Then There Were Nun

by Dakota Cassidy

“You bet she is.”

  “How about you? Any nightmares?”

  If he only knew the kind of nightmares I had living inside me, Iris’s attempt to kill us—him—was almost like cake. “I’m okay, too. But let’s talk sometime. Okay?”

  Higgs didn’t readily commit, instead he said, “I almost forgot. Let me introduce you to Jeff.” He turned toward the far side of the patio area and whistled. “Hey, Jeff! C’mere, guy!”

  Out of the dusk, a spry, four-legged creature shot toward us. Higgs knelt down and greeted him with a grin, scruffing his head with and affectionate palm. “Trixie, this is Jeff. Found him yesterday, rooting around the alleyway, looking for food. Decided I needed a new best friend.”

  I looked into Higgs’s eyes. He’d been back to the alleyway again, which meant he was still reliving that night. But looking down at this tan and white terrier mix, with ears that stood at attention, sprigs of white and tan hair for eyebrows, and a tongue that hung out of the side of his mouth, I thought maybe—just maybe—a good memory would replace the bad.

  I reached down and scratched his ears, loving the soft feel of his wiry fur. “Well, hello, Jeff. Do you like spaghetti?”

  He panted up at me, his chocolate-brown eyes following mine, making me smile wider. “Aren’t you the cutest ever?”

  Higgs rose and pointed to the table. “I’m gonna grab a glass of wine. You want?”

  Jeff pushed his compact body against my leg as I nodded. “Do I want wine? Does the Pope wear a funny hat?” I teased, listening to Higgs’s laughter as he sauntered over to the table where endless bottles of wine sat.

  As the dusky purple sky began to turn dark and bruised blue, I watched everyone talking and laughing. I listened to the music play, I saw Coop’s head bounce enthusiastically as she chatted with our guests. I grinned as Detective Primrose and Knuckles clinked glasses, and twirled spaghetti on their forks, and my heart filled to bursting.

  This was what I’d hoped for all along. It’s what I’d hoped for in Ebenezer Falls. What I’d hoped for when we’d first chosen Cobbler Cove as our new home.

  This.

  “Pssst, Trixie?”

  I looked around, unsure where the voice had come from.

  “Hey, Trixie! Down here! Down here!” a light, squeaky voice said.

  Frowning, I looked down at my feet.

  “Yeah, yeah, it’s me. I’m talkin’ to you.”

  My mouth fell open and I blinked—but I managed to say, “Jeff?”

  “Yes! Good human! Hey, listen. I got a message for you.”

  So look, I know I should be all manner of freaked out, but you have to consider Livingston. He’s a talking owl, for Gabriel’s sake. And I’m possessed by an evil entity. And Coop’s a real, live demon. Not much surprised me anymore.

  Instead of giving any thought to the idea that a dog was talking to me, I asked, “A message from whom?”

  “From Hell, Trixie. From Hell…”

  The End

  Thank you for joining Trixie, Coop, and myself on our first journey together! I hope you’ll come back for more at Inkerbelle’s in Hit and Nun, book 2 of the Nun of Your Business Mysteries—coming soon!

  Preview another book by this author

  Prawn of The Dead

  A Lemon Layne Mystery, Book 1

  Dakota Cassidy

  Chapter 1

  “Jessica Fletcher, any idea why the door to the men’s bathroom is ajar, young lady?” I asked my monkey suspiciously as I tucked the keys to my convenience store’s lavatory back inside the pocket of my hoodie.

  She, of course, looked at me as though I’d up and lost my mind on the way to do morning rounds. As though it were unseemly I’d even consider she’d tampered with the keys.

  Jess is what’s known as a spider monkey. Six years old with the attention span of an American two-year-old after a date with Grandma and too much sugar.

  Plainly speaking, my little rescue monkey is a mischievous, quick-footed, tiny troublemaker who’s alternately one of the great loves of my life and the bane of my very existence.

  Her name is a ridiculously obvious nod in honor of Angela Lansbury, and a tip of my ball cap to my father, the late great biker, Chains Forney Layne. As a kid, after we’d set some catfish or brisket to smoke overnight for the following day, we religiously watched reruns of Murder, She Wrote over bags of salty cheese popcorn and cans of ice cold grape soda from our coolers at our family-run gas station, convenience store and, as crazy as this sounds, barbecue pit.

  It was our father-and-daughter jam, and one of the countless little things I missed most about him. I know he’d laugh that hearty, deep chuckle I was sure came from his very soul if he knew about Jessica. He’d loved Angela Lansbury and a good mystery as much as I did, and still do.

  Chucking her under the chin, I pointed to the bathroom door and asked her again, “Is this the work of a certain primate?”

  JF repositioned herself on my shoulder, bracketing my face with her tiny hands and looked deep into my eyes. This was her way of sincerely assuring me she was absolutely not the guilty party.

  But I know my Jess, and she’d more than once snatched the keys off the hook above the cash register the second I was even a little distracted. Despite the fact that spider monkeys have very short thumbs and long, hook-like fingers, she’s quite adept with them and uses them to her full advantage. Not to mention that prehensile tail of hers. She’s always yanking items off shelves and scooping up shiny things that catch her fancy.

  So I narrowed my gaze at her and warned, “I’m just saying, if I find out it was you…”

  JF made a dramatic plunge backward and fell along the length of my shoulders, curling her tiny head in toward my face. In typical theatrical Jess fashion, she threw her hand across her eyes and stuttered a weak chirp.

  Nodding my head, I muttered a somber, “That’s absolutely right. You’ll be dead meat for one hundred, JF.”

  Then I grinned at her. I couldn’t help it, even though she was likely the culprit, she was too darn cute to resist.

  My phone rang to the tune of Beethoven, indicating my best friend, Coco Belinksi, calling for our usual early morning chat. Monday through Friday, it was a ritual for us to start our day off with a good gab. Our way of keeping in touch when I’d moved away to Seattle. A promise we kept so we’d never lose touch, and one we continued with the utmost reverence since I’d moved back.

  I dug my phone out of the pocket of my sweats and clicked the “accept” button and leaned against the cool brick wall right beside the bathroom while Jessica fussed with her new T-shirt. Distractedly, I wrapped one of my annoying curls around my index finger and shoved it out of my face.

  “Morning, Coco!”

  Facing the thicket of tall trees across the street lining our country road, I smiled and inhaled the chilly breeze rolling in from the ocean. January was here, and it was evident in the salty tang of the air. Harbor bells rang to signify incoming fishing boats, the early morning echo music to my ears.

  While the phone connection crackled, I scuffed my foot on the wide curb leading from the entry of the storefront all the way around to our connecting bathrooms on the right side of the building.

  “How’s Lemon Layne’s world today?” Coco finally asked, coming through surprisingly loud and clear, her liquid-smooth voice far too cheerful for seven a.m.

  I pictured my friend since preschool, her dark hair cut at a fashionable angle along her jaw, straight and gleaming, her right hand latched on to her left biceps as she paced the length of her office at the coroner’s in a trendy outfit complemented by a bright scarf. There was almost nothing she loved more than a scarf.

  We, as a pair, are quite the opposite. While Coco’s hair and clothes are fashionable and chic, my hair is unruly and brown with highlights of auburn streaked throughout. Not intentionally, mind you. They’re just there naturally, tucked amongst a massive mess of curls I’m forever trying to tame. And as far as fashion goes? I don’t think Cosmo’
s calling. But I might have a shot at Field & Stream.

  “Lemon? You still there?”

  “Lemon Layne’s world is exactly the same as it was last night, when she sat up way too late yakking on the phone with her best friend about who the new boat in the harbor belongs to while they watched mindless TV.”

  Coco giggled, soft and melodic. “That’s what I love most about you, Lemon. You’re steadfast and true. Speaking of steadfast, or dog with a bone, however you want to label it, found any new mysteries to solve today? Like who’s been stealing all the Ho Ho’s from the center aisle of the station? If anyone can figure it out, it’s you.”

  Coco was referring to the Smoke and Petrol which I mentioned earlier. My family-owned combination gas station/convenience store/best smoked catfish barbecue pit in Fig Harbor, Washington, that I run with my mother. Smoking meat, especially catfish, was another passion my dad handed down to me.

  Every time I rubbed down a catfish with our secret recipe of spices, or when I made a batch of our sweet-and-spicy homemade barbecue sauce for our brisket, I felt my dad right there next to me, showing me the tricks of the trade he’d learned in his extensive biker travels.

  I chuckled into the phone. My best friend of thirty-some odd years knew me so well. A mystery—any mystery, really, big or small—was rather like my nemesis of sorts. I couldn’t keep my nose out of it until I figured it out.

  But my sleuthing also made me feel closer to my dad. It kept the memory of the twinkle in his eye alive whenever I set my mind to figuring out whodunit. Everything I’ve learned about being a nosy, amateur puzzle solver came from him.

  We’d had a rash of recent petty thefts by someone who appeared to really enjoy the edgy coup of heisting a chocolate-covered spongy treat. Whoever it was, he was slicker than a vat of fry oil, because I still hadn’t caught the culprit.

  “Nope. Still haven’t figured out who’s desperate enough to steal Ho Ho’s in bulk. But I’m on it,” I assured her with a grin, waving to one of my favorite locals, Nita Burns, as she drove by on her way to open up her floral shop.

  “So, how’s the new fish doing this morning?”

  Coco meant my new white koi fish I’d just integrated into the pond in the backyard of the house my mother and I shared. The pond and my exotic fish tank are my Zen, my monk chants, if you will. Rain or shine, when I’m overwhelmed or just need to think, that’s usually where you can find me.

  “I’m tickled all sorts of pink to announce Koi George is still alive and swimming.”

  “Yay! You’ve had some tough luck with the pond fish lately. Glad to hear George is adjusting to his new environment.”

  The cold winter rain began to pelt my face, forcing me to take off my glasses, tuck them in my sweat’s pocket and acknowledge the task at hand. Cleaning the station’s bathroom. We didn’t just make the best barbecue catfish in town; we had the cleanest gas station bathrooms, too.

  “Lemon? You still there?”

  “Still here,” I said, and waited for her response. Instead, I only heard the crackle of our intermittent connection. “Coco?”

  Dang, lost her again. Phone reception here in our small town of Fig Harbor is spotty from time to time. Surrounded by ocean and tall trees and backed by a mountain, our slice of heaven sometimes makes for a cell phone nightmare.

  As I waited for Coco to call back, which as always, she’d undoubtedly do, I pushed off the wall with my foot, tucked my phone back into my pocket and used my elbow to shove the door to the bathroom open.

  When the gloomy light of a typical rainy Pacific Northwest day fell across the bathroom’s tile floor, I gasped in horror. A gasp so sharp, Jessica clung to my head and buried her face in the neck of my hoodie.

  I blinked my eyes—then blinked again as my throat constricted. My heart began to crash in my chest and my ears pounded with the throb of my rushing pulse.

  Was there a… Was he…?

  Oh for sure he was. There was no way…

  Dead.

  Spit and fire, there was a dead man on the floor.

  “Holy sweet-and-spicy catfish…” I muttered.

  Not that something as trivial as tender catfish and fall-off-the-bone ribs are at all important at a sensitive time like this. But in times of distress, my brain deviates to familiar comforts like barbecue and cars.

  Barbecue just happens to be one of my go-tos—that, and a good wheel alignment, always sooth my unsettled inner beast.

  The man’s torso was sprawled at an awkward angle just outside the stall where he lay on his belly, with his left cheek pressed to the tile floor and a dead prawn by his right shoulder. His long legs were still half inside the stall at the front of the toilet as though someone had launched him from their shoulder like a sack of potatoes. The newly painted white stall door stood wide open, hanging crookedly on its hinges.

  I knelt down to see if he was breathing. Though rationally, I knew that couldn’t be possible.

  And that’s when I realized who it was. I’d know that silver high school football ring with the sapphire square in it almost anywhere. He’d bragged about it at nearly every dinner I’d ever shared with him.

  It was Myron Fairbanks. My mother’s ex-boyfriend.

  Rising, I reached for the top of the stall door. I needed something to anchor me in order to stay upright as I stared down at him.

  Blood… You would think there would be more, but Myron’s light blue Member’s Only jacket was covered in mere crimson spatters, a mesmerizing Rorschach of patterns. Somehow, in his condition, I would have expected a coppery pool surrounding his body.

  Only one dark brown orthopedic shoe remained on his right foot, and the shoelace was untied, the left I thought was missing entirely until I spotted it by the corner of the wall. Yet, it wasn’t his clothes that troubled me as much as the dark splotch in his hair at the back of his head.

  I clenched my eyes shut and forced them open again, unable to look away from the spot on his skull.

  For a man Myron’s age, he had amazing snowy-white hair. But those luscious locks were now merely the resting place for what had likely killed him.

  A hole in his skull, approximately four inches in diameter with what looked like a piece of his brain missing, was the likely culprit.

  My throat tightened momentarily in a gag-reflex, and my heart picked up its pace as I forced myself to breathe and focus. I’ve been described as almost eerily calm in times of crisis. This was definitely a crisis, and I definitely needed to be calm.

  I looked to Jessica Fletcher perched on my shoulder, her sharp eyes watching mine while I reached into the pocket of my sweats and dug out a pair of sterile gloves and slipped them on.

  At the moment, I was grateful I always kept gloves on me. With a gas station frequented mostly by fishermen and touristy teenage boys who buy two bucks worth of gas to fill their jet skis just to use the facilities, they come in handy.

  Squatting on my haunches again, I double-checked Myron’s pulse to be sure I wasn’t wrong. Logically, I knew there was no way I could be wrong after seeing what was right in front of me.

  But a sudden irrational fear he would rise from the floor like the living dead and witness the condition he was in via the long mirror on the back of the entrance door made me recheck—because he was in quite a state.

  Still, there was nothing.

  How had this happened? When had it happened? Had Jessica somehow nabbed the keys and opened the bathroom door this morning? That was impossible. She’d been in her cage when I’d left to grab some coffee in town and remained there until I’d arrived back at the station to do my morning bathroom checks.

  I scanned the small area, my eyes roaming over every inch of the crisp white tile floors, the porcelain sink, the pale blue walls my mother and I had chosen the paint color for together. The sink was dry, the mirror mostly free of the speckles of water I spent so much time cleaning.

  Almost nothing aside from the crooked stall door was disturbed, which I found incredibl
y disturbing.

  I ran the back of my wrist over my forehead as I rose with caution, careful not to upset anything more than I’d already disturbed just by nature of finding the body, then clenched my eyes shut to block out the vision of Myron.

  I backed away and walked to the front door’s entryway, gulping in the damp outside air of the new day, as I prepared to call 9-1-1. I wanted to compose myself, so I didn’t scream out in haste, “There’s been a murder!”

  The shrill sound of Coco calling again made me jump. In that bizarre moment of pulsing, broken silence, I lost all sense of reason. When I should be calling 9-1-1, I was, instead, accepting Coco’s call. I needed to tell someone. I needed to purge what I saw by way of words. Cleanse it from my palette; lift the enormous weight pressing on my chest.

  “He’s dead!” I shouted into the phone like an exploding champagne cork before I thought to temper my words with a statement she’d find less jarring.

  “Koi George? The new white fish? Jeez o’ Pete. In the five minutes since we—”

  The phone began that erratic crackle once more, making me want to shake it. “You’re cutting in and out again. Stop pacing! You know what that does to our reception. The fish isn’t dead, Coco. The man is!”

  “Wait. You lost me. I only heard man. Oh, wait! Koi George is a man? You know, I’ve always wondered how you know if the fishy is a boy or a girl. Do they have tender bits you can see for gender identification?”

  “Koi George isn’t dead, Coco!”

  She breathed an impatient breath of air into the phone. Right now, I’d bet dollars to donuts she had a hand on her hip, with one of her perfectly plucked eyebrows arched in haughty indignation.

  “Then why are you yelling at me?”

  I fought my rising frustration about our shoddy connection by pressing my knuckles to my forehead right over my very imperfectly plucked eyebrow. “Because I just found Myron Fairbanks on the floor of the men’s bathroom here at the station, and I’m a little freaked out.”