The Barefoot Summer Read online

  “Get out! Both of you, get out! This is my cabin,” Amanda shouted and waved her arms around. “Conrad told me when he brought me here for my honeymoon that he was leaving it to me in his will. So get off my property and don’t ever set foot on it again.”

  Jamie took a step around the suitcases in the middle of the floor. “And he promised me and Gracie the same thing. You can leave. I’m staying right here the rest of the summer and there’s not a damn thing either of you can do about it.”

  “Just for the record, I’m the first wife and this property is mine unless there is a will. So far there’s nothing filed in Fort Worth or the surrounding counties,” Kate said.

  “He’s only been dead”—Amanda winced at the word—“nine days. Give it time and it will turn up, just like his divorces from both of you, and when it does, you are both leaving my house.”

  Jamie crossed her arms over her chest. “And if it’s my house, then you two can get out of it. How long will it take to figure this out?” She frowned at Kate.

  “I have no idea,” Kate answered. “Why would either of you even want to stay here?”

  “It’s where Conrad brought me last December on our honeymoon. We started off the new year right here on the deck and watched the fireworks display out on the lake,” Amanda answered.

  Jamie drew her eyebrows down in a frown. “And I suppose he said he’d bring you back here for a week out of every summer?”

  Amanda nodded. “We were supposed to arrive tomorrow, and now”—she sniffled—“I’ll have to just imagine that he is here with me.”

  Gracie tugged on her mother’s shirttail. “Mommy, are they really going to live with us?”

  “Looks like it, because we aren’t leaving.” Jamie grabbed the handles of two suitcases and rolled them down the hallway.

  Kate wrapped her arms around her body in a hug, but it didn’t help. Her blood still ran cold through her veins. Conrad had been a smart con. He kept his stories straight by keeping them the same, starting with her. Or did he? Was there another wife out there who was even older than Kate?

  A week in the same house with those two was not the peaceful time she’d been looking forward to, but there was no way she was backing down from the challenge. Whether she wanted to be or not, she was the real wife at the time of his death. She’d paid for his funeral, and it would cost her a lot of money to get all this crap cleared up, so she was staying right here.

  Amanda tilted her chin up a notch. “I’m having the master bedroom.”

  “I don’t want it,” Jamie said. “Gracie and I were planning to use her room anyway.”

  Kate shrugged and turned around, her high heels sounding like a BB gun on the hardwood floor. Jamie’s cowboy boots echoed like shotgun blasts as she stomped down the hallway. Amanda’s blinged-out flip-flops reminded Kate of a series of slaps as she stormed toward the master bedroom.

  Two doors slammed before Kate eased hers shut. She fell back into the rocker and closed her eyes. Evidently, Amanda had kicked off her flip-flops, because Kate heard bare feet pacing from one side of the room to the other. Jamie had shut the door to her room, and although Kate couldn’t understand a word of the rapid-fire Spanish, there was no doubt that she was ready to blow.

  I’m going to stay until I get all this stuff settled, not only with the cabin but with the investigation. I’m not going back until everyone knows that I was not responsible for Conrad’s death.

  A hard rap jerked her into an upright position. She opened the door so she could discern between the noise of the washing machine and maybe someone knocking on the door. The second rat-a-tat-tat assured her that someone was at the door.

  She headed that way, wondering the whole time if wife number four might be standing on the other side. If so, she was shit outta luck unless she wanted to sleep on the sofa or out on the deck, because the honeymoon cabin had no vacancies.

  Kate found Waylon Kramer standing there, cowboy hat tilted back so she could see his blue eyes, a smile as big as a happy Cheshire cat on his face.

  “Miz Steele,” he said.

  “How did you find me?” she asked.

  “Easy. I called your office and your mother told me where you’d gone. She’s as eager as I am to get this solved. Am I right in assuming that all three of the wives are going to spend time together in this house? Are you sure that you never met any of those women before the funeral?”

  “I guess that’s what’s about to happen. And I’m very sure I never met them before then.”

  “Did y’all plan to be here at the same time?”

  “Hell, no,” she said.

  He chuckled.

  She crossed her arms over her chest. “What’s so funny?”

  “A cussword coming out of your prim and proper mouth.”

  “I don’t think you can arrest me for cussing on my own property, can you?” she asked.

  “No, ma’am. But I’m beginning to think maybe you all three did find out about the others and planned a perfect murder. You’ve all got alibis, but one of you had to come up with the money, and I’ll bet that person was you. And honey, I will close this case,” he answered.

  “You drove all the way from Dallas just to tell me that?” she asked.

  “No, I have a small ranch in Mabelle, so I was close by. But if you’d like to confess, I brought my recorder.” He patted his shirt pocket.

  “I have nothing to confess, and just so you know, I did not know those other two were coming up here. If there’s nothing else, I’ve got unpacking to do,” she said.

  “When this all comes out in court, you’ll wish that you’d come clean. We could probably make a deal to take the death penalty off the table if you didn’t make us use up man-hours and resources. The jury might even have mercy on you when they hear what a scoundrel Conrad Steele was.”

  “Good-bye, Detective Kramer. You have a nice day, now. Do drive safe—I wouldn’t want folks saying that you ran off the road and blaming me for your death.” Kate shut the door in his face and slid down the back side. Her skirt hiked all the way up to her panty line when she drew her knees up and wrapped her arms around them. Tears stung her eyes, but she refused to let them flow. She would not cry, not one single tear, no matter how crazy things got.

  She wasn’t aware anyone was in the room with her until Jamie’s daughter laid a hand on her arm.

  “I’m Gracie. You are Kate, right? Daddy showed me a picture of you and said you was his sister. Does that make you my aunt?” Her big brown eyes bored into Kate’s. “You have blue eyes. How can you be my aunt?”

  “I’m not your aunt, Gracie. I was married to your father before he married your mama,” Kate explained.

  “And that other one, the fat one, was she married to Daddy, too?” Gracie asked.

  Kate held the giggle inside. “Yes, she was.”

  “Like Sister Wives on television?”

  “Your mama lets you watch that?” Kate asked.

  “No, but my babysitter watches it and I know that there’s one daddy and lots of wives, like now, huh?” Gracie asked. “Only y’all didn’t even know you were sister wives, did you?”

  “Gracie, where . . .” Jamie stopped both walking and talking.

  “I’m right here talking to Kate.” Gracie grinned.

  “Who was at the door?” Jamie glared at Kate.

  “That big man who was at Daddy’s funeral,” Gracie answered.

  “What did he want?” Jamie frowned.

  Amanda pushed her way past Jamie. “I heard a truck and looked out the window, hoping both of you were leaving. What did he want?”

  “He thinks we have conspired together and paid someone to . . .” Kate looked down at Gracie. “You know.”

  “Is he insane? I told him I would never . . .” Amanda puckered up again. “I loved him too much . . .” She threw up her hands and hurried to her room.

  “You better believe I told him I would have,” Jamie said bluntly. “In a split second, if I’d known for
sure.”

  “For sure?” Kate asked.

  “Oh, yeah, I had my suspicions this last year when he started arriving late and leaving a day or two early. Import, export, my behind,” Jamie said.

  “Mama, can I take my toys out on the deck and play?” Gracie asked.

  “Yes, but you can’t go to the lake or even down the steps without me. Stay on the deck.” Jamie nodded. She turned to Kate. “So exactly what is import, export? I never got a straight answer.”

  “He was a jobber. Do you know what that is?” Kate asked.

  Jamie shook her head.

  “He was an independent buyer of clothing and jewelry from stores after they had finished their seasonal sales. He would give the store ten cents on the dollar for all that was left and then sell it for twice that to discount clothing stores. He exported stuff out of those stores and imported it into other stores,” Kate said.

  “He made it sound like a fancy job.” Jamie melted into a chair. “God, I feel stupid.”

  Kate rocked up onto her knees and used the door handle to help her go from there to standing. “You mentioned doubts?”

  “A wife knows when a man is having sex outside of his home. Surely you did.”

  “I didn’t give a damn after the first year,” Kate said.

  “Then why didn’t you divorce him?”

  “That’s none of your business.” Kate’s hands were shaking when she went to her room, closed the door, and kicked off her high heels. She sat down on the edge of the bed. What if one of those other two did kill him? If so, then she might be next in line. They both sure seemed to be in a hurry to lay claim to the cabin, and she was the only one standing in their way.

  “Stop it!” she scolded herself. “They want this place, but they did not kill Conrad. Not even a Hollywood actor can put on an act like they did at the funeral.”

  Still, a shiver ran down her back as she opened her suitcases and filled the empty dresser drawers, hung up shorts and shirts, and neatly placed her sandals on the floor of the closet. She’d brought two sundresses in case she decided to go to church and two bathing suits for swimming. Other than that, it was strictly casual summer clothing.

  She unzipped her straight business skirt and removed the matching short-sleeved jacket, hung them on a hanger together, and then pushed the straps down from a full-length slip, letting it slide off her slim body and puddle up around her feet. No panty hose, no slips, no enclosed shoes—not until she went back to Fort Worth.

  Dressed in khaki shorts, a bright-orange knit shirt, and her favorite brown leather sandals, she picked up her Kindle and headed toward the deck. Halfway there she remembered that Gracie was playing out there, so she steered for the front porch instead.

  She settled into the rocking chair again. It would be a good place to sit and read until supper time, when she intended to eat the sub sandwich she’d tucked away in the refrigerator. Those other two hussies better not touch it. They had shared a husband and they might be sharing a house, but by damn, that sandwich was hers, and they’d do well to keep their hands off it.

  Tomorrow she would drive down to that grocery store in Seymour and buy what she wanted for a week. They could starve or fish for their food. Frankly, Kate didn’t give a damn what they did, as long as they stayed out of her way.

  She hadn’t sat there more than ten minutes before she got thirsty and went back to the kitchen to make a pitcher of tea. But there was no tea, no sugar, and not even a jar of peanut butter in the pantry. The only edible thing in the house was her sandwich, and she’d have to drink tap water. Fourteen years ago the water had had a strange taste to it. It was fine for laundry and not bad for showers, but drinking was impossible. She filled a glass, took a sip, and spit it out. The years had not changed the water one bit.

  She headed toward the tiny utility room and switched the sheets over to the dryer and then tossed the quilt in the washer. Right then, she would gladly pay triple for a Starbucks coffee or a McDonald’s sweet tea. Neither was available in the tiny little town of Bootleg, Texas. It had a convenience store, a post office, a tiny bank branch set up in a portable building, two churches, and a liquor store. And that was at least half a mile down the dirt road in front of the cabin.

  There had to be more than what a convenience store offered. She made a quick trip to her bedroom, exchanged the Kindle for her purse, and headed out of the house without telling anyone where she was going. These were her acquaintances, not her friends, and she didn’t care if they needed or wanted anything in the way of groceries. When the dust settled and they realized that their marriage licenses weren’t worth the paper they were printed on, they’d leave and she’d put the cabin up for sale. Until then, they were three strangers sharing a house.

  Still, even with that little pep talk, Kate was very glad there was a lock on her bedroom door. Those women were about as stable as nitroglycerin in the middle of an F5 tornado, and she didn’t trust either of them.

  She turned on the radio and headed south. “And now for your Texas news and weather,” the DJ said in a deep voice. “Weather through the week is more of the same heat we’ve been having. It looks like we’ll have days in the triple digits through Wednesday as least.”

  Kate passed a fireworks stand on the side of the road. It had closed up after the holiday the week before, but she could imagine the scent of firecrackers and that put a smile on her face. When she was a little girl, her father let her pick out her favorites every year. After the big display put on by the company after the all-day picnic at her childhood home, he would take her down to a grassy area near the pool and they’d have their own fireworks show. Her mother hated the noise and the smell of sparklers and bottle rockets, but Kate always associated them with her dad.

  I wonder if there are certain things that Gracie remembers about Conrad. Did they come to the cabin on the Fourth of July and set off fireworks on the lakeshore?

  “This is Denise Winters with your Texas news.” The voice on the radio had changed. “In statewide news, there are still no solid leads in the shooting death of Conrad Steele, the victim of a robbery gone bad in downtown Dallas on Thursday, June 29.”

  Kate’s whole body stiffened as she waited for the next sentence to be that it had been discovered that Conrad had three wives at the same time and that none of them were aware of the other two. That was sensational news—the kind of thing that those magazines beside the cash register at the grocery store checkout counter always had plastered on their covers. The headline, in big red lettering, would say, OIL COMPANY HEIRESS SUSPECTED IN POLYGAMIST HUSBAND’S DEATH!

  The lady went on to other news, talking about the new political front since the election and how gasoline prices were on the rise, but she didn’t mention Conrad again. Hopefully, pretty soon they’d stop even mentioning him, and it would just be another shooting that slipped into the cold-case file. At least she hoped that was the case. Maybe Waylon Kramer’s supervisor would put him on more pressing cases.

  Fifteen minutes later, she was inside the small grocery store in Seymour, Texas. She pulled a cart loose from a long string of others and stopped at a display with all kinds of cookies, cakes, breads, and pastries. She was trying to decide between iced sugar cookies or pretty little miniature cupcakes when she felt a presence behind her. She whipped around to find Detective Kramer so close that she could have slapped him without even stretching.

  Seeing him in the grocery store, for God’s sake, was like throwing gasoline on a bonfire. Was he going to show up in her shower stall next? That put a picture in her mind that shot the temperature of the store up twenty degrees.

  “What are you doing here?” She looked up into his eyes and visualized taking the top off the cupcake package and smashing the whole dozen into his face to get the picture of him naked in the shower out of her mind. Would that be considered assault?

  “I might ask you the same thing. You are a long way from Fort Worth.” Detective Kramer grinned.

  “A woman has
to eat. Are you stalking me?” she asked. “Don’t answer that. I don’t even want to know. Did you find out who Conrad was buying flowers for that day?”

  “You know I can’t tell you anything about an ongoing investigation. He had two more wives. Did you have an open relationship? How many men am I going to find in your little black book?”

  She looked him right in the eyes. “First you have to find the black book.”

  “From what I can piece together, y’all didn’t have much of a marriage. No kids. No joint property. Why didn’t you divorce him?” Waylon asked.

  “Keep piecing it together,” she threw over her shoulder as she walked away from him.

  It was a damn good thing that Kate did not have a weight problem, because when she was angry she had a voracious appetite. She ripped open the cookies and ate the whole dozen as she loaded her cart. Twice she passed Waylon on an aisle, but she didn’t speak and neither did he. She did sneak a peek at his purchases and was surprised to see flour, sugar, and staples that most folks bought if they were planning on preparing meals from scratch.

  Where was it he said that he lived? It was a woman’s name, like Marysville. No, Mabelle. Didn’t they have a market there? Maybe he really was following her. Did that constitute harassment?

  Back behind the steering wheel with the AC running full blast, she checked the statistics on Mabelle, Texas. Population at last census was nine. That wasn’t big enough to be considered a community, much less a town. It was about nine miles southwest from Seymour and maybe five miles from Bootleg, which sat on the edge of Lake Kemp.

  “I guess this is the closest grocery store, so at least he’s not stalking me,” she said as she started the engine and pointed her car north toward Bootleg.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  Kate let the engine run, keeping the vehicle cool, while she studied the lineup in the rocking chairs on the front porch. Jamie sat closest to the door, with a strange lady with short, curly hair a faint shade of purple beside her. Gracie was in the middle chair, bare feet dangling about halfway to the porch. Next to her, an old gentleman with thick glasses and a rim of gray hair around an otherwise bald head nodded as she chattered nonstop.