“How have you been, darling?” she asked.
Bert refrained from scrunching up her chin, pulling her head back, in distaste at the all-too-friendly greeting.
“I’m well, thank you.”
“And the practice?”
“As a matter-of-fact, I’ll be moving it here to Culver’s Hood within the next few weeks.”
At this sudden and unknown news, both Carla and Bert gasped loudly. “Sean. You didn’t tell me you were moving back to town,” his younger sister blurted out.
“Well, I wanted to keep it a secret as long as possible, but Sharon has a way of getting things out of me.”
They were still holding hands, which was making Bert more uncomfortable with each passing second.
“What?” Carla yelled. “Where will your office be? Where will you stay? How will you rebuild your client base?” She rambled off a whole slew of questions all in a row without waiting for an answer. Clearly, she was unhappy about being kept out of the loop on this.
“I’m not worried about it,” he replied. “But my new office is in the space above Blackstone Pizza here in the Old Market. It even has a small living space attached. Two birds with one stone,” he shrugged and smiled, turning his attention back to Sharon.
“That’s wonderful, Sean. I’m glad to hear you’ll be closer to Travis and me.”
At the mention of Travis Shatner, Sean’s smile immediately disappeared. “Yes. Travis. Maybe by being close, I can convince him what a joke his new movement to try to get rid of acupuncture is. I’ve been fighting him on it for years now.”
“Oh,” she got suddenly quiet, her eyes turning down timidly. “You haven’t heard?”
“Haven’t heard what?”
“He’s managed to get it past the board. He’s announcing the new vote today at the luncheon.”
Sean’s face was instantly a mask of red behind his gray beard, looking like a trucker out in the cold. “Where is he?” he snapped, finally letting go of her hands and heading for the doorway.
“Sean! Sean, please. There is nothing to be done about it,” she called, running after him.
Bert looked at Carla for some sort of reaction. How mad was mad with her brother?
“We better follow him. He’s liable to punch someone if we don’t calm him down,” Carla informed her best friend, rushing toward the door.
“Seriously?” Bert asked, following close behind. “Does he have anger issues or something?”
“No, he’s the most even-keeled guy you’d ever meet, but when he does get this mad, he sort of loses control.”
Bert didn’t doubt it with how red the man had turned. Maybe he was one of those people who just kept everything bottled up and under wraps until something pushed them over the edge. If so, did that mean he had punched someone in the past?
She was beginning to regret her initial attraction to him if he was as volatile as it seemed. Not to mention his flirting with Sharon, a married woman.
Running down the dimly lit hallway, they emerged into the large dining room which had old green and gold wallpaper, hence the name The Green Room.
“Travis. How could you do this?” Sean shouted, practically leaping up the wooden staircase to the stage. He dropped the briefcase in his right hand next to the green curtain at the wing of the stage.
Travis Shatner stood behind the podium, arranging a stack of notecards and sipping from a steaming mug of coffee. He turned to Carla’s brother with a smile. “Sean Young? Why, it’s good to see you, my old friend,” the elderly gentleman played off the accusation like it hadn’t even happened, trying to defuse the situation with a friendly greeting.
It had no effect on Sean.
“You went behind my back and passed that ridiculous regulation?”
“Sean. Travis. Please,” Sharon begged. She was ultimately ignored.
“Behind your back?” Travis gave a sideways smile, taking a loud sip from his mug. “I hardly think so. When was the last time that you were on the Nebraska Board of Chiropractors?”
“You know what I mean.”
“Last time I checked you’ve never been on the board and therefore don’t have a say in our dealings.” His half smile turned into a full-on grin, demeaning and judging Sean with a single look.
“The board is in place so that all chiropractors have a voice.”
“Not last time I checked, son,” he shot back, taking another nonchalant drink from his coffee.
Bert knew that Travis couldn’t be more than five or six years older than Sean, and yet he treated him like a child.
She could immediately see why Sean seemed to dislike him so much and why he’d gotten so angry.
“You’re supposed to wait until after the annual luncheon to pass any kind of major regulation changes like that. You have to take questions from the chiropractic community as a whole.”
The man’s smile melted away into one of pure irritation, his nostrils twitching. “I don’t have to do any such thing. I’m the chairman of the board. I have the final say. Never have I consulted the community on any decision. Most of the time they don’t even know what’s good for them.”
“I’m opening a new practice in town. Acupuncture was going to be a major part of that,” Sean bellowed, his face going so red that Bert worried he might pass out.
“Sean, calm down,” Carla cried out, also being ignored by the men who’d gotten into a match of dominance.
Travis simply smiled a wicked smile. “I guess you’ll just have to change your plan or step out of the business,” he hissed with a disgusting look of satisfaction.
In one lightning fast motion, Sean grabbed Travis by the lapel of his expensive suit and shook him like a rag doll. “I oughta kill you,” he threatened.
The coffee mug went wild, flying off the stage and landing on the carpeted floor below. A dark brown stain ran through the fabric.
“Sean!” Carla shouted.
“That’s enough. Break it up. Break it up,” came the booming, authoritative voice of Detective Mannor. He ran out from the backstage area and tore the two men apart. “Do you want me to take you down to the station?” he threatened Sean who had taken a step back but hadn’t stopped fuming.
“I ought to press assault charges,” Travis said, straightening his suit coat and smoothing out the wrinkles. “But I won’t. It'd be a waste of time. You see, you won’t be a problem soon.” His sickening smile returned. “You won’t have a single patient who is willing to come your way.”
“You’re going to regret this,” Sean snapped.
“Stand down,” Mannor ordered, placing a firm hand on the man’s chest. “If you don’t leave this area immediately, I’ll have my men cuff you and take you to the station.”
Sean narrowed his eyes at Harry. “You don’t scare me, Detective.” Turning and pointing a finger at Shatner, he added, “and neither do you, Travis.” With that, he turned and disappeared through the backstage door.
“Oh, dear,” Carla whispered, her own face as red as her brother’s.
CHAPTER 5
* * *
“I should run and find the janitor,” Bert whispered to Carla, eyeballing the broken mug and coffee stains.
“Good idea. I’ll try and track down my brother and calm him down.”
Carla took the steps up to the stage and went out the door Sean had disappeared through. Moving through the side door and into the dim hallway, Bert looked around for the janitor or the janitorial closet.
“Mrs. Hannah?” Sharon called after her, stepping through the doorway into the hall.
Bert couldn’t help raising an eyebrow at the woman. Why was she following her?
Trotting across the carpeted floor, she stopped close to the caterer and said her next words in a hushed tone as if she were afraid of being overheard. “Let me be the first to apologize for my husband’s behavior.”
“Your husband’s behavior? I think Sean sort of lost it out there.”
Sharon looked down at her green hi
gh heels. “Believe me. He has that effect on people. Sean isn’t the first person to fly off the handle like that.”
Bert sighed through her nose, putting her hands on her hips. “I sort of got that impression.”
Licking her lips, the nervous woman nodded. “He knows how to push people’s buttons to get what he wants.”
“And today he decided to push Sean’s?”
“He and Sean have always had an issue with one another.”
Folding her arms, Bert tried to look the woman directly in the eye. “You care about Sean?” she asked, trying to be tactful in her questioning but also get some answers. She wondered if there was something deeper to this rivalry between the men, and she couldn’t help but guess that Sharon might be at the center of it somehow.
Bert didn’t want to admit it, but a tiny part of her wanted to know for her own benefit.
“We’ve been friends for a very long time, since college, in fact.”
Things were starting to become clear. “You met in college?”
Sharon licked her lips again. “The truth is, Sean and I dated in college.”
“Ah. I had assumed it was something like that,” she admitted. Based on their interaction in the kitchen, and the way they held hands, Bert knew that those feelings may have never gone away for either of them.
“Things didn’t work out, you see, and I married Travis.”
Carla’s brother seemed so sincerely like a kind-hearted person, while Travis Shatner acted like a manipulative and—heaven forbid—abusive man. How had Sharon made the transition from one to the other?
She was sure that Travis had something to do with that. Bert had only met the man for a few mere minutes, but she knew people like him and could point them out after only a first-hand encounter. Travis was the kind of man to look at Sharon and decide he wanted her. Then, he would use his skillful manipulation and underhanded tactics to get what he wanted while looking like he was in the right the entire time.
People like that disgusted Bert, and it infuriated her further to see such a man in a position of power where he could take advantage of an entire community of people for his own benefit.
In the end, however, she knew it wasn’t her place to make judgments or even comment on the situation. “You don’t need to apologize to me, Sharon. It’s quite alright.”
“Oh, but I do. I can’t risk you running out on us.”
Bert tilted one eyebrow. “Running out? Has someone done that before?”
Sharon nodded somewhat mournfully. “Unfortunately, yes. My husband’s bracing personality has made caterers and other people we’ve hired for events just quit on the spot.” She said the word bracing with a hiss that showed her own true colors for her spouse. “Of course, Travis always found some way to make them pay for it in the end.”
Bert got a sudden ache in her stomach, accompanied by a foul taste in her mouth, even thinking of what that man might do to someone he disliked.
“You don’t have to worry about me,” she reassured the woman—and herself. Turning to walk down the hall, she realized Sharon was following. “I was just going to see if I could find anything to clean up that coffee spill.”
“That’s a good idea. I think the janitorial closet and office is just through that door at the end there.” She pointed further down the hall. Sure enough, there was a sign with a simplified image of a mop and bucket on it.
“Ah, yes. I see.”
Eyeballing the closet for a moment, Sharon turned to face Bert. “Well, if you’ll excuse me, I’ll check to see if the other caterer is here. If they’re late, Travis will have a conniption fit.”
“Sounds fine,” Bert agreed, watching the woman disappear into the kitchen.
Walking to the end of the hall, Bert knocked on the door as she opened it. The light was on inside, and the room beyond was larger than she expected. The walls were lined with basic metal shelving stacked to the brim with generic cleaning supplies. A separate metal cage also held the vacuum cleaners, buffers, and other electric appliances used in the cleaning process.
In the middle of the room was an old metal desk with lots of dents and tarnish. Behind it sat the same janitor Bert had met earlier with his feet up and a copy of The Chiropractic Journal of Medicine in his hands.
“Hello, can I help you?” he asked in his same timid voice, sitting up suddenly in his chair upon the unexpected entrance of the woman.
“Doing a little reading up on today’s clients?” she asked with a smile, motioning to the magazine. She hoped a little small talk would put the nervous man at ease.
The janitor hesitated, but then laughed. “Yeah. I guess you could say that.”
“Guess you like to know who you’re serving.”
He shrugged. “Really, though, I’m just interested in the practice and what’s happening in the community.” Closing the magazine, he set it on the desk.
“Oh, you’re interested in chiropractic medicine?”
“I’ve followed it for a few years, yeah.”
“Have you worked here during previous chiropractic luncheons?”
“No, no. I’ve jumped around jobs for a while, just trying to get my feet down.” His smile appeared strained, as if by grinning his wrinkles only deepened. “What can I do for you?” he asked, growing uncomfortable with talking about himself—an act that clearly was a rare occurrence.
Bert was about to answer when someone bumped her from behind. Turning around, she found Travis Shatner standing there with a deep scowl on his face. “Where is my wife?”
“Excuse me?” she retorted, not too happy with the tone he was taking with her.
“She told me she was coming out here to talk to you. Now, where is she?” he demanded.
“She went to check on the other caterer.”
“A likely story,” he grumbled, his eyes passing over the room and landing on the magazine laying on the desk. “What the heck is this?” he snapped. With one fell swoop of his arm, he picked up the magazine from the table. “I wondered where my copy had gone, and here I find you with it. You keep your hands off my items or I’ll report you to the building’s management and have you fired.”
“Sir, I didn’t steal anything.”
“You expect me to believe that? You can’t trust anyone these days.” With that, he stormed out of the room and headed for the kitchen.
Looking at the janitor who had his head down and his hands in tight fists, she gave a look of apology. “He’s really pleasant, isn’t he?”
* * *
“He never came back,” Carla admitted as she helped Bert to unload the pies from the warmer.
“What do you mean he never came back? Where did he go?” Bert asked, rearranging the pies on the trays so they looked perfect for when they carried them out.
The appetizers and main course were already served and done, and the pies were up next. Unfortunately, despite paying for two plates at the luncheon, Carla had spent the last hour searching around the Old Market and downtown areas of Culver’s Hood for her brother.
He had seemingly up and vanished into thin air.
Carla had only just walked in the door two seconds earlier, and Bert had asked for her help in carrying everything out to the tables.
“He’s done this before, you know.”
“I thought you said he doesn’t have anger issues?” Bert pointed out.
“I'm telling you, he doesn’t. That doesn’t stop him from storming off into the sunset when something does make him mad—and I can tell you he was madder than ever at Travis Shatner today for what he pulled. I’m surprised he didn’t just kill the old coot on the spot.”
“Don’t even joke,” Bert declared, putting up both hands in the air. “Now, come on. We’ll have to worry about him later. We’ve got to deliver these pies out to those stuffy people.”
Finishing loading up a pushcart with trays, the two ladies made their way to the dining hall. In addition to the green walls and carpeting, the room was decorated for the occ
asion. Golden skeletons wore leprechaun hats, some of them even posed to look like they were doing adjustments on one another. The tables were all draped in deep green tablecloths and had sparkly centerpieces including pots of gold, mean looking leprechauns, and even a skull or two.
It was all very fitting.
As they made their way among the tables, setting out the pies in front of each patron, a man who Bert didn’t recognize stood at the front, talking into the mic. “And that’s all for the preliminary business. Now, for a few of the bigger issues, our very own chairman has prepared a special presentation to ring in some big changes for the Nebraska Chiropractor’s Association.”
“Who’s that?” Bert whispered.
“Not sure. I think he may be the board secretary or treasurer or something,” Carla answered, moving on to the next table.
It helped take her mind off her brother to assist her friend in the pie serving duties.
“Oooh, these look lovely,” one man whispered as Bert placed a skull-shaped pie in front of him.
“Let’s all give a warm welcome,” the man at the front announced, “I give you our Chairman of the Board, Travis Shatner.”
The room broke out in applause as the curtains behind the podium pulled back to reveal a large white projection screen. However, they also revealed something else.
The clapping quickly died down as a wave of gasps echoed through the room.
Finally, like a knife in the ear, a woman screamed at the top of her lungs.
Bert looked up toward the front of the room and paled at the scene before them.
Hanging by his neck from a curtain cord at the back of the stage was Travis Shatner. Little glints of acupuncture needles stuck out from around his entire body.
CHAPTER 6
* * *
“Someone turned the guy into a pin cushion,” Detective Mannor groaned as he stood at the foot of the stage looking up at the grisly scene before them. A line of yellow tape blocked off the stairway and back exits. The crime scene photographer stood just underneath the body, taking pictures before the technicians came in to sweep for fingerprints, DNA, and other evidence.
Shamrock Pie Murder Page 3
