“Quincy, I wouldn’t have missed it for the world. I just wanted to say goodbye. I’ve got a one o’clock flight and I need to stop at the hotel, change and grab my stuff. I just wanted to say how proud I am of you. Everyone in Erie is. Did you see GoErie.com this morning?”
GoErie.com was my hometown, Erie, Pennsylvania’s newspaper’s online site. I shook my head.
“You’re the top story,” she said excitedly. “Front page, above the fold. I’ll send you a couple actual paper copies when I get home.”
I hugged her again. “I’m so glad you came.”
“You’ve built a good life for yourself here in LA, Quincy. I loved meeting your friends. And I love that you not only kept those silly star-shaped glasses all these years, but that you wore them on the red carpet.”
“You believed in me, Lottie. I can’t tell you how much that meant to me when I first got out here. I was alone, and though I’d never admit it, I was afraid. Those glasses were a tangible sign that someone believed in me. They were a talisman of sort.”
I am not a hugger but Lottie is, so we hugged.
“And thank you for never saying anything about—” she started.
I shushed her. She didn’t need to finish. I knew what she was talking about. It was a tiny little mystery I’d solved on a Christmas visit. A mystery I’d never write about or mention, but in my head I called it Spruced Up. It sort of fit with the other two titles.
“The money you donated made a big difference,” she whispered. “Thank you again.”
I saw Lottie out and went back into the tent that filled up Jerome and Peri’s backyard. I looked out over everyone in the crowd. My three boys were in a corner with my parents, brothers and their wives who’d come in from Erie, Pennsylvania, my hometown.
Friends. Old friends. New friends. They filled the tent.
Lottie was right. I’d built a very good life for myself in LA.
A happy life.
I was a very lucky woman.
About nine a.m. people finally had partied enough. They left in groups. My family left, too. They were going to the hotel to change, then straight to the airport. Let’s face it, the fact all six of them were doctors meant that my hometown, Erie, PA, couldn’t do without them for long.
My three boys, Hunter, Miles, and Eli hugged me before they left to go back to their college dorms. College boys are not normally big huggers, especially when their mother isn’t a hugger by nature. I got a bit misty.
Hunter said, “We’re so proud of you, Mom.”
I moved from misty to teary in a literal blink of the eye. The boys were all a year apart. Hunter had just turned twenty and the other boys had birthdays soon. They’d be nineteen and eighteen. Yes, soon all my kids would be legally adults. The thought was unsettling.
I’d thought I’d have this entire year with just Eli at home, but he’d finished his high school credits, graduated over the holidays, and started college after the holidays.
I had an empty nest sooner than expected. And I’d told Cal I wanted the experience of being on my own, but these few months seemed long enough. Yes, by August I’d be more than ready to be officially engaged.
The boys had barely left my hug when Peri ran up and hugged all three of them. “Now you all be good, but not too good,” she teased.
The boys all laughed.
Some mothers would be intimidated if their ex-husband’s new wife was on good terms with her kids, but not me…not with Peri. I mean, she landed the role of Shaley in the movie. That meant she was playing a teenager even though she was in her twenties. I remember my twenties and my teens in a distant sort of way. I certainly couldn’t play a teen or even a twenty year old in a movie.
But I couldn’t resent the fact Peri played a teenager because Peri is…Peri. Not liking Peri would be like not liking Santa Claus.
Or kittens.
Or rainbows.
My mother had tried not to like her, and generally when Judith Quincy Mac set her mind to something she succeeded. Except with not liking Peri. Mom admitted failure in short order and now they were friends.
After the boys left, Peri said, “Listen, you don’t have to be the last man standing. You just go home and I’ll see everyone else out.”
“But I thought I’d wait and help clean up.”
“Quincy, this was your party. The guest of honor—the Mortie Award winning writer—doesn’t clean up after her own party.”
“But—” I tried to interrupt, but Peri interrupted my interruption. “Even if you are a maid by trade. Tonight, or this morning, you’re an award-winning writer. Go home and try to get some sleep.”
“Let me just get my things.” Before I could turn around, Peri hugged me, too.
“I’m so proud of you,” she said. “And I’m so thrilled that my first real acting credit was in your movie.”
I’d often joked that when Jerome divorced her—Jerome always divorces his wives before they hit twenty-five—I was going to adopt her. Only it wasn’t really a joke. The boys and I—and my mom—had decided that Peri was family.
We all know that family isn’t about blood…it’s about love. So no matter what, we were keeping Peri.
I hadn’t realized just how exhausted I was. I dragged myself upstairs to get my stuff and Cal’s.
I opened the door to Hunter’s room.
“Oh, no. Not again.”
Chapter Two
“Oh, no. Not again,” I said a second time as I stood in the doorway and looked in the room.
And for a moment, time stood still.
Then the next moment, time rewound and I was standing in Mr. Banning’s house. I’d just opened his door and found him dead on his bed.
That moment had derailed my life. It had totally pivoted the direction I was moving in.
And now….
I slammed back into the present and there, on Hunter’s bed—on my son’s bed here at his father’s house—was another dead body.
Don’t ask me how I knew Mellie Adams was dead. The fact that her eyes were wide open, but she wasn’t moving was one reason. The fact her face was deathly white was another—I guess there’s a reason they refer to that kind of pallor as deathly white. But really it was whatever had made Mellie Mellie was gone.
That’s when I noticed something other than Mellie being dead. Her dead hands were clutching…a Mortie award.
And that’s when my moment of deja vu muddleness gave way to the horror of the scene in front of me. And I did what any sane woman would…I screamed.
I screamed a girly scream.
I screamed shrill, long, and loud.
I screamed for I don’t know how long, but I finally stopped when I heard footsteps.
“Quince, what the hell?” Cal said as he pulled me into his arms.
“She’s dead.”
“Who—” he started to ask, then stopped as he saw for himself who.
“Not again,” he said.
“That’s exactly what I said,” I told him.
“Did you go in the room?”
“No.”
“Good. No one goes in that room until the authorities arrive.” He reached in far enough to grab the door hand and shut the door.
He pulled his phone out of his pocket and dialed.
I didn’t point out that he was part of the authorities.
And then I realized if he was here in the house where a dead body was discovered then he wasn’t a cop in this case…he was a suspect.
So was everyone who’d been at the party.
And everyone who was here was a friend or a loved one.
People came up the stairs to see what was going on, but Cal waved them away. He said something. I couldn’t seem to follow what those words were as the weight of what this meant sank in.
Mellie was dead in Peri’s house. In my son’s room. In my son’s bed. I’d seen her alive when she arrived, which means she was killed sometime during the party. A party where my friends and family were all guests.
That meant everyone I loved would be considered a suspect.
I’m not sure if Cal dialed 911, or called the station directly. I could see him talking on the phone but I’m not sure what he said. I think he waved more people away. I’m not sure.
It was as if all the sound around me went watery. Like I was in the deep end of a pool and someone was talking to me from the diving board. I knew Cal was saying things to me, but I couldn’t make out what.
I’d figured out who killed Mr. Banning because I was terrified I’d go to prison for a crime I didn’t commit…but had cleaned.
I figured out who stole paintings from our clients and replaced them with forgeries in order to save my business, Mac’Cleaner’s, reputation.
I’d figured out who stole supplies from my parents’ practice in order to please my mother…maybe I did it to prove that although I wasn’t a doctor like everyone else in the family, I had talents. But I’d never told anyone that I’d solved that particular mystery, though my mother guessed.
But this time the stakes were much higher than saving myself, or saving my business, or pleasing my mother.
This time I had to find the real killer because someone I love might end up being wrongly accused.
Now when Steamed came out on the HeartMark channel, a few of the negative reviews referred to my character in the movie as ‘ditzy.’ They scoffed at the idea of anyone worrying they’d be convicted of a murder they didn’t commit but merely had cleaned.
But here’s the thing, my Uncle Bill, the only other non-doctor in the family, had gone to jail for a crime he didn’t commit. Eventually he was released but not until after he’d gotten a tattoo.
Macs do not get tattoos.
They don’t go to prison, even if they’re simply wrongly accused and convicted.
I felt sick thinking about the cops coming to my parents’ hospital and dragging my mother out of surgery and taking her to jail.
My mother would not survive prison. Or my father, my brothers or my sisters-in-law.
Or what if the cops suspected my boys?
The images of friends who’d come to the party to support me, friends who would now be considered suspects ran through my mind like a slideshow. Tiny. Sal. Peri. Big G… Heck even Theresa, the worst employee in the history of Mac’Cleaners.
Well, she used to be the worst employee, but once I got involved with the movie, I’d stepped back on the day-to-day operations and Theresa started to do more office work and it turned out she was wonderful at that. She was dating my computer guru resource, Rob, now. What about him? I don’t know if he’d survive in a cell with no computer and no internet.
Why was I thinking about Theresa and Rob when Mellie Adams was dead in my son’s bed?
At some point I must have sat down because I was on the floor in Jerome’s hall because Cal was kneeling next to me.
“Quince, come on. Pull it together.”
“Okay, Cal.” I said the words, but I wasn’t sure I could manage to follow through.
He kissed me. “It will be all right.”
“Will it? Because from where I’m sitting—from where I’m literally sitting—it looks like a total wreck. It’s been more than a year since anything even remotely mysterious happened. I thought I was done with dead bodies and art heists. And yet, here I am, on a night that should have been one of the highlights of my life, and there’s a dead freakin’ body in my son’s bed. The body of the meanest-spirited woman I ever met. Figuring out who wanted to kill Mellie Adams is going to be difficult because everyone who ever met that woman wanted to kill her at one time or another.”
“Quincy, you can’t say things like that.”
“Really? You think whoever investigates this won’t realize she was an awful woman and everyone who worked with her on this movie wanted to strangle her at least once…once a day, if not more often? I don’t think anyone, even the actors from the movie, are good enough at acting to sell that.”
He sighed. “I know. I talked to her tonight, this morning. Peri asked me to ask her to leave. She wasn’t invited, you know.”
“Oh, I know.” Then I realized what he was saying. “When did you talk to her?”
“About an hour ago.” He paused a moment, then said, “And afterward, I saw her go upstairs. I assumed she was getting her things.”
“Oh.” I let the ramification of his statement sink in. There was a good chance Cal had been one of the last people to see Mellie alive.
“Did you see her come back down?”
“No. I started talking to Big G and Honey,” he said. “I remembering thinking they seemed perfect together. And then I thought about how much you’d like that.”
“Quincy, you need to get out of here,” Peri said as she crested the stairway. “I told you, I’d take care of seeing everyone else out.”
“Peri,” Cal said, “You can’t let anyone leave. I’d appreciate it if you asked everyone who’s still here to wait for a few minutes. We have a slight problem.”
“What kind of problem? Is everything all right?”
“I—”
And Cal seemed unable to find the words to tell her.
Peri was sweetness personified. How was she going to cope with knowing someone died in her house?
I used to own this house. My sons still stayed here on a regular basis. And I knew I was never going to think about this house the same way.
And as I had that thought I felt guilty because I wasn’t mourning Mellie. But really, who would? I was upset that this had happened here. That it was going to impact my friends and family. That it was going to taint this house I used to call home, and now Peri called home.
“Peri—” I started to tell her, but Cal grabbed my arm and shook his head.
“We’ll be down in a few minutes and fill everyone in. A few cops are coming—”
“Are your friends are coming to congratulate Quincy? I wish you would have said something. I’d have put them on the guest list. We’ll I’ll just keep everyone who’s still here here…if that makes sense.” And with a laugh she bolted down the stairs before I could stop her.
“We should tell her,” I said.
“No. We can’t leave the room unattended and it would be best if no one knows that we found the body. If the killer is here we want him or her to stay here.”
I nodded.
That’s when it really sank in…the killer had been in this house.
Odds were that they were an invited guest. Someone I knew. Maybe someone I loved.
It had been over a year since I felt I needed to use my white-board. But I had a feeling I’d be dragging it out of storage and setting it up again when I got home.
I glanced at Cal.
I knew he’d tell me not to meddle. He’d tell me to trust that his friends, whoever was assigned to the case, would figure out who killed Mellie Adams.
And I knew that I couldn’t do that. I couldn’t trust the lives of people I loved to anyone but myself.
I was sure my writing mentor Dick Macy would be thrilled that I’d found myself thick in the midst of another mystery.
That made one of us.
Chapter Three
Detective Charles Randolph was a long, slow sip of cold water on a hot summer’s day. That’s what Grandma Mac would have said. And in this case, I’d have to agree with her.
Now, I know I’m almost engaged, but being almost engaged doesn’t mean I couldn’t appreciate a work of art when I spotted one.
Detective Charlie was that and then some.
He was tall, lean, and had intense eyes. Dark, short hair that was temptingly thick. It made a woman want to run her fingers through it.
He was also a very good listener.
He had me tell him in minute detail what had happened. He listened intently as I tried to go back over it.
Then he asked about the party itself, who was there. What I remembered of Mellie’s arrival.
I decided honesty was the best policy. I recounted e
verything I remembered. Mellie arrived. She made the rounds. I was not pleased. And I noticed no one else seemed overjoyed to see her. “And I’m not talking about just the movie crew, I’m talking about everyone. Mellie has—had—a way about her. She acted as if she was superior to everyone. From my parents, to the cast, to the crew, to my friends. Even the catering staff wore the exact same expression after they’d endured Mellie’s attention.”
“What expression was that?” he asked.
“Have you ever asked for something and got something totally different? For instance, I had a friend from Japan back in high school—an exchange student. Her family put sugar on their popcorn. The first time we went to the movies together, she grabbed a handful of popcorn. There was shock and distaste on her face. Or, when my mom and I went to Canada and she asked for iced tea. Now, if we’re down south, we know to ask if it’s sweet tea or unsweetened. But Canada is more north than Erie, my hometown, and it seemed like they should have northern US tea’s blackness. Uh, they don’t. My mom—my very prim and proper mom—took a drink and got that same look and then she choked tea out her nose.
“That’s the look people get when Mellie breezed by them. She’s—she was a beautiful woman. They expected her to be as sweet as she looked. They got that look when they realized she was not.”
“So no one liked her.” Randolph made it more a statement then a question.
“No one. I could lie to you, but I find it’s best to avoid lying to the cops.”
“And you’ve had a lot of experience with that, haven’t you?” He gave me a look that said he knew all about my other brush-ups with the cops. Of course, since the movie, even people who didn’t hear about Mr. Banning’s murder at the time knew about it now.
“I—” I had no idea how to answer that question. I’d never really lied to cops. Not to Cal or Mickey Roman, who investigated the missing paintings. But I hadn’t been exactly forthright. I could have shared more of my own investigation with them.
Charlie—it made me feel more at ease to think of him as Charlie, rather than Detective Randolph—set his notebook down and looked at me in that intense way of his. “Quincy—may I call you Quincy?”
Swept Up (Maid in LA Mystery #4) Page 2