Body Brace (Caught Dead in Wyoming, Book 10)

by Patricia McLinn

  “What does that mean?” Jennifer asked.

  “It means I’m going to the Sherman Supermarket.”

  “Of course. More pie?”

  I did not dignify Diana’s question with a direct response. Instead, I asked, “Anyone want to go with?”

  * * * *

  They all came. Jennifer and Diana in person, Mike in Diana’s pocket with her finger on mute.

  Okay, we did buy pie, but that was because we needed something to get into Penny’s line.

  Diana and Jennifer followed me, forming a human buffer against anyone overhearing what I asked.

  “Well, hi there, Elizabeth. Quite a turn up we’ve got with that strange fella dyin’ and his even stranger will. Came right—”

  I leaned forward and spoke directly to her. “Penny, the old pills Mary Ferguson kept that were taken off the market, were they sleeping pills?”

  “—out of the blue to most, though he knew. Kid with a secret, ’cept it was a secret about how he’d use a bomb to blow things up. Can’t say he shoulda been killed, but sometimes things work out in the end. Could’ve been topsy-turvy around here. Told her those pills could be dangerous. They’d—”

  “Sleeping pills?” I pressed.

  “—done it before, killing, when they were supposed to be helping. Supposed to sleep. But you get stung, all right, like handling hornets. Though Mary had a constitution of an—”

  Like handling hornets…

  Diana cleared her throat, letting me know someone had come into line behind us.

  “Yellow jackets?” I asked urgently.

  “—ox. Always him with health issues. But she goes first. Isn’t that the way? That’s the name. Hornets, yellow jackets. All bees to me. Bye now.”

  * * * *

  “Yellow jackets? How did you know that? And what does it mean?” Mike asked from Diana’s pocket, once we were back in my SUV.

  “That was the nickname for a barbiturate that’s supposed to have killed Marilyn Monroe. Long off the market after too many people died, but that didn’t bother Mary Ferguson. Even with her constitution like an ox, Penny told us last time she’d nearly killed herself accidentally with those pills a few years back, yet she kept them around. There they were, waiting.”

  “Waiting for what?” Jennifer asked.

  “Or who?” Diana added.

  “Hold on. I need to make a phone call. But I don’t want to do it while I’m driving.”

  “But—”

  “Shh. Don’t distract me.”

  I had too many distractions already with the pieces swirling through my head.

  I kept hushing them at the house, too.

  Diana made that easier by serving slices of pie to the three of us actually here. I did my best to tune out Mike’s griping.

  That was easier when I called a number and said, “Willa?”

  That quieted everything but the chewing.

  “It’s Elizabeth Margaret Danniher. I have a question I hope you can answer. You said Palmer switched to seeing a woman named Jolie. Switched from whom? Who was he seeing before her?”

  After a slight pause, she said, “Funny you should ask. My son told me his father mentioned the last time they talked that a woman from the museum broke off with him and twice was two times too many and he’d never date another woman who thought so-called history was important.

  “I was debating calling the sheriff’s department. Palmer didn’t use Clara Atwood’s name and I’d hate for Palmer Junior to be drawn into this, especially if it’s not necessary…”

  I should go directly to heaven for not telling her to skip calling the sheriff’s department.

  I didn’t tell her to call, either. There’s such a thing as too saintly.

  * * * *

  My cohorts did not nominate me for sainthood, not even when I related the conversation word for word.

  “That’s it — it’s Clara Atwood,” Mike said.

  “No.” I softened that rejection of a possible solution with, “Not yet, anyway. I have this list going through my head. But it’s still missing pieces.”

  “Share.”

  “It might not make sense…”

  “Share,” Diana repeated.

  I did. With Jennifer typing it into her device.

  Otto’s dog Devil scratching the passenger door and the front door.

  Connie didn’t know who came after her.

  The watch.

  Rennant’s truck parked at the side of the porch instead of in front.

  Poison ivy.

  Why the butte and when.

  Pillow talk with a different pillow.

  Mary Ferguson.

  At the end, I said, “Add a catalyst. And write down the fight at the Ferguson house.”

  Jennifer did, then sent it to all of us. But I didn’t want to see the list — it already took up too much space in my head.

  “The fight was the catalyst?” she asked.

  “I think… I think it was about the catalyst. I know they don’t line up or form a pattern.”

  “That’s okay.” Diana looked over Jennifer’s shoulder at the list. “We know how your mind works on these things.”

  “We’ve got some of those,” Mike said. “Otto’s dog, the truck, why the butte and when, Mary Ferguson, and we’re down to two with who came after Connie — Clara or Nadine. The pillow talk could apply to them. I don’t get the watch, but poison—”

  I jerked up. “The watch.”

  “Is that the catalyst?” Jennifer raised her fingers, ready to type.

  “No.”

  “Why are you obsessed with that watch?” Mike asked.

  “The timeline and something else. But first, the timeline. Clara says she didn’t see it. Vicky won’t say, though I think she really, really wanted to say yes. Connie said he wore it. Then a gap — our missing woman. And, finally, Jolie says he wore it.”

  “But Jolie didn’t have an affair with him. What—?”

  “No, but she saw him wear it in the pool — which must be where she spends a lot of time—”

  “It is,” Diana slipped in.

  “—to do that to her skin. Palmer told Willa last fall that Teague gave it to him to celebrate. Clara could have broken up with him before he got it, so never saw it. So that all fits. But celebrate what?”

  “Their effort to discredit history,” Jennifer said.

  “I don’t think so. Kamden said that started this spring and you said the LLC was recent. But Rennant already had the watch. James Longbaugh said there was word about Teague drawing up a new will a year ago. The will that mentions the exact replica of Palmer’s watch and leaves it to either his son or his daughter.”

  I looked at them expectantly.

  They looked back at me.

  “Not one a young woman would wear,” I quoted. “Why would Nadine associate that watch with a young woman? Why would anyone? Unless … unless they knew Russell Teague’s will included the provision that his matching watch would go to whichever of Rennant’s children hadn’t inherited Palmer’s. Which meant Palmer’s twenty-something daughter would have one of those watches.

  “To know that, Nadine had to know about the will.”

  I nodded to myself. “And not just that Rennant was the first beneficiary, but what happened if he predeceased Teague. Because if the deaths happened the other way around, and Rennant inherited everything — including the watch — there was no need for that bequest.

  “So, when he told her about that provision, is there any chance in Palmer Rennant’s universe that he didn’t tell her he would inherit everything and trash the programs she felt so strongly about? And, having told her that, would he not also rub it in about the museum being the secondary beneficiary that missed out because he got it all?”

  I looked around at my friends, who’d kept silent while I followed that thread, inch by inch.

  Diana expelled a long breath. “If he didn’t, it goes against what we’ve heard about him being oblivious and not havin
g a filter.”

  “Nadine?” Mike said. “Nadine? But how?”

  “She’s the missing woman?” Jennifer asked. “Willa said it was Clara.”

  “She did. But that’s not what Palmer told his son. He said he’d never date another woman who thought so-called history was important — that certainly applies to Nadine. And a woman from the museum broke off with him and twice was two times too many — he could easily lump Nadine in as a woman from the museum and be talking about two women, not the same woman twice.”

  “Even if Nadine is the missing woman, why tell her about the will if Rennant didn’t tell the others?” Diana asked.

  “Because she was interested in the same things he was — on opposite sides, but the same interests. Can’t you just hear this man saying, Guess what? I’m inheriting all this stuff, use it to smash the local history elements you’ve spent your adult life working on and — ha, ha, ha, listen to this — if I weren’t around, your precious museum would’ve gotten it all.”

  They absorbed that for a moment.

  Then Jennifer asked, “Now what?”

  “Now we go to the museum. They’re having a celebration tonight.”

  * * * *

  The celebration had wound down by the time I got there.

  If the others hadn’t insisted on so much planning… But maybe this was better.

  “Hi. Did you hear the great news?” Sandy, the front desk receptionist, picked up empty glasses and plates from the otherwise deserted entry area.

  “I heard.”

  We’d agreed I’d go in alone.

  Well, they’d agreed with my plan to go in alone after we’d spotted three unmarked sheriff’s department vehicles near the museum. They considered that backup.

  I thought Jennifer and Diana following me in separate cars, supplemented by them and Mike listening, was plenty. Especially, since Jennifer put a recording device in a cupholder in my SUV’s console, another on the ceiling side of the visor, a third in my other sweater pocket — all in addition to my phone.

  “You’re too late.” Vicky Upton wrapped up leftover snacks from a buffet table. A platter at the center must have held her brownies. Empty, darn it. “All the guests are gone.”

  “What about staff? Just the two of you left?”

  “No, Clara and Nadine are in Clara’s office. Go on back,” Sandy invited.

  I heard muffled voices from the sweater pocket where I had my phone.

  “Thanks, I will.”

  In the back hallway, I pulled the phone up and said urgently. “Be quiet. I will mute.”

  “What if you’re wrong? Don’t go back there alo—”

  I muted.

  Chapter Sixty-Six

  Clara was alone.

  Misdirection? Conspiracy?

  My heart thudded with the mental syllables.

  I’d thought of them in connection with Mrs. P’s view of the timing of the Bozeman Trail forts and the railroads. Then, about Sally and her stepmother possibly killing Luther Tipton.

  Now I wondered…

  What it I had the wrong one? Or only half the answer?

  Could all the things that applied to Nadine apply to Clara?

  There were other possible causes of death. The poison ivy could have come another way.

  “Hi. Where’s Nadine.”

  Clara looked up. “Oh, hi, Elizabeth. She went home, said she’s going to bed. Just left. No, wait. Something about ice cream from the supermarket. I’m going home, too. But I’m going to have more to drink. Lots more to drink.”

  “Somebody driving you?”

  “Vicky. Said I wasn’t fit to drive. But you can catch Nadine at the supermarket if you hurry.” Her voice followed me out. “Hope you like ice cream.”

  * * * *

  I drew my SUV up in front of the figure trudging away from the supermarket, missing her toes by plenty, but putting the passenger door right in front of her face.

  “Hi, Nadine,” I said cheerily. “Hop in.”

  She looked from me to her vehicle beyond me. “This isn’t a good time. I have ice cream.”

  “I want to talk to you about your poison ivy. Won’t take a minute,” I fibbed, leaning across and pushing open the door.

  “Okay. A minute. You were right about the poison ivy. I do have it. What are you doing? Where are you going?”

  The last two anxious questions came when the SUV moved. “Just over here, so we’re out of the way of traffic.”

  I parked in the middle of a patch of empty parking lot, quietly locked the doors from the inside, shut off the engine, spotted two unmarked sheriff’s department vehicles, plus Diana and Jennifer, and turned to her.

  Her earlier joy from the announcement was gone. Ripples of lines showed under her eyes, her skin sagged, drawing down lines from the corners of her mouth to her chin. She looked like an age progression rendering come to life.

  “The no-itch lotion they recommended at the pharmacy is helping. Thanks for suggesting that.” Her voice was drained of all energy.

  Looking at her, I changed my approach.

  Questions — the things I loved best in language — could let her rebuild her defenses, answer by answer. But right now, she had no defenses.

  Time for statements, leaving no escape.

  “What I don’t understand is how you got the poison ivy, Nadine. There wasn’t any near the camp. Only place there was poison ivy was up on the butte. You said you weren’t there during the week or when Palmer Rennant’s body was found.”

  “I wasn’t.”

  “How did you get that poison ivy on your arm? It’s the same place Deputy Lloyd Sampson got it — above a pair of gloves. Except his was on both arms from wrapping police tape around the bush by the cave entrance, while yours is only on your left wrist. Where it touched the poison ivy bush near Palmer’s body when you used your left hand to brace yourself as you painted red and yellow marks on him.”

  “I didn’t. I wasn’t.”

  “The rash on your wrist, the rash the pharmacy confirmed is poison ivy before selling you a remedy, says otherwise. It takes longer to develop in people who haven’t had poison ivy. Deputy Sampson has had it before. He had a rash twenty-four hours after contact. But you’d never had it before.”

  Her lips parted. I cut her off.

  “You didn’t recognize the rash. You didn’t recognize the itch. You never had it before.”

  She didn’t argue.

  I backed off slightly on the accusatory tone but presented the statements as unassailable facts.

  “But the painting on his back… That’s what I don’t understand. That pointed the finger at the reenactors from the tribes.”

  “Oh, no. I would never do that. I’ve studied the symbols and techniques. I never would have tried to duplicate them because that would be so disrespectful of their meaning to… to try to cover up… Him— His shirt was off.”

  How do you know that, Nadine?

  She was there when he was found. That fact wasn’t on-air or in the Independence. I didn’t see Mrs. P or O.D. Everett gossiping about what they saw. Could Nadine have talked to one of the reenactors?

  I held my bottom lip between my teeth to hold in the questions.

  “Tell me about the insurance.”

  The silence stretched long, especially because I was holding my breath.

  “I didn’t intend to not get insurance this year.” She sounded peeved. “I’ve done it every other year. I always do it. It’s routine. It’s basic. It’s needed, like I told you…”

  I fought to not gulp in air. “But this year you didn’t get it.”

  She didn’t respond. I’d made it a statement, but had I pushed too hard?

  I softened my tone, my words. “You needed the money for something else.”

  Her head jerked up. “You think I— You think I stole it? I’d never—”

  “Not steal it. But it went to something else and the funds became confused, so you couldn’t tell what money was used for what�
��”

  “I could tell. Precisely.” She seemed more insulted at the idea she’d been a poor record-keeper than she’d stolen the money. Or killed a man.

  The first time I talked to her…

  Wherever we can save a penny to spend it on the events instead, that’s a win.

  “The money went to something important,” I said.

  “Supplies for the camp. We’d scrimped so much last time, with two pairings having to share ingredients for making sheepherder’s bread and for fruit stew. This year each pairing made their own loaf and their own portion of fruit stew. That’s vital for their bonding, for their pride, for their sense of ownership of the event.

  “But he wouldn’t listen to any of that. He was awful, just awful. I don’t know how he found out.”

  It wouldn’t help her misery any to speculate Verona Fuller’s loose lips unknowingly sunk her ship.

  “He was … triumphant when he told me that afternoon at the Ferguson house, right before that other man called him into the house next door. He said right out he’d use what he knew.” She looked at her hands, twisting the handle of the shopping bag. “I had to try. Even knowing how he was, I had to try. I went to his place to beg him not to say anything. One more day of the camp and then the reenactment — the most tickets sold ever — and we’d be fine.

  “But he said he’d be out first thing in the morning and stop the last day of camp, make sure there was no reenactment and that would end us. Refunding the last day of the camp would have ruined us, much less refunding reenactment tickets. He had so much, was going to get more. And we were so close, then to lose everything.”

  That came close to saying she knew about the inheritance, but not close enough.

  “It wasn’t fair. And while he was planning all this … this evil, gloating over it, he acted like I was there to start things up again.

  “I told him to put his shirt back on. I told him I couldn’t be with him if he closed the camp and reenactment. I begged him. I said it wasn’t for me, it was for all of Cottonwood County and beyond, for everybody to experience history and he got …” Surprise, even shock showed in her eyes. “He got so angry. In a rage. Screaming. He wasn’t making sense, talking about a bridge and 1812 and desertion. It made no sense. His face got red and the veins stuck out on his forehead and neck and I thought…”