Murder Among Neighbors (The Kate Austen Mystery Series)

by Jonnie Jacobs

  “Then you don’t know what a slime ball that man is.”

  Actually I’d heard him called worse. “What did he do now?”

  Lily took a deep breath and exhaled slowly. “Well, the other man made some snide comment about the opportune timing of Pepper’s death. Can you imagine? Opportune. What a horrible word to use about someone’s death. And then McGregory said, ‘Maybe this will put an end to that damned petition of hers. The woman’s been a thorn in my side from the start.’ ”

  Here Lily stopped to close her eyes and shudder before continuing. “Then he laughed again and said, ‘I ought to find the guy who did it and offer him a reward.’ ” Lily turned to look at me. “Can you believe it?”

  “Well, he certainly wouldn’t win the Miss Manners award for good breeding, but his animosity toward Pepper is hardly news. And you said yourself he was a slime ball. People like that live in a different world.”

  “But still, to speak like that about someone who is dead. Someone who was m-mur-murdered. It makes me nauseous.”

  I could see that it was indeed making her sick, or at least somewhat unwell. She looked as though she might, at any moment, fall over in a heap. But she pulled herself together and continued.

  “I was at the last town council meeting,” she said. “The meeting where Pepper made that wonderful speech and the council decided to postpone the vote till next month. After the meeting, I saw McGregory grab her by the arm and call her”—here she lowered her voice and held a hand to her mouth to shield innocent bystanders—“a royal bitch. He told her she would regret the day she took him on. Wouldn’t you’d think that now, given what’s happened, he’d feel some remorse?”

  “Maybe he killed her.”

  Lily’s hands flew to her mouth. “Oh. I never thought about that.”

  And here I’d believed that’s what she’d been suggesting.

  “Do you think he did?” she asked with a nervous glance toward the Frog’s Leap table.

  “Probably not. Walnut Hills isn’t exactly Chicago, and it’s quite a jump from slime ball to murderer.” Besides, McGregory had always struck me as the brag-and-bluster type, all show and little substance. I couldn’t imagine that when it came right down to it, he felt passionately about much of anything, except maybe his twenty-two-year-old wife, Lynette.

  Larry came over then with a glass of wine for Lily and a business associate he wanted to introduce her to, so I headed back to refill my plate, promising myself that the following round would be nothing but celery spears and fruit salad. I made a quick sweep of the faces near me, hoping to catch a glimpse of Stone. Then, angry with myself for even thinking about him, I started toward one of the bands.

  This man on the brain stuff was not my usual style. I left that sort of thing to women like Susie Sullivan who seemed constitutionally unable to ignore an attractive male. Sure, now and then I’d admire a firm derriere in a pair of tight jeans, or a set of biceps which seriously tested the stretching power of lightweight jersey, but since I’d married Andy, since I’d met him in fact, I hadn’t actually spent much time thinking about other men. Not that I had found myself thinking about Stone exactly, and certainly not in any substantive way, but something about him affected me nonetheless.

  Just as I neared the knoll where a female singer was trying to dazzle the small crowd gathered around her, I saw him. He was standing off by himself, a glass of seltzer in hand, like a director surveying a scene which wasn’t playing the way he’d envisioned it. At that same moment, he noticed me and started in my direction with a smile. There was a dangerous fluttery feeling in my chest that even my deliberate deep breathing wouldn’t quiet. But what the heck, I was allowed a few harmless fantasies, wasn’t I?

  “This is quite a shindig,” Stone said with a sweep of his free hand.

  I agreed. It was, in fact, an amazing undertaking for a group of rich, pampered housewives. It surprised me every year.

  “And a great selection of wines. Too bad I’m on duty.” Frowning, he raised his glass and inspected it, then took another swallow of seltzer. “What about you? You’re not sampling any of the wine?”

  “I’m on a diet.” It was the excuse I’d been using for the last month. It had always worked just fine, but this time I was holding at least six hundred empty calories in my hand, right out in the open.

  Stone glanced at my plate and gave me a funny look. “Interesting diet.”

  He was standing close enough for me to detect a faint, fresh smell, as though he’d just stepped out of the shower. Close enough for me to feel a silent charge pulse through the warm spring air between us.

  “Did you find out who Pepper was seeing?” I asked, stepping away slightly.

  He shook his head. “Not yet. Crime detection is slow, tedious work. I’ve got men working on it though.”

  “But discreetly?”

  “Very discreetly.”

  I had just begun to tell him about Tony and my visit to Berkeley that morning, when a tall, willowy blonde in a very short, black skirt came up to us.

  “Mikey,” she cooed. “This is the last sort of place I’d expect to find you.”

  “Work,” he said, smiling blandly.

  “Oh, sure.” She gave him an odd, cryptic look. “You expecting someone to walk off with a case of pinot noir?”

  “You never can tell.”

  She was pretty in an all-American sort of way. Straight, shoulder-length hair parted on the side, cute nose, even white teeth. I disliked her immediately.

  With a glance that managed to concede my presence while not actually acknowledging it, she took a slow, theatrical sip of wine, then leaned forward and planted a delicate white hand firmly on Stone’s chest. “You do amaze me sometimes,” she said slowly. “You really do.”

  I shifted awkwardly from one foot to another while she continued to eye him with amusement. Finally, with a toss of her head, she was gone.

  “Mikey?” I asked when she was out of hearing.

  “Short for Michael.”

  “Is that what people call you?”

  “Only Barbara.” His expression was grim.

  “Who is she?”

  “My wife.”

  Boom. So much for fantasy, not that it really mattered either way, I thought. “She’s very pretty,” I said brightly.

  Stone looked amused. “Soon to be ex-wife.”

  “Oh.”

  Just then Daria and Jim joined us, drawn, I’m sure, by Daria’s unwavering curiosity. The minute I’d stepped into the car that afternoon she’d been all over me about the good-looking man I’d been talking to outside the church yesterday. When Daria calls someone attractive— or generous or talented or kind—my antennae go up immediately. Unless she is talking about her own family, these words usually signal an ulterior motive. The fact that Stone was a police officer and not some secret admirer did little to suppress her curiosity, and I knew that she was now anxious to meet him in the flesh.

  “Kate,” she gushed in her most sparkling manner, “we forgot to set a meeting time. How late do you want to stay?”

  “Whatever you two want is fine with me.”

  She smiled at Stone and waited for me to introduce her, which of course I did, although reluctantly.

  “Lieutenant Stone is investigating Pepper’s death,” I explained.

  “It’s still hard to believe,” Jim muttered, kicking at the grass with his toe. “That kind of stuff just doesn’t happen in Walnut Hills.”

  “Unfortunately,” Stone replied, his mouth tight, “murder happens everywhere.”

  Craig Foster passed by just then and gave Jim one of those male-buddy shoulder punches. “How ya’ doing? Spent all of Tuesday night’s riches yet?”

  “I’m banking it, so the next time you guys try to bleed me I’ll have an edge.”

  “Just remember,” Foster chuckled, “if my car hadn’t been blocking your Beemer, you’d have pulled out at midnight the way you wanted, and you’d still be in the hole.”


  Jim turned back to us and tugged at his ear. “Poker,” he said, looking a tad sheepish. “My one weaknesses.”

  Daria smiled blandly and then fixed her gaze attentively on Stone. “How’s the investigation coming along?” she asked, with a cute little tilt of her head. When she puts her mind to it, she can be utterly charming.

  “About as well as can be expected.”

  She flashed him a perfect smile. “Oh? Any suspects yet?”

  Stone smiled back. A congenial, good-natured, aw- shucks kind of smile. “I’m not at liberty to discuss the case, but I’ll admit it’s not the easiest one I’ve worked on.”

  “I should think not.” She tucked a strand of shiny auburn hair behind her ear. “These random violence things must be very difficult to solve. Something like looking for a needle in a haystack.”

  “They are, but sometimes we get lucky.” His eyes were softly mocking. “Sometimes we even get smart.”

  Jim looked up and shoved a hand into his pocket. “I guess you’re getting a lot of heat on this one. All that publicity and stuff. Does that help or make it worse?”

  “In the short run it’s hard, particularly when politics get involved. But in the bigger picture it sometimes helps. There may be a witness who knows something but wouldn’t come forward without all the coverage.”

  Daria frowned. “Certainly by now anyone with pertinent information would have contacted you, don’t you think?”

  “Hard to say.”

  Her frown deepened. “Pepper was a dear friend of mine. If there’s anything I can do to help out, be sure to let me know.” Reaching into the genuine alligator purse that had been a birthday gift from Jim, she handed Stone her business card. “Feel free to call me at work or at home. Anytime.” She flashed him another of her award winning smiles, then looped her arm through Jim’s and sauntered off.

  “Why do I feel like I’ve just been standing in front of a hot oven?” Stone asked me when they left.

  “Daria has that affect on people sometimes.”

  “Doesn’t it wear you down?”

  “She’s not always like that,” I explained, offering him a chocolate truffle.

  Stone picked it off my plate and took a small bite, letting the chocolate melt in his mouth before swallowing. “Truly amazing, this diet of yours.” He plopped the rest of the candy in his mouth and licked his fingers.

  “I thought of something else.” I said.

  “Mmm.”

  “About Pepper.”

  Guiding me by the elbow, Stone led me to an empty patch of grass away from the crowd. I tried not to think about the warm spot where his fingers touched my skin.

  “Shoot,” he said.

  “It may be nothing.” He nodded. “But at Pepper’s service I saw a young man sitting at the back of the church, by himself. He looked familiar, yet I couldn’t place him. Then when I got home, I started sketching the garden between our house and the Livingstons’. . .

  “You draw?”

  My artistic abilities were not the issue, but I nodded.

  “I would love to have some talent in that direction. I can barely manage a stick figure with enough toes and fingers to be certified as kindergarten level.” He shifted his weight. “Do you paint too?”

  “Yes.”

  “Oil? Watercolor?”

  “Look, do you want to hear what I found out or not?”

  “Okay. You saw a familiar face, and then in the garden you remembered who it was.”

  “How did you know?”

  “Brilliant deductive powers, I guess.”

  “And do you know who it was?”

  “The gardener?”

  So much for my great investigation. “Then you know about him already?”

  “Know what?” His voice grew suddenly serious. “I’m sorry. What did you want to tell me?”

  I described my excursion to the apartment on Blake Street that morning. “It’s odd, don’t you think?”

  Stone nodded, seemingly lost in thought “It’s probably just a coincidence, but we’ll check it out all the same. Did Pepper ever mention this Tony to you?”

  “Once. She thought I should hire him to prune the ivy along the back fence. She said he was a good worker.”

  “How long had he worked for them?”

  I tried to think. “She used a gardening service at first, but she was never happy with them. They were the mow- blow-and-go variety. Tony must have started working for them around last Thanksgiving. I know he wasn’t there last summer.”

  Stone looked perplexed. “Mow-blow-and-go?”

  “Mow the lawn, blow the leaves and go. Pepper wanted somebody who took an interest in the garden.”

  “I see. And Tony fit the bill?”

  “Apparently so.”

  His shoulder nudged mine. “Maybe I should deputize you. Seems you seem to come up with as much as we do.”

  I knew he wasn’t merely humoring me because he’d taken out a little notebook and written down Tony’s name and address, but there was a glint in his eye which was most undetective-like. I looked away quickly.

  “Still,” he said after a moment, “I wish you’d stop playing cop. If you have something you think might be important, tell me about it and I’ll look into it. Someone who has killed once finds it easier to kill a second time.”

  “Are you saying that somebody might try to kill me?”

  “If you go poking around where you’re not wanted, yes.”

  I couldn’t make up my mind whether to be angry with him or not. I don’t like to be patronized, but I’m quite willing to be cherished and protected. And I definitely prefer being alive to being dead.

  “You want anything more to eat?” Stone asked, tugging at his tie.

  “Maybe some fruit salad.”

  “Why don’t you go grab a table over there by the rose bushes, and I’ll get us some food.”

  Most people who attend the festival like to stay on their feet, drifting from station to station in order to sample the whole range of wines available, so I had no trouble finding a vacant table. I cleared the mess left by the previous occupants and sat down to await Stone’s return.

  “Fruit salad,” he said, setting two heaping plates on the table. “And pasta salad, ribs, and shrimp on a skewer. This is a crazy place to come if you’re watching your weight.”

  “You’re right.” Actually, I would have to start watching it soon, whether I decided to stay pregnant or not. With Anna I’d gained forty pounds, and even after she was born people stopped me on the street to ask when the baby was due. I didn’t intend to get myself in that fix again.

  “Do you think you’ll be able to find the killer?” I asked, between mouthfuls.

  “If it was actually someone she knew, our chances are a lot better than they were when we were simply looking for a burglar. Your friend Daria was right about random killings. They’re the worst.”

  “What will happen if you don’t find the guy?”

  There was a moment of silence before Stone said flatly, “Absolutely nothing. It happens all the time.”

  “You’re kidding?”

  “I wish I were. If you’re smart enough, it’s fairly easy to get away with murder.”

  There was a bleak quality to his voice which I found disconcerting. “You’re not very optimistic about this case are you?”

  “Let’s just say I’m trying to be realistic.” He stood and collected our empty plates. “I guess I’d better be moving on. Let me know if you think of anything else.”

  I nodded, watching him. I was trying to sort through what I knew about Pepper, to search my memory for the single tidbit of information which would make all the pieces fall into place, but instead I fixed on those blue-gray eyes of Stone’s. Eyes that seemed to speak a language of their own.

  “Why are you getting a divorce?” The words were out of my mouth before I knew it, but they’d been on the tip of my tongue ever since Barbara had waltzed through earlier in the afternoon.

 
The half-smile on Stone’s face faded. “She got tired of being married to a cop, I think. Or maybe it was just me she got tired of.” He stacked the remaining cup onto the pile in his hands and replaced his chair carefully so that its back just touched the table.

  “Any children?”

  “No. We’re fortunate in that respect I guess.” He didn’t sound particularly pleased about it, though. “I was on the force in San Francisco. It’s different there than Walnut Hills. It’s like trying to build a castle with dry sand. Nothing holds. Half the time I wouldn’t get home when I said I would, and when I was home, my mind was a million miles away. Barbara wasn’t happy about any of it. Hell, I wasn’t happy. So I took this job and we moved out here. But by then it was too late.” Stone paused. “She went back to school last year, moved out last fall. Now she has an MBA and more job offers than I could ever dream of.”

  The thin, strained quality to his voice reached out and grabbed me. “I’m sorry,” I said, then stood up too and helped him toss the trash into the basket.

  After Stone left, I listened to one of the bands for a while, glanced through an exhibition of serigraphs by my former art teacher and talked to Lisa Bloom, mother of Scotty, the boy who regularly pinched Anna and at least once a week kicked over the art-supply shelf at school. And out of the comer of my eye I continued to watch Stone, promising myself that tomorrow when I gave up sweets, I would also give up thinking about him. It was going to be clean, wholesome living from then on.

  Finally Daria found me and we rounded up Jim, who seemed to have done his part to make up for those of us who weren’t drinking. He listed slightly when he walked, and his eyes were glazed. I was glad when Daria offered to drive and Jim agreed to let her.

  “Just remember,” he warned her, “it doesn’t handle like the BMW.”

  Daria patted his knee affectionately. “I’m well aware of that.” Then she turned to me. “I can’t believe the shop can’t find a better loaner. This car is really something, isn’t it?”

  I had to agree. A blue fender, a red trunk, and rust dotted white everywhere else. “Very patriotic,” I said.

  “They promised us our car four days ago,” Jim muttered, “but that was before they realized the part they needed was on back order.” With that, he leaned back in the seat and began snoring softly.