Starke Naked Dead (Starke Dead Mysteries Book 1)

by Conda V. Douglas

  “Godiva and Derek were here, in Starke, looking for you, years ago,” I said.

  Rupert continued his stroking, still lost in his past. He smiled. “Now, at last, through the glory of the Noira—”

  “Which you stole and now need to—”

  Rupert hunched his shoulders. “Oh, Dora, I know I’ve never been a good father to you.”

  A lump formed in my throat.

  “I’m not a bad man, despite what Lester says.”

  “Father.”

  “Or despite what that spiteful, evil woman, your aunt says.”

  I pulled myself up straight and crossed my arms on my chest. “Prove it.”

  He blinked at me. Tears glinted on his eyelashes. “How?”

  “Turn yourself in.”

  “I told you, Dora, I can’t—”

  “That’s the only answer.”

  Rupert shook his head so hard that a shaving cut opened and bled. “No. I can’t spend the rest of my life in a jail cell.”

  An image came to me of Rupert huddled in the fruit cellar, and then another image of him crouched beneath his wool blankets, shivering in his tiny cabin, trapped by the snows outside. How would jail be any different? Warmer? Better food? A dentist to fix his teeth?

  “You’re already in prison,” I said.

  He ran his hand over his face, smearing the blood from the cut over his jaw.

  “You’ve never escaped, no matter how much you ran.”

  Rupert hunched his shoulders. “I’ve done everything in the service of my love.” He stepped over to Mallard’s desk, pulled open the bottom drawer, and repeated his pillaging of other people’s drawers.

  “I’ll make sure that after you turn yourself in, the cops arrest the real killer,” I said.

  I had no clue how I would force Lester to do so. But I’d think of a way to make him realize that Godiva killed her brother.

  My father ignored me. He yanked on the top drawer. Locked. He removed a needle-nosed file and inserted it into the lock.

  “Rupert—”

  A click. My father pulled the drawer open.

  Rupert withdrew his hand from the drawer. He held a gun, a .38, still wrapped in a thick plastic bag with a red “EVIDENCE” seal.

  Mallard burst through the door, gun drawn. “FREEZE,” he yelled.

  “Don’t run,” I yelled at my father.

  Rupert ran.

  TWENTY-NINE

  Rupert dashed across the office and leaped down into the fruit cellar.

  I heard the thump of his landing and then a yip of pain. I ran to the hole and peered down just in time to see my father crawl into the tunnel.

  “Don’t run!” I yelled, meaning crawl.

  Mallard pushed me aside. “Stop, thief!”

  “Stop thief? Oh, please,” I said.

  Mallard gave me one irritated glare before he jumped and clambered after Rupert.

  “Of course, it is better than ‘Stop, murderer,’” I said to the empty room.

  Rupert took the gun along on his flight. He and Mallard could be hurt—fatally.

  I grabbed Great Grandpa’s gun and bullets in their own evidence bag out of the drawer. In case I gave in to my current temptation to shoot my father. Buddhist Right Action, my right foot.

  From a distance down the tunnel, I heard Mallard yelling, faint and far away. No way to catch them.

  The sound of glass breaking came from down the street. Outside in the dim light of dawn, the glass of Mad Maddie’s Marvels front window lay in glinting shards on the sidewalk. Rupert sprinted down the street, headed again for the mining shaft mall, the only difference being this time that his beard didn’t fly in the wind. Behind him, Mallard jumped out of Aunt Maddie’s front store window.

  Couldn’t my father have picked another tunnel exit, say the one in Mama Chin’s? Couldn’t he at least have used Maddie’s front door? I knew who my aunt would blame for the trashed window.

  Mallard rushed by in hot pursuit.

  Rupert must not know that the developers had fixed the fence around the mall and padlocked it. “Wait,” I called. I ran after Mallard.

  He was a few feet behind Rupert when I reached him and grabbed his coat. Mallard stumbled, righted himself, pulled away, stood, and glared in my direction.

  I guessed I wasn’t in his good graces anymore, either. All I needed was to get Henry and the Widows Brigade angry at me and I’d be lucky not to be run out of town on a sheep. A Starke tradition.

  Rupert flung himself at the fence and bounced off. Good one, Dad. He ran toward the gate and right on past. My father must have spotted the padlock. He sprinted toward us.

  Mallard skidded to a stop, his shoes squeaking on the pine sidewalk. “Freeze,” he managed before I plowed into him and knocked him flat.

  Rupert leaped over us both. Maybe he should tout “wild mountain man recluse” as a health regime. He roared back into the sheriff’s office.

  Mallard and I rolled around for a couple of moments, a bizarre mock-dance, until we untangled. Mallard, breathing hard and heavy, jumped up and followed. Me too.

  I arrived at the front door of the office just in time to see Mallard disappear down the ladder to the tunnels. I leaned against the doorjamb and puffed and considered my few horrid options. Mallard would catch Rupert or lose his quarry in the tunnels. I suspected the latter. My father knew the tunnels. Mallard didn’t.

  When Mallard returned, I didn’t want to “discuss” with him what Rupert and I happened to be doing in the sheriff’s office. I didn’t think he’d believe I had tried to convince Rupert to turn himself in. Nor did I want to talk about my successful attempts to slow his chase of the prime murder suspect.

  The trap door to the fruit cellar and tunnels still gaped open. I moved to close it but it didn’t matter. Mallard wouldn’t forget the tunnels existed, after all. Nor would Rupert dare return.

  I sniffed and smelled eau-de-rank-Dora. I needed a shower and a change of clothes, real soon. I needed real food, real soon. I needed sleep, in a real bed, real, real soon.

  When I’d gotten a few feet down the sidewalk to Aunt Maddie’s store I hesitated, one foot raised. Parked next to my aunt’s station wagon was Nance’s Mini Cooper. Shards of glass shone on both windshields from the rising sun of another smoky, snow-bereft day.

  I sighed, got into the station wagon, crawled into the back, and found the most comfortable position. As I started to fall asleep, I realized I needed to be somewhere else.

  It all went back to her. If I could surprise her maybe I could get some answers. Or, perhaps, I could catch me a killer. I slapped myself awake enough to drive. I’d lie in wait and maybe even get some sleep.

  THIRTY

  Tap, tap, tap. I pulled the blanket over my face. “I’m up.”

  “No, you’re not.”

  “Five more minutes, Aunt Maddie. Then I’ll get up for school, I promise.”

  “School?”

  Wait. I no longer went to school. And that wasn’t Aunt Maddie’s voice; it was Mrs. McDay’s. I peeked out. What was I doing in the station wagon?

  Oh. Right. I’d staked out the Cameron Castle.

  When I’d arrived, only a faint glimmer of the dawn of another sunny day illuminated the old hotel. The soft early light didn’t help the decrepit old derelict’s appearance. The huge fir tree still leaned, a dirty drunk, against the Castle’s tower.

  A good Idahoan, I knew better than to barge into the Castle and demand answers from Godiva while it was still early enough that she could shoot me and claim she thought I was a burglar. As I’d bet she would. Of course, if Rupert had her only gun, the .22 used to kill Derek, I’d be okay. But I wasn’t willing to risk it.

  I’d parked where I could watch the Castle’s front door, crawled into the back of the station wagon, and closed my eyes for a minute.

  “Dora, wakey, wakey,” Mrs. McChin said now. She’d joined Mrs. McDay. From outside the car window, they peered at me.

  I blinked back in the brigh
t light of way-too-early morning. The smoke that softened their features didn’t help. Only let me know the forest fire still burned.

  Mrs. McDay gave a cheery wave, the cherries on her straw hat bobbing. “Time to get up, Dora. You don’t want to miss it.”

  Miss what? I sat up and stared past her. What I saw made me want to lie back down and pull the blanket over me again. On the Castle’s wraparound porch between the two main pillars, a bright pink and purple banner, half-hung, flapped in the icy cold breeze.

  Beneath the banner, matching pink and purple arrayed Mrs. McGarrity danced from one foot to another. Her arms waved as she directed her two grandsons, Jeffy and Jamey, in stringing up the other end. When I’d babysat those two they hadn’t been nearly as compliant. Or as tall. Or as capable.

  Mrs. McGarrity’s dog Bark pranced around the porch, as imperious as Mrs. McGarrity.

  In between flaps I read the banner: “NO STARK NAKEDS IN STARKE.”

  Oh Buddha, shoot me.

  Not many Starkers seemed to have turned out for this catastro—event. Yet. Still early.

  Miss Mary, married eleven years, had all her twelve kids with her, including Billy, the oldest at fourteen. Billy stared at the front door with a hungry expression. Perhaps he hoped to catch sight of a naked female who wasn’t a baby sister.

  “We figured you slept here to be ready when we started,” Mrs. McDay said.

  “Started what?” I feared I might hear a “baa” any moment.

  Joe and Joe’s daughter, Maureen, of Maureen’s Bar, set up a table with wine glasses, bottles of wine, and a price list, in the middle of the Castle’s dead grass front yard. Tony, the construction boss, helped, or at least hovered, next to pretty Maureen.

  I half-expected to see my aunt at the table beside them, selling potato-sack T-shirts. No aunt. I heaved a sigh of relief at my luck.

  “Our protest, of course.” Mrs. McChin pulled me back to the current disaster.

  “No nakeds, no nakeds,” Mrs. McDay chanted. She gave a tiny sparrow hop.

  Old George, ninety and stopped counting, paused as he hobbled behind Mrs. McChin and Mrs. McDay. He, too, stared at the Castle’s front door. Perhaps, like Billy, Old George yearned to catch a glimpse of a naked lady, maybe his first in decades.

  “Not yet,” Mrs. McChin said, “we haven’t got our signs yet.”

  “Oh, right.” Mrs. McDay trotted across the yard toward her Rambler parked on the other side of the circular drive.

  “There’s only one naked.” I paused. “That I know.” I paused again. “That’s alive.”

  Mrs. McChin backed away. “One naked is one too many.” She sauntered after Mrs. McDay. Mrs. McChin had worked too hard for too many years in Mama Chin’s to ever trot again.

  I searched the windows of the Castle for any sign of movement and saw none. Had Godiva taken off? No, she wouldn’t leave, not this close to getting the money. She must be hiding in the Castle. Not that I blamed her for not showing her face, or any of the rest of herself.

  Nance pulled up behind my car. She unfolded from her Mini Cooper. Today she wore a dress with a famous Escher print of two hands drawing each other on the front. The huge Escher hands delineated each breast. Nance munched on a cinnamon roll from Mama Chin’s.

  “Dora.” She gave a little wave with the cinnamon roll.

  “That’s not vegan,” I said.

  “This one is. Mama Chin made my specific recipe.” Nance popped the last of the roll into her mouth. As she chomped, her earrings, perfect little echoes of the Escher hands, danced.

  Crumbs sprayed. I considered opening my mouth and catching some.

  Mrs. McDay tottered up to us. In her skinny little old lady arms she held several homemade cardboard signs mounted on broomsticks that proclaimed “NUDE OUT.”

  “Here’s your signs.”

  “Those are brooms,” I said.

  “Yes. We need them back after the demonstration.”

  “What a clever idea,” Nance said, with an entrepreneurial gleam in her voice. “We should carry those in Nance’s Innovations.” She licked her fingers, smacking her lips. Whether at the taste of leftover cinnamon roll or future sales, I couldn’t tell.

  “Nance…” I needed to disabuse her of the idea of stealing my aunt’s store. Maybe if I…

  Henry pulled up behind the Mini Cooper.

  I grinned. A possible solution had possibly arrived. Henry jumped out of his car. He stared at the banner, then at Mrs. McGarrity, then at the decorated tables. He slumped.

  “Private property,” he said, loud enough for Mrs. McGarrity to pause and give him a glare, before she turned back to her task.

  Henry pulled out his ultra-sleek cell phone and pressed one number. I suspected he called the sheriff’s office. On speed dial. The problem of partying on drought-dry grass was enough to send any sane person calling the police.

  I needed to talk to Godiva before the cops arrived. Maybe I could even get her to confess. How?

  The brooms in Mrs. McDay’s arms provided much needed inspiration. “I’ll take one of those,” I said. Maybe I could sweep a confession out of Godiva.

  “Me too,” Nance said. “I need a prototype. One will look lovely as a display in the front window, perhaps with a Christmas scene as a sign.”

  “Oh, thank you, dearies,” Mrs. McDay said. “We’ll be forming a circle soon in front of the porch.” She handed a sign to Henry as he came up to us and then off she went. “Don’t forget, it’s no nakeds,” she sang over her shoulder.

  Henry smiled at Nance. His eyebrows rose as he noticed her dress. I thanked the Buddha that she hadn’t worn the bullseyes.

  I raised my chin and put on my best sales smile. “Nance, this is Henry, the one who owns Mad Maddie’s Marvels and…” —I pointed with my hand not holding the broom sign at the Cameron Castle— “this glorious Cameron Castle—”

  “Glorious?” Henry said.

  I shot him a look that I hoped said Work with me, Henry. “Soon to be vacant,” I continued.

  Henry nodded. “As soon as Lester gets here.”

  I hoped Lester took his sweet time. I needed to get to Godiva so I scanned the windows for a sign of long blonde hair and saw nothing. I beamed at Nance, showing all my teeth.

  “Dora, what’s wrong?” she asked.

  I dropped the grin. “And then you can start work on renovating the great Castle,” I finished.

  She looked blank.

  “I suggest we start with rat traps,” Henry said.

  Not helping, Henry. No wonder his realty business was failing fast. I grimaced. “Nance is a Buddhist, like me, Henry—”

  Henry didn’t look surprised.

  “And they’re chipmunks. Really cute chipmunks,” I said to Nance. “Except for Fat Freddy.”

  “Fat Freddy?” Nance asked.

  “They’re vermin…except for Fat Freddy, of course.” Affection warmed Henry’s tone. ”Maybe we can send Bark in,” he continued, pointing with his chin at the little dog who had fallen asleep on the Castle’s steps, “as an exterminator.”

  Nance and I looked at him.

  He spread his hands wide in an “understand me please” gesture. “Natural selection.”

  “Anyway,” I threw my arms wide in the direction of the Castle, well, one arm, my other hand was hampered by the sign. “This is the perfect place for Nance’s Innovations.”

  Nance placed her finger on her lips and tapped.

  “The front entry can be the art gallery,” I said.

  I could see it, with artwork adorning the old stone fireplace and a display case with my designs shimmering in it where the reception desk now stood. I smiled.

  “Oh.” Henry scrubbed at a wrinkle on his shirt front. “You’re that Nance.”

  “This filthy old place?” Nance asked.

  “It cleans up good,” Henry said.

  “That tower is completely out of proportion.”

  “We can tear the tower down,” I said.

 
; Henry shot me a glance.

  I raised my eyebrows and gave him a “sale-is-sale” nod.

  “Of course,” he said, his voice tight.

  Nance flipped a hand back and forth. “Tear the whole horrid mess down.”

  Henry’s face fell. I’m sure mine followed suit.

  “You can get right to the renovation of my new flagship store,” Nance said.

  My vision of a Castle gallery flew off, headed in the same direction as the missing snow. I’d forgotten that once Nance got on a path she stayed on that path. No matter what, not even if the path was cluttered with the bodies of her victims.

  “Flagship store?” A faint hope quavered in Henry’s voice.

  “You can’t have a flagship store with only two stores,” I said, half to myself, and half petulant.

  “I need the whole space gutted and all the fixtures replaced,” Nance said. “I need the work done as soon as possible. I can pay cash.”

  I remembered the sheaf of twenties she had pulled out of her purse. Nance had come prepared. But for what?

  Mrs. McDay called out, “Dora, Henry, we’re ready to start.”

  Henry tossed down the sign and took Nance’s arm. “I don’t see that as a problem,” he said as he led her down the driveway path. I didn’t bother to tell him that she was already ensconced, that nobody ever led Nance anywhere. I’d tried.

  “Henry?” Mrs. McChin sang out.

  The Widows Brigade stood in a circle along with Billy and Mrs. McGarrity’s grandsons in front of the Castle’s porch. All held brooms at the ready. Bark the Rat Terrier Terrorist stood, awake and alert, on the top step, head cocked to one side.

  “Henry, Dora, get over here right now,” Mrs. McGarrity said. At the sound of her command, Bark hopped down the stairs and joined the circle.

  Henry and Nance proceeded down the drive, heads close together, best friends.

  With a sigh, I hoisted the sign and joined the circle.

  “Fine then.” Mrs. McGarrity started walking.

  We all followed.

  “No nakeds!” Mrs. McDay shouted.

  “No nakeds!” we echoed.

  How to get to Godiva without anyone noticing? I wondered as I walked. Wait. There was more than one way into the Castle.