Scrapbook of Murder

by Lois Winston

  “Mrs. Pollack, this is Virginia Owens.”

  Although the business card I had handed her the day before contained both my office and cell numbers, I was surprised to hear from her so soon. “Have you thought of something else you’d like to add to the interview, Mrs. Owens?”

  “No, but after you left yesterday, I realized that if I didn’t sort through those boxes of photographs now, I’d probably never get to them. I immediately began sorting through several of the oldest ones, choosing and labeling snapshots I’d like included in albums. I’ve set aside enough for at least two or three albums at this point.”

  “That must have taken quite some time.”

  “It did. I stayed up half the night.”

  She said this as though it were my fault she missed her beauty sleep. “You must be exhausted this morning.”

  “I am, but that’s neither here nor there. I’d like to drop the photos off so you can get started on the albums. I want them finished by the time my husband and I return for Christmas.”

  “Christmas? That’s only a month away.”

  “Which should give you ample time to assemble two or three albums.”

  I wanted to remind her I wasn’t one of her servants, but I clamped my tongue firmly between my teeth. After all, thanks to Dead Louse of a Spouse, I was in no position to turn away any freelance jobs, especially from someone as rich as Virginia Owens.

  “I plan to take the remaining boxes with me when we jet down to our winter home in a few days,” she continued. “I’ll give you those photos for the other albums when you deliver the first set.”

  “We haven’t discussed the scope of the project or my fee,” I reminded her. “How many albums do you have in mind?

  “As many as it takes to include all the photos I decide to give you.”

  “I see, and do you want scrapbooks of the actual snapshots, or do you want me to scan the photos to create printed albums for you?”

  What do you mean by printed albums?”

  I quickly explained the process. “A huge benefit is once the album is designed, you can order as many copies as you’d like from the company that produces them.”

  “Why would I want more than one copy?”

  “To give to other family members. I’m currently working on one for the daughter of a neighbor who recently died. She discovered a suitcase of old family photos while cleaning out her mother’s home and wants albums made for each of her children.”

  “I see. All right. I’ll think about it. We can discuss the details when I drop off the first group of photos.”

  “You want to come here?” I could just imagine the look on her face when she pulled up to the curb of my mid-century tract rancher in desperate need of a fresh coat of paint, not to mention what she’d say once she stepped inside. Original linoleum covered my kitchen and bathroom floors. My countertops were metal-edged Formica. Mid-century modern might be on-trend right now, but my home wasn’t trendy. It was simply worn-out.

  Once upon a time, back when I thought I was living the American dream, Karl and I had discussed renovating. Somewhere I even had wood, tile, and granite swatches I’d picked up one day. “I’m not exactly around the corner from you,” I said. “I live half an hour away.”

  “That’s not a problem. When would be a good time to meet without us being disturbed?”

  “Any time this morning works for me.”

  “Your address?”

  I rattled off my address. “Perfect. I’ll see you in about an hour.”

  Shortly after I tossed the sheets into the wash, I received a text from Zack: Heading out to run some errands. Wait lunch for me.

  I responded with a thumbs-up emoji.

  ~*~

  My doorbell rang just as I finished vacuuming a week’s worth of dog hair from the living room and dining room carpets. My dream of hardwoods throughout the house having died with Karl, I was stuck with wall-to-wall gold shag installed by the former owners back in the seventies.

  I glanced out the window to find a black Mercedes SUV parked at the curb and Virginia Owens standing at my front door. Unseen, I watched her for a few seconds as she scrutinized my peeling paint. Her expression was exactly as I’d imagined it would be. I couldn’t wait to see what she thought of my home’s interior.

  I walked over to the foyer, swung open the door, and invited her inside. “How quaint,” she said, her gaze darting around as I directed her into the living room and offered her a seat on the sofa.

  “Thank you but I’ll remain standing for now,” she said. “I’m a bit stiff from sitting in the car.”

  She wore a mid-length black mink coat and carried a large gray quilted leather Prada tote that coordinated with her ankle boots. She carried no box or large envelope stuffed with photographs. “I thought you were bringing photos.”

  She patted her Prada. “I have them in here.”

  I glanced at the tote, barely large enough to hold an oversized envelope, let alone enough snapshots for two or three albums. Perhaps she only wanted one photo displayed on each page. I’d get paid for my time no matter how many or how few pictures filled the album. I gave myself a brain shrug, then asked, “May I take your coat?”

  “Thank you, no. I’ll keep it on for now.”

  Maintaining my hostess persona, I asked, “Would you like something to drink?”

  “Let’s drink together friendly and embrace. King Henry the Fourth, Part Two. Act Four, Scene Two.”

  Virginia jumped. “Who was that? I thought you said you were alone.”

  “That’s just Ralph. He’s an African Grey parrot I inherited from my great-aunt.”

  She eyed me skeptically. “A parrot that quotes Shakespeare?”

  “My aunt was a Shakespearean scholar.”

  Her eyes darted around the room as she clenched the strap of her bag, her knuckles turning white. “Where is he?”

  “Don’t worry. He’s in his cage.” I avoided mentioning that Ralph knew how to pick the lock.

  She relaxed slightly. “I’m not fond of animals.”

  Could have fooled me. “So…” I clapped my hands together and steered the conversation away from Ralph. “Would you like a cup of tea? Coffee?”

  “Tea, please.” She followed me into the kitchen.

  I removed a box of teabags from a cabinet and showed it to her. “We’re not big tea drinkers. Is this satisfactory?”

  Her nose wrinkled. “I suppose it will have to do.”

  I grabbed a mug, filled it with water, and placed it in the microwave to heat. When I turned around, Virginia Owens was pointing a gun at me.

  NINETEEN

  At first my brain refused to function. I stared at the gun, then at the woman brandishing it. Although this wasn’t the first time someone had pointed a gun at me, I’d never get used to it. However, with the exception of a couple of psycho lovers, the previous threats on my life had come from the Mafia and hired hit men, not mink-clad socialites. I couldn’t wrap my head around Virginia Owens wanting to harm me. Was I dealing with another psycho?

  “How about if you put the gun away before someone gets hurt?” I said. “We can discuss whatever is bothering you without a weapon.”

  She laughed. “I don’t think so.”

  At that moment Mephisto, who had been cowering under Lucille’s bed while I ran the vacuum, paddled into the kitchen, took one look at Virginia, and began to growl. She waved the gun wildly in his direction. “Get that dog out of here, or I’ll shoot him.”

  “There’s no need to shoot. Where would you like me to put him?”

  “I don’t care. Lock him up somewhere. I hate dogs.”

  Mephisto’s growl grew deeper. The feeling was obviously mutual. His sudden appearance and Virginia’s reaction to him gave me an idea. If I let Mephisto out the back door, Zack would see him when he arrived home and know something was wrong. We never let Mephisto loose in the backyard. He’d invariably eat something he shouldn’t, then barf it up once he came back into t
he house.

  I raised my hands up, palms out. “Okay, I’m going to kneel down and grab his collar. I’ll put him outside, all right?”

  “Just do it. And don’t get any ideas.”

  I ushered Mephisto toward the mudroom. Virginia followed, her gun pressing firmly into the center of my back.

  “I’m going to open the back door now,” I said.

  “Not all the way. Only enough for the mutt to squeeze through. Then shut it.”

  I did as she directed.

  “Now lock it.”

  I flipped the deadbolt. No matter. Zack had a key.

  “Slowly turn around and walk back into the kitchen.”

  “Why are you doing this?” I asked as I retraced my steps. Once back in the kitchen I positioned myself in such a way that her back faced the window. I didn’t want her to see Zack when he arrived home. Hopefully she wouldn’t hear his car pulling into the driveway. “What have I ever done to you?”

  “You stuck your nose where it didn’t belong. Now I have to clean up another mess.”

  Was she doing this to protect her husband? Was he the rapist, not the football player who had died? Or were both boys responsible? And how the heck did she find out my true motive for arranging the interviews?

  One thing I did know: I couldn’t disarm Virginia Owens on my own. My only chance of getting out of this alive was to keep her talking until Zack returned, which I hoped was sooner rather than later because right now I didn’t know how much of a later I had left. “I don’t understand.”

  “Don’t play dumb with me.”

  “I’m not. Honestly, I have no idea why you’re holding me at gunpoint. I never met you before yesterday. I don’t know anything about you other than what you yourself told me during the interview.” Which wasn’t much. At times I wondered which one of us was conducting that interview.

  “Is that so?”

  Wasn’t it? I studied the woman holding my life in her hands. “Who are you?”

  “Someone who got cheated out of her rightful place on the cheerleading squad, thanks to your friend.”

  Cheerleading squad? “You must have me confused with someone else. Besides, aren’t you a little old for cheerleading?”

  “I wasn’t back in high school. There was one opening for a freshman. That spot was rightfully mine before the cheerleading coach decided we needed to be welcoming to the immigrant and chose Elena over me.”

  Suddenly the puzzle pieces all dropped into place. “And you decided to get even?”

  “Damn right, I did.”

  “You set up Elena and Carmen. You’re the football player’s sister who invited them to the party.”

  “Carmen was merely collateral damage. I had nothing against her.”

  Talk about cold and heartless! “You drugged them, didn’t you?”

  “My brother came up with the idea and provided the drugs. After Elena and Carmen passed out, we had the other boys help carry them down to the rec room to sleep it off.”

  “Except someone went back downstairs and raped Elena and Carmen.”

  “Elena got what she deserved. She stole from me; my brother stole from her. Quid pro quo.”

  “Were the other boys involved in the rape?”

  She shook her head. “They were too busy getting stoned upstairs to know what was going on downstairs.”

  “Carmen wound up pregnant.”

  Virginia shrugged. “That’s on Elena, not me. She’s the one who insisted on bringing Carmen to the party.”

  “Your brother died not long afterwards, didn’t he?”

  “That’s on Elena, too.”

  “How so?”

  “He developed a conscience all of a sudden.” She said this with a sneer that suggested having a conscience was a bad thing.

  “He died of an accidental overdose, didn’t he?”

  “Not so accidental.”

  “He committed suicide?”

  “That would have been preferable. He was going to admit what we’d done. I couldn’t let him do that. He’d ruin my life.”

  My jaw dropped as I processed Virginia’s words. “You murdered your brother?”

  “I had no choice. In hindsight I should have just given Elena a lethal dose, but then she wouldn’t have suffered, and I wanted her to suffer for what she’d taken from me.”

  When she shrugged to show her lack of remorse, I knew I was dealing with a psychopath. “How did you find out I was investigating what had happened to Elena and Carmen?”

  “I didn’t know until you showed up at my house. You shocked the hell out of me when I saw you.”

  “That bit about not having eaten breakfast, that was all an act?”

  “I have a talent for thinking on my feet. I recognized you from the coffee shop. You and that other woman, Carmen’s daughter, were sitting with Elena at the table behind me. At first I didn’t recognize Elena. I hadn’t seen her in decades. Then she started telling you what had happened the night of the party. I knew from Carmen’s daughter’s reaction that she was going to be trouble. When the two of you left, I followed you.”

  This all seemed a bit too coincidental. “Cranford is a long way from Bedminster. What were you doing there?”

  “I had dropped my mother off at the convent. She spent Thanksgiving with us. I stopped for a cup of coffee before heading home.”

  “Your mother’s a nun?”

  “She blamed herself for my brother’s death and began spending all her time in church. When my father died from a heart attack a few years later, she decided to dedicate her life to God instead of me. Something else I can blame on Elena. She took my mother from me.”

  It seemed to me Virginia was the one responsible for all that had happened in her family, but I wasn’t about to challenge her cause-and-effect rationalization while she pointed a gun at me.

  Where the heck was Zack?

  “Carmen’s daughter is lying in a coma in the hospital. Are you responsible for that?”

  “I hired someone to follow her. When I learned she’d gone to the school and discovered the names of the football players, I had to keep her from contacting my husband. It cost me a fortune.”

  “He killed one woman and seriously injured two others.”

  “He botched the job. He killed the wrong woman. I’m going to have to do something about that if she ever wakes up.”

  “You won’t get away with this,” I told her.

  “I already have. For fifty years. I’m not going to let a few loose ends get in my way now.”

  “I have security cameras. The police will look at the footage and see you entering my home.”

  She laughed. “I wasn’t born yesterday. You expect me to believe a dump like this has security cameras?”

  “Laugh all you want, but you’ll be laughing behind bars. There’s a camera pointed at my front door and another pointed at the street in front of my house. My body will still be warm when you’re arrested for my murder.”

  Virginia hesitated for a split second before recovering and saying, “You’re bluffing.”

  “Am I? Is that a chance you’re willing to take?”

  “Prove it.” She grabbed my arm and dragged me from the kitchen toward the front door. “Open the door, and show me the cameras.”

  As we approached the foyer, out of the corner of my eye I spied Ralph flying through the house, making a beeline—or in this case, a parrot-line—directly toward the fur-draped Virginia. He swooped onto Virginia’s sleeve and yanked a beak full of mink from the coat.

  Virginia let loose a bloodcurdling scream, released her grip on me, and flayed her arms wildly. Having gotten what he wanted, Ralph flew off and perched on a lampshade in the living room. Virginia pointed the gun at Ralph, then at me, then back toward Ralph, all the while continuing to scream incoherently.

  “Get that…that thing out of here,” she finally yelled at me, waving the gun. Ralph took flight. Virginia fired off a round as he headed our way. The bullet took out my lamp. As Ra
lph flew over us, another bullet whizzed past my ear. Ralph headed down the hallway toward the bedrooms. Virginia’s next shot pierced the wall.

  I had to stop her before one of those bullets wound up in me. As she pivoted away from me to fire off another round down the hallway, I hurled myself at her back. I outweighed her by at least thirty pounds, and she went down with a thud, another bullet flying from the gun as she hit the floor. But cushioned by her fur coat, the force of the tackle didn’t even knock the wind out of her, and worse yet, she maintained a fierce grip on the gun.

  For a sixty-five-year-old Size Four, Virginia Owens was surprisingly strong. She probably spent her days working out with a personal trainer named Sven. I grabbed for her wrists, wrapping my fingers around them, fighting to keep the gun pointed away from me, as we rolled around on the floor.

  She kicked at me with little success. Her mink coat encumbered her and cushioned any blows she managed to land. However, the coat didn’t hamper her teeth as she sank them into my arm directly above my wrist, drawing blood. With my other arm I tried to elbow her in the jaw while still maintaining my grip on her wrists, but she only clenched down harder. I swear she struck bone. Excruciating pain radiated up my arm. Black spots danced before my eyes.

  And then I saw a man’s foot stamp down hard on Virginia’s wrist, the one connected to the hand that held the gun. She screamed so loudly in my ear I went deaf for a moment. The next thing I knew Zack had Virginia pinned to the floor, his knee on her back, her gun firmly in his hand and pointed at her head.

  “Get off me!” she screamed.

  “Not a chance, lady.”

  She twisted her neck until she could get a look at Zack. Realizing who had restrained her, her jaw dropped. “You! What the hell are you doing here?”

  “He lives here,” I said.