by Carol Schaal
“They took stuff from the Tomlinsons’ bathroom cabinets and other things from the kitchen,” Justin told me. “Tami said they were cagey about what exactly they wanted, and they haven’t told her yet what killed Dennis.
“Still, she can have the funeral soon. I guess they already got all the evidence they needed.”
We looked at each other, that gruesome thought casting a pall on the conversation. Then Justin brightened.
“Did you hear? An anonymous donor paid to have a bloodmobile park in the emergency clinic lot tomorrow. People can show up, give a blood sample, and it will be sent to a nearby facility to be tested right away and see if anyone is a good match to donate bone marrow to Evie. Promising news, right? Kylie is so excited. The word is going out by social media.
“Kylie doesn’t know who funded it and no one is letting on, but it is a wonderful gift.”
“That sounds like fun, like a vampire party,” I said, glad for some happier news. “I’ll be sure to stop by. Kylie is amazing, and I hope this all works out. If Evie couldn’t get the help she needs, it would just kill Kylie …” my bad choice of words stopped me.
“I know,” Justin said, “we’re all tiptoeing around the fact of these two deaths. Even Frank isn’t making stupid jokes like his usual self.”
I hesitated, then decided to go ahead and ask what was probably on everyone’s mind. “Does anyone really think either Tami or D.J. could have killed Dennis? I know he was difficult, but I can’t wrap my brain around the idea.”
“Guy was always a jerk to Tami,” Justin said, “but, hell, if she killed him it wouldn’t be by poison. He’d say something at the wrong time and she’d just pick up something heavy and bash his stupid brains in.”
He stopped, looking a bit shocked at his own words.
“I think you’re right,” I said. “If someone were going to poison Dennis, the most likely suspect would be D.J. Chemistry is his thing.”
It was my turn to be appalled by my words. “Forget I said that. It’s not fair to talk about people like this when they’re not here to defend themselves.” My own experience should have kept me from saying such terrible things about a person I liked.
Justin, however, had moved on to other suspects. “What about Bernice? If someone said Sarah was arrested, no one would be shocked, ’cause the Dragon Lady wouldn’t give her the shop.” He straightened one of the pieces of art. “I gotta say, though, it still would feel like the police had the wrong person. Trying to picture all these people I’ve known all these years as murderers is more than I can swallow.”
He turned and gave me an unreadable look, and I felt a chill. I was the new person in town. Was that what he was thinking? I forced myself to brush off the concern. If I thought everyone was looking at me with suspicion, just like the nasty whispers I had suffered in Florida, I wouldn’t be able to get out of bed in the morning.
16
Wednesday dawned clear and crisp, and I dressed up a bit, adding a denim jacket to my black jeans. When I walked up the three steps of the bloodmobile, I almost turned around and left once I saw the interior of the traveling medical facility. The hard-edged, cold furnishings were no doubt needed to keep the place sterile, but it all took me back to childhood visits to the doctor, when those good-for-you shots hurt, and a cherry-flavored sucker couldn’t ease the distress of a nurse sticking a needle in my arm.
“Don’t be such a baby,” I could hear Aunt Raelynn saying. “It’s okay when you’re a kid, but really, Vic, you are an adult. And when it’s done you can treat yourself to an ice cream sundae.” The thought of her laughter and hug, assuring me that everyone hated shots but ice cream offered a fine treatment for the experience, convinced me not to back out of the bloodmobile. I could even envision the mocha fudge delight that awaited.
“Lauren! So good of you to come!” Kylie, resplendent in a bright red sweater, gave me a quick hug and ushered me farther into the van. She swept her arms around the bloodmobile. “Isn’t this great? The cost of all the blood tests is already paid. But no one will tell me who paid for this. It’s making me crazy. I need to thank whoever it is.” Her glee was almost contagious.
She pointed at a free chair. “Have a seat there, a tech will go over the paperwork with you.” She glanced at her phone. “If you have time, let’s grab lunch at that coffee shop down the block. Frank might join us, he’s supposed to be here soon. Lots to tell you. And I am so excited!”
She turned to greet another visitor to the van while I settled uneasily into the gray chair, trying to ignore the smell of disinfectant permeating the bloodmobile.
“Hi, I’m AnnMarie,” said a young woman as she walked up to the chair. She handed me a pamphlet and ran through the list of conditions that would make me ineligible to join the bone marrow registry. I already knew about all of them and had passed, lucky me, but maybe, I reminded myself, lucky Evie, too, if I were a match.
Another young woman, the phlebotomist, took AnnMarie’s place. The blood stick was done in a few minutes, making me feel embarrassed at my initial hesitancy.
Kylie came by, followed by Frank, who was also wearing a red sweater. Apparently, someone forgot to tell me the proper dress code for a blood draw. “We do know how to party, don’t we?” he said, then turned as AnnMarie began her list of questions.
Kylie escorted me to the van exit. “Why don’t you go on to the restaurant? Frank and I can join you in a bit.”
The restaurant, small and homey with its mismatched chairs, specialized in vegetarian entrées, Kylie’s dietary choice, and I scanned the menu while waiting for her and Frank to arrive. When they walked in, the woman who had run through the list of questions at the bloodmobile was with them. I puzzled over why she looked familiar.
“I hope it’s okay if I join you, Kylie thought I might be able to answer some questions she had. And she thought the two of you might like to hear, too” the young woman said as she took a seat. Then she smiled at me. “I’m guessing you don’t know who I am. I was the medic who was there last week when you found Bernice. Probably not a night you want to remember.”
Of course. The woman with the bun who had kept an eye on me, probably watching for signs of shock. Her hair was pulled into a loose ponytail today, soothing the severe look the tight bun had given her.
“Yes, of course,” I said. “Detective Maccini had most of my attention that night, but I do remember you.”
The waitress came by to get our orders, and when she left, Kylie was practically bouncing in her chair. “AnnMarie was one of the medics who took Dennis to the hospital Thursday night, and she has an idea of what made him collapse and eventually killed him.”
Frank looked intrigued but AnnMarie looked hesitant, and I saw Kylie give her an imploring look. “I’m only doing this because you’re my friend,” she told Kylie, then she looked at Frank and me. “You have to promise me you won’t ever tell anyone you got this from me.” After all of us nodded, AnnMarie glanced around the restaurant, checking for eavesdroppers, but our section was relatively empty, yet another sign of the slower current of Alleton life in winter.
“Okay, when we brought Dennis in, he was close to cardiac arrest. He had an irregular heartbeat. And I had to hang around and write up a report, so I heard the doctors talking about how his wife had told them Dennis was on diuretics for high blood pressure. They wondered if maybe he had ingested too much potassium.”
The only thing I knew about potassium was that it was in bananas, and Kylie looked just as clueless as me, but Frank tilted his head. “Doesn’t that have something to do with kidney disease? I know my uncle must keep track of it. Has to eat more of it or can’t eat too much of it, not sure which.”
“Dennis didn’t have kidney disease, far as I know,” AnnMarie said. She answered our puzzled looks with a grimace. “Let me put it this way. I’m sure Dennis had been warned about the dangers of too much potassium, so he wouldn’t have knowingly consumed too much of anything like bananas or some fruit juices. A
major overdose might kill him.”
“Potassium can kill people?” I said. “Unbelievable.”
“But he didn’t die last Thursday,” Frank pointed out. “He was in the hospital and they told Tami he was getting better and then they call early Monday and say he’s dying. I don’t understand.”
“It’s tricky,” AnnMarie said. “But if his heart was already weakened, it might finally have given out. Or maybe the doctors didn’t figure out until too late what the problem was. I might be able to find out on my next run to the hospital, but right now I don’t know what happened.”
“Or maybe,” Frank said, “that’s what the cops were hunting for when they searched Tami’s house and store. Maybe they thought Tami or D.J. somehow deliberately gave him potassium.”
“Oh, come on,” Kylie said. “What, they were looking for bananas?”
17
My visits seeking volunteers for the bone marrow drive over the past few days revealed that robust tourists were continuing their winter wonderland activities in the area, snowshoeing or cross-country skiing at the nearby state park or hiking along the beach. Other visitors contented themselves with less rigorous activities, sampling what the area’s wineries and breweries had to offer, dining at their favorite farm-to-table restaurants, treating themselves to a massage, or enjoying a romantic getaway at one of the many B&Bs.
Those who decided to do some shopping were normally a welcome sight to the Alleton merchants who remained open in January, but on this Thursday those customers had no idea that all hell had broken loose in the quaint coastal village.
The police department’s official finding that Dennis was the victim of a homicide made everyone edgy. A few shopkeepers told me they were wary of the people coming through their doors, wondering if the customer could be a mad serial killer. Most of the retailers, however, thought the evil might be closer to home. They were the ones who shut their doors an hour ahead of their posted closing time, scurrying to their cars before the early winter darkness descended on the back alleyways.
Kylie had invited Frank, Justin, and me to her place for breakfast on Thursday so she could update the list of those who had been contacted about the need for a bone marrow donor and give us all a few more names. Frank and Justin had their part-time salesclerk cover their art gallery, so both could attend.
“I have some major news,” Kylie said when she called earlier that morning to remind me of the meeting. “You are not going to believe this.” She wouldn’t divulge the news, however, no matter how hard I pressed.
I’d never been to Kylie’s place before. The small cottage was on the same lot as her sister and brother-in-law’s house. Christie and Tom owned a stunning mansion that sat at the end of a curvy driveway. Large windows overlooked the front yard, and the two-story home shouted architectural elegance and a high yearly income. That made sense because Christie and Tom worked for a major financial firm, both probably putting in long hours.
If Christie and Tom’s house was impressive on a grand scale, Kylie’s cottage had me drooling with envy. As I walked up the gravel path and through a small wooded area, I considered how different it was from Sarah’s situation. Sarah had her own upstairs area in her mother’s house, and she had made it her own, but she still had to use the downstairs kitchen and the privacy factor was nil. Kylie, on the other hand, had a separate house with a charming river view, and guests could enter the way I had, walking around Tom and Christie’s abode, or take a smaller, separate driveway that led to the side of her cottage. The woods effectively hid her house from any prying eyes. And Kylie could take the path to Christie and Tom’s place, where a side door allowed her easy entry.
I stumbled when I heard Kylie shout, “Come on in,” my attention more on the view than the door to her cottage.
Once inside, I gave Kylie my coat and waved at Evie, who was standing nearby, holding a pet robotic talking hamster. She gave me one of her shy smiles. As I now understood after talking to Frank and Justin, Kylie had been pressed into service again to watch over her niece while Evie’s parents were at work. A day care center wouldn’t accept Evie, Kylie had told me once, because she needed special foods and close supervision, so she didn’t overwork her frail body. I had never once heard Kylie complain about it, even though I knew it cut into her own work.
If Sarah had gone with a country look to suit the farmhouse, Kylie went with vintage midcentury furniture, the same era as the clothes she favored. Today she was bedecked in a pink and white striped 1940s apron over a plain white T-shirt and black leggings. She handed me a Bloody Mary, and I stirred the colorful concoction, which matched the splashes of red she had used as an accent color, with a celery stick. It was only 9 a.m., to my mind a bit early for a drink, but given the bad news that had cast a pall over the previous week I was happy to enter the festive scene Kylie seemed determined to provide. Like the rest of us, she was probably ready to move from the disheartening time, at least for one morning.
Frank stood up from a retro pink and red chair and clinked his glass with mine. “Major jealous of that apron,” he said in greeting, waving in Kylie’s direction. “I am sooo boring today.” His cream-colored wool fisherman’s sweater looked good on him, and I told him so.
“Enough with the fashion commentary,” said Justin, looking cool as always in his black-and-white striped shirt, black scarf and skinny jeans. “We have mysterious doings. Frank and I have been here for 10 minutes and can’t get Kylie to tell us the big news.”
“Big news,” said Evie, who was standing by my side, and her robo-hamster immediately echoed, “Big news.”
Evie tugged on my jeans and pointed at a small circular track set up nearby. When she set her robotic toy on the track, it ran down one side then hopped onto a wheel and began running, getting his “exercise.”
“That’s good, Evie,” Kylie told her. “But I must run a meeting now, so why don’t you give your buddy a nap and color at your desk?” Evie nodded and toddled to a child-sized desk a few feet from the main area’s conversation grouping.
“That’s one happy kid,” Frank observed. “And what would make this kid happy is a bite of your spinach quiche.” He treated himself to a slice of the quiche and grabbed a seat at a mid-century Lucite and glass table.
Kylie, Justin, and I also served ourselves a portion of the quiche and joined Frank at the table, while Evie munched on a celery stick and continued coloring.
“Out with it,” Justin said, tapping Kylie’s hand with the handle of his fork. “Frank told me about your meeting with AnnMarie, now I’m thinking you have an update. Spill!”
“I called this meeting to talk about the bone marrow drive,” Kylie said, trying to sound put-upon. “And I wish I had more news about that. Sadly, no match for Evie yet, and whoever funded the bloodmobile is keeping quiet. But if you must, I’ll skip updates on that important topic and proceed to what you seem to find more pressing than Evie and her concerns.”
Justin and Frank both groaned, and I leaned over and did my best impression of a petulant child. “You’re not the boss of us,” I said, sticking out my lower lip.
Kylie laughed. “Okay, guess I can’t keep you waiting any longer. But first,” her tone turned serious, “when she called last night, AnnMarie made me promise to swear you all to secrecy again. I’m not sure that’s necessary. The word is all over the hospital, she told me, and no one could pin the leak on her. None of you will squeal on her, right?”
The three of us nodded solemnly, as if we were adolescents, swearing not to tell which one of us had filched their dad’s beer.
“Good,” Kylie said, “now here’s the bit that will blow your minds. Like AnnMarie told us at lunch, Dennis did die of an overdose of potassium.”
“You’re about to go all scientific on us, aren’t you?” Frank said. “I did my best but don’t think I did a good job explaining all this to Justin.”
“I’ll keep that part simple,” Kylie promised, “and even so, that’s not the part th
at will blow you away. AnnMarie said the doctors found a major amount of potassium in Dennis’s body, which is what made him collapse at the wake. And it’s the reason they couldn’t save him. His heart was just too weak.
“But here,” and Kylie looked slowly at each of us, deliberately building the suspense, “is the kicker.” We all leaned in. “Dennis drove straight from his usual monthly blood test to the wake. Results of that test were normal, no excess potassium present. Which means he had to get that extra potassium at the gathering.”
She ended her report with a flourish. “And that means everyone who was there is a suspect.”
She looked at each of us, and it seemed as if she might be expecting applause. The three of us could only stare. Frank was the first one to recover. “You can’t be serious,” he said.
Justin narrowed his eyes. “Are we all going to need lawyers? Does this mean the police are going to inspect our shop and apartment, like they did Tami’s place?” He shot an unreadable look at Kylie, who simply shrugged her shoulders. “I don’t like this at all. What the hell is happening in our beautiful town?”
“I know what’s happening,” Frank said, running a hand over his bald head, “One of our friends is killing people.”
Unnoticed by us, Evie had walked up to the table, the robotic hamster cradled in her arms. “Killing people,” she said. “Killing people,” the robo-hamster repeated.
-
18
We each left Kylie’s with updated lists of people to contact for the bone marrow drive. After the shock of her announcement, she switched to the reason she had called the meeting in the first place. I had more B&B owners on my list, as well as a few shop owners who hadn’t been available during my first round of visits.
As I drove from one bed and breakfast to another, almost always accepting an invitation to share a cup of coffee or tea and partake of one of the establishment’s signature goodies, from molasses brownies to lemon squares to spiced apple cake, my sugar high was counterbalanced by my mental low.
