by J. B. Lynn
Rena looked away and scuffed her shoe against the floor. “A brother.”
“What’s his name?”
For a moment, she thought the girl wasn’t going to answer and she felt guilty for bringing the subject up.
“George,” Rena said quietly.
“When was the last time you saw him?” Bea asked.
“Last week,” Rena said.
Bea blinked, surprised. “Your family lives in the area?”
Rena nodded.
Bea had assumed that the girl lived on her own because she didn’t have anyone. She found it very disconcerting to find out that she did and that they were so nearby. She wanted to ask why she didn’t live with them, why she lived as a homeless person, but she didn’t want to intrude.
The bell jangled over the door, saving Bea from an uncomfortable situation.
Nutmeg ran in and barked excitedly.
“You found him!” Bea said with a wide smile. She was happy to see the little mutt.
Rena was, too, obviously, from how quickly she scooped him up off the floor and kissed his nose. Amanda followed him inside and closed the door behind herself, leaning against it heavily. When she turned around, Bea gasped. “What happened to you?” she asked, looking at the bump and bruise that looked to be spreading on Amanda’s forehead.
“I hit my head,” Amanda said, reaching up to finger the injury.
“What happened?” Bea asked again.
“I just told you,” Amanda snapped.
Looking nervous, Rena put the dog down and began to back away.
“How did you hit your head?” Bea asked with annoyance.
“I passed out,” Amanda admitted, “in Harmony’s shop.”
“Winnie!” Bea yelled at the top of her lungs.
“It has nothing to do with her.” Amanda swayed unsteadily on her feet, and Rena rushed forward to grab her arm and steady her.
Winnie simultaneously ran downstairs, brandishing a frying pan as a weapon. “What’s wrong?”
“Amanda passed out and hit her head in Harmony’s shop,” Bea told her.
Winnie put down the pan and hurried to Amanda’s side, her eyes widening as she took in the bruise on their older sister’s forehead. Together, she and Rena guided Amanda over to the velvet chair.
“It’s nothing,” Amanda assured them. “I just got overwhelmed by the fumes in Harmony’s shop.”
“You’re sure nobody hit you?” Bea asked.
“I’m sure,” Amanda said.
Nutmeg let out a single bark, as though confirming her story. Bea watched as Winnie’s face lit up when she realized the little dog had returned home.
“Nutmeg!”
She knelt, opening her arms wide. The mutt jumped into them and licked her face excitedly.
“We missed you.”
“Apparently, he was with Harmony,” Amanda said. “So we shouldn’t have worried about him at all.”
Bea watched as Winnie gave the dog a little shake. “You bad boy, you scared us.”
“There’s a lot of that going around,” Bea remarked.
Winnie glanced over at her, a reply on the tip of her tongue, but whatever she was going to say was forgotten as her eyes grew wide.
“Where did you get that?” Winnie asked, pointing to the scarf Bea still held.
“Rena brought it in to sell,” Bea said.
Winnie whirled on Rena, almost dropping the dog in the process. “Where did you get it?”
A panicked look crossed Rena’s face as she took a step back and raised her hands defensively. “I found it. I didn’t steal it. I found it.”
“Where?” Winnie demanded to know.
“In the alley,” Rena said.
“Do you have any idea who that belongs to?” Winnie asked.
The girl shook her head, practically shaking with fear.
“Give her a break, Winnie,” Bea said, sliding off of her seat behind the cash register and limping over so that she stood between her sister and her homeless charge. She didn’t know what Winnie was going on about, but she was obviously scaring the girl.
“Let me see it,” Winnie said, snatching the scarf out of her hands.
“What is wrong with you?” Bea asked.
Behind her, Amanda got out of her chair and made her way over to examine the scarf with Winnie.
“Does it mean something to you?” Amanda asked quietly.
“Do you know who this belongs to?” Winnie asked.
“Obviously not,” Bea snapped. “Why don’t you just bring the rest of us up to speed.”
Winnie nodded. “I’m pretty sure it belongs to Suzanne.”
Amanda gasped.
“Tell me again exactly where you found it,” Winnie said to Rena.
“I can show you,” Rena said. “It’s practically right outside your back door.”
She led the Concordia sisters out the back door of their shop and pointed to the spot where she’d found it.
“What was Suzanne doing back here?” Bea asked.
“Probably smoking,” Winnie said. “I’ve seen her back here before doing it.”
“Me too,” Amanda concurred.
Nutmeg, who’d accompanied them, ran up to the dumpster and began barking wildly.
“Quiet, Nutmeg,” Bea ordered.
The dog disobeyed the order and continued making a racket.
“I think he’s trying to tell us something,” Amanda said, moving toward him.
“Like what?” Winnie asked worriedly. “Like there’s a body in there?”
Amanda shrugged and kept moving toward the dog, who was barking at the dumpster.
“What is it, boy?” she asked.
Bea watched as the dog turned and barked three times at Amanda, while looking her in the eye.
Amanda gasped. She turned back to face her sisters. “Did you hear that?”
“What?” Winnie asked. “The dog barking? I think the whole neighborhood heard it.”
Amanda shook her head. “No.” She gulped audibly. “What it was he said.”
“Said?” Winnie asked, frowning.
Bea, who’d been hearing inanimate objects talk to her for her entire life, caught on more quickly. “He talked to you, didn’t he?”
Amanda nodded.
“What did he say?” Bea asked.
“She’s in there.”
37
“Rupert!” Amanda began yelling. “Rupert! I need you.”
“Who’s Rupert?” she heard Rena whisper to Bea and Winnie.
“It’s complicated,” Winnie said.
Rupert floated out of the shop and asked, “What are you yelling about?”
“Is there a ghost around?” Amanda asked.
Out of the corner of her eye, Amanda noticed Rena cover her mouth in horror.
“Just me,” Rupert replied.
“What about in there?” Amanda asked, pointing at the dumpster.
Rupert shrugged. “It’s closed, I don’t know.”
“Can’t you go inside and look?”
“I could,” Rupert said. “But it’s going to be dark in there, so I don’t really want to tangle with a ghost if there is one in there.”
Amanda knew from the expression on Winnie’s face that she was not happy that Rena was watching her talk to what looked like empty space.
She dropped her voice down to a whisper and spoke between her teeth. “Nutmeg says Suzanne’s in there.”
Rupert looked from Amanda, to the dog, and then back to Amanda. “So now you can talk to animals, too?”
“It would appear so,” Amanda snapped.
“What happened to you?” Rupert asked, pointing to her bruised head. “Maybe you’ve got an injury, and you’re delusional.”
“So, let me get this straight,” Amanda said, advancing on him. “It’s perfectly normal that I can talk to you, but I can’t talk to dogs?”
“Really,” Winnie said on a sigh. “Do you really have to have this whole conversation now?”
“I’m tired of living in denial,” Amanda told her. “If you don’t like it, just walk away.”
“Fine,” Winnie said. “I will.” She turned to go back into the store.
“Winnie, stop,” Bea ordered.
Amanda watched as Winnie hesitated.
“We have to do these things together,” Bea reminded her. “That’s what Harmony told us.”
“But you don’t need me here, do you?” Rena asked, obviously freaked out by the whole thing.
Bea smiled at her sympathetically. “Why don’t you go wait in the shop?”
The girl was happy to oblige, practically knocking Winnie over in her hurry to get out of the alley.
“Fine,” Rupert said, “you open it, and I’ll go dumpster diving.”
Amanda nodded, squared her shoulders, and marched over to the edge of the dumpster.
“Wait,” Winnie called.
Amanda narrowed her eyes, wondering what kind of attack her sister was now going to launch.
“Let me help you,” she said.
Then she turned to Bea and said, “It’s probably a good idea if you’re ready to call nine-one-one at a moment’s notice.”
Bea nodded and pulled out her phone, indicating that she was ready.
“At least I’m not going to land on this one,” Amanda muttered under her breath. “On the count of three.”
Winnie nodded and they both put their hands on the lid of the dumpster. “One. Two,” Amanda began.
She locked eyes with Winnie as she said, “Three.”
Together, they lifted the lid of the dumpster. Rupert dove inside, and a moment later he reemerged. “She’s in there,” he said with amazement.
“Is she dead?” Amanda asked.
“I don’t know,” he told her. “There’s no ghost, but the ghost could have left and I’m in no position to take anyone’s pulse.”
“Now what do we do?” Bea asked.
“Call nine-one-one,” Winnie said.
“And tell them what?”
“Give me a boost?” Amanda asked of Winnie.
Winnie blinked and stared at her disbelievingly. “You’re going to climb in there?”
“We need to know whether or not they need to send an ambulance,” Amanda said.
Shaking her head while lacing her fingers together, Winnie offered her older sister a place to step up.
“Thanks.”
“How are you going to get back out?” she asked as Amanda placed her foot in her hands.
Amanda shrugged and then heaved herself up and into the dumpster. She crashed with a thud against the metal wall. She reached for Suzanne and saw the other woman’s eyes flutter open. “She’s alive!” she shouted to her sisters. “We need help.”
She heard Bea making the phone call, requesting an ambulance, as she leaned closer to Suzanne. “You’re going to be okay.” The woman’s eyes fluttered, but she didn’t focus and she let out a groan.
“I’m here,” Amanda told her, taking her hand and squeezing it, trying to offer her some reassurance. “You’re going to be okay.”
She practically choked on the words, reminding herself she’d done the same thing when she’d reached the hospital where Letty was lying in bed. She’d taken her godmother’s hand, made her the same promise, and Letty had still died.
“Tell them to hurry,” she yelled out. “I don’t think that there’s much time.”
38
A crowd had gathered across the street from One Woman’s Junk to see Suzanne being loaded into the back of an ambulance. The usual suspects, Ash, Piper, Rena, Hank and Harmony, were scattered among everyone that was involved with Killer Cupcakes, Cookies and Coffee.
The ambulance pulled away and the crowd had to disperse.
Detective Tom Keller eyed the Concordia sisters sternly.
“Which one of you found her?”
Amanda, feeling very self-conscious that she was covered with garbage and smelled horrible, thought the answer was pretty obvious.
“We all did,” Bea said.
Tom raised his eyebrows.
“Let’s go inside and get out of the sun,” he suggested.
Amanda was grateful, because she knew that the heat was going to make her smell even worse, even quicker.
“Can I go change clothes?” she asked, self-conscious about the way she looked and smelled in front of the man who’d kissed her.
Tom shook his head. “Not yet.”
Amanda frowned, wondering if he was somehow torturing her for not calling him instead of nine-one-one.
Once they were all inside, Bea perched on her stool and Winnie sprawled out on the velvet chair, Tom began his questioning again.
“So, how did you find her?”
“Rena brought in a scarf to sell,” Bea began.
Tom looked at her. “This does have to do with the question I just asked, doesn’t it?”
Amanda choked back a smile as Bea scowled at him.
“Of course, it does,” the youngest Concordia huffed.
Tom dipped his head. “Then continue.”
“Rena brought in a scarf,” Bea began again.
Tom looked to Rena, hovering near the front door, as though ready to bolt at any moment. “Is that right?” he asked.
The girl nodded nervously. “I just found it.”
“And Winnie recognized it,” Bea supplied helpfully.
Tom swung his attention over to the middle Concordia sister. “You recognized it?”
Winnie nodded. “I’d seen Suzanne wearing it.”
“And then what happened?” Tom asked, jotting a note down in his notebook.
“We asked Rena where she’d found it,” Winnie replied.
“And she said out in the alley,” Bea supplied helpfully.
Tom nodded, his gaze slipping over to Amanda, probably wondering why she had remained so silent. But she really didn’t want to voice her part of the whole thing.
“What happened to your head?” he asked quietly.
She raised her chin defiantly. “I passed out in Harmony’s shop.”
He frowned, and she sensed he didn’t fully believe her.
“So, we went outside to see where she’d found it,” Winnie said, bringing the conversation back to the subject at hand. “And Nutmeg started barking.”
She shot Amanda a warning look, obviously not wanting her older sister to tell the police detective that the dog had started talking to her.
“He was barking at the dumpster,” Amanda told Tom.
“And you looked inside?” he asked.
“Technically,” Rupert said from where he hovered by the bookshelf, “I looked inside first.”
Amanda ignored him. “Yes,” she said. “We looked inside.”
“And you saw her?” Tom asked.
Amanda nodded. Tom fixed her with a stare, making it clear he knew she wasn’t telling him the whole truth.
“And how did this happen?” he asked, waving his hand in the air to indicate her whole stinky body.
“I climbed in,” Amanda said.
“Why?” Tom asked, shaking his head.
“We needed to know whether or not she was alive,” she said, thinking that should have been obvious.
Something like admiration flickered in Tom’s gaze.
“And you determined she was?” he said.
“And I called nine-one-one,” Bea added.
“Do you think she’ll be okay?” Winnie asked.
Tom shrugged, and Amanda could feel his frustration.
“I’m going to go back to the dumpster now,” he said. “Maybe there’s some other clue besides a scarf that was left behind that might tell us who did this to her.”
Amanda fought the urge to point out that it was probably whoever had gone around killing people who had attacked her, too.
She was kind of surprised when Winnie asked, “Did the autopsy report on Peter Perkins’ death come back yet?”
Tom tilted his head and looked at her curiously.
“Why?”
She shrugged. “My sister’s never fallen on a dead body before,” she said. “I know it’s probably morbid of me, but I was wondering what he died of.”
Tom nodded and said, “It hasn’t come back yet.”
Winnie nodded, looking a little disappointed.
“I’ll go out the back,” Tom said. “All of you stay here.”
“Even me?” Rena asked.
Tom shook his head. “You can go, but be careful, Rena.”
The girl nodded and slipped out the front door.
“Can I at least change clothes?” Amanda asked, tired of smelling like garbage.
He nodded. “But then bag up whatever you’re wearing for me.”
“Kinky,” Amanda heard Bea mutter under her breath.
“You could have gotten trace evidence on you,” Tom said as an explanation.
Amanda nodded her understanding and went upstairs as Tom went out the back door.
She changed quickly, bagging her clothes as Tom requested, then returned to the shop after washing her face and scrubbing her hands. Bea and Winnie were deep in conversation.
When they saw Amanda returning, they drew apart.
“Tom had to leave,” Bea told her. “Suzanne is conscious, and he went to question her. He said he’ll pick up the bag of clothes later.”
Winnie fixed her with a stern stare. “Speaking of questions, you didn’t tell us what happened to you,” she said, pointing to her own forehead.
Amanda shrugged. “I told you, the fumes at Harmony’s…”
Bea shook her head. “We don’t believe you.”
“I really did pass out,” she told them.
“Why?” Winnie asked.
Amanda hesitated. She wasn’t sure that telling her sisters this bit of information was going to help anything, and she certainly didn’t want to give them one more thing to be upset about.
“No secrets,” Bea reminded her.
Amanda nodded slowly. “You know that picture you found?”
Bea beamed. “I can’t believe that Letty left that for me.”
“Me neither,” Amanda muttered bitterly. She had no idea why her godmother had done such a thing, it was going to open up old wounds, and she didn’t understand what purpose that could serve.