baking she never was able to master. Grandmama said the baking gene had skipped her and was passed right on down to me.”
“Well, I have to agree. You did get the baking gene. Even with all the running I’ve been doing, I’ve still managed to gain four pounds in the past month. Can’t you make fat free pies?” he asked, pulling into Lucy’s driveway.
“Bite your tongue! That’s an abomination!”
“I’m sure it is,” he said and chuckled.
He parked the car, and we headed to the front door. It had rained earlier in the day and Lucy’s front yard was a mess with all the mud. The rain had brought warmer temperatures, and I was enjoying it.
“Hey, there you guys are,” Lucy said, opening the door for us. Her house was warm and cozy. She had spent most of her paychecks on cute decorative items from the flower shop where she worked. Scented candles were placed in every nook and cranny, and floral arrangements adorned nearly every flat surface. Diana Bowen had helped her to decorate before she had been murdered and I regretted not having her come to my house to help me.
“Hi, Ed, how are you doing?” I asked Lucy’s husband. He sat on the sofa, with a football game on the television.
He looked up from the game, his ample body spread out on the sofa. “Hello, Allie. It’s good to see you. Alec, would you like a drink?”
“No, thank you. I’m driving,” he said. “Who’s winning?” he asked, nodding at the television.
He shrugged. “I don’t know. I never watch football, but Lucy tells me it’s un-American not to, so I thought I’d try it.”
Alec glanced at me and I gave him a slight shrug of my shoulders. Ed was one of a kind. You never knew what was going to come out of his mouth.
“Dinner’s almost ready,” Lucy said, as we all took a seat in the living room. “I made roast chicken.”
“It smells wonderful,” I said.
“So, Alec, tell me, did you ever find out who killed Todd Spellman?” Ed asked.
“No, we’re still investigating,” Alec answered, and reached for a pretzel in a bowl on the coffee table.
“Well, it doesn’t really matter. That Todd Spellman was one of the most hated people in town. He had it coming,” Ed said matter-of-factly.
“Wait, how do you know that?” Lucy asked.
He shrugged. “I thought everyone knew that? He swindled a bunch of people seven or eight years ago when he started up his own investment company. But he never got caught because he sold IRAs and invested them in places that a lot of people thought were just plain foolish. He got away with it though. One thing he did know how to do, and that was cover himself.”
“Why have you never mentioned this?” Lucy asked, wide-eyed. I had never heard any of this before, so I was pretty wide-eyed about it, too.
“Like I said, I thought everyone knew. A group of people went to a lawyer to see if they could sue, but the lawyer looked over the paperwork and said there wasn’t anything that could be done.”
“Well, it seems like you might have mentioned it when you knew Todd had been murdered,” Lucy said. She was starting to get cross with him and I hoped they didn’t start arguing.
“Who lost money?” Alec spoke up.
“Well, if I remember, Sam Bailey, Diana Bowen, oh, and his own sister,” Ed said. “I don’t know who else. I heard no one really invested large amounts, but still. Who has so much money that they don’t mind losing some of it?”
“Sam Bailey? The chief of police?” Alec asked.
“The one and only,” Ed said.
Alec looked at me.
“Wow,” I said.
“Wow is right,” he replied.
“I wonder why I hadn’t heard about it?” I asked.
“Probably happened right around the time your husband passed away,” Lucy pointed out. “That would have been around that time, it sounds like.”
“That’s true. I wasn’t aware of much for a long time after that,” I said.
I could only imagine what Alec was thinking right then. He got quiet and didn’t say much else and within a few minutes, Ed and he were interested in the game.
“I think dinner is about ready,” Lucy said, and we went in to the kitchen to get it ready to be served.
“Sorry about Ed,” she said when we were alone. “I don’t know about him sometimes. You would have thought he would have mentioned something about Todd being the most hated person in town when he was murdered.”
“It must have slipped his mind or something. I have to say, Todd certainly has turned out to be a surprise to me.”
“You can say that again,” she said.
I hoped Alec figured out who was Todd’s murderer and
soon. The deeper we dug, the more dirt we found.
Chapter Twenty
The warmer temperatures were sticking around and Alec and I decided we needed to take advantage of it by running outside while we could. The sun was out, and it felt good to be outside, stretching my legs and breathing the clean air in.
We had gone five miles and were near the end of the running trail when I heard it. It was a whistling sound, and I had a flashback to the Turkey Trot. I screamed and hit the ground. I felt the cold mud as my body landed, and it flew up in my face.
Alec looked over his shoulder, wide-eyed.
“What’s wrong?” he asked, running to my side.
Then I heard it again and something hit the mud on the side of the trail and it flew into the air.
“Get up, Allie! Get up and run!” Alec screamed. He grabbed my arm, jerking me to my feet. The whistling sound came again, and I heard it hit the ground somewhere close.
“Alec,” I managed to get out.
“Come on, run!” he said, still holding on to my arm. He pulled me toward some trees and I heard more whistling sounds and tree bark flew off a nearby tree.
There was a large round oak tree, and we hid behind it. Alec was dialing his phone and looking around the tree.
“This is Detective Blanchard, we need backup near the five-mile marker of the running trail. Shots fired. Repeat, shots fired.”
He hung up and peered around the tree again.
“Don’t do that!” I cried, pulling him back.
“I need to see if I can spot him,” he said, and leaned forward again.
We were both breathing hard and my heart felt like it would explode. We were five miles away from Alec’s car and gun. The trail ran out of town, so no houses or businesses were near.
“What do we do?” I whispered, and began crying.
“Shh,” he said without looking at me.
I heard sirens in the distance and whispered a prayer of thanks. I hoped they got here in time. There was silence around us, but I didn’t think the shooter was gone. I hoped he wouldn’t pop up on the other side of us and shoot us both dead.