by Tonya Kappes
Her purr told me I was forgiven. Last night with Mac was exactly what I needed. Long kisses and meaningful conversations about how we were breaking ourselves free of the hold Richard had on us were better than any therapy session I could’ve had. Both of us cried over the relationship we thought we had with Richard, and we even reminisced about the good times we’d had with him. Believe it or not, there were good times.
Though our new relationship would be based on us and not Richard, we did discuss how Grady was Richard’s son and Grady loved his father deeply, even though he knew about Richard’s other relationship. We’d decided how, going forward, we would be respectful of Richard’s memory when it came to Grady.
“I’ve got to get to work.” I took a few sips of my coffee and listened in for any sort of movement from the bedroom. “It must be nice to own your own company,” I told Rowena just as her feeder went off. She bolted off the couch and into the kitchen.
Next to the kitchen was the laundry room. Luckily, I didn’t have to go back to my room to get dressed in my uniform because I let my uniforms hang dry after they went through the wash cycle. Grady’s bedroom contained a private bathroom, which I kept fully stocked in case he and Julia wanted to spend the night.
Before I headed into his bathroom to grab a quick shower, I pulled out some of the breakfast scones Iris and I had made a few weeks ago from the freezer and set them out to thaw.
When I finished getting ready, there was still no movement in the house. Rowena had filled her belly, and she was lying on her back on the top rung of her cat tree in the family room. I quickly scribbled a note to Mac and left it next to the scones.
I left him the directions on how to heat the scone to perfection and to flip on the coffee pot because I started brewing him a fresh pot of coffee. When I was about to sign my name, I hesitated because I wasn’t sure how to end it, so I simply wrote a B for my initial.
Today was a day I’d been dreading for the past few months. It was the Make Kentucky Colorful campaign’s judging day, the big day Carla had been waiting for. Oddly, I found myself in a pretty good mood on my drive into the post office, where I found Monica putting the battery-operated lights on the LLV in the parking lot.
“You look awfully chipper.” Monica must’ve noticed the glow on my face. “You do know what today is, right? And how you need to string the lights on the mail cart?”
“Mmm-hhhhmm,” I said with a nod and headed to the building, where I needed to get started on the lights. “It’s going to be a great day,” I called over my shoulder, leaving her with a stunned look.
I rarely used the mail cart, but today I was able to get all three loops of my mail in it so I didn’t have to keep coming back to the post office between my stops. It would make for a smoother day, and maybe I’d be able to see Mac again tonight.
Plus I would have a little more time to snoop around since I didn’t have to come back here to pick up more mail. Ultimately, I needed to snoop around.
“What on earth do you have there?” Vince Caldwell was sitting on the front porch of the main building of the nursing home, where he loved to have his morning coffee and look at the paper or work on his crossword. “I didn’t know what that was coming this way when I saw it.”
It was still pretty dark out when I made my way over to the nursing home with the light flashing around the cart.
“Carla.” I rolled my eyes. “Speaking of which, did you find anything out from your contact?” I sorted through the mail to grab his little stack of mail. Then I suddenly noticed a few pieces of mail that looked the same in various customers’ stacks. I took a quick peek and noticed it was the much-anticipated invitation to Zeke’s granddaughter-in-law-to-be’s bridal shower.
Boy, were the front porch ladies going to be happy—and that would make Carla happy too.
“I checked out Carla first. Spotless record. She should’ve been a nun.” He grinned. “I also had them look into Walter Ward. Though he’s pretty shady on how he gets his properties, and from what I found out around here, when someone comes in here and needs to sell their home so they can pay to live here, Walter is the first one to approach them. So when you said you saw him talking to Luke, I’m thinking Luke had contacted Walter.”
“Okay.” I was confused. “What do you make of all that?”
“I got the coroner’s report.” He pulled a piece of paper from the guts of his newspaper and handed it to me.
My jaw dropped when I opened it and saw it was Lee’s final autopsy report.
“How on earth did you get this?”
“I told you I had my contacts.” He tapped the paper. “According to the autopsy, Lee died of rat poisoning, which weed killer doesn’t have, and the sheriff let Carla go.”
“Rat poisoning,” I gasped, knowing Mac told Walter to get rid of the problem.
Did Walter think the problem Mac was talking about was Lee?
“I’ve got to go.” I grabbed the handle and waved the piece of paper in the air. “Thank you!”
This was amazing news. As much as I’d figured Carla had done it, the report clearly stated it was rat poison, and the only person I saw with rat poison was Walter Ward.
“Mac.” I had dialed him with my free hand on my way back to Main Street, where I was going to deliver to the shops. “Are you awake? Of course you’re not awake.”
“Good morning.” His husky, sleepy voice made my heart fall. “I’m sitting here with a nice cup of fresh coffee you brewed with Rowena in my lap and Buster at my feet.”
“Listen.” Now that I knew he was awake, I had to tell him. “Remember when you told Walter Ward to get rid of the problem?”
“What problem?” he asked.
“The problem of why your house next to Lee’s isn’t selling.” I had to take this information to Angie.
“Oh, the rats?” he asked like he needed confirmation.
“You meant the rats. I think Walter thinks you meant Lee himself.” The facts were the facts, and I couldn’t wait to tell the front porch ladies.
“Huh?” he asked uncertainly. “I’m not sure if I’ve ever talked to you this early, but I’m feeling like you need more coffee.”
“Mac, I’m serious. I found out Lee had died from rat poison, not weed poison.” Even though I heard him let out a long, deep sigh, I continued and tugged on the handle of the cart. After crossing Main Street to stop into Social Knitwork, I got stuck going over the curb. “When you told Walter to get rid of the problem, the problem he thought was Lee because he said that’s where the rats were coming from. What if he did stop the problem, meaning Lee, then he met with Luke because he knew Luke would be the heir to Lee’s stuff?”
“First off, Lee doesn’t have any stuff worth having, from what I can tell.” He clearly didn’t know about the stamps. “Secondly, Walter is not an idiot. He knew I meant the rats on my property.”
“I can’t discount the argument Lee and Walter had when I was there, and Walter is very greedy. If he thought he was going to lose a deal, you never know what he could do.” It was a fact.
I left the cart outside and headed inside to see if Leotta had any outgoing mail.
“None today,” I told her when I came in empty handed. She waved and went right back to the class she was already teaching.
“None what?” Mac asked.
“Oh, I’m on my route.” It was all I had to say for him to know I wasn’t talking to him. “Seriously. Think about it.” A deep, gratified sigh escaped me. “The fact is that he was poisoned with rat poison. The only person…”
“What? What’s wrong?” Mac asked with urgency.
“Mac,” I said with a gasp. “What if Walter did do it and he is brought in by Angie and he tells her that you told him to get rid of the problem? And you paid him, didn’t you?”
“Yeah. I paid him to get rid of the rats.”
“I’m worried. I better not tell Angie.” My stomach felt empty all of a sudden.
I grabbed the little bit of mail fo
r Tranquility Wellness and walked in. Some sort of gong class was going on, so I left the mail on the counter and slipped right back out the door.
“Tell Angie?” Mac asked but continued, “See. This right here. I told you I couldn’t take you getting involved again. You should be enjoying your day and not worrying about Lee Macum and what the sheriff is doing to solve it.”
“I’m worried that you’re going to be pegged as the killer and Walter Ward would point a finger at you.” I recalled, “Remember when the church was selling off part of their land to help pay off the new building? Walter had originally agreed to do it for free. Doing it for God, he said. But when it came down to it and the land went into a bidding war, he took the cut above what was originally the asking price. Saying it was God’s way of paying him back for doing a good deed.” Even thinking about that still put a bad taste in my mouth.
“That man is a disgrace to our town, and he killed Lee Macum!” I didn’t figure my voice to be so loud when I walked into the Wallflower Diner.
Everyone turned around to look at me just as I came nose to nose with Carla.
FOURTEEN
“Who killed him?” Carla stood solidly at the ready.
“Umm…” My brows furrowed. “I’ll call you back.”
I hung up the phone and slipped it into the pockets of my uniform.
“I want to know who killed him because I’m going to kill them.” She wagged a gardening spade at me. “Do you know what it’s like to be locked up in jail for twenty-four hours when you didn’t do something? Do you know what it’s like to be accused and shamed by all the people of your town when all I’ve ever done was give back to all of y’all?” She dragged that spade around the room while she moved with it, eyeballing all the customers in the diner.
“You better watch what you say about killing someone,” I leaned in to whisper. “That might’ve been what got you in trouble the first time—that and the fact you were spraying poison weed killer on anything blowing in the wind.”
Carla did look a little disheveled, and she even had on the same clothes as she did yesterday.
“When did you get out of the poky?” I teased, only to find she wasn’t very accepting of it.
“Not funny, Bernadette.” She looked around my shoulder. Everyone in the diner seemed to have gone back to gossiping about Lee. “I’m glad to see you have the cart lit up. Have you noticed how nice the town looks this morning?”
I was happy to see she had forgotten about what I’d said to Mac when I was walking into the diner. The last thing I wanted was for the spotlight to be turned on Mac as the mastermind behind Walter’s evil deed.
“Of course. We are going to win, and I’ve got a smile on my face today too.” I smiled real big so she didn’t tell me how to act like she tried to do to Lee. “I’ve got to be on my way.”
I maneuvered around the tables of the diner and made it back to the counter, where my mom exchanged her stack of mail for a box of pancakes and sausage.
“I heard Mac didn’t come home last night. So I figured you better leave this for him at the office.” Mom gave me a onceover. “Do you figure you should be getting yourself into something?”
“Mom.” My jaw dropped. “I’m fifty years old.”
“And your age makes me any less of your mother?” She gave me an alert gaze.
“Mom, I…”
She interrupted and wanted to be the first one to speak of it.
“Your daddy and I want the best for you and the companion you choose to spend your life with.” She started in on all that companion talk.
“Mom.” I put my hand up to stop her. “I don’t want a companion. I want a man. A man that’s going to be my best friend and …”
“Lalalala.” Grady appeared behind me and had his fingers in his ears. “Is all this talk over?” he asked in a really loud voice, fingers still plugging his hearing.
Mom and I both laughed.
“Listen, Grandma.” Grady took the cup of coffee waiting by the register. “I’m all for Mom living a life with Mac if that’s what makes her happy, but I’m telling both y’all now.” He looked down at us before he set his eyes on me. “If you two don’t work out, I’m still going to have him in my life as normal.”
“Hey.” Mac walked up. He looked at me and smiled. He hesitated and then leaned over and kissed me right then and there… on the lips. “Good morning,” he said to everyone else and shook Grady’s hand like normal.
All of us kind of stood there, a little shocked, since it wasn’t Mac’s way of greeting me or any of us.
“What?” He looked from me to Mom to Grady. “It’s not like y’all don’t know about me and Bernie.” He put his hand on the small of my back and gave it a little scratch on top of my coat. “Right?”
And just like that… Mac went in for another kiss.
“Here.” I shoved the box of pancakes and sausage between us to give a little space.
“I was sending it next door to you because I knew you had to come in soon, since Julia is going to the doctor.” My mom took pride in making sure Mac knew feeding him was all her idea. “And you’re gonna need your strength to put up with her,” she joked with Mac.
“Are you kidding?” Mac looked at me, and my knees went weak. “I’ve been dying to know what it’s like to put up with her, and I’ve got to say that it’s pretty amazing.”
“Geez.” Grady rolled his eyes. “I’m outta here.” He gave Mac a hug and another one to me before giving my mom the final kiss on the cheek.
“Why are you so late to work?” I asked Grady, but he was already halfway through the diner, and the chit-chat was too loud for him to hear me. “Julia not better?”
“She called me telling me she was going to be late, so I made sure Rowena and Buster were okay before I left to come to work.” He lifted the box up to his nose and inhaled. He smiled, making my mom’s face light up with joy. She loved when people enjoyed her cooking. “I’ll go let Buster out at lunch.”
“Okay.” I could get used to this feeling I was having, but the ringing from my phone brought me right out of it.
“Who is it?” Mac asked me when I looked at it and paused.
“Tim Crouse.” I wondered why a lawyer was calling me. “I better get it. I’ll see y’all later.”
This time I initiated the kiss between Mac and me, leaving him with the biggest smile I’d ever seen on him.
“Hey, Tim. What’s up?” I asked as I nestled the phone between my shoulder and ear and picked up the handle to the cart.
“Bernadette, I’m Lee Macum’s attorney, and there’s a request that you be at the hearing of the will this morning.” Tim’s words forced me to stop in mid-stride, causing the cart to run up on my heels.
“Ouch,” I gasped.
“Are you okay?” Tim asked from the other end of the phone.
“Yeah. I guess I’m not sure why I’d need to be at the will reading.” Then it dawned on me. “Buster,” I whispered.
Lee had given me Buster in his will. Now the entire thing with me being the emergency contact made sense.
“Sure.” I didn’t bother waiting to see what Tim’s response to me questioning my being there had to do with me. “What time?” I asked.
“Can you come now?” he asked with a little hesitation. “Luke is here, and we’d like to start.”
“I’m right across the street at the diner. I’ll quickly deliver the rest of the shops over on this side of Main Street then head right over.” I put the phone back in my pocket.
This was about the only time I was glad to be pulling the cart. Normally the courthouse, which was where Tim’s attorney’s office was located, was on my last mail route. With the mail already with me, I could just pull out all the mail from the offices in the courthouse and deliver it before I went over to Little Creek Road.
Our courthouse was located right behind the mill wheel and housed all the officially elected offices, clerks’ offices, PVA, and much more. Most of the lawyers in
town even rented office space there. The sheriff department was in the back, and the volunteer fire department was located in the building next to the back parking lot. It was a one-stop legal shop for all of Sugar Creek Gap. The Sugar Creek Gap Library was located next to the courthouse, followed by the funeral home, which would be my next stops. I hoped I could snoop a little by asking Jigs Baker some questions about Lee’s autopsy.
“You’re early,” Trudy Evans greeted me from behind her computer where she worked in the clerk’s office. “My computer says it’s ten o’clock.”
“You’re right. I’ve got a will reading in Tim’s office, so I figured I’d drop this off right here.” Normally, I wouldn’t discuss anything around Trudy that I wouldn’t want the whole entire world to know, but I did want people to know so I could get them talking. I needed the gossip that it would generate so I could get more insight into who really asked questions, which I hoped would lead me to the killer. Or, at least, if Walter Ward knew I was getting Buster, maybe he’d come find me. Then I could question him. Either way, me telling Trudy about the will was a manipulated move.
“Will reading?” She looked around her computer and stood up as if she were really interested in the stack of mail bound by a rubber band.
“Mm-hmmm.” I pinched my lips together, giving her a slow nod, happy she took my bait. I leaned in real far over the tall counter between us and whispered like it was some big secret, “Lee Macum’s will.”
“For shame.” Trudy drew a hand to her chest. “Is that what’s going on up there? I seen Luke come in with Walter. Up the stairs they went.” She flung her hand in the air when she mentioned the location of Tim’s office. “I seen it because I was getting me a refill on coffee. No sooner did I make it to the clerk’s door to unlock it than did Walter hurry right back down spittin’ all sorts of curse words.” She glanced right and then left. “I heard Luke had all but signed over Lee’s house to Walter.”
“You mean as in to sell?” You could never be too sure what Trudy heard. She liked to add a little flair to things.