Thyme to Live: A We Sisters Three Mystery

by Miller, Melissa F.

  “Well, human behavioral psychology, but yeah.”

  We reached the fifth floor and the elevator juddered to a stop with a loud thunk. He trailed me out into the hallway.

  “To answer the question posed, no, I’ve never been involved with a married woman,” he said to my back.

  I didn’t respond.

  We reached our room and I inserted the key card into the reader. Nothing happened. I yanked it out and tried again. Still nothing. I huffed out an irritated breath. Victor reached over and plucked the card out of my fingers, flipped it around, and stuck it in the reader. The green light blinked and the metallic click sounded.

  We were in.

  I pushed open the door and walked inside. To say that the deluxe king room was small was to vastly overstate its size. It was teeny. The bed dominated the room to the point where I thought Victor might have to squeeze between the bed and the dresser sideways. I could barely fit, and I wasn’t exactly broad-shouldered. Where on earth would a cot go?

  I sidled through the narrow space and pulled open the drapes. “Look at that. There actually is a view.”

  Victor made his way to the window set into the exposed brick wall and peered over my shoulder. A sliver of the East River peeked out from between the buildings across the street, gleaming with reflected light, like a dark silk ribbon. Beyond it, Manhattan’s skyline rose in the dusk.

  “What a city,” he breathed.

  I leaned back and rested my head on his chest. He pulled me closer. I relaxed into his arms, ready to unwind after the day we’d had. Then I remembered Mia Kim. I shrugged out of his grip, twisted my neck, and stared up at him.

  “Who’s Mia Kim?”

  His face closed like a door. “I told you, I don’t know the name. She must be a friend of Helena’s. I never met her.”

  I backed up another step and bumped into the rough surface of the brick wall. I kept my eyes glued on his. “I know you’re lying.”

  He jerked his head back like I’d slapped him.

  “I’m not …”

  I tilted my head and arched my left eyebrow only—a talent my sisters envied and had been trying to replicate, without success, since we were kids. I said nothing.

  “I didn’t …”

  He took a small step backward and lowered himself until he was sitting at the foot of the bed.

  “How?” he asked.

  “How do I know you’re lying?”

  He shook his head sadly from side to side. “Yeah.”

  “There’s a checklist of common lying behaviors—physical and verbal telltale signs. I had to learn them in order to work as a research assistant in the psychology department. You exhibited, like, all of them. You’re a terrible liar.”

  It was true, he’d been a textbook example. But I had no intention of ticking off which signs he’d shown. The ability to easily discern his truthfulness would be handy on an ongoing basis—or at least until we found Helena or figured out what had happened to her. I guess I shouldn’t assume there’d be any ongoing anything after that.

  He gave a sheepish, knowing laugh. “Helena always said I couldn’t lie to save my life.”

  I waited a beat. “So, Mia Kim.”

  “Mia Kim was—is—Helena’s therapist.”

  “Okay.” That still didn’t explain why he’d lied. I mean, at least half of New York City is in therapy. It’s not some dark, shameful secret.

  He cleared his throat. “She was pretty messed up when she got here from Rio. Being with Gabriel had done a real number on her self-esteem. She was depressed, thought she was worthless. I honestly believe Mia saved her life.”

  “Your sister was suicidal?” I asked gently.

  He nodded wordlessly and hung his head.

  I looked out the window at the lit-up skyline, jewels shining in the distance, and tried to think of something comforting to say. I wished Sage were here. She’d know the right words.

  “I’m glad this Mia Kim person was able to help her,” I finally offered.

  He looked up at me. “Me too. But there’s something else you should know.” He reached inside his breast pocket and pulled out a square of paper that had been folded into fourths. He unfolded it, smoothed out the wrinkles, and handed it to me.

  It was a note from Helena:

  Dear Victor,

  I’m sorry, but I can’t do this anymore. He’s never going to let me live in peace. There’s no other way out.

  I love you,

  Helena

  I read it a second time and then a third.

  “What is this? Where did you get it?”

  “It was on Helena’s bedside table the first time we went to her apartment. You were preoccupied with that comforter, so I slipped it in my pocket before you could notice it.”

  “Why?”

  “Why? Well, for one thing, it’s addressed to me. But, more importantly, I didn’t want you to see it and think it was a suicide note. Because that’s not what it is.”

  “That’s what it sounds like.”

  “I know that’s what it sounds like,” he said fiercely. “That’s what it’s supposed to sound like. So if Gabriel, or the police, or whoever found it, they’d think she went off somewhere to kill herself.”

  “But?” I prompted.

  “But, if Helena were going to write a private note to me, a note like that, she’d have written it in Portuguese, not English.”

  “Probably,” I conceded. “But she called her therapist. That suggests she was in crisis, doesn’t it?”

  “It could, but it could mean something else entirely. Read the note again,” he directed.

  I obliged. “Okay.”

  “What doesn’t it say?”

  “You mean what does it say?”

  “No, I mean what I said. What doesn’t it say?”

  What was this? Some kind of Zen koan? I scanned the note again.

  “I give up,” I said.

  “It doesn’t say she’s going to kill herself. You see? But that’s where your mind went. And that’s also the conclusion the police will immediately jump to—especially, if they know about Mia.”

  I reread the note. He was right.

  “Okay, then what do you think she meant?”

  He stood and started pacing as best he could in the tight space. “I think you may be right. I think she staged a fight scene with that fake blood and then took off.”

  “But why?”

  “Because Gabriel found her. Or was about to, anyway, and she knew it. So she’s gone into hiding. She probably called Mia for advice or support. And then she took off.”

  “Did she give you any clues in this note? Any hints at where she is?”

  “None.” A single word that weighed the world.

  “Are you sure?”

  He gave me a dark look. “I’ve read that damn note a hundred times, probably more. If there were a secret message, I’d have found it by now.”

  “Sorry.” I felt bad pressing him, but if we were getting things out into the open, it was time for him to come clean about everything. I inhaled deeply and then hit him while he was down. “What about the box?”

  “What box?”

  “The first time we were in the apartment, you picked up a ring box from her bedside table and put it in your pocket.”

  He frowned. “That box was empty—trash. I was just getting rid of it.”

  I waited.

  “It was the box her wedding ring came in. I recognized the jeweler’s name. Gabriel’s family always used that jewelry store.”

  “But the ring was gone?”

  “The ring’s been gone. She left it behind when she left Brazil. I know because I arranged for a friend to return it to Gabriel once she was safely out of the country. I don’t understand why she left the box. It was right next the note, actually. I don’t understand any of this. It’s like a puzzle she thought I could solve. But I can’t.” He dragged his fingers through his hair. He was nearly vibrating with frustration.

  �
��I’m sorry, Victor.” I truly was. I came over to the bed and sat down next to him.

  “It’s not your fault.”

  I covered his hand with mine and squeezed. He squeezed back. We sat like that for a long time, listening to the blare of angry horns and faint sirens on the street below and the hushed ticking of the HVAC system in the walls.

  14

  Shortly before midnight, after liberating the minibar of a bottle of middling wine, a can of cashews, and couple of fair trade, dark chocolate bars (the combined cost of which probably would have covered a better-than-good dinner out), I had a brilliant thought. I sat bolt upright, dislodging his head from my shoulder.

  “What’s wrong?” His voice was sleepy, wine- and exhaustion-dulled.

  “I have an idea!”

  He rubbed his fists across his eyes. “Does it involve calling it a night and hitting the sheets?” He gestured toward the pitiful cot that housekeeping had delivered. It was still folded and propped against the wall. Anybody with enough spatial ability to park a car could look at it and tell there was no way it would fit in the available space if we opened it.

  “No. Listen, I think I know how we can smoke out Gabriel. And maybe Helena, too.”

  His droopy eyelids flipped open. “Really?” he asked, suddenly alert.

  “I think so. We think Helena vanished because she knew her ex-husband was getting close to finding her, right?”

  “Right.”

  “And she left a fake suicide note.”

  “Right.”

  “But she also staged a struggle, which I don’t get.”

  “You mean the fake blood?”

  “Yeah.” That bit was throwing me off. Had she staged a fight and her death at her own hands? It seemed like that should have been an either / or proposition, not both.

  “I don’t understand that part, either. Although, to be honest, I don’t really understand any of this. Why didn’t she just come to me for help?” His voice broke.

  I tried to put myself in Helena’s shoes. “She probably panicked. I don’t know. But here’s what I’m thinking. She wants Gabriel to think she’s dead, right?”

  “I think so.”

  “We need to have a funeral.”

  A look of pure horror crossed his face. “You’re kidding.”

  “Okay, that sounded worse aloud than it did in my head. But hear me out. Given the fact that his goons are trailing us around town like baby ducks, he must not know where she is either and he’s probably not sure she’s even alive.”

  “Probably,” he allowed.

  He was still looking at me as if I’d sprouted devil’s horns, but he hadn’t run from the room screaming, so I figured I should push on.

  “But if we visit a funeral home, a florist, go through the motions of planning a funeral, maybe it’ll get back to him that she’s dead.”

  “And what? He tucks his tail between his legs and goes back to Brazil?”

  “No. Unless Lifetime Movies have lied to me, he’ll show up at the funeral to see it with his own eyes. And that’s when the police arrest him.”

  “You think the authorities are going to go along with this harebrained scheme? It’s like something out of ‘I Love Lucy.’”

  “Tom Sawyer, actually, but whatever. And, yes, the police will play along because I’ll ask a friend for a favor.”

  ‘Friends’ may have been a slight overstatement of my actual relationship with Detective Dave Drummond, but I was confident he’d help me. Rosemary would see to it. Victor squinted, still unsure.

  “It seems morbid.”

  “Morbid, but effective,” I insisted.

  “Maybe. You’re forgetting the part where we sent Helena’s phone on a tour of bars and breweries. Gabriel’s guys are following a delivery truck now, not us.”

  I beamed at him. “Ah, if only we knew someone with an in at The New York Times. Tell me you know one of the obituary writers.”

  A spark of understanding lit his tired eyes. “This just might work.”

  “So what should we do first?”

  “First, we sleep. I’ll take the floor.” He grabbed a pillow from the pile on the bed.

  “Listen, we can share the bed. Just stay on your own side.”

  “Are you sure?”

  “Sure. I mean, it’s better than tripping over you and flying into a brick wall if I have to go to the bathroom in the middle of the night. This bed’s plenty big for both of us. Just—”

  “I know. Stay on my side.” He gave me a meaningful look. “Trust me, Thyme, the first time I take you to bed for real, it won’t be under these circumstances.”

  After dropping that bombshell, he brushed his teeth and fell asleep basically the second his head hit the pillow. I, on the other hand, lay awake staring at the ceiling, listening to his slow, even breathing and analyzing his last sentence a million different ways. Sometimes, a girl really needed to chat with her sisters.

  * * *

  I came out of the steamy bathroom with a towel wrapped around my hair and a hotel bathrobe cinched tightly around my waist to find a room service tray and several bags from the boutique around the corner. Victor was munching on a cranberry muffin and wearing brand new dark gray trousers, a cream-colored dress shirt, and a black V-neck sweater.

  “Morning,” he said around a mouthful of pastry.

  “Good morning. You look nice.”

  “We have a big day. I figured a fresh set of clothes was in order.” He nodded toward the bags on the bed. “Hope I guessed your size correctly.”

  I peeked inside. A black wrap dress, an ivory cardigan, and a pair of impossibly high, scrappy black heels. I checked the tag on the dress. “The clothes should fit, but I’m not sure I’m going to be able to run from any attackers in those shoes.”

  He wrinkled his nose. “Good point.”

  “Tell you what, I’ll just wear my ballet flats and hang onto these for that dinner at the Cuban restaurant you owe me.”

  A smile crossed his face. “It’s a date.” He brushed the crumbs from his fingers and gestured to the domed lid covering the tray. “You have a choice between oatmeal and a muffin. Orange juice and coffee. Eat up.”

  I helped myself to the oatmeal, swirling the dried fruit into it with my spoon. “So I figure our first order of business is to call my sister’s boyfriend. Should we wait until it’s a decent hour in California?”

  “Do we have to?”

  “Nah.” I reached for my phone and reinserted the battery. While I waited for the phone to restart, I downed a cup of coffee then took my new outfit into the bathroom to get dressed. I dried my hair and piled it into a loose knot at the base of my neck. I added a swipe of matte red lipstick and some mascara and checked my reflection. I was a passable grieving friend.

  I returned to the bedroom to call Rosemary and Dave. Victor was sitting on the bed with his notebook propped on his lap, chewing on the end of his pen.

  “What are you doing?”

  “Writing my sister’s obituary,” he answered without looking up.

  I grabbed the phone and dialed Rosemary’s number. She answered on the first ring.

  “Are you alright?” Even though it wasn’t yet seven o’clock on the West Coast, her voice was alert and anxious—and maybe a little bit irritated. “We’ve been worried sick about you ever since you sent that stupid text.”

  “I’m fine, Rosie. I’m sorry about the cryptic text, but I had a good reason.”

  “Right. Let me guess, traipsing around playing girl detective with a total stranger.”

  “Well, yeah. Listen, I really don’t have time for the lecture right now. But I promise I’ll call you later and let you harangue me for as long as you want.”

  “I’m not haranguing you,” she harangued.

  “Sure, okay. Lecture, scold, rant—you can pick the verb. But can we do it later, please?”

  She was silent for a moment and then let out her breath in a big whoosh. “Fine. I’m sorry. I’m just worried.” />
  “I know. I get it. I’m calling because I need your help.” I knew that would get her attention. As the oldest, Rosemary loved to be consulted. She thrived on fixing problems for me and Sage, dispensing advice, and generally being in charge of our lives.

  “Of course. Anything,” she said instantly. “What’s going on?”

  I laid out the entire situation—the stage blood; the note addressed to Victor; the crazed gunmen stalking us; all of it. I paused for a breath.

  “You spent the night with him?” she asked in a scandalized whisper.

  “Focus, Rosemary. People were shooting at us.”

  “Right. Sorry. Okay, so what’s the plan?”

  “We need Dave to hook us up with someone he knows and trusts in local law enforcement. We think we can lure Helena’s ex-husband into a trap, but we need someone to, you know, arrest him once we do.”

  “A trap?” Her voice dripped with skepticism.

  “It’ll work.”

  “Uh-huh.”

  “Can I please just talk to Dave?”

  She huffed a little at that but passed the phone to her boyfriend.

  “What’s up, Thyme?”

  I repeated the story for him, talking over his outburst when I got to the part about the Portuguese guys with the guns. I explained the fake funeral idea and then said, “Can you help us?”

  He was silent for a long time—so long, in fact, that I thought our call might have gotten disconnected.

  “Dave?”

  “I’m here. I’m just speechless. I thought your sister here was the most reckless, idiotic woman alive when she tried to catch Amber’s murderer singlehandedly.”

  “Dave—”

  He rolled right over me. “But then, your other idiotic sister drove a flipping golf cart through a window to confront a murderer on that island in South Carolina, and I thought, no, Sage takes the cake.”

  “Listen—”

  “But, now, now I see that this is hereditary. As a result of some genetic defect, the Field women seem to think they are superheroes with crime-fighting ability. Your plan is foolish, dangerous, and—”

  “Let me stop you right there. First, I’ll remind you that both Rosemary and Sage succeeded. Alayna’s in prison for the murder of Amber Patrick and the attempted murder of her stepson. And Linda Zaharee is awaiting trial for her role in the murder of Fred Spears. So tell me again how stupid we are?”