A Teeny Bit of Trouble (32 page)

Zee glanced into the rearview mirror. “What’s that light behind us?”

What light? I turned. Through the rear window, I saw the shadowy form of a man. A sour, wet hardness filled my throat, like I’d swallowed a lemon wedge.

Then the shadow passed under a streetlight. Percy Fitzgerald was chasing the van.

twenty-nine

A wheeze ripped out of my throat, blotting out Percy Fitzgerald’s voice. “Stop the vehicle,” he yelled.

Zee mashed her foot against the gas pedal. The engine misfired, and the van lurched forward and stalled. “Don’t quit on me now,” she said through gritted teeth.

I dug my fingernails into the upholstery, watching the light move over the Dumpsters and brick buildings. Percy was gaining on us.

“Pump the gas,” Asia said.

“I’m trying.” Zee stamped her foot against the accelerator.

“Stop the vehicle!” Percy yelled.

The sour lump in my throat hardened. Way to go, Teeny. Good job. I’d put everyone in danger and still didn’t have proof.

“Pump it double-time,” Asia yelled.

“I am, I am,” she said. The engine caught, and the van blasted out of the alley. “Thank you, Lord,” she said.

“Don’t thank Him yet,” I said. “What if Percy saw the license plate?”

“He didn’t.” Zee jerked the steering wheel, and the van shot down a dark street. “Before we left your farm, I smeared the tag with Hershey’s Syrup.”

“He’ll know it’s a white van,” Asia said

“And he’ll run a DMV check,” I said.

Zee’s hands tightened on the wheel. “Hate to say this, Asia, but she’s right. You better leave Teeny’s farm tonight. Get out of the state. Go to Louisiana and visit Auntie Ruth.”

“You leave. I’m staying,” Asia said. “There’s lots of white vans in Bonaventure County. Percy Fitzgerald doesn’t have anything on me. He isn’t chasing me off.”

“Did you find any poison evidence?” Zee asked.

“No,” Asia said.

I didn’t mention the computer printout.

“Then we didn’t solve those anagrams correctly,” Zee said. “We need to study them again and come back.”

Zee drove back to the farm. Her headlights swept over a yellow van, and I sat up a little straighter. Red leaned against his bumper, his arms folded, his gaze openly hostile.

“What’s his problem?” Zee asked.

“Me,” I said.

We climbed out of Asia’s van, into the heat-glazed dark. Crickets shrilled from the weeds. I heard faint barking and looked at the house. Sir ran from window to window.

Red glanced at our all-black outfits. “Let me guess. You just got back from church—Our Lady of the Haints.”

“Maybe you should join us,” Zee said.

“Can I have a private word with Teeny?” Red asked.

“I can take a hint,” Zee said, and she pulled Asia into the house. After the door closed, Red turned to me. “You talked to the boss?”

“Boy, did I ever.”

“I guess he told you what’s going on?”

“You mean, the exclusionary rule?”

Red looked off into the dark orchard.

I stepped in front of him. “Is there something I need to know?”

“You should hear it from the boss.”

“I’ve heard plenty from Lester. He told me that Coop has been seeing a brunette lawyer.”

“That’s bull. The boss is crazy in love with you and nobody else. He ain’t got no room in his heart for another woman. Is that what’s bugging you?”

“It’s been on my mind.”

“He told me he asked you to marry him. But you ain’t decided.”

“No.”

“Why the hell not?”

“Because I can’t trust him. He skirts around the truth. He hides facts. I can’t live that way. I need the truth the way he needs rules. Go ahead, call me a loon. I never said I wasn’t flawed.”

“That’s part of your charm, homegirl. You’re not super-confident. You’re not a Renaissance woman. You’re really real. Your personality compliments the boss’s personality. It’s a pitch-perfect alignment of his virtues and your virtues. Your quirks and his quirks. Together, you guys are balanced. Think of it in food terms. What makes bread dough rise?”

“Yeast.”

“Plus the right balance of sugar and warmth. It’s chemistry.”

“Are you sure that he isn’t with another woman? Because when he called, I heard a female voice in the background.”

“You might’ve heard a voice, but it had nothing to do with romance.” He put his arm around me. “Come back to the O’Malleys’. Irene and Jack aren’t home. We’ll have the run of the joint.”

“Where’d they go? On safari?” I smiled. “To feast upon wild things?”

“To the country club.” He looked down at his shoes. “They’ll be gone for hours. And we can talk.”

“I’m tired of talking. I’m staying here.”

“What’s a matter, homegirl? I thought we were friends.”

“Red, I’m tired. Just go back to Irene’s. I’ll call you tomorrow.”

“But I’ve got news. I called a buddy at the GBI. A forensic anthropologist examined a sample from the urn. It was kitty litter. Human cremains should have teeth and bone chips. This stuff didn’t.”

“How did the litter get into the urn?”

“Don’t know. But I did some checking. When a body arrives at a crematorium, it comes with paperwork. Piney Flats says it never got Kendall’s body. Even if they had, it would take awhile for the cremains to cool down. But she died one day, and the memorial service was the next. That’s too fast.”

“So the funeral home is involved in this?”

“The GBI searched Eikenberry’s. The funeral director talked to them. He says he filled out the cremation papers on Kendall. Apparently Lester arranged for Piney Flatts to do the cremation. Also, to pick up Kendall’s body. But the body never got there.”

I dragged my shoe through the gravel. “Has the GBI talked to Vlado?”

“Agents went to his duplex. He’s gone.”

“Or dead.”

“Or in the Bahamas. Drinking piña coladas on the beach.”

“Bet he’s not.”

Red gazed into the darkness, where crickets shrilled from the weeds. “I don’t want to encourage your wild ideas, homegirl. But I think the Philpots are involved with the kitty litter. I’m not saying they’re selling body parts. More likely, Lester didn’t want the ME examining Kendall’s body. He wanted to hide something. Maybe he paid the winking guy—or Vlado—to dispose of Kendall’s body.”

I thought of the printout she’d found under the rug. Now she was dead. I’d found a printout behind Barb’s photograph. Was I next?

After Red drove off, I walked into the house. Before I had time to shut the door, Sir rushed into the hall to greet me. I reached down to pet him and a thick, cottony tiredness took hold. Behind me, through the screen mesh, the crickets stopped buzzing, as if something had disturbed them. A black, sucking silence descended.

I scanned the driveway. Empty. Then I glanced toward the orchard. The branches creaked. Between the rows, shadows snaked off into the gloom. I slammed the front door and locked it. But I couldn’t shake the feeling that someone was waiting. And watching.

When I stepped into the kitchen, Asia was making BLT sandwiches. “You look shook up, Teeny.”

I glanced past him, through the window. “I have a creepy feeling that something’s out there.”

“It’s probably got four legs,” he said. “But I’ll check it out.”

Zee stretched her arms over her head and yawned. “I saw a fox earlier.”

The phone rang. Asia stepped away from the stove and lifted the receiver. “Who’s calling?” he said in a gruff, “how dare you call” voice.

He listened a moment, then said, “I don’t think she’s here, but let me check.”

He covered the receiver with a pot holder. “Son Finnegan. Says it’s urgent.”

“Tell him I’m gone,” I whispered. What did Son want? And how did he know I was here?

“Sorry, Teeny isn’t home,” Asia said, then his eyes narrowed. “It doesn’t matter who I am. Yeah, yeah. I’ll tell her you called.”

He banged down the receiver and shuffled back to the stove. The smell of bacon wafted around the room. The phone rang again. Asia sighed and lifted the receiver.

Please let it be Coop,
I thought.
Please let him say he’s coming to Georgia. Please let him say he was wrong about the poisoned tree.

“Anybody there?” Asia paused. He slammed down the phone, cursing under his breath. “How’s a man supposed to cook?”

*   *   *

I awoke early Monday morning and looked out the window. Red’s van was still parked in the driveway. I put on a loose cotton dress and ran down to the porch. I stood there, arms crossed, until he got out of the van.

“Bad news,” he said. “Picnickers at the lake found a dirt pile. Black hair was sticking out. It was a body. Young, white female.”

“A frog tattoo?” My fists knotted against my arms.

“She didn’t have much skin left,” he said. “The medical examiner had trouble identifying the body.”

The sweltering heat pushed in around me, but I felt cold, so cold. “Animals got to her?” I whispered.

“Possums did some damage. But they don’t pull teeth. They don’t slice off whole sheets of skin.”

I sat down hard on the porch step, and my knees began to shimmy. “She was harvested?”

“Yeah. And somebody went to a lot of trouble to make sure she wouldn’t be identified. Her fingertips were missing, and her eyes had been removed. But her breast implants had serial numbers. That’s how the ME identified her.”

Nausea was building in the back of my throat. No teeth. No eyes. No skin.

“You’re looking queasy,” he said. “I won’t tell the rest.”

“There’s more?” I gripped the newel post.

“You really don’t look good.” He sat down beside me. “Maybe we should go inside where it’s cool.”

I shook my head. “Why did they remove her skin?”

“It’s used for grafts. Collagen injections. Surgeons use it to plump up lips. Big money in that.”

“Were Kendall’s vital organs missing?”

“No.” A drop of perspiration slid down his temple, and he wiped it off. “A donor has to be alive for a heart or kidney transplant to work. And the procedure requires paperwork. Laws are in place to prevent trafficking. But quite a few tissues can be removed postmortem. Corneas, veins, skin, teeth, tendons. Corneas are good for about ten hours. But tendons have a longer shelf life.”

“Who did this to Kendall?”

“We’ll find out. The GBI went back to Eikenberry’s with a warrant and a team. They found some fishy-looking records. They coulda been altered. And they found discrepancies in the CODs.”

“The what?”

“Cause of death. It looks like someone forged tissue donation forms, too. That takes legal know-how.”

“Josh has an MBA.” I loosened my grip on the newel post. “But he wouldn’t have the skill to remove corneas.”

“If he’s involved, he probably hired a surgeon.”

“Norris is an ophthalmologist.”

“Yeah, but can he remove yards of skin?” Red’s gaze sharpened. “I’m thinking a plastic surgeon would’ve been on the payroll. You know anybody like that, homegirl?”

“Son would never harvest organs and sell them,” I said, trying to keep my voice steady. “He’s no criminal.”

“He’s got the skill.”

“So does Norris Philpot.”

Red shoved his hand in his pocket and jiggled his keys. “When did your aunt die?”

“This past January.”

Red stopped jingling his keys. “Was she cremated?”

“No.” I felt sick and put one hand on my stomach.

“Who handled her funeral?” Red asked.

I hesitated. “Josh Eikenberry.”

“Don’t be surprised if you have to give permission for her exhumation.”

“You’re not thinking she was … She couldn’t have been. She had cancer.”

Red picked up a rock and threw it. “Maybe the tissue bank wasn’t told about the cancer. See, a few years back, there was a case in New York and Jersey. A funeral home director falsified the COD. Said people died of heart attacks and strokes, but some were riddled with cancer. A chop shop got the cadavers and harvested the organs. The Feds exhumed bodies. Bones had been replaced with plastic pipes. The kind plumbers use. The diseased tissues went into healthy people.”

I started wheezing. I reached into my pocket, grabbed the inhaler, and dropped it. The cylinder rolled down the steps. Red picked it and set it in my hands.

“There you go, homegirl. Didn’t mean to upset you. Just want you to be prepared.”

I was barely listening. My full attention was focused on the Ventolin. I sucked in the acrid vapor, then held my breath.

“Come back to the O’Malleys’ house,” he said.

I shook my head so hard, I pulled the inhaler from my mouth. I took an experimental breath, shallow but clear. No wheezing. My bronchial tubes were opening.

He nodded at the house. “Where’s your bodyguard?”

“Inside.”

“He’s doing a shitty job. You need to be in a house with an alarm. And a loaded gun.”

“Asia’s got a gun.”

“I ain’t letting him watch you. You’re a precious woman—a little loony at times. But you’re irreplaceable.”

I put my head on his shoulder. “I feel the same way about you.”

“I know who hit you in the mouth,” he said. “Emerson called this morning. She’s worried. You ought to give her a call.”

“I’m too ashamed. See, I found Barb’s diary. She may have gotten pregnant by some guy named A.M. When the paternity test comes back, I’m going to ask Lester if I can adopt Emerson. Because he doesn’t want her, and I do.”

Red looked away. “You should discuss that with the boss.”

“There’s nothing to discuss. Either he’s in or he’s out. But I don’t want to alienate the Philpots. If I cause trouble for Norris, the family will close ranks. And Emerson will be raised by body snatchers.”

“Let’s go to the O’Malleys’. I’ll keep you safe. And I’ll fix you some lunch, too.”

All this talk of death was wearing me to a frazzle. “I don’t know. I shouldn’t leave the farm unattended.”

“Ask your bodyguards to stay. Come on, let’s see how it goes. You’ve got to be in Sweeney this Friday morning for the lineup. If Irene’s house starts to wear on your nerves, we’ll come up with another plan.”

*   *   *

Since Irene wasn’t home, I wandered upstairs, down a long hall that had floor-to-ceiling mirrors. I found Coop’s old room at the end of the corridor. White walls, twin beds with white quilts, black mattress ticking on the windows. Everything was stiff and formal.
Robert’s Rules of Order
was on the bookshelf, next to
The Right Stuff
and tennis trophies. Black-framed photos lined one wall. Punctuality awards. Pictures of him and Ava. They looked happy.