Bailey’s phone lay in the center of the usual dog park table, surrounded by a dozen avid human and canine faces. Gypsy, given the run of the table top, sniffed the phone and pawed at the screen, where Susan sat between Commodore and Dick Brewer, her elegant suit an anomaly in the comfortable jumble of the Mill Creek Alliance office.
Lia scooped Gypsy up and handed her to Jim. “Keep her out of trouble, will you?”
On the screen, Susan said, “Commodore, tell my viewers what you have in store for them.”
Commodore grinned. “Tomorrow we’re retracing our steps down Mill Creek to the shallow grave we discovered two weeks ago—”
Terry bellowed. “Foul betrayers!”
Kita yelped and leapt off the table. Gypsy objected with puppy ferocity from her perch in Jim’s arms, barking and struggling.
“Shhh!” Bailey hissed. “You’re upsetting the dogs.”
Terry grumbled. “It was my idea. I suggested it to Susan. Now they’re doing it without me. Cretins!”
Susan traced Dick’s biceps with a manicured finger. “I can tell you’ve done your share of paddling.”
On the screen, Dick’s chest expanded. He gave Susan an aw-shucks head duck. Today he’d ditched the straw hat and silver medallion for a neat golf shirt. Lia wondered if Susan would still flirt with him if he had on sweaty creek clothes.
“I hate to break it to you,” Lia said. “Susan has her sights on bigger game.”
“The perfidy of women!”
Bailey tilted her head, considered Terry’s competition. “Younger, better looking. Didn’t you say he owns a business?”
“Bah! Man think’s he’s God’s gift to the universe.” Terry stormed off, Jackson and Napa trotting behind.
Steve sighed. “My weekend is ruined. If he stays home, I get to listen to him sulk. If he goes with them, I’ll get to hear all about it after he gets back.”
Jim scratched his beard. “Sounds like she used Terry. Can’t blame him for being upset.”
José, maintenance supervisor and lifelong Westsider, stared after Terry. His biker mustache added a mournful note to his perplexed expression. “Woman like that, how’d he think he had a chance?”
Lia snorted. “I’m sure she cooed all over him before she dug her stilettos in his back. I hear it’s her specialty.”
Bailey tilted her head. “Do you think she’s really after Dick? Maybe she wants to make Peter jealous.”
Elvis grinned at Peter as he entered his office. Peter turned the ghoulish bust to face the wall every evening before he left. Every morning, Elvis greeted him when he arrived, like an evil, animate doll that moved in the night. He couldn’t decide if he should continue facing Elvis to the wall, ignore the prank, or pitch Elvis in the trash. He narrowed his eyes, searching Brent for signs of guilt.
Brent threw up his hands. “Not my problem if you’re too stubborn to toss it out.”
“Cynth?”
“Maybe. She’d think it was funny. She say where she and the caveman are going for their parkour date?”
“What possible reason could you have for wanting to know?”
Brent lifted a shoulder and looked at the permanently closed blinds. “The park’s too tame for Cynth. I’m sure it’s a route known only to counter-culture types, involving chain-link fences and condemned buildings. Hypodermics and discarded condoms will be involved.”
“If it matters so much, ask her.”
“The woman disdains me.”
“Try apologizing for whatever idiot thing you did five years ago to piss her off.”
“Think I haven’t? Woman holds a grudge longer than anyone I know.”
Peter’s phone beeped. The desk sergeant didn’t bother with niceties when he picked up the receiver. “You got another one. Line four. Why can’t these folks go through the tip line? I have actual work to do.”
“Your mouth, God’s ear.” Peter annoyed himself by looking at Elvis' mocking leer as he punched the extension. “Detective Dourson speaking. How may I help you?”
“Hi. My name is April. April Howard. I saw your interview with Aubrey Morse.”
It was hard to tell about voices, but the woman on the line sounded too young to know anything relevant. “Are you calling about Andrew Heenan?”
“Do you watch Midsommer Murders?”
Huh? “I caught an episode or two.”
“You remind me of Ben Jones. He was my favorite Detective Sergeant on the show.”
“Umm … thank you?”
“All earnest and buttoned up—”
“Ma’am—”
The voice turned breathy. “You’re really cute. Like a Beatle before they went psychedelic.”
Peter schooled the impatience from his voice before he spoke. “Do you have information about Andrew Heenan?”
“Ask me to lunch and find out.”
Peter remembered his mandate to promote community relations and resisted hanging up the phone. “Can I bring my girlfriend along?”
Dead air. Peter counted to three, then hung up. It should be illegal to sell phones that don’t make a noise when you disconnect.
At the other desk, Brent lifted an eyebrow. “Now they’re hitting on you? Sure you don’t want to trade cases?”
“In a heartbeat, but Parker won’t allow it. What’s going on with Jamal?”
“I’ve been watching him all week. He never carries anything into his crib, so it’s a good thing I didn’t get that warrant. I have to figure out where he’s taking the packages after little sis hands them off. I can’t backtrack him because he never comes home the same way twice. I zig, he zags. If Bender was still involved, she could tell us where they’re going to be.”
Peter caught the hopeful look and shook his head. “She’s out of it. Period.”
Brent sighed. “I’m tempted to put a GPS tracker on his car, but that way lies madness.”
“Unauthorized, illegal surveillance. Definite career-killing move. Social media?”
“No photos of Jamal sitting on a pile of Amazon boxes. If he’s bragging, it’s in code.”
Maybe she wants to make Peter jealous. Peter wouldn’t be manipulated by such silliness. Even so, more than twelve hours after her talk with Peter, Lia had a knot in her stomach the size of—well, bigger than Gypsy if not as big as her favorite schnauzer. Which was why she found herself climbing the steps of the repurposed clapboard house where her therapist, Asia Lewis, practiced.
Asia met Lia on the porch, embracing her tightly and without regard for her jewel-toned silk caftan or the gravity-and-logic-defying edifice of her hair. Lia continually marveled over Asia’s hairdressing adventures, assembled through some mysterious process that could survive mortar fire and qualifying as an art form.
Despite a level of personal maintenance that suggested they did not live in the same universe, Asia was comfortable in her skin and easy to be with. Lia appreciated her combination of empathy and straight talk.
She’d relied on the therapist to carry her through acute stress disorder after Luthor died. Now she made the occasional appointment when the support of friends wasn’t enough.
Like today.
Once inside her office, Asia eyed the paper shopping bag Lia carried and pressed a mocha hand against her chest. “For me?”
Asia’s fine eye and weakness for color led to the women trading services. Both felt they came out ahead.
Lia held the bag out. “Absolutely.”
Asia took it and removed the twelve-inch canvas square, holding it at arm’s length. Her mouth made a moue as she studied the dragon’s mouth orchid, an exotic fuchsia flame in a dark, misty forest.
“It reminded me of you.”
Asia’s face went soft. She propped the painting against her desk lamp. “It’s lovely. Have a seat and tell me what’s going on.”
Lia sat on the edge of the cushy visitor’s chair, her mouth suddenly dry. She looked down at her hands, twisting together like something apart from herself.
“Thank you for finding time to see me.” She consciously stilled her fingers before continuing. “I feel so ridiculous.” It took time to recount the Susan saga, but she felt better afterward. “Peter and I talked last night and we were fine. Today, I have this knot in my stomach. I don’t know what to do about it.”
Asia leaned back in her chair. Between the angle of her head and the towering hair, she reminded Lia of Nefertiti.
“Do you know the difference between envy and jealousy?”
“Aren’t they the same thing?”
“In fact, they’re opposite. Jealousy is the feeling you get when someone threatens something that belongs to you. It’s protective.”
“Jealousy is healthy?”
“In tiny doses, applied to something that genuinely belongs to you.”
“Getting angry because Susan is going after Peter is a good thing?”
“Depends on how you handle your anger. The anger itself is natural. Anger is healthiest when it motivates positive action. You have a tendency to turn anger inward, and it eats at you.”
Not something Lia wanted to think about. “How is envy different?”
“Envy is wanting something someone else has. It can be healthy if it’s used to motivate someone to work toward the things they desire.”
“But?”
“Envy becomes toxic if a person operates from a poverty mindset. She assumes there are a limited amount of goodies to go around. Toss in a sense of entitlement, and instead of saying, ‘I want a wonderful husband like Julie’s. I’m going to work on my relationship so I can have a brilliant marriage,’ this person says, ‘Julie has a great husband. I deserve a great husband, so I’m taking Julie’s husband and to hell with Julie and the husband I already have.’”
“That’s rude.”
“At the very least. They prefer to tear down the people they envy and steal what they want instead of creating it for themselves, not understanding the value in the fabulous job or the wonderful marriage comes from what they put into it. She might steal Julie’s husband or job, but they will never be the same in her hands. In fact they might never have been what she thought they were to begin with.”
“So Susan envies my relationship with Peter and wants to take him and I feel the threat and get jealous?”
“It’s possible. She may blame you for her failures: if Peter wasn’t with you, he’d be with her. The next step is the decision to tear you down, which she tried to do with that scene at the park.
“Meanwhile, you tend to avoid intense feelings, and you just lost Honey. Honey was your family before Peter. I suspect being hit with her rage and another potential loss at the same time has tossed you for a loop.”
“I don’t know what to do about it.”
“What do you want to do?”
“I want to rip her internal organs out and feed them to the Mount Airy vultures.”
“Your feelings are natural, even if the plan isn’t practical.”
“What can I do that won’t land me in prison?”
“You can’t control Susan, but you can change the way you think about her.”
“How so?”
“The threat is a mirage, and it only exists in Susan’s mind. She can’t take Peter from you. If she can, Peter isn’t yours and you’re better off without him.”
Lia folded her arms. “That makes me feel so much better.”
“Let’s put this another way. Think of everything you know about Susan, everything you feel from her when she’s around. Do you want a man who prefers her to you?”
Lia pictured herself in three-inch heels, scolding Chewy because he put nose prints on her car windows. She thought about wearing lipstick, or worse, hair goop, and clothes you could never wipe your hands on. “Ugh. No.”
“Exactly. Has Peter ever given you any indication that he’d like you to be more like her? Expressed a desire for you to dress less casually, for example?”
“He was engaged to her. Doesn’t that mean anything?”
“And he left. Is there any reason to think he regretted it?”
“He never talked about it before now.”
“Does he seem dissatisfied with you now that she’s here?”
“He’s frustrated, but that’s work.”
“Any truth to the things she said to you?”
“By her terms, I’m pathetic.”
“Forget her terms. This is your life, your terms.”
“I wouldn’t want her life if you handed it to me on a platter.”
“There you go.”
“I still don’t understand why I’m feeling this way. I never felt this way with Luthor, and plenty of women fawned over him. They irritated me, but I didn’t feel gut-punched.”
“That relationship was very different. Luthor was fungible.”
“What?”
“Fungible. Fungible items are easily interchanged with like objects. Your paintings are not fungible, but car parts are.”
“You’re saying I treated Luthor like a human widget?”
“Essentially, yes. A penis widget. You needed a boyfriend, someone who would give you your space, someone you didn’t need to invest emotions in. Other women may have irritated you, but they also served to reinforce the idea that Luthor was not your Mr. Right, only your Mr. Right Now. In a way, they made you feel safe.”
Fungible. An ugly description of the parade of Mr. Right Nows in Lia’s life before she met Peter. But the men in her life felt no differently about her, had they? Did that make it better or worse?
“Peter is not fungible. For the first time you’ve let someone in emotionally. You’ve allowed yourself to trust Peter. If Susan can take him from you, it undermines your foundations. Luthor was never your foundation, so losing him was never a threat. And, in your heart of hearts, you didn’t want the relationship to last.”
“That makes me sound like an awful person.”
“Not awful. Human. And you had your reasons. You’ve been navigating new territory since you met Peter, healthier territory. The fact that a threat to this relationship is affecting you so much is proof. I think part of what you are experiencing is the shadow of grief, the realization of what loss of Peter would mean to you.”
“And?”
“What does Peter mean to you? One word.”
Unexpected and right, the word presented itself with a warm glow.
“Home.”
“A very big word for a woman who never had one.”
“But what do I do? How do I handle Susan?”
“You don’t. You handle you. What are your options?”
“I can blow up and look like an idiot…”
“Or?”
“Keep my cool and try not to burst a blood vessel.”
“There’s a middle option. You can let Peter know how you’re feeling. Let him help you through this.”
“This is the shoe on the other foot, isn’t it?”
“How so?”
“I want to resolve this by myself. It hasn’t been that long since I was upset because Peter kept things from me, things he felt would make him look bad in my eyes.”
“Funny how that works. There’s another thing you can do.”
“Oh?”
“Keep reminding yourself she’s chasing Peter because her husband humiliated her. And if you can smile and be gracious, it will drive her nuts.”
Father Mark waved Peter into his office at Our Blessed Lady, standing up behind his desk to shake Peter’s hand.
“Thank you for seeing me, Father.”
“Happy to do whatever I can to help. I’m fascinated by the idea that an anonymous donation thirty years ago might be connected with a murder case. I had my secretary dig through our records for a year before and after the date you gave me. She found nothing over a hundred thousand dollars from an anonymous donor, or anything under the name Andrew Heenan or Tony Piraino.”
“How about under any name?”
“I can’t give you names of donors, but I will tell you there was nothing for that time period that wasn’t from a known source. I imagine you can get a court order, but you would be wasting your time.”
Another dead end.
“Cash donations of that size don’t occur, even back then.”
“What about this Father Dismas who signed the paperwork?”
“The archdiocese has no record of a Father Dismas attached to any parish in the Midwest. Your Father Dismas doesn’t exist.”
“Troubling.”
“Quite. I’m sure the church would love to know how such a significant donation was derailed.”
Peter sighed. “I’m not sure it was. Andrew Heenan named Father Dismas in the instructions he gave Tony Piraino, to be contacted through a post office box. If there is no Father Dismas, perhaps the plan was to dispose of the money without leaving a paper trail, and it was never intended for the church.”
“That would be fitting.”
“How so?”
“Dismas was one of the thieves crucified with Christ. You said Mr. Heenan was a magician. This would be a bit of misdirection?”
“In light of what you’ve said, that’s how it appears.”
Father Mark steepled long fingers and considered. “He picked Our Blessed Lady out of a hat, slapped a clerical collar on someone or other, and it had nothing to do with us.”
“Very likely.”
“It’s just as well I didn’t discuss your visit with anyone. There are those who would feel we were robbed of a substantial donation and want to pursue the matter.”
“If someone diverted that money, they could announce it on network television and I couldn’t arrest them. Statute of limitations expired years ago.”
“Then I’ll forget this conversation until you have some reason to remind me of it.”
“That would be best. I wonder if there was a reason he chose your church. Is there anyone around who was here back then?”
“Father Nicholas is the only one left. He’s ninety-four and sharp as a tack.” Father Mark looked at his watch. “He likes to sit in the garden. If you’ll follow me?”
They found Father Nicholas sitting on a bench, his bearded face turned sunward. Cataracts clouded the blue eyes, but they remained bright with intelligence.
“The name isn’t familiar. A magician during the eighties?” Father Nicholas pursed his lips, thinking. “That would have been … Ronnie Reagan was president, there was the Challenger tragedy … that awful Madonna woman.”
His face lit up. “Little man, performed for the children during our festivals. You should have seen him, Father Mark. He did the most wonderful tricks, cards and coins and scarves. Some of our members didn’t think magic was appropriate for a church event—some nonsense about devil worship—but the children loved him. Anything that brings a sense of joy and wonder to children is good to my mind. We could use more of it these days. Why are you inquiring about him?”
“He went missing back then. We recently discovered his remains.”
The clouded eyes closed as Father Nicholas' face crumpled in on itself. “I’m very sorry to hear that.”
“What do you remember about him?”
Father Nicholas stroked his beard. “Not much. He wasn’t a church member. Can’t recall that I ever saw him at Mass. Betty must have booked him for the festivals.”
“Betty?”
“Betty Zabinski. Church secretary for more years than I care to count. Kept us together. I was sorry when she passed.”
“Was there a festival committee? Someone who might have known him?”
Nicholas shook his head, slowly. “Betty handled that. We had a parade of volunteers. They’d last a few years and someone else would take their place. I rarely needed to pay attention.”
Father Mark said, “I’ll have my secretary hunt through our files. We may still have paperwork tucked away somewhere.”
“Thank you,” Peter said. “That would be helpful.”
Nicholas turned his milky eyes on Peter. “Detective?”
“Yes, Father?”
“Great evil was done to a man who took joy in making children happy. I will pray you find the man who killed him.”
Chewy, Gypsy, and Viola stared expectantly at Lia as she stirred the simmering pot of chicken and vegetables. Gypsy still couldn’t climb steps, but girlfriend could now drool like a champ. Comes from having Olympic-class mentors.
Chewy ate anything, but Viola was picky. And Gypsy was too young for spicy stuff, even if Peter said they’d cut her stomach open one day and find a license plate and a set of partially digested tires. Lia checked the clock. Ten minutes to go on the rice. Time enough to sauté carrots for the fur kids.
The front door closed as she tossed sliced carrots in her egg skillet. Approaching footfalls on the wood floor, then rapid squeaks, like the death throes of a small animal.
Gypsy jolted, then raced down the hall. More squeaks. Peter entered the kitchen with Gypsy in his arms, ignoring his ear scratches as she chewed away on a bleating, balled-up, child’s sock.
Lia spoke over the cacophony. “You found Bailey’s present.”
“And you say she’s your friend. I didn’t know they made squeaky socks.”
“Assembly required. Bailey provided the squeakers. I got the socks. That one should die in about three seconds.”
Silence fell. Gypsy, clutching an unresponsive and now-mangled sock, gave Lia a distressed look and struggled to get down.
Peter set her on the floor. Gypsy abandoned the sock and returned to drooling by the stove. “Looks like she killed it.”
“They don’t last long. She’s been through five already.”
“How many did Bailey give you?”
Lia gave the curry a stir, checked the carrots. “The sack said a hundred.”
Peter slid a hand around her waist, dropped a kiss on the back of her neck. “You need new friends. I’ll pick up a set of used tires for her to chew on.”
“Oh, stop it. How did it go today?”
Peter stuck his head in the fridge, emerged with a beer, sat at the table. “Good news, bad news. Smells like coconut. What’s for dinner?”
Lia checked the clock again, turned off the burners. “I have no clue what to call it, but it involves curry. What’s the good news?”
“Donna Merrill identified Jenny from the photos I showed her.”
“Sounds like a win.”
“It would be if we had an address. Jenny Olson fell off the map after Heenan disappeared.”
“Do you think it’s connected?”
“Unlikely. It’s not like she went missing. Today you have a digital footprint and it’s hard to go off grid. It wasn’t like that back then. I would track down her old neighbors and see what they remember, but her street was mowed down for commercial expansion. There are no doors left to knock on.”
“Maybe Alma can find her on Ancestry.com.”
“There were three hundred thousand people named Olson in the last census. I checked.”
“Ouch.”
“And that’s if she kept the name. If I have to pursue it, I could chase down her classmates and see if anyone remembers her, but that’s more than a hundred people.”
“And the bad news?”
“I got an earful from a woman across the street who swears Heenan was a pedophile in the style of John Wayne Gacy.”
“They both played with balloons. Maybe you’d better run your cadaver dogs through the crawl space.”
“This is Clifton Hills. There are no crawl spaces.”
Lia scooped carrot slices into dog bowls. “How about the priest? Weren’t you going to talk to him today?”
“Smoke and mirrors. The priest named in Heenan’s documents never existed. Looks like a scam that allowed Heenan to liquidate without leaving a money trail.”
“Where do you think the money went?”
“I think Heenan was up to something he didn’t want people to know about, and this was his exit strategy.”
Lia dished up a plate of curry and rice, set it in front of Peter. “How would that work?”
“He runs into trouble, he lays low. After a specified period of time, his lawyer liquidates and passes the cash on to the fake priest. The fake priest then passes the money on to Heenan, then they both disappear.”
Lia filled her own plate and joined Peter at the table, followed by salivating dogs who refused to be fobbed off with carrots.
“Only Heenan isn’t at the rendezvous point, because he’s already in a shallow grave?”
“Could be. We don’t know if he disappeared because he died, or if he disappeared first and the person he was running from caught up with him when he came back to pick up the cash.”
“Maybe the phony priest killed him for it. He’s the one guy who would have known where to find him. Or the fake priest was Heenan.”
Peter chewed and swallowed, shaking his head. “Piraino is a sharp guy. He would have picked up on it.”
“Jim has been active in the Catholic church for decades. If anyone knows anything about your fake priest, he could find out.”
“I can’t involve your friends.”
“Why not? You know they’re happy to help. They could track Jennifer Olson’s classmates for you.”
Peter set his fork down, his face serious. “I can get fired for talking about a case.”
“You talk to them all the time.”
“It’s a one-way street. I can ask for information and I can discuss anything that’s public. I can’t share confidential information.”
“I don’t understand. You’re sharing confidential information with me. Why are you talking to me if it could get you fired?”
Peter tapped the shallow dent in Lia’s chin. “Because I love you.”
“Don’t evade, Dourson.”
“I’m not. I don’t want to be that guy who comes home and pretends his day didn’t happen. Some women would be fine with it. That’s not you.”
“You’re right. I think we’d lose each other.”
Peter snuck a sliver of chicken under the table to Viola. Chewy whined, head-butting Lia’s leg, a reminder that fair was fair. She scraped sauce off two pieces of chicken and held them out for Chewy and Gypsy.
“And I figure you fall under the wife exclusion.”
“There’s a wife exclusion?”
“Not in writing, but everyone knows it happens. You’re a good sounding board and I can trust you. And God willing, Parker will pull me off this on Monday so I can get back to Jamal.”
“How do you figure that?”
“It’s a budgetary thing. Going further means investing a lot of man hours against diminishing returns. Let’s forget about Andrew Heenan. Tell me about your day. What did you and Alma find in the attic?”
Lia laughed. “We catalogued Ruth’s Beanie Baby collection.”
“Beanie Babies?”
“An army of them in pristine condition, with the heart-shaped tags. Alma lined them up on a plastic tarp. They look like they’re getting ready to invade Disney World.”
“Are they worth anything?”
“She’s researching that right now. She plans to find herself a boy toy and move to Myrtle Beach.”
“Anything else good?”
Lia tapped a tarnished candlestick sitting in the center of the table. “Alma insisted I keep this.”
“That will shine up nice.”
“I’m not sure I want to shine it up. Look at this.” She held it up so Peter could see a black thumbprint on the base. “It tarnished that way. It’s like a bit of Ruth remaining behind.”
“So shine selective parts of it. What else?”
“Some seriously ugly Rookwood era pottery—not Rookwood, this is from a rival studio. It’s worth something. I love this house, but I’ll never understand some of the things people put on their mantels back then. Lots of old photos. Antique side tables, a ton of books. We only got through half the boxes.”
Lia took a bite of chicken. “I got a call from David. Zoe is dithering, but her sister wants to see paintings.”
“If this keeps up, you might want to reconsider getting a space at the Pendleton.”
“I like working at home. I can’t see paying all that money for window dressing when the people I work with are happy to come here.”
“I see your point.”
Lia kept her eyes on the dogs as she hand-fed them more chicken. “I saw Susan’s new video.”
“With Commodore and Brewer? What about it?”
“They’re taking a canoe trip to your crime scene. Doesn’t that bother you?”
Peter shrugged. “The scene’s been released.”
“I was wondering if you might want to go along for damage control.”
“Susan invited me. I declined. Too many ugly ways it could go wrong.”
The last remnants of the knot in Lia’s stomach loosened.
Peter squeezed her knee. “Susan’s making a last-ditch effort to get traction for her video show. That’s all this is, and it’s nothing to worry about.”