Gran had been fine when I left home that morning, and she hadn’t had any plans to leave the house, so what had happened? The woman who had found her cell phone and used it to call me had said that Chief Kincaid had taken Gran away in his squad car, but she didn’t know why.
Now, despite the doctor’s assurances to the contrary, I wondered if Gran needed a caretaker. If she did, where would I find the money for one? I had sunk everything I had into Devereaux’s Dime Store and Gift Baskets, and in today’s economy, the few possessions I had kept wouldn’t bring enough cash to make much of a difference. Not many people were buying fancy cars, leather coats, or expensive jeans and designer blouses anymore.
Eldridge Kincaid was in the lobby when I walked in. There wasn’t a visible wrinkle in his highly starched khaki uniform and his gray buzz cut stood at attention, making me conscious of my own rumpled appearance. His expression was neutral until Poppy crowded in behind Boone and me. Then something flickered in his steel blue eyes, but it was gone before I could interpret it.
“Where’s my grandmother?” I demanded.
He was silent and unmoving. Kind of like an Easter Island statue but less responsive.
Impatient with his power games, I snapped, “Don’t you have anything better to do than harass little old ladies?”
His brows rose into his hairline and he barked, “You will respect the uniform.”
“Stuff it, Dad.” Poppy pushed past me. “What did Mrs. Sinclair do, jaywalk?”
Before Poppy could make things worse, I quickly reeled in my own resentment and said, “Sorry, Chief.” I knew better than to let my feelings get the best of me, but the stress of the day had left my emotions raw. “We’re just concerned about Birdie. No disrespect meant.”
Chief Kincaid huffed, but pointed to me and said, “You and I will talk in my office.” He motioned to Boone and Poppy. “They will wait in Reception.”
“You can’t push us around like that. We—”
“Sir.” Boone quickly cut Poppy off. “I’m Mrs. Sinclair’s attorney and therefore have a right to be present when she’s questioned.”
“Mrs. Sinclair did not invoke that privilege.” The chief turned his back and started up the short flight of cement stairs that led to the rest of the station. He didn’t turn his head when he asked, “Do you want to speak to me or not?”
“She doesn’t—”
“Yes.” It was my turn to cut Poppy off. I dashed up the steps, pausing briefly at the top to say to Boone and Poppy, “I’ll come get you if I need you.”
Chief Kincaid double-timed through the waiting room and held open the door to his office, shutting it firmly behind me once I was inside. He settled into the seat behind the desk before nodding me into a chair facing him.
Silently he straightened the immaculate leather blotter, lined the telephone up with the edge, and buffed out a fingerprint marring the shiny brass surface of his nameplate. Finally he looked up and said, “The debt you have to the people who took care of you is nothing compared to the responsibility you have to the people you want to take care of.”
I wasn’t sure what he meant. Was he referring to his daughter or my grandmother? Either way, I nodded my agreement. He was the type of man it was best not to interrupt. You had to listen to what he wanted to say and never offer a differing opinion until after he gave you the information you needed.
“You can pay back the people who took care of you,” he continued, “but the ones you want to keep safe will be your concern until one of you dies.”
“Right.” He was getting up a head of philosophical steam, and I tried to keep up. “And sometimes those two are the same people, like my grandmother. She took care of me when my parents abandoned me, and now I need to keep her safe.”
“Absolutely.” He smiled as if I had said something clever, then pointed a finger at me. “At present you are not doing a very good job.”
“Why?” I felt so tightly coiled, I ached. “What happened to her?”
He took a small notebook from his breast pocket and flipped it open, then read, “‘At twenty hundred hours a citizen called nine-one-one and reported that an elderly woman was wandering around White Eagle trailer park wearing a purple wool coat and yellow rubber boots, asking for a cigarette.’”
“Oh, my God!” Had Gran lost thirteen years of her memory? She’d quit smoking the day she took me in and became my guardian. “Is she okay?”
Ignoring my question, he continued: “‘From the description, I suspected it was Mrs. Sinclair, so instead of sending the officer on duty, I went out personally. She appeared physically unharmed but was overwrought, so I took her into custody and called her granddaughter’s store and home. No one answered at either location.’”
“I was at Gossip Central,” I mumbled, feeling guilty for having gone there rather than straight home as I usually did. “Why didn’t you call my cell?”
“I was in the process of locating the number when you arrived.”
“Oh.” I didn’t need to ask why he hadn’t contacted his daughter for my cell phone number. He hadn’t spoken directly to Poppy in two years. “So, can I take Gran home? She didn’t break any law or anything, did she?”
“No, she didn’t break any laws. And yes, you may take your grandmother home.” He stared at me. “But this can’t happen again.”
“Of course not.” I stood up. “I’m totally shocked by her behavior. She’s been doing so well. She just saw the geriatric specialist a couple of weeks ago.”
Before I could take a step toward the door, he said, “Maybe one of those detectives from Kansas City who talked to her this afternoon threw her off balance.”
“What?” My legs started to buckle and I sank back into the chair before I fell. “How did you— Did he— I mean—” I stammered to a halt, not sure what I wanted to ask.
“Professional courtesy. They stopped by to tell me about the murder and to notify me that they’d be questioning some people in my jurisdiction. No, I did not share that information with any of my staff.”
“Oh. Good.” I took a calming breath before asking, “Did they say who they were going to interview?”
“Yes.” Chief Kincaid gave a slight nod of his head. “Woods was planning to speak to you and your grandmother, and his partner was going to handle Ms. Ayers’s friends.”
“Joelle only hung around with newcomers, right?” I felt a tiny flicker of relief. “No one in town?”
“To the best of my knowledge, they were only talking to the country club crowd.” Chief Kincaid looked me in the eye. “I assured Woods and his partner that that bunch didn’t mingle with the native Shadow Benders.”
“So there’s a good chance the KC cops’ interest in me won’t hit the local grapevine?”
“Yep. Townies don’t gossip with the country clubbers.” Chief Kincaid leaned forward, a concerned expression softening his normally severe gaze. “Look. You’ve always been a good friend to my daughter, and I’m fully cognizant of how many predicaments you’ve rescued her from. I also know that you’ve had a rough time, what with your parents’ and your ex-boss’s actions, so I’ll give you a piece of advice, off the record.”
“Uh.” I clutched my purse to my midriff, almost more scared of this kinder, gentler Eldridge Kincaid than of the usual forbidding, harsh one. “Okay.”
“Hire a private investigator.” He said the last two words as if they tasted like dog poop.
“I don’t have that kind of money, and—”
Eldridge cut me off. “I gave this same advice to your father and he ignored me. I knew he hadn’t embezzled money from the bank, but old Chief Moody said it was a federal matter and ordered me to stay out of it. Then when your dad T-boned that car and tested a blood alcohol level of one-point-nine… There was nothing more I could do. Especially once they found those pills in the glove compartment.”
“Oh.” Stunned, I collapsed back in my chair. I was aware that my father and the chief had been pals back then, but no o
ne except my grandmother had ever said they thought my dad was innocent. My father had never been convicted of the embezzlement charge, but everyone assumed he was as guilty of that crime as he had been of killing that poor girl whose car he crashed into when he was drunk. It hadn’t helped his claim of innocence when the prosecutor argued that he was trying to sneak out of town at the time of the accident.
“Funny thing, though.” The chief’s voice roused me from my daze. “Kern was well known for his antidrug stance, plus we were friends since kindergarten and I never saw him drink more than a couple of beers.”
“That’s because he was framed,” announced a voice from the doorway.
Neither one of us had noticed the office door opening, but standing on the threshold, looking like a pissed-off Pekinese, was my grandmother, Birdie Sinclair. I wondered how long she’d been there and how much she’d overheard.
“Hi, Gran.” I had listened to her theory of my father’s innocence many times in the past thirteen years and was in no mood to rehash it yet again. “Let’s get you home. Then we can talk about Dad.”
“In a minute.” She spared me a brief glance before marching over to the chief, her pale blue eyes sparking with anger. “First I need to clear something up here.” Slapping his desktop for emphasis, Birdie demanded, “Eldridge Kincaid, since when is it a crime to ask someone to loan you a cigarette?”
“Now, Mrs. Sinclair, you know I never arrested you.” His tone was placating, as if he were speaking to someone not in her right mind. “I just took you into custody so you’d be safe until I could locate your granddaughter.”
“Sweet Jesus! I was perfectly fine until you showed up.” Birdie glared at him. “With your lights flashing and your siren blaring loud enough to wake the dead.”
“But, Gran, what were you doing at the trailer park?” I asked.
“After that idiot detective from the city all but accused you of murdering that trashy Joelle Ayers, I needed a cigarette.” For the first time Birdie looked a little shamefaced. “Yeah, I know you thought I quit smoking a long time ago, but every once in a while I still have a couple of puffs.”
“So, why go all the way to White Eagle?” Our house was across town from the trailer park. “Why not just get a pack from a store or a gas station nearby?”
“I couldn’t find my purse,” Birdie muttered.
“You could have called me and asked me to drop off some money for you. You wouldn’t have had to tell me what it was for.”
“I didn’t want you marking it down in that, that… uh…”
“Journal,” I supplied. The doctor had said it was best to supply the word she couldn’t recall, rather than let her become stressed.
“Right. That tattletale list the doctor told you to keep.” She glowered at me. “Just because I misplaced my purse or can’t come up with a word once in a while doesn’t mean I’m senile.”
“Of course not.” Shoot! I hadn’t meant to make her feel like I was spying on her. “So, you got in the Land Yacht and drove across town?” I had nicknamed Gran’s Buick Park Avenue the Land Yacht when I was a teenager, and the name had remained with us through the years, as had the car.
“My friend Frieda smokes, and I knew she’d be home since that stupid dance program she never misses was on TV.” Gran flipped her long gray braid over her shoulder with the defiant swagger that only a teenage girl or a ticked-off senior citizen can properly master. “Everything would have been fine, but Frieda never told me she was moving her trailer to a better location. The spot next to the laundry room opened up last month and she finally got her no-account son to come and haul it over there for her.”
“So you were looking for Frieda to borrow a cigarette because the detective accused me of murdering Joelle?” I wanted to make sure I had the evening’s events straight.
“Right. Everything was under control.” Gran’s face folded up into an accordion of wrinkles. The remnants of the deep summer tan she’d gotten working in the back garden made her look like a golden raisin. “Until his majesty here swooped in and grabbed me. That’s when it all went to hell in a handbasket.”
Which was about as mind-numbing an understatement as I had ever heard.
Gran and I tried for another half hour to persuade Chief Kincaid that she was rational and I wasn’t a neglectful granddaughter, but there was no changing his mind. Then we spent another fifteen minutes filling in Boone and Poppy on Gran’s adventures.
In his role as Gran’s attorney, Boone was satisfied with the outcome, but Poppy was convinced that her father was an incarnation of Genghis Khan intent on conquering Shadow Bend, one senior citizen at a time.
Since Gran insisted that I take her to the trailer park to pick up the Land Yacht and her phone before we could go home, it was well past eleven o’clock when I followed her down the long driveway to our house. We lived on the edge of town, on the ten remaining acres of the property my ancestors had settled in the 1860s.
Due to premature deaths, several generations of only children, and entire families packing up and moving away, Gran and I were the last Sinclairs in Shadow Bend. When my grandfather died fifteen years ago and my father declined to become a farmer, Gran had begun selling off the land surrounding the old homestead to pay taxes and support herself. I cringed every time another piece of my heritage vanished, which is why I cherished the few acres we had left.
It was too dark to see the duck pond I picnicked alongside in the summer, or the small apple orchard whose fruit I gathered in the fall for Gran’s famous pies, but as we drove through the shadow of the white fir and blue spruce lining either side of the lane, I felt myself relax. Gran and this place had been my only refuge after my father went to prison and my mother walked out on me.
A pool of artificial brightness created by the halogen light mounted on the garage roof greeted us as we stopped in front of the house. Like city streetlights, it turned on at dusk and off at sunrise, providing us with an oasis of illumination when we came home after dark.
Gran hopped out of her Buick, moving as if she were seven years old rather than over seventy. The evening’s activities seemed to have energized her while they’d sucked me dry. By the time I got inside and removed my coat, Gran had already turned on all the lamps and was in the kitchen filling the copper teakettle.
I got down the delicate china cups and saucers adorned with violets and wisps of curling ivy, then sat at the old wooden table and waited. Gran made tea only when there was something serious she wanted to discuss with me. Generally, she was more of a Jack Daniel’s type of gal.
As she fussed with the tea leaves and arranged cookies on a plate, I looked around. There was nothing fancy or new in the room, but everything reminded me of the home Gran had given me as an abandoned teenager. It was here at this table, drinking from these cups, that she had broken all the bad news since we’d lived together.
After settling into her chair, Gran said, “Are you going to take Eldridge’s advice?”
“About what?”
“Hiring a private detective.” Gran reached down and swooped up Banshee, her ancient Siamese cat.
I would have pulled back a bloody stump if I tried that trick. Gran was the only one the feline allowed such liberties. He shot me a malevolent stare and settled on her lap.
“No. Of course not.” She had surprised me; I’d thought she meant getting someone to take care of her. “Everything will turn out fine. I’m innocent.”
“So was my poor Kern, and look what happened to him.” She broke an Oreo in half as if it were someone’s neck.
“Maybe of the embezzlement.” After all, none of the money he supposedly stole had ever surfaced. “But there’s no getting around the fact that he killed a girl while driving drunk, or that he had a bottle of OxyContin in his car.”
“That wasn’t his fault.” Gran crossed her arms. “Kern said that he had no memory of drinking or even getting behind the wheel. The last thing he recalled was meeting with his boss at the bank.”
“Gran.” I took a quick sip of tea and burned my tongue. “That still doesn’t explain the alcohol in his blood or the pills.”
It hurt me to point out the impossibility of my father’s innocence. Prior to his arrest, I had been a daddy’s girl, convinced he could do no wrong. When he was first accused, I didn’t know what to think. But once reality smacked me in the face and I realized how he had betrayed everyone who loved him, I had turned my back on him. The pain of what he had done and the consequences of his actions had been too much to bear.
“There must have been a mix-up at the lab. Kern probably had a heart attack from all the stress he was under, which is why he lost control of the car.” Gran thunked her cup into her saucer. “And anyone could have planted those pills. He never locked his car.”
“But—”
“Sweet Jesus!” Gran interrupted me. “He was tried and convicted in less than six months. Who knew that small counties like ours had such speedy trials?” She wiped a tear from her cheek. “We should have hired a PI back then, but your grandfather had just passed away the year before and I was having a hard time with decisions. I’m not making the same mistake twice. We’re hiring one for you first thing tomorrow.”
“We just don’t have the money,” I explained as gently as I could. “Everything I have is invested in the store.”
She frowned. “You never said you were having trouble meeting expenses.”
“That’s because I’m not.” Trying to lighten the mood, I deadpanned, “It isn’t hard to meet expenses when they’re everywhere.”
Gran ignored my feeble attempt at humor. “I’ll sell the house and the rest of the land if I have to.” She swallowed hard and blinked away tears. “I can’t lose you, too.”
“You will not sell your home.” I got up and hugged her. “I promise I’ll be fine. Boone and Poppy are going to help me. We’ll find a better suspect for Detective Woods and he’ll have to leave me alone.”
Little Shop of Homicide: A Devereaux’s Dime Store Mystery Page 4
