by Kylie Logan
After what I’d learned from Dulcie, I felt a little funny defending Meghan. “Well, she did notice. Of course she noticed. Didn’t she put you in a rehab program?”
“That was Wilma,” Spencer told me. “I stayed exactly two days. That was enough for me. I told my counselor the truth. I told Wilma the truth. My mom . . .” His lips puckered. “I didn’t set her straight. Why bother?”
Honestly, I would have pulled the kid into a hug if I knew I could get away with it and not embarrass him to death.
Instead, I cleared away the tremor in my voice. “Is that what you wanted to talk to me about?”
“No. I mean, not exactly. See, I was thinking about how things are like that in movies. You know, like I said, when a kid needs advice and some smart adult gives it to him. And I was thinking that even if I didn’t want to tell you something, I should tell you because, you know . . .” He looked away. “I need to follow my heart.”
My voice clogged all over again. “That’s very brave.”
“It isn’t, not really. Because it’s just you and me talking and, like I said, what I’m going to tell you, it doesn’t really mean anything. But I found out yesterday, see, and last night, I figured I just wouldn’t tell anyone on account of how bad it was going to look if I did. And the funny thing is, I couldn’t sleep. Not all night long.”
He wrinkled his nose, thinking his way through this baffling turn of events.
“Is that what they call conscience?” he asked.
I dared to lean nearer. “It is. And when you’re mature enough to listen to your conscience, that’s what they call growing up.”
“It’s not much fun.”
“It can be,” I assured him. “But not all the time. Sometimes, it’s all about doing what’s right. What’s the right thing you know you have to do, Spencer?”
“Like I told you, I was investigating.” He looked at me, then quickly looked away, obviously gauging my reaction. “And before you get all bent out of shape and start talking about how dangerous something like that is, let me tell you that it’s not like I was out poking around anyplace I shouldn’t be or anything. I was back at the hotel where me and Wilma are staying. It’s kind of like a suite, you know? I have a bedroom and Wilma has a bedroom and there’s a door in between that we can open. My mom . . .” Just thinking about it made him shake his head in wonder. “I bet she never dreamed she’d ever stay in a place like that.”
I thought back to what we’d learned about Tina Moretti from Dulcie and wondered if that was true.
“So you were at the hotel.” I got Spencer back on track. “And what happened?”
“It was Wilma. She was on the phone and—” Spencer popped out of his chair. “It doesn’t mean anything,” he said, his voice high and tight. “I shouldn’t have bothered you. I was just messing around, that’s all, pretending to be a detective and listening to her on the phone, and what I heard, it doesn’t matter because it doesn’t mean anything.”
From the note of despair in his voice, I knew I was going to lose Spencer, and whatever information he might have. I had to move slowly, cautiously. I forced myself to sit back and I can’t say if I looked casual or not. I can say only that I sure tried.
“You know, I’ve solved a couple of murders,” I told Spencer.
He didn’t want to be interested, but he couldn’t help himself. His eyes lit up. “You said you weren’t a detective.”
“Well, I’m not. Not really. But that doesn’t mean I can’t watch people. And listen. And pay attention to what’s happening around me. That’s what detectives do, right?”
“In the movies, they have car chases and gun battles.”
“But you know the movies aren’t real. In real life, solving crimes isn’t about chases and shooting, it’s all about thinking, all about using your head.” I should have known better than to knock my index finger against my skull so soon after having a head injury, but it seemed like the perfect way to demonstrate and at least it didn’t hurt. Well, not too much.
“What I do is look at a situation and evaluate it. I use logic and reasoning. You learned about that in school, right?”
He made a face. “I don’t always pay attention in school.”
I laughed. “I never did, either. And you know what, I’m sorry now that I didn’t listen better. Everything I’ve learned about being a detective, I’ve had to learn on my own. It hasn’t been easy.”
“But they don’t teach you how to be a detective in school.”
“No, but they teach you how to think. And what detectives do is think. Like you were thinking yesterday back when you were at the hotel and you heard Wilma on the phone. Now, as a detective, what you need to do is step back and think about that incident. You need to consider what you saw and what you heard. You need to spend time thinking about what it is that kept you awake all night. You remember everything you saw and heard, right?”
He nodded.
“Well, the next step is to evaluate it all. Then you make decisions based on what you found out. Only when you’re just starting out as a detective, you can’t always do all that on your own. You need a sidekick.”
“You mean like”—he ran his tongue over his lips—“you?”
“Well, I’d be happy to be your sidekick if you’ll have me. But only if you’ll be mine.”
“Really?” He sat on the edge of his chair. “You’d do that? For me? You’ll let me join in on the investigation? Wow! We have a lot we need to talk about. Like code words, you know?”
I didn’t, and I admitted it.
It was obvious that in Spencer’s eyes, I was really old, or really lame. Or both.
His sigh pretty much communicated that loud and clear.
“When we talk to each other, you know, on the phone,” he said. “We should have a way of letting each other know if the coast is clear, or if there’s a problem.”
“You mean like if the coast is clear, we should say the coast is clear.”
This time I earned an eye roll for my efforts.
“I think we need to be more subtle than that.” The kid sure had a flare for the dramatic. But then, his mother was no slouch in that department. “So let’s say . . .” Thinking, he squinched his eyes shut. “If everything’s okay, we’ll say Rabbit. Or we’ll put it in a text. Can you remember that?”
I felt a little weird getting directions from a seventeen-year-old, but I knew I had to play along.
“Rabbit.” I nodded. “Got it.”
“And if there’s a problem . . . if somebody’s got their eye on us, or if somebody’s following us or something, then we’ll say . . .”
“Ostrich,” I suggested.
“That’s good.” When Spencer grinned, I realized it was one of the few times I’d seen the kid smile. That made the whole James Bond, secret-code thing worth it. “Since neither one of us would probably say rabbit or ostrich just talking everyday talk, it’s perfect. So that’s it. We’re partners. So . . . now . . .” He pulled his phone out of his pocket. “Now we can keep track of each other and we’ll know where we are in our investigation.”
“You mean, like I’ll call you and you’ll call me?”
Spencer shook his head. I was, apparently, just not with it.
“Like with this app.” He brought it up on his phone. “Place My Pals. It will let me see where you are, and you can see where I am, too. Go ahead.” He motioned for me to get out my phone. “Add it to your apps.”
I can’t say I was convinced of the benefits, but I did as I was instructed.
“There.” For Spencer, that’s all it took to make the whole thing official. “We’re partners, you have to tell me everything.” With a wave of his left hand, Spencer urged me to spill the beans. “What do you know so far?”
“Not very much. I do know there’s an old friend of your mother’s in the area, a wo
man named Dulcie Thoroughgood. Do you remember your mom ever talking about her?”
He shook his head, and I wasn’t surprised. Other than having some nameless accountant write that check to Dulcie every month, I was sure Meghan never spared her a thought. I was also sure, though, that doling out this little tidbit of information would make me look like I was willing to share. Just like I hoped Spencer would be.
“Did Dulcie kill my mom?” he asked.
“I don’t think so. Which is why I’m still collecting information. If you have any, I’d love to hear it.”
“Even if it doesn’t mean anything?” His expression was pained.
“Even if it doesn’t mean anything.”
He drew in a long breath and let it out slowly. “So here’s the thing. We were at the hotel, me and Wilma. And she said I needed to relax and she made me some hot chocolate. What’s with her? She always thinks that hot chocolate, or soup, or cookies . . . she always thinks something like that will make me feel better.”
“She cares about you.”
“Yeah, well, maybe.” He swallowed hard. “But last night, what she cared about after I was in my room and she thought I was asleep was that money she thought she was getting from the will, the money she didn’t get because none of us got any.”
I sat up. “Really? What did she say?”
“She wasn’t talking to me. She was on the phone. I don’t know who she called, but she was plenty steamed.”
“About the money.”
He nodded.
“She told the person on the phone that she was sure she was going to inherit a bundle. She said Mom owed it to her and she couldn’t believe the—” The tips of Spencer’s ears got red. “I’m not a kid and I know what the word means, but I’m not going to repeat it, not when I’m talking about my own mother.”
“You don’t have to,” I told him.
“She said something about a movie and an . . . an investment. Yeah, that’s what she called it. And I couldn’t hear everything really clear, so I got out of bed and I opened my door just a crack. You know, like a detective would. And Wilma, she was telling the person on the other end of the phone that a couple years ago, she invested all the money she had into Guinevere, you know, that big epic movie Mom was all set to make, the one that flopped because that actor who was going to play King Arthur ended up in jail for tax fraud right when they were set to start filming and Mom’s production company lost a ton of money because of it.”
“A ton of money that came from investors like Wilma,” I said.
Spencer nodded. “That’s right. That’s what Wilma told the person on the phone. Wilma, she said she thought that movie was a sure thing, and that she lost five hundred thousand dollars in the deal and that it was all the money she had saved up for her retirement.”
“Was she angry?” I asked.
One corner of Spencer’s mouth pulled into a cynical sneer. “What do you think?”
“Did she say she was angry at your mom before your mom . . .” Call me a wimp, I just couldn’t look the kid in the eye and say the words before your mom was murdered. “Before your mom came to Hubbard?”
“She said she was more than angry. She said . . . well, that’s what I need you to understand, Laurel. Because, see, Wilma was mad, first because she lost all that money and then, because once Mom was dead, she figured she’d get it back. You know, that Mom would make sure something was left to her in the will. So you can’t blame her for being pissed all over again, like it just happened yesterday. But she said . . .” Spencer pulled in a breath and let it out with a whoosh. “She said that Mom getting murdered, it was the best thing that ever happened, that my mom deserved it. But honest, Laurel, I don’t think she could have meant anything. I mean, anything other than that she was mad and she was getting her feelings out in the open. That’s what my therapist tells me I need to do if I’m ever feeling mad. She says I should express myself, I shouldn’t hold anything in. So that’s why I’m telling you all this, so I can express myself. But you’ve got to understand, Laurel, you know her. You know Wilma wouldn’t kill anybody.”
Chapter 15
“You don’t really think she did it, do you?”
It was a logical question so I gave Declan the logical answer. “Of course not. But don’t you get it? That’s exactly why I need to talk to Wilma. I’ve got to prove she didn’t do it. Before Gus somehow gets wind of all this and thinks he’s found his killer.”
“How well do you know her?”
We were standing in the kitchen at the Terminal, Declan over by the sink and me at the grill because George was taking a break and had gone outside to get some air that wasn’t heavy with the scents of the basil and fennel we’d be using in the shrimp and lemon pasta we were featuring that evening. Unlike George, who would wear fried-onion aftershave if there were such a thing, I happen to love the scent of fennel, and I drew in a deep breath and flipped the two burgers sizzling in front of me. “We worked side by side for six years.”
“And . . . ?”
“And you learn a lot about a person, working with them.”
“But you didn’t know she lost all her money in a lousy investment and blamed Meghan for it.”
“No.” My voice sank along with my spirits. “I didn’t know anything about that.”
“It’s a strong motive. If Wilma was angry . . .”
I remembered what Spencer had told me. “She was, and who can blame her?”
“Then she might have decided revenge was the only possible solution to an impossible problem. Sure, it wasn’t Meghan’s fault the film never got made, but it was her production company behind it. Or let’s look at it another way. Maybe now that all her money’s gone, Wilma figured that once Meghan was dead, she was sure to inherit. Wilma might have seen murder as the only way to get back her life savings.”
“It makes sense.”
“But?”
I gave the burgers another flip before I scooped them off the grill and put them on thick kaiser rolls. Not exactly an Italian dish, but burgers were always popular so we kept them on the menu, no matter what ethnic cuisine we were featuring. Done plating, I went to the front of the kitchen and rang the bell that alerted the waitstaff to the fact that an order was ready for pickup.
Once Inez had come to the kitchen and left with the burgers, I crossed my arms over my chest and leaned back against the stainless counter. “But I don’t know,” I admitted. “But I’m going to find out. I have to. I’ve got to clear Wilma’s name. She’s all Spencer has and if she goes down for this crime, it will break the kid’s heart. As soon as George gets back—”
He picked that moment to walk in through the back door, and I unlooped the white apron from around my neck and handed it to Declan.
“I’m heading out to see Wilma,” I told him.
“Sure you are. And I’m coming with you.”
* * *
• • •
A SHORT WHILE later we were in Austintown. I convinced Declan I might have better luck tackling Wilma alone so he waited in the car while I went to Wilma’s room. I can’t say if she was surprised to see me. I know Spencer wasn’t.
“Rabbit,” he said, barely controlling a conspiratorial smile when he stepped around me and went through the adjoining door and into his room.
Wilma carefully folded a gray cardigan and set it on top of the suitcase open on the couch.
“You’re leaving?”
She sailed back to the bed and brought over a pile of clothing. “There doesn’t seem to be any reason for us to stay. Spencer wanted to follow his mother. He did, and . . .” She sighed and pressed the clothes close to her chest. “Well, nothing good has come of it, has it? The poor boy will live the rest of his life with the memory of his mother’s murder.”
“It wouldn’t be any different if he was back in California.”
&nb
sp; She set the clothes in the suitcase. “Maybe not.”
“And it wouldn’t have changed the reading of Meghan’s will. Or the terms of it.”
At her sides, Wilma’s hands curled into fists. “No. We would have been obliged to be present for that, wouldn’t we? No matter where the will was read. Poor Spencer, subject to such humiliation!”
“I guess he’s not the only one. Especially now that the story has gone public and the world knows what Meghan wants done with all her money.”
Wilma stooped to retrieve a pair of powder blue slippers. She tucked them into her bag. “I’ll get over it,” she assured me, and slid a look at Spencer’s door, which, I noted, was closed—but not all the way. “I’m not so sure about him. A child does not easily forget a parent’s cruelty.”
“Just like an adult doesn’t forget when they lose a whole lot of money on a movie that never got made.”
Wilma froze. But only for a heartbeat. Then her shoulders rose and fell. “How did you find out?”
“Does it matter?”
“No. Just like the money no longer matters. I thought once Meghan was dead, my troubles would be over and my retirement fund would be infused with my inheritance. I was wrong.”
“And angry.”
“About the movie? Or about the money I didn’t inherit?”
“Both, I imagine.”
Wilma’s smile was tight. “Like I said, I’ll get over it.”
“It’s a nice thought, but it doesn’t help much when it comes to motive.”
She winced as if I’d slapped her. “You don’t think—”
“Honestly, Wilma, I don’t know what to think. But I do know that if someone caused me to lose all the money I’d saved for my retirement, I’d be pretty unhappy about it. Motive number one: revenge. Motive number two? If I figured I could kill that person and get all my money back as a result of the terms of the will—”