2 Grounds for Murder

by Sandra Balzo

  ‘Though it’s the crying room we see mostly at church these days,’ she admitted with a sad smile. ‘Davy’s been sick a lot lately.’

  ‘I’m sorry,’ I said, and I meant it. I’d just assumed Davy was a particularly unpleasant baby, to be honest. I hoped Janalee wasn’t dealing with both a dead husband and a truly ill baby. ‘Is it anything serious?’

  Janalee gave up trying to placate Davy and set him down on the floor. The baby crawled a few feet away and sat, sucking his thumb. It reminded me of my dream and I had to restrain a shiver.

  ‘Davy has dangerous levels of lead in his system,’ Janalee said simply.

  I gave a start. ‘From LaRoche’s . . . um, I mean, Marvin’s soldiers?’

  ‘Yes.’ She sighed. ‘Marvin tried to blame it on Janalee’s Place. He said there must have been lead in the paint there.’

  ‘There wasn’t?’ I asked.

  ‘Not for years,’ she said. ‘Marvin was just trying to blame Davy’s illness on me.’

  She shrugged. ‘But that was Marvin. Taking credit for the good things and looking for someone to blame for the bad.’

  ‘But how did Davy get hold of the soldiers?’ I was remembering how LaRoche had snatched the toy away from Davy in his office.

  ‘When Davy was younger,’ Janalee said. ‘I would leave him with Marvin. He would give him an old soldier to play with. Not one of his good ones, of course. God forbid Davy would lower its value.’ She shrugged. ‘But Davy was teething.’

  ‘And teething babies put things in their mouths,’ I said.

  ‘Babies put everything in their mouths,’ Janalee said. ‘I told Marvin that. He denied it. Said he told Davy “no”.’ She laughed. ‘Told a toddler “no” and he expected him to listen. Can you believe it?’

  ‘How bad is it?’ I asked, looking at Davy who was still sitting and sucking.

  She shrugged. ‘The stomach pain, the vomiting, the hyperactivity. They’re all symptoms. We won’t know for a while how much permanent damage there is.’

  I was listening with dawning horror. ‘LaRoche knew, didn’t he?’

  Janalee looked at me. ‘Knew that Davy had lead poisoning? Yes, I told him. Not that he cared.’

  ‘No, I mean he knew about you and Antonio.’ I couldn’t stop myself now. The horror of a grown man poisoning a child because he wasn’t his own was beyond belief. ‘He knew Davy wasn’t his baby.’

  Janalee acted like she hadn’t heard me. She picked up Davy. ‘I need to get him home.’

  But I wasn’t listening to her. I was looking at the spot where Davy had sat. His diaper had leaked and left a perfect oval. Like the one Sarah and I had been trying to cover with the trophy table.

  I looked back up at Janalee. She was wiping Davy’s mouth with a cloth diaper. The diaper brushed the front of her dark dress, which showed the lint from the cloth the way my own black dress had shown the dog hair. But rather than Frank’s long hair, these were tiny white flecks. Flecks like the ones mixed in with the drying blood on my hand after I’d touched the tablecloth.

  Janalee was talking baby talk to Davy. ‘Daddies take good care of their babies, don’t they, Davy? Real daddies don’t do things to hurt them.’

  She looked up at me. ‘Marvin was a coward. He didn’t even have the courage to hurt us himself. He let Davy hurt himself. He burned down Janalee’s Place to hurt me.’ She shook her head slowly back and forth. ‘Marvin deserved to die.’

  ‘So you killed him?’ At that moment I wanted to give her a trophy for it. Just not the trophy.

  ‘I was the one who should have killed him,’ Amy said, stepping into the room. ‘The night he burned down the store.’ She looked at Janalee. ‘Our store.’

  I thought of seeing her on the cellphone that night. ‘He called and warned you, and you went back there to stop him. But you stopped at Schultz’s Market first,’ I said, puzzled. ‘Why would you do that?’

  ‘To buy a knife.’ She walked over to Janalee and gave Davy a kiss on the forehead. ‘I didn’t have time for anything else.’

  ‘Were you lovers?’ I asked.

  ‘Just once,’ she said, glancing guiltily over at Janalee. ‘I’m so sorry, Janalee.’

  ‘I know,’ Janalee said. ‘Marvin always wanted what he couldn’t have. It was a game for him, I told you. It wasn’t your fault.’

  That’s when it hit me. Amy and Janalee both had been in the competition room. Neither one of them could have placed the table over the body by herself. I’d had to have Sarah help me move it.

  ‘Amy didn’t have anything to do with it,’ Janalee said, like she was reading my thoughts.

  ‘She must have helped you hide the body. It would have taken two people to move that table.’

  ‘The man was an animal,’ Amy exploded. ‘He deserved to die.’

  In my book he deserved far worse, though I couldn’t think of what that would be at the moment. I’d be willing to give it a shot, though.

  ‘So you killed him?’ I was looking at Amy, but Janalee answered.

  ‘I said Amy had nothing to do with it.’ When the barista started to protest, Janalee waved her down. ‘I don’t regret what I did.’ She looked me in the eye. ‘I saved my child.’

  ‘But how? What was LaRoche doing here so late?’ I asked. It still didn’t make sense to me.

  ‘Marvin planned to sabotage the other competitors’ work stations so I would win,’ Janalee said. ‘He thought that with Amy leaving, it was our only hope of winning.’ This last was in a whisper.

  ‘But he didn’t know who would compete at which station,’ I said. ‘I hadn’t decided.’

  ‘I told him I knew which station was assigned to me,’ she said in a stronger voice. Then she smiled. ‘And he believed me.’

  LaRoche might have presumed he was the master strategist in the family, but he was wrong. It was Janalee. She had learned how to push Marvin’s buttons, and she had pushed this final one in order to lure him into the competition room to kill him.

  The question was, what did I do about it?

  Chapter Twenty-three

  In a perfect world, ethics and morals would be the same thing. What our innards tell us is right would be what society also believes is right.

  My world wasn’t looking very perfect right now. A whole lot more grays than blacks and whites.

  I was sitting on the edge of a planter in the front hall of the convention center, watching the roofers move in. I’d left Janalee and Amy in the competition room – mostly, because I hadn’t known what to do with them.

  I tried to think of Janalee’s exact words. She’d alluded to saving her child, but I didn’t think she had actually come out and admitted killing her husband. But she had killed LaRoche, I knew that in my heart.

  And, God help me, I was glad. The man was a monster. Yes, Janalee had an affair and tried to pass off the product of that affair – Davy – as LaRoche’s child. LaRoche had every right to be angry. But to hurt Davy in an effort to punish Janalee? It was unconscionable.

  I thought about the pathetic folder marked ‘competitive strategies’ that Janalee had given me by mistake. I’d assumed it was the sign of an obsessed mother. Little did I know that Janalee had good reason for tracking Davy’s health so compulsively.

  LaRoche had followed the same strategy when he burned down Janalee’s Place. Janalee had loved it, so he destroyed it. With the fire, though, he’d gotten two for the price of one. He’d also been able to punish Amy for seeming to rebuff him for Levitt.

  All this, and probably a fat insurance policy on the store, too, assuming they couldn’t trace the arson back to him. That was probably why he had accused me – to deflect possible blame. It apparently was his modus operandi.

  Two burly men came past with what looked like a huge rolled-up banner balanced on their shoulders. I slid sideways on the wall, so they could back up enough to maneuver through the door and into the exhibit hall.

  Janalee and Amy still hadn’t come out of the competition room. Th
ey were probably wondering what I was going to do. Heck, I was wondering what I was going to do.

  I could go to Pavlik and tell him what I knew. Or thought I knew. I really had no proof, after all.

  The thought perked me right up. I didn’t have any evidence, just unfounded hunches, the kinds of things Pavlik had dismissed time and time again.

  The only fingerprints on the trophy were mine, presumably because Janalee had wiped it off with one of the cloth diapers she used as burp cloths. I now knew there was no camera in the back hallway, so Janalee certainly hadn’t been caught on that and, as far as I knew, no one else had seen her that night. The only one who could have seen her was me, and I could honestly say I hadn’t.

  It was like a weight had been lifted off my shoulders. The fact that it was obfuscation and rationalization that had lifted it didn’t matter for now. Tonight, when I was awakened at three a.m. by a guilty conscience, maybe it would matter. But that, to paraphrase Scarlett again, was another day.

  And I could always tell Pavlik then, if I had a change of heart. Like it hardened.

  I stood up, feeling ever so much better. Stepping away from the wall, I was almost mowed down by the same two men who had come through with the banner. Antonio was close behind them and steadied me.

  ‘What are you still doing here?’ I asked after I thanked him.

  He pointed to a small push cart. ‘My guys forgot this, so I am taking it in my car. And you, Maggy? Why are you here as well?’

  ‘I was just talking to Janalee and Amy,’ I said. I didn’t know how much Antonio knew, but it struck me that he was as much a victim of LaRoche as Janalee was. It was his son, after all, who was poisoned.

  ‘I’m really sorry about Davy’s health problems,’ I said to Antonio.

  His eyes narrowed a bit. ‘The baby’s health problems?’ he asked. ‘Has David fallen ill?’

  Antonio seemed genuinely concerned about the boy’s health. That pretty much confirmed David’s parentage, but now I had stepped in it, in an entirely different way. Apparently Janalee hadn’t told Antonio about the lead poisoning.

  I would have felt guilty about my mistake, but Janalee hadn’t said it was a secret. Besides, she was a murderess, so I figured she couldn’t get too ticked at me for being a big mouth.

  ‘Davy has lead poisoning,’ I said with that big mouth.

  Antonio just looked at me, his head tilted.

  ‘Janalee said so.’

  He looked even more perplexed.

  ‘Are you OK?’ I asked.

  ‘Yes, yes,’ Antonio said. ‘I just do not understand. David’s tests were all perfect.’

  ‘This may have been relatively recently,’ I said, thinking Antonio was talking about the Apgar test they administer to newborns.

  But Antonio was already shaking his head. ‘The tests, they were just last week.’

  Now I didn’t understand. ‘What were they for?’

  ‘A medical examination and a test to make certain the . . . what do you call it? Paternity?’

  ‘You didn’t believe that Davy was your son?’

  ‘I did, but she―’

  I interrupted. ‘Janalee thought that Davy might be LaRoche’s son?’ Couldn’t keep up with the bedmates without a score card, apparently.

  ‘She said she must make sure he had no claim on David,’ Antonio said. ‘Nor his family.’

  ‘Was she planning on leaving LaRoche and marrying you?’ I asked.

  ‘Marrying?’ He looked horrified at the thought. ‘No, Maggy, you do not understand. I merely provided the sperm.’

  But . . . ‘Why didn’t LaRoche provide the sperm?’

  ‘Because he did not want a baby. When Janalee asked him, he said he would get snipped.’ He made a scissors gesture with his fingers.

  Ouch. But I needed to get this straight. ‘So, Janalee wanted a baby. LaRoche, knowing that, threatened to get a vasectomy.’

  Antonio nodded.

  ‘So why was he crying after you and he fought?’

  ‘We argued about his speech, not David. I was angry because he had acted as my friend, sharing information about his business. So I, in turn, shared information about my business, The Milkman.’

  ‘And he used that information to set himself up to compete with you,’ I said, understanding. ‘That’s exactly what he did with us.’

  ‘Yes.’ Antonio was nodding. ‘He said it was a battle he was fighting on many . . . how you say? Fronts?’

  I nodded. I wasn’t sure anything I heard about LaRoche would surprise me anymore.

  ‘I was angry. He was angry,’ Antonio continued. ‘But I do not see him crying. He’s a man, after all.’

  I’d debate that at this point.

  Antonio was holding up a finger. ‘He did sneeze. The hay fever perhaps?’

  What did Pavlik say? The simplest solution is usually the right one? So much less satisfying than LaRoche crying, but I’d have to settle for it. ‘So you donated your sperm, and Janalee got pregnant.’

  ‘Immediately,’ Antonio said proudly.

  ‘Immediately,’ I echoed. ‘And we know that Davy is your baby because Janalee had you take a paternity test. And that she didn’t want LaRoche or his family to have any claim on Davy.’

  ‘Yes.’ Antonio didn’t seem to see why I found this so confusing.

  The fact that Janalee wanted the test meant she was planning to leave LaRoche and didn’t want a custody fight. Or . . .

  ‘And you are absolutely certain that Davy was healthy when blood was taken for the test?’ I asked.

  Antonio nodded one last time. ‘Absolutamente.’

  Well, I’ll be.

  The bitch had completely snowed me, and I’d almost let her walk.

  Leaving Antonio behind, I ran through the exhibit hall to the door of the competition room. Janalee and Amy were still there. Janalee was changing Davy’s diaper.

  ‘Janalee!’ I yelled, thereby joining every fictional character I’ve ever disparaged for giving the bad guy warning before grabbing them.

  She turned.

  ‘You lied to me.’ I advanced on her. ‘Davy is not sick.’

  Janalee picked up Davy, bare bottom and all.

  Amy got between us. ‘That’s just not true, Maggy. He has lead poisoning and Marvin―’

  ‘Oh, cut the bullshit, Amy,’ I said. ‘Either you’re in on this, too, or you’re as stupid as I am.’ Or was.

  My anger level surprised me. Now that moral and ethical were synonymous again, my world was back in balance and, apparently, there was no stopping me. I wasn’t sure if that was a good thing or not.

  ‘Why would Janalee make this up?’ Amy asked, holding up her hands. I could see Janalee edging toward the side door.

  ‘Because she got caught,’ I said. ‘She figured that I would fall for her sob story and keep my mouth shut.’

  And she had almost figured right. She had manipulated me just like she’d manipulated LaRoche to lure him into the competition room. She had used our weaknesses – and our strengths – against us.

  ‘Know your enemy’, Sun Tzu’s The Art of War, had preached. LaRoche had been a disciple of Sun Tzu, and Janalee had taken a page out of her husband’s own book and used it against him. And me. Janalee had known exactly how to gain my sympathy.

  I feared that said something about me – something bad, but I’d have to sort that out later. For now, I was going to take Janalee down.

  ‘Don’t be silly, Maggy.’ Amy said, still blocking my way. ‘Janalee told me about Davy’s . . .’ She hesitated. ‘Problem, days ago.’

  ‘Davy’s only problem is a crazy mom and an upset stomach,’ I said. ‘And I’m willing to bet that she told you when she needed you to do something, just like she did me. Maybe when she wanted help to cover up the body or . . .’

  I left off. Things were all falling into place.

  Still backing up, Janalee met my eyes defiantly.

  ‘Or,’ I continued, ‘when she called to tell you Marvin was goi
ng to burn down the store.’

  I turned back to Amy. ‘It was Janalee on the phone with you outside Schultz’s Market, wasn’t it? That’s why you were crying. She was telling you about Davy.’

  Amy was shaking now, her earrings making the same tingling sound they had as we’d stood on the stage over LaRoche’s body.

  ‘He was destroying everything,’ she said. ‘First Davy, then Janalee’s Place. She said I had to stop him, because she wasn’t strong enough. I thought –’ she looked over at Janalee – ‘I thought I owed it to her because of what I’d done.’

  A one night stand with a snake. There was something biblical about that. ‘So you bought a knife,’ I said, ‘and went to Janalee’s Place.’

  ‘It was too late,’ Amy whispered hoarsely. ‘When I got there, the store was already burning, and Marvin was gone.’

  ‘Because he was never there,’ I said. ‘Right, Janalee?’

  The woman didn’t answer. She was holding Davy tight against her. I was afraid she would smother him.

  ‘Give me David,’ I said, moving toward her. Janalee threw me a startled look.

  ‘You set the fire?’ Amy asked her incredulously. ‘You burned down the Place?’

  ‘I had to get away from him,’ Janalee said. Her face was nearly unrecognizable. ‘In order to keep Davy and the rest of the coffeehouses, I had to sacrifice Janalee’s Place.’

  ‘And me, Janalee? Did you have to sacrifice me, too?’

  Amy’s words hung in the air for a beat.

  Then Janalee took off running.

  ‘You go out front to cut her off,’ I yelled at Amy and followed Janalee out into the side corridor. ‘Whatever you do, don’t let her get in the exhibit hall.’

  Encumbered by Davy, Janalee hadn’t gotten very far, just to the entrance of the bar that Kate, Jerome and I had visited the night of the murder. Davy was screaming now, so I knew he was still breathing, at least.

  Janalee hesitated, apparently not sure whether to take a shortcut through the bar or continue down the hall. She glanced in and made her decision.