A Darling of Death

by Gin Jones

  Helen handed over her cane, and then watched as Mia demonstrated the entire sequence of movements. It looked complicated, but she felt soothed just watching it. Actually doing it would be even better, she thought.

  Next, Mia began showing Helen the individual forms that made up the exercise. Each of the arm and leg movements was simple enough, carrying with them a sense of relaxation without causing anything more than a few twinges in her troublesome hip. It was only when she tried to combine them in a series that she lost her balance and half-fell against the chair that she'd disdained leaning on until then.

  "Don't worry. It just takes practice to get the routine down, and then it will come naturally." Mia glanced at a clock high on the wall, near the transom windows. "I need to run to my office for two minutes to make a quick call, and then we can begin again. While I'm gone, you can practice your beautiful lady's hands. Do you remember how to do that?"

  The exercise involved turning slowly at the waist while her arms drew large, overlapping circles in front of her, parallel to her chest. At the same time, she was supposed to keep her hands both perfectly straight and perfectly relaxed. All while breathing deeply in harmony with the movements. It sounded simple, but when she put her body in motion, it felt as awkward as trying to pat her head while rubbing her belly.

  Not that Helen would admit she wasn't up to the challenge. Instead, she nodded her understanding. "I'll work on it."

  "Good." Mia jogged off, promising, "I'll be right back."

  Helen turned her back on the potentially busier entrance and locker rooms so she wouldn't be distracted by people arriving, and instead faced the area containing the unoccupied exercise equipment. She felt a bit silly, standing all alone in the cavernous space, waving her arms like the ridiculous robot on the vintage TV show Lost in Space, but after about a minute she could feel her shoulder joints loosening and sweat covering her skin.

  Of course, in this heat wave, it didn't take much to get sweaty, but Helen chose not to think about that. Instead, she focused on how, for the first time in about five years, ever since her lupus symptoms had gone from being a nuisance to being a disability, she was actually exercising. It might not be as intense a workout as Danica got from Sambo sparring, but it was a start.

  Helen was confident she'd be ready for the next step—hitting things—in no time at all.

  * * *

  By the time Mia reappeared—closer to ten minutes later than just two—Helen wasn't feeling quite so enthusiastic about working out. She'd continued doing her beautiful lady's hands in the stuffy, hot air that whole time, determined to show Danica, or anyone else who might be watching, that needing to use a cane did not mean she was weak-willed.

  Unfortunately, there was no denying that she was weak-bodied. Her arms felt like lead, and the initial pleasant sheen of sweat had turned into a raging torrent.

  It seemed absurd to think that she was struggling to turn at her waist and wave her arms in the air. If anyone asked, she was blaming her exhaustion on the challenge of keeping her hands both perfectly straight and softly relaxed. It was going to take a lot of practice before her hands looked even remotely like a beautiful lady's. Which seemed pointless anyway. Helen didn't care about being beautiful; she cared about being strong.

  "Very good," Mia said from right behind Helen, startling her. "You've definitely got perseverance. That will help with the rest. But you've done enough for today." She picked up Helen's cane and held it out. "Why don't you come back at the same time tomorrow, and we'll work some more on putting the individual moves together."

  "I'll see you then." Helen let her arms fall to her side, not entirely sure she'd have the strength to take her cane back.

  She managed to accept it without dropping it, though, and Mia trotted off to greet a group of three younger, fitter-looking women who'd just come through the front door. The four of them disappeared into Mia's office, although it was hard to imagine how they had all squeezed into the tiny space.

  Helen trudged across the mats, unable to think of anything but how sweltering the air was and how anxious she was to escape the heat and humidity by climbing into her car where Jack would undoubtedly have the air-conditioner set at just the right temperature for her. She stumbled slightly at the sudden, worrisome thought that perhaps the renovations of the warehouse hadn't yet extended to the installation of anything more than extremely basic communal shower facilities. After all, Kolya had only opened the place two months ago, and he might not have had sufficient funds for something as expensive as major plumbing upgrades.

  As Helen entered the locker room, she heard running water somewhere toward the back of the space. She wouldn't have to resort to splashing herself at a sink to cool off, but before she undressed, she wanted to see what the facilities looked like.

  She passed the rows of lockers and benches to where she could see that the last fifteen feet of the room had been turned into a communal shower with basic white subway tiles on the walls and a textured gray surface on the floor. A half-wall, coming almost up to Helen's neck, separated the shower from the locker room, except for a three-foot-wide opening in the middle. From where she stood, the half wall blocked her view of most of the interior. Still, she could see enough to know that the facilities weren't luxurious or private, but they were clean and more than adequate to rinse off her sticky sweat, which was starting to dry and make her skin itch.

  She was about to go back to her locker, get undressed, and grab a towel when it dawned on her that while she heard water falling, she didn't hear anyone moving around inside the shower. Perhaps there was a broken faucet that needed to be reported to Kolya. It was also possible someone had left it on intentionally to waste the water as a petty bit of revenge against the studio's owner. That seemed unlikely, though. Danica wasn't the passive-aggressive type—she'd have punched Kolya if she were angry enough to want to hurt him—and Helen hadn't noticed any other female gym members come in while she'd been learning the basics of Tai Chi. Of course, she might have missed them. She'd had her back turned to the entrance and the locker rooms for most of the time, and she'd been trying to block out distractions so she could concentrate on her movements and her breathing.

  Helen peered around the corner of the half wall. A woman with spiky red hair lay face-down and motionless on the shower floor. Next to her head, a bunched-up towel had blocked the drain, forming a pool a couple of inches deep and about two feet across.

  The water had a pink tinge to it. At first Helen thought maybe the woman's hair wasn't natural and some excess dye was washing out. Then she traced the color back to its source: a large, bloody gash in Danica's forehead.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  Detective Almeida had still been out in front of the Zubov House of Sambo, waiting for the tow truck to arrive, when the dispatcher responding to Helen's 9-1-1 call sent out a request for officers to respond to the scene. Almeida came running into the locker room and called out, "Hello?"

  "Over here." Helen had remained in the communal shower, feeling someone ought to stay with the body.

  The detective came around the half wall a moment later. She acknowledged Helen's presence with a brief nod and then squatted down to check for a pulse. After a moment, she took out her cell phone to advise someone to come check out the scene.

  Almeida gestured for Helen to precede her out of the shower to the nearby changing area. "Detective Peterson will be here in a few minutes."

  "Wonderful." Helen flopped onto the bench across from the entrance to the shower, belatedly aware of the soggy sound of her drenched sneakers. Her clothes were also drenched, but unfortunately she didn't feel noticeably cooler. The air inside the locker room was stale, without the benefit of ceiling fans that at least moved around the hot air in the workout area. "I haven't been patronized in…oh, about a week now. I can always count on Peterson to make my day."

  "Mine too." Almeida came over to straddle the bench beside Helen. "Of course, if you ask him, you're the problem, not the other
way around. I guess I should thank you for my job security. Peterson says the serious crime rate has skyrocketed since you moved to town, and until then, he could handle the investigations all by himself."

  "At least something good has come out of my moving here, if it got the town to hire you." Helen bent to remove her soaked sneakers. "Seriously, though, do you think it was murder? Not just an accident?"

  "I'm not sure. That's why I called in Peterson. Even if he doesn't have the best witness-side manner, he's seen a lot more crime scenes than I have."

  That was an appalling thought. Peterson had been supervising murder investigations for more than a decade. Helen couldn't help wondering how many of those cases might have been mishandled as badly as the ones she'd observed him bungle. How many had resulted in the wrong person being arrested or no one being arrested? She doubted the Wharton Police Department had much of a budget for looking into cold cases.

  Before Helen could worry about all the likely victims of Peterson's incompetence, a pair of young, male EMTs burst into the locker room, distracting her. It didn't take long for them to confirm that Danica was indeed beyond any help they could give her and relay that information to Detective Almeida.

  They were just leaving when Peterson showed up. He was a short, stocky man who, despite his lack of height, managed to look down his nose at pretty much everyone, including his significantly taller junior detective. With Helen seated, it was even easier for him to discount her, but she was still a little shaken by what had happened to Danica and wasn't sure she could get up from the bench without some assistance. There was no way she would ever ask Peterson for a hand.

  Not that he would offer one, either, unless it was to clap handcuffs on her.

  Peterson snapped at Almeida, "What's she doing here?"

  "Ms. Binney found the body, sir," Almeida explained calmly as she got to her feet. "She doesn't know much more than the woman's name, though."

  Peterson grunted and stepped through the opening in the half wall. "Did she mess with the scene?"

  Almeida turned to Helen, who said, "I moved her face out of a puddle of water, in case she was still alive, and I turned off the shower after I called 9-1-1. The water was running when I came into the locker room. That's why I went into the showers in the first place. To see if I could turn it off. I didn't think anyone was in there."

  Almeida looked like she was going to add something, but then thought better of it.

  Peterson emerged from the shower area. "I don't know why you called me in on this, Almeida. Simple accident. Woman slipped, hit her head, and bled out. Happens all the time."

  "Slips and falls happen frequently, yes," Almeida said. "But they aren't usually fatal."

  "True." Peterson glanced in Helen's direction before adding, "I suppose we'd better go ahead and have the forensics team do their thing. Waste of valuable time and resources, but Ms. Binney will make a fuss if we don't do it, and that will lead to an even bigger waste of resources."

  Almeida was already scrolling through the contacts on her phone. "I'll take care of it, sir. And I'll take Ms. Binney's formal statement."

  "Better give her a chance to call her lawyer first." Peterson smirked at Helen. "You wouldn't need to keep him on retainer if you'd just stay out of things that don't involve you. It would save both you and the department a whole lot of aggravation."

  Helen opted not to mention that Tate was no longer her lawyer. The less Peterson knew about her relationship with Tate, the better. "I really didn't plan for Danica to die while I was here visiting the gym."

  "Perhaps not," Peterson said. "But since it was all just a coincidence, nothing to do with you, then you've got no reason to meddle with Detective Almeida's case."

  "My case, sir?" Almeida asked, sounding equal parts surprised and excited.

  "Sure," he said over his shoulder as he headed for the exit. "Why not? It's going to be ruled an accident anyway, so you might as well get some hands-on experience with running a case."

  Helen waited until Peterson was out of earshot and Almeida had completed her call to the forensics team before asking, "Well, what's your theory of the case? Was it an accident?"

  "I have no idea," Almeida said, proving she was already a better investigator than her boss would ever be. She peered over the half wall at the interior of the shower, as if memorizing the image of the crime scene.

  "Personally," Helen said, "I think it might not turn out to be a simple slip and fall."

  Almeida turned around, abandoning her study of the crime scene. "Are you sure you aren't just being contrary, automatically taking the opposite position from Peterson?"

  "I hope not. It's just that Danica probably had a lot of people who probably wished her dead or at least in a bit of pain. From what I saw while I was here today, she annoyed absolutely everyone she came in contact with. More than annoyed, actually. Her sparring partner was pretty angry with her, and with good reason." Helen involuntarily glanced in the direction of the shower, and was grateful that the half wall hid her view of the body. "Plus, there's something about the scene that feels off to me. I can't figure out what, though."

  Almeida nodded. "Something feels wrong to me too. Something about the water, I think, and the way you said her face was submerged in it. Perhaps the forensics and autopsy will give us more to go on."

  "Give you more to go on," Helen corrected. "Peterson was right for a change. Danica's death has nothing to do with me. I just want to get some exercise."

  * * *

  Helen had Jack stop briefly at the community garden to collect a tomato on the way to getting lunch at the local deli and finally heading back to the cottage to share her harvest with Tate. He spent most of his days in her garage, which served as his woodworking studio now that he was retired from the practice of law. They'd taken to having lunch together every day except Saturday, when her nieces drove the two hours from Boston for a family brunch, which was really just a thinly disguised excuse to make sure she wasn't doing anything they disapproved of.

  Unlike Helen's forced early retirement, Tate's had been voluntary. In his early fifties, he was tall and lean, with just a smattering of gray in his dark hair. Usually, when Helen arrived for lunch, she wouldn't have been able to tell what color his hair was, since wherever it wasn't covered by his eye and ear protection, it was buried under a thick layer of sawdust and wood shavings.

  Today, though, Tate wasn't standing at his lathe, oblivious to his surroundings. Instead, he was waiting for her at the little table for two that she'd set up in the far corner for their lunches. She should have known something was up when she'd found the door slightly ajar, an apparent invitation for visitors to enter. He never encouraged visitors. The open door was more likely to have been an attempt to improve the air circulation. Despite being shaded by the many trees on the property, the windowless garage tended to get a bit stuffy during hot weather.

  Tate immediately got to his feet to acknowledge her arrival and even smiled at her approach.

  That wasn't like him at all. She knew he was always pleased to see her, even when he grumbled about his work being interrupted. And he did have good manners. But usually when she came through the garage door, he was so engrossed in his work that he simply didn't notice. He liked to eat, but he liked woodturning even more and tended to be oblivious to the passing of time until after she'd finished setting the table and opening the food containers. She was pretty sure it was the aromas sneaking past the smell of shaved wood that usually caught his attention, not her own charms.

  "Am I late?" Even as she asked it, she realized how foolish the question was. It wasn't like they'd ever scheduled a lunch date for today or any other day. They'd just sort of drifted into a habit of eating together around noon, taking turns bringing the food.

  He shook his head. "Not late. I just wanted to talk."

  That sounded ominous. They always talked during lunch. Tate was a great conversationalist, and she loved his dry sense of humor. He had to know he didn
't need an actual appointment to talk to her. Unless he had something particularly serious on his mind. He did like to protect her from perceived dangers, including what he saw as her occasional bad judgment. She didn't resent his interference too much. It was well-intentioned, and she knew that fretting about the people they cared about was an occupational hazard for lawyers, even after they'd retired.

  Helen tried not to cause him any unnecessary worries—they both had enough to handle with her health issues—but she hadn't been able to keep him from her role in the discovery of Danica's body before she could reassure him that there was nothing to worry about. News traveled fast in a town as small as Wharton.

  "It wasn't my fault." Helen dropped the takeout bags on the little table and flopped into her seat, thankful she'd recently replaced Tate's ratty old director's chairs with more sturdy furniture. "I was just doing what everyone told me to do—get more exercise. How was I supposed to know there might be a body in the shower?"

  Tate had long since perfected the art of controlling his facial muscles to avoid giving away his thoughts during negotiations as a lawyer, but at her words, he blinked and his eyebrows rose an infinitesimally small fraction of an inch. "A body in the shower?"

  Oops. He hadn't heard yet. She'd assumed someone in one of his circles—either his large, extended family who lived nearby or his ex-colleagues in the legal field—had heard and told him about it. Apparently not, though. He must have turned off his phone to concentrate on his woodworking and forgotten to turn it back on when he'd stopped to wait for her.

  If he didn't know about the death, then what else could he want to discuss with her so seriously? Perhaps he'd happened to look out the garage window when Jack had dropped her off out front and had seen the damage to her car. "Oh, you mean the car accident. That wasn't my fault either. Or Jack's. Some idiot cut us off and bumped into us. Fortunately, it was in a parking lot, so we weren't going very fast, and no one was hurt. Just some property damage. Jack's taking the car to his cousin's place now to get the body work done and the airbags replaced."