It seemed like it took six hours for my mother to eat her food--and catch Ethel up on the new world order. In reality, my torture lasted only about twenty minutes, but it was twenty minutes of pure hell, and I’d have rather been back in the van with a gun pointed at me. Yes, really. The stress of the day was taking its toll, and as soon as Ethel’s personal trainer put the last French fry into her mouth, I gave her a full body nudge. “All done. Let’s go.”

Ethel jumped a little, either startled because she’d forgotten I was there or that I could and would speak.

Lucille glared and scowled and huffed and all the typical things my mother does when she is seriously annoyed with me.

I didn’t care. Somewhere in the last few seconds I’d gone from fairly oblivious to seriously annoyed myself. I hurriedly stacked the trash on the red plastic tray, grabbed my cup and nudged her again. “Let me out. I’ve had all the fun I can stand.” She didn’t move immediately and that just added fuel to the fire that had already been lit. “I’ve got to go, Mother, really I do. Right now. Move.”

Ethel sucked in an indignant breath. “Are you going to let her talk to you like that?”

Lucille turned and glared at me again. However, she was between the proverbial rock and a hard place. If she snapped back at me as she so dearly wanted to do, she’d save face with Ethel and might win the battle. But my last straw had clearly snapped and that made me a loose cannon, which gave her zero chance of winning the war. She gritted her teeth, slid to the end of the booth and stood. She huffed and sputtered, still wanting very badly to give me a what-for. But since all eyes were already on us, she was more concerned with avoiding the equivalent of an international incident at the Dairy Queen.

I had no such concerns. I might have been in some level of shock for the last twenty minutes, but I was remembering clearly now, and what I remembered was that Ethel Fossy had not only verbally abused us in public every chance she got, she’d started vicious rumors, sent threatening hate mail and was consistently and vocally self-righteous and judgmental. Just because Mary Kay Yoda had given her a few tips on makeup, hair and clothing, it didn’t change the fact that her protégé from the dark side would still happily burn me at the stake given the opportunity.

I slid out of the booth, grabbed the tray of trash and looked down at Bony Butt. “Well, Ethel, this whole extreme makeover thing you’ve got going is pretty impressive, I’ll give you that. But there’s still that old saying about leopards and spots and such. Then again, a Bobcat may trump leopards and spots, and you could have really turned over a new leaf, or at least nailed an old hippie.”

Lucille groaned. “Oh, my Lord, Jolene.”

Ethel’s face turned so red that the expertly applied blush and highlights completely disappeared. “What do you mean by that?”

“I’m not casting stones. Hooking up with Bobcat has clearly done you a world of good. Makes you feel alive again, doesn’t it?”

“Oh, my Lord,” Lucille repeated, darting her eyes around the room to quantify witnesses.

“And finding yourself a godly man too,” I continued. “Why, I’d say he uses the word 'god' at least twice in every sentence.”

Mother grabbed me by the arm and dragged me to the door. “Why do you say these things?”

It was a rhetorical question; she had no intention of me answering. I fully intended to, of course, but Ethel raced up beside us and cut off whatever clever remark might have fallen out of my mouth.

“Are you going to let her get away with that?” Ethel said, her voice elevated with indignation and outrage. “If she was my daughter, she wouldn’t be getting away with that.”

Lucille grabbed the red tray out of my hands and set it on top of the trash can and shoved me toward the door. “Don’t pay her any mind, Ethel. She’s still real tired from her trip, jet lag and all that.”

“I just never dreamed this was what you had to put up with.”

“Well, Ethel,” I said, “there just wasn’t time to do it your way. If I had to say it behind your back and then wait for it to make the rounds on the gossip mill, well, it could take days or at least an hour.”

“What an awful thing to say! I do not gossip!” Ethel gaped and worked her jaw up and down. “You’re right, Lucille, after all you’ve done for her and she still doesn’t care at all about other people’s feelings. It is just like a knife to the heart.”

I shoved open the door and walked out.

Mother scurried out of the restaurant behind me, huffing and clucking as she followed me to the car. She clicked open the locks, opened the passenger door and flung herself inside. After I was seated, she tossed me the keys and said, “There’s no reason for you to be snippy. These situations are delicate and I just said what I had to in order to get Ethel to open up to me.” She gripped the handles of her purse and huffed. “You obviously do not understand a single thing about psychology or finesse in communication.”

“Obviously.” I stuck the key in the ignition and started the engine. “But I apparently excel at heart knifing.” I laughed, not because it was all that funny, but because it was funny enough to give me a way to release some tension other than yelling or crying. I laughed again.

“I don’t see what’s so funny.”

“Of course you don’t. You’ve had a grand time today. Your morning started out perfectly with a cup of coffee and a shooting.”

She sucked in an indignant breath then muttered, “He had it coming.”

“For most folks, that would have been a full day of fun in and of itself, but no, you were only getting started.” I ignored her scowl. “After a stimulating experience at the Little Ranch, Grannie Columbo was off to outsmart the cops at the motel room with the dead guy.”

“You can’t be blaming me for all that.”

I raised a hand to stop her. “And just because the town’s morality watchdog has rediscovered life in the immoral fast line doesn’t mean you have to conduct a fashion intervention to support it.”

She gave me a look that said she hadn’t exactly thought of it that way then muttered something under her breath that included “hateful” and “pitiful.”

“I, on the other hand,” I said, raising my voice appropriately for drama, “was dragged along for the ride of shock and fear, none of which would have been necessary had you told me the truth from the beginning. My icing on the day’s cake was being kidnapped at gunpoint by two psychos after you abandoned me in the parking lot of the Dairy Queen. But not to worry, I’m fine.”

“Oh, good grief, Jolene, I can very well see that you’re just fine,” she snapped, jumping back on the defensive and sweeping away any pesky twinge of guilt that might have occurred. “You’re certainly cranky and hateful, but you’re fine. As for Bobcat, he’s got a foul mouth, but he’s harmless.”

“No, he’s a jumpy guy with posttraumatic stress disorder and a gun.”

An excerpt from Hot Enough to Kill was included in the University of Texas Press title, Lone Star Sleuths: An Anthology of Texas Crime Fiction. 

Be sure to check out this unique anthology, Lone Star Sleuths, available from the University of Texas Press as part of its Southwestern Writers Collection Book Series.

   Texas is a state of many mysteries in 'Lone Star Sleuths'

ANTHOLOGY: Here's proof that savvy sleuthing can be found in our own back yard  12:00 AM CST on Sunday, December 16, 2007  By JANE SUMNER / Special Contributor to The Dallas Morning News (excerpt)

 

In the past, this mystery fan has turned to distant writers for a whodunit fix. Now I know that gems in the genre abound in our state. That revelation came with Lone Star Sleuths, the first book to herald the pleasures to be had reading Texas crime fiction.

 

For the maiden anthology, editors culled hundreds of Texas whodunits, most from the last 20 years. The result: atmospheric short excerpts from the works of 30 mystery writers, hard-boiled and cozy, acclaimed and rising stars.

More than a sampler, it's an overdue showcase for serious, clever, sometimes rambunctious talent who fracture clichés and face up to the state's dirty laundry. 
 

From the Guadalupe Mountains in Nevada Barr's "Track of the Cat" to the Piney Woods in Walter Mosely's "Gone Fishin'," their choices largely reflect a real, not formulaic, Texas: its history, hazards, topography and weather. The final entry, mystery maven Mary Willis Walker's "The Red Scream," takes place in the death house at Huntsville.

Of course, not every selection entrances, but it was a real treat to meet award-winning veterans such as Rick Riordan and Jeff Abbott, to find gifted outsiders such as Ms. Barr, and to be reminded that Kinky Friedman may be a lousy pol, but in "Armadillos and Old Lace," he's an affecting, near-lyrical writer.

 

Though I'm no fan of blood sports, it's hard to believe that Ben Rehder, an authority on Texas deer-hunting culture, isn't also our funniest mystery writer. His "Buck Fever" fragment is choice. A.W. Gray's "Prime Suspect," targeting Fort Worth swells, and Paula Boyd's "Hot Enough to Kill at the Kickapoo Dairy Queen" aren't far behind.

 

This latest in the Southwestern Writers Collection's classy book series does what a good anthology should – send us running to read more of the works and authors excerpted in its pages.

Jane Sumner is an Austin freelance writer.

Lone Star Sleuths: An Anthology of Texas Crime Fiction

Edited by Bill Cunningham, Steven L. Davis and Rollo K. Newsom (University of Texas, $24.95)