Flipped Out

by Jennie Bentley

  “You don’t suppose . . .” But I stopped and shook my head. “No, surely not.”

  “What?”

  I would have continued, but we could hear Dr. Ben’s footsteps in the hallway. After a few seconds, he came into the kitchen. Instead of sitting down at the table, he went around the island and pulled another mug out of the cabinet.

  “Everything OK?” Derek asked when his father didn’t immediately speak.

  Dr. Ben nodded. “She’ll be all right. I offered her a prescription for something to help her sleep, but she said she already has something at home.”

  “If you want her to sleep, I don’t think hopping her up on a stimulant is the way to go.”

  “I know that,” Dr. Ben said. “I’m making tea. With lots of sugar for the shock.”

  He put the mug of water in the microwave and set the timer. The appliance whirred, and Dr. Ben leaned against the counter, watching the mug spin through the door.

  “So, um . . .” I glanced at Derek before continuing. “She really is upset, right? She’s not just faking?”

  Derek and Cora both looked at me but neither spoke.

  “Faking?” Dr. Ben repeated. “What makes you ask that?”

  “Wayne said that when someone is killed, the significant other is always the first person they look at. She’s the significant other. His fiancée or girlfriend or whatever.”

  “Why would she want to kill him?” Cora asked. “Haven’t they just gotten engaged?”

  I shrugged apologetically. “Well . . . Tony did go to dinner with Nina last night. Maybe Melissa objected.”

  “Enough to stab him several times with a screwdriver?” Derek said. “Surely that’s overkill.”

  He flinched when he realized what he’d said. “I mean . . .”

  “I know what you mean. And she probably didn’t. It just struck me, is all. That she stopped by the house this morning because she knew the police would find her fingerprints and hair all over the kitchen, and she wanted to explain it away.”

  Nobody spoke for another few seconds. The microwave stopped running and the buzzer rang into the silence. Dr. Ben opened the door, grabbed the mug of hot water, and put it on the counter before hunting up a tea bag and dropping it in to steep. While it did, he assembled milk and sugar.

  “I’ll take this to her. You can drive her home in a few minutes.”

  He wandered out, holding the mug.

  “You’re not serious?” Derek said, turning to me.

  I shrugged, avoiding his eyes. I wanted to tell him I wasn’t, because I could see that the fact that I might be upset him, but I couldn’t bring myself to say the words. Sure, I was probably wrong. I knew I was biased. I don’t like Melissa. But the possibility should at least be noted. When someone’s killed, the significant other is always a suspect. Melissa had no business at the house this morning. And if Tony had gone to dinner with another woman last night . . .

  “You’ve got to be kidding!” Derek kept his voice low to make sure Melissa couldn’t hear him, but his eyes were blazing blue fire. “You think Melissa killed Tony!”

  “I didn’t say that. I just think we need to consider the possibility. She does have a bit of a temper, doesn’t she?”

  Derek’s face shuttered. “Who told you that?”

  “Kate,” I said. “Last summer. Before I met you. That day I got back to Waterfield from New York and discovered all of Aunt Inga’s china broken on the kitchen floor. Wayne wanted the names of anyone I knew in town who might want to upset me, and she was one of the few people I’d met. Kate said it wouldn’t have been the first time Melissa threw flatware around.”

  He didn’t answer, and I added, “Are you saying Kate’s wrong? That Melissa doesn’t have a bad temper?”

  “She has a short fuse,” Cora said. Derek sent his stepmother a look across the table, but he didn’t protest. “And she does get jealous. She never seemed to mind you hanging out with Jill—”

  Jill Cortino nee Gers was Derek’s high school sweetheart. They’re still good friends, and Jill’s husband, Peter, certainly doesn’t seem to mind their continuing relationship.

  “—but I remember when you were working with Kate McGillicutty on renovating the bed and breakfast. Melissa wasn’t happy at all.”

  “She didn’t stab me with a screwdriver, though,” Derek said.

  “But weren’t things already unraveling by then? In your marriage?” Kate had been in town for seven years, and Derek and Melissa had been divorced for at least six.

  He shrugged. “I suppose they were. As soon as I decided I didn’t want to keep being a doctor, she started to look for a way out. So I guess it wasn’t like she really cared what I did at that point.”

  “She never did,” Cora said. “She was just jealous because you belonged to her and she didn’t want anyone to think she couldn’t keep you. If anyone was going to leave the relationship, it would be her.”

  “And she did,” Derek said. “As soon as she had Ray firmly under her thumb.” He shook his head. “Why are we talking about this? She never stabbed me; I don’t think she’d have stabbed Tony.”

  “You never gave her a real reason to think you’d cheat,” I pointed out. “You’re not the type. But maybe Tony was. Maybe he and Nina were involved when they were younger, and now that he’d seen her again, he was planning to dump Melissa. If she can’t handle rejection . . .”

  “She didn’t kill anyone!” He winced at the loudness of his own voice, and moderated his tone. “I was married to her for five years and dated her for a couple years before that. Don’t you think I’d know if she’s capable of murder?”

  “I’m sure you would,” I said, although I couldn’t help involuntarily glancing at Cora. She was looking back at me, and I could tell that she shared my view. I’d definitely have to run this idea past Wayne, but it would have to be sometime when Derek wasn’t around to contribute his two cents worth of opinion.

  When my distant cousin Ray Stenham went to jail, Melissa sold their shared McMansion for a lot of money. She put half toward Ray’s legal fees and used the other half to buy herself a loft on Main Street in downtown Waterfield. It was half a block from her office at Waterfield Realty, and right in the middle of the commercial and tourist district. Unfortunately, that meant that it was also directly across the street from Derek’s loft above the hardware store. For the first couple of months after she bought it, she kept him on almost permanent retainer for things like leaking faucets and peeling paint and burned-out lightbulbs. For a few weeks at a time, it seemed like he spent almost as much time in her apartment as he did in my house. Derek swore I didn’t have anything to worry about, that she wouldn’t want him back even if he were willing to take another chance on her and he wasn’t, and I believed him . . . but I didn’t like it.

  At any rate, he was familiar with Melissa’s place. There was no hesitation at all when he walked her through the living room—painted in Melissa’s trademark cream, with a cocoa-colored sofa and cool blue chair on a geometric brown rug—and into the only bedroom.

  I trailed behind, looking right and left. She had invited me up before—heck, Derek had invited me up before to stand by and hand him his tools and at the same time see for myself that nothing was going on—but I’d declined, telling myself that I trusted him. Ergo, this was my first time inside.

  The decor was what I’d have expected, knowing Melissa. Tasteful, elegant, expensive. Not much personality. The color choices were the same ones Melissa favored in her clothing. The kitchen was updated with mocha cabinets, stainless steel appliances, and granite. The artwork seemed to have been chosen to coordinate, whether or not Melissa had any particular affinity for it. There were no photographs anywhere, and no clutter. Everything looked perfect, like a photo spread in a home-and-garden magazine, right down to the two wineglasses and expensive bottle of Bordeaux grouped on the kitchen island. Idly, I wondered if she’d kept her and Derek’s apartment looking like this when they were married, too, and ho
w my casually untidy boyfriend had felt about that.

  It wasn’t until I wandered closer that I noticed that the atmospheric grouping of wine and glasses wasn’t intended for show. The glasses were used—with Melissa’s telltale lipstick marks on one—and the wine bottle was open and empty. Incidentally, it was Melissa’s favorite Bordeaux, and coincidentally, the only wine she’d ever succeeded in getting Derek to drink. The one he’d told me about. Not that I was reading anything into that, of course.

  It did cross my mind to wonder who she’d been drinking with, however. Given the pristine state of the loft, Melissa clearly wasn’t in the habit of leaving dirty dishes sitting around, so the glasses had to be from last night or they’d already be washed and in the dish drainer. And if Tony had been having dinner with Nina, who had been here with Melissa? There were no lipstick marks on the second glass, so probably not another woman.

  I had a quick look around, but there were no other clues. No Turkish cigarette butts in the ashtray—no ashtray, for that matter—no convenient package of matches bearing the logo of a hotel in Portland, and also no monogrammed handkerchief accidentally dropped under the coffee table. A man’s jacket did hang in the coat closet just inside the front door, but it looked like something Tony would wear. Smelled like him, too.

  When I got to the bedroom, Derek had finished tucking Melissa into bed. Her clothes were still on, but he had unstrapped her sandals and slid them off. They were lying on their sides on the floor next to the bed. I picked them up and set them upright in a corner, out of harm’s way. They were Jimmy Choos, and, as such, deserved respect. Then I watched as Derek walked to the bathroom and came back with a glass of water.

  “Here you go. I’ll leave it here, along with the pills.” He put the glass and two small white capsules on the night table.

  Melissa nodded. She looked pitiful, like Greta Garbo on her deathbed in Camille. I felt guilty thinking it, but something seemed off. As if it were show rather than real emotion.

  “Is she all right?” I whispered.

  Derek glanced at me. “Fine. She just needs rest.”

  “Let’s go, then. I want to talk to Wayne.”

  “Sure,” Derek said. “See you, Melissa. Try to get some sleep.”

  Melissa nodded, looking wilted. But I could feel her eyes drilling into my back as I towed Derek toward the door.

  7

  “What was that about?” Derek asked when we were in the truck and on our way back to Cabot Street.

  I glanced at him. “What?”

  “Dragging me out of there. You’re not upset, are you?”

  “With you? Of course not.” Derek’s compassion is a wonderful quality, and one I really appreciate—when he’s taking care of me.

  I must not have sounded convincing enough, because Derek took his eyes off the road for a few seconds to look at me. “Doctors can’t always choose who they treat, Tink. They can’t pick only the fun cases, or the ones that don’t make their girlfriends feel uncomfortable. I know I’m not a doctor anymore, but it’s the way I was brought up. When someone needs my help, no matter who they are, I have to do what I can. Just like Dad.”

  “I’m glad to hear it,” I said. “Listen, you know I’ll never have warm feelings toward her, but I hope you know I didn’t want this. No matter who she is. Losing a fiancé or a husband or a boyfriend isn’t something I’d wish on my own worst enemy.” Especially under circumstances like these. Accident or natural death is bad enough; brutal, bloody murder a whole lot worse.

  “I know that, Avery,” Derek said, reaching out with his free hand to take mine, twining our fingers together. “You’re all talk. If Melissa really was in trouble, you’d be the first in line to help.”

  I wasn’t so sure about that. But in any case—

  “Hopefully it won’t come to that,” I said, thinking that the trouble Melissa was likely facing was being charged with her fiancé’s murder.

  “It won’t,” Derek answered.

  By the time we made it to Cabot Street, Wayne and the television crew were long gone, and so was Tony’s car.

  “Peter Cortino came and picked it up,” Brandon Thomas explained. Wayne’s youngest and most gung-ho deputy, he’s tall, blond, and strapping, with blue eyes and an easy smile, along with a rabid interest in anything forensic. If the Waterfield PD could afford to employ a full-time forensic tech, Brandon would be in heaven. As it is, he handles all the evidence and the crime scene investigations, but during the downtime, when nothing too exciting is going on, he’s out on patrol like everyone else. I’d gotten to know him quite well during the time I’d lived in Waterfield, since he’d had more than his fair share of crime scenes to investigate in the past year, many of them in or around houses Derek and I were renovating.

  “Anything else happen?” Derek wanted to know, looking around. There were smudges of fingerprint powder everywhere, where Brandon had checked windowsills and door frames and knobs for anything useful. I’d probably be the one who had to clean that up tomorrow or the next day, when Brandon was done and we were back at work. I’d cleaned fingerprint powder out of several of our houses in the past, so I had it down to a science by now.

  Brandon shook his head. “Nothing. Wayne took the TV crew back to the B and B to talk to them. I haven’t heard from him, so I guess the interviews are still going on. And there’s nothing exciting here.”

  “No fingerprints?”

  “Plenty of fingerprints. With as many people as have been through here, I’m not surprised. You two, the crew, Kate and Shannon, Tony and Melissa, and the people who used to live here . . . No way to tell whether any are unaccounted for yet.”

  Of course not. That’d have to wait until he got back to the police station and started processing and matching what he’d found.

  “Sounds like you’ve got a busy day ahead of you,” I said. Brandon nodded but then grinned, a little sheepishly.

  “I have fun doing this. Probably shouldn’t say that when someone’s dead, but I like doing this stuff.”

  “Is there anything we can do to help?”

  Brandon shook his head. “I should be done here in another hour or two. Don’t think you’ll get the house back until tomorrow, though. Sorry.”

  “We were prepared for that,” I said. “It isn’t the first time this has happened.”

  “The crew can’t do any filming anyway,” Derek added, hands in his pockets, “so even if we could work here, it wouldn’t do any good. We can find something to do elsewhere until the morning.”

  “By tomorrow, Wayne’ll probably be ready to release the crime scene. There’s not much here.” Brandon looked around with a shrug.

  “No sign of forced entry?” I marveled, silently, at the life I’d led in the past year that had taught me to use expressions like that.

  Brandon shook his head. “Whoever it was had a key.”

  Derek muttered something, probably about his own stupidity in leaving the key on the porch where anyone could find it.

  “It could have been Tony who unlocked the place,” I reminded him. “He probably had a key of his own.”

  “Did you find it on him?” Derek wanted to know. Brandon shook his head.

  “Well, even if the killer used the key you hid on the porch to open the door, you couldn’t have known that,” I said. “You were just trying to be nice.”

  Brandon looked nonplussed. “What’s this?”

  I explained about Ted and the key in the planter.

  “And it was his idea to leave the key outside? Show me where.” He headed for the door.

  “I don’t know that I’d call it his idea, exactly. . . .” I threw after Brandon’s departing back.

  “He asked us to leave the place open,” Derek said, following, “so he could come in early and set up. But I didn’t want to. And it didn’t make sense to have another key made, since we all planned to spend pretty much every waking moment here for the next week. Besides, I don’t like a lot of keys floating around. Especia
lly since it isn’t our house.”

  “So this guy Ted suggested that you could leave the key outside?” Brandon stopped on the porch and looked around. “Where?”

  “Right there.” Derek pointed. “Corner of the planter. And I’m not sure it was his suggestion. I think it was my call where to put the key.”

  Brandon nodded, but he looked pensive. “I don’t guess you noticed anything going on between this guy Ted and Tony Micelli?”

  Derek and I exchanged another look. “Nothing out of the ordinary,” I said. “The only person who admitted to knowing Tony from before was Nina Andrews. Ted didn’t look like he cared for him a whole lot, but that could have been because Nina didn’t seem happy to see him. At least not at first.”

  “That changed?”

  “I expect it must have. She went to dinner with him last night. Or she was supposed to.”

  “Huh,” Brandon said.

  “They were planning to go to the Waymouth Tavern. I guess someone will check?”

  “I will,” Brandon said, coming back to reality, “when I’m done with everything else I have to do. And when they open this afternoon.”

  Derek looked around. The sun was shining, small white clouds were chasing each other across the blue bowl of the sky like pieces of cotton wool, and I could hear the sound of a bumblebee nearby. “What about the neighbors? Have you spoken to them? Did anyone see anything last night?”

  “Just the old lady next door,” Brandon said. “She didn’t hear or see a thing. What can you tell me about the rest?”

  Derek shook his head. “Not a lot. We haven’t spent that much time here. Sounds like you’ve already met Miss Stevens. I know I’ve seen little children a couple houses down, playing in the yard. There’s a family with teenagers in the blue house across the street. The father drives a truck and the mother is home with the kids for the summer.

  “She works at the high school library during the school year,” I contributed. “Her name is Donna. She introduced herself to me one day last week to ask what was going on. Tony hadn’t told her he was thinking of putting the house on the market, so she was a little surprised. Then again, she said he’s pretty much never around, so it wasn’t like he’d have occasion to tell her anything.”