Deep-Fried Homicide (The Laurel Falls Mysteries Book 1) (3 page)

“Yea.” She bit into her lip, obviously fighting more tears.

“And what did you decide to do?”

The girl took a shuddering breath and when she spoke, her voice was so soft and so child-like that it made Rachel’s chest hurt. “I don’t know.”

Rachel offered what she hoped would be a supportive and hopeful smile, then nodded. “All right. Why don’t you start at the beginning and tell me everything. Maybe we can figure this out together.” She slipped her shoes off under the table and started rubbing her feet together.

“Well, I came here about six months ago to start college. I was a transfer. I was working two jobs and going to school and barely making ends meet. My dad died and my mom is…useless.” Anger boiled up from someplace deep inside, tinting her cheeks red and making her jaw clench. “So, I was doing it all on my own. Which is fine.” She sighed.

“You’re a strong girl.”

“And then I met Mike. We met at a party and he was the handsomest, most gentle man I’ve ever seen. We started talking at the party and then we took some beers and went out to The Point. We just sat in his car and talked and before we knew it, the sun was coming up. That’s all we did is talk. He was so smart and so funny. I think I fell in love with him that very night.” That last brought a smile to her face and she lifted her eyes to meet Rachel’s gaze for the first time.

“It wasn’t a week later that he asked me to move in with him. He said he’d never met another girl like me and that the thought of waking up without me even one single time make his heart ache. Isn’t that the sweetest thing you ever heard?”

“It is.” Rachel nodded and smiled.

“So, I move in with him. It took the burden of bills off me and I was able to quit one of my jobs. And later, when he saw how I was struggling to juggle the other job and my classes, he told me that I should quit the other job. I told him that I had tuition to pay and books to buy, but he said he didn’t care. He said he’d take care of it, he just couldn’t stand to see me struggling that way.

“So, I quit the other job and focused on school and on Mike. And we were so happy. He’s really a wonderful guy. That’s why this hurts so much. I mean, he’d just bring me flowers for no good reason. And he’d set up these dinners. One was on the top of The Point and there were all these lights around like fireflies. Another was at the beach. He’s just so…”

“Sweet,” Rachel finished.

“Yea.” She sighed again; a mournful sound. “But then I started to wonder…where did he get all that money? I mean, he didn’t go to work every day on any sort of schedule. And he went out sometimes at night and didn’t come back until almost sun-up. So I asked him. And he told me that he was a day trader, that he worked when he had to and that sometimes he traded on the foreign markets, which were only open at night. He said he didn’t want to disturb me while I was studying or sleeping, so he would go down to the café and work.”

“But you didn’t believe him?”

“No. I thought maybe he was doing something illegal.”

“Like dealing drugs?”

“That. Or something. So, I started searching his car and I kept questioning him. He didn’t seem to know very much about the market for a day trader, which made me even more suspicious. And the more I questioned him, the quieter and angrier he became. I should have just left it alone. I should have trusted him. That’s what he said when he broke up with me. I should have trusted him.

“And then this morning when I woke up, he told me to get my things, all my things. He said to pack my stuff in a suitcase and get in the car. I asked him what was going on but he wouldn’t tell me a thing. Then he drove right into town and pulled up to the curb. He turned to me and told me that he couldn’t take my grilling anymore. That he couldn’t be with someone who didn’t trust him. He said we were through and to just get out of the car. I tried to reason with him. I told him I was sorry. But he just kept telling me to get out of the car.”

“And that’s how you came to be here.” Rachel reached out and patted the girl’s hand sympathetically. A tear finally escape the girl’s eye and ran down her cheek. “Not to minimize your pain or anything, because I know how much something like this hurts, but this is all fixable.”

“It is?” The girl looked hopeful for the first time all day.

“It is.” Rachel smiled, waited a beat, tried to get common sense to take over. “You ever wait tables?”

“No. I don’t have a place to stay. I don’t have any money. And I don’t have a lot of skills.”

“Hmm.” Rachel let another beat pass, her brow twisting up a bit as she thought. “Okay. I can solve this whole thing for you….what’s your name again?”

“Diane.”

“Diane. Now, waiting tables is no big deal. Even if you’re a huge klutz like me, you can learn it. And you’ve got the best waitress in the world to teach you.”

“You?”

Rachel laughed. “Oh, heaven’s no! Not me. Macy over there. She’s top of the line. Cream of the crop. The number one best waitress who ever strapped on an apron. She’ll teach you everything she knows. The job pays minimum wage plus tips. Now, grab your bag and come with me.”

From behind the counter, the other three watched her, their questioning faces following Rachel’s progress across the diner and to the board where the keys were kept. It was then that Rick knew how much trouble he was in.

Rachel grabbed a set of keys off the board and headed for the back door, Diane in tow. The bright sunlight burned her eyes momentarily as she stepped out into it, but once she recovered, she was all smiles.

“You see that right there? That motorhome?”

“Yes…”

“We bought that for family vacations. The four of us shut down the diner for two weeks every year and head for someplace we’ve never been before. And in between times, we park it right here. There’s a wall and a gate closing it off from the world, so you’ll be nice and safe. It’s yours if you want it…until you get back on your feet.”

Diane looked at her, the hint of a smile twisting her lips. “Are you for real? I walk in here off the street and you give me a job I’m not qualified for and let me live in your RV?”

“Yea, it’s what we do.” Rachel’s smile brightened and she tilted her head.

“But you don’t know me from Adam. And I don’t have…I’m not…”

Rachel jingled the keys and let her smile widen. “You want it or not?”

Diane snatched the keys form her hand, then launched into a hug. “I don’t know what I ever did to deserve meeting you, but I sure am glad I walked into your diner.”

Rachel put her out to arm’s length, trying to look gruff. “Don’t get me wrong. This isn’t charity. You’ll work your butt off for every bit of it.”

“That’s fine.”

“Except when school’s in session. College comes first.”

“Always. But I don’t start again until the fall. Hopefully I’ll have it all together by then.”

“I have faith in you. Now, come on. Let’s get you an apron and get you started.”

Rachel looped an arm around Diane’s shoulders and tugged her toward the door.

As they breezed back in through the door, it was Rick’s face that Rachel checked first. It was lit up like she had rarely seen before, his eyes sparkling as he watched them both approach. She stood before the trio, her arm still draped over Diane’s shoulders.

“Everybody, this is Diane. She’s our new waitress. Diane, this is my husband, Rick, the best cook in the world. And this is Logan, the second-best cook in the world. And this is my best friend, Macy, the greatest waitress in the whole wide wonderful world. She’ll be training you.”

Diane lifted her hand in greeting and waved feebly. “Hi,” she said softly.

“Our new waitress, huh?” Rick cocked a loopy grin at her and checked her eyes.

“Yup. And she’ll be living in the RV…at least until she gets back on her feet.”

“Does that mean I can’t keep my recyclables in there anymore?” Logan asked. His smile said he was kidding but his eyes betrayed him.

“You did not store your old cans in our RV!” Rachel declared, her eyes scalding him.

“Yea, I kinda of needed a place to put them until I had enough to take in.”

“And how much is enough?” Rachel asked with a growl.

“At least thirty bags.” He checked her face, paled a bit beneath her glare. “You want me to go clear them out, huh?”

Rachel said nothing by way of response, merely stabbed her finger in the direction of the back door and narrowed her eyes.

Logan took off at once, both hands striking the door as he reached it. Logan, he of the jet-black hair, square jaw and angular features looked the part of a career Marine. Despite the bulging muscles and piercing brown eyes, he could turn on a boyish charm that made people forgive him anything.

“Macy, be a love and get Diane fixed up with an apron and stuff, hm? I’m going to run that last load of dishes through and get the shakers refilled.

Macy nodded in Rachel’s direction and smiled knowingly. “Come on, hon. Let’s start you off on the exciting road to waitressing.”

Rachel headed for the back but ran into a Rick roadblock before she reached the door. She stopped suddenly, her eyes lifting slowly to meet his.

“Our new waitress, huh?” he said softly.

“Yea.”

“Living in our RV?”

Rachel blinked, looked away. “Yup.”

“And is this a good idea?”

Rachel paused for a few beats, then nodded curtly. “It is.”

“Okay, then.” He stepped aside and let her pass with a grand sweep of his hand. If he had any more to say about the matter, he would let it go until tonight, when they were home alone.

Rachel smiled to herself and slipped into the back room, laying one hand on the rack of dishes and towing them toward the washer. Her mind was stuck on something, though, something she couldn’t quite put her finger on. Diane was okay, she was sure of that. But there was something off about the whole situation, something not quite jiving with reality.

Like Rick, she decided to let it go until later. But then she would get to the bottom of it. There was something going on and she knew it. And she would have her answers…no matter what.

Chapter 2

T
he dinner rush was a little light that evening, but things picked up after the first movie showing let out. People came in for pie and cake and ice cream. The atmosphere was relaxed and jovial. Rachel watched Diane trail after Macy, Macy’s lips never ceasing in their movement, her smile never failing as she went about the task of training her new helper.

At nine, Rachel flipped the sign on the door and Rick began dishing up plates of food for them all. They gathered at the counter just as they always did at that hour. They were a family, the four – and then five – of them and they ate together every night. Diane seemed to fit in easily with them. She was a bit more relaxed, though Rachel could tell that she wasn’t totally at ease with them all just yet.

Halfway through the meal, as Diane picked at her food and stared at her plate, Rachel lunged across the counter to grab at something on the top shelf. When she righted herself, she was holding a name tag, glistening red and white, emblazoned with Diane’s name.

“You’ll need this tomorrow morning. The customers are going to want to know all about you. They don’t see a lot of change around here.”

Diane took the tag, ran her finger over the embossed letters as though they were holy scripture. Her smile widened and when she looked up, Rachel could have sworn she saw tears at the corners of her blue eyes.

“I just want to thank you guys for helping me out. I’ve never known anybody in my life who was that generous.”

Rachel waved her off with a smile. “Aw, it weren’t nothing. We’d do the same for anybody.”

Rick nodded by way of agreement.

“Matter of fact, we all met under bad circumstance,” Rachel continued. “We sort of saved each other.”

“Tell her how you and Rick met, Rach.” Logan grinned from behind his glass. “That’s quite a story.”

“Rick, you tell it better than I do.” She winked at him for good measure.

Rick put down his fork and wiped his mouth, his eyes suddenly sinking into the past and locking onto something that the others couldn’t quite see. “Well, I was in the Navy back in those days, before I became a cop.”

“And I was in college, studying computer science,” Rachel added.

“We were on liberty in San Diego and a bunch of the guys and I had gone out to this bar they all knew. I was never one for drinking, though, so I took off early and went to find a motel room for the night. Mind you, I had had one beer, but I wasn’t drunk. So, I turn the corner onto the main drag where all the hotels are, and I see this thin, tiny woman and she’s up against this little red hatchback that looks like it was new back when Nixon was president.”

“It was,” Rachel laughed, covering her mouth.

“And there’s this guy standing there with her. He’s got a knife and he’s pinned her against the car. Well, the guy has his back to me and Rachel doesn’t see me until the last minute, but I sprinted across the street and came up behind this guy. I grabbed his arm first, so he wouldn’t have control of the knife. Now, I’d been trained in all kinds of fighting techniques and I wasn’t that big in those days. Heck, I was only twenty-two. So, I wasn’t entirely sure that any of what I was doing would actually work.

“I also didn’t know just how strong I was.” He looked down at his feet and chuckled for a moment. “So anyway, I grabbed this guy’s arm and I jerked it back, over his shoulder. And when I did it, I heard something snap. I figured at that second that I had dislocated his shoulder, but my adrenaline was pumping and, frankly, I was kind of scared. So, I gave his arm another hard jerk and at the same time I kicked his feet out from under him. As he went down, I twisted his wrist and the knife popped right out of his hand.”

“My knight in shining armor,” Rachel giggled.

“Yea. And suave dude that I was, I was still standing on his neck when I asked Rachel if she wanted to go out for coffee after we got done with the cops.”