by Nic Saint
Lucien thought for a moment, then muttered, “Darn it. He’s right!”
Just then, the front door opened and a skinny man dressed in a stained undershirt stepped out, his gray hair straight like a helmet. Probably Pen’s work. He came limping up. “Hey! What do you think you’re doing?!”
“Mom told me to put these in the trash?” the kid responded.
“Not you! You, you bozos,” Kevin Harvester said.
“We’re trying to ascertain what these spray cans were used for, sir,” I said.
Lucien, sensing an altercation coming, raised his phone and started filming. The moment he did, Mr. Harvester whipped his head in Lucien’s direction. “Are you filming me? Is that what you’re doing?”
“Um… I need to document every aspect of our investigation, sir,” Lucien lied smoothly, and even found time to give me a wink.
“No, you’re not,” said Harvester, and walked over to Lucien and tried to grab his phone.
Lucien, very protective of his spiffy smartphone, stepped back, holding the phone out of reach but still filming.
“Stop filming me!” Harvester yelled.
“I’m sorry, sir,” said Lucien. “But it’s protocol for us to document everything we see.”
“Document this!” said the guy, and gave Lucien a kick in the shin.
“Ouch!” Lucien cried, jumping up on one leg and hopping about. “What did you go and do that for?”
“Sir. Can you please tell me what those spray cans were used for?” I asked.
Harvester pointed an admonishing finger at his son. “Don’t you tell them, Jason. Don’t you tell them nothing!”
The kid held up his hands. “I wasn’t going to, Dad.”
Pen Harvester, who must have heard the noise, came walking out of the house. “What’s going on here?”
“These two bozos are trying to steal our paint cans,” he said, giving her a look of significance.
She gave me a dark look. “Haven’t you stirred up enough trouble already—ripping open all those old wounds? I want you off my property. Right now!”
I held up my arms in a peaceable gesture, but Lucien, who seemed enraged by the kick to the shin he’d received, took advantage of the temporary lull in the hostilities to move forward and grab one of the paint cans. “I’ve got one, Saffron,” he yelled. “Run!”
Mr. Harvester, who hadn’t seen this coming, raced after my brother, tackled him to the ground and straddled him. “Give me that!” he yelled. “Give it to me!”
“No!” Lucien cried, and desperately tried to lob the can in my direction.
“That’s my can—that’s my property—you thief! Gimme!”
“No way! And ‘horrible’ is spelled with two Rs!”
“That’s what I said,” said the kid proudly.
We all looked up when a police siren sounded and a squad car came screeching to a halt, jumping the curb. Logan came running out and took hold of Mr. Harvester’s shoulder, dragging him away from a cowering Lucien.
“They’re the ones who spray-painted Kandace Slaker’s house,” I told him quickly. “I’m sure of it.”
“And this maniac killed Kandace!” Lucien yelled, then held up both his phone and the can of spray paint. “And I’ve got the proof to back me up!”
Chapter 21
We arrived home just in time to see Grandma quietly fuming at the foot of the stairs while a lot of noise carried downstairs from higher up in the house.
“What’s going on?” I asked.
Grandma shook her head. “Your idiot brothers have been up there all day and so far all they’ve done is make things worse.”
“Oh, right,” I said, remembering. “They’re still busy fixing the roof?”
“Fixing it? So far all they’ve done is destroy what was left of it!”
“I think you should hire a professional contractor,” said Lucien.
“He’s right,” I agreed. “Roofing is a professional business. You can’t leave it to a bunch of amateurs.”
As if to confirm our words, just then there was a loud crash upstairs. Jerome, who’d been lying at the foot of the stairs, cowered and scooted away.
We all ran outside to see what was going on, and I saw that a large portion of the roof had just crashed down in front of the house, where it now lay, like a piece of sad wreckage.
“What do you think you’re doing?” Grandma yelled, shaking her fist.
Calvin’s face peered over the edge of the roof, just beyond the dormer. He grinned sheepishly. “Sorry about that. I guess it’s worse than we thought!”
Brice’s face appeared next to him. “This place is a dump! Are you sure you don’t want us to simply put up a completely new roof?”
“No, I don’t want you to put up a completely new roof!” Gran yelled. “That old roof was still plenty fine. All I asked you to do was fix a few small cracks—not to demolish the whole thing!”
“I think the cracks have just gotten a lot bigger,” I said, staring down at the piece of wreckage at our feet.
“So how did the investigation go?” asked Gran, rubbing her face.
“Great,” I said. “I think we might have caught the killer.”
“Or killers,” said Lucien, who’d taken out his phone and was now filming the piece of roof and then pointing it up at his brothers, who, judging from the creaking sounds, were eagerly dislodging a second big chunk.
“Killers? Like, plural?”
I nodded. “There was a family wrecked by the business decisions Kandace Slaker made, and they might be responsible for what happened to her.”
“So did you tell the police?”
“We did, actually. Logan arrested them and took them in for questioning. I’m sure he’ll figure out what happened, and make sure they are punished for what they did.”
Grandma patted my shoulder. “Well done, honey. At least someone in this family knows how to work a case.” She directed an angry look up at the roof. “Unlike some people I know!” she added, raising her voice.
Calvin came peeping over the dormer window again. “What was that?”
“Nothing,” said Gran. “Just keep doing what you’re doing and you’ll get your just reward soon enough.”
Calvin gave her a cheerful salute and retracted his head again.
Just then, Dalton came driving up in Grandma’s ancient Toyota Camry and parked the car right next to the creaky old Volvo. He extricated himself from behind the steering wheel with some effort, and then joined us on the porch.
“What’s going on here?” he asked, taking in the destruction. “Did a freak storm just blow off the roof?”
“Yes, a freak storm called Calvin and Brice,” Grandma grumbled.
Dalton laughed a honking laugh. “That’s funny!”
“So did you manage to find your charge?” I asked.
He shook his head. “Nope. The guy seems to have mislaid himself. I can’t find any trace of him. I dropped by all his usual haunts, following his ex-wife’s instructions, but he’s nowhere to be found. Even his car is gone.”
“Looks like he fled the state,” said Lucien, then locked eyes with me. “Maybe he’s responsible for Kandace Slaker’s murder after all.”
“Well, we have the Harvesters now,” I said. “So let’s wait and see what they tell Logan.”
“Logan?” asked Dalton with a guffaw. “Are you sweet on that guy again? I thought you guys were over and done with.”
“Ours is strictly a professional relationship,” I said a little frostily.
“Sure,” he said with a goofy grin. “Just like Calvin and that hot babe have a strictly professional relationship.”
“Hot babe?” asked Grandma. “What hot babe?”
But before Dalton could elaborate, there was a loud cry overhead, and a large object came flying off the roof.
This time it wasn’t a collection of random shingles, but Calvin himself!
Luckily Dalton deftly caught his brother in his arms.
“Damn!” he sa
id. “That was close.”
He then easily deposited Calvin back to the ground, where the unfortunate amateur roofer stood, with shaky legs, looking distinctly rattled.
“Thanks, bro,” Calvin breathed, holding onto Dalton for support. “I must have lost my footing.”
“That’s it,” Gran snapped, a little pale around the nostrils now. “I’m removing you from roof duties. You and Brice. I’m hiring a professional.”
“No, I can do it,” said Calvin, panting. “I just have to find my roof legs.”
“You’re not going up on that roof again!” Grandma insisted, then yelled, “Brice. Come down here—at once!”
Brice leaned over the dormer. “Calvin? How did you get down there so quick?”
“He fell!” cried Dalton. “Straight into my arms.”
Calvin grumbled something. It was obvious he was embarrassed to have needed to be saved by his big, burly brother.
“Can I try that?” asked Brice.
“Sure, buddy. Jump down,” said Dalton. “I’ll catch you.”
“Don’t you dare!” Grandma screeched, her voice skipping an octave.
Luckily Brice had more sense than that. Instead, he came down the usual way, via the stairs. Once he’d joined us, he looked at the chunk of roof. “Hey. How did this get down here?”
Grandma returned indoors, muttering strange oaths under her breath, shaking her head and pressing a hand to her frantically beating heart.
Chapter 22
We were just about to follow Gran in when a loud wailing sound alerted us that something was wrong.
It came from the thick boxwood hedge that lines our property and divides it from the next, the large mansion where Philana and Zedekia Gauntlet live. Zedekia is a well-known financier and billionaire, who’s married to a very attractive woman many years his junior. And it was Philana who now appeared at the opening in the hedge, a little boy in tow. It was the little boy who was wailing like a fire engine, being dragged along by our neighbor.
The wailing drew Grandma out of the house once more, and when she saw the procession of two heading our way, she clutched her heart with even more fervor. “Rodrick,” she muttered, then, louder, “Rodrick! What did you do now?!”
Her voice had made that magical transition from grandmotherly concern to grandmotherly peevishness in a flash, and I could see why. The only reason Philana Gauntlet would be dragging my little brother along, her own face a thundercloud, would be if he’d been up to something. Again.
“Margaret, this has got to stop!” Philana snapped the moment she came within earshot. She was a strikingly handsome woman with shiny blond locks and clear blue eyes, which were now crackling with anger.
“What did he do?” asked Grandma, now resigned to hearing yet another lament about the little rascal.
“He painted my porch!” cried Philana.
“Painted your porch?” Whatever it was that Grandma had expected, it certainly wasn’t this. “Why would he be painting your porch?”
“I only did it to help!” said Rodrick, yanking himself loose from our neighbor’s grip and streaking over to Grandma to be comforted by the old lady. Instead, Gran held him at arm’s length and gave him a reproachful look.
“He destroyed the whole thing!” Philana said. “He must have found a few old cans of paint in the shed and he simply dumped them across our beautiful porch, then dabbed it around with a broom. It’s a mess! I’ll have to have the paint scraped off and the entire porch redone! Alaskan cedar wood! Ruined!”
Rodrick, who was scuffing his foot on the porch floor, said softly, “I only wanted to help. Do my good deed for the day.”
We all uttered a collective groan.
“Haven’t you done enough good deeds for the day?” I asked. “As far as I can tell, you’re already way beyond your limit.”
“I wanted to save up a few good deeds for the days I can’t get any good deeds done,” said Rodrick with perfect childlike logic. “Save a good deed for a rainy day. And when I saw that Mrs. Gauntlet’s porch was chipped—”
“My porch wasn’t chipped,” said the woman indignantly. The former model took great pride in her house and the mention of the word ‘chipped’ seemed to set her off even more than the application of the red paint had done.
“There were a few patches that looked like they needed a nice new coat of paint,” said Rodrick. “So I decided to chip in and do my bit.”
“Oh, God,” said Calvin, shaking his head.
Dalton, who’d been gently smiling to himself, now burst into a full-featured guffaw, while Lucien, filming the scene, couldn’t suppress a smile either. The only ones who weren’t smiling were Grandma, Philana Gauntlet and me. Even Brice seemed to think the whole thing absolutely hilarious. Probably because when they were Rodrick’s age, they’d gone through the same phase—driving our parents and Grandma crazy in the process.
Philana planted her hands on her hips. “So you think this is funny, huh? Well, I don’t. Who’s going to pay to have my porch redone?”
“But it doesn’t have to be redone,” said Rodrick. “I just did it.” Then a thought occurred to him. “You mean you don’t like the color?”
“No, I don’t like the color, or the execution.”
“I can try a different color,” Rodrick offered magnanimously. “I can try purple. Or even yellow. I’m great with yellow. Or purple and yellow?”
“Don’t you dare!” the woman screamed, pointing a finger at the little pest.
“I’ll reimburse you,” said Grandma. “Of course I will. You just have your porch redone and I’ll pay for everything.”
This seemed to calm down our irate neighbor to some degree. The prospect of having her porch completely redone at the expense of a third party obviously appealed to her. And for a moment I thought she was going to tell us that Rodrick had applied his paint-daubed broom to the house as well and that the entire place would have to be redone. She refrained from going as far as that, however, probably feeling that as we were still neighbors she needed to remain neighborly. Besides, since her husband was one of the richest men in the country, he could probably afford a lick of paint. Or a new porch.
Once the woman had left, Grandma turned her seething eye on her grandson. “You’re grounded,” she announced.
“Oh, but Gran!”
“Grounded for a week. And that means no TV and no internet!”
“But Gran! How can I do my good deeds when I’m grounded?”
“And you’re going to stop with the good deeds. Until you learn the difference between a genuine good deed and simply annoying people!”
“But Gran!”
“No buts. Now get your butt inside.”
In spite of myself, I had to smile, too. Rodrick might be a little demon, but you couldn’t accuse him of doing things halfheartedly. The kid had spunk.
And we were just about to return indoors when a squad car appeared at the bottom of the drive, kicking up a trail of dust. Logan Munroe had arrived.
Chapter 23
When Logan saw four Diffley men—and one Diffley woman—forming his welcome committee, he faltered for a moment. He quickly pulled himself together, though, and proceeded to walk up to us.
“Logan! My man!” cried Dalton, the policeman’s biggest fan. He tried to perform a complicated handshake with the cop but Logan merely stared at him dumbly, probably wondering what my most muscular brother was up to.
Dalton soon gave up and went into the house.
Calvin, who’d never been Logan’s fan, merely grunted, “Munroe,” then turned on his heel and strode in, presumably to take a bath and scrub off the dirt from spending the day demolishing the roof. And falling off it, of course.
Lucien gave the detective his most seductive smile. “I knew you’d be back, darling.”
“Why did you think that, exactly?” asked Logan, eyeing Lucien with a modicum of distaste.
“Because I felt it. Didn’t you feel it?” He had placed a hand on the poli
ceman’s bicep and was massaging it gently.
“Feel what?” asked Logan, carefully removing Lucien’s hand from his bicep and returning it to its owner.
“The connection. The torrid heat emanating between us. I knew you wouldn’t be able to stay away. Oh, darling,” he sighed, and practically threw himself into the cop’s arms. Unfortunately for him, Logan sidestepped the ill-fated attempt at intimacy, causing my brother to falter and tumble into Brice’s arms instead.
Brice instantly returned Lucien to perpendicularity and gave Logan his best grin. “You still haven’t gotten back to me about that ride-along, buddy.”
Logan resisted the urge to roll his eyes. “There won’t be a ride-along, Brice,” he said. “We don’t do ride-alongs in this town. And what’s more, I’m pretty sure you’d have to take the matter up with my boss instead of me.”
“Your boss, huh? Great tip, buddy,” said Brice, planting a hearty slap on Logan’s shoulder. “I’ll get on the horn with Curtis Whitehouse and we’ll get this thing set up straightaway.” He returned inside the house, rubbing his hands, followed by Lucien, who seemed deeply saddened that Logan had spurned his advances.
Finally it was just me and Logan, and we both breathed a sigh of relief.
“Care for a stroll?” he asked, gesturing at the driveway.
“Sure. And I want to apologize for my brothers. They… can be a handful.”
“Oh, that’s all right,” he said. “I can stand my ground just fine.”
I smiled as we took a turn down the drive. “Did you come here for a reason, Detective, or did you simply miss Lucien as much as he imagined?”
“Oh, God, no,” he said immediately. “I don’t know what’s gotten into that brother of yours.”
“He needs a boyfriend,” I said. “It’s been too long since he had a solid relationship and I guess he’s getting a little desperate.”
“I’ll say. Can’t you make it plain to him that I’m not exactly boyfriend material—at least not to other boyfriends?”
“I’m sure he’ll have figured that out for himself by now.”