Digging Up Trouble

by Heather Webber

  "Actually, the opposite." She opened one of the books. "See here? This week last month, the profits on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday far exceeded Tuesday and Thursday. The weekends were somewhat of a wash. More was made, but not eye-poppingly so."

  And the numbers were eye-popping. On the days Bill managed Growl, he took in nearly quadruple what Russ had been pulling in.

  "Does it look like someone's been embezzling?"

  "Not that I could see," she said in that haughty way of hers that told me if she hadn't found something, no one would find something.

  "Do you have any idea why the take would be so much higher on those three days?"

  "Nope. Good management only goes so far."

  "Weird."

  "Very."

  I stored the books in my truck, locked the door.

  "How come BeBe is here? I thought Ursula was dogsitting?"

  At the sound of her name, BeBe's head snapped up, her tail thumped, and the drool flowed.

  Eww.

  I told Tam about Mr. Cabrera.

  "Do you think Ursula and Donatelli will get back together now?"

  "I don't know." But I hoped so. The two belonged together.

  Her gaze lingered on BeBe. "Hey, why don't I take BeBe back to the farm with me? She can visit with her brothers."

  Ian Phillips, Tam's new love, bred English mastiffs, and had raised BeBe from a pup.

  She went to check with Kit, and I took the pictures out of my back pocket, unzipped the Baggie. There were three photos, taken at night. There must have been a full moon because the lighting was great.

  I looked up at the Grabinsky house and decided that whoever took them—and I believed more and more that it had been Greta—had spied from the upstairs bathroom window. The one that overlooked the Hathaways' backyard.

  In the pictures, Dale Hathaway was participating in a little nighttime nookie, poolside.

  And I had to say, the man not only had amazing cheekbones . . . but cheeks as well. It was hard not to notice. The pictures seemed to be focused on his bare behind. Maybe Greta had a thing for cheeks too.

  I flipped through the pictures, calling Dale every sort of bad name for cheating on Kate, until I spotted a shiny anklet on Dale's partner's ankle.

  I knew that anklet.

  Kate was the woman with him.

  I silently took back the bad names as I remembered what Dale had said about Kate, about how shy and prim she was. A good Catholic girl.

  If Greta had threatened to spread these pictures around the neighborhood, I could see why Dale would have gone to any lengths to protect her modesty.

  My God. A man who loved his wife. Amazing.

  I stuck the pictures into my back pocket and told myself I'd hold onto them until Dale was cleared as a murder suspect.

  When—and if—that happened, he'd get them back.

  As Tam loaded BeBe into her car, my cell rang. It was Kevin. Reluctantly I answered.

  "Hypothetically," he said.

  "What's with you and hypotheticals?"

  "Bear with me."

  Tam waved and drove away, BeBe hanging her head out the passenger window.

  "I'm bearing."

  "Hypothetically, if there were a search warrant to be served at Growl tonight, is there any possibility the missing accounting books might be found?"

  "Hypothetically?"

  "Of course."

  I could drop them off there when I dropped Riley off for work. Hide them, maybe, so Bill wouldn't find them before the police did.

  "Maybe."

  "Maybe yes or maybe no?"

  "Hypothetically," I asked, "if my prints are found on the books, am I going to be charged with anything?"

  He groaned.

  "Or Tam's prints?"

  "You brought Tam into this?"

  "I can wipe the books clean . . ."

  "No! Don't do that. I'll deal with the fallout of the prints. Just be sure the books are there before eight tonight."

  "A search, huh? Are you looking for anything else?"

  "Good-bye, Nina."

  I flipped my phone closed, noticed I had a message waiting.

  "Hey. It's Bobby. I'll be home tomorrow afternoon. I was hoping we could meet up tomorrow night . . . to talk. 'Bye."

  I clipped my phone to my pocket and caught my reflection in the window of my truck.

  I was smiling like a fool.

  A lovesick fool.

  I pounded on Ana's door. Her SUV was in the lot and the lights were on. She had to be home.

  "Let me in!" I shouted. "I have a key and I'm not afraid to use it!"

  I heard the lock turn. The door opened slowly, and Ana stood there, wrapped in a robe, a bashful look on her face.

  "I was going to call."

  I barged in. "Before or after I worried to death?"

  "Sorry," she said. "I, um, got tied up." She giggled. A male laugh came from the bedroom.

  I rolled my eyes. I figured she'd gotten more than information out of Jake last night. So much for Shakes.

  "I'm going," I said. I wondered if the search warrant had been served on Growl yet. I'd very cleverly hidden the accounting books in a printer paper box.

  "So soon?"

  "I just wanted to make sure you were alive. You are. Good-bye."

  "Wait! Don't you want to hear about Jean-Claude?"

  I hesitated. "Maybe."

  "Sit. I'll make some popcorn. I haven't eaten all day. I'm starving."

  I didn't really want to know what she'd been doing all day. I could guess.

  And I was jealous.

  "Well," she said, "I met with Jake at All Shook Up, and it turns out he'd arranged for Jean-Claude to show up after his set."

  "Set?"

  Ana stuck a bag of popcorn into the microwave, hit the Popcorn button. She leaned against the counter, waggled her eyebrows. "He works at Steel."

  "Steel? Is that some sort of gym?"

  Ana shook her head, smiled. "Nope."

  "It's a strip club," a voice from behind me said. "I worked there during college to pay tuition. The pay is great."

  To my shock, it wasn't Jake.

  Nor was it S. Larue.

  It was Dr. Feelgood.

  I looked at Ana. "Shakes?"

  She shrugged.

  I groaned.

  "Hi," Dr. Feelgood said to me. "I'm Johan Hornsby." He wore nothing but a pair of boxers. Looked to be the same ones I'd had on the other day.

  The microwave beeped. Ana took the bag out, holding it carefully by the corner. "I came back to the hospital after meeting with Jake last night. You were gone by then. I ran into Johan."

  I slid off my stool. "Hi," I said to him. " 'Bye. I'm going."

  "Wait!" Ana said.

  "What?"

  "Jean-Claude. He wants to talk to you tomorrow morning, tell you everything."

  I nodded. "You two have fun."

  "Oh we will," Ana said, closing the door behind me.

  Twenty-Five

  I looked up from the hummingbird garden plans on my desk at the soft knock on my door. "Well, if it isn't JC Rock."

  Jean-Claude sat in the chair on the other side of my desk. He rolled his eyes. "It's a stage name."

  "But JC Rock?" I couldn't help but laugh. "It's such a stripper's name. You couldn't have been more clever?" I kicked myself now that I hadn't put it together before. Hindsight was evil.

  "Stop. I heard enough from Ms. Bertoli." He fussed with a hangnail, said, "You're not mad?"

  I shrugged. "I'm mad that you're doing a crappy job for me lately, but not because you're a stripper."

  "Exotic dancer."

  "Is there a difference?"

  "My thong doesn't come off."

  I held up a hand. "Too much information!"

  He grinned. "Sorry. Look, I don't want to stop working for you, but I really need the money."

  "I hear the money's good for str—exotic dancers."

  "Better than I make here."

  My jaw dro
pped. I knew how much Jean-Claude made working for me. It was a lot. "Really?"

  He nodded.

  Maybe I'd gone into the wrong business.

  I tried to imagine my mother's reaction to her oldest daughter being a stripper. It wasn't pretty.

  "Well, working both jobs isn't working out," I said.

  "I know."

  "Why do you need the money, Jean-Claude?"

  Clearly uncomfortable, he shifted in his seat. "It's my brother."

  Jean-Claude had two brothers who lived with him, one older, one younger. As far as I knew, there were no parents. "Michel?" Ana had dated him a few months ago. I didn't think it had gone much farther than a one-night stand.

  "No. Henrí. My younger brother. He's fourteen." He looked me in the eye. "He's in jail."

  I blinked. "In jail? At fourteen? Why?"

  "Because he's stupid. Thought selling Ecstasy and mushies would get him the girl he liked. Now he's in juvie pending his trial. They want to try him as an adult, make an example out of him. He was just a stupid kid making a stupid mistake. I need the money to get the best lawyer possible. He deserves to be punished, but not like that."

  Mushies. The word jumped out at me. I'd just heard that. Where? "What are mushies?" I asked.

  "Street name for hallucinogenic mushrooms. Liberty caps, usually."

  I nearly fell out of my chair. Mushrooms!

  "Nina, you okay?"

  It all came together so fast. Boom-Boom Vhrooman had ordered her turkey burger the other night at Growl with extra mushrooms. "Mushies," she had called them, probably oblivious to what she was ordering.

  Oh my God. It all made sense now. Goosh. The closet of mushrooms. The blackmail. Bill was a dealer. Selling mushies through Growl.

  I remembered how upset Mr. Cabrera had been at being charged fifty dollars for his and Boom-Boom's meal. It hadn't been a slip of the tongue by Goosh. He'd been charging Mr. Cabrera for the mushies.

  Extra mushies, Boom-Boom had ordered.

  "Can you O.D. on these mushrooms?"

  "Well, yeah," Jean-Claude said. "They're like any other drug. You don't look good."

  "Did you ever hear of a place called Growl?"

  Eyes wide, he opened his mouth, then snapped it closed. After a while he said, "I don't really want to get involved in this."

  "Too late."

  "Listen, Nina—"

  "Growl, Jean-Claude. What do you know?"

  "Henrí mentioned it."

  "As a place to get mushies?"

  He nodded.

  My God. No wonder Boom-Boom had seen polar bears. Had crashed.

  It all made sense. The nighttime delivery. The extra income on the days Bill worked—he probably only sold the mushrooms on the days he managed. More foot traffic, more sales.

  "How do you know about Growl?" Jean-Claude asked.

  "My son works there."

  "Oh."

  I didn't even think of that! Was Riley involved somehow? I couldn't let my brain go there. Not yet. I needed to stay focused.

  "Where does one grow mushies?"

  "They grow everywhere naturally—fields, woods, yards. It's just a matter of being able to tell them apart from other mushrooms."

  Woods. Like the ones behind the Lockharts' house? I'd seen mushrooms growing there the day BeBe got loose. "Would you know one if you saw one?"

  "Well, yeah."

  "Do I want to know how you'd know?"

  "No."

  "Okay, then." I stood up.

  "Where are you going?"

  "Where are we going," I said. "On a field trip."

  It took fifteen minutes to drive to the Lockhart house. An other five to show Jean-Claude the mushrooms growing in the woods and for him to tell me they were harmless.

  I'd been so sure.

  "What now?" he said.

  "Plan B." I walked out of the woods and couldn't help but admire the job well done in the Grabinskys' backyard. Even without the sod it was a hundred times better than what it was.

  "What's Plan B?" Jean-Claude asked.

  "Growl," I said.

  "I don't think this is in my job description."

  "Are you even still working for me?"

  "Am I?"

  "How about part-time? Afternoons? We'll work from there."

  He smiled. "Sounds good. Um, how are we going to get into Growl? It doesn't open till later, right?"

  I knew just the person.

  Thirty minutes later a grumbling Riley was in my truck. "This is wrong," he said. "It's my day off. I wanted to sleep in."

  "Nine-thirty is sleeping in."

  "In old people's time."

  "You calling me old?"

  "If the Metamucil fits."

  Jean-Claude laughed.

  "You're not much younger than I am," I pointed out to him.

  He stopped laughing.

  "You can sleep in tomorrow," I told Riley.

  "Ginger always wakes me up for pancakes."

  "Life's tough," I said.

  "Ginger?" Jean-Claude asked.

  "Dude, don't ask her."

  "Good advice." I pulled into the empty Growl parking lot.

  Riley hopped out, let us in. "What are you looking for?"

  "We'll just be a minute."

  The office door was closed but unlocked. I turned on the light, pointed to the closet door. "Go ahead," I told JeanClaude.

  He opened the door. "What am I looking for?" he asked. "Mayonnaise?"

  I peeked over his shoulder. Sure enough, the three barrels of mushrooms were gone.

  I should have known! Bill knew Kevin would come back with a search warrant. No wonder he hadn't wanted to show Kevin the blackmail letters. Had he opened the closet, Kevin would have seen the mushrooms.

  "Bill took them out two nights ago. Right after you and Dad left," Riley said from behind me.

  I jumped. My heart pounded. "Don't sneak up on me like that!" Then I realized what he said. "Took what out?"

  "The mushrooms."

  "You knew about the mushrooms?"

  "Not until you said you overheard him scheduling a delivery. I knew something weird was going on around here, but didn't know what."

  "Well, it's of no use now. I can't even say for sure if they were the hallucinogenic kind."

  "I've got one," Riley said.

  "What!"

  "I came in and took one that night. I had a feeling. I was just waiting to show Dad."

  "Where is it?"

  "At home."

  I looked at Jean-Claude. "Plan C."

  "Do I get a raise for this?" he asked.

  "No."

  I followed the two of them out the door and was just about to turn out the light when I spotted something on the floor, caught under the door.

  The corner of an envelope. I tugged, ripping a gash in it. But the words on the front were still clear. "Bill Lockhart. Personal."

  Maybe the officers executing the search warrant had dropped one of Bill's blackmail letters by mistake?

  I turned it over.

  Sealed tight.

  The hair on the back of my neck stood up.

  "Nina? You coming?" Riley called.

  I stuffed the letter in my waistband, pulled my shirt over it.

  As I closed up behind us I wondered how it was possible for Greta to blackmail Bill from the grave.

  My mother was a bit surprised to see us back so soon. Very surprised, if the way she was blocking the doorway was any indication.

  "Mom?"

  "Yes, chérie?"

  "Let us in?"

  "Now's not a good time," she said, trying to look nonchalant.