Death with a Dark Red Rose

by Julia Buckley

  Sam turned and said, “Hey! I’ve got some competition back there. Rochester is romancing Lena.”

  I giggled. “He’s tickling me. Go over there. Now, stay on your side, you monster.”

  Rochester, looking pleased, turned his attention to the window and the passing traffic. Cliff was nearing the Blue Lake Animal Center, which took up two storefronts on Maxwell Street. He parked halfway down the block “so she doesn’t see you two through the window.” Then he stepped out of the car, opened the back door to retrieve a joyful Rochester, and sloped toward the entrance door with a casual stride.

  “The crazy stunts we pull,” Sam murmured, his eyes on his brother and the dog. From behind, Cliff looked like any other dog walker in Blue Lake. Halfway up the block he turned to his right, opened a door, and ushered Rochester in. I heard the dog bark once, happily, before they disappeared.

  “I’m dying to text Isabelle, but she’ll be too busy. But she does know that Brock Cromwell is coming in with his dog,” I said, half laughing. “Where did he come up with that name, anyway?”

  Sam turned to me, grinning. “He said it was his name when he played cowboys as a kid.”

  “Does every boy have a pretend cowboy name?”

  He shrugged. “Probably.”

  “What was yours?”

  His face was a bit sheepish. “Nate Champion.”

  I laughed. “What?”

  “He was a real guy! A hero. A small rancher who stood up to corrupt cattlemen in 1890s Wyoming. Did you ever hear of the Johnson County War?”

  “Can’t say that I have, pardner. But then again, you’ve never heard of Daphne du Maurier, so we are at an impasse.”

  He studied me for a moment and said, “I’m sure a fun part of our marriage will be recommending books to each other.”

  “Sam!”

  “What?”

  “That’s her.” I pointed out the window at Elena Castellan, who was emerging from the passenger side of a dark blue car, holding a cat carrier. She waved vaguely to whoever was driving and moved swiftly into the vet’s office.

  “Okay. Here we go,” Sam said. “Suddenly this feels silly, like an episode of a bad TV show.”

  “I know. What are we even here for? Did you happen to get the license number of that car?”

  “No.” He was still peering out the front window. “There were too many other cars in the way.”

  “Oh well. We can watch for it. I know it was a dark blue sedan—I think it was a Ford.”

  “Okay.”

  We sat together in companionable silence for several minutes, looking at traffic. At one point, Sam leaned against the headrest and relaxed in his seat. I thought he might be sleeping, but eventually I saw him rustle and look at his phone.

  “Hey,” I said.

  He turned back to me. “What?”

  “Another fun thing about being married?”

  “Yeah?”

  “We—” My phone buzzed in my hand and I jumped. I saw Belinda’s name and answered it.

  “Hey,” I said.

  “Do you know that Doug is putting my brother in some kind of safe house?” she asked, her voice breathless in my ear.

  “Yeah—Sam offered an apartment he has in Daleville. Have you talked to Carl? Your brother has been up to some stuff.”

  She sighed. I thought she might be near tears. “He doesn’t have good impulse control. He shouldn’t have done that. Now I have to worry about someone hunting him down . . .”

  “No, you don’t,” I said. “You know that. Doug will make sure he’s safe.”

  I could almost feel the calming effect my voice had on her anxiety. “Well—it was nice of Sam to offer a place. Thank him for me.”

  “I will. Meanwhile we’re sitting outside the vet’s office on the off chance that Cliff might glean some clue from Elena Castellan.”

  Belinda sighed. “I’ve been looking into Plasti-Source here at the library. I can’t find too much in print, but I did find one lawsuit that alleged their improper waste disposal practices put workers at risk.”

  “Waste disposal,” I said. “What kind of waste does a plastics plant dispose of?”

  “Their mixing process produces something that they call ‘toxic sludge’ in one part of their plant, and this is what concerns people.”

  “Toxic?”

  “Potentially harmful. I’m guessing that chemicals would be involved, right? So they would have to go through proper channels and inspections and such.”

  “They claim they are doing so. Did you see the article in the paper? And if they’re not doing it legally—why aren’t they? Is it expensive to go the legal route?”

  “Yes, I suppose. They would have to hire a disposal company, which involves transportation, probably of barrels or something like that. And then an approved site for dropping off toxic waste. But it’s also expensive in the long run to break the law, isn’t it?”

  “Good point.” I felt a sudden wave of affection for Belinda. I pictured her in her back office in the library, poring over books or old files, her green eyes glowing with the love of research. Her hair tended to fall over her eyes while she worked, so generally she pulled it up into a shiny tail or librarian’s bun. She couldn’t keep her glasses contained in the same way, which is why she often had to push them up the bridge of her nose.

  “Listen, I’m here with Sam, and—oh shoot!” I ducked down in my seat, but not before I made eye contact with Elena Castellan, who had walked past our car, texting, her cat carrier handle slung like a purse strap over her shoulder. She looked up just as I squirmed in my seat, and in that millisecond that we looked at each other, I saw recognition in her eyes.

  “Gotta go,” I said, ending my conversation.

  Sam turned around. “Was that—?”

  “Yes. And she saw me. Where is Cliff?”

  We looked toward the entrance of BLAC, and Cliff came wandering out with Rochester, pausing to breathe in the fall air. He appeared to be a man with not a care in the world. I spun around for a view out the back window; Elena was tucking her cat into the backseat of the blue car. This time I took a surreptitious photograph. Elena climbed in the front passenger seat, and the car drove past us. I gasped.

  I spun back toward Sam and said, “Hey—” just as Cliff and Rochester arrived. Cliff opened the back door and Rochester dove in, greeting me as he would a long-lost friend. “Bah. Rochester! No licking. Blech. Okay, I like you, too.” I petted his big head and his soft ears, then scrubbed his tuxedo-white chest for a while. He looked nobly out the window, panting occasionally. Cliff climbed in the front and started the engine. “Okay, that was interesting.”

  “What happened?” Sam said.

  “I did my act. Very handsome local man with very handsome dog, just headed to the vet for a checkup.”

  Sam snorted.

  “Hey, they clipped his nails!” I said, studying Rochester’s neat paws.

  “Isabelle did. In about five seconds. She’s great.” I noticed that his face was particularly pleased when he mentioned her name.

  “Anyway?” Sam prompted.

  “Yeah. So I was in the lobby petting Rochester, and Elena came in. I acted like a lonely guy desperate for conversation.”

  “You are one of those,” Sam said.

  “She was quiet, sort of solemn, but friendly. I asked about her cat, and she started right in about how she got her, why she named her Sasha, stuff like that.” He cleared his throat. “Then she got a phone call. I don’t know who it was, but she told the person she was at the vet. She said, ‘Yeah, I would have canceled, but Sasha was making weird choking noises. I wanted to make sure she was okay.’ So I guess that explains why she’s at the vet right after her husband potentially died. I didn’t get any majorly weird vibes up front.”

  “But?” I said.

  He
turned to smile at me. “But I asked her if she had any other pictures of Sasha.” He turned back to look at the road. “She didn’t think twice—got out her phone to show me. But she had just used it to send an e-mail, and her send page was still open.” He stopped at a red light and turned back to me. “Guess what her username is.”

  “Elephant21,” I said.

  Cliff’s face fell. “How did you know that?”

  “I wouldn’t have, except about two minutes ago she climbed into a car with a guy I’m pretty sure was Joe Piper. They both looked at me, and they were both glaring.” It gave me the chills, thinking about the look on their faces: a shared expression that bordered on hate.

  Sam spun around. “What? Just now?”

  “Yeah. Cliff can double-check, because this time I got the license number.”

  Cliff stared hard out the window. “So what does this mean? We can definitely link her to Plasti-Source, and to the disappearance of Luis.”

  “But why is Joe Piper driving her around town? Why is he picking her up at a vet appointment?” Sam mused. “It’s a workday, right?”

  “What if it’s not Luis who was having an affair?” I said. “What if it’s Elena? What if she and Joe Piper were seeing each other behind Luis’s back, and that’s what they had a fight about?”

  “If they had a fight at all,” Cliff said. “Carl made it sound like nothing of the sort happened.”

  “Well, let’s say Elena had an affair.” I studied the back of Sam’s head as I thought it through. “Carl said that the e-mail said that she acknowledged Luis was missing and didn’t know what to do. She mentioned a “cover story.” That meant she was asking Joe Piper about some sort of secret they shared related to Luis. That’s suspicious.”

  “It is,” Sam said. “As is the fact that she said it put her in an odd position, and she was worried.”

  We sat for a while; it seemed as though we were just gliding through the streets of Blue Lake, our thoughts acting as buffers that kept out sound and sight. Even Rochester seemed to be thinking as he sat arrow straight beside me.

  Cliff said, “Let’s give Elena the benefit of the doubt. Let’s assume for a minute that she’s not a horrible person. That she really was worried about Luis, but for some reason, as her e-mail suggested, she couldn’t say so. What would prevent her from going to the police? And why would she be telling Joe Piper this?”

  Sam said, “You have to interrogate both of them, obviously. I can’t think of an innocent reason for what she’s doing.”

  “Agreed. In fact, I need to get Doug on the horn. He should have Carl safely installed in your Daleville place by now.”

  Sam leaned closer to Cliff and studied him for a moment. “Why are you in such a good mood?”

  Cliff shrugged. “Break in the case.”

  Now I was alert, too. Cliff had been sort of smiling since he had returned to the car. I had attributed it to the invigorating weather. “You asked her out!” I said.

  He grinned at me via the rearview mirror. “I did.”

  “Tell me.”

  He smiled. “I took Rochester in first. She was cool about that—she didn’t want to let Elena leave while I was in my ‘appointment.’ So she did a quick ear check and nail clip, and then she looked at me with those eyes. She has gorgeous dark eyes.”

  “And?”

  “She said, ‘How have you been, Cliff?’ It was just us in that little room, and it just flowed out of me. I said, ‘I’ve been kicking myself that I didn’t ask you out three months ago when I wanted to. And feeling like a jerk ever since.’”

  “Oh wow! What did she say?”

  Cliff turned onto Wentworth Street. “She kissed me.”

  “What?” Sam yelled.

  “She leaned in and kissed me on the mouth, and then she said, ‘Why don’t you just ask me out now?’ So I did. We’re having dinner Wednesday night.”

  I clapped. “Now, that is more like it, Cliff. She does have pretty eyes, doesn’t she?”

  “She does. I’m going to dream about that. I would never have thought it could be romantic, standing in an antiseptic room with a woman who has just clipped a German shepherd’s nails. But it was really romantic.”

  Sam turned to make a face at me—a blend of pride, disdain, and amusement. He still looked pale, and I leaned forward to feel his forehead. He said, “I’m okay, Lena. I’ll take a quick nap when we get back, and tomorrow I’ll probably be one hundred percent again.”

  “Okay.” I studied him, feeling dubious, and my phone buzzed again. This time it was Adam.

  “Lena, I’m at Wheat Grass. I’ve moved our boxes here, and I wonder if you could come by and help me go through them.”

  “Of course. I’m on the road now—I’ll get Cliff to drop me off. See you soon.”

  Sam peered at me, surprised. I told my companions what Adam had said, and Cliff said, “Sure, I can drop you off and then take Sam home. Will Adam give you a ride?”

  “I’m sure he will. He and I really need to get started on Camilla’s party room. The event is in two weekends, you know. Barring any other crazy occurrences.”

  “Like Luis staggering in with bloodstained clothing?” Sam said, his expression dark.

  “Oh God. That’s like something out of a Poe story.”

  “Sorry. I need sleep.”

  “Turn here, Cliff. This road meets up with Green Glass Highway.”

  Cliff smirked at me in the rearview mirror. “I know, Lena. I’ve lived here for months now, and I’m a cop. We tend to learn all the byways.”

  “Sorry.” I studied him in the mirror as his eyes returned to the road. “At your date tomorrow, make sure you invite Isabelle to Camilla’s party as your date.”

  “Good idea.” He turned into the driveway of Wheat Grass moments later, and, as always, I admired its driftwood façade and tasteful landscaping.

  “Thanks, guys. Adam will get me home. Sam, you go to bed,” I said.

  “I will,” Sam said. It was clear that his energy was ebbing again.

  I leaned forward to kiss his cheek, and Cliff’s. “See you later.” I climbed out and waved as they drove away. Then I mounted the steps and opened the door, pushing through the elegant main room, where diners spoke in muted tones and made gentle clinking sounds with their silver and china, to the back hallway, which led to the kitchen and to Adam’s office. I had never actually gone into the office before, but I assumed Adam would be there. I knocked on the door and he opened it almost immediately, thrusting his head out through a narrow opening. “Oh good. I was halfway afraid it was Camilla, coming by to check on me.”

  “No, I think she’s fairly distracted right now. There have been some . . . developments.”

  “So I heard. She texted me earlier. Come in.”

  He opened the door wide and I saw a spacious room with a gray desk beneath the sole window, and a series of shelves on the opposite wall, holding all sorts of restaurant supplies. A couch sat against the south wall, and a Native American rug covered much of the floor. “Hey, it’s nice in here!” I said. My mind was still half on Elena Castellan, and the look she had given me when she and Joe Piper drove past . . .

  “Yes, I like it. A good place to get work done. Come here—I’ve got five out of the boxes, but I need some help.”

  The wall opposite the couch was lined with tall boxes and with the unpacked book covers he had mentioned. “Oh, Adam! The colors on this one!” I stroked the canvas reproduction of The Lost Child, my favorite Camilla novel. “Look at the light around the Eiffel Tower! Camilla is going to love this.”

  He handed me an X-Acto knife. “Work while you talk.”

  I laughed and walked up to a box. Carefully, I sliced away the tape holding the sides together, then opened the top and pulled out another canvas—this one for On London Bridge. “Ahhh,” I said.

 
Adam laughed. “You might be too much of a fan to help with this.”

  “No, I’ll be fast, I promise.” I set the painting against the wall and went back to work. One by one, we pulled out covers that represented a lifetime of work. Each cover, with visuals tapping symbols that were important in the novel, provided a testament to Camilla’s genius. Despite my joy in the work, my mind kept wandering away, posing questions. Why did Elena Castellan take her cat to the vet? Why did she need a “cover story” for the disappearance of Luis? Was she having an affair with Joe Piper? What were the men at Plasti-Source up to? Was everyone at the Stafford plant corrupt? Was there any corruption at all, or was that an illusion? Could there somehow be an innocuous explanation for Luis’s disappearance, despite the car with blood inside? Could he simply have had an accident? Bumped his head, bled a little, and wandered away, confused?

  I looked up to find Adam studying me. “Something on your mind?”

  “All sorts of things. But mostly I’m admiring these lovely covers.” When we finished, half an hour later, there were thirty-five canvases leaning against one another.

  “Good,” Adam said. “Let me just call Enrique and Peter to take away these boxes.” He went to the door and spoke to someone in the hall. “Can you send my busboys here for a moment?”

  Enrique and Peter, both about twenty years old, appeared a moment later. “Did you want us, Adam?”

  Adam took the knife out of my hand and handed it, and his, to the boys. “Guys, can you spare about ten minutes to carry these boxes out to the recycling dumpster and break them down?”

  A light of interest gleamed in their eyes. Men loved doing jobs with tools. “Sure, Adam. No one’s close to being finished eating right now, anyway.”

  “Great! Thanks.”

  The two started carrying out boxes, tucked underneath their arms. Adam looked back at the standing covers. “Now the question is how to display them. I have about ten easels, so we can stagger some out in front—maybe the most recent ones? But I was thinking the others could be hung right on the wall. I have a fair amount of wall space if I temporarily take down the sconces. The nails are already in place, so we could maybe get six per wall. That’s twenty-four. Plus, another ten on the easels is thirty-four. So where do we put the last one, along with the author picture of Camilla?”