Flat White

by Sandra Balzo

  ‘Actually,’ I said, thinking back. ‘It was early Pavlik. But prior to our moving in together and certainly before our engagement.’

  ‘Meaning I’m not a scoundrel.’

  You gotta love a man who uses the word scoundrel. ‘Oh, but you are.’ I took a sip of the white wine the bartender had poured. ‘This is a Chardonnay. And oaky and delicious.’

  ‘Good palate,’ Stephen said, admiringly.

  I pointed at the bottle the bartender had set down. ‘Cakebread Chardonnay from Napa Valley. Ted and I used to love it.’

  He put his fist to his heart. ‘Both the ex and the fiancée have been invoked now.’

  I grinned. ‘I will still only have one glass, but thank you. This is delicious.’

  ‘You’re welcome.’ He took a sip of his. ‘And I agree.’

  ‘And thanks, too, for getting Helena a room and giving us the time to search through the suitcase.’

  ‘First of all, the “Friend and Family” rate is not much of a discount, so no need to thank me.’ He smiled at my pained expression. ‘Secondly, they were her husband’s things. All I did was give her time to look them over before they were confiscated, at least for a bit.’ His expression changed. ‘She didn’t slip out anything incriminating, did she? Hemlock or an asp, perhaps?’

  ‘Nothing so romantic,’ I said. ‘In fact, nothing romantic at all, which is kind of odd.’

  Stephen took a beat. ‘If poison and snakes are romantic to you, I think I’m glad we never got together.’

  ‘Me, too,’ I said, squeezing his hand. ‘So what do you think? Married man lies to his wife and flies to town to meet the woman he’s been cyber-courting for months on the side. Wouldn’t he arrive with a gift? Or just flowers if nothing else?’

  ‘This is Barry Margraves? Who’s the woman?’

  ‘Christy Wrigley.’

  ‘I don’t think I know her.’

  ‘Very possible. She lives across from our shop and helps out occasionally.’

  ‘And is it Christy or Helena who’s suspected in his murder?’ he asked.

  ‘Why do you think it’s murder?’

  ‘Because you’re asking questions.’

  Good point.

  Stephen continued, ‘But the weapon. How does one plot a murder using a snowplow?’

  Another good point. ‘I think it would have to be a crime of opportunity. The snowplow was there and …’ Sounded implausible, even to me.

  ‘I get it,’ Stephen said helpfully. ‘Like finding a gun on the street and shooting somebody with it.’

  ‘Somebody you have a grudge against and just happens to be there,’ I said. ‘It does stretch the imagination. But if somebody did it, we know it was not Christy. She and I were in the store and saw Barry Margraves killed.’

  ‘That’s a nice change.’ Stephen patted my hand. ‘You can’t be suspected for once.’

  Nor could Stephen’s murderous sister. Jail being the best alibi. But I did not say that. ‘Right.’

  ‘Terribly traumatic for Christy to see her lover mowed down in front of her,’ Stephen said. ‘For you, too. But you’re an old hand at this. And he was not your lover, after all.’ His eyes narrowed. ‘Or was he?’

  ‘He was not,’ I told him. ‘And, strangely, people dying in front of me never gets old.’ I sat up straight. ‘That sounded awful. I meant I never get used to it. Always traumatic. Bad.’

  Stephen suppressed a grin. ‘Of course. But back to your victim not arriving with courting gifts. He was married, so maybe he planned to pick something up here in the gift shop.’

  I wrinkled my nose. ‘Hotel gift shop gifts? Kind of tacky.’

  ‘We have a very nice gift shop,’ Stephen said. ‘And a jewelry store.’

  ‘I’m sure you do,’ I said. ‘In fact, if you could check with them to see if Barry Margraves made any purchases, I’d appreciate it.’

  ‘Walked right into that one, didn’t I?’ he said ruefully. ‘I will do that.’

  ‘Thank you,’ I said, smiling. ‘He’d already sent Christy a diamond tennis bracelet, which Helena tipped to. That’s the reason she flew out here. To track down the other woman.’

  ‘Then the cat was out of the bag.’

  ‘Exactly.’ I had a thought. ‘I have to send a quick text to Pavlik.’

  Mock sigh. ‘Fine.’

  I tapped for a few seconds and then set down the phone, so as not to miss a reply.

  ‘Telling him you’re going to be late?’

  ‘Asking whether Barry Margraves had an iPhone on him. Since it wasn’t in the room or in the suitcase, he had to have both phones with him.’

  ‘Both?’

  ‘He apparently had a separate phone for conducting the affair.’

  ‘Smart,’ Stephen said, draining his glass. He picked up the bottle. ‘Can I top you off?’

  ‘Thanks, but no,’ I said, finishing my Chard and sliding off the bar stool. ‘It was delicious and this has been fun, but I must go.’

  ‘Must you?’ Deep gaze in the eyes.

  I laughed. ‘Yes, I must. Thank you again.’

  ‘You’re—’

  I was out the door before I heard the welcome part.

  ‘I’d forgotten how charming Stephen is,’ I said to Sarah. ‘Good taste in wine, too.’

  ‘Apparently so,’ she said sourly. ‘I’m surprised you came back to help me close.’

  ‘Me, too,’ I admitted. ‘I had no intention of doing so, but my car just headed to Uncommon Grounds of its own volition.’

  ‘At least the car has a conscience,’ she said. ‘And speaking of which, what about Pavlik?’

  ‘He said Margraves had the iPhone on him, which makes sense since Kelly Anthony said she found Helena’s number on it. He wouldn’t use the burner, which is still missing, to call his wife.’

  Sarah, who had stooped to plug in the vacuum cleaner, straightened. ‘What are you talking about?’

  ‘Margraves.’ I switched on the vacuum.

  She switched it off. ‘I meant what about Pavlik? Is he all right with you having drinks with strange, good-looking men in the middle of the day?’

  ‘It was almost five and Stephen’s not strange. Pavlik knows there’s nothing to worry about.’ Though he had called Stephen my old boyfriend. So maybe he would mind. ‘I’ll tell him.’

  ‘Come clean, huh? Just in case somebody saw you?’

  I shrugged. ‘It was the lobby bar.’

  ‘Idiot.’ She pressed the switch.

  I unpressed it. ‘I am not cheating or lying. I don’t need to hide having a drink with an old friend.’

  ‘So you say.’ On again the vacuum went.

  Giving up, I went to get a damp rag to wipe the tables while she vacuumed.

  ‘So what’s the deal?’ she asked as she finally switched the vacuum off.

  ‘With what?’ I had finished my wiping and was gathering the dirty rags to take home. Finally.

  ‘The phone. You said somebody found one?’ She hit the retract button for the vacuum cord.

  The thing whipped around and nearly took my eye out as it snaked back into its hole. ‘If you guide the cord in, it won’t do that.’

  ‘But I like it when it does that,’ she said, with a grin. ‘Now, the phone?’

  ‘Barry Margraves’ iPhone. He had that on him, but he had another one and we can’t find it.’

  ‘Why another one?’

  ‘I told you – a burner or pay-as-you go. He and Helena had a joint plan, meaning calls from both their regular phones were on the same bill.’

  ‘And he wasn’t stupid enough to chance that.’

  ‘No, Helena checked.’ I was thinking. ‘Barry had a phone in his hand when he was hit, remember? Maybe that wasn’t the iPhone the sheriff’s office has. Maybe it was the burner and it went flying on impact.’

  Sarah was frowning. ‘I wasn’t there, remember? You were here with Christy and called me after.’

  I had started for the door and now turned. ‘That’s right
. Where exactly were you when I called?’

  ‘Somewhere not driving a snowplow, so just get that out of your head.’

  ‘Gone.’ I balled my fingers next to my forehead and then released them quickly. ‘Poof.’

  ‘Honestly,’ she said, shaking her head. ‘I don’t come close to being a viable suspect. I didn’t know the man. You at least had talked to him on the phone.’

  ‘I had, hadn’t I?’ I said, thinking about that. ‘When Christy handed me the phone.’

  ‘And an hour later, the guy was dead.’

  ‘Then he had to have called from his burner, right?’

  ‘Maybe, maybe not,’ Sarah shrugged. ‘If he used his iPhone, it would show up as a recent call on the phone, itself, unless he deleted it. And on his bill, even if he did.’

  ‘True. I’d like to get a look at the phone – or, better yet, the bill.’

  ‘Maybe Pavlik will let you if you sweet-talk him like you did Slattery.’

  Maybe so.

  Or not.

  ‘You know I can’t do that, Maggy,’ Pavlik said when I got home. He sniffed as he hugged me hello. ‘Chardonnay?’

  Damn, the man was good. ‘I had a glass with Stephen at the Slattery Arms.’

  ‘When you were pumping him for information as I said you would.’

  ‘Cuz you are so smart.’ I nuzzled him.

  ‘And you are so full of it,’ he said, hugging me. ‘Now what did Slattery have to tell you?’

  ‘Nothing much,’ I said, following him into the living room. ‘Margraves never came back to his room on Tuesday, as we well know. The day manager packed up his things. In fact, Kelly Anthony just picked them up. We just missed her.’

  ‘She mentioned that she saw your Escape at the hotel. Who is we?’

  ‘Me and Helena. She’s staying there tonight.’ I frowned. ‘How did Kelly know it was my Escape?’

  ‘Educated guess. And the “Proud mom of a gay man” sticker might have helped.’

  I do love my Eric. I grinned. ‘OK, so Kelly arrived while we were there.’

  ‘Did you talk Slattery into letting you go through the stuff?’

  Busted. ‘Yes. But we used gloves.’

  Pavlik looked skyward. ‘Of course you did.’

  ‘Nitrile ones,’ I continued. ‘Not my ratty mittens or anything.’

  Now he laughed. ‘Find anything?’

  ‘No, which is why I asked you about phones. You have the iPhone, but Barry had to have another, a burner, since Helena didn’t find any calls to Christy on their joint bills.’

  ‘And it wasn’t in his things.’

  ‘No, but I saw a phone in his hand as he stepped into the road. It might have gone flying when he was hit and still be buried in the snow somewhere.’

  ‘And you’re not out looking for it?’

  ‘Too dark.’ And cold, according to Sarah, who had refused to help me. ‘Not that we’d find anything your deputies didn’t find that day.’

  ‘You’re jollying me along,’ Pavlik said. ‘You know full well there was no reason to search for a second phone the day of the incident.’

  ‘True. But now that there is the possibility that Christy and Barry were in cahoots, syphoning money out of the joint accounts and hiding it, that phone could be important.’

  ‘Cahoots, huh?’ Pavlik settled onto the couch and waved me down to sit next to him.

  I snuggled in. ‘Unless, of course, you found communication between the two of them on the iPhone.’

  Pavlik kissed the top of my head. ‘Directions to Christy’s house in the maps program, but no calls or texts to her number.’

  I sat up, nearly bopping him. ‘Yet I know he called her maybe an hour before, because I talked to him. There has to be another phone.’

  ‘Unless he called from the hotel before he left.’

  That had not occurred to me. ‘And caught a ride from there after he hung up.’ Getting to Brookhills from the Slattery Arms in a snowstorm in less than an hour would have been tight, but doable. ‘But that call aside, Christy said they spoke regularly. If there’s no indication of that on the iPhone …’

  ‘He had to have another,’ Pavlik agreed.

  ‘If Margraves dropped it when he was hit, it could have been buried by Harold’s plow or any of the others that came through.’

  ‘And here we are three days later,’ Pavlik said, shaking his head. ‘That mobile could be anywhere, including under that giant pile of frozen snow the truck plowed into.’

  ‘Does this mean it won’t be found until spring?’

  ‘No, it means Anthony will need to get Public Works out with shovels tomorrow morning.’

  ‘Or flamethrowers?’ I suggested.

  ‘Not sure that’s a good idea, but we’ll let Sanitation or whoever they send decide.’

  I pulled back to see Pavlik’s face. ‘You’re taking this pretty seriously.’

  Pavlik snagged an arm around me. ‘Only because you’re right. Christy’s phone has an incoming call from “Barry” just an hour and four minutes before 911 got the call from your phone.’

  ‘When I reported Margraves being hit by the plow.’ Of course, they would have checked Christy’s phone. I only wished I had when I had the opportunity.

  ‘Exactly. The call to Christy wasn’t from the iPhone we have in our possession, yet you’re corroborating that it was Margraves calling.’

  ‘Yes, I spoke to him. I assume there were previous calls from that same number on Christy’s phone?’

  ‘More than I cared to count,’ Pavlik said. ‘Going back nearly four months.’

  That meant that everything Christy had told us about the relationship was true, not a figment of her imagination. ‘And what about texts? Do they confirm she was instructed to make those trades? Wire money?’

  ‘Afraid not,’ Pavlik said. ‘We’re still sifting through, but so far there’s nothing explicit. In one voicemail, he says he’s calling to see if she “took care of it”, but no details.’

  ‘Christy said he gave her routing and account numbers, but I suppose he did that over the phone. I mean as they were talking, not texting.’

  ‘It’s safer,’ Pavlik acknowledged. ‘And, obviously, it leaves no record. Which means we still have only Christy’s word that she was making the transactions at Margraves’ behest.’

  Ugh. ‘Is she in custody?’

  ‘Not yet,’ Pavlik said.

  ‘Good.’ I slid away and dug my phone out of my pocket, punching in a few words and then hitting send.

  ‘What are you doing?’

  ‘Texting Christy to help me open tomorrow.’

  ‘Because you need her or because you think you can pry something out of her that we haven’t?’

  ‘Both?’ I tried, settling back.

  ‘Well, just so you know,’ Pavlik said, nuzzling my neck, ‘Christy might not be in custody, but her cell phone is.’

  FIFTEEN

  Happily, I had been able to reach Christy and she joined me in the coffeehouse at six a.m. Saturday morning.

  Unfortunately, I had not thought to let Sarah know she wasn’t needed.

  ‘You have got to be kidding me.’ Morning person, Sarah was not. ‘I dragged my ass out of bed and—’

  ‘Shh,’ I said, glancing over my shoulder to where Christy was hanging up her coat. ‘If you want to go home, do it. I just needed to talk to Christy before she’ – I lowered my voice another decibel – ‘gets arrested.’

  ‘Arrested?’ Sarah repeated, not bothering to lower hers.

  ‘Who’s being arrested?’ Christy asked, coming to join us. ‘Hi Sarah.’

  ‘Hi.’ A dark look at me.

  ‘Maybe Helena,’ I fibbed. ‘Who knows?’

  ‘Poor thing,’ Christy said, wiping her finger across a table for dirt. ‘Sticky.’

  ‘Is not,’ Sarah grumbled. ‘I washed that table myself.’

  Christy ignored her, going to the back.

  ‘Let her clean if she wants to,’ I hissed to
Sarah.

  ‘I thought you might be talking about me,’ Christy said, reappearing with a navy towel and spray bottle.

  ‘I was just telling Sarah you do a better job cleaning than we do. Thank you so much for coming in.’

  ‘Happy to.’ She sprayed what smelled like pure bleach on the table. ‘How did you know to call me on my landline? Did Sheriff Pavlik tell you they took my mobile?’

  ‘I didn’t know that,’ I lied, lifting my eyebrows. ‘Did I call you on your house phone? I must have pressed the wrong one.’

  Sarah glanced at me suspiciously and back again to Christy. ‘You still have a landline?’

  ‘Of course.’ She sniffed, probably because of the fumes. ‘In case there’s an emergency and we lose electricity or the cell towers go down, I can still use it. You don’t have one, Sarah?’

  ‘My not being a dinosaur, no,’ Sarah said as she turned away to hang up her own coat.

  ‘Well, I think it’s very smart of you, Christy,’ I said. ‘I should activate mine again.’

  ‘Now that you’re with the sheriff, you probably don’t need one,’ she said, wiping the table. ‘He probably has all sorts of communications devices – satellite phones, drones and all, in case of natural disaster or nuclear war.’

  I would take my apocalypse later, thank you very much. ‘Probably.’

  ‘Drones?’ Sarah said. ‘What you do with those? Send notes like carrier pigeons?’

  ‘Shows what you know,’ Christy said, sticking her nose in the air, even as she continued to scrub. ‘Drones can be used as portable cell towers.’

  ‘Really,’ I said, genuinely interested. ‘How—’

  ‘I’ll send you some articles,’ Christy offered, waving off the subject. ‘But let’s get back to me getting arrested.’

  ‘Why would you be arrested?’

  ‘Please, Maggy,’ Christy said, giving one final rub to the imaginary spot. ‘Don’t play stupid.’

  ‘But she’s so good at it,’ Sarah kibitzed with a snarky smile.

  ‘You both know that the sheriff thinks I might have taken money out of Barry’s account without his permission.’ Christy straightened up with the navy towel which was bleaching white in spots before our very eyes.

  I decided to ignore it. ‘That’s true. But he is sending people out to search for Barry’s mobile phone this morning. Assuming they find it, it should prove he gave you the account numbers and all.’