by K C Hart
“I’m one step ahead of you. I’ve got pizza waiting and I’m gonna make some fresh tea.”
“Sounds good. I’ll see you in about twenty minutes.”
Katy slipped her phone in her purse. She decided she should probably wipe off the counters before getting out her clue book. If that sugary peach syrup and pasty flour dried together on her counter, she would never get it off.
She began wiping the counter in slow motion as she thought about everything she knew. If she took all the information she’d gathered at face value, Jake Finch had killed his girlfriend then put the monkey wrench in the back of Joe Phobs’ truck to frame him. After that he had followed his wife to Mrs. Simmons’ trailer, strangled her and left her there. Then he took her truck and drove it off in a pond across the highway. He somehow got back home to be at school the next morning but left the gloves he used to strangle his wife in the back of his jeep. Either this guy was as dumb as a rock or there was something else going on.
By the time she finished the counters and fetched her clue book from her nightstand, she heard John driving under the carport. She laughed as he stepped through the kitchen door. His bright blue eyes and white teeth were about the only parts of him that didn’t have a muddy brown coating.
“Kiss me, baby, I’m yours,” he said holding his arms out toward her like Frankenstein.
“You weren’t kidding when you said he slung mud all over you.”
“And just between you and me, I may have slipped down a couple of times too.” John stripped down in the kitchen doorway and streaked to the bathroom to shower.
Katy gathered the filthy clothes and put them on the carport with his equally nasty rubber boots. They would have to be hosed off before she put them in the washer.
After John’s shower, they had pizza and tea at the kitchen bar. Katy told John what she learned from Emma Robinson. He agreed that things didn’t add up. Why would Coach Finch wait to kill his wife at some stranger’s house then dump the truck in the pond?
John leaned back and rubbed his stomach. “I don’t think I can eat another piece.”
“You ate seven pieces,” Katie said as she counted the crusts on his plate. “My word John. I don’t know why you don’t weigh three hundred pounds.”
John stood up and took his paper plate to the trash can. “I know why. None of the Cross men are fat. Uncle Gater got a little plump when he hit his eighties, but that was those steroids the doctors put him on to help him breathe.”
“Yeah, I guess you’re right.” Katy looked at her clue book then up at John. “Hey, did they find the other flip flop?”
“It was in the cab of the truck just like you said. I had to give back the one I caught too.”
Katy jotted down the last few details of today’s discoveries and closed her book. “Oh well. Maybe you’ll catch something just as nice on your next fishing trip.”
“Yeah, maybe so.”
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Trudy Mae’s house was outside of town at the end of a narrow gravel road. A big yellow lab flopped across the bottom steps lazily watching Katy as she walked up the concrete steppingstones to the house which was kept in perpetual shade by the sprawling branches of two enormous oak trees.
She leaned over and patted the dog’s head. “Hello, big fella. You guarding the castle?”
The front door opened while she straightened up and Helen invited her in. Katy had known Trudy Mae for probably fifteen years and considered her a good friend, but they had never been to each other’s homes or socialized outside of work or bumping into each other around town. She was just more than a little curious to see if her over the top personality was reflected as much in her home as it was in her wardrobe.
The ranch-style home was decorated in a south-western style. Well, a south westerner who had had one too many margaritas would be more accurate. The living room walls were painted a deep sunset orange and a huge white longhorn cattle skull was mounted above the rough-cut stone fireplace. The couch and love seat were covered in canary yellow leather and bright blue Indian blankets were draped across the back of each. An orange and white cowhide rug lay on the floor in front of the fireplace and an enormous painting of a desert scene painted in bright primary colors complete with lizards, vultures and coyotes was the centerpiece of one of the adjoining walls.
Katy took a seat and waited while Helen went to fetch her mother. The hearth in front of the fireplace had several pairs of well-worn cowboy boots in various sizes sitting on either side of the grate. She wondered if these had belonged to Trudy Mae’s family over the years.
“Well, is it what you expected?” Mrs. Simmons asked, walking into the living room pushing her walker with Helen close behind.
Katy looked at her patient questioningly. “Is what what I expected?”
“Tru’s house. Is it what you expected?”
Katy smiled as the elderly lady took a seat across from her on the matching yellow couch. “Oh yes mam, and maybe a little more.”
“That’s my Tru. Her light has to shine through wherever she’s at.”
“Yes mam, I believe it does.”
Katy checked Mrs. Simmons’ vital signs and asked her all the questions from her nursing assessment. Her patient seemed to be doing well and not suffering any ill effects from the drama at her home on Saturday.
Mrs. Simmons answered the health-related questions and waited until Katy replaced her computer in its carrying case before addressing what was on her mind. “I guess we know what happened to poor little Laney’s truck baby now.”
“Yes mam, I guess we do.”
“That’s such a shame. She was a good girl, a little too nosey for her own good, but a good girl.”
“Yes mam. I didn’t know her very well, but I know her mamma,” Katy said. “She’s going to have a rough time ahead.”
“No mamma should have to bury her child. It just ain’t natural.” Mrs. Simmons was quiet for a long moment then deliberately smiled as she leaned back onto the blue Indian blanket. “So how did I check out? Everything still ticking like it should?”
“Yes mam, you won’t be needing home health long. A little physical therapy and we’ll be cutting you loose in about a month.”
Helen walked into the room with a T.V. tray loaded with grits, eggs, bacon, a biscuit, and a steaming mug of black coffee. “Momma, you ready for breakfast?”
“Bout to starve slap to death honey.” The petite woman dug into the enormous plate of food with the gusto of a high school football player.
Katy laughed as she watched her shovel in the buttery grits. “There’s nothing wrong with your appetite.”
“Oh no, never has been.” Mrs. Simmons smiled as she slurped down the runny grits. “I love my food.”
“Well, that’s a good thing. I figured you would be a picky eater since you’re so tiny.”
“Not me. I eat like a horse. Being skinny’s just in my blood. Poor Laney used to laugh and say I must have a sugar daddy tucked away somewhere because I spent a small fortune on groceries.”
“That’s not hard to do nowadays,” Katy said as she stood to leave.
“I felt so sorry for that young girl. She would come in and show me her new pair of two-hundred-dollar shoes then ten minutes later tell me she couldn’t buy groceries till payday. She always talked about how other folks just had it way easy while she had to work so hard to make ends meet.” Mrs. Simmons reached out and grabbed Katy’s hand and patted it, a sad expression glinted in her eyes. “She didn’t know how to count the blessings the good Lord gave her.”
“I’m afraid there’s a lot of people in that same boat.” She eased back onto the couch.
Mrs. Simmons bit off an enormous bite of bacon and nodded her head in agreement. “You’re right I’m sure. Poor ole Laney would go in these rich folks’ houses to clean, then get it in her head that she had to have what they had.”
“I believe she cleaned the Browns’ house, didn’t she?”
“Oh yeah.
That was one of her favorite topics. She was always going on about Mrs. Brown’s newest purse or shoes and how she wondered what the woman did with her stuff once she was done with it.”
“Really?”
“Yeah. She said one day that she had seen Mr. Brown’s bank statement while she was cleaning his desk. She was busting a gut to tell me how much money he had, but I wouldn’t let her.”
Katy looked at Mrs. Simmons as she took the last bite of her biscuit. “Didn’t she realize how unethical it was to snoop in their private affairs like that?”
“I don’t think she thought about it much. She kind of felt like rich people owed her something I think.”
“Wow. If people found out that she was snooping in their personal business, then telling, they would get real mad.”
“Now you’re following me, child,” Mrs. Simmons said, nodding her head. “I know if she was telling me things, she was probably telling other folks as well. Some of that telling probably got her killed.”
Katy pulled up in front of the Brown’s paved circle drive and parked her car. The daylilies looked as beautiful as ever standing tall in the morning sun. An old green pick-up truck was parked in the drive. Floyd’s Lawn Care could barely be made out from the faded logo painted on the side. She presumed that was Floyd on the riding lawn mower making leisurely loops around the expansive front lawn. She grabbed her gear and headed to the front door, determined to get the second visit of the day finished before noon.
Nelda answered the door, as usual, wearing a white scrub suit and the ever-silent tennis shoes. “Good morning Mrs. Katy. Mrs. Tellman is waiting for you in her room.”
Katy followed the sitter through the house. Mrs. Tellman was sitting in her blue recliner with her feet elevated.
“Perfect timing,” she smiled, “The Price Is Right just went off and my soap doesn’t come on until this afternoon.”
Katy sat her bag in the chair by the recliner and began pulling out her BP cuff and thermometer. “Good, that way I can have your undivided attention.” She placed the cuff on the frail little arm covered in the pink satin sleeve of a house robe. “How’re you feeling? Have you been taking the antibiotics?”
Mrs. Tellman winced as Katy pumped up the cuff and waited until she pulled the stethoscope from her ears before she answered. “I’m finished with those horse pills. I don’t think they did me any good, but I choked down every last one of them.”
Katy stuck the thermometer under her patient’s tongue and finished her head to toe assessment. She looked at the wound on Mrs. Tellman’s leg and was very pleased with how it was healing. “Your family’s taking very good care of you. The place on your leg will be completely well by next week.”
“Well, it should be. I ain’t ever seen so much fuss given to a little ole scratch.” Mrs. Tellman looked over Katy’s shoulder toward the door. Nelda had stepped out of the room leaving them alone. She leaned in toward Katy and whispered, “I guess you heard about that Finch woman dying.”
“Yes mam, I did.”
“You know she cleaned this house every week.”
“Did she?” Katy answered vaguely.
“Oh yes,” Mrs. Tellman continued in a conspirator’s whisper. “I went a round or two with Evelyn a while back because I found that girl snooping through my dresser drawers and run her out of my territory. Evelyn said I was being paranoid, and the girl was just cleaning, but I know snooping when I see it.”
“Did the girl try to explain what she was doing?”
“She just laughed and acted like she thought I kept my socks in too many drawers and she was trying to organize them for me. I run her out of here and dared Evelyn to let her back in.”
“Well, she won’t be snooping anymore, that’s for sure.”
Mrs. Tellman nodded in agreement and glanced again toward the door. “You know, Evelyn had decided to let her go anyway. She was planning on giving her the sack this week.”
“You don’t say?”
“I do say. I’m not sure what it was about, but I heard Evelyn and my son-in-law Miles arguing over where some papers had gotten left. It had something to do with Wild Thang.”
“Wild Thang?” Katy asked, her forehead creasing in confusion.
“You know. The other one that lived here.”
“Tripp?”
“No, not Tripp,” Mrs. Tellman snapped. “The one that died first…the Williams woman.”
“Oh, Jessa Williams.”
“Yes, that one. Apparently Snoopy had gotten into some of Wild Thang’s papers or something cleaning up her room and now they’re missing.”
Katy couldn’t help but smile at Mrs. Tellman’s habit of labeling people with colorful nicknames. She wondered what she called her in her absence. “Do you think that girl possibly moved the papers when she was cleaning?”
Mrs. Tellman gave Katy a ‘don’t be stupid’ look. “No, I think she took them.”
“Oh, I see.” Katy hoped the old lady was wrong. Laney Finch’s reputation was slipping more and more as the day went along. She didn’t want to believe the young woman was a thief. “Why do you think she would take Jessa Williams’ papers?” Katy had her own ideas but had no intention of sharing them with her patient.
“I’m sure it was something seedy. Wild Thang was no angel, believe me. Evelyn should have taken a stand a long time ago and kicked that one out. I don’t care what that son-in-law of mine said.”
Their conversation was cut short by the sound of feet coming down the hall to the bedroom. Mrs. Tellman sat back in her chair hurriedly, like she had been doing something illegal.
Katy turned toward the sound just in time to see Tripp Brown step through the bedroom doorway. “Nanna,” he said, not acknowledging Katy at all, “has Mom been around this morning? She’s not answering her phone.”
“She was going to the beauty parlor. Maybe she’s under the dryer and didn’t hear it ring.”
Tripp placed his hands on his hips and glared at his grandmother. “And maybe she’s ignoring my calls, so she won’t have to help with the work.”
“And maybe she wants a minute’s peace from her spoiled rotten son.” Mrs. Tellman’s glare was just as strong as her grandson’s.
Tripp started to make another comment but seemed to notice Katy’s presence for the first time. “Well, when you hear from her, tell her I’m looking for her.”
Mrs. Tellman’s sugary sweet smile dripped with sarcasm. “Oh, you know I will.”
“Where’s Nelda,” he asked, throwing both hands up in the air. He didn’t wait for an answer but walked out of the room calling the sitter’s name at the top of his lungs.
Mrs. Tellman watched him leave and looked back at Katy. “If I could, I would get a switch and turn that one over my knee.”
“I think he’s a little too big for that,” Katy said.
“I think you’re right,” Mrs. Tellman chuckled, “but I have threatened to give him a whack or two with my cane.”
“Where is your cane?” Katy looked on either side of the baby blue recliner. “You must have left it somewhere.”
Mrs. Tellman scanned her massive bedroom trying to remember where she had last used it. “Go look in my bathroom I bet it’s by the sink. I know I had it in there this morning.”
Katy went to the connecting bathroom to search. Sure enough, there it was, propped against the sink. She picked it up and started back to her patient but paused behind the doorway just out of sight. Tripp had returned to Mrs. Tellman’s room and continued with his verbal escapades even more strongly now that he thought his grandmother was alone.
“Look, Nanna, you ain’t got any business talking to that Cross woman about this family. Did you know that she was the one that found Jessa under that hay trailer? And there you go, just spilling your guts to her about the family.”
“Hush boy,” Mrs. Tellman hissed. “I ain’t spilling nothing. Jessa Williams ain’t none of my family and don’t you forget it.”
Tripp placed one hand on
either side of the recliner’s arms and leaned over his grandmother. “Well, you just remember one thing. Our business is our business and nobody else’s. If you can’t remember that, there’s a room down at the old folk’s home just waiting for you to move into.”
Mrs. Tellman leaned into her grandson’s face meeting him nose to nose. She didn’t seem the least bit intimidated by his bullying technique. “And you remember one thing. I still sign all my own legal papers. I ain’t going nowhere unless I want to. And when I do go…my money goes with me.”
Katy held her breath waiting for Tripp to respond. Dear Lord, keep that little woman safe, Katy silently prayed. She doesn’t seem to know when to keep her mouth shut.
Tripp’s face was beet red and his posture rigid as he stared at his grandmother, but reason finally won out. He let go of the chair arms and stormed out of the room without another comment.
Katy walked into the room and propped the cane next to Mrs. Tellman’s chair. “I found it. It was right where you said it would be.”
“I leave it in there about half the time.” She waited until Katy sat back down before finishing. “I know you heard us a few seconds ago.”
“Yes mam, I did.”
“I apologize for the rudeness of that boy. He’s always been a hothead, but when he quit smoking it got a lot worse.”
“I’ve heard that people can get real edgy when they try to quit.”
“He’s turned into a plumb bully,” Mrs. Tellman said. She rubbed her wrinkled hands together as she spoke. “I guess he quit about six months ago, so I would think all of the nicotine would be out of his system.”
“Yes mam, I would think so too.”
“He’s got some pills he takes. Says they take the edge off. I can’t tell that they are working.”
Katy nodded again. That must have been the Xanax and Wellbutrin she saw him picking up at the pharmacy. She glanced down at her watch. “I’m afraid it’s time for me to go.”
“Alright, dear. Will I see you next week?”
“Yes mam and call me if you need me sooner.”
