Southern Pecan Killer Read online

  She sipped her water, thankful for the refreshing burst of bubbles and just a hint of lime, hoping that he wouldn’t see her.

  “Hey, Fi!” he hollered. “Looking good.”

  So much for not being seen. She thought about answering his greeting with a special gesture, but knew that Tim would be disappointed in that type of less than polite conduct, so she refrained, contenting herself to merely sneer in silence. When she didn’t answer him, he stood on his driveway, hands on hips staring at her.

  “Don’t you dare come over here,” she muttered under her breath, taking another slug of water.

  Here he came, it was just going to be that kind of day apparently. She sighed, willing herself to be calm and get rid of him as soon as possible.

  “Go away, Steve,” she called out from her perch on the porch swing. “I’ve had a long day and I’m tired.”

  “Need a back rub?” he cackled, waggling his eyebrows suggestively.

  “Touch me and you might live to regret it,” she raised an eyebrow at him, daring him.

  He read the look and was at least smart enough to stay at the bottom of the porch steps.

  “That ain’t very neighborly of you,” he drawled, his eyes roving over her in a manner that made her skin crawl.

  “I bet your girlfriend could hear me scream from here. If she had her hearing aid in,” the young woman made a jab at the fact that Steve’s live-in girlfriend, Petaluma, was several years older than him.

  “Why are you always so nasty to me? I’m just stopping by to say hello,” he slowly climbed the steps.

  “Well, now you’ve said it. Hello yourself, and get on home,” Fiona sat up straighter, smelling trouble, along with the beer on Steve’s breath.

  “Maybe I want to say more than hello,” he leered, swaying a bit and grabbing onto the porch rail.

  “Fiona, I need you to come with me,” Timothy Eckels’ voice was the most welcome thing she’d ever heard, and she cocked her head to the side, seeing that her boss had just entered the side yard, homicidal thoughts momentarily forgotten.

  “We got a stiff?” she brightened.

  There were two things that had the unique ability to brighten her day, no matter what else was happening. The first was learning the art and craft of preparing the dead, and the second was basking in the odd brilliance of her extremely introverted boss. Timothy Eckels was a pasty, somewhat paunchy man who wore thick, horn-rimmed glasses and showed signs of male pattern baldness, and she found him delightful. He’d been reluctant to hire an assistant, but once he had, he realized that it was the best decision he’d ever made…not that he’d ever tell her so.

  “Two, actually,” he replied, looking at Steve as though he was a particularly nasty bug in his ice cream.

  Her eyes widened. “Car accident?”

  Sometimes he let her practice sewing and puttying the really nasty accident victims, in places that couldn’t be seen of course. His artistry with putting people back together was extraordinary, so it was always his work that was visible to friends and family who came to pay their respects, but he let Fiona stitch up arms, legs and various other body parts that would be hidden beneath the velvet blankets of death.

  “I’ll explain on the way.”

  “You two are creepy,” Steve shook his head, lumbering back down the steps toward his house.

  “Maybe we’ll have the pleasure of working on you someday,” Fiona muttered, going into the house to grab her lab coat.

  **

  Thankful to see that Chas Beckett was present at the scene rather than the incompetent new detective who had taken his place in Homicide, Tim approached him and shook hands briefly in front of Kaylee’s house.

  “Where is the deceased?” he asked formally. It was ingrained after years of practice as an undertaker.

  “They’re in the master bedroom in the back of the house. It looks like a murder suicide, but I want you to be careful processing the scene so that we don’t miss anything. Something seems almost…too perfect,” Chas directed.

  “I’m always careful,” Tim blinked at him, expressionless.

  “Yes, of course you are. Sorry, it’s a habit. I’ll be at the house that’s right behind this one, trying to get a statement out of a traumatized three year old. I’d appreciate it if you’d stop by before you leave.”

  “Certainly. Will Solinsky be stopping by?” Tim asked, his lip curling a bit as he uttered the name of the new homicide detective.

  “Most likely,” Chas looked at him apologetically. “I’d get in there and get as much done as you can before he arrives.”

  “Indeed,” Tim nodded once and headed for the house, Fiona trailing along after him with his tool bag and camera.

  **

  “Wow, that’s a lot of blood,” Fiona remarked, surveying the scene.

  Forensics techs swarmed throughout the house, collecting evidence, but were waiting for Tim to process the victims before sampling near the bodies.

  “About two gallons, collectively, judging by the size of the victims, and the amount of internal pooling,” Tim commented, snapping on a pair of nitrile gloves. “Stand up on that chair over there and take a photo of the scene from above,” he directed, frowning.

  The coroner took out a tape and began measuring different angles around both bodies, writing notes on his clipboard.

  “Well, this must just excite you to no end.” Tim and Fiona turned at the sound of a nasal voice with a Jersey accent. Detective Art Solinsky had arrived on the scene, in all his rumpled glory. “It’s a twofer.”

  Both of them turned away without comment, ignoring him.

  “Make it snappy, Eckels, I had to rush through my dinner for this,” Solinsky barked before leaving the room to go harass the first responders.

  Seeing the frown on her boss’s face, and ever in tune to his enigmatic moods, Fiona looked even more closely at the scene as she took photos.

  “What?” she whispered, receiving a look of reproof from her boss.

  He never discussed the scene, at the scene. It was a rule that he didn’t break, no matter how curious she was, and he always chastised her when she commented on the scene while they were still there.

  “Fine,” she sighed, knowing he’d provide a teaching moment for her later.

  Timothy Eckels wasn’t often baffled, and the things that he could figure out through the examination of the dead were legendary.

  He pointed to the opposite side of the room. “Take a step stool over there and do a top view photo from that angle,” he instructed, making Fiona even more curious.

  Typically, when Tim requested specific photos, beyond the norm, they were close-ups, not views from above. Once the photos had been taken and the forensics folks had done their thing, Fiona and Tim carefully loaded the bodies into body bags and onto gurneys and took them back to the morgue, where they’d go into cold storage until the next day. Fiona managed to hold her tongue until they were in the car on the way home.

  “So what was with the aerial shots?” she asked as Tim pulled out of the morgue’s driveway.

  “Chas Beckett has extraordinary powers of observation,” the coroner replied, thinking.

  “Okay…?” Fiona raised her eyebrows, waiting for him to continue.

  “He said that the scene seemed “too perfect,” and I believe that his suspicions may be correct.”

  “You wanna enlighten me as to what that means?” Fiona asked, exasperated.

  “No,” was the succinct reply. “There’s more testing to be done.”

  Fiona sighed, having anticipated that very response. Tim was nothing if not thorough, and would make no suppositions without facts and findings to back them up.

  “I’m guessing that means we’re going in early tomorrow.”

  “Indeed.”

  Tim paused for a moment, opened his mouth to speak, then seemed to think better of it.

  “What?” Fiona asked.

  “Nothing.”

  “No, not nothing. You
were going to say something, but then you didn’t,” she badgered him, as she often did, loving to get a rise out of the mild-mannered man. “What were you going to say?”

  “It’s none of my business,” was the strange reply as Tim stared at the road ahead.

  “Okay, now you’ve gotta say it,” Fiona sat up straight. “Come on, I’ll bug you about it until you scream,” she challenged.

  “Of course you will,” he grimaced. “Are you annoying on purpose?”

  “When it makes me get my way, I most certainly am,” she grinned.

  “What’s the nature of your relationship with the neighbor to the north?” he asked, coloring slightly, a phenomenon that she’d never seen before. Tim seemed to have no feelings whatsoever, embarrassment was unheard of in his world.

  “He’s a toad that used to be married to my sister. Why?”

  “Well of course he is, I knew that. I presided over her funeral. What I mean is…oh never mind.”

  “No. What? What do you mean?” Fiona was clearly enjoying this.

  She loved seeing Tim squirm, and since she’d let him know recently that she had a bit of a crush on him, she was interested to see if he was about to share a feeling of some sort. Jealousy maybe? She would die to have Timothy Eckels feel jealous toward Loud Steve.

  “It just looked like he was showing you some rather unwanted attention earlier, and I just wanted to make certain that it was unwanted attention. It wouldn’t do for me to step into a domestic spat,” the coroner made a face.

  “Domestic spat? Eww, not even close. Steve is a disgusting human, I would never,” Fiona exclaimed, horrified. “Besides, he has that awful woman living in his house.”

  Tim nodded. “She is rather frightening,” he agreed, having encountered Petaluma on a few memorable occasions.

  “So, are you going to tell me what you’re thinking about the crime scene now?”

  “No.”

  Fiona sighed. “It was worth a shot.”

  CHAPTER FOUR

  * * *

  “Beulah, I didn’t really expect to see you here this morning,” Missy said when she arrived at Cupcakes in Paradise.

  The elderly woman turned around, an orange in one gloved hand, a zesting tool in the other. “Why not?” she frowned.

  “Well, after what you discovered…”

  “Death is just a part of life Miz Beckett. Life goes on and so does work,” was the pragmatic reply.

  “Well yeah, but weren’t you horrified?”

  “Horrified? Honey I’ve been on this earth for about three quarters of a century.

  I’ve seen things that would make your head spin. What I saw yesterday was sad, even tragic, but horrific? Nah, there’s been worse, much much worse,” Beulah shook her head and turned back to her work. “That poor little girl ain’t never gonna be the same,” she muttered.

  “I’ll put some coffee on,” Missy said quietly.

  “Already done, just pour yourself a cup.”

  “Thank you Beulah.”

  Missy felt terrible for little Kaylee and hated feeling so helpless. She wanted to help, but once the social worker had arrived, there was nothing that she could do. The child was in the hands of the state now, and hopefully they’d find her relatives soon. When Echo came in with Jasmine to have coffee and cupcakes before she started her work day, the mood at their little table was somber indeed. They talked about Kaylee, then tried to shake off the gloom and move forward, hoping that the little girl was okay.

  **

  Chas Beckett’s hunches were rarely wrong, and something just didn’t feel right about this case. He called his junior partner, Spencer Bengal, a young Marine veteran, and Ringo, his resident hacker, into his office to assign tasks. He wanted this case solved as soon as possible. When the two young men, who were as different as night and day, Spencer in his finely tailored suit, and Ringo in yesterday’s sweat pants, were settled across the desk from him, Chas got straight to the point.

  “Ringo, this one looks like a murder/suicide, where the wife killed the husband, then herself. I want you to find everything that you can on her. Let’s see what her motive might’ve been. Her name is Dora Lyndhurst. Here’s an info sheet with everything we have so far – social security number, driver’s license and birth certificate, you can go from there.”

  “Hey, did anybody bring in doughnuts this morning?” Ringo replied, running a hand over his scruffy beard.

  Spencer and Chas stared at him, unblinking, for a moment.

  “Nah? Alright, it’s cool, I’ll just go get a breakfast burrito or something,” he muttered, taking the paper from Chas and heading down the hall toward the office’s technology center, where he ruled the roost and the receptionist, Holly, went in on occasion to spray it down with air freshener.

  “Hey, Holly…you got bagels?” they heard him holler on his way. Her reply was unintelligible, which was probably a good thing.

  “What did you find out from Child Services?” Chas asked Spencer.

  “Kaylee was picked up by her aunt and Grandma, who live here in town. She’ll be staying at the grandmother’s for now.”

  “Good,” Chas nodded. “We’ll want to talk with both of them. Maternal or paternal grandmother?”

  “Maternal. All of the father’s relatives are in the southwest and aren’t really great candidates for placing a child from what I understand.”

  “The social worker told you all that?” Chas was impressed.

  “Not in so many words, but it was pretty clear,” Spencer shrugged.

  “Well, at least Kaylee is somewhere familiar, poor kid. We need to get her to talk, but she’s so traumatized that she just shuts down.”

  “Maybe being with her grandmother will help. Safe, familiar environment and all.”

  “Did the social worker have any feedback on the grandmother?”

  Spencer shook his head. “She didn’t say anything, but I got the impression that she’s a lesser of all evils kind of alternative. Not bad, but certainly not ideal.”

  Chas nodded. “Okay, let’s get over there and see what the story is. Hopefully she’ll have some insight as to why her daughter might’ve done something like this.”

  **

  “Hi, I’m looking to speak with Rosemary Conrad,” Chas told the pleasant-looking older woman who answered the door of the well-kept, two-story stucco home.

  “I’m Rosemary. You’re not with the press, are you?” she asked wearily. Chas noticed the lines around her mouth and shadows under her eyes.

  “No, we’re not. My name is Chas Beckett, and this is my associate, Spencer Bengal. I do consulting work for the Calgon PD, in the Homicide division. May we come in?”

  “That’s fine, but I don’t have too much time. I have a conference call in less than an hour that I can’t postpone,” Rosemary led them into the well-decorated home.

  They sat down in the living room, which featured two silk cream-colored sofas, and a light beige Persian rug. Chas noted that there were no toys of any kind to be seen.

  “Little Kaylee seems to be a very sweet little girl,” Spencer smiled, wanting to open the conversation on as positive a note as possible.

  “Dora wanted to name her after me, but William wouldn’t hear of it, as if it was his decision to make,” she grimaced.

  “How’s she settling in?” Chas inquired, hoping that talking about her granddaughter would warm her up a bit.

  “She’s fine,” Rosemary replied shortly. “What can I help you with?”

  Spencer and Chas exchanged a glance.

  “We’re investigating the circumstances surrounding the death of your daughter, Ms. Conrad. I offer our most sincere condolences and assure you that we’re trying our very best to get to the bottom of this,” Chas replied.

  “Why is it that you’re involved, exactly, Mr. Beckett? I’ve already spoken with Detective Solinsky and he seemed quite on top of things.”

  In his entire time of knowing Art Solinsky, this was the first time that Ch
as had heard anyone say anything positive about the man.

  “I’m sure he is, but the Calgon PD is making this case a priority and is dedicated to using every available resource to get some answers for you.”

  “Well, my daughter didn’t plan this, I can tell you that. If he got shot, it was because she was defending herself.”

  “Was their marriage in trouble? Was Mr. Lyndhurst abusive?”

  “Their marriage should’ve never happened in the first place, if you ask me,” Rosemary clasped bejeweled fingers together in her lap. “Who knows what that ugly little man was capable of. He was never good enough for my Dora, never,” her lips clamped shut in a thin line.

  “Now, Mom, it isn’t helpful to speak ill of the dead,” a mildly reproving voice from behind them said.

  Spencer and Chas turned to see a woman who appeared to be around Dora’s age, and who looked very much like her, leading Kaylee by the hand. The little girl was clutching a somewhat bedraggled teddy bear under her arm, and her eyes were wide as she stared at the two men.

  “Hi, I’m Jeannie, Dora’s sister,” she said shyly, clutching Kaylee’s hand.

  “Jeannie, run along and take the child back downstairs,” Rosemary raised an eyebrow at her daughter. “These men are part of the investigation, and I don’t have much time left before my call.”

  “Okay, sorry,” Jeannie replied, turning to go.

  “Jeannie, I’m Chas Beckett,” Chas stood, stopping her in her tracks. “Would you have a few minutes to chat after we’re done speaking with your mother?”