One potion in the grave.., p.9
One Potion in the Grave: A Magic Potion Mystery, page 9
Curious, I backtracked down the steps and poked my head around the corner. The right wheel of Cassandra Calhoun’s wheelchair had gone off the stone pathway, and had become mired in the spiky grass covering the embankment of the lily pond. She was tipped precariously, and trying her best to use her body weight to get her wheel unstuck. Apparently she thought using every cuss word she knew would help her prevent an afternoon swim with the resident bullfrogs.
“Need help?” I asked, unsure if her sense of pride would be put in front of her sense of self-preservation.
She jumped in her seat at the sound of my voice. Her chair wobbled, and she let out a squeal. Quickly, I set my packages on a nearby bench and grabbed the handles of the chair. I gave it a good yank, back onto the safety of the walkway.
Her hands immediately went to the pearls around her neck, and she nervously rolled beads between her fingers. “Thank you.” She eyed the pond she’d almost toppled into and smiled wryly. “I don’t look good in algae.”
Her smile transformed her sullen features, crinkling her eyes and brightening her whole countenance.
“Not many can pull off that shade of green,” I said. “Are you okay?”
“Fine, fine,” she said. “Just a little rattled.”
“I heard. It’s a colorful vocabulary you have.”
She had the grace to blush. “You pick up a lot of words while working with politicians.”
“Mostly from outraged constituents, I imagine.”
Laughing, she said, “Fortunately, I don’t get much of that. Ever since leaving D.C., my work has been more . . . charitable.” Her gaze softened.
I thought about the time she’s spent with a group that raised money to help feed hungry children. Not too long ago, there had been a photo of her getting a hug from a little girl whose family had been helped by the program. There had been tears in Cassandra’s eyes. Sincere ones. “Hugs from little kids are much better than cusses.”
Smiling, she said, “Infinitely. But I’d trade those hugs in a hot second to stop the reason why I’d gotten them in the first place. No child should ever go hungry.”
I watched her closely. It sounded like such a spiel, but I could tell she meant every word. “If you become a senator, maybe you can help make that happen.”
Her eyes flashed with determination. “That’s the plan . . . eventually.” Her nose wrinkled. “I grow more impatient every day. There’s so much I want to do. To change.”
I wondered if she could truly make changes. Seemed like politicians had to jump through a hundred hoops to get anything accomplished these days.
“You were at the Crazy Loon earlier, right? Kathryn’s friend?” She held out her hand. “I’m Cassandra Calhoun.”
I shook. “Carly Hartwell.” I didn’t think it necessary to verify that I’d been at the inn—Cassandra had gotten a good look at me. “Do you want me to fetch your mother to come over here? I just saw her over at the gazebo.”
“No!” She tucked a strand of hair behind her ear. “No, thanks. I don’t want to hear the lecture about how I should have been more careful in unfamiliar terrain.” She eyed the pond. “Fortunately, I’m a good swimmer. I spent many hours in the pool after my accident, building upper arm strength. That was quite the hullaballoo earlier,” she said.
I wasn’t sure which hullaballoo she referred to. The break-in or Marjie’s trigger finger. “It was,” I said, agreeing on both accounts.
With a bemused smile, she added, “This is an interesting little town.”
It was true. We were nothing if not interesting. Movement at the back of the chapel caught my attention. Katie Sue stuck her head around the corner, gave me a finger wave, then disappeared again.
My first thought at seeing her was that I was glad she survived the car ride with Warren. My second thought was mercy sakes. What was she doing here, skulking around the chapel? Her presence most certainly wouldn’t be welcomed by the Calhouns.
“Do you need help back to the gazebo?” I asked Cassandra. Maybe if I could waylay Katie Sue, I could avoid any more drama today.
“No, thanks,” Cassandra said, “I think I’ll explore a lit—”
Her words were cut off by the sound of a man’s voice calling her name. “Cass? Cassie!”
“Over here!” she said loudly.
Landry Calhoun rounded the back corner of the chapel, and rolled his eyes when he spotted her. “I’ve been looking everywhere for you.”
To me, she said, “He always was the worst at hide-and-seek. When we were little it would take hours for him to find me sometimes.”
He winked at me. “She still hasn’t figured out that I hadn’t been that keen on finding her.”
“Hey!” she said, giving him a playful shove.
“What?” he asked slyly. “You were such a bossy thing. It was good to have a break from you ordering me around.” He nodded his head toward me. “I’m Landry Calhoun. I think I saw you earlier at the hotel.”
I introduced myself again. “How’s your headache?”
He grinned. “It would be better if my mama wasn’t harpin’ on me to find where Cass wandered off to.”
Shoo-ee. His smile could knock a girl’s knees out from under and make her throw her caution—and panties—to the wind if she weren’t careful. Fortunately for me I always had my guard up around people. For a little extra protection, I grabbed my locket. Just in case.
“Well, these days I’m not all that hard to find,” Cassandra said, smiling at her brother. She patted her wheelchair. “I can’t get very far in this thing.”
“You kiddin’ me?” he said. “You could roll plumb down to the Gulf if you wanted.”
“The Gulf sounds nice right about now,” she said, her eyes glinting with mischief. “If we leave now . . .”
“Don’t start,” he said, his voice taking a harder edge.
Seemed as though Cass wasn’t too happy about her little brother getting hitched. I had to wonder why. Because she knew he wasn’t in love?
“And on that note,” he added, “you hiding from the planning isn’t going to stop the wedding from happening. You’re Gabi’s maid of honor. You should be over at the gazebo with us and not hiding here with the lily pads.”
It was like they’d forgotten I was standing there.
“At least over here I don’t have to bear witness,” she said, folding her arms across her chest.
“Cass.”
“Landry.”
As much as I was enjoying this little show . . . “Ahem,” I said, clearing my throat.
Both their gazes snapped to me.
“I should get going,” I said. “I have a lot to do to set up for the wedding.”
Both their brows crinkled, and I could easily see the family resemblance in their confused expressions.
“The wedding?” Cassandra asked.
“Oh, didn’t you know?” I asked. “This is my mama’s chapel. I’m helping with the wedding set up. There are three hundred chairs calling my name.” And a potion to deliver to a certain bride.
“Your mama’s chapel? Doesn’t your aunt own the inn where we’re staying, too?” Cass asked.
Even though it was probably only good manners—and a desire for public office—that kept her from saying, “Are you crazy people everywhere?” I could practically hear it in her tone.
“Miss Rona is your mama?” Landry asked, another one of those knee-knocking smiles gracing his face.
“That’s what I’m told,” I said, “though when I was little my aunties, the Odd Ducks, also told me that my mama found me floating in a basket on the river while gigging frogs, felt sorry for my sad self, and brought me home to spear my daddy since she didn’t catch any frogs that day. Can’t tell you how long I believed that story.”
Landry tipped his head back and laughed.
Hoo-boy. Even holding on to my locket, the man made my knees wobble a little.
Cassandra’s lip twitched in humor.
“You think your mama would adopt me?” Landry asked. “I could get used to this town right quick.”
“I wouldn’t bring it up to her,” I said, “or you’ll have adoption papers on your pillow by bedtime.” I was kidding. Mostly.
Cassandra looked at him and pouted. “You’d be lost without me.”
He tousled her hair. “That’s a fact. I’d have no one to boss me about.”
I laughed. “Oh, my mama would have that covered in no time.”
“Whoa, then,” he said, holding up his hands. “I best stick with the bossy mama I already have. And besides, who’d find Cass when she goes hiding?”
“I swanee!” a woman cried from nearby. Louisa Calhoun stood at the curve of the walkway, her hands on hips. Color was high in her cheeks as she said, “How long does it take to find your sister? She can’t go very far.”
“I told you so,” Cassandra said.
“Lands sakes,” Louisa went on. “You think I was the one getting married for all you care about this wedding.”
I noticed her words slurring a little and had the feeling she’d indulged in an afternoon tipple. Or two.
“Come, come,” Louisa said. “Get a move on, you two.”
“Nice to meet you, Carly,” Landry said. He grabbed hold of Cassandra’s wheelchair handles and started up the walkway.
“Wait,” she said. “Turn me around.”
He did and winked at me. “See what I mean about bossy? I’m double-teamed.”
“Shush,” Cassandra said. “You wouldn’t have it any other way.”
“Oh, I don’t know,” he said. “Now that I have options . . .”
“Landry! Cassandra! Now!” Louisa said, one octave shy of shrill.
She’d definitely been drinking if she was behaving this way. Usually Southern mamas threatened by dropping voices not raising them.
Cassandra twisted and said, “One moment, Mother.” She turned back to me and said, “I just wanted to say thanks for saving me from the algae, Carly. I truly appreciate it.”
“No problem. Thanks for the vocabulary lesson.”
Smiling, she said, “Anytime.”
“Vocabulary lesson?” I heard Landry ask as they disappeared around the back of the chapel.
I thought about the upcoming wedding and how it seemed to be causing nothing but stress and strife. Then, of course, there was Delia’s dream to worry about.
As I headed to set up those chairs, I couldn’t help but wonder if this wedding was going to happen at all.
Chapter Ten
“This here row’s a little crooked.”
I wiped sweat from my eyes with blistered hands and found Dylan sitting in one of the chairs I’d just unfolded. “I think your eyes might be a little crooked.”
I’d been out here in the sun for hours now, and I was ten chairs away from being finished with this horrendous task. The last thing I wanted to hear was that one of the rows was crooked. I just wanted to be done, go home to take a cold shower, and have a heart-to-heart with Katie Sue to find out what was going on with her. I never did find her after her game of peek-a-boo behind the chapel. I hoped she’d gone back to my house to lie low for a while.
Laughing, he said, “I brought you a milk shake. Chocolate.” He held it aloft and wiggled it.
I lunged toward him, grabbed the shake, and planted myself next to him. It felt good to sit down. “I take back every bad thing I’ve ever said about you.”
“You’ve said bad things? I’m shocked. Just shocked.”
I talked around the straw. “A time or two.”
Or twenty. Out of anger. Of sadness. But as I looked at him now, I realized that all those old feelings had just about disappeared. My heart was healing. I was healing. The time we’d spent together lately had helped. I was getting to know him again. Seeing him through new eyes. And lord help me, I liked what I saw. Which made me wonder what would become of us this time around. Could we be “just friends”? Were we destined for another trip down the aisle? Or would we split for good?
I held up the drink. “Thanks for this.”
His dark eyebrows dipped into a concerned V. “What happened to your hands?”
Icy bits of chocolate slid down my throat, making me hate the past three hours a little less. “Two hundred and ninety chairs is what happened.”
Taking hold of one of my hands, he inspected my blistered palm. “No gloves?”
“In this heat?”
“Better than blisters.”
“Says you. A little marigold cream mixed with some Leilara and I’ll be good as new in no time.”
He hadn’t let go of my hand. I tried pulling it away, but he held tight.
“What?” he asked with a twinkle in his eye. “Don’t you like holding hands with me?”
Truth was I liked it. A lot. Blisters and all. This line we were walking between being friends and dating was quickly disappearing. “I’m sweaty and dirty and blistery. This is no time for hand-holding.”
“Says you,” he said, throwing my words back at me. “I like you this way. All mussed up.” He gently kissed my palm. “But I don’t like when you’re hurt.”
His kiss sent a sizzling sensation straight to the pit of my stomach.
“Better?” he asked.
I held the paper milk shake cup to my cheek, hoping the cold would freeze me from the inside out. “A little,” I admitted.
“There’s more where that came from.”
“Milk shakes?” I asked innocently.
“As many as you want, Care Bear,” he said, playing along, making me want him more than I already did.
Good Lord Almighty, I had zero willpower. I sucked so hard on my straw I wouldn’t have been the least bit surprised if I swallowed my tonsils.
Fortunately for me and my lack of discipline, Dylan let go of my hand, stood up, and grabbed a chair from the rolling rack. He went about setting it in line with the others.
“I didn’t just come bearing milk shakes,” he said, “but a bit of bad news, too.”
“Nothing happened to Gabi, did it?” Last I’d seen of her, she’d headed off to supper with the Calhouns, the love potion tucked tidily into her purse.
“Not that I know of, but Carly, Earl Pendergrass was attacked today.”
I went cold—and it had nothing to do with the shake. “What happened?”
“Someone jumped him at the tail end of his mail route. Knocked him upside the head, stole his bag.”
“Is he okay?”
“Doc Hamilton diagnosed a concussion and gave him nine stitches to the back of his head where he hit the sidewalk.”
Suddenly, my shake was sitting like lead in my stomach. “The Calhouns are behind this. They’re after the envelope Katie Sue mailed.” I’d already told him about the “ammunition” Katie Sue said she had and how she’d resorted to some form of extortion—which Dylan could do nothing about as a lawman unless the Calhouns reported it.
“Louisa had been hell-bent on getting her hands on that envelope earlier. I bet she had Warren send one of his lug nuts after it.”
He set another chair in the row. “That’s what I figured, too, but there’s just no way to prove it. No one saw anything. Wait. Lug nuts?”
“The private security thugs? But they’d probably just vouch for each other.”
“Lug nuts,” he repeated, chuckling under his breath.
“It fits.”
“Suppose so,” he said, setting another chair. “Worst of all for Earl, the attack was for nothing.”
“Why’s that?”
“Earl had already dropped off the mail he collected from his morning route at the post office.”
I wondered if Katie Sue sent the package to her home address—and suddenly worried that her local mail carrier would be attacked, too. Hopefully, she wasn’t that naïve, and had sent the package to a neutral party.
Dylan grabbed another chair—he was much faster at this than I was. “You’ll never guess who Earl called to drive him home from Doc’s.”
“Who?” I asked.
“Your aunt Hazel. I think he’s sweet on her. Last I saw, she was fussin’ over him and he was smilin’ ear to ear. Him getting conked on the head might be the best thing that happened to him all year.”
“Hush,” I said, but I couldn’t help but smile, too. Maybe Hazel’s affections could be swayed from the very young John Richard Baldwin to the very age-appropriate Earl . . . Hmm.
“Well, me-oh-my! Looks like my Carly girl got her delegating skills from her mama!” My mama, Veronica “Rona” Fowl, fanned her face with her hand as she toddled in three-inch heels over to where I sat. “You did good, baby girl. Real good.”
“You’re going to make me blush, Miz Rona,” Dylan said.
My mama’s hair color of choice this week was a nice sedate fire engine red. Little plumes of hair stuck up like flames all over her head. The pixie cut suited her spritely personality, but I could blink and she’d have extensions—she was forever changing her mind about styles.
She wore a zebra-printed wraparound dress that clung to her full-figured body, and even with her heels she barely came up to my chin.
“Did y’all hear about Earl Pendergrass?” she asked as she sat next to me. Her eyes, complete with false lashes, widened when she spotted my shake.
“It’s gone,” I said, mourning the empty cup.
“Damn shame,” she said.
“About Earl or the shake?” I asked with a smile.
“Don’t go puttin’ me on the spot like that, Carly.” She leaned in and whispered, “The shake. Earl’s going to be just fine.”
I laughed and rested against her. She was all kinds of crazy, but I loved her more than words could say. “I did bring you a torte from Dèjá Brew. It’s in your office.”
