Deadly Dog Days

by Jamie M. Blair

  Oh boy. Somebody flushed this day down the drain. “Animal control?” I said, leaving the Action Agency to be answered for last—or never. “Brutus can’t go to the pound. He’s already been uprooted from his home. You have to stop them from taking him. I’ll figure out somewhere for him to go.”

  “I don’t know if I can do that, Cam. If he’s a dangerous animal that’s already bitten someone, they’ll want to take him and put him down.”

  “Put him down? No!” I had to get Brutus out of there, fast. “Look, we can talk more later. I have to get back to the church.” I took off running again.

  “Cam!” he called after me. “It hasn’t rained yet. Don’t hurt yourself running on that knee.”

  My knee was the least of my worries. I had to get Andy on the phone and get Brutus out of my backyard.

  • Six •

  The rest of the afternoon was a wash. Anna was right: if we were going to get anywhere with the Action Agency, we needed to talk to people in person, which left me with a phone bank and nobody to call. I figured I’d check in with Soapy to see if there were any new updates on the play. Plus I was ready to give my good knee for a latte.

  “I hear you’ve got a lot on your plate with that group of yours over at the church,” Soapy said while steaming milk.

  “Not so much anymore with the play on hold, unfortunately. It’s terrible what happened to Jenn Berg.”

  He nodded thoughtfully while adding the milk to the espresso. “She was a nice girl. I knew her since she was a baby. Theresa and I took Sue flowers to the hospital the day Jenn was born.”

  Soapy handed me my mug and rested his elbows on the counter. “Sue’s ex-husband got into town last night. Staying over at Cass’s place where Ben’s got a room. Big hot-shot CEO now over in Cincinnati. I hear he complained about everything there was to complain about over there. Like the Fiddle-Dee-Doo Inn can compare to some five-star super hotel in a big city.” He scratched his white beard that hung just past his collar then adjusted his glasses. “Andrew hadn’t even seen his daughter for going on a year from what Sue tells us. Jenn didn’t visit him and he didn’t invite her to. He doesn’t see Lianne, either.”

  Jenn’s sister, Lianne Berg, was only a couple years younger than Jenn. They had another sister, Stephanie, who was much younger, around Mia’s age, but she had a different father. Rumor had it that her dad was Hank Jenkins who owned the BBQ Shack beside the Soda Pop Shop. Going by the looks of Stephanie Nelson, Hank was a dead ringer for the role of daddy.

  “Andrew’s already been riding Sheriff Rein’s rear end about finding who did this. I can only imagine what it’s like for Ben living under the same roof with the man. I can sympathize with Andrew—I’d want the person responsible found, too—but they’re doing all they can.”

  I took a sip of my latte and relished the hot liquid running all the way down to my stomach. “Ben stopped by this morning to pick up Mia and told me they ruled it a homicide, but he didn’t say why. Do you know?”

  “She had a gash on the back of her head, but landed on the front side. Looked like someone hit her with a blunt object and knocked her out, causing her to fall in the canal and drown.”

  I resisted the urge to rub the back of my head, and willed myself not to think of being cracked in the skull and knocked unconscious.

  “For the record,” Soapy said, patting my hand, “Theresa and I know you and Ben are both innocent. It’s ludicrous to think otherwise.”

  “Thanks. I wish everyone felt that way. I didn’t even know Ben had anything to do with Jenn until after I found her. Of course, there’s no way to prove what I knew and didn’t know, so I can only hope that whoever did this is caught.”

  “I hear you’ve got yourself a team of investigators now. The Metamora Action Agency, is it? Two of them stopped in earlier today.”

  “Roy and Nick,” I said. “I hope they didn’t badger you.”

  “No, no. Roy’s harmless, especially when he’s sober. There are concerns about the other, though, being that he’s a criminal and from out of town. Some people aren’t too happy with you bringing that element in from Connersville every day. He was arrested for assault, wasn’t he?”

  Panic began to rise from my chest, up my throat. I couldn’t swallow my coffee. “Yes,” I managed to say.

  “You trust that he’s got nothing to do with this?”

  I nodded, having no reason to nod. I liked Nick. I didn’t think he had anything to do with Jenn Berg’s murder, but I had no idea of his whereabouts outside of nine a.m. to four p.m.

  “Well,” Soapy said, “the players are meeting here tonight. I don’t want to have to cancel the musical after all the hard work your people put in getting tickets reserved. The town needs the revenue. Cass has reservations at her inn, and the Briar Bird is booked, too. Tourists in town will bring business to all of us.”

  I cleared my throat, happy to be past the subject of Nick Valentine. “I don’t want to seem insensitive, but since we’re on the subject, isn’t there an understudy who can fill in? Would it be in bad taste to use someone else for the part?”

  Soapy grabbed a rag and started wiping the counter. “Melody Winkler’s the understudy for the part Jenn was playing. It’s a difficult situation, because the two were always competing back in high school for the lead parts. Melody always got them. This was the first time Jenn got the lead role over Melody and now … ” He shrugged. “Shame.”

  “It is a shame.”

  My mind started buzzing. Was Melody jealous of Jenn getting the lead for once? Jealous enough to kill for the part?

  I think I had the Action Agency’s first interview. Tomorrow, we’d hunt down Melody Winkler.

  When I got home, Andy gave me a sly wink that assured me Brutus had got away. I wasn’t sure where he’d gotten away to, but as long as he wasn’t in my backyard or with Brookville Animal Control, I’d rather not know. There’d be no love lost between the two of us.

  Big Gus and Heckle and Jeckle met me at the front door, jumping and barking and licking. Enough fur flew from their coats and rained down on the foyer floor to clog my Dirt Devil beyond repair. I pushed past them and managed to coax crabby old Isobel out the back door where she could do her business, before wrangling leashes on the three most hyper dogs in existence.

  When I opened the front door, they pulled me halfway down the sidewalk, wrapping their leashes around my legs.

  Will Atkins came running out of his antique shop to help me. “That black monster was barking half the night. I saw he took a piece of a worker’s butt this afternoon.”

  “So I hear,” I said, stepping out of a loop of leash. “Guess Irene will think twice about sending people over to fetch my weathervane.”

  “You’re not someone I’d cross,” he said, handing me Gus’s leash after untangling it from around my foot. I wondered if he was joking or if he was hinting about his suspicions regarding Jenn’s death.

  John Bridgemaker, the leader of the local Native American Council, came out of his antique shop next. His long black hair was pulled back and he wore a beaded leather vest over his oxford shirt. His ancestors built many of the covered bridges in the area before the settlers ran them off the land.

  “With these three and my gimpy knee, I’m a force to be reckoned with,” I said, giving John a wave.

  “When did you hurt your knee?” John asked.

  “It started bothering me yesterday morning.”

  “Oh,” Will said, taking a step back. “Did you twist it the night before or something?”

  Perfect. Now I knew the idea his mind was circling—me sliding on a muddy canal bank and turning my knee after killing Jenn. “No. It hurts when it’s going to storm. We have a big one headed our way, I can tell.”

  “The leaves are showing their silver sides,” John said, gazing up into the trees. I took that as confirmation of the rain coming
, even if I didn’t completely understand the connection.

  The dogs were pulling and whining and doing their best to get me all wrapped up again. “I better let them walk before they drag me down the street. Thanks for the help.”

  I took off with the dogs, heading for the park by the canal. When they spotted Metamora Mike and his feathered friends swimming in the same spot where I found Jenn Berg, it was all over. They darted past the playground and gazebo, tugging me straight for the water, barking and spinning around each other like a chorus of deranged whirling dervishes. Mike and his pack beat it, posthaste, while I put all my strength and extra cookie weight into attempting to stop our forward momentum. But all my shouting for them to stop, leash burns on my hands, and promises of aching muscles in the morning were in vain. The three hairy mutts plummeted right into the water, to my mortification, taking me and the yellow crime scene tape with them.

  I fell and flailed, splashed and kicked, but never let go of their leashes. I would get them out of the water, away from the crime scene. I would make this right, somehow.

  Whistling sounded from the opposite side of the bank, and the trio paused in their thunderous pounding of paws in the water to see who wanted their attention. It was Betty Underwood, record holder of most cookie jars under one roof and owner of Grandma’s Cookie Cutter. She was a wiry seventy-something with jet-black hair that faded to a purple hue and more energy than I’d ever had in me, even after a few cups of coffee. She held something in her hand, luring the dogs up the bank. Their paws sank in the mud, ruining any evidence of Jenn Berg slipping down the side. I climbed up behind them as fast as I could, still holding tight. They bounded over to Betty, crime scene tape waving behind them like a bride and groom’s car pulling away from the church. All that was missing was old tin cans rattling on the ground.

  “Sit!” she said, and miracle of all miracles, they sat. She gave each a piece of a biscuit and turned her eyes to me, dripping, mud-covered, and humiliated. “Well, now you’ve been dragged through the mud figuratively and literally,” she said. “I heard you were the brave soul who took Jenn’s dogs in. None of them trained a lick, are they?”

  “No,” I said, futilely wiping at the mud on my shirt. “I don’t even know the names of those two.” I pointed to Huey and Dewey with their tongues lolling, drooling pieces of biscuit onto the ground. “The big one’s Gus.”

  “They like my homemade dog biscuits, that’s for sure.” She pulled another from her pocket and broke it in three. “I’ll give you the recipe, but you can use oats or flour and anything other than chocolate, or grapes because of the seeds, and onions and garlic can be a problem, too.”

  “Oh, Betty, I’m the worst baker on the planet. You know that. I’ll buy some next time I’m at the store.”

  “Nonsense,” she said. “A monkey could make these. They’re Cam-proof and much better for the dogs. No preservatives or artificial colors or flavors.”

  “Guess it wouldn’t hurt to try.” I watched my herd crunch their treats, wagging their tails and beaming up at Betty like they’d do anything she said for another, and resigned myself to becoming the best dog biscuit baker this side of the state line. “Thanks for your help. I better get them home and bathed.”

  I headed back down the opposite side of the canal from home, walking by the Ben Franklin III, a canal boat drawn from the banks by two enormous draft horses. A tourist favorite. The top of my head didn’t come up to the horses’ backs. Fortunately they weren’t in their stalls, or I’d end up in another battle of wills with the dogs.

  Every person I passed—mothers with strollers and little kids with drippy ice cream cones, old couples out walking, men mowing lawns—stared at me like I was contagious. I was sure the filth and canal water had something to do with it, but Betty’s words kept coming back. I’d been literally and figuratively dragged through the mud. My reputation as a murder suspect preceded me with every gimpy step I took down the street. I had friends here, but I’d never been a town favorite. Now I was doomed to forever remain the outsider.

  A thought glimmered in my mind: I could leave, go back to Columbus, get a job in the real world again. It wasn’t like I didn’t have a degree and experience. I could make a living and support myself. I could go home and check my email for responses to the resumes I sent out halfheartedly a few weeks ago.

  But that would mean leaving Ben. I wasn’t sure I’d ever let him move back in, but I wasn’t ready to admit defeat, either. I still saw him almost daily. In Metamora, it was almost impossible not to see him. Even if we weren’t together, it wasn’t like we were apart. If I moved away, back to Columbus …

  I couldn’t do it. Not yet, at least.

  Doing my best to ignore the steely looks from my neighbors, I crossed the bridge back to my side of the canal and went home. Isobel was asleep in a sunny spot in the backyard. I let the other three inside the fence and got a bucket and soap from inside the house.

  Gus loved the hose. He tried to eat it at first, opening his jaw wide and snapping at the water. I had to practically tackle the Wonder Twins to get them washed off. The whole time, Isobel grumbled and growled and retreated behind the Saint Francis birdbath. I had to remember to ask Dennis Stoddard to appraise it for me.

  When they were as clean as they were getting, I turned on the sprinkler and watched them run around like little kids with big goofy smiles on their doggy faces.

  Since I was covered in mud anyway, I fetched a shovel from the shed to fill in the deep hole Brutus dug the night before. That’s when my eyes scanned the roof of the house, and I knew Irene was still undaunted.

  The weathervane was gone.

  After a hot shower and a dinner consisting of peanut butter cookies and an apple for good measure, I curled up in bed with the paperback Brenda gave me the day before. My knee throbbed and my pride was battered. Unwelcome tears dribbled down my face. With an empathetic whine, Gus bounded up on the bed and lay down beside me, nuzzling his nose against my side. Not to be outdone, the nameless twins hopped up and each pinned one of my feet to the bed.

  I closed my eyes and lay my head down on Gus’s back, letting the canine warmth spread through my bones.

  • Seven •

  I woke Thursday morning with a nervousness that could only be abated by munching down half a dozen chocolate chip cookies with my coffee. I pushed away Mia’s disgust of my million-calorie habit with each and every bite. I was a murder suspect. I was separated from my husband. I’d eat as many cookies as I wanted without guilt.

  My sister would be showing up tonight, driving in after work. I’d left her a message about the dogs and hadn’t heard back. Hopefully she could deal with them. I’d have to vacuum like my life depended on it to keep her sneezing at bay.

  Looking down at my shirt, I made a mental note to pick up a truckload of lint rollers, too.

  There was a quick knock on the back door, then it opened and Andy stepped inside. “Breakfast of champions,” he said. “Toss me one.”

  I threw him a cookie and watched him down it in two bites. “Want some coffee?”

  I already knew the answer. Andy hated coffee. It was incomprehensible to me how anyone could hate coffee. He held up an extra large plastic cup from the gas station that I guessed was full of soda.

  “You need to pick out paint,” he said.

  “Did you get an estimate?”

  “I’m going to do it. Everybody else will rip you off.”

  I had a feeling he meant that nobody else wanted the job of painting the house of a possible murderess, but they’d do it for double the price.

  He pulled some paint color samples from his back pocket and slid them across the counter to me. “I’m thinking we should keep with the traditional white,” I said. “Don’t you agree?”

  “WWID,” he said, and took a slurp from his straw. “What would Irene do?”

  That statement was
a prick in my behind. “I don’t care what Irene would do. She doesn’t live here anymore.” I snatched the colors up and dropped them in my handbag. “I’ll decide later and let you know.”

  He grinned and grabbed another cookie out of the box. “Word is the players want to go on with the musical, but Melody Winkler won’t do it.”

  “She won’t do it? Why not?” It went against everything Soapy told me about her yesterday. Someone with her competitive streak who was so eager to have the lead female role wouldn’t turn it down.

  “She said out of respect for Jenn she had to decline.”

  “Strange.” I picked up another cookie and nibbled on it, thinking. “Who talked to her?”

  “I’m not sure. Cass told me this morning.”

  Cass, of the Fiddle Dee Doo Inn, and Andy had been a couple ever since he came to town. They paired off right away and were seldom apart when he wasn’t working at my house. Their age difference—he was twenty-one and she was thirty-three—didn’t seem to come into question at all. They made each other happy, and that was all that mattered. I had found out the hard way that it wasn’t always easy to be happy with the person you loved.

  “Where does Melody work? Do you know where I can find her today?”

  Andy put up a hand. “Cam, I know you have this whole Scooby Doo thing going on with your group down at the church, but before you go painting your Subaru to look like the Mystery Machine, I think you better take a look at what you’re dealing with. Jenn Berg was murdered. Someone hit her on the head and pushed her into the canal. If you go snooping around, don’t you think the same could happen to you?”

  “You sound like Ben. First you don’t tell me about him and Jenn, and now this. Whose side are you on?” I closed the cookie box and shoved it back in the pantry. No more cookies for Andy.

  “It’s not about sides. It’s about a dead woman and a dangerous situation. You’re innocent, so leave it alone and let Reins and Ben worry about it.”