“And I appreciate that. And I’ve been helpful so far, right?”
“You have.” It was grudging, but honest. “And I’m not saying that it’s not significant that Goode used to be somebody else, but it doesn’t automatically mean his death is linked with his past. It’s a tantalizing theory, but it’s only one avenue of investigation. Our victim made plenty of enemies right here and right now as David Goode.”
“But you have to admit that it’s quite a coincidence. Most people are never involved in a single murder investigation, and Goode was involved in two. First he’s the prime suspect and now he’s been murdered.”
“I agree it’s one hell of a coincidence. But stranger things have happened. Somebody might even call that poetic justice.”
“Exactly,” A.J. said.
Twelve
“Isn’t this lovely.” Elysia smiled benignly as their waitress delivered a basket of fresh baked bread to their table at the Happy Cow restaurant.
A.J. met Dean’s eyes and they both smiled automatically, politely.
Since this lunch had been A.J.’s first chance to see her mother without her, er, posse since her return to Stillbrook, she was a little disappointed to find Dean in attendance. Not that A.J. had anything against Dean. He seemed pleasant and intelligent if first impressions were anything to go by. He did have a tendency to watch his reflection in every remotely mirrorlike surface, but that was probably part of the job description.
“This place must make quite a change from Manhattan,” Dean said when the waitress sashayed off with their drink orders. “Did you ever think about moving the whole yoga franchise to the big city?”
“No.”
“Never?”
“Never.”
“That’s the first thing I’d have done. I’m a city boy through and through.”
“Where are you from originally?”
“Bismarck, North Dakota, but my family moved to Los Angeles when I was sixteen. I’ve lived there ever since.”
“You’re the second person I’ve heard of from Bismarck this week.”
“Who’s the other?”
“Sarah Ray. You met her at dinner the other evening.”
“Oh. Right. Yes.” Dean wore an odd expression. “She mentioned something about that. So you grew up around here?”
Had Elysia not shared even this much information with him? A.J. said, “Oh no. I was a city girl. I don’t know how to explain my conversion. I guess what it gets down to is I was ready for a change. I never thought I’d hear myself say this, but I like the slower pace.”
“Now that she’s used to it,” Elysia put in, buttering a thick herb-crusted slice of bread.
“True. It did take some getting used to. Is LA really like it seems in the movies?”
“Pretty much.” Dean launched into an entertaining account of his arrival in the big city and his first few acting jobs.
A.J. laughed along with Elysia. She began to see the appeal. Not only was Dean boyishly handsome, he was fun. And he was attentive. It was churlish to resent his presence today. There would be other lunches, other days spent with her mother. She wasn’t losing a mother; she was gaining . . . a brother. A brother who would be sleeping with their mother.
Uh . . . probably better not to go there. Modern families, right? A least this newest boyfriend wasn’t younger than A.J.
“So what about you?” A.J. tuned back in as Dean continued, “I understand this cop you’re seeing is just about ready to pop the question.”
“Huh?” A.J. said brilliantly. She turned to her mother. “What?”
Elysia’s expression was bland, her pencil-thin brows arching in inquiry—although the look she threw Dean should have frozen him in his tracks. “Of course he is, poppet. A mother knows these things.”
“Long distance? You haven’t seen Jake in months.”
“As the Bard says—”
“I wish the Bard would keep his nose out of my business.”
Dean cleared his throat. Luckily the waitress arrived at that moment with their meals and drink refills. Glasses were handed round, plates distributed, and the ground pepper sprinkled liberally.
When they were on their own again, A.J. said, “Speaking of weddings, how are the plans for yours coming?”
Dean smiled tentatively at Elysia, who was neatly spearing olives from her salad plate. “It’s up to the boss.”
Elysia smiled noncommittally. “There’s not a great deal to plan. We want something simple. Just our closest friends and family. We’ve both been through it before.”
Dean said, “You can’t really count my first time. I was only a kid.”
“Me as well,” Elysia said. “But mine lasted twenty years.”
A.J. took pity on Dean. “Mr. Meagher certainly seems smitten with Sarah.”
Elysia’s smiled vanished. “Nonsense.” She stabbed a final olive as though it had attempted to evade justice.
Dean said, “The old guy? I thought he was gay.”
“No, he’s not gay!” Elysia sounded quite indignant.
“Old guy?” A.J. inquired at the same time. Mr. Meagher was roughly the same age as her mother.
“Okay, okay.” Dean smiled easily and turned his attention to his salad.
Whether through luck or design, after that the conversation gravitated to such neutral themes as the weather and property values and local theater, and they made it safely through their meal without anyone getting—in Elysia’s vernacular—“up anyone else’s nose.”
The waitress brought the dessert menu. “I believe I’m in the mood for some of their delicious peach cobbler.” Elysia looked around the table. “Shall we order something?”
“I have to get back.” A.J. met her mother’s eyes and sank back into the leather bench.
“Nothing for me.” Dean slid out of the booth. “You ladies go ahead and order. I have to buy some razors and a couple of other things. I’ll meet you back here.”
Elysia smiled sweetly at him and accepted his kiss like the queen receiving the attention of courtiers. She ordered two peach cobblers and A.J. watched Dean stride through the crowded dining room, attracting glances and whispers as he went.
“He’s very nice,” A.J. said. “Can I go back to work now?”
“No. I didn’t invite you to lunch to vet Dean. I wanted to find out how the case was progressing.”
“And we couldn’t discuss that in front of Dean?”
“No.”
“Why not?”
Elysia made a little moue. “He doesn’t approve.”
A.J. laughed. “I think I’m getting to like him better every minute.”
“Never mind that. Brief me.”
A.J. rolled her eyes but related her meeting with Oriel Goode.
“Interesting.” Elysia didn’t sound particularly interested. “Did you pass the information we gave you to your Inspector Lestrade?”
“Yes.”
“And?”
A.J. took Jake’s request for discretion seriously, but it was hardly possible to conceal the information that David Goode and Maxwell Powell were one and the same from the person who had first brought it to her own attention. She comforted herself with the reflection that the Golden Gumshoes already knew the answer. They were simply waiting for corroboration.
“Marcie was right. Goode and Powell were the same man.”
“Just as we thought. Cherchez la femme.” Elysia dug triumphantly into her peach cobbler.
“Which femme? We’ve got a couple to choose from.”
“This case is directly connected to Jill Smithy-Powell’s murder. That’s obvious.”
“It’s not quite that cut-and-dried. I agree that Goode’s history makes his murder seem like an awfully big coincidence, but coincidences do happen.”
“Oh bosh. It’s perfectly obvious that someone from the past decided to even the score.”
“There are a couple of problems with that theory. Jill Smithy-Powell was an only child. Her parents wer
e elderly and in poor health at the time of her murder. Her father has since died and, according to the papers, her mother is bedridden. There don’t seem to have been cousins or uncles and aunts to have gone seeking revenge—which, you have to admit, is pretty melodramatic anyway.”
“Friends. An old boyfriend.”
A.J. sampled her own peach cobbler thoughtfully. A bit of cinnamon, nutmeg, and a hint of lemon gave the sweetness a little bite. “There is one possibility. Goode fired his assistant, Lance Dally, the morning he was slain. Dally has an alibi, but it’s shaky.”
Elysia’s eyes lit up. “Go on.”
“Supposedly Dally is a reporter working on an exposé of New Dawn Church. What if he is—or once was—a reporter for the Los Angeles Times? What if he recognized Goode? What if he knew Jill Smithy-Powell and . . . I don’t know. What if there’s a connection there?”
“That’s bloody brilliant, pumpkin!”
“It’s complete conjecture. But . . .”
“Worth checking into.”
A.J. nodded. “Maybe. It couldn’t hurt.”
“Right. The girls and I will take point on this angle.”
“Oh God. Please, please be discreet, Mother.”
Elysia’s expression grew haughty. “I wrote the book on discretion.”
“And it was a best seller. That’s what I mean.”
Elysia’s hauteur gave way to a malicious grin. “Never you worry about me, pet.” Her expression grew suspiciously innocent. A.J. didn’t have to turn around to know that Dean was returning to their table.
“How long is the, er, team staying with you?”
“The girls are leaving on Tuesday.”
“And is Dean going to be here all winter?”
Elysia said lightly, “Perhaps. As the Bard says, ‘If winter comes, can spring be far behind?’ ”
A.J. muttered through her peach cobbler, “I don’t know. I wouldn’t hand my galoshes in quite yet.”
Friday afternoon was not a particularly popular time for yoga and Sacred Balance always quieted down quickly after lunch.
“Here’s the final head count for tomorrow.” Suze offered the sheet to A.J. “Do you have a sleeping bag?”
“Jake is loaning me his.” A.J. leaned back in her chair, examining the list. “What do you know about the Jersey Devil?”
Suze laughed. “Who on that list reminds you of the Jersey Devil?”
A.J. looked up with a smile. “No one. At least . . . I can’t help wondering what Mrs. Goode was doing during the time that her husband was chasing off the Jersey Devil.”
“What do you think she was doing?”
A.J. shook her head. “I have no idea, but it wouldn’t be easy to sleep through someone kicking in your back door, right?”
“I guess. They have a pretty big house. Or maybe she takes sleeping tablets.” Suze’s gaze was curious. “So are we set for tomorrow morning?”
A.J. winced. “I guess.”
“I think Denise is going to back out. She’s been coughing and sniffling all day. I caught her popping DayQuil with her pumpkin spice latte.”
“I know,” A.J. said glumly. She handed the list back to Suze. “Oh well. It is what it is. We’ll have fun.”
“We will! Simon and Jaci have been great about communicating what clothes and equipment everyone needs to pack. They’ve really pretty much taken care of everything. All we need to do is show up.”
A.J. nodded, though she doubted it would be that simple. Still, Simon and Jaci did seem pretty confident that everything was under control.
“See you at five a.m.!” Suze said on her way out.
A.J. groaned loudly, only partly kidding. She turned her attention to her laptop once more. She had been reading up on the Jersey Devil again—in particular the recent sightings.
The background on the Jersey Devil was, not unsurprisingly, sketchy.
According to legend, the creature was the thirteenth child of a local woman by the name of Leeds. Mother Leeds was reputed to have invoked the name of the Devil while giving birth. Never a good idea. The resulting offspring transformed into a devil and flew up the chimney and off into the surrounding woods where it spent the next couple of centuries spooking people by making weird noises at night, leaving strange tracks, and occasionally killing the odd cow or sheep. Just your average everyday supernatural juvenile delinquent.
A.J. had vague memories of watching an X-Files episode about the Jersey Devil with Andy, but in that version the “monster” turned out to be feral people living in the Pine Barrens.
As far as she could tell, the Jersey Devil was on a par with the Loch Ness Monster or the Abominable Snowman. Yes, there were those who would believe till their dying breath that such creatures existed—even that they had glimpsed them—but most people agreed they were either hoaxes or someone’s imagination running away with them.
Except...
Except for those mutilated farm animals. A.J. clicked back to the online edition of the Stillbrook Streamer. She read again the account of John Baumann’s slaughtered cattle.
It amounted to two dairy cows in a pasture. So . . . not wholesale slaughter and not exactly under the nose of the Baumanns. Still pretty horrifying. The cows were described as having their throats “ripped out.” Was that an accurate description or was someone at the Stillbrook Streamer taking literacy license? Surely there would be a clear difference between someone using a butcher’s knife and an animal using teeth and claws?
A.J. shivered and read on. Local police were described as “unwilling to comment” as to the nature of the attacks.
That stance had not changed, judging by the follow-up articles A.J. scrolled through. The only possibility officially ruled out by the police was that the Jersey Devil had perpetrated the crimes. Unfortunately, that was the only theory anyone wanted to hear about. Right beneath the article where the police chief categorically denied any culpability of—or belief in—the Jersey Devil, the Streamer ran an interview with a local Jersey Devil hunter who said just the opposite.
“These attacks bear all the earmarks of a classic Devil encounter.”
A later edition ran a full history of the Jersey Devil, along with more interviews with local Devil hunters and a few anecdotal accounts from elderly local residents.
Obviously it was a lot more fun to think the Jersey Devil was hunting fresh meat than that local teenagers were running amuck again. A.J. could appreciate that.
The Reverend Goode’s own encounter with the Devil had been lost in the bigger story of his murder. The only official account seemed to be the interview he had taped for Channel 3.
A.J. watched it again on the Internet, this time paying close attention to all the visual and verbal cues that were supposed to indicate someone was lying. These were things she had learned to observe back in the day when she was advising clients on how to best present themselves to a cynical public.
Goode’s body language was relaxed and easy. He made eye contact with the interviewer. His smile was natural. He made simple, direct statements. He either believed what he was telling the at-home audience or he was a pathological liar.
A.J. suspected Goode was a pathological liar. What he hoped to gain by lying about seeing a monster, she couldn’t imagine. Admittedly, she preferred to think he was lying rather than accept the possibility that the Jersey Devil existed when she was about to go camping in its backyard.
Thirteen
Something suspiciously like snow was falling from the lead-colored sky as the eleven members of the First Annual Sacred Balance Women’s Retreat paused in a clearing of pines to catch their collective breath.
“It’s just a little rain,” Simon said, reading A.J.’s expression correctly.
A.J. gazed up worriedly at the heavy sky. Moisture kissed her face. “Are you sure? Because that looks pretty slushy to me.” There were uneasy murmurs from some of the other women.
“It’s not cold enough for snow,” Jaci told her buoyantly. Jaci was obviously
loving every moment of this expedition. She wore a knitted red ski cap with a snowflake emblem. Beneath it, her face was flushed, her eyes sparkling. In fact, as far as A.J. could tell, Jaci and Suze—who was wearing some kind of monkey sock puppet headgear—were having more fun than everyone else put together with the possible exception of Mocha. Suze and Jaci had taken the youngest member of the expedition under their wing and Mocha was clearly thriving with all the attention.
“It smells like snow,” she said happily. She reached up, spreading her gloved fingers wide as though to capture the nonexistent snowflakes.
The three of them were certainly having more fun than A.J. Not that A.J. wasn’t trying. There was no denying the beauty of the surrounding countryside. Beneath the dramatic skies, the fall foliage was vibrant with rich hues of gold and russet and red, in vivid contrast to the dark pines. The soft, sugary sand slipped beneath their boots as they walked along the narrow trail.
“See, now it’s not even raining anymore,” Suze said as the clouds parted and some fading rays of sunshine slipped through. Overhead the wind sang through the pines.
“Great.”
Now and then something small skittered beneath the undergrowth or the occasional deer bounded out of a thicket.
Maybe it wasn’t cold enough for snow, but it was more than cold enough for A.J. Her nose felt frozen. Her fingers and toes weren’t far behind. On the bright side, she had walked on and off all day and was only bone weary and not ready to fall on her face like their seven students. Not so long ago A.J. would have been huffing and puffing like Oriel or Mocha or seventy-year-old Rose Ponte. Not that Rose wasn’t doing wonderfully well for a seventy-year-old woman. But A.J. rejoiced in her own relatively newfound current state of fitness—and her lack of blisters.
Of the eight members in their party, four were Sacred Balance personnel, and three of those four were experienced campers. A.J. knew absolutely nothing about camping and would have been happy to keep it that way, but she had prepared for the trip with the same care she prepared for any business project. She’d done her homework, and she made sure to dress in layers and to wear soft, thick boot socks and sturdy footwear. In addition to a backpack and sleeping bag, Jake had loaned her a downfilled vest and his favorite green plaid flannel shirt. She wore her favorite New York Jets cap and a pair of Wayfarers to protect her eyes from the shifting sunlight.
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