A Flock and a Fluke (Clucks and Clues Cozy Mysteries)

by Hillary Avis

  “No, no.” Cal motioned me back in. I shot Preston and Eli an apologetic look and made my way to Cal’s desk.

  “I’d like to have a booth to sell my eggs at the farmers market next week,” I explained quickly, feeling stupid for broaching such a lightweight subject when he was coping with such emotional circumstances. “Doc won’t issue me a permit unless you also agree.”

  “Fine, I agree,” Cal said, nodding. “I’ll give Doc a call and let him know. I need to call him, anyway, to see if he’ll perform Amelia’s service.”

  I swallowed hard. “Thank you.”

  “I advise against it,” Preston snapped, joining me at the desk. “You’re making the decision off the cuff, Cal—there may be consequences that you can’t anticipate until you’re in the mayor’s seat. You don’t want to make a campaign promise that you can’t keep once you’re in office.”

  Cal’s forehead creased with bewilderment. “It’s a farmers market booth, not a tax levy. I hardly think I’ll regret the decision.”

  “Hmph.” Preston’s face twisted sourly.

  “It’s fine if it’s temporary,” I assured Cal. “You can revoke it any time if you get elected.”

  “When he gets elected,” Preston said firmly. “He’s the only real choice on the ballot. I’m just saying that you may wish to balance the needs of other businesses in town. You don’t want to put all your eggs in one basket. What if Ray”—he meant the owner of the grocery store—“objects to someone selling eggs across the street and pulls support from your campaign?”

  “It’s only one day a week. I’d like to think Ray is more reasonable than that.” A hint of irritation crept into Cal’s tone, and his expression grew sulky. “I think all Honeytree businesses are valuable, not just the biggest one!”

  “Ray’s is hardly the biggest! There’s the sawmill, the RV factory, all the logging outfits—heck, Doc’s pharmacy is probably up there.” Preston went on a bender, naming all the businesses in town. He was wrong about a lot of them—Doc’s for sure. From what Doc had said, his business was pretty small. “We need their financial support to do one last ad push this week if we’re going to capitalize on the sympathy for Amelia!”

  I gasped aloud. I couldn’t help it. It seemed that Cal really was using his wife’s death as a strategy to win the election. Of course, I’d heard it before. Margie had said the same thing, but I thought that was just part of her power-hungry delusions. But this time it was straight out of his campaign manager’s mouth.

  Cal’s pale complexion reddened. “You should rephrase that,” he said to Preston with a warning edge to his tone. He stood, and somehow the height difference between them grew. Cal practically towered over Preston. He looked angry—but whether because Preston had exposed him or offended him, I couldn’t tell. All I knew was that Amelia’s death and Margie’s almost-death were pretty darn convenient for Cal. His illicit non-marriage to Amelia was no longer an issue now that she was dead, and the woman who knew his secret and was unethical enough to spread it around was silenced—at least temporarily.

  “What about when Margie gets better?” I blurted out. “Even if you win, she might still talk—despite your attempts at blackmail.”

  Preston and Cal both turned to stare at me, and I quailed, shuffling backward until I bumped into Eli, who I’d forgotten was even there. I relaxed against him, relieved to have the sheriff literally standing behind me. Because it wasn’t until that moment, with both of them looking at me with anger in their eyes, that I realized someone else knew Cal’s secret—I did. And if this was a secret worth killing for, then maybe I was next in line.

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Cal said, never taking his gaze off me.

  “Drop it, Leona,” Eli said through his teeth behind me, the way he’d say it to a dog who’d gotten ahold of something it shouldn’t. Of course, I ignored him.

  “At the Scramble meeting on Saturday—” I began. I broke off when pain flashed cross Cal’s face, his forehead creased and eyelids crushed shut as he recalled that morning. But he couldn’t use Amelia’s death to manipulate me the way he was using it to manipulate the election. “You told Margie and Doc that you’d turn them in for a HIPAA violation if rumors about you and Amelia got out. You blackmailed them into silence for saying something true, all because you were so desperate to win the election.”

  “No, I didn’t.” Cal shook his head. “Amelia and I were going to pull out altogether. We just wanted to wait until Sunday to make the announcement, so we could tell our congregation first. That’s all we were asking for—a little grace.”

  “You yelled at them!” I insisted, remembering Doc’s version of events. “You bullied them right out of the room. Amelia jumped up to get coffee just to defuse the tension, remember? And that’s the coffee that killed her.”

  “Leona—” Eli’s voice warned behind me.

  Cal stumbled backward, clutching the edge of his desk for balance. “No—that didn’t happen. I was there. I never raised my voice, not once.”

  I couldn’t believe he was lying outright. I put my hands on my hips. “Are you calling Doc Morrow a liar? He said there was so much screaming, he and Marge left the meeting!”

  “It wasn’t him. He didn’t yell.” Preston set his jaw, stepping between me and Cal. “It was me. He wasn’t in the room. He stepped out for a moment.”

  Right. How convenient. I rolled my eyes.

  “What?” Cal sank down in his seat. “I don’t remember leaving the meeting except to...” His voice trailed off as realization dawned in his eyes and he ran his tongue over his teeth. “My whitening strips. I ducked into the bathroom to take them off. When I got back, Margie and Doc had left. I thought they were just eager to get going on their Scramble duties.” He shook his head and glared at Preston. “You should have told me.”

  “I took care of the problem,” Preston said calmly, smoothing the lapels of his crisp navy suit. He’d recovered his composure. “I didn’t think it’d come up again.”

  “There was no problem to take care of, though!” I said hotly. “Cal and Amelia planned to quit the campaign. He had already decided that lying about their marriage wasn’t worth it. What gave you the right to lay into the Morrows on his behalf?” I made eye contact with Cal, who was sitting there in his fancy pastor’s chair looking paralyzed as he glanced between me and Preston. “Is this the kind of person you want working for you?”

  Before Cal could answer, Preston snapped back at me. “That’s enough! It’s my job to insulate him from nonsense, and right now, that nonsense is you. Sheriff, will you please escort her out?”

  My mouth fell open. Escorted out by the sheriff? Really? He couldn’t just nicely ask me to leave? I turned and shook my head at Eli. “Oh, no. I don’t need escorting.”

  Preston’s lip curled. “I think you do.”

  “Just come on,” Eli murmured in my ear and took my elbow.

  I shot him an irritated look, but I grudgingly allowed him to guide me through the sanctuary toward the exit. “He could have just nicely asked me to leave.”

  Eli snorted as he held the front door open for me. “I doubt that would have worked. You were on a roll, and I know how you get when you’re on a roll. You’re like a lion running down an antelope.”

  I made a face at him. I really didn’t appreciate the lion comment, given my hair situation.

  “But listen”—he let the door fall shut—“I really think you should let this poor man have some peace. Whatever lies he told about his marriage, whatever ways he wronged Doc and Margie...even pastors make mistakes. He’s paid the highest price for them, already. Badgering him about it won’t solve anything.”

  “It might solve a murder,” I muttered.

  “For the last time, there was no murder!” Eli ran his hands through his hair frustratedly. Now who looked like a lion? “Stop worrying about it. You should be worrying about yourself instead. You realize you blew your chances at that farmers market booth in there,
right?”

  To be honest, I’d kind of forgotten about the booth. “You don’t think he’ll call Doc for me?”

  “Not after that performance!” Eli shook his head disbelievingly. “You need to chill out, wait until Cal is elected, and then appeal to him again. Apologize. Kiss his beatific buns. And then maybe you have a chance at gaining his approval.”

  Nausea swirled in my stomach at the thought of groveling at Pastor Cal’s feet. I quit groveling a year ago when I walked out of my marriage. Thirty years of groveling for my ex-husband’s approval were enough for me. And here was Eli, a man telling me to fluff another man’s tailfeathers so I could maybe achieve my dreams? No way—if a man was standing in the way of my dreams, I was either mowing him down or dreaming up something even better.

  “You’re an idiot!” I snapped. “You’re eating up Cal Goodbody’s lies like a baby drinks milk. He’s willing to do anything to win this election, and it’s no coincidence that two powerful women have been taken down in the last week. Did you know that the peanut-poisoned doughnut Margie ate came from the church, too? Did you?”

  By the look of his face, Eli didn’t. I leaned in, my voice pitched high with emotion. “That man, the one you’re treating like he already won the election, he gave a whole box of them to Doc. And Amelia died because she drank coffee here. You’re letting a husband get away with the murder of his wife. You’re letting a candidate get away with the attempted murder of his political rival. You’re failing this whole town, Eli, because you don’t want to make waves and lose your precious reputation with the powers-that-might-be. Well, I’m willing to lose it all. I’m willing to lose everything—my livelihood, my farm, even my friends. I’m definitely not going to put my head down low enough to get cheeky with Cal, as you so stupidly suggest.”

  Eli set his jaw, his eyes blazing so hot it almost seemed like sparks were flying out of them. “Leona—I don’t think you mean that.”

  “Oh, I assure you, I do.” I crossed my arms, daring him to contradict me. He wasn’t the only one with fire inside. “And I’m going to let as many people know as I can.”

  “Fine, go tell Irene and Tammy all about it. Make your bed with the conspiracy theorists and gossips,” he snapped. “See how far it gets you. But don’t besmirch the sheriff’s office because I refuse to play dirty. It’s not a failure, it’s a choice.” He turned his back on me and walked away, headed to his SUV.

  I wasn’t done hollering at him, so I followed him to his car. “Don’t walk away from me! You need a thicker skin if you’re going to work with the public every day.”

  “You’re not public. And you’re already under my skin, Leona.” He jerked open the driver’s door. “You’re always saying you need space, right? Well, here’s some space.”

  Then he slammed the door in my face and drove away.

  Chapter 23

  I sped home in a haze of anger, barely enjoying the way the Porsche handled the Curves. Half of me was angry with Eli for being so weak. He couldn’t even answer to me. He didn’t have an excuse for his so-called choice to do nothing in the face of Cal’s lies. He just walked away.

  The other half of me was angry with myself for sabotaging pretty much everything in my life. I could have at least gotten the motherclucking farmers market permit before I accused people of heinous crimes. And I could have maybe not been quite so rude to Eli. I didn’t regret speaking my mind, but I did regret a few of the words I’d chosen. Namely, “idiot” and “stupid.” He was neither of those things. And he was probably never going to speak to me again.

  At least I still had Ruth. If I had her friendship, that was enough.

  By the time I hit the Flats my boiling anger had settled into a simmer and I was able to actually relax a little and appreciate the wide-open feel of the sky above the valley floor as my little car zipped along. I shook out my lion’s mane to its full glory and basked in the midday sun.

  The white for-sale placard swung in front of the blueberry farm and caught my eye as I drove by. I’d been there when Ruth put it up last fall. I’d helped dig the post hole for it, so I knew it was the type with a slot on top where the for-sale notice could be swapped out for a “sale pending” and then a “sold.” But it didn’t say “pending” now. It still just said “for sale.”

  That was odd. Ruth usually put up a pending sign as soon as the ink was dry on the paperwork. Maybe Jam and Jelly’s offer had fallen through. My heart sank as I drove up to my cottage and parked near the porch. My flock scrambled to watch me get out of the car, hoping I had treats for them, but I ignored them and sank down on the porch chair to call the salon.

  “Do or Dye,” Ruth answered.

  “Why isn’t there a pending sign up next door?” I demanded.

  “No ‘hi, how are you?’” Ruth sounded amused, but I wasn’t.

  “Did those Californians punk out on the deal? I swear, I’ll hunt them down and force-feed them non-organic foods until they make good on their offer if you need me to.”

  She chuckled. “Not exactly.” The way she said it made my Ruth-radar tingle.

  “What do you mean, not exactly?” I asked, a dark suspicion roiling in my chest.

  “I may have reminded them about the murder that happened there before they signed the paperwork,” she said breezily, confirming my worst fears. I guess I wasn’t the only one who self-sabotaged. “They decided to keep looking.”

  “You didn’t! Why, Ruth?”

  She sniffed primly. “Disclosure is required by law.”

  Disclosure was one thing. I was pretty sure harping on it was another. “You promised you’d make the sale. That was our deal!”

  “You promised you’d get a farmers market permit,” she said archly. “Do you have one?”

  “No—but you didn’t know that when you made sure Jam and Jelly would walk away from the deal.”

  Ruth snickered and a growl escaped my throat. “Sorry. Those nicknames still make me giggle.”

  “Be serious! How are you going to pay your mortgages this month without the sale?”

  The smile left her voice. “I’ll figure it out. I always do. I have my fingers crossed that something will pop on the market in the next twenty-four hours so I can show them before they head back home.”

  “That’s your plan? Cross your fingers and hope?” I stood up and paced up and down the porch, panic screaming through my veins.

  “Do you have a better one?” she asked, stopping me in my tracks.

  I didn’t. In fact, “cross my fingers and hope” was pretty much my plan at this point, too. What was I thinking? If anyone was a stupid idiot in the town of Honeytree, it was me. “Are they staying at the Stagecoach?” I named the only motel in Honeytree.

  “No, Ermengarde’s B&B in Duma,” Ruth said absentmindedly. “You’re not going to—”

  I hung up on her and dashed for the driveway. I glanced between my Porsche and the Suburban for only a split-second before I chose the little convertible. I needed the speed. With only a ten- or fifteen-minute head start, I needed every spare second to convince Jam and Jelly to put in an offer before Ruth showed up to kill the deal.

  I might sabotage my own life, but I’d be fully plucked before I’d let Ruth sabotage hers. I gripped the wheel so tight my knuckles turned white and floored it all the way to Duma.

  Lucky me, Jam and Jelly were enjoying the porch rockers on Ermengarde’s pink Queen Anne when I pulled up. Good, I didn’t have to waste any time on small talk.

  “Hey,” I called to them as I jumped out of the car, waving an arm over my head and starting to jog toward them. “Good to see you!”

  Jam lifted his wine glass toward me and pushed back a lock of hair that had flopped over his left eye. “It’s the chicken lady!”

  “We were just finishing lunch,” Jelly added. She motioned with her own half-full glass to the empty rocker next to her, sloshing a little bit of the rosé onto the floorboards. “Join us?”

  I pulled the chair around to face
them instead of the view. “Listen. I’ve been thinking more about your winery plans. I want you to know—I’m in. The whole community dynamic thing? I’m down with it.”

  Jam’s smile froze, and he shot a panicked look at Jelly. She gave a slight shake of her head, and he grimaced apologetically at me. “We’re really looking for a property that already has established vines. We don’t want to wait five years for grapes.”

  “You don’t have to!”

  “We know, we could buy them. But we’d rather use our own,” Kelly said nicely. The kind of nice that means get the cluck off this porch because you’re ruining our view.

  This is for Ruth, I reminded myself. I took a deep breath and launched into the pitch I’d practiced in the car. “Now, I know this sounds crazy, but have you heard the saying that the best time to plant blueberries is five years ago?”

  “We’re in the wine business,” Jam said, also very nicely.

  Not yet, I thought but didn’t say. “What I mean is, the blueberry farm has established bushes. They’re the most productive in the valley. Only a crazy person would rip them out and start all over.”

  Jelly wasn’t even pretending to be nice anymore. She straight-up rolled her eyes at me and spoke like I was a toddler who’d crayoned the cabinets. “That’s why we’re buying elsewhere. Because we want grapes to make wine.”

  “You don’t need grapes,” I said. “Not right away. Plant your vines on the hill above the house instead of taking out the berry bushes. You can make blueberry wine while you’re waiting for your grape vines to mature. And apple wine with my apples. Fruit wine is a specialty product. Nobody else is doing it here—not yet, anyway. And you can buy the farm for a song. I know for a fact that you could offer a lot less than the asking price and still get it.”

  Jam and Jelly shared a skeptical look. But then I saw it—Jelly fluttered her eyelashes at Jam. Classic Eli Ramirez move. I knew in that moment that Jelly was on board.