“Tiffany does seem to attract attention,” I agreed and took the seat opposite Karen.
When Wilson sidled in next to me, I pushed myself farther into the corner. He stared at my hair, but made zero comment. The man is not a complete idiot.
Candy broke the silence. “We’ve been talking about Lester Quinn, Jessie. It’s so sad.”
“Quinn? As in Elsa and Mackenzie?”
“The husband and father,” Karen said. “Candy found out he was shot a few years ago. Right at the Wade On Inn.”
“He was killed,” Candy elaborated. “Mackenzie doesn’t remember it, but she told me about it.”
I scowled at Wilson. “Did you know about this?”
He nodded and reminded me about the shoot out Fritz Lupo had been involved in years earlier. “Lester Quinn was the guy who ended up dead. Elsa and Mackenzie, who was about two at the time, witnessed the whole thing.”
“Wilson!” I practically shouted. “Why didn’t you tell me the details before?”
“The less you knew, the less chance you would go in there with pre-conceived notions.” He tilted his head toward Candy. “And our brilliant friend here did a good job discovering the details all on her own. I take it you got sick of hanging around the pool table?” he asked her.
“I got sick of Spencer Erring,” Candy answered. “Mackenzie was lots more interesting. And guess what?”
She sat forward and waited until we asked what.
“Mackenzie used to talk with Angela Hernandez all the time! Did you know that, Wilson? She’s taking Spanish in school, and she used to practice with Angela. They talked about boys. In Spanish!”
Wilson also sat forward. “What boys?”
“Gosh, we didn’t get into the details.”
“My guess would be Bobby Decker the wannabe cowboy,” I said. “I think Mackenzie has a crush on him. And apparently he and Angela Hernandez were an item.”
“What!?” Karen seemed shocked. But one glance at my beau informed me he was less so.
“You knew about this, too?” I asked.
“Preconceived notions,” he reminded me. “But yes, Bobby Decker used to brag about sleeping with Angela. He’s changed his story now that she’s dead.”
Karen took a large gulp of her Corona.
“Bobby’s also the person who found both the bodies,” I said, and she emitted a slight squeak. I tapped Wilson’s hand. “And we all know from personal experience what Captain Rye thinks of the poor souls who happen to find dead bodies on their property.”
“I suspect them.” He was studying Karen. “You have something to tell me about Bobby Decker?”
“She danced with him.” That was Candy.
“She likes the music,” I added.
“Especially Isabelle Eakes and The Cornhuskers,” Karen said. “So when Bobby asked me to dance, I said sure.”
“The Cornhuskers?” Wilson asked.
“I love their stuff.” She twisted her Corona, and I noticed she was blushing. “Bobby didn’t tell me he found the bodies, but he did say he lives nearby.”
“And?” the rest of us asked in unison.
“And.” She continued admiring her beer. “And he invited me out to see his place sometime. To show me his guitar.”
“His guitar?” I said.
“Hey, I don’t plan to take him up on it.”
“Why not?” Candy asked. “Bobby’s kind of cute.”
“Bobby Decker is a suspect,” Wilson reminded her before glancing at me. “And his trailer makes my place look like the Taj Mahal.”
I grimaced at that downright frightening notion. Wilson’s little cabin—or shall I say shack—on the banks of Lake Lookadoo might have spectacular views, but the furniture is anything but. Ditto on the plumbing.
I spoke to Karen. “Do not go there,” I said sternly. “Trust me on this.”
She shrugged. “Whatever he lives in now, Bobby’s family used to own everything out that way. Something like four hundred acres, including the Wade On Inn.”
“No way,” Wilson said. “Decker’s family never owned the Wade On Inn. Elsa’s family is solely responsible for that hell-hole.”
“Maybe,” she said. “But the Rice family owned it back when it was still a working mill. Bobby’s mother was a Rice before she got married.”
“Well, I’ll be damned.” Wilson was clearly impressed with this new info.“Are you willing to keep dancing with the cowboy?”
“Hey, I like the music.”
He turned to Candy. “And you’ll keep talking to Mackenzie Quinn?”
“I’ll see what she knows about Bobby and Angela, okay?”
“And anything else she cares to mention,” Wilson suggested. “Mackenzie Quinn seems like a good kid. Amazing, considering the environment she’s grown up in. She’s been doing her homework in that bar since grade school.”
“It hasn’t done her any harm,” I said. “According to Elsa, she’s a straight-A student.”
“But they live there, too, Jessie. The Quinns live on the third floor over the hotel, which gives that poor kid a bird’s eye view of everything that goes on out there.”
“Do you think one of them saw the shootings?” Karen asked.
“Not that they’re telling me.” Wilson groaned. “No one out there has told me much of anything.”
“They like to keep to themselves,” Candy said.
“They protect each other,” Karen added.
Wilson raised an eyebrow. “They also kill each other.”
Chapter 8
“Puddles!” Candy exclaimed, and we all jumped. “I’m sorry, Wilson, but I have to go.” She stood up as I explained her puppy-sitting arrangement with Peter Harrison.
“Well then, let’s go rescue Mr. Harrison,” Wilson said. “I mean Puddles,” he corrected himself. “I haven’t met him yet.”
Karen told him he was in for a treat, and the four of us walked home to retrieve Puddles from a weary and worn Peter Harrison.
The poor old guy. As if spending an entire evening with Puddles weren’t exhausting enough, he also had the added shock of seeing me in my new look for the first time. Luckily Wilson was there to catch him when he just about fainted.
But Peter quickly recovered his jolly smile, made some excuse about being a bit tired due to the lateness of the hour, and swore to Candy that her puppy had been no trouble at all.
“Only one piddle all evening,” he said brightly.
Puddles made up for lost time the moment we got him out to Sullivan Street. As the puppy rounded the fire hydrant for the third time, Wilson reminded us we still had a lot of ground to cover.
“I know it’s late,” he said. “But what else did you ladies notice tonight?”
“Karen noticed the bouncer.” Candy bent down to tell Puddles what a good boy he was. “She danced with him, too.”
We started walking down Vine Street, deserted at such a late hour, and Karen described her conversation with Henry Jack the Bible-toting bouncer. “He goes to some new church,” she told us. “The Zion Tabernacle of Praise and Prophecy.”
“You know this how?” Wilson asked.
“Umm, Henry might have invited me to go to church with him.”
Wilson chuckled. “Is there anyone out there who didn’t ask you for a date, Ms. Sembler?”
“Hey, I’m a good dancer.”
“When Henry wasn’t flirting with Karen, he was thumping his Bible at me,” I said. “Apparently his pastor, a guy named Muckenfuss, has ordered Henry to wipe out sin at the Wade On Inn.”
“Muckenfuss?” Wilson asked.
“Isn’t it great? I guarantee an evil Lord Muckenfuss will make an appearance in my next book. Especially since he has Henry convinced that all pool players are going straight to hell.”
Speaking of hell, about then we passed 209 Vine, and I glanced up at the second floor window. The lights were out in Ian’s office. That lumpy couch must have been comfy enough after all.
“Something up t
here?” Wilson asked, and I shifted my attention back to Puddles, who had managed to twist his leash around one of Candy’s stilettos.
“Maybe Henry Jack killed those people,” she said as she struggled to disentangle herself. “You know, if he thought they were sinners?”
Wilson bent down to hold Puddles, and Candy freed her foot. He glanced up at Karen. “You willing to keep dancing with him?”
“Oh sure,” she said. “I’m way better at dancing than I am at gambling.”
He stood up. “Don’t tell me you were all betting?”
“It was fun,” Candy answered as we turned toward home. “Jessie taught us what to do.”
Wilson frowned at me for good measure and asked how my evening went. “Tell me everything, Little Girl Cue-It.” He put an arm around my shoulder and kissed the top of my head. “Except how you managed to get your hair that color.”
I reminded my soon-to-be ex-beau that my disguise was his idea, and that I did not appreciate being addressed by my childhood nickname. “Only Daddy got to call me that.”
“The Wade On Inn?” he prompted, and I told him it wasn’t at all what I expected.
“Everyone seemed so sweet and innocent.” I began counting the regulars off on my fingers. “Bobby Decker the wannabe cowboy with his shucks here and jeepers there, Elsa the adoring mother, Mackenzie the stellar student.” I waved my hands. “Quirky old ladies, yuppies, poor Melissa Purcell just hoping to play better someday. I swear it seemed almost wholesome.”
“Excuse me?”
“Of course, my favorite was Avis Sage.” I smiled at the thought of Mr. Sage after all these years. “What a sweet old man.”
“That sweet old man is my prime suspect.”
“What!?” my friends and I said in unison, and even Puddles yipped at the idea.
“We’re talking about the little old black guy?” Karen asked. “The one who’s no bigger than Kiddo here?”
“That little old black guy is a shark from way back,” Wilson said. “He has a record a mile long.”
“Yeah, right,” I said. “A bunch of silly gambling misdemeanors from way back when he knew my fa—”
Oops.
Wilson stopped. “Your father?” he said and we all stopped. “Are you telling me Avis Sage knew your daddy?”
“Umm,” I answered and appealed to my friends for support. But they were both taking an inordinate interest in the storefront window of King’s Bakery and Confections.
“The display case is empty,” I pointed out, but they kept staring at it anyway. I gave up and told Wilson to have at it.
“Please tell me Avis Sage didn’t recognize you.”
“He didn’t recognize me. He hasn’t seen me since I was ten.” I pointed to my hair. “I have changed a bit since then.”
“You’re a little scary. You know that?”
“Maybe, but Mr. Sage certainly isn’t.”
“Avis Sage has a serious heart condition and huge medical bills. His health depends on him winning at that pool table. He couldn’t afford to be losing to Lupo. Or Hernandez.”
I thought about Avis. He was good, but dare I say, he had lost some of his edge over the decades?
“He wouldn’t have the strength to push dead bodies into those waterfalls,” I argued.
“Yeah, right,” Wilson said as we started walking again.
“Speaking of scary muscle men.” I was a tad sarcastic. “There’s always Kevin to consider.” I had to describe Kevin’s goatee and glasses before Candy and Karen even remembered him.
“The guy in sandals?” Karen asked. “That really does make him scary. Right, Jess?”
Okay, so men in sandals is one of my pet peeves. And much to my chagrin, Clarence, North Carolina is a city chock-full of men in sandals. Trust me, they all look ridiculous.
“What’s a quiet, unassuming guy like that doing at the Wade On Inn?” I asked. “He looks like he belongs in a library.”
“He does,” Wilson said. “Kevin Cooper’s a librarian at the University.”
“And Melissa Purcell’s a waitress at Hastie’s Diner,” Karen added as we moseyed our way back to Sullivan Street. “She invited us to visit her sometime.”
Wilson squeezed my hand. “Don’t even think about it,” he said before addressing Karen. “Keep on Melissa’s good side? She’s been a regular out there for as long as Avis Sage. There might even be some history between her and Fritz.”
“Right now she has her eyes on Spencer,” I said, and Karen asked if any woman didn’t.
“He is incredibly handsome,” I agreed, but Candy begged to differ.
“He’s creepy. He kept bragging about his wife’s money, at the same time that he’s hitting on me.” She wrinkled her nose.
“Spencer Erring’s married to a very rich woman,” Wilson explained. “Dixie Wellington-Erring’s family owns that chain of high-end grocery stores.”
“Wellington Market?” I asked. “They have a great selection of champagne.”
“So how was playing with Mr. Incredibly Handsome?”
I reported that Spencer’s a terrible player and an even worse gambler. “He lost a lot of money tonight.”
“His wife’s money.”
“The old ladies are also good at losing money,” I said. “They seem to take great pleasure in it.”
“Ethel Abernathy and Doreen Buxton.” Wilson identified the old ladies and went on to name their sons, George Abernathy and Paul Buxton. “As in A and B Developers,” he said ominously, and we all grimaced.
A and B is the largest real estate developer in the county. The company is always in the news or in court, fighting for permits to build this or that project. They seem bent on putting shopping malls and parking lots on every square-inch of open land.
“And you’re right, Jessie,” Wilson continued. “Ethel and Doreen are working on losing every nickel of the family fortunes before they die.”
“They’re just having fun,” I argued.
“Those old ladies started showing up at that bar, and now we’ve got two murders on our hands.”
“I can’t picture them tossing people into Shinkle Creek,” Karen said as we finally headed home.
“Ethel and Doreen are nothing but trouble,” Wilson insisted. “Their sons built Cotswold Estates Retirement Home to keep them safe. But since Ethel still drives, the old ladies venture out to the Wade On Inn whenever the mood strikes.”
“Who knows?” I said, feeling a sudden affection for the feisty old duo. “I might be tempted to do the same thing when I’m their age.”
“Something I can look forward to,” Wilson mumbled.
Chapter 9
Hard to imagine, but Puddles still had one more piddle left in him before we made it into our building. Even harder to fathom, Wilson still had the energy to nibble on my neck while I was trying to unlock my door.
I might have giggled in my complete state of exhaustion, but when he reached out to help me with the door handle, the image of him guiding Tiffany Sass’s cue stick flashed before me.
I slapped his hand away and twirled around. “I am tired,” I said firmly.
“We need to talk, Jessie.” He pointed down the stairs where we had dropped off my neighbors. “Alone,” he added.
I glanced at the stairwell. “Go to bed, Sweetie,” I called down. And sure enough, I heard Candy close her door.
“You can make us some tea,” I said. I led him inside and collapsed on a barstool at my kitchen counter. “I really am tired.”
He put on the kettle while I slipped off my shoes and gestured for Snowflake to join me.
“Okay,” I said as she hopped into my lap. “Let’s talk.”
“You can begin by explaining what possessed you to take along those two.” Wilson again pointed downward.
“Oh, probably genius.”
“Nice try, Jessie.” He set the tea cups on the counter. “You want to imagine my reaction when Kim Leary called to inform me she never signed up for protecting
three civilians? ‘Three?’ I said to her. ‘What do you mean three?’ But I had a pretty good idea who she was talking about even before she described your partners in crime.”
He banged a teaspoon down. “‘It’s like trying to guard the Three Stooges,’ Kim told me.” He threw his hands in the air. “What the hell did you think you were doing?”
“Are you,” I pointed across the counter, “actually accusing me,” I pointed to my innocent self, “of causing problems? You had to know I wasn’t going to set foot in the Wade On Inn alone. Especially after you made a point of emphasizing how dangerous it is.”
“We never agreed you should bring along an entourage.”
“Come on, Wilson. It would have looked mighty strange for a woman my age to wander in there all by herself. It would look like I was interested in a lot more than a pool game.”
I waited for an argument, but clearly he was unable to counter my very sound point.
I continued, “And even you can’t deny Candy and Karen pulled their own weight tonight. I wouldn’t have found out nearly as much on my own.”
The teapot whistled, and we both jumped.
“I will agree,” he said as he poured the water, “that your friends did a great job. Densmore and Sass will be busy for days following up on what they learned.”
“Sass?”
“But having three of you to protect has my people a little on edge. Can’t you see that, Jessie? I don’t have the staff for this.”
“Sass?”
“It makes Kim Leary’s job a whole lot harder.”
I sighed and gave up on getting any sort of response about Tiffany La-Dee-Doo-Da Sass.
“So this Kim person is the undercover cop who’s watching out for us?” I asked. “She’s cute as a button, by the way. I just love the Goldilocks disguise.”
“Excuse me?”
“No one would ever suspect she’s a cop. I felt extremely safe every time I peeked over at all those blond curls.”
It suddenly occurred to me that Kevin the quiet guy, the supposed librarian, was also one of Wilson’s people. Lord knows his gambling stakes were pathetic enough to be sponsored by the Clarence Police Department.
Double Shot Page 6
