Fugitive Filling Page 4

  After Trish came back and took our lunch orders, Momma walked in, searching the tables until she found us. A petite woman with more sass in her than a busload of teenage girls, my mother was frowning as she approached us, and I wondered what kind of trouble had visited her lately. Had she heard about Jake’s confrontation with Teresa, or was this possibly about something else?

  “There you both are,” she said as she took an empty chair. “I’ve been looking all over town for you.”

  “Did you hear about Teresa Logan?” I asked her.

  “No, what about her?” Momma asked as she shed her coat.

  “She’s dead,” I said simply, not knowing any other way of breaking the news to her.

  “Oh, dear. That’s terrible. She’s awfully young to die. What happened to her? Was it a car accident? It wasn’t suicide, was it? What a complete and utter waste that would be.”

  “I’m afraid someone killed her in her office,” Jake said gravely. “Suzanne and I found the body not much more than an hour ago.”

  “That’s horrible. What is this world coming to? Have they caught the killer yet?”

  “No,” I said simply. “If that wasn’t why you were looking for us, what’s up?”

  “Suzanne, would you mind coming by the house this evening? Phillip and I need to speak with you.”

  “I have two questions for you. First, is Jake invited, too, and second, will there be food?” I asked her.

  “You don’t have to invite me, Dot. I won’t be offended if this is family business.”

  “Hey, you’re in this family, too,” I reminded him. There was no way I was going to let my husband be excluded, no matter what was happening.

  “The invitation was for both of you,” she said. “Sorry I didn’t make that clear. And yes, I’ll be happy to feed you. Let’s say six, shall we?”

  “Momma, what’s this about?” I asked her. We shared meals at each other’s homes occasionally, but usually nothing as formal as a personal invitation played a part in it.

  “We’ll discuss it this evening,” Momma said as she stood.

  “I brought you some sweet tea, Dot,” Trish said from behind her.

  “No thank you, dear, but Jake needs a refill. Let him have it,” she said with a smile.

  After Momma was gone and Jake had a second glass of sweet tea in front of him, he asked me, “What do you suppose that was all about?”

  “I haven’t the slightest clue,” I admitted, “but I’m guessing that it’s not good.”

  “Do you think she and Phillip are getting a divorce?” Jake asked me gravely.

  “What? No! Of course not! He’s wanted to be with her forever. He would never leave her.”

  “What if your mother were leaving him?” Jake asked.

  “That can’t be it. Jake, she’s smitten with him. Great. Now that’s all I’m going to be able to think about until tonight. Hang on. I’m going to find out what’s going on right now.”

  Jake tried to grab my arm, but I sidestepped him. Trish was bringing our meals out as I slipped past her as well. “I’ll be right back.”

  “Fine, but don’t let this get cold,” Trish said with a frown.

  “I won’t.”

  I hurried out into the parking lot, but I was too late.

  Momma was already gone.

  Apparently I’d have to wait until this evening to find out what was going on after all.

  Fifteen minutes later, I pushed my nearly empty plate away. We’d both ordered the special, which had featured meatloaf, mashed potatoes, and green beans, along with a fresh dinner roll and a small pat of butter. I’d eaten more than I should have, but that was often the way I behaved when everything was so tasty, and I was upset about something. For some reason, my mother’s invitation had left me anxious about the news that was too important to share in the diner. “I’m stuffed,” I told my husband. “How about you?”

  “Actually, I was thinking about having a piece of pie,” Jake said with a slow smile.

  “You do realize that Momma’s going to have dessert tonight, don’t you?”

  “I know, but that’s a good six hours from now,” he protested.

  I stopped him cold before he could go on. “I’m just doing what you told me to do. Since you quit working, you only get one dessert per day. You’re the one who made me promise to keep you strong in case you wavered.”

  “I know, but I thought I’d make an exception today.”

  “That’s fine with me. If you really want some pie, then you should get it,” I said, refusing to be his dessert police officer. Ultimately he had to decide for himself what he ate. I had enough trouble watching my own caloric intake. I didn’t need to watch his, too.

  “I probably shouldn’t,” Jake said reluctantly.

  “Either way, it’s your decision,” I answered with a shrug. I’d voiced the protest he’d made me promise to give him. After that, it was his decision.

  As he paid our check, Trish asked, “What, no pie today?”

  “Don’t get him started,” I said as I grinned at her.

  “No pie it is,” she said as she took his money and made change. “I’m sure that I’ll see you both later.”

  “We’ll be around,” I said.

  Before I could get out the door, Trish called out and asked me, “Suzanne, what’s going on with your mother?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “When she left here, she acted as though the place were on fire,” Trish said. “I can’t ever remember her coming into the Boxcar and not eating.”

  “I don’t know what’s going on, but apparently I’m going to find out tonight,” I replied.

  “The world keeps getting stranger and stranger, doesn’t it? I wish it made sense at least once in a while,” Trish said as Jake and I headed outside.

  We didn’t get far, though, without being stopped by one of our neighbors.

  Had it already started? Was this the beginning of the recriminations and accusations that were surely about to come our way?

  Chapter 4

  “I think it’s really brave of the two of you to show your faces around town, given what’s happened,” Gabby Williams said to my husband and me.

  “I hardly think it’s brave of us to be seen in public, Gabby. It’s not exactly our fault that Teresa was murdered. Finding the body was just bad luck on our part,” I said.

  “I’m not talking about that,” she said, looking at us both askance for a moment. “I’m referring to Jake’s knock-down-drag-out fight with the poor woman last night. Jake, do you know if you were the last person to see her alive?” Gabby asked him directly.

  “No, I know of at least one other person who saw her after I did,” Jake answered calmly.

  “Who might that be?” Gabby asked earnestly, clearly intent on learning a new bit of gossip from my husband.

  “It’s pretty obvious, isn’t it? We know for a fact that at least the killer saw her after I did,” Jake replied. “Who knows how many other people saw her as well?”

  “Of course,” Gabby said, as though she clearly didn’t believe one word of it.

  “I’m curious about something,” I said. “How did you hear about Jake’s argument with Teresa?”

  “Surely you’re jesting, Suzanne. He wasn’t exactly keeping his voice down, and my shop isn’t that far away from the diner. My dear, I could hear him shouting from the front door of ReNEWed.” The store she named was her gently used elegant clothing shop, a bit of an oxymoron if you ask me, but Gabby did great business, and there was no doubt in my mind that her monthly profits far exceeded mine at the donut shop.

  “It was just a simple disagreement,” Jake explained. “It could have just as easily happened with someone else.”

  I thought that possibility was highly unlikely, but I wasn’t about to mention it, s
ince I didn’t want to give Gabby anything else to dig her claws into.

  “I doubt that very much,” Gabby said, “though I do understand that you weren’t the only man around town the young attorney fancied.”

  “Really? Like who, exactly?” I asked.

  “Is that correct, or is ‘whom’ proper in that case?” Gabby asked me, clearly enjoying herself.

  “I don’t care one bit about the grammar one way or the other,” I said. “I’m looking for information. Gabby, do you know something?”

  “I know a great many things, such as when it is usually proper to use ‘who’ or ‘whom,’” Gabby said, getting in another dig.

  Enough was enough. “You know you’re going to tell us eventually, so you might as well do it now,” I said with a smile, trying my best to hide my frustration with the irascible woman.

  When Gabby realized that I wasn’t going to react to her goading, she frowned at me for a moment or two before she spoke again. “If I were you, I would speak with Robert Wells.”

  For a second I didn’t know who she was talking about. Then I got it. “Bobby? Bobby Wells? The bag boy at the grocery store?”

  “He’s eighteen years old, Suzanne, and he prefers Robert,” she informed me.

  “I’ll call him Little Miss Sunshine if it will help speed this along. Are you saying that Teresa’s been flirting with him, too?”

  “Suzanne, she flirted with most of the men in this town. You just chose not to notice until it hit a little too close to home for you.” Gabby raised one eyebrow in my husband’s direction, and I knew, though he’d kept quiet up until then, that was now about to be over.

  I was right.

  “Gabby, I did nothing to encourage Teresa Logan’s attention, and when she tried to escalate things between us, I shut her down, and hard.”

  “Of course you did,” Gabby said, nearly purring.

  It was all I could do not to smile. Gabby Williams was messing with the wrong foe. I was pretty sure that she fully realized she could get away with something like that with me, but what she didn’t understand was that Jake wasn’t going to just roll over and take it. My husband took a step closer to her to remind her exactly who she was dealing with, and as he spoke, he made sure to hold eye contact the entire time. “You need to get this straight right here and now. If I’d been interested in that woman, no one would have heard a sound out of me. Is that what happened? No, it did not. I happen to be in love with my wife. She’s everything to me, and anyone who thinks otherwise can go bark at the moon, as far as I’m concerned. Are we clear?”

  “Crystal,” Gabby said, and then, to my surprise, she smiled broadly at him. “You’ve got spunk, haven’t you?”

  I thought Jake was going to lose his temper, but then to my surprise, his angry response died in his throat and he began to laugh. “Sure. I’ve got that, all right, and a big dose of moxie, too.”

  “Suzanne, he’s a keeper,” Gabby said to me. “Don’t you two worry about a thing. If I hear a word against either one of you, they’ll rue the day they spoke it in front of me.”

  “We’d appreciate that,” I said, doing my best to hide my bewilderment as to what exactly had just happened. Frankly, I was a little puzzled by it all. Had my husband just faced down the Beast of Springs Drive and actually won the confrontation? Apparently he’d even done it well enough to gain a new ally. “Is there anything else you can share with us?”

  “As a matter of fact, there is. Apparently Robert—oh, you’re right about that; calling him Robert is ridiculous. He’s always been Bobby to me. The most he’s ever going to get is Bob, and he’s going to have to earn that. Anyway, it appears that Bobby took the flirtation a little more seriously than it was intended. I happened to be near the produce section yesterday afternoon when he confessed his undying love for Teresa to her while she was getting a salad from the bar there. She clearly thought he was joking at first, but when she saw that he was serious, she scolded him as though he were a little boy. I thought Bobby was going to explode on the spot, and he nearly knocked me down as he raced for the back door.”

  “No wonder. He had to have been humiliated,” Jake said.

  “I didn’t see any humiliation in him, only rage. To me, he looked as though he could have killed her on the spot.” Gabby let that thought hang in the air for a moment or two before she added, “If I were you, I’d speak with him, and soon, before he runs away from April Springs and no one ever sees him again.”

  “Do you happen to know where he lives?” I asked her.

  “It’s hard to miss. He’s staying in an old camper out behind St. Theresa’s right now. The land has been in his family for a long time, but from what I’ve heard, the new rector is none too happy with his living arrangements.”

  “Thanks, Gabby,” I said, and Jake offered her a smile. “We’ll look into it.”

  She looked pleased with herself as she said, “You’re most welcome.”

  Jake and I picked up my Jeep, which was still parked behind the donut shop, and as my husband and I headed for Bobby’s place, I asked him, “I’ve got to tell you, I’m really impressed. How did you manage that?”

  “Manage what? I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  “Come on, you know exactly what I’m referring to. You pulled that woman’s fangs without the least bit of effort on your part,” I said. “I thought Gabby was going to start purring there for a second.”

  “Suzanne, she was trying to bully us both, and the only way to deal with that kind of behavior is to walk right up and punch the bully in the nose.”

  “I thought you were actually going to do that for a second.”

  “I don’t mean it literally. She just needed a reminder that she wasn’t the top dog, and after I nipped a little at her, she fell right in line.”

  “Can you teach me how to do that?” I asked him. That could be the most useful skill I could ever master, given some of the folks I dealt with on occasion.

  “Sorry. It’s more of an inherent thing than one that can be taught,” he said with a laugh as I pulled up beside Bobby’s camper. No wonder the church wanted it to be relocated. It had to be at least forty years old, and it was a miracle that it had made the transition to its spot in the first place. At one point someone had clearly tried to spray-paint the old finish, but they hadn’t done a proper job of prepping the material first, and large curly flakes were now pulling away everywhere. Both tires of the trailer were low to the point of being flat, and an old bucket served as a step up into the RV. Just beside the trailer was a small portable greenhouse, and when I glanced in through the plastic shell, I saw three rose bushes thriving inside, grouped around a portable space heater and looking quite toasty despite the cold. Instead of grass or gravel inside, the bed of the greenhouse was made up of red clay dirt. It appeared that the grocery clerk was a bit of an amateur horticulturalist in his off hours. Near the edge of the woods well away from the trailer and the greenhouse, there was a beat-up old storage shed with a door that barely closed.

  “I don’t see any cars around,” Jake said as he looked around the property before we approached the front door.

  “From what I’ve heard, he’s got a car, but it doesn’t run most of the time. Maybe it’s in the shop again. All I know is that every time Bobby drives past the donut shop, he’s on his motorcycle. I don’t know why he doesn’t just get rid of his car altogether.”

  “I doubt a motorcycle would be much fun in the snow, but if his car is in the shop now, maybe he’s here after all. That shed looks big enough to hold a bike. Let’s see if anyone’s home.” Jake ignored the bucket step and stayed on the ground as he banged on the front door. I could see the thin material buckling under the stress from his assault.

  The camper door opened, and Bobby Wells peered out. He was wearing the same pattern flannel shirt and faded blue jeans that I always saw him around tow
n in. He must have bought half a dozen identical shirts at the same time, and there was a bit of red clay dirt on his shoes. No doubt he’d been out working with his roses earlier, but was there more significance to the clay than that? “What’s going on, Chief?” he asked the moment he saw my husband.

  “I’m not the chief anymore,” Jake said automatically, something I wished he’d keep to himself. I hadn’t wanted him to lie to the young man, but if Bobby had been under the impression that Jake was still in charge of the police force, he might have been more receptive to our questions.

  “Hey, Suzanne,” he said as he noticed me for the first time. “What can I do for you both?”

  “Where’s your car, Bobby?” I asked him.

  “I’m picking it up from the shop in twenty minutes. Why?”

  “Just curious. I just didn’t see it when we drove up.”

  “Is that why you’re here?” he asked me incredulously. “What’s wrong with my car? It passed inspection the last time, so I’m legally driving it, if that’s what you want to know.”

  “We’re not here about your transportation; we’re here about Teresa Logan,” I said, and Bobby immediately clouded up.

  “What about her?”

  “We heard you two had quite an altercation at the grocery store yesterday,” Jake said. There was no question posed in his voice as he stated it matter-of-factly.

  Bobby was clearly unhappy about this turn in the conversation. “I thought she wanted to date me. Apparently I was wrong. We didn’t have a confrontation. It was more like a conversation.”

  “That’s not the way we heard it,” Jake replied, keeping his voice cold and narrow as he spoke. It was an effective interviewing technique, but I knew that I could never pull it off. I had the feeling that getting that “cop voice” down pat came only after being on the police force for awhile.