A Pour Way to Dye (Book 2 in the Soapmaking Mysteries) (22 page)

“
That’s good, because you
don’t scare me, either. I’m not the one you have to watch out for,
though.”

His gaze narrowed. “What do you mean?”

“
Nobody’s killing
Perkinses,” I said.

“
At least not yet,” he
said.

“
Now who’s making
threats?”

Ralph grabbed Andrew’s arm. “Get in here, and
I mean right now.”

I was ready for him, pipe and all, and it
looked like he might come after me. Ralph jerked his arm again,
though, and Andrew just smiled at me as he walked inside. “We’ll
finish this later.”

“
Any time,” I said as I
walked back to my car.

I half expected to see the Miata’s windshield
shattered, but it was still intact as I got in and sped off. I
wasn’t quite sure where I was going, but I knew I wanted to get
away from Ralph and Andrew. Once they started comparing notes about
my behavior, I was afraid one or both of them were going to try to
stop me from nosing around in their business. I wasn’t excited
about the prospect of looking over my shoulder all of the time, but
I wasn’t about to stop snooping.

Whether Molly or the rest of the world liked
it, I wasn’t about to stop until I found Earnest Joy’s killer.

Chapter 10

Speak of the Devil and he appears. That’s the
way the old expression went, and it was true as I walked into Where
There’s Soap. Molly Wilkes, still dressed in her police uniform,
was sitting on a rocking chair out front when I walked up the
steps.

“
You’re here more than I am
lately,” I said. “Is this business or pleasure?”

“
What do you think?” she
asked.

“
I’m not so sure anymore,” I
said.

“
Have a seat, Ben. I’ve been
waiting for you.”

I took the rocker beside hers. “You haven’t
changed your mind about arresting me, have you?”

“
Not unless you’ve changed
your mind about confessing.”

I laughed. “You know better than that. Why
did you want to see me?”

“
I just got a complaint
about your behavior,” she said. “And you’re not going to believe
who made it.”

“
I don’t think I could
narrow the field if I had to. Who have I offended
lately?”

She smiled. “Andrew Joy called me twice today
telling me you’re interfering with my police investigation. That
man seems to really enjoy hating you, doesn’t he?”

“
What can I say, I’m an
acquired taste. We just had another confrontation, so expect your
phone to be ringing in a few minutes.”

She shook her head as she stared out at the
garden. “You are determined to make this difficult for me, aren’t
you?”

“
I’m not trying, I swear
it,” I said. “I just hate being your prime suspect.”

Molly stared at me a second, then said, “If
you repeat this to anyone, I’ll deny it. Do we understand each
other?”

“
I know how to keep a
secret,” I said.

“
That’s why I’m telling you.
Ben, don’t be such a dunderhead. I know you didn’t kill Earnest
Joy.”

“
That’s the best news I’ve
heard all day. What changed your mind?”

She looked at me as she said, “If you were
going to kill a man, even spur of the moment like that, you never
would have hit him from behind. I know you. You’d have looked him
in the eye as you killed him.”

“
Now why doesn’t that
explanation make me feel any better?” I asked.

“
Sometimes the truth hurts.”
She rocked a few times, then asked, “Should I even ask about what
you’ve been up to today?”

“
No. Like you said, I’m good
at keeping secrets.”

As Molly started to get up, I asked, “Have
you talked to Earnest’s wife yet?”

“
That’s not remotely funny,
Ben. Samantha Joy’s been dead for fifteen years.”

“
I’m talking about his new
wife. He got married a while ago in Vegas. At least that’s what his
bride is telling everybody in town.”

Molly frowned. “She hasn’t said anything to
me. Where might I find this woman?”

“
Her name’s Linda Mae, and
she’s staying out at the Mountain Lake Motel. Room 23. Tell her I
sent you, and she’ll sing her head off.”

“
How long were you going to
keep this to yourself? If she really was married to Earnest Joy,
she could have an excellent reason for wanting him
dead.”

“
Hey, I’m telling you right
now,” I said. “I just found out myself.”

She got up and headed for her patrol car. “Do
me a favor and tell Jeff I’ll catch up with him later, okay?”

“
Fine,” I said. In twenty
seconds, she was gone. Jeff walked out onto the porch as I was
going in.

He looked around, then said, “Hey, what
happened to Molly?”

“
She had to go,” I said,
“but she asked me to tell you she’d talk to you later.”

“
What did you say to her,
Ben?”

I was getting tired of that tone of voice,
and I wasn’t about to take it from my little brother anymore.

“
Listen, if you want to be
treated like a grown-up, why don’t you start acting like one? I
didn’t say a word to her.”

“
I don’t believe
you.”

“
Frankly, I don’t
care.”

I brushed past him, letting my arm hit his
chest enough to stagger him back a step. It was time to remind him
who the senior sibling was.

Cindy was standing by the door, not even
pretending to be doing anything but eavesdropping.

She looked at me and said, “You’re too big to
pick on him like that.”

“
I wasn’t doing anything,” I
protested.

“
I saw what happened,” Cindy
said.

“
Yeah, but you must not have
heard any of it. Jeff needs to grow up.”

She touched my arm. “Ben, why are you acting
like that?”

I looked at her and said, “Cindy, I love
you—you have to realize that—but you don’t know everything about
me. When I get pushed, I have a tendency to push back.”

She looked at me sadly. “I know this has been
hard on you.”

“
What’s that, being a murder
suspect?”

She shook her head. “I’m not talking about
that, and you know it. I mean losing Kelly like you did and then
watching your old girlfriend date your youngest brother.”

“
I’m seeing someone myself,
remember?”

Cindy arched one eyebrow. “Are you that
serious about Diana already? You two have just gone out on one
date.”

Blast it all, why did my siblings think it
was all right to meddle in my life? “Kelly and I didn’t have much
more than that. Besides, I’m not ready to propose, but Diana and I
are dating now. You know how I am. I’ve never been able to go out
with more than one woman at a time, and right now, that woman is
Diana.” I looked around, and though Kate and Louisa were both
helping customers, it was pretty obvious they were following every
word of our discussion. “Did you all get that?” I asked.

Kate looked away, but Louisa just smiled.
“Loud and clear. Benji’s got a new girlfriend.”

I shook my head, not dignifying her comment
with a response. I’d hated the nickname “Benji” since kindergarten
and had done everything in my power to discourage its usage.

I thought about going up to my office, but
then realized the shop would be closing soon, and I didn’t want to
be there alone with my thoughts. I could call Diana, though it was
short notice, but what I really needed to do was find Paulus and
see what he’d found out that had made him run.

Where to look, though? He could be anywhere,
and without access to his credit cards, I’d just have to guess.

Then I remembered where I’d found him the
last time he’d been in hiding. I told my sisters good night and
drove to Sassafras Ridge. As I drove, I realized Cindy was right.
I’d been tougher on my little brother than I had the right to be.
Lately, he found a way to get under my skin, but that was still no
excuse for my behavior. I’d have to find a way to apologize the
next time I saw him, but at the moment, I had to find Paulus. That
took precedence over a family squabble.

I knew he wouldn’t be at the Beverly. In
fact, I doubted he’d choose his old motel room. But there was one
thing I was fairly certain about. When it came to eating, Paulus
was a man of entrenched habits. I knew that if hung out at the Lazy
Spoon, sooner or later he’d turn up.

I was luckier than I deserved to be. Paulus
was sitting in a booth in back eating a piece of apple pie.

There was no place he could bolt to, so he
sat patiently in his seat as I approached him.

“
Did anybody follow you
here?” he asked me as he scanned the sidewalk.

“
No, I made sure of it. Mind
if I join you?” I asked as I slid onto the bench seat across from
him.

“
Do I have any choice?” he
asked, then added a slight smile. “I’ve got to hand it to you, Ben.
You must really be some kind of detective, finding me like
this.”

“
Don’t give me too much
credit,” I said. “This was a logical place to look. You didn’t go
too far. So, do you want to talk to me now about what you
uncovered?”

He stared at his pie, then said, “Ben, I told
you to drop it, and I meant it. You got my note, didn’t you?”

“
You knew I would,” I said.
“Did you honestly think it would dissuade me?”

He shook his head. “No, but it was worth a
shot. Ben, this is serious business.”

“
Murder always is,” I said.
“What’s got you so spooked all of a sudden?”

He sighed. “Maybe I’m just getting old,” he
finally said. “I’ve lost a step or two, and a lot of the fire in my
belly.”

“
Is that why you cleaned out
your office?” I asked as the waitress filled the coffee mug in
front of me.

I ordered myself a piece of pie. Paulus said,
“I’ve been easing myself out of the business for a while now.
Kate’s been handling the advertising for years. The truth is, you
all don’t need me anymore.”

The waitress put the pie on the table, but I
didn’t touch it. “That’s just plain wrong. You’re a part of our
family.”

He waved a hand in the air. “I know that,
Benjamin, but I have to feel useful. That’s why I started looking
for other businesses. To be honest with you, that’s kind of why I
started digging into Earnest’s murder, too. But I got myself in too
deep, and look where that got me, hiding in a town I don’t
particularly care for in a diner that has aspirations of being
average.”

“
Why don’t you tell me about
it?” I suggested. “If nothing else, I’m a good
listener.”

He seemed to think about it for nearly a
minute before he spoke again. “Okay, why not? You’re not going to
stop—I know you—so you should at least know what you’re dealing
with.”

“
You’ve certainly got my
attention,” I said.

“
I’ve long suspected Earnest
Joy did more than sell jewelry at that shop of his. I started
poking around, and I found out he’s got a second home—a much nicer
one, I might add—in Blowing Rock. That’s where he keeps his fancy
sports cars. The man’s been hemorrhaging money for years. I had a
friend check his tax returns for the past three years, and
according to those, he barely makes a profit from his jewelry shop.
So where’s the money coming from?”

I had a hard time imagining the penurious
Earnest Joy as a playboy, despite what Linda Mae had said. Blowing
Rock was a ritzy community in the North Carolina Mountains near
Boone, and it was well known in our part of the world as a haven
for the wealthy. “No offense, but how sure are you of your
source?”

He took a sip of coffee, then said, “Trust
me, I was skeptical, too. So I started asking some questions in
Blowing Rock, flashing Earnest’s picture around to see if I could
get any nibbles. It took some doing, but I found a woman who knew
him, and had even been to his house once for a party. I checked it
out, and the mailbox said Bliss. That’s a common enough synonym for
Joy, wouldn’t you say? The place was spectacular, Ben. When I
checked the county records, the house and land were registered to a
corporation called Delight Industries. He wasn’t too careful about
hiding his connections, was he?”

I rubbed my chin. “So where does that leave
us?”

“
I’m not sure,” my
grandfather said. “When I got back home from Blowing Rock, somebody
left a message on my doorstep. I’m not afraid to admit that it kind
of shook me. That’s when I asked you to meet me at The Hound
Dog.”

“
What was it?” I asked. I
knew my grandfather wasn’t that easy to intimidate.

“
There was a dagger sticking
into a bar of our soap. Whoever left the message for me knew how to
get to me. Ben, I took it as a threat against our entire family.
Whoever did it heated the blade hot enough to embed it into the
bar. I’m not afraid to say that it rattled me pretty
good.”

“
So that’s why you’ve been
in hiding. Did you tell Molly all of this?”

He nodded. “I did, just before I left. She
said she’d look into it.”

“
Blast it all, she should
have told me,” I said, the anger flowing through me.

Paulus put a hand on mine. “I asked her not
to, Ben. It was my decision, not hers. If you’re going to be angry
with anybody, it should be with me.”

That took some of the anger out of me. “I
know you had your reasons, but you should have told me.”