Dying to Remember

by Judy Fitzwater

  “It was short and to the point,” he went on, scraping out the last bit of honey-mustard dressing from a round, porcelain container.

  “I didn’t have more than a minute or two with Danny before Al Carpenter showed up and whisked him away. Like he did...” She paused when she realized her mouth was running away with her thoughts.

  “Like he did what?”

  “Nothing. Danny didn’t tell me anything. Apparently he wanted me to suggest the name of a private investigator.”

  That made him frown. “Why?”

  “I wouldn’t know. Like I said, we were interrupted.”

  “So you don’t have any idea why he would kill himself.”

  “None at all. Before the reunion, I hadn’t talked to him since high school.”

  Why did people think she would know something? Sheena and now Seth. It would help if they’d let her in on what it was.

  “You were his friend,” Jennifer pointed out.

  “That was a long time ago.”

  Jennifer nodded. It seemed like another lifetime. “What happened? Why did your foursome break up?”

  “You’d have to ask Al about that. He and Danny had some kind of falling out.”

  “Prom night?” she suggested.

  “Around then. Look, Jennifer, don’t get trapped in the past. Danny killed himself now, and now is when we’re going to find the answers. How did you find his mood? Did he seem depressed?”

  All these questions seemed strange coming from someone she’d seen in Danny’s company, but she knew an investigator was always reluctant to serve as a witness.

  “No,” she said. “Maybe a little anxious.”

  “That wouldn’t be unusual for someone about to take his own life.”

  “How’d he seem to you?” she asked.

  Seth smiled and refilled her wineglass.

  He’d answered one personal question. She had a feeling she wouldn’t get another.

  “You know,” he said, “when we were kids, I always expected you and Danny would someday get married.”

  That comment stopped her fork full of salad in mid sweep. She blushed deeply. She’d never thought it. “Why?”

  He shrugged, that smile still in place. “I don’t know. It just seemed that there was something special between the two of you, that you could talk to each other, confide in each other, share secrets. His marriage to Sheena...well, that came as a surprise.”

  “They dated for years,” Jennifer reminded him, and then let the fork complete its journey.

  “Yeah, and that surprised me, too. She can be a bit of a shrew when she’s crossed.”

  And when she’s not. But someplace deep down in her repressed memories, Jennifer was digging up a nugget. “Didn’t you date her? Maybe the beginning of our junior year?”

  “I wouldn’t have called it dating. We went out twice, I think it was.”

  “If I remember correctly, she obsessed about you—”

  “For another two months. Until I set her straight. She latched onto Danny shortly after that.”

  “How lucky for you.”

  He smiled. “And unlucky for you. Did you ever get the bubble gum out of your locker?”

  So he remembered, too. “Nope. Got fined for that one.”

  “How many pieces did she use?”

  “Hard to tell. At least two packs.” It seemed funny now, but then...

  “Sheena thinks Danny was murdered,” she said, watching for his reaction.

  “Yes, I’m well aware of Sheena’s suspicions.” He took another sip of wine.

  “You don’t seem concerned.”

  “It’s not unusual for a spouse to go into denial, especially about a suicide. We’ll keep an open mind throughout the investigation, of course, but at the moment it looks as though Danny killed himself.”

  She nodded. What was she supposed to do? Tell him how to do his job?

  “You said Danny sent you a note?” he added.

  “Right. In the mail, asking me to come to the reunion.”

  “I’d like to see it.”

  “I don’t have it with me.”

  “Fine. Send it to me at the office. I want to close out this case, so we can release the body and let Sheena bury her husband.”

  “But why do you need—”

  “We’re trying to establish Danny’s state of mind. Since we didn’t find a suicide note, we have to reconstruct the last days and weeks of his life by interviewing everyone he had contact with. It’s just routine. He was obviously despondent over something.”

  Despondent over something. The words echoed in her ears. If so, he certainly hid it well.

  “He’d made an appointment with an attorney for sometime this week,” Seth said.

  “Why?” she asked.

  “I wouldn’t want to speculate.”

  “What kind of attorney?”

  “Family law.”

  “You can’t mean to tell me—”

  “Whatever problems Danny may have had with Sheena, I’m sure he planned to work them out.”

  “Are you saying Danny was considering divorce?”

  Seth shook his head. “Of course not. Danny didn’t tell his attorney what it was he wished to speak with him about. It’s probably best that way. Suicide leaves plenty of guilt to go around as it is.”

  He glanced at his watch and downed the rest of his wine. “Sorry to run off. Maybe we can do this again. Soon, I hope.”

  “Perhaps.”

  “Don’t forget to send me the note. Right away.”

  She nodded, a little stunned. Maybe Sheena was insisting that Danny was murdered only because she couldn’t face his suicide. Still, in her own gut, she felt certain Danny had been murdered. If she’d had anything at all to offer Seth, she would have gladly shared it, but intuition wasn’t worth spit in a court of law.

  So how, exactly, was she going to get proof that someone murdered Danny when the assistant district attorney didn’t believe it?

  Chapter 17

  Intellectually, Jennifer knew that Sheena’s personality in and of itself made a good case for Danny’s death being a suicide. If she had to live with that woman, she would have slit her wrists ages ago. But even if Seth seemed convinced, he’d failed to sway her. In her bones she knew it was murder. Somehow. Some way.

  One more time, Jennifer checked the return address on the envelope Danny had sent her, and studied the house from the shelter of her Volkswagen Beetle parked across the narrow street of the housing development. The heat from the afternoon sun was broken by the tall trees that shaded the road.

  The generous lot allowed for a large, manicured front lawn that sloped gently and then rose back up to meet the road. The house itself, a lots-of-glass contemporary design, sat far enough back amidst azaleas and rhododendrons to be quite striking in the shadows of the tall pine trees. It looked brand new. Couldn’t be more than a couple of years old. She suspected it was custom built. She noticed that it had a two-car garage.

  She wondered what it must be like to live there. With Danny. Or with anybody else. Mowing grass, cooking meals—real meals, not microwave miracles. Washing windows, lots and lots of windows. Entertaining on the deck out back. (She couldn’t see it, but she felt sure there had to be one. Maybe even a pool.)

  Had they been happy? Danny and Sheena?

  Is this what Jennifer wanted? Had she ever wanted it? Is this what their life would have been if she and Danny....

  She shook her head. Something would always be missing. She probably never would have found the courage to write, maybe never even realized she wanted to. If she had, would Danny have understood?

  Why was she wasting her time speculating about life with a dead man whom, if she were honest with herself, she’d never really known?

  Because she’d seen a spark in Danny, some kind of goodness or humanity that drew her to him. It couldn’t have all been hormones.

  And because he was dead, and he shouldn’t be.

  And because Seth Y
arborough had raised the question in her mind.

  She pulled out the yellow pad that had fallen between the seats and studied her notes. After coming back from Candy’s and before going to lunch with Yarborough, she’d spent the morning with the phone sandwiched between her ear and her shoulder while she mixed dill weed dip for Dee Dee. She’d long since discovered that getting information was easy. Making sense out of what she found out was a whole other matter. Keeping artichoke salad off the receiver was even harder.

  Mick Farmer and Danny had been as tight as any two friends, tight enough to venture into business together. If Danny didn’t confide in Sheena, the next most likely person would be Mick.

  She let her pen circle Macon Pictures and rolled her eyes. It seemed Danny and Mick weren’t above using a corny pun. They were everywhere in the city. At least it wasn’t as obvious as the hockey team, the Macon Whoopees.

  A lovely sounding woman had answered the phone that morning and was more than happy to help with her inquiries. Yes, they were a video postproduction company. If she brought them her raw footage, they could edit it, put in, adjust, or alter the sound, add titles, credits, headings, or subtitles. They could also brighten or darken, at least to some degree, and suggest additional scenes or shots as needed. They’d been established for six years, and she could assure her that even with the death of Mr. Buckner, business would continue as usual. Mr. Farmer would see to that.

  Mr. Farmer. Mr. Michael Farmer. Mick.

  He and Danny must have complemented one another well. Mick was the artistic one, Danny the practical one.

  And now Mick was the sole proprietor. Not Mick and Sheena. Just Mick, whose idea had created the business in the first place. Sounded like a survivorship clause. And a possible motive. If Danny was indeed murdered. Plus a bonus: Sheena would be free to remarry.

  Some bonus.

  But some fantasies are hard to let go of. Ask Jay Gatsby.

  Mick, with his dark, hunky good looks. Mick who had never married. Mick, who being the artist he was, could appreciate suffering, which would stand him in good stead if he ever did hook up with Sheena.

  Jennifer cranked the engine and reached in the back to make sure the four large containers filled with canapés and the two small ones with the dip and salad were secure on the seat before she took off. She had to get them to Dee Dee’s before three for a drop-off at four.

  The Buckners’ home wasn’t too far out of the way. Her little Bug had practically found its way there on its own.

  So now she’d seen it. It was time to go. She had her own life to lead, and she’d do well to remember it. If she hurried, she might even be able to get home in time to write a few pages before she went to her writers’ meeting that night. She hadn’t shown the group anything for two weeks. She’d never get a novel finished at that rate.

  The notepad slipped off her lap and dropped again between the front seats as she took one final glance at Danny’s home.

  “I’ll do what I can to find out what happened to you, Danny,” she whispered. “I’m so sorry you had to die.” She was well aware of how ridiculously overdramatic she must seem. But there was no one to listen, no one to judge, no one to ridicule, and she meant it. She would.

  She knew exactly where to begin. She needed to get inside Macon Pictures without arousing Mick Farmer’s suspicions. Mick wasn’t one to be bullied or to volunteer information openly, if he was anything like he’d been in high school. He rarely, if ever, had confided in anyone that she knew of. So, if she wanted any information, she’d have to take a subtle approach, and she knew exactly who could help her get inside the business.

  Teri had been caught by the acting bug in high school. She’d even tried her hand at the community theater, but that hadn’t gone too well. Teri wasn’t one to take direction or to deliver lines verbatim. She had a problem with embellishment. The gift of imagination that fueled her stories did some real damage to her ability to memorize.

  Nevertheless, she did own a video camera, and she had known enough to catch their writers’ group on tape one time when they’d all gone to the beach. Maybe she needed a little advice with a project. Maybe she needed to speak with Mick Farmer about what he could do for her once she’d finished shooting whatever it was she might possibly be shooting. Jennifer would have to call Teri and get her to set up an appointment, but not today. They had group tonight, and it was best not to bring it up then. She knew her fellow writers all too well. They’d have a full-length feature film plotted with a part written for each of them before their meeting was over. Yes, it was a great idea, and one that would get her closer to one Mick Farmer, a friend from Danny’s past and a business partner from his present. A man who just might have some answers.

  She cranked the engine and pushed the gear lever into drive just as a flicker of motion caught her peripheral vision.

  The front door opened and Sheena came outside, broom in hand. Quickly, she swept the small front porch and then the sidewalk, beating the pavement with sufficient force to bend the broom straw. She hadn’t quite reached the driveway when she abandoned the broom against the house and dropped to her knees, frantically tearing at something in the flower bed between the walk and the front of the house. Must be weeds, Jennifer thought. Sheena tossed something green over her shoulder, apparently not caring if it found root elsewhere. Then she grabbed up the broom once more and attacked the cement drive. Halfway down she stopped abruptly, letting the broom fall to the pavement. She covered her face with both hands and sank to her knees.

  Feeling a pity she knew Sheena would detest, Jennifer pulled out into the road and drove away.

  Chapter 18

  Writing. It was Jennifer’s anchor, her link to sanity if not to reality, the one thing that kept her focused in an otherwise chaotic universe. Not that her Monday night writers’ group couldn’t be chaotic. Or unfocused. Or...

  “Go ahead, Teri,” Monique commanded, firmly rooted in her rocking chair, her leadership of this small band of young would-be writers unquestionable.

  Teri, who was lying on her stomach and propped up on her elbows in front of Monique’s sectional sofa, had been periodically touching the back of her head with her bare feet. The woman was a human pretzel, a fact that irked Jennifer as only genetic abilities could.

  Teri straightened out, swung her legs around, and dug in her briefcase for the pages from her latest romantic suspense novel.

  Jennifer, sitting next to Teri on the floor, her own legs stretched out and ankles crossed, reminded herself that she had to keep her mind on tonight’s readings. She owed at least that much to this group who tried so hard to help her get published, but thoughts of Sheena kept tugging at her.

  Their stroll down memory lane yesterday afternoon had emphasized only that Jennifer and Sheena had lived in very different worlds back then—Sheena working the popular crowd, Jennifer hanging more quietly with her friends. They’d known different people and frequented different hangouts. Their two worlds would probably never have overlapped if it hadn’t been for Danny Buckner. And now they’d overlapped again.

  While going through the past was fine, it ignored one important fact: for some reason, Gavin Lawless’s song about Jimmy Mitchell’s disappearance had upset Danny.

  April let out an unintentionally loud yawn and then excused herself in a strained, high-pitched voice as she unsuccessfully tried to stifle it. She sat on the opposite couch, quietly munching raisins. She no longer had time to bake the goodies she was so fond of bringing to these meetings. Which was just as well since she had made it known how much she resented the extra ten pounds that refused to go away and let her get back to her pre-pregnancy weight.

  Her pleasantly round face was marred by dark circles, and her blonde hair, usually loosely waved, looked as if it hadn’t met up with a curling iron in months. She seemed tired to the bone, and well she should. The delightful bundle making sweet little sleeping baby sounds in the carrier at her feet had been keeping her up every night for the last ei
ght months. Add three-year-old Jonathan running day duty, and sleep had become a fond memory and a mere hope for the future. She hadn’t produced more than a handful of pages for her children’s stories since little Colette’s birth, even though one publisher had expressed serious interest in the series. Yet April seemed happy, deep down happy if not bubbly surface happy. Jennifer could tell.

  Sheena and Danny never had children. Their decision or God’s?

  She glanced behind her at the vacant spot on the sofa that Leigh Ann usually occupied. She never missed group, so where the heck was she? Group was Leigh Ann’s last chance. If she didn’t show tonight, Jennifer was filing a missing person’s report.

  Worrying about Leigh Ann had become one more nagging nuisance in an already difficult last three days. If Danny was murdered, the murderer had to have been at the reunion, or at the very least, on the school grounds that night, the night when Leigh Ann was last seen with one Gavin Lawless. The Gavin Lawless who had no more sense than to make a blatant threat in a song he distributed over most of Georgia. So who exactly was Gavin threatening? Only one person had died. It couldn’t have been Danny. He would never have harmed anyone, let alone someone like Jimmy.

  Teri cleared her throat, holding up some printed pages. “This is a continuation of Desperate Passions, the one where he’s a biotechnical engineer and she’s the cub reporter trying to expose him as a secret agent. The last chapter ended with Wilbur Burroughs coming home earlier than expected while Chandra was going through his personal items to look for the stolen DNA analysis. This opens right after she’s slipped into his closet to hide.”

  “Wait up,” April interrupted. “Isn’t Wilbur your hero, the one Chandra is supposed to fall in love with?”

  Teri nodded.

  “I don’t like his name,” April insisted. “I told you before I thought you should change it. Burroughs is fine, but Wilbur—”

  “I agree,” Monique stated emphatically. “It raises the image of Mr. Ed.”

  “Mr. Ed?” Teri asked.

  “The talking horse. Wilbur was the guy who talked to the horse.”