Dying for Dominoes Read online

  She certainly wasn’t going to get in that fray. Still, Rian was silent.

  “Rian!” Genna exclaimed. “You better spill it and spill it now.”

  Rian sighed, and Amy felt the resignation in that breath. It was as if she let go of a lot more than the stale air she was holding.

  “Zack was pressuring me for a share of Granny’s business, and I didn’t know how to stop him. I think there were some good old boys down in Hot Springs who didn’t take kindly to Zack stepping into their territory, which is what I think he was planning to do. I’m not sure about all that now, because, well, I shouldn’t have believed anything he told me. But somebody was looking for Zack’s weed connection. I am that connection. And he was brash enough to bring them right to my front door.”

  “Oh,” Amy whispered, familiar with Rian’s code word for her pot trade. Granny’s sweaters were the green goods sold in Rian’s undercover business. “That is scary.”

  “Like sleep-with-your-gun scary,” Rian admitted. “It got all tangled up. And I really wanted to untangle it before . . .” Rian’s voice trailed away and fell silent.

  “Before what?” Amy asked finally, her voice barely above a whisper.

  “Before I lost it all. Everything I’ve worked so hard for. It’s not about the money. It never was.”

  Amy’s head was spinning. She couldn’t believe she didn’t know about any of this. Not even an inkling. She had happily skipped her way to the Cardboard Cottage every day thinking they were a merry little band of women making a lighthearted living. Maybe they did have secrets. Everyone had secrets. But theirs were silly, simple, and safe. Like what they did in the privacy of their domino game. Or how much wine they smuggled to Arkansas disguised as Omaha Steaks. Or where they hid each other’s keys when they had a bit much to drink and a cab was in order. Simple things. Safe things. Not drug dealers and dead husbands.

  She didn’t know about Rian and Genna being in cahoots with Zack. That was a secret so deep not even Zelda knew. She hadn’t known about the insurance money. She hadn’t known about the Hot Springs thugs. She was out of the loop of all these goings-on going on right under her roof. All of it right under her nose. Secrets and lies, among close friends literally in each other’s business every day. She didn’t know whether to be angry or hurt or jealous of being left out of the loop like some outsider.

  Genna had been silent, and Amy couldn’t tell what was looping through her head by the expression on her face. Her eyes were focused on Rian and nothing else, it seemed, her crimson lips pursed into a thin line.

  “Why didn’t you tell me this?” Genna asked finally. Her voice was tender.

  Rian shrugged. “The less you know about my sordid details, the better. I didn’t want to drag any of you into this.” Rian shifted her weight from one cheek to the other on the hard dock planks. “I love making people feel better. People like Becky. All those people sick on chemo and pharmaceuticals that cure one organ and kill another. I didn’t study botany in college to work in a lab making poison and GMOs.

  “Growing pot—there’s no time clock. No boss. No propaganda. Just ordinary civil disobedience. Just like our ancestors who fought against tyranny. You may not know this, but the first draft of the Constitution was written on paper made from hemp. Jefferson and Washington both grew cannabis on their farms. It was part of their everyday lifestyle. Funny how we haven’t moved on very far.”

  The mood shifted. The flutter abated inside Amy, and they were again just friends on a dock in the quiet countryside. She could feel Rian’s desperation—it was so tangible, like an ache from a sore muscle. Like an ache from a broken heart full of grief and loss.

  “Well, did you know that Thomas Jefferson was also an avid backgammon player? He played to relax while writing the Constitution. Probably with a little special help.” She grinned at Rian. “But you’re not a dope grower, Rian. You’re a medicine woman. You grow medicinal herbs and make tinctures and cookies and . . .”

  “And dope,” Rian interrupted. “I grow pot. And that’s still illegal. Not that I have all that much regard for the law. Ben excluded,” she added with a grin. Rian flicked the paper end of the roach into the lake and then turned to face her friends.

  “I know that’s a lot to take in, but we’re in the middle of some nasty business here. Zack is dead. Genna has some lame story about hitting a deer. We have an insurance policy about to pay out significant money. If anybody looks too closely, we look guilty. Zelda wanted him gone. And now he is.

  “Any which way we turn, we’ve got our fingers in this sticky pie. We have to put as much space as we can between him and us. And I don’t need anybody connecting Zack’s death with my little cannabis patch in the mountains. I’d rather let the whole business die on the vine right along with him. Zack was a nuisance, and his death has benefited us all.”

  Rian turned to face Genna. “Tell us what really happened in Hot Springs. We need to know.”

  Genna was silent for a long moment. Amy could tell she was corralling her thoughts and how they fit the picture.

  “We arrived at the Bennfield Hotel at happy hour. Zelda went to the front desk to check in and get the key. I had a dry martini with three jumbo olives—just like she likes it—waiting for her when she joined me at the bar. The reservation was made and paid for by Zack. Sneaky creep,” she added. “He was definitely up to something.”

  “Did you see Zack’s Hummer in the parking garage when you got there?”

  “I didn’t see the Hummer. But we were early, and Zelda wasn’t expecting him until after six.”

  Genna paused as if remembering. Amy hung on every word.

  “I was watching the TV above the bar. The local news was on, but the sound was down too low to hear it, so I was looking at the faces and wondering what they were saying. It’s a game I play with myself sometimes,” she added.

  “Then I saw the news crew was in Blue Mountain with a swarm of protestors in front of a church.”

  Rian perked up. “Blue Mountain? That’s one of the land leases we just bought.”

  “Yep. Wicked Creek Road. That’s why it caught my eye. The town water tower was in the background. They use the initials WC on the tower. Cracked me up. Don’t they know what a water closet is? Not far removed from an outhouse!”

  “They were protesting?” Rian asked. “I thought that lease was already signed, sealed, and delivered. That’s what Zack told me.”

  “I’m guessing something went awry. As I said, I couldn’t hear what they were saying, but there were two protest lines, with picket signs, and some really angry eyes. One of them was a man whose face was florid. I mean absolutely vermillion. I remember thinking he was the little engine that could and did and was about to drop from exhaustion.

  “But he didn’t. I think he just spit his anger at the reporter’s microphone.” She paused for a moment. “There was this lady right behind him. Looked kind of like Carvey’s Church Lady on Saturday Night Live. She had eyes like daggers aimed at the back of his head. There was a fat man in a tan suit. I thought, tacky color for a politician. I don’t know why I thought he was a politician. I didn’t recognize him. I thought I knew all of them.”

  “Did you recognize anyone?” Rian asked.

  “Nope. And then they flashed on the picket signs.” Genna laughed. “One of them said, ‘Thank you, Jesus, for bringing moble 2 our town!’ Spelled m-o-b-l-e!”

  “And the opposition?” Rian prodded.

  Genna laughed again. “There was an old farmer dude in overalls and a John Deere cap with a sign that said, ‘Dial tone is the Devil.’ Imagine that. It’s funny now, but it made me mad then. How in heaven’s name do they come up with this stuff? I don’t understand why people believe God’s paying attention to the dial tone on their phone. The world is rife of evil. Real evil. Who cares whether you talk on a cell phone or a can with a string? Picket something that m
atters. Global warming. Human trafficking. Government waste. Get off your pious butts and do something that makes a difference! Or go home and be quiet,” she added with a flourish of her hands.

  “Sheesh. I guess I got off track.”

  Amy was always surprised by Genna’s passion. Genna could stand aloof one minute and then roll up sleeves and dig in the next. She had seen her in action many times.

  “There was also the American Beekeeping Federation Convention in Hot Springs. The reporter was yammering her way around the expo booths and then he was joined on camera by the Arkansas Honey Bee Queen. She had a yellow-and-black sash across some serious cleavage. All blonde hair, long legs, boobs.

  “And then I went outside for a smoke. Zelda came with me. We had to dodge the housekeeping cones and wet paint signs.”

  “And still no Zack?” Amy asked.

  Genna shook her head. “I paid the bill and I left her there. She was pissed and ready to skin him alive when she saw him. Well—not really. That’s a manner of speech.”

  “And then you hit the deer,” Amy said.

  “Yep,” Genna drawled. “What a mess.”

  Yes, a mess. And yet, there were some pieces to the puzzle falling into place in the back of her mind. Rian’s words echoed in her thoughts: If anybody looks too closely, we look guilty. Zelda wanted him gone. And now he is.

  Wishes and dreams.

  Chapter Eleven

  Amy glanced at her friends seated next to her. They were lined up in hard metal chairs, looking stiff and uncomfortable. She clutched her hands to her stomach to still the queasy rumbling. The smell of microwave popcorn and Lean Cuisine meals lingering in the stale air didn’t help. She checked her watch. Twenty minutes had passed like a day in eternity, in insufferable silence. No one seemed to notice they were there. No one seemed to care.

  Zelda was escorted somewhere down the hall after they arrived, and they hadn’t seen her since.

  Rian rose and leaned against the wall opposite the chairs. She stood with her feet crossed, one toe to the ground, while her eyes seemed locked on the line where dirty beige walls met the gray linoleum tiles. Her fingers were shoved into her jeans pocket. The other hand twirled a brown curl. Sunglasses poked from the pocket of her scotch plaid shirt, with the sleeves rolled up to her forearm in precise wide cuffs.

  Amy’s eyes lit with surprise when she saw Rian drive up, especially after her declaration about being questioned. Rian must have had a change of mind. Or a change in tactic. She wasn’t sure which, and she wasn’t going to ask—not here, anyway.

  Amy glanced at Genna. She was sitting in the chair like a plank of southern pine. Her mouth was pressed into a tight line of Lancôme’s Rose Contre-Tremps. Her matching manicured fingers were drumming the chair arms without making a sound.

  Genna’s white linen tunic and matching pants seemed out of place in the stark police station. As if dressed to impress, her pricey pink coral beads hung in layers from her neck. Pale pink faux snake ballet flats were planted flat on the floor, ankles touching.

  Almost six feet at sixty, Genna commanded attention by the way she entered a room. A twinge of envy sliced through Amy as she looked at her friend. Even seated in the police station, waiting for who knew what, Genna was all confidence and composure. She was a woman who knew how to get her way and didn’t have an ounce of regret for the ways and means of how it was done. Genna uncrossed her ankles, and her signature perfume with its subtle notes of purpose and prosperity drifted toward Amy. A clock ticked above a dusty plastic tree. The air conditioner droned on and off, sucking the breath from the building and then blowing back out.

  A woman in uniform appeared from behind a heavy steel door.

  “Amy Sparks? This way.” She looked up and their eyes met.

  The muscles in her legs tensed, but she followed obediently, her sandals slapping against the floor as if keeping time. At the door, she paused and glanced behind her. Genna and Rian were being led to similar rooms nearby.

  A bead of sweat trickled between her breasts as she entered the room. It was bright and bare except for a table and three chairs. It still smelled of popcorn and aftershave.

  “We appreciate your coming,” the woman said. Her words were polite enough, but they seemed empty of feeling.

  “Are we in trouble? Have we done something wrong?”

  “That depends on your definition of wrong.” The woman smiled briefly. “We’re all guilty of something. Sit,” she ordered.

  Amy shuddered as the cold chair bottom met hers. Wary now, she studied the woman sitting in front of her. Her eyes were black-brown and too small for her face, and her hair was pulled back tight and slick above a shiny forehead that held the telltale tan of a ball cap like maybe she played softball or golf in her spare time. The short sleeves of her white shirt hung loosely, and her belt bunched at the waistband. She had lost weight recently.

  She pursed her lips. This was just a detective doing her job, nothing more. There was nothing to be frightened of. She was a woman who put on her pants the same way they all did.

  The detective shifted her gaze to the manila folder open in front of her. Amy swallowed hard. More sweat beaded between her breasts.

  “I understand you are friends with Mrs. Carlisle. How long have you known her?”

  “About six years.”

  “How would you describe the nature of her relationship with her husband? Her deceased husband,” she corrected flatly.

  Her shoulders jerked as if she had been shoved.

  The detective raised an eyebrow.

  Her chest tightened. Another drop of sweat trickled from beneath her bra. She was not going to crumble beneath that gaze and those eyebrows that looked as if they had never been plucked. She inhaled deeply through her nose and then exhaled through her mouth.

  Be calm. Be the calm you want to be.

  Her jaw relaxed. She squeezed her trembling hands in the deep of her lap and looked at the detective with a steady gaze.

  “I’d say they behave the way any married couple behaves.”

  “Which means what?”

  “Which means they have good days and bad days.”

  “What would cause a bad day?”

  She shrugged. “An argument.”

  “Do you know what they argued about?”

  “Money. Chores. Things Zack wouldn’t do that Zelda wanted him to, and vice versa.”

  “These were heated arguments? Were they physical? Abusive?”

  Her eyes widened. Did the detective notice? She had to keep her feelings off her sleeve. She had to keep emotions in check. She wouldn’t speak about Zack’s violent nature. She wouldn’t betray her friend in that way.

  “They were just loud. Maybe some hurtful words.”

  “You must be very close to Zelda Carlisle to know those details. A close confidant, even.”

  Amy nodded and then regretted it. Sweat trickled beneath her shirt.

  “Is Zelda Carlisle the kind of person who would kill her husband?”

  “No!” she barked, her head shaking with determination. “Never! She’s kind and generous. And she loves Zack. She loved Zack,” she repeated firmly. “I know she did.”

  “Even when he was abusive?” the detective asked.

  She answered with silence.

  The detective pulled a photo from the file and placed it in front of her on the table. A dark-haired man in a red madras shirt and a pair of khaki shorts was sprawled on a dirty concrete floor. She winced. Her stomach lurched.

  The shirt and pants were the same ones she had helped Zelda pick out for a gift last Christmas. Dark hair curled at the back of Zack’s head, which was turned to show his profile. A dark stain pooled around him and bloomed from his neck like a limp parachute that had not done its job.

  She closed her eyes against the image, but it was still there
. Nausea rocked her. She had never seen a dead body. Not outside of her dreams.

  Amy stared at the table, the photo in the periphery of her vision. She couldn’t keep her eyes on the photo, but she couldn’t keep her eyes away from it.

  The detective placed another picture next to it. There were other cars in the stalls at the parking garage, but here they were shown mostly from the license tag down. The focus of the photo was a line of tire marks that led from the top of the garage runway. The detective pulled the third photo from the folder. The garage exit sign above a door was the focus of this one, taken just outside the edges of where he lay.

  The detective tapped the photo of the sign and Amy’s eyes followed. “Carlisle was walking toward the stairs in the parking garage when he was struck down. A vehicle would have had to swerve out of its lane to strike him.”

  Amy looked up, a thousand questions running through her head, none of them willing to be spoken.

  Tapping the photo of the cars and the tire tracks, the detective said, “Let’s say the average speed in a parking garage is less than five miles an hour, if that. If someone got struck at that speed, the force would knock them down, most likely. But the car that made these tracks was going much faster. Faster, because it needed to. Because the driver wanted to hit Carlisle. Wanted to knock him down. Wanted to kill him.”

  Amy could feel her face drain of color.

  “Tell me about Genna Gregory’s car being involved in an accident that night.”

  Amy shifted uncomfortably in the chair, now painfully aware of the sweat between her breasts. She hoped there was no stain darkening the front of her T-shirt.

  “Genna? An accident?”

  “She claims she hit a deer. Were you not aware of the fact?”

  Her mind raced.

  “If Genna said she hit a deer on the way to Hot Springs, she hit a deer. She had no reason to lie about that.”