Candy Shop Mystery - Goody Goody Gunshots Part 19

Not being one to let a little thing like that stop me, I followed her outside. "So he didn't tell you why he was here?"

She lit a cigarette and inhaled until her cheeks caved in. "If you leave now, I won't call the cops on you."

"If I leave now, I won't find out what I want to know. Come on, Corelle. What's the harm in answering a few questions-unless you have something to hide?"

She glared at me, her eyes hard and pebbly. "You don't give up, do you?"

"Afraid not."

"Who did you say you were again?"

"My name's Abby Shaw. I own a candy shop downtown."

"Yeah? I knew a lady owned a candy shop once. Name of Grace Something."

"Grace was my great-aunt." I'm not above name dropping when it might do me some good.

Corelle looked interested. "No kidding? You Tuck and Elaine's girl?" I nodded, and she exhaled a thick plume of smoke. "Well, I'll be. Why didn't you just say so? What do you want to know?"

Who could have guessed it would be so simple? "Did Lou Hobbs tell you why he was in Paradise?"

"He told me he was here on business, but I don't think he was telling the truth."

"Oh? Why not?"

"Because he mentioned a couple of places that haven't been around here in a while, like the roller rink over on Fairmont and Ray's Drive-In. If you want my opinion, he's been here before, but not for ten, fifteen years."

That set me back a couple of paces. The places she'd mentioned had been popular teen hangouts for years, but they'd both gone out of business while I was living in California. Did that mean that Hobbs was from Paradise? That might explain his connections to Ingersol and Hendrix, but if he'd lived here, why hadn't anyone else come forward to say that they recognized him?

"Did he tell you what kind of business he had here in town?"

Corelle watched the smoke drifting up from the end of her cigarette. "If he did, I've forgotten. He was a quiet one, I can tell you that. Didn't talk much at all. I tried making friendly conversation when he first moved in, but I guess he wasn't interested in talking to an old lady."

"What about visitors? Did he ever have any?"

"None that I ever saw, except the first day he came to look at the place. Had a friend with him that day."

Interesting. I wondered why she hadn't mentioned that to the police. "Do you know who it was?"

She shook her head. "Don't know his name, but I've seen him around. Big fella, kind of balding. Blond hair."

Quentin Ingersol? He was tall and blond, and looking more suspicious by the minute. Or-Marshall? The thought made me almost sick. Or could it have been Dwayne? "And Hobbs? Did you run a background check on him before you rented the room to him?"

Corelle gave a sharp laugh. "Now, how would I go about doing that? I don't have that kind of money. Most of the time, I barely get from one end of the month to the other." She took her last drag and crushed out the cigarette beneath her foot. "Besides, he seemed all right."

"Why do you say that?"

"I asked for a deposit, but he said he didn't have enough money. He'd been down on his luck, and he was here to get back on his feet. That's when his friend popped up and guaranteed that the rent would be paid."

"The blond man."

Corelle nodded.

"And you believed him."

"I didn't have any reason not to."

I could think of a few, but I kept them to myself. "Did you happen to notice what kind of car they were in that day?"

"Sure. I may not know the driver, but I'd know that car anywhere." Corelle turned toward the door and grinned at me over her shoulder. "They were driving Marion Escott's Cadillac."

Chapter 31.

"Abby! You remembered!" Beaming with delight, Marion Escott pushed open her screen door and ushered me into the cool, dark interior of her house. I held out the box of caramels I'd gone back to the shop to pick up, and glanced around to see if Dwayne was lurking nearby. I couldn't see him, but I hadn't noticed him immediately last time I was here either.

"I put in all your favorites, plus a couple of new varieties," I told Marion as I sat on the sofa. "I hope you like them."

"I know I will." Marion set the box aside and looked at me expectantly. "You look worried, dear. Is something wrong?"

"I'm not sure," I said, trying to ease into the conversation. "Is Dwayne around today?"

"Dwayne?" Marion scowled in confusion. "Do you need to talk to him?"

"I'm not sure," I said again. The fact that she hadn't actually answered my question wasn't lost on me, but Marion has always been notoriously protective of her babies. "Maybe I misunderstood what he said last time I was here, but I thought he told me he hadn't seen a man with a limp around town."

Marion's spine straightened almost imperceptibly, but I knew she sensed a threat. "If you're talking about the man who was murdered in town, I'm sure that's what he said. Dwayne wouldn't know anyone like that."

Yeah. He was obviously too cla.s.sy to know any murdered people. "Has he been driving your car while he's here?"

"Sometimes, why?"

"I'm afraid somebody saw him in town with Lou Hobbs, the murder victim, a couple of weeks before the murder."

"That's ridiculous. Whoever told you that is lying."

I didn't want to put Corelle in the hot seat, so I left her name out of it. "The person I talked to said that Dwayne was driving your car."

Marion shook her head firmly. "Impossible. Dwayne told you he didn't know that man. If he says he didn't, then he didn't."

I wondered what kind of mother and grandmother I would have made. Would I have been able to look at my offspring honestly, or would I have put blinders on and refused to see them as they really were? "Has he ever mentioned the name Lou Hobbs to you before?"

"Was that the murdered man? Of course not."

"What about Kerry Hendrix or Quentin Ingersol? Are either of them friends of his?"

Clearly angry, Marion got to her feet and shoved the box of caramels at me. "I don't know why you're asking all of these ridiculous questions, Abby, but I don't like it. Dwayne is a good boy. He hasn't done anything wrong, and he doesn't know the man who was murdered. Now, I'll thank you to leave."

Disappointed but not surprised, I stood. I couldn't think of any argument for staying, so I let her usher me outside again. The door slammed behind me, and I stood on the porch trying to decide what to do next. I was halfway down the driveway when I heard a loud bang coming from the garage and realized that Dwayne must be hard at work out there.

Without giving myself a chance to think twice, I hurried down the driveway. The rolling door on the garage was closed, but the side door stood partway open, and another loud bang told me I'd been right. Dwayne was inside.

I knocked lightly on the door and stepped inside the garage at the same time. Large pieces of furniture lined the walls, blocked the windows, and threw the whole garage into shadow. I could see a single bare bulb hanging from the rafters at the back of the garage, but the place was so crammed full of furniture I wasn't sure how to get back there. "Dwayne? Are you in here?"

Something metal clanged loudly, and an instant later Dwayne materialized out of the clutter. He held something in his hand, but I couldn't get a good look at it. I was too busy looking at the unwelcome scowl on his face. "What in the h.e.l.l do you want?"

That was a good question. I wanted answers, but it seemed like a good idea to be cautious about how I went after them. I decided to act as if our encounter at the bank had never happened. "I was just talking to your grandmother. She said you were out here, and I thought I'd come out and see what it is you do."

He darted a rapid glance at something behind him. "This isn't a good time. Come back later."

That glance made my internal radar go off, and I'd have bet the farm he was hiding something back there. In fact, the whole setup felt funny to me. A row of carefully cut wooden decorations stretched away on the floor in front of me. They were beautifully crafted and intricate, but they were obviously new. In that instant, I understood that this wasn't an ordinary workshop, and Dwayne wasn't restoring old tables and chairs.

"Sure. That's cool," I said, trying to look as if I meant it. "I don't want to intrude. I'm just curious, that's all. Your grandmother can't say enough about the work you're doing."

"Yeah? Well. Whatever." Dwayne shifted his weight, and the part of him that had still been in shadow moved into the light. He was holding a ma.s.sive wrench in both hands, and the sight of it made my stomach turn over. "What did you need to talk to Grandma about?"

I wasn't planning on provoking him, but I calculated my chances of outrunning him just in case. Considering his bulk and the way his pants hung low on his hips, I figured the odds were slightly in my favor. "I didn't need to talk to her about anything. I brought her that box of caramels I've been promising her."

"That so?" He c.o.c.ked a look at the box in my hands. "Then why do you still have it?"

That was another good question. I held out the box impulsively. "I brought this one for you."

He didn't look convinced, but he took the box from me, and I considered that a step in the right direction. He put the wrench down on an unfinished two-drawer dresser with a deep scar running up the side and pawed through the first layer of caramels. I breathed a sigh of relief that I wasn't in imminent danger of having my head broken. If he'd been on the verge of attacking, he'd still be holding the wrench.

The candy didn't relax him, though. He was definitely worried about me seeing something. Every glance into a corner, every shift of his beady little eyes, only convinced me more.

"I think I may have misunderstood something you told me the other day," I said as he shoved a piece of candy into his mouth. "Didn't you say you hadn't seen the guy with the limp?"

Dwayne's eyes flicked away from the candy and landed on my face. "That's right."

"Was that before or after you guaranteed to pay the rent on his apartment if he couldn't?"

"Who said I did that?"

"I happened to run into his landlady today. She mentioned that you were with him when he rented the room from her."

Dwayne swallowed the caramel and growled, "b.i.t.c.h."

"Are you saying you weren't with him?"

He glowered at me from beneath a thick line of sandy-colored eyebrow and shoved the box of candy at me. "I'm not saying nothin'. Why don't you take your candy and get out?"

After he'd had his dirty fingers all over the box? Was he nuts? I shook my head and pressed the box back at him. "Keep it. Throw it away. Whatever. Why did you lie about knowing Lou Hobbs?"

Dwayne jammed the lid on the box and tossed it onto a table. "I don't have to answer your questions."

I kept one eye on the wrench, just in case. "No, but you will have to talk to the police when they get here."

"You gonna rat me out?"

"They're going to find out you knew Hobbs sooner or later," I said with a shrug. "If you didn't kill him, why don't you just admit it?"

He s.n.a.t.c.hed the wrench again and whipped around to glare at me. "Don't you dare try to pin that on me. I didn't touch that sonofab.i.t.c.h."

I felt myself flinch, but I forced myself to hold my ground. He wasn't out of control yet, but he was trying to intimidate me. "Can you prove that?"

"I don't have to. Not to you."

"No, but you might have to prove it to the police. Where were you last Monday night, Dwayne?"

"Go to h.e.l.l."

"Does that mean you don't have an alibi?"

"Not that it's any of your business, but I was right here, working."

"What time?"

"All evening. Whatever time Lou Hobbs got himself whacked." He stared at me, hard. "I didn't kill him, so get the h.e.l.l out of here, and let me get back to work."

That sounded like good advice, but I still had a couple of questions, and I might not get another chance to ask them. "How did you know him?"

"That's none of your business."

"Did you know him when he used to live here?"

In the blink of an eye, the anger left his face, and nervousness replaced it. "Where did you hear that?"

"Around. Is that how you know him?"

"Lou Hobbs never lived here," he said, leaning in so close I could smell something sour on his breath. "You got that?"

An uncomfortable warning darted up my spine, and this time I did draw back. "I don't believe you. I think Hobbs did live somewhere around here, and I think that's how you and Quentin and Kerry know him."

Dwayne straightened sharply. "You think you're so smart, don't you? You think you have it all figured out, but you don't know s.h.i.t."

The look in his eyes stopped me cold, and suddenly I understood the reason for his edginess. "You know who killed him, don't you?"

"I don't know anything."

"I think you do. I think you know exactly what happened, and I think you know why. So why haven't you gone to the police?"