by Tegan Maher
"And if that's the case," Gabe said, "we'll clear her. Toni just told me what you've asked her to do, and I'm okay with it. She's got a solid head on her shoulders, and I'm not so proud that I won't consider ideas other than my own. In this case, two heads may be better than one."
"I'm glad to hear that, Sheriff," Stevie said. "Now, if you'll all excuse me, I have to go for a dress fitting. I guess it's a good thing I'm not a stress eater."
Once she was outside, Dee plopped down in a chair and turned to Gabe. "So I'm glad you two are playing nice. Stevie put Toni in a rough spot and didn't leave her much room to say no."
Gabe inclined his head. "I pretty much figured that's how it went down. To be honest, I'm not gonna say I love the idea, but I don't hate it as much as I would have a few months ago, either."
"Yeah, I'm not particularly tickled about it," I said, closing my laptop. "I have a wedding to prepare for. I don't even know what sorts of food she wants. I called both caterers in town and both of them are booked this weekend, so that leaves it to me. Now all I have to do is prove that the one person I think is guilty, isn't. No pressure."
Gabe huffed a breath out his nose. "Welcome to my world."
"Thanks," I replied, chagrined. "But don't make tea. I'm not staying."
CHAPTER SEVEN
I RAN DOWN TO THE PARTY supply and crafts stores to find as many wedding decorations as I could scare up. Paper wedding bells, confetti, netting to put the birdseed in, ribbon, streamers, balloons, gift bags, whatever I could find that may be useful for making an old lodge look like a wedding venue.
On the way home, I decided to stop at the bar to say hi to Annie and ask her about helping us decorate. Strictly speaking, I could have texted her, but the idea of a cold beer and a dark environment wasn't exactly unappealing to me at that point.
"Hey, girl!" she said when I walked in. She rushed around the end of the bar and scooped me into a hug, then pushed me back to look me in the face. "I hear you had a big day. You okay?"
I bobbed my head side to side. "All things considered, I suppose I am. A cold one will help me on my way, though."
"It sure can't hurt," she said, going back around to the taps. She poured me an IPA and plopped it down on a coaster in front of me. "Was it as awful as it sounded?"
"Worse," I said, taking a long pull from my glass. "I mean, I know it's not the first body I've found, but I didn't know the others. Charlie was a friend."
"I know, sweetie," she said, reaching over to squeeze my hand. "Is there anything I can do?"
"Nah," I said, shaking my head. "Though there is something else I need your help with, if you're willing."
I knew for a fact decorating for a wedding was above and beyond my remedial skill set. That had become painfully obvious when I was shopping for supplies. I could set it up, but Annie would make it awesome, and she could use the extra money, to boot. Since Amelia had doubled the payment, I could afford to pay her a nice chunk to do it.
"Whatever you need, sugar."
"I need the lodge decorated for a wedding."
She paused, bar towel midair, and shot me a quizzical look. "Come again? I know you and Scout have moved to the next level, but I'm pretty sure you're not skippin' ahead that far yet."
I gave her a half smile. "No, you're right there. I just got out of one marriage. I'm not ready to jump into another one, thank you very much. No, somebody hired us to hold a wedding at the lodge."
"Oh," she said, her face splitting into a grin. "That's awesome! The lodge is gonna be an amazing venue when you get it finished. When's the wedding? When the time comes, I'd love to help decorate it."
Her eyes took on a faraway look, the one I'd come to connect to her mind's eye kicking in. The woman was truly an artist.
"I can see it all. When Maisey's garden's done, it'll make an amazing place for a reception, or even the ceremony. Or you could hold it in the great room in front of that monster fireplace once you get it refaced. Are you looking at a Christmas wedding? Spring?"
She looked at me, expectant. "Please tell me it's a Christmas wedding. I can see it now—twinkle lights everywhere, mistletoe and holly, candles glimmering off the glitter in the wreaths ..."
I shook my head and ran my tongue over my teeth to keep from smiling. At this point, I'd take my kicks where I could get them. Annie was a planner. This was gonna updump her apple cart in a big way. "Nope, sorry. Not Christmas. A Sunday wedding."
"Okay," she said, nonplussed. "There are Sundays in every season. I'm gonna need a little more to go on."
"Sunday as in three days from now."
"Shut up!" she exclaimed, brows drawn. "No way we can pull a wedding off in three days."
She narrowed her eyes and rubbed her chin. "Tell me this isn't the Pennington/Michaels wedding."
"I could, but I'd be lying."
"You gotta be kiddin' me."
"Serious as a heart attack," I said, raising my right hand in oath.
Her expression went from surprise to thoughtful. "What's your budget?"
"A lot," I replied. "How does two thousand dollars sound?"
She puckered her lips and pushed them to the side. "I could probably do it for that, but it'd be close."
"No, I mean that's what I can afford to pay you to design it. I can probably give you another three grand for supplies."
Her eyes grew round. "Two grand, plus a huge supply budget?"
"Yeah," I said. "And I can get you a couple sets of hands, too, once you decide what needs to be done. Honestly, I don't know jack about decorating for a wedding. I did get you some of those crepe-paper bells that unfold, and I got some streamers and ribbon."
She laughed. "Oh, sweetie. You're so cute."
She pulled her phone out of her pocket and speed dialed someone. I tilted my head, wondering why she'd stopped mid-conversation to make a phone call.
"Uncle Don?" she said after a few seconds. "Is there any way you can get that new bartender started tomorrow night instead of Monday?"
After a brief pause, she explained the situation, then nodded while he spoke. "Of course. And I'll owe you big." She smiled while he responded. "I love you too," she said, then ended the call.
"Aw, man," I said. "I don't wanna mess with his fishin' trip. He's been looking forward to his friends visiting for two months. Now I feel awful."
"Don't," she replied, tossing the towel down. "Their granddaughter went into labor with their first great-grand, so they postponed. He'd already planned to start training a new girl this weekend, so we're all good."
The timer on the fryer in the kitchen went off, and she swore. "I forgot about Ms. Archer's wings! I'll be right back."
While she was in the kitchen, an older lady came in and pulled herself onto one of the bar stools. She and her husband were regulars at the bar, but she didn't usually get take-out.
"Hey, Ms. Archer," I said, "Everything okay?"
"Oh, hi, Toni. Everything's fine with me. Stanley's having some friends over for Thursday night football and I figured I'd grab some wings for them." Her brown eyes filled with concern. "The question is—are you all right?"
The blessing and bane of small-town living. Everybody know everything. "Yeah, I guess. It wasn't my best day, but I'm muddling through."
She patted me on the arm. "Well if you need anything at all, just let me know."
"Thanks, Ms. Archer. Do you want a beer while you wait?" She did love a good red-eye—draft beer with a shot of tomato juice and salt in it. As a matter of fact, she and her husband had turned me onto it, though I had to use domestic for it. I couldn't bring myself to do that to a good craft beer. Guilty pleasures.
"That would be lovely."
I hopped off my stool and slid around behind the bar to pour her beer.
"It's a real shame about Charlie," she said, pulling her ginormous little-old-lady bag onto the bar. "He was a good man."
"He was," I said, pulling the juice from the cooler and adding a little to her beer.
"You know who I think did it?" she asked after looking over her shoulder to make sure we were alone.
I knew I had my suspect, but I wasn't willing to share. As a matter of fact, I couldn't believe word hadn't already spread about Ms. Pennington being in jail. Ms. Archer was awesome, but telling her something was akin to blasting it over a community PA system.
"Who?" I asked, handing her the glass.
"I know they have that Pennington woman in jail," she said, restoring my shaken faith in the gossip tree, "but I think they're wrong. I met her. She's more of a shooter. Or maybe a poisoner. But I guarantee she didn't kill Charlie with one of his own pots."
I raised a brow at her. "Do tell."
She waved a hand as she took a drink and liked the pink-tinged beer foam off her upper lip. "You know her type. Fancy clothes and manicure. She's not gonna mess that up by picking up something dirty, let alone bashin' somebody in the head with it. Nah. It was definitely Kristina Bell."
"You mean Jack Bell's daughter?" I asked. Jack owned the farm supply store, and they were the only Bell family I'd heard of.
Ms. Archer shook her head. "No, his niece. She just moved back here from somewhere up north and is tryin' to get her own flower shop goin'. The problem is, she's tryin' to make it one of them boutique places that charges a fortune for everything. I heard she was tryin' to get Charlie to up his prices, or else retire so she'd have the corner on the market. She supposedly had a meeting with him that day, but he'd already told her no twice."
"So you think she'd kill him for that?"
She looked at me out of the corner of her eye. "That whole family's a brick or two shy of an outhouse. Why, the boys used to duke it out over who got to ride shotgun on the way to town. Ran around like heathens, they did."
She clucked with just the right amount of outrage, then took a sip of her beer. "Their daddy was a drunk and their mama just didn't have the backbone it took to control three unruly boys. They each came into some money when their daddy's liver finally gave out, but the boys burned through theirs."
"Yeah," Annie said, catching the tail end of the conversation as she brought a plastic bag stuffed with three to-go containers from the kitchen. "But Kristina isn't like the rest of them. I went to school with her. She was brassy, but didn't have the mean streak the boys did."
The smell of vinegar and hot sauce wafted from Ms. Archer's bag, making my mouth water and kidnapping my ability to focus on anything other than my rumbling stomach. With all the fuss, I hadn't stopped to eat.
Annie winked at me and slid a plate of crispy, saucy wings—all flats—in front of me, complete with blue cheese and celery. "You look like a strong wind could blow you over. Eat."
I grinned. "Funny, the chief said the exact same thing." My stomach flip-flopped as I recalled exactly why he'd said that, and suddenly the wings didn't smell so good anymore.
My friend glared at me. "I know what you just did, and stop it. You gotta eat. I know it's hard, but push it from your mind."
"Yes," Ms. Archer said, nodding her head so that her beehive bobbled. She reached over and patted me on the arm. "Feed your body, or else your noggin won't have the energy it needs to process and get you over the hump."
I took a deep breath and tucked in. Within two bites, my stomach booted my brain out of the way and took over.
"Atta girl," Ms. Archer said, digging some cash from her purse and plunking it down on the bar. "You gotta take care of yourself. You're too skinny. All these magazine ads show them airbrushed women who live off two pieces of lettuce and that weird cucumber water, but ask any man, and he'll tell you he likes a girl with a little meat on her. Or at least a girl who's not so hung up on her weight that she won't dig into a good meal with him."
"I agree," Annie said, reaching across the bar and plucking a wing off my plate.
"It's been a pleasure, ladies," Ms. Archer said, sliding off the stool and heaving her purse off the bar, "but I got four hungry men at the house waitin' for me. Not the crowd you wanna keep waitin'. They're probably already settin' beers on my coffee table without usin' coasters, so I better get back."
She turned to me after she pulled her to-go bag off the bar. "You mark my words—Kristina Bell done it."
"You might be right," I said, for lack of anything better to say. "It was nice to see you again."
After the door closed, I turned to Annie. "Okay, I forgot to tell you—Stevie Pennington asked me to clear her mama's name, and Gabe is okay with it."
"Wait, what?" Annie said, a piece of celery halfway to her mouth.
I nodded. "You heard right. She didn't really leave me any way to say no. So on top of planning her wedding, I gotta keep her mama out of jail, too."
"Jeez," she said, biting off a chunk of celery. "No pressure."
She looked around the bar. "I'm gonna give this place another hour just so we're not closing down too early, then I'm callin' it a night. There's not enough business to keep the lights on, and I wanna get an early start in the morning. As soon as the kids are in school and daycare, I'm going supply shopping."
We spent the next hour planning—well, she used me more as a sounding board to get her creative juices flowing than anything else—and by the time I left, she had a decent idea of what she wanted to do, as well as a list of what she'd need to get started.
She was in her element, and I was relieved to have that end of things off my list so I could focus on the food.
"If it's okay with you, I already know who I want to hire to help me," she said.
"Fine with me," I replied. "I'm officially handing the whole design end of the shebang off to you. Do what you do." I handed her a credit card. "I picked up the first half of the payment earlier, but I haven't deposited it yet. Just put the supplies on that, and I'll give you your fee in the morning when you come out."
She took the card, her eyes twinkling. "You have no idea how excited I am right now."
I smiled and gave her a hug. "And you have no idea how grateful I am to have you. If I'd have done it, they'd have had flowers, some streamers, and paper bells, and that would have been the extent of it." I paused. "Speaking of, where are you going to get the flowers from?"
She furrowed her brow. "I hadn't thought of that. I guess I'll contact Charlie's nephew. I know he works out there sometimes. Maybe he'll be willing to help us out, though I'll feel kind of insensitive asking."
"That's up to you," I said.
Sighing, she said, "Not really. We don't have much of a choice. I mean, we don't have any other place to go. We could maybe hire them done by a florist in one of the towns near us, but that would be crazy expensive. I stopped to pick up a little thank-you bouquet at one of them the last time I went shopping, and just a little live arrangement was thirty bucks. It'd cost a fortune to get enough for an entire wedding."
My ears popped as Ms. Maisey popped in beside me.
"You okay?" she asked.
I cast her a quizzical look. "Yeah, why?"
"You been gone awhile. Me and Dee were startin' to worry and you didn't answer your texts."
Warmth flushed through me. I still wasn't used to having people care about me, but it was a feeling I could get used to. I pulled out my phone and cringed when I saw three missed calls and a dozen texts.
"I'm sorry. Somehow, I must have muted it. Annie and I were just going over wedding stuff. She's gonna do all the decorating and arranging, but we just realized the only affordable flower place in town is probably gonna be closed.
She rubbed her chin. "I don't know what the big problem is. You have an entire garden full of every kind of rose you could possibly ask for right in your own backyard."
I hadn't even thought of that, mostly because I considered that her private space. I enjoyed going out there, but would never have dreamed of trimming more than a small vase's worth of flowers off.
"Yeah," she said, "and you've got the carnation and snowball bushes out front. Every one of 'em produced a nice fall bloom this year. And the wi
steria, too."
"Ooh," Annie said. "You're right. But ... you're sure you don't mind us cutting your roses?"
She waved a translucent hand. "Sugar, those roses were planted with the sole purpose of makin' me happy, and I can't think of anything that would tickle me more than to see a bride carryin' em down the aisle. Sides," she continued, clearing her throat, "those bushes are bloomin' so well that you can still have the reception in the garden and nobody'll even notice any missin'."
"But the garden is only about two-thirds finished," I said.
She gave me a wink and a wily smile. "Today, maybe. I'm thinkin' with a few extra sets of hands paid for with that chunk of change you just got, it could be set to rights in a coupla days."
I raised a brow at her. She was precious about those plants, and even managed me and Scout with an iron fist when we were working back there. To be fair, I got it. Many of those bushes were unique, imported from all sorts of exotic places, and they were gifts from her husband, who'd apparently gone into the light.
"You mean to tell me you're willin' to let strangers come in and mess with your garden?"
She lifted a shimmering shoulder. "I'm willin' to recognize a gift horse without lookin' him in the mouth. Sides, you and Scout got most of the delicate parts done, and he can oversee the rest of the trimming. I'll be there to make sure it's done right. Now it's more a matter of fixin' the pavers and gettin' the fountain clean and in workin' order."
"She's got a point," Annie said, and I could see her gears turning. We'd been working on it for months and had it to the point where it's original grandeur was starting to shine through. With the finishing touches, it would be a show-stopper.
"It looks like I need to call Scout and tell him we're gonna need a few extra hands," I said, and Maisey's face lit up like I'd just told her she'd won the lotto. That alone was worth it to me.
CHAPTER EIGHT
BY THE TIME I GOT BACK, it was almost nine o'clock and I was whipped. Still, I needed to at least get a start on things, so I made little sachets of birdseed while Dee decorated her cake.
