Death by French Roast

by Alex Erickson

  I crossed the threshold, gently closing the door behind me. Rita’s house was small, but was more than big enough for a single woman. It was also rather sedate for such a loud, boisterous person as Rita. I’d expected to find colorful prints or wild rugs, but none of that was evident. Instead, the place looked like every other home. The only odd thing I noticed was Rita’s cardboard cutout of my dad peering out at me from her bedroom.

  I found Rita sitting on the couch in her living room. She had an open box on the coffee table in front of her. Photographs were spread out on the table, and many more were tossed next to her on the couch. I sat down in a rocking chair by the window so I wouldn’t disturb her spread. Glancing outside, I could see much of the neighborhood. It forcibly reminded me of Eleanor Winthrow and how she used to keep such a diligent watch on my neighborhood from her own chair.

  “I might seem morose, but I’m not,” Rita said, drawing my attention away from the window.

  “This has to be hard on you.”

  “It is, dear.” She smiled at me, then turned her attention back to the photographs. “But it’s been difficult to live with as well. I think that if you can somehow bring Wade’s killer to justice, I might finally move past it.”

  “I shouldn’t have sprung it on you like that,” I said, truly regretting how heavy-handed I’d been at the writers’ meeting. “I should have come to you and talked to you first before bringing it to the group.”

  “Oh, pah.” She waved a dismissive hand my way. “You did what you thought was right. And we did talk before anyone else arrived, so put that right out of your mind. I don’t hold it against you for wanting to talk to me when you did. I’d have done the same.”

  “Well, I regret it nonetheless.” I looked down at my hands, ashamed. “I didn’t realize how hard it would hit you. When you left so quickly after the meeting—”

  “Don’t for one second blame yourself, Krissy Hancock.”

  I looked up, surprised. I’m not sure she’d ever talked to me that way before. She sounded an awful lot like my dad did back when I was a kid who thought she could talk back to him when I was rightfully in the wrong.

  “I admit, I needed a few minutes alone to compose myself, but it’s not because I was upset. Yes, thinking of Wade and what happened to him still makes me sad, but you had nothing to do with that. I was happy you’re going to look into it. I still am. I want his killer found, even if they are long dead.” Her voice hardened by the end. I had a feeling she’d feel cheated if his killer escaped justice through death.

  Unsure where to go from there, I leaned forward and tried to get a good look at the photographs on the coffee table. They were upside down, and I was too far away to make much out.

  Rita noticed my interest and picked up one of the photographs. She stood long enough to pass it to me, before sitting back down. “That one’s of Wade and me. It was always my favorite, but I could never bring myself to frame it or hang it up. I probably should before it deteriorates any more than it already has.”

  The photo was well-worn from constant handling, and depicted the man I’d seen in Eleanor’s photograph—dressed much like Don Johnson in Miami Vice—but this time, instead of standing with a young Eleanor Winthrow, he had his arm around a thin, beaming beauty with big hair.

  “This is you?” I asked, unable to hide the awe in my voice.

  “Don’t act so surprised, dear. It was a long time ago.”

  “I . . . I’m not.” Though, honestly, I was. I could see Rita in the eyes, in the way she held herself, yet I’d never imagined her in this way. A part of me had always thought of her as she was now—a bit on the plump side, almost jolly in stature as she was in nature. The Rita in the photograph could easily have been a model if she’d so chosen.

  “That was taken a month before his death,” she said. “I marvel now that we didn’t look as miserable as we felt. The pressure was getting to the both of us by then, but our relationship was as strong as ever. We refused to let ignorance and intolerance get in the way of how we felt about one another.”

  The age difference between the two was obvious, but looking at the photograph, the fit felt right. They didn’t look like father and daughter; they didn’t look out of place at all. In my eyes, the photograph showed two people who loved each other and belonged together.

  “You were a cute couple,” I said, handing the photo back to Rita. She looked at it for a long couple of moments before setting it aside.

  “Back then, we were the only ones to think so. The town was so against us, you’d have thought we’d gone back in time to the early forties or something. You know how Pine Hills is.” She shook her head. “Everyone wants to know everyone else’s business.” Her eyes narrowed. “Don’t give me that look! I can’t help it if I happen to hear things.”

  I held up my hands placatingly. “I wasn’t judging.”

  “Good.” Rita began boxing up the photos, careful not to bend a single one. “What people didn’t understand back then was that Wade and I didn’t just up and decide we loved each other one day. It was a slow process. We started as friends, and the relationship grew out of that. This wasn’t a fling for either of us.”

  “Why do you think the town was so against the two of you dating? Was it only the age? Or was there more to it?”

  She stared at a photo, eyes slightly glazed, as if remembering, before she placed it in the box. “Wade and his family were prominent citizens of Pine Hills back then. His parents were both wealthy, influential people. They squandered their wealth, of course, but when we were dating, there was no shortage of money in that family, let me tell you.”

  I thought of Eleanor and her small house. How hard must it have been for her to drop so far in status. No wonder she’d grown so bitter over time. Between that and her brother’s death, I was surprised she hadn’t made a bigger nuisance out of herself.

  “Much of Wade’s family thought I was dating him merely for his wealth. He bought me nice things and I know many of my friends were jealous. I saw them looking at my new dresses and jewelry, how they talked about me when they thought I wasn’t listening.”

  She replaced the lid to the box and then sat back. She wasn’t looking at me as she spoke. A part of me realized she was speaking more for herself than she was me. It was a side of Rita I never knew existed.

  “Both his parents tried to make him break it off with me many times, as if they could still boss him around, despite his age. His father once even threatened to disown him, but Wade stood strong. It got so bad that I even told him I’d understand if he wanted to leave me. That night was one of the best I’d ever had.” A gleam came into her eye and she fell silent.

  I gave her a few minutes before asking, “Do you think someone in his family could have killed him?”

  “I’ve considered it,” she said. “But I don’t think so. Despite their threats, Wade’s parents weren’t malicious people. They were concerned about their image, of course, but they wouldn’t have ever hurt their son.”

  I didn’t want to ask, but felt I needed to anyway. “What about Eleanor?”

  Rita’s face clouded over briefly before she spoke. “Eleanor didn’t approve of us, but she loved her brother dearly. I think she was the only other person, other than myself, who wanted to get to the bottom of the murder. There was a time we might have been friends. If it wasn’t for the fact a part of her always thought it was my fault Wade had died, I wouldn’t have minded talking to her about him when times grew hard.”

  “She thought you killed him?” I asked, thinking back to what Patricia Dalton had said about people in town thinking Rita might have had something to do with Wade’s death. I prayed she was wrong, but couldn’t dismiss the idea out of hand either, no matter how much I might have wanted to.

  “Of course not, dear,” Rita said. “But she believed that if he hadn’t been dating me, then no one would have had a reason to kill him.”

  “And what do you think?”

  Rita considered
the question before answering. “I think it’s a shame someone decided a good man like Wade Fink needed to die. I think that whoever did it had their own reasons, reasons I can hardly fathom. If our relationship played into it at all, it wasn’t because of us. The killer is entirely to blame for their own decision.”

  She abruptly stood and snatched the box up from the coffee table. “Would you like coffee or something to drink?” she asked.

  “No, thank you.”

  Rita carried the box out of the room without another word. I remained seated, knowing she’d left not because she was upset at me, but because she needed a few minutes alone to gather her thoughts.

  She returned a few minutes later, looking far more composed than she had when she’d left.

  “I try not to get worked up about it so much these days,” she said, resuming her seat on the couch. “I can keep my mind off of it most of the time. The only time I can’t avoid it is on the Anniversary, but that’s to be expected.”

  Rita had mentioned the Anniversary—caps included—once before. I hadn’t known what she’d meant then, but now, I did.

  “It’s not like many people from my past still talk to me,” Rita went on. “After Wade’s murder, everyone turned their backs on me like I was contagious. His family didn’t want to have anything to do with the girl who’d started the whole mess, and his friends were just as cold-shouldered.”

  “It wasn’t your fault,” I said.

  “I know that, dear. But they needed someone to blame.” She heaved a sigh. “Even my own friends up and disowned me. It took me years to rebuild what was left of my reputation. I haven’t dated since Wade died, if you can believe it. Haven’t wanted to.”

  I gave her a surprised look that she caught immediately and she laughed. It was a good sound to hear.

  “I know what you’re thinking,” she said. “But James Hancock was never a realistic goal for me. He’s a famous author and I’m, well, me.”

  “Yeah, but . . .” I trailed off, not sure how to go on. Rita had thrown herself at Dad when he’d come to town, and I mean that literally. To think that she never believed he would reciprocate was almost too much for me to grasp.

  “I’m not saying I wouldn’t have ended my man-fast for James Hancock, but I always knew it would never come to anything. It’s safe that way. I wouldn’t be marring Wade’s memory by dreaming of such heights.”

  “I don’t think you could ever mar his memory,” I said. “Rita, he’d want you to be happy.”

  “Oh, dear, I’m happy.” She smiled as if to prove it. “I couldn’t live with myself if I moved on from Wade before he got the justice he deserves. It feels . . . disrespectful.”

  “Who do you think might have killed Wade?” I asked her. “Living or dead. It’ll give me a place to start.”

  Rita slid to the edge of the couch. She was practically bouncing up and down in her excitement.

  “I’ve given it a lot of thought over the years,” she said. “As I said, there’s always a chance someone in Wade’s family did it, but they’re all gone now. The only living member of that family that I know about is Jane Winthrow.”

  “She claims she was away at college when it happened,” I said.

  “It’s likely she was,” Rita said. “I don’t remember much of her. She left town the moment she got the chance, and rarely came back. I don’t know what she thought of me, if anything, but what little I know of her makes me think she could have had nothing to do with Wade’s death.”

  I agreed. While the Finks’ reputation was being harmed, what would a girl away at college care? Jane didn’t strike me as a woman who worried too much about reputations anyway.

  “Okay, so if not the family, who else?”

  Rita’s hands clenched into fists. “Those men who once called themselves Wade’s friends.”

  I knew who she was talking about instantly. “The Coffee Drinkers?”

  “That might be what everyone calls them, but I always think of them as a bunch of backstabbers.”

  “Why’s that? Did they do or say something that makes you think they might have killed him?”

  “Not expressly,” Rita said. “But they weren’t happy with the time Wade was spending with me. They bullied him and claimed it was for his own good, that they were doing it for him. These men were in their thirties and forties and acted like they were teenagers more often than not.”

  “Was there one specifically you think could have done it?”

  “Take your pick!” Rita said, the heat in her voice growing. “It wouldn’t surprise me in the slightest if they were all in on it together. A tragedy like what happened to Wade would tear most groups apart, yet they still show up every morning at the Banyon Tree, just like they did when Wade was alive. It’s disrespectful if you ask me.”

  I wasn’t so sure about that—they could very well have continued on in honor of Wade—but I let it slide.

  “What time do they get together?” I asked.

  “Eight,” she said. “It’s always been at eight sharp, every morning for the last forty, fifty years!”

  I made a mental note and stood. “I should probably get going,” I said. It looked like I had an early morning date with a group of older men and wanted to plan for it.

  Rita stood with me. “What can I do to help? I can’t just sit here while you do all the hard work. It would drive me crazy!”

  “You can take care of yourself,” I said. When Rita opened her mouth to protest, I cut her off. “For now. If I think of something you can do to help, you’ll be the first to know.”

  She clamped her mouth shut, and while she was unhappy about it, she nodded. “I hope you find out who killed my Wade,” she said.

  “I do, too, Rita.” And I prayed that when I did discover who killed Wade Fink, it wouldn’t cause more problems than it solved.

  Rita showed me out. When I got back into my car, I noted she was still standing at the door. There was so much emotion in her parting wave, I had to wipe a tear from my eye.

  6

  Light from next door drew me from my car, and across the yard to Eleanor Winthrow’s house. I was tired, but not so tired that I couldn’t pay Jane a quick visit and let her know what I was planning to do.

  She answered on the second knock, eyes and shoulders heavy. Jane looked like a woman who was trying to keep the entire world from collapsing on her, and was failing. She managed an exhausted smile and then stepped aside to let me in.

  “You’ve been hard at work, I see,” I said, glancing around the living room. Boxes were stacked against the walls and on top of the couch. The TV was gone, as were the few decorations Eleanor had kept. The room felt lifeless.

  “They’re all her papers,” she said, motioning toward the boxes. “I couldn’t bring myself to throw them out quite yet.”

  “Are you going to keep them?”

  Jane crossed the room and then sat down on one of the boxes. It sagged, but held. “I don’t know. I might put them in storage for a little while and then pitch the lot. Or I might go through them again and look for anything mentioning my family and save those ones. I simply don’t know.”

  She looked around the room and then rubbed at her eyes. “I’ve been at it all day. I should probably get some sleep before starting it all up again tomorrow.”

  “How long are you in town for?” I asked. Eleanor might not have had much to her name—outside her newspaper collection, that is—but it was still a big job.

  “I’ve got three more days to get everything together before I’m due back home.” She sagged, shook her head. “Not sure I’ll make it, but I’m sure going to try.”

  “If you need help . . .”

  Jane gave me a grateful smile. “Thanks. If I start to get overwhelmed, I’ll come knocking.” She groaned as she pushed her way to her feet. “But not tonight. I really do think I’m going to call it an early night. Was there something I could do for you before I go?”

  “Nothing you can do,” I said. “But I
did want to let you know that I’m going to be looking into your uncle’s murder. I don’t know if I’ll be able to solve it, not after so much time has passed, but it can’t hurt to ask around.” I hoped.

  Jane nodded as if she’d expected as much. “Have you talked to many people yet?” she asked.

  “A few. I talked to the police chief at the time, Albie Bruce, and I talked to Rita, of course. Other than a few older ladies in town, that’s it. I’m hoping to meet with Wade’s coffee-drinking friends tomorrow morning.”

  Jane’s face clouded over. “You won’t get much from them.”

  “I have to try,” I said. “I’m not sure what to make of them. They showed up for the service, but didn’t seem very happy about it. And everyone I’ve talked to seems to think they might have had something to do with Wade’s death.”

  “They didn’t.” Jane walked into the kitchen. I followed after her and waited while she got herself a bottle of water from the fridge. She took a long drink, capped it, but didn’t expand on her thought.

  “Why do you say that?” I asked.

  “They were my uncle’s friends. They might not have gotten on with Mother all that well, but I never got the impression they wanted to hurt her or Uncle Wade. Mom might not have seen it that way, but you know what she was like.”

  I did. I’d been accused of doing things I most definitely hadn’t been part of by Eleanor more than once. She was quick to blame, and often didn’t listen to reason when presented with the actual facts. I think she preferred thinking badly of everyone around her, and I wondered if that had more to do with what had happened to Wade than any actual malice on her part.

  “I never knew Uncle Wade’s friends, not really,” Jane went on. “I can name them, but that’s because they were at his funeral and I met them then. I saw them around town when I was here, of course, and I suppose I might have talked to one of them once or twice when they came around, but honestly, I can’t tell you much about any of them.”

  “But you don’t think they killed your uncle?”