4 Arch Enemy of Murder

by Vanessa Gray Bartal

  “Yes,” she said.

  “Where were you Tuesday?”

  “I worked until five.”

  “And after that?”

  “I went home. Alone.”

  “Did you go anywhere, see anyone?” Jason asked.

  She shook her head.

  “Out loud, please,” he prompted.

  “No. I didn’t go anywhere. I didn’t see anyone. I was home alone all night.”

  Arroyo leaned forward. “We removed a shotgun from your home. It had been recently fired. Do you have any explanation for that?”

  “I enjoy guns and shooting. I’m a member of the local range. I shoot often, and I’m an excellent shot.”

  Lacy groaned inwardly. She had no idea what to do or say to stop the avalanche.

  “Excellent enough to shoot a moving target at night?” Jason asked.

  Lacy leapt out of her chair and covered Pearl’s mouth with her hand. “Pearl, I am begging you not to answer that question,” she said. Pearl nodded.

  “Out loud, please,” Jason prompted.

  With a sigh of defeat, Lacy dropped her hand.

  “Yes,” Pearl said. “But I didn’t kill Jonah.”

  “May I have a moment alone with my client, please?” Lacy asked.

  “Seriously?” Detective Arroyo asked.

  “Yes, please,” Lacy said. She sat and folded her hands on the table in an attempt to look professional. Jason and the other detective slid their chairs back and excused themselves from the room. Lacy waited until the door clicked closed before she spoke. “Pearl, what are you doing? If you wanted to confess, then why did you bring me here?”

  “I didn’t confess,” Pearl said. She looked thoroughly baffled by the question.

  “You might as well have. You admitted you knew your husband was coming, you don’t have an alibi, and you admitted that you have a rifle and are an excellent shot.”

  “All of that is true,” Pearl said.

  “That doesn’t mean you have to say it. You have the right to remain silent. If you don’t say anything, then they have to do the work to prove your guilt. You just handed them a golden ticket,” Lacy said. “Why did you want me here if you won’t listen to my advice, paltry and ill-informed though it is?”

  “Because I want you to figure out who killed Jonah so I can get out of here.”

  “What are you talking about? Why me?”

  “Because you solved Eddie’s murder, and that Blake woman, and I looked up in the New York paper what happened. I know you solved another murder there.”

  Lacy pressed her fingers to her temples. “I didn’t solve any of those cases. In fact, I got them horribly wrong. It was only by the grace of God that I wasn’t murdered or arrested myself.”

  Pearl shook her head. “You solved them; I know it. And I need your help, I need you to do it again.”

  Lacy massaged her temples as she stared at Pearl in dismay. How was she to reason with someone for whom reality was a strange, new land? “Pearl, please get a real lawyer. I’m messing this up for you in a big way. You could go to prison for the rest of your life. Do you understand that?”

  “I’m not afraid of jail,” Pearl said. Lacy thought her fellow inmates were the ones who should be afraid. She shuddered to think of the poor schlep who would be forced to room with Pearl.

  Jason rapped on the door before pushing it open. “Minute’s up, and so is our question and answer session. Stand and put your hands behind your back, please. Not you, Lacy. Sit down.” Lacy sat and watched while Jason cuffed Pearl. Despite her dislike of the woman, it was a sad sight.

  “Pearl Clutterbuck Merleputter,” he paused and placed his hand over his mouth to cover a cough that sounded suspiciously like stifled laughter. He cleared his throat and continued. “You have the right to remain silent. Anything you say or do can and will be held against you in a court of law. You have the right to an attorney.” He paused to glance at Lacy and shake his head. “If you cannot afford an attorney, one will be provided for you. Do you understand these rights as I have just read them to you?”

  She nodded.

  “Out loud please.”

  “Yes,” she said. She sounded small and weak, and Lacy’s heart wrenched again.

  “Let the record show that the suspect has been advised of her rights,” Jason said, and then he clicked off the recorder. Detective Arroyo opened the door and reached for Pearl’s arm.

  “I’ll take her from here so you can see your girlfriend out.” The way he said “girlfriend” left little doubt as to his feelings on the matter of Lacy’s involvement with the case. Jason sighed as Pearl and the detective walked away, but he still put his arm around Lacy’s shoulders as he ushered her from the room.

  “Are you going to get some sleep now?” she asked.

  “Paperwork,” Jason mumbled.

  They paused on the jail side of the door. “Is there anything I can do to help? Do you need me to get your mail?”

  “No, uh, Cindy’s getting it for me.”

  She eased from under his arm. “Oh.”

  “There is one thing you could do,” he said.

  “What?” she asked, though some of her earlier enthusiasm was missing.

  “Stay away from this case.”

  “Okay.”

  “Okay? Just like that?”

  She nodded.

  “Why did that work now when it’s never worked before?” he asked.

  “Because before I had a compelling conviction that someone was wrongly accused. I think Pearl did it.”

  “You do?”

  “She had motive, means, opportunity, and no alibi,” she said. “Plus if there’s anyone in the world who I would believe capable of murder, it’s her. And it’s not as if she didn’t have some justification. Her husband sounded horrible—not that he deserved to die, but, you know.”

  “Yeah, I do, I just…wow, we agree on something. I’m not sure what to do with that feeling. Any ideas?” He was giving her the I-really-want-to-kiss-you look.

  “Maybe you could talk to Cindy about it,” Lacy suggested. Then she pulled open the door and walked to a waiting Tosh.

  Chapter 7

  “Want to grab breakfast?” Tosh asked.

  “What time is it?” Lacy asked.

  “A little before five.”

  “Sure.” Since she usually began her day at six, and since she didn’t envision being able to go back to sleep anytime soon, she might as well eat. They went to the diner where they had gone a year ago when they first met.

  “This is where we had our first date, although I guess it was never a date in your mind,” Tosh said as he picked up a menu.

  “Tosh,” she started, but he cut her off with a wave of his menu.

  “Forget it. I didn’t mean to bring anything up. I’m tired and frazzled. How did it go with Pearl?”

  “Horribly.” She told him all about the interview, about how Pearl hadn’t taken her advice, how she had basically told the detectives every incriminating thing she could think of.

  “We have a lot of work to do,” Tosh said.

  “How so?” Lacy asked.

  “If we’re going to get Pearl out.”

  “Oh, right. First things first, we have to call a real lawyer. Maybe he can get her to cop to an insanity defense. Her husband sounded like a truly horrible human being.”

  Tosh set down his menu and stared at her until she looked up. “Why would she do that when she’s innocent?” he asked when he finally had her full attention.

  “Innocent? Tosh, she did it.”

  “Did she say she did it?”

  “No, she said she was innocent.”

  “There you go.” He picked up his menu.

  “Tosh, people always say they’re innocent.”

  “Hmm, where could that cop-laced cynicism be coming from?” he asked.

  “Jason may be cynical, but that doesn’t mean he doesn’t have a point. Guilty people say they’re innocent all the time.”


  “And innocent people say they’re innocent and no one believes them. Like your grandmother.”

  “That’s different,” Lacy said.

  “How so?”

  “Because Grandma really was innocent,” Lacy said.

  “Just because you and Pearl haven’t gotten along well doesn’t mean you can condemn her for doing something she didn’t do,” Tosh said.

  “I’m not,” Lacy said. “The facts were there. She has no alibi. And if anyone is letting his emotions cloud his judgment, it’s you. You can’t see that she did it because you have a soft spot for her.”

  “So that’s it. You’re not going to help, not going to look into things and see if her story is true.”

  “The police are already doing that,” Lacy said.

  “The police have been wrong before,” Tosh pointed out.

  “They were wrong when it was Detective Brenner.”

  “Oh, I forgot that Mr. Perfect would never make a mistake,” Tosh said.

  “He’s not perfect, but he is thorough and good at his job,” Lacy said.

  “Why don’t you admit that his job isn’t what this is about,” Tosh said.

  “What are you talking about?”

  “I’m saying that this isn’t between who is right or wrong; this is between him and me, and you’re choosing him. Again.”

  “It’s not like that,” Lacy said.

  “It’s exactly like that,” Tosh said.

  “It’s not,” Lacy insisted.

  “Then prove it. Help me figure out what happened to Pearl’s husband.”

  Lacy dropped her head to her hands in frustration. Tosh wouldn’t believe her reluctance to help had more to do with Pearl’s guilt than Jason’s involvement. On the other hand, Jason had asked her to stay out of things. How was she to please them both? Though technically Jason had asked her to stop being Pearl’s attorney, not to stay out of the case. He hadn’t said a word about looking into things with Tosh. “I’ll help on one condition,” Lacy said.

  “Since when do we give each other conditions?” Tosh asked.

  “Since you started carrying a chip on your shoulder,” she replied. He opened his mouth, thought better of arguing, and closed it again. “I will help you try to figure out what happened if you will agree that I can’t represent Pearl anymore.”

  The waitress came to take their order before he answered. “I’ll try to find someone else for her, but I don’t see that happening before the arraignment. The guy at the jail said it would probably take place tomorrow. Pearl doesn’t warm up to people quickly. I’m going to need more time to break in someone new.”

  “An arraignment is where they plead guilty or not guilty, right?” Lacy asked.

  “I think so. I don’t think you actually have to do anything but be there and enter a plea,” Tosh said.

  “I could probably do that, but then that’s it. I’m serious, Tosh. I am no one’s Reese Witherspoon.”

  “What?”

  “Legally Blond.” He shrugged. She shook her head. “How can you say my cinematic education is lacking when you’ve never seen Reese Witherspoon’s finest performance?”

  “You’re right. Why have I been wasting my time with loser movies like Casablanca?”

  “I really don’t know,” Lacy said. Exhaustion kicked in, and they sat in comfortable silence a few minutes before their food arrived. Lacy had just taken a big bite of waffle when a shadow fell over the table.

  “Well, well, well, Pastor Underwood. How nice to see you up and about at six in the morning, and on a date, no less.” Janice, Maya, Rose, and Gladys formed what looked remarkably like a posse as they hovered disapprovingly next to the table.

  “Hello, ladies,” Tosh said in the friendly tone that never wavered no matter what the women said or did. “What brings you out so early this morning?”

  “Our weekly prayer breakfast,” Gladys said. “I believe we’ve invited you several times.”

  “So you have,” he said.

  Lacy did her best to try and remain inconspicuous, but it was a vain attempt. “Lacy, I see you’re enjoying that waffle,” Janice said. “I can’t eat a whole one by myself because they’re so big. Is that your first?”

  “Is this how you dress for a date?” Rose boomed before Lacy could try to reply.

  “Is this the end of the date or the beginning?” Maya wondered.

  Lacy made her bite of waffle last as long as possible so that Tosh would be forced to answer. “It’s not actually a date,” he said. “Lacy was kind enough to accompany me on an important errand, and we’re having breakfast before we part.”

  “What sort of errand happens in the middle of the night?” Gladys asked.

  “We had to make a visit to the sheriff’s office, but I’m sure you wouldn’t want me to break the confidentiality of one of my parishioners. Nothing worse than a gossip, is there, ladies?”

  Bless him for trying to make them squirm, Lacy thought. But either the women had no conscience anymore or they were busy trying to figure out who was at the sheriff’s office and why because none of them looked the least bit remorseful over their nosiness.

  “Did you see your other fella while you were at the sheriff’s office, Lacy?” Maya asked.

  Sensing danger, Lacy had quickly shoved a large bite of waffle in her mouth as soon as the question started. She gave Maya a helpless shrug and waved her fork in the direction of her mouth.

  “He was there,” Tosh answered for her.

  “I bet that was awkward, huh?” Janice added, but Lacy had shoved another piece of waffle in before the last one was swallowed. Her cheeks bulged. She pointed to them to explain her silence.

  The women waited her out. They stood eyeing her and chatting with Tosh as she slowly finished her waffle. As she swallowed the last bite, Rose took a breath, but Lacy dived for Tosh’s pancake and stuffed her mouth again. Rose blew out a breath that sounded a lot like defeat.

  “C’mon, ladies, let’s get to our table while there’s still food left to be eaten,” she said as she turned to go.

  “You should join us after you’re done,” Janice suggested.

  Lacy watched as Tosh desperately searched the recesses of his mind for an excuse. At last he pasted on a smile. “That sounds nice,” he said.

  Janice looked at Lacy. “Lacy, are you coming? We’ll order you another waffle or two.”

  “Work,” Lacy said around her bite of pancake. She swallowed and finished her sentence. “I have to open the Stakely building.”

  Janice didn’t reply except for a disgusted shake of her head as she walked away. “Why do they hate me so much?” Lacy whispered as soon as the women were gone.

  “Believe it or not, I think that’s their bizarre attempt to show you how much they care.”

  “You’ve got to be kidding me,” she said.

  “No, I’ve seen them with people they don’t like. They fawn.”

  “They fawn over Riley,” Lacy said.

  “There you go,” Tosh said.

  “But they love Riley.”

  “Do they? I have my doubts about that. I think when it comes to them, you’re the favored one.”

  “You’ve turned my world upside down,” Lacy said. She had never considered the possibility that her grandmother’s friends picked her apart because they cared about her, but she supposed that it made sense from their perspective. Why would they spend so much energy trying to improve someone they cared nothing about?

  “That’s what I’m here for,” Tosh said. He tossed some bills on the table, stood, and pulled her into a tight hug. “Thanks for being there when I needed you.”

  “Anytime,” Lacy said.

  “Sorry I left last night.”

  “Forget it. I’m only sorry we weren’t there to see Riley’s face when she realized she had no ride home.”

  Tosh’s shoulders shook as he laughed. “She’s a piece of work. Scientists should study your DNA.”

  She broke away and gave his chest a shove.
“Don’t lump me in with my sister.”

  “I call them like I see them. The Steele sisters are lethal.”

  “I’m leaving before you truly offend me,” Lacy said. He surprised her by leaning in to kiss her cheek.