Irish Stewed (An Ethnic Eats Mystery)

by Kylie Logan

  Food pantry.

  Where Declan volunteered.

  And so did Sophie.

  And didn’t Kim once mention that Jack Lancer had a slim file about the food pantry?

  I set all this aside as thoughts for another time and gave George and Inez instructions about what they should do for the rest of the morning.

  Me?

  Like everyone else in Hubbard, I’d watched the news the night before and I knew that there was a memorial service scheduled that morning for Jack Lancer.

  The least I could do was pay my respects.

  Chapter 15

  I was wearing black pants and a black-and-white-striped silk shirt, and I threw on a white linen blazer, a pair of Kate Spade lace and leather pumps, and a big dose of the attitude that I’d learned back in Hollywood when I found myself dealing with stylists, paparazzi, publicists, actors with egos the size of Texas, and the hangers-on (most of them pathetic wannabes) who flocked around them all like seagulls following in the wake of a ship.

  Not to brag or anything, but when I arrived at the Worth Funeral Chapel, I got the distinct feeling that Hubbard, Ohio, had never seen anything quite like it.

  In fact, I was counting on it.

  Like the Red Sea in front of Moses, the crowds in the parking lot parted when I walked through, head up, shoulders back, and that gleam in my eyes that told them I owned the world and they’d better get used to it. The same thing happened on the sidewalk in front of the well-kept brick building where hundreds of the truly sorrowful and the plenty curious were packed like sardines waiting to pay their respects to Jack Lancer.

  A little style, a little swagger, and a whole bunch of chutzpah, and I arrived at the front door, where a grim-faced man in a black suit spoke in hushed whispers.

  “We’re only allowing family and close friends in right now,” he said.

  I hoped my smile was bittersweet enough to pass muster. “Good,” I told him, and walked right by him and into the building.

  In fact, the arrangement wasn’t just good, it was perfect. There was a cluster of a dozen or so people standing outside an open door where a nine-by-sixteen photograph of Jack Lancer was displayed along with a table full of local Emmy awards and testimonials from everyone from city council members to the mayor to someone named Clowning Carl, who’d written a flowery memorial poem that managed to rhyme Lance with things like square dance, cash advance, and game of chance, and signed it all with a smiley face complete with a big red nose.

  Inside the room where a gleaming oak casket was displayed (closed, thank goodness) under dim, pinkish light, another twenty people were standing in small clusters and speaking to one another in hushed tones.

  I made myself right at home and, believe me, I didn’t waste any time. Once the guy in the black suit opened the doors to the public, I knew it would be impossible to speak to anyone. I did a quick scan of the room, chose my target, and closed in on a bleached blonde in a shape-hugging black dress with long, tight sleeves and a plunging neckline.

  Why this woman?

  I’d like to say I had a sixth sense about things like this. Or that I was especially good at scanning a crowd and picking out those people I thought might be most helpful. But truth be told, the answer was far simpler than that: the woman’s nose was wet and her eyes were red. In fact, she was the only one in the room who looked upset.

  As if to prove it, just as I closed in on her, she pulled a tissue out of the box on the table near at hand and dabbed it to her blue eyes.

  “It’s terrible, isn’t it?” I asked her, my voice as low as everyone else’s in the room. “I’m Laurel.”

  She sniffed. “Maxine. Maxine Carmichael.”

  I don’t think I was imagining it, she actually did say this like it was supposed to mean something.

  I tried to look sympathetic when all I really felt was annoyed. These were the kinds of games actors played when they expected everyone to know each role they’d played and each movie they’d been in. I didn’t expect the same sort of nonsense from a hometown woman whose lipstick was smudged and whose aqua eyeshadow practically screamed trailer trash. Believe me, I did not hold this against her. I’d been called that—and worse—back when I bounced from foster home to foster home, neighborhood to neighborhood, school to school. I knew what it meant. Trailer trash? Maybe. But that meant like me, she could be street-smart and plenty cagey.

  I told myself not to forget it.

  “I’m new in town,” I said.

  “But you were a friend of Jack’s?” For the first time since I’d closed in on her, she gave me a careful look. Her eyes narrowed and her bottom lip jutted out like the prow of the Titanic. “How well did you know him?”

  This was not a casual question. I knew this because Maxine’s eyes shot blue fire in my direction.

  “Not anywhere near as well as you obviously did,” I said, and I guess I hit the nail on the head because she let go a long breath and took a step back and away from me. “I’m the one . . .” I glanced at the gleaming casket and at the floral tributes that surrounded it. “I’m the one who found Jack’s body.”

  “Oh no!” Maxine’s voice bounced along the walls with their tasteful paintings of flowers and forests, and she clamped a hand on my arm. “That’s terrible.”

  I remembered to look upset, but while I was at it, don’t think I didn’t notice that everyone else in this company of family and close friends shot Maxine what I can only call death-ray looks. “It was,” I told her.

  “If only . . .” She ignored all those stares from all those people, raising her chin a fraction of an inch. “I should have been the one who found him,” she said, and she pressed a hand to her heart. “Our lives were entwined. I should have been the one to escort him into the arms of Death.”

  She was being poetic. I was not when I asked, “So, you’re telling me you didn’t have anything to do with Jack’s murder?”

  Her shoulders shot back. “Who says I did? It was Jill, right?” Her top lip curled and she looked over her shoulder toward where a short woman in a navy suit was talking to two other ladies. “That bitch doesn’t know when to keep her mouth shut.”

  “It wasn’t Jill. I don’t even know Jill.” I felt this was important to point out before Maxine went to the other side of the room and gave Jill what for. “No one told me anything. Not about who might have killed Jack. I thought since you knew him so well—”

  Maxine sighed. “We were soulmates. Our hearts beat as one. If you’re looking for someone who had a reason to kill Jack . . .” Again her gaze darted across the room at the three women.

  “Jill?” I asked.

  “Could be.” Maxine’s nose crinkled. “But it could be one of his other exes, too. You know, Tina or Deb.”

  This didn’t exactly surprise me. After all, I’d lived six years in Hollywood, where the “until death do us part” line of the wedding vows was often omitted, simply because no one believed a marriage could possibly last that long. But I did need to be certain. “You mean, you think one of Jack’s ex-wives might have killed him?”

  “They hated him,” Maxine told me in no uncertain terms. “And they hate me. Look at the way they’re looking at me.” As far as I could tell, Jill, Tina, and Deb weren’t looking at Maxine at all, but that didn’t stop her from harrumphing her opinion. “Jealous. Every single one of them. And it’s annoying, you know? I mean, you probably don’t. You probably don’t know what it’s like to have people watching your every move, keeping an eye on you, talking about what you’re wearing and where you go and who you’re with. But then, when you date the biggest celebrity in town—”

  I had to be sure. “Jack.”

  “Of course, Jack. Who else could it be? I was always under a microscope. I still am. That’s why they’re watching me.” She darted looks all around the room. “You know, people are jealous. Of me. Of what Jack and I had. Like the three of them.” She tossed the exes a look of collective contempt. “Each and every one of them screwe
d it up big-time with Jack. It was only after he left them that they realized what they’d lost. But by then, it was too late. Jack wasn’t the kind of guy who forgives easily. I was . . .” A tear trickled down her cheek. “I was a very lucky woman. There are few who know that kind of love.”

  Maybe, but don’t think I’d forgotten what I’d learned about Jack from Kim and from Carrie. He was a man-about-town in a town where there wasn’t much of anything to be about. I backed away from Maxine and headed over to talk to the exes.

  “Friend of yours?” Jill asked with a look over my shoulder toward Maxine. She was a petite middle-aged woman with short, dark hair, and her smile was tight. “The grieving widow.”

  “Oh, I didn’t know they were—”

  “Oh, honey! They weren’t!” Tina’s hair was too red to be natural. She was as tall as I am, and as skinny as a green bean, and she wore a black sleeveless sheath that was both appropriate to the occasion and stylish. There were a dozen gold bangles on her left wrist and they clanged together when she barked out a laugh, then clamped a hand over her mouth to contain it. “But she sure would have liked to be.”

  “Idiot.” Deb was the roundest and the oldest of the three women. Her silvery hair was cut in a stylish bob that brushed her cheeks when she bent closer and put a hand on my arm. She smelled slightly of scotch. “We don’t know you, do we?”

  “No, and Maxine, she doesn’t, either.” I thought this only fair to mention so they knew I wasn’t one of the enemy. “I just stopped in to pay my respects. I’m the one . . .” I remembered Maxine’s reaction to the news and tried to break it to them gently. “I’m the one who found Jack’s body in the restaurant.”

  “You lucky dog!” Jill crooned.

  Deb grinned. “What I wouldn’t have given for a ringside seat for that event!”

  “Not just on finding the body.” Tina cackled and when she realized how loud she was, she lowered her head and her voice. “It would have been way more fun to be the one who killed the bastard.”

  “Amen.” Deb raised an invisible glass to the ceiling.

  “What?” When she saw my jaw go slack, Jill wrapped an arm around my shoulders. “Are we shocking you? We don’t mean to, but, honey, if you were that close to Jack there at the very end, the least you deserve is a little bit of the truth. Girls?” She glanced around at the other exes. “What do you say we take our new buddy here over to McGee’s?”

  Deb looped one arm through mine. “Why not?” she said, and started for the door with me in tow. “It’s five o’clock somewhere.”

  Tina fell into step beside us. “And now that Jack is dead, we’ve definitely got something to celebrate!”

  * * *

  McGee’s was one of those places where they always keep the lights low so patrons can’t see the faded paint on the walls or the gouges in the tile on the floor. There were posters from beer companies up on the walls and a pool table over in the corner next to a jukebox. Ten tables—I counted them—and as many seats at the bar. A popcorn machine, empty at this early hour, and an old guy down at the end of the bar who looked like he’d been there forever.

  What it lacked in ambience, the bar that sat across the street and kitty-corner from the funeral chapel made up for with down-home hospitality. A tall, thin man wearing a white apron waved hello to us the moment we walked in and told us to take a table along the far wall. From there, we didn’t have a thing to worry about. Deb—who apparently spent a goodly amount of time there—ordered a pitcher of margaritas, an order of onion rings, and a plate of nachos that turned out to be heaped with cheese, salsa, and jalapeño rings.

  When the margaritas arrived, Tina poured and Jill raised a glass.

  “To Jack Lancer,” she said. “Lowest of the low.”

  “Nastiest of the nasty,” Tina added.

  “Dirtiest of dirty rats,” Deb said, and took a nice, long drink.

  I sipped, and realized that early hour or not, it was one of the best margaritas I’d ever had. When Tina handed around small plates, I took one and, like the other women, piled it with nachos. “It’s odd,” I ventured. “Three ex-wives drinking together. You’re friends?”

  “We sure weren’t in the old days,” Jill told me.

  Tina laughed. “Jill was Mrs. Jack Lancer Number One.” Jill was sitting next to her, Deb and I were across the table, and when Tina patted Jill’s arm, those bangles on Tina’s wrist added a ching-a-ling like castanets to her story. “When I started dating Jack—”

  “While he was still married to me,” Jill added for clarification.

  Tina winced. “Well, let’s just say that the first time I bumped into this lady here, Jack and I were coming out of a no-tell motel and she just happened to be running into the convenience store next door. It was not a pretty scene.”

  “Same here.” Deb poured another margarita for herself. “Tina was Mrs. Number Two when I met Jack. He charmed me.” She shook her head as if even now, she couldn’t believe it. “What a blind idiot I was. He charmed me and I let it happen. Even though I knew about his reputation. But that’s always the way it is, isn’t it?” She glanced at her friends. “We all believe we’re going to be the one to change a man, the one who finally makes him settle down.”

  “Jack? Settle down?” Tina puffed out a breath of disbelief. “Once he pulled the same nonsense on Deb, well, that’s when we all realized we had something in common.”

  “Good thing, too,” Jill told me. “What you see here—our friendship—that’s what’s gotten each of us through the horrible experience that was Jack Lancer.”

  “To Jack!” Deb raised her glass again. “I’m so glad the creep is dead, if I had the energy, I’d do a little dance.”

  Their honesty was certainly refreshing. I only hoped if they were this direct when it came to their feelings about Jack, they’d be equally reliable when it came to the details of his life and maybe the reasons for his murder.

  “So, I’ve heard . . .” There was gooey cheese on my fingers and I wiped them on a paper napkin that I plucked from the holder at the end of the table. “Somebody told me Jack used to have knock-down, drag-out phone fights with his ex. Which one of you was it?”

  They threw back their heads and laughed so loud I couldn’t hear the country song wailing from the jukebox.

  “That was me,” Jill confided.

  “Or it could have been me,” Tina said.

  “Happened to me a time or two or three or four, too!” Deb howled with laughter.

  “See, Jack . . .” Jill chomped into an onion ring and washed it down with a mouthful of margarita. “He was not an easy man to live with.”

  “Or not to live with,” Tina added. “I think most of our fights happened once we were already divorced.”

  “Because . . .” I looked at the exes. “What did you fight about?”

  “Alimony,” Tina said.

  “Child support,” Jill admitted.

  “Anything and everything,” Deb put in. “That man didn’t abide by anything in the divorce decree. He was supposed to make my mortgage payments.”

  “And never did,” Tina said. “Mine, either. And he was supposed to pay for Jill’s kids’ private school.”

  “And never contributed a penny,” Jill said.

  It was a no-brainer, but as long as they were being so brutally honest, the least I could do was be just as aboveboard. “So, what you’re telling me is that each of you had reason to hate Jack Lancer.”

  “Absolutely.” Jill nodded.

  “With a fiery passion.” Tina grinned.

  Deb took a drink. “With all my heart and all my soul.”

  “Did one of you kill him?”

  Another round of laughs made even the old guy at the bar sit up and take notice.

  “I wish!” Tina drifted a finger through the wet ring left on the table by her glass.

  “If only I’d thought of it myself,” Jill mumbled.

  “We didn’t do it.” It was amazing that Deb could sound so st
one-cold sober when it counted. “Not me, not any of us. And we didn’t somehow work together to do it, either. It’s kind of nice, though, isn’t it, girls . . . ?” She looked at her friends. “It’s kind of nice to know someone thinks we’re clever enough to actually pull off a murder!”

  I gave them a smile I hoped conveyed my apologies. “I never actually thought—”

  “Of course you did!” Deb squealed. “And that’s fine, really. That cop, that Detective Oberlin, he talked to us, too. Seems to me he didn’t find anything suspicious about any of us, because we haven’t heard from him since.”

  “So, if not the three of you, who?” I asked.

  Jill shrugged.

  Tina shook her head.

  Deb poured another margarita.

  “What about his work?” I waded into the subject carefully. I didn’t want to put thoughts in their heads or words in their mouths. “Have any of you talked to Jack recently? Do you have any idea what he was working on?”

  “I called him last week,” Jill said. “The youngest needs braces. He blew me off.”

  “I talked to him last week, too,” Tina said. “We shot the breeze for a while but he knew all along what I was calling about. He owes me a bundle of money and as soon as I mentioned it, he suddenly got all busy and had to go.”

  “You think his murder had something to do with a story he was working on?” Deb asked.

  I had to admit I didn’t know for sure. “I just wondered . . .” I grabbed another couple nachos. “Did he ever mention working on a story about the food pantry over at St. Colman’s Church?”

  Deb’s eyebrows shot up while Tina and Jill exchanged looks.

  I sat up like a shot, afraid to hear more, afraid not to ask. “He did? He really was working on a story about—”

  “Even if he did . . .” Tina waved away the idea with one hand. “What difference would it make? Somebody leaves donations at the food pantry once in a while? That’s worthy of a news story?”

  “No way that could have anything to do with his murder,” Deb said. “If you ask me, there’s only one explanation for that.”