Chapter Six

 

I answered Harrison’s call, then moved the phone a couple of inches from my ears to protect myself from the yelling I knew would come.

“What the hell is going on there?” Harrison’s voice boomed out of the phone so loud that it echoed across the room.

Since everyone could hear him anyway, I pressed the speaker button and put the phone down on the kitchen table, motioning to Ida Belle and Gertie to be quiet. “Could you be more specific?” I asked.

“Damn it, Redding, don’t play dumb with me. Deputy LeBlanc just ran your prints so you best tell me why because when Morrow comes down here ready to shoot someone if they don’t have answers, I want to give the man what he wants.”

I looked over at Ida Belle and Gertie, who both sat frozen, staring at the phone. “There was a bit of a problem here today,” I said finally.

“What kind of problem requires the deputy to run your prints?”

“The murder kind of problem?” I cringed, waiting for the bomb to drop.

“Jesus H. Christ! You’ve got one of the most dangerous men in the world looking under every leaf, rock, and grain of sand on the planet for you, and you still can’t manage to keep a low profile. What kind of threat does it take to make you invisible?”

“The wrath of God?” I replied, hoping a bit of levity would improve the situation.

“Ahmad’s wrath is far worse,” Harrison said. “And when Morrow finds out, he may fly down there and kill you himself. The man’s hair started thinning since you’ve been gone, and I swear I’ve aged ten years trying to keep him from knowing more than he already does.”

“I appreciate everything you’ve done—”

“I can’t cover this one up,” he interrupted. “If Morrow finds out you’re down there essentially implicating his niece in a murder and that I hid it from him, he’ll fire me on the spot.”

I knew he was right, so I didn’t bother to argue. “But my cover held, right?”

“It’s holding…for now. But don’t be surprised if Morrow yanks you. This whole thing has been a mistake from the beginning. In fact, I’m going to start looking for a relocation site myself.”

“No! It’s critical that I don’t leave Sinful—not now.”

“Why the hell not? It’s a spot of swamp that you didn’t even know existed two weeks ago. Give me one good reason why you can’t leave.”

I looked across the table at Ida Belle and Gertie…my friends. And although it was infinitely depressing, the only real friends I’d ever had. I couldn’t abandon them, even if it meant pissing off Morrow and losing my job. 

“I can’t leave,” I said, “because the wrong person is going to be fingered for the murder.”

“It’s not your problem.”

“Yes, it is.”

“How in the world could it be?”

“Never leave a man behind,” I said quietly.

For several seconds, the only sound in the kitchen was the ticking of the clock, then I heard Harrison sigh. “It’s one of the old women, right?”

“Who’s he calling old?” Gertie grumbled.

Ida Belle elbowed her in the ribs and put one finger across her lips.

“Yeah,” I said.

“How do you know she didn’t do it?”

“Because the target wasn’t a threat. Remember, despite appearances, these women are not regular civilians. They operate by the same code we do.”

“Shit,” Harrison said, sounding tired and defeated. “And this Deputy LeBlanc is going to be a problem?”

“Not by choice. I’m certain he knows Ida Belle didn’t kill the man, but he has to turn over the evidence to the DA, and it looks bad because of some convoluted mess concerning gophers that you don’t even need to know.”

“So his hands are tied.”

“Yes. But mine aren’t.”

“You’re not trained as an investigator,” Harrison argued.

“I know that, but I’m the only thing she’s got.”

“Fine. I won’t try to find you another cover…yet, but I can’t make any guarantees about Morrow. If he says I have to pull you out, then I don’t have a choice.”

“I understand. And Harrison?”

“Yeah?”

“I owe you.”

“Got that right,” he said and disconnected the call. 

I slumped back in my chair. “That went well.”

“Do you think your boss will pull you out?” Gertie asked.

“If he thought it would eliminate his stress level, yeah. But he’d still have to find another place for me, and that won’t be easy. Since the real Sandy-Sue inherited everything Marge had, the estate is covering all costs of my being here. It allows me to be completely off grid. No expense reports for Morrow to file for living expenses.”

“So no paper trail for the traitor in the CIA to track you with,” Ida Belle said.

“Exactly,” I said.

“So worst case,” Ida Belle said, “we’ve got some time to clear this all up and convince him to let you stay once everything is back to normal.”

I nodded, but I had little faith that things in Sinful would ever be normal. I would be happy if people just stopped turning up murdered. The general weirdness was something I could live with. 

“Let’s get back to Ted,” I said. Now that I’d made up my mind to get in the middle of another murder investigation, I wanted to get it over with as soon as possible. “The poison and your proximity to Ted last night at the end of the rally easily give you opportunity, but what they don’t have is motive.”

“What about the election?” Gertie asked. “Would that be enough reason to kill someone?”

“In DC maybe,” Ida Belle said.

“Logically,” I agreed, “you wouldn’t think so. It’s not like Ida Belle wins by default because her opponent is dead. Someone else will step up to run and the whole thing will start over again. Even if Ted had won, it wouldn’t be a threat to Ida Belle’s livelihood or quality of living, so if the prosecutor tried to make a case for an election murder, it would be a huge stretch.”

Gertie looked happy with my assessment. “So if Ida Belle has no motive, what do we do now?”

“We figure out who wanted Ted dead,” I said. “A poisoning isn’t an opportunistic sort of murder. Someone had to acquire the poison and make sure it got into something Ted was likely to drink but Paulette wasn’t.”

“What if someone put the poison in a cough syrup bottle not even caring who they killed?” Gertie asked. “What if Ted just happened to be the unlucky one who drank it?”

I blew out a breath. “Then that would mean someone has a serious beef with the Sinful Ladies if they killed someone just to make the group look bad, or someone is batshit crazy and just wanted to kill a human being, period. If it’s the latter, we won’t know until someone else turns up dead.”

Gertie’s eyes widened. “Maybe we better stick to the Ted angle for now.”

I nodded. “So if our bottle was used to poison him, the easiest way to narrow things down might be opportunity. We need to figure out how the poison got in the bottle. If we eliminate all the Sinful Ladies who prepared the syrup, and Ida Belle and I, who else had access?”

Ida Belle frowned. “I gave him the bottle before the speeches started—telling him he’d need it after I whooped him and all that.”

“What did he do with it?” I asked.

“He put it in his blazer pocket,” Ida Belle said.

I glanced at Gertie, who shook her head. “He wasn’t wearing a blazer then the speeches started,” I said.

Ida Belle’s eyes widened. “That’s right. It was so darn hot…I guess he took it off.”

“Which means it was somewhere backstage where anyone could have accessed the bottle,” I said and sighed. “We’re right back to a suspect list that encompasses the entire town.”

“So opportunity is a dead end,” Ida Belle agreed. “I guess the only thing left is motive.”

I nodded. “Then, hopefully, the murderer should be obvious.”

“The most logical suspect is always the spouse,” Gertie said.

“True,” I agreed. “So what do we really know about Ted and Paulette? Was he a cheater? An abuser? Was she running around with a local and wanted him out of the way?”

Gertie shook her head. “I haven’t heard anything along those lines, but I don’t know either of them very well. Paulette stayed in New Orleans for spa visits and shopping most of the time. She never formed friendships with any of the Sinful women. I think she considered us and the town beneath her.”

“Okay,” I said, “what about Ted? You said he was always running around town giving away stuff. Was there anyone he formed a bond with?”

Ida Belle shrugged. “I never paid attention. He was an annoying man, always smiling too big and complimenting too much.”

“And he was a front hugger,” Gertie piped in.

“What’s a front hugger?” I asked.

“You know,” Ida Belle said, “those guys who insist on hugging you straight-on full frontal, regardless of how well they know you, and when a side hug would be more appropriate.”

“I think they just want to feel your boobs,” Gertie said.

I grimaced, not completely convinced that Ted was copping a chest feel of ancient boobs, but happy I hadn’t been subjected to one of those full-frontal hugs. I had issues with my personal space. 

“My guess is,” Ida Belle said, “that most of the women in Sinful went out of their way to avoid him. I don’t think we’ll find much information through my usual channels.”

“So maybe we need to ask a guy about Ted,” I said. “What about Walter?”

Gertie perked up. “That’s a good idea. Most of the men drop by the General Store every couple of weeks to shoot the breeze with Walter. If Ted was up to anything sketchy, Walter may know about it.”

“Do you think he’d tell us if he does?” I asked.

Gertie raised one eyebrow. 

“Oh, right!” I said, remembering that Walter had been in love with Ida Belle since the crib. “So first up is talking to Walter, but I don’t think we should have that sort of conversation over the phone.”

“No,” Ida Belle agreed. “He may not be able to speak freely while he’s at the store, and I don’t want to wait until tonight.”

“Well, then we’ve got a problem,” Gertie said, “because I don’t think any of us need to make a trip down Main Street again today. Carter may throw us all in jail if he thinks it will buy him a moment of peace.”

I nodded. “He basically implied I should go home, close myself in my house, shut the blinds, and not even look out a window.”

“That was rather rude,” Gertie said, “even for Carter. Well, if he doesn’t want anyone to see you, we’ll take my boat. We can dock behind the General Store and go through the back door to the storeroom. That way we avoid being seen by the Main Street traffic.”

“I thought you wrecked your boat in my azalea bushes,” I said.

“That was my boat,” Ida Belle said. “Gertie wrecked her own boat a couple of months ago.”

“That’s an awful lot of boat wrecks,” I said.

Gertie threw her hands in the air. “How was I supposed to know a house would be there?”

I looked over at Ida Belle, not even wanting to guess how Gertie had managed to wreck her boat into a house.

Ida Belle mouthed the word “later” and I frowned, uneasy at the prospect of boating with Gertie again. “Maybe Ida Belle should drive this time.”

Gertie shook her head. “Given the circumstances, I don’t think Ida Belle should leave her house. In fact, we should probably call Marie to come over here and sit with her just in case she needs an alibi.”

I sighed. “You’re probably right. So I assume your boat has been repaired since the highly suspect boat-house accident.”

“Uh, pretty much,” Gertie said.

I narrowed my eyes at her. “What does ‘pretty much’ mean?”

“It was only a small hole. It will be fine.”

I looked over at Ida Belle, who shrugged, clearly not up to speed on Gertie’s boat repair status.

“Oh for goodness’ sakes,” Gertie said, “stop being such a chicken. It’s just a five-minute boat ride and we’ve got a limited amount of time to work with.”

I felt my back tighten and I fought the urge to stand and fight. Gertie had hit on my biggest weakness, and I’d bet anything she knew it. Nothing lit a fire under me as much as an accusation of being a coward. And it didn’t help that Gertie was right about the ticking clock. The sooner we got all this settled, the more likely that Ida Belle would be in the clear and Morrow would leave me in Sinful.

“Fine, then let’s get going,” I said, leaving off the “before I wise up and change my mind” part.

Gertie jumped up from her chair. “Great! We can drop Ida Belle off at her house on the way to the boat dock. I just need to put on tennis shoes.”

She hurried out of the kitchen and I looked over at Ida Belle. “Please tell me that boat is structurally sound.”

Ida Belle shook her head. “I lent her my welder, but I have no idea if she did the patch correctly.”

“Great.”

“Hey, look at the bright side—at least you know how to swim.”