Checkered Thief (A Laurel London Mystery Book 3) (6 page)

Sadly, Sally was an innocent victim of a bank robbery that turned out to be more than that, but it struck the community in a hard way. Especially Louie. He had accepted Sally as if she was his blood and his parents were ecstatic to finally have a girl.

Louie sucked in a deep breath and put his hands on the handles of the dolly.

“I’ll see if I can get one more trip in, but I’ve got a big delivery for Food Town. They are getting swamped too.” He used his foot to pull the dolly back on its wheels.

“Louie?” I stopped him. “Isn’t Derek’s girlfriend, Brittany, staying at the Windmill?”

Louie owned and operated the Windmill Hotel, which was right down the street from The Cracked Egg, on the way to the orphanage. It was a small, one level hotel with just a few rooms. The office was just an enclosed room with a glass window behind which Louie sat and communicated with the hotel customers.

“I wasn’t going to say anything but I heard you showed your crazy last night at Lucky Strikes.” The edge of Louie’s lip tipped up.

“Great.” I groaned and opened the top box of Krispy Kremes. I took one out and bit down into the glazed goodness. With a mouthful of dough, I mumbled, “I had the right to go nuts. Derek has been my best friend since we . . .” I tried to think back to the first time I met him. “Since I was in diapers.”

I couldn’t remember how long I had known Derek. My grandfather had given me to Trixie when I was a baby after another mob boss gunned down my parents. That was when my grandfather knew it was not safe for me to stay at our family compound in New York, thus giving me to Trixie.

I waved my hand in the air and then brought my fingers to my mouth, licking the glaze off my fingers, which was the best part in my opinion.

“Listen, I’ve accepted the fact he is dating her. I’m sure it’s nothing serious.” It was like a light bulb went off in my head. If what I did help Bethany find her sister, Derek would want nothing to do with them after he found out their history.

“I thought it was serious when he continued to stay at the hotel with her every night, but last night was a different story.” Louie cocked a brow.

“Tell me,” I begged. My eyes lit up in anticipation.

“Last night she didn’t come back until really late.” Louie put the dolly back down and leaned on it. “I mean really late as in two a.m.”

“Really?” I asked, digging for more information. At what point did she leave Derek at Lucky Strikes? Why did she leave Derek? Was this when the real abduction happened? Was this the switch off between Brittany and Bethany?

I tried to keep the timeline in my head and actively listen to Louie.

“He waited in his car the whole night. Of course I wasn’t paying attention.” He looked down his nose and stared at me.

“Of course you weren’t.” I pretended to know better. Louie was just as nosy as the rest of the town. And his gossiping about it just proved it. “I wonder where she was?”

“Well, I was up watching reruns of M*A*S*H when she walked up.”

“Walked up?” I asked.

“Yeah. She wasn’t even in her car. But there was a commercial and I went to the bathroom which is close to her room and I could hear them yelling at each other.” I leaned a little closer to Louie so I could hear everything he was saying because Mr. Chiconi was dinging the “foods up” bell so loud that it was hard to hear. “She said something about her car breaking down and that was why she was late, but he said that she should’ve called and she said something about losing her phone. Then he asked about her outfit and why she wasn’t wearing what she had on at the bowling alley.” Louie laughed. “It sounded like some sort of police interrogation on her. Or a jealous boyfriend.”

“Anything else you can remember?” There was no way Bethany was going to pull one over on Derek. From what Louie was saying, it sounded like Derek already had his suspicions. Derek was very observant and he wasn’t going to let an excuse of a car breaking down or a change in clothes sway his gut instinct that something wasn’t right.

“She got a little attitude with him and he asked her where she had gone after Lucky Strikes. He also said how he was sorry ‘bout how you acted and if that was why she suddenly disappeared. She acted like she had no idea what he was talking about, so he recapped how you paraded your crazy until you passed out in your own puke.” Louie’s nose curled and he gave a little shiver. “And she got a little mouthy about it when he kept badgering her to remember. He mentioned that he hadn’t seen this side of her and how he was only looking out for her well-being since there had been some crime lately.” Louie pulled back on the handles of the dolly again bringing it back on its wheels. “That’s when she started to whine and he must’ve hugged her, ‘cause she stopped. That was my cue to get back to my show.”

“Thanks for the doughnuts.” I decided to stop my questioning because Louie would become suspicious. Plus I didn’t want any more visuals of Derek and Brittany in any compromising situations that might stir up the anger again. The crazy I had at the bowling alley was surely to strike again and I needed to do everything in my power to dampen that down.

“I’ll check on another batch of glazed, but I can’t promise anything,” he called over his shoulder on his way toward the delivery door. “Oh, yeah. Another thing I thought was interesting with Derek and his gal.”

“What was that?” Curiosity always killed me.

“When he went to kiss her, she pulled away and she told him that she wanted to be alone for the night.” Louie shrugged. “She didn’t even give him the option to beg her, she just pushed him away and shut the door in his face leaving him standing there like an idiot. That was the first time in the last month I have seen that. Normally, she grabs him and I don’t see them until the next morning. I got to get out of here. I’m behind on cleaning too.”

“Okay, well be sure to make another delivery if you can,” I reminded him before he left.

I grabbed the boxes of doughnuts and took them behind the counter so I could fill up the already empty glass containers that were dotted along the counter.  I slowly filled them one-by-one replaying what Louie had told me.

I was still a little leery about Bethany’s story because it seemed a little far-fetched, but everything Louie told me definitely went along with what Bethany had told me. I especially liked hearing she pushed Derek away at the end of the night and didn’t play around with the charade. She probably didn’t want him to see the scar on her chest because he would’ve known for sure that she wasn’t Brittany. 

“Gia, I have to get going.” A few of their other hired help had come in early and I still had to pick up Sharon Fasa for her weekly doctor’s appointment. “Let me know if you need me later. I have a feeling that Jax isn’t going to need me anytime soon on any of his investigations.”

“You need to clear things up with Jax.” She stopped behind me with a tray of food. “Or you are going to become that cat lady we make fun of.”

“He brought up my past and that was one thing he agreed never to do.” I untied the apron and hung it back on the hook, grabbed my bag and dug down for my phone. “He obviously hasn’t embraced me. And I’m fine with being the cat lady.”

Though I was trying to be hard-hearted, I still held hope in my heart that Jax had texted me about our argument and wanted to see me, but there was nothing on my phone when I plucked it out of my bag. Only a picture of Henrietta that Trixie had sent me. Henrietta looked pissed with the small tinfoil hat Trixie had made for her. Yep. Gia was almost right, I wasn’t going to become the cat lady; I already was the cat lady.

The reminder on my phone chirped. It was the alarm for Sharon Fasa’s appointment she had booked on my Drive Me app. She always complained that I was late, and she was right so I made sure I was going to be on time this time.

“Mornin’!” I yelled across the street to Pastor Brown and his wife Rita when I bolted out of the diner and crossed the street to my car. They were holding signs and marching up and down the church lawn protesting the casino. I held my arm in the air and bent it a couple of times at the elbow. “I’m exercising my slot machine arm!”

“You need to repent!” Pastor Brown spat back. Rita jerked her head the other way in order not to see me.

Pastor Brown was also a victim of my petty crime spree when I was growing up. They wanted everyone in the community to think they were goody-two-shoes, but I knew better. They would go to the orphanage and hand-pick an orphan to take home for the holidays. It looked like a great time until the year they picked me. Trixie made a mistake allowing them to take me.

Right off the bat Pastor Brown and Rita told me how things were going to go down. I had to put on a pretty little dress, take photos with all the presents they gave me and write a letter on how they made my Christmas the best Christmas ever. Their idea of how things would go down wasn’t my idea. When they went to bed on Christmas Eve, I got on the Kmart website and ordered a toy for every orphan in the orphanage using Pastor Brown’s credit card.

I roped Derek into taking me to Kmart in the middle of the night to pick up the toys and sneak them in the orphanage. When the kids woke up, it looked like Santa had come. It beat the oranges, apples, and secondhand clothes Trixie usually gave us. I wrote my good girl letter on how Pastor Brown had given all the orphans a present this year and not just the chosen one who got to spend the holiday with them.

Needless to say, Pastor Brown lost his religion on me that Christmas morning, but quickly found it when the newspaper came to do a big article on how he was like the Grinch and his heart grew two-sizes that Christmas.

He has held it against me ever since. So to fuel the fire, I poke the bear even though I’ve always heard not to poke the bear. It was hard because he was so easy to poke.

“It’s about time you got here.” Sharon Fasa plunked her ass in the front seat of my car.

“I’m on time.” I held my phone in the air. “I even set the alarm. And why don’t you sit in the back like the rest of my clients?”

“I’m not like the rest of your clients. I’m almost family.” She jerked the door shut and held her purse in her lap. She unzipped the top and pulled out a large plastic Ziploc. “And I baked for you.” She set the bag between us. “Homemade bread. I have a pie cooling on the windowsill to take to Trixie.”

“You think Trixie is crazy.” There was not a person in town who didn’t see Trixie as a little eccentric. Sharon Fasa was one of them. And she didn’t mind speaking her mind.

“It doesn’t mean I don’t like her.” Sharon’s chin lifted in the air. “She bragged on my pies last night at the casino, so I thought I would make her one.”

“She did?” I smiled. “To whom?”

“Derek’s. . .” She smacked her lips together.

“Brittany?” I sighed.

“You know about that?” she asked.

“Clearly everyone but me knew about that.” I gripped the wheel. “Why was everyone so worried about what I thought?”

“You are a little possessive of the people you love.” Sharon didn’t lie. I was possessive and if anyone hurt them, I’d be the first to hurt
them
. “And Trixie told Derek he needed to tell you.”

“She did?” I wondered why he didn’t.

“Anyway, that Brittany wasn’t as friendly as she had been.” Sharon held on to the door handle as I zoomed down River Road to make it to I-25. Her doctor was in Louisville, which was the closest big city to our little town.

“What do you mean?” I asked.

“Trixie and I were on the penny slots and we were thirsty. We didn’t want to move because we knew our machines were getting hot and everyone knows that the longer you stay on the machine, the closer you are to hitting it big.” Her head nodded up and down. “Brittany walked by and Trixie stopped her to get us a drink. She got all pissy about it.”

“How so?”

“She said it wasn’t her job and she didn’t have time to serve us when just an hour earlier she had gotten us one with no questions asked.”

“What time was this?” I asked.

“Around ten.”

“Ten p.m.?” I asked trying to remember whether the real Brittany was at Lucky Strikes watching me make a fool of myself at ten p.m. and knowing I had taken Trixie home well before that time.

“It certainly wasn’t ten in the morning. I never miss Dr. Phil. He’s on at ten a.m.” Sharon huffed.

“Did Brittany have on her Glitz and Glam outfit?” I asked, saving my question about Trixie.

Sharon’s brows furrowed. “You know,” she tapped her chin, “I don’t think she did.”

“You said Trixie was with you?” I asked.

“Of course she was.” Sharon adjusted herself in the seat. Her chin turned up in the air. “That’s why I owe her a pie.”

“Now the truth comes out.” I didn’t bother telling her that I had taken Trixie home long before ten. I would take it up with Trixie when I got home. “What happened?”

Trying to stay focused on what Sharon was saying was hard when my mind continually wanted to wrap around the Brittany/Bethany thing. The idea of Derek being in trouble was not sitting well in my stomach. If what Bethany said was true, this was definitely out of my league of hacking. Plus it was a federal crime with a lot of prison time—like life—if I hacked the casino and got caught.

In fact, I got caught on every petty crime I committed when I was younger and Trixie even asked me why I did it because I obviously wasn’t good at it. Besides, orange was a beautiful color but it didn’t look good on me and the Kentucky correctional facilities only had orange jumpsuits.

“Trixie and I had a little bet on who could win the most at the end of the night.” Sharon huffed, folding her arms across her chest.

“End of the night?” My mind was a whole lot of fuzzy this morning when Trixie woke me up, but now that I thought about it, Trixie did have on the same outfit from last night. I glanced over at Sharon. “Oh my God! You have on the same clothes from last night. Did you and Trixie stay out all night?”

That was one problem with the casino. It was open twenty-four-seven and there were no diners or stores in Walnut Grove open that early.

“Jax brought us home around five a.m.,” Sharon said. “He sure is a nice young man.”