pro-Boone camp, and that includes Big Joey, Pillsbury, and the Seventeenth Street boys? My guess is that particular groupâs hunting you down this very minute. You need to straighten them out before youâre on the receiving end of more than flying doughnuts.â Mercedes swiped a glob of custard from my chin just as Auntie KiKi and BW pranced out of the bakery with a piled-high tray of goodies, having obviously seen Mercedes out here with me.
Without saying a word we set out the coffee and split the doughnut collection, and I put BWâs portion on the tray on the sidewalk. Simultaneously we all selected a portion of the sprinkle variety and savored the moment. It was the good-friends-plus-pup way of doing things around here.
Mercedes licked icing off her thumb and looked at me. âOkay, now that weâre sugared and caffeinated, we need tobe thinking about who did in Conway and we need to be doing it quick before the cops find Mr. Boone. The man wonât go peaceful, we all know that, and it would be a crying shame if something happened to his fine self. He sure does offer up some nice eye candy around here.â
KiKi added another packet of sugar to the coffee just in case three packets werenât enough. âIf you want my opinion, Tucker Adkins gets top billing after breaking into Reaganâs house last night.â
Mercedes dropped her doughnut in her coffee. âSweet mother. Why would he do such a thing?â
KiKi took a nibble of her cinnamon twist. âHe says heâs looking to avenge his daddy dearest and put Boone in jail, but heâs more interested in the jail part than the daddy part, I can promise you that.â
Mercedes spooned her doughnut out of her coffee. âI know the maid over there at Lillibridge House. I help her clean on occasion when she gets overworked or they got a party going on. She told me that Tucker and his daddy were never close. Fact is, she said Conway got along better with Steffy Lou than he ever did with his own son. Tucker was a mammaâs boy, never worked a day in his life and walked off with a nice chunk of change when his mamma died. The thing is, after she died Conway told Tucker about Walker being his other son and he didnât take it well at all.â
I stopped a sprinkle doughnut halfway to my mouth. ââDidnât take it wellâ in that heâd kill him?â
Mercedes fed a chunk of doughnut to BW, his head in her lap. BW knew how to play a crowd. âTucker Adkins likes nothing more than easy money and the good life. Icanât see the man risking jail over a half-brother he never knew he had. He might go ballistic and pitch a fit, but murderâs not his style, best I can tell.â
She hunched across the table, drawing us all close. âBut I got another idea. Iâve been thinking maybe those gold-digger sisters did in Conway. Anna and Bella had me on the phone last night making sure I put both their names on my clean and casket list. I only got so many openings, and they know if they get me to do their houses now Iâll take special care of their husbands when they get over to Eternal Slumber, which those two are hoping occurs right soon. Itâs what happens when feisty twenty-somethings marry rich eighty-somethings. Seems like a mighty big coincidence that with Conway dead and Boone on the run, two spots came available with neither of the octogenarian boys in the best of health, from what I hear.â
KiKi sipped her coffee and nodded. âAnd we all know that this being Savannah, thereâs nothing more important than a proper funeral no matter whoâs doing the dying, planned or otherwise.â
âWaitaminute,â I said. âYou really think Anna and Bella would knock off Conway and frame Walker to get Mercedes to clean for them?â
âAnd bury their husbands proper when the time came so they wouldnât get talked about,â Mercedes said. âTheir