Southern Discomfort Read online

  A PI would do a lot better job than I would with trying to find Drew some reasonable doubt and the police a better suspect. But Drew and I had already discussed hiring a PI and had come to the conclusion that it wasn’t an option. I was all we had. It hit me how heartbreakingly unfair this all was.

  I removed my glasses and wiped a hand down my face. “So two days ago Drew had a great future ahead of him. And because someone decided to kill his brother, his entire life is ruined just like that.” I snapped my fingers. “It’s not fair.”

  Deacon patted my knee. “No, it isn’t fair. And it’s sad that money is what makes this world go round, darlin’. But you know it’s true.” He stood. “Thank you for your kind hospitality this afternoon. The best thing you can do for your friend is to support him and keep his spirits up. He’s going to need it.”

  Once Deacon left, I opened the envelope he’d given me. Inside was a handwritten note from Drew.

  Quinn,

  Thanks again for setting me up with Deacon. You were right—he’s a snake, but I like him. Anyway, I appreciate everything you’re doing to help me. It’s really boring in here, and I miss our chats already. But PLEASE don’t come back to visit, for your own good. And above all, be safe.

  Drew

  His forlorn note was like a knife through my heart.

  Poor Drew. He’d lost everything. I couldn’t imagine the despair he must have been feeling, stuck in jail with his life crumbling around him, on top of grieving over the loss of his brother. I didn’t want him to spend a minute more inside that jail than he had to.

  Chapter 13

  With my investigative skills being subpar at best, I felt that I wasn’t doing Drew or myself any favors by continuing to mess up leads that we’d spent nearly all day yesterday thinking about and researching. I’d absolutely ruined any chance I had of ever speaking with Valerie again. I couldn’t risk another mistake. I had to do something, and although it wasn’t the best move, it was the only one I had left.

  Gathering my courage, I headed to the police station and asked to see Rufus. I knew he’d at least hear me out before laughing me from the building, and I hoped that was all I’d need. I was shown to a conference room. When I sat down, I placed the suspect list Drew and I had compiled in front of me. I only had to wait a few minutes before Rufus came in.

  His face was stuck in a frown as he sat down across from me. “Twice in one day, Quinn? What part of me begging you to stay away from the situation did you not understand?”

  I clasped my hands together to stop them from shaking. “I’m not here to visit Drew again. I only came here to speak with you about his case. His initial court appearance is tomorrow. Are you sure you’ve done a thorough enough investigation to charge him with murder?”

  He gave me a reproachful look. “Of course I did, Quinn. And the initial hearing is only for the sheriff’s office to formally inform the arrestee of the charges against him. It’s not that big a deal.”

  “It seems like a big deal to have someone accuse you of killing your brother.”

  Sighing, he said, “I meant, in the grand scheme of the legal system it isn’t such a big deal. His arraignment, where he’ll be charged by the district attorney, is a big deal, but won’t be until later. That’s when he has to enter a plea of guilty or not guilty. There may even be a grand jury hearing in between the initial hearing and the arraignment, which will stretch things out even more. There’s no cause for alarm today.”

  “Except that the man you’ve charged with murder is innocent.”

  He closed his eyes and took a deep breath. “We have evidence against him.”

  “And because of that, you’ve stopped searching for any other suspects.”

  “That’s generally how investigating works.”

  I ignored his snarky remark. “Drew has come up with a whole list of potential suspects that deserve a look.”

  Rufus’s eyebrows shot up. “Oh, he did, did he?” His gaze fell to my list sitting on the table between us. “Evil Realtor-slash-Property Buyers? Hmm. A lot of those running around Savannah these days. Gotta watch out for them.”

  I frowned, wishing I’d cleaned up the list before I’d come here. “Okay, I admit that was a bit of a joke, but the rest of this list is not. And the fact that an innocent man has been wrongly accused of murdering his only brother is certainly no laughing matter.”

  The door opened, and Flynn strode in, serious cop face in place. “Hello, Ms. Bellandini. Have you come in to confess to something?” he asked menacingly.

  “Take it easy, Flynn,” Rufus said. “Quinn came here to try to help.”

  Flynn barked out a laugh. “Help? Oh, that’s rich, especially coming from her.” Turning to me with a smirk, he added, “Are you in here doing your sweet Southern belle routine, trying to convince us that your friend Drew is a stand-up guy? Let me tell you—he’s not. And if you keep visiting him and whispering behind closed doors, we may start thinking you’re not as sweet as you pretend to be.”

  I sat there, fuming silently. This conversation was going from bad to worse.

  Ignoring his partner’s outburst, Rufus said, “Back to what we were speaking about before, Quinn, I want you to know I’m not making light of the overall situation. You have to understand that this is the way the justice system works. There’ll be plenty of time for your friend’s lawyer to put together a solid defense for him. That’s what a trial is for—to show all sides of the argument and let a jury decide the outcome. All is not lost. Besides, he’s only been in jail for a few hours.”

  “Which is a few hours too many.” I frowned, realizing Rufus wasn’t going to take me seriously until I had some kind of solid evidence to bring him, and Detective Flynn would probably never take me seriously as long as I lived.

  Case in point, Flynn ambled toward Rufus and peered over his shoulder at my list. Snickering, he asked, “What is this? A list of suspects? Who do you think you are now—Scooby-Doo? I mean, the guilty ones are always pointing the finger at someone else, but I’ve never been handed an actual list before.”

  This list was clearly not making an impression on Rufus, and it was only amusing Flynn. “I’m sorry I wasted your time, Detectives. You two may have given up on this case, but I haven’t.”

  Narrowing his eyes at me, Rufus asked, “What do you mean by that? Don’t tell me you’re going to take this ridiculous list of yours and start harassing people and poking your nose where it doesn’t belong.”

  Ridiculous list? I squared my shoulders. “What if I do?”

  Rufus leaned across the table toward me. “Quinn, this is police business. Let’s pretend for a moment that you’re right and we’ve got the wrong guy. Do you think it’s a good idea for you to run around town chasing after a murderer? Are you seriously considering going to these people on your list and accusing them of killing Jason Green? The best thing that could happen is that they’d laugh in your face. You could be hit with restraining orders or…someone’s fist. Don’t do this, Quinn. It’s crazy.”

  “It may be crazy, Rufus, but Drew is my friend, and he has no one else to turn to for help. I can’t sit around and do nothing.”

  Flynn’s eyes bored into me. “I don’t think you quite understand what my partner said. Let me make it clear. If we find out that you’ve crossed the line with any of these people or broken the law in any way, we’ll have you in here faster than you can say ‘criminal record.’ ”

  Almost losing my cool at that point, I hopped out of my seat and headed toward the door. “Point noted. Have a nice day,” I said coolly, fighting to keep my knees from knocking as I walked down the hall.

  I had no choice now but to find a way to make this investigation work. If I didn’t, Drew would be convicted of murder and locked up for the rest of his life. And according to Flynn’s barely veiled accusations about me conspiring with Drew,
I could be charged with something that would ruin my life as well. Failure was not an option.

  * * *

  —

  Back at the B&B, I hurried upstairs and collapsed into the overstuffed chair in my room. Curling my legs underneath me, I got out the new notebook I’d bought and transferred the names of our suspects into it, leaving a few blank pages between each for future information I hoped to glean. This time, I added Valerie’s name along with our other suspects.

  I stared at the names, wondering where I should start and how in the world I was going to go about it. Before I could make any headway, Delilah knocked on the door and let herself into my room.

  “Do you realize that you put the lavender-colored sheets on the bed in the red room and the peach sheets in the blue room?” she asked.

  I slapped my forehead. “Cheese and crackers. I’m sorry, D. I’ll fix it.”

  She came over and plopped down on her stomach on my bed, facing me. “It’s totally normal for you to be off your game. It may take a long time to bounce back.”

  “I know, but…I’ve actually got other things on my mind. Sort of.”

  Cocking her head to the side, she asked, “What could possibly be bigger than finding a dead body?”

  I looked down at my notebook. “Finding a way to get Drew out of jail.”

  She snorted. “Short of a professionally planned jailbreak, I don’t think you’ve got much of a chance.”

  I’d expected that kind of response out of my sister. She was the more pessimistic of the two of us, plus, as she’d alluded to before, she didn’t seem convinced of Drew’s innocence. But she always listened and offered great advice—and I could use some advice right about now. Granted, she might call me crazy and several other not-so-nice things for taking on this kind of dangerous endeavor, which was why I’d kept it from her until now. That aside, I knew she’d be in my corner once she finally came around.

  I replied, “Actually, there’s another way I can help Drew, but I doubt you’re going to like it.”

  “Let’s hear it.”

  “Okay. Here goes. Yesterday Drew and I came up with a list of people who might have had a reason to want to kill Jason.”

  “Okay…that doesn’t sound so bad. What are you going to do with the list? Give it to the police?”

  “I tried that. No luck. Rufus wasn’t in a listening mood.”

  She shrugged. “Oh. Well, I guess you tried…”

  “I’m going to do more than that, and this is the part I think you won’t like. I know in my heart that Drew didn’t kill Jason. But since his money is all tied up in the restaurant and they’ve had to close the place, he has no way of making bail, or more importantly, no way of hiring a private investigator to look more deeply into his case.”

  “So what can you do? Loan him some money you don’t have?”

  “No, I can use this list, talk to people around town, and try to find the police a better suspect than Drew.”

  Her face screwed up in confusion. “Are you saying you want to sleuth around like some kind of adult Nancy Drew or something?”

  I stuck my tongue out at her. “It sounds stupid when you say it like that.”

  “Quinn, I’m not belittling your attempt to help your friend. If you want to know the truth, I think it sounds kind of fun, in a dangerous way. But…what in the world do you know about investigating?”

  “Nothing. In fact, I’m pretty terrible at it.” Ouch. That hurt to admit out loud. “Yesterday I managed to get some information out of a restaurant critic that Jason had fought with, but it was ugly. Today I tried to talk to Valerie, but that went horribly wrong. Then I tried to follow her, and she caught me.”

  “Ooh. That couldn’t have ended well. That woman is a viper.”

  “You’re telling me. I’ve decided to call that one a learning experience and work a little smarter from now on.”

  “Right. And how do you plan to work smarter?”

  I threw my hands in the air. “That’s what I have to figure out. And fast.”

  She thought for a moment. “If you don’t mind me saying so, you can be a bit…gullible. Naïve. If you do decide to go through with this, when you go out and speak with people, you need to not readily believe everything you hear. It stands to reason that people would have things to hide in this particular situation.”

  She wasn’t wrong, but it wasn’t something I liked to hear. Straightening in my chair, I said, “I can think more critically. Be more skeptical if I need to be.”

  I could see her mulling this over, and just when I thought she wasn’t going to pull her big sister routine, her expression became strained. “Quinn…are you sure this is something you should take on? I mean, if Drew didn’t kill Jason, then someone else did. And that someone is still out there running loose. I don’t know if it’s a good idea to insert yourself into the situation. You could get hurt.”

  “Drew could get hurt in jail. Who knows what could happen in there?”

  “Yeah, he’s pretty. Some big guy could easily make Drew his b—”

  I jumped in before she had a chance to finish her vulgar thought. “Special friend? Yes, that’s crossed my mind. Look, Drew needs help, and he has no one in his corner. I’m all he’s got, such as I am.”

  “I appreciate that, and I think you’re an amazing friend for even considering taking this on. But you can’t forget about the danger aspect of it. At the end of the day, if it’s someone’s neck on the line, I’d rather it be his than yours.”

  There was one more thing I needed to tell her that would eclipse everything else for her. I blew out a breath. “If I don’t figure out who really killed Jason, my neck could be on the line as well. There’s a possibility that the police could find some reason to charge me, too, if they decide Drew and I were in cahoots.”

  “What?” she exploded, jumping off the bed so she could pace around the room. “How? Why would they think you’re in cahoots?”

  “Because I found the body. And also because of a supposedly flimsy reason to be at a closed restaurant after hours, Detective Flynn told Drew that he thought either Drew and I were in on the murder together, or that I’m covering for him. It may not be just Drew that we need to worry about. Detective Flynn might not have any evidence on me, and I don’t even know that Rufus shares his hunch, but it’s still a valid issue to worry about.”

  Delilah’s jaw dropped, and she stopped pacing. “How long have you known about this?”

  “Since yesterday morning.”

  “Why didn’t you tell me?” she cried.

  I looked down. “I didn’t want to worry you.”

  Coming over to kneel in front of me, she took my hands. “Quinn, we’re sisters. We’re supposed to weather the hard stuff together.”

  “I know. But…”

  “No buts. I will not stand for my baby sister being accused of any wrongdoing, especially a freaking murder! We’re going to clear your name once and for all, and if we happen to clear Drew’s in the process, all the better.”

  I stared at her. “What do you mean ‘we’? What are you saying?”

  “I’m saying I’m going to help you find your suspect. I always have your back, and this is no different. You need a cynical sidekick who can think like a delinquent and talk her way out of a messy situation. I’m the perfect woman for the job. Besides, I could use a little excitement in my life. Don’t tell Papa Sal, but the monotony of B&B management has been getting to me lately.”

  Tears sprang to my eyes as I broke into a smile. “You mean it? We’re going to do this together?”

  She smiled back at me. “The Bellandini sisters are on the case!”

  Chapter 14

  Delilah and I ran ourselves ragged, scrambling to get our afternoon chores done and our guests checked in so we could duck out and start our investigation. As we did ou
r errands, I filled her in on the work Drew and I had done so far, and together we developed a strategy of attack and tried to plan for any roadblocks we might encounter. Delilah was surprisingly crafty and brilliant in her investigative tactical plans. Must have been all the detective shows she’d watched on Netflix, or more likely from all the times she’d been interrogated by the school principal for being a troublemaker. I had to admit, I was giddy with excitement knowing I would have a partner in crime. Crime solving, that is. I didn’t intend to break any laws to get the job done—Rufus’s threat still loomed heavy in the back of my mind.

  We’d decided to start with the employees at Green, since Delilah had seen people working there on her morning jog. The process of shutting down a working restaurant probably wasn’t a quick one, so we figured the staff would be there for the next couple of days at least.

  Delilah thundered down the stairs ahead of me, raring to go, but stopped dead in her tracks in the foyer.

  Unable to stop quickly enough, I plowed into the back of her. “D,” I grumbled, trying to regain my balance.

  She ignored me, her rapt attention focused on the gorgeous bouquet of flowers she’d picked up off the table. She read the note out loud. “ ‘Quinn, I’m sorry. Tucker.’ ” Smiling wide, she squealed, “Tucker sent you flowers!”

  “I can see that,” I murmured, wondering why he’d even bothered. I’d told him to get lost in the most forceful and clear way I could without getting nasty. Did he not understand that sending me flowers wouldn’t fall into the category of leaving me alone?

  “I’ll put these in some water for you. That’ll give you time to call him and thank him!” She hurried off, way more thrilled about this than I was.

  Even if I’d wanted to call Tucker, which I didn’t, I didn’t have his number. That meant I’d have to speak with him in person to thank him, and I just wasn’t up for it. I had my head ready to interview the staff at Green, and I didn’t want any other thoughts clouding my focus.