by Tonya Kappes
“I’ll let you go.” Spencer had his fill of me.
“Wait,” I stopped him from hanging up on me. “Is Hill’s Orchard still closed? Because I need to buy his apples.”
“No. It’s going to be closed until I can bring this investigation to a close.” There didn’t seem to be any swaying him.
“But I can just go to one of the apple trees in the way back and pick my own apples. Not near the crime scene.” I thought I’d give it a shot.
“No. Final answer is no. You’re just going to have to go to the Farmer’s Market and get someone else’s apples.” Again, his words were strong and not wavering.
“Those farmers aren’t from here. I’m sure Jean could use the extra money, not to mention it’s for Low-retta Bebe and the Southern Women’s Club summer lunch.” I knew he’d know how urgent it was if I threw in Loretta’s name.
He did laugh at my pronunciation of her name, but it still wasn’t enough to sway him.
“It looks like you’re going to have to come up with a different idea.” He sighed. “I’ve got to go.” He clicked off before I could protest one more time.
“Can I help you?” Ida slipped her glasses off of her face.
“Umm.” I clicked on Patrick’s name. “I’m looking to see if my license is here.” I hit the keyboard to text Patrick to get out of TJ’s house because Spencer was on his way over there. I slipped the phone back into my back pocket.
“The driver’s license is two doors down.” She pointed.
“Oh, I mean my law license.” I looked up.
“You’d get the notice in the mail. We don’t file those here.” She gave me a sideways look. “Aren’t you the coffeehouse girl?”
“I am. I was at Crooked Cat the other day when you were having your book club.” For a quick second I thought about asking for the public records of the lawsuit between TJ and Fred but it seemed moot at this point.
“You really should join our book club. Leslie told us how you used to spend your summers in the bookstore with her mother.” Ida’s smile took over her face. “We could use some new members and since you’re so close.”
“Yeah. That sounds great. Stop by the coffeehouse this week and let me know the book selection. I’ve got a free treat for you,” I thanked her.
The entire time I was talking to her, my phone was vibrating in my back pants pocket. Patrick had called and so had Jeremy. I called Patrick back on my way out of the courthouse and headed down the block to the real estate office. I still wanted to talk to Doris Blankenship about going to see Jean and what her true intentions were.
“Thanks for the heads up. Only one problem,” Patrick seemed irritated. “TJ said he didn’t call for a repair but since I was there he wanted me to look at getting electric to Fred’s property line from his barn because he said that soon he was going to get his land back.”
“Really?” My mind twirled with confusion.
“Yeah. He said that with Fred dead, he was going to open an orchard and needed electric to put in a sprinkler system too. He said he was tired of working on boats. I got your text a little while after I was looking around. Spencer did show up. He asked what I was doing there and TJ told him I was there to look into installing some electric work using Cane Contractors.” He laughed. “He sure can think on his feet.”
“He’s a fast talker. But that doesn’t make him a killer. I want you to look into that IRS thing a little deeper. Evan Rich said that Fred asked him to look into it because he was trying to get a loan to pay it off. Evan said they’ve not uncovered much, but it looks like one of those scams to him.” I pulled the phone away from my ear when I noticed Jeremy was calling in. “Listen, I’m going to see Doris. Jeremy has been trying to call me, so I’m going to go.”
“Love you.” Patrick’s voice was heaven to my ears.
“I love you too.” I clicked over. “Hey, Jeremy. What’s up?”
“I’m not sure what’s going on with Louise, but she’s called in again. I’ve got class tonight and I really could use your help again.” There was a concern in his voice. “You know I wouldn’t if I didn’t need you. I could call the other volunteers, but you can do so many things and most of them can’t.”
When Aunt Maxi volunteered, she was in charge of doing the laundry and putting fresh beds into the kennels, not cleaning the poop and pee or filling up the kibble.
“Did you try calling Louise?” I asked.
“Yes. She said that she was just too upset to come in. I don’t know. Something is going on with her,” he was upset. “I can’t miss class.”
“It’s okay. I’ve got some new help at the coffeehouse. I’ll be there around five. Is that okay?” I asked when I looked down at my watch and realized it was almost noon. I had to get back to The Bean Hive and get Loretta’s pastries ready.
One problem. I didn’t have any fresh apples and Spencer wasn’t about to let any produce leave Hill’s Orchard until the investigation was over. I was going to have to do some fast thinking and baking.
“You are a lifesaver, Roxy.” There was some relief. “I don’t know what’s going on with Louise, but she’s getting worse.”
“I’ll check on her,” I said and reached for the handle of the real estate office door. “I’ve got to go. I’m heading into the real estate office to check out some leads on Fred’s death.”
“You crack me up. Maybe you need to open a private investigation service at The Bean Hive.” He laughed.
“No thank you.” I clicked off and stuck the phone back in my pocket.
Doris, who was talking to the receptionist, looked up when the bell above the door rang. The office was tastefully decorated with a sitting area and an area rug. There was a drink station along the wall and the coffee smelled burnt. No doubt it’d been sitting on the burner for a while.
“Roxy, how are you?” Doris strode toward me with an outstretched hand. “Looking to sell or buy? I know someone who’d love to have that cabin.”
“No.” I shook her hand. “I’m here to ask you about the ranch property you were talking to my mother about.”
“That.” She clasped her hands and drew her chin in the air. “I’m not sure what’s going on with the ranch, but I do have some other properties to show her.”
“Oh really? I was thinking it was Jean and Fred Hill’s house because Jean said you’d stopped by and insisted on looking around. When Mom told me about the house, it sure sounded a lot like theirs. Funny,” I rolled my eyes, lifted my hands and shrugged, “Jean doesn’t have any plans on selling. Unless she doesn’t know something that you do.”
“What are you saying?” Doris’s happy to sell me something demeanor plunged. Her face hardened.
“I’m saying that you knew Fred was in financial trouble because you have an in with the bank. I don’t think it’s Mr. Rich, but someone. You found out that Fred Hill was in trouble. Where were you the morning Fred was murdered?” I asked.
“Some nerve you got, Roxy.” She glared.
“Roxanne,” I corrected her. Only my friends call me Roxy. “Did you confront Fred about it?”
“I think it’s time for you to leave.” She pointed to the door, never denying what I was saying. “Call the cops,” she told the receptionist.
“You don’t need to call the cops. I’m leaving. Leave my mother alone. My aunt Maxi is selling her rental to my mom.” I turned on the balls of my feet and left.
I stood on the porch of the real estate office and dragged my phone out of my pocket. I had to tell Spencer my suspicions of Doris, not that it made her the killer, but she had something up her sleeve and maybe he could get it out of her.
“Excuse me.” A gentleman in a three-piece suit stood in front of me as I blocked his entrance into the real estate office.
“Oh, I’m sorry.” I held my phone up. “What would we do without these silly things? But they seem to always get in the way.” I moved over and let him pass. He wasn’t entertained.
Eighteen
; I just couldn’t leave well enough alone. The card Jean had on her pie cabinet from Doris was more than Doris making a social call to the new widow. Doris wasn’t that nice. Doris was out to make money for Doris and if she was already willing to find out information on Fred’s misfortunes and capitalize on it, she’d do anything to get it. But anything as in murder?
There wasn’t a clear-cut answer for Jean. Did she know about the IRS? It wasn’t something I’d asked her. There just seemed to be a line between being tacky and tactful. In any case, my niggling curiosity left me hankering to go visit Jean one more time and maybe score some apples Fred might’ve had lying around the kitchen.
Just like before, when I got to Hill’s Orchard, the sign was still posted that it was closed until further notice and the police tape was up. There were a couple of cars with men in khakis and blue short-sleeved polos and badges strapped to their belts. They were talking among themselves when I pulled up and stopped when I got out. There was no sense in talking them into giving me apples.
“Twice in one week?” Jean greeted me at the door of the ranch house with a pitcher of lemonade in her hand. She gave a little whistle and waved the men over. She set the lemonade on a small table on the porch where she’d already put out glasses filled with ice.
“They’ve been here day in and day out.” The smile had faltered. “Do you think they’re ever going to find out who killed Fred?”
We walked inside. The cool air conditioning felt nice.
“Jean, I hope they do and that’s sort of why I’m here.” I gestured to sit at the table. She nodded and eased herself into a chair. “Remember when I asked you about Doris Blankenship stopping by?”
“Yes.”
“I’m afraid it was more than a casual visit. Doris is obviously in the real estate business. When you told me about her wanting to look around when you aren’t going to move, it didn’t sit right with me.” I watched her face to make sure she understood what I was saying and making myself very clear. “The more digging I did in Fred’s laptop, the more things I found as to why Doris would want to look around.”
“Oh dear.” Her voice cracked. “Did it have to do with that IRS email?”
“You know about that?” My brows furrowed.
“Yes, honey. But Fred said he’d take care of it.” She wore a look of concern. “Did he not?”
“I’m not sure. It seems that he went to the bank to check about getting a loan from Mr. Rich, but Mr. Rich thought the email was a scam as well. It just seemed like Fred was smarter than that.”
“Honey, I told you that he loved that orchard so much that he spent his time in there day and night.” She tapped her temple. “But me, I’m a different story. I did pay what they called quarterly taxes.”
“You did?” This was the best news all day.
“Mmm-hmmmm.” Her chin lifted up and then down. “My daddy owned a grocery store. I worked in the office and had to help my mama do taxes. My daddy would moan and groan after Mama would tell him what he owed.” She smiled at the memory. “He’d say, where’m I gonna git all this money? And dance around in delight because he knew Mama had always kept a small kitty of money that paid the taxes.”
Jean Hill was a smart cookie.
“You know all the Farmer’s Market money?” With her hands planted on the table, she pushed herself up to stand. She walked over to the pie cabinet and opened one of the drawers. She took out an old Folgers can and came back to the table with it. “This here is my small kitty.”
She pushed it across the table to me and I looked in. Money had filled the old can to the rim and all I could see were one-hundred-dollar bills wadded up.
“We made good money at the Farmer’s Market.” She smiled. “So when Fred was stressed out, we went to the doctor. That’s when Fred told me about the IRS.”
“What about Bertie? Why was he trying so hard to sell her eggs?” I asked.
She threw her head back and laughed.
“Fred’s daddy raised chickens. He had one of them fancy birds and loved it so much. When Fred talked to Louise Carlton at the Farmer’s Market a couple of weeks ago and she showed him a photo of the bird, he immediately knew what type of bird it was. Now,” she shook her finger at me, “he had to have it and he knew that if we sold the eggs, we could fully fund the retirement account we have at the credit union up in the big city. Fred didn’t like to put all his eggs, so to speak, in one basket.”
“Fred was smart.” I was so glad to hear that Jean knew about everything going on.
“That he was. And I knew when Doris came by that she was sizing my house up, but it’s best to keep my mouth shut and let things play out. Let her think we are in hard times and eventually she’d find out the truth. The one thing that haunts me is the person who showed up here the night before Fred died.” Her eyes and mouth dipped down. “I truly think that person is the one who killed Fred and maybe took Bertie. I told Fred not to call all the Asian places.”
I guess I shouldn’t have been so happy, but I was so glad Jean knew what was going on and Fred hadn’t left her in the dark. Maybe there was hope for Patrick and me with not knowing exactly everything from the past ten years apart, but making a life and future together.
“Honey,” Jean reached over and patted my hand. “Someone sent Fred those emails and got us real scared.”
“But. . .” I gnawed on all the news reports about scams that reminded people not to click on the links in emails, but Fred’s were personal. “Do you think . . .”
“Someone was trying to scam Fred, he caught on and they killed him for it?” she finished my own question. “Whoever took Bertie, killed Fred.”
Slowly I nodded. In the pit of my stomach, I knew she was right, but who was it? There were a lot of questions to be answered.
Nineteen
“Please don’t fire me on my first full day,” was the first thing Emily said to me as soon as I’d walked into the door of The Bean Hive.
“Oh no. What?” I was almost scared to ask. There wasn’t much time before I headed to volunteer at Pet Palace. That time had to be spent making the pastries for the Southern Women’s Club.
“Loretta came in,” Emily’s voice shook.
“She’s scary.” I was a little more relieved this was about Loretta, though I knew I wasn’t going to be able to make the apple crisps the way I’d intended to.
“Beyond scary.” Emily gulped. “She insisted on seeing the apple crisps for the Southern Women’s Club Luncheon that she’s picking up tomorrow. I looked at your order form hanging up on the clipboard in the kitchen and I saw you wanted to use Mr. Hill’s apples. I guess you’ve not told her that you can’t get the apples?”
“You didn’t.” I closed my eyes and when she didn’t answer, I reopened them to find her slowly nodding, her brows and forehead wrinkled.
“She pitched a fit and took out of here lickety-split.” Her eyes teared up. “It was awful. But that’s not the end of it. She came back in and swore me up and down. I told her that wasn’t going to help nothing. But she just kept on.”
Emily picked up a stick with some sort of food on the end of it.
“I was working on some new summer creations that are easy to grab and go. Don’t get mad.” She held the stick out to me.
I rolled the food on a stick around in my finger and thumb, taking a good look at it. Bringing it to my nose, I took a sniff.
“Waffle on a stick?” I asked.
“Chicken rolled in waffle on a stick.” She smiled. “Take a bite.”
Something about food on a stick made me extremely happy and sang to my soul. I was more than happy to take a bite. There was a crisp crunch that had a hint of maple syrup and then the taste of moist chicken entwined.
“Mmmm.” The sound automatically came out of my mouth and got longer with each bite until there was nothing left on the stick. “Amazing.”
“Right?” She smiled. “I offered one to Loretta and it made her stop cussing at me. Then,” she took anot
her swallow, “she started ranting and raving on how good they were and that she wanted to cancel the apple crisp order and have me make some of these. Maxine shoved her out of the way and they fought like two hens.”
“Okay.” I ran a hand down her arm to calm her. “Where is Bunny?” I asked.
“She headed on down to the Piggly Wiggly to get more fresh chicken.” She gnawed on her bottom lip. “Are you mad?”
“Are you kidding?” I asked. “You’re a lifesaver. I’m doing Jeremy a favor tonight and volunteering at Pet Palace. I’ve got so much on my plate with the murder.”
“You’re looking into Fred’s murder?” she asked. “I mean, I’d heard you’d helped out with Alexis’s murder, but not Fred’s.”
“I’m not necessarily helping, but let’s just say that I’m making sure Louise Carlton is definitely not a suspect.” I pointed to all the ingredients she had on the counter. “Do you have time to stay here tonight and make Loretta’s order?” I asked over my shoulder on my way over to the freezer.
The last thing I wanted to do was to come back and cook all night long.
“I can,” she called just as I walked inside and grabbed a couple of trays of muffins, donuts, and soufflés I’d already cooked for the next day.
“Then I’ll tidy up here. Stick these in the refrigerator and get ready for the morning while you bake your waffles and chicken all night.” I was glad to have her. “And when you talk to your parents, I think you’ll be happy.”
“Did you talk to my dad?” she asked as she mixed her ingredients.
“I did. I also told him that I’d like to mentor you for at least a year. During that time, I told him I’d like for you to do most, if not all, of the baking for The Bean Hive. You need to come up with a business model, tax ID, and I’d pay you like you were renting the space from me. All the sales you make from your goodies are yours. It’s only fair.”
I didn’t have to ask her if she was happy. Her squeal and that she was jumping up and down told me she was beyond excited.
