Читать книгу Doggone Dead - Dane McCaslin - Страница 12

Chapter 5

We sat staring at one another, Nora’s face drained of all color while my own felt clammy from the cold sweat that had broken out. This was definitely not a joke, any more than Linda Fletcher’s dead body had been.

“I thought your last name was Goldstein.” Brent stood there watching us. “Sorry, Mrs. Gold digger.”

“Brent!” We shouted his name in concert and he hurriedly backed toward the door.

“What did I say?”

The puppy reached out and licked his nose.

“I only said that I didn’t…”

“Brent, go away. Just go, all right?” I pointed to the door, a sudden weariness causing my shoulders to sag. This retirement gig was taking more out of me than teaching a classroom full of teenagers ever did. “We’ll call you when it’s time for the next job, okay?”

“You don’t need to yell at me.” He edged through the doorway. “I only wanted to help.” His eyes were round as he poked his head back inside.

“Out. Now.” I pointed to the hallway, using my loudest teacher voice.

He skedaddled without another peep.

Nora and I sat there in silence. I slid closer to her and put one arm around her shoulders. She was shaking, and it made me angry. How dare someone threaten my best friend like that? She was anything but a gold digger. In fact, she should’ve been awarded a purple heart for everything she’d put up with in her various marriages. All right, maybe she hadn’t chosen wisely when it came to men. A lot of women didn’t, right? Still, to call her a gold digger when all she’d done was take what was rightfully hers was absurd.

“Hey, girl.” I said the words softly, giving her shoulders a small shake. “Let’s have some more of that brandy, okay? Then we’ll get the list made.” And then we’ll call the police, I added silently.

She didn’t answer. Instead, she shook off my arm and slowly got to her feet, shuffling dejectedly toward her bedroom. “I’m going to lie down. Come and get me when the cleaning people get here.”

“Oh, no, you don’t.” I jumped to my feet and went after her, firmly turning her around and guiding her back to the sofa. “You’re not going to leave me to handle this on my own. No way, no how.”

“There’s nothing to handle.” Nora dropped back down on the sofa, her limp form enough to make anyone worry.

Anyone but me, that was. This was one great acting job, in my opinion. I’d seen enough in my years as a high school teacher to know the signs. She’d either snap out of it or I’d snap it for her.

A sharp rap on the door made me jump. Giving Nora’s floppy arm a non-too-gentle tug, I pulled her to her feet and pushed her toward the door.

“Answer it, Nora. It’s probably the cleaning service.”

It was. Karen, a tiny woman who was smaller even than the Timorous Twosome, smiled at us as she marched into the apartment. She carried a large metal bucket filled with cleaning supplies and had a plastic bag of rags hooked around her wrist. She looked from me to Nora and back, one thin eyebrow lifted in question. “You called about a deep kitchen clean?”

I almost laughed aloud. That was one way to put it. How Nora would explain the blood spatter and the fingerprint dust, I had no idea, but I could hardly wait to hear her try.

“Right this way, please. I guess I was expecting an entire crew, not just one person.” Nora was still in her woe-is-me mode, her shoulders drooping as she walked to the kitchen, but I let her carry on.

Trust me, if she truly needed me, I’d be there in a heartbeat.

“Unfortunately, there was a slight accident in here yesterday. If you could get the stains off the floor, I’d sure appreciate it.”

“What sort of stains?” Karen sounded suspicious, but she followed Nora into the kitchen anyway.

I silently counted to three, waiting for her reaction.

“Oh, my God! Is that blood?”

There was the sound of crashing metal and a loud screech as she dropped her cleaning bucket. I cautiously peeked around the corner and saw Nora hopping around like an angry stork, holding on to one foot and cursing up a blue streak. Karen was doing some sort of dance, both hands covering her eyes as the cleaning supplies rolled around the floor.

Nearly three hours later, the kitchen was spotless and Nora was settled back on the couch, her injured foot propped up on the cushions next to her. Karen had finally stopped spinning long enough for me to explain what had happened, and she’d gone to work, scrubbing the floor with a vigor that had threatened to take the design off the tile.

I’d convinced Nora to give her a little extra pay for the shock, assuring her it was worth it to keep Karen from running straight back out of the apartment.

“She should be paying me,” Nora grumbled, reaching over to gingerly poke at her swollen big toe. “I tell you, Gwen, she’s lucky I’m not suing the pants off her. Who uses a metal bucket anymore?”

I didn’t bother answering. Instead, I brought her an ice pack, a notepad, and a pencil.

“What’s this for?” She stared at the items, a truculent expression on her face.

“The ice pack is for your toe.” I spoke with more patience than I was actually feeling. “The paper is for that list you still need to write. Or I can write it while you give me the names.”

“Oh, fine.” She gave an exaggerated sigh, crossing her arms over her chest in a petulant motion. “Get ready. Some of these names are doozies.”

“Worse than Grace or Mercy?” I looked up from the notepad, grinning.

To my relief, she smiled back. Crisis averted. “I must have married every man in Oregon who liked strange names. First up, Jebediah.”

“Jedediah?” I was sure I’d heard incorrectly.

“Nope. Jebediah. With a B.” She laughed at my befuddled expression. “Told you they were odd. My first husband’s mother was a direct descendent from the Mayflower Biddles and boy, did he like reminding me of that little tidbit.”

I stared at her for a moment, uncertain if this was a joke or not. I didn’t see any mirth on her face. Instead, I thought I spotted a trace of sadness, a souvenir from a time she didn’t really like to revisit.

“All right, Jeb-with-a-B it is.”

Next was Verity, which was actually kind of cute, and then Charity, which smacked of all things Plymouth Rock and Puritan. By the time we’d completed what amounted to a roll call of obscure names from the offspring of husbands one to five, it was nearly three and I was starving. The breakfast casserole seemed long ago and far away, and I was ready for lunch. My stomach, always one step ahead, gave a loud grumble.

“Are you hungry?” Nora glanced up from her cell phone, a secret smile tucked in one corner of her mouth. She’d been texting someone in between names, and, judging by that smile, it was a M-A-N. Maybe I needed to ask her what his children were named.

“Ravenous. Should we go out or stay here?”

“I vote for out.” Nora stood, testing her weight on the injured foot before dropping back down with a grimace on her face. “Or not. Maybe we’d better call out for something.”

“Or I can walk to somewhere nearby.” I glanced at the phone Nora had tossed aside. “Besides, Brent will be back soon and he’ll be starving.”