Office Heretics (A Coffee & Crime Mystery Book 2)

by Nan Sampson

  Muriel sat down and poured herself some coffee before passing the carafe to Ellie. "I understand you own a coffee shop."

  Ellie sat, poured a cup, but waved off the proffered pastry. "Yes. It's nothing fancy, but I'm quite proud of it."

  "Lacey mentioned you had your grand opening in the spring. You're very brave. It's a hell of a market to open up a new business."

  So Lacey had known about her grand opening? That felt weird somehow, although she assumed that Kate had been the one to tell her. Ellie shrugged. "I had a good business plan. And sometimes you just have to just 'do it'." She took an apprehensive sip of the coffee. It wasn't bad.

  "Well, I applaud your initiative." The woman, who had already made one cheese Danish vanish, reached into the box for a Long John and bit into it with relish. "Oh my,” she murmured around a mouthful of iced dough. “Pastry is my absolute weakness." She rolled her eyes with pleasure. "Something Lacey was always teasing me about."

  Teasing? Lacey didn't tease. Noting Muriel's extra pounds, and knowing Lacey thought anyone carrying extra weight was lazy and lacking self-control, Ellie could only imagine what that 'teasing' had been like. "We all have our weaknesses. Even Lacey, although she'd be the last to admit it. She could be critical sometimes. At least, she used to be."

  Muriel waved the Long John. Was her smile a little strained? "She didn't mean anything by it. It was just her way. And as Rob always said, she was really good at her job, and that's really why we're here, right?"

  Ellie refrained from saying 'whatever gets you through the night'. She glanced around Muriel's office, noting a couple of photos on the credenza behind the desk, group shots with little gold plaques on the frames below the photos. Some sort of commemoration she thought, or an award ceremony. No personal photos though. There was one odd thing - a little ornamental bowl containing coarse chunks of salt and a small figurine that, at least from where Ellie was sitting, looked like a tiny replica of the Willendorf Venus. Her gaze flicked up to Muriel's eyes - was she also pagan? "What an interesting little carving you have there."

  Muriel followed Ellie's gesture. "Oh. Oh that. Something one of my sisters gave me. She said it would bring me good luck. I'm supposed to put some oil in there too - lavender I think -- to make the office smell good and to help me relax." She waved her hand again. "But I don't believe in all that woo-woo stuff. I just keep it here because Jan comes by for lunch and I don't want to hurt her feelings."

  Maybe Jan was the pagan and the buzz of energy she'd felt at the threshold of Muriel's office had come from Muriel's sister, not Lacey. She responded with the only thing she could think of. "Must be nice to have family close."

  "Oh, absolutely. And you? Do you have family here in Chicago?"

  The question had the weight of something behind it, even though it seemed innocent enough. It was asked just like Lacey would have asked it - knowing it would cause pain. "No." She took a sip of her coffee and let the silence reign, unwilling to elaborate.

  After a moment, Muriel dropped her eyes and Ellie smiled inwardly. Lacey never would have looked away, and in that moment she almost admired her friend for her tenacity. Whatever else she was, Lacey was no quitter. She always went hard after what she wanted. Ellie set down her coffee cup and stood. "I really shouldn't keep you from your day any longer. Thank you so much for thinking to contact me about Lacey's belongings."

  Muriel frowned as though disappointed, then stood. "Um, of course." She stood, turned and grabbed a banker's box from the end of the credenza. "There really wasn't too much. Lacey was utterly fanatical about keeping a neat office, but I thought you would at least want the photo of the two of you with that other young woman. Oh, and right on top I put her attorney’s business card. You’ll naturally want to contact him."

  Ellie refused to remove the lid of the box and look inside - at least not while she was here. She took the box from Muriel's hands, noting how very light it was. "Her attorney?”

  “So you can notify him of Lacey’s death,” Muriel said quickly. “Surely she had a will of some kind.”

  Ellie felt her face flush. Oh, if Muriel only knew. She examined the other woman’s face – did she know? Muriel’s expression was utterly passive, so perhaps not. “Well. Thanks again."

  "Oh, you're very welcome. Here, I'll walk you out."

  "That's really not necessary. I'm sure you're very busy."

  "No, no it's the least I can do." The woman ushered her out of her office and led her around the perimeter of the sea of cubes again. Her stride was short, but her steps were brisk, authoritative. It felt to Ellie like she was parading, posturing, for the grunts in the cubes. With a sharp look, she glanced back at Ellie as they walked. "So have the police made any progress in finding who, um, killed Lacey?"

  Ellie felt the hairs stand up on the back of her neck, felt the air grow chill. Oh no, she thought. Not here, Lacey. I will not make a fool of myself in an office. Doing her best to block her awareness of Lacey, Ellie focused on Muriel's question. "No, not as far as I am aware. But they aren't exactly keeping me in the loop."

  "Oh. I thought you would be keeping up with them." It was a sly criticism. Ellie gritted her teeth, kept on smiling, while around her the temperature of the air was dropping like a stone in a pond. No, she told Lacey in her mind. Not here. Please, if you were ever my friend, not here!

  “Perhaps if you called them – I mean, surely you’re interested.”

  They crossed into the lobby and Muriel stopped, turned to face Ellie, apparently waiting for a response.

  Ellie struggled to keep her expression pleasant, all the while fighting to keep the keen awareness of Lacey’s presence under wraps. "Well, you know how cops are. I'm sure they'll let us know when they finally catch whoever did it."

  "Ah. Of course." There it was again, that whiff of disapproval. Muriel stuck out her hand then realized Ellie was holding the box. "Oh, sorry. Well, I'll see you at the memorial service then. I’ve almost finished my little farewell. I hope Lacey will like it.” Her eyes glittered and her smile was too wide. Ellie couldn’t wait to get out of the woman’s presence. She was pretty sure Lacey hadn’t liked her any better than Ellie did. “Thank you for coming into the city."

  "Of course." Ellie refused to get into a "thanking" match, so she gave the woman a nod. With a 'See you soon' over her shoulder, she made a hasty retreat to the elevators. Thankfully, as soon as the doors closed, both Muriel and Lacey vanished.

  Chapter 28

  Lacey's condo was a loft space in one of the old factory buildings that had been completely renovated. The space was enormous, the ceilings a good twenty feet high, and in the typical loft style, there were few interior walls, making it feel a lot like a cavern to Ellie. This was not a space she could have lived in. Her own little cottage, even including the small out-building that she stored her gardening equipment in could have fit in the area designated as the living room.

  Kate had been right about the lack of personality. Well, no, that wasn't it exactly. It had a personality alright, just a really cold, sterile one. There was nothing here apart from a few photographs that said "this is where Lacey Silberson lives". It could have been furnished for anyone, like a luxury hotel, lovely to look at, very posh and comfortable, but completely impersonal.

  She passed into the area that was Lacey's bedroom. This area had actual interior walls, but there wasn't a door, just a sort of narrow opening. The bed was a king, and covered in an off-white satin-finished coverlet, with about half a dozen pillow of various shapes and sizes lined up artfully against the headboard.

  She started with the dresser with its neat arrangement of perfume bottles on a glass tray. Each drawer was meticulously organized, stockings, pantyhose and socks all folded neatly in one drawer, underwear in another, bras in a third across the top. Next down were sweaters, folded perfectly, some t-shirts, and in the bottom row of drawers were jeans and a couple of pairs of shorts.

  A little part of her wanted to rumple everything up, or
maybe toss some things on to the chair in the corner, but she resisted. Feeling as though Lacey were following her around, she started speaking aloud to her. "Damn, girl, you needed medication. This is just way too anal."

  She went next to the closet and had to shake her head. It was like something out of a magazine or one of those home make-over shows. There was an elaborate and expensive closet system in place, with wooden shelves and drawers. Everything that was hung was at least an inch away from the clothes that hung on either side of it. And the shoes – of which there were several dozen pair – were all neatly arranged in a rows on special slanted shoe shelves. It was kind of creepy. She backed out, glancing up and behind her at the imaginary Lacey. "Okay, this is just wrong, Lacey. How can you live like this? How did you even have time to keep things like this? It would take me all day just to put my clothes away after doing laundry."

  She sat down on the edge of the bed, feeling frustrated and sad. Had Lacey always been like this? How could she have not seen this side of her? Had she really known her that little?

  Clearly, she needed a different approach. Okay, she asked herself, if someone were to come into my house and wanted to find out something about the real me, where would they look? A laugh bubbled up. She lived in a one room cabin with virtually no storage. That alone said something, she supposed.

  She scanned the room, the moved around to the side of the bed closest to the door. There was a nightstand on either side, but if this were Ellie's place, this would be the side she'd sleep on. There were two drawers and she opened up the top one first.

  Aha! The first signs of normalcy. There was some sign of disorganization here. Even a few crumbs – maybe chocolate chip cookie crumbs, if she recalled Lacey's favorite baked vice correctly.

  She made a little room on the bed then took things out of the drawer one by one. First, a notebook and a pen, rubber banded to the cover and holding the notebook closed. It was 5 x 8, leather bound, with ruled pages, the kind of thing you might get from Levengers. She set that aside, wanting time to digest whatever it might have written inside it. Next was a tube of hand crème, something called Paradise, part of a line of products from Bermuda, according to the bottle. She flipped the lid, squirted a little in her hand, rubbed it in. The scent was a little spicy, a little floral, and definitely expensive.

  She set that aside, made sure the lotion was completely rubbed in, then reached into the drawer again. This time she pulled out a little plastic bottle with a blue gel-like substance in it. Most of the words printed on the bottle had worn off, but it didn't take a rocket scientist to figure out what the stuff was, particularly as she had a similar sort of bottle in her own bedside drawer.

  "So you either didn't have a boyfriend, or he wasn't very 'stimulating', eh?" She chuckled, setting aside the little bottle of climax gel, and pulled out the next item, reaching into the drawer almost blindly, treating it almost as a game.

  A bottle of Excedrin Migraine. Very telling. Then came a prescription bottle for Valium, written about six months prior for a quantity of thirty pills. She opened it up, counted the pills remaining, found there were not quite fourteen missing. And the prescription still had a refill remaining. Okay, so not popping these regularly, but she had them and had used them at some point for something.

  She reached in again, but other than the crumbs, the drawer was empty. Or was it? She remembered in old mystery movies from the seventies that people would hide things in envelopes taped to the sides of drawers. So she tried to pull the drawer all the way out. The tracks on the drawer wouldn't budge and she felt she'd probably break something if she tried to force it. So once again, Nancy Drew had failed her. She thought for a moment, unwilling to let go of the idea that there was something else there.

  Getting down onto the floor on her knees, she peered into the drawer. Was there something taped to the top there? Or was that just part of the nightstand itself? She reached in, feeling around the underside of the top of the nightstand. There was something there, something papery, but it felt as if it were glued to the wood. Would Lacey glue something there and if so why? She'd never be able to get to it.

  She found a corner, scraped at it with her fingernail, trying to pry up enough to pull it. When she got her fingers around an edge, she eased it towards her, but like the label on a wine bottle, it sheared, and all she wound up with was an uneven strip of curled paper.

  "Damn it!" Unfurling it, she tried to make out what it was. At first she thought it might be a label from the furniture maker, but the printing of the letters that she could make out looked hand-written.

  She looked up again, towards the ceiling. "What the heck, Lacey? What is this?"

  She looked closely at the paper. It was old, yellowed with age, and the writing, although sparse in the piece that had torn free, was vaguely familiar. Or she was just fooling herself into thinking it was.

  She reached into the drawer again and tried to pull loose another corner. The paper still pulled away in a strip, but it was a bigger piece this time. Well, then, fine, she'd just have to piece it together later. She set to work then, determined to pull as much of it free as she could and still preserve most of what was written on it.

  A large piece came free from the center next, as though maybe the middle didn't have as much glue on it. And then something dropped down into the drawer with a small clunk.

  It startled her and she banged her hand against the drawer frame as she pulled it out reflexively with an audible gasp.

  "Damn!" She swore at herself. "No startle reflex there. Jeez." She took a deep breath to calm her pounding heart, then reached into the drawer again to pull out a small key. From its flat shape ad multiple ridges, it looked like a safety deposit box key.

  "Okay, Lacey, once again, too bizarre. Why would you hide a key like this? Who but you could get into your safe deposit box anyway? And what's with the paper?"

  She pocketed the key, the laid the strips of paper she'd pulled off the wood out onto the bed, moving them around until the pieces of the puzzle formed a rough rectangle.

  It was an old piece of three-ring notebook paper, and the hand writing was familiar because it was from the Lacey of long ago. As most of the words fell into place, and despite the absence of portions of it that were still stuck to the drawer, once she read the first few lines, she knew what the paper was.

  It was a banishing ritual they'd come up with in college. The most powerful spell the three of them had ever written together. Written, she remembered, in the days when the idea of casting spells held that magical, fantastical hold over them. It was the reason, she believed that Lacey had turned to Wicca. It wasn't her connection with the Goddess or her belief in the Rede and an abiding love of nature. It was the spell casting.

  This spell was supposed to be an emergency kind of thing, the power house of their spell casting arsenal. Unlike so-called black magic, it wasn't designed to cause anyone harm, simply to deflect negative energy someone might be directing your way back to the sender. Lacey had helped them craft the words, she'd been a master at rhyming, and Kate and Ellie had created the ritual activities that went along with it. A black candle to absorb energy, a handful of mirrors to reflect it, and a white ribbon for purity. They'd cast a circle, then use salt and blessed water to scrub down and cleanse the 'victim' of any negativity. Then the two 'unafflicted' ones would use their besoms – the official term for a witch's broom -- to 'sweep' the negative energy out of the circle, away from the victim and towards the mirrors, where it would be reflected back to the 'bad guy'. In their heads, at the time, the bad guy was just that – some guy who, in their overdramatized lives, had somehow done them wrong.

  And here it was, the most 'powerful' spell they'd ever written as a trio, and one Ellie had completely and utterly forgotten about, written in a faint brown ink on an old piece of notebook paper.

  She looked at the writing, realized Lacey must have written it with that silly ostrich quill pen she used to have. And the brown ink.... No, it
couldn't be. She wouldn't have been so dramatic as to commit the damn spell to paper in blood. And yet, that's what it looked like. And it fit Lacey's pre-occupation with the power of blood magick.

  Silly. Dramatic. And nonsense. But Lacey had bought into it.

  But why would she have pasted this old spell into her nightstand drawer with a key hidden under it? It had to be important – clearly it had been serious business to Lacey anyway. Had this been a recent thing or something she'd done long ago and just forgotten about?

  She examined the key, but found nothing on it that helped her identify what bank it might belong to. Perhaps there was something in her personal papers, something that mentioned the safety deposit box. If not, there was virtually no way to find out where the box was located.

  "Lacey, you stupid woman! What the hell were you playing at? And how on earth did it get you killed?"

  There was no answer. She hadn't really expected one.

  She sighed, pulled open the bottom drawer of the nightstand, found a handful of business-type magazines and a couple of catalogs, but other than that, disappointingly empty.

  Standing, she stretched, felt her stomach rumbling unhappily. It was nearly one o'clock, and she felt light headed. Her blood sugar was clearly dropping and she now regretted not helping herself to one of Muriel’s donuts.

  "Okay," she announced to the imagined presence of her friend, "I'm going to go grab some lunch. Something with real vegetables in it. It would be enormously helpful while I'm gone, if you could toss some things around, poltergeist-like, making sure the 'clues' are in plain sight, so I can actually find something of real importance, you know. You were certainly throwing things around the other night, now's your chance to actually do so in a useful fashion."

  Stunning silence greeted her, and probably for the best. She wasn't really looking forward to getting hit by flying objects again. With a sigh, she picked up the little notebook she’d found in the bedside table, grabbed her coat from the living room and left, not even bothering to wait for the elevator, but taking the stairs. She passed a woman and her son on the way into the stairwell, held the fire door open automatically for them, but received not so much as a nod or a thank you for her trouble. Scowling, she remembered again all the things she hated about the city. She needed fresh air and fresh food and she wanted to stop by the restaurant one more time. She kept remembering the vision she’d had in the ladies room the night Charlie and she had had dinner there. It could have just been her imagination, but it also could have been Lacey, trying to tell her something. She remembered the clink she’d heard as something had hit the ground. An earring maybe. If it were a true vision, then maybe the earring might still be there. It was a long shot, but something was better than nothing.