Jeanne Glidewell - Lexie Starr 06 - Cozy Camping (23 page)

“Huh? Why would I want to draw flies?” Brandi replied, without a clue what I was talking about. “Now that’s just gross!”

“Never mind. I’m too tired to explain the meaning behind that old adage.” I could feel my temper starting to rise, and I didn’t want to unleash it on a young girl who probably had no idea her remarks had been offensive and inappropriate.

It suddenly occurred to me that the tragic loss of her stepmother might have emotionally affected her demeanor. After all, I had no way of knowing how close the two had been. Before Brandi could think of more clever ways to demean and insult me, I decided to change the subject and offer her my condolences. My bruised and battered ego couldn’t take much more abuse from the little snot.

“By the way, I’m sorry for your loss, sweetheart.”

“My loss?” She asked, confused. “What loss are you talking about?”

“You know—the death of your stepmother.”

“Her death is no big loss as far as I’m concerned.”

“Well, dear, it’s got to be a little hard to accept the fact she’s been so brutally and abruptly removed from your life. She did play a part in your life, didn’t she?” I asked.

“Not really. The only part she played in my life was to break up my family. Now I hardly ever see my daddy anymore. But it’s my mom, more than me, who’s been a complete wreck since Daddy left us. She’s just not the same anymore. She cries all the time and refuses to let me spend much time with Daddy. She told me she doesn’t want me to be influenced by his new wife—or didn’t, I should say. But I really don’t want to talk about Fanny,” Brandi said. I could tell I’d put a damper on her mood, which hadn’t been exactly cheerful to begin with. I felt bad about bringing up a sore subject. But feeling bad, or not, it didn’t deter me from probing deeper.

“Okay, I understand. I just want you to know that I feel bad for you, and I’m sorry about the whole situation with your parents.”

“Thanks.”

“Do you know if your mother has any idea who might have electrocuted Fanny, or any suspicions about the killer?”

“I’m pretty sure she knows very little about the murder. Why do you ask?”

“My daughter and I are kind of looking into possible suspects’ motives and alibis, in hopes of being able to assist the detectives in tracking down the perpetrator. I’ve helped our local police back home solve a number of murder cases. I’m quite good at it, actually. In fact, not long ago I was awarded a Certificate of Appreciation from the police department for my help in solving the murder of our local librarian,” I boasted.
⁷

“Really! No kidding, lady?” Brandi asked. The girl might not have much of a sense of humor, but I’m sure I detected a healthy dose of sarcasm in her four-word response. Granted, a letter of appreciation from a small town’s police department was hardly a Pulitzer Prize for single-handedly discovering a cancer-cell-killing medication, or a Medal of Honor for saving an entire platoon of soldiers from being ambushed by the enemy—or even a Doctorate Degree from Harvard, which I had no doubt she’d be awarded before she could legally purchase a beer. Still, I felt my achievement demanded a little more respect than Brandi had extended to me.

A sense of melancholy had settled over both of us, as if a thick cloud had dipped down into the valley we were meandering through. We walked the rest of the way to the barn in silence. I was relieved to see a smile return to the young girl’s face when her mother met us at the entrance to the barn. I could hear Wendy and Veronica talking and laughing animatedly inside the barn. I patted Brandi on the shoulder.

“Thanks for coming to my rescue, sweetheart. I wish you only the best in the future, one I know will be bright, like yourself. I’m certain you’ll be successful in whatever path you choose to follow.”

Brandi thanked me politely, as did Cassie, who asked me if I’d had fun on the trail ride.

“Yes, very much, Cassie. I appreciate you telling me about it. I know Wendy and Veronica had a wonderful time, as well. Enjoy the rest of your stay here in Cheyenne.”

“Thanks. You too. We head home Friday afternoon. I have a photo shoot for a magazine cover on Monday, and want to be well rested so I don’t have bags under my eyes. Not to mention, these photo shoots can be long and tedious—much more than people who aren’t in the fashion industry could possibly imagine. And a model my age needs a long time in the makeup chair before the shoot can even commence.”

“Don’t cut yourself short, honey. I’m certain that even at your age, which I still consider to be ‘spring chicken-ish,’ and with your looks and physique, you are still in high demand. Best of luck with your upcoming photo shoot. In the meantime, I hope we run into you and your kids around the campground before we leave. We’re heading home Saturday morning, since we don’t have tickets to the rodeo finals on Sunday and we want to beat the mass exodus out of town.”

“Spring chicken-ish? Ha-ha. I wish! But thank you for the kind words. Sad to say, but that’s one of the nicest compliments I’ve received in a while,” Cassie replied. Then Cassie told her daughter to go on into the barn and get herself and her brother a sugar-free soda. Afterwards, she’d meet them at their car to head back to the campground.

I bade Cassie goodbye and walked into the barn, mentally going over how I’d explain to Wendy why I ended up needing to be rescued by a ten-year old. An extremely intelligent and mature ten-year-old, I might add, but a ten-year-old, nonetheless.

* * *

As I walked toward the corner of the barn where Wendy and Veronica were chatting with one of the other female riders on our excursion that day, I thought I detected paleness in Veronica’s expressionless face. Studying her intently as I approached the three women, I saw her knees begin to buckle and I moved faster than I’d have ever guessed my fifty-one-year old, worn-out body, with every muscle screaming in agony, could move. I reached out my arms and cushioned Veronica’s fall just as she toppled over face-first in a dead faint.

A loud gasp echoed around the room as people realized what had just happened. Shortly after their initial reaction, they all rushed to offer assistance. The olive-skinned woman with whom Wendy and Veronica had just been conversing shouted out to her husband, who, as luck would have it, was a trauma nurse at their local hospital in Idaho.

Veronica regained consciousness fairly quickly, but we were all concerned about what had prompted the fainting incident. Wendy explained to the male nurse about how little her friend had eaten at the cowpoke lunch earlier in the day, and he agreed the lack of nourishment had most likely been what had caused her to pass out. The nurse pulled a candy bar out of a pocket of his windbreaker and handed it to Veronica. When she shook her head to refuse it I felt I had to speak up.

“Take the bar and eat it! And I mean right now, Veronica! You need the energy and sustenance it will provide, and I am not going to let you die of malnutrition on my watch!”

The still shaken woman looked up at me in bewilderment, as if trying to recall who I was. Then she snarfed the candy bar down like she’d been stranded on a desert island without food for a month. The poor confused girl was literally in danger of starving herself to death, I realized.

After Veronica had regained enough strength to get up and walk under her own power, we thanked the nurse for coming to her aid, and prepared to leave the ranch. Not surprisingly, with Veronica’s fainting spell at the forefront of our minds, nothing was said about my little “incident” on the trail ride as we drove back to the campground. I gave a great deal of thought on how to approach the nutrition issue with Veronica without making it obvious I’d spoken to Wyatt about her.

“How are you feeling, honey?” I asked as I studied her face in the rear view mirror. Wendy was sitting in the back seat with her so she could keep an eye on her and respond to an emergency if one arose.

After she weakly replied she was fine, I said, “Veronica, I’ve been noticing your weight dwindling over the last year or so, and I’m concerned about your welfare. You just don’t look well to me.”

Even though I’d kept Wyatt’s concerns to myself, Wendy jumped right in with concurrence, and said earnestly, “I agree with Mom. You know, Veronica, a year ago I thought you were the prettiest woman on the planet, as I’m sure Wyatt, and everyone who’s ever laid eyes on you, did too. But now as the pounds are melting off your body, so are the gorgeous features that impressed me so much. They are being replaced by sunken cheeks, dark shadows under your eyes and skeletal limbs. Even your once lustrous hair is being adversely affected. You are much too thin—unhealthily so, as today’s fainting episode proves. If you have body image issues, please, for your and Wyatt’s sake, get some help before it’s too late. You have beautiful features, Veronica, and they’d only be enhanced by a healthy-looking physique. “

Veronica’s head hung down, in embarrassment I’m sure. Her chin nearly touched her prominent breast bone. I knew my daughter was speaking from the heart and had no intention of hurting her friend’s feelings. She was as concerned as I was about the emaciated young lady. I didn’t want to humiliate Veronica, so I added, “Honey, we aren’t trying to beat you down in any way. We care so much about you that we’re afraid of what might happen to you if you don’t start eating better, and hopefully put a few pounds on your thin frame in the process.”

“I know, and I appreciate your concern,” she replied, as I saw Wendy reach over and put her arm around Veronica’s shoulders. “I promise I’ll try. I know Wyatt is worried about me too. I’ve been battling demons from my past for several years, and he has been helping me in my attempt to overcome them. Please don’t tell him what happened today. I don’t want him to be angry with me.”

I was thinking I didn’t want her boyfriend to be angry with me either, and he surely would be if I didn’t share today’s health scare with him. I’d been on the wrong side of Wyatt’s good nature several times before, and had no desire to be there again.
⁸
So, instead of promising to keep my lips sealed, I replied evasively, “We don’t want him angry either, but we all are concerned. And we’re here for you—always—to do whatever it takes to get you well!”

We rode in silence for a while until I asked Wendy about her conversation with Cassie Bumberdinger. As Wendy and I discussed the Bumberdingers, Veronica listened to tunes on her iPod, with an ear bud in each ear. She dutifully munched on a pack of peanut butter crackers I’d had in my fanny pack. In contrast to Veronica, I was never without some form of snack in my possession, and it didn’t take a fainting spell to encourage me to indulge. In fact, it took great willpower not to.

I listened now as Wendy spoke. “Although she didn’t have much to say about Fanny’s death, she did make a remark that kind of threw me for a loop. She said, kind of under her breath, ‘This just wasn’t the way Avery and I planned it.’”

“I wonder what she meant by that?” I asked. “Did she expound on her comment at all?”

“Well, when I asked her, she just kind of hemmed and hawed, and said she was referring to the way they’d planned to spend their lives together after she’d gotten pregnant with Brandi.”

“Hmmm… interesting.”

“I told her I couldn’t quite see what there was about Fanny Finch that would have attracted her ex-husband, and she told me there was more to Fanny than met the eye. When I prodded her to continue, she explained that Fanny’s father, who was critically ill with terminal kidney cancer, was the owner of a huge trash hauling company, a company that included five massive dump sites, hundreds of trash trucks, and thousands of employees. Apparently, there’s a lot of money to be made in trash removal, and Fanny was the sole heir to a small fortune. In fact, Cassie told me that ownership of the Vandersnoozeski Waste Management Corporation had already been transferred over to Fanny when her father became too ill to run the company and she took over as the CEO. It was basically a figurehead position, with a board of trustees handling the day-to-day operations of the company.”

“Did she think Avery had an eye on Fanny’s money?” I asked.

“She didn’t say so, but she kind of inferred that might be the case, because, like all of us, she couldn’t imagine what attracted her husband to an overbearing woman like Fanny. In any event, it was obvious there was no love lost between her and Avery’s new wife. Do I think she might have been involved with Fanny’s death? I don’t really know. But I think she definitely had an ax to grind with her and is not overcome with grief about her replacement’s untimely death.”

“It doesn’t appear as if anyone is exactly overcome with grief. Brandi doesn’t consider her stepmother’s death to be much of a loss, either,” I said.

“Cassie told me Brandi is extremely intelligent, and that the girl’s so mature for her age that Cassie often forgets she talking to a child when she’s discussing a grown-up matter with her. She said Brandi’s what is known as—”

“Let me guess,” I said, interrupting Wendy in mid-sentence. “Gifted, right? Brandi refers to herself as gifted as most kids would refer to themselves as being bored, completely matter-of-factly, as if she’s been reminded of it a zillion times.”

“Exactly,” Wendy replied. “What was she like when you were with her today? By the way, did I not caution you about drinking all that coffee at lunch?”

I decided to ignore her last question, and answer the first one instead. “Brandi’s an enigma, let me tell you. Conversing with her is like chatting with R2-D2, the Stars Wars robot. She was almost stoic while she expelled facts and figures as if she was reading from a text book. Saying she’s extremely intelligent is an understatement if I’ve ever heard one.”