Bad Neighbors

by Maia Chance

  “I found one,” I said. “In Mikey Brown’s medicine cabinet. With your hair on it.”

  “How do you know it’s mine?”

  “I just do.”

  “Why were you in Mikey’s bathroom?”

  “Why were you?”

  Alexa slitted her eyes. “Why don’t you just come right out and say it? You think I’m a killer.”

  “Of course not,” Effie cooed.

  “Well,” I said, “you claim to have an alibi…”

  “Okay, fine!” Alexa pulled a mobile phone from her jeans pocket. “You win. I’m going to call Walnut Manor and confirm that I was there on Sunday when Mikey was killed.”

  “With Delilah,” I said.

  “That’s right.” Alexa was scrolling through the contacts on her phone. “With Delilah.” She punched one of the contacts, set the phone on speaker, and it was ringing.

  Someone picked up. “Walnut Manor, where seniors live life to the very fullest,” a woman’s voice droned.

  “Hi, Patsy, this is Alexa Rice, Morton’s granddaughter?”

  “Oh, hi, Alexa.” Patsy was still droning, but it sounded as though she liked Alexa.

  “Hi. Say, remember when my friend and I were in on Sunday to have lunch in the dining room with Grandpa Morton?”

  “Sure do—”

  Alexa shot Effie and me an I-told-you-so look.

  “—and your friend was just as cute as a button!”

  “You mean Delilah?”

  “Yes, Delilah. Such pretty eyes!”

  Puke.

  “Anyway, Patsy, did anyone see a pair of sunglasses in the dining room? I lost a pair.”

  “Not that I know of, hon, but I can check.”

  “Thanks! See you the Sunday after next, Patsy.” Alexa punched her phone off. “Satisfied?”

  “Yeah,” I said, feeling like rained-on laundry. I guess that was it, then. Alexa and Delilah were both, beyond a shadow of a doubt, nonsuspects. At least for Mikey’s murder.

  I hadn’t realized how much I’d been clinging to the hope that Delilah was the killer. Apparently I had some serious jealousy issues to work through.

  Later.

  On the positive side, this meant we were closing in on Randy as the only suspect. Progress, folks.

  “Now that that’s all sorted out,” Effie said, “about the hair elastic. How long were you and Mikey seeing each other, Alexa dear?”

  I thought Alexa was going to get angry. Instead, she burst into tears. “I can’t believe he’s g-gone,” she sobbed. “He was my age! That’s too young to d-d-die!” She hunkered down on a porch swing, her body racked with sobs.

  Great. Now I felt guilty.

  Aunt Effie produced a travel-size packet of Kleenex from her handbag and passed it to Alexa. “There, there,” she said. “It’ll be all right.” A tactful pause. “Did Randy know about your fling?”

  Alexa sounded choked. “I—I don’t know, actually. But I’m … I’m afraid.”

  “Afraid?” Effie said. “For your safety?”

  “No, no.” Alexa shook her head. “Randy loves me—he’s devoted to me. I was an idiot to start something again with Mikey. It was the biggest mistake of my life. It’s just that I’ve been so depressed. And believe me, no pills the doctor gave me could make it stop. I’ve tried every single kind. I just … I just needed something to make me feel good again. Even if it was just for a little bit. In high school, Mikey and I dated from the summer before senior year till we left for college. We broke up when Mikey went to Finger Lakes Community College and I went away to school in Pittsburg. I feel like I’ve wasted my life! It’s half over—half over!—and what do I have to show for it? Nothing. Poor Randy. I don’t deserve him.”

  “Of course you do,” Effie said.

  “Well, okay, I guess I do. Randy had always … it sounds vain to say it, but he’s always just worshiped the ground I walk on. He always has, ever since we were forced to be study partners in health-and-hygiene class during sophomore year. I was failing, so the teacher paired me up with the best student, Randy.”

  “How romantic,” Effie murmured.

  “I know, right?” Alexa blew her nose.

  “Back up,” I said. “You said you were afraid?”

  Alexa swallowed. “I’m afraid that Randy might’ve—you know.”

  “Killed Mikey?” I said.

  Alexa’s voice was a whisper. “Yeah.”

  I knew it.

  “Out of jealousy, you know,” Alexa said. “If he knew about me and Mikey’s fling. Randy has just an awful temper. He loses it—and I mean loses it—if someone, like, cuts in line at the supermarket, or forgets to use their turn signal, or drives too slow in the fast lane.”

  “Road rage?” I said, sliding my eyes to Effie.

  She’d caught on already. Because remember who else had a bad case of road rage? Pumpkinhead, cruising around in the Buick LeSabre.

  “Um, Alexa,” I said, “what was Randy doing last night?”

  “Last night?” Her expression closed. “He was with his buddies, same as every Thursday night. Poker at his friend Charlie’s.”

  “Uh-huh.”

  “Randy hated Mikey—just hated him. He couldn’t forgive him for kissing his girlfriend one time back when they were in high school. If he somehow found out that Mikey and I were—you know—he would’ve gone ballistic.”

  Effie said, “Is there any reason your husband might’ve wanted Clifford Prentiss dead?”

  “Clifford?” Alexa rubbed her nose. “No. We barely knew him and Belinda, and that was just through the Chamber of Commerce, you know?”

  Still, if Randy was the killer, he might’ve killed Clifford just because Clifford knew too much. Happens all the time on PBS Mystery!.

  “If you truly believe Randy could be the killer,” Effie said, “don’t you think you should mention it to the police?”

  “I did,” Alexa said.

  “Oh?” Effie and I exchanged a look.

  Did Alexa throw her husband under the bus?

  “Yeah,” Alexa said. “I mentioned Randy’s rage about Mikey to Detective Albright. But he said they have a prime suspect already and it’s only a matter of time before they nail him.”

  My belly twisted. “Great.”

  “Alexa dear,” Effie said, “I don’t wish to cause you any more pain, but are you aware that Mikey and Delilah Fortune went on a date last Saturday?”

  “Yeah.” Alexa shrugged. “So?”

  “Didn’t that … bother you?”

  Alexa snorted. “Um, I’m married? How could I have a problem with it?”

  “So it did bother you,” Effie said.

  “Whatever.”

  I said, “You mentioned that Mikey had a mysterious influx of cash in the weeks before he died.”

  “Yeah.”

  “Delilah told us that’s why she consented to going out with him— “Consented?” Alexa narrowed her eyes. “Is that what she said?”

  “More or less.”

  “I thought we could be friends, but I am so sick of her! She waltzes into town and just grab, grab, grabs. She’s a narcissist, you know. I saw a Dr. Phil about them.”

  “I’m going to have to agree with you on that one,” I said.

  Alexa slid me a look. “I hear she stole your man, too.”

  “Anyway,” I said, “do you have any more insight about where Mikey’s influx of cash might’ve come from?”

  I had already asked Alexa and other people that question a bunch of times to no avail, so I was shocked when she whispered, “Yeah.”

  “You do?”

  “Yeah.” Alexa shifted in the porch swing. “He … found it.”

  “Really? Where?”

  “In a ziplock baggie. In a … a car he was working on at Hatch Automotive.”

  “Whose car?” Effie asked.

  “No idea. Some car he was working on a few weeks back. He bragged about it to me. Pillow talk, you know. Mikey liked stealing stuff. He liked the
thrill of it.”

  Right. Like stealing other men’s wives.

  “What … what did you do with that hair elastic you found?” Alexa asked. Her eyes had gone flinty.

  “Um…” I said. I had actually left it in Mikey’s medicine cabinet.

  “If you turn that over to the police,” Alexa said, “I’ll tell them you were snooping in Mikey’s house.”

  “Deal,” I said quickly. “We stay mum if you do, too.”

  “Great. Okay, I have to go fix my makeup and get back to work.”

  “She certainly drives a hard bargain,” Effie said as we walked back to the orchard.

  “Can we talk about the bigger issue here?” I said. “Mikey Brown found that money. In a car he was working on.”

  “Yes, Agnes. I heard her.”

  “Don’t you see what this means? If we figure out which car he found it in, we could really be on to something. I mean, maybe someone killed him just to get their money back.”

  “How can we figure out which car he found it in without looking at Hatch Automotive’s records?—which, I must point out, would entail speaking to Otis about our investigation, something you have hands down refused to do.”

  I didn’t answer.

  “Let’s stop at the farm stand,” Effie said. “I need a bottle of water.”

  “Sure. I’m going to run to the restroom. Meet you back here.”

  I saw a sign for the restrooms and headed down a hallway at the rear of the farm stand.

  Up ahead, I caught sight of none other than Karen Brown. Seeing she was about to look over her shoulder, I darted behind a stack of apple crates. I waited a few beats. I peeked out.

  Karen was disappearing through a door.

  I tiptoed after her.

  As I drew closer, I realized she hadn’t gone into the restroom, but into some kind of storeroom.

  The storeroom door was half open. Whispering floated out.

  I edged close to the doorway and strained my ears.

  “Ten tonight, right?” Karen whispered. “At your garage?”

  “Yeah,” a man said. This was definitely Randy. “Why can’t you remember anything?”

  Stop the presses. Were Karen and Randy having an affair? What was going on in this town? Jeez. It was starting to seem like a prime-time soap opera.

  Hearing footsteps, I hurried on to the restroom, my brain buzzing.

  Your garage, Karen had said. Not the garage.

  Had I misinterpreted those texts I had seen on Karen’s phone? Karen had texted her son Scootch saying he was not allowed to go with Uncle Mikey to meet Randy at a garage. All along, I’d been assuming the garage in question was Hatch Automotive.

  Had Mikey and Randy actually been planning to meet on Saturday at Randy’s garage at Naneda Orchards?

  And now Randy was setting up a meeting with Karen Brown. That was something I did not want to miss.

  When I passed the storeroom on the way out, Karen and Randy had gone.

  *

  Effie was waiting for me in front of the farm stand with a bottle of spring water.

  “You’re not going to believe what I just heard,” I whispered. “Walk and talk.”

  We headed back into the apple orchard, and I summarized what I’d overheard.

  “All I know his, Randy is looking bad,” I said. “Really, really bad.” I ticked it off on my fingers. “He has a rage problem. He hated Mikey—who was having an affair with his wife. And now he’s setting up clandestine meetings with another woman. This stinks to high heaven.”

  “We should check on Randy’s alibi for last night,” Effie said. “Alexa said he was playing poker at his friend’s house.”

  “Yes,” I said, “we should. Charlie Morel was the friend. He’s my dad’s neighbor. He teaches English lit at the university. And we also have to show up tonight at ten at Randy’s garage.”

  We looked across the fields to the garage. It was a newer-looking red building with two shut vehicle-sized doors and one regular door. No windows. Its corrugated metal roof glinted in the sunlight.

  “Not many places to hide,” Effie said.

  “Nope.”

  An enormous pumpkin patch stretched away from one side of the garage, a stubble field on the other. No trees. No shrubs. A couple of grinning scarecrows in plaid shirts and floppy hats studded the field.

  “It’ll be dark, though,” Effie said in an optimistic tone. “And we’ll be wearing black.”

  “I think I might have a better idea,” I said.

  *

  The gaggle managed to pick and press only a half gallon of cider, yet by the time they were done, they were overheated, sweaty, hungry, and sticky with apple juice.

  “Lunchtime!” Effie trilled.

  I drove us into town, and we disembarked in front of That’s Italiano. The fact that they offered senior lunch specials was a big selling point.

  After lunch, we headed back to the inn. I had about half an hour to get ready for my date with Albright. But first: call Professor Charlie Morel and verify that Randy had been at the poker game the previous night.

  Sitting at the kitchen table, I looked up his number in the white pages and dialed.

  He didn’t answer. No answering machine picked up. Shucks.

  After that, Effie volunteered to do my eyebrows.

  “Now remember, use your feminine wiles with Albright, Agnes,” she said, dabbing the makeup brush across my brow bones. “It’s your prerogative as a woman.”

  “Gross.”

  “No, really. You have them. Let them come out and play.”

  “What’s wrong with being honest?”

  “In this case, everything. We can’t have Albright know we’re snooping, dear. There. Today you’re less Sophia Loren and more Audrey Hepburn.”

  “So we’re adding another half inch of thickness. Fab. By the way, why are you all gussied up?” Effie had changed from slacks and a blouse to a formfitting plum dress, and her makeup had been redone.

  “Mr. Solomon is coming over for a drink.”

  “He just can’t get enough, huh?”

  Effie’s smiled. “We have things to discuss.”

  “I’ll bet you do.”

  “Knock-knock,” Dorothea said, standing in the kitchen doorway.

  “Oh, hello,” Effie said. “Would you like a cup of tea? Or, it’s not too early for a drink—?”

  “No, thank you.” Dorothea waved some papers in her hand. “I’m afraid someone else’s papers got mixed up with mine in the printer—they look like some sort of university application forms?”

  “Oh.” I hurried over and took the forms. “Thanks.”

  Dorothea left. Effie was opening the window over the sink, lighting up a cigarette.

  “Aren’t you going to ask me about the application forms?” I said.

  Effie blew a thin stream of smoke through the screen and turned to me. “You do what you need to do, Agnes.”

  “Are you … upset?”

  “How could I be? You’re young, you’re exploring your options. I know that you’ll keep me updated on a need-to-know basis, m-kay?”

  “Okay.” Feeling vaguely like a jerk, I stashed the application forms on the pile of junk mail and takeout menus on the kitchen counter. I’d deal with them, just as I was apparently dealing with everything else in my life, later.

  I drove myself downtown, since everyone was planning on spending the afternoon at the inn anyway. Effie had impulse-bought a croquet set at an estate sale a few weeks before and had triumphantly wheeled it out, much to the gaggle’s delight. They were whacking wooden balls around on the lawn when I left.

  Chapter 25

  “Wow,” Detective Albright said when I found him waiting on the sidewalk in front of the movie theater at 3:59. “You look great! Are those new glasses?”

  “Hi. Thanks. These are my backup glasses. I keep losing eyewear. Sorry I’m late.”

  Albright was wearing saggy jeans, a too-tight windbreaker, and approximately one
gallon of cheap aftershave. All for my benefit.

  Man, I felt like a jerk, leading him on. On the other hand, he knew stuff that I wanted to know, and wasn’t as if going to one movie with a guy means you’re going to marry him. Besides, Albright didn’t really deserve my pity. Not when he was trying to get Otis thrown in the slammer.

  At my insistence, we bought our own tickets for Headless Horseman III at the window, and went in. At the concession stand, Albright bought an extra-large buttered popcorn and Coke, and I bought a jumbo Junior Mints. Silent ads were flashing on the screen when we shuffled into a couple of free seats.

  “So,” I said, after what I hoped had been a reasonable amount of time, and also because I couldn’t stand the sound of Albright’s adenoidal breathing. “How’s that crazy murder case going?”

  “You know I can’t talk about my work,” Albright said with all the husky mysteriousness of Batman.

  “Yeah, I know … but a murderer, still at large.” I gave a mock shiver. “It’s pretty scary.”

  “Don’t be scared,” Albright said, and to my total horror he raised one of his stubby windbreakered arms and put it around my shoulder.

  Oh, no. Ugh. No, no, no.

  Aunt Effie’s voice echoed in my skull: Use your feminine wiles, Agnes. It’s your prerogative as a woman.

  I didn’t remove Albright’s arm. It was like a slug. A limp, clammy, nylon-covered slug. I mustered what I hoped was a sweet-and-frightened tone. “Um, about Clifford Prentiss’s secret van parked at Hatch Automotive … have you looked into that?”

  “Yeah, it’s true. He had a 1987 Volkswagen Vanagon … recently purchased with cash from Hatch Automotive.”

  I swallowed thickly. “Oh.”

  “Clifford was keeping the van a secret from his wife, it seems. She knew nothing about it, and it wasn’t registered or insured. I’m thinking he was planning on taking off in that thing, leaving his life behind, as soon as the time was right.” Albright sighed and stuffed a handful of popcorn in his mouth. A few pieces dribbled onto his lap. “But he didn’t make it out alive. This is the thing that just kills me about cases like this. Unhappy people wading through life and then—poof—their lives are over and they’ll never have another chance to make things better for themselves. Sure makes you think, doesn’t it?”

  “Uh-huh.” I shrank incrementally away from Albright’s arm.