The Busy Woman's Guide to Murder

by Mary Jane Maffini

  I felt a chill run down my spine as she said, “Tiffanee was a wonderful woman, very spiritual and evolved. She was my lifelong friend. I can’t begin to tell you how devastated we are. And now this . . . Things will never be the same.” She broke off and dissolved into very attractive weeping. A distinguished silver-haired man—in what had to be a cashmere overcoat—led her away to comfort her. That revealed the woman behind her. Haley, mascara smeared, eyes swollen, shaking. As Todd thrust the mic into her ruined face, all she could manage was a strangled wail. Fortunately, Randy shambled up, got between Haley and Todd, and put his arms around his wife to keep her from collapsing. “They are very old friends. This has been very hard on everybody,” he said, looking like he meant it. “Please leave us alone.”

  The camera lingered enough to catch Haley being sick in the fresh snowbank. While Haley was falling about, that beautiful witch Serena was no more grief stricken than my dogs were. I was 100 percent sure of that. I made a note to bring flowers or cookies to Haley though. She needed serious support.

  I switched off Todd with a shudder. Now I understood the three messages. Mona didn’t answer her phone. Pepper was probably in full investigation mode. Jack had no information.

  Jasmin. It had to be Jasmin Lorenz who’d been killed.

  I couldn’t keep the thought out of my head: Two down. Two to go. And there was the one mistaken identity of course.

  My appointment with Dr. Partridge wasn’t until noon and that left me time to visit my favorite reference librarian.

  “Don’t have to,” Ramona said. “I know half this stuff. So if you’re asking me as a friend, I can just tell you. If you’re asking me as a librarian, I’ll give you documents and sources.”

  “Friend,” I said.

  “Okay, now I’m officially on my break, so I can say that Serena Redding is on her third marriage and—”

  “What? She’s my age!”

  That outburst earned me the usual disapproving stares from the reference regulars.

  “You want to know or not?”

  “Keep spilling and I’ll try to keep my voice down.”

  “Her former mother-in-law is a good friend of my aunt’s. She says that Serena has actually made a profit on each marriage. Apparently this third one is on the rocks too.”

  “A profit?”

  “Surely you know what a profit is, Charlotte.”

  “Very funny. But it doesn’t seem very—”

  “Modern?”

  “Moral. Decent. Ethical.”

  “I hear you,” Ramona agreed. “Of course, her ex-mother-in-law could be just the tiniest bit biased.”

  “I’m sure. But if anyone was going to use people that way, I guess it doesn’t surprise me that it would be Serena.”

  “You and me both. I saw the results of her handiwork the summer I was working in parks. I saw what she did to Mona.”

  “Wait. We weren’t even in high school then. I didn’t realize when you were talking about Mona wearing the ‘kick me’ sign that it was Serena doing the kicking.”

  “She had help. It took me a long time to figure out that Serena was behind a lot of the cruel behavior of the other kids. She got to suck up to the counselors and come across like such a smart little angel, but she was not at all what she seemed. And if my aunt’s friend is to be believed, nothing much has changed.”

  “She has a new persona; churchgoing, charitable, kind, giving. I’m trying to find out what she’s up to.”

  “You don’t want to get too close to her. This woman makes a nasty enemy.”

  “What’s that they say? Keep your friends close and your enemies closer? Who said that?”

  “Sun Tzu,” Ramona said. “Way, way back in the day. Although I’ll confirm the reference. I like to be sure about these things.”

  “That’s okay. Can you keep me posted about what Serena’s up to?”

  “Sure thing, but it will be a hobby, not business. I’ll troll around a bit too on my own time. Woodbridge is a pretty small town.”

  “Thank you. If you’re in contact with Mona, tell her I said if she needs anything to get in touch. I’ll be there for her. And I’ll make a better job of it this time. She can even stay with me. She just needs to pick up her phone when I call.”

  The cafeteria at Woodbridge General was a vast clatter of activity. Crowds of people in white coats accessorized with stethoscopes, or wearing scrubs and ID tags stood jostling and chatting, grabbing good-size servings of food they’d never let their patients get away with: pizza, fries, gravy. Fried cholesterol, supersize starch, sugared and salted snacks. As Jack would say, yowza. I glanced around. Staff tended to congregate at tables, laughing and socializing, a brief break from their demanding jobs.

  Near the entrance a man was just taking a seat at a table for four near a window with a view over the parklike area in back of the hospital. Very serene. He carefully set out a lunch from a lunch bag that featured Homer Simpson.

  As I approached, he glanced my way. He recognized me, no question about it. But Dr. Sam Partridge was not what I was expecting.

  He waved and stood up. I smiled and waved back. I estimated he was five seven tops. A man I could have made eye contact with, if he wasn’t wearing glasses with bottle-thick lenses. Behind the lenses, a pair of intelligent green eyes blinked back at me. The ceiling lights were reflected on his shiny head. His tidy fringe of gray hair could have worked on a medieval monk too. The hand-knit brown sweater was about as far from GQ as you could get, ditto the relaxed-fit jeans and the deck shoes. I put him in his midfifties. For an instant, I wished he was my father. Of course, my mother likes men with proper wardrobes.

  I liked him before I even sat down. He wore a wedding ring. I thought he’d be a nice husband for someone to come home to. I imagined he was a good dad too, even if he could never have been mine.

  He didn’t want to shake my hand though. “I’m at the tail end of a bad cold and a bit of bronchitis. I think I’m past the contagious stage, but why take a chance. Picked it up here in the hospital. Make sure you use hand sanitizer while you’re here,” he said, pointing to his small sanitizer sitting next to a small blue container of medications and a mug of steaming coffee. He saw me check that out and said, “I’m doped up on cold meds to get through the day: antihistamines, decongestants, painkillers, you name it. Coffee too.”

  “I love those little dispensers,” I said as I pulled my sanitizer out of my handbag. The last thing I needed was a cold.

  “Sally said it was urgent.” He had the kind of voice that could make you believe your fears and troubles would soon be fixed. If I hadn’t had my own agenda, I think I might have leaned over and spilled every secret I’d ever had, just to be reassured by this man. I managed to hold back.

  “I’ve been hoping it isn’t urgent, but I fear that it is.”

  Behind the thick lenses, the green eyes twinkled. Or maybe they gleamed. Whichever, it was effective. “Let’s hear it.”

  I watched as he opened three packets of sugar and sprinkled them slowly into his coffee.

  “How about I give you the background while you eat. Then you can tell me what you think.”

  He smiled, stirred the coffee, and then started to unwrap a sandwich that had been carefully constructed and was obviously homemade. Someone cared deeply about this therapist. I imagined a small, round wife happily preparing celery, carrots, and a small container of hummus, then moving on to the sandwich, which was making my mouth water: I figured it was multigrain bread with smoked turkey and cheese, and some brilliant green, cheerful lettuce variety. I wondered if there were matching small, round children sitting at a table somewhere, each with the same lunch. I was going to have to deal with this mixing love and food fixation I seemed to be developing. Maybe the next time I saw Dr. Partridge, I’d be stretched out on the couch blabbing on about steaming bowls of soup and how I never got anything like that from my mother, although Jack’s mom had made plenty. Now Jack was unlikely to get that from me. Not
that he’d ever requested it. On the other hand, he didn’t turn down the sandwiches I brought him from Ciao! Ciao! on a regular basis. These were modern times and I didn’t have to be tied to a kitchen to have a happy life. Did I?

  Dr. Partridge said, “Charlotte?”

  “Oh, sorry. I got a bit distracted.” I pulled myself together and started my long and bizarre story, trying not to leave out anything germane and giving what detail I could about the bullying incidents at St. Jude’s and outside.

  The green eyes watched my face carefully as I filled him in, without naming any names, on the rumored and known crimes of Serena and her ilk, Mona’s reaction, Haley’s guilt and regret, my own fears for Mona and my anger at myself for my inaction and at the bully who could still reach out after all that time to ruin lives.

  “Sadly,” he said, “this is not an uncommon story.”

  “What? You mean the hit-and-runs?”

  He shook his head. “Of course, the hit-and-runs are unusual, although I wish they were nonexistent. I’m talking about the events at St. Jude’s. The damage to your friend. And the fallout. For her and for you.”

  “Well, I like to fix things. And I need to know what to do.”

  He shook his head. “Not sure if you can fix this one. But I can give you some advice.”

  “I’ll pay you for your time, of course.”

  “This bit will be on the house. There are often consequences to childhood bullying. A person can end up with diminished self-esteem, anger, depression. All that can happen. It’s a horrible history for someone to carry around with them.”

  “Does treatment help?”

  “I’m biased, of course, since that’s what I do, but I believe it does, if the patient finds the right therapist to help them move past it. People need to work through the trauma. To see what was going on. And most important to understand and forgive their own helplessness. And see the bullies for what they were. Children, too. Adolescents in this case, but not adults. I hope your friend will get some professional help.”

  “So they get away with it? The bullies? The tormentors? They get forgiven by their victims and it’s all la-la-la?”

  “Not always. Many bullies get in trouble with the law, do jail time. That’s another pattern.”

  “Well these bullies were beautiful, smart, successful, and respected, and in one case, rich and getting richer. They got away with it.”

  Dr. Partridge nodded. “Unfortunately, that’s also a pattern. People in authority favor attractive, clever people. Research backs that up. Some of them will go on to bully as adults too. Others won’t.”

  I couldn’t hold back a rant. “Well, that explains why Serena Redding or Jasmin Lorenz or Haley McKee or Tiffanee Dupont never did jail time. They seemed to have had charmed lives. Well maybe not Haley, but the rest of them.” It crossed my mind that being dead was worse than jail time for Tiffanee and Jasmin, but it didn’t stop my tirade. “And Mona Pringle still lives with the nightmare. These people were getting away with murder.”

  Dr. Partridge had dropped his sandwich. Something flickered across his gentle, understanding face. Recognition. I was absolutely sure of that. And something else. Whatever it was, Dr. Partridge wasn’t happy that I’d let those names slip. I could have sworn that he turned pale, but that must have been my imagination. I was way too emotionally involved in this whole business.

  He picked up his sandwich, stared at it, and put it back in its little bag.

  “What?” I said. “Do you know these people? Was one of them a patient?”

  He regarded me sadly. “Charlotte, even if one of them had been my patient, you must know I can’t tell you anything about that.”

  I did know that, of course, but I gave it my best shot anyway. “Was it Mona?”

  Dr. Partridge let his disappointment show on his face. “Charlotte, please.”

  I blurted, “Because if it was Mona, she is in desperate shape. I am worried about her. She’s strung out. If you can’t tell me, can you contact her? You have to help. I mean, what are you permitted to do?”

  He shook his head. “We’re not like paramedics. We can’t go racing after people with our sirens blaring, whether or not we have treated them. They have to come to us. If you see your friend, try to convince her to seek help. I would make myself available to any of these people, but we have our share of qualified practitioners in Woodbridge.”

  As I thanked Dr. Partridge and walked away, I noticed he seemed to have lost interest in his lovely lunch. On the plus side, he had given me a good idea.

  As I left the hospital, I saw Pepper hurrying in through the automatic doors.

  “Everything all right?” I said.

  “Routine follow-up. They do that with brain injuries. You?”

  I hesitated, thinking that Pepper’s brain injury had been almost a year ago and she was still dealing with it. “I just wanted to talk to someone about Mona. To try to find out whether she might be—”

  “Charlotte. You can’t get involved in this. I told you to leave Mona alone.”

  “I know. And I’m not investigating. I assure you I have no desire to. But I feel an obligation to help Mona. We all should. She’s been missing work and she’s leaving me hysterical messages and—”

  “Good, as long as you’re not involved. Oh, wait. You sound like you are involved. I told you not to go to her workplace or her home. What do you mean, talking to someone about her? Are you consulting medical personnel about Mona? What the hell is wrong with you? I’ll haul you in and charge you. I mean it.”

  “I’d love not to be involved. I don’t want anyone else to be hurt. Or killed. There are three people dead now. And Mona—”

  She let that slide. “Let me remind you that we are investigating the three hit-and-runs. And I doubt if any one of them was in any way related to Mona.”

  “Are you serious? Two of them were her bullies.”

  “What makes you say that? We haven’t released the name of the third victim yet.”

  “You don’t have to be a big-shot detective to figure it out, Pepper. They interviewed Haley and Serena on WINY. Clearly it was Jasmin.”

  “Dammit, that Todd Tyrell does more harm.”

  “So it was her. Mona as good as told me. Can’t you find her, Pepper? Before something else happens? I’m worried about Haley, and I don’t even want that revolting Serena to be murdered.”

  Pepper snapped, “We’re on it. I just told you that.”

  “But—”

  “Do you have any real information for me, Charlotte?”

  What now? I could hardly tell Pepper that I’d seen an odd expression on Dr. Partridge’s face when I talked about Serena’s nasty little cabal and their effect on Mona.

  “I thought so. Go back to your closets, Charlotte. We don’t need you getting killed too.”

  She disappeared down the long corridor. I noticed she was rubbing her temple as she went.

  Of course, I was starving by this time. I had ruined Dr. Partridge’s lunch, but I hadn’t taken my own. It was either pick up food or gnaw on the seats of the Miata. I headed to a new little take-out place that had a smoky bacon and lentil soup that was to die for—especially when you had garlicky croutons to drop in. A meal in a bowl; perfect for a wintry day. I got two servings for Mr. Jack “Hollow Legs” Reilly and one for me, and turboed over to CYCotics before the soup could cool. I was happy that I’d made the investment in snow tires. Jack was glad to get the soup, but not so glad to hear me obsessing about Mona.

  “But where is she?” I said for the fourth time as we polished off our lunch.

  “I don’t want to rain on your parade. I know this is serious and I understand that you’re worried, but you have to leave all this to the police. Pepper will deal with Mona. She’ll find her. You can figure out another way to be a friend to Mona. She’ll need you when they find her,” Jack said.

  “Did I tell you what Dr. Partridge said?”

  “Several times.”

  “We
ll, it was revealing.”

  “I suppose in a useless way. If his expression was, as you interpreted it, that he treated someone who may have been a victim or a bully. Unless of course he didn’t. Don’t want to bring you down, Charlotte, but that’s not going to get you too far. Not that you should be going far since you’re not supposed to be investigating.”

  “Not investigating,” I snapped, “just trying to find Mona before she loses her job or her mind. Or before someone else gets killed.”

  “Yes. And I don’t want that to be you. This is already a dangerous situation. Don’t forget that.”

  For sure it could have been dangerous, but not for me. I believed that Mona would not lash out at me, not harm me. Or Jack either for that matter. She had turned to me for help and I had helped her in the past, even if not enough. She was staying in touch even if her calls were alarming. I was worried that Mona had done something that could never be undone. I hoped like hell I was wrong.

  “Jack. What do you think happened to those girls to turn them into monsters?”

  “I don’t know. I hardly knew them.”

  “You do know the kinds of things they did to people. You’re the philosopher. Where’s the justice in that?”

  Jack stared at me. “Philosophy isn’t about justice, Charlotte.”

  I sniffed. “Well, maybe it should be. Don’t laugh at me.”

  “I’m glad you care about this whole situation. I’m glad you care about Mona and other people. And I agree with you. We should do whatever we can for Mona. I’ll help you. But I hope you do know that you have a tendency to charge right in, no matter what the risks, and try to make everything right. You just have to learn to be cautious.”

  “We’re just talking. I’m trying to get my head around what’s happened with those hit-and-runs and what happened when we were all at St. Jude’s. It’s haunting me.”

  “That’s the thing. Why is all this coming back to haunt you now?”

  “Easy to answer. Because Serena Redding is back and now she’s Mrs. Jerome Zeitz, so she has even more money and power than she did before. Oh wow, thanks, Jack. You’ve clarified it for me.”