Jam Up and Jelly Fright

by Donna Walo Clancy

  “Seriously? You can’t spare Jen for an hour so we can catch up?” Tabby asked.

  “I said, she doesn’t have the time,” Alex stated, in a threatening voice.

  “Jen, how about it? Apple Spice coffee with your best friend?” Tabby insisted.

  “I can’t,” Jen stuttered, keeping her eyes glued to the floor.

  Alex moved closer and put his arm around Jen. She tensed up and looked like she was ready to cry. Tabby wanted to reach out and grab her away from Alex, but she was afraid of the consequences that her best friend might suffer later due to Tabby’s actions.

  “I’m not giving up. If you do the windows today, there is no reason she can’t go with me tomorrow. We have to talk about who we want to be the fourth on our bowling team this year. Linda Lee left for her new job in New York City, so we are down a bowler,” Tabby pushed.

  “Jen won’t be bowling this year. It’s a stupid waste of time, and she won’t be participating,” Alex replied, stepping forward toward Tabby, still holding on to Jen. “It looks like you will have to find two new bowlers this year.”

  “Excuse me? Jen and I have been on the same bowling team since high school. Who are you to say if she wants to bowl or not?” Tabby demanded.

  “You need to leave this store now,” Alex growled in a low, controlled tone. “And don’t come back.”

  “Just who do you think you are? What is going on around here, Jen? We are best friends. Since when does someone tell you what to do? Do you want me to leave?”

  Alex tightened his grip around Jen’s shoulders.

  “Please,” Jen whispered, not looking up.

  “This isn’t over, Alex. I don’t know who the heck you think you are coming into town and creating problems. This is so not over,” she exclaimed, storming her way toward the door. “I will be back, Jen, you can count on it.”

  Tabby ran up the street toward the flower shop crying the whole way. She burst through the front door and ran to sit next to the frog fountain. She had to calm down, and she had to think. The cascading waters of the frog fountain could help her do both. Greg dropped what he was doing and ran to her side.

  “What’s the matter? It didn’t go well at the bookstore, did it?” Greg inquired, putting his arms around her. “What happened?”

  “Somethings not right. She wouldn’t look at me, talk to me, and she was definitely afraid of him. I need to go speak to the sheriff right away. We must find out who is he and what the hold is that he has over Jen. He said she wouldn’t be bowling this year because it was a waste of time.”

  “This is not good,” Greg agreed.

  “He threatened me and told me not to come back to the bookstore.”

  Tabby took a deep breath. She didn’t want to start crying again even though she felt like her insides had been ripped out.

  “What am I going to do?” Tabby lamented.

  The door to the shop opened and in strolled Sheriff Puckett. He walked directly to Tabby and sat down next to her on the bench.

  “Two different people came to me and told me you were running up the street crying. What’s going on?” the sheriff questioned.

  “What do you know about Alex Keyes, Jen’s boyfriend?” Tabby asked.

  “Not much, he’s fairly new in town. Why?”

  “You need to use all your sources to find out about him. He’s got a hold on Jen. I don’t know if he abuses her or has threatened her or her family and friends, but something is not right.”

  Tabby went on to tell Stan what happened when she went to the bookstore. She cried several times before she could get the whole story out. The sheriff shook his head.

  “That doesn’t sound like Jen at all,” he agreed. “I’ll have to pay a visit to the bookstore and talk to her myself.”

  “He’s also alienated her from Bea. She’s not allowed to visit or even talk to her mom,” Greg added.

  “Sounds like a control issue and abuse to me. I will look into his background and let you know what I find. Tabby, as much as this kills you, you have to promise not to go back there tomorrow. If you do, he could hurt Jen. Promise me you won’t go back there until you hear from me.”

  “She’ll think I deserted her and that I don’t care about her,” Tabby replied.

  “Jen knows better than that. She knows if anyone can help her it is you. But we have to do things legally so he can’t come back on her. Understand?”

  “I’m going to go pay her a visit. I’ll call you on your cell so that Alex doesn’t see me going into your shop or you coming to my office. We WILL figure this out and help Jen, don’t you worry,” the sheriff assured the distraught girl, patting her clutched hands. “I’m going to pay Bea a visit at the diner for lunch.”

  The sheriff left. Tabby was so upset about her best friend that she completely forgot about the second reason she was going to see the sheriff. Jen’s situation was more pressing right now than a bunch of old bones. Yes, Tony’s wife had been threatened, but it still hadn’t been forty-eight hours and Tony had not got back to her yet.

  Greg moved on to the bench next to Tabby and pulled her close.

  “Jen looked so beat down…so sad,” Tabby sobbed. “She’s small in stature anyway, but it looked like she’s lost even more weight. She’s not eating, I can tell.”

  “The sheriff will find out what’s going on,” Greg said, stroking her hair gently.

  “I was so busy with the shop I didn’t even see what was happening to Jen,” Tabby whispered, tears sliding down her cheeks. “I am a lousy best friend.”

  “You can’t say that, Tabs. I was in the bookstore at least five times this summer and didn’t see what was going on. Granted, I haven’t been in there for over a month, but come to think of it, Jen was never there when I went in to get a book.”

  “That should have been a red flag right there. Jen is always in her shop,” Tabby insisted.

  “Wipe off those tears. You have to walk by the bookstore, and you don’t want Alex to see that you have been crying. He might feel threatened and take it out on Jen.”

  “I have got cooking to do. I’ll call you when I hear from Sheriff Puckett,” Tabby said, standing up and dying her face.

  “Please do. Promise me you will listen to the sheriff and stay away from the bookstore,” Greg admonished.

  “I promise. I don’t want to do anything to endanger Jen.”

  She gave Greg a quick kiss and headed for her own shop. As she passed the bookstore, she glanced in, and Jen was behind the counter staring off into space. Tabby waved to her friend. Jen looked around and not seeing Alex anywhere, she waved back. Tabby was happy to get a wave even though it wasn’t accompanied by her friend’s usual smile. She hurried on to her shop so Alex wouldn’t catch her at the front window.

  “Tony Capri was here looking for you,” Janice stated as Tabby entered through the front door. “He left his cell phone number. He’s leaving on a business trip for a few days and wanted you to call him before noon if you got back.”

  “Thanks,” Tabby said, taking the paper with the phone number on it. “I’ll call him from upstairs. You guys okay here? I need to get a few batches of jelly done, and I have to go to Mac’s and pick up the fruit that I ordered.”

  “We’re good. It’s been kind of slow today,” Janice replied.

  “Hey, boss,” Thelma said, from behind the register. “Is it okay if I don’t come in on Friday? My daughter is going to pick me up so I can spend the long weekend with the family.”

  “I forgot Monday was a holiday. Sure, go and have a great time. Say hi to Suzie for me.”

  Tabby climbed the stairs between the shop and her apartment with the two cats in tow. She sat on the floor of her kitchen, hugging Marmalade and Ghost, crying. Marmalade licked the salty tears off Tabby’s cheeks. Ghost didn’t want to be hugged and chose to sit on her lap instead.

  Memories brought back the tears. Thelma had reminded her that Monday was Labor Day. Since the girls were in high school, Tabby and Jen would
picnic on the town green to celebrate the holiday. Should she take a chance and ask about the annual picnic or would that put Jen in more danger? She decided to wait until she heard from the sheriff and ask him his advice on what she should do.

  She pulled her cell phone out of her back pocket and dialed Tony’s number. It rang several times and went to voicemail. She left a message.

  “Enough crying,” she said to the cats. “It’s time to get busy.”

  Grabbing her purse and making sure she had the store credit card in her wallet she headed out for Mac’s Market. She had ordered strawberries, blood oranges, and a variety of apples to try out her new apple butter recipe. She pulled her car up to the rear loading dock and opened her trunk.

  She entered the market, grabbed a grocery cart and started her shopping. Besides the special order of fruit, she needed to pick up several staples that she was out of at home; cat food and coffee were at the top of the list.

  Tabby didn’t notice that Gladys was watching her from the meat counter. Mac saw trouble in the making and cut Tabby off just before she turned down the aisle that led to the meat.

  “You don’t want to go up that aisle,” Mac warned. “Gladys is waiting to pounce; I can see it in her eyes.”

  “I don’t need another run-in with that woman right now,” Tabby sighed.

  “That’s what I thought, too,” Mac agreed. “Here’s your slip for the special order. Head up to the registers, and I’ll meet you out back near the loading dock. I have some new kids to introduce you to who will be delivering your larger special orders to the shop.”

  “Thanks for the warning about Gladys. I’ll see you out back,” Tabby replied.

  She paid for her groceries and just managed to get out the door avoiding Gladys who had come up front to see where she went. As she reached her car, Mac and three college-aged guys were loading the fruit into her trunk.

  “Tabby, this is Angelo, Gage, and Anson. They are attending college at Larsen Community, and the college was looking for places to put students up for the coming year. The Mrs. and I figured we had that huge apartment over the garage that our son used to live in, so we offered it up for housing. They will be working here part-time while they go to school,” Mac announced.

  “Hello,” she said, smiling.

  They all smiled and said hello. Tabby thought they all seemed like pleasant, respectable kids. It wasn’t too long ago that she was still in college and struggling for every buck she could get. At least they had a decent place to live while they went to school. Tabby, who couldn’t afford the expense of living in the dorms, had a dingy little apartment, two blocks from the school, in the worst neighborhood you could be in as a young woman.

  “Thanks again, Mac, for running interference. I have to run; lots of cooking to do,” Tabby said, climbing into her car. “Nice to meet you guys and good luck in school.”

  The next two hours were spent cooking. Tabby kept looking at the clock above the stove. Why hadn’t the sheriff called? It was well into the afternoon, and he should have had plenty of time to visit both the bookstore and Bea at the diner. There was a knock at the apartment door.

  “Tabby, Sheriff’s downstairs to see you,” Janice said through the door.

  “I’ll be right down.”

  Sheriff Puckett was leaning against the counter with a cup of coffee in his hand.

  “I thought you were going to call me so you wouldn’t be seen coming in here?” Tabby questioned when she got closer.

  “I was. But, the more I thought about it I changed my mind. I come in here almost every day for a cup of coffee. This is normal for me, and I don’t want to change the norm,” he said, picking up a piece of sample maple sugar candy that Tabby had just started to carry in the shop.

  “Make’s sense,” she agreed. “So, what did you find out?”

  “You were right. I couldn’t find anything in our system regarding Alex Keyes. It’s like he doesn’t exist.”

  “That’s got to say something in itself. Did you go to the bookstore?”

  “Yes, I did. Alex was the only one there. I asked to speak to Jen directly. He told me she wasn’t feeling well, so she went upstairs to lay down. He asked if he could help with something. I told him I needed to speak to Jen about her yearly donation to the Children’s Christmas Party and that I would be back to talk to her within the week.”

  “What did he say?”

  “He said the store wasn’t doing as good as it had in previous years and he didn’t think Jen would be donating anything this year.”

  “Well, you know that’s a crock because her bookstore is doing awesome. She doesn’t even pay a monthly mortgage since Mr. Wells gifted her the building. What is he up to?”

  “I don’t know. I am going back there tomorrow to talk to Jen. I did talk to Bea at lunch. Both your stories are the same. She’s afraid for her daughter’s life.”

  “I don’t like this,” Tabby muttered, slamming her fist on the register counter.

  “I don’t either,” the kindly sheriff said. “I need to find out a lot more about Alex Keyes background. I’m going to refill my coffee and get back out on the streets. I’ll be walking by Jen’s store a lot more than usual, believe me.”

  Tabby followed him to the back room.

  “Sheriff, I have something else I need to address with you. But I promised the other person involved that I would give him forty-eight hours to decide what to do,” Tabby commented.

  “You are a busy person,” he chuckled. “Another mystery?”

  “Yes, I think so, but I think this one happened a while ago. I haven’t got all the facts yet,” Tabby replied, pouring herself a cup of coffee. “The cut-off date for him to call me back is tonight. If he doesn’t, I’ll be in to see you tomorrow.”

  “Okay. I meant what I said. I don’t like this Alex character. Don’t go back there until I say so,” he instructed.

  “I should tell you that when I was walking back to my shop from the flower shop, I passed the bookstore. As I looked in the window, Jen appeared to be alone. I waved to her. She looked around to make sure Alex wasn’t there to see her, and she waved back. No smile, but she waved to me.”

  “She’s afraid, and I think she has a right to be. We’ll get to the bottom of this and quickly,” Stan insisted. “I’ll call you.”

  Tabby returned to the task of making her jelly. She was extending her edible line with new pumpkin butter and apple butter that she wanted to have in store for fall sales. Biscuits also needed to be made as the shelf was almost empty downstairs. As much as she tried, she couldn’t get her mind off her best friend. As a result, she lost a whole batch of biscuits that burned to a crisp as she sat lost in thought.

  Smoke filled the upstairs apartment when she opened the stove door. The smoke detector went off. Janice came running up the adjoining stairs from the shop.

  “Tabby! Are you okay?” she yelled, banging on the door.

  “Come in, I’m fine. Just a stupid case of daydreaming and I let the biscuits burn,” Tabby stated, waving a towel in the air near the smoke detector to disperse the smoke. “Can you open the front windows, please?”

  Janice opened the windows as wide as they would go. Tabby brought a fan out of the second bedroom to help the smoke find its way out of the apartment. The alarm stopped screeching, and Tabby went in search for the cats who had taken off for the back bedroom when the alarm sounded. They were both hiding under the bed, snuggled together, quivering.

  “Did you find them?” Janice called out.

  “Yes. They’re okay, just scared,” Tabby answered, trying to coax the cats out from under the bed.

  “Everything okay up there?” the elderly cashier yelled from the shop.

  “Go ahead back down to the shop with Thelma. It may take me a while to get the cats to come out,” Tabby called to Janice from the bedroom.

  Janice told the customers in the shop everything was fine and there was no danger. In the middle of her explanation, Greg came runn
ing into the shop. Out of breath from running the whole length of Main Street, he looked around for Tabby, panic in his eyes.

  “Why… was the alarm… going off? Where… is Tabby?” he managed to get out in between deep breaths.

  “Man, oh man, calm down. She burnt a batch of biscuits,” Janice commented.

  “Young people…” Thelma sighed, walking into the back room.

  “Gladys ran into the flower shop and said the alarm was going off and the building was on fire,” Greg replied, calming down.

  “And you believed her? Come on, it’s Gladys,” Janice said, laughing. “You know, The Town Mouth?”

  “I know, duh. I could kill that woman sometimes,” Greg chuckled. “Where is Tabby?”

  “She’s upstairs calming down the cats. They didn’t like the screech of the smoke alarm very much.”

  “Thanks,” Greg said, heading up the stairs.

  “Tabby?”

  “Back here in the bedroom.”

  Greg walked into the room to find his girlfriend sitting on the floor holding Marmalade.

  “I can’t get Ghost to come out. He’s still under the bed.”

  “Leave it to me. He likes me better anyway,” Greg teased, smiling as he knelt at the end of the bed.

  Tabby swatted at Greg’s leg, but she knew what he was saying was the truth. Ghost did like Greg better than her, and the cat made it very obvious when they were all together in a room. He always went to Greg for rubs and snuggling. Ghost very rarely came to Tabby for anything but food.

  “Hey, buddy. What’s up? Come on out and see me,” Greg coaxed, lifting the edge of the quilt. “Come on.”

  Immediately, the cat got up and walked to Greg. He picked up the cat, rubbing his ears and talking softly to him. The cat settled into the crock of his best friend’s arm and began purring. Greg made his ‘I told you so face’ and walked toward the living room.

  Tabby watched them walk away. Not only was Greg gorgeous, generous, and loving, but he also had a soft place in his heart for animals. They had been dating for only a short time, and she still hadn’t found a thing wrong with him. He was almost perfect which made him almost scary. She got off the floor and Marmalade followed her to the living room.