Lucky Stuff (Jane Wheel Mysteries) Read online

  Tossing the menu aside, Jane looked her partner in the eye.

  “We’ve known each other for a few years now,” she said, stirring a packet of sugar into her tea. She always drank her coffee black, but loved to load up her tea with sugar or honey and as much lemon as a waitress offered. “And I think we…” Jane hesitated, hoping Oh would read her mind as he frequently did and bail her out by finishing her sentence.

  Oh, however, never finished her sentences or anyone’s, even if he could read minds. “Listening, Mrs. Wheel, is a lost art. People will always tell you more and tell you precisely, if they are allowed to tell you themselves.”

  Jane took another sip of her tea, admiring the mismatched vintage cup and saucer that the café used.

  “We’ve been through a lot together, and I think you and I, we should…”

  “Hey, Jane, want the club?” asked Lissa from behind the counter.

  Jane looked at Detective Oh, who nodded.

  “Two,” said Jane, holding up two fingers.

  She had thought about this conversation for several days. Since she would be going to Kankakee and staying over the weekend she knew she wanted to say it now, before she left town, and get the hard words behind her.

  “We both know we have a special rapport and I…” said Jane.

  “Extra pickles?” yelled Lissa.

  Jane nodded, but then saw that Lissa was, as usual, doing four things at once and not looking in Jane’s direction. “Yes, pickles,” said Jane.

  “Perhaps,” said Oh.

  “Yes?” said Jane. He was going to bail her out after all.

  “You should just say it, Mrs. Wheel. Perhaps we are of one mind.”

  “We usually are, don’t you think? And that’s why I think, we should begin…”

  Lissa set the plates down in front of them. Their sandwiches were perfect, giant slabs of whole wheat bread, with avocado, cheese, tomatoes, sprouts and cucumbers, and smoked tempeh. Fakin Bacon, one of Jane’s favorite food groups. Once she took a bite, the moment would be lost forever, since beginning a sandwich like this was a commitment. One bite and all serious conversation would be lost to shredding and swallowing. That was true for Jane, anyway. Oh was deconstructing his sandwich and, using a knife and fork, managing to consume the components with his usual grace.

  “It’s nothing,” said Jane. She shook her head. There would be other opportunities to have this discussion. In fact, what she had been about to say wasn’t even important. Jane was going to simply suggest that they call each other by their first names. A simple request, perfectly appropriate for their friendship, their business partnership. Why did she find it so difficult to simply say, Please call me Jane? As she looked at Detective Oh, his knife and fork held aloft over his plate, his dark eyes staring frankly into her own, she smiled. Maybe she couldn’t bring herself to say it because she liked the way he called her Mrs. Wheel.

  Looking down at her plate piled high with her most favorite lunch in the world, she realized she had completely forgotten to eat breakfast. She picked up her sandwich and took an enormous bite.

  * * *

  Jane was on her way to Kankakee one half hour before the showing of her house was to begin. Driving through Chicago in the early afternoon was painless. Light traffic, a clear day, and although Jane couldn’t quite see forever, she could see the Chicago skyline as perfectly carved into the blue sky as one could hope. Curving and swerving into, and then around the city, taking an almost straight line south to Kankakee, Jane felt that she had driven the I94 to I57 route so often, her car could autopilot her to Kankakee.

  This was an oddly carefree trip. Jane wasn’t rushing to put out any fire set by Nellie, she wasn’t flying down to fix any of Tim’s problems, she wasn’t being lured into a fake murder mystery that all too often turned real when she hit Kankakee County. Nope. This was just a girl and her dog heading down to visit her hometown on a clear September day. This would be the perfect visit. She had left her house in order, the realtor would host the open houses, and Jane wouldn’t be there to mess up anything between today’s showing and the weekend open house. Her packed treasures had already arrived in Kankakee, several hours ahead of her. Tim would supervise the unloading into the storage locker. Her son Nick had her on speed dial—an archaic expression if ever there was one, thought Jane. What was today’s smart phone equivalent? Detective Oh could take care of any little thing that came up at their office. Over the summer, the initial gloom and doom of Charley’s departure had lifted, Jane’s adjustment to this new chapter in her life was complete, and by golly, life was, or at least could be—no, would be—good. Jane turned on the radio, hoping some oldie would come on so she could sing along and make this little moment complete.

  “Uh-oh,” said Jane out loud when “Love the One You’re With” came on.

  Singing along, Jane started planning. There was an auction scheduled for the weekend. It was taking place at a farm just west of Kankakee and it was a complete household. The farm equipment would be sold out in the barns and the house would be turned inside out, its contents displayed under tents out in the yard. Tim had been invited in early to look at a few of the antiques and he had advised sending two of the pieces out to special sales for the best prices.

  “But there’s plenty for us, Janie. How long since you’ve been at a country auction?”

  Too long, thought Jane.

  Even Nellie had seemed welcoming when Jane told her she was coming for a long weekend.

  “Yeah, I guess it’s okay if you come. Bringing the dog?”

  That was practically a welcome-home banner strung across the lawn in Nellie language!

  Speaking of banners, or thinking of them, as Jane was, she saw something flapping in the breeze on Court Street as she made her way through downtown Kankakee. Held taut by wires across the street from the courthouse, there was a bright yellow banner.

  “Maybe there’s a big church rummage sale this weekend, Rita,” said Jane, feeling like everything was going her way. Maybe this would be her first visit to Kankakee where nothing terrible happened. Her parents would stay well, she wouldn’t discover any new relatives, no skeletons would be unearthed, no beams would fall on anyone, no one would discover an old body, an old theft, an old forgery, no poisonings would occur, no nail guns would be fired, and no schemes to liven up Kankakee would be hatched by Tim. Maybe she would go to an auction and find a box of vintage pottery, a bag of Bakelite bangles, and, for good measure, an old sewing box with a sterling silver thimble case. Maybe this would be her lucky weekend.

  Jane stopped at the red light and looked over at the banner.

  LUCKY KILLED THEM IN LAS VEGAS!

  Jane could see from where she sat at the light, there was another banner planted on the parkway a few buildings down.

  LUCKY KILLED THEM IN BRANSON!

  “What the hell does that mean?” Jane asked. Rita pulled her nose in from her window and turned her head to Jane. She looked as puzzled as her mistress. On the next block was another banner.

  NOW LUCKY’S GONNA GET KILLED IN KANKAKEE!

  Maybe some football player from a rival team? Was there some big game? Would they actually allow the kids to put up signs about being killed?

  KANKAKEE’S FAVORITE SON’S COMEDY ROAST

  TAPED LIVE—IN KANKAKEE, ILLINOIS!

  Under the words of this next banner was a caricature of a man with a cigar in his mouth, a pouf of black hair and a toothy grin.

  “Well, Rita, that must be Lucky,” said Jane, and added, “whoever the hell he is.”

  Jane was at another stoplight, staring at this last banner when her phone rang.

  Jane clicked it on speaker to answer.

  “Are you driving, Jane? Pull over,” said Melinda. Jane could hear her chewing something crunchy.

  Jane did as she was told. What could have happened? Did a water pipe burst? A fire? Gas explosion?

  Jane parked in front of a lawn sign that had been stuck into a large concret
e planter in front of what used to be Kresge’s Dime Store.

  TODAY’S YOUR LUCKY DAY read the sign with that same grinning, cigar-smoking face outlined underneath the lettering.

  “Today’s your lucky day,” said Melinda.

  “How did you know?” asked Jane, thinking somehow she must be sending a picture of what she was looking at. Just how smart was this smart phone?

  “How did I know?” asked Melinda, chomping away at what sounded like two stalks of celery. “Find a new place to live, Jane Wheel, because you just sold your house!”

  2

  “I knew something like this was going to happen,” said Nellie.

  Nellie always knew what was going to happen. She’d see someone trip on the sidewalk, two cars crash at an intersection, lightning hit a rooftop, and shake her head.

  “I knew that was going to happen.”

  During what experts call the “magic years” of childhood, when children believe in impossible behaviors and events, Jane truly thought her mother had special powers. As Jane grew into the less magical years, she grew slightly more judgmental.

  “If you knew it was going to happen, Mom, why didn’t you stop it?”

  Nellie shrugged. Her powers could not be explained.

  When Jane spilled a cup of coffee, ripped the hem of her skirt, or lost her job, Nellie, in the same monotone, would chant, “I knew that was going to happen.”

  When Charley left? “I knew that was going to happen.”

  And if there was an earthquake on the other side of the world? Nellie knew that was going to happen, too.

  From the smallest accidents to the largest acts of nature, Nellie knew.

  Five minutes before Nellie made her most recent assertion of prescience, Jane had let herself in to what she thought was her parents’ empty house. Don and Nellie would be at the EZ Way Inn and although the tavern was generally Jane’s first stop, she had no desire to walk into the barroom, make small talk with Francis the bread man or Boxcar or anyone else sitting at the bar, halfheartedly watching the Cubs lose.

  Instead, Jane and Rita had walked into the house through the back door, directly into the kitchen, where Jane was examining the contents of Nellie’s refrigerator and Rita was sniffing around for nonexistent crumbs on Nellie’s antiseptic floor. The shelves in the refrigerator, often still referred to as the icebox by both Don and Nellie, were spotless and the condiments were lined up in an orderly fashion, not a drip of catsup, not a dried spot of mustard to be seen. Orange juice and milk standing sentry on the top shelf, butter and eggs in their assigned niches. Dill pickles, olives, and jam in the side pocket. One meticulously rewrapped package of turkey, one package of muenster cheese in the cold drawer, and a loaf of bread tucked into the middle shelf. Jane had the feeling she was looking at a museum display—so clean, so predictable—as if it should be titled “Contemporary Refrigerator” and protected behind two stanchions and a velvet rope.

  Yup … all the normal stuff of Don and Nellie’s daily lives … except for the magnum of Veuve Clicquot.

  Veuve Clicquot? Jane took out the bottle and studied the label. What were Don and Nellie doing with a bottle of French champagne?

  “What the hell you looking for?” said Nellie, in a kind of low growl.

  Jane nearly dropped the bottle.

  “When will you stop scaring the hell out of me?” said Jane.

  “You’re the one snooping. Put down my wine, it’s too early to drink.”

  Jane forced her mother into a kind of hug, although Nellie dodged and ducked out of it as quickly as possible. It was highly unusual for Nellie to be home in the middle of the day. Although Jane had never known a germ to dare settle on Nellie—she had never sniffled, sneezed, or missed a day of work that Jane knew of—she did have to acknowledge that her mother was getting older. Maybe she had started coming home for midday naps?

  “I came home to mow the lawn,” said Nellie. “Want to do the edging?”

  “Thanks for asking, but I have to run over to Tim’s and print out something and then I guess I have to sign it and…” Jane stopped, finally letting it all sink in. She looked at her mother. “I think I just sold my house.”

  “I knew something like this was going to happen,” said Nellie. “You’re homeless.”

  And with Nellie’s pronouncement, which Jane knew was going to happen, Jane felt herself go a little weak in the knees.

  * * *

  “Do you know how freaking lucky you are?” asked Tim. Although he was phasing out of the florist business, he still operated his estate sale business out of the flower shop, partially furnished with antiques and special treasures from the estates he had helped liquidate for clients. Today, behind the long iron and butcher-block worktable he had scavenged from an old garment factory, Tim looked every inch the florist he was when he had first opened the shop. Wearing a white apron with bits of fern and foliage stuck to it, his workspace was covered with raffia and stems, and his giant coolers were filled with mixed bouquets.

  “Last minute favor for a friend,” Tim said, waving his hand in the general direction of the coolers. “Bit of a splashy party and I agreed to do flowers.”

  Jane pulled out one of the bouquets for a closer look. It was tied with a green ribbon; a few charms hung from the bow. A four-leaf clover and a fake rabbit’s foot.

  “What?” asked Jane, pointing to the bow.

  “Lucky charms,” said Tim with a shrug. “Theme party. Here’s your offer. I’ll print it out for you, then you can sign and fax it.”

  Jane was silent as she replaced the flowers.

  “You are going to sign it,” said Tim. “Aren’t you?”

  “What’s with all of this Lucky stuff all over town. I saw a bunch of banners across from the courthouse.”

  “You are going to sign it, right, Janie?”

  Jane paced around the office of the shop and looked over Tim’s shoulder.

  “How did you get into my e-mail? I didn’t log in yet.”

  “Honey, I set up your e-mail in-box, remember? It’s not like you ever changed your password or anything,” said Tim, as the printer started spewing pages. “Stop avoiding my question. You got a cash offer in a rock-hard, rock-bottom market. You’ll be more financially solvent than you’ve been in years.” Tim started picking up the pages and arranging them in a neat stack. “Charlie has a new home in Peru or wherever…”

  “Honduras,” said Jane.

  “Wherever. And I got an e-mail yesterday from Nick. He’s happy as a clam at school. Loves his classes, likes the kids. He sounds perfectly at home. He’ll be relieved when he doesn’t have to worry about you all alone in that house,” said Tim.

  Jane nodded.

  “So let’s read this baby over and then sign it. I’m a notary, you know,” said Tim, hunting for something in his desk drawer.

  “Why?” asked Jane.

  “Because even if it’s the best deal in the world, you still have to read the contract, honey.”

  “No. Why are you a notary?” asked Jane

  “Why are you avoiding the subject at hand?” said Tim, standing and walking over to Jane. He put his hands on her shoulders and looked her in the eye.

  “I’ll be homeless,” said Jane.

  “Nellie,” said Tim.

  “What?”

  “You’re talking like Nellie. Here’s what’s going to happen. You’re going to sign this deal before the buyer wises up and actually looks at the real antiques in your house—the hot-water heater, the furnace. According to the date on this offer, they want to close in a week if they can. The company’s buying the house for the family and the wife wants their kids in school asap. They’ve been in a hotel in downtown Chicago and…” said Tim, looking for the exact wording from Melinda’s cover letter he’d printed out with the offer, “… the wife wants Evanston, wants your house because it’s a giant corner lot, and she wants the location, both the elementary and middle school districts and plans on redecorating, but slowly, and w
ants your furniture, all your stuff, beds, bureaus, dining room furniture, all of the big stuff, to use as her temporary furnishings until her decorator takes over and gets in the real pieces she wants.” He scanned down the page. “Listen to this. She told Melinda she thinks your eclecticism is charming, but feels that bringing the house back to a true Arts and Crafts consistency will make it a more peaceful space in which to raise her children.”

  “Where should I live?” asked Jane, slowly warming to the idea that she was going to have some interesting choices.

  “How about a condo in the city. Make Millennium Park your front yard?”

  “Maybe I could find a sweet little place in Lakeview. When Nick’s home, he could walk to Wrigley Field?”

  “You could go way suburban, babe. Find a cool little ranch house on a big lot west of the city and fill it up with midcentury modern.”

  “Or I could find one of those places off the Red Arrow Highway in Michigan on the lake, a kind of winterized summer cabin,” said Jane. “All knotty pine and Pendleton blankets in the winter … all votive candles anchored in tin sand pails in the summer. Or a little farmhouse with a barn and outbuildings…”

  Jane picked up a stack of Bakelite ashtrays from Tim’s desk and separated them, laying them out in a line. Red, yellow, green, black. She restacked them slowly, each one making a kind of sucking sound as they came together.

  “I could leave altogether,” said Jane. “I don’t have to stay in the Midwest. I mean, Nick’s going to spend more than half of his vacations with Charley and he’ll be happy to come to me wherever I am, he loves change, and I could pick him up at school and we could go somewhere together and…”

  Jane stopped talking and looked at Tim, who had grown completely still. Until Jane started daydreaming, neither of them had ever thought that Jane would leave the Midwest, leave Evanston or Chicago, or be more than an hour or two’s drive from Kankakee. Or the EZ Way Inn. Or Don and Nellie.

  “It’s not like you have to decide where you’re going to live right this very minute,” said Tim.