Murderous Secrets: A Shandra Higheagle Mystery #4

by Paty Jager

  Aunt Jo placed a cup of tea in front of Shandra. “Thank you. I didn’t have the heart yesterday to tell Velma I didn’t like coffee.”

  Jo smiled. “She makes a strong cup of coffee anyway. I’m surprised you didn’t make a face when you sipped her brew.”

  “The smell told me it was strong so I barely took a sip. I mainly held it for the warmth.” Shandra looked down at the plate piled high with pancakes, bacon, and scrambled eggs that Aunt Jo placed in front of her. “I can’t eat this much,” she said.

  Martin sat down opposite her. He tipped his head toward Andy. “What you don’t eat, he’ll clean up.”

  Andy nodded as he scooped a forkful of pancake into his mouth.

  Shandra laughed and dug into her breakfast. This was what had been missing in her childhood. A pang of grief clenched her chest. She could have had this fifteen years ago if she’d sought her family when she’d left home at eighteen.

  “What’s wrong?” Jo asked, sitting next to Shandra, placing a hand on her arm.

  “Nothing. Just wishing I hadn’t stayed away from all of you so long.” Tears burned behind her eyes. She’d missed out on learning things from Ella and getting to know the side of her family she most connected with.

  “Well, you’re here now.” Jo hugged her and Martin nodded his head. She glanced at the boys. They were grinning and nodding. For the first time in a very long time, she felt as if she were home.

  “Thank you. Next time I come, I’ll bring my friend, Ryan. He’s been pestering me about learning more about my heritage.” Shandra picked up her tea. She noticed a look that went between Jo and Martin.

  “What was that?” she asked.

  “What?” Jo asked, rising from her chair and moving to the sink.

  Shandra peered into Martin’s eyes. “Did Ryan contact you?”

  “Me?” Martin’s eyes widened. He shook his head. “I haven’t talked to anyone but those of this household.”

  Shandra had a feeling Ryan had called here after talking to her. But she wasn’t going to find out from Martin or Jo. She smiled at Coop. She’d get it out of him on the way to Omak. She stood.

  “Thank you for breakfast. Coop, get your things if you’re going with me. You can find something to do while I visit with Velma.” Shandra faced her aunt. “We’ll be back for dinner. Depending on what I learn in Omak, I’ll either stay another day or leave tomorrow.” She hugged her aunt. “But I’ll be back to visit soon.”

  “You know once you say a thing like that you can’t go back on your word,” Aunt Jo said, stepping back and peering into Shandra’s eyes.

  “You have my word.” Shandra slid her arms into her coat and picked up her purse.

  “You know, you carry many traits of your father.” Martin pointed to her leather fringed, messenger bag styled purse with beading. “That is very close to the traditional bags we used to carry things.”

  Shandra smiled. “I know. That’s why I like it.”

  Coop loped into the room. “Ready.”

  “Let’s go.” Shandra exited the house, drew her coat closer, and headed to her Jeep. The gray skies loomed low and oppressive. “Will it snow?”

  “No. We rarely get snow. If we do, it melts right away.” Coop climbed into her passenger seat. “Nice!”

  “Your pickup is newer than my Jeep,” Shandra said, buckling up and backing out to the driveway.

  Coop ran his hand over her dash. “Didn’t you get this when you turned eighteen?”

  Shandra stared at him. “No. I bought this when I made enough from my pottery to afford a new car.”

  “But you got a new car when you turned eighteen,” he said, staring at her wide-eyed.

  “No. When I was seventeen, I worked for my stepfather and I worked for a neighbor in the summer to buy a 1977 Ford pickup that would haul the two-horse trailer I’d worked for the summer before.” She had worked for everything other than the ranch on Huckleberry Mountain. She’d purchased that with money her grandmother on her mother’s side had left her.

  “You had to work to get your first car? When you live on the rez, when you turn eighteen and have a diploma, you get what we call ‘Eighteen Money’. Most go out and buy a car with it.” He made the statement like it was a privilege.

  “But I’ve seen how the young people around here drive, and I’ve seen new cars sitting in yards that look like they’ve been wrecked.” They were on the outskirts of Nespelem. She pointed to the right. “Like that one. How did it get mangled like that?”

  Coop smiled. “That was the pickup Rodney Near rolled one night when a group of us were up at Owhi Lake drinking.”

  Shandra shook her head. “Was anyone hurt in the accident?”

  Coop sobered. “Yeah, Rodney had to have pins put in his leg where the truck rolled over it and Debbie was in a coma for a couple of weeks.”

  “Your mother mentioned how bad drinking and drugs were on the reservation. Do you drink or do drugs?” She asked, not to get him in trouble but to make him see it wasn’t the route to go.

  “I drink once in a while, but I’m of age.” He scowled at her.

  “Do you drink until you’re stupid?” she asked, pulling into Velma’s driveway. She was pleased to see only one car. She presumed it belonged to Velma.

  “I’m going to make something of myself. I won’t become like Uncle Clyde and some of my friends.” His eyes shone with conviction.

  “I hope so. Life is too precious to throw it away. What do you want to do for a living?” She turned off the Jeep and turned to Coop.

  His gaze lingered on the dash, and his fingers picked at the denim incasing his thigh. “I’d thought about basketball, but then I read some stories about players who hadn’t had an education and when they became injured became like the lost Indians on the rez.” He glanced at her as if expecting her to belittle his dream.

  “Don’t you have to go to college to get into pro basketball?” she asked.

  “I’m taking online courses right now to get into Washington State.”

  “Good! Let me know when you make it. What will your major be?” She was happy to hear he planned to get out in the world and get a degree.

  “Computer science.” He smiled.

  “That’s an excellent choice. The world will be run by computers someday.” She opened her door as Velma stepped out onto her porch. The woman waved, then cast a glance at Coop.

  Shandra walked around the front of her Jeep and handed the keys to Coop. “Come back and get me in an hour.”

  “Really?”

  “Yes, Really. But I want my Jeep to look just like it does now.” She narrowed her eyes.

  “It will. Thanks. I didn’t want to sit around Velma’s pretending I didn’t hear what you talked about.” He grinned and hustled around to the driver’s side.

  Shandra grinned, waved to Coop as he backed out of the drive, and headed up the cracked sidewalk to Velma’s porch.

  “You sure you want that boy driving your Jeep?” Velma asked.

  “He’ll be fine. I told him to come back in an hour. He’s going to Omak with me.” Shandra witnessed Velma’s brow rise, but she didn’t say anything.

  “Come on in. I have a pot of tea ready.”

  Shandra smiled. Aunt Jo must have called and broken the news to Velma that Shandra wasn’t a big coffee drinker.

  They settled at the kitchen table.

  “Why did you want to visit with me this morning?” Velma asked, lifting a cookie to her mouth.

  Shandra fidgeted in her seat. Even though her father’s cousin knew why she came here, and belonged to the same religion as Ella, she had a hard time telling her what she found so easy to tell Ryan.

  “Has Aunt Minnie visited you?” Velma asked.

  Shandra sucked in air so fast she choked. Velma patted her back and shoved Shandra’s mug of tea toward her. She raised the glass and drank a long soothing swallow.

  “How did you know Ella visited me?” Shandra asked.

  “That is why
she had you attend the ceremony after her funeral. She wanted to know if she could reach you.”

  Velma said it all so matter-of-factly, Shandra could only take in the information as real.

  “Reach me?” She had a feeling she knew what it meant but wanted to hear it from Velma.

  “She planned to visit you in dreams.” Velma stared at her. “She has, hasn’t she?”

  “Yes. The first time was when I was mixed up in a murder. The second time was when my friend Lil was suspected of murder, and the third time was when a man was found dead on my property. But lately, she’s been showing me Father, mangled, on the ground, and horses peering down at him.” She stared into Velma’s eyes. Where she’d witnessed the same scene the day before. Today, they were chocolate brown eyes staring back at her.

  “That’s what brought you here to find out more about your father’s death.”

  “Yes. I’m headed to Omak to talk with Charlie Frank.” Shandra drank her tea.

  “You do know looking into your father’s death, may reveal truths you don’t want to know.”

  Chapter Eight

  Shandra peered into Velma’s eyes. After the information she’d learned last night about Adam and her mother, she had a pretty good idea what Velma was referring to.

  “I’m aware Mother and Father didn’t have a marriage of love.”

  Velma put her mug down. “When did you discover this?”

  “I had a feeling when I talked with Mr. Seeton a couple months ago. Then last night Bud and Jo told me how they thought Mother sleeping with an Indian had been her revenge on Adam. That they’d been seeing one another before my conception and the marriage.”

  Velma nodded. “I told Aunt Minnie to stay out of it. To let it be. But she feared for you. That was why she forced the two to marry. To keep you alive.”

  Shandra shook her head. “Mother wouldn’t have—” She couldn’t bring herself to say the word, only because it would have meant her mother wished to kill her. Celeste wasn’t much of a mother, but she couldn’t see her cold-blooded enough to kill an innocent baby.

  “Minnie had a vision. She saw your mother enter a building that had one of the doctors that back then did that sort of thing. Your ella came to me saying we had to stop Celeste. You were to live.” Velma took a drink of her tea. “That was when she threatened your mother. Back then Celeste was naïve to our ways and believed Minnie could put a spell on her, like a witch.” Velma laughed. “She was easy to tell stories to.”

  Shandra saw the humor and also understood her mother’s fear. That was why she refused to let Shandra see the Higheagles. She’d believed they would teach her daughter heathen ways.

  Velma stopped laughing. “What questions will you ask Charlie Frank?”

  Setting her cup down, Shandra told Velma of her plan to talk to Charlie without him becoming suspicious of her reasons.

  An hour later, Coop walked through the front door. “Ready to go?” he asked, holding out the keys to Shandra.

  “I am.” Shandra took the keys, hugged Velma, and donned her coat.

  “You should make Omak in time for lunch,” Velma said, looking over at the round clock on the wall that had the words ‘Indian Time’ across the middle and had the numbers in all the wrong places.

  “Good. I’m hungry,” Coop stated and headed to the front door.

  “You’re always hungry,” Shandra said, following her cousin out of the house and to her Jeep. She made one pass around the vehicle checking for dings and scratches.

  “I thought you trusted my driving,” Coop said.

  Climbing behind the steering wheel, she glanced over at him. His bottom lip was in a pout and his eyes had taken on a sad countenance. Shandra laughed. “I was just making sure someone else hadn’t dinged the Jeep while you were parked.”

  He snapped out of the pout and smiled. “I parked far from any other cars at the Trading Post.”

  “Were you there the whole time?” she asked, pulling out of Velma’s driveway and heading to the highway.

  “Sandy Williams was working today.”

  She could tell by his tone, he was smitten with the girl. “Really? Tell me about Sandy.” The next thirty minutes was spent listening to Coop talk about Sandy and all her accomplishments.

  “That’s the road Charlie lives on,” Coop interrupted his dialogue to point at a road to the left that they’d passed.

  “Oh! I thought he lived in Omak.” Shandra slowed the Jeep, debating whether to turn around or not.

  “No. That’s the road. We can go on into Omak, eat lunch, get my shoes, and then stop in on the way back,” Coop said.

  Shandra’s stomach growled. “That sounds like a good plan.” She continued on to Omak.

  ***

  Two hours later, their bellies full and a new pair of basketball shoes sitting in her back seat, Shandra turned down the lane to Charlie Frank’s ranch. As she drove closer to the buildings and paddocks, she wondered if the man still lived here.

  “That barn looks like its leaning, and I don’t see any horses,” she said to Coop. “Are you sure Charlie still lives here?”

  “That’s the word. He’s here but he’s been losing races, bets, and horse owners.” Coop stared out the passenger window.

  She parked in front of a one-level, ranch-style home. The gray walls had curled flakes of paint clinging to them. Grimy windows gave the building an unfriendly nuance. There were two pickups on blocks between the house and the leaning barn.

  “I don’t see a running vehicle. Do you think he’s even here right now?” Shandra opened the door, hesitant to venture farther without consent of the owner.

  “He gets a ride from Tommy Lighthorse when he needs to go to town.” Coop closed the Jeep door and strode to the front door.

  “How come you know so much about Charlie?” Shandra asked, catching up to Coop’s long stride.

  “Everyone knows about Charlie. He sees himself as an Indian who made it.”

  Shandra scanned the porch, missing boards, and the cracked beams holding up the porch roof. “I would say he is an Indian who squandered his good fortune.”

  Coop shrugged and knocked on the door.

  Nothing.

  He knocked longer and harder.

  “Who’s there?” called a gravelly, slurred voice.

  “Coop Elwood.”

  Shandra raised an eyebrow at how he’d neglected to say her name.

  “He wouldn’t come if he knew there was a woman standing out here,” Coop said.

  She nodded. Why would a woman keep Charlie from coming to the door?

  A couple of thuds and shuffling steps on the other side of the door and it opened.

  A stooped man with gray braids dangling in the air in front of his body, raised fading brown eyes upward. When he still couldn’t seem to see Coop’s face, he motioned with his hand. “Lean down, so’s I can see you are who you say you are.”

  Coop grinned and bent at his waist, bringing his face into the man’s vision.

  Charlie grunted and turned. That’s when his gaze landed on Shandra’s feet.

  “Those are fancy boots.” Charlie raised his head as best he could and when he peered into Shandra’s face he said something in his language.

  Shandra glanced at Coop to see if he knew what the man said. He shook his head.

  “Mr. Franks, I’m Shandra Higheagle. I’ve recently connected with my family and heard you knew my father. Since I was so small when he had his accident, I’ve been talking to people who knew him to discover what kind of a man he was.” She reached down, taking his gnarled fingers in her hand and shaking.

  “Higheagle. You mean Edward?” he asked, moving slowly into the house.

  “Yes. Edward Higheagle,” Shandra said, following the shrunken man into a room piled high with horse magazines of all kinds, empty beer cans, and T.V. dinner containers with half-eaten food in them.

  Charlie took the only seat in the place that wasn’t covered with anything. Once seated he looke
d her up and down. He nodded. “You have your father’s look.”

  Coop grabbed the back of what looked to be a dining room chair and dumped the contents on the seat to the floor. Four mice scurried out of the pile.

  Shandra squeaked, startled by the creatures and the knowledge the man lived in such deplorable conditions.

  Coop placed the chair behind her. She glanced at the wooden seat, hoping there wasn’t any mouse leavings. As if reading her mind, Coop picked up a newspaper on the top of a stack of magazines and placed it on the seat.

  “Thanks,” she said under her breath and sat.

  “What can you tell me about Edward?” she asked Charlie.

  “He was a member of them snooty Nez Perce in Nespelem.” Charlie didn’t look at her, he stared at a spot on the floor between his stocking clad feet. The big toe on his left foot stuck out a hole in the sock.

  Shandra locked gazes with Coop. Charlie was talking about their family. Coop only shook his head, holding his tongue. Her respect for her cousin had been growing with each hour she spent with him.

  “When did you first meet Edward?” she asked, deciding to keep it impersonal and perhaps he’d reveal his true feeling rather than try to keep anything from her.

  “In grade school. We fought a lot.” Charlie nodded his head.

  “What did you fight about?”

  Charlie wiggled one of his hands. “Everything.”

  “Why?”

  “Because he thought so high of himself and his family. Others said he had the way with horses. But he didn’t. They just said that to make people think he was some kind of horse whisperer when he rode horses that bucked everyone else off, but not him.”

  “So you think it was just a story he could talk to the horses?” This was interesting considering what she’d learned from Bud and others about her father and this man.

  “It had to be. Otherwise, he would have rode Loco that day and not been bucked off.” Charlie stared into space now. “He should have talked that horse out of bucking if he was so good.”

  “You were there that day?” Shandra asked, finally feeling like she had a viable witness.