Salvaged to Death (9 page)

“The dried bones of former communists,” Sadie muttered.

“Sadie,” Luke said. To her right, she could swear that she heard Bo chuckle, but when she looked at him, he was dabbing his lips with a napkin. He stood and tossed the napkin onto his plate.

“Delicious, Fiona. Thank you.” The assembled group watched him walk out of the kitchen and through the back door, with the exception of Vaslilssa who had commandeered the grits and was eating straight from the bowl.

“It’s not often you get to have a murderer over for breakfast,” Hal said.

“You think he’s the killer and you let him eat with us?” Luke said.

“I don’t know what to think,” Sadie said. She patted the place Bo had vacated. “Fiona, sit. Let’s talk.”

Fiona sank wearily to the chair and rested her bust on the table. “For all his faults, and he’s got a lot, I just can’t see Tom as a murderer. The thought of him rotting in that jail, well, it hurts me.” She broke off and twisted her fingers together, her expression miserable.

“Are you saying you want me to look into it?” Sadie said. To her left, Luke let out a puff of what was either exasperation or frustration, or maybe a bit of both.

Fiona nodded.

Vaslilssa finished the bowl of grits and let the spoon drop with a clatter. “Lucas has promised to take me to house of cheese. We go now, yes?”

“I guess,” Luke said. “I’m obviously not going to have any effect here.”

“The cheese shop downtown is very nice,” Fiona added helpfully.

“We’ll come, too,” Sadie said. “I need to talk to people, to get a feel for what’s happening in the town.” She stood and began clearing plates. Hal, Luke, and even Vaslilssa stood to do the same, though Sadie thought Vaslilssa’s interest lay in snatching rogue sausages off plates. They helped Fiona do the dishes and tidy the kitchen, and then they headed for the door. Vaslilssa clapped her hands together like a trained seal.

“I am so excitement for the house of cheese,” she said.

“Fifty bucks says she thinks the house is actually made of cheese,” Sadie whispered to Hal. Luke overheard and shot her a withering glare.

“I can’t wait to see you in action, Hal,” Luke said. “Meaning I can’t wait to see Sadie not in action. This should be good.” He rubbed his hands together in gleeful anticipation.

“Don’t do that near your girlfriend’s mouth. The combined friction and sausage fumes could cause an explosion,” Sadie said.

“You two are especially contentious today,” Hal remarked.

“The anemone theory,” Luke said.

“Ah.” Hal nodded, leading Sadie to believe they’d had the conversation before, possibly many times. She didn’t ask. Sometimes it was better not to know what might be lurking deep in their nerd brains.

They piled together in Luke’s car with Luke and Vaslilssa in the front. “How’s that back seat, Sadie?” Luke asked.

“Free of grease prints,” she replied. Before he could form a retort, he caught sight of the passenger side and the orange remnants Vaslilssa had left on the window after her last bag of Cheetos.

“Car needs washed anyway,” he said.

“You might want to get the EPA’s permission first so you don’t get fined for creating a toxic oil slick,” Sadie said.

“There it is!” Vaslilssa screamed and pressed her nose to the window. “It is the cheese house, and they are having samples!”

“And in about an hour, they are going out of business,” Sadie added.

Vaslilssa tugged Luke’s arm, jerking the wheel as he tried to park. “We must hurry before they go out of business.”

“They’re not going out of business,” Luke said. “Sadie was joking.”

Vaslilssa turned a furious glare on Sadie. “Why did you make joking about the cheese shop?”

“Lactose intolerance has made me bitter,” Sadie said.

“You are not funny, Sadie. And you are short,” Vaslilssa returned.

“That’s because I can’t ever get enough food to grow. Too much competition,” Sadie said, but Vaslilssa’s attention had once again been captured by the cheese store, which was shaped like a Swiss chalet.

“It is beautiful,” Vaslilssa exclaimed. “The cheese house is my new favorite place.” She hurdled from the car, grabbed Luke’s hand, and began dragging him behind her. He tossed a glance toward Sadie and Hal. Sadie was pleased to see that he didn’t look happy. In fact, he looked a little desperate. The evil part of her hoped Vaslilssa loaded up on all the garlic, horseradish, and limburger cheese the Bateman Cheese House had to offer.

“I don’t get why he’s still with her,” Hal said. 

“I think he stays with her out of habit. Once Luke gets settled in a pattern, it takes something cataclysmic to jolt him out of it.”

“Maybe we should hit him over the head a few times and see if it works as a reset button. Do you know how many sausages she ate this morning? I don’t because my abacus doesn’t go that high. What does he see in her? Okay, she’s gorgeous and a whiz at quantum physics, but…wait I forgot the question. Maybe I should tell him I want her. He would probably give her to me.”

“Do you want her?” Sadie asked. Maybe Hal had a secret crush on Vaslilssa, one he hid well so Luke wouldn’t know.

“Who wouldn’t?” Hal said. His tone was evasive, and she began to worry that he did have a secret crush on Luke’s girlfriend. That would be awkward. They were about to enter the town’s only market. She put her hand on his arm and drew him to a halt.

“Hal, you don’t actually have a thing for Vaslilssa, do you?”

“Oh, honey, I couldn’t afford the food bill,” Hal said. He slung an arm around Sadie’s shoulders and they entered the store together.

As they had in Atwood, the occupants of the store came to a standstill and stared at Sadie and Hal in silence.

“Can they smell Atwood on us or is this a customary greeting in Virginia?” Hal whispered.

Finally a cashier spoke. “Y’all reporters?”

Sadie opened her mouth to answer and closed it again. If she had her way, she would pretend to be a reporter and use it as an opening to question everyone. She had handed the reins to Hal, however. Even though she hadn’t intended him to take point for the entire case, Luke’s goading had worked to make her prove that she could give up control once in a while. She trusted Hal. Mostly.

“No, I’m the one who discovered the dead body,” he said.

There was another silence as people began creeping closer to hear his story. They looked more like employees than customers. As far as Sadie could tell, they were the only non-workers in the store.

“What’d it look like?” the cashier asked.

“Are you familiar with the lard rendering process?” Hal asked.

She wrinkled her nose. “No.”

“It’s best you remain that way,” Hal said.

“How’d you find it?” The man who asked the question wore a blood-soaked smock. Either he was a butcher, or he was a killer looking for trade secrets. Sadie hoped for the former.

“I was doing some investigative work in the area when I stumbled across it. I followed my nose. It was like the world’s worst Fruit Loops commercial,” Hal said.

“What kind of investigative work?” the cashier asked.

“I can’t say—professional ethics—let’s just say it was big, bigger than any case I’ve worked before. And now I have a murder to solve.” Hal was being uncharacteristically brash. Sadie wondered what his angle was before she remembered that she had told him the people here respected authority. Obviously he was setting himself up as the world’s greatest detective, and it was working. The group gathered tighter as if one of them might reach out and touch the hem of his coat soon.

“But they say Tom did it. I heard they arrested him,” the butcher said.

“Do you think he did it?” Hal asked. His head tipped to the side, expressing his earnest curiosity. The butcher puffed importantly and cast his eyes heavenward as he thought.

“Well, Tom’s got a mighty temper, and he’s the head of our local law. It’s possible he might have killed before. Lots of people have come up missing and everybody knows they was probably murdered.” “Everybody” came out sounding like “everbody.” Did people believe they were saving time by cutting syllables from words? Sadie wondered what they did with all the extra milliseconds mispronunciation bought them.  

“Course, it could have been Fiona,” the butcher added. Around him, people began to shift their weight and glance off into the distance as if uncomfortable with the butcher’s pronouncement.

“Why Fiona?” Hal asked. This time Sadie was glad he was the one asking the questions. She wasn’t sure she would be able to keep the emotion out of her voice. Just because Fiona was large, did that make her a likely suspect? She liked her employer and didn’t appreciate anyone besmirching her.

“There’s bad blood between Fiona and Johnny’s grandma, Shirley,” the butcher said.

“Why?” Hal asked, but the butcher clammed up. He shrugged and now it was his turn to let his eyes wander, the universal signal for “I’ve said too much.”

Hal glanced at Sadie, silently asking where to go from here. She linked her arm through his and smiled at the assembled group. They were far more likely to blab one on one. She scanned their faces to see which had the most to say.

“We need to pick up some things, and I’m craving something sweet. Which way to the bakery?” she asked. The tiny crowd broke up, coming to attention as a unit as if they had suddenly remembered that they were supposed to be working.

“This way,” a woman spoke. Unlike the others, she was wearing a floury nametag that read, “Dusty.” She led them to a baked goods section. Sadie gave Hal’s arm a squeeze and let it go under the guise of inspecting the tiny bakery section. She wasn’t one for sweets, and she thought Fiona could probably out-bake anything the store had to offer, but she browsed the selection anyway, comparing blueberry and bran muffins as if it mattered which one she chose.

Hal started to talk. He was good at probing people, at getting them to open up and making them feel important. Not only did he ask a lot of questions, but he actually listened to the answers. After a few minutes of chatting, they had learned Dusty’s entire life story. She had lived in Bateman all her life, knew everyone, wanted to escape but never got away, had two kids immediately after high school, and was dumped by both their fathers, whom she called “no-good, down-low,” and a few other choice expletives.

The fathers of her children didn’t pay child support. Hal spent a few minutes sympathizing with the sorry state of family law for a while and then effortlessly transitioned the topic. “Did you know Johnny?” he asked.

“Everyone knows everyone here. There aren’t very many of us, and most of us have lived here since the Pilgrims. We’re bluebloods,” she added, cackling a little at the joke she had probably said hundreds of times. There was more than a trace of bitterness in her tone, as if she resented the fact that her family came over on the Mayflower and ended up in Bateman instead of Boston.

“What did you think of him?” Hal asked.

Dusty shrugged. “He was all right. He got away for a while, then he came back real uppity like. He had some fancy job for a while, but I guess he must have lost it if he came back. No one comes back to Bateman if things are going well.”

“Do you believe that Tom killed him?” Hal asked.

“Everyone knows Johnny and his gang robbed Tom’s place all them years ago. It would make sense if Tom finally got his revenge. I woulda thought he woulda hid it better, though.”

“What was that part about bad blood between Fiona and Johnny’s grandma?” Hal asked. His tone and smile were conspiratorial.
Come on, we’re good buddies, and it’s just between us.
He rested his elbow on the bakery counter to further the effect.

Dusty looked around to make sure they weren’t being overheard. “There were rumors about Tom and Shirley. Shirley’s a waitress at the diner. They say that’s what broke up their marriage.”

Poor Fiona,
Sadie thought. She had let Shirley sit in her living room, all the while wondering if the woman was having an affair with her husband. Hal glanced at Sadie to see if she had any more questions. Sadie settled on a container of blueberry muffins and smiled. “These look delicious. Do you know Bo? Tom’s worker?”

“Know him? I dream about him practically every night,” Dusty said with another cackle.

Sadie blinked at her. “You find Bo attractive?”

“Don’t you?” Dusty asked.

“I can’t tell what he looks like behind the beard,” Sadie said.

“The beard is part of the appeal. He’s mysterious and sexy.”

“Do you think it’s possible that he might have killed Johnny?” Sadie asked.

Dusty shrugged. “Maybe. Who cares? I’d still let him have a shot at being my third baby daddy.”

That piece of information gave Sadie a clearer perspective on why baby daddies one and two didn’t pay child support. Picking men was apparently not Dusty’s forte. “You said Johnny’s gang robbed Tom. Who was in the gang?”

Dusty pressed her lips together and darted another furtive glance. “You didn’t hear this from me, okay?” Hal and Sadie nodded. “It was Argus McGee, the sheriff’s son.”

Bateman had one bar, an outcast among the upstanding and family-friendly establishments. It sat at the end of the main street, which for some reason was not called Main Street; it was Second Street, although Sadie never saw First or Third. “We need to go there tonight,” Sadie said.

“Absolutely,” Hal agreed. “Detecting is hard. Time to give it up and pickle our livers.”

“Not exactly,” Sadie said. “But it is time to turn over a few rocks and see what scurries out.”

“Speaking of which,” Hal said as Luke and Vaslilssa emerged from the cheese house. Under Luke’s arm was the largest wheel of cheese Sadie had ever seen. It spanned the length of his torso; he could barely contain it.

“That should be enough to last until you get back to Atwood,” Sadie said. “Maybe.”

“Can I catch a ride?” Hal asked. “I was thinking I should get my car in case I need to leave before Sadie is finished. I can make it back tonight before the rendezvous.”

Luke shifted the cheese to his left arm and settled a worried frown on Sadie. “I could stay until Hal gets back.”

“How would you get back to Atwood when Hal returns?” Sadie asked.

“I could stay here until you’re finished. I don’t like this,” Luke said. To his left, Vaslilssa began picking at the wax on the outside of the cheese.

“Luke, you should go,” Sadie said. “I’m fine, and I don’t want Abby to be alone.”

“Gideon is there,” Luke pointed out. “And my parents.”

“It’s not the same,” Sadie said. “I would feel better with you there to take care of her. And I’m fine, really. You should go.”

“Something doesn’t feel right,” he said.

“Could it be the fifty pounds of cheese dislocating your shoulder?” Hal guessed.

For once, Sadie was more touched than annoyed by his concern. Probably because he was leaving. “You might be the only scientist in the world who relies on gut instinct.” She leaned forward on her toes and kissed his cheek. “I’m fine.”

Vaslilssa shifted possessively, took the cheese, and cradled it close like a baby.

“You always say you’re fine, but you rarely are,” Luke said.

“I think she’s fine,” Hal said. “Better than fine. Practically a superhero.” He gave her shoulders a one-armed squeeze.

Luke shot him a look of annoyance but didn’t comment.

“My cheese is going to melting,” Vaslilssa announced.

“Let’s go,” Sadie said. She waved them toward the car. “You can drop me at Fiona’s and be on your way.”

Luke sighed, the same sigh he used whenever he capitulated and wasn’t happy about it.

After an argument over whether or not the cheese wheel deserved its own seatbelt, the ride to Fiona’s house was silent.

“I’ll be back as soon as I get my car,” Hal said. “Don’t go to you-know-where without me.”

“Why are you speaking in code?” Luke asked.

“You wouldn’t approve,” Hal said.

“How do you know?” Luke asked.

“Because you never approve,” Hal said. Sadie exited the car. They continued bickering as they drove away. Fiona’s car—an antiquated Ford pickup—wasn’t in the drive. Sadie let herself in with the key Fiona had given her that morning. Her skin prickled, alerting her to the fact that someone was in the house. There was no sound, no smell, no movement, but still she sensed that she wasn’t alone.

A slow scan of the quaint living room showed her no one was in there. Unless he was a leprechaun, no one would be able to fit behind Fiona’s wing chair, and the couch backed up to the wall. On the far side of the room was a closet. She crept to it, opened it, and peeked inside. It was empty except for a few coats, hats, and gloves.

Next she searched the kitchen, but it was similarly a tiny and poor hiding spot. That left the bathroom and three bedrooms at the end of the hall. She crept toward the bathroom, hugging the wall with her back. The small closet was filled with shelves and unsuitable for hiding. She skipped it and peeked behind the curtain in case the intruder was a Hitchcock fan. The shower was empty. Next she went to her room and stood on the threshold.

Someone had been in the room. Since finding out that Ben had repeatedly stalked her by sneaking into her room to watch her sleep and touch her things, Sadie had become adept at memorizing exactly where everything was when she left a space. Perhaps she was paranoid, but she had taken to setting little traps for any would-be peepers. This morning when she left, she had placed a nail file on the edge of her bag of toiletries. It was now on the dresser. She had also left an unused tissue draped over the edge of her suitcase, half in and half out. It was now crumpled in her suitcase, which was slightly askew, and off somehow. Whoever looked through her things had been careful and thorough in his or her attempt to put things back together. Maybe if she hadn’t learned to be so observant in recent weeks, she wouldn’t have noticed. As it was, she felt exposed, and that vulnerability made her angry.

That was why she didn’t sneak to the closet. She marched forward and flung it open. “You might as well come out,” she called, but no one was there. The closet was filled with a few of Fiona’s odds and ends and a tiny suit that looked like it probably belonged to either Tom or a ventriloquist’s dummy. She slammed the door with a huff. Whoever it was must have come and gone. Unless it was Fiona. Would she do that? Sadie hated to have such an unkind thought toward her employer, but the truth was that she barely knew the woman. That morning she had learned that Fiona had a reason to hurt Johnny. Had the whole thing been a ruse to frame Tom and get her revenge on Shirley in one fell swoop? Was Fiona that devious? That seemed far-fetched, but what did she really know about the woman other than that she loved pumpkins, cooking, and needlework? Maybe turnabout was fair play. Maybe a search of Fiona’s things was needed to allay any suspicion. Distasteful as it may be, it would rule her out as a suspect so Sadie could focus on other people. Like Bo and Argus McGee, the sheriff’s son. She hadn’t yet had time to digest that interesting tidbit, but she certainly intended to.

Her mind was intent on the question she would ask Argus when she stepped into the hall and was quickly barreled back again. A body landed on hers, flinging her hard against the floor. Her head bounced twice on the braided rug, but what bothered her more was the pinning of her arms and legs, cutting off all hope of escape.