Guns, Wives and Chocolate

by Sally Berneathy

  She wailed.

  Logic wasn’t helping.

  “Grace, I’m sorry if I hurt you.”

  “I’m glad they’re gone.” I hadn’t seen Rickie come in.

  Grace pulled her son into an embrace. “They were the only grandparents you’ll ever have.”

  He wiggled free. “They’re not my grandparents. I don’t want any grandparents. They smelled bad like they hadn’t taken a bath in a month. I bet they had lice.”

  Kid was smarter than I thought.

  Grace forced a smile. “No, you don’t need grandparents. We have each other.”

  “Whatever.” He left the room.

  Such a touching moment between mother and son.

  Grace’s smile turned to a frown when she looked at me. “See what you did to my son?”

  What had I done to her son? Made him happy?

  “Lindsay,” Fred said, “you need to get some sleep. You’re going to be exhausted at work tomorrow.”

  I stood. “Yeah. Right. I better go.” Before Grace kicked me out.

  Fred and I left.

  Grace slammed the door behind us. I couldn’t hear the new deadbolts turning, but I was sure she’d locked them all.

  “She’ll get over it,” Fred assured me as we walked toward the street.

  “I know.”

  “Do you?” he asked.

  “No. I don’t know. I don’t care.”

  He didn’t challenge my lie. “That was an excellent display of using your stun gun for maximum effect without harming anyone.”

  His white hair glowed in the moonlight almost like a halo. “Was that a compliment?”

  “Of course.”

  Wow. The evening wasn’t a complete loss. Fred had complimented my skills with a gun.

  “Do you think Alinn is really pregnant?” I asked.

  “I have no idea. But if she is, it doesn’t belong to Chuck. There’s a note in the autopsy report about his vasectomy.”

  Rickhead had one of those, but Rickie was proof it hadn’t been successful. “Those have been known to fail.”

  “Not Chuck’s. His vas deferens was severed.”

  Chuck had been sort of truthful with Grace. He really was sterile. He’d lied about the reason, but he’d completely lied to the other women. I needed to tell her that.

  If she ever spoke to me again.

  Chapter Sixteen

  Fred walked me to my door because it was dark and he’s a gentleman and evil people were about. I had my stun gun and was quite capable of defending myself, but I appreciated his gesture.

  “Good night,” I said.

  “Open your door before I leave.”

  “Seriously? Do you think somebody’s hiding inside?”

  “It wouldn’t be the first time.”

  I sighed melodramatically before unlocking and opening my front door.

  He stepped inside briefly. “Nobody here. Good night.”

  After the drama of the evening, I wouldn’t have minded a hug. Fred’s not a hugger, and I wasn’t about to admit to feeling needy. It was a ridiculous feeling anyway. Grace and I weren’t real friends like Paula and I were. It didn’t matter if she was angry with me. It was crazy that I felt guilty for playing a part in separating her from those awful people.

  But I did. I felt guilty and sad and inexplicably lonely, as if I were experiencing Grace’s loneliness.

  I stood on the threshold of my empty house for a moment.

  Of course it was empty since I wasn’t inside yet.

  A white streak came out of the darkness and rubbed against my leg. Henry knew I needed a bit of comfort. He’s psychic, sometimes more so than Fred.

  “Come in, big guy, and let’s have a snack.”

  He trotted toward the kitchen.

  One leg rub was better than nothing.

  I turned on the light and followed him. After I poured food into his bowl, I checked my phone. Trent had called twice.

  I wanted to talk to him. I needed to talk to him, hear a friendly voice, feel not alone. I needed him to tell me I’d done the right thing for Grace by getting rid of her in-laws.

  I went to the living room and sank into my comfortable arm chair for a comfortable conversation.

  “Missed you last night,” I said as soon as he answered.

  “Missed you too. How’d your day go? Sell a lot of chocolate?”

  For his own good, I wasn’t going to tell him about Fred’s and my visit to Howdy Doody’s place. He’d worry. Grace hadn’t asked me to keep her in-laws a secret, so we could talk about them. “I got to meet Chuck’s parents tonight.” I told him about Leon and Edwina and how Alinn swooped in to claim them as hers. “Grace is pretty upset about all of it.”

  “Yeah, she has a lot going on in her life right now.”

  “You could say that. Her husband’s been murdered, she may go to prison, and her husband’s first wife just stole her in-laws. And now she blames me for them leaving.”

  “How about I come over for a while?”

  “No.” Yes! “It’s late. We both need to get some sleep.” I was being rational. Much as I wanted Trent to come over, I knew that would be silly.

  “I understand. You have to get up really early. It’s Wednesday. The weekend will be here soon. Get some sleep and try not to worry about Grace. Chuck’s parents sound like terrible people. She’s better off without them.”

  “She’s lonely. She wants to have a family.”

  “She has Rickie.”

  “Who’s going to take care of him if you cops put her in prison?” The confrontational question flew out of my mouth before I could stop it. That happens a lot.

  Trent was silent for a moment. “His dad?”

  “Yeah, right. We both know that’s not going to happen. Are you still investigating Chuck’s murder or have you decided you have the guilty person and you’re not going to do anything else?”

  He was silent for a longer moment.

  “You’re not doing anything, are you?” I demanded. “You’ve made up your mind Grace is guilty, and that’s the end of it. You’re going to ramrod her straight to the gas chamber.”

  “Get some sleep. Love you.”

  I pushed the “End Call” button as hard as I could. It wasn’t nearly as satisfying as slamming down the receiver on an old phone, but it would have to do.

  I was angry. With Trent? Maybe. With myself? Definitely.

  Henry strolled into the room and meowed then headed for the stairs.

  At least my cat and I were still on good terms.

  

  The next morning while Paula and I worked I told her about Gaylord’s wife and Chuck’s parents and Alinn and how Grace wasn’t speaking to me. I left out the part about me not speaking to Trent. I hadn’t told him yet that I wasn’t speaking to him, so it didn’t count.

  She slid a pan of cinnamon rolls into the oven. “Grace will get over it.”

  I set a stalk of bananas on the counter and began peeling them for my Chocolate Chip Banana Nut Brownies. Fruit, nuts, and chocolate in one delicious dessert. Practically health food. “I guess. But you should have seen how sad she was. She hasn’t had a lot of luck in the family department.”

  “It doesn’t sound like those people would have brightened her family experience. Grace will be fine. She’s a survivor.”

  I hate it when somebody gives me logic instead of sympathy. I plopped another banana into my bowl. “She’ll survive if she doesn’t go to prison for killing Chuck.”

  “Well, yes, there is that. Have you heard anything else about the case against her?” Paula measured flour for biscuits into a large bowl.

  “Trent and I had a very short conversation after I got home last night. He wouldn’t tell me anything about the investigation or if there even is one. I think they’ve decided Grace is guilty, and they’re not going to look any further. Thank goodness Fred and I are doing something.” I assaulted the bananas viciously with a potato masher.

  “Have you ever co
nsidered the possibility that Grace might be guilty?” Paula kept her attention focused on stirring the contents of her bowl, thus avoiding the visual scolding I sent her way.

  “No.”

  My self-proclaimed best friend wasn’t speaking to me. My real best friend didn’t trust my judgment. My boyfriend and I were not on good terms. For all I knew, Fred and Henry could be mad at me now.

  By 1:30 the lunch hour rush was winding down. Six people remained at the counter and four tables were occupied.

  I handed a woman her change.

  “The Chocolate Chip Banana Nut Brownie was wonderful,” she said.

  “Thank you. Glad you enjoyed it.”

  It always makes me happy to know my creations bring pleasure to people.

  The satisfied customer left.

  Paula moved up beside me and leaned close. “Look at that woman at the corner table.” She inclined her head toward the end of the room farthest from the front wall of windows.

  The woman at that table had short, curly gray hair, black-framed glasses, and wore a frumpy black dress that disproved the notion of black making a woman look slimmer. She was big, probably close to six feet and two hundred fifty pounds. She sat alone, staring at her plate, pushing around pieces of her Chocolate Chip Banana Nut Brownie.

  “She looks lonely,” I whispered. “We could give her a complimentary dessert to cheer her up, but the one she already has doesn’t seem to be helping. My brownies deserve better treatment than that.”

  “She has a five-o’clock shadow.”

  “That’s even sadder. Let’s tell her she’s our hundredth customer of the day and give her half a dozen cookies.” That much chocolate should cheer up anybody.

  “I think it’s a man.”

  “Poor thing. No wonder she’s alone. Struggling with gender identity has got to be tough.”

  “Something’s not right.”

  “I can’t believe you’re being so judgmental.” I took two chocolate chip cookies with nuts from the dessert display case and set them on a plate.

  Paula laid a restraining hand on my arm, but I ignored her.

  I approached the unfortunate person’s table. “Good after…”

  The person looked up. His sleeve slid down his arm exposing a tattoo of a heart with the lopsided initials “KD” inside it.

  I almost dropped my plate of cookies.

  Paula had called it. Something was wrong, bad wrong.

  George held a finger to his lips.

  He needn’t have worried. I wasn’t going to draw the attention of my normal customers to him.

  “What are you doing here in that ridiculous outfit?” I whispered angrily.

  “You gotta help me.”

  “No, I don’t.”

  “If you don’t help me, that crazy Gaylord Dumford’s going to kill me.”

  “That is not my problem.”

  “Yeah, it is. Dumford wants the money I stole from him and buried in your basement. You gotta give it to me or he’ll kill me.”

  I didn’t have that money. His grandparents dug it up before they sold the house to me. They tucked it away safely in an account in the Cayman Islands, taking only some of the interest to repay all the money they’d spent trying to keep George out of prison. The rest was waiting for George to start college. Well, first he had to get his GED, but his grandparents were eternally optimistic.

  If I told George’s grandparents his life was in danger, they’d probably withdraw the entire amount and give it to him so he could give it to that disgusting Gaylord Dumford.

  Dilemma. Let Dumford kill the Murrays’ worthless grandson and upset Cathy and Harold or let Dumford have ten million dollars?

  Even if he got the money, what guarantee would we have that he wouldn’t kill George anyway? Howdy Doody didn’t strike me as the kind of man whose word was his bond.

  “I don’t have that money. Do you think if I had ten million dollars, I’d be working this hard every day?” I would, actually, because I love making desserts and seeing the happiness my work brings to people.

  His cold gaze constricted behind the phony glasses. “How did you know it was ten million?”

  “Tiger Lily told me.” A few other people, including his grandparents, had told me, but George didn’t need to know that.

  “You said she took it, but I talked to her. She said she didn’t.”

  “I said she probably took it.”

  “Well, she didn’t so it’s still in your basement or you have it.”

  My mind was blank. No believable lies came to mind. “I can’t talk. I’ve got customers.” I spun around and headed back to the cash register with my cookies.

  “I’ll wait.”

  He did. Sat there playing with his food until the last customer left and Paula and I had taken all the dirty dishes except his to the kitchen.

  I sighed and headed toward his table.

  “Call the police,” Paula said for the third time or maybe it was the fifth or sixth.

  “I’ll talk to him. Then we’ll get rid of him one way or the other.”

  I filled two glasses with Coke, slid into a chair at George’s table, and shoved one toward him. “Why are you wearing those weird clothes?”

  “He’s following me. Well, not him but one of his men. Maybe more than one of his men. I lost him at a thrift shop by coming out dressed like a woman.”

  I studied him closely. Sweat glistened on his forehead. The room temperature was sixty-eight degrees. I’d been rushing around so I had a sheen of sweat on my forehead too. However, George wasn’t sweating from sitting in the corner, mangling my Chocolate Chip Banana Nut Brownie. He was genuinely frightened. Surely he wouldn’t have gone out in public looking like that if he wasn’t.

  “George, I do not have your money. You’re going to have to go to Plan B.” I took a drink from my Coke.

  “I already went to Plan B. You’re the reason it didn’t work.”

  I slammed my Coke on the table so hard some of it splashed out. “Seriously? I’m to blame because you can’t find the money you stole and buried in the basement of the house I now own? I’m to blame because Plan B failed? Am I also to blame because you flunked second grade?”

  “It was third grade, and how did you know about that?”

  I slid my chair back and stood. “This conversation is over.” Of course my curiosity got the better of me. “What was Plan B and why am I the reason it didn’t work?”

  “You stopped me from finding Chuck’s money.”

  I sat again. “Dumford would have forgiven the ten million you stole from him if you brought him the money Chuck skimmed? How much did Chuck skim?” Grace hadn’t mentioned how much money Chuck had left, but surely she’d have said something if it was ten million dollars.

  George looked away.

  “Don’t lie to me,” I warned. “If you lie to me, there’s no chance I’ll help you.”

  He leaned forward. “Chuck didn’t skim any money.”

  “Wait. You said Dumford sent you to Grace’s house to get back the money Chuck skimmed from him.” If Chuck hadn’t been stealing Howdy Doody’s money, what reason did he have to kill him?

  He shrugged. “Like you never told a lie?”

  “My veracity isn’t in question here. What were you doing in Chuck’s house in the middle of the night?”

  “I knew Chuck was saving up so he could quit the drug business. He didn’t say how much he had, but I figured it was enough to get Dumford off my ass for a little while until I could find that money in your basement.”

  This time I slammed my fist on the table. Didn’t want to waste any more Coke. “I’m only going to say this one more time, so you need to listen. There. Is. No. Money. In. My. Basement. Your girlfriend dug up the floor. Fred and I dug it up even more when we fixed it. You can dig all the way to the center of the earth, and you will find nothing but dirt, molten lava, and maybe a few skeletons of prehistoric men along the way!”

  Silence.

  Di
shes rattled in the kitchen. I needed to finish with George and go help Paula.

  I rose again. “Are we done?”

  He dropped his head. His whole body sagged. “Yeah, we’re done. I’m done. You ever heard the term walking dead man?”

  I did not feel sorry for him.

  I did not. He was a horrible man who brought this on himself.

  I did feel sorry for the Murrays who would grieve for all the lost dreams they had for their grandson if Howdy Doody killed him.

  But that was not my problem.

  I started away from the table.

  “Hey, you know that cop you’re dating, the one you called last night?” George asked.

  I turned back slowly. “What about him?”

  “I might need to talk to him.”

  Was he going to blackmail me into helping him by threatening to rat me out over the stun gun episode in Grace’s house? “What do you want to talk to him about?”

  He pushed his wig back and ran a hand over his forehead. “If Dumford goes to prison, he can’t kill me.”

  From what I’d seen on Investigation Discovery, I doubted that was true. Howdy Doody seemed the type criminal who could reach out from behind bars to put a hit on somebody. But I was interested to hear what George had to say. Howdy Doody was still my favorite suspect in Chuck’s murder. Just because I didn’t know what his motive was didn’t mean he didn’t have one. “Go on.”

  “If I deliver him to the cops, maybe they can put me in one of those witness protection things where I change my name and nobody can find me.”

  I returned to my seat, put my elbows on the table, and tented my fingers. “I’m listening.”

  “Get me an appointment with your boyfriend. I’ll tell him everything I know about Dumford and his drug business.”

  “Trent’s a busy man. I’m not going to bother him unless you convince me you’ve got something worth his time.”

  George sat upright. “Dumford’s in charge of getting drugs into prisons in five states. I think that’s going to be worth your boyfriend’s time.”

  I shrugged and tried to appear casual. Inside I was chortling smugly that I would so easily be able to stomp on his self-importance. “You’ve got to do better than that. We already know about the church-to-prison connections and how Chuck’s wives gave him access to all those different churches.”