Just as they planted their feet firmly on the boardwalk, Shelby pulled up in the truck. She jumped out and opened the back door. Luckily her common sense had kicked in. The backseat was already covered carefully with an old blanket that he carried in the truck for emergencies, and all the windows were rolled down.
They headed straight back toward the café, but Jack was mumbling strangely again, not acting like himself at all. Blake was worried that maybe he’d had a brain aneurism or something. “Change of plans, Shel.” He waved her past Luanne’s and on up the hill. “Let’s go to the B&B. In this state, he’s bad for business.”
She raised her brows. “Is he ever good for business?”
“Where’s that drink you promised me?” Jack bellowed from the backseat.
<<>>
“Why did you bring him here?” Alice asked, holding the door open. “Didn’t Dr. Morgan show up?” She reluctantly backed up, allowing their filthy guest access.
The old man looked around as though he’d just entered the summer palace of a king. “You live here?”
“This is Clara’s house, Jack. Remember?” Blake started to lower him onto a chair in the corner.
Alice shook her head. “Don’t even think about it.”
“Okay. Where should I put him? My back is about to give out and I only have one good leg.”
“Just a minute.” She raced off up the stairs, and returned shortly with an old ratty quilt. It was clean but had definitely seen better days. She placed it over a couch and tucked it in carefully so it wouldn’t slip off. “There. Set him down and then you can tell me why you brought him here when you know my father and he are like oil and water.”
Shelby placed a hand on her arm. “Your doctor friend wouldn’t help. He showed up long enough to give the diagnosis that Jack was alive. Which we’d already figured out. Then he made it crystal clear he wanted nothing to do with an uninsured patient who hadn’t seen the inside of a bathtub for a month of Sundays.”
“Not his exact words, but a good facsimile,” Blake said, stretching his aching back.
Alice looked as if she’d like to crawl under the carpet. She slowly shook her head. “I should have known. Tucker was right. Preston is a pompous, self-centered, egotistical…”
“Who’s Preston?” Shelby interrupted.
“Preston Morgan. The not so good doctor.” She pressed her lips firmly together.
“Is it okay if we let him sleep here for the night? I’ll pay for the extra room. He just needs a good night’s sleep and some decent food for a change.” Blake glanced back and saw Jack already stretched out and fast asleep. He sighed. “Getting him upstairs might be a problem right now though.”
“Let him sleep for a bit. I’ll try to keep my father in the back room as long as possible. He’s been asking me to bring him out here to his favorite chair. I don’t know how much longer I can keep him in bed.”
“Thank you, Alice. I owe you.”
“Big time. And believe me, you’re footing the bill.”
<<>>
While Alice fed her father dinner, Blake and Shelby waited for Jack to wake up. They sat as far away as possible, while still maintaining a line of sight. The smell, even at this distance, was like living upwind from a garbage dump.
Blake propped his leg on the chipped coffee table and crossed his arms. “Jack would be considered an unreliable witness by most law enforcement personal, but with his mind wandering like this…” He shook his head, staring straight ahead. “Whatever he says will be laughed off by some flunky cop. We have to find credible proof. Something tangible.”
“A smoking gun.”
“Or the vehicle with Clara’s DNA on the bumper. But that’s virtually impossible after all this time.”
“He’s not the only one who thinks Clara was murdered. Mrs. Davies said as much. I don’t know why she thinks so, and I’d hate to be the one to ask her. Hearing her tear down my friends and not being able to say anything, is worse than getting a bikini wax while listening to a Yoko Ono CD.”
Blake laughed. “She’s a real piece of work, all right. But she may inadvertently know something. I’ll talk to her next time, although, I was never one of her favorite students.”
“Don’t be so sure. I put in a good word for you. I think she sees you in a whole new light now.”
“Really.” He didn’t seem convinced.
“Her son, Teddy, is definitely shady. Did you see that huge metal contraption on the front of his pickup? He could mow someone over and not have a dent to show for it.”
“In this part of the country, those deer killer bumpers are pretty much standard issue. We can’t arrest him for protecting his investment in rust.”
Shelby tugged at her earlobe, remembering the way that man had looked at her. She staunchly would go with her gut on this one. “He might not be a killer, but he’s up to something.”
“How so?”
“He tried to buy this place right after my mother’s death,” Alice interjected from the doorway. She gave a wide berth to the couch where Jack lay snoring, and sat on the floor beside the coffee table. “I don’t know where he would have gotten that much money. Maybe a loan from his mother?” She shrugged. “It wasn’t his offer to buy the place that made me so mad though. It was how he offered. Like he was buying me along with the house. Said I could stay on as the maid, or whatever else I was good at.”
“Ick,” Shelby said. “No wonder he lives with his mother. No one else could stand him.”
Blake slipped his ever present notebook out of the inside pocket of his jacket. “I’ll add his name.”
“You have a list of suspects?”
“He doesn’t call them suspects,” Shelby explained, sending Blake a smug smile. “He calls them persons of interest. But after what Jack told us, maybe he’ll change his definition.”
“What did Jack say?” Alice asked, glancing back toward their snoring guest. “Is that why you brought him here? He knows something? Let’s wake him up!”
Blake put out a calming hand. “It’s not that simple. He’s old and he may be starting to suffer from dementia or something. He said he overheard a conversation outside the boathouse one night before your mother was killed. He couldn’t see the men’s faces, but he heard what they said. If his memories are true and not some twisted perception of a dream, then we have reason to believe your mother wasn’t killed by accident – but targeted. Murdered.”
Shelby moved off her chair and sat beside Alice, wrapping an arm around her. “I’m sorry. I know you’re just starting to heal and get past the pain of losing her, and now this.”
A tear slipped down her cheek, but she wiped it away, her voice steady. “This is good,” she said, surprising them both. “If Mom was killed randomly, by a drunk or reckless driver, we might never find them, because there would be no motive. But a homicide… that’s different.” She raised her gaze to Blake. “I know you’ll find whoever took my mother from us. They will pay. One way or another.”
“I’ll do my best but…” He slipped his leg off the table and leaned forward. “Sometimes the trail runs cold. Sometimes the bad guys get away.”
She pointed back at Jack. “You care about that man, in spite of what he looks like. And smells like. You see below the surface to the heart of things. That’s what makes you an excellent detective. You’re good at what you do, and you should be compensated. I want to hire you as a private investigator. Forget what my father said. If you want to buy this place, it’s yours. I’ll let Jack stay here for free as long as he needs or wants to. I’ll even feed him three meals a day.” Blake started to protest but she shut him down. “I know you two planned to leave today because you still have lives and responsibilities in the city to take care of, but if you’ll agree to stay until this is resolved, your room is on the house from here on out.”
“I’m not staying here,” Jack grumbled from across the room. His voice was still weaker than usual, but he was sitting up with a bewildered look on h
is face. “Where in tarnation am I?”
Chapter Twelve
Getting Jack upstairs, bathed, and comfortable in a room of his own was a major endeavor. First of all, he nearly went into convulsions when they mentioned bathing, argued at the top of his voice that soap would kill the immunity he’d built up around his body. Apparently, germs knew the stench of death and avoided him like the plague.
Shelby and Alice had been banned from the room after running the bath and now leaned against the wall in the hallway, laughing so hard that tears flowed freely. They could still hear Blake cajoling the old man and when that failed he began giving him ultimatums, citing every ridiculous law he could come up with in regard to cleanliness or being a health menace to the community.
Finally, they heard the splash of water and assumed Blake either got into the bath himself or Jack had finally given in under threat of a citizen’s arrest by an out of work cop. Moments later, before they had time to compose their faces, Blake opened the door and stepped out of the room. The front of his shirt and jeans was damp, and he looked like he just found out there were no superheroes left in America.
“Everything okay?” Shelby asked, wiping tears from her lashes with the sleeve of her t-shirt. She tried to look serious, but a smile kept stretching her lips.
Blake shook his head, blue eyes narrowed with frustration. “You two think this is funny, huh? Do you know how hard it is to get a grown man to do something totally against his will?”
They both exploded with laughter, and Shelby clamped a hand over her mouth, trying to stop. He waited, tapping the toe of his boot and trying hard to keep a straight face.
“Are you done now?” he asked, hands on his hips. He turned to Alice. “Does your father have an electric beard groomer we could borrow? I have some disposable razors, but Jack wants to keep his beard. I thought we could just trim it up a bit.”
She wiped the smile off her face and nodded. “I’ll go find it. Hopefully he’s still sleeping and I won’t have to explain.”
“It may be too late for that,” Shelby warned.
Alice hurried off on her errand, and Blake leaned against the wall, expelling a breath. Weariness edged his eyes. “I hate this. Treating a man I respect–a man I owe so much to–like a child. Making him do things he doesn’t want to do. It goes against every fiber of my being.”
She put her arms around him and leaned into his chest, serious now. “I’m sorry, babe. I know it’s hard.”
“It’s just difficult to reconcile the man he is today from the one I remember.”
“Minds are frayed by time or disease. Roles are reversed. Everyone deals with it someday if they live long enough.” She tipped her face up. “Jack will respect you in the morning, after a good night’s sleep on fresh sheets and warm food in his stomach. All will be forgiven. Wait and see.”
“I hope so.”
They heard Jack mumbling about something and then he yelled good and loud, “Where’s the conditioner? Shampoo dries my hair follicles!”
Shelby grinned. “I think he’s got his sense of humor back.”
Blake opened the door, picked up the filthy clothes he’d dumped in a pile and shoved them into her arms. “Good thing. Because when he finds out you took his clothes to wash, he’s going to be coming for you.” He winked and shut the door before she could respond.
“Eew!” she said, wrinkling her nose. “These should be burned, not washed.”
<<>>
Alice was trying to calm her father down. Mr. Booth sounded like a foghorn, bellowing his disapproval at their unannounced guest. He continued to rant and rave, until Alice strode out of the room and slammed the door behind her.
Shelby took that moment to cautiously approach. “You wouldn’t happen to have a garbage bag I can put these in?” she asked, trying to breathe as shallowly as possible. “Blake wants me to wash them. Is there a Laundromat nearby?”
Alice held an electric shaver in one hand and was clenching a kitchen towel in the other, as though trying to strangle her anger. “Give them to me. I’ll throw them in our washer. It’s heavy duty. I can always disinfect it later with a little bleach.”
“Are you sure? You’ve already done so much by letting Jack stay. I don’t want your father blaming you for any of this.”
“Once I tell him why we’re doing it, he’ll come around.”
“You didn’t tell him what Jack overheard?”
“No, not yet.”
“Are you worried about his reaction?”
“I’m always worried about his reaction – to everything! The man is infuriating. He even fought with Mom the night before she died.” She spread her arms in a sweeping gesture. “About selling this place! She loved it and he wanted to be rid of it. After a hundred years in her family. Just like that.”
“But I thought your father was against selling. That putting it on the market now was a last resort after the lawsuit and his health problems.” Shelby couldn’t believe what she was hearing. Did Alice just point the metaphorical finger at Oliver Booth as a possible suspect? Her own father?
Alice gripped the towel hard, her knuckles going white. “Guilt has lingering side-effects,” she said, than cocked her ear toward the closed door and swore under her breath. “He’s trying to get into that chair by himself. Drop those right there. I’ll take care of them. Here.” She handed Shelby the shaver, and managed to lighten her tone. “Turn the beast into a handsome prince.”
“That’s easier said than done.”
There were still so many questions she wanted to ask, but now was not the time. Alice had enough to deal with. She dropped the clothes, and reluctantly turned to go back upstairs.
The door to Jack’s bedroom was now wide open. She hesitated, not wanting to walk in on a sight she might never get out of head, then slowly advanced, shaver in hand. “Hello?”
Jack sat in the straight-backed chair before the tiny writing desk, reading a book. As if he belonged there. He even smelled good, exactly like the Ivory soap she’d left for him on the side of the tub. He was wrapped in a white terrycloth robe – one of the few perks of the B&B – paired with red plaid lounge pants. What? Those were the ones she’d bought Blake for Christmas. Now she knew he’d been lying when he told her he loved them. He’d just given them to a homeless man.
Blake strode into the room behind her, his hands full of toiletries. He dumped a brush, comb, scissors, shaving cream and disposable razor into a pile on the desktop and shot her a grin. He held out the comb. “Ever play the part of a barber? This will help get you into character.”
“The only play about a barber I know is Sweeney Todd, and I’d need a straight razor to get in character for that.”
Jack’s curious stare didn’t hold any recognition from their earlier meeting. “You must be Blake’s wife. The actress. I’ve heard so much about you.”
“Is that so?”
“Blake said you are the most talented woman he knows,” he continued, smiling through a tangle of matted, wet beard that still dripped onto the front of his robe. “That you’ve been in nearly every play written by Shakespeare and dozens of others as well.” He held up the book he was reading. “Hamlet. One of my favorite’s.”
“You read Shakespeare?”
“I do when I have the time,” he said, as though a homeless wanderer’s life was filled with an endless work schedule. He straightened up and quoted, “This above all, to thine own self be true.”
“Very good.”
“I really enjoyed seeing Hamlet on the big screen once, down in Eagle Harbor. I think it was a couple years ago. With that handsome young actor…” he waved a finger, eyes narrowed, “you know the one, Bill Gibson or something other.”
“Mel Gibson?”
He clapped the book down on his thigh. “That’s the one!”
“That was over twenty-five years ago, Jack,” she said, knowing it had been made before she was even born. “That’s the last movie you’ve been to?”
“
I don’t go very often.”
She took the comb from Blake’s outstretched hand and stepped around her creature. He already seemed more man than beast. “Hmm. Where do we start?”
Jack waggled bushy brows. “It is spring. Guess I’m due for a shearing. Beautiful lady like you doing the job, I’ll leave it up to you.”
Twenty minutes later, she had Jack get up and look in the bathroom mirror. She followed to see his reaction. He stared into the glass like he thought maybe it was a funhouse mirror. The well-groomed elderly man, looking back at him with twinkling blue eyes, was as much a stranger to Jack as he would be to anyone he came in contact with.
“I look swell enough to play the lead in one of them Hollywood movies. You’re a miracle worker, Miss Shelby.” He ran fingers through silver hair, now cut short and parted on the side. It had a natural wave and was still thick and full, reminding Shelby of one of those male actors on an AARP commercial talking about retirement. Without the extra layers of clothes, filth, and hair, he was actually quite handsome. She smiled, imagining him strolling down Silver Street with the Bailey twins, one on each arm. Tucker would have to wait his turn.
Blake had disappeared while the grooming was going on, but she heard him come in behind them now. “Wow!” he said from the doorway of the bathroom. His face lit up and a grin spread wide. “Either you’ve been body snatched or my wife plays the part of a barber to perfection.”
“It wasn’t all me. Jack’s been hiding his light under a bushel.”
“Ain’t that a fact. Didn’t know I was so good lookin’.”
Blake leaned against the doorjamb, arms crossed. “Neither did anyone else. We could hide you in plain sight.”
“Son, I’ve been hiding in plain sight most of my life.” Jack reached out and pulled Blake’s police cap off his head, and clapped it down on his own.
<<>>
Jack had eaten a huge chunk of meatloaf, a baked potato, and a pile of green beans for dinner, but despite his amazing appetite, he still looked weary and pale. A bath may have freshened him up, but he had a long way to go physically. Blake made sure he had a couple of books to read, and left him in his room for the night. The old man didn’t even bother to protest. He seemed to have acclimated to the new reality with the shedding of his hair and dirt.
Roadkill (Double Barrel Mysteries Book 1) Page 13
