The bill for the evening came to a whopping two hundred and fourteen dollars without the tip. Hiram paid it without complaint. In cash.
As they walked out of the restaurant, her shoulder under Hiram’s arm to support him, the fog drifted in, all but obscuring the headlights of the cars on the road.
“You’d better drive.” He handed over the keys to the car. She took them, helped shovel Hiram into the passenger’s seat, and started the engine.
“Where to?”
“Let’s go to the reservoir and skinny dip. I think I’m owed something in return for that hefty dinner bill.”
Just what she did not want to do with him. She had no intention of getting naked with him for swimming or anything else. Besides, the water would either sober him up, or he would drown, and that would take a lot of explaining. And suddenly she knew she was in far deeper than she intended. She’d need help with Hiram.
“Nuh uh. How about we go back to my place?”
“Kaitlin home?” he asked.
“Yeah, but we can be quiet. She’s asleep. She’ll never hear us. Besides, I’ve got a twelve-year-old single malt scotch there.” She knew how to tempt him.
“Hit it, honey.”
Chapter 13
Mary Jane helped him out of the car and walked him down the driveway out to the patio beyond the lilac bushes surrounding the back of the house.
“Wait right here,” she said. She ran into the house and grabbed the scotch bottle and two glasses, not that she intended to drink, but to make it look like she was, and dashed back outside, being careful to muffle the sound of the back screen door closing behind her.
Hiram patted the settee as Mary Jane handed the glass of scotch to him. His head dipped to one side, and his eyes were slits in his face.
“So, Hiram, your car was parked in the back lot at ARC on Saturday night, late. Why? You a volunteer? Somehow I can’t really see you emptying bedpans or playing scrabble with the folks there.”
“Why’d ya think it was my car? Someone else’s. There’re a lot of those around. My doctor drives one, you know.”
“Baldo? No way.”
“Not Baldo. My other doctor. Why so interested in my car?”
“Because I think you hid there until Kaitlin showed, and then you hit her over the head.”
Hiram’s eyes widened for a brief moment. “Nah. This is a dumb conversation. Let’s get to it.” With that, Hiram plunked his glass on the end table and threw himself across the settee and onto her, placing one hand up her miniskirt, the other on her breast.
“Hiram! Get off me, you jerk.”
Before Hiram could reply, Mac’s form rushed from the bushes. In two strides, he crossed the patio, grabbed Hiram by the back of his collar, and pulled him off her.
“Get up!”
He propelled the drunk toward the driveway. Hiram may have been big, but Mac was no small man himself. He looked like a pit bull with a wharf rat in his jaws. And the night must be catching up with Hiram. She watched him slide into unconsciousness still held on his feet by Mac. Mac shook him, but Hiram hung limp in his arms.
“This doesn’t look like a day old pastry to me,” said Mac.
“I can explain,” said Mary Jane.
“I can hardly wait, but for now we need to get him home. I’ll drive him, but you’ll have to follow in my car.”
Mary Jane agreed. It was one thing to explain her behavior to Mac, she could manage that, but she knew Kaitlin would see her night with Hiram as interference and might ask her to leave the house. And the last thing anyone needed was for the neighbors to wake up to that racy car in the driveway and have a hung-over Hiram Blackman wending his way down the sidewalk or urinating in the neighbor’s petunias first thing in the morning.
She did as Mac suggested; Mac piloted Hiram’s car with Hiram passed out in the passenger’s seat while she followed in the blue Buick. When they arrived at Hiram’s, Mary Jane watched Mac carry him into the house. The door was locked, so Mac simply bashed it in with his foot. Standing in the open doorway with Hiram over his shoulder, he flipped on the overhead light in the living room. Through the lighted window, she saw Mac dump Hiram on the couch and toss his keys on a nearby table. Mac slammed the door on his way out, but the wind caught it, and it swung freely on its hinges.
She pointed out the open door to Mac, but he seemed unconcerned.
“I doubt anyone would consider breaking into that dump, and if they did, there’s nothing worth taking, aside from the car. Well, that’s his problem, not mine.”
Mary Jane slid over, and Mac drove the Buick back to Kaitlin’s.
“Now get some sleep.”
“Don’t you want to know why I was out with Hiram?”
“Insanity?”
“No. His car was at ARC the night Kaitlin was attacked. Residents there say he visits Toliver now and then, but, that night, I think he was the one responsible for hitting Kaitlin. I don’t understand why. And I don’t get him as a volunteer at ARC. He doesn’t seem to me to be the charitable type. Odd, don’t’ you think?”
“Yeah, but even odder that you’d want to date him.”
“It wasn’t a date. It was a…” she paused, “a fact-finding mission. You believe me, right?”
Mac leaned against the door on the driver’s side, his eyes boring into hers. Please let him believe me.
“From what I’ve seen of you, you’re just kooky enough to think you could get information out of a grizzly bear. What is it with you? You think you have nine lives, like a cat maybe?”
She smiled. Maybe I do.
“So?” She leaned across the seat and looked up into his eyes, her own rounded like an innocent child’s. She had him. She could tell by the way he leaned ever so slightly toward her.
“I believe you, but you’re on probation. No more detective missions. Let me do the sleuthing work.”
“Or yeah, like Hiram would tell you anything.”
“What did you find out?” he asked.
Her shoulders slumped in an attitude of defeat. “Nothing. He likes booze more than he likes girls, I guess.”
Mac laughed and reached out to touch her hair. “I don’t,” he said.
* * *
Kaitlin thought she heard someone downstairs, but by the time she rousted herself out of bed and tiptoed down the stairs, she found the house empty. The lights were off and the door locked.
Back upstairs, she looked in on Jeremy. He’d thrown off his blanket and sheets and slept with his body curled around Hester’s. She pulled the sheet over him and tucked the blanket around him and the cat. Neither moved.
She fell back asleep within minutes and was settling into a dream about Zack and her at the beach in Coney Island last summer, when the doorbell rang. Her clock said it was three in the morning. She considered ignoring it, but she heard Mac shout through the front door.
“You’ve got visitors.”
She threw on an old robe and headed down the stairs. At the bottom, she flipped on the porch light and looked through the window to see Mac there. Beside him stood Lily and Paul.
“Come on in. What’s going on here?”
“Lily came to my apartment several minutes ago and said she had to come see you. She wouldn’t say why, but she was pretty worked up. So I called a cab, and here we are,” Paul said.
Lily, in a bathrobe not much younger than Kaitlin’s ratty blue one, gazed up into her eyes, drawing her brows together in a look of consternation. Kaitlin guided her into the living room and settled her on the couch.
“You wanted to talk with me?”
“Yep. It’s important. I know it’s important, but now I forget why. Darn this old head of mine. It’s like a sieve. Won’t hold stuff for longer than a minute or so.”
“Well, you just sit here for a minute and relax. I’ll make us all a cup of tea,” Kaitlin said. Mary Jane appeared at the top of the stairs, clad in a multicolored silk dressing gown.
“Anything I can do?” she asked.
“I’d rather have a shot of bourbon,” said Lily. “How ’bout you, Paul?”
Paul seemed about to demur for the both of them, but Lily held up her hand.
“Might help me remember.” There was a sly look on her face.
Kaitlin grabbed Mary Jane’s arm and dashed for the kitchen.
“Look for the booze. I’ll get glasses.”
“I know where it is,” said Mary Jane. She handed Kaitlin the bottle.
Kaitlin grabbed glasses and hurried back into the living room.
By now Jeremy was in the living room.
“Dessie?” asked Jeremy. Hope and worry worked for dominance in his voice.
“I don’t think so, honey,” said Mary Jane. “Why don’t you go on back to bed?”
“’Kay,” he said. In that one word hope died.
Kaitlin poured Jack Daniels for Mac, Paul, and Lily, and lifted her eyebrow in a question at Mary Jane, who shook her head no.
“Everybody know each other?” Kaitlin asked. They all nodded yes.
“You not a drinking woman?” asked Lily. Kaitlin shook her head no. Lily seemed disappointed.
She downed the shot in one gulp and held her glass out for another. Kaitlin looked at Paul, who shrugged his shoulders.
“Might as well,” he said. “And I’ll have a little more, too.”
Mac nursed his drink.
Lily finished her second drink, then sat back on the couch, and closed her eyes. Soon her breathing became deep and regular.
“I guess that’s about it.” Paul jostled her shoulder to wake her. “Lily, let’s go home now.”
“Where am I?” Lily came awake with a start.
“At Kaitlin’s. You wanted to come here, remember?”
“Of course I don’t remember. I have Alzheimer’s or something. And I’m old and a little drunk. Who tried to get me drunk? I need to be home in bed, not out running around at this hour of the morning.”
Paul and Lily stood, and he took her arm to help her to the door.
“Well, lookee here.” Lily pulled a sheaf of papers out of her robe pocket and handed them to Kaitlin. “These must be yours.”
Kaitlin was about to deny she owned them when she noticed the top line of the document—“Last Will and Testament of…” Kaitlin couldn’t read the rest, but she didn’t need to.
It was Leda’s will.
Chapter 14
Jeremy awoke the next morning early. The sun just topped the low trees at the edge of the yard, and he needed to be out and on his way. He was determined to find Desdemona even if he had to ride around all day. What he feared most of all was that she would return to her old home, wander next door and get herself into trouble when the resident of the house came home drunk as he usually did. One more stumble over Desdemona on his front porch or his kitchen floor, and she would surely find herself taking a stock truck downstate to the rendering works.
Jeremy told his mom where he was going, grabbed his baseball cap, and hopped on his bike. He headed out to Desdemona’s old house, but his pig wasn’t there. Discouraged, he pedaled back toward town and thought about where he should look. Desdemona sure liked people, and they liked her. Maybe she’d head up the hill to ARC where there were plenty of people to fuss over her and a slew of other animals to play with. Besides, in the short time Jeremy and his mother had been in the village, he had made a lot of friends at ARC who would help him find her, not just the residents but also some staff and a lot of the high school and college interns. He especially liked Bethany, a senior in high school.
He pulled his bike up at the rear of the facility. What luck! Bethany sat at the picnic table beneath the oak tree. She looked as if she were crying. He hesitated, but she glanced up and saw him. A small smile formed on her lips, and she signaled Jeremy over to the table.
“Hi! What’s up?” She wiped her face with a tissue she extracted from her pocket.
“Desdemona, my pig, ran off. I thought maybe she might have come here.”
“Oh, I’m sorry, Jeremy. No, I haven’t seen her, but I’ll ask around if you’d like.”
“That’d be great.”
Jeremy waited a minute, hands behind his back, toeing the grass at his feet. Bethany began crying again.
“You seem awfully sad,” Jeremy said.
“I have a secret that could get a lot of people in trouble if I tell it to anyone, but, if I don’t, a lot of other people could get hurt, hurt bad,” she said.
“I’d tell someone.”
“You’re right. I did try to tell someone, but I’m scared to say anything more. I don’t know what to do.” Bethany lowered her head and began twisting the tissue in her hands.
Jeremy thought hard about this one. It sure wasn’t easy to be a grown-up and be expected to make decisions in a smart way. He didn’t know the answer to Bethany’s problem.
“Maybe my mom or Kaitlin could help. They’re both real smart.”
“I don’t think so,” she said. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have told you this. I have to go in now. I’ll ask about your pig.” Bethany sprang off the picnic bench and ran in the door of ARC.
Now Jeremy was sad about Desdemona and Bethany.
* * *
Kaitlin turned off the ringer on her bedroom phone and her alarm and slept in, exhausted from the events of the night before. Late in the morning, she could hear someone, either Mac or Mary Jane, rattling around in the kitchen. She hopped in the shower to wake up, then threw on her usual tee-shirt and jeans.
Mac and she had discussed it the night before. She’d have to see the police again. Contact with the authorities was occurring much too often for her taste, but Mac convinced her to show them the will. She could see the suspicion on Officer Hendricks’ face already.
She trudged down the stairs with the weight of the village upon her shoulders.
“Coffee, fresh, in the pot.”
“Thanks, Mac. Thoughtful of you. Where’s Mary Jane this morning?”
“She and Jeremy left to search again for Dessie. I’m babysitting you for now.”
“Great,” she said. She tried for a small smile.
“Someone called earlier this morning, your roommate from college days?”
“Oh, damn. I forgot. I’m supposed to go visit her in the city this coming week. I don’t have the time.”
“Writing filling your every waking moment?” Mac asked.
Kaitlin scrutinized his face, looking for signs of sarcasm there. It was hard to read an old cop, she realized.
“Just asking,” he said. “If it were me, and I’m just speculating here because I know squat about writing, I’d think a few days without a blank screen and a cursor pulsating nothing, blink, nothing, blink, might be a break in the routine, get your creative juices flowing.”
“Your girlfriend thought writing the column and volunteering at ARC would get those juices flowing. I’ll bet you’re both wrong.”
“Or you could visit your mother. Mary Jane told me she was here the other day. Said she’s an interesting woman.”
“Interesting, yes. Therapeutic, no.”
Kaitlin tapped her fingers on the table and looked over at the counter where the papers Lily delivered last night still lay.
“Mac.”
“Hmmm?”
“I think we should take a look at that will before we turn it over to the authorities, just in case.”
“In case of what? Besides, it’s none of our business.”
“Aren’t you just a little curious? Tell you what. We just kind of skim it.”
“I’ve got a bad feeling about this whole thing.”
Kaitlin tipped her head to one side and tried to bat her eyelashes at him, a look she knew she was bad at.
“Don’t do that,” he said. “It makes me worry a sand
storm is coming up.”
She continued to bat.
“Will you stop that if I agree to look at the damn thing?”
She stopped flapping her lids, grabbed the papers off the counter and opened them.
The document surprised her. Leda left her entire estate to someone by the name of Caroline Adams, identified in the will as Leda’s daughter. Daughter? Leda and her husband had no children, and, as far as Kaitlin knew, Leda married only once.
“This is exciting. Leda had a daughter that no one knew about. I wonder who Caroline’s father is? And I wonder where we can find Caroline?”
“What do you mean we? We aren’t going to find anyone,” said Mac.
“But we have to. If there’s something funny about Leda’s death, and her will somehow figures in all of this, then Caroline may be in danger. What if nephew Will was involved in Leda’s death or in what’s happening at ARC? He’d sure want to keep his inheritance. And everyone knows he needs the money to pay off his gambling debts.”
“You know how you hate the rumors going around about your role in Leda’s death? Well, I think everyone does not know Will needs money because he’s in debt to the wrong people.”
But finding out about Caroline’s existence made her want to jump around the kitchen with excitement.
“So, now the police will try to find Caroline?” Her joy turned to concern. She shared it with Mac. “This whole thing could be kind of messy, especially if Will has spent his inheritance.”
“It’s only been a few weeks. Estates aren’t settled that fast.”
“Let’s find her ourselves.” Her urge to dance returned. “You’ve got contacts all over the country from your detective days. You could locate her.”
“I could, but it’s not my job. It’s work for the authorities.”
“Yeah, but they could take forever, and I think Caroline needs to be protected just in case Will doesn’t take well to her inheriting the estate instead of him.”
“I don’t see Will as the dangerous type, and he’d be a fool to do anything to Caroline.” Mac paused and began another line of reasoning. “However, if he owes money to his bookie, the bookie’s friends may take matters into their own hands and make Will the only living relative.”
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