Southern Discomfort Read online

  Drew’s eyes grew wide. “Then what are you doing here? Leave!”

  “I’m not going to abandon you, Drew. You need someone on your side. Besides, they have no evidence against me.”

  “They have no real evidence against me, either, because I didn’t kill my brother. Yet I’m still stuck in here. Quinn, promise me you won’t do anything stupid and land yourself in here, too. You know how the cops reacted when you tried to stop them from arresting me this morning. Like it or not, you’re on their radar. I think Detective King is right. You shouldn’t be here.”

  I gave him a reproachful frown. “Well, I’m already here, so let’s use the time we have to come up with a plan to get you out of jail. Okay?”

  He seemed so defeated, it was hard to look at his sad face. “I guess.”

  “Back to the evidence. Are your fingerprints on the knife?”

  “Yes, from when I was using it.”

  “And no one else’s are on there?”

  “They didn’t tell me if there were.”

  “You’re positive that’s all they have on you?”

  “Compounded with everything else, it’s enough.” He beckoned for me to lean closer to him and whispered, “There’s more, but they haven’t found this out yet. I’m going to tell you, but I don’t want them hearing us talking about it.”

  My stomach churned. I didn’t know if I wanted to hear more.

  He continued quietly, “You know how I told you that Green hasn’t been profitable lately?”

  I nodded.

  “Well, I didn’t exactly tell you the whole story. Since Jason wouldn’t hear of selling the place as a whole, Valerie and I asked him if he would consider buying us out.”

  “Oh…” If both of them wanted out, especially Jason’s own wife, I guessed business was even worse than I’d imagined.

  “We didn’t expect Jason to have the money to pull it off. What we were trying to do was show him we were serious about getting out from under a dying restaurant before it was too late. But Jason being Jason, he took it as a challenge.”

  I held up one finger for him to stop for a moment. I whispered, “Um…you said ‘we didn’t expect’ Jason to have enough money for the buyout. Is Valerie not privy to Jason’s personal finances?”

  “Not since they’ve separated.”

  My eyes widened, and I said in a normal voice, “I did not know about that.”

  No wonder Valerie hadn’t been overly upset about Jason’s passing. If those two hotheads were divorcing, I had no doubt the process was ugly. Any love she’d had for him had to have been long extinguished. Maybe she as the spouse wasn’t such a likely suspect after all if they were splitting up anyway. Then again, why bother divorcing someone when you could just kill him? I thought it best not to voice that idea out loud, though, especially since Drew didn’t take kindly to me bringing Valerie’s name up before.

  Drew hissed, “Shh. It’s been a few months since she moved out. She’s living above her spice shop.”

  I nodded again, thinking I was right to add her name to our list.

  Drew sighed. “Anyway, I don’t know what in the world he was trying to do to raise the money, but I’m pretty sure he was gambling to try to cover part of it. Jason has had problems with gambling addiction over the years. He’ll be fine for a while, then he’ll slip back into it. Problem is, he’s a terrible gambler. He never won, and when he didn’t, he’d come to me for the money. In the midst of our arguing over the restaurant, early last week he had the gall to ask me to loan him five hundred dollars. I told him no, and of course he didn’t like that answer.” He shook his head. “But then he came home with a black eye from his bookie, so I did the brotherly thing and floated him a loan. If his bookie gave him a black eye over five hundred dollars, what might he have done for a larger amount?”

  Giving Drew a blank look, I replied quietly, “I don’t know. Break his kneecaps?”

  “Or kill him.”

  I gasped, then clapped my hand over my mouth.

  Drew went on quietly, “Exactly. Problem is, I have no way of knowing whether Jason owed the guy more money or not.”

  “I think it’s something worth finding out, though. What’s the bookie’s name?”

  “No clue. I never met the guy.”

  “Can you think of anyone who might know the bookie?”

  “No, unless…CJ McLeod might know. I think he’s got a gambling problem, too. It would be worth it to give him a call.”

  Although it seemed like an unpleasant prospect, I needed to meet with both CJ McLeod and the bookie. From Drew’s description, CJ didn’t seem too bright, so it might be easy to get him to spill his guts before he realized what he was doing. Even with my limited skills, I felt confident about getting what I needed out of CJ McLeod. The bookie who dished out a black eye for five hundred dollars, though, would provide more of a challenge.

  I nodded. “Looks like I have some work to do.”

  The uniformed officer who’d shown me into the room stuck his head back in the door. “Time’s up, you two.”

  Drew said, “Thanks for coming, Quinn. But please make this your last visit.”

  I smiled. “I make no promises, except that I will get you out of here.”

  Chapter 12

  For my money, Valerie was as logical a suspect as Drew was. It’s always the spouse, right? After all, I’d witnessed the beginning of an ugly argument between Jason and Valerie the morning of the day he was killed. What if it had escalated during the day until Valerie couldn’t take it anymore? What if Jason had come after her physically and she was forced to defend herself? Granted, stabbing another person in the back couldn’t technically be classified as defending oneself from an oncoming attack, but maybe Valerie took the only shot she had at him. Or maybe she’d finally had enough of his nonsense and snapped. When I’d talked to him, Drew had been adamant about Valerie’s innocence. Then again, he hadn’t been there, so he could have been wrong. And her friends could easily have been covering for her by providing an alibi.

  Valerie seemed to be as likely a person as any for me to begin “investigating.” A shiver of fear coursed through me as I contemplated what it could entail as I was now on my own. If I actually managed to get on the right track and found the real killer, it could put me in some real danger. As my breath quickened and panic began to wash over me, I reminded myself that Drew was the one in real danger here. Drew was in danger of his life being over if he was charged with murder. Prison life, at least from what I’d heard, was dangerous. He could get shanked or worse. I shuddered at thoughts of the myriad abuse he could be forced to endure. And if I were to be saddled with some kind of conspiracy charge, I’d be in the same boat. Hardening my resolve, I decided to jump in with both feet. Might as well get the hard part out of the way. I needed to talk with Valerie Green face-to-face. And maybe also spy on her.

  * * *

  —

  I got back on my Vespa and headed to the City Market. Parking downtown was, as usual, a nightmare, but I eventually found a spot where I could park legally. When I entered the store, Valerie looked up from her work of portioning out small bags of spices at the counter. Her face slipped into a frown.

  Clearing my throat, I said, “Valerie, I wanted to tell you in person how sorry—”

  “Can it, Quinn. It’s just the two of us here, so let’s cut the crap. What do you want from me?”

  I swallowed. This was going to be even harder than I’d thought. “I…um…”

  “I…um…” she parroted mockingly. “If you’re not here to buy something, then get out.”

  I grabbed the nearest thing to me, which was a packet of spice called fenugreek, which I had never heard of before. “I’m here to get some things…”

  Valerie rolled her eyes and disappeared into the office behind the counter.

 
Feeling like a fool, I quickly put the fenugreek back and picked out a couple of spices I’d actually use. I stood at the counter for what seemed like an eternity before she deigned to come out and ring up my purchase.

  As she slammed my spice packets into a small shopping bag, I said as nonchalantly as I could, “I spoke with Drew, as you may have guessed.”

  She lasered her steely gaze onto me. “Yes, I assumed you were there to offer poor Drew a soft, sweet shoulder to cry on.”

  I fought off the urge to run away. I didn’t know if I had what it took to go up against Valerie. With my voice only shaking a little, I replied, “Drew needs a friend. He’s innocent.”

  She scowled. “Innocent, right. That’s rather unfortunate for him since he’s been arrested for murder.”

  “You know him. He could never have killed Jason.”

  I noticed her eyes become glassy. She wiped the back of her hand across her eyes and said under her breath, “I don’t know anything anymore.”

  While her guard was down, I ventured, “Has anyone been angry with Jason lately besides Drew…and maybe yourself? Drew told me he and Jason had been arguing over the future of Green. I assumed you’d been in on some of those conversations since you’re part owner, too.”

  She snapped back to her icy demeanor. “What the hell kind of question is that?”

  My insides began quaking so hard I couldn’t muster a reply.

  Valerie went on. “Our family business is none of your business, so keep your nose out of it.” She thrust my bag of spices at me. “Now get out.”

  I backed away, wishing I hadn’t had the bright idea to speak with her first. I hurried out of her shop and out into the City Market’s plaza. Happy-go-lucky tourists were milling around without a care in the world; meanwhile, my world was crumbling. If I couldn’t manage to get useful information out of someone I knew, how was I going to be able to go up to total strangers and get them to open up to me? Maybe investigating wasn’t as simple as Drew and I had hoped. Maybe I wouldn’t be able to do it after all.

  When I’d wandered to the end of the block, I turned around to glance back at the spice shop. Valerie had turned the sign in her window to read closed and was coming outside to lock the place up in the middle of the day. I hadn’t expected her to be open at all, but it struck me as odd that she’d leave just after my conversation with her, especially since she’d seemed to be in the middle of portioning out bags of spices.

  I had a brilliant idea. Far easier than trying to draw information out of someone, following a person from a safe distance wouldn’t require nearly as much thinking on my feet. If I could manage to stay out of her sight, I could follow Valerie around for hours. I slipped behind a group of tourists and watched her as she exited the plaza, turning and heading south on Jefferson.

  I hurried to follow her, making sure to leave at least one block between us and keeping an eye out for places to hide should she decide to turn around. She crossed Broughton, and I lost sight of her as a tour trolley went by on the street between us. When the trolley passed and I could see down the street again, Valerie had vanished. Ding dang it! So much for my surveillance skills.

  Surely she couldn’t have gotten far. I hurried across Broughton once the pedestrian light permitted, then took off at a jog down Jefferson in hopes of catching up with Valerie.

  Seconds later, I screamed when someone leaped out in front of me from the alley.

  “Why are you stalking me?” Valerie demanded.

  My heart was hammering so hard, I was afraid she could hear it. “I’m not,” I squeaked. It came out more as a question than a statement.

  “You’re a terrible liar. What I don’t get is why you keep sniffing around me today. Wait…” She eyed me with a thoughtful expression. “You were the one who found Jason. Do you have some morbid obsession with death or something?”

  “No, I—”

  A smile was playing at her lips. “Oh…Maybe you killed him, and now you’re hunting me.”

  As she let out a peal of laughter, I huffed, “I wouldn’t do that! And I didn’t kill Jason!”

  Still cracking up at her own joke, she replied, “I know. You don’t have the guts. You are so pathetic.”

  Her words stung me and brought tears to my eyes. Why did she have to be so stinking mean all the time? It was like I was back in high school again, getting picked on by the cool kids. I had no response to give, because the last thing I wanted was for Valerie to find out that this was my sad attempt at solo investigating. She would have busted a gut laughing at me. I did the only thing I could do—I turned and walked away.

  Valerie called after me, “If I ever think you’re creeping on me again, I’ll get a restraining order against you. No, on second thought, maybe I’ll just tell your precious Drew how much of a loser you really are. That’ll hurt worse.”

  I bit back a sob and picked up my pace, finding a glimmer of solace in being able to disappear into a pack of tourists crossing over Broughton Street. My first stab at surveillance was nothing but a heartbreaking failure.

  * * *

  —

  When I got back to the B&B, I slipped in quietly, trying not to be noticed. As I was changing the sheets in one of the rooms, my sister found me. She walked up to me and took me by the shoulders.

  “What’s wrong, Quinn? Is the murder hitting you harder today now that you’ve had a little time to process it? Or is it Drew’s arrest? You’ve not been yourself today at all…even before Drew got taken in.”

  Tears filled my eyes. “Oh, D. It’s everything.”

  Delilah put her arm around me and steered me to sit down on the bed. She sat next to me. “Tell me.”

  I put my head in my hands. “I don’t even know where to begin.”

  Squeezing my shoulder, she said, “What about your gig last night? Surely that took your mind off life for a while. Did it not help?”

  I groaned. “No. Tucker showed up and ruined the night.”

  “Ruined it? How?” I could hear the tension in her voice.

  “By being Tucker.” I sighed. “And I know you were the one who told him about our performance. I’d appreciate it if you quit trying to push us together. You did it yesterday afternoon, too, when he came over.”

  She sighed. “Quinn, I’m sorry. I was trying to help. He’s interested in you—there’s no doubt about that. He’s a great guy.”

  “I don’t see it. No offense, but right now I think you need to take a break from meddling in my love life.”

  “I just want my little sister to be happy.”

  I smiled weakly. “Thanks. But that’s going to take a lot more than a date with some guy.”

  “I know. What can I do? Name it.”

  I didn’t have the energy to explain to Delilah about my investigation. Not right now. “Can I take a raincheck on the heart-to-heart?”

  She gave me another squeeze. “I’m here whenever you’re ready to talk.”

  * * *

  —

  After Papa Sal’s magic show that afternoon, another gentleman caller came looking for me, but this was a welcome one. Deacon Palmer arrived at our door, the picture of a quintessential Southern lawyer in his rumpled tan suit.

  I sat us both down in the parlor with glasses of sweet tea and leftover cookies from the show.

  Deacon smiled at me. “My dear, thank you for putting me in touch with your friend. That Drew is a nice young fella. What a shame for him to be in such a pickle.”

  “Yes, it is,” I replied, although “pickle” wasn’t quite the term I might have used. “Deacon, please understand how much I appreciate you taking his case, especially at a reduced rate since we’re family.”

  Laughing heartily, he drawled, “Oh, I can’t say my motives are purely selfless. This will be a high-profile case. If I can manage to prove his innocence—which
I believe in—Savannahians will be beating down my door for representation. Win or lose, I’ll be the talk of the town.” He reached into his breast pocket and produced a sealed envelope with my name on it, which he handed to me. “I came over here to deliver a message from Drew.” His expression softened and his ever-present bravado wavered. “And to warn you not to get your hopes up too high. I’m not a miracle worker, you know.”

  My face fell. “Why do you say that?” If Deacon Palmer admitted he was worried he couldn’t deliver, it was cause for concern.

  He frowned. “The boy’s stuck between a rock and a hard place in more ways than one. The evidence is stacked against him.” As I started to come to Drew’s defense, Deacon raised a hand. “I know evidence can be misleading, and in this case I wholeheartedly believe it is. But with the strength of the case the police and the DA have put together so far, it doesn’t look good for Drew. His initial hearing is tomorrow.”

  “So soon?” I breathed.

  “Yes, that’s how it works. His other problem is that his money’s all tied up in that restaurant. With him in jail and his brother dead, Green is without both head chefs. He has no other choice but to shut down indefinitely. A closed restaurant means no revenue stream, and that means Drew Green is flat broke. Even if the judge grants bail, which I highly doubt, he won’t be able to pay it.”

  I felt a stab in my heart. Drew hadn’t said a word to me about having to shut down Green. We’d only discussed it being temporarily closed while it was an active crime scene. I wondered why he’d kept that to himself. “So until the trial, he’ll be stuck in jail no matter what?”

  “I’m afraid so.”

  My head started spinning. “And what about the trial itself? What do you think your chances are of getting him exonerated?”

  He shrugged. “I’ll do what I can. Normally I’d hire a private investigator to search for conflicting evidence and oversights in the police’s investigation. Find the poor boy some reasonable doubt. Unfortunately, that isn’t possible because of Drew’s current financial situation. I can justify taking on this case for a song because of the potential publicity. A PI isn’t going to feel the same way.”