The Fashion Hound Murders (27 page)

Josie hung up the phone and sighed with relief. She’d gotten over that hurdle. She needed a moment to relax and she’d be fine.

She didn’t get it. Before Josie could start a fresh pot of coffee, she had a phone call from Jerry. Chloe’s owner was talking faster than an auctioneer. “Josie, I’m on my break and I have to ask you something quick. Now that you can’t go out with that killer vet, you have time to date me.”

“What?” Josie said. She wanted to slam down the phone. Then she wondered if Jerry might have given the police that tip about Ted’s snake. Maybe Jerry planted the coral snake skin under Ted’s couch. He could have walked in with Chloe. Who’d notice one more dog at a vet’s office?

“Mom really likes you,” Jerry said. “She wants me to invite you to dinner tonight with her and Paul.”

“Who’s Paul?” Josie asked.

“You know. He rents the duplex attached to Mom’s house. The guy with the snakes.”

Bingo! Just the man I want to meet, Josie thought. I wonder if Paul has a coral snake in his collection. And if he was in league with Jonah.

“Hello? Josie? Are you still there?”

“I’d love to have dinner at your mom’s,” Josie said. “Would we have time to see Paul’s snakes?”

“Paul always has time to show off his pets,” Jerry said. “I’ll pick you up around five thirty. Can Amelia come, too?”

“She has school,” Josie said.

Cooking school. It really wasn’t a lie. Much.

Josie drank a whole pot of coffee, then spent the day on a caffeine high. She cleaned the kitchen, sewed a button on her coat, did three loads of laundry, vacuumed the rug, and suddenly it was time to pick up her daughter at school.

“Tonight Grandma and I are making chicken salad,” Amelia announced as she dropped her backpack in the car.

“That should taste good,” Josie said. “I’m supposed to have dinner with Jerry at his mother’s house. He invited you, too.”

“Ew, all those skanky cats—and the cat hair in the food.”

“But you’ll get to see Paul feed his snakes,” Josie said.

“I’d rather have a front row seat at a Miley Cyrus concert.”

“I gather that’s a no.”

“It’s an ew, no,” Amelia said. “I like Jerry’s dog, but I’m not hanging around snakes or those disgusting cats. One sat in the roll basket and then Jerry’s mom served us bread from it. Some of the cats are sick. One had a drippy eye. I might bring a disease home to Harry.”

“Good thinking,” Josie said. “You help Grandma make chicken salad tonight and enjoy your soup. It’s even better the second day.”

“Can I bring Harry upstairs while I visit Grandma?”

“You’ll have to clear that with your grandmother. It’s her home,” Josie said.

Amelia spent ten minutes pleading on the phone until she convinced her grandmother that Harry would behave if she brought him upstairs. “I’ll keep him in the little bathroom, Grandma, so he can’t hurt your furniture. No, he won’t wrap himself around your ankles, I promise. Yes, I realize this is a one-time trial. No, we won’t make it a habit.”

Josie watched with amusement as Amelia carried the freshly cleaned litter box upstairs to her grandmother’s flat. The bowls of cat food and water followed next.

“I’m sure Grandma would let you use her bowls,” Josie said.

“She doesn’t like cats eating out of her dishes,” Amelia said. She picked up Harry and cradled him while Josie waited for Jerry’s truck to arrive.

“Why are you going out with that loser face, Mom?” Amelia asked.

“Jerry?” Josie asked. “I’m not going out with him. I’m having dinner at his mother’s house.”

“And looking at snakes. Wait—are you hanging out with Jerry so you can help Ted?”

“Jerry doesn’t have any snakes,” Josie said.

“But that weird guy next door does. That’s it. That’s what you’re doing. It won’t work, Mom. You’ll get hurt.”

“Hah! Who’s the mom here?” Josie asked.

“Remember what you said yesterday—just because someone is older doesn’t mean they act like an adult.”

Why didn’t I think before I said that? Josie wondered. Talking baby talk to a cat has rotted my brain.

“I’ll be having a quiet dinner with his mother, Bernie,” Josie said.

“Don’t snakes eat rats?” Amelia said. “I wonder if they eat the ears and tail first, the way we eat chocolate Easter bunnies.”

Josie’s stomach rolled. “There’s Jerry’s truck out front,” she said. “I have to go.”

“Be careful,” Amelia said. “Watch out for the rats. They come in all sizes.”

Jerry’s truck looked disturbingly like Jonah’s fatal pickup, but Jerry had made a touching effort to shine it up. “I got most of Chloe’s hair off the passenger seat,” he said, “but I put a blanket over it just in case.”

“Where is your dog?”

“I can leave her at home now without her piddling on the floor,” he said. “Provided we don’t stay too late.”

“Fine with me,” Josie said, a little too enthusiastically.

“I just hope she doesn’t eat something important,” Jerry said. “She gnawed my good shoes last week.”

“She’ll be out of that stage soon,” Josie said.

“She’d better be. I’m down to two pairs of shoes.”

They rode in a silence that grew heavier by the minute. Finally Jerry said, “I still can’t believe all this stuff about Jonah.”

“Do you think he killed his wife?” Josie asked.

“I think someone else killed her and hid her body on his property,” Jerry said. “There was a lot of junk around the farm. It would have been easy.”

Great, Jerry believes Jonah was set up, Josie thought. Just like I think Ted was framed. We make quite a pair.

“But who would want to kill her?” she asked.

“Jonah said Allegra was sneaking around on him. Maybe her lover shot her.”

“And then he killed Jonah with a snake?” Josie asked.

“No, no. Your vet did that,” Jerry said. “He’s one of those radical animal rights types. Did you hear him go on about snakes being our friends with Ike Ikeman on TV? The dude’s a nut. He killed Jonah because he sold puppies. He put one of his snake friends in Jonah’s pickup.”

“How could he?” Josie asked. “Dr. Ted didn’t have a key to Jonah’s truck.”

“Didn’t need one,” Jerry said. “Jonah didn’t lock his truck. A lot of farmers don’t.”

Jerry’s truck was bumping up the rutted road to his mother’s house. Josie hung on to the door handle to keep from bouncing across the seat.

“Aw, look,” Jerry said softly. “Mom’s left the porch light burning.”

Bernie was waiting at the front door, surrounded by a half-dozen multicolored cats. More cats were perched on chairs, the couch, and the television. Cat hair floated through the air like dandelion fluff.

“You look nice, Mom,” Jerry said. He kissed his mother’s cheek. “Is that a new dress?”

“Nope, just one I haven’t worn in a while. Dinner’s ready to go on the table. Why don’t you and Josie go sit down. You can introduce her to Paul.”

Paul stood up when Josie entered the kitchen. He was a tall man about sixty with wide shoulders and a nose like a new potato. “Pleased to meet you,” he said, and extended a calloused hand. Paul had had a lifetime of hard work.

Jerry threw a fat gray cat off a chair and said, “Have a seat, Josie. What would you like to drink?”

“Beer,” she said. “Any kind is fine.”

Bernie hauled a huge platter to the table, avoiding the cruising cats.

“Boy, that looks good,” Paul said. “I can’t tell you the last time I had homemade fried chicken.”

“It’s my mama’s recipe,” Bernie said. “Help yourself to the mashed potatoes and gravy. Josie, would you start passing the string beans?”

Josie passed them without taking any. She’d rather eat cat hair. But the chicken smelled delicious and there had been no cats near the stove.

“Did you ever eat snake?” Paul asked, as he handed the platter to Josie.

“Uh, no,” Josie said. “Does it taste like fish?”

“More like chicken,” he said. “White meat.”

Josie carefully backed her fork out of the chicken breast she’d speared and stuck it into a leg. “Guess you wouldn’t find a drumstick on a snake,” she said.

“That’s a good one!” Paul said. “Snakes don’t have legs. Wanna see mine after dinner?”

“Your snakes?” Josie asked.

“Well, my legs aren’t as interesting, but you’re welcome to look.” Paul laughed at his own joke. “I’ve got quite a collection next door. And it’s dinnertime for one of the big guys.”

The last of Josie’s appetite disappeared.

“I keep them in the spare room,” Paul said.

“If one of your houseguests wiggles his way over here, you’re out on the street,” Bernie said.

Josie managed to eat her cherry cobbler, then helped Jerry’s mom with the dishes. Jerry and Paul retired to watch television. She thought longingly of Ted, who cooked for her and entertained her—and languished in jail.

“You ready to watch me feed my snakes?” Paul asked, popping his head into the kitchen.

“You go next door, honey,” Jerry’s mom said to Josie. “I’m finished here. I have to feed the kitties.”

Paul lived in three small, square rooms tacked onto the side of Bernie’s house. “I built special shelves in the back room here,” Paul said, as he led them through a living room just big enough for a recliner and a television.

He switched on a light. “Here they are.”

The room was lined with what looked like aquariums in different sizes. The snakes were loathsome, Josie thought. And they were moving. Some were barely bigger than belts. Others were six or seven feet long. Their colors ranged from bright spring green to autumnal orange and the brown of dead leaves. None had the colorful coral snake bands.

“Now that one there is a corn snake,” Paul said, tapping on one aquarium. “They’re pretty common. I’ve got an orange one, which is sort of unusual. That yellowish one is Herman, a rat snake. Herman’s mean. He bites, but his bites aren’t poisonous.”

Josie backed away from the aquarium and Paul laughed. “Herman ain’t coming through the glass, honey. You’re safe.”

“That’s good,” Josie said, her voice shaking slightly.

Paul turned to the rat snake. “It’s time to feed you, isn’t it, boy? You’re hungry.”

Josie didn’t feel quite so bad about talking to Harry the cat if Paul spoke to Herman the snake.

“Now, over here is his dinner,” Paul said. He put on thick work gloves, opened a cage of live white rats, and grabbed one behind the head. The fat rat struggled.

“Most collectors feed their snakes frozen mice or rats, but I like the live ones. Makes the snakes work for their dinner. Gives ’em an interest in life, you know?” He dropped the struggling rat into the cage.

Josie felt sick.

“What’s the matter, honey? You’re as green as a grass snake.”

“I didn’t know the rats would be so alive,” she said.

“You gotta kill to eat. That’s the rule of the animal kingdom. Heck, you didn’t think that chicken committed suicide for our supper? You’d better never see how they kill chickens.”

If I could stand vegetables, I’d become a vegetarian right now, Josie thought.

“Look at that! Look at that! He’s got him!” Paul said, as if he were cheering on a football team. Out of the corner of her eye, Josie saw the snake unhinge its jaws and swallow the rat whole. She couldn’t bear to watch Paul smile.

“Look!” Paul said. Josie saw the rat’s tail disappear into the snake’s jaws.

Well, at least I can answer Amelia’s question, she thought. Head and ears first, tail last. I never thought I’d feel sorry for a rat.

“Do you have any rattlesnakes?” Josie asked. “Or cop perheads?”

“Nope, I don’t keep venomous snakes,” Paul said. “Too dangerous. Bernie would have my hide. I wanted the boa that turned up on the lawn last year, but then I decided it was a bad idea. Those big snakes can squeeze you to death. Don’t keep poisonous ones, either. Don’t want any pets killing me.”

“Did you say you vacation in Bonita Springs, Florida?” Josie asked.

“Sure do,” Paul said. “My brother’s got a condo there, and I spend a couple of months with him every year. Winter if I’m lucky, summer if I’m not.”

Bonita Springs. “Isn’t that where a person was killed by a coral snake a few years ago?”

“Talk of the town when I was there,” Paul said. “A couple of illegals were camping out in the woods and a coral snake bit one. Same kind of snake that killed old Jonah. He made a go out of that farm of his. Who’d a thought things would turn out the way they did? I kind of liked the guy, until I got a good look at those kennels of his. Mistreating puppies. He should be ashamed. And the way he raised those poor boys. He starved them and used them as cheap help. That’s no way to treat your own flesh and blood. Then he killed that store clerk. I knew Edna. Nice lady. She sold me these rats. She didn’t deserve to die like that. I’ll tell you—whoever murdered Jonah did the world a favor.

“Well, that’s it,” Paul said. “Show’s over. Herman’s going to sleep after a good dinner, and so am I.”

“Thank you for a most unusual evening,” Josie said. “Jerry, don’t we have to get home before your dog eats your shoes?”

Chapter 33

“What did you think of Paul’s snakes?” Jerry asked.

“Incredible,” Josie said. That one word summed up the whole evening, no matter how Josie looked at it.

Jerry’s pickup rocked and swayed down Bernie’s unpaved road toward civilization, while Josie clung to the door handle to keep from sliding around the cab. She hoped this would be her last trip along these ruts. Jerry downshifted as the truck lumbered past the Deerford Kennels’ entrance. Ghostly yellow police tape flapped in the cold winter wind. Josie shivered. What a lonely place to live—and die.

“You’re very quiet tonight,” Jerry said.

“Just tired,” Josie said. “I had a long day.”

They rode the rest of the way in silence, but it wasn’t the easy silence of two people who enjoyed being together. Josie desperately wanted to go home. She had nothing more to say to Jerry. She could feel their friendship dying as he drove along the highway.

An hour later she saw the warm, welcoming lights of her house. Jerry’s truck was still rolling when Josie opened the door and jumped out. She was afraid he might try to kiss her good-bye—or want an even closer encounter.