PENITENCE: An Andi Comstock Supernatural Mystery, Book 2 (95,893 words)

by Ann Simas

  By the time she’d finished her tea, no great revelation had occurred to her, but she intuited that she was missing something. Something big. Something important.

  Frustrated by her lack of comprehension over what the calendar could provide, she took a break and seized the opportunity to splash her face with cold water.

  Back at the table again, she stared down at the sheet of paper as if she could will it to speak.

  As if it had a willingness to oblige, though not in a neon-light sort of way, the information transmitted to Andi’s brain and she saw what she had completely missed before.

  . . .

  Jack leaned against his EPD-issued sedan, looking a little GQ-ish in his immaculate suit and tie. He had his arms crossed over his wide chest and his foot tapped impatiently against the asphalt. His usual welcoming smile was absent and in its place was a frown topped off by an unpleasant glare.

  Andi tried not to let it rattle her, but it was obvious he was beyond pissed. Consumed with regret for the way she’d handled getting herself inserted into the Helen MacLeary interview, she considered driving right on by. Not that she wanted to, but apparently, it would lighten Jack’s mood.

  She took a deep breath, unhooked her seatbelt, and climbed out of the rental car.

  Jack pushed away from his vehicle as she approached and moved toward the house without waiting for her to join him.

  Andi said, “Hi,” and got a grunt in reply.

  So, it was going to be like that. Well, it wasn’t as if she didn’t deserve it, but this was a new side of Jack she hadn’t seen before. She wasn’t quite sure what to make of it, but she did know it left her with an unsettling buzz deep inside her. She sent a little prayer toward Heaven, asking for a nugget from Helen that would abate Jack’s displeasure and bring back that sexy smile of his.

  Usually, he matched her shorter stride, but today, she had to quicken her step to catch up with him. He rang the doorbell and they waited in silence for the door to open. When they heard the lock click, he said, without looking at her, “Remember what I said about keeping your mouth shut.”

  “I’ll try,” Andi said, unwilling to make any promises.

  He spared her a dark glance that would have frozen chestnuts roasting on an open fire, but he had no chance to follow up with an acerbic comment. Andi thanked God for small favors.

  “Mrs. MacLeary?” he asked of the woman in the doorway.

  “Yes. You must be Detective Harmon.” Her eyes slid toward Andi, widening momentarily before she looked back at Jack. “Please, come in.”

  Davis, according to everything Andi had read about him, and the pictures she’d seen of him, was a good-looking man of forty-five. He was buff, but without being a well-oiled muscle man. He’d made a lot of money in the surveying business, which was something he had in common with Clem and his real estate investments. He’d married Helen eighteen years earlier.

  Based on the one grainy photo she’d found of Helen online, Andi had formed a picture in her mind of a youngish-looking granny. Instead, Helen stood about Andi’s height, with silver hair and blue eyes, a lush figure shown off to perfection in the silk blouse and tailored trousers she wore, and nary a wrinkle in sight. Helen MacLeary had a innate sexiness about her that Andi suspected would be attractive to any male she encountered. Even Jack seemed to be tongue-tied.

  Andi’s curious mind got to wondering. Since Helen and Davis were into wife-swapping, did they have kids, and if so, where did they go when it was their parents’ turn to host a sexual liberation party? With the obvious age difference between them, it was possible they hadn’t had any children, so maybe it hadn’t been an issue.

  Helen gave Jack a blatant once-over, her gaze lingering too long, Andi thought, on a certain part of his anatomy. Nothing like a woman on the prowl letting a guy know it. She turned those blue eyes on Andi and studied her for a moment after that, as if assessing her in the same sexual way.

  Andi managed to keep her expression neutral, even though Helen’s blatant perusal disturbed her.

  With a knowing smirk and a slight shrug, Helen slid her arm through Jack’s and urged him forward. “Let’s go into the drawing room,”

  Left in their dust, Andi closed the door and followed behind, taking in her surroundings with interest. The home, which was relatively new, had been furnished with Mid-Century Modern décor. It would have done a Frank Lloyd Wright house proud, but seemed out of place in a Colonial. Every piece was sleek and beautiful, including the furnishings in the home office in what Helen, again, referred to as the drawing room. Who the heck called any room in their house a drawing room these days?

  Still, Andi couldn’t help admiring the gorgeous L-shaped walnut desk with the floating drawer stacks, exoskeleton legs, and brass hardware. “The desk is amazing,” she said, earning another sour look from Jack.

  “If you’re interested in buying it, I’ll give it to you for a steal,” Helen said.

  “I might be,” Andi said, “but that’s a conversation for another day.”

  Helen nodded. “I know you, don’t I?”

  “I don’t think so.”

  “I know I’ve seen you somewhere before.” She glanced at Jack and snapped her fingers. “You’re the woman who crashed her car.”

  Not exactly the way Andi would have described it. “Yes.”

  Helen put her full attention on Jack. “Do you always bring—what is she, a culprit?—with you when you’re interviewing witnesses?”

  “Culprit!” Andi burst out, incensed.

  “Ms. Comstock, please!” Jack said, his voice stern. “If you don’t mind, Mrs. MacLeary, I need to get a statement from you on what you saw the night of Ms. Comstock’s crash.”

  Andi narrowed her eyes on him, but he didn’t look her way again. Ms. Comstock, my ass, Andi fumed silently.

  “Can I offer you a coffee, Detective?”

  “No, thanks. Do you mind if we sit?”

  “Please do.” She took his arm and guided him to a two-seater, floating-frame settee with three legs.

  Andi watched with some amusement as Jack reluctantly settled himself beside Helen. Served him right.

  He took out his detective notebook and said, “Where were you in relation to Ms. Comstock’s vehicle?”

  Helen put a beautifully manicured fingertip to her lips. “Hmm, let me think. I was in the next lane and two cars behind.”

  “When did you first notice that something wasn’t right?”

  Helen’s gaze slid sideways, in Andi’s direction. “Almost as soon as I pulled into the traffic lane. She was driving rather erratically, and the roads were wet. I thought her speed was too fast for the conditions.”

  Andi opened her mouth to protest, caught Jack’s eye and read something there that made her keep quiet.

  “Then what?”

  “Well, she apparently jerked the wheel and veered off the roadway before she jumped the curb and rammed the bank building.” She cast a rather sneering glance in Andi’s direction. “Quite truthfully, I thought she must have been either drinking or doing drugs to drive like that.”

  Jack flexed his jaw, but didn’t respond with a contradictory comment. “Backing up just a minute, do you remember what the vehicle behind Ms. Comstock’s looked like?”

  “No, I’m sorry, I don’t.”

  “Do you know what kind of vehicle Ms. Comstock was driving?”

  “Certainly. It was a VW SUV. Gray.”

  Andi noticed Jack’s hand pause a moment on his notebook. “What about the car in front of you?”

  “It was an SUV, too. I don’t remember what kind.”

  “What about the vehicle in the inside lane next to you?”

  She shrugged. “A truck, I think. I’m not sure.”

  Jack tapped his pen against his notebook. “If you don’t mind me asking, how is it you remember the make of Ms. Comstock’s vehicle, but not of any of the others immediately adjacent to you?”

  Helen puckered her lips, her displeasure in bei
ng challenged obvious.

  “Mrs. MacLeary?” Jack prodded.

  Her eyes tracked to Andi again, those blue orbs of hers radiating more than just dislike. Andi felt like she was being eyeballed by a chunk of kryptonite.

  The seconds passed with laborious slowness and still Helen didn’t respond. Jack’s glance slid from Davis’s widow to Andi and back. His jaw flexed again as he waited the woman out.

  Andi decided to take the initiative and break new ground. She’d have to deal with some major fallout later, but for now, she was determined to get something useful out of Helen. “What did Davis do to you that infuriated Clem Naylor so much?”

  Jack made a choking sound. “Ms. Comstock, please!”

  Helen MacLeary’s hand flew to her chest in harmony with her startled gasp. “What?” she whispered hoarsely.

  Andi could play Helen’s game. “What did Davis—?”

  “Never mind, I heard you the first time! What makes you think Davis did anything to me?”

  “Clem said—”

  “Clem couldn’t have said a damned thing. He’s dead!” The scathing tone of her voice didn’t give away the depth of her agitation, but her body language spoke volumes.

  Andi adroitly avoided the issue of Clem being dead. “Regardless, Clem did tell me he hated your husband for what he’d done to you.”

  Her face colored to a pallor nearly the shade of her silvery hair. “You don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  Andi, still standing because she hadn’t been invited to sit, leaned forward a couple of inches. “Oh, don’t I? I know you and Davis couples’ swapped. I know you and Davis tried to get Clem and Denise to participate. I know you suggested to them that maybe you could do a four-way.” She paused for effect before her final bomb. “I know Davis wanted to get it on with Clem.”

  Andi had heard the term “bulging eyes” before, but had never seen it. Poor Helen. If she wasn’t apoplectic, the bear didn’t you-know-what in the woods.

  “Andi—”

  “Clem?” Helen managed, sounding strangled. “No, you’re wrong. It was Denise that Davis was salivating over. He couldn’t stop talking about her and what a good fuck she’d be.” She pushed herself up off the sofa heading toward Andi, abandoning her ladylike persona.

  “Ms. Comstock, I really don’t think this is the appropriate time for this,” Jack said, his tone stern.

  So much for the sexy-siren facade, Andi thought, ignoring him as she tracked the approach of the woman with the I-could-kill-you-with-my-bare-hands look in her eyes.

  “Davis couldn’t see straight, he was so ga-ga over that damned piece of property she owned next to the infill parcel.” Helen sneered. “My husband never could keep business separate from pleasure.”

  Denise owned the property adjacent to the land she and Davis feuded over? And Davis had been hot to trot for Denise? That was news to Andi. Clem had been pretty insistent that Davis had been a thorn in Denise’s side. Did that have to do with more than the battle over the infill project? “Are you sure she owns that property?”

  “Of course, I’m sure. The bitch inherited it from her parents, along with a lot of other odd properties around the city.”

  “You and Davis were good friends with the Naylors before all of the acrimony cropped up over the infill.”

  “We were, but what does that have to do with anything?”

  “Clem said he met with you, trying to figure out a way to mend the fences between Denise and Davis.”

  “I suppose you could say that.”

  “And yet you refer to Denise as a bitch. Isn’t it difficult to be friends with someone you dislike so much you call her names?”

  “Andi—” Jack said again from the sidelines, but Helen cut him off.

  “I didn’t always dislike her. That started when she came on to Davis.”

  Andi didn’t want to hear more of Helen’s dogged insistence to blame Denise. “Was there some other reason you met with Clem behind Denise and Davis’s backs?”

  “No, of course not.”

  “Andi—”

  “Weren’t you trying seduce him?”

  The side of her mouth curved up in a triumphant smile. “I didn’t just try. If Davis hadn’t come home unexpectedly that day, it would have been a fait accompli.”

  “Clem said you took off for the store and your husband picked up where you left off.”

  Helen’s features turned to stone. “The Naylors are nothing but liars. They were trying to steal Davis away from me.”

  Andi sneaked a look at Jack. He had a frown on his face, but he was scribbling madly in his notebook, so something Helen had to say interested him. “How so?”

  “Davis told me Clem came on to him after I left. He said Clem suggested he come over to his house and they could do Denise together.”

  “That’s not true.”

  Helen snickered. “Right. You know because you were there, hiding in a corner, watching them.”

  “Well, no, but Clem told me what happened. He and Davis had a drink and your husband told him he was tired of feuding with Denise. He wanted it to end, especially because he’d located some documents that substantiated her claims opposing the proposed project.”

  Helen remained mute, though her moue of distaste spoke for itself.

  “Clem said Davis started to cry. He didn’t know what to do, so he man-hugged him and Davis started rubbing his back and he got a…well, he had an anatomical response when Davis began kissing him. Clem admitted to kissing him back and feeling all mixed up. He put Davis off and went straight home to Denise. Later he made a decision he’d rather remain loyal to his wife than choose the path Davis was badgering him to take.”

  Helen uttered a snide laugh. “Poor, gullible you. Both of them were practically throwing themselves at my husband, begging us to take them back into our swapping group.”

  “Did you know Davis was bi-sexual?”

  “I’m telling you, he wasn’t!”

  “Andi!”

  “Yes, he was.”

  “No!” Helen screamed. “How could he have been when all he could talk about was fucking that whore Clem was married to?”

  “You do know the meaning of bi-sexual, right? He went both ways?”

  Helen lunged at Andi. “You are so vanilla.”

  Jack restrained Helen’s arms from behind before she could rake those lethal fingernails of hers down Andi’s face.

  What did that mean? That she was so vanilla? “Why are you lying about what happened the night of my car crash?” Andi demanded, her voice raised as she tried to get her labored breathing under control.

  “Step back, Andi,” Jack said.

  Step back? Helen had rushed her. “Were you driving the car that ran me off the road?”

  “No, and I saw no one run you off the road,” Helen insisted. Her lips curved into a thin smile of victory that completely obliterated her beauty. “You are such a liar, in every way.”

  Andi was not a violent person, but she really felt like smacking Helen right across her smirking lips. Not only did the woman’s phoniness surpass Jupiter in mass, but the ugliness inside her had reared its venomous head, going in for the kill.

  And what about Jack? He was a cop who was supposed to be trained in recognizing liars, not playing Sir Galahad when liars feigned distress.

  Step back, my ass, Andi fumed silently.

  Chapter 28

  Jack parked Helen on the settee and escorted Andi to the front door, grasping her arm none too gently. “I’m too pissed to have a rational discussion with you right now,” he said. “Go home and think about how you’ve screwed this up, maybe beyond repair.” He opened the door and shoved her across the threshold. “Jesus, Andi, don’t you have a goddamned lick of sense?”

  “But—”

  He closed the door in her face before she had a chance to respond. Andi knew that once he cooled down, he’d revisit her questions and Helen’s responses and understand what a liar Helen was.

&nbs
p; Or maybe, he was right and she’d harangued Helen for nothing and she didn’t have a lick of sense. Maybe it was Clem who’d been doing all the lying. And Denise. Maybe Andi was being played for a fool by a dead guy and his widow.

  She climbed into her rental car and wove her way through the neighborhood, thinking. Steaming, actually. She thought about backtracking to Vaughn’s house. He had a level head on his shoulders. Perhaps he could help her work this out.

  Then she considered going down to St. Gemma’s to talk to Father Riley, whose head was on even straighter than Vaughn’s. She discarded that possibility when she remembered that the priest had told her he was conducting a funeral mass right after lunch. He didn’t need to be saddled in advance of that with Andi’s problems.

  What she needed was a conversation with Clem. If only she could see him in person, everything might be resolved. Face-to-face, Andi was a pretty good judge of character. Face-to-face, she could tell if a person was being sincere or lying. But with Clem, face-to-face would never be an option. With him, all she had to go on were the intonations and inflections of his voice.

  Aside from that insurmountable hurdle, she had another problem, too. She’d called in sick, so she couldn’t very well go down to Orion’s Belt, or anywhere on the block, for that matter, to summon Clem for another conversation.

  Either she had to wait a day, or she could bundle up and go sit in the parking lot that evening after the Belt had emptied and hope he’d answer an urgent summons.

  Frustrated and fighting a headache, Andi pointed her car in the direction of home. Something nagged at her brain, but when she tried to pin it down, the only thing that popped into her head was ET, phone home. Why that particular phrase surfaced, or how it was relevant, she had no idea.

  By the time she climbed the stairs to her apartment, she felt overwhelmed by exhaustion. No surprise there. She’d stayed up late, waiting for a phone call about Denise, slept fitfully after that, and gotten up early to head down to EPD. Maybe a nap would do her some good.

  She decided to snuggle in on the sofa with a blanket and some soft instrumental music playing in the background. She also turned on the fireplace. In broad daylight, it produced no ambiance, but it did make the living room nice and toasty.