Maggie and the Empty Noose

by Barbara Cool Lee

  The same movie executive Maggie herself had later married. The two ex-Mrs. McJaspers had formed an unlikely friendship, bonding over their disenchantment with show business and their mutual contempt for the two-timing jerk they'd each fallen for and later divorced.

  "Wow, that's a bad shiner," Maggie said to her.

  Nora felt gently at her eyelid, which was puffy and discolored. "My boy's got a good right hook," she said. But she said it with a smile, her love for her client undamaged by all that had happened.

  It was refreshing to find one other person who still cared about Reese, and Maggie told her so.

  "Of course I care. I've known him since he was fifteen years old. If I didn't abandon him when he hit bottom all those years ago, I'm not going to do it now. Even if he killed Olivia."

  "He didn't," Maggie said, her heart sinking to realize that even Nora thought he might have done it. "I'm sure he's innocent."

  "I hope so," she said. "But if anyone deserved to die, Olivia did. She was a real piece of work."

  "She was your client, too," Maggie pointed out.

  Nora leaned against the gurney, looking exhausted. "I know. I knew her for a long time. And I knew just what she was."

  "Reese wanted you to dump her as a client," Maggie said, glancing back down the hall toward that guarded door.

  "He didn't understand," she said. "If I wasn't managing her, who would take care of Shane? Better to have me handle his career than someone who didn't care about him."

  "But Reese didn't want him to have a career at all," Maggie said.

  "He didn't have primary custody," she said shortly. "Wasn't a thing he could do about it."

  Then she seemed to realize what she was saying, because she added, "I'm not saying that's why he—"

  "He didn't," Maggie said firmly. "I'm sure he didn't."

  Nora, the tough-talking, take-no-prisoners negotiator, had tears in her eyes when she looked Maggie's way. "I hope so," she said softly. "She probably had about a million people who would have cheerfully killed her. I was telling Quinn—" (Quinn was her current husband, a younger man who worshipped the ground she walked on) "—if Olivia's body had been found anywhere else, we'd all be suspects."

  "Yeah," Maggie said carefully. "So did the police ask you for an alibi yet?"

  Nora didn't fall for her casual tone. "I was home in bed, Maggie. With my husband. What about you?"

  "Home in bed. With my dog," she said, trying to make it light. She suspected everyone now.

  "So neither of us have great alibis, do we?" Nora said, taking no offense. "How can you prove you were asleep?"

  "Yeah," Maggie said. She motioned to the door. "So, can we talk to him?"

  Nora shook her head. "He's unconscious. Sleeping, they say, but I think it's a drug-induced sleep. They're trying to clear the drugs from his system and I think he's having a pretty hard time of it."

  "It was evil," Maggie said. "I can't think of anything more cruel than slipping drugs to an addict."

  "Except murder, I guess," Nora said.

  "I suppose," Maggie said, finding it hard to care about Olivia, except for how her death affected those around her. Which reminded her: "Shane's at Eddie and Paige's house."

  "I know. I called them and they said the police have already questioned them all."

  "Can they do that? Question Shane without a parent present?"

  Nora raised an eyebrow. "It would be a little hard to get a parent's permission at the moment."

  "I guess. So who has custody of him?"

  Nora looked down. "I think I might, technically. I have him under contract and there's a power of attorney that comes with that, allowing me to take him to the doctor if he's with me and he gets hurt, stuff like that. But it's going to be a mess if Reese can't take care of him. He'll probably end up living with his grandparents."

  "Which grandparents?" Maggie asked.

  "Olivia had no family. Reese's parents are wonderful people, but I don't think Shane has spent too much time with them."

  "Reese will be here to take care of Shane," Maggie said firmly, hoping it was true.

  Nora nodded. "Look, I have to go talk to him about it."

  "Shane?"

  "Yes. Would you come along? Help me do it?"

  Maggie recoiled. "Talk to Shane? About what? About his parents? I… I'm not qualified to talk to him. I don't know him that well."

  "You mean you're scared to deal with it."

  "Yes. I'm scared to deal with it."

  Nora put a hand on her shoulder. "Please, Maggie. We have to decide where to send him. What to do now. And I could really use your help."

  "I'll bring Jasper along," Maggie said. "He loves Jasper. And Jasper loves him. A boy needs a dog at a time like this. It'll help."

  "We need all the help we can get," Nora said.

  Chapter Eight

  Maggie braved the gauntlet of people at Casablanca to pick up Jasper, and then Nora drove them to see Shane, using side streets and backtracking to make sure they weren't followed. Nora's Carita car was a vintage VW Beetle, a blazing orange the color of English marmalade, and it had a pristine interior that was refurbished to be just like Nora's first car had looked when she was a small-town teenager.

  The nostalgic car was part of Nora's Carita life, where she escaped the LA world of sleek Mercedes, designer business suits, and airbrushed makeup for the funky old car, huarache sandals, and margaritas. Maggie had left LA behind permanently, and didn't envy Nora's back-and-forth lifestyle one bit.

  After taking the circuitous route, Nora finally pulled into the driveway of Seva House, the Zimmer's home on The Row not far from where they started.

  They got out, Maggie unhooking Jasper's leash from the seat belt in back and helping him jump down. The stalkers hadn't figured out this house's connection to the case yet, so all was quiet, with only a soft rustling from the swaying grasses that softened the contemporary lines of the big beach house.

  A tall clump of bamboo sheltered the entrance, and a feng shui fountain with water pouring from the Buddha's hands played gently by the front door. Seva meant selfless service in Sanskrit, and the name was appropriate for the Zimmers, who had founded a charitable organization that was the focus of their lives.

  Reese was the main source of funds for the charity, helping his childhood friend fulfill his dream of serving disadvantaged children all over the world. Maggie wondered what would happen to the charity if Reese went to prison.

  Paige Zimmer let them in. Unlike Casablanca, the Zimmer house, though just as expensive and luxurious, had the air of a well-used family home, with sofas slipcovered in patchworks of old saris, soft landscape paintings on the walls, and toys everywhere.

  The two little Zimmer girls were out playing on the back lawn that overlooked the ocean. Lotus and Serenity sat on the grass in the sunshine, giggling and acting out a game with cloth dolls.

  Shane was sitting on one of the sofas looking out the window. Maggie unhooked Jasper's leash and he went straight to the boy, who wrapped his arms around the dog and buried his face in his fur.

  Eddie offered them water or tea and they declined. They all sat in the living room and talked quietly. Shane listened while Nora explained Reese's medical condition, and told, without going into detail, how Reese would not be coming home until his legal issues were straightened out.

  The boy said nothing, though his haunted eyes showed that he absorbed what was not being said—that his father was being formally accused of murdering his mother.

  "He's innocent, of course," Maggie hastened to add. "But he has to prove it, and that could take time."

  Shane nodded. "I know. How long will it take before everyone knows he's innocent?"

  The adults all looked at each other awkwardly.

  "We don't know," Maggie said gently. "But we won't stop fighting until the truth comes out."

  Shane looked back out the window. His arm rested on the dog, who had crawled up on the sofa to sit on Shane's lap. Jasper was
hardly lap dog size, but Shane seemed comforted by the huge beast sitting on him, so Maggie let them be.

  "The police asked me about the fight," Shane said quietly. "At the coffee house. They said I had to tell the truth."

  "You did have to tell the truth," Eddie said. "That is not something to feel bad about. You did the right thing."

  "And I witnessed the fight, too," Maggie said. "Several people did. You have nothing to do with the trouble your father is in." The last thing the poor kid needed was to think he was responsible for his father's arrest.

  "After you went home to your mom's last night, what happened?" she asked, hoping there would be a clue to Olivia's movements.

  But, "nothing," Shane said. "I went to my room and put on my ear buds and listened to music on my phone until I fell asleep."

  "So you don't know if she came home," Maggie asked, wanting to be sure.

  He shook his head. "I woke up in the morning and she wasn't there, so I figured she left the house early."

  "What about her boyfriend?" Maggie asked. "Did you see him?"

  He looked confused. "What boyfriend?"

  "Tom Vee?"

  He shrugged his shoulders. "Never heard of him. I was away at school a lot, and she didn't… she didn't tell me a lot of stuff."

  "Okay," Maggie said. "I'm sorry to ask you all these questions, but we need to figure out what happened so we can find the real killer."

  "Yeah," he said. "The cops already asked me all this stuff."

  Of course they did.

  "They talked to all of us," Eddie said. "Got our alibis and all that." He had tears in his eyes. He muttered a curse under his breath, which shocked Maggie, since Eddie Zimmer had always been the most Zen and peaceful man she'd ever met. But he had known Reese longer than anyone. The men had been country boys from a high desert town in the middle of nowhere. Two pairs of brothers had started a rock band in high school: Eddie and his brother David, and Reese and his brother Frank. And all four of them had ended up drug addicts.

  Yoga, Eastern philosophy, and a complete break from his past life had been Eddie's cure for his addictions. Maggie wondered if something like that would help Reese.

  "We all had to give our alibis to the police," she said. "I'm sure it's nothing personal." At least the police were doing a bit of investigating, instead of just assuming Reese was guilty and washing their hands of it.

  "It doesn't matter," Nora said. "We all have the same alibis. Being home asleep isn't much of an alibi anyway."

  Paige looked out at the back yard where the kids were playing. "We weren't asleep. The girls had tummy aches and we were all up until 4:00 AM." Her eyes were red, too, like her husband's. But she still had her usual aura of tranquility around her.

  When Maggie commented on it, Paige said, "I'm still sleepy from being up half the night. So I guess I'm too tired to feel the stress." She stood up and did a yoga stretch. "Would you like to try an asana, Shane? It might help."

  The boy shook his head and clung to the dog, who licked his face. "When can I see him?" Shane asked.

  Nora's eyes widened a bit, but she just said, "probably not for a little while. He's not up to visitors right now."

  She glanced at Maggie. "Maybe you two can talk on the phone soon," Maggie said. "But I think it would be best for you to not get in the middle of what's happening."

  Shane nodded. "You knew when you sent me away," he said.

  "Yes," Maggie said. "I knew your dad was very sick."

  "And that my mom was…."

  "That she was dead. Yes. But I didn't know what had happened. So I needed to get you to safety until we could find out what happened."

  "What happened," he repeated in a whisper. He still seemed stunned. "They're saying my dad—"

  "Your dad was poisoned," she said firmly. "Someone slipped him drugs without his knowledge. Someone killed your mother, too, Shane. I'm sorry this is so hard, but when your dad is cleared and can come home, he will help you through this."

  The silence of the others in the room was deafening. Was what she said true? Would Reese be coming home? Would he be able to help Shane? Or would this poor kid have to live with the knowledge that his own father had murdered his mother?

  Jasper broke the silence with an ear-splitting bark. They all jumped.

  The dog stood up on the sofa and looked out the window.

  There was a man talking to the two Zimmer girls on the lawn.

  Eddie was on his feet and ran.

  They all leaped to their feet and followed him.

  He slammed the French door open and shouted at the man: "Who are you? Get away from my kids!"

  The man was recording with a small camera. He backed away from Eddie, who was coming at him quickly.

  But the man continued to film as he backed over to the beach stairs and then turned and ran.

  The Zimmer girls laughed and clapped their hands. "That was funny, Daddy," Lotus said. "Do it again."

  Serenity, whose name was longer than she was, stuck out one little leg. "Daddy, are we going in the ocean now?"

  "Not now, sweetheart." He patted her head.

  "Lotus," he said to the older girl, "what was that man talking to you about?"

  "He wanted to know when Uncle Stanley had been here," she said, playing with a fistful of grass she had clasped in her fingers. "He called him Reese, but he meant Uncle Stanley, I think." She picked out one blade at a time and dropped it on the ground, like plucking daisies. "One, two, three," she whispered.

  He cupped her hand in his. "Did he say why?"

  Her hair was a curtain of soft curls swirling around her face as she vigorously shook her head no. "He took a picture."

  "Come on, girls," Eddie said. The glance he gave the other adults was horrified, but his voice remained calm and soothing as always. "We'll go play inside now."

  Once they'd led the girls inside and set them to playing on the living room rug, Paige said softly, "we're out of here." Her hands were clenched together, and she seemed to suddenly become aware of the tension in her body, because she moved a bit apart from the others and did a quick yoga pose to settle herself.

  When she finished, her face had returned to its normal gentleness. "Where can we go to get peace?" she asked Eddie.

  "A retreat, maybe?" he answered. He looked at the kids. "We should take Shane, as well, unless Reese will be able to…." He let the sentence drift off to nothingness. Who knew what Reese would be able to do?

  "How about your house in LA?" Nora asked. "You have a good security system there, and you could keep the gawkers out."

  But he shook his head. "The paparazzi are even worse there. You know that. I'm thinking a yoga retreat. In the mountains somewhere. Somewhere far away from this chaos."

  Shane hadn't gotten up with the others. He was still curled up on the couch with the dog. Maggie stood by him, thinking hard.

  "How far away is Deep Creek?" she asked.

  Eddie laughed. "Deep Creek? It's about a million miles from here. The far end of the state." Then he got a thoughtful look. "Yeah. Maybe."

  "Deep Creek?" Lotus piped up. "That's Grandma's house."

  "That's right," Paige said. "It's where Grandma and Grandpa live."

  "Your grandparents live in Deep Creek, too," Maggie said to Shane.

  "I guess so," he said.

  "Have you ever been there?"

  He shook his head.

  "When's the last time you saw your grandparents?"

  "They came to my junior high graduation. Last spring. Dad invited them. And then Dad got us the private tour at Disneyland, and we had a lot of fun and…." Then he sobbed, and put his head down on the dog's fur.

  Maggie cleared her throat. "Then I think it's time you visited them." Especially if they might eventually have custody of him, if Reese went to prison for the rest of his life.

  "So it's settled?" she said, looking from one to the other of them.

  Nora nodded. "Yes! That's the best thing. You all should go to D
eep Creek."

  "What do you think, honey?" Eddie asked Paige.

  She smiled. "The girls haven't seen their grandparents in a long time. I think it would be healing."

  Nora dropped Maggie at Casablanca so they wouldn't have to run the gauntlet of paparazzi just to get home.

  Nora pulled her little Beetle to a stop just outside the crime scene tape still strung across Casablanca's driveway. She honked the car's funky little horn to push the crowd milling around there out of the way so she could pull up.

  The crime scene tape held the reporters back from the house, but the cop on duty let Maggie pass, and she led Jasper across the driveway to her tiny house as quickly as she could, ignoring the shouts from the vultures trying to get an exclusive on the GRUESOME MURDER COMMITTED BY DRUG-ADDICT MOVIE STAR.

  Once inside she unhooked Jasper's leash and sat down on the daybed. Jasper grabbed his favorite toy sheeple, crawled up next to her, and set the toy on her lap. She patted him absently.

  "Deep Creek," she said aloud to the dog, and his ears pricked up.

  He didn't smile at the words, clearly still unsettled by all the negative vibrations of the day. But he seemed to understand that something had been settled, for he put his head on his paws and relaxed.

  By the time they'd left the Zimmer house, Nora had made all the arrangements for the Zimmer family and Shane to take a private jet to Deep Creek, California, the little town up in the high desert at the far Northeast corner of the state.

  Deep Creek was home, or, it had been, decades ago.

  Eddie Zimmer was from Deep Creek, and so was Reese, back when they were just small town kids who formed a rock-and-roll band in the barn. And their families still lived there, so it was the one safe place for Shane, somewhere far from police investigations, tabloid stringers, and curious gawkers who wanted a piece of the boy whose famous father had murdered his mother.

  Nora had told her quietly, on the trip back from the Zimmer house, that if Reese was convicted of Olivia's murder, Shane would spend what was left of his childhood there.

  Maggie had shuddered at the thought of it all ending that way. But there had been nothing more to say after that.