Bake Until Golden: A Novel (The Potluck Catering Club)

by Linda Evans Shepherd

  Her shoulders slumped, and she flopped her graying head back in her seat and looked straight out the cab window. “Oh.”

  I seat-belted her in then scurried around the truck to the driver’s side. When I climbed inside, she picked up where she’d left off. “How will you protect me at my home?”

  “Protect you from what? Evie’s rudeness?” I snorted a laugh. “Evie wouldn’t hurt a fly, you know that. Just steer clear of her and you’ll be all right.”

  “If only it were that simple,” Dee Dee said through soft sniffles. I brought the engine to life and pulled onto the street. As I drove the few blocks to her trailer park, she asked again, “Donna, will you ever forgive me?”

  “For what?” I asked, knowing there were a thousand answers I’d never speak aloud, at least not today. I pulled into the trailer park and drove down the asphalt road toward her ancient aluminum home. The trailer reminded me of a beached whale wearing a skirt of turquoise siding. Its cloudy eyes were outlined in aging black shutters. Beer bottles, cigarette butts, and crumpled malt liquor cans littered the front porch, which also hosted a couple of rough cedar chairs that had darkened with age.

  Out of habit, I turned my radio on, then stepped out of my truck, my feet crunching on the gravel of her short driveway. I hurried to open Doreen’s side of my Bronco so I could help her walk to her front steps. But before I got more than a couple of feet, my half sister Velvet came charging out of the trailer, her blonde ponytail swinging behind her. With her angry scowl and her red-rimmed blue eyes, she looked like she had tipped back a few longnecks herself.

  I’ll admit that seeing Velvet up close always gives me a bit of a start. She looks a lot like me, except for the longer hair, the false eyelashes, short cutoffs, and of course the lime green tube top. Her cheeks burned with indignation. “What have you gone and done to my mother?”

  I stepped past Velvet and walked over to the passenger side of the truck, where I helped Doreen step out and onto her remnant of a lawn, which consisted mainly of yellow-flowering noxious weeds known around here as Alpine Parsley.

  “Now, hush, Velvet,” Doreen said. “Donna ain’t gone and done nothing to me. She was just giving me a lift after I had the misfortune of running into that witch of a stepmother of hers in the checkout line.”

  Velvet pushed past me and pulled Mom out of my grasp. She turned to me and glared. “You Veseys are nothing but trouble,” she hissed through her teeth.

  “It ain’t her fault,” Doreen slurred, trying to defend me as she leaned on Velvet.

  As Velvet guided our mother to the front steps, I looked up to see Wade skipping down the steps of his trailer a few doors down.

  “Everything okay over there?” he asked.

  His sudden appearance during this ugly family scene caught my breath. Wade and I had a past, a past that had almost made us a family when I became pregnant at eighteen. And if the truth be told, our past almost tempted me to reconsider his quest to look past our old issues and pick up again. And maybe I would have, if I hadn’t met David Harris, the new man in my life. I mean, I cared about David, but our relationship was too new to ease all of my regrets, especially when it came to Wade.

  Velvet turned and fluttered her fringe of lashes at him, “Oh, Wade, you’re just the man I hoped to see. Could you help me get Mom inside the house?”

  “What happened?” Wade asked as he sprinted over. He took Doreen’s elbow and helped Velvet walk our wobbly mother up the porch steps.

  “Why don’t you ask her?” Velvet said, pointing at me over her shoulder with her chin.

  “I already told you,” Doreen said. “It weren’t her fault.”

  Before I could join the conversation, the radio in my cab crackled to life. Was that Dad’s voice? He wasn’t supposed to be at work. What had happened to his night off? I hurried back to my cab, worried that Evie was still on her rampage.

  As I opened the door of my Bronco, Dad’s voice blared, “DB at 250 Mountain Meadow Lane, 10-55d.”

  So help me if I didn’t gasp. Dad was calling for a coroner? At Goldie’s address? I called back to Wade, “Take care of my mom, okay? Got a real emergency here.”

  I didn’t wait for his answer. I hopped inside my truck, slammed my door, and hit my siren switch in one swift move. I did pause long enough to catch Wade’s nod and rather worried expression just before he disappeared into the trailer with the women.

  I drove my Bronco hard through town, a total of seven blocks, to discover my dad’s truck as well as the paramedic’s van in front of the Dippel residence. With the motor still running, and against all protocol, I jumped out of my truck and ran into the house, following the trail of people leading to Goldie’s bedroom.

  I stopped in the doorway and stared as David Harris, who was working the scene as the on-call paramedic, rolled a gurney next to the bed. He looked up at me and shook his head. My lips parted, but I couldn’t speak as I gazed back at the body sprawled across the bed.

  It was Jack. He must have had a heart attack.

  Clay Whitefield, one of our local reporters, materialized from a corner of the room, where I assumed he’d been scribbling notes on his pad to go with a story he was writing for the paper. I grabbed his shoulders. “Where’s Goldie?”

  “She’s in the kitchen with your dad,” he said in a voice that warned me I needed to calm down. He was right. Even though I’d been thoroughly trained not to lose my cool, I was almost in a panic.

  I blew out a breath. “Thanks,” I said. I turned, acknowledging David with a glance as I left the room. David looked up at me with those wistful, puppy dog brown eyes of his. He was at least as handsome as Wade, though in a more Julio Iglesias kind of way. Too, I loved the fact that David was a paramedic; he of all people knew what I experienced on the job because we often worked the same calls. If only we could take a moment to confer about his impressions of what had happened, or if I could at least get one of his comforting hugs, but that was impossible, at least for now. Maybe we’d meet for a midnight lunch behind the Gold Mine Bank. Besides, I was anxious to talk to Goldie.

  Just as Clay had promised, I found Goldie sitting in one of her oak captain chairs at her kitchen table, with my dad sitting across from her. Dad, dressed in his full sheriff’s garb, was handing Goldie a tissue as he used his gentlest voice to say, “The coroner should be here soon, Goldie. His visit is just a formality, of course. We all know Jack was having trouble with his heart, so it’s pretty obvious he had a heart attack.”

  Goldie sucked in her breath. “If only I’d been here and not off doing TV interviews . . .”

  Dad patted her hand. “The good Lord was here with Jack when he passed. He wasn’t alone now, you know that.”

  Goldie nodded, and Dad slipped her one of the many business cards we in law enforcement carry in our wallets for such occasions. I looked over his shoulder and saw the black-and-gold foil card that belonged to Hugh Mitchell, the local funeral home director.

  Dad said, “Just call Hugh and he’ll help you make your arrangements.”

  Goldie nodded and looked up at me. She said in a little-girl voice, just above a whisper, “Donna, you came.”

  “Oh, sweet friend,” I said and leaned down to hug her neck. She half stood and hugged me hard, her arms tightening in a grasp around my neck that almost toppled me onto her lap. I would have fallen if I hadn’t pressed a palm onto her oak tabletop to steady myself. Somehow, I managed to detach myself from her grip and pull up the captain’s chair my dad had just vacated, though he still hovered above us. I looked up at him as he said, “You sit with her for a while, okay, Donna? I have some things to check on.”

  I nodded. “Will do.”

  I took Goldie’s hands. They were small and cold, despite the rainbow of sparkles from so many diamond rings. Gracious, Jack had managed to turn this woman into a walking jewelry store.

  “You’re cold as ice, girlfriend.” I stood. “Let me start a pot of coffee.” She started to rise, but I protested, “Y
ou hold on. I know my way around your kitchen.”

  She nodded while I put together a quick pot to brew.

  While the coffee percolated, I sat with Goldie as she told me her horror of finding Jack dead when she returned from our trip to Denver.

  “When did you call dispatch?”

  Goldie looked up at me, her blue eyes hazy with grief. “Less than an hour ago, I guess.”

  “Ah, I was offline on another call,” I explained. I felt my brows knit. “Wish I could have come immediately to be with you.”

  She squeezed my hand. “Don’t you worry about it,” she said before drifting into silence. After a few moments she looked up at me with starling clarity, as though she were about to make a confession. “Donna, it’s no secret that Jack and I had issues but . . .”

  I waited while she collected herself.

  Her voice was low and shaky. “Still, I loved him and forgave him for cheating on me with all those women.”

  I looked around nervously, hoping no one overheard what could be construed as a motive, just in case there turned out to be any question about the cause of Jack’s death.

  I lowered my voice. “But he hasn’t, I mean, he hadn’t cheated on you lately, had he?”

  She looked startled. “Why do you ask?”

  “I have no cause to think he was seeing anyone,” I said gently. “I’m just wondering if you suspected him of being with anyone else.”

  She shook her head absently. “No, no. Not now that he was losing his health.”

  She stared at the white knuckles of her balled fists on her lap. “But at least I got a chance to sit with him before your dad arrived,” she said as she spread her fingers, smoothing the fabric of her beige pants. “I got my chance to tell my Jack that despite it all, I loved him, and that I was sooo sorry.”

  Jerry, one of the other deputies who often partnered with me, interrupted us.

  “Sorry for what, Mrs. Dippel?”

  I narrowed my eyes. Now, I liked Jerry. He was a big roly-poly teddy bear sort of a man. But the problem with Jerry was that he wanted nothing more than to sink his teeth into “real police work,” as he was fond of saying. I held my breath, waiting for Goldie’s answer, hoping it wouldn’t set my partner into detective mode.

  Goldie responded, “I was sorry that the two of us had so many regrets.”

  I stopped her before she could say more. “Meaning she’s sorry that she wasn’t here when Jack had his heart attack. Right, Goldie?”

  She nodded. “Among other things.”

  Jerry nodded too but didn’t look convinced. “Donna, may I have a word with you outside?” he asked.

  I looked at Goldie, who said, “I’ll be okay. Really.” She stood up and walked over to the coffeepot. Her grief made her a bit unsteady on her feet.

  I went out on the back porch and into the evening chill with Jerry, who shifted his weight from foot to foot. “Jerry, what’s wrong?” I asked.

  Jerry pulled out my Bronco keys from his pocket and dangled them in front of me. “This is what’s wrong.” He tossed my keys to me, and I slid them into a pocket.

  “Where’d you find them?”

  “In your Bronco. You left them in the ignition with the motor running.”

  “Oh! Yeah. Well, it looks like I owe you one.”

  Jerry chuckled. “The way I figure it, the next time we have lunch at Higher Grounds, you’re buying.”

  I nodded. “That’s fair.”

  “Now for my question: is it your opinion that Jack died of natural causes?”

  I shrugged. “He had a heart condition, what else could it have been?”

  “Do you know if Goldie had any big insurance policies out on him?”

  “Even if she does, it’s not a concern here.”

  Jerry looked over his shoulder and through the door. “How can you be so sure?”

  “Because we’re talking about Goldie. She wouldn’t hurt a fly.”

  Jerry shrugged. “Only if you say so,” he said as he pushed open the door to go back into the house. “But I’ll let you know if I find any evidence to suggest otherwise.”

  I almost laughed. “You do that, Jerry, and if you find anything, which you won’t, I’ll handcuff Goldie myself. But trust me, that’s not going to happen.”

  “Well, something is going to happen.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Just a gut feeling,” Jerry said.

  “For that they make antacid,” I teased. “Besides, this is Summit View, what could possibly happen here?”

  Vonnie

  6

  Preserving Secrets

  I was absolutely tuckered when the girls and I got back from Denver. The first thing I did upon entering my little high country home was kick off my heels and plant my bare toes into my new chutney-colored carpet I’d ordered in extra soft deluxe.

  Since the Potluck Club’s big win, I’d taken my share of the proceeds, after contributing big-time to the church’s new youth wing, and splurged on wall-to-wall carpeting, not to mention the lovely granite countertops in the kitchen.

  “It’ll really add value to your home,” Helen, the decorator at the local carpet store, had explained to me a few weeks back, and by George, I believe she was right. I loved the new look, and I must say it certainly cheered up my ever-expanding doll collection. “A sea of eyeballs,” Fred often called the never-blinking faces peeking out from every flat surface of our house.

  My appreciation for collectable dolls developed sometime after I’d lost my baby.

  I’d found out that my husband, Joseph Ray Jewel, had been killed in Nam the morning my labor stated. As I was rather hysterical, there’s no telling what the doctors used to medicate me through my baby’s birth. But whatever it was, I was too groggy to understand I was signing away my parental rights when my mom handed me the paperwork. I thought I was signing the baby’s death certificate. If you can imagine how that broke my heart, losing both my husband and my baby the same day.

  Well, as it turns out, my son David didn’t die but was lost to Hollywood. You see, his adoptive mother was Miss Harmony Harris. And yes, I do mean the recently deceased actress known mostly for her musicals some decades back.

  Frankly, I’m still appalled that my baby was stolen away from me because my mother didn’t think it would be proper for me to raise a child with a skin tone a few shades darker than my own, seeing as David’s daddy was of Hispanic descent. How could she have been so . . . okay, stupid?

  But it was David who suffered the most. He’d lost not only his dad but also his mom. It seems Harmony had little time for him, and it was the hired help who raised him, not to become a spoiled Hollywood heartthrob but, believe it or not, a paramedic who happens to be a millionaire, seeing as he inherited most of Harmony’s wealth. It warms my heart to know David went into the medical profession, just like his biological mom and dad.

  Still, David loved Harmony and saw her through her death from cancer, though he won’t talk about it much. Her passing was the main reason David came looking for me.

  You can’t imagine my surprise to discover my son was alive after all this time. I must say, it was a wonderful reunion, though not so much for my husband Fred. The news that I’d been married before and had a child came as a shock. I’m really proud of the way Fred has warmed up to David, though. In fact, the two of them have been getting along rather well, like real family, which of course is what we are.

  I leaned over the antique wicker cradle nestled on my hearth to fold back a soft, miniature blanket covering Joey, a porcelain-faced baby doll with pouty lips and wide, brown eyes. “There you go,” I said before slowly straightening, with one hand on the small of my back as if that would stop its complaining. I turned and headed toward the kitchen, walking past the guest bedroom, which had until recently been my mother’s home while she convalesced from a broken ankle.

  Nursing my grumpy mother back to health had been anything but nice, but the experience had helped me work out a fe
w of my issues with her, plus it gave Mother a chance to get to know David. But even after seeing their affection for one another grow, it was hard to let go of my grudge. The fact that I’d made progress was nothing short of a miracle. Still, I can’t say I’m not glad she’s back home with my dad in the nearby mountain town of Frisco.

  I padded across the carpet and yawned, then climbed into my new, velvety-blue recliner for a nap. I snored while my large bichon frise, Chucky, slept on my lap until Fred pulled his truck into the driveway.

  As soon as Fred slammed his door, Chucky yapped and I was on my feet running for the kitchen. I don’t think I really woke up until I was standing at the sink, heart pounding as I rinsed out my big, greasy skillet. I don’t know why the thought of Fred finding me napping caused such a panic. But since I’m a retired nurse, I merely entertain dust bunnies when not entertaining America on reality TV shows. So, there seems to be no harm in my afternoon snoozes. Of course, I manage to stay awake whenever one of the Potluck gals calls me over for coffee, a beverage I seem to drink by the gallon.

  I quickly retrieved my refrigerated chili from my big sealed Tupperware tub, scraping every drop into my skillet before turning up the gas. By the time Fred walked into the front door, the chili was heating up on the stove and I was peeling carrots for the salad, the very picture of a woman who’d been cooking for hours.

  “How was your TV interview in Denver?” Fred asked as he kissed me on the top of my head.

  With my vegetable peeler in hand, I turned to give him a hug. “Good!” I said. “Though, Evie wanted to talk about Colorado’s gold rush history more than our big win in New York, if you can believe it.”

  Fred laughed. “I bet the librarian in Lizzie had a lot to offer on that topic.”

  I giggled as he brushed my cheek with his five o’clock whiskers. “When she managed to interrupt Evie, she did.”

  I turned back to my work while Fred scratched his balding head, as if he were hesitating. “Do you know why an ambulance is in front of the Dippel house?”