Bones in the Begonias Read online

  More often than not she’d had nothing left over.

  “You’d save a lot of money if you would cook for yourself,” he said gently.

  She shot him a resentful look. “I would, if I didn’t have to deal with the devil himself to do that.”

  He frowned at her and glanced around the kitchen, as if questioning what she was talking about. “What do you mean?”

  She snorted and pointed at the stove. “That thing. It’s the very devil. Every time I try to do anything with it, it fills the room with a horrible gas smell. I’d be sick before I could even cook something. Better to go hungry than fight with that nightmare.”

  Chapter 8

  Mack stared at her in disbelief, a strangled sound escaping despite his best attempts to hold it back. But that quickly became a chuckle, and, before long, the room filled with a big rolling sound as he laughed.

  She stood and glared at him. “You can leave if you’re just going to laugh at me,” she snapped. But she doubted he even heard her, his laughing was so loud. She stomped her feet in frustration, making him howl all the more. “What is your problem?”

  He dropped his chin to his chest, still chuckling. Finally, after several big gasping breaths, he raised his head and said, “It’s a stove. It’s not the devil incarnate. It is a stove.”

  She sniffed and raised her nose in the air. “To you, it’s a stove. To me it’s something designed to torment honest citizens all over the world.”

  He tried to contain the mirth once again bubbling up.

  She shook her finger at him. “If you dare laugh at me again …”

  His face worked in all kinds of directions as he tried to hold it in.

  Finally she slumped down at the table into her chair again. “It’s not funny,” she said in disgust. “You have no idea how many times I’ve tried to work that stove.”

  He leaned forward. “You could take a cooking class.”

  “Do you think they teach these basics, like how to turn on the damn thing?” She narrowed her gaze as his eyes widened, and his shoulders shook, and his face turned bright red as he tried not to crack up once more. She crossed her arms. “Oh, what the hell. Go ahead and make fun of me. That’s what my soon-to-be ex-husband always did.”

  That stopped his laughter as fast as anything. “Did you not cook growing up?”

  She shook her head. “My mother wouldn’t cook at all. We lived on takeout.”

  He stared at her in horror. “What?”

  She nodded. “It was either takeout or we had a housekeeper who cooked. I never was in the kitchen. All throughout my marriage we had chefs, and I wasn’t allowed to do anything. I couldn’t even get my own tea.”

  It was his turn to sit back and stare. “I can’t imagine a life like that.”

  “Well, I can’t imagine a life like everybody else must have had. It seems like I was raised in an entirely different way from the rest of the world. I married into a similar atmosphere and now find myself completely flummoxed by the basics.”

  He glanced around the kitchen, then back at her, a speculative look on his face. “How are you surviving if you can’t cook?”

  She shrugged. “I can make cheese and crackers.”

  His jaw dropped.

  She waved a hand at him. “Okay, it’s not that bad. I can make a sandwich.”

  “And what else?”

  She glared at him. “Anything that comes out of a can or a jar that doesn’t require cooking. Takeout is my best friend. But even more so is the deli. I eat a lot of bread and peanut butter lately.” She stared morosely at the table. “I feel like I must have something in common with starving students. They always talk about Ramen noodles and peanut butter sandwiches.”

  In a deceptively calm voice he said, “Ramen noodles have to be cooked.”

  She stared at him in outrage. “Really? I’ve been eating them dry out of the package.”

  And that did it. He almost fell off his chair to the floor as he howled.

  Pissed off at herself and at him, and frustrated by the whole world for making something so simple so complicated, she picked up her coffee and headed to the back deck. She’d be damned if she would sit here and let him laugh at her.

  Still, if she were rational and detached from the whole thing, it would be funny as hell, providing it happened to somebody else. The fact that it was her, that was a whole different story. As she walked in the backyard onto the grass, or what was supposed to be grass, she tried to focus on the broken fence in front of her and the weeds in the garden.

  It all seemed like too much. She should be eating well to do this kind of physical work. And she’d lied, as she couldn’t afford takeout. It was too expensive. Her last grocery shopping had been fruits and veggies for a salad, and some hearty bread. She could at least have those with cheese.

  “I’m sorry,” Mack said from behind her.

  Her shoulders stiffened and then relaxed. “Whatever. I’m glad it made somebody’s day.”

  “I could show you, if you want.”

  She froze. She didn’t know how to take his offer. Was he being genuinely helpful, or did he just want his funny bone tickled every time he came over? Because she knew he’d find her inability to do anything in the kitchen amusing. She didn’t have anything left but her pride, and that hadn’t gotten her anywhere so far. She turned to look at him, studying the sincerity in his face. “Show me what?”

  “Well, we could start with lighting the stove,” he said with a big smile.

  She glared at him but was cutting her nose off to spite her face if she said no. “And I want you to show me how you make the coffee. Mine never tastes the same.”

  He nodded solemnly. “You wrote it down before, didn’t you?”

  She frowned. “I did, but it doesn’t taste like yours when I make it.”

  Back in the house, she snatched up her pad of paper where she’d been taking notes on the Betty Miles case.

  He caught sight of the name at the top and glared at her. “No digging into cold cases.”

  “The thing about cold cases,” she snapped back, “is that nobody gives a damn. They’re cold. They’re old. They’re gone and forgotten.”

  “Nobody has forgotten Betty Miles.” He waved a hand over her kitchen table. “Look. You just came up with the name on the box, and your neighbor popped up, heard you, and told you about the girl. It was a big case at the time. Nobody has forgotten about her.”

  She shrugged. “In which case, nobody should object to me taking a look around to see if I can find anything, should they?”

  He glared at her. Now she felt better.

  “And why was she so infamous? She was just a teenager.”

  “She was. She was a troubled teen. But a lot of very expensive jewelry disappeared around the same time, and there were suspicions it was all connected. But all of the threads fell apart. The prosecutor couldn’t pull together enough evidence to charge anyone.”

  “So she became known as the thief as well?”

  “She was a local, and there was a lot of press about the missing jewels, so she became quite infamous. The fact that she’d been dismembered, and we’d only found one arm, just added to it.”

  “And we are sure it’s her?”

  “Yes.” He pulled the ring from his pocket. “I’ll check and see if this is one of the missing pieces of jewelry from back then.”

  Her eyes lit up. “You suspected that right away, didn’t you?”

  “No, not necessarily.”

  She sniffed. “Liar.”

  He glared at her. “Is that anything to say to somebody who’s willing to help you?”

  Immediately she felt bad. He was trying to help her. In fact, ever since they’d met, although he was brusque and gruff, he’d been very good at helping her out. “So why don’t we go back to the creek and see if there’s more jewelry?”

  “Because it’s a waste of time if this isn’t connected to the case.”

  “That means you have pictures
you can check?”

  “The pieces were all insured. So, with any luck, there should be pictures, yes.” He pointed at the stove. “Let me at least show you how to turn that on.”

  She smiled, happy that maybe he could help her with that much.

  “But let’s start with this.” He showed her the coffee carafe and where he filled the water up to.

  She read the line that said six cups. She carefully put that in her notes. She had been filling the entire carafe.

  “Fill the water to here. Pour it into the back.” He pulled out the used coffee grounds and dumped them in the trash.

  She wanted to say something about him mocking her for not knowing something so basic as to where the water went in a coffeemaker, then realized not being able to turn on a stove was pretty damn basic. So she should just shut up and take notes in case her brain decided to have a fast one day, and she couldn’t remember what the hell she was doing again. She wrote down his instructions as he explained how much coffee to grind, how to know how much coffee she was grinding, and how to pour it all into the new filter.

  Then he gave her instructions on cleaning the coffee grinder.

  She stared at the small hopper in horror. “You mean, I have to clean that thing?”

  He slid her a sidelong glance. “You don’t do it all that often. But every six months would be a good idea.”

  She shrugged, made a note on the page, but mentally thought, Nope, not going to happen. Still, she was turning over a new leaf and trying to do everything herself, so, if cleaning out a coffee grinder was doing that, then fine.

  Then he moved on to the stove. “Come take a look at this.”

  Obediently she stood beside him, the pad of paper and a pen in her hand.

  “See this?” He pointed at all the knobs in the front.

  She nodded. It really hurt her ego to have somebody explain this to her.

  “This one’s for the back left burner. This one is for the back right. This is for the front right. This one is for the front left.”

  She looked at the knobs. “How do you know that?”

  He glanced at her in surprise. “That’s what these letters mean down here.”

  The letters were so worn off she couldn’t see them. In fact, she wasn’t sure she’d ever seen them. “How did you know that?” She waved at the stove knobs. “There’s nothing left to read on this thing.”

  He stared at her. “In this case it’s common sense because I’ve used stoves a lot. But you’re right. All the letters and numbers of the dials have been completely worn down to nothing.” He frowned. “It would be a good idea for you to get something more modern.”

  “Like I’m going to spend money on a second devil when I can’t even use the first one,” she scoffed.

  He chuckled. “Now, when you turn this knob, the gas will come up. It should light automatically.”

  Instinctively she backed up as he turned the knob, and instantly the smell of gas wafted up her nose. But no lighting happened. There was no flame. There was nothing at all.

  A frown formed on his face. He turned off the burner and turned on the second one that went to the back burner. Again the same thing.

  “So?”

  He turned it off and opened the doors on the side of the oven. “If it doesn’t light automatically, then she must have a lighter here for it.”

  “A lighter?”

  He nodded. “A lighter. Something that will ignite the gas to a blue flame.”

  She stared at him in horror. “As in flame flames? Like fire? Real fire? Inside the house?”

  He turned to look at her and, once again, broke down laughing.

  Chapter 9

  An hour later …

  As she walked to the creek after her cold dinner of salad and crackers, a cup of tea in her hand, she pondered how she would have known the stove wasn’t working properly if Mack hadn’t tried. There really wasn’t any way to know unless she understood the workings of a stove. He told her not to turn it on again until she had somebody come and check it out.

  She had frowned. “I don’t have money to fix that.”

  He gave her a harsh look. “And you don’t have the money if this thing blows up. It’s ancient. None of the lighters work, and I wouldn’t trust the gas either. It comes on too strong, too fast. It probably just needs to be checked out. Don’t worry about it. The repairman is a friend of mine. I don’t think he’ll charge you very much.”

  Her gut clenched at the not very much. That was relative. It varied from person to person, but, in her case, there really was no variance. Any money was too much money.

  She stood at the creek for a long moment, unsettled. And then thought of Nan. Doreen hadn’t seen Nan today. Buoyed at the thought of seeing her grandmother and hearing Nan’s quirky stories, Doreen pulled out her cell phone and called her. “Hey, Nan. Have you had dinner?”

  “I sure have. Are you coming to visit me and have a cup of tea?” Nan invited her over.

  She stared at the tea in her hand and smiled. “Absolutely. You okay if I bring the animals?”

  “I’d be heartbroken if you didn’t,” Nan declared.

  With that, Doreen left her chipped teacup on a nearby rock, crossed over the creek on the bridge, Mugs and Goliath moving ahead of her, and Thaddeus, being stubborn, waddling behind. She led her menagerie down the opposite side of the creek toward Nan’s place.

  It was a bit of a roundabout way, but it was much nicer than going through town. Not that Nan lived very far away. This route just tacked on five minutes. But it was five minutes along the creek, so who could argue with that?

  She passed the spot and tried not to look where she’d found the dead man last week. It was hard to believe it had only been a handful of days ago. “Come on, Mugs,” she called out to the basset hound, who dragged his nose along the ground as he appeared to sniff every critter’s scent that might have gone this way.

  He was a good guard dog. But, more than that, he was a wonderful companion. He’d helped her keep her sanity when her marriage had splintered. Who’d have thought that this pet would be such a comfort to her?

  She turned to look at Thaddeus and frowned. “Thaddeus? Thaddeus!”

  Worried, she retraced her steps. “Where are you, Thaddeus?”

  “Thaddeus is here. Thaddeus is here.”

  With relief she watched as he wandered toward her from the underbelly of a tree. “Thaddeus, you can’t just roam around free like that,” she said worriedly. The bird appeared to be completely unconcerned. “Don’t you know it’s dangerous for you to be out here alone?”

  He stopped and stared at her. “Thaddeus up. Thaddeus up.”

  She frowned. Normally he didn’t request to come on her shoulder—he just flew up. She patted her shoulder, and he opened his wings. But he didn’t seem able to hop. Startled, worried, she walked toward him and scooped him up. That was when she saw the blood on his foot. “What have you done?”

  She wasn’t sure what he got caught in, but something small had ripped his skin. Cooing to him gently, she turned and walked toward Mugs and Goliath. “It’s just a little scratch. You should be okay.”

  As she wandered toward Nan’s, Thaddeus gently cooed along Doreen’s neck and brushed against her cheek.

  She smiled and reached up to stroke him. “I wasn’t so sure about having you originally, but I’m really glad you’re part of my family now,” she said in a low voice, kissing his shoulder.

  As if he understood, he dropped his head against her cheek and just held it there for a long moment.

  With a happy sigh, and feeling more contentment than she had all day, she walked the last block toward Nan’s place. As they approached, Nan was already seated outside on the patio, waiting for them. Mugs barked and raced across the grass.

  Doreen winced. She’d been told many times by the rude gardener here how she was not to walk on the grass. But no stepping stones or even a walking path led to Nan’s corner apartment, so Doreen had to cross on t
he grass. The only way for her to avoid it was to walk all the way to the front of the complex and enter the building, where no animals were allowed. She shrugged and once again did what she was told not to do and stepped on the grass. But she did it just as fast as she could.

  Before long she was seated at the little bistro of a table Nan had. She smiled as her grandmother joyously welcomed a big greeting from both Goliath and Mugs. Nan looked over at Doreen and beamed. “I think it’s the best thing ever that you moved to town, my dear.”

  “That’s just so you can keep your pets close.”

  Nan chuckled. “Well, I certainly have lots of friends here. At my age, this is a lovely place to be. The house was getting to be a bit too much work. I do miss the animals though.” She reached across the table with a tiny bit of bread in her fingers. “Thaddeus, are you hungry?”

  Thaddeus hopped off Doreen’s shoulder and waddled across the table.

  Nan immediately noticed the blood. “Oh, dear, what did he do?”

  “I’m not sure,” Doreen said. “He went into the underbrush when we were on the path. When he came back out, he had this scratch on his skin there.”

  Nan sighed. “He does think he’s a dog and should be allowed to go wherever he wants.”

  “And Goliath thinks he’s people, and Mugs thinks he’s the king of the pack,” Doreen finished for her grandmother with a laugh. “That’s all right. They’ve become a family for me, and I appreciate that.”

  With a smile of satisfaction Nan sat back. “Good,” she said firmly. “That’s what you need.”

  “I really appreciate you giving me a place to stay,” Doreen said. “I am having trouble with the stove though.”

  Nan looked at her with a frown. “What kind of trouble?”

  Doreen shrugged. She didn’t want to say too much. Nan knew Doreen couldn’t cook, but that didn’t mean she understood the depths of Doreen’s ignorance. “Couldn’t get it to light.”

  Nan nodded sagely. “It could be fussy.”

  “That’s not what I call it,” she said with a smirk. “I think it’s a little more than that. Mack said that I need to get it checked out before trying to use it again.”