“What about?” Celia snapped. “That stupid restraining order?”
“Yes, ma’am,” Savannah replied. “That’s a real good guess.”
“It wasn’t all that hard to figure out. It’s the most ridiculous thing in the world, and I’m sick to death of hearing about it. After all that woman did to me, I’m the one who gets an order of protection filed against her? Get real!”
Dirk pointed to a wrought iron bench that was strategically situated to take in the view of a statue of a woman in a long dress, holding hands with a child ... no doubt the founder of the school. “Would you like to sit down and—”
“No, I would most certainly not like to sit down. I’m on a break, the only break I get from these screaming brats all morning long, and I’m not going to spend it talking to you about some perceived threat I made toward that stupid bitch.”
“Actually,” Savannah said, “I’m more interested in hearing what she did to you.”
Yeah, right, she thought. Toxic dumping ground, that’s me. Lay it on me.
“Oh, well ... in that case ...” Celia took a deep breath, and Savannah braced herself for the onslaught. “I don’t know where to begin. Madeline Aberson is the wedding planner from hell! Don’t let anybody that you know hire her! She totally ruined our day for us. It was a disaster because of her, and she won’t even own up to it, let alone apologize!”
“Could you be more specific?” Savannah asked ... knowing she could and would.
“Oh, sure. First of all, she didn’t even show up on our wedding day. I didn’t see her face or get as much as a phone call from her. Come to find out, she’d booked two weddings at the same time. I guess the other one meant more to her than mine.”
“Okay. That’s very unprofessional of her. What else?”
“Our flowers never arrived! She booked the vendor and placed the order, but she owed them a fortune, and they refused to deliver. My husband’s father ran to the grocery store at the last minute and bought some supermarket roses, or my bridesmaids and I would’ve been empty-handed walking down the aisle.”
“Ouch.”
“And the hotel where she’d booked us for our first night together, before we took off for Cabo? We arrived only to find it was closed for remodeling! She should have known that! We had to spend our first night as husband and wife at my mother-in-law’s!”
“Whoa, that’s a bite in the butt!” Savannah said, forgetting, for a moment, her own wedding catastrophes.
“No kidding. And she never returned the money to us either. No matter how many times I called her. That’s the so-called ‘harassment’ that she accused me of to get that restraining order. I was just calling to tell her she’d better at least pay me what she owed me, or I’d sue her. What’s ‘harassing’ about that?”
Dirk cleared his throat. “Um ... I read the order. It says you made threats of physical violence against her.”
Celia shrugged. “I might have casually mentioned in passing that if she didn’t fork over the cash, I was going to kick her ass so hard that it’d be up between her shoulder blades.”
Nodding, Savannah said, “Yep. That’d be it.”
“It was just a colorful figure of speech.”
Savannah chuckled. “I’m from the South, so I understand all about colorful figures of speech, but can you see how Ms. Aberson and the court construed that as a threat?”
“I guess. But what the heck are you here for? I haven’t gone near her or called her or contacted her in any way since I was served that paper telling me not to.”
“We’re working a case,” Dirk told her. “And we’re here to ask you where you were last Saturday afternoon.”
“Why?”
“You answer my question, and maybe I’ll answer yours,” he told her.
She seemed to think for a moment. “Let’s see ... Saturday afternoon. ... My fianc—I mean, my husband—and I had just returned from our honeymoon. I guess I was home unpacking and doing laundry.”
“Can anybody verify that?” Dirk asked.
“No. Not really. My husband was already back at work. It was just me and the dogs there at home. Why? Why does it matter where I was?”
“Because we’re trying to rule you out as a suspect.”
“A suspect for what?” She looked at Dirk, then at Savannah.
“Madeline,” Savannah said simply.
“What about Madeline?” An ugly, most unladylike grin spread across Celia’s face. “Don’t tell me ... somebody actually did kick her butt up between her shoulder blades.”
“No,” Savannah said.
Celia looked deeply disappointed. “Oh, damn.”
Savannah watched her closely when she said, “But they did stab her between the shoulder blades. Three times.”
Celia Barnhart-Wynn’s face suddenly turned as white as the shirts her students wore. “Oh,” she said. “Oh, wow.”
Savannah nodded solemnly. “Oh, yeah.”
Later, they left Celia to return to her teacher’s assistant duties, and as they walked back to the car, Savannah said, “Can you believe a person that hostile takes care of children? Scary thought.”
“Do you think she killed Madeline?” Dirk asked.
“I don’t know, but one thing’s for sure ... she certainly had motive. Listening to her story, I was wanting to kill Madeline for her.”
Dirk sighed as he opened the Buick’s passenger door for Savannah. “You know, it’s a lot easier when the victim’s a nice person without an enemy in the world.”
“Except one.”
“Yeah, except one. It’s a lot easier to catch a murderer if the whole damned state didn’t want them dead.”
Once again, Savannah and Dirk were driving along the winding streets through Spirit Hills, the posh community where Savannah intended to live when she grew up someday.
That was also the day when she won the lottery, the Miss America Pageant, and married Prince Charming.
“Oh, yeah,” she told Dirk. “I’m going to have to revise my life plan. You’ve thrown a monkey wrench into the works.”
“What?” he said. “Are you talking to yourself again?”
“Of course not. I never talk to myself. You’re the one who does that.”
“What were you saying about your life plan?”
“Only that I’d intended to grow up and marry a prince, so you’re messing up my plans.”
“I feel really bad about that.”
He didn’t look the least bit remorseful. In fact, he was giving her a little smirk that made her want to whack him and kiss him at the same time.
“How about just a prince of a guy?” he said. “A man among men. A studly stud. A hunk, a hunk of burnin’ love.”
“Whose good looks and virility are surpassed only by his humility.”
“Yeah, something like that.”
“Okay, I guess you’ll do.”
“Gee, thanks.”
“Prince Charming’s horse probably broke down on the way here.”
“Threw a shoe on the Golden State Freeway.”
“Yeah, something like that.”
They had arrived at Odelle Peters’s house just in time to see an enormous truck backing into the driveway.
“Uh-oh,” Savannah said. “Moving day.”
“That’s rough.” He pulled the Buick to the curb across the street from the house. “Moving’s tough enough, even under the best of circumstances... .”
“Like when you’re moving from a trailer into your new wife’s cute little house?”
“Exactly. But to lose your house like that ... I don’t particularly like this gal, but I feel for her.”
“A lot of people are in her shoes these days,” Savannah said sadly. “I feel for all of them.”
They got out of the car and walked up to the front door, which was standing wide open. Dozens of cardboard boxes were stacked in the foyer.
Farther inside the house, Savannah could see still more boxes and pieces of furniture swaddled in padded covers
.
A couple of burly fellows had begun to carry the cardboard boxes out to the truck.
“You be careful with that stuff!” Savannah and Dirk heard Odelle shout from several rooms away. “Those are valuable antiques, and don’t think I won’t sue your boss to kingdom come if you break anything!”
A moment later she came stomping out of a room toward the rear of the house and into the entryway. “Hey, that’s a mirror you’ve got there, buddy, and you’d better—”
She caught sight of Savannah and Dirk and stopped abruptly. The cross look on her face deepened into something akin to loathing.
“You two again?” she snapped. “I thought we’d already said all we needed to say to each other.”
“Do you know a Celia Barnhart-Wynn?” Dirk asked without bothering to exchange any mundane pleasantries.
Savannah agreed it was the right move. Odelle didn’t seem to be in a “pleasantries” sort of mood.
“Of course I know her!” she returned. “She’s one of the reasons I had to sell my house! I had to settle up with her, and at least half a dozen of Madeline’s other highly dissatisfied customers.”
“But why is that?” Savannah asked. “If they were her customers and not yours ...”
“We were partners, remember? And when she started to go downhill, I couldn’t get our assets untangled fast enough. She brought me down with her.”
“I’m sorry,” Savannah said, sincerely meaning it. She’d seen too many people dragged under by their associations with the wrong people.
It seemed so unfair. But then, many things seemed unfair. The older she got, the more she was pretty certain that the whole concept of “fair” was a hoax played on children, like Santa and the Tooth Fairy, only minus the magic and fun. The world wasn’t a fair place, and to expect it to be only ensured disappointment.
“We just went to see Celia Barnhart,” Savannah told her. “She has a lot of hatred for Madeline, blames her for ruining her wedding.”
“Oh, pleeez. Celia’s no different from any other spoiled, impossible-to-please bridezilla.”
“Impossible to please? Madeline never even showed at the wedding. Celia had no flowers. No hotel room for her honeymoon night. That goes beyond just being spoiled, now doesn’t it?”
Odelle walked past them to an oversized antique vase that was only half wrapped in padding. She began to tug the cover around it, securing it with a stretchy cord.
“Sure, Madeline was getting sloppy and Celia Barnhart probably didn’t get all she paid for,” she said, “but still ... You have no idea what we put up with in this business. There are a lot of controlling, nasty women out there, and when they’re about to get married, it all comes to the surface. They bark and expect everybody to jump. They tell you they want one thing and then throw a temper tantrum when you get it for them and they don’t like it quite as much as they thought they would.”
“It’s a lot of stress, putting a wedding together,” Savannah said, feeling the need to stand up for her sister brides everywhere.
“Yes, and a lot of that stress can come from indecisive, bossy brides. Celia Barnhart’s one of them.”
“Do you think she’d hurt Madeline?”
Odelle shrugged and walked over to a wall niche that held a beautiful bronze statue of a mermaid combing her hair with a sea shell. Lovingly, as though attending a baby, she started to wrap it as well.
“I suppose she could have. I don’t know. Does she have an alibi?”
“Sort of,” Savannah said. “Not a very solid one.”
“Well, then, I guess you’d better keep her on your short list, huh?” Odelle paused, ran her fingers through her hair, and then wiped her hand across her face, as though refusing to see what was abundantly clear ... herself moving out of her beloved home.
“We’ll leave you alone now, Ms. Peters,” Dirk said. “Thank you for your time ... and I’m sorry about your home.”
Odelle gave him a mildly surprised look, as though not expecting comfort from that quarter. “Okay,” she said. “I appreciate that.”
“I’m going to be moving soon myself,” he told her.
“I hope you’re moving up in the world, not down, the way I am.”
Dirk gave Savannah a sweet smile and said, “Oh, I am. I most certainly am.”
“Then you’re a lucky man,” Odelle told him.
“Oh, you have no idea how lucky.”
Chapter 17
“Do you really have to do this?” Dirk asked Savannah as they pulled up in front of her house. “You can come back to the trailer with me and hide out.”
“I do. I really do. They’re my family, and they’ve come all this way to visit me. I can’t keep avoiding them forever,” she replied, staring at her yard, which was littered with toys. Her hedge was draped with a Minnie Mouse beach towel. Her bougainvillea had sprouted a pair of Mickey ears. A couple of Toy Story dolls were lying in the middle of her lawn. She wasn’t sure if Woody and Jessie were doing something naughty or wrestling.
Dirk noticed her looking over the carnage. He shook his head. “Did it occur to Vidalia when she let the kids buy all that stuff that she’s going to have a helluva time getting it all into a suitcase when she goes home?”
“She won’t bother,” Savannah replied. “I’ll be the one packing it into cardboard boxes and standing in line at the post office to mail it back to them.”
He reached over and took her hand. “Has it ever dawned on you ... um ... how can I put this nicely ... that you do a bit too much for your family?”
“You mean, has it ever occurred to me that I’m a doormat, an enabler of bad behavior, a flunky, and a pushover?”
“That would about sum it up.”
Savannah rolled her eyes. “Of course it has. I’ve read the self-help books about setting boundaries and all that good stuff. I may be codependent as hell, but I’m not stupid or ill-informed.”
“Then why do you do it?”
Savannah thought about it a long time before answering. It was a good question and deserved an honest answer. “It isn’t what people think. It’s not because I’m too weak to stand up for myself.”
“Knowing you, that never occurred to me.”
“I guess more than anything else, it’s a habit ... a habit that started years and years ago, and I’ve never changed it. When I was little, my mom was always saying, ‘Watch the kids, fetch Vidalia a bottle, change Macon’s diaper, get Waycross out of that mud puddle before he drowns hisself.’ And, of course, if I didn’t watch them close enough, and they got into trouble—which was bound to happen ten times a day with so many of them—I’d get a whoopin’.”
Dirk was quiet for a long time. And when she turned to look at him, she saw what could only be described as fury on his face. And tears in his eyes.
“Your mother brought all these kids into the world and then made a child take care of them? And she gave you beatings when you didn’t do it to suit her?”
“Wasn’t exactly beatings. Just your old-fashioned hide tanning.”
“Did it leave marks?”
“Are you kidding? After she took a switch to the back of my legs, I’d have to wear knee socks for weeks. You’d be surprised the sort of bruises and welts a hickory switch can raise.”
He gently squeezed her hand and said softly, “Savannah, that’s a beating. A felony. How many times have we hauled a guy outta his house in cuffs for doing way less than that to his old lady ... a grown woman, not a kid?”
“I never thought of it that way,” she said. “I guess if it’s your parent doing it, it’s just a spanking.”
“If a stranger did that to someone’s child, everybody would be up in arms about it. He’d be arrested on the spot. So, if it’s your parent leaving bruises on you—the person whose job it is to protect you from harm—and not a stranger on the street, that makes it worse, not better. Acting like it’s okay just adds insult to injury.”
They sat in silence for a long time as Savannah thought
over what he’d said. It was as if he had switched on a bright light inside a dark room in her soul.
He lifted her hand to his lips and kissed the back of it. “You know, baby,” he said, “times have changed. That crap’s all in the past. They aren’t kids anymore. And your mom’s sitting on a bar stool in Georgia, drinking her way into an early grave. She’s never going to hit you again.”
“No, she isn’t. Nobody’s ever going to hit me. Never again. I decided that years ago.”
“So, nobody’s going to beat you if you go in there and tell Vidalia to take care of her own kids. Or if you tell Marietta to make her own damned bologna sandwiches. Or if you tell Macon to get up off his fat ass and pick up his empty pizza boxes and soda cans.”
Savannah sat, staring at him for a long time, as his words found their way from her ears, through her brain, and down into a place much deeper.
And in that place, deep in her soul, she heard him loud and clear.
More importantly, the little girl who had been beaten because her baby brother had broken his bottle, spilling the last bit of milk in the house, heard it.
Savannah jerked the car door open, got out, and slammed it so hard that Dirk thought his windows would break.
“Uh-oh,” he muttered as he watched her storm up the sidewalk to her front door. “Hell’s broke loose in Georgia and the devil deals the cards.”
“Where’s Granny and the children?” Savannah demanded, standing in the middle of her living room and looking around at her siblings, who, from what she could tell, hadn’t budged an inch from the last time she’d seen them.
“They’re upstairs, taking naps. Butch, too,” Marietta told her without taking her eyes off the television.
“And not a minute too soon,” Vidalia said from the sofa as she flipped through her movie magazine. “I’m so tired, I’m draggin’ my tracks out, just tryin’ to corral ’em. It’s time Butch lifted a finger to be a father to those younguns.”
“Gran and the kids are upstairs? Good,” Savannah said. “Then I don’t have to watch my language none when I tell y’all what’s what.”
Buried In Buttercream Page 17