Death Comes to Suburbia (Book 2 Molly Masters Mysteries)

by Leslie O'Kane

  “The Novocain will take just a couple of minutes to take effect,” Chase assured me.

  Provided it was Novocain. “Let me ask you something,” I blurted out, realizing this was my one opportunity to talk to him sans drool. “Where does Hank Mueller work? I have some glass I need to ship.”

  “He owns the Ship-it franchise.”

  Figured. There were at least ten SHIP IT! shops in the Albany area alone. “So how could I find him to discuss my project personally?”

  “Unless I’m mistaken, he spends most of his time at the shop on Route Nine.”

  He scratched the side of his nose. The motion must have been similar to watching someone yawn, for my nose began to itch. I scratched both sides, remembering how drills always make me feel the need to sneeze.

  “Say, Molly,” Chase said. “How well did you know Preston Saunders?”

  “Not very well, like I said yesterday. He’d been over to my house a number of times, picking up his daughter, who babysits for my children. Why?”

  Chase became engrossed with rearranging the silver instruments of oral torture on his tray. “You seemed inordinately nervous about my drilling your cavity. I wondered if Preston had said something to you.”

  Chase seemed to be implying that Preston might have warned me not to let Chase drill my teeth. Maybe this had to do with the legal matter Emma had started to tell me about yesterday. I took a gamble and asked, “You mean about his lawsuit?”

  His face tightened. “So he did tell you.” He sighed. “I hope he also told you it was a complete scam.”

  “You good fwend Pweston bwought a phony lawsuit against you?” The injection had indeed been Novocain, thank God, which was starting to take effect.

  Chase nodded.

  “That must have made you fuwious.”

  “Let’s see if the anesthetic is working yet,” Chase said.

  As if my sounding like Elmer Fudd was intentional. He reached inside in my mouth and did something with a pointy instrument that I couldn’t feel at all.

  “Ouch!” I feigned pain to stall for time, hoping to learn more about his relationship with Preston.

  “You felt that?” he asked, surprised. I nodded.

  “Hmm. I’ll give you a second half dose, just to be safe, then give it another minute to work.”

  I clenched my fists in frustration, and opened my mouth while he gave me a totally unnecessary second shot. My mouth felt painfully dry, all of my saliva having already been vacuumed away to who knows where. When he’d finished, I licked my lips in a failed attempt to wet them. It felt as though I were licking pork chops. Taking a sip of water with four-inch-thick lips was out of the question, though.

  He certainly was not going to tell me about a possible malpractice suit while he was moments away from drilling into my tooth. I cleared my throat, then said, “I enjoyed playing wiff your wife yesterday. She’s vewy nice.”

  “So you got to talk to each other quite a bit?” he asked.

  “Not weewee, but she invited me ova fa wunch tomorrow.”

  “That’s nice. Let’s check the Novocain again.” He again did something with his pointed instrument in my mouth and asked, “Did you feel that?”

  “Yeah.”

  He chuckled. “Amazing, since I didn’t touch you at all that time. Let’s get it over with, shall we? I promise. You won’t feel a thing.”

  True to his word, I didn’t feel the drill, but smelled the awful, eye-watering scent of burning tooth as he worked. The procedure took only a minute or two, then he prepared my filling at the counter in back of the room.

  I ran my tongue along the hole, glad that I seemed to be alive and well. Preston’s death probably brought a timely end to a legal case against Chase—one that had apparently inspired an ugly altercation at the Carlton Country Club. Yet I decided to cross him off of my list of suspects. Maybe it was flawed logic, but I just couldn’t see him trying to slash my face with razor blades, then filling my cavity. That would be similar to building a chimney atop a house you’d tried to demolish.

  “Who do you think killed Preston?” I asked.

  He glanced over his shoulder at me. For that one moment, he let down his guard, and his eyes flashed with raw hatred.

  “I don’t know,” he said, “but I’d sure like to shake the killer’s hand.”

  With no feeling in half of my face, I could not bring myself to go into SHIP IT! and try to have an intelligent conversation with Hank Mueller. On the other hand, I had Jim waiting for me at home, and I’d assured him I would be back by lunchtime. Not that I was allowed to eat in this condition.

  After pondering the matter for a few minutes, I drove to Carlton High-School and wove through the parking lot to search for Jose’s junky Ford Galaxy. It was there. I parked and sat in my car, carefully redoing my copy of the drawing of the messenger that I’d given to Tommy Newton, and giving the messenger a shaved head. My work was especially slow, since I periodically interrupted myself to look into the rearview mirror to make sure both halves of my face were still present, and that I hadn’t actually mutated into the hideous drooling beast I felt like.

  The results were far superior to my first rendition. I jotted Jose a note on the margin, asking him please to show this picture around to all of his friends and acquaintances, and to call me if he had any information about the subject’s whereabouts. In case of rain, I stashed it inside a discarded peanut butter-scented sandwich bag I’d found in my backseat, and carefully wedged this under Jose’s windshield wiper. Then, not having the luxury of time, I massaged my lips as I drove to SHIP IT! My mouth was getting a tingling sensation, and I practiced enunciating. By the time I arrived, I could hear some improvement in my speech.

  Though the young female clerk seemed put out that I insisted on speaking directly to the owner about my precious picture, she also seemed to have no trouble believing that I was an eccentric. She disappeared through a doorway at the back of the store and returned moments later with Hank Mueller.

  Hank was wearing slacks but no jacket or tie, the top button of his shirt open and his sleeves rolled up on those hairy arms of his. The overall effect seemed as carefully orchestrated as a campaign poster: Here’s Hard-working Everyman, at your service. Yet with his hawk nose and dark, deep-set eyes, he too closely resembled a cartoon villain to have succeeded in politics.

  I contorted my facial muscles in what I hoped was a smile. “Hi, Hank. How are you?”

  “I’m fine.” He studied my face. “Did you get hit in the mouth or something yesterday?”

  “No. Excuse my speech. I’ve just been to the dentist, where I lost most of the feeling in my face, along with much of my dignity.”

  Again, I tried to smile, but he winced as he watched me.

  “When I heard you owned this place, I remembered I had a picture I’ve been meaning to ship, but didn’t know who I could trust to do a proper job.”

  His eyes lit up. Nothing got results as fast as the old ego massage. “Ah. Well, you’ve come to the right place. I’ll show you my design. It’s revolutionized the shipping industry, if I do say so myself.” He put his hand on my back to escort me to a display case that was all of two steps away.

  The display helped to demonstrate their patented design: “So lightweight! And yet so sturdy!” metal reinforcements inside a “Cardboard!” box.

  It was indeed precisely the type of box that Jim had described as holding the bladed springs Stephanie and I had received.

  “Oh, good,” I said, looking at a photo in the display of an elephant standing on one of SHIP IT! boxes. “I see it’s elephant proof. They seem to step on a lot of packages shipped through U.S. Mail.”

  Hank chuckled and began his spiel. Midway through, it occurred to me that Hank Mueller could not possibly be so stupid as to use packaging material that pointed directly to him. He was being set up.

  After he’d finished his routine and I’d murmured what felt like a sufficient number of appreciative remarks, I said, “Pres
ton Saunders ran an export business. Are your companies affiliated?”

  Hank shook his head. “We used to be their main contractor. Not anymore.”

  “Come to think of it, I should have known your companies weren’t affiliated. You’d made a remark about him ripping you off again.”

  He merely watched me. His brow was furrowed and his jaw and fists were clenched. He looked like the quintessential villain, but with his black hair and mustache combined with his craggy features, that didn’t take much. Maybe I could get him to open up by using an us-against-Preston tack.

  “You were right, by the way,” I said. “That was my cartoon he won the contest with, not his. He took my drawing and submitted without my knowledge or consent.”

  “Sounds like Preston Saunders, all right. I hate to speak ill of the dead, but his questionable business tactics almost put my company under. That’s why I moved here. To keep a closer eye on what he was doing to my franchise.” He slicked back his hair with his palms. “Let’s get this picture ready to go, shall we?”

  Chapter 15

  Putting on a Shine

  I was slightly leery of letting Hank Mueller handle my picture in his current mood, but he was surprisingly gentle with it. He packaged up my picture himself, allowing me to watch every stage. It turned into a grand production, especially when the foam peanuts children love and mothers detest were added by a big machine that resembled a coal chute.

  To set up Hank Mueller, all someone would have to do was get hold of a couple of his boxes. As he totaled my charges, I asked, “Does your company have to do all the packaging yourselves, or do you sell your boxes as well?”

  “We can do it either way. Do you have some exact dimensions in mind?”

  “Actually, I was wondering about a pair of boxes you might have sold here recently. They were cubes, about six inches or so each direction.”

  “Doesn’t ring any bells for me.” He turned toward the clerk, who was standing nearby. “Becky?”

  She shook her head. “We have several stores in the Albany area, you know. Could’ve been bought at any of them.”

  I nodded and thanked them, but felt deeply frustrated. There had to have been tremendous animosity between the two men. Preston had damaged Hank’s business. Hank had impregnated Preston’s fiancee. Preston had raised Hank’s only child as his own.

  Here was the man who had the motive and the opportunity. He had to be guilty. Yet there was no getting around one question: how could anyone run a large franchise successfully, but be so stupid as to incriminate himself by using his own, patented boxes?

  The person setting him up had to be someone who knew about Preston’s bet over my cartoon. So if it wasn’t Chase or Hank, that left Richard Worthington. An architect. How was I supposed to spy surreptitiously on him? Tell him I wanted him to design an addition for my parents’ house? Maybe tomorrow’s luncheon with Emma Groves would give me some ideas.

  I paid my staggering shipping-and-handling fees, left the store, and nearly collided with Tommy Newton, who was about to enter. We both jerked back a little in surprise. “Aw, jeez, Molly!” he cried as the glass door swung shut. “When the hell are you gonna learn to stay out of police business!”

  I feigned indignation. “I was just mailing a package.”

  His face was rapidly turning redder than his hair. “Uh-huh. And Al Capone was just a choir leader.” He stared at me. “What’s the matter with your mouth? Someone smack you?”

  “No, I just—” I stopped, realizing the mention of a dental appointment would tip Tommy off to my visit to Chase.

  “You just got a shot of Novocain, right? And was Chase Groves your dentist, by any chance?”

  If only Tommy were this successful at analyzing the murderer’s behavior, my children wouldn’t have handled a box of spring-loaded razors. To escape the weight of his glare, I glanced around. The store next to SHIP IT! was a doughnut shop.

  Giving his arm a friendly squeeze, I said, “How ‘bout I buy you coffee and a doughnut, Tommy?”

  He shook his head. “I hate doughnuts.”

  “Fine.” I turned on a heel and headed for the restaurant door without waiting for his response. “We’ll make it a muffin.”

  Tommy grumbled, but followed me inside. It was a bargain-basement establishment—scuffed-up linoleum floors and a crumb-laden counter where one middle-aged woman stood, looking bored. All four small tables were empty. We sat at one and Tommy tried to order me a cup of coffee. No doubt he would have enjoyed watching me dribble scalding hot liquid down my chin. Though it cost me two blueberry muffins—how anyone could “hate” doughnuts but love blueberries was beyond me—he eventually cooled off. He even agreed he may as well give me the scoop on Preston’s malpractice suit against Chase to save me a trip to the library and its newspaper microfilm.

  Preston had claimed Chase gave him permanent nerve damage when he’d drilled too deep while replacing an old filling. That, however, was as much information as I could extract from Tommy. When I mentioned, casually, that Preston’s death must have brought a timely end to that lawsuit, Tommy said, “Chase was in Cleveland last Monday. He didn’t do it.”

  En route to the school bus stop the next morning, rain drummed steadily on the hood of my Gore-Tex coat. It was another of those dreary East Coast days when the world looks like an enormous black-and-white photograph. And an ugly one at that. Damn, I missed Boulder’s blue skies. I had never known how brilliant a shade of blue the sky could be till I moved to Colorado.

  “Eww! Sick!” Karen cried as Nathan pulled a soggy earthworm out of a puddle on our driveway.

  “How come you say everything’s sick?” He held the dripping worm up in front of Karen’s face, who shrieked. Nathan giggled. “It’s just a wet worm.”

  “The bus will be here any minute. Please put the worm down, Nathan, and—”

  “Bus!” Karen interrupted as the shoosh of air brakes resounded from the corner where the yellow bus was just now turning. She took off at a dead run.

  “Slow down!” I demanded, afraid she’d slip on the wet pavement. “There’s—”

  “Wait for me, Karen!” Nathan turned, called, “Here, Mommy,” and flung the worm at me. “Bye.”

  Startled at suddenly having a worm pitched to me, I jumped back, said something along the lines of, “Gllll,” then had to peel the lower life-form off the sleeve of my jacket.

  Worm in hand, I waved goodbye, then dropped it onto the mud in my mother’s garden. Plants seemed to die en masse in my presence. Now when Mother returned in June, I could tell her I’d made an earnest effort to plant something, at least.

  I went inside, ready to set a plan into motion for getting information from Richard Worthington, the architect. From my brief stint at pretending to be with 20/20, I knew that people were willing to answer all kinds of questions posed by a stranger’s voice over the phone, provided that voice was supposedly affiliated with a recognized institution.

  The laundry room was the least likely room for my husband, currently sleeping late, to stumble into accidentally. I grabbed the portable phone and climbed on top of my dryer for a seat. With a quick prayer that Jim wouldn’t wake and realize he had no clean underwear and that the Worthingtons wouldn’t have Caller I.D. installed on their phone, I dialed.

  “Hello, is this Mr. Richard Worthington?” I asked, holding my nose and using my breathiest voice, which took some doing, considering I couldn’t breathe this way.

  “Yes, it is,” he answered, his voice just as booming over the phone as it was in person.

  “My name is Elsa Vanderkind. I’m doing a very brief phone survey on behalf of the NRA.”

  “The NRA?”

  “Yes,” I replied, panicking slightly as I realized that I suddenly couldn’t remember what the initials stood for. “The National Right to Armament. What types of guns do you currently own, sir?”

  “A three-fifty-seven Magnum. Double-action.”

  Aha! He did own a gun. “Have you, or
any member of your family, had an occasion to fire your weapon within the last three months?”

  “No.”

  “Would you say you felt very strongly, somewhat strongly, or don’t care about your Constitutional right to continue to own your weapon?”

  “Very strongly.”

  “Thank you very much, sir.” I promptly hung up and hopped off the dryer.

  That had all worked out quite nicely. Though I was fairly certain that when Tommy had talked to me just after Tiffany and I had been shot at, he’d said the weapon in both shootings was a .22, not a .357. And I suddenly realized that NRA stood for National Rifle Association.

  Drat! This is what happens when I try to sleuth before drinking my first cup of coffee.

  Richard Worthington was now my top suspect.

  Forty-eight hours and counting from my flight to Florida. Though Tommy was sharp and a good cop, I couldn’t shake my fear that he would never solve this thing on his own, and we’d be stuck in my parents’ tiny condo for months. I tried to block out the ever-louder ticking clock by sketching some ideas for greeting cards. Recalling yesterday’s exploits, I drew a man wearing an expression of terror as he sits in a dentist chair and stares at a parrot perched in the corner of the office. The parrot is squawking, “Open wide. OWWW!! Open wide. OWWW!! Open wide…”

  Then I paused to consider marketing strategy. The cartoon might work as a reminder to patients about upcoming dental checkups. Any dentist willing to send such an eCard would have to know the patient pretty well. I worked up a second drawing as a companion card for newer patients. This one showed a woman with rays of light beaming from her wide smile and another woman shielding her eyes. Underneath was the caption, “Time to put a shine on your smile!”

  The phone rang. I glanced at the clock, surprised to discover it was already almost ten and that Jim was still in bed. But then the poor man hadn’t been sleeping well of late. I answered the phone on the first ring.