by Cindy Brown
“Money.” Roger’s skull face loomed nearer. “You didn’t really think that house in Mexico was built on actor’s wages, did you? Oh.” His eyebrows shot up in mock amusement. “Maybe you did. After all, this house,” he gestured back at Marge’s house, “was built on theater.” His words dripped with disgust.
“I thought you loved the theater.” The water was up to my shoulders.
Roger snorted. “I gave my life to the theater and where am I? Fifty years old—”
“Sixty.” If I was about to die, I wasn’t putting up with any bullshit.
Roger took another step toward me. “And basically homeless, moving from town to town, living from paycheck to paycheck.”
I swore my costume was alive and trying to drag me down. “Who paid you to murder all those people? Bitsy? Arnie?”
“Bitsy? She’s just a malicious nymphomaniac. And Arnie…” Roger’s voice actually softened. “Arnie’s just a guy like me, duped by the illusion of theater. In fact, I don’t think I would have killed him even if I had been contracted to do it.”
The habit tangled itself into the purse slung across my body, threatening to throw me off-balance. “I’ve been duped by the illusion of theater too. How about not kill me?”
“Nice try.”
Balanced on my tiptoes, I desperately tried to untangle the habit from my bag.
Oh.
My bag.
“Who did contract you?” I grappled underwater with the bag’s clasp.
“Debra, my agent. She decided to quit show business and invest in real estate. Needed to make some real money. Then we both got a little drunk one night and started talking about how traveling actors have the perfect cover for crime. We have aliases—like ‘Ivy Meadows’—no permanent addresses, no long-term ties, and we’re in and out of a city in three months or less.”
I let Roger get nearer. He had to be close for my plan to work.
“We even have the perfect motive,” Roger said. “We’re always broke.”
He took another step toward me. I forced myself to stay where I was. “You killed all those people for your agent? Just for money?” I grasped the weapon inside my bag. The pool bottom sloped away beneath my feet. I struggled to stay upright. And to breathe.
“It’s not such a bad thing,” he said. “I only kill people over seventy. They’ve had their chance at life.”
I thought of Charlie Small. I thought of Marge and Arnie and my other friends over seventy. I thought of all the older performers who made me laugh and cry and dream. I looked at Roger, smug with his rationalized belief.
And I shot him.
CHAPTER 57
“Good thing that worked after being submerged.” Hank pointed at the lipstick pepper spray I still held in my hand.
“Nice job with the pool toy,” I replied.
Hank had figured something was wrong when I ran offstage. Being a logical sort, he started his search for me at Marge’s house and arrived just after I’d shot Roger in the face with the spray. While Roger was still yelling and thrashing around in the pool, Hank grabbed an inner tube and shoved it over Roger’s head, pinning his arms to his sides and making him look like a big fat fool.
Hank helped me out of the pool and stood guard until official help arrived just a few minutes later. Now he stood (sans sunglasses for a change), in front of the patio chair where I sat with Lassie in my lap.
“Seriously, I’m fine,” I said to the young redheaded EMT who was kneeling next to me, checking me out. “It’s just a scrape.” I lifted a hand to feel the gash on my chin but Hank grabbed it. “Don’t. You probably have some pepper spray on your face.” There was no probably about it. I’d held my breath and closed my eyes when I shot Roger, but I could still feel a sting on my face.
The EMT straightened up. “Neither your chin or your lip look like they need stitches. You’re lucky, Sister.”
Sister? Oh, I still wore the habit. “Thanks be to God,” I said, with a sideways smile at Hank. He smiled back, a first.
“We do want to get that pepper spray off you, though. I’ll be right back.” The EMT disappeared inside the house, probably to get something from the fire truck parked out front. The police had already left, taking the dripping red-faced Roger with them.
Lassie, who had sat up straight in my lap while the EMT was near, now curled into a ball with a big doggie sigh. Poor little pug, all tuckered out.
Hank sat down across the table. “You know,” he said slowly, “when I found out you were investigating the suicides, I was really pissed off. Thought Bob wasn’t taking me seriously, you being so green and all.”
I didn’t tell him that my uncle hadn’t taken him seriously, or that he thought Hank was just being paranoid, or that he was worried about him acting “hinky.” I also didn’t tell Hank that the investigation would never have happened without Marge’s call to Amy Small. Which brought me to another question.
“How did you know it was Marge who had the accident? You know, that day at the 7-Eleven when you got the call from the posse?”
“You mean the day you followed me dressed in that nun outfit?” He nodded at the costume I still wore.
I cringed. “Yeah, then.”
“I recognized the address, because…well, it was sort of an unusual situation.” He looked at me, a question in those silvery gray eyes.
“I know about Marge’s confusion, if that’s what you’re wondering.”
“Yeah. Well, see, the posse has this program to keep watch on folks who tend to wander away. Works with a personal GPS unit they wear that connects to our computers at the station and to a home computer. It’s almost always a spouse or caregiver who requests it. Marge asked for one for herself. I admired her for that—thought it took guts to admit something like that—so I kept an especially good eye on her.”
Hank cleared his throat. “And, I, uh, admire the job you did too. Even though I’m pretty sure you suspected me.” Lassie, on the edge of sleep, snorted. “See,” said Hank, with a nod to the pug. “Even the dog’s smarter than that.”
I was about to protest when I saw the twinkle in his eyes. “You were always first at the scenes, and…” I decided to take advantage of our newfound camaraderie. “It was your sunglasses.”
He looked at me, his eyes flashing silver in the light from the full moon. If I had cool eyes like that, I’d show them off all the time.
“Uncle Bob thinks you wear them all the time because there’s something wrong with your eyes.” I took a deep breath. “I think you wear them to hide the fact you’re high.”
Hank paused, but his face didn’t change expression. “You’re both right. I have glaucoma, acute angle-closure glaucoma. Sometimes it hurts like hell. The pressure builds up in your eyes, and you feel like your head is going to explode. Painkillers don’t help. One day, my doctor said he’d ‘heard,’” he made air quotes with his fingers, “that marijuana could help with the pressure and the pain. It does. But…”
Good PI-in-training that I was, I waited for him to go on.
He sighed. “Medical marijuana may be legal now, but it’s not well-accepted yet. Hell, even my doctor was reluctant to write the prescription. Plus I shouldn’t be driving if I’ve…taken a dose.” Hank tipped his head back toward the sky. I wondered if he could see the stars above us. “I guess I need to quit the posse.”
The first time I’d ever heard emotion in Hank’s voice, and it was sadness.
CHAPTER 58
“But Hank didn’t have to quit.” I updated Marge and Arnie over celebratory drinks at Marge’s house a couple of days later. “The posse said he could work dispatch when he was feeling okay. And his doctor’s looking into a new treatment.” I had told them about Hank’s glaucoma, not his pot use. Hadn’t told anyone, not even my uncle. Legal or not, it didn’t seem like something Hank wanted spread around.
The two lovebirds sat close together on Arnie’s sofa, Lassie snoring away at their feet. Marge’s doctors had determined that her dementia was medication-based, not organic. That’s what we were celebrating. Or so I thought.
“Time for a toast,” said Arnie, standing up and refilling our champagne glasses. “To Ivy, the great detective.”
“I’m not such a great detective.” I clinked glasses with them anyway. “I never even suspected Roger.”
“You thought it was Bitsy, didn’t you?” Marge smiled at the bubbles in her champagne.
“I thought she might have paid someone to do it. I couldn’t figure out her motive when it came to everyone other than you and Charlie, but I knew she had something to hide.” That something had turned out to be her husband in Nebraska, whom she had tried to ease out of this world a little early. No one had been able to prove what she had done, so she’d been let go with a slap on the wrist and the restraining order, courtesy of her now-estranged son.
“You suspected me too, didn’t you?” asked Arnie. My face grew hot, but he didn’t look the least bit offended. “I mean, I installed that security system to keep an eye on Marge, and I did commit fraud once.” He held up a hand in his defense. “Albeit for art, but fraud all the same.” I wasn’t sure a swamp-themed amusement park was art, but decided to give him this one. “Between my history, the theater being in trouble, and the life insurance policy, I made a pretty good suspect.” He managed to take a sip of champagne with his cigar still in his mouth.
“Yeah,” I admitted. “And speaking of insurance, I’ve been saving this for you two.” I put my phone on speaker so they could hear the voicemail I’d received a few hours earlier. “Guess what?” My uncle’s voice filled the room. “Carl Marks was picked up a few hours ago. Had the audacity to show up at a military funeral in Yuma. I guess he…” His voice took on the tone he had when he was reading, “‘Wore Ray Bans with a Class A uniform, which is not military protocol.’” Back to regular Uncle Bob voice. “A couple of real Marines took exception to an imposter at the funeral.” He chuckled. “He’s in the Yuma jail now.”
“Here’s to that.” Marge raised her glass. “Asshole.”
“And I have one more toast.” Arnie’s voice cracked as he lifted his glass too. “Damn it.” He swiped at his teary eyes.
“To Desert Dinner Theater?” I guessed. Once the local media picked up on the “Captain Vaughn Katt Tries to Drown Cabaret Dancer” news, the show was so popular the theater had to add two weeks to the run.
“That’s not it,” Arnie said with a sob.
“Aww, chickie.” Marge gave him a tissue. “Let me do it.” She clinked her glass with his. “To the new Edelweiss team.”
“The Edelweiss…? Oh!” I hugged Marge around the neck. Marge Weiss, that is, who sat next to the tearfully happy Arnie Adel. “The Adel-Weiss team.”
“Yeah.” Marge’s eyes glimmered too. “We’re getting hitched.”
CHAPTER 59
Tears were on the menu, it seemed. I’d emailed Amy Small right away after learning that Charlie’s death was not suicide, but when I finally got to talk to her on the phone at my uncle’s office, she had a hard time making it through the conversation.
“I just knew my dad wouldn’t do that.” She snuffled. “I mean, it’s horrible, but I’m…relieved.” I had already told her that Charlie hadn’t suffered. “If he had killed himself, I would have felt like I didn’t really know him.” She began crying in earnest. “Oh, Dad…”
I hung up quietly so Amy could grieve on her own. Besides, I had work to do.
I had Roger’s admission that he had killed those retirees. His shoes were in the incriminating Pet Cam photos (which I had emailed to Uncle Bob right after downloading them). I even found seven different bank accounts in his name with large semi-regular cash deposits. But none of that was concrete proof. And Roger and his agent had made sure they had no obvious connections to Underwood Holdings. It was going to be tough to pin the Sunnydale murders on Roger. I searched through my notes again. Surely there was something…
“Olive.” My uncle got up from his office chair, and walked over to me. “You’ve done everything you could. It’s time to let the police handle the rest.” He gently closed my new laptop. “Good thing that Roger guy tried to kill you. They’ll keep him in jail for that.”
“Yeah, good thing.” I knew I was lucky, but it didn’t really feel that way.
He went back to his desk and opened the top drawer. “Come over here. I’ve got a few things for you.”
I walked the few feet to his desk.
“First of all, I owe you an apology.”
Wow. My family did not do apologies.
“I should have filled you in about Hank’s suspicions. I thought he was just being paranoid. I didn’t want to get you headed down the wrong road.”
“Secondly,” Uncle Bob’s chins tripled as he tried to hold back a smile, “someone else owed you a little something too. I wasn’t sure your landlady could ask you to pay rent while they fixed your apartment. It’s a little complicated, since it looks like you might have caused the fire, which you will never, ever do again—”
“Never,” I agreed.
“But a nice letter from a PI on the official letterhead of Franko, Hricko and Maionchi did the trick.” He handed me a check from the account of Mae Freeman, my landlady. “The rent money you paid.”
“Thank you!” I ran around the desk so I could hug my uncle.
“One more thing.” Uncle Bob took a small cardboard box out of his drawer and handed it to me. This time he didn’t try to hold back his smile. I opened it to see a stack of business cards, printed with “Duda Detective Agency, Olive Ziegwart, Assistant Investigator.”
I didn’t know what to say so I hugged him again.
He made some “aw gee shucks” noises, then looked at me. “Hey, I like your peacock earrings. They go really nice with your blonde hair. Now,” he patted me on the head, “can I take my ace detective out for a beer?”
“I’d love to,” I said, “but I’ve got a date.”
Water sparkled in the pool at my feet, cascaded in waterfalls next to me, and reflected the setting sun in the canal below. Water, water, everywhere—and I wasn’t afraid.
“I guess the baptism by fire cured me,” I said to Matt, who sat on a sculpted “boulder” near me at Arizona Falls, a way cool hydroelectric generator-turned-art installation.
“Any other issues cured?” He looked over at the couple who stood hand in hand gazing through a sheet of falling water. Cody reached out to the waterfall and splashed Sarah, who squealed in delight.
“I’m working on it.” I knew I needed to recognize Cody as more than just my kid brother with a disability. He was a full-fledged adult with a girlfriend. “Really.”
“Thanks for coming. Cody really wanted a double date.” Matt’s smile didn’t reach his eyes. “I think it would have been too much like having a chaperone if it was just me.”
“I’m sorry about Candy.”
“I’m not sure we would have ever worked out long-term.” Matt watched Cody and Sarah as they walked toward us. “This acting life in L.A….it’s what she wanted.”
“Yeah.” Spray from the nearest fall misted my face. I closed my eyes and thought about what Jeremy had said, about acting precluding any romantic relationship.
“What about you?” Matt must have read my mind. I was so comfortable with him. Maybe I didn’t need romance, as long as I had friendship like this. “Don’t you want that too?” he continued. “Fame and fortune?”
I tried to picture myself onstage in a fancy theater in New York. I wanted it, oh, I wanted it, but the photo in my head was fuzzy. “Not yet.” Roger might be a despicable man, but he was right about one thing. “I’m not good enough yet. I think I can be, but I’ve got a lot to learn.”
I opened my eye
s and turned toward Matt. “And I like working with Uncle Bob.” I thought again of Roger and how I didn’t suspect him until it was nearly too late. “But I’m not a great detective yet, either.”
“What are you guys talking about?” I turned to see Cody behind me, Sarah by his side.
“I was just telling Matt that I’m not a great actor or a great detective—”
“But you’re a great sister.” Cody hugged me around the neck.
Not yet.
But I’m working on that too.
Author’s Note
You won’t find Sunnydale on an Arizona map, though you will find several very nice retirement communities that look a bit like Marge’s hometown. A couple of these communities in Maricopa County (which is on a map) have posses, staffed by volunteers who help their neighbors and even save lives.
The Phoenix Fire Department is thankfully very real, though the annual Fire vs. Police tug-of-war is not. That said, Guns and Hoses events across the country raise money for charity and include not just tug-of-wars, but golf tournaments, bouncy ball races, and jelly donut-eating contests. Go out and support your local first responders!
About the Author
Cindy Brown has been a theater geek (musician, actor, director, producer, and playwright) since her first professional gig at age 14. Now a full-time writer, she’s lucky enough to have garnered several awards (including 3rd place in the 2013 international Words With Jam First Page Competition, judged by Sue Grafton!) and is an alumnus of the Squaw Valley Writers Workshop. Though Cindy and her husband now live in Portland, Oregon, she made her home in Phoenix, Arizona, for more than 25 years and knows all the good places to hide dead bodies in both cities.
