by Susan Cory
“He’s telling me to avoid providing any more damning circumstantial evidence, or I’ll get sent to the chair.”
“Swell. The police need to get this wrapped up soon, before someone else gets killed. They need to get somebody behind bars. And we need to insulate ourselves from the whole thing. Tomorrow I’ll get back to the second draft of my book and you’ll start your new project in Chestnut Hill. Then Raven gets back from RISD on Wednesday. You promised to make her a cake. Meanwhile, we’ll leave this for the police to figure out. Agreed?”
“Absolutely,” Iris crossed her heart and had every intention of sticking to this plan.
Chapter 23
She was startled to hear her doorbell ring at dinnertime that evening. Few people except Sierra Club solicitors ever approached her front door. She saw Luc through the door’s glass panel, his blue eyes twinkling. Sheba looked up at her quizzically.
“You order a pizza, ma’am?” He held up a large box from Emma’s—the source of the best gourmet pizza in Cambridge.
She gave him a grin, chin raised. “Depends. What’s on it?”
He peeked into the box: “Chevre and basil?” He cocked an eyebrow. Iris had always wanted to be able to do that. As a girl she used to practice isolating just one brow while she sat with her mother in church, but she’d never succeeded.
“Yup. That’s mine. Come on in, young man.”
He handed her a padded yellow envelope.
“What’s this?”
“I don’t know. It was sticking out of your mail slot.” He bent to pat Sheba, who was sniffing intently at the box. The aroma was tantalizing.
“Watch out. That’s my vicious watch dog Sheba.”
At hearing her name, Sheba rolled onto her back, legs in air.
“Vicious.” Luc laughed. “I can see that.” He obliged the watch dog with a full-belly rub.
As she led him back to the kitchen, Iris turned down Lucinda Williams’ languid, bad-girl voice crooning “Words Fell”, and tossed the envelope on the kitchen’s island.
“Don’t turn down Lucinda on my account,” he said.
“Actually, I’ve been trying to drown out what happened this afternoon.”
“What else could’ve possibly happened?” He set down the box on the kitchen table and looked at her, turning serious.
“I know, it’s incredible but there’s been another death. Norman. I found his body out in Lincoln.” She rested the palms of her hands on her eyes.
Luc erupted into coughing before he managed to wheeze out “wha-a-at? Norman’s dead? We just saw the guy. Was it an accident? Are you okay?”—all interspersed with more coughing.
“Do you want some water? How about a beer?” She hurried to get two bottles of Sam Adams and a bottle opener.
“No, it looks like murder again, using the same method as with Will. Norman called this morning. God, it was just this morning! He asked me to come out there to help him hang some artwork. When I got there, I couldn’t find him. I thought he might be down in the wine cellar and couldn’t hear me. Well, he was down there. Someone had stuffed his dead body into the wine refrigerator.”
He stared at her, open-mouthed. Then, he snapped his mouth closed and said, “Damn.”
She looked down and studied the pizza. She couldn’t get the ugly image of Norman’s corpse out of her head.
“Iris, why don’t you move in with Ellie for awhile—just until the killer is found? You could be next on this guy’s list. There’s a psycho running around and now two people are dead—no, three.”
“I know. I will lie low. But the people from the reunion have all left by now except G.B., and I never run into him. I intend to leave all further sleuthing to the police. I just hope they can manage to figure out who’s doing this. I have no sense of whether they’re getting anywhere. Detective Malone is playing his cards close to the vest.”
Luc hesitated. “I don’t know if I should even mention this now, but I saw my father’s old partner this afternoon. We talked and I tried to get out of him anything he might have heard about the case. At first Ed didn’t want to say anything at all, but then he loosened up. He says they haven’t found Will’s cell phone yet and the wife’s alibi checks out. Also, C.C., Alyssa and Adam are in the clear for the time frame of Will’s death. That’s all he knows. Or all he’d tell me. I did ask him if he remembered that case from 20 years ago, of the Harvard student going off the balcony, and he did. They thought it was a clear-cut drug thing, tragic but all too common. Then he went on to say that one thing had always bothered him about the case. The kid’s apartment had been tossed before they got there the next day—you know, burglarized. It’s sometimes hard to tell the difference between the usual mess of a student’s apartment, especially at the end of a term, and a place that’s been systematically searched, but he had the definite impression that it had been gone through.”
“Hmmm. I wonder if Carey’s friend, Patty, knows anything about that. Would it be dangerous to talk with her?”
“Please Iris, don’t risk it.”
Luc, then Iris, picked up a pizza slice, now cold, and chewed in preoccupied silence.
“This is amazing pizza. I’m sorry I’m not better company tonight.”
“I’d say discovering a corpse a few hours ago is a good excuse for not feeling chatty. Would you like me to go?”
“No, I’m glad you’re here but I’ve completely lost my appetite and this pizza is too good to waste.”
“Here, I’ll wrap it up. You can have it tomorrow.”
Luc crushed the pizza box into her recycling bin by the back door while Iris cleared the plates. She glanced at the envelope still on the counter. No address or name. As she tore open the flap, her mind had a split second to register the scraping sound.
Chapter 24
“Ooooh, God. My head is in a vise,” Iris moaned.
The next thing she blurted out, after she opened her eyes and registered the hospital bed she lay in, was “Don’t call my brother!”
Detective Malone couldn’t hold back a snort of laughter.
She smelled something burning. The explosion came back to her. “Where’s Luc? Is he okay?”
“Right here. I’m fine,” he said, leaning forward in a chair next to her bed, his face filled with concern. The dim light coming through the window behind him hinted at some time in the evening.
“Do you want me to get the nurse for more pain meds?” luc asked.
Her head throbbed, but she wanted to get answers before losing her concentration.
“That’s okay. I’ll wait. What about Sheba? Did she get hurt?”
“No, no, she’s fine. When the ambulance came, your neighbor, the woman with the gray braid, came over to see what happened. She said that Sheba could stay with her—said she looks after her sometimes when you’re away.”
“Right, that’s good. What happened? There was an explosion, wasn’t there?”
Detective Malone leaned against the door, watching her. “You got a letter bomb. It was a crude device— match-heads on one side of the flap and flint on the other. When you tore it, the burst of flames knocked you back and you hit your head on the edge of the counter. This could have killed you instead of just leaving you with minor burns. Your friend here thought fast, put out the fire, and called 911. We couldn’t find any prints on the remains of the envelope. The doctors are keeping you here overnight to watch your burn blisters and make sure you don’t have a concussion.”
Iris felt the edges of a bandage on the side of her forehead. That’s what was throbbing, she realized. She could see another bandage extending up her neck from under the hospital johnny. “Did it burn my face?”
“No,” the detective said. “I’m told that your friend here smothered the flames before they could do much damage.”
She looked across at Luc and smiled weakly. “Good work, bodyguard. Thank God you were there. A letter bomb—I can’t believe it!”
“I know, it’s crazy. I called Ellie and
she’s on her way. She’s bringing some of your things,” Luc said, reaching for her hand and giving it a squeeze.
“I don’t mean to interrupt, Ms. Reid, but I’d like to go over anything you might remember that could have triggered this attempt on your life.”
“That’s just it. I can’t make any sense out of the last few days. You know how I spent most of today, Detective. I’ve told you everything I know about Will and Norman. I can’t figure out any connection between them, and yet there must be one. What can you tell me about what’s going on?”
“I can’t talk about the murder investigations, but I can say that my detectives are canvassing your neighborhood to see if anyone saw who dropped off this envelope. This murderer is clever and he’s getting bolder. Still, his luck can’t go on like this forever. Someone’s going to spot something out of place. What concerns me is your safety. You’re lucky to be alive. He, or she for that matter, seems to think you know something that might incriminate him.”
“All I know is that Will’s wife told Ellie she overheard him talking on his cell saying he would meet someone for lunch on Friday and then drive out with them to the dinner later on.”
“Yes, we got that information too. We’ve been checking out everyone at the Friday night dinner and their alibis. But Ms. Reid, I can’t stress this enough, this bomb was meant to silence you. Let us do the investigating. If anything occurs to you, any connections from the past that you see in a different light, call me immediately. Don’t try to follow up on anything yourself. It’s gotten too dangerous. You have my number.”
“I have it and I’ll call you, I promise.”
As Detective Malone walked out, a nurse in hippo-patterned scrubs strode in brandishing a blood pressure cuff. “Time to check your vitals,” she called out cheerfully.
Luc stood up and squeezed her gently on the shoulder. “I should take off. I’ll call you in the morning. I hope you can sleep in here.”
“Don’t worry. I’ll get them to give me some good drugs. Thanks again for helping me.”
He smiled back at her, then walked out.
“That your boyfriend? He seems nice,” the nurse said while pumping the cuff excruciatingly tight.
“If I’m lucky,” Iris said staring at the hippos. Had this nurse strayed from the pediatrics ward?
Iris’ vitals noted, the nurse swept out just as Ellie entered. “Great hairdo, darlin’. It looks like something Raven might have created.” She gently gave Iris a kiss on the forehead. “Poor baby.”
“How bad do I look? I smell like an incinerator.”
“Don’t worry. I brought my hair-cutting shears. We’ll just give you some layers in the front.”
Chapter 25
“I look like Karen Carpenter!” Iris moaned as she inspected herself in the hospital’s bathroom mirror. “Do you think I’ll bring back the ‘shag’?”
“Now don’t you be dissin your hairdresser, girl.”
“I’m sorry. I’m such an ungrateful wretch. Thank you for salvaging what you could. Can you believe someone sent me a letter bomb? It’s not that I was hoping to win Miss Congeniality, but it’s hard not to take this personally.” She slid back into the bed and her head started to throb again.
“Someone thinks you know something.”
“Maybe I do have some vital clue buried deep in my sub-conscious. I think I need a hypnotist.” Iris pried off an edge of the gauze bandage and peered at the burns on her upper chest. Even through the white salve coating her skin, she could see the ugly red blisters.
“I guess I won’t be showing a lot of cleavage for awhile.”
“How does it feel? Do they itch?”
“Not too bad yet. They’ll probably itch when they dry out.”
“Luc said that Detective Malone was here. Who does he think is behind all this?”
“He said that the murderer hasn’t made any mistakes yet, but that sooner or later he or she would slip up.”
“Well, doesn’t that inspire confidence. We could all be butchered in our beds by then. Where’s Chief Inspector Jane Tennison when you need her?”
“The police said that Norman’s body was still slightly warm, despite the wine refrigerator being on, so he must have been killed either right before I drove up or while I was upstairs.”
“Ugh! What a creepy thought. But wouldn’t you have heard something or seen a car if it had happened while you were there?”
“I saw Norman’s Prius in the upper driveway, but the murderer could have parked in the garage on the side. I wouldn’t have seen it when I came to the front door. There was loud music on when I got there, so it was hard to hear anything. Since the garage is on the middle level between the wine cellar and main floor above, the murderer could have escaped through the garage while I was up in the kitchen. Come to think of it, I think I did hear a door slam.”
“Did you tell that to Detective Malone?”
“All except the door slamming. I just remembered that.”
“You should tell him.”
“He’ll probably think I’m trying to divert suspicion from myself again.”
“Oh, come on. The police can’t possibly think that you killed Norman and stuffed him in the wine refrigerator. Think of all the valuable wine that might have gotten wrecked. You’d never do that!”
“Very funny. True as well. Why didn’t I think of using the wine snob defense?”
“So our timeline doesn’t show us anyone who could have killed both Will and Norman. Unless you actually did do it, Iris.”
“With my middle-age memory, I wouldn’t rule me out.”
Chapter 26
On Monday morning, as soon as she could convince her doctor to release her, she walked from Mt. Auburn Hospital to one of her favorite places in Cambridge, Formaggio Kitchen, a gourmet deli. Aside from being packed to the rafters with unusual food, its floor plan of three rooms laid out in a row had always intrigued her. Iris grabbed a basket and headed toward the cheese case. She studied the different choices. Stinky epoisses sat haunch-to-haunch with raw-milk chevre, mimolettes, brebis, and a huge wheel of gruyere—many of them aged in the shop’s own basement ‘cave.’ She lingered over two choices, discussing their merits with the salesperson, a skinny young man with an eager expression. After settling on a wedge of pecorino, she moved on to the cured meats that shared the glass-fronted display. She debated among the prepared foods, pates, exotic condiments, and the expensive but well edited wine selection.
With her basket half filled, she moved on to the store’s middle room, a ‘captive room’, accessed only through one of the other two. This tiny jewel box was filled with all things sweet. Pastel petit-fours, madeleines dipped in chocolate and a dozen different kinds of cakes and cookies were on display. But Iris delighted most in the exotic brightly-wrapped candies lining the floor-to-ceiling shelves—hand-cut sherbet-colored marshmallows, green apple lollipops, and sugary fondants. This room was straight out of her childhood fantasies. She hesitated, then had two fruit tarts carefully wrapped in a bakery box.
The last room was the largest. It was an elegant grocery with the platonic ideal of each category on offer. One could find perfectly ripe organic mission figs or tart bilberry nectar. Along the edges of the minuscule aisles could be found fresh brioches, burnt caramel ice cream, or eggplants so beautiful they might have been sculpted from wax. There was even a flower shop within the grocery space offering exquisite single blooms at impressive prices. She considered getting some flowers, but didn’t want to overdo her thank-you picnic for Luc and run the risk of embarrassing him.
It was just after noon by the time she returned home and it dawned on her that Luc might be overseeing the lunch shift at the café. She had never actually been at the Paradise during lunchtime, and realized she didn’t know his schedule. She had imagined the two of them enjoying this picnic in his apartment. She searched on line to find his home phone number and noticed that he lived on Arlington Street—Ellie’s street. She was surprised that
they hadn’t ever bumped into him walking around the neighborhood. His building was on the odd side, not the even. Good. That meant that it wasn’t the condo building with the ugly modern entryways.
“Hello?” His voice sounded ragged, tentative.
“Oh, God. I’ve woken you up. It’s Iris. Go back to sleep—sorry…”
“No, that’s okay. I need to get up soon anyway. I’m up early to visit the markets, and help with the breakfast crowd, then come home to get a few more hours of sleep before starting the dinner prep. I usually wake up around now. It’s good to hear from you. How’s the head feeling? Are you home now?”
“There’s no pain that Advil can’t handle at this point. I’m home, and I wanted to drop by with something for you.”
“Great. Come on over. Do you know where I am? It’s the corner of Mass Ave and Arlington Street, above the Paper Source—Building 3, third floor, door on the right. I can buzz you in. Just give me fifteen minutes to take a shower.”
Chapter 27
This was always the tricky part for Iris. Being so visually particular, she had a hard time being with someone with bad taste. What if Luc’s living room featured a clunky pleather sofa with floral wing chairs facing an enormous TV? More than one of her relationships had been scuttled when the guy’s place had spaghetti sauce encrusted on the stove’s burners or toothpaste spit on the medicine chest. But then Luc had designed the interior of the Paradise Café, and that was tasteful.
She got buzzed into a well-maintained lobby with an old-fashioned cage-type elevator. As she got out on the third floor, she heard a blues riff that she didn’t recognize seeping out from an open door.
“Luc?”
He came into his foyer wearing jeans and a white button-down shirt, drying his hair with a towel. His skin looked rosy from the warm shower. The open top buttons of his shirt revealed light brown chest hair. He looked vulnerable and sexy. Before she could think about it, she kissed him on the lips and felt his responding warmth. The same scent from their kiss in the café reached her—spicy and a little woodsy. Was it aftershave or an exotic Italian soap that he’d gotten in Rome?