“Why, honey, because he figured since I’m going to be your mother-in-law, you wouldn’t mind me bunking in with you for a few days.” Bunny grinned. “A chance for you to get on my good side, so to speak.”
Mother-in-law! Had Charlie lost his mind? Skye knew that both he and her own mother, May, desperately wanted her to get married. And they both thought Simon would nicely fit the role of husband. But if they were telling people that she and Simon were engaged, she would have to kill them. Any jury of her peers—her peers being single females over thirty with interfering families—would never find her guilty.
Skye refocused on the woman sitting across from her. Bunny’s face held a bright, expectant look. Skye tried to come up with something tactful to say. Instead she blurted out, “Simon and I are not engaged.”
Bunny leaned forward and patted her hand. “Oh, I know it’s a secret. But Charlie said when he found out you and Sonny had spent the weekend in Chicago together, he knew you’d be making the announcement soon.” Bunny reached for another cookie. “Don’t you worry. I’m sure Sonny Boy will make an honest woman of you before too long.”
Skye’s head was pounding, and she felt the area under her right eye start to twitch. “I’m really sorry, Mrs. Reid, but Uncle Charlie was wrong. Wishful thinking on his part, understand?”
“If you don’t want to call me Bunny, you could call me Mom, but I told you, cut the Mrs. Reid crap.”
Skye had a brief vision of calling this woman Mom, and how well her own mother would react to that. “Mrs…. Bunny, look, I’m really not your future daughter-in-law, and we really ought to call Simon.”
The redhead shrugged, her suspiciously firm breasts hardly moving. “If you want to keep it a secret, I understand, but couldn’t you just let me stay with you for a night or two without calling Sonny?”
“I’m sorry, it just doesn’t feel right to keep this from Simon.” Skye always got into trouble whenever she tried to keep secrets from the men in her life.
“But …”
Skye watched the other woman’s face crumple, and hurried to continue. “And, you know, I don’t even have a guest room. There’s just this room, the kitchen, and my bedroom. There’s nowhere for you to sleep.”
Bunny bounced up and down a couple of times on the sofa. “Honey, this little old couch will do me just fine.”
“But Simon has a really nice guest room, with a queen-size bed and everything.”
Bunny raised an eyebrow. “And how do you know that, Missy, if you and him aren’t getting married?”
Even though Skye suspected that Bunny, of all people, had no right to question where anyone else slept, she felt herself blushing and stammered, “He showed it to me once. I didn’t stay there or anything.”
The sly grin that appeared on the redhead’s face confirmed Skye’s thought.
“Anyway, I have to call Simon. I’m sorry.”
Bunny trailed Skye into the kitchen, and sighed as Skye punched his number into the telephone. After four rings Simon’s voice answered. “I’m not available at this time. Please leave a message after the tone.” She tried the funeral home number and his cell phone, and got similar announcements. She told all the machines to have Simon call her, but didn’t say why. It was too confusing to explain in a short message.
“Looks like Simon’s not home yet,” Skye said, looking at the clock. Only seven. It seemed later. “When I talked to him yesterday, he said something about a meeting in Chicago. He must not be back yet.”
“Sure. I know Sonny would never cheat on you, honey.”
Skye opened her mouth, but shut it without speaking. What was the use? She had learned quickly that Bunny heard only what Bunny wanted to hear. Instead she asked, “Did you have supper? Are you hungry?”
“A little. I had a big lunch, but I could go for something light.” The older woman patted her flat stomach. “Gotta watch my figure, or no one else will.”
Skye frowned. Was that an insult? For most of her life, she had starved herself on less than eight hundred calories a day and managed to keep her weight within society’s expectations, but a few years ago she had decided to get off the diet roller coaster. Now she ate sensibly, exercised, and accepted the fact that she would never make the cover of Cosmopolitan.
Usually she was okay with her more curvaceous appearance, but occasionally someone would say something, and it would throw her self-esteem off balance for a moment or two. “Bunny, I’m sure you didn’t mean to imply that no one could be attractive if they weren’t a size six, right?”
The older woman looked at Skye, her eyes widening. “Oh, no, honey. You’re a beautiful girl. Those emerald eyes and that long curly chestnut hair probably have men panting on your steps all the time. I’m sure those extra pounds don’t make a bit a difference for you.”
“Thank you, but my goal in life isn’t to have men panting at my door. I’m perfectly happy on my own. I don’t need a man to make my life complete.”
“That’s sure different from my day. But then, everything is different from when I was young.” Bunny’s voice grew nostalgic. “In the sixties, we took acid to make the world weirder. Now the world is weirder than we can handle, and we take Prozac to make it normal.” She was silent a second, then shook her head and straightened her shoulders. “Oh, I forgot to tell you, something’s wrong with your toilet.”
“What?” Skye wondered if this was Bunny’s way of changing the subject.
“It didn’t seem to want to flush, and now I can still hear it running.”
Skye cocked her head. Yes, she could hear it, too. She rushed toward the bathroom. What in the world had Bunny done to it? It had always worked okay until now.
Flinging open the door, Skye was just in time to see the water in the bowl start to overflow. She leaped to jiggle the handle, but the water kept rising.
She pushed Bunny aside and ran for the plunger, which was stowed in the bathroom off her bedroom. Returning, she again had to push the older woman out of the way. Why was Bunny so fascinated with a plumbing problem? Could she have flushed something she didn’t want Skye to see?
The ringing of the telephone momentarily stopped Skye’s efforts to unblock the toilet, but she quickly resumed plunging and said to Bunny, “Could you get that?”
The redhead paused and listened as the phone rang for the second time, then shook her head. “It might be Sonny.”
“For crying out loud.” Skye thrust the plunger’s wooden handle at Bunny. “Then you use this, while I answer it.”
Bunny backed, away as if Skye had tried to hand her a pile of poop. “Ew, no way.”
The phone rang for the third time.
“Fine.” What was a little more water? The bathroom floor already looked like Lake Michigan. Skye tried to edge past Bunny who had resumed her position in the doorway.
The phone rang for a fourth time and the answering machine picked up.
Skye could hear Simon start to talk. “Hi, I got your message. Where are you?”
Missing this phone call was not an option. She pushed at Bunny, who now seemed to be deliberately blocking her way. The two women struggled, the plunger held horizontally between them like some sort of jousting pole.
Simon continued, “I’m stuck in Chicago. I’m going to check in to a hotel. The snow has closed down most of the roads, and I don’t want to chance trying to drive home.” There was a high-pitched beep, then he said, “Damn, the battery on my cell phone is dying.”
With a mighty shove, Skye finally managed to move Bunny and raced toward the phone. She was just in time to hear “I’ll talk to you tomorrow. Bye.”
Bunny had followed her into the kitchen and cooed, “Oh, you missed Sonny. That’s too bad.”
Skye gritted her teeth.
Bunny widened her eyes and twisted a strand of hair around her finger. “Guess that means I’m staying here tonight.”
Skye took a deep breath. “I guess so.”
“So, when do you think you’ll ge
t my bathroom cleaned up?”
“How about never?” Skye muttered as she left Bunny standing in the kitchen. “Is never good for you?”
CHAPTER 3
Man shall not live by bread alone.
—New Testament
Achoo! Achoo! Achoo!” Without lifting her head from the pillow, Skye grabbed a tissue from the nightstand and blew her nose.
“God bless you,” a voice called.
She sat up. When had Bingo learned to talk? Oh. She sank back down on the mattress and pulled the covers over her head. She had forgotten her houseguest. What in the world would she do with Bunny?
She’d think about that later. According to the clock, she had fifteen minutes before she had to get up for work. Closing her eyes, Skye made her mind go blank.
After what seemed like seconds later, her radio alarm clicked on and the announcer said, “It’s six o’clock on a snowy Wednesday morning. Most roads are impassable. The following schools are closed …”
Skye listened intently.
Half a dozen names into the list the DJ said the magic words, “Scumble River Elementary, Junior, and Senior High Schools.”
Technically, if her district was closed, Skye should have received a phone call, but she was on the very bottom of the phone tree, so it came as no surprise to hear the news from WJOL first.
Skye switched off the radio and snuggled back under the covers. A bout of sneezing woke her up a half hour later. Her head was completely stuffed up and her throat hurt. Wonderful. She would spend her day off sick in bed.
“You really ought to take something for that.” Bunny’s voice blasted through Skye’s closed bedroom door. “Then we could both get our beauty sleep. Time may be a great healer, but it’s a lousy beautician.” It was obvious that Bunny would not be an easy houseguest.
Skye reluctantly got up and shuffled into the connecting bath. She mounted the two steps leading up to the oversize soaking tub, turned on the faucet, and poured in some foaming oil.
Although she loved everything about her little cottage—the unusual octagonal shape, the deck reaching from the left of the front door, around the side, and all along the back, and the small center cupola that acted as a skylight—in many ways, the master bathroom was her favorite part.
As the tub filled, she crossed to the medicine cabinet and took out a box of cold tablets. She popped two pills from the blister pack, ran a glass of water, and swallowed the green capsules. Oops! Skye squinted. The directions said for nighttime use only. Oh, well, she was just going to lie around all day anyway.
After stripping off her pajamas and putting them into the hamper, Skye climbed into the bathtub. An oval window was set high on the wall, positioned so the tub’s occupant could lie back and look outside. This morning the only thing to see was snow pelting the glass.
She settled back, adjusted the foam neck pillow, and let her eyes drift shut. She was dreaming of the beach when she first became aware of the cacophony of noises—the phone was ringing, Bingo was yowling, and Bunny was cursing. What the heck was going on?
Skye reluctantly emerged from the soothing water, toweled dry, donned her robe, and braced herself to face whatever chaos had erupted on the other side of her bedroom door. As she stepped over the threshold and got her first good look, she groaned.
Bunny had certainly made herself at home. Clothes and makeup were everywhere. Red satin bikini panties and a matching bra were draped over a lamp, hand lotion oozed out of its bottle onto the coffee table, and Bingo was wrapped in what looked like a lime-green marabou boa.
Skye leaned against the wall. Her head was spinning, and she wasn’t sure what was causing her dizziness—the mess or the cold medicine. She could hear Bunny’s voice from the kitchen. Who was the woman talking to? It had better be a hotel reservation clerk.
Bingo freed himself from the feathers and rubbed against Skye’s leg. She scooped him up and he started to purr. “Are you hungry?”
The purring grew louder, and she carried the cat into the kitchen, where an odor of burnt toast greeted her.
Bunny waved as Skye entered and put her hand over the receiver. “I’ll just be a minute.” Stretching the cord to its maximum length, she disappeared around the corner into the foyer and lowered her voice.
Skye fed Bingo, then filled the teakettle and put it on the stove to heat. Bunny had done a number on the kitchen, too—unwashed dishes filled the sink, a pool of coffee spread over the counter, and the table was littered with the remains of breakfast. As Skye waited for the water to boil, she began to clean up.
Bunny materialized from the foyer just as the last spoon was washed and put into the draining rack. She pointed to the dishes. “I was going to wash them as soon as I finished my phone call.”
Nodding, Skye asked, “Any luck?”
Bunny looked confused. “What?”
“Did you find a room?”
“Oh, no … ah … all the hotels are still full. The snow and all.”
Both women looked out the window. The snow had stopped falling, and the sun was out.
“You can try later today,” Skye said. “It looks as if the plows will start opening the roads soon.”
“Right, or maybe tomorrow.” Bunny didn’t meet Skye’s gaze. “Ah, hey, guess I’ll go take a shower.” She had already turned to go when she said over her shoulder, “Your mom’s left three or four messages on your machine. You’d better call her back. She sounded kind of cranky the last time.”
Skye played back her mother’s messages. The first one was: “Skye, this is Mom. Pick up the phone.”
The next one said, “Skye, where are you? I hope you haven’t been in an accident. It’s snowing out.”
For the last one, May’s words had become intensified. “Skye, if you’re lying dead somewhere, I’ll kill you. Call me right now.”
Skye scooped up the receiver and dialed. Her mom answered before the first ring was completed.
“Hi, Mom. I’m fine.”
“You don’t sound fine. You’re sick, aren’t you? Did you drive into a ditch and have to walk home?”
“No, I’ve just got a little cold.”
May sighed. “Why weren’t you answering your phone? Did you have a fight with Simon?”
“No, I was in the bathtub.”
“For two hours? I’ve been calling since six-thirty.”
“Sorry. I had my bedroom door closed and the humidifier going. I couldn’t hear the phone.” Skye tried to divert her mother. “Are you working today?” May was a dispatcher for the local police department.
“No, thank goodness. I’ll bet the station is flooded with car accident calls. I’m just glad you’re home safe and sound. With the schools closed, you can have a nice quiet day.”
Skye thought of Bunny and wondered about the accuracy of her mother’s last statement. “Why were you trying to get me?”
“Your father’s out with the tractor plowing the family’s driveways. He should be back soon. I’ll send him over in the pickup if you need to go to the store or anything. You shouldn’t drive your car on these roads.”
Skye drove a ’57 Chevy Bel Air. It was huge and not designed for icy streets. “Thanks, Mom. I do need to get a few things.” She didn’t mention her houseguest, as she wasn’t sure what May’s reaction to Bunny would be.
“You go get ready, then. Dad should be there in half an hour or so.”
Jed’s old blue truck rattled to a stop in Skye’s driveway. Knowing her dad’s opinion about being kept waiting, she was ready for his arrival and ran out of the door before he could cut the engine. She hopped in, buckled the seat belt, and said, “Good morning.”
Chocolate, her father’s Labrador retriever, wagged his tail and licked her face. She scratched him behind the ears. The aroma of wet dog filled the cab.
“Morning,” Jed mumbled as he put the vehicle in reverse. “Where to?”
“Walter’s.” Skye named the closest grocery store.
As they pulled away,
she realized that the only car in the driveway was her own. How had Bunny arrived? Skye lived more than a mile from town. Surely, the older woman hadn’t walked to her cottage in the middle of the snowstorm.
A wave of dizziness pushed the question of her houseguest’s transportation from Skye’s thoughts. She laid her head on the back of the seat and closed her eyes for a second. Woo. That cold medicine must be strong. Her head was swimming, and she felt as if she might pass out. Not wanting her father to notice and tell her mom, she made small talk. “Did you get everyone’s driveway cleared?”
“Yep.” Jed’s steel-gray crew cut was hidden by a bright orange cap with the earflaps folded up. His jacket was open, revealing a red plaid flannel shirt, and his hands were bare. No Scumble River man ever buttoned a coat or put on a pair of gloves until the mercury stayed below the zero mark on the barn thermometer for at least a week.
Jed’s faded brown eyes squinted as he gazed out the windshield. Only citified wimps wore sunglasses. He had a summer face—tanned and leathery—which looked out of place in contrast to the snowy landscape.
Skye took a deep breath. Good, the wooziness was passing. “What’s the temperature?” She tightened the wool scarf she had wound around her throat, and adjusted her earmuffs.
“Radio said it was hovering around the mid-twenties.”
“That’s too cold for November.” She put her gloved hands to the truck’s heating vent. “If this keeps up, we’re all going to freeze come January.”
“Can’t do nothing about the weather.”
Skye shot him a look. “That’s not what you say in July when the crops need rain.”
Jed and Skye rode in silence past mountains of snow and ice-encrusted trees. A few hardy souls were out with shovels and blowers, but most of the houses they passed were silent, the snow surrounding them pristine, untouched by footprints.
Murder of a Barbie and Ken Page 3
