Regina just laughed at my explanation. “Maybe you should start wearing Daddy’s hearing aids.”
“Somebody needs to,” I replied. “Your father doesn’t, and they cost almost as much as the Chartreuse Caboose.”
“Do you really need to call it that?” Regina asked with a long, drawn-out groan. “Please don’t refer to your travel trailer by name around my friends. Or anyone else, for that matter. Okay?”
“I suppose.” I was a bit offended by Regina’s request but willing to agree to almost anything as long as it kept the conversation from reverting back to why I’d inferred Reilly was not the only one in the Reynolds household who was having an affair. Not to mention, she had just saved my life.
As Regina negotiated the heavy Corpus Christi traffic on South Padre Island Drive, or SPID, as it was called, I thought about how I might determine the true identity of the eyewitness the media had mentioned. I had to find a way to canvass the residents at the end of the cul-de-sac on Flamingo Road. The Moores’ home was the third one from the end. The huge orange house on the end had once been owned by the Eastman-Kodak Company, and I knew it was not occupied full-time. But there were three or four, maybe five, other possible homes where the eyewitness could reside.
I was considering possible ways to accomplish that feat when I glanced out the window and saw a business on Cantwell Lane named JJ’s Insulation.
As nonchalantly as I could manage, I pointed toward the building and asked my daughter, “Is that one of the subcontractors Milo uses?”
“No.”
“How about Walker next door?”
“I don’t think so. Why do you ask?” I swear Regina’s voice sounded suspicious, but I tried to convince myself it was just my imagination.
“Oh, I was just curious.” I shrugged and attempted to sound as if I were being sentimental. It was too early to bring up the post-it note I had seen on her neighbor’s kitchen table. I surely didn’t want to come across as being nosy and having infringed on her neighbor’s privacy, even though I was guilty of both charges. “It made me think about JJ’s Cafe in town. I noticed their building was flattened, and I feel so bad for them. Your dad and I always loved that place.”
“Yeah, me too. The folks who own it are extremely good people, too. Not sure what they’ll do now, but I certainly hope they rebuild.”
I agreed and became more interested when Regina said, “When I see the name JJ, I think about a gal I went to high school with. She used to work at Bealls and part-time at Quang Lé Bait Shack, her uncle’s bait stand down by Fulton Marina. Like so many others, she lost both jobs when both businesses were forced to close until they can be rebuilt.”
“That’s too bad. Is JJ Vietnamese, like most of the bait stand owners?”
“No, but her uncle is. He’s her uncle by name only. Quang Lê is her dad’s best friend. Jenavieve Jacobowitz is her name. She was a grade ahead of me.”
“I can certainly understand why she prefers to go by her initials. Her real name is a mouthful.” I was just making conversation at this point because I didn’t see how I could connect this old schoolmate of Regina’s with Walker Reynolds.
That changed quickly, however. In fact, I nearly wet my pants when Regina replied, “Yeah. No kidding! I noticed her ex-fiancé is doing the drywall work next door.”
“You mean Bruno?” I asked breathlessly, realizing too late I’d spoken before giving my words any thought. Again!
Regina almost drove off the road when she turned to me and asked, “How in the (bleep) do you know about Bruno Watts?”
“Watch your language, young lady!” I reprimanded in order to stall for time. Finally, to appease Regina, I gave her a rudimentary version of my visit next door. I basically told her the head contractor in charge of rebuilding the Reynolds’s home had mentioned his drywall guy named Bruno was a diabetic when I dropped off the cookies. When my explanation seemed to appease her, I asked, “Are you still in contact with JJ?”
“No. Haven’t seen or talked to her in several years. Another friend told me JJ recently married a guy out of Austin and is working as an Uber driver up there.” Regina ceased talking so she could concentrate on driving, as we were now in extremely heavy traffic on the Crosstown Expressway.
As she studied the road ahead, I thought it must be a different JJ who’d left the note for Walker. I thought about asking Regina if she knew of any other woman in the area who went by the initials JJ. Regina wasn’t the best driver under normal circumstances, though, so I didn’t want to distract her. I spent the rest of the return trip to Rockport gazing out the passenger-side window at uprooted live oak trees and destroyed buildings. Every once in a while we’d pass a structure that looked totally unaffected by the hurricane. It was as if God had placed a protective shield around that particular building while the storm roared through the area. It seemed hurricanes were indiscriminate, in the same nature as tornadoes.
I remained silent as Regina sang along with the radio in a key about three octaves too high. My ears were beginning to hurt after about four songs. The poor girl had inherited her mother's inability to carry a tune in a dump truck, much less a bucket. Holding my hands over my ears might be considered a touch offensive, so instead, I tried to block out her singing by mulling over what I’d just learned.
Now I had even more to think about. As they say: the plot was thickening. Was Regina’s friend named JJ back in town and the same blonde who left Walker a note about meeting her? The odds of another young lady being nicknamed JJ in a town the size of Rockport were not infinitesimal, but they were low, I’d guess. Or was the note left by a contractor who wanted Walker to meet him at the insulation store in Corpus? More likely, did the note on Walker’s kitchen table have no significance whatsoever in his wife’s disappearance? It was quite possible I was trying to create a mountain out of a molehill where not even a molehill existed. I had a tendency to create a lot of pointless mountains out of imaginary molehills.
I wasn’t sure if I was getting closer to determining who or what was behind Reilly’s disappearance or further away, but I did know I now had a drywall guy I wanted to talk with. Even as this thought crossed my mind, I wondered, by going to the trouble to make the man sugar-free cookies, am I pandering to a killer?
Eight
As we reached the Rockport city limits, Regina received a text on her cell phone. After glancing at it, she set the phone back down in the truck’s console. “Milo said to tell you Daddy is helping him with a little project this morning.”
This was welcome news. I wouldn’t have to explain why I was taking snacks over to the workers next door―again!
Regina and I parted ways as soon as we arrived back at the Moores’ house; she to work on her insurance claim, and me to gather up my Ziploc bags full of cookies. On each bag was a name. I’d used a permanent marker to write “Jessie” and “Tony” on the snickerdoodle bags and “Bruno” on the bag of sugar-free chocolate chip cookies.
While everyone was busy elsewhere, I slipped next door to deliver the promised treats. I was met at the door by a man of very short stature and slight frame who looked more like a librarian than a construction worker. I was pretty sure I could easily turn him horizontal and bench press him a dozen times.
“Hello,” I said in greeting. I figured this man was the accountant Jessie had mentioned was helping Walker with his own insurance claim. “I’m sorry. I was looking for Jessie, Tony, or Bruno. Are any of them here today?”
“I’m Bruno. Whaddya want?” His impatient tone was anything but welcoming. I hadn’t met him before, but he looked nothing like I’d expected a man named Bruno to look. He looked more like a Francis or an Ira. To be truthful, without the well-trimmed mustache he sported, he'd have looked more like a Frances or an Irene. He was extremely effeminate in both looks and manner. His baritone voice had been totally unexpected.
“You’re the drywall contractor?” I know I sounded surprised but hoped I hadn’t also sounded skeptical.
When he stood silently, glaring at me, I handed him the bag of cookies with his name on it. “It’s nice to meet you, Bruno. I’m Rapella Ripple, the mother of Regina Moore from next door. Jessie and Tony asked me to bake them some snickerdoodles, which I was more than happy to do. Jessie told me you were diabetic, so I made you a batch of sugar-free cookies. I hope you like chocolate chip.”
“I don’t like anything that’s sugar-free. Something in the synthetic sugar gives me the shits.” Bruno quickly apologized for his offensive language. “Pardon my French. I meant to say it gives me the runs.”
“I’m not sure which sounds best, but I understand completely. Sorbitol, maltitol, and other sweeteners have the tendency to give me either gas or diarrhea, too.” I was a little embarrassed by my confession and was surprised when the grey-eyed man’s glare turned into an amused grin, exposing a beautiful mouthful of straight, white teeth. The diminutive fellow was quite attractive when he smiled. “Perhaps, there’s something else I can make for you that you can tolerate.”
“Thanks,” he replied. “But I’m good. I don’t want you to go to any trouble for me. Jessie and Tony are out back removing the forms from around the concrete patio that was poured a couple of days ago. While Walker’s having all this other reconstruction done, Jessie convinced Walker to have the rear patio enlarged too.”
“I see. And what are you working on?” I was trying to engage Mr. Watts in conversation without appearing to be prying into his business. I was relieved he seemed genuinely happy to discuss his work with me. In fact, I must have given him the impression I was much more interested in the art of drywalling than I really was.
“Come in here,” he replied. He led me into the living room, where the overwhelming stench of mildew was even stronger than it had been in the foyer. I was about to comment on the odor when Bruno pointed to a surprisingly thick wall separating the living room from a smaller nook. “As you can see, I’ve already put up all of the sheetrock. Currently, I am finishing taping the final wall in here, and then I will begin sealing the joints with a drywall compound of what’s primarily gypsum dust mixed with water to form a mud-like consistency. Then, I will use aluminum stilts to―”
“Oh, my! There is so much more to the art of drywalling than I’d imagined.” I’d cut him off because I couldn’t afford to stand around all day listening to the ins and outs of Bruno’s trade. Not to mention, it was stifling hot inside the house. Pointing to the far corner of the room, I asked, “What’s with the thick wall and little open area behind it?”
“Oh, that,” Bruno began. “Well, you see, the lady who lived here―”
“You mean Reilly Reynolds? The lady who’s missing and presumed dead?”
“Well, um, yeah. That’s the one. Walker told me that Reilly had always wanted to have a library in her home and he’d repeatedly pooh-poohed the idea. As you can imagine, he’s holding out hope she’ll return home safely and, of course, soon. When and if she does, he’ll be able to give her the library she's always wanted, even if it does make the living room a bit smaller. Creating the new walled-off area was kind of my idea, actually.”
Bruno was obviously pleased with himself for coming up with the inspiration of surprising Reilly with her very own library. But it seemed to me to be putting the water skier in front of the boat. So far, there was nothing to indicate the woman would ever return to her house on Flamingo Road. By originally referring to her in the past tense, Bruno made me think he didn’t hold out much hope Reilly would turn up alive and well.
“That’s nice, but I thought everyone initially assumed she was blown off the pier during the hurricane and her body had washed out to sea. Does Walker truly think there’s a chance Reilly’s still alive?” I asked.
“Yeah, I think so. I guess it’s hard to give up hope when it’s someone you love. But there’s really no explanation other than the one you just mentioned.”
“Maybe, maybe not. I heard on the news that an anonymous eyewitness reported seeing her get into a car out front during the time the eye of the hurricane was directly over the island.”
“I don’t know anything about that, but it sounds like hogwash to me. It was probably that half-witted goofball, Barlow Barnaby up the street, who called in the bogus tip. It was nice to meet you, Rachel.”
Bruno turned as if the conversation was over. I didn’t bother to correct him on my name. He either hadn’t been interested enough to pay attention when I introduced myself just a couple of minutes prior, or he was like Rip, who occasionally had trouble remembering names. He picked up a roll of drywall tape and walked toward the unfinished section he’d probably been working on when I’d knocked on the front door.
“Hmm,” I mumbled. I had so many more questions to ask Bruno. I hadn’t even gotten to the point of somehow bringing Jenavieve Jacobowitz into the conversation. In the form of a question, I said, “I assume the thick wall is intended to serve as a sound barrier since libraries are notorious for being quiet places? It’s probably well-insulated too.”
“Uh, yeah. Sure.” Bruno stuck a large flat carpenter’s pencil in his mouth and turned away again. He walked over to the wall, measured a large void with a tape measure he’d yanked off his belt, and wrote the measurement down on a piece of sheetrock.
“So how’s JJ doing?” I asked. I know this was a bold move, but I couldn’t think of any better idea about how to broach the subject of his former fiancée.
“Say what?” If Bruno hadn’t removed the bulky pencil just before I asked the question, he would’ve swallowed it whole. He spun around so fast, I saw spittle fly out of the corner of his mouth. “What’d you say?”
“I was just curious how JJ’s doing. I know her uncle, Quang Lê, and he’d told me a while back that you two had once been engaged. We used to buy our fishing bait at Quang’s little bait shop all the―”
“I haven’t seen JJ in months. We broke up. She told me she found someone else. No big deal, though, because I have, too.”
“Oh, well. I’m glad to hear you found a new girlfriend.” I began to formulate another question in my mind when Bruno waved me off. This was probably a good thing as I was about to ask if he’d heard JJ had married a guy out of Austin, and I had no idea how he’d take that kind of crushing news if he still carried a torch for his former fiancée. Chances were, his new girlfriend was just a rebound fling to prove to his ex he could move on just as easily as she had.
“Sorry, lady, but―”
“It’s Rapella.”
“Whatever,” he said, rather rudely. “I should get back to work. As you can see, I need to get the rest of this room taped. Thanks anyway for going to the trouble to make the sugar-free cookies for me. Sorry I won’t be eating any of them.”
“You’re welcome. No problem on the cookies. My husband will see to it they don’t go to waste. I’ll let you get back to work now and go hand off these other bags to Jessie and Tony.” I wasn’t finished questioning him, so decided I might as well roll the dice and break the news to him. If nothing else, it might prolong our conversation to the point I was able to dig more info out of him. “Just, F.Y.I., I heard from a fairly reliable source that JJ recently married that new guy she left you for and moved to Austin. She’s driving for Uber now and―”
“Sorry, lady, but I’ve really got to get back to work.” The steely look he gave me made it clear he had no interest in continuing our little chat-fest.
I walked out of the room, realizing I’d learned very little new information from the drywall contractor. I can’t be positive, and I was afraid to retrace my steps to check it out, but it sounded as if Bruno had slammed his fist through a sheet of sheetrock just about the time I turned the knob on the door to the back deck.
My final remarks about his former flame must have really hit a raw nerve.
Nine
“Good afternoon, Ms. Ripple,” the handsome demolition man greeted me on the back porch of the Reynolds’s home a minute or so later, after I’d left the drywall
man to return to his work. As he spoke, Tony tossed a long two-by-four into a pile next to the patio.
“Please call me Rapella, Tony,” I said politely. “How are you today?”
“Just fine, thank you.” After noticing the bags of cookies I was holding, he added, “I can’t believe you actually brought me some home-baked snickerdoodles.”
“I told you I would, didn’t I?” I returned playfully. “I would never promise cookies and not deliver.”
“Well, thank you again.” Tony gallantly raised my right hand to his lips and kissed the back of it. “But, please, don’t bring me any more after this. I’m already doing a ton of crunches and sit-ups every morning to keep my body mass index at an acceptable level.”
His BMI looked to be ideal to me. I admired his perfect physique for a moment and nodded. I didn’t want to sound like a flirt, but I felt compelled to compliment his build. “You don’t appear to have a single molecule out of place, and I agree it should stay that way.”
Jessie walked around the corner before Tony could finish blushing and respond. The general contractor had a broad smile on his face. “Ahhh…It’s the cookie lady. I heard what Tony said. I want you to know that I have officially let myself go and no longer care about how buff I look. Feel free to drop off as many cookies as you’d like, and I’ll personally see to it that they don’t go to waste.”
Jessie appeared much more relaxed than the last time I’d seen him. I wasn’t certain if he was teasing or serious so I chuckled in response. I might need to bring over cookies in the future just as an excuse to question someone working inside the Reynolds’s home, so I wanted to keep that option available if at all possible. I handed him the bag of snickerdoodles with his name on it.
As Jessie scrutinized the contents of the bag, he said, “I see you fulfilled Tony’s request for snickerdoodles.”
“You dislike snickerdoodles?” I asked. I’m sure I sounded disappointed.
Ripped Apart (A Ripple Effect Cozy Mystery, Book 5) Page 8
