Bittersweet (17 page)

I put the plate of glazed buns on the table and began laying out the place mats and silverware at our places, two on one side of the table, two on the other. I was remembering what Justine had told me earlier that morning about the East Texas deer-smuggling case, which had involved both state and federal violations. It sounded like that was what Sue Ellen was talking about. But I needed to hear it from her.

“‘Bringing in white-tails'?” I asked. “Exactly what does that mean?”

“It means that they've been trucking in deer from Oklahoma.”

“As in . . . smuggling?”

“Yeah, right. As in smuggling.” She eyed me. “So I guess you know it's against the law to haul white-tailed deer into Texas.” Her mouth was a thin line, twisted down in one corner, as if she were tasting something sour. “Kind of a dumb law, seems to me. I mean, hundreds of deer walk back and forth across the border anytime they want and nobody tries to stop them. But if you load a couple of deer in a truck and drive them across, all of a sudden you're a smuggler, and both the state guys and the feds are after you. Heck, you can't even truck deer around
inside
the state without a permit. You can go to jail.”

“Okay,” I said. “I get that. And I understand that the penalties for doing that sort of thing are pretty stiff, and that a smuggler can find himself in some serious trouble.” I frowned. “But last night, I understood you to be talking about something else. You said that your husband was stealing money from his employer, and you implied that the thefts amounted to a sizable chunk of change. So how is smuggling connected to—”

“I didn't say he was stealing actual
money
,” she put in quickly. “I said—”

“You said it boiled down to money,” I corrected myself. “So if it isn't money, what is it? Equipment?” But she seemed to think he had taken more than $200,000—what under the sun had he stolen that had that kind of value?

“No, not equipment.” She put a folded paper towel on a plate and began forking bacon strips onto it. “When you hear what it is, you're going to think it's nothing much. But that's because you don't know what's going on in deer ranching these days. These animals—”

“Good morning, girls,” my mother said cheerily, coming into the kitchen. She was wearing a navy blue wool pantsuit and matching navy heels, with a white scoop-neck top, pearls, and pearl earrings. Her gray
hair was attractively swept back, and her face was carefully made up. She might have been going to a charity fund-raiser luncheon at the River Oaks Country Club.

“Good morning,” Sue Ellen and I chorused. We traded half-guilty glances, as if Leatha had caught us telling a dirty story, which in a sense she had.

“Oh, my, that coffee smells good!” she exclaimed, coming over to give me a peck on the cheek and bestowing one on Sue Ellen as well. “I think I'll have another cup. China, did Sue Ellen tell you about going to the hospital this morning?”

For the record, I love my mother and I want to be there for her when she needs me. But at that moment I fervently wished she had put off coming into the kitchen until Sue Ellen had finished her sentence. Or her paragraph. Or whatever it took for me to get the story. By the time we were able to return to the subject, she might have changed her mind.

But there were other priorities, of course. “What's happening with Sam?” I asked urgently. “What did you hear from the hospital? Is there a problem?”

As Leatha poured coffee, I saw that her hands were trembling, and I guessed that the hospital hadn't phoned with good news. “They want to do more surgery.” She wasn't looking at me. “Today.”

“On Thanksgiving?” If they were doing it on a holiday, it must be serious.

She nodded. “Can you go with me?”

“Of course,” I replied promptly. I hesitated and added, “What surgery, exactly?”

She glanced at the serving plate on the table. “Oh, look! Glazed buns.” She bent to sniff. “Lemon and rosemary! What a wonderful combination!” She took her coffee to the table and sat down. Beneath her makeup,
her face was sallow. “I didn't ask for details, China. I just said we'd get there quick as we could. I thought we'd find out soon enough.”

Just like my mother, I thought to myself. Queen of Denial, determined to put off knowing about or even acknowledging the bad stuff as long as possible. But I couldn't blame her. What she and Sam were facing was a threat to the life they had built here at Bittersweet. A life they expected to live together for years to come, a life that would be very difficult for her to manage alone. No wonder she didn't want to know the bad news until she had to.

I put my hand on her shoulder. “Oatmeal? Sue Ellen's made a pot of it.”

She bent her cheek to my hand. “Just a little, please.” She took a deep breath, then began spooning sugar into her coffee. “Sue Ellen, are there any eggs?”

“Coming up,” Sue Ellen said cheerily. “And bacon.” She glanced at me.
Later
,
she mouthed, as she put a plate in front of my mother. “I'll get you some orange juice,” she said to Leatha, and went to the fridge.

Stepping close to Sue Ellen, I said in a low voice, “Maybe you and I can talk some more before we have to leave for Kerrville.”

“You need to get going,” she said, getting out the pitcher. “Anyway, we don't have to do it today, do we?”

“No.” I took the pitcher from her and began pouring juice into glasses. “But if you hold off, Justine is likely to think—”

“Happy Thanksgiving, everybody!” Caitie sang, standing in the doorway with Mr. P draped like an orange fur stole over her arm. “Is it time for breakfast?” She was wearing her favorite pink fairy pajamas and fluffy pink bunny-ear house slippers, and her dark hair was tousled. She looked adorable—although I am her mother, and naturally prejudiced. I
often find myself wishing that I could keep her safe from the world and at this sweet age forever.

“Breakfast is most definitely ready,” Leatha said with a broad smile. She patted the chair beside her. “Come and sit by Gramma, and Sue Ellen will fix you some eggs and bacon. Did you and Mr. P sleep well last night?”

“Oh, yes!” Caitie exclaimed. She found a small bowl and began filling it with milk for the cat.

“Scrambled okay?” Sue Ellen asked.

Caitie nodded. “Did you know that those eggs were laid by my girls?” She put the bowl on the floor, and Mr. P began to lap up the milk, purring throatily and twirling his tail. That cat is such a
ham.

“They were, truly?” Sue Ellen asked in mock astonishment. “You mean, you have your very own chickens?”

“Six hens, a rooster, and seven little chickens,” Caitie boasted, sitting down beside her grandmother. “And the girls' eggs are all
fertile
. That means,” she explained in a knowing tone, “that the hen and the rooster had sex, so if a hen sits on the eggs and keeps them warm all day every day for twenty-one days, baby chicks will hatch out. I know this works,” she confided, “because one of my hens volunteered. That's how we got the seven little chickens.”

I put a glass of orange juice in front of Leatha, watching to see how she would respond to her granddaughter's version of the facts of life. She didn't even raise an eyebrow. “What a well-informed young lady you are,” she said, picking up her fork and smiling at Caitie.

Caitie beamed. “Thank you,” she said modestly, and launched into a lengthy description of her chicken-raising, egg-selling enterprise, which
occupied us for the duration of breakfast. After that, my mother was anxious to get off to the hospital, so there was no more opportunity for Sue Ellen and me to talk. I had the uneasy feeling that she had welcomed the interruption. I knew from experience with clients that the trek to the DA's office can be a scary one, and I wouldn't be surprised if she got cold feet. But I would be sorry. Her knowledge of her husband's guilt—whatever his crime—could come back to haunt her.

Before we left, Leatha and Sue Ellen quickly conferred about the food for Thanksgiving dinner—stuffed turkey with the usual trimmings. The pies had been baked the evening before, and Sue Ellen planned to stuff the turkey and get it into the oven in time for dinner shortly after four. The sky had been cloudless when I got up, but by the time we started out, it was drizzling a little, and from the look of the thick gray bank of clouds hanging low over the northern hills, we might get a downpour at any moment. We took Sam's Impala, but Leatha asked me to drive—an admission, I thought, that she was feeling a little shaky about what we would find when we got to the hospital. We followed 187 north to Utopia, and as we passed the site of Jennie's Kitchen, the restaurant where Jennie and I would be installing the herb garden the next day, I pointed it out.

“I hope it's not raining tomorrow,” I added. “Jennie has some people coming in to help, and it would be good to get all the plants in the ground if we can.” Leatha nodded but didn't say anything, and I saw that her jaw was clenched tight. Whatever the bad news to come, she was already arming herself against it.

For once, there were no vehicles parked in front of the Lost Maples Café, which was closed for Thanksgiving. The general store was closed, too, and Main Street was empty—until, that is, we reached the northern
outskirts of town. On the right-hand side of the road, a half mile past the library, a half-dozen official trucks and cars were parked cattywampus in the asphalt-paved parking lot in front of the Masters Animal Clinic. The EMS ambulance, followed by a sheriff's car, was just pulling out. A woman wearing jeans, a green cap, and a green Parks and Wildlife jacket stepped out onto the road in front of us. She raised her hand, stopping us to allow the official vehicles to make their exit. Since the ambulance was running its lights but not its siren and wasn't flying at warp speed, I guessed that their cargo was bound for the county morgue. And that it wasn't an animal patient.

“Oh, look!” Leatha exclaimed, leaning forward. “That woman—that's Mackenzie! Mackenzie Chambers, our game warden friend.”

So it was. Mack stepped back to the right-hand shoulder and motioned to us to drive on. I checked the mirror and saw that there weren't any cars coming up behind us, so I pulled up next to her and hit the button that lowered the passenger-side window.

“Great to see you, Mack,” I said, leaning on the steering wheel and speaking across my mother. “It's been too long.” I gestured toward the parking lot. “What's going on?”

She bent over to look through the window, did a double take when she saw me, then smiled quickly, showing even, white teeth in a face reddened by the wind. “Oh, hi, China! Yeah, it's been a while, hasn't it? Seven or eight months, at least. Welcome to Utopia.” She put out her hand to my mother. “Hello, Leatha. Happy Thanksgiving.”

“We're looking forward to seeing you this afternoon,” Leatha said, squeezing her hand briefly and releasing it. “We'll be at the hospital in Kerrville this morning, but we're planning dinner sometime after four. Is that still good for you?”

Mack nodded. “I heard about Sam,” she said soberly. “I'm sorry. I know how difficult this must be for you. He's going to be okay, isn't he?”

Leatha lifted her chin. “Sam is going to be
fine
,” she said with a determined emphasis. “Of course, it may take a while, but he'll be good as new. And if you're thinking that dinner might be too much trouble for us or something silly like that, just stop.” She smiled brightly. “Sam insists that we have our holiday as usual, and you're included. I thought of having a stuffed venison roast, but turkey is really easier.”

“Turkey will be wonderful,” Mack said. “Looking forward to it.”

“What's going on?” I repeated, gesturing toward the parking lot. “Looks like a full house, including EMS. Did somebody get hurt?” I didn't ask why she happened to be there, but I wondered. Game wardens are also peace officers, but you don't often see them directing traffic.

Mack's smile vanished. “Doc Masters,” she said gravely. “He was shot.”

“Shot!” Leatha's hand went to her mouth. “Oh, no! Was it an accident? Is he going to be all right? Phil is such a wonderful, thoughtful man.” Turning to me, she explained, “Phillip Masters is a longtime veterinarian and an old friend of Sam's. He's also an expert bird-watcher, and he's offered to come out next spring and lead bird walks along the river for our guests. He can identify every single bird by the song alone.”

Mack's mouth was hard and tight, and I could see the pain in her dark eyes. “I'm afraid he's dead,” she said, answering my mother's second question. Then, as Leatha gasped, she answered the first. “And it wasn't an accident,” she added grimly. “He was murdered. Shot at close range.”

“Murdered!” Leatha whispered. Her eyes were wide and disbelieving. “You can't be serious, Mack. Not Phil—and not in Utopia!”

“Afraid so,” Mack said. Her loose dark hair blew across her face, and she turned her back to the chill wind.

“Was it a robbery?” I asked. I was remembering that there had been several break-ins at vet hospitals in the Pecan Springs and San Marcos areas. Animal clinics are a tempting target because they stock narcotics—and because some of them don't have the necessary security. “Somebody after drugs?”

Mack gave me a glance I couldn't read. “That's still under investigation,” she replied, in a carefully neutral tone I recognized from my conversations with police officers who don't want to let you in on the details. Somehow, though, I got the idea that it might
not
have been a robbery—or at least, that Mack didn't think so.

There was a quick, light tap on a car horn behind us. Straightening, Mack slapped the roof of our car. “Need you to move on now,” she said crisply, and softened it with a smile. “Drive safely. See you at four.”