Greedy Bones

by Carolyn Haines

  “Nothing. As I said, Mississippi Agri-Team manages the crops on it. You got a question about that, take it up with them.”

  I thanked Luther for his time and lead-footed it to the hospital.

  4

  Tinkie and her father showed up late that afternoon. At first she was too angry to speak to me for sending the chemical sandman to visit, but when she realized that Oscar was no worse—and the nurses told her how I’d stood at the window, willing Oscar to heal—her anger broke.

  “He’s better, isn’t he, Daddy?” Tinkie looked up at her father, and I could imagine her through the years of her childhood turning to him in that same way, asking for his reassurance. Tinkie loved her mom, but Mr. Bell-case was the end-all of her childhood universe.

  “Oscar’s a strong-willed man.” Avery Bellcase patted Tinkie’s hand. “He has every reason to live. He has you. No man in his right mind would leave that behind.”

  Tinkie at last included me in the conversation. “What did the tests show?”

  “Doc hasn’t said anything specific. He was waiting for you to return.” For all that she’d gotten furious at me for tricking her, she looked better. The sleep had taken the gray tones out of her skin.

  “Have you found out what this illness is?” She’d pinned her hopes on me and my investigative skills, and I felt the weight on my shoulders increase. Tinkie had saved me more times than I could count. I had to find an answer.

  “A few things.” I didn’t want to mislead her. “We’ll talk when I have a chance to check them out.”

  She grasped my shoulders. “Promise me you won’t go to the Carlisle place. If that’s the source of this illness, it’s too dangerous.”

  “Someone has to look.” I meant to be logical, not argumentative.

  “The CDC will bring hazmat suits. Let them go, Sarah Booth. Promise me.”

  I couldn’t imagine that stepping on a piece of property could bring personal destruction, but the Carlisle place did appear to be the epicenter of this disaster. “I won’t take any unnecessary risks. I promise.”

  Mr. Bellcase watched the scene play out. With a tilt of his head, he indicated that he wanted to speak with me.

  “I have to meet with Coleman and the CDC,” I told her.

  Mr. Bellcase kissed Tinkie’s cheek. “And I’m needed at the bank. Your mother will take over for a few hours. Remember, you gave your word you’d leave.”

  Tinkie nodded, the façade of the obedient daughter perfectly in place. “I will, Daddy.”

  “I love you, Tinkie,” he said.

  “Me too.”

  I fell into step beside him as we walked down the sterile corridor.

  “I’ve never approved of Tinkie’s work with you,” he said, “but she believes you can resolve this.”

  The problem was that I wasn’t certain I could without Tinkie’s help. We were truly partners—in the P.I. agency and in so many other ways. We worked as a team. Tinkie had a skill-set I didn’t. Our cases often required both of our abilities.

  “I’ll do my best, sir.”

  “I know you walked away from a Hollywood career to be here with her.” He faced me. “That won’t be forgotten.”

  “Tinkie is my friend. She’d do the same for me, sir.”

  “If you need our help, the bank’s resources are at your disposal.”

  “I need to find Erin Carlisle. The bank must have some address on her. It would be quicker than trying a computer search.”

  “Harold will get that information. Call him.”

  “Thank you.”

  We parted in the parking lot, and I watched Mr. Bellcase drive away. He was in the worst position possible—forced to watch his daughter suffer and unable to do a thing to stop it.

  Coleman’s office door was open, and a new dispatcher greeted me with a smile. “He’s been waiting for you,” she said, ushering me through the main office. It was strange not to see Gordon sitting at his desk.

  “Sarah Booth.”

  Coleman’s deep voice drew my attention to the far corner of his office, where he stood beside a man who was a twin for Omar Sharif in his younger days. “This is Peyton Fidellas, an expert in airborne diseases and chemical reactions—”

  “I’ve heard about your investigations and your film,” Peyton said. “It’s a pleasure to meet you.”

  Coleman motioned to a woman on the far side of the man. “And Bonnie Louise McRae, whose specialty is parasitic life-cycle development. They’re with the Epidemic Intelligence Services of the Centers for Disease Control. Sarah Booth is—”

  “I know Sarah Booth,” the woman said. “She was always in trouble for skipping school and running wild.”

  I hadn’t really noticed her, a serious oversight on my part. Where Peyton was darkly handsome, European exotic, and charming, Bonnie was California blond with a sharp arrogance and a body any starlet would kill to possess. She was walking va-va-voom. I looked her up and down. “Sorry, but I’m sure I’d recognize you if we’d met before.”

  “Try high school. Freshman year. I didn’t graduate in Sunflower County. I decided an education was important.”

  I was beginning to think I’d forgotten Bonnie Louise McRae on purpose. “I’m sorry, Miss McRae, I don’t remember you.”

  “Not a surprise. I wasn’t in the popular set. My family farmed six hundred acres up in the north of the county.” She stared at me as if I should instantly be able to conjure a map and pinpoint the axis of her birth, life, and departure.

  Coleman cleared his throat. “Peyton and Ms. McRae will investigate the Carlisle place, which is ground zero for our investigation. Did you learn anything new from Tinkie?”

  “No.” I started to tell him about Luther, but for some reason I was reluctant to talk in front of the EIS agents. Maybe it was because they were government and I had an inherent distrust of federal agencies. Maybe coming back to Sunflower County after a stint in Hollywood, I wanted to close the borders and exclude all outsiders. Or maybe it was because Bonnie Louise McRae came across as a bitch on wheels. What ever the reason, I kept my lip zipped. I didn’t have my partner to back me up if the situation deteriorated to a good old-fashioned hair-pulling.

  “Is there an office we can use?” Bonnie asked Coleman.

  “The county health department will let you have the back half of their building. It’s beside the hospital, so that should prove convenient, I hope.”

  “Isn’t there some place closer to the sheriff’s office?” Bonnie asked.

  “There’s always the jail.” Karo syrup had nothing on me. “That space would serve perfectly.”

  “Four people’s lives are on the line here.” Coleman cast me a warning glance. “Doc Sawyer is waiting at the hospital to talk with you,” he told the EIS agents. “I’ll be there in half an hour. I need to check on something.”

  As Coleman left the room, Bonnie Louise fell into step beside him. She linked her arm through his and simpered up at him, batting her eyelashes and swinging her butt like she’d broken a hitch in her get-along.

  It was inevitable that Coleman would find another girl, especially in light of his impending divorce. But plainly put, Bonnie Louise McRae set my teeth on edge. Any involvement with her would be a repeat of his calamitous marriage to Connie.

  My cell phone buzzed, and I answered it as I followed Peyton out.

  “Sarah Booth, it’s Harold Erkwell.”

  I would have recognized the banker’s cultured voice, but Harold didn’t play telephone-guessing games. “How are you doing, Harold?”

  “Worried. I’ve been at the bank a long time, and I don’t ever recall Oscar missing a day of work. We’re all in shock here.”

  “Me too.”

  “Mr. Bellcase is beside himself. He rushes into the bank, spins around, and runs out. Oscar’s like a son to him, and he’s terrified for Tinkie.”

  “I know.” My mood sank a little lower.

  “I have an address on Erin Carlisle. She’s a photographer. A pretty g
ood one, from all accounts. Does the carriage trade in portraits and photographs of important people.”

  “Was she difficult to locate?”

  Harold laughed. “Not in the least. Luther knows exactly where she lives. Erin is opposed to selling the land for development. In fact, she’s blocked a sale before. Luther is trying to slide this past her.”

  Goes to show that just because a man has bone china coffee cups in a trailer, he doesn’t always have high morals.

  Harold gave me her address and phone number. “Erin is . . . difficult. She’s angry, and she takes it out on this county and the people who live here.”

  “How do you mean?”

  “When her mom died, neither Luther nor her father let her know. Someone from the funeral home finally took pity and called her. She arrived just in time to see the casket going into the hearse for transport. She’s never forgiven the people here. She felt, rightly so, that someone should have notified her.”

  “That’s awful. Luther told me a lot of stuff, but he acted like Erin’s refusal to join a sorority was a big deal.”

  Harold hesitated. “Lana Entrekin Carlisle was a fifth-generation Zeta Zeta. Her ancestor was one of the founders. ZZ is the sorority at Ole Miss. Haven’t you seen the billboards set up along the highways during rush?”

  “I’ve seen them.” I had indeed. Mortified described my reaction. The billboards listed a toll-free suicide hotline for girls who weren’t offered bids for this sorority. “A tad extreme, wouldn’t you say?”

  “Erin was a heritage candidate. She was a shoo-in.”

  “Jesus, Harold, this is a sorority you’re talking about, not membership to The Rapture.”

  “Social connections are often more important than any academic degree.”

  I couldn’t argue that. Too often, life has nothing to do with merit and too much to do with contacts.

  “Still and all, to cut her out of the family seems a bit extreme. I mean, she could have married a first cousin and produced a child with twelve fingers. That might have been a reason to kick her out. But a sorority?” I couldn’t let it go.

  Harold wisely ignored me. “Call her. She can fill you in on details I’m not privy to. The bank deals with Luther, but she gets a copy of everything.”

  “Thanks, but I have another question.”

  “No, my lust for you hasn’t waned. Those photographs from Hollywood have only made me want you more.”

  Harold delighted me, even when he was being outrageous. He’d once proposed, but our friendship had recovered from that hurdle. “You know Jitty thinks I should marry—” I stopped dead. Jitty was Harold’s strongest proponent. She viewed him as the perfect donor of sperm and the best potential partner for marriage. But I didn’t need to tell him that.

  “Who’s Jitty?” he asked.

  “Oh, a friend.”

  “From Zinnia?”

  I was stumped for an answer. “Sort of.”

  “How are you ‘sort of’ from a place? Either you are or you aren’t.”

  “She lived here once but doesn’t now.” I outdid myself with cleverness.

  “Have I met her?”

  “What is this? Sixty questions? She’s a friend. Case closed. Saving Oscar is the focus.”

  “You’re right. We can explore tomfoolery at another time.”

  “I’ll contact Erin and let you know what I find out.”

  “Anything else?”

  “Lana Carlisle. Did she trip and fall down the stairs, or did she have some help?”

  Harold hesitated. “The death was ruled accidental. But there was gossip. A lot of it. Especially since the funeral was held so fast and Erin wasn’t notified.”

  “Talk that Mr. Carlisle killed his wife?” I was remembering what Luther had said about Erin tattling about an affair. High emotions sometimes led to rash actions.

  “That either Mr. Carlisle or Luther killed her.”

  Now that shocked me. “Luther was a suspect in his mother’s death?”

  “And his father’s.”

  “Holy cow. Was there an investigation?”

  “That was before Coleman became sheriff, so things weren’t always done by the book. As you recall, there were some issues with our former sheriff.”

  “Thanks for the heads up, Harold.”

  “Glad to help. Call me if you need anything. I’m stopping by the hospital when I get off work.”

  “Cece and I will be by there as soon as we can. I think I’m going to make a quick trip to Jackson.”

  “Good luck, Sarah Booth.” He dropped his voice a notch. “I can’t wait to meet this Jitty person.”

  “Sure thing.” Now I’d jumped on the gut wagon with a one-eyed dog. Before long, I just might have to feed him.

  5

  Image Photography was located on the north side of Jackson, Mississippi, in the Ridgeland area. I found the studio with ease and noted the parked Lexus and Mercedes crossovers and one vintage, baby-blue Nissan that obviously belonged to someone with excellent taste. I parked my antique Mercedes roadster that had been my mother’s pride and joy next to it.

  For fifteen minutes I watched the studio, taking the temperature of the clientele and what Erin Carlisle had given up an inheritance of land and comfort to pursue.

  While I waited, I got the number for Mississippi Agri-Team in Yazoo City, Mississippi. My plan was to stop by there and speak with Lester Ballard, until a receptionist at the company told me he was out of the country.

  “May I speak with someone about the cotton crop on the Carlisle plantation land?” I asked.

  “I’m sorry, only Mr. Ballard can talk with you. He handles that property.”

  Across the parking lot, a mom came out of the photography studio with twin boys about five years old, dressed in suits and ties. The boys were miserable, tugging at their clothes. The woman looked like she’d stepped from a fashion magazine.

  “When will Mr. Ballard return?” I asked, still watching the studio’s front door.

  “He should have been back yesterday, but there was a delay.”

  Another woman with a lovely young girl departed the photographer’s. The child’s white dress imitated a Victorian design. This girl was in hog heaven in her finery. She pirouetted on the sidewalk and then slipped into the passenger side of a Bentley.

  “Where did you say Mr. Ballard had gone?” I asked.

  “I didn’t say. Shall I have him call when he returns?”

  “Please.” I gave her the contact information and got out of my car as another client exited the studio and got into a BMW convertible.

  I strolled up to the storefront and examined some of the photographs on display. These were not graduation pictures or images of happy moments caught on film. These were portraits, as in the kind that brought to mind great painters. Art with a capital A. They had the quality of a painting in the use of light, texture, composition—a richness normally not captured by a camera.

  What ever else could be said, Image Photography had a clientele with taste. Erin had managed a career that blended art and commerce.

  If I had a child, Image Photography is where I’d want her portrait taken.

  Hoping the coast was clear and no additional clients lurked inside, I walked in and stopped at the reception desk. A young woman with dark-framed glasses angled stark against her pale skin looked up at me. “May I help you?”

  “Erin Carlisle, please.”

  “She’s in the darkroom and can’t be disturbed.”

  “I’ll wait.” I took a seat in one of the chairs. Several magazines were spread on a coffee table and I selected one and began to read about vacations in the Eastern bloc and why they were such good bargains.

  The receptionist watched me with discomfort but returned to her work.

  Twenty minutes later, I’d skimmed through a series of articles on places to avoid in the way of restaurants, hotels, transportation, and travel guides. An itch of irritation, plus the sense that I should be back in Zinnia with
Tinkie, made me snappish.

  “Would you ask Ms. Carlisle when she’ll be available to see me?” I asked.

  “May I tell Erin why you’re here?” the young woman countered.

  I nodded agreeably, controlling my urge to point out that she could have asked that question half an hour sooner. “Certainly. I’m here to talk about her family estate in Sunflower County. I’m not going back to Zinnia until I do.”

  The girl’s expression went blank. “I’ll tell her.” She got up immediately. She was gone about five minutes, returned to her desk without a word, and began phoning clients to set up appointments for the next week.

  Footsteps sounded coming my way. I was looking at the door when Erin Carlisle stepped through it. She was striking, with honey-blond hair, blue eyes, and classic features. “What do you want?” she asked.

  She wasn’t friendly, but then I didn’t need to be her BFF. “Can we talk privately?”

  She waved me to follow her through a sitting area with several sets and into an office in the back. Leather sofa, plush carpeting, well appointed. Classy, just like Erin.

  She put her hands on her hips. “What?”

  “Four people who visited the Carlisle estate—your family property—have become seriously ill. They may die.” I thought that would take the wind out of her sails, but her mouth only hardened.

  “Over a decade ago, two people did die there,” she said. “My mother and my father. And no one would do a damn thing about either of those murders. Why should I get worked up over the fate of some strangers who co-incidentally got sick?”

  “I don’t believe it’s coincidental.”

  “Are you suggesting someone on my property concocted an illness and is spreading it in the hopes of murdering your friends?”

  “ ‘Murder’ isn’t a word to use carelessly,” I warned her, but gauging her tight jaw, my advice held no weight.

  “When someone deliberately takes another’s life, premeditated, for personal gain, I’d say that’s murder, wouldn’t you?”

  I nodded. “By definition, yes. Are you talking about your parents?”