Chapter Five

The next morning, Orion and I got into the Element. I rolled the passenger window down and Orion stuck his head out. As we left town and picked up speed, I could have sworn I heard him laugh.

I pulled up into the driveway at Kyle and Lola’s house. Kyle and Lola were my dad’s best friends. They’d been fixtures in my life ever since I could remember. If I had a second Dad, it was Kyle. Lola was the one who’d inspired me to become a journalist. She’d been the one to notice my writing while I was in high school and had helped me navigate my way through the world of journalism. She’d also been the one to tell me to come home after I’d torpedoed the whole thing. It made me sad that their gate was locked, but I understood why. I glanced up the road at the neighboring property with its prominent FOR SALE sign out front. Apparently, people weren’t keen to buy a place that had been the scene of a murder. Well, that and one where chickens had apparently been allowed to live in the house.

Lola walked down the driveway, her step light, with her Australian shepherds, Maurice and Barry, cavorting around her. She looked tall to me again. For a while there, she had seemed to shrink as evidence had mounted up against Kyle. Who could blame her, really? Her husband had been accused of murdering a neighbor. Everyone had thought he was guilty. Well, everyone except Lola, and their lawyer Janet, and me. Together we’d figured out who had really done it and made sure that person went to jail. I’d help remove that burden from Lola’s shoulders and that thought made me stand a little taller, too. She opened the gate, but held up her hand for me to wait. “I thought it might be best if the dogs all met out here, not quite on our property. Then nobody has to get defensive.”

I bowed to her greater doggie wisdom. I opened the door and slid out, then called Orion. He came to the edge of the seat and looked down. His eyes got wide then he looked at me. “It’s okay.” I said. “They’re friendly.” I hoped I was right.

Then Barry did that thing dogs do where they stretch their legs out in front of themselves and wiggle their butts up in the air that seems to be a universal invitation to come play. Orion’s ears perked up and he leapt from the car. In a second, the three dogs were chasing each other around in circles.

“I think it’s going to be okay,” I said to Lola.

She laughed. “Apparently.”

She opened the gate and we all went in.

“So how did you end up with this dog again?” she asked.

She motioned me to their deck where Kyle waited with coffee and muffins. “Just guarding the snacks,” he said.

“Smart move. Orion stole a cookie out of my hand yesterday. He did it so quickly and gently, I didn’t even know it was gone until I tried to eat another bite of it.” I was kind of proud of him. It had been a slick move. I also hadn’t thought it was possible to feel so much affection for a being who had stolen my Snickerdoodle, but here we were.

Kyle motioned for me to sit. “When did you get Orion?”

“He’s not really mine. I’m fostering him until the person who inherited him figures out what to do with him. She’s all the way in Maine and didn’t really know the person who died. It’s been hard.” I grabbed a poppy seed muffin and took a big bite.

“He’s gorgeous. Why don’t you keep him?” Lola sat down and poured herself a cup of coffee.

“I’d like too, but Dad always said a funeral home was a terrible place for a dog and Donna agrees with him.” Again with the indigestion! I set the muffin I’d been about to eat down. Maybe too much sugar on an empty stomach was causing it. I rubbed at my sternum. According to what I’d read about training therapy dogs, I’d have to start with some special puppy training for Orion. I’d have to look into that next.

“So what else brings you out here?” Kyle stood up and threw a ball for the three dogs to chase. It bounced off their deck and down the long slope toward their stand of olive trees. Their branches drooped with fruit. Harvest time must be right around the corner. We—and thirty or so of Lola and Kyle’s closest friends—would spent most of the day picking and then be rewarded with a truly astounding meal and a bottle of oil that came from the olives we’d picked ourselves. “What did you need to ask?”

I pulled out the list of four names I’d made the day before and pushed it across the low table to Lola. “Did Dad ever have any issues with any of these people?” I asked.

Lola picked up the paper and looked over the list. Kyle looked over their shoulder. They both snorted at the same time.

“What?” I asked.

“Well,” Lola said. “Everyone had trouble with Jerrod Dew. He was an ornery old coot.”

“What kind of trouble?” Maybe I was on to something.

Kyle broke off a piece of blueberry muffin and chewed for a moment. “The get off my lawn kind of trouble. Nothing big. Why?”

“Yes.” Lola shook her head. “Not that I know of. What are you up to, Desiree?”

I slumped back in my chair. “I’m not sure.”

“Walk me through it.” Lola tapped me on the knee and it was like I was back in high school trying to figure out how to write an article for the paper.

“These are the last four people whose funerals Dad oversaw before he disappeared. I thought maybe he might have stumbled across something that would make someone get rid of him or make it so he needed to disappear.” I kicked at the leg of my chair. “It might explain where he is and why he had to go there.”

Lola was shaking her head before I even finished speaking. “No. Stop this. It’s not good for you. It’s not good for any of us.”

I felt tears filling my eyes. Suddenly, Orion was back on the deck and sitting on my feet. I reached down to scratch him behind his ears. “I can’t. I can’t drop it. Until I know what happened, I can’t let it go. I swear I feel his presence sometimes.”

Kyle sighed and scratched at his beard. “I know. I get the same feelings. I want so much for him not to be dead that I entertain all kinds of thoughts about how he might have survived and what he might have been doing all this time. Sometimes I even convince myself that I can feel his presence nearby, too. It’s because we miss him so much. It’s magical thinking. He would have told you the same thing. You know how he was about ghosts.”

I did. This was different, though. “I don’t think he’s a ghost, Kyle. That’s why I’m looking into this. I think he’s here. Really.”

Kyle leaned forward, elbows braced on knees. “We’ve been over this so many times. Your dad’s gone, Desiree. I don’t like it any better than you do. At least he got to go out doing something he loved.”

“What about the tape?” I asked. I’d installed a security camera over our back door. I had tape of the person who’d left the note for us. We couldn’t see that person’s face; he’d had on a baseball cap pulled low. We could see his general build, though. “How can you ignore that?”

Lola put her hand over mine. “That tape was like photos of the Loch Ness Monster or Big Foot. Yes. The man who left that note on your back porch was the right height and general weight as your dad, but you really can’t see anything else. You can read all kinds of things into that tape.”

“The handwriting?” I pressed.

“A lot of people around your dad’s age made their Ys like that. It’s how they were taught to write cursive in elementary school. You had Luke dust the note for fingerprints, didn’t you?” she asked.

I nodded. “There were none. Totally none. Like someone had wiped the paper clean with something and then worn gloves whenever they touched it.” I’d been so hopeful when I’d brought it to him. I’d have proof. My dad was alive. The results had been more than disappointing. “So if that guy wasn’t my dad, who was he?”

Kyle threw his hands in the air. “Who knows? None of it makes sense, Desiree. None of it.”

I tore up my muffin into pieces. “I feel like there’s more to this story.”

Kyle said, “I feel like if he wasn’t dead, he’d be here with his daughters. Not running around leaving weird notes and creepy gifts. You know how important family was to him.”

He had a point about that.

*   *   *

Jordan Giroux had a heart attack and dropped dead on the kitchen floor while his wife, Reita, was playing bridge like she did every Tuesday night. It wasn’t a total surprise. It wasn’t Jordan’s first heart attack and he hadn’t exactly been living life the way his doctor wanted him, too.

Reita, a tiny woman of Mexican descent with neatly cut graying hair, patted his hand inside the coffin. “He did it all on his terms,” she said. “If he couldn’t have a beer or eat cheese, he didn’t want to live. It may have shortened his life, but at least he was happy while he was here.” A little sob wracked her.

“Oh, here.” I guided her to a seat and settled her. I felt as if I could pick her up and carry her, her bones seemed so fragile and light. “Can I get you anything? Some water?”

“Would you mind?” She looked up at me, her brown eyes starting to swim with tears behind her glasses.

I brought her a cup of water, which she gulped down greedily. “Are you taking care of yourself?” I asked. “Are you eating and drinking enough?”

She looked up at me as if those words didn’t have meaning. “I think so.”

“But you don’t know so?” It was easy when you were grieving to forget about such ordinary things as eating and drinking. I was certain Reita wouldn’t starve herself, but it was easy to get dehydrated and that didn’t help anything at all. “I’ll get you another cup.”

I got her another cup of water and then the guests began to file in. “I’m worried about Reita,” I told Olive as I took her walker. “I’m not sure she’s taking care of herself.”

Olive looked over at Grace. “We’ve got this,” she said, taking her walker back. All three of them shuffled over to sit around Reita, patting her shoulder.

There was a time that I thought Olive, Grace, and Henrietta’s presence at every funeral was ghoulish. I couldn’t decide if they were lording it over the dead that they were still alive or faced with their deaths coming closer they had an unhealthy fascination with it. Dad had explained that it was none of the above.

“When someone passes, there’s a hole in the community. The community needs to mourn that. These days, people are too busy. Everyone is going a million directions at once. Olive, Grace, and Henrietta come to represent the community so the family of the person who passed knows they’re not alone,” Dad had said.

I hadn’t totally bought it at the time. They liked to throw a little too much shade to be seen as entirely benevolent. Seeing them surround Reita now, I thought maybe he had a point.

When the service was done and people had filed out, Reita came over to say her final good-bye.

“I knew when it happened, you know,” she told me.

“You did?” I’d thought she wasn’t home at the time. Maybe I’d heard wrong.

She nodded. “I didn’t know what it was, but I felt it. I thought it was one of those little earthquakes. You know, the ones that you barely notice, but still wake you up at night or knock a picture off the wall.”

I knew exactly what she meant. Pretty much anyone who lived in California for any length of time knew what she meant. You found yourself sitting bolt upright in bed and you wouldn’t even know why until you read the newspaper the next morning. Or maybe you thought you heard the sound of a really big truck going down the street, but there was no truck there. “I asked the other ladies at the bridge table if they’d felt it, too, but they all said no. I thought I was just a bit more sensitive than the rest of them.” She looked up at me. “I always have been,” she said. “I’ve always been a bit more sensitive than everyone else.”

“Do you really think it was the exact time?” I asked. “How do you know?”

She nodded. “I looked at my watch. You know, so I could look it up later and say I told you so to the other ladies about feeling the earthquake at the exact time and Jordan smashed his watch when he fell down in the kitchen so we know when that happened, too.” She gave another little sob. “Maybe if I’d run home right then, they’d have been able to bring him back like they had before. I felt it and didn’t listen to whatever forces were telling me that he was gone, that our connection had been severed.”

Their connection. She was talking about that emotional and psychic link that some couples had. I’d seen it between Donna and Greg and I was pretty sure I’d seen it between Carlotta and Jasmine. I’d bet Reita never had to ask Jordan to pass the salt. I wracked my brain for something to say to comfort her. Something Dad would have known to say. “If the connection was severed, he was really gone,” I said. “Gone past bringing him back.”

“Do you think so?” she asked. Something in her eyes behind the tears gave me courage to say more. I wasn’t sure what the something was. I thought maybe it was a tiny bit of hope.

“I do. I really do.” I closed the coffin lid and helped her outside to go to the cemetery.

Jordan Giroux’s graveside service took place under blue skies with hardly a trace of cloud. As the coffin was beginning to be lowered, a perfect V-formation of geese flew overhead, heading south. I saw Reita look up and then her hand went to her chest. I thought she’d been hit with a surfeit of emotion. I knew how she felt. There was something about the perfection of those moments that stirred me, too. Then her legs crumpled beneath her.

I dialed 911 as I rushed to her side. “We need an ambulance at Lawn of Heaven,” I said.

There was a moment of silence, then the dispatcher said, “Isn’t everybody there already dead?”

“Not yet, but maybe if they don’t get here soon. Reita Giroux just collapsed.”

“Oh, poor thing. I’m sending them now.”

Sure enough, I heard the sirens within a few minutes.

*   *   *

After the paramedics left with Reita, Luke strolled over to me. “Hell of a way to drum up business, Desiree.”

I glared at him. “Show some respect for Reita and Jordan, Luke.”

To his credit, he looked a little bit embarrassed. “Gonna need a statement from you.” He pulled out a pen and a notepad.

“Right here?” I asked, looking around the cemetery at the people still milling around not quite sure what to do.

“Unless you want to come down to the station.” He looked at me over the top of his mirrored sunglasses.

I didn’t want to come to the station. I wanted to go back home, find Orion, and have a good cry with my face pressed into his neck. I definitely didn’t want to make a statement here at the cemetery. “Let me make sure people know they can go home, then I’ll meet you at Turner, okay?”

He thought for a second. “Yeah. I can make that work.”

I went around to the other mourners, suggesting that they go home. Many wanted to know what they could do and I really didn’t know what to tell them since I didn’t know what to do in these circumstances. I’d never had anyone have a heart attack at a graveside service before. At the moment, I was mainly relieved that she hadn’t tumbled right into the open grave with the coffin. Once everyone was gone, I got back into my car and headed back home.

I saw Luke in his police cruiser parked in front as I pulled up. I waved and drove around back, went inside through the back entrance, went to my room, changed my clothes, found Orion, and then went downstairs to let him in.

“Took you long enough,” he said, looking me up and down.

I’d put on a soft cotton tunic, jeans, and fuzzy boots. I needed comfort. “This way.” I nodded with my head toward the Lilac Room.

I settled myself on the couch where we usually seat our clients. I shuffled today’s newspaper that was on the coffee table over to one side. Luke sat down across from me in the straight chair I usually sat in these days. I plucked a tissue from the box and Orion put his head on my knee.

“Hey, who’s this?” he asked, pointing at Orion.

“Luke,” I said. “Meet Orion. He was Violet Daugherty’s dog.” We did the handshake routine. “I’m taking care of him until I find a home for him.”

“The cousin didn’t want him?” Luke asked.

“She already has a dog. She thought a second one would be too much.” It wasn’t really a lie. I was pretty sure that was what she’d meant when she hung up the phone on me.

“How could you be too much?” Luke leaned down and rubbed his head against Orion’s. “You’re too cute to be too much.”

He was awfully cute. Orion. Not Luke. Although I suppose some people might think Luke was good looking.

“So what happened with Reita?” Luke sat up and asked.

“I don’t really know. One minute we were standing there. Then Reita looked up as some geese flew over and crumpled to the ground.” I scratched Orion behind the ears. He licked my hands.

“What do you think happened?” he asked. “Do you think it’s goose-related?”

I looked up. He was willing to entertain the possibility of a goose-related death, but not one caused by insulin? “Earlier she seemed a little dehydrated. I gave her some water. I’m hoping it’s just that.”

“Uh-huh.” He made a note. “So you don’t think it’s another murder?”

There was a gloating smirkiness to his tone that I didn’t like. The goose thing was a joke. It wasn’t funny. Then again, Luke rarely was. “Is that really all this is to you? An opportunity to bust my chops?”

He shrugged. “When something drops into your lap like this, you gotta take advantage of it.”

“Luke Butler, a member of our community has been rushed to the hospital and all you can think of is scoring points in an argument?” Every once in a while, I warmed to Luke. I started to think he was okay. Then he proved to me he wasn’t.

“Hey, who’s busting whose chops?” He snapped his notepad shut. “You never come to me for those quotes you put in your articles. You always talk to Carlotta. And you and Johar are the ones trying to tell me I’m not doing my job.”

He was jealous that I’d quoted Carlotta and not him. How old was he? “Well,” I asked. “Are you?”

“Of course I am.”

“Then have you looked into what Nate found out about Violet Daugherty? That she had high levels of insulin in her blood when she crashed her car?” I started to get up, but Orion put his paw on my leg and I settled back on the couch.

“No. Because that’s a bunch of nonsense.” He waved me away.

“How do you know it’s nonsense? You haven’t looked into it at all.”

“Because there’s no reason to! The woman lost control of her car and it went into an embankment on a twisty country road at a time of day when the sun is setting and gets into people’s eyes. It’s tragic. It’s sad. It’s not murder.” He shook his head. “Somebody forgot to write down something that was done in the field in a moment of high pressure. I’m sure that’s it.”

That was just supposition. Not fact. Not investigation. “But you don’t know, do you?”

“I do know.” I hated how confident he sounded, how confident he always sounded. I’d felt that confident at one point in my life. I missed the feeling.

“What about that e-mail? The nasty one. Nate said he told you about it. Maybe there are other people with grudges against her.”

“Oh, no, no, no,” Luke said, sitting up straight. “You’re not playing detective again, are you?”

“I’m not playing at anything,” I said. “I’m keeping my eyes open and seeing a lot of connections. I’m a reporter. It’s what I do. If that also makes me a detective, then I guess I’m a reporter-detective. I’m not so bad at it, if you’ll remember.”

Luke’s eyes narrowed. “Solving one murder doesn’t make you a detective.”

I leaned forward. “Yeah. How many have you solved?”

He leaned forward, too, so we were nose to nose. “I solve what needs to be solved and there’s nothing here to solve. There are no murders to be solved here. None. Chick fell asleep while driving her car and rammed into an embankment. It was a single-car accident. No skid marks on the ground. There’s not a lot more to discuss.” He sat back and wagged his finger at me. “You are skating on thin ice, Death Ray. Don’t think I didn’t hear about your little to-do with Iris and Daisy Fiore.”

I decided to ignore Luke going back to using my old grade school nickname. He knew how much I hated it. He was only doing it to get a rise out of me. “That was a mistake,” I said. I looked down. I still felt bad about it. Every time I thought of it, I saw the tears in Iris’s eyes when she talked about what it took to be a good daughter. I was embarrassed that I’d made her feel bad when she was already grieving. Embarrassed enough that I hadn’t talked to anyone about it, except Jasmine. I sat up straight. If Luke had heard about it, someone was talking about it. The only other people who knew were Daisy or Iris. They had to have been spreading it around. What possible reason would they have for that? “Who told you about it anyway?”

Luke puffed up his cheeks and blew out a breath. “Someone at the coffee shop told me. No idea who told her.”

So weird. Why would Iris tell anyone? But back to the matter at hand. “If there aren’t murders to be solved here, what does it matter if I poke around?”

“You’re pissing people off,” Luke said, sounding as if he was one of the people I was doing that to.

The feeling was mutual. “You’re pissing me off. Do you have to stop what you’re doing?” I said.

He stood up, too. “I suppose so. I’ll see myself out.”

I couldn’t help it. I stuck my tongue out at his retreating back as he went out of the room.

Donna slipped into the room and cuddled into the couch with Orion. Perhaps he was already growing on her. I sat back down. I was not going to miss a group cuddle. “What did Luke want?”

I told her what happened at Jordan’s graveside service. Her hand went to her mouth. “That’s terrible.”

“I know. I feel awful.” I did, too. Now that my self-righteous indignation from talking to Luke was burning out, the sorrow over Reita came back to the fore.

“It’s not like you did anything wrong.” She paused. “Did you?”

Her tone made me think of Daisy asking Iris what she’d done. “Of course not!” I shrunk down in my corner. “At least, I don’t think so.”

“Well, then we’re fine.” She patted me on the knee and left to go back upstairs.

I didn’t feel like we were fine, though. I felt like there was some kind of disturbance in the field. Things were off kilter. I’d felt that way for a while, too. First Dad, then Kyle being accused of Alan Brewer’s murder. It had felt like something had happened to my community, something had knocked it out of balance, had put on a blot on it. Now there was Violet Daugherty, too. Something wasn’t right there, but Luke refused to see it. I needed to find something to force him to open his eyes.