Sleuthing Women

by Lois Winston

  His eyes narrowed. Snide comments about his bank had not been allowed when we were married. “Well now. That would put Jonette at the top of the suspect list, wouldn’t it? Which underscores my previous point. She’s a loser.”

  I didn’t have to take his condescension anymore. My opinion was just as valid as his, especially when it came to my best friend.

  I jumped up and yelled down at him. “You never understood Jonette. All you ever saw was that when I was with her, I wasn’t there for you. Jonette didn’t murder anyone. She’s my friend and I believe she didn’t do it.”

  Charlie went very still on the swing. “You’re a hypocrite if you can stand there and lecture me about friendship. My best friend is dead and Jonette probably murdered him. Where’s your compassion? Don’t you feel anything for me?”

  If he only knew the things I felt for him, he’d be taking cover behind his car. I was sick and tired of his attitude about Jonette. I had more sympathy for the grieving dog than I did for my ex-husband.

  It was past time Charlie got the message through his thick skull. “You threw my friendship and compassion back in my face when you committed adultery. You made promises of fidelity, and you broke them over and over again. I won’t be your friend, and you want to know why? Because I don’t trust you.”

  Charlie stood up and grabbed me by the shoulders. I thought he was about to shake the daylights out of me, but at that moment, the girls walked up the sidewalk from school. Madonna woofed in greeting and bounded over to intercept them.

  Charla dropped her bookbag and hugged the Saint Bernard. The color of her wavy chestnut hair exactly mirrored the dark brown of the dog’s tri-colored coat. “Did we get a dog?” she asked me. Then she noticed her father standing behind me on the porch. She abandoned the dog, which bounded over to Lexy.

  Charla ran up the stairs and hurled herself at the two of us. Charlie had no choice to let me go and catch her. “Daddy! I knew you two would get back together,” Charla exclaimed.

  Before the girls appeared I’d been thinking of wrapping my fingers around Charlie’s thick neck and choking the life out of him. I swore inwardly. Reining in my temper was my only option right now. “I’m afraid we have some bad news for you girls. Lexy, come on up here.”

  Lexy edged up to my side. She wasn’t as naïve and impulsive as her sister. Charla, on the other hand, had thrown her arms around Charlie and was hanging on for dear life. The dog sat next to Lexy and wagged its tail hopefully.

  I looked at Charlie, hoping he’d be the man here and do this hard thing for our broken family. His blue eyes filled with tears and he looked like a puff of wind would blow him over.

  Another minor twinge of sympathy bubbled out of the dangerous emotions circulating through me. Charlie had lost his best friend. I could afford to be magnanimous just this once. “It’s about your Uncle Dudley. He’s no longer with us.”

  Charla lifted her head from her father’s chest. Her eyes looked watery. “Uncle Dudley? What’s wrong? Is he in the hospital?”

  All eyes were on me. I wanted to spare my girls this pain, but there was no way to soften the news. My heart swelled with grief. “Afraid not, sweetheart. There’s just no easy way to say this. Your Uncle Dudley is dead. Murdered.”

  “Are you sure?” Lexy asked.

  I nodded slowly. “Real sure. I saw him myself.” The wind seemed to go out of Lexy. I reached for her and hugged her close.

  My eyes met Charlie’s over our girls and I knew that, no matter what, we were aligned in our feelings for our children. For the first time since the divorce, I didn’t feel quite so alone.

  My heart melted enough to realize that having a dog here for a few days might not be such a bad thing. It would give us something external to focus on as we dealt with our grief. “Your father wants us to keep Madonna until Aunt Bitsy and the boys get here. It’s a big responsibility. We’d have to keep track of her so that she doesn’t accidentally wander out onto the road.”

  Lexy scooted out of my arms and hugged the dog. She’d inherited Charlie’s jet-black hair, which exactly matched the thick eyebrow markings on the dog. “I’ll watch her, Mom. She must wonder what the heck’s going on and I know what that’s like. Can she sleep in my room?”

  Charla disengaged herself from her dad and followed Lexy and the dog inside the house. “No way. She’s staying with me. I’m the oldest. I get first pick. Mom!”

  Charlie looked momentarily pained at their squabbling. “Thanks for taking the dog, Clee.”

  I marveled that we were in accord. Not that I was in danger of succumbing to his boyish charm, but it was the first time since the divorce that I hadn’t felt like strangling the life out of him. And it meant a lot that he’d been here when I told the girls about Dudley, even if he didn’t say much.

  While we stood there, my next-door neighbor came home. Ed Monday waved, then unloaded four shopping bags from the office supply place and ambled into his house as fast as a three-hundred-pound man could move.

  My neighbor was something of a weird duck. His blinds and curtains were never open. I imagined the inside of his house to be dark as a subterranean crypt. Maybe he was a nudist and liked privacy so that he could prance around in his birthday suit.

  Beside me, Charlie shoved his hands in his pockets. What should I do with him? If I invited Charlie in, Mama would probably have a heart attack. The girls were so busy with the dog, they’d forgotten all about their father. Speaking of the dog, I wondered what kind of food she ate. “Does this dog come with accessories?”

  “Huh?”

  So much for being on the same wavelength. I rephrased my question. “Dishes, leashes, bowls, food, dog bed? You know, dog stuff.”

  “It’s in my trunk. Just a minute.”

  Charlie lugged the doggie gear to the porch. “Keep the girls away from your neighbor, Clee,” he warned.

  I figured he wasn’t talking about nice Mrs. Waltz in the house to my right. I glanced over at Ed Monday’s heavily curtained house. “Why? Do you know something about him?”

  Charlie lowered his voice and leaned in close. “I’ve seen him down at the bank a lot these past few weeks. Several times I heard raised voices when he was in with Dudley, and the last time we had security escort him out of the building.”

  My eyes rounded and my throat constricted. “Ohmigod,” I whispered. “You think Ed killed Dudley?”

  Charlie’s eyes narrowed. “I don’t know, and I don’t trust him, that’s for sure. Be careful and don’t let the girls go over there. I’m glad you’ll have the dog here for a few days.”

  So was I. There was a murderer running loose in Hogan’s Glen. A big dog like Madonna would help me feel safer late at night.

  Charlie left then, and I was spared the embarrassment of reminding him that he wasn’t welcome in Mama’s house, even though technically I owned the house. As long as my mother lived here, this would always be her place, no matter what the deed said.

  If what Charlie said was true about my neighbor, I had plenty to worry about. I’d never considered reclusive Ed Monday to be a threat in the year he’d lived next door.

  A lawn service cut his spartan yard, and he didn’t have any flowerbeds to weed. We’d collected his newspapers the few times he’d gone away for a weekend, but that was it for neighborly interaction.

  Ed looked like someone’s grandpa. Sixtyish with a receding hairline and a protruding stomach. He didn’t throw wild parties. A perfect neighbor.

  Ed hadn’t been here long enough to be mad at Dudley on general principle so the most likely cause for his atypical behavior was a money problem. What kind of financial trouble did Ed have? Insufficient funds? Gambling debts? It worried at me like an infected splinter.

  I didn’t want to agree with Charlie, but my family’s safety came first. Until I knew more about what was going on in this community, I was going to assume everyone was guilty of murder, Ed Monday included.

  Why couldn’t life be as simple as an accounting
problem? In my everyday world, I plugged financial information into spreadsheets and the answers came out automatically.

  Only real life didn’t fit into tidy columns of numbers. Life didn’t follow formulas. Life was messy.

  My family wouldn’t be safe until Dudley’s killer was behind bars. Until then I’d be wise to remember that a killer walked our streets. I had just begun to think I was finally on the road to recovery, but Dudley’s murder scared me witless. No matter how much my life was messed up, I was still in better shape than Dudley.

  SEVEN

  “I’m gonna walk the dog after dinner.” Lexy shoveled the dinner I’d so lovingly balanced and cooked to perfection down her throat as if she were in an eating contest.

  “No you’re not.” Charla turned to me with anguish written all over her big brown eyes. “Mom, tell her that’s not fair.”

  “Madonna likes me more than you,” Lexy quickly interjected. “Can she sleep in my room tonight, Mom? Please?”

  At the mention of her name, Madonna thumped her tail on the kitchen floor.

  “Mo—om,” Charla said. “Tell her the dog is sleeping with me.”

  It didn’t matter to me who took care of the dog, but I couldn’t take much more of this bickering. My patience was shot. All I wanted was to go to bed and forget today ever happened. The dog would be gone in a few days. By then, hopefully, the world would be normal again.

  I looked up from buttering my roll and dispensed justice. “Lexy, you already had a turn walking the dog. Charla can take her out after dinner. Madonna will sleep in the kitchen. Don’t get too attached to this dog.”

  Lexy’s eyes brightened. “Can we keep her, Mom? We’ve never had a dog before. I want Madonna to be our dog, Mom.”

  The dog’s tail thumped again and she looked expectantly at the table. I willed her to stay in place. If she stood, her head was high enough to rest comfortably on my plate and she outweighed me.

  Speaking of plates, Charla’s was untouched. Why wasn’t she eating? Meatloaf was one of her favorite foods, and tonight’s dinner was cooked to perfection. Was she in the throes of an eating disorder?

  Charla joined forces with her sister. “We need this dog, Mom. It’s like fate, or something. Her coat matches all of our hair colors. How perfect is that? It’s like she was made for our family. Can we keep her, please?”

  I felt my resolve wavering under their combined onslaught. Madonna was a very nice dog. “This situation is temporary. Bitsy’s boys just lost their father. We can’t take this dog from them, too.”

  Both faces fell. I felt like an ogre for laying it out for them in black and white, but it didn’t help to shield them from the truth. This way they wouldn’t get too attached to the dog. “Brownies for dessert,” I said with forced cheer.

  “I’m not hungry.” Charla pushed away from the table and headed outside with Madonna.

  Lexy glared at me and stomped off to her room.

  Wasn’t it just like Mama to be off at bingo night when all the fireworks happened in our kitchen? Standing firm required lots of chocolate. Good thing I had an entire tray of turtle brownies.

  ~*~

  Before I turned in for the night, I walked the dog. I didn’t know if Madonna had to go out again, but I figured it wouldn’t hurt to try. I tucked a plastic grocery bag in my jacket pocket just in case there was anything to pick up.

  We walked on the sidewalk past Mrs. Waltz’s house and down to the end of the block before we turned around. The street was empty and I was glad for the corner streetlights. Madonna padded slowly at my side, her head leaning against my leg, as if she would perish without that human contact.

  She was in a strange place and her person was long gone. My heart ached for her. I’d love to make things right for her, but I didn’t know how.

  A passing car slowed, then crossed the street to our side. The driver’s window rolled down.

  I didn’t recognize the car and felt uneasy. What if the person who killed Dudley was stalking our streets looking for potential victims? I tightened my grip on Madonna’s leash. How fast could I sprint back to my front door?

  “Hey, Mrs. Jones.” The woman tapped on the side of her car. “Hey, Madonna.”

  Madonna’s ears perked up at the familiar voice and she dragged me over to the car. Up until that point I’d been walking her. Now she was walking me.

  I squinted into the boxy little sedan. Murderers didn’t go around greeting folks and their dogs, did they? A familiar freckled face smiled at me as she leaned out to pet Madonna.

  Katie Morales. She used to baby-sit for my kids when we lived in the old neighborhood. These days she cleaned people’s teeth for a living. “Hey, Katie. What brings you downtown?”

  “My boyfriend has a place out on Alternate Forty. I was on my way home when I saw you walking Madonna. I just had to stop and say hello. How you holding up, sweetie?”

  In answer, Madonna licked Katie’s entire face. Her tail wagged a few times before it dropped back between her legs.

  “She didn’t eat her dinner,” I said.

  “She won’t eat if she’s upset. When Mr. Davis had me watch her, I hand fed her for the first day or two. Once she got used to the change she was fine.”

  “You still living with your parents?” I asked. Katie’s parents were Dudley’s next-door neighbors.

  “Yeah.” Katie used both hands to massage Madonna’s whole face. “I’m saving my money so that when I get married next year we’ll have enough for a house down payment.”

  “You’re engaged?”

  Katie grinned. “Not exactly, but it won’t be too much longer, I don’t think.”

  “You should be careful being out this late. The police don’t know what happened to Dudley. I wouldn’t be out here myself if I didn’t have to walk the dog.”

  “Madonna and I are used to being out this time of night. I usually saw her and Mr. Davis walking the neighborhood every night when I got in from Adam’s.”

  I liked information to fit in neat little boxes. It seemed that Katie knew something about Dudley’s final hours. “Did you see Dudley walking his dog last night?”

  “Now that you mention it, I did see him, but he didn’t have Madonna with him. He waved at me, though, just like he always does.”

  A chill snaked down my spine. Katie may have been the last person to see him alive. “Do you remember what time that was?”

  “Sure do. Adam’s mother always makes me clear out by eleven on weeknights. It takes me fifteen minutes to get home, so that would make it eleven fifteen.”

  Madonna suddenly arched her back and hunched her hindquarters in. A smelly, gooey mess piled up beneath her. My plastic grocery bag wasn’t big enough to hold all that.

  Katie held her nose. “Gross.”

  “She must not be feeling too good.”

  Katie recoiled into her car. “Gotta run. If you need anyone to pet-sit Madonna, keep me in mind. Madonna and I are buds.”

  Katie sped off. What I was going to do with the gloppy mess on Mrs. Waltz’s sidewalk? Holding my breath, I scooped up as much as possible in my bag, then I ran and threw the bag in my trash can. Yuck.

  I’d never missed this part of owning a pet. It was one thing to care for a sick kid. They were your own flesh and blood, after all. Doggie diarrhea was above and beyond the call of duty.

  I thought about Dudley’s neighborhood as I locked the door, started the dishwasher, and went to bed. Across the street from his house was a fallow farm field. That field backed up to the number six green on the golf course. Had Dudley planned to meet someone on the golf course? He could have walked there in less than ten minutes.

  Madonna cried pitifully in my kitchen. She was in a new place, with strangers, and she couldn’t possibly understand that Dudley wouldn’t be coming back to get her. Tough love wasn’t meant for situations like this. It wouldn’t hurt anything if she slept in my room for a few days.

  The dog seemed overjoyed by the change in plan and leaped in
to my bed. This wasn’t what I had in mind, but I was too tired to argue with a dog that outweighed me. On the bright side, the dog generated heat and she really wanted to be with me.

  Why did Madonna think sleeping in a bed was acceptable? The only reasonable explanation was that Dudley had trained the dog to sleep with him.

  Dudley, the super stud, sleeping with his dog. Was he so hard up that only his dog would sleep with him? I’d never once suspected Dudley was lonely. He always seemed to have something going on. I yawned and snuggled into my side of the bed and dozed off.

  I awakened with a big dog head lying on my chest, my sensible cotton nightgown sopping wet with doggie drool. The shock might have killed a lesser mortal, but I’d raised two kids and knew how to roll with the punches.

  “Mom!” Charla burst into my bedroom, her red hair waving like a bright flag. “The dog’s missing.”

  “I’ve got her,” I said.

  Charla’s face fell and darts of jealousy shot out of her brown eyes. “No fair. She slept with you? In your bed? Don’t you get detention for that?”

  I edged out from under the dog’s massive head. “Nobody said this household was a democracy.”

  Charla appeared to consider the import of the dog wearing me down. And in that second I knew trouble was brewing.

  “Can I have a fringed leather motorcycle jacket? Can I? Can I?”

  “As soon as I win the lottery.” I shooed her out of my room.

  ~*~

  I called Britt right after I sent the girls off to school. “Got some detective news for you,” I said.

  He yawned into the phone. “What kind of news?”

  “I found out something last night. Dudley was in the habit of walking his dog every night about eleven-fifteen. The night he was killed, he went for a walk without his dog.”

  “And you know this because?”

  I winced at his sharp tone. “I know what you’re thinking. I’m not as nosy as Mama. I was out walking Dudley’s dog, minding my own business, and Katie Morales stopped to see the dog. Katie comes home the same time each night and always sees Dudley out walking his dog. On the night he died, she says he went out alone.”