“Why wouldn’t she let her in?”
“You didn’t hear this from me, okay?”
I nodded.
“Irene told me it’s because Wanda is two years younger than Geraldine.”
“So, what does that have to do with anything?”
Lloyd laughed again. “Your grandmother wants to be the youngest person in the group. She wasn’t about to let Wanda take that title.”
I rolled my eyes. That sounded exactly like something Grandma Dean would do.
“But don’t worry,” Lloyd said. “They’ll get over this tiff soon enough. No one can stay mad at Geraldine for too long.”
It was quiet for a minute while Lloyd and I sipped our wine and looked up at the stars.
“Lloyd,” I said, pouring a little more wine in my glass and reaching over and adding a little more to his. “Have you heard anything about who might be responsible for the fire at Grandma’s shop?”
He shook his head. “I have no idea. Everyone likes Geraldine.”
“Do you think there’s a chance that Wanda did it?”
“Wanda? Oh, no. She might be mad right now, but she would never do anything like that.”
“How do you know?” I asked.
“She’s too straight-laced. Everything is by the books. That’s one reason why we broke up. She never wanted to have any fun.”
“Okay, what about Perry Landon? Do you know him?”
“I know him as much as everybody else does, which isn’t much. He mainly keeps to himself. I see him at the grocery store every once in a while. I know he hung out at the shop a lot.”
“Do you think he could’ve done it?”
Lloyd thought about it for a minute. “I guess I don’t know. I can’t say for sure either way. He’s a quiet fellow, a bit strange, but I don’t know if he would do something like that.”
I leaned back in my lawn chair and looked up at the sky. Thanks to the lights around the pool, only the brightest stars were visible. Suddenly, my curiosity got the best of me.
“So, you don’t have to answer this if it’s too personal…” I paused, questioning if I should ask him. “How many ladies here have you dated?”
He leaned back, a big smile overtaking his face. “All of them except your grandmother.”
“All of them?” I asked, surprised.
“Yep. I think women are like fine cars. You have to ride them every once in a while or their parts stop working.” He winked at me. “I’ve been trying to stick my wrench in Geraldine’s chassis since she got here, but she won’t have anything to do with it.”
That was enough for me. It was my own fault for asking.
“Okayyy,” I said, standing up. “I’m going to head inside. You have a good evening, Lloyd.”
“Oh, come on! Not you too. Just stay out here a little longer. It’s such a nice night!”
“Nope,” I said, putting down my glass and walking away. For a moment, I had thought Lloyd was sweet and maybe just a little misunderstood. He quickly reminded me that I had him pegged right the first time I met him. He was creepy.
I made two mental notes as I walked into Grandma Dean’s apartment: find out more about Perry Landon and stay far away from Lloyd.
10
The next morning, I lay in bed thinking about Perry Landon. How was I going to find out more about him? Maybe I could find out where he lived and pay him a little visit. Maybe I could bring him some donuts and apologize for making him uncomfortable at Bev’s antique store. This plan had two things going for it: one, I would have an excuse to get donuts, and two, if word got back to Grandma Dean that I talked to him, and I was sure it would, I would look like the good guy this time.
I was just about ready to get out of bed when Grandma Dean came in with Kitty Purry tucked under her arm.
“Are you getting up?” she asked, ducking into the closet. “I’m having a meeting here in a few minutes and I think maybe this would be a good time for you to go outside and get some fresh air.”
I rolled my eyes. She was kicking me out. Suddenly, I had a flashback to my elementary school days when I didn’t want to go to school. Would the same tricks that worked on my mother work on Grandma Dean?
I listened to her rummaging through the closet and waited until she walked out carrying a tiny outfit draped over her arm.
“Do you have a stomachache?” I asked, making sure to add just the right amount of discomfort to my voice.
“No,” Grandma Dean said as she sat Kitty Purry on the side of the bed. “Why?”
“I feel terrible and I was just wondering if it was something I ate.”
A look of worry flashed across Grandma Dean’s face and I could tell she was concentrating on her insides, searching for any sort of pain or distress. I secretly smiled. The seed had been planted.
“You know, now that you mention it, I do feel a little queasy today.”
I lay back, pulling the blankets up to my chin. “I think I’m just going to rest for a while,” I said as I turned to my side. “Maybe that will make me feel better. Hopefully, it’s just something I ate and I’m not actually coming down with something.”
I couldn’t see Grandma Dean’s face, but I could hear the air leave her lungs. She was worried. “I’ll bring you some probiotics,” she said as she carried a freshly dressed Kitty Purry out the door. “I’ll be right back.”
Within minutes, she was back with a supplement cocktail of ginger, vitamin C, and probiotics. She refused to leave until I took them and even then, she stood there staring at me for a minute. “I hope you’re not getting sick,” she finally said. “That’s the last thing I need.”
“I’ll be fine after I rest while,” I reassured her. “I just feel so weak.”
She made her way to the door and turned to me before she walked out. “You rest then. I’ll come and check on you when my friends leave. If you need anything in the meantime, just text me.” She paused, a look of worry overtaking her face. “My meeting is…private,” she said cautiously.
“Don’t worry,” I said, wrinkling my face like I was in pain. “I’m not going anywhere.”
She stood in the doorway for a minute before finally walking out and closing the door behind her.
Now was my chance to find out what these meetings were all about.
It didn’t take long for Grandma’s friends to arrive. They seemed to all come at once. I could hear muffled talking, but I couldn’t make anything out. There was a lot of laughter and I assumed they were just greeting each other, so no reason to get out of bed just yet.
Finally, the laughter died down and I could hear a quiet hum of voices just beyond the wall. Now they were finally getting started. I got out of bed and tiptoed across the floor. I held my breath as I slowly turned the doorknob, pulling slightly once it was completely turned.
I opened the door a crack and listened.
“Do you think she’s sick? Or do you think it was bad salmon from The Cobbler’s Tea Room?” I recognized Irene’s voice immediately.
“I don’t know,” Grandma Dean replied. “But she looked terrible.”
“Are you sure it’s okay to have the meeting here?” Hattie asked. “She can’t hear us can she?”
“No,” Grandma Dean assured them. “She went right back to sleep.”
“I bet you she’s coming down with the stomach flu that’s going around.” I wasn’t sure, but I thought that might have been Virginia speaking.
“You know half the county has had it,” she continued. “Remember, I had it two weeks ago. I couldn’t stay out of the bathroom!”
“Oh yes,” Hattie chimed in. “I had it too. I nearly lost my bowels in the butter aisle at the Savemart.”
I cringed at the thought.
I heard a sigh but couldn’t recognize the voice that followed. “Well, I’ve had the opposite problem. I’m so backed up I can practically taste it.”
I couldn’t take anymore bowel talk. I was just about to close the door and climb back in bed wh
en Grandma Dean spoke up. “Okay, ladies, we have a lot to discuss so we should get started.”
“Do you think the cops know it was us?” Was that Hattie? Or Irene? Why were they suddenly talking so quiet?
“I don’t think so,” Grandma said, her voice hushed. “But I’m afraid we were a little careless. I don’t want to mention names, but someone dropped something out there.”
“I’m sorry. It was me. My hands were full and we were in such a hurry…” Virginia’s sentence trailed off and I couldn’t hear the last of it.
“What we need to discuss is what we’re going to do with the money when we get it.”
Grandma Dean’s words made my blood freeze. In my shock, I accidentally let go of the door handle, which caused it to spin back around.
“What was that?” a worried Hattie asked.
“Probably just the cat,” Grandma Dean mumbled. “But I’ll go check.”
I quickly and carefully closed the door then jumped in bed and pulled the covers up just as Grandma peeked her head inside. My heart was pounding in my chest as I tried to concentrate and slow my breathing.
“Nikki,” I heard her say barely above a whisper. “Are you awake? I have donuts out here. Would you like one? They have sprinkles!”
Oh, that was low. Trying to trick me by using my weakness against me.
She stood in the doorway for a full minute before finally closing the door. I let out a breath and stared up at the ceiling. Lloyd had thought they were a neighborhood watch group, but I thought it was the opposite. They weren’t preventing crimes; they were committing them.
11
The next hour and a half dragged on. I was thankful when I finally heard the front door opening and the high-pitched chatter of the women saying good-bye. Hopefully that meant Grandma Dean would be in soon to let me know that everyone had left and I was free to come out of my room.
“How are you feeling?” Grandma Dean asked a few minutes later when she peeked her head in the door.
“Much better,” I said, getting out of bed. “All I needed was a little rest.”
She gave me a look that said she wasn’t too convinced. “Get dressed,” she said as she was leaving the room. “I have some place I want to show you.”
Thirty minutes later, we were in the car. “You haven’t eaten yet; you must be starving.” She rummaged through her purse and pulled something out. “Try one of these. You’ll love it!”
I took the little package from her, hoping it was a granola bar—the kind with chocolate chips and a layer of chocolate at the bottom. I was deeply disappointed.
“What is this?” I opened the wrapper and looked at the little log that sat in my hand.
Grandma sighed. “It’s a fruit and nut bar. It also has flax, pumpkin seeds, and chia seeds. It’s good for you.”
“Chia seeds? Like the ones that come in the little kit?”
“What kit?” I could tell she was irritated with me as she drove out of the parking lot.
“You know those kits you used to be able to order off the TV. What were they called…Chia Pets! I had a dog when I was a kid!” I looked down at the bar. It looked like bird food.
“I’ve never heard of such a thing,” she said, looking straight ahead. “Just eat it.” She glanced at me. “The wrapper is even edible!”
I let out a laugh. “I’ll eat this weird bar, but there’s no way I’m going to eat the wrapper!”
Grandma loosened up and laughed too. “I’ve never been able to get myself to eat it either.”
“The bar or the wrapper,” I asked her. She laughed but didn’t answer my question.
It wasn’t long before I noticed we were headed downtown. I started to get a sick feeling in the pit of my stomach. What was Grandma Dean up to?
“What are we doing here?” I asked as we neared her shop.
To my surprise, she drove right past it and pulled into a parking spot a block away on the other side of the street. Grandma’s face lit up. “I’m here to sign the lease on my new shop! I wanted you to come too so you could see my new store!”
I was shocked. “You’re signing a lease? Already? What about your other store?”
Grandma turned serious. “I have no idea when they’ll hand it back over to me. I can’t just sit around and do nothing while they try to figure out who started the fire.”
“But what happens when they finally turn it back over to you?” I asked. “You own that part of the building, right? What will you do with two shops?”
“I’ve always wanted to own an old fashioned ice cream shop,” she said, smiling. “Maybe I’ll turn it into one of those! I could decorate it with pictures of celebrities from the past.” She beamed as she told me her plans. “Or,” she said, getting even more excited, “I could turn it into a little sandwich shop.” She unclicked her seatbelt. “The options are endless! It could be whatever I wanted. Or whatever we wanted.”
She smiled and it took me a minute to understand what she meant. When I finally got it, my heart swelled. She was saying we could open something together. I wasn’t sure I wanted to commit to staying here long enough to go into business with Grandma Dean, but it made my heart happy to know she was willing to do that with me.
We got out of car and walked up to the door of the new shop. Grandma opened the door and spoke to the man waiting for us inside. “Hey, Rog,” she said, extending her hand to him.
“Good morning, Geraldine!” he said brightly. “Who’s your sidekick?”
She turned to me. “This is my daughter’s daughter, Nikki. Nikki, this is Roger Matthews.”
I extended my hand and he took it, then pulled me in for a hug. I wasn’t expecting it and I nearly fell into him. “It’s nice to meet you!” he said cheerily. “I’ve heard a lot about you!”
I wasn’t sure what to say. Not only had I never heard of him, I didn’t even know until just minutes ago that Grandma was going to be leasing a store from him.
I let the two of them talk and I roamed around the store, taking everything in. I could tell right away that it had once been a hardware store. The few shelves held items long forgotten by the last tenants—a few boxes of nails, a can of motor oil, pieces of pipe. In the corner sat a sign. “Havard’s Hardware.” I stood there and stared at it for a minute. I used to go to school with a Havard. Kelly, I thought her name was. Or was it Shelley? I wondered if it was any relation.
Before long, I heard Roger and Grandma Dean laughing and then I heard the jingling of keys. “Take good care of her,” Roger said. “If anyone can bring this place back to life, it’s you!”
He left and Grandma turned to me with an excited gleam in her eyes that I knew meant I would be working the rest of the day.
“Come on!” she called, waving me toward the front of the store. “We have work to do!”
“Where are we going?”
“To my storage unit on the edge of town!”
It took nearly twenty minutes to drive to “Sinner’s Self Storage.” Under the name was a Bible verse, John 14:2, with the words “When you don’t live like Jesus.”
“What does that mean?” I asked Grandma. She laughed. “Pull it up on your phone,” she said as she pulled into a parking spot in front of a storage unit.
“My phone doesn’t have internet,” I said as I pulled my phone out of my pocket.
Grandma Dean looked at me like I was crazy. “What do you mean your phone doesn’t have Internet? Let me see it.”
I handed her my phone.
“What is this?” she asked disgusted.
“It’s my phone.”
“You can only talk on this?”
“No, I can text too.”
She gave me an “are you serious?” look. “This is a flip phone. Nobody uses these anymore!”
“Well, I use it!” I took the phone back and returned it to my pocket. I liked my little phone.
Grandma scoffed. “When we open the new antique shop, that will be the first item we put in the store.” She pul
led out her phone and typed in the verse. She handed it to me to read:
“My Father’s house has many rooms…”
“You know, if you don’t have as many rooms as Jesus, you need a storage unit…”
“I get it,” I said as I handed the phone back to her.
“It confused a lot of the old people around here. Was he making fun of the Bible or was it a way to get people to read God’s word? People couldn’t figure it out.” She laughed. “Hattie tried to get people to sign a petition to force him to change the name, but no one wanted to sign it in case it actually prompted someone to open their Bible.”
Grandma got out of the car and I stood behind her and waited for her to open the storage unit’s door. When she did, I couldn’t believe what I saw. It was packed full of boxes. You couldn’t fit another box in there if you tried.
“What is all of this stuff?” I asked.
“It’s all the things I was eventually going to put in my old shop; all things that will now go in my new shop!”
She started hauling out boxes and I pointed out that they weren’t all going to fit in her little car.
“Cliff Sinner is going to be here any minute. He’s going to load all of this in his truck and take it to my shop.” She pulled out a few more boxes, opening them to peek inside.
“Is any of this stuff going to go to Bev?” I asked.
“No,” Grandma said, pulling brown packing paper out of a large box. “This is all stuff I decided to keep. I had a little bit of storage in the back of my shop,” she sighed, “where the fire was started, but I kept most of my things here.”
Cliff pulled up just then and jumped out of his truck. “Wow!” he said, taking a look at Grandma Dean’s unit. “This is going to take more than one trip!”
Grandma laughed and patted him on the arm. “I bet you can get it done in one load!”
I helped load the truck and soon it was obvious to everyone that there was no way it was all going to fit in one load…and probably not even two.
“You go on to your shop,” Cliff said to us as he closed the lift gate. “I’ll deliver this one and make sure you get the rest of your boxes this afternoon.”
Up in Smoke (Glock Grannies Cozy Mystery Book 1) Page 7