1 Murder on Sugar Creek (2 page)

Chapter Two

Maggie finished eating her Hot
Pocket and glanced at the vending machine. A snack cake or candy bar would complement
the flavors of the philly steak and cheese sandwich, but she was determined to
win her newly-declared battle of the bulge. She had always maintained a trim
figure with little effort and without curbing her overactive sweet tooth, but
age and a sedentary lifestyle had finally caught up with her. In the past few
months, she had noticed excess weight around her waist, hips, and thighs.
Although the weight gain had not caused her to burst out of her clothes, she
had vowed to put a stop to her unwelcome expansion before it turned her into
one of those people who had to be pulled by a crane out of the house because
she was too fat to move or to fit through the entry doors. Needing a
distraction from the urge to raid the snack machine, she picked up the paper
and started reading the Mac Honaker murder story. Tyler hadn’t finished the
story when five o’clock rolled around the previous day and, although she had
volunteered to stay late and wait on him, Joe had sent her home. Still, on most
days, she had read the paper from cover to cover before midday, but two
interviews and a deadline had prevented her from doing so today. Tyler had
already shared many of the details with the newsroom, but Maggie learned much
from reading his story. According to Mac’s cousin, Bug, and Dottie, the lady
who worked part-time at the store, within the past six months two attempted
robberies had been thwarted by the store’s top-notch security system.

Dottie explained why Mac installed
cameras with his security system but didn’t bother to turn them on. “He said he
didn’t need to see no faces,” Tyler quoted Dottie as saying. “He said the
security system would stop them when the store was closed and his gun would
stop them when it was open. He even made sure I could shoot it before he hired
me.” As tears formed in her eyes, Dottie added, “I guess he didn’t have time to
grab the gun. It’s a shame.”

The story also contained personal
tidbits about the murder victim. Bug said Mac always wanted to run his own
business. After unfulfilling stints selling insurance, managing a shoe store,
and running the maintenance department of a small chain of locally-owned nursing
homes, Bug said Mac finally got to fulfill his dream with money he inherited
following his father’s death.

“He loved running that store,” Bug
said. “He loved meeting people and talking to them. I stopped by there every
day for breakfast and he always had a smile on his face.”

Neither Bug nor Dottie could
predict the store’s future.

“His wife, Carla, has her own catering
business and bakery, and I don’t know if she has time for a store,” Dottie said.

Maggie stopped reading, looked up
from the paper, and repeated the words, “Carla. Catering.”

She flipped through the lifestyle
section until her eyes landed on the advertisement for Carla’s Cakes &
Catering. The way the smiling wisp of a woman stood by the table of sandwiches,
chicken salad, and cupcakes had always reminded Maggie of a
Price Is Right
model
presenting a washer and dryer. Maggie estimated she had glanced at the ad
hundreds of times, but had only given it casual attention. This time, she
studied every aspect of the ad. She wondered how someone who cooked and baked
all day could stay as thin as Carla. Having eaten a few pieces of Carla’s
cakes, Maggie hoped the baker pulled her long auburn hair into a ponytail when
she worked and not just when she posed for pictures. Maggie also decided Carla
had lucked out by having a name that started with the letter C.

“What would she have named the
company if her name had been Darla?” Maggie asked herself.

 Before she could further speculate
on the fictitious Darla’s employment prospects, Tyler entered the break room.

“Your murder story was really
good,” Maggie complimented him.

Tyler opened the refrigerator door.
“I hope the follow-up is just as good.”

“Oh, when can we expect that?”

Tyler put a plastic bowl of
butternut squash soup in the microwave. “Tomorrow.”

“Tomorrow? Have there already been
new developments?”

“Yes. That is if an arrest
qualifies as a new development.”

“An arrest? Who is it?”

Tyler shrugged. “Some guy named
Kevin Mullins.”

Maggie gasped. “Kevin? I know him.”

Chapter Three

Tyler offered no further comment
and Maggie finished her lunch and returned to her desk. But she didn’t
accomplish much work. She couldn’t stop thinking about Kevin. As a boy, he had
been a friend of her younger brother, Mark. If she closed her eyes, Maggie
could see the boys collapsing in laughter under the clothesline the day they
hid a frog in her clothes basket. After overcoming the shock of a frog leaping
onto her face, Maggie had tried without success to be angry with them.

Mark and Kevin had grown apart once
they reached high school. Mark graduated as class valedictorian. Maggie wasn’t
even sure if Kevin finished school. Mark earned his master’s and worked as a
chemist in a lab outside Indianapolis. Maggie didn’t know if Kevin had a job,
but she was fairly certain he had developed a drug problem. The last time she
had seen him, she had been struck by how the skinny man with vacant eyes who asked
about Mark bore little resemblance to the chubby boy with dancing eyes who had accompanied
Mark in pursuit of a litter of runaway pigs.

The memory of the boys chasing the
pigs down the road brought a smile to Maggie’s face, but Tyler quickly brought
her out of her reverie. “Maggie, could you come in here a minute?”

Maggie joined Tyler in Joe’s
office. With a nod of his head, Joe suggested she take a seat.

“Maggie, Tyler tells me they’ve
arrested a suspect in the Honaker murder, and he’s from Sugar Creek.”

“Can you believe that?” Maggie
asked. “I told Tyler I knew Kevin –”

“You did?” Joe’s eyes settled on Tyler. “That would have been helpful information.”

“Why?” Tyler asked. “Everybody
knows everybody in small towns like Jasper.”

“Actually, Tyler, Sugar Creek is
not part of Jasper. It’s out in the county and is unincorporated, so it’s
technically not even a town. And it would be impossible for me to know all seventy
thousand people who live in the county or –”

Joe held up his hand. “Maggie, tell
us what you know about Kevin Mullins.”

Maggie scratched her head. “Except
for chatting at the store or waving at him when I’d meet his car on the road, I
haven’t seen him for some time. The last I heard, he still lived with his dad
on Little Elm Fork.” Maggie pronounced the three-word location as if it were
one word.

“Is there a Big Elm Fork?” Although
Joe made an effort to prevent the corners of his mouth from expanding, he couldn’t
suppress a smile.

“I don’t think so,” Maggie answered.

“Is that where you live? Little Elm
Fork?”

Although Maggie knew Tyler was
making fun of her, she also recognized that his question represented the first time
he had solicited personal information from her.

“No, I live on Caldonia Road.”

“What do you know? That’s actually
a normal-sounding name,” Tyler said.

“It’s what the Romans called Scotland. It’s misspelled, but it’s still paying homage to our Scots-Irish roots.”

“Is Caldonia Road considered a
holler?”

The question itself didn’t bother
Maggie. Many newcomers to the area struggled with geographic definitions. The
way locals attached terms such as creek, branch, bottom, and fork to the names
of their communities didn’t help matters, so she had no problem guiding
transplants toward an understanding of the vernacular. She did have a problem
with the way Tyler substituted his northern Kentucky accent with an exaggerated
tone when he pronounced the word “holler.”

“Yes, Tyler, Caldonia is a valley
and, thus, a hollow or, as we say it around here, a holler.”

“Ahh,” Tyler said. “Have you ever
wondered about the origin of that word?”

“Tyler,” Joe cautioned.

“I imagine the term is a reference
to the roads that were hollowed – or hollered – out of the hills.” From the
corner of her eyes, Maggie noticed Joe smiling. “Anyway, when he was younger, Kevin
was friends with my brother. They raised chickens together.”

“Of course,” Tyler said.

“Chickens?” Joe asked.

“Yeah. Daddy helped them build a
pen. They sold eggs and the occasional hen.”

“To whom?” Joe asked.

“Anybody who wanted fresh eggs or a
frying hen.”

“A frying hen?”

“Come on, Joe, you’ve lived here
for decades. This can’t be the first time you’ve heard of a frying hen.” When
Joe met her declaration with silence, Maggie added, “But you live in Jasper. It
must be a county-town thing.”

Joe nodded. “Must be.” He cleared
his throat. “Anything else you can tell us about him?”

Maggie hesitated. “I’ve heard he’s
on drugs. The last few times I’ve seen him, he’s seemed out of it. He’s a
familiar presence in the police log, too. But it’s always been for theft. I’ve
never known him to use violence. What evidence do they have on him?”

Tyler flipped open his notebook. “A
man fitting the suspect’s description was seen riding a bicycle up Lonesome Road – seriously? – shortly after Mac Honaker was shot.”

“Lonesome Road is on Sugar Creek,”
Maggie thought aloud.

Tyler continued, “The police
canvassed the area and learned the bicyclist visited one Ray Short. During an
interview with Mr. Short, police learned that Kevin Mullins had stopped by that
morning to give him money he was owed.”

“I can’t speak from experience, but
everybody says Ray Short deals drugs,” Maggie told Tyler and Joe.

“You can count the police as
everybody,” Tyler said.

“Did they search his trailer?”
Maggie asked.

“No, they didn’t have a warrant.”

“Did Ray say why Kevin owed him
money?”

“He said it was a loan, but I think
we know the truth,” Tyler answered while closing his notebook. “Anyway, Ray
said Kevin gave him two hundred bucks.”

“That’s all they have on him?”
Maggie asked. “I could come up with two hundred dollars. It doesn’t mean I
killed Mac Honaker.”

“Maggie, drug addicts don’t keep
cash on hand,” Joe reasoned.

“His dad could have given it to
him,” Maggie countered.

“Actually, he said he got the money
by selling stolen weed eaters.” Tyler paused. “That’s a lot of weed eaters.”

“I don’t know,” Maggie said. “Weed
eaters are expensive. But I don’t think any of that justifies an arrest.”

“Two witnesses picked him out of a
lineup, the police found a recently-discharged gun in the house, and his hands
tested positive for gunpowder residue. The ammunition matched casings found at
the crime scene. They’ve sent it away for a ballistics test.”

Maggie
considered Tyler’s words and asked no one in particular, “Kevin? A murderer?”

Following college, Maggie had moved
home with her parents and her brother, who was then a high school senior. Although
she didn’t feel suffocated by the arrangement, a year later, in a move that
coincided with Mark leaving for college, she rented a small apartment in Jasper.
Maggie enjoyed the three years she spent living in town. She loved walking to
work on a pleasant day and watching the annual Moonshiner Days and Christmas parades
from her apartment balcony. But she preferred county living and, following the
death of her paternal grandmother, Maggie moved into the small white clapboard
house her grandfather had built in the 1940s and in which her grandparents
raised seven children. Aunts, uncles, and cousins inhabited the hollow and only
sixty feet separated Maggie’s back door from her parents’ house. Every Saturday
morning, Maggie made that short walk for a country breakfast featuring pork
raised, butchered, and processed by her dad and fried to perfection by her mom.

As was the case at most kitchen
tables in the commonwealth, breakfast conversation focused on the University of Kentucky’s upcoming basketball season. But as Maggie scooped up the last of the
red-eye gravy with a scrap of biscuit, the talk turned to murder.

“I didn’t do much trading at Mac
Honaker’s store, but I’d stop in there to buy a bag of chips or a pack of nabs
if I got hungry,” Maggie’s dad, Robert, said.

“You bought lottery tickets in
there, too,” Maggie’s mom, Lena, sassed.

“I thought the store might be
lucky.”

“Luck didn’t have anything to do
with it,” Lena snapped.

Maggie refused to become embroiled
in her parents’ dispute over her dad’s casual lottery playing, so she asked, “Daddy,
do you believe Kevin Mullins could kill somebody?”

Robert had popped a biscuit dripping
with homemade raspberry jam into his mouth just as Maggie made her query. Still
chewing, his opened hands served as his answer.

“The police must think he could.
They arrested him,” Lena noted.

“But we know him,” Maggie said. “He
spent a lot of time at this house hanging out with Mark, and Mark doesn’t think
he’s capable of murder.”

“When did you talk to Mark?” Lena asked.

“Last night.”

“How was he? How are the boys? Did
he say when they’ll be coming in again? Does he think they’ll make it in for
Thanksgiving?”

“He was fine. The boys are fine. He
didn’t say when they would be visiting or if they’d made definite plans for the
holiday, but he did tell me you talked to him yesterday, Mom. You could have
asked him these questions.”

“I did,” Lena answered. “I thought
things might have changed.”

“From morning to evening?” Maggie closed
her eyes, rubbed her forehead, and counted to ten. “Never mind.”

“He don’t think Kevin did it?”
Robert asked.

“No. He admitted that he and Kevin
had grown apart and that they hadn’t spent much time together since freshman
year of high school, but he described Kevin as a gentle soul and a good person.
He thinks he would find money somewhere else before he would kill in cold
blood,” Maggie said.

“Everything changes when people get
on that dope,” Lena said. “It turns them into thieves. Those druggies are
robbing everybody blind. I knew something like this would happen. It’s why I’m
terrified to be here by myself. But your daddy leaves me alone to hunt or to
buy livestock or to stand down there at the hog pen and watch those hogs eat.
If it don’t have four legs and a tail, he ain’t interested in it.”

“I’m next door, Mom.”

“Even if you were home, you
couldn’t hear me scream –”

“When was the last time you talked
to Kevin, Daddy?” Maggie’s question had a dual purpose: To cut off her mom, who
lived in fear of bands of marauding home invaders, and to further ascertain her
dad’s opinion.

“Let me see,” Robert tilted his
head to the left and cleaned out his right ear with his house key. “It was back
in the spring. I saw him at the feed store. He was picking up chicken feed.”

“He still keeps chickens?”

“Yeah.” Robert finished cleaning
his right ear and moved on to his left. “He was Kevin.”

“You mean he didn’t seem high?”

“Not that day.”

Her mom snorted, “But what about
the day before that or the day after?”

“Mom, you always liked Kevin,”
Maggie said. “What’s with this attitude?”

“I did like
him – when he was a little boy. I don’t know Kevin as a man. And neither do you
and Mark.”

Maggie surveyed her living room and
kitchen. She didn’t know how her mommaw and poppaw, their seven children, and
her poppaw’s dad had managed to reside in the six-room house. Between
furniture, books, movies, electronics, and appliances, the house barely
provided enough space for her and Barnaby. Not that she planned to leave.
Maggie hated moving. After she had taken up residence in the house, she had declared
she would never move again and had performed needed repairs and renovations to
modernize the house. She had replaced the white clapboard siding with vinyl
siding, painted the kitchen cabinets, installed new windows, laid hardwood
flooring, and hung new exterior and interior doors. Although the house looked
and felt fresher, she had kept certain items for nostalgia’s sake including her
poppaw’s hat rack and her mommaw’s ironing board.

She honed in on the stack of dirty
dishes that overwhelmed the kitchen sink and decided to get the cleaning out of
the way so she wouldn’t have it on her mind when she met her friend, Edie,
later for dinner. Maggie had started running the dish water when the phone
rang.

“Hello,” she answered only to be
greeted by an automated voice asking if she would accept a call from the county
detention center. Maggie had received such calls before and had never accepted,
reasoning that those calls were probably wrong numbers. But this time, she said
yes. A few seconds later, she heard Kevin’s voice.

“Maggie? It’s me, Kevin Mullins.
Mark’s friend.”

“Hello,” Maggie knew her greeting
sounded hollow, but she didn’t know the proper salutation to offer a man
recently charged with murder.

“Listen, Maggie, I know you work
for that paper and you’ve got to tell them I didn’t kill that man. You’ve got
to tell them you know me.”

“Tell who, Kevin?”

“Everybody. The paper ain’t showing
my side of the story.”

“What is your story?”

“That I didn’t kill that man. I
went to Ray’s cause I owed him money. That ain’t no crime. I tried to tell the
cops that, but they wouldn’t listen. You can make them listen,” Kevin pleaded.

“What about the gunshot residue on
your hands?”

“I shot at a coyote that was
bothering the chickens.”

“I don’t know what I could do,
Kevin. I’m not that kind of reporter. I cover plays and pageants.”

“Dad said you could help me. He
said, ‘Call Robert’s girl. She works at the paper. She can help.’ Can you help
me, Maggie?”

“I don’t know,
Kevin,” Maggie paused before adding, “but I’ll see what I can do.”

Maggie dipped a chicken tender into
ranch dressing and listened as Edie debated which color boots to buy.

“Black will go with my entire
winter wardrobe, give or take a few items,” Edie said, “but the gray pair is super
adorable.”