Black Coffee

by Jaye Watson

  If they said she couldn't present the paper, she couldn't present it.

  She couldn't decide whether she was more angry or disappointed as she threw herself into the chair behind her desk.

  * * * *

  As she carried her breakfast dishes to the sink the next morning, the phone rang. A quick glance at the clock told her she had time for a short call, but only just.

  "I can't find Darlin'."

  "Martha?" She had to say her friend's name three times before Martha stopped sobbing. "Martha, I'm on my way out the door. Why don't I come by after work and we can talk about this?"

  "I can't wait. I've got to find her now. She's so little. So helpless. And Walt's no help."

  "Call the police. Maybe they can help. I promise I'll be there no later than six. But right now I've got to go. The situation at the lab--"

  "Go. I'll manage. Just come as soon as you can. Please."

  She promised again and hung up, while praying that traffic would be light this morning.

  It wasn't and she walked through the front door of BioLogic at 8:35.

  "Dr. Allardyce wants to see you right away." Sylvia, the receptionist-from-hell, sounded like she could hardly wait for the beheading. She was one of a series who'd come and gone ever since the holidays. So far she'd made none of the old guard happy, but she seemed to get along beautifully with Allardyce's team.

  "Thanks." Emaline kept going. She'd be darned if her raincoat was going to drip on the carpet Sylvia's tone indicated she'd been called upon.

  Fenella Allardyce looked up as she entered the corner office with the great view. The tall, icy blonde looked totally out of place in the comfortable, slightly shabby room. Dr. Burton had liked leather and dark wood, with a few touches of homespun kitsch. Emaline bet herself that redecoration was in the near future.

  "Good morning, Emaline. You don't mind if I call you Emaline?"

  She wanted to growl, but pasted a polite smile on her face. "Not at all." She took the seat Allardyce indicated, a futuristic-looking molded plastic chair that went way beyond incongruous in the room. It was as uncomfortable as it was ugly.

  Allardyce picked up the single file folder centered on the desktop and opened it. "Your paper is...interesting. I'm not sure why Dr. Burton felt it was worth presenting at the symposium, but, well...I suppose it's too late to withdraw. I've decided to allow you to present it, but I'm afraid the company will be unable to cover your expenses. There's quite a bit of modernization needed and we'll be taking some measures to tighten expenditures."

  "I see." It was too late to withdraw, darn it. And it wasn't as if she couldn't afford the trip, but still... "If that's all?"

  "Yes, you may go." Allardyce pushed the folder across the desk. "Please deliver this to Mr. Fontina." Clearly dismissing all thought of the paper, she spun around and retrieved another file from the credenza behind her.

  Seething, Emaline returned to her office. She scrawled Fontina on a Post-It and stuck it on the folder before tossing it into her OUT box. The rest of the afternoon, she resolutely concentrated on her work which was, fortunately, complex enough to hold her attention.

  * * * *

  Directly after work, Emaline went to Martha's. The puppy was still missing, and her friend was beyond distraught. "Is there any way she could have gotten out?"

  "I don't see how. I had her in this crate, and she's really a calm little thing. She didn't make any kind of a fuss."

  Emaline looked over the molded plastic structure. She'd seen Perky in it, but not for a long time. Martha liked to have her baby on her lap or at her feet. "The door is open." As soon as she'd spoken, she felt like an idiot, for stating the obvious.

  "I know I fastened it when I put her in. It's got these latches, here." She pointed to the bottom of the frame. "There's no way a tiny thing like Darlin' could have opened them. Someone stole her."

  "Out of your locked house? Martha, Have you looked everywhere? If she's as tiny as you say, she could be in the back of a drawer, or tucked into a shoebox."

  "Well, yes, I guess..."

  They searched the house. For two hours they delved into every nook and cranny. Emaline though to herself how fortunate it was that Martha wasn't the packrat Grandad had been. There were no stacks of old magazines, or cardboard boxes that had been sitting closed for twenty years in this house.

  By nine o'clock, she was ready to quit. "I've got to work tomorrow. Why don't you set some food out and maybe she'll come out of hiding to eat it."

  "She's gone. I just know it."

  "Martha, there is no way she could have gotten out of this house. You said that yourself."

  "I know, but--" Martha sniffed, and blinked back the tears that had been threatening all evening. "You go on, get some rest. I'll keep looking."

  She sounded so darned pathetic. So vulnerable. "I'll come over after work tomorrow, if you haven't found her by then."

  "Thanks." The word dripped hopelessness.

  Emaline knew just how she felt. It had been weeks since Detective Armbruster had told her they'd lost contact with Harry. Somehow she couldn't equate a missing puppy with his disappearance, even as she sympathized with Martha.

  * * * *

  "Em?" The hoarse voice was not one she recognized.

  "Yes. Who--"

  "Em, it's Martha."

  "I should be there about six. You know how traffic is."

  "No, that's not why I called. I don't want you to... Don't come over. Walt and I have to talk this out. He--" Her voice broke. "He sold Darlin'."

  "Oh, no. What--"

  "I-I'll talk to you tomorrow." The line when dead.

  Damn him! Emaline had never particularly cared for Martha's husband, but mostly because he was an unfriendly, cranky sort. On the occasions they had met, he'd acted almost as if she was a bad influence on his wife. But to sell her dog...?

  "What a stinker."

  She forced her attention back to the report she was reviewing. Occasionally the Portland Police bureau came to them for tests they hadn't the capability to run. Like this one. There had hardly been enough in the sample to make the determination. Roger admitted that his findings were eighty percent certain, but he couldn't state that the match with the suspect's blood was definite. Just a strong maybe.

  She had to agree, and said so in the short statement she appended to the report. After digitally signing it, she emailed it to Detective Alazar, cc'd it to Central Files.

  A quick glance at the clock told her she still had twenty-eight minutes to fill. She switched to Google Calendar. The Esterhazy report was due Monday, but all she had to do was give it a last read before signing off on it. She was still waiting for the results on the metallurgical report in the Parkinson case, and the Slivingberg paternity suit was on hold until the lawyers came to some sort of compromise. A game of Solitaire would fill the remaining minutes. And about then Fontina would come slithering in. The Office Manager had an uncanny ability to appear at precisely the wrong time.

  After a moment's debate, she opened Word and started drafting a resignation.

  Not that she really intended to submit it. She liked her job. But darned if she liked the atmosphere anymore. "Maybe things will get better when the dust settles, Any transition is difficult."

  "I've had it."

  She jumped and spun to face the door.

  Roger threw himself into her visitor chair with such force that it skidded backwards a good foot.

  She didn't have to ask with whom. "What did Fontina do this time?"

  "He gave me hell for sending my review of Clare's findings to the client instead of to Schaatz. Did you see a memo about him reviewing everything before it went out?"

  "No, but there have been so many lately that I've pretty much ignored them."

  "Me, too. Guess I should have been paying more attention." He slumped even lower in the chair. "He told me that I had violated an important policy and to consider myself on probation. Probation! Like I'm a kid who's cut a class or som
ething."

  Emaline thought back to the email she'd sent not ten minutes earlier. "What's this about Schaatz reviewing everything? When did that come out?"

  "Hell if I know. I delete the damn things as soon as I get them anymore. Shit, Em, they're like spam. There were fifteen memos in my inbox when I logged in this morning. I haven't got time to read them, not if I want to get anything done"

  She couldn't resist rolling her eyes. "I counted twenty-three. And no, if you're wondering, I didn't read them all either. Just the ones where the subject line sounded important."

  "Fortunately I hadn't cleared the Trash. I found the one he was referring to. You know what the subject line was?"

  "I haven't a clue."

  "'One More Thing.'"

  "What?"

  "I kid you not. That was the subject line. And worse, the first paragraph was about how we were to make sure all reports were saved in the Corporate folder under 'Reports' as well as in Central Files. I got that far and didn't read any further. Putting a copy there is SOP."

  "I doubt I even read that far. So where does it say--"

  "Last line. 'Do not submit reports to clients until approved by Dr. Schaatz.' That's all. Honest to God. That's all it said. After two whole wordy paragraphs about how we were to label reports when storing them in the Corporate Review Folder."

  The phone on her desk rang. Her direct extension.

  Absently she reached for it. "Dr. Banister."

  "Em..." The whisper was almost too faint to hear.

  "Please speak up. I can barely hear you?"

  "It's me. Tell Armbru--"

  A click. And then silence.

  She held the phone hard against her ear, as if that would force a sound from it.

  "Are you okay?"

  She stared across the desk at Roger, and knew he could see how her hands shook.

  "Harry. It was Harry. He's alive."

  Chapter Three

  She couldn't work with Fenella Allardyce. Emaline knew that as sure as she knew her own name. With a sense that fate had caught up with her, she booted her laptop and opened her investment file.

  Granddad had been generous. He'd left her two-thirds of his estate, no small amount. Even after inheritance taxes, she had enough to live in comfort on for the rest of her life, unless the volatile stock market wiped out her 401-K, which was invested in supposedly conservative stocks. They'd not done well in the recession. Some of her more adventurous investments had done better. But she was still...comfortable.

  But she couldn't just quit. What would she do with herself?

  What were you planning to do with yourself when Harry came home?

  Oh, God! Harry. He was alive, but was he safe?

  Hope had kept her going since that suddenly terminated phone call. Meanwhile, Allardyce and her minions had turned a company with strong espirit de corps into a tight-assed, suspicious assemblage of backstabbers.

  Lucky Roger. He already had an offer from PSU. She couldn't imagine him as an academic, but still...

  I'm only fifty-one. Way too young to retire.

  Holding the thought at bay, she got up and poured herself another cup of coffee.

  For more than ten years she'd been a tea-drinker, except for an occasional cup of decaf coffee. Now she was living on black coffee. With caffeine.

  Maybe I should take up smoking again.

  The craving for a cigarette, one she hadn't felt for more than twenty years, came back as if her last smoke had been an hour ago.

  Once she'd all but lived on black coffee and cigarettes. They had gotten her through graduate school. Through her first heartbreak. Through the shock of Matt's death. Maybe they were what she needed to get her through a major career decision.

  Not to mention something worse than just a heartbreak.

  The melody of a once-favorite song circled in her head. Wasn't there a line in the lyrics about waiting for her man to come around--to come home?

  She forced her thoughts back to the immediate situation.

  Decision time. If she quit BioLogic, she'd still have to present the paper at the Society of Genetic Chemists conference in three weeks. I owe Dr. Burton that much, even if he did cut the ground out from under me. Me and everyone else at BioLogic. Besides, having a recent paper on her resume would go a long way toward getting her another position.

  Except she didn't want an academic position, and there weren't any other firms in the area she'd even consider. Leaving Portland meant giving up the house, uprooting herself.

  Leaving Harry.

  Oh, God, Harry! You've got to be safe.

  Resolutely she tamped the tears and the terror back into the mental file she did her best to keep locked. At least she usually managed keeping it locked during the day. Night was a different matter entirely. Hence the black coffee that was all that kept her going.

  Cigarettes were probably next.

  * * * *

  When the landline phone rang as she was going out the door Friday morning, she almost didn't answer it. Except it could be Detective Armbruster, with news about Harry. He'd promised to let her know if the feelers he'd put out following Harry's phone call yielded anything. "Hello?"

  "He's dead."

  Her heart all but stopped in her chest before she recognized Martha's voice. Not Harry. Harry's alive.

  Before she could speak, Martha said, "Walt's dead."

  "Oh my God, Martha, what happened? Are you sure? No, wait, I'll be there in ten minutes." She remembered to grab her purse, but paused as she was about to shut the door and dialed the lab. "This is Dr. Banister. I've had an emergency. I'll be in later if I can. If I can't I'll call."

  Before Sylvia could remind her that she was supposed to report directly to Mr. Fontina--she'd read that memo--she hung up, locked the door, and was gone.

  Martha was hunched into a sodden ball of misery in the wing chair beside the front window. Through the archway into the dining room, Emaline could see an arm, hand open, on the floor. To her surprise, there was no ambulance, no police car at the curb.

  The air in the room reeked with the sour smell of vomit, the stink of feces. When she went to stand beside Walt's body, she didn't bother to check for a pulse. There was no doubt at all he was dead. The utter flaccidity of his body was unmistakable.

  She was barely seated on the hassock in front of Martha when she was enveloped, hugged until she could hardly breathe. Carefully she eased out of the too-close embrace. "What happened?"

  Martha's voice was barely above a whisper, but she seemed strangely calm. "He got sick last night. A belly ache, then he vomited. I gave him some herbal tea, but it seemed to make him worse. When I checked before I went to bed about ten--I slept in the guest room because I could hardly stand to be around him--he was in the bathroom. I think he had diarrhea."

  "You aren't sure?"

  Martha sniffed and wiped her wet cheeks. "I was so mad at him. I wanted him to be miserable. My poor little Darlin'..."

  The guest room was at the opposite end of the house from the master suite. Far enough away that Walt could have called for help without Martha hearing him, if he'd been too weak to shout. "Did you check on him again?"

  "I did. Around two, I think. He was on the floor in the master bath. A real mess." Her face screwed into an expression of disgust. "I cleaned him up and helped him put on clean pajamas. Then I went back to bed."

  How could she have gone calmly back to bed and ignored the severity of Walt's condition? This was a side of Martha Emaline had never seen. A cold, almost vengeful, side.

  "How long ago did you call the doctor?"

  A confused expression crossed Martha's face. "Doctor? Why should I call a doctor? He's dead. I need an undertaker."

  Convinced now that her friend was suffering dissociation due to shock, Emaline pried herself free of Martha's clutching hands and pulled out her phone. All she could remember was that any unattended death had to be investigated. She called the only person she knew who might advise her about t
he next step. Fortunately Detective Armbruster was available.

  "You say she wasn't actively caring for him? The Medical Examiner's office will have to investigate. Can you make sure the body isn't disturbed?"

  After a quick glance at Martha, sitting curled in on herself, she said, "I'll stay and make sure. Have you--"

  "Nothing. I'm sorry, Dr. Banister. No one in the team has seen or heard from him in nearly three weeks. They'll let me know the minute anything changes."

  "Thanks." She ended the call and dropped the phone into her jacket pocket. After a couple of abortive attempts to pull Martha out of her near trance, she said, "Let's get out of here. It could be some time before the Medical Examiner gets here."

  Passively her friend let herself be led to the kitchen, a cheerless room with a northern exposure. On a gray, rainy day, like today, it wasn't conducive to good cheer under the best of conditions. Why on earth had they chosen slate counters and stainless fixtures when they remodeled? There wasn't a smidgeon of color in the entire room.

  Once Emaline had coffee started, she called the lab and told--not asked--Mr. Fontina that she was taking a couple of days off. "A death in the family," she said, and really didn't care if someone checked and discovered that Martha wasn't a relative. Sometime since yesterday, she'd made up her mind. All that was left was to decide when she'd resign.

  Martha's voice cut through her wool-gathering. "He was mean. Mean clear through."

  "Walt?" The last thing she wanted to do was hear about a man she'd never warmed to, but she owed it to Martha to be supportive. If lending an ear was what she needed, that's what Emaline would do.

  "He was mean. Stingy, selfish, cold. Just mean. I don't know why I ever married him."

  Considering that she'd been married to Walt Kaczynski for nearly thirty years, her statement struck Emaline as odd. "You must have loved him once."

  "I can't remember. He was hot, though. And real good in bed. But otherwise..." Her shrug spoke of boredom and scorn. "I'm glad he's dead."