by Ellen Riggs
“I never lock him in the trunk,” I said, with a laugh that sounded false even to me. “I think Animal Services might frown on that.”
“Oh, I know,” Heddy said. “What I meant was that we were looking for him and then I saw this trunk. No antiques dealer could pass this beauty by. It’s in very good condition. What would you want for it, Ivy?”
“Not interested in selling at the moment, thanks,” I said, letting Keats circle and herd them out. His tail was down and his ruff at half mast. He didn’t like the sisters at all. “Hannah Pemberton left it behind so it has sentimental value.”
“Ah, sentiment,” Kaye said, appearing not to notice being subtly pressed to the door. “We can’t afford to get attached to things in our line of work.”
“Easy come, easy go,” Heddy chimed in. By now they were in the front hall and she looked a little surprised when the door opened and Jilly came back in. “Since we’re here, we’d love to see the items you came into the store to tell us about.”
“They’re not here,” I said. “In fact, I believe Mom already sold them.” Turning to Jilly, I said, “Where’s Asher? Can you tell him I need him to help me reach something in the kitchen?”
She texted promptly but it was unnecessary because hearing his name had the desired effect of ridding the house of pests.
As the sisters went down the front stairs, I called after them, “I think the cranberry glass vase might still be available if you’re interested.”
Heddy raised her hand and I could have sworn there was a little Cori Hudson finger flare in the gesture. But maybe I was wrong. It was turning into that kind of day.
“I’ll get Daisy in here to watch the place and then go and warn Mom about the Langman vultures. She knows about the setup but I didn’t think they’d take it this far.”
“The Langmans would be hard-pressed to get through the crowd around your mom,” Jilly said, grinning. “She’s drumming up plenty of barbershop business for when they reopen.”
I groaned. “Oh great. She’s got a legit way to add constantly to her rotation now.”
“Don’t worry about Dahlia,” Jilly said. “Worry about Roy Macintosh. I happened to be serving Dina lemonade when he pulled in. She dropped a few choice words and then left in a hurry.”
“Interesting,” I said, looking down. “Shall we go have a chat with Roy, Keats?”
He mumbled agreement but it didn’t sound very enthusiastic.
“What’s wrong with him?” Jilly asked.
“Not sure,” I said. “He hasn’t been quite himself lately. Senna York will probably show up today and I’ll get her to give him the once-over. As far as I know, she liked Portia and someone had to be providing vet services off the record. I’d vote Senna as most likely to thumb her nose at the County.”
“Be careful,” Jilly called after us, as we ran down the front stairs.
Her warning was unnecessary. Roy Macintosh was far from threatening, at least in appearance. In fact, he made an unlikely Lothario. He was paunchy, balding and had a pronounced overbite. Or perhaps it was a receding chin. Either way, he didn’t initially seem like a hot enough ticket to have two women fighting over him. Mom always said there was a lid for every pot, and this lucky pot had two.
I’d shopped in The Hound and the Furry often enough that I didn’t have to introduce myself when I joined him beside the pasture containing the llamas, donkeys and Alvina the alpaca.
“Hey, Ivy,” he said. “I heard your alpaca dances. Where do you hit go?”
“Oh, she’s fickle,” I said. “She needs to be in the mood.”
His smile was kinder than I remembered and his blue eyes crinkled in the corners. Now I was seeing more of the attraction.
“Ah,” he said, with a wink. I knew he wanted to add, “Like all women,” but was wise enough to hold it back. “I hoped she would. I think Portia would have liked that for her celebration of life.”
“Maybe. To be honest, Roy, she didn’t think much of me or my livestock handling, though.”
He leaned against the fence and sighed. “She wasn’t herself toward the end, Ivy. Don’t take it personally.”
“It was hard not to, when she threatened to start a petition against my farm. But I heard she was under a lot of stress. Perhaps you would know better.”
He rubbed one hand over his balding head rather roughly. Too much of that and he’d lose the rest of his hair.
“I guess you’ve heard what happened between us,” he said. “But it wasn’t as bad as you probably think.”
“I don’t think anything in particular. There are two sides to every story. Who would know that better than me?”
“Dina and I had split,” he blurted. “She threw me out and I didn’t learn till later that she was seeing Al Geeter, the guy who runs the motorhome dealership. No one talks about that whereas I got the bum rap for starting to date Portia.”
“Ah. Well, that seems unfair. Were you at least happy with Portia?”
He nodded. “At first, yeah. She was passionate about her work. A good person.” He glanced at me. “I thought so, anyway. But over the months she changed. She got moody. Jumpy. Suddenly she was collecting more and more cats at the manor. I didn’t want to go over there anymore because it stank of pee. And she didn’t want to leave, even for a few hours. She was more worried about those cats than about me.”
“Everyone says they saw a huge change in her, Roy. Any idea what caused it?”
He shook his head. “It was subtle at first but turned into complete paranoia. Finally she just snapped and said, ‘I can’t do this. Not with them after me.’”
“Them? Who was them?”
“As far as I know there was no one ‘after her.’ I mean, she was starting to annoy people but I don’t think anyone would take it that far.”
I thought about Silvio the butcher going out to Portia’s and threatening her. “Some might, Roy. Someone did, I guess. People feel strongly about their pets, and Portia may have rescued some that already had good homes.”
“She couldn’t stop herself, and I didn’t know how to help.” His eyes filled. “I hoped it could work out between us later, when things settled down for her. But the last time I went over she just stared at me through a crack in the door. All I saw was crazy-eye, you know? And the cats were trying to get out. She asked to borrow my ATV a couple of weeks later and I dropped it off. Not so much as a thanks.” He looked back at Alvina. “And then she was gone.”
“Will you and Dina patch things up now?” I asked.
He turned toward me quickly and his blue eyes were cold. “Never. She’s trying to take the store from me. And my ATV. Even the cats. She’d leave me with nothing and I wasn’t the one who cheated.”
Glancing down at Keats, I saw that while the dog was still unsettled, he hadn’t reacted strongly to Roy. So I snapped my fingers in the pen to get Alvina’s attention. She came over quickly and I told Roy to stand back.
“She spits,” I said. “Usually you’ll see that crazy eye you mentioned before it happens. But if you jumped around out here, I bet she’d dance for you.”
“I can’t just jump around,” he said. “There are too many people watching.”
“Who cares?” I said. “If there’s one thing I’ve learned since I came home it’s that you have to dance like no one’s watching. So dance hard, Roy, and see what happens.”
Finally he gave me a little smile, and flapped his arms. I gestured for him to hop and he did. That was enough to galvanize Alvina. On the other side of the fence, she gave a hop, too. And when Roy started skipping along the fence, she bucked her heels in joy and took off after him.
His laughter caught fire in the crowd and whatever Portia may have thought about the event, I knew Roy, at least, celebrated her life with gusto that day.
Chapter Twenty-One
Mom may not always have been present in body or spirit as we were growing up, but I had to acknowledge she’d managed to instil certain principles and values
in all of us. Or perhaps she just instilled them in Daisy, who did the heavy lifting with the remaining five. Either way, it started with Mom because our father—I refused to call him dad—had no principles whatsoever. To my knowledge, not a single dollar had flowed to Mom to raise six kids after he left. And to my knowledge, none of us had ever heard from him again. I had to caveat that because there was plenty I didn’t know about my mom or my siblings, and not just because I’d stayed away so long. After all, one of Mom’s principles was keeping a certain measure of privacy about our individual and family dealings. Despite our frequent too-much-information family meetings, all of us had a few secrets. Except Asher, perhaps. The golden boy was an open book.
One thing we all learned young was our family “safe word.” We could call anytime, day or night, say the safe word, and anyone who could come would come to our aid. It wasn’t unlike the Rescue Mafia’s 911 notification. Only with Cori at the helm, their safe word would never be “butter tart.” That was technically two words, but they were enough to send a chill down my spine. Before I left for college, we’d rescued Daisy from home invasion, Asher from two back alley ambushes long before he was a cop, and Poppy from many an unsavoury situation she could have avoided.
When I was putting the livestock to bed after the celebration finally ended, Mom called me and said, “Darling, could you swing by the salon with some of Jilly’s classic butter tarts? The Langmans have dropped by for tea and I have nothing to serve them.” She gave a tinkling laugh. “Such a faux pas!”
“Be right there,” I said.
I dropped the pitchfork and ran, leaving the cows hungry. Keats was on my heels, his blue eye glowing up at me. I called Jilly and told her to meet me at the car. Then I texted Kellan and the rest of my siblings while I waited. Mom hadn’t used the code when Portia died, either because she was in shock, or because she didn’t want the rest of the family to know until necessary. This time she obviously didn’t feel quite as alarmed. But still, those Langmans weren’t to be trusted.
Jilly jumped into the passenger seat, dressed in pajamas and rubber boots, and panting. She was holding a tin Mandy had left behind and whatever was in it had no doubt crumbled during the run. It wasn’t butter tarts, I knew, but it was only a prop anyway.
The old yellow car took that moment to pass out. “Come on, come on,” I said, turning the key in the ignition again. She was unresponsive. Dead.
“Let’s go,” Jilly said, jumping out. “We’ll need to take the truck.”
Now I was doubly worried. The antiques oddballs had my mom cornered in the salon and I had to make peace with my automotive enemy to get there.
This time I caught an orange flash from the corner of my eye as Percy slipped into the back seat with Keats. Well, there was no time to evict him now. If he was that desperate for an adventure, he was about to get it.
Jilly braced herself on the dashboard with her right hand and called Mom with the phone in her left. I was astounded that she could carry on a cheery conversation about the finer points of pastry and filling while lurching through my perilous shifts and one seismic stall at a four-way stop. The dog and the cat had retreated to the rear footwell, which Keats only did when the conditions were particularly bad.
Nonetheless, we reached the salon before anyone else, including two of my sisters who lived right downtown. I pulled up on the sidewalk and gave the truck a grateful pat before leading the others into the salon.
“Darling,” Mom trilled, as the bell jingled overhead. “You’re just in time for tea. The police left the place in a state so I had trouble finding the orange pekoe. Heddy, Kaye and I agree it’s the only tea worth drinking. And would you believe they’ve never had a butter tart?”
“Well, you ladies are in for a treat,” I said. “Discovering the perfect butter tart has been our family’s lifelong mission and now Jilly’s created it.”
Heddy and Kaye sat in the two styling chairs looking impatient and befuddled.
“Ivy, it really wasn’t necessary for you to run over here. You had a long day,” Kaye said. “We stopped by our store after the celebration and saw your Mom cleaning up in here.”
“I don’t think I’ve ever seen Dahlia in jeans,” Heddy added, with a smirk.
“I don’t think I have either,” I said, taking a mug of hot tea from Mom’s hand quickly, before they could see her hand shake.
Keats positioned himself between the styling chairs and the rest of us. His ruff was up and his ears back, a definite failing grade for the sisters Langman. Percy, who’d previously been so charming, now sat on the shelf above them puffed to about twice his normal size. His twitching tail suggested he’d fling himself down if needed. His seductive behavior in their shop had clearly been an act.
“Never mind my jeans,” Mom said, sounding more confident already. “Chief Harper gave us the go ahead to reopen and someone has to clean this place up. Iris is on her way to pitch in.”
“Mom, we’ll all help,” I said. “I sent out a family SOS. Anyone with free hands will be here in minutes to help clean. Asher’s coming, and Kellan too.”
The sisters struggled to slide out of the chairs, which Mom had pumped too high.
“Ladies, don’t leave,” she said. “I was going to give you both some styling tips.”
“Another time,” Heddy said, zipping her parka. “But we did want to ask you about the so-called treasure Ivy said you found last week at a rummage sale, or some such.”
“Oh yes, the cranberry glass vase,” Mom said. “I’d love to sell it to you. It really doesn’t fit with my décor at home.”
“It would be nice right here,” Jilly said, tapping the front counter. “Fresh flowers and butter tarts are the best welcome any client could get.”
Kaye shook her head. “There was something else. Ivy mentioned a stacking set of animals. Like a rhinoceros or hippo.”
“Or was it a manatee?” I asked Mom. “Were there flippers or hooves?”
“Oh darling, I can’t remember. I brought it home on a whim thinking it would be fun for a grandchild. But it seems like Daisy is the only one destined to procreate.”
“Don’t be hasty,” I said. “We all still have time.”
She tapped her watch. “Tick tock, Ivy. But maybe Jilly will beat you all.”
Heddy gave an exasperated grunt. “Where is this so-called manatee? It sounds like something we might like to pick up. We have a buyer who likes peculiar things like that.”
“Oh ladies, I’m so sorry,” Mom said. “I already threw it away.”
“Threw it away?” the sisters said at the same time. “No!”
“It’s just junk. If you’re really interested, I tossed it in the dumpster behind the grocery store last night. I leave trash there all the time. I love the hunt but I can’t stand clutter. It’s probably just as well or there’d be no room for me in the apartment.”
Heddy and Kaye elbowed each other to get through the door first. They were already in their car before Asher and Kellan arrived, and my sisters straggled in after that, one by one.
“Well, thanks for the speedy emergency response, girls,” Mom said, hoisting herself into her barber chair. “Iris, I need to recline.”
My sister adjusted the chair so that Mom was practically horizontal. She fanned Mom with one hand while Jilly came over with tea. Mom pretended to be as weak as a kitten, allowing Jilly to tilt up her head and pour a little orange pekoe between her scarlet lips. She may have dressed down but her lips were still dressed up.
“What’s going on?” Kellan said.
“It was a butter tart 911,” Iris said. “It’s the family safe word.”
“I get the concept. Asher explained on the way over.” He looked at me. “You texted my personal phone so it’s obviously not a true emergency.”
“It might have been,” I said. “But I only needed my, uh—” I hesitated to use the word in front of everyone.
“Boyfriend?” Kellan said, grinning.
“Family,
” Jilly said, also grinning. “We’re honorary Galloways now, Kellan.”
He blew out a breath through pursed lips before saying, “Heaven help us, Jilly.”
“Right? Never a dull moment with this bunch,” she said.
“So what was so important you needed to call for butter tarts, Mrs. Galloway?” Kellan asked.
She lifted her head and glared at him. “Ms. Galloway. I already told you that, Kellan. Since this is a personal call, you may even call me Dahlia.”
That would never happen. Or at least not till way down the road, perhaps if we produced that grandchild to play with the imaginary manatee. Where my mother was concerned, Kellan had to juggle professional frustration and personal intimidation. It was kind of fun to watch.
Keats thought so, too. His spirits were high now and he prepared to cut Kellan from the herd of people and bring him in to me.
“Keats,” Mom said. “I see you. And I’d really like all the attention for myself, if you don’t mind. I’ve had a terrible shock.”
Kellan moved against a wall so that the dog couldn’t circle him. “Thanks for the warning, Ms. Galloway. Now, what happened?”
“Ivy set me up, that’s what happened,” Mom said. “She told the Langman sisters that I found a rare artifact at a rummage sale. As if I would ever go to a rummage sale, let alone pick up a hippo or a manatee.”
“Ah,” Kellan said. “You were trying to bait out the Langmans to see if they’d bite.”
“And they tried to,” Mom said. “They wanted to bite and it wasn’t butter tarts they fancied.”
“Ivy.” Kellan’s voice was serious but it was hard to take him seriously when he had backed into a corner to avoid little lunges by Keats that were intended to flush him out. “If you thought one or both of the Langman sisters killed Portia, do you really think it was wise to tell them your mom had a valuable collectible in her possession?”
“I told them it was no longer in her possession when I found them poking around my family room this afternoon. They obviously wanted to find out what she did with it.”
