Delicious and Suspicious

by Riley Adams

  Seb frowned. Lulu could tell he didn’t have a clue in the world why Sara and Susan’s gallery would be mentioned in the same sentence. As irritated as she was with her son, she hated seeing him look so oblivious.

  “You know, Seb. Sara’s art.” Lulu pressed hard on Seb’s toes under the table with her foot. “Susan finally talked her into showing it at Southern Accents yesterday. You’ll have to run by and see it,” she added in a more threatening than encouraging tone.

  Seb grunted from the pressure on his foot, then said, “Yes, ma’am, I’ll have to do that.” Then he flashed his slow smile, and Lulu saw Susan melt right then and there. Lulu gritted her teeth.

  Susan gulped and tried to pull it together. “Your mother and I were talking about business at the restaurant.”

  Seb raised a dark eyebrow. “Business is great. I worked on the numbers today. They look fantastic.”

  Susan blushed. “Well, yes. I mean, I’m sure it has been great.” She looked to Lulu for a lifeline.

  “Sales look great for before the murder, Seb.” Lulu was knocking on the wooden table. “We seem to have gotten ourselves mixed up in a poisoning, so we can’t be feeling cocky about our numbers.”

  Seb shrugged. “People want barbeque, Mother. I doubt they’re really going to think about it. The lunch crowd was good.”

  “Because people are curious, Seb. There are television cameras out there and reporters. They just want to see what’s going on. But what’ll happen after that?”

  Seb lost interest in the conversation. “I’m sure there’ll still be plenty of guests tonight and tomorrow, too. We’ve got a great band lineup. They’ll be here when the music starts playing.”

  “No, they won’t, because there won’t be a blues band. They cancelled tonight’s appearance, and the one for tomorrow night cancelled, too. I guess they’re afraid they might be murdered while they’re playing.” Lulu finally noticed that Seb had his laptop bag with him. “Where are you going, by the way?”

  “It’s quitting time,” drawled Seb calmly.

  “Is it? Well, I guess I’ll have to take my watch by Bing’s Clock Shop, because by my watch, Aunt Pat’s is open another four hours.”

  Now Seb frowned in irritation. “I’ll check back in later, Mom.” He quickly exited the screen porch, letting the door slam behind him. Lulu clucked. That was the last she’d see of Seb for the rest of the day, she knew it.

  Susan stared at the spot where he’d last stood. “I’d better go, too, Lulu. Call me later when you get the chance?”

  Lulu rocked violently in her chair. Everything about this day had gone wrong from the start. Before the start. She couldn’t wait for the moment when she pulled those cotton checked sheets up to her chin, laid her head on her feather pillow, and put today to bed for good.

  Then she saw three familiar figures coming into the porch. Big Ben, Morty, and Buddy. She couldn’t do anything else but smile at the sight of her friends. They hugged her, then peeked into the dining room.

  Buddy shook his head. “Can’t believe how empty that room is. I never thought I’d see the day.”

  “More food for us!” grinned Morty, rubbing his good-sized belly.

  Lulu turned serious. “It’s been a rough day for us. Once the curiosity seekers left, we didn’t get our regulars back. The live blues acts cancelled their gigs ‘out of respect for the recent events.’ The tourists have been walking right on by when there’s nobody lined up to get in. I guess they figure the more-popular-looking places look like better bets.”

  Big Ben gave a harrumphing cough. Apparently the cough was a signal to the others to tell Lulu something. “Do you think,” asked Buddy, “tomorrow evening would be a good night for a blues concert on your porch? We thought we’d revive the Back Porch Blues Band. Gratis, of course. Nothing too big or fancy,” he hurried on, “but a size such as three blues musicians in their eighties could comfortably handle.”

  Lulu felt tears welling in her eyes. She nodded.

  “We didn’t want to take up too much of your space, honey,” said Morty. “This joint is going to be hopping with paying customers as soon as we start to play and they start smelling that barbeque cooking. I’m going to get my boys to bring in some bongo drums, and we’ll have a guitar, a bass, a trumpet, and a harmonica. There’ll be some heavenly music pouring out on the street.”

  Lulu hid a smile, knowing Morty’s boys were at least sixty-five years old. “They’ll be battering down that screen door to get in.”

  “We figured you could use some help with your advertising right now. Since you don’t have any dancing fuchsia pigs to draw in customers,” said Buddy. “Although why that woman thinks anyone wants to dwell on pigs before eating pork is anyone’s guess.”

  Lulu hugged them all again.

  “This reminds me of that time, back in the day, when we put on a concert in the park. We were the headliners, man, and people poured into the park by the hundreds,” said Morty in a dreamlike tone.

  “Funny,” drawled Big Ben, “how I never manage to remember any of these events.”

  “Well, I hate to say it, Big Ben, but I think your memory has slipped some as you’ve gotten older. Or maybe you’re just blocking out the gigs altogether. You know, since all the pretty ladies were coming up to me.” He winked at Lulu. “I was always the debonair one, you know.”

  Lulu hid a smile. If any one of the three qualified as debonair, it was Buddy. If he’d wanted to turn on his charm, the ladies would have come in droves. But no one had managed to turn his head since his wife of fifty years had died several years ago.

  Buddy cut Big Ben off before he could stutter out an indignant retort. “We’re going to grab us some food before the hordes come. And they will come, I know it. Especially after a special concert by the kings of blues.”

  Chapter 6

  “Ben, are you listening to me?” asked Sara. Since this was the second time she’d asked that particular question, exasperation fairly dripped from her words.

  Ben, whose mind only seconds ago had been happily engaged in a daydream involving an eight-point whitetail buck, an excellent vantage point, and a trusty rifle, startled guiltily. “Yes,” he said.

  “Yes what?”

  Ben crinkled his brow. “Yes, ma’am?”

  Sara ran her fingers through her curly red hair until it poofed out around her head like a fiery halo. “No, Ben. I mean, what are you yesing? Didn’t you listen to what I said?”

  Ben was suddenly intensely interested in Aunt Pat’s food inventory list.

  Sara frowned at him with great irritation. “I was just saying that your mother has moped around for a couple of days now. Now she’s determined to find out what really happened and clear the names of the innocent,” said Sara.

  “That could be a good thing,” suggested Ben. “After all, you’re one of the primary suspects. Considering the brouhaha in Susan’s gallery and everything.”

  “Well, that’s certainly true. It’s not something your mother needs to be worrying herself over, though. The police will figure it out and probably in no time flat. I hate seeing Lulu so sad. I think that a diversion for the day is in order.”

  “What kind of a diversion?” asked Ben nervously. He hoped this wasn’t the sort of diversion that entailed him driving his mother to the mall and giving feedback as she tried on a variety of floral-print cotton frocks. Her dresses all looked the same to him. “I need to be cooking on the pit today, honey. We have a huge takeout order to put together.” Please, God, he thought. It’s amazing how quickly you can fall from a happy hunting daydream into a suburbanmall nightmare.

  “The Graces,” said Sara complacently. “They’ll make the perfect diversion for your mama. I don’t know what they’ll find to do, but I’m sure it’ll be entertaining.”

  Peggy Sue was Sara’s go-to Grace. “Sara, honey, we’d be delighted to take Lulu out and show her a good time. She needs to get away from the restaurant for a little while. It’s not healthy to mope aro
und and ruminate on bad stuff.”

  “I think she’s trying to solve the case,” said Sara. “You know how she’s always looking out for ‘her children.’ I think she wants to figure out who did it, get them tossed in the clink, and get on with life as usual.”

  “Sounds like a pretty good plan, actually,” said Peggy Sue in a considering voice. “But if she’s getting too wrapped up in it all, she should take a step back. We were going to go out anyway today for a happy little outing. Because you know,” she spoke in a hushed voice as if somebody was listening in on the conversation, “Flo is not doing well.”

  “Flo isn’t?”

  “Oh, honey, not at all. We don’t know what’s wrong with her. We know it has to do with Miss Adrian’s murder, of course, but we don’t know if she feels guilty about it because she had a run-in with her before Miss Adrian ended up deader than a doornail, or if she knows something, or if she did something . . .” Peggy Sue broke off. She sounded a little guilty now herself. “Not that we think that Flo could hurt the very nastiest of flies, mind you, but . . .”

  “I know what you mean, Peggy Sue. And I’m starting to think that Lulu’s right. The sooner this case is wrapped up, the better.”

  The plan, in theory, was a sound one. It involved Peggy Sue picking up the still car-less Lulu and the other Graces, and heading on a fun-filled trip to the mall with food, shopping, and makeovers.

  But implementing this plan was harder than Peggy Sue expected. By the time she’d finally rounded everybody up, her face glowed with perspiration, and she had to perform major reconstruction on her heavy makeup.

  Cherry hadn’t picked up on her house phone or cell phone. Peggy Sue had hopped in her VW bug and drove over to check in on the out-of-pocket Grace. It turned out that she was tackling her yard work early in the day before it got too muggy. Peggy Sue was greeted by the sight of Cherry, helmet firmly on her head, bouncing around on her riding lawnmower at a tearing speed and seeming to be thoroughly enjoying herself.

  Peggy Sue pulled into the driveway and managed to flag her down after several attempts. Apparently Cherry’s peripheral vision was somewhat compromised by her Elvis helmet. It was clear, though, that she was the safest lawn-mowing homeowner in Memphis. “What’re we doing?” she asked. She looked at her Elvis watch. “It’s only nine fifteen.”

  “I think,” said Peggy Sue, “that the best course of action would be a trip to the mall. Serious measures have to be taken because we have two people to cheer up. Lulu is so fit that she won’t have a problem walking all over the mall. And Flo . . .” She shook her head. “Flo needs a makeover.”

  “Has it gotten that bad?” asked Cherry in a hushed voice. “I just don’t see her as needing a makeover intervention. Flo is always really put together.”

  “Well, honey, it looks like something done took her apart. She needs some reconstructive makeup of the emergency variety,” said Peggy Sue. “And fast.”

  Cherry took off her helmet and patted her hair. Her bouffant do was a don’t. “I need thirty minutes, Peggy Sue. I can’t leave my front yard half mowed, and I can’t go to the mall looking like something the cat drug in.”

  “I’ll sit in my car and call the other Graces.” A guilty flush spread over Peggy’s Sue’s neck and generously exposed chest. “I feel like this is partly my fault. I never should’ve said what I did that night at the Peabody. You know,” she muttered, “about Flo’s background.”

  Cherry looked around swiftly as if the squirrels and chipmunks might be taping their conversation. “The less said about that, the better. Besides, Flo forgave you for it. She knows it was the margaritas talking and not you.”

  “Just the same, I do feel awful about it. The next day I was actually sick with an upset stomach, headache, and all,” said Peggy Sue. “I don’t think my tummy will settle down until the police put somebody away for that murder.”

  Cherry thought it might have been more like a swift-acting, frightening hangover that attacked her, but she had more sense than to say that to Peggy Sue. She didn’t need a mad Peggy Sue on her back—that was for sure.

  “True. Although I think that if anybody needed killing, it was that Rebecca Adrian. She got what was coming to her.”

  “You don’t think . . .” Peggy Sue hesitated. “Never mind. Flo’s got a heart of gold. She’d never hurt anybody. I don’t care what happened in her past.”

  Jeanne and Evelyn quickly signed on for a trip to the mall. They’d been there yesterday, but who cared? It was always fun to have a girls’ day out.

  Then Peggy Sue called Lulu. Sara had asked her to make it look like it was the Graces’ idea to go shopping and not hers. Peggy Sue had totally agreed with that line of thought. After all, it wasn’t a stretch. At some point, the Graces and a shopping expedition were bound to happen. Lulu’s battle with the blues would not have gone unnoticed by their sharp eyes, and a trip to the mall was their favorite remedy.

  Lulu was, fortunately, easily convinced. “Sweetie, that sounds like fun. I’d love to escape for a while. My car is still at the shop, though.”

  “That’s no problem at all, Lulu. There’ll be six of us going, so we’ll either take Cherry’s old minivan or else we’ll do two cars. See you in about thirty minutes.”

  As soon as Cherry was clean, garbed in jangly bracelets and tight but cute clothing, and had her helmet in place since she was driving a car, Peggy Sue and Cherry drove around Memphis, collecting Lulu and various Graces, all eager for a day at the mall.

  Flo, however, was not easily reached. First they tried her house phone. Then they left imploring, loud messages on her answering machine. Her cell phone must have been either turned off or out of batteries.

  But the Graces were not easily dissuaded. They’d come too far with their plans to have them dashed by a fallen Grace. Jeanne snapped her fingers. “I got it!” she said. “I’ve got Flo’s house key still. I had to keep her cat for her a few months ago when she went on that church retreat. I never did give the key back to her.”

  Jeanne, always the cleanest-living Grace and the one who adhered closest to Christian values, carefully avoided mentioning the cat’s name.

  Evelyn, however, had no such compunction. She hooted. “I just die whenever that cat is mentioned. Who else but Flo would name a cat Dammit?”

  Lulu said, “I think the cat named itself. Considering that’s the only thing it would sometimes answer to.”

  Evelyn was still giggling in the third row of the minivan as the car headed back to Jeanne’s house. “Here kitty, kitty, kitty! Heeeeeeerrre kitty, kitty kitty. Heeeeeeeerrrreeeeee kitty, kitty, kitty. Come here, Dammit!”

  Jeanne gave her a subduing look as she hopped out of the minivan and ran inside to dig out Flo’s house key from the depths of her junk drawer.

  It was a good thing the Graces broke into Flo’s house, thought Lulu. Because Flo definitely needed resuscitation. “Dear Jesus,” hissed Evelyn. “She looks like holy hell.” In a loud voice, Evelyn said, “Flo, sweetie! How stunning you look in that muumuu. I’ve never seen you in that chartreuse color before. It suits you, it really does.”

  Flo’s eyes bored holes into Evelyn, which she carefully ignored.

  Cherry picked up where Evelyn left off. “I do believe that’s the most perfect thing I’ve ever seen—for sitting around the house. Oh, and look at this . . .” Cherry turned her back to Flo and held up a blanket-type thing for the viewing pleasure of the wide-eyed Graces. “A Snuggie. Look, everyone: Flo has a Snuggie.”

  Flo remained stoically silent.

  Jeanne coughed. “I have a Snuggie, too. A sage green one. Although your royal blue one is very pretty.”

  “And they are,” said Peggy Sue, “wonderful for watching soap operas in your den. But we’re going to go to the mall. Flo,” she spoke loudly as if Flo had acquired deafness along with her crippling deficiency of good fashion judgment, “we’re all going to the mall for the day.”

  Flo looked one step away from catatonic.
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  Dammit, the cat, abruptly materialized in Flo’s rather chaotic den. It glowered at them with raging hostility before bounding into the dimness of Flo’s bedroom.

  “Could y’all give me a few minutes with Flo? Alone?” asked Cherry.

  Peggy Sue whispered to Cherry, “I could stay and talk to her with you.”

  Cherry shook her helmeted head. “That’s okay. Just go on out with the other girls back to the car.” Flo didn’t seem to harbor any hard feelings against Peggy Sue for her drunken expose the other night, but at a time when Cherry needed to persuade her to do something, she didn’t want to take the chance.

  “Honey,” Cherry said after the girls had retreated outside, “I know you don’t feel like going anywhere or doing anything. I can tell that you’re hurting.” And how, thought Cherry, wincing again at Flo’s appearance. “But I need you to rally yourself for a little while. The Graces have been assigned a mission,” said Cherry with all the patriotic pride of a World War II munitions-factory worker.

  There was a flicker of life in Flo’s eyes.

  “Lulu,” said Cherry with great dignity and seriousness, “is in trouble. She’s all depressed, and you know how older ladies don’t like to take happy pills. It’s our duty to revive her. We’re going to take her for a day at the mall. We’ll do makeovers and eat and have a grand time. What do you think?” she asked imploringly. “Can the Graces count on you? For Lulu?”

  Cherry’s call to action seemed to jumpstart Flo. At least temporarily, and enough to stand up. Flo reached for the Snuggie.

  “Uh-uh. Let’s put something a little bit peppier on. It’ll cheer Lulu up.” Cherry directed Flo to the bedroom and sighed with relief as she encountered no resistance.

  “She’s driving?” squeaked Jeanne in alarm. “Why on earth is she driving? The minivan seats seven.”

  Cherry shrugged. “She said she might want to leave before we do. She’ll meet us at the food court.”