And maybe, just maybe, the “woman” she’d seen was a man dressed up as a woman. Maybe it was this Gus Moran whom Bernie had been talking about. Okay, so the scenario she was conjuring up was slightly far-fetched, but then everything about this case was. She and Bernie hadn’t been up on the roof yet. Maybe it was time they took a look. Maybe whoever had been up there—if anyone had been—had left something behind. She was thinking about when they could go up there when Bernie walked back into the prep room.
“Penny Moran-Engels wants to meet with us,” Bernie told her.
Libby put her rolling pin down. “And she is . . . ?”
“Guy Moran’s ex.”
“And we want to talk to her why?”
“Because she says she has something to tell us,” Bernie replied. She turned and yelled to Amber that she’d be there in a sec, then turned back to her sister. “I told her we’d meet her at her place at five.” Then she was gone with a swish of her skirt and a clack of her heels.
“I don’t suppose she gave a hint about what it’s about?” Libby called after her sister. “No. Of course she didn’t,” she grumbled to herself when Bernie didn’t answer.
“What did you say?” Bernie asked, popping back in.
“Nothing,” Libby replied. What was the point?
She sighed, picked up her rolling pin, and got back to work. The pies had to be done and boxed by four, when everyone was going to pick them up. After she’d put the pies in the oven, she carefully wiped off the rolling pin with a clean cotton dish towel and placed it in its drawer.
The rolling pin had been her mother’s, and Libby always felt as if her mom was watching over her when she used it. In this case, though, she hoped that wasn’t true, because her mother would most certainly not approve of what she was doing. At all. Well, not the baking part. She would have liked that. The detecting part, on the other hand, not so much.
In fact, her mom had never allowed her dad to talk about his cases at dinner. That was how strongly she felt about “bringing that kind of thing into the house.” Not that that had stopped Bernie and Libby. They’d just waited until their mom was downstairs, in the shop, getting ready for the next day, before they pestered their dad into telling them what he was working on. It had been their little secret.
Chapter 19
The sun was setting over the Hudson, and Penny Moran-Engels was exiting her Kia when Libby and Bernie pulled into the parking lot of the Longely Apartments. The apartments were a series of beige brick, two-story, one-and two-bedroom rentals targeted toward the lower-income inhabitants of the town. The apartments weren’t awful; they weren’t great; they weren’t anything. They were simply there. What they weren’t was quiet, since they were a little less than a block away from the train tracks.
“I just got home from work,” Penny Moran-Engels explained as she strode toward them.
She was wearing a black leather jacket, an expensively cut dark blue suit, and blue suede wedges, and she had a Louis Vuitton bag slung over her shoulder, making her look, Bernie reflected, as out of place here as a side of beef in a vegan’s freezer.
“How do you know who we are?” Libby asked, wondering.
Penny smiled. Her teeth were perfect.
Expensive caps, Bernie thought.
“Your name is on your van. And I’ve been in your shop. I love your mint double chocolate fudge bars and your red ginger chicken.”
Libby thanked her.
“I’d go there more often,” Penny continued, a wistful tone in her voice, “but Serena and I are on a ramen budget these days.” And with that observation, she turned and led the sisters into her apartment. Bernie instinctively ducked under the cobwebs hanging from the ceiling and the cardboard ghosts dangling from the overhead fan.
“Serena likes keeping them up,” Penny informed the sisters without being asked. She shrugged off her jacket and threw it on top of the bookcase in the hallway. Libby and Bernie did the same. “Halloween is her favorite holiday.”
“It was mine, too,” Bernie told her. Which was true. She’d loved being out and about at night with her friends. Knocking on people’s doors. Giggling. Yelling, “Trick or treat!” Getting candy. What was there not to like?
“I’m sorry, but I haven’t gotten around to furnishing the place yet,” Penny said as she walked into the living room, with Libby and Bernie right behind her. “I just can’t bring myself to. Then it would mean that this is permanent.”
They looked around. The only things in the room were a tired-looking tweed sofa, two matching armchairs, a cheapo coffee table made out of laminate, and a large flat-screen TV, which hung on one of the white walls.
“It’s all Salvation Army,” Penny said, sitting down on the sagging sofa. “Except for the TV. That came from the house. That’s all I can afford,” Penny explained as Bernie and Libby sat down in the armchairs. “He lives up there.” Penny pointed in the direction of the Berkshire Arms. “My ex,” she said, clarifying, in case Bernie and Libby didn’t get it. “And we live down here, on the wrong side of the tracks. Literally.”
Penny worried one of her nails with her teeth. Bernie noticed that they were all bitten down to the quick. “Serena had to give up her dog because they don’t allow pets here, but this was the only thing I could afford.”
“It must be tough,” Bernie told her, thinking about the discrepancy between Penny’s clothes and where she was living.
“You have no idea.” Bernie could hear the rage in Penny’s voice. She watched her take a deep breath and get hold of herself. “I heard you two were investigating Darius Witherspoon’s death,” she said when she had. “My daughter said her boss told her you guys think he was murdered. Well, I think my ex could have done it, and I want you to tell the police that.”
“Why don’t you?” Libby asked her. It was not, she thought, an unreasonable question.
“Because Gus scares me,” Penny said after a pause. “He and his dad are really good with the words. But they’re not right in the head. They do things when they get mad.” She stopped talking.
Bernie leaned forward. “Like what?” she asked.
Penny bit her lip and studied her hands.
Bernie sat back and waited. A freight train rumbled by. She could feel the vibrations through the floor. “It can’t be easy living here, especially given where you came from,” Bernie said, playing the sympathy card.
Penny’s eyes grew misty. She blinked the tears away. “Our house in Hayden was quite nice. Lovely really.”
“I bet it was,” Bernie said. Hayden was old money. All the houses up there were stone mansions, interspersed with horse farms.
“You know what really gets me, though?” Penny continued, looking up from her hands. “It’s that Gus used our money. His and mine. All our money, and he can’t understand why I’m so upset. He keeps saying if the expedition had been successful, I wouldn’t feel this way. That’s not the point.” She slammed her hand down on the coffee table. “That’s not the point at all. The point is that he didn’t talk to me about it first.” She paused. “Are either of you married?” she asked Bernie and Libby.
They both shook their heads.
“Well, when you get married, keep your money separate,” Penelope told them, her eyes flashing. “Whatever you do, don’t have a joint account.”
“I understand what you’re saying,” Libby replied. “But we’re not divorce lawyers. There’s nothing we can do about what happened to you.”
Penny sat up straighter. Her eyes flashed. “There certainly is. You can put that son of a bitch in jail.”
“Your ex?” Bernie asked.
Penny nodded. “Who else are we talking about?”
“In jail for what?” Libby asked.
“What do you think? Are you dumb or something?” Penny looked from Bernie to Libby and back again.
“How about you assume that we are and spell it out for us?” Libby told her with what she thought was admirable restraint.
Penny
studied her hands again. Then she looked up at the ceiling, as if searching for the answers there. “You know Gus has a terrible temper, especially when he thinks he’s being made a fool of,” she said, speaking to the overhead lights. Then she stopped again.
Libby looked at her watch. She knew she should be more sympathetic. Obviously, this woman had been traumatized. But couldn’t she speed things up a little? This was taking forever.
Penny started speaking again. “He does things,” she said, looking everywhere but at Bernie and Libby.
Bernie and Libby waited some more.
“Like when he was in college, there was this guy Mike in a bar who was making fun of him, and two nights later someone set a fire in his room. Mike nearly died.”
“I take it you think that Gus did it?” Libby asked.
Penny waved her hands in the air. “I know he did it, because he told me he did.”
“And yet you married him,” Bernie couldn’t stop herself from saying.
“I . . . I thought he was saying that stuff to impress me, you know. I didn’t believe him . . . but then there were other things. Accidents. Like this kid who sold Gus some bad sound stuff and got attacked one night with a baseball bat. Or the contractor who did a lousy job on the new bathroom in our house in Hayden and had his workshop flooded out and the windows in his truck broken. Everything was a total loss.”
Bernie nodded to show she understood. “And the authorities never questioned Gus about these incidents?” she asked, making a note to ask her dad if he knew anyone in Hayden they could talk to.
Penny shook her head. “There were other things that happened, too. But Gus is really convincing, and his dad is really rich, and he gets away with whatever he wants.”
“So you think he killed Darius Witherspoon?” Libby asked.
Penny nodded emphatically. “Witherspoon made a fool out of him,” she said. “Killing him that way would be something that Gus would do.”
“Okay. I get it,” Libby said. “Thanks for letting us know. We’ll put him on our list.”
“I can do better than that,” Penny said, and she got up, went to her bag, opened it, and pulled out a key. “Here,” she said, handing it to Libby.
“What is it?” Libby asked.
“The key to Gus’s apartment,” Penny explained. “He’s at work till six. I figure you can let yourselves in and take a look around. See if you can find anything that ties him to Witherspoon’s murder.”
“How did you get this?” Bernie asked.
“My daughter copied his key when she was over there.”
Bernie raised an eyebrow.
“She hates him, too,” Penny said. “Look,” she continued, more urgently this time. “All I want you to do is go in and look around. If you find some sort of proof that Gus killed Witherspoon, then you can figure out how to take it to the police, and if you can’t, then I’ll figure out something else.”
“And what’s in it for you?” Bernie asked Penny.
She clenched her fist and brought it down on the coffee table again, harder this time. “I want to see that SOB fry. That’s what’s in it for me.”
* * *
“It’s nice seeing a loving family working together,” Bernie commented as she and Libby walked toward their van.
“So what do you think?” Libby said.
Bernie looked at her watch. It was almost six. They had to get back to the store. “I say when we get home, we ask Dad if he knows anyone in Hayden, then visit Mr. Moran’s abode tomorrow afternoon.”
“The whole thing seems too pat to me,” Libby observed as she jumped in the van and started the vehicle up.
“You think Penny’s setting us up?” Bernie asked.
“The thought had crossed my mind.”
“Have you ever heard the expression Don’t look a gift horse in the mouth?” asked Bernie.
Libby grimaced. “Have you ever heard the expression If it’s too good to be true, then it is too good to be true?”
“All the time, Libby, all the time,” Bernie replied, thinking of her past dating life.
Chapter 20
Yesterday the weatherman had predicted a storm blowing in today, and it seemed as if the weatherman had been correct, Libby thought as she looked outside and saw the rain splattering on the sidewalk. She sighed, put on her hoodie, and slipped her yellow slicker on over that.
“By all means, be inconspicuous,” Bernie commented as Libby went by her. “That’s what the well-dressed burglar always wears.”
“Well, excuse me if I’m not wearing my fancy-schmancy French raincoat,” Libby retorted.
“It’s Italian, and it’s black. Which is the whole point.”
“Being Italian?”
“No, doofus. Being black.”
Libby folded her arms across her chest. “This is what I have, and this is what I’m wearing. Or I could just stay here.”
“Jeez,” Bernie said, and she went back to the office, lifted one of her old raincoats off the coat tree, and handed it to her sister. “Put this on.”
“This is the one with all those frills and stuff. I’ll look like a ruffled shower curtain,” Libby protested.
“A dark, navy ruffled shower curtain, but at least you won’t look like a bumblebee,” Bernie pointed out.
“This slicker isn’t that bad,” Libby protested.
“It’s fine if you’re on the ocean, fishing for marlin,” Bernie shot back, letting her inner snark out.
“We shouldn’t be doing this, anyway,” Libby grumbled as she put on Bernie’s coat. “Or at least, we shouldn’t be going until we finish up the Blitman job.”
“We have plenty of time.” Bernie gestured toward the clock on the kitchen wall. “It’s two, and we don’t have to be there until six, which leaves us four hours to pull together the appetizers, salad, and vegetable. We’ll be in and out of Moran’s place in no time.”
“So you say.”
“Yes, I do. You know what your problem is, Libby?” Bernie countered.
“I’m sensible.”
“Your problem,” Bernie continued, “is that you worry too much. Everything will be fine. And, anyway, I don’t think this is about the Blitman job. I think you’re using this as an excuse to chicken out.”
“No, I’m not.” Which was not true. “We just can’t afford to lose the business.”
“We won’t.” Bernie raised her right hand. “I swear.”
Given Bernie’s track record, Libby was not comforted.
* * *
As they set off for the Berkshire Arms, the sisters were silent, each wrapped up in her own thoughts. It was not a hospitable day. It was the kind of day in which one wanted to be home, in front of a fire, eating grilled cheese sandwiches and sipping tomato soup, yet here they were, going back to a place neither of them wanted to return to. Ever.
The Hudson was shrouded in gray, and the streets of Longely looked cold and lonely, the few people out hurrying along with their heads down, trying to avoid the rain. The road up to the Berkshire Arms was foggy again, and the trees nodded in the wind as the skeletons hanging from their branches swung back and forth in time to a rhythm Bernie and Libby couldn’t discern. “Welcome, welcome,” they seemed to whisper.
“I wish they’d take those damn things down,” Libby groused as they drove up and up, rounding one curve after another. She shivered. “They give me the creeps.” She looked up at the Berkshire Arms and saw a flash of what on the roof? A person? Something else? A something else she didn’t want to entertain. It was probably a trick of the light, she told herself. Only she couldn’t quite convince herself of that. “Did you see it?” she asked her sister, even though she hadn’t been going to say anything.
“See what?” Bernie turned to glance at Libby. She looks pale, Bernie reflected. She needs to get out in the sun more.
Libby swallowed. “Nothing.”
“Obviously, it was something.”
Libby rubbed her eyes. She wasn’t sleeping well
these days. “I think I’m going nuts,” she confessed, the words falling out of her mouth before she could take them back.
“No. You’re not going nuts. You already are,” Bernie assured her.
Libby laughed in spite of herself. “That makes me feel so much better.”
“Tell me what you’re thinking,” Bernie commanded.
Libby did.
Bernie listened carefully. “We should look on the roof,” she said when Libby had finished. “Maybe there is something up there besides the ghost you think you keep seeing.”
“We can’t. It’s alarmed,” Libby reminded her.
“True. But if it wasn’t . . .”
“But it is.”
“Maybe there’s a way to short-circuit the alarm.”
Libby snorted. “I think breaking and entering is enough for one day.”
“We’re not breaking. We’re just entering. Remember, I have the key.”
“I still think going into Moran’s apartment is a bad idea,” Libby protested.
“If we get caught, it’ll be a very bad idea,” Bernie agreed. “But we’re not going to be.”
“You don’t know that,” Libby challenged. “Anyway, I don’t think it’s worth the risk,” she huffed.
“Obviously,” Bernie said. “But I do. Gus Moran is on our suspect list. This is a chance to cross him off. Or not.”
“What do you expect to find?” Libby grumped.
“I don’t know,” Bernie replied. “That’s the fun.”
“Not for me,” Libby told her, then retreated into brooding silence.
Five minutes later they arrived at the Berkshire Arms. Another thought occurred to Libby as she looked at the parking lot.
“Where are you going to park Mathilda?” she asked Bernie. “It’s not as if our vehicle is inconspicuous.” She indicated the lot with a wave of her hand. Three cars were parked there. That was it. “Or,” she went on, “that there are a lot of vehicles in the lot. Most of the people who live here are at work.”
“No kidding. That’s the whole point.” Bernie gestured to the far side of the lot. There was a wide path that led to a toolshed. “We can park on the other side of the shed. No one can see us there.”
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