by Karen Pullen
“Mommy, you were supposed to find me,” Oliver said. “You didn’t tell me you were going to take a bath.”
“Sorry, sweetie.” She leaned to kiss his cheek, then turned to me. “Did I hear you say we were leaving? Ollie and I are one hundred percent in favor of that plan. When I saw Jax out the window I thought my short miserable life was about to end.” She was bone-pale, her eyes shadowy. She took Oliver’s hand and started down the stairs as I placed a quick call to the Chatham sergeant to let him know about the SUV.
We left Bebe’s station wagon parked in the driveway. Fern had hastily shoveled an extra two days’ worth of hay into the donkey pen, and Merle had reluctantly climbed back into my car. Bebe installed Ollie on his booster seat, and the four of us plus dog set out. I checked the highway for black SUVs, as the last thing I needed at the moment was a car chase. But the road was clear, so I pulled out, and headed east.
Fern took a deep breath and let it out. “It was one of those ‘I know he knows I know’ moments but neither of us could let on. He comes tootling up the driveway, backs up to the shed, and starts unloading materials. I go out to see who it is and I can’t believe it. Like nothing happened. Tell me what’s going on, Stella.”
“Are you a CI?” Bebe asked.
“What’s a CI?” Fern asked.
“Informant. A snitch. No, I’m not. I can’t talk about it any more.” The complexity of the situation was giving me a headache. Did Jax know that Dana had kidnapped me? Why hadn’t he killed me? Had he killed Mo, as Bebe suspected? Perhaps someone else had killed Mo? Maybe Jax knew I was police and left me alive since killing a drug agent would be a far worse crime than selling, and he wasn’t stupid. But I was certain of one thing—he knew Stella Lavender was Fern Lavender’s granddaughter, and he’d dropped by Fern’s to send that message.
“Where are we going?” Fern asked.
“You’ll love it.” I didn’t want to stash Fern, Bebe, and Oliver in a crummy motel room with nothing to eat but delivery pizza, and nothing to do but watch TV and peep fearfully through the polyester drapes every time a car pulled up. They needed a safe haven, where no one would think to look. I knew the perfect place.
CHAPTER 21
* * *
Monday Mid-Afternoon
We tromped up the steps of Pink Magnolia Manor. “This is nice,” Bebe said, looking around at the big porch with its wicker furniture, ferns, and ceiling fans. Oliver clung to her, his eyes huge. I rang the doorbell.
After a few minutes, Camilla’s face appeared in the door’s glass window and she opened the door, rubbing her wet hair with a towel. She smiled but it seemed forced; this was the second time I’d showed up without calling first. “Oh my, what happened to you?” she asked.
I was getting tired of the question. “An accident. Looks worse than it is.” I introduced Fern, Bebe, and Oliver. “They need two rooms for a few nights.” Surely Jax would be found by then, limiting the damage to my credit card.
She ushered us inside. A cinnamon-yeast aroma pervaded the house. “Smells good,” Oliver said. He smiled shyly, and twisted himself behind Bebe’s skirt.
“I’m making sticky buns.” Camilla turned to Fern. “We’ve met before. Have you stayed here?”
“I have.” Fern chewed her lip as she searched her memory. “With Harry Edwards. Would have been six years ago.” She winked at me. “Two nights, for my birthday.”
Bebe sank onto the chenille-covered couch. “Ooof. Ollie, look at the pretty birds.”
He put his nose to the cage as the finches chirped and preened. “Theys looking in the mirror,” Ollie said. “They see themselfs.” He giggled and the birds fluttered.
“Easy, Ollie, don’t touch the cage. Say, what kind of place is this? It’s much nicer than any shelter I’ve ever seen,” said Bebe.
“A bed-and-breakfast,” Fern said. “Like a little hotel. Nonsmoking.”
Camilla studied her reservation book. “I have a couple of rooms upstairs that share a bath if that’s all right. For as long as you want them. Breakfast at eight.” She dug in her pocket. “Here’s a key to the front door.”
I led my troop up the stairs. On the landing, a stained-glass window sprinkled rose, blue, and amber lights onto the worn brown carpet. “Fairy lights,” Bebe told Ollie. Her room had two twin beds with white quilted coverlets. She kicked her shoes off and sank onto one of the beds. “Lord have mercy,” she said, “I am not moving for the next three hours. Ollie, lie down over there. We’re taking a nap.”
His eyes were big as he took in the room, the flowered wallpaper, the hobnail lamp. I helped him remove his shoes, and pulled the coverlet back. Clutching the teddy bear, he climbed up and lay down on his side to face his mother. Despite Bebe’s bad habits, she’d raised an obedient child.
Fern’s room had plum-colored walls, a double bed, and walnut dresser. Dotted Swiss curtains filtered the sunlight, and the bed covering, a paisley quilt, looked new. “Very nice,” she said. “But I hope we don’t have to stay here too long.” She looked at me searchingly, distress etched on her face.
“Me too. I have a feeling Jax will be found soon.” My feeling was more like hope than assurance. There was an outstanding warrant for his arrest, but aside from alerting the county sheriff, there was little else I could do. Fredricks had told me that he wasn’t known to the drug task force, that their informants had never mentioned him. My purchase of coke from Jax revealed him as a new player. Now that he’d been spooked and disappeared, they didn’t have the information to find him.
Fern and I went outside to a brick patio warmed by the afternoon sun. Merle napped by my feet as we lounged on cushioned iron chairs. Camilla brought us a tray with chicken salad sandwiches, brownies, and a pot of Lady Londonderry tea, my new favorite. The chicken salad had grapes and walnuts in it, and the brownies were frosted in chocolate with white marshmallow swirls.
“Lovely,” Fern said. “Sit down with us.”
Camilla pulled a chair over and poured herself a cup of tea. I held out the plate of brownies but she declined. “I don’t eat my own baking,” she said. “When I first opened my B&B, I went to an innkeeper conference. Everyone I met there was huge from eating their own cooking.”
“I’ve always wanted to open a bed and breakfast,” Fern mused.
“Quite a common fantasy. I hear it all the time. But just have a morning like mine, you’d run fast in the other direction.”
“Bad morning, was it?” Fern said.
“This couple brings their two-year-old, a real rug rat. His mom says to fix him eggs and hash browns, but he throws them on the floor.” Camilla illustrated with a broad swoop of her arm. “Hollers ‘pancakes!’ Mom says ‘no pancakes’ and he screams so loud I’m surprised there’s still glass in my windows. She gives in and I make pancakes. Kid pours his own maple syrup, a half-cup at least—real maple syrup—eats two bites and screams ‘down down down.’ Mom puts him down and Mr. Sticky-hands heads right for my music box collection. I jump ahead and grab the music boxes, more screaming from kid and a dirty look from Mom. I wanted to swat the kid so bad, right on his little behind . . .” Camilla shook her head. “When people ask if I take children, I always say ‘if they’re well-behaved.’ I’m going to change it to ‘if the parents are well-behaved.’ ”
“So the fantasy isn’t real,” Fern said.
“The reality is that running a B&B is a twenty-four-seven job for very little profit. I mean, we have enough, Blue and me. But insurance, utilities, everything is high. I was glad when Blue got a job.”
“Across the river, at the Castle B&B,” I told Fern.
“He can ride his bike over there, and it pays for his braces, his skateboard, his clothes.” She opened a slim booklet. “Time for research. I have vegans coming for a week. That’s seven breakfasts without eggs, cheese, or meat.”
“Oatmeal and soymilk,” Fern said.
“Good, thanks. Our B&B association put this out a couple of years ago.” She held it up, a pa
mphlet entitled “Special Diets for the B&B.” She leafed through it. “Here we go, vegan breakfast items. Couscous with fruit and nuts. Tofu scramble. Okay, with the oatmeal that covers three mornings. Four to go.”
“I have something for you,” I said. “Be right back.” I went out to my car and opened the carton containing Justine’s vegan cookbook, Enchanted Food. Surely there were breakfast menu items in here. I glanced at the table of contents. Appetizers, Soups, Entrees, Vegetables. Special Meals—Children, Picnics, Breakfast, Party. The “Breakfast” section had twelve pages of recipes. I handed the book to Camilla. “Keep it,” I said.
She thanked me and leafed through the recipes, then studied Justine’s picture on the back cover. “The girl who died at the Castle B&B, right? Kind of ironic that she was so particular about what she ate. The rest of us eat whatever and live for years, she eats healthy and . . .” She stood. “I’ve got to get back to work. Find me if you want another pot of tea.”
I thought about Camilla’s words. It was ironic, that Justine’s death was the result of drinking her cleansing tea. Despite being so careful about her food, she’d ingested a substance that killed her within minutes. Was the irony deliberate, an intentional aspect of a calculated act of murder?
“I know you can’t tell me everything,” Fern said. A breeze whipped her hair around her face. She fished in her pocket for an elastic and fastened her hair up. “But I feel so ignorant. What has Jax done?”
I studied her for a moment. Blessed with wide cheekbones, a piquant smile, and big blue eyes, Fern had always been the pretty one in the house, the cheerful flirt, the free-spirited sprite. But the past few days had taken their toll and it showed in her tired eyes. She looked frail, and for the first time I noticed a delicate spider’s web of wrinkles on her face. She must have been devastated by my abduction, then terribly frightened to see Jax step out of the SUV onto her driveway, asking for my whereabouts. I wanted to put my arms around her and assure her all would be well for the rest of her life. But I couldn’t, not yet.
Slowly I told her the story, how Mo had led me to Jax and I’d bought a kilo of cocaine from Jax and Dana. “When Dana saw me at the rest stop, she grabbed me, because she and Jax were convinced I’d given them to the police. I was the only witness who could testify about the drug buy.”
“What were they going to do to you?” Fern picked up the teapot to pour another cup.
“Who knows? Jax never showed up, it was just Dana.”
“Are the police looking for Jax?”
“Yes, but he’s gone into hiding. The only thing Dana told us was that he sometimes visited an ex-wife around here.”
Fern set the teapot down and looked at me with an excited gleam in her eye. “He mentioned her to me! Hmmm . . . what did he tell me. She takes care of their granddaughters. He showed me a picture. Just as cute as could be, identical twins, with red hair and freckles and missing front teeth. Like a
Norman Rockwell painting.”
“Identical? How old?”
“Around six.”
I popped the rest of the brownie into my mouth and pondered Fern’s words. There couldn’t be many red-haired twin girls in the area. I could start with pediatricians. Or the schools. Red-haired. Girls. Sifting through the detritus that fills up my memory, I came up with an image—a double-door stainless steel refrigerator covered with pictures of red-haired girls, a matching set grinning gap-toothed into the camera. A camera held by their grandpa? Could there be two such sets of twins? What was her name . . . Lynn, she’d told me. The oxy lady. Was she christened Lynda Christina Pons?
I couldn’t help myself. “Hoo-wee!” I jumped up and spun in a little victory dance. Merle woke up and woofed. “Fern, you are awesome. I think I know who the ex-wife is. She’ll give up his whereabouts, and he’ll go to jail.”
She studied my face. “Are you sure?”
“Wow, what a lucky break.” I felt a shimmer of optimism. “I’m going out for a while. You and Bebe stay put, okay? I’ll leave Merle with you.”
For an answer, Fern crossed her eyes at me, picked up her teacup, and drank. I could almost feel her gaze on my back as I walked to my car. If I were a mind-reader, I’d swear she didn’t want me to leave.
In a simpler universe, the cops would bust oxy lady Lynn’s butt and wring her until she gave up Jax.
This universe? Not simple.
Fredricks’s cubicle in the SBI building was decorated with photos of his boys. He was a proud dad. His computer screen, however, rotated through a show of wine-themed slides, one after another: bottle labels, dewy grapes, misty vineyards, and glasses of wine. I was admiring an artistic arrangement of purple-stained corks, listening to his end of a phone conversation, when I heard the wrong answer. Lynn’s name had been flagged in our database as the subject of an ongoing investigation into prescription drug sales, evidence courtesy of yours truly. When Fredricks made a courtesy call to the leader of the team to inform him of our plan to arrest her, I could hear the sputtering and cussing from across the room.
“I guess that means no,” Fredricks said, holding the phone away from his ear.
More buzzing sputter.
“Thanks. We’ll hold off.” He hung up and shook his head. “He says no go. They’re building a case against pharmacies, as well as a dozen dealers. The FBI and DEA are involved. If Lynn Pons is arrested now, the case will implode. We don’t go anywhere near her.”
My mood plummeted into a moshpit of anxious frustration. “Did I tell you Jax showed up at my grandmother’s house? I had to move her and Bebe and Oliver into a B&B.”
Fredricks nodded. He tipped his chair onto its back legs, creaking ominously under the strain, and stared at the ceiling. He appeared to be thinking about Jax’s whereabouts but I wasn’t sure. Perhaps he was thinking about pâté, or truffles. “The sheriff’s patrols will find him,” he said.
“I’ve bought from his ex-wife three times. She knows me, we chat a little, mostly about her nice jewelry. I’m thinking I might be able to get Jax’s contact info from her. Not in a pushy way. Just in conversation.”
He let his chair down with a thump. “Absolutely not.”
“Why not?”
“If you alert her, the massive wrath of the enforcement arm of the federal government will descend upon me.” He pointed to the phone.
“I won’t alert her.”
“The answer is no.”
“When are we going out again?”
He looked at his calendar. “Tomorrow night, if you feel up to it.”
“Let’s make a buy at Lynn’s.”
“No.”
Reluctantly, I nodded, hating the answer. My fault, for asking the question.
I wandered toward my own cubicle, to kill a few minutes until my appointment with Richard. I loathed my cubicle. Every time I sat down to read memos and write reports, I turned into Eeyore, toiling in gray pessimism. On my cork board were some snaps of Fern and Merle, and a few pictures from a trip to Jamaica with three friends after graduation—posing with Noel Coward’s statue at his home, Firefly, perched over a balmy blue bay, climbing Dunn’s River Falls, having our hair braided on the beach. Who was that dark-haired girl, the one on the left in the red bathing suit? She looked happy. She wasn’t worried about drug sellers or murderers or her reputation in the SBI. She was having fun on her vacation. I had to give up hopes of another vacation when Hogan and I split. We’d been saving for a trip to Ireland, but after our breakup, we divided the money. My half went to pay for roof repairs at Fern’s farmhouse.
I knocked on Richard’s office door but he couldn’t hear me over the screech of his grinder so I let myself in. Richard frowned as he measured the freshly ground coffee into a French press. I paused to admire him, a vision in a subtly checked tan linen suit and tassel loafers. A puff of brown silk swelled out of his breast pocket. His shirt was pale green with tonal stripes, and more stripes—tan and blue and green—lay diagonally across his tie. Checked suit, striped shirt, s
triped tie—you have to know what you’re doing to make that work. He reminded me of a peacock, fine to look at and admire until you were warned away by a shrill scream—the equivalent in Richard’s case being his dour expression and stinky cigar.
He carefully poured boiling water into the press, then stirred the slurry with a chopstick. He placed the filter assembly on top and set a timer. Finally, he turned to me. “Stella. You look terrible.”
“I know. Getting better though.”
“I want to hear about the homicide investigation.”
I knew he didn’t want to be bored with the details. “I’ve talked to a lot of people and learned more about the victim, but we have no reason to charge anyone. No witnesses, no evidence. No one’s even pointing fingers at a suspect.”
“I heard the victim was transsexual. Has to be a factor, no?”
“The guy she was going to marry says he didn’t know. And I think he’s credible.”
“Morales is okay with progress on the case?” He picked an invisible piece of lint off his French cuff and smoothed down his tie.
“Neither of us is,” I said. I was getting an uneasy feeling. I never liked talking with Richard in the best of circumstances—he rarely had good news for me—and he hadn’t assigned me to support Anselmo Morales because he felt charitable. He thought I’d be able to get results. I wondered if Anselmo had complained about the progress but thought it better not to plant that thought in Richard’s mind by asking the question.
The timer dinged and Richard pressed down on the handle, pushing the filter through the coffee carefully and evenly. He poured himself a cup, added about three drops of cream, and sipped. “Aahhh.” He put the cup down. “So, bad weekend for you.” He paused but I didn’t respond. “I’m considering moving you out of the drug business.”
Four years with Richard had taught me that his ideas didn’t always fit well with my plans. The idea of leaving my job as an undercover drug agent was appealing only if I moved to something I preferred, like homicide. “Why?”