Swamp Team 3 (9 page)

I waved a hand in dismissal. “I bet everyone around here has one of those stories from their childhood.”

“It happened last year.”

I smiled. “Chocolate cake and ultimate humiliation it is.”

Chapter Seven

I managed to convince Gertie and Ida Belle that we should delay our Swamp Bar trip until the next day, and they headed out to return Maisey’s car. Ally decided that hours of prayer and insults from Celia rated a long, hot shower, and hurried upstairs to indulge. I took advantage of being alone to make a trip to the General Store to talk to Walter, the owner.

The reason I’d given Ida Belle and Gertie for wanting to delay the Swamp Bar trip was because I wanted to keep a close eye on Ally since we’d had a creeper the night before. And that wasn’t completely a lie. Except for the part where I wanted to keep a close eye on Ally. What I really wanted to do was set my sights on the creeper. And assuming he was stupid enough to return, I wanted a way to make him pay without involving myself in a law enforcement incident. But I wanted to keep my plan on the down low.
 

It was much easier to cover your tracks if no one else was stepping in them with you.

Walter, unlike Ida Belle and Gertie, was happy to give advice without wanting to have any part in the actual activity, especially if the activity bordered on the illegal kind. The really cool thing about Walter was that despite being Carter’s uncle, he didn’t seem to have any desire to inform his nephew of other people’s business. Basically, conversations with Walter were in a locked vault, which probably made him the most valuable person in Sinful.

 
Despite my new goal to exercise more, I drove my Jeep to the store. If things went the way I expected, I would be returning with goods—the kind of goods I didn’t want people to see me walking down the sidewalk with.
 

The store was empty when I walked in. Walter looked up from his newspaper and gave me a smile and a wave. “About time someone came in here and took me away from boredom,” he said.

I slid onto a stool across the checkout counter from him. “I thought you were reading the newspaper.”

He folded the paper closed and tossed it on the counter behind him. “It’s all political nonsense and sports statistics. No one has anything interesting to say anymore. How are things going with the cat?”

“Considering I can’t keep cactus alive, I guess it’s going well.”

“Tomcats have survival skills that match the best of military special forces. He’ll be fine.”

“He’s definitely interesting. I’ve never been around cats before and the things he does are fascinating. The other day I was cleaning one of Marge’s guns and activated the laser sight. He bolted off the couch and chased that pointer until he was too tired to move. I’ve never laughed so hard in my life.”

“Hunting instinct. It’s still strong with him because he was fending for himself for so long. And most cats can’t ignore a moving light.”

“Hunting instinct…that makes sense.”
 

He nodded and his expression shifted from cheery to serious. “I hear Ally’s staying at your house. Why don’t you bring me up to speed?”

“When Carter suspected the fire was deliberate, he asked me to keep an eye on her, so as far as I’m concerned, she can have the guest room until Carter is certain it’s safe for her to go back home.”

Walter shook his head. “I can’t imagine any reason that someone would want to hurt Ally. That girl has got to be the nicest person in this town.”

“That might be reason enough.”

“Ha. You got a point there. But still, I can’t think of anything to be gained. I don’t know her mother’s financial situation but I don’t think she has much to speak of besides that house.”

I nodded. “That’s my understanding as well. And if someone were looking to kill Ally to inherit, the last thing they’d do was burn down the only asset she had.”

“Exactly. But what other reason could there be?”

“I have no idea. Ida Belle, Gertie, and I ran through every possibility we could think of this afternoon but Ally can’t come up with a single reason someone would be out to get her. We’ve decided to go with the ‘completely insane attacker’ idea for the time being.”

“Given the lack of facts, it seems the only possibility, but then that doesn’t really narrow down your suspects—not if you’re assuming it’s a Sinful resident.”

“We thought we’d start with Floyd Guidry.”

Walter raised his eyebrows. “He’s certainly got the backbone for it, and the anger issues.”

“That’s what I hear. We’re going to try to establish opportunity tomorrow—”

Walter held up a hand. “The less I know, the better. Carter was in here earlier stomping around and muttering about the three of you and a bobcat. I didn’t even ask.”

“Floyd has a pet bobcat, and I’m not going to share how I know that.”

“That’s probably best.”

“Anyway, Floyd wasn’t the reason I stopped by. I have a personal project that I want to work on tonight, and I’d like you to keep it between the two of us.”

“I’m intrigued. What’s the project?”

I glanced behind me to make sure the store was still empty, then leaned across the counter. “Did you hear about the creeper at my house last night?”

Walter nodded. “Carter mentioned that as well. Said you threw a cat on him.”

I rolled my eyes. “The creeper threw my cat on him. Anyway, I don’t know what the guy was up to—maybe it’s related to the fire, maybe not—but I have this feeling that he’ll come back.”

“And you want to catch him?”

“Not necessarily.
 

Walter’s eyes widened. “You don’t want to kill him, do you?”

“No! At least, not until I know what he’s up to. Then I reserve the right to change my mind.”

“That seems reasonable.”

I grinned. Even though every minute of my existence in Sinful, I felt like a fish out of water, I had formed a huge appreciation for Southern practicality. “I was looking more to mark him.”

“Paint gun?”

“I was thinking something that lasts a bit longer and can’t be washed off. What can you tell me about shooting someone with rock salt?”

Walter gave me an approving nod. “You’re thinking the salt will scare him off from whatever nefarious thing he has planned and give him some marks you may be able to see the next day or so.”

“That was my thinking, but I’ve never shot rock salt. Would it work?”

“If you’re within thirty feet of him or so, it should leave some good red marks, maybe break the skin a place or two.”

“Sounds perfect.”

He reached beneath the counter and pulled out a box of shotgun shells. “It so happens, I keep a few in stock. For my better customers, of course.”

I pulled one of the shells out and studied it. It didn’t look any different from a regular shotgun shell. “You do good work. This looks factory.”

Walter blushed at my praise, the red tips of his ears almost glowing against his silver hair. “Oh, everyone around here knows how to load shells.”

“I bet they don’t like this. If you were thirty years younger, I’d marry you.”

His blush deepened. “It so happens there’s a version of me in town who is a bit younger. I’m not admitting to thirty years.”

“I think the bobcat incident might have killed things on that front,” I said.

Walter shook his head. “If a couple of scratches and a little trespassing scares the boy off, he wasn’t worth your time in the first place.”

I smiled. “How come you’re so reasonable and he’s so…not?”

“Well, I don’t have anything to prove professionally, don’t need to defend my manhood, and I’m not trying to impress a young lady.”

“Then maybe he should take a job here with you and stop trying to impress ladies. I’m not touching the manhood thing. That’s just asking for trouble.”

Walter started chuckling, then slapped his knees and laughed so hard tears formed in his eyes. “By God, you are just what that boy needs,” he said when he’d finally regained control.

“Somehow, I doubt that. So how much for the ammo?”

He grabbed a handful out of the box and set them on the counter. “On the house…with the condition that you come back tomorrow and tell me what happened.”

“Deal. If anything happens.” I hopped off my stool. “And Walter, not a word to Ida Belle.”

He shook his head. “I may be in love with the woman, but I’m not blinded by it. My lips are sealed.”

“Then here’s hoping I see you tomorrow.”

I slipped the shells in my purse and headed out of the store, where I ran right into Carter.
 

“Oh crap,” I said.
 

“Do you always exit buildings without looking?”

“Sorry. I was looking in my purse.”

“Uh-huh. I just spoke to one of Ally’s neighbors. She said she saw three women speeding down the block in Maisey Jackson’s car.”

I stared at him for a couple of seconds. “Sooooooo, you should ticket Ms. Jackson for speeding?”

His jaw flexed. “Mrs. Jackson’s been in the hospital for a week now.”

“Someone stole her car? Wow. Is that a problem here too?”

“You know good and well who stole her car.”

“Look,” I said, starting to get bored with the whole cat-and-mouse thing. “I have a Jeep, so I have no reason to steal someone else’s car. If you want to help people, then I suggest you contact this Mrs. Jackson and assist her with the insurance claim.”

He frowned.

“What?”

“The car was returned,” he said, and I could tell how much those words irritated him.

“So it wasn’t stolen.”

“Of course it was stolen.”

I threw my hands in the air. “What kind of thief returns what they stole? Look, with the arson, creepers, bobcat owners, and car thieves, it sounds like you have a lot to do. I’m going to head home and check off the only thing on my list, which is keeping Ally safe and secure inside my house.”

I whirled around and headed to my Jeep. When I turned around to climb in the driver’s seat, the sidewalk was empty. I felt momentary regret that I’d intentionally provoked Carter to anger. It wasn’t nice, and normally, I didn’t do that sort of thing to people I liked.
 

Unfortunately, I liked Carter too much.

And that was something I needed to correct before things got messy. And the easiest way I knew how to do that was to make him stop liking me.

###

Around 11:00 p.m., I poured Ally into bed and pretended to turn in myself. Instead, I pulled on black sweats, a long-sleeved T-shirt, and black shoes, secured a 12-gauge with a strap from Marge’s secret weapons stash behind a hidden panel in her closet, then headed downstairs and unlocked one of the windows in the living room to give myself a backup plan in case the doors weren’t an option when I returned.
 

The creeper wasn’t likely to try the front of the house, where he could be seen by neighbors across the street. If he was smart, he’d head to the back of the house as he had before, but tonight I had the benefit of moonlight to help illuminate the backyard. I figured the creeper had probably been trying the windows on the back of the house when I startled him. This time, I planned on giving him an even bigger surprise—one he’d never see coming.

I slipped out the back door and locked it behind me, slipping the key into my pocket, then skirted around the side of the house and crawled through an enormous hedge and into my neighbor’s side yard. Ronald J. Franklin Jr. was an odd-looking man with a long beak nose and frantically moving limbs. Gertie said he looked like Ichabod Crane, but I had no idea who that was.
 

His oddities didn’t end with his looks. From an upstairs window, I once watched him dancing around his backyard in full ballerina dress—female, not male—while waving a stick with a long streamer. I decided he was on something really good and much stronger than Sinful Ladies Cough Syrup, which was basically cherry flavoring and homemade Everclear. At least, I hoped he was high on something because…well, damn.

He was also the neighbor who lived with one finger on speed dial for 911. I had no doubt that every call the sheriff’s department had received on me, about occurrences at my house, had been made by Ronald. But his roof was the best line of sight I had, and by God, I was using it.

I looped the 12-gauge strap over my shoulder and positioned the gun diagonally across my back, then grabbed one of the lower limbs of a giant oak and pulled myself up into the tree. I scaled the tree quickly until I reached the same height as his roofline. I stood on one wide branch that reached almost to his roof and crept out on it like a tightrope walker until I stepped onto his roof.
 

I immediately dropped down on my knees and inched down the back side of the roof until I had a clear view of my backyard. I gauged the distance between my position and the back corner of my house at about twenty-five feet, allowing for the height. If he approached the house from the opposite side, I’d have to wait until he got two-thirds of the way in before taking a shot; otherwise, I ran the risk of only scaring him but not leaving anything for him to remember me by.