Dial Marr for Murder

by Karen Cantwell

  Howard rolled his eyes. Howard was an expert eye roller. He could beat a teenage girl in a Best Disgusted Look contest, hands down.

  “Hey,” Colt defended his action, “she’s on to us, already.”

  “First alert?” I asked, my voice hitting shrill in a hurry. “There are second and third alerts?”

  “Code yellow, code orange, and the worst, code red.” Colt ticked them off his fingers.

  “Code red,” I repeated. “SWAT team?”

  He nodded. “Basically.”

  My mother was in the foyer calling up the stairs. “Bethany! Amber! Let’s go! Bring pajamas and a toothbrush with you! Sleepover with the grandmas!”

  This code thing was escalating too quickly, right alongside my blood pressure. I stomped through the kitchen to stop the madness. “No, Mom. The girls aren’t going anywhere.”

  Bethany was ready, plodding down the stairs with a pillow, her overnight bag over one shoulder, and a frown on her face. “Fine. I might as well stay home. My social life is dead now anyway.”

  “Why?” I asked. “What’s wrong?”

  “Hashtag That Barbara Marr, that’s what’s wrong. I can’t show my face in public.” Bethany paused on the bottom step, her frown turning into a major pout.

  Amber flew down the stairs, scooting around Bethany and landing on the foyer floor in a panic. “I can’t go now, I have friends coming over.”

  “Friends?” I swiveled my gaze to Amber, confused. “Did we talk about this?”

  “It’s not a play date. They won’t stay long.”

  The doorbell rang.

  “There they are!” she squealed.

  They? I wondered just how many friends Amber had invited over for this not-a-play-date.

  Amber pulled the door open and a crowd of kids spilled into my foyer forcing my mother up against the wall and leaving Bethany stuck on the staircase. “They just want to meet you, Mommy.”

  “See, Bethany,” I said. “Amber isn’t embarrassed of her mother. Her friends want to meet me.”

  Before I could sort any more of the current chaos, a blonde girl nudged Bethany out of the way, popped up on the first stair, put her arm around me, lifted her cell phone, smiled, and snapped a selfie.

  “Oh. My. Okay.” I wasn’t sure I wanted to be selfied while still in my robe. I wasn’t sure I wanted to be selfied at all.

  Bethany grunted and pounded up the stairs, her door slamming an instant later.

  “Thanks!” selfie girl said, jumping off the step.

  “Children, please compose yourselves!” My mom shouted over the din of excited pre-adolescent chatter.

  A curly-haired boy took her place and snapped his selfie before I could argue or say cheese. He sneezed on my arm then wiped away the nasal fluids with his hand.

  “Yikes. Is anyone in your house sick?” I looked down at my arm in horror.

  “Yeah, my brothers have the flu. Dad too.”

  I stepped down and ushered the boy out of the door. “I don’t mean to be rude, but this is a flu-free zone. Back home you go.”

  “Wait, I didn’t pay Amber my ten dollars,” he said, reaching into his pocket.

  Uh-oh. What was my daughter up to?

  I pointed the sick boy toward the sidewalk. “Your money is no good here. Home you go.” I turned. “Amber? Can I talk with you privately?”

  Before she could respond, a girl I recognized from Amber’s class appeared at my side as if by some black magic. “Hi, Mrs. Marr! Thank you for doing this. You’re the coolest mom, ever!” The selfie was snapped.

  “Yeah, yeah, yeah,” I said, corralling the kids toward the door. My mother stood on the stoop, directing the little social media wizards outside the house. “Cool mom is putting an end to the selfie parade.”

  A chorus of disappointed “noooos” echoed through the foyer.

  “Put your ten dollar bills back in your wallets and have a nice Saturday.”

  I closed the door and gave Amber a stern look. “You were charging your friends for selfies? You’re nine years old, and I give you an allowance. What do you need money for?”

  “I’m saving for college.”

  “That’s years away.”

  “Exactly. If I start now, I can pay for it myself. You and Daddy are always talking about how expensive it is to pay for Callie’s college.”

  I didn’t know what was worse. The fact that I’d turned my nine-year-old into a capitalist fiend or that my nine-year-old daughter’s friends all seemed to have cell phones. She didn’t have one. What does a nine-year-old need a cell phone for?

  “Am I in trouble?” Amber asked.

  I put my arm around her shoulders. “No. But don’t do that again, okay?”

  “Okay. I’ll get my bag and pillow.”

  “No. You girls aren’t going anywhere. Not until I say so.”

  Colt’s head appeared around the corner. “Yo, Curly. Can we see you for a minute?”

  I gave my mother the evil eye in case she had grand designs to take Amber and run. “Stay here.”

  The paper was still laid out on the table with Howard leaning over it. He looked at me as I came into the room.

  “What’s wrong?” I asked.

  “We found it.” Howard answered.

  “Found what?” I stared down where he pointed. After reading the message and soaking in the danger, I lifted my head to shout, “Amber, go get your bag. You and Bethany are going to the grandmas!”

  Chapter Seven

  The clue had been left by way of the most basic of codes. Individual letters had been circled, one on each page. When lined up together, they spelled out the message, Viviana Buttaro wants Barbara Marr to suffer. Watch your back Barbara Marr. Watch your back.

  The message chilled me to the bone and not just because I needed more clothes on than a thin robe. This was the day I’d been dreading. You don’t put a chain-smoking, butt-kicking, she-devil behind bars and not worry about what will happen when she was let out. “Is she out of prison already? I don’t remember the exact length of her sentence, but I feel it was at least longer than our car loan for crying out loud.” I knew Howard could see the terror on my face.

  “She shouldn’t be out yet,” he said. “I have a friend in the bureau checking for me right now, but it doesn’t seem likely.”

  “Unless she made a deal,” Colt said.

  The room whirled around me. “What kind of deal?”

  Howard drew a quick breath. “Informant.”

  “They’d let her out just like that?” My voice did that shrill thing again.

  “Yes, but I just can’t believe she’d be released without someone letting me know.”

  “Are you sure you transcribed the letters right? Maybe it says, Viviana Buttaro wants Barbara Marr to… surf. I’m not very coordinated, but the activity itself is joyous. Instead of ill will, she’s offering me happy tidings. No pun intended.”

  “What about the watch your back part?” Colt tapped on the newspaper.

  “She’s just looking out for me. Shouldn’t everyone watch their back, when you think about it?”

  “So, Roz and Peggy are too sick to guard you?”

  “Howard, they’re hallucinating. And don’t even get me started on the bodily fluids issue.”

  He looked at Colt. “Then you’ll have to stay with her while I dig around and find out what’s going on.”

  A sharp knocking on the door made me jump.

  “I’ll check it out.” Colt started for the front door.

  Howard followed him.

  “Where are you going?”

  “To get my gun.”

  “We don’t keep guns in the house. Remember our pact? No guns with kids still in the house?”

  “I, uh, forgot about that. It’s in a locked case in a safe.”

  “We have a safe?”

  “Look what I found at your door—a good guy.” Colt came back into the kitchen with Eric following on his heels. He was wearing his badge.

  “
You work weekends?” I asked Eric.

  “When I have a murder to solve, I do.” Eric sighed loudly. “I don’t suppose you have coffee for a tired cop?”

  I motioned for him to sit down at the table. “I’m sure the pot has gone cold, but I can make more.”

  Eric rubbed his eyes, looking like he could use a shower and a nap. “Usually my manners would require me to say don’t go out of your way, but I really need a cup.” He coughed, and my radar went up.

  I emptied the pot of cold coffee into the sink. “I think you could use some flu bomb too. You interviewed Tate Kilbourn yesterday, and I’m sure he has the flu.”

  Eric looked at me like I was crazy.

  Colt tried to reassure him. “We all thought she was she batty when she went on this flu bomb kick last fall, but despite the grittiness, it actually tastes pretty good. None of us got sick when people around us were dropping like flies.”

  “I guess I’ll try it, but I still get my coffee right?”

  “You bet,” I said, retrieving a prepared jar from the fridge. I poured it into a sauce pan and left it to simmer while I started a fresh pot of coffee. “Speaking of murders, how’s that going? Did you arrest Del Rowenhorst?”

  “Couldn’t. She didn’t do it.”

  I took out two clean mugs from the cabinet, and looked at Eric, surprised. “How do you know?”

  “She snapped like a dry twig the minute I pressed her for specifics, which she couldn’t give.”

  “She confessed to a murder she didn’t commit?”

  Eric leaned back, sprawling in the chair. “She’s covering for someone, but she won’t say who.”

  “Whom,” Colt said.

  Eric squinted over at Colt. “What?”

  “I think it’s ‘she won’t say whom.’”

  “Are you sure?” Eric crossed his arms. “That doesn’t sound right.”

  “What is it with you and grammar these days?” I asked Colt.

  Colt shrugged. His grin was sheepish. “I can’t shake it. You date a writer, you get corrected a lot. And that’s two words, not one. Do you know how many people spell 'a lot' as one word?”

  I ignored Colt's dating problems in favor of steering the conversation back to the murder. “I’ll bet she’s covering for the long-haired lady that I saw fleeing the scene.”

  Eric gave a small nod. “You might be right. I’m working that angle now.”

  Pointing a spoon at Eric, I asked, “Not that I’m telling you how to do your job, but can’t you arrest Del Rowenhorst for obstructing a murder investigation by withholding information?”

  “Technically, yes, I could, and I tried that threat, but that didn’t faze her. She was willing to go to jail for murder, so she didn’t care if I sent her to jail on a lesser charge. And let’s face it, she’s not going anywhere. She’s almost eighty years old.” Eric leaned forward to peer at the newspaper. The circled letters must have caught his eye. “Did I catch you in the middle of something?”

  “Curly can’t seem to stay out of trouble no matter how hard we try.” Colt lifted his coffee mug at me.

  “Are you talking about the hashtag business?” Eric lifted a brow in my direction.

  “You’d think, right?” Colt snorted. “No, this is something entirely unrelated. Remember our friend, Viviana Buttaro?”

  Eric’s eyes grew wide. “How can I forget her?”

  “She hasn’t forgotten me,” I whined. I showed him Howard’s decoded message.

  Eric leaned in and squinted. After a moment, he sucked in a breath. “Whoa. She isn’t out of prison, is she?”

  “We’re waiting to hear.” Leaving the paper on the table, I went back to the stove to pour Eric’s flu bomb. I set the mug in front of him. “Why are you here, by the way? You said you were working. Is it about Pickle’s murder?”

  Eric sniffed the steaming mug before sipping cautiously. After a moment, he winced and pushed the mug away. “Just the coffee please.”

  The pot had just finished brewing so I gave him a cup with a warning. “Don’t come crying to me when you get sick, mister. Cream and sugar?”

  “No. Black is good.” He swigged some down and gave me a thumbs-up. “That hits the spot.” He took another long swallow before setting the mug back down. “Yes, to answer your earlier question, I’m here about the murder. Someone called in an anonymous tip.”

  I sat down at the table. “Is it a good tip?”

  “I don’t know. You tell me.” Eric narrowed his eyes at me. “The anonymous caller said to talk to you.” He pulled his note pad and pen from his jacket pocket. “A man identified only as Moe said to ask Barbara Marr who killed Pickle.”

  “It’s not Moe, it’s Moyle, and he wasn’t being anonymous.”

  Colt rolled his head in frustration. “Not this guy again.”

  Eric readied his pen to scribble. “Is that his last name or first name?”

  “It’s his only name. He just goes by Moyle. He’s homeless, and he thinks he’s a time traveler from the future.”

  Stone-faced, Eric considered me for several silent seconds. Maybe he thought something less bizarre might come from my mouth if he waited long enough.

  “I’m sorry,” I said, breaking the stare-off. “I’m an oddball magnet. He’s actually really nice.” I shot Colt a hard glare. “And he’s perfectly harmless.”

  Eric shook his head. “How do you spell his name?”

  I’d never seen his name spelled, now that I thought of it. “Like it sounds, I guess.”

  “Would Moyle have any reason to think you know more about the murder other than the fact that you’re the one who found the body?”

  The smell of coffee made me want another cup, so I got up from the table, and circled around the island. “No. He showed up saying something about a woman named Bernie Ford and Pickle but said it was ‘hazy,’ whatever that means. When I asked Bunny, she said Bernie and Pickle were lovers.” I paused, to raise a knowing eyebrow before pouring. “And word has it that Del Rowenhorst and Pickle danced the horizontal hula too. So… maybe Bernie found out about Del, wasn’t too happy, and sent Pickle a ‘Dear John’ by way of a knife in the chest. There you go. Bernie Ford is your killer.” I pointed to his pad. “Write that down.”

  “I think I should talk with this Moyle person.” Eric closed the note pad and slipped it back in his pocket. “You said he’s homeless?”

  I sat back down next to Colt. “I thought he was homeless, but last night he said he lived in a house, so I don’t know. Bottom line, every time he shows up, he just disappears again. Good luck talking to him. You need to find this Bernie Ford. And you should talk with Olga the Russian lady. Did you check out her shoe by the way? Was that blood I saw?”

  “It was red paint,” Eric said.

  I shrugged. “Well, you should talk to her anyway. She seems to know everything that goes on between the volunteers.” I cocked my head. “Sounds like they are a promiscuous group. I just feel it in my bones that this was a crime of passion.”

  Eric looked at Colt. “She said she doesn’t want to tell me how to do my job, but that sounded suspiciously like she’s telling me how to do my job.”

  Colt nodded. “Welcome to our world.”

  Howard finally reappeared from his gun-retrieving mission. A semi-automatic was snapped into his chest holster as if he still worked for the FBI. I hated that he had a gun in the house, and I especially hated him wearing it. Gave me the heebie-jeebies. On the other hand, thinking that Viviana Buttaro might be out of prison gave me the heebie-jeebies times a million. I guessed, under the circumstances, Howard with a gun was acceptable.

  “Viviana hasn’t been released,” he said, “so she didn’t send the message herself. She must have arranged the delivery from within.”

  “We need to find Purple Rain Man, then,” I said.

  Eric scratched his head. “Don’t tell me. Another oddball?”

  Howard examined the leftover flu bomb in the sauce pan. “He’s the man Barb saw del
iver the paper last night. She’s also seen him walking in the neighborhood.” He poured the drink into a mug.

  Colt looked at his phone and then at me. “Callie just texted. She wants you to call her right away. It’s an emergency.

  At first, I didn’t understand why Callie hadn’t called me or Howard if she had an emergency. Then I remembered that my phone was on low battery after Peggy’s call. I pulled it from my robe pocket, and sure enough, it was dead. I plugged it into the charger on the kitchen counter. When the power returned, I had fifteen missed calls, eight voicemails, and twenty texts.

  Chapter Eight

  Not all of the calls and texts were from Callie, but I handled hers immediately. I pressed call-back and waited for her to pick up.

  “I just texted Callie a few minutes ago,” Howard said, brows raised. “She didn’t say she had an emergency.”

  Callie picked up on the first ring. “Mom!” she shouted into my ear. “Dad is ruining my life!”

  “What?” I turned away from Howard.

  “It’s so humiliating. I can’t even believe how embarrassing this is.” Callie was ready to blow a gasket.

  I spoke in a soothing tone to calm her upset. “Are you talking about the hashtag nonsense? Your dad didn’t have anything to do with that. And in a few days, it will all settle down.”

  “No, Mom, I’m talking about the bodyguard. He’s standing outside my door right now,” Callie shrieked.

  I pulled the phone away from my mouth. “Howard, did you hire a bodyguard for Callie?”

  “Of course, I did. It was either that or she came home where I could guard her.” He looked at me like he didn’t understand the question. “Is she complaining?”

  “She’s shrieking.”

  “I’m not shrieking!”

  “Honey,” I responded in my softest mommy-tone, “everyone in the room can hear you. Even Puddles is covering his ears.”

  “Family issues.” Eric stood, draining his coffee cup. “That’s my cue to leave.” Eric and Colt murmured as they left the room.