I started to protest, then stopped. Bill had proven beyond a shadow of a doubt he had my back when he’d faced Cale Malone with me.
“Look,” Tony said, “we have a better view of the pond than you do, and we don’t see a thing. You’re safe. Besides, he’s more afraid of you than you are of him.”
“Are you getting out of your truck to shoot this?” I asked.
“No way,” Tony said. “You said Bill was camera A next time.”
“Thanks a lot,” Bill groaned.
“I’m warnin’ you right now,” I said, “you’re only gettin’ one shot at this, so make it count.” I turned to Dixie. “Are you comin’ with me?”
Her mouth was pressed into a tight line. “I haven’t decided yet.”
“Traitor.” I pushed open the truck door, glancing down to make sure an alligator wasn’t underneath the truck, and gingerly put a foot on the ground, ready to get back inside, if need be.
“Just get out of the truck already,” Dixie said good-naturedly. “You think it might be hiding under there?”
“Well, now that you mention it . . .”
“Then you would have run it over. We didn’t drive over any lumps, and if you had run it over, it would be dead, and Sylvia would likely get another tattoo of you.”
I shuddered at the thought.
“Oh, come on, you big baby,” she said as she shoved her door open, but I noticed she glanced around before she actually got out.
I hopped out too and told myself that Tony was right—it was likely more scared of me than I was of it, which meant it was probably on Xanax and so lethargic it wasn’t capable of running after me, let alone eating me.
If I could get so lucky.
We headed for the front porch, but Bill told us to slow down as he adjusted his camera and started recording. He followed us up the steps and onto the covered porch, then moved to the side to capture the front door.
I knocked and waited, then knocked again. Rick Springfield was liable to be cranky at my impatience, but I couldn’t bring myself to care. I needed to talk to him now because I never wanted to come back.
Ever.
I heard a grumbling voice, and then the lock was unlatched. As the door swung open, a guy said, “This better be damn important since you woke me—” He took one look at us, and a hesitant smile spread across his stubbly face. I got the impression we’d caught him off guard. “Well, good morning, ladies.”
We were face-to-face with a scruffy-looking guy wearing a stained white T-shirt and a navy bathrobe. He had a serious case of bedhead, but my eyes were drawn to his messy, dark hair and his pajama pants, which were covered in bloody zombies being chased by guys with hatchets.
“Hi.” I forced my eyes to his face. “I’m Summer Butler, and this is my cousin Dixie.”
He leaned his shoulder into the doorjamb while leisurely looking me up and down, but an undercurrent of something dark hummed beneath his casual demeanor. “I know who you are. You’re big news around here, or at least you used to be. You were on that stupid show about the girl detective.”
My brow lifted, and I bit back a retort. Let it go, Summer. I forced a smile. “That’s neither here nor there. I’m here because your neighbor Sylvia Rush says you have a pet alligator that’s eating her chickens.”
For half a second he looked surprised, then he crossed his arms over his chest and grinned. “Chickens are meant to be eaten.”
“But only if you pay for ’em,” Dixie said. “So you owe Sylvia for her chickens.”
I stared at her in astonishment for a half second before I recovered. I wouldn’t have gone that direction, but it was a good idea.
Rick let out a barky laugh. “Like hell I’m payin’ for her chickens.”
“If your alligator ate them, then, yes, you will be,” I said with more confidence than I felt.
“First of all, little lady, nobody tells Big D what to do.” He winked. “Unless it’s in bed, then I’m open to suggestions.”
I didn’t try to hide my disgust.
“And second, I ain’t got no pet alligator.”
“So you’re saying you don’t have an alligator in your pond in the backyard?” I asked.
“Oh, yeah, I have one all right, but he’s not my pet. He comes and goes as he pleases, and I leave out raw meat to entice him back.”
“Why would you entice him back?” I asked.
“To keep nosy girls away from my house.” Then he slammed the door in our faces.
Dixie looked disappointed. Bill kept the camera running, and I realized that Big D never said anything about the camera. I wasn’t sure what to make of that. Had he been expecting us? As prepared as Karen had been last season, she’d probably already scoped him out and hopefully gotten him to sign the waiver to appear on the show. If she hadn’t, we wouldn’t be able to use any of the footage from his house.
Either way, there was no reason for us to stick around. I spun around to leave when I heard clanging behind the house. Then Rick shouted, “Come on, Kitty, Kitty. Come and get the tasty meat.”
Dixie’s eyes widened. “Oh, crap! He’s calling that thing!”
“And he named it Kitty,” I said as I hurried down the steps. That lunatic was siccing his alligator on us.
Dixie hurried after me, then tripped and fell to her knees.
I could see Rick holding a pie tin and a steak with one hand, and banging the tin with a wooden spoon.
“Oh, my word!” I shouted. “He’s crazy!” The alligator surfaced and wiggled out of the pond.
“I’ll say,” Dixie said as I pulled her to her feet. “He’s giving that gator a ten-dollar steak!”
Bill was still filming, though he’d taken the precaution of running around to Dixie’s side of the truck.
Dixie was already climbing inside the cab, but I remained in place. I had moved past scared and well on to pissed. Who the hell did this guy think he was?
Rick was already at the front corner of his house, and I could see the alligator lumbering after him. The front door opened, and another guy walked out of the house and onto the front porch.
“Rick! What the hell are you doin’?”
“Lettin’ these fine ladies meet Kitty.”
The guy—who was dressed in jeans and a light-gray T-shirt that clung to the muscles of his upper arms, shoulders, and chest—had short, dark, damp hair. He rushed down the steps in bare feet and raced toward me.
“Just get in your truck and get out of here.”
“Not until Mr. Springfield pays for Ms. Rush’s chickens.”
The new guy’s mouth dropped open. “What?”
“He’s named this alligator and is feeding it, which proves it’s his pet. Turns out he lets Kitty roam free and terrorize his neighbors.”
The new guy’s head jutted forward. “What?”
I put my hands on my hips. “Are you deaf? He’s paying Sylvia Rush for the two chickens his alligator ate.” While part of me was terrified of the advancing alligator, the fact that the two men were out here with it proved it couldn’t be that dangerous. Maybe Tony was right that it was more scared of us.
The new guy glanced over at the alligator. Rick tossed the steak about six feet from where we stood, then scampered up onto the porch, all while wearing an amused grin.
The new guy’s eyes widened, and he dug into his pocket and retrieved his wallet. “How much?”
“How much what?”
“How much for the damn chickens?”
“Are you the alligator’s owner? Because you payin’ for those chickens defeats the whole purpose of this exercise.”
He started to pull some bills out of his wallet, and a condom package fell onto the ground.
“Classy . . . ,” I said in disgust, starting to get nervous when the alligator continued advancing. But surely Rick wouldn’t sic an alligator on his friend.
Right?
The gator snatched up the steak in a quick movement, then eyed the two of us speculatively.
The alligator tried to climb the front wheel, and the guy jerked his feet up onto the hood. Rick burst out laughing on the front porch.
My new hero turned to me, fury in his eyes, and shouted, “Are you crazy?”
“Me?” I shouted, flinging an arm toward his friend on the porch. “He’s the crazy one! He just tried to kill us with his alligator!”
“Kitty wouldn’t have killed you,” Rick said with a chuckle. “He might have eaten Nash’s foot, though.”
“This is gettin’ out of hand, Rick!” his friend shouted. “Now call this damn thing off, pay the lady for the two chickens, and let me get to work.”
“Oh, come on,” Rick said, resting his palms on the front-porch railing. “I’m enjoyin’ the show.” Sure enough, he’d taken a seat on an Adirondack chair, as if he were watching a movie or a live performance.
Nash shook his head, looking like he was about to vault over the alligator and wring his friend’s neck. “I swear to God, Rick, if you don’t call off this alligator, I’ll go get my .22 and shoot the thing right in the head.”
Rick scowled and grumbled under his breath as he picked up the pie tin and wooden spoon, which he’d set on the table next to his chair. “You used to be fun, Nash Jackson. What the hell happened to you?”
“I grew up, you asshole,” Nash said, his chest heaving.
Rick walked down the steps, beating the pie tin. “Here, Kitty, Kitty.”
The sound caught the alligator’s attention. It lowered to the ground, watching Rick walk backward to the other corner of the house, and started following him like he was the pied piper and not some fool with a pie tin.
Once the gator was almost to the corner, Nash slid off the hood and grabbed his wallet from where it had landed in the yard next to his condom package. He snatched out two bills and strode toward me with murder in his eyes.
I was still on top of the cab, watching him move toward me.
He lifted his hand and shoved two twenties at me. “And before you say it’s not Rick’s money,” he said through gritted teeth, “I plan to get it from him—plus twenty more for my inconvenience—so I suggest you take it and get the hell out of here while you can.”
I slid down the windshield to the hood and took the bills.
“Listen,” he said, his anger fading, “I don’t know who you are or what you want, but do me a favor and stay the hell away from my cousin.”
“Rick’s your cousin?”
He ignored my question and started to stomp off to the souped-up truck, but he stopped and did a double take when he saw Dixie through the windshield.
“You know Dixie?” I asked, thrown off by his reaction.
His gaze lifted to me. “Dixie?”
“My cousin, although I actually claim her, as opposed to you and your cousin.”
He didn’t answer. Instead, his face paled as he took another glance at Dixie and then took off for his truck.
Nash Jackson knew something about Dixie, and I planned to find out what.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
We decided that it would be better for Dixie to deliver the forty dollars to Sylvia, so we dropped by, and I ducked down and hid in the truck while Tony filmed Dixie handing her the money and declaring the case closed. Afterward, we all headed to Maybelline’s for lunch and grabbed a table in the front facing the street.
“What in the world got into you?” Tony asked me as he grabbed a menu. “You were afraid to step foot out of the truck when we first got there, and then you decided to stare that alligator down.”
“I did not,” I said, my brow furrowing. “But I reasoned if those two men were standin’ there, I wasn’t goin’ to back down.” I turned to Bill. “How much of that did you get?”
“All of it. When I realized the alligator was goin’ after you and that guy, I moved to the side and got a great shot of him picking you up and vaulting you onto the hood of the truck. Who is he?”
“Nash Jackson,” I said.
I’d quizzed Dixie about him on the ride into town, but she’d sworn up and down that she’d never met him before, which made me wonder if Nash had been at Trent’s party. He’d definitely acted like he recognized her.
“Dixie, was Rick at the party?”
“I don’t remember seeing him there.”
“How many other people were there?”
“I don’t know. At least twenty, maybe more.”
“On a Monday night?” Tony asked.
She shrugged “It’s Trent. He parties when he feels like it, and he’s such a good host, people come.”
“By good host, you mean supplying refreshments?” I asked.
She shrugged again. “I guess.”
“How old is this kid?” Tony asked.
“Twenty-five,” I said. “Old enough that calling him a kid doesn’t let him off the hook anymore.”
“Sorry,” Tony said. “I just meant that he’s old enough for free alcohol not to have the same draw as it would for underage minors.”
“Tony’s right,” Dixie said. “Back in high school, Trent and his brother were known for the parties they threw. And now I guess he’s known for the samples he provides.”
“Drugs?” I said. “After what happened with Cale, you condone what he’s doin’?”
I expected her to get angry—instead, she looked sad. “I had no idea what he was up to until last night, but as soon as I figured it out, I asked him to bring me home.”
“And he refused.”
“He told me to lighten up. Then he handed me a red plastic cup of Coke and told me to go enjoy myself.”
Which probably explained how she was drugged. “What happened after that?” I asked.
“I sat with a group of people, and then April Jean showed up and found out that Trent had picked me up. She stomped over and threatened to snatch me bald for tryin’ to steal him back. I told her she could have him, but she thought I was lyin’ and lunged for me. I told her to back off, that I didn’t want Trent anymore and she was welcome to him. I remember thinking about calling you to come get me, but my body felt weird. I couldn’t feel my legs.”
Which proved she’d been drugged. “What do you remember after that?” I asked. Why hadn’t she told me all this before?
She smoothed a few strands of hair from her forehead with a shaky hand but didn’t answer.
“We don’t have to talk about this now,” I said. “Especially here. You can tell me later, and I’ll fill the guys in.”
She shook her head and lifted her chin, determination filling her eyes. “No. I’ll tell them. I’ve got nothin’ to hide, whether I did it or not.”
“What do you remember next?” Bill asked, his eyes guarded.
“Wakin’ up to Summer’s alarm and wonderin’ why she’d slept in my bed. I have no idea what happened.”
“What time did you ask Trent to take you home?” I asked.
“Around eleven.” A half hour after she and I had first texted each other.
“Can you give me a list of who was at the party besides Trent, April Jean, and Rick Springfield?”
She hesitated. “I guess it depends on who’s gonna see the list.”
“Not Luke,” I said. “I told you I want to prove your innocence before he gets anywhere near it.”
“Because you don’t trust him,” she said, sounding disappointed.
“No, because I trust him to be a good and honorable man. He’ll do everything by the letter of the law, including arrest me if someone turns me in for doin’ something illegal.” I gave the men a half smile when I saw their shocked faces. “I asked him what he’d do if confronted with the situation. I wasn’t surprised at his answer, but it confirmed that we keep this to ourselves fo
r now. Teddy’s gettin’ the drug screen, and we’re workin’ on the investigative part. When we have everything to prove your innocence, we’ll present it to Luke.”
She paused for several seconds, then nodded. “Okay.”
“So you’ll give me a list?” I asked.
“Yeah. As long as you don’t give it to Teddy either.”
Maybelline came over to take our orders, and we changed the subject, going over our encounters with Sylvia and Rick. Discussing what we could have done differently.
“We need to get that other guy to sign a release,” Tony said. “And verify that Karen got one from Rick.”
“Agreed. But we need to track him down,” I said. I glanced at Dixie, about to ask her to do it, then quickly changed my mind. Rick seemed like the logical person to ask, and I didn’t want her anywhere near either one of those guys. “I have an idea on how to get it.” From someone who had recently been knee-deep in the county riffraff . . .
“How’s that?” Dixie asked, narrowing her eyes.
“Never you mind. I have it covered. Your job is to call the woman who thinks her husband is working some side jobs and not reporting it to pay less child support. Oh, and that guy who thinks his wife is cheating is coming by this afternoon. After you get some preliminary information on camera, we’ll schedule some surveillance on both cases.” I paused. “Oh! I completely forgot about Bruce Jepper. You feelin’ up to interviewin’ him?”
Her eyes flew wide. “Me? What would I ask him?”
I started to give her some suggestions, then stopped and gave her a warm smile. “You’ve got great instincts, Dix. You can figure it out. You can ask me for help or suggestions, of course, but you take point on this one.”
Her mouth pinched tight with anxiety. “But I can’t investigate cases, I’m not a PI.”
“You won’t be investigatin’ his case,” I said with a smile. “You’ll just be askin’ questions.” I turned to Bill. “I want you to stick with Dixie for the rest of the day until one of us is done.”
“You think I need a babysitter,” she said, sounding forlorn.
“No. I want you to have an alibi. If another fire pops up and you’re with someone, it will automatically prove you weren’t responsible for April Jean’s fire.” It didn’t mean any such thing, but I hoped Dixie believed it. At least for a little while.
Blazing Summer (Darling Investigations Book 2) Page 13