Interior Motives (8 page)

Before Dad could object or pepper me with questions, I ran out, plopped into my car, and sped down the street. Larry lived on Seagull Court, one of the older streets in tiny Wilmont, one where homes had hit lean times a while back. Most of the large, family-size structures had long been converted into apartments, and a slew of college kids rented them for peanuts.

I’d never peddle my services around here.

When I pulled up to 1569 Seagull Court, I was surprised to find a tiny shotgun-style house with a second story plopped on the first like a brooding hen on a nest of eggs. Its two stories probably didn’t add up to more than 850 to 900 square feet of living space. But it stood alone, and that said a lot: Larry’s place, the Taj Mahal of Seagull Court. Interesting.

I parked at the end of the street and settled in to wait. What for? I didn’t know. I figured sooner or later something would come to me.

And it did. In the person of the delivery guy.

“Oh yeah! It’s a party, it’s a party.”

Okay. So I quote corny stuff, but hey! It can come in handy.

Maybe I could get in to look around if I posed as a delivery girl. At the very least, if someone caught me snooping outside, I’d have a . . . maybe excuse.

I accosted the kid right before he stepped onto the front stoop of Larry’s place. I sniffed. Soy sauce and garlic and all other good things—yum!

“Here,” I said with an overzealous smile. “I’ll take that—”

I caught a glimpse of the box. “Nike?”

He shrugged. “We’re out of bags tonight. Besides, shoe boxes work better. They don’t rip so much.”

“Okay. Anyway, I’ll take it. I’m so hungry I could eat a bear, but Chinese’ll taste better, I’m sure. How much do I owe you?”

“You’re not the guy who called the order in. What’s up with that?”

Lucky for me, it was dark and he couldn’t see me blush. “Nothing. Nothing at all. I just want to surprise him is all. You know. We haven’t seen each other for days, and I figure this’ll be . . . I don’t know. Fun?”

At first he looked even more doubtful. Then he must have had a lightbulb moment. “Oh, I get it. It’s one of those chick things. Guys don’t get it, but you do it anyway. You women are crazy. All right. It’s sixteen twenty-five.”

“Larry must’ve been hungry,” I said before I could stop myself. I gave the boy a twenty and a nervous laugh.

He shook his head and left. I heard him mutter, “Crazy chick.” I had to agree.

What to do with a Nike shoe box of really hot cartons until I
scope out the territory?

What? What next, Haley?

I looked around, stunned by the smorgasbord of louder-than-loud music that exploded out of windows next door— on both sides—across the street, to the rear, and even from the ratty Yugo that spit and sputtered down the street. I heard reggae, rap, and rock. Beneath that, New Age and jazz gave the cacophony of words a base coat of melody. And if I tried really, really hard, I could pick out a thin gloss of Mozart, which added to the bizarre feel of the place.

As much as I wished the music were the score to a movie of my life story, complete with script and director to tell me what to do next, I was as clueless as before.

Hot grease seeped through the shoe box onto my hand.

What to do? What to do?

Well, I sure wasn’t about to learn anything helpful as a human kung pao stand, so I decided to check out the house. Why? I don’t know. It just seemed
the
thing in movies and TV shows, and since I didn’t have a script of my own, I figured I’d take a page from theirs. Besides, I think better when I’m doing something.

I went to the pencil-thin aisle of grass on the right-hand side of the house. It ran straight to the rear, where a monster tree blocked the way. That’s when I finally got a clue.

Up on the second floor and toward the back, yellowy light speared out from a window and into the night sky. A hefty branch of that lovely, lovely tree spread out oh so very, very close by.

Serendipity!

Maybe I wouldn’t have to come face-to-face with Larry after all, moo shoo whatever in hand.

I dropped the fragrant shoe box at the foot of the tree and called on my tree-climbing skills, skills I hadn’t used for years—at least fourteen. To my relief, they came back fast, especially since I was motivated.

Hidden by the lush thicket of leaves, I scooched my behind onto the branch and inched forward as far as I dared. Then I parted some of the greenery.

“Oh, wow . . .”

I was stunned, amazed, stupefied. I’d never seen anything like it. Good grief! I couldn’t have imagined it, no matter how wild my imagination.

Larry Weikert had more electronics stuffed in one small room than I’d seen in my entire life. NASA had nothing on the man. He had stuff hooked up with enough wires to light up New York, Chicago, LA, Dallas, and Seattle—all at one time. I stared in horrified fascination.

Hands on one of the multitude of keyboards, Larry typed at a feverish rate. He then spun to face another wall covered in monitors and stacks of black boxes adorned with wires, buttons, and disk-eating maws. He flicked a slender silver lever, checked a screen above his head, then reached for the keyboard and beat out another bunch of stuff.

Icons scrambled across the screen he’d checked, then morphed into a pair of lists. Curious, I widened my peephole, leaned forward, and saw it wasn’t words but numbers in one of the columns. Unless I was way wrong, it looked like Larry had pulled up the activity in a bank account or maybe a business’s financial transactions.

He seemed fixated on this particular screen. He stood, ran a hand through his thinning hair, then pushed his glasses up to his forehead and rubbed his eyes. Something didn’t seem to add up for him. What? I didn’t know.

But I was determined to find out.

Mindful of my precarious perch but also aware of the solid thickness of the tree limb, I decided to scooch a couple of inches closer to the window.

“Mmmrrrrreoooow!”

At the sound of that familiar feral cry, I jerked. I dropped through empty space, scrambled for a handhold on leaves, twigs, anything my sheltering tree might offer. I found nothing.

Splat!

“Yuck!” At least I didn’t land on my butt.

My Birkenstock offered no protection against the sticky, slithery ooze of saucy Chinese once my foot tore through the flimsy protection of the steam-dampened cardboard lid. So much for the delivery kid’s faith in Nike shoe boxes. Hope the spiffy shoes hold up better.

Above me, still on my branch, Bali H’ai—or maybe Faux Bali, who can tell?—kept up her off-key contribution to the musical stew of Seagull Court. I’m sure it was nothing less than hysterical laughter on her part. She got me, all right.

I hobbled in a hurry toward my Honda, determined to rid myself of my very first piece of Nike footwear. Hobble, hobble, hobble, stick out my leg, and shake, shake, shake. Mushrooms and pea pods and rice littered the walkway in my wake.

Lovely.

Elegant.

Sophisticated—just the look every up-and-coming interior designer wants as she goes down the street.

Yeah right.

But I couldn’t take the time to stop, yank off the box lid, and scrape away the remains of Larry’s dinner. I had to make my escape, and fast. Because wherever Bali is, Bella can’t be far behind. I didn’t want her to see me shackled by soy-sauced noodles and soggy cardboard. Especially not after I’d warned her against snooping.

By now I was sure not just Larry but also the whole free world had heard Bali, my disgraceful descent from the tree, and my subsequent landing in the food.

So much for stealthy snooping.

I really, really had to split. Right then. No matter how much sauce and starch I smeared onto my gas pedal. I hobbled faster.

And ran headfirst into an aftershave-scented wall. Big hands manacled my shoulders. “Not so fast,” a well-known voice said. “I thought you were too busy to go off like Bella on one of her ‘missions.’”

“Ah . . . er . . . I was . . . oh yeah. Right. I had to deliver something—”

“Give it up, Haley. I followed you from your house. I saw you accost the delivery kid, watched you pay for the egg foo yong. Sure, at that point, you had Larry’s dinner to deliver, so you didn’t technically lie. Then you climbed the tree. You know? You’re almost as fast as Bali, going up and coming down to obliterate the chop suey.”

I sputtered.

He covered my mouth. Then he added insult to injury. “I had to watch you turn into Wilmont’s latest Peeping Tom. Can you imagine how the headline would’ve gone over if the cops had caught you looking in Larry Weikert’s window?”

Oops!
“It never crossed my mind—”

“Did anything cross your mind? Besides your loony idea that this man had something to do with his mother’s death, that is.”

He had me there. I was thankful for the cover of darkness so he couldn’t see my dismay. That’s when a zillion floodlights beamed on. In the dark I’d missed the evidence of Larry’s paranoia; the roof of the house was wired to the hilt. What is his deal?

I winced at the assault on my eyes. “Oh, okay. You busted me, all right? So. What’re you going to do about it,Merrill?” “I’m going to watch you get in your car; then I’m going to follow you home. And just so you don’t get any more crazy ideas, I’m going to be on you closer than your shadow. You need a keeper.”

Super.
“Oh, that won’t be necessary—”

“You don’t have to do that!” Wilmont’s pet detective cut in. “I’m on the job already.”

Dutch and I groaned.

“Bella,” I muttered.

“Bella,” he echoed.

A door with squeaky hinges opened. “What’s coming down out there?”

The three of us spun toward the front of the house. Larry, in another message T-shirt and ratty jeans, glared from the doorway, his nondescript features twisted in anger. “What are you people doing on my property? Can’t you read? I have ‘No Trespassing’ signs everywhere.”

I looked where he pointed and saw his signs, the ones I hadn’t noticed before. “Ah . . . Larry? Do you remember me? I’m the interior designer who had an appointment with your mother the day she died—”

“What? Are you nuts?” Dutch’s question came out as a low growl. “That was dumb. Why identify yourself? Now he can sic the cops on you.”

“Hey, Lila and her Smurfs don’t scare me anymore. They did their worst, and I lived through it.” I turned back to my quarry turned irate home owner. “Um . . . you asked my father to do your mother’s funeral, but he told me you and your brother owed him a hymn and some Scriptures so he can write his sermon. At dinner he said you hadn’t done it yet.”

“I know nothing about hymns and verses. He must’ve talked to my brother. Tommy doesn’t live here. Hey! Is that my moo goo gai pan you’re standing on?”

Yet another of the innumerable awkward moments in the life of Haley Farrell. I gave the mess another shake, but the box lid didn’t budge. “I . . . had a small accident.”

“What kind of accident do you have with Chinese that hasn’t been delivered? And how do you wind up with it on your foot?”

“It’s perfectly logicable,” Bella said. “Haley fell out of your tree.”

Larry’s eyes looked ready to pop from their sockets. “What were you doing in my tree?”

“I . . . ah—”

“Mmmrrrrreoooow!”

“There!” I exclaimed, relieved to finally find a use for Bali H’ai. “See the cat? She belongs to my elderly neighbor here. I . . . was on that branch—with her, you understand—and slipped. That’s how I landed on the food.”

“I’m disappointed,” my albatross whispered. “I’ve heard you do so much better.”

“What’s up with that, Haley girl? You didn’t go get Bali,” Bella said, indignant. “Bali went up to fetch you.”

“What was my dinner doing by the tree?”

“Okay,” I said. “I’m outta here. You guys can sort it all out together. This is too weird even for me.”

“Wait!” Bella cried, in a hurry to catch up to me. “You can’t leave. What about the murder?”

Larry gasped. “What?”

Dutch groaned. “Not again.”

“She died of cancer, Bella,” I said in an attempt at normalcy. “You can go home too.”

“Murder?” Larry asked, his eyes narrowed. He trotted over. “Cancer? Is she talking about my mother?”

I gave up. The curb looked like a great place to sit and remove the cardboard shackle. Off my foot, the scraps looked even more pathetic. “Sorry—”

Larry’s look cut off my apology.

“Terrific,” he muttered when he glanced farther down. “That’s my lo mein you smushed too. So much for dinner.” He pointed at Bella. “About her. Does she think my mother was murdered?”

I sighed. “I’m afraid she does.”

Dutch snickered and came over to join the circus. “So does our dinner killer.”

“I do not—”

“Watch it!” he said. “You’re going to blow your no lies streak.”

“Don’t you have somewhere else you have to be?” I blew a disobedient curl off my forehead. “And yes, Larry. Bella does think your mother was murdered, but that’s because she just got her private investigator license and thinks there’s a crime under every toadstool, boulder, and leaf.”

“I do not,” Bella argued, fists on hips. “And you’re the one who started the investigating. I’m just following up— you know, double-checking the clues to make sure you don’t wind up in trouble like the last two times.”

Larry looked ill. “Two times? You do this on a regular basis? How many other Chinese dinners have you trashed?”

I stood. “It’s my first and last. I’m going home.”

This time no one tried to stop me. I walked away with what few shreds of dignity I could call up. But when I reached the Honda, Larry spoke up again.

“Tell you what. If you women think my mother was murdered, you need to check out Cissy. She’s the one who shot Mom up with all that bogus stuff from Mexico, and she stole more than half of it for herself.”

My jaw nearly clipped the sidewalk.

“Cissy?” I asked when I forced my mouth to work again.

“Yeah, lady. Cissy. She’s nuttier than peanut butter. She hooked Mom up with that Mexican quack, and I’m not sure she did it to help Mom either. I think she just wanted a free ride to the stuff for herself. And hey. If she could get the terminal patient to change the will in her favor while she was at it, then that’s just the cherry on the Cissy fruitcake sundae’s top, you know?”