A Dead Husband (Jessica Huntington Desert Cities Mystery)

by Anna Burke

  “Well we don’t know that. The neighbor did say she had seen both the Prius and the BMW at the curb on other occasions. Do you remember anyone coming to the house in a car like that, Laura? One of Roger’s clients or a worker maybe? If not at the house, how about at his shop when it was still open?” Laura was shaking her head.

  “No, no, no. Another woman. Roger was seeing another woman, at our house!”

  “Hey, it happens,” Jessica muttered knowing all too well what Laura was going through.

  “Roger was a busy man, Friday night, Jessica. A lot was going on right under my nose, apparently. Not that I have any right to hold myself up as his virtuous wife.” Laura sat back in her chair, arms folded across her chest, and wretchedness on her face. Sara squirmed uncomfortably, watching her sister’s suffering.

  “I said I’d stay for pizza, Jessica, but I really should get home.” As Sara stood up to leave, the doorbell rang.

  Bernadette rushed to the front door. “Pizza’s here,” she said on her way to the door. “Come give me a hand, somebody.”

  The three of them followed Bernadette to the door, single-file, each of them absorbed in thought. A gust of hot air brought them all around. It had to be well into the triple digits out there. The hot air was followed by the aroma of pizza as Bernadette passed along boxes and bags, loading them up. The delivery guy had to make a second trip to his car to retrieve all the items Jessica had ordered. When he returned, a little sweat had broken out on his upper lip. A few minutes in that heat was all it took to make you thank your lucky stars for air conditioners, swimming pools, patio misters and all the other things that made it possible to live in the Sonoran desert year-round.

  Growing up in the desert, Jessica had never really minded the heat. Unlike true “desert rats” who hung out in Sky Valley or “the slabs” near Salton Sea, Jessica never had to endure it without all the creature comforts. “Yeah, but it’s dry heat” was the old adage that emblazoned a favorite Palm Springs tourist t-shirt, bearing faux singe marks. “Dry maybe, but still hot as hell,” she thought as she shut the door. Jessica still hadn’t readjusted after her extended sojourn in cooler climes. She couldn’t wait to block the sauna-like blasts of the evening “blow” that often kicks up as the sun sets and the desert cools.

  Once she had distributed the load along the queue of waiting hands, all Bernadette had to do was scrawl a signature on the receipt. That sent the overheated delivery guy scurrying back to the comfort of his air-conditioned car. As she began to shut the door a voice hollered out.

  “Hang on a sec. The Pacifico’s here.”

  Bernadette opened the door again and Brien stepped into the house hauling his case of Mexican beer. A few steps behind, Tommy and Jerry strode into the foyer. Their parade longer now, they all filed back into the kitchen and morning room, and readied their feast.

  “Won’t you stay for a little while, Sara? At least have a piece of pizza before you go,” Jessica asked.

  “Oh yeah, you gotta have a beer too,” Brien said holding up one of the cold beers he was stashing in the beverage fridge. Bernadette, who seemed to be everywhere at once, intercepted the bottle. She handed it, and a frosty beer glass pulled from the freezer, to Sara. The frosted Belgian beer glasses were overkill given the brew about to be poured into them, but “the colder the better,” Jessica thought.

  “Sara, please stay and have some pizza with me,” Laura implored putting an arm around her sister’s shoulders.

  “Okay, I’ll stay, but only a little longer. I feel guilty leaving Dave alone with the kids. I am hungry all of a sudden.” With that she opened the beer, poured most of it into the glass and took a big swig.

  “You can make it up to him by not going home empty-handed. Jessica ordered pizza for an army. Take a pizza when you leave,” Bernadette suggested, giving Sara a reassuring pat on the arm as she spoke. Not sure who liked what, Jessica had ordered way more than they could eat in one sitting. Nobody would go home empty-handed, not even with Brien at the table.

  CHAPTER 21

  When they were done feasting, the cat pack moved to the patio, turned on the misters and waited for the last rays of the summer sun to disappear. Sara had excused herself, going home loaded down with leftovers for Dave and the kids. Laura soon begged off, too, saying she was so stuffed she had to go lie down. The look on her face betrayed her. The distraction brought on by all the activity of the day had given way to the anguish of her circumstances. That included the new revelations about owing Sara and Dave money, and the possibility that Roger had another woman at her house Friday night.

  Jessica knew all too well what she was feeling. That moment when it all comes rushing in on you and you know nothing in your life is ever going to be the same. It was a blast of cold, harsh reality that could chill you to the bone even in the desert heat. Those blasts, that often hit you the first thing in the morning, could strike at any time and took their toll on you, body and soul.

  It would happen again when Jessica was back in her room, alone, staring at the divorce papers that had mysteriously reappeared on the beautiful Gatsby desk. She would have to ask Bernadette where she had found them this time. Why didn’t she sign them and get it over with? Maybe she should go have that talk with Father Martin. What would she say? Her husband’s a dirt bag. So, why did she marry him in the first place?

  “Earth-to-Jessica,” Tommy chided.

  “I’m sorry, what?”

  “Jerry was trying to tell us what he found out today. You have to come out of your pizza stupor long enough to hear it. I have news for you too,” Tommy added.

  “Sorry you guys, I’m ready to talk. I found out a few things today too,” Jessica said, stifling a yawn. Bernadette took that as her cue to head indoors to finish cleaning up. Jessica offered to help but she waved her off. Brien was snoozing on a chaise nearby, occasionally snorting the way he had done Saturday morning when Jessica woke to find him in her bed. That recollection still caused her some chagrin. Jessica pointedly forced her attention back to the present.

  “First things first,” Jerry began. “There’s nothing new from my search of the house today. I walked the grounds in case the police missed anything left by our intruder as he fled on Sunday. Nothing. Nothing new inside, either. Things you would expect thieves to take were still in place: electronics, jewelry, watches, china and silver were all still in the house. Some things were tossed around in the bedroom, but not elsewhere in the house. Did you show Laura the pictures you took of the office and bedroom, Jessica?”

  “Yeah I did. She said about the same thing. Nothing major was missing or out of place when she got home that night. No cupboards or drawers hanging open or anything obvious like that. Roger’s iPod was still on his desk where he kept it and you know we found his laptop there too. From the photos, it was obvious someone had gone through things in her bedroom. Her jewelry was dumped out on the dresser top, but the few good pieces she owns were all still there in that photo. She needs to do her own walkthrough to confirm what’s missing or damaged.”

  “I don’t think she should go in there until the cleanup folks have done their job, though. They’ll be in there tomorrow, right Tommy?” Jerry asked.

  “Yes, I told Laura about the service I found. They’ll bill her homeowners insurance directly. I’m going to let them in with the key you two have been using. A clean-up like this can usually be done in an afternoon. They’re going to show up at 8:00 a.m. so they have the whole day to work if they need it. I asked Laura if she wanted me to hang around but she doesn’t think that’s necessary. I’m going to grab her jewelry and a few other valuables while I’m there. I don’t figure they need me to supervise, so I’m going to get the cleanup crew situated in the morning, then I’ll run errands for Jerry.”

  “I already gave them the information to contact and bill the insurance company, so that’s all set. I’ll check back in around lunch time and again later if they need to continue to work in the afternoon. The crew leader said they c
an even take care of things like patching and painting the walls in the hallway and fixing the broken glass in the door leading from the bedroom to the patio. If it looks good, I’ll sign whatever they need me to sign so they can get paid. Then I’ll lock up the house before I leave. They’re just going to haul away anything that your closet creep tossed in Laura’s closet, keeping an inventory so Laura will have a record for insurance and tax purposes. The carpets in the master bedroom are trashed. They’ll do the best they can to clean them up, but Laura may have to have them replaced. Anyway, the crew is going to tackle cleanup of the mess from both crime scenes at once.”

  “Great work, Tommy,” Jessica said. She was impressed, maybe even a little surprised. It must have shown in her voice or on her face.

  “Hey, you don’t need to be that surprised, Jessica. I can be responsible if I want to be. My parents depend on me a lot. It does help to be motivated.” He flashed a shy grin in Jerry’s direction who returned it. “Wow,” she wondered, “could this be the real deal for the two of them?” It was way too soon to think like that. How did you ever know if it was the real deal, anyway?

  “I know that about you Tommy. I’m just not so sure you always do, though. Thanks for the good work.” Jessica smiled at him fondly. Tommy beamed.

  “But wait, there’s more. I’m not done yet and Jerry has more to tell you, too. Do you want me to talk about Eric-the-waiter next or do you want to fill Jessica in on your conversations with Laura’s neighbors?”

  “Why don’t you tell us what you’ve learned about Eric,” Jerry smiled at Tommy who looked like he was about to burst.

  “Well as you know, his name is Eric Warren. He’s 24 years old, lived all his life in the greater Los Angeles area, and graduated from Glendale High School five years ago. He was registered at Cal State Fullerton for about five minutes, actually registered for classes in the fall of 2009 then dropped them all. He’s had half a dozen different addresses in the past couple years, and at least that many jobs. Mostly he’s worked waiting tables, but did a stint at a photography studio at the Northridge Mall, worked a few months at the Pacific Theaters at the same mall, and at a Pinkberry’s dishing up yogurt to the masses. His last job was with a PF Chang’s in Sherman Oaks. I called his boss who said he was sick of being asked about the guy. I was the third person to call in the past month. As he had told the others who called, Eric was an okay employee who, like a lot of ‘jerk-off 20-somethings dropped in for a few months then moved on to greener pastures.’ Those are his words not mine. I asked him who else had called and he said the manager at Lulu’s and probably bill collectors, but he didn’t know for sure and didn’t care.”

  After taking a sip of beer, Tommy continued reporting from notes he had made on his laptop. “I called the phone number for the last place he lived in LA, an apartment in Sherman Oaks. He has a couple roommates who still live there and are trying to find someone to take his place since he left before his lease was up. He stiffed them for last month’s rent. They thought he headed out to the desert to hang with a cousin. They don’t know the cousin’s name. He promised to send them rent money once he got situated but so far nothing, no contact, no money since he left a few weeks ago. The roommate suggested I call his mom: Cathy Warren in Glendale. I did that but she was another dead end. She was even unhappier about being contacted about Eric than either the ex-boss or the roommate. Another ‘don’t know-don’t care’ person in our young mystery man’s life. According to her rant, he’s a good for nothing son who only calls her when he wants money or needs to get bailed out of jail. He has had a couple DUIs so I presume that’s what she was talking about. An ordinary, SoCal guy in his mid-twenties to me. It could have been me, before I cleaned up my act, although I only had one DUI.”

  “Sounds a lot like me, too, at that age. What a difference a few years makes, huh?” Jessica was astonished hearing that from Jerry.

  “What? Now you’re surprised about how irresponsible I can be? It’s not easy figuring out how to be a man, Jessica, especially a gay man.”

  “I hear you, Jerry.” Still, she found it hard to imagine Jerry as an irresponsible lost soul as a teen, much less as a young adult. Maybe it was harder than she thought growing up male, gay or straight. In college, Jessica and her women friends were convinced most of their male counterparts were matrimonially impaired. Until Jim’s escapade with the blond, Jessica had not thought he suffered from the same problems a lot of her friends encountered in men: commitment phobias, arrested development, allergic reactions to work and responsibility. He had been her only serious adult boyfriend and she had counted herself lucky to find her soul mate on the first try. She must have been an idiot, or maybe in too big a hurry to march down the aisle given the man Jim turned out to be.

  “What did you find about Joe Abernathy, Tommy?” The question from Jerry brought her back to the present.

  “Well he does work for Desert Lifestyles Realty, in their Palm Springs office on East Palm Canyon. He hasn’t been seen or heard from since Friday. Normally that’s no big deal. The broker he works with said they got a couple calls from realtors who drove in from the coast and were ticked off at Mr. Abernathy. Joe Abernathy had two houses that were supposed to be part of something they call a realtor caravan. That’s where realtors get a chance to look at new listings before the buyers do. Anyway, it’s not unheard of that someone would ditch such an event, given that it’s summer and all, but that was unusual for Joe Abernathy. The broker hasn’t been able to reach him by phone. I asked if there are any friends or family members I could call to track him down? He said nobody came to mind. The broker gave me Joe Abernathy’s home phone number and put me through to his voice mail at work. This morning I left a message asking him to contact me, but no luck so far.”

  “Thanks, Tommy that’s great work,” Jerry said. “I did another drive by at the apartment complex and didn’t fare any better. Do another round of calls to his apartment and office in the morning, and again at lunch time. If he’s still a no show I’m going to lean on the apartment manager to do a check. I’ll see if I can’t get her to meet me there in the afternoon to inspect the air conditioning or something like that. Maybe he and Eric Warren cleared out without telling anyone, or took off for an unplanned vacation. If we can get into the apartment we might be able to figure that out.”

  Tommy nodded and made a note on his laptop.

  “Let’s start with Laura’s neighbors,” Jerry said. I worked my way through most of the block. As you’d expect there was nobody home at a number of the places I tried. I did speak to several of them. Most were in the ‘see no evil, hear no evil, say no evil’ mode. A harried next door neighbor by the name of Caroline Carter, with kids hanging all over her, was more forthcoming. She presumed I was a bill collector and told me I was too late because the guy was dead. I assured her I wasn’t a bill collector but had been hired by the family to look into things for them. I asked if bill collectors had been to her door looking for Roger and she said yes, a couple times.” Jerry paused for a sip of water before going on.

  “I asked her how she knew Roger was dead. Besides the fact that the scene at the house Saturday morning was hard to miss, the police had stopped by. They asked if she had seen or heard anything going on at the house Friday night or early Saturday morning. She told me the same thing she told them. As a single mom she doesn’t have time to keep track of her neighbors. With all the noise her kids make she can barely hear herself think, much less hear anything going on outside the house. That’s especially true now when it’s so hot they keep the windows and doors shut and the air conditioner running.” He paused again, this time to look through the pages of his notepad.

  “She knew both Laura and Roger, and spoke to them if their paths crossed. They weren’t close and didn’t socialize. Laura and Roger never griped about the noise her kids made, like others did. As she said that, she looked across the street at the house in which Mrs. Gomez lives. I asked if she had seen cars parked in front of the hou
se Friday night and she said sure, but didn’t think much of it. She noticed the BMW that’s sort of her dream car. Ms. Carter claims it’s a dark blue Z4 roadster, with plates that said something about ‘fun’ but she couldn’t remember exactly what. A friend of mine at the Cat City police department, who’s working on the case, ran a check on vanity plates. So far no BMW roadster, with the word ‘fun’ on the plates, is registered to anyone in Riverside County. My friend will run similar checks on plates registered to folks in Orange County and Los Angeles County and in other counties if we don’t find something.” He looked up at Jessica, who gave him a thumbs up, as he continued.

  “Okay, so now for the gabby Mrs. Gomez. She gave me pretty much the same story you already read about in the police report. At first she thought Laura was heading into the house Friday night, then realized it wasn’t her. She didn’t actually see her get out of the Prius, but figured that’s where the woman came from before walking up to the front door. She never saw the woman leave but the BMW sports car was parked there later. She is a piece of work, I might add. She didn’t much scare who I was or why I was asking about her neighbors. It didn’t take much for tell me what she saw that night and all she thinks she knows about Laura and Roger.” Looking again at the notes in his little book Jerry went on.

  “And I quote: ‘Their marriage was on the rocks. I just knew something awful was going to happen.’ When I asked how she knew that, she said she had to call the police a while back to report a fight before someone got hurt. Twice, in fact, in the spring when she was walking the dog and heard the two of them yelling loudly. From what Laura told you, nothing much came of the calls, but there might be incident reports on file with the dispatcher or at the call center.”

  “Well we’ve cleared up the matter of the Prius. You saw it parked out front a little while ago.”