Artful Dodger (Maggie Kean Mis-Adventures) (12 page)

“Look, I’ve got to go, Lisa. I’ll call you later.” I hung up the receiver. “Don’t say a word, Villari. I’m in a lousy mood.”

“Loincloths?”

“Forget it. Lisa has her own screwy, romanticized view of the world and it’s rarely compatible with what’s happening in the real one.” I grabbed my coffee, which had cooled considerably when Villari decided to get amorous, and stuck it in the microwave to reheat. I set the timer for thirty seconds before turning around. “By the way, are you leaving soon?”

“You’ve got a great way with people, Maggie. Keep it up and I may nominate you for Hostess of the Year. You’d be a shoo-in.”

“I’m not trying to win a popularity contest, Detective. I’m trying to get my life back to normal and you seem intent on impeding that process.”

“We’re back to ‘Detective,’ I see.”

The microwave
pinged
. I pulled the coffee out and shut the door. “That is your job, isn’t it? You
are
supposed to be finding Elizabeth’s Boyer’s murderer, aren’t you?”

Villari leaned back and crossed his arms in front of his chest. “You get downright bristly when you’re kissed, don’t you?”

“Could we stick to one subject, please? The kiss was an aberration. I will admit it was nice, but it doesn’t change anything. I still have rent to pay and Elizabeth is still dead.”

“Okay, Maggie, we’ll do it your way... for a little while. Let’s go back to question number one then. Where were you this morning?”

While I sputtered into my coffee, life interfered for the second time.  I snatched the ringing phone again, praying it was a long-winded telemarketer making a pitch for a new phone service or credit card with a preapproved credit limit.  Anything to keep me on the line and away from Villari’s piercing eyes and questions I didn’t want to answer.

“Hello?” No one answered. I tried again.  “Hello?”

“Elizabeth Boyer was killed because she asked too many questions. Don’t make the same mistake.”
Click
.

I felt the blood drain from my face. I never heard the phone hit the floor, but Villari was up in two seconds flat, grabbing my arms and turning me to face him.

“Who the hell was that?” He shook me. “Maggie, talk to me.”

I couldn’t answer him. The walls bulged in and out like they were breathing and the room began to stretch and bend like a funhouse mirror. My stomach started to pitch and turn, and sweat broke out on my forehead. Before I knew it, Villari had lifted me in his arms and carried me to the kitchen table. With one foot, he pulled out a chair and sat me down.

“Put your head between your legs. I don’t want you fainting on me.”

I did as I was told simply because I didn’t have the strength to do otherwise. After a few minutes the rolling stopped and the world straightened out. 

“Breathe slowly and evenly. Take your time.”

My stomach eased up bit by bit and I managed to pull myself upright without throwing up three cups of coffee. Villari brought me a towel he had dampened with cool water from the sink. I accepted it gratefully and wiped the sheen of sweat off my face.

Villari dragged one of the kitchen chairs across the floor and sat down next to me. “What happened, Maggie? Who was on the phone?”

I shook my head. “I don’t know.”

“Okay, Maggie,” Villari said patiently. “Just tell me what the caller said to you. Don’t leave out any details.”

Details? It was pretty short and sweet, if you ask me.

A threat, pure and simple. No need to dress it up with fancy words. Villari waited quietly while I calmed down enough to repeat the caller’s warning.

“Do you have any idea who it might have been? Did you recognize the voice?”

I shuddered. “No. It sounded like a male, but the voice was so low and whispery I could be wrong about that. It was this creepy voice, just like the ones you hear in horror movies, talking through the phone and asking if you know where your children are.”

Villari laid his hand on my shoulder. “You’re doing fine, Maggie. I just need to ask you a couple more questions. Have you talked to anyone about Elizabeth’s death?”

“Not really. School’s out, so most people are off on vacation and things like that.” I hesitated a moment. “Besides, Lisa’s the only one of my friends who has even met Elizabeth.” I looked up into his eyes and answered his unasked question. “Don’t even go down that road, Villari. I would trust her with my life.”

He was quiet for a few minutes.

“Elizabeth’s funeral was yesterday, Villari. Even if I wanted to, I haven’t had time to talk to anyone, even in passing. The only people who know anything are the ones who read the obits this morning, and the newspaper said very little about the actual cause of death.”

“Yeah, I know.” Villari scratched the stubble on his chin. “The press has been cooperative in keeping a lid on this so far, but I’m not sure how long we can keep it that way. We’ve insisted that public knowledge would impede the investigation, but that won’t work too much longer. Once the details are out, especially about your involvement, the media will circle this place like ravenous sharks.”

“What about Preston or Cassie?” I didn’t have any difficulty seeing them huddled around the phone talking through a handkerchief and laughing with glee at my distress.

 “I don’t know, Maggie. So far neither one of them has hidden their animosity toward you. They’ve already made a big stink about the will, the investigation, and anything else standing in the way of them getting their hands on their inheritance. I don’t see them sneaking around threatening you over the phone, not when they’re already doing it in public. Of course, that’s only my first hunch. It won’t keep me from questioning them further.”

“If it’s not them, who would do this?”

“I don’t know, Maggie. I’m going to try and get approval to put a tap on your phone and beef up security around here. If we’re lucky, maybe the culprit will call back and give us a chance to trace the call.”

“Yeah, if we’re lucky,” I muttered dryly as Villari walked over and hung up the phone. Nothing sparks up my day more than a death threat. My hands were still trembling, so I clamped them together like I was praying.  Which I was.   I’ve never been a devout churchgoer; in fact, I’m a lapsed Catholic despite the years I spent doing the Big C’s: Communion and Confession.  But at a time like this, a prayer seemed like a good idea, even though the only one I could remember at the moment was the grace before meals.

“Maggie?”

I never heard him. With my head bowed and my eyes squeezed shut, I mumbled bits and pieces of the prayer, effectively blocking out everything but my own voice.

He sat down next to me and gently touched my shoulder.  I opened my eyes, feeling a little foolish, but a little calmer.

“Will they call again?”

Villari’s eyes bored into mine. “There’s no way to know. Most likely this guy is just trying to scare you.”

Sweat broke out on my palms. “I’d say he was doing an damn good job.”

“And that’s probably all he wants to do.” Villari sat forward in his chair. “Maggie, could this call have anything to do with your little trip this morning?”

As soon as the words were out of his mouth, Lindsay Burns’ pinched face and burning green eyes flashed across my mind. I wasn’t sure if she was part of this, but the timing did seem awfully coincidental. Only, I couldn’t tell Villari. One word to him and he’d have me tied to my chair with Officer Godzilla guarding me until the murderer was found, assuming the blame wasn’t pinned on me. There was no way I was going to let Villari keep me from running my own investigation, not when it was my neck on the line...or in jail. Besides, there was no graceful way to admit that I had found Lindsay Burns’ name in the book I pilfered off of Elizabeth’s desk last night. I had the distinct feeling that learning about my nocturnal escapade would ratchet Villari’s temper up a notch or two.

So I tried evading the question. “What makes you ask that?”

“I ask because you never answered the question the first time around, which is apparently SOP for you. Then, suddenly, you get a phone call from a guy threatening to stuff you in a body bag. Call me cynical, paranoid, or whatever you want, but answer the damn question.”

Okay, obviously evading the question hadn’t worked.  Onto strategy #2:  Dodging the question.  “Where I went this morning and the phone call I just got are completely unrelated. And don’t bother asking me where I was again because I’m not going to tell you.  What I do on my own time is my own business. I don’t need you hovering over my shoulder counting each hair on my head every time I turn around.”

His eyes narrowed down to slits. I could almost hear his teeth grinding while veins pulsed at his temple.

“Start talking,” he said, “or you’ll be very sorry you ever met me. Mess with me right now and I’ll introduce you to a nice, piss-stained cell just large enough for you and a couple hundred cockroaches. I can, and will, trump up enough charges to keep you from seeing the light of day until your next birthday, starting with obstructing an investigation.” He took a deep breath. “Is any of this sinking in, Maggie?”

Okay, the guy was beginning to scare me. It didn’t take a rocket scientist to understand what he was saying, but I had a bone-deep fear that all the coincidences were going to mount up and bury me, starting with the fact that Elizabeth was found in my tank, not somebody else’s. I couldn’t afford to cower in a corner or crumble beneath Villari’s threats, not while misleading information was still stacked against me. Cockroaches or not, I couldn’t quit now.

“You really think I killed her, don’t you?”

He paused a moment and then sighed heavily. “No, Maggie, I don’t. Granted, there’s a lot of circumstantial evidence that points in your direction, but that’s all there is. This has ‘reasonable doubt’ stamped all over it. There’s not enough solid evidence to even begin proceedings.”

“Then why all the threats?”

“Because I can’t remove you from the list of suspects until the case is officially closed. But more importantly, you’re the type that dives without looking, straight into shallow water. I don’t want you hurt and you’re naive enough to stumble into a dangerous situation without realizing it until you’re staring down a gun barrel.”

“Gee, I sure do appreciate your faith in my intelligence.”

“This has nothing to do with your IQ. It has to do with impulsiveness. Case in point: you’ve already made someone nervous enough to threaten your life. What I’m asking is simple. Where were you this morning?”

I wanted to answer, but I’d made a commitment to Elizabeth and to myself. The phone call didn’t change anything.

I had no choice. I lied through my teeth. “I went to church.”

Villari looked dubious. “Are you telling the truth this time, or hauling me down another dark alley in your zest for circumventing the truth?”

“Look, I said I went to church. You’ll just have to trust me on this because there’s no way of proving or disproving it. It’s not like they hand out prayer receipts for tax purposes or charge admission for dipping into the holy water.”

Villari ignored my sarcasm. “There’s a church on every corner. Why the hell did you have to go downtown?”

Stalking. The man couldn’t know where I’d been unless he had followed me and he’d already said he hadn’t. I threw the question back in his lap.

“Who said I went downtown?”

Villari dug his fingers through his hair, creating deep furrows across the top of his head. It was a nervous habit I’d noticed before, one that seemed to worsen whenever he was deep in thought or especially irritated, frequently directed at me.  My instincts said that irritation had long since fallen by the wayside and heavy exasperation had settled in its place.

“Okay, Maggie, let’s say I believe you actually took a little trip to church. Can you answer a few questions for me?”

I shrugged.

“What time did you leave home?”

“Somewhere around seven.  I didn’t look at the clock.”  Best to stick as close to the truth as possible.

“What was the name of the church?”

“Saint Mary’s.  Right off of Bijou.” Just call me Ms. Cooperative.

“I know where it is, Maggie. My mother, my Italian, Catholic mother, doesn’t live far from there, just on the other side of the freeway, as a matter of fact.”

My stomach fell like a lead balloon.

“She attends mass every morning from seven to eight. Maybe you saw her?”

“Well, I’ve never met her, so I can’t say for sure.  But I doubt it,” I began. “I sat in the back and left early.”

“Right after the priest washed his hands, right?”

I managed a weak smile. When I was growing up, if you had any expectations of walking through the Pearly Gates, weekly mass was not a choice. It was mandatory. God didn’t care whether you were nursing a hangover or had a new guy in your bed who was feeling his early morning oats. Skip a Sunday and you could march yourself straight down to hell. Visions of raging fires and red devils filled my head every time I missed church. For years, just to avoid the rather gruesome previews of my eternal life poofing up in smoke, I dragged myself to mass every week, until I finally struck a bargain with the man upstairs.  I agreed to fulfill the minimum Heaven requirement, which meant that I was willing to climb the lowest rung on the ladder just high enough to keep the flames from licking my feet.

It was pretty simple, really.  It meant going to mass, but leaving at the end of Communion when the priest locked the chalice and the golden plate away in a gilded safe, much like clearing the dinner dishes. After a couple of quick kneelings, he would complete the ritual by washing his hands and drying them on a small cotton cloth.  According to folklore, mass was officially over. 

At that exact moment, I would slip out of the pew and out the back, thereby avoiding the endless announcements and the last song, inevitably eight verses long. Believe me, I was hardly alone. I wasn’t the only one with abbreviated church plans. More often than not, I was hit in the solar plexus or jabbed in the ribs by the throngs of people elbowing me out of the way as they headed out the door.

“Before that,” I admitted. “I wasn’t really listening, just looking for a quiet place where I could gather my thoughts and try to impose some kind of order or gain some perspective on everything that’s happened.” Okay, maybe I was pushing the drama a bit.