Maggie and the Inconvenient Corpse

by Barbara Cool Lee

Lauren shrugged. "I'm not a cop or anything. People often make that mistake when I say I work for the police. I'm a records clerk, which means I'm basically a secretary, filing and answering phones."

  "But I bet you hear all the gossip about the cases," Maggie said in a deliberately uninterested tone.

  Lauren gave her a sideways glance. "I can't talk about anything confidential," she said. "But if it's public information…."

  "About Michael McJasper…?"

  "Your ex-husband," Lauren said. "I figured that's why you were fishing." She held up a gold-plated magnet clasp. "I can't decide if I want silver or gold color metal with these pearls."

  Maggie handed her a different clasp. "This one has silver, gold, and copper tones mixed together."

  Lauren took it. "You're not a suspect," she said. "If you were worrying about that."

  "I know that," Maggie replied. "I have an alibi. Lieutenant Ibarra told me I'm in the clear. But have the police checked everyone else's alibis, or are they just looking at Virginia?"

  "This clasp is pretty, but it doesn't have any sparkle." Lauren put it back. "That's not confidential. The alibis, I mean. I can tell you anything our esteemed Chief Randall had me type up into a press release, even if it wasn't mentioned on the news." She said Randall's name with contempt. Lauren clearly saw the police chief as an opportunist, just like Maggie did. She added, "Virginia Foley made bail, but you don't have to worry. They've got her dead to rights, and they aren't really looking at anyone else."

  "How about this one?" Maggie handed her a clasp with rhinestones around the barrel.

  Lauren ran her fingers over the rhinestones. "Do the crystals come in any color other than clear?"

  "That's the only color we have in stock, but we can order it in pink, gold, or red." Maggie paused, then added, "so everyone has alibis for the time of murder except Virginia?"

  Lauren put down the glittery clasp and picked up a plain hammered silver one. "Too rustic." She set that one down with a shake of her head. "Your alibi checked out. The delivery driver was with you from 5:45 to nearly 6:30, according to the GPS tracker on his delivery app."

  "Yeah. We talked about tiny houses for longer than I realized, I guess. So what about the others?" Maggie asked.

  "The movie star next door was at a restaurant with his date. It's not like anyone could miss seeing the two of them. They don't exactly fly under the radar."

  "What exactly was the time of death?" Maggie asked casually, handing Lauren a silver-plated clasp with a pearl button."

  "Around six o'clock. They estimate you found the body at 6:30, based on the time of the phone calls to the doctor and police. Virginia Foley says she was upstairs taking a bath at the time of the murder, but that sounds phony. No one was downstairs then. The housekeeper was on the grocery store's security camera at that time, buying potatoes and cabbages."

  Maggie took a quick breath, and Lauren gave her a sudden glance.

  "She was going to make him colcannon," Maggie whispered. "Potatoes and cabbage. It's one of his favorites with roast beef. Sorry. I don't know why that makes me cry. I didn't even like him."

  Lauren smiled. "It's natural. And I think it's natural to want to know why something so tragic happened to someone you once loved." There was something about the way she said it that made Maggie wonder if she was speaking from personal experience, but she quickly changed the subject. "No. This one won't do. I want something to contrast with the pearls."

  "How about bronze?" Maggie asked. "I know you were looking at the bright silvery ones, but this would give it a rich, dark look against the light pearls."

  Lauren held it in her hand. "That's not what I thought I wanted. But it's really pretty." She held up the pearls in her other hand, close to the clasp.

  "Who was Virginia talking to on the phone when I got there?" Maggie asked.

  Lauren shook her head. "No way to know. It was a burner cell. And of course she lawyered up and isn't talking. I like this clasp better, but I'm still not sure."

  "So Reese and his date, Mrs. Queen, and me," Maggie said thoughtfully. "We're all eliminated as suspects because we were with other people around 6:00 PM. Anyone else out of the running?"

  "Let me see." She thought about it a bit. "Mrs. Queen's son was with his girlfriend. The neighbors on the other side of the house don't have an alibi. I think that's everybody."

  "The diplomat who lives next door to Mac's house?" Maggie asked. "He probably has diplomatic immunity. He's also over seventy years old. Do the police really suspect him?"

  "No. They're sure it's Virginia Foley. But they're checking everyone's alibis just to be thorough."

  "Got it. So other than the ruler of a small country and Mac's fiancé, is there anyone else?" Brooke's name wasn't on the police radar. This was good. Her friend was in the clear. Maggie started to relax.

  "Oh, yeah. The other wife. She doesn't have an alibi. I'll take this one."

  "Nora?" Maggie asked, her voice sounding strangled at the sudden shock. "Nora McJasper?"

  "Yes," Lauren said indifferently. "She's the one. She apparently doesn't have any proof of where she was at the time of the murder. She said she was working alone at home."

  Maggie stood there.

  Lauren cleared her throat, and Maggie looked at her. "I'll take the bronze clasp."

  "Oh," Maggie said. "Okay. I'll ring that right up."

  By the time the door closed behind Lauren, Maggie was on the phone to Nora. "Senior, please tell me you're not holding anything back on me…."

  Chapter 16

  When Maggie came outside the next morning, Pool Boy Ned's white truck was parked sideways in the driveway, parallel to Reese's car, and it stuck out into the narrow street, making cars slow down to get past.

  She'd had a terrible night. Her two best friends were both way too close to the murder of Big Mac. Brooke had the kind of motive the police would love to hear about, and Nora had no alibi, though when Maggie had talked to her, she swore she had no motive to kill their mutual ex-husband.

  Between worrying about that, and the dog's constant pacing, she was exhausted. And then she'd gotten a notification from the parking app that the driveway was booked today, only to find Reese rudely ignoring her texts telling him to move his car.

  She marched over to Casablanca and went in without knocking. She was fed up. She was tired, broke, scared about the fallout from Big Mac's murder, and just about ready to scream.

  It didn't help that she found Reese out in the yard, lying on his pool float, looking like the very stereotype of a movie star. He was rich and handsome and relaxed, and didn't have a worry in the world. It just made her more mad.

  Pool Boy Ned was finishing up the cleaning, and he flashed her a quick glance when she came into the yard.

  "Aren't you supposed to come on Tuesday?" she asked, and he nodded.

  "I had to change the schedule because of—" he paused. "—next door."

  "Oh," she said softly. "Okay. I guess it's fine then." She didn't get why that meant he had to come to her house twice in one week, but as long as he didn't bill her extra, it was okay.

  She watched him finish up the job. Ned was in his late twenties, with a muscular physique. He was showing it off today in super-tight white shorts and a skimpy red tank top. A less professional outfit than what he usually wore, but the day was hot, so she wasn't going to harass him about it.

  Some people would find him good looking, but she didn't, since she wasn't a fan of tattoos. Oh, one or two discreet ones never bothered her, but this guy never met a patch of skin he couldn't slap some ink on, and it just turned her off. He had abstract tribal symbols running down his legs, a wolf on his chest that peeked out above his tank top's neckline, and, when he turned around, the sheer fabric of his shorts showed the outline of a dolphin on one cheek and a cheshire cat on the other. She didn't even want to think about where else he might be sporting ink.

  Not that it mattered what she thought of his appearance. Ned had probably never ev
en noticed what she looked like. On the contrary, he was eyeing Reese with over-the-top admiration, to the point he seemed distracted from his job.

  Reese was lying back on his pool float in the middle of the freshly cleaned pool. He was wearing nothing but very brief swim trunks and his mirrored shades. He was reading, or trying to.

  Ned kept staring, then looking away every time Reese glanced his way.

  Reese studiously ignored him until he finally took off his sunglasses and stared back at the man. "Do you mind?" he said coldly.

  "Sorry," Ned said sheepishly. "I didn't mean anything by it."

  Reese shrugged. "I'm off duty right now, okay? You can ogle me on-screen as much as you like. But let me read my book in peace."

  Ned blushed as red as his shirt, then packed up the rest of his stuff quickly and headed out to his truck. When he passed Maggie he said quietly, "how is anyone supposed to not look?"

  "I know," she said. "But be a professional about it, all right?"

  He shrugged and left.

  She went out to sit on one of the deck chairs by the pool. Seeing Ned had gotten her thinking. She'd never really noticed him before. He was just part of the scenery. Invisible.

  "Don't lecture me, Maggie," Reese said from his spot in the middle of the pool.

  "Lecture you?" she asked, lost in thought. She pulled out her phone and looked up the Pool Boy Ned business profile on a review site. His first review after he took over the pool cleaning business had been last year, around the time Mac and Maggie had started spending so much time in Carita. Interesting.

  "That dude has been flirting with me all morning like he just discovered men last week," Reese said. "It was the longest pool cleaning in history. I had to tell him three times to knock it off."

  "I'm sorry," she said, putting the phone down. "It was a bit over the top. But he's been our pool maintenance guy for the past year and we've never had any problems before. He's always been very professional. I only knew he was gay because Big Mac told me not to bother flirting with him because he batted for the other team." She added, "I never even thought of cheating on Mac. Not once."

  "Not even with me," Reese said with a smile. "Believe me, I noticed."

  "Not even with you, Charm Boy. But Mac just had to find a way to accuse me, anyway. And now that I know Mac was cheating all the time he was accusing me…." She let it drift off. It no longer mattered.

  "Your husband was a real piece of work," Reese said.

  "Don't speak ill of the dead," she replied automatically. "Just make nice with Ned, okay? I'm probably going to have to fire him if I can't make ends meet. Cut him some slack."

  "All right." He shrugged those gorgeous shoulders. "Honestly, I don't mind one pass. One time. But no means no."

  She smiled. "Remember that when I avert my gaze, okay?"

  He smiled back. "Fair enough." Then he paddled his float over closer to her side of the pool. "So what's bothering you, other than your finances?"

  "I just had an idea…," she said tentatively. "It's probably crazy…." Then she stopped, and stared off at the ocean. Maybe she had been looking in the wrong place all along.

  Reese jumped out of the float, holding his book aloft to keep it dry. He waded over to the pool stairs and got out.

  She averted her gaze and he laughed. "Let me get my bathrobe."

  He grabbed it from one of the deck chairs and put it on, then sat down in the chair next to her and wrapped the robe around his knees. "What were you starting to say?"

  She turned back to him. "This is going to sound crazy, but I just wondered…."

  "Yes?"

  "I just looked up Pool Boy Ned. He bought out the local pool cleaning business and started working The Row about a year ago. Around the time Mac and I started hanging out here a lot. And I never paid much attention to his personal life before."

  "Why would you pay attention to the personal life of the guy who cleans your pool, Maggie?"

  She pursed her lips together, then blurted out, "did you ever hear any rumors about Big Mac?"

  "What kind of rumors?"

  "Gay rumors. Are you sure there were never any gay rumors about Mac?"

  "You would know, Maggie. He was your husband. Why?"

  "I'm still trying to figure this out. The murder, I mean. This whole theory of Virginia killing Mac before marrying him just doesn't make sense. Either she truly loved him, which means she wouldn't bash him in the head. Or she was after his money, which means she wouldn't bash him in the head."

  "But who else could have done it?" he asked.

  Maggie thought of Nora, and Brooke, and all the other people who weren't exactly sad to see Mac dead. But she knew it couldn't be anyone she liked. It just couldn't be. "Have you ever thought about the idea that—" She stopped.

  "Give it to me," he said.

  "It would be tidy if Mac had an affair with Pool Boy Ned and then Ned killed him in a lover's quarrel," she blurted out quickly.

  He laughed. "Tidy and neat. And it would conveniently avoid implicating someone you feel sorry for, like Virginia."

  "So maybe it's true?" she asked. "Did you ever hear any rumors about Big Mac's, um, personal proclivities?"

  "Only that he messed around with his secretaries."

  She grimaced, and he mumbled, "sorry, Maggie."

  "You don't have to be sorry for telling the truth," she said. "But I hate being reminded of my own stupidity."

  "You weren't stupid. Just naïve."

  "No," she said. "I was stupid. He was married when I met him. I should have realized. If he'd cheat on Nora with me, he'd cheat on me with Virginia."

  "Among others," Reese muttered.

  "Yeah," she said. "I'm sure there were plenty of others."

  Then she gave him a questioning look. His mirrored sunglasses reflected the blue of the pool and sky when he shook his head.

  Then he pushed the glasses down on his nose to peer at her. "Nope. None of them were men."

  "It just seemed to fit so conveniently," she muttered. "Ned has been around all this time, but I never paid any attention to him. He could have had access. It just seemed like it would be a neat fit to the crime."

  He took off the glasses and twirled them in his fingers. "Tidy and neat," he repeated. "But wrong. Sorry, Maggie. I hate to break it to you, but your husband was totally straight."

  "You sure?"

  He raised one eyebrow, if possible looking even more handsome in the process. "I've known Big Mac most of my life. I used to be reasonably good looking."

  She laughed out loud. "Understatement of the year."

  "Yeah. I'm pretty cute. Modest, too," he added with a smirk. "So if Big Mac was interested in men, don't you think he would have hit on me at least once in the last twenty years?" Then he grinned maliciously. "I mean, don't you think I'm better looking than Virginia? What's she got that I haven't got? Except the obvious, of course."

  She laughed. "You are so arrogant."

  "The word is honest. Brutally honest, Maggie."

  Maggie sighed. "You're right. Brutally honest, but right. So much for that theory."

  He got up and headed into the house, and she followed. "So is that what's got you so worked up this morning?" he asked. "You seem tense."

  "Oh, yeah," she said. "I forgot I was mad at you."

  Chapter 17

  "Mad about what?" He went into the kitchen and she followed.

  He got out his orange juice and filled a glass, gesturing to her.

  She waved her hand, and he put the bottle away in the fridge. Then he took a sip from his glass. "So what's the problem today?"

  "You need to move your car."

  "Right. I forgot all about that."

  "I got a text from the app. The parking spot is reserved all day today. They could show up anytime, and I don't want to have to refund their money."

  He just stood there, drinking his juice and looking placidly at her.

  "We're going to get this settled once and for all," she
said, his lack of response making her mad all over again. "You are going to move that car or I'm having it towed."

  "Nope," he said. He stood there, calmly sipping his orange juice.

  "What do you mean, nope?"

  He handed her his orange juice glass and walked away.

  He didn't say a word. She could hear him climbing the stairs to the second floor.

  She stood there, fuming, holding the glass, wondering whether she should follow him upstairs to the master bedroom to yell at him. How dare he just ignore her like that?

  She heard him coming back.

  He took the glass back. "Thank you," he said mildly, and had another sip of juice.

  She stood at the kitchen island, arms crossed, tapping her foot, ready to have it out with him. He was so disrespectful. So arrogant. So—

  He set a stack of papers on the island in front of her.

  "What are those?"

  He just stood there, no expression at all on his face.

  She picked up the papers and rifled through them. "Receipts? You reserved my driveway on the parking app?" She rifled some more. "How many reservations did you make?"

  "I dunno. How many days are there until the summer's over?"

  "That's like…." She trailed off. "That's like, almost three months."

  "Yeah. That was a pain, by the way. You should rent your parking space by the month instead of by the day. I could have just clicked it a couple of times and been done with it. I had to make about seventy reservations to book the whole rest of the summer."

  "It must have taken you hours."

  "I sat in the pool with my phone and sent receipts to the printer in the upstairs office. Got a good tan while I did it." He winked.

  "Um," she said, trying to think of what to say.

  "What?" He grinned at her.

  "You seriously went on the app and made seventy individual parking reservations just so you wouldn't have to move your car all summer?"

  "I told you, it's easier to park sideways."

  "You're insane."

  "I'm rich." He shrugged. "Same thing, basically."

  "Don't remind me."

  "Okay. But now we don't have to talk about it anymore." He finished his juice and set the glass in the sink.