1 In For A Penny Page 3

  “Did you close the office?” I asked Mama.

  “Sure did. A trauma of this magnitude calls for at least one pair of new shoes.”

  I shook my head in denial. “Mama, I’m a tight-fisted accountant. I don’t believe in new shoes.”

  Mama humpfed. “You might as well spend your money, Cleo. The government takes such a big chunk that what’s left over never seems like much. I say we hit every shoe store in Frederick. Lunch will be my treat.” She turned to Jonette. “You’re welcome to come along too, Johnsy.”

  Jonette’s eyes crossed from the effort it took not to throttle Mama for calling her that. Husband number three had dubbed her Johnsy and Mama had picked it up. So far, Jonette’s nickname had lasted five years longer than Roger Dalton. “No thanks. I’ve made other plans for the afternoon.”

  Mama stomped on Jonette’s foot. “Don’t be ridiculous. You can’t desert Cleo in her hour of need.”

  Jonette howled and jumped around on one foot. “Dammit. That was my good foot. Why the hell did you do that?”

  “Allow me.” Rafe Golden scooped Jonette up into his arms.

  Jonette wasn’t in the mood to be soothed. “Put me down, you muscle-bound oaf.”

  Rafe took the hint and put her down.

  I searched Jonette’s face to see if she was in the thrall of a rewarding feminine experience after his touch. I didn’t see the slightest indication of ecstasy or bliss, so I decided not to murder Jonette in front of witnesses. But I did need to get Mama out of here before she started ordering the entire police force around.

  From a nearby treetop a bird sang out, purty-purty-purty. I most definitely didn’t feel pretty. I felt like I needed a shower and a new life. I gripped Mama’s elbow and tugged her forwards. “Come on now, Mama. It’s not good for your heart to be getting so stirred up.”

  Mama sniffed copiously and dabbed at her dry eyes. She allowed herself to be steered towards the club parking lot. When Britt made no move to stop us, I assumed our leaving wasn’t a problem. After all, he knew where we lived.

  I led the parade back to my indestructible Volvo. I refused to ride in Jonette’s death trap and Mama’s ancient Oldsmobile navigated like a small ocean liner. It was the Gray Beast or nothing.

  So much for my hour of need.

  Chapter 4

  I nibbled at my free lunch. Mama had insisted on going to a discount store, and she’d sprung for hot dogs. Not my favorite comfort food, but I needed something in my empty stomach. “Sure you don’t want a bite?”

  Jonette snorted. “Hell no. Your Mama lured me here under false pretenses. She promised me a real lunch. Grabbing a hot dog is not my idea of comfort food. I need about two pounds of macaroni and cheese followed by a hot fudge brownie sundae. With real ice cream.” She pointed at my lunch. “No telling how old that hot dog is.”

  I shrugged. “Who cares? It’s got enough preservatives in it that it’d be safe to eat two hundred years from now.”

  Jonette gestured towards the industrial girders and fluorescent lights overhead. “Why are we sitting here? I don’t want to go shopping and neither do you.” Jonette narrowed her gaze at me. “This is all your fault anyway. I told you in fourth grade that Charlie Jones was trouble and did you listen to me?”

  I arched an eyebrow. “You’re going to fling that in my face again? What about all those men I warned you off of? What about Lance and Nathan and Roger and Vern and Simon? I’d go on but I’ve run out of fingers.”

  “Hey. I only married three of those losers. And it wasn’t my fault they were all such duds. They were really good kissers.”

  My recent encounter with Rafe Golden had me feeling as if there was life in this dead wood after all. Dreams and hopes and wishes all seemed as possible as my next breath. “Speaking of kissing, have you ever kissed the golf pro?”

  Jonette gazed sharply at me. A slow smile tugged at the corners of her lips. “I’ll be damned. It’s finally happening, isn’t it? You’re noticing men. Good God Almighty. I’d dance a little jig but your mother smashed my foot. And no, I’ve not had the pleasure.”

  I licked the last of the mustard from my fingers. So much for Rafe’s involvement with every female golfer at our club. Hope flickered like a single candle in the darkness. “Me either. I didn’t even know I wanted to until today. For some reason, I want to jump his bones. Do you think my reaction is a springtime thing like sap rising in the trees and animals mating?”

  Jonette patted my shoulder. “Yeah, you’re such an animal and all that. But I have to warn you. Rafe Golden isn’t a training wheels kind of date. He has a reputation for getting around.”

  Part of me wanted to play it safe but the rest of me wanted to forget that I had good reason to be cautious. That reckless part of me was willing to pay any price to feel alive again.

  A stoop-shouldered woman with a screaming kid in her shopping cart wheeled past. I waited until I could hear myself think before I spoke again. “That is a problem. How would I know if he was sincere or if I was just the flavor of the week? God, Jonette. I feel like I’m in eighth grade again. Doesn’t this attraction stuff ever get any easier?”

  Her eyebrows arched up under her highlighted bangs. “You’re asking me?”

  I was a mother of two and I lived in the same house as my Mama, neither of which was conducive to a freewheeling singles atmosphere. Besides, Mama, Jonette, Charla, and Lexy all had ideas about the type of man that I should acquire.

  Mama wanted me to marry a billionaire, while Jonette thought anything with a Y chromosome was fine. Charla wanted me to get back together with her father, and Lexy, bless her, was trying to fix me up with the football coach at the high school. I, of course, wanted Sean Connery, but he wasn’t knocking down my door.

  My gaze traveled down to my feet and I realized I still had on my golf shoes. I’d been doing a good job of not thinking about the events on the golf course until then, but that one glance took me right back to the number six rough and Dudley. Sitting there in the little hot dog alcove under fluorescent lights seemed every bit as surreal as the crime scene at Hogan’s Glen Golf Club.

  I’d have to tell the girls that Uncle Dudley was dead as soon as they got home from school. If I hadn’t left my cell phone in my golf bag, I could start making calls while we waited here. But I wasn’t the only one with a mobile phone. “Gimme your phone, Jonette. I should call Charlie and tell him about Dudley.”

  She shook her head. “Forget it. You’re not putting yourself through that. Bad idea. Very bad idea.”

  I knew it was a bad idea, but it needed to be done. Charlie and I maintained an amicable façade for the girls, but Dudley’s death would hit him hard. He didn’t have any family left to help him bear up under this strain. I owed him the common courtesy of a phone call.

  “Jonette, Charlie will come unglued when he finds out,” I said. “He needs to hear the news from someone he knows, not the police.”

  “Cleo, don’t do this to yourself. How can you forget for a minute that Charlie threw you away for Duh-nise? You don’t owe him a damned thing. The man deserves to rot in hell. If you forget that, you’re going to be stuck in emotional backwash forever. Cheaters never change. They cheat, period. Don’t get sucked into thinking you’re doing him any favors. The man made his bed. Let him lie there.”

  Two gnarled old men circled the alcove, obviously annoyed with us for sitting in their spot. I shifted uneasily on the bench we occupied. There was no question I hated what Charlie had done to our family, but there had been sixteen years of good times. I couldn’t erase those memories.

  My head ached. Charlie’s betrayal of our wedding vows had cut deep, deeper than any hurt I had ever experienced, including natural childbirth. Jonette was right. Charlie Jones and his feelings were no longer my responsibility. “Sounds like you’ve got an ax or two to grind. Is this how you’ve managed to get on with your life?”

  Jonette’s lower lip trembled. “I feel for you, Cleo. I know exactly what you’re
going through with Charlie. It feels like your guts have been ripped out and trampled. It feels like you want to curl up in a ball and check out. You start to doubt everything about yourself, from your ability to tie your shoes to how you drive a car. Being tough is the only way to survive.”

  In that moment I wanted to lash out at any member of the male species. I glared at the old men orbiting our bench. From the way they started at my fierce expression, you’d have thought I was the Antichrist.

  I drew in a shaky breath. Did I want to go through the rest of my life scaring old men? Was that really me? “Being tough sucks. I want my old life back.”

  Jonette growled at the old men and they shuffled away. “Get a grip. Your old life is gone. This is your new reality. If you had your old life back, you’d be watching Charlie like a hawk, waiting for him to mess up, and he would. There’s no going back. Forward is the only way to go.”

  I hated that she was right. I wanted to stick my head in the sand and wake up when I felt whole again. That wasn’t going to happen. My marriage was past tense, and so was Dudley.

  Speaking of Dudley, I wondered about Jonette’s edginess around the corpse. Had Britt’s suspicions about Jonette had any basis? I cleared my throat delicately. “About Dudley. Is there anything I should know?”

  Jonette stared at the thronged checkout lines. “What do you mean?”

  “I have a feeling there’s something you’re not telling me about Dudley. Do you know why he’s dead?”

  Except for a sudden hitch in Jonette’s breath, you wouldn’t have known my question bothered her. “Sure do,” she said. “The man was a royal prick. It’s a wonder he lived this long.”

  “I know you two had your differences, but I was wondering if there might be something more going on. Was there ever a time when you wanted your name linked with Dudley’s?”

  Jonette leaped to her feet. “One little mistake. Where’s your Christian charity? It’s not enough that Bitsy hates my guts, you’re going to hound me about it all of my days.”

  I waved her down. Jonette could do mad better than anybody I knew. She didn’t have to convince me she was upset. Back in high school Dudley had cheated Jonette out of her virginity. That single event had a profound effect on all of our lives. “I’m not talking about ancient history, for Pete’s sake. I’m talking about right now.”

  The old men made another lap past. They must have thought we were vacating the bench when Jonette got up. I glared at them again and they shuffled away. One of them flipped me a finger, but I couldn’t be bothered with him right now.

  Jonette was hiding something. I could smell it. The problem was that Jonette and Dudley had always been like oil and vinegar. Had something changed?

  She had always claimed she hated Dudley. His denying her a bank loan when she desperately needed one hadn’t helped either. Love and hate were two sides of the same coin as I had recently discovered. What wasn’t she telling me?

  Jonette grabbed my leg. “This is Dudley we’re talking about. The biggest liar of all time. What makes you think I’d let him back in my pants again? I’m not a complete idiot.”

  I pried her fingers loose lest the old men get the wrong idea. I loved Jonette like a sister but I knew she wasn’t being completely truthful. Did that make her a murderess?

  “Dammit, Jonette. You can’t fool me. I know you’re hiding something. Is it something that can get you arrested?”

  She shot me her best Queen Bee look. “That’s for me to know and you to find out.”

  That did it. I lunged for her throat.

  “You girls ready to go?” Mama asked sweetly.

  Sanity returned. If I was going to manhandle Jonette into spilling her guts, I was intelligent enough to do it where there were no witnesses. “Past ready.” I glanced down and saw that Mama had no shopping bags attached to her hands. “Where are the shoes you came here to buy?”

  “They didn’t have my size in the style I wanted. My choices were to chop off my toes and buy a smaller shoe or stuff the toes of a larger pair with tissue paper. I don’t need shoes that bad. Besides, we’ve still got the mall to go.”

  Jonette and I would kill each other if we had to spend more time together. “Not today. I’ve gotta get home, Mama. The girls will be home from school soon, and I have things that have to be done.”

  “Me too,” Jonette added hastily as she limped out of the discount store. “I’ve got to get ready for work.”

  Mama ignored Jonette’s comment and grabbed my arm. “Things? What kind of things do you have to do today?”

  I got Mama settled in the passenger seat while Jonette climbed in the back. Walking around the car, I collected my thoughts.

  If I dodged Mama’s question, she’d be merciless and no telling what else she’d also weasel out of me. If I said what I was going to do, I’d hurt Jonette. But Jonette had hurt me by not trusting me, so I wasn’t going to spare her feelings right now.

  I started the car and pulled out on the highway. “Things. Like picking up the house. Like making calls. I’ll offer for Bitsy and the boys to stay with us as long as they need to. It will be easier for her to make the funeral arrangements if she can stay here.”

  In my rearview mirror, I saw Jonette’s face tighten with anger. She’d always had trouble with my friendship with Bitsy, even aside from the Dudley thing. Jonette viewed Bitsy as a rival for my friendship.

  She had nothing to worry about there, and I’d told her so repeatedly over the years, but old insecurities die hard. In the twenty years I’d known Bitsy, we’d never shared the same level of closeness that Jonette and I had. For instance, I couldn’t imagine ever lunging for Bitsy’s throat.

  Jonette was different. I could easily want to strangle her in one minute and then go out to dinner with her the next. She understood me like no one else and we’d always shared our deepest darkest secrets.

  What she knew about me would easily fill a tell-all biography if I was famous or anything. Fortunately my lack of fame hadn’t tempted Jonette to sell me out.

  But now that my thoughts had started down that other road, I couldn’t stop myself from connecting the dots. Jonette was lying about Dudley. I knew that as sure as I knew my name.

  What I didn’t know was how big a lie it was. Over the years, Jonette and I had been in the trenches many times, and she’d never had homicidal tendencies before. What would make her lie to her closest friend?

  Chapter 5

  I pulled up near Mama’s whale of a car in the empty golf course parking lot. “I’ll see you at home.”

  Mama didn’t move a muscle. “Oh. I couldn’t possibly drive. My heart, you know. We’ll pick up my car tomorrow.”

  Jonette opened her door.

  Her car was parked clear across the lot. “Wait, Jonette. I’ll drive you over,” I said.

  “No thanks. I wouldn’t want to put you out in your hour of need.”

  It wasn’t very sporting of her to go away mad. I wanted to grill her but of course I couldn’t with Mama present, which was why I’d stopped at Mama’s car first. Given Jonette’s history with Dudley, I had to be sneaky if I wanted to pry her secrets out of her. “I’ll call you,” I said.

  I watched her limp to her car, waiting until I knew for sure that her tin can cranked up and I didn’t leave her stranded.

  “You and Jonette settle your differences?” Mama asked.

  I gripped the steering wheel tightly. Protecting Mama from Jonette’s secrets involved walking a fine line. I loved them both dearly but everyone knew there were some things you didn’t tell your Mama, no matter how old you were. Even though my Mama thought she knew everything, some of Jonette’s secrets would make her hair stand on end. “Now why would you think that? You caught me about to strangle her there at the hot dog stand.”

  Mama tsked. “The way you girls go on. I’ve never understood how you two could be best friends one minute and mortal enemies the next. And then when the mud slinging stopped you’d be inseparable again. I
s Dudley’s death driving a wedge between you?”

  I wondered how much Mama knew about Jonette and Dudley. Had Mama known that Jonette’s mother had thrown her out like garbage because of Dudley? Mama had never questioned me about my wanting Jonette to come live with us.

  But as a mother, I had a new perspective on that incident. If one of Charla or Lexy’s friends asked to move in with us, I would worry about the legal ramifications. I’d also worry that the child’s mother would be frantic until they learned of their child’s whereabouts. Without a doubt, I would phone the child’s mother. Is that what Mama had done?

  “We didn’t settle a darn thing,” I said. “Jonette is holding out on me and it’s irritating the daylights out of me. I’m worried that she’s somehow mixed up in this mess with Dudley.”

  “Jonette’s had a hard life,” Mama said as I headed over the mountain to Hogan’s Glen.

  “I’m not in the mood for one of your lectures, Mama. If you recall, I’m the one who found the dead body today. I’m the one whose life is currently in the toilet, and I’ll be damned if I’ll let you lecture me about Jonette falling on hard times. This is supposed to be my hour of need.”

  Mama sniffed. “Don’t get snippy with me, missy. Just because your father deeded the house over to you in his will doesn’t mean I won’t throw you out of my house.”

  I edged around the slow traffic in the right lane as we descended to the valley. It was a sore point with her that Daddy had entrusted the house to me.

  I knew he’d done it because he’d trained me to think like him, but Mama was certain I had ulterior motives and that I’d made him change his will. “Look, neither of us is going to throw the other one out, so don’t threaten me with that. Someone killed Dudley, and I’m afraid it might have been Jonette. Why else would she lie to me?”

  Mama did a double take. “Bite your tongue. Our Jonette? A bloodthirsty murderer? Does she even own a gun?”

  “Not unless she’s taken to keeping multiple secrets from me. But in this day and age, you never know who’ll be toting guns.” I had three guns under my bed, but that was beside the point.