“Coach Thompson, my high school football coach. I’m still thinking about whether to go or not.” His expression held a melancholy I hadn’t noted before but he shook it off. “Mark’s really back in town? Two years now? Wow. I had no idea. We lost touch after he moved. Jeff used to be a friend too. I haven’t really talked to him in years either. Where did you meet them at?”
“They all came out and helped Buzz bring the trailer out to the new property. Him and Nick Newton, Mark Stephens, Paul Simmons, and Nick’s nephew, Addison.” Jeff didn’t look athletic. At all. “Jeff played football?”
Parker grinned. “He rode the bench mostly, but he was part of the team. That’s all that mattered.” He shrugged. “Small town.”
I liked that in Moonrise, even geeks could be jocks. Still, it surprised me. All of Buzz’s lodge brothers had seemed like decent guys. I still wondered about Paul, though. “Is Paul Simmons related to Theresa’s husband?”
“He and Jock are cousins, I think. Why?”
“No reason. Curious is all.”
“I don’t know him well.” He sipped more from his cup, his blue eyes flashing on me briefly. “Jeff’s an accountant.”
“Yeah, I know.”
“Apparently, he makes a killing during tax season.” Parker sighed. “It seems like all my high school teammates are doing well for themselves.”
Did Parker think because Jeff had a degree that it meant he was better somehow? I hoped not. Parker was the best man I knew. “If it makes you feel better, he’s a total pot head,” I blurted out.
Parker’s eyes widened, and he scootched forward. “Seriously?”
“Totally.” I grinned. “I could smell it when he stood by me.”
“You know he’s an instructor out at the college.”
“He works at the college too?”
“According to his bio.” Parker turned in his chair, opened a cabinet drawer, and pulled out a flyer and set it on the table.
“What’s that?”
“It came with the invitation. It’s the 2009 3A State Football Champions. The whole team is listed, along with their accomplishments.”
I skimmed down until I landed on Parker’s name. “Parker Knowles. After an honorable discharge from the Army, Parker settled back home in Moonrise, where he runs a rescue shelter for American Pit Bulls and Pit Bull Breeds. He is currently single.”
“That’s me in a nutshell,” Parker said.
I scanned the brochure and saw a few names a recognized, including Jeff’s and Mark’s. Bridgette Jones’ name was at the very end with two others, Michael Duffy and Travis Mount, on the “Deceased” list. My heart pinched. She’d been Parker’s high school sweetheart, but she’d been nuts.
“Why are there female names on here? Did you all have girls on the team?” It seemed very progressive for the area.
Parker laughed. “No. The cheerleaders were invited as special guests as well. They supported us all the way to state.”
“Go team,” I muttered as I stared down at Bridgette’s name. She had taken her own life after she’d tried to kill me and failed. I was surprised they’d included her. I figured the town of Moonrise would just as soon forget that they’d born a murderess into the world. Especially after it made the national news.
The press had made Parker out to be a local hero who took down a husband and wife murder team despite the incompetence of the county police. Yet another reason Sheriff Avery hated my guts. It hadn’t happened that way, exactly, but I was more than okay with not landing in the spotlight.
I read a few other biographies, a nurse, a human resources manager, a pharmacist, a safety engineer, physical therapist, and the list went on. Parker’s class only had thirty-nine students. I couldn’t believe how many of them had gone on to complete college degrees.
“Oh, look.” I pointed toward the end of the bio list. “Ryan’s in here. He played too?” I didn’t wait for Parker to answer. “Ryan Petry. Degree in Veterinarian Medicine from Missouri State University. Ryan has a successful practice in Moonrise, where he treats both domestic and farm animals. He teaches introduction to veterinarian medicine at Two Hills Community College. He is currently single.”
“He’s a catch,” Parker muttered. He and Ryan were friends, but he was jealous of my friendship with the handsome vet.
I’d had lunch and a couple of dinners with Ryan over the past several months, but our relationship was not a romantic one. I’d told Parker before that Ryan and I weren’t dating, but he didn’t seem to believe me. If Parker had been a Shifter like me, he’d be able to scent my lack of attraction to Ryan. Hell, he’d be able to smell, like I could, Ryan’s lack of attraction to me.
“Speaking of Two Hills Community College,” I said, moving the conversation away from Ryan. “I think I might check it out.”
“For classes? What are you planning to study?”
I wasn’t exactly ashamed to tell Parker that I hadn’t finished high school, or that I needed to take a GED class, but after seeing all the successful biographies of Parker’s classmates, I felt self-conscious. So, I skipped the middle step to my goals and went straight for, “I’ve always wanted to study medicine.”
“You want to be a nurse?”
I did not roll my eyes. I wanted to. But I didn’t. “That would be an honorable profession, but no, I want to be a doctor.” Or at least I had for the past twenty-seven years. Up until my eighth year, I’d wanted to be a pretty, pretty princess.
For the past couple of months, I’d been thinking about practicing a different kind of medicine, though. It was one of the many reasons I enjoyed Ryan’s company. He’d even offered to hire me part time to work in his office and assist him out in the field on occasion. I wasn’t sure how Parker would react, but I was seriously considering the job. Especially now that I had a home that needed a substantial investment for improvements.
Hazel had lent me the ten-thousand dollar down payment and enough scratch to get my utilities hooked up, but I would still have to come up with a five-hundred-dollar mortgage payment every month, pay back my BFF, and find spare money to buy items to fix up the place. Buzz giving me his trailer to stay in was a huge weight off my mind. It meant I could make repairs on my own timetable. Years of poverty had taught me to be an amateur plumber, electrician, and carpenter. I had basic skills, but I knew at some point, I’d have to hire professionals.
“That’s great, Lily,” he said. “You’d be a really good doctor.” He leaned forward and pushed his fingers across the table toward mine. Only inches separated us, and I could see a gentle longing in his expression. One I’m certain matched my own.
“I’m not sure if I’ll do it or not,” I told Parker. “I’ll check out their programs and settle on something, though.”
“Do you need some time off tomorrow to go out to Two Hills?”
“I’ll go on my lunch break.” I turned the handbill over. The back had candid shots of the 2009 Moonrise football teams, and their cheerleaders, of course. I recognized Parker in several group shots and one where he was standing next to a hulking guy who made him look like a dwarf.
“Who is that?”
Parker’s face lit up. “Adam Davis. He was the class clown. Real nice guy off the field, but on the field, watch out.” His eyes stared off into the distance. “Just another friend I lost touch with. You never think that’s going to happen when you’re in school. I really thought we’d all be hanging out forever. I left for basic two weeks after graduation.” He tapped a picture of him, Mark, Jeff, Adam, Ryan, and some guy I didn’t recognize. “When I got home two years ago, I felt like I was wearing the wrong skin. Sometimes I still feel that way.”
He was singing my tune. Only it had been the opposite for me. The whole time I’d been in my hometown, I’d felt like an alien trapped on a hostile planet. Moving to Moonrise changed that for me.
I caught Parker staring at the guy in the picture I didn’t know. “Who’s that?”
“Mike Duffy.”
&
nbsp; I recognized his name from the deceased list. “He was a good friend?”
“The best. We’d been best friends since kindergarten. The six of us hung out all the time, but I was closest to Mike. I couldn’t believe it when my dad told me he died. I was still in service at the time.”
“What happened to him?”
“Some farm accident.” His eyes crinkled with a brief wince of pain. He moved the conversation to his other friends. “Adam and Jeff hung out a lot. They were an odd pair, but they had a lot in common. They both liked numbers, for one thing.” He smiled at the memory. “Adam had a good head on his shoulders. He got a concussion his first semester at college. It pretty much ended his football career. Really, he was the only one of us good enough to play at that level. He became an engineer instead.”
“And Ryan and Mark?”
“Yeah, those two palled around. They were inseparable in high school. We all hung out, though. In school, they called us the ‘Big Six.’” He smiled again. It made his face, which had seen too much death and war, appear young.
I looked down at his high school pictures again. I could see the boy in the photos when Parker smiled. The details for the weekend event were centered on the back. “The dinner honoring your coach and team is next Saturday. You need me to work extra here so you can go?”
Parker shrugged. “Maybe.” He shook his head. “A classmate, Naomi Wells, has been calling me for the past week. She wants me to go with her to the Saturday night dinner.” He looked at me as if gauging my reaction.
I pursed my lips, my mood souring. “Then it’s settled. I’ll stay here next Saturday night and hold down the fort while you enjoy reminiscing about the good old days with Naomi.”
“You don’t mind?” His voice was soft.
My throat tightened with emotion. “Of course not. Not at all.” I stood up and looked out the kitchen window.
“Shoot! Smooshie is digging her way out under the fence.”
“She’s tenacious,” Parker said, standing up and looking outside. Elvis, of course, was happily sitting and watching.
Impulsively, I grabbed the flyer and shoved it in my pocket when Parker stood up to look. “I’ll see you in a little bit,” I said and hurried out the door to stop my Hairy Houdini from making a grand escape.
Chapter 4
The morning passed quickly, with a new intake, a black and white male named Dexter, brought in by Keith Porter. This was the second new one this week. The other, a gray female we named Star looked practically starved, and Keith said she’d been overbred to the point of malnourishment. Star was a sweetheart, and Ryan seemed certain she’d recover well.
When Dexter was walked past the kennels, the loud barking from all the dogs thundered up the hallway. It was a cacophony of sound that reverberated throughout the center.
Until I’d started working for Parker, I’d never heard anything like the noise these dogs could generate. The place smelled like dog, of course, but we tried to keep it clean, so there was always an undercurrent of lemon, pine, bleach, and Lysol. Blankets and towels were washed as needed, but we had a lot, so it didn’t have to be every day. Unless the smell grew too pungent to handle. In January, the washing machine had broken down. We started throwing the soiled items outside because it got too bad in the utility room, and they’d frozen to the ground. It hadn’t been our brightest move.
Keith Porter was a tall, lanky fellow, a little younger than Parker in age, and his brown hair and the scruff on his face always reminded me of Shaggy from Scooby-Doo. Theresa had confessed to me when I first got to town that she’d been having an affair with the young man. I didn’t judge her. Her husband was a monster, and according to Theresa, he’d made several threats about what would happen if Theresa tried to leave him. When I asked her if he hit her, she didn’t deny it.
Parker worked outside most the day with the dogs. He was also setting up a new run fence for the pit bulls who needed to be kept separate from the other dogs, even with supervision, until they could be properly socialized for rehousing.
It was Theresa’s day off, so I cleaned all the three social rooms by myself as Parker and Keith took the dogs, one by one, out for exercise, training, and play. I put clean covers on the couches, picked up any poop, mopped up any pee, and swept the floors of dirt, debris, and dog hair—though pit bulls didn’t shed much, thank heavens—and made sure each one of the kennels had food and water.
Smooshie, who followed me everywhere during my chores as long as the other dogs were kenneled or outside, had learned to leave the food and water alone. The afternoon volunteers usually cleaned the kennels, but if they were bad enough, I’d do it in the morning too. The dog beds were made of PVC and vinyl, so they were easy to wipe down, and the blankets were changed out when they got too smelly.
I threw myself into work to keep my mind off Parker and his event. Why had I said I’d cover for him so he could go with another woman? Was Naomi Wells tall? Beautiful? With a name like Naomi, she probably had the body of a supermodel. She’d been one of the team’s cheerleaders, and I’d snuck a peek at her bio on the flyer. She was a journalist for the St. Louis New Dispatch, which meant she was smart.
Dang it! I wanted to be happy for Parker. We were friends. That’s it. That’s all I wanted. Just because I wasn’t seeing anyone didn’t mean it was fair for me to expect him to stay celibate and relationship-free too. On some level, I think I’d hoped he would.
No, I told myself. Be happy for Parker. He deserves to be loved. He deserves to be loved by someone who isn’t lying to him all the time about who and what she is. Someone who can give him babies. Someone he can grow old with.
I walked down the hall after I put away the barrel of dog food in the supply closet, and was surprised to see Theresa, crying as she talked to Keith. Her blonde hair was curled and flawlessly set, and she wore a pale-green going-to-church dress suit that complimented her creamy peach skin tone. She was clenching a piece of paper in her hand.
“Theresa,” I said as I came up on them. “Are you okay?”
She thrust the paper at me. “Someone knows, Lily.”
I uncrumpled the note. I recognized the large capital letters immediately. The blood drained from my face. I know your secret. Soon everyone will.
This had to be the same person who had sent me similar notes when I’d first moved to town.
Anger bubbled inside me. “Where did you find the note?”
“It was under the windshield wiper on my car!” Her lower lip quivered. “What if Jock had seen it first?”
“Do you know it wasn’t meant for Jock?” I asked.
“That’s a good point,” Keith said. “What if it was for Jock, not you?”
“Don’t be stupid,” Theresa snapped. “It was on my car, not his. Besides, Jock doesn’t give a damn what people think about him.” She walked over to the chair in the living room and slumped down into it. “Jock is going to kill me.”
I tried not to get irritated with her for calling Keith stupid. Stress could turn even the best people ugly. “This could be some bored old bitty just trying to have fun with people.” I’d read Agatha Christie’s book The Poisoned Pen when I was younger. I hoped that’s all these notes were. Nothing had come of the one I’d received in November. Two notes claiming to know my secret and nothing more. It had been long enough that I’d managed to put it out of my mind most days.
I put my hand on her shoulder. “You tell enough people that you know something about them, and you’re bound to hit a few that will feel guilty enough to think it’s a possibility.”
“Oh, do you think so?” Theresa’s eyes glimmered with hope.
“Definitely.” I gave her a quick, supportive smile. “Now, don’t let whoever it is see you sweat.”
Keith gave me a grateful look as Theresa visibly relaxed and her tears dried up.
“I’m going to get lunch over at The Cat’s Meow now that I’m done with my morning chores. Do you want to get a bite with me?”
“Thanks, but no, Lily. I have to get back home. Jock’s parents are coming for dinner tonight, and I have a lot of food to prepare,” she said.
“Another time then,” I said.
Before I could leave, Parker came inside with a guy who was several inches taller than he was, and he had a big grin on his face. His eyes were lit with pure joy, and I couldn’t stop watching.
He saw me and smiled wider. “Lily! I want you to meet someone.”
The man, who was built like a lumberjack on steroids, leaned forward and held out a meaty hand. “Adam Davis,” he said genially when I took his hand and shook. “Nice to meet you.”
“You too, Adam.” I looked at Parker. “I recognize you from the pictures of the football team. I’m sure Parker’s glad to see you.”
Adam gave Parker’s shoulder a little punch. “This guy had an arm like a rocket, Lily. He could throw a ball like no one I’d seen.”
“And this guy could block the defense in a way that normally took three guys.”
“That’s great.” I had no idea what they were talking about. I never watched football. Ever. “It sounds like you two were superstars.”
“Adam just got into town this morning.” Parker sounded happy. “He’s here for the Coach’s retirement dinner.”
“I figured so.” I laughed. “Well, it’s a good thing I’m free to work for you then. You’ll have a great time catching up. I’m going to get some lunch. You want me to bring you anything back?”
“No, I got stuff in the fridge,” Parker said. “I’ll see you in a bit.”
As I was leaving, I heard Adam say, “Please tell me you’re tapping that.”
To which Parker said, “Shut the hell up.”
* * * *
The Cat’s Meow was packed with the local Sunday crowd. Buzz did great business on “the Lord’s day.” After all, who wanted to go home after sitting in church for two or more hours and then cook all afternoon? Besides, for some of the women in town, it was the only day of the week they put on dressy clothes and did their hair. I didn’t blame them for wanting to take advantage of feeling pretty for a while longer.
The Money Pit Page 4