Rogues & Rascals in Goose Pimple Junction (Goose Pimple Junction Mysteries Book 4) (35 page)

Very quietly, she said, “You won’t find her. Him. Whoever.” She coughed and continued. “It’s my doing. I brought her here. To town and to my house.”

Johnny heard the siren growing stronger. “Dee Dee, you’re not making sense.” Soon footsteps were pounding toward them. “In here,” he screamed.

Two paramedics rushed in, immediately assessing the situation. Officer Duke came in behind them.

“Stab wound to the abdomen,” Johnny informed the paramedics, stepping away to let them work. “Y’all sure didn’t waste any time getting here.” Johnny ignored their confused expressions.

Blood was everywhere. All over him, all over the floor, like she’d tried to drag herself across the room. He’d never seen so much blood. “Thanks for coming, Duke. Why don’t you check the outside of the house?”

Skeeter pulled Johnny aside. “Sure, Chief. But I wanted to tell you that something weird’s going on. Two calls came over the wire requesting assistance at this address.”

“Two calls? Me and who else?

Skeeter shrugged. “The other call was made first—anonymously.” Just then, a second siren approached the house. Skeeter went out to meet it.

The paramedics pulled the stretcher into position and began wheeling it and Dee Dee out of the house. Johnny saw the grave look that passed between the two.

“What’s that look for?” Johnny walked alongside one of them.

Speaking into the chief’s ear, the paramedic said, “Chief, it’s bad. The wound is deep, and she’s already lost a lot of blood. I don’t know if we can save her. She may bleed out on the way to the ER. In any event, it won’t be a pleasant trip.”

“I’ll ride along with you.”

In the ambulance, Johnny leaned over Dee Dee. “Dee, is there anyone you want me to call?”

She was getting weaker. She whispered, “Phil.”

“Do you remember the number? If you don’t, I can get it.”

It took all her effort, but Dee Dee gave it to him, and he punched in the numbers on his phone while holding onto her hand. She was fading in and out of consciousness now.

He talked for several minutes, glancing at her to make sure she couldn’t hear the conversation. He realized she was in too much pain to pay attention. Finally, he quietly hit “end.” Never in his life had he been so dumbfounded. The man simply couldn’t be bothered. He’d showed no emotion whatsoever.

Johnny faced Dee Dee and lied. “He’s on his way, Dee.”

Mama always said . . . Speak your mind, but ride a fast horse.

J
immy Dean heard the sound of a key card as it was run through the lock on the woman’s hotel room door. She put one foot inside the door and pulled up short when she saw him reclined on the bed, ankles crossed, arms behind his head, watching television. He flashed her what he hoped was a roguish smile.

“Welcome home,” he said, swinging his legs off the bed and sitting on the edge, looking expectantly at her. He jumped up and down on his bottom three times. “I knew it was you. I
knew
it.” He pounded a fist on the bed.

“How?” was her sharp reply. She came in the room and closed the door, dropping her key card on the table. She looked every bit a man.

His eyes followed her as she moved to the closet. “Nobody else has figured it out, but I got to thinking there’ve been some pretty strange characters lately who’ve popped in and out of town, usually—
coincidentally—
right around the time a crime has occurred.” He winked at her. “I recognized your work. I wish you’d told me you were coming back. I coulda helped you with the Santa caper.”

“I work alone, kid.” She took off her suit coat, grabbed a laundry bag from the closet, and stuffed it in.

Jimmy Dean began to talk a blue streak. “I saw you leave the diner earlier today. After the Santa incident, I put two and two together, and I’ve been searching for you ever since. When I saw you today, I followed you all over town, and you finally led me to this hotel. My biggest problem was that I wasn’t sure what name or which persona you’d registered under, so I didn’t know if I’d be able to pinpoint your room. But I recalled seeing enough unique characters that I figured I’d just keep describing people until one rung a bell with the clerk.” He watched as Wynona pulled a sweater from a hanger and jeans from the top shelf, seemingly indifferent to what he was saying.

“See, I go to school with Darla, who was at the desk. She went on and on about
company policy,
” he mimicked a whiny tone, “and she wasn’t going to play nice until I threatened to take off my leg and beat her with it. That loosened her lips. She knows I will and I have done that.”

Wynona disappeared into the bathroom without a word.

He talked through the bathroom door, raising his voice a little. “You
wanted
to stick out like a sore thumb, didn’t you? And that was a good plan since your multiple personalities are untraceable. But you didn’t count on me recognizing you, did ya?” When he got no response, he tried again.

“You know I don’t even know your name? I mean your
real
name.” Still nothing from the bathroom, so Jimmy Dean went back to reclining on the bed and flipping channels. His nervous energy made it hard for him to sit still. His eyes darted around the room, and his foot bobbed up and down.

After a few minutes, he turned down the sound and hollered, “So what did you do? Was that blood all over you? Say, that was you I saw yesterday dressed in a tan velour warm-up suit, a cowboy hat, and big cover-your-face sunglasses, wasn’t it? And I gotta tell you, the Santa get-up was a stroke of genius.” His hand surfed the air.

The closet door wasn’t closed all the way, and it got his attention. He went over and pulled out the overstuffed laundry bag. Holding it upside down, he dumped the clothes on the bed. There was an assortment of different styles and sizes of clothing, both men’s and women’s.

When Wynona came out of the bathroom, she’d lost a good twenty to thirty pounds and some inches in height. Jimmy Dean could see on the bathroom floor a padded body suit and the brace that she must have used to force her posture to appear ramrod straight. She was dressed in a sweater and jeans, barefoot, but she still wore John Noseworthy’s nose, teeth, and fake glasses. She’d taken off the wig and put her hair up in a ponytail. She threw a pair of black wing tips on the bed.

“There must be clothes for three or four people here,” he marveled.

“Exactly. The Boy Scouts were onto something.”

He looked at her blankly.

“Be prepared?” She held out a hand, waiting for him to get the reference.

“Oh! Yeah. I get it now. Good one.”

While she was changing, Jimmy Dean had tried on a pink woman’s jacket. He held out his arms. “How do I look?”

She walked behind him and yanked down the sleeves. In one smooth move she had the jacket off. She snatched the empty laundry bag off the bed and began stuffing the clothes back into it. “You sure are a nosy one, aren’t you, kid?”

“How else am I gonna learn?” Noticing the shoes, he marveled, “So
that’s
how you got taller. Lifts. I shoulda thought of that.” He dropped the shoes and moved to the dresser next to the television, opened a drawer, and found various wigs, eyeglasses, and rubber noses. He put on a brown-haired men’s wig with a dangling ponytail.

She snatched it off his head and began adding the contents of the drawer in with the clothes she’d stuffed into the laundry bag.

“Oh come on. Can’t I have that?” He reached for it, but she blocked his hand with her arm. The murderous look in her eye caused him to step back and swallow hard.

“Sit down, kid.” She jerked her head toward a seat at the table by the window. He obeyed.

Wynona took two bottles of water from the mini-fridge, put one on the table in front of him, and unscrewed the cap of her bottle. She loomed over him, studying his face. She was very subdued. Almost morose.

His eyes darted from the bottle to her. He swallowed hard. “It’s not poisoned, is it?”

She scoffed. “You have a fertile imagination. No, it’s not poisoned.”

He took a long gulp of water.

“So what is it you want, kid?” She pulled out a chair opposite him, slumped into it, and crossed her legs.

He held out his arms, palms up. “I done told you. I want to be your apprentice. I want to be a male version of you.”

She let out a long breath. “You should aim higher, dude.”

“So, I’m guessing you killed the judge?” When she looked at him quizzically, he continued. “I followed you today when you went to his house. I looked through the window after you left, and since he was deader ’n dead, I—”

“I didn’t kill him,” she said with conviction.

“Oh come on. You expect me to believe that? You can be honest with me. I’m not gonna rat you out.”

“I’m serious. I didn’t kill the judge. But I know who did: one Dee Dee Petty.”

His face froze, and he sat up straight. “No shit?”

She nodded. “I shit you not. But watch your language, dude. My mama always told me those who swear don’t have much of a vocabulary.”

“Oh, I get it. Do as I say, not as I do, huh?”

She put the water bottle to her lips and studied him out of the corner of her eye as she took a long drink. “Kid, take my advice. Don’t be me. In fact, don’t be anything like me. You’re from a good home. You have two parents who love you. Why do you want to be me? I don’t even want to be me.”

He picked at the sticker on the bottle and unraveled a strip off the top. He kept his eyes on the bottle, and his voice came out husky and soft. “Nobody likes me. I’m different from everybody else. I’ve been deformed since day one.” His eyes teared up, and he tried to lighten the moment by adding, “And do you have any idea what it’s like to have the same name as a sausage king?
What
were my parents thinking?”

Her brow came to a V, and her eyes asked the question.

“I was born with a deformed foot. When I was two, I had to have my left leg amputated right above the knee.” He stared at his own leg as he held his foot in the air several inches from the ground. He was silent for several minutes, and she waited him out.

With his head propped on his right hand, he continued in that same lost voice. “My parents don’t care what I do. And I don’t have any friends. Nobody wants to be friends with a freak.”

“Or is it nobody wants to be friends with a bully?” Her tone was flat and held no hint of pity.