When I pressed the buttons on our security system and entered our home, the warmth inside brought a small lift in my spirits. It’s not so bad, I told myself. ReeAnn was alive, if injured. I was upholding my promise to Arch. I was trying to find out what really had happened to Suz Craig. I didn’t want to clear the Jerk, I didn’t even care if anything ever exonerated him. But I did want to know what had happened, and why, so that when they hauled John Richard off for an extended prison stay, I could tell Arch with a clear conscience that I had done my darnedest.
I called Lutheran Hospital and asked to check on the condition of ReeAnn Collins. Since I was not family, I was told, the information could not be divulged. Upstairs, Arch and Macguire were listening to what could advisedly be called music. Macguire showed me a huge box of imported chocolates that Marla had brought over. She’d told the boys she was going down to Lutheran Hospital to check on ReeAnn personally, and she’d call me later. I knew she’d get the info. When Marla told people she was a family member, they rarely argued.
The boys offered me a wrapped Mozartkügel and I took it. It was somewhat ironic that the only way these two would acknowledge the classical masters of music was through candy. Within moments I more chocolate bulged in their cheeks and noise blared down our street. I thought again of Schoenberg’s mother and retreated hastily to my kitchen.
I booted up my computer and went through the file I’d opened on the circumstances surrounding Suz Craig’s death. What significance could ReeAnn have to the murder of Suz Craig? What was the link? I couldn’t see any, apart from the fact that ReeAnn had known all about the Jerk’s affairs, and probably a great deal about Suz’s as well.
I scrolled back through my computer file and reread an early entry, where I summarized the catering job I’d done at Suz’s house in July. It had been a clear, sunlit day, with clouds piling up over the mountains to the west and birds flitting among the blue campanula and columbine. Suz had been nervous about the appearance of her yard with its unfinished landscaping. She’d fretted about the weather, since she hadn’t wanted the ACHMO honchos to be soaked by an unexpected mountain shower. She’d shown little interest in the food preparation and presentation. To me this said: Career woman whose postcollege path did not detour through the kitchen. Which was just fine. That kind of client uncritically appreciates my work, even thinks of it as a kind of magic. Suz had appeared cheerful, but she had not really enjoyed the food. And when Chris Corey had fallen down the steps, she’d been distraught.
All of this begged the question I’d never thought to ask in the first place: Why had the Minneapolis people been visiting in July? The people at the party had certainly made no mention of an annual review, audit, or meeting. In retrospect, that seemed strange. When I’d asked one visiting staff member what had brought him out to Denver, I’d received a noncommittal response along the lines of “Fighting fires.” Exactly what kind of fire? Suz’s guests had all been from Human Resources at ACHMO headquarters, that much I knew. I did have a foodie buddy in the Denver ACHMO HR office. But the last time I’d seen Brandon Yuille, at John Richard’s office, he had been upset with me for not telling him where the Jerk would hide something. Now I realized he’d probably been referring to the missing meeting tapes, as well as notes about the malpractice and negligence suits. I felt guilty all over again for snapping at him, and resolved to be reconciled before asking him more about Suz.
To keep my promise to Tom, I knew I couldn’t pay Brandon a visit at the ACHMO office itself. Not that they’d let the ex-wife of the man accused of murdering their vice-president through the doors. So instead I phoned Brandon’s office and again identified myself: Goldy Schulz, the caterer, the friend of Brandon’s. Once more Brandon’s secretary was either well-trained or just her usual wary self. She asked the nature of my call.
“I need to apologize to him for a misunderstanding we had. Also, I’d like to talk to him about a lunch I catered a while ago,” I replied. I avoided mentioning the name of Suz Craig. “We talked about Thai food and fudge, remind him of that. I have a couple of questions about the event itself.”
There was a pause. “Aah,” the secretary said finally, with mock regretfulness, “it looks as if Mr. Yuille will be in a meeting for the next three days.”
“Don’t they ever take breaks?” I asked good-naturedly. “This won’t take long.”
She didn’t respond immediately. I had the feeling she was looking straight at Brandon, who was vigorously shaking his head. At length she stiffly announced, “I can connect you with Mr. Yuille’s voice mail, if you’d like.”
I assented and briefly told the recorded voice that I was trying to help my son deal with his father being arrested by keeping him informed about the murder investigation. Could Brandon forgive me for being short with him at Korman’s office? And could he satisfy my curiosity, tell me why the Minneapolis HR team at Suz’s house had come to Denver in the first place? Finally, did he happen to know if anyone had it in for John Richard’s secretary, ReeAnn Collins, who’d just been badly injured in a barbecue incident?
Well, I thought as I hung up, that ought to either ruin our friendship or take it to a whole new level. I had the disconcerting feeling that I’d been too pushy. Moreover, whether any useful information would come out of my requests was, it seemed at this point, extremely questionable.
I wanted to cook. But my growling stomach announced I was too hungry to concentrate. I’d had nothing to eat in the last eight hours except a piece of toast, coffee, and a Mozartkügel. Looking around, I dove into the container of Chocolate Comfort Cookies like a madwoman. Although I’ve read accounts of how addicts heighten their drug experiences, in my opinion nothing beats a large mouthful of dark, velvety chocolate on an empty stomach. I closed my eyes, bit into the cookie, and waited for the rush. An ecstasy of shivers began in the small of my back. I sighed with chocoholic contentment Now I was ready to face whatever the rest of the day cared to deliver.
According to my catering calendar, the following morning Wednesday Gail Rodine’s doll-club board of directors wanted a fancy breakfast by the lake. I’d promised her baked scrambled eggs with cream cheese and shrimp, fruit kebabs, honey-cured ham, and an assortment of breads. My supplier had delivered the meat last Friday. I heaved the plump, bone-in ham onto the counter to check if it had been spiral-cut as I’d ordered. It was, and would only need heating in the morning. The eggs and shrimp I would assemble at the LakeCenter, but the breads needed to be organized today.
I had two large loaves of the brioche left over from the box lunches, plus several dozen dark pumpernickel rolls that I’d made and frozen particularly’ for this event. But one more bread was needed to round things out. Experimenting to put together a delectable new bread for an upscale breakfast? Please don’t throw me in the briar patch. Thomas Edison, here I come. I knew I could do it. I scanned the walk-in pensively.
In the use-up-stray-ingredients economy that good caterers invariably subscribe to, I noted egg whites left over from making the Babsie Tarts, a couple of oranges that I’d ordered along with the lemons, and several unopened jars of poppy seeds. I pounced on these ingredients. I’d assemble a cake-like orange poppy-seed bread. Or die in the attempt.
As always, cooking lifted me from the doldrums. While the egg whites were whipped into a froth, I measured the dry ingredients and then delighted in the fine spray of citrus oil that slicked my fingers when I scraped the zest from the oranges. I Outside, the sun shone brilliantly in a deep blue sky and a warm breeze swished through the aspens. I opened the window over the sink. The boys’ music reverberated along the street. Out back Jake howled an accompaniment. I smiled. If the music made the boys happy, I wasn’t going to say a thing.
I was folding the poppy seeds into the batter when John Richard Korman jumped in front of the window. I screamed and dropped the bowl in the sink. The bowl shattered. Jake howled. Locked out back, the dog couldn’t help me. I’d disarmed the security system. I hadn’t turned it back
on. Oh, God.
Unthinking, I wheeled around wildly for the phone. But by then John Richard had pulled off the screen, reached through the window, and grabbed my wrist.
“Let go!” I cried as I wrenched my hand back. “Go away!” I screamed. He lurched up through the window, with my wrist still in a death grip. His free hand slapped my face. He smelled like whiskey.
“Shut up!” he growled. “I’m telling you, Goldy,” he said in a menacing voice as I opened my mouth to scream again, “shut the hell up. I want to talk to you. I want to talk to Arch. Let me in.”
Instead I pushed hard to try to get him out. Mercilessly, he twisted my wrist. I cried out in pain. Again he told me to shut the hell up. Then he yanked my hand over the window frame. Blood spurted from my forearm where the skin scraped against the metal. Poor Jake howled to no avail. My abdomen pressed painfully against the sink. My feet barely touched the floor.
“Who wrote that shit on my house?” He twisted harder on my wrist. “The neighbors say you know. Who was it?”
“Vandals.” I put my free hand on my face, trying to protect it from another slap. “Vandals. The sheriff’s department doesn’t know who they were. They can’t find them. This isn’t a good idea,” I warned him. “Just go away. I promise I won’t tell Tom.”
“Why didn’t you open your door when I knocked?”
“I didn’t hear you.”
“I said, ‘Why didn’t you open your door when I knocked?’ “
“I told you… agh …” Pain shot through my wrist again. “I didn’t hear you.”
“Bullshit. Listen. I didn’t kill her, Goldy.” With his other hand he seized my chin and forced me to look in his eyes. “I did not kill Suz Craig. She’d been reprimanded” another tug on my arm made me squeal “by the Minneapolis people and faced being fired We had a fight, but 1Ididn’t kill her. They killed her.” His fingers bit into my wrist so savagely that I whimpered.
“Tell the cops,” I gasped. “Tell… your lawyer.”
“I did! I just wanted to tell you!”
His handsome face twisted in rage. I knew he would hit me again. I was panicked about the two boys upstairs. I couldn’t let Arch see us like this again. I wouldn’t let the Jerk hurt me like this again. Stunned with pain, I frantically searched for something any thing to rescue me. There was no knife in sight.
Through gritted teeth he said, “I want to talk to that kid you have living here. Perkins. I think he painted my house. “
Pain shot through my arm. I squirmed to get some leverage against the sink.
“For-get it!” I screamed. With my left hand I seized the heavy piece of ham on the counter. I swung the meat up, then down on top of John Richard’s head. The meat glanced off his forehead and his eyes rolled up in his head. Releasing my wrist, he stumbled backward. I lurched for the phone, dropped it, retrieved it, pressed 911. I shouted that I had an intruder, my ex-husband, John Richard Korman.
I screamed, “He hurt me! I’m bleeding!”
“Is he there now?” The 911 operator spoke calmly.
I scrambled for the window in time to see John Richard, one hand clutching his temple, limping toward the street. “Yes, yes, but he’s leaving! Hurry!” I yelled. “Quickly! Come and get him and take him away!”
But I already knew it was too late. The Jeep roared and he was gone.
22
I closed and locked the window. Outside, Jake had not stopped his incessant howling. I let him in through the back door. He bounded over to me immediately, whining, putting his muzzle up to my face, trying to lick it. I floundered into the bathroom to wash the blood off my arm. Unfortunately, the sound of sirens brought Arch and Macguire rushing down the stairs.
The bloody fingers of my left hand pressed the lock on the bathroom door. I couldn’t talk to anyone just yet. When the boys called, I responded by saying I’d be there in a minute. I looked dreadful. My face was blotchy; my right cheek bore the scarlet imprint of John Richard’s hand. I turned the cold water all the way up and splashed and resplashed my face. It had been a long time since the Jerk had treated me like this. Our house boasted a security system, a bloodhound, and a live-in policeman. Tone of these had helped.
Would we ever be safe?
The next hour passed in a daze. At my insistence, Arch and Macguire went back upstairs. The two policemen who came to the door, both deputies I did not know, asked if I could tell them where John Richard had gone. I gave them his address in the country club and begged not to have to go down to the department to make my statement. The deputies instructed me to write down exactly what had happened. As I was scribbling, one of the cops called Tom, who was not at his desk. The other took the ham into evidence. I almost laughed, but I couldn’t stop trembling enough to do so.
By contacting and attacking a witness in the homicide investigation in which he’d been charged, John Richard had gotten himself into deep trouble. When the sheriff’s department located him, they would arrest him again. Somehow knowing this did not make me feel much better. All I could think of was Arch.
I took a shower, changed into fresh clothes, and searched for my son. I found him on a portable phone in his room. Judging from his confidential tone, he was talking to his buddy Todd. When I knocked on the door, he quickly disconnected.
“May I come in?”
I could tell he felt horrible. His voice cracked when he whispered, “Mom, are you okay?”
“No, hon, I’m really not.”
“I didn’t even have a chance to see him.”
“I know.”
Arch slumped morosely on his bed, his lips pressed together. Finally he said, “I just feel as if it’s so hopeless. You promised you’d help him and “
“I have tried to help him,” I interrupted, carefuI to keep my tone soothing. “Not because of anything good he’s done, but because I promised you that I would “
“Excuse me, Mom, but you have not helped him. He says he didn’t kill Ms. Craig. I believe him.”
“Arch, please. I have spent the last three days on the telephone asking questions, going around talking to people, and “
Behind the glasses, his eyes burned ferociously. “And what have you found out? Nothing!” Guiltily, he softened his tone. “I know you want him to go to prison. In your heart.”
Poor, miserable Arch. It didn’t help that he was probably right. I did want John Richard in prison, where he couldn’t hurt another woman. I said patiently, “I am waiting for people to call me back. I can’t make people talk to me.”
He got up and slid halfway under his bed. When he inched back out, he was clutching his backpack. “Sorry, Mom, but I’m going to live with the Druckmans for a while. At least until Dad’s hearing. Todd’s mother said it was okay.” He opened a drawer and began pulling out shorts and shins. “If I hadn’t been here, Dad never would have come around and started hitting you. He was probably looking for me.”
“Honey, please, please don’t go.”
“This way,” my son continued, avoiding my eyes, “we won’t have another big mess with the police coming over. Please leave my room now, Mom.”
He’d ordered me from his room. He wouldn’t speak to me. He refused to even listen. I retreated to my kitchen, where I sat in silent shock for ten minutes. Then I called the Druckmans to apologize for my son being a freeloader and to see if I could at least bring over some food. Kathleen Druckman assured me that she was happy to have Arch for as long as he wanted to stay. I didn’t need to deliver any meals, either, she said with a laugh, she’d be insulted. She and her husband would even take Arch down to the jail to see his father. And was it true that John Richard had knocked me unconscious with a whole poached salmon? I said no, thanked her again, and hung up.
Macguire had left a note taped to my computer: Going out for a walk, hope you’re okay. See you at dinner. Can we have pizza? Not even Macguire’s renewed appetite cut through my misery. When Arch slammed out the front door, I almost burst into tea
rs. Instead, I dialed Tom’s number.
It was four o’clock. He wasn’t there, so I left a very brief voice-mail message. John Richard had been here. Both Arch and I were okay. If he wanted more information, he could talk to the officers who, I hoped, would have arrested John Richard by the time he got this message.
The memory of the Jerk’s slap rushed back into my consciousness. But what had he shrieked about Suz Craig? She’d been reprimanded. For what? I put in another call to Brandon Yuille. He was the Human Resources person, after all. Unfortunately, he again refused to speak to me except through hi secretary. I told her to ask Brandon if the ACHMO bigwigs were about to fire Suz Craig and if so, why: And remind him, I said, that I was sorry we’d had a misunderstanding. Also that I had a close personal relationship with the investigative journalist of the Mountain Journal and she’d just love to start bothering him for an interview. I hung up with a bang that did nothing to improve my mood.
I cleaned up the mess in the kitchen left from my fracas with the Jerk. To fulfill Macguire’s request, I mixed up some pizza dough and set it aside to rise. I called my supplier to see about replacing the ham and got her machine. Then, because I couldn’t think of anything else to do, I started over on the orange poppy-seed bread.
This time, just as I was again at the fateful point of folding in the poppy seeds, the phone rang. I thought it might be Marla or Tom or even Brandon Yuille getting back to me, but I was wrong. To my surprise, it was Patricia McCracken.
“Well,” she demanded breathlessly, as if none of the sorry events of the last three days had ever transpired and we were still happy confidantes, “what have you found out?”
“About what?” I gently scraped a poppy seed-speckled pillow of the light, moist batter into a buttered and floured loaf pan.
“About John Richard, silly! Has he gotten himself into any more trouble?”
“Like what?” I really did not want to discuss this. Any info I gave Patricia would be all over Aspen Meadow in an hour, given her feud with the Jerk. At least she hadn’t heard the crazy story about him hitting me with a salmon.
The Grilling Season gbcm-7 Page 24
