A Merry Branson Murder (A Tiny House Cozy Mystery Book 2)

by Abby L. Vandiver

  “Zdravo,” I said picking up the phone. “Hello” in Slovene hoping he'd get the hint and not speak English. I didn't want Levi to know about my grandfather being involved.

  “Princeska,” Dedek said. “Have you found out who the killer is yet?”

  “Ne, Dedek” I said continuing the conversation in Slovene. He had told me that he was once a spy, but he was sure having a hard time picking up on my hints. “Moram te poklicati nazaj, v redu?”

  “No, you can’t call me back,” he said. “Why would you have to call me back?” He was still speaking in English.

  “Dedek,” I said.

  “Ooohhh,” he said and moved closer to the screen as if he could peer into my world. “You have someone there you don’t want to know what you’re saying.”

  “Dedek!”

  “Ah! I mean, "Imate nekoga, ki ga ne želite vedeti, kar govorite." He repeated word-for-word what he'd just said only now in Slovene.

  Levi started laughing. “Tell him I already heard what he said.” Then he looked at me. “How many languages do you speak?’

  “Who is that?” Dedek asked.

  “Levi Garza,” I said pointing my tablet his way. “Meet my grandfather. Luka Kovac.”

  “Hi, Grandpa,” Levi said.

  My grandfather frowned. “Who is this?”

  “This is Blu’s boyfriend. Well,” I bobbed my head. “Was her boyfriend.”

  “She had a rude boyfriend.”

  I held back my laugh. “He is helping me to figure out what happened.”

  “Well, if he was helping you, why did you speak in Slovene?”

  “Because I didn’t want him to know you were involved.”

  “Are you ashamed of your grandfather?”

  “Hey!” Levi said interrupting the interrogation my grandfather had initiated, and for which I was glad. He opened the car door and hopped out. “There’s Benjamin right there.”

  “Who is Benjamin?” Dedek said.

  “I have to go,” I said grabbing my purse and trying to open the car door at the same time. “I’ll tell you later. And I’ll call you back.”

  I hopped out the car, and holding my purse and tablet close so I wouldn’t drop it, I tried to catch up with Levi. I didn’t know what he was going to say, we hadn’t even formulated a plan.

  I watched as he ran toward a sandy-colored hair guy. He was tall and fit. He wore a striped button-down shirt and khaki colored pants. But it seemed the guy didn’t want to speak to Levi, when he saw him coming toward him, he turned and started hurriedly walking the other way.

  “Hey!” Levi shouted.

  “Go away,” the guy said.

  “C’mon Benjamin,” Levi said. “I just want to talk to you for a minute.”

  “I don’t have anything to say to you.” Benjamin made another abrupt turn and started walking off to the right.

  I caught up with Levi. He was standing still watching Realtor Guy, rather Ex Realtor Guy. He glanced at me when I arrived by his side.

  “I don’t know where he’s going,” he said. “That’s his car parked right there.” He pointed to the left of us. “Unless he’s planning on walking out of this parking lot and all the way home.”

  I chuckled. “He really doesn’t want to talk to us.”

  “I know,” Levi said. “We’ll just wait here until he gets done walking around the parking lot.”

  We stood and watched him, it only took a couple minutes before he gave up trying to avoid us. “What do you want,” Benjamin D’Avila said as he reluctantly walked toward us out of breath.

  “We’re not here to do anything to you, man,” Levi said. “I mean, wow, you running around here like you have something to hide.”

  “I don’t,” he said, he was fidgeting from one foot to the other.

  “We just wanted to ask you about when you used to give Blu the keys to the houses you were selling so she could stay in them.”

  “Don’t want to talk about that,” he said and held up a hand. “All water under the bridge.” He started walking to his car, but Levi jumped in front of him.

  “Did you have anything to do with the sale of the house on Orchid Tree Lane?” I asked walking up to stand beside him. He was busy trying to get around Levi.

  “There are a lot of houses on Orchid Tree Lane,” he said. “I’m sure I don’t know which one you mean.”

  “You know exactly which one she means,” Levi said. The one where they found Blu.”

  “I don’t know anything,” Benjamin stood still and bowed his head, then shook it back and forth. “Blu made me lose my job with Humphrey’s.”

  “You know that Blu made keys of all the houses, right?” Levi said. “She could still get into them.”

  He closed his eyes and still shaking his head said, “I don’t know anything about any of that.”

  “Look man, we’re not the police,” Levi said raising his voice. “I’m just trying to figure out who did this to her and why?”

  “Why don’t you think it was just random?” Benjamin looked up at Levi and squinted his eyes. “Why does anyone have to be involved in it for a reason? She was in the house and someone else was there. Someone that she didn’t even know.”

  That had been Tangie’s suggestion as well. Blu was just in the wrong place at the wrong time.

  “That would be too much of a coincidence,” Levi said. “Two people breaking into the same house, at the same time.” He looked into Benjamin’s eyes. “I just want to know what happened to Blu.”

  Benjamin held his head up and looked at both of us. Biting the inside of his cheek, I saw his eyes turn red. He was starting to cry. “I’m sorry that’s she’s dead,” the words tumbling out of his mouth. “But I don’t know anything about anything else,” he said. “So if you want information, you trying to get it from the wrong person.”

  “Ask him how she would know which houses were empty after they’d been sold.”

  Levi and Benjamin turned around to see where the question was coming from.

  I already knew. Who could mistake that accent?

  “Who was that?” Benjamin said.

  I looked down at my iPad. I had never hung up from Dedek. “It’s my grandfather,” I said.

  “Your grandfather?” Benjamin asked. “Where is he?”

  Levi broke out into a grin. “On the phone.” He leaned into me and the phone. “Hey grandpa,” Levi said and tapped on the edge of the tablet. “Whatc’ya say now?”

  “Nixie,” my grandfather said, directing that his answer was for me. “Ask the gentleman in the blue-striped shirt how did Miss Blu know when a house was going to be empty after it had been sold.”

  “You heard what Grandpa said,” Levi said to Benjamin, still smiling.

  “Benjamin,” I said. “My grandfather wants to know-”

  “I heard what he asked,” Benjamin interrupted me.

  “Well do you know?” Levi asked. “I mean you don’t want to leave grandpa hanging.”

  “Nixie tell that man that I am not his grandfather.”

  I put the tablet up to my face and lowered my voice. “I think he knows that,” I said.

  “Then my first assessment was right. He is rude.”

  “Your grandfather is something else,” Levi said.

  I ignored them both and looked to Benjamin. Dedek’s question was a good one, and not one I had thought of.

  “Benjamin, do you know?” I asked again.

  He looked off, shaking his leg and I saw a tear fall down his cheek. “Sort of.”

  “Are you going to tell us?” Levi asked.

  “She had a lookout,” he said, his voice quivering.

  “What is a lookout?” I asked. “Who can “lookout” into someone else’s life? How would they know who to look at? That sounds crazy.”

  “The Lookout had a connection with someone else who knew when houses were going to be empty.”

  “How is that possible?” I asked again, Levi staying unusually quiet.

  �
�I already told you all I know.” He said shaking his head. “I told her about the ones that were empty because they were up for sale. Then she had someone else who told her about the ones that were empty because people were on vacation.”

  Vacation . . .

  It hit me like a rock. That was almost what Neighbor Andie has said about the employees of Harrington House and Pet Sitters. Only he said that when they came to housesit for clients on vacation, they would rob the houses around it.

  He also said there were other house sitter companies. Maybe some of them, of course not Harrington, let people know when people were going to be on vacation?

  “So is that how she knew about the Dallasandros’ house,” I asked.

  He hunched in shoulder and hung his head. “I don’t know. All I know is she had another way to find out about houses that she used even before I got fired.”

  “And after?”

  “I guess,” he said. “How else would she have did it?”

  “Ask him does he know where Miss Blu kept the keys to his houses,” my grandfather said.

  I turned the screen toward Benjamin and the three of us looked at him.

  “Well?” Levi said. “Do you?”

  Benjamin licked his lips and closed his eyes. “Yeah. I think I might have an idea,” he muttered.

  Chapter Twenty

  I was back to climbing over the fence at the Merry Stampede. Second time in as many days. Solving a murder sure did involve activities that broke the law.

  But the Merry Stampede was where Benjamin said Blu kept the keys. Actually, he said that she told him she kept them, “Under her heart.” And when he said it, Levi immediately knew where to look. In the stall where she kept the horse she rode at the rodeo.

  According to Levi, she’d always said that, Star, her black stallion, had “heart.”

  As we rode over to the stampede arena I thought about what Swan had told me. She’d said that Ethan had gone into a stall to see a friend who was taking care of the horses and Blu was there. Maybe she had been there because that’s where she kept the keys not because she was having some rendezvous with Ethan. I mean who would fool around in an open stall with a horse anyway.

  Maybe Ethan was telling the truth about that, but still his familiarity with her that day at the Roundabout could still easily fuel suspicion. It made him stick in my mind as a possible suspect.

  The barn area looked as it did when I’d been there before. A few lights could be seen through the windows and there were a couple of cars parked in the lot. But this time the large double doors were locked. That didn’t stop Levi. He was able to jimmy a window, got us in, and knew exactly where to go.

  “Someone is here,” I said whispering. We were bent over and running from one hiding place to another.

  “Someone is always here,” he said whispering, too. “But they don’t usually lock the doors, they ususally figure the fence is enough.

  “Why is it locked now?” I asked.

  He hunched his shoulders. “Riders come at night sometime and walk the arena, they say they like to get the feel of the land. Practicing at the ranch, so they say, isn’t the same.” He looked at me. “You might even see Lowell here. He’s always working on the horses. So I don’t know why it’s locked.”

  “Oh,” I said. “So, technically they’re open.”

  “Yeah,” he said and shrugged. “Technically.”

  “So that means we’re not trespassing,” I said.

  “Oh, we’re definitely trespassing,” he said and grinned. “They don’t like strangers at all. Just like out at the Merry Joy. They’re always thinking someone is going to steal some of their secrets.”

  “We are in here to steal,” I said.

  “No. We’re here just to look.” He flashed me one of his slick smiles. “Okay,” he said. “That’s where they kept Blu’s horse.” He pointed to an empty dark stall.

  “Where’s the horse?” I said, no longer whispering. I looked around.

  “Star?” He shook his head. “I don’t know. I hope they didn’t sell it already. Blu loved that horse, and that horse loved her. He’ll probably be heartbroken never seeing her again.”

  We stood in the middle of the floor and looked at each other. “Okay no horse. Maybe that’s a good thing,” I said. Makes it easier to look for the keys.”

  “The horse would have kept us hidden.”

  I gave him a worried glance. “So we need to hurry. Where do you think she kept the keys?”

  “I don’t know,” Levi said. “It had to be somewhere she could keep them hidden but convenient enough to get without too much trouble.” He looked at me then down at my purse. “Call your grandfather.” He grinned. “Maybe he’ll know where to look.”

  “I think we can figure this out without my grandfather,” I said. “If she hid it, it would have to be behind the wall, or underneath a floorboard those are the only places that could be hidden in here.”

  We both looked down at the floor. It was covered with hay. Then we looked at each other.

  “Let’s start looking,” I said.

  “Where?” he said, his eyes big.

  “I think we should start in the corners. Work our way to the center,” I said.

  “Okay,” Levi said and nodded. “Pick your corner.”

  I pointed to one and headed over to it. I used the toe of my heels to kick the hay around and see if I could feel any differences in the floor. “Do they always keep the stall floor covered in hay?” I asked.

  “No. They are usually very clean. And Lowell is here, I don’t know why this is like this.”

  “So this is weird, huh?”

  “Yes,” he said. “But don’t worry about that. I think I found something.”

  I walked over to his corner. He had stooped down and was lifting up a loose floorboard. “I think there’s something in here,” he said. He got down flat, laying on his belly, he reached his arm inside the hole. “I got something.”

  He pulled it out and stood up. It was a small safe.

  “You think that’s it?”

  He shrugged.

  “There’s a lock on it,” I said.

  “Not for long,” he said. “I just need something to break the lock.”

  “You shouldn’t do that,” I said.

  “Why? We need to see what’s inside.”

  “Yeah. Now that we’re here, I’m not so sure I know why we came.”

  Levi stopped for a minute and thought about what I said. “Well . . .” he started.

  “I mean, I don’t know why my grandfather even wanted to know if he knew where the keys were. What are we supposed to do with keys?”

  “I don’t know,” he said.

  “I mean we’re not going to any of the houses.

  “Maybe you should call your grandfather,” Levi said, and he was serious.

  “You sure seemed attached to my grandfather.”

  “No,” he said. “He seems to ask the right questions. Maybe he’ll tell us what we need to do. Plus, I like him.”

  “Yeah. He does ask good questions.” I looked at him. “But, you know he doesn’t like you. And there is no turning my grandfather around when he has his mind set.”

  He chuckled. “Because I called him grandpa?” he asked. “Is that why he doesn’t like me?”

  “Yep.” I said with a firm nod. “It doesn’t take much to set him off. Just ask his many ex-aides.”

  “I think that we should look in the box.” He changed the subject, maybe figuring he and I could fare alright on our own and realizing we didn’t have much time for chitchat.

  “What if this isn’t Blu’s box?” I said, I too thought it was a good idea to get back to the matter at hand.

  “Let’s open it and see what we find,” he said. “It’s not like we are breaking in someone’s house or anything. We’ll take a look. If it’s not Blu’s then we’ll put it back with a note of apology. If it is Blu’s then we’ll see what we see and then decide what to do with it.”


  “Okay,” I said hurriedly. “Open it.”

  So we did. We found a bucket right outside the stall door that had spurs inside. He used it to pry open the lock. Inside was Blu’s social security card, her birth certificate, a ring with a bunch of keys, and a little black, leather notebook.

  “What’s in the notebook?” Levi said as I picked it up and inspected the outside of it. It was good leather, initials that didn’t appear to be Blu’s embossed on the front, it even had a paisley patterned lining on the inside of each cover.

  “I don’t know. I was just getting ready to look.” So I did. I flipped through the pages, then slowed and glanced at it one page at a time. “Those keys have numbers on them?” I asked.

  “Yep,” he said. He balanced the box in one hand and held up the ring. “These little round stickers. See.” Levi showed me stickers – some orange, but mostly green – with numbers written on them. “This is Blu’s handwriting on them. I can tell.”

  “Well, then I’m thinking this is a list of addresses,” I pointed to writing in the notebook, “that correspond to those keys and are for the houses that Benjamin and or her lookout let her stay in,” I said. “Each line has a number with an address and letters next to it. And some of them have little Xs next to them. And some have a date.”

  “What are the letters?” he asked.

  “Uhm. Not sure,” I said. “Some of them have a ‘DA.’ That’s what is written next to the addresses. Some have an ‘S.’ I don’t know what they mean.” I looked up at him. “Do you?” I leaned over so he could see and pointed to the page.

  “No,” he said.

  “Okay. So let me see if I can figure this out.” I ran my finger down the list on the first page, then halfway down the second. “I think I got it.” I looked up at Levi wide-eyed. “Key #32 is for 36710 Orchid Tree Lane. That’s the Dallasandro house” I looked at him. “You see key #32?”

  He flipped through the keys, then looked up at me. “No. It’s not here. I got #31 and #33.”

  “Okay. I think that means she used the key to get into the Dallasandros’ house. She probably had it on her when I found her.”

  Levi looked at me, his eyes inquisitive. “Maybe,” he said. “But then wouldn’t the police know how she’d gotten in?”