Pleating for Mercy

“Gracie. My daughter?” He felt my forehead with the back of his hand. “You doin’ okay there, Cassidy?”

I batted his hand away. “Right. Of course. I’m fine.”

He picked up his hammer and went up the three steps to the kitchen. “She started with an apron. She’s made a couple skirts and a vest. I’ve been holding her back, giving you time to get settled, but she’s itching to get started. She’s coming by this after—”

A shrill holler came from the workroom. No! My heart seized and I ran toward the noise. I knew that sound all too well. Thelma Louise.

The Geena Davis/Susan Sarandon movie was Nana’s favorite. When naming the grand dam of her goat herd she hadn’t been able to decide: Thelma or Louise? In true Texas tradition, she settled on both.

The doe whacked her flat, Romanesque nose against the window in the workroom between her ear-piercing bleats. I charged forward. “Stop it, Thelma Louise!” I scolded, wagging my finger at her. “Shoo!”

The ornery Nubian dairy goat ignored me. Her floppy white ears swung back and forth on either side of her black-and-brown face as she shook her head. I stared her down. She never blinked, but just as suddenly as she’d started banging on the window, she stopped, ducked her head, and vanished.

There was plenty of grass for the goats to graze on Nana’s farm, especially after Mama paid a visit and her charm made it grow extra lush, but my yard, which Meemaw had tended to so carefully, was full of flowers. And now Thelma Louise had scampered off to wreak havoc.

“Oh, no, you don’t,” I said, dodging the cutting table and a dress form as I raced out of the workroom.

Will leaned against the back of the couch, watching the scene unfold as if it were dinner theater and he wasn’t sure what his part was or when to step in. “You need help, Cassidy?” he asked as I zoomed to the kitchen door to cut Thelma off at the pass.

He’d already helped me enough by bargaining with Meemaw. I flung my hand up in a dismissive wave. “Nope, I’m good.”

First order of business: Stop Thelma from destroying the flowers.

Second order of business: Figure out how to postpone sewing lessons for Gracie Flores.

Third order of business: Make Josie’s wedding gown, and the bridesmaids’ dresses.

The screen door banged behind me as I ran across the back porch and took the steps in a single bound. Nana and Granddaddy had five acres behind my lot and their land stretched the entire block behind the square. I had a little less than a third of an acre, which was more than plenty. I caught a glimpse of the gate between my property and my grandparents’ farm. Wide open. Easy to see how Thelma Louise had escaped.

Maybe Will would fix that. We could renegotiate and I could pay him cash for the repair work. And then he could find a different sewing teacher for his little girl.

Scratch that. I didn’t have any money to spare.

I scanned the yard. “Here, Thelma Louise,” I called, clucking my tongue. I followed the flagstone steps to the front. As I rounded the corner, my stomach dropped. The doe stood, nose to the ground, just a few feet from where Nell had died. “Thelma Louise!”

I dashed over to her, grabbed her by the pale green collar Nana put on all her goats, and yanked her away from the scene of the crime and the leftover crime scene tape. It all felt very ominous in my yard. Any evidence had already been taken, but what if they’d missed something? Goats were notorious for eating anything and everything. I didn’t want Thelma to digest something that could lead to Nell’s killer.

“Come on,” I said to her.

She dug her hooves into the ground, rooting herself there. “Ornery” was an understatement. She was downright defiant.

“Thelma, come on. Let’s go.” I stroked her neck and side, trying to coax her forward, but she wouldn’t budge. Instead she let out a long, mournful sound that settled over the yard like a light dusting of snowflakes.

Nana’s Nubians, as well as her LaManchas, couldn’t bear to be away from her. She was like their mother. They connected on some deep, inexplicable level. The goat-whisperer. All she had to do was touch them, or coo, and they calmed and obeyed.

I was definitely not a goat-whisperer.

“Let’s go home,” I cooed, but Thelma wagged her head.

I tried a few more times, finally giving up and backing away. I couldn’t leave her here. She’d destroy the flowers for sure. But I couldn’t get her to move.

The front door creaked open, the faint jingling bells dinging as it banged shut. Will sauntered across the porch, a length of rope swinging from his right hand. He didn’t even bother hiding his amusement. “Need a rope, darlin’?”

Darlin’? My blood boiled. I was not his darlin’. I was nobody’s darlin’. “No, thanks, cowboy,” I said, regretting my pride. That rope would come in handy.

I stroked Thelma’s neck again, scratching at the Fu Manchu beard under her chin. “Come on, girl. Let’s go.”

She cocked her head and looked up at me. I couldn’t see the rectangular pupil, but her usually soulful black eyes looked like she was plotting something. She suddenly kicked her hind legs and took off, scooting across the front yard, past the archway, to the street. I sped after her, snatching the rope from Will’s hand as I passed him.

He didn’t say a word, just released it to me as I kept on the chase, my skirt slapping around my legs as I ran after the ornery goat.

Thelma turned around, darted past me, and trotted back to where she’d been a minute before. She stopped, cocked her head, and gave me a penetrating look that seemed to go straight into my soul. With a start I realized she was standing in the exact spot where Nell’s body had lain. Before I could grab her, she bolted again, charging through the yard, slowing to scratch her body against the low, jasmine-covered fence.

I tiptoed up to her and before she could dodge me again, I slipped the rope through her collar, grabbed both ends, and tugged at it. “Come on, Thelma, move,” I said. She followed, but I’d made it only a few steps when something reflected in the sunlight.

Holding tight to the rope, I bent down.

“What’s that?” Will’s voice was directly behind me now.

He was not going to leave, was he? Mentally, I shook a fist in the air at Meemaw, wherever she was, but in reality, I lifted the object for him to see. It was a small handheld mirror. And it had definitely seen better days. The glass was scratched like someone had taken a knife to it, the plastic handle worn and smudged.

How long had it been buried under the foliage of Meemaw’s yard?

“Thelma Louise! You naughty girl.” Nana barreled toward us, her straw cowboy hat tipped back on her head. Her outfit, from her Wrangler jeans to her pink-and-gray plaid shirt, looked like it had come straight out of a Drysdales catalog.

Thelma Louise gave Nana a contrite look. The jig was up. “Someone took the bungee cord off the gate,” Nana said. “Without it, Thelma Louise can open the latch, no problem. She’s the smartest of the bunch,” she added, a touch of pride in her voice.

I handed her the rope. Wagging my finger at Thelma Louise, I chided, “Don’t do that again, you hear me? I have some dresses to make. No time for your shenanigans.”

The doe ignored the scolding, instead giving me that penetrating gaze again. As I watched Nana lead her back to her farm, I wondered how smart goats really were.

Chapter 17

By two o’clock, I’d placed a rush order on fifteen yards of Diamond French silk and the other fabrics needed for the bridal dresses, and I’d searched every corner of Buttons & Bows, including the attic, looking for any piece of trim, cording, or braiding that might have left the odd strangulation markings on Nell’s neck.

Nothing came even remotely close.

Despite leaving a message for Josie, I hadn’t heard from her since I’d left her with Nate at the Sheriff’s Department. I directed all my restless energy on the muslin mock-up of her gown.