I picked up a pile of clean laundry from the living room floor and decided to use a pair of my grandpa’s boxers as a dust rag. I traveled from room to room, tossing misplaced belongings into a clothes basket. After I made the first trip through, I went to the laundry room and started the washer. In the kitchen, a groan escaped when I saw the pile of dirty dishes. It was obvious that the nurse had stacked everything to wait for my Tuesday visit. The top-of-the-line dishwasher sat untouched.
I filled the dishwasher, washing what remained by hand, before scrubbing everything else in the kitchen. As I cleaned, my grandpa brought me an assortment of things, one by one. Some were dirty dishes or silverware, but most were oddball knickknacks from around the house that needed cleaning. I’d wash and dry them and then he’d disappear with each item to God knows where. I doubted they’d end up where they belonged, but it was keeping him settled, so it didn’t matter.
I finished cleaning the kitchen, including the floors. I washed, dried, and took care of three loads of laundry, intentionally leaving the nurse’s dirty clothes in a pile. After vacuuming, dusting a second time, and moving various knickknacks back into their original rooms, I sat in a chair in the foyer, exhausted. Looking up the grand stairway, I willed myself to get up and clean the second floor. I just didn’t have it in me, though, to see what was up there.
I decided to look for my grandpa. The house was quiet, too quiet. I found him in his den, behind the massive mahogany desk, sitting in his leather chair.
“Hey, Grandpa.” I sat in one of the guest chairs.
He looked at me before turning his head toward the other room. I heard a car pulling up outside and was about to stand when Grandpa reached a hand out and grabbed my arm with such force that I knew I was going to have bruises.
“Don’t let the Martians get you, Tweedle-Dee. Run!”
With that, he jumped from his chair and ran from the room with his terry cloth robe flapping behind him.
I sighed. He was getting worse, and I needed to make better arrangements for him. It was obvious the house needed more attention, and the lawn was looking pretty shabby as well.
“Where’s the old dude?” the nurse asked, stepping into the room.
“The old dude’s name is Vince,” I snapped.
I wanted desperately to fire her and send her packing, but my grandpa’s attorney handled the estate, and I didn’t have the authority. I only held his medical proxy.
Fuming, I grabbed the rolodex and looked up the attorney’s number again. Getting his voicemail, I demanded he call me immediately. I slammed the phone down in its cradle and went in search of Grandpa again. I found him asleep in his bed and decided to slip out before he woke.
Knowing I was in trouble, I drove to Uncle Mike’s house to face the music. Wayne and Bones were leaning against a black Escalade a few houses down when I pulled up.
Wayne walked over and opened my car door, grinning. “Ryan’s pissed.”
“Good for him,” I said. “I’m more worried about my uncle.”
“Ryan texted us and said your uncle knew where you were at but wouldn’t tell him. We’ve been listening to them yell at each other for ten minutes and decided it wasn’t a good time for introductions.”
I snorted and made my way inside.
“Where the hell have you been?” Reel yelled.
“Why?”
“Why? Why!? Because some nut job has been trying to kill you and you ditched your security detail. That’s why!”
“So? Everyone knew where I was. I was perfectly safe.” I tossed my purse atop the counter and gave Aunt Carol a kiss on the cheek. “Uncle Mike, why aren’t you at work?”
“Got suspended for twenty-four hours,” he snorted.
“Why? What happened?”
“I told the chief he was an idiot. He didn’t take to kindly to my honesty. He wanted to fire me, but I’m the only one with any real training, so he suspended me without pay for twenty-four hours.”
“Well, at least you finally have a day off,” I grinned.
“How’s your grandpa, dear?” Aunt Carol asked.
“That’s where you were? You should have told us. It wasn’t safe for you to go alone.”
My temper spiked, and I turned on Reel to unload. “Get this through that thick skull of yours—I didn’t ask for a babysitter! I am not your responsibility. And I don’t need or want for you to be bossing me around all the time. I will do-go-see whomever I damn well please!”
Bridget snorted from the doorway. “She reminds me of Kelsey.”
“She’s usually not as stubborn and cranky as Kelsey,” Reel grumbled. He rubbed his hands over his face and stepped closer to me, placing his hands on my hips. “What’s wrong? You only yell when you are upset about someone you care about.”
“It’s her grandpa,” Uncle Mike sighed. “Old man isn’t doing so well.”
My lower lip started to tremble, and I tried to turn away, but Reel pulled me into his embrace. I sobbed into his shoulder, trying to come to terms with the fact that my grandpa would never again be the man I had known him to be.
When I settled, Reel steered me over to the kitchen table and sat me down.
“I’m sorry. I know how close you are to him,” he said, pushing my hair out of my face.
“Once upon a time, you were close to him too.”
Reel nodded. “I was going to visit him when I got back into town, but someone has kept me busy lately.” He wiped my tears away.
“Is he eating? Taking his meds?” Aunt Carol asked, placing a hand on my shoulder.
“I don’t know if he’s taking his meds, but I know he’s eating,” I nodded. “I tried to call the attorney again. If I don’t hear from him by tomorrow, I’ll drive to the city to track him down.”
“Put him in a headlock?” Reel grinned.
“If that’s what it takes,” I nodded, raising my chin.
“Come on. You need some fresh air,” Reel said, pulling me up from the chair and steering me toward the door.
Reel led me outside and down the walkway to the west.
I stopped walking and tugged on his hand to get him to stop. “Let’s go the other direction. Toward town.”
“I want to show you something. We need to go this way,” he said, pulling me along.
I followed his lead, down one block and then the next. Wayne and Bones stayed on the walkway behind us, giving us some privacy, but close enough if trouble arose. As we crossed the next block, my steps slowed, moving barely a few inches at a time as my legs trembled.
“Deanna, come on,” Reel said, pulling me to hurry.
As we passed the big evergreen, my knees locked, and I was frozen, staring at the house across the street.
“Deanna?”
“Brother, something’s wrong,” Wayne said, as he stepped beside me.
Bones stepped protectively in front of me. “Tweedle?” Bones asked, scouting the perimeter. “What’s wrong?”
“The house, the blue one at the end of the road,” I said, leaning into Wayne to hide it from my view.
Bridget’s black Escalade screeched to a halt beside us, and Tansey jumped out of the passenger seat. I threw myself at her, and she wrapped her arms around me while ushering me toward the Escalade.
“What the hell is going on?” Reel asked.
“She’s terrified,” Bones answered.
“Of what?” Reel asked, trying to stop me.
“The blue house?” Wayne answered as Tansey opened the backseat door and helped me inside.
“But she adores that house,” Reel said. “That’s why I bought it for her.”
“You bought that thing? Are you insane?” Tansey yelled.
“She used to stare at it for hours when we were kids. I’d find her almost every night at the end of the block looking at it.”
“Because it has haunted her since she was a little girl. She used to have nightmares about it. Her sister used to tease her about that house coming to get her!”
“Shit! Why didn’t anyone tell me?”
“You should have known!” Tansey yelled, slamming the car door and getting in the front passenger seat.
Bridget accelerated down the road, and Tansey started counting with me, 11, 12, 13, 14, …
“S-M-A-C-K.”
I reeled to the side, grasping the side of my face as I fell to the floor. My cheek was burning. I looked up at a wide-eyed Bridget, standing over me.
“What the hell happened?” Tansey asked, running into the room and kneeling on the floor beside me.
“Your method of coaxing her out of her trance wasn’t working,” Bridget shrugged. “I thought I’d try my method.”
“You hit her?”
“My best friend, Haley, had to give me a good whack once or twice in the past,” Bridget shrugged again, moving over to sit in an accent chair. “You with us now?”
“Was I not with you before?” I asked, crawling up from the floor and back onto the couch. I was startled when I realized I was in my own house.
“You’ve been in a trance for about an hour,” Aunt Carol said, walking into the room and setting out a platter of cheese, crackers, and grapes. “Nicely done, Bridget.”
“She hit me!”
“Yes, dear. But nothing else was working,” Aunt Carol sighed. “You once went a whole week without talking to anyone, only eating when forced. You barely even slept. You were like the walking dead. I’m all for Bridget knocking you around if I don’t have to go through that again.”
Aunt Carol turned back to the kitchen. Tansey rolled her eyes.
“I barely remember that,” she said. “We were so young.”
“When did that happen?”
“We were in kindergarten or somewhere before kindergarten,” Tansey shrugged. “I don’t remember much, other than you were like a zombie. Then one day you showed up my house ready to go for a bike ride.”
“Was she at the blue house before she went into shock?” Bridget asked.
“Drop it, Bridget. Or I’ll return the favor of smacking you around,” Tansey glared.
I giggled, watching my best friend. “You’re such a badass.”
“Only when my girl needs some protecting,” she said, hugging me.
I heard both yelling and laughing, all of which was loud, coming from the front yard. Aunt Carol rushed over and looked out the front door.
“Oh, dear. Tweedle, you may need to intervene,” Aunt Carol said, wringing her hands.
I walked over to the door to look out and laughed at the scene in front of me. Bones and Wayne were on the porch, laughing too.
Reel, on the other hand, was yelling loudly as my sister chased him around the front yard, calling him Rod.
“You should go help him,” Aunt Carol insisted.
“Why? He was the idiot that bought the blue house,” I snorted, as I watched the game of tag play out.
“You’d think that after all of us growing up together, she’d be able to tell Reel and Rod apart,” Tansey said.
“She was too busy looking in the mirror to pay attention.”
“Where is Rod, anyway?” Aunt Carol asked.
“He was outside,” Tansey said, as we all pressed our noses closer to the glass.
“He’s in the bushes,” Bridget said, pointing from a side window.
I opened the door, and Darlene stopped chasing Reel long enough to look at me.
“That’s Reel,” I said, pointing to Reel. “That’s Rod,” I said, pointing to Rod, who had poked his head up out of the bushes.
“Damn you, Tweedle!” Rod yelled as he took off running down the street.
Darlene chased after him in her heels, pulling the skimpy leather skirt down every few paces.
“That was evil,” Tansey laughed, throwing an arm around my shoulder.
“You both need to repent,” Aunt Carol clucked, as she turned back to the kitchen.
Chapter Sixteen
I spent the rest of the day in my room, reading and sorting my closet. Aunt Carol and Tansey checked on me occasionally but sensing I needed time alone, left me in peace. I knew everyone else was somewhere nearby, but I didn’t care. I was upset with Reel for buying that damn blue house. I was upset that, after several more phone calls, I was still unable to get ahold of the lawyer.
I went to bed early, and by the time I woke in the morning, I felt like I hadn’t slept at all.
Reel greeted me in my kitchen with a to-go coffee and insisted on driving me to work in his truck. When we arrived at the bakery, I was ordered to stand beside the door while he completed a thorough search. Only when he gave the all-clear did I move to start up all four ovens and the deep-fryer.
“What can I do to help?” Reel asked.
“Make a pot of tea? Coffee isn’t working for me this morning.”
Reel heated a kettle and made a pot of coffee for himself. I mixed up a batch of muffins and started them baking before making a batch of donut batter. I showed Reel how to fry the donuts and started mixing up biscuits.
“Damn it! How do you do this without burning yourself?”
I shrugged, rolling out the biscuit dough. “I’ve been making them for so long now that either I learned how to magically make them, or I’m immune to burning my hands. I probably have permanent nerve damage. Here, trade me jobs.”
I set Reel to work cutting out the biscuits while I took over making the donuts. I kept catching him watching my hands, trying to see whether I was splattered with hot oil. He finally shook his head and gave up trying to figure out what the trick was.
“What’s next?” Reel asked.
I looked at the table and grinned. “Did you think we’d just throw out the extra dough?”
“I guess not,” he chuckled, rolling it into a ball.
He didn’t cover his hands in flour and ended up with biscuit dough sticking everywhere. I cooked the last plain donut before going over and covering my hands in flour to finish the biscuits.
“You make this look easy,” Reel sighed, going to the sink to wash the sticky dough off his hands.
“It is after this many years. Sit. Drink your coffee. I need to finish a few more things, and then I’ll put you to work peeling apples.”
Reel pulled out a stool. After pulling the muffins, I filled three of the ovens with biscuits.
“Why do you cook them all at once?”
“It’s easier to smell when they’re done.”
“You don’t use a timer?”
“With a timer, you can’t be sure whether the oven is running a little hot, or whether your biscuits were too big or small. But with smell, you always know.”
I poured more hot water into my teacup before mixing up a batch of apple fritters, using the last of my precut apples. I set out a new bushel for Reel to peel.
Checking the front storage cabinets and the catering orders, I took inventory and made a mental list of everything that needed to be prepped and baked. I had the cooling racks half filled by the time Samantha arrived.
“Bless you,” she smiled. “Inventory got pretty low yesterday.”
“I saw that,” I smiled back. “Okay, Reel. You can leave now. Samantha’s here.”
“I don’t think so,” he said, focused on the apple he was peeling.
Truth be told, I could have peeled all the apples in about ten minutes, but it was keeping him out of my hair.
“Seriously. We open at seven anyway. Go home. You have furniture and rugs being delivered today.”
“What’s going on?” Samantha asked, hanging up her purse.
“Somebody is trying to hurt Deanna,” Reel said, tossing the half-peeled apple into the bowl.
“Why on Earth would anyone want to hurt Tweedle?”
“I wish I knew,” I said. “I’m really curious how I pissed someone off this much.”
“Is it your sister? She’s evil.”
“No. I know that at least three of the occasions it was a man,” I answered as I dropped another fritter into the hot oi
l.
“Three?” Reel’s voice growled.
Shit-shit-shit. I just tattled on myself!
“I mean, I assume the second time was a man. Everybody knows there are more guy mechanics than girl mechanics.”
I could feel Reel approaching, but I didn’t turn to face him. Samantha’s eyes expanded to twice their normal size as she walked backward.
“Turn and face me if you’re going to lie to me, Deanna,” he said, standing right behind me.
“I have to watch the fritter,” I said, looking into the fryer.
He didn’t say anything. But he didn’t move away either.
I stood watching the fritter as it got browner by the second.
“You going to take it out or let it burn?”
“What are the chances of you being distracted by a kitchen fire?”
“Set the place on fire. You’re still going to face me when the smoke clears.”
“Fine!” I said, pulling the strainer up to remove the fritter. “Someone was in my house last week. They left a muddy footprint on my floor. And, unless the chick has really big feet, it was a man.”
“You sure it wasn’t your uncle?”
“It could have been,” I shrugged.
Reel put his hands on my shoulders and turned me to face him. Using his finger, he lifted my chin, so I was forced to look up at him.
“But you know it wasn’t your uncle. How?”
“It was the same day I found the snake in the house.”
“The rattlesnake? And you didn’t think the footprint was a clue that someone put it there deliberately?” he asked with a raised eyebrow.
“Holy shit!” Samantha squealed. “Did you pee your pants?”
“No, of course not,” I lied, hoping that she didn’t see my face turning red or my fingers crossed behind my back. “I’m not stupid, Reel. I suspected someone put the snake in my bedroom.”
I never stopped looking at Reel. His intense blue eyes appeared to darken to a deep purple. He was beyond angry.
“Reel, I was fine.”
“Someone broke into your house and left a poisonous snake, and you didn’t tell anyone? You did what, exactly?”
“Hoped it was all a big misunderstanding?” I shrugged. “I mean, who’d want to hurt me? I’m a baker! It sounds crazy!”
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