Crossed Bones

by Carolyn Haines

  “You're . . . going . . . to . . . pay,” she gasped, trying to buck her hips.

  “Sarah Booth, call the sheriff,” Scott said. “I'm sick of this, Nandy. I'm worn out with you stalking me. This time I have a witness.”

  I stood in the field. Reveler was fine. He'd calmed down and was grazing again, one eye watching the antics of the humans as he ate. The dirt clods wouldn't really have hurt him, but it was the danger that he'd try to jump the fence that had scared me. He could have gotten into a lot of trouble before I could catch him.

  “Don't call Coleman,” Nandy said, finally getting her wind back.

  “Call the sheriff,” Scott repeated, glancing at me. “I finally have proof that Nandy is stalking me, and this will go a long way toward invalidating her eyewitness testimony.”

  I didn't move. It was as if my body had gone numb. I didn't want Coleman to get in the middle of this. Nandy would be sure to tell him exactly what Scott and I were doing that had her so upset. At the thought of Coleman's possible opinion of me, I felt the first tidal wave of regret. Anger was the next emotion. Anger at myself. Why was I feeling guilty? Coleman was married and had publicly announced his intention to make that marriage work. I was a free agent. I could do anything I wished.

  “Sarah Booth?” Scott was looking at me with confusion.

  “Wait a minute,” I said. “Let's talk this through.”

  Nandy instantly quit struggling. Her makeup was bad, but her instincts were razor-sharp. “She doesn't want everyone in town to know she was doing the wild thing with you, Scott. She has a little pride left. It doesn't look good to be one of a thousand lovers. Even someone as pathetic as Sarah Booth wants to feel special.” She grinned. “Get off me, or I'll call the sheriff.”

  “Sarah Booth?” Scott was waiting for me to deny her charges.

  “Look, Nandy can recant her testimony—that she saw you leaving the club around two o'clock. If she does that, then we won't tell the sheriff about this.” There was a way Scott could achieve his goal without involving Coleman.

  “And Nandy goes free?” Scott asked, obviously unhappy. “I don't think so.”

  “I won't recant, because it's the truth!” Nandy glared at me.

  “You offered to recant if Scott would say he was with you,” I reminded her.

  “That was before. This is now. Since he's been in bed with you, I don't want him to say he was with me. In fact, I would be humiliated if he said he was with me. Unlike you, Sarah Booth, I have family and pride. I don't want the Shanahan name smeared with sexual association with Scott.” She started wiggling again.

  Scott was still looking at me. When he finally released Nandy, he rose fluidly to his feet and stepped away from her.

  “Get out of here,” he said, “and don't come back. Stay away from me, and keep your husband away from me, too.”

  Nandy stopped all movements. She looked up at Scott. “What are you talking about? What about my husband?”

  When Scott realized Nandy was clueless about her husband's attempts to make his bond, a slow grin passed over his face. “If you aren't gone from here in the next five minutes, I will call Coleman and Sarah Booth will back me up. Now stay away from me, Nandy. Don't come around me, don't call me, don't show up for my performances, and I suggest that you listen to Sarah Booth and figure out how not to show up for court.”

  “You can't tell me where I can go or what I can do.” She was on her feet.

  “Take a vacation, Nandy,” I said. “I hear Scotland's really nice this time of year.”

  “You lowbred . . . bitch.” Nandy had a new talent; she could speak with her teeth clenched together.

  “Go,” Scott said, pointing toward the road. “I'm counting to ten.”

  Nandy started walking sideways. “I had something important to tell you, Scott. I came all the way out here to deliver a message, but I guess you're not interested in hearing it.”

  “I'm not,” Scott said, his finger still pointing at the road. “Keep moving.”

  “I had a little conversation with Emanuel this morning.”

  “I don't care if you talked with Elvis Presley, just keep moving.”

  “He's going to sell the club.”

  Scott's finger faltered in the air. “That's not my business. That's up to Ida Mae.”

  She shook her head. “No, it isn't. Ida Mae doesn't have a say at all. The club belongs to Emanuel. Ivory left it to him in the will.”

  Scott was obviously stricken by the news, though he was doing everything he could to hide it.

  “Emanuel said he was going to raze the club and sell the land. But I told him I might be interested in buying the club, as it is. I told him I was thinking about opening a country-music joint. He said he'd think about it.” She stopped. “So I might be the new club owner.”

  “Good for you, Nandy,” Scott said. “Have a ball. Maybe you can find a yodeler who'll sleep with you.”

  “I could keep it a blues club. Once it's sold, Emanuel wouldn't have any say over what I did with it. I could keep it blues, and I could make you my partner. We could create the finest blues club in the United States.”

  Scott walked over to stand by me. His arm went around my waist and he drew me against him. “Not interested. I wouldn't work for you if you had the last club on the face of the earth.”

  Nandy was pale with anger. “By the way, Scott, you should know that no respectable man in Sunflower County will go out with Sarah Booth.”

  Scott's smile was slow and sexy. “What's wrong with them? They can't hold up to the kind of loving she gives? She is hot.”

  Nothing I said or did could have scorched Nandy more.

  “The two of you are perfect for each other. A male and female slut.”

  That was her parting remark, and then she was gone. She walked down the driveway and disappeared behind a row of chinaberry trees and thick hedges.

  “That isn't the end of her and she's going to make trouble for you now,” Scott said. “I'm sorry. We should have called the sheriff. Why didn't you want to?”

  “You have nothing to be sorry about. As to Coleman, I thought we would have better leverage on Nandy if we didn't call.” My lie was halfhearted. I had other things on my mind. Like my most recent actions. “Let's just hope Nandy decides to forget what time she saw you at the club. But if she doesn't, that also makes her a suspect.”

  “Right.” Scott gently maneuvered me toward the cottage. “She's crazy, you know.”

  “Crazy as a run-over dog,” I agreed. “I need to find out a little more about her husband and where they both were the night Ivory was killed.”

  Scott opened the door and followed me inside. “You honestly think Nandy could have killed Ivory?”

  “I think she's capable of anything.” And I wasn't exaggerating.

  My first action when I got to Dahlia House was to call Cece. It was Sunday afternoon, and I was lucky to catch her at home. As the newspaper's society editor in a county that put social connections above all else, she was invited to every significant soiree—or the celebrators paid dearly. Her dance card was rarely empty, and those who questioned Cece's sexual heritage did so very discreetly.

  “Sarah Booth, dahling,” Cece said in a long drawl, “one might get the idea that one is being snubbed.”

  “I've been working,” I said, having the grace to blush at my lie. Thank goodness she couldn't see me. Part of her journalistic skill was her ability to discern truth from fabrication. She knew where debutantes bought their dresses and how much they paid for them and doled out the inches on her page accordingly. She was never fooled by a knockoff. She had a gut instinct for genealogy that made the grande dames of Zinnia tremble. “I need to return the hat I borrowed.”

  “You obviously need something else, too.”

  She also knew her friends. “I do,” I confessed. Cece kept her finger on the pulse of all upscale rentals in the county. “Where is Robert McBruce residing?”

  “He's taken a six-month lea
se on the old Jackson estate.”

  Her voice betrayed her envy. The old Jackson place contained the finest chandeliers in the United States. There were even chandeliers in the bathroom. Cece loved the fire and ice of good lighting ornamentation.

  “You wouldn't want to have to clean all that dangly glass. Besides, the chandelier would detract from you, Cece.”

  “You're absolutely right, dahling.” She was done with envy. “I wonder if Nandy will be residing there with her spouse. It was quite a scene this morning.”

  “What are you talking about?” Had Nandy made it back to town and already started the rumor mill grinding my reputation?

  “Dahling! You don't know?”

  Cece was firmly in control of the conversation and she loved it this way.

  “What have I missed?”

  “McBruce showed up on the courthouse lawn this morning and physically removed Nandy from the premises. It was something to see. She was spitting and fighting and screaming.”

  “You saw it?”

  “Indeed, dahling. My sources never let me down. I got a call just as the sun was pinking up the sky in that delicious shade of peach. I put on my Chanel housecoat and a pair of Gucci slippers and I went right over. That twit Garvel couldn't manage to get a camera there in time, though. By the time he dragged his sorry ass—excuse me, dahling, I'm still feeling a little hostile—his sorry self up there, McBruce had shoved her headfirst into his Land Rover. Charming man, he waved to me as he drove away. I've already written it for my Tuesday column. I'm calling it 'Courthouse Capers.' Do you like?”

  “Perfect.”

  “What do you want with McBruce? I think it's a little late for condolences on his marriage. I can't help but wonder how a man with a heritage of clan lords could have tied up with Nandy. She must have been on heavy psychotic drugs. You know, they say Thorazine is a wonder drug for someone like her.”

  “It was an arranged marriage.” Cece's gasp was gratifying. Well, Nandy had spilled the beans on herself. And then she'd shown up at Scott's and was currently engaged in a campaign to ruin me. Tit for tat.

  “But that doesn't explain what you want with McBruce.” Cece was seldom thrown off the scent.

  “Focus on the arranged marriage. If I can tell you the rest, I will.” The fact that McBruce had tried to make Scott's bail had come from a bondsman. He'd told me in a friendly conversation, and I wasn't certain he'd intended it to become fodder for the newspaper.

  “Arranged marriage. I wonder if the Shanahans had to pay McBruce to marry her?”

  “Ask for a list of wedding presents. Maybe a wooden stake was included.” What else was there to say? Nandy had had a very busy morning being dragged and driven around the county. I intended to make her life even busier.

  “Good work, Sarah Booth. By the way, how is Scott Hampton?”

  There was just enough edge in her voice to make me wonder what she'd heard about me. Perhaps I was getting ready to bleed from the double-edge of the gossip sword. “Scott's fine. I've got to go. Talk to you later, Cece.”

  Two calls later and I was set for the rest of the day. In my wildest dreams, I'd never envisioned my P.I. job as a means of playing Robin Leach, yet I had appointments to interview two of the richest men in the Southeast.

  Bridge was first. To my shame, he sounded eager to see me and thrilled that I'd broken Daddy's Girl rule number six, phonus abstentia, and called him.

  When I called McBruce, he didn't even ask why I wanted to talk to him. My evening appointment with him—drinks at six o'clock at The Club—would serve the secondary purpose of keeping me from lingering too long at Bridge's. Confession might be good for the soul, but it was not good for my future as a social companion with Bridge. I'd learned from hard experience that if my womb was wanton, my tongue was even worse. I had been known to blab my most personal secrets.

  I had just sunk beneath the bathwater when I felt someone staring at me. I rose, water sluicing in all directions, to find Jitty sitting on the toilet beside the old claw-footed tub.

  “Water can't wash away what you done,” she pointed out. She was wearing a sequined evening gown. Red. And her hair was swept into a beehive. Even though she looked like Satan's daughter, she was giving off the vibes of Pollyanna.

  “I'm a grown woman. I can do whatever I want.” I spoke boldly, but even the Delaney womb was a little uncomfortable. The truth was, I did feel guilty. And the demon regret that Scott had evoked was nibbling my toes. How in the world was I going to face Scott the next time I saw him? He was my client.

  “You sure can do whatever you want, but you're gonna have to live with the consequences. And what if those consequences need bottles and diapers?”

  The bathtub was deep, and the water covered everything but my neck and head. Still, I felt vulnerable. “Jitty, there are no consequences. So I slept with Scott Hampton. I didn't violate any laws. Besides, I thought a baby was all you wanted. When I slept with Hamilton Garrett V, you were bitterly disappointed when I didn't get pregnant.” Even to myself I sounded pathetic.

  “Scott Hampton ain't Hamilton Garrett V, and you know it. Besides, you stomped all over your ethics.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “I don't think it's such a good idea to sleep with a client. Especially not a racist murderer.”

  There it was, the little thorn that was festering deep inside my heart. Jitty had found it and managed to wiggle it in a little deeper.

  “Scott isn't a racist. And he isn't a murderer.”

  “We've been over this before. But let me ask you just one question: What are you gonna do if it turns out he's both of those things?”

  It was a good question, and one that I didn't want to contemplate. I had made my share of social mistakes. I'd slept with men for various reasons that seemed good at the time but turned out to be not so good. But if he was guilty of killing Ivory, Scott Hampton would be the biggest mistake of my ignoble romantic career.

  “He isn't like that.” My heart and my womb surely wouldn't lead me that far astray.

  Jitty stood up. “I almost called in my backup singers, but I thought I could handle this alone.” She put a hand on one hip and held the other out, palm facing me. “Stop, in the name of love, before you get yourself pregnant with a love child that's half-Yankee and half-racist.”

  She was gone and I was left sitting in a tub of cold, dirty water. “You don't even look like Diana Ross!” I yelled after her.

  20

  Standing naked in front of my closet, I had to admit that Jitty had done her work. She'd planted the seed of fear regarding a love child. I tried to convince myself that the tiny bulge of my abdomen had been there for the last three years, but I couldn't be certain. Perhaps a child was already incubating!

  Dang Jitty! If it had been any other man except Scott Hampton, Jitty would have been ecstatic.

  Then again, maybe not. She was in a new mode. Gone were the advice for the lovelorn from Cosmopolitan, the Stephen Stills lyrics of “Love the One You're With,” and the find-you-a-man-in-cyberspace lectures. She was operating on a new set of rules, and they reeked of that transitional era, the sixties. Jitty had regressed! Again!

  Sinking deeper into de-spair with every passing second, I snatched a pair of white slacks and a chartreuse sleeveless sweater out of the closet and onto my body. My mother's peridot-and-amethyst earrings were perfect, even though wearing my hair on my shoulders slightly concealed the earrings. I'd perfected the humidity “do.” My hair was gelled and allowed to dry in natural curls. Then it was hair-sprayed to the consistency of sheet metal. If I didn't mess with it, it wouldn't frizz.

  I had to get out of Dahlia House. And I had to get out of my present mood before I talked to Bridge. I had legitimate questions to ask him, and I could not go over there beating myself on the back with a cat-o'-nine-tails.

  I left Sweetie asleep in the kitchen, one paw on her food bowl. Reveler was grazing happily in the back pasture, and I was wearing the colo
r, according to Margaret Mitchell, that blondes dare not wear. It was time to gird my loins and get busy.

  Bridge opened the front door before I could ring the bell. In less than a second I was folded into his arms and he was kissing me.

  “Sarah Booth, I've been thinking about you all weekend.” He was strong and he gave me an extra little squeeze. “They were very pleasant thoughts. And here you are.”

  In a matter of hours, I'd slipped from the exemplary conduct of an earnest investigator to the ditch of compromised ethics. I'd slept with the primary suspect, and I was kissing a potentially important player. “Bridge,” I said, pushing against his chest.

  My slightest hint of discomfort was enough. His arms dropped and he stepped back from me. “Forgive me, Sarah Booth. I didn't mean to presume. I was simply delighted to see you.”

  His feelings were hurt. Damn! And he didn't even know the half of it. I put my hand on his arm. “I'm here on official business, Bridge.”

  “Oh.” He stepped back from the door to allow me to enter. “Thank goodness. I was afraid you'd fallen in love with someone else and had come to tell me.”

  He'd turned away to close the door and didn't see me cringe. I hadn't exactly fallen in love, I'd jumped in the sack. The quicker I got to this, the better. “Bridge, why did you make Scott's bail?”

  If I'd hoped to surprise him, it backfired. He gave a fine imitation of the Cheshire cat. “Scott is free to play at the club now. He and Ida Mae can keep it open.”

  Was it possible a man could be so generous? It was my job to be skeptical. “Are you going to buy the club?” Keeping it up and running would only be good business for him if he bought it.

  “Ida Mae never responded to the offer you made in my behalf. I know it must be hard for her to consider selling the club, and I didn't want to pressure her right now.”

  “I hear Emanuel's going to inherit the club.”

  A frown crossed his face. “That might complicate things. He won't keep it open, and he certainly won't let Scott continue to play, no matter what Scott's contract says. I wonder . . .” His voice trailed off.