miss fortune mystery (ff) - bayou bubba (2 page)

Cal’s brows lowered even farther and his wide, perfect mouth tightened. “As I was saying. I don’t think it’s a good idea for you to come. I don’t know what kind of shape…Bubba’s in. You might be traumatizing yourself for no reason.”

“Even more reason for me to come with. I know him, Cal. I lived with him for twenty years. You only know him from a picture. If the…” I swallowed bile. “—face is mangled, I’m more likely to recognize him.”

I could tell I’d convinced him but he didn’t look pleased.

Either way, I wasn’t interested in his opinion. Grabbing my purse, I headed for the door. “Come on, the sooner we get this over with, the sooner we can start looking for my father.”

I thought I heard a sigh. But I’d already breezed through the door, my wobbly-assed optimism pasted over the tidal wave of niggling doubt surging through me.

After all, there was always brain bleach if what I saw threatened to scar me for life.

###

Nothing’s ever easy. We discovered the nearest hospital was about thirty miles outside of Sinful and, before they would let us look at the body of the man they’d dubbed Bayou Bubba, they insisted we talk to the local sheriff. Luckily I had Cal to do the talking, because, after seeing the sheriff ride up on a horse and strap it to a bicycle rack outside, I wasn’t sure I could keep a straight face.

What kind of Southern Hick Hell had my father brought me to? And more importantly, what was he thinking coming there himself?

“You Bubba’s daughter?”

I turned to find a tiny, gray haired woman with poodle curls all over her small head staring at me like she was considering gnawing on one of my legs.

I pressed my lips together as my pulse spiked. Barely overcoming the urge to tell her to mind her own business, I decided to satisfy my curiosity instead. “Who are you?”

She narrowed her borderline hostile gaze and pursed her lips. “I’m with the Sinful Ladies Society. We run Sinful.”

And that, apparently was that. “Ookay.” I extended my hand. “My name’s Felicity Chance. I came to Sinful because I think my father’s here. I really don’t think the body in there—Bubba—is my father.”

The woman’s hard gaze slipped over me, clearly judging my worth. I doubted it was a monetary thing. “Uh-huh.” She shook my hand. “I’m Ida Belle. I run the SLS.”

“SLS?”

The frown that had never really left her face since she arrived deepened. “Pay attention. I don’t have time to keep repeating myself.”

“Oh. Right, the Sinful Ladies Society. Got it.”

The smell of sexy man suddenly filled the air I breathed. “The sheriff said the coroner’s out sick today, but he’s okay with us identifying the body.” Sexy Cal slid his knee-melting gaze over Ida Belle and smiled.

I almost fainted. I hadn’t been aware his lips could do that.

He offered her his hand. “I’m Cal Amity.”

A subtle pink suffused Ida Belle’s cheeks and she actually sucked air as her hand touched his. “Ida Belle.”

“She runs the Sinful Ladies Society. They run Sinful,” I told him helpfully.

Cal nodded, his smile widening. Ida Belle’s hand was still enclosed in his and, as god is my witness, the crabby geriatric was actually batting her eyelashes. “How lucky for us! I need someone to fill me in about…um…Bubba. I’ve just been talking to the sheriff…” Cal lifted an eyebrow by way of finishing the thought.

Ida Bella rolled her eyes. “And you realized you needed to talk to someone who had a clue.” She nodded. “I’ll tell you anything you need to know about poor Bubba.” Her gaze skimmed the door leading to the morgue. For just a moment I saw a spark of sadness, before she ruthlessly squashed it. “Why don’t you come over to
Francine’s Café
when you’re done here? Francine serves up some of the best banana pudding in Louisiana.”

Cal patted her hand and released it. “We’ll do that. Thanks for your help, Ida. We’re very grateful.”

She pshawed dismissively and, after sliding a final, assessing look over me, walked away from the hospital at a brisk pace.

“That’s a woman who is constantly on a mission,” I told Cal.

“She’s exactly the type of person we need to talk to.” He glanced at me, his blue gaze soft. “Are you sure you want to do this, Miss Chance?”

I sighed. “Look, Cal. We’re going to be together for several days. Don’t you think you could call me Felicity?”

He thought about it for a minute and then shook his head. “No. Ready?”

Ready or not, my stomach was jumping all over the place as I approached the body on the table. He was covered with a white sheet, but I couldn’t help thinking, as Cal reached to pull the top of the sheet down, that the size of the dead guy was about right.

Cal met my gaze one last time and I nodded. I held my breath as he folded the sheet back. Though I thought I was man enough to handle it, the sight of the corpse’s half eaten face brought bile into my throat. Covering my mouth with my hand, I clenched my lips tight and forced myself to look at him.

The man on the table had light brown, almost blond hair like mine, though it was darker around the face from grease and blood. It was much longer than my father’s had been, but that didn’t mean anything. If he really had been living on the streets of Sinful his hair could have grown long.

There was one area, along the right side of his jaw, where the flesh was mostly intact. A couple of baby pea sized indentations made me whimper softly, tears flooding my eyes.

“What is it?” Cal asked softly. “Is it him?”

I shook my head, sniffling. “I can’t tell.” Swallowing hard, I chewed on my lower lip, terrified I was lying to myself. “He has pockmarks,” I pointed to the jawline. “Just there. My dad had…” Sniffling, I turned away. Tears drenched my cheeks and suddenly I found myself enclosed in a hard pair of arms, pressed against a broad chest that smelled of fabric softener and sun-drenched man.

His kindness overwhelmed me and I gave up trying to control the sobs. I let it go, washing months of doubt and fear out in the copious amount of tears I dumped onto poor Cal’s shirt. Finally I pulled away, dragging a hand over my soggy cheeks.

Cal handed me a tissue. “Better?”

I blew my nose, honking loudly.

When I looked up he was grinning.

“What?”

“Nothing. Will you be okay while I search the body?”

I inhaled deeply and nodded.

Cal moved back to the table and pulled the sheet all the way down, uncovering the man to his shins. I wanted to run out of the room but some perverse curiosity kept me there, watching carefully as Cal searched the dead guy’s pockets. I was surprised, that, despite the fact the clothes didn’t fit Bubba very well, they were in pretty good shape and relatively clean. “Anything in his pockets?”

Cal shook his head. He was trying to pry the man’s hand open. “He seems to be holding onto something though.” I gasped at a horrible cracking noise and Cal threw me an apologetic look. He reached between the fingers he’d wrenched loose and pulled out something long and white.

“Is that an alligator tooth?” I asked, moving closer.

“It sure looks like it. It’s got a hole drilled through the top like it was hanging from something.” Cal handed the tooth to me. “Hold this.”

My eyes widened. “Please tell me you’re not going to check the other hand.”

“I’ll try not to break any fingers this time.”

“Oh god.” My mouth filled with saliva and I thought I might throw up. I swung my gaze away as he moved to the other side. I caught the flash of something in my peripheral vision and turned to get a better look. Frowning, I looked closer. “Cal, I think he’s got something in his mouth.”

Cal stuck his head down really close, inches from the mangled mess of the face, and stars burst before my eyes. But it wasn’t until he pried the hamburger lips apart that I squealed and ran from the room, barely making it to the ladies room across the hall before I threw up everything I’d eaten that day.

Cal met me in the hall a few minutes later. “You gonna be all right?”

“Stop asking me that. I just had to pee.” I glared at him, hoping to distract him from the fact that I was a sissy girl. “Did you find anything?”

He opened his hand and showed me the gold coin which I knew would be verified to have come from my father’s collection.

I sighed, my eyes filling again.

You want to skip the meeting with the intrepid Ida Belle?”

I scrubbed my long-suffering tissue under my eyes. “Not a chance. I still need to figure out what the hell he was doing here.”

“Good.” Cal wrapped an arm around my shoulders. “Let’s go then.”

###

“I won’t ask if it was him.” Ida Belle declared as we moved toward the table she’d saved for us. Two other women were sitting at the table with her. The older one had a kind smile for me, before her gaze caught on Cal and got stuck there. At that point I might as well not have existed.

The other one was much younger, probably around my age, and pretty. She had long blonde hair which she’d pulled back into a ruthlessly banded ponytail and, though she wore no discernible makeup, her complexion was clear and her features were pretty.

She also looked familiar.

“This is Gertie and that’s Fortune.”

I smiled at Gertie as I shook her hand. “I’m Felicity.

The younger woman scoured a look over me as she took my hand, her lips twisting a little as if she disapproved.

“Are you members of SLS too?”

Cal pulled a chair out for me and waited while I sat down. Then he slid lightly into the chair beside me. All three women at the table watched him like he was the glossy stallion in their pony club. It bothered me. And the fact that it bothered me, bothered me even more.

“I’m not,” Fortune offered in a deep voice with a sexy husk to it.

“Guilty as charged.” Gertie reached across the table and patted my hand. “I’m sorry about your daddy, Felicity.”

To my horror, tears flooded my eyes again. “Thanks.”

“What can you tell us about Bubba?” Cal asked the ladies. “How long has he been in Sinful?”

Ida Belle shrugged. “I’m not sure exactly. I think he was here a while before we knew it.

Gertie nodded. “Pim Gordon down at the pawn shop said Bubba’d been trading stuff for a few weeks before we first saw him. I guess he’d only come into town at night.”

“Traded stuff?” I asked.

Ida Belle nodded. “Old coins and bottles of Kentucky Bourbon. I guess it was pricey stuff.”

I shared a glance with Cal. He broke eye contact almost immediately. “Nobody knew where he was staying?”

“We thought he was out on Number Two,” Gertie offered.

“Where’s that?” Cal had opened his notes app on his phone and was typing with his thumbs. I watched him, impressed by his dexterity.

I filed that away. You know. Just in case.

“An island not far from here,” Fortune offered in her brusque, husky voice. “They call it that because it smells like a turd.”

I laughed. “Wonderful.”

She grinned and I had a sense of déjà vu so strong it made me blink. “I’m sorry. Have we met?”

Fortune’s smile slid away, her gaze turning to ice. “No. Why?”

“I don’t know. You look so familiar.”

The two older women across the table turned a startled gaze to Fortune and she glared back at them. “I just have one of those faces,” she offered, trying a smile that reminded me of the gator at the motel.

“He had a shack on Number Two, made of sticks and old boxes,” Gertie offered too quickly. “A few people saw him there when they were fishing. He liked to hang out along the shore, staring out at the water.”

Her words painted such a lonely picture I found myself tearing up again.

“The sheriff said Bubba died from several blows to the back of the head.

“That’s right,” Ida Belle said, nodding. “I checked the body myself when they brought him in.”

My eyes widened. “Are you the coroner?”

Gertie blew a raspberry, earning her a glare from Ida Belle. “She does keep Doc Ye busy but she’s more like the supplier than the distributor.”

Fortune chuckled darkly and she and Gertie bumped fists.

“Shut up, Gertie!” Ida Belle redirected her hostile gaze toward me. “I told you. The SLS runs Sinful. If somebody dies I make it my business to find out why.”

“So why did Bubba die, Ida Belle?” Cal asked softly.

She held his sexy blue gaze for a long moment and then said, “Let’s get some banana pudding, shall we?”

CHAPTER THREE

“What now?” I asked the intrepid Cal as we emerged from
Francine’s Café
into a fading Louisiana sun. The coming night promised to be only slightly less sultry than the day had been. My pores sprouted copious amounts of sweat as soon as I removed them from the blissfully cool air of the diner.

After a trauma-filled day, I was ready for a long shower and a short meal.

“Let’s go talk to the pawn shop owner before we call it a day. If we get lucky he’ll be able to tell us where to look for Bubba.”

Gordon’s Pawn Shop
was two blocks from the diner and three buildings down from the Catholic church, across the street from the Baptist church. “There are sure a lot of churches here for a place called Sinful,” I observed crabbily.

Cal skimmed the opposing structures a quick look. “Especially since the entire town is only about four blocks square.”

Dragging an arm over my forehead, I realized I was likely to run out of bodily fluids if I didn’t hydrate soon. “I haven’t seen any bars in town. Have you?”

Cal opened the door to the pawn shop and ushered me through. “We passed one a couple miles out of town. I’m guessing Sinful might be a dry town.”

I grimaced. “Of course it would be. A place with a name like Sinful has to be the epicenter of Hell.”

“Only if you get on the wrong side of the Geritol Mafia,” a disembodied voice offered in response to my statement.

Looking for the source of the voice, Cal and I glanced toward the back of the long, narrow space that comprised
Gordon’s
. A wide, rosy-cheeked face blinked at us from just above a cloudy glass counter. As I was trying to figure out if it was one of those carnival machines where you feed a quarter in and something slides out through the lips, said lips moved. “Welcome, folks. How can I help you?”