Hickory Smoked Homicide (21 page)

Ben piped up from in front of the pit. “We parked on the bottom level, so Sara should be able to scoot out with Coco, then.”

“That shouldn’t be a problem, no.”

Lulu said, “Ben? What do you think we should do about everybody else? Keep putting food out there?”

“Mother, those folks have got to be stuffed. And really, we’re about at the end of what we planned on fixing for tonight. I think they should be okay with the band and just drinking sweet tea while they wait. Or they can check out some other places on Beale Street.”

“But, of course, we’re going to need to talk to a few of those people before they go, too—I’m going to need to nail down everyone’s actions tonight.” Pink yawned. “I think it’s going to be a long night. Too bad, because I’m ready to hit the sack after all that barbeque. Oh, and do me a favor and don’t mention anything about that painting of Tristan being at the crime scene.... I’m going to tell Derrick to keep it quiet, too. Is it okay if Detective Freeman and I use your office to do some questioning? It’s usually better to figure out where people were as soon as possible and before they forget.”

“Feel free,” said Lulu. “I’m going to see if we can get Sara to take Coco home.”

Pink hesitated. “If it’s all right, Lulu, let me and Freeman talk to Sara for a few minutes before she goes. It’s nothing important—it’s just for the record. I know Coco needs to go home. And Sara can take Derrick home, also . . . I’m sure he’ll be ready to get out of here, too.”

 

 

The rest of the evening had seemed to go on forever, thought Lulu as she got dressed the next morning. On top of it all, she didn’t learn any new clues. Everyone was tight-lipped as he or she waited to talk to the police, and even Pink hushed up and wouldn’t talk. The suspects looked somber when they found out about Dee Dee’s death as Pink was herding them to the back office—even Loren, who said that he didn’t even know who Dee Dee was. Pepper, who had shopped at Dee Dee’s boutique, was quiet; Colleen sniffed melodramatically into a tissue; and Steffi and Pansy gripped each other’s arms as if they thought the murderer might be coming after them next. Marlowe seemed shaken and confused.

Everyone had left with relief as soon as the police had reopened the parking deck. Lulu had helped clean up at the restaurant and fell into her bed exhausted at almost two o’clock in the morning.

And she could tell it, thought Lulu with a grimace as she saw her reflection in the mirror. Especially with the circles under her eyes. She got out a little makeup to help cover them up.

Lulu jumped as the doorbell rang. She smoothed down the dress she’d just put on and hurried over to peep out the front door. She saw it was Cherry and opened the door. “Good morning! You’re out bright and early this morning.”

Cherry followed Lulu into her cheerful kitchen, where Lulu poured them both a cup of coffee. “Wow, Lulu, you look worn out.” Lulu winced, and Cherry said, “Sorry, hon. I know it was a long night. I couldn’t sleep last night myself, which is one reason I’m here so early. I finally gave up and pulled some clothes on and came on over.”

“I’m glad you did because I didn’t even get a chance to talk to you last night after everything started going downhill.”

“Is Coco feeling any better?” asked Cherry.

“She’s fine. Her tummy ended up getting upset because she ate a whole bag of miniature chocolates that were left over from last Halloween. Poor thing.” Lulu knew she wouldn’t be doing that again anytime soon. “With all that was going on with Coco, I didn’t really get a good sense of what was going on in Aunt Pat’s last night. Did you see anything?”

Cherry said, “Actually, I saw a lot. I figured you’d need me to be on sleuthing backup. I saw a lot of coming and going.
Everybody
walked out the front door and then came back in again later. I wish I’d taken a little more notice of when everyone left and came back, but I didn’t know it was going to be important.” Cherry looked put out.

“You found out more than I did, at least!” said Lulu. “So did it seem to you that most people were going out on the porch to listen to the music? Or were they joining friends that were out there so they could talk for a while?”

“Or were they going out there to murder Dee Dee?” Cherry finished wryly. “That’s what we don’t know, of course. But I did notice that Dee Dee had spoken to all the suspects. And that all the suspects ended up going outside at some point.
And
,” Cherry looked smug, “she’d given them
all
some sort of a note.”

Lulu frowned. “That
is
a little strange, isn’t it? I wouldn’t have thought that Dee Dee would have wanted to talk to all of them.”

“Talk? I’d say Dee Dee was planning on blackmailing them or putting some pressure on them in some way. What do you want to bet that she was trying to squeeze some money out of all our suspects? It sounds like that was Dee Dee’s special talent. Did you happen to notice when she wasn’t in the dining room anymore? When you went off to take care of Coco, was she still in there chatting?”

Lulu pressed her fingers to her temples like she could conjure up the memory. “You know, Cherry, I couldn’t say for sure. I was trying to keep track of everybody at the beginning of the fund-raiser, but then so many people came in from off the street that I just couldn’t do it. I don’t remember seeing her when I went to the back of the restaurant. But she could have been on the porch or in a booth where I couldn’t see her.”

“Okay,” said Cherry briskly. “So we don’t know for sure how long she was out there. But I
can
tell you that I never saw her after I saw her making the rounds to talk to the suspects. Not once.”

Lulu said slowly, “Let’s just say that Dee Dee came in, spoke to Steffi and Marlowe, had a little food, talked to me for a couple of minutes, noticed who was at the party, spoke to all of them, and handed them notes with times to come see her out in her car. Maybe she thought it would be the quickest and easiest way to try to extort some money out of people.”

“She had money on the brain,” said Cherry, with a bob of her head. “I could tell that she was practically salivating when she thought I was going to buy a whole wardrobe from her. She’d probably already spent it in her head.”

Lulu frowned again. “I need a little something sweet to get my brain going this morning, Cherry. Want some coffee cake? I cooked it yesterday and can warm it up in the microwave in a jiff.”

Cherry definitely wanted some coffee cake . After a few minutes munching on it, Lulu said, “I guess we should think about what people Dee Dee might have asked to see. The one that doesn’t make sense to me is Loren.”

Cherry said, “I don’t see him killing Dee Dee at all. He wouldn’t have gone to her shop, and I can’t see what she would have known about him to make him a good target for blackmail.”

“True. Still, though—Dee Dee was being pretty nosy the night of Tristan’s murder. She could have seen something at the party that night that proved that one of the suspects had murdered Tristan. So I think we should still keep Loren in the loop on that.”

Cherry looked glum. “That means that
everyone
is still in the loop, then. She could have seen any of those folks do something suspicious the night Tristan was murdered. I was hoping we could at least eliminate
somebody
.”

“Let’s think if there’s anything else that Dee Dee might have had on these folks, besides anything she might have seen the night of the murder. Dee Dee said some pointed things at Tristan’s funeral—remember? I recall thinking how odd it was for her to be behaving that way at a funeral service. Just real coarse.”

“That’s right!” said Cherry, brightening. “She
was
acting weird. She mentioned something about people messing around where they shouldn’t have been and stuff going missing.”

Lulu’s eyes widened. “Cherry, what do you want to bet that she was talking about the portrait? She probably saw who destroyed it.”

“I wonder how it ended up there with Dee Dee,” said Cherry. “That’s weird.”

“Maybe Dee Dee was the one who took it home . . . after she saw it get ruined. Maybe she thought she could use it to extort money out of somebody. She could have swiped it when she realized Tristan was dead, realizing that whoever messed up the picture would look really guilty.”

Cherry added, “Then she could have given that person a note last night to meet her and had the picture in the car to use as proof. Didn’t you tell me that Derrick said there was lipstick smeared all over the portrait? I bet the police can easily figure out who the person who scribbled lipstick on the portrait was—there’d have to be DNA all over that picture from the lipstick.”

Lulu said thoughtfully, “And if my recollection is correct, Dee Dee knew exactly who Loren was, and he knew her from the funeral. She even said something that made Pepper upset—claiming that the only people at the service who cared anything about Tristan were herself and Loren.”

Cherry snapped her fingers. “That’s right! I remember how uncomfortable everybody was when she said it, too. And Pepper was right there!”

“I think Dee Dee was just one of those people who liked stirring up trouble,” said Lulu, with a shake of her head. “And she went a little too far this time. Do you remember that she was also talking about an ‘inappropriate relationship’?”

“You mean when she was talking about Loren and Tristan?”

“No, she said that wasn’t the
only
inappropriate relationship. And something about things aren’t always what they seem.”

Cherry looked admiringly at Lulu. “You sure do have a great memory! I can’t remember half of what she was babbling about that day.”

“I was trying to pay attention to all that—looking for some clues. But I remember thinking at the time that Dee Dee wanted to be the center of attention. You know, that she was just trying to draw attention to herself.”

Cherry said, “I’m thinking maybe she was also tipping off some folks that she was onto them. Right? Then she’d have set the scene before she started asking them for money.”

Lulu was quiet for a moment, thinking. “I’m trying to think what Dee Dee knew about some of the suspects. You said she spoke to Marlowe. Do you think she was just talking to her because it was a fund-raiser for Steffi? Like she was being nice? Or do you think that she was talking to her because she had something on her?”

“But Marlowe wasn’t at Tristan’s party,” said Cherry. “At least—I don’t think anyone saw her at the party. But she
was
in town, like I mentioned to you before. I saw Marlowe at the beauty parlor not long before Tristan’s party started.” Cherry snapped her fingers. “And that’s Dee Dee’s beauty parlor, too. She and I have a regular appointment there on the same day, but not exactly the same time. So it’s possible that Dee Dee saw Marlowe driving into or out of the salon. The next day, that would have been an important point—that Marlowe was in town during the murder although she claimed to be on a business trip.”

“I’ve already talked to Marlowe about it. I didn’t tell her who saw her, don’t worry. She admitted that she was in town because her business trip had wrapped up early. But she says that Tristan’s party was the
last
place on earth that she’d wanted to be.”

Cherry took another swallow of her coffee. “So here’s what I was thinking. We’ll go around and talk to all the suspects again. And I’ll drop by your house from time to time like I did this morning, and we’ll rehash what we’ve learned. That way we’re not acting all secretive and suspicious over in Aunt Pat’s or something.
We
don’t want to end up murdered, after all!”

“No,” said Lulu with emphasis. “We certainly don’t. How are we going to talk to everyone without looking suspicious while we’re questioning them?”

Cherry tried to look modest. “I had a couple of ideas about that. Really, we can make it pretty natural, I think. I could tell Colleen that you simply don’t know what to do now that Dee Dee’s Darling Dress Shoppe is kaput. You’re inconsolable! And, since I know that Colleen has shopped in every shop in town, I’ll ask her to give us a little tour of boutiques.”

“You’re coming along for that, too?” said Lulu with surprise. “I know you can’t stand to shop, and these shops won’t be the kinds of places you like to go.”

“It’s a sacrifice for the case,” said Cherry with a small bow.

“Why don’t we just ask her to give us some places to shop? I don’t think we need to be dragged all over town to see the shops for ourselves. And that might give us a little more time to talk if we’re at her house. We could claim that
we’re
about to go shopping and decided to stop by for a little advice.”

“Sure—it doesn’t bother me to get out of shopping, that’s for sure. If we’re lucky, then Pansy will be there while we’re talking to Colleen. I have some ideas about talking to the other suspects, too.” Cherry bounced in her seat like she might fly off. “I think we have a good shot at cracking this case, Lulu! And before Pink even does.”

Chapter 17

That afternoon, after Lulu had checked in at the restaurant to make sure everything was running smoothly, she and Cherry hopped in Lulu’s car to take off for their “shopping trip.”

In minutes, they were knocking at Colleen’s door. She answered it, smiling, but looking a little confused. “Well, hey, y’all. What’s up? Want to come inside?” Colleen held the door open for them, and they walked into her chintz-filled living room.

“We’re only going to stay for a minute,” said Lulu a little apologetically.

“We just had some quick questions for you,” said Cherry, making a show of sitting down so that Lulu would follow. “Lulu is so devastated about Dee Dee’s death.”

Lulu was startled that she was suddenly supposed to produce a look of devastation on her face. She hastily managed at least a serious expression, since she’d still had her social smile on.

“Dee Dee’s was
the
place where Lulu shopped. She’d been going to Dee Dee’s boutique for the last twenty years and pretty much gotten the same type of clothing.” Colleen and Cherry looked contemplatively at Lulu’s floral dress.