by Sam Cheever
He expelled a long breath of air. “The electrician actually stopped by before you came. He and I discussed the option of security floodlights on the exterior of the place. He was probably there an hour. Then you and Caphy came. And after you left I called Cal and we went over one of our cases together.”
“Being on the phone isn’t a good alibi,” I said, frowning. “You could have taken the cell phone with you to my house.”
He nodded. “That’s true. But I was doing Facetime with my brother the entire time. Cal’s a pretty good PI. He would probably have noticed if I clocked Penney Sellers over the head while I was talking to him about round the clock surveillance options for a client.”
I fought the smile trying to form on my lips. “I’m just making sure. Arno’s going to go down the same path I have, and he’ll ask for an alibi.”
“Already has. He contacted both the electrician and Cal right away.” Hal winced. “Big brother wants to come down here and help me clear my name.”
I felt my eyes go round. The women of Deer Hollow would never survive a dual invasion of Amity brothers. The ground would tremble under all that hotness. “Is Felicity coming?” Despite my concern for Hal, I couldn’t keep the excitement out of my voice.
“Neither one of them is coming. I told him I’m just fine and that you and I were on the case.”
“Oh.” Disappointment fought pride. “I guess that would be too many cooks in this stew.”
“Way too many,” Hal agreed. “Now, how about you and I head into town and talk to some potential suspects?”
“Sounds like a plan.”
Chapter Eight
Since it was close to lunchtime and I’d lost out on my slice of banana cream pie the night before when I’d stormed out of the cabin, I opted to start with Sonny’s Diner.
Erm…I mean. Given its importance to the community, the diner seemed like a very important first step in our investigation.
Better?
Situated in the center of Deer Hollow’s main street, Sonny’s Diner was the heartbeat of the tiny town. People came to Sonny’s from miles around to get great food served in an atmosphere where homey and comfortable fought tooth and nail with dumpy and sketchy for top billing.
Main street is really Deer Hollow’s only street. The angry outbursts of asphalt and gravel protruding from either side were too short and uneven to be called roads, and the mismatched array of lumps hunkered down along those outbursts represented the town’s unassuming and slightly off-putting array of businesses and homes.
To near-universal community relief, the restaurant was no longer owned by Sonny, whose real name had been Matthew Earl. He’d generally been a terrible person. A self-centered, only child whose doting mother had called him Sonny for no explicable reason.
Sonny’s daughter Max was the current owner of the humble little diner, which squatted under a massive sign promising the best banana cream pie in the state. That was no lie.
Now if the sign had promised modern décor and booths whose torn plastic seats didn’t scratch your behind…that would have been not just a lie but a dang lie.
A cheerful bell jangled when I opened the door, and a handful of locals turned away from their chicken and noodles with mashed potatoes to check me out. Their gazes swept quickly over me and got caught on Hal, tightening with distrust for a moment, before returning to the delicious, carb-filled glops on their yellowed plastic plates.
My nose twitched with delight under the scent of rich chicken broth and buttery mashed potatoes.
“What smells so good?” Hal asked, his eyes alight.
“The best chicken and noodles you’ll ever taste,” I told him, grinning from ear to ear. I pointed to a back booth when Max looked up from the order she was taking at the long, chipped linoleum counter. She caught my message and nodded.
I carefully scooted into the least torn side of the booth and sat there vibrating with excitement.
Hal eyed me. “You okay?”
“Great!” I told him in an over-enthusiastic tone.
He flinched. “How much coffee have you had today?”
“Only two cups. Maybe three.” I squinted my eyes in thought. “Definitely no more than four. Why?”
“Because you’re vibrating like a mouse on a washer in spin cycle.”
I laughed gaily. “It’s not the coffee. I’m excited about lunch.”
He eyed me again. “You do love your vittles.”
“Is that a country bumpkin reference?”
“Not at all. I was just trying to fit in.”
“Then it was an epic fail. Nobody around here says vittles.”
The bell jangled again, and we looked up to find a heavy-set elderly man wearing a plaid flannel coat and sporting a toothpick in his teeth. He was headed out, but before he left, he lifted a hand to Max. “Great vittles, Max!”
Jeezopete!
I fought the urge to stick my tongue out at Hal when he gave me a smug grin. “Nobody under ninety says that anyway.”
His chuckle made me flush with embarrassment.
“Hey, kids,” Max said, dropping menus in front of us.
Smiling up at the woman with the ratty tangle of yellow-white hair piled on top of her head, I gave the curled-plastic-covered list of goodies a cursory glance and handed it back. “I know what I want.”
Max was already writing on her pad. “Chicken and noodles and creampie.” She made the word “pie” sound like waa with a p.
I grinned my response.
“Green beans for cover?” she asked.
I nodded.
Max looked at Hal. He shook his head. “Make that two of everything. Even the cover beans, though I have no idea what that means.”
Max walked away while writing in her pad.
“This meal is pure decadent delight,” I explained to Hal. “Carb-on-carb crime. The green beans give it respectability. Sort of.”
Hal chuckled. “Works for me.”
Less than five minutes later, Max was back, placing two oversized bowls filled with a mound of mashed potatoes covered by a glistening gravy filled with dense, chewy noodles and big chunks of chicken. She slid the slices of pie onto the front of the table and eyed the bounty. “Can I get you two anything else?”
“A bib?” Hal asked, picking up his fork. “I’m not sure what kind of mental condition I’ll be in when I finish all this. I might be in a carb coma.”
Max gave him a crooked smile. “It won’t be anything we haven’t seen before.”
I took a bite, moaning softly as my teeth sank into a dense, chewy noodle. “Delicious,” I told Max. “Actually, we were wondering if you could tell us about your experience with Penney Sellers.”
Max’s grin died an immediate death, replaced by a look of pure disgust. “I didn’t kill her,” she said. “But Lord help me, I did consider it.”
Hal nodded in agreement, chewing.
“She tried to get you to sell Sonny’s?”
“Worse. Would you believe she wanted to tear the whole building down and put in some kind of vegetarian grill or something?”
“What kind of vegetables would you even grill? I asked.
Max shrugged. “She mentioned squash steaks or some such nonsense. I told her I prefer my squash whipped into a casserole or pie with lots of lard and sugar.” Max’s grin made a quick, temporary return. “I thought she was going to swallow her tongue on that one.”
I looked at Hal. “I’m sensing a theme here.”
“Yeah.” He swiped his napkin over his lips and looked down at his empty bowl, a look of perplexity on his face. “Did you eat my food?” he asked me.
I snorted out a laugh. He looked at Max, and she threw up her hands. “Wasn’t me. You want more?”
Though he looked really unhappy about it, he shook his head. “I’d better not. This place is going to be death to my waistline.”
“Why thank you,” Max said.
Hal leaned toward Max, lowering his voice. “She came at me ab
out the cabin I just bought outside of town. She wanted me to sell it to her so she could tear it down and subdivide the land.”
Max glanced my way.
Swallowing a bite, I explained. “Dev’s place.”
“Ah…” Max said, nodding. “Nice property. I hate to say it, but that woman didn’t understand Deer Hollow’s charm. She sang the same song everywhere she went. Tear stuff down and start over. I think she had in mind to build someplace more hip.”
“It would take a pretty big bankroll to buy up a whole town, tear it down and rebuild,” Hal said.
I agreed. “Her place was nice, but I didn’t get the feeling she had that kind of money.”
“If she did, that partner of hers would know.”
“What do you know about them?” Hal asked Max.
“Not much. I know they came from Indianapolis. Had an office in the Broad Ripple area, I heard. But I don’t think they were there for very long either.”
“Lots of old buildings, clubs, and restaurants on Broad Ripple,” I told them. “If she tried the same thing there…”
“She’d have been thrown out on her keister,” Max said on a nod. “Her way didn’t make her many friends.”
“No,” Hal said, pushing his empty bowl aside. “In fact, I’m wondering if it didn’t make her an enemy who was mad enough to follow her down here.”
Max shrugged and then slid her gaze back to me. “I’m guessing she tried to get her hands on your place too?”
“She did. I closed the door in her face.” I dropped my fork into my empty bowl. “Unfortunately, she snuck back later and got her head bashed in at my pond.”
“Really?” Max’s eyes went wide. “I’d heard she was killed, but I didn’t realize it was at your place.” Her expression turned soft. “Oh, honey. I’m sorry.”
I nodded. “That’s why Hal and I are asking so many questions. We’re trying to find out why she was there and who killed her.”
“And you don’t think Arno will figure it out?” The censure was gentle. Max had known the deputy sheriff since he was in diapers, but she also knew how stubborn and set in his ways he could be.
“He will,” I said as she picked up my and Hal’s empty bowls. “But I’m sure he’d appreciate our help.” My grin felt kind of strained.
She barked out a laugh. “I wouldn’t count on that. Well, if I was gonna look at people who might want to bash that horrible woman over the head and dump her in your pond, I’d start with old Devon. You haven’t heard from him, have you?”
I shook my head. “Not for over a month. He knows if he comes back, Arno’s gonna want to talk to him about the last time he showed up.”
Max nodded. “Well, whatever you want to say about that guy, he’s always been very protective of you, honey. If he thought Penney Sellers was a danger to you or your inheritance, he just might take things into his own hands.”
I nodded, knowing she was right. “I don’t disagree. It’s just that I don’t know where he is.”
Max glanced at Hal. “You say you bought his place? You’ve spoken to him?”
Hal shook his head. “I dealt with a lawyer here in town to buy the property. George Shulz.”
Max made a face. “I know George.” The way she said it, I figured she didn’t like him much. I’d never met the man.
She patted me on the shoulder. “I’ll get you two clean forks. Would you like coffee to go with that pie?”
“Sounds great,” I told her. Hal nodded, giving her a grateful smile.
We climbed into Hal’s Escalade, our bellies so full we groaned as we moved. “I might need a nap,” Hal said. “I don’t think I’ve ever been this full before.”
“Stick with me,” I said, grinning. “Comfort food is kind of my thing.”
“Oh, I intend to,” he agreed, turning the key. The engine started with a rumble, and he glanced my way. “Who do you want to talk to first?”
I flushed with pleasure from his words, looking away with embarrassment. “When I was waiting for you at the hospital, I was talking to a friend of mine there. She’s a nurse. She told me Penney Sellers harassed that mystery writer outside town.”
“Scott Abels?” Hal asked, frowning. “Isn’t he a recluse?”
“Pretty much,” I agreed. “Sally said Penney Sellers was brutal to him. It wouldn’t hurt to find out if he has an alibi.”
He nodded. “He lives south of town, right?”
I nodded. “His road’s on the right, just after Mitzner’s.”
Mitzner’s Landscaping was the largest greenhouse and landscaping store and service within sixty miles of Deer Hollow. Hal and I had bumped up against the owner, Buck Mitzner, the last time I’d found a dead body. Buck was everybody’s idea of a jerk and, if Penney Sellers had spoken to him, he’d definitely be on my shortlist for her killer. “I wonder if Buck had the pleasure of meeting our Ms. Sellers?”
Hal shook his head. “Mitzner’s wasn’t in that journal you found.”
My eyes went wide. “I’d forgotten about the journal. You’ve been going over it?”
He nodded. “Cal and I talked about it this morning. He thinks there’s a good chance we could be looking at title fraud.”
I frowned. “Title fraud? Why does he think that?”
“Because of the victim’s unusual interest in the bank assessment of these properties...”
“But isn’t that an important piece of data for a Realtor?” I interrupted.
“Market value is important. But bank value isn’t necessarily something a realtor considers until the appraisal stage.” He slanted me a look as he hit the highway and picked up speed. “But if you want to take out loans on properties for which you’d stolen the title, the bank value is important.”
“Ah,” I said, nodding. I thought about the pages in the journal. “You know, that theory clarifies that second column of numbers we couldn’t figure out.”
“If you assume that’s the amount of money the thief can wring from a stolen title, it does, yes.”
My eyes went wide. “Hal, she had my house on that list.”
“No worries. Cal and I are working on that.”
“How?”
“He knows a guy who sells title insurance. He’ll get you a partner deal.”
“Thanks.” I relaxed. Until I realized everybody else in Deer Hollow was in trouble. “What about Max, and the rest?”
“Hopefully Miss Sellers was working alone and the threat is gone now that she is. But Cal and I are going to run security checks on everybody in her journal. If anybody’s been exposed, we’ll make sure they’re protected.”
My chest tightened with emotion, and tears filled my eyes. “You guys are pretty special. You know that?”
He reached over and grabbed my hand, giving it a warm squeeze. “We didn’t really have a choice. Felly threatened to smack him upside the head with her biggest purse if we didn’t help you.”
I laughed. “I don’t even think you’re lying about that.”
Scott Abels’ place was set way back from the road, at the end of a long, winding driveway with “No Trespassing” signs peppered along its length. I fully expected a gated entrance when we reached the end of the drive, but there was no gate.
The house was a colonial style, white clapboard with black shutters and a covered porch that ran the width of the house.
The porch was sans furniture or any other softening items. The landscaping was minimal, consisting mainly of boxy shrubs and a couple of small trees. A sea of grass spread around the house, about ten acres of it, if I had to guess, and ended at a distant line of mature trees that ringed it like a fence and ran all the way to the road.
The land had likely once been farmland, and it was stark. No other homes were visible around Abels’ house. The place felt remote and was almost uncomfortably quiet.
We climbed out of the Escalade and headed up the sidewalk to the front door. It was painted black like the shutters and had no glass or any adornment, such as a door knoc
ker.
There wasn’t even a doorbell.
Clearly, Scott Abels didn’t encourage company. A fact that was underscored by the mat in front of the door, which read, “Go away. This is not a joke.”
I pointed to it, and Hal shook his head, knocking firmly on the door. We looked around, baked in silence, as his knock was apparently ignored.
Five knocks later, the door finally opened to show us a small man with a balding head and irritation writ-large across his round face. Scott Abels looked exactly as I remembered him. “I’m assuming you didn’t see all the No Trespassing signs?”
Hal held out his PI’s license. “We’re sorry to bother you, Mr. Abels.”
The man took the license and examined it carefully, then handed it back and started to close the door. “You and I have no business together, Mr. Amity.”
Hal reached out and grasped the edge of the door, stopping it. “This will only take a moment, sir. I promise.”
Abels expelled a long-suffering sigh. “I’ll give you that minute and nothing more. Go.”
“It’s our understanding that Realtor Penney Sellers visited you recently.”
His expression was filled with repugnance. “Horrid woman.”
“Were you aware she’d been killed?” Hal asked.
Abels’ expression didn’t change. “There is a God, apparently.”
“You don’t seem surprised,” I put in.
He turned to me, his upper lip curling. “Who are you?”
I offered him my hand and a smile. “I’m Joey Fulle. And the unfortunate hostess of Miss Seller’s dead body.”
His eyes went wide. “I know your story. About your parents.”
I barely kept from wincing. “It wasn’t exactly a secret.”
“Not at all. Fascinating case. I wonder if you’d be willing to sit down with me sometime. I’d love to get your perspective on what happened. It would make a riveting murder mystery.”
Hal nudged my arm ever so slightly. He wanted me to play along.
I forced myself to respond. “Maybe we could work something out, Mr. Abels…”
