Brooks Regional was a major donor site. Lots of transplants were done there. Cash was Chief of Staff. It made sense for him to have donor information. But why have an itemized price list that insinuated hearts were more profitable than lungs? What was the point? I wanted to believe there was a logical, medical record explanation for it all. An explanation my background wasn’t aware of.
The problem was I knew where all this was going, but again, why would Cash get involved?
I saw Nonnie’s house in sight and picked up the pace, breath huffing and legs aching. But that didn’t account for Tina’s awful and seemingly timely demise or the attempt on Cash’s life. She didn’t die from an overdose of diet pills; someone obviously killed her. I sprinted the fifty yards to Nonnie’s, sighting her in the flowerbed with her roses. She waved me over.
“What’s wrong?” She snipped at dead leaves. I put my hands on my hips and wiped some sweat off my face.
“Just trying to decide who’s guilty around here,” I told her, picking out some weeds. “And what they’re guilty of.” She bent down to toss out some leaves.
“Well as a rule, it’s always the quiet ones, or someone who’s in love, or someone who’s been trying to hide something for a long time. Or all of the above.” She informed me matter-of-factly and nodded. “That’s what always happens on Law and Order.”
“I don’t think Cash falls into any of those categories.”
“That’s bullshit. He’s got some good in him, but you’re about the only one who can bring it out. And as bad as he’d like to be good, he can’t stick with it for very long. He’s weak, honey. Always has been. He can’t stay away from you, but he can’t stay with you either. He took up with that Tina because being at her level was easier than living up to your expectations.”
Noticing my morose expression, she reached up and took my face in her hands. “But you don’t need me to tell you all this. You knew it a long time ago.”
“Nonnie, do you think Cash killed Tina?” She laughed and rolled her eyes.
“No,” she waved her arms again and laughed, quite sincerely, “He’s not strong enough to follow through with something like that. If he were, he’d have killed her a long time ago.” Laughing and shaking her head, she headed into the house, leaving me to contemplate that assertion.
xxx
The icy blast of the air conditioner slammed against my skin, bringing goose bumps as I walked out of the bathroom. I’d showered and was all decked out in a chocolate and jade patchwork sundress, my reclaimed boots, and chunky gold jewelry. My hair had been light-socketed via the blow dryer, and I’d stolen some of Tally’s signature lip gloss. Gone was the pruney, pinched look I’d been sporting. This chick was ready to roll. I’d made the symbolic gesture of handing over my three hundred dollar straightening iron to Tally, raided her closet, and allowed her to commandeer my subtle makeup shades. It was amazing how much more comfortable I was not blending in. I’d probably always have a ramrod sense of what I thought was right, but at least the knots of tension I’d been carrying around were finally loosening. The door swung shut behind me as Tally came out of her bedroom, holding the cordless phone. She plopped jointlessly on the overstuffed sofa and crossed her long legs.
“We’re on go,” she stated without preamble. I nodded affirmatively.
“Everybody?” I asked.
“Fae Lynn’s callin’ the troops. Do you think we should call Mama and Nonnie?” I shook my head.
“I think the less we have involved, the safer we are,” I told her. I was beginning to sense the danger in being near Cash Stetson, definite doer of dastardly deeds. I didn’t want to put my family in harms’ way any more than necessary. And Nonnie had a history of rash reactions
“I agree,” Tally said.
“We’ll call them if we need them,” I told her, “Until then, let’s hold off.”
“So what’d you come up with?”
“Not a lot. And too much. I really don’t like where my thoughts are going. A lot of facts seem to be connected, and all roads lead to Cash Stetson. And a fork in the road seems to take you to Spencer Locke.”
“I agree. Sissy, I hate to tell you this, but if I was a bettin’ woman, my money’d be on Cash being guilty of something.” This gave me slight pause.
“You? You’ve always defended Cash. I thought he could do no wrong.” She shook her head vehemently.
“I’ve always loved Cash like a brother, but that doesn’t mean I can’t see through his bullshit. The only reason I never said anything was because you always seemed so sure of yourself, and frankly, I was just the little sister.” I did my best not to roll my eyes and then went ahead and gave in.
“You and Fae Lynn are some pair. I wish everyone would get over the fact that they think I have my act together, because I’m pretty sure the culmination of the last few months has shown that I most certainly do not. Next time, little sister, please don’t refrain from telling me what you truly think. Deal?” She softened and nodded.
“Deal. But one more thing.” I braced myself.
“I could never stand Van.”
Chapter Twenty-Four
We were taking what we knew and slapping it up on an oversized whiteboard Fae Lynn had stolen from the dispatch office. Tally, organized to a fault despite trying to pretend otherwise, was color-coding the facts based on participant. A loose timeline was forming.
Char waved a bag of tortilla chips at me. “Do a recap. I’ve had one shot too many.”
Giggles and guffaws mixed with the heaviness of the night air as it floated through the open windows. The smell of honeysuckle and chirping crickets accented the rich chocolate and tinkling of ice. We gathered around my great grandmother’s walnut dining table like a team of mission impossible covert ops engaged in a planning session.
In any other, more sane, part of the country, a city perhaps, this meeting would have never happened. Regular people would have left the detecting to the detectives. Normal women would have spent their girl’s nights drinking cosmos and talking about celebrities. But this was Brooks. My hometown wasn’t exactly logical, no one here was really regular, and there was nothing normal about my group of friends. So we ignored all societal norms and, infused with the maybe not so false sense that we were the smartest in the room, decided to just figure it out ourselves. Because my whole life, there wasn’t a problem that couldn’t be solved with cheese and six angry women. I’d missed that in Dallas, where the rules were the rules and most everyone I knew there abided by them.
“Ok, so here’s the deal. Cash is obviously mixed up in something. I still don’t think he killed Tina, though.” I took a breath.
“Spencer Locke then arrives on the scene, which may or may not have anything to do with Cash, but it is weird.”
“No such thing as a coincidence,” Char said importantly.
“He is so hot,” Jacque said, and everyone murmured their agreement, Fae Lynn cutting her eyes at me with a smile.
“So what does all this mean?” Brandy asked.
“It means that someone’s killing and cutting open bodies to sell their organs like meat,” Char announced tactlessly before I could beat her to it, swigging her margarita and wiping the salt off her mouth with the back of her hand.
“So what were the papers you think are suspicious, exactly?” Jacque asked. I took a breath.
“Files of donor and donee charts. It all looked normal, for the most part. But there were lists of body parts. And…” I trailed off. Fae Lynn helped me out.
“A price list,” she announced.
“For body parts?!” Jacque asked. I nodded.
“In Cash’s office?” Char questioned. Tally nodded.
“Cash’s selling dead bodies!?” Brandy squeaked. Tally shrugged her shoulders.
“That’s what it looks like.”
“I can’t think of a better explanation,” I chewed a brownie, thoughtfully. I didn’t want to voice the direction my thoughts were taking me because that path
led to the edge of a cliff and the conclusion had Cash riding a toboggan on the slippery slope to hell.
“That doesn’t explain Tina’s being dead,” Tally reasoned. Char rolled her eyes and looked at me sympathetically.
“Are you sure Cash didn’t do it?” I shook my head emphatically.
“Someone else is involved.”
“Spencer.” Tally offered.
“Not Spencer,” Char shot back. “No one would trust him. He’s not from around here, even if Charlie and Annabelle are his people.”
“Okay, let’s focus on the selling bodies aspect and forget about Tina being dead,” Fae Lynn steered us back on track.
“If Cash didn’t kill her, someone else did. Because no doubt she was involved in this thing. Who else could be a possibility?” Jacque asked.
“Well everyone knows that Drew Fans is running drugs through the tire shop,” Brandy said, and we all nodded affirmatively, no irony in the fact that this had nothing to do with our discussion ever surfacing.
“Drugs are small time,” said Char, who’d lived in Atlanta for a while. “This is a high-class, white-collar crime,” she told us.
An inkling of an idea of what was going on began to form.
“Wait. Tally, don’t you remember telling me that Danny was at Drew Fan’s the day I came back into town?” She nodded, realization dawning in her eye. “Why was he there? To get a flat fixed?” She shook her head slowly, thinking hard.
“Not that I remember. They seemed to just be shooting the shit. I remember thinking it was odd at the time because I didn’t know them to be friends.”
“You think Danny’s on drugs?” Fae Lynn asked.
“Along with some other folks,” I answered.
“What does that have to do with the body-smuggling ring?”
“Think about it Fae Lynn. There’s nothing in this town that would really drive anyone to need the kind of money they’re getting off the selling of toenails unless they’re desperate. What makes someone more desperate than drugs?” She began to nod.
“So you think Danny’s involved?” I sighed.
“I don’t know who is involved at this point. I think it’s a little strange that Danny always seemed to be on the fringes when something has happened to Cash. It’s not like he’s a detective or even one of the go-to police officers. I mainly thought they kept him around for traffic offenses.”
“That’s true. Wasn’t he there whenever they arrested Cash?”
“And when Cash got shot,” I added. “Cash also offered the alternative theory that maybe Tina’s death was an accident, and he was the real target.”
“Of course he did,” Char snorted. I shot her a look.
“So how does this all add up?” Tally interjected. “There’s no way in hell Danny Muggs is running a body-smuggling ring in order to support his drug habit; he’s not that clever or smooth. Someone else is involved.” Fae Lynn answered before I could.
“I think we can agree Lilly’s resigned herself to the fact that Cash is in some way implicated. He could be directing Danny.” Tally shook her head, vehemently.
“I’m not saying this because I’m defending Cash, but Cash is not at the top of the food chain on this. There’s a reason Cash has never been without a girlfriend since he was fourteen. His motto has always been that it’s easier to say yes than to say no. I cross my heart that he doesn’t have enough gumption to set all this up, nor does he have the desperate factor. All he’s ever wanted was to be respected in Brooks. He’s got that with his position. Granted, his wife didn’t help out his status, but he was working on getting rid of her.” We all looked closely at Tally. She was right. She had always had Cash pegged better than any of us, even as a pre-teen to our teenage years.
“So someone is directing Cash?” I thought out loud. Jacque and Char reached for brownies and chomped thoughtfully. Brandy, who’d remained oddly quiet during the discourse, cleared her throat.
“Spencer,” Jacque said again.
“Not Spencer,” Char shut her down.
“He really is hot,” Brandy offered.
“So not Spencer,” Fae said. “Who?”
“Someone with money,” I reasoned. “Too much money, too fast. That’s probably being thrown around.”
“Or someone desperate for money,” Jacque reasoned. “Remember the drug theory.”
“Big Jim,” Char announced, snapping her fingers. We all stopped and stared. Tally’s chip paused in mid air, and a glob of congealed cheese dropped on the table. Jacque stopped chewing in midchomp and Brandy swallowed hard. Fae Lynn and I sat up a little straighter. Char fiddled with her glass and downed a thick gulp, shuddering as she put it down. She opened her mouth and her theory poured out. A titter ran through the group as we chewed on what Char had just thrown out.
Big Jim Handler was Char’s father-in-law, and also the mayor. He was barrel-chested, smooth with a gun, and smoked horribly stinky cigars. He was also the person who had almost broken Fae Lynn’s backside at the hospital the morning we investigated the morgue.
To accuse him of something like this was out of the ordinary for Char, who was privy to and upheld the code of keeping family secrets. Family was family, whether you’d been born or married into it. Which was a whole other code.
“Lilly, this is out of left field, but Aaron’s daddy came up with some extra funds last year outta nowhere for his campaign. I know I shouldn’t be talkin’ trash about my father-in-law, but Big Jim’s never been my favorite, and it’s just always stuck in my mind that Aaron could never understand where that money came from.” She shrugged, “Just a thought.” I just looked at her.
“It’s just hard to wrap your mind around it all. I mean, my so-called ex-boyfriend, turned head of the hospital, smuggling body parts so your father-in-law, who happens to be the mayor, can sell them? It’s like something out of a really clichéd mystery novel,” I teased. A nervous laugh ran through the group.
“Hey, I know it’s a leap, but truth’s stranger than fiction, especially around here.”
“Yeah, and the Yankees have a better outfield than the Braves.” I scoffed.
Fae Lynn took over and started devising a flow chart. “So for giggles, we’ll say Big Jim is the head guy doing the wheeling and dealing. From what Scott told me, buying a body part is kind of like adopting a kid. It can be done legally through the donee program, or illegally like this.” She wrote as she talked. We were all agreeing with her and my stomach was bubbling with both apprehension and excitement at the thought of finally having a full clue.
“So in theory, Cash procures body parts,” I said delicately, “and then passes them on to Big Jim?”
“It would be fairly obvious for Cash to take them out of the hospital or for Big Jim to keep coming to the hospital.” Tally interjected.
“Tina,” Brandy finally spoke, loudly. “About a month ago. Right before you came back, Lilly, I was taking my Aunt Lolly to the hospital, because she had to have a colonoscopy. I saw Tina coming out with a little cooler. Well, I know y’all can’t stand her, but she’s never had a beef with me so we got to chatting, and I asked her what it was. She told me she had brought Cash lunch, which was kind of silly ‘cause I didn’t think she ever cooked or did anything for Cash for that matter, but I didn’t really question it at the time. But now…” We all contemplated the implications. Char broke the silence.
“So basically, Cash’s cuttin’ up dead bodies, stickin’ 'em on ice and Tina was smuggling them out to somebody, maybe the mayor, who happens to be my father-in-law, who’s selling them on the black market.” The silence resumed. But some nagging thought kept creeping at the edges of my thought process, holding me back from completely jumping on the bandwagon.
If Cash was as weak as the consensus claimed, he wouldn’t have had the gumption to begin. I couldn’t see Tina being able to talk him into it. She wasn’t capable of controlling him that much, and I couldn’t see Cash just acquiescing to the idea of endangering his career without
some coercion. I know it was a long shot, but I was still clutching with slippery, sweaty fingers the idea of him turning out to have morals. So if he was under duress, then why?
And Spencer, where did he fit in? He was obviously involved. And maybe he was in charge. But the fact that he was from out of town put a crimp in that theory because no one around here trusted an out-of-towner, even if they were only from the next county. He did always happen to be at the right place at the time when it came to something detrimental happening to Cash. And if he was such a bad guy, why did I keep having such fantastic fantasies about him? I mean, wouldn’t my gut tell me if he was a cold-blooded killer? Okay, maybe my instinct’s track record wasn’t all that great, but still.
And how were they getting the body parts to their buyers? You couldn’t exactly ship a lung Fedex.
Fae Lynn knocked me on the shoulder.
“You okay?” she asked. I smiled and nodded.
“Yeah, but this is all a lot of circumstantial evidence,” I sighed. “And if Big Jim is involved, we probably don’t want to go straight to the police. There could be someone else involved.” The girls agreed and we finished our drinks and snacks, the conversation slowly turning to kids and less disturbing gossip, until everyone had to go before a husband started to worry.
Fae Lynn was the last one out the door.
“We’ll figure this out, Lilly, if it’s the last thing we do.”
I hoped it wouldn’t be.
xxx
After church the next day, my father, noticing my distracted demeanor and borderline pitiful expression, decided to put me to work.
“I need you to muck some stalls,” he told me while we were finishing up lunch. “Won’t take long. One of the guys hurt his back yesterday and we didn’t get to finish.” I nodded. On another day, I might protest or at least complain about doing dirty work on the farm. As it was, I needed to work off my consternation. Yesterday’s run insufficient; I was still burning at both ends after last night’s powwow.
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