Bob and I shared a bond as Davey’s parents. Now we’d have the relationship to go with it. And who knew? We might even end up friends.
I heard a giggle from the doorway and turned to look. Joey and Davey were both there. Alice Brickman, too.
“Gross,” said our son, rolling his eyes. “Mushy stuff.”
Thirty-four
Tranquillity reigned for the rest of the afternoon. In my house, that in itself is unusual enough to be worth noting.
After the Brickmans left, Bob and I sat Davey down and told him that it was time for his father to go home to Texas. Davey was sad, but not crushed. I think he’d always realized Bob wouldn’t be staying; and now he had the promise of future letters and visits to look forward to.
Sensing his mood, Faith crowded close to Davey, anxious to offer what comfort she could. The big Poodle puppy climbed in his lap and licked his face until he giggled. Davey was cheered; I relaxed. Even Bob was charmed by the puppy’s behavior.
I looked around at my family and decided we’d all come a long way in a few short weeks. On that upbeat thought, we trooped out to the kitchen for a mid-afternoon treat of ice cream and chocolate sauce. Faith even got a scoop of her own—plain vanilla—in a bowl on the floor.
At six forty-five, I ran upstairs and changed from my jeans into attire more suitable for a cocktail party in Greenwich: linen slacks and a shawl collared blouse. Bob was staying with Davey one last time, and I promised him I wouldn’t be long.
When I arrived at Lydia’s, the reception was already in progress. The semicircular driveway was filled with cars and I wedged the Volvo behind Aunt Peg’s station wagon. The front door to the house was slightly ajar. I pushed it open and let myself in.
Lydia was in the hall, talking to Barbara Rubicov. She smiled when she saw me. “Melanie, I’m so glad you could make it,” she said graciously. “Coats go in the closet, drinks are in the library. I’m sure you can find your way around.”
I could, and I did. I didn’t see Penny and Mark Romano, but I found Aunt Peg in the living room. She introduced me to the guest of honor: a trim woman in her mid-fifties whose erect carriage and exuberant demeanor were not at all dimmed by the long day she’d just spent judging dogs.
We were pleased to make each other’s acquaintance, but I had places to go and people to see and I soon moved on. Louis and Sharon LaPlante were standing near the fireplace. After our tumultuous visit that afternoon, I was glad to see them there together.
“Melanie.” Louis nodded briefly in my direction. “I think you should know I’ve written a letter to the A.K.C., withdrawing my application to become a judge.”
“Are you sure that’s what you want to do?”
“Actually, I’m quite certain it isn’t. But under the present circumstances, I don’t see that I have any choice. I hope this whole matter need go no further.”
Aunt Peg had relied on Louis to do the honorable thing, and he had. Still, it seemed a shame. He probably would have made a fine judge. And though he hadn’t done anything wrong, thanks to Monica, Sharon’s mistake had cost him what he wanted most.
“As far as I’m concerned, the topic is closed,” I told him. Then I turned to Sharon, who had yet to say a word. “The night the dinner checks disappeared, who were you sitting next to?”
She glanced at her husband, as if seeking permission to answer. I wondered how long it would be until she made a move without his approval. “I was next to Louis, of course.”
“And on the other side?”
Her brow furrowed as she thought back. “Darla Heins,” she said finally, pleased to have remembered. “We talked about needlepoint all through dinner.”
“Thank you,” I said and moved on.
A teenage waiter came by with a warm tray of hors d’oeuvres and I felt my stomach rumble. Bob had promised to take Davey out for pizza, but plans for my own dinner were still up in the air. I snagged a stuffed mushroom, a chicken wing, and a napkin on which to balance them both.
As I was dipping the wing in its sauce, the front door opened and I heard Lydia greeting new arrivals. A moment later, Mark and Penny appeared in the doorway.
“Are those any good?” asked Joanne, reaching for the tray.
“Great.”
I had to talk with my mouth full, but the effort was worth it. Joanne held the waiter up long enough that I was able to get a second piece of chicken for myself. With regret, I watched him move on.
“Joanne, I know you told Monica that you’d reported the Heinses. And I believe you mentioned it to Barbara. Did you tell anyone else?”
“Yeah.” Her gaze skittered over to where Bertie was holding court. Seated on a long couch, the redhead was engaged in an animated conversation with Cy and Louis.
“Bertie knew. She was really nasty about it, too. As if she thinks she’s little Miss Perfect. And, believe me, she’s not.”
At least Bertie and Joanne agreed on something, if only their lack of mutual admiration. I looked around for Mark and Penny. They’d come into the living room and were talking to Peg and Thelma. I hoped Aunt Peg would manage to wait until we got them alone before bringing up what we’d learned.
I crossed the room to where Lydia stood. “If I were able to return the missing dinner checks, would you take them back with no questions asked?”
The club president thought for a moment. “Would I get an assurance that something like this won’t happen again?”
“Yes.” The pledge wasn’t mine to make. That being the case, I fervently hoped it was true.
“Yes, I would. Do you have them?”
“No. But I know who does. I’ll return them to you early in the week. Will that be all right?”
Lydia eyed me assessingly. I knew she wanted to ask. I also knew she was smart enough to realize I wouldn’t answer her question. “That would be fine.”
Thelma strolled over and placed an arm around Lydia’s shoulders. She had a drink in her hand and a twinkle in her eyes. “You’ve gone to too much trouble. But I love it. If I’d known you were going to put on a do like this, I’d have come back sooner.”
Lydia smiled fondly at her old friend. “I just wanted you to know how happy the Belle Haven Club is to see you again. We hate to let our good members get away.”
Over Lydia’s shoulder, I saw Penny head through a door at the end of the room. I excused myself and followed her.
The door led to the library, a high ceilinged room that was filled with books. A built-in bar, stocked with a generous supply of liquor and mixers, took up the far wall. Penny was there, making herself a drink. We were the only ones in the room and I pulled the door shut behind me.
“I found Monica’s notes,” I said quietly. “I know what you were trying to hide.”
Penny whirled to face me. The amber colored liquid in her glass sloshed over the rim and onto her fingers. She didn’t seem to notice.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“I’m talking about the adoption you arranged through Walter Crispus.” It was only a guess, but as soon as I’d spoken, I knew I was right. Penny’s expression hardened. “You said Monica knew about your drinking, but that wasn’t all she knew, was it? How long have you and Mark been waiting for a child?”
“Years,” Penny snapped. “Someone like you ... a mother in your twenties ... you’d never understand what we’ve been through.”
“Maybe I would. Why don’t you tell me about it?”
“Why should I?”
“Because I want to know.”
I want to understand, I could have said. Because looking at the flat, dark anger in Penny’s eyes, I suddenly knew that I was seeing the face of Monica’s murderer.
She took a long swallow from her drink. “Mark and I got married when we were in our thirties. We started trying to have children right away, but nothing happened. We saw a fertility specialist. Do you know what that costs?”
“I can imagine.”
“When that didn’t work,
we were stuck.” Penny’s tone was bitter. “We knew about private adoptions, knew there was a better chance that way than going through the state agencies, but after all the medical bills, we didn’t have the money. Ten thousand, just to get your foot in the door. That’s what we needed, and we didn’t have it.”
“So you applied for a state approved adoption?” I asked.
“Along with thousands of others. We ended up on a waiting list. And every year we waited, we were growing older and becoming less suitable in the eyes of the agency. What a catch-22.”
Penny tipped up her glass and poured the last of her drink into her mouth. “Then a miracle happened. At least that’s what we thought. Our name came up and a baby was available.”
When she didn’t continue, I hazarded another guess to nudge her along. “They found out about your drinking, didn’t they?”
“Yes. We failed the inspection. Mark was devastated. I was ...” Her hands flailed expressively. “After all that time waiting, the only thing we could do was go back to the beginning and start over.”
I knew she wanted me to feel sympathetic, but I couldn’t. I shuddered to think what kind of a mother this woman would make.
“Why didn’t you stop drinking?” I asked angrily.
“I tried. Don’t you think I tried? But the longer things dragged on, the worse the pressure became. I felt like I was nothing, that I was useless as a woman. My life had no meaning.
“Sometimes I needed a drink or two to help me cope. Sometimes I just needed to forget. But that’s over now. As soon as Mark and I get our baby, that will all be behind us. I’ll be in control again, and everything will be fine.”
I didn’t believe that for a minute. But Penny did, and that was all that mattered. Monica had delighted in picking at the scabs of other peoples’ wounds. I wondered if she had known how desperate Penny was to have a baby. I wondered if that had made her enjoy the game all the more.
“So when the state turned you down, you signed up for a private adoption where there would be fewer questions. Where did you get the money?”
“We’d been saving it all those years we were on the waiting list. We’re not stupid. And neither is Walter. He got a deal put together pretty quickly. We’ve met the birth mother and the baby’s due in a few weeks. This time, nothing’s going to go wrong.”
I watched as Penny fixed herself another drink, a double shot of whiskey, straight up. “How did Monica find out about your arrangement with the lawyer?”
“How did she find out about anything?” Penny snapped. “She was nosy, and she asked too many questions. I told Mark not to say anything until after the adoption was finalized, but after all the time we’d waited, he was just so delighted he wanted to tell the whole world. It wasn’t hard for Monica to get him talking.”
I could see how it wouldn’t have been. More than once, Mark had told me that he and Penny were about to become parents. I’d misunderstood. No doubt Monica had been quicker on the uptake. Then, once she had the information, she hadn’t been able to resist turning the screws.
There was a quiet click as the door opened behind me. I kept my gaze firmly trained on Penny. “Monica was threatening to expose you, wasn’t she? Is that why you followed her outside after the meeting?”
“I only wanted to talk to her,” Penny said, her voice rising shrilly. “But she wouldn’t listen. She said I wasn’t fit to be a mother. She said that I needed help.
“I followed her back to her van because I had to make her see that she was wrong. Do you understand? I had to. But Monica just ignored me. She was fiddling with those damn Beagles of hers and didn’t even have the decency to turn around and listen to what I had to say.”
I didn’t have to ask if Penny had been drinking that night. I already knew the answer. “So you picked up a rock.”
I heard a gasp, and this time I turned. Mark was standing in the doorway, his face ashen.
“No!” he cried. The word sounded like an anguished groan, torn from deep within. Mark started toward his wife, then stopped.
His expression clawed at me. It was both bewildered and disbelieving. He was staring at his wife as if he’d never seen her before. As she started toward him, he backed away.
“Mark, honey ...” Penny held out a placating hand. “I did it for you, for both of us.”
“No!” His voice was firmer, but he was shaking his head violently, as if to negate the terrible truth he’d just learned. He slapped his wife’s hand away. “Get away from me.”
Penny stopped, confused. Mark spun on his heel and headed for the door.
“I did it for you,” she said again, her gaze following him.
Mark’s stride never faltered.
“Don’t you dare walk away from me!”
Mark kept going.
I was watching him, so I didn’t see Penny pick up the heavy crystal decanter from the bar. She screamed as she threw it but there wasn’t time to react. The faceted glass bottle hit Mark in the back of the head and he fell like a stone. The decanter shattered beside him on the floor, spilling a thick dark liquor over the polished wood.
I whirled toward Penny who was picking up another bottle. Only three steps separated us, but in the seconds it took to reach her, she’d swung the bottle around to grip it by the neck as a weapon. Chivas Regal, the black label said. It’s amazing the irrelevant information the mind will process in times of stress. If I were dead, what would it matter that it was the good stuff that had done me in?
Judging by the look on Penny’s face, that’s what she had in mind. Clearly she was beyond rational thought. The house was filled with people; doing me harm would only make things worse. Penny glowered at me, teeth gritted in rage, and swung the bottle anyway.
I jumped back, but wasn’t fast enough. The bottle missed my head, but glanced off my shoulder, sending a hot lance of pain down my arm and through my hand. It happened so quickly I didn’t realize my fingers had gone numb until I tried to grab Penny’s arm and nothing happened. She shook me off easily and swung the bottle again.
I’m a fast learner, especially with pain avoidance as an incentive. This time I didn’t dodge, I ducked. Then I came up swinging.
I kicked Penny in the shin, then balled my fist and punched her in the gut. Both moves probably hurt me as much as they did her, but at least they got Penny’s attention. She dropped the bottle and clawed at my eyes.
I’ve probably watched too many movies because I reached up and fastened my hands around her throat. I don’t know what I was thinking. It’s not as if strangulation was an option. Two fingernails raked down my cheek. I yanked Penny’s hair, then kneed her in the groin. The combination sent her sprawling.
I heard a commotion behind me and before Penny could get up, Bertie was on her. Penny struggled, screeching like a banshee and Louis jumped in to grab her other arm.
Shoulder throbbing, cheek stinging, I slumped down onto the couch. A low moan came from the body near the door. I guessed that meant Mark wasn’t dead.
I glanced over and saw Lydia standing in the doorway, looking horrified. Thelma was beside her. The judge surveyed the scene with interest.
“Things sure have gotten exciting around here since I left,” she said.
Thirty-five
At the first sound of trouble, Aunt Peg had called the police. Cy stationed himself at the front door so that nobody could leave until the authorities arrived. In the ten minutes that took, Sharon and Barbara applied cold compresses to Mark’s head and managed to bring him around.
He was in a chair, groggy, but mostly upright. His wife was in another chair on the other side of the room, with Bertie and Louis standing over her like a pair of belligerent watch dogs. Mark looked her way once, briefly; then firmly looked away. Penny didn’t look up at all.
The first squad car was quickly followed by a second containing Detective Shertz. He listened briefly as all the club members tried to explain everything at once, then zeroed in on me.
Even t
hough I’d heard Penny confess to murdering Monica, I’d been afraid it would be her word against mine. It turned out I needn’t have worried. Mark still wasn’t looking at Penny, and when Detective Shertz questioned him, his version of events was the same as mine.
Mark’s voice was flat as he recounted what had happened. He looked like a man defeated; one who has no reason left to care. He’d enabled Penny to keep drinking and now, like Louis, he was going to pay for his wife’s mistakes.
The police put handcuffs on Penny before taking her away. Mark went out with them. I heard the cars start up outside and wondered whether he would follow her to the police station, or turn the other way, toward home. I didn’t look out to see. I wasn’t sure I really wanted to know.
Everybody had more questions, but I didn’t feel much like talking. While Aunt Peg held court, I took a moment to pull Paul Heins aside for a quiet chat, then finished up with a conversation I’d needed to have with Bertie. After that, Aunt Peg shooed everybody away and escorted me out to my car.
“You look like hell,” she said bluntly. “Follow me home and I’ll patch you up.”
I felt like hell, too, but a cup of strong, brandy-laced, coffee got the revival process started. Aunt Peg got out a tube of ointment. I could see perfectly well that it had come from her vet, but when she dabbed some on my cheek, the scratches began to feel better. The house Poodles milled around my chair in sympathetic solidarity.
The cosseting lasted at least a good five minutes.
It was followed by a reproach.
“I can’t believe I missed all the fun,” Aunt Peg grumbled. “The least you could have done was let me in on it.”
“Some fun,” I muttered, rubbing my shoulder.
She was rooting around in the refrigerator, and came up, after a moment, with a box of Twinkies. Peg set them on the table between us. “There’s one thing I still don’t understand. Why on earth did Penny steal the club’s dinner checks?”
“She didn’t. It was simply coincidence that the checks disappeared and Monica was murdered around the same time. The two things weren’t related at all.”
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