If Fried Chicken Could Fly (10 page)

“Betts, we have a lot to do. Let’s not talk about all this nastiness right now. Maybe later, okay? I’m fine, though. You, your dad, and your mom don’t need to worry about me or protect me. I’m a big girl.”

I nodded. She was making amends, but she still wasn’t telling me the truth. We had to get the cupcakes delivered or I would have pushed it more. We switched into work mode, finished arranging the cupcakes on platters, and then carried them out to her car.

As we were loading them I said, “Oh, we also had a visitor just a little bit ago.”

“Who?”

“He was a cowboy—well, a new character/actor, I suppose.”

“Here? What did he look like?”

I shrugged. “Like all the cowboys, I suppose. Except this one had a little more cowboy in him. He seemed naturally rugged, not phony like some of the others. Sort of.” He’d been a contradiction because though he seemed more authentic, he also seemed less…something. I couldn’t pinpoint it, but it was as though he’d been made of faded colors. I didn’t want to describe him that way. “He smelled of wood smoke.”

“What did he want?” she asked.

“He wanted to talk to Missouri. I don’t know many people who use your full first name. Do you know who I’m talking about?”

“No,” she said.

“Really? He sure seemed to know you.”

“Come on, Betts, let’s get these cupcakes to the library.”

“Did the cowboy have something to do with Everett?”

“No. I mean, I don’t know. I don’t know who you’re talking about.”

Gram kept her eyes away from mine. The hurt I’d felt a few minutes ago was transforming into anger. What was she keeping from me, and how could it not have something to do with Everett’s murder? If I hadn’t been so committed to the read-a-thon, I would’ve refused to budge and demanded that Gram tell me what was going on. Instead, I told myself to save it until later. I’d get the truth—or the whole story—from her before the day was out. I just wasn’t sure what method I’d use to wrestle it free.

We had an old white panel van we sometimes used for deliveries or groceries or whatever, but the cupcakes would
fit fine in the back of Gram’s old Volvo station wagon. She insisted on driving, probably so she could turn up the radio and continue to avoid me.

It was either that or her love of country music. Gram loved Tim McGraw and Toby Keith. The local country radio station, the only local radio station in fact, played these two artists frequently. When the radio didn’t come through, Gram would hit the CD button. Currently, Toby Keith was singing something about a bar or a girl, or a girl in a bar; Gram seemed to know every word.

The library was on the other side of town from the cooking school. It was in a skinny three-story old brick building that was at one time a hospital for the mentally ill; “insane asylum” was the politically incorrect description and the one we all most used. The county hospital was active up until the 1950s when the population grew and shifted in southern Missouri. The need for a larger mental health facility forced ours closed and a new facility was built in Springfield. Along the road in front of the building, a large stone wall announced that you were fast approaching the entrance of the library, still named the Fallow Facility as it had been in its hospital days. Halfway along the perimeter of the wall, the entrance was marked by two tall black wrought-iron gates that were now secured in the open position. Through the entrance, there was a long drive that snaked up toward the main building. The property had been used for a few Hollywood movies because when the backdrop of thunder and lightning was added, there was no hint that the place was a peaceful library. It could just as easily still be a haunted and horrifying facility for long-gone and probably mistreated insane people.

But today was sunny and the parking lot and open field
to the side of the building were jam-packed with children and their parents. As she entered through the gate, Gram brought the speed down to something respectable.

“Sarabeth told me to pull to the back door. Right around there.” She maneuvered the Volvo and we unloaded the cupcakes, placing them on one of the long tables in the front area of the main floor that was full of beanbag furniture and small chairs. The outside of the building might still have been ominous, but the inside was bright and cheery and made one want to pull out a book and sink into a beanbag.

“Miz, I heard about poor Everett. Found in your supply room! Such a shame!” Sarabeth was as old as Gram and had been Broken Rope’s librarian since the beginning of time. She was round and agile and always wore dresses with flowered prints. For years she’d also worn shoes with heels, but for the last five years her footwear of choice had been sneakers. Her size belied her quick agility and made her look kind of mean and rough. But she was one of the sweetest women in town, unless you harmed one of her books. Then the wrath of Sarabeth was frightening and ugly. She’d track down past-due books by showing up at offenders’ homes and demanding the book be given to her before she left the premises. There was a story around town that her longest stay had been two days. No one had confirmed the legend, though. No one wanted it not to be true.

“Horrible,” Gram said. “Just horrible.”

“Does Jim have any leads?” Sarabeth asked.

“Not that I’m aware of,” Gram said. Clearly, Sarabeth hadn’t heard all the details yet. She wouldn’t have been shy about asking how Gram’s questioning had gone if she’d known about it.

As we finished arranging the cupcakes so they looked nice next to some pitchers of water and a jar of peppermints, I looked up to see Cliff, now out of his uniform, walk past the large front pane-glass window. He was dressed in jeans and a short-sleeved nice blue shirt. He also held on to the hand of a very small, very adorable little girl.

My heart did two things at once; it thought the child might be one of the cutest it had ever seen so it kind of soared. But mostly, it sank. There it was, that thing I was dreading: seeing Cliff with his family. I and my heart didn’t like that part at all.

“What is it, Betts?” Gram asked.

“Huh?”

“You squeaked or something.”

“Nothing. Sorry about that.” I pulled my glance away from Cliff and the little girl with the head full of short unruly brown hair. But, as though a string was attached to my head and someone tugged on it relentlessly, I turned to watch them again. They were making their way to an area where someone was dressed in a costume from a Dr. Seuss book. Broken Rope was good at anything that required a costume.

“Oh, I see.” Gram’s eyes followed mine. “Go say hi to him, Betts. It might be better for the two of you to have a conversation that wasn’t centered around your grandmother’s guilt or innocence. You won’t be able to avoid him forever,” she said quietly enough so that Sarabeth wouldn’t hear.

“I’m fine,” I said.

Gram laughed. “Whatever you say, dear.”

“Miz, someone dropped off some old cookbooks. I
thought about putting them on the shelves to lend out, but I’d really like for you to take a look at them and let me know if you think they’re any good. I need to get outside, but do you have a minute to look at them before you leave? They’re just in the back in my office.”

“Sure,” Gram said after she surveyed Cliff’s location again and lifted her eyebrows at me. “I don’t have to be anywhere for a while.”

I rolled my eyes, but that only made her smile bigger.

“You need to get used to him being back, Betts. The sooner, the better,” she said, quietly again.

As she turned to follow Sarabeth, I debated escaping out the back door and hiding in Gram’s car. It was the chicken way out, but that didn’t bother me so much. I realized, though, that Gram was right. Broken Rope was too small to continue to hide whenever I saw Cliff with one of his family members. Besides, it would be easier to start with a daughter than a wife.

I ventured away from the food tables and outside into the throng. I wouldn’t force the issue, but if I ran into them, I’d be polite.

The read-a-thon was more a celebration of the end of the school year than a place for kids to sit quietly and read. Mostly, parents and younger children attended to see what Sarabeth recommended for good summer reading—the time away from swimming pools and baseball games that produced the dreaded phrase “I’m bored.” Besides the Dr. Seuss character whose name I still couldn’t remember, there were tables with all sorts of puzzles, a rubber duck pond, a puppet show, and other various activities that appealed to children of all ages.

It only took a minute or two to run into Cliff and his daughter. His look of surprise seemed genuine.

“Betts, hi! What’re you doing here?”

“Catering.” I nodded toward the building.

“Great. We’ll have to go in and check it out, won’t we, Ashley?”

The little girl with unruly hair nodded. She was definitely adorable but didn’t look a bit like Cliff. That meant his wife was adorable, too.

I can do this. I can do this. I can do this.

“Betts, this is my niece, Ashley; she’s Cora’s daughter. Ashley, this is my friend Isabelle Winston.” Cora was Cliff’s younger sister. I knew she’d gotten married, but I didn’t realize she’d had a child—more proof that my family was slipping when it came to keeping me up-to-date regarding Cliff’s or his family’s life.

My insides imploded a little and relief washed over me. I giggled and said, “Oh, I thought she was your daughter.”

“No, I don’t have any kids,” he said casually.

Now I felt ridiculous. I bit my cheeks to keep from more giddy laughter and just nodded.

“Nice to meet you,” Ashley said, proving her manners were rungs above mine.

“Nice to meet you, too.”

“Can we go to the duck pond, Uncle Cliff?”

“Sure, kiddo. Talk to you later, Betts?”

I nodded again.

As I watched them walk away, I had a sudden urge to kick my heels in the air and give a woot of glee. And how unbelievably immature would that have been? I imagined what Jake would say if he were here.

You are out of control, Betts.

He would have been right. But Cliff’s telling me he didn’t have kids was an unexpected bit of good news.

My momentary happiness was interrupted by the high-pitched wail of a siren. Everyone turned toward the open gates. Jim steered his police car, under control at a slow speed but with the lights and siren on full power.

“What the…?” I muttered as I maneuvered my way through the crowd of small people. Was this some sort of event? Part of the party? Maybe so the kids could get a look at a police car? Was the fire truck close behind? Not that I could see.

Jim parked his car, turned off the siren but not the lights, and stepped out. His face was serious and told me he wasn’t there for fun. Cliff and Ashley hurried toward him. Jim said something to Cliff as he searched the crowd and then pointed at me.

Suddenly there was a voice in my ear.

“Your gram would never have killed that man,” the voice said.

I turned to see the cowboy, still in the same getup and still smelling of wood smoke.

“I know…Who are you and how do you know Gram?”

“Don’t let them arrest her. She’s the only one who can help me and can help them figure out who killed Everett.”

“No one’s going to arrest anyone,” I said.

Jim walked directly to me. Cliff followed behind him as he held on to Ashley’s hand.

“Isabelle, where’s your gram?” Jim asked as he stopped and put his thumb in his belt buckle next to his gun.

“Why?”

“Where is Miz?” he demanded. He didn’t pull his gun out of the holster, but even in the midst of the panic that was spreading through my limbs, I had the sense to be offended at the mere hint that he could if he wanted to.

“She’s in Sarabeth’s office. Looking at some cookbooks.”

Jim made a move to walk past me, but I grabbed his arm. He looked at my grip and then back at my eyes with something that didn’t need words attached. I was to let go of him immediately. I did.

But I also followed closely at his heels, with Cliff, Ashley, and the cowboy close on mine.

“Jim, what’s going on? Should I call Verna?”

He didn’t answer, so I turned and said the same thing to Cliff. He gave me a stern look and shook his head with two quick moves. I was suddenly angry at both of them. What was going on that they couldn’t be civil to me? This was not the way things were done in Broken Rope.

“She couldn’t kill him, Isabelle. Somehow you need to convince them,” the cowboy said.

“How do you propose I do that?” I asked as I tried to keep up with Jim. Cliff shot me another look that got further under my skin. How dare he reprimand, even though it was with just his eyes.

“I don’t know, but we need her to help find the real killer,” the cowboy said.

“What are you talking about?” I said.

“I’m not talking,” Cliff said, his eyes now more questioning than punitive.

“Not you. Him.”

Cliff’s eyebrows came together before he blew by me and walked next to Jim. Ashley was hanging on to Cliff’s hand
and her short legs lifted high and quick with the two men’s pace.

Jim pulled open one of the big swinging front doors and continued to march toward Gram. Children and parents moved out of our way; the cowboy was following me, bringing the smoky scent with him.

I needed to track down Verna as quickly as possible, but I couldn’t manage a call until I knew what Jim would do with Gram.

Jim yanked open the office door. Gram was sitting behind Sarabeth’s messy desk, a thick cookbook open in front of her. She looked up casually at each of us.

“Jim, Cliff, Betts,” she said, and then her eyes landed on the cowboy. “Uh-oh.”

“Missouri Anna Winston, could you please stand up,” Jim said. I could hear both anger and pain in his voice.

“What’s this about?” Gram said as she stood.

“Missouri, you’re under arrest for the murder of Everett Morningside…” Jim recited the Miranda warnings as I watched, but I couldn’t digest the words. Gram was really being formally arrested for Everett’s murder? What had they found?

“Isabelle, do not let them arrest her,” the cowboy said again.