“What’s over, Stacy?”
“Me and Bruce. It was nothing, really. Just a fling. I mean, for Christ’s sake, I’m entitled. Do you know how many times I’ve had to deal with Andy’s little adventures? It’s about time it was my turn.”
Stacy’s husband, Andy, has always been a notorious womanizer. Stacy knows it. Her friends know it. Everyone knows it. Every couple of years they separate, only to get back together again a few weeks or months later after therapy and lots of promises of eternal fidelity. I’d thought Stacy had reached some kind of peace with it—that she’d gotten used to it in a way. Maybe she had. Maybe betraying him back was her way of dealing with Andy’s treachery.
“How long were you seeing LeCrone?”
Stacy laughed mirthlessly. “I’d hardly call it that. We had sex a few times. The first time was in his bathroom in the middle of a party.”
I grimaced. She looked at me, almost defiantly. “We got carried away.”
“I guess you did,” I said. Then I felt bad about sounding so judgmental. “It sounds pretty exciting.”
“It was. I met him a couple more times. And then, that Monday night we got a room at the Beverly Wilshire. That was the last time.” She was looking straight into her coffee cup, and it took a moment for me to realize that she was crying.
“Oh, Stacy, honey, don’t cry,” I said. “You’re right, you do deserve it. Andy’s been doing this kind of thing to you for years. You are entitled. Really you are.”
“But you wouldn’t have done it,” she said.
That brought me up short. No, I couldn’t imagine cheating on Peter. But then, I couldn’t imagine him cheating on me, either.
“I don’t know, Stacy. I have no idea what I would do under similar circumstances. But that doesn’t matter. All that matters is how you feel.”
“Well, I feel like I’m the one who was hit by a car.”
I reached my hand out across the table, and she took it. We sat there silently for a few more minutes and then paid the bill, gathered our things together, and left. We stood awkwardly in front of my car. I reached out my arms and hugged my friend.
“Call me, okay?” I said when I released her.
“Okay. I love you, Juliet.”
“I love you, too. You’re my best friend. You know that, don’t you?”
“Yeah. I know. You’re mine, too.”
I waved good-bye, opened my car door, and squeezed myself behind the wheel. I headed for home, thinking about all those terrible marriages around me. LeCrone and his wives. Andy and Stacy. Abigail Hathaway and Daniel Mooney. It often felt like Peter and I were the only happily married couple we knew. Sometimes that made me feel complacent, better than anyone else. Sometimes it just scared me. Maybe we weren’t any different. Maybe it was just that our misery simply hadn’t started yet.
Eight
I walked in the house and, not hearing Ruby’s voice, peeked my head into Peter’s office. He was lying on his stomach on the floor, surrounded by Star Wars action figures, carefully putting the mask on Darth Vader.
“Luke, it is your destiny,” I said.
“Hi.” He didn’t look up.
“Where’s Ruby?” I asked.
“Nap.”
“Whatcha doing?”
“Playing.”
“Hmm.”
Peter’s “office” looks like an eight-year-old boy’s clubhouse. The bookshelves are crammed full of action figures. He’s got every comic book hero placed carefully next to the appropriate villains. I’m convinced Peter collects all these toys not, as he insists, because they are valuable (although his collection of vintage ’70s Mego Superheroes was once appraised at $4,750), or even as inspiration for his writing, but because as a kid he was deprived of them. His mother did her best, but she just barely managed to support her three children after his father walked out on her. Whatever money she had went to cover the basics, such as food and shelter and, of course, television.
Peter spent his childhood craving the toys he saw on TV. He tells one story that always makes me cry, although he tells it as a joke. One year at Christmas he desperately wanted a GI Joe Frogman. His mother couldn’t afford the doll, but she did get him the doll’s diving suit. He used a tiny, plastic GI Joe coat hanger for a head and shoulders, and tugged the empty wet suit around a bucket of water. I like to tease him that his next feature will star the archvillain “Hangerman.” Every time Peter shows up with another two-hundred-dollar Major Matt Mason figurine in the original 1969 packaging and I want to wring his neck, I try to remember that boy with no dolls.
I walked into the room, straddled his prone figure, and lowered myself onto his rear end.
“Ooph.” He grunted. “You weigh a ton, babe. It’s like having Juggernaut sitting on my butt.”
“Gee, thanks. Come to think of it, I do feel sort of like a fat mutant.”
“You’re not fat, you’re pregnant.”
“That’s turning into your mantra.”
“Yeah? Well, I’ll stop saying it as soon as you get over your lunatic obsession with your weight.”
“First of all, I’m never going to get over that particular lunatic obsession, and second of all, you’re no stringbean yourself.”
“Oh, yeah?” he said, flipping over under me so that I was straddling his crotch. He started tickling me in the ribs.
“Stop! Oh, please stop. Please please please.” By then I was laughing so hard I was crying. I rolled off of him and onto my side on the floor, curling up into as small a ball as I could—that is to say, not very small. He kept tickling me.
“Peter! Stop it right now or I’m going to pee in my pants! I’m serious!”
That made him quit. He leaned down and kissed me on the mouth, lingeringly.
I won’t describe what happened next. Suffice it to say we did what most couples do when they find themselves at home on a lazy afternoon with the kid down for her nap and no laundry to be done.
Afterward, as we lay on the floor of his office, tucked together like spoons—well, like a spoon and a ladle—I reached under me and grabbed a little figurine. “Boba Fett is poking a hole in my back,” I said, handing Peter the toy.
Holding the doll puppet-fashion, Peter deepened his voice and said, “May the force be with you!”
“It already was, baby,” I said. “Hey, guess where I went this afternoon?”
“Yoga?”
“Nope. Abigail Hathaway’s memorial service.” I winced, waiting for the bomb to drop. Surprisingly, it didn’t.
“Hmm,” he said.
“That’s it? Hmm? Aren’t you angry? Aren’t you going to tell me to mind my own business?”
“Nope.”
“Why not?”
“Well, Juliet, I’ve been thinking about it a lot. For the past year or so you’ve been sort of at loose ends. It’s like you know you should be staying home with Ruby, but something in you doesn’t really like it. You’re used to being useful. You’re used to helping people. And for some reason, being useful to us, helping your family, isn’t as satisfying to you as doing for other people. Ever since you’ve started looking into this Hathaway thing, you’ve been different. It’s like you’ve got your old sense of purpose back.”
“You know, Dorothy noticed that, too,” I said. “I definitely feel like I can contribute something here. But I’m surprised that you’re not worried about me.”
“Well, I’m not,” he replied. “I’m not worried because I know that you know what you’re doing. I wasn’t worried when you were out canvassing witnesses in Crip or Blood territory. Why should I worry now? I assume that you aren’t going to do anything that will put yourself in any danger. I assume that you will nose around and give whatever information you uncover to that detective you spoke to. I assume you’ll be sensible.”
“I will be sensible. I am being sensible, really.”
“Good.”
“Do you want to hear what I found out at the service?”
“Sure.”
“First of all, I saw her husband, who is a total creep. He looks like some Yanni-wannabe.”
“Really? That doesn’t seem like the kind of person she would be with.”
“Exactly what I thought. You should have seen this creep. His stepdaughter was sitting there, weeping, and he barely noticed her. It was awful. I felt like scooping the poor thing up and taking her home.”
“I’m glad you didn’t. I don’t think I could be so understanding about kidnapping.”
“Teenagernapping, actually. She’s about fifteen or so. Anyway, it turns out that Abigail was seeing a shrink, and you’ll never believe who.”
“Who?”
“Herma Wang!”
“Herma Wang, celebotherapist?”
“Wouldn’t it be celebratherapist?”
“Celebo is better.”
“Whatever. Yes, her! I was thinking I would call Lilly and see if she’s still seeing Wang. If she is, maybe she can find out for me whether Abigail was seeing her, too, and if she was, whether it was for couples counseling.”
“Lilly’s in town,” Peter said. “She left a message on the machine this morning. By the way, do we want to stay with her and the twins at the Telluride Film Festival this year?”
“Um, Peter, I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but I’m about to have a baby. I don’t thing we’re going to make it to Telluride this year.”
“Oh, right.” He laughed. “I keep forgetting.”
“Maybe I’ll give her a call and ask her about Wang.”
“You do that. I’m going to get back to work,” Peter said.
“Back to work?”
He blushed. “To work.”
“Um, Peter, I found out something else.”
“Hmm?” He was already thinking about his script.
“Stacy was with Bruce LeCrone the night of the murder.”
“At the ICA party. You knew that.”
“No, Peter. She was with him.”
He looked at me. “With as in with?”
I nodded.
“Wow. Does Andy know?”
“I don’t think so. At least not yet.”
“Wow.”
We looked at each other and recognized the emotion we were both feeling. Relief. Profound relief to be married to one another. To be married to someone we not only loved, but also trusted.
I kissed Peter and, leaving him to his toys, went to call Lilly from our bedroom. Lilly Green is definitely our most famous friend. She’s the only one who’s really achieved movie-star status. Despite this, she’s managed to stay unpretentious and almost normal. She has the usual Hollywood retinue of personal assistants, business managers, and household staff, but she still drives her twin daughters to school every morning that she’s not working.
One of her assistants answered the phone and put me on hold while she checked if Lilly was “available.”
“Juliet! Great to hear from you. So, do you guys want to join us at Telluride?” Lilly shouted in the receiver.
“I wish we could, but I don’t think we’ll be able to manage it with the new baby.”
“Oh, that’s right, I totally forgot! When are you due?”
“In about a month.”
“How fabulous! Boy or girl?”
“A little boy. His name is Isaac.”
“That’s so sweet! What a terrific name. I can’t believe you’ve picked out a name already. The girls were almost a month old before we’d settled on Amber and Jade. And even then I wanted to change it two weeks later!”
“Well, you know me, decisive to a fault. Listen, I was wondering if you could help me out with something?”
“Sure.”
“Remember that therapist you recommended to Peter a couple of years ago? Herma Wang?”
“Of course.” Lilly’s voice lowered in sympathy. “Do you need her number? Is something going on with you two? Are you okay?”
“No, no, we’re fine, it’s not that. It’s just . . . where do I begin here?” I launched into the long, tangled story of why I wanted to track down the good Dr. Wang. When I’d finished, Lilly whistled.
“Juliet, you are so cool! The crime-solving soccer mom!”
I snorted. “Ruby hasn’t started soccer yet. And I haven’t solved any crimes.”
“I haven’t seen Wang as a patient in about a year, but ever since I got my Oscar she’s called every couple of months inviting me to lunch.”
“How starstruck is she?”
“She’s pretty bad. It was kind of icky by the end of therapy. She always took my side, not that I minded, but it did get a little ridiculous.”
“Starstruck enough to breach confidentiality? Could you try to find out if she was seeing Abigail alone, or if she was treating her and her husband, together? And it would be really good to know why she was seeing her, okay?”
“I bet I could find out something from her. She’s so completely indiscreet. I’ll take her to the Ivy. That’ll knock her onto her butt-kissing butt. This is kind of fun; I feel like Miss Marple!”
“Only much better-looking,” I said.
“You flatter me, dahling,” Lilly replied, doing her best Zsa Zsa Gabor. “I’ll call you as soon as I talk to the doc.”
“Great! Talk to you soon.”
I hung up the phone just in time to hear Ruby yelling from her bed.
“Mama! Nap all done! Come get me! Mama come now!!”
“I’m coming!” I yelled back. “And stop yelling at me!”
I walked into Ruby’s room and found her standing in her crib, one leg hoisted over the side.
“What are you doing, Houdini-baby?” I said, grabbing her just in time to break her fall.
“Nap all done,” she said. “I want out.”
“I see that,” I said. “If you’re big enough to climb out of your crib, maybe you’re big enough to get a big-girl bed. Do you want a big-girl bed?”
“No.”
“You could pick one out by yourself.”
“No.”
“It could be a really pretty bed,” I wheedled. I needed to get her out of that crib before her brother made his appearance. No way was I buying a second crib.
“No.” Jeez, this kid was stubborn. Wherever did she get that?
“It could be pink,” I said in a singsong voice.
That sparked her interest. “Pink?”
“Sure. Wouldn’t that be great? Let’s go buy you a pink, big-girl bed!”
“No.”
Time to quit while I was behind. “Okay. Never mind. Let’s go find Daddy.”
It took all of three seconds to pry Peter away from his work. The bait was a trip to the grocery store to buy the fixings for chicken tacos. The man is easily distracted.
Peter wheeled our big cart down the aisles, Ruby trundled along behind wheeling her minicart, and I brought up the rear, wishing that one of them was wheeling me. In the produce aisle I caught up to Peter and asked, “Do you goyim have any ritual where friends and family pay visits on the bereaved after a death?”
“You mean like a wake?” he asked.
“No. Not like a party or anything. More like . . . well, like a shiva call.”
“What’s a shiva call?”
“You know, we paid a shiva call on my aunt Gracie when Uncle Irving died.”
“Oh, right. Of course. When they sat around on stools for seven days and everybody came by with food.”
“Exactly.”
“Nope. I don’t think there’s a WASP equivalent.”
“Really? That’s so cold! You just let the family mope in their house all alone?”
“No, Juliet. We all meet up at the country club and play a round of golf. And then we have a big meeting and discuss how to keep the Jews and blacks out of the neighborhood.”
I laughed. “Seriously, there’s no time where you just drop by and visit the family?”
“Not really. Although my mom is always dropping off casseroles for eligible widowers. Does that count?”
/> “No, I don’t think . . . wait a minute, maybe that could work.”
“What could work?”
“Maybe I could make a casserole for Abigail Hathaway’s husband!”
“That’s a terrible idea.”
“Why? I think it’s a great idea.”
“First of all, didn’t you say she had a daughter?”
“Yes. So what?”
“It’s hardly fair to leave her an orphan. I can’t imagine a surer way to kill the poor girl’s stepfather than feeding him a casserole that you made.”
“Ha, ha. You’re a laugh a minute.”
“Seriously, Juliet. You don’t even know these people. You can’t just show up with food.”
“Why not? I’m just showing support. Helping them out. And I did so know her.”
“You did not. She probably wouldn’t even have recognized you.”
“Yes, she would have. She would have remembered that you saved her from Bruce LeCrone. And anyway, they don’t know how well I knew her.”
“Juliet, be careful around that family. This isn’t a game. They’re grieving.”
“I will be careful. I just want to get a sense of them, on a more personal level. I’m not even going to ask any questions.”
“I’m just giving you my two cents.”
“Duly noted. And I will be discreet. I promise.” I gave his arm a reassuring squeeze. “Okay?”
“Okay.”
“Peter?”
“Yes?”
“How would you feel about cooking up a little casserole?”
“Oh, my God. No. Definitely not.”
“Please. Oh, please.” I kissed him on the cheek.
“I can’t believe you.”
I reached out to a grocery bin and tossed a few bags of spinach into our cart.
“What’s that for?” Peter asked.
“Spinach lasagna. Only make it with fewer onions this time. Most people don’t like as many onions as you do.”
Nine
THE preschool gig sure paid well, I thought as I pulled up in front of Abigail Hathaway’s oversized Tudor house in the Santa Monica Canyon, one of the most prestigious neighborhoods on the Westside. A manicured lawn stretched from the brass-riveted front door down to the curb. A brick path meandered down the lawn between carefully tended beds of winter flowers. In the driveway were parked two cars—a bright-blue Jeep, and one of those BMW two-seaters that a certain kind of middle-aged man feels compelled to purchase immediately upon seeing James Bond tooling around in one on the silver screen.
Nursery Crimes Page 8
