The Perfect Facade (A Jessie Hunt Psychological Suspense Thriller—Book Twelve)

by Blake Pierce

  “I peed them,” he said, his mouth full and crumbs falling out. “So I had to take them off. Mommy’s making clean undies so I’m waiting.”

  “I see,” Jessie replied.

  Just then, Lauren Kiplinger rounded the corner in yoga pants and a sweat top. The sight of her half naked son eating a pastry while talking to the LAPD made her gasp.

  “Where are your pants, Miles?”

  “I peed them,” he reminded her.

  “But I told you to wear your brother’s until I finish the laundry.”

  “They’re too big. They kept falling down. I’m okay like this,” he insisted.

  Kiplinger’s whole face sank. Without the makeup, the cute outfit, and the buzzy Hollywood energy from yesterday, she looked worn down and borderline sickly. Jessie wondered how much of that was due to the challenge of domestic life, how much was grief over the loss of her friend, and how much was another possible lost, boozy night.

  “You can’t go around opening the door without pants on,” she said with forced patience. “Go wrap a towel around yourself until I give you a clean pair. And wipe your face. It’s dripping with sugar.”

  Miles took his last bite of roll and walked off without another word. Once he was gone, Kiplinger’s face quickly turned from harried to overtly concerned.

  “Why are you here?”

  “We have a few more questions for you, Mrs. Kiplinger,” Karen said. “Rather than ask you to come all the way to the city, we decided to come to you.”

  “Am I the only one you’re talking to?” she asked anxiously.

  “You don’t need to concern yourself with anyone else, ma’am. Is there somewhere private we can talk?”

  The woman thought for a moment. Jessie started to wonder if the answer might actually be no. Finally she seemed to come up with an idea.

  “Follow me,” she said, turning around without another word. As Karen did, Jessie closed and locked the front door to make it harder for her son to flash the rest of the neighborhood.

  Kiplinger led them back into the bowels of the home. Jessie had to dodge everything from toy trucks to dolls to random Lego pieces, all of which were scattered among the various rooms. They passed through the kitchen, which looked like it had been the victim of a small, isolated tornado. Flour was on every counter, an open syrup bottle lay on its side as liquid dripped out into a brown puddle on the floor. The sink was piled high with dishes. On a cabinet in the corner stood multiple empty liquor bottles.

  They continued on into the living room, where a boy of about seven and a girl around nine were sitting on the floor, throwing small discs that looked like pieces of cereal into each other’s mouth. The floor around them was littered with bits that hadn’t found their mark. In an easy chair nearby, a guy in sweatpants and a rugby shirt sat watching a football game on TV. He looked up as they entered.

  “Dale, don’t let the kids out back,” Lauren said. “I’m going to be having a private conversation out there.”

  “Who are they?’ he demanded. Now Jessie knew where little Miles got his manners.

  “They’re investigating…” She paused, glancing at the kids on the floor before continuing, “What happened on Friday.”

  “Oh,” he said, clearly wishing he hadn’t asked. “Okay.”

  Kiplinger opened the sliding glass door and pointed them toward a patio table. Jessie wandered over and zipped up her jacket before taking a seat. It was a chilly mid-morning and the Kiplingers’ backyard, which was on a hill exposed to cutting ocean winds, wasn’t helping.

  “I thought I answered everything yesterday at the hotel,” Lauren said, even before sitting down.

  “Some new questions came up,” Karen said matter-of-factly. “We’re hoping you can help us clear them up.”

  “I can try, but it’s all pretty hazy.”

  “You coordinated for the stripper to arrive at midnight, correct?” Karen said.

  “Yeah. And he showed up right on time. I remember thinking that was a good sign. You never know how professional a company like that is going to be.”

  “It sounds like Rock Harder was on better behavior than you,” Jessie poked. If she was going to get these women to open up more than they had yesterday, she knew the best bet was to get them sniping at one another.

  “What does that mean?” Kiplinger asked, clearly irked as she glanced over her shoulder.

  Jessie suspected that the woman was making sure the sliding door was closed and that her husband couldn’t hear them.

  “We were told you got pretty grabby that night,” she said flatly.

  “Who told you that?” Kiplinger demanded.

  “Is it true?” Jessie pressed, ignoring her question.

  Realizing she couldn’t order law enforcement to answer her, she gave a resentful sigh.

  “I’m sure I was,” she said defensively. “I like to have a good time. He was a big boy. If I went too far, he could have told me, and he didn’t.”

  “Are you sure about that?” Jessie pushed. “We heard you were on the verge of passing out at that point. How do you even remember what he said or you did?”

  Kiplinger seemed about to retort angrily before a thought popped into her head.

  “Actually, I may have passed out. I don’t remember him leaving. I have a vague recollection of him dancing, and then he wasn’t there. The next thing I remember is falling off the loveseat I was sleeping on in the middle of the night. Everything in between is a blur.”

  Jessie decided now was the time to let the woman’s stewing bitterness at being called out flower fully. Lauren Kiplinger was pissed and she was under the mistaken impression that having passed out at some point gave her an impenetrable alibi. She was primed to rip her gal pals and Jessie was happy to let her.

  “So Lauren, you were completely out,” she said leadingly, using the woman’s first name to make things seem more casual. “In that case, who do you think could have done this? Did one of the others have a beef with Cloudy?”

  Lauren looked down at the table, giving the impression that she was really pondering the question. Jessie glanced at Karen, whose eyebrows were raised, and gave her best “I told you so” look. It looked like the decision to let these women go yesterday and chat now in their natural habitat was about to pay off.

  “I would never accuse either of them of something like that,” Lauren said, looking back up with robotic sincerity. “But you never know what someone’s capable when they’re not in their right mind.”

  “What do you mean?” Karen asked curiously, playing into the gossipy vibe.

  Lauren leaned in conspiratorially, even though there was no one else around.

  “Like, Veronica seems like such a goody-goody church mouse. But when she lets loose, she really goes all out. She’s so buttoned up most of the time that when she finally lets her hair down she tends to overdo it.”

  “How so?” Jessie asked, leaning in as well.

  “For example, that night she was making out with some guy in the club. Then they went off to a dark corner. I couldn’t see everything but there was a lot of writhing around going on. And that’s not the first time.”

  “But that doesn’t mean she would kill her friend,” Karen pointed out.

  “No, of course not,” Lauren said, straightening up again. “My point is just that when she’s drunk, which isn’t often, her brain turns off and she starts operating on instinct.”

  “Isn’t that kind of true for anyone who gets drunk?” Jessie said.

  “Sure, but some of us, who drink a little more on the regular, know when we’re pushing up against the limit. Veronica would bust right through. I don’t think she’d ever intentionally hurt Claudia. But I know she was jealous of her—happy marriage, good kids. I could see her accidentally snapping if she was really smashed and Cloudy said the wrong thing to her. All it takes is a second of anger, you know?”

  Jessie didn’t point out that the same “second of anger” could lead anyone, including her, to ac
cidentally snap.

  “What about Kimberly?” she asked.

  Lauren shook her head.

  “Kim will do some wild stuff too, but she doesn’t need to be in an altered state to do it. She used to be real prim and proper. But a couple of years ago, she found her husband was nailing their nanny. He convinced her to let it continue, saying that an open marriage would be better for their relationship long term. But then there was this big bust at the yacht club they belonged to. It turned out it was basically this fancy whorehouse masquerading as a fancy club and he’d been using that for kicks too.”

  As she talked, Karen looked over at Jessie incredulously. They were clearly thinking the same thing. How could Lauren Kiplinger not realize that the big bust she was referring to happened as a result of the woman sitting across from her? Then again, Lauren didn’t seem to Jessie like the type who committed details of news stories to memory, especially not ones from more than a week ago.

  “After that,” she went on, oblivious to the expressions of the other two, “Kim was done with putting up with the double standard. She decided to give as good as she got. If she saw a guy she liked, and he was game, she’d have her way with him. She didn’t even try to hide it. Her husband, Morgan is his name, couldn’t say boo. They have two kids. She runs everything in that family, keeps the trains running. He knows if he said a word, she’d bail and his life would fall apart. So she has her fun and he keeps his mouth shut.”

  “So you don’t think she’s capable of this?” Karen tried to clarify.

  “Never say never,” Lauren said, now in total “chatty” mode. “She was pretty far gone on Friday too. But I don’t think she had as much reason to resent Cloudy. I mean, maybe she wished her husband wasn’t an asshole and was more like Joe. He’s a real solid guy. And I say that knowing he doesn’t like me that much. But Cloudy loved him, so I’d never say a bad word about him. Anyway, Cloudy never rubbed it in Kim’s face and that doesn’t seem like enough of a reason to kill your friend, drunk or sober.”

  “Did you resent her marriage?” Jessie asked.

  Lauren didn’t seem as offended by the question as expected.

  “Not resent,” she said. “I mean, I wish my husband wasn’t such a lazy lay-about who watches sports every night and can barely keep track of his kids’ names. But I’m not exactly a walk in the park either, so I can’t really complain too much.”

  It was about as honest-sounding an answer as Jessie could have hoped for. Whether it was actually true was another matter.

  “Anyone else that had a problem with Claudia?” she asked, sensing that their hostess was running out of steam.

  Lauren shook her head.

  “Not that I know of. She was a hard person to hate. Besides, she never said a bad word about anyone. When we had our gripe sessions, she listened but never joined in. So I don’t know where anyone would get the ammunition to come after her, you know?”

  Jessie nodded, though she didn’t necessarily agree. Sometimes people create their own ammunition. And in her experience, her old neighbor Kimberly Miner was good at manufacturing bullets. She decided now was a good time to find out for sure.

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  Jessie was pretty sure this was what a panic attack felt like.

  She and Karen were so immersed in breaking down their interview with Lauren Kiplinger that she’d somehow forgotten that Kimberly Miner’s house was right across the street from where she used to live.

  But as they rounded the corner and both places came into view, her chest tightened and she started to hyperventilate.

  “Are you okay?” Karen asked, pulling over just a few homes away.

  “No,” Jessie grunted.

  “What is it?”

  Jessie, not sure she could speak, pointed at her old house, where she had lived with a husband who poisoned her while she was pregnant, inducing a miscarriage. It was the house where she slept each night beside a man who cheated on her, eventually tried to frame her for murdering his mistress, and then tried to kill her when she found out. After getting out of prison for those crimes, he would go on to kill her mentor, nearly kill her boyfriend, and try to do the same to both her and her sister. All that madness began in the house less than half a block away.

  Karen knew most of that and seemed to understand the gist of what was happening without being told.

  “Okay, listen,” she said calmly and slowly. “Here’s what you’re going to do. Take a deep breath in through your nose and out through your mouth. Then do it again. I’m going to come around and help you out of the car. Standing up in the fresh air will do you good. While I come over, I want you to focus on a spot on the dashboard. Don’t look anywhere else.”

  Jessie did her best to follow Karen’s instructions. She fixated on a dusty patch on the detective’s dash, though her eyes watered with the effort. She inhaled as deeply as she could, allowing the cold air to fill her lungs before she slowly expelled it.

  The passenger door opened and Karen extended her hand. Jessie reached for it, allowing the other woman to bear the brunt of lifting her out of her seat. Once she was upright, she leaned her back against the car and took several more deep breaths.

  She was just starting to feel like she was regaining control when a memory of Kyle, hovering over her as he plunged a fireplace poker downward, popped into her head, followed by another of him coolly convincing her that she had actually killed his mistress in a drunken, angry rage. She felt a cascade of additional memories lining up to invade her mind and sensed that if she didn’t gain control now, she might never.

  “Stop!” she ordered.

  “What?” Karen asked, her lips pinched in worry.

  Jessie forced a smile.

  “I’m telling myself to stop this spiraling. I don’t live there anymore. The man responsible for my anxiety about it is dead. I killed him myself. The only claim that place has on me is what I allow it to have.”

  “That’s exactly right,” Karen agreed. “That thing is just wood and drywall, nothing more.”

  Jessie took another deep breath.

  “Now I just have to get myself to believe it,” she said, wincing.

  Something about the line, about the absurdity of her trying to convince herself that she ought not to be haunted by her old home, made them both laugh. It was enough to break the spell.

  “You okay now?” Karen checked.

  “I will be by the time we talk to Kimberly.”

  “You sure?” Karen said. “Because we can’t have you go all Cuckoo’s Nest in the middle of the interview. It’d kind of undermine our ability to determine her credibility.”

  “Noted,” Jessie said. “Maybe we just walk the rest of the way from here to give me a little more time to get my bearings.”

  “Not a problem,” Karen said. “Maybe on the way over you can fill me in on what you know about Mrs. Miner. I get the distinct feeling that it’s more than you’ve shared so far.”

  Jessie chuckled uneasily as she grabbed her coat from the car and put it on.

  “That’s an understatement,” she said as they walked along the sidewalk to the Miner house. “I was trying to be discreet to protect her privacy earlier because I didn’t think my connection to her was material to the case. But now I’m reconsidering that. We knew each other pretty well back when I lived here.”

  “As neighbors?”

  “At first, yes,” Jessie told her, stopping for a moment to catch her still too-rapid breathing. “She was very sweet when we first moved in—brought us food, invited me over. I met her husband and her kids. We hung out a few times. Unfortunately, that all changed when the nanny incident happened.”

  “The one Lauren mentioned,” Karen recalled.

  “Right,” Jessie confirmed, finally sensing her frayed nerves settling. “But what Lauren didn’t know and I wasn’t going to tell her was that I was the reason Kimberly found out about her husband and the nanny. I saw them walking up the stairs, naked, toward a darkened bedroom in
the middle of the night. I told Kimberly, thinking she deserved to know. She did not react well.”

  “How so?” Karen wondered aloud.

  “I won’t bore you with all the ugly details, mostly because they’re too cringy to think about. But it turned out that she already knew. She’d found some way to trick herself into thinking it wasn’t a big deal or that it didn’t mean anything or…I don’t know what. But when I told her directly, she had to face the truth and she took it out on me.”

  “That sounds brutal,” Karen said quietly.

  “It was. She didn’t speak to me for two months. But eventually we smoothed things over. I think she eventually just decided where the real blame belonged. And that was around the time things started falling apart with Kyle. I didn’t know everything he was doing on the side, but we were fighting. I know she heard at least one of them. And then—”

  Jessie stopped short, surprised by the wave of emotion that hit her. This time it wasn’t panic but grief.

  “What is it?” Karen asked.

  Jessie forced a smile as she wiped away a tear with the back of her wrist.

  “I had kind of blocked out this part,” she said. “But I was pregnant. Kyle apparently wasn’t excited because he poisoned me, which I didn’t learn until much later. I lost the baby. But the night it happened, I nearly died. I was calling nine-one-one and crawling to the front door. I barely made it outside before I collapsed. When I woke up in the hospital, Kimberly was asleep in a chair across the room. She had found me on my porch. She stayed with me all night in that room. We never really talked about it after. It was too painful. It’s a little weird that we don’t know each other that well and yet we were both present for one of the most traumatic experiences in the other one’s life.”

  “I’m really sorry that happened to you,” Karen said, focusing on the one part of the story Jessie still hadn’t found a way to process. Even two years later, she still felt a hole in her gut when she thought about it.

  “Thank you,” she said, before blowing her nose. “But don’t worry. I won’t let any of that affect how I handle this interview. If Kimberly Miner is responsible for Claudia’s death, she needs to pay, no matter what she’s suffered or what kindness she showed me in the past.”