A Tough Nut to Kill (Nut House Mystery Series) (20 page)

My mouth dropped open in surprise, watching my grandmother move sedately along the dance floor. Her back was straight, head up, chin in the air. She looked good and danced like a pro.

Before long a very good-looking guy I’d known in high school came over and claimed me. Since I’d been feeling like a wallflower, I took Jeremy Burset’s hand and cut in line next to Miss Amelia.

The music was good. The floor was sticky. The air was so thick with smoke the tables around the dance floor disappeared in a blue haze.

I settled down to have a good time, though I wasn’t above doing a little teasing on the way home about somebody in our family having a shady past—somebody leading me directly to hell in a hand basket.

When the phone rang the next morning, I fumbled around,
then happily ignored it until it stopped ringing. I let myself lie still, hoping today would be different, everything would go our way, and the doctor in Houston would clear up where Uncle Amos had been and what he was doing and why he came back to Riverville. And for good measure, I threw in that he would trot Virginia out for us to meet and ask about the “package” Amos left with her. She would look thoughtful for a minute and—in my daydream—walk back to wherever she’d come from and bring us the package. Me and Hunter would open it together, and there was the answer to everything. It seemed he was murdered because . . .

Mama was yelling up the stairs and everything hit the fan just as I was about to solve the whole mess.

“It’s the Nut House. Somebody broke in last night. That was the sheriff. He’s over there now. Get up! Bethany! Lindy! Come on. We’ve got to get there right now.”

There was banging and yelling back and forth and I was out of bed, washed, brushed, dressed, and downstairs in about ten minutes. Bethany, looking unbrushed and unwashed and almost undressed, in a T-shirt with no bra and a pair of jeans from some back hanger in her closet, was still there ahead of me. Miss Amelia stood framed in the front doorway, as cool as ever, despite her night of pure debauchery. Mama looked flustered, but somehow all the better for being on the job and in charge again.

“Treenie’s there,” Mama said. “Sheriff told me to get into town. They’re going over things but it’s a mess. Come on, Lindy. You ride with us.”

“How did they get in?” I asked, pushing my feet into sandals.

Mama made a face at me. “How’d somebody get in your apartment? Everybody knows that key’s right up there . . .”

Miss Amelia cleared her throat. “I took it away yesterday, Emma.”

Mama looked embarrassed and, on her way out the door, leaned up to her mother and kissed her on the cheek. “Sorry, Mama. I shoulda known. Just so much . . .”

• • •

The store looked like a dervish had whirled through, front
to back. Bottles of pecan oil were spilled over split cellophane bags of nuts. Tins and gift baskets had been emptied on top of the rest of the mess. Cookbooks lay beside jars of dip, dressings, and roasted pecan syrup. A table of Miss Amelia’s special pecan and bourbon grilling glaze was upended near the register. Candies littered the floor.

Miss Amelia, standing in the open doorway, made a startled sound then shook herself.

Treenie, back by the kitchen, tears running down her face, ran to comfort her.

Bethany, Mama, and I stood with our mouths open. There wasn’t a single package of nuts or candy or bread or anything left intact. Whoever’d been there tore up things the way my test grove had been torn apart.

“Sheriff says they got in a back window. Out in the kitchen.” Hunter hurried in, open notebook in his hand.

“What’s it like out there?” Miss Amelia demanded, nodding toward her kitchens.

“Nothing,” Treenie put in. “Musta come straight in here.”

Miss Amelia looked relieved, then settled herself to deal with the mess. I could almost see her mind swinging from misery to the job ahead of us.

“Could it have been kids?” Mama looked up at Hunter, not so much worried as shocked. “Maybe teenagers. There’ve been times in the past; I remember when the co-op got torn apart, kids after money.”

“No idea yet. Sheriff says it looks like kids, because of the damage. No guy out for money would take the time. But you never know.”

“Where
is
the sheriff?” she asked, looking around. “I thought he’d still be here . . .”

“Got a call. A wild hog attacked a dog over to the Dolorous Ranch. Said to tell you he’s sorry he’s not here but most of what we had to do is finished.”

“Can we start cleaning up?” Miss Amelia asked.

“Go ahead. Hope you’ve got plenty of people.”

“I imagine, when they hear, we’ll get all kinds of folks turning up to help.” Miss Amelia rubbed her hands together. “Nothing we can’t put right in a couple of days. Still got pecans in storage. Just got to get baking, and candy making, and filling boxes.”

I looked around the store thinking maybe I wasn’t seeing the same thing she saw: pecan oil soaking into the floorboards. Syrup trickling over display tables. It looked like pure meanness to me.

Mama came from the kitchen with an armful of garbage bags. Treenie brought in a bucket of soapy water and a bunch of rags.

As if the cavalry were riding into town, the bell over the door rang and Ethelred Tomroy hurried in, her face outraged when she looked around at the damage.

“My! My!” Miss Ethelred, otherwise struck dumb, said as she grabbed a broom and started sweeping.

Behind Ethelred came Harry and Chastity Conway.

“Heard about it,” Harry said, shaking his head. “Figured you’d need help.”

Chastity hugged Miss Amelia hard then stepped back to look her over while waving away Mama’s offer of a garbage bag. “Me and Harry hurried right into town. Got the men out in our grove, spraying and such, but we can’t turn our backs on our best friends in their hour of need. That’s what Harry said, soon as we heard.”

“Just tell us what you want us to do, Emma.” Harry turned to Mama. “We’re planning on spending the whole day with you.”

He rolled up the sleeves on his new-looking fancy cowboy shirt.

“Well, Harry’s staying,” Chastity smirked. “I’ve got my weekly hair appointment. But I’ll be happy to do some baking for you. Just need your recipes, is all.”

Miss Amelia might have had a short comment on Chastity’s request and on her priorities except Jessie and Juanita Sanchez walked in right then. Tears welled in Juanita’s eyes. She put her hands to her mouth.

Jessie shook her head, looking around at the disorder. “What’s happening? Who would do this to you?” She choked on the words.

Then, Tommy Johns, the kid Miss Amelia gave work to whenever she could, came in and went right to picking things up. Morton Shrift from the Barking Coyote, along with his wife, Susie, brought in big brooms and a bucket on wheels. An industrial-sized mop was stuck under his arm.

Willy Shuck, the town miser, sidled in and went to work picking up boxes. Not a word to anyone.

The place was getting noisy with people talking and sweeping and calling out, “Get that bucket over here.” “Need another bag.” One by one, people came, until the store was filled with friends and neighbors and even some friendly strangers who’d heard and stopped in to see what they could do.

Last to arrive, probably because it took time for word to spread out as far as they lived, were the Chauncey twins. Melody and Miranda wandered in and looked around at the commotion as if they’d landed in the wrong place.

“Whew, look at this place, will ya? Why, Miss Amelia, I don’t blame you for swellin’ up like an ole toad. Awful. Jist awful. Me and Melody was on our way into town when we heard.”

“Terrible. Just terrible,” Melody put in, head shaking hard enough to knock her hat sidewise.

“Don’t you worry. We’ll get all this mess cleaned up in no time,” Amelia said. “Look at all this help we’re getting. Now you girls here to help . . .”

Melody shook her head. “We was comin’ in anyway. It’s about that gift box we bought to take to Martin. Never got there. First we had no time to come back to town to go see ’im. Next thing that greedy one there”—she motioned toward Miranda—“was rooting around in the box, opening the cookies and eatin’ ’em . . .”

“One cookie, Melody,” Miranda snapped back. “Don’t go exaggerating. Maybe you don’t see things right. Gettin’ so old, half the time you don’t know whether to scratch yer watch or wind yer butt.”

“No older than you.” Melody rolled her eyes. “Nothing sacred with this one, I’ll tell you. Like we had money for something else to take to Mr. Sanchez. Greedy, that one.” She pointed to Miranda.

“What are you trying to say?” Miss Amelia urged Melody out of her new grievance against Miranda.

“What she’s trying to say,” Miranda took over as Melody kept working herself into a state where she was almost speechless, “is that we found us something shouldn’t have been in there.”

Miss Amelia reached out to take Miranda’s hand as she turned back to her sister. By the look in her eye, she’d just come up with another pithy saying to fling at Melody.

“What I’m saying is we found something in the box. Didn’t belong there,” she confided.

Miss Amelia put a hand up, stopping her.

She turned to me. I could almost see thoughts leaping through her head. She raised her voice. “I’m gonna take a rest now. You know us old folks.” She looked around to see who was listening. She slid a look toward Hunter, to make sure he was busy. “Why don’t you girls come out to the kitchen with me? Something I’d like to show you. Oh, and Lindy, don’t you and Hunter have someplace you gotta be?”

“Well . . .” I had my hopes up about what the girls found in that gift box and didn’t like being shut out of the kitchen conclave. But Miss Amelia was giving me the head nod to get out of there and I didn’t want to make her mad at me again.

“Sure thing,” I agreed. But it was a reluctant agreement. “Guess we gotta go.”

I looked from Melody and Miranda to Miss Amelia. The twins were giving me identical frowns.

“I’ll call you, okay?” I said loud enough for everybody to hear.

She lifted a single eyebrow at me. “I’d say that’s a good idea. You call me. Just as quick as you can.”

Hunter, who’d been standing behind me, ready to go for some time, took my elbow and steered me back through the working townsfolk.

Only Mama stopped me on the way out. “You call that private detective yet, Lindy? I really got to know . . .”

“I will, Mama.”

I got a long-suffering look.

“Soon as I get a minute.”

What I didn’t add was that I had no idea when I’d have so much as a minute to myself ever again.

“Don’t forget your truck’s at the ranch,” she said, waving me away. “Better stop when you and Hunter get back, if you want to come to town.”

She looked hard at Hunter, then at me. She almost smiled. I was grateful she wasn’t up to teasing me, or that nothing sprang to her mind. I grabbed Hunter’s hand and cleared our path the rest of the way to the door.

“We’re taking the Katy Freeway.” Hunter pointed out the
obvious, making uncomfortable small talk.

I nodded. He could get there any way he wanted, as long as we got going.

“You know where we’re headed?” I asked.

“Got it on my GPS. Over by Memorial Park.”

“You call the doctor? We’re going to be late, you know.”

He nodded as he settled behind the wheel, snapped on his seat belt, and started the car. “Told him we couldn’t get there until after lunch. Fine with him. Said he’s got morning appointments anyway.”

“I hope this isn’t a wild-goose chase,” I groused because I felt like grousing.

He shrugged as he turned south at Carya and then east on US 10. “You got a better idea?”

“Not at the moment. Just I wish we didn’t have to rush out of there.”

“Why not? We’re late as it is . . .”

“The Chaunceys found something. Miss Amelia didn’t want to make a big deal out of it in front of everybody, but I know they’ve got that paper Amos wanted to give Mama. I can just feel that’s what they were talking about.”

“It’ll wait.”

“What kind of cop are you, Hunter? It’s got to be what everybody was looking for. A letter. A document. Whatever Amos wanted Mama to have.”

“You said yourself, Houston’s the most important thing we’ve got to do right now.” He turned to smile at me. “Your grandma’s just as smart as you think you are, Lindy. She’ll take care of it. You think I didn’t catch on, what was goin’ on?”

“’Course I figured. Miss Amelia must’ve thought you’d grab the letter or whatever, the way you do. It’s just that here we go running off when things are—”

“Can it, Lindy. Let’s get this done and see where it takes us. We’ll be back to Riverville this afternoon. With what we find in Houston and what your grandma’s got there, it might be all over by tonight.”

I took in a long breath, wanting to believe him but not having much faith in anything right then. “I wish Martin would get better.”

“Know what you mean. Me, too. Poor man.”

“He’s got to know . . .”

“You learn anything at the Barking Coyote last night? And why didn’t you call me? Heard you did some dancing while you were there.”

“It was kinda late when we got back. I was tired.”

“All that dancing, I’ll bet.”

I ignored him. “We saw that old girlfriend of Uncle Amos’s. That Finula.”

“Yeah. Finula Prentiss. I tried to talk to her when I was over there. Wouldn’t tell me a thing. It was like she never knew your uncle. What did she have to say?”

“That Amos was leaving town to clean up his life. She said he was all worked up, talking about people she didn’t know. He told her there was something going on in town and that it was time he stepped up. She didn’t know ‘stepped up’ to what. That was about it.”

“Heard she was pregnant. That’s the real reason he took off the way he did.”

“Well, seems that baby didn’t even exist. Old trick. Maybe this other thing he told her was just a way to get her off his back.”

“But he
was
going to this Spenser Clinic. Looks like he stayed awhile.”

“There’s that. I’m looking forward to talking to the doctor. Sure hope this woman, this ‘Virginia,’ was there with him at the time,” I said.

“I hope she’s still got that package. You think the whole thing’s for real? You know how Amos liked to lead women on.”

“Why would Amos say she should only give it to a cop or some official in case something happened to him? That doesn’t sound like a game to me.”

We were quiet. I leaned against the seat and tried to clear my head. It felt good to be with Hunter again, as a friend. I was telling myself how much I could trust him when a smarter part of me woke up and warned me to remember we were still on opposite sides of this thing. Hunter was looking for a killer. He could still believe that killer was my brother. I knew Hunter well enough to know that law and truth were important to him. And I knew me well enough to know I’d do anything to prove that no Blanchard did this.

We were getting close to Houston. Soaring cement ramps of other freeways intersected overhead. The skyline was right in front of us, tall buildings against a big flat sky filled with murky clouds rolling in from the bay. I couldn’t help thinking of those clouds as traitors, promising much and delivering nothing. Still no rain.

Hunter drove easily in traffic, pulling off the ramp to Memorial Park and going straight to where we found the rehab clinic, set down in a green park with even a few browning palm trees thrown in among the mix of native plants. Sprinklers shot out water, keeping that grass green. People on benches set in shady places fanned themselves with folded newspapers. Children chased a football halfheartedly. Early afternoon, on a sweltering Texas day, wasn’t a time for running and playing hard, unless a person courted heat stroke.

The steps to the wide glass doors of the low, stone building were deep, as if to give patients a time or two to think about the commitment ahead.

The receptionist, a typical Texas girl, pretty, with blond hair and a wide smile, offered us sweet tea while we waited for Dr. Lambert to come out to the lobby. We turned her down. I was thirsty, but more than that, I was nervous. So much counted on what the man would tell us.

The doctor was short and wiry. He wore a blue short-sleeved shirt, open at the neck. Not what I had pictured—expecting tall and thin with dark hair and a white coat. Kind of like most TV doctors.

We introduced ourselves, shaking hands all around, then followed the doctor back to his office, down a beige-carpeted hall. Photographs of historical places in Texas lined the pale green walls. Not exactly calming—battlefields and the Alamo.

At his office, he shut the door and took a chair behind his desk. We took plastic chairs across from him.

“So.” He laid thick hands on top of a stack of papers and asked to see Hunter’s credentials. Everything to his satisfaction, he relaxed back and took a deep breath. “You want to know if Amos Blanchard of Riverville was here and how that went. That about it?”

Hunter nodded.

“I’ll tell you, Officer, he was a patient up to a few months ago. He was in and out at first. Then he settled down and worked hard at his sobriety. When he left us, to go back home, he was in great shape. Had a handle on his drinking. Told me he was a changed man.”

“You know he was murdered in Riverville?” I said.

“So you told me on the phone. I looked up the news from last week and found the story online. Terrible thing. You get who did it?”

Hunter shook his head. “That’s why we’re here, Doctor. Did Amos have any problems with other patients?”

The man shook his head. “Nothing. If anything, he made a lot of friends. Amos was here to heal his life. He didn’t get mixed up in little squabbles that sometimes get started among recovering alcoholics. Too much time on their hands and too much truth coming at them all at once. We understand that. Amos stuck to his own business. Helped people. Listened to them if they came to him. But otherwise, he was like a man on a mission. Getting well meant a lot to him.”

“Did he talk to a psychiatrist here?” I asked.

The man nodded. “To me. I am a psychiatrist.”

“Can you tell me anything about what he planned to do when he left? What he was thinking about?”

The doctor shook his head. “I’m sorry. That’s all confidential.”

“But the guy’s dead.” Hunter moved uncomfortably in the chair.

“Nevertheless. He was my patient.”

I leaned forward. “Did he meet a woman named Virginia here?”

The doctor sat back and looked hard at me. “Why?”

“I’ve got this letter . . .” I pulled the copy from my purse and pushed it across the desk toward the doctor.

“Hmm . . .” he said. “Sounds like they had something going on, doesn’t it? To tell you the truth, I’m glad to hear it.”

“What we’re most interested in is this package he left with her. She still here?”

He shook his head. “All I can tell you is that, if possible, I will locate the woman. This Virginia. I can’t say if she is a patient or if I even know her.”

He stood. “I’ll do what I can. No promises. There is a great deal of importance placed on anonymity here at Spenser’s.”

I took out a ranch business card and handed it to the doctor. Hunter made a move to stop me, then sat back in his chair.

“Have her contact me at either number,” I said. “And that’s my address.” I pointed.

The doctor nodded and we left.