drowning,” Miss Vivee said. “So it’s called dry drowning.”
I looked over at Vivee and back at Mac. I had never heard of dry drowning before. I was so tempted to pull out my iPhone and Google it. But that would upset Miss Vivee that I had to confirm what she and Mac were telling me. I made a mental note to look it up later. In the privacy of my room.
“How do you two know that?” I said instead.
“The symptoms of course,” Vivee said. “She came in coughing. When she sat down to eat she told Renmar that she thought some of her soup would help her. And she had dirt on her clothes.”
“Coughing?” I said. “That’s all?” I shook my head in disbelief.
“And the dirt on her clothes,” Miss Vivee said again.
“You could tell from that?” I said confused. “That’s what made you know she dry drowned. Or whatever it’s called. Maybe she just swallowed the wrong way, or she was catching a cold.”
“You don’t die from a cold. Or from swallowing the wrong way. Leastways not that quickly. And you don’t cough that long.” Miss Vivee didn’t like the idea that I wasn’t just falling in line with her coughing culprit version of Gemma’s death.
“Vivee said that Gemma complained to Renmar of being tired. Having chest pain,” Mac said.
“I heard Renmar tell the Sheriff that,” Vivee said and gave a quick nod of her head. “And Brie confirmed it.”
Mac looked at me. “I know it seems quite incredulous for us to make that assumption on so little information. And you’re right, there’s lots of things that’ll make you cough. But there aren’t many things that will make you cough and kill you.” He nodded his head slowly. “Go ahead. Gaggle it,” he said and sat back in his seat, seemingly quite pleased with himself.
“Gaggle it?” I crunched up my nose.
“You know,” Miss Vivee said. “On the World Wide Web.”
I started laughing. I had planned to later on, but since they were okay with it, I whipped out my phone.
“Just do a search for coughing as a symptom,” he said.
And while I searched, I heard Miss Vivee talk to Mac about what she had come to ask.
“Mac,” she said. “Like I said, we’re on the trail of a few of the suspects. And it’s led us to a strip club in Atlanta.”
“Really?”
“Yes. And . . . Well. Logan and I, upstanding women that we are, can’t go into one of those places by ourselves.”
“So you and Logan are solving the murder?”
“Logan’s an archaeologist,” Miss Vivee said.
I glanced up when she said that. I wondered was being an archaeologist a step up or down from me being “a good friend and companion.”
“And she knows all about solving murders,” Miss Vivee continued, her voice was so sweet it could have sweeten a whole sea of iced tea.
“And?” he asked. He seemed eager to find out what she wanted.
“Well.” I saw her lick her lips out the side of my eye. “I want you to ride to Atlanta with us,” she said, rather meekly for her. “You know. For protection and to help with our investigation.”
He smiled. “When you thinking about leaving?”
“Tomorrow,” she said and smiled.
“I’m in,” he said returning the smile.
“Thank you, Mac,” she said. She batted what was left of her eyelashes and blushed. “I knew I could count on you.” Then in the same breath, the smile disappeared and she raised an eyebrow. “And when we go,” her voice dropped an octave lower. “Don’t wear any of that pomade.”
She patted her hands on the table and said, “Now, we’re all set.” She nodded her head at me. “I’m going to the little’s girl’s room. You need to go?”
“No. I’m good,” I muttered barely looking up from my phone. There really was a thing called dry drowning. I Googled “cough symptom” and every illness it listed wasn’t very serious or took a really long time like emphysema or lung cancer. Except for dry drowning. It took anywhere from one to twenty-four hours to kill a person. The symptoms, according to WebMD were coughing, chest pain and shortness of breath.
Wow. Maybe Miss Vivee really did know what she was talking about.
Once she left, Mac slid down his bench so he was directly across from me. “I know Vivee must’ve told you that story about me, her and Betsy.”
“Huh,” I said and looked up from my phone. “Betsy?” the name sounded familiar.
“Her car. My limp.” He pointed down to his leg.
“Oh yeah,”