“What about Shirley?” I asked, thinking back to the woman in Alice’s life who might have been involved in this. Any business partnership between them would have to be spelled out and there were no mentions of it in Alice’s papers. Since they had passed away before marriage equality came to our state, if there was a relationship between Alice and Shirley, they would’ve had to have listed each possession and who would inherit it after their death.
“Maybe. I don’t know. We never knew Shirley all that well. She just showed up with Alice one day and she was there until she died. Your mother would never let me ask anything about them or the relationship. She wanted to live without knowing. Don’t ask, don’t tell, according to your mother. So Shirley might have been involved in the transfers, but I have no way of telling. You’d have to ask her executor.”
“Who is that?” I asked, wondering if my dad knew any more about Shirley than my mother had. “Mom didn’t even know her last name, much less the conditions of her will.”
“Shirley’s last name was Bradley. She lived in a house down the street from your aunt. They met and became friends after Alice had lost Ralph. Inseparable friends. Your mother, who is normally the most tolerant woman around, wouldn’t hear about it. Alice brought Shirley to events even after your mother put her foot down about it.”
“Any thoughts on why?” I asked, curious to hear about the backroom scandals of my family. Who knew that my dad could be a gossip? I leaned forward like a co-conspirator.
“It could just be that Alice was her only sister, or that it became such an matter of curiosity. Your mother thought gay was gay and straight was straight, and no one could cross that double yellow line. It was just odd and very unlike her. I wish they had ended on a better note.”
I nodded. “Do you think that’s why I inherited?”
My father smiled and patted my hand. “Not at all. Alice always planned to leave you something in her will. She’d said so for a long time. You were her only niece and our only child. We just hadn’t expected that it would be a food truck—but that was Alice to the end.”
“So did Alice inherit anything from Shirley’s estate?” I asked, trying to get back to the conversation at hand. I still had to figure out how Alice had purchased the food truck with no resources of her own to help her.
“Some possessions, but no real liquid assets. They had some things they had purchased together: a sofa, a table, and things like that. There were also some photos that Shirley wanted Alice to have. I don’t know about the rest. There would have been a house and likely a car and the normal day-to-day things of life.”
“But you can find out the name of Shirley’s executor, right?” If that executor were anywhere as helpful as my father was, I’d have the answers in no time.
He nodded. “Give me a day or two, and I’ll find out everything you need.”
I did know one thing. There was no way that she could carry out any covert operation in the food truck without being seen by Land. Either he’d turned a blind eye to whatever it was or he had been in on the operation.
Land had already begun work when I arrived at the truck the next morning. His back was to me when I opened the door, and I wondered if he had been stowing something in a secret location in the truck. The space inside the truck wasn’t big, and I wasn’t good enough at spatial reasoning to know if there was an unaccounted for space in the truck. I would have to be the one to put the truck away and devote some time to looking around. I had the drawings for the truck at my apartment now. I could give the place a thorough going over.
I decided to be forward with Land. I asked, “Do you know why my aunt wanted a food truck?”
“Why not? She wouldn’t be the first woman to think that she could do anything. I can’t tell you how many people over the years I’ve seen go into the restaurant business without a clue as to what was needed. Almost an equal number of them failed, too.” He shrugged his shoulders and went back to his work.
Land had saved himself from a sexism speech by throwing a “people” in the diatribe, but he’d made it clear how he felt about businesswomen. “So how was my aunt in the restaurant business?”
He smiled. His corners of his eyes crinkled and he almost looked human. “Not bad. Better than most, not as good as others. I helped her with a variety of things that she’d forgotten or didn’t even know were needed. She didn’t have a clue about how to handle the cash required for a restaurant, but she learned quickly.”
“So she never mentioned why she got a food truck? It makes sense for her in terms of being her own boss, but I’m trying to figure out how she paid for the truck, to be honest.” While I wasn’t keen on sharing my personal business with Land, it felt like he’d already been dragged into this mess by the fake will and my aunt’s supposed promises to him. Besides, he was the only non-family person who might know where Alice had gotten the money to buy the truck. My family certainly had no idea of the source of her funds.
“No idea. She was very evasive about that. There was a time that we needed a new burner for the cooktop. She had the money a few days later. She laughed and said that she got by with a little help from her friends. I wasn’t sure what that meant, but then I heard it as a song later.”
Leave it to Land not to know the Beatles. Of course, the reference meant nothing to me either. It was vague enough that it could refer to nearly anyone in her life. It certainly didn’t help me find out who had bankrolled this endeavor. I made a mental note to ask Shirley’s executor once my dad found him.
I was curious though. Again, there seemed to be two opposing forces at work. I would think that if someone gave Alice $30,000, then that person would expect something in return, presumably something worth more than thirty grand. Yet, they had received nothing in the will.
However, assuming that she’d been killed, no one had come to me with the same bargain. So Alice’s killer could not be the person who had given her the cash to buy Dogs on the Roll. Either that or he’d gotten the very short end of the hot dog here.
I sat puzzling this for a few minutes. Land finally cleared his throat. “The coffee isn’t going to brew itself,” he reminded me, and I got back to work. Land’s coffee was to die for, and most of the customers asked for two or more cups of coffee on their way to work. He had his own blend that he refused to share with me, pointing out that he still wanted his own truck and that the coffee blend we used here was just a loaner.
I started going through the motions of getting ready, which consisted mostly of pouring water into the bins and putting the right amount of coffee into the filters, but I couldn’t stop thinking about the situation. The donor had to be someone who was close to Alice and someone with whom she had mutual trust. Otherwise, there would be a contract detailing what was expected for the money.
This only led me back to my dad’s speculation that since nothing had been written down this must have been a criminal enterprise. That could explain why Alice was given such a hard time about the permits and the inspection. They might have suspected that the provenance of the truck, and the odd occurrence of two older women buying that truck, combined to make a shady deal. If that were true, then the people who were working with Alice would have been more likely to have killed the inspector and left me alive. There seemed to be too many parties in this case with opposing desires. I had no way of telling who was on my side and who was not.
I suspected that Detective Danvers’ showing up at the truck just after the window went up was no accident. He ordered a coffee and looked at me. “What’s this about your aunt’s new will?” he asked calmly, as if he’d mentioned a chance of rain. “Mr. Huff called me last night and told me that you’ve discovered a new will, and that according to his expert, the will is a forgery. Is that right?”
I cursed Mr. Huff under my breath. While I figured that there was likely a protocol that needed to be followed for such things, the fact that Danvers was right behind me in terms of trying to figure out this mystery was not comforting. I
had hoped to have enough time to figure out what was going on before I notified him. I had no desire to be questioned again by the police. It had not been a great experience the first time around.
“Yeah, that’s right. I turned it over to John Summers, but it’s pretty clear that it was forged. I’m not sure why.”
Danvers’ eyebrow went up and he frowned. “I know Summers. He said that it was forged?”
I explained the visit to his house and the determination of the forgery as best as I could. I knew I wouldn’t explain it to Summers’ approval, but I did enough to sound convincing. I told Danvers that the forged will made no sense to me.
“That’s a good question. Why would someone hide a will in a book at your parents’ house—where it might have been discovered right away—or it might have never been found at all? It seems like a very random sort of way to get noticed.”
“I can’t help you there. I have no idea what runs through the mind of a killer.”
“Then of course, there’s the whole scenario where you could have just as easily burned the will rather than turn it in. As plots to get you out of the food biz, this one stinks to high heaven. Most killers don’t leave everything to chance like this. Even the dumb ones try to tie up the loose ends.”
“Most killers are caught in the first few hours because they leave their fingerprints all over the crime scene,” I pointed out. He was getting under my skin. He knew it, and he was delighting in it. “That way, people like you can find them easily enough. If a married person gets killed, the spouse did it. You could phone in most of your work.”
“I have to say that I’ve never seen a case where the all the bodies point to one person like they do here, and I can’t arrest that person.” While I was still tired, I could have sworn that he was posturing himself for my benefit. At one point, it even appeared as if he was flexing his chest underneath the tight-fitting dress shirt. Was he that vain, or did he think that his physique would distract me? If that were the case, given that I was missing what he was saying, he’d have been right.
“That’s not true. First, I had no prior interactions with the health inspector. I wanted information from her about her interactions with my aunt, and when I went to see her for information, someone else killed her before she could divulge what she knew. That’s a much more likely scenario. Plus I couldn’t have hit myself on the back of the head. It wasn’t possible. Even the EMT said so, and he had no prior relationship with me either.” I didn’t like the sound of my own words. It made me sound friendless and rather unattractive. Even Summers hadn’t pulled anything with me.
“You could always have had an accomplice, someone to hit you so that it looked like you had plausible deniability.” Danvers’ face was getting red. I was glad to see that I had forced a reaction from him. “Like Land here.”
“Land wouldn’t pick up a pack of hot dogs for me much less cooperate in a multiple homicide spree so that I could keep the food truck. He wants the truck for himself, so he’s much more likely to frame me than assist me.” I didn’t bother to look back at Land. I knew the truth, which was that he’d pick up hot dogs, but little else for me.
Danvers thrust his hands deep into his pockets. “Just so you know, the heads were cut off with a two-handed, blade-heavy sword. You wouldn’t know where to get your hands on one of those would you? Your parents were kind enough to let me search their place without a warrant, but nothing was there. Your place is too obvious to hide something unwieldy like that.”
“You searched my parents’ house?” I asked. I thought of how someone had put a copy of that fake will in their home without being detected. Hiding a sword in a long-forgotten nook would be a piece of cake in comparison. My being so naïve about police searches, and the deviousness involved in these crimes, was not useful. I couldn’t really fault them. I’d been relatively clueless about these matters until the recent spate of events, but now I saw conspiracies everywhere.
“Yeah, but you’re innocent. So you have nothing to worry about.” He almost made it sound like a complaint.
“Hey, Land,” Danvers called across the truck. “Any thought that Miss Kinkaid here might be stringing you along? After all, this new will gives the whole shebang to you.”
I heard Land mutter under his breath. We’d just established a sort of truce, and now Danvers was causing a rift in the gentle peace that we had, most likely on purpose. I was sure that we’d go back to hours of uneasy silence after this.
I glared at Danvers to no avail. “I promptly reported a new will and followed up with the appropriate people to see if it was legitimate. What else was I supposed to do?” I planted my hands on my hips for effect.
“Ms. Kinkaid, I have to tell you, I’m always suspicious when someone does the right thing, especially when the right thing would cost them five figures. It seemed too providential for this to show up, just as Land was getting set to quit. You could string him along for a while longer with the promise of getting this food truck.” He smirked as he finished. I had to say that I didn’t find him nearly as attractive right now. Being an ass was always a big turn-off for me.
“So I do the right thing, and I’m guilty. I do the wrong thing, and I’m guilty. That doesn’t leave me a lot of options with you.” I was seething now, and I had an urge to stuff a few dogs in his pretty face to stop him from talking any more.
“That’s about right. The best option for you right now is to do nothing and say nothing. Remember what I said about open police investigations.”
I raised an eyebrow. “Unless you have decided to declare my aunt’s death a homicide and reopen the case, I don’t think I’m doing anything with an open investigation. I’m looking into some details regarding my aunt and this truck—nothing more.”
He laughed. “You keep telling yourself that.” He pitched his nearly full cup of coffee in the trash and walked off. I think that detail alone would have set me off, even if he hadn’t just accused me of being a murderer and a nuisance. The coffee here was not to be treated so lightly.
I turned around and faced Land. “You’re getting ready to quit?” I’d been stunned by Danvers’ words, but in my heart, I knew it was true. Land’s ego would not allow him to work for a beginner, when he was supposed to get the entire food truck for himself.
He raised an eyebrow. “All of that information to process, and that’s what stands out to you? He practically accused you of beheading those people, and you’re worried about who’s going to chop your vegetables for you.”
I rolled my eyes at him. “Look at me. I’m 5’6” and barely able to carry a coffee urn. Do you really think that I could render someone unconscious and raise a heavy sword to cut off their head? Really?”
Land gave me another look from head to toe. I felt a bit undressed by his action. I didn’t like it. I wasn’t above enjoying a man appraising my looks, but in this case, this particularly good-looking man was determining if I had the upper body strength to behead someone. It was not a good feeling. “Probably not, but as Danvers said, you could have had an accomplice.”
“You work with me all day. Who have you seen me with besides you and my parents?”
“You have all evening to hang out with someone. You could be dating someone seriously for all I know. Remember, we don’t share personal information here.” Again, I was distracted by the fact that Land seemed to care about my personal life, but at the moment, I was more interested in what Danvers had said.
Ugh, this was no time for him to complain about the lack of interpersonal rapport in the truck. I wanted some answers. “So, you didn’t bother to share that you’re about to quit? And how did Danvers know about that before I did?”
Land’s face looked pained. “Nothing was definite. I was just talking.”
“To whom?” I knew I was pissed. My mother’s love of grammar came out in me whenever I was overly angry, and this was definitely such a moment. Land had another job offer. That meant that this truck’s greatest asset would be leaving.
I knew that finding a replacement would be difficult, if not impossible.
“Tony Samples. He’s going ahead with the expansion of the company now that his father is dead. He’s going to open three more trucks in Capital City. He asked me to be the lead cook for the downtown truck and train the three cooks for the other trucks. He offered me a lot of money for the job. I was thinking about it, but I haven’t made any decisions.”
I wondered for a second. If someone had offered me more money, more responsibility and the fulfillment of my lifelong dream, I would have jumped on it without two thoughts. Why was Land hesitating when this is what he wanted? For a second, I entertained the thought that he cared for me. “I suppose it’s because you’re concerned about your green card?”
His brows furrowed, and he frowned. “Yeah, if you say so.” I assumed that his answer meant that he didn’t want to concede that I was right, fearing that I might do something to mess up his current work visa status.
I cleared my throat. “Well, if you were to get a job there and it didn’t work out, you could always come back here and work. That way, you could have your dream and still have some security against any immigration issues. Would that work for you?” Magnanimity was not my forte, but I knew that I had to do the right thing by him. I’d jumped at the chance to be my own boss; Land should have the same opportunities. After all, America was supposed to be the land of opportunities, not a place where you just need to ensure you meet the requirements for a work visa.
He hesitated. “You’d do that for me?”
“Sure. You were a big help to my aunt and, through no fault of my own, you didn’t get what she promised. It’s the least I could do.” Part of me felt like a sucker for giving Land a safety net to be my competition, but I knew my aunt, and she was never the kind to hold grudges. She would have done the same for him in these circumstances.
FOOD TRUCK MYSTERIES: The Complete Series (14 Books) Page 8