by Jana DeLeon
Before he could get in another word or I could even see his expression, I stepped to his side and started off up the street at a good clip. Maybe he’d think about that and decide that checking into my background was a waste of time. As I approached Gertie’s street, I slowed just a bit and made a show of looking up and down the street for traffic. I could still feel his eyes on me, but I wanted to verify that I hadn’t lost my touch. I hadn’t.
Damn.
I crossed the street and went into a park, the opposite direction of Gertie’s house. I’d walk across the park to the bayou and circle around through the tree line to the row of houses behind Gertie’s. Then I’d cut through to her house. I heard Deputy LeBlanc’s truck engine fire up and the enormous tires turning on the pavement. A little girl and her mother were playing in a sandbox, so I stopped to pet her puppy, a roly-poly, happy, brown little thing. I heard the truck slow as it passed the park, but finally, it sped up and the noise of the obnoxious tires faded into the distance.
I said good-bye to the puppy and its people and continued on my original course to the bayou. The truck was gone, but Deputy LeBlanc could easily have rounded a corner and parked to spy on me. It was best I stick to my stealth plan. As I skirted the edge of the park around the bayou, I started to realize exactly how vast the swamp wasteland that surrounded Sinful really was. Narrow passages of water, which Ida Belle had called channels, stretched in every direction like wavy spiderwebs weaving across the land. If a piece of Harvey hadn’t surfaced the day I arrived in town, I would have believed this the perfect place to dump a body.
Apparently, Marie had felt the same way.
The tree line curved to the left, and I trudged alongside it until I was behind the last row of houses that made up the town of Sinful. All I needed to do was find a way through that last row and into the block before it, and I’d be safely tucked away at Gertie’s house. I scanned the backyards, looking for an entry point, but a row of eight-foot fences stared back at me. At the far end of the row of houses, the bayou curved around, cutting off access unless I wanted to swim. Circling back the other way put me right back in the open and exposed to Deputy LeBlanc, who might be lurking behind a bush.
Mind made up, I approached the row of fences. It was only eight feet. If I couldn’t scale eight feet, I needed to go ahead and retire. Gertie’s house was in the middle of the block, directly across the street from the row of houses I was behind, so I chose a stretch of fence in the middle.
I looked down at the bag of cookies and sighed before tossing the whole thing into the bayou. Then, I leapt up, grabbed the top row of the fence, and pulled myself up to peer into the yard. The last thing I needed was to run into a loud or angry dog.
The backyard was clear except for a barbecue pit, a single lawn chair, and a doghouse. A careful study of the doghouse proved it to be empty, so I pulled myself over the fence and jumped over the hedge that lined the back wall of the fence. I did a quick drop and roll, then bounced back up, ready to take off across the lawn. That’s when I heard the rattle of a doorknob. I sprang back into the bushes, hoping my stay would be a temporary one.
An enormous Rottweiler bounded out the back door and hurried to the center of the lawn, where he stood scanning his domain, no doubt to ensure it was free of intruders. Before I could launch into panic mode, my training took over and I immediately modified my breathing to control my heartbeat.
Just wait it out.
With any luck, the owner had let him out to do his business, and he’d do it and go back inside. He sniffed the ground and then lifted his head and sniffed the air. I was certain he couldn’t hear me as I hadn’t moved a muscle and was barely breathing, but I knew he could smell me, or at least smell the apple-scented shampoo that the beauty shop had insisted I use on my fake hair. Finally, he turned and trotted over to a section of the fence on the side of the yard and hiked a leg. Slowly, I let out the breath I’d been holding.
He finished his business, then trotted back to the back door and barked. I felt relief wash over me. The owner would let him back in the house, and this would be just another minor delay in my trip to Gertie’s. But when the back door opened, the dog did not walk in. Instead, the owner walked out.
Deputy LeBlanc!
I felt the blood rush out of my face. Of all the bushes in Sinful to hide in, I had managed to choose bushes that belonged to the one person I was trying desperately to avoid. No way would he take trespassing into his fenced backyard as part of my workout routine.
Using a single finger, I moved leaves out of the way to get a better view. Maybe he’d just stepped out to smoke or something and would be heading back inside, complete with Rambo dog. My hopes were dashed when he set a plate of hamburger patties next to the grill, then opened the grill and lit the flame. Once the grill was lit, he sat in the lawn chair and lifted the beer he was holding in his other hand to take a drink.
This was so not good.
My chance of remaining undiscovered by the dog during the time it took for him to cook the stack of hamburger patties was so miniscule that it wasn’t even worth calculating. The dog, standing next to the lawn chair so that Deputy LeBlanc could stroke his massive head, suddenly stiffened and looked straight at my hiding place. If I could have mentally willed myself to become a leaf, I would have done so.
After what seemed like an excruciating amount of time, the dog finally relaxed and sank to the ground next to the chair. At that moment, I felt a vibration in my pocket and struggled not to make a sound.
The cell phone.
Harrison had bought me a disposable cell phone before I left D.C. He was the only one with the number, and he wasn’t supposed to use it unless there was an emergency. I felt my pulse increase as I abandoned my sniper breathing and eased the phone from my pocket, saying a prayer of thanks that the ringer hadn’t been on.
I glanced at the display and saw I had a text message—from Gertie!
I didn’t know or even care how she’d gotten my number. All I knew was that she’d just thrown me a lifeline. I watched Deputy LeBlanc consume his beer for a couple of minutes, then finally got the movement I’d been waiting on. He rose from the lawn chair to put the burgers on the grill. Immediately, I went to text messages, hoping the noise he made putting the burgers to cook would mask the sound of my texting.
Where are you? Need to talk.
That was the message from Gertie. No shit, we needed to talk. I kept one eye on the dog and used both hands to tap out my message, glad I’d bothered to develop texting-without-looking skills. I glanced down at my message to check it before sending.
Call Deputy LeBlanc at his home. I’ll explain later.
I pressed Send, slipped the phone back in my pocket, and prayed. A couple of seconds later, I heard a phone ringing inside Deputy LeBlanc’s house. He looked at the back door and frowned, and for a moment, I was afraid he was going to ignore it. Finally, he sighed, closed the cover on the grill, and walked inside. Unfortunately, he left Rambo Rottweiler outside.
As I hadn’t given Gertie criteria for keeping him on the phone, I didn’t have much time. Between the time constraint and the dog, crossing the backyard was completely out of the question. I picked up a rock from the landscaping bed and threw it at the fence in the far corner of the yard.
Rambo dog launched in that direction, and I spun and jumped for the top of the fence. I was halfway over before I realized a lock of my fake hair was caught in the bush. My head yanked backward and my eyes watered, but it was too late to stop the momentum. I tumbled over the top of the fence and the hair ripped from my head with a sickening tear.
I bit my bottom lip and held in a string of cursing as I ran for the tree line. I could hear Rambo dog barking at the fence behind me and the back door of Deputy LeBlanc’s house bang shut as I dove into some brush at the edge of the swamp. I heard Deputy LeBlanc yell at the dog, and I froze behind the brush. If he found that piece of hair, I was sunk. Being Creole country, this wasn’t exactly a town of wom
en with long blond hair. Most of the hair I’d seen so far had been silver or gray.
I waited a couple of seconds more, then hurried through the brush and back into the park. As I burst out of the tree line into the playground, everyone stopped what they were doing and stared.
“Bird watching,” I said, and hurried past.
I had one hand over the top of my head where the extension had torn out, and I could feel blood oozing between my fingers. I hurried away from the park before anyone called the sheriff to report a deranged-looking woman bleeding in a public park.
Now that I knew Deputy LeBlanc lived right across the street from Gertie, walking up the block and entering her house by the front door was clearly out. As much as I wanted to avoid scaling another fence, it looked inevitable. I passed Gertie’s street and entered the neighborhood one street over. I was relieved to see that several of the homes didn’t have fences that met on the sides. I would avoid at least one incident of fence jumping.
I picked the one closest to Gertie’s house and hurried down the fence line, darting from one shrub to another in an effort to remain mostly out of sight. When I got to the back of Gertie’s fence, I glanced around to make sure no one was looking, then hopped across her lawn. The back door was open, so I let myself inside her kitchen. I could hear Gertie talking at the front of the house, so I eased down the hall to peek around the corner.
She stood in the living room, peeking between the blinds on her front window. “You sound frustrated, Carter,” she said. “You need to work on that attitude if you ever expect to be elected sheriff when Robert E. Lee retires.”
I shook my head in admiration. She still had Deputy LeBlanc on the phone. Gertie had serious skills.
As I stepped into the living room, the hardwood floor creaked and Gertie spun around. Her relief was apparent as she broke out into a smile.
“Oh my goodness. I’m so sorry, Carter,” she said. “I’ve just found my glasses in the refrigerator. I guess no one stole them after all.”
She ended the call and dropped her cell phone on the couch before rushing over to me. “Are you injured? How badly?”
“I had a hair accident,” I said. “I haven’t had time to check it out.”
“Come into the kitchen and I’ll fix you up. I texted Ida Belle while I had Carter on the phone. She should be here any minute.”
I followed Gertie back into the kitchen and sat in a chair at the end of the breakfast table. Gertie turned on the water in the sink and grabbed a clean dish towel from the drawer.
“I’ll let this water warm up a little,” she said. “It will be easier to lift the blood off your hair so I can see what kind of damage you did.”
I still had my hand pressed on my head, but I couldn't feel blood rushing out any longer. Apparently, the worst was past. Gertie dampened the towel with warm water and was just starting to lift the blood from my scalp when Ida Belle burst through the back door, huffing like a freight train.
“Damn battery is dead on my car. I ran all the way over here from my house.”
Gertie shook her head. “You live a block away.”
“So, what's your point?”
“You really need to start exercising.”
“I'm seventy-two. How many reasons before I die do you think I'll need to run?”
I piped up, “Banana pudding, man-eating alligators, texts from Gertie—”
“Fine. What the hell happened to your head?” Ida Belle narrowed her eyes at Gertie. “Did you shoot her?”
I stared at Ida Belle. “Is that a real problem around here?”
Gertie glared. “That thing with the mailman was an accident.”
“Uh-huh. And what about the thing with the dishwasher repairman?”
Gertie grumbled and went back to dabbing at my scalp. “You have a couple of mishaps and everyone’s labeling you.”
A second later, a hunk of my fake hair fell off in her hand and Gertie shrieked, tossing the hair in the air.
For a woman who was already winded, and clearly out of shape, Ida Belle sprang from her chair like a criminal who'd just spotted the police. The blond and somewhat red extension landed in the middle of the table, and Ida Belle leaned forward to see what it was.
“Is that your hair?” She looked over at Gertie, her eyes wide. “You scalped her.”
“She didn't scalp me,” I said. Best to contain this before it got out of hand. “I scalped myself before I got here.”
Gertie leaned over to inspect my head. “Well, for someone who just lost a wad of hair, you're certainly not bleeding much. There only a little tear here.”
“That’s because it's not my real hair. It's extensions. They were glued to my real hair. I don’t think much of the real stuff came out.”
Ida Belle slipped back into her chair and stared at me, cocking her head to the side. “Why would a former beauty queen have hair so short she needed to glue some in?”
Crap! I had to come up with something plausible fast, or the two nosy Nellies would be suspicious. My mind raced, and then I remembered some woman who'd come into the beauty shop in tears when I was getting the extensions put in.
“There was a horrible accident with hair bleach,” I said. “We had to shave it all off.”
Their eyes widened and Gertie's mouth formed an O.
Ida Belle nodded. “Tilly Monroe did something similar a couple of years ago. Thought she was going to go from red to blond, but her hair turned green. So she tried to fix it and burnt it all up to her scalp. Had to wear a wig for a year. They only do that fancy glued hair stuff in New Orleans.”
Gertie picked up the extension from the table and held it next to my head. “It doesn't look like this covers the entire bald spot.”
“No, I lost a piece before this one. That's why it started bleeding in the first place.”
Ida Belle leaned forward in her chair. “Lost it where?”
“In Deputy LeBlanc's bushes.”
Chapter Eleven
Gertie and Ida Belle both exploded at once.
“What were you doing in his lawn?”
“He’s going to know we’re up to something!”
I held up a hand to stop the outrage. “I didn’t intend to be in his lawn. It was an accident.” Then I explained my attempt to sneak to Gertie’s house, my worry about Deputy LeBlanc watching me, my bright idea about cutting through a lawn, and the comedy of errors that followed.
When I was done, Ida Belle and Gertie looked at each other, their expressions unreadable; then they both started giggling, then laughing. Finally, Gertie sank into the chair next to me with a snort, unable to remain standing, she was laughing so hard.
I drummed my fingers on the table and waited for the hilarity to end. Finally, they took a few deep gasping breaths, Ida Belle wiped the tears from her eyes with the bottom of her blouse, and they sat back in their chairs.
“My word,” Ida Belle said, “you have got to have the absolute worst luck in the world. The irony of your mother calling you Fortune is priceless.”
Gertie nodded. “Maybe we should revert to your beauty days and call you Miss Fortune. Get it—misfortune?”
She started howling with laughter all over again. Ida Belle scrunched up her face, clearly trying to hold it in, but finally, a burst of air came barreling out and she started laughing again. I yanked the dish towel from Gertie’s hand and began patting my sore head.
“Go ahead and keep laughing,” I said. “You two will die long before me. I’ll get plenty of peace and quiet then.”
They sobered a bit and reduced their laughter to gasping for air.
“You have to admit,” Gertie wheezed, “it is an odd coincidence. What are the odds that the one lawn you pick belonged to Carter?”
“One in forty, given the size of the neighborhood,” I said, not near as convinced of the hilarity as they were. It’s not like I ran across him in Manhattan or something.”
“And he caught you tossing your shoes into the bayou, trying to ki
ll an alligator you thought was a frog, eating Sunday lunch with the Sinful Ladies, and the bone was found in your yard,” Ida Belle pointed out. “That’s a statistical improbability even for a town this size, especially given the amount of time you’ve been here.”
I threw up my hands. “So, what am I supposed to do? You guys got me in the middle of this mess, and now it seems no matter what I do, the spotlight is on me.”
“I am worried about that piece of hair you left behind,” Gertie said. “If Carter finds it, he’ll know for sure it’s yours. Not many platinum blondes around here, and with me keeping him on the phone with all that unnecessary nonsense about my glasses, he probably already suspects something.”
“We have to get that hair back,” I said.
Ida Belle nodded. “You’re right about that. Can’t leave that hair in his bushes. Eventually, he’ll get around to working on his lawn. Carter always works in his lawn when he’s thinking hard on something.”
My mind flashed back to the burgers and the beer. “Please don’t tell me it’s his day off.”
Gertie bit her lower lip and looked at Ida Belle.
“I’m afraid so,” Ida Belle said, “and as he won’t have another for ten days, he’ll probably tackle the lawn this afternoon.”
“We’ve got to get him out of the house,” I said.
“I don’t know,” Gertie said. “Carter is pretty strict about his days’ off. He doesn’t get many.”
“Even if there was a call, the sheriff would take it today,” Ida Belle added.
“There has to be a way to get him out of his house,” I said.
Ida Belle stared at the wall for a moment, then nodded. “There is one way.” She looked at Gertie. “You still got those pictures that we took on your phone last week?”
Gertie smiled. “You’re a genius!” She ran out of the room and returned seconds later with her cell phone. She passed it to Ida Belle, who pushed around on the display for a bit, then smiled.
“Now we wait,” Ida Belle said.