I was up early the next morning, had a bowl of Styrofoam pellets masquerading as cereal, which Maizy had insisted I buy at the Shop 'n Save along with some tasteless unsweetened almond milk, and a slice of nutty whole grain bread, unbuttered. Ten minutes later, I hauled out the box of Cap'n Crunch, which I ate in dry fistfuls straight from the box.
I spent the next twenty minutes practicing warrior asanas while wondering who could have taken that newspaper photo of me. It seemed clear that Maizy wasn't a target in the same way that I was. She hadn't been photographed or named a person of interest. Of course, she was the daughter of a police officer and therefore not the easiest person to frame, but none of our suspects would know that. The real question was why frame me? Why would anyone think I'd want Dorcas dead? Knowing what I now knew, I wasn't fond of her, but it was pretty clear that a lot of people had real motives to kill her. Knowing what I now knew, I wasn't too keen on her myself. And all Maizy and I had to go on was a black SUV and a lot of dollar signs. Even if we followed the money trail, it veered off in several different directions.
Meantime, the phony evidence against me kept mounting. Which made me wonder why Detective Bensinger hadn't shown up to ask me about the photo in the paper.
Or why I hadn't followed up on it myself. Maizy had gotten nowhere with a phone call, but maybe that wasn't the end of it.
I pulled myself out of Warrior Two and reached for my rickety old laptop. It had the Windows Prehistoric operating system, but it was good enough to get me online, and moments later I was on the newspaper's website. I hadn't even noticed if the photo of me had carried a credit. Time to find out.
I scrolled down to find a link to the prior day's paper. I didn't scroll far before I noticed the screaming headline for the current edition. "Did Local Woman Owe Thousands to Murder Victim?"
Oh, no.
I pressed my fist against my mouth to keep from screaming as I read. Sure enough, I was the local woman who works at a boutique law firm (guess they weren't quite as up-to-date with their information as they thought). According to this new load of cow patties, I'd been overheard threatening Dorcas with dire consequences over some nonspecific grievance about which the reporter seemed happy to speculate. Was it a professional association gone wrong? Money? A secret love affair between Weaver and me?
I know. I had to read that last part twice too.
Outside of its straight-from-the-50s film noir language, the article was completely useless. To me. To a casual reader, I was clearly so guilty that a trial would be superfluous, and I should just go straight to death row before the sun set. Although bogus, here was the motive I'd been lacking. The article was so general that it could have been talking about anybody. Like, say, the actual killer. Huge sums of money, vague threats, overheard arguments. It was straight out of an episode of Columbo. I know. I'd seen Columbo on MeTV during a bout of insomnia a few weeks earlier.
Only it wasn't talking about anybody. It was talking about me. As usual, a photo accompanied the article, a shot of the façade of Parker, Dennis, complete with the blue-with-gold-lettering sign out front. And this time, I noticed the credit, for a staff photographer whose name was unfamiliar. And irrelevant. Parker, Dennis used that same stock shot in its marketing.
I groped for the phone and punched in Maizy's number. She answered in a whisper on the third ring. "I'm in the paper again," I told her. "It's a real hatchet job. They're claiming I was overheard threatening Dorcas."
"Hold on. I'm in English class." I heard some rustling around, the sounds of Doc Martens clomping along the floor, a door opening and closing, and then Maizy was back. "Okay, I'm in the bathroom. Wait, let me get this up on the tablet."
I fidgeted while I waited, unable to stand still. "Unnamed sources," I spat out. "Why are they allowed to hide behind anonymity when they're dragging me through the mud?"
"First Amendment. Let me read." She was quiet for a minute. "This is so not good," she said. "Tell you what we're gonna do. You stay inside. Lock the door. Close the blinds. I'm going to go see Honest Aaron about a car. If they track down where you live and what you drive, it'll be a feeding frenzy."
It already felt like one to me. "What are we going to do, Maizy?"
"We're going to do just what we planned," she said firmly. "Only we're gonna do it in a Pacer. Sit tight 'til I get there."
* * *
While I was sitting tight, I thought it might be a good idea to check my e-mail. Not that I expected to find anything from Curt. But I was pathetically hopeful anyway. Maybe he'd been mistaken when he said he'd have connectivity issues while he was gone. And if the reports of my criminal activities had made the papers in upstate New York, I was pretty sure Curt would have contacted me somehow. But my in-box was empty, except for a message from a helpful stranger offering to pay me great gobs of money for the temporary use of my bank account to shelter an incoming windfall.
So maybe Curt hadn't gotten around to checking his mail. That didn't mean I couldn't reach out to him.
I clicked on compose and typed Dear Curt. Then I backspaced that away and typed Hey, Curt! No, that didn't work, either. I hit delete and tried Curt: which was much too curt, no pun intended. How could I have no idea what to say to him when I had so much to say?
I typed I really need you and let the icon hover over Send. Not sure why I didn't want to send it. It was the truth.
But it wasn't normal.
I bit my lip and exited out of the program entirely. While I considered a do-over, the phone rang.
"Have you seen Wally?" my sister shrieked in my ear.
Well, it was bound to happen. "If you mean his black hair and that silly pink earring," I said, "no, I haven't seen him."
Sherri was quiet for a second. "You know," she said at last, "one day you're going to have problems, and you'll want a shoulder to cry on, and then where will you be?"
Same place I was now. I had problems, and the only shoulder I could cry on belonged to a teenager, because my so-called maybe sort-of boyfriend was playing Grizzly Adams with his brother.
"I can't go out with that," she said. "I swear his earlobe said something to me!"
"He did it because he cares about you," I said quietly. "And he thinks that's what you want in a man."
"A raging infection?" she screeched. "Who'd want that? I can get that from Frankie!"
Oh, gross. Also, way too much information. Also, note to self, don't let Sherri use my toilet for awhile.
"You have to get him to back off," Sherri told me. "He tries too hard. It's as if I don't even have to make an effort, 'cause every time I turn around, he's there."
"Tell him yourself," I said. "I won't be seeing Wally anymore. I was fired."
Sherri responded with exactly the sort of sisterly support I'd expected. "Well, that's just great. How could you do that to me? I swear, you can be so selfish!" She took a breath. "What did you do? Is it that murder thing again?"
"Yes," I said. "It's that murder thing. Apparently I give the firm a bad name."
"Oh, please." Sherri snorted. "They could use the publicity. That firm hasn't been relevant since Doug Heath died. Personally, I think they need to make those sleazy commercials again. Give us a call if you died during botched surgery? Priceless."
Now, here was the support I'd been hoping for. I could really go for some Parker, Dennis bashing right about now.
"You could even star in them," Sherri added. "Right now, you're the sleaziest thing they've got going."
I decided to pretend she'd meant that with affection. Then I decided we were done talking about Parker, Dennis because I knew she hadn't. "Think of Wally as a lump of clay," I told her. "Mold him into whatever you want him to be. Just tell him something."
Sherri didn't miss a beat at the change in topic. She never did, when it was about her. "I told him to go back to blond," she said. "And that he should try black onyx. He's more black onyx than pink sapphire."
"Okay. That's a start."
"And if he really wanted to impress me, he'd get my name tattooed on his private parts." She giggled. "I don't think he'll do it, though. He's weird about his private parts. I'm just testing him."
From the sounds of it, she should be more worried about testing herself. But I couldn't be concerned about Wally's private parts and this Romeo and Juliet thing he had going on with Sherri, or Sherri and the free clinic thing she had going on with Frankie Ritter.
"He did bring me a red velvet cake, though," Sherri said, sounding thoughtful. In Sherri's world, red velvet cake cured almost any problem. "From Leonetti's. Got to give him points for that."
"Yes," I said, "lots of points. That's going above and beyond. What a guy."
"Except I couldn't eat it," she said. "Not with that ear sitting there watching me the whole time."
I sighed. "Don't be so superficial, Sher. The ear will go away. And so will Wally, eventually, if you keep stringing him along." I looked out the window at the empty driveway, where Curt's Jeep should be. Well, except it wouldn't be there right now, anyway, because he'd be at work, since he was gainfully employed, and a homeowner, and he could cook and clean and wore clean underwear. I was pretty sure. Anyone with looks like his had to wear clean underwear. Unless he went commando. That thought made my legs weak. Either way, any one of those things put him head and shoulders above Frankie Ritter, and most of them put him above Wally too. Which made me a lucky woman.
Except the driveway was empty, and I didn't feel very lucky.
I saw a flaming red Plymouth Valiant pull in, and Maizy leaned out the window and tapped the horn. It gave a wheezy bleat, but that was enough for me.
Sherri was still whining about Wally and his talking earlobe when I hung up.