Lies That Bind (Maeve Conlon Novels Book 2)

by Maggie Barbieri

  She waited a few seconds, the two of them in a macabre standoff on a lovely, manicured lawn, and then walked away. In the end, reason overtook insanity and she left. She was no closer to a motive for his behavior and that gave her pause. In addition, the company he kept? That was a major concern.

  CHAPTER 15

  The next day, Jo’s incessant chatter kept Maeve’s mind off the one topic she was thinking about.

  “You seem tired,” Jo said.

  You have no idea how much energy it takes to threaten young men in the middle of the night, she thought. “It’s been a long week,” Maeve said.

  Jo went back to her monologue. “So they are working this huge homicide,” Jo said, referencing her detective husband as Maeve iced a birthday cake for someone’s seventieth birthday. It was gorgeous, if she did say so herself. “Doug says thank you for taking me to class. Honestly, I think the real reason he doesn’t want to be at the birth is because of what he might see, not his schedule.”

  “He’s a homicide detective,” Maeve said, “and the thought of childbirth disgusts him?” Something pinged in the back of her brain. He’s lying, she thought.

  Jo shrugged. “Don’t ask me. Maybe he just doesn’t want to see me like that. You know, splayed out like a turkey on Thanksgiving. There are men out there like that.” She dropped her voice to a whisper. “And then there are the vaginas.”

  “I’m sure there are,” Maeve said, crafting a perfect rosette and placing it on the cake. “What makes a homicide ‘huge’?” Maeve asked without going to her follow-up questions: And is your husband really that much of a pantywaist? And you still find him attractive?

  “More than one body at the scene. Drugs. Execution-style.” Jo held her finger to her head. “Pow! One to the front temporal lobe.” She looked out the window to the parking lot, tapping the glass. “Can you drop me off at home and on our way can we stop at that Ecuadorian place on Main Street in Prideville? I have a hankering for chorizo. And they got ‘Best of Westchester,’ just like you.”

  “Chorizo? That’s what you crave?” It was a little out of the way but Maeve rarely said no to Jo’s requests for bizarre foods, being as she realized, after the fact, that she craved them, too.

  “Yes,” she said. “And flautas and arepas and anything salty and anything filled with cheese.” She rested her hands on her belly. “My goal, before this baby is born, is to try every food item that was in the magazine and got ‘best of.’”

  “That’s your goal?” Maeve asked. Mine is not to not harm anyone before Christmas who is looking for my daughter. To find my sister. Anything less than achieving one of those things would cast an even greater pall over the holiday.

  “Doug sometimes brings me home a Cuban sandwich after work.” Jo was still working her way through the items on her to-do list, Cuban sandwiches having made their way on there, despite being available only out of county and not a “best of” item.

  That’s better, Doug, Maeve thought. She knew “after work” sometimes meant the middle of the night, but she wouldn’t judge. She remembered making some interesting culinary choices when she was pregnant with Heather; in particular, once finishing off a large tub of hummus for breakfast.

  “Oh, I forgot,” Jo said, starting some dishes in the sink, uncharacteristically. Maybe her nesting instinct was kicking in; Maeve could only hope. “Doug said that Rodney sends his condolences.”

  “Rodney?” Maeve asked, although she knew exactly who Jo was talking about.

  “Yeah. Rodney Poole? His partner? I know there’s no love lost between you two after the whole accusing-Jack-of-murder thing, but he’s actually a really nice guy, Maeve.”

  “I’m sure he is,” she said, as if she didn’t know. She knew he was a nice guy. They were kindred spirits, but Jo didn’t need to know that. She would be lying if she said she hadn’t thought about him once or twice, called him to find out how to buy a gun that could never be traced. She wondered if after finding out what she did, endorsing it, and letting her go scot free, if he slept at night.

  She suspected he did. Like a baby.

  Rodney Poole. Huh, she thought. Now there’s someone who might come in handy regarding my sister. He had helped her once. Well, twice. He would probably help her again.

  Maeve finished the cake and stood back to admire it. “What do you think?”

  Jo turned to her, the shirt stretched over her belly wet from leaning over the sink. “What’s going on with your sister? Finding her?” she asked, completely out of the blue.

  “Nothing going on with my sister. And her name is Evelyn.” She had started thinking of her that way, referring to her by that name because that was what she had been called, she thought. It was easier for everyone if her name was Americanized. She thought about how much to tell Jo and knew that she would have to give her a little information, if only to shut the conversation down. “Cal is going to look into it for me. Research death certificates,” she said, her voice catching. “See if she’s maybe still alive?”

  “You’re really going through with this,” Jo said. “You’re really going to try to find her.”

  “I am.”

  “And what if she’s dead? What then?”

  “Then, that’s it,” Maeve said, looking down, concentrating on her work. “She’ll have died and I will have never known her.”

  But she knew that wasn’t it. She knew that she would carry that death around in her heart just like she carried her mother’s and her father’s.

  Jo turned back to the sink. “I hope she’s alive.”

  “Me, too,” Maeve said, opening the refrigerator door and making room for the cake. “Jo, a hand, please?” she asked as the refrigerator door—off-kilter and off-balance like everything else in the old store—started to close, threatening the perfection of the seven-layer cake in her hands. “Clear that shelf,” Maeve said, motioning with her head, “and hold the door open for me.”

  Jo reached in and moved a few items around, a gallon of milk, a container of icing. She pulled a Ziploc baggie out from the way back and held it up, keeping it at arm’s length. “Have you started making fondant body parts?” she asked as Maeve slid the cake onto the shelf. “Someone having a Walking Dead party?”

  Maeve slammed the refrigerator door shut. “No.” She peered at the bag and its contents.

  “Because that sure looks like a finger to me,” Jo said before dropping the bag on the floor.

  CHAPTER 16

  Chris Larsson had held the baggie up to the light. “Yep, that’s a finger.” He asked Maeve and Jo to show him their hands. “And it doesn’t belong to either one of you,” he said, laughing.

  “It’s someone’s finger, Detective Larsson,” Jo said, put out. “Is this really a good time for your comedic stylings?”

  He grew somber, chagrined. “That’s a good point, Jo.” He inserted the baggie into an evidence bag and went through the kitchen again, looking for other body parts or any kind of evidence that might help him figure out who the finger might belong to. “So, be on the lookout for any customers who are missing a pinkie,” he said, examining the digit in the bag more closely.

  “Please, Chris, I’m begging you,” Maeve said. “Please, please keep this out of The Day Timer and the police blotter.” So far, he had done that with the breakin and the assault; she was hoping he could keep up his good track record.

  He looked down at her, the big, handsome Swedish guy with the gallows humor, and smiled, understanding her concern. The guy whose nose looked like it had been broken more than once, bringing to mind Jack’s friend Jimmy Moriarty and his own damaged proboscis, and the kind blue eyes that belied what he did for a living. He had a face that looked like it belonged behind an old-time butcher counter in the Bronx, with the giant hands to match, not of a small-town cop who probably had to look stern more than he was comfortable doing. The smile that broke out on his face every time he saw Maeve couldn’t just be related to her, she thought, but it did make her wonder.

/>   Jimmy Moriarty coming to mind, Maeve made a mental note to track him down, see what he knew, if anything, about Evelyn. If Jack hadn’t told her anything, why would she think he’d tell Jimmy? Worth a shot, though. Those old cops really stuck together. “Blue wall of silence” and all.

  “The last thing I need is for The Comfort Zone to become a place where dismembered body parts go to hide,” Maeve went on. “And owners get assaulted. If this ends up in the blotter, I’m dead,” she said. “And if the Health Department gets wind of it, well, it would be over for sure.” Her planned two-week closure for the holidays would be more like a six-month hiatus, and that would be a very bad thing.

  “Dead,” Jo repeated solemnly. “Over.”

  “Maeve, I’ll do whatever I can,” he said, before heading toward the back door. “If I had to go somewhere else for my muffin, I’d be very sad.”

  “Does this have something to do with the breakin?” Maeve asked.

  Chris shrugged. “You’ve got to give me time to investigate further.”

  “Can I stay here and bake?” she asked. Out of the corner of her eye, she spied Jo, her hands together in prayer, beseeching Chris to close them down.

  He leaned out the back door and consulted with some of the guys he had brought along. “We’ve got everything we need,” he said. “It’s not like we do DNA sampling at the station or even do fingerprinting. We’re Farringville, Maeve. It’s usually small-town stuff,” he said. “I think McCloskey out there is aroused at the thought of what we may get to do in relation to this. Cop-wise, that is.”

  “TMI, Chris,” Maeve said. She knew that the sight of that finger, long and with the nail bitten to the quick, would stay with her for a long time. As would the question of to whom it might belong.

  “Sorry,” Larsson said, lingering for a moment. He had a habit of saying the wrong thing at the wrong time, making jokes when they weren’t required. Still, Maeve found that a little endearing.

  Jo shuddered as she left the kitchen, returning to the safety of the front of the store, which Chris had deemed devoid of any additional body parts. Maeve could hear her talking to herself while she cleaned up, muttering about her job, fingers, Ziploc baggies that held things they shouldn’t.

  “Thanks for coming so quickly, Chris,” Maeve said. She handed him a blueberry muffin from a tin on the counter. “These were made pre-finger discovery, so it’s up to you as to whether or not to eat it.”

  “Listen, I know you’re busy but I just … well, I wanted to ask you a question,” he said, changing the subject. “Have you been to the new place in town? Monty’s?”

  She hadn’t, but she knew where he was going with this line of questioning. And she could think of nothing that would set tongues wagging more than the local baker out with a village cop, but being as she had always lectured her daughters on friendship and the right thing to do, she had a hard time thinking of a reason to turn him down completely. He was single, though newly according to Jo, and she had no attachments. Jo knew the whole story: his wife had left abruptly after twenty-two years of marriage. She had moved upstate and was involved with a man who used to be a woman, though Maeve wondered if that was just small-town embellishment for embellishment’s sake. Chris had been shocked and heartbroken, though Maeve had never seen evidence to support that. He was always Chris Larsson, blueberry muffin and coffee light and sweet. If she had allowed herself to think about it, let her mind go to places that had been closed off, she would have realized that he had been trying to woo her for a while.

  She looked at him, enjoying his blueberry muffin like he was a starving man who had just been handed a steak dinner. If she was really honest with herself, she had to admit that she was lonely and she suspected that he was, too. She remembered what six months into a divorce felt like and it wasn’t enjoyable, her “freedom” something she had never wanted.

  “I haven’t,” she said. Before his crestfallen face could really take shape, she added, “But I’ve always wanted to go back to that Indian place in Irvington. I went there once and it was great.” As the words slid out of her mouth, she realized that Chris, a product of Farringville, might not enjoy Indian food, looking more like a meat-and-potatoes guy. He surprised her by brightening right up.

  “I love that place,” he said. “So what’s good for you? I know it’s short notice, but how’s tonight?” he asked.

  She thought about it. Anything to rid herself of the mental stench of this day. “You’ve got a … date,” she said, stumbling over “date.”

  “Really? Tonight is good,” he said, getting up.

  “I guess I should have played harder to get?” she said, chagrined at the thought that she had said it out loud.

  “Nah. I hate hard to get,” he said. “I’ll pick you up at your house.” She started to give him her address. “I know where you live,” he said. “And not in a stalkery way. I know where everyone lives.”

  “More cop humor?” she said.

  He smiled. “Thanks for the muffin. And the … date. How’s eight?”

  “Perfect.” She watched him go and wondered what exactly she had gotten herself into.

  She figured whatever it was, it had to be good, if only for a little while. And that was good enough for now.

  CHAPTER 17

  That night, after debating for far too long about what she would wear on the date, Maeve settled on the usual: turtleneck. Nice jeans. Boots. Tinted ChapStick. She scrubbed her nails under the bathroom sink, trying desperately to get rid of the red icing that seemed to have taken up residence around her cuticles. It was no use; the icing was staying and Chris Larsson, if he were someone who noticed things like that, would just have to get used to it.

  He picked her up at eight, just like he said he would. That was a good sign. Cal was habitually late and that had driven her insane. Just not as insane as some other things he had done, like sleeping with her friends, marrying one of them.

  How do I do this? she wondered. Does he know how complicated my life is? How I had accepted that I would be alone for the rest of my life?

  And then the thought that she wasn’t proud of: I wonder how much experience he has with missing persons.

  Maeve realized that she was thinking all of this as she watched the river whiz by, Chris not terribly concerned with the speed limit on Route 9; her father had been the same way when he had had a license. Cops drove fast and rarely, if ever, suffered the consequences. They darted in and out of traffic, always hurrying to the next thing. “Has that ever happened to you?” he asked.

  She hadn’t heard a word of what he had said, so preoccupied with her own thoughts that she had tuned out; her mind kept returning, even as she willed it not to, to her father’s death. Family secrets. Her sister. Billy Brantley. She turned and rather than try to cover up, admitted that she hadn’t been listening. “I’m sorry,” she said. “It’s been crazy. As you know.”

  “No problem,” he said. “My ex used to accuse me of never listening to her, and you know what? Guilty as charged.” They stopped at a light. “I’m working on that,” he said.

  She fiddled with the charm bracelet on her wrist, the one her father had given her and had added charms to her whole life, the last being a tiny donut with an emerald where the hole should be. She was impressed by how relaxed Chris seemed, much more relaxed than she was. Had he done this before, taken out a woman from the village for Indian food? Was he more experienced when it came to dating after a divorce? Rather than wonder, she asked him outright. “Have you dated since your divorce?”

  “Nope,” he said. “First time.”

  She let out a breath. They’d be jumping into the deep end together, and knowing that was a tremendous relief.

  “How am I doing so far?” he asked.

  “You’re doing great,” she said and sank back into the passenger seat of his Jeep, a car that existed in direct opposition to Cal’s Town & Country minivan, which beeped when it went in reverse and that, to Maeve, always smelled like b
aby formula and crushed Goldfish. This car, this manly vehicle, smelled like coffee and some indescribable scent of the male species. Man with SUV. Man who wore gun. Man who didn’t constantly have a baby strapped to his chest and refer to his flaky wife as “Mommy.”

  Man who seemed just the slightest bit interested in Maeve, her own scent of flour and butter and her unwillingness to tolerate fools of any kind seeming to be the recipe he was looking for.

  The restaurant was just as she remembered it: warm, inviting, and smelling of an exotic blend of spices she knew weren’t in her pantry. They were seated upstairs with a table that had a river view, and ordered drinks, a beer for him and a glass of white wine for her. As they perused the menu, they talked easily about what they had eaten in the past, what was good, and what didn’t need a second chance. He expressed his sympathy at her father’s passing.

  “You doing okay with that?” he asked, scanning the menu, not wanting to meet her eye.

  “No. Yes. I don’t know,” she said. “He was old. He was sick. But he was all I had,” she said, surprising herself at the admission. “Well, not all. I have the girls. I have Jo.”

  “I understand what you mean. It kind of thrusts you full on into adulthood, losing a parent,” he said, and then seeing she didn’t understand what he meant, added, “You’re no one’s child anymore.”

  It was honest, direct, and probably not what she needed to hear at that precise moment.

  “I’m sorry,” he said. “It’s how I felt when I lost my mother last year.”

  “And your father?”

  “Died when I was a kid.”

  They had that in common, losing a parent when they were young. She wondered what else was similar about their backgrounds. For his sake, she hoped it was not much else.

  After they ordered, Maeve asked Chris about his job. “So, you’re a detective. What kind of detecting do you do in Farringville?” Beyond what you do with me at my store, she thought. She had a pretty good idea of what kind of detecting he did based on how many times he had been at The Comfort Zone in a professional capacity in the last few weeks.