by Ali Franklin
Trainor looked skeptical. She asked the question a different way. Then she found a third way to ask. Grace was getting used to it. After more than two hours of questioning and re-questioning, Trainor told Grace she was free to go.
“But don’t leave the county without checking with me first.”
Grace stood and prepared to leave. When she reached the door she turned to face Trainor. “Detective, am I a suspect?” she asked.
Trainor tilted her head. “Should you be?”
“I loved Cora. I would never hurt her.” Grace opened the door and made her way through the office without making eye contact with anyone. She reached the parking lot and got into her car. Then she took three deep breaths.
Come on, Gracie. You can do this. She shook her head as if to clear it, then pulled out her phone. She found a name in her contact list and pushed the phone icon.
“Hi. It’s Grace. Grace Loh. I hate to bother you, but do you have time to talk?” She listened. "Yes, I’m okay. I mean, it’s very said, but do you think we could—.” She listened again and smiled in response. “Yes, thank you, that would be great. See you then.”
9
Trainor and Prieto spent Tuesday afternoon at the victim’s house. They started, as they always did, in the living room. Although people often kept secrets hidden in a bedroom closet, there were usually plenty of blatant clues to their personalities right inside the front door.
Cora DeLuca’s home was no different. The living room was small and neat, with framed pictures on three walls and a picture window on the fourth. A flowered loveseat took up one side of the room. Trainor recognized the faint smell of lemon furniture polish. An oak armoire with a television and DVD collection stood in one corner. Prieto knelt down and thumbed through the titles.
“I’ve never seen any of these movies.”
Trainor walked over and picked up a few. “But I’m a Cheerleader, D.E.B.S., Imagine Me and You.” She smiled. “All the classics.” Prieto lifted his shoulders, a questioning look on his face. Maddie picked up another disc and held it for him to see. “The L Word?”
“Oh,” he said, smiling. “Those classics.”
They continued their exploration. Trainor always felt a little intrusive looking through someone’s things when they weren’t there. But her craving for justice made her keep going.
She returned to the pictures, which seemed to consist mostly of family members. Cora was in about half of them, and the majority of the subjects had the same olive skin and dark hair as the dead woman. There were pictures from the beach, one from a snowy mountainside, and one taken at the top of a roller coaster. She wondered if all the people in these pictures had heard the news by now.
In the kitchen she found a coffee cup, bowl, and spoon in the sink. The little table in the corner was empty except for ceramic salt and pepper shakers shaped like smiling frogs. Two wooden chairs fit snugly beneath the table.
Pictures of smiling children and families were attached to one door of the refrigerator with large magnets shaped like musical instruments. A calendar was attached to the other door. Trainor flipped through it, looking in vain for appointments or reminders.
The detectives split up. Prieto walked out of the kitchen through one doorway and Trainor went through the other. She checked out the master bedroom and bath next, then the spare bedroom. There were no ominous notes sitting on a desk, no shrines to past girlfriends hidden in a back closet (they had actually found one of those once), and no journal to be found. Nothing presented itself as a clue to why Cora had been murdered.
“Hey Trainor, come look at this,” Jack yelled from the garage. She strode out to join him, hoping he had found something useful. “Check this out,” he said, pointing.
The conspicuously clean two-car garage had obviously been used for Cora’s car and for storage. The space closest to the kitchen door was empty. A tennis ball hung from a long string stapled to the ceiling about five feet from the back wall. A small piece of indoor-outdoor carpeting directly beneath it captured an oil stain.
Prieto was standing on the far side of the garage next to at least a dozen large plastic storage bins. Two of them had big pieces of masking tape with the word “GOODWILL” written in fat blue marker. The lids were off and leaned against the wall, allowing Trainor to see that the bins were full. More items were stacked on the floor beside the bins.
“It looks like she was going to give a lot of stuff away,” Prieto said, pointing to the bins.
“I wonder if she was planning to move.”
“I don’t know, but you should see some of this stuff.”
Trainor walked over to one of the bins and looked inside. It was filled with items of all sizes, shapes, and colors. She reached in and pulled out a small box. Inside was a brand-new designer watch.
“This is gorgeous.” She frowned and turned it over in her hand. It looked like it had never been worn.
“And there’s this,” said Prieto. He opened a box and pulled out a pink designer handbag.
“Is that snakeskin?”
He nodded and opened the bag. His partner reached in and found a leather strap with a serial number. They looked at each other.
“I’m not much of a handbag girl, but even I know that is worth a pretty penny.” Reaching into another bin, Trainor pulled out a light blue box. Diamond earrings. She found expensive perfume, a slim laptop computer, and a two-foot-square quadcopter drone. Every item was still in its box and looked like it was fresh from the store or factory.
“This doesn’t make sense,” she said. “The inside of the house looks like what you’d expect from a college professor – basic, middle-class stuff. What’s she doing with all this?”
Prieto shrugged. “Shoplifter?”
“Doesn’t seem like it. Unless she was wracked with guilt.” She scratched her head. “Most thieves end up using or selling the things they take — especially if they are high-end like these. They don’t just give them away”
Prieto tried again. “Robin Hood complex?”
She didn’t respond to that one. Instead, she said, “Thousands and thousands of dollars’ worth of merchandise just sitting out here.” She shook her head again.
“It would’ve been great for Goodwill if she was actually going to donate it.”
Trainor wondered briefly if the dead woman really had been planning to donate the items to the charity. Now it would be up to her beneficiary. She jotted something in her notebook and looked at her partner.
“We’ll have to keep a lookout for high-dollar shopping sprees when we go through her financials.”
Prieto pursed his lips. “Did you notice that there are no price tags on any of this stuff?”
“Weird.”
“Maybe we’ll find a fairy godmother,” said Prieto.
“She would have been better off with a guardian angel.”
10
At a quarter to six that evening, Ryan found herself in the supermarket trying to decide what to take to Teddy and Summer’s for dinner. Teddy had made it clear they didn’t need anything for the meal, but Ryan hated to arrive empty-handed. She settled on two bouquets of summer blooms in red, orange, and yellow and two bottles of chardonnay.
Arriving at the house, she parked in the driveway next to Nicki’s red Jeep. A Tesla sedan she didn’t recognize was parked on the street. She wondered if Teddy had invited someone else to their little meeting. Ryan entered the house to find Summer in the kitchen taking a casserole dish out of the refrigerator.
“Welcome, friend,” said Summer with a smile. “We’re glad you could join us.” She set the pan on the counter and walked over to hug Ryan. As was usual when Summer was at home, she was barefoot and wore a loose, earth-toned dress. Today her long gray hair was pulled back with a leather strap and dotted with little flowers from the backyard.
“It’s a terrible thing,” Summer said with a sympathetic frown. “I can’t believe it.”
“Yeah, it’s still sinking in. Poor Cora."
>
“Her ex-girlfriend Grace is here,” said Summer. “She’s really broken up.” Hefting the casserole pan again, she motioned to the back door. “Would you mind?”
The two women went out to the backyard. Teddy and Nicki were sitting at the large picnic table facing a thin woman with short dark hair. Teddy stood when she saw Ryan and motioned her over.
After Nicki and Teddy had both hugged Ryan, Teddy said, "This is our friend Grace Loh.” She motioned toward the third woman at the table, who had risen to shake Ryan’s hand.
Grace looked like she might be in her late twenties. She had a pretty face with faintly Asian features and flawless skin. Her eyes were large, adding to an overall sense of youth and vulnerability. She was wearing shorts and a dressy T-shirt with a rhinestone heart design on the front. She glanced at Ryan for a moment then lowered her gaze.
Ryan shook Grace’s hand and introduced herself, adding, “I’m so sorry about Cora.” She couldn’t think of anything else to say.
The foursome sat down, each woman lost in her own thoughts for a moment.
“Owww!” A loud clang came from the direction of the grill. The women looked up to see Summer shaking out the hand that had just inadvertently come into contact with the grill.
“You okay, hon?” Teddy asked, rising from the table.
“Just clumsy,” said her partner.
The mini-emergency had brought the women at the table back to the present. Teddy turned to Ryan. “Grace was taken to the sheriff’s station today,” she said. “They questioned her for hours.”
Ryan looked at Grace, who was shaking her head. “Are you okay?”
Grace told the women how the two detectives had come to her house and escorted her to the station. She recounted how Trainor had asked her the same set of questions over and over, making her feel like a suspect.
Ryan frowned. “That woman is a real piece of work.”
Grace nodded. She continued, describing the part of the questioning when the detective had asked Grace to account for her whereabouts between three and four o’clock the previous day.
“Do you know?” she asked, “Is that when she was killed?”
“They must know what time it happened from things like body temperature and," Ryan winced, wondering if she was being callous. Grace was leaning forward, clearly waiting to hear more, so she continued, "...the rigor mortis.” Ryan decided not to recount how cold and pale Cora’s arm had been when she had found her.
The women fell into silence again. Eventually, Ryan turned her head toward Grace. “So you and Cora were partners?” she asked.
“Well, girlfriends. We never called ourselves partners. I would have loved that, but I guess it just wasn’t meant to be.” She looked down at her hands on the tabletop.
Ryan found herself interested in this woman’s story. She tilted her head. "Wasn't meant to be?"
Grace swallowed. “We were great together, but in the end we just wanted different things.” She paused and looked around the table, looking at each woman in turn. “Do any of you have kids?” All three women shook their heads.
“I wanted kids. A couple,” she continued. “But Cora didn’t. That’s not the kind of thing you can just work through.” She stared at the top of the picnic table. “We decided we were better off as friends.”
“Well,” said Teddy, “we can all understand that. The kids-or-no-kids discussion is about as serious as it gets. And I’m glad you stayed friends.” She patted Grace’s arm. “But we’ve missed you around here. I don’t think we’ve seen you since last spring.”
“It was hard for us to do things together until we’d had a little bit of space,” said Grace. “We just had lunch together yesterday; did you know that?”
All three women sucked in a breath. Nicki mouthed a “Wow.”
Grace shook her head silently then bowed it.
“Come and get it!” yelled Summer from the grill. While the others had been talking, she had grilled the meat and arranged the cooked-to-perfection pieces neatly on a white serving platter. “We’re doing buffet style, so meet me in the kitchen.” She led the way through the back door, platter held high.
The women followed her into the house, where Teddy insisted her guests serve themselves first. Within a few minutes they were back at the picnic table eating a feast of chicken breasts, corn on the cob, baked beans, and green salad.
When they had all eaten their fill, Ryan turned to Grace. “Teddy tells us you work for the state. That must be rewarding work.”
Grace smiled. “Oh, it really is. My job is helping people who have been hurt by the system. The online recordkeeping for the program is so complex that it’s actually easy to misplace files or make the wrong entry and cause a family to lose their benefits. That’s where I come in.” She sipped her iced tea and continued, “I go into the back end of the computer system and investigate what happened. I find the mistakes so we can correct the record and help families get their benefits again.”
“Like online investigation?” said Nicki.
“Exactly,” said Grace. “Sometimes I really have to hunt to find what I’m looking for, but I always find it.”
“Have you always worked in social services?” asked Ryan.
Grace shook her head. “I never planned to work in the public sector. In fact, it was the opposite. When I was studying computer science in college my plan was to work for the New York Stock Exchange or one of the larger global banks. And I did that for a few years.”
Ryan laughed. “So that’s why there’s a Tesla out front.”
Grace looked down sheepishly. “It’s one of the few things I bought for myself when I worked in finance.”
Summer smiled and said, “No judgment here. So how did you get from that world to working for the welfare system?”
“I started volunteering at a halfway house on the weekends, helping the residents learn basic computer skills. From there I met some people who were in social work. Eventually, my computer skills and my desire to help people came together in this job, which I love.”
Nicki smiled and said, “My pop always used to tell me, ‘Find work that fills both your heart and your pocketbook.’”
Grace smiled. “I have and I’m blessed,” she said.
Eventually the women cleared the table and cleaned the kitchen. It was quick work with five people and they started to migrate toward the backyard again.
“Summer, could you come back in here for a sec?” called Grace from the kitchen.
Summer walked in. "What's up?"
“I'm not sure what to do with this,” said Grace, frowning and pointing at the closed dishwasher door. “There aren't any buttons.”
“You don't have to do anything with it,” said Summer with a smile. “It knows when it’s full. It'll start by itself.”
“A 'smart' dishwasher?” asked Ryan.
“Dishwasher, fridge, and oven,” said Summer. “All on the system. I can control it from my computer if I want. Energy-efficient like you wouldn’t believe. It even calls for its own repairs when it’s broken.” She smiled. “Though it hasn’t broken yet.”
“Fascinating,” said Grace, staring around the kitchen at the appliances.
“Only you would think a computer was fascinating,” teased Ryan. “C’mon, let’s go back outside and enjoy this weather.”
This time the five women settled into the lawn chairs at the far end of the yard. “You have such a nice layout here,” said Grace.
“We love to come out here after dinner and watch the sunset or the stars,” said Teddy. She and Summer were holding hands and looking content.
“I can see why,” said Grace. “I'd do the same thing if I had this view from my backyard.” She relaxed more deeply into her chair.
The women watched as the fireflies started their nightly dance. After a few minutes Ryan sat up straight, holding up her drink.
“To Cora.”
“To Cora,” came the chorus. They all clinked their glasses.
/> “Here’s hoping the detectives find out who did this,” said Teddy.
“I hope they do, but that Trainor is going to make a lot of enemies along the way,” said Ryan.
“That woman scares me,” said Grace.
They lapsed into silence again. Grace's phone rang from its spot on the picnic table and she stood to get it. She walked away from the little group and turned her back to them while she talked. When the call was finished, she returned to her seat, shaking her head.
“Speak of the devil,” she said. “Detective Trainor wants me to come back to her office in the morning.”
“Why?” asked Summer.
“She didn’t say. But I am definitely feeling like a suspect.”
The phone callput a damper on the rest of the evening. Grace told the group she needed to get a good night’s sleep before going to the sheriff’s station in the morning. She laid her hand on Ryan’s arm and told her how great it had been to meet her. Then they all said good night and wished Grace the best for her meeting. When the door closed behind her, Teddy turned to Ryan.
“What do you think?”
“She is an interesting woman,” Ryan said with a smile. “There’s something...intriguing about her.”
Teddy winked at her partner, then looked back at Ryan. “Intriguing?”
“I think she’s interesting.” Ryan shook her head as she read her friend’s face. “Oh my gosh — are you going to give me a hard time for thinking a girl is cute?”
Her three friends nodded in unison.
“Seriously though, she’s got it rough,” said Nicki. “First her ex is killed, then the cops think she did it. It must be terrible.”
Teddy put her hands on Ryan’s shoulders. “Now will you agree to help her? Just see if you can prove her alibi, or look into some other leads? She’s obviously innocent.”
Ryan shook her head. “She probably is innocent. But I am not going to go head to head with that detective. It’s not worth it.”
Ryan left Teddy and Summer’s house shortly after Grace. Her thoughts raced as she drove. She couldn't stop replaying the moment when she had found Cora’s body. She sensed that she had missed something; that she had seen something important. A glimmer of an idea sat at the edge of her consciousness, trying to gain traction. But the more she thought about it, the more elusive it became.
