Текст книги "Foul Play"

Автор книги: Jeff Shelby

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Текущая страница: 4 (всего у книги 14 страниц)

TEN

“Good morning, ladies,” Eleanor said, sitting down before we’d even had time to invite her to do so. “How are we this fine morning?”

“Good, good,” Joanne said. She picked up her phone from the tabletop. “But I was just on my way out. I have another appointment that I can’t be late for. Daisy, here, however, has graciously offered to take a shot at designing our programs.”

Eleanor eyed me with suspicion. Her eyelashes were nearly as long as my fingers. “Is that right?”

I smiled at her. “That’s right.”

Joanne stood and gathered up her things. “Yes, that’s right. And I hate to leave so quickly, but I really do need to get going. Daisy, please call me if you need anything. I’ll be in touch soon.” She forced a smile. “Eleanor, nice to see you, as always.”

“I’m sure,” Eleanor said, stretching out in her chair. The wooden legs creaked in protest. “Toodleloo.”

Joanne waved and set a land speed record getting out of the coffee shop.

I hadn’t planned on sitting down with Eleanor and I was fairly certain that Joanne hadn’t planned on it, either. Eleanor, however, seemed to think that she’d made our day by gracing us with her presence.

“So. Daisy,” she said, still eyeing me with curiosity. Her eyelashes brushed her cheeks. “Do you think you can do our program justice?”

“Justice?” I tried hard not to stare at her and her horrible fake eyelashes.  “I’m not really sure what that means.”

“Hmm,” she said, squinting at me. She blinked rapidly, trying to get her lashes unstuck. “I’m not sure that bodes well, then. You do understand how important the programs are, correct? Other than the stage production, they are the showcase piece of our event.”

“Of course,” I lied. Of course I didn’t know that. I thought the kids were the showcase piece, since it was a kid’s community theater group. But clearly I was wrong.

“So then you do understand that these must be just perfect, correct?” She waited expectantly for my answer.

“I’ll do my best,” I told her.

“Yes, I’m sure you will,” she said. “And I guess we’ll just hope that’s good enough, now won’t we?”

She was arrogant. She was haughty. She literally looked down her long pointed nose at everyone she spoke to. So I had to remind myself that two of my girls were in her play and that it would not be good form to dump my coffee all over her pulled-up pants and fake eyelashes.

“My understanding is that you’re really looking to bring in some money with this production,” I said. “So I’ll do what I can to—”

She smacked her hands down on the table and leaned forward. “Ms. Savage.” She sucked in a deep breath, then exhaled slowly. “These productions are not about money. They are about the art of the theater.”

“Uh, so, then it doesn’t matter if we sell tickets or not?” I asked innocently. “I mean, since this is about the art, not the money…”

“Of course it matters,” she snapped. She took another deep breath. “Without money, we cannot serve the wonderful people of Moose River and the surrounding communities. Of course we must have money – it is a necessary evil, if you will. But the money is secondary to the beauty of the stage.”

“Right,” I said. “Well, this production has probably gotten a lot of attention.”

She settled back in her seat, her arms folded over her enormous pant-covered bosom, and arched a satisfied eyebrow at me. “Well, my dear, anytime my name is attached to a production, I think it’s safe to say that it will garner attention. I’m quite well known around here, and even down in the Twin Cities for what I’ve accomplished. I don’t want to diminish the work of our young actors, but it’s quite possible that many of our attendees will be attending because I’m the director.” Her big red lips parted into a smile. “You’d be hard-pressed to find a director with a larger following here in Minnesota. Perhaps even the Midwest.”

I smothered a horrified giggle at her inflated sense of self-worth. The Twin Cities had one of the largest, most prestigious theater districts in the Midwest. I was fairly certain our tiny town’s local community theater – performing in the rented theater at our high school – was not on anyone’s radar outside of the city limits.

“Right,” I said again, not bothering to hide the doubt laced in my voice. “But I guess I was referring to the drama that has surrounded the play. You know, with Amanda going missing and all.”

Her smile dimmed. “Hmm. Yes, I suppose that probably has drawn the interest of a few folks.” Eleanor drummed her fingers on the table. Her nails were as red as her lips. “But what is the saying? All publicity is good publicity?”

“I suppose,” I said, thinking that there wasn't anything good about a missing teenage girl. “Have you heard anything from the girl's family?”

She made a face at me, a cross between a frown and a haughty look of disdain. “Ms. Savage, it's not my nature to intrude on the business of others.”

“I'd think you might be able to offer some help, though,” I said. “Insight as to what her mood was like before she went missing… things like that.”

“Her mood was fine,” she said curtly. “I don't believe I have anything else to offer her family, thus I've chosen to mind my own business.” Her eyes narrowed and once again, her lashes clumped together. “Which I think might be a wise decision for everyone to live by.”

It felt like a pointed remark, aimed directly at me. I wasn't sure how aware she was of me and the things I'd been involved with in Moose River. However, if I had to wager a guess, I would think she was familiar with some of the stories, as my name had been in the local paper and I knew people had been talking about the computer theft and, earlier on, the discovery of Olaf Stunderson in my coal chute. I was comfortable with my involvement with those other things – well, as comfortable as I could be being tied to a murder investigation and grand larceny – but I didn't like her taking a jab at me. Mostly because I didn't like her.

“I hear your daughter is taking over the role of Snow White,” I said, picking up my coffee. It was still hot and I took a sip. “She must be thrilled to be in the lead role. Again.”

Something flickered through her eyes. “Again? She was never cast as Snow White previous to this… incident.”

“No, I meant again in that she is always the star of your shows.” I smiled at her over my mug. “At least that's what I've been told.”

“Madison is a wonderful actress,” she said primly. “Any notion of nepotism is purely sour grapes.”

“I'm sure,” I asked. “I mean, nepotism at this level of theater would just be… stupid.” She visibly bristled and I continued. “How were the auditions?”

“Auditions?”

“For Snow White? You told us the other day that there would be auditions to recast the role?” I smiled innocently. “I just assumed that you'd already completed the auditions since Madison is now set to replace Amanda.”

For the first time since she walked in, Eleanor Bandersand seemed less than sure of herself. She uncrossed her arms and adjusted herself in the chair, like she'd just realized that it was the most uncomfortable seating arrangement in the world. She looked across the table, searching for a cup of coffee or a blueberry muffin or anything to busy herself with instead of answering my questions.

“Auditions?” I repeated again, prompting her.

She cleared her throat. “Well, after looking at our options, we decided that Madison was best suited to play the role, given the circumstances we are now working under.”

Translation: there were no try-outs and she'd handed it to her daughter.

“Madison has consistently demonstrated the ability to learn large roles and perform them well,” she continued. “She will help make the production a success and it will be one more reason that the drama schools will be requesting her presence in the fall.”

I remembered hearing Madison run her mouth when I was picking up the costumes for the girls. “Has she decided where she'll be attending?”

“Not as of yet, no,” Eleanor said. “She's still waiting to receive all of her acceptance letters.”

“Oh. She hasn't heard yet from the schools?”

Her brows knitted together. “We haven't yet reached the window where the schools send out their acceptance letters. I'm sure she'll have multiple options, though.”

I thought that was interesting. Either Madison had lied to her friend or she hadn't yet told her mother that she'd been accepted. But I seriously doubted that anyone touched the mail before Eleanor got her hands on it.

Interesting.

“Well, I'm certain you must have a lot to do now,” Eleanor said, standing. “So I will let you get to it.”

I nodded. “Yes, I guess I do.”

“As I said before,” she said, pushing her chair in. “I hope you're up to the task.”

I stood and collected the brochures Joanne left for me. “I hope your family is, too.”

Her eyes narrowed, confused and wary. “My family?”

“Both you and your daughter,” I said. “Your daughter with the new role you gave her and your task of directing a brand new actress in the lead role. I'd imagine you have a lot to do, too.” I smiled at her. “Would be a shame if this show wasn't up to your...usual standards.”

The corners of her mouth twitched. “Don't you worry about us. We'll be fine. You just focus on the programs.”

I held them up and slung my purse over my arm. “I'll do that, Eleanor. Toodleloo.”

ELEVEN

Are you home right now?

I'd left Eleanor at Cream and Sugar and, after stopping home for an hour to check on the kids and feed them lunch, I finished my running around for the day, hitting the post office, the bank and the gas station. I was just about to pull away from the pump when I got Emily's text.

I called her back. When she answered, I said, “No, I am not currently home. What do you need?”

“How long are you not going to be home for?” she asked, her voice nearly a whisper.

“I don't know. Why? And why are you talking like a spy?”

“Can you not be home for awhile?” she asked. “For, like, maybe the next hour or so?”

“That sounds ominous.”

“Can you?”

“Emily. What is going on?”

She sighed so hard into the phone, I nearly felt her breath on my cheek. “I have a friend who’s stuck here at school. I was going to bring them home for a little bit until their mom can come and pick them up.”

“Well, that's fine,” I said, confused. “What does any of that have to do with me being home?”

“I just...I just...I don't know,” she answered, flustered. “I guess I was just checking. So you'll be gone for a little while longer?”

I smelled a rat. “Who is your friend, Em?”

“Just a friend.”

“The name of the friend, please.”

She sighed again. “It's Andy Hartnell.”

“So you want to bring a boy home while I'm not there?”

“Oh my God. It's not like that, Mom,” she said. “And besides, the other kids are there, aren't they?”

I knew Emily was a private kid; I knew she kept things to herself; she was always very careful about what she shared and how she shared it. And I’d always thought Emily was savvy. But this conversation was forcing me to rethink that entire idea. Because she was trying to game me in a couple of different ways and she was doing an utterly poor job of it. If she knew the other kids were home, then she'd already talked to one of them – probably Will – and realized that I wasn't there. So then she'd called me and was attempting to keep me out of the house, most likely because she was afraid I'd embarrass her. And all of this involved her maybe-boyfriend.

I admired her nerve, but frowned at her poor execution. “Okay, sure,” I told her. “Go ahead and bring him home. His parents will pick him up?”

“Really?” she said, surprised. “You don't mind? And you won't be home?”

“I don't mind,” I said. “You're right. The other kids will be home.”

“Seriously?”

“Seriously.”

The line buzzed for a moment. “Okay. Alright. So he's going to take the bus home with me in a minute and then his mom will pick him up by 4:30. You can come home after that.”

“That sounds fine.”

“Thanks, Mom! You're the best!”

She hung up and I dropped the phone in my purse and smiled.

Foolish, foolish girl.

I pulled out of the gas station and pointed the minivan in the direction of my home.

We'd see if she still thought I was the best when I was home to greet her and her new friend.

TWELVE

I watched the bus pull up at the corner.

I’d made it home in about four minutes, which I knew would give me just enough time to get settled before the bus got them to our street. I put the stamps away and peeked in on the girls before I returned to the kitchen. I poured myself a glass of water and waited.

Several minutes later, I was rewarded as the yellow bus pulled to a halt across the street.

I smiled again. I knew she was going to freak out, but I also knew her freak out would be decidedly less than what it would be later on, when Andy was gone and she went full-on crazy with me. She’d dial it down while he was there because she wouldn’t want to embarrass herself. We could deal with the crazy later on.

The bus pulled away and they both stood there, laughing about something.

And I realized that I recognized Andy.

A month or so earlier, I’d been involved in a fundraiser at Prism, Em’s charter high school. The fundraiser was a talent show that I’d planned to help the school deal with the theft of its computers. While we were backstage at the show, I’d seen Emily talking to a boy I didn’t recognize.

That same boy was now walking across the street with her.

Emily was running a hand through her hair and laughing, a sure sign that she was nervous, when she finally realized my car was in the driveway. She stopped in the middle of the street and I could tell by their expressions that he was asking her what she was doing.

I knew what she was doing.

She was realizing that it had been a mistake to underestimate me.

She finally started walking again, her feet dragging across the pavement like a convicted felon might to their jail cell.

I pulled open the kitchen door and smiled at them as they reached the bottom step. “Wouldn’t you know, I finished my errands sooner than planned?”

She looked like she wanted to growl at me as she trudged up the stairs. Andy came up behind her, a large backpack slung over his shoulder, his dark brown hair swept to the side.

“Andy, this is my mom,” Em mumbled as she passed me.

He held out his hand. “Hi.”

“Hi, Andy,” I said, shaking his hand. “I’m Daisy.”

“Hi,” he said again. He had blue eyes and a dimple in his chin. He wore a thick red hoodie and jeans with running shoes and I noticed he was slightly taller than me. He smelled like bubblegum and some kind of boy teen body spray.

“Are you coming?” Emily asked from the dining room.

Andy stood there awkwardly, unsure where to head.

Which made me like him because he wasn’t making a direct beeline to my daughter’s bedroom.

“Actually, I need you to do something for me,” I said.

Her shoulders fell and she shoved the backpack off her arm. “What?”

“I need you to run downstairs to the basement and unload the dryer and move the clothes from the washer to the dryer,” I said, smiling. “Please.”

“I’ll do it later.”

“Actually, no, I need you to do it now because it was supposed to be done yesterday,” I said, maintaining the smile. “I’ll keep Andy occupied until you’re done. Oh, and while you’re down there, I also need you to go up in the crawl space and grab the scissors and flashlight that Jake left up there last winter. Okay? Thanks.”

“Mom.”

“Emily, hurry.” I grinned at her. “That way when you’re done, you’ll be able to spend a few minutes with Andy.” I looked at Andy. “Do you like bars?”

“Bars?” He looked confused, like it was a trick question or something.

“Cookie bars,” I corrected and his eyes lit up with relief.

“Oh.” He shrugged. “Sure.”

“Chocolate chip?”

“Sure.”

Emily groaned and stomped past us, through the kitchen and down the stairs to the basement, slamming the door as she went.

Never underestimate your mother.

I gestured at the kitchen table. “Have a seat. I’ll grab the bars.”

He pulled out a chair and sat. I grabbed the plastic container of bars and brought it to the table, then sat down across from him. I pulled off the lid and pushed it toward him.

He pulled one out. “Thanks.”

“Of course,” I said. “So, you and Em are in the same grade?”

He took a bite. “Yeah. I mean, yes.”

“How do you like Prism?”

He shrugged again. “It’s okay, I guess. Kinda small. But it’s fine.”

“You didn’t want to go to Moose River High?”

“Actually, I did, but my parents weren’t crazy about it,” he explained. “They thought it was too big.” He shrugged again and polished off the bar.

I nudged the container toward him. “Have another.”

He hesitated, then pulled out another.

“So I hear you and Amanda Pendleton were friends,” I said.

He shrugged and bit into the second bar. He was very good at shrugging. “Yeah, sorta.”

“And no one’s heard from Amanda yet?” I asked.

Andy hesitated. “Not that I’ve heard.”

“Emily said you and Amanda were...dating?”

He froze in mid-bite. Then he unfroze and swallowed hard. “Yeah. We were.” His cheeks turned red. “We, uh, broke up, though.”

“She told me that, too,” I said, not wanting to intentionally embarrass him. “It’s all just sort of awkward, with her disappearing or whatever people are calling it.”

He finished the second bar and folded his hands on the table. “I guess so. I don’t know. It’s all just weird. I just hope she’s okay. I mean, I don’t like her anymore. Not like that. I mean, we’re friends and stuff. But we’re not together. So I just hope she’s okay.” He paused. “That all probably sounds pretty weird.”

“Not at all,” I assured him. “Sounds pretty normal, actually.”

“I mean, I wouldn’t want anything to happen to anyone,” he said. “But especially not someone I know.” He cleared his throat. “So yeah. It’s all kind of weird, I guess.”

Any thoughts I might have entertained about Andy somehow being involved with Amanda’s disappearance were quickly vanishing. Unless he was the world’s greatest actor, he seemed like a sincere kid who hoped his ex-girlfriend/friend was okay. There was no nervousness, no desire to cover anything up. He seemed flustered talking about it but not because he had anything to do with it; he just seemed weirded out because he was talking about his old girlfriend with his new girlfriend’s mother. I thought about how I’d reacted to questions about Olaf and my connection to him. I’d been a little unnerved, too… and I’d actually had his dead body in my coal chute.

I didn’t think Andy was faking anything or lying to me. Or hiding his ex-girlfriend’s body in a coal chute.

Score another point for Andy.

I heard the washer lid bang shut down in the basement.

“So,” I said. “How do you and Em know one another?”

He squirmed in his chair. “Just school, I guess. We had a class together last year. Think it was math.”

“I think I saw you with a violin.”

He smiled, relaxing a little. “Yeah, I play the violin. Probably at the talent show that you put on. That was you, right?”

I nodded. “That was me and, yes, I think that was it.”

“That was a cool night.”

“Thanks. I’m glad you thought so.”

Feet pounded down the stairs from above and the two younger girls crashed into the living room, their arms full of dolls. They froze when they saw an unfamiliar face at the table.

“Mom, who’s that?” Grace asked, staring at him.

“This is Andy. He’s Emily’s friend.”

Grace broke into a big grin. “Oh. You’re her boyfriend.”

Andy tried to smile but his teeth got stuck on his lips and his cheeks burned an even darker shade of red.

“Grace,” I said, frowning. “He’s her friend. How about if you girls play upstairs?”

“Where’s Emily?” Sophie asked. She peered at Andy through her glasses. “Or did you come by yourself?”

“Uh,” Andy said. “I’m not really sure. I think she’s doing laundry?”

“Oh,” Sophie said, as if it made perfect sense for her older sister to be doing chores while a strange boy sat at the table with her stepmom. “Okay. Come on, Grace. Let’s go.”

She bounded back up the stairs. Grace gave Andy one more hard stare, then scurried after her.

“Sorry about that,” I said. “Grace is a little… nosy.”

“I have a little sister,” he said. “It’s okay.”

Andy was a nice kid and despite my questioning and Grace’s questions, he’d remained mostly unflappable. I was starting to feel a little guilty about sending Emily down to the basement. She and I could have a discussion about bringing boys home later. I didn’t need to make her pay for it while he was there.

“Let me go grab Em,” I said, standing up. “Give me just a minute?”

“Sure.”

I jogged down the basement stairs. Emily was up on the step stool, her eyes shut tight, steeling herself for going into the crawl space.

“Stop,” I said.

Her eyes flew open.

“Go back upstairs. And hang out with your...Andy.”

She turned around, her cheeks flushed, strands of hair flying all over the place. “I didn’t get the scissors yet.”

“It’s fine,” I said, waving her off. “Go.”

She jumped off the stool. “Why did you come home?”

“Because you asked me to stay out of my own house while you brought a boy home,” I said pointedly. “But we can talk about that later. Right now, a very nice, patient young boy is waiting on you upstairs.”

“Do I look terrible?” she asked, running her hands through her hair.

I looked at her long brown hair and blue eyes and perfectly pink lips. There was nothing terrible looking about her. “No. Go.”

She took a couple of steps and then stopped. “Wait. Did you tell him anything about me?”

“Nothing too embarrassing. Yet.” I pointed at the stairs. “Go. And keep the door to your room open.”

She huffed, irritated, then hustled up the steps.

I took a deep breath.

She’d been a teenager for several years, but now that she was inviting boys over to the house, it appeared as if we were in the throes of teenage hormones and insanity. Emily was a good kid but that didn’t mean it was going to be a smooth ride. I knew better. I’d been a teenage girl, too.

And that was enough to make me hustle back up the stairs to keep an eye on them.