The Root of All Trouble

by Heather Webber

  "Don't look at me like that," she said, pouting.

  She was a master pouter. Seriously, she could give lessons. However, I had spent my whole life building up immunity. "You promised me the last time I caught you breaking in that you weren't going to do it again. Plus, you're supposed to be on bed rest, remember? How did you even get here? And where's Gracie?"

  Gracie was my sister's mostly blind, mostly incontinent Chihuahua. Lately, she'd also become mostly deaf. The only thing she had going for her was her innate cuteness—and my sister's adoration.

  "Gracie's around here somewhere," Maria said. "Check under the couch."

  In her pre-pregnant days Maria mostly resembled Grace Kelly. These days...she looked more like a relative of the Stay Puft Marshmallow Man.

  Pregnancy hadn't been kind to her, or easy. A few months ago she swelled up and was diagnosed with a case of mild preeclampsia and prescribed bed rest. Her cheeks had puffed up and her ankles had puffed out. As she neared the end of her pregnancy, her bed rest orders had become stricter—the baby's lungs weren't quite mature yet and no one wanted a premature delivery.

  At Christmastime she thought she was two months pregnant but a later ultrasound confirmed it to be closer to three. Her due date was in three weeks.

  Maria's husband, Nate, and our mother had been taking turns caring for her. But my mother and father had just left on a long-planned cruise around Fiji so Nate had taken vacation time from his new job to stay home and look after Maria—who had a tendency to forget doctor's orders. She simply was not one to sit still for long and the bed rest was driving her crazy.

  Therefore she drove everyone around her crazy as well.

  I crouched down. Sure enough, Gracie was under the sofa, curled into a little ball snoozing away. Her "mostly" deaf might have become "totally" deaf over the last couple of months—she hadn't heard me come in at all. "She's there. Sleeping."

  "She's been tired lately." There was wistfulness in her voice, an acknowledgement that her beloved pet probably wasn't going to live forever. However, I fully believed Gracie had a few more good years left in her.

  Maria waddled toward the couch and slowly lowered herself down onto a cushion, expelling a long breath as she did so. Letting her head fall back onto a pillow, she said, "My doctor let me off bed rest now that the baby's lungs are mature. We set the date for the induction."

  This was news. "You did? When is it?"

  "A week from today, after Mom and Dad get home from their trip. I still have to take my blood pressure every few hours and email my doctor the results in case my blood pressure skyrockets, but the end is in sight. Thank God. Have you seen my cankles? Out of control."

  Her ankles had long since blended in with her calves becoming cankles—and they were out of control. She hadn't been able to wear footwear other than flip-flops for two months now.

  "That's still a little early...is the doctor sure the baby's okay to be delivered?"

  "It's only two weeks early—and the doctor thinks it's best."

  "She's seen your cankles, too?"

  Maria chucked a pillow at me. I caught it and smiled. I tried not to tease her too much, but sometimes it slipped out. Payback for years of her torturing me about my looks. "And how did you get here?" She surely hadn't walked and her car wasn't out front.

  "Nate dropped me off."

  I'd taken to calling him Saint Nate for all he had to put up with. Maria had always been a self-centered and controlling dynamo, but her pregnancy hormones coupled with no physical activity had created quite the demanding diva.

  "Why?" I asked.

  "There was some sort of emergency at work. Something to do with the storm. He had to go in, and he didn't want to leave me alone."

  Nate had recently taken a new job as TV news producer and loved it. However, it did make for odd hours, and when emergencies happened, he usually had to work, vacations or not.

  "Riley called, by the way. He said to tell you he was fine and on his way home."

  There was an ache in my chest that made me remember that his home was no longer this home. Even though he was my stepson, I loved him as my own, and hadn't quite adjusted to him living with Kevin full-time. He did stay with me every other weekend, but it didn't feel right. He belonged here.

  Maria snapped her fingers at me, trying to get my attention. "Hello! My feet?"

  I bit my tongue, rolled my eyes, and lifted Maria's feet, one at a time, onto the coffee table.

  "Put this under them," she said, handing me a pillow.

  I thought about putting it over her face, but then thought about the little innocent baby she was carrying and reconsidered. I lifted Maria's feet and placed the pillow beneath them.

  "Water?" she asked.

  Jaw tight, I headed for the kitchen. "When is Nate picking you up?"

  "Tomorrow."

  My hand froze on the refrigerator door. "What?"

  "Tomorrow. He didn't know how long he'd have to work, so he suggested I spend the night here with you."

  I bet he did. I mentally erased the saintly part of his nickname.

  "I told him you wouldn't mind," she said. "You don't mind, right?"

  I handed her a bottle of water and decided it was best if I didn't answer.

  She handed the bottle right back. "It's not open."

  I was about to give her a lecture on how a difficult pregnancy didn't give her the right to forfeit simple manners, but then I saw a flash of emotion cross her eyes and her fists clench.

  Or try to clench, at least. Her fingers were so swollen it was hard for her to bend them. It was probably nearly impossible for her to open the water herself.

  I twisted the cap off, handed the bottle to her, and said, "When was your last blood pressure reading?"

  "About an hour ago."

  "And?"

  "The same. Nina?"

  "Yeah?"

  "Why do you smell like gin and vomit?"

  "Long story," I said.

  "Something that has to do with the coroner's van across the street?"

  "Kind of." I filled her in on the discovery of Joey Miller's body.

  "If I was dating Nate and found out he was already married, I'd probably bash him on the head and dump him in a hollow tree, too."

  "Do you think Delphine is tall or strong enough to have gotten him into that tree?"

  "Nina, never underestimate the strength of a woman deceived." Her eyelids drifted closed. "I'm tired."

  "That's what happens when you wear yourself out snooping around my house."

  "I wouldn't have to snoop if you'd just tell me."

  "You didn't want to know, remember? You made me promise. And I never break my promises."

  She'd broken in here at least once a month for the last four months in search of the ultrasound report revealing the gender of her baby. She'd made the doctor, a family friend, promise to not even write the gender in her file. Only on the piece of paper tucked into an envelope that she'd given to me for safekeeping.

  "Since when do you listen to me? I changed my mind. I want to know."

  "No you don't."

  "Yes, I do." She frowned. "No, I don't. Yes, I do!"

  I sat next to her. "What brought this on?"

  With the past break-ins there had always been an instigating factor. The baby registry had sparked one break-in, the baby shower another.

  "Nate wants to buy the baby a baseball glove."

  "So?"

  She wrinkled her nose. "Girls don't play baseball."

  "No, they usually play softball, which also requires a glove."

  "Not my daughter. She's going to be a girly girl. Pink dresses, tutus, piano lessons, tea parties, dance classes."

  Her eyes turned glassy. She'd put a lot of thought into this.

  "And if it's a boy?" I asked.

  "It's not a boy. That's why I need to see those results. I need to prove it to Nate before he goes off and buys my baby girl a basketball hoop or something."

  "The horror
."

  "Are you mocking me?"

  "Of course."

  She pouted.

  "What if it's a boy?" I asked again.

  Letting out a deep breath, she said, "I don't know. I don't really like the whole sports thing. So sweaty."

  "Have you seen yourself at Zumba?"

  She glared at me. "Dancing sweat is different from sporty sweat."

  "How so?"

  "It just is."

  I decided not to argue and instead pursued another tactic. "Nate was a pro baseball player. Peter ran cross country and also played basketball and tennis. They're pretty good role models."

  Peter, our older brother, was a pediatrician who lived out of state. He'd just been home at New Year's and called every week to keep tabs on Maria.

  "I guess," she said. "But I'm still having a girl. I refuse to have a boy."

  Smiling, I hoped that she was having a boy. It would serve her right. But I didn't know what she was having, either. The results she searched for were locked in my Taken by Surprise office—still sealed because I didn't trust myself from blabbing.

  I drew my feet up onto the sofa, unable to get comfortable, and realized something was bothering me. The mention of Peter had triggered another memory. One of him and one of his high school best friends running on weekends, teasing me as I followed alongside them on my bike.

  Oh. My. God. It couldn't be.

  I jumped up and peeked out the window.

  "What?" Maria asked.

  "There's a man out there who works for the coroner's office. I thought I knew him but couldn't place how. I think I just remembered..."

  Maria levered herself off the couch and toddled over to the window. "Which one?"

  "The guy over there, behind the van."

  "The hottie in the windbreaker?"

  Eyebrow raised, I glanced at her.

  "What?" she said. "I'm pregnant, not comatose."

  "Do you recognize him?" I asked.

  She squinted. "He does look familiar."

  I swallowed. "Does he look like Seth Thiessen?"

  Her eyes flew open wide, then she squinted again. "Impossible," she whispered. "That's impossible."

  It was.

  Because Seth Thiessen was dead.

  Chapter Five

  "What kind of neighborhood do you live in?" Kevin asked as he strode in the front door several hours later. "I think the Mill accounts for the highest crime rate in the county."

  "Have you ever heard of knocking?" I said from my spot on the couch. Even though it wasn't even close to being dark out yet, I'd already changed into my pajamas, was snuggled under a blanket, and had a bowl of popcorn balanced on my lap.

  I was clearly not a party girl.

  Gracie charged out from beneath the couch, her high-pitched barking drowning out the Project Runway episode Maria and I had been watching—one of many. There was a marathon airing and we couldn't pull ourselves away. Gracie barreled toward Kevin's feet, stopped abruptly when she neared him, piddled, and ran back under the couch.

  "She doesn't like you," Maria said, stealing a piece of popcorn.

  I smacked her hand—she'd already eaten her bowl. Tossing aside the blanket, I reluctantly stood, set my popcorn bowl out of Maria's reach, and went for the paper towels and spray cleaner.

  "The feeling is mutual," he said, stepping over the new puddle.

  Maria held out her hands to him. "Help me up. Gracie reminded me that I need to go pee."

  "Charming," he said, but easily pulled her off the sofa.

  "Hey," she snapped, "you try having an eight pound kid sitting on your bladder day and night, then we'll talk charming." She flipped him the finger, then penguin-waddled toward the powder room, cursing under her breath.

  I jabbed a paper towel at him. "Do not get her riled up. It took me an hour to calm her down after one of her favorite contestants was auf wiedersehen-ed on an earlier episode. I had to ply her with warm chocolate chip cookies to bring her blood pressure back down—my last roll. So unless you want to either make a run to Kroger for me, or babysit her while I go, I suggest you play nice."

  "With the rat, too?"

  The rat being Gracie. I poked his arm. "Her, too."

  He held his hands up in surrender. "Okay, okay. Ca—"

  "And don't you dare tell me to calm down."

  Pressing his lips closed, he pretended to zip them. There was a light in his green eyes, however, that told me he was on the verge of flat-out laughing.

  "You're impossible," I said.

  "Impossible to resist." He batted his lashes.

  I crouched to clean up after Gracie. "What happened to the zipper?"

  "It broke. Like that one time you and I... Ow! Why'd you pinch my leg?"

  "Why are you here?" I asked.

  "Are you seriously wearing your pajamas at six in the afternoon?" He followed me into the kitchen.

  "Six is technically evening," I said, tossing soiled paper towels into the trash can. "And you didn't seriously just change the subject did you?"

  Squinting, he said, "Are those flying cows on your pajamas?"

  "Stop looking at me." I zipped past him, brushing so close to his chest that I could feel his body heat.

  "No bra, either," he said. "You're just a girl gone wild."

  I hurdled the back of the couch and pulled the blanket up to my chin. "What's that?" I said. "It's time for you to leave? So sad."

  Smiling, he sank into the faux leather recliner. "No, no. I have a little more time before I go back to the station."

  "Anything new with the case?"

  He pulled the handle on the recliner, and the foot rest popped up. "God, I miss this chair."

  It had been a little over a year since he moved out. A year of anger, hurt...forgiveness. We were in a strange place, him and me. Our divorce had been finalized months and months ago. But lately...it was starting to feel like a new beginning.

  I didn't know if that was what I wanted.

  His friendship was nice. But he wanted more. He'd never actually come out and said so, but I could tell by the way he'd drop by just to visit, the way he always offered to fix things around the house, the way he looked at me.

  Oh, the way he looked at me.

  I tugged the blanket up a little higher and wished I could pull it right over my head and pretend I didn't still have feelings for him.

  Maria came out of the powder room, stopped in the kitchen for a snack (an apple), and then approached the couch like she was preparing for battle. I supposed she was—it was a two-minute process to get herself in a comfortable position. After a lot of moaning, groaning and cursing, she finally settled in.

  Kevin stared aghast at her.

  "Don't make me throw this apple at your head," she warned.

  "I didn't say anything." He looked at me. "Did I say anything?"

  "A picture is worth a thousand words," I said.

  Maria gave him the Ceceri Evil Eye—which she was really good at, but he pointedly ignored her and said to me, "There's nothing new on the case you didn't already know. The scene is an absolute mess. If we find any evidence it'll be a miracle with the way it was raining today, and then having half the neighborhood traipsing through the yard."

  "Speaking of the yard, when do you think it will be cleared?" The weather had already put me behind on my plans, and I needed to know how long the police would need the area cordoned off.

  "Depends," Kevin said. "A day or two. It depends on the coroner's report and if someone happens to confess overnight."

  A chill went up my spine as I thought again of the coroner's investigator. "It doesn't seem like you have a lack of suspects."

  He dragged a hand over his face. "That's true. I'm waiting for background checks on Delphine and her crew before I head back to the station for interviews. I have a feeling more than one rap sheet is going to pop up."

  Undoubtedly.

  He added, "Why did Perry and Mario hire Reaux Construction in the first place? It doesn't
seem like their type of company."

  "Caviar dreams," Maria said as she nibbled her apple to its core. She looked around—probably for my popcorn bowl. "Boxed-wine budget."

  "When did the crew start working there?" Kevin asked.

  I wished I had changed my clothes—I was starting to get chilled. "About two weeks ago."

  "Was Joey Miller there every day?"

  "Is this why you came over?" I asked. "To question me?"

  He smiled. "It wasn't for the hospitality—or to see the rat."

  "Hey!" Maria said. "You're going to hurt Gracie's feelings."

  I was pretty sure Gracie was stone-cold deaf—her feelings were safe from his jibes.

  Kevin leveled me with a hard stare. "You never had an argument with Joey, did you?"

  "Nope, though I did kick him in the shins once after he grabbed my ass."

  "Me, too," Maria said, holding her apple core with two fingers.

  Kevin closed his eyes briefly, then opened them. "I can't say I blame him for trying. I mean, look at you two."

  Maria glanced at me. "I like him again."

  "But," Kevin continued, "after hearing the type of person he was, I am surprised that it's taken this long for someone to snuff him out."

  "Well," I said, "apparently someone reached the end of his or her tolerance with him."

  Kevin glanced at his watch. "I better go. I have some interviews to do." He stood and stretched. "Is it okay if Riley comes here tonight? I'll probably be pulling an all-nighter at the station."

  "No problem." I was practically giddy at the thought. I missed that boy something fierce. "Hey," I said as Kevin strode to the door.

  "Yeah?"

  "Do you know the coroner's investigator who showed up today?"

  "Which one?" he asked.

  "The hottie," Maria said.

  I frowned at her. "He's medium tall, dark hair, a little scruff..."

  "Sounds like the new guy, Cain Monahan." He narrowed his eyes. "Why do you want to know?"

  Cain Monahan. Not Seth Thiessen.

  "No reason," I said.

  "Are you interested in him?" Kevin asked. "As in interested in him?"