Val Fremden Mystery Box Set 3

by Margaret Lashley

  “Thanks for inviting me, Stumpy,” I said. “That was the best catfish and hush puppies I’ve had in like...forever.”

  “You don’t say,” Stumpy grinned. “Well, yore mighty welcome, young lady.”

  “I’m serious, Stumpy. Everything was delicious. And...thank you for...well, you all made me feel right at home.”

  “That’s mighty sweet, Val.”

  Stumpy gave me a kind, fatherly smile. “I guess I’ll get me another slice a that Cheeto pie and head home.” He grabbed a square and looked Steve and me over. “Somebody ought to see you back to your place. Ain’t fit for a purty woman like you to be wanderin’ ‘round alone in the dark.”

  Stumpy winked at Steve.

  “Stumpy’s right,” Steve said. “A woman can’t be too careful these days.”

  Before I could answer, Steve took me by the arm.

  “Shall we?” he asked.

  I looked at Steve, then back at Stumpy. An odd whirlwind of emotions swept through me. I was flattered, confused, and a little flabbergasted at being called a young lady. But the biggest shock was how much this place actually did feel like home.

  I turned to Steve. “Uh...sure.”

  Stumpy smiled and kept a watchful eye on us as Steve and I ambled off toward my RV.

  After we’d gotten out of earshot of everyone, Steve pulled my arm in tight, drawing me closer to him. “So, what’s a nice gal like you doing in a place like this?”

  “I’m married,” I lied.

  Steve laughed and loosened his grip. “So what are you doing out here all on your own?”

  “Well, it’s kind of a secret. But I’m working on a story.”

  “A story? Like a reporter? What’s it about?”

  “More like a novelist. And I don’t know yet. You on vacation?”

  “I guess you could say that.”

  The yellowish light emanating from my RV window looked as welcoming to me as a beacon to a drowning sailor. I pulled my arm out of Steve’s.

  “Well, thanks for seeing me home.”

  “You going to stay awhile?” he asked as I scurried to the door.

  “I don’t think so. You?”

  “Depends.”

  “On what?”

  “On which way the wind blows.”

  Steve turned and disappeared into the night. I got out my key and reached for the door.

  As my fingers encircled the doorknob, they got tangled in something wrapped around it. I squinted in the dim light and made out the silhouette of a round object dangling from a string. I unhooked it from the knob and scooped it up in my hand. The fragrance of cinnamon wafted in the night breeze.

  I held the trinket to my nose and sniffed it as I carried it inside.

  Mmmm. How cute! Someone left me a little RV-warming present. Sure beats the smell of moth balls and mildew....

  I flipped on the kitchen light and “cute” skittered out the window along with my smile. I heard a squeal shoot out my mouth, then my heartbeat as it pulsed in my ears.

  Hanging from the string in my hand was a shriveled, shrunken head. Its grotesque face, rimmed in haggish moss hair, grinned maniacally at me with a set of sharp teeth made from broken shells.

  “Aaarrghh!”

  I flung the thing across the room. It ricocheted off the refrigerator and clanked into the sink. I shook my head, shuddered, then laughed nervously.

  Come on, Val! A shrunken head? That can’t be right.

  I tiptoed over to the sink and peered inside. The thing was gone! How could that be?

  The only thing in the sink was my dirty coffee cup. I noticed a clump of Spanish moss sticking out of the grey water inside it. Cautiously, I reached for the mug handle and dumped it out.

  I gasped again. I hadn’t imagined it.

  Two beady, cat-like eyes stared at me from a shriveled face the color of dried tobacco. Clutched in the shrunken head’s jagged teeth was a soggy piece of paper rolled up into a scroll.

  I had to know what was written on that scroll!

  But there was no use taking any chances. I subdued the shriveled head with a wooden spoon before warily plucking the paper from between its sharp little teeth.

  As I unrolled the soggy scroll, a message scrawled in red ink appeared. It spread across the paper like a bloodstain, the last few letters not much more than a smear. It read:

  Stay Away.

  Chapter Sixteen

  So much for “feeling right at home.”

  As I stared at the shriveled head, I became aware that I was aping its horrific expression as it glared back at me with sinister, cat-eyes and vicious, jagged teeth.

  Even though the monstrosity was no bigger than a tangerine, my heart thumped in my throat. My imagination envisioned the head sprouting legs and coming after me like that disembodied eyeball from in that low-budget B movie.

  No, sirree. This RV isn’t big enough for the two of us.

  I grabbed the wooden spoon, scooped up the hideous voodoo head with it, and catapulted it out the door and back into the dark, evil night from which it had come.

  My skin crawled as I heard it thump onto the ground. I slammed the door, locked it, and shoved the cooler against the door for good measure. I hoped that would be enough. After all, I had no experience with shrunken heads and their devious ways.

  With the unwelcome voodoo head duly thwarted, I collapsed into the dinette booth. I didn’t know whether to laugh or cry.

  What was this place, anyway?

  Either I was cavorting with a bunch of nice country folks, or I was the next intended victim of a coven of blood-thirsty demons. I guess only time would tell.

  No matter what, though, I knew I was in way over my head. I didn’t want to admit defeat, but it was time to call Tom.

  I lifted my cellphone from the table. The display lit up. On it was my text to Tom about the car keys being on the key rack. I’d forgotten to press “send.”

  Crap!

  I clamped my teeth tighter than my Aunt Pansy’s girdle and mashed the send button with all my might.

  The phone cut out.

  “Nooooo!”

  I tried to turn it back on, but it wouldn’t budge. Either I’d squashed its tiny brains out or the battery was dead. I pilfered through my suitcase and found the charger. I tried to stick it in the phone but it didn’t fit. I must have picked up Tom’s charger by mistake.

  “You’ve got to be kidding me,” I groaned aloud.

  Crap on a cracker! This was all Tom’s fault! His stupid stuff was spread all over my house...getting me all confused. Dang it! Why in the world did I let him move in?

  I flung the charger across the RV.

  Oh, how I wish Tom was here now....

  My heart thumped hollow in my chest as I re-checked the deadbolt on the door and the locks on every single window. When I’d finished securing every one of the tiny RV’s possible entry points, I brushed my teeth, washed my face and grabbed my spray bottle of Ty-D-Bol.

  From my perch in the dinette booth, I kept a wary eye on that bloody note until the smeary red words, “Stay Away,” were burned into my frazzled retinas.

  A NOISE STARTLED ME awake in the middle of the night again. Apparently, the RV’s manufacturer had spared every expense when it came to insulation. I would swear I could hear every cricket in Polk County chirping on my roof.

  My head was slumped forward. My neck ached. As I lifted my head to look around, my vertebrae cracked like a long line of knuckles.

  Ugh.

  I was still in the dinette booth.

  Groggily, I scooted across the booth and stood up. As I took a fumbling step toward the bathroom, I saw something move at the end of the hallway.

  I froze like I’d been dipped in liquid nitrogen.

  I willed my bleary eyes into focus. Out of the haze, the shadowy silhouette of an intruder stared back at me from inside the bedroom.

  This can’t be happening.

  I blinked once. Twice. It was still there. Staring at me.r />
  The hair on the back of my neck pricked up. The ghostly apparition didn’t budge.

  Holy crap! It’s the demon spirit of that shrunken head! It’s come to kill me!

  “What do you want?” I croaked, my lungs so tight I could barely speak.

  No reply.

  In the silence, I could hear its heavy breathing. I took a step backward. The hideous intruder took a step.

  Adrenaline pulsed through my veins, standing the rest of my hair on end.

  I turned to run.

  I only managed two steps before whatever it was caught me by the foot.

  As I fell toward the floor, it bashed me hard on the back of my head. My face hit the linoleum, and just before everything went black, I saw a mouse staring at me from under the cabinet baseboard.

  Chapter Seventeen

  I woke up sopping wet in a pool of blood. My head throbbed with dull, intermittent pulses of pain. Sunbeams shot their cruel lasers through the kitchen window straight into my eyes, turning up the volume on my headache. I raised a sticky, red-stained hand to my forehead.

  Memories of last night flooded back. I sat up with a start.

  As my face rose from the floor, something dislodged from the side of my head and slid down my cheek. It plopped onto my shoulder, then fell into my lap. A pang of horror clamped my eyes shut.

  Dear lord! Is that my ear? Have I been cut to pieces by some sick slasher?

  I cracked opened one eye and peeked down. In between my knees, a plump, silver-haired man smiled back at me. His cook’s hat, cocked at a rakish angle, seemed to imply that the whole thing had all been in jolly good fun.

  I let out a half-cry/half-laugh and plucked the Chef Boyardee spaghetti sauce lid from my lap. I wasn’t covered in blood. I was covered in spaghetti Bolognese.

  I glanced around. So was the entire kitchen.

  “Oh, great,” I muttered.

  I grabbed the end of the dinette table and pulled myself to standing. The dull ache pulsing between my eyes picked up tempo. I took a step with my right foot. My little toe shot a bullet of pain directly into my brain.

  I looked down at my little toe. It was the size and color of a small plum.

  What the? Why would someone break into my RV, knock me out with a jar of spaghetti sauce and smash my little toe?

  A chill shot through me.

  Oh no! What if they’re still in here!

  I leaned over and took a trembling, cautious peek down the hallway toward the bedroom.

  My instincts had been right. The intruder was still there.

  A hand came up and slapped me in the forehead. It was my own. Halfway down the hall, the bathroom door hung open. The intruder last night had been my own reflection in the full-length mirror.

  I’d run away from my own shadow.

  What an idiot!

  Last night I’d stubbed my toe on the corner of the dinette booth. When I fell, it must have knocked the jar of spaghetti sauce off the table and right onto my dimwitted noggin.

  Bloody. Freaking. Brilliant.

  Great detective work, Val. You just solved the case of your own stupidity.

  I STRIPPED OFF MY TOMATO-spattered clothes and stuffed myself inside the phone-booth sized shower. Last night’s fried food fest hadn’t done me any favors. My butt was already big enough to fill a bench. Now my stomach was as bloated as a dead toad-frog.

  After I cleaned myself up, I put on a loose-fitting sundress, bandaged my toe and started in on the sauce-splattered kitchen.

  Over by the fridge, I found the busted jar of spaghetti sauce. The expiration date revealed it had gone bad sometime during the second Bush administration.

  Geeze! The jar must have exploded on impact. That explains the spatter. That crap is everywhere!

  I sponged down the sink, counters and cabinets and started on the booth. The mouse was gone, but it had left a trail of footprints across the table.

  Gross!

  With no mop to be found, I hobbled outside and yanked my “emergency” towel from the makeshift clothesline. I tried to wipe down the floor with it, but it was still so dirty from cleaning Maggie that I only managed to add mud to the Bolognese. Not a pretty combo.

  I flung the towel out the door and got the one I’d just dried myself off with.

  A half an hour later, every towel in the place was filthy and so was I. I took another shower and changed into jean shorts and a t-shirt.

  My head had stopped throbbing, but my toe wasn’t that easily dissuaded. To make matters worse, my tin-can condo was heating up in the late morning sun like an Easy-Bake oven fitted with a million-watt bulb.

  I cranked the window-rattler AC unit down to sixty-eight degrees and hoped for the best. What I really needed, though, was a nice, cold drink.

  I opened the freezer in search of ice. The tiny freezer was empty except for my flask of Tanqueray and a miniscule, Barbie-sized ice tray. I dumped the dehydrated, yellowed chips of ice into a glass. They looked like a pile of dead man’s toenails.

  Geeze, Louise. Maybe I can borrow Charlene’s shopper chopper....

  I stuffed my sauce-soaked clothes and towels into a garbage bag, opened the RV door and tossed it outside. As I did, my eyes caught sight of Queen Elmira’s back end.

  She straightened up, turned around, and glared at me.

  I couldn’t decide what it was that was more disconcerting about that woman. Was it her bad attitude, her frizzy beard, or her belief that it was okay to wear a white sports bra as a top?

  I waved at her. She shot me a look that could have melted a steel girder at the North Pole.

  “Witch!” she hissed.

  Dumbfounded, I stood in the doorway and watched her huff down the lane.

  “Don’t take it personal. Elmira hates near ‘bout ever’body.”

  “Hi, Stumpy.”

  “Mornin’ Val. You seen Woggles around here?”

  “No. Not since last night. Hey, do you know where I can get some ice?”

  “Up by the laundry-mat.”

  “There’s a laundry here?”

  “Sure. A dollar a load.”

  “Thanks. Good to know.”

  “You got quarters?”

  “Yessir.”

  “All right then. You should be all set. You have yourself a good morning, young lady.”

  “You, too. And thanks again for inviting me to the fish fry last night. It was fun.”

  I went inside and pulled a roll of quarters from my purse. I always kept at least two full rolls in my handbag at all times. My adoptive mother, Lucille Jolly, had shown me by example that a purse full of quarters could come in handy against stray dogs, strange women, and wayward husbands. Over the years, I’d begun to see her point more and more.

  Quarters in hand, I grabbed my writing notebook, locked the RV and slung the bag of towels over my shoulder. Barefoot and with a smashed toe, I hobbled down the dirt road in the general direction of the laundromat looking like a down-and-out Santa with a busted sleigh.

  Chapter Eighteen

  I don’t know why I was so surprised, but I was. The Hell’ammo’s so-called “laundromat” was just a derelict washer and dryer loitering under an open, tin-roofed porch like a pair of stray dogs.

  Both appliances appeared to have been scabbed together from the remains of the poor machines that had come before them. I hobbled over to the washer, lifted the Harvest Gold lid on its otherwise white frame, and peered cautiously inside to make sure it wasn’t already occupied.

  Seeing as the washing machine didn’t contain anyone else’s laundry or a newborn litter of varmints, I bought some soap out of the small vending machine nailed to the wall, ripped the top off a box of Stain-Killer Tide about the size of a deck of cards, and poured it all in.

  I hoisted the garbage bag up and let the Chef Boyardee-encrusted clothes and towels tumble in. The last thing to fall out was my muddy “emergency” towel. It was as stiff and black as a charred steak.

  Beyond saving, I tossed it in the
trash and pumped four quarters into a slot in the washer. Seeing as how there was no “post-apocalypse” wash option, I mashed the button for “heavy duty” and hit start. The machine jerked to life and began humming.

  With thirty-five minutes to kill and a little toe that was screaming bloody murder, it didn’t seem worth it to shamble back to the RV. So, I took advantage of the “waiting room” facilities instead. Of the two chairs sitting in the open yard amongst the debris, one looked as if it just might have enough strength left to hold my weight.

  I limped over to the ice machine and blew seventy-five cents on a twenty-pound bag of ice, then plopped down in the dilapidated lawn chair.

  As I sat there, a plastic bag drifted by like a tumbleweed, leaving me with an idea. I snatched the wayward bag and fashioned it into an icepack for my toe. That done, I hoisted my foot up to rest on the upturned hull of a refrigerator, and gently applied the little bag of ice. The relief was instant.

  “Aahh.”

  It seemed a shame to waste the other nineteen pounds of ice. A while back, I’d read an article about how ice could kill fat cells. Some scientist had come to that conclusion after noticing that kids who ate popsicles developed dimples.

  If ice pops could put a divot in some kid’s fat cheeks, why couldn’t it carve out a sizable slab from my stomach? Besides, what did I have to lose? It was sweltering outside, and there was nobody around to tell me not to try this at home.

  I hauled the bag of ice up onto my bloated gut and wondered how long it would take me to get down to a size six. While I waited for my fat to melt away, I got out my notebook and fiddled with more ideas on how to kill someone with a casserole....

  “That’s a novel way to cool off.”

  I looked up. Gold-toothed Steve was staring at me, an amused look plastered on his smarmy face.

  “Yeah. I call it ‘country cryosurgery.’”

  Steve’s bushy black eyebrows met in the middle. “What?”

  “Never mind. What have you got there?”

  “Oh. I saw you hobbling down the path. Thought you might could use this.”