Read Still Life in Brunswick Stew Online
Authors: Larissa Reinhart
Tags: #Mystery, #humor, #cozy, #Humour, #Romance, #cozy mystery, #southern mystery, #humorous mystery, #mystery series
Still Life in Brunswick Stew (32 page)
I hoisted myself into the bed to get a better look at the herbicide. Careful not to touch the jug itself, I peered at the sticker for a moment. According to the caution label, the stuff would kill weeds found in cotton fields and make a person real sick. Unless Hunter was a total idiot, he would know the herbicide was lethal.
The poisoning couldn’t be accidental.
“Holy crap. I left a killer at my Grandpa’s farm.” I needed to call Uncle Will. I patted my dress, searching for the pocket that hid my phone. And remembered the fringed dress had no pockets.
My phone was still in the truck. I shot to standing and the truck rocked beneath me. I steadied myself with a hand to the back of the cab and glanced in the rear window.
Slumped along the bench seat lay Janine Adams.
And she looked pretty dead.
My hands flew off the cab. I stepped backward, tripped over the herbicide jug, and fell on my rear. The truck’s suspension jounced and the liquid sloshed in the bottle. I scrambled out of the truck and had a quick freak-out dance in the musty barn.
“Shit. Shit. Shit,” I screamed, then crept to the window of the truck cab.
Janine lay face down on the bench seat, her blonde hair scattered and limbs askew. From my tip-toe view, there was no way to tell what killed her, and I wasn’t about to open the door to find out. I spun on my toes to hightail it out of the barn and stopped at the low rumble of a vehicle’s slow approach.
I sped to the gap in the barn door and peeked. The dark sedan from Cotton Pickin’ place circled the drive. My truck was parked near the house, about one hundred yards away. I needed my phone. But the Lexus’s crawl around the drive jangled my nerves. Why would Miss Marion—if she did indeed drive that car—follow me here? I glanced back at Hunter’s truck and shuddered.
The black car rolled to a stop before the barn. I back stepped into the shadows. Call me crazy, but I didn’t want to get caught with a dead body. The large, dusty barn had walls full of tools and equipment, but no other door I could see. A tractor blocked my view of the far wall. I scurried toward the tractor hoping for a door hidden in the back. The barn door bumped at someone’s push through, and I slid behind the tractor, hunching behind a big tire.
Miss Marion’s shadowy figure stood between the heavy barn doors, lit by the sunshine falling through the gap.
“I know you’re in here,” she said and stepped into the shadow of the door.
Marion had changed from her black dress into what my Grandma Jo would call “weed-pulling attire.” And she had swapped her pearls for a new accessory. The sunlight pouring through the door glinted off the barrel of a small handgun.
“Walk yourself over here, young lady,” she called.
I stayed crouched and held my breath.
“You can’t hide in here.”
Unfortunately she was right. If only I hid in the machine shed, I could have secreted myself in a combine tire. I prepared to talk myself out of getting shot, but my body would not give up the crouch.
“Perhaps I’ll just walk over and shoot you. I’ve got a pocketful of bullets,” said Marion. “I can see the fringe of your ridiculous ensemble peeking from behind the tractor.”
“I ruined three dresses this week,” I said, rising from my stoop. “I’m sorry I didn’t have anything more appropriate for the funeral.”
“I don’t believe fringe is ever appropriate. Unless you’re attending a western function.”
“Yes, ma’am,” I said out of habit more than service. I treaded slowly toward her, my eyes on the derringer. “You don’t need to point that at me.”
“You didn’t eat my brownies,” Marion said.
“Sorry, no. I’ve been trying to help Hunter.”
“You didn’t let the boy eat them, did you?”
“The brownies? No.” I stopped a few paces away.
“Where is Hunter? I’m worried about him. He didn’t stay at Cotton Pickin’ last night.”
“He thinks he poisoned Mr. Maynard and Miss Parker,” I said. “But he didn’t, did he?”
“Obviously the Gables poisoned them.”
“The Gables?”
“Why else would the truck be here? And the poison? You call yourself a detective? Can’t you put two and two together?”
“I call myself an artist,” I said and eyed the gun. “But I don’t believe the Gables did this.”
“You should have stuck to painting. Delivering evidence to the police, of all things.” She waved the gun. “You should have eaten those brownies, too. The bowl and mix are in the Gables kitchen now. Clear evidence, don’t you think? Now what am I going to do with you?”
Considering that was most likely a hypothetical question, I kept my mouth shut.
“I didn’t mean for Miss Parker to die. I know she was your friend,” said Marion, apologetically. “Since Miss Janine didn’t care enough about Lewis to eat his stew, I thought she’d at least care about Hunter to leave town in disgrace. Miss Parker was an unfortunate side effect.”
“What are you saying? You only intended for Lewis to die?”
“Lewis has been ingesting a little weed killer with his stew every Sunday for months. I knew he’d taste enough of the stew during the cook-off that it’d send him right over the edge. I forced myself to eat the festival stew, but Daddy always said hard effort returns great rewards.”
“You poisoned yourself along with everyone else. Including Griffin?”
“Odious man, Griffin Ward. You gave me that idea. If everyone thought he had poisoned the drinks, it would have worked out just fine. Although then I couldn’t implicate the Gables, which would have been unfortunate.”
“You poisoned Griffin’s new batch of Genuine Juice.”
“I didn’t know he was going to drink it all. And he should lock his doors to keep folks from tampering with that vile stuff.” She glared at me. “I heard you fought with him before he died. In the Viper’s parking lot. You are as trashy as Belinda Gable and Janine Adams.”
“I’m not trashy,” I said, “I’m colorful.”
She raised her pencil thin brows. “Call it what you want, but in my book it’s trashy. Sidewinder has become nothing but a cesspool of whoremongers, sluts, and gossipers. Daddy Maynard would roll over in his grave to see what’s become of our town.”
I expect her daddy was rolling in his grave at the thought of his princess on a murderous rampage, but I held back that remark as well.
“Now walk your skinny little hiney to the truck. I don’t want to shoot you. That’s too obvious. I’ll have to make you drink the weed killer.”
“Like that’s not obvious,” I said, then bit my lip for not cutting the sass.
She pointed the derringer at me, grabbing her bony wrist to hold it steady. “But I will shoot you if I need to. This is a .357 and the recoil isn’t as bad as people say. Daddy made sure I could defend myself. He said it’s important to be self-reliant.”
“Self-reliant? You got married. You had Lewis take your name.”
“I needed an heir. Lewis knew cotton farming.”
“But he didn’t love you.”
“I didn’t need Lewis to love me,” she cried. “I had Daddy!”
My face must have betrayed my internal “Eew.”
Marion’s expression went cold. “Get in that truck,” she said.
“Janine’s in there.”
Marion rolled her eyes. “What does that matter? Just shove her over.”
I shuffled to the cab and opened the truck door. My stomach rolled. The stench in the closed cab overpowered me. I backed up and bumped into Marion.
“Get in the truck,” she said and struck my hip with the barrel of her gun. The rotting smell drifted past me. Marion gagged.
I spun around, rammed her with my shoulder, and took off.
I made it to the barn door when the gun exploded. I heard a metallic crack, but didn’t slow to see where the bullet hit. I knew that derringer had a double barrel. My aunt Linda had a Texas Defender she kept in her pocketbook. The hollow point bullets would stop me in my tracks. And Marion had one more round before reloading.
If she were smart, she wouldn’t waste her remaining bullet on a difficult target. If I were lucky, she was a bad aim.
I ran through the doorway gap into the sunshine, zigzagging toward my truck. The tarmac stretched before me, shimmering in the heat. I heard another blast and flinched. When the bullet failed to hit, I gathered a spurt of energy and urged my flip-flops to move faster. My chest burned and my hip ached where Marion clouted me, but I could see my beautiful, lemon yellow truck as I closed the distance between us. I had never loved my Datsun more than at that moment.
Another fire from the gun almost made me stumble, but I righted myself and continued forward. I could now see the shotgun holes on the side of the truck that I had never patched. Twenty yards to go. Pain radiated from my chest, up into my shoulders, and down my arms. I hated running.
I heard the sharp blast from the gun just as the bullet zinged past my arm. I felt searing heat, but didn’t stop. I had a chance. Marion would have to reload again.
I grabbed the handle, yanked the door open, and slid onto the seat of the truck. With shaking hands, I turned the key.
And nothing.
“No,” I screamed. “No. No. No.”
I glanced out the window. Marion stood in the middle of the parking lot, reloading. I flipped around and leaned over the seat to grab my Remington. And realized I had left the shotgun beside my bed after finding Hunter in my house.
My expletive scared the birds off a nearby pecan tree.
I grabbed the phone out of my purse and slid out the passenger door. My lungs protested another run. I pushed myself toward the patio and hoped Bruce had left his baseball bat, because I was planning on smashing that patio door. Then I’d lock myself in a room and call the police.
I rounded the side of the house, praying Marion wouldn’t wing me with a hollow point. The pool gate remained open. I had forgotten to move the rock. I could have kissed myself if I wasn’t so intent on outrunning the crazy woman with the gun. I stumbled over the staked bed again, tripped up the patio stairs, and did a quick standing search for the baseball bat. I spied it behind a grill, dropped my phone on the patio table, and grabbed the bat. Then I battered the door.
Which did not shatter. But it did send a mighty reverberation up my arm.
I scared more birds with my scream of frustration and took off running again, this time holding the bat. I quickly ascertained I had pinned myself in a cage with a tall fence I could not climb. My lungs, angry with the constant running, wouldn’t let me breathe to curse, and my arm felt as if it had been sprayed with hot grease. I hurdled the stakes and aimed for the giant pile of orange dirt left from the swimming pool on the far side of the yawning hole. Maybe I would get lucky and Marion wouldn’t know I was still in the back yard.
Panting and wheezing, I put my back against the small mountain of dirt and peered around the side. Marion stalked through the open gate and glanced at the unfinished landscaping.
“Where are you?” she called. Obviously Miss Marion didn’t play hide-n-seek as a kid.
I reached for my phone. And remembered I still didn’t have pockets. My phone remained somewhere on the patio.
Marion paced to the patio and tried the door without success. Placing a hand over her eyes, she surveyed the yard. I ducked behind the dirt, careful to gather my fringe. I held my breath. I couldn’t risk a peek, but I could hear Marion mumbling to herself as she stumbled through the garden.
“The things I have to do,” said Miss Marion. “And this clay will get all over my shoes.”
I stood in a half-crouch, bat in hand. I’d go out swinging.
But I lost my nerve and swung the bat behind me as Marion followed the gun around the corner of the dirt pile.
She shook her head. “If you had just eaten the brownies, this business would be done. Come out of there.”
She backed up, keeping the derringer trained on me.
I followed, holding the bat behind me. I fought my eyes to stay on Marion’s face and not on the swimming pool hole we approached.
Just as she reached the edge of the pool, she stopped.
I silently cursed her good backing instincts.
“I don’t think that bat will do you much good.” She glanced at the crater beside us. “Maybe this will work. If I shot you and you fell in this hole, maybe they’ll think the Gables did it. If there was only a loader or some such machinery to cover you up.”
“You are something else,” I said, hoping to distract her from the bat I still held. “No wonder you have no friends in this town. You do have good planning skills, though. I’ll give you that.”
“Any last words?”
“I wish I carried concealed,” I said. “And I wish I didn’t wear flip-flops so much. I can run better in boots.”
“I meant a final prayer. Ladies shouldn’t wear flip-flops in public. They’re meant to be shower shoes. Although, the beach is acceptable.”
“I also wear white before Memorial Day.”
She narrowed her eyes and aimed the gun at my head.
“One last thing,” I said. “If you could find some way to tell Deputy Luke Harper I’m sorry. I really do love him and didn’t want to give him ulcers. And Max Avtaikin has your brownies, so you’ve got another poisoning on your hands. He thinks he’s impervious to poison, but I’m carrying a load of guilt about accidentally killing him. It might hinder my heaven-bound status. Although I did go to church this week, which should help.”