Drop Dead Divas (3 page)

“Chicken and dumplings.”

Mama laughed. That particular dish has been a joke around our house ever since it caused so much trouble a few months back. Trust Bitty to be able to give a household favorite a bad reputation.

“Hey, punkin,” my daddy said behind me, and gave me a squeeze around my shoulders. “What have you got all over the back of you?”

I answered dutifully, “Chicken and dumplings.”

At that, Mama turned around to look at me. While my father, Edward Wellford Truevine, is six foot four in his socks, my mother is just a little over five feet tall. Once she might have been taller, like five-one. Now she’s petite, has nicely coifed silver hair, fair skin that has rarely if ever seen a blemish, and insists on coordinating her clothes with Daddy’s. Oh, and with Brownie’s. That’s only in the winter, though. In the summer he gets to go naked. The dog, not my dad.

Before my mother could ask, I explained. “Naomi Spencer came up to our table to ask Bitty to be friends since Philip is dead and shouldn’t mind. It did not go well.”

My father guffawed. “She’s either crazy or stupid.”

“Yes,” I agreed.

Mama, of course, had to hear the entire story. She sat transfixed while I related the experience, a hand over her mouth to hide her laughter. Bad manners should not be rewarded or encouraged, she has always felt. When I finished, both my parents expressed their relief that Bitty seems to be recovering nicely from the shock of a few months ago.

“At least she’s not grieving anymore,” Mama said.

I stared at her. “For
Philip?
Why would she grieve for him? He cheated on her with any bimbo who’d go out with him. He embarrassed her. He gave her nothing but trouble. She’s glad to be rid of him.”

“Yes, all of that is true. But he hurt her deeply with his affairs, and in public, too. That’s not something a woman can easily forgive. Yet she stayed married to him even after he took that girl to Mexico and all the pictures of them drunk in the Acapulco hotel pool made the evening news and papers. She
must
have felt something for him.”

I hadn’t thought of that. Why hadn’t I guessed that real emotion lay beneath all her callous comments about Philip Hollandale? Sometimes I can be so self-centered. I thought about all the gossip, and how I’d listened to what Bitty said instead of how she felt. I should really learn to look beneath the surface, I told myself, and resolved that from now on, I would do my best to recognize what Bitty really meant instead of what she said.

It would not be easy.

CHAPTER 2

“Philip was pond scum,” said Bitty, regarding her freshly manicured fingernails with a critical eye. “Do you like this color? It seems too red to me, but DJ says I’m the type who can wear bold colors. Did I tell you I have a new manicurist?”

I tried again to plumb the depths of emotion that must be tightly trapped in her scarred psyche. “But he had his good points, too, I’m sure. There must be times when you really miss him.”

Bitty turned to look at me. We sat in her euphemistically named parlor with our shoes off and bare feet up on plush ottomans. Refreshing glasses of sweet tea helped cool some of the heat of midday.

“Eureka May Truevine, have you been drinking? Or smoking something funny? You’ve done nothing but pester me about that man since you got here. The funeral’s come and gone, and now we don’t have to pretend there was anything nice about him.”

Since Bitty had used my full name, it hardly seemed worth another try. Maybe my mother had misread Bitty. It was possible. Not likely, but possible. Obviously, I would have to be more subtle in my effort to allow Bitty to properly purge her grief.

Subtlety is not my strong suit. Silence stretched until I said, “Well, if ever you want to talk about him, I’m here for you.”

“I’d rather eat rocks than talk about Philip. Wait. You aren’t thinking of going back to Perry, are you? Is that what this is about?”

Since any discussion of my ex-husband usually summons an instant migraine, I became rather cross. “
No
. I just had the brainless idea your late husband’s violent death may have scarred you somehow. My mistake.”

“Good god, Trinket. The only thing that got scarred was my expensive rug. By the time I got it back from the police, it was ruined for me. Every time I looked at it, all I could see was Philip rolled up in it like a taco.  I donated it to charity, though, so it wasn’t a complete waste.”

A sharp tap in the region of my sinus cavity suggested that Chen Ling had missed her regular appointment with Bitty’s front lawn. It could certainly clear sinuses in a hurry. Since there was no sign of anything unpleasant behind or under the dog sitting next to Bitty, however, I figured it was just Chitling’s usual digestive windiness. I put my hand over my nose and seized the moment to change topics.

“What on earth do you feed that dog?” I asked despite knowing the answer. “Gunpowder and pinto beans?”

“Now, Trinket, you know she’s on a strict diet these days. I’m still using Rayna’s recipe for dog food.”

“You mean Sharita is using Rayna’s recipe. You don’t cook.”

Bitty looked at me over the rim of her tea glass. “You’re awfully cranky today. I’d ask if it was that time of the month, but you should be past that by now. Maybe you should think about taking Kit Coltrane for a test drive. If you know what I mean.”

I knew what she meant.  “While your interest in my sex life—”

“You don’t have a sex life,” Bitty rudely interrupted.

“—is gratifying,” I continued as if she hadn’t spoken, “we have an agreement.”

“I didn’t say one word about you not ever having a
hallelujah
moment. You’re just being sensitive.”

“I tend to get that way when people start prying into my personal business.”

“It’s fortunate I don’t do the same then, because you’re always prying into my personal business.”

There wasn’t a whole lot I could say to refute that. She’s right. I have a lamentable tendency to pry into Bitty’s personal business at times. There’s no good reason for it, since she lives such a charmed life nothing ever really touches her, it seems. Apparently, despite Mama’s opinion to the contrary, not even the murder of her ex-husband affected her for long.

“Forgive me,” I said, more to end the conversational sidebar than because I was sorry. Bitty, of course, knew what I was doing.

“That won’t work every time, you know. I’ll let you get by with it now, but you owe me.”

I said something rude and she smiled. “Sharita made up a batch of Mama’s pimento cheese. Want some?”

Bitty’s late mother Sarah made unarguably the best pimento cheese in the entire world, and she’d entrusted her only daughter with the recipe. Eating one of Aunt Sarah’s pimento cheese sandwiches is like taking a bite of heaven. Rich, creamy, cheesy, with just the right amount of pimento—I began to drool just thinking about it.

Sharita Stone owns a catering service and also cooks for a few private citizens who were lucky enough to get on her list of clients. Her family owns a diner that makes delicious muffins and other baked goods, and their jams and jellies are superb. Sharita’s brother is a Holly Springs policeman, and happened to be the one who arrested Bitty when she was thought to have murdered her ex-husband. All a terrible mistake, of course, and Bitty never held a grudge against Sharita or Marcus Stone for it. She’s very open-minded. That’s one of Bitty’s best virtues, that she holds very few grudges, which makes her hostility toward Naomi Spencer that much more intriguing.

Of course, if my ex had flaunted his mistress right under my nose like the senator did to Bitty, my hostility would have been immediate and flammable. Perry would have been looking for what was left of his . . . well, badly bruised private parts, while I was on the way to my divorce attorney’s office. This would have occurred in private, of course, since I really do have a dread of public scenes.

But that’s me.

Bitty often utilizes the Southern-belle trick of being a perfect lady in public, yet still manages to convey just what she
really
thinks of the person or their actions. I’ve never quite figured out how she does it without looking like a complete bitch. If I ever do figure it out, I intend to practice the art until I’ve got it mastered. There must be some kind of code words belles use. I’m usually so enthralled with their absolute mastery of the art that I don’t take notes, and consequently, can never recall exactly what was said or in what tone. It’s usually not so much the words as it is the tone of voice, the smile, the tilt of the head and batting of the eyelashes that convey exactly what is really meant, despite even the most innocuous comments. As I said, it’s an art form.

As Bitty and I converged on her gleaming kitchen like piranhas in a feeding frenzy, her phone rang. I stuck to my mission and took a bowl of pimento cheese out of the refrigerator while she answered the phone. Chen Ling—abandoned on the floor—looked up at me with a decidedly greedy gleam in her little bug-eyes. I smiled at her, rather relishing the fact that I have opposable thumbs and she—despite her charms—does not. It gave me a rare feeling of superiority, which is usually short-lived.

“Rayna!” Bitty exclaimed in what can only be described as a deliciously shocked tone. “Are you certain?”

Whatever Rayna Blue, a founding member of the Dixie Divas, said on the other end of the line must have been affirmative, because Bitty immediately laughed, then said in a solemn, pious voice, “Well, bless her heart.”

My attention was now immediately riveted on the informative phone call instead of pimento cheese. I moved closer to Bitty. “What? Bless whose heart?”

“Naomi Spencer’s,” Bitty said over her shoulder, and then went back to listening to Rayna.

Naomi Spencer? The young woman Bitty had so recently showered with venom and chicken and dumplings? Oh, this had to be good. I could hardly wait for her to get off the phone and tell me what was going on.

By the time Bitty finally hung up the phone and turned to look at me, I had managed to smear pimento cheese on slices of bread, the countertop, and the back of my hand. She sucked in a deep breath and smiled. It was a feline, satisfied smile.

“Naomi Spencer has been arrested.”

In my shock, I nearly spread pimento cheese up my arm. “No! For what?”

Bitty leaned against the counter and propped her chin in her palm.
“Murder.”

She rolled the R and drew the word out like a character in a bad TV show.

I rolled my eyes. “Who did she murder?”

“Oh, that’s the best part. Her fiancé. Race Champion.”

“Dear god—that’s really his name?”

“No, I think it’s Rupert or Roger, or something like that. They only call him Race because he races stock cars. Can you believe it? She probably killed him for giving her an engagement ring he got out of a box of Cracker Jacks.”

“I don’t think Cracker Jacks has prizes anymore,” I said, and it was Bitty’s turn to roll her eyes. I ignored her. “How did Rayna find out about it?”

“Rob. He’s a bail bondsman, remember?”

“Oh, that’s right.” Rob Rainey, Rayna’s husband, is an insurance investigator and writes bonds on the side. Since Rayna would be known as Rayna Rainey if she took his last name, she kept her maiden name. A lot of women do that these days, I’ve noticed, for various reasons. After my divorce, I went back to my maiden name, too. I’m not really sure why, except that at the time the only memory of Perry I wanted to keep was our daughter. Silly, in reflection, but that’s the way I felt then.

Anyway, Bitty and I both silently absorbed the information of Naomi’s arrest, each of us from our own points of view.

Bitty broke the silence first. “Just how much pimento cheese are you going to put on that one sandwich?”

I looked down. At least an inch of creamy, yellow-orange deliciousness was piled atop a single slice of bread. “Too much?” I asked.

“Not for me. Slap that other slice of light bread on top and hand it over.”

For those unfamiliar with Southern dialect, in some parts of the South
light bread
simply refers to plain white bread, not the low-calorie or low-carb kind. There was nothing low-calorie about our sandwiches.

We ate in silence attended only by the occasional meaningful glance and nod of our heads at one another. I’m pretty sure our inner dialogue ran along similar lines. After all, Naomi Spencer had been heard to say quite a few tacky things about Bitty’s arrest for the murder of Philip Hollandale.
What goes around, comes around
, must be the thought uppermost in both our minds.

“Well,” Bitty said when we had polished off our sandwiches and licked clean our fingers, “which Diva do we tell first?”

I thought about it. There was no question of keeping it to ourselves, of course. This was big news in a small town. Murder, despite recent experiences to the contrary, was not a common crime in Holly Springs. 

“Cady Lee Forsythe,” I said, and Bitty smiled.

“Perfect. She’s got the biggest mouth in town. It will be all over Marshall County before sundown.”

Cady Lee Forsythe, now married to Brett Kincade, whose family owns a chain of department stores, is a member of the Divas as well. A short explanation may be in order here for those unfamiliar with the Dixie Divas.

Sometime in the late 1990s, a group of Holly Springs’ female residents formed a club of sorts. It’s nothing like the Ya-Yas or Sweet Potato Queens or Red Hat Ladies, but more an informal group of women from thirty to sixty-ish who get together every month to celebrate being alive. Chocolate is a menu staple, as is champagne and/or wine, along with casseroles, and whatever covered dish anyone wants to bring. Membership in the Divas remains at twelve full-time members, with guests allowed on occasion as long as said guest is female. No men are allowed to attend our meetings other than as a deliveryman or form of entertainment. While I shall not go into too much detail about what forms of entertainment they may provide, suffice it to say I still have in my possession a black leather halter top from a transvestite stripper. It was a Mardi Gras celebration, and if you haven’t been to one, don’t scoff.