The Secret Ingredient Murders: A Eugenia Potter Mystery Page 14

  Jason laughed, but behind him Janie did not even smile.

  “You know what’s up, Jason,” the policeman continued in a casual tone. “I know it seems like a crock to you, but them’s the rules, kid.”

  “Urine check?”

  “Right.”

  “Here?” Jason’s voice rose a little. “At my aunt’s house? This is embarrassing, man! Why can’t we do it like in other cities, where at least I’d have to go someplace else, like the police station or something. Why do you have to come out to my own house? Or my aunt’s house?”

  “Because that’s the way we do it here, son.”

  Unmoved, the cop handed Jason a plastic container with a lid on it, and a plastic bag in which to put the “evidence” and seal it so it couldn’t be opened until a lab technician tested it.

  “Find a bathroom. Just do it. And then I’ll leave you alone.”

  While Jason trudged off to follow the humiliating instructions, Officer Patterson shrugged apologetically to Genia. “Sorry about this.”

  “It’s ridiculous!” Janie burst out.

  He glanced at her. “We’re just trying to keep your brother clean, young lady.”

  “It’s so unfair. He’s not a criminal—”

  “Well,” the officer interrupted, “yes, he is. He broke the law, and I hate to tell you this, but that’s what a criminal is. Next time, he could get jail time. Do you want that to happen?”

  “No, but—”

  “That’s what we’re trying to prevent.”

  “You’re just fascists—”

  Genia stepped in quickly before her niece could land herself in trouble as big as her brother’s. “Sweetheart, come back into the kitchen with me. Officer, I’m sure you understand. My niece is upset for her brother. If you’ll excuse us …”

  Grabbing Janie by the wrist, she tugged the girl away from temptation.

  “I knew it!” Janie exploded in the kitchen. The words tumbled over each other. “I knew that’s what he was here for as soon as I saw that cop car. I hate this! All Jason was doing is what every kid does. He was just experimenting, but he got unlucky and got caught. It could have been me, Aunt Genia! I’ve tried pot, and other stuff, too. So has everybody I know. And the cops and the court, they treat him like he’s an ax murderer or something, when all he is is a normal kid like anybody else. It’s so unfair! That cop out there, I’ll bet he’s tried pot. I’d bet you anything he has! And he probably drinks, but adults don’t see that as a drug. Oh, no,” she said with deep bitterness, “alcohol doesn’t count, that’s not an addictive drug, not unless a kid drinks it, of course. Then suddenly it’s illegal and they throw the book at him. I hate it, it’s so hypocritical and unfair!”

  Genia let her get it all out and didn’t argue with her.

  But when Janie plopped down into a kitchen chair and put her face in her hands, Genia sat down near her and said, “You’re right about a lot of things, sweetheart. It’s true that grown-ups are the most hypocritical creatures on the face of the earth. I don’t know if the officer out there drinks, or has ever tried drugs. I do know there are certain laws in this state and this country, and anyone who breaks them takes the risk of getting caught and punished. Just like Jason. That’s how it is. You know that. We can change laws we don’t like, but as long as they’re on the books, there are consequences to breaking them. I love the fact that you care about your brother so much, but you won’t help him if you make enemies of the police.”

  The girl looked up, her face tear-stained.

  “Do you understand what I’m saying, Janie?”

  Her niece nodded, though her face looked mulish.

  Genia got up to make them both a cup of tea. “Have you eaten anything today?”

  “I’m not hungry.”

  Her aunt started getting out a large skillet anyway, and then she pulled out all she would need to fix up “a mess”—as her Arizona neighbors might say—of scrambled eggs, bacon, hash browns with onions, and pancakes on the side. It was her opinion that low blood sugar made almost anything seem worse, and also that there was no such thing as a teenager who wasn’t hungry.

  When Jason came into the kitchen a few minutes later, looking cheerful enough, he appeared delighted to smell breakfast cooking, even if his sister still sat at the table looking as if she’d like to kill somebody.

  “Sorry about that, Aunt Genia,” he said, with no real rancor in his tone.

  “How much longer, Jason?” she asked him.

  “One more week, then I’m free at last.” He spread his arms expansively and grinned at them. “Then I can smoke all the dope I want. Just kidding! Just kidding!”

  He and Janie had already turned eighteen, which the family had quietly celebrated with a cake at their mother’s house. If he broke the terms of his diversion now, he would be held accountable as an adult and be subject to a possible prison term. Genia realized that she only had to hold her breath for one more week, until he had completed his “sentence.” Then she had only to worry about the rest of his life! At this moment, Jason certainly didn’t look as if he had any fears about this last drug test. She felt so proud of him for staying “clean” and for working so hard at the Castle during this difficult summer.

  When his sister stubbornly refused to come out of her unhappy mood or to eat a bite that Genia fixed, Jason gobbled up her share, too. With the resilience of youth, he seemed to be doing fine in regard to Stanley’s death. Maybe he had let out his emotions in private, Genia thought, so that now he felt better. She hoped so. It wouldn’t be healthy for an eighteen-year-old boy to grieve too much over the death of an old man, no matter how much he liked him.

  Looking over at both of them, Genia admitted to herself that if she had to choose which twin worried her most at the moment, it wouldn’t be Jason. It would be sensitive, emotional, unhappy Jane.

  “I think I’ll stop by to see your mom today,” she told them.

  “You can’t,” they warned her. “Mom’s gone to Providence, and she won’t be back until time for the memorial service tomorrow.” The twins told her they were going out to Parker’s Island to spend the night with their dad, because, as Janie bitterly said, “Mom doesn’t trust us to stay on our own for one night.”

  “But at least if we go to the island to see Dad, we’ll get away from Mom,” her brother pointed out. He looked up at his great-aunt and grinned. “All Mom has to do is look at a boat and she pukes.”

  “Runs in your family,” Genia told him. “Your uncle Lew was like that, too.”

  For once Genia agreed totally with their mother’s decision. Without a parent around to supervise, teens could find themselves in big trouble they didn’t ever intend to happen. Much better for these two to be secluded out on the island with their father, especially considering the fact that unless Stanley’s murderer was some stranger who’d already fled, there was a killer still on the loose in their hometown.

  “Janie, eat something,” she pleaded with her niece.

  “I can’t,” the girl complained. “Jason ate it all.”

  “You snooze, you lose,” he shot back at her.

  “I have more eggs,” their great-aunt promised, and she turned to crack two more into the skillet. A few minutes later, she watched with pleasure as Janie chowed down on scrambled eggs, toast, and bacon. Genia knew she was foolish to think food always made everything all right, but sometimes, it surely made things better.

  14

  FOOD FOR THOUGHT

  Nikki Parker Dixon didn’t wait for her father’s murder to be solved to hold his memorial service. On the Tuesday morning following his murder, almost six hundred persons filled St. Anne’s parish church to hear their celebrated citizen eulogized by mourners ranging from the lieutenant governor to an ex-convict who had gone straight under Stanley’s sponsorship. The weather changed from clear to overcast that very morning as the limousine pulled up in front of the church with Nikki and Randy inside.

  Within the church the people who had
attended Genia’s dinner party sat near one another, as if drawn together by something in common beyond the fact of their mutual acquaintance with the deceased. Harrison Wright held his arm around his wife throughout the service. Celeste Hutchinson sat in the front row with the mayor, Larry Averill. David Graham slid into a row beside Genia. They shared a hymnal, and he whispered to her, “I hope you still want to have dinner with me tomorrow night?” Why did I agree to that? she thought. Nevertheless, she inclined her head in acceptance. The church was no place, and this service was no time, to back out now. Beside her the whole Eden family sat together, the twins sandwiched protectively between Kevin and Donna.

  As Genia nodded her hellos to all of them, she thought of the names on the white bookmarks in the old cookbook, and she wondered, Why did he invite you to lunch at the Castle? Why did he make me invite you to dinner?

  Ed Hennessey, dressed in a suit, stayed outside and smoked.

  As Genia listened to one speaker after another extol her late friend, she thought unhappily, Was he killed last Saturday by someone who is eulogizing him today?

  Genia had just finished changing from her black funeral suit into a comfortable pair of slacks and a blouse when a brand-new crisis exploded, forcing her attention in another direction. She had spent an hour at the Castle with other invited mourners. Now, middle of the day or not, she wanted to pour herself a glass of the wine and indulge in some of the creamy French cheese that David Graham had given her. Then she wanted to retreat with her snack to a covered section of the deck, blessedly alone, to watch the rain begin to fall.

  The crisis call came from Donna.

  “The police just called, Aunt Genia. It’s positive.” Donna’s voice was rough with anguish.

  Alarmed, but not understanding, Genia asked, “What is, dear?”

  “Jason’s drug test!”

  “Oh, no! Does he know?”

  “Jason? Aunt Genia, it was Jason they tested. Of course he knows. He had to know it would be positive. He couldn’t have smoked the stuff in his sleep.”

  “No, of course not.” Genia felt a rush of sympathy for her overburdened niece. To make matters worse, he was now eighteen. “You must be worried sick. Where is he now?”

  “I don’t know! He raced off in his car, and I haven’t seen him since. The court date is already set. It’s in three weeks. How could he do this? He knew what would happen.”

  “Did he say anything to you before he left?”

  “Oh yes. My son said, and forgive me, but I quote, ‘Those assholes, I didn’t smoke pot, I’m clean.’ ”

  “Well, then, we need to find out what went wrong.”

  “Aunt Genia, you don’t believe him, do you?”

  “Well, I don’t think we ought to take it for granted that he’s guilty. He may be. But drug tests are often wrong. There can be false positives and false negatives.”

  For a moment, Donna seemed to forget her own troubles, as she exclaimed, “Sometimes I wonder about you, Aunt Genia! The things you know that I would never expect you to know … well, if Jason shows up there, tell him to come home so that his mother can kill him. And tell him if I don’t, his father will.”

  Within the hour, Jason showed up at Genia’s back door. She let him in, observing that his young face looked shadowed with concerns that no one his age should have to carry.

  “Come in, dear.” She ushered him directly to the kitchen, the room in any house where troubles, if they could not be solved, could at least be salved. After the call from his mother, Genia had never poured that glass of wine. Instead, she had water on the boil, and so she poured for him and herself cups of herbal tea that advertised itself as “soothing.” That was what they needed, she thought, a little warm and calming comfort. To the tea, she added honey.

  “Here, Jason, drink this.”

  “Did Mom call you?”

  Genia nodded.

  “For what it’s worth—probably nothing—I didn’t do it, Aunt Genia. There’s a mistake, there’s got to be.”

  His aunt released her breath in a long sigh.

  “It doesn’t make any sense, I know,” her nephew admitted. “I can’t explain it. But I swear to God, I swear on Mr. Parker’s grave, I didn’t smoke any dope. I know what will happen if I do, I’m not a total moron. Even if my mother thinks I am. Does she really think I’m so stupid I’d risk going to jail? For a joint?” His voice was choked with anger and hurt feelings, and the sight and sound of him hurt Genia’s own heart.

  “I don’t think you’d do that.”

  He lifted his head and stared at her. “You believe me? Really?”

  “Of course I believe you.” Genia said the words stoutly, as if they were completely true, but inside she quailed a bit, hating the soupçon of doubt she felt. “If you say you didn’t, you didn’t. It’s true that it doesn’t make any sense, but there has to be an explanation. Perhaps a mix-up in samples. Mislabeling. Something simple.” She reached over to lay her hand on his arm, and she could feel how tight his muscles were.

  “There’s more.” He paused, and gulped in air. His body looked all bunched in the chair now, as if he were pulling himself in tight. “The cops think … Eddie told them … they think I smoked pot … because he told them I was growing a bunch of it in Stanley’s greenhouse.”

  “Oh, Jason. Were you?”

  He lifted his head again and stared directly into her eyes. “Well. Sort of.”

  Genia felt her heart sink. “You were? Did Stanley know?”

  Suddenly the boy’s gaze shifted away from her. “That’s what the cops want to know, too. What do they care if Mr. Parker knew?” His tone became deeply sarcastic. “Are they going to arrest him, too?”

  “I have to ask, Jason. Why did you grow it?”

  He shrugged and avoided her gaze. “I just did. I never meant to smoke it.”

  “Or sell it?”

  “No way!”

  “Then … why, Jason?”

  “Does there have to be a reason for everything?”

  “Well, there usually is,” she replied gently.

  “Yeah, well, I don’t know what to tell you.”

  The police will not be satisfied with that, Genia thought.

  They finished their tea in a tense and worried silence, until her nephew said, “I’m sorry, Aunt Genia.”

  She clasped one of his hands. “We’ll get you through this.”

  “I’m really glad you’re here. I don’t know what I’d do—”

  “The main thing is, you didn’t smoke it, and that can’t have been your sample they tested. Let’s get that straightened out first, and then we’ll figure out what to do about the pot in the greenhouse. You say the police know about that?”

  “Yeah. Yes.”

  “We’re going to need to talk to your lawyer, Jason.”

  The boy’s eyes filled with tears, which he angrily wiped away.

  “Life sucks,” he blurted out.

  She hated very much to hear him say so. “I hope one day you’ll be able to change your mind about that.”

  “Don’t count on it, Aunt Genia,” he said bitterly.

  But she did count on it, with all of her heart.

  And now she deduced what Kevin Eden was doing at the greenhouse the morning after Stanley’s death: He wanted to destroy the evidence of his son’s illegal crop.

  “How did your father know you were growing pot?”

  “Janie told him.” This was said without surprise or rancor. “Remember when she was so mad at Mr. Parker? She saw it in the greenhouse when you sent her up to the Castle to look for him. She was so mad at Mr. Parker and me that she called Dad out on the island. She called him from right there in the greenhouse and told him.”

  “That’s why she was so mad at Mr. Parker?”

  “Yeah. Janie was pissed! Excuse me.”

  “That’s all right. I’ll bet she was! I am, too!”

  “Don’t be mad at him, okay?”

  “Why not? Look at the trouble you’
re in now. He should never have allowed it, and don’t tell me that Stanley didn’t know anything about it. He knew every plant by sight. He would certainly have noticed a marijuana plant growing in his greenhouse! Honestly, if he weren’t already dead, I think I would kill him myself.”

  “My dad was sure mad enough to kill him.”

  Suddenly great-aunt and grandnephew stared at each other in mutual dismay at those words.

  “No!” Jason protested. “I never meant—”

  “I know, honey. But tell me something. Is that why your father was here that night, Jason? He wasn’t really coming to my dinner party, was he? He was coming to give Stanley a piece of his mind, wasn’t he?”

  “Yes, but Aunt Genia, my dad wouldn’t …”

  She covered one of his hands with her own again. “Of course not, but we have to know the whole truth so that no one can surprise us with it, don’t we?”

  She waited, but Jason didn’t respond.

  “Is that the whole truth, dear?”

  He nodded without looking at her.

  “And nothing but the truth?”

  “So help me.” But he said it bitterly, and it sounded to Genia more like a prayer than a vow.

  The next evening, while getting dressed to go out to dinner with David Graham, Genia thought wearily, Why in heaven’s name did I agree to this? She didn’t want to go out with a man she barely knew and pretend that everything was just fine; she wanted to stay home and think about how to help her family. Plus, now that push came to shove, she felt a little uneasy about going out with a man other than her friend Jed White, who lived in Boston. Not that she and Jed had any claims on one another, but neither had they gone out with other people, either.

  Jed had been her first true love, a college friend who had appeared back in her life a year ago. When she had first arrived in Devon, Jed had driven down from Boston to see her that week. They had met in Newport, where they had dined at a charming coastal restaurant owned by a friend of his. They’d sat outside on a heated deck, under a sky packed so full of stars that Genia accused Jed of ordering them from a catalog, just for the evening.