Authors: Blair Bancroft
Crystal and I extended our profuse thanks for the marvelous food and sterling hospitality. I bent and patted Royal Willie on his aristocratic head, and then we were in the hallway, standing in front of the elevator. “Okay,” I said, “what do you know that I don’t?”
“That bit about the detective? That’s the Bank Examiner scam. Another ten thousand Letty will never see again, no matter what this Marshall and Eric do.”
“You think she’s lost it all, close to three hundred thousand?”
“People get dead for that kind of money,” Crystal said.
The elevator doors opened, and we stepped in, descending in a screaming silence that threatened to blow our heads off.
Chapter 10
The replacement for our red velvet Santa suit arrived, and by one o’clock the next day we’d checked out every last Santa, Mrs. Santa, and Elf costume DreamWear offered. Someone actually zipped in at the last minute and settled for the French Maid Mrs. Santa when nothing else was available. I hoped no little kiddies were going to be around for that particular Santa delivery. But, then, there were all kinds of presents.
Crystal and I closed the shop and went home to Wallace family traditions. The four of us—Mom, Scott, Crystal, and I—placed luminarias down each side of our driveway and along the front property line, as did most of our neighbors. If you’re not familiar with luminarias, they are small white paper bags with a squat candle inside. When lit, light shines through the bag, creating a twinkling ethereal glow. The effect of a whole street filled with luminarias is magical, part of the mystique, rather than the commercial hype, of Christmas.
Shortly after six, when Royal Palm Drive glowed from one end to the other, a steady stream of cars would drive by, headlights dimmed to “park,” to enjoy the spectacle. At the moment, however, my back screamed at me as I bent double, lighting candles, flogging myself forward with anticipation of the sheer wonder of the combined effect of hundreds of luminarias lining our street. I guess costume designers keep childhood delights alive in
our
hearts. Where would we be if we couldn’t summon up an unusually high quotient of
joie de vivre
?
By nine o’clock most of the candles had guttered out. We blew out the rest and left the bags for pick-up in the morning when the hot wax had cooled and our backs had recovered. At ten-thirty the four of us were off to St. Anthony’s Episcopal candlelight service, where we sang all the wonderful carols that so-called political correctness no longer allowed in public places. It occasionally occurred to me that Crystal’s beliefs were probably closer to Wicca than Christian, but she always joined us at the Christmas Eve service, her robust alto belting out the carols in remarkable tune.
Christmas Dinner was always a giant affair, with Mom inviting several elderly neighbors, particularly those who lived alone. Why I’d never before thought to invite Miss Letty made me kick myself all over again. In spite of an eighty-degree temperature outside, we served hot spiced cider and cranberry-rum punch, followed by a dinner of ham, candied yams, mashed redskin potatoes, and roast vegetables, plus an onion-Parmesan casserole. And all the sauces and gravies to go with them.
A double oven, and three cooks made it all possible, including apple pie, pecan pie, and ambrosia for dessert. There were also handmade Christmas cookies and two bowls of nuts to accompany after-dinner nibbles and coffee in the living room. At four-thirty when the last guest went home, the four of us kicked off our shoes and collapsed into the comfort of the living room upholstery, deliberately ignoring the towering specter of clean-up.
Scott heaved a sigh. “Hey, Crystal, you have a magic wand handy? Something to conjure up a cleaning wraith? We wake up in the morning and—Presto, chango!—the kitchen’s sparkling clean, the luminarias all folded up and put away for another year—”
Crystal hit him in the face with a pillow. Mom barked a sharp, “Scott!” before he could throw it back. I heaved myself up off the couch and poured us each a tot of B&B. There’s nothing like a small nip of Benedictine & Brandy to round out a successful, if slightly frantic, day.
Finally, since no dishwashing fairy made a magical appearance, we pried ourselves out of our comfortable sprawls and went to work. When the dining room table was cleared and the first massive load swishing in the dishwasher, Scott and I shooed Mom and Crystal to a well-earned rest while we tackled the oversize pots and pans.
Scott, up to his elbows in suds, suddenly said, “Gwynie . . . I may have messed up.”
Not again
! I didn’t say it out loud, but my last Santa cookie rose in my throat.
“You know when you asked me about Jeb? Well, I shouldn’t have blown you off. Not that I think you ought to be butting into the cops’ job, but, well, you’re my sister, and . . . murder’s worse than being a snitch, right?”
My hand paused in the midst of drying a six-quart sauce pan. My brain snapped to attention. “Definitely,” I assured him.
“What did Jeb tell you?”
“He turned drama queen, confessing it was all his fault. Says he lost it when he saw Martin collapse and accidently jib
b
ed the wheel.”
“Bullshit.”
“Nobody’s perfect,” I reminded him. Gently. Into the seething silence I added, “He denied any interest in Vanessa Kellerman. Evidently he’s into cradle-robbing. Some seventeen-year-old named Cary Knight has him bagged and t
agg
ed.”
Clang
! Scott’s hand slipped, banging Mom’s favorite ceramic casserole dish hard against the sink. I squeaked in protest. He stood there, holding the thankfully intact dish and looked down at me, shaking his head. A lock of wavy blond hair slipped down toward his lively blue eyes. “How gullible can you get?” he demanded. “Jeb nails every female he can get his hands on, the more the merrier. He does business with Cary’s father, so, sure, he takes what’s offered, but Jeb
monogamous
? No way, no how.”
“What business?”
“You don’t want to know.”
“Fine.” Scott was right. I had enough problems. “So who’s Jeb sleeping with besides Cary?”
“Hell,” Scott muttered, “where to begin? “I mean, there’s not a boating emergency every minute, is there? You wouldn’t believe what you can see from a berth that overlooks the Yacht Club marina and Fat-cat Row, as well as every boat heading down the Waterway. And I hear things too, lots of stories floating around—”
“For real, or just rumors?”
Scott shrugged. “Where there’s smoke, and all that.”
“So tell me.”
“Vanessa Kellerman for sure. I’ve seen her eyes damn near eat him up when Jeb was sunning on his deck.”
“Doesn’t mean she was sleeping with him.”
“Get real, sis. Take my word for it. And then there’s Martin’s ex-girlfriend—”
“His
what
?” I nearly dropped the glass pot lid I was drying.
“What?” Scott mocked, blue eyes wide. “You thought Martin went all celibate like you after his divorce? I got news for you, Gwynie. He’s a
guy
. His latest chick before Vanessa took him by storm was Sherry Lambert.”
I blinked. “Sherry Lambert from Mom’s office?”
“Playgirl. Twice divorced. Really likes
a good time. Word is, Jeb took ’
em both on, just for the challenge of keeping them from killing each other.”
“That’s sick,” I breathed. “You
are
saying what I think you’re saying?”
“
Menage à trois
, baby. And Jeb keeps a few other chicks on the string. He’s like one of those sultans with a harem. He can take his pick.”
My stomach churned.
Gullible idiot
! “What about Cary?” I asked. Faintly.
“She’s seventeen. She does what she’s told.”
“Including providing alibis.” It wasn’t a question. Dear God, I’d swallowed Jeb’s story hook, line, and sinker. And I’d led Boone Talbot astray as well.
Scott could be wrong.
I needed to dig deeper.
That was a good one. The naive twit who’d believe anything was considering playing detective again.
Scott and I finished up in the kitchen. Before leaving for his apartment over the garage, he enveloped me in a bear hug. “Careful, Sis,” he whispered. “Questions can get dangerous.”
I dead-bolted the door after him, then climbed the stairs to my room, the last vestiges of Christmas cheer draining out of me with each step.
The Saturday after Christmas was relatively quiet at DreamWear. All our costumes came back on time, with little wear and no rips or tears. There would be no costume rush for the Hospital barbecue. Everyone was expected to have some form of Western wear in the closet. We were, after all, the West Coast of Florida and, in spite of snowbirds and tourists never venturing beyond our downtown boutiques, our miles of sandy beachfront, and our golf courses, we were still ranch country. In spite of the landowners who had sold out for housing developments that were rapidly tripling the size of Golden Beach’s population.
It used to be that cattle ranches began on the east side of the Bypass, less than a mile from downtown. Now, except for a hold-out or two—their cattle sandwiched between low-rise condos and trailer parks—you have to drive at least four miles east on our main street, Golden Beach Avenue, before you begin to run into tree and flower nurseries, orchid farms, ostrich farms, horse farms, riding stables, and of course cattle ranches. The Yarnells, who own a remarkable portion of undeveloped land that sprawls over two counties, were farthest out, their property extending well beyond the Arcadia River, where our ruler-straight, ten-mile-long main street came to an end at Bud’s Snook Shack. The Yarnell ranch was, in fact, so large it extended all the way to Three Rivers, a low-lying town southeast of Golden Beach.
Three Rivers was a town caught up, then thrown aside by the development boom in the sixties. Hundreds of miles of roads were paved, street signs erected, ready and waiting for houses that were never built. Gradually, grass grew up through cracks in the pavement and the Florida jungle closed in on each side. Some roads now led nowhere, cut off by the construction of I-75.
A ghost town for more than thirty years, Three Rivers had finally begun to grow from a few houses and businesses clinging to the edges of the Tamiami Trail when newcomers discovered it offered real estate bargains far below the area’s norm. But even now, ninety percent of the aging roads were deserted, so far from civilization that there were always rumors of drag racing, keg parties, cattle rustling, and even small drug-smuggling planes landing on the deserted fringes of a town that was more myth than reality. The isolated roads also offered access to the far reaches of two major ranches, both prime hog-hunting territory.
Not surprisingly, the oddity of a town like Three Rivers was not something I thought about very often. But it was brought home to me with considerable drama as the shop’s front door slammed all the way back, thudding against the wall next to the display window, and a man stomped in. Scott had urged me to keep a real gun amid all the fakes in our accessory chest. I’d refused. At this particular moment I
regretted my decision
.
The man, who moved so fast he was already within a foot of the counter, was rail thin, maybe six-two without the slouch. Mousy brown hair that looked as if it had never seen shampoo straggled to his shoulders, exaggerating skin so pale the word
vampire
leaped to mind. His scruffy beard looked somewhere between deliberate growth and couldn’t-be-bothered-to-shave. A closer inspection suggested he might be ill, suffering from depression, or just out of a psych ward. Maybe all three. He was wearing a wrinkled and stained blue chambray shirt and jeans that looked as if he never took them off. Angry sparks lit his sunken eyes. Add in his belligerent stance, and he was more than a little menacing.
I’ve always enjoyed being alone in the shop, just me and my costumes. But not now, not today. I gulped and stood my ground, summoning my best, if a trifle shaky, customer smile. “How can I help you?”
“You can tell that miserable, thieving brother of yours not to shoot Yarnell pigs!”
I took a second look, staring into blue-green eyes I’d never forget if I lived to be one hundred. My legs wobbled. I sat down abruptly on my stool. “
Chad?
”
“Damn right!” growled the ragged apparition before me. “I tried to track Sco
tt down, but he was off in the G
ulf somewhere, so you can pass along the message. Keep off Yarnell land.”
I wanted to cry.
This
was my hero, the great crush of my teenage years? I’d seen homeless men living in cardboard boxes on the streets of New York who looked better than Chad Yarnell did at the moment.
My brain went on autopilot. “I didn’t know you were back in town.”
“Shocked the family Christmas Eve,” he drawled, his tone somewhere between sarcasm and self-mockery. “Living at the ranch ’til I find a place of my own. This little errand is Mom’s way of seeing that I earn my keep.”
Poor Margaret
. Margaret Yarnell, with the aid of Chad’s younger sister and her husband, had run the Yarnell ranch for years, ever since her husband had been killed in a five-car pile-up in fog on I-75. She was probably trying to get Chad to reach out, touch the world that once was his. Talk. Re-integrate. Good luck with that. Her ploy didn’t seem to be working.