The Dead-End Job Mysteries Box Set 2

by Elaine Viets

  If the interstate is blocked, I can always get off and take old, slow Federal Highway, Helen decided, and got on I-95.

  She breezed past the first few exits at top speed, artfully dodging a dented pickup loaded with mattresses at Cypress Creek Road in northern Fort Lauderdale.

  I’m making good time through Broward County, she thought.

  Then she crossed into Palm Beach County, and the traffic picked up. The graceful curve near Glades Road was a string of red brake lights, sparkling like jewels on a trophy wife’s necklace.

  Helen checked her watch. Seven o’clock. Her stomach knotted. Thirty minutes to save Margery.

  The Igloo crawled forward. Helen changed lanes twice, hoping each one would move faster. Instead, she found herself stuck behind a white box truck that blocked her view. Finally, she saw the Delray Beach exit: Atlantic Avenue was one mile ahead.

  Helen threaded her way through the heavy traffic. She was off the highway and waiting impatiently at the red light at the end of the exit, drumming her fingers on the steering wheel. Seven twenty-one. Finally, the light turned green and Helen headed east toward the beach, where the traffic was thickest.

  Daisy’s bungalow was on the edge of downtown Delray. Helen prayed there wasn’t a special event that night. She ran a red light, made a left turn and found herself in front of Daisy’s periwinkle picket fence.

  Daisy lived on a street of pricey Caribbean cottages painted like dollhouses and exquisitely landscaped. No one was outside in the humid evening.

  Helen saw a light on in a side room, but no sign of Daisy. She parked at a real estate agent’s office a block away, switched on the recorder in her shirt pocket, and hurried to Daisy’s turquoise and hot pink home. It looked the same, except for the For Rent sign planted in the garden with a rental agent’s phone number.

  Was Daisy leaving for a month or for good? Helen wondered.

  Floridians who lived near the beach often rented their homes to travelers for fat fees. Even if she was gone a month, Daisy could make enough to cover a big chunk of her trip to Australia. If she wasn’t planning to return, her pretty cottage would provide a steady income. Daisy’s front gate was unlatched. Helen slipped through it, then angled off toward the small landscaped jungle on the left. She crept through a thick hibiscus hedge, snagging her shirt. Now she was under the lighted side window, framed in hot pink. Helen carefully raised her head to eye level and peeked inside.

  Daisy sparkled in a cobalt blue pantsuit trimmed with rhinestones. Her fluffy blond hair seemed electric. She was struggling to zip a pink flowered suitcase the size of a cedar chest. She must have packed everything she owned.

  Helen moved her head an inch higher. Yep, the closet was open and empty, except for a few hangers. The open dresser drawers looked empty, too.

  Helen saw Daisy’s plump finger poke at something pink in the path of the zipper. Once the obstruction was out of the way, she dragged the zipper around the final corner. Daisy sighed with relief when the bulging case was zipped, and sat down beside it on the red-flowered spread.

  Daisy definitely liked color, Helen decided. And flowers.

  A mosquito stabbed Helen’s neck. She swatted it and Daisy looked over her shoulder at the window. Did she hear the slap? Helen wondered. Time to move on.

  Helen edged around the side of the house. Most of the backyard was taken up by an enormous turquoise wooden garage, trimmed in cheerful pink. The rest of the space was more gaudy flowers—all real—a birdbath with a silver gazing ball and a gravel path. Helen’s legs were long enough that she could step over the crunchy gravel path. She wanted to see the turquoise garage.

  Ouch! Helen tripped on a concrete cherub treacherously covered with moss. She limped over to the garage and opened the side door. It creaked. She froze.

  Helen counted to ten, holding her breath. No sound from inside the house. The back door, only ten feet away, stayed closed.

  Inside, the garage was neatly organized and smelled pleasantly of potting soil and sawdust. A red Ford Fiesta subcompact took up almost half the space closest to the door. It was crammed with dark shapes. Helen peered in the car window and saw boxes on the seats marked KITCHEN, LIVING ROOM, BEDROOM.

  Florida houses rarely had basements. Was Daisy storing her personal possessions in the car while she was gone? Was she planning to come back? Where was she going? Australia, or some country without extradition? Sweat trickled down Helen’s forehead and her shirt stuck to her chest. The garage was hot and airless.

  Helen tiptoed around the car and saw a workbench neatly lined with well-used gardening tools: trowels, sharp-pointed weeders, pruners and cruel, curved instruments. A jug of weed killer, the same brand Margery used, squatted on the bench.

  Progress! Helen thought. Not proof, but progress. She found a few grains of sawdust behind the bench and wondered if this was where Zach made his cat towers before he moved out.

  More long-handled gardening tools hung on the walls—a leaf rake, a pitchfork, a hoe, three steel shovels. Daisy or her aunt Tillie must do a lot of yard work. No, not Aunt Tillie. Daisy said her aunt was old and sick and she had to care for her.

  In the far corner, an old-fashioned white chest freezer hummed beside the workbench. It was nearly as big as the Ford. Maybe Daisy had more poisoned pies in the freezer, Helen thought. Then she’d have proof to link her to Zach’s murder.

  The longer Helen stayed in the sweltering garage, the more her dash to Daisy’s house seemed foolish. She had nothing to link her to Zach’s murder. Worse, if Daisy caught Helen, she could accuse Helen of trespassing, breaking and entering, even theft. She felt sick and dizzy in the smothering heat.

  The freezer had to have the answer.

  She lifted the heavy, yellow-white lid of the old freezer and got a blast of frosty air. No pies, just neatly stacked pizzas and bags of peas. Damn. Helen was sure she’d find Daisy’s pies in here.

  Wait! What was that under the frozen peas? Something wrapped in white. A pie? No, too big for a pie. Wrapped in white plastic trash bags, it took up the whole length of the freezer. It felt like . . . meat? That couldn’t be right.

  Helen tossed three bags of frozen peas, then grabbed the sharp-pointed weeder to rip open the white plastic trash bag.

  She peeled back the edges for a look inside.

  The old woman’s blue face was frozen in a peaceful expression.

  Helen screamed.

  CHAPTER 32

  Tuesday

  “You!”

  Daisy filled the garage doorway, rhinestone top sparkling in the dying light, baseball bat aching to batter Helen. Helen slammed the freezer lid on the poor, permanently cold woman and looked for a way to escape.

  Did Daisy kill her sick old aunt? Helen wondered. Is she going to kill me now?

  She was trapped.

  Daisy was fast and light for a large woman. She swiftly rounded the red Fiesta and swung the bat at Helen.

  Strike one! Helen ducked, then lashed back with the sharp-pointed weeder, digging a long scratch into Daisy’s arm, ripping her cobalt blue sleeve.

  “My blouse!” Daisy cried. “You tore my blouse.” She clung to the bat as blood ran down her arm.

  “You killed Zach,” Helen said.

  Stuck between the workbench and the freezer coffin, Helen tore the long-handled pitchfork off the wall and held it in front of her. Daisy swung at her again. Helen parried the swing, but felt the bat strike into the sturdy wooden handle and rattle her bones.

  Where the heck is Phil? she wondered.

  “Prove it!” Daisy said, and slammed the bat at Helen again. She missed. Helen ducked and staggered back against the bench.

  “Easy,” Helen said, hoping her talk would distract Daisy. “I’ve got the poisoned apple pies you made for Zach, each pie dated and labeled in your handwriting. They’re still in his condo freezer. Margery inherited his condo.”

  Helen enjoyed delivering that little dig. Daisy stepped back as if Helen had knifed her, then laughed
and swung the bat again, so close Helen heard it whistle past her ear.

  “Missed again!” Helen said.

  “Margery!” Daisy said, and sneered. “Zach’s true love is in jail. The Keystone Cops think she killed him. I hope there’s life after death, because I want Zach to roast in hell while his darling rots in jail.”

  Daisy swung again, and the bat sent the garden tools on the bench clattering to the floor. Helen dropped with them. She tried to catch her breath in the hot, airless garage. Sweat ran down her forehead and soaked her shirt.

  Come on, Phil, she thought. Get here before Daisy shatters my skull.

  “I can see why you’re mad at Zach,” Helen said. “He refused to marry you.” She hoped that opened another wound.

  From her shelter under the bench, Helen reached for a wicked three-pronged cultivator, closed her eyes, gritted her teeth and aimed for Daisy’s blue-sandaled foot, right in front of her. She swung it like a hatchet.

  Helen winced. She could feel the prongs stab Daisy’s meaty instep. The killer’s pink-painted toes curled in pain.

  Daisy howled and whacked the sturdy front legs of the heavy workbench so hard it shuddered.

  “I gave him thirty years,” Daisy said. Helen heard the tears in her voice and saw them drip on the concrete floor. “I cooked. I cleaned. I loved that man, and I was still no match for Margery.”

  Helen was crouched under the bench. She retreated into the corner closest to the humming freezer, where Aunt Tillie was in cold storage.

  Daisy’s got me boxed in, Helen thought. I’m thirty-five years younger, but she’s fifty pounds heavier, strong from gardening and supple from dancing.

  Where are you, Phil? You should be here by now.

  Helen heard the bat whipping overhead and Daisy snarling about her injured foot. Thick red blood pooled on the clean concrete floor from the new wound Helen had inflicted.

  I have to run for it, she thought, and there’s no way I can pass Daisy without getting pounded by the bat. My only chance is to slide under the car, then make a break for the door. I’ll make my move in midsentence, and keep her talking until I do.

  Helen grasped the long handle of the pitchfork, the devil’s weapon. She’d need it to fight thirty years of Daisy’s demons.

  “I can understand killing Zach,” Helen said, launching herself under the red Ford, pitchfork in her left hand. Her upper body went under first, and she hit her head on the driveshaft running down the center of the car. Her shoulder scraped the rusty undercarriage. Her hips were safe, but Helen’s long legs still stuck out.

  Helen slid her left leg under the car, but she wasn’t fast enough with the right. Daisy swung the bat and thwacked Helen’s ankle. Shock waves of pain undulated up her leg. Helen bit her lip to keep from crying out and used her free hand to drag her wounded leg underneath the car.

  In its shelter, she wiggled her toes. Her ankle wasn’t broken. She hoped she could walk—no, run—when she made her break for the side door.

  Keep talking, Daisy, she prayed. Phil, where are you?

  “But why did you kill Aunt Tillie?” Helen said.

  “I didn’t kill her,” Daisy said. “She died of a heart attack. The doctor warned her she was digging her grave with her teeth, but Aunt Tillie didn’t like health food. I helped her along by fixing her favorite fattening food, but I was just making an old lady happy. Her last meal was roast pork with mashed potatoes and gravy, lima beans in cheese sauce, and apple pie with ice cream and real whipped cream. She ate nearly half an apple pie, then said she felt tired and went to bed. When I brought her bacon and eggs in the morning, she was dead.”

  Daisy seemed to need this break as much as Helen did. She also needed to tell her story. The words poured out, like pus from a lanced boil.

  “Dear Aunt Tillie was getting old all alone, so she invited me, her only niece, to live with her. Said she’d give me the house if I’d take care of her. She even let Zach stay here, though she insisted on separate rooms. Didn’t believe in us living in sin—her words.”

  Keep talking, Helen thought. She gripped the pitchfork for her upcoming dash to the door and cursed whatever kept Phil from showing up.

  “But Aunt Tillie broke her promise?” Helen prompted.

  “Oh no,” Daisy said. “She made sure I saw the will. Made a big deal of summoning her lawyer to the house to change it in my favor. Got Zach to witness it, since he didn’t benefit from the will. She also gave me power of attorney in case she got sick. Then she introduced me around town as her dear niece. Told everyone I’d moved into her home to help her.

  “Help her! Hah! I was a live-in maid. A slave! Spent my days fetching and carrying and cleaning for the old bat. ‘Get this!’ ‘Do that!’ ‘Go to the store and buy me Welch’s Grape Jelly, Daisy. It’s on sale. I want the eighteen-ounce jar.’ So I did. But she wasn’t happy. They were out of the eighteen-ounce size, so I brought her the twenty-two-ounce jar. She made me go back to the store and return that size, then drive to another store five miles away to get the size she wanted. Spent twenty dollars on gas to save a nickel.

  “I was at her beck and call, day and night. I couldn’t do anything right. If I bought peanut butter, it wasn’t the right brand. If I got the right brand, it was creamy instead of chunky. She’d make me return it until I got exactly what she wanted.

  “The house was never clean enough for her. ‘You’ve got to get in the corners with a knife, Daisy,’ she’d say. ‘That’s where the wax builds up.’ ‘There’s soap scum on the shower tile, Daisy. Clean it off.’ And the garden! I’d get up at six in the morning to weed, before the day got too hot. When I finished, her majesty would go out and inspect her estate. No matter how hard I worked, she’d still find something in the garden that needed pruning or edging or deadheading. Grubbing in the garden was ruining my hands. Scrubbing floors was killing my knees.

  “And Zach, she had him painting the house, then the trim, then the stupid picket fence. Whenever he finished one house project, Aunt Tillie would find another.”

  Sweat trickled down Helen’s face, and she licked it away. Phil, she thought, hurry! I have to get out of here and I’m wounded. I can’t move fast.

  But Helen saw the dark blood pooling by Daisy’s sandaled foot and realized her attacker was hurt, too.

  Daisy was still telling her story. If she hadn’t tried to kill me, Helen thought, I might feel sorry for her. Might.

  “But dear Aunt Tillie did me a favor when she had me drive all over town,” Daisy said. “People got used to seeing me in her car and at her house. I discovered most of the neighbors didn’t know who she was, and if they did, they tried to avoid her. The rest of the people around here were newcomers who didn’t know she existed—or didn’t care. Aunt Tillie never went out. She had no friends.

  “She sent me to the bank all the time. All the bank tellers knew me and thought I was so sweet to take care of my poor, sick aunt. That’s how I discovered her Social Security checks were direct deposit. Between Tillie’s money from Uncle Sam and mine, well, we had a nice little income—for one.”

  “So when Tillie died suddenly,” Helen said, “you didn’t want to spend that money on an expensive funeral.”

  “And I didn’t want to lose her Social Security check,” Daisy said. “So I put her in cold storage and collected her money. It wasn’t like I hurt her or anything. She was resting in peas. Get it?”

  Helen shivered. She could almost touch Tillie’s resting place.

  “Tillie taught me one thing. I could keep posing as her dutiful niece, and no one realized she was gone.”

  “Not even Zach?” Helen asked.

  “He’d moved out by then. Her constant demands finally drove Zach away. She wanted him to shingle the roof next. A man his age, crawling around on a roof in the heat! Zach bought his own condo in Snakehead Bay. He wanted me to move in with him. I was tempted, but he wouldn’t give me the only thing I’d wanted for three decades: marriage. So I told him to beat it.

>   “But he couldn’t stay away. He liked my pies, especially my apple pies.” Helen could sense that Daisy’s story was running down. She’d have to make a run for it soon.

  “So you poisoned his pies,” Helen said.

  “Just a little,” Daisy said, and laughed. “A little arsenic goes a long way. He was a health nut. He wasn’t going to drop dead of a heart attack, like my aunt. Zach lost that fine hair he was so proud of. He went to doctor after doctor, but not one was smart enough to figure out what was wrong.”

  Helen could tell by the light on the floor that Daisy had left the side door open. The killer’s voice was stronger. It was time for Helen to leave.

  “You must have loved how he drove up here to get his own death,” she said.

  “I relished every . . .”

  Helen inched forward until her head was free of the car on the other side.

  “. . . second,” Daisy said.

  Helen quickly crab-crawled to the door while Daisy said, “Knowing Zach couldn’t live without my apple pies—and wouldn’t live when he ate them—”

  Helen slammed the door shut and stood up slowly, gasping for breath. The yard spun and she held on to the garage wall to steady herself. Her ankle was swelling. She could hear Daisy running around the car, then rattling the doorknob.

  Helen limped across the yard toward the side of the house, when she saw Phil rounding the corner.

  “Helen!” he said. “Sorry it took me so long. You won’t believe the traffic on I-95. What’s going on? You’re hurt!”

  A blood-soaked Daisy burst out of the garage, brandishing the baseball bat. She tripped over the mossy cherub and hit the mirrored gazing ball. It shattered.

  “Oops,” Helen said. “Seven years’ bad luck.”

  CHAPTER 33

  Saturday

  Margery was waiting outside the county jail four days later, dressed in her familiar purple and puffing on a Marlboro. Her steel gray hair stuck out like an angry cactus and she’d lost weight.

  But she was Margery again, proud, angry and commanding.