Bailey held her hands out as Lia and her wiggly passenger approached their usual picnic table. “Come to Auntie Bailey, you gorgeous thing.”
Lia set her travel mug on the table and good-naturedly removed Gypsy from the Moby wrap, handing her over. Kita, lying prone on the tabletop, lifted her head, gave Gypsy a sniff, snorted, then laid her muzzle on her paws. Chewy butted Lia’s leg, looking for attention. Lia dropped a hand without thinking and scratched the base of his ear.
Bailey stroked Gypsy’s head. “Since you’re not halfway to Canada, I assume Susan lives.”
Lia inhaled the spicy scent of her chai latte, took a sip, and admired her own zen calm. “Can’t kill her if I don’t know where to find her. Seriously, I refuse to let that woman mess with my head.”
“Good plan.”
“She is less than the buzzing of insects in my world.”
“Attagirl.”
“May she find happiness, wherever she is.”
Bailey frowned at the parking lot. “Who do you suppose that is?”
Lia caught a flash of blue from the corner of her eye. “Who do you think it is? That’s Terry’s truck.”
“Not Terry. Behind him.”
Lia lifted her head to see a white Cadillac pulling up to the fence.
“Geezle-freaking-pete. That’s Susan’s car.”
“What’s she doing here?”
“The video wasn’t enough. She wants to insult me in person.”
“Forget what I said about the Rule of Three. Do you want me to sic Kita on her?”
Kita, who was about seventy-eleven in dog years, looked up at the mention of her name. A four-inch tendril of drool hung dangerously from her muzzle.
“You’d have Kita slime her for me? You’re a true friend.”
Susan exited her car and joined Terry and Steve.
Bailey cocked her head. “She’s wearing an Ann Taylor suit to a dog park. Goddess, she’s wearing pumps. That’s reason enough to slime her.”
Napa, Jackson, and Penny crowded around Susan, sniffing. Susan took a stiff step back. Terry said something to the dogs and they retreated.
“Don’t,” Lia said. “If Kita goes near her, she’ll swear out a complaint against you and try to get Kita put down.”
“She can’t do that unless Kita bites her.”
Kita gave Bailey a mournful look.
Lia snorted. “She’ll bite herself and say Kita did it.”
Bailey tickled Gypsy’s chin with a calloused finger. “I have a screwdriver. We could puncture her tires.”
“She won’t be able to leave. We’ll be stuck with her.”
“That’s no good. How did she find you?”
“I don’t think she did. She’s talking to Terry and Steve like she knows them. I bet she wants to interview them about the bones.”
“What are you going to do?”
Gypsy wandered across the table. Lia picked her up, holding her like a baby as she rubbed the fat tummy. “Nothing. I refuse to let her get a rise out of me. And I’m not leaving my own damn dog park.”
The trio progressed up the service road. They parted at the picnic shelter with Terry and Susan remaining behind while Steve brought the dogs into the park.
Bailey waved to catch Steve’s eye. “We need intel,” she explained.
Steve ambled back to their table, opening his arms to Gypsy. “Come to papa, you vixen.”
Lia surrendered the pup. “I’m going to start renting her out by the quarter hour.”
Bailey nodded at the pair now assembling a tripod in the picnic shelter. “What’s with the overdressed blonde?”
Steve cradled Gypsy as he looked over his shoulder. “Susan’s a video blogger. She saw the story Aubrey Morse did with the guys at Boswell’s and called Terry to set up an interview. He offered to meet her here.”
Bailey’s protuberant eyes widened for an alarming effect. “Didn’t you get the memo? That’s Peter’s old girlfriend. I can’t believe you brought her here.”
Steve’s eyebrow raised as he turned to Lia. “Peter’s ex? I saw you take out Desiree in that video. You plan to put her down?”
“Don’t ever joke about Desiree. I won’t plow into Susan however much she deserves it. She’d cry fake tears while she asks Peter how I could be so mean to her.”
“What will you do?” Steve asked.
Lia lifted her head to a virtuous angle. “She’s Peter’s problem. I plan to let him handle it.”
Bailey bit her lip. “Are you sure you want to do that?”
“Why wouldn’t I?”
Steve and Bailey exchanged glances.
“What?” Lia demanded.
Bailey folded her arms. “You think she’ll ignore you and go on her way?”
Steve said, “We know that’s not happening.” He eyed Lia shrewdly. “Question is, if Lia can handle someone with obvious mean-girl chops when Susan decides to get under her skin.”
Lia’s back went up. “What mean-girl chops?”
Inside the shelter, Susan and Terry stood in front of the tripod, an iPhone serving as camera. Daylight bled into the darkened space, illuminating the pair while the shadowed background created a natural chiaroscuro effect. It was a sophisticated choice. Has to be an accident. Lia shoved the thought away as petty and mean-spirited.
Terry removed his camo cap and flipped an index finger skyward, making some point. Susan tilted her head and clapped her hands, clasping them between her breasts.
Steve interrupted her thoughts. “Former cheerleader, right?”
“How can you tell?”
“You saw her clap her hands and toss her head,” he said. “Classic cheerleader moves. All cheerleaders have serious mean-girl chops. You can’t make the squad without them. But there’s something else you should consider.”
Lia’s temples pulsed with an incipient headache. “And that is?”
“None of us will admit it, but guys like it when a woman shows a little jealousy.”
Lia’s mouth dropped open. “You think making an ass out of myself would please Peter?” She turned to Bailey. “Tell me this isn’t a thing.”
Bailey’s expression filled with pity. “It’s a thing.”
“Would you do it?”
“No, but John isn’t like other men.”
Lia looked from Bailey to Steve. “And Peter is?”
Steve cradled Gypsy with one hand and held the other palm up in defense. “Don’t look at me. But you might want to consider how many hits that video got before it came down.”
Like children banging on an out-of-tune piano, Lia’s friends gleefully punched all the buttons she didn’t know she had. It was something friends did—usually at the worst possible time—and she’d never understood it. She dedicated herself to picking stray twigs out of Chewy’s fur.
“I refuse to lose my dignity over a woman Peter doesn’t want.”
“Famous last words.” Steve nudged Bailey, whispering, “I bet she makes Lia blow up.”
Lia stuffed her irritation and maintained an even voice. “I heard that.”
Bailey poked her tongue in her cheek, considering. “What qualifies as a blowup?”
Steve rubbed his chin. “Screaming, profanity in a raised voice, anything that meets the requirements for assault under the law.”
“You’re on. We need a deadline.”
“I say she loses it within a week.”
“Up the stakes and make it two.” Bailey placed a hand on Lia’s. “You can avoid hitting Susan for fourteen days, can’t you? You won’t even see her for most of them.”
The pulse in Lia’s temples became a throb. She ground out, “I don’t plan to hit anyone. Ever.”
“Good girl.” Bailey turned back to Steve. “What’s at stake?”
“Steak sounds good. If I win, you can buy me one.”
“That’s low, expecting a vegan to buy you a steak.”
“Why do you think I chose it?”
Head beating like a drum, Lia pretended she was far, far away. Somewhere without people. The Mojave would do, or that vacant beach Jody Foster found herself on in Contact. The one on the other side of the intergalactic wormhole.
Bailey said, “All right then. If I win, you detail my truck.”
Steve’s eyes tracked over the fifteen-year-old Toyota Bailey used to haul mulch. “What would be the point?”
“You want dead cow. I want a clean truck.”
“Doesn’t matter, since I’m going to win.”
Her skull pounding, Lia snapped, “I’m not here so you can abuse me for entertainment value.”
“See? Short fuse,” Steve said.
Bailey didn’t miss a beat. “What if Chewy attacks Susan? Does that count?”
“We’ll take that on a case-by-case basis. Depends on whether Susan does something that would make any dog respond aggressively, or if Lia instigates the attack. Can’t have loopholes.”
Lia screeched, “You think Chewy would bite someone, even if I told him to?”
Chewy whimpered and hid under the table. Gypsy whined and squirmed in Steve’s arms, desperate to get to Lia. She jumped onto the table and burrowed into Lia, seeking reassurance, giving solace. Lia’s headache faded.
Steve tsked, shaking his head. “Short fuse. Still think you’re going to win?”
Lia held Gypsy to her chest, glaring at Steve. “I won’t punch Susan, but I may give you a good smack. Why aren’t you interviewing with her? You found the bones.”
Steve removed his Panama hat, scratched his bald scalp. “I spent enough time talking to the press when I was a union rep. No matter what you say, they find a way to make you look bad.”
Lia forgot her pique. “You didn’t warn Terry?”
“This is Terry we’re talking about. The women he knows are either Mensa nerds or former hookers court-ordered to A.A.” He finger-quoted the “former” part. “You think he won’t invite public humiliation to hang with a classy blonde?”
On the far side of the park, Susan leaned over her tripod and removed the phone. Terry collapsed the tripod and presented it to Susan, who tucked it into her hobo bag. The pair strolled across the park to Lia’s table, Susan’s manicured hand resting lightly on Terry’s arm.
Terry, at his most gallant, nodded to the group. “Susan, I’d like you to meet my friends.”
Susan’s eyes met Lia’s and her practiced smile froze. Those eyes dropped to Gypsy, still in Lia’s arms.
“I see you have that adorable puppy with you.”
Lia bared her teeth in a parody of Susan’s smile. “Always. She’s my bodyguard. She’s so enjoying the scarf you gave her.”
“Delighted to hear it.”
Underneath the table, Chewy sensed Lia’s tension and whined. She dropped a hand and rubbed his neck.
Terry’s face brightened. “You know each other? Excellent!”
Bailey cleared her throat. “Susan’s an old friend of Peter’s from high school.”
“Really?”
Lia saw gears turning in Terry’s head. Steve planted a foot on Terry’s camo-patterned Croc. She wondered if Terry felt the pressure through the spongy synthetic. Probably wouldn’t matter if he did.
“Peter and I were engaged for years. I can’t believe I let him get away.” Susan addressed Lia. “We got off on the wrong foot the other day. I hope we can start over. Do you mind if I sit?”
Bailey stood and Kita jumped down. “We’re going for a walk.” She nudged Steve. He and Terry followed, three rats deserting a sinking ship.
Susan took a faded bandana from her hobo bag and laid it across the bench before she sat. Not Hermès. Terry must have given it to her.
“Peter says you’re an artist—”
Not bloody likely he said anything to you about me.
“—It must be tough, making a living that way. Did he tell you about my video show? Maybe I can help you.”
Gypsy squirmed, wanting to explore the table. Lia stuffed her in the Moby wrap to keep her away from Susan and a possible case of rabies.
“What did you have in mind?” She didn’t know why she bothered asking. She knew what was coming.
“It would be fun to interview a local artist, and it would give you exposure.”
Exposure: code for “something for nothing.”
“Thanks, but I don’t need the help.”
Susan scanned Lia’s paint-spattered shorts, took a side trip to stare pointedly at her bare left hand. Her eyes softened with pity as she took in Gypsy and the rumpled Moby wrap slung across Lia’s chest like bandoliers.
Lia saw herself through Susan’s eyes, saw Gypsy as a poor substitute for the infant the wrap was designed to hold, saw the studio clothes as a pathetic lack of personal pride. She understood in that moment how the right clothes provide armor. Today, in her safest of safe places, she had none.
Susan’s eyes completed their circuit, meeting Lia’s, oozing sympathy like too much maple syrup drowning a stack of pancakes.
“Artists are so independent. I admire that. Really.”
“Let’s not pretend. You’re in Cincinnati because of Peter. You have no interest in me.”
Susan tilted her head, blinked, made a little frown. The sequence made Lia think of android Nicole Kidman in The Stepford Wives. “Honey, you’re selling yourself short. I find artists fascinat—”
“Peter and I are together. You can’t waltz in here and snap him up like a purse at Nordstrom’s.”
Chewy’s head butted Lia’s leg, demanding reassurance. She dropped her hand again. Gypsy wiggled, trying to climb out of the wrap. Lia kept her eyes on Susan, restraining Gypsy with her free hand.
Susan’s eyes hardened to cold, stone disks. “Believe what you want. I’ve known Peter all his life. You don’t mean a thing to him, no matter what he tells you.”
“And what makes you say that?”
“If you mattered, he’d marry you. You don’t even have a ring.”
Lia’s hand flew to the lump under her shirt, the bit of Peter’s heart she wore on a chain, precious and personal to her. Her fingers curled around it, drawing on it for strength and dignity. Chewy butted her leg and whined.
“You had a ring. You had more than one, and here you are. I guess a ring isn’t everything.”
The stone disks turned mean, snakelike. “If Peter loves you, why doesn’t his family know about you? All he wants from you is easy sex and cheap rent. Or maybe that’s cheap sex and easy rent. You’re what we call a free-range dairy cow back home.”
Lia blinked, speechless.
Susan resumed her cheerful expression. “Get a clue. You and your pathetic dogs mean nothing to him.” She strolled away, abandoning Terry’s bandana on the bench. Then she stopped, looked back, lifted her chin.
“Nothing.”
Pride kept the hit from showing on Lia’s face, but there was something smug in Susan’s walk as she left the park. Chewy came out from under the table. Lia ruffled his ears with both hands.
“You, little man, can be very inconvenient.”
Bailey hoisted herself onto the table top. “Are you okay?”
“You heard that?”
“It’s all crap.”
“I don’t think so. Not the part about Peter not telling his family about me. I bet that’s true.”
“Then he has a reason. Peter loves you. You know that.”
Lia said nothing. She dropped her face to rub her cheek against Gypsy’s head.
“Peter would marry you in a minute. Not getting married was your idea.”
Lia climbed onto the table and curled into Bailey. Chewy jumped up beside her, pressing against her hip. Gypsy struggled to reach Lia’s face, the bright pink tongue flicking at her chin. In this moment, Lia missed Honey’s soothing presence ferociously.
“It’s not that.”
“Why are you crying?”
“I’m not crying.” Because she hadn’t let tears come. “It was all bullshit, but it was so ugly. She wanted to make me feel like nothing and she succeeded.”
“You got hit with a psychic zap.”
“A what?”
“Thoughts can hurt, even, especially, when they aren’t true.”
“What are you talking about?”
“If your barriers aren’t solid, people can impose their thoughts and feelings on you. And when those thoughts are hateful, it can make you sick.” She took Lia’s shoulders, pushing her into an upright position. “Cuddle Gypsy and close your eyes.”
“You’re going to do puppy woo-woo on me?”
“I use whatever is available.”
Lia plucked Gypsy out of the wrap and laid the pup against her shoulder, shutting her eyes as she stroked the tiny body. Felt Gypsy’s butter-soft fur against her cheek, the muzzle poking around her neck, in her hair. Inhaled the warm, sweet animal scent.
“Tickles.”
“Feel better?”
“A little.”
“Keep your eyes shut. Plant your feet firmly on the bench. Breathe in.... Now breathe out and feel all the poison and hatred flowing through you, out the bottom of your feet. It’s not yours, it doesn’t belong to you. She gave it to you but you don’t need to keep it. Give it to the earth.... Breathe in through the top of your head. There’s a gold light surrounding you. Breathe it in.”
Lia didn’t hold with Bailey’s New Age mumbo, but the pit in her stomach was now large enough for her to fall in. She inhaled, having no clue how to do it through the top of her head.
“Keep breathing. When you exhale, imagine all the poison is dark smoke, leaving through the bottom of your feet, going into the earth where it will be purified. Breathe in the gold light. Fill yourself with it.”
Lia kept her eyes shut. Gypsy squirmed and licked her nose.
“I want in on that bet.”
“No can do.”
“Why not? If you can bet on me, I can bet on me.”
Bailey, her voice firm, said, “Lia, look at me.”
Lia opened her eyes. “What?”
“We were yanking your chain. There is no bet.”
Thanks to cell phones, Tony Piraino Jr., Esq. caught Tony Piraino Sr. at the eleventh hole of the Losantiville Country Club, where the old man now practiced golf instead of law. He agreed to meet with Peter, stating this was likely to be more entertaining than his usual round of lies at the bar.
Piraino stood when the hostess delivered Peter to his table of cronies, shaking Peter’s hand with an impressive grip for a man well into his seventies. Trim build, excellent posture, and a full head of well-tended hair. Alma would call him a silver fox.
“Maggie, let Carmen know I need another scotch and water, and—” he turned to Peter “What’s your poison?”
Peter wanted Pepsi, but that wouldn’t win him points with Piraino. “Sweet tea, Thanks.”
“Sweet tea it is.” Piraino turned back to Maggie. “Pete and I will be over in the corner.”
He nodded at an empty table in a sea of empty tables, then took the seat in the corner, giving Peter a view of the golf course. It made Peter nervous, not being able to see the door. He imagined Piraino put his back to the wall for the same reason he would, to ensure they were not overheard.
Piraino leaned back in his chair. “I was wondering when you’d get to me.”
“You remember Andrew Heenan, then.”
“It’s hard to forget a client who goes missing.” Piraino lifted his chin, eyes focused over Peter’s shoulder. A waitress arrived, setting down their drinks. “Thank you Carmen.” He waited for Carmen to leave before he resumed speaking. “You sure it’s him?”
“He was wearing an Elvis jumpsuit and absent the lower half of one leg. Who else would it be?”
Piraino sighed. “I’m sorry to hear it. I liked Andrew. Any chance it was a natural death?”
“Unlikely.”
“Damn shame. I think he expected something like this—not the shallow grave, precisely, but something.”
“What makes you say that?”
“Our arrangement. As his attorney I can’t talk to you, but as his agent under power of attorney I can say whatever I want. Andrew traveled overseas for extended periods. He hired me to pay the bills.”
“He didn’t have an accountant for that?”
“He did. One I hired for him. I had specific instructions in the event he disappeared.”
“Did he have a will?”
“It was the same as his instructions.”
“Which were?”
“If he went missing for ninety days, I was to sell his house and liquidate his assets.”
“What happened to the proceeds?”
“Everything went to Our Blessed Lady Church.”
Peter ran through the list of churches he knew. Our Blessed Lady had to be one of several lined up on Clifton Avenue, one-stop shopping for the soul. “You have an excellent memory.”
“It was an odd situation. Hard to forget.”
“Andrew strike you as a religious man?”
“Not particularly. As far as I know, he never set foot in the place. I’m sure I have the name of the priest I dealt with in my files. I’ll look it up for you after I get home.”
“How much money was involved?”
“Between the house and his financial assets, in the neighborhood of a quarter mil.”
“That house has to be worth half a million.”
“Today, sure. A fraction of that thirty years ago. But I always wondered about his finances.”
“How so?”
“Andrew’s lifestyle was modest. Modest people accumulate assets, janitors you hear about who squirrel away a million dollars. And he was no janitor. He was always vague about what he did, just said he was a businessman with interests overseas.”
“In my experience, people who say things like that are usually posers living off someone else.”
“I know what you’re talking about. Someone who talks a good game without ever saying anything. That kind of person, there’s a feel, something behind the facade. Gold diggers, social climbers, con men. In my business you learn to spot them. That wasn’t Andrew.
“Most people are nervous when they deal with lawyers. Andrew could have been ordering a Big Mac. He didn’t need to impress anyone. You get a feel for that, too. The guy who walks into your office wearing stained overalls with forty grand in his pocket and forty million in real estate.”
“You pegged Heenan as money under the radar.”
“I did. But his accounts maintained a reasonable cushion and nothing more. Funny thing, the foreign interests, his travel expenses, they never came through me.”
“How do you explain the theoretical missing money?”
Piraino eyed Peter while he took another sip of scotch. “I am unhappy with the prospect of any speculations I make becoming public.”
“This is between you, me, and your scotch. And we both know the scotch will never make it out of this room.”
Piraino barked a laugh. “You’re all right, Pete. My dealings with Andrew were aboveboard, but your typical businessman doesn’t make contingency plans for their sudden disappearance. I wondered if I was maintaining a front for him, and my purpose was to fold his tent when the time came.”
“A front for what?”
“That’s the question, isn’t it? Whatever it was, there had to be other assets, and none of them in the name Andrew Heenan.”
Kim Freeman pulled two more volumes from the Hughes High School library shelf and added them to the pile Peter held.
“That should do it. If Jenny was here, she’ll be in one of these.”
The stack of yearbooks Peter carried had to weigh more than twenty pounds. He hoped Kim wasn’t feeling chatty. “It will be just like looking at mugshots.”
“I suspect more than a few of these kids wound up in your books. Our records don’t go back to the eighties, but if you find your Jenny, the alumni association might have a current address.”
“This will do for a start.”
Kim ran her fingers over the spines of the books Peter held, confirming dates. “I’ll check these out for you. Call me if I can do anything else.”
Kim headed for the desk. Peter turned for the door. A timid whisper came from the next row of shelves.
“Detective Dourson?”
Stacy Bender leaned against the shelves in the ancient history section, arms wrapped around herself as if she had a stomach ache. She looked as miserable as she had the last time he’d seen her.
Peter set the books on a convenient table. He spoke quietly, as much to soothe her as to avoid attracting attention. “Hey. How are you getting on?”
Her bottom lip trembled. “Not so good. When will you arrest Jamal? You said two days.”
Peter sighed. “They reassigned the case. I’m not in charge anymore.”
Stacy’s face froze in a deer-in-headlights, oh-my-god-I’m-gonna-die look.
“They’re still working it, but it’s taking a little longer than expected. We need you to hang in there.”
“Are they gonna arrest me?”
“Stay out of it and you’re clear. I promise.”
“Taneesha’s coming around. She doesn’t understand why I won’t let her in, since mom works evenings and wouldn’t know. Last night she was yelling through the door. I don’t know what to do.”
“I know it’s tough. Look—” He pulled out his wallet, removed a slightly bent business card. “You can go here. There’s safety in numbers.”
Stacy frowned at the card and rubbed at an acne scab on her chin. “Happen? Isn’t that the place where kids make Easter eggs and weird toys?”
“They have programs for teens. It’s a place where kids like you are taking steps to make something of themselves.” He grabbed for a straw. “You’ll learn how to make T-shirts.”
Stacy snorted. “Mine will say ‘loser’ on the front in big fat letters.”
“It will be over soon. Just keep your head down.”
“Can’t I warn Taneesha? She’s still my friend. I don’t want her to get arrested.”
“Does Jamal own a gun?”
Stacy’s mouth popped open, forming an “O.”
“There’s your answer. Bad things will happen if you tell Taneesha. Jamal’s her brother. She’ll tell him, just like you want to tell her. Jamal will get mad and do something to you or your family. Then he’ll change his operation and I’ll have to explain why the taxpayer money we spent building a case to get him off the street got us nothing. And because you warned him, I can’t keep you out of it. You’ll get it from both sides.”
The lip trembled again, violently. “You’re scaring me.”
“I don’t want to scare you, but I need to scare you. Talk to nobody. Tell Taneesha you’re grounded for the rest of your life if you have to. Tell her your sisters will rat you out if you let her in. Your choices are to stay out of it or wind up in more trouble than you ever imagined.”
Stacy’s eyes blazed, furious. She hissed. “I thought you’d help me. I’m sorry I ever talked to you.”
Cheap sneakers squeaked as Stacy spun on her heels, the unspoken “I hate you” hanging in the air.
Chewy butted Lia’s hand as she skimmed emails on her laptop. Obliging, she scratched behind his ears while she read an update from David. Zoe liked the paintings but wanted to have friends for dinner to see what they thought.
Typical, needing a committee to tell you if you wanted something or not. Either that, or Zoe had David install the paintings to dress up her house for a dinner party she planned weeks ago, and she’d tell David to return them Monday with some lame reason why they didn’t fit, like her husband was allergic to lilies and looking at them made him sneeze.
It was a trick certain people used to make themselves look wealthier than they were, and it applied to clothing, jewelry, art, and even cars. It didn’t happen often, but every time it did left an indelible memory. If that was Zoe’s plan, her machinations would cost David money as well as waste his time. David would smile and nod because any sign of censure would cost him business.
Here’s hoping Zoe lives among the well-meaning and flighty, not the sneaking and social-climbing.
Thinking of Zoe reminded her of the morning’s ugliness with Susan. She chucked Chewy under the chin. “What do you think, little man? Is it time to talk to Peter?”
Peter’s voice drifted in from the living room. “Get away, rat.”
Peter had a man cave in his apartment where he could concentrate without distractions, but he’d bonded with the leather Morris chair and it was now his preferred place to review files after dinner.
“Lia! Come get the swamp monster.”
Lia rolled her eyes and closed the laptop.
“Coming, dearest.”
Peter sat with a stack of yearbooks in his lap and a beer in one hand, shooing Gypsy away with the other. Unconcerned, Gypsy propped her feet on the coffee table and sniffed a pile of neatly cut paper slips. She licked the pile, then started chewing. She looked up at Lia, confusion in her eyes and paper stuck to her muzzle. Viola snorted from her spot on the floor.
“Lia!” Peter yelled again, eyes glued to Gypsy and unaware Lia was already in the room.
“Watch your beer.”
Peter’s hand jerked up. Chewy sat innocently underneath as if the bottle had never been in danger, though everyone in the room knew he didn’t care what you had in your hand when he head-butted you for a pet.
Lia scooped Gypsy up. “What do you expect? Puppies explore everything with their mouths.” She grabbed a pencil cup off the phone table and handed it to Peter, nodding at the molested paper slips. “You can put those in here.” She settled on the sofa, snuggling Gypsy in her lap. “Can I help?”
Peter gave Gypsy an evil look. “Not if Jaws is a member of your team.”
She held Gypsy up, nose to nose, and was rewarded with a puppy kiss. “He doesn’t understand. Floor for you, girlfriend.” She pulled Susan’s tormented scarf from a basket, dangled it long enough to get Gypsy’s attention and dropped it to the gaping maw. Divested of puppy, she turned expectantly to Peter. “What are we looking for?”
He handed her a book. “Jennys, Jennifers, Jeans, Ginnys, Virginias, or other derivatives. If she has long brown hair, put a star on the bookmark. Two stars if it’s Jenny or Jennifer.” He pointed to a legal pad next to the mauled bookmarks. “Note the year, name, and page number on the master list. I’ll show the matches to Heenan’s neighbor. Maybe she can identify our housekeeper.”
“Sounds like a long shot.”
“It’s a place to start.”
It was companionable, soothing work, requiring concentration and marked only by the sound of turning pages. Lia wondered if every third girl child was named Jennifer when these kids were born, or if it was like your friend buying a red Datsun and suddenly you saw red Datsuns everywhere.
She ran her fingers through the forest of bookmarks sprouting from the top of her current volume. Two dozen? Three? Eyes frying from the tiny type, she flipped absently through the back of the book, stopping when she saw the damage. She made a disgusted sound as she turned a few more pages.
“Kids can be so thoughtless.”
“Graffiti?”
“Someone sliced out random pages.”
“Let me look at that.”
She tilted the book so Peter could see where a page in the activities section had been removed near the spine. It had been a neat job, almost invisible. The shallow cut in the next page indicated it had been done with a stencil knife. Peter took the book, thumbed through the rest of it.
“Four more pages. Wonder if Kim knows about this.”
“Some people hate photos of themselves. I bet if we hunt up the missing pages, we’ll find the same person on each page. Some poor girl immortalized with fake big hair like Melanie Griffith in Working Girl.”
Peter puffed out his cheeks, blew audibly. “I didn’t bother with the activities section.” He looked at the stack of completed volumes. “Guess I ought to go through these again.”
“What for? It can’t have anything to do with your case.”
“Just to alert the school to the vandalism. Up to them what they do about it.”
“Speaking of juvenile delinquents, how is your package thief doing?”
Peter took a long pull from his beer. “I saw Stacy today. She hates me.”
“I’m so sorry. Is there anything you can do?”
“Jamal is on Brent now. I’m out of it until Parker sends these bones to Cold Case where they belong, which I’m hoping she’ll do Monday. I laid out the realities for Stacy as gently as I could, and I think she’ll hold. It’s her mother I’m worried about. People who drink as their life’s avocation have big mouths.”
Lia was silent for a moment. Time to bite the bullet. “Speaking of mothers …”
Peter looked up, a question on his face. She dropped her eyes. A fierce Indian chief glared at her from the cover of the yearbook in her lap, an artifact from pre-politically correct times. She traced an index finger around the feathers in his bonnet while Peter waited. Chewy, sensing tension, curled by her feet.
“Susan came to the park today.”
“You didn’t say.”
“I needed time to marinate.”
“What happened?”
“She came to interview Terry about finding the bones. I don’t think she knew I would be there. She was friendly at first. Then she said some things.”
He set his beer aside and joined her on the sofa. His hand was gentle as he pulled hers away from the book. Gentle as he stroked her knuckles with a thumb.
Anger lurked under the calm of his voice. “What things?”
“Look, most of it was silly. She offered to put me on her show—”
Peter’s look of horror made Lia choke on a laugh. “Don’t worry, I turned her down. Then she said I didn’t matter to you because we weren’t married.”
He opened his mouth to protest. She placed the fingers of her free hand to his lips. “That’s the silly part, and I didn’t buy it, not for a minute—” The rest came out in a rush. “—but then she said you never told your family about us, and that meant you didn’t care about me. Only she wasn’t so nice about it.”
Peter squeezed her hand and sighed. “I hope this hasn’t been eating at you.”
“Not exactly.... Maybe a little, partly because I knew she meant to hurt me.”
“And partly because I never told my family about you.”
“I never thought about it before because I never tell my mother anything. But we’re estranged. You talk to your family all the time.”
“If it helps, Abby knows about you.”
“That’s a start.”
“She runs interference for me.”
“She’s a good sister.”
He tapped their clasped hands against his leg, gathering thoughts. “Sometimes … sometimes being the fruit of someone’s loins makes them believe they have proprietary rights over your life, ordained by God. The only defense is distance and silence.”
A long pause, punctuated by the tapping of their joined hands. “I promised to always tell you everything. That doesn’t work with my parents. There’s no way to tell Mom about you that she’ll accept. If I say we’re committed to each other, she’ll wonder why I’m not good enough to pledge your life to.
“If I tell her you have legitimate reasons to distrust marriage as an institution and I’m fine with that, not only would that entail telling her things that are none of her business, it won’t make a dent in her ability to accept our situation. Worst case, she’ll decide you’re broken and nothing will ever change her mind.”
“What’s the best case?”
“She’ll show up for a come to Jesus meeting and she won’t be satisfied until we’re married or she succeeds in grabbing me by my ear and dragging me home.”
“Ouch.”
“As far as Mom is concerned, the only acceptable state of affairs is me married to a nice Christian girl who pumps out babies. And in her book, you hardly qualify as Christian.”
“What about your dad?”
“Dad’s more flexible, but he’s not inclined to get in the way when Mom has the bit in her teeth.”
Something shifted, like a Magic Eye picture—when the big blur of nothing suddenly becomes the Statue of Liberty, or maybe a race car.
“I grew up aching for a nice, normal family. I guess being the scion of a nice, normal family isn’t always wonderful.”
Peter kissed her knuckles, shrugged. They were past the difficult part.
“Only son, oldest child, good student, athlete. They had huge expectations, beyond wanting me to marry a girl they approved of so I could go forth and multiply.
“You had to fight for everything you ever got. I had my life handed to me. I was just fine with it until I realized I hadn’t bothered to think about where I was being led.
“Their plan wasn’t a bad plan, just not right for me. But how do you tell people who love you that you don’t want the best they have to offer? It’s like saying their love isn’t good enough.”
“I thought you left Cave City because Susan dumped you.”
“Everyone thinks that, and I let them. Susan just provided convenient timing. I wasn’t getting with the program, so she went out and found what she wanted. If she hadn’t dumped me, I would have left her. It just would have taken longer.”
“What made you change your mind about her?”
“I didn’t change my mind about her so much as I changed it about myself. Mom’s the church secretary. Dad’s an elder. They raised us on Adam’s rib and everything that goes with it. Then I got a basketball scholarship to UC.”
Peter paused to grab his abandoned beer. “A teammate invited me to his brother’s wedding—this was when Susan was pressuring me long distance about law school. They had a reading full of flowery mixed metaphors that I mostly ignored the way you do when a sermon goes on too long. But one sentence stuck with me: ‘Make not a bond of love.’ It made so little sense to me that someone would read that at a wedding, I had to find out what it meant.”
“Kahlil Gibran.”
“You know it.”
“I read it years ago. He wasn’t a member of the ‘two hearts that beat as one’ school.”
“I got a copy of it. The part that struck me was the end, where he talks about the oak and cypress not growing in each other’s shadow. I asked myself why he didn’t say ‘two oaks’ or ‘two trees,’ since the rest of it uses generic images.
“I realized that was the point, that they were different, that he saw strength in the differences. And I thought about how, if trees are too close, one of the trees gets stunted. He was saying it was wrong to want your spouse to be like you, and you had to give each other room to be who you are.”
“I never thought about it so deeply.”
“I showed it to Dad.”
“Not your mother?”
“Like I said, Dad’s more flexible. He said no matter what, never show it to Mom. He said most couples build space in their marriage, even if they don’t know that’s what they’re doing and never admit it.
“I told him Susan was pressuring me about law school, and the longer I was at college, the less I liked the idea of being a lawyer. He said most women feel it’s their mission in life to save men from themselves and mostly it’s okay but a smart man knows when to put his foot down.”
“What did you think when he said that?”
Peter laughed. “I didn’t know what to think except I knew I wasn’t going to like fifty years of Susan saving me from myself. It wasn’t long after that the furniture king lured her away and it was a moot point.”
“A narrow escape.”
“True, that. It’s a bad sign when you feel the walls closing in and you aren’t married yet. When I first saw you, you were so nakedly real, vulnerable in a way Susan would never allow herself to be.”
“I thought she played the fragile southern belle quite well.”
“Susan’s as helpless as Rambo with a rocket launcher. When I saw you on that picnic table, you were so devastated, it made all of Susan’s pouts and hurts look as trivial as me pitching a fit because I had to drink Coke instead of Pepsi.
“Then I saw how you made your own life, your way. For the first time I wanted to know all the corners of someone, inside and out. I’ve never felt about anyone the way I feel about you.”
“Back atcha, Kentucky Boy. You’re my rock. I never had a rock before.” Lia leaned against Peter’s chest, her head against his shoulder. “What happens when Susan tells everyone you’re sinning it up in Cincinnati?”
“I blackmailed her into keeping her mouth shut. No telling how long that will last. Maybe we can spread a rumor on the internet that I died in the line of duty.”
“Died tragically in the line of duty. If we’re going to do it, we need to get it right. Did you interrupt a convenience store robbery on your day off, or get crushed shoving a child away from a runaway semi?”
“Let’s go with number two. If we have to produce a body, it won’t have to look like me.”