The next morning, Kiska and I were lounging in Rhonda’s backyard. Well, I was lounging, on my back in the grass, while Kiska rooted around looking for some forgotten nugget of something (anything) from last barbecue season.
Not that Rhonda barbecued. That whole “no eating anything with a face” thing kind of took the fun out of that summer ritual.
“She didn’t say anything to you?” Rhonda asked, obviously as dumbfounded as I was at Phyllis’s ungrateful behavior.
“Not a word, and she didn’t answer her phone last night either,” I complained.
“Maybe she didn’t go home.”
“She did. I drove by and saw her car.”
“Maybe her lawyer told her not to talk to anyone.”
That was likely, but seriously no excuse. I ignored smart professional advice all the time.
“You don’t really think she thinks that I ratted her out to Klein, do you?”
Rhonda shrugged. “I doubt it, but you know Phyllis, she has to make a stand of some sort, to keep you humble if nothing else.”
Like I had any problem staying humble.
“What’s Betty say?” she asked.
“You don’t want to know,” I muttered, rolling over onto my stomach and immediately regretting it. I was face to face with a dead mouse.
“Nostradamus!” Rhonda chided.
Her over–sized black Persian, who was perched on the railing of Rhonda’s porch, swished his tail side to side and stared down on us completely unrepentant.
Kiska, however, was intrigued. He charged toward me, forcing me to fall flat over the disgusting prize. I lay there protecting my find, while Rhonda ran inside for a plastic bag.
Nostradamus, seeing Kiska shoving his nose into my side, urging me to roll over, hopped down from his railing, sauntered over and positioned himself delicately on the center of my back where he went about the business of grooming his nethers.
I was laying there bemoaning my fate when a voice called from the alley.
“Lucy Mathews? Is that you?”
I lifted myself enough to peer up and spy Bev, TV reporter extraordinaire. Groaning, I lay back down.
The gate creaked.
Crap.
“Do you live here?”
Amazed at her ability to act as if nothing was odd about finding me face down in the dirt with a cat licking his most private of parts on my back, I didn’t reply.
She, however, didn’t take the hint either. I could hear her pulling one of Rhonda’s heavy wooden garden chairs toward me.
“I heard the police found Phyllis Cox. Do you know anything about that?”
Her tone was chatty, like we were two girlfriends gossiping over coffee and croissants. I muttered something not fit for little ears into the earth.
Nostradamus, apparently appalled by my language, stood, kneaded his claws into my back a couple of times and flounced off.
He of much lower standards, aka my dog, plopped down in front of Bev and waited for her acknowledgment.
To her credit, she reached out and rubbed him on the chest.
Grudgingly, I rolled onto my back and sat up. As I did, the sound of someone clattering through the alley drew our attention.
“Did you find her—” Kristi, dressed head to toe in pink, including a pink visor with lace trim around the edges, ground to a halt just outside Rhonda’s fence. “Oh, there you are.”
Without waiting for an invitation, she opened Rhonda’s back gate and stomped into the yard.
Suspicious now that this was not some random coincidence, I glanced at the back door, hoping my friend would come to my rescue.
No Rhonda appeared.
“So,” Kristi said, with a smile that looked as fake as a Hummel marked “made in China.” “We heard that Phyllis has been found, but she isn’t answering her phone or her door. You don’t happen to know how we can get in touch with her, do you?”
Considering the last time I’d seen Phyllis, she’d barely let the air around her brush by me, much less share her plans for the upcoming week, I felt completely confident in my answer. “No idea at all.” I stood up and brushed the damp off my backside, or brushed at it at least.
“Uh, Lucy, you have something—” Kristi leapt backward just as the dead mouse I’d been pressed against fell off my chest and onto the ground.
I grimaced, or started to. Kiska lunging toward the creature cut off my response. I grabbed my dog by the collar and tugged him away.
At that opportune moment, Rhonda finally appeared with what appeared to be the plastic wrapping that had come around her last purchase of toilet paper.
This frugal choice explained her delay. My friend never used store bags, and I guessed a trash bag would have been too big for such a small job.
Seeing her new, uninvited, guests, she hesitated, but my incoherent yells as I held onto Kiska shot her back into motion.
After scooping up the mouse and tying a knot in the wrapping, she tossed it into a galvanized metal trashcan and brushed her hands against each other.
Relieved, I released my hound, but with the mouse gone, his energy dissipated too. He slumped off to the corner of the yard and lay down.
This left me free to chat with our visitors. Unfortunately.
With a sigh, I turned and tried to look, if not happy to see them, at least not overtly annoyed.
Kristi, who had taken a seat at Rhonda’s weathered picnic table, patted the bench beside her. I chose one of the Adirondack chairs instead.
I smiled politely as Bev and Kristi introduced themselves to Rhonda. My friend, being gracious, didn’t ask them why they’d felt comfortable barging into her yard. Maybe she just assumed I’d invited them.
I gave her a look to dissuade her from that impression, just in case.
She raised her brows in acknowledgment and sat down in the other unoccupied Adirondack. “So,” she said. “You’re here because?”
Rhonda was no push over, but then neither, apparently, was Kristi. She laughed and gestured in the air. “Just out for some steps.” She held up her arm, indicating a wristband thing that more determined people than I used to keep track of their daily exercise.
“Oh.” Rhonda, obviously not buying this at all, smiled.
“But,” Bev interrupted. “We heard Phyllis had turned up and were wondering if Lucy knew how to get a hold of her.”
All three women looked at me.
I thought I’d already answered this. Just to make sure, I answered again. Same answer. “I don’t.”
Kristi leaned forward. “Really? Because I know she thinks so highly of you. I can’t imagine she would go too long without talking to you.”
Bev interrupted her. “We also heard that the police found something in your car. Something that had to do with Phyllis?”
Her wide–eyed innocent look didn’t fool me.
We talked for another thirty minutes or so, and by “we” I mean Rhonda, Kristi, and Bev. I considered sharing how my visit with Rachel had gone, but since I didn’t feel that I’d truly learned anything of use, and I was fairly certain that I had been tracked to Rhonda’s with the clear intent of turning Bev onto me/Phyllis, I instead sat in my chair and waited for them to realize that I wasn’t going to pull Phyllis, or even any information on Phyllis, out of my pocket any time soon.
Finally, after Rhonda made a big production of uncovering and turning a compost heap that she had started the previous fall, the two uninvited women stood to leave.
Kristi stopped on her way out of the gate. “By the way, did you have time to...” She glanced at Bev and then continued in a whisper. “Stop by that business we discussed?”
My jaw clenched, I didn’t reply.
Bev leaned forward and sniffed the air in a very good imitation of a malamute onto an open bag of chips that you’ve just stashed under your car seat.
Kristi smiled and spoke louder. “If you do see Phyllis, you will let her know that it’s very important that I speak with her.”
It wasn’t quite a request, but it wasn’t quite an order either. I gave her begrudging nod.
When we were sure they were gone, Rhonda pulled the tarp back over her compost and stood up. “You know what this means.”
I did.
Time for Phyllis to talk, and this time, for real.
o0o
Rhonda and Betty helped me stake out Phyllis’s townhouse. We parked a block away. Rhonda wrapped a scarf around her red hair and got out. She walked down the street, past Phyllis’s and back again. When she was sure no one was watching the house, she pulled out her cell phone and dialed my number.
I didn’t bother answering.
Betty took the next leg. Dressed in a black coat, dress, and hat, and carrying an umbrella, she looked like a depressed Mary Poppins.
The umbrella had been her idea. She said it went with the outfit. I didn’t understand her reasoning, but I didn’t argue.
At the front door of Phyllis’s townhouse, she adjusted her hat, pulled out a stack of flyers that we had picked up at a gas station and rapped on the door with her umbrella.
Shockingly, there was no answer.
We hadn’t really thought there would be.
Betty opened her umbrella. My signal, I guessed, to spring into action and for Rhonda to move to step two of her role.
Resisting the urge to roll my eyes, I crept between two other townhouses and along their back fences. I could hear Betty rapping again.
The townhouses had apparently come standard with not only six–foot tall wooden privacy fences, but also Beware of Dog signs that were institutionally plain enough to actually be intimidating. I hesitated, but only for a second. Phyllis did not have a dog, and I was smart enough not to be fooled by such obvious trickery. I grabbed hold of the top of the fence and scrambled upward until I was balanced on my stomach on the top.
That’s when I saw the dog. He was big and brown with long ears and longer teeth, and he did not look happy.
“Lucy, what are you doing? Go over before someone sees you.” Rhonda, who had left her detail to help with mine, grabbed my ankle and tried to spin me so my body would be even with the fence instead of my current perpendicular position.
The dog bounded forward, gums and ears flopping.
I squeaked, “Stop.” But it was too late. Rhonda’s “help” had done its job. I toppled over the fence and into the yard with the dog.
Five seconds later, Rhonda landed on top of me.
Struggling to knock my best friend off my body, I umphed out a panicked warning. “Dog.”
“Shh,” she warned. “People will hear us.”
Hoping someone heard us before the hellhound I’d seen ripped our throats out, I opened my mouth to scream.
Rhonda, obviously thinking I was addled from the fall, slapped her hand over my mouth. “What is wrong with you?”
“Dog!” I yelled, twisting to a stand, just as the dog, a bloodhound I realized, bolted toward us.
Rhonda, on her feet too, let out a very unladylike curse and spun, ready to race back to the fence, which I knew we would never get back over, not at least before a pair of big toothy jaws sank into one of our legs.
When chased by a dog, don’t run. Don’t run... I repeated the mantra, realizing it sounded a whole lot better when you weren’t facing a creature the size of a small pony that had the obvious intention of eating you for lunch.
Rhonda was wearing her favorite crunchy Granola sandals. Great for slouching around looking earth conscious. Not all that great for sprinting away from sure death.
Some would take this as good news. I figured, just like with bears, the first rule of surviving a dog attack had to be being faster than the person behind you.
It didn’t give me a lot of comfort, however. I was, after all, kind of fond of my best friend.
Besides, I wasn’t going to run. That would be... the dog lunged closer... my foot, developing a mind of its own, slid forward. My body leaned too.
The mind was strong, but the body was scared—
“Beauregard!” a voice bellowed.
I spun to see Phyllis, dressed in a fluffy pink housecoat and carrying a lowball glass filled with something mint green, waving a white towel above her head. Or a kind–of white towel. The thing had seen better days.
Either way, I hoped she wasn’t throwing it in and was instead using it to come to our rescue.
It appeared she was doing the latter. The dog, Beauregard, I presumed, lowered his head in sullen shame and ambled toward her.
After giving Rhonda and me looks that dripped with judgment and disbelief, Phyllis took a sip of her drink and bent down to wipe the strands of spittle that dangled from the beast’s mouth.
The back door to the townhouse opened, and Betty walked out. She took in the scene with one sweeping glance. “Seriously, Phyllis? A bloodhound? And what is that get up? Could you be anymore cliché?”
Realizing that Betty was right, and that Rhonda and I had just dropped into a scene straight out of Tennessee Williams, I shook my head and wondered yet again, what I had done in a previous life to deserve this one.
Betty, however, done with her pronouncement, settled right in, filling a glass with a green drink of her own and stretching out on one of two unoccupied chaise lounges. She took a sip and choked. “What is this? Not a mint julep, that’s as sure as Shanghai.”
Phyllis took her place on the other lounge. “Green smoothie. They keep my skin wrinkle free.” She analyzed Betty’s profile. “You should drink more of them.”
Before Betty could fire back, I launched myself onto the end of Betty’s lounge chair, grabbed the glass she was holding and handed it to a welcoming Rhonda.
I didn’t watch as she drank it. Betty did. She shivered.
“So,” Phyllis said. “You found me.” She crossed her legs at the ankle and fluttered her filmy wrap over them.
Betty, obviously still insulted by the drink, put her feet on the ground and leaned forward. “We did. What were you thinking, leaving Lucy—”
I placed a hand on Betty’s knee and interrupted. “I didn’t know you have a dog.” I was changing the subject to keep things from getting violent, but that wasn’t all. If Phyllis had kept her dog ownership from me, of all people, what else had she kept hidden? Did I know the woman at all?
“He’s a puppy,” she explained, sounding more than just a little grudging for having to admit that she had been caught in this lie of omission. “My parents raised bloodhounds. When my mother passed last month, Beauregard was willed to me. He only arrived today.”
“Really?” It was all the response I could come up with. I’d had no idea that Phyllis’s mother had died. I’d had no idea Phyllis’s mother had still been alive. And so far as the dog only just arriving, it seemed darn convenient to me, but calling this out as a lie would only antagonize her. The dog looked happy and healthy enough, now that he wasn’t all teeth and gums and rushing toward me with the obvious intention of sending me back over the fence in bite–sized pieces.
“He’s gorgeous,” I added, and he was. Again... without the snarling teeth.
This seemed to please her. “His father was a Grand Champion.” She smiled and adjusted herself a bit more in the chair.
“So—” Betty started again.
I elbowed her.
She ignored me. “Why were your pills in Lucy’s rig? Did you kill that Cutie?”
Rhonda and I blanched. Phyllis, however, seemed unfazed by the accusation. She rotated in the lounge chair until her feet were firmly on the ground and she was facing her accuser. “I did not kill that girl. I would be hurt that you would think such a thing, if I thought you truly believed it, but I know you don’t.” She paused, obviously giving Betty the opportunity to agree.
Betty squinched one eye closed. I could tell she was weighing whether to let Phyllis off the hook.
After a few seconds, Phyllis gave a dramatic roll of her eyes and settled back into the chair. “I did not kill that girl, and I have no idea how my pill bottle got in Lucy’s Jeep. I hadn’t seen it since—” She cut off whatever she was going to say next.
“Since what?” Betty prompted.
“Since...” Phyllis squished up her face. “The night we used them to make it easier for the Cutie to share information with us.”
I wasn’t sure which word in that barrage to attack first.
I decided to let the appearance of the pill bottle in my Jeep go for now. “Us?” I prompted.
“Those WIL women, I’m sure,” Betty said. “Bunch of holier–than–holy–water busybodies.”
Phyllis didn’t disagree.
Rhonda spread out her skirt and positioned herself cross–legged in the grass. “How exactly did you make it easier for her to share?”
“And share what?” Betty interrupted.
Phyllis tapped one finger against the lounge chair’s armrest. “Well, now that is the part where things get difficult.”
We waited.
“You see, we knew that kiosk couldn’t just be selling coffee, but we had no proof. We’d staged the protest and Kristi, even though she wasn’t sure about the protest to start with, asked that nice young TV reporter to come over and cover it, but she was busy and that Daniel...” She shook her head. “Did you see his article? He made it sound like we were bullies picking on these poor innocent young girls.” She made a pffting sound. “But we had no proof and we needed proof.”
She looked at each of us, obviously expecting our agreement. I gave a weak nod. It seemed to be enough.
“So, Phoebe had the idea that we should get inside the kiosk and go through their records. Then we’d have proof that they were doing something other than just selling coffee.”
Betty’s eyes widened. “So you broke in?”
“No, of course not. I would never do such a thing.” Phyllis’s outrage was palpable. She lifted on shoulder. “We drugged her.”
We inhaled as a group. I recovered first.
“You what?”
“Drugged her.” Seeing our expressions, she waved off our horror. “Nothing dangerous. You saw the pill bottle. Just a sedative. Just something to make her... less resistant to sharing with us.”
Betty looked at me. I could see what she was thinking. We’d been wrong. Phyllis had killed the Cutie.
“I did not kill that girl!” the accused declared.
Her vehemence was laudable, but I feared misguided.
“Phyllis,” I said, calmly, like I try to speak to all crazy people who I encounter. “She is dead. She died. I’m sure you didn’t mean to kill her. No one thinks that—”
Phyllis rose to her feet, housecoat swirling. “I did not kill her. I didn’t even give her the pills, but it doesn’t matter because she was alive when we left.”
I grabbed hold of the lifeline. “We?”
Phyllis, still in a snit, gathered her housecoat around her and sat down. “Yes.” She glanced at Betty. “It was WIL.”
Betty only gloated a little.
“All of them?” I asked, trying to imagine the whole crew crowding into the tiny kiosk.
“No, just Phoebe, Laura, Kristi, and me.”
Four of them? Still a pretty big crowd.
“Laura slipped her the pills. She has that all American you–can–trust–me face. Kristi and I waited in my car. And Phoebe went through the files.”
Again, I weighed which question to ask next. This time Betty beat me to it.
“What was in the files?”
Phyllis pursed her lips. “Nothing.”
“How long were you there?” I asked.
“Not long, at least not long after the kiosk closed. We didn’t think that would ever happen. It was past two in the morning when that girl finally shut off the outside lights. I’d dozed off, and by the time I was fully awake, Laura and Phoebe were already halfway across the parking lot.”
I held up my hand. “So, you never went inside the kiosk?”
She took a drink and shook her head. “Not so much as my pinkie toe.”
“And Laura and Phoebe both did?”
She considered this for a minute. “Yes, but I don’t know if it was at the same time. As I said, it was taking forever for the girl to shut the place down. So about 1 a.m., Laura decided we should speed things up by dosing her early. She went to the kiosk by herself then, just walked up and knocked on the back door, went inside and a few minutes later she came back and we waited some more. Phoebe didn’t go in until after the lights were off. Like an hour later.”
So Laura had been inside the kiosk twice. I wasn’t sure that was important, but at this stage anything could be important.
Rhonda set her empty glass down on the grass. “How’d she get Missy to take the pills?”
Looking completely unconcerned, Phyllis shrugged. “I told you, she has that all American charm.” She paused, then added, “She also might have cried.”
I felt my brows rise.
“At least it looked like she’d been crying, but she didn’t seem upset when she came back.”
In my experience, tears worked better on men than other women, but maybe Laura was just better at it than I was.
“How long was she there?”
“Twenty minutes or so. Long enough that one car pulled out of line and left.”
Phyllis looked pleased with this.
I decided it was time for a recap. “Okay, so you, Kristi, Phoebe and Laura came to the parking lot that night in your car fully planning on drugging Missy and going through her files.”
Phyllis nodded as if nothing I had said had been in the least bit disturbing.
“Laura went over to the kiosk around 1 in the morning with the pills and came back looking as if she’d been crying.” That right there didn’t sound good at all now that I’d said it out loud, but Phyllis continued to look unfazed.
“Then, an hour or so later, Missy turns out the lights, sending everyone in the line home and Phoebe and Laura went back to the kiosk, where Phoebe, at least, went inside and looked through Missy’s files while you and Kristi stood watch in the parking lot.”
Phyllis beamed. “Yes, see, I couldn’t have killed that poor girl. I was never even near her.”
But two other WILers were. This, however, didn’t seem to bother Phyllis at all.
“How much of this did you tell the police?” I asked.
Her expression quickly shifted to disdain. “As if I’d tell that trussed up rooster from Chicago anything.”
Rhonda caught my eye, then edged forward. “But if you know someone else saw Missy after you did—”
“Like he’d believe me. Besides, I won’t betray the WILers. We didn’t do a thing wrong, and I won’t be part of people thinking that we did.”
Except drug someone and then pilfer through their personal records.
And that was assuming one of the WILers hadn’t killed Missy either accidentally or on purpose.
The set of Phyllis’s jaw had taken on a particularly determined set, telling me that no more information would be forthcoming from her, at least for now. But there were others who knew what had happened that night and at least one of them had had possession of Phyllis’s pill bottle and access to my unlocked Jeep.
Suddenly, I had an uncontrollable craving for cheese.