Bone Appétit (33 page)

He nodded. “Marcus?”

I shook my head.

He headed down the carpeted hall, opening doors swiftly and entering fast. When we were certain no one was home, Jansen waved me into the nanny’s room. “See what you can unearth,” he said. “I’ll take Marcus’s room.”

I expected to find a closet full of black dresses with sensible shoes, but that wasn’t the case. Anna-the-nanny dressed expensively, if blandly. The most impressive feature of the room was a wall of books, her personal library. She was a student of American literature and had a fine collection of first editions.

Tucked beneath her undies I found a photo album. I put it on the bed to examine later, but the slick leather slid to the floor. Photos spilled across the carpet. Some were old family pictures, but most documented the childhood and adolescence of a blue-eyed, dark-haired boy named Larry Blackledge, Anna’s brother. Hedy’s father.

From young boy to teenager to college student, Larry’s life was recorded by a loving hand. The last photo was of the young man standing beside packed bags. The note under it said, “Destination Pearl River swamps.” That was
when the Blackledge family lost their young man to a Saulnier woman.

There were also pictures of Hedy. They were infrequent and taken at a distance, but they covered the years of her childhood and adolescence.

Dozens and dozens of photographs showed Hedy pregnant. Anna’s obsession was clear to see. I gathered them up to show Jansen. The snapshots weren’t concrete evidence that Anna was behind the poisonings or anything else, but they clearly showed her compulsion where Hedy was involved.

The rest of the room yielded no secrets. While I’d expected to find resource material on poisons in the bookcase, there was none. Jansen’s luck was no better. If Anna or Anna and Marcus were poisoning the pageant gals, they weren’t keeping the how-to manuals or ingredients in the house.

“I’ll check the grounds,” Jansen said when I joined him in the hallway. “I’ve put out a call for Marcus. No one has seen him lately, which worries me.”

“He might be at Clive’s horse ranch,” I said. If Anna had lost her mind completely, it was possible she’d harmed Marcus. Jansen was right to be concerned.

“I’ll have an officer check. Let’s hope he’s there. We could stand some positive news.”

When we arrived back at the hotel, Coleman was waiting in the Alluvian lobby. He shook hands with Jansen, who wasted no time listing the pertinent facts. Marcus, he’d learned, was not at Clive’s and hadn’t been seen all day.

“So the facts are, Tinkie left the Alluvian and a woman resembling Anna Lock followed her,” Coleman said. “Except
for the note, there was no indication where she might be headed?”

“None. But she wasn’t at the Wellingtons’ and there was no sign she’d ever been there. She forgot her phone. And her camera, which has virtually grown to her hand in the last week. She never goes anywhere without it.” The same thought struck Coleman and me.

“The camera,” we said.

“She might have recorded a picture.” Jansen made the leap with us.

We all three hustled to the room.

Holding the camera where we could see it, I played back the images. In the last shot, Voncil Payne stood in the bedroom doorway wearing a wide smile.

“Crap. I was certain Tink had left us a clue,” I said.

“Maybe it is.” Coleman put a warm hand on my shoulder. “We should check it out. Maybe Voncil saw something.”

“You two go ahead,” Jansen said. “I’ll check at the cooking school to see what I can find. It’s almost time for the contestants to begin preparing their dishes. Perhaps Hedy will put in an appearance.”

“She’d be in her room if she could,” I said. “Someone forced her to drug Eddie and leave.”

“Your partner was the last person she spoke to. If they’re together, you’d tell me, right?” Jansen asked.

“Let me just say if the two of them have run off together and didn’t bother to tell me, you won’t have to arrest them. I’ll kick their butts into a cell.”

“She means it,” Coleman said.

A smile lifted one corner of Jansen’s mouth. “Yeah, I think she does.”

While Jansen took an elevator down, Coleman and I
walked to Voncil and Amanda’s room. I’d known all along this case was trouble. I’d let Tinkie talk me into it, even when my gut screamed something awful was brewing.

“Tinkie is okay,” Coleman said, as if he could read my mind. We’d always had a connection when it came to danger.

“Graf and Oscar want us to dissolve the agency. They say it’s too dangerous, and maybe they’re right.” I could be honest with Coleman in a way I couldn’t with anyone else. “I didn’t want to take this case. Tinkie pushed it. If we closed the agency, Tinkie could become a photojournalist.”

“And that’s safer?” Coleman asked. “Some people fear exposure in the newspaper far more than jail.”

“Good point.”

“And what would you do, Sarah Booth?” He wasn’t asking as if I had no options.

“I could focus on my acting career.”

We turned the corner and were almost at the door of the Paynes’ room. “Funny how a dream isn’t ever what we think it is,” he said.

I couldn’t look at him. It wasn’t that acting wasn’t satisfying. It was. But in coming home to Zinnia from New York as a failure and reinventing myself as a private investigator, I’d found something of value in myself and my heritage. It wasn’t that I wanted to act less, but I needed to hold on to the me I’d discovered in Zinnia.

Coleman read it all over me. “You’ve never done the expected.”

“Maybe I’m just hardheaded,” I said. “Maybe I fought too hard to make Delaney Detective Agency a success.”

“Maybe you love the work and helping people,” Coleman said.

We stopped in the empty hallway and stared at each other. We’d been high school crushes and antagonists, newfound
friends when I returned from New York, and in love and almost lovers for most of a year. Now we were . . . more than friends. Coleman knew me in a way no one else ever would.

“If Tinkie has gotten hurt because of—” I stopped.

“Because of you?” He shook his head. “Give her credit for being smart and capable, Sarah Booth. She makes her own decisions. As do you. While others may hurt
for
us when we’re injured, no one bears the blame but us.”

I couldn’t speak around the lump in my throat. I nodded and Coleman brought his fist against the wooded door.

“Mrs. Payne, it’s Sheriff Coleman Peters, from Sunflower County. I’d like a word with you.”

“Sheriff who?” Amanda Payne opened the door wearing cut-off shorts and a stained T-shirt. She wiped her hands on her shorts. A bowl of carrots and a small grater were on the bed. “Sarah Booth, what’s wrong?”

“Is your mother here?” I asked.

“She went out about an hour ago.” She frowned. “Why is the sheriff of another county here?”

“We’re concerned about some Sunflower County residents,” Coleman said smoothly. “We’re hoping your mother saw something when she went to Tinkie Richmond’s room.”

Amanda waved us into the room. “Please don’t tell anyone what I’m making,” she said. “The girls are so competitive. Surprise is one of the big elements in this last part of the contest.”

“Amanda is highly ranked in the competition,” I told
Coleman. “Along with cooking, she writes and performs great songs.”

Amanda blushed. If she wasn’t shy and modest, she was damned good at faking it. “Thank you, Sarah Booth. I don’t know where Mother is. She gets so uptight about these contests. She makes me more nervous than I already am. When I told her that, she got angry. She left without saying where she was headed.”

“She spoke with Tinkie at eleven forty-five this morning.” The photo in the camera was time-stamped.

“I haven’t seen her since about eleven, maybe eleven thirty.” Amanda sank onto the bed. “She was pretty upset with me, said I was ungrateful . . .” She clamped a hand over her mouth. “More than you wanted to know, I’m sure. She’s probably shopping. She likes to hit the stores when she’s emotional.”

“Any idea why she might visit Mrs. Richmond?” Coleman asked.

Amanda bit her bottom lip. When Tinkie did it, she was sexy. Amanda reminded me of a lost child. “Mrs. Richmond called Mom, and Mom was eager to talk to her. I don’t know what Mrs. Richmond wanted, but Mom’s plan was to convince her to include pictures of me in the paper. Mother is obsessed with publicity. She’s always aggravating the media. She doesn’t understand people think she’s half a bubble off plumb when she keeps on and on. In the world of celebrity news, I’m a nobody. She just can’t accept that.”

To think I’d envied Amanda the presence of her mother to help support and encourage her. Voncil was directing her daughter’s life, and down a path that Amanda found stony and hard.

“Do you want this title?” I asked her.

She shrugged. “I need the money.
We
need it. But I’d just
as soon stay home and write my songs. I like that, and I could support myself while I finished my college degree.” Her cheeks flushed as she straightened her shoulders. “This pageant stuff . . . it’s always been Mother’s dream, not mine.”

“Why don’t you tell Voncil?” I asked.

“This is the last contest. I’m twenty-three. If I don’t win this, I’m too old. It’ll be over without a confrontation. My mother doesn’t handle resistance well, especially from me.”

“And if you win?” Coleman asked.

“It’s only a year. I’ll do everything the Viking people want, and I’ll do a good job. After that, I can pay off our debts, settle down to write songs, finish college, and live my life.”

“Voncil will accept that?” My take on Voncil was that as soon as Amanda wasn’t pageant material, Voncil would push her to marry well and have a baby. Amanda was the main course meal ticket, even if the menu changed drastically.

Amanda’s smile was tender. “Mom gets desperate sometimes. We’ve had some rough times, especially when I was younger. But she wants what’s best for me. She pushes too hard, but only because she wants me to have the security she never had.”

“It’s hard for a single mother with a child,” Coleman said. “Are your parents divorced?”

“No. My dad died when I was fourteen. Heart attack. He was only thirty-nine. Mom used to say they were lucky they got an early start and had me because his days were numbered.”

Coleman put a hand on her shoulder. “When your mother comes in, tell her to contact us,” he said. “Amanda, maybe I’ll ask Chief Jansen to put an officer on you, just to keep you safe.”

“That isn’t necessary. Karrie’s going to win. If not her, then Hedy.”

“But it would make me feel better to know you’re safe.”

“Okay. Now I have to get back to my preparations.”

We stood up to leave when her cell phone rang. She held up a finger as she checked the caller I.D. “It’s Mother,” she said.

She started to say something several times but stopped short. Her expression shifted from concern to worry to outright horror. “Sarah Booth Delaney and the Sunflower County Sheriff are here right now. I’ll tell them. They’ll help.” She reached out a hand to us.

“What’s wrong?” I asked.

“Mrs. Richmond has been taken hostage by a woman in a blue SUV. Mother’s tailing them.”

Coleman took the phone from her hand. “Mrs. Payne, Sheriff Peters here. Where are you?”

He took the pen and paper I offered and made quick notes. “Stay with them. I’ll call you from my cell phone as soon as we’re on the way.”

He gave Amanda back her phone after he’d programmed her mother’s number into his.

“What should I do?” Amanda asked. “Is Mom in danger?”

“I think your mom is safe. Get ready for the cooking event,” I told her. I wasn’t clear on what was happening, but Coleman was ready to bolt from the room. “Finish the pageant. We’ll call when we know more,” I assured her.

When Amanda’s room door snicked shut behind us, I grasped Coleman’s arm. “Where is Tinkie?”

“Cottondale Plantation, a B&B on the Tallahatchie River just out of town.”

“Are we going there?”

Coleman tucked my hand through his arm as if he meant to escort me, while what he really intended was to frog-march me down the hall as fast as he could go. “Chief Jansen, his men, and I will handle this. You’ll stay in the hotel where you’re safe.”

“Coleman, that is not—”

“You’re not going. End of story.”

Red swam behind my eyes—and no doubt shot from them. “You can’t stop me. You have no jurisdiction here. Jansen is police chief of Greenwood, not the outlying county.”

Coleman sighed as he hustled me into the elevator. “After what happened at the Carlisle plantation, I won’t let you walk into danger.” When I started to interrupt him, he grasped my shoulders and gave me a light rattle. “Listen to me, Sarah Booth. My heart can’t take it.” His blue eyes snapped with frustration and hurt as he forced me to look into his gaze.

The elevator door opened to reveal Chief Jansen, his mustache twitching as he stared at the two of us, caught in such an emotional clinch.

“Some women just can’t keep their hands off a man in uniform.” He motioned for us to follow him. “Back in my younger days, the women were on me like flies on a . . . never mind.” His mustache almost hid his smile.

No matter what Coleman said, I would defend my partner. They’d have to handcuff me to a wall to keep me away. Tinkie was in danger. I had to be there.

The chief and several of his best officers were gathered in the hotel’s office. Coleman relayed Voncil Payne’s message. Jansen took charge instantly. “I’ll coordinate with the Leflore County Sheriff. We’ll have units all over Cottondale. They won’t get away from us.”

Coleman tried Voncil’s number. No answer. He dialed again, and the call went straight to voice mail. “This isn’t good,” he said.

“We’ll go in quietly,” Jansen said. “No grandstanding. A plainclothes officer can check in, scope it out. The B&B is spread out with cottages tucked among twenty acres of gardens. When we locate the women, we’ll move in with a team. We don’t want a hostage situation if we can avoid it.”

I sat quietly, hoping in the rush of strategic planning, Coleman would forget about me. I was not that lucky.