Cold Feet (Five Star Mystery Series)

by Karen Pullen

  Hogan called when I was halfway to Fern’s. “I must admit failure,” he said. “I couldn’t find a record of Jax Covas’s divorce.”

  “Darn,” I said. “I did so want to impress that sergeant.”

  “But he married a woman named Lynda Christina Pons in 1972, in Amarillo, Texas.”

  “Brilliant! Now tell me her North Carolina address.”

  “Alas. Couldn’t find her. Two failures in one day.”

  “A record for you, isn’t it?”

  “It’s a personal worst. But I got hits on the bracelet.”

  I felt a jolt of excitement at this bit of news. At the same time I noticed a herd of brown cows, my marker on Highway 64 for a cell phone dead zone. “Hold on, I’ve got to pull over before I lose you.” On one side of the highway, a forest of scrubby trees sported autumnal gold and scarlet, and on the other, fat hay rolls dotted the fields. No cell phone towers in sight. I got out of the car and walked back a hundred feet. One curious cow took a few steps in my direction to get a closer look. “Okay, shoot,” I said.

  “Remember the charms? I started with two bona fide facts. The mystery woman’s a teacher, born on April 2. So I contacted the Educational Testing Service, since all teachers have to take one of their exams, the PRAXIS. I asked them to tell me the names of anyone who took the PRAXIS who had that birthday. They wouldn’t tell me without a subpoena.”

  “You knew that would happen.”

  “Not always, you’d be surprised. So I put my mom on the case. She called a friend of hers who works in the Department of Public Instruction, and told her she’d found this teacher’s bracelet with a birth date. Her friend came back with six names, and one of them you’ll recognize.”

  “Your mom rocks. What’s the name?” I inspected a grassy spot for cow patties and sat down.

  “What was the name. She’s dead. Emma Grantham McMahon.”

  Gregor McMahon’s wife, who died at the picnic six months ago. I thought back to my interview with Gregor. He’d said he’d first met Justine at the picnic, on the day Emma died. I had assumed that’s when Emma first met her, too. How did her bracelet end up in Justine’s B&B room, six months later? This could be nothing. It could be everything.

  “Can you dig a little more? Look for a connection between

  Justine and Emma. Something has to make sense.”

  “Even geniuses have limits, Stella.”

  “Aw, come on.You owe me. For all those years I washed your socks.”

  He laughed. “And I cooked your dinner. Okay, I’ll work on it and get back to you.” He hung up.

  From a twiggy shrub nearby came a performance equal to any symphony as a mockingbird trilled brilliantly through his repertoire. Soothed by a warm breeze, I lay back in the grass and closed my eyes to listen. An approaching car slowed, then pulled over and stopped just past me. A woman leaned out the door. “Need a hand?” she called.

  I waved her off. I guess I did look needy, lying back behind my car in the grass. I shut my eyes and waited for my intuition to work, but nothing emerged from my subconscious about Gregor McMahon, the furry corporate economist, part-time professor, best man at Mike’s wedding. Yet I thought I should look at Gia Mabe’s camera one more time.

  I stood and brushed myself off. The curious cow stared at me. “How now?” I asked. “How now?” Her jaws rolled as she chewed thoughtfully on her cud.

  A sharp wind whipped my hair into a froth as I trotted along a woodsy path in the Eno River State Park, trying to keep up with the director of the North Carolina Birthing Center. She’d suggested the walk for a bit of midday exercise. Monica Reardon was an aged flower-child, with wispy, flowing gray hair, a long denim skirt, crinkled blouse, and clogs. From a piece of string around her neck hung an amulet, a cobalt blue glass bead with a white and yellow eye like an egg. “We give one of these to each new baby,” she said. “It’s an evil eye bead, to protect against evil spirits. Looks like you could use one right now. How do you feel?”

  I gave her my now-standard response—looks worse than it feels, only hurts when I smile. The bead seemed the perfect size to choke an infant. Guess that was why the birthing center carried liability insurance, which was on my mind when I scheduled this interview.

  “You know I’m investigating the poisoning murder of Justine Bradley. I need to know whether there was any relationship between Justine and Lottie Ember, one of your patients. Alice Ember was born here, and her parents sued.” I didn’t ask whether they’d given Alice her very own bead.

  She grimaced and shook her head. “Justine had just started working here when the Embers came in to have their baby. But she wasn’t the midwife, I was.”

  “So Justine wasn’t involved in the lawsuit,” I said. Monica set a brisk pace, her arms pumping and a long heel-to-toe stride, longer than mine, so every now and then I had to insert a little jog to stay abreast.

  “Well, Justine was named in the lawsuit, because she had made notes during some of Lottie’s labor.”

  Lottie had certainly not mentioned that when I first interviewed her. Well, I hadn’t asked her directly, had I? I assumed she’d first met Justine at the picnic like the rest of Mike’s friends. Lesson to self—never assume. “Did the Embers win their case?” I asked.

  “Partly. It went on over two years, what with discovery and depositions and counterclaims.” She clutched her hair. “Turned me completely gray. It was awful.”

  We reached the Eno River, low and slow because of the drought, and paused at a wooden viewing platform. A red-tailed hawk flew overhead, following the river. At its “scree, scree,” I looked up. An eagle had entered its territory. Though the eagle was much larger, the hawk dived at it repeatedly until the eagle soared away. A reminder that you don’t have to be the biggest to win, just the one with the most to lose.

  “So they received a settlement?” I asked.

  “A million dollars.”

  Not much, given the severity of Alice’s disability. I asked how the amount was arrived at.

  “I know what you’re getting at. These cases sometimes settle for five, ten million or more. But my insurance company took a hard line after Justine was deposed, because she backed me up completely.”

  “What was the basis for the lawsuit?”

  “The Embers claimed I ignored warning signs during Lottie’s labor.”

  “Such as?”

  “Fetal heart rate changes.”

  “Did you monitor the baby’s heart rate?”

  “Of course, but we don’t use electronic fetal monitoring. It’s not in the protocol for a normal low-risk childbirth. Instead, we intermittently auscultate.”

  “Auscultate?”

  “We have a handheld ultrasound device that amplifies the sound of the fetal heart. During the second stage of labor, I made a note in the record every five minutes. The baby’s heartbeat was well within normal limits, with no unusual accelerations or decelerations. The Ember’s attorney subpoenaed the records, and tried to make a case that they’d been altered, because the handwriting was different for some of the entries. But Justine backed me up. She had made some of the entries, I had made some. We showed the attorney other records where the same practice was obvious. They had to let it go; the fetal heart rate showed no distress.”

  “So, due to Justine’s testimony, the Embers had to settle for considerably less,” I said. A motive for murder? After all, the Embers came to Mike and Justine’s wedding. So they didn’t seem to be holding a grudge. Unless they planned all along to attend and exact some retribution during the wedding weekend? That seemed improbable. But everything about this case seemed improbable, starting with the murder of a bride.

  We started back toward the park entrance. The rude wind was now at our backs so it was a bit easier to keep up with Monica’s long stride. “I don’t think they should’ve gotten a dime,” she said. “I did nothing wrong, it was a perfectly normal birth. These things happen, and it’s normal to want to blame someone, but a million dollars?
Our insurance costs are second only to our payroll.”

  She stopped and took a deep breath, standing straight with her hand on her back. “Women have managed to give birth for a hundred thousand years without Pitocin and fetal monitors. I wanted to give them a technology-free option. But it’s been a constant struggle with the medical profession, the state, the insurance agencies and lawyers. No one wants us here except the mothers.” We reached a small park, a nook with a fountain, and we sat down on a bench. “Justine’s going to be hard to replace.”

  “Because everyone liked her?” I asked.

  “Hmmm. She wasn’t warm and huggy. But she was very good. She took the time to explain things clearly. Women, even the first-time moms, knew exactly what was going on. Knowledge goes a long way to reduce fear. She could talk them through it.”

  “Did they know she was transsexual?”

  Monica whipped her head around and her face looked a lot less friendly. “What? Are you kidding? She was a man?”

  “She was born male. She transitioned to female about seven years ago.”

  She fondled her evil eye as she pondered the implications of this news. “Honestly, it’s impossible to believe. She was so feminine. I never would have guessed. Why was she murdered?”

  I shrugged. “We don’t have a viable suspect. So the answer is, I don’t know.”

  Monica Reardon was polite enough, and forthcoming, but she didn’t offer me an evil eye bead. And I could have used it.

  I called the sheriff’s department and inquired about Gia Mabe. The duty officer told me she’d been taken to the hospital in Chapel Hill and admitted to a psychiatric unit. So I spent an hour obtaining a warrant to search her home for the camera, then drove to her address, an old brick school renovated into condos. The street had begun a slow evolution into gentrification. A Realtor, an artsy-crafts store, and a bistro with a chalkboard menu on the sidewalk were neighbors to a dusty-windowed appliance stockroom and two dead storefronts. I showed the warrant to the building supervisor and he unlocked the door to Gia’s apartment.

  I halted at the threshold to drink in the gorgeousness of the place. Apparently a biotech salary could buy some fine details—re-pointed brick walls, granite countertops, and recycled antique pine floors. The generous open space was furnished with a long low couch covered in thick dove-gray plush, a twiggy rocker, and glass coffee table, all grouped in front of a ceiling-high stone fireplace. A farmhouse dining table nestled amid a jungle of leafy green plants well-nourished by the sunlight pouring through a solarium wall. It was restful, pleasant, nice. Unlike Gia. In the midst of the plants I noticed a little movement, then sharp white teeth in a pink mouth as a black kitten yawned. It stood, arched its back in a stretch, then walked over to me to investigate. I touched its bony little head and it began a mad purring.

  Gia’s camera sat handily on the kitchen counter. I turned it on and searched her photographs. A week-ago Saturday, wedding day. Mike, Mike, Mike, starting at twelve-twenty. Twenty minutes later, Mike was on the phone, making his call to Justine. Then Mike was standing in front of the guests with his stepfather Scoop in his ministerial robe and the sullen Evan Ember. Just the three of them. Gregor McMahon and his cervical collar didn’t show up in any of the pictures until exactly one o’clock. The moment of the scheduled start of the wedding. Wherever he was until then, it wasn’t where Gia wanted to aim her lens.

  Once I found the camera, my legal right to search ended. However, I didn’t think a quick look through Gia’s effects was out of order. I didn’t plan to uncover any evidence against her, just snoop a bit and see where it might lead. The hallway was a gallery of framed photographs, all seemingly from the pre-breakup period, evidence of Gia and Mike together in happier times. One photo had been enlarged to sixteen by twenty and placed in the center of the rest. It showed a group of people sitting around a bonfire, toasting marshmallows on sticks. Firelight illuminated their faces. I noticed Gia and Mike sitting close together, smiling at each other. Kate and Ingrid were in the picture too, Kate’s arms mid-fling as Ingrid sipped a beer. And was that Gregor McMahon? Sans cervical collar, wearing tee-shirt and baggy shorts, he looked relaxed and happy. Even Lottie and Evan were there—Lottie in maternity clothes, Evan many pounds thinner. They leaned into each other, posing for the camera, each holding a marshmallow on a stick to the other’s mouth. Lottie’s pregnancy made it easy to date this photo-graph—when I met Alice in Lottie’s chocolate shop, Lottie told me she had just turned four. There were three other women in the picture but I didn’t recognize them. Gia had lost more than a lover when Mike and she parted; she had lost a family of friends.

  The kitten followed me into Gia’s impressive walk-in closet, bigger than my bedroom, where I found more evidence of Mikefixation—boxes of memorabilia, including random pieces of his clothes and junk mail. Gia had a nice wardrobe, I observed idly, neat and well organized, though very corporate, not really my style of clothing. Then I noticed a pair of jeans still sporting price and size tags. Really nice jeans, medium wash with a distinctive turquoise thread. Hmmm. I checked out the pockets—rounded, with a circular appliqué and stitching like rays from the center. I recognized these jeans. I liked those jeans, just as much now as when I had bought them. They were my jeans, stolen from my house in the break-in.

  I sat down on the floor of the closet to reorder my thinking. Gia had broken into my house and trashed it. Not Jax. A heaviness left me, a burden I didn’t even realize I’d carried. I wasn’t afraid of Gia, despite her love-crazed shotgun-totin’ ways. She was scary like a tarantula—to be avoided, certainly, but not that interested in my demise. Jax, on the other hand, was a different species, a predator species.

  In a dresser drawer I found my nightgown. Black lace with spaghetti straps and a scalloped hem, still wearing store tags. Mine. Gia, you are where you belong, on a locked ward. “Woohee,” I whispered, picking up the kitten and pressing my cheek into its fur. “Your mommy’s also a burglar.” It stretched out a paw and touched my nose.

  I would let the Verwood police know they could close the case of the break-in to my house. Gia’s troubles with the law were only beginning and she’d probably lose her job if convicted. She’d have to sell this pretty apartment. Would kitty need a home? Kitty’s black fur had a reflected luster like velvet. Velvet, that would be a good name for a black kitten. I found a stash of cat food and opened a can of salmon dinner. Velvet lit into it with a growl. I refilled a water bowl beside the fridge, added another for good measure, and on my way out I found the super and asked him to feed the kitten until Gia returned.

  I picked up a bagel and a coffee at the bistro next to the condo building, and took them back to my car. I was pleased to have the jeans and nightgown back, and pleased that the mystery of who trashed my house was solved, but the jeans were too small, and there was no point in putting on a spaghetti-strap black lace negligee just to sleep with Merle. He preferred flannel.

  At the red mailbox I slowed to turn into Fern’s lane, but braked when I saw a car coming toward me, a super-sized black SUV scraping its way through the scrubby brush. I reversed and backed out onto the highway shoulder to let the mammoth vehicle pass. Its dark-tinted windows reflected the light, and I couldn’t see inside. One of Fern’s admirers, no doubt.

  I pulled up to the farmhouse and opened the car door to let Merle out. He bounded toward the donkey pen, stopping every few feet to sniff and explore. Fern came out onto the porch. I noticed right away that something was wrong. Her blue eyes were too big, her expression too strained, and when I hugged her, her body was trembling.

  “What’s wrong?”

  “You just missed Jax,” she said.

  “That was Jax in the Navigator?” I tried to control my reaction but Jax’s appearance at my grandmother’s was no friendly little visit.

  “He dropped off some roof tiles and screening. Said he’d be back later. Asked where you were.” She took my hand and squeezed it tightly. “Bebe’s hiding somewhere. I can�
�t find her or Ollie.”

  Certainly she’s hiding. We should all be hiding. I took a deep breath. “Fern.”

  “I know,” she said. “I pretended everything was all right. So did he.”

  It was one thing to wrestle with Dana as she injected me with opiates. One thing to lock eyes with the demented Gia, wait for her to drop her guard and her gun. It was something else entirely to know that Jax had my grandmother in his sights.

  “We’re getting out of here now,” I said. “Pack something quick. I’ll find Bebe.”

  She nodded and went into the house. I followed and started up the stairs, calling out, “Bebe! Where are you?”

  In the bedroom where they’d been sleeping, the bed was neatly made, with my old teddy bear and a couple of Barbie dolls that had been in the attic resting on the pillows. I stood still and listened but heard only a tick, tick, tick as a honey bee knocked against the window, trying to get out. My heart pounded a similar rhythm. “Bebe! We’re leaving!”

  At the end of the hall, behind a narrow door, was the attic, an unfinished space under the eaves. I opened the door and peered in. The space was hot, dusty, and cluttered with over a century of boxes, trunks, dressers, coat racks, mirrors. “Bebe,” I said, “Jax is gone and I’m going to take you somewhere else for a while. Somewhere safe.”

  I heard a rustle from behind a chifferobe, and the little boy crawled out. He met my gaze with a solemn expression. “We’re playing hide-and-seek,” he said. “Mommy said to be very quiet.”

  “Where is she?” I asked.

  He shrugged.

  “Well, come on. We have to find her.” I poked around, looking inside, behind, and underneath, but Bebe wasn’t in the room. We went out into the hall, and I decided to check the bathroom.

  Behind the shower curtain, Bebe sat in the bathtub, knees and arms folded around her big belly. “It’s goddam uncomfortable in here,” she said. “This tub is cast iron. Help me out.” I held out my hand and she tugged herself up and stepped awkwardly out of the tub.