01 - Playing with Poison (9 page)

“What are all those things Audrey wears?” I asked when Bryce came back.

“Crystals,” he said without even a peek in her direction. “But don’t go asking her about them. Make that mistake and you’ll end up with a big old bag of rocks.”

“Excuse me?”

“Really, Jessie. I’ve seen it happen.” Bryce held out his arms and stumbled around, pretending to hold a very large imaginary bag of rocks.

“I won’t mention the jewelry,” I promised. “But I should buy them a drink, no?”

Bryce produced two more Long Island Iced Teas. “These will get them talking,” he said. “Talking nonsense, but talking.”

I mumbled something about how Captain Rye probably didn’t have to ruin his monthly booze budget getting information out of people and picked up the drinks.

***

Subtlety, I reminded myself as I approached the Dibbles. They looked puzzled, but I refused to be discouraged and asked ever so politely if I could talk to them about Stanley. Indeed, I practically curtsied as I set the Long Island Iced Teas before them.

“May I join you?” I asked.

Jackson grunted and reached for the drink, which I interpreted as a yes. Audrey also was welcoming. She moved over, her jewelry clinking and clanking, and patted the seat next to her.

“We were just talking about you,” she said as I sat down. “We saw you on TV, and I reminded Jackson you’re the only Pisces I know. It’s uncanny, isn’t it?” She appealed to me with her bulbous eyes, and I agreed that it did seem uncanny.

“And it’s uncanny you’re the one who found Stan.” Audrey leaned a bit too close. “Pisces have to watch out for things like that, you know?”

“Oh?”

“Well, yes! Stan did die in your house, didn’t he?”

I nodded. “On my couch to be exact.”

“But how awful for you!” Audrey stared at me with a fascination I don’t believe I merited, even considering I was the only Pisces she knew.

“Where are you living now?” she asked. “And what about your couch?”

“Excuse me?”

“My wife believes in ghosts.” Jackson grunted. “I’d bet good money she thinks your place is haunted.”

“You can’t possibly sleep in a house where someone just died! Murdered, no less!” Audrey shuddered at the prospect, and as if on cue, the weather outside broke.

As the first thunderclap boomed, I confessed that I was still living in the same place. Audrey looked horrified, so I tried to ease her distress. “My couch is gone, though. It was confiscated by the police.” I shrugged. “I do hope to get it back someday.”

“Oh no, Jessie!” Audrey shuddered again. “You really must get rid of that couch. Do not allow it back into your home!”

“Huh?”

Jackson looked up from his drink. “She’s serious, you know? Listen to her long enough, and you’ll start thinking everything’s haunted.”

With that, the Dibbles started arguing over the validity or absurdity of Audrey’s claims, and Audrey was spouting off some rather complicated statistics of ghost sightings before we could stop her. I interrupted a detailed explanation of the hazards of unhappy poltergeists and insisted I hadn’t seen any trace of Stanley or his apparition since he had died.

“I don’t see why he would haunt me, anyway,” I said. “I didn’t kill him.”

The Dibbles stopped bickering to stare at me.

“I’m innocent,” I told them.

They continued staring.

“That’s probably true,” Audrey said eventually, although she didn’t sound all that convinced.

I cleared my throat and moved on. “If Stanley were going to haunt someone, who would it be?”

She sat up straight and set some crystals a-clanking. “I see what you’re getting at, Jessie. You think Stan would haunt the person who killed him, right?”

“Maybe.” Personally, I didn’t think Stanley’s ghost would be bothering anyone, but if that was the way to approach the question, why not?

I watched Audrey think and Jackson drink until my patience ran out. “Do either of you have any ideas about the murder?” I asked point blank. “For instance, could anyone in here be responsible?”

I scanned the crowd, and invited the Dibbles to do the same. Audrey looked around with me, and we waved at Bryce, who was watching us from behind the bar.

“Oh, I just don’t know.” She sounded quite forlorn, but then perked right up and yanked on her earrings. “These will help though!”

I stared at the black rocks Audrey held aloft from her ear, and instinctively touched the small diamond studs that adorn my own earlobes.

“They’re lovely,” I lied.

“I bought them today! Aren’t they wonderful?”

Jackson grunted. “You’re supposed to ask her why her stupid earrings are wonderful.”

I asked.

“Well now, all crystals are beneficial to one’s chakras.” Audrey waved a hand in the air. “Erasing negative energy, improving one’s intellect and intuition, and so forth. But these are obsidian. I bought them especially to improve my insightfulness.”

“Ask her how much improving her insightfulness chakra set us back,” Jackson ordered.

Audrey pursed her lips. “I think Jessie here understands that we need some insight if we’re ever going to help Stan.”

“I think Jessie here understands Stan don’t need no more help.”

Audrey ignored her husband’s obtuseness. “The dead will not rest until justice is served,” she announced.

“Oh?” I said, feeling a bit obtuse myself. I had no idea how the dead might rest, for instance, and I was clueless as to what a chakra was, or was not. Most of all I was puzzled about how our conversation had gone off on this odd tangent.

“So!” I said brightly. “What did you and Stanley talk about Saturday night?” I looked back and forth between the Dibbles. “Anything important?”

“Nope.” So much for Jackson’s contribution.

I appealed to Audrey, but she was in some sort of trance. She had her eyes closed and was rubbing both of her earrings between her thumbs and index fingers, garnering up all her insightfulness chakras as it were.

I sighed dramatically and caught Gina’s eye. “Bryce is keeping my tab,” I told her and pointed to the Dibbles. “And perhaps you would bring my champagne over?”

“That’s it!” Audrey hit the table with both palms, and Gina scurried away.

“I need to consult Ezekiel.” She opened her eyes and blinked at me. “I’ll go tomorrow.”

“Ezekiel?”

“Ezekiel Titus. He’s my astrologer. I’ll ask him who could have done this terrible thing to poor Stan. Let’s just hope he can fit me in on such short notice.”

She started rummaging through her purse as Gina came back with our drinks.

“Scorpio!” Audrey proclaimed triumphantly, and Gina ran away again.

I glanced at the handful of frayed notes Audrey was brandishing before me and recognized what she was so proud of—her infamous list of the birth dates and sun signs of everyone she knew, however remotely.

“Here’s my list for The Stone Fountain.” She ran a ring-clad index finger down the page and tapped my name. “You see, Jessie? You really are the only Pisces.”

I took a wild guess. “And Stanley was a Scorpio?”

“Mm-hmm.” Audrey pointed to his birthday. “November 13, 1983. I can’t wait to hear what Ezekiel makes of that!”

“I can’t wait to hear what Ezekiel charges you,” Jackson said.

Audrey rolled her eyes at me. “I really must consult Ezekiel before I say anything further.” She put away her notes. “You understand, Jessie?”

Not really.

I turned to Jackson. “Do you have any ideas about Stanley?”

He said he’d get back to me after his next session with his psychic advisor and commenced humming the tune from
The Twilight Zone
.

“Laugh all you want, Jackson Dibble. But if you had just listened to Ezekiel when you had the chance, we wouldn’t be in this mess, would we?”

Audrey spoke to me. “My husband simply does not know how to handle money. Ezekiel offered us such good advice on these things, but would he listen?”

She waved a dismissive hand at Jackson, and I actually smiled. Maybe we were finally getting somewhere.

“Stanley was a financial advisor,” I ventured. “I understand he was quite good at it.” I tilted my head and waited for a response.

Nothing.

“I invested a little with him,” I lied with a huge smile on my face. “How about you?”

I looked expectantly at the Dibbles. But just my luck, Audrey had returned to a trance-like state, and Jackson got busy devouring his drink.

I took my leave before he could order another round on me.

Chapter 9

“Cue please?” I asked as I swept past the bar, Gina Stone style.

Bryce handed me my cue, I handed him my glass, and I kept on going. Next stop, the pool table—the blessed place where I understood the rules of the game.

“Jessie!” Kirby called out as I approached. “Play me a game?”

“Oh, if you insist.” I smiled and reached for the triangle, but Gus took it and racked the balls while I announced my purpose to the small group of regulars. Thanks to Jimmy Beak, everyone knew more than enough about Stanley and where he had died.

“I’ll play left-handed with anyone who can tell me anything useful about what happened that night,” I said as I chalked up.

“Can you do that?” Kirby asked.

“Ask about Stanley? I don’t see why not.”

“No, no, no. Can you actually play left-handed?”

“Not very well,” I answered honestly and motioned for him to break.

The left-handed approach worked, at least to some extent, and at least playing against Kirby Cox. But our game took a lot longer than usual, giving the pool table gang plenty of time to reminisce about Stanley. Or argue about Stanley, as the case may be.

As I coached Kirby on how best to make a fairly straightforward bank shot for the seven ball, Bernie and Camille Allen got into it. I would have felt guilty about introducing what was clearly a touchy subject, but I had seen the Allens bicker before. I do believe they were better at it than the Dibbles.

Bernie kept insisting Stanley wasn’t nearly as rich as he pretended to be, but Camille was convinced otherwise.

“You can’t fake a thing like that, Bernard.” The irritation in her voice made me glance up from the table. “Bernie’s just jealous, is all,” Camille told me. “Stan Sweetzer was a class act. Period.”

“Did you invest with him?” I asked, and her mouth dropped open. “I did,” I chirped. This ridiculous lie was getting easier by the minute.

But it still wasn’t getting the results I was hoping for. Camille bent down to tighten a strap on her sandals. I turned and appealed to Bernie.

“Ain’t hardly likely,” he mumbled with his eyes on his wife.

“Why’s that?” I asked.

He rubbed his thumb and fingers together. “Cash-o-la, Jessie. We didn’t have enough for Stan to bother.”

And that seemed to be the general consensus. Stanley ignored the little people, as Kirby put it. He frowned and pointed at the two ball, nestled against the left rail and blocked by my fifteen. The poor man was never going to pocket that one.

I turned to the new guy. “Do you even know who we’re talking about, John?”

“Not really, but I’ve seen the news. And Sweetzer’s girlfriend.” He let out a slow whistle.

“Candy’s cute, isn’t she?”

“Oh, yeah.”

I looked around at the various male heads nodding in agreement and wondered how a person might approach the next delicate topic. I had no idea.

“So, Gus?” I gave up on subtlety altogether. “I understand you used to date Candy?”

The loud clanking of balls from behind startled me, but not nearly as much as the cue ball, which landed at my feet.

I spun around, and Kirby saluted. “Your turn,” he said.

Gus bent down and handed me the cue ball. “It was a long time ago, Jessie. Besides, practically everyone’s been with Candy.”

“Until Stanley,” Bryce called over from the bar.

Kirby agreed with Bryce. “None of us had a chance after that.”

“What are you getting at, anyway?” Camille Allen scowled at me.

I shrugged and told her, quite honestly, that I had no idea.

“Well, I do,” she said. “You’re trying to pin this on one of us.”

She took a step toward me, and I backed away and onto Kirby’s foot. Instead of yelping, he held onto my shoulders and steadied me.

“Jimmy Beak’s practically court-martialed Jessie,” he said. “You’d be trying to prove your innocence, too.”

Gus threw his hands up. “Oh, for God’s sake, people.” He continued waving his arms. “Jessie’s innocent, I’m innocent, you’re innocent, we’re all innocent.” He waved at me. “Would you finish the game, already?”

That did seem like a good idea. I cleared the table. Then I played Gus.

He’s a little more skilled than Kirby, but then again, Snowflake’s a little more skilled than Kirby. Gus is one of those guys who swings way too hard, apparently believing that if the balls make enough noise banging into each other, something—anything—is bound to go in. His is not the most successful strategy, but playing with Gus does add some drama to the game. He’s also trainable. If I can catch him before he blows it, I can usually calm him down enough to make a decent shot.

That evening I did some quick coaching, and Gus was pleased to make a couple of tricky shots. In fact, he only had one ball on the table when I sunk the eight ball in the side pocket.

“Nice shot, Ms. Hewitt.” I froze with my back to him, but Captain Rye walked around me until I had to look up. “But I think you’ll need your right hand for the next round.”

***

“What the hell are you doing here?” I asked cordially.

“Getting even.” Rye refused the cue Gus offered him, and walked over to the rack to find something better. He turned to me while he chalked up. “The best of three?”

I raised an eyebrow. “Do you planning on arresting me when I win?”

Gus racked, and I motioned for Rye to break, unnecessarily reminding him he had lost when he had given me the break. He mumbled something about my fine manners, downed the six and the four balls while he was at it, and left me with very little to play with.

I rose to the occasion, however, and pocketed three stripes before giving the table back. But Rye must have gotten distracted when Kirby asked me how Candy was holding up, and he missed an easy shot at the one ball. That clinched it. I ran the rest of the stripes and finished the game.