by Bill Alive
“Maybe he’d been planning on that money! It’s millions of dollars, Gwen, and the man’s obsessed with scoring a big win.”
“No. In the real world, murders aren’t that complicated. They’re usually boring, very often the husband, and they have some obvious reason like an affair. It’s a very rare father who would actually kill his own child. He would have to be in an immediate crisis, not laying some elaborate plan where killing his kid in cold blood is the first step.”
“But—”
“You were right, Mr. Falcon. I did want to talk about this. Thank you. And now I am absolutely certain that Lindsay Mackenzie died a natural death.”
“But what about her sister? And her sister’s terrible husband?”
“They’re losers. Sibyl is lucky to remember to shower, much less mastermind a murder. And Fidelio is a white collar conman telemarketer. His kind don’t turn violent.”
“But I still feel like—”
“Mr. Falcon, with all due respects to your expert instincts, I’m done vacuuming.”
“Fine. So we’ll do this next Thursday? Double date, me and Pete with you and the vacuum? Give you an update?”
“You’re not going to have an update, Mr. Falcon, because you’re going to stop your amateur sleuthing as of now.”
“Gwen! Why? There’s nothing illegal about going around talking to people.”
“Strictly speaking, no, but—”
“No? Was that a no? So are you just worried about us, is that it? Or even … something more?”
I had been lulled almost to a state of mere hypervigilance, but at this, I snapped back to Code Red terror.
Mark ground on. “After all these lonely years surrounded by rules and uniforms, could a strange new feeling be tingling beneath those tough cop blues? It’s Pete, right?”
“Don’t!” I squeaked.
“Now that he could be in danger, you can see that you’ve always been jealous of Ceci … plus he has such great hair—”
Gwen interrupted. “Ceci’s the only reason you two idiots aren’t already in jail,” she said, with cool nonchalance. “But you’re only one punk-ass remark or so from breaking that, too. So good night, Mr. Falcon.” And she hung up.
Mark was grinning. He swiveled toward me and winked. “Okay, Pete, you can resume breathing.”
“I can’t believe we’re still alive. It’s like you were flirting with the Statue of Liberty. If her torch were a giant club.”
“I don’t think that really counted as flirting.”
“I thought you knew what women were feeling!”
“Not her. I have no idea what that woman is feeling. Not yet.”
“But in the hospital—”
“That was a fluke. She’d been triggered hard, and her shields were down. But her normal shielding is the strongest I’ve ever seen, men included. It’s like talking to a …” He trailed off, thinking. “I guess it’s what it must be like to talk to a woman if you’re not an empath. Huh.”
“You mean you had no idea how she was taking all that? What were you thinking? Wasn’t that terrifying?”
“Actually, it was relaxing.”
“That makes no sense.”
“Talking to most women is like trying to eat an ice cream cone next to a bonfire in the Sahara. Blast after blast of blistering emotion. But Gwen … huh … that is really interesting.”
“She’s like the one mysterious woman in your world.”
Mark shrugged. “I wouldn’t say that.” But his eyes gleamed with a dangerous sparkle.
I had a sudden vision of Mark and Gwen spooning cranberry sauce into each others mouths at the next Jensen Thanksgiving dinner, while Ceci and I tried to have a normal conversation. Mark claimed he couldn’t read Gwen, but that talk had been uncanny. What if he leveled up his superpowers and Gwen the Ice Queen really did thaw? With a gazillion gorgeous women in the world, would he really have to choose my best friend’s sister? That would be the Worst Thing Ever.
I shouldn’t have worried. I mean, I should have worried, but about a much more immediate threat. An even more terrifying female lurked dead ahead.
Chapter 20
Surprisingly, both Mark and I actually had to work for the next couple days. Mark didn’t call Lindsay’s mother-in-law to arrange an appointment until Saturday morning. When he did, it was the shortest phone call ever. She was eager to talk to us, even more eager than Waterbury had been.
Eager is not always best.
She lived near her son, Crowley, in a condo in Alexandria. This meant another long, Thunderous haul up I-66, but since we started in the early afternoon and it was Saturday anyway, we only hit a little traffic at Gainesville.
The condo complex was enormous, five or six huge apartment buildings brimming with balconies. Mark winced as we pulled into the entrance drive.
“You okay?” I said.
“Not a huge fan of condos.”
“Why?”
He eyed me, hesitating. Then he turned away. “Stupid hive,” he muttered. “Human storage units.”
“I bet a condo would be fun,” I said. “Imagine all the buddies you could walk to! Like a huge dorm for grownups. That’s the one part that sucks about the country, you have to work so hard to see anyone. There’s probably at least five awesome knockout women right here in these buildings.”
“Don’t go there,” Mark said. “Trust me.”
Grandma Crowley lived on the twenty-third floor, far down a hallway that felt like a pricey hotel. When we rang, the door was slowly opened by a haggard kid.
He stared up at us with wide, watchful eyes. His face was shrouded and impassive, and his skinny body was still. The skin under his eyes was puffy and dark, like a bruise against his pale unbroken skin.
I recognized him from the funeral as Vincent, Lindsay’s son. I’m not sure what I expected from a ten-year-old kid whose mom had died a couple weeks ago, but even my non-empath senses vibed a terrible grief. Everything about this kid was serious; he was wearing khaki pants in the heat of a Virginia September.
To us, Lindsay Mackenzie’s death had become this big intellectual puzzle, an exciting chance to catch a real criminal. To Vincent, it was a one-way ticket to hell.
He flicked me a glance, then studied Mark, who studied him back. They both looked inscrutable, at least to me.
“Hey,” Mark said gently. “No worries, Vince.”
“Vincent!” screeched an elderly woman voice. “You’re letting the air conditioning out! Bring them in!”
The kid startled, then grimly waved us in and carefully shut and locked the door.
The apartment living room had been designed to be light and spacious and airy, with a wide white carpet and the whole back wall a wide window onto a balcony. But dark curtains were drawn tight, and cheap lamps cast a sullen light on an enormous old woman in a wheelchair, who was hooked to an enormous machine.
“So,” she wheezed, boring into us with sunken gimlet eyes. “You’re investigating the death of that little gold digger.”
I flinched. Did she really talk like that about the kid’s mother? In front of him? When the woman had just died?
But the kid stood silent, with no response, against the fake fireplace in the living room corner. He watched his grandmother’s face with no expression.
All at once, I did not want to do this interview.
“That’s interesting,” Mark said, with Client Mode politeness. “I thought Lindsay was the one with the millions.”
“Not when she married my son,” she snapped.
“Ah.”
Grandma Crowley leaned toward us as if to say more, but then she twisted her head towards the kitchen and barked, “Malaika! We’re done here!”
From the beaded curtain to the kitchen, a nurse bustled out, shimmering with amazing braids. She had that glowing Caribbean skin and smile, and she said in a gorgeous accent, “We did finish your dialysis, Mrs. Crowley, but let’s go over your pill plan—”
“We’re
done.”
The nurse gave a theatrical sigh, then packed up and left. Before the door had quite closed behind her, Grandma Crowley belted at us, “She’s really a very good nurse. Very respectful for a black. No chip on her shoulder.”
I think I gasped.
Her eyes narrowed at me. “What’s with you?”
“I was just thinking,” I said quickly, “why don’t you two chat, and I can play checkers with Vincent. You like checkers, Vince?”
“Sit down. He’s got homework,” she said. She snapped him a glance, and he scurried away.
Mark sat on the ratty couch. I reluctantly joined him.
“He’s a good kid,” she said. “Been through a lot. But he needs routine.” She frowned, then hollered, “Make sure you check your math, sir!”
Then she swerved her motorized chair and faced us full on.
“Okay,” Mark said. “I get the impression you weren’t thrilled when your daughter-in-law opted for a divorce.”
“Ha! Good riddance to bad rubbish.”
I squirmed, then rose. “I’m so sorry to trouble you, where’s your bathroom?”
“Sit down!” she said. “I don’t know you from Adam. For all I know, you’ve got bloody scabs all over your ass.”
“I … I just have to pee…”
Mark tugged me back down and smiled. “We won’t keep you long.”
“Don’t worry, hon, I’ve got plenty to say.”
I snuck out my phone, propped it against my thigh, and texted Mark with one hand, sorry cant take this got to go.
“It sounds like you had strong objections—” Mark began, but his phone pinged. He looked confused, apologized, and quickly read his phone. He frowned, then kept talking while he texted me. “…strong objections to Lindsay,” he said.
stay, he texted.
Grandma Crowley grunted. “Objections? The woman was a bitch and a slut.”
Mark flinched, but kept a professional smile plastered in place.
seriously i cant, I texted back.
“I’m glad that, despite your differences,” he said, “you still want the murderers brought to justice.”
i need you here, he texted.
really? I texted.
“Sure, I want justice,” she said. “Those bastards cheated my grandson out of a fortune.”
Mark’s smile tightened. Without watching his fingers, he tapped me another text.
without your happy sappy aura this bitch will drain me in ten seconds flat so just DEAL
A warm glow buzzed my chest. Mark actually needed my help?
“And it was her fault,” Grandma Crowley ground on. “The ink wasn’t dry on those divorce papers before she was running around with some boy toy. Vincent would tell us things
…”
“But how would her dating get her murdered?” Mark said.
“She was dating a criminal!”
“Really? What kind?”
“A con artist. Fidelio Samson.”
“Fidelio?” I blurted. “But he married her sister Sibyl! He like just married her! He dated Lindsay first?”
“That man would do anything for money.”
“But did Sibyl not know?” I said.
“Of course she knew,” Grandma Crowley said. “Couple of sluts, probably shared him.”
“Really?” Mark said. “Lindsay didn’t end it before he started with Sibyl?”
“Oh, I don’t know all the details,” she said. “I’m sure she ended it eventually, she’s a gold digger and she wouldn’t have much use for all his debts.”
“And then what?” Mark said. “Fidelio killed Lindsay because she ditched him?”
She shrugged. “Either he did or one of her new flyboy friends. You know what goes on at that airport, don’t you?”
“No, not really,” Mark said carefully.
“Everyone knows that airport’s a mess of drugs and dirty money.”
“The Brown County airport?” I said. “It’s a bunch of retired commercial pilots!”
“You don’t know what you’re talking about.” Grandma Crowley leaned forward, her eyes glittering with malice. “That woman divorced my son to get her paws on those Mackenzie millions, but she wasn’t going to get it till Old Moneybags kicked the bucket. That could have taken years. So there that poor little princess was, having to get off her ass and work for the first time in her life, and what do you know, she has no skills, so all she can get are crap jobs. And then, suddenly, in between waitressing and Wal-Mart shifts … she’s getting a pilot’s license? How the hell could she afford that on tips?”
I’d never thought of that. Flight training could easily cost thousands of dollars.
“But she…” I faltered. “Her flight instructor said she was super nice.”
“Men only care about one thing,” she said acidly. “She looked decent for forty-two, I’ll give her that. It’s the quiet ones that turn out lethal.”
I protested. “Even her jealous sister said Lindsay was a good person!”
“Did you hear anything I said?” Grandma Crowley croaked. “How does a broke, divorced greeter shell out thousands for flight lessons? Well? You think alimony’s going to cover that?”
I looked at Mark. Neither of us had an answer.
Chapter 21
We suffered another half hour with Grandma Crowley, but we didn’t learn anything further, except blistering synonyms for “slut” that I hoped to Abundance I’d never hear again.
When we got back on the highway, I saw our gas was running low, but Mark wanted to push for home, both to beat any weekend traffic and to make it back to Back Mosby where gas was cheaper. On the way, we talked the interview over, but we agreed the new revelations only meant more interviews. Well, we sort of agreed.
“We’ll have to see Sibyl and Fidelio again,” Mark said. “I’ve got to vibe what the hell was going on there — he dates Lindsay and then marries her sister? Two heiresses?”
“Do we have to see them?” I pleaded. “They’re such terrible people.”
“Seriously?”
“Can’t we talk to Waterbury? Lindsay might have talked to him about Fidelio, or even brought Fidelio to a flying lesson. Fidelio’s got every motive to hide stuff, but Waterbury won’t. And he might even explain how she paid for the lessons.”
Mark sighed. “We can talk to Waterbury first,” he grumbled. “Sometimes I wonder which of us is the empath.”
We drove in silence for a bit, and then I said, “What really gets me is that kid.”
“What do you mean?” he said. “I vibed a ton of grief and fear, but I don’t know what else he’d feel, going from his mom to a witch like that.”
“But how could he just sit there while she trash-talked his mom?” I said. “It was like he didn’t care.”
“I wouldn’t say that,” Mark said. “Not everyone handles grief the same way. Besides, he’s powerless. Maybe he and Grandma Crowley had a nonstop shouting match all last week, and she won.”
“I guess,” I said. “But I still don’t get it. I’m not getting any awards for Most Devoted Son, but if anyone ever threw the Slut Thesaurus at my mom, they’d pull back a stump.”
“Lucky you,” Mark said quietly.
The needle hit E and the light went on, but Mark assured me we’d make it. We did … barely. At the gas station, he suggested I run in and grab a copy of the Gazette, in case there’d been any “developments”.
I felt quaint and old-fashioned looking for news in an actual physical newspaper. But I’d tried to use the newspaper’s website on my phone once, and I’d promised myself I’d never, ever do that again. Ever.
Okay, maybe if I were being held hostage in a decommissioned nuclear plant, and for some reason, the only way I could call for rescue was to leave a comment on a Hannigan-Quinn article. Maybe then. But I’d still try to rig up an explosion first.
Back in the car, I flipped through the ad-disfigured pages. The cover story was some budget fiasco, but on page 10, I shrieked
. “Dude! Developments! Listen to this! ‘Murder Victim’s Apartment Violated’!”
Mark’s eyes narrowed, and he waited to start Thunder. “A break-in? When? Was anything stolen?”
“Wednesday night,” I said. “It says nothing seems to have been stolen, but it’s a low-rent apartment outside town, so they don’t really know.”
“Did they catch anyone?”
“Doesn’t sound like it. There’s a statement from Gwen that it was probably a random thief and they’re working on it, but the article makes it sound like the cops are too busy trying to meet speeding ticket quotas to care about the murder.”
“Really? He keeps calling it murder?”
“‘As must be obvious to any rational adult resident of Brown County,’” I read, “‘this break-in proves that the murderer is still at large and still dangerous. Is this what we spend our tax money on, for our county-paid police force to harass hurried drivers while a cold-blooded killer goes unpunished?’”
“That guy is such a tool,” Mark said. “I wasn’t planning to be on his team.”
“He hints at the airport-drug thing, too,” I said. “You really think Lindsay got mixed up with selling drugs? Maybe they came for a stash in her apartment?”
“We don’t even know that that airport-drug connection is a thing,” Mark said.
“I hope not,” I said. “Drugs are super boring.”
“What? What are you talking about?”
“It’s always drugs!” I said. “Every single movie, it’s like, ‘Oh man, surprise surprise, it’s drugs! The bad guys are selling drugs!’”
Mark said stiffly, “Drugs aren’t boring when you know the person. At least a murder is a quick death.”
Awkward pause. What do you say to that? I haven’t had any close friends do drugs, at least not any hard stuff.
Finally I said, “Sorry, man. I didn’t know.”
“It’s cool,” he said, not looking at me. “We can’t all be mind readers.” He fired up Thunder.
We didn’t talk for awhile, but he still looked so thoughtful that I eventually shouted, “What’s up? Are you getting a vibe about the case?”
“Just a feeling.”
