Killerfind (23 page)

t took two more
squad cars, an officer with a megaphone, two television camera crews—one from
Paducah, and one from Cape Girardeau—three newspaper reporters with cameras,
and a Girl Scout selling cookies to subdue the crowd of over fifty angry people
who’d gathered. The locals chanted they weren’t going to put up with any more
police profiling.

Rhetta spoke up early on, trying to convince the
crowd that no persons of color were being arrested. She couldn’t speak for the
other minorities, like the Irish, Scots or French-Canadians. In fact, no
persons at all were being arrested, since the baby-tossing woman had fled in an
overgrown pickup. She gave up trying to explain anything to the crowd and
retreated into the safety of the supermarket.

It took a lot more explaining to two burly police
officers before Rhetta convinced them about the eBay hoax and the involvement
by Trevor or Treva Brinkman, or whoever this person was. Rhetta wasn’t entirely
convinced that the woman with the baby had even been a woman. The stocky build
combined with the testosterone-fueled pickup led her to believe it was a man
disguised as a female in this scheme. She described Brinkman as best she could.
The customer service manager was able to verify the story. Finally, the cops
shook their heads, took out their notepads and began to write out everyone’s
statements.

The baby in the carrier turned out to be a doll
covered in blankets, lending more credence to the story about the scam. The
store manager, who was called in from a round of golf on his day off, was only
too glad to hand over the Western Union money to Ricky, if she and Rhetta
promised to leave, never come back, and take the crowd with them. He was not
convinced that any of the publicity would benefit his store.

Rhetta steered around the panel van from the Cape
television station. She recognized the cameraman/newsman as the one who’d been
to her office interviewing Woody about low mortgage rates last spring. He was
one of the “stringers” that the Cape station sent out to cover Paducah and
Southern Illinois. Those areas are part of the Cape Girardeau viewing and
advertising reach, since they were within a hundred mile radius as the crow
flies. She waved as she went by. He smiled and gave her a thumbs-up as he
rolled the camera on her departure. She decided to call Randolph and warn him
that she might appear on the evening news. Again.

*
* *

Luckily,
Randolph didn’t answer his phone before the voice mail picked up. Rhetta left
him a short message summing up their Paducah trip. “I’ll tell you all about it
tonight, Sweets. The good news is that we got Ricky’s money back and we didn’t
get arrested.” She clicked the left turn signal as she pulled out from the
Wendy’s Restaurant where they had picked up lunch at the drive-through.

Rhetta wolfed down her two plain chicken wraps, and
sipped an icy Diet Coke. She envied Ricky who scarfed two cheeseburgers with
fries and a chocolate milkshake. Ricky never worried about her weight. Rhetta
sighed.

“How’s your back?” Rhetta asked as she eased into
traffic. “You took quite a fall trying to save that baby.”

Ricky rubbed the small of her back. “I’ll probably be
black and blue tomorrow, but I’m okay.”

“That was quite a production back there, but at
least the manager gave you your money.”

“I really owe you for this, Rhetta. I can’t believe
I was bullied into sending the money in the first place.”

“Kris Williams with First News out of Cape said they
wanted to do a story with us about the eBay scam.” Rhetta stopped for a red
light. “I think it might help expose both eBay and Craigslist scammers. I’m all
for it.”

“I’ll let you be the one on TV, Rhetta. I don’t want
to be high profile with Jeremy’s death still hanging out there.” Ricky turned
her attention to the side window.

Rhetta thought she caught a tear sneaking down
Ricky’s cheek. She reached across the seat and squeezed her hand. “On second
thought, let’s not either one of us do anything on TV.”

After a few seconds, Rhetta asked, “When is Jeremy’s
funeral?

Ricky shook her head. “I still don’t know. I think
the coroner will notify Anjanette when they release his body. Might be a few
more days.”

Rhetta patted her friend’s hand.

Ricky’s head swiveled sideways as she glanced out
the side window. “I don’t remember coming in this way. Are we lost?” She
scanned the mostly commercial area. “None of this looks familiar.”

“I think we can go out this way,” Rhetta answered. They
headed down a one-way street directly toward the elaborately painted floodwall
along the river that reminded her of the one in Cape Girardeau. She turned left
on Water then another left on Jefferson. “I’ll pull into that parking lot over
there and re-configure the GPS.” Making a right turn landed them in the parking
lot at the National Quilt Museum.

Rhetta re-set the GPS, then paused to admire the
building. “Wow, I guess I never realized that the National Quilt Museum was in
Paducah. My mother had several quilts belonging to my grandmother. I still have
them.” She had them packed in tissue paper inside a camelback trunk she’d
bought at Annie Laurie’s Antiques in Cape. Thinking about the precious
hand-made quilts made her want to get into the trunk and caress them again.
When she buried her head in a fold, she swore she could still smell the sweet
lingering lavender fragrance that her mother wore.

Rhetta put Streak in gear, adjusted her seat belt
and cut across the parking lot to exit on Jefferson, heading west. Just as she
passed the side of the two-story sprawling compound that was bordered by a
perfectly manicured lawn edged in reproduction gas lamps, she spotted a large
sign near the entrance to the building. It announced the dates for the upcoming
National Quilt Show next spring. The show’s theme, written in two-foot-high
blue lettering read, “Gone Quilting!”

hetta
braked hard, then
slammed Streak into reverse.

    
“What’s wrong?” Ricky asked as she gripped the entry bar over the door to keep
from sliding off the seat. She was in the process of fastening her seat belt
when Rhetta stopped abruptly.

“I think I know where Mylene Allard might be.”
Rhetta dug her phone out of her purse and dialed Mylene’s number. It went
directly to an automated message stating the number was not a working number.
“Just as I thought. Her cell phone in Illinois is disconnected. She placed a
sign on The Pink Peacock that said ‘Gone Quilting.’ That was a message.”

Ricky scooted back up on her seat and pointed to the
museum sign. “That’s what this sign says.”

“Right. ‘Gone Quilting’ means she’s here in Paducah.
Locals in Illinois or Missouri probably wouldn’t understand the significance,
but folks who know Mylene, like her regular customers will understand what it
means. She put up that innocent sounding message to tell anyone looking for her
where she is! I bet she’s lived here in Paducah all along, perhaps shuttling
back and forth between The Pink Peacock and a business or her home here. And
I’ll just bet the business really does involve drugs. That Viper I saw in the
parking lot had to be hers. Those babies aren’t cheap. Now that I think about
the personalized plate that said MYVPR, it wasn’t an Illinois plate. There was
a stylized running horse across the top of it. That’s a Kentucky plate. And MY
could mean either “my,” as possessive or M-Y as in the first two letters of
Mylene.” She slapped her forehead. “We need to find her.”

“Oh, no. No, no, no.” Ricky threw up her hand in a
palm-out stopping motion. You just finished telling me what happened the last
time you found her. Do you want to try again to get arrested, this time in
Kentucky? This afternoon and the Shop ’n’ Save wasn’t enough? Randolph will
kill you.”

“Okay, you’re right, but I bet we can find her car.
That Viper should be easy to spot. We can at least tell the Cape authorities
where to look for her, just in case they start acting like cops and pursuing
another suspect in their investigation.”

Ricky sat back against the seat and closed her eyes.
“Besides me, you mean.” She opened her eyes and stared earnestly at Rhetta.
“Where do you suggest we start?”

“Paducah isn’t any bigger than Cape, so I bet if we
cruise around downtown, we’ll find her.” Rhetta hoped she sounded more
confident that she felt.

“Sure, that’s a good plan. I wonder how many bars
are in Paducah?”

“Wait a sec, maybe she won’t be in the city limits.
I don’t know, but I bet Paducah is like Cape and doesn’t allow pole dancing and
all-night drinking. Let’s go back through Mayfield and Wickliffe. More than
likely she’ll be on the outskirts somewhere.”

Ricky swallowed the last of her soda, and tossed the
empty into the small trashcan Rhetta kept on the back seat floorboard. “Let’s
do this.”

*
* *

Back
out on Jefferson, Rhetta headed west. She was concentrating on the GPS
directions and watching for road sign markers, when Ricky said, “Hey, look over
there. It’s a topless bar, and the sign says they feature pole dancing and lap
dancing.”

“So much for my theory about topless bars not being
allowed within the Paducah city limits.” Rhetta swerved to the curb. The place
wasn’t open yet, but the outside seemed pretty seedy-looking. They could assume
the worst for the interior. She pulled into the parking lot and headed for the
back of the brown, shingle-sided converted house. No cars back there either.
“This one is about as ratty-looking as the Peacock. But no Viper.” She parked
Streak and grabbed her iPhone. “I’m going to Google strip clubs in Paducah and
see what I get.” She tapped her phone. Within seconds a list appeared. “There
are five listed here,” she said, handing the phone to Ricky. “Call out the
addresses and I’ll put them into the GPS.”

Once all five were programmed, Rhetta calculated
that four of them were within a twenty-block radius. The fifth was at the west
edge of town. They’d already eliminated the one they were at, since there was
no red Viper in the parking lot. That left three in town and one outside town.

“What if Mylene Allard isn’t driving the Viper
today? Does that mean we have to double back and actually go inside those
places? ” Ricky shook her head. “I’m no prude, but I’m not going in any of them
to ask about her, and neither are you.” She folded her hands across her chest.

“I have no intentions of going in any of them
either.” She couldn’t look at Ricky because she knew that was a bald-faced lie
and Ricky would be able to tell from her shifty eyes that she was lying. “If we
see the car, we get the heck away from Paducah. And let the cops in Cape deal
with talking to her somehow.”

Ricky nodded enthusiastically.

Rhetta began planning a way to talk Ricky into going
in if they found the car.

None of the remaining downtown establishments had a
red Viper in the parking areas. Some had other vehicles, but no super-hot
sports car.

“I kinda hope I get to see the car close up,” Ricky
said. “I’ve only seen two ever, and those were at the River Tales Car Show in
Cape last year. A doctor owned one, and a dentist owned the other one. And they
had them corded off so we, the peasants, couldn’t get too close.”

Rhetta detoured into a nearby Dairy Queen, stopped
and studied her GPS. “I think I know how to get over to the last one when we
leave. What did you tell me the name of the place is?” She pulled to the
drive-up. “Besides, I need a Dilly Bar.”

Ricky studied the list she had copied from Rhetta’s
phone on to a napkin. “The Pink Partridge.”

“That has to be it.” Rhetta said, paying for their
treats. After carefully removing the paper from the frozen bar, Rhetta aimed
Streak for The Pink Partridge. The GPS indicated it was about five miles from
where they were at the Dairy Queen. Rhetta gulped her ice cream. Her adrenalin
kicked in, and she began to sweat.
Maybe I’ll sweat off these calories.
She didn’t turn the air on high.

Ricky put her window down. “First you get me ice
cream I gorge so fast I have brain freeze, and now you’re turning Streak into a
sauna. What’s wrong with you?”

“Nothing,” Rhetta said, and switched on the air and
fan. She’d run an extra mile in the morning.

By the time they caught sight of the two-story
Victorian style home with a wrought iron double gate entryway bearing a rather
elaborate pink partridge on each gate, Streak’s cab temperature was back down
to beef hanging range. Rhetta stopped in front of the closed gate and stared
through the iron grille toward the elegant home. A circular driveway wound
around an artificial pond with a three-tiered waterfall that tumbled over large
boulders. A perfectly manicured lawn fanned out in front of the house, with
colorful flowers lining a walkway to the front porch.

“This place looks more like a bed and breakfast than
a nightclub, or strip joint.” Rhetta bounced out of the SUV and walked to the
gate. Overhead she glimpsed a small camera that swept back and forth, aimed at
anyone standing at the gate. A security system. The green light atop the camera
indicated it was operating. Great. Now they’d be on Candid Camera at the
Partridge.

A simple sign, no bigger than a turkey platter, was
mounted on one of the rock wall pillars that supported an iron gate. In flowing
script that required being within a foot to read it, the sign read,
The Pink
Partridge Gentlemen’s Club opens at 7:00
on the first line. The script was
appropriately colored partridge pink.

And on the second line:
Mylene Allard,
Proprietor.

Rhetta returned to her car, giving the camera a
jaunty salute as she went past. “I think we just found Mylene Allard’s
hideout.”