Dead in the Doorway

by Diane Kelly

  While Buck cleaned his tools, I grabbed my water bottle and sat down on the top step of the lower staircase. I pulled my cell phone out of my pocket and lowered my dust mask.

  As I scrolled though my contacts list looking for Detective Flynn’s number, Sawdust rubbed himself in circles around my hips. Deciding I was too soft to provide the deep tissue massage he seemed to seek, he moved down a step, rubbing himself along the overhang. He arched his back to make full contact before moving down another step and rubbing himself in the other direction.

  I found the contact, tapped the screen, and placed a call to Detective Flynn. He sounded out of breath when he answered. “You okay?” I asked.

  “In the middle of a run,” he replied. “Catch me up while I catch my breath.”

  While Sawdust continued to zigzag down the steps, I gave the detective a rundown of last night’s poker game, including the big reveal about Nelda’s life insurance policy and how it was set to expire in a short time. “If Nelda had reached seventy-five, neither Carl nor Becky would have seen a single dime.” I also filled him in on Becky and Roxanne’s disregard for Wayne and Dakota Walsh.

  “Seems Becky not only had a motivation to kill her mother,” Collin said, “but she also has reason to implicate Dakota.”

  As much as I hated to admit that I made a terrible mole, I knew I needed to be honest with him. “The ladies seem to know that something more is going on than a routine investigation. I have a horrible poker face.”

  “I’m not surprised,” he said. “You’re an honest person. Lying doesn’t come naturally to you.”

  Aw, shucks. “This may be nothing,” I said, “but Roxanne was wearing an artificial fingernail last night. It came off when she was scooping up her winnings. She said she doesn’t normally wear fake nails, but that she’d had her nail technician glue one on her index finger after she’d broken a nail recently.”

  “Did she say how she broke the nail?”

  “She claimed it happened when she was trying on shoes at the mall the morning Nelda was found dead.”

  “But you’re thinking she could have broken it during a confrontation with Nelda Dolan.”

  “Exactly.”

  “We didn’t find any physical evidence like that on the staircase.”

  “Maybe it got lost in the shag carpeting.” Of course, that shag carpeting was now all rolled up and stacked in the garage. Ugh. I mentioned this fact to Collin.

  “Can you keep the carpet around for a while, just in case?”

  “Sure. We’ve stashed it in the garage. It’s not in our way.”

  “What about Gayle?” he asked. “Was she on a roll last night?”

  “Not at all. She only won three hands, one of which she didn’t really win but we let her think she did. She’s been having knee problems and is on a new pain medication. It really messes with her head.”

  “So you couldn’t tell whether she’s a card cheat?”

  “No, but we might have another cheat on our hands.”

  “Oh, yeah?” He cocked his head. “Who?”

  “Carl Dolan.” I told him how Carl claimed to have spent the night drinking beers with his buddies down at the VFW. “I didn’t buy it. He was dressed for a date and holding a takeout bag from a steakhouse.” If he were on trial for cheating on his wife, that bag would be Exhibit A. Or should I say A.1., as in the steak sauce? “Something else crossed my mind, too. Another theory. Becky mentioned that her father loved Lillian’s pie, and that her mother would get irritated when he’d mention it. Do you think there could have been more to it? Do you think Carl and Lillian might have been involved while Lillian was still alive, and that Nelda just used Dakota as an excuse to come to the house and look for proof?”

  “With Lillian gone, any affair they might have had would be over.”

  “True, but from what I gather Nelda wouldn’t be the type to let something like that go. Maybe she wanted evidence of his infidelity so she could hold it over him, or use it as leverage in a divorce.”

  “You’ve given me a lot to think about,” Collin said. “I’ll get in touch with Andy Walsh, find out more about the insurance policy. While I’m at it, I’ll ask him about his mother’s relationship with both of the Dolans, see if he offers anything of use.”

  In other words, Carl and Becky were back in the hot seat.

  “By the way,” he said, “archives finally coughed up the file on Bertram Garner. The arrest related to events that took place at a civil-rights march in support of the Voting Rights Act. Some bigot started a shoving match with those who were marching. Garner’s so-called assault was determined to be self-defense. A dozen eyewitnesses provided statements on his behalf. The man who started the ruckus was convicted and served three months in jail. The charges against Bertram Garner were dropped.”

  Phew. “I’m relieved to hear that.” Maybe he really was the nice guy he seemed to be.

  “It still doesn’t explain why Gayle lied to me about when she’d gone into your flip house.”

  “No,” I agreed, “but her meds might explain it. She was all sorts of confused last night. She invented poker hands that don’t even exist.”

  “So she did cheat, after all.”

  “Not intentionally.”

  With the detective now updated, we wrapped up our call. By that point, Sawdust had zigzagged his way down to the final, creaky step, which I’d planned to fix when we returned tomorrow. Two or three nails would hold it in place and stop the creaking. The cat rubbed along the step, arching his back again. This time, though, the wood on the step lifted an inch or two, falling back into place with a slap. Looks like the stair needs more work than I’d thought.

  Sawdust turned and retraced his steps, this time rubbing his forehead along the stair. The wood lifted again and landed back in place with another slap. He turned to sniff along the edge of the step and set out again, pushing his head against the step. Slap.

  Lest Sawdust accidentally pinch his ear between the riser and tread boards, I decided to go ahead and fix the creaky step right away. I rounded up a hammer and three small nails, donned my kneepads, and knelt down in front of the stair. Curious about how loose the top seemed to be, I put my fingers under the tread and pulled upward, surprised by how easily the wood lifted. Wait. Is this step hinged?

  CHAPTER 20

  UPS AND DOWNS

  SAWDUST

  While Sawdust loved it when Whitney stroked him and scratched behind his ears, he was a resourceful cat. When she was too busy to attend to his needs, he tried his best to be self-sufficient. He’d seek out a nice corner or surface to rub against. It wasn’t the same as being attended to by the woman he adored, but he realized sometimes he had to settle for second best.

  He’d been doing just that, rubbing himself along the step, when the stair had surprised him by moving upward an inch or two and then falling back into place. That’s strange. He’d rubbed on plenty of stairs before, but none had ever moved. Why did this one move?

  When he’d sniffed the step, he noticed that the edge smelled faintly of the same floral scent he’d smelled before on the sheets in the bedroom upstairs and on the appliances on the kitchen counter and on the box of playing cards on the coffee table. Dogs might be known for their sense of smell, but cats had darn good noses, too. Whoever had slept in that bed and used those gadgets and touched the box of cards had also touched the edge of this step, though the faintness of the smell said it had been awhile. Who was that person?

  Before he could think too much about it, Whitney had scooped him up and set him down in the hallway behind her. “Out of the way, buddy. I need to take a look at that stair.”

  He stretched his neck to get a better look, watching and wondering. What is Whitney doing?

  CHAPTER 21

  A STEP IN THE RIGHT DIRECTION

  WHITNEY

  The tread swung up and back. The flat board was indeed hinged on the backside, revealing a secret storage compartment underneath the stair. Inside the hidd
en space was a large manila envelope resting at an angle. Intriguing.

  Secret closets or rooms were rare, but not unheard-of. In fact, not long ago, I’d helped my uncle Roger install a large hinged bookcase at the front of an unused alcove in a home office, giving the homeowner more usable wall space and turning the space behind the shelves into a hidden closet. Cabinets and closets sometimes had false backs or bottoms to hide plumbing or wiring. Back in the day, many pieces of furniture contained secret compartments to prevent servants or thieves from making off with jewelry or other small valuables. The tiny house fad required maximization of space, with windowsills sometimes doubling as shallow drawers, and movable flooring panels allowing access to storage underneath. Every inch counted. Still, finding this secret stash was a surprise.

  I made my way up the staircase, trying the other steps. None of the others was hinged. Satisfied I’d found the only secret compartment on the stairs, I returned to the bottom and peered again into the space.

  Curious, I retrieved the manila envelope. Underneath was a wooden box identical in size and shape to the recipe box that had been in Lillian’s kitchen. My pulse quickened. Could I have just discovered her secret stash of blue-ribbon recipes?

  I flipped open the lid. Bingo! Inside were recipe cards for her prize-winning peach crumble, the raspberry-peach tart, the blackberry-peach coffee cake, and, most importantly, the beloved peach pie for which she’d always be fondly remembered. Hooray!

  My first instinct was to run next door and tell Mary Sue the good news, that I’d found her best friend’s long-lost recipes. I’d tour the block after, let the others know, too, that the missing peach pie recipe had been discovered. But it would be much more fun to surprise the ladies at next Friday’s poker game, wouldn’t it? I wasn’t much of a cook, but Colette would bake Lillian’s peach pie for me if I asked. She’d been curious about the recipe herself. Maybe I could even convince her to bake several of the pies so I could surprise everyone on the circle. I couldn’t resurrect their friend, but I could bring Lillian’s beloved pie back to life.

  Setting the recipe box aside, I turned my attention to the manila envelope.

  Buck trod down the stairs, his boots loud on the wood. He stopped one step above me and stared down at the open compartment. “Well, lookie there. A hidey-hole.”

  “Sawdust discovered it.”

  Buck scoffed. “You give that cat too much credit.”

  “You don’t give him enough.” After all, the cat had once saved me from an intruder intent on killing me. “If Sawdust hadn’t rubbed up against the step, I wouldn’t have realized the tread was hinged. I would’ve just hammered a few nails into it from the top to stop the creaking and been done. Lillian’s recipes would never have been found.” They’d have been sealed away forever in their secret hiding place, like pirate treasure buried on a deserted island or ancient Egyptian mummies tucked away in their hidden tombs.

  Buck gestured to the envelope in my hand. “Whatcha got there?”

  Nothing was written on the front of the envelope. I turned it over. The back was blank, too, and fully sealed by both a clasp and the adhesive strip. “I have no idea.”

  “Gonna open it?”

  “It doesn’t seem right to go poking around in Lillian’s business. I should give it to Andy.”

  Buck’s eyes narrowed. “What if that’s something Lillian didn’t want anyone to see? That could be why she hid it under the stair. What if it’s Andy’s real birth certificate? What if he’s the secret love child of Lillian and Willie Nelson?”

  “What if you’ve lost your ever-loving mind?”

  Buck reached down and eased the envelope out of my hand. I probably should have held on tighter to both the envelope and my principles, but to be honest, I was curious, too. What could be so secret that she’d hide it under the stairs where nobody would accidentally come across it? Obviously she hadn’t told her friends or sons about this hidden compartment or they would have looked for her recipes here.

  After opening the clasp, Buck eased his index finger under the flap and ran it across, breaking the seal. He opened the flap, reached inside, and pulled out a stapled document that looked to be about three or four pages in length. His gaze ran across the first page.

  “Well?” I asked. “What is it?”

  “Lillian Walsh’s will.”

  I stood and he handed it to me. The first page did little more than identify Lillian Walsh as the testator and state that the document was her last will and testament, intended to replace all previous wills. The second page identified Wayne and Andy Walsh as her only children. Apparently, Lillian and Willie Nelson had not, in fact, conceived a love child. On page two, Lillian also appointed Andy as the executor of her estate. No surprise there. Though he was the younger of her two sons, he was clearly the more responsible one.

  Page three was where things got interesting. This will left one hundred percent of Lillian’s property to Andy. In fact, Lillian expressly noted in the will that she’d made multiple monetary gifts to Wayne during her lifetime and, as such, she considered Wayne’s share of her estate already paid to him.

  Given what the ladies had told me at poker last night—that Lillian had been on a fixed income and had little in the way of funds after helping to support Wayne—I’d gathered that Lillian’s house represented the bulk of her estate. Per the terms of this will, the money I’d paid to purchase the house should have gone entirely to Andy. Contrary to the will, the closing documents for the house sale had indicated the net proceeds would be split equally between Andy and Wayne. The closing documents were directly at odds with the will.

  While the page regarding the bequest had definitely caught my attention, the final page caused my heart to leap into my throat and my blood to freeze in my veins. There were two witnesses to the will. One of the names was unfamiliar to me. The name of the other witness had become all too familiar by this point. The second witness was none other than Nelda Dolan.

  “What’s wrong?” Buck asked. “You look like you’ve seen a ghost.”

  I felt like I’d seen one, too, or at least felt one, her hand reaching out from the grave with a ballpoint pen clutched in its cold fingers. I held up the page and pointed to Nelda’s signature. “Nelda Dolan signed this will. It leaves everything to Andy.”

  “I thought you said her sons inherited everything fifty-fifty.”

  “That’s how the money we paid for the house was divided.” I looked down at the page again. Next to each signature, including Lillian’s and the notary’s, was a date around a year prior. Because this will had been executed fairly recently, it was likely intended to replace a previous will. I could only wonder if Nelda Dolan’s signature on the will was the reason she, too, was executed. I shared my theory with Buck. “Do you think Nelda might have questioned Wayne about his inheritance? Maybe Nelda told Wayne she’d witnessed Lillian’s most recent will and that he’d been left nothing. Maybe Wayne hoped that by getting rid of Nelda, nobody would find out about this will and he’d get to keep his inheritance.”

  Was Wayne the one who’d pushed Nelda down the stairs? Or was I making wild accusations? Was I the one who was out of my ever-loving mind?

  Buck looked thoughtful. “Wouldn’t Lillian have given a copy of the will to Andy? After all, she appointed him executor.”

  “That would have been the logical thing to do,” I agreed. “But she hadn’t yet given anyone her blue-ribbon recipes, even though she’d promised she would. She might have planned to share the recipes and the new will at some point, but then suffered her stroke before she got around to it. Or she might not have wanted to let her sons know she’d cut Wayne out of the will. She could have told her sons to get a copy of her will from her lawyer after she passed.” Thinking out loud, I argued with myself. “But if that was the case, Andy would have gone to the lawyer, obtained a copy of the will, and found out he was the sole heir. Obviously, that didn’t happen.”

  Buck gestured to the will. “Is there
an attorney’s name on there? Maybe a law firm? They might could clear things up.”

  I looked the pages over. No law firm or attorney’s name appeared anywhere. In fact, the footer that appeared in tiny type on each page indicated Lillian had obtained the will form online, from one of those do-it-yourself websites. No attorney had been involved in preparing it. Given that Lillian purportedly had only a meager income in her later years, it wasn’t surprising that she’d gone the frugal route and prepared the will herself. I pointed at the footer and showed it to Buck. “This will in my hand might be the only copy.”

  “That would explain things,” Buck said. “Andy might have divided things up according to an older will. Guess all you can do at this point is turn that document over to Flynn and let him follow up.”

  Though putting things in the detective’s hands was likely the smart choice, once again I found myself wanting to take the bull by the horns and do some sleuthing myself. “Aren’t court filings public record? That would include probate court, too, right?”

  Buck raised his palms. “Don’t know about that. What I do know is that you and I have a house to renovate and put on the market.” He gave me a pointed look. “Your time would be better spent here, fixing up the house, than chasing down clues. Investigating is the detective’s job.”

  Ironically, the more Buck tried to dissuade me, the more determined I was to hunt down the information. No man’s going to tell Whitney Whitaker what to do! “A visit to the courthouse won’t take long.”

  Buck raised his palms again, this time in surrender. “I give up. When you get that fire in your eyes there’s no stopping you. It’s best to stay out of your way.”

  Yep. My cousin knew me well.

  From outside came a squeal of brakes followed by the hiss of the brakes being released. The delivery truck had arrived.

  “There’s our materials,” Buck said.

  As he turned and headed up the stairs to let the deliverymen in, I settled the stair tread back in place and tucked the will and recipe box in my purse. Buck stepped outside with the men to make sure everything we’d ordered was on the truck, while I took up a post on the front porch where I could make sure Sawdust didn’t attempt an escape.