Chili Con Carnage (6 page)

“No denying it.”

Gert pushed a hand through her auburn hair. It was shoulder length, and she scooped it up at the back of her neck, twisted it into a loose sort of bun, and grabbed a nearby chopstick to poke through it and keep it in place. “From what I’ve heard, Jack likes his women long and leggy.” Gert patted her own sizable thighs. “I bet your mother was a beauty.”

“Absolutely.”

“And Sylvia’s, too?”

I remembered all the times I’d seen Norma Montgomery when Jack and I had stopped to pick up Sylvia for the summer. My first impression of Norma was that she looked like she didn’t sleep nearly enough. My second was that she held herself too stiff. Like she was afraid that if she gave an inch, she’d crack right in half. But it was her eyes that I remembered most, and the looks she sent in Jack’s direction.

Even though it was warm in the tent, I shivered. “Norma’s pretty enough, I suppose,” I admitted and added, not because I wanted to but because I felt it was only fair, “Sylvia looks a lot like her. She’s not a nice person, though. Norma, I mean.” I felt it necessary to point this out because, after all, it could just as easily have applied to my half sister. “She hates Jack.”

Gert finished her tea. “Maybe she has her reasons.”

When it came to his love life, I wasn’t about to defend my father. “Maybe,” I admitted. “But what kind of reasons could he have to leave the Showdown and not tell anyone where he was going?”

I’d hoped for more than just a shrug in reply, but really, I hadn’t expected more.

I thanked her for the tea with a smile and got up to leave.

“You know . . .” Gert joined me, straightening the pot holders on a rack when we walked by. “If you’re trying to come up with new theories on what might have happened to Jack and not getting anywhere, you could use an old technique I always found helpful in business. When I felt like I was a hamster on a wheel, going over the same ol’ same ol’ again and again, sometimes I’d get a new perspective on things if I changed the view.”

I looked around at the dusty New Mexico scenery. “You mean, go back to Abilene?”

“Well, eventually you might want to do that. For now, I’m thinking that maybe if you just got away from the hustle and bustle around here for a while, you know, so you could think and not get distracted by Jack’s spices and Jack’s customers and Jack’s friends, maybe that would help. Of course, so would settling that ugly business from yesterday.” In spite of the heat, she shivered and wrapped her arms over her broad chest. “You haven’t heard anything, have you? About who the police are talking to?”

“I haven’t. Though I guess I won’t be surprised if they show up to talk to me again.”

“When they do . . .” Whatever Gert was going to say, she thought better of it, and instead, she put a hand on my shoulder. “Well, you just tell them the truth, Maxie. That’s all you need to prove you had nothing to do with the whole thing.”

Finally, a person with sense.

I kept that in mind when I walked back through the Showdown setup, ignoring the few people I saw whispering behind their hands when I passed. When I got to the Palace, everything was ready for the opening: jars neatly arranged, price lists—of course they included the new, higher prices Sylvia insisted on—laminated and hung where everyone could see them.

When she caught sight of me, Sylvia’s eyes lit. Not like she was happy to see me. More like there was a fire burning in her belly and the flames were about to pop through the top of her head. “It’s about time you showed up,” she said. “Now that all the work is done.”

I headed for the RV, and maybe it was Gert’s herb tea that mellowed me, because even I was surprised when I did my best to explain what I was up to. “I’ll be back before the show opens,” I promised Sylvia. “I’m just going to get—”

“Back before the show opens?” Oh yes, she might look like an angel, but Sylvia had a harpy side, and she showed her true colors when she leaned over the front counter. It might have been a trick of the light, but I swear, I saw smoke coming out of her ears. “I never would have agreed to run the Palace if I knew I’d be doing all the work by myself,” she said, her words all the more brutal because of the way she kept her voice down. Her jaw tight was so tight, I heard her teeth grind. “Here I am doing everything. And there you are . . . again. There you are doing nothing but wasting time.”

I screeched to a stop directly in front of her and wished there wasn’t a counter separating us. It would have been plenty satisfying to go toe-to-toe with Sylvia. That way, maybe it would have sunk into her thick skull when I said, “For your information, I was asking around. About Jack. Unlike some people who’d rather build pyramids out of spice jars . . .” I glanced at the perfect formation that glittered in the morning sun. “. . . I’m more interested in what happened to our father. So you see, I’m not wasting my time.”

“Or you are, and you’re just not willing to admit it to yourself.”

It wasn’t until I opened my mouth and nothing came out that I realized I was speechless. Me! Instead of standing there looking stupid, I stomped into the RV and into my bedroom. Just like I had the day before when Nick was there, I squeezed myself between the bed and the wall, got down on my belly and felt around under the bed.

I pulled out the shoe box I’d stashed there soon after I arrived at the Showdown and while I was in there, I grabbed my purse, too, just in case I needed a fix from the vendor down the way who sold chocolate-covered chili peppers. Then I went back outside with it. Instead of going past the Palace again, I headed the other way, skirting the motorhome still parked next to us, the one with yellow crime scene tape strung around it.

Off the main drag, there were picnic tables set up where folks could rest and enjoy their chili and salsa samples, and I found one in the shade of a scraggly tree and plunked down. I’d been through the contents of the shoe box a dozen times before, but in light of what Gert had recommended, I was hoping that away from the noise of the last-minute setup, maybe—just maybe—it wouldn’t hurt to do it again.

One by one, I plucked the familiar items from the box and set them on the table in front of me.

Every single receipt of Jack’s that I’d found lying around the RV and the Palace, receipts for things like gas and groceries and the bottle of booze he bought occasionally and enjoyed sharing with any and all.

The photograph that had been tucked into the visor of the RV, right where Jack could see it as he drove from town to town. It showed me at ten or so and Sylvia a gawky couple years older. Jack must have caught us on a good day (or more likely at a good moment); our arms were looped around each other’s shoulders and we were both smiling. Sylvia had braces on her teeth. I’d forgotten I used to call her Metal Mouth.

Jack’s notebook. It was one of those garden-variety, spiral-bound ones, and like I always did when I pulled it out of the shoe box, I flipped through it. Back in the days before MapQuest and GPS, Jack kept a scrawled list of directions to the cities the Showdown visited, and looking at it was like seeing the history of the Showdown itself. Memphis to Little Rock. Little Rock to Dallas. Dallas to San Antonio.

I’d been through the notebook a dozen times at least, and I knew the only thing that was even vaguely interesting in it was what wasn’t in it—pages near the back that had been torn away.

“Because they were directions Jack didn’t need anymore,” I told myself like I’d told myself before. “Because he’d been doodling. Because that’s where he’d written the phone numbers of women he knew he’d never call.”

I slapped the notebook closed and reached into the box again. At the bottom was a fat manila envelope that contained various and sundry bits and pieces—articles Jack had torn from magazines, cards I’d sent him for his birthday and Father’s Day and Christmas. As if I needed it, the forwarding addresses on each one of those cards reminded me that Jack was the proverbial rolling stone. You couldn’t gather moss, or obligations, or messy emotional entanglements if you kept on moving.

I spread the envelopes out on the table in front of me. One of them was from Norma, and honestly, I’d never paid much attention to it. Norma being Norma, I was sure it was a letter demanding extra child support, or reminding Jack he needed to get Sylvia back home to Seattle in plenty of time before school started.

Except that by the time this particular letter was postmarked . . .

I squinted for a better look and saw that the letter had been mailed back when Sylvia was in culinary school, long after she’d stopped spending summers on the road with Jack.

I slipped the contents out of the envelope and unfolded a newspaper clipping with a Post-it note attached.

I can’t imagine you really care,
it said in Norma’s cramped handwriting,
but this is from Sylvia’s school newspaper. One more hurdle to jump! If she gets this award, she’ll spend next year in Vienna.

“Vienna?” Something I knew nothing about, the city or the fact that Sylvia had once had the opportunity to go there. According to the headline on the article, that one last hurdle Norma referred to was the fact that Sylvia was a semifinalist for some snooty culinary award. The other person up for the award—

The article continued on the next page, and I flipped to it and caught my breath. There was a photo there, old and grainy and black-and-white. It showed a smiling Sylvia near a podium with the only person standing between her and Vienna.

Robert Lasky.

I squinted some more and ice filled my veins. The photo had been taken ten years earlier, but it was hard not to recognize the face of the smiling Robert Lasky.

Especially since the last I’d seen him, he was tumbling out of an RV and right on top of me.

When I raced back to the Palace, my knees were shaking.

“Why didn’t you tell me?” I’d already called out when I saw that Sylvia wasn’t alone.

Cops.

Three of them.

And one of them had his cuffs out.

My timing was perfect. I got there just in time to see my sister . . . well, my half sister . . . get arrested.

It was as if every dream I’d ever dared to imagine had been suddenly brought to life right before my very eyes.

Sylvia.

Being led away in handcuffs.

By a couple of big guys with guns.

I swear, if this was a cartoon, there would have been an angel chorus singing in the background and bluebirds of happiness tweeting out their hallelujahs around my head.

Unfortunately, before I ever had a chance to fully appreciate the beauty of the moment, my conscience kicked in. Damn conscience. Naturally, my curiosity followed right behind. I knew it wasn’t smart to interfere with anything as official as an arrest, but I couldn’t help myself. I darted over to where Sylvia—so stunned, each of her steps was as wooden as a zombie’s—was being led away.

“Sylvia, what the—” It wasn’t any big surprise when I was stopped in my tracks by another big guy with a gun who’d apparently come along with the other two just in case someone like me tried to make a scene.

“Stand back, ma’am.”

“I will. But—” Since he had a hand out at chest level and a no-nonsense look in his beady brown eyes, it wasn’t like I was about to argue. Still, it was hard not to be overwhelmed by the panic that suddenly turned my blood to the consistency of a Jell-O shot. I leaned to my right so I could see around the cop’s bulk to where one of the other officers was assisting Sylvia into the back of a white patrol car with a blue-and-orange logo on it. I pointed. Yeah, like the guy didn’t know who I was talking about.

“That’s my sister,” I said, for once not bothering to mention the “half” part. Past experience had taught me that at times like this, it is best not to muddy the waters with too many details. Before the back door of the patrol car closed, I stepped around him. “I’ve got to talk to her before—”

I actually might have made it over to the car if the cop hadn’t clamped a hand on my arm. “Don’t make me arrest you, too,” he said, his voice just weary enough to make it clear that he might not want to, but he would if he had to. “She’s going down to the station. You can come down there in a couple hours if you want to talk to her.”

“But—”

It was as far as I got before that cop loosened his grip, whirled around, and joined the others.

I found myself staring at the back of the patrol car, rooted to the spot, and honestly, I didn’t think I was talking to anyone but myself when I asked, “But what’s going on? Why would they arrest Sylvia?”

“Got something to do with Roberto’s murder.”

Puff had sidled up, and he watched the patrol car drive away, too. “Heard them read Sylvia her rights.”

“Roberto’s murder?” The words tasted funny in my mouth. At least until I remembered that newspaper article I’d found among Jack’s things. “Roberto’s real name was Robert,” I said, though I was pretty sure Puff had already lost interest and wasn’t listening, anyway; someone had dropped a nickel on the ground and he bent to retrieve it, blew off the dust, and tucked the coin in his pocket.

“I’ve got to get down to the police station,” I said by way of letting him know that our conversation was over. “They said I could talk to Sylvia there.”

“It’s going to take a few hours before they’re done booking her.”

Though I had no doubt Puff knew this information firsthand, this last comment didn’t come from him but from Nick. Even though the crowd that had gathered was slowly breaking up and the patrol car was long gone, like me he was still looking down the long, dusty midway toward where the cop car had disappeared. At least I think he was. It was impossible to see his eyes behind his Ray-Ban Aviators. “They’re not going to let you talk to her until then so you might as well relax.”

“Relax?” Oh sure. I knew I’d heard him right. I just couldn’t believe the word had actually come out of his mouth. “They just arrested my sister for killing somebody, and you want me to relax?”

Nick adjusted the glasses on the bridge of his nose. “Your half sister.”

“Oh yeah, that’s right. Half sister. So I guess I should only be half as worried.” There was no use arguing with a man that thickheaded, so I decided not to bother. I spun toward the RV.

For the second time in the space of just a couple minutes, a hand clamped down on my arm. Nick’s hand to be specific. I didn’t let him hang on for long. I yanked my arm away, the better to tuck the shoe box under one arm and prop my other fist on my hip, but before I could get out the first word of the tirade I planned to launch in his direction, he cut me off.

“The police and a crime-scene team are already in the RV looking for evidence,” Nick informed me. “They’re not going to let you in there, or in the Palace.”

“But what . . .” It wasn’t like I didn’t believe him, but I swung from the RV to the Palace and back again in the other direction. There were a couple guys already in the Palace poking around, and Phil the perv was just walking into the RV. That pretty much helped me make up my mind about not wanting to go in there.

“What the hell am I supposed to do?” I asked no one in particular. “I can’t work if they’re in the Palace, and if I can’t get into the RV . . .” Another thought struck, and I turned on Nick. “How long are they going to be in there? Where the hell am I supposed to sleep tonight?”

Puff’s lips twitched. “You can always bunk with me,” he said.

I actually might have accepted the invitation if not for the sudden gleam in Puff’s eyes.

“Thanks.” The way my lips squeezed the life out of the word told him all he needed to know. “I’ll stay—”

“I’ll take care of it.”

Again, Nick’s hand closed over my arm. This time, he didn’t give me a chance to pull away. He maneuvered me to the right, then turned me in the other direction. “I’m staying at the Taos Inn,” he said, once we were away from Puff and closer to the Palace. “You’ll come with me.”

Honestly, I’d had more romantic invitations in my day. Plenty of them, actually. And it wasn’t like I wasn’t interested. In spite of the fact that Nick had the whole macho mystery-man thing going on—or maybe because of it—he was plenty hot. And I was plenty intrigued. But that didn’t mean I was going to cave in without at least the pretense of a fight.

In front of the Palace, I locked my knees and refused to budge another inch. “That’s how you invite a woman to spend the night with you? By telling her where she’s going and what she’s going to do? You haven’t learned very much about wooing a girl, have you?”

“You haven’t learned very much about making assumptions.”

“But you said—”

“The Taos Inn, where I’m staying. Yeah, I know what I said.”

“And that means—”

“No, it really doesn’t.”

Nick was tough enough to read under normal circumstances, and this particular Friday was turning out to be anything but normal. Boy, how I wished could get a look behind those sunglasses of his and see his eyes.

Then again, maybe not. Because when he finally did slip off his glasses and tuck them in his pocket, I still couldn’t figure out what was going on behind that gorgeous face of his. “Do you expect every guy you meet to try and take advantage of you?” he asked.

I’d never thought about it. Which didn’t mean I had to admit that to Nick. Instead, I chewed on my lower lip. “I expect when a guy says—”

“That you can stay where he’s staying, you think it means he wants to jump in bed with you?”

“Don’t you?”

Unfair question and I knew it, but really, it wasn’t like I could help myself. Every time Nick was around, I felt like there were ants nibbling at the edges of my self-control. I wasn’t used to not being in charge—of my own life or of the men in it—and the least I could do was fight the feeling.

Nick pivoted toward the parking lot. “I’ll call and see if we can get you a room,” he said. He pulled out his cell and made the call, but before he started talking he slid me a sidelong glance. “No strings attached.”

It was what I’d wanted all along, right? I mean, I’d already decided my life was complicated enough, that I didn’t need another guy to make things any messier. And that was before Sylvia got arrested. Which means that in the great scheme of things, I was coming out of this particular argument on top. Right where I liked to be. All well and good, but it didn’t explain the sudden stab of disappointment that hit between my heart and stomach.

“I’ll need to get into the RV. You know for my tooth brush and clothes and stuff.”

Nick looked to where Phil and a couple other guys walked down the steps of the RV, boxes of our possessions in their hands, and I realized that if I hadn’t decided to go through Jack’s things earlier, they would have had the newspaper article that featured a smiling Sylvia standing next to a smiling (and now deceased) Robert Lasky.

As if the article was smoldering inside the shoe box, I adjusted my purse on my shoulder and shifted the box to my other hand. “Can I get some clothes?” I asked.

Nick went over to the RV to find out.

I had to give him credit. He might be an SOB, but Nick got results. Though Phil insisted on coming in with us, we were allowed to return to the RV long enough for me to pack a duffel bag. Fifteen minutes later, we were in Nick’s shiny black Audi.

I waited until we were on the road before I threw him a glance. “Most of the folks in the Showdown would kill for a car like this.”

“Bad choice of words, considering.”

He was right. And I wasn’t ready to talk about it. The murder, I mean, and Sylvia’s arrest. My mind was still in a whirl, what with everything that had gone on that morning. I wondered why Sylvia had never mentioned that she and Roberto knew each other way back when, and I wondered, too, why the cops thought she had any reason to kill him. I knew I wouldn’t get any answers. Not when my brain was on overload. And not until I talked to Sylvia. Until then, the only thing I could do was follow Gert’s advice. Thanks to Nick, I was getting a change of scenery, and if what Gert had said was true, maybe that would kick-start my brain. My subconscious could take over and I could start to make some sense of everything that had happened.

Good thinking on my part. Which didn’t explain why the words that came out of my mouth were, “I think maybe she knew him.”

We were stopped at a red light. Good thing since Nick gave me a careful look. “She?”

“Sylvia.”

“Knew—”

“Roberto. Except his real name was Robert. Look.” I dug through the shoe box and found the old newspaper article, but before Nick had a chance to give it barely more than a glance, the light changed and he needed to pay attention to the road.

“Looks like that was a long time ago,” he said. He was apparently a fast reader.

“Ten years.” I scanned the article again. “They were both finalists for some snooty culinary prize. There’s no way Sylvia would ever forget anything like that. Sylvia’s got a mind like fly paper. She must have recognized Roberto the moment she laid eyes on him at the Showdown.”

“But she never said anything to you about knowing him.”

“Not a peep.” I put the article back in the shoe box.

“But you knew he was a lowlife.”

“One date. History.” I gave the word all the sour emphasis it deserved. “That’s all it took for me to figure him out. I guess I should have questioned how Sylvia could have known.”

“Because you didn’t tell her.”

“About my date with Roberto . . . er . . . Robert? Not really. I mean, no more than she needed to know.”

“So maybe she knew firsthand that he was a creep.”

“Maybe.” Just to satisfy my own curiosity, I checked out the article again. “He doesn’t look like a lowlife,” I said, and this time Nick didn’t have to ask who I was talking about.

“But she warned you away.”

“She was probably just jealous.”

“Of you and Roberto?”

I might not have taken offense if Nick didn’t laugh. My shoulders shot back. “Sylvia’s always been jealous of me. She sees me with a guy—”

“Okay. Yeah. Whatever.” Nick guided the car through a turn. “What I meant is that I don’t see why Sylvia would have been jealous. She couldn’t have had her eye on Roberto. He wasn’t exactly her type.”

Not like you.

For once, I kept the words in my head and off my lips.

“So that should have been my first clue, right?” I asked instead. “He was new to the Showdown, I didn’t tell her our date was a bust, and she still told me to stay away. She did recognize him. And she didn’t like him. If the cops find out she knew him once upon a time, that will give them a reason to think Sylvia killed Roberto.” I wrinkled my nose and puckered my lips. “Except, they must already think she had a reason. Otherwise, they wouldn’t have arrested her.”

We stopped to let a group of tourists scamper across the street, but Nick didn’t look my way. Don’t think I didn’t notice.

“What?” I would have sat up if my seat belt wasn’t as tight as a boa constrictor around me. “You know something you’re not telling me.”

He drummed his fingers on the steering wheel. “I know they found the murder weapon.”

He didn’t sound especially happy about that.

“And . . . ?”

More drumming. “It was one of Sylvia’s chef’s knives,” Nick said.

My blood ran cold. That is, until my temper turned it to molten lava. “There are a million chef knives in the world. Just because somebody used one to skewer Roberto doesn’t mean—”