Finger Lickin' Dead (24 page)

Ben shrugged, his back to her as he worked. “Mother, I don’t really know. He was here just a little while ago, although he looked really sick. Said he had to go take care of something real quick. You mind finding him for me? I could use the extra hands.”

Lulu was on her way out to find Oliver when she felt a tap on her shoulder and turned to see Derrick behind her. “What should I be doing, Granny Lulu?”

Lulu looked around. “Where’s Peaches?”

Derrick shrugged. “She’s helping out the Graces with the tables. But that stuff looks like it’s all under control.”

Lulu thought about it. “Either help your Uncle Ben out in the kitchen or maybe help Big Ben, Morty, and Buddy set up the electrical system and speakers? Just hop in.” She saw that Derrick wasn’t completely comfortable with either of those assignments. “Or you could ask Ben what to do if you’re not sure how to prepare the food, you know. Just ask him.”

“I hate to interrupt him when he’s tearing around trying to throw this stuff together,” said Derrick in a low voice.

“Or hunt me down and ask me, sweetie, if you have any questions about cooking the food. I can give you whatever directions you need. Just find me,” said Lulu. “And now I’m sorry, Derrick, but I’ve got to run, hon.” She absently patted him on the arm and jogged off to find Oliver.

It didn’t take her long to find him. He was outside the car museum around a corner, talking very quietly to Holden Parsons.

“Holden! Honey, you need to run over to the chapel—they’re getting ready to start the ceremony!”

Holden looked startled. He opened his mouth to say something, but whatever he was trying to say came out in an odd squeaking whisper. He started running toward the street to cross over to the wedding chapel.

“I don’t believe it!” said Lulu, gaping at the road. “Look! There’s some guests that are parking right there on the side of the road in Elvis’s
yard
. Well, the fence is there, but nobody is supposed to be parking right there on Elvis Presley Boulevard. I hope somebody gets them to move their cars before the cops get here.” She looked at Oliver, who seemed like he was a million miles away. “Aren’t you feeling well, hon? I hate to say it, but you really need to be over there giving Ben a hand. He’s got all this extra food to fix now, since all those guests showed up.” She peered closer at Oliver.

“There’s just something eating me up right now, Lulu. All I keep thinking about is how I don’t want to go to jail. I don’t. I’d die in there—there’s no way I could survive in that place.”

Lulu thought about what Tudy had said about how devastated Oliver had been at the failure of his restaurant. And what Derrick had told her about how Oliver had been furious about Adam and bashed him on the Internet. And what Big Jack had said about Oliver pushing Adam down the stairs in the parking deck. And that he’d argued with Ginger the day she died. Lulu gave a shiver even though the day was hot. No one could see her right here, around the corner of the museum.

But it still just didn’t seem to fit. “Oliver, what are you talking about? I don’t think you killed Adam. I know you were furious with him, but from what I understand, he got up and walked away after you pushed him.”

Oliver looked startled. “How did you know about that?”

“Big Jack told me. He only told me because he knew I could keep a secret. You were kind of worrying me a second ago, getting so serious. But I’m right, aren’t I? You were so scared and horrified at the thought that you’d killed Adam that you weren’t about to try to kill him again. Besides, you already thought he was dead.”

Oliver hung his head. “Big Jack told me not to tell a soul about it. I guess because I involved him in it when I thought I’d murdered Adam. I
was
horrified. But who knows—I might have tried to kill him again if I’d known he was still alive. Especially since he would have told the police what I’d done and I’d have been arrested for assault.”

“And Ginger? You
were
talking to her that day that Jeanne saw you, weren’t you? I’m guessing you didn’t want to admit it because she was blackmailing you—Pink told me that Ginger and Adam had a little blackmailing business going and Ginger must have inherited it when Adam died.”

“She was
trying
to blackmail me,” said Oliver, looking blankly across at the wall.

“What I don’t understand is what Ginger knew. Did Adam have something on you before he died? But I thought you didn’t even know who he really was.”

“I didn’t. No, Ginger thought up her very own angle this time—Adam had talked to her on the phone right after he pulled himself off the bottom of the staircase. So she thought the police might want to know that I’d already tried to kill Adam once that day.”

Lulu said, “And you didn’t take the bait?”

“No. I was tired of the whole thing by then. I figured that even if I started paying her to keep quiet that somehow the police might figure out what had happened. They’d already found the stuff I’d written online and figured out that I fit the description of the guy having the argument with Adam in the restaurant. And I
didn’t
kill Adam. It didn’t really matter if Ginger said anything or not.”

Lulu glanced at her watch and winced. But she still needed to know. “Did you kill Ginger? Did you decide to just shut her up permanently so you wouldn’t have to keep paying her?”

“No. I didn’t.”

“Oliver, where were you the afternoon Ginger was killed?” Oliver opened his mouth up quickly, and Lulu held up her hand to stop him. “And I know it wasn’t at the dentist office because Tudy told me y’all had to pay a missed-appointment fee. And—where was Tudy? She said she was at home, upset about you, but Evelyn saw her driving around that afternoon.”

Oliver swallowed hard. “No, I wasn’t at the doctor. I forgot all about that appointment after Ginger and I had that argument. I just went out to the park and hung out there for a while, thinking about the mess I was in.”

“Well, honey, you don’t even know the half of the mess you’re in. Tudy thinks you were cheating on her with Ginger. She was with Jeanne that afternoon and saw you with Ginger. And she knew you were sneaking around and hiding things from her, but she didn’t know what. She thought you were being sneaky because you were having an affair.”

Oliver rubbed his very large forehead like it was hurting him badly.

Lulu asked quietly, “Do you think Tudy had anything to do with Ginger’s death? She was awfully mad at the thought Ginger had stolen you away from her.”

Oliver shook his head. “Lulu! You know Tudy wouldn’t do something like that. She was probably just driving around that afternoon looking for
me
. That’s all.” But his eyes didn’t look as convinced as his voice.

“Look, Lulu,” he said, “it’s been good talking to you, but I’ve got to help Ben out with that food.”

Lulu still wondered what Holden had been talking to Oliver about so intently. But Oliver was already dashing inside the car museum to help Ben. She couldn’t see him killing Adam—not after thinking he was already dead before. But Ginger? He’d sure looked upset at the idea of going to prison . . . and getting rid of Ginger would be a little bit of insurance that the police wouldn’t find out about his fight with Adam.

She jumped as her cell phone starting singing “Zip-a-Dee-Doo-Dah.” “Hello?”

“Where in the hell is Holden?” squeaked Flo in a hoarse voice.

“Up at the ceremony! I just sent him packing up there ten minutes ago with his camera in his hand. And he was running, too. He’s
got
to be over there.”

Flo gave a sob. “But he’s not! And Cynthia is on the warpath. The guests are all crammed into the chapel because there’s too many of them and I don’t even have all of the bridal party together!”

“Flo, it’s going to be
perfect
,” said Lulu, picking up Flo’s mantra. “I’m going to find Holden. And if I can’t, I’ll take pictures with the digital camera I brought—it’s better than nothing. You just calm down your mother of the bride and round up the wedding party.” And she charged across the street to the chapel.

Lulu tried to think, which was hard to do when her head was pounding. Where could Holden be? The chapel was in the woods next to the mansion and clearly he wasn’t there with Flo. Could he still be trying to take some pictures around the mansion like he did at the car museum?

She couldn’t believe he’d have gone
inside
Graceland right before the ceremony. But could he have been taking pictures around the exterior of the house? And that’s when she found him
inside
the wrought iron gate around Elvis’ pool. In a restricted area. “Holden! They need you . . .” She dropped off as she saw the reason he was in there at all—Big Jack was standing behind him, near the bushes on the inside of the fence. Holden’s camera was at the bottom of the swimming pool. And Big Jack looked to be holding a gun pointed directly at Holden.

“Great,” snarled Big Jack. “Holden, you have Lulu Taylor to thank for what I’m about to do. I
was
just going to make sure you understood how serious I was and let you go. But now that Lulu’s here, I’ll need to get rid of both of you and give myself a head start to get out of town.”

Lulu said in a hoarse voice, “Holden took a picture of you with Ginger, didn’t he? So you threw his camera in the pool.”

“Of course. It’s a digital camera. And I was just having a friendly little talk with him a minute ago, making sure he hadn’t uploaded those pictures onto a computer or a phone or anything. And then we were just going to go our own ways with the understanding that he was never going to say a word about that picture and that it was never going to surface anywhere . . . or he’d be very sorry. But that plan is all shot to hell now.”

Holden was ashen and looked at Lulu in desperation. Lulu said, sounding braver than she felt, “Big Jack, you’re not going to be able to get away with this. They’re already out looking for you—I came out here because Flo said you weren’t there,” lied Lulu. “You’re not going to get that head start you’re looking for.”

“I think you’re wrong,” said Big Jack. He cocked the gun at them.

“Where did things start going wrong, Big Jack?” asked Lulu desperately. “You weren’t too upset when Adam died. You must have been the one to kill him, though. Because that’s why Holden has a photo of you with Ginger from the day she died, right? She was blackmailing you over murdering Adam.”

“Among other things,” said Big Jack dryly. “She picked up where Adam left off—they were like blackmailing business partners or something. So she had me over a barrel with the affair—and she knew I was on the scene at Adam’s murder.”

“Because she was there, too, wasn’t she? Ginger had been talking on the phone to Adam right before his death—that’s why she knew Oliver had pushed him down the stairs. And when she caught up with Adam, you were already there, arguing with him. And you had a gun.”

“I wasn’t even going to
do
anything with that gun!” said Big Jack, holding out one hand beseechingly. “I just wanted to scare some sense into Adam and let him know that I was not going to be blackmailed for the rest of my life. Something was going to have to change.”

Lulu said thoughtfully, “One thing about Ginger that week . . . she was really fired up. She had this huge argument with Evelyn in Aunt Pat’s. She had a fight with Adam and dumped him—at least for a little while. I bet she was still really fired up at that point. Did she take your gun and shoot him with it? Since you weren’t going to shoot him.”

Big Jack gave a short laugh. “The crazy woman. Yeah, she said, ‘Give me that gun. You know you aren’t supposed to point a gun at somebody unless you plan on using it.’ I was surprised to see her there and just handed the thing over. And then she shot him right in the chest. I couldn’t believe it. Kept thinking the cops would be over in a flash, but there was all this construction noise going on and nobody seemed to notice.”

“And nobody even saw you.”

“That was weird, too! It was like I was meant to get away with it. There we were, right by the river in front of a condo. But we were kind of in the trees—I didn’t want anybody to see me arguing with Adam so I’d dragged him over there to talk to him on the sly.”

“So there you were with a dead body, shot with
your
gun, and a woman who had proof you’d been blackmailed by the victim.”

Big Jack nodded and pointed the gun more directly at Lulu. Lulu said quickly, “And Holden took pictures the day Ginger died—but he only mentioned seeing Oliver in them. But I’m thinking he must have gotten a picture of you, too, since his camera is at the bottom of the pool.”

Big Jack drawled, “Oh he got a picture of me. . . . He just didn’t realize he had until yesterday. He took a closer look at the photo of Ginger and Oliver and saw me, sitting in my car, watching them. I was tailing Ginger to get her alone.”

Lulu swallowed. “When we were at the lake house, I asked Holden to send me those pictures. You must have realized what I’d find if I studied them closely. So you called me the night I got home from the lake. You must have had some device to disguise your voice. You warned me off the case so I wouldn’t remind Holden about the pictures.

“Not that warning you did a lick of good.” Big Jack motioned for Lulu to move closer to Holden. “Chat time’s over.”

Lulu scrambled to delay him. “And I didn’t realize it until just now, but you messed up when you told me about Evelyn pointing her little gun at Ginger. When we were at the funeral, the very day you murdered Ginger, you said you were driving directly out of town to go see your accountant. So you
shouldn’t
have been in Memphis to see Evelyn do anything at all!”

Big Jack drawled, “Aren’t you such a clever one. That’s right. . . . I was weaving a tangled web for myself, wasn’t I?” He pointed the gun at Lulu.

They were standing right next to the pool. Lulu searched her brain for something, anything at all, to stop him. “They’re going to hear the gunshots, Big Jack!”