My mother’s name is Ruth. To many outside the family she’s known as Mama Ruth. Ruth Dearing is like my mom in a couple of ways: my mother tends to be a worrier, and she’s warm and loving—a true friend to all.
I have three sisters—six, eleven, and fifteen years older than I. (Clearly, my parents saved the best for last.) None of the Dearing family members are named after my sisters or are based on them.
There are no boys in our family. Hence, Ben is also fictional.
Christina is an entirely fictional character as well.
My sisters and I used to play Liverpool Rummy when I was a kid. Later we got into Scrabble, which we’ve now played for years. We’re competitive. And good. Don’t play Scrabble with us. You’ll die.
Lady Penelope was my childhood dog. However, she was a Chihuahua, not a Yorkie. The personality quirks she possesses in this book are straight out of Penny’s real doggie life. Except for sighing about having to go to her bed while the family eats. That quirk was taken from another dog of mine named Mallie.
Much of the food the Dearings eat is from my childhood. My mother is a wonderful cook. At the time of this writing (December 2012), Mom just celebrated her 96th birthday. She lives in an assisted living apartment and no longer has to cook for herself. But she misses it.
My mother made pickled watermelon rind. I liked it as a kid. Although I suppose it’s an acquired taste.
Mom also made incredible buttermilk biscuits. And fried chicken and gravy. And sausage with biscuits. And apple pie. Family reunions have been a time of lip-smacking weight gain.
Yes, there is a coffee snob in our family—me. I take my own coffee to reunions and years ago bought an espresso maker to leave at my parents’ house. My coffee is always too strong for everyone else. When I make it, they’ll pour it into a cup, then water it down. There’s just no accounting for taste.
No one in my childhood family played golf. My dad coached soccer and played tennis. He managed to play doubles tennis until he was 84. He passed away from Parkinson’s at the age of 88.
My father did not own a car dealership, far from it. He was a missionary, then a professor of missions at a seminary.
My family does have strong Christian roots and beliefs, as do the Dearings.
My husband, Mark, and I follow the same marriage principles of Sy and Ruth: place God in the center and put each other’s needs before our own. As Ben said: this takes two.
Remember Syton Dearing’s look-right-look-left silent message to Ruth that she’s the prettiest in the room? That comes straight from my husband. Like Syton, when we first started dating, Mark would look around and say, “You’re the prettiest one here.” Years ago the words were no longer needed. He can send me the message across a room—and still does.
For years I’ve been gathering family photos and putting them into a calendar, which I give each family member for Christmas. Each summer reunion I try to come up with a new crazy venue for taking a picture of my mother and us four daughters. One year it was pink bathtubs at the Habitat for Humanity Restore. Another year is was—yup, you guessed it. Lined-up toilets. I’ve had a hard time topping that one ever since.
There is no one in my family with horrendously smelly feet like Pogey. For this I am grateful.
Years ago a friend told me of someone he knew in a Southern town who drove a banana yellow hearse. I filed that away in my brain, knowing someday I’d use it in a book.
I used to know a couple named Christina and Ben.
Like Lacey, my little great-niece Breanna takes dancing lessons and tends to walk around on her toes.
Breanna’s mother—my niece—is named Jessica. Jess for short.
I have always loved mixed metaphors and other mangled sayings, and was waiting for the day I could create a character who tended to say them without realizing it.
A good friend did once say to me, “That’s like putting the cart before the egg.” I still think that’s the greatest mixed metaphor ever.
Syton Dearing looks like my next-door neighbor.
In the town where I now live is a coffee express named Mocha Ritaville. I don’t know the owner. But I’ve convinced myself she’s a woman named Rita in her mid-fifties or so who loves Jimmy Buffett.
The lobster story really did happen—in the household of my oldest sister.
I heard the dead rabbit story from a friend and later learned that snopes.com says it’s an urban legend. Whether or not it really happened to Tamel Curd is up to you to decide.
There are no lawyers in our family. There is a doctor (my oldest sister). I was supposed to be the attorney. Every family should have a doctor and a lawyer, don’t you think? Makes life so much more convenient. But somewhere I took a wrong turn and ended up writing fiction. Maybe that’s not so far off from being a lawyer after all …
Why are you writing Southern family fiction in addition to your trademarked Seatbelt Suspense®?
When I first began to be published in fiction in 2001, I was writing in both the suspense and women’s fiction genres. After a three-book women’s fiction series—the Bradleyville series—I turned to writing suspense full time. But I always had a hankering to return to women’s fiction. I love exploring relationships, especially those of family in small towns. In fact I had the idea for the Dearing Family series way back when I wrote in both genres, and the books were contracted with my publisher. When the publisher’s marketing team and I decided I should write only suspense, the Dearing Family books were set aside. Now that today’s technology makes self-publishing so easy, I’m able to finally write this series.
As for my Seatbelt Suspense®, those books are written with a four-point brand promise in mind: fast-paced, character-driven suspense with myriad twists and an interwoven thread of faith. You can read more about them, including the first chapter of each, on my website. (See below.)
I’ve got a crazy story you should use in one of your Dearing Family books!
You do? Great! E-mail the story to me, giving me permission to use it, and you just might see it show up in a novel.
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Twitter: @Brandilyn
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Turn the page to read the first chapter of my Southern suspense novel Gone to Ground.
Back Cover Copy
Amaryllis, Mississippi is a scrappy little town of strong backbone and Southern hospitality. A brick-paved Main Street, a park, and a legendary ghost in the local cemetery are all part of its heritage. Everybody knows everybody there, and gossip wafts on the breeze. Its people are friendly, its families tight. On the surface Amaryllis seems much like the flower for which it’s named—bright and fragrant.
But the Amaryllis flower is poisonous.
In the past three years five unsolved murders have occurred within the town. All the victims were women, and all were killed in similar fashion in their homes. And just two night ago—a sixth murder.
Clearly a killer lives among the good citizens of Amaryllis. Now three terrified women are sure they know who he is—someone they love. None is aware of the others’ suspicions. And each must make the heartrending choice to bring the killer down.
But each woman suspects a different man.
“Moves along briskly … the popular novelist’s talent continues to flower.” —Publishers Weekly
GONE TO GROUND
CHAPTER ONE
Cherrie Mae
You can tell an awful lot bout people from cleanin their houses. Like the time I drug a hot pink thong out from under ol Ed McAllister’s bed—a lacy little piece a cloth that wouldn’t a fit round his wife’s hiney in her best days. So what did Verna McAllister do to protect her husband’s stellar reputation? Tried to hide her shock while swearin up and down she used that thong for a dust rag. Mm-hmm. Thing’s no bigger than a piece a lint. Besides, who cleans that house, her or me?
I’ve had plenty other revelations. Like when I seen that h
oard a sleepin pills stuck down in Alicia May Alkin’s sweater drawer—enough to kill at least two and a half people. And her so happy and all after marryin the man a her dreams.
Words is just air. Faces tell you more, if you pay attention. (Most people don’t.) But houses, they hold the darkest secrets.
Not that I go pokin round the places I clean. Well, maybe I do, but a woman’s got to have somethin to keep her brain goin while she scrubs toilets. Like Sherlock Holmes said, “My mind rebels at stagnation.” Besides anybody in this town’ll tell you Cherrie Mae Devine’s the best housecleaner around. I got my customer list—white and black folk alike—so full there ain’t room for one more, and that’s a fact. So I figure some rovin eyes now and then ain’t gon hurt nobody. I always keep my discoveries to myself.
But mercy, what I seen today.
Austin Bradmeyer, mayor a Amaryllis, is a finicky man. Finicky enough he wants me cleanin his house twice a week—every Thursday and Monday—even though the missus don’t work, so what she do all day? The mayor keeps his things just so, and that includes his fancy mahogany office. Big desk and leather chair, a straight-back settee, and huge shelves full a books. The top a the desk is always perfect, no cluttered papers, every pen in the wooden holder. Even his ash tray is always emptied into the trash can. (Which don’t keep smokin from bein a nasty habit.) I happen to know that office is Mayor B’s private little place. The missus ain’t even allowed to go in there.
See, Mayor B ain’t as nice and gentlemanly as folks think. I seen him more than once come home for lunch and yell at his wife over nothin. And I mean stompin round, red-faced mad. Fire in his eyes like the devil. So outta control he don’t even care I seen him—as if anybody would believe my word over his anyway. Then he’ll turn it off, just like that. Light a cigarette and go back to his plastics factory, no doubt smilin at everbody there.
I done lived long enough to know this: people can fool you. You think they one thing—they might be somethin else altogether.
Today, Thursday, Mayor B was at work as usual. His factory has a second shift that goes till 11 p.m., but the mayor keeps regular business hours in his office. Mrs. Eva B said she had to run out to Piggly Wiggly, and in case she didn’t return before I was through, she left my check on the kitchen counter. The door slammed behind her on her way out. Mrs. B’s always in a hurry.
I finished my dustin in the formal dinin room and headed to Mayor B’s office, totin my fold-up, two-step stool. Have to drag that thing to ever room to dust up high. House cleanin would be a whole lot easier if I was six foot tall.
In the office I set down my stool and walked to the desk I done dusted a thousand times. And found myself eyein the shiny gold drawer handles.
Like iron filings to a magnet my hand reached for the top drawer. I glanced over my shoulder out to the front hallway, even though I knew nobody was there. My fingers pulled the drawer. It rolled open so easy.
Green hangin files is what I seen. Inside em, folder after beige folder with labels like “City Council” and “Downtown.” But the one that caught my eye was “Closet Killings.”
That sent a chill rollin down my back.
Three years and five victims. Then, just two nights ago—Lord, have mercy on us—a sixth. I could recite each name and date, knew each woman myself. The whole town did. The population a Amaryllis barely reaches 1700, so who’s not gon know everbody else?
I pulled out the manila folder. Laid it on the desk.
My heart took to trippin.
For a minute I almost put the file back. Didn’t want to see, didn’t want to know. Instead I opened the folder.
On top sat a full-page color picture a Martha Edgars, from the waist up. Blood all over her, a knife buried in her neck. She’d been shoved in a closet, clothes hangin round her. Her eyes was wide open like she died in utter terror.
I let out a little scream and tipped my face to the ceilin. Jesus, Jesus, Jesus. Couldn’t pray no more than the precious Savior’s name. My breaths got all staggery, and sweat popped down my back. I leaned against the desk and pulled in air.
Not that I hadn’t known how Martha died. But to see it for myself …
I flipped over the picture. Couldn’t bear to see it again. I lowered my eyes—and saw photo #2. Sara Fulgerson. Just as bloody. Knife just as deep in her neck, but the handle was different. Sara’s eyes was closed. Like Martha, she was propped up against a closet wall. ?My heart liked to beat right outta me. I pressed a hand to my chest.
Martha was my age—62. Sara, 57. Both white women.
What crazy voice in my head was it tol me to look at the third picture, I’ll never know.
It was Sonya Stelligman, 61. Another knife in the neck, blood everwhere. She sat in her closet. Sonya was a black lady, went to my church. I loved that woman.
Next I saw Alma Withers, only 48 when she was killed. Similar stab wound. Then Carla Brewster, 64. Butchered the same way. Alma was white, Carla, black.
There they was—pictures a the first five murders, in order. That Mayor B, he was meticulous, all right.
My knees went weak. I huffed down into Mayor B’s chair and leaned back, steadyin myself. Alma’s photo still glared up at me, should I turn my face back to it. Last thing I wanted to do.
But there was one more killin—the most recent. Erika Hollinger, white girl jus twenty years old. Husband sent off to the Afghanistan war, then blown to pieces by a bomb six months ago. Erika had been a town wild child, raised by a single mother who drank too much. As for Erika’s husband, Brent Hollinger, I’d cleaned his parents’ house for years. Watched Brent grow. He was a good boy. I went to his and Erika’s weddin—just about the only black face there. Later I went to Brent’s funeral. Who’d a guessed within half a year Erika would be dead too. Now, two days after her murder I still didn’t know when her funeral would be. The police had yet to release her body.
Somethin beyond me made my hand flip over Alma’s picture. And there sat Erika. Knifed in the neck and bloodied, the ends a her thick brown hair clotted in red. Once pretty face all blotched and purple.
My body went to shakin. Good thing Mrs. B didn’t choose that time to come home. Don’t think I coulda moved.
The whole town knew the victims was all found in their closets. And that one person killed em all. The police said no doubt bout that, because ever crime scene was the same. Now I seen the proof. Each knife handle looked different, but from the size they all looked to be parin knives. Somethin ever woman would have in her kitchen.
I slapped the file shut. Why did the mayor have these pictures?
They had to come from the police. But those men were a tight bunch, two of em father and son. And Chief Adam Cotter ruled the roost. Cotter and Mayor B was tight, too. But the chief had kept a zipped lip on details a the Closet Killings. So to make an extra set a pictures a ever murder for Austin Bradmeyer—and let the man take em home? I couldn’t see Mr. I’m-the-Boss-Here Cotter doin that, even for the mayor. Besides, why would Mayor B want those horrible things?
The grandfather clock in the front hallway bonged, bringin me back to my senses. I still had an office to clean. If Mrs. B come back she’d wonder what I been doin with my time.
I picked up the folder—with two fingers like I didn’t want to touch it—and spread apart the green hangin file to drop it back in. That’s when I seen the ring restin on the bottom a the file.
My heart knew what it was almost before my brain kicked in—and my muscles just plain froze.
Erika Hollinger, born Erika Lokin, got the ring from her mother on her sixteenth birthday, handed down from her great grandmother. Far as I know she never took it off. Two days ago I seen Erika at the drugstore late that afternoon. She seemed upset. “How you doin?” I touched her arm. She shook her head in that determined way a hers—“I’m fine”—but wiped her eyes. Sad, her bein so young and losin a husband and all. So I took myself home and baked a batch a brownies and carted em over to Erika’s house to cheer her up. We ended u
p sittin on her couch like two good friends—which we really ain’t—eatin those brownies and watchin a movie. Around 10:00 I went home, and Erika said she was headed for bed. I tol her to wrap up the brownies so they wouldn’t get hard. Erika rolled her big brown eyes but did what I said. She made a big deal a rippin off the plastic wrap while I watched.
And that ring was on her finger.
Sometime that night Erika was killed while sleepin in her bed. Just like the other five. When I heard the awful news yesterday I couldn’t believe it. I called the police and tol em I been to Erika’s house that very night. Chief Cotter said to come in and give a statement. He took me in that little interrogation room at the station and questioned me up and down. At the end he said, “You by any chance notice Erika’s diamond ring on her little finger?”
Later that day I talked to Erika’s mama. She also wondered if I seen the ring. Because when the police found Erika’s body, she said, that ring was the only thing missin from the house.
Mayor B said nothin bout bein in Erika’s house that night she was killed. Why should he be? In fact just this mornin the county paper ran a quote from Mayor B, sayin how sad he was that while he and the wife were safe at home, across town another woman was gettin herself killed.
That Dog Won't Hunt (Dearing Family Series) Page 17