“I know them,” Vivian chimed in. “Young man, give me a pair of those gloves. I might as well do something useful. Your grandfather and I dated in high school,” she added, taking the blue gloves offered by the clean-jawed youth with brown eyes and tawny hair. “Tell Buddy Dobson that Vivy said hi. He was a handsome cuss, your grandad. You look a lot like him.”
Bob smiled. “He’s mentioned you, ma’am. I know he’ll be happy you still remember him.” Then, with a nod of his head, the young man made his way to the grave site.
“You’re going to ruin those shoes, Vivian,” Jesse cautioned as they started toward the barn.
“Well, I’m not going to walk on this gravel barefoot, and I’m not going to go sit in my car until you’re finished, so if they can’t be fixed, I guess that’ll help me remember to be more sensible next time.”
“I’m really sorry about the gravel, Mrs. Windsor,” Winnie said mournfully. “But it gets muddy out here when it rains, and that’s way too much driveway to even think about paving.”
“Winnifryd, dear, don’t be silly.” Vivian wrapped her arm around the shoulders of the shorter, stouter woman and pulled her closer. “I should have worn shoes more suited to the occasion. I just wasn’t thinking. And there’s nothing to blame but my own vanity. So, ladies, what are we looking for?”
They walked, more slowly than they would have, while Vivian shredded the leather heels of her designer pumps on the limestone gravel of the drive and Jesse explained their mission. “And then, Winnie, we need to get you into the house to pack so you can spend the night with me after we’ve had supper at Vivian’s.”
“There’s no reason why she can’t stay with me,” Vivian argued. “I have six guest bedrooms that are just going to waste. And after we had so much fun redecorating them last year.”
“I don’t want to be a bother,” Winnie protested. “And I think I’d feel better spending the night here.”
“Winnie…” Jesse stopped, turned and looked into her friend’s eyes.
“I think I’ll practice putting my gloves on,” Vivian said. “Over here.” She pointed to the barn and walked on, picking her way across the uneven surface while her stiletto heels sank in between shards of rock with each step she took.
“Winnie…” Jesse said again, “do you have any idea who that body belongs to?”
Winnie’s eyes widened until they were saucers of bloodshot white surrounding hazel centers. “No! Honestly, I thought it was a dog or something.”
“Do you have any idea who could have buried a body in your backyard?”
“No! I thought it was something that had been there since the last owner.”
“Okay. But since you found out it was a person,” Jesse continued patiently, “and that it hasn’t been there very long, have you had a chance to wonder how it could have gotten there?”
Winnie’s head shook ‘no’ slowly while her gaze dropped down and to the side. “I think I’ve been scared to think about it,” she almost whispered.
“How about Roy Lee? Do you have any idea who could have shot him and why?” Jesse felt almost cruel, but these questions had to be asked, and answers needed to be found.
Again, Winnie shook her head ‘no.’
“Winnie…” Jesse put her hands on her friend’s shoulders. Her voice remained calm, her words measured and distinct. “Somebody came out here in the middle of the day and dug up a body in your backyard. We can hope they purposely waited until you were gone, but we don’t know what they would have done if you had come home. Or if you had been here when they got here. And on the same day, somebody murdered your ex-husband not even a mile from where we went fishing this morning.”
She could feel Winnie trembling under her hands, and Jesse longed to quit—just to stop and leave the rest of it unsaid—but she couldn’t. “Both of these people are connected to you somehow, and until we know who killed them and why, there is no way you can stay out here in this house alone, especially at night. You haven’t even got a way to drive out of here, Winnie.”
“Okay.” Raising her head finally, Winnie squared her shoulders and looked Jesse in the eye. “Okay, I get it. My home isn’t safe. I’m not safe.” Tears pooled, turning the bloodshot whites of her eyes a pale pink, and her voice, a hoarse whisper. “I get it.”
“I’m sorry.” Jesse felt like she’d just run over someone’s puppy. In the back of her mind a small, gruff voice that sounded a lot like Joe Tyler’s reminded her that she wasn’t that far removed from Winnie’s situation. “I guess we could call your dad if you’d rather. You could stay with him if…”
“No,” Winnie said quickly. “No, I’d rather stay with you or with Mrs. Windsor. My dad doesn’t need to know yet. He’s not too good with… well, stress, or grief, or you know, emotions.”
“Okay.” Jesse hooked her arm through Winnie’s and gently tugged to get them started toward the barn again. “If you stay with Viv, though, you’ll probably need to stop calling her Mrs. Windsor. And the Gilded Lily is closed on Mondays, so that will give us plenty of time to work things out tomorrow.”
“I guess it could be fun,” Winnie said. Her face looked almost cheerful even if her voice seemed a little grudging still. “I sure could use Roy Lee’s truck when they get through with it, though. My name’s still on the title, so I’m the one they would release it to, anyway.”
“Maybe we could mention that to the sheriff before we leave. In the meantime, I think I can come up with a rental we can use.”
“Good.” Winnie nodded, definitely more cheerful. “I’ll have to get back to work before too long. Still got bills to pay no matter what else happens.”
“That won’t be a problem. Somebody will make sure you’ve got transportation.” Jesse remembered that Winnie had started working weekends in high school for a local grocery store and was still there. “You’re a manager now, aren’t you?”
“Yep, in the Bakery Department, and I’m still the head decorator for any special cake orders we get.” Winnie’s pride was obvious. “We’re about the only bakery for things like wedding cakes until you get all the way over to Culverton.”
“You’re one of the few people I know who’s held the same job since high school,” Jesse said. “Have you ever thought of doing something else?”
“Naw. Everybody’s friendly there, and I’m good at what I do. I’ve done it long enough now that it’s just kind of natural.”
For someone like Winnie, who had always been a hard worker happiest with a task, Jesse realized that her job had probably become one of Winnie’s main anchors, and that getting back to work would be important to her—especially when everything else in her life seemed to be falling apart.
“So, you’re happy, except for maybe days like today? Basically happy?”
Winnie bobbed her head in agreement. “I like my home. I like my job. I’ve got friends who’re willing to listen to my problems and help me when I need it. That’s not a bad life.”
“Hey, you two,” Vivian called from the door of the barn. “I’m willing to sacrifice my shoes, but not my dress. I’m going to leave this door to you.” She held up her hands clothed in the lightweight latex. “I’m ready to go to work.”
Within a few steps, Jesse and Winnie had joined her and together they slid open the tall, bulky main door to the barn. Inside, dust motes danced on the beams of light that sliced through openings in the rafters. Straw covered a bare dirt floor. Stalls stood empty, waiting for a mare in foal, or a horse in need of shelter.
In the front corner, hanging from wall pegs was a variety of shovels, spades, hoes, rakes, and a post hole digger, along with an axe, a pitch fork, and several implements of manual labor Jesse had never seen before.
“How in the world would you know if something was missing?” she asked, genuinely impressed by the arsenal of farming equipment.
“There would be an empty peg, for one thing,” Winnie said as her eyes scanned the wall.
“You have a peg for everything
?” Vivian asked.
“Some of those things are older than I am. And in better shape,” Winnie answered with another head bob. “A good tool doesn’t sit around on the ground collecting rust.” She walked across the cavernous room to the rough, wood wall they were all studying. Her hand reached out, not quite touching one of the larger shovels, even though she wore the protective gloves they had been given.
“This. And this.”
Her hovering hand skipped over several shovels over to one Jesse recognized as a No. 2, lighter weight, with a smaller head. The larger shovel was next to one that was much smaller, and the No. 2 Winnie pointed to was next to a larger one, probably a No. 4. A lot of people wouldn’t think to organize their gardening tools by size, and not many would notice if they had gotten them out of order.
“These have been swapped,” Winnie said. “I wouldn’t have left these like this, and no one else has cause to be using them.”
“So somebody has been in here using your shovels.” Vivian stated the obvious because someone needed to. “I guess we should show the sheriff which ones to check for prints.” She turned to Jesse. “Can you get prints off of old wood like that?”
“Probably not, but they might be able to find something worthwhile on it,” Jesse said. “Just the fact that someone has been in here using them is significant.”
“Sons of bitches,” Winnie spit out under her breath. “I wonder if they went into the house and fixed a pot of coffee while they were at it?”
“It’s probably something worth checking.” Having made a similar offhand comment in Joe Tyler’s hearing and been sent to the barn to check it out, Jesse knew he would have the same reaction to Winnie’s remark. “Let’s look around for any missing tarps or something else they might have used to dig up or haul away the bones.”
“Why would anyone come to dig up a body,” Vivian asked, still staring at the wall of shovels, “and not bring anything to dig it up with?”
“Maybe because they knew there would be tools here they could use.” Silence hung in the air as everyone turned to look at Jesse.
“How would they know that?” Winnie asked softly.
“I would say that, more and more, this is looking like your visitors knew their way around here,” Vivian answered, taking her turn at stating an unpleasant truth.
“Well, at least this time it wasn’t Roy Lee.” Winnie turned on her heel and started across the barn to where shelves filled the opposite corner. “Since he was already dead by then.”
Chapter Twenty
Jesse turned to follow Winnie but stopped almost immediately when she heard a faint voice and the crackle of static just outside the open barn door.
“Go ahead,” Joe Tyler’s voice said clearly.
Hearing the word “boat,” Jesse crept closer to the doorway, not stopping until she saw the arm of a sheriff’s uniform come into view. With one step to the left, she put the unopened half of the barn door between herself and the new arrival, who had apparently been on his way inside.
“…loaded and outa here,” came the muted conversation from the radio. Jesse tiptoed nearer, careful to stay hidden behind the heavy door.
“You find anything?” Joe asked, sounding as if he had stopped walking and was standing still.
“Blood in the bottom…” Marla’s voice remained distant and blurred. “Had time to dry before… wet.”
“So you’re saying that the body was in the boat long enough for the blood to pool and start to dry before the holes were put in the bottom of the boat?” he repeated. “Could you tell if he was shot on shore and then put in the boat, or was there blood spatter inside, indicating he was shot while in the boat?”
“…on shore… pictures and… soil sample… pooled under… in boat,” came the staccato answer that left Jesse burning to hear more.
“Okay, that’s good for now,” Joe said. “Are you free to head over here for awhile? This is turning into a bigger thing than I anticipated.” He was silent through a short burst of static, then, “Good. Check in with dispatch. They’ll get you here.”
Jesse quickly scooted away toward Winnie before he could come through the opening and catch her eavesdropping. It wasn’t that she was afraid of his reaction, or that he would even be surprised. It was more like she wasn’t ready for him to realize how involved she was becoming in all this.
“Found anything?” she asked in an undertone when she reached her target.
“My big blue tarp is gone. Bastards.” Winnie’s words held the thin edge of someone who had struggled through about all she had the strength for. “I don’t understand any of this, Jesse. Why me?” She turned as she spoke, holding out her arms helplessly. “Why here? Why now?”
Before Jesse could react, Vivian arrived and shifted into the maternal mode Jesse wasn’t comfortable with. Taking Winnie’s extended hands, Vivian led her away from the dark corner toward the light coming through the oversized doorway. “Come along, Winnifryd, dear. We need to get you out of here and get some food into you before you collapse. You’ll feel much better once you’ve eaten.”
“We’ll all feel much better after we’ve eaten,” Jesse said, following closely behind. “I haven’t had anything since daybreak, and I don’t think Winnie’s had anything at all except for that one piece of chocolate.”
“Just a few more questions, ladies, and I’ll be happy to send you on your way.”
Even knowing he was on his way inside, Jesse still managed to be startled by his size when she saw Joe Tyler standing just inside the doorway. He was the kind of man her grandfather used to say cast a long shadow, and that was exactly what he was doing at the moment.
“Well, hello there, Sheriff,” Vivian replied. “You’ve saved us a trip out to get you. Winnifryd has identified several shovels that are out of place.”
“And a tarp,” Winnie said in a voice that cracked. She cleared her throat and tried again. “And a tarp is missing.”
“Can you describe it?” he asked.
“A big one. Blue. Fifteen feet by twenty-four, something like that. It was new. Hardly been used. Not expensive though. One of those thin ones you can find about anywhere.”
Joe wrote down what she said in a three by five inch notebook, then closed it and returned it to his shirt pocket. In an almost unbroken motion, he tucked his chin to his shoulder and spoke into the mike there. “Can somebody get in here? Looks like this barn is going to need to be checked, and we’ve got a couple of shovels that will have to go back to the lab.”
“Okay, Mrs. Rogers,” he said, glancing up again, “we’re almost done with you for today. I know that’ll make you happy. I just need to ask you a couple of questions, and then it would be a great help if you could look through your house for me before you go. Just to see if anything has been disturbed in there.”
“I need to get some clothes,” Winnie answered.
“Yes. That’s right. You do.” He smiled without looking very happy. “It would be good if you could take as little as possible and keep those gloves on while you’re in the house. Just until we’ve had a chance to clear it as a crime scene. Then you’re free to…”
“Crime scene?!” Winnie’s voice rose an octave, and her chin took on a determined thrust.
“There has obviously been a dead body dug up and removed from your property, from all evidence. Today,” he said, emphasizing the last word. “So, yes, Mrs. Rogers, a crime scene. “
Winnie’s chin stayed where it was. “When you’re done with Roy Lee’s truck, I want it.”
“It will, by law, be released to his estate.”
“I’m on the title,” Winnie shot back, not waiting to see if he had more to say.
The sheriff nodded. “Then I guess we can release it to you. When we’re done. Which may not be real soon. There were some shovels and a tarp behind the seat in his pickup, and we’re going to need to take a good look at them.”
Jesse gasped, quietly, inside, then looked around to see if anyone had noticed.
Winnie wasn’t looking at anything but the sheriff, and she had fire in her eyes.
“Well, it hasn’t got anything to do with this, because he was dead before anything got dug up here.”
It was at that moment that Jesse finally realized Winnie was still in love with Roy Lee. In spite of the divorce, in spite of his girlfriend of the last year, in spite of whatever caused their split in the first place, and regardless of her staunch refusal to reconcile with him, she was still, even now, in love with her ex-husband.
And they really needed to get her out of there to someplace quiet before all hell broke loose. Because for all of her shy, awkward, conflict-avoiding ways, Winnifryd Rogers was hell on wheels when she got riled up, and now was not the time for law enforcement to see that side of her.
“Okay,” Jesse said, stepping forward, “so, if we’re through in here, maybe we should go pack a few things and take a look around inside the house…” Still speaking, she turned enough to include Vivian, who immediately slipped a hand under Winnie’s arm and started her moving forward. “…before a couple of us pass out from hunger and exhaustion.”
“They can go,” Joe said, stepping out of the way as Vivian hustled Winnie past him and out the door. “You will have to stay and show me which shovels are out of place.”
Jesse closed her eyes and replayed in her mind which shovel was where another one was supposed to be. They started with the No. 0, and went to the No. 4, and it was the…
“Okay,” she said, opening her eyes, “I’ve got it. Come on over here.”
“I have questions for her,” he said, falling into step beside Jesse. “If I don’t get a chance to question her before she leaves here, I will find her at Vivian’s before this afternoon is out.”
Jesse stopped and turned to look at him. She wasn’t accustomed to looking into his eyes when she talked to him. Usually she was having to stare at her own reflection in those damned mirrored sunglasses he constantly wore. “Where are your sunglasses?”
Murder Most Thorny (Myrtle Grove Garden Club Mystery Book 2) Page 14