Free Elvis and the Blue Christmas Corpse by Peggy Webb Page A

storms over in her steel-toed cowboy boots and snatches me away from Detective Carter like I’m a newborn and he’s the bubonic plague.
    “That’s enough. Can’t you see she’s traumatized? There’s been a death in the family.”
    “Excuse me, ma’am? Now, who are you?”
    “Santa’s fiancé.” Lovie starts shivering and bawling so loud you can hear her all the way to the Alabama state line. If I didn’t know her so well, I’d think she was in deep mourning. But this is not Lovie being heartbroken: this is my cousin reprising her role as the Wicked Stepmother in her fifth-grade production of “Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs.”
    Detective Carter looks like he’d rather be anywhere except in the faux North Pole with an unlikely elf and a grieving almost Mrs. Claus. He tells me not to leave town, then pats Lovie on the arm and wanders off like somebody lost in a snowstorm.
    Meanwhile, the cops are busy putting up yellow tape, and the manager is hanging a sign that says S ANTA’S C OURT IS CLOSED UNTIL FURTHER NOTICE . If anything can snatch dreams of sugar plums right out of the heads of little kids, crime tape ought to do it. For once in my life, I’m glad I’m not a mother.
    How do you explain to a three-year-old that you lied about the man in the red suit? That in spite of Santa dying right before their eyes, he will still clamber down their chimneys to bring gifts you’ll be paying for over the next six months? Even worse, how do you tell them that somebody out there hates Santa Claus?
    Lovie is quiet as she watches Santa’s Court become the crime scene. I link arms with her.
    “This is awful, Lovie. Somebody out there hates Christmas and that cop thinks it’s me.”
    She says a word that would raise blood blisters. “If the killer thinks I’m going to sit back after he’s snatched a perfectly good fiancé before I could get to the altar, he’s got another think coming.”
    She roars through the mall like a summer tornado. And I’m grateful to sail along in her tailwinds. Listen, this is Lovie we’re talking about. I’d much rather see my cousin in revenge mode than falling to pieces over a man she never loved in the first place.
    Trust me. I know.

Chapter 6
    Yellow Tape, Santa Haters, and Cancelled Christmas
    A s we storm through the mall, Christmas charity booths are being abandoned faster than Elvis can steal a ham bone. Bobby has already left the Eternal Rest booth and Fayrene is packing up the Gas, Grits, and Guts paraphernalia. Mama, who is still staying in the hospital with Uncle Charlie, never even opened Fa La La La Farewell today.
    I feel sorry for poor Cleveland White. He’s racing from one vendor to the next, mopping his face with a large white handkerchief and trying to talk them out of abandoning the mall’s biggest Christmas event, no doubt.
    Whipping out my cell, I call Darlene to give her an update. Since the Hair.Net booth was not located in viewing distance of Santa’s Court, she had no idea what was happening. And neither did her customers.
    “People are still lined up here three deep,” she says.
    “Good. Keep the booth open as long as we’ve got a crowd. I knew they’d love your nail art.”
    “ ’Natch. But it’s the star predictions that’s drawing them in.”
    “Don’t tell me you’re reading horoscopes.”
    “Everybody wants to know the future.”
    At the rate people are getting knocked off, looks like some of them won’t even have a future.
    “Just don’t make any iron-clad promises. Okay, Darlene?”
    When we get to the parking lot, Lovie and I stop to plan.
    “We can’t go home,” I say. “Jack’s there.” Meaning he would try to keep me from wading up to my neck into police business. He’ll find out soon enough, but at least I’ll have a head start.
    “My house. And we’d better tell Aunt Ruby Nell and Fayrene.”
    “Why? The last time they were involved in a murder investigation, I had to wear war paint, dance half-naked under the