The Bad Break

by Jill Orr

  I was about halfway through the park when I heard Toby calling my name. I sped up.

  “Riley! Hey, Riley, wait up!” For a natural-born baller, Toby was pretty damn slow.

  “I’ve got to get back to work. What is it?” I hated to be rude to anyone, but Toby made it easy.

  “I trust you’re rushing back to the office to update the Times online with this latest development?”

  “Something like that.” I had way more information gathering to do before I wrote an update, but there was no sense in telling Toby that.

  “Mayor Lancett would be most grateful if y’all could quickly report the news that the Davenport killer has been apprehended.”

  I stopped walking. “You don’t seriously believe that Tabitha killed Arthur Davenport, do you?”

  “She said she did.” Toby didn’t care one bit about what was true or what wasn’t, as long as the scandal was put to bed.

  “Well, I don’t believe it for a minute.” I started to walk toward the office at a pace I was certain he couldn’t keep up with for long.

  “You have a duty to report the news of Tuttle Corner,” he said, chasing me as fast as his stubby legs would allow. “The mayor will be very disappointed if you don’t!”

  CHAPTER 16

  I went back to the office, grabbed the Davenport file, and was about to Google Libby Nichols’s phone number when I noticed I had a new voicemail from a number I didn’t recognize.

  Hey, Riley, it’s David Davenport. I heard about Tabitha’s confession and I’m shocked. Going to try to get by the sheriff’s office to convince Carl Haight that there’s about as much chance of Tabitha having killed my father as the man on the moon. I’m going to tell Carl about that new information I found, too. I don’t know if it’s relevant, but Dad had been involved with a biotech company called Invigor8—spelled with the number eight at the end. They hired him as a consultant on a new biologic they’re developing. He left the study suddenly and I just thought it might be worth looking into what exactly happened. I have access to some of his files and I’m going to look through them. I’ll let you know what I find out. All right, this is officially the world’s longest voicemail—but I won’t be available for a few hours so I wanted you to know. Anyway, thanks. And don’t forget to send me—

  I pressed End before he could finish that sentence. I was still holding my phone when it rang and I nearly jumped out of my chair. “Hey,” I said, without even looking at who it was. I assumed it was David calling me back.

  A woman’s tentative voice came across the line. “Is this Riley Ellison?”

  I sat up straighter. “It is.”

  “And are you the one writing Arthur Davenport’s obituary?”

  “Yes . . .”

  “Okay, good.” The woman exhaled audibly. “My name is Susan Pettis and I was a patient of Dr. Davenport’s and I’m just torn up about him been killed.” She pronounced it kilt.

  “What can I do for you, Ms. Pettis?”

  “Susan, please, um, I’d been a patient of his on about seventeen years.” The way she spoke in halted clips told me she was working her way up to something. “My regular doctor over in Henrico sent me over to see Dr. Davenport because I was too tired for a forty-six-year-old woman. Couldn’t hardly walk down the street without needing to sit down. Anyway, Dr. Davenport really listened to me. He didn’t make me feel like I was a complainer or nothing, he believed me and did all kind of tests. Found out I had three arteries blocked up like clogged drains. He had to go in and Roto-Rooter them out, ’course they don’t call it that over there in the hospital,” she added with a nervous laugh.

  “He took good care of you then,” I said.

  “Saved my life. Told me those arteries were over ninety percent blocked from all the years of cheeseburgers and french fries. He said if he wouldn’t have gone in and cleared ’em out, I’da been dead inside of a month. I credit that man with my life.”

  I was quiet as I jotted down this information. “What would you like people to know about Arthur Davenport, Susan? I assume that’s why you called.”

  “Yeah,” she said, and then hesitated before speaking again. “I just feel so bad about what happened to him, and I wanted to make sure that it got into the paper that he was a fine and decent man, a smart man, who listened to people.” She paused and I sensed something else was coming. “And anyway, there’s one other thing. I told the sheriff, but he didn’t sound too interested.”

  “Yes?”

  “Last Wednesday, I came into town—had to get the mower fixed and Tuttle has the closest shop,” she explained. “I saw Dr. Davenport standing on the corner of Plantation and Somerset Drive around 3 p.m. He was talking, or what looked to me like arguing, with another man. The man’s arms were flailing and he was red in the face. And then the other man pushed Dr. Davenport with two hands right in the chest.”

  “Do you know who the man was?”

  “Never seen him before.”

  “Can you describe him?”

  “Let’s see, he was white, tall, and bald. And he was probably in his middle forties, if I had to guess.”

  I wrote all of this down. “Was he wearing a uniform or anything distinctive?”

  “No—he just looked like a regular guy. After I saw him push Dr. Davenport, I pulled my car over in that direction—you know, to see if the doc needed help or anything. I told you, I owe that man my life. But when I got close enough to see, Dr. Davenport had started walking back toward the street in the other direction, and the man, the bald guy, had his phone out and looked like he was texting somebody or something.”

  “Can you remember anything else?”

  “Only thing I can remember is he had a big tattoo on his left forearm. Couldn’t see what the design was, but I saw the black ink against his skin. But that’s all. Other than that, he just looked regular.”

  I took Susan’s full name and contact information and thanked her for the call. The picture of Arthur Davenport as a hard-working, caring medical professional was coming clearer into view with each interview. Everyone I’d spoken to, without exception, had nothing but respect for him as a doctor. And yet he’d been murdered. That probably meant it was something in his personal life that motivated the killing. So far, I knew he had a rocky relationship with his oldest son. He’d had an affair with a married woman, and had possibly been threatened by her husband. And he’d been seen arguing with someone on the street the day before his death. None of these things screamed motive for murder, but all of the sudden I was desperate to find out if Bennett Nichols was tall, bald, and/or tattooed.

  CHAPTER 17

  The Nicholses lived in a large plantation-style home set way back off of a long paved private road. The landscaping alone probably cost more than I’d make in a lifetime at the newspaper. It was dark by the time I got there, but only just. I was awfully close to the dinner hour and wasn’t expected, but I had a feeling the element of surprise might just work in my favor in this situation.

  I rang the doorbell and waited a full minute with no answer. I rang it again and heard some noises from inside, so I knew someone was home. When she finally opened the door, I could see what the delay had been. Libby Nichols appeared to either have just rolled out of bed or out of a bottle of vodka. Or maybe both.

  She was dressed in cutoff jean shorts and a black, long-sleeved thermal top unbuttoned far enough to see two inches of cleavage. Her long blond hair looked like it hadn’t seen a brush in days—actual bed head, not the sexified version in shampoo ads. But despite the crazy hair, the wrinkled clothes, and the sour expression, you could see that Libby Nichols was a beautiful woman.

  I introduced myself and asked if she and her husband had time to answer a few questions for an article I was writing for the Times.

  “All right,” she said. “But you’ll have to excuse me, I’m not feeling my best today.”

  Eager to take her up on her offer before she changed her mind, I followed her into the grand living room, whic
h was decorated in soft grays and creams with lots of shiny, mirrored surfaces to reflect the light from the large picture windows along the back wall. It was very “tastefully done,” as Mrs. Winterthorne would have said, but it smacked of a professional decorator.

  A man I assumed to be Bennett Nichols sat in a large black leather recliner and barely looked at me when I walked in. His attention was on the massive flat-screen TV that hung over the fireplace. He was playing a video game, some shoot ’em up kind with glossy soldiers in beige uniforms hurling grenades into burned-out buildings. On the side table next to him was a fifth of Wild Turkey, three-quarters empty, and an ashtray containing the remnants of a joint. He wore a red Washington Nationals baseball hat, turned backward, under which poked out a thicket of dark brown hair. Not bald. I did a quick scan of his forearms too. No tattoos that I could see.

  “What can we do for you?” Bennett said, without taking his eyes off his game.

  I took a deep breath. I knew what I was doing was a little risky, but I also didn’t want to waste a trip out here. I took out a notepad and said brightly, “I’m writing the obituary for Dr. Arthur Davenport and I heard you were a patient of his. I wondered if you had any stories or recollections about him that I could use in the obit?”

  I heard a pinging sound that paused the game as he lowered his controller and looked at me. “Is this some kind of joke?”

  “No,” I said, playing dumb. “I’ve already spoken to a few of his other patients, but they were women. I wanted to get a man’s take on him and I heard through the grapevine that you were one of his patients.” I opened my eyes wider, presenting the very picture of innocence.

  “That man,” Bennett said through gritted teeth, “was a snake in the grass. You can print that if you want.”

  “Really? How so?”

  “You want to know about that dirty son of a bitch—I’ll tell you all you need to know,” Bennett hissed.

  Jackpot! I flipped to a new page in my notebook. But Libby interrupted before he could continue. “Aw, Benny’s just pissed off ’cause Artie had a little thing for me,” she said as she walked over and perched on the side of Bennett’s recliner.

  “Babe, you smell like rotten milk,” Bennett said to Libby and crinkled his nose.

  Her face colored. She turned into him and whispered, “I told you I wasn’t feeling well today.”

  “Well, you stink,” he said before turning back to me. “Anyways, Dr. Davenport was a first-class asshole.”

  “The truth is,” Libby stood up and moved to the sofa, “Dr. Davenport took good care of Benny while he was sick, but he got a little too attached to me.” She attempted a demure smile. “The two of them ended up having a little bit of a scuffle over it all, but it was fine. In the end, Artie knew I was taken.”

  “A scuffle?”

  “Yeah, caught him trying to get his hands on my wife,” Bennett said, his anger rising again. “I would have kicked his ass too, but I have a heart condition—which of course he knew.”

  “My hero,” Libby cooed, and it was hard to tell if she was being sarcastic or not.

  This was not the same story I got from Dr. Steeler and Mrs. Winterthorne. “Um,” I said, trying to think of a good follow-up question, “Do you have any idea who might have wanted him dead?”

  “Duh—me,” Bennett said.

  The shock on my face must have shown because Libby jumped in quickly. “Wanting someone dead and killing them are two different things, you know. We were home together all night on Monday, if that’s what you’re getting around to asking.”

  Bennett’s eyes left the TV and snapped to me. “Is that what you’re after? ’Cause the sheriff’s already been here. We didn’t have anything to do with that scumbag dying—not that I’m sorry to see him dead. I won’t lie about that.” Between the flared nostrils and the hard-set jaw, Bennett looked like a man working awfully hard to control his temper.

  “Can anyone else vouch for your whereabouts on Monday night at about 11 p.m.?”

  “Seems like those are sheriff questions, not obituary-writer questions,” Bennett said, a challenge in his low voice.

  “Oh, didn’t I mention?” I said. “I’m also a crime reporter for the Times.”

  His face went from surprise to anger in about three seconds flat. Libby’s response was a little more controlled. “I think it’s time for you to go,” she said with a smile that did not reach her eyes. “Let me show you out.”

  Libby walked slowly as I followed her outside onto the driveway and the motion-sensor lights came on. Standing beneath the lights I could see dark circles under her eyes.

  “Listen,” she said, her tone more conciliatory now that we were outside, “the truth is that Arthur was crushing on me pretty hard. Benny gets upset about it, understandably. When we’d go in for appointments, Artie would stare at me and make inappropriate comments. And then one day he called me and said he had some news about Benny that he wanted to discuss with me in private. I thought it was a little weird, but I was worried about my husband so I agreed to meet with him—actually invited him out here to the house because my car was in the shop. But when he got here, he had only one thing on his mind.”

  I was pretty sure Libby was lying, but she had a confessional way of talking that drew me in. I didn’t necessarily believe her, but I was still interested.

  “He got a little handsy. I would’ve had no problem kicking him out—but then Benny walked in and just went ape-shit. He got himself so worked up his heart went into overdrive and he passed out right on our kitchen floor. Artie had to do CPR on him till the ambulance came. It was crazy.”

  “Sounds like it.”

  “Word got out, as it always does in this town, and people were saying Artie and I were in bed when Benny walked in. None of that’s true. But it didn’t stop the gossip. I actually blame Benny’s mom for a lot of it. She never liked me—thought I was just after Benny’s money—so I think she almost wanted it to be true, you know?” Libby’s angelic face looked sad as she talked, the poor persecuted hot girl.

  “So you and Arthur didn’t have a relationship then?”

  She nodded toward the house. “That man doesn’t let me out of his sight. When would I have time enough for an affair?”

  Fair enough, but it didn’t really answer the question.

  “Look at me,” she said sweeping a hand down her long, lean frame. “Ever since I married Benny, people have been trying to figure out why. They can’t accept that I love him even though he’s a little bit older, even though he’s a little bit possessive. And so they talk, they make up gossip—but the truth is, Riley, I love my husband. Dr. Davenport thought he could get in between that and he couldn’t. But none of that has anything to do with how or why that man was killed.”

  “So, do you have any theories on who might have wanted to hurt Arthur?”

  Libby scratched the side of her cheek. “You know,” she said, as if the thought had just popped into her head, “now that you mention it, I remember Arthur mentioning an ex-girlfriend who’d threatened to kill him.”

  Well that certainly seemed relevant. Of course it also seemed a little too convenient for her to have “all of the sudden” remembered such information. But I played along. “Anyone I might know?”

  “Depends,” she said, a challenge in her eyes. “How familiar with local politics are you?”

  I got a tingly feeling on the back of my neck.

  “Does the name Mayor Shaylene Lancett ring a bell?” She crossed her arms and raised an eyebrow. “’Cause I’m pretty sure at one point, Arthur was ringing hers.”

  CHAPTER 18

  When I left the Nichols house, questions buzzed around my mind like fireflies in a jar. I wanted to know more about the relationship between Libby, Bennett, and Arthur, and if there was any truth to what Libby had just told me about Mayor Lancett. I knew better than to believe what she said without proof, but if she was telling the truth, it could shed a whole new light on the mayor’s eagerness
to get this case wrapped up.

  The Nichols house was on the outer west edge of Tuttle Corner, pretty close to West Bay, where Jay lived. It was almost time for our date, so I thought I’d just head over that way. I was keyed up and wanted to talk things over with him—he might have some insight into what was really going on here. It’d be good to talk through all of this with someone so I could figure out what my next move was going to be.

  I turned out of the Nichols driveway, and after a few seconds I noticed a gray BMW pull out behind me from one of the side roads. It was hard to tell, but it looked like it could be Jay’s car. What would Jay be doing out here? I thought. At lunch I thought he said he had a meeting back at the Richmond office. I slowed down, hoping the car would catch up to where I could see if it was him—thinking that if it was, I could just follow him back to his place. But when I slowed down, the car slowed down too. So I sped up. And the car sped up too. A creepy feeling took hold.

  It was dark and there were no lights on those rural county roads, so it was impossible for me to tell from my angle who it was, or even if it was a man or a woman. Since my entire knowledge base of what to do when being followed came from what I’d seen in movies, I did what I thought Reese Witherspoon would have done if someone were following her. I adjusted my mirror, sunk low in my seat, and pulled over to the side of the road so the car would have to pass me. I figured this would accomplish two things: one, I’d be able to see who was doing the following when it drove past, and two, it’d put an end to the whole thing because they would then no longer be behind me.

  I trained my eyes on the rearview waiting for the car to speed past, but before it got to me, the car took a sudden left turn onto a gravel road that headed back toward town. Huh? So, again channeling my inner Reese, I whipped around and followed the car down the road. From this vantage point, I could now see that it was a man driving—at least it looked like a man, judging by the height and outline of the head; both details looked familiar to me. A prickly hot sensation crept up through my chest. Was this Jay? Was Jay following me?