WHEN I PEEKED OUT THE window early Wednesday morning, the grass gleamed silver/white with dew. A neighbor's car windshield was etched with ice that would melt with the first rays of sun, only minutes away; but for the moment long, damp shadows stretched away from a backdrop of thin clear blue.
Pants and a sweater, I decided as if my suitcase actually offered a choice.
I lingered in the shower, and when I finally arrived in the kitchen, Doug was busy cleaning up what looked to be a breakfast of eggs, toast, yogurt, fruit, and coffee. Practice resumed today. No doubt he needed the fuel.
"Is there a library near here?" I asked after we mumbled the amenities. I wanted to be sure he didn’t stumble across the searches I planned for today in his computer’s history.
"What do you need?" he asked.
I wrinkled my nose. "Old magazines and newspapers, I think."
He closed the dishwasher door and examined my face. I had forgotten makeup, but that wasn't it. "You're researching suspects," he concluded.
Yes, including you.
"Um humm," I replied lightly.
Doug’s pale eyes broke contact, and he gave an exasperated sigh. "Why?"
"I take my family very seriously," an answer I trusted he would understand.
He read my face again for a few seconds. Then he shook his head and blinked. "I've never met anyone else quite like you."
"Likewise, I'm sure," I replied, because technically he was right. We are all unique. "So are you going to tell me where the library is, or what?"
He wrote something on Michelle's grocery-list pad.
"How about a party supply store, too–for Saturday's shower?"
He added directions to a strip mall on Virginia Beach Boulevard.
"Anything else?" That came off a little sarcastic, but to be fair the chances of me helping the Turners with anything more difficult than laundry were pretty slim.
Still, Michelle knew I was trying to protect them and their child, and if knowing that made her feel a little better, any amount of effort was worth it. For her I would dig into Norfolk dirt until I hit China.
"One other thing," I forestalled Doug as he reached for his jacket. "Mind if I come by the stadium later?"
"You want to watch practice?"
"Not really. Afterwards would be better."
Doug’s forehead creased, so I lifted a shoulder. "Maybe you could introduce me to some of the guys as they're leaving?" I couldn’t exactly barge into the training room for a look at the scene of the crime, but I could check out the surrounding hallways to see how Tim’s killer might have escaped.
“You’re not going to ask for autographs, are you?”
“Moi?” What an undignified idea!
Doug was still puzzled, but marriage to Michelle must have taught him that humoring a Siddons offspring took far less time than reasoning with one. He ripped off a fresh sheet of paper and began to write.
"Security's been beefed up," he explained as he handed me the note. "This'll get you into the hallway outside the locker room. After that, you're on your own."
THE VIRGINIA BEACH PUBLIC Library was a low white meringue of paneling and glass set on a base of brick. Tucked into the curve of the front entrance and rising from a low square of clipped hedge, an abstract silver sculpture either reached for the sky or attempted to take off.
A garden to the right of a variegated brick walk displayed a discreet sign that read, "Adopt-a-Spot," and "Princess Anne Women's Club of Virginia Beach."
An "Entrance" sign in red and white hung above the glass and chrome door. Glad for the warmth inside, I headed for the long central "Information" island and introduced myself to a congenial, middle-aged woman wearing a white shirt with a black skirt and vest. She led me into a maze of resource volumes flanked by a row of computers. Then with a whisper of pantyhose and soft shoes she disappeared into the stacks.
Where to start, where to start? Bobby Frye, Supratech, the Tomcat coaches, or the individual players?
My tolerance for technology was stretched thin by the time I finished, but from the Boston Globe's archives, "Take a Peek in Our Old Drawers," I learned that Bobby Frye's original name had been Robert J. Freyerhoffer. He had survived a nasty divorce, barely, from a woman named Joline.
Supratech held several technology companies under its corporate umbrella, all of which manufactured or developed complicated equipment that either made other equipment work better or cleaned up after their messes.
Jack Laneer had come to the Tomcats' head coaching job directly from a Cinderella college team nobody outside of a neighboring Louisiana county ever heard of. In other words, he was a judiciously chosen bargain. The New York Times and the St. Louis Ledger sports columnists congratulated him for making the transition to pro coaching with ease. The Philadelphia Inquirer chose to wait and see, but that was no surprise. Philadelphians are like that.
A book dropping in another aisle startled me into checking my watch. Yikes! I patted my computer monitor goodbye, deposited the materials I used on a rolling cart, and rushed out the door.
"You're late," my pregnant cousin pointed out when I arrived at her hospital room. Dressed in a huge blue denim jumper and a pink blouse, she sat on the edge of her bed swinging an extra-wide red ballet flat on her toe, back and forth, back and forth. I figured Doug had selected the outfit in haste.
"Sorry," I apologized, finally remembering that discharged hospital patients were about as eager to get moving as greyhounds leaving the gate.
"Will you forgive me if I take you out to lunch?"
Michelle's tension evaporated, leaving her wilted. "No, thanks,” she replied. “Let's just get home."
She eased her bulk down from the bed and began to reach for a black overnight bag, but I beat her to it.
We remained silent while a nurse transported her to the entrance curb in a wheelchair, silent really until we were half a mile from the hospital when Michelle finally asked why I’d been late.
"Research at a library."
"Find anything useful?" She was making an effort to sound interested, but she wouldn't remember my answer if she heard it at all; she was that exhausted.
"Just some background. Nothing earth-shattering."
That satisfied her for the moment. She lolled her head against the headrest and shut her eyes.
She brightened as soon as we entered Broad Bay Point Greens and drove by the "Cart Crossing" signs. When I stopped in her driveway, she unbuckled her seatbelt and climbed out of the Jeep before I could turn off the ignition and do the same. Her eyes drank in the sight of the dark shutters against the earthy brick red, the frosted glass design on the door windows, the ornamental grasses rattling in the breeze, the seagull overhead, and the sky beyond.
I handed my cousin her keys, and she entered her home beaming with pride.
"How about some tomato soup and a tuna sandwich?" I offered.
"Toasted cheese instead of tuna?”
"I can probably manage that," I said, keeping it upbeat, keeping my worries to myself.
We ate, and, as predicted, Michelle could scarcely wait to take a nap.
"Mind if I go out for a while?" I inquired from her bedroom doorway.
"No. No, of course not." She was already under the covers, her denim jumper replaced by a nightgown.
"You’ll be okay until dinner?"
"Yes. Go. Go." She wiggled a few fingers to shoo me out.
I went, but still I worried–about her and Kewpie/QB.
And about the timing of her recent crises, which came so suddenly after the news of Tim Duffy's death. Had it been caused entirely by stress? Or had it been brought on by something worse—real fear? I’d procrastinated my research on Doug until last and had never gotten to it.
Biting my lip to punish my disloyal suspicions, I shook the thought away. Doug and Michelle had been at home together at the time of the murder. Having dinner. Watching TV.
Doug and Michelle–together. That's what they said. So what if I hadn’t gotten to research Doug as a suspect? They said they were together, and that was enough for me. Let the police break their alibi if they could. I had plenty of other pots to stir.
Plenty.