Chaos in Mudbug (Ghost-in-Law Mystery/Romance Series)

by Jana DeLeon

  Immediately, Maryse and Jadyn turned to look at Helena. The ghost stared at them for a moment, then put her hands in the air. “I swear, it wasn’t me.”

  Helena was as close as one came to a professional liar, but Jadyn hadn’t known her long enough to know her tells. Maryse, on the other hand, could smell the ghost lying from another parish. She took one long look at Helena, then looked over at Jadyn and shook her head.

  “I ordered five pounds of bacon,” the woman argued. “I took possession of the order yesterday and did the inventory myself. The bacon was right there in freezer number two where it belongs.”

  “Well, it’s not there now. So either you’re crazy or the bacon’s walking.”

  “Then the bacon’s walking. Maybe you should have this conversation with the other cooks.”

  The man’s face turned red. “Are you accusing one of my employees of stealing?”

  “Unless that bacon grew legs, that’s exactly what I’m doing. Figure it out, because Sally’s not going to be happy if her food cost doubles and profits don’t.”

  The cook spun around and headed back into the kitchen, the swinging door flapping in a frenzy behind him.

  “That was pleasant,” Jadyn said.

  “Freda is no pushover,” Maryse said. “Willie can get as angry as he wants, but if she says that bacon was in the freezer yesterday, I guarantee you it was.”

  Helena nodded. “Freda’s practically a military commander. I always thought she was scary.”

  “Agreed,” Maryse said.

  Jadyn stared at the kitchen door. “I wonder who took it.”

  “Probably someone who works in the kitchen,” Maryse said.

  “That makes the most sense, but five pounds of bacon. That’s a lot of breakfast.”

  “Or fishing bait. Catfish like it.”

  “Really?” Jadyn said. “You learn something new every day.”

  The waitress appeared and slid their breakfast plates onto the table. Maryse had two cinnamon rolls and hot chocolate. Jadyn had opted for the healthier and far less sexy egg white omelet with mozzarella and spinach. Helena took one look at Jadyn’s plate and made a face.

  “You don’t have to worry about anyone stealing your food,” Helena said. “Maryse’s on the other hand…”

  “Don’t even think about it,” Maryse said and held the fork above the ghost’s approaching hand.

  “I’ll give you half of the deer steaks.”

  Maryse frowned and Jadyn could see her cousin wavering. Steak was the magic word with Maryse.

  “Half of one,” Maryse said. “But you have to take it and leave.”

  Helena rolled her eyes. “Of course. What do you take me for—an idiot?”

  “Don’t answer that,” Jadyn said.

  Maryse cut one of the cinnamon rolls in half and put it on a napkin. Helena scooped it up and disappeared back through the wall without a sound. “Hopefully, we can finish the rest of breakfast in peace,” Maryse said.

  “I still haven’t gotten used to seeing her pop through walls,” Jadyn said. “I mean, I see a whole person, and God knows, she’s as annoying as real people.”

  Maryse nodded. “She’s the most annoying person of all. I’ve seen her do the wall thing a million times, but there’s still that couple of seconds when I wonder if it’s not going to work and I’m going to have to dream up some absurd cover story.”

  The door to the café opened and two middle-aged women walked in and sat at a table near Jadyn and Maryse. One of them was clearly upset.

  “I’m telling you, Bernice, I don’t know what this town is coming to. Murder, drugs, chop shops…and now this thing with my laundry.”

  “You’re sure someone stole it?” the other woman, Bernice, asked.

  “Well, I think should know what I hung outside, and I’m certain only half of it was there when I went back to take it in. I could handle the towels and the cotton blanket, but the quilt really hacks me off. My grandma made that quilt.”

  Bernice shook her head. “Sharon Simmons said someone took two packages of shrimp off her back porch yesterday. She’d put them out there to thaw and not twenty minutes later, they were gone.”

  “If Colt Bertrand doesn’t get this town under control, I’m not voting for him again. I thought someone younger would be more educated on crime and such, but things are only getting worse. When you can’t even hang out your own underwear without fear that someone will make off with them, well I just don’t know what to say about that.”

  “That’s weird,” Maryse said.

  “I take it Mudbug doesn’t usually have much petty theft of random food and laundry?” Jadyn asked.

  “Not that I’ve ever heard of.”

  “Do you think Helena had anything to do with it?”

  “I can’t see a good reason why. Helena can throw deer steaks on a grill, but she doesn’t know how to cook shrimp. She’s never had to know. And she would never use someone else’s linens. She bitched night and day about cooties until Mildred finally bought her new sheets and towels for her room at the hotel.”

  Jadyn frowned. It could be a coincidence that those things and the missing bacon had all happened recently, but as a rule, Jadyn didn’t like coincidences. In her experience, things that appeared to be linked usually were. “Do you think all the troubles will cause Colt to lose the next election?”

  Maryse bit her lower lip. “I’d like to say no, but the reality is, small towns can be funny places. One day you’re the hero, and the next day everything bad is your fault. I was hoping things would settle down to the point of boredom, and everyone would forget all the bad stuff, or at least push it to the back of their minds.”

  “How long have things been happening?”

  “I guess the first wave started when Helena was murdered and came back. That was over a year ago, but we had a rash of bad for a good while. Then, except for your basic small-town stuff, almost a year of quiet, until…”

  Jadyn cringed. “Until I came to Mudbug.”

  Maryse shook her head. “Until Helena returned.”

  “But there’s no way she could be at the root of the last month’s trouble. We know who the bad guys were in all those situations, and some of the crimes exposed were going on long before Helena was murdered.”

  “I know. It’s not logical to pin it on her. But until someone proves otherwise, I’m convinced that Helena is the harbinger of doom. She shows up, and everything goes to hell in a handbasket.”

  “So what’s the solution? I mean, you helped her ascend before, but this time is different. This time, she wants to be here.”

  Maryse sighed. “Whether we want her here or not.”

  “You know earlier, when I asked Helena about spying at the beauty salon?”

  “Yeah. That sort of surprised me.”

  “It was an idea that crossed my mind.” Jadyn explained her theory to Maryse.

  Maryse scrunched her brow. “Do you think it could really be that simple?”

  Jadyn raised one eyebrow. “How bored are you right now?”

  “I’m ready to set myself on fire for some entertainment.”

  “Exactly. And you’ve only been sorta dormant for a couple of weeks. Helena’s been at this for well over a year.”

  “You may be onto something.” Maryse stared out the window for a bit, then looked back at Jadyn. “Okay, we’ll try it. But we have to give her things to do that won’t cause even more trouble.”

  “I’m not even sure what that would be.”

  “Nothing around food.”

  “Naturally. What else?”

  “She tends to play practical jokes when she doesn’t like someone.”

  Jadyn shook her head. “That seems a limiting rule, since I’m not sure she likes anyone.”

  “Good point. Maybe we should have her patrol the swamps.”

  “No good. She won’t walk and I’m not letting her drive a boat again.”

  “God forbid. Well, I don’t see any straightfo
rward option. The beauty shop thing was a good one. We might just have to play it by ear.”

  “We might have to make stuff up.”

  Maryse grinned. “I’ve never been above lying for the general good.”

  “Then we have a plan.”

  Chapter Three

  It took only a minute for Maryse to decide she didn’t recognize the shrimp boat. Marty, the garage owner, had managed to drag the mangled boat out of the cove in one piece and tow the entire mess to his garage, where he’d parked it in the end slot.

  “Sorry,” Maryse said as she stepped onto a ladder and peered inside. “I’ve seen this same model, of course, but not with red stripes or this color decking. Unless someone in Mudbug got a new boat in the last couple of months, I don’t think it belongs to a local.”

  “I appreciate you looking,” Jadyn said.

  Maryse stepped off the ladder. “I wish I could have helped.”

  “You did help. I’ll concentrate my search on the villages surrounding Mudbug instead of wasting time polling the locals.” She reached into her duffel bag and pulled out a pair of plastic gloves.

  “You want me to help you search it?” Maryse asked.

  Before Jadyn could answer, the door at the far end of the garage swung open and Colt walked inside. Maryse grinned and winked. “Never mind,” she said. “You’ve got this.”

  Maryse skipped off across the garage, singing a hello to Colt as she passed. He glanced back, then shook his head as he stepped up to the wreckage. “What’s she so happy about?”

  “Nothing in particular,” Jadyn said. “But I’m pretty sure Luc is at the bottom of the majority of her good moods.”

  “You may be right. I don’t ever recall her skipping when she was hooked up with Hank Henry. In fact, back then Hank did all the skipping—skipping out on bills, skipping out on responsibilities, skipping out on his wife.”

  Jadyn nodded. “I’ve heard some of the Hank horror stories. It’s hard to reconcile those stories with the man he is now.”

  “He’s definitely made changes for the better, and God knows, no one expected him to. If you’d told me a year ago that Hank Henry would be a productive, responsible, married man about to be a father, I would have laughed myself into heart attack range.”

  “Maybe there are still miracles after the New Testament.”

  “I hope so. We might need one to figure this out.” He pointed to the boat.

  “I take it you didn’t find any missing person reports?”

  He shook his head. “I called all the local law enforcement offices myself and explained the situation. They’re all going to pay a visit to the docks and ask around, but as of this morning, none of them have had a report or heard any gossip about someone’s boat sinking.”

  Jadyn felt some of the tension leave her back. “I keep forgetting that he may have bailed and made it home. For all we know, he could be sleeping off the six-pack he consumed last night after sinking his boat. And all of us are out looking for someone who isn’t missing at all.”

  “That’s definitely the best-case scenario.”

  “Then why do I always gravitate to the worst?”

  He stared at the boat for several seconds and frowned. “Maybe because worst case is all you’ve experienced since you’ve been here.”

  “I suppose that’s true, in a work capacity anyway. But the rest of it has been better than I’d ever imagined it could be.”

  He raised one eyebrow. “Really? Do tell?”

  Jadyn felt a blush run across her chest and up her neck. She hadn’t meant to make such a personal statement, but now that it was out, she had no choice but to explain. “I guess I was thinking about Mildred and Maryse. When I first arrived, I expected polite because that’s the Southern way of anyone raised with some manners, but they took it way beyond that.”

  “They treated you like family from the moment they met you.”

  Jadyn stared at him, slightly surprised. “Yeah. How did you know?”

  He shrugged. “I’ve known them my entire life. Maryse, for all her recent skipping and singing instead of talking, is one of the most practical women I’ve ever met. And she has absolutely no verbal regulator. If she’s thinking it, she says it. So if she’s saying she likes you, bet your butt she does.”

  Jadyn grinned. He definitely had Maryse down perfectly.

  “If Mildred likes you,” he continued, “she’s going to try to take care of you. More so in your case because you’re Maryse’s family and Mildred practically raised Maryse after her mom died.”

  “I suppose you’re right, although it feels odd to be mothered. My own mother wasn’t all that into it.”

  “Well, be flattered that Mildred wants the job. She doesn’t suffer fools well and is a great judge of character. It speaks highly of you that she wants to be involved.”

  Jadyn felt her face redden with the words.

  Colt grinned. “You’re blushing. Good Lord, woman, don’t you know how to take a compliment? Surely you’ve gotten your share.”

  Jadyn tried to think of something to say, but nothing came to mind that didn’t make her sound more pathetic. She could only hope that Colt found her blushing charming and not sad. That would be the death blow. No woman wanted the man she was attracted to feeling sorry for her.

  “I guess so,” she finally managed.

  Apparently sensing her discomfort, he changed subject. “So are you ready to do a search?”

  She held up her plastic gloves. “You want a set or are you merely an observer?”

  Colt took the gloves from her. “I’ll observe when I retire.”

  She grabbed another pair of gloves and they climbed into the boat. “I figured we should check the storage compartments first…see if there’s any paperwork.”

  Colt nodded. “I’ll take the cabin,” he said and ducked into the tiny cabin at the front of the boat.

  Jadyn pulled the cushion off the back bench and checked inside, but all she found was netting and an anchor. She put the cushion back in place and checked both the storage bins in the floor, but both had sustained large holes so only items too big to fit through the openings still remained. She moved to the storage in the driver’s column, hoping this was where she got lucky, but when she opened the cabinet door, the only thing she saw was straight through to the concrete floor of Marty’s garage.

  “Any luck?” Colt asked as he exited the cabin.

  “Not even a scrap. The column storage and floor storage are both broken through. If any paperwork was there, it’s long gone now. What about the cabin?”

  He held up a hat. “This is for a high school in one of the larger villages about twenty miles from here.”

  “Well, I guess that’s a place to start.”

  As they climbed out of the boat, Marty walked up and greeted them. “Sorry I couldn’t get over here when you arrived. My mom called all in a snit and I thought I’d never get her off the phone.”

  “Anything wrong?” Colt asked.

  Marty waved a hand in dismissal. “She’s ranting about someone stealing tarps and gasoline out of her garage.”

  Jadyn frowned.

  “Did someone break in?” Colt asked.

  “Probably wouldn’t have to. I’m always telling her to keep the door locked, but I don’t think she does half the time. But it’s nothing to worry about. The way mom’s mind is going, chances are she didn’t have gas or tarps in there. Last week she was harping about someone stealing her clothesline. Now, I ask you, why in the world would someone go to the trouble of stealing a cheap piece of metal wire?”

  “Was the clothesline missing?” Jadyn asked.

  “Yeah, but it could have popped and sprung off into the swamp. Mom’s property backs up against it. That’s far more likely than someone stealing it.”

  Jadyn nodded, but after what she’d heard at the café that morning, she wasn’t as ready to dismiss his mother’s claims as he was.

  Marty waved at the boat. “I had to use some tie-
downs to hold the back end together, but I’m pretty sure I got it all out…everything that was attached when it was in the cove, anyway. I scanned the area for the pieces that broke off, but didn’t see anything except an oar handle.”

  “You did a great job,” Jadyn said. “I didn’t realize how much of the bottom had broken off until we searched it.”

  Marty nodded, but Jadyn could tell he was only half listening. His gaze was focused on the back part of the boat where the siding that would have contained the boat name had been ripped off. He narrowed his eyes on it and frowned.

  “Is something wrong?” Jadyn asked.

  “What?” Marty swung around to face her. “No. I don’t think so. I mean…I don’t want to tell you something wrong.”

  “If you see something off here,” Jadyn said, “I’d love to know, even if it’s just a feeling. Usually those bad feelings are our subconscious mind locking onto something that our conscious mind hasn’t processed yet.”

  Marty scratched his head. “I don’t know about all that. I was just thinking that the damage on the back of the boat looked funny.”

  “Funny how?”

  “Well, if we assume the boat got caught in the storm and tossed about, then the back end must have slammed into something to break out those planks.”

  “That’s what we’re thinking,” Jadyn agreed.

  “But the thing is, the splintering on the back looks like the back was broken from the inside out.” He studied the back of the boat once more and ran his finger across one of the broken planks. “Never mind. The more I think about it, the dumber it sounds. That couldn’t possibly happen in a storm.”

  He looked back at them. “I’m going to lock up for lunch in about twenty minutes. If you need to stay longer, I’ll give you a key.”

  “I think we’re done,” Jadyn said, “but thank you for everything. And remember to send me an invoice for the tow.”

  Marty waved a hand in dismissal. “I’d rather wait and bill the tow and storage all at one time. Hate doing paperwork. No sense doing it twice.” He headed across the shop toward the office.