Food Fair Frenzy Page 4

  I took the paper back from Mac and let my eyes scan the poem again. “Oh yeah, I see.” I passed the note back over the seat and sat back. “Does that mean something?”

  “Just that whoever wrote it could use a dictionary.”

  Chapter Six

  I’d never known Miss Vivee not to be able to just look at a body that had succumbed under suspicious circumstances and not know what killed it. It bothered me that she hadn’t been able to do that for Jack Wagner. And from how quiet she’d kept on the ride home, I could tell that it bothered her, too.

  Hazel Cobb talked all the way back to Yasamee, about a forty minute drive from the fairgrounds at Lincoln Park. Her chattering was exasperating to me after the long and harrowing day I had just lived through. So, I was happier than a tick on a fat dog, as Miss Vivee would say, when I saw the large, white gazebo sitting in the midst of the manicured green lawn that marked the center of town, letting me know we’d made it home.

  I chuckled to myself at how sometimes I felt like I was turning into Miss Vivee. She had definitely invaded my spirit, and I found myself more like her all the time. I had taken to calling people by two names, just like her. And I was spitting out her southern colloquialisms so often, people would probably have a hard time knowing that I had been a northerner all my life.

  We crossed the center of town that was flanked on four sides by the town’s main buildings – library, Baptist church, the movie theater, and Jellybean’s Café and headed down Magnolia to Mac’s house.

  Yasamee, a small coastal city off the Savannah River, was a quiet and idyllic place. Everyone neighbors – they knew each other’s name, and for the most part, all of their business. It was a place from a different time – a time more simple and unhurried, and except for all the murders I’d encountered since I arrived, it was a storybook kind of town.

  After we dropped Mac off, we re-crossed the square to get to Piedmont Avenue where the bed and breakfast was located. As we drove down the street, I felt the stress of the day dissipate. I was glad to call this place home. My mother, I knew, didn’t like that I had settled down there.

  At my age, even with small children and a husband, my mother, Justin Dickerson, Biblical archaeologist extraordinaire, had travelled the world participating in digs in Jerusalem, Turkey, and Egypt, she had even excavated all over the United States. She wanted the same for me and wished I spent less time at the Maypop and more time on digs. She had yet to meet Miss Vivee, and would be really surprised at my choice of company, considering Miss Vivee’s age and the penchant she had for attracting murders. I had been her cohort in solving more than a couple of them. Yes. Murders in Yasamee had certainly become the fare of the day. And one thing for sure, if I’d learned anything from hanging out with Miss Vivee, it was that murder followed her around like a love-struck puppy.

  I had come to Yasamee to hide out from the FBI, and it was on the second day after I arrived that Gemma Burke was murdered, bringing the FBI right to me. I had jumped “out of the frying pan right into the fire,” as Miss Vivee would say. But coming to Yasamee had also given me Bay.

  We pulled up in the driveway at the Maypop and I helped Miss Vivee and Cat out of the car.

  Maypop, the edible fruit part of the North American passion flower, was perfect for the name of the house. It was an enormous colonial painted a bright white, and had black shutters that framed an abundance of windows across its front. The brick walkway was bordered with pink azalea bushes, and the lush glossy foliage and exotic colored blooms of the magenta begonias. The steps led up to a wide, airy, wrap-around porch. It was inviting at first sight.

  I let out a pent up breath as soon as I stuck the key in the lock of the double oak door.

  I had originally planned on going back home to Cleveland, stay there while I looked for another dig site – do all the things my mother wanted me to do, but it just hadn’t worked out like that. I had become part of the Pennywell-Colquett family. For better or worse. I remembered the disappointment in my mother’s voice, how she had just grunted and moved on to another subject when I told her I hadn’t given up on my career, but I wasn’t planning on leaving Georgia any time soon.

  I unlocked the door, and stood back while Miss Vivee and Cat came in. Without stopping, she came in the front door and went out the back. She said she wanted to check on her greenhouse. She seemed troubled and unusually bemused. I asked her if she wanted me to help her, she told me she didn’t need help to water flowers.

  Well, she isn’t too upset not to be rude.

  I didn’t argue, and took it that she wanted to work on that note. I left her to herself. I knew Renmar and Brie wouldn’t be long coming back, they’d check on her then.

  I went upstairs and took the first look at myself since the fair fiasco in the cheval mirror in my room. I did look a mess. Renmar was right. I hoped Bay hadn’t had the same reaction to my appearance as she had.

  I peeled my clothes off, threw them into the hamper and hit the shower. I turned on the water and made it as hot as I could stand. I wanted to wash all the madness – and death – away.

  I poured shampoo into my hand, massaged it into my hair, and started thinking about that note and all those people that had gotten sick.

  What in the world is going on?

  I squirted some conditioner in my hand and slathered it on, pulling the creamy liquid down the length of my hair. “Was someone trying to kill all those people at the fair?” I said aloud.

  What would have happened if I had eaten that pie?

  A chill ran down my spine.

  And then to make their murderous intentions into a game?

  Miss Vivee was right, that was the action of someone with a sick mind. But Miss Vivee, even before anyone else thought about it, wouldn’t give in to it. She refused to play along. I smiled. Kudos to her for that.

  I lathered up my loofah, and thought about Camren Wagner. In a way, she reminded me of Renmar – the beautiful clear skin, the ever present winning smile, and that conspicuous Southern drawl. And maybe, I supposed, how she had carried on after the death of her husband, as if nothing had happened, were all part of that persona. The joviality and affability she exuded, all the while standing in front of an empty chair where her husband, who was now underneath a sheet dead, was supposed to be. I knew that no matter how much time I spent in the south, and picked up their mannerisms, I could never put on that kind of show if anything happened to Bay.

  I rinsed off and stepped out of the shower. I grabbed a towel and dried off. I leaned forward over the sink and stared at my reflection in the medicine chest mirror. I turned from side to side, stroked my chin and forehead with my fingers, and thought that I didn’t look so much like me anymore. I was changing – growing. I guess. I wasn’t really sure. I let out a long sigh.

  Turning from the mirror, I grabbed the bottle of Nivea and sat down on the side of the bed. Rubbing the lotion slowly over my body I thought about my life now.

  I hadn’t really given up on my career, even if my mother thought I had. Since I’d been in Georgia, I had excavated a four-thousand year old Native American site on Stallings Island. I was the first that had been given permission to do so in more than seventy-five years. And even though it was because of my mother’s clout that I’d gotten the job, I had done really well there. I was the one who discovered Renmar’s fish, swimming in an interior waterway for thousands of years. It had been an invaluable find. And that little unearthing had raised my clout tenfold in the world of ichthyology, and even a few with the Archaeology Conservancy, the AMA or ABA of my profession. Either way it was all good for my career. And the only down side had been Gemma Burke keeling over dead in a bowl of Renmar’s pseudo-extinct fish stew, and Oliver Gibbons sprawled out across the sand shoal leading to the island poisoned with the nicotine from his e-cigarettes.

  And then there was Rock Trap Gap.

  I initially broke into the place, a federally guarded archaeological site, after I had visited it with my mother. W
e’d gone to prove my theory that the Maya once lived in the United States, specifically northern Georgia. I left there running like a fugitive, but after showing what a good archaeologist I was at Stallings Island, the Conservancy had given me permission to excavate there. That find would have been the career defining moment for me. Unfortunately, I was unable to even get a foothold in proving my supposition of the American-Maya connection because another body showed up. And before it was over, the body count had risen to two.

  I put the lotion bottle up, turned the light off and climbed into bed. I closed my eyes, happy to be away from all the madness of the day. My thoughts drifted to Bay and I sighed a smile.

  Then my eyes popped open.

  Wait! Death didn’t follow Miss Vivee around like a love sick puppy. It shadowed me.

  Before I even came to Yasamee, my manager on my dig in Belize, Jairo Zacapa died. Shot. Second day in Yasamee there was Gemma Burke. Dry Drowned. Stallings Island and Oliver Gibbons. Poisoned. Rock Trap Gap, and Aaron Coulter and Laura Tyler . . .

  Murdered. All of them murdered.

  I sat straight up in bed.

  Oh. My. God.

  I was a homicide magnet.

  Chapter Seven

  I came down the oak staircase into the foyer and caught a whiff of something scrumptious wafting out from the kitchen.

  “Here I come,” I said out loud as my stomach growled in synchronous response. I hadn’t eaten anything at the fair the day before after all the uproar of people getting sick. And I was starving. I couldn’t wait to see what delicious dish Renmar had whipped up for the Monday morning crowd.

  The dining room to the left of the foyer was full. Even more than usual. I guess word had gotten around of all the blue ribbons Renmar had swept up at the fair. I waved at the people in the dining area as I followed my nose toward the kitchen. With my thoughts wrapped around food, I must have missed the creaking of the closet door under the staircase when it opened.

  I let out a screech as something reached out and yanked me in. I stumbled and bumped my head on the sloping ceiling.

  “Oh crap!”

  Bay put a finger up to his mouth to shush me, then reached up and pulled the chain, turning off the light.

  “What the hey?” I said and tried to adjust my eyes to the dark.

  “You got away from me last night.”

  I chuckled. “No. You got away from me. Seems like your job is your favorite girl, and, as your grandmother would say, I’m just playing second fiddle.”

  He clicked on the light. “Did my grandmother tell you that? You don’t really think that, do you?” Brows knitted in slight confusion, his eyes narrowed so much that with his thick, dark eyelashes they appeared closed. “I try not to let work get in the way of us.”

  I wanted to keep up the ruse, I enjoyed him being so concerned about me. But he was smelling so good, and looking so cute, I just couldn’t do it.

  “Just kidding,” I said and punched him. “Sheesh!”

  “Oh,” he said and clicked the light back off. “Good, then give me a kiss.” I could feel his hot breath on my face and I instinctively raised my head and closed my eyes.

  “So, are you going to marry me?” he asked.

  “I thought we were going to kiss?” I said. “What’s with all the talking?”

  “No,” he said and pulled back. “No kisses for you. Not until you answer my question.”

  “I don’t think that’s legal.”

  “What?”

  “Pulling a girl into a tight, dark closet, offering her kisses, then not delivering.”

  “I’m the law in this closet,” Bay said. “And I say it’s perfectly legal. And don’t try to get off the subject here. Are you going to marry me or not?”

  “Are you going to kiss me or not?”

  “Only if you’re going to marry me.”

  “Then get to kissing,” I said and reached up and pecked him somewhere on his face.

  “Is that a yes?” he asked.

  “Yes. I guess so. But, what happened to a romantic expensive restaurant, down on one-knee, you-complete-me, prepared speech kind of proposal?”

  “What? You don’t like the closet?”

  “I love the closet,” I said. “And I love you. Now give me my ring.” I poked him in his stomach.

  “Not yet. I have to ask your father, get his blessing. You know I’m a southern gentleman.”

  “Then why you keep wanting an answer from me now?”

  “Because I needed to get your dad’s phone number.” He clicked on the light.

  “Omigosh!” I said and laughed. I blinked trying to get used to the change in lighting. “You’re the FBI, and you can’t get a phone number?”

  “Can you just text it to me?” he asked. “Please.”

  My stomach rumbled.

  “What was that?” he asked.

  “I’m hungry and you’re keeping me from whatever your mother has smelling so good in the kitchen.” I put my hand on the knob of the door. “I’ll text you my dad’s number, but you better speak to my mom, too. She runs things at our house.”

  “And for some reason, I’m betting you think you’re going to be doing the same thing at our house.”

  “Not if you keep food from me, like you’re doing now. I’ll be too weak to try and run anything.”

  He leaned down and gave me a kiss. “I’ll keep you fed and happy when we get married.”

  “And let me run everything?”

  “Everything,” he said. “I promise.”

  He gave me a real kiss that time, and then not only was my stomach growling, but my head was reeling, and my knees went weak.

  Mmmmm . . . I’m already happy.

  “I can’t wait for you to be my bride.” Bay said, pulling his lips away from mine. “You are my world, you know? Prepared speech aside.”

  I smiled. “And I can’t wait to get that two-carat ring.” I pulled my cell phone from my pocket and texted him my parents’ numbers.

  He chuckled. “Two carats. Right.” We heard the ding of his phone, letting us know there was a message received. “Okay,” he said and kissed me again. “So, look. I gotta make a phone call,” he said. “Then I have to go up to Augusta to the coroner’s office to check on Jackson Wagner’s autopsy results.”

  “They finished with the autopsy?” I asked. “That was quick, especially for a Sunday.’

  “Just the preliminary report. Toxicology is still out, but the ME hinted that he had some pertinent info for me.”

  “Oh, okay.”

  “So, go get something to eat, and I’ll come say bye after I make my call.”

  He leaned down and gave me a peck on the lips.

  I made it into the kitchen, a grin on my face wide as the Savannah, thoughts of marrying Bay on my mind. “Mornin,’” I said.

  Brie, Hazel Cobb and Renmar were talking – gossiping – about the fair, and the entries into the cook-off. Brie and Hazel sat at the large kitchen table drinking coffee. Renmar stood on the other side of the oversized, butcher block topped island stacking plates and carrying them over to the sink.

  The large chef’s kitchen was bright, shiny and cheery. A big window over the farmhouse sink let in lots of natural light, and bright white eyelet cotton curtains were ruffled by the breeze that blew in.

  I walked across the rust and black checkerboard cork floor, my feet sinking into it as I made my way to the six burner aluminum gas stove. There, sat atop of it, were homemade cinnamon buns topped with glazed pecans in a glass Pyrex dish

  Oh my . . .

  My mouth watered as I plucked a butter knife from the silverware drawer, bumped it shut with my hip, and pulled a small plate from the cabinet. I cut out one of the gooey rolls, and slid it onto the plate, then licked the knife, and my fingers. I grabbed a glass, and went to the fridge and poured myself some milk, then slid into a seat at the table with Brie and Hazel Cobb. I broke off a huge piece of the pastry and stuffed it into my mouth.

  I chewe
d slowly to savor every morsel, my eyes almost shutting. I watched Renmar through half-closed eyes as she squirted dish liquid on the plates in the sink, steam rising as she sprayed them with hot water.

  I plucked off another piece, plopped it into my mouth and licked my fingers.

  “Why would you have my mother grow dreadlocks?” Renmar said, just out of blue. She had turned from the sink, her hands covered in the sudsy water.

  I turned to look in back of me to see who she was talking to. Had someone just walked in? No. No one was behind me. I looked at Brie and Hazel Cobb, who were looking at me.

  “I’m talking to you, Miss Logan,” Renmar said wiping her hands on a dishtowel, her accent more pronounced than usual.

  My eyes got wide, and a pecan got stuck in my throat. “Me?” came my choked response.

  “Yes. You.” She placed her hands on her hips. “She doesn’t need any help going down the crazy road.”

  “I . . .” I opened my mouth to answer and then shut it again. I didn’t know what to say because there was no telling what Miss Vivee had told her.

  There was an awkward silence as everyone waited for me to answer.

  “Morning.” Bay walked into the doorway and stopped. Licking his thick lips, he rubbed his hands together, and smiled wide, showing a mouth full of white teeth.

  Saved by the bell – or rather Bay.

  Thank you, husband-to-be.

  “My, my,” he said. “I’ve never seen so many beautiful women in one place in all my life.”

  “Hi Bay,” Hazel said smiling.

  “Good morning,” Brie greeted him.

  He walked around the table and kissed Hazel Cobb.

  “Give me a hug,” she said.

  He did and then kissed his Auntie Brie. He went over to his mother, who still stood by the sink, and gave her a big bear hug.

  “My favorite son,” Renmar said.

  “Your only son, Ma.” He planted a big kiss on her forehead, each cheek, and then touched her nose with his finger tip. “And the luckiest son in the world.”

  His gestures and words made her eyes gleam with joy. She wasn’t thinking about anything I’d done anymore.