by Laura Childs
Toni put her feet up on a leather footstool. “It’ll be a miracle if we get through it.”
Petra glanced up from arranging her yarns and smiled serenely. “I don’t believe in miracles. These days I rely on them.”
Chapter eight
The sun was just beginning to dip below the horizon when Suzanne stepped outside the back door of the Cackleberry Club. Everything, as far as she could see—fields, woods, faraway farmhouses—was bathed in a golden reddish light. It reminded her of a line from Shelley’s poem “To a Skylark.”
In the golden light’ning of the sunken sun O’er which clouds are bright’ning, though dost float and run.
The broad, leafy field of soybeans rippled like waves as the breeze washed across it. Across Suzanne’s field.
She and Walter had bought the land adjacent to the Cackleberry Club some five years ago, as a kind of investment. Now she leased the land and the farmhouse to a farmer named Ducovny.
Squinting across the field, Suzanne was just able to make out a shimmer of buildings. Ducovny and his wife lived in the farmhouse and took care of the horse she had bought for herself a month or so ago. A nice reddish brown quarter horse named Mocha Gent. Stocky and blocky, Mocha was just the kind of horse who could dodge and dance his way around a barrel racing course, or chug along on long trail rides.
Lots of evenings, Suzanne and Baxter would down a quick dinner, then drive back to the farmhouse where Suzanne would throw an Indian blanket and worn leather saddle on Mocha’s broad back, then take a leisurely canter around the perimeter of the field. Sometimes Baxter lazed in the barn on a bale of hay, sometimes he loped along beside them.
“Hey, Bax,” Suzanne called to Baxter, whose tail gave a welcoming thump, then revved into a fast drumming motion. “Ready to pack it in for the day?”
“Roowr,” he growled. Ready to go.
“Me, too,” Suzanne told him. “I’m beat.” She unclipped Baxter from his long lead and opened the passenger door of her Ford Taurus. Baxter jumped in and settled down on the front seat.
Suzanne had intended to go right home. Fix a quick supper, slip into a warm bath, then maybe catch an old black-and-white movie on Turner Classic Movies. Maybe Sunset Boulevard or The Maltese Falcon was playing tonight. Or something light and frothy, with Fred Astaire.
Suzanne was bone tired and still reeling a bit from Ozzie’s murder. But the notion of meth lab assholes breaking into Driesden and Draper to steal drugs intrigued her. Kept whirling in her brain like a big thumpin’ load of towels tossed in her old Kenmore washer.
“Change of plans,” she told Baxter as they zoomed along. “Hope you can wait ten more minutes for din-din.” When Baxter gazed at her with limpid brown eyes, she added, “I’ll make it worth your while.”
“Grrrr?” he growled.
“Yeah,” she said, “I could probably manage gravy.”
Hanging a quick left, Suzanne cruised slowly through Kindred’s downtown. It was both peaceful and pretty.
Lots of vintage yellow and red brick buildings standing shoulder to shoulder, like old World War I solders. Diagonal parking on the streets. Nice shops like Kuyper’s Drug Store, the Kindred Bakery, the Ben Franklin, and Root 66, a hair salon run by Gregg and Brett, two gay guys who did a mean color and foil and whose styling techniques ran the gamut from sleek and posh to Hindenburg-sized beehives.
The largest, really the prettiest, building downtown was the Chandler Building, a three-story tower of red stone. This was where Bobby Wake’s law offices had been located, and this was the building that his widow, Carmen Copeland, had recently purchased. Now the first floor had been turned into Alchemy Boutique. As Suzanne crept slowly toward it, she could see large, well-lit windows swagged with elegant mauve draperies. Quite a change from the garish video store that had inhabited the space earlier. And, as Suzanne coasted past the front, she saw black lacquered mannequins dressed in chic, red sheath dresses and short, thigh-skimming geometric shifts. Since all the lights blazed inside, Suzanne imagined that Missy Langston was working away, artfully arranging bangles and bags, hanging jackets and T-shirts, putting on the finishing touches for the big opening.
Then Suzanne swung out Valley View Road, past the OK Used Car Lot, the Lo Mein Palace, and Pizzaluna’s, and pulled into the parking lot of Westvale Medical Clinic. Turning the engine off, Suzanne listened to the tick-tick-tick of her engine cooling. She touched her palms to her cheeks, blinked at herself in the rearview mirror, and thought about the many times she’d breezed over here when Walter was on staff.
But that was then and this was now, she told herself. Grief was still a part of her life, but she’d tucked it deep inside her heart where it would always remain a part of her, but hopefully mellow.
Like a sand pebble in an oyster that, over time, acquires a shimmering luster.
Suzanne grabbed her hobo bag and said, “Hang tight, Bax. I’ll only be a couple of minutes.” Then she climbed out of her car and scurried through the front door.
A woman in blue scrubs glanced up from behind the front desk and exclaimed, “Suzanne! Is that really you?”
“Esther!” called Suzanne. “How are you? You look great!” Esther was the office manager at the clinic.
Like she’d been perched in an ejection seat, Esther popped up and flew around the front desk to greet Suzanne and exchange hugs. “Hey, sweetie!” she exclaimed, clearly delighted to see Suzanne.
“I mean it,” said Suzanne. “You look terrific. What’s your secret? Did you lose weight or something?” Esther was in her early fifties, but had been blessed with a clear complexion, hazel eyes, rich brown hair, and very few wrinkles.
Esther giggled. “I’ve been on the seafood that. I see food, I eat it.”
“Seriously,” said Suzanne, studying her. “There’s something different.”
“Botox,” whispered Esther. “There’s a dermatologist over in Jessup who’s an artist with the syringe. He made two tiny injections right in the lines between my eyes . . . you know, those nasty elevens ... and they were suddenly gone. Vanished! I said, thank you kindly, Doctor, now please make short work of my crow’s feet, too.”
“Ah,” said Suzanne. Might that deft dermatologist also be the secret behind Carmen’s slightly plumped-up face? Could be.
Suzanne was about to pull out a pocket mirror and contemplate her own elevens when Esther asked, “What brings you in? We close in ten minutes, you know.”
“Right,” said Suzanne. “Sorry. I was wondering if Dr. Hazelet was still around. I have a quick question for him. Nothing concerning health,” she added hastily. “Just... a question.”
“Sure,” smiled Esther. “Let me buzz his office. See if we can catch him.”
Two minutes later Dr. Sam Hazelet was grinning at Suzanne as they stood outside the clinic’s front door. He was tall, early forties, good-looking, with tousled brown hair and blue eyes. Of course he looked adorable in his white coat over a pale blue shirt and slightly loosened Ralph Lauren tie with its scatter of polo ponies.
“It’s good to see you again,” he told her. His words sounded more than genuine and Suzanne blushed slightly. This was a man she wouldn’t mind getting to know better.
“Great to see you,” she replied. Okay, a good and a great, she told herself. Now how do I phrase my particular question?
Sam Hazelet seemed be studying her. “You feeling okay?” he asked. “Because . . . ah . . . well, I heard about what happened yesterday. With Ozzie and with you.” He looked extremely concerned. “In fact, why don’t we go in and do a quick blood draw? Make sure you’re all right.”
“I’m fine, really,” Suzanne told him. “I just stopped by to ask you a quick question.”
He moved a step closer and Suzanne could smell what was either aftershave or a much better grade of hand soap than the clinic used to use. Something faintly peppery.
“Yes?” he said.
Suzanne didn’t hesitate. “It concerns Ozzie Driesden’s murder.”
/> “Lot of theories going around about that,” said Sam. He rolled his eyes. “Thank goodness I’m not the duly appointed county coroner.
Although I think I might have to take a turn at it next year.”
“All those theories?” said Suzanne. “I have one, too.”
“You want to go somewhere for coffee?” Sam asked. “Talk this over?”
“No,” said Suzanne. “I mean, no, thanks. This isn’t a good night for me.” She didn’t have anything going, but she needed a little think time. Besides, if she and the good doctor were going to start something, she wanted it to be done at a careful, relaxed pace, not over a hurried cup of coffee.
“Okay,” said Sam. “So give me the elevator test.”
“Pardon?” said Suzanne.
“We’re riding from the tenth floor down to the first floor. You’ve got approximately twelve seconds to make your pitch.”
“Oh,” said Suzanne. “Okay. It occurred to me that Ozzie’s murder might have been peripheral. That some meth lab guys broke in to steal drugs and Ozzie just happened to be in their way.”
“Interesting,” said Sam.
“So what I wanted to know from you,” said Suzanne, “was if drugs that are commonly used in funeral homes for . . . you know . . . embalming purposes . . . might also be used to cook up a batch of crystal meth?”
Sam stared at her, his eyes crinkling slightly at the corners. “And you came up with this on your own?”
“I think so,” said Suzanne. “Although I could have seen a similar plot on TV. Maybe CSI: Miami? She thought for a few moments and then asked, “Or did Sheriff Doogie already talk to you about this?”
“Haven’t seen the good sheriff lately,” said Sam. He crossed his arms and seemed to regard her with curiosity. Then he launched into a quick lesson on illegal drugs.
“Meth and ecstasy are the most common drugs produced in what’s commonly referred to as mom-and-pop labs,” he told her. “On the street, meth is often referred to as crank, zip, or cristy. The pure smokeable form, methamphetamine hydrochloride, which is the really bad stuff, also goes by a batch of names. Ice, quartz, blizzard, glass, sparkle, and white lady.”
“Wow,” said Suzanne. “You really know this stuff.”
“I served on a community action board once,” said Sam. “During my residency. Anyway, to answer your question, yes. Embalming fluid generally contains formaldehyde, methanol, ethanol, ether, and other solvents. The basic formula depends, of course, on which manufacturer you buy your embalming fluid from. They’re all slightly different.”
“But not by much,” said Suzanne.
“That’s right,” said Sam. “So a crew of crank-head, meth-lab freaks would probably jump at the chance to get their hands on any kind of embalming fluid.”
“Hmm,” said Suzanne.
Sam Hazelet glanced over at her car. It was the only one left in the lot. “You’ve got a dog.”
“Baxter,” said Suzanne.
“Looks like a nice enough guy.”
Suzanne smiled. “I could introduce you sometime.”
Sam smiled back. “Soon, I think.”
Chapter nine
On the way to her house on Laurel Lane, on the north side, the oldest part of Kindred, Suzanne took a slightly circuitous route and cruised past the Driesden and Draper Funeral Home. It was a big old rambling place, American Gothic with a few touches of Victorian thrown in for good measure. Set back from the street, the wooden clapboard building had been painted a somber gray with white trim. Like a modestly dressed Quaker.
On a whim, Suzanne pulled over to the curb and gazed up at the roofline with its fanciful array of turrets, finials, and balustrades. And wondered why so many funeral homes had a certain creep factor about them, always looked like a place where the Addams Family could settle in nicely.
Then, for no reason at all, except pure curiosity, Suzanne crept around the corner and crunched down the back alley that ran directly behind the funeral home. A thick, tangled line of cedars formed a sort of natural barrier on the right side of the alley. Probably helping to screen the loading and unloading of caskets. On Suzanne’s left was the rear wing of the funeral home, a stone block addition that had probably been added some twenty years ago.
Just ahead, the alley widened out slightly. And as Suzanne approached the rear, covered portico, she noticed a red car, an older model Mustang coupe, parked beneath it.
As she rolled to a stop, the assistant, Bo Becker, came bounding out the back door, his arms stretched wide around a half dozen containers of white lilies and one huge bouquet of purple and gold chrysanthemums.
Hastily unrolling her window, Suzanne called, “Bo? Hello there. I’m Suzanne Thetz, the lady who found Ozzie yesterday? Could I talk to you for a second?”
Bo never bothered to look up. He dumped the flowers onto the pavement, jerked open his car door, spread out a black plastic tarp on his backseat, then began piling in containers.
“Excuse me?” Suzanne called again. How rude was this?
Bo slammed the door shut, grabbed the big pot of mums, and flipped open his trunk. Dressed in jeans and a khaki green T-shirt, he looked just as casual as he had yesterday. Except that his hair was combed back flatter and probably held in place with a gob of gel.
“Please don’t be rude,” said Suzanne.
Bo loaded the final pot, then glanced over at her. “You here to jump on the bandwagon, too?” he asked. “Accuse me of murdering Ozzie?” His handsome face twisted with anger, his voice dripped poison. “Because that fat old sheriff sure got it in his head that I’m involved.”
“I wasn’t going to accuse you of anything,” said Suzanne. “I just wanted to ask you a couple of questions.”
“I’m busy,” snarled Bo. He stared at a smudge on his car’s rear fender, then used the bottom edge of his T-shirt to wipe it away.
“That’s a pretty neat car you’ve got,” said Suzanne. “I love that candy-apple red color.” Maybe she could flatter him a little. Pretend to be a motor head. Although if he said anything about rims or carburetors, she’d be outed immediately.
“This here’s a ninety-four Mustang with a custom Borla exhaust,” Bo announced, a smidgen of pride in his voice. “Can’t nobody touch her.”
“I believe it,” said Suzanne. She let a few moments slide by. “I was a friend of Ozzie’s, too. I’m just as upset about his death.”
Bo slammed the trunk. “Tough shit.”
Suzanne gazed into her refrigerator, then grabbed a plastic container of leftover chicken chili and a carton of sour cream. While she heated her chili on the stove, she measured out a cup of kibbles into Baxter’s bowl. Then she opened a can of Newman’s Own Chicken and Brown Rice Formula, scooped a third of the can into a small bowl, added a small amount of water, and warmed it in the microwave. When it was a nice, smooshy gravy consistency, Suzanne poured it over Baxter’s food, added a Rimadyl tablet, and set the dish on a raised metal feeding stand, a new addition in her kitchen.
“There you go, pal. Kibbles avec poulet.” While her chili steamed and bubbled, Suzanne pulled a piece of cornbread from the freezer and popped it into the microwave. Then she gazed around her kitchen.
It was a cook’s toy store, really. Renovated three years ago so she and Walter could indulge their secret little foodie passions. They’d installed a Wolf gas range with char broiler, Sub-Zero refrigerator, and granite counter-tops. It was all quite gorgeous and very Food Network, but not terribly practical now that she was alone. Now it felt a little like a restaurant kitchen, superbly equipped, but a trifle impersonal, too. Maybe, once she started entertaining again, her kitchen would magically transform into a warm, welcoming space where everyone would want to congregate. On the other hand, that might depend on who she entertained.
Her chili heated, Suzanne poured it into a handmade ceramic bowl that was one of a set she’d purchased at the Darlington College Art Fair and added a dollop of sour cream. She set it on a wicker tray along with t
he cornbread, paper napkin, and spoon and carried the whole shebang into the living room.
As she ate and halfheartedly watched the nightly news, Suzanne’s thoughts wandered back to the murder. She wondered who could carry so much anger and malice in their heart that they would kill Ozzie Driesden? Someone right here in Kindred? Someone close to Ozzie? Someone so close that Ozzie never suspected until the final moments when he was held hostage, drugged, and then had his blood drained?
Suzanne shook her head, grabbed the remote control, and switched over to Wheel of Fortune.
Gotta watch something a little lighter, she told herself. Stop these dark thoughts from rattling around inside my head.
Vanna was rah-rahing and busily turning over letters. The clue was “thing.”
Suzanne stared at the letters that had been revealed on the board. Two G’s, a B, a T, and an R.
