Poisoned Tarts (18 page)

Tiffany lifted red, swollen eyes to Savannah's and stared at her for a long time. It was a searching look, as though she was truly considering whether she could trust her or not.

She seemed to decide Savannah was being honest with her, and she dropped a bit of her hostility.

“So are you going to find out who killed my father?” she asked. “Or, maybe I should say, are you going to nail that bitch stepmother of mine and make her pay for this?”

“Why do you think Robyn killed him?”

She gave a disdainful sniff. “Oh, pleeez. Like we don't all know she did it.”

“
I
don't know that she did it. Do
you?”

“Of course she did.”

“Why? Why would she kill your dad?”

Tiffany hesitated, then said, “Because he was fooling around on her. My dad was a good guy, a great father, but he was a lousy husband, unfaithful and all that. It's not like that's a secret.”

This time, the hurt in the girl's eyes, mixed with shame, was so strong that Savannah felt it wash all the way through her.

Besides, Savannah knew what it was to have a father who chased women and to have everyone around you know it, too. It was a shame she and her eight other siblings had borne their whole lives.

Everyone in the little town of McGill, Georgia, knew that Macon Reid, Sr., had girlfriends who rode across the country with him in his eighteen-wheeler. He would stash them in a fleabag hotel when he came home a couple of times a year. And when he would leave to go back on the road, he took his latest squeeze with him and left his wife at the local bar to drink away her anger and loneliness.

And this young woman sitting across the table lived with the same shame. Only, thanks to the tabloids, the whole world knew about her father.

“I'm really sorry for your troubles, Tiffany,” she said. “I can understand why you don't like your stepmother. My dad finally married one of his girlfriends. I'm not very fond of her, either.”

Tiffany looked surprised. Either that she and Savannah shared a life experience or that Savannah would tell her about it, Savannah didn't know which.

“Are you sure your dad was fooling around on Robyn?” Savannah asked her.

“Yeah, I'm sure. I know how he acts when he's got somebody new. We went through this about every two or three years when I was growing up. I know the symptoms. He gets all happy…and giggly…and worried about how he looks. And sneaky.”

“Do you know who he's been seeing?”

Tiffany stalled, sipping from her soda can, playing with her hair, before she finally said, “No.”

Savannah didn't believe her. “Do you have any other reason to believe that Robyn did it?” she asked her. “Did you overhear them fighting about another woman, or anything else, for that matter?”

“Not really. Dad wasn't home enough for them to fight much. He'd be home a day or two, and then he'd leave again. Probably to be with
her.”

“The girlfriend.”

“Yeah.”

“The girlfriend you don't know.”

Tiffany shot her an unpleasant look. “Yeah. The one I don't know.”

She downed the rest of her soda and stood up. “Are you about done with me now?” she said. “Because I'm really tired, and I want to go lay down. You let Robyn go to bed. I want to go to bed.”

“Sure.” Savannah stood, too. “I just have one more question. When you got out of Detective Coulter's car there in front of the station and your attorney picked you up…did he bring you right back here?”

“Yeah. He did.”

“And was your father here then? Did you see him?”

“No. I mean…he wasn't in the house. The house was empty. I guess he might have been already out there, but I didn't see—”

She choked on her words and started to cry.

Savannah reached to touch her, comfort her, but she flinched and moved out of reach.

“Okay, thank you,” Savannah told her. “Go on upstairs, and get some rest. I appreciate you talking to me. If you need anything, let me or any of the rest of us know.”

Tiffany shot her a bitter look and said, “Yeah, right. All of you can go screw yourselves.” Then she left the room.

Savannah stood there in the middle of the kitchen, shaking her head and muttering a short prayer. “Lord, give me patience,” she said, feeling too tired to breathe. “Because if you give me strength, I just might slap that girl into next Tuesday.”

 

“I wish I'd gotten another chance to talk to Kiki Wallace,” Savannah told Dirk when he finally took her home at nearly three in the morning. “I swear she was just about to tell me something about Daisy when Tiffany came in and put a halt to it. And then Bunny found Dante, and all hell broke loose.”

“Yeah,” he said as he turned down her street. “Her mother came and got her, too, and I couldn't really hold her any longer. You were talking to Tiffany, and I figured that was more important.”

“As it turns out, not really. She says she thinks Robyn killed him. But I think that's wishful thinking on her part. I'm sure nothing would make her happier than to see her wicked stepmother go away for it.”

“But the kid gets the old man's money either way, right?”

“According to Robyn, yes. I'd check it out though, just to be sure.”

“In my spare time.”

“Yeah, in your spare time.”

They both sighed, exhausted.

“I'm sorry that you have to drive home,” she said. “I'd let you crash on my sofa, but…well…Gran.”

“No way. I'm afraid of your grandma. She'd think I was up to no good for sure.”

“She would. She truly would.”

They drove a few more blocks through the silent, moonlit neighborhood. The only sounds were some yipping coyotes in the foothills beyond. The cool October night air smelled of citrus and eucalyptus as it rushed through the car's open windows.

Dirk reached over and took a cinnamon stick from the dash. Sticking it into his mouth, he said, “I felt bad for that O'Neil gal. Must be hell what she's going through.”

“I can't even imagine. It's got to be a fate way worse than death.”

Savannah reflected back over the conversation she'd had with Daisy's mother earlier. “There's just something that's sorta bothering me,” she told him.

He drew a long breath through the stick. “What's that?”

“She came rushing over there because she was afraid that the body we'd found was Daisy's, right?”

“That's what she said. Why?”

“Well, we talked for a while, for several minutes…”

“Yeah? And…?”

“We talked, and she left.” Savannah ran her fingers through her hair and massaged a spot that was starting to ache right in the middle of her forehead. “And she never once asked me who it was that we found.”

Dirk shot her a quick look. “Oh yeah?”

“Yeah.”

They rode on in silence a little while.

Then Dirk said, “I would have asked. I mean…she may have just been really upset and worked up about it being Daisy and was so relieved to hear that it wasn't her. And she's probably really tired and hasn't slept.”

Again, a prolonged, tense silence. Finally, Savannah said. “I don't know for sure because I'm not her, but I think I would have asked.”

Dirk nodded, took the cinnamon stick out of his mouth, and tossed it out the window. “Me, too,” he said. “Me, too.”

T
his time, when Savannah walked into her house, she found Granny sitting in her comfy chair and wide awake.

“Well, look at you,” Savannah said, peeling off her jacket and removing her weapon and holster, “all bright-eyed and bushy-tailed in the wee hours of the morning.”

Gran chuckled. “Hey, I've got a chance to find out something juicy even before the
True Informer
does! How many chances in a lifetime does a body get to do that?”

Savannah kicked her loafers off and tossed them into the bottom of the coat closet. Then she put the Beretta in its off duty resting place on the top shelf of the closet under a folded windbreaker.

“Dirk gave us strict instructions not to say
anything
to
anybody
about what happened over there today,” she told Gran as she walked through the living room and into the kitchen. “On pain of death, not one single word.”

Gran followed right behind. “So, that means you're only going to tell me half of it?”

“Oh, no. I'm going to spill it all. There's no way I could keep anything like this all to myself. Besides, I remember what you told me about the definition of a secret.”

Gran smiled. “A secret is something a body tells to one person at a time.”

“That's it. Tonight I tell you. Tomorrow I tell Tammy.”

“And who do I get to tell?”

“Certainly not the
True Informer!
You make any phone calls to them, and we'll all be in deep doo-doo.”

“What if I call Martha Phelps, and she calls them? Then we could split the money they pay.”

Martha had been Gran's best friend for more than seventy years, and she was sure that whether she gave Gran permission or not, Martha would know every grisly detail before sunrise.

And since the two dear ladies were living off meager pension checks and were both born blabbermouths, why interfere with the normal processes of nature?

“I don't want to know anything about anything having to do with Martha or the
True Informer
,” Savannah said. “Not a word.”

Gran's eyes twinkled. “You won't. I'll be the soul of discretion.”

“Yeah, right.” Savannah reached into the refrigerator and took out the pitcher of sweet tea. “Want a glass?” she asked.

“No, thanks. It would keep me up all night.”

Savannah glanced up at the clock and said, “In case you haven't noticed, the night's pretty much gone already.”

“You sure are burning the midnight oil on this one.”

Savannah took a long drink of the iced tea, then stood still, eyes closed, waiting for the sugar and caffeine to hit her system, for the cold refreshment to do its work and refresh her tired body.

But nothing happened.

“You look plum worn to a frazzle, sweet pea,” Gran said. “If you don't get some rest, you're just gonna fall down in a dead faint.”

“I know. I'm going to go to bed and try to get some sleep pretty soon. I'm sure tomorrow's going to be a doozy. Just looking for Daisy was enough, and now this murder on top of it.”

“There's nothing new at all about the girl?”

“No, nothing. For a moment tonight, I thought I was going to get something out of one of the girls in their little club, but then the body was discovered and…”

Savannah dumped the rest of the tea into the sink and put the glass into the dishwasher. “That's the worst part,” she said. “Not that I don't feel terrible about Andrew Dante getting murdered, but—”

Gran gasped. “It's Andrew Dante who's dead! Lord have mercy! I figured it was one of their servants or somebody working on the party there.”

“No, it's the master of the house himself. And all the media coverage is just going to make things worse, not to mention the pressure from folks in high places.” She ran her hand over her face and through her hair. She was too tired to even focus anymore. “I just feel so bad for Daisy and her poor mother. Andrew's dead and of course, we have to catch the killer, but Daisy…Daisy's the one who's going to keep me awake tonight. I feel guilty even going to bed when she's still out there somewhere.”

Gran reached for her, took her in her arms, and gave her a hearty hug. Holding her close, she patted her back and said, “My sweet, brave Savannah. It's always about the kids for you, isn't it, darlin'? Always has been about the kids your whole life.”

Savannah looked into her grandmother's dear face and remembered the years and years of sacrifice that she had made to raise her and her siblings. “You're somebody to talk,” she said, giving Gran a kiss on the nose. “You softie. You still spoil them rotten.”

The pat on the back turned to a playful slap. “I do not. I'm gettin' downright ornery in my old age.”

“Yeah, yeah. That'll be the day.”

She took her grandmother's hand and said, “Okay, come on into the living room, and I'll fill you in on all the gory details. But there are a few things that you can't even tell Martha because they're confidential facts of the case. You're going to have to keep it straight, what you can repeat and what you can't. Got it?”

Gran swelled up, moderately indignant. “Listen, young lady, I may be old, but I'm not the least bit senile. I'm fast as a tack and sharp as a whip.”

Savannah sighed. “That's what I'm afraid of.”

 

By the time Savannah arrived at the county morgue the next morning, Dirk was already there. She saw his Buick in the parking lot when she pulled in and parked the Mustang beside it.

Normally, he might have waited for her in the lot to see if she had brought him any biscuits left over from breakfast. The fact that he had gone on inside without her, risking the possibility of having hot biscuits get cold, showed that he was in a highly agitated state.

She laid the tin containing the fresh bread on the black dash of her car in the sunshine. The biscuits would still be warm, even if it was hours before they returned.

She left the car and walked up the pathway to the brick building, thinking that she'd rather go to the dentist or the gynecologist.

Too many sad things occurred inside this building for it to be one of her favorite places. She had witnessed one too many next of kin having to identify the remains of their loved ones inside these walls.

Walking through the front doors, she saw the other reason why she hated to come here: the desk attendant, Officer Kenny Bates.

“Savannah!” he exclaimed the moment he saw her. “Hey, girl, you're looking good today!”

She and Kenny had a love-loathe relationship. He loved her; she loathed him, the ground he plodded on, the air he breathed.

Especially the air he exhales
, she thought as she caught a whiff of something that smelled like a toxic mixture of garlic and licorice.

Yeap, there were dill pickles and licorice whips on his desk.

She tried to breathe through her ears as she wrote on his sign-in sheet, Ida Spize U.

“I was wondering,” he said, leaning over the counter, trying to look down her blouse. “Do you wanna—”

“No. I do not.”

“Go to Las Vegas—”

“No!”

“With me—”

“Never.”

“For a long, romantic weekend?”

“I'd rather die. No, wait. I'd rather that
you
died.”

“We can take in some of those topless shows and get massages together, maybe get our naked bodies painted with chocolate while the other one watches.”

She looked at his metal-framed glasses, the lens of which hadn't been cleaned for years. She watched as he licked his lips with a black, licorice-stained tongue. She noted the shirt wet with green pickle juice and the way it gaped open over his gut between the buttons, letting some of his belly hairs stick through.

“I'll bet that'd put you in the mood, huh?” he said. “I'd even lick the chocolate off you if you want me to.”

The way he waggled one scraggly eyebrow at her made her fantasize about vats of hot, flaming oil being poured from castle parapets down onto deserving pervert, peasant desk attendants.

“Someday,” she told him, “I'm going to just say, ‘Screw it,' and shoot you dead where you stand, Bates. Or maybe I'll stab you in the eyeballs with your own pen over a hundred times and let Dr. Liu decide if it was overkill.”

He chuckled. And as she walked away, she heard him say, “I love all this sexual tension between us, Savannah. But we just have to take it to the next level. Reconsider that Las Vegas offer, okay.”

“Go to hell, Bates. Do not pass Go. Do not collect two hundred dollars.”

At the end of the long hallway with its shiny, hospital-type linoleum, she came to a pair of large swinging doors.

Opening one of them a couple of inches, she peeped inside and said, “Yoo-hoo. Anybody here? Dr. Jen?”

“Yeah, Van, come on in,” replied a masculine voice.

She opened the door the rest of the way to find that Dirk was there with Dr. Liu, both of them looking down at the body stretched out on the autopsy table.

“Sorry I'm late,” she said.

“You aren't late,” Dr. Liu told her. “This guy is just rushing me.”

“Who? Me?” Dirk looked highly offended. “I'd never rush anybody.”

“Oh please.” Savannah shook her head. “You've offered to push little old ladies with walkers to get them out of your way.”

“That only happened once!
Once,
and now you're never gonna let me live it down “

“Sh-h-h. Can't you tell when I'm teasing you, boy?”

Out of habit, Savannah went over to a cupboard, opened it, and took out a paper smock, cap, booties, and a pair of surgical gloves.

Once she was appropriately dressed, she walked up to the table where Dr. Liu was in the middle of Andrew Dante's autopsy.

“See,” Dr. Liu told Dirk. “Savannah wears the disposable protective gear like I ask her to.”

“Yeah, and she crosses streets at the corners, inside the little lines, too. She's a nerd, so—ow-w!”

He grabbed his arm and rubbed the spot where Savannah had slugged him. “And for a nerd, she's got a pretty good right jab, too,” he said with a chuckle.

“What have y'all got here?” Savannah asked, looking down on the body with the detachment of a professional and only a little of a layman's queasiness.

“What we have,” Dr. Liu said, “is a very interesting case.”

“That's for sure,” Dirk added. “Wait'll we tell you what killed him.”

“What killed him?” Savannah looked down at the grievous wound in the chest, which had been incised even further open. “The stake didn't do it?”

“Nope.” Dirk grinned, enjoying the suspense. “The stake didn't do it. Remember Dr. Liu said at the scene that the wound didn't look right to her, didn't look like your average stabbing with a foreign object.”

“The stake was inserted postmortem,” Dr. Liu said.

“For effect, I suppose.” Savannah shook her head. “And whoa! What an effect! What was it that actually killed him?”

“Manner of death, homicide,” Dr. Liu told her. “Cause of death, gunshot wound of chest.”

“Gunshot? Get out!”

“She's dead serious,” Dirk said. “Can you roll him over, Doc, and show her?”

“No, but if you suit up, I'll let you roll him over,” Dr. Liu said with a grin.

Grumbling, Dirk went to the cupboard, got the disposable protection gear, and put it on. When he returned to the table, Savannah snickered and said, “You didn't have to put the cap on. That's to keep your hair from dropping on the body.”

“Shut up.”

“We could do a hair count before and after you look at him,” Savannah continued, undaunted. “If you start out with eleven and end up with eleven, no problem.”

“I said, ‘Shut up.' There are some things you just don't tease about. And the hair is one of them.”

He walked around to the opposite side of the table, put one hand on Dante's shoulder and the other under his hip, and rolled him onto his side. “Are you going to stand there smarting off about my lack of hair, or are you gonna check this out?”

“I'm checking. I'm checking.”

Savannah hurried around the table to stand next to him. One look at the back of Andrew Dante's shirt told the story all too clearly.

In the center of his pale blue shirt—high, only a few inches below the neck—was a neat black hole burned into the fabric. A small amount of blood had oozed onto the fabric around it. But even with the bloodstains, she could see the telltale stain of gunpowder residue.