Rubbed Out (A Memphis BBQ Mystery)

by Riley Adams

  “We’re happy to do it, Brody. Y’all have been in a real tough spot,” said Cherry.

  “So have you, though. You’d never have been mixed up in a murder investigation if it hadn’t been for us,” said Brody.

  Cherry looked at Lulu and gave a half-smile. “Well, I’m not so sure about that.”

  Brody raised his eyebrows and said, “It’s true, then? Sharon said that Flo told her that Lulu has investigated murders before and been able to solve them before the police do.”

  “I do have a nasty habit of getting involved with murders, yes,” said Lulu. “I try to pitch in and help get to the bottom of things. I’m sort of tidying up and putting everything back to normal.”

  Brody leaned forward and studied her intently. “Then there’s something you should know about. I’ve got to tell your police officer friend, too. Reuben’s ex-wife and his teenage son are here at the festival.”

  “You’ve seen them walking around?” asked Lulu.

  Brody shook his head. “I’ve seen them at a booth. They’re part of a team at the festival. What’s more, I’ve seen the ex-wife hanging around not far from our booth and watching it. Maybe they’ve been up to something.”

  “Let’s tell Pink. He will be sure to talk to the ex,” said Cherry. “It might not be immediate, but he’ll get around to it. An ex-wife has got to be on the list of suspects, especially if she was at the festival where it happened.”

  Brody seemed like he wanted to say more, but at that point they heard Morty’s voice calling him, searching for equipment. He thanked them for the drink and headed back over to his booth, leaving the women staring after him.

  “What do you think?” asked Cherry in a low voice. “Could the ex have done it?”

  Flo snorted. “The ex always wants to do it. But how many actually act on it? Maybe our friend Brody wants to focus attention on someone else for a change. He’s got to know that he’s a main suspect, considering he was in a huge fight with the victim a few hours before he showed up dead.”

  “Yeah,” said Cherry glumly, staring into her empty beer bottle, “but that also describes me, too.”

  Lulu said, “I think we’ve just increased our suspects by one. Maybe by two, depending on this teenager. Is Reuben’s child nineteen or thirteen? If he’s older, maybe he felt resentful and did it himself. Which would be a very sad thing.”

  “Even kids have been homicidal,” reminded Flo, absently patting her beehive hairdo.

  “Sure, but not very often,” said Cherry. “We should find out more about those two.”

  “And more about John and Tim the waiter,” said Lulu with a sigh. She filled them in on what Derrick and the girls had shared with her. “We have our work cut out for us.”

  “Where should we start?” asked Cherry.

  “Where should I start, you mean?” asked Lulu ruefully. “You need to be getting your samples out for the judges. I believe I’ll help close down the restaurant tonight and give Ben and Sara a break.”

  Cherry said, “And ask Tim a few questions while you’re there, I’m guessing?”

  “Exactly. I won’t have a chance otherwise. I can’t pull a waiter aside when the restaurant is as busy as it is,” said Lulu. “We’d have another murder on our hands then because Ben and Sara would have my head.”

  * * *

  Even after closing, there was still a very busy feel to Aunt Pat’s. The staff swept and vacuumed, removed tablecloths, and wiped down tables. Ben was cleaning in the kitchen and Sara was working on the books in the office. They both looked beat.

  “Why don’t y’all go ahead and scoot on off home,” said Lulu to Sara. “I can finish up the accounts and the kitchen in a jiff.”

  Sara frowned. “Are you sure? You’re spending a heap of time at the festival, and I know you took the girls around today. Don’t you want to go turn in yourself?”

  “You know, I kind of miss my Aunt Pat’s time. It’s hard to go from spending all day here to no time here at all. No, y’all go on home and I’ll lock up. Give the twins and Derrick a kiss for me,” said Lulu.

  Sara wasn’t going to argue with her, especially as worn out as she was. She quickly collected her pocketbook and Ben, and they left in a hurry.

  Most of the staff was leaving, too, so Lulu was quick to pull Tim aside before he made his way to the parking deck. “Tim, can I talk to you for a few minutes in the office?”

  He followed her in and sat at the table in the room. “I’m sorry—did I do something wrong?”

  Lulu quickly shook her head. Tim Gentry’s face had a perennially anxious expression on it, and she didn’t want to make it any worse. He had very dark hair that appeared dyed to her, as if the worry had turned him gray prematurely. He was lean, almost gaunt.

  “No,” Lulu said, “you’ve been a great worker since you’ve joined us, Tim. I guess that’s been…let’s see…”

  “About four months,” said Tim. “And I’m grateful for the job,” he added quickly, again getting that strained crease around his lips.

  Lulu quickly got to the point to avoid making the man any more anxious. “I was curious about a connection of yours, actually—someone we saw you with recently that we didn’t know you knew. A man named Reuben Shaw.”

  What little remaining color in Tim’s face quickly vanished and his shoulders slumped as if the name itself was a burden. “What?” he mumbled. “How did you…”

  “We saw you at the festival talking to him,” said Lulu. “Or arguing with him, really. I wanted to find out how you knew him.” She leaned forward and put her hand on Tim’s arm. “We’re a family here at Aunt Pat’s, Tim. I look after my own and you’re one of mine. My Ella Beth thinks the sun rises and sets with you because you play Crazy Eights with her. If I can help you, I will. But I need to know what’s going on.”

  Tim nodded slowly. “That family feeling is real strong here, and I’ve gotten to love my time at Aunt Pat’s. I’ll tell you about me and Reuben, Mrs. Taylor. I don’t understand why you’re interested in it, though.” His gray eyes gazed questioningly at her.

  “Please call me Lulu, Tim. And the reason why I’m interested is because Reuben is dead,” she said gently. “In fact, he was murdered last night.”

  Tim put his hands to his face and covered his eyes with his long fingers. He stayed that way for almost a minute, digesting the information. Finally, he put his hands down and looked at Lulu with worried eyes. “I didn’t know. I didn’t know anything about that.”

  “I know,” said Lulu soothingly. “It’s got to come as a shock to you. How did you know Reuben?”

  “I’ve been friends with Reuben for the last few years,” he said slowly. “Reuben is some years older than me, but we got to know each other because our wives worked together at a preschool. After a while, we started doing things as couples. We had a lot of things in common. I was involved in construction, too, but because I’m an accountant.”

  Lulu couldn’t help wondering why an accountant would be a full-time waiter at her restaurant. Maybe he should be doing their books for them instead of Sara or her doing them.

  Lulu said, “It sounded like Reuben was upset with you at the festival. He seemed feisty most of yesterday, but I wonder why he was talking in a very loud voice with you.” She didn’t want to bring the girls or Derrick into the conversation—she decided to let Tim think that she was the one who’d overheard the argument.

  She thought she saw a flash of fear in Tim’s eyes. Then he said, “Reuben was upset, yes ma’am. Lately, Reuben was almost always upset, over everything. I can’t believe he couldn’t understand why I wasn’t returning his messages.” But Tim couldn’t seem to look Lulu in the eye. He was hiding something, she was sure of it.

  Clearly, though, he wasn’t ready to talk about it.

  “I hear that Reuben acted upset with everyone,” said Lulu. “But I understand he wasn’t always like that—that he was fun to be around at one point. But before he died, he even got into an argument with ou
r Cherry. He couldn’t seem to be around anyone without turning it into a huge scene. Do you know when he started being like that and why it happened?”

  This time Tim didn’t only turn pale, he was tinged with green, and Lulu wondered if she needed to grab the trash can real quick just in case. She had no idea that was such a loaded question.

  Tim shook his head again. “I sure don’t,” he said, still not meeting Lulu’s eyes.

  The next day, Lulu was back at the festival. She’d never spent so much time at Rock and Ribs in all her days. The barbeque contest had been judged by the time she arrived and she was sorry to hear that the Graces hadn’t won. But she couldn’t be too surprised. After all, there had been plenty of distractions for the women to contend with. And there were over three hundred other competitors there—most of which were one hundred percent focused on cooking.

  “Pooh,” said Cherry when they were all sitting around a table in the booth. “I thought we might have at least gotten some sort of prize. Our barbeque is really good…not like some people’s.”

  “Oh, well,” said Evelyn philosophically. “There’s always next year.”

  “If we want to participate next year,” grumbled Cherry. “This year has been kind of crazy.”

  “There’s not usually murders at the festival,” reminded Flo. “And next year we’ll be a lot more prepared since we’ll have done it before.”

  “I guess,” said Cherry glumly. Then she glanced over Flo’s shoulder and raised her eyebrows. “Hi there—can we help you with something?”

  There was a woman standing there with a tall boy. The woman was pretty big, a problem that wasn’t helped by the large paisley print on her dress. The boy dwarfed her in height but clearly appeared uncomfortable where the woman seemed confrontational.

  “I’m looking for Cherry and Lulu,” the woman said in a rasping voice that hinted at cigarette smoke.

  “You’ve found them,” said Cherry, crossing her arms as if ready to do battle. This woman didn’t seem particularly friendly.

  “I’m Dawn Brown and this is my son, Finn Shaw.”

  She almost acted like she expected them to know who they were. And after studying Finn for a moment, Lulu thought she might. “Oh. You must be Reuben’s son and his…wife.”

  “Ex-wife,” Dawn said briskly. “We wanted to talk to y’all for a little while…seeing as how you found Reuben’s body and all.”

  The woman didn’t seem to be making any concession for the fact that Finn was there. You’d think that she’d be softening her words around her son. Even though she still clearly had hard feelings for Reuben, his son might not share them. It was his father who’d been killed, after all.

  They invited Dawn and Finn to take a seat and offered them food, which they turned down, and soft drinks, which they took them up on. Once they were settled, Dawn said, “The police were talking to us about what happened. Y’all were over in the booth next door and were messing around in Reuben’s storage area? The police were telling us about it and it didn’t sound right to me.”

  Lulu sighed. It didn’t, when you put it that way. It made it sound like she and Cherry had been snooping around. Or even worse, like they were possibly responsible somehow for what happened. “We were. I know that sounds funny, but we were searching for a missing tarp that I wanted to hold over my head while I ran through the rain for the parking lot. We’d seen a lot of tarps coming and going next door, and Cherry said that the things for our booth and the things for Reuben’s booth were right next to each other when they were putting the booths together.”

  Cherry nodded. “We thought they might have accidentally taken one of our tarps, so we walked over to the storage area to see if we could find it.”

  Or that Reuben had snatched one of their tarps to try to make trouble. And at that point they didn’t really know much about Sharon and Brody and what kind of people they were, either.

  Dawn nodded like it made better sense to her. Maybe she was thinking that Reuben might have taken the tarp, too. “And he’d been stabbed,” she said in a conversational tone.

  Lulu and Cherry both winced, thinking of Finn. The boy simply seemed tired, though—the harsh words didn’t cause him any change of expression.

  “I’m afraid so,” said Lulu quietly. “It was a really terrible evening. We’re very sorry,” she said.

  “Don’t feel sorry on my account,” said Dawn, waving a dismissive hand. “There were plenty of times when I’d have liked to have killed the man myself. Especially since he wasn’t pulling his weight with Finn.”

  This uncomfortable conversation was abruptly interrupted when Ella Beth and Coco came racing into the booth. “The Graces should have won!” said Coco.

  “Y’all had the best ribs here,” said Ella Beth loyally.

  Flo and Evelyn gave the girls a hug and Cherry said, “Aren’t y’all sweet for saying so! Are you doing one more walk-through today?”

  “Where’s Derrick?” asked Lulu.

  Derrick came in, much slower-paced than the twins had. “Here I am,” he said. “Guess I don’t have quite as much energy as Coco and Ella Beth. We were checking in and saying hi.” He gazed curiously at Dawn and Finn, and Lulu quickly made introductions.

  “What are y’all planning on doing?” asked Lulu.

  “We’re going to check out all the different booths,” said Ella Beth. “There was one that we saw when we were with Flo that we wanted to show Derrick. It was a triple-decker with a white picket fence with pinwheels stuck in it that sort of resembled a clubhouse. Then there was a booth where you could make crafts, so we thought we’d go by there. And the main stage has bluegrass music playing now, and is going to have a rock band a little later. We also were going to get some cotton candy because Coco said she was dying for some.”

  “Blue cotton candy,” said Coco.

  Finn was wistful as Ella Beth listed their plans. Despite his height, he was very boyish with gangling arms and legs that he didn’t seem to know what to do with. “Finn,” said Lulu, “have you had a chance to walk around the festival at all? Get a feel for it? It’s really a lot of fun—good food, interesting people.”

  Finn shook his head, but watched his mother cautiously, as if not sure if he should admit that he’d been at the festival but not really explored it.

  “Why don’t you go with Derrick and the girls for a while? Sounds like they’re going to go have fun. Might be a good chance for you to see what it’s all about,” said Lulu.

  “And eat cotton candy!” said Ella Beth.

  Finn gave his mother a hopeful look.

  Derrick said, “Sure, that’s fine, if he wants to hang out with us.” He cast his eyes down, a little shy, but Ella Beth and Coco were already chiming in. “We can show you the best places to get food here,” said Ella Beth. “And where there’s some fun stuff to do,” said Coco. Clearly, they were going to be competing with each other to see who could show Finn the festival better.

  After Finn left with the kids, Dawn stared after him for a moment. Then she gritted, “I guess I should feel sorrier than I do. About Reuben’s death.” She cleared her throat and stared at the temporary flooring that made up the bottom of the Graces’ booth. “He did give me a beautiful son. We had some good years and good times together.”

  The bitterness was never very far away, though. “The reason I sound so uncaring is because he basically abandoned us. He changed overnight. Next thing I knew, I was searching for a place to work…because I wasn’t going to be able to make it as a preschool teacher single mom. He never did send along the child support he was supposed to. How was Finn going to go to college on my salary?”

  She dropped into a brooding silence and the other women gazed uncomfortably at each other. Lulu said, “That’s real hard, Dawn. But Finn seems to be a fine young man, so you must be doing something right.”

  Dawn’s small eyes gazed at her blankly as if unable to see where she could possibly have done something right. “Well, that’s what we
call a miracle,” she said finally, “because between Reuben and me, I’d say we’d messed that boy up.”

  Flo said, “Were you able to end up finding a job and keep your head above water, then?” It was said in the tone of someone who really wanted to know how the story ended. Flo had gone through tough times of her own, and she was a sucker for an inspirational story.

  “I found a job, but I wasn’t really qualified to do anything. Ended up working a few part-time jobs. No benefits and I’ve got health problems, so it’s been real rough. Rough on Finn, too. Wouldn’t have been so bad if Reuben had helped us out some.”

  “This might sound crass,” said Lulu, slowly trying to think through her words before saying them, “but do you think…well, the will…”

  “Do I think that we might get money from Reuben’s will? I’d be surprised if he even had a will at all. That’s one guy who thought so much of himself that I bet he never thought he would actually die. My grandpa never had a will, either, and when he passed, his estate had to go through probate court—which was a nightmare for my mama. I bet it’ll be the same thing for Reuben. After it makes its way through court, there won’t be much of his ‘estate’ left—but maybe Finn will at least get something.”

  “Having a booth at the festival is pretty expensive,” said Evelyn. “If Reuben didn’t have a lot of money, how would he have managed it?”

  Dawn shrugged. “How would I know? I guess he either charged it to a credit card or the other teammates footed the bill.”

  Lulu said, “You mentioned that Reuben changed overnight. Do you know what made him change? Was it really overnight?” This wasn’t the first time she’d heard that Reuben had turned into a different person in a short period of time.

  “It really, literally was overnight. One day he was fine and dandy. We even went out with friends that evening. The next day, he wouldn’t look me in the eye and everything started going downhill from that.” Dawn shrugged. “I figured he must have met a woman when he was out that night. Why else would he change that much and that quick? But I never have seen or heard of another woman spending time with Reuben. Maybe it didn’t end up working out for him. I hope it didn’t. Maybe she messed up his heart like he messed up mine.”