Advance Notice (2 page)

Chapter Two

I pulled into the parking lot of the police
station and cut the engine. Nina had managed to convince the judge to sentence
her to exactly thirty days in jail. Now, here I was to give her a ride home. I
figured the peace of the last month was about to be shattered.

Since she’d called me over thirty minutes
ago, I’d expected her to be outside waiting. Yet, the autumn wind blew and
there was no sign of Nina and her bright yellow clothes. I sighed and shoved
open my car door.

“
Yoo
hoo
!” Oh, there she was. Nina bounded down the steps.
“Thank you so much for picking me up. Isn’t it a glorious day?” She slid into
the passenger seat.

“Yes, it is,” I said, closing my door. “A
bit chilly, though.”

“Not compared to those jail cells. Do you
know that they only let the inmates wear thin cotton shirts and pants? Kind of
like what nurses wear, but not as nice of quality. And that pea green color.
Oh, my.” Nina set her purse in her lap. “You know I’m partial to yellow. Bruce
wouldn’t even check to see if the uniforms came in yellow. He is a rude little
man.”

I listened to Nina continue to rant about
the lack of proper food and the hard cot she’d slept on for the ten minutes it
took for me to drive her home. I pulled onto the gravel drive leading to her
house,
then
stopped in front of the garage. “Do you
want me to come in and check things out for you?”

Her eyes widened. “No, that’s probably not
necessary. Although, I was wondering whether I should’ve had the judge hold me
that one extra
day.
Today is the thirtieth day.” She
scrunched her mouth to the side. “I’ll be fine. Mae died on the twenty-ninth
day and was found on the thirtieth day, I think.
Although, I
could be wrong.
Now, I’m just being silly. You go on home.”

“How about I call you later?” My head was
spinning from her calculations. If today were the thirtieth day, wouldn’t that
mean she should’ve stayed in jail until tomorrow?

“That’s sweet of you. Call me around
eight.” Nina exited my car, slammed the door, I hated that, then hurried to
unlock her front door.

The explosion rocked my car and belted it
with gravel. Nina flew backward as if attached to a rope and yanked. I screamed
and ducked as far as the steering wheel would allow. Nina! I shoved open my
door, crawled out, and raced toward the house. My ears rang. My legs wobbled,
giving me a weird lurch as I ran.

Flames shot out the door, gobbling the
wood porch stretched along the house. I suspected the use of an accelerant, but
couldn’t stop to investigate. I also needed to stop watching so many crime
shows.

Nina lay under a magnolia tree as if she
were taking an afternoon nap. I fell to my knees beside her, the ground damp on
the knees of my jeans, and felt for a pulse in the side of her neck that wasn’t
horribly burned. Nothing. The concussion of the blast probably killed her
instantly, thank the Lord. To be conscious while her skin charred would be pain
unmentionable. By the time I got to my feet, sirens wailed in the distance.

I no longer believed the names in the
obituary column to be a coincidence. Once again, something was rotten in River
Valley. Now, for me to convince the authorities of which there were few. With
budget cuts and a town that mostly slumbered with no crime, our police force
consisted of one Bruce Barnett.

Bruce arrived a split second before the
fire truck that roared to a stop in front of the burning house. He stared at me
over his steering wheel. His shoulders slumped before he shook his head and exited
the squad car. “I feel sorry for Duane,” he said marching past me. “Trouble
follows you.”

“I had nothing to do with this.” I jogged
to keep up with him. “I brought Mrs. Worth home, she unlocked her door, and
BAM! She’s dead under the magnolia tree.”

“And yet, here you are.” He turned so
fast, we bumped noses. “Go home, Marsha. I’ll be by later to fill out the
report.”

“I already told you everything.” Did he
not listen when I talked? “Except for the fact that today is thirty days after
the announcement in the obituaries.
Same as Mae Campbell.
It is no longer a coincidence.”

“Stop looking for a mystery. All the
homes in this part of the city are old and probably not built to code. Go
home.”

“But—”

“Now! And don’t leave town. I have
questions for you. A lot of them.”

“Fine!” If he wasn’t so dense, it might
have occurred to him that it was strange for Nina’s gas to be on when she’d
been gone for a month. She didn’t strike me as a woman who would be that
careless. Also, he might have stopped to wonder why the house blew up when she
unlocked the door. But, since he was being such an obnoxious jerk, I wouldn’t
say a thing about a possible trap. Let him figure it out for himself. “I’m
leaving.”

I marched back to my car, tried to ignore
all the pings in my doors and hood, and peeled out of the driveway, scattering
my own fair share of rocks. Bruce Barnett made me so angry! Not to mention the
horrible fact I’d watched a woman die. Put those two facts together, and my
hands shook so hard I was afraid of driving into the ditch.

Blinking back tears, I drove slower than
I needed to and crowded the shoulder of the highway. Hopefully, there wouldn’t
be any poor animals for me to run over.

“Look out!” I wrenched the wheel in order
not to hit a young man. With my eyes full of tears, I almost didn’t see him. He
dove into a ditch. I slammed on my brakes, shoved the car into park,
then
rushed to his side. “I’m so sorry.”

“You should watch where you’re going.” He
got to his feet and brushed off the knees of his ragged jeans. “Are you trying
to kill somebody?” He fished in his pocket for a lighter, pulled a cigarette
from somewhere inside his vinyl jacket, and lit up.

“No. I said I was sorry. My name is
Marsha Steele. Can I give you a ride somewhere?” I didn’t usually pick up
strangers on the side of the road, but considering I’d almost made him road
kill, it seemed the least I could do.

“Danny Vera.” He stuck his cigarette in
his mouth,
then
thrust out his hand.

“Oh, you’ve been staying with your
grandparents for several years, right?” I took in the layered hair spiked
around his face, the skinny jeans, and black sneakers. A good-looking young man
who should have better things to do in the middle of the day than hike down a
major highway.

He nodded. “Off and on. I’m going to
college at Arkansas Tech next semester. Thanks for the offer of the ride, but I
live half a mile from here and prefer to walk. Be careful with your driving, Mrs.
Steele.” He blew out a puff of smoke and continued on his way. “No one should
die before their time.”

A weird thing to say.
Frowning, I watched him
saunter down the highway, his cigarette smoke leaving a gray haze over his
head.

As I got in my car, my cell phone rang.
Duane. “Hi, Babe.”

“I just heard what happened. Are you
okay?”

“I’m fine, just a little shook up.” More
than a little, judging by the way my hands still trembled. I glanced in the
side mirror and pulled back onto the highway.

“Where are you? Do I need to come get
you?”

“There’s no need for you to leave work.
I’m going home.”

“I’ll meet you at your mom’s in ten
minutes. Love you.” Click.

Which was the same as going home, since I
lived in Mom’s guesthouse. I dropped the phone in my purse and pressed the gas
pedal. The sooner I got home and into my bag of dark chocolate M&Ms, the
sooner I’d start to settle down. The candy-coated chocolate made everything
better.

My phone rang again, this time being my
mother. News traveled fast in River Valley. “Hello, Mom.”

“I heard what happened. Don’t bother
coming in to work today. I’ll meet you at the house in ten minutes.”

“Who’s minding the store?” We couldn’t
all take off work because of an explosion.

“Leroy can handle it. I want to hear all
the details.” Click.

I sighed. I’d rather not relive them,
especially with Bruce coming by later, but it appeared I’d have no choice. I’d
have to tell the horrible afternoon’s events over and over.

Thankfully, no news vans waited in the
driveway when I got home. I hated that whole ‘no comment’ thing. The reporters
didn’t pay attention anyway. They made something up. Why couldn’t the vultures
leave folks alone and go straight to the police department for their
information?

Ooops
. I spoke too soon. The
local channel news van sped up the road. I cut the ignition, grabbed my purse,
and sprinted like an Olympic Champion for Mom’s back door. Not only did I not
like talking to the press, but I’d heard one of my high school non-buddies was
now the main reporter. Stacy Tate was definitely not on the list of people I
wanted to talk to. Especially after trying to steal Duane away during our
Junior
year of high school. Nope. I burst into the house.
Not in the mood for her.

Dropping my purse on the counter, I
opened the cabinet above the refrigerator, climbed on the counter, and grabbed
my candy. Obviously, putting it out of easy arm’s reach didn’t work at keeping
me from them, but it made me work a little harder when stress called, and I
didn’t feel quite so bad at ruining my diet.

“Marsha.”

I whirled and screamed, almost falling
from my perch. “Duane! You scared ten years off me.”

“Sorry.” He scooped me in his arms and
marched to the living room, where he plopped both of us on the sofa, me on his
lap. I clutched my purple bag and burrowed my face in his neck.

His arms tightened around me. “You’re going
to be the death of me, Marsha Calloway Steele.”

“You’ve said that a hundred times, yet
you still live.”
Thank you, God
. I couldn’t do without my bear of a
man.

“Ready to talk about it?”

“No. Mom’s on her way, too, then Bruce.
I’d rather not go over it too many times. It was awful.” I sniffed and tossed
in a handful of therapeutic chocolate. “All I did was drive poor Nina home. I’m
thinking she was right about the obit being a warning.”

“Stop the wheels in your head right now.”
Duane tilted my face toward his. “You could’ve been killed today.”

“Not really. I was in my car.” The paint
job was ruined. Maybe I wasn’t meant to drive new vehicles. Something always
happened to them. “Nina unlocked her door, and whoosh, fireball Worth flew
across the yard.”

“Marsha!” Mom fumbled getting her key in
the front door. “Marsha! Why’s the door locked? That evil Stacy is heading this
way. Let me in.”

“Should I?”

Duane shook his head. “No, this gives us
a couple more seconds of privacy.” He grinned. “Not enough of that with you
living so close to Nosey
Gertie
.”

I giggled and kept my head where it lay,
watching the door bang open and Mom charge in. She rushed across the room and
plopped next to us, taking my hands in hers. “First of all, you two should not
be alone in the house without supervision, and—”

“Mother, I’m thirty-four years old.”

“All the more reason. Secondly, tell me
all about it. Oh, wait.” She jumped to her feet. “Let me fix us some tea and
grab some cookies.” She flew to the kitchen.

“Let’s make out before she returns,”
Duane suggested. “Get you all flustered and her imagination running wild.”

“You’re incorrigible.” I lifted my face
for his kiss and closed my eyes.

“But girls always fall for the bad boys.”
His lips covered mine, sending my heart into a race that even a thoroughbred
couldn’t win.

I slid my arms around his neck and pulled
him closer, deepening my response. He smelled of
a musky
cologne and tasted of coffee. I wanted my fill before our chaperone returned.

The sound of footsteps alerted us to Mom’s
return, and I slid from Duane’s lap, sitting as close to him as humanly
possible without being on top of him. I rubbed my lips and blinked at my …
daughter.

“Seriously? You have a fit if you see me
kissing a boy, but it’s okay for you to be all over Uncle Duane?” She took a
deep breath. “Double standards. Oh, sometimes you make me so mad!”

“Is school out already?” I glanced at the
clock.

“Don’t change the subject.” Lindsey
tossed her backpack on the floor. “Did you know that Mariah’s mom is having a
baby?
At her age?
I don’t want a baby brother or
sister, Mom. Really!”

Duane and I glanced at each other and
burst into laughter. We’d already said we’d try for a baby immediately after
the wedding. I stopped laughing. Was that the reason I hadn’t set a wedding
date yet? Because I wasn’t sure I wanted another baby?

Chapter Three

“Why is Officer Barney sitting outside in his
car?” Lindsey asked. “The last time he stopped by was because of a crime.” She
glared at me. “What did you do?”

“I didn’t do anything.” I unfolded myself
from the sofa and moved to peer out the curtains. “I witnessed a crime today
and Officer
Barnett
, not Barney, is
here to take my statement.”

“You are so embarrassing, Mom.” She
grabbed her backpack and stomped to the kitchen.

Me? How quickly she seemed to forget that
the last crime we were involved in was because she was the prime person of
interest. I sighed and let the curtains fall into place. “I might as well see
what’s taking him so long.” I stepped on to the front porch and crossed my
arms.

Bruce stared at me for a few seconds,
then got out of his car. “Glad to see you’re here.”

“Where would I go? I live here. Were you
sitting in your car trying to think of witty ways to irritate me?” Stacy, the
well-dressed reporter, made a beeline toward us. “Hurry up before the vulture
lands.”

He increased his pace. “I’m here on
police business, Marsha. You need to respect the badge.”

“Whatever.” I stepped aside and waved my
arm for him to enter. Respect my right foot. This little weasel accused my
daughter of theft not so long ago. He wasn’t starting this newest misfortune
off much better. I straightened my shoulders and marched back to the living
room.

Mom entered with a tray of packaged lemon
cookies and a pitcher of iced tea. She narrowed her eyes at Bruce. “You,
again.”

“Who else would there be, Mrs.
Bohan
?”

“I keep hoping they’ll scrape the bottom
of the pickle barrel for someone else.” She set the tray on the coffee table
and sat on the couch, leaving me room beside Duane.

Bruce glanced at all three of us. “I’d
like to speak with the witness privately, please.”

“Never mind.” I shook my head. “I’m going
to tell them anyway. Tea and cookies?”

“I’m on duty.” He pulled a notepad from
his pocket. “Please start at the beginning and tell me everything.”

“Well,” I dug into my candy, choosing one
of each color. “A month ago on Sunday, Nina came to me and said—”

“What happened today?” Strain showed in
his voice, and we’d just begun. Poor man.

“Okay, but that isn’t the beginning.” I
peeled Duane’s fingers off my leg where he squeezed in an attempt to get me to
curb my tongue. “I picked Nina up from the jail and drove her home. She stuck
her key in the lock of her house, and BAM!”

“And?” His pencil paused its scratching.

“That’s it. You and the ambulance arrived
shortly after. Great job on the quick response, by the way.” I popped a blue
M&M in my mouth and tried to ignore Duane’s increasing pressure on my thigh.
“I think she died on impact.”

“This isn’t much to go on.” Bruce snapped
the notepad against his hand. “Maybe we should go back to that Sunday. What
happened?”

“Her name was in the obit column of the
newspaper. She was still very much alive.” I studied his face, noting his
mustache now resembled Hitler’s rather than the curved look of an old-fashioned
cowboy like he usually wore. “She said the same thing happened to Mae Campbell.
Obit, then death, instead of the other way around.”

“Mrs. Campbell’s death was from a gas
leak.”

“As Nina’s appears to be until someone
investigates further. Ouch, Duane, stop it.” I slapped his gripping hand. “Way
too similar of deaths, don’t you think?”

Bruce stood. “I’ll take it into
consideration. Duane, keep her out of the investigation, please.”

“I’ll do my best.” He fought, trying to
keep me from pounding him, until he captured both my hands in one of his strong
grips. What was wrong with everyone?

“Right. Well. I’ll be leaving.” He tossed
a business card on the cookie tray. “Call me if you think of anything else.”

Once he’d left, I yanked free of Duane and
turned with the ferocity of a cornered cat. “What are you doing?”

“Trying to keep you from mouthing off and
upsetting our local police department.”

“I’ll behave if he does. I’m going to
have bruises on my knee, thank you very much.” I rubbed the offending spot.

“I’m sorry, but I could tell you were
working up a good steam of sarcasm.” He kissed the tip of my nose. My legs went
weak and whatever annoyance I felt from his death grip on my knee, went out the
window. “Don’t get involved, don’t make people angry. Live to see another day.
I love you. Now, I have football practice.”

“Come for dinner?”

“Wouldn’t miss it.” He kissed me long and
hard, unmindful of Mom’s eagle eye. “I’ll get rid of the news reporter for
you.”

I glanced outside. Sure enough, Stacy
leaned against her van, microphone in hand, shapely legs crossed at the ankles.
“Thank you. Don’t let her try anything funny. I’ll be watching from the
window.”

He laughed. “I wouldn’t dream of it.”

Way too soon, Duane stood next to the
temptress in an expensively tailored red suit. She said something. He laughed.
She giggled. My hands curled into fists. What would Stacy look like if I pulled
out every strand of her honey-blond hair?

“Relax. Duane loves you too much for a
vixen like that to take him away.” Mom lifted the untouched tray. “Come on into
the kitchen. I set the newspaper on the table before leaving for work this
morning.”

Would another living victim’s name be in
the obituaries? I prayed not, as I followed my mother. If we did find a name,
how would we convince them to take care? So far, two victims had died of gas
leaks in their house. If Nina’s premonition had been taken seriously, would the
killer have gotten to her somewhere else? If she had waited until tomorrow to
go home, would the killer have found a way to get to her in jail? My head ached
from more than the blast of the explosion.

I pulled the rubber band off the paper
and spread the thin Wednesday edition out on the table. Only three names were
listed, and I knew all three were deceased and from our church. I plopped into
a chair and accepted the cup of sweet tea Mom handed me. “Mom, how long between
Mae’s death announcement and Nina’s?”

“About thirty days.”

“Exactly?”

“I didn’t mark it on the calendar,
Marsha. That would be gruesome.” Mom opened the drawer by the refrigerator and
pulled out a hot pink clipboard. “Until Nina mentioned it, I didn’t think
anything suspicious was going on.”

I grinned, recognizing the notes I’d
taken on our last mystery. “You kept it.”

“Figured it would come in handy again.”
She handed me the board and a pencil. “Now, start writing things down.”

“Duane will kill me.”

“There’s nothing against the law about
taking notes.” Mom sat across from me, clutching a sweating glass of tea. “What
do the two victims have in common?”

Oh, but I did love the thrill of a good
mystery. “They both went to our church.” I wrote that down.

“And belonged to that quilting circle
that will be meeting at our store soon.” Mom pointed at the pad. “Add that.
First chance I get, I’ll head down to the newspaper office and see exactly when
both obits were published. That will give us a better time line.”

“
Here.
” Lindsey
entered through the back door, carrying my laptop. “I’ve been eavesdropping.
The obits should be online.”

“You’re a genius.” I turned on the computer
and waited for the screen to boot up. “But it’s wrong to listen in on other
people’s conversations.”

“I know.” She poured herself a glass of
tea and joined us at the table. “But talking about murder is way more
interesting than what you usually talk about.”

Within minutes, we’d discovered that
Mae’s and Nina’s obituaries ran sometime during the week thirty days before
they died. I sat back in my chair. If the killer stayed true, there would be
another obit sometime this week. I wrote down gas leak and put a question mark
beside it. Was this the only way the killer offed his victims? Unfortunately,
only time would tell.
Sad that someone had to die in order
for an MO to be brought to light.

I shut off the computer and sat it on the
counter before hiding the notes back in a drawer. Duane would be back in less
than an hour. I definitely didn’t want him to know how I’d spent my afternoon.
I’d plead curiosity, which would be the truth, but we both knew it probably
wouldn’t stop at that.

“Marsha, come fix the salad while I get
the spaghetti water boiling.” Mom handed me a large wooden bowl. “I’ll make
sure to pick up a paper tomorrow, and we’ll go through it between customers at
work.”

“Don’t forget, I have those placemats to
finish.” A customer had ordered two hundred white cotton placemats, complete
with embroidered initials, for her wedding. “I still don’t understand why you
won’t purchase an embroidery machine. It’s taking me forever to finish.”

“That’s an expense we don’t need, since
God gave you two perfectly good hands.”

“Hands that are quickly developing
carpel-tunnel syndrome.” I ripped into a head of iceberg lettuce.

“See,” Lindsey said, setting her glass in
the sink. “These are the types of conversations that I am not interested in
hearing. Call me when supper’s done. I’ll be in the cottage doing my homework.”

“Teenagers.”

“Mothers.”

We grinned at each other,
then
she sailed out the back door. Thank you, God, for the
gift of a good kid. One who unfortunately, enjoyed mysteries as much as I
did.
I grabbed a tomato and started slicing. Between me,
Lindsey, and Mom, we’d managed to solve a crime a few months ago, and stayed
alive while doing so. Just call us the Three Musketeers.

My cell phone rang. I wiped my hands on a
dishtowel, ignored Mom’s complaint about wiping tomato hands on her white
towel, and then fished my phone from my purse. Lynn.

“Hey,
Bestie
.”

“Is your life so boring that you have to regularly
get involved in death?” Lynn sighed hard enough to vibrate the phone.

“I didn’t do it on purpose.” Was there
anyone in River Valley who didn’t know I was there when Nina died?

“You never do. I thank the good Lord you
decided not to take the aide position at the high school. Heaven forbid you
should drag death to the school.” Lynn taught high school English.

“You’re being kind of harsh.”

“Honest.”

“Evil.”

“Watching out for you.”

“Fine.” I propped the phone on my
shoulder, not an easy task since it was a slim smart phone, and started rinsing
the mushrooms.

Mom butted me with her hip. “Tell her I
said hello.”

“Tell your Mom I heard her and hello
back.”

Mom waved a water dripping spoon at me.
“Ask her if she wants to join us in this current mystery. It might be good to
have a college educated woman helping us.”

“Mom said…”

“Tell your mother there is no way on heaven
or earth I want to get involved. Gracious, Marsha.”

“Do y’all want to talk to each other? Because
I’m getting a crick in my neck.” I dropped the mushrooms into a colander, shook
them, and carried the lot to the table to chop.

My gaze fell on the paper. Fingers
tickled up my spine. What if my name got posted next?

Or Mom’s?