The Ex Who Wouldn't Die

by Sally Berneathy

  Charley looked down, avoiding her eyes. "You need to go back to Dallas. You need to trust me on this one." With that pronouncement, he disappeared. Into the house, into the dark, wherever he went when he wanted to avoid her.

  Amanda studied her bike, but decided she wouldn't be able to inspect it properly until daylight. She went back inside. This would be a good opportunity to corner Kimball in the safe environment of so many people. She was going to demand some answers, though she wasn't sure what the questions were.

  In any event, it didn't matter because he eluded her, moving through the crowd with a practiced politician's smoothness, then slipping away into the night.

  Chapter Eleven

  The Silver Creek courthouse dominated the small town square. A venerable old building of red brick and limestone with wide steps and ornate columns of white marble, it was flanked on one side by a large live oak tree and the Silver Creek Police Department and City Jail, and on the other by a large live oak tree and the Silver Creek Fire department. All very symmetrical.

  Amanda checked her bike carefully that morning and found no evidence of tampering. Nevertheless, she was riding more slowly than usual.

  She passed the government buildings and went on to the end of the square, choosing a parking space in front of the First Baptist Church. Pulling off her helmet, she remained astride her bike as she surveyed the quiet morning scene.

  A young man polished a bright yellow fire truck that sat half in and half out the wide door of the fire department. Two men climbed the steps of the courthouse, one wearing a tailored, immaculate suit and carrying a briefcase, the other wearing a rumpled, ill-fitting suit and looking nervous. Easy to figure out their relationship. Lawyer and client. Probably guilty client.

  Across the street from the Courthouse, Paw Paw's Cafe offered daytime fare while Billy Earl's Roadhouse promised evening entertainment. Small shops offered ice cream, candy and books. Manikins from the ‘50s wearing modern clothing posed in the windows of Hunt’s Department Store.

  At the far end of the Square she could see the Methodist Church where they'd attended Charley's funeral service yesterday.

  Small town serenity. On the surface.

  She took the key from her bike and stood, peeling off her leather jacket in the growing warmth of the early morning sunshine. Tucking her helmet under one arm and tossing her jacket over her shoulder, she headed for the white wrought iron bench under a magnolia tree on one side of the First Baptist Church lawn. This provided her with a good view of the courthouse steps and the empty parking space reserved for the mayor. She'd be able to track Kimball's comings and goings, though she wasn't quite certain how that information was going to help her. The man wasn't likely to emerge, wielding her stolen gun and shouting a confession.

  Hard to imagine the creepy Mayor Kimball inside this building that reeked of tradition and justice.

  “What are you doing here?”

  Amanda gasped, startled by the abrupt question, but then she saw the familiar figure standing beside her, his feet not quite touching the grass.

  “I might ask the same question of you. I thought dead people were supposed to leave this world.” An elderly woman walking down the sidewalk eyed her curiously. “Good morning!” Amanda said, forcing herself to smile. She was fairly certain she’d met the woman at Charley’s funeral though she couldn’t remember her name.

  “Good morning, Miz Randolph,” the woman replied, her tone and expression sympathetic.

  “The whole town’s going to think I’m nuts, talking to myself,” Amanda muttered when the woman had passed.

  “Grief-stricken over my death.”

  "Grief-stricken over your continuing existence. Go away."

  "You know I can't. I have to save you, and you're making it really hard, hanging around here. What are you trying to do? With me and The Judge both telling you to go home, why are you still here?" Though she hadn't seen Charley after his abrupt disappearance last night, obviously he'd been there, listening to her phone call with her father.

  "Dad told me to come home and you ordered me to go home. But your mother, your father, your sisters and about fifty other relatives asked me to stay at least a week or until our barbeque next week or even until our big Independence Day celebration. I think I'll go with the majority on this decision. Besides, if I go home now, they may put me in jail for killing you."

  "You think you're some kind of a detective? You're going to prove Kimball murdered me?"

  When Charley said it like that, the whole thing sounded absurd. "If I could just get my gun from him, at least I could prove I didn't do it. As for proving Kimball's guilt and seeing that he's punished for his crimes, who cares? If I find out for sure he murdered you, I'll give him a reward."

  "Nice talk, Amanda."

  A black Cadillac pulled into the mayor's parking space.

  "There he is!" Amanda reached to grab Charley's arm, but her fingers slid through the chilly space. She shook her hand to rid it of the eerie sensation, but that same chill stuck in the middle of her chest, an area that hadn't even been close to Charley. She forced her gaze to remain focused on the car, forced herself to remain seated rather than follow her impulse to get on her bike and ride as fast as she could away from that car and the man she knew was driving it.

  The driver's side door opened, and Roland Kimball emerged.

  Amanda swallowed, trying to push down the lump that had somehow crept into her throat.

  Now what?

  Get up. Get moving.

  Are you sure?

  Amanda drew in a deep breath and stood.

  Left foot forward.

  Right foot forward.

  On shaky legs, she moved toward the courthouse.

  "What are you doing? Where are you going?" Charley called from behind her.

  The fear in his voice increased her determination and steadied her steps. Be damned if she'd let him know she was scared.

  "Amanda, come back here!"

  Her path intersected Kimball's just as he reached the bottom of the courthouse steps.

  "Hi," she said, the word coming out as sort of a croak.

  Sunglasses hid the man's demon eyes, but the rest of his face revealed enough to make Amanda cringe and wish she'd followed Charley's advice to go back. "Still here, Mrs. Randolph?"

  He moved to go past her, and suddenly anger gave her courage. She hadn't come this far to be ignored. She moved with him, into his path.

  "Could we…uh…" Okay, she hadn't thought this through. What was she going to ask him? Could we get together for drinks, oh, by the way, if you have my gun, would you please bring it along?

  "Is there something I can do for you?" The mayor stood his ground, seeming to grow in size, blocking the sun.

  "Yes," she said, her chin lifting. "We need to talk. About a gun."

  His jaw firmed, and his lips thinned. "We have nothing to talk about, and you have no reason to be here. Good day, Mrs. Randolph." He turned from her, dismissing her, and strode up the courthouse steps.

  Amanda stood for a moment, blinking in the sunlight. The man had walked away and left her. Ignored her as if she were nobody. She wanted to call after him, to demand he talk to her, demand he confess to stealing her gun, to killing Charley, to trying to kill her, maybe even to killing Jimmy Hoffa.

  She had accomplished one thing. Now she knew he had her gun. He hadn't flinched when she'd mentioned it. An innocent person would have been astonished at the accusation.

  That would also seem to verify that he had murdered Charley and tried to kill her.

  She shuddered as she watched his dark figure disappear into the courthouse. This did not bode well for her continued existence.

  She walked slowly across the square, back to the bench where Charley waited.

  "That went well, Nancy Drew," Charley said.

  "I found out for sure he's got my gun."

  "I told you that already."

  "Yeah, and you also told me your mother was a dead
prostitute."

  "That was when I was alive. It doesn't count."

  Pointless to argue. She had more important things to think about than Charley, things like staying alive while she got her gun back so she could stay out of prison.

  Amanda picked up her helmet and jacket. As she started toward her motorcycle, a gleam of bright fire drew her attention back to the courthouse steps. A familiar figure moved upward, the morning sunlight spinning her red hair into flames.

  "There's that woman from the funeral, Sunny something or other."

  "Sunny Donovan." Charley's voice sounded choked.

  Amanda turned toward him. He looked like someone was choking him.

  "What is it with this woman?" Amanda demanded. "You said you didn't sleep with her."

  "I didn't."

  "Then why do you act so strange every time she comes around?"

  Charley gazed into the distance, his lips tightly compressed.

  "Come to think of it, you never acted the least bit guilty when you slept with some bimbo." She watched the tall, regal figure of Sunny Donovan disappear into the courthouse. "And that woman doesn't look like any of your other bimbos. She's dignified, not sleazy."

  Charley said nothing. That meant something.

  "You said you can't lie to me."

  He looked at her, and this time she was certain she saw guilt and remorse in his gaze. "It's true. I can't lie."

  Guilt and remorse. She would have sworn Charley couldn't spell either of those emotions, let alone feel them.

  Had he hurt Sunny Donovan?

  He'd hurt her, Amanda, and never shown the slightest signs of guilt or remorse.

  It was hard to imagine that dignified woman involved with Charley in any other capacity than as his lawyer, trying to keep his sorry ass out of jail.

  But something was going on, something she needed to know.

  "Then tell me the story about Sunny Donovan. Why do you freak out when she comes around? What's going on between you two? And where do I know her from?"

  He said nothing.

  "So you can't lie to me, but that's not the same thing as refusing to answer. Is that the deal?"

  Charley shrugged, a remnant of his old, arrogant expression returning in a half-smile.

  "Fine." She took a step forward. "I'll go ask her myself." After approaching Kimball, talking to this lady who seemed quite nice would be a snap.

  "Wait!" A chill wind passed through Amanda's arm as Charley attempted to grab it and restrain her.

  "Why should I wait?"

  Charley opened his mouth as if to speak, then closed it again. "You don't understand."

  "My point, exactly. I don't understand what's such a big deal about this Sunny Donovan, but I'm going to."

  "No!"

  She leaned forward, invading his space. He took a step backward. Oh, yeah. Something was going on. Charley never backed away.

  "Then talk," she ordered. "Tell me why you don't want me to meet her. Tell me what's going on with that woman."

  Charley drew in a deep breath and squared his shoulders as if prepared for battle. "If I help you get your gun back from Kimball so you can prove you didn't kill me with it, will you go home to Dallas, get out of Silver Creek?"

  Amanda leaned back, folding her arms and studying him. This was a completely unexpected turn of events. Mild curiosity about the woman had just turned into a puzzle she was determined to solve.

  "Is that it?" she asked. "You help me get the gun, I go back to Dallas? That's all I have to do in exchange for your services?"

  Charley's features contorted, his lips twisting as if they wanted to speak but he was trying to keep them shut.

  "What else do you want from me, Charley? What's the rest of the deal?"

  Charley opened his mouth then closed it. He rose a few inches off the sidewalk, straightened and met her gaze. "Forget about Sunny Donovan."

  Wow. The Sunny Donovan story was big, so big Charley would do anything to keep her from finding out. "Okay, sure," she said.

  She was under no compulsion to tell the truth.

  Chapter Twelve

  Only Irene and Amanda were home for lunch. The house was unusually but not uncomfortably quiet. All the windows stood open, and ceiling fans whirred in each room. Amanda could hear a mockingbird chirping, tweeting, and trilling its diverse song from a nearby tree. Leaves on the dozens of large trees around the house stirred quietly in the faint breeze, their shade shielding the house from the midday heat. After her morning meeting with Kimball, Amanda had expected to feel stressed for at least the rest of her life, but Irene and this house had a calming effect on her.

  "I thought we could have some ham sandwiches, if that's okay with you," Irene said, taking a large platter from the refrigerator. "Allan Middleton smokes his hams with mesquite instead of hickory. Some say he just does it because he has so much mesquite on his property. I say it's the best ham I ever ate so who cares why he does it."

  "I agree," Amanda replied. There had been such a quantity of food the day before, she'd only eaten a few bites of the ham. However, those bites, unadorned with any of the fancy sauces her mother favored, had, indeed, been the best ham she'd ever eaten. "What can I do to help?"

  "Why don't you look through the refrigerator and see if you can find that potato salad Alta Bernhart brought. And pick out anything else you see that looks good."

  Amanda opened the refrigerator door and peered at the large quantity of food crammed inside. "It all looks good. If I stay here very long, I'll gain so much weight, I won't be able to get through the door of my shop."

  "That's a big door. You'll have to eat a lot of ham and potato salad."

  "I can do that." Amanda located the large glass bowl of potato salad and put it on the table.

  "If you'll get the plates and silverware, I'll slice a tomato, pour some tea, and we should be ready to eat."

  Amanda set the table while Irene added tomato, lettuce and pickles to the tray of ham then cut slices from a loaf of homemade bread and poured the translucent amber tea into ice-filled glasses.

  Finally they sat down at one end of the wooden table. Amanda built her sandwich, took a big bite and then a drink of the cold, sweet tea.

  "This is wonderful," she said, leaning back with a sigh. "Not just the food. You, your home, your family." This place and these people were one-hundred-eighty degrees different from her home and family, but Amanda felt more comfortable, more at home here than she'd ever felt in that mausoleum in which her mother held court.

  Irene smiled, the lines around her eyes tilting upward. Beverly Caulfield would never have allowed those lines to appear on her face. Of course, her mother didn't smile often enough to cause them. "We're your family, too," Irene said. "I can't tell you how much it means to me, to all of us, that you came down here, that we finally got to meet you and welcome you to the family." The smile remained, but her blue eyes misted. "You're all we have left of Charley."

  If you only knew, Amanda thought, her gaze searching the corners of the room to see if he was lurking. His mother would have been thrilled to see him again. Amanda would have been thrilled to never see him again.

  For the moment, he was not in sight. Good. She could relax and have a chat with this woman he'd kept hidden from her. "I don't understand why he told me…" She stopped herself before telling Irene the horrible stories he'd fabricated about his family. "Why he never told me about you all. I never even knew he talked to you."

  "He was trying to protect you."

  Not likely. Protect himself, maybe. "Protect me? From what?"

  Irene sipped from her tea, then set it on the table. "I don't know. He said he was in trouble, and all he could say was that we couldn't tell anybody where he was or who he was married to."

  "So it was okay if people knew he was married, just as long as they didn't know my name?"

  "That's right," Irene confirmed. "He told me your first name but not your last. He didn't intend to say that much, but he talked about
you so often, it just came out."

  Amanda supposed that ruled out Charley's hiding from an ex-girlfriend. She chewed another bite of sandwich then decided to go for it. "How well did Charley know the mayor?"

  Irene's gaze sharpened, and she frowned slightly. "Roland Kimball? Him and Charley didn't exactly travel in the same circles."

  Amanda studied Irene. She did not have her son's talent for deceit. The woman knew something she wasn't telling. "Maybe not, but they had some sort of connection, didn't they?"