The Spia Family Presses On - By Mary Leo Page 0,45
much. “And just how do we let the killer know we don’t have the ring? Stand on my front porch and yell it out?” Hello, Mr. Killer, we don’t have the ring!”
“I hadn’t thought of that one, but we could leave a note on the front door: Dear Killer, Somebody else stole your ring. Sincerely, Mia and Lisa.”
“You’re not serious.”
She found dishes and flatware in the cupboards and placed them on my counter. “Kind of, yes. What else are we supposed to do?”
“Here’s the thing. The killer is not going to believe that we don’t have it. Not in this group. Too many trust issues. Besides, you said the ring was a lead.”
“Yeah, to the killer, not a thief. This is an entirely different game now. We’re suddenly in the crosshairs and I’m not sure I’m too comfortable with that. Can’t we just forget about the whole thing and leave for Maui early?”
I tossed my clothes on the bed, got up and walked over to the small wooden table in front of a side window. Lisa busied herself setting up a tea party for two complete with anise biscotti, and warm, olive focaccia bread courtesy of Aunt Hetty who routinely brought me a tray of early morning goodies, a couple of ripe pears, deep purple grapes, several thick slices of goat cheese, honey, and a cow shaped creamer filled with warmed milk. I pulled out a chair and made myself comfortable.
“We could do that, but there are a few things that I can’t seem to let go of,” I said as she poured me a cup of steaming Palm Court tea, our favorite ever since our last trip to New York City and our visit to the Plaza Hotel where we shared high tea. Of course, I had added a couple shots of bourbon to my cup, but that was in another life.
“What’s that?” she asked as she placed the tea pot back on the table.
“Why did the killer try to set up my mom? And what makes you think Nick will give up his search for Dickey when he found fresh blood on the millstone, my mom’s handgun floating in olive oil and the two of us acting so weird? And what does it say to the family if I don’t ferret out the killer? I’ve been working hard to keep them honest for the past two years. This murder blows that right into orbit. And besides all of that, what the hell do we do with Dickey’s pinky finger?”
Lisa stirred milk and honey into her tea and looked at me as if all my worries were totally insignificant. “About the killer setting up your mom, maybe he or she didn’t actually try to set her up. Maybe the killer threw the gun in the futso because the killer didn’t know what else to do with it when we walked in. Granted, the killer used your mom’s handgun, but that’s the only gun on the land, right?”
“As far as I know, yes, but these are ex-Mafiosi. Do you really think they gave up all of their hardware? Not likely. And what about my mom’s bracelet?”
“I think that’s legitimate. Meaning that somehow it came off while she was talking to him in the barn, and it simply ended up under his feet. Total accident.”
I was skeptical, but for the sake of argument, willing to go along. For now. “Okay. I’ll accept that, but what about Nick? He’s like a bloodhound. I don’t think he’s going to stop looking for Dickey.”
She drank down some tea and smirked. “Don’t worry about Nick. He’s all mine and after one night with me he won’t even remember Dickey’s name.”
“You’re that good, huh?”
Lisa leaned back in her chair and smirked. “Better.”
I smiled as I poured milk into my tea then drank down half the cup. “One last thing, Ms Vixen, we have a bloody finger sitting in the sink, and a killer who thinks we have Dickey’s ring. What exactly do you propose we do next?”
She shrugged. “Bury the finger, and let it be known that we do not have the ring and that we’ll forget about finding Dickey’s killer. You’ll simply let this whole thing slide as long as they don’t ever kill anybody else.”
“Simple,” I said. “I slap their hands and tell them they were bad and I’m done with it.”
“Something like that, yes,” she said, in between sips of hot tea.
My stomach wasn’t buying any of this. It cramped up so tight