“Who are you?” she asked sadly.
“Mrs. Walters, I’m Alex Montero from the Sunset Ridge Police and this is Poppy McGuire. We’re sorry for your loss. I was hoping you’d be able to speak to us to help us figure out who did this to your husband.”
She hung her head and nodded as she stepped back and opened the door to let us in. We entered a house that looked as solidly middle class on the inside as it did on the outside. Mrs. Walters escorted us into a living room to the right of the front door, and as we walked in, I noticed wood framed pictures of Canton Walters, his wife, and their three children above a blue patterned sofa.
She pointed toward them as she offered us a seat. “Those are our children, Canton Junior, Michael, and Emma.”
Alex gave them a cursory glance as he sat down, but I took a longer look and saw all three children had their father’s curly blond hair and almost angelic face, even the baby girl who couldn’t have been older than a few months in the picture. It seemed that none of their mother’s traits had transferred to them.
I sat and realized this was the first time I’d ever been with Alex when he had to speak to the wife or husband of a murder victim. Unsure how he’d handle it, I decided this would be a good time for me to begin practicing silence and let him do all the talking.
“Mrs. Walters—”
She raised her hand to stop him and smiled. “Please, call me Rose.”
“Rose, thank you for agreeing to speak to us. When we talked on the phone, you said your husband was a salesman. Can you tell me what he sold?”
Her cheeks grew pink, which made her blue eyes even bluer, and then a look of discomfort settled into her face. “Marital aids.”
Now I was definitely happy to let Alex handle this visit with her.
He lifted his gaze from his notebook and repeated what she’d just said in a voice that sounded as awkward as she looked. “Marital aids?”
Rose Walters took a deep breath in and exhaled slowly before she answered. “Mr. Montero, my husband was a good man. He supported his family the best he could. I could only work part time once Emma came along last year. He was a high school biology teacher and a very good one, but his pay wasn’t enough. So he took on a second job selling for Naughty and Spice Toys.”
I’d heard of the sexy toy company once or twice in college. Their representatives held parties much like makeup or candle parties, and groups of women got together to drink wine and giggle about sex toys like vibrators.
“So that’s why he was in Maryland this past week?”
“Yes. When he began making more from selling for the company than he made in two years teaching, we agreed he should leave his day job and go where the money was.”
She sniffled a tear away and sighed. “If I’d known it would all end like this, I would have never told him I was okay with him leaving his teaching job.”
Still sounding uncomfortable, Alex asked, “What did he do to sell the products?”
I lowered my head to stare down at my legs and pressed my lips together so I wouldn’t begin laughing. Had he just asked our victim what he did to sell sex toys to groups of drunk women? He surely had never experienced a Naughty and Spice party or he would have never asked such an indelicate question.
“What are you implying?” Rose snapped.
I quickly felt Alex’s control over the situation begin to slip away, so I looked up and gave her my best sympathetic smile as I explained why he didn’t seem to have a clue at the moment.
“Rose, please excuse my partner. As you can see by the confused look on his face, he’s a typical bachelor who has no idea about parties women have when they want to buy makeup, kitchen containers, candles, or sex toys. But I know, so please understand he meant no harm. He just doesn’t know.”
Her eyes studied me for a long moment like she was trying to figure out if I was someone she could trust, and then she nodded and smiled at the two of us. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have snapped like that. I know a lot of people didn’t respect Canton for what he did for a living, and I thought you were one of those people.”
“Thank you for understanding. He’s such a typical guy that he just doesn’t know.”
I elbowed Alex in the side and turned toward him hoping he understood the look I was giving him meant back off from asking any more questions about what our victim did at his job. For his part, he seemed confused about what had happened but understood the look I shot him and returned to asking other questions we needed answered.
“When did you last hear from your husband, Rose?”
“The night before last. He called me to tell me he had to stay over in Maryland because it was late and he didn’t feel right about driving. He said he’d only be gone one night, so I didn’t think much of it.”
Instantly, my mind kicked into high gear. Why would he have felt uncomfortable driving on a Tuesday night? The weather that night had been gorgeous. Clear skies, lots of stars and a full moon shining lots of light, and not a drop of rain to be found. And why had Canton lied to his wife about only being gone for one night when he’d been at the Hotel Piermont for days before?
“Did he give you a sense of why he didn’t feel right about driving the hour or so back home?” Alex asked.
I heard the indictment from one man about another in Alex’s voice and hoped Rose didn’t hear it too. I didn’t want to have to explain to her again how he was perfectly clueless, especially since I couldn’t account for his clumsiness with her. He was never this way when he questioned people, and this was the widow of a murder victim, for God’s sake. Of all people, he should know how delicately he should be approaching her.
But Rose didn’t seem to pick up on his tone and simply answered, “At first I thought he sounded strange, like he had the flu or something, but I think he had stopped at a bar for a drink or two and didn’t want to risk getting a DUI. He wouldn’t have been able to make any money if he couldn’t drive, you see.”
“I understand. So when he didn’t arrive home, did you try to call him?” Alex asked, his voice ever-so-slightly less accusing.
“I took the children to my mother’s to celebrate the Fourth of July holiday, so I didn’t return until this morning. I’d just gotten home when you called to tell me the news.”
“Is your mother’s house close?”
Rose began to cry and covered her face with her hands. “Just a few miles north in Wolf Trap. I just can’t believe this happened. All he wanted to do was make an honest living. Why would anyone kill him?”
Still fixated on her calling him, he asked again, “So you didn’t try to call him when you got home and didn’t find him here?”
She lifted her face and wiped her tear-stained cheeks. “Yes, I did, but I got no answer. I trusted him, so I didn’t really worry, but then you called and I knew why he hadn’t answered.”
Rose started to sob again, so I nudged Alex and looked toward the door. “We’re so sorry for your loss,” I said as I gently patted her arm. “Thank you for your time. We can see ourselves out.”
She nodded as she continued to cry, and we left even as I practically had to pull Alex out of the house. When we got to the car, I saw he still had no idea of what had happened in there.
Closing the door, I turned toward him in the front seat and grabbed his arm to stop him from starting the car. “Hold on. What was going on with you in there? You aren’t that clueless, so what gives?”
He looked at me and gave me one of those sly smiles that often made me want to shake him. “I’m happy to know you don’t think I’m a thoughtless idiot, Poppy. I’d hoped you thought more of me.”
Frustrated, I slumped back against the seat. “Alex, please tell me you didn’t think it was okay to practically accuse the victim of sleeping with other women as you talked to his widow? That’s all I want to know.”
“I asked her that question to see if she thought he was sleeping with other women. You’re the one who said from the very beginning of this case that you thou
ght a woman was involved.”
“Oh. Sorry,” I mumbled. “I guess I should have trusted you.”
Alex started the car and drove away from Canton Walters’ nice suburban house. “I will admit one thing, though. You didn’t lie to her when you said I have no idea what happens at those parties. I just found it unlikely that a guy selling sex toys to a bunch of women wouldn’t get hit on, so I asked her to find out what he did.”
Driving down the highway toward Sunset Ridge, I thought about what he said. “You know what? I’ve been to parties like those. Not Naughty and Spice parties, but similar ones, and I can tell you women get a little wild at them. The combination of alcohol and sex toys makes for a pretty rowdy time. I’m having a hard time imagining our victim not getting hit on a lot at them. He was a good looking guy. Not my type, but I can see lots of women liking him. That blond sort of surfer guy look with a touch of innocence works for some women.”
Alex chuckled and passed a truck before turning to look at me. “I don’t think I would have described Canton Walters like that in a million years.”
“You’re not a woman. We see things differently. That’s what makes us such good partners. Dark and light. Yin and yang. You know, opposites.”
“I don’t know if we’re dark and light, but I’ll agree to the opposites. So Yin, what did we learn from Rose?”
“We learned our victim was lying to his wife. He wasn’t home all that time and then gone for one night, so if she knew what he did for a living, why would he lie?”
Pursing his lips, Alex shook his head. “I have no idea. We need to get the details about his cell. I want to see if she actually called him when she said she did.”
“Do you think we should consider her a suspect?”
With a smile, he said, “Definitely. The spouse is always the first one to look at when someone is murdered, if just to cross her off the list. For now, she may not be a formal suspect yet, but I’m not ruling her out, by any means.”
I thought about Rose saying she was at her mother’s for the past week and said, “Imagine having a mother-in-law who lived in a place called Wolf Trap.”
Alex smiled. “If this was a novel, I’d say that would be a huge clue that one of those women did something to him. Do me favor and look to see how far that town is from Sunset Ridge and then how far it’s from their house.”
I took out my cell phone and in seconds I had my answer. “It’s less than fifteen minutes from their house. It’s about forty-five miles from Sunset Ridge and just under ten from where they live.”
“Certainly not far enough to make it impossible for her to get up to Sunset Ridge, kill her cheating husband, and then get back to her mother’s.”
“So you agree a woman is involved?” I asked excitedly, happy to think he was coming around to my idea, as hasty as it may have been.
“I never thought you were wrong, Poppy. I think you’ve been right about the handwriting from the beginning. We just need to find out whose handwriting that is since it isn’t Rose Walters.”
Now he’d amazed me. How did he know that? “How can you say that? Did you slip a letter of hers in your pocket as we were leaving?”
He shot me a sideways glance. “Who writes letters anymore, Poppy? I didn’t steal anything. I just happened to notice she had written a few things down on a piece of paper that was sitting on the coffee table. The handwriting on our notes is definitely not Rose Walters’.”
Unable to hold in my disappointment at missing a detail right in front of my eyes, I smacked my leg in frustration. “Damn it! I didn’t even see that paper.”
“That’s because you were too busy looking at the pictures of their kids.”
I heard the same indicting tone in his voice when he said that as I’d heard when he was talking to Rose, and I turned toward him to argue my point, but I didn’t have one. He was right. I’d missed getting a glimpse at her handwriting because I had been more interested in looking at their three children.
“If it makes you feel any better, I wouldn’t have known to pay attention to the writing on that piece of paper if it weren’t for you and your knowledge of handwriting. That says something.”
“I guess. I’m just disgusted with myself. For months I’ve been following you around like a puppy, and what have I learned? Not much, it seems.”
Alex stopped the car at a red light and turned to look at me. “Don’t be so hard on yourself. Remember Yin and Yang? Maybe I’m good at the little details and you’re good at instinct.”
He turned away to drive again and I mumbled that he might be right. I just wished I would get better at the details part too.
Chapter Five
The next day while I sat at my kitchen table drinking a cup of iced coffee I’d brewed myself, I thought about the possibility of Canton Walters hosting sex toys parties and remaining a committed married man. I didn’t need a lot of caffeine to figure out the odds of that happening were thin, at best. Added to that the female’s handwriting that wasn’t his wife’s on those notes in his room at a hotel notorious for on-the-side rendezvous, and those odds shrank even more.
I checked my phone for the fifth time that hour, but still there was no text back from Alex. I hadn’t heard from him since we returned from our little road trip the day before, and he’d never gotten back to me about meeting at The Grounds that morning either. So I’d stayed home and christened my new iced coffee maker my father had given me for my birthday a few weeks earlier.
Taking a sip of the refreshing drink, I had to admit it was good and it did exactly what I needed my caffeine to do on a hot July morning. Cool me off while waking me up. The temperature had settled into the mid-seventies the night before, so by the time the sun was up for a mere two hours, the mercury had climbed to nearly eighty. As the guy on the radio had lamely joked, it was going to be a scorcher out there today.
At a few minutes after nine, I found the number for the Naughty and Spice Toy Company on their very colorful website and figured I’d try to find out what they knew of our victim. The worst they could tell me was nothing, so I had nothing to lose.
A young woman with a far sexier voice than I expected answered the phone and happily introduced the company with the words, “Welcome to Naughty and Spice. We make sex fun! My name is Candy. What can I do for you today?”
Caught off guard, particularly with her emphasis on the word you in her greeting, I fumbled my words and finally stuttered out, “I…I’m…I was hoping to speak to someone about one of your party reps?”
“It’s my pleasure to connect you to one of our Naughty and Spice counselors. Please hold.”
I wasn’t sure, but I didn’t think I’d ever heard anyone tell me to hold on in such a sexual way. Candy certainly did seem to enjoy her job.
“Hello, my name is Audrey. You’d like to speak to someone about one of our party givers?”
Givers? Was everything with this company all sex?
Recovered from my earlier awkwardness, I answered, “Yes, Audrey. My name is Poppy McGuire and I’m calling about one of your reps. I mean party givers. His name is Canton Walters.”
“Pardon me? I don’t understand.”
I stood up and walked over toward the kitchen door. Sometimes my cell phone lost all its bars when I stood in certain spots in the room. Once I reached the outside wall of the kitchen, I repeated, “My name is Poppy McGuire and I’m calling about one of your party givers named Canton Walters.”
For a long moment, all I heard was silence from Audrey and then she said, “There must be some mistake. We don’t have anyone by that name on our party giver roster.”
“How can you be sure? I didn’t even give you his location where he holds parties. He’s from the Virginia and Maryland region.”
“See, there’s the thing. I don’t need his location because at Naughty and Spice, we don’t have any male party givers. Our company is almost completely female driven, and every one of our party givers is female and even the supervisors and
managers are female in our company. The only male involved in Naughty and Spice is our president and CEO, Charles Axelrod.”
“Really? That’s your company’s CEO’s name?” I asked as I struggled to stifle a laugh.
Audrey didn’t seem to understand my amusement with Mr. Axelrod’s name as the CEO of a sex toy company. “Yes, but he wouldn’t have anything to do with our party givers. I’m sorry, but if you’ve been told that a male is giving parties for Naughty and Spice, then you’ve been misled. It’s company policy that all party givers are female. No exceptions.”
“Thank you for your help. I appreciate it.”
And just like Candy before her, Audrey said in a sultry voice that must have been a requirement of employment, “It’s my pleasure. Goodbye.”
Well, that was interesting. Canton Walters wasn’t a Naughty and Spice sales rep at all. So what was he doing in Sunset Ridge?
On a hunch, I called the Naughty and Spice number again and this time a woman named Kimberly answered with her same sexy speech. When she finished, I asked, “Can you give me the names of party givers in the Sunset Ridge, Maryland area? I’m looking to attend a party, but I don’t know anyone who hosts them.”
“My pleasure. Hold one moment, please.”
I did as she asked and a few seconds later she returned to tell me the two party givers in my area were Delilah Roberts and Elizabeth Freely. I thanked her for the very interesting information and then called Alex to give him the news.
He answered on the first ring and said, “Hey, Poppy. What’s up?”
“Where have you been? I texted you about coffee and never heard back, so I was forced to brew my own. Thankfully, my father got me a new iced coffee maker, so I wasn’t stuck sans caffeine. I’ve got news.”
Skipping right over my initial question, he answered, “Really? What did you find out?”
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