“Morning, Bella,” said Annie. “You want some hotcakes?”
“Yeah, I guess.”
“Sleep okay?” Drake asked, his light blue eyes actually soft and sympathetic.
“Rock-like. That stuff’s powerful.”
“It is. You shouldn’t take it much, though. Totally addictive.”
“Yeah, big brother, I know,” she said, glancing at Annie and rolling her eyes.
“I saw that.” Drake poured the syrup into a pitcher. Normally she’d be dumping as much as she could get away with over a giant stack of pancakes but this morning her stomach turned at the thought of eating. Was her appetite permanently suppressed? Damn you, Benjamin Fleck, she thought. You’ve messed with my stomach.
As if she conjured him, Ben was suddenly there in the kitchen doorway with wet hair and dressed casually in a jeans and a t-shirt that matched his eyes. Sunday, she thought. He was off work. Why did he have to look so good in jeans? Everyone greeted him, except Bella. She avoided looking at him, her heart pounding in her chest. Don’t give him the satisfaction, she thought, of letting him know how much he’d hurt her. She poured some coffee, added a dab of half-and-half, and headed towards the door.
“Bella, no breakfast?” called Annie.
“I’m not hungry.” She didn’t turn around.
“Just coffee for me too,” she heard Ben say.
***
She was in the living room, pretending to read a magazine, reclined on one of the tan couches, when Cleo came through, still carrying her script. “Bella, I’m off to work with the coach Richard suggested. Wish me luck.”
“You’ll do great. She’s the best coach around from what I hear.”
Cleo came to the couch, kneeling on the floor and resting her forearms on the cushion next to Bella. “Don’t worry about this thing with Ben. He’ll come around. He’s just been hurt and is trying to push you away. I did that with Peter but he’ll figure it out. And Peter will figure out who did this.”
“Promise?”
“He’s relentless.” Cleo patted her knee. “I’m so glad you’ll be there tomorrow to make me look decent.”
“This will not be hard.”
A few minutes after Cleo left, she heard the front door open and shut and Alder shout out his standard greeting. “I’m home, peeps.”
Alder. He would cheer her up. “In here,” she called out to him, tossing the magazine aside.
“Auntie Bel, whatcha doing?”
“Nothing.”
He perched on the coffee table, scrutinizing her face. “You sad?”
Behind him, Ellen White was coming in, carrying a pie. “Bella, I brought you a pie.”
She sat up. Pie? “What kind?”
“Apple.”
She clapped her hands. “Pie’s good.” The room filled with the scent of cinnamon and cooked apples and butter. “Is that a butter crust?”
“Is there any other kind?”
“What’s for breakfast?” asked Alder.
“Whole grain pancakes.”
“What? Whole grain? Seriously, Bella, you’ve got to do something about Mom’s health kick. She’s ruining perfectly good pancakes by putting that awful stuff in them.”
“I know,” said Bella. “But there’s nothing I can do. Plus, Peter’s here. You know what that means.”
Ellen chuckled. “You two just come on over to my house if you get hungry. I’ll make you some real pancakes.”
“Maybe tomorrow?” He grinned. “No school.”
“No school on Monday?” Bella asked.
“Parent/teacher conferences,” said Alder. “I get to stay with Momo and Goldie.” Momo was Alder’s pet name for Ellen, and Goldie was her dog. Alder was crazy for both of them.
“Should we be worried?” asked Bella.
“About my conference?” asked Alder, looking perplexed.
“Right. Just thinking of my own experiences,” said Bella, smiling. “I wasn’t the best student.”
Ellen jumped in. “Of course not. Alder’s an excellent student.” She sniffed, somewhat judgmentally, and added, “He hardly studies because it’s all too easy for him.” She wagged her finger at him. “However, young man, it’s not a good idea to develop lazy habits just ‘cause things are easy. Someday you’ll be challenged and then you won’t have the proper study habits in place.”
“But Momo, what am I supposed to study if I already have my homework done?”
“Smart boy like you should be asking for extra credit. Matter of fact, I’m going to suggest that to your mother this morning.” She handed Alder the pie. “You take this into the kitchen. I need to talk to little miss here for a minute.”
Bella sat up, crossing her legs, readying herself for one of Ellen White’s life lessons. No idea what it would be about this time but Ellen White was always at the ready with advice, whether one asked for it or not.
She lowered her voice to just above a whisper. “Annie told me on the phone that Ben’s acting like a real nincompoop. Men can be profoundly idiotic, unfortunately. But Ben’s a good one. Needs a little grace I suspect, given this ridiculous police business.”
Bella remained quiet.
Ellen went on, speaking louder now. “I was awake last night—Vern snores like a bear some nights—and I started thinking about this whole darn thing and something occurred to me.”
Behind them, both Drake and Ben were coming out of the kitchen. “What occurred to you?” asked Ben.
Ellen motioned for them to come sit by pointing to one of the couches. “Good, get on in here. Both of you.” If there was any doubt in anyone’s mind that Ellen White was a former high school English teacher, there certainly shouldn’t be. She eyed Ben as he sat on the opposite couch from Bella. “Where’s Peter Ball? I need him to hear this too.”
“I’m here,” said Peter, carrying a coffee cup into the room. He sat in one of the easy chairs.
“You need a chalkboard?” Ben asked Ellen, grinning. Bella looked at him in surprise. Was he teasing Ellen? When had she last seen him smile? Three days ago. Ben glanced her way. They locked eyes for a moment before she looked away. The doorbell chimed. Who could that be?
“I’ll get it,” said Bella.
Annie had beat Bella to the door. It was Linus. He was wearing one of his blue silk suits and a red tie. “Good morning, ladies.”
“Linus, what’re you doing here?” Annie had a towel in her hand and was still wearing her apron, which was smeared with pancake batter and blackberry syrup.
Linus slipped off his coat and placed it carefully on the bench near the door before turning to Annie with his hands on his hips. “Oh, sweetie, why are you wearing an apron at home? You should be running around here in that negligée I got you for your wedding. Do you girls never listen?”
“Linus, your expectations for my sexiness are way too high. I have a house full of people, and, in case you don’t remember, a ten-year-old boy living here.”
“That’s absolutely no excuse.” Linus turned to greet Bella, giving her air kisses on each cheek. “You look gorgeous.” He pursed his lips and cocked his head to the side. “Falling in love agrees with you.”
Bella shook her head, trying not to let the tears flood her eyes. Linus being kind to her might send her over the crying precipice. And she was done crying over Benjamin Fleck. At least for the next hour. Damn you, she cursed him again silently. “He’s already dumped me,” she said in a whisper.
“That isn’t true,” said Annie, matching Bella’s whisper. “He’s just acting crazy because of this whole thing with the police.”
Linus glanced toward the front room. “Is he here now?”
Annie nodded. “And Ellen.”
“She says she has something she wanted to discuss about the police,” said Bella.
“I have an idea I want to run by the gang too,” said Linus. “But we have to wait. Lee and Tommy are on their way over as well. And Mike and Sharon. Everyone’s concerned about Ben and we want to get on t
he same page on this thing. Make sure we’re all in this together to figure out the real killer.”
Bella smiled, squeezing Annie’s hand. “Your gang of misfits always comes through when it counts.”
“You know it,” she said as they went into the living room.
Annie made more coffee while Drake found a white board. Bella took Peter into Drake’s office. “The whole gang’s on their way over. They all want to help.” She said it almost apologetically but there was no need.
“Good. The more people we have on this thing the better.”
She left Peter to set up the whiteboard on an easel and went to fetch another cup of coffee. Lee and Tommy must have arrived because Alder was in the kitchen holding their toddler, Ellie-Rose, on his lap and feeding her small bites of pancake. “She needs tiny bites so she doesn’t choke,” he said. Her heart twisted, remembering doing the same with her little niece. Don’t think of it now, she told herself. Just focus in the moment.
Ellie-Rose, a smaller version of her pretty redheaded mother, grinned at Bella. “’Pakes.” She raised her arms in the air. “Yay.”
“Pakes are yay.” Bella poured more coffee into her cup and added cream that Annie had placed out for the guests.
“They banished us to the kitchen. I’m too young to hear all the grizzly details, which totally sucks because I’m a great detective,” said Alder.
“I’ll fill you in later,” she promised, with her hand on his sweet head. “Just without the R-rated parts.”
“But Bella, those are all the badass parts.”
“I know. But you’re too young for badass parts yet. Give it a couple more years.”
She was almost to the door when he called out to her. “Bella?”
“Yep?”
“Ben’s not going to jail, is he?”
“Absolutely not. He didn’t do anything.”
“Yeah, but sometimes innocent people go to jail. Look at what happened in To Kill a Mockingbird.”
“No way this gang will let that happen.”
“More ‘pakes,” said Ellie-Rose, tugging on Adler’s arm.
He fed the baby another piece and kissed her forehead. “Bella, I know Ben’s acting like a jerk but that’s just what men do when they’re afraid.”
She chuckled. “I know, honey.” She paused. “But thanks for saying that.”
“Badass,” said Ellie-Rose, crystal clear. Bella couldn’t help but laugh. She couldn’t say pancake but badass came out as though spoken by a classically trained actress.
“Oh no,” said Alder, grimacing. “I’m in so much trouble.”
Bella continued to laugh. “You better teach her a new word before her parents come back in here. Seriously.”
Alder made a clicking noise with his tongue and shook his head sadly. “Why are people so worried over conventions?”
“You better start worrying about them or your mother’s going to have you banished to your room until Thanksgiving.”
“Oh, Bella, I’m not made for this world.”
“Badass,” said Ellie-Rose, grinning.
***
In the living room, Mike and Sharon had arrived and were sitting together on one of the couches next to Tommy, Lee, and Ellen. Ben was talking quietly with Drake and Linus near the fireplace. Annie was pouring coffee for everyone and had somehow produced pastries. There was a never-ending supply of food in this house, thought Bella. Such a shame she felt like road kill. She hated to waste good pastries.
Ben and Linus took seats as Annie settled next to Drake on the loveseat closest to the stone fireplace. Bella stood in the corner of the room, feeling awkward. Why couldn’t her place be by Ben? Why did he have to act like such a fool and ruin everything between them? Finally, she opted for the chair nearest Peter.
Ben cleared his throat and looked around the room. “Listen, I just wanted to say thanks for rallying behind me. You all have no reason to believe I’m innocent but I’m grateful you do. I hope this all blows over but, I don’t know, I have a bad feeling. The way those cops interrogated me the other day I feel like they want to pin this on me just to meet the demands of the public. Anyway, thank you.”
“We take care of our own here,” said Mike. “Always have, always will.”
“That’s right,” said Tommy.
“And all this because you did the right thing for that poor girl. Just shameful,” said Ellen.
Peter, using the whiteboard, charted out what they knew thus far. “Ben arrived with a drunk Tiffany at eleven and left at midnight. The clerk at the front desk substantiated this. We also were able to see him arrive and leave from the security cameras.”
Ellen, looking up from her pad, raised her hand. “Were there any other people in or out of the lobby on the security cameras?”
“No,” said Peter. “Which tells me one thing.”
“That it was done by someone staying in the lodge?” asked Lee, sitting forward on the couch, her intelligent eyes snapping.
“Exactly,” said Peter. He twirled the pen between his fingers like a baton and gazed at the white board. “The problem with this case is there are too many suspects.” He went on to tell them about Graham Rouse admitting to an affair with Tiffany and the two men in suits who had followed Tiffany that night, along with the blackmail scheme.
“So this Jocelyn Zinn—she could have hired someone to do it, right, Peter?” asked Tommy. “Those two men could be working for her?”
Peter nodded. “Yes. Only problem is we can’t seem to find them. It’s like they disappeared into thin air. But we know they exist because the bartender at Lefty’s corroborated what Ben told us.”
Mike’s brow was furrowed, like he was thinking hard. “I’ve followed this Zinn thing in the news and that woman’s not somebody to mess with. Her client list, it’s assumed by the press anyway, has everyone from men in the mob to elected public officials, all with deep motivation to keep their names out of the paper.”
“Any of them could’ve hired someone to kill Tiffany if they thought she was blackmailing them,” said Tommy. “Don’t you think, Peter?”
“Absolutely. If she was blackmailing them, which I’m not totally convinced of. From what her sister says and what we know of her personality it seems unlikely,” said Peter.
Ellen raised her hand again.
“Ellen, you don’t have to raise your hand,” teased Tommy. “This isn’t your classroom.”
Ellen slapped him on the knee. “Good thing for you it isn’t. I’d have you in detention so fast it’d make your head swim.”
“Detention?” Tommy’s eyes went wide. “I’ve never been in detention or anything close to it in my life.”
“Goodie-two-shoes,” said Bella. “That’s totally obvious.”
Drake, from where he and Annie sat on a loveseat near the fireplace, laughed. “Let’s tell them how many times you’ve been in detention, Bella.”
She blushed and shot him a dirty look. “Keep quiet, smart boy. Shouldn’t you be in the front row with the other nerds?”
“Front row’s where all the best students sit,” said Drake. “Right, Lee?”
Lee, with a prim smile, pushed a strand of her strawberry-blond hair behind her ear. “It’s where I always was, yes.”
Linus pointed at Tommy with his half-eaten croissant. “Tommy wasn’t in detention, he was wherever the ladies were, probably reciting poetry to them and telling them where to meet him after school.”
Tommy laughed. “Well, I did have a way with the ladies.”
“Still do,” said Annie.
“I only have eyes for my wife now. Right, honey?” Tommy looked over at Lee. She was writing something in her notebook. “Um, hello, Lee, they’re talking about my charming ways.”
She glanced up with a blank expression. “What’s that?”
Tommy, with his characteristic grin, shook his head and rolled his eyes. “Never mind. The honeymoon’s over.”
“Of course it is, sweetheart. Don’t be silly.�
� Lee went back to her notebook.
“Oh, that hurt,” said Tommy. “I’m not writing any more love songs about you.”
“I doubt that,” said Lee, smacking his knee. “Now focus on what we’re doing here.”
“You can’t distract the best student in class by flirting with her,” said Drake.
Annie kissed Drake on the cheek and put her finger through one of the curls by his ear. “You sure about that?”
“No, I’m not, now you put it that way.” He leaned over and kissed her on the mouth.
“Oh my God, get a room, you two,” said Linus. “You breeders are so inappropriate.”
Ellen waved her pen in the air. “Laser-like focus, people. We have a murder to solve here. If any of you were in my class you’d all get a D minus for effort.” She turned her gaze to Peter. “I have something I want to propose, Peter, as a possible angle to this case.”
Peter’s eyes were amused but he kept his face straight. “Do tell.”
“I think the cops on this case are crooked.”
“I agree but what makes you think so?” he asked, all amusement gone from his eyes.
Ellen tapped her pencil on the palm of her hand. “Because I had that red-headed cop in class years ago and he was nothing short of a liar. His brother was a big athlete and good student—went off to Yale or Harvard, can’t remember which now—and now he’s a big shot in the Los Angeles attorney’s office. Gale and Rawley Hough.”
“Gale’s the local cop, right?” asked Peter.
“Right. Gale was always trying to prove he was as smart as Rawley but he wasn’t even close. And then there was the problem of his name. Gale? A name that’s also a girl’s name plus red hair, the kid was doomed. Anyway, let’s just say this Gale has an agenda. He wants to solve this case and look like a big shot. But he’s lazy. Plagiarized a paper in my American Literature class when he was a junior. Cried like a baby when I confronted him, begged me to give him another chance, which I did and probably shouldn’t have because he needed to learn his lesson. Anyhow, this shows his character. Once a cheater and a liar, always a cheater and a liar. And, no offence, Peter, but there’s a fine line between those who choose the criminal life and those who choose the life in law enforcement.”
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