Drip Dead Page 5

  A couple quick phone calls and I had company. Sue was ready for a break and Paula Ciccone, Barry’s wife and the Pine Ridge librarian, agreed to meet us at Franklin’s.

  My aging Beetle looked right at home in the parking lot of the Googie-style coffee shop. The expansive front windows and cantilevered concrete roof that typified the style testified to the origin of the building in the early 1960s, when Pine Ridge was a dinner stop on the way home from a day of skiing on Mount Hood.

  Inside, Franklin’s hadn’t changed much in the decades since. The booths lined against the front window were dark vinyl, the walls were covered with fake stone made of concrete, and the stainless-steel kitchen was clearly visible from the swivel stools that lined the counter.

  Sue and I settled into a booth where we could watch for Paula. We didn’t need to look at the menu. It hadn’t changed since we were kids. Good iced tea and the best club sandwich I’d ever had.

  Paula arrived a couple minutes later, out of breath.

  “The tenth-graders took longer than I expected,” she panted, sliding in next to me. “Too busy sizing up date choices to focus on their book choices.” She sighed. “As if I didn’t get enough of that at home.”

  I chuckled. Barry and Paula had married young and their youngest daughter had turned fourteen a few months ago. I knew from the stories Barry told that Megan was a greater challenge than both the older girls put together.

  Megan was the reason I even had a job with Barry. A couple years earlier she had chided her father about the absence of women on his crew. When I began looking for an apprentice spot Barry was eager to hire a woman, if only to get out of the doghouse with Megan.

  “Still battling the raging teenage hormones?” Sue asked with a grin.

  Since neither of us had kids, we could tease Paula without fear. My dogs might occasionally misbehave, but it was nothing compared to a rebellious teenager.

  Paula shook her head and groaned softly. “My mother tried to warn me. She said ‘Never let them outnumber you,’ and she was right. But we didn’t listen.” She shook her head, but it was more a gesture of amusement than denial. It was clear she enjoyed the challenge of Megan, whatever she said.

  “Can we talk about something besides my wayward daughter?”

  I was still laughing when the waitress appeared to take our order. I paid careful attention to the ordering process ever since the day I’d been so distracted I didn’t notice I had egg salad until I bit into it.

  I hate egg salad.

  “I have to watch my time,” I said. “I promised Sue’s boyfriend I’d be at his office at one thirty.” I threw Sue a glance and continued. “Wouldn’t want him tracking me down on the job. Again.”

  “On the job?” Paula said, her voice rising in indignation.

  “Georgie, you know he has to take your statement!” Sue protested.

  “What? He can’t use a telephone?” Paula wasn’t letting this one go.

  “He tried! Several times.” Sue stopped suddenly. She grabbed her iced tea and sucked on the straw, staring into the glass as though it was the most fascinating thing in the world.

  She could avoid looking at us, but she couldn’t stop the blush that spread up her neck and covered her face.

  “Uh, Sue?” I wished I could cock one eyebrow like everyone else on the planet. This was the perfect time for that expression. “What did he try”—I paused for dramatic effect—“several times?”

  Beside me Paula gasped, then giggled. Sue turned even redder, if that was possible.

  I couldn’t keep a straight face.

  “Never mind,” I said through the giggles that erupted. “I think I know!”

  “You two have very dirty minds!”

  “Us?” I proclaimed in mock outrage. “You’re the one turning several colors of red. What are we supposed to think?”

  Sue’s color slowly subsided. She waited a moment, then said stubbornly, “Well, he did try to call.”

  That brought a fresh wave of giggles from me and Paula, and finally a lopsided grin from Sue. Her relationship with the sheriff was still new, and we were all trying to figure out where it fit with our friendships. But no matter what, Sue would always be my best friend.

  “So what’s the problem?” Paula said. “Why is ‘Fred,’”—she made the quotation marks with her fingers—“so intent on talking to you?”

  It was our turn to stare at her.

  “You don’t know?” I managed at last.

  “Know what?”

  “About Gregory Whitlock,” Sue said.

  Paula shook her head. “I know that. Everyone in town knows. But just because Georgie got herself involved in a couple murders . . .” Her voice trailed off and she reached up to touch the brooch she wore on her jacket.

  I don’t think Paula even realized she was fingering Martha Tepper’s brooch, the one that had drawn me into the mystery of Miss Tepper’s disappearance and led to the discovery of her murder.

  Sue’s eyes widened. “Then you don’t know!”

  “Know what?” Paula’s voice rose, and her hand dropped back to the table. The spoon rattled in my iced tea glass. “How could I know what you’re talking about when you’re talking in circles?”

  There was a flash of the infamous Ciccone temper Barry talked about.

  “Paula.”

  She turned to look at me.

  “You heard he was dead, right?”

  She nodded.

  “Did you hear where he was found?”

  She furrowed her brow for a moment. “He wasn’t at home,” she said slowly, thinking aloud. “Something about someone else’s house.” She thought for a minute longer, then shook her head. “No, I think that’s all I heard.”

  I took a deep breath. “It was my mother’s house,” I said. I fought back the panic that tried to overwhelm me every time I thought about it. “He was under the house.”

  I could see the understanding begin to dawn in her expression.

  I nodded. “I found him.”

  “Oh, Georgie!” She threw her arm over my shoulders and gave me an awkward, one-armed hug. “How awful for you!”

  I tried to shrug off her concern, unwilling to face the harsh reality of what I’d seen. “Worse for my mother.”

  “Of course! How is she, Georgie? Is there anything I can do?”

  Sue’s bark of harsh laughter drew Paula’s attention.

  “She’s doing her usual thing,” I said, and Paula looked back at me. “Claims she’s fine, that she doesn’t need anything. I’ll bet she’s at the office right now, trying to act like it’s business as usual.” I shook my head. “That’s my mother.”

  “Tell her the worst part,” Sue said.

  “There’s more?” Paula sounded incredulous. After all, when your mother’s fiancé is dead, and you found the body, how much worse can it be?

  “She’s staying with me.”

  Paula winced and gave my shoulder another squeeze before she moved her arm. “Okay,” she agreed, “that’s worse.”

  “I don’t know how long I can do this. She’s already taken over the bathroom, and I think the kitchen is next.”

  “That would be an improvement,” Sue said, then looked sheepish. “I mean, your mom’s a good cook, Georgie. You said so yourself.”

  “I manage,” I muttered. I’d known how to cook once upon a time. My mother had insisted that a woman needed to know how to prepare a proper meal. But when you work through dinner, you get used to takeout or ordering in and actual cooking goes by the wayside.

  “Never mind,” Paula said in her best everybody-play-nice voice. “What can we do to help, Georgie?”

  “Nothing. That’s the worst part. Right now I can’t do anything. The only thing we can do is hold on until the sheriff lets Mom back into her house.” I glanced at my watch. “And speaking of our esteemed sheriff, I am going to have to run. Don’t want to be late.”

  Sue made a face, but she didn’t say anything. I dropped some bills on the
tabletop as Paula moved to let me out. “Call me later,” she said. “Just let me know you’re okay.”

  Sue reached out and touched my arm. “Me, too,” she said.

  I nodded to both of them and headed for the car.

  chapter 8

  I parked in the sheriff’s lot with a couple minutes to spare. By the time I locked up the Beetle—force of habit, who’d be stupid enough to steal an old Beetle from a sheriff’s office parking lot?—I was right on time to meet Sheriff Mitchell.

  Mitchell was waiting in the now-familiar interrogation room. At least he didn’t keep me waiting as he had on past visits. I wasn’t sure whether I should be relieved or suspicious. I settled on wait-and-see.

  “Thank you for coming.” The sheriff gestured to the chair across from him. I’d grown used to the battered steel-and-cracked-vinyl side chair. I was surprised to see something a little newer in its place.

  Newer was a relative term I realized as I sat down. This one might have a little more padding, though it wasn’t a vast improvement. Still, it seemed like the sheriff was making an effort.

  Once I was settled, the sheriff took out his pocket recorder. I was used to this part, too. He always claimed it was so he could be sure he remembered things correctly. Not that I believed him.

  “You mind?” he asked.

  I could have objected but what was the point? I was there to give a statement, and we’d done this dance before.

  “Go right ahead.”

  He switched on the recorder, set it to voice activation, and tested it by giving the date and time. When he was satisfied it was working properly he sat back a few inches and leveled his gaze at me.

  “You’re developing a bad habit of finding dead bodies, Miss Neverall.”

  I shrugged. “It’s not exactly my fault, Sheriff. I’m certainly not the one responsible for them.”

  He sighed. “I suppose not. But this is the third time you’ve done this. Tell me, Georgie, did you have this knack for finding bodies when you lived in San Francisco, or is it something special about Pine Ridge?”

  I can recognize a rhetorical question when I hear it. I kept my mouth shut.

  “How well did you know Mr. Whitlock?”

  I thought about the question. I’d tried to be cordial to Gregory for my mother’s sake, but I had to admit I hadn’t known much about him. “He and my mother worked together. I think they started dating before I moved back to Pine Ridge, but I wouldn’t swear to it. He seemed to be successful. Drove a new car, just built a big new house, got involved with local politics—all the stuff a successful local guy does.

  “Beyond that I really didn’t know him very well. I had dinner with him and Mom about once a month or so, maybe a little more often since the engagement because there were wedding plans and stuff.”

  I shoved a strand of hair out of my eyes, the distraction reminding me I needed to get a haircut. “Other than that, I really didn’t know much about him.”

  “You never talked about where he was from, or where he went to school? His hobbies?”

  I shook my head.

  “Dinner about once a month for a couple years, and you never talked about anything like that?”

  I shook my head again. “We didn’t have much in common. Mostly we talked about the local sports teams—the high school, or the Blazers—and whether City Hall should be painted this year. You know, the kind of small talk you make when you’re being polite.”

  The sheriff leaned back in his chair and rested his chin on one fist. He rocked slightly as though he was thinking so hard he didn’t realize he was moving.

  He leaned forward and placed his forearms on the desk. “You didn’t like him very much, did you?”

  I bristled. “Is that an accusation, Sheriff?”

  “No,” he said mildly. “But you’ve already answered my question. You didn’t like him.” It wasn’t a question; it was a statement.

  He was right, of course.

  I’d tried. I really tried. But there was something about Gregory Whitlock that I had never warmed up to.

  A realization hit me, turning the flash of anger to icy cold. “You haven’t said anything about how he died, Sheriff. What was it?”

  I waited, dread seeping through me. Even before I asked the question I was sure what the answer would be. And I knew I wouldn’t like it.

  “We’re treating his death as a homicide, Miss Neverall.” The sheriff retreated into his formal mode again.

  Not the answer I wanted.

  The sheriff gave me a moment to digest the news, but it was going to take a lot longer than that, even though I was expecting it.

  “When did you arrive at your mother’s house?”

  The sheriff’s question drew me back to the events of the previous day. I forced my thoughts back to that morning and tried to remember exactly what I’d done.

  “I was at the McComb site in the morning,” I said. “Barry and Sean agreed I could inspect Mom’s house at lunch, so I left a little early—maybe eleven fifteen or so—and swung by my house to let the dogs out. Figure about fifteen minutes’ driving time?”

  The sheriff nodded.

  I thought for a minute and went on. “I was probably at home fifteen or twenty minutes, tops. Another five minutes to Mom’s house, so I got there just before noon, I’d guess.”

  “Was there anyone else there when you arrived?”

  “Mom was gone, taking some stuff to Gregory’s house before she went to the office for the afternoon.” I guess Gregory had been there, but I pushed that thought aside.

  “And what did you do then?”

  “I let myself in the front door. I suppose I didn’t even need to go in the house, but I’ve always had a key and it just seemed like the normal thing to do. I went through the kitchen to the back door—” I stopped, remembering something odd. “I was going to get a drink of water, and I noticed an empty glass on the counter by the sink, which was weird.”

  Sheriff Mitchell cocked his head to the side. “Why is that weird? You should see the stack of dirty dishes next to my sink.” He tried to laugh at his own joke, but it sounded forced.

  “Sure, that’s normal for most people, but not for Sandra Neverall. You saw her house. There is never, ever, anything out of place. If there’s a dirty plate or cup or glass it goes in the dishwasher immediately. She would never leave a dirty glass on the counter.”

  “Maybe,” the sheriff said, but it was clear he wasn’t convinced. “So did you get your drink?”

  “Yeah. I got a glass of water, then I put both glasses in the dishwasher. Old habits are hard to break. Then I went out the back door and started checking under the house.”

  “About how long had you been at the house at that point?”

  I shrugged. “I don’t really know. Maybe eight or ten minutes, I’d imagine. Certainly not much more than that. I didn’t go anywhere but the kitchen, and I didn’t do anything but get a drink and put the glasses in the dishwasher. It might even have been a couple minutes less than that.”

  My neck and shoulders tensed, the muscles tightening with stress as the sheriff’s questions drew me nearer to the moment I found Gregory.

  “Take it easy,” the sheriff said as though he could read my mind. “I know this is upsetting, but we’ll take it slow. Okay?”

  I nodded. Sheriff Mitchell and I weren’t always best pals, but it seemed clear he was trying to be considerate and I appreciated the effort.

  “Okay. You went out the back door just a few minutes after you arrived at the house. You were getting ready to go under the house. How long before you actually went into the crawl space?”

  “Only a minute or two. I checked my flashlight and kind of peered under there, and then I put on my mask and went in.”

  “You put on a mask?”

  “Yeah. It was musty smelling. I thought there might be mold. That’s pretty normal.”

  The sheriff didn’t ask any more questions, so I swallowed hard and went on. I told him ev
erything I could remember until I got up to the hard part. I was telling the sheriff about how I’d switched my flashlight back on after noticing the pile of boxes and something else.

  I stopped. Several years of martial-arts training had helped me gain some control of my temper, to find the calm inside me. I used the same techniques to help control the panic that threatened to overtake me now.

  I closed my eyes for a minute and focused on breathing deep and slow, letting the tension go. It helped a little.

  “That ‘something else’ was Gregory Whitlock?”

  “Yes. I got close enough to see what it was and I reached out with my flashlight and kind of tapped it against his foot. He didn’t move.

  “I got out of there as fast as I could and called 9-1-1. You know the rest.”

  chapter 9

  “How about a break?”

  Without waiting for an answer, Sheriff Mitchell stood up. He wiggled his shoulders a little as though trying to release some tension of his own.

  At that moment his suggestion made Sheriff Mitchell my best friend. I stood up myself and stretched my arms out, pulling the knots out of my back and shoulders.

  The sheriff opened the door to the corridor and spoke to someone outside. I couldn’t make out his words, but a minute later a deputy appeared at the door with two cups of coffee.

  The sheriff handed one cup to me and carried his around the desk. He resumed his seat, and looked pointedly at the other chair.

  I took the hint.

  “Just a few more questions,” the sheriff tried to reassure me. I hoped he meant it. I was way past ready to be out of there and thinking about anything but the death—the murder—of Gregory Whitlock.

  I took a sip of the coffee. It had been sitting too long on the heat, the bitterness of cheap beans burned into the brew.

  “You mentioned your mother and Mr. Whitlock’s wedding plans a few minutes ago. How was that going?”

  Without thinking I rolled my eyes, and the sheriff chuckled.

  I realized what I’d done an instant too late. “No, nothing wrong. Just Mom wanting things a certain way. And there was so much to do! She was obsessing over every detail.