A Catered Wedding (12 page)

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Authors: Isis Crawford

BOOK: A Catered Wedding
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“I'm not doing anything. I'm just speculating.”
“Good. Because you're leaving this case to the professionals, right?”
“Right,” Bernie repeated.
“You promise? No cross counts.”
“I promise,” Bernie said, raising her right hand. “At least for the time being.”
She was too tired tonight to go into the whole thing about how solving crimes was her karma.
Chapter 12
T
hree weeks later Sean Simmons was sitting in his bedroom typing on his computer at two o'clock in the afternoon when he heard a knock on the downstairs door. A moment later, he heard footsteps coming up the stairs and Libby popped her head into his room.
“You're not going to like this,” she said.
“Like what?” Sean asked quickly turning off the monitor before he turned to regard his eldest daughter.
In truth he really didn't want her to see what he was working on. Not that he was doing anything wrong mind you. He just hadn't told Libby about the letter he was in the midst of writing because he was pretty certain she wouldn't approve, and why cause problems if you didn't have to? Why subject yourself to one of those emotional scenes Libby had a habit of throwing if you could avoid it?
He was as willing as the next man to listen to what someone had to say, but he preferred that it be presented to him in a logical fashion. He didn't think that was too much to ask. But Libby was like Rose in that regard. She could never manage to talk dispassionately. She always had to bring feelings into it, and then she got mad when he walked out.
All he was doing here was looking for justice. What was so bad about that? On the advice of his attorney—well really he'd had to coax Paul a little bit to get him in back of this—he was in the midst of drafting a letter to the West Vale District Attorney informing him of his intent to lodge a wrongful action suit against Alex Fisher and the West Vale Police Department for the false arrest and imprisonment of him and Bernie.
Sean figured there was time enough to let Libby know about the lawsuit if it came to anything. Who knew? Maybe it wouldn't. Then he'd have to listen to her blather on about how concerned she was that he not stress himself out, but not before it was necessary.
Anyway a man needed some stress in his life, something to butt up against. Otherwise you might as well be a sack of potatoes sitting on the shelf. And he had to say he was enjoying anticipating the look on Alex Fisher's face when he was served with the papers. He only wished he could be there to see it.
“The Walker sisters are here,” Libby said, interrupting his train of thought.
“The Walker sisters?” Sean repeated hoping he hadn't heard correctly.
Libby brushed a piece of lint off her T-shirt. “That's what I just said.”
Sean groaned. They were the last people he wanted to talk to. “I thought they were in Sumatra.” Or was it Bali? He forgot. Well actually, he didn't care.
“I think it was South Dakota.”
Sean waved his hand in the air. “Same thing.”
“Not exactly,” Libby pointed out.
“Frankly, I don't give a hoot if they've just come back from the Arctic Circle. Can't you put them off? Tell them I've had a relapse, and I'm on my deathbed. Better yet, tell them I've died.”
“You know what they're like. They'd want to see your corpse,” Libby told him.
Sean had to agree that unfortunately Libby's assessment was spot on.
“Can't
you
talk to them?” he asked.
“They want to speak to you. They said it's urgent.”
Sean licked his lips. That wasn't good. Heaven only knows how but the last time they'd said something like that they'd convinced his wife, Rose, to keep a twelve-foot Burmese python for them. Just for a couple of weeks, they'd said. Naturally the two weeks had stretched into two months.
And of course the damned thing had escaped just like he'd predicted it would. And of course, Rose had gotten hysterical just like he'd predicted she would. He'd wasted two whole days looking for the snake when he should have been out patrolling the town. He'd taken the house apart. Nothing. Then the thing had turned up next door. To this day he didn't know how that had happened.
But there it was wrapped around the toilet bowl when his neighbor Mrs. Peabody had gone to take her morning pee. He could remember her shrieking. He'd thought a murder was being committed. Then when he'd gotten there, having busted through her screen door he might add, he'd thought she was going to stroke out on him.
Lucky for him she hadn't. But that vision of Mrs. Peabody with her undies down around her ankles had stayed with him. Unfortunately. He couldn't look the woman in the face after that. He wouldn't have claimed ownership of the damned thing, if Rose hadn't been in back of him shaming him into it.
“What would I have told Eunice and Gertrude when they got back?” she demanded when they'd gotten home.
Well that had just opened the door to all sorts of comments he'd been married long enough to know better than to say, so he'd kept his mouth shut. With a great deal of difficulty, he might add.
Libby coughed. Sean shook his head to clear it.
“You want me to bring up tea or coffee?” she asked him.
“Coffee,” Sean said bowing to the inevitable, “and some lemon bars.” From what he remembered of the Walker sisters they didn't eat sugar, so he'd have them all to himself.
A moment later, the Walker sisters came into his bedroom. He blinked his eyes. The last time he'd seen them, which was not more then three weeks ago when Alex Fisher was carting him off to jail, their hair had been turquoise. Now it was green. Why would anyone do that to themselves he wondered as they took seats on the sofa opposite him.
He watched as they both tucked their skirts under their thighs and sat down in unison. They'd been living together for so long, Sean reflected, that they were like an old married couple. In fact, they looked so much alike it was hard to tell them apart.
Especially since not only did they have the same hair color, they were both dressed in the same clothes, in this case long black skirts and bright pink T-shirts, with the logo
We Kick Ass
printed on them. The only difference between the two women as far as he could see was that Eunice had brown eyes and Gertrude's were blue.
“So what can I do for you ladies?” he asked them.
“I hope we didn't interrupt,” Eunice said.
“Not at all,” Sean lied.
He watched as Eunice looked at Gertrude and Gertrude looked at Eunice.
Finally Eunice said, “You start, Gertrude.”
Gertrude smoothed down her skirt again and coughed into her hand. Sean didn't say anything. He waited. It was something he'd become good at in his years on the force. He'd learned in his first year that most people couldn't deal with silence. Eventually they talked just to fill the void.
“I know you don't like us very much,” Gertrude began.
Sean opened his mouth to deny it, but Gertrude put up her hand to stop him.
“We're too old for lies at this stage of our life,” she told him.
Speak for yourself,
Sean thought. He wheeled himself a little closer to the sisters.
“Go on,” Sean told Gertrude. Never admit; never deny. That was his motto.
Gertrude coughed again. “I know you think we're strange. I know you don't approve of the way we dress or the color we dye out hair. I know you think we imposed on Rose over the years. I know you never forgave us for the snake.”
“That's not true,” Sean protested.
Gertrude snorted. “Even back then,” she told him. “You could never could hide what you were thinking very well. That's one of the things Rose loved about you.”
Sean looked away. The last thing he wanted to do was discuss Rose with them. Or anyone for that matter.
“And I know you'd prefer that we not be here now,” Gertrude continued.
Did they overhear what I was saying to Libby, Sean wondered. Boy, he hoped not.
“And we wouldn't be,” Eunice continued. “If we really didn't need your help. And since you are family . . .” Eunice let her voice drop off.
“That would be stretching it,” Sean said.
Eunice gave him what Rose had called “The Look” and even though Sean knew it was ridiculous, he felt guilty. “All right. Why are you here?” he asked.
He watched while Eunice and Gertrude exchanged another set of looks. A moment later, Gertrude took up the conversational banner.
“You know,” she began. “Marx . . .”
Sean cut her off. “Please not that,” he said. “Don't rehash that stuff.”
Gertrude opened her mouth and shut it. As Sean watched her casting around for another way to start he wondered where the hell Libby was with coffee and cookies. A shot of Jameson in his coffee would also help, but it was too late to ask for that now.
“Fine,” Gertrude finally said. “At least grant me the premise that the rich have more privileges than the poor.”
“Agreed,” Sean said wondering where this was going.
“And that since they operate in a closed strata unlike, let us say, people in the middle class, what they do tends to be shielded from society at large.”
Sean reluctantly nodded his head again. His work had taught him the truth of that statement—after all that's why he'd gotten fired—so he couldn't argue with that either, much as he would have liked to.
Gertrude patted her hair down. “And when I say society, I mean its public institutions such as social services, the courts, and the judicial system.”
Can you just get on with it,
Sean was thinking when Libby came in bearing a tray laden with coffee, mugs, sugar and cream and, Sean was glad to see, not one but two kinds of cookies.
Not that he really had to ask the Walker sisters why they were here. Two minutes into the conversation and he'd had a pretty good idea where it was leading. He just wished they'd speed things up. Of course he could bring that about, but that was a last resort.
Usually he found it more useful to just let people chat. It was amazing what you could find out that way. And that was what he intended to do here—if he could stand it. For the next five minutes or so he watched Libby serving everyone.
“Very nice, dear,” Gertrude said after taking a sip of her coffee. “I hope you made this from fair-traded beans,” she said lowering her mug.
“Actually, no,” Libby said. Now she knew where Bernie got her nitpicking abilities from.
“Do you know what fair-traded beans are?”
Libby nodded. “Coffee harvested by co-ops.”
“If you know, then you have no excuse,” Gertrude told her sternly. “Coffee workers are horribly exploited by large conglomerates.” She took another sip and put her cup down. “But we're not here to talk about that. We're here to request some help from your father.”
“And what do you want him to do?” Libby asked Gertrude.
Sean was amused to see Gertrude pick up her spoon, stir her coffee, then put her spoon down and take a sip. All for dramatic effect, Sean thought.
She's good
, he decided.
Better than I thought
.
“Well, dear,” Gertrude began, “it's been a little over three weeks since Leeza Sharp has been killed, and the West Vale police, despite our daily urging, have made no progress whatsoever that we can see in this case. In fact, they are teetering on the brink of declaring Leeza's death a misadventure.”
“They wouldn't,” Sean said, despite his resolution to remain silent. “Not with the booby trap that they found.”
“They're thinking about it,” Gertrude told him. “Although I don't understand how they can be given the situation.
Gertrude smiled and Sean realized she'd got him, too. She was almost professional caliber. No wonder Rose had had trouble saying no to the sisters. But then Rose was a civilian. He wasn't. He knew how things worked. Prided himself on it, in fact.
“Evidently,” Gertrude continued, “the booby trap is being considered a practical joke gone bad. At least that's my understanding though I might be mistaken. The officers I've been talking to have been less then communicative. In fact, I've had better conversations with the baboons at the San Diego Zoo.”
Nice one,
Sean thought.
“So,” Gertrude went on, “you can see why my sister and I are of the opinion that the police department of West Vale isn't interested in finding the person that murdered Leeza Sharp, which coincidentally leads us to believe it has to be one of the brothers because if it were a servant, the police would be on him like white on rice. As far as we can see, the only thing the police department is interested in doing is making sure that the whole thing goes away. Bad for property values.”
“That sounds like Bree,” Libby said.
“Well she's right,” Eunice said. “Just look at the funeral,” she continued.
“Or lack thereof, “ Gertrude added.

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