Val Fremden Mystery Box Set 3

by Margaret Lashley

  I passed the beers around, then plopped down on the couch in between Tom and Milly. Winnie and Winky were in front of us, lounging like a pair of lazy bookends in their matching arm chairs.

  “I think what you two need is a new puppy,” Milly said to Winnie, and winked at her.

  “Well, I don’t know,” Winnie said. “We’ve got so much going on right now, what with the new house and the wedding to plan.”

  “And a hearse to drive,” Tom quipped.

  Winky laughed. “That’s right! It’s hard to be on the road yard salin’ with a puppy at home.”

  “Take it with you!” Milly said. “The puppies love to ride in the car.”

  “What about in a hearse?” Winky asked.

  “Sure,” Milly said. “And it just so happens, I’ve got two puppies left. A boy and a girl.”

  Winkie turned to Winnie. “What ‘a you think, Princess? You ready for a new addition to the family?”

  Winnie smiled. “Why not. The more the merrier, right?”

  “We’ll take ‘em both,” Winky said.

  “Perfect!” Milly said. “What will you call them?”

  “Well, if’n it’s all right with my darlin’ here, I think we should name ‘em after Val.”

  “Me?” I said.

  “Yep,” Winky said. “Miss fancy mystery writer, what’d’ya thank about Nancy Drew and Hardy Boy?”

  I shook my head and laughed. “I think it’s bloody genius, Winky.”

  Tom took my hand and smiled. “While you’re all here, I have an announcement to make, too,” he said.

  Everyone looked his way. Tom gripped my hand firmly and said, “I just wanted to make it official. Val has lost our little wager. My Barcalounger stays.”

  My head snapped around. “What are you talking about, Tom?”

  “It’s simple, Val. You smashed a figurine. You lost.”

  “But...I thought we agreed, Tom. Dropping that pizza guy on the floor didn’t count.”

  “No. But this does.”

  Tom reached in his shirt pocket and handed me something. My eyebrows raised an inch.

  It was the little slip of paper from inside the Dr. Dingbat figurine. I’d thrown it away in Jake’s garbage bin – along with the shattered remains of Doo-Doo Daddy.

  “Where’d you get this?” I asked, and looked up at Tom. His face was unreadable.

  “I have my sources,” he said.

  Right. And they’re named Jake Johnson.

  “I bet you do,” I muttered. “But so what? NIM 1 is just the name of some Chinese factory inspector, Tom. I’m sure the poor guy’s had to inspect millions of figurines. This doesn’t prove a thing.”

  Tom shook his head. “Geeze, Val. Turn the paper the other way around.”

  When I turned the paper upside down, it read, “I WIN.”

  My line of vision zeroed in on Tom. The rest of the world fell away.

  “Wait a minute...” I said. But I couldn’t hear myself over the din.

  Everyone was laughing.

  At me.

  “That’s right, Val,” Tom said, a sly grin plastered on his lips. “You’ve been set up.”

  “Had,” Milly said.

  I looked, one by one, at my circle of friends.

  “Tricked,” Vance said.

  “Conned,” Jorge said.

  “Duped,” Sherryl said.

  “Outsmarted,” Laverne said.

  “Deceived,” J.D. said.

  “Hoodwinked,” Winnie said.

  “Bamboozled,” Winky said, and waggled his ginger eyebrows.

  The circle completed, my eyes returned to Tom.

  “But...how?” I stammered.

  “You forget. I’m a detective.”

  “With a good back-up team,” Jorge added.

  I shook my head slowly. “The Dr. Dingbat figurine...wasn’t real?”

  “Nope,” Tom said.

  “Ha ha! We got you good!” Winky said.

  My gut relaxed, as if everything inside me had suddenly given up all hope. I felt as if I were hovering somewhere outside my own body.

  How could I have been so utterly fooled?

  “The figurine of a guy on a toilet was my idea,” Tom said.

  His voice sounded as if it were underwater. I watched as Tom high-fived Jorge and said, “Didn’t I tell you she wouldn’t be able to resist?”

  “Tom told me what he wanted,” Laverne’s voice rang out loud and clear, bursting the water-bubble effect. “I had a buddy from my old ceramics class make it” Laverne beamed at me. “Wasn’t that a great idea, honey?”

  “You were in on it too?” I asked, still stunned with disbelief.

  I shook my head again and muttered, “I should have known something was up when you made that comment about it taking a dingbat to know a dingbat.”

  The old lady smiled at me brightly. “It sure does, sugar!”

  “I’m the one wanted it to grunt,” Winky said. “So I got Jorge to wire it up for sound.”

  Jorge laughed. “I guess you’ve probably figured out by now that Winky provided the sound effects.”

  As the shock began to wear off, I realized, in hindsight, that clues had been everywhere.

  I should have known something was up when Winky knew what the term ‘defecation’ meant.

  “Wait a minute,” I said. “What about the ad in Craigslist?”

  “Totally made up.” Milly said, raising a finger. “By me, I might add.”

  “But Layla Lark,” I protested. “She was real.”

  “My great aunt,” Sherryl said.

  “The figurine...it was on Nancy’s yard-sale table. How’d you get her to play along?”

  Tom shrugged. “Nancy was happy to help...in exchange for the name of the person who left those black tire tracks in her driveway.”

  “Traitor!” I hissed at Tom. “You let me dive in a dumpster for nothing! I could’ve gotten hepatitis!”

  Tom cringed. “I know. I’m sorry. I had no idea that was going to happen. It was totally off script. The whole ‘wrong battery’ thing was improvised by Layla.”

  “She can be a bit sadistic,” Sherryl said and shrugged apologetically. “What can I say? She’s a Scorpio.”

  I turned my wrath toward Winky. “But you knew the battery was worthless! And you still let me scrounge around in that filthy dumpster for half an hour!”

  Winky shrunk back, his face one big grimace surrounded by freckles.

  “Sorry, Val pal. But I couldn’t do nothin’ about it.”

  “Why not?”

  “You see, when I called Layla to let her know you was on your way, I just happened to mention the battery was dead and I’d changed it out. Well, I guess she run wild with it. Right after your meetin’ with her, Layla called me. She told me she’d upped the prank by telling you the figure was worthless without the original battery.

  “Well, by that point, Val, you was already pullin’ up in the parkin’ lot. I couldn’t do nothin’ but play along else’n I’d a ruined the whole thang.”

  Winky smiled apologetically. “On the bright side, at least I got you outta the dumpster a’fore they dumped you into the truck.”

  “Yeah. Thanks,” I muttered.

  I shook my head and stared at the group snickering around me.

  “Am I really that easy a mark?” I asked.

  Tom snorted. “So easy, Val, it’s scary.”

  Chapter Forty-Six

  I would have liked to say that I’d been a good sport about the whole prank thing. But that would’ve been a lie. I was as bad a sport as had ever been aired on ESPN.

  In fact, when everyone got done telling their side of the story, I do believe my anger could only have been measured on a Richter scale.

  I’d been fooled by Tom. That was bad enough. But I’d also been duped by the gang of people I’d thought were my loyal friends.

  Outsmarted by Laverne and Winky? Geeze!

  That had been too much for my Southern pride to bear. Even worse
, the trick I’d fallen for had doomed me to have to look at Tom’s ugly chair for the rest of my life. Now there would be a daily reminder that I’d been played for a chump – by a figurine taking a dump.

  “You okay, Val?” Milly asked.

  “Sure,” I lied, and laughed bitterly as an iron fist clamped around my heart.

  Tom and the rest of you just made a fool out of me. I’m perfectly fine, Milly. Hunky dory. Peachy keen.

  Then a thought occurred to me that made me feel even worse – something I hadn’t thought was possible.

  Maybe they hadn’t made me into a fool. Maybe they’d only given me enough rope to do it myself....

  As I stood in the circle along with the people I’d thought were my friends, something broke inside me. Or sealed up. I couldn’t decide. Was I too sensitive? Or were they too insensitive?

  All I knew for sure was that the camaraderie I’d felt earlier in the evening had evaporated. A thick void had taken its place – a barrier between “me” and “them” as tangible to me as a concrete wall.

  “You gotta admit, we got you good,” Jorge said, breaking me out of my inner machinations.

  “Yes. Good one,” I said. “Excuse me for a moment.”

  I stepped out of the room. Everyone continued to talk and laugh as I calmly walked down the hall and into the kitchen.

  By the time I grabbed my purse off the countertop, my pulse was beating in my throat. I sprinted for the front door....

  I WAS BACKING MAGGIE out of Winky’s yard when Tom came running out the door.

  “Wait! Val! Where are you going?” he called out.

  “Home!” I hissed.

  “Why?”

  “Why don’t you ‘figure’ it out?” I yelled, and shifted Maggie into drive.

  Tom’s face sagged with distress. “Val! I’m sorry! I told you, I didn’t mean for it –”

  “Save it!” I bellowed.

  “But...how will I get home?”

  “They’re your friends, Tom. I’m sure somebody’ll give you a lift.”

  I stomped on the gas.

  Maggie’s twin glass-packs roared.

  The tires squealed. Burnt rubber and dust boiled up and clouded the road, until both Tom and Winky’s place were completely out of sight.

  NEVER AROUND WHEN I need him!

  Quick streaks of shiny metal.

  Thinks I’m nothing but a bumbling fool!

  A sound like distant drumbeats.

  Got rid of Goober’s dreamcatcher!

  Whooshing in my eardrums.

  I bet an old girlfriend gave it to him!

  My Hammer of Justice came down on Tom’s old Barcalounger like a knife blade in a shower at the Bates Motel.

  I know he’s keeping you just to piss me off! Well, we’ll see about that!

  I hammered at the hapless chair again and again and again, until I was so spent I collapsed on my knees in front of it. Despite my brutal attack, the hideous Barcalounger didn’t look any worse for wear.

  How was that even possible?

  Tires ground on the driveway in front of the house. A car door slammed shut. I tried to stand up, but couldn’t.

  If I’m going to be made a fool of, I might as well let an expert do it. Forget you, Tom Foreman! In the morning, I’m packing my bags and heading to my mother’s in Greenville!

  Dizzy and hassling like a hound, I scrambled down the hallway on my hands and knees. I heard the front door creak open just as the office door clicked behind me. I locked the door, then leaned up against it, panting with fury and exhaustion.

  A moment later, I heard Tom’s voice.

  “Are you all right, Val?”

  I didn’t answer.

  Tom didn’t ask again.

  I dragged myself to the daybed, crawled onto it and pulled the covers up to my neck.

  A voice whispered in my ear.

  What are you winning, holding onto your anger?

  I flung the hammer against the wall.

  I don’t know, Glad. But I’m afraid if I let it go, I’ll disappear into nothingness....

  I WOKE TO THE SMELL of cappuccino and someone tapping lightly on my office door.

  “You awake in there?”

  “Go away, Tom.”

  “I have a cappuccino for you. And something I think will make you feel a whole lot better.”

  I didn’t answer.

  “Please, Val. Give me one minute. That’s all I ask.”

  I crawled out of the daybed and cracked open the door.

  What Tom had in his hand made me break down and ball my eyes out.

  And it wasn’t a cappuccino.

  Chapter Forty-Seven

  “Where did you find it?” I asked, and wiped the brimming tears from my eyes.

  “For the record, I never lost it,” Tom said, and handed me Goober’s redneck dreamcatcher.

  “You didn’t?” I sniffed.

  “No. I hid it in the garage. Somehow, Winky found it and sold it at the yard sale when you left him in charge. I looked out the window and saw Finkerman carrying it away. I want you to know, it cost me my old boom box and a potato peeler to get it back.”

  “But Tom, you lied to me. You told me you sold it to a guy with pink glasses.”

  “To Finkerman.”

  “But Finkerman wasn’t wearing those stupid glasses the second day of sale – when Winky was there.”

  Tom smiled at me with a mixture of guilt and pride.

  “You’re right. Nice work, Valiant Stranger. And yes, technically, I lied. But Finkerman did have the dreamcatcher...for a few minutes.”

  “But Tom, I was devastated at losing it.”

  “I know. I mean, I know now. I had no idea you would take it so hard. And after it was done, I couldn’t go back. Not until, you know, the goose chase was finished.”

  “And I guess my goose is well and truly cooked now. Thanks.”

  Tom took my hand. “Val, you have to believe me. I had no idea this stupid prank would turn into such a fiasco. Do you? Believe me, I mean? I’d never do anything to intentionally hurt you.”

  I looked into Tom’s sea-green eyes. They shone with sincerity.

  “I do,” I said. “But I hope you understand this means you owe me, Tom Foreman. And I mean big time.”

  A tear trailed down Tom’s dimpled cheek. “Yes ma’am. What can I do to make it up to you?”

  “You can start by handing me that cappuccino.”

  Tom laughed and handed me the cup.

  I took a sip. “Not bad,” I said. “Now, you can tell me why in the world you want to torture the living daylights out of me by keeping that hideous chair. Be honest with me. Did some other woman give it to you?”

  “Yes,” Tom said.

  I shot him a hurt look. Tom shook his head and laughed.

  “She was my grandmother, Val. But that’s not the reason I want to keep the chair.”

  “Then what in the world is?”

  “I was sitting in that chair the first time I asked you out...and you said ‘yes.’”

  Tears flooded my eyes to the brim.

  “But Val, if you hate it that much, I’ll get rid of it. And you can keep on smashing your figurines, if you need to. All I ask is one thing in return.”

  “What?”

  “Snuggle with me one more time in it, before I take the old beast to the curb.”

  “Okay.”

  Tom took the cappuccino from my hand and tugged me into the living room. He set the cup on the kitchen counter, scooped me up into his arms like Prince Charming, and carried me to the chair.

  Then he leaned back and fell, butt-first, into the old Barcalounger. It collapsed under our weight like a soggy cardboard box.

  Tom and I tumbled downward, along with the chair’s plaid-upholstered remains, until we were sprawled out on the floor.

  But when the dust had settled, we were still in each other’s arms.

  Chapter Forty-Eight

  “Here you go!” Milly said, and handed T
om a wriggling clump of white and grey fluff. “Sir Albert Snoggles, III is all yours!”

  I smiled at Tom as I patted the tiny dog’s head. Seeing how small the puppy was made me realize how foolish I’d been to make such a big deal out of what to call it.

  In the end, I’d let Tom keep the name he’d wanted all along. It was only fair. After all, Tom really had won our wager.

  Naming the dog Sir Albert Snoggles, III was a consolation prize Tom could live with. He had to. I’d destroyed his original ante. Somewhere in northern Pinellas County, his poor old plaid Barcalounger was making an ugly landfill even more unsightly.

  Oh, well.

  Tom passed me the pup. One look at precious little Albert’s face convinced me everything was going to be all right. It was love at first sight.

  “Uh oh!” Tom said. “Watch out!”

  I heard a snarl at my ankles. I looked down to see my old nemesis, Albert’s mother, Charmine. She was getting ready to nip my fledgling love for her son in the bud – or, more accurately, the ankle.

  My ankle.

  Milly grabbed Charmine up in her arms before she had time to chew my toes off.

  “Sorry, Val,” Milly said. “I guess you’re right. She really doesn’t like you.”

  I shrugged. “I guess you can’t please everyone.”

  “That’s right,” Vance said. “If you want to be happy, you’ve got to please yourself.”

  “Or your girlfriend,” I heard Tom whisper.

  “Ha ha,” I said, and cuddled my new companion. “Like I said before, Tom. I liked you better when you couldn’t tell a joke.”

  Weary from an angry, fitful night spent on the daybed, I yawned. Sir Albert Snoggles, III took the opportunity to insert his little pink puppy tongue right into my mouth.

  Yuck!

  “Snoggles must be French,” I said, trying not to gag.

  “French!” Milly squealed. “The French toast!”

  Milly stuffed Charmine into Vance’s arms and took off for the kitchen.

  “It’s too early to tell,” Vance said. “But we might have to go out for brunch.”

  “That’s okay,” I said to my new fur baby. “Isn’t it, little Snoggly-Woggly?”

  Now I had two guys to love.