He seemed disgruntled, but also might have realized Tizzy was right and he changed the subject. ‘She called it an accident. Does that mean it’s official?’

  ‘The last I heard it was being left as inconclusive until they get results back from the tox screen to see what – if any – drugs were in her system.’

  ‘If it was foul play, any ideas of who?’ Theo asked.

  ‘Maeve seemed to be a really nice person. She was loved at the school. I just talked to one of her neighbors who I think had a crush on her. But …’ I took a breath and collected my thoughts. ‘From what Tizzy and I found out, Michael’s ex-wife was very angry at Maeve and blamed her for being left before the gravy train pulled in.’ Tizzy and I traded glances and laughed at variation on the cliché.

  ‘You know where that came from?’ Theo asked. ‘It’s from the 1920s, during the financial boom, and was railroad slang for a run that had good pay and little work.’ He seemed amused by my surprise. ‘I know about your thing about clichés. It made me curious about their derivation.’

  ‘I told you, Theo is curious about everything,’ Tizzy said as she gave his arm a squeeze.

  ‘Back to the suspects,’ I said. ‘I just got a call from his stepdaughter, Suzzanna. She did a number on me about wanting to help with the manuscript, but her real motive was to see what I have. She seemed to be representing her father and, reading between the lines, they seem worried there is something damaging about him in the material she gave me. She ended the call with what seemed like a threat.’

  ‘You didn’t tell me,’ Tizzy said.

  ‘It just happened this afternoon, between the time we went to the gallery and when you came over.’

  ‘What are you going to do about it, the threat?’ Tizzy asked.

  ‘It was really the threat of suing me, and I don’t think there is much chance of that, so I’m ignoring it.’

  Theo had been typing into the laptop as we were talking. ‘I agree with Veronica,’ he said. ‘What it really comes down to is if whatever they’re worried about being disclosed is true. My guess is that it is, and they’re just trying to scare you into glossing over anything negative about him.’ Theo looked back at the screen. ‘Do you know where that phrase reading between the lines came from?’ he asked.

  ‘No,’ I said, embarrassed that with all my fussing I’d used a cliché and not even realized it. It was nice of Theo to call it a phrase rather than what it was.

  ‘I never would have guessed it,’ he said, looking at his wife and me. It comes from cryptography, when a code was used that had the real message on every second line. So you had to read between the other lines of text to get it.’ Tizzy and I agreed what he’d found out was fascinating.

  ‘And then there’s Michael himself,’ I said. ‘Everyone seems to agree that being the spouse puts him in first position. And I heard something from the neighbor that contradicted his alibi that he was gone the whole time at an event they were using to get some material for a documentary being made on him.’ When I mentioned the documentary, it reminded me of what I’d found in Maeve’s notes about Jennifer Soames. ‘There’s someone else who might be involved.’ I told them that Maeve had written about Jennifer spending a lot of time with Michael. ‘And then later, Maeve wrote something that made it seem she knew he was a womanizer, but then wrote something to the effect that if she found out that he’d settled on one woman, she was going to do something that would cause him trouble. When I read it, it seemed to me to be a threat. I have to wonder if Maeve was referring to Jennifer.’

  ‘If they were spending a lot of time together, I bet you’re right,’ Tizzy said.

  ‘And you can be sure that Michael knows whatever she was threatening,’ Theo said.

  ‘Maybe he did something criminal,’ Tizzy said. ‘And he’d gotten away with it for all this time.’

  ‘I don’t know,’ I said, shaking my head. ‘Maeve was very nice in all my dealings with her, but she was really desperate to keep the whole project a secret. Maybe because she was worried.’

  ‘Are you going to mention this to the police?’ Theo asked.

  ‘Hardly,’ I said, rolling my eyes. ‘I don’t want to bring any attention to myself since it might end up making me a person of interest.’

  ‘I don’t like that term,’ Theo said. ‘It seems too imprecise. It’s like that thing where people say they’re engaged to be engaged. You’re almost a suspect and the cops have their eyes on you. It’s not even defined by the US Department of Justice.’

  ‘I think this particular homicide detective says it to annoy me,’ I said. ‘He knows I wrote a mystery and it’s the soft kind, more about people and the puzzle than gore. Derek Streeter doesn’t even carry a gun most of the time. Everybody keeps their clothes on and eats a lot. Derek succeeds when the cops overlook important clues. Maybe if I wrote something like Ben …’ I said, looking to Tizzy before explaining to Theo that he was a cop.

  ‘I know all about Ben,’ he said. ‘And Daryl with the job that convinced her to get tattoos and Ed with the pages so full of heaving and throbbing that no one except Ben can read them out loud.’ Tizzy obviously shared even more than I realized.

  Theo nodded. ‘Yes, I understand why this detective wouldn’t be a fan and might resent you offering him any information. So, what’s the plan. Investigate on your own?’

  It was a good question, and I wasn’t sure of the answer.

  TWENTY-FOUR

  I had enjoyed having Tizzy and Theo’s company. I did a quick cleanup and went back to looking through Maeve’s notes, curious if there was anything about Sophia. It would have been nice if it was all on my computer and I could have just done a search, but I was stuck actually speed-reading the pages, looking for some mention. I found a couple of snippets in the pages and mixed them in with what Theo had showed us on YouTube.

  Who would have thought that Michael and I would have gotten involved with a YouTube star? I didn’t even know who Sophia was. I only found out after she bought the Scotty painting. It was easy to see why she acquired it. Her Drexel could have been the model. It was fun being included in one of her videos. It was nice that she appreciated my value as an art teacher. You could say we appreciated each other. I was amazed at her knack for finding things and turning them into treasures.

  I left it at that, thinking I’d look at one of the later videos again so I could get exact details of the treasures Sophia had created. And maybe find the video Maeve had been in to pick up some details. Finally, I called it a night, and fell asleep without the need of chamomile or crochet.

  In the morning I made a deal with myself. If I spent the morning writing, I’d treat myself to a bowl of soup at the coffee shop in the afternoon. Thursday was cream of potato soup, another of my favorites. I repeated what I’d done so many times, which was to comb through more of the pages, looking for something I’d missed. It was easy to miss things because there were often just random paragraphs or thoughts and not in a particular order. This time I found something from their early days. She seemed to have some concerns about money that she had given to Michael. It was a little vague, but it sounded like he’d done some creative bookkeeping when he managed the coffee house and she had given him the money to make up for it. Wasn’t ‘creative bookkeeping’ another way of saying embezzling? I wondered if there was more.

  The deal worked and the morning slipped by without me noticing as I racked up some more pieces to include in the book.

  ‘Sorry you can’t join me, no cats allowed,’ I said to Rocky as I put my jacket on. The black-and-white cat looked up at me from the couch and he had a pleading look that I’d seen when he was up for adoption. Then it had said, Please take me with you. This time it seemed like he was saying, Do you really have to go?

  The wind swirled through the tree out front, sending a shower of semi-parched leaves around me as I stepped onto the sidewalk. I didn’t bother closing my jacket since I was literally just walking across the street.

  It always felt inviting in the small coffee shop and, since it was the slow time after lunch, I took a big booth in the window where I could look out at the street. There were always people coming and going and the inevitable group of joggers on their way to the lakefront.

  The soup arrived, steaming hot with a basket of bread and butter. Since it was homemade, it was always a little different, though always delicious. I was savoring a creamy spoonful when I felt a blast of air as the door opened and someone came in. Before it could fully register, someone was in my face talking in a low, terse voice.

  ‘What did Maeve tell you about me?’ Michael Angel demanded. He didn’t give me space to say anything before he continued. ‘You should know that Maeve was crazy.’ He was leaning on the table so we were eye to eye. ‘What have you found out from all your snooping?’

  ‘It wasn’t snooping,’ I said. ‘I went to the art gallery that features your work.’

  ‘You weren’t exactly honest about who you were,’ he said, almost spitting the words.

  ‘That’s not true,’ I said. ‘I gave them my name and even gave Melanie my card. I said I was writing something. I just wasn’t specific.’

  ‘Whatever you were doing, I don’t like it. You went to my neighbor’s, too.’

  ‘It’s a public street and he started the conversation.’ I didn’t like having to defend myself, and instead tried to turn the questioning on him. ‘How do you know about my conversation with Kent?’

  ‘I saw you go in there, and I asked him. He said you were looking for information about Maeve.’

  ‘And he told me she liked to garden,’ I said, trying to keep things calm.

  He had moved closer to me and I could see anger building up inside of him. ‘You better take my daughter up on her offer.’ His eyes flared and his voice was almost a growl. ‘One way or another, that book won’t come out without my approval.’ He tried to lean even closer with a menacing stare. ‘I could ruin you, or worse.’

  I felt another blast of air as the door opened again. I tried to look around him to see who’d come in, but he reacted by putting his hands on my arms. ‘I’m talking to you.’ I was surprised and annoyed at being grabbed and was going to push him away, but someone else did it for me. Michael stood upright in surprise and found himself staring at Ben.

  ‘What’s the problem?’ Ben said.

  ‘Just a misunderstanding,’ Michael said as he backed his way to the door. The whole time he was glaring at me, and he did that thing with his fingers where he pointed at his eyes and then at me. The meaning was clear, he would be watching me.

  ‘Thanks,’ I said to Ben, and then I saw that he wasn’t alone. A petite woman with over-tweezed eyebrows was standing next to him.

  ‘You must be As—’ I stuttered on the syllable and almost called her Ben’s sister’s nickname for her, ‘Ashleigh,’ I said, relieved that I managed to get her name right.

  ‘And you are?’ Her voice was harsh and demanding.

  ‘I’m Sara’s upstairs neighbor,’ I said, trying to hide that I was checking her out. She was pretty in a sharp sort of way and, though she was wearing a light coat, I saw the short, clingy dress just as Sara had described. She stared back at me and if looks could have killed, I would have been dead. She obviously had figured I was more than I’d said. All this and I was still recovering from the interchange with Michael. Why was he acting so threatened? What did he think I knew? Did it have to do with what I’d figured out in my latest go-through of the pages? The thoughts swirled through my mind as I tried to deal with the current circumstance. Ashleigh made a point to wave her left hand at me so I could see the gold band with a diamond on her ring finger.

  ‘Who was the guy? Your boyfriend?’ she said.

  ‘Yeah, who was he?’ Ben repeated.

  ‘The upset spouse of a client,’ I said.

  Ashleigh was still staring at me, and a look of recognition came over her face. ‘You’re the writing teacher?’ She turned to Ben. ‘You made her sound like a gray-haired librarian type, like Donna Reed in that movie they show every Christmas.’ I knew she was referring to a scene in It’s a Wonderful Life, and the actress who had been made up to look like a dried-up fidgety woman. Why had Ben said that? Obviously, so she wouldn’t think of me as competition.

  ‘If everything is OK,’ Ben said, snagging her arm, ‘we have to go.’ He went to the door with her in tow and looked back just before they went outside and mouthed something which I gathered was an apology.

  I looked down at the almost full bowl of the creamy soup, which was now cold. It didn’t matter because I’d lost my appetite anyway. I asked to get it packed to go.

  The whole episode of Michael’s appearance, the veiled threat and then having Ben and Ashleigh show up had given me a super adrenalin rush. When I got upstairs, I put the soup away and flopped on the couch to recover. The adrenalin receded, but it left me with sort of a brain fog. I tried to think of doing normal things to get myself back together, like to check Rocky’s dry food and clean his litter box, but I couldn’t seem to boost myself off the couch. I needed to calm myself and instinctively pulled out the plastic bag with the crochet square I’d just started. I was glad it was a really basic one, just a single and then a double crochet in a toast-colored worsted yarn. Even with the simplicity of the pattern, when I looked back at the rows I’d done, I saw that I’d made a mistake and screwed up the order of stitches which threw the whole pattern off. I gave the yarn a yank and started ripping, as my mind went back to what had just happened. Without meaning to, I ripped the whole thing apart and was left with a pile of yarn. As I went to start over, I had an uneasy feeling as I considered Michael’s sudden appearance. He must have been holding a lot of anger and then seen me through the window.

  I wondered how idle his threat was. He’d said he’d ruin me and that the book wouldn’t come out, no matter what he had to do. How had it gone from what seemed like a nice memoir to this? Maeve was dead and he had sort of implied I might be too if I persisted. Maeve had said there might be a problem if Michael found out about the memoir, but I never thought it would be something so serious. I wondered if I should try to back out of the whole thing. Maybe I could borrow some money to give back what I’d been paid.

  But there was a part of me that didn’t want to be scared off. And no way was I going to deal with Suzzanna’s ‘help’. I began to feel a new resolve to finish the manuscript and to find out what he was hiding and make it public. And if I found Maeve’s killer, so much the better.

  I’d chained the first row and begun working on the pattern of stitches. My mind switched to Ben. Not really Ben – it was more about seeing Assleigh in person. It was OK to call her that name since it was only in my head anyway. Why had they gone to see Sara? She was the one who came up with the name for Ben’s wife, clearly expressing her feelings about her. I imagined various scenarios, but the predominant one was that Ben had brought her over to tell his sister they were trying to make a go of it and attempt to make peace between them. Maybe Ashleigh’d talked him into it. Or maybe he was a willing participant. There had to be something about her that attracted her to him in the first place, since obviously he’d married her.

  Looking to distract myself from the Ben situation, I went into my office and grabbed the packet Maeve had given me. I’d noticed that every time I looked through the papers, I found something new. I started with the first page and began to read through her notes again, hoping there’d be a clue to what Michael was so worried about.

  The afternoon faded into darkness without me noticing. I reheated the soup and ate it while I continued to read. The beginning pages had stops and starts as she had attempted to write entries. I had to force my shoulders to unhunch and skipped ahead back to the journal pages that I had glossed over before. I got that she felt guilty when she realized he was married, but she was so infatuated with him that she convinced herself that Rina was in competition with him, while she wasn’t. Rina had been holding him back, and she would help him soar.

  I heard my cell announce the arrival of a text. I figured it was probably from Sara with some sort of update, but when I looked it was from Ben. He was standing outside my door and didn’t want to knock and scare me and asked if he could come in.

  He was holding a bunch of sad-looking flowers and there was no reserved cop look this time. The best way I could describe his expression was ‘hangdog’. ‘They were the only ones left at the market,’ he said, handing them to me. ‘You have to give me credit for intent.’ He blew out his breath and rubbed his forehead. ‘I’m sorry,’ he said.

  I waved for him to come in and he went into the living room and sat on the couch.

  ‘You could have just texted me the apology,’ I said.

  ‘No. I’m not that kind of guy. I believe in person is the best.’

  I had to give him credit for that. Most people would have taken the easy way out and just sent me a message telling me about the change in his situation. But now it was my turn to step up and deal with him. I didn’t want to be the one who was dumped, so I decided not to wait for him to say his piece. Despite my efforts to distract myself, I had kept going back to seeing him with Ashleigh. It was pretty clear what was going on and OK, it was a cliché, but true. Three was a crowd. It would make me feel better to speak first as if it was my decision.

  He had that look on his face as if he was trying to put the words together, but I put up my hand. ‘No worries, I understand,’ I began. ‘I get it. You want to give it a second chance and come up with a happy ending this time. Isn’t that the fantasy of everyone who gets dumped? What was it? Did you bring her over to show Sara you were back together and hope you could make it so you all would get along?’ I kept going, never giving him a chance to answer what I looked at as rhetorical questions.

  ‘Whatever we started together was nice, but you really need to put all of your attention on her. I’m perfectly fine with you staying in the writers’ group. I promise it won’t be awkward.’ I stopped to take a breath.

 

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