DIGGIN' UP THE DIRT

by Tonya Kappes

  “Mama, this is an ongoing investigation. Do I need to remind you that you can’t talk to anyone about the case?” I asked, though she really didn’t have any information.

  “Oh yes.” Her chin moved up and down in dramatic fashion. A sure sign she was lying.

  “Because if you do and the body was murdered, you could give pertinent information that would let the killer off if they knew you were blabbing.” I put the notebook back in my pocket.

  “Blabbing? You think I blab?” She snarled.

  “Mama, I’ll see you either at the station or at Tibbie’s.” I looked towards North Second Street where Tibbie lived off the town branch.

  If there were a gunshot, wouldn’t someone have heard it and reported it?

  Chapter Six

  “Where are you going? I thought we could head over to Ben’s for a cup of coffee before we went back to the office to start putting together the case file.” Finn stood next to the hearse where Max had just loaded up Avon’s body. “Deputy Lee is finishing up scouring the trail and once he’s done, we can come back and recheck to make sure.”

  “I’m going to walk along the trail and finish up over on North Second Street. I want to check if any of the residents heard a gunshot.” The one thing Max did say about the shot was that Avon had been looking at the shooter. I could only imagine how she felt or even what she’d said. “I’d like you to get all the information you can on Avon. Where she lives. Look into her job. Her friends and family,” my voice trailing off.

  “Do you want me to go?” Finn knew telling the family was always my hardest part of the job.

  “No.” I shook my head. “If you get me their address, I’ll stop by.” I gnawed on my to-do list. “If a shot rang out in the city limits, someone had to have heard it.”

  “Unless there was a silencer on it” He shrugged one shoulder.

  “Maybe in Chicago people use silencers, but in Cottonwood, they take pride in their gunshots.” We were a big hunting town and even had our own hunting club that did a lot of good for the community. “I’ll also walk on down to the rehab since it’s down the Town Branch on the left.”

  “Sheriff!” Scott stood in front of the police line and waved me over.

  “You go on and get the paper trail started. I’ll let you know if he’s found something and be there soon.” I just wasn’t quite ready to be alone, though Ben’s Diner would be buzzing about the murder.

  Even though Finn and I knew we’d get past this little hiccup in the relationship department, I couldn’t help but think this was a big deal if we did get married. I’d never thought I’d get married in any other church besides Cottonwood Baptist. I’d always imagined my kids doing the big Easter Egg hunt and even participating in the Christmas Eve Pageant put on by the children in the church while I sat in the front row with a camera and pride in my heart.

  “Alright. I’ll have you a cup of coffee waiting.” He smiled. “Do you want me to take Duke?”

  “That’d be great.” I whistled and Duke came running over.

  “Let’s go, Duke.” Finn walked away and Duke was right by his side.

  I waited there until he drove off. Poppa must’ve thought it was his time to reappear.

  “Thank goodness you got him out of here.” He stood with his arms crossed. “Let’s go see what this feller knows.” He nodded towards Scott, who was still standing at the police tape with something dangling from his hand.

  As much as I wanted to yell at Poppa and tell him to leave because I just wasn’t strong enough to tell Finn that I see my ghost Poppa, it felt so good to have him here with me. He was my rock when I was living and the day he died, I thought my world was over. Little did I know that years later I’d find out he’d been my guardian angel.

  No matter how much I tried to convince myself otherwise, Poppa and I did have a better working relationship and we did understand how each other better than me and Finn. Finn had gotten better over the last couple of years picking up on my little ideocracies, but we still weren’t as fluid as me and Poppa. We could practically see into what each other was thinking.

  I’d thought about my situation a lot. What would happen if I told someone about Poppa? Would it make Poppa disappear forever? I wasn’t ready for him to leave me again. What if I did tell Finn about Poppa? Would he think I was crazy and leave me? I wasn’t ready for that either.

  As I saw it, it was a no-win situation on my part. My future with Finn had now been questioned and keeping Poppa a secret, for now, was my best option.

  “Fine. I need you to help me,” I whispered to Poppa as he ghosted past me.

  “Yipppee!” He screamed. “Now you’ve come to your senses.”

  “What do you have there?” I asked Deputy Lee and noticed it appeared to be a purse.

  “It’s Avon Meyers purse. It looks like this could be a robbery. I found the purse about thirty feet into the woods.” He turned around to show me there were some gloves in his back pocket.

  I tugged them out and put them on the hands, taking a look inside of the purse while he held it for me.

  “There’s a wallet about ten feet from the purse. I used your camera to take photos before I picked it up and placed markers there too for you to look at.” Deputy Lee was thorough. He was a good addition to our department and that had to be a plus when it came to the decision of the city council.

  “You’re doing good work,” I complimented Scott and walked around to look at the markers. “I want you to be sure that you package up all this evidence and write a thorough report. Lock this purse up in the evidence vault at the office. Have it on my desk by tonight so I can go through it and have it ready to present at the city council meeting tomorrow.”

  “Do you think they’re not going to approve the new position? I mean, if I weren’t here now, Deputy Vincent couldn’t be looking into the victim’s history. You’d not be able to oversee the entire operation.”

  “You and I know that, but the budget doesn’t know that. Plus, Mayor Ryland had his own agenda and he likes to run a tight budget. He might give a little pushback, but if we make a good case for ourselves and this here is a start, we might have a good shot.”

  “No stone unturned,” Poppa reminded me of his catch phrase as he ghosted himself next to Scott. “I like this guy.”

  “No stone unturned,” I repeated.

  “Yes, Sheriff.” Scott nodded.

  “I also want you to go around to the pawn shops and continue to look for the cuff links stolen during the burglary at the Moss house.” That crime couldn’t be put on the back burner because of this murder. Though a dead girl did take precedent over the burglary. “Can you please process her car after Sean Graves tows it to the tow lot?”

  I wasn’t sure which car belonged to Avon, but I knew her parents would know.

  “Okay. I will,” he confirmed before I headed back to clearing the park.

  The sun was starting to pop up and for a late spring, early summer morning, and I could tell it was going to be unseasonably hot. The humidity had already picked up and I’d already started to sweat a smidgen. Something I really didn’t like to do.

  The hiking trail wasn’t all that terribly long or hard to travel. It was just in the local park where children loved to romp and roam. The park was surrounded on all four sides by either a street, a subdivision or a business. Someone had to’d seen something, I didn’t care what hour Max Bogus was going put her time of death.

  The sunlight found its way through the branches of the trees, filtering down on the man-made path. There were a few squirrels along the way, but that was about all the creatures you’d see in Rock Fence Park. Still, with the death looming over my head, any crackling noise made goosebumps crawl along my neck and clutch my bag with a tighter grip.

  I ended up following the trail that Mama said Lulu McClain had taken, which was on the side of the Town Br
anch. When I looked left across the street, I could see Tibbie’s house.

  “If I were going to rob someone in the park, I’d pick the least visible place to get out of there and I think North Second Street would be it.” I pointed to the end of the trail where I’d walked from and dragged my finger to where we were standing. “There’s a lot of space here to just pretend to be walking down the street.”

  “I think it’d depend on the time.” Poppa was really good at establishing a time frame for all the crimes he’d solved. “If it was before midnight, the killer could’ve easily come from the back of the park, robbed and killed her, then took off through the front of the park since it isn’t lit up.”

  “Another one of Mayor Ryland’s awful decisions.” I made a mental note to bring that up at the council meeting.

  Parents had come to the meeting a year ago and asked to have lights put up at the park. He insisted that the park was only for daylight hours, when in reality, he’d just wanted to use that money for something else.

  I unzipped my bag and took out my camera. Rotating at all different angles, I took photos of the park.

  “If the killer ran through here in the middle of the night, no one might’ve seen them.” Poppa’s eyes lowered as he followed a path with his eyes. “I really don’t think they would’ve gone Oak Street, seeing cars were probably traveling through there all night.”

  “Then you have South Second.” I ran my finger in the air behind the park and parallel to where we were currently standing. “I’m just afraid the killer ran out unseen.”

  “We’ve got a lot of things we need to get to.” Poppa smiled. “I love this.”

  “I know you do. So do I, but I also have to live my breathing life and that means Finn right now.” I gulped back the lump forming in my throat. “I’m not sure how I’m going to fix the situation with Mama and Mrs. Vincent.”

  We walked out of the parking lot and headed back down towards the park, stopping at the foot of the trail.

  “Your mama has always had a plan for you in her head. She finally accepted you as a sheriff and knows you’re good at it.” He talked while I snapped more photos. When a car drove by, I made sure I didn’t open my mouth since it would appear as if I were talking to myself. “Then the little hiccup you and Finn had to get through over Christmas when you were going to spend the holiday with his family.”

  “That made her go nuts.” I could laugh at it now, but when Mama first heard of my plans to go to Chicago for Christmas, she flat out pulled a crazy.

  I swear she had a direct line to God because she prayed for the blizzard that’d been predicted, knowing the history of the weather forecasted on the news was never right. Of course, the day Finn and I were going to fly out of the Bluegrass Airport for Chicago, the biggest blizzard on record hit Kentucky and grounded every flight and bus for two weeks. We were stuck, and Mama was as happy as a fuzzy peach.

  “You know, Viv, she loves her religion. And her mama and I made sure Viv grew up in the church learning the good word. And she did that for you too.” Poppa gave me a square look. “She might have her heels dug in on this one. She’s pretty firm on her beliefs.”

  “I’m not saying she’s not right, but does she have to worry about that now? Finn and I are just dating. It’s not like he’s asked me to marry him or nothing.” I glance around and realized I’d taken photos from every angle possible.

  More than likely, I was snapping away to continue my conversation with Poppa. If anyone knew Mama well, it was him.

  “I’m not saying you are going to marry him, but it’s something you need to think about because if that boy is wanting to ask for your hand in marriage, you better know where y’all stand on issues like religion, children, where you’re going to live.” Poppa’s words were wise, but I knew I’d always live in Cottonwood.

  My phone rang and I pulled it out of my pocket.

  “It’s Finn.” I wiggled the screen towards Poppa. “Hey,” I answered. “Listen, do you see yourself living in Cottonwood all your life?”

  He surprised me with a little laugh.

  “I don’t think I want to stay a deputy for the rest of my life. I’d like to move up to sheriff or something bigger.” He caught me off guard.

  “You’re going to run against me?” My heart took a dip down into my toes.

  “No. There are other sheriff’s departments. Maybe back home.” He hesitated. “Listen, I called to give you Avon’s parent’s address. It’s actually on North Second Street. I didn’t call to discuss our future.”

  “Do we have a future if you don’t want to live in Cottonwood?” I was a little angry at Finn and annoyed at Poppa that he’d actually put this in my head.

  “Kenni, honey, I know this murder is stressful, but can we just do our job today and maybe talk about this tonight?” He questioned, making a lot of sense in the professional department.

  “Of course.” I stopped myself from anymore nonsense about our personal life. It was one thing that we’d discussed before we let the cat out of the bag, so to speak, to the public about us dating.

  I insisted that our personal life didn’t interfere with our professional life and here I was doing it.

  “Just text me their address and I’ll keep you posted after I talk to them.” I clicked off the phone and turned to give Poppa my speech about how I couldn’t discuss anything but the case with him.

  But he was gone.

  How convenient.

  Chapter Seven

  Avon Meyer’s parents live on Stratton Avenue, a few blocks going away from the park. It wasn’t too much further down where the Cottonwood Acres Rehabilitation was located.

  The walk down the street to Avon’s parents’ house, even though the humidity had picked up, was much needed to clear my head from the conversation Poppa and I were having about Finn and getting my head back into my job.

  The house number Finn had texted me, left me standing in front of a white picket fence. Quickly I scanned down the stats Finn had uncovered. Avon was a graduate of a state college with a physical therapy degree, Cottonwood Acres Rehabilitation Center was her first job, only child, age thirty-three, not married and lived alone in a house on Hickory Hill.

  With my hand on the gate, I took a second to notice the clapboard house with the two dormer windows in the front. I imagined Avon playing on the covered front porch and even looking out of one of the windows as a child. The news that was about to come out of my mouth was unimaginable, and the woman who opened the front door after I knocked, staring at me, knew something was wrong.

  The screen door creaked when she opened it and stepped out onto the porch, a cup of coffee in her hand. Something I was in much need of at this moment.

  “Sheriff, what’s wrong?” She was about fifty years old. She had on a pair of jeans and a “Kentucky Y’all” tee shirt. “Wesley, get out here. The sheriff is here,” she called over her right shoulder, keeping her eyes on me.

  “Mrs. Meyers?” I questioned to make sure I had the right house, though Finn had texted me Carey and Wesley Meyers, which matched with the name of the husband that she’d called to come out. “Carey Meyers?”

  “It’s Avon, isn’t it. She’s done something to Mrs. Brumfield. I know it. I knew it.” The coffee was spilling over the edges of her mug. “I told Wesley that he needed to step in and do something, but he swore up and down that Avon had to be an adult and learn to get along with everyone.”

  “What’s all the fussin’ about?” A man, I assumed to be Wesley, came to the door, shirtless, gut hanging over his jeans and barefooted. His eyes traveled down their front walk and fixed on me standing at the gate. “Sheriff.”

  “Wesley Meyers? Avon Meyers’s father?” I tried him since Carey hadn’t responded.

  “I told you.” Carey spat at her husband.

  “Shh.” He opened the screen door, putting a hand out fo
r his wife to be quiet. “Let the sheriff say her piece.”

  I took that as an okay to enter and let myself in the gate and walked up to the porch.

  “Can we go inside to talk?” I questioned when I heard someone next door to them clear their throat.

  “Would you like a cup of coffee?” Carey waved me up to the porch and Wesley held the door for us to walk inside.

  “I’m good. Can we sit?” I gestured to the small couch in the room we were standing in.

  “Yes. Sure.” She nodded. “You’re making me nervous. I think I’ll stand.”

  “I think you’ll want to sit.” I’d made this mistake before, where I’d let a parent stand while I gave them the same awful news about the death of a child and when they fainted, they had to go to the hospital for a concussion.

  “Wesley?” Carey seemed to understand the severity of why I was there. The scared look in her eyes searched her husband’s face for a quick answer.

  “I’m sorry to inform you, but your daughter Avon was found deceased in the park this morning by a walker.” I bent my head down so I didn’t have to see the scene that started to play out before me.

  The coffee cup slipped from Carey’s fingers, shattering on their hardwood floor and splattering coffee around the room.

  “Sheriff, how? How did my girl die?” Wesley held his wife close to his chest, tears streaming down his face. “She’s so young and I’m sure she’s fit. She wasn’t sick.”

  “She has a gunshot wound to her chest.” My words were like a bullet to their heart and it killed me a little inside each time I had to tell a parent. There was nothing normal about this situation.

  Carey gasped as sobs, uncontrollable sobs, escaped her.

  “We believe that she was robbed at gunpoint and the robber shot her.” There was no other explanation I had at this time. “Though it could change since we are just a few hours into the investigation.”

  “Do you have anyone in custody?” Wesley had eased Carey down onto the couch. He held her close.