Still Life in Brunswick Stew (24 page)
Read Still Life in Brunswick Stew Online
Authors: Larissa Reinhart
Tags: #Mystery, #humor, #cozy, #Humour, #Romance, #cozy mystery, #southern mystery, #humorous mystery, #mystery series
Max whipped me through the rec-room door, past the raucous action in the bingo room, and up the stairs.
“Now listen, Bear,” I said. “I don’t need a tour. I am concerned about your sudden decision to host bingo in my town. You have a history of encouraging private gambling in your home—gambling that is illegal in the state of Georgia—and it’s best if you just come clean.”
“Come clean? Your idiomatic references confuse me.”
“I also know you are entertaining a person of interest in the Sidewinder poisoning. Actually two, considering one’s playing bingo and the other’s in the pool house. Not a good idea, Bear.”
“I had heard wrong that the poisoner had been caught? And died by his own hand?”
He examined my consternated look and before I could remark, pointed to the heavy wooden door on the opposite side of the foyer. “I believe you have seen my library with its Confederate States collection, no? Let me take you to parts of my home you haven’t seen.”
“I don’t want a tour. Break up this party before you get in trouble with the law.” I dug my bare toes into his tiled foyer as best I could. “I want you to fess up. They’ll be easier on you that way.”
“Fess up? Again Miss Tucker, please use the standard English with me.” He pulled me across the tile to the winding staircase. “I have more collections upstairs. Come.”
Curiosity got the better of me. I hopped up the stairs to match his long strides. “Can you at least relax your grip? My limbs haven’t quite recovered from my, uh, climb.”
He gave me one of those almost-scary smiles and drug me up the rest of the staircase. At the top, another hallway stretched before us. We shot past four closed doors to an end room.
Inside, Max released my arm and closed the door with his back. We had entered a kind of sitting room for what I suspected was a master bedroom.
I spun around to face him. “So what’s all fired important in this room, Bear? Or are you just squirreling me away from the bingo crowd so they can’t hear your confession?”
He folded his arms across his chest. “What confession would that be? The one where I have caught you trespassing on my grounds? You are trying my patience, Artist.”
“Trying patience is my M.O. What are you getting out of this bingo deal?”
“Why do you doubt me so?” He sighed. “If you must know, I do receive the compensation for hosting. I have legitimately bought the license from the charity. The ladies appreciate my efforts. Why must you always look for the ulterior motive?”
“Because I caught you hosting big money poker once before. You got lucky the police were more interested in a murder at the time to pursue it. There is such a thing as bingo scams. I looked it up. Some guy made a million running bingo until he got busted. Do you know the punishment for illegal gambling charges?”
Max took a long step in my direction and stood over me. His girth and strength had never missed my notice, but his sudden proximity was unnerving.
Goosebumps broke across my arms. I took a small step back, but countered the move with my best redneck glare.
His lips twitched, and he took another step forward.
I planted my feet into his ridiculously plush carpet.
“Which worries you more, Artist?” he whispered. “That I’ll be caught and punished? Or that I might get rich?”
He knew I didn’t have an answer and took advantage of my pursed lip silence to whirl me around to face the opposite wall.
I gulped. In the center of the wall hung my commissioned portrait of Dustin Branson.
“This is what I wanted to show you,” he said. “I have found a good place for the painting. I did not enjoy it with the rest of my collection as much as I do here. Beyond is my bedroom, but I do not think you need to see that room.”
I took a deep breath and inhaled the spicy, exotic cologne he wore. The head rush left me dizzy.
“I have decided your talent may be worth something one day. I will be keeping the eye on you. I pay well, remember this.” Max grasped my elbow and yanked me toward the door.
Once again we strode down the carpeted hall to the big staircase. I felt a bit dumbfounded, unusual for me, but it seemed to be a day for oddities. At the bottom of the staircase, Max walked me across the foyer, punched a few buttons on the security monitor, and opened the door.
“Wait,” I said. “What about the bingo games? And your pool house? And Todd?”
“I have found in friendships, it is the slow revelation of self that is the most pleasurable.” He leaned over my hand to kiss it. “Without an air of mystery, one becomes bored. Don’t you agree, Artist?”
Before I could think out a smart reply, the front door shut. I found myself on his porch, Max inside, and the door locked.
“Hell,” I said and sank onto the steps to wait for bingo to end.
By the time Pearl and Casey emerged from the Bear’s bingo lair, I had worked up a fine sweat that had nothing to do with the weather. Neither Max nor Todd reappeared, and because I had been keeping a careful eye on Max’s driveway, I knew Max’s male visitors also remained. I had given up scaling walls, although attempting to climb a fence had crossed my mind, and used the porch time for introspection.
Todd could escape me at Max’s House of Bingo Pleasure, but he promised to bring Eloise’s pottery to my home. I would corner him there.
Max might slither out of my clutches, but Todd couldn’t.
Casey tossed me my flip-flops with a grin. “Mr. Max said to give you these.”
“Look at my winnings.” Pearl waved her gift cards in my face. “You missed out on a good day and an appearance of that hunk of deliciousness.”
I scrunched my face into a what-the-hey expression, which Casey caught.
“She means Mr. Max. He’s a hunk of something,” Casey mused, “although of what I don’t know. I can see why you call him Bear. He’s gigantic and kind of testy.”
“Thank you,” I said. “I don’t know what’s wrong with Pearl and her buddies. I’m not seeing their fascination.”
“Yeah, right,” said Casey. “But, he’s rich.”
“I need more than rich to find a guy a hunk of deliciousness. I don’t understand him at all.”
“I don’t need more than rich,” said Casey. “And I don’t care about his accent. I’m not looking for conversation.”
“I’m not talking about his language skills. I don’t understand his motives. And you need to reexamine your values before you go looking for a sugar daddy.”
“Your sister is right,” said Pearl. “Money’s not everything. You need common interests. Like your Grandpa Ed and me.”
I suppressed a shudder at Pearl and Grandpa’s common interests—which was goats as far as I could tell—and allowed my stomach to speak for the time.
“God Almighty, what was that noise?” asked Pearl, looking around Max’s drive.
Most of the bingo ladies had left while we talked, so I couldn’t blame my internal roaring on the backfire of a Buick.
“Cherry’s gut,” said Casey. “I’ve got to go to work now anyway. If you throw hot wings at her, the noise will back down to a low roar.”
“I’ve got a County Line Tap gift certificate,” exclaimed Pearl. “I was going to hold on to it until the Sticks performance on Friday night, but I guess I could spend it now.”
Although my mood hadn’t improved after cooling my hot heels on the Bear’s porch, I decided a beer and hot wings might help. Usually it did.
That’s what’s great about wings and beer. Especially on someone else’s gift certificate.
On the ride to Red’s, I chose to not mention my tour of Max’s bedroom in front of Pearl for fear it might cause her heart palpitations, but I did explain my theory on the fancy cars and inaccessible pool house. I hoped to put a damper on Pearl’s enthusiasm about “sweet Mr. Max.”
At the tavern, we followed Casey into the restaurant. She disappeared through the swinging kitchen doors to change into more practical clothes for waiting tables. Practical for Casey meant switching her stilettos for tennis shoes and putting on Daisy Duke shorts and an extra small County Line t-shirt.
“You want a table?” asked Pearl.
“Let’s talk to Red,” I said and steered her toward the bar. Red played the role of my personal bartender and therapist pretty well. I needed both after the confusion at Max Avtaikin’s house.
Red’s smile spread across his freckled face at our appearance. He snapped his bar rag with a flourish for Pearl. Red was sweet like that. Because of our long friendship, he liked to keep it real for me. I didn’t get a lot of bar rag snapping.
“How you doing?” Red asked, handing me a beer. “I heard all about your friend Eloise. I’m sorry.”
“Thanks, Red.” I snatched the frosty mug with an eagerness that would have gotten me a smack on my hand by Grandma Jo. “Visitation is tomorrow. Funeral Friday.”
“What happened to your face?”
“An abusive boyfriend.” I touched the scrape under my lip.
Red’s ruddy face deepened to a Perylene Maroon. “How?”
I waved my hand. “That’s water under the bridge. I don’t believe Griffin committed suicide. But whatever happened, three people are dead. I guess justice was served. But it throws a monkey wrench into Hunter Adams’s theory. Maybe I should go talk to him again.”
“Who’s Hunter Adams?”
“This kid from one of the most dysfunctional family situations I’ve ever known. He thought his mom’s boyfriend poisoned their Brunswick Stew in the Sidewinder cook-off. In order to kill his wife. But he died instead.”
“Good heavens,” said Pearl. “I had no idea you were running around with teenagers whose mother’s had murdering boyfriends.”
With my pinky, I drew a gun on my frosty mug. “If Griffin hadn’t poisoned the Genuine Juice, I would have thought it might be Hunter’s mom. She’s murdered before.”
“Good Lord, Cherry,” said Red. “How do you get yourself in these situations?”
“I’m not in the situation,” I said. “I’m just in the know. Because Eloise’s family deserved to find out what happened. I guess instead of trying to figure out what Mr. Max and Todd are up to, I should be calling on the Sidewinder folks. I need to make a visit to Mrs. Maynard and express my sympathy. She’s the one who lost the cheating husband who didn’t poison the stew.”
Pearl nodded. “Bring her a pie. I can whip you up a pecan if you want.”
At the thought of pecan pie, my stomach ripped into overdrive.
Red hollered at Casey to bring hot wings.
“Well, I’m glad the police figured it out,” said Red. “Sounds like an awful mess.”
“They didn’t exactly figure it out. I tried to tell them Griffin was dangerous and nobody listened to me. Just like this business with Mr. Max. I’m pretty sure he’s ripping off the bingo community of Forks County. And running hot poker games again.”
“You need to lay off Mr. Max,” said Pearl. “He’s a honey. I’m sure the men with the fancy cars were watching baseball or something.”
“I don’t think Mr. Max is the baseball type,” I said. “He’s the Monte Carlo-type you see in the 007 movies. Except the Bear’s the guy holding a cat and playing with stolen money.”
“What are you saying? Mr. Max is dangerous?” asked Red.
“There’s no poker,” said Pearl. “Just bingo. I was there all afternoon and didn’t see any poker.”
“That’s because you were playing bingo and salivating over Mr. Max. They’re doing it in the pool house and Todd’s somehow involved. He’s going to get fired from his job or worse. End up in jail for getting involved in an illegal gambling ring. And you know about his gambling addiction.”
Red drew back. “You think? You want me to talk to Todd?”
“You can try,” I said. “I’m going to see him later tonight when he drops off Eloise’s stuff from the festival. I’m going to do my best to convince him to spill the beans.”
“Speaking of spilling beans,” said Red, “your buddy Shawna was in here the other night, trash talking you.”
I slammed my empty beer mug on the bar. “What’s she saying now?”
“After one too many appletinis—do you know I had to look that up? This is Halo, Georgia. Who drinks appletinis here? I don’t know what she’s trying to prove with an appletini.”
I smirked and allowed Red’s rant. He loved Shawna as much as I did.
“She wants me to create an art gallery on one of my walls to class up Halo.” Red shook his head. “I told her I wasn’t moving my softball trophies or my flat-screens. That’s as classy as we get in here. Then she called me ‘country’.”
Pearl gasped at the insult and reached for a hot wing. Casey tossed us a bundle of napkins and stalked away before Red could yell about her poor service.
“But what did she say about me?” I persisted, pulling the wing plate down the bar. “She’s on a roll. I don’t know why she’s acting so ugly now. I was flying low on her radar until the last couple months, when boom! I’m on Shawna’s shit list.”
“Well,” said Red, repositioning the wing plate to force me to share with Pearl, “she had one too many appletinis, then went off on your mother and the quality of Bransons over Tuckers.”
“Nothing new there,” I said. “She thinks being a Branson is God’s gift to the people of Forks County. And she’s probably right about my mother, although I served her a couple fat lips in high school for saying it.”
“It’s childish,” said Pearl. “Good breeding says you don’t bring up a person’s unfortunate circumstances, even with someone like your mother. God bless her.”
As many times as Forks County citizens had my mother blessed, you’d think she’d be a saint by now.
“Shawna’s just a hater,” I said.
Red shook his head. “Be careful. She vowed to bring you down low.”
“I do a pretty good job of that on my own,” I sighed, thinking of my double-crossing lips. “Speaking of that, I’ve got to get home before Todd arrives. And I’ve got a Greek painting to attempt without a model. Red, would you pose for me?”
His cobalt green eyes burned with fear. “God Almighty. No. Don’t you put me in one of those naked pictures. I will never serve you again.”
“It’s not a naked picture! It’s called a life drawing. I am an artist not a pornographer. When are you Philistines going to get that?”
I hopped off my stool and stomped toward the door.
Casey caught my arm before I hit the foyer. “Just a minute, sister. Todd’s coming over tonight?”
“Just to drop off some stuff, I need,” I said. “Don’t worry.”
“Where’s Luke?”
“Good question. I haven’t heard from him today. But I assume Uncle Will’s kept the deputies busy wrapping up the poisoning case.” While waiting on Max’s porch, I had called Dot. “They decorated Griffin’s house with yellow tape and had his car impounded. The deputies are searching to bring in all available Genuine Juice.”
“Maybe you should call him. You know, have Luke stop in while Todd’s there.”
“You think I’m going to cheat on Luke. Which I have no interest in doing.”
She pulled me through the glass door into Red’s vestibule. I leaned against a gum ball machine and glared while Casey searched for words that wouldn’t cause me to kick her out of Great-Gam’s house before she moved in.
“Listen, we both know we inherited a problem from Momma.”
By problem, she referred to a mental issue we had around beautiful men. And by mental issue, I mean downright stupidity.
“I’m around Todd all the time and it’s never been a problem before. Except for the Vegas fiasco.”
“You let him talk you into marrying him. That’s a pretty big fiasco.”
“And when my thoughts cleared, I got it annulled. He didn’t talk me into it. I think I was just lonely or something. Todd couldn’t talk his way into a time share commitment.”
“I’m not so sure about that. He knows how to push your buttons.”
I smiled thinking about the buttons he was good at pressing.
“See what I mean,” exclaimed Casey. “Look, just call Luke and have him come over. Then you don’t need to worry.”
I pushed off the gum ball machine and stalked to the outside door. “I can fight abusive men in parking lots and handle teenage boys with anger management issues. But around one simple, dumb guy, I suddenly need a babysitter.”
“Yep,” said Casey, swinging her hips in the direction of the restaurant.
I shoved open the door and slapped my flip-flops in the direction of home. “This is all your fault,” I said to my lips. “If you’d just settle down and control yourselves, I wouldn’t have these insane conversations.”