“Wow. What’s the special occasion for us to get a real homemade breakfast?” Elise took a quick peek at the cookbooks scattered on the counter to assure herself the concoction in the bowl was really a mixture of eggs and milk for dipping the bread.
“Look, look, Elise,” Todd said turning away from the counter with the syrup bottle held upside down and making Bess’s fondest wish come true as a stream of maple syrup flowed onto the floor. “We’re making fried toast.”
“French toast, little buddy,” Elise said as she leaped forward and turned the bottle upright in the child’s hands.
Lucas turned from the stove and smiled. “Todd and his dad used to make pancakes together on weekends. I thought we could have our own weekend ritual and make French toast.”
Elise’s heart did a small dive when she thought about how hard Lucas was trying to win Todd’s trust and devotion and to help him make a smooth adjustment from his dad’s death.
“Holy fright! How many people are you two planning to feed?” She eyed the loaf of bread, now over three-quarters gone.
Lucas looked at the bread bag sheepishly. “I guess we got a little carried away, huh?”
She shook her head cynically, smiled, and opened a cupboard to get a cup for her coffee. She poured a cup and leaned against the counter. “It does smell good.”
“Then let’s eat,” Lucas said, turning off the stove and taking a wet cloth to scrub some of the stickiness from Todd’s hands.
“Once that child picks up a fork, we’ll have to pry it out of his fingers.” Elise laughed and watched as Lucas scrubbed, but made little progress with the wet cloth.
“Did you know,” he said while he worked, “the earliest mention of French toast comes from Latin recipes dating back to the fourth or fifth century? During the reign of Henry V, it was known as pain perdu, meaning lost bread. Actually it was stale bread that might otherwise be thrown away.”
“What are you, the historical guru of victuals?” Elise looked at him in dismay, then proceeded to set three plates and silverware on the table before going to the refrigerator where she found some orange juice. She motioned them to the table.
“It was just something that popped up when I was looking for the recipe. You know how I like history and trivia.” He took a piece of the toast, doused it in more syrup, and took a bite.
“So how did the meeting with Mort Levinson go?”
Elise had spent all afternoon on Friday with Mort Levinson. It started with lunch at the Gourmet Café before they moved to the Radisson Lackawanna Station Hotel to meet with a group of investors. Elise thought it odd she was the only one representing Winston and Sanders, but she wasn’t able to find a moment alone with Mort Levinson to ask him why Paul or Chuck wasn’t present. It was only when Mort and his wife, Lucy, invited her to dine privately with them later in the evening she learned the truth. Mort Levinson very vocally and adamantly admitted he didn’t want to work with anyone but her. His decision created a dilemma she didn’t know how to solve. She had only two choices—make a complete break with Winston and Sanders or tell Mort Levinson she was unable to work on his projects. Sometimes, Elise thought, she was taking more steps backward than forward.
“Hello? Elise?” she heard Lucas say, breaking her reverie.
“Fine,” Elise said, coming to her senses. “Everything went fine, I guess. When we get a minute, I’d like to talk with you.”
“I know what you mean. Things are moving along faster than I expected with the restoration garage. Can you watch Todd this afternoon?” he asked. “Cindy has to take her mother to the doctor and I have to meet J.B. at the showroom to meet with a client.”
Elise nodded. “Actually, I was planning to take Todd, Cindy, and Bess to the cottage and check on what still needs to be done. Cindy can meet us there when she gets free.” If the truth were told, she wanted to get Todd acclimated to the newness of the cottage and to look around some more. There were still boxes stacked in the shed she hadn’t yet rummaged through. She wanted to get a feel for where Mike might have left more information. She was certain a good cop, as clever as he seemed to be, would leave behind valuable information just in case of his demise. Then there was the $25,000 of Lucas’s money in question, a misplaced or lost will, and the undiscovered $100,000 of undercover money. All of it didn’t make any sense. Something didn’t add up. According to Nick, Mike Fisher was neither sloppy nor careless. Lucas described him as a stickler for detail. Elise was certain a detailed person would have a well-thought-out plan for keeping his personal information safe. But where?
“We’re still going, aren’t we?” Todd piped up.
“Yes.” Elise smiled. “This afternoon. I have to run some errands this morning.”
“And Bess, too?”
“Bess, too.”
Since Todd had come to live at the farm, the dog and boy had become inseparable. Right now the dog had taken her place beside Todd’s chair.
“Traitor,” Elise muttered under her breath and gave Bess an evil eye. In reality, the dog was a godsend, she silently admitted. Not only did Bess keep a careful watch over Todd, but she doubled as the canine floor sweeper, snatching up all the crumbs and food that fell from Todd’s plate or hands as he galloped through the house. Bess had given up sleeping in Elise’s bedroom and had moved permanently to the side of Todd’s bed.
“Can we look for Ranger?” he asked.
“You know, kiddo, we’ll take a look in the shed and see what we can find.” She nodded and watched as sheer pleasure twisted his lips into a smile. She knew they’d have no peace until they located the beanbag dog.
“Now, I can’t promise you we’ll find him, but we’ll try,” she admitted.
“I have a deal for you,” Lucas said, looking over at her.
“Uh-oh, this doesn’t sound good.”
“Since Todd and I made breakfast, you can either clean the kitchen or clean Todd.”
Elise looked around the room and winced. Then she looked over at Todd and saw every strand of his hair permanently plastered to his scalp with maple syrup. Even his little eyelashes glistened with the sticky stuff.
“I want Uncle Lucas to give me a bath,” Todd said, gazing eagerly up at Lucas.
Gleefully, Elise pushed herself up from the table and started collecting plates. “Well, then, it looks like this Merry Maid has kitchen duty.”
****
It wasn’t errands that sent Elise to the west side of Scranton toward Dunmore, where she knew Clarisse Fisher lived in a small apartment over a small plumbing and heating business. It was a mixture of curiosity and the need to make contact with someone who might lend more insight into the affairs of Mike Fisher. There was also the need to see Clarisse in her own environment.
The borough of Dunmore comprised a little less than nine square miles. Just like Scranton, it was an old town built as far back as 1835 when interest in anthracite coal, brick, stone, and silk mills drew people to swell its meager population. She found Clarisse’s apartment in a matter of minutes. It was a dilapidated two-story structure with six garbage cans lined up in front like old soldiers on guard. She took the weathered outside steps leading directly to the top apartment and knocked on the door.
From what Lucas had told her, Clarisse had spent most of her life as a waitress and barmaid, preferring nighttime bar work where tips flowed more freely with alcohol and late night inebriation.
Clarisse opened the door on the third knock. She was a tall, underweight woman with bleached platinum hair pulled into a knot at the top of her head. Dressed in skintight black leotards with a red tunic top matching her lipstick, she wore open-toed platform shoes more uncomfortable than the stilts Elise had worn when she stepped off the plane. She was also wearing more makeup than Elise had in her make-up case, and on every finger of her hands she wore some type of ring. A cheap rhinestone bracelet with a tarnished clasp twinkled from her right wrist. Clarisse obviously adored jewelry.
“My, my, now isn’t this a surprise
,” Clarisse said in a voice capable of flash-freezing seawater. “Coming to see stepmommy?”
“May I come in?” Elise asked, ignoring the greeting. “You obviously know who I am.”
“Yup, the famous architect everyone is talking about and the bitch who got Children and Youth to give you the kid.” Clarisse opened the door wider and allowed Elise to step into a dull brown living room smelling like stale cigarette smoke. Clarisse gestured to a recliner across from a faded teal couch where stacks of magazines and clothes fought for room at one end.
Elise took the offered chair and decided to get straight to the point. “I was hoping you might be able to give me some insight into your ex-husband and his habits.”
“Late husband.” Brown raccoon-looking eyes, ringed in dark eyeliner, flashed hotly.
“Okay, late ex-husband,” Elise said. “Your divorce was final. Both you and Mike signed the papers, and it was recorded.”
“That doesn’t mean I don’t count.” Clarisse’s voice took on a sharp, whiney tone. “That doesn’t mean Mike didn’t want me to take care of Todd. That doesn’t mean part of his estate doesn’t belong to me-eeee.”
“What it does mean,” Elise said enunciating every word in a sharp tone, “is you don’t have a legal leg to stand on concerning Todd or Mike’s estate, unless you have proof, such as a will or mutually signed agreement.”
“You mean all I get out of giving him a year of my life was the lousy $25,000 we agreed on during the divorce?” Clarisse’s voice raised an octave. “Well, ain’t that a kick in my skinny backside!”
Elise stared at the woman and almost sighed in relief. Clarisse had just solved the mystery of the missing $25,000 Mike was supposed to give Lucas to invest. Elise reminded herself to choose her words carefully if she brought up the subject of Mike Fisher and his habits. The last thing she needed was to send Clarisse’s temper soaring and get her own backside kicked to Scranton. The woman’s temperament was anything but calm and collected.
Elise tried another approach. “You know, Clarisse, I really need some help finding Todd’s health records. They weren’t among Mike’s belongings. Do you have any idea where he might have stashed valuable paperwork concerning family members? Did he have a safe deposit box in a local bank or a lock box or safe he kept around the house?”
Clarisse stared at her with a blank expression. Elise forged on. “Where would Mike have stored or filed insurance policies, a passport, birth certificates, or documents similar to those?”
Clarisse shrugged. “He used to keep papers in a lock box back in New Castle, but I have no idea what he did with anything once he moved to Scranton. Have you gone through all of his boxes and belongings?”
“I’m working on it,” Elise lied. Technically, she decided, it wasn’t a lie since she had rummaged through the boxes she had earlier taken to the farm and she planned to go to the cottage in the afternoon to dig around again. “Did Mike have any enemies?”
Clarisse laughed. “He was a cop. He probably had lots of them, but none I knew by name or face.”
Elise nodded and stood. “Well, I’d better be on my way. I’m headed to the cottage later this afternoon to check on some details.” She started for the door and turned. “One more question—do you know Jack Morrison?”
Clarisse hesitated a moment too long for Elise’s liking. “No, I don’t believe I do.”
“From Children and Youth Services?”
She shook her head. “Is he important?”
“No, not any more.” She smiled. “I appreciate the time you’ve given me, Clarisse. If you think of anything, please give me a call.”
Outside, in her car, Elise sat for a moment wearily staring at the building. She was pleased she had at least solved the mystery of the missing $25,000. However, she wondered how many of Clarisse Fisher’s answers were truths and how many were lies.
****
Never in her entire harried life did Elise think she’d ever be sitting at the kitchen table with a four-year-old, sorting animal crackers into Zip lock bags as if they were gathering essential supplies for a hike up Montage Mountain. Four boxes of Barnum’s Animal Crackers were spilled out into a heap before them. Juice boxes stood on the counter, waiting to be packed with a bag of toys and the crackers.
“Tell me again, Todd, why can’t we take all the animals in one box of crackers to the cottage?” she asked and watched in fascination as he patiently and carefully separated the kangaroos, elephants, and polar bears and put them into individual piles.
“Because only certain ones can come,” he said, “and some of them don’t get along. The monkeys and sheep don’t like the mean lions and tigers, you know.”
“But we’re not taking the monkeys, sheep, lions or tigers.”
The little boy looked at her with exasperated gray Fisher eyes. “But we can’t leave them here all mixed up if they’re not friends, Eee-lise.”
Cursing Nabisco under her breath, Elise decided no one—children or adults—should ever have that many choices of animal shapes to consume in one sitting. She tried another approach. “Todd, if we don’t get started soon there won’t be enough daylight to play outside with Bess. How about we leave a note for Lucas and Cindy and tell them to finish sorting these? Don’t forget we need to look for Ranger, too.”
Beside them, Bess whined. Elise looked down at the bored canine and commiserated with her. She secretly popped a mean tiger into her mouth and then slipped a couple of lions and tigers into the dog’s awaiting mouth.
There is nothing more rewarding than destroying your enemies with a couple of chews and a swallow. If only life could be so easy.
****
The late morning was getting hot and humid, but it was hotter in the beat-up old maroon Chevy pickup where Lucas sat with J.B., eating cheeseburgers and fries and watching the parking lot of Children and Youth Services a half a block away. Parked behind them, a block up the street, was Lucas’s Trans Am. Across the street, the bank was doing a sporadic business through the drive-thru. Beside them, the florist shop had opened, and a worker was busy hanging colorful flowering baskets of petunias on hooks underneath a canopy over the entrance. The canopy read “Rosie’s Posies.”
“Man, there is nothing better than melted cheese on some meat,” J.B. said between mouthfuls. He was on his second burger. “The only thing to improve this would be a beer.”
“If our plan works, I’ll buy you a case,” Lucas said. Despite the escalating heat, he didn’t want to start the truck to use the air conditioner and call needless attention to their location. He was not even fond of the idea of opening all the windows, but he knew there was no alternative. Once Elise had told him Nick found white paint chips on Mike’s car, he hadn’t been able to sleep, thinking sleazebag Morrison might be involved in his brother’s death.
“Now tell me again how you want this to go down,” J.B. asked.
“Loosely, you have to either run into the back of Morrison’s car when he’s coming out of the parking lot, or just hit it after it’s parked. That’ll give us reason to get old paint flecks from the back fenders. The police think the vehicle that ran Mike’s car off the road came up on him from behind, passed, and hit him on his left front fender with its right front fender, sending him off the road. It’s highly possible Morrison had his front fender, bumper, and right side panels repaired and repainted. So we need old stuff from the back side, preferably driver’s side, to see if it matches the samples left on Mike’s car.”
“Loosely?” J.B. asked. “Now I’d call it freakin’ idiotic, man. I thought you said you had this all thought out. I’ve no desire to up my insurance rates, ruin my perfectly stellar driving record, and possibly injure myself for a few flecks of paint!”
“Somebody’s cranky.”
When J.B. only glared at him, Lucas continued, “Unless you have a better idea, we are stuck with the plan.”
“If you take a look ahead of you,” J.B. pointed out, “you would see Morrison’s white Mercedes i
s parked between a Lexus and a Hummer—two cars I’d hate to inflict collateral damage on using your loose plan.” J.B. reached for a fistful of fries and took a sip of lemonade.
“Well, the dork always takes a late lunch, so we have some time to think this through.”
“And we have to wait for what? Two hours? And sit here and fry inside this cab in this heat?” J.B. finished his burger and dropped the wrappings into the take-out bag. He reached behind the seat, grabbed a grubby baseball hat with “Wayland Construction” written on it, and rummaged around until he found an old clipboard. From his pocket he withdrew a penknife and some small plastic bags.
“You know, Lucas, when someone acts like he’s guilty, he probably is. So stop acting like you’re guilty and stop playing by the book. You’d put ol’ Abe Lincoln to shame! Here’s the new plan. You’re going to drive into the parking lot like you should be there, pull perpendicular to the back of Morrison’s car, stop and block any view from the opposite windows in the office building. Consider yourself part of the Wayland Construction follow-up crew who’s inspecting the macadam parking lot for defects. I plan to jump out, scratch off some paint, and hop back in. It’s that simple.”
Lucas looked at him incredulously. “And you think I’m crazy? I don’t even know if it’s legal. What if someone recognizes me?”
J.B. shook his head and gave him a dismal look. “Legal? You’re worrying about legalities now? For crying out loud, you make something up on the spot if you bump into someone you know.” He looked over at Lucas. “Come on, boss guy, buck up. Let’s do it. An adrenaline rush would do wonders for your ethics. We’re trying to solve a crime here.”
“Ah, bite me,” Lucas grunted. With a sour look, he peered at J.B. and his battered hat. “Gawd Almighty, you look like the Jeff Foxworthy of a redneck construction company. Okay, let’s get this over with.” He turned the key in the ignition, and within minutes they were positioned in back of Morrison’s car. J.B. jumped out with hat, clipboard, and knife.
Not even fifteen seconds elapsed before Twila Pedmo motored into the parking lot and steered her big blue Buick into a parking spot opposite and perpendicular to them, across the egress lane, and in front of the entrance to the building.
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