Dead On the Bayou

by June Shaw

  Eve drew it back. “I see your garbage can. I’ll just drop it in there.”

  The white garbage can stood out, an unattractive stained thing standing in the room. When Eve stepped on the foot press, the top opened to reveal take-out containers and two liter-and-a-half bottles that recently held wine.

  “Do y’all have parties?” Eve asked, trying to discreetly look away from their trashcan’s contents. “Lots of company comes over?”

  Cherry, the constant mover, kept shaking her head. “No. That’s the reason we want the kitchen finished so fast. Well actually, I do. Charles doesn’t really seem to care about much except his surgeries—oh, and this granite top. But I’m sure he’ll love it once you’re finished with the room.”

  I had to blurt to get in my question. “So you were saying the reason you want the kitchen finished so fast—”

  “Is so we can have our first real visitors over. Our families and whoever else might come.”

  She had told us about the big family get-together, not that the people who attended would be the first real visitors to their house. Now I really understood why the work we would accomplish in here would become so important to her. From her trashcan’s contents, I also perceived why she might be so happy all the time. Or maybe her husband imbibed quite a bit? I hoped not while he was on call.

  “We’ll need to hide the receptacle where you keep trash,” Eve said, giving a nod toward where she’d discarded her tissue.

  “Oh, yes, good idea.” Cherry spoke with big nods as though it had never occurred to her to do that. She leaned in closer to Eve. “What else?”

  “Umgg,” or something like that came from my sister’s mouth and then her lips went slack. She swayed back and grabbed the top of the island.

  I grabbed her around the waist. “What’s wrong?”

  “Uk.” A smaller sound.

  “Let’s sit her down.” Cherry caught hold of a chair and pushed it behind Eve. “I’ll call my husband.”

  I stood beside Eve and supported her upper body, which leaned hard against me. “You’re going to be all right,” I promised her. Promised myself. One sister died beside me. This one that I equally adored couldn’t also vanish.

  Cherry yelled into her phone, barking out orders, seeming quite a different and stronger person than the one we’d met. “I don’t care if he’s in surgery. Tell him it’s an emergency. I need to know what to do.”

  She waited and paced and came close to Eve to check her out. “You doing okay?” she asked.

  Eve gave her head a slight nod, which also pleased me. She pulled away from me and sat straighter, but then leaned back against me. I gripped her tight, not about to let her fall.

  “Okay, okay,” Cherry said annoyed, again in her phone. “Then tell him this. We have a guest in the house, and she had the sniffles, so I gave her an OTC tablet to help clear it up.” She gave the name of the product, which she must have been asked. A minute later, she came and stooped beside Eve. “No, her lips aren’t blue. I don’t see a rash around her face or neck. And her nose isn’t swollen.” Cherry flicked her gaze toward me. “Is it?”

  I shook my head. Eve watched and looked relieved at my headshake.

  An extended minute later, Cherry started nodding again at her phone. She told the person okay and hung up. Darting to their kitchen’s medicine cabinet, she took out a box I recognized. It was a product I’d sometimes used when my sinuses required help.

  “Have you ever used this before?” Cherry held the box up to Eve.

  “Yes, once or twice.” At least her voice was stronger.

  “This is what I gave you, but you’ve become allergic to it. Don’t ever use it again.” She set the box down. “Do you feel like you’d need an ambulance?”

  “Absolutely not.”

  “Do you want us to get you to an emergency room to get checked out?”

  “No, I’m fine.” Still seated, Eve swayed a little. “Or I’m getting there.”

  “Okay then. Charles couldn’t leave his patient but heard everything I relayed about you. He said you need to take this.” She replaced her OTC sinus meds and grabbed another box. Eve was shaking her head as Cherry came toward her, taking out two pink tablets and refilling water in Eve’s glass. “Don’t worry, these can’t hurt you. They’re to stop an allergic reaction.” When she pressed the tablets to my sister’s lips, Eve opened her mouth and allowed them in. Then she sipped water.

  “But that never happened to me when I took those other things before,” Eve said.

  Cherry stopped moving. “Anyone can become allergic to anything at any time.” She spoke slower than I had ever heard her. “You could have taken some type medicine or used some other product all your life and then one day, you become allergic to it. Just leave those other pills alone, and you should be fine.”

  Eve had straightened her spine and sat straighter to drink the water, but began to slant toward the side. I pressed against her.

  “You just had a mild reaction to that product,” Cherry told her in a slow, gentle tone. “You should be fine.” Our hostess looked up at me. “You need to take her home, or I can help drive her there if you’d like.” She saw me shaking my head and continued. “That reaction could probably make her feel a little woozy, and the pill she took for sinuses sometimes causes drowsiness. Oh, and meds I gave her to counter that reaction normally make people quite sleepy.”

  “I’ll take her to my house.”

  Cherry was shaking her head, tapping the granite top on her island. “I never would have imagined putting a color like this in here,” she said, and I awaited an outburst. We would need to foot the bill? Her lips moved into a smile. “You two are so talented. I love this.”

  I faked a smile, the same as I figured she was doing with her words. “Come on, Eve.” I slid my shoulder under hers and placed my arm around her, gripping her tight. Cherry got the other side and supported Eve by holding one arm and watching her. We all three walked out of that ugly kitchen and helped Eve stumble through the living room. At the door, Cherry held onto her while I got Eve’s keys out of her purse and went to get her car, driving it up to Cherry’s door. Both of us helped her get inside. I strapped her in and ran around to the driver’s seat.

  “Please let me know if she needs anything, anything at all,” Cherry called out once I lowered a window. “If she needs any emergency care, Charles will be there.” I was certain she meant if he wasn’t involved in an operation like right now. “I’m sure she’ll be fine, but I’ll call later and check on her.”

  Cherry nodded and gave us big waves while I drove away, down their long driveway past all the big oaks. By the time I got on the highway, I said, “I guess doctors get sued so often, they’re really afraid something might happen if a person gets hurt at their house. Especially from taking medicine either of them gave a person.”

  Getting no reply, I glanced at Eve, worried.

  Her head was slumped to the side toward me. The big snorts that came out of her brought out my laugh. My sister was sound asleep.

  Cherry called later that evening and again fairly early at night. She wanted to assure me that if Eve needed anything—anything at all—I should just let them know. If we wanted Charles to check her out, he would be glad to come out and do that.

  “She’s fine. She’s just really sleepy,” I assured her as I had the first time she’d called. I managed to wake Eve enough to help me walk her inside my house and then down the hall to the first bedroom, where she slumped onto the bed, clothes and all. I slid off her shoes, pulled the covers from the other side of the bed and placed them over her. She kept snoring so loud I thought she might wake Mrs. Hawthorne down the street.

  When I finally went to sleep myself after replaying all of the events of the day, snorts and snores occasionally woke me. At least I knew I still had a sister.

  Chapter 27

  “I can’t believe I slept so much.” Eve drank coffee while she sat at my sma
ll kitchen table wearing an unusual look. She was all rumpled. From the top of her hair down to the hem of her dress, she had parts out of place. A wide swath of her red wavy hair stood up in back, mascara made a wide black rim a quarter of an inch beneath her eyes, and her dress bunched up with creases.

  “But you feel better now?” I sat beside her, had cooked her breakfast, and we’d eaten. “Are you doing okay?”

  She waved a hand to brush off any idea of ill effects. “Don’t worry. I’m great. Did I miss anything?”

  Surely she missed seeing herself in a mirror yet. It was difficult to hold a serious conversation with her now. Bright crimson lipstick remained on one side of her lips, but not the other. Watching those lips move and looking into her eyes that appeared raccoon-like this morning made me only want to grin. Instead, I took a swallow of my dark roast hot coffee and told her about Cherry’s offer to have her husband help. “But the big plus was that right before we got you out of her house, she praised the granite.”

  Eve chuckled. “She did not.”

  “I’m pretty sure she was only trying to appease us since you seemed to have a reaction to something she gave you. Oh, you remember that you can’t take that medicine anymore, don’t you?”

  “Yes. I won’t, but the other one helped me, right?”

  “It sure did. Okay, so what happened at their house probably scared the couple so much that we might sue them that it should give us a little breathing room to try to decide what in the world we might do in that hideous kitchen.”

  Eve was nodding. “It is bad.” She widened her eyes. Made me think of an owl. Would she turn her head around on her neck? “Or maybe I was having a nightmare about what I saw in there.”

  “No, it was real. That’s a color we never would have chosen. Anyway, we’ll need to come up with really good ideas on how to fix that kitchen and make it look much better.” Impossible was the thought that came to mind. I didn’t voice it. “We need the income, and the granite store will send us a bill for those materials and their installation. Just their time driving here and back from New Orleans will add a bit. But even worse, after we or I am cleared of murder, word will spread that we’re horrible at selecting materials to remodel anything.”

  Eve took a swallow of coffee and set the cup down. “Right. Even if they let us out of completing the job, some doctors and other people with large budgets will be going in their kitchen. They certainly won’t consider us now.” She carried her cup to the sink. “I need to get home to shower. We’ll get together afterward.”

  I watched her walk outside and get into her car, assuring myself that she was no longer woozy or unsteady. She seemed fine.

  Returning my attention inside, I got out the lists I had made of suspects and such, considering what we might do next. Looking through the pages, I knew we’d have to try to bandage or somehow otherwise fix up the huge mistake I had made with the granite. The days were counting down until the big party at Cherry’s house, but we wouldn’t deal with it today. I put the sheet mentioning remodeling behind the others.

  Thoughts focused on anyone else beside me who could have killed Eve’s neighbors, I considered phoning Detective Wilet and asking what he found out about the tip I’d given him yesterday. If it was a tip. Or possibly the whole story of Royce impregnating that woman at the manor was fabricated. Hoping that wasn’t the case, I put aside the idea of calling him.

  What Eve and I needed to do was return to the manor and try to discover more, like had any of our mother’s other friends heard about that possible affair. Darn, considering an affair and Mom at the same time made scenes flash into mind that I didn’t want to imagine. Mom. That new guy. Both coming down that hall about the same time. “Uhn-uh.” I fixed another cup of strong coffee to send my thoughts other places, and sat again, placing the tip of my pen on one possibility after another and making notes while I came up with ideas.

  An image came of that alligator swimming in the bayou beyond Dave’s camp in the direction of the camp beyond, where a man had been using fine tools to work on his wharf. I had no idea whether he would be around his camp since he lived out of state, but was fairly certain Detective Wilet had investigated him. Eve and I could run out there to see if we’d find him although I had no idea what good that would do. The man certainly wouldn’t admit to us that he’d killed Mrs. Wilburn and brought her dead body out to Dave’s. Considering that idea made the concept of him being a suspect in the murders of her and her son seem ridiculous. I crossed him out as a suspect. Something worked the edges of my mind. I tried to focus on it but could not grab onto that thought and pull it into view.

  The young fellow behind the Wilburns’ fence was another one I wondered about. In my mind, he was a distinct possibility for Royce’s death. But his mother’s? If that guy were the killer, I would only find out when the detective was ready to tell me or if he announced it to the public. I made a large question mark.

  A similar mark went next to what I’d written about the killer being someone Eve and I didn’t know at all. Somebody else could have a motive, means, and opportunity to kill both of them.

  Moving along to those we knew about left only a couple of possibilities. Rayne, the woman in navy at the manor. Mrs. Wilburn’s nephew Andrew Primeaux whose niece Jessica lived with him. I had seen him first at the manor, and he’d told me none of Mrs. Wilburn’s relatives liked her. They both had the older relative residing at the manor that I’d seen but hadn’t been able to speak to at first because another resident told me mealtime or right afterward was a bad time to do that. The person who said that was Cherry’s grandmother, whose table in the cafeteria was two before hers. Cherry’s grandmother would soon see her horrible kitchen and then the entire manor would know about it. Twin Sisters Remodeling and Repair would quickly be junked out the window.

  I drove to Eve’s house with my lists of names and notes. It didn’t take long for me to fill her in on what I’d thought of. We agreed that the manor was the place we needed to start.

  “You look nice,” I had to say on our way outside. Her slender dress showed off her trim figure from all of her workouts and healthy meals. Her makeup and hair all looked perfect.

  “I can’t believe you didn’t tell me how awful I looked this morning.”

  I grinned at her.

  Midmorning at the retirement home was the liveliest time in the place. Everyone had gotten up early and eaten a substantial breakfast. There was still a little time before lunch—that brief time between meals when kitchen staffers would clean used items and start preparing the next dishes.

  We’d passed a handful of residents going out while we came in. Some of them may have wanted to sit awhile in the sunshine on one of the many benches. Others could go off in their cars to shop, visit friends or family, or eat out. Maybe see a dentist, a doctor, or who knows where else? We hadn’t seen anyone we wanted to speak to in that group, so we’d only exchanged greetings with individuals and moved on.

  An administrator standing behind the check-in desk eyed me and then the book we should write in and the long-tailed white pen standing in its holder. I sped my gaze away from hers and kept going.

  “There’s Mom’s group.” Eve pointed toward where they normally sat. “But Mom’s not there.”

  I didn’t want to think of where she could be.

  “Hello, you two. Your mother should be out here soon.” The speaker played with her pearls.

  One woman on the sofa and another on a loveseat that helped create this cozy seating area tapped places beside them. “Come join us. Tell us what you’ve been doing,” the one on the sofa said, and Eve and I took the seats offered.

  “And don’t leave out the juicy parts.” This came from the person we’d looked for who kept her phone in her bra, and again I was grateful I’d discovered and called in Rayne Adams’s name on my own.

  “There are no juicy parts in our lives right now,” Eve said, prompting an uninterrupted discussion from the sen
ior women.

  “We know that man you’re all hot for is still in jail, but what if he never gets out?” asked the negative Ida.

  “My son is a widow and a nice man,” a wheelchair-bound woman said.

  “No, he’s too old. How about my grandson? He likes girls…I think,” another one offered.

  “We have lots of visitors who come to this place. You should come and sit out here.” This suggestion was directed at me. “Then you could introduce yourself, start up a conversation.”

  “Just don’t get too pushy at first.” That love advice was aimed at my sister. These women knew her.

  A familiar female staff member wearing navy walked into view. She stopped to speak to a man whose lap was covered with a blanket in a wheelchair.

  “That’s a nice woman,” I said, pointing to her and interrupting some other advice aimed at Eve. “She has such an unusual name.” Yes, I was pulling for anything.

  “She does.” Ms. Grace shoved her hand down into the top of her dress. “I think I have her picture.” Her hand resembled a third boob dancing around behind those buttons. I was no longer interested in that photo.

  “But it’s a shame she has to miss so often,” another one said, this statement truly drawing my attention. “All that morning sickness she has.”

  Eve and I whipped our faces toward each other and then the last speaker. “She still has morning sickness?” Eve asked.

  “Yes, I wouldn’t say she’s a floozy or anything,” the person still digging said, “but she’s pregnant, and she’s not even married.”

  “I’ll be right back.” I rushed to the exit and got outside, my fingers locating the contact info for Detective Wilet. When he answered, I said, “She’s still pregnant.”

  “Who?”

  “Rayne Adams. This is Sunny, and I’m at the manor and just found out Rayne didn’t abort Royce’s baby. She’s still carrying it.”

  “Okay.” His hesitancy to say anything else gave me pause. What could this mean? Would this info help me? Hurt me?