Undertaking Irene

by Pamela Burford

  “Can you be serious for one second?”

  “Hey.” He spread his hands, all innocence. “I’m just offering to return the favor.”

  “I didn’t mean I’d have, you know, stood here and…” I made a vague gesture toward Roberta’s grave. “But I could have… well, I could have subcontracted it out. Found a guy to dress up like a priest and put on an accent and all that.”

  “It wouldn’t have been the same. Admit it.” He slathered on the brogue. “You got yourself all hot and bothered listening to Father Martin’s naughty ramblings, now didn’t you, lass?”

  “Oh, good grief.” I turned and headed for the car so he wouldn’t see how on the mark he was. “Come on, SB, we’re done here.”

  He kept pace with me. “It was Veronica’s script, not mine. Well, I embellished a bit.”

  “I’m sure you did,” I said. “That’s not even anatomically possible. That last position. In the, um, school bus.”

  “Is that so?” His voice held the hint of a dare.

  I picked up the pace, jerking poor SB away from this and that fascinating thing he paused to sniff. I grabbed him up, hurled us into the passenger seat, and slammed the door. It felt darn good and I got a chance to do it again when I realized I’d caught the leash in the door.

  Martin took his place behind the wheel with exasperating calm. He reached across my body and I shouted, “What are you doing?” just before he pulled the seat belt and buckled me in.

  “What’s got you so jumpy all of a sudden?” His silky half smile made me want to beat him with Mr. F’s tire iron.

  “This is the worst possible time for you to horn in on my business,” I said, as he drove toward the exit. “A lot of my jobs came from Irene. With her gone, my income’s going to take a big hit.”

  “You talk like you haven’t just inherited a big-ass house worth millions.” Before I could speak, he added, “And spare me that crap about how it really belongs to the dog.”

  “Well, technically—”

  “My grandmother’s dream house does not belong to any damn poodle!”

  His outburst caused the damn poodle in question to stop car-whining. Martin’s features were rigid, his knuckles pale on the steering wheel.

  After a few moments I said, “Of course it doesn’t. That’s just a… it’s a legal device.” I watched him take a deep breath and slowly exhale. I wondered about his mysterious past, about the experiences that had shaped him and taught him to control his anger. “Your grandma McAuliffe chose that house?”

  He didn’t answer right away and I wondered if he’d shut me out. He turned out of the cemetery onto the town’s main road and said, “They had it built as soon as they could afford to. Their sons were grown by then—it was the mid-sixties—but Grandma had wanted a house like that her whole life, and Grandpa was finally in a position to give it to her.”

  “Yeah, but when they divorced about twenty years later,” I said, “Arthur ended up with the house.”

  “Irene was on the lookout for a rich old husband, and he fit the bill,” he said. “So the old bitch pried him away from Grandma, but that wasn’t enough. She knew how much Grandma loved that house, how she’d built it to her specifications. Grandpa was still in thrall to Irene at that point, and she persuaded him to fight for the house and put her name on the deed. It was all too much for Grandma.”

  “Anne died not long after Irene and Arthur married, as I recall.”

  “Eight months,” he said. “That’s when Grandpa realized what a monumental mistake he’d made. He never got over it.”

  He died a few years later, and Anne McAuliffe’s dream house went to the scheming second wife. And eventually to Jane Delaney, Death Diva. And a neurotic little poodle.

  “Are you thinking the house would have gone to you,” I asked, “if your grandparents had remained married?”

  He shrugged, as if that were of no concern. “It would’ve stayed in the family, that’s all that matters.”

  “I thought you hated the McAuliffes.”

  “That’s not the point.” He wore an enigmatic smile as he added, “The younger generation aren’t so bad.”

  The younger generation? Was Martin in touch with Anne and Arthur’s grandchildren? Or was he referring to the great-grandchildren? I didn’t even know how far the McAuliffe dynasty had spread.

  “So that’s why you’re doing this to me?” I asked. “Sabotaging the business I worked two decades to build because I happened to end up owning your grandmother’s house? I don’t know what you think, but I never asked for it or… or schemed to get it. I was stunned when I got the news.”

  “Oh, I forgot,” he sneered. “You’re just a helpless pawn in all this. You are in no way responsible for any part you might have played in Irene’s malignant little games.”

  Malignant game. An apt description for loading the ashes of anti-firearms activist Anne McAuliffe into shotgun shells. I was tempted to remind him I was just following orders, but it would have sounded as lame to him as it did to me. Hadn’t I already decided I wasn’t off the hook for trying to steal the brooch for Irene? I should have challenged her all along instead of doing her bidding without question for all those years.

  And if I had, would she have left me her house?

  Martin glanced at me and I knew he read it on my face. The doubt, the self-recrimination. Instinct told me to go on the attack.

  “Speaking of games,” I said, “you deliberately flirted with Veronica Sheffield just to get this sex-talk gig. Deny it.”

  “What’s your point?”

  I sat up. “Wait a minute. Hold on.” I’d been so outraged by Martin’s raiding my clients, it hadn’t occurred to me to ask the obvious question. “How did you know about Veronica?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “You know what I mean.” I twisted in my seat to face him. SB perched on my hip to whine out the window. “How did you find out she’s one of my clients? And Maia too—that we throw business each other’s way?” These were things he couldn’t have learned from Irene’s files.

  “Have you always been this suspicious?”

  It hit me like an anvil. “You broke in to my apartment!”

  “You need better computer passwords,” he said. “Your anniversary? Really?”

  “You got into my computer?” I thought of my out-of-date laptop, sitting there all vulnerable on my rickety kitchen table.

  “It took me less than a minute, literally, to guess it,” he said. “I mean, your anniversary? How long has that marriage been over?”

  “I’ve been meaning to change it,” I muttered. “Wait, how do you know the date Dom and I got married?”

  “It’s printed right there on the invitation. Page one in your wedding album.”

  “You went through my wedding album? You were in my bedroom?” I’d kept the album on a closet shelf, in a box with other memorabilia. Pictures of Dom. Pictures of me and Dom. Little gifts from Dom. Birthday cards from Dom. Love letters from Dom.

  I couldn’t decide whether to throw up or faint, imagining Martin reading Dom’s youthful, lustful letters to me.

  “When…” I could barely speak. “When did you do this? When did you break in to my place?”

  “Last Friday. I waited till you left.” He turned onto my street. “You looked totally hot, by the way. You should wear that green dress more often.”

  That was the day I’d gone to Ted Seabrook’s funeral, playing the part of his sexpot mistress. I’d left my bedroom strewn with clothing and shoes, after trying on practically every item in my closet in an attempt to find an outfit sexy enough for the gig. And then there was the matter of choosing the right underwear to go with the slinky dress. I groaned, recalling the thongs and push-up bras I’d left littering the bed.

  I narrowed my eyes at him. “Did you finish my tequila?”

  “There was a sip left.”

  “There was a good, solid shot left in that bottle. I was saving it.” I could have used it right th
en. “So who else?” I demanded. “What other clients of mine have you gone after?”

  “Well, Sophie Halperin’s uncle Morty just kicked the bucket,” he said. “She has me ordering a bunch of food for the folks sitting shivah. What do you think? Nova or belly lox?”

  “That job was supposed to be mine!” I said. “Morty’s been teetering on the edge for months. I had the menu picked out and everything.”

  “You snooze, you lose.” He turned onto the long, tree-lined drive to my new home. “Sophie had doubts about trusting the job to some shaygetz she’d just met, but I assured her I’ve catered plenty of kosher events. And that I’m half-Jewish.”

  “You lied, in other words.”

  “Plus I undercut your prices by twenty percent,” he said. “Plus I’m cute as all get-out.”

  “Who’s that?” I squinted at the dark sedan parked in the courtyard. I didn’t recognize it.

  Martin frowned. “Plainclothes.”

  “What?”

  “A cop.” He pulled in behind it.

  “How can you tell?” I asked, then realized I probably didn’t want to know.

  The occupant of the unmarked vehicle got out at the same moment we did and I found myself standing face-to-face with Detective Bonnie Hernandez.

  Dom’s fiancée wore a smart burgundy pantsuit and heels. Her dark hair was cut short and feathery around her face, and she was as pretty as I remembered from Dom’s Christmas party last December when he’d introduced us. If Bonnie was surprised to see me in the company of a priest, she hid it well.

  Of the many thoughts vying for attention at that moment, the one that whined loudest was, I hope she doesn’t think this heap is my car.

  Sexy Beast, the anti-Frederick, strained at the leash, barking ferociously at the interloper. I picked him up and hushed him, causing him to mutter indignantly about not being allowed to do his job.

  “Bonnie. Hi. This is a, uh, surprise.” I forced myself to smile. She made no such effort. “Listen, I want to thank you for getting SB that appointment with Rocky.”

  “You’re welcome. This isn’t a personal visit.” She retained a slight accent from her native Dominican Republic, from which she’d emigrated with her family as a small child. She stuck out her hand to Martin. “Detective Bonnie Hernandez, Crystal Harbor PD.”

  They shook. “Martin Kade.”

  How convenient. A middle name that sounded like a last name. I found myself wondering whether impersonating a priest is a crime.

  “I have some questions that I’m hoping you can help me with, Jane.” Bonnie indicated the front door. “This shouldn’t take long.”

  “Um, okay,” I said. “This is about Irene, I assume? I mean, I know Sten Jakobsen told the police—”

  “Why don’t we discuss this inside.” She dismissed Martin with a curt “It was nice to meet you, Father Kade.”

  “Jane, don’t talk to her without a lawyer,” he said. “You don’t have to talk to her at all.”

  “What? No,” I said. “Bonnie just wants me to tell her what little I know—the same stuff I told Sten. Right?” I asked her.

  “We’re wasting time standing around out here,” Bonnie said. “I’m sure you’re as busy as I am. The sooner we get started—”

  “I know someone.” Martin tipped my face up, his gaze locked on mine. “He can be here in half an hour.”

  “That’s… it’s insane. I don’t need a lawyer just to answer a few routine questions.” I turned to Bonnie, feeling my insides tighten. “Do I?”

  At last, something that could almost be called a smile. “Not if you haven’t done anything wrong.”

  12

  You Never Told Me What a Ditz She Is!

  “SO YOU HAVEN’T arrested Patrick yet?” I asked. Bonnie and I were perched on matching linen-upholstered armchairs. Martin sat across the glass coffee table from us on the big, cushy living room sofa. His posture was indolent, one arm draped on the sofa back as he lazily stroked Sexy Beast, but I knew he was anything but relaxed.

  When the meddlesome Father Kade had followed us into the house, Bonnie had told him to make tracks. He’d told her no. Just like that. “No.” In the end it was up to me, and I’d decided to trust his instincts and let him stay. It was a good bet he knew more about the perils and pitfalls of chatting with the cops than I did. I’d drawn the line, however, at calling in a lawyer. I mean really—how could I possibly be considered a suspect?

  “No one is under arrest at this point,” she said.

  “But you interrogated him, right?” I said. “I mean, I know Sten shared all the facts with you, the toxicology report and all—”

  “I spoke with Patrick this morning at Janey’s Place,” she said. “He confirmed that he’d been bringing Irene those special drinks from the shop to settle her stomach.”

  “See?” I leaned toward her, jabbing the air. “He lied to me. He said they didn’t come from him. But Maria—that’s Irene’s housekeeper—”

  “I know Maria.”

  “She told me they did,” I said. “Why would he have lied about that if he had nothing to hide?”

  “When did you and Patrick have this conversation?”

  “Last Saturday,” I said, “when I caught him snooping through the fridge looking for that last remaining smoothie cup. The cup that could incriminate him.”

  “The cup you later found in Irene’s garbage.”

  “Right.”

  “Patrick says he was never here that day.”

  “Well, that’s just another whopper,” I said.

  “And no one else was here then?” she asked. “You’re the only one who saw him going through the fridge?”

  “Yeah. So?”

  “So the thing that makes this awkward, Jane, is that I have only your word to go on.” Bonnie gave me an apologetic little smile. Out of the corner of my eye I saw Martin go very still.

  “Why would I fabricate something like that?” I asked.

  “No one’s accusing you of fabricating anything,” she said, “but I can’t make any progress here when it’s just your word against Patrick’s. He insists he hasn’t been in this house since before Irene died.”

  “Well, isn’t there some way you can prove he was here?” I said. “I mean, he had to have left fingerprints on the fridge.”

  “I’m sure he did,” Bonnie said, “since he brought her those smoothies every day. He told me she didn’t drink them right away. He’d put them in the fridge and she’d sip them a little at a time whenever her stomach was acting up.”

  “Great, and meanwhile the stuff that was supposed to be helping her was slowly killing her.” Yet Irene hadn’t mentioned the chronic pain to her doctor until it was too late. If she were alive, I’d give her hell for being such a stubborn old fool.

  “Your fingerprints are probably on that fridge, too,” Bonnie said.

  “Well, sure they are.” My guts knotted again. “This is my house now. And even before then, when Irene was alive, I was here all the time. At least two or three times a week.”

  Martin caught my eye and sent a wordless command. Shut up. Stop volunteering information she didn’t ask for.

  “I need to consider every possibility, Jane, no matter how outlandish it might sound.” Bonnie gave me another of those benign little smiles that were beginning to seem anything but. “You can understand that, right? It’s my job.” She spread her hands. The four-karat diamond on her left ring finger ignited in the sunlight streaming through the towering window. Good grief, the thing was the size of an M&M. Plain, not peanut, but still.

  When Dom had married me, I’d gotten a plain silver band. He’d promised to replace it with a gold one as soon as the money started coming in, as soon as Janey’s Place was out of the red. It was all right because I loved him. We loved each other. And wasn’t that worth more than gold and diamonds and all that shallow stuff?

  Bonnie’s shallow stuff threatened to blind me every time she moved her left hand. Of course, I happened to kno
w she was getting another little wedding present from Dom that I didn’t get back then either—a prenup. Pretty standard nowadays when one party comes to the marriage with significantly more wealth than the other, but that doesn’t take away the ick factor. I was dying to know the details of the contract Sten had drawn up at Dom’s request—who walks away with what, and under what circumstances, in the all-too-likely event Mrs. Faso Number Four turns into The Former Mrs. Faso Number Four.

  Then again, Bonnie Hernandez was what Irene used to call a smart cookie. I couldn’t see her compliantly signing any old thing Dom shoved under her nose before her own lawyer had checked it over and negotiated more favorable terms.

  Ah, romance.

  “So just bear with me here,” Bonnie said, “while I work through the various what-ifs.”

  Why did I get the feeling this smart cookie had already worked through the various what-ifs long before she pulled up to my door? I sensed it would be all too easy for me to step in a big, steaming pile of what-if.

  I glanced at Martin and saw my thoughts reflected on his face. I could stop answering questions at any time, he silently reminded me. But wouldn’t I look guilty then? Like I had something to hide?

  “The insecticides they found in that cup, and in Irene,” she said, “they’re pretty common.”

  I nodded. “That’s what the pathologist told Sten. They’re found in a bunch of different bug killers.”

  “Patrick says he has no idea how the poison got into those drinks,” Bonnie said. “Or to be more precise, how it got into the cup you gave to Sten, because that’s the only thing connecting the smoothies with the poison.”

  “Of course he doesn’t,” I scoffed.

  “So the question I have to ask myself is, who had access to those drinks?” she said. “Obviously Patrick did while he was making them and transporting them here.”

  “Not to mention his sneaking into my house and lying—”

  She stopped me with a raised palm. “We’re talking opportunity here, Jane. Who else could have messed with those smoothies?”

  “You know, I did wonder about Maria, but the more I think about it…” I shook my head.