by Leslie Karst
A frown momentarily creased Vargas’s brow, but he quickly nodded. “I see no reason why not.” We followed him through the door from which he’d emerged and then up the stairs, Evelyn gripping her cane in one hand and taking hold of my forearm with the other.
“So you two are cousins?” the detective asked as we entered the investigation department’s interview room, a place I’d visited on several previous occasions. “Please, sit,” he said, motioning for us to sit on the small couch, then took the chair across from us.
“Uh-huh. Second cousins once removed, actually.”
“Ah.” Vargas leaned back and clasped his hands behind his shaved head. “Are you staying with your cousin, then, Ms. Olivieri?”
“Evelyn, please. And yes. Sally was generous enough to take me in for a while.”
He dropped his arms onto his legs and smiled. “Well, I do have some good news. The investigation at the house has been completed. Oh, and by the way,” Vargas said, turning toward Evelyn. “We couldn’t locate your mom’s phone or her computer. They weren’t at the house or at her restaurant. Did she have a laptop?”
“Uh-huh. A Mac Air.”
“Well, if you happen to find it—or her phone—I’d appreciate it if you’d let me know. In any case, we finished up at the house this morning, so you’re free to go back whenever you want.”
Evelyn bit her lower lip but didn’t respond.
“It’s okay,” I said. “You can stay with me as long as you like.”
“Thanks. It’s just that the memory of coming home and tripping over her like that …” The jimmy leg had now returned. “I think it’s going to take a while before I’m ready to sleep there again.”
“Of course. I completely understand.” Vargas cleared his throat. “Since we’re on the subject of your finding your mother like that, I was wondering if you’d be willing to describe for me exactly what happened that day when you came home.”
“All right.” Evelyn swallowed, then sat up straighter on the couch. “I’d spent that Monday night at a friend’s house—Lucy. She’s a student with me at Cabrillo, and we’d both turned in our last papers for the semester that day, so we decided to hang out together and celebrate.”
“What time did you leave the house?” Vargas asked.
“Around six, I think. Maybe seven at the latest.” She frowned. “Do they know what time Mom died?”
“The coroner says at least twelve hours before she was found, probably more. Which would place the time somewhere between when you left and midnight.” Vargas jotted a note in the file, then set down his pen. “So, you were talking about what happened when you came home that day …”
“Right. I didn’t get back till a little before noon, and when I came in the door, Coco—that’s our dog—was acting really weird, pacing and panting and stuff. I sat on the sofa to comfort her and try to figure out why she was so agitated, and when I called out for my mom, she didn’t answer, so I just assumed she’d gone out.”
Evelyn paused, twisting the cane’s elastic loop about her fingers. Neither Vargas nor I spoke, letting her take her time. “After a couple minutes, Coco seemed to have calmed down, and I started across the living room to take my overnight bag upstairs to my bedroom. That’s when I discovered her. At first I thought it was a seat cushion or something on the floor that I’d walked into, but when I knelt down to move it out of the way, I realized … what it really was.”
I reached out to lay a palm on her knee, and Evelyn took my hand in hers.
“I knew right away it was Mom,” she went on. “From the shoes she was wearing—these short leather boots with buckles on the side. But I went ahead and felt her face to make absolutely sure …” The grip on my hand tightened. “Her skin was clammy and cold, so I knew there was probably nothing I could do at that point. And then as I crawled over to get my phone out of my bag to call 911, I knocked into the bottles. A couple of pill containers and some kind of alcohol. Vodka, I think.”
“That’s right,” Vargas said. “But how did you know?”
“From the smell. Vodka is really medicinal, almost like rubbing alcohol. Plus, it’s what my mom liked to drink.” She lifted her head, which had gradually drooped down as she spoke, to face the detective. “Can you tell me, were there other fingerprints on the bottles besides my mom’s?”
The detective shook his head, then, realizing she wouldn’t notice this response, said, “No, there weren’t any but hers.”
“On the vodka bottle, too?”
“That’s correct. Hers were the only prints on all three of the bottles. Why? Do you think that’s odd?”
“Not for the pill bottles,” Evelyn said. “But it is a little surprising for the vodka, since I know she’d have friends over for drinks.”
“Well, there was still a fair amount left in the bottle, so perhaps it hadn’t been opened until that night.”
Evelyn thought a moment. “So what was in the two pill bottles?”
“Percocet and Ambien,” he answered. “And they both were prescribed to your mother. Do you know why she’d gotten a prescription for Percocet?”
“It was when she had oral surgery a few months ago—two really badly impacted wisdom teeth. But she only took one or two, ’cause she didn’t like how they made her feel. How many were left in the bottle?”
“None,” Vargas said with a frown. “Which means she must have taken at least four that day, based on what you say, since the prescription was for six.”
Evelyn bit her lip again and slumped back down into the couch, letting go of my hand. I wanted to take it back, to squeeze it hard and let her know I was there for her, but resisted the impulse. “How about the other bottle?” she asked quietly. “The Ambien.”
“It was a prescription for thirty and there were fifteen left. Did she take it very often, do you know?”
“Not every night, but maybe a couple times a week, I think. Mom had been having a hard time sleeping for the past few months, so she finally went to the doctor and got the Ambien to help with her insomnia.”
Vargas picked up a file that sat on the low table between us and consulted the report inside. “So if she was taking two a week,” he said, tapping his finger on the page, “given the date of the prescription, that means she must have taken about four or five the night she died.”
“Would that have been enough to …?” Evelyn asked.
“The forensic pathologist at the coroner’s office says yes, that about four of each—the Percocet and the Ambien—along with several strong drinks could be enough to cause a fatal overdose for someone of her weight.”
“Really?” I sat up straighter. “That doesn’t sound like a whole lot.”
“Yeah, well, that’s one of the dangers with opioids. It doesn’t take very much, especially when they’re mixed with other drugs. You fall asleep and slip into a coma, essentially, from the buildup of excess CO2, and when your brain tells you to take a deep breath, you’re so sedated that you can’t.”
“So she suffocated,” Evelyn said, wrapping her arms about herself.
“Probably. I’m truly sorry.”
No one spoke, and the only sound was that of Vargas tapping the typed label affixed to the front of the case file.
Although it was somewhat chilly in the small interview room, I felt the heat rise within me and shrugged out of my wool blazer. I’d come to learn that the annoying hot flashes I’d been experiencing over the past year could occur at any moment, but times of stress or high emotion were especially likely to trigger them.
After a moment, Evelyn shook her head. “But I just don’t understand how she could have taken that many pills by accident,” she said. “Are you sure there weren’t any on the floor you might have missed?”
“No, there weren’t any other pills that we found. And you should know that it seems pretty clear it wasn’t an accident.” Vargas glanced in my direction before continuing. “Because, well, there was a note.”
Evelyn flinched as if she’d been struck by a
n actual blow to the face. “No,” she said. “That’s not possible. She would never have done it on purpose.”
Vargas removed a sheet of plain white paper from the file and handed it to me. Two short sentences were hand-printed on the page in blue ink. “We found this next to her body,” he said.
“What’s it say?” Evelyn asked.
The combination of hurt and fear in her eyes made it difficult for me to speak. “It says,” I answered, my voice catching. “I’m sorry, Evelyn. I love you.”
I’d expected her to slump, or cry out, or react in some obvious way, but she didn’t move—except for a slow furrowing of the brow. After a moment she swallowed, then turned to face Detective Vargas.
“It’s not from her,” Evelyn said.
He shifted in his chair, then glanced my way once more. “Um, well, we did have our handwriting guy examine the note, and he says that although he can’t be absolutely certain, it does match her writing pretty well.”
“But you don’t understand,” Evelyn said, leaning forward. “My mom never called me that. She always called me Evie, or sometimes Ev. But she never ever called me Evelyn.”
Vargas frowned and scratched his ear. “Never? Not even when she was angry or upset?”
Evelyn was shaking her head vehemently. “No, never. She’s called me Evie since I was a baby. So don’t you see? She can’t have written that note. It had to be somebody else.”
Chapter 5
Once Evelyn and I had put away the groceries, I rustled up some leftover rigatoni with fennel and Italian sausage for lunch, and we sat at the kitchen table to eat. Buster and Coco crouched expectantly on either side of us, hoping for a dropped morsel or handout.
Since leaving the police station, Evelyn hadn’t mentioned her mom or the note they’d found beside her body, so I let the subject be. She could bring it up again when she was ready.
“You have any plans for this afternoon?” I asked.
“Not much.” Evelyn poked a fork at her mound of pasta and came up with several tubes. “I guess I should answer all those texts and emails I’ve gotten in the past few days,” she said, sounding anything but enthusiastic about the chore. “How about you?”
“I have to go down to Gauguin after lunch. I left my laptop there last night, and since I’m not working tonight, I need to swing by and pick it up.”
“Could I come with you? I’ve never been to Gauguin.”
“Sure,” I said. “I’d be happy to give you a quick tour of the place.”
Evelyn helped with the dishes, washing and rinsing them in the sink and handing them to me to dry and put away. Then, after taking the dogs for a walk down to the ocean and back, Evelyn and I climbed into the T-Bird and headed downtown.
Javier’s car was parked in the small lot alongside the restaurant. Not finding the chef in the kitchen, I took Evelyn upstairs to the office, where he sat at the desk, a pad of inventory sheets before him.
“You’re here early,” I said.
“Getting a head start on the weekend ordering,” he replied. “And this must be Evelyn, no?” I’d told Javier about my new, temporary housemate, and given the white-and-red cane she held, it didn’t take a mastermind to realize this was she.
“Hi.” Evelyn extended her hand, and Javier stood and reached across the desk to take it in his.
“Pleased to meet you,” he said. “Would you care to sit?”
I got Evelyn situated in the wing chair and, since there were no other seats in the office, made do with leaning against the bookshelf.
After expressing his condolences to Evelyn about her mother, Javier turned to me. “You have a minute to talk about tonight’s specials?”
“Sure.”
“So, a buddy of mine brought me a couple bags of chanterelles this morning,” he said, “which would be perfect for a risotto with butter and shallots. And we could use up the rest of that Grana Padano cheese we got in last week.”
Evelyn sat up in her chair. “Oh, wow,” she said. “That sounds delicious. My nonna made great risotto, but I’ve never had it with fresh chanterelles.”
“Evelyn’s grandmother is a wonderful cook,” I told Javier. “I remember she used to make this amazing fresh pasta. She didn’t use a machine, but rolled it out and cut it by hand. Does she still do that?”
“Not since she moved into that assisted-care place,” Evelyn said. “But I do.”
“Really?” Javier and I said simultaneously.
“Yeah, Nonna taught me years ago.”
She smiled at the memory, then slapped her hand on the armrest. “Hey, how ’bout I make fresh pasta for you sometime, Sally? I could use some kind of extracurricular activity now that school’s out. Maybe I could even cook a whole dinner for you, as a way to thank you for letting me stay at your house. I know some amazing recipes for fettuccine my nonna taught me.”
Javier smacked his lips theatrically. “Oooh, sounds delicious. So how do I finagle an invitation to that dinner?”
I was so taken aback by the fact that the Michoacán native had the word finagle in his vocabulary that I almost missed the spark in his eyes as he watched Evelyn’s laughing response.
* * *
Javier and I had been swapping Friday nights off of late, in an effort for each of us to have at least some semblance of a normal social life. Tonight was my free night, so I called Eric to see if he wanted to meet someplace for dinner.
“Uh, sorry, Sal, but no can do. I’ve got other plans.” He didn’t elaborate and I didn’t ask, but I figured it was Gayle, the public defender he’d brought to Gauguin the other night.
“That’s cool,” I said, hoping he wouldn’t sense my disappointment. “It is kind of late notice, and I’m sure you’re in very high demand.” Oops. So much for hiding my feelings.
But Eric merely chuckled, taking it as simple joke. “So what’s new with you, anyway?” he asked. “We didn’t really get to talk when I saw you last night, since you were working.”
And you were flirting.
No, I wasn’t going to let myself go there. I’d been the one to push him away, after all.
“Oh, lord,” I said. “You haven’t heard the latest. First off, Javier is worried that Brian—our new cook and your fellow bass singer—is having some kind of stress-related meltdown.”
“Really? How so?”
“Well, he has seemed kind of distracted at work, not as focused as he usually is. And he’s been a lot more testy of late than usual.”
“It might be simply a case of fatigue,” Eric said. “We did have our marathon of chorus concerts last weekend, preceded by a pretty intense week of rehearsals. Maybe he’s just exhausted.”
“So you haven’t noticed him acting weird or anything?”
“Not that I can think of. No, wait. He missed a rehearsal last week, but said it was ’cause he’d been sick. That must be what’s been going on with him. So, anyway, what was the other news you had?”
“I have a new roommate.”
There was a sputtering sound, as if he’d choked on his morning Starbucks. “No way.”
“Way.” I told him about Evelyn—how we were related, what had happened to her mom, and how my father had asked me to take her in for a few weeks.
“Huh,” he said, then, “Hold on a sec.” I could hear a woman’s voice murmuring in the background, to which Eric responded with something about a pretrial hearing. He came back on the line. “I’m really sorry, Sal, but I gotta go and help put out a fire. I’ll talk to you soon, okay?”
After we hung up, I tried my buddy Allison as well, but she and her husband Greg were going to a party up on the university campus hosted by the provost of her college. “I’d actually rather go out with you tonight,” she said, “but duty calls. The provost was, after all, one of my biggest supporters when I was up for tenure, so the least I can do is attend her end-of-the-semester shindig.”
Oh, well. Maybe it’ll be good for me to just stay in tonight and relax.
Setti
ng my phone on the kitchen table, I spied Evelyn through the window. She was out in the backyard, throwing a pair of balls for Buster and Coco. My dog was not being cooperative. As I watched, he ran after the ball, but then lay down where he was to chew on it its ratty felt. Coco, however, brought her tennis ball promptly back and dropped it at Evelyn’s feet so she could pick it up and throw it again.
I headed out the back door and plopped down at the wooden picnic table set up in the middle of the brick patio. There was a chill to the air, accompanied by the faint bite of a neighbor’s wood-burning stove. A cluster of gray clouds chased across the sky, likely the advance guard of the storm predicted in this morning’s paper. “Buster’s not much of a retriever,” I said, buttoning up my blue flannel shirt.
Evelyn grinned. “Well, Coco has it in her genes. She’s obsessed. Mom and I had to make a no-balls-in-the-house rule.”
But as she said this, the smile faded. How long does it take, I wondered, before you get over the death of someone you love? I still felt a pang of hurt every time someone mentioned my Aunt Letta’s name, and she’d been gone eight months now.
Evelyn picked up the slobbery green ball and tossed it again, but with less enthusiasm than before.
“I was thinking,” I said, “that maybe we could go out to dinner tonight. My treat.”
The smile returned. “That would be awesome. Thanks. Where should we go?”
“Someplace fun,” I said, “and I know the perfect spot.”
* * *
The bar area at Kalo’s that night was packed, as usual, but Evelyn and I were able to get a table in the dining room after only a five-minute wait. I’d started frequenting this Hawaiian-themed restaurant the previous summer when I’d sung the Mozart Requiem with Eric’s chorus, since it was the group’s preferred post-rehearsal watering hole. As a seasonal touch, Christmas lights in the shape of tikis and pineapples were now strung from the ceiling, and slack-key Christmas music was playing over the stereo system.
“You want me to read you the menu?” I asked Evelyn.
“Sure. That would be easier. It’s hard to hear my app when it’s crowded like this.”
