“That, plus he always has his finger on the pulse on everything going on in Cape.”
Rhetta tucked the envelope in her purse, hugged her friend again, and left.
Poor Ricky. First a scam for her Trans Am and now her man gets murdered. Boy, when things go south, they go in a hurry.
Chapter 28
“Rhetta, you don’t need to be sticking your nose into this murder investigation,” Randolph said as he forked two thick sirloins onto the grill and stood back as they sizzled. Sniffing the delicious odor of the cooking steaks launched Rhetta’s stomach into a growl that made one of the cats meow in response.
She crossed the patio and placed two foil-covered potatoes and fresh ears of corn wrapped in their husks alongside the steaks. “I’m not the least bit sticking my nose in. But, if you remember, Sweets, my fingerprints are also on that metal detector they think is the murder weapon. I have to be prepared to defend myself in case Sheriff Unreasonable decides to come after me, too.”
“Reasoner will definitely be pushing for an arrest. Ricky may still be the one they agree to charge, but they need more evidence. I hope she’s not planning on leaving town, and I hope she gets a lawyer.”
“Can you represent her?” Rhetta asked as she stirred seasoned oil and vinegar into a fresh salad she’d assembled in a large olivewood bowl.
“No. I don’t practice law at all anymore, and I don’t keep malpractice insurance since I retired.”
“Can you find someone for her?” Rhetta asked.
“I already did.” Randolph winked at her.
She hugged his neck. “Thanks!”
She set plates on the red and white checked tablecloth on the outdoor patio table. Although the temperature was still high, a light breeze whispered through the weeping willow that shaded the patio. A perfect evening for an outdoor meal.
With the steaming food on a platter, and tall glasses of tea at the ready, they sat to enjoy the meal. Rhetta cut her steak meticulously, trimming away all the outer fat. Then she forked a piece of the tender meat into her mouth, and murmured with pleasure. “Umm, this is absolutely heavenly. Steak, baked potato, salad and corn on the cob is my absolute favorite meal in the whole world.”
Randolph nodded his agreement.
When they’d eaten enough to resume conversation, Rhetta said, “Ricky told me she and Jeremy had a bad fight the night he was killed.”
“Is that right?” Randolph said, and swallowed some tea. He stirred some sweetener into his drink, then sampled it again.
“Ricky caught him with another woman.” At her words, Randolph stopped chewing to glance at her. “I think Jeremy made a habit out of seducing any woman he could,” Rhetta said. “He made a pass at me, too.”
Randolph resumed chewing and then chuckled. “I bet he regretted that pretty quickly.”
Rhetta smiled. “Yep, I’m sure he did.” She told him what happened.
Randolph’s smile turned to a frown. “Rhetta, that could have been a dangerous situation for you. Why didn’t you tell me about this sooner?”
“It was nothing at the time and ever since then everything’s been chaotic.”
“I wouldn’t call what he did, nothing.”
She shrugged. “You know I can take care of myself. Well, most of the time, anyway. Especially with a jerk like Jeremy.” She stabbed at an ear of corn, and brought it to her plate. “I wonder if he made arrangements to meet another woman out at the barn, and he made an unwanted pass at her, too, and she conked him on the head. Maybe she’s too frightened to come forward.”
Rhetta said, “My money’s on Mylene Allard!”
“Why her?”
“Maybe she was the one who was at the barn. And, maybe she had already killed Jeremy before I got there.”
He shook his head. “That doesn’t make any sense. Why would she call you if she was planning to meet Jeremy?”
“Who knows? When the cops catch up with her, they can ask her that question.” She gulped the last of her tea.
“At the rate the cops are going, I wouldn’t look for them to be checking her out anytime soon,” Randolph said, and began scraping his leftovers into a plate. “I honestly think they won’t even check out this Mylene, since they don’t see a connection. I feel that they’re going to try to pin this on Ricky. And if she told them about the fight, that may make it look worse for her.”
Rhetta’s head swirled with what Randolph just said. She began clearing away the dishes. Randolph carried the platters and remaining food into the house. At the other side of the kitchen, four feline faces pressed against the glass.
“I’ll give a few of these scraps to our poor starving cats,” Randolph said, and squeezed out the door. The cats surrounded him.
Rhetta snatched her phone and dialed Woody. “I have a challenge for you,” she said when he answered. “We need to find an address for this cell number in Illinois” She repeated it twice.
“Why?”
“I want to personally ask Mylene Allard why she called me. I’ve tried calling her back, and she doesn’t answer.”
“Does Randolph know you want me to do this?”
“What do you think?”
“That’s what I thought.”
“Woody, don’t you tell him.”
“I get the parking spot for a month.” He hung up.
Chapter 29
Woody’s Jeep sat prominently in the primo slot next to the door when Rhetta pulled in.
She parked next to his ride, then reached in the back seat for her bag of overdue books from the library. She hoped to persuade LuEllen to take them back for her. Sliding the canvas book bag up on to one shoulder and her purse on the other, she balanced her coffee in her left hand and tugged the door. It didn’t open, and the force of the resistance caused a middle fingernail to bend backwards and snap. “Oww,” she whimpered, not wanting to see the damage to her finger. It would only make it hurt worse. Her mother used to tell her not to look at her scrapes and cuts when she was a kid, telling her that if she looked, it would hurt more. She still believed it.
She rapped on the door glass and stuck her finger in her mouth to assuage the pain. She didn’t want to have to set everything down to fish for her keys.
Woody appeared and unlocked the door.
“Why is the door still locked?” Rhetta said, sliding past him and dropping her books near LuEllen’s desk. After making sure her coffee and purse were safe on her own desk, she held up her injured finger. “I pulled that door so hard I broke this nail down into the quick.” She worked up the courage to look at it. New pain throbbed up her finger. Her mother was right.
“Why did you do that?”
“Never mind, I’ll live. It’s too far from my heart to kill me.” Honestly, sometimes Woody asked the silliest questions.
Woody ignored her wounded finger. “I got here really early and was so absorbed in searching for your Mylene Allard that I forgot to check the time. Sorry.” He had returned to his desk. His fingers flew over the keyboard.
“You found her?” Rhetta reached for her coffee.
“Yep.”
Rhetta leapt up and danced around, high-fiving Woody. He glanced around as though embarrassed, afraid that someone might come through the door any moment and catch her ungainly duck dancing.
The printer whirred and he snatched the page it spit out, handing it to her. His wide grin split his whiskers. “Here it is. When do we go?”
Rhetta scanned the address. “Jonesboro, Illinois, isn’t very far, about an hour’s drive, right?” She glanced at her watch. LuEllen would be here in a few minutes. “We can go when LuEllen gets here. Do you have anything going on this morning?”
“Nope.” As he rubbed his head, something sparkly fell to his shoulder. Rhetta glanced at it, then back to his shaved head.
“Is that glitter on your head? And on your shirt, too?” She sidled over to his desk. “There’s even some in your beard.” She began chuckling. “What kind of kinky ga
me were you and Jenn playing?”
Woody rubbed his head, swiped his shoulder and tried finger combing his beard.
“It’s Jenn’s fault. She had a top with sparkly stuff all over it and she dried it with the towels.” He swiped furiously. “When I took my shower, I must’ve grabbed a towel she dried with that top.”
He swatted his head and face as though bees were after him.
“I’m going to run home and change clothes,” he said, and galloped to the door.
Rhetta laughed so hard she forgot about her broken nail.
LuEllen arrived just as Woody flew out the door. “Where’s he going?”
“So much glitter,” Rhetta said, and cracked up. LuEllen glanced from Rhetta back to the door Woody just exited through, shrugged and sat at her desk.
“What’s this?” LuEllen asked, picking up Rhetta’s tote, and wagging it in her direction.
“I have some overdue books. Can I talk you into taking them back for me? I put the money in an envelope inside the tote. They always look at me like I’m a criminal when I’m late.”
LuEllen merely smiled and placed the tote next to her purse. “I’ll put it next to my purse so I won’t forget,” she said, and turned on her computer. “You really ought to get an eReader,” she added. “I have one and I love it.” LuEllen was always on the cutting edge of electronics. Rhetta, not so much. Most days even the copier challenged her.
* * *
It took Woody nearly an hour to change clothes. Rhetta had been so tempted to move her car into his space while he was gone, but decided against it. She didn’t want Woody tattling to Randolph.
When he finally returned he was rubbing the side of his head. Rhetta glanced at him as he strode by. He had on the same shirt and slacks.
“I thought you were going home to change?”
“I decided to go to the car wash instead.”
She sidled over to him, giving him the once-over for glitter. She didn’t see any, but noticed the whole side of his face and the top of his shaved head were red and swollen.
“What happened to your head?”
“I told you, I went to the car wash.”
“What has that got to do with your head?”
Woody patted his head instead of rubbing it. “I thought I could use the power wand at the car wash and rinse my head off with it.”
“Wait, you used the high powered rinse on your head?”
“Yeah, after I used the soap, I needed to rinse it off.”
Rhetta couldn’t help herself. She erupted into laughter and collapsed into her chair so hard she nearly knocked her chin on the desk.
LuEllen was much more sympathetic. She rushed to Woody’s side. “Oh, my goodness, Woody. Why didn’t you use the gentle rinse? You could have peeled your head with that power wand. My nephew, Franklin, complained that it took the paint off his car’s bumper last year.”
“Now, you tell me,” Woody said.
By now, Rhetta was laughing so hard, she made a beeline to the bathroom.
When she returned, Woody was trying his best to shoo LuEllen away and stop her fussing over his head.
“It’ll be all right. I’m fine,” he grumbled. “At least I got rid of the glitter.”
“Not all of it,” Rhetta said, flicking a silvery morsel from his shoulder.
“Okay, keep that up, and I won’t tell you who I saw at the car wash.”
Still chuckling, but trying not to, Rhetta said, “All right, I’ll quit picking on you. Who did you see?” She sat at her desk and reached for her coffee. She tried to stifle her giggles.
Woody straightened his tie, swatted at any possible remaining glitter, visible or invisible, then sat. He swiveled slowly around to an expectant Rhetta. “When I got done, and was driving out, I glanced over to see who was in the next bay. A lady was rinsing off the muddy wheels of a high riding pickup truck complete with gun racks, one of which held a rifle and scope.”
“Okay, so a woman was rinsing off her vehicle. At least she wasn’t rinsing off her head.” Rhetta couldn’t control her laughter any longer. She went back to her desk and picked up her cup.
“Then I won’t tell you it was Adele Griffith.”
Chapter 30
Rhetta nearly spit coffee across her desk.
“Adele Griffith? Are you sure?”
“Yep. Her picture was in the paper this weekend.”
“Still, how do you know it was her for sure?”
“Well, besides the lady looking just like her picture, her license plates are personalized. They say A-D-E-L-E.”
“Holy cow. I overheard her tell the deputy she doesn’t drive.”
“Well, maybe she doesn’t drive much, but that doesn’t mean she can’t drive.”
Rhetta thought about that. “Yeah, maybe she was too upset in the sheriff’s office.” She told Woody about seeing her there, and how she’d confirmed that the belongings they found were indeed Malcom’s.
“Have you just changed your mind or are we still going to Illinois?”
“We’re absolutely going to go look for Mylene Allard. Checking out Mrs. Griffith will just have to wait.”
“Do you want to drive on this person hunt, or do you want me to?” Woody asked, jingling his keys at her.
“I need air conditioning, so I’ll drive,” Rhetta said, withdrawing her keys from her purse, then sliding the purse up her arm. She gulped the last of her coffee.
“My Jeep is air conditioned. All natural air when the top’s down.”
“I know how that works. No thanks. Let’s take mine.” She aimed her keys at Streak, clicked the opener and unlocked the doors.
Woody jumped in quickly and was strapped in by the time Rhetta slid behind the wheel, set her phone on top of the console and inserted the keys in the ignition. She turned and studied him. “You sure got in quickly.”
“Last time I got in with you, you took off so fast, you nearly threw me out on the pavement,” he said. His lips twitched in a faint smile.
“Dang, Woody, you make it sound like I did that on purpose.”
He shot her a sideways look, but said nothing. He pulled out his notepad containing the page he had printed with the information, along with his iPhone. “I mapped the address, as well as printed it.” He held up the phone. “Let’s roll.”
* * *
Twenty minutes later, they’d crossed the Emerson Bridge over the bank-full Mississippi River. The drive normally took about five minutes, but today, thanks to a load of produce that had been dumped in the middle of Kingshighway, and a minivan that sideswiped a police cruiser, traffic was snarled all the way from their office to the bridge.
Early persistent summer rains had pushed the river up against the Cape Girardeau, Missouri, floodwall during several months of high water, resulting in swamped fields on the unprotected Illinois side. The flooding was still evident in the water-soaked land that bordered each side of Route 146, making the highway look like a causeway through a giant lake. No crops this year. As they rounded a curve near the small village of East Cape Girardeau, Rhetta spotted the local notorious bar and hot spot, The Pink Peacock. A single car sat in the parking lot. Although the business appeared closed, she knew the bar didn’t open until evenings, and that later, the lot would be full. She and Randolph used this route when they went to the Lake. According to the blinking roadside sign in the parking lot, the club featured pole dancers, strippers and various other forms of entertainment that Rhetta didn’t want to think about. About a quarter mile past the Peacock, Rhetta pulled over and began to turn around.
“What’s up?” Woody asked, swiveling his head to look back to where they’d just come. “Why are you turning around?”
“The sign back there said the Pink Peacock has strippers and pole dancers. Just for grins, let’s go and see if anyone there knows Mylene Allard.”
“There doesn’t seem to be anyone there right now, and what makes you think anyone there would know her?”
“There’s
one car in the lot. Someone’s there, maybe the manager. I’m thinking Mylene’s our missing pole dancer.”
Woody gazed back at Rhetta. “If she is, she’d be a little old to still be pole dancing, don’t you think?”
“That depends. Nobody seemed to know exactly how old she was when she was supposedly carrying on with Malcom Griffith. She could be barely in her forties now. Not too old for the Peacock, based on the pictures I’ve seen of the entertainers there,” Rhetta said and chuckled. “It isn’t Las Vegas. Besides, the interior is dim and they serve alcohol, so all the women are bound to look good.” Woody just shook his head, and said nothing. “I’m wondering why she wanted to meet me out at the barn. Now Jeremy is dead. It’s much too coincidental.”
Woody continued staring at Rhetta. “I know—you hate coincidences. You think she might be the killer?”
“I don’t really know what to think. That’s why we need to find her and talk to her. The cops don’t seem in a big hurry to find her. They’re too busy looking at Ricky for this.”
“Then we should try going to her address first. It’s only about ten miles from here. Besides, if we ask about her at the Peacock, word might get back to her. Not to mention what might happen to us for asking.”
Rhetta made a left turn into the Peacock’s pothole-riddled parking lot. The only car near the building was incongruous in the surroundings—a magnificent late-model Dodge Viper. She pulled in beside it and shut off Streak. She climbed out and wandered around to the front of the spotless red machine. The personalized plate read MYVPR. “Hmm. My Viper. I’d take it in a heartbeat.” She glanced at the plate again and noticed it bore a running horse across the top. Not an Illinois tag. The car must belong to a wealthy Peacock customer from Kentucky.
Rhetta returned to her vehicle and leaned on the passenger door. Woody had rolled down the window, but was still buckled in. She pointed to the bar. “This is the only strip joint in a fifty mile radius of where you say her address is. All the more reason to stop here and check it out.” She eyed Woody, who still hadn’t unfastened his seat belt. “Aren’t you coming with me?”
“I want to know how you know this is the only strip joint? You make a habit of going to strip joints? Does Randolph know about this?”