Death by Deep Dish Pie Read Online Free

Jackie Kennedy-pillbox-hatted Midwest at the height of Flower Power, she now always dressed as though Janis Joplin had gotten fashion tips from her. Somehow, on Winnie, this didn’t seem at odds with the fact that she also drove a full-cab, bright red Dodge Ram truck named Dolly (in honor of Dolly Parton, Winnie’s favorite country-and-western star), or that she loved to wear a Dolly wig on Saturday nights and go two-stepping with her husband, Martin, at the Bar-None. Or that while checking out copies of Star Reporter magazine to the locals, she also talked them into trying Jane Austen.
    Any woman who mixes Janis Joplin, Dolly Parton, and Jane Austen to come up with her unique identity is not to be messed with, not even by a country road that’s put fear into the diesel-powered hearts of many a snow plow. That’s why Winnie is my best friend.
    Still, I looked at her and said, “Did I mention Slinky the ferret?” I’d quickly told Winnie and Owen about the previous day’s events with Dinky and Trudy (leaving out Mrs. Beavy’s blouse, which I thought was a kind of personal detail), and the deal I’d made to get Trudy to watch my this morning—that I would sponsor her attending this evening’s Paradise Historical Society meeting to discuss the annual Founder’s Day play.
    â€œYou’ve told us about twenty times,” Winnie said, referring to the ferret.
    â€œDid I mention ferrets smell bad and eat anything?”
    â€œAbout another twenty times. But I thought Slinky’s been demusked and is in her favorite cage for the day in your storeroom?”
    Okay, so Slinky only smelled slightly musky. Still.
    â€œWhat if Slinky gets out?” I fussed. “What if Mrs. Schroeder comes in to drop off Pastor Schroeder’s shirts and the choir robes and sees Slinky? She’ll swear Slinky is a manifestation of Satan come to Paradise—you know how she is about anything remotely rodent.”
    â€œFerrets aren’t rodents—” Winnie started.
    But I went on. “What if Trudy gets lonely and reattaches Slinky to her neck with the ferret leash?”
    â€œNow, Josie, you must look beyond the physical fact of Trudy’s shoulder-laden ferret to the psychological ramifications. In short, Trudy has attachment issues. She needs to be attached to someone or something that will provide a loving response to her nurturance, reciprocating her love, something she’s obviously missing at home, and you should be pleased that she’s willing to detach enough from Slinky to let the ferret stay in a cage today because this shows that your response to her is boosting her sense of . . .”
    This, obviously, was not Winnie, who was now frowning with asphalt-curling concentration at the road slipping at seventy-plus mph beneath Dolly’s wheels.
    This was Owen. He was thirty-something, a few years older than me (I’m twenty-nine), and not as fussy or boring as his remarks about Trudy made him sound. He carries the weight of triple PhDs—in psychology, philosophy, and religious studies—which is why, I think, it’s hard for him to simply say, for example, “Trudy’s family is really screwed up. No wonder the poor kid’s trying to get affection from a ferret leashed to her neck.”
    His heart’s in the right place, though. Besides teaching at Masonville Community College and at the state prison, on Sunday afternoons he reads the Bible and other books to a group of blind women at the Paradise Retirement Village, even though he’s agnostic, because he feels he ought to do something in the way of spirituality, what with his religious studies degree. The old ladies dote on him and call him “cutie pie” and “sweet pea” even though they can’t see him, but they’re right, he is cute—in a lost-puppy-dog kind of way, although they probably wouldn’t approve of his long blond ponytail.