by Ginny Aiken
“If she’s involved.” I drew a deep breath. “I know it doesn’t look so hot for Cissy, and I like her too. I don’t want her to be guilty, but guilt’s not something you can cook up after the death. Either she did it or she didn’t.”
“So how’re we going to prove she didn’t?”
I stopped for the red light at the corner of Sandy Cove Lane and Whitecap Drive. We were only three blocks away from home, and I didn’t know if I could come up with an answer in that short a time. I didn’t know if I could come up with an answer no matter how long I took to think.
That’s what I told Bella. “But,” I added. “There is one thing I can try. I don’t know how far I’ll get, since I don’t have any great connections at the bank, but I’m going to try to check out her finances. There’s all that money Darlene ‘gave’ her. I want to know why, when, how—everything about that gift.”
“I can help you with some of that. Cissy had a stump put in one of her arteries.”
Stump? “Do you mean stent? One of those jobbies that open up clogged arteries?”
“That’s what I told you, Haley girl. A stump. And Cissy needs one of them to try to avoid a heart attack. She’s got gunky veins.”
Only Bella would translate technical terminology like that. “So she told you she had a pile of medical bills? And that’s why Darlene gave her the money?”
“That’s what she said. She even showed me her medicines. Not so pretty, so much stuff, you know?”
“I can imagine.” So the stent could be verified by following up with a doctor or hospital. “But do you know if she’s out of debt now? That apartment looked crummy and cheap.”
“What do you want? The Brothers Chromosov kicked her out of the house. She doesn’t have much money besides her skimpy Social Security check. That’s all she can afford until the estate clears prostate.”
I have to pick my battles around Bella. “Karamazov, Bella. The movie’s name is The Brothers Karamazov.
” She shrugged. “You know what I mean. Larry and Tommy are rotten, and they’re mean too. Cissy is broke. But I don’t want her to be the one who killed Darlene. Even if she needs Darlene’s money the most. I’d rather the brothers be the perps. You know, like the ones in the old movie.”
I pulled into Bella’s driveway. “I already said I like her too, and I don’t want her to be guilty, but the person who killed Darlene is guilty, no matter who it is.” I jerked a thumb toward the backseat. “Want some help?”
“You want to help me with the Balis?”
“Why not? They already shredded me to pieces. They can’t do much worse.”
We got the cats into the house with less trouble than I expected. I wound up with only two new gouges and counted myself lucky they weren’t all that deep.
“Gotta go,” I told Bella. On my way to the door, though, I turned around and on impulse gave her a hug. “I love you in spite of your cats.”
Tears filled her eyes. “Love you too, Haley girl. I love you too. So take good care of yourself, and make sure you clean up those scratches. You don’t want them to get infracted.”
Is it any wonder I always feel dizzy around Bella? At the door I called back, “See ya.”
How was I going to get the scoop on Cissy?
I’d have to start at the beginning all over again. With her.
I buckled down for the rest of that afternoon and worked on one of the paperwork peaks. Even though I still had a whole mountain range left to go through after four hours, I felt satisfied with that day’s progress.
And I planned my visit to Cissy in the morning.
I brought my secret weapon with me to Cissy’s place. Midas was over-the-top thrilled when I uttered that magical, mystical question: “Ride?”
His exuberance piled on the guilt; we weren’t going to the park as he expected. But he did ride in the car.
At Cissy’s, he spent an eternity sniffing the shrubs. Of course he did. The bushes must’ve reeked of fresh Balis. Midas is no dummy. He loves to give fresh c-a-t a good run for the money.
When I finally dragged him away, I went up the porch steps, avoided the splintered top board, then made my way to the door and rang the bell. Cissy opened up and immediately slammed the door in my face.
“Hey! Do I have cooties or what?”
“Give me a minute,” she called from within. “I have to lock up Garfield. He’s not fond of dogs.”
Great. I forgot about her love of cats, one of the things she shares with Bella, when I decided to bring Midas. But it was too late to back down. I needed answers, and it was past time for Cissy to give them.
When the door opened again, she was somewhat breathless. “I’m sorry about that. If I’d known you were coming, I’d have made sure Garfield was in the bedroom before you got here. But come on in.”
We did, and I sat on the shabby brown and green plaid sofa she pointed to. Midas became a canine vacuum cleaner again, his nose to the ground, sucking up every last hint of new and exciting scent.
“I’m the one who should apologize,” I said. “I forgot you were of the Bella persuasion. You’re both cat people.”
“And you’re a dog person. There’s nothing wrong with that. They’re all perfectly fine animals.”
Except the Balis. But why bicker?
Midas’s excitement grew by the nanosecond. When he discovered the door that hid the c-a-t, he’d go for it, and then I’d have to drag him away. I had a small window of opportunity here, and I had to climb through it.
“Tell you what. I’m going to cut straight through all the garbage.” I didn’t want to pretend anymore. “I don’t think Darlene died from cancer, but it’s not been easy to find anything that’ll get the cops to open an investigation. After thinking and thinking until my brain went numb, I realized I had a bunch of questions for you.”
“Not more about the HGH, I hope.”
“Not really. Those I’m tagging for Dr. Dope.”
“HGH is not a drug. Not like you mean.”
“Let’s just agree to disagree, okay?” When she nodded— not happy about it either—I continued. “My questions for you are about you. About your finances, to make things clear.”
“You want to know about the money Darlene insisted on giving me. And she did insist. I wanted a loan to pay off my part of the cost of my procedure—I had a stent inserted— but she wouldn’t listen to my arguments. She said her money did no good if it sat in the bank. So she gave me what I needed to cover the bills as they came in.”
“So you have no proof that she gave you the money.”
“No, but I have the bills and the receipts from when I paid them in full.”
“That’ll help.” I was glad she could prove at least that much. Her responses were straightforward, and I hoped she was as honest as she appeared. “So you’re all out of debt now?”
“As far as I know, yes. But you know how hospitals operate. Just when you think you’re done, they bill you for one more thing they overlooked. I haven’t received any new statements in the last seven weeks.”
“Would you say you don’t need the money Darlene left you?”
She took a moment to consider my question. “I don’t need the money, but I won’t lie and tell you I won’t take it.” She gestured toward the room’s four walls. “This isn’t exactly the lap of luxury—not that I’d want that either.”
“I understand.” And I did. I’d inherited a fortune, and while it provided me with a great deal of material security, I hadn’t used the money to change much in my life. “You wouldn’t—”
The doorbell cut into my question. I fought down my irritation, but when I saw who’d arrived, that irritation mushroomed.
“I shouldn’t be surprised to find you here,” Lila said. “But I am. Why are you?”
“Midas and I went for an r-i-d-e, and since I had a couple of questions for Cissy, I decided to stop by.”
Midas’s wild exuberance went outright ballistic. That’s when I noticed that Lil
a held a leash in her hand. At the end of that leash I found the cutest golden pup I’d seen since Midas was that size.
I managed to get in a question over the yips and yaps. “That’s the little sib, right?”
Lila glanced at her furry companion. “None other.”
“Looks just like his older brother did at that age. He’s going to be big.”
“And just as loud.”
I laughed. “Can’t deny the truth.”
The brothers quieted as they sniffed each other. Then Midas cuffed the little one on the side of the head, and the baby latched onto his floppy ear. The game was on, and in minutes the two went rolling over the floor, their delighted grunts and growls a bizarre background to our equally strange threesome.
“I should leave,” I said. “I’m sure you have a reason to stop by, and I doubt it has anything to do with our dogs.
” Lila studied Cissy. Then she turned toward me. Finally she shrugged. “If it’s acceptable to Mrs. Grover, then I don’t care if you stay. It’ll save me the effort of telling you later.”
I glanced at Cissy and saw the color leach from her cheeks. A buzzard or two swooped in my middle. Lila didn’t make visits for no reason at all.
Cissy’s voice came out hoarse. “This is about Darlene Weikert, isn’t it?”
The detective nodded.
I had to know. “The tox screen results are in?”
She nodded again. “I have to swallow my pride. The tests did turn up something unexpected. Mrs. Weikert had unusually high levels of arsenic in the tested tissues. According to the pathologist, she’d been ingesting the poison for some time.”
Although I’d expected it, her confirmation of my suspicion stole my breath away.
Darlene Weikert had been murdered.
I’d thought I’d feel triumphant, but “I told you so” is dull as flat paint when it means a neat lady lost her life through foul play.
“Arsenic?” I asked. “I thought it caused convulsions and that the faces of people who died from arsenic poisoning were fixed in horrible grimaces. Darlene didn’t look like that, did she?”
Lila turned to Cissy, then gestured to the empty cushions to my left. “May I?”
Cissy nodded.
“You’re right, Haley,” the detective said. “That is the normal trademark of arsenic poisoning. But from what the pathologist told me, if a person ingests a steady, increasingly larger amount of arsenic, then the poison doesn’t leave its usual fingerprint.”
“Arsenic . . .” Cissy leaned forward. “How would Darlene have ingested enough arsenic to kill her, even if in small measured doses? How did the killer get her to take it?”
Lila’s eyes narrowed, but her gaze never left our hostess’s face. “That’s what I’d like to know. You were the housekeeper at the Weikert home, weren’t you?”
“I did most of the housekeeping, but I was really there to help with Jacob’s and Darlene’s medical needs.”
“Did you prepare their meals?”
Cissy smiled. “I’m a terrible cook. But Darlene loved everything about it, and she was a genius in the kitchen. She made everything from scratch. Convenience foods insulted her love of good food.”
Lila pulled her small notepad from her leather handbag, and with her silver pen, took down a couple of notes. “Did you serve the meals?”
Cissy shook her head. “Darlene loved food. She loved shopping, loved preparing it, and she was very, very particular about the presentation. She always served, even when she didn’t feel very well.”
I admired Cissy’s patience with Lila. I don’t know that I could’ve stayed so calm in the face of the detective’s implied accusation.
But before Lila could fire off another question, Cissy spoke. “I’ll make your job easier, Detective. I did not put arsenic in the Weikerts’ food. Never. I wouldn’t have done it under any circumstances, and even less would I have hurt my dearest friend.”
Her voice rang with conviction. Even Lila blinked.
“I think,” I ventured, “we can assume Cissy didn’t sprinkle arsenic on Darlene’s spaghetti instead of Parmesan. So we need to find out how it was administered.”
Lila’s laser gaze speared me. “Why don’t you backtrack a couple of sentences, Haley, and get rid of all those wes? There is no we here. There’s the PD, who will conduct a full investigation into Darlene Weikert’s murder, and then there’s you. You’re the innocent bystander who just happened to suspect murder, because murder is the first thing you think of when someone dies.”
“That’s not fair, Lila. Even though I did call you right away, that was a knee-jerk reaction. I don’t just paint a mural and stick a killer in it whenever there’s a death. Something has to tip me off. The picture of murder was there for anyone to see. Just because you missed it doesn’t mean you have to turn snide on me.”
“That’s not the point,” she said. “At least, not right now. We can discuss your odder tendencies at a later time.”
I sat back into the lumpy couch. “Go ahead. Grill her some more. I don’t know what you’re going to get out of her.”
Lila shook her head. “I didn’t come to grill her. I had questions for Mrs. Grover.”
“You girls have problems to solve,” Cissy said. “But you can better address them when I’m not around.”
“She agrees with me. This isn’t the time or place.” Lila’s satisfaction came as a surprise. Around me she’s always so self-assured that I never think she might need approval or support.
Cissy jumped in. “Only when it comes to your argument with Haley.”
Lila sighed. “Fine. If you had to take a guess, how would you say the arsenic got into Darlene’s system?”
“I can think of only one way.” Cissy’s expression grew grim. “The HGH. And, yes, I injected her. But I did not mix it with arsenic. I don’t know how the poison entered the serum, much less Darlene’s body.”
“But we agree it was in the HGH,” Lila said.
Cissy lifted her chin. “In principal.”
“Don’t you think,” I said, “that if Cissy wanted to kill Darlene she would have gone about it in a way that didn’t point suspicion right at her?”
The gratitude in Cissy’s eyes encouraged me. So I added, “I’m not a professional”—I had to appease Lila and her cop pride—“but I think a nurse would know dozens, if not hundreds, of ways to kill someone. She probably also knows how to make it look as if someone else did it.”
Lila turned to Cissy. “Is Haley right? Do you know that many ways to kill?”
Cissy stood, anger in her tight lips, her stiff stance, and her blazing eyes. “Any medical professional knows how to kill, just like any law enforcement officer does. That doesn’t mean we kill as a matter of fact any more than you do, Detective.”
Lila got up too. I had no choice but to follow.
“You understand, Mrs. Grover,” the karate chop cop said, “that even though we don’t have enough evidence to charge you, we will continue to observe you.”
“I know I’m a suspect. But my conscience is clear.”
Lila closed her handbag on her notepad and pen. “I hope you have good reason for it.” She turned to the peaceful, snoozing dogs. “Come on, Rookie. Let’s go home.”
Despite the seriousness of the moment, I burst out laughing. “Rookie? What kind of name is that for a dog?”
The cop’s expression softened as the pup trotted to her. “It just fits.”
“You’re a dog-owner disgrace. You can’t even shake off the cop gig long enough to give your dog a decent name.
” She snapped Rookie’s leash to his collar, then crossed her arms, the leash looped around a hand. “And Midas is a stroke of genius?”
“Well, it does acknowledge something about the dog himself.”
“So does Rookie. He’s the new dog in my life. I had a veteran.”
Cissy must’ve had it with the two of us, because she went straight to the door. “You two are so alike that if it wer
en’t for the obvious physical differences, I’d say you were twins. Now please take your sibling rivalry somewhere else.”
I glared at the karate chop cop but only called my dog.
Lila didn’t respond to Cissy’s comment but rather led her pup outside.
When we both stood on the sidewalk, I let out my held breath. “That’s ridiculous. I don’t know how anyone can say that. You have to be the most inflexible, narrow-minded human I’ve ever met.”
She looked down her small nose—she did even that with panache, so I knew we couldn’t have anything in common. “I’d have to say you’re the obstinate one. Why you persist in thrusting yourself into situations where you’re not welcome or for which you lack even the most basic training is beyond me.”
“In a pig’s eye! I don’t stick myself in. Things happen around me.”
She stepped toward her plain-vanilla, unmarked department car. “Do take note of your elegant eloquence.”
“Hey! I get my point across.” I dragged Midas to my car. “But remember, if I hadn’t ‘thrust’ myself into the last situation where you definitely didn’t want me, then a killer would’ve gone free.”
She stopped. Turned. Nodded. “I can’t argue there. You clung to your suspicion, and you pushed and pushed until we did something to prove you either right or wrong.”
“See? You can’t just dismiss me as a crank. Even you have to admit my instincts were right on.”
“I did admit it. What do you want now, an apology to your dented pride, an ode to your suspicious nature, and a bow to your pushier side?”
I let Midas in through the Honda’s back door. Then I faced the cop again. “Okay. I get it. I was right, you said so, and now we can get on with our lives.”
Rookie chose that moment to whimper. We both turned toward the sweet little guy. “What’s wrong?” I asked.
Lila knelt at his side in spite of her chic tan slacks. “Aw . . . baby boy. What’s the matter? You want to go home? We did cut into your nap back there. Is that it? Did the brotherly wrestling wear you out?”
The pup nuzzled her hand, then licked away, like every good golden does. Lila reached inside the pocket of her blue blazer. “Here you go. You were a good boy.”