Murder on the Ol' Bunions (A LaTisha Barnhart Mystery)

by S. Dionne Moore

  I sat forward in the roomy car and patted her shoulder. “You’ve got a town full of people who love you and want what’s best for you. You’ll feel alone in your grief, but you won’t be alone in spirit.”

  A tear trickled down Regina’s face as she edged sideways in her seat. A small smile curved her lips. “I really appreciate what a comfort you are to people, LaTisha. To me. You always make me smile.”

  “She just makes me tired,” Hardy piped up from the back seat.

  I cuffed him on his arm. “You keep your trap shut. Can’t say nothing nice, keep quiet.”

  But it was too late. Chief chuckled and Regina smothered a laugh. Before I knew what was happening, Hardy joined in. A chuckle rose in my throat. “You all make me crazy.”

  “Sorry, LaTisha, but you and Hardy are quite the couple.” Chief’s eyes smiled at me in the rearview mirror.

  I slid my eyes over to Hardy. He flashed his gold tooth and winked. “Loving her for thirty-seven years. Every man should have himself a good woman.”

  Chief sent Regina a guarded look, half hope, half begging. She didn’t seem to notice.

  I struggled with how to get the conversation back on track so I could dump some questions on Regina.

  “I wonder how it was between Marion and Mark. You have any ideas, Regina?”

  “She complained about Mark a lot. They never married, you know.”

  “Didn’t he come to town about the time you were involved in the mayoral campaign?”

  Regina clasped her hands in her lap. “No, not that I can recall. He came later on.”

  Chief met my gaze in the rearview mirror, pure torture in his eyes. “That was always a mystery to me—uh, I mean, what happened during that campaign and everything.”

  “You’d think that money would have turned up somewhere," I added, flashing him an encouraging smile. "Guess whoever did it must have paid it back. That’s the only reason I can think the mayor might have dropped the whole incident like he did.”

  “LaTisha and I were trying to remember just the other night who all was on that committee. Do you remember, Regina?” Hardy offered. “Wasn’t Marion on it? You think she stole the money?”

  I kept a close eye on Regina. “Probably won’t ever know. What do you think, Chief”

  “As a citizen. . .” he stuttered to a halt, his eyes darted to mine again. He cleared his throat. “Someone on the committee had to do it.” He turned his head to Regina. “You were involved in that campaign, what’s your take on it?”

  She didn’t make eye contact with him. If I didn’t know better, I’d have thought the woman was praying. My breath halted.

  “Marion and I worked together. We weren’t really good friends.” She raised her eyes and caught Chief’s gaze, then glanced at me. Something snapped in the brown depths of her eyes. A knowingness. A cautious flicker that said, I-don’t-know-if-I-can-trust-you.

  “I don’t think Marion knew quite how to love, but we’re your friends, Regina.” Whatever prompted me to say that?

  Regina faced forward again, eyes staring out the front windshield. Her sigh whispered through the car and Chief took one hand from the steering wheel and reached for Regina’s hand.

  “It’s all in the past, Regina,” I said.

  She nodded. “You all know, don’t you?”

  “We guessed,” I said in a low, soothing voice. “What we don’t understand is that envelope you left on the counter at Marion’s shop.”

  “I didn’t kill Marion, Chief” The knuckles of her hand holding his turned white. “You’ve got to believe me.”

  Chapter Eighteen

  As we rode along, Regina shared the whole story of the campaign funds. With composure and sadness she explained how her mother’s failing health had scared her.

  “I knew mother’s sickness was getting beyond my ability to care for her. I had to get her in a home, and fast, but I didn’t have a lot of money and I hated the thought of putting her in the state’s answer to those too poor to afford alternatives. So I—” She sucked in a breath. “I directed some funds away from the campaign.” For the first time, she looked up, directly at the chief. “I fully planned on paying them back. I made that promise to myself.”

  “But Marion discovered your secret,” I guessed.

  Regina nodded, obviously miserable. “She threatened me. Called me a thief, and I guess I was, but I still knew I would pay them back. I told her that.”

  “That was over two years ago. Did you get caught up?”

  “Yes. Three months ago. From day one, Marion agreed to keep quiet about it.”

  “That is strange,” I said.

  “Until last week. Then I understood her motive.”

  I figured I knew what was coming, and it sounded just like Marion.

  “Last week Marion sent me a letter. She threatened to tell everything, but she’d keep quiet if I paid her three hundred dollars.”

  “The envelope of money was your payment.” Chief voiced exactly what I’d been thinking. “Your fingerprints were all over it.”

  “Yes, I knew you’d find that out. She came into my shop that morning and told me payment was due by noon.” Her gaze swung to me, and she looked guilty and sad. “That’s why I had to cancel those appointments. It wasn’t a lunch date like I said.”

  “I knew that, baby.”

  “It really shook me up when she demanded the money that soon and I knew she’d tell. I was afraid the whole town would blacklist me and I’d lose all my business. I worked myself up into a rage as I walked over to her store, and by the time I went in, I didn’t care that she wasn’t there. I slapped the envelope down on that counter and left.” With her free hand, Regina wound a clump of hair around her finger. “You believe me, don’t you, Chad?”

  Again, I met Chief’s eyes in the mirror and saw his distress.

  “I believe you,” Hardy sent his encouragement.

  “I believe you, too,” I added, “but your fingerprints being all over that envelope, and all that you told us really makes your motive rock-n-roll.”

  Chief, eyes on the road, let go of her hand. I felt for him powerful hard. He must be torn up inside big time. His words, though, came out hard, cop-like. “I need to think about this. I want to believe you, Regina. Really. But the cop in me says I’d better be careful. I can’t afford a scandal, and this, unfortunately, makes you a prime suspect.”

  “I understand, Chad, it was your duty.” Regina, head bowed, rubbed her thumb against her fingertips, as if trying to remove any last traces of the fingerprinting ink.

  Because he knew he had to do it, Chief had taken Regina by the state police office and had her fingerprinted. He looked like a whipped puppy during the entire process, but knowing Regina needed to get to her mother, he tried to hasten the process along as much as lay within his power and return later to discover what the state police had come up with on the case.

  We left the station and went directly to her motel, where Regina handed me the key to her shop. Chief sat in the car, talking to Hardy. “You got clothes?” I asked.

  She patted her purse. “I’ve got a little cash. I can always buy an extra outfit.”

  “I’ll call and cancel your appointments for tomorrow,” I assured her. “And Hardy can come haul you back to Maple Gap whenever you need. Just give us a holler.”

  She nodded and opened the door to her room. I reached to pull her close. Hated leaving her alone. Made me want to dig an elbow into Chief’s side and tell that boy to get his act together and ask her out. Everyone needed someone, and Regina and Chief needed each other. But her confession had changed everything and I also understood the chief’s responsibility to do things by the book.

  I patted her cheek and went back to the car, slipping into the front seat. “It’s awful hard to leave her like this,” I said as we pulled out of the parking lot.

  Chief startled at my words, like I’d verbalized his very thoughts, and, judging by his hang-dog look, I probably had.

&
nbsp; I slipped off my shoes and rubbed my feet together. “My bunions tell me she’s a good girl.”

  Tendons jumped in the chief’s hands as he gripped the steering wheel. “I had to do what I had to do.”

  “Yes, but just because she admitted being involved in a scandal back then doesn’t mean she killed Marion. Besides, there’s something Hardy and I need to tell you about Dana and Payton.”

  Chief sent me a sideways glance then put his eyes back on the road. “Shoot.”

  “After the council meeting, Hardy overheard Payton and Dana talking. He picked up on a couple of things that made us think we should hustle on over there and see if we could learn anything.” I hesitated to say that we spied. Unfortunately Hardy had no such reservations.

  He leaned forward from the backseat. “’bout killed LaTisha to have to hoist me up, but there was no way I could hoist her—”

  I shot him daggers.

  He got the message. “So’s I saw them through the window. Payton looked all scared. Dana seemed angry. They was looking over some sort of drawing on a paper. Told LaTisha it looked like a map.”

  I leaned forward. “Maybe it’s time we start looking closer at Payton’s and Dana’s motives. And don’t forget Mark. I need to have another talk with him. From that first day after I found Marion, I thought there was something Valorie wasn’t saying.”

  Chief held the wheel with one hand and ran the other over his hair and down his neck. “Mark has a strong motive if Marion was prepared to give him a hard time about custody of Valorie. Payton’s alibi is he was in his music store, and Hardy can vouch for that.”

  “Hardy can vouch for him being there a few minutes before we discovered her body, but nothing before that. What about Dana and that connection? Why would she point to Payton as a suspect for stealing her diary—”

  Chief arched a brow at me. “I don’t recall telling you it was over a diary.”

  For once, my brain froze over and I couldn’t think fast enough to formulate a good evasive answer. “You didn’t,” I confessed. “Dana was the person on the other end of the phone conversation that I told you Marion was having when I was in the store before her death.”

  Chief’s eyes crinkled at the corners. “In other words, you took it upon yourself to investigate before I asked you to help me out.”

  “You never asked me if I knew who Marion was talking to.” I defended myself.

  “Still, you shouldn’t have taken it upon yourself. I have checked out her alibi at the school. Everyone there said Dana was in her classes and they saw her at lunch, but she came in late.”

  “But she’s right across the street.” I made a whooshing motion with my hands. “It wouldn’t take but ten minutes for her to dash across and do the deed.”

  “Motive?”

  “She accused Valorie of cheating. Marion wasn’t happy, I can tell you that.”

  “But that gives Marion more of a motive to knock off Dana.”

  I sat up straight. “They fought over a diary, Dana told me. Is it the same one she reported missing? If so, how did Marion get it and why did Dana accuse Payton of taking it?”

  “Why would Dana push Marion over a diary?”

  “Dunno. It’s seeming like that might be important. Maybe we should start looking for it.”

  “Dana said she found it.”

  “Looks like we might need to go back and ask her a few more questions then. I was over at the school today and saw her in the class, alone with this kid. Looked an awful lot like they were up to no good. The kid pulled out his wallet. She refused it but erased something in her grade book and penciled something else in.”

  “Can’t prove anything based on that, LaTisha.”

  “I know.” And that’s what troubled me.

  Chief pulled up in front of the precinct and glanced between Hardy and me. “You all want to come in?”

  Hardy, his stomach always first priority, spotted a fast food restaurant. “How ‘bout LaTisha and I go pick us up something to eat while you go wheel and deal with the big city cops?”

  Chad leaned to one side, his hand traveling to his wallet.

  “Nope. This one is on us,” I said. “Just tell Hardy what you want.”

  He thanked us and we all tumbled out. We expected it to take him a long time, but when we got back to the car, he sat inside, the music blaring.

  “He don’t look none too happy,” Hardy whispered near my ear.

  I flung open the front door as Chief fumbled for the volume and the music faded to a dull thump. Hardy passed the food around.

  “No success?” I ventured, before sinking my teeth into a nice, greasy cheeseburger with everything on it except lettuce. Hate lettuce on my burgers.

  Chief Conrad’s head sunk back against the headrest as he chewed. “Not yet. They said the tests were lined up to be completed by Monday.”

  Secretly, I relaxed a bit, not realizing how tense I’d been at the thought that the state police might move in and take over the whole investigation based on their test results. I had the entire weekend ahead of me to do more investigating, or, in my case, inguesstigating.

  Two days.

  And tomorrow was the funeral.

  Chapter Nineteen

  When we arrived back in town, silver light cast from the streetlights to light up the front of the various businesses along Gold Street. Your Goose Is Cooked was pitch black inside, the grocery the only store with any lights on. Tomorrow I’d have to call Mark and explain my reason for not showing up to hash out the new, improved menu I wanted.

  “Guess from the lights shining so bright that Shiny’s got some customers, even at this time of the evening,” I observed as we passed the store.

  “You going by Regina’s tonight?” Hardy asked.

  “Wouldn’t hurt none. Then we can go to Marion’s and look for the diary. When Mark and I were looking over the books, I saw quite a few.”

  Chief’s brows pinched together. “I think you’re right. That diary could be the key to everything.”

  As he pulled into the parking space at the station, Hardy slunk down in his seat. “You all gonna make me go with you?”

  “You’d miss the chance to go squirreling around in a dead woman’s shop?” I teased him.

  He shuddered. “Makes me weak to think about it.”

  “You go on home then. The last thing we need is you swoonin’.”

  Chief disappeared into the station while Hardy got out to stretch. “I can’t believe you’re going there tonight. You crazy, woman.”

  “We’ve got to find that diary.”

  He pressed his lips together and shook his head. “You thinkin’ Marion had it? Did it ever occur to you she might have been baitin’ Dana into thinking that just to get her goat?”

  “We’ll find out.”

  Chief reappeared after a few minutes and told us he needed to check a few messages. He dropped us off in front of Regina’s shop. Hardy coughed up the car key, then got in the car and pointed Lou toward home, leaving me standing beside the chief.

  Regina’s front door opened easily. A pile of mail scattered across the floor from where the mailman slipped it through the slot on the door. Chief knelt to pick it up, stacked it nice and neat, and took it with us to the backroom where Regina’s appointment book lay on the desk. Chief tossed the stack of mail beside the book, gave it a once over, though I wasn’t sure what, exactly, he was looking for, then nodded at me. I slapped the book shut. The draft of air blew the mail onto the floor.

  Chief grunted at me. I grinned. He bent and scooped it into a pile and froze. I followed his stare to the envelope on top.

  “Mighty suspicious looking,” I whispered.

  The writing, plain block letters spelling out Regina’s name, plus the absence of a stamp, postmark, or return address, made my mind start ticking. I watched as chief turned it over. The flap had been tucked in and not sealed. Using the tips of his fingers, chief pulled the paper out. What I saw set my mind on fire.

&n
bsp; The sender used block letters on the note inside, too.

  Regina,

  Marion might be gone, but your little secret remains safe with me. Dead people can’t talk. I can. Four hundred by tomorrow noon. Set it on your back step in a shopping bag.

  Chief folded the note with great care. “This must have been put through the slot today since you found it with the rest of the mail.”

  “Or maybe it was already in here on this table and fell when the mail went sailing all over the floor.”

  Chief moved his fingers to the edge of the envelope. “Let’s get this back to the station. I’ll call in Nelson and have him run fingerprints immediately.”

  After we dropped off the envelope, and Nelson arrived looking groggy and disheveled, we left again. Within minutes we pulled into a space in front of Payton’s music store. A light shone from the back of the store just as it had the night Hardy and I had done our spying.

  Chief cut his headlights, but I figured it was too late. If anyone had been in the store, they would have seen the pop of headlights sweep along the interior. As my eyes adjusted to the darkness, I kept my gaze on the place where the light had shone. It still glowed.

  Before I knew it, Chief swung the car door open and began to slide from the car. “Whoever is in there will either lay low, or try to get away without being seen. I’m going to have a look. I can let you into Marion’s and you can start—”

  “This black woman ain’t settin’ her bunions into Marion’s shop until you get back. I’m no fool.”

  His smile seemed a bit too condescending. “Afraid of ghosts?”

  “No,” I snorted. “I’m just not interested in being in there without the light of day and remembering what she looked like the day I found her.”

  “Stay here, then. I’ll be back.” He took off at a quick trot, stopped in front of Payton’s shop, and cupped his hands on the glass to look inside. He took off again and dropped out of sight around the end of the building.

  I relaxed back in my seat and let my mind wander where it would. My run-in with Marion that final day when I quit. . .was fired. . .whatever. . .fanned the flames of my aggravation with her. The woman had been next to impossible. No, not next to. But whole-hog impossible. Through and through. All the time. Never satisfied with the way I did anything. I’d finally had enough and told Marion to back off.