Wanda Nell hardly dared breathe, waiting for him to continue. Maybe he’d seen the guys who’d broken into her trailer.
“Just as I was coming down the road into the trailer park,” Jim Ed said, “I passed another truck. I think there was a coupla guys in it, maybe three.” He shrugged, his fingers beating a tattoo against the steering wheel. “I don’t recall seeing that particular truck at the trailer park before.” “Would you recognize it if you saw it again?”
Jim Ed nodded. “Yeah, I sure would. I mean, I seen it around town often enough.”
“What’d it look like?”
“It’s all black,” Jim Ed replied, “ ’cept for a streak of yellow lightning down the side. Only one like that in Tullahoma that I seen.”
Stunned, Wanda Nell stared back at Jim Ed. She knew that truck, too. Ricky Ratliff sure as hell had some explaining to do. He’d just better hope the sheriff’s department got to him before she did.
When Wanda Nell walked into the trailer, she found Mayrene sound asleep on the couch, snoring, her shotgun on the coffee table within easy reach. Smiling, Wanda Nell shook her head at the picture. When Mayrene had first told her she was going to bring the shotgun with her, Wanda Nell had been a little worried. But when she saw there was nobody from the sheriff’s department posted at the trailer park this morning to keep watch, Wanda Nell was all the more grateful for her friend’s presence. Elmer Lee had obviously discontinued the watch because he believed it wasn’t necessary. And that told Wanda Nell that Deputy Taylor was right. Elmer Lee was planning to arrest her.
Thanks to her neighbor Jim Ed Woods, though, she now had something solid to wave in front of Elmer Lee. He couldn’t ignore a witness like Jim Ed.
Wanda Nell stepped carefully closer to Mayrene, still snoring away on the couch. She was about to poke Mayrene gently on the shoulder when Mayrene’s eyes popped open. “Good morning, Wanda Nell.”
Startled, Wanda Nell jumped back a little. “Good Lord, Mayrene, you about gave me a heart attack. I thought for sure you were so sound asleep I’d have to shake you to get you awake.”
Laughing, Mayrene sat up on the couch. She patted her hair into place. “I do sleep pretty sound sometimes,” she admitted. “But I can feel it when there’s somebody near me. That’s what woke me up.”
“Well, I’m glad you spent the night,” Wanda Nell said, sinking down on the couch beside her friend. “There was somebody from the sheriff’s department out there when I left for work last night, but there ain’t a sign of ’em this morning.”
“Yeah, I heard him drive off about midnight,” Mayrene said. She reached out to pat her shotgun. “But me and Ol’ Reliable here’s on the job. Anybody’d tried to come through that door had no business here, they’d’ve ended up with a big hole through ’em.”
Wanda Nell did her best not to imagine that. “I got some news,” she said, and she proceeded to fill Mayrene in on her conversation with Deputy Taylor.
Mayrene shook her head when Wanda Nell had finished. “Looks like ol’ Elmer Lee’d better be watching his back. That girl is sure ambitious, and if he don’t watch out, he’s gonna have her bootprints all over him.” She laughed. “More power to her, that’s what I say. That girl has balls, and then some.”
“Maybe,” Wanda Nell said, “and I sure don’t care much what happens to Elmer Lee, but there’s something about her I can’t quite figure out.”
“Well, honey,” Mayrene said, standing up and stretching, “she ain’t aiming to be your best friend, but I guess you know that. You’re her ticket to pulling one over on that jackass commonly known as Elmer Lee Johnson.” She laughed again. “You may not wanna trust her far’s you can throw her, but usin’s a two-way street. You can both get what you want, you play your cards just right.”
“Maybe so,” Wanda Nell said. “But I found out something else.” She motioned for Mayrene to sit down again.
“Okay,” Mayrene said as she complied, “but make it snappy. I got a little errand ain’t gonna wait much longer.” Wanda Nell grinned. Mayrene’s “errand” was the way she always said she had to go to the bathroom.
“I saw Jim Ed Woods on the way in this morning,” she said. “And he told me he saw a pickup here the night those men broke in. A pickup that didn’t belong here.”
“And?” Mayrene said when Wanda Nell paused.
“He described it,” Wanda Nell went on, “and I knew whose it was right away. There’s only one in town I know of.”
“Well, whose is it?” Mayrene said, getting twitchy.
“Ricky Ratliff’s.”
“Why, that little sonofabitch,” Mayrene said, her eyes widening. She hopped up from the couch. “Be right back.” While she waited for Mayrene to return, Wanda Nell fished around in her purse for the card Deputy Taylor had given her. When she found it, she sat staring at it until Mayrene came back.
“What’s that?” Mayrene asked.
Wanda Nell handed it to her.
“You gonna call her instead of Elmer Lee?” Mayrene asked.
Wanda Nell shrugged. “That’s what I’m trying to decide. Jim Ed said he was going to the Kountry Kitchen for breakfast, and I told him I was gonna let somebody from the sheriff’s department know about what he saw. I guess I could call her, and she could go over there and talk to him.”
“Yeah,” Mayrene said, “and you could always say you called her first ’cause you couldn’t get Elmer Lee on the phone.”
“Yeah, like Elmer Lee’d believe that.” Wanda Nell snorted in derision.
“Honey, it don’t matter at this point what Elmer Lee thinks about it. He’s gonna have to believe Jim Ed and follow up on that lead. And soon’s they talk to that human snotball Ricky, they’re gonna convince him to come clean.” “And then Elmer Lee’ll have to start thinking somebody else killed Bobby Ray,” Wanda Nell said. “But I tell you, I could just about kill Ricky myself. He knew damn well when I was talking to him those men used his truck, and he knew they probably killed Bobby Ray. Why didn’t he go to Elmer Lee himself?”
“’Cause he’s probably mixed up in it, too,” Mayrene pointed out, very reasonably. “Honey, you know that little jerkwad’d do anything Bobby Ray wanted him to. And I bet you anything Bobby Ray got him so mixed up in whatever the hell it was, Ricky’s deep in the doodoo now. Just depends on who he’s scaredest of. The sheriff’s department or those men.”
“Looks like it was those men,” Wanda Nell said. “But I’m about to fix it so he hadn’t got much choice.” She got up and went to the phone in the kitchen.
Wanda Nell punched in the number on Deputy Taylor’s business card and waited. The phone rang four times before someone answered. ‘Taylor, here.”
“Morning, Deputy,” Wanda Nell said, then identified her-self. “I got some information you oughta hear.”
There was a pause, and Wanda Nell thought maybe she’d somehow been disconnected. Then, when she was about to hang up and dial again, Taylor’s voice came through, low but clear.
“Look, I can’t talk much right now,” the deputy said. “We’re in the middle of something here. What is it?”
“I found you a witness,” Wanda Nell said quickly. “I got somebody who saw a strange pickup here the night those men broke into my trailer. And that pickup belongs to Ricky Ratliff. You need to talk to him soon’s you can.”
Again there was silence. “Okay,” Taylor said, “I’ll take care of that when I can. You just hold tight, all right?”
“Sure,” Wanda Nell said, puzzled. She had expected more of a reaction, but maybe Elmer Lee was close by, and Taylor didn’t want to give anything away. “I’ll be here at home the rest of the day.”
“Got you,” Taylor said, and the line went dead.
Wanda Nell came back into the living room. She told Mayrene about the strange conversation, and Mayrene agreed that Elmer Lee had probably been right there. “That girl’s sharp,” Mayrene commented. “She’s not going to give anything away.” She stood up and collected her
shotgun. “Time for you to get some sleep, honey. You need me for anything, you just holler.”
Wanda Nell gave her a big hug, being careful not to bump the shotgun, then followed her to the door and locked it behind her. She leaned against the door and closed her eyes for a moment. She was so tired she felt like she could sleep for a week. The girls probably wouldn’t stir for another hour at least, although Lavon would be ready to get up soon. For once, Wanda Nell decided, Miranda would just have to cope with him. She was going to bed.
In her bedroom she wearily stripped off her clothes, laid them across a chair, then put on a nightgown. After setting her alarm, she climbed into bed and made herself comfortable under the covers. Sleep came quickly.
When the alarm went off at three that afternoon, Wanda Nell surfaced slowly from a sad dream about Bobby Ray. He had been trying to tell her something, but she couldn’t hear him. A loud noise blocked out his voice. As she became more alert, she realized the loud sound was her alarm going off.
She sat up in the bed and turned the buzzer off. Yawning, she stretched, then rolled her head around on her shoulders to ease some of the stiffness there. She found her house shoes and robe and, still yawning, made her way into the kitchen.
Juliet met her with a glass of cold Coke in her hands. “Here, Mama,” she said. “I heard your alarm go off.”
“Thanks, baby,” Wanda Nell said before she sipped at the drink. The caffeine would get her going.
Wanda Nell sat down at the kitchen table and blinked at the sunshine streaming in the window. Juliet sat down across from her.
“Did you sleep well?”
Wanda Nell nodded. “Yeah, thank the Lord. I was so worn out, I sure needed it.” She yawned again and quickly covered her mouth. “Guess it’ll take me a little while to wake up.” Juliet laughed. “Take your time. You don’t have to be at work till six tonight, right?”
“Yeah, just a short shift tonight, and that’s it. I can actually come home and go to bed like a real human being.”
“I wish you didn’t have to work so much, Mama.” Juliet’s face puckered in a frown.
Wanda Nell stretched a hand across the table to her daughter. “Now, honey, don’t you worry about that. I don’t really mind, most of the time.”
“I’m going to get a job this summer,” Juliet announced, “and I’ll be able to help out some.”
“We’ll see,” Wanda Nell said. She wanted Juliet to wait until she was sixteen before she got some kind of job, but Juliet was as stubborn as her mother. Wanda Nell really didn’t want to argue with her about it now.
As she came more awake, Wanda Nell remembered her odd phone conversation with Deputy Taylor. She wondered why she hadn’t heard from the younger woman yet.
“Baby, did anybody call while I was asleep?” When Juliet was home, she would try to answer the phone quickly to keep it from disturbing her mother.
Miranda, with Lavon on her hip, ambled into the kitchen in time to hear her mother’s question. “Yeah, you sure did get a phone call, Mama. Why didn’t you tell us you had a new boyfriend?” The stormy look in Miranda’s eyes warned Wanda Nell to expect fireworks.
Wanda Nell blushed. “I don’t have a boyfriend,” she said, “and I don’t like your tone, Miranda.”
“Don’t pay any attention to Miranda, Mama,” Juliet said indignantly. “She’s just being mean.” Then she giggled. “But Mr. Pemberton did call to talk to you, Mama.”
Wanda Nell felt oddly breathless for a moment. Then she forced herself to speak. “Oh, he did, did he?”
“Yes, Mama, he did,” Juliet answered.
“And what did he have to say?”
“Oh, he said he’d call back,” Juliet responded airily. “I told him to try back around four. That you’d be up and able to talk coherently by then.”
“Juliet!” Wanda Nell protested. “Surely you didn’t say something like that to him.”
Juliet giggled. “Well, not exactly, Mama,” she said. Miranda had poured some juice in a sippy cup for Lavon, and now she sat down at the table with the baby in her lap.
Lavon pounded the cup up and down on the table and smiled happily at his grandmother.
Wanda Nell reached out and tousled his brown curls. “Your aunt thinks she’s awful smart, doesn’t she, sweetie? Yes, she does, but she’s being real silly, and I’m gonna smack her bottom if she keeps it up.” Juliet made a funny face at her mother. Miranda just sat there, glowering at both of them.
Wanda Nell got up to pour herself some more Coke from the bottle in the fridge. With her back to the girls, she said, “Then I guess Mr. Pemberton might be calling back. Do y’all mind?” She closed the door of the fridge and waited a moment before turning around.
“I can’t believe you, Mama,” Miranda said. “How can you act like this, and Daddy dead. It’s not right.” She burst into tears, and Lavon, startled by his mother’s outburst, started crying, too.
Wanda Nell, stricken, stared at Miranda for a moment. She should have given this more thought. Juliet hardly knew her father, but Miranda had idolized him. She and Bobby Ray had been divorced for a long time, but evidently that didn’t matter much to Miranda right now.
Wanda Nell sat down at the table again and reached out her hands to Miranda. “I’m sorry, Miranda. I know how much you loved your daddy. I loved him, too, honey, but it’s been a long time since him and me was married. We both moved on.”
Miranda regarded her mother balefully. “I don’t care, Mama. It just don’t seem right. Daddy not even buried yet, and you going out with somebody you barely know.”
“Oh, Miranda, stop being so mean to Mama,” Juliet said. “How can you be so selfish?”
Miranda stood up from the table, Lavon still crying in her arms. “That’s right, Mama loves you best anyway. Take her side, I don’t care. Neither one of you cares a bit about me and my baby. Daddy loved me, even if you didn’t.” She started to walk away.
“Miranda! Don’t you walk away from me.” When Wanda Nell used that tone; Miranda knew better than to disobey. “Turn around and look at me.”
Miranda turned, and the misery in her eyes made Wanda Nell feel even more guilty than she already did. “Honey,” she said softly, going around the table to hold out her arms. Miranda stood there, unmoving.
“Honey, don’t be like this,” Wanda Nell pleaded. “You know I love you, that’s just ridiculous. Your daddy loved you, too, but you’re making too much out of this.”
Miranda began sobbing again, and Wanda Nell stepped closer and wrapped her arms around her daughter and grandson. They all cried for a moment, then Miranda pulled back.
“I’m sorry, Mama,” she said. “But it just seems like nobody cares that Daddy is dead.”
“I’m sorry, too, honey,” Wanda Nell said. “I’m sorry your daddy’s dead, believe me.” She grinned suddenly. “I can’t fuss at him and call him names now like I used to.”
Miranda laughed. “He sure could get you riled up.”
“Yeah, he could,” Wanda Nell said. “That was because I loved him, too, Miranda. Never forget that. I finally got to the point where I just couldn’t live with him anymore, so I did what I thought I had to do. Your daddy was the most aggravating man on the face of the earth sometimes, but even then, you couldn’t help loving him.”
“I know, Mama,” Miranda said softly. “I know.”
“I promise you, if it really upsets you, I won’t go out with anybody for a while.”
Miranda shook her head. “No, Mama, it’s okay. Don’t mind me.”
“Well, we’ll see,” Wanda Nell said. She turned to her younger daughter, who had been sitting very still, watching the scene between her mother and sister. “Juliet, honey, would it make you feel funny if I ever went out with one of your teachers?”
Juliet shook her head. “No, Mama, I wouldn’t mind at all. He seems like an awfully nice man. Everybody at school likes him. You deserve to go out and have a good time.”
Wanda Nell blinked bac
k tears. “Thank you, honey,” she said, her voice husky. She cleared her throat. “Then maybe one of these days, if he does ask me out, I’ll say ‘yes.’ ” Miranda came back to the table and sat down. Lavon had stopped crying, and Wanda Nell rubbed his head. He smiled up at her.
“Tell me something,” Wanda Nell said, trying to keep her tone casual, “I noticed that Mr. Pemberton carries this notebook with him. He was scribbling away in it both times he came to the Kountry Kitchen.” She watched Juliet covertly as she took another sip of her Coke.
Juliet smiled. “He’s a writer, Mama, and it’s really exciting,” she said eagerly. “He told us all about it a few weeks ago. He’s actually sold a book. Can you believe that?”
Wanda Nell was impressed. “That is something! I don’t think I’ve ever known a real writer before. What does he write?”
“He writes true-crime books,” Juliet answered, almost bouncing up and down in her chair, she was so excited. “You know, like that Ann Rule writes, Mama? You’ve read some of her books, haven’t you?”
Her hand shaking, Wanda Nell set down her glass. “Uh, yeah, I’ve read some of her books.” Suddenly, the Coke felt like acid in her stomach.
A true-crime writer, she thought dully. So that’s why he’s interested in me. He wants to write a book about Bobby Ray’s murder.
Dimly, she could hear her daughters’ voices. “Mama, are you okay?”
“I’m fine,” Wanda Nell said mechanically. She started to take another sip of her drink, then set the glass down on the table with a thump. She stood up. “I’m going to go take a shower.”
If the girls said anything in answer to this announcement, she didn’t hear it. She was still trying to cope with what Juliet had told her.
Before she had gone more than a few steps, Wanda Nell heard someone knocking at the door. She stumbled toward it, still not totally focusing on anything other than her inward confusion, and opened the door.
Elmer Lee Johnson stood there, his hand raised to knock again. Deputy Taylor was right behind him.
Elmer Lee didn’t wait for an invitation, just pushed his way into the trailer.
Flamingo Fatale (A Trailer Park Mystery Book 1) Page 12