by Misty Simon
I stuck to the important part. “Did you touch her when you were giving her the clothes?”
Everyone sat in complete silence for about ten seconds before all hell broke loose.
“There was a naked woman in your apartment?” That was Bella.
“No, I did not touch her, and is that really the most important part of what I just told you?” Ben.
“Of course, it’s important.” Bella. “What the hell else is there, and how did she get in if you didn’t open the door?”
“Stop it,” I said over them. When the bickering continued, and they were visually shooting darts at each other, I yelled it. “Stop it, right now! I have a headache already, and you all are making it worse.”
“See what you did,” they both said in unison. It was like yelling in bad stereo.
I jumped off the couch and managed to knock Ben back on his ass. Bella fell sideways into the cushions now that she didn’t have me to lean on anymore. I stood with my hands on my hips and glared for all I was worth. “Get out of my house.” I even pointed to emphasize my, um, point.
“Me?” Both of them, again, at the same time. I wanted to tear my hair out at the roots.
“You,” I said, using my pointing finger to aim at the man I was trying hard not to cry over, again. Like it wasn’t important that he might have touched her while handing her the clothes. How stupid was he, and why had I wasted so much time on someone who couldn’t grasp that fundamental principle? A tiny part of my brain wondered if the guy from the wedding would have understood the question. But I shut that off as hurt talking, and reminded myself that, no matter what else happened, this was only between Ben and me. I didn’t need another man clouding my head when it came to my relationship.
Ben dropped his head and ran his hand through his hair again. I knew this was his sign of frustration but couldn’t find it in myself to care. No matter if he had touched her or not, let her in or not, I needed time to figure out what was going on and where it belonged in my head.
“Please, leave.” I shoved my hands into the pockets of my dark blue cords, wishing they were brown sweatpants. “I need time.”
When he raised his eyes to mine, I could see my soul reflected there. It was torn and bloody, hurting so much it felt wrenched from my body. I sucked in a breath, determined I would not cry again, especially not with him in the house this time. But let me tell you, it was not easy at all.
“Please,” I whispered, standing before the man who’d made me so happy. He sat on his butt in my living room in the exact place where he’d held me so close when we’d watched The Lord of the Rings together. He’d put up with my rhapsodizing of Legolas and his ears, told me he’d take me over Liv Tyler any day, and made me miss the end of the movie. Of course, that was fine with me at the time, because we were doing other, more creative things.
A lone tear tracked down my cheek as he got up from the floor slowly, gracefully. He reached out one hand as if to tuck the hair behind my ear, but dropped it before it connected.
When he left, he took my heart with him. I ran to my room looking for the nearest brown thing to hold or wear or wrap myself in. I didn’t care what it was. I would have held on to a hot dog at this point, as long as it was the correct color.
Chapter Twenty-One
Bella was already in my big bedroom, sitting on the edge of the bed, waiting for me.
“I already removed all tempting brown from your drawers,” she said, plucking at my bedspread and not looking in my eyes. “I figured you’d be back here as soon as he left, looking for something to wrap your head in to shut out the world.”
That should have sounded sympathetic. And yet, the way she wouldn’t raise her eyes to mine made me feel as if I’d done something wrong. Couldn’t I get anything right these days?
“Spill it,” I said, ready for anything at this point.
“Spill what?”
“Whatever it is you think I did wrong, or messed up, or overreacted about. Say your piece, so I can lie down on my bed and die.”
She reached behind her and handed me a brown blanket, then held me as I sobbed again. Friends like Bella came along once in a lifetime. So did boyfriends like Ben, but apparently I’d missed my one chance. Would I ever be enough for someone, and not too much for others?
****
Later, much later, with my eyes nearly swollen shut and my nose so raw I barely wanted to breathe, I decided to get to the bottom of at least one of the mysteries in my life.
Determination hummed through my body as I went back to the beginning and started all over again.
“Horace,” I bellowed as I strode into Martha’s house like a Valkyrie on a mission. I must have scared him, because he came running out of the kitchen, his toupee flapping and his eyes wild.
“What, what, what!” he squawked. “What the hell is going on?”
“Get your bony ass in here and tell me everything you know.” I crossed my arms and tapped my foot on the carpeted floor. “I don’t have time for your ridiculous games anymore, nor do I have the patience. And what do you know about guns?”
He halted in the hallway, his hair standing up, and his hands on his hips. “Nothing. Never touch them. And I’ve told you everything I know. Why are you back here bothering me instead of trying to find out who’s trying to kill me?”
“I am trying, but you are making this the most difficult thing I’ve ever done, you old coot.” I stamped my foot. I’m not afraid to admit it. “You tell me you have no enemies and no leads. You are absolutely no help.” I threw my hands into the air. “I don’t know why I keep coming back to you. You are my worst nightmare.”
His lips quirked up for a second before he straightened his mouth out into a flat line. “Then I think you know what you need to do.” He had the audacity to wink at me. “You need to go back out there and figure it out. I’m sure you’re a smart girl, since Martha asked for you specifically.”
Without another word, I stomped back out of the house before I could strangle the man. Where was I going to go from here? I had no other real leads and no earthly idea what the heck I was even looking for. Crap.
****
While driving around aimlessly in my little car, I still didn’t know what to do. Normally, I would have gone to Ben and bounced ideas off him. Since that was completely not going to happen at this point, I pulled over for a few minutes and cried yet one more time. I thought I was dry as a desert in August, but apparently not. This was disgusting. I wasn’t a weeping willow. I wasn’t willowy at all.
I got myself composed, again, and took the car out of park. Who could I talk to? I saw Bella’s shop up on the left, and Jared’s name popped into my head. He was off work and at my disposal; I needed to use him and stop trying to recapture what I used to have.
I rushed over to Bella’s cottage and breathed a sigh of relief when I saw Jared’s car there. I needed some chips-and-dip therapy, and someone to kick around some theories with. That I would be able to hang out with my best friend (who gave me brown when I needed it!) in the process was a huge bonus.
I burst through the front door, thinking one second too late that I might be breaking in on a scene I did not want to see. I slammed my eyes shut, closing the door behind me. I put my hands over my face and called out in my loudest voice, “If you’re not dressed, or dressed decently, please tell me now so I can back quietly out of the house and not have to endure laser eye surgery to remove naked images from my eyeballs.”
Clacking steps on the wood floor reached my ears. I almost opened my eyes but thought at the last second I would wait for Bella to say something. She could possibly have been walking around in a pair of high heels and little else, despite how completely cold it was outside, again. Who was I to say what turned different people on?
“Oh, Ivy, take your hands off your face. I wouldn’t have left the door unlocked if we were getting it on.” She grabbed my arm and pried my hand away.
“I wasn’t sure.”
“Ye
ah, well, you never know when someone might walk in, like when you and Ben were in your shop, so I keep my door locked now when I don’t want anyone in here.”
“Even locked doors didn’t seem to work in the shoppe, but I get what you mean.”
Jared came strolling out of the back of the house with his shirt partially unbuttoned and completely untucked. His normally smooth hair stuck straight up from his head.
As I stood there with my mouth hanging open (he had a very yummy chest), Bella laughed. “We weren’t completely idle.”
Jared ran a hand over the top of his head and shot Bella a smile even I felt all the way down to my toes. My heart dropped to join the shiver when I remembered Ben and I were on the outs. I used every trick in the book to keep from crying, but I must not have done a very good job. Out of the corner of my eye I saw Bella shoo Jared out of the hallway. She led me into the living room and gave me a crocheted blanket.
“I don’t have anything brown except some Peanut Butter Tastykakes.”
I shored up my tears, straightened my back, and threw the blanket off my legs. I was not going to sink back into my melancholy. I’d made a decision to move forward and figure out what the hell was happening. I wasn’t backing down at the first sign of someone being nice to me.
However, I would be taking those Tastykakes.
****
Forty minutes later, Bella, Jared, and I were seated around the table, still trying to get down all the facts we had. There were no viable suspects at this time, but we were determined to get to the bottom of this. I’d be doing most of the work, but at this point, that felt good. I would be doing something with myself, instead of sitting here twiddling my thumbs.
“Okay, so, Bella, you overheard the caterer threatening to torture Horace as she was being tortured by his singing?” I paused with my pencil hovering over a piece of frilly paper I’d taken from Bella’s kitchen drawer. It didn’t really suit her, but she’d explained it was a late Christmas present from one of her cousins. Nice.
“Yeah, and she said he might be related to her, but that didn’t mean she’d cry at his funeral. Apparently, he was ruining the guests’ appetites.”
I snickered even though that wasn’t particularly funny if this caterer woman had tried to kill Horace. “But did she have anything against the trumpeter guy?”
Bella and Jared looked at each other. “Not that we know of,” Bella said after a moment of silent communication.
Ben and I used to have those same wavelength moments...
“All right,” I said, shaking myself out of BenLand and back to what was going on here. I needed information and I needed a place to start. The caterer seemed like the best bet to me, even if it was the only bet. I’d start there and leave these two lovebirds alone for a little while.
“I’m going to go out to see if I can get to this caterer. I’ll probably be back in about an hour.” I gave them both the eye. “Try to be fully dressed when I get back.”
Jared had the grace to blush a little, but Bella looked me right in the eye and said, “I make no promises. If the door’s locked, come back later.”
Meow!
****
I called Martha to get the name and number of the caterer. The woman happened to be in, so score one for my side. Which put me in the negative, though, because apparently this was also a relative, and a local woman at that, so minus two for me. I would have to tread lightly here and hope I didn’t offend her. When I called her she said she was available now, so I hustled tail over there.
Less than ten minutes later I was in her store, feeling toasty warm and nibbling on some of the samples left out by the receptionist. She might have been slightly misled to think I was there to hire them, as opposed to interrogate them, but it was free, warm, fragrant bread slathered with butter. To get that, I’m not above letting other people think what they want.
Mid-chomp, a stunning woman with deep red hair reaching her waist came out of a nearly hidden door from the back. At first I assumed there were offices back there, but then a whiff of something heavenly—even more heavenly than the bread—hit me square in the nose, and I was pretty sure the kitchen was hidden behind that magic door. Yum.
“Ivy Morris? I’m Rhiannon,” the stunning women said, and stuck her hand out.
I, of course, had been eating very buttery bread only a moment ago, so I had to wipe my hand on my pants before shaking, or risk greasing her up. I only hoped I hadn’t left a shiny smear on my corduroys.
“What can I do for you?” She gestured me toward a wonderfully comfortable, oversized chair in plum. She took the matching chair on the other side of a small end table and crossed her legs with a pleasant smile on her face. I really hoped that smile would stay on even after I was done asking questions. Maybe we could become good friends, and she’d make me mouth-watering desserts.
I tried to get my mind back on why I was there, but the fantastic smells filtering into the reception area were almost more than I could handle.
Reluctantly I pulled myself back to the business at hand before I started drooling on the floor. “First, before anything else, I want to tell you how fabulous I think your shop is. I could die here and be absolutely ecstatic.”
She chuckled, patting me on the arm. “I’m glad to hear it. I’m afraid I wasn’t able to be at my best at Aunt Martha’s wedding, especially with that ridiculous Horace screeching his way through his horrendous rendition of the Chicken Dance. Who ever heard of the Chicken Dance having words?” She flipped her long hair over her shoulder with disdain.
Now it was my turn to chuckle. Here was a woman after my own heart, and one who could seriously cook, if the smells emanating from the back were to be believed. “I know, I said the same thing to my friend at the reception. But I still thought your food was wonderful.”
“Well, thanks for that.” She tapped her chin with one slim finger. “But I highly doubt you made an appointment and came all the way over here just to tell me you liked what you ate. So what can I do for you?”
Since she had already kind of opened the conversation on Horace, I thought it would be a little bit easier to flow into my interrogation. Not that this was exactly going to be an interrogation, since I was already almost positive the woman in front of me wouldn’t have tried to kill Horace for being a weirdo. A little more motivation would be needed to risk everything she had built here.
“Well.” I actually scuffed the tip of my foot on her thick carpet. I didn’t even want to ask, at this point.
She flipped her hair over her shoulder again. “Let me guess. You want to know if I had something to do with the water Horace drank.”
I could not handle another psychic person in my life. Of course, it made things so much easier, because I didn’t have to ask. Sweet. I kept it simple. “Yes.”
“The thing is, I wasn’t anywhere near that glass or the water. I was trying to get one of my workers calmed down in the Barn’s kitchen, if you must know. She’d had a nasty shock earlier in the evening. I couldn’t get her to get out on the floor for a long time, and I was struggling with being one person short with such a huge party. It took a few minutes to get her evened out, and then I sent her out to serve just as someone shouted for an ambulance.”
Hmmm. Sounded good to me. But, “Any way you could tell me what the problem was with the employee?”
“I don’t think it’s a secret. It seems her husband, Nathaniel, was missing. He was the one found dead later on.”
****
Thirty minutes later, I finally managed to extract myself from Rhiannon’s shop. I’d stayed a lot longer than I needed to, since I couldn’t give up that fabulous smell just because I had some answers. I asked dozens of completely inane questions simply to stay surrounded by the smell of baking bread and a chocolate cake to die for.
I did have another name to look at, though, when I left. Rhiannon had been very forthcoming with the information, even giving me the employee’s name and address. She lived on the outskirts
of town and had been a temporary employee for the evening, to round out the normal staff. I planned to stop by her place before heading back to Bella’s.
And that would have been a good idea, too, if it hadn’t been for the way I completely got lost out on one rural route or another. There was actually a road named Dungeon’s Thicket, and I was almost positive I was never going to see the light of day again. Tall trees grew close together on either side of the narrow road, and their branches intertwined so only muted light appeared through the canopy. It was like being in a tunnel with no light in my foreseeable future.
I was stuck out in the middle of nowhere—with no bread crumbs to lead me home—and when I went to dial my cell phone I got a blinking “no service” signal.
“Okay, don’t panic, don’t panic,” I said to myself as my pulse accelerated and my breathing shortened. I had a full tank of gas, and, according to my dear deceased grandfather, that meant I wasn’t truly lost at all.
I could do this. My sense of direction might very well suck, but that didn’t mean I had to wander around aimlessly for hours. I’d just, well, I’d just turn around and go back the way I came.
I made an illegal U-turn after checking to make sure no police were around. The last thing I needed right now was to get a ticket.
Ten minutes later, I was still telling myself I could find the way back. Thumping my head on the steering wheel after I pulled over for the second time, I tried hard to keep the tears at bay. Where was my granddad now? He had the sense of direction of a bloodhound, but he was probably sniffing around up in heaven, seeking out his favorite cream-filled doughnuts. But I was stuck down here, toiling around in the dark, thinking every single tree looked exactly like the last one and not knowing where the heck I was.
Through the wavy sheen covering my eyes—I hated tears, but I was out of ways to stop the flow—a light pierced the darkness in the distance. After wandering around for so long, I was almost ready to drive straight through the forest to get there. My car wasn’t really an off-road vehicle, but I hadn’t seen any signs of civilization for at least the last fifteen minutes, and I wanted that light, no matter what it signaled.
