Humpty Bumpkin

by Sam Cheever

  So, I’d also hated them for their secret. I blinked, realizing it was the first time I’d ever admitted that to myself. I’d always been a little jealous of my parents’ relationship, because it sometimes felt as if it excluded me.

  And even now, after they’d been gone almost two years, I was still clinging to that resentment.

  I frowned, saddened by my own feelings.

  “Are you okay? Is there anything I can do for you?”

  I skimmed Hal a look, the scales of suspicion falling away. I saw again the handsome and serious man who’d come to my rescue when I’d asked and had done everything he could to help me and keep me and my dog safe while he was there.

  And I was repaying him with suspicion.

  I was suddenly ashamed.

  I gave him a smile that I hoped was sincere. “I’m good. Just feeling a little drained and freaked out.”

  He inclined his dark head. “Totally understandable. Why don’t you try to rest? I’ll keep watch.”

  I lifted the mug. “Thank you for this. You’re right. It might help me rest.” To show him I meant it, I lifted the mug and took a sip.

  “Good. I’m just going out to look at the car. See if I can strap that bumper on until I have a chance to get it into the shop. Will you be okay in here with Caphy?”

  I swallowed another sip, amazed at how good it tasted. “We’re perfect. Go ahead and do what you need to do.”

  “Okay.” He stared down at me for another moment, some undefined emotion flaring in his sexy gaze, and then nodded. “I’ll just be outside. And I’ll leave the door open. If you need me...”

  “I’ll call,” I assured him.

  I took a couple more sips of tea and then, as I felt my muscles begin to relax, I set it on the table and lay down, pulling my dog close so she was draped along my front. I wrapped my arms around her and, with a shaky sigh, drifted off to sleep.

  THE SUN WAS BEAMING in the window when I came awake. I was drowsy and felt like I’d been hit by a truck.

  That thought brought my eyes fully open as I remembered I had been hit. Several times.

  By a shark-nosed car.

  Caphy was no longer on the couch with me so I sat up, yawning widely, and stretched, looking around for her.

  She barked happily, the sound coming from outside. It was probably her barking that had brought me awake.

  I shoved at the throw I didn’t remember pulling over myself and pushed to my feet. The front door was closed but Hal had opened the window with Caphy smears all over it, allowing a warm, sweetly scented breeze to dance over me as I looked outside.

  The pibl ran in enthusiastic circles, barking up at the sky, as a couple of massive turkey vultures orbited the pond. I smiled. She’d never understood the concepts of air and ground...and the reality that she couldn’t catch a bird that flew by high over her head.

  A voice pulled my attention away from Caphy and I frowned when I found Hal, leaning against his battered SUV, arms crossed over his chest and a scowl on his face.

  A woman in a form-fitting light gray suit stood a couple of feet away from him, her back to me. I couldn’t see her face, or hear what they were saying, but I could see that she was lean and attractive in a very athletic way that I would never be able to master.

  She stood with her hands on her narrow hips, her shapely legs splayed in battle stance, and one dainty foot in a two inch high heel that matched her suit tapping against the drive as if she were irritated.

  Before I gave my actions any thought, I was storming to the door and yanking it open.

  Both of them turned when I came outside. Both of them frowned as if I were an unwelcome addition to their little twosome. And both of them made a little sound of alarm when I took the top step without looking down and caught the toe of my flip flop on the concrete. Arms flailing wildly, I stumbled down three very hard steps and crumpled into an achy heap at the bottom.

  Well, I thought as they hurried over to help and I tried to fold myself into the fetal position and hide. I always have known how to make an entrance.

  “Are you all right, Joey?”

  My PI always seemed to be asking me that. I suddenly found it irritating.

  “I’m fine,” I snapped at him, jerking my arm away. “I just want to sit here a while.”

  Hal tried to clasp my arm and help me off the ground. I jerked my arm away. “Just give me a minute, please!”

  The woman stared down at me with bright blue eyes that were filled with amusement. A dense fan of dark gold lashes framed her pretty gaze. She pursed perfectly shaped pink lips and reached up to tuck a strand of dark gold hair behind one ear, her cute, pixy hairstyle flaring out in perfect flips around her perfect head.

  Her lips twitched when I yelled at Hal and that made me dislike her immensely.

  I looked up at him. “I’m sorry. I slept really deeply. I must still be a little drowsy.”

  He nodded. “You need to clean that up.”

  For the first time I looked down and saw that I’d badly skinned one knee, the blood running down my shin.

  “Ugh.” I stood up, ignoring the woman’s offered hand of support. Then I fixed her with a look that I hoped regained at least a sliver of the dignity I’d thrown out the window when I’d toppled down the stairs and offered her my hand. “I’m Joey Fulle.”

  “Prudence Frect. My friends call me Pru.”

  Of course they do, I couldn’t help thinking.

  She shook my hand and gave me a tight smile. “I understand you’ve been on a bit of a wild ride lately.”

  I looked at Hal, lifting a questioning brow.

  He flushed slightly. “I’m sorry, Joey. I would have run it by you but you were sleeping and I didn’t want to wake you up. I invited Pru...erm...Prudence here to help us figure out what’s going on.”

  A scowl crawled across my face and I did nothing to stop it. “You hired another investigator without asking me first?”

  Hal didn’t get a chance to respond. She cut him off. “I’m not a PI. I’m FBI.”

  Both eyebrows jerked upward. “You hired one of Cox’s cronies?”

  “Nobody hired me,” Prudence said in a voice tinged with impatience. “I’m here as Hal’s friend.”

  I wasn’t sure I liked that any better.

  “Pru isn’t a fan of Cox,” Hal told me, his manner unapologetic. “And to tell you the truth, with two attempts on your life already and an unsolved murder, I thought the best way I could keep you safe was to consult with Pru.”

  I carefully modulated my voice, trying to mask some of the irritability in it. “What have the two of you figured out?”

  “Pru knows a bit about Cox’s investigation into your parents,” he told me.

  I let that sink in for a moment and then nodded. I looked at Miss Pru Frect. God help me. “We might as well go inside. I need to feed my dog and then myself.” My stomach growled and I flushed with embarrassment. Shoving it away, I whistled for Caphy and started up the steps.

  After all, once you’ve proven to your natural enemies that you’re about as graceful as a hippopotamus in ballet class, there was nowhere to go but up.

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  “Talk to me,” I told Pru as I settled into a chair across from her.

  Hal placed a plate with a delicious looking burger in front of me and put catsup and mustard in the center of the table. “Eat up before it gets cold.”

  I plucked a crispy sweet potato fry off the plate and nibbled it, nearly moaning with delight as the sweet and salty flavor burst over my tongue.

  I was starting to think Hal had a magic bag with an endless supply of groceries in it, ala Mary Poppins. “Where do you keep pulling this food from?”

  He arched a dark brow at me. “When was the last time you looked in your freezer?”

  My lips twitched. “Did you just answer a question with a question?”

  “Do you really want me to answer that?”

  We shared a grin and I felt my equilibrium retu
rning.

  Pru looked at her plate and I pictured her rejecting the food. I spent a gleeful moment wondering how Hal would take her rejection of his cooking. She was probably one of those annoying rabbit food females. You know the type. The ones who subsist on grass and dandelions with vinegar for dressing and think eating dessert is akin to chomping rat poison.

  But she surprised me by putting a healthy dose of both catsup and mustard onto her burger and then arranging pickles in vast amounts over the condiments. Pressing the bun down on top and cutting the burger in half, Pru frowned. “Where do I start?”

  I swallowed my bite of burger, which was every bit as delicious as the fry had been. “How about two years before they died. Because that’s when I remember seeing Cox for the first time.”

  Pru nodded. “You’re close. Actually, it was about eighteen months. I remember because that was when the Monet disappeared.”

  Hal sat down with his own plate, which overflowed with two burgers and a mountain of fries.

  “Monet?” I asked her.

  “Yes. That was what brought Cox to your doorstep. The theft was tracked to Deer Hollow and, since your parents had a shadow business selling expensive items to wealthy buyers around the world, they were the obvious target for the investigation.”

  I held up my hands, licking one of them when I noticed the smear of mustard painting the tip. “Hold on. Shadow business?” I shook my head. “Never mind that for the moment. Let’s go back to the Monet. Tell me about it.”

  She stopped with her burger halfway to her mouth and stared at me, clearly not used to being interrupted.

  Funny how I didn’t give a dang. “I have a reason for asking.”

  Pru took her bite, chewing slowly, and sipped her water before responding. “It was a little-known painting by Monet entitled, Blue Boats. The painting was an earlier one and it inspired the painting he eventually called, Red Boats. Part of his Argenteuil collection. But Monet didn’t like the way the painting turned out so he disposed of it in a fit of temper. A friend begged to be allowed to save it from the trash, promising never to reveal its existence to anyone. Apparently, Monet reluctantly allowed it to be retrieved. Nobody knew anything about the painting until decades later, when Monet’s friend, a guy named Alexandre Dubois, who at the time was desperate for money and very ill, tried to sell it on the street. Fortunately for the art world, the man who bought it recognized its value and placed it in his own, private collection, which was passed down within his family for several generations before it was stolen.”

  “How was it stolen,” Hal asked.

  “I don’t know all the details, but apparently it happened in transit to the Art Institute of Chicago.” She made a face. “Ironic since the family had refused to allow it into a museum until that point. And a little sad.”

  “How was it traced here?” I asked.

  “That’s a little trickier. Cox had a source who he refused to name. That source apparently saw the painting mixed in with several other items that were going to be delivered to your parents’ auction. It was wrapped but the source was curious because he’d heard about the theft and he opened the wrapping to look.”

  “Why didn’t he just take the painting to the police?” Hal asked.

  “I think Cox was hoping to catch the thief and planned to follow the painting to its ultimate destination.” Pru shrugged. “Like I said, the details of that part of this are murky at best. Cox keeps his information close.”

  I set my burger down, my appetite gone. “That doesn’t make any sense. My parents only auctioned off farm equipment. They didn’t have the connections to dispose of a valuable and very hot painting.”

  “That’s where the shadow business comes in.”

  “My parents weren’t involved in anything illegal. If Cox could have proven that he already would have.” Heat infused my face and my hands shook with anger. I was sick of people disparaging the motives of my dead parents.

  Pru lifted a hand. “Maybe that wasn’t a good choice of words. I don’t mean shadowy. I just mean it was a side business that was lightly connected to the auction. Your parents were go-betweens for the sale of precious goods between private investors.”

  “What does that even mean?”

  She nibbled on a fry while she seemed to be considering how to respond. Finally, she picked up her napkin, wiping her fingers. “Sometimes people sold things that had been in their families for a long time. Sales they didn’t want to go public for whatever reason.” She must have seen me bristle because she quickly clarified. “Not necessarily illegal reasons. Many times, there are family concerns. Sometimes it’s purely a personal need for privacy.” She shrugged.

  “And my parents were selected for this why?”

  “Despite what you believe, they did have connections, Joey. Lots of them. With people in the right economic spheres. And they had the ability to perform the private exchange of funds or goods.”

  “They had their own plane for private deliveries,” Hal added, nodding.

  Despite my resistance, Pru’s story was starting to make sense. Especially when I looked back at my parents’ practices.

  But it all fell apart with the stolen painting. “My parents would have known the painting was stolen,” I told her. “They wouldn’t have taken it on.”

  “Actually, I don’t think they did take it on. We have no record that they either requested or accepted the item. In fact, though I can’t get Cox to consider the possibility, I believe it’s entirely possible that the thief planted the painting in their warehouse to point the finger at them for the theft.”

  “And then took the painting out after it was spotted,” Hal said. “That makes a lot of sense. What better way to take the heat off than to give the world a plausible thief whose practices would make disposal of the painting much easier.”

  I still didn’t like it. “That would all depend on someone seeing the painting in the warehouse,” I argued. “And even Cox’s informer said it was wrapped. That seems like a real risk to me.”

  “I agree.” Pru told me. “Which is why I think the informant might be the thief.”

  Hal and I stared at her for a long moment. Then I leaned forward, excited. “If that’s true the problem’s solved. You just need to make Cox give up his informant.”

  Pru laughed. “You have met him, right?”

  “This is important enough you could go over his head,” Hal said.

  “You don’t think I’ve tried that? Cox is bullet proof. He’s got wings in the organization. Aspirations and sponsors. They’d never believe me over him. Besides...” She threw me an apologetic smile. “They have a perfect scapegoat in your parents. They have no incentive at all to rock that boat.”

  “That blue boat,” I murmured, miserable.

  “What happened to the painting? Has it been recovered?” Hal asked.

  “No. And that brings us to the present problem.” She swung her gaze back to me. “We think your parents tried to find the real thief, Joey. And maybe they did. Maybe they threatened to expose the person if he didn’t cough up the painting. And maybe that got them killed.”

  I swallowed hard, my mind spinning. I’d often thought about whether my parents’ death was really an accident. There had been speculation at the time. Even through my grief I’d noticed the whispered conversations that died quickly away when I walked into a room. And the way people looked at me, as if I might be holding a dangerous secret close and they wanted to warn me not to tell anyone.

  I’d thought at the time I was just being paranoid. But suddenly I wondered if I was. “You’re saying my parents’ crash wasn’t an accident?”

  “It’s possible.”

  “Did the FBI find any proof of that?” Hal asked.

  “Nothing definitive. But nobody’s come up yet with a plausible explanation for how that rock got on the runway.”

  And just in time to take advantage of a storm that had rolled in as my parents landed, utilizing a driving rain and the subse
quent lack of visibility. It wasn’t very sophisticated sabotage, if that’s what it was, but it had been effective. “It wouldn’t take any special knowledge to crash a plane with a rock on the runway,” I told Pru.

  “Exactly. Which means our pool of suspects widens considerably.”

  “So, other than Joey, who is Cox looking at?”

  Pru shook her head. “He’s not. That’s the problem. He’s convinced Joey knows where that painting is.”

  “And he thinks I killed my own parents?” I shrieked unbecomingly.

  “Not necessarily. He’s working off the simplest scenario. That your parents died in a freak accident and that you’re protecting their memory by not admitting they stole the painting.”

  Hal sighed. “It’s plausible enough. The rock could have been carried there by kids. And clearly Joey is protective of her parents.”

  I glared at him, my pulse spiking with anger. “You’re buying Cox’s theory then?”

  “I’m not buying anything, Joey. I’m investigating this along with you.”

  His answer didn’t make me feel any better. “I can’t believe it.”

  “Look,” he said, lifting his hands off the table. “I’m not going to do you any good at all if I let myself buy into your concept of your parents without any evidence to back it up. Of course, you believe they’re innocent. They were your parents and you loved them. But you said yourself they didn’t always include you in things. It’s possible they did some things that were slightly above the law. Maybe even for the right reasons. The only way to clear their names is to shine a light on all the evidence and discover some that proves their innocence.”

  What he was saying made sense. But I wasn’t feeling reasonable. I’d thought Hal was firmly on my side. And then Prudence Frect showed up and he was suddenly doubting whether I really knew my parents or not. Or worse, whether I’d stolen an...erm...stolen painting.

  I stood up so quickly my chair tipped backward, slamming against the floor. Caphy jumped up with a yelp, scurrying away with her tail tucked. I glared at him, ignoring the miserable expression on his handsome face. “I guess I’m on my own in this then. Like I always am. You might as well leave with Prudence. You’re fired.”