Bad Debt (Savannah Martin Mysteries Book 14)

by Jenna Bennett

Right. Message received. None of my business.

  I put the glass down and leaned on the counter, tucking the stomach under the edge. “I forgot to ask. Did you learn anything interesting last night? Other than the fact that the bartender at Dusty’s knows how to hold a grudge?”

  He made a face. “Not much. Got it confirmed that Robbie Skinner liked to throw his fists around. More so with people who couldn’t fight back—”

  “Like his wife.”

  “—than with other guys, but he’d get drunk once in a while and pick a fight with somebody. Nobody could think of a reason why anybody’d wanna kill him over that, though, since that kinda thing’s pretty common when a bunch of guys get drunk.”

  I nodded. “What about the dog fighting? Did that come up at all?”

  “We got confirmation on that, too, pretty much. The Skinners were running dog fights.”

  Mother wrinkled her nose. We never had a dog growing up—or any other kind of pet—but she obviously doesn’t hold with hurting them. Nobody decent would. And while my mother might be concerned with appearances, and with keeping the furniture looking nice, she’s a decent person.

  “You said there’s a lot of money in dog fighting,” I said, “didn’t you? Maybe somebody else is running dog fights, too, and the Skinners were honing in on the action and siphoning off their income?”

  “It’s possible. And something we’ll have to look into.”

  “So you’ll have to go to dog fights?”

  He made a face. “If we can find one to go to. If somebody killed all the Skinners over dog fighting, I’d think they’d have enough sense not to put on any dog fights while the investigation’s going on.”

  He had a point. “I don’t want to come with you,” I said.

  “I wouldn’t want you to, darlin’. I don’t wanna go, either, but it’s part of the job. But there might not be anybody else doing dog fights.”

  “Then who killed them?”

  “We don’t know that they were killed over dogs,” Rafe reminded me. “But if they were, there’s the other side. The folks who are against dog fighting and want the people who abuse animals dead.”

  It’s hard to drum up any sympathy for people who abuse animals. But that doesn’t mean I think it’s OK to kill them. Even if maybe it would feel good. At least in theory.

  “The woman from Animal Control might be able to help you there. She knew about the dog fighting. And she’d probably know other people who like animals.”

  “Believe me,” Rafe said, “I’m gonna be talking to her.”

  Something in his voice was a little off, and I looked at him, just as the telephone rang. Mother murmured an excuse and took herself off to answer it. I turned back to Rafe. “Surely you don’t suspect that she had anything to do with it?”

  He shrugged. “No more’n anybody else. But I can’t write her off, either.”

  “She didn’t seem crazy. And somebody would have to be crazy to kill seven people over dogs, wouldn’t they?”

  “Yes,” Mother told the phone, with a glance over her shoulder in our direction. “He’s right here. Do you...?”

  The person on the other end of the line must have declined to talk to Rafe, because Mother didn’t wave for him. He was already on his way across the floor to her, anyway. And she must not have realized it, because she jumped when he took the phone out of her hand and lifted it. He put a hand on her back to steady her, and for a second she stiffened before she relaxed again.

  “Who’s this?” Rafe asked the phone.

  I have no idea what the phone said. Probably nothing, because it was only a second later that he hung it back on the wall. (Yes, it’s the kind of old-fashioned kitchen phone that hangs on the wall next to the door. We’ve had it since I was a little girl. The kitchen’s been updated since then, but around the phone. The phone stayed.)

  “Who was it?” I asked.

  He shook his head. “He hung up when he heard my voice. Or she.”

  “He,” Mother said, and stepped away from him. She headed back toward her cup of coffee. After a beat, Rafe did the same. “I don’t know who it was,” Mother continued. “He didn’t introduce himself, and I didn’t recognize the voice.”

  No reason why she would. She and my husband don’t exactly travel in the same circles.

  “What did he want?” Rafe picked up his coffee mug and took a sip. I had another of my milk.

  “To give you a message,” Mother said. “‘Look behind Robbie’s trailer.’”

  “That’s the message?”

  Mother nodded.

  “Look for what?” I wanted to know.

  Mother shook her head. “He didn’t say. Just to look behind Robbie’s trailer. Robbie Skinner, I assume.”

  It was a safe assumption.

  “Wasn’t there crime scene crews crawling all over the crime scenes yesterday?” I asked Rafe.

  He nodded. “I don’t think they found much. Wasn’t much to find, what with the weather. Anything that was there woulda washed away.”

  “But if something was there, they would have found it.”

  “You’d think.”

  “But you’re going over there anyway.”

  “I figure I better, don’t you?” He drained the coffee cup. “Maybe there ain’t nothing there. Maybe they missed something yesterday. Or maybe somebody wants to talk to me, and this is a way to get me out there.”

  “If he wanted to talk to you,” I wanted to know, “why didn’t he talk to you on the phone?”

  “Maybe he was afraid I’d recognize his voice.”

  “In that case, I doubt he’ll be there waiting for you, since you’d certainly recognize his face.” Unless he never got the chance to tell anyone who he was meeting. Because someone was trying to lure him there to kill him.

  “I’m coming with you,” I said.

  “Like hell you are. I’m gonna call the sheriff for some backup. Just in case.”

  At least he seemed to be aware of the possibilities, too. Although it didn’t actually make me feel a lot better. “It might take them a while to get there. It’s better if I come along.”

  He shook his head. “You can’t come along, darlin’. This is a criminal investigation. And you’ve heard that saying about the murderer returning to the scene of the crime?”

  “All the more reason for me to go with you,” I said. “Just let me get my coat.”

  He looked mutinous. I added, “And if you try to leave without me, I’ll borrow Mother’s car and follow you. I remember where Robbie lives.” Or lived.

  He sighed. “Make it quick.”

  I scurried out of the kitchen to visit the bathroom and find my coat. Behind me, I heard Rafe begin to ask my mother questions about the man who had called.

  Eleven

  When I came back downstairs, he was waiting in the foyer, obviously more than ready to go.

  “I brought your coat.” I handed him the gray hoodie he’d worn yesterday, and watched him shrug into it. “Are you ready?”

  He nodded. “You sure you wanna do this? It might not be a lot of fun.”

  If someone tried to kill him, it certainly wouldn’t be. But I wasn’t looking for fun. I nodded and reached for my coat.

  He took it and held it for me even as he kept arguing. “It could be nothing. We could drive all the way out there, and there’s nothing to see. Nobody and nothing.”

  “I’d rather do nothing with you than sit here and wait,” I told him.

  He sighed. “Fine. C’mon.”

  He turned to the door, only to stop again when Mother came hurrying down the hallway from the kitchen, her heels clicking on the wood. “Wait!”

  She handed us each an English muffin with jam. They must have been hiding in a drawer, and she had taken the time to make sure we wouldn’t leave the house without something to eat. My stomach thanked her. So did I. “I’m starving.”

  “Be careful,” Mother said and took a step back. She watched while Rafe ushered me out the door�
�without touching me, since his hands were full of muffin—and down the stairs. I heard the front door lock click when we reached the gravel.

  “That was nice of her,” I said when we were properly buckled into the car and on our way down the driveway a minute later. “My mother made us breakfast. With her own hands.”

  Rafe glanced at me. He was driving with one hand, with half an English muffin in the other, and the second half balanced on his thigh. It was liberally spread with strawberry jam, as was mine, so I hoped it wouldn’t slide if he had to stop quickly, and wouldn’t accidentally smear red all over his zipper. “Didn’t your mama make breakfast for you when you were growing up?”

  “Did yours?” Somehow I wouldn’t have expected that.

  His lips curved. “She liked Lucky Charms. I did, too. We had cereal together.”

  That was actually kind of sweet. And maybe I should have guessed it. LaDonna had only been fifteen when he was born. Just a kid herself, really, if one who had to grow up fast. But it wasn’t surprising that she’d liked sugary cereal. I had, too, at that age. Not that Mother would allow it in the house.

  “I rarely ate a lot for breakfast.”

  “Dieting?” Rafe guessed and bit into the muffin.

  “Something like that.” Mother’s idea of breakfast had been a cup of tea—no milk—and a piece of dry toast. Is it any wonder I grew up with body issues? “So what did the two of you talk about before I got downstairs?”

  “None of your business,” Rafe told me, and stuffed the rest of the first half of English muffin into his mouth.

  I nibbled on the edge of mine while I waited for him to chew and swallow. When he had, he didn’t say anything else, though, just rescued the second half of muffin from his thigh and bit into that, as well. “You looked comfortable.”

  “Your mama’s all right,” Rafe said. “It took her a while to get used to me, but we’re all right now.”

  Good to know. “Did she mention Caroline and William and that whole mess?”

  He licked a smear of strawberry off his thumb. “Some part of ‘none of your business’ you didn’t understand?”

  No. But— “She’s my mother. And she was very upset last night. I just want to make sure she’s all right.”

  “She’s working her way through it,” Rafe said, with both hands on the wheel now. We were just passing Beulah’s Meat’n Three, zooming toward Columbia. “If it helps, she’s more upset that nobody told her than because her kids are some unknown percent black.”

  “That’s good.” I’d been concerned. My mother is old-time Southern, and there’s some lingering racial prejudice there. It was nice to hear that her priorities were in order, even if she’d come to them late. “Was she able to tell you anything else about the person who called?”

  He shook his head, his expression—or at least his profile—frustrated. “She’s pretty sure it was a male. She didn’t recognize the voice. She couldn’t tell whether he was young or old. She thought he might have been talking through a handkerchief to disguise his voice.”

  “In my mother’s world, men still carry handkerchiefs.” While the rest of us had moved on to disposable Kleenex.

  Rafe smiled. “More likely he used his T-shirt or a towel, but it does work.”

  “Does that mean it was someone whose voice she’d recognize if he hadn’t disguised it?”

  “Mighta been. Or could just be someone who thought he’d have some fun.”

  Sure. “Did you try to call back?”

  He nodded. “No answer.”

  Big surprise. “You can ask the sheriff to check the phone records, can’t you? And find out where the call came from?”

  He nodded. “Or do it myself. And if this little trip don’t pan out, I might do that. We’ll see what happens.”

  We would. “You have a gun, right? Just in case?”

  He smiled. “Yes, darlin’. I have a gun.”

  “Good,” I said, and sat back in the seat to nibble on my muffin.

  * * *

  The weather was a lot nicer today than yesterday. Sometime during the night, the rain had stopped and the clouds had blown through. By the time we got to Robbie’s place, the sun was slanting rays of yellow between the trees lining the road.

  “Can you see any tire tracks?” I asked Rafe, as he maneuvered the Volvo along the ruts in the dirt road.

  He didn’t look away from the windshield. “Plenty. Dunno if any of’em are from today.”

  I nodded. No way to know whether anyone had gotten here before us, then, or whether the tire tracks were all from yesterday.

  There was no car parked outside Robbie’s trailer, anyway. Not except for Robbie’s truck, that had been there yesterday, as well. “Would Sandy inherit that?”

  “His next of kin’s prob’ly the kid,” Rafe said. “Kayla. She ain’t old enough to drive, so yeah, I guess Sandy’ll keep it safe for her.”

  It seemed like justice, as long as she didn’t mind driving a big truck. It was a much nicer vehicle than the one Sandy had gotten into yesterday, at any rate.

  “You don’t think... no, that’s stupid.”

  He glanced at me as he turned the car off. “People have killed other people for a lot less than a truck. Specially if there are other considerations.”

  Like in this case, when Robbie had beaten Sandy and started hitting the girl. That alone might have been reason enough for Sandy to kill him. A new truck was just a bonus.

  The trailer door was closed today, with bright yellow crime scene tape across it, running from the door handle to the truck mirror to a stake in the ground beyond the point where Robbie’s body had lain.

  “Stay here,” Rafe said. He opened the car door and slipped out onto the grass, his hand reaching for the gun at his back.

  I opened my own door. “If you’re going, I’m going.”

  He put his finger across his lips to tell me to keep my voice down. “You’d be safer in the car.”

  “Not necessarily,” I told him. “If someone’s coming after you, they might be here already. Somewhere behind the trailer. But they might not. And if you go behind the trailer and leave me here, they could show up and shoot me.”

  He didn’t disagree with me on that. “Can you at least stay in the car while I make sure nobody’s inside the trailer?”

  I told him I could do that.

  “Lock the door.” He waited for me to get back inside the car and close—and lock—the door before he headed for the truck, gun in his hand but down at his side.

  The truck cab must have been empty, because he moved on to the door of the trailer. The crime scene tape drooped when he pulled the screen door out. It flapped in the breeze. While the weather was prettier today, the temperature had dropped at least ten degrees, and it was windy.

  He disappeared inside, gun up and ready. I looked around, but nobody jumped out from concealment to take him on now that he was cornered.

  He came back out a few seconds later. I held my breath for the moment he stood framed in the doorway—it would be such a perfect moment to shoot him—but nothing happened. He hopped down and came over to the car. “It’s empty. Looks just like yesterday.”

  I nodded. “I guess we go behind the trailer, then, and see what—or who—is back there.”

  He sighed. “Stay behind me. And if I tell you to run, you run.”

  I told him I would, although between you and me, I wasn’t sure how fast I’d be able to move, carrying all this extra weight on my stomach.

  But I fell in behind him, and stayed a step behind—and slightly off to the side—as we made our way past the truck and around the corner of the trailer.

  It looked about as you’d expect. Patchy grass and mud, and about twenty feet away, the tree line. The trailer itself sat up on a few courses of bricks. One at each corner, a few in the middle. There was an old, rusty HVAC condenser halfway down, sitting on a little platform of bricks. The various tubes and pipes went through the wall of the trailer and inside. Other t
han that, there was nothing to see back here. I might have expected some trash, maybe, but it was possible the crime scene techs had picked anything like that up.

  “Nobody,” I said.

  Rafe shook his head, looking around.

  “There’s a path.” I pointed.

  There was an opening behind the trailer into the brush and trees. Not a wide path, just enough for a single person to walk. But it was worn, with no grass growing there, so it looked like it might have been used a lot.

  “Mighta been where Robbie walked his dog.”

  Might have. If he’d bothered to walk the dog. “We should take a look,” I said. “I mean, it’s behind the trailer. We were supposed to look behind the trailer, right?”

  “We weren’t supposed to do anything,” Rafe told me. “I was supposed to look behind the trailer.”

  I gestured to the beginning of the path. “Be my guest. I’ll be right behind you.”

  He made a face, but went. I followed.

  The path widened a little once we were through the tree line. Not enough for us to walk side by side, but enough that it was obvious that someone—probably Robbie—had kept the path clear. It was easy to see where he had trimmed bushes and small trees to make the path more comfortable to walk. In fact, it was so easy to walk, I wondered why Rafe moved so slowly.

  After about three minutes, I got my answer. He stopped, and put out an arm to keep me from passing him. “See that?”

  “What?” I peered past him.

  “Fishing line.”

  Fishing line?

  I looked closer—maybe it was time for new contacts?—and saw it, too. A thin, clear, practically invisible thread strung across the path roughly at ankle height.

  “Don’t touch it,” Rafe said.

  I’d had no intention of touching it. “Why would somebody string fishing line across the path?”

  “Could be a couple reasons.” He looked around. “Could be hooked up to a bell. To let Robbie know people are coming. Or it could be a booby trap.”

  “Booby trap?” My mind conjured up visions of a net falling down and then yanking us back up into the trees, followed by the sound of cannibals beating drums.