Small-Town Secrets

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Frank’s eyes blazed with temper, but he quickly masked it when he realized the dog picked up on his reaction.

“Who do I apologize to? You or the dog?” he asked, keeping his voice low and even.

“Jinx is the one you disparaged.”

He took a deep breath. “Jinx, I’m sorry if I saw you more as a dog than as an officer,” he muttered.

“Jinx, stand down,” Bree said softly.

Jinx released his grip on the man’s pant leg, took two steps back and settled back on his haunches.

“Say hello, Jinx,” Bree instructed.

The dog lifted his paw. Frank looked as if the last thing he wanted to do was shake the dog’s paw, but too many people were watching. He circled his fingers around the paw and shook it.

Bree stepped forward. “I’m not trying to embarrass you, Frank,” she said in a low voice, meant for his ears only. “But I want to make the people in here understand that Jinx isn’t just a dog who happens to have a shield attached to his collar. He’s been trained as a deputy’s partner, which frees up someone to work elsewhere. He was one of the first to work in a trial program to work with detectives also.”

Frank’s jaw worked as he thought about her words. “Just as long as he doesn’t have fleas,” he said grudgingly, drawing on anything to preserve his dignity before he returned to his desk.

“You should worry more about me than him on that count.” She offered him a smile.

He didn’t return her smile. She didn’t take it personally. She sensed he was of the mind-set that didn’t believe women belonged in law enforcement. Nothing new to her.

He looked around at their audience, officers that pretended not to be interested. “I see one dog collar or chew bone on this desk and there’ll be hell to pay.” He gave a growl worthy of Jinx.

“Our cue to leave. Jinx. Heel.”

Bree walked out to her SUV and opened the rear door for Jinx to climb up inside. “Domestic dispute,” she murmured with a sigh, switching on the engine. “My favorite kind of case.”

She didn’t have any trouble finding the location of the dispute. The first thing she noticed was Cole Becker standing on the sidewalk. He was busy studying what looked like a major war zone. She hazarded a guess that the day before, the green lawn had been lush and flowers bordering the front porch had added a colorful accent to the neatly painted house. Today it looked as if a deranged gardener had been let loose on the lawn. Flowers were torn up and thrown every which way. Chunks of sod were tossed up onto the porch and ground into the steps. And some kind of strange design was burned into the lawn.

Bree winced as she studied the destruction in front of her.

Then she sneaked a peek at Cole, who stood nearby. It was a sin a man could look so good in a pair of jeans.

Keeping her eyes off his illegal rear end, she parked in front of the house and got out. She let Jinx out of the truck and walked up the driveway with him at her side.

The morning breeze sent a hint of lemony aftershave her way. The man smelled as good as he looked.

“What did you do so wrong that you caught the Williams-Baxter feud?” he asked, snapping off a couple of photos.

“Don’t tell me, you not only write the stories, you take the photos, too,” Bree commented.

“I’m a Renaissance man. I do everything,” he admitted.

A woman stepped outside. “Who’re you?” she asked in a raspy voice that had an accent more commonly heard in Brooklyn, New York, than Southern California. She wore baggy shorts and a faded blue T-shirt that hung on her bony frame. Chipped red polish adorned her toes and fingernails. A cigarette dipped dangerously from her lower lip. She had the look of a woman who’d lived a hard life and didn’t mind if it showed. She cast a suspicious eye in Jinx’s direction. “He won’t pee on my lawn, will he?”

As if that would hurt it more! Bree thought to herself.

“Mrs. Williams, I’m Detective Fitzpatrick.” She moved forward, holding out her hand. The woman took it in a brief shake. “I understand you’ve had some vandalism.”

“Hell, yes, I’ve had problems. You can’t miss them, can you?” Her eyes flashed fire. In between puffs on her cigarette, she mouthed a few colorful phrases detailing what she thought of the vandals. “Teresa and her spawn are the ones who made this mess on my Harry’s lawn. He works damn hard to keep it looking beautiful and they’ve ruined it. I want them arrested.”

“Why do you think Teresa is to blame?” Bree’s nose twitched at the acrid smoke. She’d quit smoking when she learned she was pregnant with Cody, and every once in a while that craving for nicotine hit her. Thanks to Mrs. Williams, it was rearing its ugly head.

“Teresa is my sneaky sister. How do I know she’s behind this? I know because this is something she’d do. Or she’d have her son do it.” She squinted in the plume of smoke rising upward.

“Come on, Mattie, tell her the truth why you think it was the Baxters,” Cole suggested.

She glared at Cole. “Everyone knows why, Cole. This detective is here to arrest them. Not hear stories.”

“Mrs. Williams, I can’t arrest someone just on your say-so. I need proof,” Bree explained.

The other woman snorted. “It’s not as if I know they’re out here so I run out with a camera. Besides, that’s your job. Proving they did it,” she insisted. “You just go on and do your job and put the two of them behind bars! This yard was just fine last night. That means they did it between the time I went to bed after Letterman and sometime before I came out for my newspaper this morning after the morning news.” She waved her cigarette for emphasis, sending ash flying everywhere.

“Stand on the sidewalk where you can get a better look at the lawn,” Cole advised in a low voice.

Bree did just that. As she stood on the sidewalk and looked at the grass, she realized it was more than some kind of design burned in the lawn, it was words.

“Interesting choice, wouldn’t you say?” Cole asked, moving over to stand next to her. “No crop circles for this person.”

“Whoever did it can’t spell worth a damn,” she muttered. “Considering this could be considered a favorite obscenity, you’d think they’d know how to spell it.”

“All you need to do is ask someone to spell this word and see if they use two ks instead of a ck,” he commented. “Too bad that last school bond was voted down. Seems like our schools really need to do something about the students’ spelling skills.”

“When my Harry gets home and sees what those Baxters did to his lawn, he’s going to bust a gut,” Mrs. Williams said. “You have to arrest them!”

Bree took a deep breath, then wished she hadn’t when she inhaled a hint of smoke. She was going to have to dig through the glove compartment and hope she could find a stick of gum. A mint. Anything that would help the craving. She blinked when something appeared in her range of vision.

Cole held out a square of bubble gum.

“It’s the only way I can be around Mattie for more than thirty seconds,” he said quietly. “And a hell of a lot safer. If I tried to take that cigarette from her, she’d have me flat on my back before I knew what happened.”

Bree pulled off the paper wrapper, popped the pink disk in her mouth and started chewing.

“Mrs. Williams, I’m going to have a talk with Mrs. Baxter,” she told the other woman. “But I’d like to ask you a few more questions first.” She pulled her notebook and a pen out of her bag.

It didn’t take her long to realize that all Mrs. Williams cared about was Bree arresting the entire Baxter family and putting them away for the next hundred years. Cole made no pretense of pretending not to hear. What irked Bree most was the tiny smile that tugged at the corner of his lips, as if he knew something she didn’t.

He was walking toward a battered pickup truck when she finished talking to Mrs. Williams.

“Becker,” Bree called out, just as he opened the door. She picked up her pace and headed toward him. “Okay, what’s the big joke about this feud? And if you tell me the Baxters are aliens from another galaxy…” She left the threat unspoken, but no less powerful.

“Whoa, Detective, I’m not packing heat.” He held up his hands in surrender. “You’re not even close with the alien guess. But you have to meet the Baxters to understand where Mattie is coming from. Or not,” he muttered. He climbed inside the truck and closed the door after him. The window lowered. “Let me know how your meeting with the Baxters goes.”

“You know something,” she accused.

“Nothing that can help the case. See ya, Detective, honey.” The window rolled upward and the engine rumbled to life.

Bree remained on the sidewalk, watching Cole drive away.

“You’re seein’ the Baxters today, arn’cha?” Mattie Williams called out to her.

“Yes, ma’am.” Bree headed for her vehicle. She had an idea this case wasn’t going to get any easier.

Bree knew it for a fact the moment she rolled to a stop in front of the Baxter house, situated a few miles outside of town.

She guessed the two-story dwelling had been built in the 1940s, but the paint job was pure 1960s—hot-pink with orange and purple daisies decorating the shutters bracketing each window, and an equally bright green door. As she walked up the obviously handmade stone walkway, she surreptitiously gave a few sniffs. The only smoke she detected was the tangy aroma of mesquite, not the sweet odor of something illegal.

When she reached the door, she found a multicolored rope hanging there. She gave a yank and listened to melodic chimes echo from inside the house.

“May I help you?”

She turned toward the side of the house. The woman she faced wasn’t who she expected after listening to Mattie Williams ranting and raving about the people destroying her life. This woman dressed as if she still lived in the sixties in a pale yellow peasant-style blouse with a drawstring neckline and a brightly colored skirt that swirled around her bare ankles. Her brown hair was liberally streaked with gray and hung straight to her waist.

“Mrs. Baxter?”

Her smile was serene. “I prefer Teresa.”

Bree moved forward. “I’m Detective Bree Fitzpatrick.” She pulled out her shield and identification.

“Mattie sent you,” she said softly. “Please, come on back.” She stepped around to the rear of the house. “Would you like some tea?”

“No, thank you.” Bree looked at the greenhouses set away from the house. “What do you grow?”

Teresa smiled as if she found her question amusing. “I supply orchids to local florists. Would you care to see them?”

She saw it as a chance to learn about the woman. “Yes, I would.”

The first thing Bree noticed as she stepped inside the glass enclosure was the heavy moisture in the air. At first she felt as if she was breathing water.

“Do you feel as if you’ve suddenly traveled to the tropics?” Teresa asked. “Orchids prefer this type of atmosphere.”

For the next hour, Bree was shown varieties of orchids. She expressed her astonishment at the colors arrayed before her.

“What is Mattie saying I’ve done this time?” Teresa asked, after she led Bree out of the greenhouse.

“She insists you carved designs in her lawn.” Bree told her the words adorning the yard.

Teresa chuckled. She gestured for Bree to follow her inside the house. The kitchen was as brightly colored as the exterior, but very much set in the present. The two women sat at the butcher block table set with red-and-black cloth place mats.

“Mattie has blamed us for everything from her water heater going out to her cat having a hairball to her husband’s erectile dysfunction,” she said serenely as she set a teakettle designed to look like a duck on the stove.

Bree swallowed the laugh that threatened to crawl up her throat. “Any reason why she would think that?” She pulled out her notebook.

“Her reason for me to be in jail is very easy. She believes I stole this property from her.”

Bree paused. “Any reason why she would think that?”

“Possibly because I married the man she thought she was in love with.” She poured tea into a cup and carried it over to the table. She sat across from Bree. She nodded as if Bree had said something. “It’s not a new story. Two sisters attracted to the same man. The man chooses one over the other. The spurned sister plots revenge.”

“How long has this been going on?” Bree asked.

She closed her eyes in thought. “It’s been a good thirty years.”

“Even though she has Harry,” Bree said.

“Harry is the man in question. We divorced fifteen years ago and he married Mattie. I received the house as a settlement.”

“But you’ve since remarried,” Bree said, hoping she could keep this straight.

Teresa nodded. “And divorced again. Harry and I had a son who is now nineteen. Adam helps me with the orchids.”

Now Bree felt lost. “If Mattie has the man she’s wanted for so long, why would she accuse you? And her husband’s son?”

She smiled. “That’s Mattie’s way. She thinks I still want Harry. But I don’t.”

Bree shook her head, amazed at the woman’s story. And believing it because it was too bizarre not to believe.

Teresa sipped her tea. “I don’t want her husband, Detective Fitzpatrick. But Mattie refuses to believe me. So she does whatever she can to try to get me into trouble. This is an ongoing thing,” she explained. “And I’m afraid since you’re new to the area, you had no idea what you were in for.” She got up from the table and headed for the stove. “I think you’ll take that tea now.”

“Let me get this straight. You married the man your sister was in love with?”

Teresa nodded.

“You had a son. Later, you divorced the man and your sister married him. You married someone else.”

“Correct.”

“But your sister thinks you want him back, so she’s making all these accusations.” Bree hoped she was filling in the blanks properly. “For what reason?”

“If I’m in prison, I can’t chase after Harry,” Teresa said evenly. “I have to say the vandalism of her front yard is a new twist. Before, it’s been trash strewn around on the lawn or flowers dug up. What you’ve described is much too imaginative for Mattie. I hope she hasn’t made an enemy.” She shook her head in sympathy. “She can sometimes come across as a bit abrasive.”

Bree didn’t doubt it.

An hour later, she left Teresa’s house feeling as if she had been Alice traveling through the Looking Glass. She didn’t doubt Teresa’s story. Bree was familiar with liars. In her line of work, it was a given. She also noticed that when someone lied they had a habit of coming up with a complicated story, as if it made them sound more credible. She usually had a pretty easy time finding the truth. However, she didn’t doubt Teresa’s convoluted tale.