The Body in the Attic

by Judi Lynn

  Jazzi waited till he handed Gaff his glass. “You know, Uncle Arnold took forever to meet someone new after Lynda dumped him. Then when she disappeared, it really threw him. He always wondered why she didn’t contact anyone or return home.”

  Jerod nodded. “I bet your dad didn’t have any great love for Lynda. She didn’t make his life any easier.”

  “It caused some friction between Mom and Dad, that’s for sure.” Jazzi thought of Mom’s reaction when she told her about Lynda’s skeleton in the trunk. She’d turned to Dad to blame his brother.

  Jerod sighed. “I don’t think she had many close friends here.”

  Jazzi hadn’t really heard much about her. People in her family avoided the subject. “I wonder what Grandma thought. She never mentions Lynda. And she comes to family meals every Sunday. Not much is sacred in our family. We gossip about everything, but not Lynda.”

  Jerod gave her a look. “It’s a little tricky talking to your grandma now. I never know if she’s living in the present or the past.”

  Gaff leaned forward, interested. “Could I talk to her?”

  “You can try.” Jazzi wasn’t sure how to describe her grandmother. She adored the old woman, but her mind was a slippery slope these days. “Most of the time now, Grams thinks I’m her dead sister. My whole family comes to my place every Sunday. Grams, too. You’re invited if you want to meet them all.”

  “Can’t this time,” Gaff said. “It’s my grandson’s birthday.”

  “How old?” Jazzi asked.

  “He’s turning seven.”

  “A fun age.” Jerod looked at Jazzi. “My buddy’s kid is seven. They get better the older they get.”

  “Until they become teenagers.” Gaff shook his head. “That’s when parents call us because their kids are giving them grief.”

  Jazzi wouldn’t know, and she was fine with that. She looked at Gaff. “If you decide to visit Grams, let me know and I’ll go with you. Sometimes she’s on track, and sometimes she isn’t.”

  “I’ll keep that in mind.” He glanced at his watch. “Have to go. If you’re having company tomorrow, you have to be busy, too. We have more homicides than we need right now.” He handed Jazzi his empty glass.

  River Bluffs had grown enough to be like most big cities. Someone shot someone else almost every weekend. Most were gang or drug related.

  Jerod finished his tea and stood. “Franny’s going to wonder what’s keeping me.”

  Ansel had texted that Emily worked tonight and wanted a quiet apartment to sleep. He’d be over earlier than usual. No biggie. She’d preroasted four chicken leg quarters last weekend, so all she had to do was throw them on the grill with some barbecue sauce. No, make that sauce on three chicken quarters. George didn’t like anything with a tomato base. And yes, they fed him human food and he loved it. He especially liked it when they set empty beer cans on the cement patio and he could take his front paws and tip the can to get the last sips of brew. Yup, George would be a happy dog tonight.

  They never worked on weekends. Jerod spent every Saturday and Sunday with Franny and his kids. Jazzi spent Saturday cleaning and cooking during the day. She relaxed on Saturday night. Sometimes Ansel came over. Sometimes she went out. This time, she and Ansel were supposed to meet a group of friends for Mexican food on Wells Street. She’d looked forward to stuffing herself with a spicy beef chimichanga and a couple of margaritas, and they’d all be home by eleven. They were older now, and she and Ansel were the only ones in their group without kids. Their friends’ weekend dynamics had changed. They drove kids to soccer games or swim meets. And when their kids went to camp and shared germs, unfortunately, they stayed home to care for them. They’d had to cancel their plans.

  As Jazzi changed into running shorts to clean, she sighed. How long could you wait to start a family? Had she made a mistake breaking up with Chad? Heck, no, but sometimes, she missed having someone to talk to. Was she in a rush to meet Significant Number Two? Not really. A girl had to kiss a lot of toads before she met a serious contender. But the big 3-0 was getting closer. Soon, it would be breathing down her neck.

  Before she started her usual weekend routine, Jazzi braced her shoulders and called her mom. Her cell phone buzzed three times before she picked up. “Hey, kid! How’s it going?”

  “Pretty good. I was thinking of coming over to see you and Dad when you get out of the salon today.”

  “Can’t happen. I took the day off and your dad and I are on our way to Shipshewana. There’s a big craft fair today, and your dad loves Amish pies. If you haven’t started dessert yet, we can bring a few to the Sunday meal.”

  Mom had told her about visiting all the shops in Shipshewana. Her parents oohed over anything Amish made, but it had completely slipped her mind. “That would be great. I love pie.”

  “Good. I don’t get to pitch in very often. Anything else?”

  “Nope, thanks. You’re saving me some work.” There was no way she was telling her mom about Noah over the phone when Mom and Dad had a day to play. The news would have to wait.

  Chapter 9

  It took only an hour to clean the apartment—the good thing about small spaces. Then she started to make a grocery list of things she needed for tomorrow’s meal. She’d decided on bruschetta, melon slices wrapped in prosciutto, and a seafood pasta. Jerod had a thing for deviled eggs. Did she have enough eggs to make some? When she went to the kitchen to see, she glanced out the window to the small backyard.

  Doggone it. Her upstairs neighbor, Reuben, had passed out on the picnic table. He wasn’t there earlier, so he must have just gotten home.

  Reuben didn’t overindulge often, but when he did, he didn’t handle it well. She went out and shook his shoulder to wake him. “Hey, Reuben! You’re going to get a serious sunburn if you sleep it off here.”

  He stirred and mumbled. He wore expensive slacks and a silk shirt. The party he’d attended must have been swanky. With his mocha skin, blue eyes, and slight build, he was a beautiful man. He looked like an interior designer who worked with wealthy clients. He didn’t look like he belonged passed out on a picnic table.

  She gave him another shake. He cracked an eye and immediately shut it. “Isabelle?”

  “Nope, just me—Jazzi.”

  He yawned. “Isabelle couldn’t make it last night. I missed her, and I might have drunk too much.”

  “Looks like it. You’re going to have one heck of a headache. Come on. Let’s get you inside.” She pushed him into a sitting position. “You can lean on me.”

  He stumbled to his feet and they stood shoulder to shoulder. She had to admit, she was surprised to hear him ask for a woman friend. If she’d have placed a bet, she thought he was gay. Not that it mattered.

  They made their way to his second-floor apartment and she helped him to his blue velvet-covered sofa. She went to the kitchen and brought him two aspirins and a glass of water, careful to place it on a coaster on his coffee table.

  “You okay?”

  He nodded. “Thank you, dear.” He was fifty-six, close to her parents’ age, and insisted on calling her “dear.” He liked to cluck over her and keep track of what she was doing. Sometimes, when she and Jerod finished a house, he’d give her ideas on how to design it. She was sure he could afford a bigger apartment, but he swore he loved his upstairs unit. And she had to admit, he’d made it stunning.

  She patted his shoulder. “Do you want me to call anyone, get you anything?”

  He reached for his cell phone. “I’ll call Isabelle. She’ll come for me.”

  Isabelle? Cal’s friend? “You’ve never mentioned her before.”

  “We only met a while ago after Cal Juniper died. They were an item, and she was lonely without him. We started going to dinner and the theater together. We’ve grown quite close.”

  “Jerod and I just bought his house, and we’re getting
it ready to flip.”

  He chuckled. “It’s a small world, isn’t it? I’ll have to tell Isabelle. She loved his home. She’ll be happy someone’s taking care of it again.”

  Jazzi decided not to mention Aunt Lynda’s body in the cedar chest. Why ruin Isabelle’s fond memories? Or did Isabelle already know about the trunk? A suspicion niggled in her mind. How much did Isabelle love Cal and his house? Enough to get rid of Lynda? She pushed the thought away.

  “Feel better,” she told Reuben and left.

  Once back in her own kitchen, she read through the recipes she was going to use and finished her grocery list. The trip to the store didn’t take long, so she stopped at Olivia’s apartment on her way home. Olivia could still be at the salon, but she might have taken the day off, too, since Mom did.

  She was in luck. Olivia smiled a greeting and motioned Jazzi into a large great room. The carpet was worn, but sliding doors offered lots of light. Large, colorful, modern paintings hung on the walls. She and her sister attended River Bluffs’ art fairs every summer to find artists they liked and could afford.

  Olivia sank onto the burnt orange sectional and picked up a bottle of teal polish. She raised her foot to finish painting her toenails. “Thane’s fishing with a friend today. I’m doing girly things.”

  It must be home spa day. Her sister’s hair was wrapped in a towel.

  “Deep root treatment,” Olivia said.

  A green mask covered her face.

  “Deep pore cleansing. You should try it.”

  “Someday.” Jazzi sat across from her. “I can’t stay long. I just wondered how Mom’s doing.”

  “She’s having a hard time. Knowing someone stuck Lynda in a trunk is bad enough, but knowing her sister purposely tricked her really hurts. You’d never do that to me, right?”

  “You wouldn’t judge me. I wouldn’t have to.”

  “Mom and Grandma wouldn’t judge Lynda either.”

  “Grandpa would.”

  “They wouldn’t tell him.” Olivia started on her other foot. “Detective Gaff gave Mom Lynda’s locket and she tossed it in a drawer and won’t look at it.”

  “How’s Dad?”

  “He’s on the fence. Mom blames his brother, Arnie, for indulging Lynda too much. She says it changed her. That’s not the way Dad sees it. He says whenever Arnie lost interest, she did the sly, push-pull flirting thing only really pretty girls can pull off. You know, that combination I-want-you, stay-away-from-me type thing. I guess poor Arnie didn’t know if he was coming or going.”

  “Dad didn’t like her.”

  “He calls her high maintenance. Keeps saying he’s glad he met Mom, not her. Lynda was a knockout, and when she was on, Dad says she was something. Arnie thought they’d eventually end up together, until she met Cal. It threw him when she just up and disappeared and left Cal, too. He liked him. Everyone did.”

  “It took Arnie a long time to get over Lynda, didn’t it?”

  “He was thirty-five when he finally married his Lucy, and even Mom wishes after all he’d been through, he’d have been able to grow old with her.” Olivia finished painting her toenails and screwed the lid on the polish. She held a hand next to her foot. The nails matched. Satisfied, she said, “At least they had twenty-five good years together before cancer got her.”

  “And he has his two kids,” Jazzi added. Whenever she saw Arnie at family holidays, he doted on his son and daughter. “Um, I was thinking about Lynda and New York. Do you think Grandma and Grandpa knew she was pregnant and she was going there to have a baby and put it up for adoption?”

  “Dad thinks Grandma suspected, but Lynda swore she wasn’t.”

  “Didn’t they pay to send Lynda to New York? Did they have to pay for her to stay there?”

  “Lynda told everyone she got a job in New York, and all she had to pay for was her trip there. Mom said her parents footed the bill for that, and then she wrote to tell them she’d found a cheap apartment and was doing fine. Looking back, the cheap apartment was most likely a home for unwed mothers and giving up her baby for adoption paid for her stay there. Mom said she came home broke, said that it was too expensive living in New York to save any money, and that’s why she came back to River Bluffs.”

  “I can see why people would believe that.”

  “All I know is when Mom got all excited when Lynda wrote that she’d spent the day in Coney Island, she said Grandma raised an eyebrow and snapped, ‘You know better than to believe everything your sister tells you, don’t you, Cyn?’”

  “What did Mom say?”

  “She just laughed and said, ‘Why would she make up something like that?’ And I guess Grandma just shook her head and looked away.”

  “But Grandma didn’t really know?” Jazzi asked.

  “No, but she told Mom once that she couldn’t trust Lynda’s version of any story, that she always waited to hear the other side before she made up her mind.”

  Jazzi bit her bottom lip. “I found out that Cal hired a detective to find Lynda’s baby. Just before he died, he went to New York to meet him.”

  “For real?” Olivia started to jump to her feet, then thought better of it. Her polish wasn’t dry yet.

  “I called Mom to tell her, but I forgot about her taking the day off. I couldn’t ruin her fun.”

  “You’ll have to tell her tomorrow. I’ll be there to help you.”

  Jazzi stayed to visit a few more minutes before she had to leave. “Ansel’s coming over for supper tonight.”

  Olivia snorted. “What’s new?”

  Jazzi laughed. On the drive back to her apartment, though, she thought about Lynda. She’d hurt a few people, yet someone had carefully folded her inside the trunk and put a pillow under her head.

  Chapter 10

  On Sunday, Dad called to tell Jazzi that he’d talked to Arnold last night, and his brother was coming to the family meal.

  “His kids, too?” Jazzi glanced at the table stretched between her living room and dining room. It would be crowded with three more people. Her lease was up at the end of August. Maybe it was time to find someplace bigger to live.

  “No, it was too short of a notice for them to make the trip, but Arnie wants to hear about Lynda. He’s moved on. She’s in his past, but he always thought something happened to her, or she’d have contacted us. He thought maybe she caught something and died in a foreign country.”

  Jerod was right. Lynda was going to be the topic of conversation for the entire meal. Most Sunday meals were filled with teasing and laughter, catching up with each other, but families were there for each other through good times and bad. They’d weather Lynda’s past and death together. For the moment, though, she pushed her aunt out of her mind while she cut cantaloupe slices and wrapped them in prosciutto. Then she made the toppings for the bruschetta—diced fresh tomatoes with basil for some and a white bean puree for others. She was sautéing the shrimp and scallops when Jerod and Franny came.

  Jazzi added white wine and chicken broth to the pan, then turned and frowned at them. “No kids?”

  Franny put a relish tray on the table—her usual contribution to the meal. Franny and stoves were never simpatico. “My parents wanted to take them to the zoo. I figured that might be a good thing if we’re going to sit around talking about a skeleton today.”

  “Yeah, I can see that.” Jazzi tossed halved cherry tomatoes and baby spinach into the pan.

  Jerod went to grab a beer when Ansel gave a quick knock on the door and held it open for George. “I had to bring him today,” he told Franny. “Emily locked him in the bathroom when I was getting ready to leave.”

  Jazzi bent to pet the pug behind his ears. She wouldn’t be surprised if Ansel insisted they eat at outdoor cafés from now on, so that George could come, too.

  Franny gave Ansel a sympathetic look. “I always worry about the kids
when I leave them, but it’s good to separate from each other once in a while. It builds strength. You don’t want George to be too dependent on you, do you?”

  Ansel looked shocked. “George likes alone time once in a while, but he’s never been locked in the bathroom before.”

  Emily probably did it to bother Ansel. Jazzi gave George one last pat and started to put glasses on the table. Ansel reached for a deviled egg when there was another quick knock at the door and Dad and Mom came in with Arnie. Dad carried three pies, stacked on top of each other, into the kitchen.

  “Hey, good to see you!” Jerod went to pump Arnie’s hand. Their uncle had enjoyed giving Jerod a hard time while he was growing up. At Christmas, he always gave him a fake present before he gave him a real one. One year, when Arnie had heard that Jerod had been grounded for a week, he wrapped a piece of coal in an elaborate box. Jerod loved it.

  Arnie looked at Jerod’s waistline and shook his head. “You’re not getting any thinner, kid.”

  With a snort, Jerod reached for a deviled egg before Ansel took another one. “How’s retirement, old man? I heard you were just another Q-tip, soaking up the rays in Florida, now.”

  If Arnie was a Q-tip with his thatch of pure white hair, he was a good-looking one, fit and healthy. Lynda would have had a good life with him.

  “Come down and visit me sometime.” Arnie slapped Jerod on the shoulder. “I’ll take you out on my boat and we’ll do some deep-sea fishing. My house has a pool, and I belong to a golf club. I’ll show you a good time.”

  Jerod looked at Franny, and she nodded. “Works for me.”

  Just then, Grandma knocked and joined the party, followed by Jerod’s mom and dad. Jazzi took a second to study Grams and was relieved. She looked sharp today, like she was with them, mentally acute. She didn’t have the lost look she sometimes got.

  Jazzi’s mom looked surprised. “I thought you weren’t coming.”

  “And miss Arnie? I called Eli and he came to pick me up.” Jerod’s parents had grown as fond of Grams as Mom was, claiming her as part of their family now, too.