Rest in Peach

by Susan Furlong

  “Here they come now,” Mama said. She hastened over to meet them halfway, looping her arm in Hattie’s as she chatted. Despite her three-inch heels—her Sunday best—my mama still looked petite next to Hattie, who was blessed with the perfect height and a figure suited for modeling swimsuits.

  “No, no need to bring anything but yourselves,” Mama was saying. “I’ve fixed enough chicken to feed an army.” That was true. I woke first thing that morning to the smell of chicken frying. Mama had been at the stove in her robe and slippers, turning chicken in a large cast-iron skillet. And that was after she’d already deviled a couple dozen eggs.

  I greeted my friends with a hug, letting my arm linger on Cade’s while I asked Mama, “Will Daddy and the hands be joining us?” Much to her disgust, when peaches were on, Daddy didn’t break for anything. Not even church.

  “Well, they have to eat, don’t they?” she answered, pursing her lips and craning her neck to check out the line of churchgoers still shaking the preacher’s hand. “Did I see Pete Sanchez in church this morning?” she asked Hattie with mischievous gleam in her eye. “Because we could invite him, too.” Hattie flinched at the mention of Pete’s name, but before she could muster an answer, Mama flitted on to something else. “Oh, there’s Ida and the kids. I’ll just go over and remind them about lunch.” She handed me the car keys. “Be right back. Get the air going, will you?”

  As soon as she was out of earshot, I turned to Hattie. “What’s going on?”

  “What do you mean?”

  Next to me, Cade tensed and shot me a warning look. I ignored him and pressed on. “The way you reacted when Mama mentioned Pete. What’s up?”

  Bristling, she raised her fingertips to her temples and shook her head. “I’d rather not go into all that right now. Actually, you’d be doing me a favor if you never mentioned that man’s name again.” Hattie was quickly working herself into a frenzy.

  Cade blew out a long breath and took a step backward.

  “I thought things were going so well. What happened?” I was shocked. Hattie adored Pete. They were perfect for each other. Things were getting serious between them, or at least so I thought.

  “I’ll tell you what happened . . .” she started, but from somewhere within the depths of her shoulder bag, Tim McGraw started crooning a sexy tune. “Oh, shoot! This sure the heck better not be Pete calling me again.” She dug around in her bag, extracting her cell and checking the display. Her brows furrowed as she raised the phone to her ear. “Mrs. Busby? . . . What?” Mrs. Busby’s voice sounded frantic over the other end. Hattie gasped. “Oh, sweet Je— Did you call the police? . . . I’m on my way.” She disconnected and stared at us with round eyes, the color draining from her face.

  “What is it, sis?” Cade asked. But Hattie only shook her head in response before turning and darting through the lot toward her shop down the street. Without even taking time to think, we dashed after her, weaving our way between parked cars before crossing the street and running past a couple storefronts. Once inside her shop, we came to a screeching halt. There, sprawled on the floor by the counter, was Vivien Crenshaw—a wicked-looking pair of scissors protruding from the base of her throat. My eyes followed the line of her outstretched arm. Clutched in her now lifeless hand was a debutante gown, its blood-soaked satin transformed from pure white to murderous crimson.

  • • •

  It seemed like an eternity before the authorities arrived. In reality, it was probably only a few minutes, but something about being up close to a corpse made time slow to a crawl. It wasn’t until Sheriff Maudy Payne and her deputy sauntered through the door that I was able to breathe a little easier.

  “What do we have here?” the sheriff asked, removing her Stetson and running a hand over an unruly crop of mousy brown hair before bringing it to rest on her gun belt. She stood there a few seconds, shoulders back, chest puffed out and dark eyes roaming the room. Unfortunately, they turned even darker when they landed on me. Ever since last August, when I got myself tangled up in one of her murder cases, she’d been cold toward me. Of course, I don’t think she cared for me much before then, either. Something to do with a long rivalry between her and my sister, Ida. Guilt by association, I guess.

  “It’s Vivien Crenshaw,” Mrs. Busby said. The poor woman was standing off to the side with her arms clenched around her midsection as if she was trying to hold herself together. “I found her when I opened the door.”

  “What time was that?” the deputy asked. Deputy Travis Hanes was homegrown, although I’d never really met him until after I returned to Cays Mill last summer. I’d heard he studied criminal justice at Central Georgia Tech up in Macon and had just taken the job with the Cays Mill Sheriff’s Department a few months before our last murder occurred. Now this. Guess he was learning the ropes the hard way.

  Mrs. Busby continued, “Just right before I called you. Maybe a little after eleven. I’d come in to get some extra work done. When I saw what’d happened, I called you right away.” Mrs. Busby started trembling. I crossed over and wrapped my arm around her shoulders.

  “You came through the front door?”

  Mrs. Busby nodded.

  “And it was locked?”

  Another nod.

  Maudy motioned for Travis to check out the back room. In the meantime, she started pacing the scene, circling the body slowly, bending down here and there to get a closer look. “And the rest of you? Why are you here?”

  I assumed she meant Cade and me, since it would make sense for Hattie to be in her own shop. “Cade and I were with Hattie when Mrs. Busby called. We just came along to help.”

  “Aw . . . I see.” Maudy removed a ballpoint pen from her front shirt pocket and started poking at the dress in Mrs. Crenshaw’s hand. “What time did you close up shop yesterday, Ms. McKenna?”

  “I left early, I guess. Maybe around four thirty. I’d had a bad day.”

  “Did you lock up the place?”

  Hattie glanced over to where I was standing with Mrs. Busby. “No, Mrs. Busby was staying late. Keeping an eye on things for me.”

  A pointed look from the sheriff prompted Mrs. Busby to explain. “That’s true. I had to wait for Mrs. Crenshaw anyway. She was supposed to be coming in to pick up a dress at six thirty, but she called and canceled. Said she had something come up and that she’d call me today to reschedule.”

  That seemed strange. If Vivien had canceled then why did she show up at all?

  “About what time did you get the call?” the sheriff asked.

  Mrs. Busby pressed her lips together, tucked her chin and rolled her eyes to the ceiling. A few seconds later she finally responded, “It must have been a little before six. I only say that because I left right afterward, and when I got home the six o’clock news was still on. Channel thirteen. The weather girl was predicting rain, which would make it about six twenty,” she babbled. “Wish it would rain. We could use a little relief.”

  “Looks like the back door was jimmied,” Travis announced, coming back into the room. “Nothing else seems to be disturbed.” He looked at Hattie. “You’ll need to replace the lock, though.”

  “Don’t worry. I’ll see to it,” Cade told the deputy.

  “Travis, put in a call to the crime scene guys. We’ve got some work to do here.”

  “Yes, ma’am. Funeral home, too?”

  Maudy sighed. “Yeah, give JB a call. We’ll need a transport. But call Doc Harris, first. Tell him to get over here. I need him to pinpoint the time of . . . Well, lookie here.”

  We all took a half step forward as Maudy squinted with interest at Vivien’s diamond-studded watch. She turned to Travis. “Got some gloves on ya?”

  He opened a pouch on his utility belt and produced a pair of latex gloves. Maudy stretched them over her big hands and carefully turned Vivien’s arm, just a fraction, so she could see the whole face of the wa
tch. “It’s busted,” Maudy said. “Must have broken during a struggle. Or maybe when she fell after bein’ stabbed. And it looks like time stopped a little after six thirty.” She pointed at the scissors. “These yours?” she asked Hattie.

  Hattie hesitated, sliding her eyes toward Mrs. Busby, who hemmed and hawed a bit before answering, “Afraid those are my fabric scissors, Sheriff. They’re as sharp as a thistle.”

  The sheriff nodded and moved to the other side of the body, where she used her pen to lift part of the dress. She studied it for a long time. Finally, she asked, “What is this? A wedding gown?”

  Hattie and I exchanged a look, but neither of us dared go down that path. The last thing we wanted to do was identify the garment as the debutante gown our friend Ginny and the very dead Vivien Crenshaw had been fighting over. Mrs. Busby, on the other hand, didn’t feel the same need for discreetness. “That’s a girl’s debutante gown, Sheriff. Just yesterday, Mrs. Crenshaw and that red-haired woman who runs the diner were fighting over that gown.” I closed my eyes and cringed as she went on, “They practically came to blows over it. But Mrs. Crenshaw won out. Made that other gal real mad, too. Why, she was fit to be tied. Should have heard the way she was talking about Mrs. Crenshaw.”

  The sheriff was all ears. “You don’t say?”

  Mrs. Busby was on a roll. “Yes, I think she even said something about stabbing the poor woman.”

  “No, she didn’t!” I couldn’t help blurting out.

  Maudy gave me a cold stare then the cold shoulder as she glanced at her deputy, who’d finished up his phone calls and was busy scribbling in his notepad. “Did ya get that, Travis?”

  “Yes, ma’am. Suspect threatened to kill the victim.”

  Suspect?

  Hattie stepped forward. “Now, that’s not quite what she said, Mrs. Busby. I think you’re a little confused. Must be the shock and all.” She turned to Maudy. “She just called her a backstabbing snob, that’s all. That’s not the same as threatening to stab someone.”

  “Oh, you’re right,” Mrs. Busby conceded with a nod. Tugging at her close-cropped curls, she screwed up her face and asked, “What all did she say, exactly? She said more, I know. I’m afraid I just can’t recall.”

  The room grew silent as the sheriff looked back and forth between Hattie and me, waiting for one of us to crack, I supposed. Hattie fixated on the floor and clamped her lips tight, which left me as the bad guy. I wavered for a few seconds, finally figuring I might as well spill. The sheriff would get what she needed from one of the other ladies anyway, and who knew what “recollection” they might have of the exact wording. “They were simply arguing over the dress, that’s all.”

  “This dress?” Maudy pointed at the blood-soaked gown.

  “Uh-huh. A silly thing, really. In the end, things got a little heated between them. All Ginny said was that she wasn’t going to stand for Vivien stealing her daughter’s dress. Who could blame her, really?” I didn’t add about Ginny stating she’d be sure Vivien got “her due.” Because of course, she didn’t mean this.

  But I hadn’t needed to add anything else. Maudy stood a little straighter, an unmistakable grin tugging at the corner of her mouth. She raised her chin toward Travis, arched her brows and inhaled deeply, as if she’d just caught a whiff of something very satisfying. I recognized the look in her eyes. It was the same dogged determination I’d seen the summer before, when she went after my own brother-in-law for murder.

  Ginny was in big trouble.

  Chapter 3

  Debutante Rule #026: When in doubt, just ask yourself, “What would Scarlett do?”

  The deafening din of the after-church crowd was in full swing when we arrived at the diner: people murmuring, dishes clinking, food sizzling, someone’s baby crying . . . Hattie, Cade and I lingered by the chalkboard menu for a second, trying to collect our wits as we scanned the place for Ginny. She wasn’t anywhere to be found, but Emily was there. She looked up from taking an order and tossed us a friendly but frazzled wave. To my surprise, I also saw the same dark-haired girl I’d seen in the dress shop the day before. Only today, she was busing tables, not washing windows.

  “Maybe Ginny’s in the kitchen helping Sam,” Hattie suggested. As soon as the sheriff had finished her questions, we’d rushed right over to the diner to warn Ginny. We were hoping to give her a heads-up before Maudy showed up to interrogate her.

  “There she is.” Cade pointed to where Ginny popped through the swinging kitchen door, a tray of juice glasses in hand, and headed for the far end of the counter, where she used her open hand to retrieve a cinnamon roll from under a glass dome. Despite everything, my mouth watered. I happened to know that Ginny and Sam purchased a couple dozen pastries every weekend from Ezra Sugar, owner of Sugar’s Bakery. Cinnamon rolls, along with peach scones, were his specialty.

  “Hey, all!” she called out as we approached. “Don’t think there’s a spot open right now.” She slid the roll in front of a guy seated at the bar and handed him a glass of orange juice. “Could I get Sam to fix y’all something to go?” she called over her shoulder, heading back around the counter toward the pass-through window that separated the kitchen and diner. Several plates were sitting under the warmer, stacked high with eggs, flapjacks and grits awaiting delivery.

  “We need to talk to you,” Cade said. “It’s important.”

  Ginny shrugged and double-checked one of her tickets before grabbing a couple plates. “Sure. What’s up?”

  “In private,” Hattie added.

  She shot us a flinty stare and pushed around us, plates balanced on her arms. “Are you serious? It’s a nuthouse in here. It’ll have to wait until later.”

  Cade started to protest, but I grabbed his arm and pulled him close to my face. “Watch what you say.” I dipped my chin toward the far end of the bar where Frances was turned our way, staring suspiciously. “Let’s not alert the press.” So far, word hadn’t gotten out about Vivien. I wanted to keep it that way for at least a little while. But, Frances’s uncanny senses must have alerted her that something was awry. She started glancing about, homing in on various individuals before finally turning her focus out the window. I followed her gaze, dismayed to find that even though Hattie’s Boutique was located across the square on the other side of the old courthouse, it was still partially visible from the diner. Even from where I was standing, I could see the sheriff’s cruiser parked on the curb outside the shop.

  Uh-oh. “We’ve just run out of time,” I told Hattie and Cade, watching Frances hop off her stool and make her way closer to the front window. “We need to find a way to get Ginny alone, now.”

  “But be discreet about it,” Hattie warned her brother.

  Ginny was on her way to one of the booths with coffeepot in hand when he finally flagged her down. “Think we will get something to go, after all.”

  She ambled back, setting the coffeepot by the cash register and pulling the pen from behind ear. “Okay, then. What can I get y’all?”

  I held my breath as Frances neared our group, but she pushed right past us with a determined gait, slapped a few dollars on the bar and passed us again as she headed out the door. I leaned forward. “Vivien Crenshaw’s been murdered.”

  “What?”

  “And you may be a suspect,” Cade added.

  “Me?”

  Hattie touched her arm. “You had that terrible argument with her yesterday.”

  Ginny frantically shook her head. “I argue with people all the time, but I don’t kill them!”

  “Shhh,” I warned, glancing around the crowded diner. “We need to go somewhere private and discuss this. Maudy is probably on her way over here right now.”

  Ginny glanced around, her eyes finally settling on Emily, who was standing at another table, pen poised over her order pad, addressing a group of well-dressed matrons. “Let’s go back into the kitchen,”
she told us, then she signaled to Emily and mouthed, “Cover me?” Emily nodded and quickly turned her focus back to one of the ladies who was pointing out an item on the menu.

  “What are you doing back here? There must be another dozen orders waiting,” Sam said, glancing up from the grill as we entered the kitchen. He was tending a line of at least twenty pancakes, flipping each one to golden perfection. I watched in amazement as he reached over with his other hand, grabbed an egg and cracked it single-handedly, then lifted a heavy iron off a row of frying bacon. Sam defied the stereotype about men and multitasking.

  Ginny started to explain, “Remember me telling you about Vivien Crenshaw last night?”

  “Remember? How could I forget? You were fit to be tied.” He chuckled over his eggs, then sobered. “Poor Emily, though. Went straight to her room and cried half the night. ’Bout never got her settled down.” He grabbed four plates from a nearby stack, setting them up on the counter next to the grill. Removing pancakes in sets of three, he began making a neat stack on each plate.

  “She was murdered last night,” Ginny told him.

  Sam stopped and gave us his full attention. “Murdered?”

  Hattie chimed in, “It’s true. They found her this morning at my shop.”

  “And the sheriff knows all about the argument we had over that dress.”

  Cade shifted his feet. “And, she’s probably on her way over here right now.”