Uncommon Grounds

by Sandra Balzo

  He put his hand over mine. “Listen to me.” His eyes were golden brown and very serious. “I’m not going to let Pavlik railroad you. You have to believe that.”

  The fact that Gary actually thought Pavlik might try to, scared the heck out of me in and of itself. “Then tell me what Way wanted.”

  He was fiddling with his pen, not looking at me. “Way came here to tell me that the newspaper was wrong. That someone else was at the shop after you.”

  I jumped up. “But that’s great! That means somebody else could have done it.” I stopped. Gary still wasn’t looking at me. “What’s wrong?”

  He finally set the pen aside and looked up. “I’m sorry, Maggy, but this muddies the waters even more. Way saw somebody leaving Uncommon Grounds by the back door on Saturday afternoon. It was Caron.”

  Chapter Five

  I sat back down. “Caron? He has to be wrong. Caron didn’t say anything about being at the shop this weekend, even when I told her I was the last one there. She wouldn’t—”

  Gary was shaking his head. “I know, I know. She didn’t say a word to me either. And I asked her point blank, when was the last time she was in Uncommon Grounds. If Way is right, she lied to me.”

  “But I’ve known Caron for twenty years,” I said flatly. “She doesn’t lie.”

  Gary leaned forward, and the chair squealed under his weight. “Well, I’ll tell you one thing. If she did, she’s in big trouble. Not only with me, but with Pavlik.”

  Pavlik. My mind was racing. If Caron lied, there had to be a good reason. “Gary, did you tell him about this?”

  “Pavlik? Not yet.”

  I let out a sigh of relief.

  “Don’t get too comfortable,” Gary warned. “You know I have to.”

  I had a bright idea. “Let me talk to her first. I’ll let you know what she says, then we can decide what to do. Maybe there’s a perfectly innocent explanation.”

  Which would still leave me hanging out to dry, of course. Talk about your Catch-22.

  Gary stood up. “There’s no ‘we,’ here, Maggy, and no ‘deciding what to do.’ I have to go to Pavlik on this, no matter what I think of him.”

  I stood up, too, and grabbed his arm. “Just wait half an hour. I’ll go see her right now.”

  Gary looked me in the eye, then looked away. “Tell you what I’ll do. I’ll leave a message on Pavlik’s voice mail for him to call. When he does, I’ll tell him what Way told me.”

  “So...”Iwasn’t sure how this would buy me time.

  Gary rolled his eyes. “Pavlik’s not very prompt about returning phone calls. It should give you that half an hour, at least.”

  Ohhhh. Good thinking. This way Gary would have fulfilled his professional obligation, and I’d still have time to fulfill my personal one. I hugged him and grabbed the newspaper I’d balanced on the corner of the desk. “You are a gem, thank you.” I swung around and headed out the door.

  Gary’s voice followed me. “Call me with what you find out, Maggy, but remember this isn’t my case. Anything I know goes straight to Pavlik.”

  Back in the parking lot, I checked my watch: 10:14 a.m. Caron had better be home. I was getting angrier at her by the second. How could she sit there last night and listen to me whine, knowing full well that I hadn’t been the last one in Uncommon Grounds?

  As I walked to my car, I allowed myself another thought. Maybe Way had lied. But why?

  Preoccupied, I realized too late that the woman bearing down on me from the Town Hall side of the parking lot was Kate McNamara, ace reporter. Between us stood my minivan. I increased my pace, trying to reach the van first. She did likewise. By the time we got to the Caravan, we were both practically at a dead run.

  “Maggy!” she demanded, puffing. Everything Kate said was either a demand or a command.

  I countered with “breezy.” “Hi, Kate, I’d love to chat, but I have an appointment.” I flashed her a smile and swung open the door of the van.

  She managed to avoid being hit by the door and wedged herself between it and the driver’s seat, so I couldn’t get in myself. Slick. I considered slamming the door on her, but balked at outright personal injury. Besides, I’d spent twenty years in PR and marketing, I could handle one small-town reporter.

  I stepped back and, reassured I wasn’t going to bolt, Kate moved out from behind the door. “I understand that you’re a suspect in Patricia Harper’s murder. Do you have a comment?”

  I nodded at the CitySentinel in Kate’s hand. “Researching your story, Kate?”

  She looked down at the newspaper and tucked it under her arm. “I’m on my way to see Chief Donovan and thought I should give you a chance to comment. That’s more than this rag did.”

  I just looked at her. Never rush to fill silences when you’re talking to a reporter. Make them ask the questions.

  She tried again. “So what happened, Maggy? I understand you were the last one to have access to the murder weapon.”

  I wondered if a frothing wand had ever been entered into evidence before. “Caron and I are both terribly upset by Pa-tricia’s death,” I said evenly, “and we will do whatever we can to assist the police in their investigation. Our thoughts are with David Harper and with Patricia’s two children, and we would hate for anyone to exploit the sad situation for the sake of a story.”

  Taking advantage of the fact that Kate was scribbling down the quote, I stepped around the door and into the driver’s seat.

  Then I drove off, leaving her in the dust, I hoped both literally and figuratively.

  * * * * *

  It was already 10:45 when I got to Caron’s house. “You lied to me and you lied to Gary,” I blasted her with when she opened the door. “Why?”

  Caron’s face crumpled, but she tried to cover. “What in the world are you—”

  I interrupted. “You told Gary you weren’t in Uncommon Grounds after you left on Friday.” I was moving toward her into the foyer as I spoke and she was giving ground. “Last night, you let me go on and on about my being the last one there. How could you?”

  By this time, I was in the foyer and she was practically backed into the antique table across from the door. Tears began to roll down her cheeks and I stopped, ashamed of myself. After all, Caron was not only my partner, but she was my friend. I owed her the chance to explain. “Can we sit down?”

  She nodded, the freckles standing out starkly against her pale face. Her good manners, even now, took over as she led me toward the living room. I steered her into the kitchen instead. This was not a living room conversation. We needed a table between us.

  Caron kept glancing at me, a question in her brown eyes.

  I answered it. “Way saw you leaving Uncommon Grounds on Saturday afternoon.”

  She nodded and sat down heavily at the table. I took the chair across from her and waited. Finally, she looked up to meet my eyes. She reminded me of a deer trapped in the middle of traffic. Run and be killed, or stay and be killed. The proverbial rock and the hard place.

  I decided to put her out of her misery. Reaching across the table, I took her hand. “Tell me,” I said.

  “I’ve done something horrible, Maggy. Oh God.” She put her hands to her face.

  My heart stood still. She had really done it. Caron had killed Patricia.

  “—got married in college,” Caron was saying. “He’s the only man I’d ever dated. Then we got married and had the kids—”

  Had the woman lost her mind? “What in the world are you talking about?” I demanded.

  She stopped and looked at me. “I’m having—had—an affair. It’s over.”

  My jaw dropped. Here I was thinking that my best friend had murdered someone by hot-wiring an espresso machine, and she was admitting to an affair. “You’re fooling around?”

  Caron watched her fingers trace the planks of the oak table. “That’s why I was at Uncommon Grounds on Saturday. I was meeting Roger.”

  Roger? Roger Karsten? The building inspector?
“Aww, geez, Caron. He’s what? Twenty-eight?”

  She nodded miserably. “I know, I know. I’ve been a fool. Bernie is a wonderful man. But I just wanted some excitement, I guess.”

  She was pleading for my understanding. I wasn’t sure if I could give it to her, at least right now.

  “You see,” she continued, “I’ve always done what was expected of me. Went to the right school, met the right guy, got married, had kids, bought a house. The whole load.”

  Yeah, I thought, the whole load—successful career, nice husband, good kids, big house in the country and more money than she could spend. Any thinking person’s nightmare.

  Caron was still talking. “Now that the kids are practically gone, I have time to think about what I want.”

  “And you want Roger Karsten?” I asked dryly.

  Her eyes dropped again. “Well, no, but he seemed to want me, and that made me feel—”

  “Like an idiot apparently. Does Bernie know?”

  She shook her head, seeming horrified at the thought. “Of course not. I ended it with Roger and hoped...”

  The dam broke again. I handed her a tissue and waited.

  “Maggy, what am I going to do? If I tell the police, Bernie will find out. If I don’t, they’ll think I had something to do with Patricia’s death.”

  Back to the rock and the hard place. “But you don’t have a choice. Way told Gary he saw you leaving by the back door. Gary left a message for the sheriff.” I checked my watch. It was a little after eleven. “He probably has it by now.”

  Caron looked as sick as I felt. “Maybe I can just say I stopped by to get something.”

  “And forgot to mention it? And who’s to say that nobody saw Roger?”

  Caron was thinking furiously. “I know. I’ll say there was a problem with the inspection and Roger had to come back Saturday afternoon and finish up.” She was getting up. “I’ll call Roger and tell him to say—”

  For a moment, hope burned bright. I was sorry to lift my leg on it. “Won’t work. I picked up the occupancy permit Saturday morning. It wouldn’t have been issued if he hadn’t finished the inspection.”

  Caron sat back down. “Maybe Roger forgot some-thing...”She trailed off.

  A tool perhaps. “That might work,” I said carefully. “The only thing anyone could prove was that you were there together. Who’s to say, except for the two of you, what you were doing there?” And where exactly you were doing it. The counter? The desk? I hoped she’d disinfected.

  Caron started for the phone on the planning desk. “I have to get hold of Roger.”

  “Will he lie for you?” I asked, wondering if I would, if it came right down to it.

  “He’d better,” she said grimly as she picked up the phone. “He owes me.” Just then the doorbell rang.

  “I’ll get that,” I said hastily and hurried out. I didn’t want to hear this particular conversation.

  My mind was racing as I went to the door. So Caron was having an affair. I tried to force myself to look at it objectively, to not put my personal experience into play. After all, plenty of women had affairs. For every cheating man, there was a cheating woman, right?

  Right. Dirtballs, all.

  I peeked out the etched glass sidelight of the door. As I’d feared, there was a county sheriff’s car in the driveway and a Pavlik at the door.

  I took a deep breath, released it and opened the door. “Sheriff, how nice to see you.” Too late, I realized it was an unlikely way to greet someone who suspected you of murder.

  To his credit, Pavlik didn’t remark on the welcome. “Thank you, Ms. Thorsen.” He stepped in, wearing a well-tailored gray cashmere topcoat. “Am I interrupting a business meeting?”

  “Oh, no...well, yes. I came over to talk to Caron about re-opening the store. I understand we can get back in later today?”

  Pavlik nodded. “We’ll be done by one or two this afternoon, but I’m afraid you’ll have a bit of a mess. Fingerprint powder, body fluids. We try to clean up the best we can, but...”He shrugged, smiling pleasantly.

  My stomach was churning. “I know it seems heartless,” I explained, “but we just can’t afford to stay closed long. There are loans and rent that have to be paid, no matter what.”

  “Of course, business is business. Your partner dying couldn’t come at a more inopportune time.” He moved in just close enough to make me feel uncomfortable, his eyes dark and watching me. “You know, Mrs. Harper was electrocuted.”

  I nodded.

  “The whole espresso machine was live. Somebody had rewired it. But I don’t have to tell you that, do I? You were there.”

  “There?” The word caught in my throat.

  “At the store, when Kevin took apart the machine. You were there.” He was watching me closely.

  I nodded again.

  He wasn’t done. “You shouldn’t have left so soon. You didn’t see the most interesting part.”

  He pulled a thick black electrical wire from his coat pocket. It was in another plastic bag. He pointed to a small green wire. “See that? It’s the ground wire.” He put it up to my face. “If you look real closely, you can see it’s been cut. Between that, the rubber mat being moved, and the skim milk we found on the floor...”

  He shrugged and put the bag back into his coat pocket, his eyes never leaving mine. “She was able to start making her drink because the handles on those portafilters of yours are plastic. And so are the buttons she had to push to brew the espresso. She probably didn’t even realize anything was wrong. Not until the moment she pulled out that frothing wand with her left hand, while picking up the metal pitcher from the stainless steel counter with her right.”

  His eyes were so dark now I couldn’t see the pupils, his body so close I could feel him breathe. “You see, the electricity entered her left hand, shot right across her body through the heart and then exited her right hand.”

  He traced the path up my left arm, across my shoulders and down my right, matching his words. His hand lingered on mine. “It probably blew the pitcher right off the counter.”

  His face was no farther than three inches from mine now. He turned and his cheek, rough with stubble, brushed me. His mouth was close to my ear. His voice, low.

  “Just how long do you suppose she hung there, Ms. Thorsen, before her heart finally stopped? Before she finally died, and her muscles released so she could fall? What do you think? A minute? Five minutes? Ten?” His breath was hot against my ear.

  I jerked back, nearly knocking the silk flower arrangement off the hall table.

  Just then, Caron breezed into the foyer. She looked like a different woman. Hair brushed, makeup repaired. “I’m sorry, I was on the phone. I’m Caron Egan.” She offered Pavlik her hand.

  He smiled and took it as if we had been making polite small talk while we waited for her. “Mrs. Egan, I’m Jake Pavlik, the county sheriff. Might I have a moment of your time?”

  Caron nodded and smiled back. “I recognize you from your campaign literature, Sheriff.” Before my very eyes, Caron had gone from trapped animal to coquette.

  As for myself, I needed to get out. And now. I flung open the door and started down the walk, talking to Caron over my shoulder as I went. “I’ll call L’Cafe to see if we can get a loaner installed this afternoon. The sheriff says we can get back into the shop around two.”

  I was at the van, fumbling to get my keys out of my purse, when Pavlik called my name. I had to force myself to turn and look back. He and Caron still stood in the doorway. Caron had a puzzled look on her face.

  Pavlik smiled politely, a different man than the one who had mentally assaulted me just now. “Ms. Thorsen, where will I find you later?”

  I struggled to control my voice, show a little bravado even. “L’Cafe or Uncommon Grounds maybe. You’ll just have to find me.”

  Pavlik raised his eyebrows. “Oh, believe me, Ms. Thorsen, if I want you, I will.”

  Chapter Six

  After Caron an
d Pavlik closed the door, I sat in my van trying to get the shaking under control. I must have sat there for twenty minutes before I finally reached for the ignition, and then only because I didn’t want to still be there when Pavlik came out.

  I put the van into reverse. My foot was trembling so badly on the accelerator that the Caravan bucked all the way down the driveway. Stopping at the end, I waited for traffic on Pleasant to pass.

  Damn Pavlik. And damn me. I’d fed him just the reaction he’d probably been after. But did he really believe I’d killed Patricia? The whole idea was ridiculous.

  Melodramatic.

  Scary as hell.

  So what did he expect me to do now? Run?

  I stepped on the gas and the van shot backwards out onto the street right in front of a Lexus. The Lexus’ horn blared and the driver swerved around me, taking the time to throw me the finger as he did.

  I waved back and drove myself to the police station. Gary took one look at my face and led me back to his office, where I sat as he poured us each a cup of coffee.

  “Milk?” Gary asked, handing me a mug.

  Having experienced Gary’s idea of coffee, I nodded. At Uncommon Grounds, our policy was to dump any pot that sat on the heating element longer than thirty minutes. Gary, on the other hand, preferred his coffee “aged,” like fine wine. But who was I to look a caffeinated gift horse in the mouth?

  Gary went to his fridge and pulled out a red and white half-pint of whole milk that looked suspiciously like he’d filched it from Brookhills Elementary the last time he did his “Stranger Danger” talk. I wondered how long ago that had been.

  Apparently so did Gary. He dumped half the carton into his own mug and peered into its depths before declaring the milk “okay” and sliding it over to me.

  It was sort of like having a royal taster in times of yore. Or a canary in the mines. I used the rest of the carton in my coffee, transforming it from black sludge to gray sludge, and took a sip.

  “Better?” Gary asked, watching me.

  “Much, thank you,” I said hoarsely.