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Snakes & Snails and Deadly Cattails: An Ivy Bloom Mystery (Ivy Bloom Mysteries Book 2)

Page 3

by Caryn Thomas Mitchell


  "And is there? A reason I mean?" I said as I put creamer in my coffee and some cinnamon, and tried not to think about the sugar it was missing.

  She sighed, "Well, no, I don't think so. I mean we follow all the rules, so we should be fine."

  "But?" I asked.

  "Well, it's these TV people."

  I rolled my eyes, "Let me guess, Bruce?"

  "No, actually, not him specifically. It's the company though, they have like one thousand accounts and they're active every day."

  "A thousand?!"

  "No, I'm exaggerating. They have maybe a dozen though. And every day there's cash deposited by one of the...what do you call them?"

  "Oh, the PA's I think you mean?"

  "Right, that's probably it. Young, casual clothes, always carrying coffee."

  I nodded, that sounded about right. I used to see them around my neighborhood in New York when shows were filming nearby.

  "It seems like it's nothing illegal or anything. But," she shook her head, "it's a lot of accounts, it's confusing."

  "Well, they probably need different accounts, they have craft services to get them food, and make-up people, and some sort of account to buy those big bulldozers, and one for the land."

  "Right," she nodded. "It seems legit, but the auditors were just digging into it. And then Luke was killed. I don't know," she sipped her coffee and winced, "this is going to take the enamel off my teeth, I'll be right back, it needs more cream" she said and got up to go see Gertie at the counter.

  I turned this over in my head, it didn't really add up to trouble. At least not that I could tell. Seemed like it would be a problem for the bank though, at least in terms of aggravation.

  When she got back to the table with a fresh cup of coffee, and what looked like a snickerdoodle the size of my head, she sat down and sighed again. "It's so weird, you know? He was here one day and gone the next," she said breaking off a part of her cookie.

  "I know," I said and reached over and patted her hand. Stealing a piece of cookie didn't even cross my mind. Mostly.

  "Do you know...well, how it, I mean what kil..." she sniffed, "I can't even say it."

  "You mean what happened? No, I'm not sure, I didn't get close enough to see, and Drake didn't have anything he wanted to share. I did see a snake, or I thought I did anyway."

  "A snake! There aren't poison snakes here...are there?"

  "No, I don't think so, I mean I guess I don't know for sure, but that probably wasn't it anyway."

  "He was afraid of them."

  "What?"

  "Snakes, he was afraid of them."

  "How do you even know that?"

  "One year Miranda had a rubber one in her car, she was going to use it in her garden to scare off some birds or whatever. He saw it in the backseat and nearly had a heart attack."

  "Well, I'm not even sure there was one there, but I thought I saw one in the cattails. Probably just my imagination," Had it been? I wasn't sure. I thought back to the statement I had given the police. I had said I thought I'd seen a snake but they dismissed it. They'd know. Right? Yeah, probably.

  "Ivy, are you in there?" she was snapping her fingers in front of my face. "Lost you for a minute there. I have to get back to work."

  "Yeah, me too, Gigi is going to be here soon to get me."

  "Thanks for the chat. Stay in touch, and let me know if you hear anything."

  "Sure, you do the same," she said taking her coffee and heading across the street to the bank. I watched her walk away and thought for about the millionth time how glad I was not to have a desk job. I do have a job though, and I needed to get to the store. I got up, cleared my stuff and texted Gigi to see where she was. We had things to do.

  Chapter 5

  Gigi responded that she was on her way, with Jenn in tow. I got another cup of coffee, cream and cinnamon-ed it, looked wistfully at the sugar, and then went back to the table.

  Just like before, I heard the crew before I saw them. They were all dressed alike in t-shirts, with the show logo on them, and jeans. The camera guy came in first, the rig balanced on his hip so that the camera would stay steady. He was wiry but must have been pretty strong to manage that thing. Immediately, he was followed by a huge pole with a microphone at the end and a guy, who was wearing headphones, at the end of the pole. The two designers, Angel and Heather, were accompanied by Bruce and they were all heading into the shop. Behind all of them were Jenn and Gigi. Luckily I had taken their order by text so their food was ready. Jenn came to sit at the table and I looked at her carefully made up face.

  "You knew they'd be here today, didn't' you?"

  "Yep," she said opening her phone and facing it toward me, "there's an app we're using."

  "Who's we?"

  "Anyone who wants to be on camera," she said as her mom approached the table with their food and drinks.

  "Are you trying to torture me or get me to bite your arm off?" I said eyeing the goodies they were eating. Sometimes I wondered if we were even related, considering the carbs they could pack away.

  "No biting," Gigi said swatting my hand away as I pretended to steal a piece of bagel.

  The crew had finished ordering and meandered over to a table next to us. Jenn sat up a little straighter, smiled a little brighter, and tossed her hair for extra fluffiness.

  Just as he was meant to, Bruce noticed and smiled and waved at her. The camera swung around as Bruce mentioned the bookstore and my niece who worked there. The last thing I wanted was to be on camera today in all my post-run glory, so I was glad it was at my back. I turned around in order to ignore them.

  The camera must have only lingered on us for a minute or two, as Jenn returned to her normal relaxed self moments later.

  I cocked my head to see if I could hear what they were talking about. Word of Luke's death had obviously gotten to them and it was a topic of conversation. I couldn't hear everything but something about the land, and their accounts.

  I heard another voice chiming in and turned slightly to see that the camera man had stopped filming and was talking to Bruce.

  I squinted my eyes, wondering why the crew would weigh in.

  My thoughts were interrupted by a young woman in a crew tee-shirt who came flying in the door and went right over to Bruce and the camera guy. She knelt on the floor and whispered to them, they took turns whispering back.

  The whole thing took just a few seconds, then she was up and gone and the little group was filming again.

  They seemed to have moved on to discussing the building project, and the designers were arguing about windows and skylights.

  I tuned back out, having learned exactly nothing, and focused on Gigi and Jenn.

  "Ladies, I have to get to work, and...so do you!"

  "Right," Gigi said, and she began gathering up the paper napkins and bag from Jenn's cookies and her bagel.

  Jenn looked at me with big eyes, and I looked at my watch.

  "Half an hour, okay?"

  "Yes, thank you!" She sang, and went to the counter for another cookie, while her mom and I walked to the door.

  As we were leaving Drake pulled up in his truck.

  "Hey," he said as he walked past us to go inside.

  "Hey," I said and I watched as he walked right to the table with the designers and crew. He didn't even ask me anything about my run! Or what I had eaten! I stared after him and shook my head.

  "Rats! We should have stayed," I whispered as we stood around outside the shop pretending to discuss something very important in Gigi's planner. "He was too busy to hassle me, or even ask about my run. That's weird. I mean he was working, but still."

  "Nothing we can do now," she whispered back, "I'll text Jenn to let us know if anything interesting happens."

  "Teaching your daughter to snoop!"

  "Yep! How does anything get done around here if we don't do it ourselves?"

  "Exactly what I was thinking, "I said as we walked to Gigi's car and slid inside. The interior was
warm and I rolled down the window. As I did, the two designers walked past, without their entourage.

  I put my hand on Gigi's arm to keep her from starting the car so I could try to hear what they were saying.

  The short one, Angel, was saying to the other one, "Well, his dad does own it, so that's why." And then they were out of earshot.

  Whose dad? Probably Bruce's as he was in charge, or maybe they weren't talking about the crew or the show at all. Not enough information to go on, not that too little information had ever stopped me before. I shrugged and let her arm go so she could get the car started. As I did she handed me her cell.

  "Text from Jenn," she said.

  "Oh, thanks," I said as I opened her texting app.

  She had sent a picture of Drake, who was clearly angry, waving his arms as he spoke to Bruce, who was standing facing him and appeared to be shouting back at him.

  "Well phooey! Looks like we missed the good stuff again."

  I texted back, 'Come to work and report in asap!'.

  "Looks like there was an argument," I said to Gigi, "Drake and Bruce, your daughter got a picture. I told her to come to work and report in."

  Gigi laughed "Now who's teaching her to snoop?"

  "Guilty as charged. Does she have her car with her?"

  "Yep, she's got wheels, we'll see her soon I'm sure."

  "Maybe sooner than we thought," I said as Drake's truck came around us in traffic, lights and sirens going and pulled to a stop at Bertie Q's, a downtown bar and grille.

  "Huh," I said as we drove by, "I wonder what that's all about?"

  "Right? Rough night at Bertie's? Usually the calls there are at 2 am, not this late in the morning."

  "No idea, weird though," I said, checking in the rearview mirror as the parking lot for the bar disappeared out of sight.

  "He must have something he's working on. But it's not necessarily about this."

  "No, of course not," I said. It's probably just a coincidence. "We're just really being nosey anyway, he doesn't need our help, he's perfectly good at this detecting stuff."

  "But?" Gigi asked.

  "What do you mean?"

  "I'm sure there's a 'but' there somewhere."

  "No," I settled back in my chair, "of course not, just that..."

  "I knew it," she said smacking the steering wheel for emphasis.

  "No, really, well, it's that we can maybe ask questions easier and get answers because no one knows us as anything other than the bookstore sisters."

  "That's true," she said tapping her fingers thoughtfully as she steered, "I don't think people always tell the police everything."

  "But gossiping with people you grew up with is different."

  "We grew up with Drake too," she pointed out.

  "True, but he's still police. A detective no less. People get unnerved around them—sometimes anyway. I think we should at least keep our ears open, then we can decide if there's anything we need to share."

  "Good idea, although I wonder what he was doing at Bertie's"

  "A little mystery is good for the soul," I said as she parked the car at the bookstore. "I'm going to run upstairs for a quick shower, I'll meet you back down here in a little bit."

  My apartment was beginning to heat up in the late morning sun and I clicked the thermostat to the air conditioner to cool things off. As I crossed to the bathroom I remembered the card from the trail near the lake and I went to the drawer to pull it out.

  Turning it over thoughtfully in my hand I decided I had better suck it up and tell Drake about it. He was going to be mad, but if it was something important I'd feel terrible.

  After my shower I power dried my hair and slicked on some lip gloss and mascara. Calling it good I pulled on a skirt and top and checked myself in the mirror.

  Why did running make everyone thin except me? It was hardly worth giving up bagels for. As an afterthought I slid the card into my skirt pocket and headed down to the store. The day had already been so interesting that it felt like mid-afternoon. And from the sounds of things downstairs at the store, we were on a roll.

  Chapter 6

  Outside the store was the camera crew and the ever-present Bruce, with his handmaidens. I mean designers, Angel and Heather. I could tell who was a member of the crew because, just like this morning, all of them were wearing their red "Nailing It!" shirts with the white logo and the word 'Crew' on the back in neat white letters. Subtle.

  The commotion was from Gigi keeping them outside.

  "We're just filming B roll, we won't bother you."

  "B roll?" Gigi asked.

  "Background, just scenery to use between shots or whatever."

  "Why? And why today? And wouldn't you think to ask for permission before filming here?" Gigi asked. It seemed like a logical series of questions.

  I stepped outside to help.

  "Hi, Bruce, what's going on?"

  My conciliatory tone took the tension down a notch and he scrubbed his hand through his hair as he turned to look at me. I thought I spotted shadows beneath his eyes. Was he tired? From what?

  "It's a beautiful day, I thought you'd be out at the site?"

  Bruce took me by the elbow and stepped to the side. Quietly he said, "Well, so did we, but we need to fall back and re-group. The death of the bank president has made things difficult. We were still working through the final pieces of the land purchase. Things are tied up according to your sheriff, I'm sure it's just temporary and we'll work it all out, but in the meantime I have a lot of people I have to keep busy."

  "Detective."

  "What?"

  "Detective, he's a detective. Anyway I'm sorry to hear all that, what a fly in the ointment. I guess I had the impression that everything was signed, sealed and delivered."

  "Almost," he smiled thinly, "but with Luke dying, and then the auditors at the bank asking questions, the sher...uh detective has told us to hold up until they decide when we can film again."

  "Oh, I see," I said, not seeing at all. How were they using the land and not full owners of the property yet? "I don't mind you filming here, but we would have appreciated a heads up. Can you give us some time to make the store camera ready? As you can see we're kind of busy. Maybe," I glanced at my small band of booksellers who by now had all gathered in the large entryway that served as a cashier area, and were looking at me expectantly, "what do you think guys, can we do this in two hours?" All of them nodded yes, and then scurried off to begin working on making the store look good for its close-up. I seriously had the best book crew ever.

  "That's the best I can do at the moment, will that work for you?"

  "Yeah, I guess," he stopped and took a deep breath, "I mean, thank you." He waved his camera man over, "Mike, we have to go find something else to do for the moment, we can come back here later." Mike just nodded his head.

  Bruce looked so defeated, I actually felt sorry for him. I thought a minute then said "We have a lot of land here, it's on the edge of a small pond that leads to the bay. If you can promise me no one will fall in or anything, I can let you get some scenery shots from outside."

  "Yeah, okay, that might work."

  "It's really lovely back there, we have gardens and some really old trees. Maybe your designers can use it as inspiration?"

  I could tell he didn't know if I was teasing him or being serious, but at this point he clearly didn't care.

  "Thanks, we'll do that. Hey, Mike! We're going to do some filming out back. After we can go get lunch then be back here in a few hours, will that work for everyone?" Mike nodded his agreement, and Bruce turned to me.

  "This is nice of you, thanks. Will that timing work for you too?"

  "Yes, sure, we can make that work. Just one thing."

  "Yes?"

  "Once you're in the store leave the displays alone and don't re-arrange anything. Please. We work hard on the place and it's set up to please the customers, not anyone else. I don't mean to be rude, but, well, you know. Just don't."


  "Right, I'll do my best. Thanks," turning to his team he waved them forward and they went to explore the back gardens.

  "Nice save!" Gigi said, as we headed back inside.

  "Well, the place doesn't look bad really, but you can't just pop around to take film of the store with no notice."

  Gigi went upstairs to make sure things were okay in the various rooms that were being used by the store, and I stayed downstairs to get to work. Fortunately, our team was on top of things, and there wasn't too needing to be done.

  I turned to head to the storeroom and nearly tripped over Drake. "Hey! What's up?" I asked.

  "Sorry I didn't really talk earlier, I was distracted."

  "I noticed that, anything you can share?" I didn't want to pry, well no I wanted to but didn't dare. I was dying to know what was happening though.

  "A bunch of unrelated issues I think. I had to stop that crew from filming at the construction site this morning. And that," he rolled his eyes, "went about as badly as I expected. Then I got a call to Bertie's. It turns out there was a camera at Bertie's that got video of someone leaving with Luke. It's fuzzy and hard to figure out who it was, but we have an idea. We've found Luke's car, it was at home, but it looked like there was a lot of mud inside so we're not sure if he had it with him and someone drove it back, or if he left it there to begin with, but then why all the mud? That's about all I can say right now, nothing conclusive just some threads to follow."

  "That's weird, right? Didn't Luke kinda keep to himself?"

  "Not that weird. He wasn't exactly a regular, but he wasn't a stranger there either."

  "Really? I hadn't realized that. I thought he kept to himself these days."

  "Lots of folks go out for a drink now and again. He used to turn up later, like 11 or so. He liked to work late at the bank, then stop in for a drink."

  "I see, so there's video?"

  "Two actually, a pretty good one from inside, and a pretty terrible one from outside."

 

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