by Kylie Logan
“Like me working too much.”
“And me devoting all my free times to the dogs.”
“And then there’s your family, of course.”
Seeing her spine straighten and her fingers tighten over the fork she held in one hand, Nick made a face. “You are pretty devoted to them.”
“That’s how families are supposed to be with each other.”
“Yeah, I get that. I guess.” She couldn’t blame him for being confused. Nick’s family consisted of just his mother, Kim, an alcoholic with rotten social skills and a talent for ripping out her only child’s heart and stomping on it every chance she got. “I think sometimes it’s hard for me to understand all that warm and fuzzy stuff.”
“How is Kim?” she asked, and she could have spoken the answer along with him, because it was the one she always got when she asked.
“Fine.”
“And how are you with handling Kim?”
He lifted one shoulder. “Same as always. She won’t listen to advice. She refuses to go to rehab. She keeps reminding me that she’s an adult.”
“Then I hope you’re telling her to start acting like one.”
His smile was soft. “She’s not going to listen.”
She reached across the table long enough to squeeze his hand. “None of it is your fault.”
“No, but it is my problem.”
“Not if you just walk away.”
“Like you’d do that if it was someone in your family?”
It was his turn to bristle, and she couldn’t blame him. “I know you’d never do that,” she jumped in and told him. “You’re too kind a person.”
“Or maybe I just always want to be in charge of everything and everyone.” As if he could so easily get rid of the problem that was Kim, he jiggled his shoulders. “Speaking of which…”
Nick slathered his roast beef sandwich with horseradish and mustard. “Skeleton?”
“Yeah, Bernadette Quinn.” Jazz pushed her fork through her salad. As long as she had the attention of an expert, she figured it didn’t hurt to ask. “It is her, isn’t it?”
“Sure looks that way.” Nick took a bite of his sandwich and chewed. “Skeleton’s the right size, right age. Her hyoid bone…” Nick pointed to a spot on his neck under his chin. “It was fractured. She was strangled. I hear Lindsey hasn’t had any luck tracking down dental records so far, so that’s not going to help with final identification, but there’s DNA, of course. For now, we’re going with what we know. Or at least what we’re pretty sure of.”
“It’s her, all right,” Jazz told him. “The clothes, the cross. Still, it just seems … I don’t know … wrong.”
“Wrong that it’s her?”
“Wrong that she’s dead. That her skeleton has been up in the attic all those years and no one knew. Why would anyone want to kill Bernadette?”
“I’m sure that’s what Gary Lindsey’s asking himself.”
“And if it was you, what would you be asking yourself?”
He took another bite of his sandwich, chewed, considered. “Enemies?”
“None we knew about, and though she was admired for her teaching skills, she didn’t really have fans, either. She was odd. And she was seen around school with a man.” Jazz filled him in on the details she’d learned from Marilyn Massey.
This time when he bit and chewed, he raised his eyebrows, too, waiting for her to tell him more.
“There really isn’t any more. We don’t know who the man is, but if I see him around again I’ll let you know. The only other thing about Bernadette … well, she was really holy.”
“That’s a good thing at a Catholic school, isn’t it?”
Jazz thought about what Eileen had said. The truth but not the whole truth. She understood Eileen’s reasoning. If the media got ahold of the entire story, they’d make a mockery of Bernadette, and of St. Catherine’s, too. She couldn’t let that happen.
“You won’t tell?” she asked Nick.
He didn’t have to think about it. “If it affects the case—”
“It doesn’t. But if the press gets hold of the details, it could get ugly.”
“If it points to any suspects—”
“Definitely not.”
He gave her that old, familiar smile. “Spill the beans!”
Jazz took a bite of chicken, added a bit more dressing. “She … Bernadette…” She pulled in a breath and let it out slowly. “She said she talked to angels.”
Nick wiped mustard off his mouth, then pursed his lips. “Isn’t that what prayer is? Talking to God? Talking to saints and angels?”
“Well, yeah. Except Bernadette believed the angels talked back.”
He wasn’t expecting this, and for a minute Nick simply stared at her. At least until he found his voice. “To her?”
“I know, I know!” She set down her fork, the better to put out both her hands, palms toward him as if to signal that he needed to stay quiet, to hear the rest of the story. “It sounds crazy.”
“Amen to that!”
“It is crazy. She was crazy. Nick, it’s not something Eileen wants the world to know.”
“Because she doesn’t want the blowback. Yeah, I get that. It’s bad enough the remains were found in the school; if the public knew this teacher was some sort of nutcase—”
“Exactly.”
He took another bite of his sandwich, and while he was at it, he poked a finger at her salad, urging her to eat, and for a few minutes they concentrated on their food.
Finally, Nick took a drink of tea and sat back. “What did they tell her?”
“Who?”
“The angels, of course. What did the angels tell Bernadette?”
“You don’t really believe that stuff about how they talked to her, do you?”
“Ah, see, that’s the whole point.” A satisfied smile lighting his face, Nick opened the bag of potato chips that came with his sandwich and offered the bag to Jazz. He knew her well. She was a sucker for potato chips.
Jazz grabbed a handful of chips and pushed the bag across the table at him, and after Nick chomped on a couple he leaned his elbows on the table.
“If Bernadette made up the fact that the angels were talking to her, then what they told her was really just the workings of Bernadette’s mind, and that’s interesting in one way,” he said. “But if the angels really were talking to her—”
“Nick, are you listening to yourself?” Jazz actually might have laughed if they weren’t discussing something so weird. If there wasn’t a murder involved. “How could angels talk to her? Why would they?”
He wrinkled his nose. “Why wouldn’t they? Don’t Catholics believe in miracles?”
“Bernadette did,” Jazz admitted, and in spite of the warmth of the sun, she felt the icy pain of remembrance, of telling Bernadette that Titus the cat had really never been cured, that he was dead. “I guess in her world, it was perfectly normal to expect to hear from angels. The rest of us … well, it’s not like everyone in school knew about it, thank goodness, but Eileen and I did.”
“And Eileen…?”
“Offered her the name of a good therapist and told Bernadette not to say anything to anyone. We couldn’t let people think we had a crazy teacher!”
“Could someone have found out?”
“And killed Bernadette because of it? Why? They were jealous that Bernadette was hearing from angels and they weren’t? They were afraid Bernadette would talk about it too loud, too long, that people would hear, the news would spread?”
“There had to be some reason.”
“Maybe, but—” Jazz was about to stab a dried cranberry with the tine of her fork and she shot Nick a look. “You’re thinking about Eileen. You’re thinking that if she was afraid Bernadette was going to embarrass the school—”
“Was she?”
“Yes, of course she was. We both were. We still are. If word of this gets out … It’s not the Middle Ages, Nick. People aren’t going to flock t
o St. Catherine’s on pilgrimage. They’re going to talk psychosis. And personality disorders. They’re going to question Eileen’s judgment and say that Bernadette never should have been allowed through the front door of St. Catherine’s.”
“Do you think that’s true?”
Jazz shook her head. “We didn’t know about it. Not when she was hired. She never said a word. But then, that’s not exactly something you just start talking about with people you hardly know, is it? Early in the semester, she said something to me about angels, but heck, I thought it was just a figure of speech. It wasn’t until about the middle of the term that she mentioned it again. That she told me they were talking to her.”
“And you told Eileen.”
“Of course I did. Bernadette was a teacher; she was responsible for our students. If there was something wrong with her—”
“Was there?”
Jazz felt as helpless as she did the day she’d informed Eileen of what Bernadette told her and Eileen asked her the same question. “I’m not a psychiatrist. I don’t know.”
“And that’s when you two—you and Eileen—decided to keep things under wraps.”
Jazz wasn’t cold, but she wrapped herself in a hug. “You make it sound like a cover-up.”
“Was it?”
She drew in a long breath and let it out slowly. “I told you, Eileen told Bernadette she wanted her to get counseling.”
“And she wanted her to keep quiet. So did you.”
“That doesn’t mean I killed Bernadette!” When Jazz realized how loudly she’d spoken, she cringed and looked around. Except for two people sitting nearby who stopped their conversation and gave her funny looks, no one else there seemed to notice. She lowered her voice. “That doesn’t mean I killed Bernadette. And it doesn’t mean Eileen did, either.”
“I hear she’s the only one who has a key to the room where the skeleton was found.”
Suddenly Jazz wasn’t so hungry anymore. She pushed her plate away. “That doesn’t mean anything, either.”
“No, it probably doesn’t. But I guarantee you it’s what Lindsey’s thinking.”
“Then his thinking’s as bad as his fashion sense.”
Nick laughed. “The man’s just doing his job. He’s got to follow where the facts lead him.”
“Then we’ve got to find the right facts.”
“Oh, no! Don’t even think about doing that again.” He might have gotten away with the warning if he didn’t add a finger wag. One little gesture and Jazz’s anger shot through the roof.
She kept her voice calm, innocent. “Doing what?”
“Investigating.”
“I was never investigating. Last time, all I did was ask some questions.”
“Yeah, and it could have gotten you killed.”
“But it didn’t, did it?” She pushed back her chair. “I’m not going to sit back and watch Eileen get railroaded.”
“And I’m not going to, either. Look…” Nick stood when Jazz did. “I’ll see what I can find out, okay? I’ll ask around. I’ll talk to Lindsey and see what he knows and what he’s thinking.”
She looked up into his eyes. “Really?”
“But only if you promise to stay out of it.”
She had no choice but to agree. That, or lose his support.
It was a good thing he grabbed her right hand and held it when they crossed the street and headed back toward Jazz’s house.
That way, he never knew the fingers of her left hand were crossed.
CHAPTER 8
It was Monday morning, and Jazz had just opened her desk and pulled out the grim painting she’d found hung outside Bernadette’s classroom on Friday when Sarah Carrington sashayed into the office. That day she was decked out in black pants, a black T-shirt, and a filmy kimono top in shades of pink and blue and an earthy green that matched the stripe of color in her blond hair. She plopped into Jazz’s guest chair and blew an errant curl out of her eyes.
“What do you think?” she asked Jazz.
“About…?”
“About how today is going to go, of course. Friday went too well. The girls were…” As if she could snatch the right word out of the air, Sarah fluttered her hands. “They were calm. Accepting. Almost as if they knew Bernadette was dead and it was no big deal.”
In an attempt to get rid of the chill that crawled along her skin, Jazz rubbed her hands up and down her arms. “Don’t say that. They were stunned, that’s all. They were shocked. We all were.”
“And now they’ve had all weekend to think about it.”
“It’s going to be a long day.” Jazz said what they both were thinking. “There will be counselors available all week for the girls.” She darted a look at Sarah. “And for the teachers, too.”
Sarah didn’t miss the subtle inference. “How about for the staff?”
Jazz dropped into the chair behind her desk. “I don’t need counseling. I need answers.”
“You mean, who killed her?”
“And why. Maybe that’s what we all need. Maybe that’s the only way things will get back to normal around here. We can’t act like nothing happened. We can’t pretend life just goes on. That wouldn’t be fair. To the girls or to Bernadette.”
“Bernadette.” When Sarah shook her head, her pink beaded earrings swayed. “Doesn’t it figure she’d be the one to go and get herself killed here at school?” As if she expected Jazz to lecture her, she instantly added, “You know what I’m talking about, Jazz. She was…”
“Strange?”
If only Sarah knew!
Jazz tucked away the thought. This was not the time for gossip. And Sarah was certainly not the person to tell. Not about the mystery man who’d been visiting Bernadette here at school. And certainly not about the angels. Until Jazz knew more—and was certain of every bit of it—she’d keep her mouth shut. Sarah had a tendency to say too much to too many people about things she knew too little about. It didn’t make her any less lovable. It just meant Jazz knew she had to be careful.
“Speaking of strange…” Jazz handed the gloomy painting across the desk to Sarah. “Did you happen to see who painted that on Friday?”
Sarah took one look at the painting and let out a long, low whistle. “This I would have noticed,” she said. “Though I have to tell you, there were so many girls up in the art room, I couldn’t keep a close eye on them all. Besides…” Her mouth thinned, she slid the picture back in Jazz’s direction. “You don’t really need to ask, do you?”
“I was thinking.…” No, that wasn’t really true. Jazz wasn’t just thinking about the situation. She was hoping. Praying. She would have liked nothing better than to find out she was wrong. “I just want to make sure before I say anything. Was Maddie Parker up in the art room with the other girls?”
Sarah’s gaze flickered to the painting. “If I told you no—”
“I wouldn’t believe you.” Jazz ran her hands through her hair. “You know Maddie’s not going to be here next year. Well, not after summer school.”
“I heard.” Sarah pulled her gaze away from the grim painting. “Right about now, that’s sounding like a good thing, isn’t it?”
“They were close.” Jazz wasn’t sure that fully explained the Bernadette/Maddie relationship, but it was a start, and Eileen had said the truth, but not the whole truth. “Of course Maddie’s upset. It will be good for her to get away next year.”
“Sunny Honduras!” Sarah smiled. “A year abroad while her parents work at some clinic down there. Couldn’t come at a better time for Maddie. The sooner she’s away from here, the sooner she’ll forget Bernadette.”
“You know it’s not that easy.” Jazz shouldn’t have had to remind her. “Bernadette tutored her. Bernadette had a problem with dyslexia, too. I think that’s one of the things that brought them together. They both had challenges and it was kind of Bernadette to help Maddie. They were … friends.” Did that explain their relationship any more than saying they were close? Jazz didn
’t think so, but maybe now it didn’t matter. “Maddie’s taking Spanish in summer school.”
“I’m glad it’s not art.” Sarah’s attempt at humor fell flat, and her shoulders rose and fell. She leaned forward and grabbed the painting. “Truth is, I can only tell you she was in my art room on Friday. I can’t tell you if she painted that picture. Or even how long she hung around. I had thirty girls in a space designed to hold twenty and I knew they were hurting so I let them mess with my iPod and play some music and I dug out the snacks I keep in my bottom desk drawer for emergencies.”
Above all else except for her children, Sarah loved the candies she got from a vegan-friendly chocolatier, and her stash was hidden and secret. “You shared your peanut butter cups?”
Sarah fluffed off the thought. “The girls needed a distraction. And to my way of thinking, chocolate and peanut butter cures just about anything.”
“Did it help them?”
“It hyped them up.” A smile flitted across Sarah’s face. “And hey, if it helped them forget, even for a little while, it was worth it.”
Jazz made a mental note to pick up more chocolates for Sarah at the same time Sarah said, “I couldn’t keep track of every one of the girls, what with them singing and washing brushes and digging out every jar of acrylic paint I had in the art cabinet. Early on I saw Maddie in the back of the room sitting by herself. But sitting by herself, that’s not unusual for Maddie, is it?”
It wasn’t. Maddie, a junior, was a quiet kid with a learning disability that made her self-conscious. She was middle-sized, with straight dark hair and a splotchy complexion, one of those girls Jazz knew would grow up to be a poised, confident adult—if only she could get through the awkward teenage years intact.
“Maddie and Della Robinson are pretty friendly, but I know Della’s mom came and picked her up early after word about Bernadette went out on Friday,” Jazz told Sarah. “Maddie probably didn’t know too many of the other girls who were in your room.”
“Probably,” Sarah conceded. “Or maybe Maddie didn’t want to sit with anyone who would see her drawing.” She reached for the painting and slipped it closer. She made a face. “She’s upset.”
“You think?”
