by Joanne Fluke
Michele Serchuk
Chapter One
Ah, Christmas in Los Angeles. There’s nothing quite like it. Chestnuts roasting on an open hibachi. Jack Frost nipping at your frappucino. Santa in cutoffs and flip-flops. It’s hard to get in the holiday spirit when the closest you get to snow is the ice in your margarita, but I was trying.
On the day my story begins, I was attempting to take a picture of my cat Prozac for my holiday photo card. I thought it would be cute to get her to pose in a Santa hat. Prozac, however, was not so keen on the idea. And I still have the scars to prove it.
The only holiday Prozac gets excited about is Let’s Claw A Pair of Pantyhose to Shreds Day. Not a national holiday, I know, but one celebrated quite often in my apartment.
I kept putting the Santa hat on her head, only to find it on the floor by the time I picked up my camera.
“Oh, Prozac!” I wailed after about the thirtieth try. “What’s wrong with you? Why can’t you wear a simple Santa hat?”
She glared at me as if to say, I refuse to look like a fool for the amusement of your friends and relatives. I’ve got my dignity, you know.
This from a cat who’s been known to swan dive into the garbage for a chicken McNugget.
I was beginning to think E. Scrooge may have had the right idea about Christmas when the phone rang. I recognized the voice of Seymour Fiedler of Fiedler on the Roof Roofers, one of the not-so-long list of clients who use my services as a freelance writer.
“Jaine, you’ve got to come over to the shop right away.”
I wondered if he wanted me to punch up the Yellow Pages ad I’d just written for him. Although for the life of me I couldn’t see how I could possibly top Size Doesn’t Matter. We Do Big Jobs and Small.
But he wasn’t calling about the Yellow Pages ad.
“I’m in big trouble,” he said, his voice a hoarse whisper.
“What’s wrong?”
“I’m being accused of murder!”
Mild-mannered Seymour Fiedler, a man I’d never once heard utter an angry word, accused of murder? Impossible!
“Hang on, Seymour. I’ll be right over.”
I grabbed my car keys and headed for the door, just in time to see Prozac celebrating a whole new holiday—Let’s Poop on A Santa Hat Day.
Chapter Two
Seymour’s shop was in the industrial section of Santa Monica, a no-frills box of a building whose only concession to whimsy was a huge plaster fiddle on the roof.
His wife, Maxine, who doubled as his bookkeeper, sat at her desk out front, weeping into a Kleenex.
“Oh, Judy!” she cried, looking up at me with red-rimmed eyes. “It’s all too awful!”
Maxine was a fifty something woman with fried blond hair and a fondness for turquoise eye shadow, most of which had now rubbed off on her Kleenex. For as long as I’d been working for Seymour, she’d been calling me Judy. Every paycheck she’d ever written had been made out to Judy Austen, often in the wrong amount. Not exactly the sharpest blade in the Veg-O-Matic.
“Seymour’s waiting for you,” she said, gesturing to his office.
I found Seymour behind his desk, guzzling Maalox straight from the bottle. Normally a jovial butterball of a guy, Seymour showed no hint of joviality that day. His pudgy face was ashen, and sweat beaded on his balding scalp.
“Seymour,” I said, “what on earth happened?”
He took a swig of Maalox and wiped his mouth with the back of his hand.
“One of my customers was putting up Christmas decorations on his roof last week and fell. He landed on the driveway. Cracked his skull and died instantly.
“And now,” he groaned, “they’re blaming me.”
“But why?”
“I’d just finished re-roofing his house. And apparently some of the shingles were loose. They say that’s why he fell. His wife is hitting me with a wrongful death lawsuit. I might even be arrested on criminal charges.”
I shook my head in disbelief.
“The police are conducting an investigation,” he said, “but they’re just going through the motions. They’re pretty much convinced it was my fault.”
“Any chance one of your workmen screwed up?” I asked, wondering if maybe the cops were right.
“No way. I personally inspected the job when they were through.
“Oh, Jaine!” he said, mopping his scalp with an already-damp hankie, “I’m going to be ruined.”
“Don’t you have insurance for things like this?”
He let out a big sigh.
“That’s just it. Maxine’s been distracted lately. Our daughter’s getting married, and she’s been so busy planning the wedding, she forgot to mail in the last two premiums.”
Holy Tarpaper. Poor Seymour was in deep doo doo.
“I swear, Jaine, when I left that roof, every shingle was nailed down tight as a drum. Something fishy’s going on here and I want you to investigate.”
“You think somebody was trying to kill your client?”
“That’s exactly what I think. The only way those shingles could’ve gotten loose was if somebody went up there and loosened them.”
Now those of you who picked up this book for Hannah Swensen’s latest recipes are probably wondering: Why was Seymour Fiedler asking a freelance writer to investigate a murder? Shouldn’t he be talking to a private eye?
Well, it just so happens I’ve solved a few murders in my time. It’s a life-threatening hobby, I know, but it adds zest to my days and breaks up the monotony of writing about No-Leak Roof Warrantees.
“Of course, Seymour,” I said. “I’ll be happy to investigate.”
“How can I ever thank you, Jaine?” His eyes shone with gratitude.
Money might be nice, I couldn’t help thinking.
“Of course, I’ll pay you your going rate,” he said, as if reading my thoughts.
Now my eyes were the ones shining with gratitude. My job docket was a tad on the empty side, and I desperately needed the money for Christmas gifts.
“In fact,” Seymour said, “let me pay you something right now.”
He whipped out his checkbook and wrote out a check with a heartwarming number of zeroes.
I was sitting there thinking of the lavish gifts I could buy my parents and, not incidentally, a new cashmere sweater I’d been lusting after at Nordstrom, when Seymour broke into my reverie.
“I, um, wouldn’t try to cash that check right away.” He looked at me sheepishly. “I don’t exactly have enough in my account to cover it. Between our daughter’s wedding and my lawyer’s retainer, I’m sort of strapped.”
Bye-bye, cashmere. Hello, polyester.
“But I’m sure the check will clear some time in February,” he added hopefully. “Or March. Maybe April.”
I told him not to worry and scooted out of his office before he had me cashing the check in July.
I stopped at Maxine’s desk on my way out to say good-bye.
“So long, Judy,” she sniffled, her Kleenex by now pulverized in her palm.
“Try not to worry.” I gave her a reassuring smile. “I’m sure everything will be okay.”
I was sure of no such thing, but she looked so damn pathetic sitting there with mascara tracks down her cheeks, I had to say something.
“I hope so. I don’t know what I’d do if they ever arrested Seymour.”
My attention was momentarily diverted from Maxine’s grief by the sight of an untouched cheeseburger at her side.
Gosh, it smelled good.
“Would you like my cheeseburger?” she asked, following my gaze.
“Oh, no, thanks,” I said, eyeing the cheese oozing out from the sides.
“You sure? I’m so upset about what happened with those insurance premiums, I’ve totally lost my appetite.”
One thing I’ve never lost is my appetite, and that burger smelled like heaven on a bun. But I couldn’t possibly say yes, not if I expected to squeeze into a bathing suit by Christmas.
And squeez
ing into a bathing suit was definitely on my Holiday To Do List. That’s because every year I spend Christmas with my parents in their retirement condo in Tampa Vistas, Florida—much of that time on display at the Tampa Vistas pool. True, I’m not rich or wildly successful like some of the other kids on display, but I’m all they’ve got, and my parents are determined to show me off.
It’s a trip I dread every year. And not because I don’t love my parents. I do. If it were just the three off us, I’d be fine. But it’s not just the three of us. Every year my parents invite my Aunt Clara and Uncle Ed and my cousin Joanie to join us, along with Joanie’s husband Bradley and son Dexter. All of us bunking in a two-bedroom condo.
My mom calls it “cozy.” I call it hell.
Joanie and her family get to sleep in the guest bedroom. Uncle Ed and Aunt Clara camp out in the den. And lucky me—I get to sleep on the living room sofa right next to the Christmas tree. You haven’t lived till you wake up Christmas morning with pine needles up your nose.
And if all that weren’t bad enough, I have to spend an entire week feeling like a blimp next to my cousin Joanie, a perfect size two—and that’s after giving birth to Dexter.
Suffice it to say, the last time I wore a size two, I was in preschool.
All of which explains why I turned down that cheeseburger. I simply had to shed a few pounds before Florida.
True, I was feeling a bit hungry, but I made up my mind to stop off at the market and buy myself a nice healthy 100-calorie apple. That would tide me over till dinner. No burgers for me. No way. No how.
Okay, so I didn’t stop off at the market for an apple. I stopped off at McDonald’s for a quarter pounder. What can I say? I got in my car with the noblest of intentions, but the smell of Maxine’s burger hounded me like a hari krishna at an airport, and I couldn’t resist.
After licking the last of the ketchup from my fingers, I drove to the home of Garth Janken, Seymour’s recently deceased customer. Janken lived in the megabucks north-of-Wilshire section of Westwood, a bucolic bit of suburbia, which—in the interests of protecting the innocent and staving off a lawsuit—I shall call Hysteria Lane.
The houses were straight out of a Town & Country spread, dotted with gracious elms and white picket fences running riot with rosebushes.
At this time of year, however, landscaping took a backseat to Christmas decorations. Clearly the people on Hysteria Lane took their decorating seriously. No mere Christmas-lights-and-a-tree-in-the-window on this block. Everywhere I looked, I saw animated Christmas figures. Santas waved, reindeers nodded, elves pranced. For a minute I thought I’d made a wrong turn and wound up at Disneyland. A far cry from my own modest neck of the woods, where the only animated figure I’d ever seen on a lawn was Mr. Hurlbut, the guy in the duplex across the street, after he’d had one eggnog too many.
The theme of Garth Janken’s house was Christmas in Candyland. I could tell this was the theme by the gold-embossed CHRISTMAS IN CANDYLAND banner draped out front. Candy canes and sugarplums dotted the pathway to the front door, and perched on the roof on a carpet of pink flocking, amid a jungle of even more candy canes, was an elfin creature that I assumed was either the Sugarplum Fairy or Mrs. Claus after gastric bypass surgery.
As I climbed out of my car, I saw a mailman approaching. I decided to question him, hoping he’d seen something that would get Seymour off the hook.
“Excuse me.” I flashed him my most winning smile. “Can you spare a few minutes?”
“I’m afraid I’m sort of busy right now,” he said, sorting through some letters. “These weeks before Christmas are nuts.”
He was an energetic guy, in a pith helmet and USPS shorts, tanned and well-muscled from toting all that mail in the sun. What a difference from my mail carrier, a somewhat less than motivated employee who manages to deliver my Christmas cards just in time for Valentine’s Day.
“I promise it won’t take long. I’m investigating Garth Janken’s death.”
“You a cop?”
“No,” I demurred, “I’m a private investigator.”
He looked me up and down, taking in my elastic waist jeans and unruly mop of curls lassoed into a scrunchy.
“You’re kidding, right?”
I get that a lot. There’s something about elastic waist jeans and scrunchies that tend to take away your credibility as a P.I.
“No, I’m not kidding. I’m representing Seymour Fiedler of Fiedler on the Roof Roofers, and I want to ask you a few questions about Mr. Janken’s death.”
“Man, what a mess,” he said, shaking his head. “They’ll never get the blood out of the driveway.” He looked over at the Jankens’s house and sighed. “Poor Mrs. Janken. Such a nice lady. I hope she’ll be okay.”
“Do you know if Mr. Janken had any enemies?”
He barked out a laugh.
“Ring a doorbell on this street, you’ll find an enemy. Garth was an attorney. One of those sue-happy characters always threatening to haul somebody into court. Just about everybody disliked the guy.”
“Anybody dislike him enough to want to see him dead?”
He blinked in surprise.
“You think what happened to Garth was murder?”
“Possibly.”
His eyes took on a guarded look.
“Hey, I don’t want to go accusing anybody of murder.”
Rats. I hate it when people are discreet.
Then he took a deep breath and continued.
“But Mr. Cox sure looked like he wanted to kill him sometimes.”
Yippee. He wasn’t so discreet after all.
“Mr. Cox?”
He pointed across the street to a mock Tudor house with an elaborate display of animated reindeer out front.
“Willard Cox. He and Garth were always at each other’s throats. Especially this time of year, over the Christmas decorations.”
“They fought over Christmas decorations?”
“It’s nuts, I know. But the neighborhood association gives out an award for the best decorations, and the competition gets pretty fierce. Folks around here will do anything to win. You know what Garth’s dying words to his wife were? Not ‘I love you’ or ‘Hold me close.’ No, his dying words were, ‘Call in a decorator and finish the roof!’ Which is exactly what she did as soon as the police let her.
“Anyhow, Garth always won the contest and it drove Willard crazy. Before Garth and his wife moved here, Willard used to take home the prize every year. He was constantly accusing Garth of stealing his ideas and sabotaging his displays. Last year he claimed Garth beheaded his Santa Claus. Things really blew up a few months ago when Garth ran over Pumpkin.”
“Pumpkin?”
“Willard’s dog. Willard and his wife used to keep Pumpkin out in the front yard. She barked a lot and Garth was always complaining about her. One day Pumpkin got loose from the yard while Garth was backing out of his driveway, and he ran her over. He claimed it was an accident, but Willard was convinced he did it on purpose. That’s when I thought he was gonna kill him.”
Wow, this guy was a fount of information, Wolf Blitzer with a mailbag.
But the fount was about to run dry.
“Hey,” he said, checking his watch, “I’ve really got to go now.”
“Just one more question.” I trotted after him as he started up the street. “You ever see anybody up on the roof in the days before Mr. Janken’s death?”
“Nope. Nobody but the roofers.”
Sad to say, it was an answer I was to hear over and over again in the days to come.
I thanked him for his time, and headed back to Candyland to speak with the bereaved widow.
Cathy Janken was a real-life version of the sugarplum fairy on her roof—a delicate blonde with porcelain cheeks and enormous blue eyes. She came to the door in a pastel pink sweat suit the same color as the flocking on her roof, her platinum hair caught up in a wispy ponytail.
I gazed at her enviously. Sure, her husband had just died. But
on the plus side, the woman actually managed to look skinny in a pink sweat suit. If I dared to wrap my body in pink velour, I’d bear an unsettling resemblance to the Michelin man.
“Mrs. Janken?” I asked, trying to figure out if her ashen pallor was a result of grief or sunblock.
“Yes,” she said, blinking out into the bright sunshine. “Can I help you?”
Something told me she might not want to talk to me if she knew I was a private eye, not when she was in the midst of suing my client for several million dollars. So I’d decided to try another tactic.
“I’d like to speak with you about your husband’s unfortunate demise,” I said in my most professional voice. “I’m an insurance investigator with Century National.”
I flashed her my auto insurance card which I’d cleverly had laminated on my way to McDonald’s. It’s amazing how laminating things makes them look official.
“You representing Seymour Fiedler?” she asked.
“Yes, I am.”
Doubt clouded her baby blues. “I don’t know if I should be talking with you. What with the lawsuit and all.”
“I’m afraid you have to, Mrs. Janken. California state law. Plaintiff in a wrongful death suit must give a deposition to the defendant’s insurance representative.”
A law I’d just made up on the spot. But she didn’t know that. At least I hoped she didn’t.
“Okay,” she sighed. “C’mon in.”
Bingo. She bought it!
She ushered me into her living room, a fussy space done in peachy silks and velvets.
Above the fireplace was a framed portrait of Cathy and a fleshy man with dark, slicked-back hair, a feral grin, and a predatory gleam in his eyes that even the artist couldn’t quite camouflage. Presumably, the late Garth Janken. I could easily picture this barracuda fighting tooth and nail to win the Christmas decorating contest.
Cathy perched her wee bottom on a silk moiré sofa, and I took a seat across from her on a dollhouse-sized armchair. I teetered on it cautiously, hoping I wouldn’t break the darn thing, whose arms were as fragile as twigs.
Resting on a coffee table between us was a cut glass bowl of candy canes.