Morning Glory Circle (35 page)

“Speaking of which,” Drew said. “Did I tell you the weird news about Connie’s cat?”

“No, what?”

“She told me I could donate it to the vet school, so I sent it, and when they performed the autopsy they found out what shut the kidneys down.”

“What’s that?”

“Chloroform.”

“You’re kidding me.”

“No, it’s true. If a cat ingests or inhales chloroform, or any strong chemical for that matter, it can shut the kidneys right down, especially in an old, sick cat like Connie’s. They want to know, hell, I want to know, how did that cat get exposed to chloroform? It hasn’t been used as an anesthetic for years. I don’t even know how someone could get some if they wanted to.”

Hannah was already putting on her coat.

“I have to go,” she said. “Sorry to rush, but I have to find Scott right away.”

Hannah tried first at the station, then at Scott’s house, calling people as she drove. Maggie didn’t answer, and neither Skip nor Frank knew where Scott went. Hannah finally decided to just start driving the streets, looking for his SUV. She finally found it, parked in front of the Eldridge Inn.
             

Connie answered the door, her eyes red and swollen, looking awful.

“Hey Connie,” Hannah said, trying to look past her. “Can I talk to Scott?”

“He’s not here,” Connie said, and drew the door close in behind her.

“His Explorer’s here,” Hannah said, pointing at the SUV parked in front of the inn.

“Well, he isn’t here,” Connie insisted.

Connie’s voice was shaky and she wasn’t looking Hannah in the eye. All the hairs stood up on the back of Hannah’s neck.

“Okay,” Hannah said. “If you don’t mind, I’ll just have a look around without him, then. When I saw his Explorer here, I thought maybe he got my message about the snakes.”

“Snakes?” Connie said, eyes wide, clutching her shirt collar together.

“Yeah, Gwyneth was on her way over here to bring you a coffee cake, and she saw a huge snake in your driveway, so she ran home and called me. I don’t want to panic you, but you really should be careful until I’ve caught them all. There are probably three or four dozen of them crawling all over the neighborhood.”

“It’s twenty degrees outside,” Connie protested. “How can there be snakes out in the middle of the winter?”

“The city was working on a water main under Lilac Avenue,” Hannah said, “and they broke up a hibernating nest of ‘em. There could be twenty to forty snakes crawling around in the sewer lines under the Inn right now.”

“Oh my God!” Connie said. “Filthy snakes!”

“You just go on back inside,” Hannah said, as she backed away, pretending to check under the porch as she did so. “I think I just saw one looking out at me. Damn, that’s a big snake.”

Connie went back inside and slammed the door. Hannah whipped out her cell phone and called the station.

“Connie Fenton’s done something to Scott and he’s in the Inn,” she told Frank when he answered. “You and Skip get over here but don’t use your sirens. Bring a shotgun. I told her we were looking for snakes.”

Hannah went back to the county animal control truck, unlocked the glove box, got her taser out, and switched the safety off. She also grabbed a big burlap bag and surreptitiously stuffed a long braided leather dog leash into her coat pocket. She knew Connie was watching her out the window, so she held the bag open and approached the porch as if she was going to bag a snake with it, taser in hand. She knelt down out of sight of the windows and put the dog leash in the bag, then twisted the top closed and stood up. She held the bag out away from her body at arm’s length and shook it a little, so it looked like something was alive in there.

Connie came out the front door.

“Did you catch it?”

“I caught one of ‘em,” Hannah said, “but I can see where they’ve gone through a hole into your basement. You better let me come in and look.”

“No,” Connie said sharply. “You’ll track mud in on my clean floors. You go around back and I’ll open the cellar door for you.”

Hannah did not want Connie to lock her out of the main house with Scott in there somewhere, obviously incapacitated. She thought fast.

“Oh Connie, watch out, snake!” Hannah screamed, and flung the burlap bag with the dog leash in it right at the woman.

Connie screamed and ran back inside the house with Hannah right behind her. Hannah could hear the squeal of tires behind her as the police cruiser fishtailed up the street, crossed the lawn, and came to a stop right at the front steps of the Inn.

Connie realized Hannah was behind her and stopped, turned in the hallway, and blocked her way, screaming, “You can’t come in here!”

Hannah knocked the woman aside using a football rushing technique she’d learned from her big brothers, and ran into the kitchen. Scott was sprawled out face down on the floor with a wound on the back of his head, bleeding onto the sparkling clean white tile floor.

Hannah heard a noise behind her, and turned around just in time to see Connie coming after her with a small iron skillet raised over her head. Hannah shot her with the taser. Connie then demonstrated the effects of the “high” voltage setting by dropping the pan, jerking violently, and falling to the floor, where she writhed in pain.

As Frank and Skip rushed down the hallway, Hannah stepped over Scott’s still body and stooped down to check his neck for a pulse.

“He’s alive!” she shouted and then burst into tears.

Patrick unloaded the last of the empty liquor bottle boxes from the back of his pickup truck into Mandy’s trailer by standing in the truck bed and tossing them to Tommy, who stood in the trailer doorway. When they were finished, Patrick jumped down and came inside, where Mandy was wrapping her collection of mismatched drinking glasses in newspaper.

“You’ve got it made, woman,” Patrick said. “I got all the boxes you could want, and old Ed has all the newspapers.”

Mandy smiled so hard she almost twinkled. She was beaming with happiness, and Patrick wished he could feel happy for her. What he did feel was mad, but he wasn’t sure why.

“This okay with you?” he asked Tommy.

“Yeah,” Tommy shrugged, “if it makes Mom happy.”

“If Mama ain’t happy ain’t nobody happy, am I right?” Patrick asked Tommy, pulling him into a bear hug. “You’re not too big for this, right? I’m not creepin’ you out or anything, am I?”

“No,” Tommy laughed.

Patrick wrestled him to the floor and held him there in a headlock.

“And this is okay too, right? I’m not that heavy.”

“Agh!”

“Patrick, get off a him. He needs to go to school, and you’re ‘sposed to be helping me.”

“Alright, that’s enough horseplay, kid,” Patrick said, pulling Tommy off the floor and dangling him by the back of his pants. “Let’s roll him in newspaper and stuff him in a box.”

“You’re worse than a kid,” Mandy said, but she was smiling affectionately at him as she said it.

“You’re gettin’ me in trouble with your mom,” Patrick said, setting Tommy upright on his feet. “You better go to school.”

“Bye Mom,” Tommy said. “See you later, Patrick.”

After he’d gone, Patrick sat down on the couch.

“You sure you want to do this?” he asked her in a serious tone.

“Of course I’m sure. I told you, this is what I want.”

“For Tommy, or for you?”

“For both of us. Look, I’m tired of doin’ it all by myself all the time. I’m tired of bein’ lonely and pitiful. I been waitin’ for my real life to start and this is it.”

“But is it Ed you want, or was he just handy?”

“Patrick! Ed’s ‘sposed to be a friend a yours.”

“I know. I just can’t shake the feeling that this is all a big mistake. I’m fond of you both, but I can’t picture you together ‘til death do us part.”

“You almost sound jealous.”

“Hardly. I could’ve had Ed anytime I wanted him.”

Mandy threw a pillow at him.

“Very funny.”

“Well, I’m single, and I’m handy, and never once did you offer to make me breakfast in bed.”

“I would have, Patrick, but we both know you ain’t really been available.”

“I am now. She kicked me to the curb.”

“That’s just temporary. Ava’s in the middle of a poop storm right now and she’s just tryin’ to keep you clean. When all that clears, I bet you end up with exactly what you want.”

“You think?”

“I know it.”

“I hope so. What can I do to help?”

“Well, you could move in here, so I don’t have to store all this crap in Ed’s garage and sell this place.”

“Done.”

“Really?”

“Yeah, I need to get out of my mom’s house,” Patrick said. “I’ll rent it from you.”

“I’ll do ya one better’n that. Just pay the utilities and fix stuff when it breaks, and we’ll call it even.”

“Deal.”

They shook on it.

“Your mom’s gonna throw a fit,” Mandy said.

“Yes, she is,” Patrick said, “and I’m gonna tell her it was all your idea.”

Ava Fitzpatrick needed to use a phone not currently being monitored by the FBI or the unsavory Mrs. Wells, which she now assumed was the case at her home. She considered all her options before she put on her coat and picked up the baby, using her good arm and the cast-covered one she was supposed to be resting.

“I’m running down to the church,” she told Delia, who was sitting at the front desk.

The strain of being everyone’s confidante plus covering various shifts at all the family businesses was starting to show on Delia’s face, so Ava had not shared her latest scheme with the kind woman.

“That’ll do you good,” Delia said. “You sure you don’t want to leave him with me?”

“No,” Ava said. “I want him right where I can see him at all times.”

“I can understand that,” Delia said, “after the week you’ve had.”

Ava kissed Delia’s cheek, and Delia felt the baby’s forehead.

“He’s much better today. His fever’s gone.”

“His congestion is just about cleared up too,” Ava said. “He’s looking like himself again.”

He was a smiley baby, and gave Delia a toothless grin over Ava’s shoulder as they left.

Midge McCallister was the church secretary, and she loved babies. She was sorry to hear Ava was having phone troubles, and was glad to hold the baby while Ava used the phone in the counting room, which was a storage room where the collections were counted. As Ava closed the door between the counting room and the outer office, Midge said she was taking the baby down to see the children at the pre-school in the basement.

Ava called Sean’s cell phone, and he answered on the second ring.

“I think the FBI has bugged my home phone,” she told him. “Yours probably is too.”

“Do you want me to call you back from a pay phone?” he asked her. “I’m walking down the street and I can see one from here.”

Ava gave him the number and within a minute he called her back.

“Jesus, Ava, the FBI? What did Brian do?”

“Well, let’s see, according to agent James R. Brown, who paid me a visit yesterday, my husband married some rich woman, she had this baby, and then she disappeared mysteriously on a scuba diving trip in the Bahamas, right after Brian took out a big life insurance policy on her.”

“Oh, no,” Sean groaned.

“No, wait, there’s more. There’s also the little matter of a bar he burned down in order to collect insurance money, and some people he swindled out of investment money for a new bar.”

“Lovely,” Sean said. “Anything else?”

“A nicely-dressed little old lady named Mrs. Wells came by the house yesterday, to tell me Brian owes her a half million dollars for a shipment of drugs he misplaced, and if I want to make sure my family stays safe I need to give any money I have to her, and not to Brian.”

“Ava, this is really bad.”

“I know,” her voice quavered.

“Okay, take a deep breath, and let’s think this through together.”

“I’m so sorry I dragged you into this.”

“Forget that, we’re family.”

“I was awake all night trying to figure out what to do. Do you think we can mortgage my house and pay this woman off that way? I can’t have that threat hanging over my family’s head.”

“We really should go to the police,” Sean said. “Why didn’t you tell the FBI agent about her?”

“She wasn’t kidding around,” Ava said. “She offered to knock fifty thousand off the debt if I let her know where to find Brian. Unless everyone we know and love wants to go into the witness protection program, I don’t think telling the FBI is an option.”

“Okay,” Sean said. “I can arrange the mortgage, but it will take a few days.”

“She’s given me thirty days.”

“Good. We can meet that deadline. Your home and business are easily worth that, so don’t worry.”

“There’s more. The FBI knows Brian is coming to your office this morning.”

“Will they be waiting for him?”

“They agreed to arrest him after he comes out of your building, and not before. That way I get custody of the baby and your bank doesn’t have to be involved. This is in exchange for your and my cooperation with their investigation. If Brian calls and tries to change the time or place of the meeting, don’t agree to it.”

“He called me at home last night. He said 9:00 a.m. sharp in my office.”

“Mrs. Wells probably knows that too. If he’s lucky the FBI will get to him before she does.”

“Oh my,” Sean said. “This is really happening, isn’t it?”

“I’m afraid so. Is the paperwork ready for the custody change?”

“It’s all set. A friend of mine from law school handles private adoptions, and he owed me a favor. Brian says he has the death certificate for his wife, and if he really does, that will make it legal and binding. My friend will be here, my assistant will be a witness, and she’s a notary as well. You still have to sign, and everything will have to be filed, but it’s as good as a done deal as long as Brian signs this morning.”

“Is this going to jeopardize your job?”

“I don’t think so. I hope not.”

“I keep saying I’m sorry, but I really am.”

“It’s okay. I’m just not used to this sort of crime drama in real life. I’m a little nervous.”

“God bless you, Sean,” Ava said. “Please call me later. I should be home all day.”

“Wish me luck,” Sean said, and hung up.

Ava found Midge in the basement, where the pre-school children were having fun making the baby laugh. She thanked Midge and took little Fitz from her, and he snuggled against her shoulder. As she climbed the steps to the ground floor, she met Father Stephen coming down, and she introduced the baby.

“He’s my stepson,” she said. “It’s a long story.”

Father Stephen was in his late sixties and was still a handsome man, tall and lean with striking blue eyes, a white beard and mustache, wire rim spectacles, and a head full of thick gray and white hair. He had been the priest at Sacred Heart for thirty years, and knew Ava well.

“I have some time now, Ava, if you need to talk,” he offered in his deep, warm voice.

“Thank you, Father, sometime soon, I promise,” she said, with a smile, “but just now I need to get this little one home.”

Ava considered going into the sanctuary to say a prayer, asking for protection, guidance, and forgiveness for all the illegal activities she was engaging in, but decided she didn’t have time.

“Please bless us,” she said under her breath, as she passed between the statue of Mary and the large crucifix hanging in the nave. “I’m doing the best I can.”

On the way back to the house Ava saw a large black luxury car gliding slowly down Pine Mountain Road toward town, and suddenly remembered where she’d seen Mrs. Wells before. When she took her children out to Lily Crawford’s house the previous week, so they could slide down her snow covered hill on an inner tube, she’d seen Mrs. Wells talking with Lily in the driveway before leaving in a big black car just like it.

‘What in the world was Lily doing with Mrs. Wells?’ Ava wondered, as she quickened her pace in order to get home before the car could circle the block.

When Ava got back to the house Maggie was sitting in the front room talking to Delia. Maggie’s eyes were swollen and red. Ava handed the baby to Delia and rushed to her sister-in-law’s side.

“Maggie, what’s happened?”

Maggie handed her a letter, and Ava sat down to read it.

“Oh, no,” she said when she saw who it was from.

Delia sniffed the bottom half of the baby, who was fussy.

“I think little Fitz needs his diaper changed,” she said, and went down the hall.

When Ava finished the letter, she looked at Maggie and burst into tears, so Maggie cried again too. Hannah walked in just then.

“What in the hell’s going on?” she demanded. “Why is everybody crying?”

Maggie took the letter from Ava and handed it to Hannah.

“Oh, crap,” Hannah said when she saw who it was from.

She sat down on the chair behind the front desk and read through it, as Maggie and Ava wiped their faces and blew their noses.

When she finished, Hannah handed the letter back to Maggie and then pointed at her.

“This is just Gabe’s version of events,” she said. “You remember that.”

“But I believe the part about Brian,” Ava said. “I think that’s exactly what happened.”

“I saw Hatch yesterday,” Maggie said, “in Fleurmania.”

“What’s he got to do with this?” Hannah asked.

“He told me he heard Gabe was in prison in Florida for drug trafficking, and I didn’t believe it.”

“So you’re turning your back on Scott for giving Gabe the option of leaving town or being arrested, without even giving him the chance to explain.”

“Scott was hiding the letter,” Maggie said. “He must have found it in Margie’s crawl space. He didn’t give it to me when he could have. I only found it after it fell out of his coat pocket.”

“I admit, that sounds bad,” Hannah said.

“He could have destroyed it, and then you never would have known,” Ava said.

“That’s true,” Hannah said. “He was probably just waiting for the right time to give it to you.”