A Pizza To Die For

by None

  “You don’t want to see the amount? You might change your mind if you do.” He was watching me closely to see how I’d react. “I know there’s not a single soul in Timber Ridge who thinks I have money, but they’re all wrong.”

  “It’s not a factor, anyway. Would you like more cocoa?” I asked. “I think I’ll have some.” I looked at Maddy, but she just shook her head silently. My sister was clearly intrigued by what was going on, and she didn’t want to interrupt for fear of breaking the conversation up.

  “I don’t get it,” he said as he shook his head. “You and I both know that it’s not worth half what I’m offering. Sentimental attachment is understandable, but there comes a time when turning money down just doesn’t make sense.”

  He wasn’t trying to be offensive, I could see that now. I really wanted him to understand my reasoning. “Maybe it doesn’t make sense on one level, but in my heart, there isn’t enough money in the world to make me give this place up.”

  Nathan put the checkbook back into his pocket and looked at Maddy. “Do you understand her?”

  “About half the time, if I’m having a good day,” she admitted with a grin. “The rest of the time I just play it by ear.”

  Nathan seemed to finally grasp what I’d been trying to tell him. With a dour smile, he said, “Okay, it’s not for sale. Got it. Tell you what I’ll do,” he said after a moment’s pause. “If I hire the right crew, can they come here to see what you’ve done? I’d appreciate if you’d give them pointers, too, if it wouldn’t be too much trouble.”

  “I can do that,” I said. “As a matter of fact, I’d be glad to help in any way I can.”

  He nodded. “That sounds like a plan. We’ll negotiate your fee later.”

  “We’ll do it now,” I said firmly.

  He looked surprised by my tone of voice and the direct nature of my reply, but he nodded briefly. “Tell me what you’re asking, and we’ll go from there.”

  “Listen carefully, because I’m not a woman to be trifled with. I have a figure in mind, and I won’t back down from it.”

  He took that declaration seriously. “Let’s hear it, then.”

  “I will accept nothing for whatever help I’m able to give you,” I said, “and that’s my final offer.”

  He looked bewildered by my requirement; that much was clear. “Why would you do that? What’s in it for you?”

  I gave him my broadest smile. “To see another bungalow brought back to life is all the pay I need. These houses need to be preserved, not destroyed to churn out large houses that no one needs. What do you think?”

  He seemed to mull that over, and then said, “Ma’am, I’m not sure I can accept that deal.”

  “Then I’m afraid we’re stuck,” I said.

  Again, Nathan turned to Maddy. “Is she always this stubborn?”

  “You don’t know the half of it,” my sister said.

  Nathan nodded, and then chewed on his lower lip for a few seconds before speaking again. “I’m a hermit, and I know how folks talk about me in town, but if I’d known you were around, I might have made more of an effort to get to know some of the people in Timber Ridge.”

  “I take that as a compliment,” I said.

  “Good, because that’s how I meant it.” He looked around admiringly, and then added, “You made the right decision.”

  That was a real switch in attitudes. “Do you mean it’s worth more than you were offering?”

  “In dollars? No, there you’re crazier than most folks think I am. But I can see this place is your home. I’m beginning to understand why you won’t sell it.” He yawned, and though the hour was still early, Nathan said, “Ladies, if you’ll excuse me, I’m bushed. Can I catch a ride back home?”

  “We’d be glad to take you,” Maddy said before I could reply.

  Once we were in the car, my sister asked from the back seat, “Did you hear about what happened at Italia’s today?”

  “No,” he said. “I’ve been wrapping up a deal all day. Other than that snot-nosed lawyer I’ve been dealing with, you two are the first folks I’ve talked to all day.” He paused, and then added, “The past three days, as a matter of fact. I don’t exactly have a parade of folks just dropping in on me.”

  “There was a murder,” Maddy said softly as we approached Nathan’s house.

  He turned in his seat to look at her, and I could see worry in his expression. “What are you talking about?”

  “The owner was killed sometime last night,” she said.

  I pulled up in front of Nathan’s house, and without a word, he unbuckled his seat belt and stumbled out of the car.

  Opening my own door, I called out, “Nathan, are you okay?”

  He waved a hand in the air toward me, and as I saw him go into his house, the look of weariness and anguish on his face was nearly too much to take.

  “What should we do?” I asked Maddy as I stared after him.

  “There’s nothing we can do,” she said. “If he’d wanted us to follow him in, he would have invited us. One thing’s for certain. He hadn’t heard the news until I told him. If I’d known how he was going to react, I would have done it a little more delicately.”

  “I wonder what his connection to Judson Sizemore is.”

  “I don’t know, but it’s something we need to find out. I can’t imagine that shrewd old man willing to back Judson without a very good reason.”

  “But not tonight,” I said as I stifled a yawn. “We’re not going to be able to uncover anything at the moment, and I’m completely worn out.”

  Maddy nodded. “I’m exhausted myself. Why don’t you drop me off at home so I can grab a shower and go to bed early?”

  My sister was known for keeping late hours, and I had to wonder if her exhaustion was because of what we’d done at the Slice today, or whether it had been brought on by her rift with Bob Lemon. “Don’t you want to go back to the Slice and get your car?”

  “I forgot all about it,” she said. “I shouldn’t just leave it parked there all night. Something might happen to it.”

  As we drove back to the Slice, I said, “I can’t stop thinking about how Nathan reacted back there.”

  Maddy paused, and then answered, “Is there any chance he might be related to Judson? After all, they share the same last name.”

  “It should be a possibility we consider. Why else would he back him in a business?” I asked. “A pizzeria doesn’t really seem like Nathan’s style.”

  “After meeting the man, I can’t imagine why he’d do it.”

  “He could have had lots of reasons,” I said. “For all we know, he didn’t like our pizza and wanted somebody else’s.”

  Maddy looked at me as she shook her head. “That can’t be it.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because I can’t imagine anybody not liking what we make at the Slice,” she said with a smile. “Maybe I’ll put off going to bed and do some work on the case, instead. I need to do a little digging around on the Internet tonight and see what turns up. What are you going to do?”

  I stifled another yawn as I said, “I’d planned to take a shower and go to bed.”

  “Very productive. What’s your game plan for tomorrow, sleep in?”

  “No,” I said as we neared her car, and stopped. “I’m going back to Nathan’s first thing in the morning and ask him directly about why he was trying to put me out of business. There’s got to be something that he’s not telling us, and I mean to find out exactly what it is, and I’m not leaving until I do.”

  Chapter 5

  “Okay, just to set things straight, your plan last night was better than mine,” Maddy said as she picked me up at my house the next morning at eight.

  “Why? Didn’t you have any luck online?”

  “I didn’t think it was possible, but Nathan Sizemore has literally made himself invisible on the Internet,” she said. “I could barely find any place that acknowledged that he’d ever been born.”

  �
��How was Bob able to find out so much about him, then?”

  I knew I was poking an angry bear with a stick, but I really wanted to know. “Don’t you think I’ve been asking myself that same question? The only thing I can figure out is that he’s got access to some kind of extended search engines that I don’t have.”

  “You could always ask him for help,” I said.

  “Gosh, Eleanor, sometimes it’s like you don’t even know me at all,” she said with a smile.

  “Granted, that was a stupid suggestion. How about Judson Sizemore? Did you have better luck looking into his life?”

  Maddy didn’t answer, and after a second, I looked at her, concerned that she hadn’t replied. “What’s wrong?”

  In a low voice, she said, “Eleanor, I don’t know how to tell you this, but I didn’t even check. I had so much trouble getting anything on Nathan that I completely forgot about digging into Judson’s life. Some detective I turned out to be.”

  “Hey, don’t beat yourself up about it, Maddy. We’ve got time.”

  We drove in silence for a few miles, and then my sister asked as she pulled up in front of his place, “Do you really think Nathan’s going to talk to us if we just show up on his doorstep?”

  “I can’t think of anything better to do at this point, can you?”

  “You’ve got a point. We don’t have anything to lose,” she said.

  We rang the doorbell a dozen times, but there was no reply.

  “He’s not home,” Maddy said, “and that’s not going to change no matter how many times you ring that bell.”

  She was right, but I wasn’t ready to give up yet. “Maybe he’s just not in the house. Let’s look around back.”

  Maddy touched my shoulder. “You saw how he reacted when we showed up unannounced last night. Do you really want to take the chance he’ll think we’re a pair of trespassers?”

  “We are trespassing Maddy, need I remind you?” I asked.

  “Okay, but that still doesn’t protect us from a shotgun blast.”

  I laughed out of humor and more than a touch of sheer terror. “What do you want to do, Maddy, live forever? Let’s go.”

  I led the way around the house, and she followed me, something I wasn’t entirely certain would happen. In the end, no matter what, my sister always had my back, and I always had hers. It was what was so good and right about having her as family.

  When we got around the side to the back of Nathan’s house, it was like stepping back in time. The man hadn’t wasted a cent on lawn care, mainly because there wasn’t a lawn. Instead, there was a garden large enough to be a small farm, but I didn’t see the usual crops of corn and beans growing. Instead, Nathan was growing sugarcane, cotton, and the oddest collection of plants I’d ever seen in my life.

  “Hello? Nathan? Are you back here?” I called out.

  I saw a scarecrow with two heads among the crops, and suddenly realized that one of the heads was alive. He didn’t look all that pleased to see us, and I had to wonder if that shotgun was somewhere close by. “What are you doing here?”

  “We just want to talk,” I said. I held my empty hands in the air and added, “We’re not armed.”

  He shook his head. “I’m not, either. You’re here, so you both might as well come on over.”

  We walked down the path toward him, and as I looked around, I said, “I’ve got to tell you, I haven’t seen cane and cotton growing since I was a girl.”

  He nodded. “It reminds me of my childhood. I spent too many hours working my daddy’s farm not to appreciate how tough they are to grow.”

  “They’re beautiful,” I said, meaning it.

  “Well, it’s kind of you to say, and I appreciate it,” he said. “What brings you back here to my place?”

  “We wanted to apologize,” Maddy said. That was news to me, but I decided to go along with it and see where she was heading.

  “What did you do?” he asked as he arched one eyebrow.

  “Last night we sprang that news on you without considering for one second how you’d react to it,” I said.

  “Doesn’t matter either way to me,” he said gruffly.

  It was decision time. We could pretend to accept that at face value, or call him on it. There was really no doubt in my mind which way to go. “We know you backed the restaurant,” I said. “You had a stake in what happened, whether you want to admit it or not.”

  The friendly warmth that had been there vanished as Nathan looked at me sharply. “What makes you say a crazy thing like that, just when I was starting to like you?”

  I didn’t know how to respond to that when Maddy answered for the both of us, “It’s amazing how much ground is covered by Mountain Properties and Trust.”

  That got his attention. “Okay, you know about me; I can see that. Now tell me who I need to fire.”

  “What do you mean?”

  He was openly angry now, and I was glad that he didn’t have his shotgun with him. I was even happier that his ire wasn’t directed at Maddy or me. Nathan said loudly, “Somebody’s been blabbing, and I won’t stand for it. I took particular care to make sure no one knew about that.”

  “There’s no one to blame, really. We just stumbled across it,” I said.

  “I know better than that,” he said harshly.

  There was no way I was going to throw Bob Lemon under the bus just to stay in this man’s good graces. “Sorry, but that’s the only answer we’ve got. Tell us about your relationship with Judson Sizemore.”

  Nathan shook his head, kicked at a clod of dirt, and kept his gaze on the ground without answering.

  “Why won’t you tell us?” I asked softly. “It might make you feel better.”

  “It might, but I’m willing to bet that it won’t,” he said.

  “We’re not going to just go away,” I said, without threat or implication.

  “I know that,” he said as he idly kicked at another clod. “I just hate spreading my business around town. This is personal, as personal as it gets.”

  I looked at Nathan and said, “We won’t say anything to anyone that you don’t want us to.”

  “You speak for your sister, do you?”

  Maddy nodded. “Here and now, about this, she does, completely.”

  Nathan seemed to take that in, and then he finally nodded his agreement. “It just might be good to get it all out, at that. It’s been weighing heavy on my mind, and I need to talk to somebody about it.” He took a deep breath, let some of it out, and then added, “Judson was my nephew, and now my family’s just about all gone.”

  Once Nathan started talking, it was hard to believe that he’d been so reticent with us before. Maddy and I did our best to listen without interrupting as he spoke.

  Staring at the dirt at his feet, Nathan said, “My brother was one mean son of a gun, let me start with that. He tortured me as a kid, beating me up for no reason other than because he could. The summer after my eighth grade year in school, I went to stay with my uncle Bob and his family on their farm. They’re all long gone now, but I’ll never forget what happened while I was there. I was a scrawny little kid when I left home, but a few months of throwing hay bales over my head made me strong, and the home cooking I got didn’t hurt, either. When I came back home, my brother greeted me by punching me in the gut. Instead of doubling over, I tensed myself and took it, and then I put him down with one blow. That’s all it took, and he never lifted a finger toward me again. Needless to say, as soon as we could go our separate ways, we did, and I never thought twice about him until the day he died.”

  “You didn’t have any contact with him at all?” Maddy asked.

  “My momma used to keep me updated on his shenanigans back when she was still alive, but the two of us barely spoke at her funeral, and our dad was long gone. After that, I had no reason to think about him. And then he up and died.” Was that a tear in the corner of Nathan’s eye? I couldn’t tell for sure because he brushed it away so quickly. He continued, “No
w, I’ve long known that just because someone’s family, it doesn’t mean you have to love them, and there was none lost between the two of us, trust me when I tell you that. But I felt a compulsion to go to his funeral, so with mixed emotions, I drove to Chastain to pay my last respects, mostly because my momma would have wanted it that way. What I didn’t expect to find were two kids in their twenties who didn’t hold my past with their father against me. Turns out they hadn’t been all that fond of the jerk, themselves.”

  “It must have been a shock when you just showed up like that.” I couldn’t help speaking as I tried to imagine what it must have been like for him. Maddy and I have had our differences in the past, but she was so much a part of me, I could never turn my back on her. Then again, Nathan hadn’t had it all that easy, if his story was even close to what had really happened between the two brothers.

  He shrugged, and then kicked at the dirt again. “It was a surprise to all of us. Their mother was already gone, so it turned out that the three of us were all that was left of our line. Oh, there was a rumor of a cousin somewhere here in town, but nobody ever came right out and claimed kinship with me, so I figured it was just one more thing folks around Timber Ridge got wrong. I came back here after we screwed him into the ground—my brother was too crooked to go in any other way—not expecting anything else from either one of his kids. Then, Judson and Gina both showed up on my doorstep nine months ago.”

  “What did they want?” I asked, unaware that all this drama had gone on right under our noses. Hearing him tell it was like seeing it unfold on the screen, it seemed so vivid to me.

  “Believe it or not, they wanted to get to know their uncle Nathan,” he said. “And before you think they came here after my money—they were as much in the dark about what I’m worth as everyone else in Timber Ridge has been—until you two poked your noses into my business.”

  “I’ll bet they were surprised when you told them,” I said.

  “I never did tell them. They had no idea, and now Judson will never know.” He leveled a look at us and said, “Ladies, I’d appreciate you keeping what you know about me to yourselves.”