Upstate Uproar (31 page)

She yawned and laid the file on the
nightstand. She clicked off the lamp and snuggled down in bed,
concentrating on the gentle raindrops tap-tap-tapping against the
window. It didn’t take long before she had slipped into a peaceful
slumber.

V
ivian rolled over,
pulling the covers off her head. She smelled smoke but snuggled her
pillow and yanked the covers up over her eyes. She lay there for a
beat before it hit her.
Holy crap, smoke!

She threw back the covers, jumped out of bed
and ran into Kate and Wendy’s room. “Fire! Quick, get out of the
house!” She sprinted toward their door.

Wendy pulled a gray sweater out of the
dresser and sniffed. “That’s bacon cooking.”

Kate walked out of the bathroom wrapped in a
towel. “Applewood smoked, I’d say.”

“Could be hickory or maple,” Wendy said. “I
see that on the packages in the store sometimes.”

Vivian paused, doorknob in hand, and took a
breath. “I must still have smoke in my sinuses after yesterday.
Either that or I’m losing it.”

“Or both,” Wendy said with a smile then
walked into the bathroom and closed the door.

“I’m starved,” Kate said and pulled on a pair
of yoga pants. “Join me for breakfast? Smells delicious!”

Vivian laughed and went back to her room.
“Yeah, yeah, I’ll get ready quick.”

Before the girls could leave the room,
Wendy’s phone rang. The words “Wade Nelson” lit up the display.

“Good morning, Agent Nelson,” Wendy said,
putting him on speaker.

“Morning,” he said. “I had a visit yesterday
from the higher-ups. I knew running Jake’s name and the passport
name would set off some bells, but I didn’t expect the deputy
director in my office.”

“That sounds serious,” Wendy replied.

“I don’t know what Jake was up to, but it
involves a higher pay grade than mine. I’m sorry, but I can’t look
into this any further. You need to stay out of it, too.”

Wendy’s shoulders sagged and she looked at
the floor. “Did you reach out to Antonio Robichaux?”

Nelson hesitated before answering. “I did and
I’ve talked to his agent friend. He’s in the IT Applications and
Data Division but not much higher up the food chain than I am. He
doesn’t need to be looking into this, either.”

Wendy sighed. “He was able to get the call
history, but Antonio said it will take him weeks to thoroughly
analyze it.”

When Nelson didn’t respond, Wendy said,
“Thanks for taking this as far as you could.”

“You got it,” Nelson answered. “If there’s
any other information I come across, I’ll get in touch. Take care,
and Wendy — ”

“Yeah?”

“I’m really sorry.” Click.

Wendy set the phone on the bed and stared at
it. “I hope Antonio’s friend comes through for us because it sure
doesn’t look like Nelson will. He’s not my knight in shining
armor.”

Vivian felt awful that Nelson could not, or
would not, do anything else. “I’ll call Antonio today, see if he
has any other ideas.”

Kate’s tummy rumbled, so she, Wendy and
Vivian followed the bacon smell into the dining room where they
joined Lucy and Pierre, who were almost finished eating.

“Tracy and Brandon made a feast this
morning,” Lucy said as she set down a bottle of maple syrup.
“There’s enough for 20 people, easy.”

“Are they expecting more guests?” Vivian
asked.

Pierre shook his head. “They haven’t said.
Tracy’s just in a really good mood and is cooking like crazy.”

Tracy bustled through the dining room door
carrying a plate of pancakes. “Oh good, you’re up. We’ve got
pancakes, Belgian waffles, regular waffles, hash browns, biscuits,
eggs poached, fried or scrambled, white and wheat toast, a variety
of fruit, oatmeal, sausage, bacon, and… there’s something I’m
forgetting.”

“Grits?” Wendy asked.

Tracy’s face remained serious as she set the
pancake plate on the sideboard beside the waffles. “Oh dear, I need
to add those to my grocery list.”

Kate looked at the variety of food. “Who did
you make all of this for?”

Tracy patted Kate on the arm. “You guys, of
course. I thought you’d be hungry after yesterday.”

Vivian tried to hold back a laugh and grabbed
a plate. “I’ll do my part to make sure it doesn’t go to waste.”

The group did their best, but plenty of food
was leftover. “I hope Brandon’s hungry,” Pierre said. “I can’t eat
another bite.”

Brandon walked through the dining room on his
way outside and shook his head. “Now she’s baking a cake. It’ll be
cookies next.”

“What’s gotten into her?” Wendy asked.

“I’ve only seen her like this a couple of
times. I’m not sure what it is, but it’s best to just eat and say
thanks. We’ll take some of this to the neighbors later.” He pushed
open the back door and hopped down the steps.

Vivian threw her napkin beside her plate. “I
want to go call Larson, check up on April.” She stood and mouthed
“upstairs.”

“I’m going to sit out back,” Pierre said.
“Enjoy the morning.” He leaned and whispered into Lucy’s ear loud
enough for Vivian to hear. “And see what our chef whips up
next.”

Lucy giggled and gave him a peck on the
cheek, then went up the stairs after the other three girls.

The door to the bedroom firmly shut, Vivian
dialed Larson. “Hi, there. You’ll be happy to know your truck made
it here safe and sound last night.”

“That’s a relief,” he said, sounding
groggy.

“I take it you were up late last night.”

“Stayed at the house for another three hours
putting the fire out, then stomped around, dousing hot spots.”

“How’s April doing this morning?”

“I heard she’s out of the woods, but she’ll
have one hell of a headache. She should get discharged today.”

“Does she remember what happened?”

“I haven’t heard her side of the story and I
don’t know if the police have talked to her yet, but she’s got
quite a knot on her head. She might have passed out from the carbon
monoxide and other gases in the fire and hit her head as she
fell.”

“Any idea how it started?”

“The arson investigator was out there at the
crack of dawn, and the report is that the gas to the stove was on
but the pilot wasn’t lit. Dan, one of the investigators, found
candle wax on the fireplace mantel. He suspects she had a couple of
candles going and that once the fumes from the stove reached those,
kaboom! The explosion spread the fire instantaneously but the force
was focused higher up and not across the floor, so April wasn’t
badly burned or killed.”

“She’s really lucky. I wonder why she left
the gas on.”

“You’re asking the wrong guy. People bump
knobs and turn them on, forget things. Who knows?”

“Have you heard if Nicole has been
discharged?”

“If I had to guess, she’s probably still
admitted. My friend Marty is going to drop me by there to grab my
truck, but I’d like to see you tonight. Lake Placid Brewery about
9? I can’t get free until then.”

“Sounds good, see ya then.” Vivian relayed
the information to Lucy, Kate and Wendy. “Let’s go see Nicole and
maybe we’ll even see April. I feel so bad for both of them.”

“We should get April a $100 Visa gift card,”
Kate said. “She’s going to have a lot of rebuilding to do with
losing everything in the fire. That would help with some clothes at
least.”

“We can use money from our Getaway Girlz
trust fund,” Wendy said. “But first we need a replacement car.
Again.”

Kate groaned and called the rental car
company. The operator told her the new SUV should be there within
the hour. “We need to get cleaned up, then let’s go sit on the
porch while we wait. And I may grab a snack for later.”

Vivian smiled at her. “And by snack, you mean
bacon.”

Kate stretched and stood. “I’ll put it on a
biscuit at least.”

They all laughed and took turns getting ready
and threw on their usual brisk weather wear: jeans and
sweaters.

Finally ready for the day, the girls joined
Pierre on the back porch. Lucy quietly filled him in on what they’d
learned about April and Nicole. Just as she was finishing, Brandon
walked up, hammer in hand.

“I heard about your car. That’s
unbelievable.”

Vivian didn’t feel right telling him their
plans, so she said, “Our car will be here shortly and we thought
we’d go for a drive, maybe to Saranac Lake or to Lake George, see a
little more of the Adirondacks.”

He opened the back door. “Nice day for a
drive. Steer clear of any bodies of water or fireballs.” He went
inside the house but popped his head out the door a minute later.
“Your new car is here.”

The girls and Pierre met the rental car
employee in the driveway. He handed Kate the keys and a clipboard.
“I need you to sign the new rental agreement and check whether
you’d like additional insurance.”

“That’s a big, fat affirmative,” Kate said,
signing the form. She handed him the pen and clipboard. “We’ll try
not to destroy it.”

K
ate got behind the
wheel of the bright red SUV and everyone else piled in. “Viv, why
don’t you call Nicole, just to make sure she’s not home yet.” She
took off down the drive of Turlington Farms.

Nicole answered her cellphone on the fourth
ring with a weak, “Hi, Vivian.”

“Hey, Nicole, you okay? We’re going to come
see you.”

“I’m getting better, but I’m still in the
hospital.”

“We’ll pop in. We may check on someone else
while we’re there — April Robinson.”

“What’s she doing in here?”

“That’s a whopper of a story,” Vivian said
and filled her in, then said, “We’re almost there, see you in a few
minutes.”

Kate pulled into a CVS so Wendy could buy a
get-well card for April and the gift card. She got back into the
car and pulled out a card with the cartoon image of a newspaper
headline that read, Get over it already! “I thought we ought to
take Nicole a card, too.”

Kate pulled into a parking space at the
hospital shortly thereafter. She looked at the two-story building.
“We’ve been here way too much on this trip.”

They made their way to Nicole’s room.
Kandace, Nicole’s sister, let them in. “Good to see you all.”

“You, too, though we wish it was under
different circumstances,” Vivian said and handed Nicole her
get-well card. Dark bags hung from Nicole’s eyes and her skin
seemed to have aged overnight. New wrinkles lined her laugh lines.
“So what’s the plan? When are you getting out of here?”

Nicole looked at Kandace, then back to
Vivian. “I probably would have gone home yesterday — I’m basically
over the E. coli poisoning, they’ve been pumping me full of fluids
—but I went into anaphylactic shock yesterday afternoon. It was
bad.”

Kandace huffed from her chair in the corner.
“She almost died.”

Nicole dismissed Kandace’s comment with a
wave. “You were quick to call the nurse. I was already in the
hospital so the chances of me actually dying were slim.”

Vivian leaned against the windowsill. “What
happened?”

“Tracy came to see me, said she felt bad I’d
been at her house and got sick. I think she was trying to feel me
out, see if I thought her hot tea was what made me ill. I don’t
know what I had that was contaminated. I’m going to throw out all
of the food at home.”

“Your food has already been tossed,” Kandace
said. “Mom and Charbra did it. But it’s that woman’s fault you
almost died, I’m telling you.”

“Kan—.” Nicole started to answer but Kandace
cut in.

“That bitch ate a peanut butter and jelly
sandwich right before she came to visit. Wasn’t that nice?”

Kate snapped her fingers. “Didn’t you say you
were allergic to peanuts?”

“That girl waited around while they got
Nicole’s reaction under control and then told the nurses that she
hadn’t even thought about it,” Kandace said.

“You don’t believe her?” Wendy asked.

Kandace looked at Nicole. “I can see where if
you’re not allergic to nuts, you wouldn’t think about it. But…”

“You didn’t like her from the start,” Nicole
said.

“I sure as heck don’t like her now.”

Nicole sighed. “I know, and she’s not exactly
my favorite person, either.”

“She seems all right to us,” Lucy said.
“We’ve determined that Tracy might not be in the best marriage. We
think Brandon’s mean to her, maybe a bit rough, too.”

“Great, now I feel bad for talking about an
abused woman,” Nicole said.

Vivian looked at her. “Don’t feel bad, you
need to feel better. Let us tell you about our last couple of crazy
days.”

The girls filled her in on their adventure
on, in and around the lake two days ago and the house fire the
night before.

“I’m never traveling with you girls,” Kandace
said, shaking her head.

“I’m glad to see you are all in one piece.”
Nicole tapped on the bedside railing. “I’ve heard rumors Brandon
and Shawna had a little something something going on. I was in the
bar at Lake Placid Brewery a couple of weeks ago and he was there
flirting with her. She gave him a hug when he left that lingered a
little too long. Did she say when she started seeing Dale?”

“It sounded like it was new,” Wendy said.
“But Brandon might not’ve liked it just the same.”

Nicole laughed, but sounded weak. “You can’t
call it cheating when you’re married and your girlfriend goes out
with someone else.”

Vivian gave her arm a gentle squeeze. “We’ll
go so you can rest. If we don’t see you before we leave tomorrow,
let us know if you ever get to the bottom of Mary Beth’s and
Rebecca’s deaths.”

“You got it. Take care. Enjoy your last day
of vacation.”