by Becky Clark
I read the blurb at the top of the page. Last Sunday night. Oh, that was why. Because the next critique meeting was when all hell broke loose. I looked at more of the photos but didn’t recognize anyone else. Until I got to the last one.
Melinda and her husband smiling at the camera, a colorful parrot perched on his shoulder.
She and Kell were at the same party, the night before she was murdered. And he didn’t think to tell us that?
Twenty-One
I swirled the dregs of my coffee and stared at the photo of Melinda, all angles and sharp features visible in an elegant strapless gown. Henry, softer, with his rounder face, wore an impeccably tailored suit that showed off his perfect V-shaped torso. This had been her very last party and she didn’t even know it. Weird to see her reincarnated like this, and looking so happy. I tried to think of when I’d really seen Melinda happy. Getting book deals made her happy. Rejecting bad authors made her happy. A perfectly cooked rib-eye steak made her happy. Her zippy little car made her happy. But then I was stumped. Was she happy? I didn’t know.
Were any of us really happy? I tried to think what people would assume about my life after I was dead. They’d know coffee made me happy. And movies. And lasagne. And writing, at least up until recently.
I studied Melinda and Henry again. The closer I examined the photo, the less happy she seemed. She smiled straight ahead at the camera, even though her handsome husband was gazing at the huge red-yellow-and-blue parrot sitting on his shoulder. And they weren’t even standing that close together. No touching, arms by their sides.
I studied the photos of the other women at the event. Each one wore the same perfect smile. Not too toothy, not big enough to create wrinkles. Their public smile.
The one Melinda flashed for the camera too.
Henry was clearly more captivated by the parrot than by his wife, but was that normal? They’d been married a long time and he probably didn’t have a parrot on his shoulder for very much of it. The only thing I really knew about Henry was that women looked at him like he was a diamond necklace and they wanted to wear him. And that he was going to be my new agent, whether I liked it or not. He was holding me to the letter of my contract despite the circumstances. He was clearly a tough businessman, despite his love for tropical birds at the zoo.
With a jolt, I remembered that Kell had said he was on the red-eye returning from Chicago last Monday. How could he have been at a fancy fundraiser in Denver Sunday night, then fly home from Chicago early Monday morning?
My tremor intensified and I wrapped both hands around my coffee. I really needed to connect with his secretary to confirm he was on that flight. But even if she verified it, why would he have made such a quick a trip? It made no sense. I checked the article for the date of the fundraiser again. Yep, last Sunday.
The music in Espresso Yourself had changed from Irving Berlin to Cole Porter and I listened to a haunting arrangement of “Night and Day.” AmyJo still hadn’t arrived, and I considered calling her. Instead I called Kell.
I got right to the point. “You and Melinda were at the same fundraiser for the zoo the night before she died and you didn’t tell me?”
“Were we? Half of Denver supports the zoo,” Kell replied. “I don’t know about Melinda, but I’m on a million nonprofit boards. I don’t do anything, just throw money at them and show up to their parties. Presumably it’s the same for her and her husband.” Kell corrected himself. “Was the same.”
“Do you know her husband?”
“I don’t think so.” Kell spoke to someone in the background. “Hey, Charlee, I’ve got to go. Is that all you wanted?”
Is that all I wanted? Hmm. No. I wanted a fully stocked refrigerator. I wanted my royalty payments higher. I wanted the police to arrest the murderer so I could get on with my life. I wanted Kell not to be a murderer. “Just one more thing. You went to Chicago after that party and came home barely a few hours later?”
It took him a moment longer than was reasonable to reply. When he did, his voice had a somber tone. “Yes, Charlee. I did. I had to.” He cleared his throat. “I’ll see you tomorrow.”
I clicked away but toyed with the phone until it went dark. The first notes of “You’re the Top” wafted through the coffee shop along with the image of my mom singing it to me as she brushed and braided my hair into pigtails. I drifted on the clouds of nostalgia until the song ended. I thought about calling my mom, but I knew it would be a bad idea to talk to her in public. Meltdown potential was too high.
I reached down to rub the dog’s soft ears again. I straightened when AmyJo plunked herself at the table.
“Goalie spit, it’s cold out there.”
“It must be, if it makes you use such foul language.”
She pulled off her gloves and unswaddled the 9,000-foot-long scarf around her neck, piling it in a heap on top of the newspaper. “Doing your crossword?”
“Nope.” I turned the paper so she could see the photo of Melinda and Henry, but kept to myself the fact that the Sunday crosswords were simply too difficult for me.
She read the caption on the photo and her face fell. “That was her last party.”
I nodded, then pointed at the photo of Kell. She studied it, then glanced up at me. “He was there, too?”
“Yeah, but he says he didn’t even realize it.”
“Do you believe him?” AmyJo struggled out of her knee-length puffy coat and draped it on the back of her chair, apologizing way too much to the man behind her.
“I don’t know. Why would he lie?”
AmyJo leaned in conspiratorially. “Why wouldn’t he?” My raised eyebrows and tilted head had apparently stirred up her conspiracy theories. She glanced around the coffee shop and whispered, “Maybe he and Melinda had a lovers’ spat.”
I wasn’t sure why, but I leaned in too and whispered back, “They were lovers?”
“I don’t know. But it makes sense.”
“It makes no sense.” I sat back in my chair. “Kell’s so nice and she’s so … not. Like a panda cub dating a razor blade. Can’t picture it. But even so, you think he’d kill her? Could a kitten slay a dragon?”
“If the kitten was rich enough, he could hire someone to slay the dragon for him.”
“But why?”
AmyJo played Connect the Dots with some coffee stains on the table. “To prove he’s not a kitten? To get some real-life experience to change his milders into thrillers?”
I thought about our critique group conversations involving the early drafts of Mercury Rising. Kell had loved the murder scene, even when it wasn’t polished. But did he love it because of the writing or because it was just the information he needed?
“I don’t know what to think, Ames.”
“Me neither. But why would he keep it a secret that they were both there?”
“Maybe he really didn’t know. Maybe these fancy events are huge and you don’t get the chance to mingle. Maybe you just waltz in, drop off your enormous donation, eat a crab puff, then get your picture taken. Bing-bang-boom. He said he didn’t know her husband, so maybe he really doesn’t know her either.”
“Maybe.” AmyJo waved her fingers at Tuttle. “But wasn’t he flying back from Chicago that night?”
As I relayed Kell’s opaque explanation, Tuttle picked his way through the crowd with a coffeepot and an empty cup, which he set down in front of AmyJo.
“Hey, darlin’.” He pecked her cheek, then filled our cups. “Can’t chat. These folks need caffeine like a buzzard needs roadkill.”
“Eww,” she said as he moved away, glad-handing and refilling mugs. She took a sip and made happy noises.
I leaned on the table, chin in my palm. “I’ll check into Kell’s alibi of being on that red-eye. If he can lie about the fundraiser, he could certainly lie about that.”
“Who else besides Kell is sti
ll on your list?”
“Einstein, Heinrich, Henry, Melinda—” When AmyJo looked at me askance, I added, “Melinda was on antidepressants. Far-fetched, but maybe she killed herself.”
“Very far-fetched. And Henry?”
“Husbands are prime suspects. Didn’t you tell me that? Maybe he was having an affair.”
“Maybe.” She blew across the top of her cup. “And Einstein and Heinrich?”
“I don’t know. They’re avoiding me. When I was on campus the other night, I swear Einstein looked me right in the eye, then raced away in the opposite direction. And, get this, Jenica told me Heinrich knows my brother because of some police problem at the high school a few years back.” I stuck my face in my cup to avoid saying anything more about Lance.
“That’s it!” AmyJo spoke loudly enough that people turned to stare. Quieter, she added, “Heinrich is framing you to get revenge on Lance.”
“That doesn’t make much sense.” I hoped I sounded more confident than I felt. “I have the feeling that Lance already got in some kind of trouble over it. Jenica said there was a hearing Heinrich testified at.”
“What does Lance say about it?”
I chose my words carefully so nothing could slip and hurt Lance. “Never asked him. The fact that he’s never mentioned it must mean he doesn’t want to talk about it. I’m sure it was nothing. They let him keep being a cop, after all.”
“I guess.”
AmyJo sipped her coffee while I played with the crumbs on my plate. Finally, she pushed her cup away and proclaimed, “Nobody in our critique group could have killed Melinda.” She brushed her hands together as if that were the final dispensation of the case.
“There is one more suspect.” I told her about what Suzanne had been up to, ending with, “I’m eighty-five percent sure she’s innocent, but I need to be a hundred percent. What are you doing late tonight?”
AmyJo clapped her hands. “Going undercover?”
“Wanna come over now and make a surveillance plan?” I lowered my voice. “Theoretically, tonight’s the night Suzanne breaks into this place. We can see if she goes all cat burglar in here. I can bribe you with cookies and banana bread.” Nope, I’d given both of those to Suzanne. “Correction. I can bribe you with smushed brownies.”
“You sure know how to sweet-talk guests. I’ll pull the truck around front.” It wasn’t until she’d gathered her coat, scarf, and gloves in her arms that AmyJo saw the stray dog on the floor. “Friend of yours?”
“Nah, just met her earlier. Thought we’d share a snack.”
AmyJo picked her way through the tables, holding her bundle of winter wear over her head. The end of the scarf came loose and brushed across the heads of everyone she passed.
I cleared our table but left the newspaper in a neat pile for someone else to peruse. On second thought, I dug through the pile to keep the sections with the articles about myself and the zoo fundraiser, then straightened the pile again.
Lavar and Tuttle were busy with customers, so I decided not to say goodbye. The place was packed now, all the tables full both on the café side and the bookstore side, plus people perched on the ledge in front of the window. I planned my route: try to slide by a table of six people clustered around a table for four, or backtrack past a couple with a toddler in a highchair?
I chose the highchair, but hadn’t seen the enormous diaper bag on the floor. While the dad worked at shoving it under the table with his foot, I felt a hand on my shoulder.
A voice whispered in my ear, “I’ve got a gun.”
Without thinking, I jammed the highchair forward toward the dad and scrambled behind it, pushing chairs, people, and tables out of my way until I reached the counter. I forced my way in front of the customer who was ordering.
“Charlee! What the hell?” Tuttle said.
“He’s got a gun!” I whispered. I pointed at a man holding my newspaper.
Before Tuttle could react, the man called over the din. “Are you done? Can I have your newspaper?”
Relief and humiliation flooded my core. I nodded weakly and gave an apologetic smile to the couple trying to comfort their now-screaming toddler. Hanging my head so my hair covered my face, I slipped away from the counter and hurried toward the door before I misunderstood anyone else.
Glancing at the dog on my way out, I was a bit hurt she hadn’t even woken up. Some watchdog.
Twenty-Two
As I expected, AmyJo took advantage of the non-existent traffic and wild amount of snow, gunning her truck around the block back to my apartment. In the passenger seat, I gripped the strap with my right hand and braced myself with my other hand on the dashboard, hoping I wouldn’t hurt my wrist again. AmyJo gleefully slid around corners and headed toward an area in the far corner of the complex parking lot without any cars, where she could perform a reckless series of doughnuts. I closed my eyes and hoped she’d take pity on me.
“Woohoo!” She did a little dance with her shoulders. “Isn’t this a hoot?”
“No. Can we be done yet?” I opened one eye.
“Spoilsport.” She slammed on the brakes, fishtailed, and slid into a perfectly executed finale, the nose of the truck pointing directly at my apartment building. It was a move that would make any stunt driver bow down in solidarity. Or so she said.
She coasted closer to the building and pulled into an empty spot between two compact cars. Without crampons, carabiners, or a Sherpa to guide me, I rappelled from the summit of Mount Chevrolet until I’d descended far enough to distinguish the tiny car next to me.
AmyJo regarded me with bemusement, as she did every time I tried to free-climb out of her truck.
“I have to go slow or I’ll get the bends,” I explained.
“I think that’s only when you come up too fast. And in the ocean.”
As we approached my building, I saw that the maintenance crew still hadn’t made it this far with their plowing. There were several sets of footprints on the sidewalk and leading up to my door. I held out my arm to block AmyJo, trying to determine if the footprints all belonged to me. I moved my right foot as far away from my body as I could before tamping it into some virgin snow. I compared the print to the ones heading toward my door.
They weren’t all mine.
AmyJo started to say something but I put my finger to my lips, then felt for my keys. When I had them, I mouthed the word “Run!” and we raced for my door. I jammed the key into the lock and slammed the door behind us, breathing hard.
We barely got our coats off before someone knocked. Again, I put my finger to my lips, then tiptoed to the peephole.
Ozzi. I released a hysterical giggle and so did AmyJo. I opened the door.
He flashed his dazzling smile, shaming every toothpaste commercial ever created. “Hey, beautiful. Can I come in?”
I stepped aside and waved him in, afraid to speak for fear I’d embarrass myself in my relief.
“Hi, AmyJo,” he said.
AmyJo kept giggling. I rolled my eyes at her, forgetting that she hadn’t been jumping at shadows all week.
Ozzi carried two big reusable grocery bags into the kitchen. We followed him. He set the bags down, then stepped forward to kiss me. I took a half-step back and he returned to the bags, not appearing to take offense.
“I noticed your car hasn’t moved all week and I figured you were running low on supplies,” he said.
He began opening cabinets and the refrigerator, expertly placing everything in its rightful place. I caught AmyJo’s eye and she caught the hint to leave the kitchen.
“Actually, I’ve been out a lot,” I said. “And I have an assigned space. Remember?”
“I know. But I needed something to say, right? Some piece of perfect dialogue?”
I watched him work while I tried to sort out my feelings for him and our relationship. Yes, he’d rebu
ffed my booty call and then pretty much accused me of killing Melinda, but I recalled accusing him of the same thing. And his sister. I’d accused lots of people of murder that week, at least in my thoughts. Was that such a bad thing? How else would I figure out what had happened? We’d both said some things we probably shouldn’t have, and man-oh-man, was he trying hard to make up. Calls, texts, flowers, and now a full refrigerator?
“Thanks for this.”
He leaned out from behind the refrigerator door. “You’re welcome.” He finished emptying one bag, folded it, and started on the other. “Now for the good stuff.”
Apparently he knew I needed healthy stuff as well as comfort food because this second bag was brimming with all the things I loved. A half-gallon of ice cream, Fig Newtons, chocolate mini-donuts, a variety pack of crackers with an enormous block of cheese, cinnamon raisin bread, a pound of butter, the protein bars I liked, pancake mix, and real maple syrup.
And coffee. Glorious, marvelous coffee.
How could I stay mad after all that?
He folded the bag and leaned against the sink. “How are you? Getting any sleep?”
I leaned on the doorjamb, suddenly self-conscious and shy. “Not really.” My thumbnail became fascinating to me and I studied it. “So, you hacked my computer … ”
“Did you like that? I worked really hard on it.”
I looked up and saw him smiling at me.
“Oz … how did you … what did you—”
“If you’re asking if I did anything illegal, I can assure you I did not. And you should be more careful with your passwords.”
“I’m going to ask you something that might make you mad, but I have to know—”
“There’s a red X up in the corner of the animation. Just click it away and your desktop comes back.”
“Yeah, I already figured that out.” I hoped AmyJo wasn’t eavesdropping. “It’s not that. Did you hack into Melinda’s computer? You didn’t actually answer me before, when we were fighting.”
