Pineapple Puppies

by Amy Vansant

  “What is it?” Charlotte looked at the document. “Another paternity test?”

  She nodded. “The twins are Kimber’s, too.”

  Charlotte gasped. “I thought they were your other brother’s kids?”

  “Kimber had an affair with Liz, our sister-in-law. She was in the process of proving the babies were his when she died.”

  “Proving?”

  “She wanted Kimber to give John a raise and give her money as well.”

  “She was blackmailing him.”

  “Yes. Though it wouldn’t have worked. Kimber would have told his brother himself before he let her blackmail him.”

  “Then they end up dead and he takes in the girls? His girls?”

  She nodded. “At the time he felt everything was turning out the way it should, in a way. He didn’t want our brother dead, of course. But he went from villain to hero in a heartbeat.”

  “Villain?”

  “I mean having an affair with his brother’s wife. She was about to tell everyone. And there were people who knew about the affair. At the time, a part of me thought taking in Lyndsey, too, made it less obvious the twins were his. It made it look like we were just doing the right thing. It threw the company rumor mill off the scent.”

  “Didn’t Tracy Griffin work for him?”

  “Yes. But who would ever imagine he was the real father of all three kids? I told him taking the girls would make him look like a great guy. Especially to women. That did it.”

  Charlotte studied the document in her hand.

  “I assume the twins don’t know?”

  Mina shook her head.

  Charlotte pointed to a circular splash mark on the paternity test results. “What’s this red blotch at the top?”

  Mina sniffed. “Cherry juice, I think. Kimber loved his Manhattans. I’m sure as soon as he found out his sister-in-law’s kids were actually his, he probably started drinking.”

  “So this is the original?”

  Mina leaned to look. “Yes. I left him a copy. I was afraid he might destroy the original during one of his snits and I wanted a record in case I needed it.” She grit her teeth. “Like now.”

  “You think the girls deserve more.”

  Mina nodded. “I feel trapped. If I tell the girls they’re Kimber’s daughters too, they’ll contest the will. It will tear the family apart.”

  “But if you don’t tell them, they lose their rightful portion of the inheritance to Lyndsey.”

  “Exactly.”

  Something about that red mark bothered Charlotte. She moved to grab the lawyer’s packet again, and flipped to the paternity test results proving Lyndsey was his daughter. There, she also found an affidavit from Tracy, admitting to their affair.

  “Look.” She held up the paternity sheet and pointed to a gray splotch. “I thought something looked familiar.”

  Mina held up her own copy of the twins’ test and compared the two. “They both have the same splotch, but Lyndsey’s is gray. How is that possible?”

  “I think Lyndsey found the copy you left in Kimber’s things. We know she’s been sneaking up there for weeks. I’m assuming he wasn’t always awake.”

  “Probably not.”

  “She must have made a copy with her own name on it and then convinced him to change his will based on the information.”

  Mina gaped. “He was awfully fuzzy the last few months of his life. He could have gotten the story confused and believed she was his daughter, not the twins.”

  “Could he have believed he’d had an affair with Lyndsey’s mom?”

  Mina snorted a laugh. “He’d slept with everything that moved at that company. That part probably is real.”

  “And he could have forgotten the twins were his too?”

  “During those last few months, he’d forgotten they existed entirely, several times. He forgot who I was once or twice.”

  Mina’s eyes began to tear. “What am I going to do?”

  “I think we have to take this new information to Sheriff Carter.” Charlotte grimaced. “And we definitely need a new paternity test, not to mention a lawyer to prove Kimber wasn’t of sound mind and check the dates and signatures on everything.”

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Gemma leaned against the doorway of the stall and stared at Todd. He’d taken off his shirt and the muscles in his back moved and flexed as he picked through the straw.

  “Hey,” she said, in what she hoped sounded like a sexy, smoky voice.

  Todd looked up and rolled his eyes. He had a smile on his face when he first glanced up, but it had slipped away the moment he saw it was her.

  No. I’m imagining that. He’s just hot. It’s humid today.

  “Hey,” he said before returning to his work.

  “What time do you think you’ll be done?”

  Todd paused and leaned on his apple-picker, wiping his brow with the back of his arm.

  “I don’t know. I guess the same time I’m usually done.”

  He stared at her, as if waiting for her to say something, but she suddenly lost her nerve. Her mouth felt dry.

  Gemma chewed her tongue a second and swallowed. “I was wondering if, maybe later—”

  “If maybe later she could ride you like a stallion.” Payne banged into her sister’s arm, knocking her from her sexy, hip-cocked pose and sending her sprawling toward the wheelbarrow full of horse manure. She caught her balance and shoved her sister back.

  “You’re such a jerk.”

  Payne laughed and stepped back to avoid Gemma’s retaliation. She folded her hands and held them beneath her chin as she stared into the rafters. “Oh Todd, what are you doing tonight, big boy?”

  Gemma could feel her face burning. She glanced at Todd and saw he, too, was laughing. Laughing at her.

  She turned on her sister, who still stood swoony-eyed, pantomiming her adoration for Todd.

  “I hate you!”

  She ran down the center aisle to the barn exit. Once out, she threw her back against the outer wall, tears gliding down her hot cheeks.

  He thinks I’m a joke.

  She heard boots approaching and for a moment thought it might be Todd on his way to comfort her. He was coming to tell her she had no reason to be embarrassed and that he had feelings for her, too.

  “Come on, I was just playing,” said Payne as she rounded the corner.

  Oh it’s you.

  Gemma looked away and wiped at her tears. “It’s not funny. You embarrassed me. Why do you always have to be such a jerk?”

  Payne snorted a laugh. “You can’t be serious. You don’t really like Todd.”

  Gemma looked at her sister. “What if I did?”

  “Why would you be all over the manure boy?”

  “He’s not a boy. He’s older than we are.”

  “Yeah, and there’s another reason he wouldn’t want to be with you. You’re seventeen.”

  “So?”

  “He’s, like, twenty-one. That’s, like, statutory rape or something. He could go to jail.”

  “We’re only four years apart.”

  “It doesn’t matter.”

  Gemma crossed her arms against her chest and pouted. “We could wait to have sex.”

  Payne guffawed. “Boys that age don’t wait to have sex.”

  “How would you know?”

  “Everyone knows. Boys that age are basically just a walking penis. It’s all they think about.”

  Gemma looked across the field at her horse in the pasture, grazing. “Not Todd.”

  “You’re kidding. Especially Todd. You know about him and Lyndsey, right?”

  Gemma’s attention whipped back to her sister. “What?”

  Payne nodded, a smug look on her face.

  She always thinks she knows everything. Trouble was, she did seem to know more and she was younger by four minutes.

  Payne rolled her eyes. “They’ve been doing it for months.”

  “No, they haven’t.”

  �
�Yes, they have.”

  “How do you know?”

  Payne huffed, as if she could barely deal with how stupid her sister was. “Remember that time she was late for our lesson and I rode back to the barn to find her?”

  “Yeah?”

  “Guess where I found her?”

  Gemma sniffed and forgot her embarrassment. The gossip was proving much more interesting than her own pain. “Where?”

  “I saw him coming down Lyndsey’s stairs. Tucking in his shirt.”

  “So?”

  “Whaddya mean so? It was so obvious. He had a whole look about him.”

  “What kind of look?”

  “You know. That I-just-rolled-out-of-Lyndsey’s-bed kind of look.”

  Gemma peeked around the corner of the barn to stare down the center aisle. She saw a flash of Todd’s hands as he threw a shovel full of manure into the wheelbarrow and then turned to her sister.

  “Todd and Lyndsey are going out?”

  Payne chuckled. “I don’t know if they’re going out but he’s definitely going in, if you know what I mean.”

  “Ew. You’re gross.”

  “You’re gross. You’re the one who wants him in your pants.”

  “I do not. I just wanted to go out with him.”

  “Yeah, well. Don’t date the help.”

  Gemma sighed.

  “See? I saved your from yourself. And you say I don’t take care of you.”

  “Yeah, yeah.” Gemma allowed herself a tiny smile. “Speaking of help, did I tell you I saw her that day?”

  Payne kicked a stone and watched it roll down the paved path leading away from the barn. “Saw who?”

  “Lyndsey. She was in the hall when I went to go to my room the night Mina came down freaking out looking for her phone.”

  “Lyndsey was in the hall?”

  Gemma nodded, excited to have gossip of her own to share.

  “What was she doing there?” asked Payne.

  “I don’t know. That’s just it. She was near the help stairs acting really squirrelly.”

  Payne’s eyebrows slid up her forehead and Gemma enjoyed a rush of pleasure.

  Who has the gossip now?

  Payne looked at the house. “That’s where they found that rabbit.”

  “I know.”

  “Now everyone thinks Uncle Kimber was murdered.”

  “Murdered?” asked Gemma so loudly she slapped her hand over her mouth and began to titter. Her laughter set off Payne and the two of them dissolved into giggles.

  Gemma took a deep breath and whispered, “I thought he had a stroke or something. I thought he hit his head on the rabbit when he fell.”

  “Then who moved it to the stairs?”

  “I figured Mina cleaned it up and didn’t notice or something. Like she was embarrassed she’d left it out for him to trip on it.”

  “I think the killer was on the stairs.”

  Gemma shivered. “That’s right outside our rooms.”

  “I know. They could have killed us.” Payne kicked another stone. “Did you tell Mina you saw Lyndsey?”

  “No.”

  “Do you think it’s weird? What was she doing?”

  The sound of a window closing scraped above them and both Gemma and Payne’s gazes shot towards Lyndsey’s apartment above the stable.

  “Was that Lyndsey?” hissed Gemma.

  “I don’t know. Do you think she heard us talking?”

  “I hope not.”

  Payne walked around the corner of the barn and Gemma followed her to hide from Lyndsey should she be watching them from the window above. By the time she’d stopped her nervous giggling, Gemma noticed her sister staring out into space, as if her mind had run elsewhere.

  “What are you thinking?”

  “Do you think Lyndsey killed Uncle Kimber?”

  Gemma snorted. “That’s crazy.”

  “Is it? He was her father.”

  “Exactly. Why would she kill her dad?”

  “She got all the money.”

  “Oh. Right. But she didn’t know he was her dad.”

  “Maybe. Maybe she did and all that who me? stuff was an act.”

  Gemma found herself speechless.

  Payne tapped her on the arm. “I think we should go ask her.”

  A rush of adrenalin shot through Gemma’s veins like it always did when her sister went off on one of her hare-brained schemes. They were exciting, but they also scared her to death.

  “Ask her if she killed Uncle Kimber?”

  Payne shook her head. “Ask her for half the money.”

  “What?”

  “If she killed Uncle Kimber and you caught her, she has to give us the money to keep us quiet.”

  “I didn’t see her do it.”

  “You might as well have. What was she doing near the stairs?”

  “I don’t know. Just moving from one place to another. It’s not like she’s not allowed in the house.”

  “I don’t know. It sounds pretty fishy to me.”

  “Payne—”

  Gemma cut short as Lyndsey walked around the corner and nearly ran into Payne. Payne saw her sister’s eyes pop wide and spun.

  “What are you two doing?” asked Lyndsey, smiling playfully.

  “Nothing,” said Gemma, taking a step back.

  “Nothing,” echoed Payne. “What are you doing? I mean besides Todd.”

  Gemma pressed her lips shut to keep from laughing out loud. Payne is crazy. Sometimes she wished she could be that brave.

  Lyndsey rolled her eyes, but not before a flash of surprise rippled across her expression.

  “Very funny. As if.”

  “I’ve seen him coming out of your apartment,” said Payne.

  “So? I make the daily schedule for him. Sometimes he comes up to get it if I haven’t hung it on the wall yet.”

  “Riiight.” Payne crossed her arms against her chest like a lawyer in a movie about to cross-examine the bad guy. “And what about the other day in the hall?”

  “What?”

  “Gemma saw you in the hall outside our rooms.”

  Lyndsey looked at Gemma. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  Inspired by her sister, Gemma perked. “The day Uncle Kimber died. Mina was talking to Payne about how he fell and I went back to my room. You were in the hall.”

  Lyndsey cackled. “No, I wasn’t.”

  Gemma scowled. “That’s a lie. You know I saw you.”

  Lyndsey shook her head. “You’ve got your days and times mixed up or something. I wasn’t there. I was driving away with the puppies.”

  “Yeah, what was up with that?” asked Payne, straightening so tall Gemma took a step back to stay out of her way. “Why did you steal the puppies?”

  Lyndsey looked flustered for the first time.

  “I didn’t steal them.”

  “I heard they found them all over some neighborhood.”

  Lyndsey huffed. “What you two don’t know would fill a dump truck.” She spun on her boot heel to leave and Payne blurted her next words like a shotgun blast behind her.

  “We want half the money.”

  Lyndsey whirled back around. “What?”

  “We want half your inheritance or we’ll tell everyone we saw you in the hall that night.”

  “But I wasn’t there.”

  “Yes you were,” said Gemma. “I know it for sure.”

  “No, I wasn’t. And anyway, it would be your word against mine.”

  Payne sneered. “Half.”

  “You’re crazy.”

  Lyndsey walked towards the barn entrance.

  “You’ve got twenty-four hours,” called Payne after her.

  Gemma smacked her sister’s arm. “What are you doing?”

  “What? We deserve half.”

  “We should turn her in if you think she killed him.”

  “We should get half.”

  “But she got the house. What if she kicks us out?”


  Payne shrugged. “Then she’s going to jail.”

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Charlotte entered Sheriff Carter’s station to find it bustling with activity. By comparison, Frank’s station usually felt like a library, though the idea of Deputy Daniel reading anything besides Guns & Ammo magazine was a stretch.

  Carter strode into the waiting area and spotted her. He stopped in his tracks.

  “What are you doing here?”

  “I have something I want to show you regarding the Miller homicide. Do you have a second?”

  Carter smiled. “Sure. Follow me.”

  He led her back down the hall to his office and shut the door behind her.

  “What’s up?”

  She held out the two paternity tests. “This is the paternity test Miller supposedly used to prove Lyndsey was his biological daughter. It was included in the will.”

  “Okay.” Carter took the sheet and glanced over it. “And the other?”

  “This is a copy of a paternity test Mina had in her possession, proving Miller is the real father of the twins.”

  “The twins? But that would mean—”

  “That he had an affair with his brother’s wife. She was in the process of blackmailing him when she died.”

  Carter whistled. “Boy, it’s crazy when you find out what old people did when they were young.”

  “You have no idea,” muttered Charlotte.

  Carter glanced at the other sheet and then dropped them to his sides. “So what does this prove other than the fact Miller was a world class hound dog?”

  “Do you notice anything similar about them?”

  Carter lifted the sheets again and held them side by side. “Well, sure. They’re almost identical. Probably from the same lab…” His forehead furrowed. “What’s this splotch?”

  “That’s the thing. The one naming the twins as his children has a cherry juice stain on it. The other is a photo copy of a stain.”

  “It’s the same doc.”

  “Has to be.”

  “That’s cherry juice?”

  “He liked Manhattans.”

  “Oh. Hm.” Carter handed her back the sheets. “So I guess they’ll be getting Lyndsey retested.”

  Charlotte blinked at him. “Sure, but, don’t you see? She had to have killed him for the money. She doctored the will.”