All three of the other ladies began to snicker but reeled it back in quickly when they saw the annoyed expression on my face. In my own defense I said, "I only participated in the silly class for Lexie's benefit, you realize."
I could sense Lexie was trying to hold back a smile as she reached over and patted my hand and said, "I know you did, sweetie, and I appreciate what you had to go through for my benefit. Now let's get back to Joy White."
"Rapella said Joy seemed genuinely upset. But if she had anything to do with Trotter's death, I'd think she'd act as devastated as she possibly could," Mattie said. "I'm not sure Joy's scene-stealing act of grievance after his death at the party wasn't designed to make everyone view her as a victim. She'd want to come across as a victim, along with Trotter, instead of as a potential killer."
Wendy agreed and added, "And there's always the possibility we discussed before. She might have staged that dramatic scene to get off the premises before the police began taking statements."
"That's true," I said. "Joy managed to avoid the scrutiny the rest of the party guests were subjected to. Could that have been her ploy from the start? If so, she pulled the ruse off perfectly. Also, there could be a great deal of resentment on her part, especially if after the abortion took place, she was filled with remorse about killing her baby, which again Mattie doesn't think is something she'd do on her own without being coerced in to it," I said.
"Damn straight," Mattie said.
"Then we have Alice Runcan, who arrived with an unknown guest who appeared to me to be at odds with her at the party."
"Sammy Sparks." Wendy and Mattie spoke out in stereo.
"Who's that?" Lexie and I then asked at the exact same time. Great minds think alike, I've heard.
Wendy spoke first. "He's just a guy who recently moved to town. He owns the nightclub where Rayleen Waters is employed as an entertainer. But I really can't see any imaginable reason he'd have to kill Trotter Hayes, whom I doubt he was even acquainted with, unless Trotter frequented his club, which is quite possible. More likely, however, Sammy was just disgusted that his date was ignoring him."
I had to agree with Wendy's assessment. It would have irritated me too, had I been in Sammy Sparks's shoes. And there was the word "entertainer" used as Rayleen's job description again. "Entertainer" could mean a whole host of different things, I thought. So I asked, "Does she sing, dance, pull rabbits out of a top hat, or what?"
"She's a stripper!" Wendy answered. "Probably the last occupation any of us who knew her in high school could have ever imagined she'd be involved in."
"Rayleen was very shy and withdrawn back then," Mattie added. "But I guess people can change. And, by the way, I agree with Wendy's opinion about Sammy. He had no connection to the victim as far as I can tell."
"Okay. We'll mark him off our suspect list for now. Back to Rayleen Waters. Along with Rayleen, Alice and Joy were the other two gals in their Three Musketeers club, according to what Alice told me," I said.
"Yeah, that's what they called themselves back then," Wendy replied. "Mattie and I always thought their little club was kind of childish."
"I remember you two joking about their Three Musketeers club when you were in high school," Lexie said to the two friends. Then she turned to me and asked, "When did you speak to Alice Runcan?"
I didn't feel it necessary to go into the story about my short-lived employment at Alice's health-food diner, so I replied, "Long story. But during our conversation, Alice told me she was stood up at the last minute when she and Trotter were supposed to attend their high school homecoming dance together. As the queen of the dance that year, Alice was mortified. Even worse, her close friend, Rayleen Waters, showed up with Trotter later on in the evening. Even though it's been years since that snub, Alice still appeared to have a great deal of bitterness toward Trotter. Was it enough to kill him though? I don't know."
Wendy nodded and added, "Mattie and I remember that night vividly. Alice truly was devastated by the humiliation she experienced, and it was a bad deal all the way around."
"No doubt," I agreed. Then Wendy continued.
"As Stone and Rip probably informed you, Falcon Jons told me Rayleen called and begged him to take her to the dance. Mattie hadn't invited her, which was fine with me since I hadn't spoken to her in years. Maybe Rayleen still harbored some animosity toward Trotter herself. Even though she and Alice eventually buried the hatchet, I doubt their friendship was ever as tight knit as it had been before what Alice had to think of as being stabbed in the back by Rayleen. It seems Trotter had lied to both girls, causing a serious rift between them for a while. It wasn't long after the homecoming fiasco that all three of the musketeers went their separate ways. That most likely left Rayleen with no close friends to hang out with, which she might have blamed Trotter for."
"Okay, that's something to keep in mind. I think we should check further into Rayleen's possible motive to kill Trotter." I consulted my list and added, "Then there's Falcon Jons, who owns the aerospace firm and is a bit 'off,' as you girls put it. He showed some serious hostility toward Trotter for stealing his girlfriend and getting her pregnant when I spoke to him. But Falcon was clearly not aware that Joy wasn't still pregnant at the party. He had estimated to me that she'd be four months along with what he claimed should have been his baby. He knew nothing about the abortion, I'm certain."
"When did you speak to Falcon Jons?" Lexie asked me, puzzlement etched across her face. "You've been a busy girl the last couple of days, haven't you? A woman after my own heart. Now I'm more sure than ever we are twins who were separated at birth."
Wendy and Mattie chuckled and agreed Lexie and I were two of a kind.
"I hate to use a cliché, but we're what they call 'birds of a feather'. But how and when I spoke with Falcon is another long story that we don't have time for now. Let's just say, he didn't seem to think I was capable of handling a computer software engineering position he was interviewing applicants for."
"No shit?" Mattie asked with a great deal of sarcasm.
"That's exactly what Falcon said, Mattie, and I was not amused then either."
The smile on Mattie's face evaporated like morning dew on a hot summer day. She hung her head and said, "I'm sorry, Rapella. No offense intended. In fact, I'm very impressed and extremely proud of your new skill with the iPad. I must be a very talented tutor."
I could still sense a small degree of derision in her apology, but it was buried deep within a flattering compliment so I let it slide.
"Get back to Falcon Jons, Rapella," Lexie urged. I did as she requested.
"Falcon went to the party with Rayleen after she begged him to take her as his date. But I believe his sole purpose of agreeing with her request was to try to make his ex, Joy White, jealous. Why else was he making out so publicly with a gal he had no real interest in, all the while staring at his ex-girlfriend? Joy, of course, was there with Trotter, and that could have triggered a fit of uncontrollable rage in Falcon. After all, Joy had betrayed him by going out with Trotter behind his back. He could hold Trotter responsible for luring Joy away from him."
"Another possibility to keep in mind. But a crime of passion doesn't seem likely. Whoever killed him came to the party armed with the poison and ready to carry out the execution of a man they wanted retribution against. The throat-slitting was probably just an unplanned addition to insure Trotter's death," Lexie said. "I'm beginning to see a pattern here. It seems like nearly every young person at the party had some sort of issue with Trotter, and a possible motive to want him eliminated."
Wendy, Mattie, and I all nodded in agreement. And we all also agreed this fact would not make figuring out who the actual killer was any easier.
The niggling thought returned that we might be overlooking someone. Maybe a suspect who didn't appear to have a substantial enough motive to actually take another person's life. The motive could involve something really devious that none of us four were privy to.
At that poi
nt, we had very little idea of how Rayleen felt about Trotter, or about any deep resentment she might have had against her former homecoming date. Could Rayleen have held Trotter responsible for the gradual unraveling of the Three Musketeers' friendship? Neither Joy nor Alice had spoken with Rayleen in years, according to them. Could she even feel he had something to do with her resigning herself to becoming a stripper—perhaps due to a negative opinion of herself? Wendy and Mattie had mentioned that low self-esteem had always been an issue with Rayleen, and it wasn't likely to have improved much in the intervening years, particularly after her friendship with Joy and Alice had dissolved.
I thought Rayleen Waters deserved a little attention. Before the meeting broke up I asked, "Who feels like going out on the town tonight? Maybe we could even stop by Sammy Sparks's nightclub and grab a drink. I'm suddenly craving a tequila sunshine like you wouldn't believe. And I can't tell you ladies how long it's been since I've been entertained by a stripper."
Chapter 14
Rip, Stone, and Andy decided to join the four of us in going to the nightclub that evening. I'd like to think their decision was borne out of concern for our welfare, but I had a sneaking suspicion there was more to it than that. Now that he was retired from the police force, Rip couldn't possibly make up an excuse to visit a strip club that wouldn't land him in the doghouse for a month, and I'd imagine the same was true for Stone and Andy. The cheerful willingness of all three of the men to suffer through the evening as our escorts was a little disturbing.
When we arrived at the nightclub called Sparky's, we found a large table toward the back. It wouldn't have bothered me, but Wendy and Mattie weren't anxious to be recognized by their old classmate. They were reluctant to have Rayleen Waters spot the two of them sitting together in the crowd. The two girls were afraid she would think they were there to judge and ridicule her, and it could make her feel badly about herself. The two gals had no desire to hurt the stripper's feelings.
Fortunately, with the spotlights all aimed at the girls performing on stage, it was difficult to see your drink in front of you in the sheer darkness of the remainder of the room. How the barmaids found their way around without tripping and spilling the drinks all over the patrons was beyond me.
In retrospect, it might have been better had I not been able to find my drink in the darkness as often as I did. The "titty bar," as Rip had referred to it, served very strong, but tasty, tequila sunrises. They certainly weren't watering down their drinks or skimping on the alcohol. Before I knew it, I was beginning to feel a little woozy and must have been acting bizarrely because the other three ladies were eyeing me with concern on their faces. Rip was ignoring me but he had gotten accustomed to seeing me over-imbibe, as it had happened on a number of occasions. He was throwing back quite a few Crown and Cokes himself, I noticed.
The men took turns buying rounds as we sat through the first two performers' routines. The first one was an exotic dancer who made quite a production of removing her sequined and feathery outfit one article of clothing at a time. There was a long, drawn-out, agonizing amount of time in between each one. I could have washed, dried, and folded each item before she removed the next one. Each piece that hit the floor resulted in a rally cry from all the young men who were fixated on her performance. I was just glad when she picked up the pile of discarded clothing and left the stage.
The second performer was a striking, willowy black lady with huge boobs. I could recall as a child honeydew melons half their size taking home the grand prize at our local county fair. Since the woman's breasts were not even remotely in the same proportions with the rest of her body, I had to assume she'd purchased them out of a "Racks R Us" catalog. Her talent, if you could call it that, was giving lap dances to the salivating men on the front row. The men were shoving cash into her barely-there thong every time they got a chance.
Rayleen Waters was the next act to come out on the stage. As was with the first two acts, we sat through Rayleen's strip-tease routine without talking. It had been almost impossible to carry on a conversation in the lively crowd and ear-splitting volume of the band. We had eventually quit trying to communicate verbally.
I'm hardly a good judge of strip-tease performances, having never watched one in my entire life before that night. However, the thought crossed my mind that after a couple more rounds of drinks I could probably give a more spell-binding display of stripping than Rayleen. In my intoxicated state, I might have been tempted to get up on stage and give it a shot if not for the fact I was wearing a twenty-year old bra and a pair of undies in less than stellar condition. The elastic had torn away from the material in several spots and the once stark-white cotton now had a beige tinge to it from thousands of rotations in the washing machine. And the fact that I could practically tuck the waistline of my underpants into my brassiere was probably less than titillating too.
Soon after the thought of entertaining a room full of predominantly twenty- to thirty-year-old men by baring my sixty-eight-year-old body, and nearly as old underwear, had crossed my mind, I realized it was time to cut myself off. By now everyone at the table except Andy seemed to have a buzz on. Andy was our designated driver and drinking Sprite. He probably was praying that none of the other men in the crowd recognized him.
I staggered to the bathroom, joined by Lexie, who tripped over a swizzle stick on the way. Once there, we discussed the possibilities of finding a way to have a conversation with Rayleen. None of our ideas sounded plausible, and a few of them, fueled by too much alcohol, no doubt, were almost ludicrous. I didn't mention anything about my silly notion of going up on stage, because I knew Lexie would find that as amusing as she did the fact that I took a pole-dancing lesson earlier in the day.
Lexie was as blitzed as I was and she was laughing at nearly everything, including the fact that her stall had no toilet paper in it and she had to borrow some from me. I took solace in thinking the pole-dancing lesson that morning was probably what spurred the ridiculous idea of doing an onstage strip tease to begin with, along with too many tequila sunrises, of course.
As it turned out, we were able to discover an interesting detail without even speaking to Rayleen. As Lexie and I drunkenly zigzagged our way back toward the table, we both stopped in our tracks when we saw Joy White walk out on stage next to a stainless steel pole. The pole was mounted on a huge marble base that a couple of burly bouncers had just wheeled out on a dolly. We looked at each other in amazement and then scurried back to the bathroom as if we hadn't touched a drop of alcohol all day. We were anxious to discuss the ramifications of what we'd just witnessed. The noise level in the women's john was muffled enough that we could understand each other's words.
"I don't know why it never occurred to me that a single woman couldn't make a living off teaching a weekly pole-dancing class. To earn a reasonable income, she'd also need a more profitable job to make ends meet. What else would a pole-dance instructor do to earn a living other than perform as a pole-dancer?" I asked Lexie.
"True. And didn't you tell us earlier that Joy mentioned having not seen Rayleen or Alice in years?" She responded. "They're co-workers, for goodness sakes!"
"Alice Runcan, the third of the Three Musketeers, told me the same thing in almost the same exact words. It was as if both of their comments had been rehearsed," I said.
"But why would either of them lie to you about it? They could have no idea you're involved in investigating Trotter's death. In fact, I don't know how they could even know you and I were acquainted."
"No, me either. As far as Joy is aware, I only know her mother, Viola," I said.
"Why didn't you tell me you knew Joy's mother? How in the world do you know this Viola?" Lexie asked.
"I don't."
"Huh?"
"I only said I did after I'd told Falcon Jons I was her godmother and had known her mother for years. He mentioned that Viola was the mother's name, so I dropped her name when I spoke with Joy later. It was a tactic to segue into the discussion
about her pregnancy. It's a long story and of no consequence now." As I explained this to Lexie, it was as if all of the alcohol I'd put away in the past two hours had been flushed out of my system when I'd used the toilet minutes earlier. I was stone cold sober and Lexie appeared to be as well.
The door opened then and Wendy and Mattie entered the small, but adequate, restroom. They were both excitedly talking at once, unaware we'd already seen Joy up on stage. It was their joint opinion that it was likely that neither Joy nor Rayleen made a habit of telling strangers what they did for a living. Mattie added a slightly offensive remark. "Telling an older woman your age, Rapella, that you worked in a strip club would be highly embarrassing to most young ladies. It'd be almost like telling your own grandmother."
"Taking into consideration that both girls, along with Alice Runcan, who also claimed to not have seen the other two girls in years, all seem to have an issue with Trotter, sure makes you stop to think," I said. "Could Alice have lied about not having any contact with her two old friends also?"
Mattie nodded and said, "From the close relationship they had for years, my guess would be she did lie about it. They live in the same county, after all! If nothing else, you'd think they'd occasionally run into each other at the mall, an area restaurant, or even while shopping for groceries at Pete's Pantry."
"My thoughts exactly," I said. "If all three ladies are lying, there's got to be a reason. Otherwise, what purpose would it serve? Could the Three Musketeers have banded together again to eliminate their common nemesis?"
"Are you suggesting the three of them killed Trotter together?" Mattie asked. "Like a tag team kind of slaying perhaps?"
A Rip Roaring Good Time Page 16