Southern Discomfort

by Caroline Fardig

  She pushed past me and went around to where I’d been watching over the fence. I wandered over to stand beside her while she peered at the burglars.

  After a moment, she whispered, “Hey, that’s our hot fish guy.”

  “The hot fish guy was old.”

  “No, the other hot fish guy. The one who was passed out drunk.”

  I nudged her out of the way and took another look. Once the man walked out of the shadows and into the light of a nearby streetlamp, I realized it was indeed the dead-drunk hot fish guy.

  I turned to Delilah. “I’ll give you three guesses what they’re going to do with all that expensive restaurant equipment.”

  My sister was deep in thought. “I wonder if Ava is how Jason got connected with the hot fish guys in the first place. She’s clearly working with them, so maybe she recommended them to him.”

  “Could be. I wonder if he’s her boyfriend, Brock. Jen told me about him earlier. He and Jason supposedly didn’t get along. But what does this have to do with Jason’s murder?”

  “Maybe nothing. You never know—”

  I sucked in a gasp and grabbed Delilah’s arm before she could finish her thought. The wail of a siren had cut through the quiet night air, and I did not want to be in sight when the cops got here. I pulled her with me down the street, running as fast as I could toward home. We finally slowed down when we got to Pulaski Square, cutting through on one of the pathways to be quickly cloaked in the darkness under the live oaks.

  We leaned against each other, exhausted from the excitement and from the day in general. Neither one of us said a word until we were inside our home. Delilah grabbed a book off the front desk and handed it to me.

  “You need to deal with this.”

  I took the book from her. It was a copy of our high school yearbook from my sophomore year, which was Tucker’s and her senior year. “I don’t get it.”

  “Looks like there’s a note between the pages.”

  I opened the book and took out the note. It said, Here’s proof of what I told you tonight. I looked down at the open page and found a picture of Tucker wearing his football uniform and a crown. The caption under the photo read, BEST DAY EVER FOR TUCKER HEYWARD. NOT ONLY DID HE MAKE THE GAME-WINNING TOUCHDOWN, HE WAS ALSO CROWNED HOMECOMING KING AND GOT HIS BRACES OFF. CONGRATS, TUCKER!

  Delilah said, “Well, what is it?”

  I shrugged. “He made a big deal at dinner out of telling me that he wasn’t at school the day of the homecoming pep rally. I guess this is the proof.” I pointed at the photo.

  “See? I told you. Does that mean you can forgive him now and move on?”

  I set the yearbook down on the front desk. “Not really. The ridiculing went on long after the pep rally. The fact that he did nothing to stop it is still a huge problem to me.”

  Delilah had suddenly become very still. “You know what? Let’s not talk about it any more tonight. It’s water under the bridge. Besides, the ridiculing stopped.”

  “No thanks to him.”

  She grimaced. “Quinn, shut up. And leave it.”

  “I won’t leave it. And don’t tell me to shut up. If Tucker was truly your friend, he wouldn’t have allowed that to happen to you. Because of that, I can’t trust him, and you shouldn’t, either. Frankly, I don’t understand why you insist on acting like he’s the innocent one in all this. By doing nothing at all, he probably did the most damage. You trusted him to be your friend, and he didn’t have your back when you needed it the most. Tucker Heyward is literally the worst person I’ve ever met.”

  “I’m sorry you feel that way, Quinn,” a voice said from behind me.

  My jaw dropped, and I stared blankly at my sister, unable to turn around.

  She shook her head at me. “Let the record show that I tried to shut you up.” Traitor that she was, she ran upstairs and left me alone with Tucker.

  I blew out a breath and turned around. “I didn’t know you’d come in, Tucker. I apologize that you had to hear that. You have to know that I never meant for you to.”

  His expression was darker than I’d ever seen it. “But you said what you really think instead of the polite version you sold me earlier tonight. It’s pretty clear to me where you stand. And if you can’t trust me, there can never be anything between us. No matter how much I want there to be. Goodbye, Quinn.”

  Tucker stormed out, and I put my head in my hands. Even though I stood by what I’d said to Delilah, my harsh words were never meant for Tucker’s ears. I’d made it clear to him earlier what I thought (“the polite version,” as he’d put it), but hadn’t intended to admonish him any further. I felt terrible that he’d overheard me.

  Unfortunately, my apology had done nothing to smooth things over. He was hurt, which was understandable. I didn’t know what else I could do. I couldn’t take the words back, even if I wanted to.

  “This is the part where you go after him,” Delilah’s voice called from upstairs. I should have known she’d be eavesdropping.

  I sighed. I guessed I should make the effort at least. Another crack at apologizing couldn’t hurt.

  I was about to head toward the door when Delilah cried, “Wait!” She thundered down the steps, yelling, “The yearbook! The yearbook! What page? What page?”

  Not following, I shook my head. “What are you freaking out about?”

  She snatched the yearbook off the front desk and opened it to the page I’d looked at a few minutes ago. Letting out a yelp, she exclaimed, “Page seventy-six! I knew it!”

  “So?”

  “So, remember earlier today when Uncle Frank told me to tell you to keep an open mind?”

  “I remember earlier when you and Papa Sal were pretending to talk to an imaginary ghost, yes.”

  She rolled her eyes. “O ye of little faith. Uncle Frank said ‘seeing is believing’ and ‘page seventy-six.’ Don’t you get it? It all fits! You had to see that Tucker was out of school getting his braces off on the day of the pep rally, on page seventy-six of this yearbook, to believe that he was telling you the truth. If this doesn’t convince you that ghosts are real, I don’t know what will!”

  I shrugged. “I think you’re feeding me a line. You probably knew about the page seventy-six thing all along.”

  “No, I did not. In fact, I don’t even own a yearbook from that year. I didn’t buy one. Oh, and by the way, you did not keep an open mind.”

  “Because your ridiculous predictions are too vague to be helpful,” I shot back, making a second attempt to leave so I could go find Tucker. But as I opened the door, I found Officer Morrel coming up the steps.

  “Good evening, Miss Bellandini,” he said. “I’m here to get your statement about the alleged break-in at Green.”

  This apology was not happening tonight.

  “Hello, Officer Morrel. Come in.”

  I gestured for him to follow me to the kitchen, where I knew we wouldn’t have to worry about the prying eyes and ears of any guests or family members. Papa Sal was already upset enough about the sleuthing. But if the police were going to come around and make the guests nervous, he was going to have a lot more to say to me. He didn’t blow his temper often, but when he did, it wasn’t pretty.

  “May I offer you some coffee or sweet tea?” I asked, although I could tell from his stern expression that this was far from a social call.

  “No, thank you. Let’s get down to it.” Officer Morrel sat at the kitchen table and got out an official-looking document. “How did you happen upon seeing someone moving items out of Green tonight?”

  “I went out for dinner, and on my walk home, I went past Green. I noticed some light inside, and thought it looked like a flashlight. I knew the employees were to have gone home earlier, so I didn’t think anyone should have been in there. I went around to the back to take a closer look, and when I got to the f
ence, I saw Ava Newton, Green’s manager, loading a bunch of boxes and equipment into a truck.”

  He nodded. “And you told Detective King that there was also a man there that you didn’t know.”

  “Right. Only now I realize I do know him. Wait, not really. I’ve never met him, actually, but I guess I know who he is. I mean, I’ve seen him before. Around town. That’s all. His name might be Brock. That’s Ava’s boyfriend’s name.”

  I willed myself to quit babbling. I hadn’t given any thought to this before, but in the middle of eagerly spilling my guts to Officer Morrel, it suddenly dawned on me that to tell the police how I knew the hot fish guy would spill the beans about my ongoing investigation, which Rufus and Flynn had already advised me against. Where was Sassy Quinn who didn’t get flustered and knew all the right things to say?

  “So you don’t know him personally, this man possibly named Brock?”

  I shook my head. I couldn’t risk any more verbal diarrhea.

  “Walk me through what you saw, moment by moment. I want to make sure I got everything down.”

  In an attempt to steady my nerves, I blew out a breath. I carefully told him the sequence of events from tonight again, this time in detail, up to the part where Delilah showed up.

  “Do you have anything more to add, Miss Bellandini?” Officer Morrel asked.

  I shook my head again, still unconvinced I could keep my cool. It had been a long, trying day.

  “Then if you’ll sign this statement, I’ll be on my way.”

  After scanning what he’d written, I signed my name at the bottom and stood up.

  Officer Morrel stood and shook my hand. “Thank you for your time, Miss Bellandini. Now I hope not to see you again. No offense. But at least let’s try not to make it another time this week.”

  I sighed, utterly drained physically, mentally, and emotionally. “Same.”

  Chapter 20

  After breakfast, I headed to the police station to speak to Drew. I had to know more about Green being in serious debt, and I needed to make Drew aware that Ava had tried to rob him blind.

  I was shown to our usual room, but when I got there, I was surprised by who was sitting at the table.

  “You’re not Drew,” I said warily.

  Detective Flynn looked up at me with a smirk. “No, I’m not. And you’re not ‘working with the police.’ ”

  A cold sweat popped out on my forehead. That was what I’d said to Mark Potter last night. Maybe it was a coincidence. Either way, if there was ever a time for Sassy Quinn to make an appearance, now was that time.

  “I, um…of course I’m working with the police. I’m certainly not working against you,” I said as I sat down across from him. “In fact, I’ve been extremely helpful and forthcoming lately when asked for information. Plus, I’ve reported two crimes, and the week isn’t even over yet.”

  He drummed his fingers against the tabletop while his eyes bored into me. “Why do I feel like you’re lying to me?”

  I’d said I wasn’t going to break the law in order to find out who killed Jason, and lying to a cop was pretty much the definition of breaking the law. It’s not like I was under oath or anything, but lies obstructed justice, and that was a punishable offense. Even though I was splitting some pretty fine hairs here and stretching semantics to their breaking point, I wasn’t technically lying.

  “I’m not. I think you’re just cynical.”

  Flynn fought to keep a smile from tugging at the corner of his mouth. “I’ll give you that. But we’re discussing you, here. You’ve taken it upon yourself to launch your own investigation with this supposed suspect list of yours. Miss Bellandini, are you aware of the punishment for impersonating a police officer?”

  My mouth went dry, and my stomach started churning. But somehow I managed to put together a coherent sentence. “I’ve never impersonated a police officer.”

  He narrowed his eyes at me. “Mark Potter called to ask if you were on the up-and-up. Don’t tell me you’ve already forgotten about last night when you were trying to wrangle information out of him.”

  He had me.

  I replied, “Okay, so I went to his bistro to speak with him. That’s not a crime. When he asked me if I was a cop, I very clearly said no, but that I was working with the police, which I am, as I stated earlier. Also not a crime.”

  “I believe you were told by both Detective King and myself to keep your nose out of our investigation.”

  “I am. You’re gathering evidence against Drew, and I’m not standing in the way of that, so my nose is miles away from anything that you’re doing.”

  He clenched his jaw. “Quinn, please. Will you give this investigation of yours a rest? King and I are still chasing down a few more pieces of evidence, which means we could…Just…” He sighed heavily. “Can I count on you to stay out of this?”

  “While Drew Green is still in jail for a crime he didn’t commit? Not likely.” I crossed my arms. “I was told I could speak to my friend. I’d like to see him now, Detective.”

  After giving me a hard stare for a good ten seconds, he said, “Okay. But consider this your warning. You don’t want to know what will happen if I get another call about you.”

  Flynn stormed out, leaving me sitting there shaking like a leaf. I forced myself to slow my breathing and think rationally about the situation. I was no lawyer, but I didn’t think that Flynn could slap a harassment charge against me if the person I was supposedly harassing didn’t press formal charges. There was no crime in talking to people as long as I didn’t take my questioning too far or tell them I was a police officer. Maybe it would behoove me to give people a fake name. That way when they called in to complain, it wouldn’t be about me.

  As I was trying to massage the stress out of my temples, the door opened again. This time it was a uniformed officer bringing a considerably haggard-looking Drew in to see me. Sympathy shot through my heart when I noticed that he was now dressed in an orange jumpsuit like a common criminal.

  The uniformed officer said, “You have fifteen minutes.”

  “Are you okay?” Drew asked, concern etched on his face, making him look even more drawn.

  I forced a smile. “I’m fine. Detective Flynn tried to rattle my cage a little, but it’s okay. The question is—how are you holding up?”

  He sighed. “Not great. It’s beginning to feel claustrophobic in my cell. I feel like I should be out helping you, but I’m stuck. I worry all the time. Are you being careful? What was Flynn bothering you about?”

  Waving a hand, I said, “Oh, nothing. A misunderstanding between Mark Potter and me last night. It’s fine.”

  Drew’s eyes bulged out. “He didn’t try to hurt you, did he?”

  “No, not at all. In fact, you’d have been proud of me. I had the upper hand the whole conversation and actually felt like a real investigator for the first time.”

  “That’s great. Did you find out anything from him?”

  I sobered. “He told me that Green was in a lot of debt, on top of the decline in customers. Once he found that out, he was the one who pulled out of the deal with Valerie. I wish you would have told me about the debt.”

  “I’m sorry. I didn’t think it was a big deal or pertinent to Jason’s murder. Everyone who owns a restaurant has some kind of debt. It’s a given in the business.”

  “Let’s just proceed with the idea that everything pertaining to Jason and the restaurant is a big deal.” I lowered my voice. “Drew, you do realize that Valerie has a massive amount of reasons to kill Jason that could have stemmed from total panic on her part. It seems to me that she’s been scrambling to find a way to plug the leaks in Green before it went down like a sinking ship. Once she figured out she was in real trouble financially, she might have snapped.”

  “Valerie didn’t kill my brother.”

  �
�You can’t know that for certain.”

  “She has an alibi.”

  “Sure. Her friends vouched for her. How hard is it to fake that? I’m sure they saw how Jason treated her, and they probably hated him for it. A good friend would want her to get out of that situation, so they might be convinced to commit a little perjury for her.”

  “I think that’s a stretch.”

  “I disagree. Since she was cheating on him, too, what’s to say that she didn’t decide that she would come out ahead by killing him rather than divorcing him?” I had another thought. “Or maybe…Jason and her new guy got into an argument over her, and the guy killed him.”

  “Quinn, you’re way off base here.”

  I could see that we were going to have to agree to disagree on this one. “Okay. Um…one more thing. Do you know about a potential business partner of Jason’s? Ross Cline said when he still working at Green he’d seen an older man arguing with Jason over a partnership deal. Any ideas?”

  “No,” Drew replied flatly.

  “Okay.” I got up and went to the door and knocked to be let out of the room. “I’ll see you soon, Drew. I’ll do what I can.”

  As I walked down the hall, I wondered why Drew was so closed off toward me today. Maybe he had been notified about the break-in and was upset by that. I’d forgotten to even bring it up. Or had he accepted his fate and stopped fighting? There had to be more to it…Oh. His brother’s funeral was this morning, and he was going to miss it. No wonder he wasn’t acting like himself. He was probably devastated over it.

  From behind me, Rufus called, “Quinn, wait up.”

  I turned, hoping he wasn’t tracking me down to give me yet another reprimand. I’d had enough harsh words directed at me today. “Yes?”

  “I heard you spoke with my partner earlier.”

  “Unfortunately.”

  Rufus smiled. “I’m sorry he was gruff with you, but he made a good point. Quinn, the last thing any of us want to see is you hurt. Can you at least appreciate where we’re coming from?”