by Laurie Cass
Her upbeat attitude continued as we walked the wide waterfront sidewalk. She kept her head down the entire way, paying no attention to the bevy of boats on the water, to the eclectic mix of people playing in the adjacent park, or to the gorgeousness of the sun sliding down the edge of the sky, about to dip behind the long line of hills that separated Janay Lake from Lake Michigan.
With me in the lead, mainly because Kate continued to lag behind, we barged in the back door of Three Seasons. Once upon a time, the building had been a Chicago family’s summer cottage, but they’d long ago abandoned it in favor of a larger place on the secluded and exclusive point. When Kristen renovated it to restaurant use, she’d magically kept the charm of the original structure, but the kitchen itself she’d gutted from top to bottom, enlarged, and made into a gleaming space of white and stainless steel.
Harvey, Kristen’s devoted sous-chef, smiled without looking up from what he was doing. This was a good thing because he had a long, undoubtedly sharp knife in his hand and was slicing strawberries. “She’s in her office,” he said. “I’m almost done with the dessert.”
After Kristen’s engagement, I’d been a bit worried about Harvey’s reaction, since for years I’d been convinced he was deeply in love with Kristen and would fall into the depths of despair when he realized there was never any chance of romance between the two of them. She’d always waved off that opinion, and she was right, because Harvey was still happy as sous-chef and was now dating one of Kristen’s cousins, who’d been a bridesmaid.
“Come on,” I told Kate, who was still lagging.
“She doesn’t like me,” Kate whispered.
“What?” I stopped in the narrow hallway and turned. “What are you talking about?”
“Your friend. Kristen. She doesn’t like me.”
I stared. What on earth could have given the child that idea? “Of course she does.”
“She’s always yelling at me,” Kate said.
“Always” was a stretch, since the two had met only a handful of times. “That’s Kristen’s default.” I smiled and patted my niece on the shoulder. “It’s not personal. She yells at everyone. You should hear her with Harvey.”
Kate crossed her arms over her chest. “She doesn’t like me,” she repeated.
It would have been better if she’d mentioned this earlier, when I would have had time to straighten everything out. But we were now walking into Kristen’s office and it was too late to do anything about Kate’s misconception.
“About time you two got here.” Kristen tossed a three-ring binder to the floor and picked up her desk phone’s receiver. “Harvey, are they done or not done? Not done, and you’re fired.” She slammed the receiver down. “Hard to get good help these days.”
I grinned. If Kristen didn’t fire Harvey at least three times a week, there was something wrong with the world. But his job was safe for the day, because almost before Kate and I sat, he was walking in the door with a folding stand and a tray of delectable dessert.
Harvey set up the stand and laid the tray atop.Kristen rolled her chair around, squinted at the ramekins of yumminess, and pronounced him hired until next time.
“Yes, your worship,” Harvey said, backing out with a bow.
Kristen snorted and distributed spoons and linen napkins. “That boy is a trial, I tell you.”
Kate looked at me, wide-eyed, and I sent her a reassuring smile. “How was your weekend?” I asked Kristen. “Good, I assume, with the Fourth just last week.”
She tossed her long blond ponytail off her shoulder. “If by ‘good,’ you mean busy, then yeah, it was good. But have I mentioned how hard it is to find supplemental staff? My people are working themselves into the ground and there’s no end in sight.
“And you,” Kristen said, banging her spoon on her desk and glaring at Kate. “I hear you get headaches from the smell of cooking food. You must be the first in the history of the world. What’s up with that?”
“I don’t . . . I can’t . . .” Kate leapt to her feet and ran out of the room. A few seconds later, the kitchen door slammed.
Kristen half stood, then sat back down. “I’m such an idiot. Sorry, Minnie. I’m used to being able to say whatever I want around you. I wasn’t thinking.”
“Don’t worry about it.” I gave my crème brûlée a longing glance, picked the strawberry off the top, popped it in my mouth, and went after my niece.
* * *
* * *
The next morning I wasn’t scheduled to work until noon, so I made a Real Breakfast for Kate and me. Omelets—egg and cheese only because that’s all there was—and fried potatoes. I didn’t burn a thing, and Kate ate hers without a single complaint.
The night before, after I’d caught up with her halfway back to the boathouse, she’d agreed to return to Kristen’s only after I convinced her that though Kristen was crusty on the outside, inside she had the proverbial heart of gold. Or if not gold, at least high-quality silver. Kate had dragged her feet all the way back, but once there, Kristen turned on the charm and had her laughing in minutes. She laughed the hardest at Kristen’s stories of a young Minnie’s attempts to play basketball, and I was so glad to see her laughing I didn’t mind the ridicule a single bit.
Now, Kate finished her glass of orange juice and put her dirty dishes next to the sink. “I’m working late,” she said. “Don’t know when I’ll be back.”
“Are you at the toy store?” I asked, turning to look at the whiteboard, but it was blank. “Kate, you didn’t write down—”
“Mrr,” Eddie said, just as the door shut. I felt the deck of the houseboat shift as Kate jumped to the pier and was gone.
“What am I doing wrong?” I asked my cat as I washed the dishes.
He jumped down from the nest he’d made of Kate’s sleeping bag and, purring, bumped my shin.
“This summer isn’t anything like I imagined,” I said, picking him up and giving him a good snuggle, one guaranteed to get Eddie hair all over my clothing.
“Mrr!” He squiggled out of my grasp, jumped to the floor, and pelted down the steps and into my bedroom.
Nice. Even my cat couldn’t stand me. “Love you, too, pal,” I called. I brushed off what feline hairs I could, grabbed my backpack, managed to drop it, picked it up again, and headed out into the sunshine. Rafe had left at oh-dark-thirty for a short fishing trip with some friends, but I looked at the house as I walked by, somehow hoping to catch a glimpse of him even though I knew he was gone.
“Silly,” I murmured, shaking my head at myself. Had I really come to this? That a single day without him was too long to endure? Was this what love could do?
I decided to think about it later and turned my face to the morning sun, the better to enjoy my walk. The last few days, I’d been thinking about John and Nandi Jaquay and how Polly from the chamber of commerce had said they’d seemed intent on putting Rex out of business. Even though I’d passed that information on to Ash, I’d thought of a way that I, as a private and concerned citizen, could learn more about the Jaquays without raising anyone’s suspicions. It could be that Kate’s unhappiness with me was due to associating me with finding a murder victim, and if I could help find the killer, maybe she’d shift from angry adolescent to nice niece.
The alliteration was pleasing, but it wasn’t quite right, so instead of going straight to the front door of the Tonedagana County Building, which was right in front of me at this point, I wandered a bit on the county’s complicated system of sidewalks, thinking about other possibilities. Radiant relative? Kind kin? Friendly family?
“It’s Minnie, right?”
I jumped at the gravelly voice. In the shade of a large maple tree, a man was sitting on a picnic table bench. He was thin, with long, sun-streaked hair and was smiling at me over the innards of a lawn mower. One of Ash’s friends, and last summer he’d helped teach me to water-ski.
Sort of.
“Hey, Tank.” I eyed his uniform of dark blue pants and a light blue short-sleeved shirt with a name embroidered on the left pocket. “Is your name really Cecil?”
“Yeah, and if you call me that, I’ll never talk to you again.” He smiled, wiping his greasy hands on a rag.
I laughed. “No worries. I didn’t know you worked here.”
“Maintenance for almost three years, did roofing before that. What brings you to the county building?” he asked.
It occurred to me that my plan of going up to the building department could be revised. I’d met the head of the building department last year and had hoped to expand our acquaintance this morning, but maybe Tank could help me. “Do you know John and Nandi Jaquay?”
Tank’s easy smile faded fast. “Why do you ask?” His voice was wary.
And now was the time to trot out the not-quite-true story I’d dreamed up for the building department. “I have a friend who’s thinking about doing some work for them, but I’ve heard—”
“If whatever you’ve heard is bad, then it’s right.” Tank pulled a screwdriver out of his pocket and leaned forward to replace the lawnmower’s housing. “Those two are why I ended up here at the county. Things came out okay for me, but the roofer I worked for lost his business. Lost his house and his wife, too.”
“That sounds horrible.” I sat across from him. “Do you mind telling me what happened?”
He snorted. “We put a top-of-the-line standing seam metal roof on their house and never got paid because those two said our work was substandard.” He said the word in almost a growl. “Substandard, my . . . my aunt Fanny. We did quality work, the best in the area, and because we finished a week late, they wouldn’t pay.”
“That can’t be right.”
“Yeah, tell me about it.” Tank finished tightening and put the screwdriver in his pocket. “My boss took them to court, but it didn’t do any good. The Jaquays had all these lies the judge believed and we didn’t get a dime. Worse, those two spread the word that our roofing was crap, and before you knew it, business dried up and we were done.”
I stared at him. “That’s awful!”
He nodded. “So tell your friend to stay away.” Standing, he said, “The only people I know to win against the Jaquays were Rex and Dawn Stuhler. They ran this huge social media blitz and got the Jaquays to back down. Of course, now Rex is dead.” Tank shrugged. “You never know, do you?”
I thanked him for his information and time, and left as he pulled the lawnmower to life, but the engine’s roar didn’t drown out my thoughts.
The Jaquays were small-minded, grasping, and vindictive toward more than just ABK Pest Control. On the plus side, Rex and his wife had fought back and won against the Jaquays.
But had the fight cost Rex his life?
Chapter 8
There were still a couple of hours before I needed to show up at the library, so I did a Minnie-size U-turn and aimed myself downtown. If I could manage a few minutes with a detective or two, I’d save myself having to call or e-mail or text. Plus, if I showed up at their front door, it was harder for them to ignore me.
“Now that’s an evil smile,” Pam Fazio said. She was sitting on the front step of her store, which was one of the three places Kate was working. Pam was originally from Ohio, had retired early from a successful corporate career, and was now the successful proprietor of Older Than Dirt, with its eclectic collection of antiques, kitchenware, and shoes.
“Evil is in the eye of the beholder,” I told her. “What does that say about you?”
She hoisted her coffee mug in my direction. “That I’m a remarkably good judge of character.”
I laughed, and since it was a beautiful morning and I had time, I asked, “Any chance I can mooch a cup of that?” There was indeed, and two minutes later I was sitting in the sun next to Pam, sipping her outstanding brew. It had been Pam’s post-retirement vow that she would, every morning, drink a cup of coffee outside in the fresh air, and to date she’d done so, if you counted her home’s unheated glass porch as outside, which I did when the temperature was below freezing.
After chatting about this and that, I summoned the courage to ask the question for which I wasn’t sure I wanted an honest answer. “How’s it going with Kate?”
Pam’s face had been buried in her mug, and when she came up for air, she was . . . smiling?
“It’s only been a few days, but I can tell she’s going to be outstanding,” Pam said. “Shows up on time, stays late, works hard, bends over backward for customers. And she’s funny.”
No, she had to be talking about someone else. “Kate’s funny?”
Pam laughed. “Haven’t you ever heard her imitate—”
“Are you the owner of this place?”
Pam and I looked up at the couple standing in front of us. The male looked about fifty, she looked a few years younger, and they both looked cranky.
“That’s me,” Pam said, smiling. “And if I recall correctly, you’re Nandi and John Jaquay. What can I do for you?”
I pricked up my ears. This was the couple who had given Rex Stuhler such a hard time? Interesting.
“We’re returning all of this,” John said, pointing with his chin at the bags they both held. “None of it works in our house like you said, and we want a full refund.”
“Okay.” Pam eased to her feet. “Well, come on inside and I’ll take a look.”
“There’s nothing to look at,” Nandi said loudly. “Here’s the receipt. Just give us our money back, cash is fine, and we won’t report you.”
“Oh?” Pam’s eyebrows went up and she glanced in my direction. I gave her a quick wave and a nod good-bye. Pam had genius-level conflict management skills, so I had no doubt she’d come out of this situation with flying colors.
Thinking, I made my way to the sheriff’s office, where a new deputy showed me into the dragon-less interview room and told me to make myself comfortable, because both Detective Inwood and Deputy Wolverson were in another meeting.
“No problem,” I said, pulling a copy of Josephine Tey’s The Daughter of Time from my backpack.
The deputy blinked, then she smiled. “That’s right, you’re the bookmobile librarian, aren’t you? Brynn talks about you all the time.”
“Brynn Wilbanks?” I let the book drop to my lap. “How do you know her? And how is she? We haven’t seen her in months.”
And I’d been concerned, because the seven-year-old Brynn was in remission from leukemia. At least I hoped she was. Brynn was the primary reason Eddie was a fixture on the bookmobile. When Eddie had stowed away on the vehicle’s maiden voyage, I’d initially vowed it would be a one-time deal. But Brynn had also discovered the bookmobile kitty. On the second Eddie-less trip, she’d been so disappointed at his absence that she’d dissolved into tears and that was that.
The deputy said Brynn’s mom was her cousin, that Brynn was fine, and that the family had moved to Charlevoix.
“Next time you see them, tell them Eddie and I say hello.” I sat back, smiling. Brynn wasn’t sick; they’d just moved, and I hadn’t heard the news. Easy explanation, nothing bad at all. Sometimes it happened.
“Hey,” Ash said, sliding into the seat opposite. “Hal’s in with the sheriff and it sounds like they’re going to be there for a while. Hope you can live with the disappointment of not seeing him.”
“If I die in the night, you’ll know why.” I smiled. “Thanks for making time for me. I was walking past and thought I’d pop in to see if there’s anything new on Rex’s murder.”
Ash glanced out the open door and hitched his chair a little closer. “I can’t see how it would hurt to tell you this. Remember Rex’s wife, Fawn? We’re back to considering her a suspect.”
“How?” I frowned. “She had an alibi.”
“Not all alibis are created equal,”
he said enigmatically. “And don’t bother asking for details, because I’m not going to give any. But I’ll say one more thing; the pest control business was in financial trouble.”
Time ticked along, then my brain caught up. “You think she might have killed him for the insurance?”
Ash smiled and quoted Hal Inwood. “All avenues of investigation are being pursued.”
I flapped my hand at him. “Whatever. But do you know why the business wasn’t doing well?”
“Because they didn’t have enough customers,” he said promptly.
I sighed. “Yes, but why didn’t they have enough customers?”
“Because they weren’t good at getting rid of pests?”
“This,” I told my imaginary audience, “is why I’m here.” I put my elbows on the table and leaned in. “Have you ever heard of John and Nandi Jaquay?”
* * *
* * *
By the time I left the sheriff’s office, the sky had clouded up something fierce. Lightning flashed, thunder crashed, and I was glad I’d worn sensible shoes because running in sandals never ends well for me.
I dashed inside the library just as the heavens opened up, and I stood in the entryway, chest heaving, until I caught my breath and could turn back into a calm and collected assistant director. That coolheadedness stayed with me all the way through until the eight o’clock closing time, and persisted until I had to double back to the library to check that I’d turned off the coffeepot.
Which I had, but not being able to remember for sure was going to make me late for whatever Rafe was cooking for dinner at the house. Luckily, he and Kate had been playing a cutthroat game of double solitaire and hadn’t noticed I was late.
After a quick dinner of grilled cheese sandwiches accompanied by the salad masterpiece of iceberg lettuce, one cherry tomato, and shredded cheddar cheese topped with ranch dressing, Kate retreated to the houseboat while Rafe and I sat on the front porch and watched the rain come down. It was a nice feeling, sitting there side by side and hand in hand, and I had a vision of us sitting the same way in front of the fireplace this winter.
